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 To pardon me; and hear this hard constraint With patience, while I sing; and pity it. And eke ye rural Muses, that do dwell In these wild woods: if ever piteous plaint We did indite, or taught a woeful mind With words of pure affect, his grief to tell; Instruct me now! Now COLIN then go on; And I will follow thee, though far behind.

Colin. PHILLISIDES is dead! O harmful death! O deadly harm! Unhappy Albion! When shalt thou see emong thy shepherds all Any so sage, so perfect? Whom uneath Envy could touch for virtuous life and skill; Courteous, valiant, and liberal. Behold the sacred PALES! where with hair Untrusst, she sits in shade of yonder hill; And her fair face bent sadly down, doth send A flood of tears to bathe the earth: and there Doth call the heavens despiteful, envious; Cruel his fate, that made so short an end Of that same life, well worthy to have been Prolonged with many years, happy and famous. The Nymphs and Oreades her round about Do sit lamenting on the grassy green; And with shrill cries, beating their whitest breasts, Accuse the direful dart that DEATH sent out