Top 500 Poems

Come to, Companyons: ren: tyme it is to rowe:
Our Carake fletis: the se is large and wyde
And depe Inough: a pleasaunt wynde doth blowe.
Prolonge no tyme, our Carake doth you byde,
Our felawes tary for you on every syde.
Hast hyther, I say, ye folys naturall,
Howe oft shall I you unto my Navy call?

Ye have one confort, ye shall nat be alone:
Your company almoste is infynyte;
For nowe alyve ar men but fewe or none
That of my shyp can red hym selfe out quyte.
A fole in felawes hath pleasour and delyte.
Here can none want, for our proclamacion
Extendyth farre: and to many a straunge nacyon.

Both yonge and olde, pore man, and estate:
The folysshe moder: hir doughter by hir syde,
Ren to our Navy, ferynge to come too late.
No maner of degre is in the worlde wyde,
But that for all theyr statelynes and pryde
As many as from the way of wysdome tryp
Shall have a rowme and place within my shyp.

My folysshe felawes therfore I you exort
Hast to our Navy, for tyme it is to rowe:
Nowe must we leve eche sympyll haven and porte,
And sayle to that londe where folys abound and flow;
For whether we aryve at London or Bristowe,
Or any other Haven within this our londe,