To the Worshipful and Learned Society, the GENTLEMEN STUDENTS of the Inner Temple, with the rest of his good Friends, the GENTLEMEN of the Middle Temple, and to all other courteous Readers, R. W. wisheth increase of all health, worship, and learning, with the immortal glory of the graces adorning the

same.

YE may perceive (right Worshipful) in perusing the former Epistle sent to me, how sore I am beset with the importunities of my friends, to publish this Pamphlet: truly I am and have been (if there be in me any soundness of judgement) of this opinion, that whatsoever is committed to the press is commended to eternity, and it shall stand a lively witness with our conscience, to our comfort or confusion, in the reckoning of that great day.

Advisedly therefore was that Proverb used of our elder Philosophers, Manum a Tabula : with-hold thy hand from the paper, and thy papers from the print or light of the world: for a lewd word escaped is irrevocable, but a bad or base discourse published in print is intolerable.

Hereupon I have indured some conflicts between reason and judgement, whether it were convenient for the commonwealth, with the indecorum of my calling (as some think it) that the memory of Tancred's Tragedy should be again by my means revived, which the oftner I read over, and the more I considered thereon, the sooner I was won to consent thereunto: calling to mind that neither the thrice reverend and learned father, M. Beza, was ashamed in his younger years to send abroad, in his own name, his Tragedy of Abraham, nor that rare Scot (the scholar of our age) Buchanan, his most pathetical Jephtha.

Indeed I must willingly confess this work simple, and not worth comparison to any of theirs: for the writers of them were grave men; of this, young heads: In them is shewn the perfection of their studies; in this, the imperfection of their wits. Nevertheless

herein they all agree, commending virtue, detesting vice, and lively deciphering their overthrow that suppress not their unruly affections. These things noted

herein, how simple soever the verse be, I hope the matter will be acceptable to the wise.

Wherefore I am now bold to present Gismund to your sights, and unto yours only, for therefore have I conjured her, by the love that hath been these twenty-four years betwixt us, that she wax not so proud of her fresh painting, to straggle in her plumes abroad, but to contain herself within the walls of your house; so am I sure she shall be safe from the Tragedian Tyrants of our time, who are not ashamed to affirm that there can no amorous poem savour of any sharpness of wit, unless it be seasoned with scurrilous words.

But leaving them to their lewdness, I hope you, and all discreet readers will thankfully receive my pains, the fruits of my first harvest: the rather, perceiving that my purpose in this Tragedy tendeth only to the exaltation of virtue, and suppression of vice, with pleasure to profit and help all men, but to offend or hurt no man. As for such as have neither the grace, nor the good gift, to do well themselves, nor the common honesty to speak well of others, I must (as I may) hear and bear their baitings with patience.

Yours devoted in his ability,

R. WILMOT.

A PREFACE

ΤΟ

THE QUEEN'S MAIDS OF HONOUR.

FLOWERS of prime, pearls couched all in gold,
Light of our days, that glads the fainting hearts.
Of them that shall your shinning gleams behold,
Salve of each sore, recure of inward smarts,
In whom virtue and beauty striveth so

As neither yields: behold here, for your gain,
Gismund's unlucky love, her fault, her woe,
And death; at last her cruel father slain
Through his mishap; and though you do not see,
Yet read and rue their woful tragedy.

So Jove, as your high virtues done deserve,
Grant you such 3 pheers as may your virtues serve
With like virtues; and blissful Venus send
Unto your happy loves an happy end.

ANOTHER TO THE SAME.

GISMUND, that whilome liv'd her father's joy
And died his death, now dead, doth (as she may)
By us pray you to pity her annoy.

And, to requite the same, doth humbly pray,
Heavens to forefend your loves from like decay.

3 pheers,] Pheers signifies a husband, a friend, or a companion, and in all these senses it is used in our ancient writers. It here means a husband. So, in Lyly's Euphues, 1581, p. 29: "If he be young, he is the more fitter to be thy pheere. If he bee olde, the lyker to thine aged father."

Again, A. 2. S. 3. and A. 4. S. 3.

forefend] Prevent, or forbid. So, in Euphues and his England, 1582, p. 40: "For never shall it be said that Iffida was false to Thirsus, "though Thirsus be faithlesse (which the Gods forefend) "unto Iffida."

The faithful Earl doth also make request,
Wishing those worthy knights whom ye embrace,
The constant truth that lodged in his breast.
His hearty love, not his unhappy case,
Befall to such as triumph in your grace.
The King prays pardon of his cruel hest",
And for amends desires it may suffice,
That by his blood he warneth all the rest
Of fond fathers, that they in kinder wise
Intreat the jewels where their comfort lies.
We, as their messengers beseech ye all
On their behalfs to pity all their smarts.
And for ourselves (although the worth be small)
We pray ye to accept our humble hearts,
Avow'd to serve with prayer and with praise
Your honours, all unworthy other ways.

5

hest,] Command. So, in Lyly's Euphues and his England, p. 78: For this I sweare by her whose lightes canne never die Vesta, " and by her whose heasts are not to be broken Diana, &c." Again, Shakspeare's Tempest, A. 3. S. 1:

O my father,

"I have broke your hest to say so!" Prologue to Araygnement of Paris, 1584:

"Done by the pleasure of the powers above,

"Whose hestes men must obey:"

The word occurs again in A. 4. S. 2. A. 4. S. 4. and A. 5. S. 1.