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Title: An Princess Katherine Born, Christened, Buried In One Day [Elegy]
Author: Richard Lovelace [
More Titles by Lovelace]
AN ELEGIE. PRINCESSE KATHERINE<1>
BORNE, CHRISTENED, BURIED, IN ONE DAY.
You, that can haply<2> mixe your joyes with cries,
And weave white Ios with black Elegies,
Can caroll out a dirge, and in one breath
Sing to the tune either of life, or death;
You, that can weepe the gladnesse of the spheres,
And pen a hymne, in stead of inke, with teares;
Here, here your unproportion'd wit let fall,
To celebrate this new-borne funerall,
And greete that little greatnesse, which from th' wombe
Dropt both a load to th' cradle and the tombe.
Bright soule! teach us, to warble with what feet
Thy swathing linnen and thy winding sheet,
Weepe,<3> or shout forth that fonts solemnitie,
Which at once christn'd and buried<4> thee,
And change our shriller passions with that sound,
First told thee into th' ayre, then to<5> the ground.
Ah, wert thou borne for this? only to call
The King and Queen guests to your buriall!
To bid good night, your day not yet begun,
And shew<6> a setting, ere a rising sun!
Or wouldst thou have thy life a martyrdom?
Dye in the act of thy religion,
Fit, excellently, innocently good,
First sealing it with water, then thy blood?
As when on blazing wings a blest man sores,
And having past to God through fiery dores,
Straight 's roab'd with flames, when the same element,
Which was his shame, proves now his ornament;
Oh, how he hast'ned death, burn't to be fryed,<7>
Kill'd twice with each delay, till deified.
So swift hath been thy race, so full of flight,
Like him condemn'd, ev'n aged with a night,
Cutting all lets with clouds, as if th' hadst been
Like angels plum'd, and borne a Cherubin.
Or, in your journey towards heav'n, say,
Tooke you the world a little in your way?
Saw'st and dislik'st its vaine pompe, then didst flye
Up for eternall glories to the skye?
Like a religious ambitious one,
Aspiredst for the everlasting crowne?
Ah! holy traytour to your brother prince,
Rob'd of his birth-right and preheminence!
Could you ascend yon' chaire of state e're him,
And snatch from th' heire the starry diadem?
Making your honours now as much uneven,
As gods on earth are lesse then saints in heav'n.
Triumph! sing triumphs, then! Oh, put on all
Your richest lookes, drest for this festivall!
Thoughts full of ravisht reverence, with eyes
So fixt, as when a saint we canonize;
Clap wings with Seraphins before the throne
At this eternall coronation,
And teach your soules new mirth, such as may be
Worthy this birth-day to divinity.
But ah! these blast your feasts, the jubilies
We send you up are sad, as were our cries,
And of true joy we can expresse no more
Thus crown'd, then when we buried thee before.
Princesse in heav'n, forgivenes! whilst we
Resigne our office to the HIERARCHY.
Notes:
<1> All historical and genealogical works are deficient in minute information relative to the family of Charles I. Even in Anderson's ROYAL GENEALOGIES, 1732, and in the folio editions of Rapin and Tindal, these details are overlooked. At page 36 of his DESCENDANTS OF THE STUARTS, 1858, Mr. Townend observes that two of the children of Charles I. died in infancy, and of these the Princesse Katherine, commemorated by Lovelace, was perhaps one. The present verses were originally printed in MUSARUM OXONIENSIUM CHARISTERIA, Oxon. 1638, 4to, from which a few better readings have been obtained. With the exceptions mentioned in the notes, the variations of the earlier text from that found here are merely literal.
P. 140. PRINCESSE KATHERINE, BORNE, &C., IN ONE DAY. In Ellis's ORIGINAL LETTERS, Second Series, iii. 265, is printed a scrap from Harl. MS. 6988, in the handwriting of the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of Charles I., giving a list of the children of that prince by Henrietta Maria, with the dates of their birth. There mention is made of a Princess Katherine, born Jan. 29, 1639. 1639 is, I believe, a slip of the pen for 1637; that is to say, the princess was born on the 29th of January, 1637-8. This discrepancy between the CHARISTERIA and the memorandum in Harl. MS. escaped Sir H. Ellis, who was possibly unaware of the existence of the former. For, unless a mistake is assumed on the part of the writer of the MS., the existence of TWO Princesses Katherine must be granted.
<2> This reading from CHARISTERIA, 1638, seems preferable to APTLY, as it stands in the LUCASTA.
<3> So the CHARISTERIA. The reading in LUCASTA is MOURNE.
<4> In LUCASTA the reading is BURIED, AND CHRIST'NED.
<5> This word is omitted in the LUCASTA; it is here supplied from the CHARISTERIA.
<6> LUCASTA reads SHOWE'S. SHEW, as printed in CHARISTERIA, is clearly the true word.
<7> i.e. freed. FREE and FREED were sometimes formerly pronounced like FRY and FRYED: for Lord North, in his FOREST OF VARIETIES, 1645, has these lines--
"Birds that long have lived free,
Caught and cag'd, but pine and die."
Here evidently FREE is intended to rhyme with DIE.
[The end]
Richard Lovelace's poem: Elegie. Princesse Katherine Borne, Christened, Buried In One Day
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