[Wolf MS]
A small quarto verse miscellany, in a single neat italic hand, with rubrication, 144 pages (plus later index). Including twelve poems by Carew, nine poems (plus one of doubtful authorship) by Randolph and nineteen (plus two of doubtful authorship) by Strode, the miscellany associated with Oxford University and possibly related to Bodleian MS Malone 21, the latest date occuring in a poem on pp. 63-6 ‘Vpon ye great Frost 1634’. c.1635.
Inscribed inside the front cover by a later owner: ‘April 1853 Read to Lit[erary] & Philosophical] Soc[iet]y of L[iver]pool’. Acquired in 1940 by Edwin Wolf II (1911-91), Philadelphia librarian.
Cited in IELM, II.i-ii (1987-93), as the ‘Wolf MS’: CwT Δ 37; RnT Δ 12; StW Δ 28.
pp. 1-2
• StW 283: William Strode, On a blisterd Lippe (‘Chide not thy sprowting lippe, nor kill’)
Copy, headed ‘On a Gentlewoman's Lippe’.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Dobell, pp. 28-9. Forey, pp. 92-3.
pp. 2-3
• KiH 90: Henry King, The Boy's answere to the Blackmore (‘Black Mayd, complayne not that I fly’)
Copy, headed ‘The answere of ye fayre Boy to ye black Mayd’ and beginning ‘Blacke Girle…’.
First published in The Academy of Complements (London, 1646). Poems (1657). Crum, p. 151. The text almost invariably preceded, in both printed and MS versions, by (variously headed) ‘A Blackmore Mayd wooing a faire Boy: sent to the Author by Mr. Hen. Rainolds’ (‘Stay, lovely Boy, why fly'st thou mee’). Musical settings by John Wilson in Henry Lawes, Select Ayres and Dialogues (London, 1669).
p. 3
• WoH 129.5: Sir Henry Wotton, On his Mistress, the Queen of Bohemia (‘You meaner beauties of the night’)
Copy, followed (p. 4) by a Latin version.
First published (in a musical setting) in Michael East, Sixt Set of Bookes (London, 1624). Reliquiae Wottonianae (London, 1651), p. 518. Hannah (1845), pp. 12-15. Some texts of this poem discussed in J.B. Leishman, ‘“You Meaner Beauties of the Night” A Study in Transmission and Transmogrification’, The Library, 4th Ser. 26 (1945-6), 99-121. Some musical versions edited in English Songs 1625-1660, ed. Ian Spink, Musica Britannica XXXIII (London, 1971), Nos. 66, 122.
pp. 6-7
• RnT 376: Thomas Randolph, Upon the losse of his little finger (‘Arithmetique nine digits, and no more’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 56-7.
pp. 7-8
• StW 134: William Strode, For a Gentleman who kissing his frinde, at his departure out of England, left a Signe of blood upon her (‘What Mystery was this, that I should finde’)
Copy, headed ‘On a Gentleman who kissing his Mistresse at his departinge from England left blood upon her’.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Dobell, pp. 32-3. Forey, pp. 22-3.
pp. 8-9
• KiH 461: Henry King, My Midd-night Meditation (‘Ill busy'd Man! why should'st thou take such care’)
Copy, untitled.
First published, as ‘Man's Miserie, by Dr. K’, in Richard Chamberlain, The Harmony of the Muses (London, 1654) [apparently unique exemplum in the Huntington, edited in facsimile by Ernest W. Sullivan (Aldershot, 1990), pp. 5-6]. Poems (1657). Crum, pp. 157-8.
pp. 8-9
• StW 1304: William Strode, A Lover to his Mistress (‘Ile tell you how the Rose did first grow redde’)
Copy, headed ‘On his Mistresse’.
First published, in Wits Recreations (London, 1640). Dobell, p. 48. Listed, without text, in Forey, p. 339.
pp. 9-10
• CwT 66: Thomas Carew, The Comparison (‘Dearest thy tresses are not threads of gold’)
Copy, headed ‘On his Mistresse’.
First published in Poems (1640), and lines 1-10 also in Wits Recreations (London, 1640). Dunlap, pp. 98-9.
pp. 10-11
• CwT 568: Thomas Carew, A prayer to the Wind (‘Goe thou gentle whispering wind’)
Copy, headed ‘A Sigh’.
First published in Poems (1640) and in Poems: written by Wil. Shake-speare, Gent. (London, 1640). Dunlap, pp. 11-12.
pp. 11-12
• CwT 818: Thomas Carew, Song. Celia singing (‘Harke how my Celia, with the choyce’)
Copy, headed ‘On his Mistresse singing in a Gallery at Yorke howse’.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, p. 38.
pp. 14-17
• CwT 1007: Thomas Carew, To A.L. Perswasions to love (‘Thinke not cause men flatt'ring say’)
Copy, headed ‘To his Mistress’.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, pp. 4-6.
p. 18
• PoW 35: Walton Poole, ‘If shadows be a picture's excellence’
Copy, headed ‘To Mistris Beata Poole in defence of her blacke hayre’.
This MS collated in Wolf (as MS K).
First published, as ‘In praise of black Women; by T.R.’, in Robert Chamberlain, The Harmony of the Muses (London, 1654), p. 15 [unique exemplum in Huntington, edited in facsimile by Ernest W. Sullivan, II (Aldershot, 1990)]; in Abraham Wright, Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656), pp. 75-7, as ‘On a black Gentlewoman’. Poems (1660), pp. 61-2, as ‘On black Hair and Eyes’ and superscribed ‘R’; in The Poems of John Donne, ed Herbert J.C. Grierson, 2 vols (Oxford, 1912), I, 460-1, as ‘on Black Hayre and Eyes’, among ‘Poems attributed to Donne in MSS’; and in The Poems of William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, ed. Robert Krueger (B.Litt. thesis, Oxford, 1961: Bodleian, MS B. Litt. d. 871), p. 61.
pp. 19-25
• EaJ 35: John Earle, Bishop of Worcester and Salisbury, An Elegie, Upon the death of Sir John Burrowes, Slaine at the Isle of Ree (‘Oh wound us not with this sad tale, forbear’)
Copy.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656), pp. 12-16. Extract in Bliss, pp. 225-6. Edited in James Doelman, ‘John Earle's Funeral Elegy on Sir John Burroughs’, English Literary Renaissance, 41/3 (Autumn 2011), 485-502 (pp. 499-502).
pp. 25-6
• StW 546: William Strode, On the Bible (‘Behold this little Volume here inrold’)
Copy.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Dobell, pp. 51-2. Forey, pp. 46-7.
pp. 26-7
• StW 702: William Strode, A Register for a Bible (‘I am the faithfull deputy’)
Copy.
First published in Dobell (1907), pp. 52-3. Forey, p. 52.
p. 27
• StW 13: William Strode, Another (‘I, your Memory's Recorder’)
Copy.
First published in Dobell (1907), p. 53. Forey, p. 52.
pp. 27-8
• StW 672: William Strode, Poses for Braceletts (‘This keepes my hande’)
Copy.
Third stanza (beginning ‘Voutchsafe my Pris'ner thus to be’) and fourth stanza (beginning ‘When you putt on this little bande’) first published in Wits Interpreter (London, 1655), Part II, p. 386. Published complete in Dobell (1907), pp. 43-4. Forey, p. 34.
p. 28
• StW 81: William Strode, An Earestring (‘'Tis vaine to adde a ring or Gemme’)
Copy.
First published in Poems…by William Earl of Pembroke…[and] Sr Benjamin Ruddier, [ed. John Donne the Younger] (London, 1660), p. 101. Dobell, p. 44. Forey, pp. 34-5.
p. 28
• StW 1230: William Strode, A watchstring (‘Tymes picture here invites your eyes’)
Copy.
First published in Dobell (1907), p. 44. Forey, p. 210.
p. 29
• StW 259: William Strode, A Necklace (‘These Vaines are Natures Nett’)
Copy.
First stanza first published in Wits Interpreter (London, 1655), Part II, p. 386. Second stanza (‘Loe on my necke…’) first published in Poems…by William Earl of Pembroke…[and] Sr Benjamin Ruddier, [ed. John Donne the Younger] (London, 1660), p. 100. Complete in Dobell, p. 45. Forey, p. 35.
p. 29
• StW 685: William Strode, A pursestringe (‘Wee hugg, imprison, hang and save’)
Copy.
First published in Dobell (1907), pp. 44-5. Forey, p. 210.
p. 30
• StW 355: William Strode, On a Dissembler (‘Could any shew where Pliny's people dwell’)
Copy.
First published in Wit Restor'd (London, 1658). Dobell, pp. 33-4. Forey pp. 42-3.
p. 31
• CwT 696: Thomas Carew, Secresie protested (‘Feare not (deare Love) that I'le reveale’)
Copy, headed ‘To his Mistresse’ and here beginning ‘Thinke not…’.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, p. 11. Musical setting by Henry Lawes published in The Second Book of Ayres and Dialogues (London, 1655).
See also Introduction.
pp. 31-2
• StW 1077: William Strode, To a frinde (‘Like as the hande which hath bin usd to play’)
Copy.
First published in Wit Restor'd (London, 1658). Dobell, pp. 99-100. The Poems of Thomas Carew, ed. Rhodes Dunlap (Oxford, 1949), p. 130. Forey, p. 31.
pp. 35-8
• RnT 336: Thomas Randolph, Upon a very deformed Gentlewoman, but of a voice incomparably sweet (‘I chanc'd sweet Lesbia's voice to heare’)
Copy, headed ‘On a Gentlewoman deformed yt sung exquisitely’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 115-17. Davis, pp. 92-105.
pp. 47-9
• JnB 670: Ben Jonson, The Gypsies Metamorphosed, Song (‘ffrom a Gypsie in the morninge’)
Copy.
Herford & Simpson, lines 1329-89. Greg, Windsor version, lines 1129-89.
For a parody of this song, see DrW 117.1.
pp. 49-50
• RnT 513: Thomas Randolph, On the Goodwife's Ale (‘When shall we meet again and have a taste’)
Copy.
First published, anonymously, in Witts Recreations Augmented (London, 1641), sig. Y5v. Francis Beaumont, Poems (London, 1653), sig. M8v. Moore Smith (1925), pp. 252-4, and in Moore Smith (1927), pp. 92-3. Edited, discussed, and the possible attribution to Randolph supported, in Ben Jonson, ed. C.H. Herford and Percy & Evelyn Simpson, VIII (Oxford, 1947), 448-9.
The poem is most commonly attributed to Ben Jonson. Also sometimes ascribed to Sir Thomas Jay, JP, and to Randolph.
p. 51
• DaJ 62: Sir John Davies, A Lover out of Fashion (‘Faith (wench) I cannot court thy sprightly eyes’)
Copy, headed ‘A Rustick Gallants wooing’ and here beginning ‘Faire Wench I cannott court thy sprit-like eyes’.
First published in Epigrammes and Elegies (‘Middleborugh’ [i.e. London?] [1595-6?]). Krueger, p. 180.
p. 52
• WoH 197: Sir Henry Wotton, Upon the Death of Sir Albert Morton's Wife (‘He first deceased. she for a little tried’)
Copy.
First published as an independent couplet in William Camden, Remaines (London, 1636). Reliquiae Wottonianae (London, 1651), p. 529. Hannah (1845), p. 44. The authorship is uncertain.
This couplet, which was subject to different versions over the years, is in fact lines 5-6 of a twelve-line poem beginning ‘Here lye two Bodyes happy in their kinds’, which has also been attributed to George Herbert: see HrG 290.5-290.8.
pp. 53-6
• StW 494: William Strode, On Faireford windores (‘I know noe paint of Poetry’)
Copy.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Dobell, pp. 25-7. Forey, pp. 7-10.
pp. 56-7
• CoR 711: Richard Corbett, Upon Faireford Windowes (‘Tell mee, you Anti-Saintes, why glasse’)
Copy, headed ‘On ye same [i.e. Fairford Windows] by another’.
First published in Poëtica Stromata ([no place], 1648). Bennett & Trevor-Roper, p. 87.
pp. 66-8
• CwT 1121: Thomas Carew, To Saxham (‘Though frost, and snow, lockt from mine eyes’)
Copy, headed ‘His Entertaynment at Taxum [sic] in Kent’.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, pp. 27-9.
pp. 68-9
• StW 176: William Strode, In commendation of Musique (‘When whispering straines do softly steale’)
Copy.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Dobell, pp. 2-3. Four Poems by William Strode (Flansham, Bognor Regis, 1934), pp. 1-2. Forey, pp. 196-7. The poem also discussed in C.F. Main, ‘Notes on some Poems attributed to William Strode’, PQ, 34 (1955), 444-8 (p. 445).
pp. 70-2
• CoR 686: Richard Corbett, Upon An Unhandsome Gentlewoman, who made Love unto him (‘Have I renounc't my faith, or basely sold’)
Copy, headed ‘Dr Corbett on Mrs Mallett a very deformed Gentlewoman, yt was in love wth him’.
First published in Certain Elegant Poems (London, 1647). Bennett & Trevor-Roper, pp. 6-7.
pp. 72-3
• StW 917: William Strode, Song (‘When Orpheus sweetly did complaine’)
Copy.
First published in Poems: Written by Wil. Shake-speare, Gent. (London, 1640). Dobell, pp. 1-2. Forey, pp. 79-80. The poem also discussed in C.F. Main, ‘Notes on some Poems attributed to William Strode’, PQ, 34 (1955), 444-8 (p. 445).
p. 73
• B&F 150: Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, The Nice Valour, III, iii, 36-4. Song (‘Hence, all you vain delights’)
Copy.
Bowers, VII, 468-9. This song first published in A Description of the King and Queene of Fayries (London, 1634). Thomas Middleton, The Collected Works, general editors Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino (Oxford, 2007), pp. 1698-9.
For William Strode's answer to this song (which has sometimes led to both songs being attributed to Strode) see StW 641-663.
p. 74
• StW 653: William Strode, An Opposite to Melancholy (‘Returne my joyes, and hither bring’)
Copy.
First published in Wit Restor'd (London, 1658). Dobell, p. 15. Forey, pp. 103-5.
pp. 76-8
• StW 459: William Strode, On a good legge and foote (‘If Hercules tall Stature might be guest’)
Copy.
First published in Wit Restor'd (London, 1658). Dobell, pp. 108-9. Forey, pp. 16-17.
pp. 78-9
• StW 42: William Strode, The commendation of gray Eies (‘Looke how the russet Morne exceedes the Night’)
Copy, headed ‘Gray Eyes’.
First published in Dobell (1907), pp. 35-6. Forey pp. 40-1.
pp. 83-4
• StW 374: William Strode, On a freind's absence (‘Come, come, I faint: thy heavy stay’)
Copy, headed ‘Song to his Mistresse’.
First published in The Academy of Complements (London, 1650). Dobell, p. 13. Forey, pp. 95-6.
pp. 88-9
• HrJ 123: Sir John Harington, Of a Lady that giues the cheek (‘Is't for a grace, or is't for some disleeke’)
Copy, headed ‘On a Gentlewoman paynted’.
First published in 1615. 1618, Book III, No. 3. McClure No. 201, p. 230. Kilroy, Book IV, No. 84, p. 201.
p. 89
• RnT 362: Thomas Randolph, Upon his Picture (‘When age hath made me what I am not now’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, p. 79.
pp. 90-1
• CwT 892: Thomas Carew, Song. Murdring beautie (‘Ile gaze no more on her bewitching face’)
Copy, headed ‘On his Mistresse’.
First published in Poems (1640) and in Wits Recreations (London, 1640). Dunlap, p. 8.
pp. 91-2
• JnB 191: Ben Jonson, Eupheme. or, The Faire Fame Left to Posteritie Of that truly noble Lady, the Lady Venetia Digby. 3. The Picture of the Body (‘Sitting, and ready to be drawne’)
Copy.
First published (Nos. 3 and 4) in John Benson's 4to edition of Jonson's poems (1640) and (all poems) in The Vnder-wood (lxxxiv) in Workes (London, 1640). Herford & Simpson, VIII, 272-89 (pp. 275-7).
pp. 92-5
• JnB 225: Ben Jonson, Eupheme. or, The Faire Fame Left to Posteritie Of that truly noble Lady, the Lady Venetia Digby. 4. The Mind (‘Painter, yo'are come, but may be gone’)
Copy.
Herford & Simpson, VIII, 277-81.
pp. 95-6
• CwT 976: Thomas Carew, The Spring (‘Now that the winter's gone, the earth hath lost’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, p. 3.
pp. 96-7
• CwT 185: Thomas Carew, A divine Mistris (‘In natures peeces still I see’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, pp. 6-7.
pp. 97-8
• CwT 130: Thomas Carew, A cruel Mistris (‘Wee read of Kings and Gods that kindly tooke’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1640). Dunlap, p. 8.
p. 98
• CwT 410: Thomas Carew, Lips and Eyes (‘In Celia's face a question did arise’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1640) and in Wits Recreations (London, 1640). Dunlap, p. 6.
pp. 98-9
• DrM 32: Michael Drayton, The Cryer (‘Good Folke, for Gold or Hyre’)
Copy.
First published, among Odes with Other Lyrick Poesies, in Poems (London, 1619). Hebel, II, 371.
pp. 101-3
• RnT 94: Thomas Randolph, An Elegie (‘Love, give me leave to serve thee, and be wise’)
Copy, headed ‘To his chast Mrs.’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 66-7.
pp. 103-5
• RnT 90: Thomas Randolph, An Elegie (‘Heav'n knowes my Love to thee, fed on desires’)
Copy, headed ‘To his fayre Mrs. incensed upon a mistake’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 95-6.
pp. 105-6
• RnT 116: Thomas Randolph, An Epitaph upon his honour'd freind Mr. Warre (‘Here lyes the knowing head, the honest heart’)
Copy, headed ‘An Epitaph on Mr Warr’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, p. 56.
pp. 106-8
• RnT 105: Thomas Randolph, An Elegie upon the Lady Venetia Digby (‘Death, who'ld not change prerogatives with thee’)
Copy, headed ‘An Elegie On ye incomparable beauteous Lady, Madam Venetia Digby’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 52-3.
pp. 108-10
• RnT 72: Thomas Randolph, A Dialogue. Thirsis. Lalage (‘My Lalage when I behold’)
Copy.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 84-5.
pp. 110-14
• RnT 184: Thomas Randolph, An Ode to Mr. Anthony Stafford to hasten him into the Country (‘Come spurre away’)
Copy, headed ‘An Ode to Captaine Stafford to hasten him into ye Countrey’.
First published in Poems (1638). Thorn-Drury, pp. 79-82.
pp. 114-5
• KiH 557: Henry King, Sonnet (‘Dry those faire, those Christall Eyes’)
Copy, headed ‘On his discontented Mrs’.
First published in Poems (1657). Crum, pp. 147-8.
pp. 116-17
• StW 1371: William Strode, Upon the blush of a faire Ladie (‘Stay, lustie bloud, where canst thou seeke’)
Copy, headed ‘On a Blush’.
First published in Wit Restor'd (London, 1658). Dobell, pp. 39-40. Listed, without text, in Forey, p. 339.
pp. 117-18
• CoR 627: Richard Corbett, To the Ladyes of the New Dresse (‘Ladyes that weare black cypresse vailes’)
Copy, headed ‘To or new fashiond Ladyes’.
First published in Witts Recreations (London, 1640). Certain Elegant Poems (London, 1647). Bennett & Trevor-Roper, p. 90.
This poem is usually followed in MSS by ‘The Ladyes Answer’ (‘Blacke Cypresse vailes are shrouds of night’): see GrJ 14.
p. 119
• BrW 228: William Browne of Tavistock, On the Countess Dowager of Pembroke (‘Underneath this sable herse’)
Copy.
First published in William Camden, Remaines (London, 1623), p. 340. Brydges (1815), p. 5. Goodwin, II, 294. Browne's authorship supported in C.F. Main, ‘Two Items in the Jonson Apocrypha’, N&Q, 199 (June 1954), 243-5.
pp. 123-4
• KiH 682: Henry King, The Surrender (‘My once Deare Love. Happlesse that I no more’)
Copy, headed ‘To his Mrs’.
First published in Poems (1657). Crum, pp. 146-7.
p. 127
• CwT 507: Thomas Carew, On Mistris N. to the greene sicknesse (‘Stay coward blood, and doe not yield’)
Copy, headed ‘To ye greene Sicknesse’.
First published in Poems (1642). Dunlap, p. 113.
p. 130
• HeR 103: Robert Herrick, The Curse. A Song (‘Goe perjur'd man. and if thou ere return’)
Copy.
First published in Hesperides (London, 1648). Martin, p. 49. Patrick, p. 69. Musical setting by John Blow published in John Playford, Choice Ayres and Songs (London, 1683).
pp. 131-4
• ShJ 116: James Shirley, Vpon the Princes Birth (‘Fair fall their Muses that in well-chim'd verse’)
Copy, headed ‘Charles his birth. Song’ and here beginning ‘Faire fare, ye Muses wch in well-chim'd verse’.
First published in Poems (London, 1646). Armstrong, pp. 7-8.
pp. 140-1
• KiH 184: Henry King, An Elegy Upon Prince Henryes Death (‘Keep station Nature, and rest Heaven sure’)
Copy, headed ‘On ye Death of Prince Henry’.
First published in Parnassus Biceps (London, 1656). Poems (1657). Crum, p. 65.