immoderate sleep is rust to the soul; she rises therefore with
chanticleer, her dame's cock, and at night makes lamb her curfew. In
milking a cow and straining the teats through her fingers, it seems that
so sweet a milk-press makes the milk the whiter or sweeter; for never
came almond glove or aromatic ointment off her palm to taint it. The
golden ears of corn fall and kiss her feet when she reaps them, as if
they wished to be bound and led prisoners by the same hand that felled
them. Her breath is her own, which scents all the year long of June,
like a new made haycock. She makes her hand hard with labour, and her
heart soft with pity; and when winter's evenings fall early (sitting at
her merry wheel) she sings a defiance to the giddy wheel of fortune. She
doth all things with so sweet a grace, it seems ignorance will not
suffer her to do ill, because her mind is to do well. She bestows her
year's wages at next fair; and, in choosing her garments, counts no
bravery in the world like decency. The garden and beehive are all her
physic and chirurgery, and she lives the longer for it. She dares go
alone and unfold sheep in the night, and fears no manner of ill because
she means none; yet, to say truth, she is never alone, for she is still
accompanied with old songs, honest thoughts, and prayers, but short
ones; yet they have their efficacy, in that they are not palled with
ensuing idle cogitations. Lastly, her dreams are so chaste that she dare
tell them: only a Friday's dream is all her superstition; that she
conceals for fear of anger. Thus lives she, and all her care is that she
may die in the spring-time, to have store of flowers stuck upon her
winding-sheet.



AN ARRANT HORSE-COURSER