The fiddlers

Nine feat Fiddlers had good Queen Bess

To play her music as she did dress.

Behind an arras of horse and hound

They sate there scraping delightsome sound.

Spangled, bejewelled, her skirts would she

Draw o'er a petticoat of cramasie;

And soft each string like a bird would sing

In the starry dusk of evening.

Then slow from the deeps the crisscross bows,

Crooning like doves, arose and arose.

When, like a cage, did her ladies raise

A stiff rich splendour o'er her ribbed stays,

Like bumbling bees those four times nine

Fingers in melodies loud did pine;

Last came her coif and her violet shoon

And her virgin face shone out like the moon:

Oh, then in a rapture those three times three

Fiddlers squealed shrill on their topmost C.