A web-based edition of early seventeenth-century political poetry from manuscript sources. It brings into the public domain over 350 poems, many of which have never before been published.

Oii5 And wilt thou goe, great Duke, and leave us heere


Notes. This is by far the sharpest and widest-circulated of the attacks preceding Buckingham’s expedition to the Ile de Ré in the summer of 1627. On the possible attribution of this poem to John Marston, see Brettle.


“Upon the Duke of Buck. his goeing to Ree”

And wilt thou goe, great Duke, and leave us heere

Lamenting thee and eke thy Pupill deare

Great Charles? Alas! who shall his Scepter sway,

And Kingdome rule now thou art gone away?

Are there noe Whores in Court to stay thee? Must

5

Thy hate to France and Spaine exceed thy Lust?

Hast thou no Neece to marry? Cannot an Inne

Or bawdyhouse afford thee any kinne

To cuckold Lords withall?1 Hast not a Foe

To poison heere at home?2 And wilt thou goe

10

And thinke the Kingdome plagu’ed sufficiently?

Most gracelesse Duke, wee thanke thy charitie,

Wishing the Fleet such speed, as thou but lost,

Though wee bee conquer’d, wee have quitted cost.



Source. BL MS Sloane 826, fol. 161r

Other known sources. Bodleian MS Douce f.5, fol. 21v; Bodleian MS Eng. Poet. c.50, fol. 13v; Bodleian MS Malone 23 , p. 105; Bodleian MS Rawl. Poet 26, fol. 80v; Bodleian MS Rawl. Poet 160, fol. 198r; BL Add. MS 10309, fol. 42r; BL MS Sloane 1792, fol. 5r; Houghton MS Eng. 1278, item 14; Huntington MS HM 742, fol. 1v; Rosenbach MS 239/27, p. 57

Oii5






1   Hast thou no Neece...cuckold Lords withall: allusion to Buckingham’s notoriously aggressive pursuit of socially and politically advantageous marriages for his close (and distant) kindred. <back>

2   Hast not a Foe...at home: George Eglisham, a former physician to James I and to James, the Marquis Hamilton, published a tract in 1626 accusing Buckingham of poisoning the King, Hamilton and several other nobles who had crossed his intentions at court. <back>