A Description OF THE Four Seasons or Quarters of the YEAR, AS SPRING, SUMMER, AUTUMN and WINTER. Likewise of Beauty, the Bees and Aunts, and also on Prodigality. personification of seasons spring summer autumn winter Ro: Walton excutlit SPRING. THE Pleyades their influence now give, And all that seemed as dead afresh, do live. The croaking Frogs, whom nipping Winter killed, Like Birds, now chirp, and hop about the field; The Nightingale, the Blackbird and the Thrush, Now tune their lays on sprays of every bush; The wanton frisking Kids, and soft-fleeced Lambs, Now jump, and play before their feeding Dams; The tender tops of budding Grass they crop, They joy in what they have, but more in hope. This is that part, whose fruitful showers produces All Plants and Flowers for all delights and uses; The Pear, the Plum, and Appletree now flourish: The Primrose pale and Azure Violer, Among the verduous Grass hath Nature set; But chief of all the pleasant fruitful May, Wherein the Earth is clad in rich array: All Flowers before the Sunbeams now discloses Except the double Pinks, and matchless Roses. Now swarms the busy buzzing Honey-Bee, Whose praise deserves a page, from more than me. The Meads with Cowslips, Honey-suckles dight, One hangs his head, the other stands upright: For fruit my Season yields the early cherry, The early Pease and wholesome red Strawberry. On Beauty. WOuld foolish Females, with their Features, Remember they're but mortal Creatures, Of which rightly Man may say, They're but beauteous Clods of Clay; Or refined, though pure dust, From whence they came, and thither must. And that as their great Grand-dame died before, Even so must they, and then be seen no more. And all their Gaudy Glory be forgot, Whilst they must lie, consume, yea, stink and rot. If these things they would to remembrance call, Their Honeyed Pleasures would be mixed with Gall, And all and every one their course would bend, Within themselves, what is amiss to mend. The Memory unto the soul is food. That thinks, and says, and doth the things that's good. But Shows of Virtue, hiding of their Vice, Bring simple Ga' lants to th' Fool's Paradise: For when the Heart thinks Lust abomination, Sense nicknames it but Youthful Recreation. Reason delights in Liberality, Which Sense perverts to Prodigality. And thus this little Kingdom, Man, doth fade, With hearing Traitors when they do persuade. SUMMER. SPring being past, than Summer must begin, With melted Tawny face, and Garments thin. Now go those frolic Swains, the Shepherd-Lad, To wash their thick-cloathed Flocks, with Pipes full glad. In the cool streams they labour with delight, Rubbing their dirty coats till they look white. Whose fleeces, when purely spun, and deeply died, With Robes thereof Kings have been dignifyde, This part the Roses are distilled in Glasses, Whose fragrant Scent all made-Perfume surpasses; The Cherry, Goosberry, is now in th' prime, And for all sorts of Pease this is the Time. On goes the Mowers to their flashing Toil, The Meadows of their burdens to despoil; The Forks and Rakes do follow them amain, Which makes the Aged Fields look young again; The loaden Carts do bear away this Prize To Barns and Stacks, where it for Fodder lies, With Sickles eke, the painful Reapers go, The ruffling Tress of Terra for to Mow; And bundles up in sheaves the weighty Wheat, Which after Manchets make for Kings to eat; Now's ripe the Pear, Pear-Plum and Apricock, The Prince of Plums, whose stone is hard as Rock. On the Ants. I Walked, and did a little Molehill view, Full peopled with a most industrious Crew Of busy Aunts, where each one laboured more, Then if he were to bring home Indian Ore; Here wrought the Pioners, there marched the Bands, Here Colonies went forth to Plant new Lands: These hasted out, and those supplies brought in, As if they had some sudden siege foreseen: Until there came an angry Spade, and cast Country and People to a Pit at last. And therefore as Solomon saith, Go to the Ant thou Sluggard, consider her ways and be wise, Prov. 16.6. For though they are not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the Summer, Prov 30.25. On the Bees. AGAIN I viewed a Kingdom in an Hive, Where every one did work, and so all thrive; Some go, some come, some war, some watch and wa●d, Some make the works, and some the works do Guard. These frame their curious waxed Cells, and those Do into them their Nectar-drops dispose: Until the greedy Gardener brought his smoke, And for the Work, did all the Workmen choke. AUTUMN. THE Vintage now is ripe, the Grapes are pressed, Whose lively Liquor oft is cursed and blest; The Raisins now in clusters dried be, The Orange, Lemon dangle on the Tree; The Fig is ripe, the Pomegranate also, And Apples now their yellow sides do show; Of Medler, Quince, of Warden and of Peach, The Seasons now at hand of all and each; The fruitful Trees, all withered now do stand, Whose yellow sapless leaves by wind are fanned: Which notes, when youth and strength have past their prime, Decrepit Age must also have his time: The sap doth slily creep towards the Earth, There rests until the Sun gives it a birth: Almost at shortest is the shortened day, The Northern pole beholdeth not one Ray! Now Greenland, Groenland, Lapland, Finland, see No Sun to lighten their obscurity. This Month is Timber for all uses felled, When cooled, the sap to the roots hath low'st repelled: Beef, Brawns and Pork are now in great'st request. And solio'st meats our stomaches can digest: This time warm , full diet, and good fires, Our pinching flesh, and appetite requires▪ On Prodigality. I Dread when I do see a Prodigal, On whom a fair Estate of late did fall: When as is spent his Credit and his Chink, And he quite wasted, to a snuff doth stink, Who in the Spring or Summer of his Pride. Was worshipped, honoured, almost deified: And whilst the Golden Angels did attend him, What swarms of Friends and Kindred did befriend him: Persuading him, that give, and spend, and lend, Were Virties which on Gentry do depend. But though of late be seemed in wealth to swim, Yet many b●se occasions do suck him. The Prodigals Estate, like to a Flux. The Mercer, Draper, and the Silkman plucks. The Tailor, Milliner, Dogs, Drabs and Dice, Trey-trip, or Passage, or the most at thrice: At Irish, Tick-tack, Doublets, Draughts or Chess, He flings his Money free with carelessness; Kuff, Slam, Trump, Nod, Whisk, Hole, Saut, New Cut; Unto the keeping of four Knaves he'll put. Bowls, Shove-groate, Tennis, no Game comes amiss, His Purse a Nurse for any body is: His vain Expenses daily suck and soak, And be himself sucks only drink and smoke: And thus the Prodigal, himself alone Gives suck to Thousands, and himself sucks none. WINTER. COLD, Moist, young Phlegmy Winter now doth le In swaddling Clothes, like newborn Infancy; Bound up with Frosts, and Fur'd with Hails and Snows, And like an Infant still he taller grows. December is the first; And now the Sun To th' Southward Tropic her swift Race hath run●. This Month he's Housed in horned Capricorn, From thence gins to length the shortened Morn: Through Christendom with great Festivity, Now's held, a Guest, (but blest) Nativity. Old frozen January next comes in, Chilling the blood, and shrinking up the skin. In Aquarius now keeps the loved Sun, And Northward his unwearied Race doth run, The day much longer than it was before, The Cold not lessened, but augmented more. Now Toes, and Ears, and Fingers often freeze, And Travellers sometimes their Noses leeze. Moist snowy February is my last, I care not how the Wintertime doth haste; In Pisces now the Golden Sun doth shine, And Northward still approaches to the line; The Rivers now do , and Snows do melt, And some warm Glances from the Sun are felt, Which is increased by the lengthened day, Until by's heat he drives all Cold away. Printed and sold by Rob. Walton at the Globe and Compasses; at the West-end of St. Paul's Church, turning down towards Ludgate, where you may be fitted with All sorts of Maps and Copy-books, large or small, Coloured or not, the Marrow of Humane Learning, the Laurel of Metaphysic, an Artificial Description of Logic, the Tree of Man's Life, His Majesty in Armour on Horseback, and underneath the Manner of his Riding through London the day before his Coronation, another of him in Parliament Robes, and underneath the Manner of his going to his Coronation, the King and Queen, the Story of David and Abigail, Orpheus Playing on his Music, and Beasts about him, the Manner of the tortures used by the Heathen Emperors of Rome on the Christians, and a Comparison of the like bloody cruelties used by the Pope and that Party since they got up, a Description of the four Ages of Man, Childhood, Youth Middle-Age and Old Age, a Description of the four Elements, Earth, Water, Fie and Air, A Lookingglass for Youth, 1. The Devilentices Youth. 2. Wisdom gives good Advice to Youth. 3. Time declares his Experience to Youth. 4. Death sounds an Alarm to Youth. 5. Youth Reasons with Death. 6. The Soul speaks to the Devil. 7. All is Vanity. And 8. Of the Chief Good. The four Elements, each with Borders about them, and Verses, all these in large sheets, and many others, that here is not space to mention. And he is the oldest in London in that way, and doth truly say, as the Poet, That when each Man keeps to his own Trade, Then all thing will be better made.