Chidiock Tichborne - Tichborne's Elegy

Tichborne's Elegy

My prime of youth is but a frost of cares,

My feast of joy is but a dish of pain,

My crop of corn is but a field of tares,

And all my good is but vain hope of gain;

The day is past, and yet I saw no sun,

And now I live, and now my life is done.

My tale was heard and yet it was not told,

My fruit is fallen, and yet my leaves are green,

My youth is spent and yet I am not old,

I saw the world and yet I was not seen;

My thread is cut and yet it is not spun,

And now I live, and now my life is done.

I sought my death and found it in my womb,

I looked for life and saw it was a shade,

I trod the earth and knew it was my tomb,

And now I die, and now I was but made;

My glass is full, and now my glass is run,

And now I live, and now my life is done.

This is the first printed version from Verses of Prayse and Joye (1586). The original text differs slightly: along with other minor differences, the first line of the second verse reads "The spring is past, and yet it hath not sprung," and the third line reads "My youth is gone, and yet I am but young."

To His Friend (assumed to be Anthony Babington)

Good sorrow cease, false hope be gone, misfortune once farewell;

Come, solemn muse, the sad discourse of our adventures tell.

A friend I had whose special part made mine affection his;

We ruled tides and streams ourselves, no want was in our bliss.

Six years we sailed, sea-room enough, by many happy lands,

Till at the length, a stream us took and cast us on the sands.

There lodged we were in a gulf of woe, despairing what to do,

Till at the length, from shore unknown, a Pilot to us drew,

Whose help did sound our grounded ship from out Caribda's mouth,

But unadvised, on Scylla drives; the wind which from the South

Did blustering blow the fatal blast of our unhappy fall,

Where driving, leaves my friend and I to fortune ever thrall;

Where we be worse beset with sands and rocks on every side,

Where we be quite bereft of aid, of men, of winds, of tide.

Where vain it is to hail for help so far from any shore,

So far from Pilot's course; despair shall we, therefore?

No! God from out his heap of helps on us will some bestow,

And send such mighty surge of seas, or else such blasts to blow

As shall remove our grounded ship far from this dangerous place,

And we shall joy each others' chance through God's almighty grace,

And keep ourselves on land secure, our sail on safer seas.

Sweet friend, till then content thy self, and pray for our release.

The Housedove

A silly housedove happed to fall

amongst a flock of crows,

Which fed and filled her harmless craw

amongst her fatal foes.

The crafty fowler drew his net -

all his that he could catch -

The crows lament their hellish chance,

the dove repents her match.

But too, too late! it was her chance

the fowler did her spy,

And so did take her for a crow -

which thing caused her to die.

The only known manuscript versions of To His Friend and The Housedove are from Edinburgh Library MS Laing, II, 69/24

However twenty eight different manuscript versions of the Elegy (or Lament) are known and there are many variations of the text.

Tichborne's authorship of the Elegy has been disputed, with attributions to others including Sir Walter Raleigh. However it was printed soon after the Babington plot in a volume called Verses of Praise and Joy in 1586, published by John Wolfe of London to celebrate the Queen's survival and to attack the plotters. Another poem in the volume is titled: Hendecasyllabon T. K. in Cygneam Cantionem Chideochi Tychborne and is an answer to Chidiock verses, most likely by the poet and dramatist Thomas Kyd, author of The Spanish Tragedy.

Hendecasyllabon T. K. (Thomas Kyd 1558-1595) in Cygneam Cantionem Chideochi Tychborne

Thy prime of youth is frozen with thy faults,

Thy feast of joy is finisht with thy fall;

Thy crop of corn is tares availing naughts,

Thy good God knows thy hope, thy hap and all.

Short were thy days, and shadowed was thy sun,

T'obscure thy light unluckily begun.

Time trieth truth, and truth hath treason tripped;

Thy faith bare fruit as thou hadst faithless been:

Thy ill spent youth thine after years hath nipt;

And God that saw thee hath preserved our Queen.

Her thread still holds, thine perished though unspun,

And she shall live when traitors lives are done.

Thou soughtst thy death, and found it in desert,

Thou look'dst for life, yet lewdly forc'd it fade:

Thou trodst the earth, and now on earth thou art,

As men may wish thou never hadst been made.

Thy glory, and thy glass are timeless run;

And this, O Tychborne, hath thy treason done.