"this lovely green"

"No white nor red was ever seen
So amorous as this lovely green.
Fond lovers, cruel as their flame,
Cut in these trees their mistress' name:
Little, alas, they know or heed
How far these beauties her exceed!
Fair trees! where'er your barks I wound,
No name shall but your own be found.

When we have run our passion's heat,
Love hither makes his best retreat:
The gods, who mortal beauty chase,
Still in a tree did end their race:
Apollo hunted Daphne so
Only that she might laurel grow:
And Pan did after Syrinx speed
Not as a nymph, but for a reed.

What wond'rous life is this I lead!
Ripe apples drop about my head;
The luscious clusters of the vine
Upon my mouth do crush their wine;
The nectarine and curious peach
Into my hands themselves do reach;
Stumbling on melons, as I pass
Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass."

from The Garden  Andrew Marvell

Temptations - The Tree of Love

"Belle quittez moy ces amants qui ne sont pour vous que de glace dénichez les sur cette arbre cessez de leur faire des present coupez moy larbre par le tronc et moquez vous de leurs audace faite les tombe sur la place sont des laches et des poltrons"  [outer border inscription]

"Mes dames nous allons tous descendre  Appaizez tous vostre fureur nous vous allons donn nos coeurs que voulez vous donc entre pré(n)dre allons descendez chers amants et ne soyez plus rebelle vous serez chéris tendrement de vos maitress fidèle"  [inner border inscription]

Delftware Salad bowl, Nevers 1739  ©  Fitzwilliam Museum

O Fortune!

" O Fortune! How thy restless wavering state
Hath fraught with cares my troubled wit,
Witness this present prison, whither Fate
Could bear me, and the joys I quit.
Thou caus'dst the guilty to be loosed
From bands wherein are innocents enclosed,
Causing the guiltless to be strait reserved,
And freeing those that death had well deserved,
But by her envy can be nothing wrought,
So God send to my foes all they have wrought."

Charcoal inscription attrib. Princess Elizabeth (Queen Elizabeth I),  while imprisoned at Woodstock.

Old St. Paul's Church 1666

"At my return I was infinitly concern'd to find that goodly Church St. Paules now a sad ruine, & that beautifull Portico (for structure comparable to any in Europ, as not long repaired by the late King) now rent in pieces, flakes of vast Stone Split in sunder & nothing remaining intire but the Inscription in the Architrave
which shewing by whom it was built, had not one letter of it defac'd:  which I could not but take notice of:

Diary John Evelyn, 7 September 1666