r THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES cassell's Library of English Literature. SHORTEE ENGLISH POEMS SELECTED EDITED AND AllUANCxET) Henry Morley Pll F E S so K OF E X G 1. 1 S H L I T E R A T L" It E AT TJ N I V E U S I T Y COLLEGE Tj O M) 1) X. " Blest be the song that Biti^iHTENS The blind siax's GLOO^ki, exalts the tetekan's mirth; UnSCORNEP the peasant's whistling BREATH THAT LIGHTENS His ddteocs toil of furrowing the green earth." Wordsworth: T\u ^oxttr 0/ SkUuiJ. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. CASSELL cV^ ViVMVK^X, Ltmtted LOXDOX. I'AHIS ,i- Nf:\V YOh'K. CONTENTS, I lis .• 3 Introduction FA8E 1 CHArTER T. The Gaels axd Cymry. — a.d. 284 to a.d. oi7 3—8 CHAPTEE TI. The First English. — a.d. .370 to a.d. 10C8 8—11 CHAPTEK III. Tr.axsition E.nglish : from the Conqve.st to Cihucer. — a.d. 1066 to a.d. 13.52 11—37 CHAPTER IV. Chaucer and Gower. — a.d. 13-52 to a.d. HOO 37—53 CHAPTER V. IjYDG.iTE, HOCCLEVE, .AND JaMES THE FlKST OF ScOTLAND.^A.D. 1400 TO A.D. 14.>0 CHAPTER VI. The Nut-rrown Maid: Robert Hexrysox. Old Ball.vds. — a.d. 14.50 to a.d. 1508. 5.3—70 70- 109 CHAPTER VII. William Dunbar and Gavin Douglas. — a.d. 1480 to a.d. 1522 :09— :29 CHAPTER VIII. John Skelton .and Sir David Linds.ay, with Others. — a.d. 1.500 to a.d. 1550 CHAPTER IX. Courtly Poets: Wvatt, Surrey, and Others.— a.d. 1520 to a.d. 1558 120—152 152—104 CHAPTER X. Eeign of Elizareth — "The Par.adise of Dainty Devices;" The " JIirror for Magistrates;" Gascoigne's "Steel Glass;" Minor Poets.— From a.d. 1558 to a.d. 1579 ...... 105—202 vi CONTENTS. CHAPTER XI. Keigx of Elizahetu. — FuoM A.]). l.')"9 TO A.I). 1603: — Section I. Spessek, liALEioii, Sidney, Dyeu, Fi;lke Gueyille, and Others. ..... 203—23* Section 11. Poetical Miscellanies. — Songs of the Elizaiiethan Dr-imatists. Shakesfeare. Drayton, D.^niel, .\ND Others ....... ..... 238 — 262 CHAPTER XII. Reign of James I.: Ben Jonson. Donne, and Others.— a.d. 1603 to a.d. 162a .... 262 — 291 CHAPTER XIII. Under Charles I. and the Common\yealth ; John Milton, and Others. — a.d. 1625 to a.d. 1660 . 291 — 322 CHAPTER XIV. From the Restoration to the Reyolvtion; John Duyden, and Others. — a.d. 1660 to a.d. 1689. . 322 — 346 CHAPTER XV. From the English Reyolution to the Death of George I. : Defoe, Addison, Pofe, and Others. Allan Ramsay, Thomson, Dyeu. — v.d. 1689 to a.d. 1727 . . . . . . 346— 36T CHAPTER XVI. Reign of George II.: Pope, Johnson, Gray, Collins, ajd Others. — a.d. 1727 to a.d. 1700 . . 367 — 386- CHAPTER XVII. Before and After the French Eeyolction : Goldsmith, Cowfer, Burns, and Others. — a.d. 1700 to A.D. 1800 ............. 386—434 CHAPTER XVIII. The First Qf.\RTER of the Nineteenth Century : '\VoRDs^YoRTH, Scott, Byron, Shelley, Ke.yts, and Others.- A.D. 1800 to a.d. 1825 . . . . . . . . . . 434- 45R CHAPTER XIX. The Second Quarter of the Xineteenth Century; AVordsworth. Tennyson, Bro'sx-ning, and Others. —A.D. 182.3 TO a.d. 18.50 ........... 4,58—480 CHAPTER XX. The Third Qu.arter of the Nineteenth Century : Tennyson and Bro\yning, Algernon Swinburne, William Morris, a.n'd Others. — a.d. 1850 to a.d. 1875 ....... 480 — 490 Indexes : — I. — Poets .^nd Poems ........... 491 — 496 II. — Specimens of English ........... 497 III.— Notes 498—503 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. onquer d Pr Celtic English Brooch Celtic Initial "8" The Header First-English Initial . The New-born C'liilJ . " Destroyed by Darts " "In Grasp of the Gallows' Ploughing . Winged ^Vi'rows . Cai-ouse The Harper A Bishop Fruit Diet . Meat .... Drink. The Geese . A Minstrel . A King's Feast . Head of Edward III. . Armour of Edward III. Edward III. granting the Ci France to the Black Prince David the Bruce Battle Piece David the Bruce and Edward II War Ships .... Naval Armament King Edward III. John of France . Geoffrey Chaucer Portrait of Petrarch . John Gowcr Gower shooting at the Wnrld John Lydgate Head of Lydgate Hoccleve presenting Iiis Book to Sign and Lure . The Thames, from A\'estminstcr Charing Cross, from the Kiver The Tavern Beggary James I. of Scotland in liis Yuu .lames I. in Lati'r Life •Sumptuous Head-dresses Trader The Musicians . Twecdside, a Mile West of Peebles, Neidpath O Ciiko and Ale Strife .... Is he Hurt ? . . . Shall he Dance ': . Fair -\Uce .... Bagpipes .... -\ Lady Writing. Hanged without Pity . The Woodland S]iring A Knight taking his Rank . atli Kin; to Bli ovinces in ■ Henrv V ickfriars :istl(' PAGE 1 •S 8 9 i) 10 JO 10 11 Vl lU in 10 24 •29 30 ai :u ;n 37 3S •)0 50 •")C ."19 (iO (il (i2 (13 111 11.') G.'> GG GO GG G7 07 GS G9 G9 70 70 Schoolmaster and Pupil Dunfermline Abbey . Colloquy .... Cat aud JIousc . Kobin Hood's Cap and Part of his Ch The Hunt is up . Ruins of St. Mary's .Vbbey, Xw The Knight Mounted . .Vncient Seal of St. ilary's Abbe The Abbot Counting the Coin Hunting with Hound and Horn The Monk .... Shooting at the Butts . Nottingham (Jld Town Hall and Pris. Lady of the Time of Edward I Great Se.al of Edward I. Robin Hood's Grave . A Chevaueheo Pennon of Percy Pennon of Douglas Witherington Castle . Gradientes in Superbia Percutiam Pastorem . Siibito morientur Homo natus de Mulierc Ducunt in Bonis Dies suos . Indice mDii si nosti omnia . Medico, eura teipsum . The Wheel of Fortune The Old Dragon Pride Wrath .... Envy ..... (ireed ..... ^'\'tcliing the Piper Dunkeld, with Bii'nam \\'iii]d ami D Distance The Castle of Pleasiuinci' . The Srouts .... '• Then out they Rode " Heart's DcUght Youth Dei)arting Reason Pleads The Queen Dc'iiarts Death is Near Cardinal Wolsey i The Fool in Books Quitting the Pulpit "Go ye also into tlie Vineyard" Tlie tJood Wife . An Astrologer . The Pluralist . Wisdom is Preacher . The Devil is Teacher . Flinching from Duty . A'ain Care .... ill tin LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Vain Force. ....... One of the Heretics ...... Fac-siinile of "Wood-cut from the Last Page of li Kcle's Edition of "Colin Clout" . The Ship of Fools Dice Play Iiuag-e Worship James Y. of .Scotland Sii' Thomas Wyatt Hura-y Howard, Earl of Surrey .... Thomas, Second Lord Vaux .... Beauty and the Bared Skull .... Wealth that Passes Gascoig'ue presenting a Book to (iiieen Elizabeth Initial "Ci" ....... Dives Indoetus Thomas Sackville, in Later Life .... Sorrow ........ Initial "T" Italian Initial '-U," 15G3 George Gascoigne ...... Queen Elizabeth's Visit to Hunsdon House, 1.371 Prosperous Law . Jlisused Authority ...... Gascoigne' s Priests . . . . ■ . Not Gascoigne' s Priests Historiographers ...... A Martyrdom imder Mary ..... Praise of Elizabeth Edmund Spenser ...... Thomalin and Jlorrell Ivilcolman Tower ...... Sir Walter lialeigh Penshmst Castle ...... Sir Plulip Sidney Obsequies of Sir Plulip Sidney : the Pall-bonrcrs Sharpham M.inor ...... Fulke Cfreville, Lord Brooke .... Tailijicce Publisher's Mark of William Ponsonby on tlie TitU' jmge of the Second Part of the " Faerie Uueene. 1.596 Tilting King and Sheath .... Tilting at the King Cipher of Elizabeth, and Emblems of her Keigi Tailpiece to the Epithalamiuu Initial Letter " A " The Falconer Shepherd and Bagpipe .... The Morrice Dance The Hobby Horse A Martialist PAtlE HI 143 U4 147 147 l.)0 1.51 1.53 1.57 100 Ifil 161 16.5 16*5 16S 170 172 177 171) 184 188 190 193 194 19.5 196 200 203 204 20.5 209 210 212 214 21.5 218 221 225 22" 228 228 231 23.5 238 243 24.5 24.5 246 247 The M;i3ter Gunner . AVilliam Shakespeare . Samuel Daniel . Michael Drayton James the First . Kenaissance Ornaments Bon Jonson Thomas Dekker . George Chapman Francis Beaumont John Fletcher Francis Bacon John Donne Sir Thomas Ovcrbury . Cupid leaving his Bow Francis Quarles . Sir' Henry Wotton William Cartwright . Lady Dorothy Sidney (Wa Abraham Cowley John Jlilton Kiehard Lovelace John Cleveland . Cromwell lying in State at Cowley in Later Life . Boileau Dcspreaux John Sheffield . John Dryden Margaret, Duchess of New JIatthew Prior . Alexander Pope . John Philips Allan Ramsay William Shenstone Thomas Gray Eobert Fergusson The Parsonage at Lissoy William Cowper . Cowper's House at Olney Kobert Bums William Wordsworth Samuel Taylor Coleridge William Gifford . Rydal Mount Lord Byron The Dead Shelley Cupids in a Bower Pastoral Innocence Greta Hall . Initial "I" to Index . Ornaments to Index, &c. Ucr's Sach; Somerset Houst' castle PAGE . 248 . 2.51 . 2.54 . 2.50 . 202 263, 26.5 . 267 . 269 . 270 . 273 . 273 . 274 . 276 . 277 . 288 . 292 . 293 . 293 . 301 . 308 . 310 . 314 . 31.5 . 321 . 323 . 324 . 329 . 333 . 339 . 350 . 353 . 360 . 364 . 373 . 378 . 391 . 394 . 398 . 399 . 408 . 417 . 420 . 430 . 437 . 442 . 447 . 457 . 458 . 459 . 491 , 491, 503 (From Draytun's " Polyolhion.") Cassell's Library of Ei^glish Literature. INTRODUCTION. England's place in the ■world has been earned by faithful thouglit and faithful work of many generations. " Through Wisdom is an house builded ; and by Understanding it is established ; and by Knowledge shall the chambers thereof be filled with all precious and pleasant riches." The Literature of each nation shows the form of thought within the outer body of its History ; and only by coming fairly into contact with this inner life of our country can we know through what wisdom our house was built, approach to the understanding by which it was established, and in so doing acquire the knowledge that shall fill it with true riches. Attention is being now paid to that study of the outside world which is the province of Science. It is exalted in orations, sul)sidised by governments, because it adds matei'ial wealth to the state. Honour and help be to it, let us rather say, because it trains the minds of men to faithful observation and pure search for truth, because it sets them to increase wisdom and power by drawing light from the mind of God revealed in His creation. No man, no people, lives by bread alone ; and it is no wise statecraft that seeks only to beget a commonwealth of bakers. The mistake of those who encourage a one-sided culture — no matter which the side — brings its revenges. Ah'eady we are sufifering in many ways from our too long neglect of the fit means of strengthening all that is best in a nation's character which would be found in a right study of its Literature. I mean no mere learning by rote of dates and names and second hand opinions ; nor even cultivation of a fine sense of the beauty of detached thoughts, when a reader looks chiefly to these. Eight study of our Literature is a fimi endeavour to get from the soul of England in her writers an interpretation of her work among the nations, by generous ap]5rehension of the best aims of the best of our forerunners ; and it leads to the raising of our hearts, in national fellowship, by the desire to at least try how far we can aid the life of our own day with aim as high, with words as apt, with work as strenuous. The purpose of this work is to provide a compact and comprehensive library of English thought, from the earliest times to our own day. The arrangement will be chronological. Characteristics of our Celtic and Teutonic forefiithers ; the days of transition, after the Conquest, through the time of Chaucer, with the rising spirit of the Reformation, to the England of Elizabeth ; the conflicts of opinion by which England advanced from the days of her first Stuart king to the Revolution of 1 688 ; and the course of thought and action by which we have been broiight to the England of to-day — not ■ndthout illustration of the charactei' of our own time, by selections fi'om the works of our chief living wi-iters, where we have leave to introduce them ; — all these should be found here represented in such order as to make this Library of use to the student of the History and Literature of our country. Each piece of prose or verse will be set in a brief narrative showing when and by whom it was written, as far as that can be told, with here and there such information as may serve to secure fuller enjoyment of some part of the mind of a people " not slow and dull, but of a quick, ingenious, and piercing spirit, acute to invent, subtle and sine'svy to discourse, not beneath the reach of any point the highest that human capacity can soar to." So Milton described his countrymen, and the readers of these volumes will see that he spoke truth. The work has been planned to contain in a few volumes — (1) A series selected from all the best and most characteristic of those poems which are short enough to be given in full ; (2)- -but fourth in order of issue — a corresponding series of the best of our prose works ; (3) a series of pieces in prose and CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. verse illusti-ating fi-dm first to last the religions life of England ; and (4) a series of plays by the best dramatists, from the time of the miracle-plays downward. We propose also to supplement the j)lan already sketched by giving a section to our longer poems and another to our longer prose works. In reproducing these it will become unavoidable that parts should represent the whole ; but each will be so described that whatever passages are given may be read with knowledge of their context and of their relation to the main design. These volumes wUl gain much by rigid avoidance of disconnected extracts. A mere book of cuttings out of finished pieces is handiwork like that of the degenerate courtiers of the days of Louis XV., who snipped single figures from engra^angs of the works of the best masters, and stuck them confusedly on screens. Every true work of art has its own point of unity, and blends its harmonies into a perfect round. No healthy sense of Literature can be acquired, and where any exists it can only be stupefied, by the use of " elegant extracts." A fair selection from its riches ought to luring a large and happy sense of the true meaning of our Literature home into many a room where books miist needs be few, and ought to make the wit and wisdom of our country pleasant to yoimg and old wherever English books are read. If sometimes a good work contains a word or passage that, through change of manners, could not now be read aloud in every household, I remove the stumbling-block. But wherever change is made, square brackets [ ] or notes show the extent of it. In giving pieces of our early Literature, \\Titers before the Conquest will be represented by translation. In what was written after that time, spelling of words still current will be brought into agreement with the present usage, whenever that can be done without injury to i-hyme, metre, or sense ; and many notes will help the interpretation of the words now obsolete. The notes may contaui any kind of information or suggestion that ^\'ill quicken the enjoyment of the work they illustrate. Now and then some short pieces of old English will be left just as we receive them from our forefathers, and this will be done at intervals frequent enough to make them, serviceable to those who care to get what help they can to a closer knowledge of oui- language. The best use of the study of language is to develop our perception of the finer charms of thought, and if it should be the good fortune of this Library to be well thumbed in many homes, the quiet hours will come when one and another reader will be disposed to get all possible help from notes that were at first passed over. The volumes will be freely illustrated with copies from trustworthy portraits, sketches of jJaces, contemporary illustrations of manners and customs, or of incidents described or referred to in the pieces quoted. Our Library of English Literature seeks to draw, for rich and poor, for young and old, the healthiest of pleasures from the highest human source. It will illustrate all forms of thought, from the lightest jest that has the true ring in it to the utmost reach of heavenward aspiration. It will put no true man under ban for his opinions, but foirly represent, as far as space permits, the -various forms of thai endeavour of the English people which is as old as England and alone keeps England young, the fii-m endeavour to find out the right, and do it for the love of God. H. M. University College, London. Cassell's Library of E^^glisk Literature. I.— SHORTER POEMS. CHAPTER I. The Gaels and Cymry. — a.d. 28i to a.d. 547. 1 BATING cares aiul quickening tlie energies of life while giving S^**^x utterance to its emotions, its desires, its best re- ' solves, a strain of music that springs from the souls of men accompanies their actions in the world. There ave no records of a humanity without such music. History itself began in song. The life of our own country opens among those Celtic populations who occupied the land the Scandinavians and Teutons came. There are two branches of Celts : the Gaelic or Erse, still represented amoug us by the Celts of Ireland, the Scotch Highlands, and the Isle of Man ; and the Cymric, called also Cambrian or British, represented among us by the Celts of Wales and Cornwall. The Celts are by nature artists. Mr. Fergusson has felt this in his own art, and said in his " History of Architecture," " The true glory of the Celt in Europe is his artistic eminence. It is perhaps not too much to assert that without his intervention we should not have possessed in modern times a church worthy of admiration, or a picture or a statue we could look at without shame." It would be far too much to assert this of liooks ; but certainly Teutonic England could not have risen to the full grandeur and beauty of that expression of all lier life in all her literature, which these volumes will make some attempt to illustrate, without a wholesome blending of Teutonic ^^ith Celtic blood. The Celts are a vital ^ Found in the Ardakillan Crannoge, near Strokestown, County Roscommon. From the fijjure, natural size, in the Catalogue of Antiquities in the Royal Irish Academy, hy Sir W. R. WUde, M.R.I. A. - From the Book of Kells, a Latin Vellum MS. of the Gospels, said to be as old as the sisth century. From the copy of it in the same Catalogue of Antiquities as preceding. part of our country, and theirs were the first songs in the land. There are certain characteristic differences in the music of the two great branches of the Celtic race. Giraldus Cambrensis (Gerald of Wales), who went to Ireland as secretary to Prince John, rightly ex- pressed them when he praised, in 1187, the musical skill of the Irish Gaels, and said, " Their modulation on these instruments" (the harp and tabor), " unlike that of the Bi'itons" (Cymry) "to which I am ac- customed, is not slow and harsh, but lively and rapid, while the harmony is both sweet and gay." The musical instrimients of the Cymry were the hail), ^^^^ pip6, and the crowd, which was a three- stringed fiddle. In both Gael and Cyiury there was bold play of imagiriation, frequent use of simile ; but while the Gael poured out his song with great animation, was quick in suggestion, delighted in images bright with colour and the stir of life, the Cymrjr indulged rather in plaintive repetition, and their songs, more laden than those of the Gael ■nath pathetic thought, wound their way often slowly onward in the minor key. The vex'se system of the Celts was founded not on quantity, and not on rhyme in the modern sense, but upon agreement in the sound of initial and final letters, alliteration and assonance, with frequently an exact correspondence of final syllaliles in several successive lines. Each of the two Iji-anches of our Celtic pojiulation has an ancient literature, of which some fnigmenta have come down to us by popular tradition. Each of these literatures was chiefly the utterance of feeling stirred by a great struggle for independence ; and each has at the heart of it a battle disastrous to the men whose wi'estle with an over-mastering power is the chief theme of their liards. I. The earlier of these two literatures was that of the Gaels, and the battle at the heart of it is that of Gabhra (pronounced Gavvlira or Gawra), said to have been fought a.d. 284:. CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 284. Fionn (called sometimes in Scotland, before tlie time of Macpheison's Ossian, Fingal — yal being a common final syllable in Gaelic proper names) was the son of C'yauhaill, chief of one of the four Irish clans — that of Leiuster, the C'lamia Baoisgne. Ciimhaill was killed in battle by Goll, of the C'lanua Morna, the clan of C'onnaught. Fionn MacCumhaill thus began life with hereditaiy feud against Goll Mac- Morna, but afterwards made peace with him. Fioiui's clan became so powei'ful that the other Irish forces, except that of the King of Munster, banded against it. The Clanna Baoisgne fought for its life against this over-mastering confederac}', and was crushed at the battle of Gabhra. Fionn (" Fair-haired"), the son of C'umhaill, had a cousin famous in song, Caeilte MacRonan ; and two sons, Fergus Finnbheoil (" the Eloquwit"), who was chief bard, and Oisin ("the Little Fa^v^l"), who was bard and warrior. Oisin is among the Scotch Gaels, Ossun — or, as Mac- pherson wTote it, Ossian — a word of two syllables, having its accent usually in Irish Gaelic on the second syllable, and in .Scotch Gaelic on the first. Oisin had a warrior son, Oscar. This grandson of Fionn MacCumhaill was killed at the battle of Gabhra by Cairbar, the son of Cormac MacArt, King of Ireland. The King of Ireland was attacked by Oscar in the battle, but defended by his son Cairbar, who gave Oscar his death-wound before he was himself slain by the dying warrior. The following piece is from a collection of old Gaelic poems made by Sir James M'Gregor, Dean of Lismore, in the beginning of the sixteenth century. His MS. was edited in 1862 as "The Dean of Lismore's Book," with a translation and notes by the Rev. Thomas M'Lauchlan, and an introduction and additional notes by Mr. William F. Skene. Mr. M'Lauchlan is not answerable for the attempt I have here made to represent the song of the chief bard to fnodern ears by a rude blending of rhyme and assonance. Fergus FinnbheoU is supposed to tell, in reply to questions from his father Fionn MacCumhaill, the slaughter of his Feinn, or Fenians, at the battle of Gabhi'a, and the death of Oscar, Oisin's son, the old man's grandson.' A Gaelic poem closes usually with repetition of its first word or phrase. That repetition here serves also to sug- gest the bard, who was the historian of ancient times, passing from tribe to tribe, and answering in each place -the demand for fidl detail of the great deeds whereof it was he only who kept the record and maintained the fame, THE DEATH OF OSCAE. " Say, Bard of the Feinn of Erin, How fared the fight, Fergus, my son, In Gabhia's fierce battle-day ? Say ! " 1 These axe the first lines of the poem as transferred hy Mr. M'Lauchlan into the modem spelling of Scotch Gaelic from the dean's phonetic style : — *' Inn is diiinn a Fhergruis, fhilidh Feinn Eirinn, Cionnus tbarladh dlniinn, an oath Ghabluii nam benman. Ni maitb Mliic Cumhail, mo sgeul o chath Gbablira. Cha mhair Osgar ioumhuiiin, thug mbr cbosgar chalma, Cha mhair seachd mhic Clmoilte, no gasraidh Fiann Almhuin, Do thuit oige na Feiun, ann an eideadh airich." " The fight fared not -nell, son of Cundiaill, From Gabhra come tidings of ruin. For Oscar the fearless is slain. The sons of Caeilte were seven ; They fell ■svith the Feinn of AlvTn. The youth of the Feinn are fallen, Are dead in then- battle array. And dead on the field lies SlacLuy, AVith six of the sons of thy sire. The young men of Alvin are fallen ; The Feiun of Britain are fallen. And dead is the king's son of Lochlin, WTio hastened to war for om' right — The king's son with |i heart ever open. And aiTu ever strong in the fight." "Now, Bard — my son's son, my desire. My Oscar, of him, Fergus, tell How he hewed at the helms ere he fell." " Hard were it, Fionn, to number. Heavy for me were the labour. To teU of the host that has fallen. Slain by the valour of Oscar. No rush of the waterfall swifter. No pounce of the hawk on his prey, J^^o whii'lpool more sweeping and deadly. Than Oscar in battle that day. And you who last saw him could see How he thi'obbed in the roar of the fray. As a storm-worried leaf on the tree Whose fellows lie fallen below, • As an aspen will quiver and sway While the axe deals it blow upon blow. WTien he saw that MacArt, King of Erin, StUl lived in thf midst of the roar, Oscar gathered his force to roll on him As waves roU to break on the .shore. The King's son, Cahbar, saw the danger, He shook his great hungering spear. Grief of griefs ! di'ove its point througli our Oscai', Wtio braved the death-stroke without fear. Bushing still on MacAi-t, King of Eiin, His weight on his weapon he thi'ew, ■And smote at MacAi-t, and again smote Cau'bar, whom that second blow slew. So died Oscar, a king in his glory. I, Fergus the Bard, grieve my way Through aU lands, sa\-ing how went the story Of Gabhi-a's fierce battle-day." " Say ! " II. The later of our two old Celtic literatures was that of the Cymry, and the battle at' the heart of it is that of Cattraeth, said to have been fought a.d. 570. When the Celts of Britain were resisting the occu- pation of their lands by those Teutonic immigrants who gave to the country afterwards its name of England, a great northern chief called Uiien became famous for his patriotic struggle. His contest was against those Angles who, first landing under Ida, in the year 547, battled their way inland from the coasts now known as those of Dmham and Northumberland, and Scotland from the Tweed up to the Forth. The bards of Frien represented by theii- energy of song the fervour of this contest. The same struggle was maintained in other parts of A.D. 570.] SHORTER POEMS. Britain by another cldef, tLat Arthur who in after time became the great mythical hero of the British story. In the traces of old Cymric song which seem to have been left from a time earlier than the twelfth century, when Arthurian romance arose, it is Urien who appears as the great chief; and his bards were Llywarch Hen, prince and bard ; Aneurin, warrior and bard ; and Taliesin, a bard only ; while Merddhin, or Merlin, seems to have been at the same tune a bard iii the service of Arthm-. In those days Mynyddawg, the Lord of Eiddin (Eiddin means, I suppose, not Edinburgh, but the region of the ri'i-er Eden that flows through West- moreland and Cumberland to the Solway Frith), foi'med a league of Cymric cliiefs to contest the possession of their land Ijy the Teutonic settlers, who had occupied the coasts of the Deivyr and Bryneich, known as the land of Ododui, The people of Deivyr and Bryneich had blended themsehes ^\•ith the immigrants, and were therefore branded as traitors by the other Celts, The words Deivyr and Brj-neich were transformed by the Romans into Deira and Bemicia. This part of our coast, belonging to Durham and Northumberland, had a name common to both Deivyr and Bryneich, that was Latinised as the land of the Otadini ; and Ododin (without the prefix of an unessential G, that makes the ward Gododin) is the name gi\-en to the district whence marched the foemen \rith whom the leagued Cymry endeavoured to contest the occupation of their land. Among the British warriors were tribes gathered apparently from between the Clyde and Solway Frith. The Novantie were from Wigtown, ELu'k- cudbright, and Ayr ; Aeron probably stands for modern Ayr ; Breatan has its name extant in Dum- bai-ton by the Clyde. Assembling among the hills by the source of the river Eden, which is only two or three miles from the source of the Swale, the Cymry seem to have marched down Swidedale towards the advancing Teutons, whom they en- countered at Cattraeth. A march of live-and-twenty miles along the valley of the Swale woidil bring the Cymry to Cattraeth, if that be Catterick, the Roman Cataractoneum. A tributary stream there flows into the Swale, and part of the fight is said to have been at the confluence of rivers. The churchyard of Catterick village is within an ancient camp, and near it are ancient burial-grounds. Cattraeth, then, we may perhaps identify with Catterick, about five miles from Richmond, in Yorkshire. The battle of Cattraeth began on a Tuesday, lasted for a week, and ended with great slaughter of the Britons, who fought desperately till they perished on the field. The warrior bard Aneurin was among the combatants, and a lament for the dead is ascribed to him that, imder the name of The Gododin, is the most im- portant fragment of what may represent the oldest Cymric literature. The stoiy of the battle runs in this fragment through a series of ninety-seven stanzas, each usually devoted to the celebration of some one of the many chiefs who fell. The ninety-seven stanzas record in various measures praise of ninety of the fallen Cymric chiefs. One of them was put into verse by Gi-ay, who had found literal translations in Evans's "Specimens of Welsh Poetry." I ha\e followed an edition of the Gododm, published in 1852, by the Rev. John Williams ab Ithel,' with a literal )»ro.se translation, in the following attempt to give metrical form to the successive staiizas as far as the twenty- first, which is the one known to modern readers, by Gray's version of it, as "The Death of Hoel." Here — since a version of the ninety-seven stanzas would still only I'epresent a fragment— I break ofl', that my o\\-n ruder attempt in the rest of the piece to rhyme the Gododin may have the advantage of a poet's close. THE GODODIN. A man in thought, a boy in form. He stoutly fought, and sought the stonn Of flashing war that thundered far. His courser lank and swift, thick-maned, Bore on his flank, as on he strained. The fight bro-n-n shield — as on he sped, With golden spiu-, in cloak of fui-, His hlue sword gleaming. Be there said No word of mine that does not hold thee dear ! Before thy youtli had tasted hiidal cheer The red Death was thy bride ! The ravens feed On thee yet straining to the front, to lead. Owain, the friend I loved, is dead '. Woe is it that on bim the ravens feed ! Wreathed, he led his rustic heroes ; In his home the friend of maidens, Poming out the mead before them. When the shout of war rang out, Spear-dipts were large on the front of his targe ; He gave no quarter, chased for slaughter, Swift to mow as gTass the foe, Uustaiped he disdained to return. Of a himdi-ed rustic heroes. Homeward to Ms coast of Mordei, To the wave-washed land that bore them, Madog saw but one retiuTi. Wreathed, hard-toiling, strength of many. Like au eagle swooping to us When allured to join our band. High upraised and bravo his banner ; Higher, braver, mood and manner ; Eagle-mind that feared not any ' These ai-e the first lines of the Cymric as given in the edition above cited ; — " Gredyf gwi- oed gwas Gwrhj-t am dias Meircli mwth uiyugvras A dau vordwyl megyrwas Ysgwyt ysgauyn Uedan Ar bedrein meiu vuan Kledyiiawr glas glau Ethy ear aphan Ny bi ef a vi Cas e rof a thi Gwell gwneif a thi Ar wawt dy uoli," &c. CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 570. Of the warriors trooping to us, Flocking from Gododin land. Manawyd, thou swift and fearless, By no foeman's spear delayed ; Foemen's tents tlu'ough thee are cheerless, None evade thy spearmen's raid. IV. Wreathed the leadur wolf came forth ; Amber rings liis temple twine, Amber worth a feast of wine. He quelled the strong of the hostile throng ; Though his shield waa shattered he shunned no roan. Mine would have been Venedut and the North, Said the heart of the son of YsgjTan. V. Wreathed was the leader who, armed for the bloody strife. Went to the battle-field noted of all. Chief in the foremost rank, fearlessly' spendi;ig life, Sweeping battalions down, groaning they fall. Foemen of Deivyr and foemen of Bryneich slain. Hundreds on huncU-eds in one little hour. Ever his bride-feast untasted must now remain ; Him now the wolves and the ravens devour. Mead in the hall, Hyveidd Hir, cost us high I Praise shall yet live for thee till om- song die 1 VI. To Gododin marched the heroes ; Gognaw laughed, Round their flag's they fiercely battled ; bore their- smarts ; Few the fleeting year^ when pleasure's cup they quaffed : Strokes of Gognaw, son of Botgad, shook men's hearts. Better penance is than laughter on the breath. When young and old, and strong and bold. Heroes march to meet the fated stroke of Death. To Gododin marched the heroes ; Gwanar laughed. As his shining troop went down adorned to kiU. Jest thou checkest with the gripe of thy sword-haft, — When, its blade, Death, thou wavest, we are still ! The wan-iors marched to Cattracth, fuU of words : Bright mead gave them pleasure, theii- bliss was their bane ; In serried array they rushed down on the swords With joyous outcry, — then was silence again. Better penance is than laughter on the breath. When young and old, and strong and bold. Heroes march to meet the fated stroke of Death. The warriors marched to Cattraeth, full of mead ; Drunken, but firm in array ; great the shame. But greater the valour no bard can defame. The war-dogs fought fiercely, red swords seemed to bleed, Flesh and soul I had slain thee myself, had I thought. Son of C'ian, my friend, that thy faith had been bought By a bride from the tribe of the Brj-neich ! But no ; He scorned to take dowry from hands of the foe. And I, all unhurt, lost a friend in the fight. Whom the wrath of a father felled down for the slight.' 1 Upon this verse, and the general sense of its context. Gray founded the opening of his Ode from the Welsh, " The Death of Heel :"— " Had I but the torrent's might "With headlong rage and wild affright The warriors marched to Cattraeth with the dawn ; They feared them who met them with martial uproar ; A host on a handful to battle were drawn. Broad mark for the lances that drenched them in gore. The shock of the battle, before the brave band Of the nobles who freekly obeyed his command, MjTiyddawg, Friend of Heroes, was bold to withstand. The warriors marched to Cattraeth with the da^wn ; The loved ones lamented in masterless tents ; A snare had the sweet yellow mead round them drawn. That dark year full often the minstrel laments ; Red Illumes, redder swords, broken blades, helmets cleft. Even those of the band that obeyed thy conunand, Mynyddawg, Fi-iend of Heroes, of heroes bereft. The warriors marched to Cattraeth with the day ; Base taunts shamed the greatest of battles. They cried. As their blades slew the baptized Gelorwydd, " Away With your kindr'ed the homeless, the dead, to abide ! For the Gem of the Baptized behold we provide — We, the host of Gododin — an unction of blood ; A last uuctiop is due ere the last fight is fought." Should the might of true chiefs not be mastered with thought ? XIII. The warrior marched to Cattraeth with the day ; In the stillness of night he had quaffed the white mead. He was wretched, though prophesied glory and sway Had winged his ambition. Were none there to lead To Cattraeth with a loftier hope in theii- speed. Secure in his boast, he would scatter the host, Bold standard in hand ; no other such band Went fi-om Eiddin as his, that would rescue the laud From the troops of the ravagers. Far from the sight Of home that was dear to him, ere he too perished, Tudvwlch Hii' slew the Saxons in seven days' fight. He owed not the freedom of life to his might, But dear is his memory where he was cherished. When Tudvwlch amain came that post to maintain- By the son of KUydd, the blood covered the plain. The waniors marched to Cattraeth with the dawn ; Their shields were no shelter ; jn shining array Upon Deira's squadrons hurl'd To rush and sweep them from the world. Too, too secure in youthfnl pride By them my friend, my Hoel, died, Great Clan's son : of Madoc old He ask'd no heaps of hoarded gold ; Alone in Nature's wealth array'd, He ask'd and had the lovely maid." But the sense of the original is far more vigorous. The son of Cian had married the daughter of one of the Bryneich. His maiTiage did not stay his feud with his wife's tribe. He repudiated her family, disdained to take her dowry, and was sought and slain in the battle by her insulted father. The rest of Gray's Ode is a snilicieutly close version of the twenty-first stanza of the Gododin. Gray closes it hke the true poet that he is; but the "diction" of the eighteenth century is answerable for his inflation of the plain words "wine and mead "into " Nectar that the bees produce. Or the grape's extatic juice." A.D. 570.] SHORTER POEMS. They sought blood. On tlicir fi-ont tlie war thundered, its dm Crashed resounding from targets. 'W'lien lie woidd repay The fickle and base for their fealty withdi-awn, The mailed chief of the Mordei his high hand could slay ; The homage they owed him liis iron ooiild win ; For a host before Erthai would flinch in disniav. "Wlien the bards tell the tale of the fight at Cattraeth, The bereaved ones will sigh ,as they sighed through the years Of the moui'ning for warriors gone to their death, For lands left without leadei's to nun and tears. Tlie fair baud of his sons on his bier bore afar Ciodebog, whose sword ploughed tlie long fiuTows of war. And shall C'yvwlch the Tall, and Tudvwlch, now no more Quaft' sweet mead under torches 'i Just fate we deplore : For the sweetness of mead, In the day of our need. Is our bitterness ; blunts all our amis for the strife ; Is a friend to the hp and a foe to the life. In other days he frowned on Eching fort, To him the young and bold pressed ever near ; In other days on Bludwe he would sport, While Ms glad horn for Mordei made good cheer. In other days he blended mead and ale ; In other days piu'ple and gold he wore ; In other days Gwarthlev — " the Voice of Blame" — Hero deser'ving of a truer name — Had stall-fed steeds, who safely, swiftly bore Tlieii' master out of peril. These now fail. In other days he turned the ebbing tide. And bade the flood of war sweep high, spread wide. XVII. Light of lights — the sun, Leader of the day, First to rise and run His appointed way. Crowned with many a ray, Seeks the British skj' ; Sees the flight's dismay. Sees the Briton fly. The horn in Eiddin's liall Had sparkled with the wine, And thither, at the call To drink and be dirine, He went, to share the feast Of reapers, wine and mead ; He drank and so increased His daiing for wild deed. The reapers sang of war That lifts its sliining wings, Its shining wings of fire. Its shields that flutter far. The bards too sang of war, Of plumed and crested war ; The song rose ever higher. Not a shield Escapes the shock. To the field They fiercely flock, There to fall. But of all ^\Tio struck on giant Gwrveling, Whom he would he struck again. All he struck in grave were lain Ere the bearers came to bring To his grave stout Gwr\'eling. XVIII. These gathered from the lauds around : Three chiefs from the Novantine ground ; Five times five hunditd men, embattled bands, Thi-ee times three hundred levied from their lands ; Three huncb'cd men of battle, armed in gold, From Eiddin ; then three cuirasscd hosts enrolled By tliree kings golden-chained ; three chiefs beside With whom three hunib'ed marclied in equal pride ; Three of like mark, and jealous each of each, Fierce in attack and tb-eadful in the breach. Would strike a Hon dead ; with gold the}- shone. Thi'ee kings came from the Brython, Cj-nrig one, And C\iion and Cynrain from Aeron, To breast the darts the sidlcn Deivj-r Ihrow. Better than Cynon came from Brython none, He proved a deadly serpent to the foe. I di-ank the Mordei's ■wine and mead ; Spears were many, men prepared For the banquet, sadly shared. The solemn feast where ea*les feed. When C'ydywal to battle sped. In the green dawn, he raised a shout Triumphant over many dead. Upon the field were strown about The shields he splintered, tearing spears Hewn and cast down. His were no fears ; Son of the star-wise Syvno, he Itnew that his death that day should be By spear or bow, not by sword-blade. And not a sword his havoc stayed Or could against his sword a strife sustain. He gave his own life, took a host ; Blaen Gwj-nedd knew his ancient boast Of the brave toilers piled whom he had slain. I di-ank the Mordei's wine and mead, I di-ank, and now for that I bleed. And j-ield me to the stroke of pain With yearning throb of high disdain. That upward pants to strike again. Thee too the sword that slays me slays. '\\nien danger threatens us, the days Of evil-doing quail the hand : Had we withstood we could withstand. Presynt was bold, through war's alarm He thi'ust his way with doughty aiTU. XXI. To Cattraeth's vale in glittering row Twice two hundred warriors go ; Every warrior's manly neck Chains of regal honoiu' dock, Wreathed in many a golden link : From the golden cup they di-ink Nectar that the bees produce, Or the grajie's extatic juice. Flu.sh'd witli mirth and hope they burn : But none from Cattraeth's vale rctum, CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 670 Save Aeron brave and Conan strong (Biu-sting through the bloody throng), And I, tlie meanest of them all, That live to weep, and sing their fall. CHAPTER II. The First English. — a.d. 570 to a.d. 1066. The Eeadbr. From a Tldrtcenth Century MS. in the British Museum.- fol. 185 (at back). 'Arundel, 91, First English Initiiil.i I CANDINAVIAN and Teutonic, tlie incoming population, allied I in race as closely as the Gael and Cymry, were immigrant from all lands on the other side of the sea opposite Eastern Britain. <^ne of those triljes, who were to blend with one another and with the Celts whom they at first partly displaced, was that which gave after- wards its name to the united people. By this name the people, in later time styled Anglo-Saxons, called themselves. They were the English folk ; the language proper to them, formed hei'e by a fusion of dialects and cultivated by their wTiters as the language of the country, they called English, although in later days some have been taught to call it Anglo-Saxon. It was our first English ; and by that name of First English we can simply and suffi- ciently distinguish it from English of any later time. Fiivst English, so developed, was watched over by scholars in the monasteries, and remained for about ' From the MS. of C(eilmon's Pni-ap?irose in the Bodleian Library. Oxford. C-jpied from the fac-similea of the illuminations in the CEDdmon MS. published by the Antiqutirian Society. four centuries a fixed language, with some such variety of gender and inflexion as we may still find in modern German. All aptitude for work in fellowship, and a religious sense of duty, wei'e the qualities by which especially these races became builders of the rising jiower of the country. Except where there could be a dash of Celtic blood in his family, thero was no vivacity of genius in a First English poet. The first and best of these poets, Credmon, belonged to a corner of Yorkshire — Whitby — where the two races lived in contact with each other. Until the fourteenth century — Ijy which time men of all races in the land had been drawn together in London and elsewhere, and there was no longer a very definite line of division — not one man arose in this country who showed much quickness of fancy or any bold origi- nality of thought, except in the north or west of England, along the line of contact between Celt and Teuton, where men and women of the two races were fellow-citizens, and intermarried. But throughout the land good men there were in jilenty, studious men, hard workers, who lived lives of duty for the love of God, and strenuously sought to find and uphold the right, find and cast out the wrong. Cd'dmon's Para- phrase of Bible story, written a.d. 670 — 680, will have its place in that section of our Library which is designed to illustrate the course of English religious thought. The heroic strain known by the name of its hero, Beoundf, hardly less ancient, is in more than. six thousand lines, and cannot therefore be included among shorter poems. Nearly all the rest of the First English poetry deals -w-ith the life of Christ, or with legends of saints, or is other^vise directly religious in its nature. There is a famous collection of it known as the Exeter Book, given by Bishop Leofric, between A.D. 1046 and 1073, to the library of Exeter Cathe- dral, of which it is still one of the treasures. Another collection is known as the VerceUi Book, because it was discovered in 18i23 in a monastery at Vercelli, in the Milanese. First English poetry is without syllabic quantity or rhyme or assonance, but with alliteration ; that is to say, in two successive short lines, three chief words — two in the first line and one in the other — are made to begm with the same letter. If one of these words has a prefix, the alliteration is ^\dth the first letter of the root-word, not that of the prefix. When the chief words begin wth vowels the rule is reversed, and the vowels difl'er. The following short poem from the Exeter Book I have endeavoured to put into modern English with alliteration according to the First English method of versification. THE FORTUNES OF MEN. FuU often it falls out. By Fortune from God, That a man and a maiden In this world may marry, Find cheer in the child Whom they care for and cherish. Tenderly tend it. Until the time comes. Beyond the first j^ears, When the young limbs increasing. TO A.D. 1066,] SHORTER POEMS. The New-born Child. Fiom part of ike Hhistration of the liirth of Aid in the MS. of Cirdmoil, i-uhlished hj the Antiquarian Society. Grown firm with life's fulness, Ai'e formed for tlieir work. Fond father and mother, So guide it and feed it, Give gifts to it, clothe it : God only can know What lot to its latter days Life has to bring. To some that make music In hfe's morning hour Pining days are appointed Of plaint at the close. One the wild wolf shall eat. Hoary haunter of wastes ; His mother shall mourn The small strength of a man. One sh.all sharp hunger slay ; One shall the storms heat do^vn ; One he destroyed by darts, Destroyed by Darts. From a First Eiitilish MS,— Harleiaa, 603, fol. 2. One die in war. One shall live losing The light of his eyes. Feel hhndly with fingers ; And one, lame of foot, "With sinew-womitl wearily Wasteth away. Musing and mourning, With death in his mind. One, failing feathers. Shall fall from the height Of the tall forest tree : Yet he trips as though flying, Plays proudly in air Till he reaches the point Where the woodgrowth is weak ; Life then whirls in his brain. Bereft of his reason He sinks to the root. Falls flat on tlie groiind, His Ufe fleeting away. Afoot on the far- ways. His food in Ilia hand, One shall go grieying. And great bo liis need. Press dew on the paths Of the pci-ilous lands WHiere the stranger may strike, Wliere Uye none to sustain. All shun the desolate For being sad. In Grasp of the Gallow,s. From a First English iHS.— Cotton. CluuOius, B. IV., fol. GO, One the great gallows shall Have in its grasp. Strained in stark agony Till the soul's stay, The bone-house, is bloodily All broken up ; When the har.sh raven hacks Eyes from the lirad. The sallow-coated slits The soulless man. 10 CASSELL'S LIBRART OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad 870 Nor can he shield from shame, Scare with his hands, , Off from their eager feast Prowlers of air. Lost is his life to him, No breath is left, Bleached on the gallows-heam Bides he his doom ; Cold death-mists close round him Called the Accursed. One shall Imra in the halo-fire. The bright cruel flame Shall devour the man destined To die in its maw ; In the red raging glow, Quick the rending of life ; The woman shall wail And shall weep when she sees Her boy, her beloved one. Laid over the brands. One shall die by the dagger. In wrath, drenched with ale, Wild through wine, on the mead liench. Too s\vift with his words ; Through the hand that brings beer, Through the gay boon companion. His mouth has no measure, His mood no restraint ; Too lightly his hfe ShaU the -n-retched one lose. Undergo the great ill. Be left empty of joy. "WTien they speak of him slain By the sweetness of mead. His comrades shall call him One killed by himself. To one God shall grant To get through in his youth All the days of distress. That, his sorrow dispersed. His old age becomes easy Wilh use of his goods. His life becomes lucky And gladdened ^^-ith love. His caskets and mead-cups As costly and full As any can earn To bestow on liis own. So does God diversely Deal out to men Their lots over earth ; For so He, the .Umighty Lord, "Will appoint each his portion, rro%-ide each his share. y A, PLOrnHIMO. From a First EvriU.!h M.S.— Cottou. Juliu?. A. VI,, fol. 3. r^ M.. Some have good hap. And some hard days of toil ; Some glad glow of youth. And some glory in war, Strength in the strife ; Some sling the stone, some shoot, Winged Arrows. Harleian, 613, fol. 64 (part of a sketch). Far shines the fame ; Some fling the dice with .skill, Quick at the bright boanl ; Some grow wise in books. Rare gift for goldsmith's work Is given to one, He will make hard and handsome The arms of a high king Of Britain, whose boimty Repays with broad lands, A much-reUshed requital. And one shall rejoice \\Tio has charge from a chief. And makes cheer on the bench With a crowd of brave comrades In martial carouse. Cakott^e. Harleian, SOS, fol. 51, part of u sketch. TO A.D. 1066.] SHORTER POEMS. 11 One shall handle the harp, At the feet of his hero Sit and win wealth From the will of his lord ; Still quickly contriving The throb of the cords, The nail nimblj- makes music, Awakes a glad noise, The Harper. Harleian, 6J3, fol. 55, part . f a sketch. While the heart of the harper Throbs, hurried by zeal. One shall find how fierce wild biids, How falcons are tamed, Have the hawk on the hand, Till the rough haggard learns To be social, he sets Silver ring.s on his feet. And feeds thus in fetters The feather-proud bird ; The air-flyer flutters Confined to a perch. Till the Welsh bird is wrought. By what's woni and what's done, To be meek with the master Mlio gives him his meat, And hold to the hands Of the dwellers in homes. So the good God of each of us Governs and shapes. Above this our earth. The employments of men ; Divides and disposes, And deals out to each Of his priWleged people A portion in life. Then to God let each gratefully Give now his thanks. For his manifold mercies Apportioned to man. CHAPTER III. Transition English : from the Conquest to Chaucer. — a.d. 1066 to a.d. 1352. After the Concjuest there was no verse of any note ill Transition English until the reign of John. But English minds were at work in English fashion, though the language of theii- verse and prose was chiefly Latin, pai-tly French. Liveliest of the Latin poems is the BriineUus of Nigel Wu-eker, a pre- centor in the Benedictine monastery at Canterbury. It was produced in Henry II. 's reign, and is a re- forming Churchman's satire upon greed, hypocrisy, and ignorance, then common among too many of his brethren. Brunellus, the hero of the poem, is an ass who goes the round of the religious orders, and gets also some experience of univereity life. Nigel Wireker's Brunellus is a piece of about 3,800 lines, and therefore not shoit enough to be completely translated for this section of our Library ; but the illustration of our Longer Poems, in a later section, ■m\\ mclude an account of its plan, with attempt at a metrical version of some characteristic passages. The reign of Heniy II. (11.54 — 1189) was a time of great energy of thought in Europe. The Flemish Reinaert began, in 11 50, the career of Reiueke Fuchs (Reynard the Fox), in popular literatiu'e. It was a poem in which animals were the actors, but the satire was all levelled from the side of the people against tyrannies and corruptions that pro- voked a cry for reform. The old national poem of Germany, the NibchuujenlieJ , was shaping itself in those days. The old Spanish poem of TJie Cid came also into life towards the close of that busy twelfth century. The Troubadours were singing in the south of Europe, and Germany had like music from the Suabian Minnesimjcrs. In 1147, in the reign of Stephen, a spring of romance had broken out fi'om among the dryness of chronicle-writmg in the fabulous Latin C/ironicle of Geoffrey of Monmouth, called the Histoi-y of the Britons; meaning by Britons the Cj^mry, for whom he fonnd a wondrous line of kings. This brought among us again King Arthur, of whom till then chiefly the Bretons of France had preserved the memory. The great ]iopularity of Geoftrey of Monmouth's chronicle, and the new cvirrency given by it to stories of King Arthur, were the chief incidents in our literature at the beginning of the reign of Hemy. Geoffrey of Monmouth's Latin chronicle was abridged, and was contmued in Latm jtrose ; was tmned into French verse by Gaimar ; and again tui-ned into French verse, with much addition to the details about King Arthur, by Wace, when the chronicle that set so many pens at work was still but eight years old. Arthurian I'omance in these days of its first expansion was soon rich in tales of love — animal love — and war. Then Walter Map, a cha])lain to King Henry II., and the Englishman of greatest genius in Henry's reign, a man who united li^■ely wit with a profound religious earnestness, blended Arthurian romance with the legend of Joseph of Ai'imathea and the Holy Graal visible only to the pure in heart. Taking the 12 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURK. [a.d. 1170 Holy Graal as a symbol of the mysteries of God, lie opened new spiritual depths among tales of the animal life of man, and elevated Arthur to the place he has since held as the mj-thical hero of an essen- tially religious people. Walter Map — who called the Welsh his countrymen, England " our mother " — was bom about the year 11-13, and after studies in the University of Paris, became attached to the coiu-t of otu- Henry II., under whom he became a canon of St. Paul's and a precentor of Lincoln. He held also the living of Westbury in Gloueestershii'e. Map has been called, l)y misunderstanding of the sense of some of his lines, the jovial archdeacon ; but he did not become an archdeacon till the year 1196, in the reign of Richard I., when his work as a writer was done. He then became Archdeacon of Oxford, and after that date nothing is known of him. His time of energy was in the reign of Henry II. One part of the work of Walter Map, Ijy which he souglit to make his wit serve for the advancement of men to a moi-e spiritual life, was the invention of a Bishop Golias, who stood for all fleshly corruptions of the Church. In the name of Golias, Map cu-culated Latin poems of his own that set others to work on the same form of satii-e, and thus the battle against gi'owing corruptions in the Church was aided in Henry II. 's days — days of the struggle between Henry and Becket — by a force of light artillery in the Golias poems, of which the following was one of the most famous. The translation here given was made in the Elizabethan time. Mr. Thomas Wright, an active student of our early literature, who has done much to e;xtend the knowledge that has been a life-long source of pleasure to himself, copied it from a Harleian MS., and first printed it (of course, retaining the old spelling, here imnecessary) in an appendbc to a volume of " The Latin Poems com- monly attributed to Walter Mapes," edited by him for the Camden Society iii 1811. Although tJolias is named in the title, he does not in this poem speak in his own person, but stands generally for that advancing evU against which good Cliurchnien, clergy and laity alike, were uttering their protest. The satii-e is sweeping, but the satu-ist is himself one of the clergy. The worst hinderers and the best helpei-s of the advance of man to a higher life, were among the men who were alike sworn servants of the Temple. THE APOCALYPSE OF GOLIAS.' WHien that the shining sun from Taurus down had sent His fiery burning darts and beams so hot of kind. Into the woods anon and shadows dark I went. There for to take the air aud pleasant western wind. ' These ai-e the fii-st liues of the original. May is the month of the sun in T..iu"us : — " A Taui'o torrida lampade Cynthii Fundeute jacula feiTentis i-adii, Umbrosas uemoris latebras adii, Explorans gratiam levis Favonii. *' .Slstivffi mQdio diei tempore Frondosa reculxms Jovis sub arbore, Astantis video formam Pyth;igorBe : Deus sit, nescio, utrum in coi^ore.'* A Bishop. from a Thirteenth Century MS in ihc British Museum.— Aiundel 91, fol. 85. And as I lay me down under an oaken tree. About the mid-time just, even of the summer's day, Pythagoras his shape methought that I did see, But that it was his corpse,- God wot, I cannot say. Pythagoras his shape indeed I did behold. With divers kinds of art i-painted well about ; But yet this sight, God wot, by me cannot' he told \NTiether it were in deed, in body, or without. Upon his forehead fail- Astrology did slune. And Grammar stood along upon his teeth arow. More faii-ly Rhetoric bloomed upon his tongue's confine,' And in his trembling lips did ai-t of Logic flow. And in his fingers eke did Arithmetic lie, Within Iris hollow pidse did Music finely play, And then in both his eyne stood pale Geometrie : Thus each one of these arts in his own place did stay. In reason is contained morall phUusophie, And then upon his back all hanihcrafts were writ ; At length much like a book imfolded his bodie, And did disclose his hand, and bade me look in it. And then he did shew forth his right hand's secrets clear, AMiich I beheld right well, and after gan to read ; With letters black as ink, thus found I written there, " I vriW. thee lead the way. To follow me make speed." 3 Ccrpse — French, corps, the body — not necessai-ily, as now, the dead body. Pythagoras was looked upon as the founder of knowledge in its seven divisions, namely, the Tiivinm of Ethics — Grammar, Rhetoric, Logic ; and the Quadi'ivium of Physics— Arithmetic, Geometry, Music, and Astrology or Astronomy. They all led, from Grammar- upward, by several stages to Theology. The Pythagoras of this vision is repre- sented with Astrology, highest of the seven sciences, upon his fore- head ; then are placed on his teeth, tongue, and lips the sciences that foi-m the Tririvuu, and next follow the remaining three of the Quadri- vium, which ai-e placed in fingers, aa*teries, and eyes. 3 " Aud Rhetoric did spring within liis hollow eyne," says, by over- sight, the Elizabethan translator ; but that is the place of Geometry, and Map gave Rhetoric to the tongue : " In lingua pulcrius vemat rhetorica." TO A.r. I1P9. SHORTER rOEMS. 13 And forth he passed then, and after followed I, Into another world anon both we two fell, WTiere many wondrous things and strange I did espy, . And people mo thereto than any man can tell. And whiles I stood in doubt what all this folk might he, Upon their foreheads all I cast mine cyue anon, And there I found their names, which I mif,'ht clearly sec, As it had been in lead, or else in hard flint stone. Then s;iw 1 Priscian ' first, beating his scholar's hanil, And Aristotle eke against the air did fight. But Tullius his words with cunning smoothly scanned. And Ptolemy upon the stars did set his sight. Boetius was there, and did his number tell, And Euclid measm-cd the space of place hard by^, Pythagoras likewise Ms hammer hamlled well, By sound whereof the notes of music he did try. There saw I Lucan eke, of warlike writers chief. And Virgil there did shape the small bees of the ah', And Ovid with his tales to many was relief, Persius his taunts and satires did not spare. By Statins he stood, to him, in other ways, Whose labour painted Ufe, unequal in renown ; There also Terence danced, who gave the people plays, Hippocrates with wormwood dosed the coimtry clown. WliUes I of iiU this rout the gestures did espy An angel came to me with countenance full clear. And said to me, " Behold, and look into the sky, And thou shalt see therera what shortly shall appear." Upon the sky anon my sight I quickly bent. And by and by I fell into a sudden trance. And all along the air was man-ellously hent,'- But yet at length I was set in the heaven's entrance. But such a sudden flash of lightning did appear, That it bereft from me the sight of both nune ej-ne. Then did the angel say, that stood fast by me there, " Stand still, and thou shalt see what John before hath seen.' ^ The persons here named only personify human intelligence by re- presenting the several parts of tlie Trivinm and Quadrivium. Priscian stands for Grammar, with which Ms name was so well identiiied that talkinj^ bad fpraramar was called " breaking Priscian's head." Aris- totle stands for Loffic ; TuUy or Cicero for Rhetoric ; Ptolemy for Astronomy ; Boetins for Arithmetic ; Euclid for Geometry ; and Pythagoras for Music. Boetius, who stands for Arithmetic, was said to have constructed by his mathematical skill mechanical figures that blew trumpets, oxen that lowed, and birds that s.\ng. He is praised for his skill in a letter to him among tbe epistles of Cassiodorus, who lived a.d. iGS — 568. When these seven representatives of human intellect have been named there is added a group of famous poets, among whom Vii'gil is associated with tbe traditions of liim as pn enchanter. Map says be saw " formantem tereas muscas Virgiliaim," Virgil making brazen flies. He was said to have tised over a gate of Naples a brazen fly that kept all flies out of the city. The Elizal>ethan translator seems to have imagined a reference to Virgil's account of the management of bees in the fourth book of the Georgics. I have iwlded a transl-ation of tbe verse that included Staiius, Terence, and Hippocrates, which the author of the above version accidentally passed over. * Hent, taken. First English, " heutan," to pursue, seize, or take. So Spenser .- — *' Thus when Sir Guyon with bis faithful guide Had with due rites and dolorous lament The end of their sa/1 tra redy up'yM, The little babe up in his arms he bent." fne'fit QafCTie, Il.-ii. 1. And as I stood thus still, all in a doubt and fear, One thundcr( il in the air, and air mcthoughl it was, Like to a thund'riiig wlu-cl right terrible to hear. Or like a trunqict shrill of horn or else of brass. And after that this sound had pierced the air eaw I A goocUy personage, that held in his right hand Seven candlesticks by tale,* and eke seven stars thereby ; And then the .Vngel said, " Mark well, and understand. " These candlesticks thou seest are churches seven," said he, " And Bishops ben the stars; but all the same this day. The shining light of grace whereby all men should see. Under a bushel hide and keep out of the way." Anl when he had thus done, lie did liiing out a book, WTiich book had titles seven, and seven seals sealed well, And with a steadfast eye bade me therein to look. And see thereby what I to all the world should tell. Of Bishops' life and trade this book hath right good skill. As by the seals thereof more plainly doth appear. For in the inner part is hid all that is ill, But to the outward shew all goodly things appear. Anon a certain power there was that opened clear The foremost chapter's seal, and then I did espy Four beasts, whose shape each one unlike to other were. But nothing yet at all in gesture contrary. The fir.st of these four beasts a Lion seemed to be, The second like a Calf, the third an Eagle stout. The fourth was like a Man ; and they had wings to fly, And full of eyne they were, and turned like wheels about. And when unclosed was the first seal's knot anon, And I perused weU the chapter thorough dear. And after that I bent my whole sight thereupon, A\Tiereof the title was as here it may appear. The Lion is the Pope that useth to devour. And lay'th his books to pledge, and thirsteth after gold. And doth regard the mark,'' but Saint Mark dishonour, And while he sails aloft on coin takes anchor hold. Also the Bishop is the Calf that we di The Elizatetliaii translator has darkly interpreted the latter part of Map's verse : — *' Hi sunt quos retiuens mundus inliomiit ; A qitonim facie terra contremuit ; Quos, dum in cotibus Rhodope genuit, Ad onmes scelerum moUis exacuit." In Virgil's eighth eclogue Damon says, " Now I know what love is. Isuiarus, or Rhodope, or the remotest Garamantes. produced him on rugged cliffs, a boy not of our race nor of our blood. Begin with me. my pipe, Majnalian strains. Sav.\ge love tixuglit the mother [Medea] to imbrue her hands in the blood of her own children," &c. Ismarus and Rhodope were two wild mountains of Tlirace ; the Gara- mantes savage Libyans. So the officials are said to be bred like the savage love, among the cliffs of Rhodope. that sharpened them for all impulses to impious deeds. Missing Map's allusion, the translator seems to have thought that cliffs by which anything was sharpened must be whetstones 3 Broofc, use ; from First Enrrlish " brucin," to use, eat. enjoy, bear. In Shakespeare, the sense is genemlly " to bear or endure." as in Lucroce — " A woeful hostess brooks not merry guests." But there He is more bold to sin because he hears in Lent The people's grievous crimes and all their sins at large, And all the faults for which they ought for to be shent, And thus he counts his own to be of smallest charge. [IG lines omitted.] And then a lady fair from Heaven herself did shew, With goodly countenance, as fresh as any rose ; And when she touched the book with hand as white as snow, I might perceive right well the si.\th seal did disclose. This chapter was all wn-it with figures .short and fine, And eke with letters small couched as in a press. Having a narrow gloss drawn between every line. And therein was contained the Clergy's great excess. For (.b'owsy slothfulncss and swelling })ride likewise, And all uncleanly lusts, and fervent vainglorie, L'nfitting pleasm'e eke and filthy acts arise Out of the shameful rout of Clergy's companye. The parson doth commit the souls of all our sheep Into the \'icar's hands, with spiritual power; But to himself the rents and profits he doth keep, ^^^lich boldly without fear he lets not to dcvoiu-. He doth his wand'riug soul in many parts divide, And doth ten churches hold or moe within his hands ; Anil yet he cannot well in each of these abide, IMuch like an accident, that in no case still stands.^ And higher is the roof advanced of his hall Than is AlUiallows Church, made high with hands of men, In value eke much more did cost his wench's pall Than all th' attire is worth that covereth altars ten. He maketh toils'* and parks and buildings cimninglie. And coins and other toys and rings to wear on hand. And all this he doth make of God's patrimonie. Whom he sees at his door, and lets him naked stand. The vicar rules the souls committed to his charge, Even as he doth his own. for to the end he may More freely other lose, he lets his own at large i'irst to be lost, and thus to mischief leads the way. Thus aU enormity doth from the Clergy rise ; And when they ought on God to set their mind and care, They meddle with affairs and forbidden merchai.d se, And occupy themselves with much unhonest ware. At bidding of his lord this priest the seas doth pass ; And that priest haunteth fairs, whom no man ought to trust ; Another go'th to plough as doth the ox or ass ; And thus their order break according to their lust. is more of the sense of use and enjoyment in the word as it occurs in Aumerle's question to Rioliard II. I Act iii. sc. 2) : *' How brooks your grace the air After your late tossing on the breaking seas ? " 3 It is as by accident tliat he is iiresent or absent in any one of his places of duty—" dum iidest et abest semper ut accidens." * Enclosures for wild animals—" facit indagines et eediticia." — " God's p.atrimony,'' the poor. 16 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITEEATURE. [a d. 1189 And, like a gentleman, this priest will not be polled ; Another to be called a clerk doth take great shame ; The third doth childi-en choose, when he his books hath sold ; Among the laymen thus the Clergy lose theii- name. And after came, with mnd, of Ethiops a rout, And from a limy pit, full black and foid to see, And in an order long they ranged round about. And seven times they cried, Tu autem, Doiniiie .' Then at the feai-ful noise of this huge hideous cry, Mv guide began to shake and tremble all for fear, And like a mazed corpse for fright nigh dead stood I, Until I plainly saw the seventh seal to appear. I saw the works and trade of Abbots there each one Of whom theii- flock to lead to hell not one doth miss. In cloister moving aye, in chamber still as stone, But in the chapter house much like ague is. All worldly pomp these men do utterly despise. Which may be proved well by their still silent spiiit. And by their contrite heart, and water from their eyes. And by their shaving vile, and habit like to it. But wher' their garments ben both foul and also bare, All idle sport in them with less suspect may be, And though uncomely be the shaving of their beard, Unto the diiukiug pot their face is much more free. And though with contrite heart they use much for to weep, Yet laugh they on the cup and smilingly they beck ; And though with sOent breath they can theii- tongue in keep, With finger they can point and speak reproach and check. At dinner when they sit, to which they go apace. Their jaws are very swift, their teeth much pain do take, Ulieir throat an open grave, their stomach in like case A foaming whirlpool is, each finger is a cake. And when the Abbot doth among his brethren sup, Then tossed are the cups with quaffing to and fro. And then with both his hands the wine he holdeth up, And with a thund'ring voice these words he doth outblow: " how much glorious is the Lordes lamp so bright, The cup in strong man's hand that makes men di'unk I mean ! O Bacchus, God of wine ! Oiu- convent guide aright, Witli fruit of David's stock lo wash us throughly clean I" And after this the cup he taketh from the bread. And cries aloud, " Ho! siis, can you as well as I Drink this cup in his kind that I lift to my lu^ad r " They answer, " Yea, we can," then go to by-and-by. And lest that any o:ie should keep with him the cup TUl he had drunk but half , and so might rise thereby Among them some del)ate and stiife, they diink all up. And thus they jily the jwt, and quaffing quietly. And then they make a law to which each one must stand. That nothing shall be left within the cup to spiU, And thus, without the rest of belly or of hand, They di-aw one vessel out and then one other fiU. Then of a monk a right demoniac is made. And every monk doth chat and jangle with his brother As popinjay or pie. the which are taught this trade By fiUing of their gorge, tc speak to one another. Their order to transgress they have but small remorse, By fraud and perjui'v, by misreport and spite, By greediness of mind, withholding things by force. By filling of their paunches, and by fleshly foul delight. Worse than a monk there is no fiend nor sprite in hell. Nothing so covetous nor more strange to be known ; For if you give him auglit, he may possess it well; But if you ask him aught, then nothing is his own. And if he dine, he must no words nor talking make Lest that his tongue do let ' his teeth to chew his meat ; And if he think, he must needs sit his di-aught to take. Lest that his foot do fail, liis belly is so gi-eat. [4 lines omitted.] And after this my guide fast with his hands me hent, AMion I had all perused and scene tilings at full. And with his lingers four my head in sunder rent. Dissolving in foiu- jiarts the compass of my .skull. And then he took a straw that was both hard and dry, Because I should not see those mysteries in vain. And in my noddle fast he set it tenderly. And all that I had seen he wrote it in my lirain. And then I was caught up even to the third sky, Advanced in the tops of clouds above man's sight, ^^^lere 1 a secret saw, and wondrous mystery, The which may not be told to any li\-ing wight. Before the liighest Judge in council brought was I, ^^^lere many hundreds were, and many thousands eke, And there the secrets deep of God I did espy. The which no mind of man is able out to seek. '\^'^len these sights seen had I, I waxed hungrie anon. The nobles then that were come to that counsel great Brought me of poppy bread a loaf to feed upon, ^■Vnd diink of Lethe's flood my bread therewith to eat. And when I had myself well fed with poppy bread. And with my wretched lips this drink had tasted well, The council of the Gods was quite out of my head. And of this secret sight not one whit could I tell. Then like a Cato third down from the sky I fell, No news to bring from thence, nor secrets to declare ; But I can shew you all, and certainly can tell '\\Tiat my fellow did wTite upon my nodiUe bare. Oh I what tales could I tell, how strange to hear and see. Of things that ben above, and he;ivenly state and trade, If that subtile supper the poppy made to me The printings of my head had not so slipi]ie made ! ' 1 Here let means hinder. From First English "Iffi'tan," to let, suifer, hinder. The word lias the same root as " late." To be late or delay is hindrance for the person who is late, but sufferance for him who by delay of opposition is left free to do as he will. '^ These are the two last verses in the onginil : — ** De ccelo cecidi ut Cato tertius. Nee summi venio secreti nuncius, Sed mens mihi quod inscripsit socius, Hoc vobis dieere possum fidelius. ** O qmnta dicerem et quam miriiica De rebus superis et sorte coeliea, Nisi p'lpaveiis ccEua sophistica Mentis vestigia fecissot lubrioa ! " TO A.U. 13 JO ] SHORTER POEMS. 17 In the I'eign of King John we begin to have many poems written in the languture narrative of " Genesis and Exodus," produced about the year 12.30, in East Midland dialect. French romances, as of " King Horn " and of " King Alexander," were at the same time made English ; and there were rhymed Homilies, Creeds, Paternosters, Joys of the Virgin. Also there was a Bestiary which followeil an ancient fashion of the Church in turning ((ualities of animals (mostly imagined qualities) into religioiis allegory. EoVicrt, a monk of the aliliey of Gloucester, rhymed, at the end of the thirteenth century, a " Chronicle of English History " from the siege of Troy to the death of Henry III. in 1272. An English version of the "Lay of Havelok the Dane" was made about the year 1280. A version of the Psalms, known as the "Northumbrian Psalter," was made about the same time ; and the south of England produced a collection of ])roverbs, each introduced by a rlijiuing stanza, known as the " Proverlis of Hendyng." In earlier time English proveibs had been fathered on King Alfred. Their new father is called in an ojiening stanza " Marcolve's son," but Hendyng seems to have been only a name given U an imaginary proverb-maker. So the old French proverbs were fathered on " li Vilains," — " Ce dit 11 Vilains," answering to the " Quoth Hendyng" of the English rhymes. Hendyng may have liad Marcolph given to him for a father because in an old popular poem of the Middle Ages, " Salomo and Marcoljih," Marcolph represents tlie homely wisdom of the people in communion with the wisdom of the wise. As for tlie name Hend3'ng itself, I believe that it suggests only the wisdom of age and experience, and is one of the vernacular words drav\m from the Celtic part of our population, for Henddyn means in Welsh " an aged person," I translate a few of these sayings into modern English before giving their original form to represent the manner of the PROVERBS OF HENDYNG. [Wise man's words are ■n-ell kept in : For he ■will no song begin Ere he have tuned his pipe. The fool's a fool, and that is seen ; For he will speak words while they're green Sooner than they are ripe. " The fool's bolt is soon shot ; " Quoth Hendyng.] Wis men holt is wordes ynne ; For he nul no gle byg\-nne Ere he have tempred is pype. Sot is sot,' ant that is sene ; For he wol speke wordes gi'ene Er then hue huen rype. " Sottes bolt is sone shote ;" Quoth Hendyng. [Xever let thy foeman hear Of shame or pain thou hast to hear, Of thy woe or troulile. If he can he'll find a way. Working at it night and day. Every grief to double. " Tell thou never thy foe that thy foot aehelh ;" Quoth Hendj-ng.] - S-it is still French for a fool or stupid persou. It meant the sime in First English. Zot still means a fool or stupid person also 18 CASSELL'S LIBEAKY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [*.D. 1250 Tell Ihou nerer thy fo-mon Sliomc ne teone' lliat the is on, Thi care ne thy wo : For he wol fonde, yef he may, Both by nyhie.3 ant by day, Of on to make two. "Tel thou never thy fo that thy fot aketh;" Quoth Hend}-ng. [Hast of bread and ale no lack. Put not all in thine own sack. But scatter some about. Art thou free with thine own meals, Where another his meat deals Go'st thou not without. " Better apple gi'cn nor eaten;" Quoth Hendyng.] Yef thou havcst bred ant ale. No put thou nout al in thy male,' Thou del it sum aboute. Be thou fro of thy meelei!, AVher so me cny mete deles, Gest thou nout withoute. " Betere is appel y-geye^ then y-ete ; " Quoth Hendyng. [Art, thou rich, of much account, Let thy mood not rashly mount. And grow not over wild ; But bear thee faii'ly every way. That so thy blessing with theo stay, And be thou meek and mild. " "When the cup is full, carry it even ;" Quoth Hendyng.] Yef thou art riche ant wel y-told, No be thou notht tharefore to bold, Ne wax thou nout to wilde ; Ah ber the foyre-" in al thj-ng. Ant thou might habbe blessj-ng. Ant be mekc ant mylde. " When the coppe is foUest, thenne ber hire feyrest ; Quoth Hendyng. in Dutch. In modem English the word is applied only to one who makes himself stupid t>y drinking. ' Tconc. First English, " teona," reproach, injury, vrvong, vexation, from " fynau," to incense or vex, allied to"t3ndiiu," or "tendan," to set on iire : whence our word (indcr. Tliero was the old English form, tccn, for soitow or vexation, used by Shakespeare in " Love's Labour's Lost " (Act iv. sc. 3), "Romeo and Juliet" (Act i. sc. 3), " The Tempest" (Act i. sc. 2), " Eichard III." (Act iv. sc. 1.) " Eighty odd yeai's of sorrow have I seen. And each hour's joy wi'ecked with a week of teen." 2 Male. From malic, a word found in many langiiTges, meaning bag, cack, or trunk, allied to the Greek uoXi.it, hide or skin. Her Majesty's maiis are Her Mxjcsty's ^acks or bags containing the letters. A m;ul triin i3 a traiu carrying such b^gs. •• Y-gcvc. Y is a softened form of the prefix <;c. The softened a, which sometimes tec^mo it or (jh in later spelling, was often repre- sented in Tr-.nsition English by it letter not unlike a r, and old MS3. hive often been printed with this letter tiu-ned into a z. The old word (jp, wi-ittcn with the modified (i that is now ij, is thus meta- morphosed into re, so that wo have re, r.onrc, and other such words as never Englishman or Scotchman wrote. In planting old English in these volumes I represent the sign of the soft jj by y where it has actually passed into i; cr else disappeared, by [I'l where it is nowfl/i, and by g where the word is now written without change of the letter. ' Ah ber the fe .re. Ah is First English " ac." but. The final o in /«l^-« is adverbial. Another popular poem assigned to the latter part of the thii'teenth century is a satire upon corruptions in the Church, that paints a Fool's Paradise for monks, wherein all the delights are sensual, and spii'itual life passes for nothing. The Paradise of this satire, ■which spread through several countries, was entitled " the Land of Cockaigne " — that is to say, Kitchen- land. From coqiiere, to cook, came the Latin coquiiia, Italian cncina, English kitchen, French cuisine ; which yielded such names as the Italian Cuccagna, Spanish Cucana, French Coquaine, to tlie land of animal delights painted liy popular satii'e as the happy land of monks who had turned their backs upon the higher life to which they were devoted. An old German poet described it as " dat edele lant van Cockcengen."'' In what spirit this popular satire was written none can doubt, when they tiud at the close how such a Paradise as it paints is to be earned only by seven years wading chin-deep in swinish filth. THE LAND OF COKAVGNE. Fur in see bi west Spaygne Far at sea to west of Spain Is a land ihote'' Cokaygne. Is a country called Cockaigne. Ther nis lond tmder heven-riche ' There is no land under the kinffdoin of heaven Of wel, of godnis, hit iliche, it/it' it i?i weal and goodness ; Thogh paradis be nuia'* and bright. Though Paradise be soft and bright^ Cokaygne is of fairir sight. Cockaigne is of fairer sight. * So our co];cne\i or cockr\c\j, which may mean literally or morally a servant of the kitchen, was a name given to men of the capital who were made etfeminate by over-elaboration of the i^leasxu-es of the flesh. 5 Ihote. From First English, " hrltan," to name, making its past tense " hdtte," and jjast participle " gehdten." " Hatan," meaning to command, made its past tense "hdf'and past participle " hdten." In "ihote," from "gehaten," the prefix has softened to i( or i, the broad 6. weakened to o (a common change), and the final n has dis- appeared. The later form is " bight," used in past tense, as in Chaucer's " Knight's Tale" — " Of whichd two Arcita highte that on. And he that other hightd Palamon ; " or for participle, as in Spenser's " Mother Hubbard's Tale "— " Among the rest a good old woman w.is, Hight Mother Hubbard." This form — used in the present tense as well as in the past and parti- ciple — may possibly have arisen h'om confusion out of " h^t," the past tense of "h.-itan," to command, but was more probably taken from a Scandinavian form on the lips of the people in the uorth of England. The Scandinavian form, " heita." the Gothic " haitan," the old High German " heizan," and the modem German "heissen," all have tlio sound that was reproduced in hvjiht. ' Ucrcn-riche. Fii-st English, " heofon-rfcc," the kingdom of heaven. Sharp / between two vowels took the flat sotmd v, and afterwards, v being sounded, v was written. 1 iUri. First English, " mirig," the adjeciivo, and the noun " myrth," mirth, ai-e from the rooi of " meai-o," tender, soft, delicate, and "mearh," moiTow, the soft fat within bones. The first use of the adjective now spelt " merry " is more in accord with the sense of a soothing enjoyment than with that of active laughter, now moro commonly associated with it. In the " Visiou of Piers Plowman," the dreamer was first luUed to repose with the music of a .stream by which he sat on Malvern Hills— " it sweyued " (sounded) "so merye." TO A.D. laoj.] SHORTER POEMS. 19 "NVliat is ther in pai-adis What is there in Paradise But gTUsso ;md liuro ami grcnc ris ? ' Jjtif f/rass and Jloivcrs and green tuigs ? Tliough tlicr be ioi ami grcte ilutc,- Thotujh there be joy aud great diversion, Ther nis mete bote frutc ; There is no food bitt fruit ; Fruit Diet. From ^loanc JUS.- 2-1-35, fol. 55. Ther nis halle, bure,^ no benclio, There is no hall^ chamber, or bench, Bot "n-ater, nianis thurst to quencho. Nothing but ivater man's thirst to quench. Beth ther no man but two, There is no man except tivo, Hely and Enok also ; Elijah and Enoch also ; Eliugiicli'' may hi go Adingbj may theg go AVhar ther wonith^ men no mo Where there dwell no more men. In Cokaygne is met and drink In Cockaigne is meat and drink Withutc care, how,** and swink.^ Without care, trouble, and toil. * Ris. Fii'st English, " lu-is ;" Scandinavian, " lirisla," twig, or thiu branch of a tree, probably from the mstling sound made by the breeze among the lighter branches. To make a rustling noise was " hriaciau." ^ Dutc. Shortened from " dedute." Old French dcduit, diversion, pastime. The word in its other form, "dedute," is in line 50; its root is in the Latin deducere. ^ Iiiirc. First English, "bur," bower, an inner room, bedchamber, also a cottage or dwelling ; from " bum," to iulabit. * EUnglich. First English, " eglian," and " eliau," to feel pain, now spelt, to *' ail," is from '' egl," a sprout, beard of com, pricks of a thistle, that which pricks or troubles ; "selinge," trouble, weariness. —Hi, the unaltered First English nominative plural of he, hco, hit (he. she, it). 5 M'onith. From First English, "wunian," to dwell. * Hotr. First English, "hog," thou,'-htful anxiety, from "hyge," mind, thought. " Sw'nlc. First English, " swine," labour; " swincan," to toil. Milton uses the word in " Comus : " " And the swink'd hedger at his supper sat." Meat. From Arundd JUS.— 91, fol. 189. The met is trie,^ the drinlc is elero, The meat is choice, the drinJ: is clear. To none,° russin^*' and soppcr. At dinner draught and supper. JO Dkisi:. From Sloanc 3fS.— 2135, fol. 44. 8 Trie. From the French tr cr, to pick out. Isonc, The ninth hoiu', at which the Romans ate their coma, or chief meal. The first meal of the Rom;ins was the janfaculum, usuilly of bread and salt, with some relish, as olives, cht^cso, or dried grapes, eaten uuceremoi.iously anywhere. V ith this th^y ' broke fust after rising. At the sixth huiu', that is to siy, nbout mid- day, came the praiidfitm, or lunch. 'Ihen, h ilf-wjy between mid-day and sunset, about the ninth hour, came the cann, or dinner elabo- rated into three divisions: " gust us," the whet; "fercula," the dimier itself in three courses; " meusce secuudo;," pnstry and des- sert. The "none" (in summer from half-:>jst two to half-past three) was associated generally with the Roman cxna ; and in the monasteries remained associated with the diuner-hour, when that had come to be twelve o'clock iu the day. Therefore twelve o'clock was called noon. i" Ru.'stn. I take this to represent a diMught of wine between dinner nnd supper, the drink between meals often condemned by old writers. Our words "rouse" and "coi-ouse," meant emptying of tho wine-cup. *' No jocund health that Denmark drinks to-dny But the great cannon to tbi clouds shall tell ; And the king's rouse the heavens shall biuit atrain." JlamUi, Act i.. sc. 2. The king's "rouse" is the king's emptying of his eup. And again (Act 20 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1250 I segge' for soth, boute -vrere, I say for sooth, tcit/ioiit doubt, Ther nis lond on crthe is pere ; There is no land on earth its peer; Vntler heven nis lond iwisse- Undcr heaven there eertaiiili/ is >io laiirl Of so mochiP ioi and blisse. Of so great joy and bliss. Thcr is mani swete sighte : I'here is many a sweet siyht : Al is dai, nis ther no niglite. All is day, there is no niyht, Ther nis baret,'' nother sti-if ; There is no contest, neither strife ; Nis ther no deth, ao ever lif ; There is no death, but ever life ; Ther nis lac of met no cloth, There is no tvant of meat or cloth, Ther nis man no womman wroth ; There is no man or woman wroth ; Ther nis sei-pent, wolf, no fox, There is no serpent, wolf, nor fox, Hors no capil," kowe no ox, Horse nor nay, cow nor ox, Ther nis schepe, no swine, no gote, There is no sheep, or pig, or goat. Ne non horwgh/' la, god it wot. And there's no filth there, God knows. T. so. 2), "The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet." The word has been derived from the Gei-man gar aus, all out. But it may possibly be associated with the old French airoiiser (modem arvoscv), which Cotgrave intei-prets " to bedew, besprinkle, wet gently." Arroscr son chagrin is French for the drowning of one's sorrow in the bottle. So, from the old French arrouOTir (modem, ariosicr) comes the Scottish " rooser," for a watei-ing-can. There is also the Danish "runs," for surfeit in drinking. " Sove iiiusen ud," is to sleep out the excess of di-inkiug— sleep oneself sober. "Rushing** is given in Mr. J. O. Halliwell's valuable " Dictionary of Archaic and Pi-ovincial "Words" as meaning refreshment in Northern English dialect; and russin was mentioned by a Times Special Commissioner, who wrote on the agricultural strike in the Eastern counties in 1874, as a local name for a refreshment taken by the Sullolk han-esters at four p.m. ^ Segge. First English " secge," pronounced segge, then written so, and the g between two weak vowels softened to the y in " say." — Boxde. Fii-st English " biitan," without, as in the motto of the Macintoshes : " Touch not the cat but a glove." — TTere. Fii"st English " wsere," caution; adj. " waer," wary, cautious. * Imsse. First English, " gewis ; " modem German, " gewiss ; " First English, " mycel ; " Scottish, " mickle ; " Greek, certainly. 3 ifocJiil, * Baret. Icelandic, " burdtta," a fight. It has been suggested that the barbarian was, to the civilised ancient, one whose language was an unintelligible sequence of sounds, imitated by repetition of the syllables, " bar bar; " and that the same sense of bar applied to the confused noise of strife in wax, or in the old haggling of trade, gave the Italian " baratta," strife ; " barattare," to cheat — whence, perhaps, our word "barter;" the Spanish, " barajar," to confuse, dispute — "barahimda," confusion, disorder; the old French, " b.irguigner," to wrangle, haggle, chaffer, bargain ; and other such words. Baragmdn now means, in French, the jargon or confused sound of talk not properly understood. See Mr. Hensleigh Wedgwood's " Dictionary of Enghsh Etymology," a suggestive work, ingeniously enforcing the mimetic origin of words. ^ Capil. Gaelic, " capull ; " Latin, "cabaUus;" French, " che- val." ^ BTonrgh. First Euy:lish, " hdru," " hhysician named Andromachus, who first thought of quickening its efficacy by the addition of the flesh of vipers. Antlromachus describes its compo- sition in verses quoted by Galen liu his treatise, " De Theriaca, ad Pisonem "}, and gave to it names expressive of its soothing, cheering properties. But others named it, " theriake," because of the viper's flesh that now formed part of it. Many physicians had formulas of their own for the theriaca. There was a theriacal salt, the prepai'atiou of which began by putting four vipers alive into an earthen pot, throwing over them twenty pounds of sal-ammoniac, or common salt, then many herbs, biiiised nnd beaten up with honey, then putting fire under the pot, and after much stewing and long cooling, adding many bruised aromatic herbs and spices. The origiuul Theriaci of Andro- machus contained about sixty ingredients, chiefly aromatics. with gums and extracts, including opium and the viijer flesh. Opium was used in the proportion of a grain to four scruples of the whole com- pound, and to this, no doubt, the confection owed its first name of fa\i)vtj — "calm-procuring." The vipers entered into the composition in the form of little prepai'ed cakes or lozenges, that consisted of their flesh carefully cleaned, boiled in water with dill and salt, and then kneaded into paste with crumbs of bread. Tbe theriaca of Andro- machus was declared to be a remedy for most ills of the flesh, and was in such repute at Rome that some of the emperors had it made on theii" own premises. The Emperor Antoninus took a piece as large as a be^in every morning fasting. For centuries it continued to be prepared in many towns of Europe, according to the original recipe, and at Venice the manufactiu-e of it was so large that it acquired the name of "Venice treacle." "Theriac" had become the " triac " in "triacle," afterwards written "treacle." So Jeremy Taylor wrote, " We kill the viper, and make treacle of liim." Since triacle was an electuary made with honey and tinged with safl'ron. the uncrystaUis- able syrup that drains fi'om the sugar refiner's mould had some resem- blance to it, and inherited its name. The powers assigned to this great medicine against ills of the flesh ciused the author of " The Vision of Piers Plowmnn " to call Love the " Triacle of Heaven." r^ Hahi^ci. " Hitl," whole, sound, healtby ; " wa?g," a cup ; " halwei," "haliweie," "halewi," occurs in various pieces, ns the name of a heaUng balsamic draught, mild enough to be taken by the cupful. Of triacle, because of the opium in it, a piece as big as a bean w..s Q fair dose. 22 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 125U Of baum^ and ck piement,- Of htthn and also sivcet spiced toine, Ever cracnd to right rent,'* ^vcr running to right rvudcring Of thai strcmi-s al the moldc. Of those streams to all the land. Stonis preciusc and goldc : Precious stones and gold : Ther is saphir and ^^lilmc,■' There is sapphire and pearly Carbuncle and astiune,^ Carbuncle and Jasper (r) Smaragde, lugre,"* and prassiune,' Smaragd, lijncure, and ehrysopmsay Beril, onix, topasiiinc, Beryl, onyx, and topaz, Ametist and crisolite,^ Amethyst and chrysolite, Calccdun and opetite. Chalcedony and hcpatife. Ther beth briddes mani and fale : * There are birds many and many : * Baum. " Bilsamum," tlirou^li tlic Frencli "baume." In Fii'st English it was "boldsaui." Bals::ms ai-e said to liave been first used by tlie people of Palestine and the coasts of Phcenicia, and by the Egyptians and Arabians. One derivative of the name is " Bala Schemen," prince of oils and spices; another from the Hebrew- word ho^cm for the most fragrant substances ; another from an ■unused root, that indicates the way of getting it by cuts made in the trees. The most delightful, and those which were thought most healing, of the spices, aiomatic oils, and resins, were called balsams. The name was given to all medicines that were resinous or oily, in- flammable, and at the same time of a pleasant smell and penetrating aromatic taste, with cvu-ative powers. The prince of balsams was the Balm of Gilead, or True Balsam of Mecci, the resinous juice obtained by incisions in a snia 1 tree found only in part of Judea, and in Ai'abia about Mecca. It was sold in Rome for double its weight m silver. 2 Piemcnt. "Wine mixed with honey and spice. Old French, "pig- ment," "piument," "piment;" middle Latin, " j)igmentuus," i)er- -haps so called because prepared by the pigmcntarii, or apothecai-ies. Pimenta,the sweet-scented Jamaica pepper called all-spice, because its scent is said to have in it a something of all the spices, could hardly have been known before the discovery of Jamaica by Columbus, in 1494. An old recipe for piment is to powder and mis cloves, cubebs, mace, canella bark, and galangale ; pom- over them a mixture of two parts good wine and one ijart honey, let them stand, and then strain throTigh a cloth. 3 Bent. French, "rente;" Italian, "rendita;" Latin, "reddita," from "rendere," to give back, render, sun-ender, yield, p.iy. * Vniune. Latin, " unio," a large pearl ; said to he so called from •* imio," oneness, because two were seldom found together. 5 Asiiufic perhaps should be " astriune." Pliny describes " asteria " as one of the many forms of j:isper. a gem so called, he says, because it has included light moving within it that gives out rays of its own. <■' /.ligiT. Or "ligure." Latin, " IjTicuriis " and "lingurium;" Greek, XcN-Not'pioi- : a gem like a c:rbuncle, shining with fiery colour, or hke some amber, though not attracting straws when nibbed, but attracting flakes of metal. A fabulous origin from the urine of the lynx was ascribed to it, and this accounted for its name. It was said also to have curative powers whc-i diuuk in wine. Pliny repeated in- credulously what " the pertinacity of authors compelled him to say ;" nnd added that he never saw a gem so named. Perhaps it was stmj)ly a dark amber. But the name, sjys Jean de Gorris, in his Bcfimiioixes ^cdicarum, was in his time (1500—1572) given by physicians to an amber-coloured belemnite. 7 Pm^.-niHc. Or " chryso-prasc," an apple-gi*een variety of agate, coloured by nickel. 8 ChY\iio\iU is a variety of serpentine.— Hialccdon;/ is an ogit« pearly or smoky-grey in colour, waxy in lustre, and very translucent. —Bepaiiic (known also as heavy spar and Bologna spar) is a sulphite of baryta ; some forms of it are phosphorescent when heated. ^ Falc. First English, "feb." many; "moui and fale" is like *' time and tide." an example of the pauing of synonyms ; " tide " in the proverb, "Time and tide wait for no man," being the First English " tid," time or season, as in Whitsuntide, &c. ThrostU, thruissc, and nightingale, Throstle^ thrush, and nightingale, Chalandrc ^* and -wodwale,^* Lark and n'oodpecher. And other briddes without tale, And other birds without number. That stinteth neucr by har might That Jlag never according to their might Miri to sing dai and night. In softly singing day and ■night. Yit I do vow mo -^ttc : Yet I cause you piore to know : The Geese. From Sloanc MS.~2i35, fol. 50. The gees, irostid on the spitte. The geese, roasted on the spit, Fleegh to that abbai, god hit wot, Fly to that abbey, God ivot. And gredith '^ " Gees 1 al hote ! al hot I And cry " Geese ! all hot ! all hot !" Hi bringeth garlelc gret plentc They bring garlic in great plenty The best idight ^^ that man mai se. The best dressed that one can see. The leuerokes'^ that beih cuth. The skylarks^ that are tame, Lightith adun to manis muth, Light doivn on a man's mouth, Idight in stu ful swithc wel, Dressed in stctv thoroughly uelly Pudi-id with gilofre and canel. Poivdered u'ith clove and canella bark. ^^ CTiaJniidre. Our skylai-k is the AXauda orrcripis. The Calendra Lark {'Mclanocorij'plin culai^Ara) is a larger bird, found in most paiis of Eiu-ope, with a voice more sonorous, lut not less agi'eeable. The calaudra lark will imitate also readily the notes of other birds, cud even the squalling of a cat. It is a compliment in Lay to tell a lady that she sings like a calnndra. 11 TT'odualc — translated " Piciis " in the " Promptorium Parvn- lorum," and said to be equivalent to " reyncfowle " and " wodchake " — is the wood-hacker, or pecker. 12 Grcdiih. First English, " giaedcn," to sry, c]"y. call. The plural of the present indicative in cih, here and elsewhere in the poem, inchcates Southern dialect. In Northern dialect, the characteristic plural of the present indicative is ra ; in Midland dialect, en. The difference in this respect supplies one of the chief tests in discrimi- nating early dialects. 1* Idiglii. Fust English. " dihtan," to set in order, arrange, pre- pare ; past participle, " gediht." The ge was softened to i; or i ; the strongly aspii-ated /i came to be represented by the letter used for a soft f}, the rou'jh aspirate being Hke an aspirated 3. When that letter was disused, the soimd was in this word reinescuted by gJi, and the lirefix disappeared. 1* Xei'rroJ.cs. First Enghsh. " lafcrc ; " the sharp /taking the flit sound of V between two vowels, or bccominc yet more softened, ond the r well soxmded in old fashion, gives the Northern English lava-ock or Inuero- k, that we clip dovm to l-rk. Tlie laverock is the skylark of our fields, not the calnndra. The two birds are distinguished in our English version of a part of " The Romauut of the Rose : " — " There mighte men see msny flockes Of tiu-tles and of laverockes, Chelaundres feld saw I there." TO AD. 13J0.] SHORTER POEMS. 23 Ni3 no spech of no drink, There are no u-ords about any drink, Ak take ino^h withute swinlc. Hut take enouijli wit/iont troubh. AVhan the uioukcs gcclh to niasso, When the monks (jo to mass, Al the fenestres, that hcth of glasse, ^lll the leindows, that arc of fflass, Turnoth into crystal bright Turn into bright cri/stal To give moukcs more light. ?y give monks more light. ^^^len the masses heth isciid, IJ'hen the masses hare been said, And the bokes up ileiid, ylnd the books aside arc laid, The cristal tm-nith into glasse, The enjstal tttrneth into glass, In state that hit i-athcr' wasse. In state that before it teas. The yung monkes euch dai Tho young monks each day At'tir met goth to plai. After meat go to })lay. Nis ther hauk no fule so smfto There is no hawk or bird so sirift Bettir fleing bi the lifte^ Better flying in the air Than the monkes heigh of mode Then the monks high of mood With har sleuis and bar hode. IJ'ith their slecres and their hood. ■Whan the abbot sceth ham flee, IJ'hcn the abbot sees them fly. That he holt for moch glee, That he holds for much glee, Ak natheles al thar amang Hut nevertheless all Ihereamong He biddcth tham light to euo-sang. Jle bids them alight at evensong. The monkes lighteth noght adun. The monks do not alight, Ac fuiTe fleeth in o randun.' But farther fly in one sicift sudden rush. [14 lines omitted.] Another abbei is therbi. Another abbey is thereby, For soth a gret fair nunnerie, Forsooth a great fair nunnery, 1 Father. First English, "lirEeth," swift, quick; *'hratlie" and "rathe" (with c as adverbial si^), swiftly, ciiiickly. To say that one would " rather " do anything, is equivalent to sayin;j one would "sooner" do it. = J.iftc. First Engli*, "lyTt" (Gjrman, "lult"), tho air. Tho final e here is a case-ending. ' In randini. "An," with tho v dropped before a consonant, meant cue. Tho broad sound of a weakened to o, and its length was marked, according to a lj,ter custom, by the cdded c ; thus " rfn " became " one," and (with the it omitted) (i became as here, o. *' Ran- dun " was a First -Engiish wcrd, that meant rapid or sudden rush ; it became "randon " and "random." I^oTition, in old French, meant rapid force — the force of a violent stream. In B.u"boiu*'s Bt'uce, " rjndoun " is used for swift mo'i ion ; and elsewhere, "to randon " means to run swiftly and wildly, the sense of the old French " raudonner," a term applied in tho chase to the rush of a hunted beast that had been struck with arrow or siJeor. I'p a river of swot milko, . i'p a river of sivect milk, ^Vhar is pleuto grcte of silk. Where is great plenty of silk. A\Tian the somcris dai is hoto, When the summer s day is hot, Tho yung nonucs lakith a bote, The youny nuns take a boat. And doth ham forth in that riuor And put them forth in that river Botho with oris and ^vith stere. Both with oars and with rudder. [22 lines omitted.] Whoso wU come that lond to. Whoso icill come that land unto, Ful grete ijcnance he mot do ; Full great pena>:ee he must do : Seve yere in swincis diaUo Seven years in filth of swine He mot wade, wul ye iwitte,'' He must trade, if yon will understand, Al anon up to tho chynne, All at once up to the chin. So he schal the londe winne. So he shall that country win. Lorchngcs gode and head, Cobles good and gentle. Mot ye neuer of world wend. May you never go from this world Fort ye stond to yure cheanco* Till you stand to your chance And fulfiUc that penance, And fulfil that penance, That ye mote that lond ise That ye may see that land And never more tume age. And never more turn back. ' Prey we god, so mote hit be. Pray we God, so may it be. Amen, per scintc cUarite. Amen, by Saint Charity. Translation of metrical romances from the French was a marked feature of onr verse literature in the latter part of the thirteenth century, and throughout the fourteenth. Let us be, therefore, among the listeners to an old minstrel who has romance to chant for our amusement, and he shall give us tlie"Faljliau of Sir Cleges." A Faljliau was a short metrical talc, busy with action, and told with a lively freedom. It would be recited not v/itliout dramatic animation to its audiences, had its origin in Northern France, and was related to the Ijallatl of North Europe. I pre- serve old spelling only where the verse rc(iuircs it. * Tu'ittc. First English, " gcwitan," to understand. '' CJicance. Tho word is old French, trom "chcoh*;" Latin, " cadere ;" to fill. It is new spelt, both in French and English, "chance." Taking "what chances" is taking "what falls," tho imago being dr .wn from the nncert^iin liuu of the dice. '' This was first printed in IStO by Mr. Hcmy Weber, in his "Metrical Romances of tho Thirteenth, Foui-tccnth, and Fifteenth Centuries," from a fifteenth century MS. in tho Advocate's library. 24 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. ■"i.D. 130.1 The reader of Early English should remember that words from the Norman-French, retaining much of their- original prommciation, have the accent on the last syllable iii such words as '-hard}'," '"stature," and often on the last syllable of a participle, as '• parting ; " also that syllables in such words were often distinctly pronounced, where in modern English they are run together, thus making three syllables of such a word as " cre-a-ture." In coiu'se of time the tendency of English accents iipon syllables is to be transfen-ed to an earlier one than that to which it first gave sti-ess. In reading old verse we should place the accent where the measure tells us that it fell. The final e that represented old case-endings, &c., was usually sounded before a consonant, and dropped before a vowel. Except where eii-oi's of a copyist have marred the music, the most unpractised reader of an Early English poem who makes proper allow- ance for these dilferences ^Yil\ soon learn to preserve its rhythm. The pronunciation generally should be less sliuTed than it now is, and tend slightly to bring the vowel-sounds into accord with those of our neigh hours over sea. SfR CLEGES. Will ye listen, and ye shall hear Of elders that before us were, Both hardy and wight,' In the time of King I'ther That was father of King Arthur, A seemly man in sight. He had a knight that hight Sii- Cleges, A doughtier was none of deeds Of the Round Table right : He was a man of high stature, And thereto full fair of feati'ire. And also of gi-eat might. 10 A courteouser knight than he was one In all the lande there was none ; He was so gentle and free ; To men that travelled in land of ware ^ And wercn fallen in poverte hare He gave both gold and fee : The poore people he would relieve And no man would he aggrieve ; Jleck of manners was he ; His meat was free to eveiy man That would come and \-isit him than ; •'' He was full of jdenty. The knight had a gcntiUe Axdfe. There might never better b«ir life. And merry* she was in sight. Dame Clarice liight that fair lady ; She was full good sickerly. And gladsome both day and niglil ; 20 31 1 Wight, vigorous. Swedish " vig," nimble, active. Tlie " vig"* in vi'jour is from the same root. 2 Ware, cost, expense. In Scottish dialect, to wai' or ware is to lay out in expense. Mceso-Gothic " wairths," Icelandic *' verth," worth, price. Ware as merchandise is from the same root. :i Tlinn, then. < Jlcvrjj, softly pleasing. See Note (8 on page 18) to " The Load of Cockai^e." Ahues great she wolde give The poore people to reheve. She cherished many a wight ; For them hadde no man dere ; ' Rich or poor whether they were, They did ever right. Every year Sir Cleges would At Christmas a great feast hold In worsliip of that day, As royal in alle thing •As he hadde been a king For sooth as I you say. Rich and poor in the country about Should be there withouten doubt ; There would no man say nay. Minstrels would not be behind. For there they might most mii'thes find Here would they be aye. 40 ( A MiNSTHEL. From .4niiidc! MS.— 91, fol. 217. Minstrels when the feast was done Withouten giftcs should not gon, .(Vnd that both rich and good : Horse, robes and richc ring. Gold, silver, and other thing, To mend with their mood. Ten yeare such feast he held. In the woi\ship of JIai'y mild And for Him that died on the rood. By that his good began to slake For the great feasts that he did make, The knight gentU of blood. To hold the feast he would not let,^ His manors he did to wed ' set ; .50 r,o 5 Vci-e, hni-t ; no man received hurt, because of them, from " derian." to injure. * Let, hinder or stop. " HVd, pledge ; the sense in the word iredding. TO i.D. 1350.] SHORTEK POEMS. 25 He thought them out to quite ; ' Thus he feasted many a year Many a knight and many a squier In the name of God Abiiight. So at the last, the sooth to say, All his good was spent away. Then had he but lite.- Though his good were near hand leste ' 70 Yet he thought to make a fest : In God he hoped right. This royalty he made then aye, Till his manors were all away, Him was left but one i And that was of so little value That he and his wife true JVDght not live thereon. His men that were mickle of pride Gan slake away on every side ; 80 With him there would dwelle none, But she and his children two. Then his heart was in much woe, And he made much moan. And it betel on Christmas even The king bethought of him full erea ; He dwelt by Cardiff side. When it drew towai'ds the noon, Sir C'leges fell in swooning soon 'WTien he thought on that tide, 90 And on his mirths that he should hold, And how he had his manors sold. And his rentes wide. Muche sorrow made he there : He wrung his hand and weped sore. And felled was his pride. And as he walked up and down Sore sighing, he heard a soune ' Of divers minstrelsie ; Of trumpes, pipes, and claranis,^ 100 Of harpes, lutes, and getamis,* A citole and psaltrie ; Many carols and great dancing ; On every side he heard singing. In every place tridie. He wTimg his hands and weped sore, Muche moane made he there, Sighing piteousHe. "Lord .Tesu," ho said, "heaven's Iring, Of nought Thou madest aUe thing, 110 1 Qiiiie, obtain quittance, redeem. = Lite, little. * Leste, lost; from First English " leosau." * Soune, sound. French " son." 5 CJaranis, clarions ; a Hue for wind instmment is followed by two lines for stringed instruments, and two for voices. * GetamU, citterns or griiitars. The German " zither." a citole, was a sort, of dtdcimer, an arransrement of some fifty wires stretched on a sounding-board, and played with sticks, one having its end padded for use in the softer passages. An old Cornish drama of the fourteenth century, " Ordinale de Origine Mimdi," groups in one line " cj-thol, crowd, fyt.h. ha sautry " — citole, fiddle, viol, and psaltery. The original psaltery is said to have been triangular and ten-stringed ; afterwards its form was changed, and more strings were added. 120 130 140 I thank Thee of thy sonde ; ' The miith that I was wont to make. At tliis time for Thy sake I fed both free and bond ; All that ever came in Thy name Wanted neither wOd nor tame That was in my lond ; Of rich metes and driukcs good That might be got, by the rood, For cost I would not lend." ^ As he stood in mourning so His good wife came him unto. And in her arms him heut : ' She Idssed him vrith gladsome cheer : "My lord," she said, "my true fere," I heard what ye ment ; " Ye see well it helpeth naught To make sorrow in yoiu* heart, Therefore I pray you stint. Let your sorrow away gon. And thanke God of His loan Of aU that He hath sent. " For Christis sake I pray you bUn'- Of aU the son-ow that ye be in In honour of this day. Now every man should be glad. Therefore I pray you be not sad ; Tliink what I you say. Go we to our raeate swithe,^"* And let us make us glad and blithe As well as we may. I hold it for tlie best trul j' , For your meat is all ready, I hope to your pay." '* " I assente," said he tho," And in with her he gan go, And somewhat mended his cheer ; But nevertheless his heart was sore. And she him comforted more and more, His so:tow away to stere ; "" So he began to waxe blithe. And whipped '' away his teres swithe. That ran down by his lere.^^ Then they washed and went to meat. With such victual as they might get. And made merrie in fere.i' 7 Sonde, that which is sent, a gift. " I thank Thee for thy gift." go the author of " Piers Plowman" makes Conscience say to Meed, who had quoted half a test, to get Scripture w.an-ant for ascribing victory and honoiur to those who gave money, that the soul which receives the gift is by so much in bondage : " The soule that the sonde taketh bi so moche is bounde." 8 Lend, abate. French " lentir," retard the pace. 9 Hcnt, took, seized. Fii'st English " heutau." 1" Fere, companion. First English '' fera" and " gefcra." u Ment, bemoaned. First English " mfe'nan." •^ Blin, cease. First English " blinniin." '■' SKithe, quickly ; unchanged from First English. ^* Pay, content, French. Old French " pale," from Latin " pacare," to pacify. " Tho (First English "tha"), then. 'C Stere, turn away ; from " styran," to steer, guide, remove. '" Whipped axemi, whip and qnip. First English " hweop " (still in Yxilgar use as " whop " ) , Cvmric " chwip," are mimetic words, repre- senting the sound of a quick movement through the air. It is still used, as here, in its first sense, to represent quick movement simply. "^ Lere. face. First English " hleor." the jaw, cheek, face. '3 [h fere, together. First English " fera," a companion. 150 26 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A."). 1300 AMien they had eat, the sooth to say, AVith mirth they th-ove the day away As well as they might ; With their childien play they ded, 160 And after supper went to hed. When it was time of night : And on the morrow they went to church Godes ser-^ice for to werch.' As it was reason and right. Sir Cleges kneeled on his knee. To Jesus Christ prayed he, Because of his wife : " Gracious Lord," he saide thoo,' " My wife and childi'en two, 170 Keep them out of strife 1 " The lady prayed for him again. That God should keep him from pain In everlasting Hfe. "When service was done home they went. And thanked God with good intent. And put away pensi.^ When he to his place came, His care was well aliated then, Thereof he gan stint : 180 He made his wife afore him go, And his children'' both two. Himself alone went Into a garden there beside, • And kneeled down in that tide And prayed God veramcnt," And thanked God, with all his heart, Of his disease^ and his povert That to him was sent, . As he kneeled on his knee, 190 Underneath a cherry tree, Making his prayere. He raught" a bough on his head And rose up in that stead, ^ No longer kneeled he there. When the bough was in his hond, Greene leaves thereon he fond. And round berries in fere. He said, "Dear God in Trinity, What manner of benues may these be, 200 That grow tliis time of year ? " About this time T saw never ore That any tree should fruit' bear. 1 Worch, work, do ; First Euglisli *' wyrcau," in which the c might be hardeued or softened, like the c in cU'ce^ wliich has become kirk and church. ' Thoo (First English " tha " ), then. 3 Pcnsi, thought. French " pensde." * Here the r in children gives the word a third syllable. So Shake- speare, in " Comedy of EiTors," Act i., sc. 2 — " These are the parents of those children." In " Timou of Athens." Act iii., sc. 5 — "But who is man that is not angry ? " and in other places. 5 FernmcTif, truly. French "vraiment." * Dis-ease, want of ease. ' Ratujht, reached. First English "rffican," to reach, had for its past tense " rsehte." ' Stead (First English "stede"!, place. ^ Fyitif had each vowel sounded, ns in Fr'^nch. As far as I have sought. He thought to taste it if he couth,'" And one " he put in his mouth. And spare would he not. After a cheny the relish was The best that ever he ate in place Since he was man wrought. 210 A little bough he gan off sUve,'-' And thought to shew it to his wife, And in he it brought. " Lo, dame I Here is novelty ; In our garden of a cherry-tree I found it sickerly. I am afeard it is tokening Of more harm that is coming. Forsooth thus tliinkcth me.'^ But whether we have less or more, 220 Alway thank we God therefore ; It is best truly." Then said the lady, with good cheer, " Let us fill a pannier Of this that God hath sent : To-moiTow when the day doth spring Ye shall to Cardiff" to the king, And give him this present ; And such a gift ye may have there That the better we may fare this year, 230 I tell you veranient." Sir Cleges granted soon thereto : " To-morrow to Cardiff will I go. After your intent." On the morrow, when it was Ught, The lady had a pannier dight," Her eldest son called she ; " Take up this pannier goodly,'' And bear it forth easily With thy father free." 2 '0 Then Sir Cleges a staff' took. He had no horse, so saith the book. To ride on his journey : Ni'ither stcede nor paUrey, But a staff' was his hackney, As man in po'\'ertie. Sir Cleges and his sonc gent The righte way to Cardiff' went Upon Christmas-day. To the castle he came full right 250 As they were to meatc (light. Anon, the sooth to say. i" Couth, could. First English "cunnan," to ken, know, be able, had for its present "can," and for its past " ciithe ;" this was written " couthe," " couth," " coud," then " cou'd," because (from a supposed relation to woutd and should) I seemed to be wanting; then the I was inserted, and we came to " could." u Pronounce " o-ne," not "wiiu." '- O#slo'e, to slive off. First English "slifan,'' to cleave, split. '3 Thinkcih jiie, methiuks. it seems to me. From the First English impersouil verb '* thincan." to seem; past *' thuhte." To think is from "thencan," paat "thtihte." n Dight, prepared, Fu"st English " dihtan." '5 Gofidly h.as the d and / so sounded as to give the effect of a short vowel sound between them. So Shakespeare in "Henry r\'".. Part II.," "A rotten case obide.-? no handMng." and in "Taming of the Shrew," " While she did call me i-ascal fid-^fer." TO A.D. 135U _ SHOKTEK POEMS. 27 In Six Cleges thought to go ; But in poor clothing was hu tho,' And in simple array. The Porter Siiid full hastOy, " Thou churl, withdi'aw thee smartly,'-^ I rede^ thee, without delay. " Elles, by Heaven and Saint Mary, I shall break tbine head on high ! 260 Go stand in Ijeggar's rout 1 If thou come more inward It shall thee rue afterwai'd. So I shall thee clout!" "Good sir," said Sir Cleges tho, " I pray thou let me in go Now withoute doubt : The King I have a present brought From Him that made all things of nought : Behold all about : " 27U The Porter to the pannier went, And the lid up he hent ; The cheriies he gan behold. Well he wist for his coming With that present to the King Great gifts have he should. " By Him," he said, "that lue bought. Into this place com'st thou not, As I am man of mould. The tlurd part but^ thou graunt me 280 Of that the Iving wiU give thee, Wliether^ it be silver or gold I" Sir Cleges said, " I assent." He gave him leave, and in he went. Withouten more lett ing. In he went a greate pace : The Usher at the hall door was With a statt' standing. In point Cleges for to smite : " Go back, thou chml," he said, 290 " Full tite'' without taiTjang I I shall thee beat every leth,^ Head and body, without greth,^ If thou make more pressing I " " Good sii'," said Su' Cleges than, " For His love that made man. Cease your angry mood 1 I have here a present brought From Him that made all things of nought And died on the rood : 300 ' Tho (First Euglisli " tha"), then. ' Smarlli/; see uote 1-5, page 26. So in " As Tou Like It," "The parts and graces of the wrestler." ^ Rede (First English " rse'dan," past "r^d"), advise. " Rae'dan." to read, discern, mle, made its past *' rse'dde." * But, except, unless.— The r infliiivt adds a syllable, " the thir-rid part." So also in lines 174, 476. See Note 4, page 26. ^ Wltethei- was often pronounced as a monosyllable, by elision of th. So in Shakespeare, "Julius Caesai'," Act v., sc. 4 — " But see whether Bnitus be alive or no." * Tift', quickly. Icelandic "tithr" and " titt." " /,ctli. limb. First English "lith." ^ Grcth, privilege of protection to you. First En-_'lish " grith." the king's peace, or protection given to officials j piivilege of security within a certain place. Tliis night in my gai-den it grew. Beliold whether '' it be false or true ; They be fail' and good." The Usher lift the lid smartly, ' And saw the cherries verily ; He marvelled in his mood. The Usher .said, " By Mary sweet, Chui'l, thou come.st not in vet I tell thee sickerly. But thou me grant, without leasing, 310 The thii-d '" part of thy winning When thou com'st again to me." Su' Cleges saw none other won," Thereto he granted soon anon. It will none other be. Then Sir Cleges with heavy cheer Took his son and his pannier ; Into the hall went he. The Steward walked therewithal Among the lordes in the hall 320 That were rich in weed.'^ To Sir Cleges he went boldly. And said, " Who made thee so hardy To come into this stead r Chui'l." he said, " thou art too bold ! Withdi-aw thee with thy elo.hJs old Smartly, I thee rede ! " '^ " I have," he said, "a present brought From our Lord that us dear bought And on the rood gan '■• bleed." 330 The pannier took the Steward soon, And he pulled out tlie piu As smartly as he might. The Steward said, " By Mary dear, This saw I never this time of year Syne I was man wrought ! Thou shalt come no nearer the King But if '^ thou grant me mine asking. By Him that me bought : The third part of the fcng's g-ift S40 That will I have, by my thrift. Or fuither go'st thou not '. " Sir Cleges bethought him then, '■ My part is least betwixt these men. And I shall have nothing ; For my labour' shall I not get But it be a meale's meat," Thus he thought sighing. 9 Wliether is here again contracted into a monosyllible. ^0 The r here adds a syllable. See Note 4, page 26. n Won, way, Fii'st Enirlish " wuue," practice, custom. '2 Weed, dress. First English "weed," ayai'mcut, clothing. The word remains in " widow's weeds." 13 Rede, advise. Fii'st English " rce'dan," to counsel, made its past tense " ri?d," and participle " rae'den." " Ras'dan," to read, interpret, decree, rule, made its past " rte'dde," and its participle " ree'ded." 1* Gan often served, as here, only to give more emphasis to the verb that followed ; and the inceptive sense was seldom so strongly marked as to bear translation by the word " began." In First English " gin," meaning open, spacious, vast, from the root of the word " yawn," was used in composition as simply intensive : " fasst," firm ; " ginftest," very firm. Although " giuau," to yawn, become spacious, past " gin," is not related to the verb " onginnan," to begin, past " ongan," I am not sure whether the use of one root as intensive may not, in some degree, have atiected the use of the other. 1^ But ij, unless. CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad. 1300 He said, " Harlot, hast no tongue ? Speak to me and tarry not long, 350 And grant me mine asking ; Or \%'ith a staff I shall thee wake That thy ribs shall all to quake, And put thee out headling." ' Sir Clegcs saw none other bot- But his asking grant ho mot. And said with sighing .sore : " \\Tiatsoever the King reward Ye shall have the third part '■' Be it less or more." 360 Tip to the dais Sir Cleges went, Full soberly ■* and with good intent Ivneeling the King before. Sir Cleges uncovered the pannier And shewed the King the cherries clear On the ground kneeling. He said, " Jesu our Saviour Sent thee this fruit with honour On this earth grow'ing." The King saw these cherries new ; 370 He said, " I thanke Christ Jesu, This is a fail' newing.'" ^ He commanded Sir Cleges to meat. And after thought with him to speak. Without any failing. The King thereof^ made a present And sent it to a lady gent Was bom in Coniewaile : She was a lady bright and shene," And also right well beseen, 380 AVithout any fail. The cherries were served through the hall, Then said the King, that lord royid, *' Be merry, by my counseil; And he that brought me this present Fitll well I shall him content, It shall him well avail." AAlien all men were merry and glad Anon the king a squier bade " Bring now me beforn 390 The poor man that the cherries brought I " He came anon and tarried not, Witliout any scorn. \\Tien he came before the King On his knees he fell kneeling The lords all beforn. To the King he spake full stUl : " Lord," he said, " what is your will ? I am Your man free bom." ^ HeadUyig, headlong. 2 Bot (First English, "bi5t'*K help, remedy, amends; as in "It boots not," and such later phrases. 2 See Note 4, page 26. * The y in '* soberly " runs into one syllable with the following vowel. So in Milton—" Though all oui- glory extinct and happy state" (J^aradisc Lost, i. 141). s Neiring, New-Tear's gift. « Thereof, out of them. ^ Shene (Fh'st English " sc^n" (German, "schon";, beautiful; from " scinan," to shine. " I thank thee heartily," said the King, 4U0 " Of thy gift and presenting That thou hast now i-do. Thou hast honoured all my feast, Old and youngc, most and least, And worshipp'd me also ; Whatsoever thou wilt have, I ^\'ill thee grant, so God me save, That thine heart standeth to." He said, " Gramercy, liege King, Tills is to me a comforting : 410 I tell you sickerly For to have land or lede^ Or other riches, so God me speed, It is too much for me. But sith ' I shall choose myself, I pray you grant me strokes twelve To deal where liketh me ; With my staff to pay them all To luine adversaries in the hall, For Saiut Charitie." 420 Then answered Uther the King, " I repent of my granting That I to thee made. Good," he said, " so mote I thee,'" Thou haddest better have gold or fee, More need thereto thou had." Sii' Cleges said, with a waunt," " Lord, it is j'our owen gi'aut. Therefore I am fuU glad." The King was sorry therefore, 430 But natheless he gxanted him there. Therefore he was full sad. Sir Cleges went into the hall Among the greate lordes all Withouten any more. He sought after the proud Steward, For to give him his reward Because he grieved him sore. He gave the Steward such a stroke That he fell down as a block 440 Before all that therein were : And after he gave him other three He said, " Sii-, for thy coui'tesy Smite me uo raoie ! ' Out of the haU Sii- Cleges we»t, More to pay was his intent Without any let.'- He went to the Usher in a braid," " Have here some strokes," he said, WHien he with him met, 450 I thrive. First English "theon," to 8 Lede, people. First English " leode." 9 Sith, since. 1'' So mite I thee, so may thrive; "ictheo," I tlirive. n Waunt, shake of the head. Fii-st English " wagim," to wag or shake. 1- Let, hindrance. ^3 Braid, stai't. Old Norse " bvgth." quick motion; " bregtlia," to wake out of sleep, start. So in " Genesis and Exodus." when Phai'aoh had dreamt of the fat and lean kine, it is said, " The king abraid and woe in thogt." TO i.D. 1350] SHORTER POEMS. 29 So that after aud many a day He woidd -n-arn ' no man the way, So grimly he him gret.'- Sir Cleges said, " By my thrift. Thou hast the third ^ part of my gift As I thee behight.'" ■• Then he went to tlic Portere, And fuiu- strokes he gave him there His part liad he thereto. So that after and many a day 460 He would warn no man the way Neither to ride neither go. The firste stroke he laid liim on He brake in two his shuulder-bone And his one arm thereto. Sir Cleges saide, '' By my tlirift, Thou hast the third part of my gift, The covenant we made so." Sir Cleges kneeled before the King, For he granted his aslviag 470 He thank'd him courteously. Specially the King lum prayed To tell him wliy those strokes he paid To his men three.* He said, " I might not come inward Till each I granted^ the tliird part Of that ye would give me. With that I should have nought myself. Wherefore I gave them strokes twelf ; Methought it best truly." 480 The lordes laughed both old and yeng. And all that weren with the King, They made solace enow. The King laughed [on till it was night :] ' He said, " This is a noble wight : To God I make a vow ! " He sent after his [sore] Steward, " Hast thou," he said, " thy reward, [<_)r shall he pay more now ?" The Steward said, and he looked grim, 490 " I think me now in debt to him For my taste of his bough."] The King was set in his parloiu' With mirth, solace, and great honour. Sir Cleges thither went. A harper sang a gest by mouth Of a knight was there by sooth, Himself verament. 1 Warn, forbid. First Englisli " wyman," to forbid, to deny ; " wamiau," to take care, to warn. 2 Grct, fleeted. Fii-st English " ^^tan." ^ Here and in the two following stanzas third, as before, becomes a dissyllable, by rolliuq- the r. * Behight ( First English "beh^t"), promised. ^ Three counts as two syllables [thcr-ee) in the metre by the rollinij of r. ** Grmited : cd after f was scarcely sounded, often it was not written. So Shakespeare in " Cymbeliue," " I fast and prayed for their intelli- gence." 7 The words in square brackets are substituted for " so not might," Square brackets indicate some alteration in following lines of this stanza. A King's Feast. From MS. Reg.~2, Bk. VII., fol. 71. Then said the King to the Harper, " Wliere is knight Cleges 'r Tell me here, SCO For thou hast wide i-went. Tell me the truth if thou can, Knowest thou aught of that man ?" The Harijer said, " Yea, i-wis." " Sometime, for sootli, I him knew, He was a knight of yoiu's full true, And comely of gesture. We minstrels miss him sickerly Sith lie went out of country," He was fair of stature." 510 The King said to him, " By ndne headj I trow that Sir Cleges be dead. That I loved par anioiu-. Woulde God he were aUve ! I had him Kever '" tlian other iive, For he was strong in stour." " The King Uther said to him than, " MTiat is thy name ? tell me, good man, Now anon right." " I hight Sir Cleges, so have I blisse, 620 My righte name it is i-wis ; I was your owen knight." " Art thou Sir Cleges, that served me, That was so gentil and so fi'ee, Aud so strong in tight ':" " Yea, Sir Lord," he said, " so mot I thee,'- Till God in heaven had \'isit me Thus poverte hath me diglit." The King gave him anon right AH that 'longed to a kniglit fiSO To rich his body with ; The Castle of Cardiff lie gave him then. [What else is now beyond our ken ; We have the pith. 8 First English " gewis," certainly. ' Here the r in count rij makes it a word of three syllables. So Shakespeare in " Twelfth Night," Act i., sc. 2 ;— " Mine own escape uufoldeth to mine hope The like of him. Know'st thou this coiint-r-y?" '0 Liever (First English " Icfjfre "), dearer. Thei' in words like over, ever (o'er, e'er), having, evil, liever, devil (de'il), was often dropped in pronunciation, making of any such word, as here, a monosyllable. u Stonr, battle. Old French " estour; " Iceljndic " styr." 12 So mot 1 thee, so may I thrive. See Kote 10, page 28. It was a common form of asseveration. In the "Vision of Piers Plowman." when Avarice, preached to by Repentmce, told of Misdeed, he added an oath, so might he thrive, that he would give up that sin. " Ac I swere now, so the ie, that s^Tine wil I lete." 30 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a. II. 1346 Lost lines had told, to close the song, Of Clarice gentle, C'leges strong, And aU theh- kith. How lands came hack and love remained, And trust in God the knight retained To rich his spii-it with.] 640 Head of Edward III, Ad copkd ill Gough's "Sepulchral Monuments, Westmitlhier Ahlen, fi-Oiti his Tomb in The victories of Edward III. over the Scots and Pi-ench, from July, 1333, when he won the battle of Halidon Hill, to Januai-y, 135:?, the date of the cap- ture of Guines Castle (a period including the battle of Crecy, on the 26th of August, 1346), had a poet in Laurence Minot, who strung together his lyrics in the form next to be illustrated. In the pieces given from Minot, where an obsolete word can, without loss of metre, alliteration, or rhyme, be modernised in reading the text, that is done, and the original word is given in a foot-note ; otherwise the obsolete word is in the text and the interpretation in tlie foot-note. In each case the reader has the words of the original. Let us take the poems following that upon Crecy, which form a little more than a thii-d part of the whole series. The events celebrated are : — (1) The siege of Calais, begun on the 3rd of Sep- tember, 13-16. King Edward camped about the place to reduce it by famine without assault of artillery. The town held out for more than eleven months, during which King Philip YI. of France — Philip of Valois — failed in his endeavours to relieve it. Calais surrendered unconditionally on the 4th of August, 1347. The well-known story of Queen Philippa's sa%-ing of the lives of the six burgesses of Calais who brought the keys of the town we owe to Frois- sart alone. After the surrender of Calais the town was peopled with English, and belonged to England for the next 210 year.s. (2) The battle of Neville's Cross, near Durham, fought on the 12th of October, 1346, about a month after King Edward had begun his investment of Calais. The Scots, as they usually did when the King of England was making war in France, had crossed the border ; but they were defeated at Neville's Cross by Earl Percy. David Bruce, their king, was taken jirisoner. King David of Scotland I'emained prisoner in England until 13.57, and was so, therefore, when Laurence Minot wrote his war poems. (3) A victory over the Spaiiianls v. ho, in the summer of 1350, occupied our seas with forty-four gieat ships of war, took a revenge for former injuries by spoiling and sinking ten English ships on their way from Gascony, and then went triumphing into Sluys. King Etlward gathered a navy of tifty ships and pinnaces to catch the Spanish fleet on its return, and met it at Winchilsea, where, says John Stow, " the great Spanish vessels surmounting our ships and foists,' like as castles to cottages, sharjjly assailed our men ; the stones and quarrels flying from the tops sore and cruelly wounded our men, who are no less busy to tight aloof with lance and sword, and with the fore ward manfully defend themselves ; at length our archers pierced their arbalisters with a further reach than they coukl strike again, and there- by compelled them to forsake their place, and caused others fighting from the hatches to shade themselves with tables of the ships, and compelled them that threw stones from the tops so to hide them that they durst not show their heads but tinnble down ; then our men entering the Spanish vessels with swords and halberds, kill those they meet, within a while making \oid the vessels, and furnish them ■with Englishmen, tintil they, being beset with dai'kness of the night, could not discern the twenty-.seven yet re- maining tmtaken. Our men cast anchor, studying of the hoped battle, supposing nothing finished while anything remained undone, dressing the wounded, throwing the miseraljle Spaniards into the sea, re- freshing themselves with victuals and sleep, yet com- mitting the vigilant watch to the armed band. The night o\'erpassed, the Englishmen prepared (but in VMu) to a new battle ; but when the sun began to appear they, ^dewing the seas, could perceive no sign of resistance ; for twenty-seven ships, flying away by night, left seventeen, spoiled in the evening, to thj kuig's pleasui'e. but against their will. The king ■returned into England with victoiy and triumph ; the kmg ))referred there eighty noble imps'' to the oi'der of knighthood, greatly bewailing the loss of one, to wit. Sir Richard Goldsborough, knight." (4) The taking of Guines Castle, six miles from Calais, by John of Doncaster. John of Doncaster was an English archer among the jjrisoners of Guines who had no friends to ransom him, and was employed to work at restoration of the castle walls. He be- came acquainted with a way across the castle ditch by a submerged wall, two feet broad with a break of two feet in the middle, that was used by fishers. John of Doncaster measured the height of the 1 A foist was a barge or pinnace, from Dutch /usfe. — A quarrel was the square dart shot from a crossbow. 2 From First Euglisli " impan." to engraft, "imij" means a graft or shoot, theuce offspring. So Spenser, in the Introduction to Book i. of the " Faerie Queene." addresses the " most dreaded imp of highest Jove, fjir Venus' son." The " imps " in the text were therefore sons of noble houses, raised from the grade of squire to that of knight. TO A.D. 1352.] SHORTER POEMS. 31 ramparts with a thread, escaped over the ditch to Calais, and there conspired with thirty men, greedy of jn-ey, to get leathern scaling-ladders of the requisite height, advance on the castlo mider cover of night and in black arraonr, catch its cnstodians asleep, and win then- piize. This they did one night in January, 1352, in time of truce between England and Fi-ance, and the town of Guines did not know till next day that its castle had been taken. When the Earl of Guines demanded in whose name it h.ad been attackerl and seized in a time of truce, the reply was that it had been taken in the name of John of Doncaster ; that although its captors were Englishmen, they were not English subjects, but outlaws, and that they meant to sell their prize. The earl bid high for his castle, but John of Doncaster replied that he pre- ferred to sell it to the King of England ; and if the King of England would not Imy it, he would sell it to King John of France (who, at the age of thirty- two, had succeeded his father Philip iii 1350), or to any who would make a better bid. King Edward ARMOtrn OF Edward III. A& cnjiictl in Grose's " Military Antiquities," froin (he CoUedion in the Tower of London. bought the castle of its captors ; and with a poem upon this adventure Minot ends. If he had lived to see the close of the truce between England and Fi-ance, he would surely have added some rhymes on the battle of Poitiers, in September, 1356, when " Sir John of France " was taken pi-isoner. W.\R POEMS OF LArRENCE JIIXOT. (1) How Edirard, as the lioiiinnce sai/s. Held his Siege before Calais. Calais men, now may ye care And monraing mun ye have to meed : Jlirth on mould get ye no mair Sir Edward shall ken ycu your creed. 'Whilome where }-e wicht ' in weed To robbing- rathly for to ren ;^ Mend you soon of your misdeed. Your care is comen, will ye it ken. Kcnn'd it is how ye were keen All Englishmen with dole to dere,^ 10 Theu- goods took ye alhidene,^ No man bora would ye forbere ; Ye spared not with sword nor spear To stick them and their goods to steal ; ■\Vith weapon and with deed of were* Thus have ye wonnen worldcs weal. AVealiul men were ye iwis,^ But far on fold'' shall ye not fare, A Boar 8 shall now abate your bliss And work you bale on bankes bare. 20 He shall you huut as hound does hare, That in no hole shall ye you ' hide ; For all your speech wUl ho not spare, But bigges'" him right by your side. Be.side you here the Boar begins To big his bower in wintertide. And all bctime takes he his inns With seemly Serjeants him beside. The word of him walkes full wide, .Tesu save him from mischance ! SO In battle dare he well abide Su- PhiHp and Sir John of France. The Franchcmen are fierce and fell, And make great di-ay " when they are dight. By them'- men heard such" tales tell, With Edward think they for to fight, Him for to hold out of his right, AnA do him treason with their tales; Th.at was their purpose, day and night. By counsel of the cardinales." 40 • Wicht is still the Scottish forai of the old Swedish "wig," sti-ong, powerful, allied to the "vig" in Latiu "vi^or." '^ The Calais men had been bold when equipped for a quick run, a raid in search of plunder. First English " hi-ieth," swift, quick. 3 With dole to derc, to hurt by fi-aiid or malice. First English " derian," to injure ; French " dol ; " Litiu " dolus," deceit. * Alhid^ne, altogether. " Bideue " or " bedeue " is an adverb of un- certain origin, frequently nssd with " all " before it. 5 Were, war. ^ Iiris, certainly. First EngUsh " gewis." 7 Fold (First EngHsh " folde "I, the surface of the e.arth. 8 A Boar. Minot applies to Edwai'd III. a prophecy ascribed to Merlin, of a Boar that should make Spain tremble, and set his head in France, while his tail rested in England, where he was bom. ^ re you. Observe here the right use of ye (ge) as nominative ; yo^l (eow) as accusative. It is always so in our version of the Bible. For example (Jeremiah xvi. 12. 13) ; " Ye have done worse than your fathers ; for, behold, ye walk every one after the imagination of his evil heart : . . . . therefore will I cast you out of this land into a land that ye know not, neither ye nor yom- fathers ; and there shall ye serve other gods day and night ; where I will not shew you favour." 1" Biygefi, builds. Icelandic " byggja." King Edward "made car- penters to make houses and lodgings of gi-eat timber, and set the houses like streets, and covered them with reed and broom ; so thot it was like a little town : and there was everything to sell, and a market-place to be kept every Tuesd ly and Siturday." (Froj.s.sort.) u Make great dray, dray and deray (Old French " desroy "), disorder. 12 By them, of them. " Sl'tke, "swa lie " = so like, thence "slike." Scottish "swilk," German " soldi," English " such." 1* The cardinaJe?. King Philip having brought an army to raise the siege of Calais, found the only ways of .npproach too well defended 32 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF- ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 13W Cardinales with hattes red Were from Calais -nell three mile, They took their counsel ia that stead How they might Sir Edward beguile. They lended' there but little while To- Franchcnien to grant their graee; Sir Philip was founden a file,^ He fled, and fought not in that place. In that place the Boar was blithe. For all was found that he had sought ; 50 Philip the Valois fled full swithe With the batiiil that he had brought : For to have Calais had he thought, All at his leading loud or still ; But all their wiles were for nought, Edward won it at his will. Listen now and ye may lore'' As men the sooth may understand ; The knightes that in Calais were Come to Sir Edward sair wepiind, 60 In kirtle only ° and sword in hand. And cried, " Sir Edward, thine wc are, Do now, lord, by law of land. Thy will with us for ever mair." The noble burgase" and the best Come unto him to have their hire ; The common people were full prest" Ropes to bring about their swire.^ They said all, " Sir Philip, our sire. And his son. Sir John of France, 70 Have left us lying ' in the mire. And brought us to '" this doleful dance. " Our horses that were fair and fat Are eaten up ilk one bidene ; " Have we neither coney nor cat That are not '- eaten, and houndcs keen against him. Then, says Froissart., " In the mean season, while the French king studied how to fight with the King of England, there came into his liost two ciu-dinals from Bishop Clement, in legation, who took great pains to ride between these hosts ; and they procured so much that there was granted a certain treaty of accord and a respite between the two kings and then' men, being there at the siege and in the field all only. And so there were four lords appointed on either party to coimsel together, and to treat for peace ; and the two cardinals wei e means between the parties. These lords met three days, and many devices put forth, but none effect ; then the two cardinals retm-ned to Saint Omer's ; and when the French king saw that he could do nothing, the next day he dislodged betimes and took his w.iy to Amiens, and gave every min leave to depart." Upon which followed the siu-render. 1 Lcnded, dwelt, stayed. Icelandic "lenda," to fix one's seat. 2 To. Minot wrote "til." 3 rile, cheat. The Eev. J. C. Atkinson, in his excellent Glossarti of the CleDeland Dialect, traces tliis sense of the word from First English "wigelung," " gewiglimg," deception, juggling. Tlie g in "wigel." when softened by position into y. only added to the length of the preceding i, and then, since ir is interchangeable with v and /. we get the word "file" with unaltered sense; its sense in the phrase " cunning old file." * Lere, leani- First English "lasran," from " lar," lore, learning. * Only. Miuot wrote " one. " fi Biivijase I French " bourgeois"), citizens, burgesses. ' Frcst (French "pr6t"), ready. 8 Svire (First English " sweora"), neck. " Htis Jeft us hgand. 1" Ti\ til. " Bidenp. See Note 4, page 31. " Are not. Minot wrote " ne er." All are eaten up full clean, Is neither leaved bitch nor whelp That is well in our semblance''' seen. And they are fled that should us help." A knight that was of great renown. Sir John de Vienne was his name, He was Warden of the Town And had done England mickle shame. For all their boast they are to blame, Full stalwartly there have they striven, A Boar is comen to make them tame. Keys of the town to him are given. The keys are yolden '■* him of the gate, Let him now keep them if he cun ; To Calais come they all too late. Sir Philip and Sir John his son. All were full feared " that there were fun Their leaders may they barely ban.'^ All on this wise was Calais won ; God save them that it so gat wan.'' 80 90 Edward III. granting the CoNQrERED Provinces in France to THE Black Prince. From Initial Letter of the Original Grant, Cotton US. — Nero D. VI. (2) *S'/r Dtrrld hnt^ of his mcv (jrrnt hss. With Sir Edward, at the Xeril's Cross. Sir David the Bruce Was at his dist&nce. When Edward the BaUol'^ Eode with his lance : 13 On our serahlance, in our lean faces and figures. I* Yolden, yielded. The g in the following word "gate," pro- nounced "yate," was softened to another y. '^ Feared, struck with fe.ar; fun, found. 's Barely han, ciu-se openly, without cover. 17 Got, lean, got won. caused to be won. 18 Edward the Baliol. Joseph Ritsou, who published Minot's Poems in 1825, pointed out that Thoinns Warion, in his History of EvgH.h Voctrii, supposed Edward Baliol. here mentioned, to be King Edward III-, who was in France, besieging Calais, at the date of the battle of Neville's Cross. Edward, son of John de Baliol. the 10 A. p. 1352.J SHORTER rOEMS. 33 The north end of England Teaehed him to dance, \Mion lie was met on the moor With mickle misdianco. Sir I'hilip tlie Valois May him not advance, TIio flowers ' that fair were Are fallen in France ; Tlie flowers are now fallen That fierce were and fell,- A Boar with his hataille Has done them to dweU.^ Sir David the Bruce Said he should fondc,'' To ride tlu'oiigh all England Would he not wonde,» At the Westminster Hall Should his steeds stoudc, While our Iving Edward Was out of the londe ; But now his Su' David Jlisscd of his marks, And Philip the Valois, With all their great clerks. 10 20 David the Bruce. From Piiikei-ton's " Scottish Gallery.' Sii' PhiUp the Valois, Sooth for to say, Sent unto Sir David And fail' gan him pray 30 claimant of tlie Scottish crown, whom Edward favoui'ed and called Kiuf? of Scotlaud, reuouueed his title for an annuity iu 1356. ^ T7ic fioirersy meaning the lilies of France. 2 fell, cruel. ^ Done ilieiii to dwell, caused them to be as if dead. " Dwala," iu Old Swedish, was a state of life resembling death, as of the flies in cold weather. The root of the word is iu all the Gothic langriages. In Old GeiTnan, *' twelan" was to be torpid. " Dualm " is stiU Scot- tish for "swoon." * Fondc (Fii'st English "fandian"), try. 5 Wonde, fear (First EugUsh "waudlan," to fear, omit, neglect, ehrinlc from). To ride " tlu'ough England Their foemcn to slay, And .Siiid, " None is at home To let J' him the way To wend where he will : But with shepherd staves Found lie his fill." From Philip the Valois Was Sir DaWd sent, All England to win From Tweed unto Trent ; He hrought many bear-hags^ With bow ready bent. They robbed and they reaved And held that they hent,' It was in the wane of year'" That they forth went ; For covcitise of cattle Those shi-cws were shent ; " Shent were those shrews And ailed imsele,'^ For at the Nevil Cross Needs bade them kneel. At the Archbishop of York Now will I begin. For he may, with his riglit hand, Assoil'^ us of sin. Both Dui'ham and Carlisle They woidd never blin " The worship of England With weapon to win ; '* 40 50 60 *■' At ride. A Northern form. Scotlaud aud France were allies for defence of each against the King of Euglaud, as theii- coinmou enemy. In those days the French aUiauce was a pai-t of Scottish nationality ; and whenever the EugUsh crossed the Channel the Scots usually crossed the Border. 7 Let means hinder. 8 Beat-'hags. The Scots are called *' bere-bags," because each man, on a militai-y exjiedition, carried behind his saddle a little sack of oatmeal, and also had with him a metal plate, on which to make it into oatcake. " Wherefore," says Froissaii, " it is uo great mai'vel though they ma^le gi'eater journeys than other people do." 3 Sent, seized, from " hentan," to search closely after, pursue, seize. 10 Wanuind. It may be wane of moon. The day of defeat was tl>* 12th of October. 'I Shciit, fi-om Fu-st Euglish " sceudan," to confound, put t^ shame. The old word schmrc, defined by "pravus" in the " Promp- toriiim Parvulonim," a man of crooked, evil ways, is from " syni " oi " searo," a snare or treacherous contrivance. The ■' flu-ee shrews" in Chaucer's " Pardoner's Tale" were riotous youths who found death in the snares they set for one auother. '2 Ailed imsek, pained with mishap. Ailed, from " egliau," to inflict paiu, iirick, torment ; loiscle, from the negative of " sro'l," good oppor- tunity, prosperity, happiness. 13 Assoil, absolve. " Blin (First English "blinnau"), cease, rest. '» If il7i weapon to iciii. " The lords and prelates of England said they were content to adveuture their lives with the right and heritage of the King of England, their master. . . . Then the Scots came and lodged against them ueiu- together : then every mau was set in order of battle. Then the Queeu came auioug her men, and there was ordained foiu- batayls, one to aid another. The iii'st had iu governince the Bishop of Durham and the Lord Percy ; the second, the Arch- bishop of York and the Lord Neville ; the third, the Bishop of Lincoln and the Lord Mowbray ; the fourth, the Lord Edwiu'd de Baliol, captain of Berwick, the Archbishop of Canterbury, aud the Lord Rose." (Froissai-t.) :u CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad. law Jlicklc worship they won And wcl have they waken,' For Sir David the Bruce Was in that time taken. Battle Piece. From Harleian MS.— 2278, fol. 50. MTien Sir Da^-id the Bruce Sat on his steed, He said of aU England 70 Had ho no dread ; But handy John Coiiland,^ A wicht man in weed ' Talked to Da%-id, And kenned him his creed : There was Sii' David So doughty in his deed. The fair Tower of London Had he to meed. Soon then was Sir David ■ 80 Brought unto the Tower, And AViUiam the Douglas AVith men of honour, Fidl swithe ready service Found they there a shower. For first they di'ank of the sweet And senin ^ of the som-. Then Sir- Da\-id the Bruce Slakes his moan. The fair crown of Scotland 90 Has he foregone : . He looked forth into France, Help had he none Of Sir rhilip the Valois Nor yet of Sir John. The jiridc of Sir- Da^-id Began fast to slakcn. For he wakened the war That held himself waken ; ' Wali^n, keiJt watcli. - Hinde John of Coi'jWaiid. From Firet English " geliende," what is nt Iiaud or Bear, came the word " heude," iu frequeut and voiious use, as at hand, near, ready, polite, gentle. 3 A vicJit iiinn in need. i)lirase for a \"igorous man in his wai" di'ess. John Copland was a squire who took the King of Scotland prisoner iu battle, with loss only of two teeth knocked out by David's dagger. As he refused to deliver his prisoner to the Queen, he was summoned to Calais by King EdwarJ, who there thanked him, made him a banneret, rewarded him with land to the value of five himdred ix>imds a year, gi'noiting him that income from the customs of London and BeiTvick until the land was found for him, aaid bade him give up his prisoner. ' Scniii (First English "sith-thau"). after that, atterwai'ds, since. For Philip the Valois Had he hread baken, And in the Tower of Loudon His inns are taken : To be both iu one* place Theii- foreward they uonien,'' But Philip faded there, And Da\'id is comen. Sir- DaWd the Bruce On this manere Said unto Sir Pluhp All these saws thus sere :" " Pliilip the Valois, Thou made nie be here ; This is not the foreward AVe made ere toge'er ; False is thy foreward And evU * mot thou fare, For thou and Sii' John thy son Have cast me in care." The Scots with theii' falsehood Thus went they about For to win England AATiile Edward was out ; For Cuthbert of Diu-ham Had they no doubt. Therefore at Ncx-il Cross Low gan they lout. There'louted they low, And levcd '■' alane. Thus was Da\-id the Bruce Into the Tow'r ta'en. 100 110 120 130 David the Bguce and Edward III. Fro))i an UUtminaiion at ihc hend of the Articles of Peace hetxeeen them^ Cotton 3fS.— Nero D. TI. s A place. An, or a before a consonant, was the old form of " one.*' 6 Thairc fornard thai nomen, they took their promise of each other. First English "foreweard," a covenant made beforehand. First English " niman," to take ; past " nam." " Seir (Old Swedish "saer"), several. 8 Evil is contracted to a monosyllable, as in Shakespeai'e's " Cjnn- beline" (Act v. sc. 5), "The evils she hatch'd were not effected so." And iu Act i., the third line of the second scene. 5 Lct'^d, remained, were left. TO A.D. 1352.] SHORTER POEMS. 35 War Ships. Pi-om Htirkiail MS.— 1319, fol. 18. (3) ffoif Kiiiij Edicdrcl and /its Meni Met with the Hjianianh on the Sea. I would not spare for to speak Wist I to speed,' Of wifht men mth weapon, And worthy in weed. That now are daiven to dale^ And dead all theii- deed, They sail in the sea ground, Fishes to feed : Felo fishes they feed For aU theii- gi'eat faro,' It was in the wane of day * That they came there. 10 Naval Armament. F,-Oin Harhlan MS.— 1319, fol. 14. They sailed forth in the Swin ' In a summer's tide. With trumpets and tahors, And mickle other pride ; ' T7isf 1(0 s^H'cd, if I knew how to prosi>er. First Euglisli " spiJdan," to speed, prosper; the sense iu such phrases as " Speed the plough," or " More haste less speed." — Wicht, vit^orous. See Note 1, page 24. * Weed, dress. See Note 12, page 27. — Dah (French " deiiil "), grief. ^ Fele (First English "fela"), many. — Fare, solemn preparation. Allied to German " feier," solemnity, * In the u-aniand. Perhaps wane of year. Stow says that the fleets met at Winchelsea " upon the Feast of the Decollation of St. John, about evensong time." Th it would he on the 29th o£ August. ^ The Sii-in. A i>assage between Cadsand, at the mouth of the West The word "^ of those warmcn Walked fuU wide. The goods tliat they rohlied In hull gan they hide : 20 In huU then they liided Great wealth as I ween, Of gold and of silver. Of srarlet and green. WTien they sailed westward, Those wieht men in war, Their hardis " their anehors Hanged they on here ; * Wiiht men of the west Nighed them ncn- ' 30 And gert them snajjper '" in the snare, Blight they no fciT ; " Far might they not flit But there must they fine,'- And that they heforc rcaved '^ Then must they tjiie.'^ Boy with the hlack heai'd, I rede that thou hlin,'» And soon set thee to shr-ive With soiTOw of thy sin ; 40 If thou were in England Nought shalt thou win, Come thou more on that coast Thy bale shall begin, There kindles thy care ; Keen men shall thee keep, And do thee die on a day, And dump '^ in the deep. Ye brought o>it of Biitain Your custom with care, 50 Ye met ■with the merchants And made them full bare ; 'Ti.s good reason and right That ye evil misfare, When ye would in England Lere of a new lare : ''' Scheldt, and the south-west of Flanders. Cadsand is opposite the seaport of Sluys, to which the Simuish ships went after they had waylaid, spoiled, and destroyed the ten English vessels from Gascony. ^ Word . . icalfefd /uU iridc, fame travelled far. 7 Hardis, light defence against arrows. 8 Oil here, for expedition of war. First English " here," a hostile expedition. '•' Nerr, nearer. First English "neah," neai- : comparative, "uearre," "near," and " nyr." >" Gcrt them snaper, made them stumble. " Gar " "gora" and "gera"), to make; "snaper" (Old Swedish ' to stagger or reel. " FciT, farther. First English "feor;" comparative, "fyr." •- Fine (French "fiuir"), end. " Ream (First English "reaflan"), to seize, rob. '* Ttjne (Icelandic "tyua"), lose. " Blin, cease. See Note 14, page 33. '" Domp (Modem Scottish " dump "), to plunge. The dumps that we are sometimes down in derive their name from Dutch " domp," English "damp" (the damps), German "dampf" (steam, vapour), a Teutonic name for " the vapoiu-s " supposed to be caused by v.iponrs from the humoiu-s of the body. Wheu the Spaniards are said to be thrown overboard " dump in the deep," the word, used iu that way, is probably mimetic, like " plump." 17 J.crc of a Tieuj larc, leara a new lesson. Fu-st Euudish " Itir, teaching. (Icelandic ' snafwa"), ' fyrre" and ' lore, 36 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1346 New liire shall ye lero, Sir Edward to lout,' For -n-hcn ye stood in yom- strength Ye were all too stout. 60 KiNf: Edward III. Fi-oiii Cotloii MS.— Nero D. VI. (4) How Gentle Sir Edtcnrd, u-itJi his great Engines, Jl'on with his Jrieht Men the Castle of G nines. Were this winter away Well woidd I ween That summer should show him In shawes full sheen ; - Both the Lily and the Leopard' Should gather on a green. Mary, have mind of thy man, Thou wot whom I mean ; Lady, think what I mean I make thee my monc ; ■* Thou wreak good King Edward On wicked Sir John. Of Guincs full gladly Now wiU I begin ■ 10 1 Sir Edii-ard (o loui, to bow to King Edward. First EuglisU *' hliitan," to bow. 2 Shnv (First Euglisb '* sciia" and "sciiwa," sbade), a wool. Slteen (First English " seine," from " scinan," to shine), bright, beautiful. 3 The Lily of France. The Leoitaril, now Lion, of England. They both adorn King Edward's coat in the sketch by a contemporary- copied on tliis page. Drayton, in his " Polyolbiou " (Eleventh Song), praised the Old English armies that *' Of otir tall yeomen were, and footmen for the most. Who with their bills and bows may confidently boast Oirr Leopards they so long and bnively did advance Above the Flower-de-lice even in the heart of France." John Selden, in a Note upon this, produced authority to show that the Lions on the English coat-of-anns used to be Leopards ; and this line iu Minot's poems adds to the evidence. ■• Monc, probably from " mune" (First English " myne"), thought, remembrauce; " ma:uau," to have in mind, and not "mEe'nan,"to moan. We wot well that woning* ^\'as wicked for to win : '' Clirist that swelt' on the rood'* For sake of man's sin, Hold them in good heal That now are therein I 20 Englishmen are therein The castle to keep ; And Jolm of France is so wroth, For wo will he weep. Gentle John of Doncaster Did a fuU hold deed, When he came toward Guines To ken them Iheii- creed ; He stirt unto the castle Withoutcn any steed, 30 Of folk that ho found there Had he no drede ; Dread in heart had he none Of all he foimd there ; Fain were they to flee For all their great fear. A leatheren ladder And a long line, A small boat was thereby. That put them from pine ; 40 The folk that they foimd there Was fain for to fyno ;' Soon their dinner was dight'*' And there would they dine ; There was then' piu'pose To (line and to dwcU, For treason of the Franehc-men That false were and fell. Say now, Sir John of France, How shalt thou fare, SO That both Calais and Guines Has kindled thy care 'f If thou be man of mieklc might, Leap up on thy mare. Take thy gate" unto Guines, And greet them well there ; '- There greetes thy guestes And wcndcs " with wo. 5 Waning (First English "wunung," from "wuuian," to dwell), a dwelling. In some parts of Scotland the chief house on a farm is still called the wonnin-house or wunnin' -house. ' Wiclcd fo uin, hai-d to win. In " Sir Tristram," "wick to slow" meiuis hard to slay. Jamieson, iu his Scottish Dictiomuy, suggests that *' wicked" used in this sense is from the root of iric>if (the vi'j in vigour), or allied to the Cynuic "gwech," brave; and therefore not related to the " wicked " now in use. " Sii-dt (First English " sweltan," to die), died. ** Rode (First English "rdd"), rood, cross; so Holyrood means Holycross. ■' Fime (French " finii- "), make an end ; so in line 34, page 35. i<* Di'jlit, from Fii-st English " dihtan," to set iu order, arrange, prepare. u Talcc thy gate, go thy way ; Icelandic " gata," a way ; German, " Gasse." '2 Greet than veil there. Greet is fi-om First English " givtan,'* past " grette," to go to meet, gi-eet in the modem English sense. In " there (jrccfesthy guestiSs," gi'cet is from First English " gite'tan," past " grdt," to weep or cry out, a word still used in Scotland. 13 Wendea, fi-om First English " wendan," to go. The final e.s' iu yi-eetes and lecnde.s was the regular plural of the present indicative in Northern English. One of the clearest marks of distinction between TO A.D. 1373.] SHORTER POEMS. 37 King Edward has ■n-onnen The castle them fro. Yc men of Saint Omer's Trus' yc this tide, And put out your pavilions With your miekle pride ; Send after Sir John of France To stand hy your side, A Boar is boun you to bicker^ That well dare abide ; Well dare he abide Bataile to bede,-* And of yom- Sir John of France Has he no dredc. eo 70 John of France. From the Cotton MS.— Nero, D. VI. Gofl save Sir Edward his riglit In everilka^ need, And he that vriW not so Evil mote he speed ; And len^ oiu- Sir Edward His life well to lead, That he may at his ending Have heaven to his meed. Amen. 80 the old Nortlieru, Midland, and Soutliem dialects was tliat tlie Nortliem had that phiral iu es, while the Midland plural was in eii, aud the Soxithem iu cth. • Trus, Begone ! (Ghielic *' tiiiis " or *' tnis ") was the sound by which dogs were driven away. Icelandic "tmtta;" to shout " tmtt ! " as shepherds do. 2 Bovn you to hickcr, ready to attack you ; houn (Icelandic " bi'iinu," from "bua," Old Swedish "boa," to make ready), ready prepared; bicher {CjTnric "bicre,"a battle) is used, says Jamieson, in Scotland to represent rapid succession of strokes in a battle or broil. Con- stant throwina: of stones, plying of sticks, or the noise of successive strokes or of uny rapid motion, is called bickering. ' Bvde (from First English "beodan"), offer. * EverWi, as I trow, jVIaketh you not forgetful for to be That I you took in poor estate full low, For any weal yc mote youi' solve know. Take heed of every word that I you say, There is no wight that hearth it but we t^'ay. 420 " Ye wot youi- self well how that ye came here Into this house, it is not long ago ; And though to me that ye be lief and dear, Unto my gentles ye be no thing so. They say, to them it is great shame and wo For to be subject and ben in servage To thee that born art of a small village. " And namely * sith ^ thy daughter was i-bore. These wordcs han thay spoken doubtelcss, But I desii-e, as I have done before, 430 To live my life with them in rest and peace, I may not in this case be rockcless ; ' I mote doon with thy daughter for the best, Not as I would, but as my people lost.^ 1 Liever, pronounced as a monosyllable. See Note 10, page 29. 3 Knave child, l.oy. Fii'st Eufrlisli " cnapa," Gennau "knabe," a boy ; with softeniui^ of p or b to v. 3 Throw (First English *' thrah "), a short space of time. * Assay, try, test minutely, to find what are the constituents of anything and tbe proportion of each. 5 Namchj, especially. ^ Situ, since. ' Recltcless (First English " regol-lejs "), regardless of miles. * Leste, hist, please. First English " lystan," to wish or choose, from "lust " (see Note 2, page 38). " .\jid yet, God wot, this is fuU loth to me ; But nathelcs withoutc your witting' WiU I not doon ; but this would I," quod he, " That ye to me assent as in this thing. Shew now your patience in your working. That ye me hight and swore in your vilKige, 440 That day that makcd was our mariage." When slie had heard all tliis, she Hot ameeved'" Neither in word, or cheer, or countenaneo, For, as it seemed, she was not aggrieved : She saide, " Lord, aU lieth in your pleasance ; My child and I, witJi heartly obeisance, Ben yom'es all, and ye may save or spill" Yom- ownen thing ; worketh after your will. " There may no tiling, so God my soule save, Liken to you that m.ay displeasen me ; 4.i0 Nor I desire no thing for to have. Nor drcadc for to lose, .save only ye. This will is in mine heart, and aye shall be. No length of time or death may this deface. Nor change my courage to other place." Glad was this.iuai-qius of her answeiing. But yet he feigned as he were not so. All di-eary was his cheer and his looking, When that he should out of the chamljci' go. Soon after this, a furlong way or two, 400 He privily hath told all his intent Unto a man, and to his wife him sent. A manner sergeant was Ibis privt!' man. The whicli that faithful oft he foundon had In thingcs great, and eke such folk well can Doon execution in thingcs bad : The lord knew well that ho him loved and di'ad ; And whan this sergeant wist his loi'des will. Into the chamber he stalked liim full still. " Madam," he said, " ye uiost forgive it me, 470 Though I do thing to which I am constrained ; Ye ben so wise, that full well knowc ye. That lordes hestes may n(jt ben i-fe\Tied. They may well ben bewailed or complained, But men must need unto their lust obey, And so will I ; tliere is no more to say. " This child I am conmiauded fur tu take " — And spake no more, but out the child he hent'^ Despitously, and gan a cheerc make. As though ho would have slain it ere ho went. 480 Grisildc mote all suifer and all consent ; And as a lamb she sitteth meek and still, And let this cruel sergeant doon Ids will. Suspicious was the defame of this man. Suspect his face, suspect his word also ; Svispect the time in which he this began. Alas ! her daughter, th.at .she loved so, She weened he woidd have .slayen it right the ; But nathCdes .ihe neither wept nor siked," Consenting her to that the marquis liked. 490 3 Witting, knowlerlge. a* Ameevcd, changed, moved. u S-piU, destroy. First Fuglisli " spillau," to kill. '- Ucnl, seized. 13 Sikcd I First English "sican"), to sigh. 44 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1373 But at the laste si^eken she hegan, And mekely she to the sergeant prayed, So as he was a worthy gentleman, That she must kiss her cliild ere that it deid. And in her barm' this Uttle child she laid With fidl sad face, and gan the child to kiss, And lulled it. and after gan it bliss. And thus she said in her bcnignc voice : " ITarewell, my child ! I shall thee never see ; But sith I thee have marked 'n-ith the erois, 500 Of thUke father blessed mot thou be That for us died upon a cross of tree ; Thy soule, little cluld, I him betako,- For this night shult thou deyen for ni}- sake." I trow that to a noriee in this cas It had been hard this ruthe for to see ; Well might a mother then have cried "Alas !" But natheles so sad steadf&st was she, That she endm-ed all adversite. And to the sergeant meekely she said, 510 " Have here again yoiu' Uttle yoimgo maid. " Go now," quoth she, " and do my lordes best ; But one thing wUl I pray you of your grace. That, but my lord forbid you, at the least Biu'y this little body in some jdace. That beastes nor no birdcs it to-race."^ But he no word will to that pui'pose say, But took the child and went upon his way. This sergeant came imto his lord again. And of GrisUdis wordes and her cheer 520 He toldc point for point, in short and plain. And him prescnteth with his daughter dear. Somewhat this lord hath ruth in his manere ; But natheles his purpose held he still. As lordes doou ^^■hen they will ban their will ; And bade his sergeant that he piivily Shoulde this child fuU softe wind and wrap. With alle cii'cumstances tenderly. And carry it in a coffer or in a lap ; But upon pain his head off for to swap,* 530 That no man shoulde know of his intent. Nor whence he came, nor whither that he went ; But at Bologna, to his sister dear. That thilkc time of Panak* was countess, He should it take, and shew her this materc. Beseeching her to doon her business This child to foster in all gentiless. And whose child that it was he bade her hide From every wight, for aught that might betide. The sergeant go'th, and hath fulfiU'd this tiling. 510 But to this marquis now retiune we ; For now go'th he full fast imagining. If by his wives cheer he mightc see, Or by her word apcrceivc, that she > Barm, bosom. First English " bearm." = Him betake, commit to Him. First English " betse'caoi," to put in trust. 3 To-race. Race (French " raser"), take from the face of the earth; *' to " is an intensive prefix. * Su'ap, from First English " swiii)au," to sweep, strike. 5 PanaJc. Boccaccio wrote " FiUiago." Were changed ; but he never her coud find But ever in one alike sad and kind. As glad, as humble, as busy in sen-'ioe And eke in love, as she was wont to be, Was she to him, in every manner wise ; No of her daughter not one word spake she ; 550 None accident for none adversite Was seen in her, ne never her daughter's name Ne nempned^ she, in earnest nor in game. PAET IV. In this estate there passed ben foiu- year Ere she ^\-ith childc was; but, as God would, A knave child she bare by this Walticr, Ful gracious, and fail' for to behold ; And when that folk it to its father told, Not only he, but all his eoimtry, merie Was for this child, and God they thank and licrie.'' 560 \Mien it was two year old, and from the breast Departed of his nonce, on a day This marquis caughtc yet another lest To tempt his wif yet offer, if he may. 1 needless was .she tempted in assay ! But wedded men ne knoweu no mestiro, A\'han that they find a patient creatilre. "Wifi'," quoth this marquis, "ye have heard ere this My people sickly bear'th oiu' mariage. And namely since my son y-boren is, 570 Now is it worse than ever in all our age ; The miu-mur slay'th mine heart and my courige, For to mine earcs com'th the voice so smart. That it well nigh destroyed hath mine heart. " Now say they thus, ' "UTien Walter is agone. Then shall the blojd of Janicle succeed. And ben our lord, for other have we none.' Such wordes saith my people, out of dread. Well ought I of such mumiiu' taken heed. For certainly I di-eade such sentence, 580 Though they not plainly speak in mine audience. " I wolde Uve in peace, if that I might ; \^'Tiercfore I am disposed utterly. As I his sister servcde by night. Eight so think I to serve him pri\-ily. This warn I you, that ye not suddenly Out of yoiu-self for no wo should outray : ' Be patient, and thereof I you pray." " I have," quoth she, " said thus, and ever shall, 1 will no thing, ne nill no tiling certain, .590 But as you list ; nought grieveth me at all. Though that my daughter and my son be slain At your commandement ; this is to sain, I have not had no part of children twain. But first sickness, and after wo and pain. 6 Ncmpncd, named. Fii*st English " nemnan," to name. ■ Hei-ic, from First English "herian," to praise. 8 Outray (French *'outrer"), go beyond bounds, Itse patience. i TO A.li. UM.'i SHORTER POEMS. 45 " Ye ben oui- lord, doth with your owen thing Eight as you list, askcth no rede' of me ; For, as I left at home all my clothing When I first came to yovi, right so," quoth she, " Left I my will and aU my Uberte, 600 And took yom' clotliing ; wherefore I you pray Doth youi- ploasLtncc, I will your lust obey. " And certes, if I liadde prescience Your wlU to know, ere ye your lust me told, I would it do withoute negUgence. But now I wot yom' lust, and what ye wold, All yoiu" plcasiince firm and stable I hold ; For wist I that my death would do you ease. Eight gladly would I dejxn, you to please. 610 But there ben folk of such condition. That, when they have a certain pm-pose take, They cannot stint of their intention. But, right as they were boundcn to a stake. They will not of their firste purpose slake : Eight so this marquis fully hath jniiiiosed To tempt his w ifc, as he was first disposed. 620 " Death may not maken no comparisoun Unto your love." And when this marquis sey The Constance of his wife, he cast adown His even two, and wonch-eth that she may In patience suffre oil this array ;- And forth he go'th with di-oary counteniince. But to his heart it was full great pleasince. This ugly sergeant in the .same wise That he her daughter caughte, right so he, Or worse, if men can any worse de'^use. Hath hent her son, that fuU was of beautc. And ever in one so patient was she, That she no cheere made of hea^-iness, But kissed her son, and after gan it bless. Save this ; she prayed him that, if he might, Her Uttlo son he would in earthe grave. His tender linibes, delicate to sight. From fowlcs and fron\ beastes for to save. But .she none answer of liim mighte have. He went his way, as him no thing ne rought ; But to Bolo\Tie he tenderly it brought. 6.30 This marquis wondi'eth ever longer the more Upon her patience, and if that he Ne hadde soothly knowen therbefore. That perfectly her children loved she. He would have weened that of some subtilte And of malice, or for cruel courage. That she had suffered this with sad visSige. But weU he knew that, next himself, certain 8he loved her cliildren best in every wise. But now of women would I asken fain, H these assayes mighten not suffice ? \\Tiat could a sturdy husband^ more devise To prove her wifehood and her .steadfastness. And he continidng ever in stiu'dinoss ? 640 6.50 * Bede, counsel. 2 An-ay, ordinance, making ready. ^ Sturdy lufsband. Stiirdi/ (Icelandic "styrtlr"), rigid. Lard. An oak is stiurdy when firmly fixed and not easily shaken. He waiteth, if by word or coimtonauce That she to him was changed of cor&ge. But never could he finde variance. She w;is aye one in heart and in visftge ; And aye the farther that she was in age, The more true, if that it were possible. She was to him in love, and more penible.^ For which it seemed thus, that of them two Ther nas but one will ; for as Walter lest, 660 The same lust was her plea.sance also ; And, God be thanked, all fell for the best. She shewed well, for no worldly unrest A wife, as of herself, no thing ne should Will in effect but as her husband would. The slander of Walter oft and -wide sprad. That of a cruel heart he ^vickedly, For* he a podre woman wedded had, Hath murdered both his children privily ; Such murmur was among them commonly. 670 Ko wonder is ; for to the people's ear There came no word but that thej- murdered were. For which, where as his people therbefore Had loved him well, the slander of his defame Made them that they him hatede therefore ; To ben a mm'd'rer is an hateful name. But natheles, for earnest nor for game, He of his cruel purpose nolde stent ; ^ To tempt his wife was set all his intent. When that his daughter twelve year was of age, 680 He to the com-t of Eome, in subtle wise Informed of his will, sent his message C'ommandj-ng them such bulles to devise As to his cruel purpose may suifice. How that the Pope, as for his people's rest, Bade him to wed another, if him lest. I say, he bade they shouldc counterfeit The Popes bulles, making mention That he hath leave his firste wife to lete,' As by the Popes dispensatidn, ggo To stintc rancour and dissension Betwixt his people and him ; thus said the bull, The which they han published at the full. The rude people, as it no wonder is. Weened fid well that it had been right so. But when these tidings come to Grisildis, I deemc that her heart was full of wo ; But she, alike sad for evermo. Disposed was, this humble creiitftre, Th' adversitc of fortune all t' endure; 700 Abiding ever his lu.st and his pleasince. To whom that slie was given, heart and all. As to her verj- worldly s\iffisance. But shortly if this story I tellen shall. This marquis written hath in special A letter in which he sheweth his intent, And secretlv he to Boloync it sent. * Penihle, jiftinstakiuff. ^ For, because. ' NoUe, would not. First English ' to will.— Sdnf, stint. ' Leic, leave. wiUan," to will ; "nillan," not 46 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. lA.D. l:i7a To the Earl of Piinak, which that haddc tho Woddcil his sister, prayed he specially To bi-ingen homo again Ixis children two 710 In honoiu-able estate all openly. But one thing he l>im prayed utterly, That he to no wight, though men would enquere, Shoulde not teUcn whose chUdi-en they were, But say the maiden should i-wcddcd bo Unto the Marqiiis of 8alucc anon. And as tliis earl was prayed, so did he ; For at day set, he on his way is gone Toward Saluce, and lordcs many one In rich array, this maiden for to guide, 7'20 Her younge brother riding by her side. An-aycd was toward her marriage This frcshc maidc full of geranics clear ; Her brother, which that seven year was of age, Anaycd eke full fresh in his manere : And thvis in great nobles.se and with glad cheer Towiird Saluces shaping their joiu-ney. From day to day they riden on thcii- way. PAKT V. Among all this, after his wiclc'd ussige, This marqui.s, yet his wife to tcmpto more 730 To the utterestc proof of her courage. Fully to han experience and lore If that she were as steadfast as before, He on a day in open aiulicnco Full boistously hath siiid her this sentence : <' Certes, Grisild, I had enough pleasimce To han you to my wife, for your goodness, As for your truth and for your obeisance. Not for your lineage nor for your richesse ; But now know I in very soothfastness, 7-10 That in great lordsliip, if I well aviso, There is gi-eat servitude in sundry wise. " I may not doon as every ploughman may ; My people me constraineth for to take Another wife, and ci-ien day by day ; And eke the Pope, r.ancom- for to slake, Consenteth it, that dare I xmdertake : And truely, thus much I will you say, My newe wife is coming by the 'way. " Be strong of heart, and void anon her place, 750 And thilkc dower that ye broughten me Take it again, I grant it of my grace ; Retumeth to your father's house," quoth he, " No man may alway han prosperite. With even heart I rede you t' endure Tho stroke of fortune or of adventure." And she answered .again in patience : " My lord," quoth she, " I wot, and wist alway, How that betwixen your magnificence And my poverty no wight can ne may 700 Maken comparison ; it is no nay. I ne held me never digTie in no manere To be youi' wife, no, ne your chamberere. " And in this house, there yo me lady made, — The highe God take I for my witness. And all-so wisely he my soulc glad, — I never held me lady ne mistress, But humble servant to youi' worthiness. And ever shall, while that my life may duic, Aboven every worldly creature. 770 " That ye so long of youi' beniguitc Han holden me in honour and nobleyc, ' Whereas I was not worthy for to be. That thank I God and you, to -nhom I pray For-yeld* it you; ther is no more to say. Unto my father gladly wiU I wend, And with liim dwell unto my lives end. " There I was fostered as a cliild fuU small. Till I lie dead my life there will I lead, A widow clean in body, heart, and all ; 7H0 For sith I gave to you my maidenhead, And am yoiu' true wife, it is no dread, God shicldc such a lordcs wife to take Another man to husband or to make. ■' And of youi' newe wife, God of his grace So gi'ante you weal and prosperite ; For I ■will glaiUy yielden her my place. In which that I was blissful -wont to be. For sith it Uketh you, my lord," quod she, " That wliilom weren all mine hcartcs rest, 790 That I shall go, I will go when you lest. " But thercas ye me proifer such dnwaire As I first brought, it is well in my mind It were my wretched clothes, no thing faii-e. The which to me were hard now for to find. goodc God ! how gentle and how kind Ye seemed by yom' speech and your visage. The day that makcd 'was our mariage ! "But sooth is said, algate- I find it true. For in effect it proved is on me, 800 Love is not old as when that it is new. But certes, lord, for none adversitc. To deyen in the case,^ it .shall not be That ever in word or work I shall repent That I yo>i gave mine heart in '\vholc intent. " My lord, ye wot that in my father's place Yo did me strip out of my poorc wcdo, And richcly me cladden of yom- grace ; To you brought I nought elles, out of di-ede,'' But faith, and nakedness, and maidenhede: 810 And here again my clothing I restore, And eke my wedding ring for evei-more. " Tho remnant of your jewels ready be Within your chamber, dare I safely sayn. Naked out of my fathers house," quoth she, " I came, and naked mote I turn again. All your plesance would I fulfillcn fain ; But yet I hope it be not your intent. That I smockless out of your palace went. 1 Foi'-ijcid, requite. First Englisli " forgyldan ;" German, " ver gelten." 2 AlgaiCf always. ^ To deyen in ihe case, tliough I die for it. * Out of drede, beyond doubt. See line 782. TO A.D. 1400.] SHORTER POEMS. 47 820 " Ye could not do so dlshouost a thing, That thilke womb, in whic-h your ohildi-cn lay, Shouldc before the people, in my walking, Be seen all l)are : wherefore I you pray Let mo not like a wonn go by the way ; Remember you, nune ownc lord so dear, I was your wife, though I unworthy were. " Wherefore in guerdon of my maydeuhcde, AMiieh that I brought and not again I bear, As vouehcsafe to give me to my meed But such a smock as I was wont to wear, 830 That I therewith may wrie ' the womb of her That was your wife ; and here take I my leave Of you, mine owne lord, lest 1 you grieve." "The smock," quoth he, '^ that thou hast on thy back, Let it be stiU, and bear it forth with thee ; " But well unethos thilke word he spake. But went his way for ruth and for pite. Before the folk herselven strippeth she. And in her smock, with head and foot all bare, Toward her father's house forth is she fare. 840 The folk her follow, weeping on tlieir way. And fortune aye they cursen as they gon ; But she from weeping kept her eyen drcye, Nc in this time word ne spake she none. Her father, that this tiding heard anon, Cursed tlie day and time that nature 8hope- him to ben a hves creature. For out of doubt this olde poore man Was e'er in suspect of her manage; For e'er he deemed, sith that it began, That when the lord fulfill' il had his courage. Him wolde think that it were disparage To his estate, so lowe for t' alight. And voiden her as soon as e'er he might. 850 860 Against his daughter hastily go'th he ; For he l»y noise of folk knew her coming ; And with her olde coat, as it might be. He covered her, full sorn-f ully weeping ; But on her body might he it not biing. For nide was the cloth, and more of age By dayes f ele ' than at her mariage. Thus with her father for a certain space Dwelleth this flow'r of wifely patience. That neither by her words nor by her face, Before the folk, nor eke in their absence, Ne shewed she that her was done offence, Ne of her high estate no remcmbrimce Ne hadde she, as by her countenance. No wonder is. for in her great estate Her ghost was ever in plain himiiUte ; No tender mouth, no hearte delicate, No pompe, no semblant of royalte, But full of patient benignitc. Discreet, and pridcles, ay honourable. And to her husband ever meek and stable. • Wrie, clothe. First Eug-lisli " wrigan ;" whence " rig." - S?(opf, shaped, made. First English "scyppan," past "sceop,' made him to be a living creature. 3 Day^fde, many days. First English '* fela," many. 870 Men speak of Job, and most for his humblesse. As derkes, when them Ust, can well indite. Namely,'' of men, but as in soothfastnesse. Though clerkes praise women but a lite,* There can no man in humblesse him acquite 880 As women can, no can ben half so true As women ben, but it be fall of new.^ PART VI. From Boloj-ne is this Earl of Panak come. Of which the fame up-sprang to more and less, And to the people's earcs all aijd some Was couth eke, that a nowe marquisesse He with him brought, in such pomp and richesse, That never was there seen with luanncs eye So noble an-ay in all West Lombardye. The marquis, which that shope and knew all this, 890 Ere that this earl was eonu', sent liis mess&ge For thilke seely ^ poore Gri-sildis ; And she with humble heart and glad visage. Not with no swollen thought in her corn-age, Came at his hest, and on her knees her set, And i-evercntly and wisely she him gret." " Grisild," quoth he, " my will is utterly. This maiden, tliat shall wedded ben to me. Received be to-morwe as royally As it possible is in mine house to be ; 900 And eke that every wight in Ids degi'ee, Ha^'c his estate in sitting and servise And high pleasance as I can best devise. " I ha^'e no woman suffisant ceiiuin The chambers for t' array in ordinance After my lust, and therefore would I fain That thine were all such manner govei-nance ; Thou knowest oko of old all my pleasance ; Though thine array be bad and ill beseie,' Do thou thy devoii' at the leaste weie." 910 " Not only, lord, that I am glad," quoth she, " To do your lust, but I desire also You for to serve and please in my degree Withouten fainting, and shall evermo ; Ne never, for no weal ne for no wo, Ne shall the ghost within mine hearte stent To love you best with all my true intent." And with that word .she gan the house to dight, And tiibles for to set, and beddcs make. And pained her to doon all that she might, 929 Praj-ing the chamberers, for Goddcs sake. To hasten them, and faste sweep and shake. And she, the mo-stc servis&ble of all. Hath every chamber arrayed, and his hall. Abouten imdein '" gan this Earl aliglit, That with him brought these noble children twey ; For which the people ran to sec the sight Of theii' an-ay, so richcly bisey." And then at erst amonges them they say, * Namely, esi)ecially. So in Orerman, namentJich. ^ Lite, little. 6 Bi(f tt he faU of new, nnless it has occiun-ed quite newly; since I list heard anj'thing about such matters. " Seely. First English *' sffilig," hnppy, innocent ; thence " silly," in the sense first of the guileless, e.isily beguiled ; *' a f)lessed innocent." 8 Gret, greeted. ^ Ul hcscie, makes a poor show. '" Vndtrn. See line 204. " Biaey, displayed. 48 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1373 That Walter was no fool, though that him lest 930 To change his wife ; for it was for the best. For she is fairer, as they decmen all. Than is Grisiltl, and more tendre of age, And fairer fruit between them shoidde fall, ,\nd more pleasant for her high linage ; Her brother eke so fair was of visage. That them to see the jseople hath caught pleasance, Commending now the marquis' governance. O stoi-my people, unsad and ever untrue ! Aye undiscrect, and changing as a vane, 940 Delighting ever in rimible that is new. For like the moon aye waxe ye and wane ; Aye full of clapping, dear enough a jane ; ' Your doom is false, yoiu' Constance evil preveth, A ful great fool is he that on you licvcth 1 Thus saiden sadde folk in that cite, When that the people gazed up and down. For they were glad right for the novcltc. To have a newe lady of their town. No more of this make I now mentioun, 950 But to Cirisild again will I me di'ess, And tell her Constance and her business. FuU busy was Grisild in everytMag, That to the feaste was appertinent ; Right nought was she abashed of her clothing, Though it was rude, and somedcal eke to-rent,- But with glad cheerc to the gate she went, With other folk, to greet the marquisess. And after that doth forth her business. With so glad cheer his guestcs she receiveth, 960 And cunningly everich in his degree, That no defaultc no man appcrceiveth, But aye they wondren what she mighte be That in so poor array was for to see, And coudc such honour and reverence, And worthily they praisen her prudence. In all this meane-whilc she ne stent This maid and eke her brother to commend With all her heart, in full benign intent, So well, that no man could her praise amend. 970 But at the last when that these lordes wend To sitten down to meat, he gan to call Grisild, as .she was busy in his hall. " Gri.sild," quoth he, as it were in his play, "How liketh thee my wife and her beautc ?" " Right well, my lord," quoth she, " for, in good fay,^ A faii'er saw I never none than she. I pray to God give her prosperite ; And so hope I, that he wiU to you scud Pleasance enough unto your lives end. 980 One thing beseech I you and warn also. That ye ne pricke with no tormenting This tender maiden, as ye han doon mo ;■* For she is foster' d in her nourishing More tenderly, and to my sujiposing 1 Dear erwtiglt a jane, dear at a halfpenny. The jane was a small coin of Genoa (or Janua). Speght (Glossary to Chaucer, 1598) interprets jane as "halfpence of Janua" (Genoa), " galley halfpence." 2 Some deal eke to-rent, some part also much torn. 3 Fay, faith. French " foi." * Mo, more, others. She coudc not adversity endiu-e, As coud a poore foster'd creature." And when this Walter saw her patience. Her glade cheer, and no malice at all. And he so oft had done to her oifence, 990 And she aye sad° and constant as a wall, Continuing e'er her innocence o'er all. This stui-dy marquis gan his hearte dress To rue upon her wifely steadfastness. "This is enough, Grisilde mine," quoth he, " Bo now no more aghast, nor evil apayed ; I have thy faith and thy benignitc. As well as ever woman was, assayed, In great estate, and poorely aiTayed ; Now know I, deare wife, thy steadfastness,"- - lOOC And her in anncs took, and gan her kess. And she for wonder took of it no keep ; She herdc not what thing he to her said. She far'd as she had stcrt out of a sleep. Till she out of her mazedness abraid.^ " Grisild," quoth he, "by God tluit for us dcyd. Thou art my wife, ne nose other I have, Ne never had, as God my soule save. " This is my daughter, which thou hast supposed To be my wife; that other faithfully 1010 Shall be mine heii-, as I have aye pm-posed ; Thou bare them in thy body truely. At Bolo>Tie have 1 kept him privily ; Take them again, for now may'st thou not say That thou hast lorn none of thy chUdi-en tway. " And folk, that otherwise han said of me, I warn them well that I have done this deed For no malice, ne for no cruelte. But for t' assaye in thee thy womanhede ; And not to slay my children, God forbede! 1020 But for to keep them privily and stOl, Tin I thy purpose knew and all thy will." \Mian she this heard, aswoonc down she fallcth For piteous joy, and after her swooning She both her youngc children to her f aUeth, And in her anncs, piteously weeping, Embraceth them, and tenderly kissing Full like a mother, with her salte tears She bathed both theii- visage and their hairs. Oh, such a piteous thing it was to see 1030 Her swooning, and her hiunble voice to hear I " Grand merci, lord. God thank it you," quoth she, " That ye han saved me my chilth'en dear ! Now reck I never to ben dead right here, Sith I stand in your love and in your grace. No force of ' death, ne when my spiiit pace. ■' tender, dear, O youngc children mine. Your woful mother weened steadfastly. That cruel hoimdcs or some foid vermine Had eaten you ; but God of His mercy, 1040 And your bcnigne father tenderly Hath doon you keep." .iVnd in that same stound All suddenly she swapt adown to ground. 5 Sad, firm. See Note 11, page 40. 7 No force of, no matter for. ^ Ahraid, started. i TO A.D. 1400.] SHORTER POEMS. 49 And in her swough so sadly hoUIcth she Her childi'en two, when she g-iii them t' embrace, That with great sleight aud great tlift'ieulte The ehildi'en from her arm they gon araee.' many a tear on many a piteous face Down ran of them that stoodeu her beside ; "Uneth abouten her might they abide. lOoO Walter her gladdeth, and her soitow slaketh ; She riseth up abashed from her tranoe, And every wight her joy and teste maketh, TUl she hath caught again her contenince. AValter her doth so faithfully plesance, That it was dainty for to see the cheer Betwixt them two, now they be met v-fere.' These ladies, when that they their time sey, Have taken her, and into chamber gone, And strippen her out of her rude an-ay, 1060 And in a cloth of gold that brighte shone, With a coroun of many a riehe stone Upon her head, they into hall her brought ; And there she was honoured as her ought. Thus hath this piteous day a blissful end ; For every man and woman doth his might This day in mii-th and revel to dispend, Till on the welkin shone the starres light ; For more solemn in every mannes sight This feaste was, and gTeater of costage, 1070 Then was the revel of her marriage. Full many a year in high prosperite Liven these two in concord aud in rest, And richely his daughter married he Unto a lord, one of the worthiest Of all Itale ; and then in peace and rest His wifcs father in his court he keepeth, Till that the soul out of his body creepeth. His son succeedeth in his heritage, In rest and peace, after his father's day ; 1080 And fortimate was eke in marriage. All put he not his wife in great assay. This world is not so strong, it is no nay. As it hath been of oldo times yore, And hearkneth what this author saith^ therefore. This story is said, not for that wives should FoUow GrisUd, as in hunulite, For it were importable,^ though they would ; But for that every wight in his degree Shoulde he constant in adversity 1090 ^ Arace, tear away. Old Frencli '* aracer ;" Latin *' eradicare." ^ Tfere, togetlier. ^ What this author Miifh has been told on pa^e 38. Some m:iy be glad to have Petrarch's own words, and see exactly how Chaucer is quotms: them in his next, verses. This is the passage : " Hauc histo- rian! stilo nunc alio retexere visum fuit, nou tam ideb ut mati'onas nostri temporis ad imitandam Inijus usoris patientiam, quae niiiii vis imitabilis videtur, quam ut legentes ad imitandam saltem feminee constantiam escitarem, ut quod hiec viro suo prsestitit, hoc prEEstare Deo nostro audeaut, qui licet, ut liicobus ait Apostolus, inteutator fit malorum et ipse uemiuem tentat, probat tamen, et sffipe nos multis ac gravibns ilagellis esercen siuit, uon ut animum nostrum sciat, quem scivit antequam crearemur, sed ut nobis nostra fragilitas notis ac domesticis indiciis innotescat. Abunde ego constantibus viris as- cripserim, quisquis is fuerit, qui pro Deo suo sine murmnre patiatur, quod pro suo mortali conjuge nisticaua hsec muliercula passa est." * JmporlnhlCy uot to be borne. As was Grisild, therefore Petrarch writeth This story, which with high style he inditeth. For sith a woman was so patient Unto a mortal man, well more us ought Eeceiven all in gree* that God ua sent. For great skill " is He prove that He WTought, But He no tempteth no man that He bought, As saith Saint James, if ye his 'pistle read ; He proveth folk all day, it is no di'cad, And suifereth us, as for our exercise, 1100 With sharpc scom-gcs of adversite Full ofte to be beat in suudi-y wise ; Not for to know om- will, for certes He, Er we were born, knew al our frailete ; And for our best is all His governance ; Let us then hve in vii'tuous sufErance. But one word, lordings, hearkneth ere I go: — It were fidl hard to finde nowadays In all a town Grisildes thi-ee or two ; For if that they were put to such assays, 1110 The gold of them hath now so bad allays With brass, that though the coin be fair at eye, It ■woulde rather burst atwo than ply. For which heer, for the wyvcs love of Bathe — AVhos lyf and al hii- secte God mayntcne In heigh maistrie, and elles were it scathe — I win, with lu.sty hertc fi'esshe and grene, Saye yow a song to glade yow, I wene, And lat us stjTit of emestful matiere. Herkneth my song, that seith in this manere : — 1120 1130 LENVOYE DE CHAUCER.' Grisild is deed, and eek hir pacienee. And bothe at oones bm-ied in Itayle : For whiche I crye in open audience, No weddid man so hardy be to assayle His wy\-es pacienee, in hope to fynde GrisQdes, for in eerteyn he schal fayle. O noble wjtcs, fidl of heigh prudence, Let noon humUite your tonges nayle ; Ne lat no clerk have cause or diligence To write of yow a story of such mervayle, As of Grisildes, paeient and kynde, Lest Chichevaehe^ yow swowle in hir entraile. Folwith Ecco, that holdith no silence. But ever answereth at the countretayle , Beth nought bydaffed for youi- innocence. But scharply tak on yow the govemayle ; s Gree (French " gr(t "), goodwill ; Latin " gratns." s Great still, good reason ; Icelandic " skil," discei-ument. ' L'Emmie de Chaucer. I give the comic epilogue without auy modem spelling, that the reader may learu from it the form iu which au old MS. dehvers to us Chaucer's English. "L'Envoy" was a name derived from early singers of love poeti7 iu Prance, who would form themselves into a court of rhymers, called the " Pny d'Amom-,'" under a president whom they called " Prince du Puy." When oue had written a balade, rondeau, pasfourelle, or other piece, it was recited to the Prince du Puy, with the addition of lines called *' L'Envoy," specially adtii'essed to himself. 8 Chichevache was a popidar jest of a cow lean as a skeleton, because she fed only on patient wives. She had a hu.^band, Bicom, who was very fat, because he fed on patient husbands, aud was in no diuiger of famine. See Lydgate's poem on p.iges 5-1 — 5t>. 50 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1393 Empiyntith wel this lessoun on your mj-nde, For comim profyt, sith it may avayle : — Ye archcn-j-vcs, stondith at dcfens, S>Ti ye ben strong;', as is a gi-cot camaille, 1140 Nc siifii-c not that men yow don oft'ens. And selendre -n-ives, fiehlo as in bataylo, Beth egre ' as is a tyger yond in Indo ; Ay clappith as a mylle, I yow counsailo. Ne di-ed hem not, do hem no reverence, For though thin housbond armed be in mayle, The arwcs of thy crabbid eloquence vSchal perse his brest, and eek his adventayle : - In gelousy I rede eek thou him bynde, And thou schalt make him couche as doth a quayle. 1150 If thou be fair, ther folk ben in presence Shew thou thy \-isage and thin apparaillc. If thou be foul, be fre of thy despense, To gete thee frendes do ay thy travayle ; Be ay of chier as Ught as leef on Ij-nde, And let him care and wcpe, and wring and waille. These are said to huve been Chaucer's last lines : — GOOD COUNSEL OF CHAUCER, Fly from the press and dwell with soothfastness, Suffice imto thy good though it be small, For hoard hath hate, and climbing fickleness,' Press hath envy and weal is blent ■■ over all. Savour no more than thee behove shall, Eede well thyself that other folk canst rede,^ And truth thee shall deliver it is no di-ede.^ Paine thee not each crooked to reth-ess. In trust of her that tm-neth as a ball ; Great rest standeth in little business ; ' 10 Beware also to spum against a nall,^ Strive not as doth a crockc with a wall ; Deemc' thyself that dcemest others deed, And Truth thee shall deHver it is no drede. That thee is sent receive in buxomness ; •" The wrestling of this world asketh a fall, ^ Here is no home, here is but -nTldcrness. Forth, pilgrime ! forth, beast, out of thy stall, Look up on high and thankc God of all ! Waive " thy lusts, and let thy ghost '- thee lead, 20 And Truth thee shall deliver, it is no di'cde. 1 1^'jrc, sharp ; French " aigre ;" Latiu " acer." 2 A^ventaijle, veutal or veutail lOltl Trench " veufciille"), the visor of the helmet, iu its character of ventilator. 3 Ticklencss, instahility. So iu Shakespeare's " Measm-e for Mea- siu-e," Act i., sc. 3;— "Thy head stands so tickle on thy shoulders, that a milkmaid, if she be in love, may sigh it off." ■> sunt, blinded. ^ Eede, advise. '• Wo drcde, no dnulit. See Note 12, page 39, and Hues 578, 782, 909, and 1099 of " Grisildis." 7 Busfiness, here xised in the sense of being cal'eful and troubled about many things, as iu the word "busybody." 8 Nail (First English " njegel "), nail. ^ Deemc, judge. 10 Buxonmess (First English " biihsomnes "), obedience ; from " bu- gan," to bow. u Waive (Old French " guesver"), cast away, relinquish. 12 Glwsi, spirit. First English "gifst," breath, spirit. John Gower. From his Tomb in St. Saviour's, Southwarlt. John Gower's " Confessio Amantis " is an English poem devised towards the close of the fourteenth century, like Cliaucei''s " Canterbury Tales," for the introduction of a number of good stories told in verse. It is so plaiuied that the stories ai'e gi-ouped wdth a moral purpose into sections contrived each as a lesson, enforced by various examples, against one of the seven deadly sins. There is an eighth section that warns kings of their duty. In the jjoem next to be read, Jolm Gower tells a story levelled against one of the five ministers of Pride, Presumption. He had found the tale in older collections. It was first told in tlifi Spiritual Romance of " Barlaam and Josaphat," written in Greek by a Greek monk, Joannes Damas- cenus, about the year 800, and translated into Latin before the thirteenth centuiy. Vincent of Beauvais, who wrote a Historical MiiTor, " Speculum Historiale," about the year 1290, included in it this wth the rest of the history of Barlaam and Josaphat. The tale had been repeated also iu the " Gesta Romanorum," a mediaeval collection of stories made for use in the teaching of the people. Thus it was told us by John Gower : — • GOWKR SHOOXrNG AT THE WOELD. From Cotton MS.— Tiberius A. IV., page 8. THE TRUMP OF DEATH. I find upon surquederie " How that whilom of Hungarie, By oldc dayes, was a king Wise and honest in all thing. 13 SitrTuedcrio, presumption ; from Old French " surcuiderie " and " siu-quiderie " — there was also the form " outrecuidauce " — from an old verb " cuider," to think, and " siu" " or " outre," beyoud. Chaucer i TO A.D. 1408.] SHOETER POEMS. 51 And so befel upon a day, And that was in the mouth of Slay, As thilke time it was usance, This king with nohle puryeyanco Hath for himself his chare ' arrayed Wherein he wolde ride amayed-' 10 Out of the city for to pleie With lordes and with great nohleie Of lusty folk that were young, ^Vhcre some played and some sung, Aud some gon and some ride, And some prick their horse aside .Vnd bridle them^ now in now out. The king his eye cast about, TUl he was at the laste ware •^jid saw comend again ^ his chare 20 Two pilgrimcs of so great age That like uuto a dry imago They wereu palo and fade hued. And as a bush which is bcsnewed. Their boardes wereu hoar and white. There was of kinde but a lite" That they no seemcn fully dede. They comen to the king and bede' Some of his good par chaiite ; , And he, with great humilite, 30 Out of his chare to groimde leapt. And them in both liis armes kept. And kiss'd them bothe foot and hand Before the lordes of his land. And gave them of his good thereto. And when he hath this deodc do, He go'th into his chare again. Then was mm'miir, then was disdain, Then ^ was complaint on every side ; They saiden of their ownc pride 40 Each one to other : ' " \^^lat is this ? Our king hath done ' this tiling amiss. So to abase his royalty That every man it mighte see, And humbled him in such a wise To them that were of none cmpiise." '" Thus was it spoken to and fro Of them that were with him tho" All privily behind his back. But to him selfe no man .spake. 50 The kinges brother in presence Was thilke '- time, and great offence He took thereof, and was the same Above all other which most blamo Upon his liege lord hath laid. And hath unto the lordes said. Anon as he may time find. There shall nothing be left behind, says, in his " Parson's Tale," *' Presumption is wlien a man under- taketli an emprise that him oujjht not to do, or elles that he may not do ; and this is called siu"qiii(li-ie." ' C/iarc, chainot. 2 Amayed, attended by his mates or companions. There is another word "amayed" or "amated," from another root, meaniuir dismayed. * Bridlen Jiem, the same foi-m in other passajjes. From the old form "hem" we get the contraction 'cm for *' them." * Comend ayain, coming towards. 5 Etndx (First English "cind" aud "gecind"), nature. — Lite, little. By nature they seemed little else than dead. ^ Bedc, pray for. First English "biddnn." Beads are so called from the use of them in counting pnyers. ' Tho. 8 Eclwne HI other. ' Haih do. 10 None emprise, no mark. " Emprise " here means impress or stamp, maik of worth. " Tho, then. '^ Thilke, that. That he will speak unto the king. Now list what fell upon this thing 60 The weather was merry and fair enough, Each one with other played and lough " And fellen into tales new How that the freshe tioures grew And how tho grene leaves sprung. And how that love among the young Began the heartes then awake, And every bird hath chose his make." And thus the JIayes day to th' end They lead and home again they wend. 70 The king was not so soone come That when he had his chamber nome '^ His brother ne was ready there, And brought a tale unto his car Of that he didde such a shame In hindi'ing of his owne name When he himself e wolde dreche '^ That to so vile a pouer wretch Him deigncth shewc such simplesse Against the state of liis noblesse. 80 And saith, he shall it no more use. And that he mot " himself excuse Toward his lordes every one. The king stood still as any stone And to liis tale an ear- he laid. And thoughte more than he said. Eut natheles to that he heard Well com-teously the king answer J, And told it shouldc ben amended. And thus when that their tale is ended 90 All ready was the board and cloth. The king unto his supper go'th Among the lordes to the hall. And when they hadde supped all, They tooken leave and forth they go. The king bethought himself e tho '^ How he his brother may chastio. That he thi'ough" his siu'quedrie Took upon hande to dispraise Humility which is to praise, 100 And thereupon gave such coimseil Towards his king that was not heil,-" Wliereof to be the better lered-' He thinketh to make him afeared. It fell so that in thilke dawo— There was ordained by the law A trmnpe -n^th a .sternc breath Which was clcpcd " The Trump of Death." And in the court where the k!ng was A certain man this trump of brass 110 Hath in keeping, and thereof servcth That when a lord his death dcserveth, He shall this dreadful trmnpet blow To-fore his gate, and make it knowe " Lou5?i, laughed. First English " lilUian," to laugh ; past " Uoh." 1* Make, mate. First English " maca," mate or husband. IS Nome, taken. First English *' nimau," to take ; past " nfim." ifi Dreche, trouVile. First English " di'ecceau " and " drecan." , 1' Jlfot, must or ought. Fu-st English imchaugcd : " ic mot, thu most, he mot, we moton ; " past " ic mostc." '1 Tho, then. 1^ Tlu-ouyh, by soimding of r, becomes a dissyllable, ** thorough." -■* Hcil (First English "hal"), whole, soxmd. -1 Lcrcd, taught. 22 Dauc (First English "dceg"), day. 52 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. ia93 How that the jugomcnt is give Of death, \vhieh shall not he forgive. The king, when it was night anon, This man assent ' and hade hiin gon To tnimpcn at his brother's gate. And he, which mot so don algate,- 120 Goth foith and doth the kinge's hest.' This lord, which heard of this tempest That he to-fore his gate blew. Then -n-ist he ■" by the law and knew That he was sickerliehe dcdc,* And as of help he wist no rede^ Bade sendc for his friendes alle And told them how it is befaUe. And they liim askc cause why, But he the soothe not f orthy ' 130 Ne wist, and there was soiTow tho. For it stood thilkc time so This trumpe was of such sentence That there against no resistence They couth ordaine hy no weio That he ne mot algate deie,* But if so ' that ho may purchace '" To get his Uegc lordcs grace. Their wittcs thereujion they cast, And ben appointed at the last. 140 This lord a worthy lady had Unto his wife, which also drad Her lordes death ; and children iive Between them two they had alive, That weren young and tender of age, And of stature and of visage Eight fair and lusty on to see. Then easten they that ho and she Forth with their children on the morrow, As they that were full of son-ow, 150 All naked but of smock and sherte To tender with " the kinges hcrte. His grace shulden go to seche '^ And pardon of the death beseche. Thus passen they that wofiU night, And early when they saw it light They gon them forth, in such a wise As thou to-fore hast heard devise. All naked but theii' shii'tcs on. They wept and made mochel mono, 160 Their hair hangcnd about their ears. With sobbing and with sorry tears This lord goth then an humble pas That whilom proud and noble was ; ■Whereof the city sore a-flight " Of them that sawen thilke sight ; > Assent, seut to. 2 Mot so don ajgatc, always must do so. 3 Kc?t, command. First Euglish " liae's," from " hatan." * Tho v-ist he, then Imew he. 5 Siclcerlichc dede, surely dead. * Bede, coimsel. ' He for all that did not know the truth. s Algate, all ways, by all means. — Dn'e, die. 3 But if so, unless. 1" Purchace (French " pour chasser), hunt for, and so obtain. u To tender with, whereby to make tender, soften. '- SecTic, seek. *3 Sore a-jlight, sorely jested or sneered. •* That they must fligger, scoff, deride, and jeer. Appoint their servants cei-taiu hours to appear." (" History of Albino and BeUama," 1638.) First English " flftan," to dispute, blame. And natheless all openly. With such weeping and with such cry, Forth with his childi-cn and his wife He goth to praye for his life. 170 Unto the court when they be come And men therein have heedc nome,''' There was no -ndght if he them seigh,'» From water mighte keep his eye, For sorrow which they maden tho. The king supposeth of this wo, And feigneth as he nought ne wiste ; "' But natheless at his upriste '? Men tolden him how that it ferde," And when that ho this wonder herde, 180 In haste he go'th into the haU. And all at ones down they fall. If any pity may be found. The king which seeth them go to ground Hath asked them, what is the fear ? "VS^iy they be so despoiled there ? His brother said, "Ah, lord, mere/ ! I wot none other cause why. But only that this night fuU late The Trump of Death was at my gate 190 In token that I shiddc dcic ; Thus we be come for to preic That ye may worldcs death respite." " Ha, fool, how thou art for to wite," ^' The king unto his brother saith, " That thou art of so little faith That only for a trumpes soim-" .Hath gone despoiled through the town, Thou and thy -n-ife, in such manere Forth with thy children that ben here, 200 In sight of alle men about. For that thou say'st thou art in doubt Of death, which stand'th under the law Of man, and man it may withdi'aw, So that it may perchance fail. Now shalt thou not f orthy-' merveile. That I down from my chare alight, WTien I beheld to-fore my sight. In them that were of so groat age. Mine o'mic death through theur imkge, 210 ■VNTiich God hath set by law of kind \^Ticreof I may no bote-- find. For well I wot, such as they be, Eight such am I in my degxee, Of flesh and blood and so .shall deie.-' And thus though I that law obcie Of which that kinges ben put under. It ought ben well the lasse-* wonder Than thou, which art, withoute node. For law of land in such a dredc, 220 Which for t' account is but a jape"^ As thing which thou might ovcrscape. Therefore,"' my brother, after this I rede, that sithen^' so it is ^* Heede nome, taken heed. '^ Seigh, saw. 16 Wiste, knew. '" Upriste, uprising. I3 Ferde, fared. 1^ To u-ite, to blame. Fii-st English " wftan." 20 Soun (French '* son ; " Latin " Sonus ") , sound. =■ Forthy, for that. " Thy ' ' is the old ablative of " that." ^ Bote (First EugUsh "hot "), remedy. 23 jyde, die. 2* Lasse, less. 25 Jape, jest. ^s Fortfty. 27 Sithen, since. TO A.D. 1150.] SHORTER POEMS. 53 That thou canst dread a man so sore, Dread God with all thine hearte more. For all shall die and all shall pass, As well a lion as an ass, As well a beggar as a lord, Towardes Death in one accord 230 They shullen stand." And in this wise The kinge, with his wordes wise. His brother taught and all forgave. CHAPTER V. Lydgate, Hoccleve, and James the First OF Scotland. — a.d. 1400 to a.d. 1450. In the generation after Langland, Chancer, and Gower, the three chief poets were John Lydgate, Thomas Oceleve or Hoccleve, and King James I. of Scotland. Lydgate and Hoccleve were nearly of like age, young men of about thirty, when Chaucer died in the j'ear 1400, but James I. of Scotland was then only a l)oy of six. John Lydgate, named from his birth in Suffolk, at John Lydgate. From Hui-Ieiaii MS.— 1766, page 5. the village of Lydgate, a few miles from Newmarket, was an ordained priest of the monastery of Bury St. Edmund's, where he taught rhetoric in the monastery school, and lived in repute over all the country as poet himself and teacher of the art of versifying to otliers. He WTote many legends of saints ; he versified the tales of Troy and Thebes, and also the Falls of Princes, from a French metrical version of a Latin prose book by Boccaccio. His religious feeling will be illustrated in another volume. Here let us show that he could be lively when he pleased. His poem describing a poor Kentish countryman who has come in search of justice to London, the licker up of pence, once had the widest popularity, and is even at this day well known to many readers. LONDON LICKPENNY. To London once my stcjjs I bent, ■\;\liere truth in nowise should be faint ; To Westminster- ward I forthwith went, To a Man of Law to make complaint, I said " For Mary's love, that holy saint, Pity the poor that would proceed ! " But for lack of Money I could not speed. And as I thrust the press among, By froward chance my hood was gone, Yet for all that I stayed not long 10 Till to the King's Bench I was come. Before the Judge I kneel'd anon. And pray'd him for God's sake to take heed. But for lack of Money I might not speed. Beneath them sat clerks a great rout, WTiich fast did write by one assent. There stood up one and cried about " Richard, Robert, and John of Kent ! " I wist not well what this man meant. He cried so thickly there indeed. 20 But he that lacked Jloney might not speed. Unto the Common Pleas I yodc ' tho, TVTiere sat one with a silken hood ; ^ I did him reverence, for I ought to do so. And told my case as well as I coud, How my goods were defrauded me by falsehood. I got not a mum of his mouth for my meed. And for lack of Money I might not speed. Unto the Rolls I gat me from thence, Before the clerkes of the Chancerie, 30 Where many I found earning of pence. But none at all once regarded me. I gave them my plaint upon my knee ; They liked it well when they had it read. But lacking Money I could not be sped. In Westminster Hall I found out one WTiich went in a long gown of raj',^ I crouched and kneeled before him anon. For Marye's love of help I him pray. " I wot not what thou mean'st," gau he say; 40 To get me thence he did me bode, For lack of Money I could not speed. Within this Hall, neither rich nor yet poor Would do for me aught although I should die. Which seeing, I got me out of the door MTiere Flemings began on me for to cry, " Master, what will you copen* or buy 'i Fine felt hats, or spectacles to read ? Lay down your silver, and here you may speed." ' rode, went. First English " giln," to go ; present, " ic ga," I go ; past, " ic code," I went. Tlie initiiil j has disappeared after becoming soft before the vowel soiuids. The v in 'jodi^ represents it. The past fonn now used with the verb " to go " is from another verb " to wend." - SiRcn hood, badge of a serjeant-at-law. 3 Kay, a rayed or striped cloth. * Cojii^H (Dutch "koopeu"),l>uy. So in Dekker's " Shoemaker's Holi- day," the skipper whose wonderful ship is bought to make Simon Eyre's fortxme, recommends it as " good copen," well worth buying. 54 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad. 1400 Then to Westminster Gate I presently went, 50 When the sun was at highe prime ; ' Cookes to me they took good intent, And proffered mo bread with ale and wine, Eibs of beef, both fat and full fine ; A faire cloth they gan for to sprcde, But wanting Money I might not then speed. Then wato London I did me hie. Of aU the land it beareth the prise. " Hot peascodes ! " one began to cry, " Strawberry i-ipe ! " and " Cherries in the rise ! " " 60 One bade me come near and buy some spice, Pepper and saffrone they gan me bcde,^ But for lack of Money I might not speed. Then to the Cheap I began me di-a-n-n. Where much people I saw for to stand ; One offered me velvuet, sillc, and lawn, Another he taketh me by the hand, " Here is Par-is thi'ead, the fin'st in the land ! " ^ -never was used to such tilings indeed, An^ wanting Money I might not speed. 70 Then went I forth by London Stone, Thi'oughout all Can' wick Street.* Drapers much clot, me offered anon ; Then comes me one cried, " Hot sheep's feet 1 " One criede " Mackerel ! " " Pushes green ! " another gan greet ; * One bade me buj' a hood to cover my head, But for want of Money I might not be sped. Then I hied me into East Cheap ; One cries *' Kibs of beef," and many a pie ; Pewter pottes they clatter'd on a heap, 80 There was harpc, pipe, and minstrelsie. " Yea, by cock ! " " Nay, bj- cock ! " some began cry ; Some sung of Jenkin and Julian for their meed, But for lack of Money I might not speed. Then into Comhill anon I yode, WTiere was much stolen gear among ; I saw where hung mine OAvnc hood That I had lost among the throng : To buy my own hood I thought it wrong ; I knew it well as I did my Creed, 90 But for lack of Money I could not speed. The taveraer took me by the sleeve, " Sir," saith he, " wiU you our wine assay ? " I answered, " That cannot much me grieve, A penny can do no more than it may." I di-ank a pint, and for it I did pay. Yet soon ahungcred from thence I yede. And wanting Money I could not speed. Then hied I me to Bilhngsgate, And one cried, " Hoo 1 Cto we hence ! " 100 I prayed a bai-ge man, for God ses sake, That he would spare me my expence. [pence ; " Thou scrap'st not here," quoth he, " imder two I hst not yet bestow any alms deed." Thus lacking Money I could not speed. ' Pi'imc, morning, the first canonical hour of prayer. s In the rise, on the bough. See Note 1, page 13. ' Bedc, offer. * Can'iricfc, Candlewick Sircct, now lost in Cannon Street, where a bit of Loudon Stone may be seen built into a wall of St. Swithin's. ^ Greet, cry. Fu-st English " giajdan," to cry or call. Then I conveyed me into Kent ; For of the law woidd I meddle no more. Because no man to me took intent, I dight me to do as I did before. Now Jesus, that in Bethlehem was bore, 110 Save London, and send true lawyers theii- meed ! For whoso wants Money with them shall not speed. Geoffrey Chaucer, in liis comic epilogue to the tale of " Griselda," counselled women not to imitate that heroine, " lest Chichevache you take." Among Lydgate's shorter poems is one written to accompany the public illustration of the popular myth, French in its origin, of Chichevache and Bicorn. French chiche (from the Latin ciccus, worthless) means niggardly, stingy ; and vache is a cow. Chichevache means, therefore, the cow that has niggardly fare. Her husband, Bicornis the Two-horned, explains himself — as, indeed, Chichevache vn\\ also speak for herself — in the poem follow ing. Head op Lydsate. From Harleian MS. — 4826, between pages 1 and 2. BICOEN AXD CHICHEVCHE. First there shall stand an image in Poet-wise, sai/ing these verses : O prudent folkes, taketh heed. And remembreth in your lives How this story doth pToceed Of the husbands and their wives. Of their accord and then- .strives, With life or death which to darrain* Is granted to these beastes twain. 6 PaiTain, decide. From Latin "do," and "lationes," pleadings. The three words of the Roman Prjetor in execution of his office were " do," " dico," •' addico ; " ** do ' in LTanting that a cause be brought for judgment; "dico "in pronouncing judgment; and "addico" in adjudging to either disputant the matter in debate. To " arraign " was to call ad rationcs to the pleadings ; to " darraign " was to proceed to settling of the question. So Chaucer writes {" Knight's Tale," 772-4)— .. ^^^,Q hameis hath he dight, Both sufficient and meti' to darrain The battail in the field betwtst hem twain : "' and Spenser (" Faerie Queene," I. iv. 40) — " Therewith they gan to hurtlen greedily Redoubted battail ready to darrain.'* TO A.D. 1450.] SHORTER POEMS. 55 Then shatl be pourtrayid two beasts, one fat, another lean. For this Bicom of his natfire WOl none other manner food, But patient husbands his pasture, 10 And Chichcvache eat'th the women good ; And both these beastes, by the Eood, Be fat or lean, it may not fail, Like lack or jilenty of their vitaU. Of ChichcTache and of Bicom, Treateth wholly this niatere, Whose story hath taught us befom How these beastes both iiif ere ' Have their pasture, as you shall hear. Of men and women in sentence 20 Thi-ough suffi-ance or through impatience. Then shall be potirtrayed a fat beast called Bieorn, of the country of Bicornis, and saij these three verses following : " Of Bicornis I am Bicom, Full fat and roimd here as I stand. And in man-iage bound and sworn To Chichevachc as her husband, ■Which wiU not eat on sea nor land But patient wives debonair. Which to theu- husbands be n't contraire. " Full scarce, God wot, is her %'itail, Himible wives she finds so few, 30 For always at the centre taU- Theii' tongue clappeth and doth hew. Such meeke wives I beshrew. That neither can at bed ne board Their husbands not forbear one word. " But my food and my cherishing. To tell plainly and not to vaiy, Is of such folks which, their li\-ing,^ Dare to their wives be not contrary, Ne from theii- lustes dare not vary, 40 Nor with them hold no champal-ty,* All such my stomach will defj-." * • Infcrc, together. 2 Contrc fail, counter-thrust. French " centre," against, and " taille," a cutting or hewing. 3 Their livhig (and lower down, fhdr lives), in their lifetime. • CTiomporfy, fail' division. French " champ (p)arter," to divide a field or its crop into due portions. Then " champar " or " chauipart " meant the field-rent or share of a crop due by bargain or custom to the landlord, and taken o£E the groimd by him before the farmer gathered any. Chaucer says, in " The Knight's Tale" — " Beauty ne sleight, strength ne hardinesse, Ne may with Venus holdd champartye." 5 "My stomach will defy," digest. "Fying and defying meat and drink, digero." So in the " Vision of Piers Plowman " we read of wine as an aid to digestion : — ■ " Bed wine of Gascoine Of the Ehine and of the Kochel, the roast to defy." Mr. Albert "Way suggests, in a note to this word in the " Promptorium Par\'ulorum," tliat its root is Icelandic " fgegja," to cleanse. But there is also an Icelandic word " fi'ii," meaning decay or putrefaction, and a participial adjective *' fuiuu," from a lost strong verb tliat means decomposition without sense of an ill smell attached to it. In the WiclifRte version of Deut. xxiii. 13, English for the " egesta," is " things defied out." A less probable etymology is from Latin " de " and " fio." The word is from another root than that of the " defy " now alone in use (from Latin *' fides"), to renounce faith or allegiance. Then shall be pourtrayed a eompany of men coming towards this beast Bieornis, and sag these four balads : — " Fellows, take heed and ye may see How Bieorn casteth him to devour All humble men, both you and me. There is no gain may us succour ; Wo be therefore in h:ill and bower To all those husbands which, their lives, Make mistresses of their wives. " Who that so doth, this is the law. That this Bicom wiU him oppress And devouren in his maw That of his wife makes his mistress ; This will us bring in great distress, For we, for om- humility. Of Bicom shall devom-ed be. " We standen plainly in such case, For they to xis mistresses be ; We may well sing and say, 'Alas, That we gave them the sovereigntie ! ' For we ben thi-aU and they be fi-oe. '\\'Tierefore Bicom, this cruel beast, Will us devom-en at the least. " But who that can be sovereign. And liis wife teach and chastise, That she dare not a word gainsain Nor disobey in no manner wise. Of such a man I can devise He stands under protection From Bicom's jurisdiction." 50 60 70 Then shall there be a woman devoured in the mouth of Chiche- vache, crying to all wires, and say this verse : — " O noble wives, be well ware. Take example now by me ; Or else affii-me well I dare Ye shall be dead, ye shaU not flee ; Be crabbed, void humilitie. Or Chichevache ne wUl not fail You for to swallow in his entrail." Then shall there be pourtrayed a long-horned beast, slender and lean, ii-ith sharp teeth, and on her body nothing but skin and bone ' Chichevache, this is my name. Hungry, meagTe, slender, and lean, To show my body I have great shame, 80 For himger I feel so great teen ; ^ On me no fatness will be seen. Because that pasture I iind none. Therefore I am but skin and bone. " For my feeding in existence Is of women that be meek, And Uke Grisield in patience Or more their bounty for to eke ;' But I full long may go and seek Ere I can find a good repast, 90 A morrow" to break with my fast. 5 Tccn, hurt, vexation, iuceuse or vex. ' Elie (from First EngUsh " 8 A jrioi-i-oii', in the morning. First English "teona, dean" ) , to increase. from " tyi^ttu," to 56 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.D. 140U 100 110 "I trow there he a dearc year Of patient women now-a-tlays. Who g-riovcth them with word or cheer Let him beware of such assiiys ; For it is more than thirty Mays That I have sought from lond to lond, But yet one Grisield ne'er I fond. " I found hut one in all my live, And she was dead ago f \ill yore ; For more pasti'ire I will not strive Nor seeke for my food no more. Ne for vitail me to restore ; Women hen woxen ' so prudent They will no more he patient." T/icn ahall be jjoitrtrinjed, after Chichei-achc, an old man with a baton on his back, mmaciiKj the beast for devouring of his wife. " My wife, alas, devom-ed is, Most patient and most pesible ! - She never said to me amiss. Whom now hath slain this beast horrible ! And for it is an impossible To find again e'er such a wife I will live sole aU my Ufe. " For now of newe, for theii- prow,^ The wives of full high prudence Have of assent made thcii' avow T' e.\ile for ever patience. And cried-wolf's-head'' obedience, To make Chichevache fail Of them to finde more vitail. Now Chichevache may fast long And die for all her cruelty. Women have made themselves so strong For to outrage humiUty. silly husbands, wo ben ye ! Such as can have no patience Against yoiu' wives ^•iolence. If that ye suffer, ye be but dead, Bicom awaiteth you so sore ; Eke of your wives go stand in dread, If ye gainsay them any more I And thus ye .stand, and have done yore, Of life and death bet-naxt coveyne* Linked in a double chain. 120 130 Thomas Hoccieve — who derived his name, perhayis, from Hockliffe, in Bedfordshire — was of about Lyd- gate's age, and had known Chaucer. He was, like his master Chaucer, a Londoner, and he was a Government clerk in the Office of the Privy Seal. 1 Womn, grown. First English " weaxan ; " past " weiis " and " wi5x." » Pestijlc, peaceable. French "paisible." " Prom (French "prou"), profit. ■* When a reward had been cried for a wolf's head, it would soon be off. '' Coveijne or contii, an old French term for the convening, that is, onung together or conspiring, of two or more to defraud another. i-'-'SKic: HOCCLEVE PEESEHTIHS HIS BOOK TO KiNG HeNET V, From the King's MS.— 17, D. VI., page 37. That office was on the site of the present Somerset House, a site haunted in our own day also by Government clerks, but by clerks whose salaries are paid. We might have known little of Hoccieve as a poet, if he had not found in song a courteous way of diuining his employers. His longest work was a metrical version of a book ascribed to Aristotle on the Duty of Princes, with an ingenious introduction, written avowedly for presentation to Henry V., as a way of commending to royal attention his own hard case, as a married man in the Government service \vith arrears of unpaid salary. Here again is a short poem of his, wi'itten in the name of himself and his fellow-clerks, Bailly, Oftbrd, and Heath, who had a cold Christmas in view for want of their money. It was addi-essed, with graceful play njwn his name, to Henry Somer, when he was Under- Treasiu-er; that is to say, before November, 1408, when Somer became a Baron of the Exchequer. POEM AND ROUNDEL. "TO MY M.AISTER, H. SOMER." The Sonne with his beames of biightness To man so kindly is and nourisliing. That lacking it day nere " but darkness ; To-day he giveth his enlumining, And causeth all fruit for to wax' and spring Now syn that sonne may so much avail, And most with Somer is his sojourning. That season boimteou.s we will assail. *■ NciC, were not. The negative was contracted with the verb ijl First English; " eom," I am; "neom" (also "ne eom"), I am not ; in the past, " wtes," I was; " n£es," I was not. In like manner, "habban," to have; "nabban,"uot to have; " willan," to will ; and " uyllau," to will not; whence the phrase, "will he nil! he," or " willy uilly." In Shakesper.re's " Taming of the Slu'ew," Petiaicio tells Katheriue. " Will you, uill yon, I will maiTy yon." " TTaa- (First English "weasan"), to gi'ow. TO A.D. 1450.] SHORTER POEMS. Glad cheered Somer, to your govemail And grace we submit all oiir ^\-ining ; 10 To whom ye fiiendly ben he may not fail, But he shall have his reasonable axing : ^ Aiter your good lust- be the seasoning Of our fruits : the laste Michaehness The time of year was of oui* seed inning ; The lack of which is our great heaviness. AVe trust upon youi- friendly geutilless Ye will us help and ben oui' suppoaill,^ Now give us cause again this Chi'istemess For to be glad, lord, whether om- taill^ 20 Shall soone make us with qui- sliipi)cs sail To Port Salut.^ If you list, we may sing ; And eUes mote us^ bothe mourn and wail Till your favour us sende relieving. We, your servantes Hoccleve and Baillay, Heath and Ofl'orde, you" beseech and pray, Hasteth oui- harvest as soon as ye may ; For fear of stormes om* wit is away. Were oui" seed inncd'* then we niighten play, And us disport and sing, and make game, 30 And yet this roimdel^ shall we sing and say In trust of you, and honour of yoiu* name. 1 Axing (First Englisli "ascian," "ahsian," "acsian," or "oxiaii"). to ask. "Axe" for "iisk," like many auother form now reekoued vulgar, is only a piece of oldest English commou still to some among the people. ^ Lust (First English "desire"), will, pleasure. Pay when it so pleases you. We have sown the seed— tliat is, we have done the work for which money is due — and sorely need the hai-vest. 3 Suppoai'U, support. * Whether our taill, if our tally, or the clearing of oiu* score. Even Government accounts were formerly kept by tallies, pieces of notched wood, so named from the French " tailler," to cut. A nmning account of small debts might be kept with chalk m.irks, and when there were twenty of them they would be represented by a cut or score across two sticks fitting together. First English " sceran"— past participle *'scoren" — means to shear or cut. Hence the use of the word "score" for a reckoning, and also for the number twenty. Family piilk scores and accounts between brewers and publicans were long kept in the same way. Account was kept with Hoccleve and his friends by hazel or ash rods, spht into two parts, one held by the Exchequer, the other by its creditor. Since the two sticks fitted to- gether exactly, the score was across them both when joined together, and eacb half was kept by an opposite party to the contract. A false score was, tberefore, detected instantly, by want of the corresponding cut on the other half of the tally. Hence, in our own day, when two statements agree exactly, they are said to " tally." s Port Sahit, the port of safety. * Mote W3, we must. First EngHsh, " ic mut," " tliu most," " he jndt ; " past, " ic moste." 7 you is tlie accusative, governed by *' beseech " and " pray ; " i/c is nominative. In Early English the distinction is preserved in use of "ye" and "you." It is so throughout our version of the Bible: " O yc remnant of Judah, Go ye not into Egypt, know certainly that 1 have admonished T/oit this day. For i/e dissembled in your hearts when yc sent me unto tbe Lord your God, saying, Pray for us And now I have this day declared it unto you, but ijc have not obeyed," &c. (Jeremiab xlii. 19 — 21). Both forms were pliunil only, plural of respect to a superior, and eth in hasteth^vras the Southern plural ending. 8 Jnncd, gathered in. 5 Roundol. The French rondeau was a small poem of thirteen ten- eyllabled lines and two half lines. The half lines were repetitious of the four or five first words of the first line, which served, as a refrain. Tbey were repeated after the eighth line and at the close. There were only two rhymes in a rondeau. Hoccleve's roundel is a variation of this ; being like it in length, in confinement to two rhymes, and in the use of the refrain three times. It is a rondeau with the refrain de- veloped from a phrase of foiu' words to a sentence of three lines. 8 THE ROUNDEL. Somer, that ripest mannes Bustenance, AVith wholesome heat of the somies wannucss, All kind of man thee holden is to bless. Aye thanked he thy friendly governance, And thy fresh look of mirth and of gladness. Somer, that ripest mannes sustenance. With wholesome heat of the sonncs waniuiess. All kind of man thee holden is to bless. 40 To heavy folk of thee the remembrance Is salve and oinement '" to their sickness, Forwhy we this shaU sing in Cristemesa : Somer, that ripest mannes sustenance, With wholesome heat of the soones waminess, All kind of man thee holden is to bless. The same evidence that Hoccleve was singing for his suijper appears at the close of the most important of his shorter poems. This also was written in the reign of Henry V. He lost liealth when sufiering from poverty caused by the Government's want of means to pay its clerks. In the day of sickness he invoked the health that he had lost, and by con- demning himself as one who paid the penalty of past neglects, taught others, while seeming to be not their censor but his own. In this way he caused his poem to fulfil the more eflectually its appointed purpose as a warning of youth against folly. It is entitled " La Male Eegle de T. Hoccleve." hoccleve's misrule. O precious tresor incomparable, O ground and root of all prosperity, excellent richessc commendable Aboven alle that in earthe be, 'WTio may sustainc thine adversity ? What wight" may him avaimt'- of worldly wealth But if " he fully stand in grace of thee, Earthely god, pillar of life, thou Health ! While thy power and excellent ^-igour. As was pleasant unto thy worthiness, 10 Eeigned in me and was my goveraour, Then was I well, then felt I no dm-esse," Then farced'* was I with heart's gladness;'" And now my body empty is and bare Of joy, and full of sickly heaviness. All poor of ease, and rich of evQ fare. "> Oinement, ointment. Latin " ungere," French " oindre," to anoint. Mr. Halliwell-PIiillips, in his useful " Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words," quotes from a Harleian MS. ;— " Now of the seventhe sacrament These clerkes kalle hit oynamcnt." " Wight (First English " wiht"), a creature, thing, any thing. It ia used in its widest sense (with the h transposed) in " not a whit." 1- Avaunt, hoast. 13 Bid if, unless. 1* Duresse, con&trainfc. 13 Farced, stuiled, from French " farcir," to stuff. The French "farce," stuffing, by a commou change of a to o, gives our word " forcemeat," for stuffing of veal &.c. "^ Gladness. Mai'ked pronunciation of dn gives t'je i;tlect of another syllable in the metre. 58 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1400 If that thy faroiii- twj-nne^ from a wight, Small is his case, and great is his gTif\imce; Thy love is life, thiue hate slay'th dowm-ight; Who may complaint' thy dissevcriince 'iO Better than I, that of mine ignorince Unto sickness am knit, thy mortal foe ? Now can I knowc feaste from penince, And while I was with thee could I not so. My grief and busy smart quotidian^ So me labouren and tormcnten sore That what thou art, now well remember I can. And what fruit is in keeping of thy lore. Had I thy power knowcn or this yere,^ As now thy foe compcUcth me to know, 30 Not shoidd his lime*" have cleaved to my gore For all his art, ne have me brought thus low. But I have heard men saye long ago Prosperity is blind, and see ne may ; And verify I can well it is so. For I myself have put it in assay.* When I was well, could I consider it ? Nay. But what ? Me longed after novelrie. As yeares younge yearncn day by day : And now my smart aecuseth my folic. 40 Mine unware youthe knew not what it wi-ought, This wot I well, when from thee twjTmed she : But of her ignorance herself she sought And knew not that she dwelling was \\'ith thee. For to a wight were it great nicetee^ His lord or friend -n-ittingly for t' offend, Lest that the weight of his adversitee The fool oppress and make of him an end. From hennesforth will I do reverence Unto thy name and hold of thee in chief ; 50 And warre make and sharpe resistence Against thy foe and mine, that cruel thief That imder foote me holds in mischief,' So thou me to thy grace reconcile. O now thine help, thy succour and relief, And I, for aye, Misrule will exile ! 1 Twynnc^ separate, part from, divide (come in two). 2 Quotidian, daily. 3 Or this yore, before this year. Or is the word dow writteu ere. The forms iu First English were dr and (E'r; *' iir" became, by the common change of n to o, "or;" "ffi'r" became "ere." Or for before was common in old Enghsh. So in our version of the Bible, " Or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from ever- lasting to everlasting, thou art God " (Psalm xc. 2) ; and of Paul (Acts xxiii. 15), "We, or ever he come near, are ready to kill him." " Or " is the form used by Hoccleve in other lines of this poem. * Lime. First English " Km," what causes adhesion ; glue, mud, lime, as in the limed twigs for catching birds. Of the same origin is Idm, " loam," or clay, so called for its stickiness. 5 Assail, trial, exact weighing and measuring. 6 Nicetcc, extreme regard for trifles. The pleasures for the sake of which we offend heiilth are trifling in comparison with the great blessing we thereby may lose. Hence there is a nicety, an excessive regard for trifles in such offence. ' Mischief, Old French " meschef," Provencal " niescnp," Spanish " menoscapo," equivalent to miinis and caput, " without head " in the sense of extremity or end. The first sense of mischief is, that which leads to no good end. In the graver sense, all evil is miscliief ; in a lighter sense, as of monkey tricks, actions without rational cause or jMirpose, without head or tail to them, are mischievous. 60 70 80 But* thy mercy exceede mine offence The keen assaultcs of thine adversary Me will opprcsse with theii' violence. No wonder though thou be to me contrary : My lustes bliud have caused thee to vary From me, through my folic and imprudence; Wherefore I, wrctchc, cui-se may and wary' The seed and fruit of chUdly sapience. As for the more part Youth is rebel Unto Eeason, and hateth her doctrine, Eeigninge which,'" it may not standc well With Youth as far as wit can imagine. O Youth, alas, why wilt thou not incline And imto ruled Eeason bowe thee, SjTi" Eeason is the veiTay'^ straighte line That leadeth folk unto f elicitee f FuU sold is seen that Youthe taketh heed Of perils that ben Ukely for to fall ; For have he take a pm-pose '^ that mote need Ben execut ; no counsel wUl he call ; His owne wit he decmeth best of all ; And forth theremth he runneth bridlclees. As he that not betwixt honey and gall Can judge, ne the warre from the peace. All other mcnnes wittes he dospiseth. They answeren no thing to his intent ; His rakU'^ wit only'* to him sufficeth. His high iiresumptiiin not Ust consent To doon as that Salomon ^^^•ote and meant. That redde '^ men by coimsel for to werke. Now, Youthe, now, thou sore shall repent Thy lightless wittes dull, of reason derke ! My friendcs saiden imto me full oft My Slisrule me cause woidd a fit," And redden me in easy wise and soft A lite and lite,'" to withcb-aweu it : But that not mightc sink into my wit, So was the lust y-rooted in mine heart : And now I am so ripe unto my pit That scarcely I may it not astart.'^ » But, unless. ^ Curse and wary. To curse is to execr;ite in the name of the cross, from the use of which in cursing the name is derived. To n-ary, from First Enghsh "wergiau,"or "wcrigan," is to curse in the sense of declaring any one "wearg" (old Icelandic " vergr," foul), wicked, infamous. 10 Reigninge v^hich, &c. The sense is, that when Eeason reigns, as far as the knowledge goes of " childly sapience," Youth is supposed to lose its pleasures. 11 Syn, since. '- rcrrni; (French " vrai"), true. 13 Have lie take a intrposc, if he has made up his mind to anything. 1^ RahT, ranging, roaming. Cattle and sheep that wandered from their pasture were said to " raik " or "rake." Old Swedish " reka," to roam. When its origin was forgotten, the word " rakil " remained in common use as the name of a wild fellow who got out of bounds, and was written " rakehell," upon the principle of the sailor who made sense of his ship, the " Bellerophon," by calling her the " Billy EuiRan;" so, too, an inn, "the Bacchanals," became "the Bag o' Nails." 15 Only, alone, by itself. i"^ Redde, adWsed. First English "raa'dan," to coimsel. 1" Fit, stniggle. First English " fettian," to contend. IS Lite and liti, little and little. First Enghsh " lyt," little. In the first "lite" the final e is dropped, because a vowel follows; in the second it is sounded because a consonant follows. 1' Astart, avoid, start aside from. 90 TO A.D. 1451'.] SHORTER POEMS. 59 Whoso clear eyen hath and cannot see, Full small of eye avail- eth the office ; Right so, syn reason given is to me For to discern a vii-tue from a vice, 100 If I not can with Reason me chevice,' But wilfully from Reason me withdraw. Though I of her have no benefice, No wonder, ne no favour in her law. Reason me bade and redde as for the best, To eat and di-ink in time attemprely ; But wilfid Youthe not obeye lest- Unto that rede, ne sette not thereby ; ^ I take have* of them both outrageously, And out of time ; not two year or three, But twenty winter* past continually Excess at board hath laid his knife with me. The custom of my replete abstinence And greedy mouth, receipt of such outri'ige. And handes two, as wot ^ my negligence. Thus han me guided and brought in servugo Of her that werreieth ' every age. Sickness, I meane, riotoiu'es whip. Abundantly that payeth me my wage So that me neither dance Ust ne sldp. 120 The outward sign of Bacchus and his lure That at his doore hangeth day by day, Exciteth folk to taste of his moisture So often that men cannot well say nay. For me, I say I was incUned aye Withouten^ danger thither for to hie mc, But if ' such charge upon my back lay- That I mote it forbear as for a time. Sign and Luke. Ill )l Siijn and Garland of the " Old Nag's Head" Clieapgide. (T'rom Le Serre's Print of the Pro- cession of Mary de Medicis. ) Or but I were nakedly bestad By force of the pennyless maladie ; 130 For then in herte could I not be glad, Ne lust had none to Bacchus house to hie. * Me cJievice, sustain myself. ** Chevyn or tliryvin' — vigeo " (** Promptorium Parvulorum " ) . French '*chevir," accomplish, bring to a head, or good end, from '* chef," caput, the head. 2 Not obeyj lest, did not please to obey. ' Sette tliereby. To " set by " is to value. * Take hare, have taken of both (eating and drinking). 5 TxKenUj winter. In First English, winters were named for reckon- ing of years, and nights for days, as in se'nnight a.nd for tni'jht. ^ Wot, knows. 7 Werroieth, wars against. 8 WitJwuten danger. Equivalent to our phrase *' no fear." ® But (/, unless. The full sounding of r in " charge " gives the word force of a dissyllable in the metre. The same development is to be noticed in other cases, as in Hne 166. the ghh in " neighboiu'." 160 170 180 Fio ! Lack of coin dcparteth '" companic, And heavy piuse witli hcrte Ubcril tiuenchctli tlie thusty heat of lieiles diie, Where chinchy " herte hath thereof but smal. [Three stanzas omitted.] Of him that hauuteth tavern of custumo, In shorte wordes the profit is this. In double wise : His bag it shall consume, And make liis tonge speak of folk amis : For in the cuppc seldom founden is That any %vight his neighbom- commendeth. Behold and see what avantiige is his That God, his friend, and eke himself offendeth ! But one advantage in this case I have : I was so feared with any man to fight Close kept I me ; no man durst I deprave But rowningiy ; '- I spake no thing on hight ; '^ And yet my will was good, if that I might For letting '^ of my manly cowardise That aye of strokes impressed the wight,'* So that I durste medlen in no wise. Where was a greater master eke than I, Or bet acquainted at Westminster gate Among the taverncrcs namely,'^ And cookes ? When I came, early or late, I pinched not at them in mine acate," But payed them as that they axe wolde. Wherefore I was the welcomer algate,'^ And for a veri'ay gentil man y-holde. And if it happed on the summer's day That I thus at the tavern haddc be. When I departc should and go my way Home to the Privy Seal, so wooed me Heat and Unlust, and Supcrfluitec, To walk unto the bridge and take a boat. That not dm-st I contrii-y them all tlu-ee, But did all that they stiiTed me. Got wot. And in the Winter, for the way was deep, Unto the bridge I dressed me also ; And there the boatmen took upon me keep,'' For they my riot knewen fern '" ago : 10 Beparteth, parts. u Cldnchy (French " chiche,"), niggardly. '2 RownmgUj, by secret whisper. Riiu (rune), a letter; a mystery; as it was when speech by written signs—the art of inaudible speech —was known only to a few. "Euna" was, in First English, a whisperer, a sorcerer; " runian," to whisper or speak mysteriously. This word"rown" was afterwards written "round." So Faulcon. bridge, in Shakespeare's "King John," speaks of the King of France as "roundel in the ear with that same purpose changer . . . tickling Commodity." " Oil TiigM, on high, aloud ; did not speak iiji. 1* Letting, hindrance. 15 Wight (First English "wiht"), weight. (Jerman "wichtig," weighty. 's Namely, especially; as (Jerman " ramentlioh. " " Alcaic, buying, from French " acheter." I never beat down their prices. IS Algate, every way. 1^ Took keep, took notice. 20 Fern (First English " fyru"), formerly; ot old. 190 60 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.r. 1400 The Thames, feom WES7snii3TER to Blackfkiars. (From Aggas' Map, 1563.) "With them I was y-tugge'i to and fro,* So well was him that I with wolde fare, For Eiot'paycth largely ever mo; He stinteth never till his purse he bare. 200 Other than Slaster called was I never Among this mej'nee ^ in mine audience ; ^ Methought I was y-made a man for ever, So tickled me that nice reverence 1 Ytugged to and fro. These Tom Tugs were to the men of Hoccleve's time what Hansom cabmen are to modem Londoners. The Thames was the great highway, landing " bridges " jutted into it, as the map shows ; but there was only one bridge over it, so that there was con- stant crossing by boat, or going up and down by boat. The Privy Seal Office, heing on the site of Somerset House, was by the river- side, and if Hoccleve took a boat he saved himself the short walk •ly the Strand of the river, then an open road with some gi-eat houses by it, although now one of the populous paved highways of the town, n part of what might be called the High Street of Loudon, extending irom the Bank and Exchange to the Houses of Pai'liament. " Meynee, company of followers ; French ' ' mesnie," a family, house- liold, company, servants ; Italian " masnada," a troop of soldiers, com- pany, family. "Mansus," " manse" (from *'manere," to remain), was a holding that could be cultivated with a couple of oxen ; the tenantry of the "mansi," bound to feudal service, were the " mansata," *' masnada," or " maiuada." The word so formed easily blended with " mains ud," *' moius ne," " minores natu," younger members of a family as opposed to "majores natu," heads of the family, in Middle Latin. French " maisnete*" was the right of the younger son or brother. So in Piedmontese "masna," ahoy, in Languedoc "meina," a child. " Meinee," from "mansus," means the company of sei"vants attached to a house; and possibly a like word from the other source adds the sense of a family. In this passage the word does not include the second sense, and means only a troop of retainers ; as in " Lear," act ii., sc. 4, when Goneril's letters had been delivered to Regan and her husband, " They summon'd up their meiny, straight took horse." 3 In mine audience, in my hearing ; which excludes what they may liave called him behind his back. That it me made larger of dispence Than that I thought han"* been. Flattcrie, The guise of thv traiterous diligeene Is folk to misdiiet nat'ten and tc hie.* Albeit that my yearca be hut young, Yet hai'e I seen in folk of high degree 210 How that the venom of Favele.s ^ tongue Hath mortified their prosperitee, And brought them in so sharp adversitee That it their life hath also thrown adown, And yet there can no man in this countree TJncath ^ eschewe this confusioun. IMany a servant unto his lord saith That all the world speaketh ** of him honour, Allien the contrary of that is sooth in faith, And lightly leeved^ is this losengour: ^^ 220 * Han, to have. ■^ Hie (Pirst English "higan"), to hurry. ^ Favel, flattery, speaker of fables (Latin "fabula," from " fari, ' to speak), ~ XJneath, not easily. A double negative in early English only sus- tained the negation. 8 World speaketh. Pronounced "wo-r-ld speakth." In the next line the y of "coutrai-y" makes one syllable with the following word, " of." So Milton runs the y of " gloi'y " into the succeeding vowel, when he says Satan aspired "To set himself in glory above his peers " {" Paradise Lost," I, 39), and makes him boast that he and his fellows are in mind invincible :— "Though all our glory extinct, and happy state Here swallow'd up in endless misery." 3 Lceved, believed. First English " Ijffan," to allow, i" Losengour, sounder of praises, from Old French " los *' (Latin *' laua"^, praise, and " losange," the flattering with praises. TO A.D. 1450. 1 SHORTER POEMS. 01 Chaking Cross, from THr Eitek. (From a Print by Fi'sscJier, ahout J540,) His honey irordcs wrapped in errour Blindly conceived ben, the more harm is. thou, Favel, of leasingcs ' auctoiu-, Oaiiscst all day thy lord to fare ainiss ! The cumberworldes ^ clept hen enchantouis In hookes, as that I hare or this '' read, That is to sayc subtle deccivours By whom the people is misgycd and led, And with pleasance so fostered and fed That they forg-et themselves, and cannot feel 230 The sooth of the condition in them bred, No more than theii' wit were in their heel. Whoso that hst in the book of Xature Of beastes reade, therein he may see, If he take heed imto the scriptfire "' ^^^lcre it speak'th of mermaides in the sea, How that so inly mii-ie * singeth she That the shipman therewith fallcth asleep, And by her after devoured is he. From all such song is good men them to keep. 2-iO Eight so the feigned wordes of pleasance Annoyen ^ after, though they please a time To them that ben unwise of govei-nance. Lordes, beth ware, let not Favel you lime 1 ' If that ye ben enveloped in crime, Ye may not deeme men speak of you weel ; Though Favel paint her tale in prose or rhyme, Full wholesome is it trust her not a deal.' 1 LeasingeSf from First Englisli " leas," false, feigned, counterfeit ; "leasung,"' falseness. 2 TJie cuhiherworldcs. Tliose wlio are only troublers of the world. "Cumber" (Scotisli " cummer," German "kumnier"), vexation or care. ^ Or this, ere tbis. * Scnpturc Cprononnced sc-r-ipturc), the writing. 5 Afrne, softly (First Enelish " mearo," soft, tender), root of the words maryoK (soft fat of bones) and mnry. ^ Annoyen (French '•nuire"), hurt. 7 Beth, hen. Bclh (First Eng:Ush *' beoth ") was plural of the indica- tive present and of the imperative; hen iFirst English *'bedn") was plural of the subjimctive, "If that ye ben." — Favel you lime. See note 4, page 58. ^ Not a deal, not a pait, not a bit. 250 260 Holcotc saith ' upon the book also Of Sapience, as it can testifie, WTicn that Ulysses sailed to and fro By mermaides, tins was his policie : — AH eares of men of his companie With wax he stoppe let, for that they nought Their song should hearc, lest the harmonic Them might into such deadly sleep have brought ; And bound himself unto the shippes mast t So thus them all saved his providence. The wise man is of peril sore aghast. O Flatterj', lurking Pestilence, If some man '" did his care and diligence To stop his cares from thy poesie, And not would hearken a word of thy sentence Unto his grief it. were a remedie. Ah nay ! Although thy tonge were ago." Yet canst thovi glose in countenance and cheer; Thou supportest with lookcs evermo Thy lordes wordes in eache matere. Although that they a mite be too dear,'- And thus thy guise is, privy and apert With word and look, among our lordes here Preferi'od be, though there be no desert. '^ But when the sober true and well ad%'ised With sad ^-isige his lord informcth plajTi '■• How that his governance '* is despised Among the people, and saith him as they sajTi, ' Holcote saith. Eobert Holcot, a philosopher and theologian, who died of the plague in 1349, ivrote many books of high repute in their time, besides the one here quoted. 1" Some man, any man. First English "sum," some, one, any one. ^1 Were ago, were gone. '^ A mite too dear, not worth a mite. 13 The sense is, And thus your manner. w> other secret or open, flattering by words or looks, " is be preferred " among oiir lords here, though there be no iireference deserved. ^^ PJeyn (French "plein," fully), without reservation or false colouring. '^ The four syllables in " governance " are made by sounding the ni, not by use of the final c, since that is followed by a vowel. We must either roll the r in ''governance, " or assume that the form " is be," 270 62 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH IJTERATURE. [A.D. 1400 290 As man true ought uuto his sovereign, CounseUing liim amend his governance, The lordcs hcrtc swelleth for disdain And bids him voidc hlive ' with mischance. 280 Men sctten not hy Ti-uthe nowadays ; Men love it not, men will it not cherice;''' And yet is Truthc best at all assays : "S\'iieu that false Favcl, soustenom' of vice, Not wite shall how hu'c to chevice,' Full boldely shall Truth her head upbear. Lordcs, lest Favel you from weale trice,'' No longer sufi'er her nestlcu in your ear. Be as be may, no more of this as now ; But to my Misrule will I refeere ; Whereas I was at ease well enow Or* excess unto me was lief and deere. And or I knew his earnesfuP maneere My purse of coin had reasonable wone ; ' But now therein can there but scant appeere, Excess hath nigh exiled them each one. The Fiend and Exccsse ben convertible. As enditeth to me my fantasie : This is my skill, — If it be admittible Excess in meat and di-ink is Gluttonie, 300 Gluttony awaketh Melancholic, Melancholy engendi-cth War and Strife, Strife causeth Mortal Hmt thi-ough her folic. Thus may Excesse reve a soul her life.* No force of all this ; ' go we now to watch '" By nightertale " out of all mesure ; For as in that '- findc could I no match In all the Privy Seal with me to endure, And to the cup aye took I keep and ciue '^ For that the diink appallen" shoulde nought, 310 But when the pot emptied was of moistilre To wake afterward came not in my thought. here used as a sort of equivalent in the present to " has been," occiirs in line 275. Shakespeare his even made three syllables of such a word as Percy. " It is my sou, young Harry Percy," and found the final r in words hke mollicf, brotltcr, so well sounded that he might give it the value of a syllable at the end of a line, thus making mother and hrother three-syllabled words ("Eichai-d III.," v. 3; "JuUus Ctesar," iv. 3). But, perhaps, Hoccleve repeated the form "is he." " Governance" has only three syllables in Hne 278. 1 Voide blive, depart from him quickly. ' Clierice, cherish. S Shall not know how to sustain herself. » Trice, thrust. ' Or, before. « Eani^a/ul, full of ye.arniag ; the manner of excess that leads, not to content, but to new cravings. ' iro)ic, frequency, custom, from First English "wanian" (Ger- man " wohnen"), to dwell. From the sense of habitual frequenting comes the use of the word to mean plenty. So in the Chester Miracle Play of the " Pilgrims of Emmuxis," Peter answers to the question of Jesus, " Have you any meat here ?" " Yea, my Lorde lief and dear, Boasted fish and honey infere Thereof we have good wone." s Eeve a soul )ici hfc, rob a soul of its life, as the fiend does ; rere, from First English " rcafian," to seize, rob, spoil, destroy. 5 No force of all this, no care about all this (in our riotous youth). " No force for" this or that was a common phrase for not caring, and the verb "to force" had a sense of regarding or caring for, as in " Love's Labour's Lost " (v. 2), " Your oath once broke, you force not to forswear." 1^ Waicli, keep awake. " Nightcrlak, night time. The ght here has the value of a syllable, like the glib in "neighbour," line 166. »s .4s in t!iat, i.c., in that power of " making a night of it." 13 Cure, care. '* A\>imlUn, fail, lose power. The Tavern. From King's JIS.— 19, C. XI., page 37. But when the cup had thus my neede sped, And somedeal '* more than necessitee, With replete spii-it went I to my bed And bathed there in superfluitee. But on the mom was wight of no degree So loth as I to twynne "* fiom my couch By aght I wot'' . . . abide, let me see . . Of two as loth I am sui-e could I touch ! I dare not say Prentys and Arundel'* Me counterfeit and in such wake go ny me ; But often thi-y their bed loven so well That of the day it diaweth nigh the pryme Ere they rise up ; not can I tell the time When they to bedde goon, it is so late. O llealthe, lord, thou seest them in that crime, And yet thee loth is with them to debate ! " And why ': I n'at ;-" it sit not unto me. That mirror am of riot and excess, To knowen of a goddes pri\itee. But thus I imagine and thus I guess : Thou moved art of tender gentleness Them to forbear, and -nTll them not chastise For they in mirth and virtuous gladness Lordes reconfortec in sundry wise. But to my purpose : syn that my sickness. As well of purse as body, hath refrained Me from tavern and other wantonness. Among an heap-' my name is now distained; 320 330 340 15 Somcieal, some part, deal, from " dselan," to divide ; so we deal or divide cards, and a " dole" is a portion divided out, as of money or bread to the poor. 1^ Tirynnr, separate. " By strict reckoning, I know — stop, let me see — I could smrely pat my finger on two as loth to leave their beds as I am. — Aght (First Enghsh " se'ht," German "acht "), estimation, careful observing. 18 Prcnfis ani Ai'uniel seem to have been two jesters. 19 Debate. French " debattre," to beat down. 2'^ 1 n'at, I know not. Like " habban " .and " uabban " were " witan," to know, and *' nytau," not to know. "Icwitt" (afterwards " wot ") was First English for " I know," and " ic niit " for "I know not. " -1 Hea-p, a crowd. First English "hejtp," a troop or company of TO A.D. 1J50.] SHORTER POEMS. 63 My grievous hurt full little is complained, But they the lack complain of my dispence, Alas, that ever knit I was and chained To Excess, or him did obedience I Dispences large enhance a mannes loos ' ^V^aile they endure; and when they be forbore His name is dead; men keep theii' niouthes close As" not a penny had he spent before : My thank is qweynt,^ my purse his stuff hath lore,* And my carc&se replete with heaviness : 350 Be ware, Hoccleve, I rede* thee therefore. And to a meane rule* thou thee dress. Who so passinge measm-e desu'eth, As that witnessen olde clerkcs wise, Himself encumbreth oftensith'^ and mii'eth,' And f orthy ' let the Meane thee suffise. If such a conceit in thine herte rise As thy profit may hinder or thy renown If it were execut in any wise, — With manlv reason thruste thou it down. 360 Thy rentes annual as thou well woost '" Too scarce been great costcs to sustain ; And in thy coffer, pard}-, is cold roast ; And of thy manual laboiu-, as I ween. Thy lucre is such that it uneath" is seen Ne felt ; of giftes say I eke the same ; And steale, for the guerdon " is so keen, Ne darst thou not ; ne beg also, for shame. Beggart. From Earleian MS. — 4,425, page 73, men st.inding close together. It is good old English, if not now polite, to speak of " a heap of people." > Loos, pi-aise. See Note 9, page 60. ^ Ast as if. ^ Qtceynt, quenched. ' Lore, lost. ^ Eedc, counsel, ^ Meane rule, nUe of the Golden Meaji, neither too mu-'-h nor too little. 7 Ofiensith, oftentimes. ^ Mireth, stains with mire, » Forthy, for that, therefore. *° Woosty knowest. from " witan." '1 CiteatJi, not easily. ^ The jucrdon, hanging for ovn a slight theft. Then would it seeme that thou borrowed hast Mochil'^ of that that thou hast thus dispent 370 In outrage, and excess, and vorray waste. Avise thee; " for what thing that is lent Of ven-ay right must home again be sent ; Thou therein hast no pcrpetuitee : Thy dcbtes payc, lest that thou be shent,'* And ere that thou thereto compelled be. Some folk in this case cli-cadon more offence Of man, for wily -nTenches of the law. Than he doth either God or conscience. For by them two he setteth not an haw. 380 If thy conceit be such, thou it mthdi'aw I rede, and void it clean out of thine heart ; And £ir.st of God, and syn of man have awe, Lest that they bothc make thee to smart. Now let this smart waminge to thee be, And if thou may'st hereafter be relieved Of body and piu'se, so thou guide thee By wit that thou no more thus be grieved. AVhat riot is, thou tasted hast and preeved. The fire, men sajm, he dreadeth that is brent ; ^90 And if thou so do, thou ai-t wcU y-meeved.'" Be now no longer fool, by mine as.sent. Ey ! what is me ? that to myself thus long- Clapped have I ! I trowe that I rave. Ah, naj- ! My poore purse and paines strong Have arted '^ me sjjcak as I spoken have. Whoso him shapeth mercy for to crave His lesson mote record in sundry wise ; And while my breath may in my body wave To record it uneath I may suffise. "100 God, Health, imto thino ordinance Wealefull lord, meekly submit I me ! 1 am contrite, and of full repentance That e'er I swinimcd in such nicetee As was displeasant to thy deitce : Now kv-f he '^ on me thy mercy and thy grace ! It sit" a God be of his grace free; Forgive ! and never will I aft trespace. My body and pirrse ben at ones seeke,-" And for them both I to thine high noblesse, iU As humblely as that I can, bcsoeke With heart imfeigned, rue on our distress ! Pity have of mine harmfuU hea^Hncss I Believe the repentant in disease ! Dispend on me a drop of thy largesse, — Eight in this wise, if it thee like and please : — Lo, let my lord the Fumival^' I pray, Jly noble lord, that now is Tresoreer, From thine highnesse have a token or twey To paye me that due is for this year 420 » Mochtl, (Scotch "mickle" and "muckle"). much. 1' AvM thcc (from French " s'aviser "), reflect, think. 15 Slieni, put to shame. First English " scendan," to put to shame, confound, reproach ; German, " schiinden." "> T-meeved, moved. '~ Arted, constrained, Latin "artare," to draw close, compress. IS Kylhc, make known, " It sit, it befits. " Seel-e, seek. 21 My lord the Fumival. Thomas Nevil, Lord Fumival, was made by Parliament joint-treasurer of the kingdom with Sir John Pelham in 1405. u CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1400 Of my yearly ten pounds in fh' eschcqueer ; Not Lut for' Jliuhael termu that was last : I dare not sjieak a word of femeyear," So is my spirit simple and sore aghast. I iepte ^ not to be seen importune In my pursuit, I am thereto full loth, And yet that guise rife is and comune Among the people now, withouten oath ; As the shameless craver will it go'th, For estate royal cannot aU day werne;'' 430 But poore shamcf ast * man oft is -n-roth ; Wherefore for to crave mote I learn. The proverb is, The Dumb Man No Land Getteth. Whoso not speaketh and with need is bete, And through arghness^ his owne self forgetteth, No wonder though another him forgete ; Need hath no law, as that the clerkes trete ; And thus to craven arteth ' me my need. And right -svill eke that I me entremete : ^ For that I axe is due, as God me speed. 440 And that that due is, thy magnificence Shunneth to wernen' as that I beHevc. As I saide, Eue on mine impotence. That likely am to sterven "* yet ere eve But if " thou in this wise me relieve ; By coin I gete may such medicine As may mine hiu-tes, alle that me gi'ieve, Exile clean and voide me of pine.'- King James I. of Scotland, bom in 1394, was intercepted at sea, and made prisoner by Henry IV. in 1405. He was educated in England during tlie reign of Heiu-y V. Every attempt was made to trara him in Englisli habits of thought, and by marriage with Jane Beaufort he was attached to the royal family of England. His love for Lady Jane Beaufort was expressed in a poem of some length called "the King's Quau'," which means, the king's little book, ^vTitten before his release. King James returned to Scotland soon after the death of Heni-y V., was crowned at Scone in 1424, and was for twelve years a vigorous Scottish king, endeavouring to esta- blish law and order among turbident nobles, and to assure the rights and just liberties of his people. His firm upholding of justice led to his assassination in 1436. A famous old poem, that dwells heartily upon the humours of a festival day in a Scottish town, " Peblis to the Play," is ascribed to King James I. by John Mair, who was born thirty-three years after the king's death. Mair said of him, " He was a most ^ Wot hut for, only for. ' Offerneijear, arrears from a past year. = I keptc, &c., I took heed not to be a dun— am loth to he cue- though that fashion is common now, aad the shameless craver gets what he will because a king cannot be always saying, No. * Werne, refuse. First EngUsh " wyrmm," to forbid, refuse, deny. 5 Sliamffast (First English " sceamfaest" "), modest, fast or firm in "sceamu;" now spelt " shame-faced." ' Arghness. hesitation, indolence. First English "yrhth," slug- gishness, dread. 7 Arteth, constrains. * Me entremete, put between, interpose myself. s Wn-nc, refuse. '5 Steite, perish. Fjrst English ■' steorian," German "sterben." " But if, unless. " Pine (First English " p(n"), pain, torment. James I. of Scotland in his Tocth. From a Contemporary Portrait at Kiclherg, engraved in " Pinlierton's Iconographia Scotica." clever composer in his mother tongue ; whereof many writings and familiar songs are still held by the Scots in memory among their best. He composed the clever song 'Yas sen,' and that pleasant and clever song 'At Beltane,' which others have en- deavoured to change into a song of Dalkeith and Gargeil, because it was kept close in a tower or chamber where a woman lived with her mother." Though James I.'s authorship has been questioned, no evidence in favour of another author is as good as this. The first words forming the old title to "Peblis to the Play" are "At Beltane;" the subject of the poem is the Beltane festival at Peebles, and as Mair says, othei's, when the original covild not be got at, gave imitations of it with the scene laid else- where. We have such an imitation extant in the poem of " Christ's Ku-k on the Green," which de- scribes, after the manner of " Peebles to the Play," a rustic festival, of which the scene seems to be laid at Leslie, in Aberdeenshire, where the ruins of an old Christ's Kii-k still stand on a green, and a fail- used to be held. The other imitations of King James's play- ful sketch of life among his people have been lost. In choice of the theme of " Peebles to the Play'' there was a poet's feeling. Beltane Day was an ancient festival, originating in the days of Celtic paganism, held on old May Day by the Scots, and in Ii-eland on the 21st of June, at the time of the solstice. The word Beil-tine. meant Bel's fire : Bel being one of the old Celtic names of the sun. Advance of the sun's beneficent power over the earth fixed the time of this ancient festi^val for joyous w-orship of one of the great forces of nature. The celebration was first and last a rustic one, and it was kept at last especially by cowiierds, who gathered in the fields, and dressed themselves a dinner of boUeil milk and eggs, ■with cakes of a mystical foi-m, de- signed,, doubtless, by heathen priests of old, for they were studded with lumps in the shape of nipples. TO A.D. 145iJ.j SHORTER POEMS. 65 James L in Later Life. From John Jonston's '* Inscriptiones Historic^e." {Amsterdam, 1602.) Peebles kept Beltane Day with so much holiday fun that strangeiT? were drawn even from Edin- burgh. The author of " Peebles to the Play" begins his sketch of the humoni'S of this Beltane festival with a description of the gatheruig in the fields. Then he proceeds to the dinner, the dance, the fun of an incidental fight, and so forth ; his song being alive throughout \vith homely incident. It may be noticed that a " Beltane Fair" is still held at Peebles on the second Wednesday of May. PEEBLES TO THE PLAY. At Beltane when ilk body bownis * To Peebles to the Play, To hear the singing- and the soundis The solace, sooth to say. By firth and forest forih they found;- They graythit^ them full gay ; God waif* that would they do that stound,^ For it was theu' feast day, They said. Of Peebles to the Play. " 10 1 Uk hody bownis, everybody makes ready. " Boun," or *' bown," to make ready. Icelandic "bua," past participle " buinn." Tbe word " boun," common in old Englisli — " boitn (tbat is, made ready, or prepai'ed) for sea," &c.— was afterwards written "bound," as in "outward bound." "bound for New York." Otber old Nortliem senses of tbe word " buinn " or " boun," were " ready " or " willing," and allied to it tbe being- about to do anything. Tbus in Cleasby's Icelandic Dictiouary we liave tbe plu'ase quoted, "lianu var biiinn til falls," he w.is just about to tumble, as one might still say in English of a boy on the edge of a wall that he "is bound to fall." In some common English phrases the word has been confused in usage with the participle of " bind." 2 Found, go. First English "fundian," endeavour to find, go for- ward. The ending ian is only a sign of the infinitive, like er or i/r in French. 3 GrayiJiit, made ready. Fii'st English " gerae'diau." * Wait (First English " wrft"), knows. s Stoxind, time. First English " stund," a space of time. All the wenches of the west "Were up ere the cock crew ; For reeling^ there might no man rest, For garray ' and for glew ; ^ One said " My curches^ are not prest T'^" Then answerit Meg full blew : " " To get an hood I hold it best." *' By [my own] soul that is true !" Quoth she, Of Peebles to the Play. 20 fi Keeling. Used here in the sense of quick movement, as in the song quoted by Jamieson in his " Scottish Dictionary : " " The sack an' the sieve, an' a' I will leave. An' alang wi' my soger reel, O ! " " Garray, preparation. First English " gearo," ready ; " gearwian," to make ready. With the g softened, "geara" becomes " yare," as in the opening of the "Tempest," "Fall to't yarely, or we run our- selves abound." Another form " gearcian," to prepare, has the g softened to j, in "jerked" (or prepared) beef; the same word occurs, misspelt through a mistaken etymology, in "jugged hare." 8 Glev: {First English " gleo" and " gliw"), glee. 9 CurcJies, kerchiefs ; our "courches" in the original sense of the word as a woman's covering for the head, " cou\Te-chef . " It has been argued that James I. could not be the author of this poem, because curches and hoods are mentioned in it ; and a statute of James II., in 1457, enacted "that the wives and daughters of men living in boroughs, and of landwart" {those living in the country), •'should not wear sumptuous clothing, but be abnlzied" (apparelled, from French "habiller") "in manner correspondent to their estate ; that is to say, on their head short curchies, with little hoods, such as are used in Flanders, England, and other countries." From this sumptuary law, and the pointing to the use of " curchies with little hoods" by women in Flanders, England, and elsewhere, of like station with those who over-dressed their heads in Scotland, it is inferred without sufficient reason tbat the Scottish peasantry never wore curches, or hoods— the simplest of head-coverings— till 1457. In the fashion of ladies' head-dresses, horns, or high heart-shaped rp^4l\ n\^ Sumptuous Head-dresses. From ffiiiii's MS. 18, E. II., p. 269. stnictnres, prevaUed dviring tbe reign of James I. of Scotland, wlio was killed in 1437, and tbey were superseded after the middle of tbe century by steeple caps half an eU or tbree-quarters of an ell bigli. i» Prest (Frencb " pret"), ready. 11 BIcio, disconcerted, looking blue. On tbe very morning of tbe holiday, says Kitty to Meg. " Thy kerchiefs are not ready " {meaning, perhaps, not dry or smooth from the wash). Meg looks concerned, but says, "You'd better get a hood." "Well thought of," says Kitty ; " so I will " (takes from its nail her bomespim hood, and goes without a kerchief). 66 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURK [a.d. 1400 She took the tippet' hy the end, To let it hang she leit- not ; Ciuoth he, " Thy haek shall bear a bend." " In faith," quoth she, " we meet not." She was so guekit^ and so gend» That day one bit she ate not ; Then spake her fellows that her kcnd,* " Be still, my joy, and greet not Now!" Of Peebles to the Play. " Ever alas ! " then said she, " Am I not clearly tint ? ' I dare not come yon market to I am so evil sunhrint ; 30 Trader. From King's MS. 19, C. XI., p. 31. 40 Among yon merchants my dudds do ': ^ Marie, I saU anis mj-nt,' Stand oil: far and keik '" them to. As I at homo was wont," Uuoth she, Of Peebles to the Play. Hop, Calye and Cardronow Gatherit out thickfold ! With hey and how, rohmnbelow ! The young foUc were full bold. The bagpipe blew, and they out thi'ew Out of the to^^^li3 untold. 1 Tippet, a length of twisted hair. 2 Lcit, permitted. 3 Bend, band, ribbon. She coiled up a length of plaited hair, and ■would not let it hanjj down her back, though a sweetheart did oifer to grace her back with a bunch, that was to do what a much later song represents as good in a damsel's eyes ; *' He promised to buy me a bunch of blue ribbon to tie up my bonny brown hair." * (xucliit, foolish, from "gowk." ^ Gend, playful. '' Kcnd, knew. 7 Tint, lost. Icelandic " tj^na," to lose. ^ Dudds (Icelandic "diithi"), swaddling clothes, poor clothing, rags. — Do, " dow," lose freshness, look faded. Mseso-Gotliic *' dojan," and " afdojan," to wear down, destroy. 3 I sail ants mynt, I shall once try for it. First English " myn* tan ;" that is, try to see all the folk— stand far ofl' and attempt. ^^ Ktiik, peexJ at them. The MnsiciANS.il Lord, sic a shout was them among When they were over the wold There west, Of Peebles to the Plav. 50 TWEEDSIDE, A MiLE WEST OF PEEBLES, NeIDPATH CASTLE, A young man stert into that steid '^ As cant '^ as any colt, A bu-ldn''' hat upon his head With a bow and a bolt ; '* 11 Drawn in 1788 for John Carter's "Ancient Architecture of England," from carvings that represent humours of a popular fes- tival (a Whitsun Ale) on the entablature under the parapet of the nave of St. John's Church, Cirencester. The nave was rebuilt between 1504 and 1522, and its carvings, from which I take also the figures ou pages 67 — 69, were to be seen only from the leads of the side aisles. " Steid, place. 13 Cavif, and " canty," lively. Old Swedish " ganta," to play. 1* Birkin, birchen. 1^ Bolt, an-ow, that which is thrust forward; from a root meaning "impel." The same idea gives its name to the bolt of a door; indeed, we speak of shooting the bolt of a door. TO A.D. 1450. J SHORTER POEMS. 67 Said, " Merry maidenis, think not lung I The weather is fair and smolt . " ' He cleikit up a high ruf - sang, " Therefiirc ane man to the holt" Quoth he. Of Peebles to the Play. 60 They had not gone half of the gait^ When the maidens came upon them. Ilk ane man gave his consait How at'' they would dispone them. One said, '• The fairest fallis me ; Tak ye the laif and fone* them ! " Another said, " "\Vys mc ':'' Lat be ! On, Twedell side, and on them Swith,"? Of Peebles to the Play. 70 Tken he to go, and she to go, And never ane bade '• Abide you." Ane winklot^ fell her ankles up. "Wow," quoth Malkin, "hide you! What needis you to make it so ? Yon man wiU [but deride] you!" " Ai'e yo ower gude," quoth she, "I say To hit them gang beside you Yonder?" Of Peebles to the Play. 80 Then they come to the townis end Withouton more delay, He before, and she before, To see who was most gay. ' All that lookit them upon Louche ' fast at their array ; Some said, that they were market folk ; Some said, the Queen of May Was come ; Of Peebles to the Play. 90 Then they to the tavern house With mickle oly '" prance ; Ane spake with wordis wonder crous" " A done, with ane mischance ! '- Braid '^ up the board," he hydis; "tyte 1 '■• We are all in a trance,'* See that our naprc '^ be white. For we will dine and dance There out," Of Peebles to the Plav. 100 ' SrnoU (First Englisii " smylt " and " smolt ") , serene, mild, calm. 2 C'cil:it up, raised, snatched np. The first idea is, catching 9ny- thing up with a " cleik." or iron hook, or chain.— Rn/, rough. ^ Gait, way. Scandinavian " gata." * How at, iu what way. 5 The laif, those left.— Foue, fondle. * Wys me? direct me? don't try it. First English "wisian," to instruct, show, guide, direct, govern. ' Sn'ith, in strengtli, bravely. A First English word. 8 Winldot, young woman. First English "wencle," a maid or daughter. ' Lmche, laughed. '" Oil/ (French "joli"), with jollity, good .htunoiired prancing. " Croas, brisk-tempered. French " courrouce." ^2 TTith ane mischance, with a mischief to you ! *3 Bvaid (First English " bne'dau "). make broad, sjjread out. The noun "bree'de" meant breadth, and also a table, as that which is spread. '* He hydis, he hurries, says hurryingly ; to " hey," to hasten. First English " higan," to hie, to make haste. — Tfjic, soon. ■5 In a trance, passing away, dying for our dinner. 'fi Napre (French " mppe "), a cloth. Cake and Ale. Ay as the goodwifo brought in Ane scorit ui)on the waueh,'^ Ane bade " Pay I " Another said, " Nay, Bide while we rakin our lauch ! " '' The goodwife said " Have ye na dread, Ye sail pay at ye aucht." '" A young man stert upon his feet And he began to lauche For heydinj^" Of Peebles to the Play. He gat a trencher in his hand And he began to count. " Ilk man twa and ane happenie : To pay thus we were wont." Another stert upon his feet And said " Thou art o'er blunt To tak sic office upon hand ; [I vow] thou scr^'ite ane dunt-' Of me ! " Of Peebles to the Play. 110 120 1' ScoHt upon the wavch, kept score upon the wall. Js Rakin our Imtcli, reckon our tavern bill. " Lauch " (also " lawin** and " lawmg:") may be from " lecgan," to lay, or put down. " At ye aucht, what you ought. You need not score all my jugs and dishes on the wall, and trouble yourselves to check my reckoning. I shall not cheat you, 20 Lauche for heydin, laugh for scorn. Heydin (Icelandic " bietlmi "), mockery, scumlity. ^i Thou servite ane dunt, deservest a blow. 68 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1400 " Ane dunt ! " quoth lie. " ^\^lat devil is that ? [I vow] yow dar not du'd." ' He atert to a broggit staft',- Wincheand^ as he were wood.'' All that house was in a reii-d ; ' Ane cried " The haUe ruid ! Help us, Lord, upon this erde, That there be spilt na blude Herein 1 " Of Peebles to the Tlay . 1 30 They thrang out at the door at anis ^ Withouten any reddin ; " GUbert in a gutter glayde,*' He gat na better beddin. There was not ane of them that day Would do another's biddin. Thereby lay three and thirty some Thrunland ' in a middin Of di-afi. Of Peebles to the Play. 140 A cadger on the market gait '" Heard them bargane" begin; He gave a shout, his -nife came out, .Scantly she might ourhye'- him. He held, she di-ew ; for dust that day Might no men see a stjTiie " To red them.'* Of Peebles to the Play. 148 He stert'^ to his great gray mare And off he tumbled the creUlis." " Alas!" quoth she, " hald oui- gude man !" And on her knees she kneehs. " Abide ! " quoth she. " Why nay," quoth he. IntiU his stirrups he lap." The girding brake, and he flew ofi And up start both his heelis At anis. Of Peebles to the Play. 158 His wife came out, and gave a shout, And by the foot she gat him ; All bedirtin drew him out ; Lord, [how] right weQ that sat him I '^ 1 Dar not da'd, dare not do it. ' Broggit staff inow ** prog staff"), a staff with a sharp irou point. 3 Wmcheand, nodding. First English " wincean " to bend one's self, nod, wink. * Tf'ood, mad. ^ Reirdt roar. •* At anis, at once. ' Reddin, counsel, pacifying. ^ Glayde, glided, slipped. 5 Thrunland, rolling, trundling ; in a middin of draff, a waste heap of grains (thrown out after the brewing at the tavemj. ^■^ Market gait, market street. ** Bargane, battle. Bargaining in trade was so named from the noisy contest that made part of it. ^ Oiti-hyc, overtake. *3 A styme, the faintest form of anything, a glimpse. " To red than, to part them and put them in order. The cadger and his wife held men and pulled them from one another ; but there was such a dust that there was no seeijig how to set them to rights. *'To red up one's self** is to dress; "to red a play** is to settle a broil, and so forth. IS StcH, started. Its r has the value of a second syllable in the metre. " Creiili's, paniers. The cadger, when he threw off his mare's paniers to moont himself, meant, perhaps, to ride for help to stop the battle. 17 xi ; And gif ye will gif me richt nocht, The mickle devil gang wi you ! " Quoth he, Of Peebles to the Play. By that the dancing was all done, Their leave took less and muir ; "When the winklottis " and the wooers twynit To see it was heart sair What Atkin said to fair Ales : 228 238 248 Fair Alice. " My bird, now vnR I fare." [Was never] a word that she might speak, But swownit that swcit of swair " For kindness. Of Peebles to the Play. He fippilit '3 Uko a fatherless foal ; And " Be still, my sweet thing '." " By the haly ruid of Peblis I may not rest for greeting." '* He whistlit and he pipit baith To make her blithe that meeting ; " My honey heart, how says the sang, There sail be mirth at our meeting Yet." Of Peebles to the Play. By that the sun was settand shaftis, And near done was the day ; There men might hear schriken of chaftis'* When that thev went their wav. " Winklottis, damsels; when the girls and their wooers tviyntt, parted. '= Su-ou-iul of sioair, fainted on his neck. First English " sweor," the neck. 13 Fippilit, whimpered. " Grceling, weeping. First English " grse'tan," to weep. 15 C)iaftis, chaps. Icelandic " kjaptr," older form " kjoptr," the jaw, in a vulgar sense. The holiday-makers end their day with shrieking noises on the way home, still familiar to those who live anywhere upon the path of Whitsun or other popular holiday-makers. The tailpiece on the nert page is taken, like the other figures repre- senting humours of a p'lpular festival, as carved by a Cruikshank of more than 350 years ago, through Carter's "Ancient Architectxire of England," from the wall of St. John's Chiu'ch, Cirencester. 70 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITEEATTTllE. [a. 11. UV1 Had there lieen more made of thi^ song, Jlore should I to you say ; At Bcltanp ilka body Tjownd To Peebles to the Play. 256 Monkey and Bagpipes. CHAPTER VI. The Nit-brown Maid : Robert Henbyson. Old Ballads. — a.d. 14.50 to a.d. 1508. Ballads and poems written for recitation to the people followed the romances, lays, and fabliaux written, like Sir Cleges, for the lords in hall. In the latter part of the fifteenth century our literatm-e was enriched with ballads of " Robin Hood," " Chevy Chase," and other such pieces, which usually survive in later versions. " The Nut-browai Maid " (to which a moral is attached in the last stanza, derived, no doubt, through Chaucer, from Petrarch's version of "Griselda") certainly belongs to the fifteenth century, for it was printed as early as 1.502 in Richard Arnold's book on the customs of London, known as his Chronicle. Arnold was a Londoner trading to Flanders, and, as he was executor to a will in 147.3, he could not have been born at a later date than 1452. Nut-hroimi was the old English woi'd for hriinette, and there was a saying that " A nut-brown girl is neat and blithe by nature." It may be that many of the old ballads were written by ladies. Dr. R. C. A. Prior, in the in- troduction to his excellent translation of Ancient Danish Ballads, says that " the MSS. in which they are preser\ed are almost every one of them in female handwriting, which alone might lead us to expect that females had composed them. But it is also remarkable that wves invariably give their liusbands the best possible advice, and that men who are pictured as fine characters follow their advice. Now as gallantry towards the fair was not a promi- nent characteristic of the Danes or any other Scan- dinavians in former times, we cannot suppose that anything so flattering to them was composed by men, but feel justified in admitting the conclusion to which Oelilenschliiger, N. M. Petersen, and other Danish critics have arrived, that we are indebted for most of them to ladies. There is almost as con- clusive internal evidence that they are in great part also the work of persons of education and refine- ment." Among the English ballads written by women some are disposed to include the " Nut-brown Maid." " We " in the last stanza would in that case be put into the mouth of the male reciter of the ballad to the listeners in castle hall or by the wayside. A Lady Writing. From Hurlciaii JUS. «31, p. 3. THE NUT-BROWN MAID. Be it right, or wi-ong, these men among On women do complain ; Affirming this, how that it is A labour spent in vain To love them wele ; for never a dele ' The)' love a man again : For let a man do what he can, Their favour to attain, Yet, if a new to them pursue. Their first true lover than - Laboureth for naught ; and from her thought Ho is a banished man. 12 I say not nay, but that all day It is both writ and said That woman's faith is, as who saith. All utterly decayed ; But nevertheless, right good witness In this case might be laid. That they love true, and continue, Record the Nut-brown Jlaid ; WTiieh, from her love when her to prove, He came to make his moan. Would not depart ; for in her heart 8he loved but him alone. 24 Then between us let us discuss "\Miat was all the manere Between them two ; we ■s^^ll also Tell all the pain in fere'' That she was in. Now I begin, So that ye me answere : "N^Ticrefore, ye, that present be I pray you give an ear. 1 Dcic (First English " dffil "), part ; never a bit. ~ TJtflji, then. 3 111 /iTf, together ; tell also all the pain. TO i.n. 1608.] SHORTER POEMS. 71 I am the knight.' I come by night, As secret as I can ; Saying, "Alas! thus standeth" the case, I am a banished man." :jG Anu I your wUl for to fulfil In this wlU not refuse ; Trusting to shew, in wordes few. That men have an ill use (To thcLi- own shame) women to blame. And causeless them accuse : Therefore to you I answer now, All women to excuse, — " Mine own heart dear, with you what cheer ? I pray you, teU anono : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 48 Hi. " It standeth so : a deed is do Whereof much harm shall grow ; My destiny is for to die A shameful death, I trow ; Or else to tlee. The one^ must be. None other way I know. But to withdraw as an outlaw, And take me to my bow. Wherefore, adieu, my own heart true I None other rede* I can ; ^ For I must to the green wood go. Alone, a banished man." 60 She. " Lord, what is this worldes bliss, That changeth as the moon ! My sinmuer's day in lusty Jlay Is darked before the noon. I hoar you say, farewell : Nay, nay ! We depart not so soon. Why say ye so ? whither will ye go ? Alas 1 what have ye done ? All my welfare to sorrow and care Should change, if ye were gone : For, in my mind, of all manldnd I love but you alone." 72 He. " I can beUeve, it shall you grieve. And somewhat you distrain ; But, afterward, your paines hard Within a day or twain Shall soon aslake ; and ye shall take Comfort to' you again. Why .should ye nought ? for, to make thought. Your labour were in vain. And thus I do ; and pray you, lo. As heartUy as I can : For I must to the green wood go. Alone, a banished man." 84 * I am the fcmg?^t. The reciter of the tale is telliug its plan and preparing liis hearers for its dialo^ie form, that would presently be represented with dramatic spirit. As first printed each stanza con- tains sis long lines, hut I follow the usual division of them, and also insert " He" and " She." - Sfaiidcth. Here the final th did not more necessarily than a final s cause the precetling c to be sounded as a separate syllable. 3 The to\i, in original ; ton is an old contraction of " that one," as ioiher of *' that other." * Ecdc, counsel. ^ Cafi, know. She. " Now, sith that ye have shewed to me The secret of your mind, I shall be plain to you again. Like as ye shall me find. Sith it is so, that )e will go, I will not leave behind. Shall never be said, the Nut-brown Maid Was to her love unkind : Make you ready, for so am I, Although it were anone : For, in my mind, of all niaukiuc I love but you alone." 96 Uc. " Yet I you rede take good heed When men will think and say : Of young, of old, it shall be told, That ye be gone away. Your wanton will for to fulfil. In green wood you to play ; And that ye might from yoiu- delight No longer make delay. Rather than ye should thus for me Be called an Ul woman, Yet would I to the green wood go, ,\Ionc, a banished mar.." 108 She. " Though it bo simg of old and young. That I should be to blame, Theh-s bo the charge that speak so large In hm-ting of my name ; For I will prove, that faithful love It is devoid of shame In your distress and heaviness To part^ with you the same ; And sure all tho that do net so. True lovers are they none : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 120 He. " I counsel you, Remember how It is no maiden's law Nothing to doubt, but to rim out To wood with an outlaw ; For ye must there in your hand bear A bow to bear and di-aw ; And, as a thief, thus must ye live, Ever in di-ead aud awe ; By which to you great hai-m might grow : Yet had I liever than That I had to the green wood go. Alone, a banished man." 132 She. " I think not nay, but as ye say. It is no maiden's lore ; But love may make me for youi- sake, As ye have said before, To come on foot, to hunt and shoot To get us meat and store ; For so that I youi' company May have, I ask no more ; ' Part, divide ; is not ashamed to share. 72 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 From which to part, it mateth mine heart As cold as any stone : For, in my mind, of all manldnd I love bxit you alone." lie. " For an outlaw, tliis is the law, That men hiui take and hind ; Without pitie, hanged to he, And waver with the wind. m Hanged without Pity. From King's MS., E. II., p. 31. If I had nedc, (as God forhede I) \\1iat rescues could ye find ? Forsooth, I trow, you and your bow Should di-aw for fear behind. And no mervayle : for Uttle avail "Were in your counsel than : Wherefore I to the wood will go, Alone, a banished man." S/ic. " Fidl weU know ye, that women be Full feeble for to fight ; No womanhede it is indeed To be bold as a knight ; Yet, in such fear if that ye were Among enemies day and night, I would withstand, with bow in hand, To grieve them as I might. And you to save ; as women have From death many one : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." He. " Yet take good hede ; for ever I drede Tliat ye could not sustain The thorny ways, the deep vaUeys, The snow, the frost, the rain. The cold, the heat : for dry or wet, We must lodge on the plain ; And, us above, none other roof But a brake bush or twain : 156 168 Which soon should grieve you, I believe : And ye would gladly than That I had to the gi'cen wood go, Alone, a banished man." 180 Sfie. " Sith I have here been partynere With you of joy and bliss, I must also part of your woe Endure, as reason is : Yet am I sure of one pleaslire ; And, shortly, it is this : That, where ye be, me seemeth, perde,' I could not faro amiss. Without more speech, I you beseech That we were soon agone : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 92 He. " If ye go thyder, ye must consider, ■WTien ye have lust to dine. There shall no meat be for to gete. Nor drink, beer, ale, ne wine. Ne sheetcs clean, to lie between, Made of thi-ead and twine ; None other house, but leaves and boughs, To cover your head and mine ; Lo mine heart sweet, this ill diete Shoidd make you pale and wan : Wherefore I to the wood will go. Alone, a banished man." 204 The Woodland Spring. From HorWuTV MS. 4431, p. 106. She. " Among the wild deer, such an archere, As men say that ye be, Ne may not fail of good vitayle, Where is so great plentj' : And water clear of the rivere Shall be full sweet to me ; With which in hele I shall right wele Endure, as ye shall see ; 1 Perd4, par Dieu. TO i.D. 150S.] SHORTER POEMS. 73 And, ere we go, a bed or two I can pro\ndc anonc ; For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 216 He. " Lo yet, before, ye must do more. If ye will go with mo ; As cut your hair up by your ear, Yom' Idrtlo by the knee. With bow in hand, for to withstand Your enemies, if need be : And this same nig'ht, before daylight, To woodward will I flee. And ye will all this fidfil. Do it .shortly as ye can : Else ■will I to the green wood go, Alone, a banished man." 228 She. " I shall as now do more for you Than 'longeth to womauhedo ; To short my hair, a bow to bear. To shoot in time of need. O my sweet mother ! before all other For you have I most diede ! But now, adieu ! I must ensue. Where fortune doth me lead. All this make ye. Now let us flee ; The day come fast upon : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 240 Ee. " Nay, nay, not so ; ye shall not go, And I shall tell you why, Your appetite is to be light Of love, I well espy : For, right as ye have said to me. In like wise hardily Ye would answere whosoever it were, In way of company. It is said of old. Soon hot, soon cold ; And so is a woman : Wherefore I to the wood will go. Alone, a banished man." 252 SJie. " If ye take heed, it is no need Such words to say by me ; For oft ye prayed, and long assayed, Or I you loved, parde ; And though that I of ancestry A baron's daughter be, Yet have you proved how I you loved A squire of low degree ; And ever shall, whatso befall ; To die therefore anone ; For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 264 m. " A baron's child to be beguiled ! It were a cursed dede ; To be felaw with an outlaw Almighty God forbede ! 10 Yet better were, the poor squyero Alone to forest yedo,' Than ye shall say another day. That, by my wicked dedc. Ye were betrayed : Wherefore, good maid, The best rede that I can. Is, that I to the green wood go. Alone, a banished man." 276 S/w. " ^^^latsoeyer befall, I never shaU Of this thing you upbraid : But if ye go, and leave me so, Then have ye me betrayed. Remember you wele, how that ye dele ; For if ye, as ye said. Be so unkind to leave behind Yoiir love, the Nut-brown Maid, Trust me truly, that I die Soon after ye be gone : For, in my mind, of all manldnd I love but you alone." 288 Se. " If that ye went, ye should repent ; For in the forest now I have purveyed me of a maid, Whom I love more than you ; Another fairer than ever ye were, I dare it well avow ; And of you both, each shoidd be wroth With other, as I trow : It were mine ease, to live in peace ; So will I, if I can : Wherefore I to the wood will go. Alone, a banished man." 3-30 S/ie. " Though in the wood I understood Ye had a paramour. All this may nought remove my thought, But that I will be your : And she shall find me soft and kind, And coiu-teis every hour ; Glad to fulfil all that she wiU Command me, to my power : For had ye, lol an hundred mo. Yet would I be that one : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 312 Se. " Mine own dear love, I see the proof That ye be kind and true : Of maid, and wife, in all my life. The best that ever I knew. Be merry and glad ; be no more sad ; The ease is changed new ; For it were ruth that for your truth Yoii should have cause to rue. Be not dismayed, whatsoever I said To you, when I began : I win not to the green wood go ; I am no banished man." 324 1 Tede, went. The oM verb " gaii," to go, had for its past tense ' eode," spelt afterwards " yode." The post tense now in use, " went," 74 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH IJTERATURE. [a.d. 1450 She. " These tidings lie inoro glad to me, Thau to bo made a queen, If I were sure they should oudm-e : But it is often soon. When men will break promise they speak The wordis on the spleen.' Ye shape some wile me to beguile, And steal from me, I ween : Then were the case worse than it was, And I more wo-hegone : For, in my mind, of all mankind I love but you alone." 336 Me. " Ye shall not uede further to di-ede : I will not disparage You (God defend!), sith you descend Of so great a linage. Now understand ; to Westmoreland, Which is my heritage, I will you bring ; and ^^'ith a ring, By way of marriige I will you take, and lady make, As shortly as I can : Thus have ye won an carle's son. And not a banished man." 348 A Knight taking his Rank. From Harleian MS. 4431, p. 114. Here may yo see, that women be In love, meek, kind, and stable ; Let never man reprove them than. Or call them variable : is from another verb, " wendan," of whicli the present is not quite obsolete. We may still say that a person " wends his way." ' Tlie spleen. Not from the heart, but from the spleen, which was cuce regarded as the som-ce of auger and melancholy, and thence associated with hasty and variable conduct. Thus, in Beaumont and Fletcher's " Women Pleased" (" Give 'em their sovereign wills aud -■'leased they are "), the usiu-er Lopez says to his wife Isabella — *' You must be wise then. And hve sequester'd to yourself aud me. Not wand'ring after every toy comes cross ye. Nor struck with every spleen." But, rather, pray God that we may To them be comfortable, ^\^lich sometime proveth such as he loveth. If they be ^ charitable. For sith men would that women .should Be meek to them each one ; Much more ought they to God obey. And serve but Him alone. 360 To the generation that produced the ballad of the ■' Nut-brown Maid," which is by an unknown author, seems to have belonged also the fir.st pastoral in our literature, " Robm and Makyn," by Robert Henryson. Henryson was the oldest of an important group of Scottish poets who, at the close of the fifteenth and beguining of the sixteenth centuries, were tilling our North country with music. Licentiate in Arts and Bachelor in Decrees when admitted, in 14;G2, to the newly-founded University of Glasgow, he became notary public and schoolmaster at Dunfermline, lived to be an old man, and was dead in 1508. Schoolmaster and Pupil. From Rcisch's *' Margarita Philosopliica" (1513). ROBIN AND MAKYN.' Robin sat on gude green hill Kepand a flock of fe : '' Jlirry * Makyn said him tiU,^ " Robin, thou rue on me ; I have thee lovit, loud and still. These yearis two or thi-ee ; My dule' in dem' but if thou dill,' Doubtless, but'" dreid, I dee." " I/theij he, to try whether they continue in faith and charity. 3 Makyn (Mawkyn or Malkin), Httle MoU ; from " Mary." ■> Ft; sheep, cattle. First English " feo." 5 Mirry, gentle, soft. First Fnglish " mirig." See Note .S, page 18. 6 Him fill, to him. ' Dii'e (French " deuil "), sorrow. 8 Deni, secret. First English " dyme." s Dill, share. First English "dee'lan," divide; "dae'I" (German 'theil"), a part. M But, without.— But drcid, certainly. So in the refrain to the TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEM>S. 7i> Itobin answerit, '* By the Rudu, N;i thing of liive I knaw, 10 But keipis my sheep under yon wude, Lo, "where they raik on raw : ^ AA'hat has niarrit thcc in thy mudc, Mak)*n to me thou shaw l- Or what is luve, or to bo bide,- Fain ^oiild I leir^ that biw." *' At luvis laii"* gif thou will lcu% Tak there ane ABC: Be hend,^ courtass. and fair of feir,® "Wise, hardy, and free : 20 So that no danger do thee deir," Wliat dule in dern thou di'c ; ^ Preiss thee^ >vith pain at all powcir, Be patient, and pri^-ie." Robin answerit liir ag-ain. *' I wat'*' not what is lufc ; But I have mervell in certain, \Vhat makis thee this wanrufe : '' The weather is fail", and I am fain,'- My sheep goes haill'^ above ; 30 An "we wald^* play us in this plain, They wald us baith reprove." " Robin, tak tent^^ unto my tale, And -work all as I rede,^^ And thou shall have my hairt all haill, Eke and uij maidenhede. Sen God sendis bute^' for baill,'^ And for mumj'ng remcid, My dule with tliee '^ but if T daill, Doubtless I am but deid." 40 " Good Coimsel of Chaucer," page 50, " And Tnitb thee shall dehver, it is no drede." See Note 6 on that page. I Raik on ra-n, adieu I the sun goes west, The day is near hand gone." " Robin, in dule-"* I am so di'est,-^ That lufe "will be my bone."-'' *' Ga lufe, IMak^-n, wherever thou list, For leman-^ I luve none." " Robin, I stand in sic a style I sicht,-^ and that full sair.'* " Mak>-n, I haif been here this whyle, At hame God gif I were." -^ 60 " My honey, Robin, talk a while, If thou wUl do na mair." " MalcATi, some other man beguile. For homeward I Mdll fare." Robin on Ms wayis went. As light as leaf of tree ; Mak}-n murnit in her intent,^" And trow'd lum never to see. Robin brayd attour the bent ; 3' Then MakjTi cr^'it on hic,^- 70 " Now may thou sing, for I am shent,-^^ What ahs lufe at me ? " ^^ Jilakyn went hame withouten fail Full werj'^^ after couth weep ; Then Robin in a ful fair dale Assemblit all his sheep. 20 To wiorne, to-morrow.— i7ta (First English "ylc"), same. — Pera- venture, two lines lower down, was prouoiuiced swiftly, p'va'ntiirc. 21 But mangrt, &c. Thomas Campbell skipped over these four lines when giving, in " Specimens of the Eughsh Poets," his modem para- pluuse of " Robin and Makyn." The veteran scholar, Dr. David Laing, in the notes to his edition of Henryson, only quotes Chalmers, who says that maugre " is here used in the sense of ill-will or spite," and that, " in this sense, Henryson's verse would mean, " But ill-will may I have if I stay.' " Yet surely that is not its meaning. What is done malgre, is done against one's will or inclination ; and when Makyn would occupy Robin with love talk, Robin's practical mind, yet imtouched by love, answers, "Makyn, you may come here to- mon*ow, and if we sit in one place, occupied with oiu"selves, our sheep may be straying; but I have maurjrc" — it is against my inclina- tion — "an I bide" — if I remain in one place — that is to say, it is much against my will if I do not move after them — " fra they begin to steir " — from the time when they begin to stir, or move over the pas- tiu*es in their gazing. In short, " I am too busy to attend to you." -~ Reivi-i >i)c, robbest me. " Roif, quiet. See Note to line 28. -* Dide, grief. ^ Brest, treated, ill-treated. -c Bone (First Enghsh " b^n"), petition, prayer. "I must pray for the love that alone will ease my grief." "~ Leman, a sweetheart, male or female. First English " leve-man," loved person. ^ Sicht, sigh. ^ Robiu, weary of Makyn's voice of love, suggests lliat her talk has kept him waiting on the pasture for some time, and tliat he wishes to get home. 30 Intent, direction of one's coui'se. From Latin " intendere.** Robin went his way home lightly, aud Makyn hers with a hea\-y heart. 31 Brayd attour the lent, started across the coarse grass or rushes by the hill-side. ^^ q^ jtic, on high. ^^ Shent, put to shame. 3* AUs at me, ails me. ^^ Wcnj, feeble, sorrowful. 76 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATUEE. [a.d. 1450 80 90 100 By that' some part of Makynis ail Out-tlirougli- his hairt coud creep ; Be foUowit her fast there till assaill, And till^ her tuke gudo keep.* " Abide, abide/ thou fail- Jlakyn, A word for any thing ; For all my luve it shall be thine, Withouten departing.^ All haUl' thy hairt for till have mine. Is all my coveting ; My sheep to morn, while liouiis nine, "Will need of no keeping." " Eobin, thou hes heard sung and say, In gestis and stories auld, ' The man that will not when he may, Shall have not when he wald.' I pray to Jesu, every day Mot eke* their- cairis cauld, That fii-.st preissis with thee to play. By firth, forest, or fauld." " Makyn, the night is soft and di-y. The weather is wiirm and fair, And the green wood right near us by To walk attorn- all where : Thau- may no janglour' us espy, That is to lufe contrail- ; Therein, Mak)-n, bath ye and I, Unseen we may repair." " Eobin, that warld is all away, And quite brought to an end. And never again thereto perfay,'" Shall it be as thou wend : " For of my pain thou made it play, And all in vain I spend : As thou hes done, so' shall I say, Mourn on ; I think to mend." " Mak)Ti, the hope of all my heill, My haii-t on thee is set. And ever mair to thee be leiU, While I may live but let ; '- * By fTiat, by the time that. ^ Out-through^ throughout. 3 Tin, to. * Keep, observance, close attention. First English "cypan," to hold, observe carefully, desii-e, take. ^ Abide, abide. Now that the tables are turned, it is Makyn who ■will not stay, and Robin's '* A word for ony thing " — anything for one word — is his parallel to her '* My honey, Robin, talk awhile, If thou -will do na mair." (Lines 61, G2.) 6 Depai-ting, division, by giving others a share. ' All haill, &c. Dr. David Laini^, a master in Scottish literatm-e, to whom we are much indebted for the on]y collected edition of the " Poems and Fables of Robert Henryson," prints " All bain ! '■ as an eiclamation. But the line is clearly a response to Makyn's once rejected offer. She had said (Hue .35), " And thow sail haif my hairt all haOl ; " now Robin says, ■• All haiU thy hairt for till haif myne "— for to have all thy whole heart mine— is all my coveting ; and then, with another playful reversal of the former dialogue, proceeds to discover that he has nine hours' time to-morrow at her service, let his sheep stir as they may (see note to line 45). » Ske, increase— the cold cares of the first who trouble themselves to seek you for a playfellow. s JanglouT, teller of tales. i» Perfaij fpar foil, in faith. " Wend, expected, weened. ^ But let, without hindrance. Never to fail, as others fail, What gi-ace that ever I get." " Robin, with thee I will not deal ; Adieu I for thus we met." 120 Makyn went hame blithe eneuch. Attorn- '•' the holtis hair ; '^ Robin mm-nit, and Makj-n leuch ; '* She sang, lie sichit sail- : And so left him, baith w-o and wreuch, In dolour and in cair, Kcpand his herd under a heuch, Amangis the holtis hair. In the folio-wing little poem by Henryson, I have modernised one or t-wo words as well as the spelling, but wherever a word is so changed the original is given in a note. THE ABBEY WALK. Alone as I went up and dowTi In an Abbey was fail- to see, Thinking what consolation Was best under '^ adversitie, By chance '^ I cast aside mine ee And saw tliis wn-itten upon a wall : Of what estate, M.ix, TH.iT thou be, Obey, a:«d th^lnk thy God foe all."* 110 Thy kingdom and thy great empire, Thy royalty nor rich array 10 Shall not endm-e at thy desire, But, as the wind, -will w-end away ; Th}' gold and all thy goodis gay Wlien fortune list will fi-om thee fall : Since thou examples " seest each day, Obey, and thank thy God for all. Job was most rich, in Writ we find, Tobit most full of chai-ity ; Job became poor and Tobit blind. Both tempted with advci-sity. 20 Since blindness was infiiniity, And poverty was natural ; Therefore right patiently both he and he"" Obeyed, and thanked God for all. Though thou be blind, or liavc an halt ; Or in thy face defoi-med ill. So it come not through thy default. No man .should thee reprove by skOl.^' Blame not thy Lord. So is His -will. Spui-n not thy foot against the wall, 30 But with meek heart and prayer stOl,-- Obey, and thank thy God for all. ^3 Attour (atover), above or across. ^* Holtis luiir, hoary woods. 15 See lines 58 and 71. The tables are now turned. It is Robin who mourns, Makyn who lauglis. She sang, he sighed ; and so she left him, woeful and peeHsh, in sorrow and care, keeping his herd under a crag among the cold grey woods. i^ Under, into. 1" By chance, on caiss. i^ -poT all, of all. 1^ Examples, sic sampillis, such examples. 20 He and ?u% a Scottish jihi-ase for one and the other, seems to have taken place of the one syllable (equivalent to First English "hi," they), which completed the metre. 21 By slcill, by reason. It is unreasonable that any man should blame. It ig blamiug God ; for it was God's wiU to give the bliuuness, lame- ness, or deformity of feature. ~ Still, silent, secret. TO A.D. 1508.J SHORTER POEMS. 77 Dunfermline Abbey. {From an Engraving in Scott's " Border Antiq%uti€S.") God of his justice must' correct, And of his mercy pity have ; He is a Judge to none suspect, To punish sinful man and save. Though thou he lord above the lave," And afterward made bound and thr-aU, A poor beggar with scrip and stave. Obey, and thank thy God for all. 40 This changing and great variance Of earthly statis up and down Is not but^ casualty and chance As some men say \vithout reasoun, But by the great provisioun Of God above that rule thee shall ; Therefore ever thou make thee boun'' To obey, and thank thy God for aU. In wealth be meek, lift* not thyself ; Be glad in wilful ^ povertie; 50 Thy power and thy worldis pelf. Is nought but very vanitie. Remember Him that died on tree. For thy sake tasted' bitter gall ; Who lifts * low hearts, and lowers hie : ** Obey, and thank thy God for all. Robert Henryson wi-ote, among otlier poems, a sequel to Chaucer'.s " Troilus and Cressida," called " the Testament of Cresseid," and he is not only the author of onr first pastoral, but also our first popular rhymer of old fables. He m.oralised thirteen, and one of these we take as the last example of his skill. It is the colloquy of the " Town and Countr\' Mouse," * Must, mon. = Above, attour. * Not but, uot merely. * Bonn, ready. Icelandic " bua," to prepare. 5 Lift. Henrysou's word is heich, make high ** Wilful, witli which your will or assent goes ' Tasted, taisiei the. ' Lifts, heis. ■Tlic hfe, the I'est. See Note 1, page 65. ' Hie, high. amplified from a passage iii the satires of Horace (sixth of the second Book). In the appended Moral I leave the old spelling, to show the exact form in which Henrvson's verse has come down to us. COLLOQtIY. From a Bonier Ornament in Reisch's "Margarita Fhilosophica" (1513^. THE TALE OF THE UPLANDIS MOUSE AND THE BURGES MOUSE. Esope, mine Author, makis mentioun Of twa jMps, and they were .sisters dear. Of whom the eldest dwelt in a Borrowis toun ; '" The other wj-nnit" Uponland,'- well near. Eight sohtar, whUes" imder busk" and breir, A\'hiles in the com, and other meimis skaith,'* As outlaws does and livis on then- waith."" "^ Borrowis toun, royal borough. Ane is written for a throughout. " irj/niiit, dwelt, from First English " wuniau." '- Uponland, or upland, in the country. An old name for the rustic was Jack Upland. " Whiles, spelt guhyles, at times. First EngUsh " hwil," a space of time. " Bual; bush. ^^ Slmith, " scathe," hurt. Fii-st English ** sceathan," German " schadeu," to hurt. "' Oil their waith, on what they can hunt ux>. First Eughsh "wEe'thian," to drive or hunt up. So in the First English trans- lation of the "Metra" of Boethius, ascribed to King Alfred, Death CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Thia rural ilouso in to ^ the winter tide, Harl hunger, canld, and tholit- great distress; The other ]\Ious that in the hurg-h can hide, 10 Was gild-l)rothor and made a free biu-gess : Toll free also, bnt^ custom mair or less, And freedom had to go -wlicre"* e'er she list, Among the cheese in ark, and meal in kist.^ One time when she was full and unf ute-sair,'"' 8he took in mind her sister uponland, And longit for to hear of her wcilfarc To see what life she had under the wand:' Barefoot alone, with pikestaff in her hand, As poor pilgrim she passit out of town, 20 To seek her sister both o'er dale and down. Forth many wilsomc^ wayis can she walk, Through moss and moor, through bankis, busk and breii", She ran ciyand, till^ she came to a balk,''* *' Cum forth to me my awin" sister dear , Cry ' Peip' anis." ^'^ AVith that the INIouse could hear, And knew her voice, as kinnisman will do. By vcrray kind,'^ and forth she came her to. The hartlie joy, Lord God ! if yc had seen, Was k-ithit^-* when that these twa sisteris met : 30 And great kindness was showen them between. For whiles they leuch, and whiles for joy they gret,'-^ Whiles kissit sweet, and whiles in armis plet ;^^ And thus thay f urc ^^ till sobcrit was their mude, Sj-ne foot for foot imto the chamber j-ude.^^ is described as a grim liiuiter of meu, who is " always ou the hiuil " — " a bith ou waith." ' III to, in. 2 TJwlit, suffered. First En^hsh "tholiau," to suffer. 3 But (be-utan)), without; but custom, without charge of custom duty. ■* "Where" is spelt throughout QuJiair, and "she" sclio. 5 Avli, alargekist. — Kist, chest. ^ trn/iife-sair, not footsore. " Vnder the v:an'i. Wand, a rod or sceptre; imdcr the vand, in subjection ; in her humble state. ^ Wihome, or u-i?sum, wild. ^ Tin, in the original always <2u7tiU, while (First English "hwile"), meaning unfit. The Scottish qnh represented the sound of Fii'st English hn\ now ir7i. Thus Firot English " hwteg" (Modem English *' whey ") was Scottish *' quhij," whig, and in that form gave its name to a politic il pai'ty. The First English " hwil," a space of time, made the adverbial forms '* hwile" and "hwilum." While, whiles, and vhilom were in Old Scottish spelling, " quhile," " quhiles," and "quhilura," which, with the suffix inverted, become " umquhile." In all such words quh is only a way of representing wh well sounded, as of old, and as now according to the Northern fashion. ^^ Ball:, an unijloughed strip between two fiurows. First English "bale." If the plough had been through, it would have destroyed the nest of the " wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beestie." n jlu-in, owTi. '2 Anh, once. ^* Kind, nature, kindred, born comi-ades, from *'cennan," to beget. So *' kindness " means origiually the form of goodwill iiatural between kinsmen, and " kind " was our old home word for natin-f , which is, in f ict, simply the corresponding Latin word, derived in like manner, that is to say, f lom *' natus " (participle of " nascor"), bom. " Kithit, shown. First English "cythan," to show, from "cunnan," to know, "cutli" (couth), known. The i>lirase "kith and kin" means our home— the ground known to us (see line 190) and our kin- dred. Uncouth ways are ways not generally known. >^ Gret, wept. First English "grse'tan," to weep, past " gri5t ;" **gr€tan," to greet, past "gv<5tte." 16 Plct, folded. 17 Fure, went ou. fared ; from First English " farau," to go. w Tude, went. First English " eode," from *' gan," to go. As I heard say, it was a sober wane,^"-* Of fog-" and fairn-* full febillie was made, A sillie scheill'^- under a steidfast stane. Of whilk the entnes was nocht high nor braid ; And in the aamyn-^ they went but mair abaid,^^ 4(' AVithoutin tire or candle bumand blight, For commonly such pickers-* loves not light. A\Ticn they were lodgit thus, these selie-"^ Mice, The yoimgest sister unto her buttery yeid,^^ And brought forth nuts and pease instead of spice : If this was good fare I do it on them beside.-"* The biu-gcss Mouse prompit forth*'' in pride. And said, " Sister, is this youi- daily food ?" " AVTiy not," quod she, " is not this meat right good ?" " No, by my soul, I think it but a scorn." 56 " Madame," quod she, '* ye be the mair to blame . My mother said, sister, when we were born. That ye and I lay baith -within ane wame ; I keep the rate and custom of my dame. And of my living in to povei-tie, For landis have we nane in propcrtic." *' My fail- sister," quod she, " have me excusit, Tliis rude diet and I can not accord ; To tender meat my stomach is aye usit,^*' For whiles I fare as well as any lord : 60 These withered pease and nuts or they be bored ^^ Will break my teeth, and make my wame full slender, Whilk was before usit to meattis tender." '^ Sober wane, frugal dwelling. The Latin "sobrius" is usually derived from " se," negative, and " ebrius," but the same root ap- pears in the Teutonic languages. Fii-st English " syfer," Old High German " siibar," Dutch " sober," with an orisanal sense, as in the text, of poor, simple, and mean, the forced abstinence of those who have not wherewith to be liistu"ious; derived from it is the sense of moi-al self-restraint and purity. A modem Dutchman might say of a poor, miserable house, " Het is liier sober gesteld," and in that sense the word is used by Heuryson in speaking of the " sober wane," or dwelling (First English " wunian," to dwell), in which the country mouse received her kinswoman. ^" Fog, moss; Danish "fug," mo?siness. -^ Fairn, fern. " SilUe $chciU, simple sheal, or shield, or shed. " Sel '' is Icelandic for the summer hut among the mountains, and our "sheal" is the name of the hut sheltering those who looked after the cattle, or of any little shed or place of shelter, 23 Tlie samyn, togethei'. First English " samod," Grerman " zusam- men." '■^* But mair abnid, without more delay or waiting; " abad " and " abaid," from " abidan," to bide or remain. -•"> Pickers, Old French " picoreiu's," niai-auders, pillagers. "Aller h la picore'e " was to go marauding, go on a venture. 26 Sclie, simple. For years after Henryson's time the word was used only faintly and occasionally in its later sense of contemptible simphcity. From First English "sae'l," well-being, came the ad- jective " saelig" — " seelie" — " silly," meaning prosperous temporally and in the highest spiritual sense. That kind of prosperity was the result of living innocent and simple lives ; aud the word thus came to mean innocent, simple, blessed. When theii* ignorance of evil made them an easy prey, the word "silly" gradually took the sense that it now shares with the equivalent phrase " blessed innocent." -' Teid (First English "eode"), went. 28 J do it on tliame besyde, I put it to those who stand by, whether this was good fare. 2fl Prompit fin-th, hurst out. Prompit, pronoimced as three syllables by well rolling of the r, is from the Latin " prorumpere." A rolled r completes the measure also in lines 64, 90, 128, 204. ^^ Aye nst(, always accustomed. 31 Or they he bored, ere they be bored, before I bite a hole in them. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 79 " Weill, Weill, sister,' quod the rural Mouse, " If it jjlease you, sic thingis as ye see here, Baith meat and diink, harberie and house. Shall be your own, will ye remain all year. Ye shall it have with blithe and merrie cheer, And that should make the messes that are rude, Amang freindis right tender and wonder gude. 70 WTiat pleasure is in feastis delicate. The which are given with a gloomy brow ? ^ A gentle heart is better recreate With blithe courage ^ than scith tiU him a cow : ■* A modicum is mair for till allow, ° So that good-will be carver at the dais. Than thiawin vult* and many spicit mais." ' For aU ^ her merrie '' exhortatioun, Tliis burgess Mouse had little wiU to sing. But heavily she cast her browis doun, 80 For all the dainties that she could her bring. Yet at the last she .said, half in hething ; '" " Sister, this victual and youi' royal feast, May well suffice unto a rural beast. " Let be this hole, and come in to my place, I shall to you show by experience, My Good Friday is better nor yom- Pace ; " My dish washings is worth your haUl expenco ; I have houses enow of great defence ; Of cat, nor faU trap, I have no di'eid." 90 " I grant," quod she; and on together they yeid.'^ In stubble array through rankest grass and com, And imder buskis '•* privily eouth they creep, The eldest was the guide and went beforn, The younger to her wayis took good keeii.'"* On night thay ran, and on the day can sleep ; TiU in the morning ere the Laverock '* sang. They found the town, and in blithely couth gang. 1 Sister. Pronounced as three syllables by ^ving force to the final r. So Shakespeare, in *' As Tou Like It " (Act iv., scene 3) ; — '* The boy is fair, Of female favour, and bestows himself Like a ripe sister : the woman low And browner than her brother." It may be going too far to suggest that in the preceding stanzas it was chiefly madame the Town Mouse who spoke, and "sister" was pronoimced in two syllables, but that the answer of tho Country Mouse, perhaps, came into the poet's mind in character, and oi^ened with more of a rustic burr. ^ A gloomy brow, atie glonmand hrotc. .4nde was the old Northern participial form, ende the Midland, and hide (now intj) the Southern. ^ Blyith ciLraiic, cheerful heartiness. * Than seith till hira anc liow, than a cow seethed for him. ^ Till allow (French " allouer"), to praise, to be approved. *• Thrawin vuli, a cross face. Thraxcart, athwart, cross (Icelandic *' thrar," obstinate, stubborn) ; vult (from Latin *' vultus "), the countenance. 7 Hais, meat. ^ For all, notwitlistanding all. ^ Merie, gentle. '° Hethin and heydin (Icelandic " hgstbiuu "), scoffing. '' Pace, " Pasch," Easter. From Hebrew "pasach," to pass over; *' pC'sach," the Passover. ^ Yeid, went. See Note 18, page 78. 1^ Buskis, bushes. 1* Keep, heed. " Laverock, lark. See Note 14, page 22. Not far fra thyne " unto a worthy wane," This burgess brought them soon where they should be ; 100 Without God speed theli- herbcrie '^ was taue, In to a spence'^ with victual great plentie ; Baith cheese and butter ujjon their shelfis hie. And flesh and fish aneuch, baith fresh and salt, And sackis full of meal and eko of malt. After when they disposit were to dine, Withouten grace they wesh-" and went to meat. With all the coui'ses that cooks could define. Mutton and beef strikin in tailyeis great;"' And lordis fail- thus couth they counterfeit, 110 Except one thing, they drank the water clear Instead of wine, but yet they made good cheer. With blithe upcast and merie countenance, The eldest sister spehit at her guest. If that she by reason found difference Betwix that chamber and her sorry neat ? " Yea, dame," quod she, " how lang will this lest ?" ^^ " For evermore I wot, and longer too." " If it be so, ye are at ease," quod scho.-^ To eke their cheer a subcharge''' forth she brought, 120 A plate of groats and a dish full of meal, Thraf cakis-^ also I trow she sparit nought, Abundantlie about her for to deal ; And mane-^ full fine she brought in stead of geUl,'? And a white candle out of a coft'er stall,-" In stead of spice to gust^" theu' mouth withall. Thus made they men-y till they might na mair, And, Hail Yule, hail ! cryit upon hie ; Yet after joy ofttimes coniis care. And trouble after great prosperitie : 130 Thus as thay sat in all theh' jollitie. The Spenser came with keyis in liis hand, Openit the door, and them at dinner fand. They tarried uocht to wash as I suppose. But on to go who that might formest win. The bui-gess had a hole, and in she goes. Her sister had no hole to hide her in. To see that sehe Mouse, it was great sin,-*" 16 Pj-o tJiyne, from thence. " Wane, dweUing. See Note 5, page 3G. '8 Herberie, place of lodging. First English " here-berga," originally a station where the army rested on its march ; theu any place of rest and refreshment. German " herberge," shelter, inn ; Old French " herberge," **hauberge;" Modern French " auberge." The modern English form of the word is " harbour " '^ Spence, pantry or larder. Old French " despence," from Latin " dispeudere," to weigh out, dispense (as iu our word " dispeusai'y "). The speacer was the domestic who had charge of the provisions in it. -0 Wesche, washed. First English " wascan," past " w6sc." 2' Strikin in taUyeis great, stretched out in great slices (ready for cooking). Tailyeis (see Note 4, page 57). " Lest, last. 23 Scho, she. 2* Suheharge, second course, or charging of the table. French, " charger," to load. 25 Thraf cakis, harvest cakes. To thrave was to work at hai-vesting for pay by the thraive of twenty-four sheaves of corn. 2e Mane, almond-bread, of fine flour with mUk, egg, and almond. From French, *' pain d'amand." ^7 Geill, jelly. French " gelde." From Latin " gelare," to freeze. a Stall, stolen. ^ Gust, flavour. French •' gofit," Latin " g^iatus,'* taste. 30 Sin, matter for concern. First English *' airman/' to take thouglit over, care for. 80 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1450 So desolate and ^sill of ane gude reid,' For very di-ead she fell in swoon near deid. 140 But as God would, it fell a happy case, The Spenser had no leisure for to l)ide, Neither to seek nor search, to scare nor chase, But on he went, and left the door up -n-ide. The hold hm-gess his passing well has spied, Out of her hole she came, and CTvit on hie, " How fare ye,'- sister ; cry ' Peip,' where e'er ye be ?" This riu-al Mouse lay flatling on the ground, iVnd for the death she was full fail- dred-ind. For to her heart struck many wofull stound, 150 As in a fever she tremhlit foot and hand ; And when her sister in sic ply^ her fand. For very pity she began to greet,^ SjTie comfort her with wordis honey sweet. " MTiy lie ye thus ? rise up my sister dear : Come to your meat, this peril is overpast." The other answerit her with hea-^-y cheer, " I may not eat, so sair I am aghast ; I had liever these forty daj-is fast. With water caUl, and to g-naw beans or pease, 160 Than all your feast, in this ch-ead and disease." With fail' tretie^ yet she gart'' her uprise. And to the board they went and together sat, And scantlie had they drunken anis or t^^'ise, A\'hen in come Gib-Hunter oiu" jolie cat. And bade God speed : the burgess up with that And to the hole she went as fire from flint — Bawdrons'' the other by the back has hint.* Fra fute to fute he cast her to and fra, A^Tiilos up, whUes down, as cant' as any kid; 170 ^^^liles wald he lat her run under the stra, WTiilcs wald he wink, and play with her bukhid.'" Thus to the selie IMouse great pain he did. Till at the last, thi'ough fortune and gude hap. Betwixt a board and the wall she crap." And up in haste behind a paiTalling '^ She clam so high, that Gilbert might not get her, Syne by the cluke '•' there craftily can hing. Till he was gane her cheer was all the better; S\-ne down she lap'^ when there was nane to let her, ISO 1 Will of ane gude rcid, at loss for a bit of good advice. Trill (Ice- landic " willa," error) means astray, at a loss, uncertain how to go. 2 Uoicfareye? pronounced swiftly as two syllables. Lower down, in line 151, "fever" is contr.icted into a monosyllable '* fe'er," as " ever " into " e'er," and in line 156, " overpast " into " o'ei-past ;" line 163, " together " into "toge'er." See notes in which attention h.is been drawn to an effect of quick speech upon versification, which has frequently to be recognised in reading oiu' old poetiy. s Phj, plight. First English " pleo " and " plight," danger, difficulty. ♦ Greet, weep. See Note 13, page 36. s Tt-ctic, entreaty. * (zart, made; to "gar" (Icelandic " giii-a," "gera," or "geyra"), to make. ^ Baredrons^ hadrans, or bathrons, Scottish pet name for a eat. « Hint, seized. See Notes 2, page 13 ; 9, page 25. ' Car.t, lively. Old Swedish " ganta," to play. i» Bulhid. Perhaps the child's game known as " Buck, buck, how many horns do I hold up ? " Perhaps " Hide and Seek " or " Bo Peep." " Cyap, crept. First English " creopan ;" past, " creap." ^- ParnUing, perhaps partition, from "parpane" mid " parpall wall " (Old French " paiimigne ") ; or, more probably, hangings, from "paraille," apparel, paraments, hangings of a room. ^3 Cluke and cleuclc, claw, of which it may be a diminutive. '* Lap, leapt. And to the burges Mouse loud can she cry, " Farewell, sister, thy feast here I defy!" " Thy mangerie"' is mj-ngit" iiU vrith care, Thy guse •* is gude, thy gansell sour-as gaU : The subcharge " of thy service is but fare,^" So shall thou find hereafterward may fall. I thank yon courtine and yon perpall wall,^' Of my defence now fra ane cruel beast. Alniighty God keep me fra sic a feast ! 190 " Were I in to the Idth^- that I come fra, For Weill nor wo, should never come again." With that she took her leave and forth can ga, Wliiles thi'ough the corn, and whiles through the plain, AVhen she was forth and free, she was full fain,-^ And merilie merlrit'-'' unto the muii' : I can not tell how afterward she fure.-^ But I heard say she passit to licr den. As wai-m as wool, suppose it was not great, Full benely-^ stuffit, baith but and ben,^' Of beanis, and nuttis, pease, rye, and wheat ; WTien ever she list she had ancuch to eat, In quiet and ease, withouten any di'eid. But to her sister's*feast«na mair .she yeid.-' 200 Cat and Mouse. From the PcrcJt of St. Margaret's Church, York, MOEALITAS. Friends 3*0 may find, and-' ye will tak heid. In to this Fabill ane gude moraHtie, As fitchis*' mj-ngit ar with nobill seid, Swa intermynglit is adversitie 1^ Defij, renounce my faith in. 16 Mangei-ie, banqueting. 17 Myngit, mingled. 1^ Thy guse, &c. " A gude guse indeed, but she has an ill gansell," was a Scottish proverb. Dr. David Laing suggests that ganseU must mean sauce ; but in Jamiesou's Scottish Dictionary gan^ald and gariM'U is interpreted as a severe rebuke, in the sense of punishing the offender by " giving it liim back," the word being from First English " ageu," again, and " sellan." to give. A gansell, therefore, may mean what is given in return for anything, and " a good goose with an ill gansell" may answer to Franklin's whistle, that one can pay too dear for. The country mouse having, in return for the rich dinners, to give up a qtiiet mind, said to her sister, " Thy guse is gude, thy gansell sour as gall." 19 Suhcharge, second course. 21 But fair, without fare. There's ill fare at your dessert. 21 Perpall ir;aU, partition wall. See Note to line 176. 22 Kith, home. First English " cyth," home, that which is well known. See Note to line 30. » Fain, glad. 2* Merhit, trotted. To mcrk was to ride, from " marc," a horse. ^ Fitre, fared. 26 Bendy, bonnily. 27 But and ?)(■». without and within. 2* Yeid (First EngHsh "eode"), went. 23 ^nd, if. An, meaning " if," is written and throughout. 30 Fitchis, vetches. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 81 With eirthlie joy, swa that na estait is fro, And als ' troubill, and sum vexatioun ; And namelic - thay quhilk climniis up niaist hie. That ar nocht content -svith small possessioun. Blissit be sempill l\-f e w-ithoutin dreid ; BUssit be sober feist in quyetie : Quha hes aneuch, of na mair hcs he neid, Thocht it be l\-till in to quantitie ; Greit abundiincc, and blind prosperitie, Oft\Tncs makis ane evill^ conclusioun ; The sweitest h-fe thairfoir in tliis cuntrie. Is sickemess, with smaU possessioun. O -n-antoun man ! that usis for to feid Thy -n-ambe, and makis it ane god to be, Luik to thy self ! I wame thee wele, but dreid,* The Cat cunimis, and to the Mous hes ee,* Quhat vaillis^ than thy feist and rialtie. With dreidfuU hart and tribulacioun ? Thairfou- best thing in eird, I say, for mo. Is blythness in hart, -n-ith small possessioun. Thy a-n-in fyre, my freind, sa it be hot ane gleid,' It -n-annis weill, and is worth gold to thee ; And Solomon sa>-is, gif that tliow -w-iU reid, " Under the heWn it can nocht better be. Than ay be bh-ith, and leif in honestie :" Ciuhairfoir I may conclude be this ressoun. Of eirthly joy it beiris maist degi-ie, Blj-ithnes in hart, with small possessioun. 210 220 230 In the lifetime of Robert Henryi3on the art of printing first came into use in England, and among the pleasm-e books produced by one of the earliest printers, Wyukyn de Worde, was the story of Robin Hood in Viallad verse. Wpikyn de Worde, a native of Lorraine, had l)een assistant to William Caxton, the introducer of the art of pi-inting into England. After Caxton's death, in 1491, he carried on his work, and afterwards removed the business to Fleet Street, where it was continued until his own death in the year 1534. The first printing-press was not set up in Scotland before 1507, when James IV. granted a patent to Walter Chepman, a merchant, and Andrew Millar, a workman, for a press in Edin- burgh. " A Lj'tell Geste of Robin Hode " was prmted in London by Wpikpi de Worde, in thirty- two leaves of Ijlack letter, before the reappearance of it as one of the first pieces printed at Edinburgli. It came from the press of Chepman and Millar in L508. Here, therefore, the story of Robin Hood is to be read as it was actually read in rhjTiie by our forefathers at the end of the fifteenth and begimimg of the sixteenth centuries. As the hero of old popular tales and ballads, Robin Hood is supposed to have been formed liy the gather- ing of later traditions about the memory of Robert Fitzooth, reputed Earl of Huntingdon, who was born at Loxley Chase, near Sheffield in Yorkshire (by the river Loxley), perhaps at the close of the reign of * Als, also. 2 i^amdic, especially. ^ Evill, pronoimced e'ill. * But dreid, certainly. See note 10, page 74. 5 Hcs ec, has eye. ^ VailUs, avails. 7 Gieid, a glowing coal. Icelandic " gUta,'* to glitter ; " glietlia," to Bpnrkle or kindle ; " glseja," to glow. 11 Henry II., but more probably in the reign of Henry III., towards the year 1230. He was outlawed and lived in war against authority ; eating the king's deer, defjTiig the oppressive game laws, and all those of the king's officers who represented the hard hand of power that was used often oppressively against the poor. He scorned bishops and archbishops, who grew fat on the goods of the people. He was generous to the poor, and he was religious in the poor man's fashion, by devotion to the Virgin ; for in her the mistaught and oppressed of the Middle Ages — forced to fear power in this world and in the next — found the lost spirit of love within an image of mild, womanly tenderness ; and to her, there- fore, they prayed for shelter from the wrath of God and man. Robin Hood personified to thousands in England the spirit of liberty m anus against the cruel forest laws, against all tjTannies of the strong in church and state, agamst all luxury fed on the spoils of labour. From the old days when Hereward the Saxon held the woods in defiance of the Norman kings, there had been stories of bold outlaws who through songs and tales of the country side became heroes to the labourmg men with more freedom in their souls than in their lives. They were heroes full of wild energy, with roughness of the times in much of the adventiu'e set do-mi to them; but they represented not an aspiration only, for there was also the vigour of a shrewd practical humour that would in good time refine and raise, and realise all that was best in the ideal of the men who ^vrote such ballads as that of Robin Hood. EoBUJ Hood's Cap and paet of his Chair." {From Thoroton's History of Nottinijhamshire.) Tlie Robin Hood story here given was firet printed in or about the year 1489. There are traces in the rhjnne of earlier pronunciation, as of the f, once part of the word head {heqfod) in lines 1216, 1218, 8 The objects are here figured as they used to be shown at a house by St. Ann's Well (called also Robin Hood's Weill, two miles north' east of Nottingham. 82 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. fA.n. 14,50. where "head" rhymes with "left," and in lines 1156, 1158. Note also the nasal sound of a final 7ul which rhymes with ng. The reader will seldom miss the measure of the verse if allowance be made (a) for the frequent addition of a trivial monosyllable to tJie beghming of a line, as in lines 3, 7, 13, 15, 28, 35, ike. : (h) for the old elisions in quick speech, as in line 3, "(I) shall you | t^ll 'f a | good yeo|man|;" line 7, "(So) ciii-t'se an | outlaw's | h6 was | 6ne|j" line 19, "Master, T | ye would | dine be | time |;" or lines 32 and 33, "T'one i'th' | worshij) | of the | Fa'r II TVr of | the H6|ly Gli6st|:" and (c) for the occasional development of syllables, by dwelling, say, upon an ?• that can be rolled, or on a ;// that can be emphatically broadened, as iji line 77, "These ye6|men aU|thr-ee|," or line 252, " Nd-y | b^ him I that me | ma.de|," or the pronouncing of "more" (lines 159, 238) and "four" (lines 266, 270) as dissyllables. The Huirr is dp. Frmn Bas-reliefs under Seats of the CTioir in Ely Cathedral. {Carter.) A LYTELL GESTE^ OF ROBYN HOOD. ' Lithe and listen,- gentlemen, That he of freehorn blood ; I shall you tell of a good yeom^. His name was Rohin Hood. Kohin was a proud outlaw, Wliiles Jie walked on ground, So cui-teyse an outlawe as ho was one Was never none yfound. Robin stood in Baraysdale,^ And leaned him to a tree, 10 * Gcsfc, record of " gesta," things done. Prom this word " geste," meaning- a record of things done, told for amusement, came probahly the use of " jest," for anytliing said or done to amuse. 2 Lithe and listen are syuouymous. Lithe (Icelandic "hlytha"), to hearken. 3 Barnysdale. The district of Bamsdale, in Yorkshire, a few miles north of Doncaster, between that town and Pontefract, was once covered with forest, and celebrated as one of the chief haunts of Robin Hood. John of Pordun, in Ids " Scoti-chronicon," written in the reign of Edward III., says that Robin Hood was attending mass: in Bamsdale when he heard that his enemies were upon him, that he would not defend himself until the mass was done, then triumphed easily, and ever after held masses in greater veneration. And hy him stood little John,"* A good yeoman was he ; And also did good Scathelock,* And Much the miller s son ; There was no inch of his body, But it was worth a groom.^ Then bespake him Little John All unto Robin Hood, " Master, if ye would dine betime, It would do you much good,'* Then bespake good Robin, " To dine I have no lust, Till I have some bold baron, Or some imketh' gest, That may jjay for the best ; Or some knight or some squyere That dwelleth here by west." A good manner then had Robin In land where that he were, Every day ere'* he would dine Three masses would he hear : The one in the worship of the Father, The other of the Holy Ghost, The thud was of oui' dear Lady, That he loved of all other most. 20 30 Fordim places the date of Robin Hood's adventures after the battle of Evesham (a.d. 1265). He says that "then, from among the dis- possessed and the banished, arose that most famous cut-throat Rohin Hood, with Little John, and their accomplices, whom the foolish multitude are so exti'avagantly fond of celebrating in tragedy and comedy, and the ballails concerning whom, sung by the jesters and minstrels, delight them beyond all others." Pordun's contiuuei, Bower, writes, under the year 1266, of obstinate hostilities between the dispossessed barons and the royalists, adding that " Robert Hood now hved as an outlaw among the woodland copses and thickets.** In Dr. Stukeley's *' Palseographia Britannica'' there is a pedigree of Robin Hood to this effect :^ Gilbert de Gaunt, Earl of Lincoln, and his wife, Avis, had two daughters, Alice and Maud. Alice man-ied an Eaii of Huntingdon ; Maud maiTied Ralph * Pitzooth, a Norman Lord of Kyme. Ahce died, childless, in 1184. John, Earl of Huntingdon by another line, died, childless, in li!37. Maud had by her husband, Ralph Pitzooth, a son, Walter, who was brought up by Robert, Earl of Oxford, as his son. That Walter married a daughter of Pnyn Beauchamp and Lady Roisia de Vere. The hero of popular legend was their son Robert, grandson of Ralph, whose name of Pitzooth was corrupted by the people into Hood, who, on the strength of tliis pedigree, claimed the earldom of Huutingdou, and who died towards the close of the century. This pedigree agrees with Pordun's statement, that Robin Hood was active and well known at the date of the battle of Evesham ; but if we t-ake these dates, he must have been bom, not in the reign of Henry II., but in the reign of Henry III., whom he out hved. * Little John. Tradition says that his smniame was Nailor. ^ Scathelock is also called in the ballads "Scadlock" and "Scarlet." 6 GrTOom, man. Pirst English "guma;" Old High German " gomo ;" allied to Latin *' homo." 7 Unhcth, First English "imcuth" (uncouth), unknown. Unlicth gest, adveutiire of some kind yet unknown. Since surprise is caused by the unexpected, "uncouth" (Scottish *'iuico"J can also mean surprising, aud take other secondary meanings, as "very," or to an unknown extent. One to whom the appointed ways of doing anything are unknown may show himself uncouthj and that is the sense of the word as now commonly used in England. ^ Ere, or. I change the old word "or" (First EngHsh "^'r") into "ere" throughout, to avoid confusion with the "or" (First English " athor," &c.), which occurs three times in the two stanzas preceding this. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 83 Roliin loved our dear Lady, Fur dout ' of deadly sin ; Would he never do company harm That any -woman was in. " Master," then said Little John, " An- we om' board shall spread, Tell us whither we shall gon. And what life we shall lead ; Where we shall take, where we shall leave, AATierc we shall bide behind, Where we shall rob, where wo shall reve,' ■VATiere we shall beat and bind." " Thereof no force," ■* then said Eohin, "We shall do well enow ; But look ye do no housbonde' harm That tilleth with his plow ; No more ye shall no good yeoman, That walk'th by green wood shaw,^ Ne no knight, ne no squycr. That would be a good felaw.' These bishops, and these archbishops, Ye shall them beat and bind; The high sheriff of Nottingham, Him hold in your* mind." " This word shall bo holde," said Little John, " And this lesson shall we lore ; ' It is ferrc days,'" God send us a geste, That we were at o\ir dinere ! " 40 50 60 " Take thy good bow in thy hand,' " Let Much wende with thee. And so shall William Scathclock, And no man abide -n-ith me : And walk up to the Sayles," said Robin, 1 For dout, do out, putting out, or eitinguisliing. So in " Hamlet," act iv. sc. 7, Sliafeespeare made Laertes say — " I have a speeeli of fire that fain would blaze, But that this folly douts it." And in " Henry V.," act iv. sc. 2, where the old editions have "doubt," probably this was the word written : *' Consiahle. Hark, how our steeds for present service neigh. Dauphin. Mount them, and make incision in their hides, That their hot blood may spin in English eyes, And dou^ them with superfluous courage. Ha ! " * An, and in the original, from which the form "an," in the sense of " if," was probably derived. Home Tooke traced it from the im- perative of the verb " uunan," to grant. ■^ Reve, from Fii-st English " reafian," seize, rob, spoil. "Rob" and "reave" are sj-nonynious, like "lithe" and "listen." * No force, no importance, no matter. 5 Housbonde, from Fii-st Enghsh "hus," a house, and "bnend," one inhabiting and cultivating the soil. The husband me.ant by Robin Hood is the occupier of a house who tills the ground about it. From this duty of the man came the name "husband," as "wife," from the duty of the misti'css of the house to weave into cloth the yam spim for her by her maidens, who were thence called spinsters. ^ Sliaw, of same root with First English " sceado," shadow, means the shade under the trees, and thence commonly the wood itself. ' Felai« (the First English spelling of "fellow," from "fyligean," to follow), follower or comi-ade. ^ Pronounced j/oi(-r. ^ Lcve, learn. '" It is fevre days, the day is far gone; God send us an adventure, so that we might dine. " ('t is) fdrre | days, God | stand's a | gi^ste | That w^ 1 were't our [ dint^re. | Take thy [ goi'id bow'n [ th'hand, said ] Rob'n. 1 " " In his edition of the Robin Hood Ballads, Joseph Ritson says : — " The Sayles appears to be some place in the neighbourhood of Barns- dale, but no mention of it has elsewhere occurred; though, it is believed, there is a field so called not f.ar from Doncaster." Sail, as suffix to a local name, indicated the place where a stone house (First And so to Watling-street,'- And wait after some un"kcth gest, 70 Up-chanco yo mowe them meet. Be he earl or any baron, Abbot or any knight. Bring him to lodge to me. His dinner shall be dight." " They went imto the Sayles, These yeomen all three,''' They looked east, they looked west, They mightc no man see. But as they looked '* in Barnisdale, 80 By a dome '^ street. Then came there a knight riding. Full soon they gan him meet. All dreary was his semblaunce, And Uttle was his pride. His one foot in the stirrup stood, That other waved beside. His hood hanging over his " eyen two. He rode in simple array ; A sorrier man than he was one 90 Kode never in simimer's day. Little John was fuU curtcyse, And set him'^ on his knee ; " Welcome be ye, gentle knight, Welcome are you to me. Welcome be thou to green wood, Hende '^ knight and free ; My master hath abiden-" you fasting, Sir, aU these houres thiee." " Who is your master ?" said the knight. 100 John said, " Robin Hood." " He is a good yeoman," said the knight, " Of him I have heard much good. I grant," he said, " with you to wend, My brethren all iu-fere ; -' My pm'pose was to have dined to-day At Blj-th-'^ or Doncastere." Forth then went this gentle knight, With a careful cheer, The tears out of his eyen ran, 1 1 And fell down by his lere.-^ English "sal ") had been built, and that close to Bamsdale district there are several places with that suffix. On one side of Bamsdale is Campsall, with a house known as Camps Mount, and on the other side are North and South Elmsall or Emsall. " The Sayles " (pronounced f^a-ii-les) may have been cleared high ground on which some houses had been built, and from which there was free view over the forest. ^ Watting Street. Two miles west of Campsall the old North road runs through Bamsdale along the line of the Roman Ermyn or Watling Street. There is a piece of the old road now to be seeu close by the tumjiike known as Bamsdale bar. '3 Ditjht, prepared, from First English " dihtan," to set in order. " Prouoimced t7i-r-pe. '^ " But 's they looked." 16 Deime (First Enghsh " dyme"), liidden, secret. '^ Lines rl to 91. Over his runs into one syllable, o'er*.^; the e in .sf'mp^p is lost before the succeeding vowel ; the ier in sorrier counts as one syllable, like %er in lawyer; never is pronounced ne'er. '^ Him, himself. '3 Hende, handy, thence courteous ; without the awkwardness of miud and habit that is foimd in the ill-trained. 2'^ Ahiden, waited for. " (My) mast'r hath | 'biden I you fast ] ing." Line 100, " who's ;" 103, " I've ;" 106, " to 've," &c. 21 Jri-/ere, together. — Bhjth, on the borders of Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, six miles north-west of East Retford. 23 here (First English "hleor"), the cheek. 84 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. li..u. 1450 They brought Imu iintu the lodge door,' \\'Tion Kobin gan him see, Full curteysly did off his hood, And set him on his knee. " Welcome, sii- knight," then said Eohin, " Welcome thou art to me ; I have abiden you fasting, sir, All these houres'^ three." Then answered the gentle knight, 120 With words fair and free, "God thee save, good Robin, And all thy fair meyne." ^ They washed together and wiped both, And set to their dinere ; Bread and wine they had enough, And numblcs'' of the deer ; Swans and pheasants they had full good, And fowls of the rivere ; There failed never" so little a bird, 130 That ever was bred on brere. ■" Do gladly,* sir knight," said Eobin. " Gramercy,'' sir," said he, " Such a dinner had I not Of all these weekes three ; If I come again, Eobin, Here by this countre, As good a dinner I shall thee make, As thou hast made to me." " Gramercy, knight," s.aid Eobin, 140 " My dinner when I have ; I was never so greedy, by dere-worthy^ God, My dinner for to crave. But pay ere ye wend," said Eobin, " Me thinketh it is good right ; It was never the manner, by dere-worthy God, A yeoman to jiay for a knight." " I have nought in my coffers," . said the knight, " That I may proffer for shame." " Little John, go look," said Eobin, 150 " Ne let not' for no blame. Tell me truth," then said Eobin, " So God have part of thee." " I have no more but ten shillings," said the knight,'" " So God have part of me I " 1 lodge door. The word lodge is allied to the German " laub," foliage, and originally meant a shelter formed of the branches, twigs, and leaves of trees. It is the apt name, therefore, for Eobin Hood's bower. 2 Hourcs, like " count-r-e " in line 137, counts as three syllables, "hou.r-^s." Line 118, " I've abid'n ; " 124, " toge'r;" 128, " they'd." 3 Meijm, company of followers. See Note 2, page 60. ♦ HuinUes, liver, kidneys, &c. ; Fi-euch •' nombles." The word was variously wi-itten uomiics, numbhs, and very commonly timbles or humbles. Old cookery books gave receipts for " umble pie," whence came the sajong that a man is made *' to eat humble pie "~to content himself with inferior meat while another may dine from the hamieh. The uiiiWes, with the sldn, head, chine and shoulders, used to be the keeper's perquisites. ' Pronounce timer and cuer (lines 130 .and 131) ne'er and e'er. ^ Bo gladhj, enjoy yourself. ■ Gramcrci/ (French " grand merci "), many thanks. « Dcre-uorthii (First Enghsh " deorwurthe "), precious. ' Let 9iot, refrain not ; be not hindered. "' " (I've) no more | but ten | shQl'n's, said | th' knight. | " "If thou have no more," said Eobin," " I will not one penny ; And if thou have need of any more. More shall I lend thee. Go now forth. Little John, 100 The truth tell thou me. If there be no more but ten shillings. No penny of that I see." Little John spread down his mantle Fidl fair upon the ground, And there he found in the knight's coffer '- But even " half a pound. Little John let it lie full stiU, And went to his master full low. " What tidingc, Jolm ? " said Eobin. 170 " Sii', the knight is true enow." " FiU of the best -n-ine," said Eobin, " The knight shall begin ; Much wonder''' thinketh me Thy clothing is so thin. Tell me one word," said Robin, "And counsel shall it be ; I trow thou were made a knight of force, Or else of yeomanry ; Or else thou hast been a soiTvTiousband 180 And lived in stroke and strife ; An okerer, or lechoiu',"'* said Eobin " With -n-Tong hast thou led thy Hfe." " I am none of them," said the knight, " By [him] that made me ; An himdi-ed winter here before. Mine aunsetters "* kniglits have be. But oft it hath befal, Eobin, A man hath be disgrate ; But God that sitteth'' in heaven above 190 May amend his state. AVithin two or'^ three year, Eobin," he said, " My neighbours well it kend,'^ " " I'f thou've I no more | said Eo 1 bin. | " Line 158, " (And) if thon've | ne€d of | dny | m6re. | " In line 159 " more " is pronounced as two syllables ; so also in line 238. In line 160 (also in lines 264, 268) pronounce " fo-r-th " as a dissyllable. In line 161 the missing syllable is got from the rolled r in dwelling upon the word *' tr.u-th," as in line 217, where "thou" would hardly bear to be prolon.ged, as it could, no doubt, be in this contest. Line 162, " (If) there be 1 nd more | but ten 1 shill'n's. | " ^~ " (And) thiVe he 1 foun' 'n t'je [ knight's cof | fer." 13 Even, just. 1* Wonder, in three syllables, by sounding final r. See Note 15, page 61. '^ Olicrer, usurer, from First English " eacan," to eke or increase, " or elles a lechour " in the original ; but this seems to be a tran- scriber's accidental repetition of " or else " from the preceding lines. 1^ Aunsetters, ancestors, pronounced in two syllables, annsc-ters. ^~ Sitteth, pronounced as a monosyllable, sitt'tk. In the nest line May seems to have had a broad pronunciation that gave to the final y the force of a second syllable ma-y in the measin-e. In other words there is at times the same effect of a broadly soimded y, as in line 68, " Sayles," and line 271, " By e | yghtt? [ ne score [ ." In line 209 sqiiycr counts as three syllables, squ-i-cr. IS irithiH tieo or counts as two syllables only in this metre, the th in within, as was common in such words as n-hether, uhither, hithi'r, either, r.either, father, &c. (see Dr. Abbott's " Shakesi>earian Gram- mar," § 466) , being slipped over in pronunciation, and the o at the end of two running into the o of or. The word or is itself an example of the slipping over of th, being a contraction from other. '^ In the original " know." TO A.D. :5oa] SHORTER POEMS. 85 Four hundred pound of good money Full well then might I spend. Now liave I no good," said the laiight, " But m)- children and my wife ; God hath shapen such an end, Till [he] it may amend." " In what manner," said Robin, " Hast thou lore' thy richesse ?" " For my great foUy," he said, "And for my kindenesse. I had a son, for sooth, Robin, Tliat should have been my heii, AVhon he was twenty winter- old. In field would Joust full fair ; He slew a knight of Lancashire, And a squyer bold ; For to save him in his right My goods beth' set and sold ; My lands beth set to wed,* Robin, Until a certain day, To a rich abbot hero beside. Of Saint Marv ubbav." 200 210 Ruins of St. Makys Abbey, York. As theij appeared in the tjenr 1736. (From a view given in Drafce's " Ehoracum.") ' ^\^lat is the summe ? " said Robin, " Truth then tell thou me." ' Sir," ho said, " four hundred pound, The abbot told it to me." ' Now, an thou lose thy land," said Robin, 220 "AATiat shall fall of thee ? " 1 Lore^ lost. The r is equivalent to the s in lose. First English " leoran " and " leosan." The past tense (I lost) ran thus, with both letters ; " ic l»^as, thu lure, he leas ; we luron." 2 Twenty uinter, twenty years. In First English years were reckoned by winters, and days by nights, as is still to be found in the words se'rtnight and /ortnigJit, which stand respectively for sevcnnifjht and/our(ccn ni^ht, ' Beth, are; the plural (First EngUsh "beoth") of the obsolete indicative present of " hedn." * Wed, pledL:e. First English "weddian," tc make a contract, whence marriage is a wedding or pledging. " HastOy I -n-ill mo busk,"* said the knight, "Over the salto sea, And see where Christ was quick and dead, On the mount of Calvary. Fare well, friend, and have good day, It may no better be" Tears fell out of his eyen two, He would have gone his way — " Farewell, friends, and have good day, 230 I ne have more to pay." " Where be thy friends ? " said Robin. " Sii', never* one -n-iU me know ; While I was rich enow at home Great boast lien would they blow, And now they run away from me. As beastes on a row ; They take no more heed of me Than they me never saw." For ruthc then wept Little John, 24? Scathelocke and JIuch also. " Fill of the best wine," said Robin, " For here is a simple cheer. Hast thou any fi-ieuds," said Robin, " Thy borowes' that will be ? " " I have none," then said the knight, " But [him] that died on a tree." " Do way thy japes ! " said Robin, " Thereof will I right none ; Weenest thou I will have' God to borowe f 250 Peter, Paul or John ? Nay,' by him that me made. And shope both sun and moon. Find a better borowe," said Robin, " Or money gettest thou none." " I have none other," said the knight, " The sooth for to say, But if it be our dear Lady,'" She failed me ne'er ere this day." " By dere-worthy God," said Robin, 260 " To seek aU England thorowe. Yet found I never to my pay, A much better borowe. Come now forth. Little John, And go to my treasury, And bring me foiir hundi-cd pound, And loolc that it wcU told be." Forth then went Little John, And Scathelock went before. He told out foiii- hundred poimd, 270 By eighteene score." ■ " Is this well told ? " said Little Much. John said, " What grieveth thee ? It is abns to help a gentle knight That is fall in ijovcrty. s Bnslc, dii-ect my coiu^e ; allied to the German " putzen." ^ Never, pronounced vc'ei-. ' Boroires, surety. First Eu'^Iish ** borh," plural *' borgas." So in line 254. ^ " Ween'st thou I'll have." 3 Naij, pronounced here with broad emphasis, becomes a dissy lable. See Note 17, page 84. 10 Observe in this line and in line 254 the strength of the hold taken on the i:ieople by the worship of the Virgin Miu'y. 1' By eighteen score to the hundred. 86 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Jlustcr," then said Little Joliii, '■ His clotliiag is full thin, Yc must give the knight a liveray,' To wTap his body therein.^ For yo have scarlet and green, master, 280 And many a rich array, There is no merchant in merry England >So rich, I dare well say." " Take liim thi'eo yards of every colour, And look that well metc^ it be." Little John took none other measure But his how tree. And of every handfull that he mcf He leapt oucr foots tlrree. " WTiat devilkj-ns^ draper," said Little Much, 290 " Thinkest thou to he ?" Scathelock stood full still and lough, And said, " By God aUmight, John may give Mm the better measure, [For] it cost him hut light." " Master," said Little John, All unto Robin Hood, " Ye must give that knight an horse, To lead home aU tliis good." " Take him a gray courser," said Kobin, 300 " And a saddle new ; Ho is our Lady's messengere, God lend^ that he be true I" " And a good palfrey," said Little Much, " To maintain him in his right." " And a pair of hoots," said Scathelock, " For he is a gentle knight." "'What shalt thou give him. Little John?" said Robin. " Sir, a paire of gilt spiu's clenc. To pray for all this company : 310 God bringe him out of tene ! " ' " When shall my day be," said the knight, " Sir, an yoiu' ^ntU be ? " '■ This day twelve month," said Robin, " Under this green wood tree. It were great shame," said Robin, "A knight alone to ride. Without squyer, yeoman or page. To walkc by his side. I shall thee lend Little Johan my man, 320 For he shall bo thy knave ; ^ In a yeoman's stead he may thee .stand. If thou gTeat need have." ^ Livevoij. A livery is a suit of clothes (Old French "livree") delivered by a master to his followers. 2 " To wrap's 1 body' | therein." * Well mete, well measured. * Ke met, lie measured. First English " metau," past " m£et." 5 VevilTcyns, of the devil's kind ; pronounced dc'ilkiiis. 6 Lend, give. See Note 5, pajje 37. ' Tmc, sorrow. First English "teoua," reproach, wi-on^, &c. ; from " tynan " .and " teouan," to incense, vex. 8 Knave (First English " cnapa," Grerman •' kuahe"), boy. The Knight Mounted. From the To-mhof Aymer de Valence, murdered in 1323. {Gough.) THE SECONDE FYTTE.' Now is the knight went on his way, This game he thought full good, ■When he looked on Baruisdale, He blessed Robin Hood ; And when he thought on Barnisdale, On Scathelock, Much, and John, He blessed them for the best company 330 That ever he in come. Then spake that gentle knight. To Little John gan he say, " To-morrow I must to York to'mi. To Saint Mary abbay ; And to the abbot of that place Four hundred pound I must pay . And but 1" I be there upon this night My land is lost for aye." Ancient Seal of St. Mart's Abbey. Ai^pcnded to a Deed of 1478. {From BraWs " Ehorac\im.") « Fijtte (First English " fitt"), a song. *" And but, unless. TO A.D. 1508.J SHORTER POEMS. 87 The abbot said to his convent, 340 There he stood on gxoimd, " This day twelve month came tliere a knight And borrowed four hundred pound Upon all his land free, But he come tliis Uke day ' Disherited shall he be." " It is full early," said the prior," " The day is not yet far gone, I had liever to pay an hundi'ed pound, And lay it down anone. 350 The knight is far beyond the sea, In England is his right. And suffereth hunger and cold And many a sorry night : It were great pity," said the prior, " So to have his lond ; An ye be so light of your conscience, Ye do to him much wrong." " Thovi art ever in my beard," said the abbot, " By God and Saint KiehCu-d ! " 360 With that came in a fat-headed monk. The high cellarer ; " He is dead or hanged," said the monk, " By [him] that bought me dear. And we shall have to spend in tliis place Foul' hundred pound by year." The abbot and the high cellarer, Sterte forth full bold. The high justice of Englond^ The abbot there did hold ; 370 The high justice and many mo Had take into their bond. Wholly all the knightcs debt. To put that knight to wrong. They deemed the knight wonder sore. The abbot and his incynQ : " But he come this ilke day Disherited shall he be." " He win not come yet," said the justice, " I dare well undertake." 380 But in soiTowe time for them all The knight came to the giite. Then bespake that gentle knight Unto his meyne, " Now put on your simple weeds* That ye brought from the sea." And came to the gates anone, The porter was ready himself. And welcomed them every one. " AVclcorae, sir knyght," said the porter, 390 " Jly lord to meat^ is he, And so is many a gentle man, For the love of thee." The porter swore a fuU great oath, " By [him] that made me, 1 Uke day {"ilk," from First English " selc," each), every lawful day on which business could be done, as distinguished from days set Apart for worship. 2 xhe prior was second in authority. ^ Eng-l-ondf as three syllables. * Weeds (First EngUsh " wffi'd "), clothes. 6 To meat, at meat, at dinner. 11 mo bo the best corcsed'" horse That ever yet saw I me. Load them into the stable," he said, " That eased miglit they be." " They shall not come therein," said the knight, 400 " By [liim] that died on a tree." Lordi's were to moat iset In that abbotcs hall. The knight went forth and kneeled down. And salved'' thenr great and small. " Do gladly, sir .abb6t," said the knight, " 1 am come to hold my day." The first ^ word the abbot spake, " Hast thou brought my pay i " " Not one penny," said the knight, 410 " By [him] that makcd me." " Thou art a slu-cwd' debtor 1 " said the abbot ; " Sir justice, drink to me ! What dost thou here," said the abbot, " But'" thou hadst brought thy pay ? " " Fere God," then said the knight, " To pray of a longer day." " Thy day is broke," said the justice, " Land gettest thou none." " Now, good sir justice, be my friend, 420 And fend me of my fone." " " I am hold with the abbot," said the justice, " Both with cloth and fee." " Now, good sir sheriff, be my friend." " Nay, fore God," said he. " Now, good sir abbot, be my friend. For thy ciu-teyse. And hold my landes in thy hand Till I have made thee gree ; '- And 1 will 1)0 thj' true servCmt, 430 And truly serve thee. Till yo have foiii- hvmdred pound Of money good and free." The abbot sware a fidl great oath, " By [him] that died on a tree. Get the land where thou may, For thou gettest none of me." " By dero-worthy God," then said the knight, " That all this world wrought. But I have my land again 440 FuH dear it shall be bought ; God, that was of a maiden home, Leno'^ us well to speed ! For it is good to assay a friend Ere that a man have need." 8 Corcsed f French " cuirasst? "), harnessed. " Salved, saluted (French "saluer"); said "Salve," hail. ^ Fi-r-st, as two syllables. So also wo-r-d. In the jireceding and follomng lines "day" and "pay" are pronounced broadly, as dis- syllables : " I'm come | f hold my | da-y. | " 3 .S?ir( ltd, cuuuin^ in good or bad sense; at first usually a bad sense. See Note 11, page 33. 1" But, unless. •* Fend me ofmiifoiw, defend me from my foes. 12 Gree ('French "grc^ "), satisfaction. 13 Lene (First English), give, grjuit. 88 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Tlie abbot loatUy on him H'an look And villainously gan call ; " Out," he said, " thou false knight ! Speed thee out of my hall ! " " Thou Hcst," then said the gentle knight, "Abbot in thy hall; False knight was I never, By [him] that made us all." Tp then stood that gentle Icnight, To the abbot said he, " To sufier a knight to kneel so long, Thou eanst ' no courtesy . In joustcs and in tom-nement Full far then have I be, And put myself as far in press As any that ever I see." " What will ye give more ? " said the justice, '■And the knight shall make a release; And elles dare I safely swear Ye hold never your land in peace." " An hundred pound," said the abbot. The justice said, " Give him two." • " Nay, by God," said the knight, " Yet get ye it not so : Though ye woidd give a thousand more, Yet were thou never the nere ; - Shall there never be mine heir. Abbot, justice, ne frere." 400 460 470 The Abbot. From a Brass at St. Albans. {Carter.) He stert him to a board anon, To a table round. And there he shook out of a bag Even' foiir hundi-ed pound. 1 Canst, knowest. ^ Ncre, uearer. First English " neali," near ; " nean-e/' nearer. 3 Even, just. Pronounced c'cn. So above, line 465 should be reid, " T'hold ne'er your limd in peace." The reader is only now and tlien reminded of tbese frequent contractions. Counting the Cotn, From a Windov: Painting of an Old Mansion in Loit:cy Street, Islingion, date about 1471. (Carter.) "Have here thy gold, sir abbot," said the Icnight, " Wliich that thou lentest me ; Haddest thou been curteys at my coming, 480 Rewarded'' shouldst thou have* be." The abbot sat still, and ate no more. For all his royal cheer. He cast his hood on his shoulder. And fast began to stare. " Take me my gold again," said the abbot, " Sii' justice, tliat I took thee." " Not a penny," said the justice, " By [him] that died on a tree." " Sir abbot, and ye men of la'sv, 490 Now have I held my day, Now shall I have my land again, For aught that you can say." The Imight stert out of the door. Away was all his care. And on he put liis good clothing. The other he left there. He went him forth full merry singing. As men have told in tale, His lady met him at the gate, 500 At home in Uterysdale. " Welc6mc, my lord," said his lady : " Sii', lost is all yom- good h " " Be merry, dame," said the knight, "And pray for Robin Hood, That ever his soule be in bliss. He help me out of my tene ; Ne had not be his Idndcnesse, * Reu-arded lias the final ed lost iu tbe final d of tlie word itself. Very commonly in old Englisli the suffix representing tbe past tense was drawn into a d or t closing tbe word to wliich it was or should have been attached. See line 346. 5 Should'st thou've. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 89 The ubbot and I accorded ben, 510 He is served of his jwiy, The good yeoman lent it me, As I came by the way." Tliis knight then dwelled fail' at homo. The sooth for to s;iy, Till ho hud got foiu' hundi'od pound, All ready for to jjay. He purveyed liim un himdi'ed bows, The stringcs well ydight. All hundred sheaf of arrows good, 520 The heads burnished full bright, And every arrow an elle long, AVith peacock well ydight, Inoeked ' all ^ith white silver. It was a seemly sight. He pi'irvcyed him an hundred men, ^^'ell hai-neyscd in that stead, And himself in that same set, And clothed in white and red. He bare a Laimsgay* in his hand, 5o0 And a man led his male,'' And ridden with a light song, Unto Barnisdale. As ho went at a bridge there was a wi-csteling, And there tan'ied was he, And there was all the best yeomen Of all the west countree. A full fail- game there was upset, A white bull up ipight ; A gi-oat coiu-ser with saddle and bridle, 540 With gold bm-nished full bright ; A pair of gloves, a red gold ring, A pipe of wine, in good fay : "* WTiat man beareth liuu best, i-wis,* The pi-ize shall bear away. There was a yeoman in that place. And best wortliy was ho, And for he was fuiTO and fremd bestad,' I-slain he should have be. The knight had ruth of this yeomin, 550 In place where that he stood, He said that yeoman shoiUd have no harm, For love of Robin Hood. The knight pressed into the place. An hundi-ed followed him free, With bowes bent, and an'ows sharp. For to shend' that company. They shoiddered all, and made liim room. To wete ^ what he would say, He took the yeoman by the hand, 560 And gave him all the play ; 1 Inoeked, notched, mounted with silver in the notches. 2 Launsgo]!, or lancegay, a form of spear that was prohibited in Eiclmrd 11. 's time, but still used iu the time of Elizabeth. 3 Male ( French " maille " ) . ba^ or tnmk to carry baggage. * Fay (French " foi "I, faith. 5 I-n-is (First English " gewis "), certainly. ^ Feri'e and fremd hcsiad, one from afar and among stiunErers. I have ventured to read " fremd " for " freud." Fvem-stcd is still used in Scotland for one who is placed away fi-om friends and dependent upon strangers : in that sense the yeoman wnsfn'md tr.sfad. Strangers also are still fi-rm'd persons iu the dialect of the North of England ; and syhhe or fi-eiumede wiis an old antithesis for " kindred or no kindred." 7 Shend (First English " scendau "), to confound, shame. Grerman "schanden." ^ Wetc (First English "witan "), know. 12 He ga\'e him five mark for his wine, There it lay on the mould, And bade it should be sot abroach, Drinke who so would. Thus long tarried tliis gentle knight, Till that play was done, So long abode Kobin fasting, Thi-ee hours after the none.' THE THVEDE FYTTE. Lithe and listen, gentle men, 570 All that now be here, Of Little John,'" that was the laiight's man. Good mirth ye shall hear. It was upon a merry day, That young men would go shete," Little John fot '• his bow anon. And said ho would them meet. Thi-ec times Little John .shot about. And alway cleft the wand, The proud sheriff of Nottingham 580 By the marks gan stand. The sheriff swore a fuU great oath, " By him that died on a tree, Tliis man is the best archer That ever yet saw I me. Say me now, wight '^ young man, \ATiat is now thy name Y In what country were thou bom,' And where is thy wonning''' wan ?" " In Holdemesse I was bore, 590 I-wis all of my dame. Men call me Rejmold Greenleaf, AVTian I am at hame." " Say me, Re^^^old Greenleaf, Wilt thou dwell with me ? And every j-car I will thee give Twenty mark to thy fee." " I have a master," said Little John, "A eurteys knight is he. May ye get leave of him, 600 The better may it be." The sheriff gat Little John Twelve months of the knight. Therefore he gave him right anon A good horse and a T\'ight. Now is Little John the sheiifi's man, He give us well to speed, But alway thought Little John To quite him well his meed.'* " Now so God me help," said Little John, 610 " And by my true Icwtc,'* I shall be the worst servant to him That ever yet had he 1 " It befell upon a Wednesday, The shei-ifi a-hunting was gone. And Little John lay in his bed, And was forgot at home. ^ None, dinner-time. See Note 9, page 19. 1" Little John, often pronounced Li'le John. " SJiete, shoot. '2 Fet, fetched. " Wight, active, vigorous. See Note 1, p. 24. '* Wonnyn^, dwelling; from First English " wimian," to dwell. ''• Qin'te him his meed, pay him his deserts. '^ f/cicft', loyalty. 90 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Therefore ho was fasting Till it was past the none. " Good sir Steward, I pray tliee, 620 Give mc to dine," said Little John ; " It is too long for Grccnlcaf, Fasting- so long to he ; Therefore I pray thee, steward, My dinner give thou me ! " " Shalt thou never cat ne diink," s;\id the steward, " Till mv lord he eome to to-n-n." " I make mine avow," said Little John, " I had liever to crack thy crown ! " The hutler was full imcm-teys, 630 There he stood on floor. He stei-t to the huttcry, And shut fast the door, little John gave the butler such a His back ycdc' nigh in two. Though he lived an hundred winter. The worse he shouldc go. He spiu-ned the door with his foot, It went up well and fine, And there he made a large livcray 640 Both of ale and wine. " Sith ye ■n'ill not dine," said Little John, " I shall give you to drink. And though ye Hve an hundi-ed winter. On Little John ye shall think I " Little John ate, and Little John diauk. The while that he would. The sheriff had in his kitchen a cook, A stout man and a hold. " I make mine avow to God," said the cook, 6.50 " Thou art a shi'cwd hind. In an household to dwell. For to ask thus to dine." And there he lent Little John, Good strokes- thi-ee. " I make mine avow," said Little John, " These strokes hketh^ well me. ThoTi art a hold man and an hardy. And so thinketli me ; And ere I pass from this place, 660 Assayed better shalt thou be." Little John di'cw a good sword. The cook took another in hand ; They thought nothing for to flee, But stiffly for to stand. There they fought sore together, Two mile way and more, Might neither other harm don, The mountenance of an hour. " I make mine avow," said Little John, 670 " And by mj- true lewto. Thou art one of the best swordmen That ever yet saw I me. Couldcst thou shoot as well in a bow. To green wood thou shouldcst -n-ith me, And two times in the year thy clothing Ichangcd shouldc be : And even- year of Robin Hood Twenty mark to thy fee." 1 Yeda CFirst English " eode ; " past of " g.in," to go), went. 2 St-r-oti'.s, x^'ououneed as three syllables, s Liliet\ pronounced as one syllable. " Put up thy sword," siiid the cook, 680 "And fellows wiU we be." Then he fet to Little John The numbles of a doe, Good bread and full good wine, They ate and drank thereto. And when they had drunken well. Their troth.s together they plight, That they would be with Robin That ilke same day at night. They hied them to the treasure-house, 690 As fast as they might gone. The locks that were of good steel They brake them every one ; They took away the silver vessel. And all that they might get, Pieces,' masui-s,' and spoons, Would they none forget ; Also they took the good pence, . Throe hundi-ed pound and thi'ce ; Aiul did them straight to Robin Hood, 700 Under the green wood tree. "God thee save, my dear master. And Christ thee save and see." And then said Robin to Little John, " Welcome might thou be ; And also be that fau' yeom&n Thou bringest there with thee. Wliat tidingcs from Nottingham ? Little John, tell thou me." " Well thee greeteth the proud sheriff, 710 jVnd scndeth thee here by me. His cook and his silver vessel, And three hundred pound and thi-ee." " I make mine avow to God," said Robin, "And to tho Trinity, It was never by his good v.-ill. This good is come to me." Little John him there bethought, On a shi'cwcd wile. Five mile in the forest he ran, 720 Him happed at liis will ; Tlion he met the proud sheriff. Hunting with hound and hom. HlINTrNG WITH HbUND AND HOHN. From CarviTig under a Seat in the Choir of Sherhonie Minster (Tine of Edu-ard III.). (Carter.) •* Pieces, driulriug-enps. s Manors (or "mazers"), howls or sohlets. ^TO A.U. 15u8.] SHORTER "POEMS. 91 little John coud liis cmieysye,' And kneeled him bef om : " God thee save, my dear master, And Chi-ist thee save and see." " Eaynold Gieenleaf," said the sheriff, " AVTicre hast thou now bo 'r" " I have be in this forest, 730 A fail- sight can I see, It was one of the fairest sights That ever yet saw I me ; Yonder I see a right fail- hart. His colour is of green, Seven score of deer upon an herd. Be with him all bedcnc ; ^ His tpide' are so sharp, master. Of sixty and well mo. That I dui'st not shoot for di'edc 7iO Lest they wold mc slo." " I make mine avow to God," said the sheriff, " That sight would I fain see." " Busk you thitherward, my dear master. Anon, and wend with me." The sheriff rode, and Little John Of foot he was full smart, And when they came afore Robin : " Lo, here is the master hart !" Still stood the proud sheriff, 750 A Sony man was he : " Wo worth thee, Ra}-nold Greenleaf ! Thou hast now betrayed me." " I make mine avow," said Little John, " Master, ye be to blame, I was misserved of my dinerc. When I was with you at hame." Soon he was to supper set. And served with silver white ; And when the sheriff see his vessel, 760 For soiTow he nug'ht not eat. " Jlako good cheer," said Robin Hood, " Sheriff, for charity. And for the love of Little John ; Thy life is granted to thee." AMicn they had supped well, The day was all ugone, Eobin commanded Little John To draw off his hosen and his shone. His kirtlc and his coat a pye,"* 770 That was fiuTed well fine. And take him a gi-een mantell, To lap his body therein. Robin commanded his \vight young men, LTnder the green wood tree. They shall lay in that same sort. That the sheriff might them sec. * Coud lii^ cuYteysyc, kuow liow to be courteous. 2 All hedcne. See Note 4, page 31. 3 Tynde, brauclies of hoi-us. First English " tiutlas," tines, the teeth of harrows, prou^ of forks, &c. * Coat a pijf, loose riding-coat, rough overcoat. Dutch "py," a coarse rough cloth, or a coat made from it. We have the word iu om- pea-coat, which is a coat a pye. AH night lay that proud sheriff In his'" breche and in liis sherte, Ko wonder it was, in green wood, 780 Tliough his sides do smerte. "Make glad cheer," said Robin Hood, " .Sheriff, for charite. For this is our order i-wis. Under the green wood tree." " This IS harder order," said the sheriff, '■ Than any anker" or frere ; For all the gold in merry England I would not long dwell hei'e." " All these twelve months," said Robin, 790 " Thou shalt dwell with mo ; I shall thee teach, jiroud sheriff'. An outlaw for to be." " Ere I here another night lie," said the sheriff, " Eobin, now I pray thee. Smite off my head rather to-morn. And I forgive it thee. Let me go," then said the sheriff, " For saint Charite, And I will be thy best friend 800 That ever yet had thee." " Thou shalt swear me an oath," said Robin, " On mj- bright brand. Thou shalt never awaj-te me scathe," By water ne by land ; And if thou find any of my men. By night or by day. Upon thine oath thou shalt swear. To help them that thou may.' ' Now have the sheriff iswore his oath, 810 And home he gan to gone. He was as full of gi-een wood As ever was heap of stone. ^ THE FOUKTH FYTTE. The sheriff dwelled in Nottingham, He was fain' that he was gone, And Robin and his merry men Went to wood anone. " Go we to dinner," said Little John. Eobin Hood said, " Nay ; For I dread Our Lady be ^\TOth with me, 820 For she sent me not my pay." "Have no doubt, master," said Little John, " Yet is not the sun at rest. For I dare say, and safely swear. The knight is true and trust." " Take thy bow in thy hand," said Eobin, " Let Much wende with thee, And so shall William Scathelock, And no man abide with me. And walk up into the SajUcs, 830 And to Watling-street, ^ la Ms, pronounced iii's. s Anl:ey, anchorite. " Your discipline is harder than the nile of any order of anchorites or friars." ' Awayte vw scatlw, Ifly iu wait to harm me. 8 In his thoughts he was ii8 full of gi-eeu wood as ever a heap was full of stones. 'J Fnin (First Euvilish " fajgen "), glad. 92 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 And wait after such unkcth gcst, Up-chance ye may them meet. WTicther he he messenger, Or a man that mirthes can, Or if he he a poor man, Of my good he shall have some. Forth then stert Little John, Half in tray' and tcen,- And girded him with a full good sword, 840 Under a mantle of green. They went up to the Sayles, These yeomen all thi-ee ; They looked cast, they looked west. They might no man see. But as he looked in Bamisdale, By the liigh way. Then were they ware of two hlack monks. Each on a good palfray. Then hespake Little John, 850 To Much he gan say, " I dare lay my life to wed,^ That these monks have hrought our pay. Make glad cheer," said Little John, " And frese'' our hows of )'ew. And look your hearts he sicker* and sad,' Your strings trusty and tnre. The monk hath fifty-two men. And seven somers^ full strong. There lideth no hishoii in this land 860 So royally, I understond. Brethi'cn," said Little John, " Here are no more hut we thi-ee; But" we hi'ing them to dinner, Our master dare we not see. Bend your hows," said Little Jolin, " Make all yon press to stand ! The foremost monk, his life and his death, Is closed in my hand ! Ahide, chui-I monk," said Little John, 870 " No farther that thou gone ; If thou dost, hy dere- worthy ' God, Thy death is in mj' hond. And evil tluift on thy head," said Little John, " Right under thy hat's hond, For thou hast made our master wroth, He is fasting so long." " Who is your master ?" said the monk. Little John said, " Eohin Hood." " He is a strong tluef," said the monk, 880 " Of him heard I never good." " Thou liest 1 " then said Little John, " And that shall rewe thee ; He is a yeoman of the forest, To dine hath bode'" thee." 1 Tray, surly iinwiUingTiess. Icelandic *' thra," obstinate ; "threfa," to disjuite. First Euglisli " tliratian," to blame. ^ Teen (First English " teona"), reproach. " Teouan," from "tynan," to incense or ves. 3 To wed, in pledge. * Frese, bend. French ** friser," to bend or curl. 5 Sicfccf, sure. Icelandic, " seigr ; " Latin "secunis." 6 Sad, firm, settled. The orisriual sense of the word. 7 Somas (from French " sommier"), pack-horses for can-ying pro- visions, &c. ^ Bihty imless. 9 Vere-xeorthy (First English " deorwtirthe"), precious. 1'^ Bode, bidden, invited. Much was ready with a holt, Kcdly and anon. He set the monk tofore the hreast. To the ground that he can gon. Of fifty-two wight " young men, 890 There ahode not one, Save a Uttle page, and a groom To lead the soraers with Little John. They hrought the monk to the lodge door, \\Tiether he were loth or lief. For to speak ^\•ith Eohin Hood, Maugi-c in their- teeth. Eohin did ado%vn his hood, The monk when that he see ; The monk was not so courteyous, 900 His hood then let he he. " He is a churl, master, hy dere-worthy God," Then said Little John. " Thereof no force," '- said Rohm, " For coui'tes}' can he none. How many men," said Eohin, " Had tliis monk, John ■"" " Fifty and two when that we met, But many of them be gone." " Let blow a horn," said Robin, 910 " That feDowship may us know." Seven score of wight yeomen, Came pricking on a row. And everich of them a good mantell, Of scarlet and of ray,'^ All they came to good Eohin, To wite '^ what he woidd say. They made the monk to wash and wipe, And sit at his tlinerc, Eohin Hood and Little John 920 They served them both in fere.'* '■ Do gladly, '^ monk," said Eohin. " Gramcrcy,'' sir," said he. " WTiere is your abbey, whan }-e are at home. And who is yotu' avowe ?" '" " Saint Mary abbey," said the monk, " Though I he simple here." " In what office ?" said Robin, " Sir, the high cellarer." " Ye be the more welcome," said Eobi'n, 930 " So ever mote I the." Fill of the best wine," said Eohin, " This monk shall diink to me. But I have great marvel," said Eohin, " Of all this long day, I dread Our Lady he wToth with me. She sent me not my Jiay." " Have no doubt, master," said Little John, " Ye have no need I say, This monk it hath hrought, I dare well swear, 940 For he is of her ahbay." n Wight, active. " No force, no matter. 13 Ray, a striped cloth. French " raie," a stripe. '* Wite, know. Fii-st English " witan," whence " wit." 1^ In fere, together. "• Do gladhj, that is, enjoy yoiu' dimior. 17 Gramercy (French '* grand merci "), many thanks. 1^ Avowc (French " avond," attorney), the saint wlio pleads for you, " Mote I the, might I thi-ive. First English " ic thdo." I thrive. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 93 " And she was a borow," ' said llobin, " Between a kniyht and mo, Of a little money that I him lent, Under the sreen wood tree ; And if thou hast that silver ibrought, I pi'ay thee let me see. And I shall hulj> thee eftsoons,^ If thou have need of me." The monk swore a full gi-eat oath, 950 With a sorry eheer, " Of the horowhood thou speakcst to me, Heard I never ere 1 " " I make mine avow to God," said Kobin, " Jlonk, thou art to blame, For God is hold a righteous man. And so is his dame. Thou toldest with thine own tongue, Thou may not say nay. How thou art her servant, 960 And servest her every day, And thou art made her messenger, My money for to pay. Therefore I con thee more thank,' Thou art come at thy day. AVhat is in your coffers ?" said Robin, " True then tell thou mo." " Sir," he said, " twenty mark,'' All so mote I the." " If there be no more," said Kobin, 970 " I will not one penny ; If thou hast mister* of any more, 8ir, more I shall lend to thee ; And if I find more," said Kobin, " I-wia^ thou shalt it forgone ; For of thy spending silver,? monk, Thereof vnll I right none. Go now forth. Little John, And the truth tell thou me ; If there be no mox-e but twenty mark, 980 No penny of that I see." Little John spi-ead his mantle down. As he had done before. And he told out of the monkcs mail. Eight himdi'ed pound and more. Little John let it Uc full still, And went to liis master in haste ; " Sir," he said, " the monk is true enow, Oui- Lady hath doubled your cost." " I make mine avow to God," said Robin, 990 " Monk, what told I thee ? Our Lady is the truest woman, That ever yet fomid I me. 1 Borow {rirst English "borli"), surety. 2 EfUoons (First English " eft soua "), agaiu soou, soou after. 3 Con thee more thanlc {Icelandic "keuna;" Gothic " kuunan ;" Fii'St English " knawau," to ken or know ; know as one's own, claim ; know as belonging to another), owe you the more tlnmks. So Chaucer, in his " Treatise of the Astrolabe," says to his little son, Lewis, " If I show thee in my little English as true conclusions as be showed in Latin, con jiic the more tltanli, and pray God save the king that is lord of this language." ■* Mai% a silver coia, worth 13s. 4d. ■'■ Mi.sfcr (Danish "miste "), want. « I-wis (First English " gewis "), certainly. 7 Spending silver, that which you will need to spend upon your journey. By dere-worthy (iod," said Kobin, " To seek all Kngland thorowe. Yet found I never to my pay A much better borowc. Fill of the best wine, do hin\ drink," Siiid Robin ; " And gr-eet well thy Lady hend," And if she have need of Robin Hood, 1003 A friend she shall him iind ; And if she necdeth any more silver. Come thou again to me. And, by this token she hath me sent, She shall liave such three." The monk was going to Ijondon ward. There to hold groat mote. The knight that rode so high on horse, To bring him under foot. " Whither be ye away ?" said Robin. 1010 " Su', to manors in this lond. To reckon -with our reve.s, That have done much wrong." " Come now forth. Little John, And hearkeir to my tale, A better yeoman I know none, To search a monkes mail. How much is in yonder other com-scr ?" said Rcbia, " The sooth must we sec." " By our Lady," then said the monk, " That were no couitesy To bid a man to dinner. And sith him beat and bind." ' " It is our old manner," said Kobin, " To leave but little behind." 1020 Thk Monk. (From the Carvings on St. John's Clnirch, Cirencester.) The monk took the horse with spur, Ko longer would he .abide. "Ask to drink," then said Robin, " Ere that ye further ride." " Nay, fore God," then said the monk, " Me rewcth I came so near. For better cheap' I might have dined. In Blyth or in Doncastere." 8 Send, gentle, originally handy, not doing things clumsily. 9 Cheap (First English "ceiip"), bargain, price. First English 1030 94 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [I.D. 14S3 " Greet well your abbot," said Robin, " And yoiu- prior, I you pray, And bid him send me such a monk, To dinner every day I" Now let we that monk be still, And speak we of that knight, Yet he camo to hold liis day 10-10 "Wliile that it was light. He did liim straight to Barnisdale, Under the gxcen wood tree, And he found there Kobin Hood, And all his merry mej-nc. The Imight light downe of his good palfrey, llobin Avhen he gan see. So couiteysly he did adown his hood. And set him on his knee. " God thee save, good Eoljin Hood, iOoO And all this company." " Welcome be thou, gentle knight, And light welcome to mo." Than bespake him Robin Hood, To that knight so free, " What need driveth thee to green wood ? I pray thee, sir knight, tell me. And welcome be thou, gentle knight, Why hast thou be so long ?" " For the abbot and the high justice lOGO Would have had my loud." " Hast thou thy land again i" said Robin, " Truth then tell thou me." "Yea, fore God," said the knight, " And that thank I God and thee. But take not a grief," said the knight, " That I have been so long ; I came by a wresteling, And there T did help a poor yeorain. With wTong was jiut beliind." 1070 " Nay, fore God," said Robin, " Sir knight, that thank I thee ; Wliat man that helpeth a good yeom&n, His friend then wHl I be." " Have here four hundred pound," then said the knight, " The wliich yo lent to mo ; And hero is also twenty mark For yoiu' courtesy." " Nay, fore God," then said Robin, " Thou broke' it well for aye, For our Lady, by her cellarer, Hath sent to me my pay ; iVnd if I took it twice, A shame it were to me : But truly, gentle knight. Welcome art thou to me." lOSO **ceap-stow," a place for bargain and sale, thence "Chepstow." There is the same word iu " Cheapside." Cheap is thus used as a uoiui by Shakespeare, when Falstaff tells Bardolph that the lamp of his 'nose has saved a thousand marks iu links and torches ; *' hut the sack that thou hast di'unk me would have bought me lights as good cheap at the dearest chandler's in Europe." ' Broke, use. See Note 2, page 15. AVhen Robin had told his tale. He laughed and had good cheer. " By my troth," then said the knight, " Yoiu- money is ready here." " Broke it well," said Robin, " Thou gentle knight so free ; And welcome be thou, gentle knight, Under my trystell tree. But what shall these bows do i"" sayd Robin, " And these ari'ows ifeathered free i" " [It is]," then said the knight, " A poor present to thee." " Come now forth, Little John, And go to my trcasiu-y. And bring mo there foiu' hundi'cd pound. The monk over-told it to mc. Have here foiu' hundied 2jound, Thou gentle knight and true, And buy horse and harness good. And gild thy spurs all new : And if thou fail any spending. Come to Robin Hood, And by my troth thou shalt none fail The wliUcs I have- any good. And broke well thy four himch-ed pound, Wliich I lent to thee. And make thyseU no more so bare. By the coimsel of mc." Thus then help him good Robin, The knight of all his care. God, that sitteth in heaven high, Grant us well to fare. THE FIFTH FYTTE. No-w hath the knight liis leave itake, And went him on his way ; Robin Hood and his merry men DwcUcd still fuU many a diiy. Lithe and listen, gentle men. And hearken what I shall say, How the proud sheiiff of Nottingham Did crj' a full fail' play ; loao 1100 1110 112() Shooting at the Botts. (From a Fourteenth Century Psalter.) Tliat all the best archers of the north Should come upon a day. And they that shoot all of the best The game shall bear a-n-ay. " He that shootcth all of the best Furthest fair- and low. At a pan- of fjTily' butts, Under the green wood shaw. 1139 - r have, pronounced I've. ' Fijnhi (First English "findigj" substantial, considerable, heavy. Provincial Scottish "findy"). TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 95 A right good arrow he shall have, The shaft of silver white, The head and the feathers of rich red gold. In England is none like." This then heard good Robin, Under his trystell tree : 11 -1 " JIake you ready, ye wight young men, That shooting wiU I sec. Busk you, my men-y young men, Yc shall go with me ; And 1 will wetei the sheriff's faith. True an if he be." When they had their- bows ibent. Their- tackles feathered free, Seven score of -n-ight young men Stood by Eoliin's knee. 11.30 When they came to Nottingham, The butts were fab- and long, Many was the bold arehcr Tliat shooted with bowcs strong. " There .shall but six shoot with me, The other shall keep my head, And stand with good bowcs bent That I be not deceived." The fourth outlaw his bow gan bend. And that was Robin Hood, 1160 And that beheld the proud sheriff, All by the butt he stood. Thrics Robin shot about, And alway he cleft the wand. And so did good Gilbert, With the white hand. Little John and good Seathelock Were archers good and free ; Little MuL'ii and good Eej-nold, The worst would they not be. 1170 Wlien they'haJ shot about, These archers fair and good) Evermore was the best, For sootli, Robin Hood. Him was delivered the good an-6-w, For best worthy was he ; He took the gift so com-teysly, To green wood woldc he. They cried out on Robin Hood, And gi-eat horns gan they blow. 1180 " Wo worth thee I ^ treason ! " said Robin, " Full e\'il thou art to know ! And wo be thou, thou proud sheriff. Thus gladding thy guest. Otherwise thou behote^ me In yonder wild forest ; But had I thee in gxeen wood, Under my trysteU tree. Thou shouldest leave me a bettor wed^ Than thy true Icwic." 1 190 Full many a bow there was bent. And arrows let they gHde, Many a kirtle there -was rent, And hm-t man)' a side. 1 Wete (First Englisli "witan"), know, 2 Wo worth thee, woe be to thee. First English *' weorthau," to become, be, happen. 3 Behote, proraised. First English " behiitan," to promise. * Wed, pledge. Tlie outlawcs shot was so strong. That no man might tliem drive. And the proud sherifcs men They fled aw-ay full blive.-^ Eobin saw the InLsshenu-nt '' to-broke,' In green wood he would have be, 1200 Many an arrow tliero was sliot Among that company. Little John was hurt full sore, With an arrow in his k-nee. That he might neither go nor ride ; It was full great jiitc. " Master," then said Little John, " If ever thou lovcst me. And for that ilke* Lordcs love, Tliat died upon a tree, 1210 And for the meeds' of my service, That I have served tliee. Let never the proud .sherift' Alive now- find me ; But take out thy brown sword, And smite all oil my licad. And give me woundes dead and -wide. That I after cat no bread." "> " I wolde not that," said Robin, " John, that thou were slawo, 1220 For all the gold in merry England, Though it lay now on a rawe." " " Grod forbid," said Little Much, " That died on a tree, That thou shouldest. Little John, Part our company !" Up he took him on his back. And bare him well a mile. Many a time he laid him do-rni, And shot another while. 1230 Then was there a fail- casteU, A little within the wood. Double-ditched it was about. And walled, by the rood ; And there dwelled that gentle knight. Sir Richard at the Leo, That Robin had lent his good. Under the green wood ti-ce. In he took good Robin, And all his company : 1240 " Welcome be thou, Robin Hood, Welcome art thou me ; And much thank thee of thy comf6rt. And of thy com-tcsy, And of thy great kindeness. Under the green wood tree ; I love no man in all this world So much as I do thee ; For all tlie proud sheriff of Nottingham, Right here shaft thou be. 12.50 5 Bliee (" bi live "), quickly. The word quick itself means alive. 6 Bueshement (French " embuche "), ambush, snaj-e. 7 To-hro};e. The to, like the Oermau zcr, is intensive. 8 Hhe, same. ' Meeds, rewai'ds. First English " mi!d," a i-ewai-d. 1" This is Cbepman's version. Wyukyn de Worde's is *' No life on me be left," whei-e " left" rhymes to " hea'od," the original foi-m of " bead ;" se^ col. 1, page 82. n Hawe, row. 9G CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Shut tlio gates, and draw tlie bridge, And let no man come in ; And arm you well, and make you ready, iVnd to the wall ye \\-in.' For one thing, Uobin, I tlice Leliotr,- I swear by Saint Quintin, These twelve days thou wonest^ with me, To sup, eat, and dine." Boards were laid, and clothes spread, Keadily and anon ; 1260 Eobin Hood and his merry men To meat gan they gon. THE SIXTH FYTTE. Lithe and listen, gentle men, And hearken iiiito yoiu- song : How the proud sheriff of Nottingham, And men of anncs strong, Full fast came to the high sheriff. The country >ip to I'out, And they beset the knight's casteU, The wallcs all about. 1270 The proud sheriff loudc gan eiy, And said, " Thou traitor knight. Thou keepest here the king's enemy, Against the laws and right ! " " Sir, I will avow that I have done, The deeds th;it here be dight. Upon all the landcs that I have, As I am a true knight. "Wendc forth, sir.s, on your way, And doth no more to me, 1280 Till ye wife our kingcs wiU WTiat he will say to thee." The sheriff thus had his answer, Without any leasing, Forth he yode"* to Loudon town. All for to toll our Icing. There he told him of that knight. And eke of Robin Hood, And also of the bold archers. That noble were and good. 1290 " He would avow that he had done. To maintain the outlaws strong ; He would be lord, and set you at nought, In all the north lend." " I will be at Nottingham," said the king, " Within this fortnight,* And take I will Robin Hood, And so I will that Icnight. Go home, thou proud sheriff, And do as I bid thee, 1300 And ordain good archers enow. Of all the wide countrce." 1 Will (Fii'st Euglisli " winuau "), go in battle. The old word win (masculine, genitive il'ijick) meant sti-ife and struggle. "To win the day " iniplies the strife that gave the victory ; " a bread-irnnicr is he who strives and struggles for the good he eanis. Another word will (feminine, genitive uine) meant pleasure or joy ; and v:in (neuter, genitive uoio.s) meant wine. 2 Behotc, promise. 3 Wone^t, dwellest. * Yode, went. First English " gau," to go ; past tense " eode." ^ Foiinitiht, with a well-rolled r, has the value of three syllables. The sheriff had his leave itake. And went him on his way ; And Eobin Hood to green wood I'pon a certain day ; And Little John was whole of the arrow, That shot was in his knee. And did him straight to liobin Hood, F^uder the green wood tree, lioljin Hood walked in the forest, Under the leaves green. The proud sheriff' of Nottingham, Therefore he had great teen.'' The sheriff thei-e failed of Robin Hood, He might not have his prey. Then he awaited? that gentle knight. Both by night and by day. Ever he awaited that gentle knight, Sir Richard at the Lee, As he went on hawking by the river side, And let his hawkes flee. Took he there his gentle knight, 'With men of anncs sti-ong. And led him home to Nottingham ward, Ibound both foot and bond. 1310 1320 Nottingham Old Town Hall and Prison. (Ffom Thofoton'a Histoi-y of Notts.) The sheriff swore a full great oath. By him that died on a tree, He had liever than an hundred pound. That Robin Hood had he. 1330 Then the lady, the knightcs wife, A fair lady and free. She set her on a good palfrey, To green wood anon rode she. ■When she came to the forest. Under the green wood tree. Found she there Robin Hood, And all his fail' mej-nc. " God thee save, good Robin Hood, And all thy company ; 1340 For our deare Ladyes love, A boon grant thou me. ^ Tticn, vexation. 7 Aii--aited. Here the cd is not sounded, liecnuse it follows t. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 97 Let thou never my wedded lord shamefully slain to he ; He is fast il)oundc to Nottingham ward, For the love of thee." Lady of the Time of Edward L^ {Froni Stothai-d s " Monumental E^gies.") Aboh then said good Kuhin, To that lady free, ** WTiat man hath yoiu' lord itake ?" "The proud sheriff," then said she. *' Forsooth as I thee say ; He is not yet tlu-co miles, Passed on your way." Up then aterte good Robin, As a man that had be wode : ^ *' Busk you, my merry young men. For bim that died on a rode ; ^ And be that tbis sorrow forsaketh, By him that died on a tree, Shall be never in green wood be, Nor longer dwell with me." 1350 13G0 Again, for example, in line 1526, deimrted is pronounced depart. So in the " Merchant of Venice," act v., sc. 1 : — " A thing: stnck on with oaths upon your finger, And so riveted with faith unto your flesh." Sometimes the cd after t is not written, as a little earlier in the same play we meet \vith the following example ; — " Stood Dido Upon the wild sea-hanks, and t'.-u/t her love To come again to Carthage." In line 1319— " Ever he awaited "—there are two contractions, ever into t^'fi', and axraitcd into airnit. lu line 1321, the r in r'n:er is slipped over, like the v iu ever, over, &c., and " the river" runs into a mono- syllahle. So agniu, in line 1343, nocr was xu-ououuced ne'er. 1 This lady, Avehne, Countess of Lancaster, daughter of the Earl of Albemarle and Holdernesse, died in 1267, and represents the costume of the time to wbich the poem is assigned by the intro- duction of King Edward I. among its characters. The wimple, wrai^ped two or three times round the neck, was called a " gorget," and Jean de Meung, when he satirised this fashion in his part of the "Roman de la Rose" (written between 1270 and 1282), said that he often thought the ladies nailed their neckcloths to their cliiu, or pinned them to their flesh. - Wodc, mad. 3 jjodr, cross. 13 Soon there were good bows ibcnt, More than seven score, Hedge ne diteh spared they none, That was them before. " I make mine avow," said Kobin, " The knight would I fain sec. And if I ma\' him take, Iquit^ then shall he be." And when they came to Nottingham, 1370 They walked in the str Br-lijU lir-niid. Obsei-ve also how often the broadly ijronoiinced 1/ couuts as a syllable. ' Bideiie, promptly. See Note 4, page 31. ' Ren, nm. 8 leasing (Fii-st EuglisU "leasmig"), t^ilseness. 98 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.B. 1450 AVlxcn they had told him the case, Oiu' king understood theii' tale, And seised in his hand 1420 The kni.nlites Inndos all. All the jiass of Laneashire, He went both far and near, Till he came to Plompton park. He failed many of his deer. ^ITiere our king* was wont to see Hordes many one He could unneth ' find one deer, That bare any good horn. The king was wonder wroth withal, 1430 And swore by the trinitc, " I would I had Kobin Hood, AVith eyen I might him see : And he that would smite off the knightes head, And bring it to me, He shall have the knightes lands, Sir IJyehard at the Lee ; I give it him with my charter, And seal it with my hand, To have and hold for ever-more, , 1440 In all meny England." Then bespake a fair old knight. That was true in his fay,^ '■ Ah, my liege lord the king-. One woi'd I shall you say : There is no man in this country Jlay have the knightes lands. While Robin Hood may ride or gon, And bear a bow in his hands, That he no shall lose his head, 1450 That is the best ball in his hood : Give it no man, my lord the king, That ye will any good !" Half a year dwelled oiu' comely king. In Nottingham, and well more. Could he not hear of Kobin Hood, In what coimtry' that he were ; But alway went good Kobin By hai* and eke by hiU, And alway slew the kingcs deer, 1460 AJid welt' them at liis will. Than bespake a proud forstere, That stood by our king's knee, " If ye %\-ill see good Robin, Ye must do after me. Take five of the best knyghtcs That be in your lede, And -walk down by your abbey, And get you monkcs weed. 1 TInneili, not easily. First Euglish " erftlie," easilj. 2 Faij (Freucli " foi "), faith. 3 Couniry, divisiou of the land (French " controe," from Latiu " con " and " ten'a "). Countries are lands lying together or adjacent. Oui* countieii were once commonly called countries, and are still called so in some provincial dialects. * Hn?fc, enclosure (?). Jamieson, in his " Scottish Dictionary," a book often very iiseful to the student of Old English, suggests that Tui/fc-hens may have been hens cooped in, from Old Swedish " hoekle." Ihtll-ard, as a name for a low fellow, may thus have meant one of the herd. = Welt them (First English " wseltan," - -oil or tumble), tumbled them over. And I will be your- ledes man, 1470' And lede you the way, And ere ye come to Nottingham, Jline head then dare I lay, That ye shall meet with good Kobin, Alive if that he be, Ere ye come to Nottingham, With eyen ye shall him see." Ftdl hastily om' king was dight, So were his knightes five. Each of them in monkes weed, 1480 And hasted them tliither blithe. Our king was great above his cowl, A broad hat on his crown, liight as lie were abbot-like, They rode up in-to the town. Stiff boots oui' king had on. Forsooth as I you say, He rode singing to green wood, The convent was clothed in gray, His mail horse, and his great somcrs,*" 1490 Followed OUI- king behind, Till they came to gi-cenc wood, A mile imder the lind : ^ There they mot -n-ith good Robin, Standing on the way. And so did many a bold archer. For sooth as I you say. Kobin took the kingcs horse. Hastily in that stead,^ And said, " Sir abbot, by your leave, loOO A while ye must abide ; We be yeomen of this forest. Under the green wood tree. Wo live by our king-es deer. Other shift have not we ; And ye have chmches and rentes both, And gold full great plenty ; Give us some of youi- spending. For saint Charity." Than bespake our comely king, 1510 Anon then said he, ■' I brought no more to greenc wood, But forty pound with me. I have lain at Nottinghcmi, This fortnight with om- king, And spent I have full much good, On many a great lording ; And I have but forty pound. No more then have I me ; But if I had an hundred pound, 1520 I would give it to thee." Robin took the forty pound. And departed it in two partye, HaUendell' he gave his men-y men, And bade them meii-y to be. ^ So)UCi-s, sumpter horses. ' Under the lind, under the trees, not necessarily lime-trees, "lind" being Noi-se for a tree, though First English "hnde" is the linden or lime-tree. So " light as leaf on lind," light as the leiif on the tree. « Stead, place. ' HiilfendcU, half-part. First Euglish " daal," a division. So thi' deal, parting, or dividing out, of cards. TO A.D. 150S.] SHORTER P0EM8. 9d FuU courteously Kobin gan say, " Sii', have this for your spending, We shall meet another day." " Gramerey," then said our king , " But wcU thee grectcth Edward our king, .'Vud sent to thee his seal, And biddeth thee come to Nottingham, Both to meat and meal. 1530 Great Seal of Edward I. He took out the broad tarpc,' And soon he let hini see ; Kobin coud his coiu-tcsy. And set him on his knee : ■' I love no man in all the world So well as I do my king, Welcome is my lordcs seal ; And, monk, for thy tiding. Sir abliot, for thy tidingcs, To day thou shalt dine with me. For the love of my king, Under my trystell tree." Forth he led our comely king, Fidl fair by the hand, Blany a deer there w-as slain. And full fast dightand." Robin took a full great hom. And loud he gan blow ; Seven score of wight^ young men, Came ready on a row, All they kneeled on their knee, Full fail- before Kobin. The king said himself unto, And swore by saint Austin, " Here is a wonder seemly sight. Me thinkcth, by Goddcs pine ; His men are more at his bidding. Then my men be at mine 1 " 1.540 1550 1560 ' Tarpc, a word with no kuown meaning', is probably " targe," and means tlie king's writ, bearing his seal. The word is in the *' Promptorium Parvulomm " " targe, or chartyr," carta. 2 Diglitand, being made ready. 3 Wight, active, nimble. 1570 1580 Full hastily was their dinner idight, And therto gan* they gon. They served our king with all theii' might, Both Kobin and Little John. Anon before oui' king was set The fatte veniscm, The good white bread, the good red wine, And therto the fine ale brown. " JIake good cheer," said Kobin, " Abbot, for oliarity ; And for this ilkc tidinge, Blessed mote thou bo. Now shalt thou see what life we lead. Or* thou hcnnes'' wend, Then thou may infoi-m our king. When ve together lend." Up they stert all in haste. Their bows were smartlj- bent, Our king was never so sore agast, He weened to have be shent.' Two yardes there were up set, Tlieieto gan they gang ; ]!ut iifty pace, oiu' king said. The markcs were too long. On every side a rose garland, They shot under the line. " Whoso faileth of the rose garland," said Robin, " His tackle he shall tine,^ And yield it to his master, 1590 Be it never so fine, — For no man will I .spare. So ch-inke I ale or wine, — And bear a buffet on liis head, I-wvs right all bare." And all that fell in Robin's lot. He smote them wonder sair. Twies Kobin shot about. And ever he cleaved the wand, And so did good GUbcrt, With the lily white hand ; Little John and good Scathclock, For nothing would they spare, AMien they failed of the garland, Robin smote them fall sair. At the last shot that Kobin shot. For all his friends fair, Yet he failed of the garland, Thi'eo fingers and mair. Then bespake good Gilbei-t, And thus he gan say, " Slaster," ho said, " your tackle is lost. Stand forth and take yom- pay." " If it be so," said Robin, " That may no better be : Sir abbot, I deliver thee mine aiTOW, I pray thee, sii', serve thou me." ICOO ICIO " It faileth not for mine order," said our king, " Robin, by thy leave. For to smite no good yeoman. For doubt I should hini grieve." IB'20 ■» Gon (First English " gan"), to go. 5 Or, ere. '' Hennes, hence. ' Slienf. brought to shame. First EnsrUsh " scsendan." '^ Tine, lose, forfet. Icelandic " tyna," to lose. 100 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d, 1150 " Smite on boldly 1" said Robin, " I give thee lai-ge leave." Anon oiir king;, with that word. He fold up his slccvo, And suuh a buffet he gave Kobin, To ground he yodc ' full near. " I make mine avow to God," said Itobin, " Thou art a stahvorthy- frere ; There is pith in thine ann," said Eobin, 1C30 " I trow thou canst well shoot 1" Thus our King and Eobin Hood Together then they met. Eobin beheld our comely king Wistly^ in the face, So did Sir Richard at the Lee, And kneeled do-n-n in that place ; And so did all the wild outlaws, "\Micn they see them kneel. " My lord the King of England, 1640 Now I know you well. Mercy," then Robin said to our king, " Under your trystal tree. Of thy goodness and thy grace, For my men and me ! Yes, fore God," said Robin, " And also God me save ; I ask mercy, my lord the king, And for my men I crave." "Yes, fore God," then said our king, 1650 " Thy petition I grant thee, With that^ thou leave the green wood. And all thy company ; And come home, sir, to my court, And there dwell ^^■ith me." " I make mine avow," said Rob n, " And right so shall it be ; I ^"ill come to your court. Your ser\-ice for to see. And bring with me of my men 1660 Seven score and thi-ec. But' me like well yoiu- service, I come again full soon. And shoot at the donne ^ deer. As I am wont to doon." THE EIGHTH FVTTE.' " Haste thou ony gi-ene cloth," said our kynge, "That thou ^ylte sell nowe to me ?" "Ye, for god," sayd Robyn, '• Th\Tty yerdes and thi-e." " Eobj-n," sayd oiu- k)-ngc, 1670 " Now pr'Tige 1720 To sjT Rychardc at the Lee : He gave h^-m there his londe agajTio, A good man he bad hym be. Robyn thanked oui' comly kynge, .iVnd set hjTn on his kne. Had Rob>"n dwelled in the kynges coui'tc But twelve monethes and thre. That he had spent an hondi'cd pounde. And all his mennes fe. In eveiy place where Robj-n came, 1730 Ever more he layde downe. Both for knyghtes and squyres. To gcte hii-in grete reno\\Tie. By than the yere was all agone. He had no man but twaync Lytell Johan and good Scathclocke, Wj-th hym all for to gone. 8 To leve, to learn. TO A.D. 1508 ] SHORTER rOEMS. 101 Kobyu sawc yongc men shotc, Full t'uyrc upon a day, "Alas!" than sayd good Koliyn, 1740 " 3Iy wolthe is went away. SomtjTiic I was an archero good, A stj-ffo and oko a strongc, I was comm_\-tted the best archere, That was in mcry Englonde. Alas !" then sayd good Eobyn, ^ " Alas and well a woo I Yf I dwele longer with the kynge, Sorowe wj-11 mo sloo ! " Forth than went Kobj-n Hode, 1750 TyU he came to cm- kjTige : " My lorde the kynge of Englonde, Graunte mo mjTi askj-nge. I made a ohapell in Bemysdale, That semely is to se, It is of Jlaiy Magdalene, And thereto wolde I be ; I myght never in this seven nyght, No tjTne to slepe ne wynke, Nother aU these seven dayes, 1760 Nother etc ne di-j-nke. Me longeth sore to Bemysdale, I may not be therfro, Barefote and wolwarde ' I have hyght Thydor for to go." " Yf it lie so," than sayd our kjTige, " It may no better be ; Seven nyght I g\Te the love. No lengTe, to dwell fro me." "Gramerey, lorde," then sayd Eob^•n, 1770 And set h}"m on his kne ; He toke his leve full coiu-tey.sly. To greno wode then went he. Whan he eame to grcne wode. In a meiy moiTijiigc, There he hcrde the notes small ( )f b\Tdes mery s>Tigyngo. " It is ferre gone," sayd Kobjii, " That I was last here. Me ly.ste a l_\-tell for to shote 1780 At the donne dere." I\oli}Ti slrwe a full grete harte, His home than gan he blow, That all the outlawcs of that forest, That home coxid they knowe, And gadred them togyder, In a lytell throwe,^ Seven seore of wight yonge men. Came ready on a rowe ; And fayre dyde of thcyr hodes, 1790 And set them on thcjT kne : " Welcome," they sayd, " our ma}'Stcr, Under this grene wode tre !" Eobyn dwelled in grene wode, Twenty yero and two, For all drede of Edwarde our kj-nge,' Agayne wolde he not goo. 1 Wolwarde, dressed iu wool only. So Aiinado in " Love's Laboiu'*3 Lost :" " The naked trutli of it is, I liave no sliirt ; I go woo/icard for penance." 2 Thron-c (First Englisli " tbrag," or " tlirah "), space of time. 2 Ticnify ycre and tiro, for all drede of King Edicard (i.e. all dread Yet he was bcgyled, I wys, Through a wyeked wouu'in. The prj'oresse of Kyrkesly, That nye was of his kyr.ne, For the love of a knyght, SjT Roger of Donkesley, That was her owne speciall, Full evyll mote they thee. They toke togyder thejT coimsell Eobyn Hode for to sle. And how they myght best do that dede, His banis * for to be. Than bcspake good Eobj-n, In place where as he .stode. To morow I muste to Kyrkeslcy, Craftely to be leten blode. Syr Roger of Donkcstere, By the pryoresse he lay, And there they betrayed good Eobj-n Hode, Through theyr false playe. Cryst have mercy on his sonle, That dyed on the rode ! For he was a good outlawe. And dyde pore men moch god. 1300 ISIO 1820 EoBiN Hood's Grave. * Tlie old ballad of "Chevy Cliace " is proUably represented to us by a piece of later form. A notwithstanding : so we can still say, " It is dangerous, but /«-r all tJiat I shall do it)." The Edwai'd of the poem is King Ed^i-ard I., who reigned from 1272 to 1307 : twenty -two years iu Biu-usleydale, even if counted from the date of the king's accession, would keep Robin Hood living until 129-t. * Biinia, banes (from First English "baua"), murderers. Kobiu Hood went to his aunt, the Prioress of Kirklees Nunner>-, iu York- shire, to be bled, and she suffered him to bleed to death. As a later ballad says — " She bleeded him iu the vein of the arm. And locked him up iu the room ; Tliere did he bleed all the livelong day, Until the next day at noon." 5 No inscription is now legible on what is said to be the gravestone of Eobin Hood in Kirklees Park; but the following epitaph, once legible, was copied from it by Dr. Gale, Dean of York, .and printed by Thoresby, in his "Ducat. Leod." Though mock-antique, it may represent an old tradition : — *' Hear undemead dis latil steau Laiz Robert Eiud of Huntington ; Nea arcer ver az hie sa geud. An pipl kauld im Robin Heud : Sick utlaz az hi an iz men, Til England ui\T si ageu. Obit 24 Kal. Dekembris, 1247." 102 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.u. 146;) " chevauclioe " is the French word for a raid over the enemy's border, femiliar to the English while they possessed settlements in France, and representing such attacks as were often made by the Scots, who were at that time allied with tlie French, against England. The famous Battle of Otterburn, fought on the 19th of August, 1388, came of a "chevauchee" — the word corrujited into " Chevy Chase " — by James, Earl of Douglas, with 3,800 men, which were met by the English mider the two sons of the Earl of Northum- berland. The corrupted name for a " chevauchee " was trans- lated into the " Hunting of the Cheviot," a confusion easily made, since there are Cheviot Hills in Northumbei'land as well as in Otterburn. In the A Chevauchee. Badcian MS. 4379, p. 113. oldest extant version of "Chevy Chase," the name means " the Cheviot hunting-gi'ound." This version is in a manuscript in the Ashmolean Collection at Oxford. It was jirinted by Thomas Hearne, in the year 1719, in his preface to an edi- tion of William of Newbiuy's " Chronicle," and is the text here followed. Its date seems to be about 1500, and if not the original, it is much nearer to the original than the version given in Percy's " Reliques," and perhaps it may be the same of which Sir Philij) Sitbiey said, " I ne^■er heard the old song of ' Percy and Douglas ' that I found not my heart moved more than with a trumpet ; and yet it is sung but by some blind crowder" (tiddler) " with no rougher voice than I'ude .style." Pennon of Percy. {Fi'oia Scott's *^ Boydcf .-Jntiyiu'tics.") CIIEVY CHASE. Thn Percy out of Xortlninibcrland, and avow to God made he That he would hunt in tlic mounfcims of Cheviot witliin days thi"ee. In the maugTc of doughty Douglas and all that ever with liim be, The fattest harts in all Cheviot he said lie would kill and eaiTv them away. " By my faith," said the doughty Douglas again, " I will let ' that hunting, if that I may I " Then the Percy out of Bamhorough came, with him a mighty nieany ; - With fifteen hundi-ed archers, hold of blood and hone, they were chosen out of shires three. This began on a Jlonday, at mom, in Cheviot, the hillis so hic,^ The ohild may rue that is mihom, it was the more pitic. The chnvers tlu-ough the woodes went for to raise the deer ; Bowmen bickered upon the bent'' with theu' broad aiTOws clear, Then the wild thorough the woodes went on every side shear ;^ Greyhounds thorough the groves gient'' for to kill there deer. They began in Cheviot, the hills above, early on a Jlonnynday ; By that it ih-ew to the hour of noon a hundred fat harts dead there lay. They blew a mort ' upon the bent ; they sembled on sidis shear, * To the quari-y' then the Percy went to sec the brittling'" of the deer. He said, " It was the Douglas' promise this day to meet me here ; 10 ' Lciy liiuder. 2 Hcany. See note 2, page 60. ^ jj,v_ liisrh. * BiVtcrcd upon the bent, skiraiislaed over the coarse grass of the hills. ^ Shear, in tUtfei'ent directions {fi'om " sciran,*' to divide, part). •■ Glcnt, passed suddenly, tiashed. " .-1 mort, the notes of the hunter's horn at the death of the deer. '^ .Soiibled on sidis shear, assembled from all sides. » The ijaan-i/ (French " curi.%," from " oiir," skiu), the entrails of the slaughtered deer spread on its skin for the dogs to eat. Wheu given on the spot it was called curt'fl chaude; when prepared with hread, &c., and given in the kennel, it was cur^c froidc. It is the wor 1 used by Coriolanus, act i., scene 1, when, in contempt of the Eomau populace, he says — " Would the nobility lay aside their ruth And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry With thousands of these quartered slaves, as high As I could pick my lauce." J'' BfiUling, dividing or " breaking" and distributing, according ta fixed rules of the hujiting.iield. TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 103 But I -wist he would fail veramcnt " — a gi-oat oath the Percy swarc. At the last a squire of Nortluunberland looked, at his hand full nifjli 20 He was ware of the douylity Douslus coming-, witli him a mighty inuany, Both with spear, hill," aud brand, it was a mighty sight to see. Hardier men both of lieart nor hand were not in Ghristiantc. They were twenty hundi-ed speamien good witliout any fail ; They were borne along by the water of Tweed, i'th' bounds of Tividale. " Leave oft the brittling of the deer," he said, " and to youi- bows look ye take good heed, For never sitli ye were of yoiu' mothers'* bom had ye never so miekle need."' The doughty Doug;las on a steed he rode at his men Ijeforn, His armour ghttcred as did a glede,'' a bolder Irani' was never born. " Tell mo whose men ye are," ho says, "or whoso men that ye be : 30 Who gave your leave to hunt in this Cheviot Chase in the spite of me ': ' ' The first man that ever him an an3^\-er made, it was the good Lord Percy, " We will not tell thee whoso men we arc," ho says, " nor whose men that we he ; But we will hunt here in this Chase in the spite of thine aud of thee. The fattest harts in all Cheviot wo have killed, and cast to carry them away." " By my troth," said the doughty Douglas again, "therefore the tone of us" shall die tliis day." Then said the doughty Douglas unto the Lord Percy, "To kill all these guiltless men, alas! it wore great pity. But, Percy, thou art a lord of land, I am an earl' called within my country. Let all our men upon a parti stand,* and do the battle of thee and of me." 40 " Now Chi-ist's curse on his crown," " said then the Lord Percy, "whosoever thereto says nay I By my troth, doughty Douglas," he says, "thou shalt never see that day ! Neither in England, Scotland, nor France, nor for no man of a woman born. But and fortune he my chance I dare meet him, one man for one." Then hespake a squii'e of Northumberland, Richard Witheiington was his name, " It shall never be told in .South England," he says, "to King Harry the Fom-tli, for shame. I wot'" you ben gi-eat lordes two, I am a poor squii'e of hmd ; I will never see my captain fight on a field, and stand myself and look on ; But while I may my weapon wield I will fight both heart and hand." " That day, that day, that tb'cadful day : the fir.st fytto '= here I find," 50 An you will hear any more of tlie hunting Cheviot, of this yet is there more behind. SECOND rVTTE. The English men had their bows ybent, their hearts were good enow ; The fii'st of arrows that they shot oti:, scvenscore speai-mcn they slowc." Yet bides the Earl Douglas upon the bent, a captain good enow. And that was scene verament, for he wrought them both wo and wougli.'° The Douglas parted his host in thi'ec like a chief chieftain of pride, Witli suar'^ spears of mighty tree they come in on every side, Tlu'ough our English arehery gave many a wound full wide ; Many a doughty they gard''' to die, which gained them no pride. The Englishmen let their bows he, and pulled out brands that were bright : [60 It was a heavy sight to see, bright swords on basnets light.'* Thorough rich mail and manople" many stern they struck down straight. Many a freke-" that was full free there under foot did light. At last the Douglas and the Percy met, like to captains of might and of main ; They swapt together till they both swat, with swords that were of fine Milan.^' Tliese worthy frckis for to fight thereto they were full fain, Till the blood out of theu- basnets sprent as ever did hail or rain. - Wai'e of, wave aih. 2 gji]^ ortlJii. ^ Of your mothers, on your mof/er.^. * Gtt'dt', fire, live coal. ^ Barn, chieftain. 6 The tmie of us, one of us. Tone and tother were simiku: and common contractious from " that one " aud " that other." " An earl, a yerlc (Danish " jarl"). ^ Upon a parti .stand, stand apart, on one side. ^ CliriMcn cors on his croii:v. The curse of Cluist be on the head of him who says nay. '" I vot, I know. " I will fitrht both heart aud hand, f tci/ll not hoth Jiai-tc roid hnnOc. 12 Fijttc (First Euslish " fitt "j, a song. '^ Find, finish. '* Slowe, filouiihe. slew. '^ ^o and iroMg?i Fii'st Eui^hsh " wa" and " woh "). " Wo," from '" Glate about the yetu' 1408. rj Myne yc pic. The Rev. Walter W. Skeat, in his "Specimens of English Literature from 13yl to 1579, "" has. I think, solved the riddle of this coiTuptiou, by suggesting " mmiitplc, a French term for a large gauntlet protecting the hand and the whole forearm." Mr. Skeat is a master in Early English, by whom and by the Rev. Dr. Mon-is the best aids have been provided for any reader of these pages who desires *'wa" — a mimetic word — is the lamentation, " woh," the evil wrought : to advance to a more thorough study of our early literature. The its first sense is of swerve from the right line, theu error, evil, &c. book just cited is one of a, series which will be spoken of more fully i*^ Snnv (First English " swse'r "}, heavy ; perhaps " sure." " Shiver- in a note to Skelton's " Colin Clout." ing " has been suggested. I ^^ Frckc, -w^iYTioT. -' Milan, itiylfail. 104 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. Itti^ " Hold thee, Percy," said the Douglas, "and in faith I shall thee bring AVliero thdii shalt have an earl's wagis of .laniy our Scottish king. Thou shalt have thy ransom free, I hight' thee here this thing. For the manfullest man yet art thou that ever I conquered in field fighting." " Nay," said the Lord Percy, " I told it thee bcforn, That I would never yielded be to no man of a woman bom." AVith that there came an aiTow hastily forth of a mighty wone;- It hath stricken the Earl Douglas in at the breast-bone. Through liver and lungs both the sharp aiTow is gone, That never after in all his life-days he spake mo wordcs but one, That was, " Fight ye, my merry men, whiUs ye may, for my life-days ben gone ! " The Percy leaned on his brand and saw the Douglas dee ; He took the dead man by the hand, and said, "Wo is me for thee ! To have saved thy life I would have parted with my lands for years three, For a better man of heart nor of hand was not in all the north countree." Of all that see, a Scottish knight, was called Sii- Hugh the Montgomery .^ He saw the Douglas to the death was dight, he spended a spear a trusty tree, He rode upon a coursiere through a hundred archery. He never stinted nor never blave* tiU he came to the good Lord Percy. He set upon the Lord Percy a dint that Avas full sore ; With a suar spear of a mighty tree clean thorough the body he the Percy bore Out on the other side,* that a man might see, a large cloth yard and more. Two better captains were not in Christiantc than that day slain were there. An archer of Northumberland saw slain w-as the Lord Percy, He bare a bent bow in his hand was made of trusty tree. An arrow that a cloth yard was long to the hard steel haled he, A dint that was both sad and sore he sat on Sir Hugh the Montgomery. The dint it was both sad and sore that he on Jlontgomery set. The swan-feathers that his arrow bare, with his heart-blood they were wet. There was never a frcke one'' foot would flee, but .still in stour" did stand, Hewing on each other while they might cU-ee* with many a baleful brand. This battle began in Cheviot an houi-^ before the noon. And when evensong liell was rang the battle was not half done. They took on either hand by the light of the moon, Many had no strength for to stand in Cheviot the hillis aboon. Ctf fifteen hundred archers of England went away but fifty and thi-ee. Of twenty hundred spearmen of Scotland but even five and fifty ; But all were slain Cheviot within, they had no strength to stand on hy ; '" The child may rue that is unbom, it was the more pity. There was slain with the Lord Percy Sir John of Agerstone, Sir Kogcr the hinde" Hartley, Su- WilUam the bold Herone, Sir George the worthy Lumlcy,'^ a knight of great renown, Sir lialph the rich Eugby, with dints were beaten down ; For Witherington my heart was wo, that ever he slain should be, For when both his leggis were howen in two, yet he kneeled and fought on his knee. There was slain with the doughty Douglas Sir Hugh the Montgomery ; Sir Davy Lewdale, that worthy was, his .sister's son was he ; Sir Charles a Murray in that place that never a foot would flee ; Sir Hugh Maxwell, a lord he was, with the Douglas did he dee. So on the morrow they made them biers of birch and hazel so gay ; Many widows Avith weeping tears came to fetch theii- makis '^ away. Tivydale may carp of care, Northumberland may make great moan. For two such captains as slain were there on the mairh parti '^ shall never be none. Word is comen to Edinborough to Jamy the Scottish king. That doughty Douglas, lieutenant of the Marches, he lay slain Cheviot within. His hands did he weal'^ and wTing ; he said, " Alas ' and woe is me : Such another captain Scotland within," he said, " yea faith should never be." 70 80 90 100 110 120 1 Sight, promise. 2 TFoiif, or wane, crowd {from First Eucrlish " wima," custom, frequency), a great number, as in the *' Chester Plays " — " Rosted fish and honey iufere, Thereof wc had good wone." * Montgomei'y, Monggon hcrrij. •> Vlave (First English "helnf "), stayed. 5 Out on the other side, athc lothnr sudc. ^ One (u'one), who on. " StoK I- (Icelandic "styi-r"), battle. ^ Dree, endure, suffer. First English " drtdgan." ^ An hour, a noiva-. So also in the original spelling, a narow for an alTOW. 1" Hi/, high. Fii-st English "he.oh" and "hih." u Hinde, heude, coiu-teous, gentle. 1= Lumleij. Mr. Skeat points out that this has hitherto been pi-inted Lovclc through misreading of a MS. contraction. ^^ Maids, mates. First Enghsh " maca," a mate or husband; " mace," a wife. 1* March parti, border side. "•' Wca^; twist. Fir.st English " wealwian," to roll. TO A.D. 15D8.] SHORTER POEMS. 105 Word is comen to lovely London, to the fom-th Hurry om- king, That Lord Percy, chief tenant of the Marches, he lay slain Cheviot within. " God hiivc mercy on his soul," said King Hany, "good Lord, if thy will it he, I have a liundrcd captains in England," he said, " as good as ever was he ; But Percy, an I hrook my life, thy death well quite' shall he." As oiu- noble king made his avow, Ukc a noble jirince of renown, .jor the death of the Lord Percy he did the hattle of Honiildoun,^ Where six and tliirty Scottish knights on a day were beaten down ; Glcndale ghttcrcd on their armour bright, over castle, tower, and to%vn. This was tlie hunting of the Cheviot : that tear hcgan this spmii ;'■' Old men that knowen the ground well enough call it the hattle of Otterhum. At Otterburn began this spurn upon a Monenday ; There was the doughty Douglas slain, the Percy never went away. There was never a time on the march partes sen * the Douglas and the Percy met, But it was marvel an the red blood run not as the rain docs in the stret.' Jesu Clu-ist om- balls hcte,^ and to the bhss us bring. Thus was the himting of the Cheviot. God send us all good ending. 130 140 Pennon oy Douglas. (Fi-om Scott's ** Border Antiquities.") The extant copy of this okl l):illai:l ends with the signature, " Expliceth quoth liychard Sheale," but Richai-d Sheal was living in 1.588, and ^vl■ote some bad ^'erse of his own. Of this old poem, which appears to date from the close of the fifteenth cen- tury, he could have been only the transcriber. The modernised ^'ersion of it, probably not older than the time of .James I., was that known to Addison, and praised by him. It is also the received version. Some vigour has been smoothed out of the old lines by 1 QHife, requited, atoned for. " Tlie Scots were beaten at Honiildoii, September 14, 14()2. Wooler, in North iiniberlaud, is the- chief town of the Cheviot district. Near it is Homildou, or Hiunbledo^vn, in Gleudale ward. -* That rent caused this lack. * Sen, since. ^ strct, street. fi Our halis bete, amend our ills. First English " bealu," bale, evil ; " bdtan," to amend, remedy, from " btit," a remedy. 7 *' The old soufT of Cheiuj Clmse is the favourite ballad of the common people of Enij:land ; and Ben Jonson used to say he had rather been the author of it th in of all liis works. . . . For my own x^art I am so professed an admirer of this .nntiquated song that I shall jjive r;v reader a critick upon it, without any fiu-ther apology for so doiny. The greatest modei-n criticks h.ave laid it down as a i-ule, that an heroick poem should be founded upon some important precexjt of morality, adapted to the constitiition of the country in which the poet writes. Homer and Virgil have formed their plans in this view. As Greece was a collection of many govei-nments, who suffered very much among themselves, and g.ive the Persian emperor, who was their common enemy, many advant.ages over them by their mutual jealousies and animosities, Homer, in order to establish among them an union, which was so necessnry for their safety, grounds his poem ni^ou the discords of the several Grecian princes who were engaged in a coufederaoy against an Asiatick prince, and the several advantages 14 the later workman, whose version it may be pleasant to compare with the original. Addison's comments shall be given v\ith it in the form of notes. CHEVY CHASE.' (the later veksios.) God prosper long our noble Iniig, Om- lives and safeties all 1 A w'oef ul hunting once there did Lr Chevy Chase hefaU. which the enemy gained by such their discords. At the time the poem we are now treating of was wi-itten, the dissentions of the barons, who were then so many petty princes, ran very high, whether they quai-relled among themselves, or with their neighbours, and produced unspeakable calamities to the country. The poet, to deter men from such unnatural contentions, describes a bloody battle and dreadful scene of death, occasioned by the mutual feuds wliich reigned in the families of an English and Scotch nobleman. That he designed this for the instruction of his poem, we may learn from his four last lines, in which, after the example of the modern tragedians, he draws from it a iirecept for the benefit of his readers, ' God save the King, and bless the land In plenty, joy, and peace ; And grant henceforth that fold debate 'Twist noblemen may cease.' The next point observed by the greatest heroick poets, hath been to celebrate persons and actions wiiich do honour to their counti-y. Thus Virgil's hero was the founder of Rome, Homer's a prince of Greece ; and for this reason Valerius Flaccus and Statins, who were both Romans, mi.'ht be justly derided for having chosen the expedi- tion of the G ilden Fleece and the Wars of Thebes for the subjects of their epic writings. The poet bafore us has not only found out an 105 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. fA.y. H50 To diivc the deer with hound and horn Eurl riorcy took his way ; The iliikl may rue that was unborn Tlu' hunting of that day I ' 8 The stout Earl of Northumberland, A vow to God did make, His jdcasure in the Scottish woods Three smnmers' days to take, The chiefest hurts in Chevy Chass To kill and bear away ; These tidings to Earl Douglas cams In Scotland where he lay,- 16 WTio sent Earl Piercy present word He would prevent the sport. The English Earl, not fearing him, Did to the woods resort, With fifteen hundi'ed bowmen bold, All chosen men of might, Who knew full well in time of need To aim theu- shafts aright. 24 The gallant greyhounds swiftly ran To chase the fallow deer ; On Monday they began to hunt When daylight did appear ; And long before liigh noon they had A hundred fat bucks slain. Then haWng dined, the tU-ivers went To rouse the deer again. 32 hero in liis own country, but raises the reputatiou of it by several beautiful iucideuts." (AdtUsou, Spcctiitm; No. 70.) " The seutimeuts in that ballad ai-e extremely natm'al and poetical, and f>ill of the mnjestick simplicity which we admii-e in the greatest of the ancient poets ; for which reason I shall quote several passages of it, in which the thought is altogether the same with what we meet in several passai^es of the JEneid ; not that I woiild inter from thence that the poet (whoever he was) proposed to himself any imitation of those passages, but that he was directed to them in general by the same kind of poetical genius, and by the same copyings after nature. Had this old song been filled with epigrammatical tiu-ns and jKiints of wit. it might perhaps have pleased the wrong taste of some readers ; but it woidd never have become the delight of the common people, nor have warmed the heai-t of Sii- Philip Sidney like the sound of a trumpet ; it is only natiu-e that can have tliis effect, and please those tastes wliich are the most uuiu'ejudiced or the most refined. I must however beg leave to dissent from so great an authoi-ity as that of Sir Philip Sidney, in the judgment which he has passed as to the rude style and evil apparel of this antiquated song ; for there are several parts in it where not only the thought but the language is majestick, and the numbers sonorous ; at least, the apparel is much more gorgeous than many of the poets made use of in Queen EUza- beth'stime." (Addison, Siwctator, No. 74.) 1 *' What can be gi-eater than either the thought or the expression in that stanza. This way of considering the misfortunes which this battle would bring upon posterity, not only on those who were bom immediately after the battle and lost their fathers in it, but on those also who perished in futm-e b.ittles which took their rise from this quarrel of the two eiirls, is wonderfully beautiful, and conformable to the way of thinking among the ancient poets. * Audiet pugn-is vitio pirentum Kara juventus.' — Hoy." (Addison, Spectator, No. 74.) 2 Of the two preceding stanzas (lines 9 — 16), with which he joined the tenth (lines 37 — iO\, Addison wrote : " What can be more sound- ing and poetical, resembling m.re the majestic simplicity of the ancients ?^ . * Vocat ingenti clamore Cithieron Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaunis equorum : Et vox ossensu nemonun ingemimxta reuiugit.' " {Addison, Specfa'or, No. 71.) | The bowmen mustered on the liills, Well able to endure ; Their backsides all with special care Thai day were guarded sui-e. The hounds ran s%viftly tlu'ough the woods The nimble deer to take, And with their cries the lulls and dales An echo shrill did make. 40 Earl Piercy to the quarry went To view the tender deer ; Quoth he, " Earl Douglas promised once Tliis day to meet me here ; " But if I thought he would not come, No longer would I stay." With that a brave j'oung gentleman Thus to tlie Earl lUd say, 48 " Lo, yonder doth Earl Douglas come, His men in armoiu- bright. Full twenty htmdred Scottish spears All marcliing in cm- sight, " All men of pleasant Ti\-idale Fast by the river Tweed." " cease your sports !" Earl Piercy said, " And take your bows with speed,'' OG " And now with me, my countrjnnen, Your coui'age to rdv,ancc I For there was never champion yet In Scotland nor in France " That ever did on horseback come, But if my hap it were, I durst encounter man for man, With him to break a spear." 64 Earl Douglas on a milk-white steed, Slost Uke a baron bold, Rode foremost of the company, WTiose annom- .shone like gold : '' " Show me," said he, " whose men you be That hunt so boldly here ; Th,at without my consent do chase And kill mv fallow deer." 72 3 " The coimtry of the Scotch warriors, described in tliese two lost verses, has a fine romantick situation, and affords a couple of smOvith words for verse. If the reader eompai'es the foregoing six lines of the song with the following Latin verses, he will see how much they are wiitt^u iu the sxnrit of Virgil — ' Adversi camiio apiiarent, hastasque reductis Protendunt longe dextris ; et spicula vibrant ; . . . Quique altum Prseneste viri, quique arva Gabinse Junonis, gelidumque Anienem, et roscida rivis Hemica saxa colunt ; . . . qui rose.i i-in-a Veliui, Qui Tetricte hoiTentes mpes, montemque Sevemm, Casperiamque colunt, Forulosque et ilumen Himellse : Qui Tiberim Faborimque bibunt.' " ' * Tumus ut autevolans tardum x>recesserat agmen,' &c. ' Vidisti. quo Tiunius equo, quibus ibat in armis Aureus ' (Addison, Spectator, No. 74.) At the same time tliat oiu- poet shows a laudable partiality to his countrjmien, he represents the Scots after a manner not imbecoming so bold and bi*ave a people." (Addison, Spectator, No. 70.) TO A.D. 15G8.] SHORTER POEMS. 107 The first man that did answer make Was nohlc Piercy, ho, Wlio said, " We Ust not to declare, Nor show whoso men wc be ; " Yet wc will sj)cnd oiu' dearest Ijlood The cliicfcst harts to slay." Then Douglas swore a solcniii oath, And thus in rage did say,' " Ere thus I will outhraved be, One of us two shall die 1 I know thee well ! an earl thou art, Lord Piercy I su mu 1. " But trust me, Piercy, pity it were, And great offence, to kill Any of those oiu' liarmloss men. For they have done no ill ; " Let thou and I the battle try, jVnd set oiu" men aside." " Accurst be he," Lord Piercy said, " By whom this is denied." Then stepped a gallant squire forth, — Witherington was his name, — Who said, " I would not have it told To Hemy oiu- kmg, for shame, " That e'er my captain fought on foot. And I stand looking on : You be two Earls," said Witherington, " And I a Squii-c alone. 80 8S 96 W I i II i.uiNiiToN Castle. (Now ))iitlecl (loioi. From Buck's Slcclcli, 1728, tii Hodgson's " Noi'tliiiiii- hcrlnnd.") " I'U do the best that do I may, A\liile I have power to stand I \ATiile I have power to wield my sword, I'll fiirht with heart and hand : " 104 ' Upon the nest three stanzas Addison wrote : " His sentiments and actions are every way suitable to an hero. ' One of us two,' says he, ' must dye : I am an earl as well as yoiu'self, so that yon can have no pretence for refusiuj,' the combat : however,' says lie, ' 'tis pity, and indeed would he a sin, that so many imiocent men sliould perish for OIU* sakes ; rather let you and I end oui- quarrel in single fight.' " (Addison, Spectator, No. 70.) Our English archers bent their bows — Then- hearts were good and true, — At the first flight of arrows sent. Full foiu'score Scots they slew. To drive the deer with hound and horn, Douglas bade on the bent ; Two captains moved with mickle might, Theii- spears in shivers went. 112 They closed full fast (m every side. No slackness there was found. But many a gallant gentl<>man Lay gasping on the ground. O Chiist 1 it was gTeat grief to see How each man chose his spear, And how the blood out of their breasts Did gush like wafer clear I 1'20 At last these two stout Earls did meet Like captains of great might ; Like lions moved they laid on load, They made a, cruel tight. They fought, until they both did sweat. With swords of tenijiered steel, Till blood adowni their cheeks like rain They triekUng down did feel. 128 " yield thee, Piercy ! " Douglas said, "And in faith I will thee bring Where thou shall high ad\-aneed be By James oui- .Scottish king ; " Thy ransom I will freely giv.^, And this report of thee. Thou art the most coiu-ageous knight That ever I did see." i3S "No, Douglas 1" quoth Lord Piercy then, " Thy jjroffer I do seorn ; T will not yield to any Scot That ever yet was born ! " With that there came an aiTOw keen Out of an English bow, Who struck Earl Douglas to the heart A deep and deadly blow ;'- Itl '\^^lo never spake more words than these, " Fight on, my mcn-y men all I For why ? my life is at an end. Lord Piercy sees my fall." ' - ".31neas was woiuided after the same manner by an unknown hand in the midst of a i^arly : * Has inter voces, medi.a inter talia verba, Ecce viro strideus alis allapsa sagitta est, lucertum qua pulsa minu ' " (Addison, Spectator, No. 74.) ^ Of the two preceding stanzas Addison said : '* When these brave men had distiuiruished tliemselves in the battle and a single combat with each other, in the midst of a generous parly, full of heroick sen- timents, the Scotch earl falls ; and with bis dyiuir words eucoiu-ages his men to revenge his death, representing to tlicm, as the most bitter circumstance of it, that his rival saw liim fall. Merry Men, in the language of tliose times, is no more than a cheerful word for companions and fellow-soldiers. A passage in tlie Eleveutli Book 108 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1450 Then leaving life, Earl Piercy took The dead man by the hand ; AVlio said, " Earl Douglas ! for t}iy life AVould I had lost my land ! 152 ** Christ ! my very heart doth bleed For sorrow for thy sake ! For sure, a more renowned knight i\Iisehanee did never take I" ^ A Icnight amongst the Soots there was, A\Tiich saw Earl Douglas die, Wlio straight in ^^Tath did vow revenge Upon the Lord Picrey ; 160 Sir Hugh ilontgomery he was called, AVho, with a spear full bright, Well mounted on a gallant steed, Kan fiercely through the fight ; He past the English archers all "Without all tlread or fear. And through Earl Piercy's body then He thi'ust his hateful spear. • 168 "With such a vehement force and might His body ho did gore, The staff ran tlirough tlic other side A large cloth yard and more. So thus - did both those nobles die, AVhose courage none could stain. An English archer then perceived The noble Earl was slain ; 176 of Vii-gil's JEncid is very much to be admired, where Cauxilla iu her last agonies, instead of weeping over the wound she had received, as one might have expected from a warrior of her sex, considers only (like the hero of whom we are now speaking) , how the battle should be continued after her death. * Turn sic esspiraus,' &c. * A gablieriug mist o'erclouds her chearful eyes ; And from her cheeks the rosie coloiu* flies. Then turns to lier, whom, of her female ti-aiu. She tnisted most, and thns she speaks with pain. Aeca, 'tis past ! he swims before my sight, Inexorable Death ; and claims his right. Bear my last words to Tuinius, fly with speed, And bid him timely to my chiu-ge succeed : Repel the Ti'ojaus, and the town reUeve : Farewell ' Tumus did not die in so heroic a manner ; though onr poet seems to have had his eye upon Turnus'a speech in the last verse— ' Lord Piercy sees my fall.' ' Vicisti, et victum tendere jialmas Ausonii videre ' " {Addison, Spcdatov, No. 70.) 1 " Earl Piercy's lamentation over his enemy is generous, beau- tiful, and passionate ; I must only caution the reader not to let the simplicity of the style, wliich one mny well pardon iu so old a poet, l>rejudice him against the gren.tness of the thought. That beautiful line. Takiiif} the dvnd man hij the hand, will i>ut the reader in mind of .ffiueas's behaviour towai'ds Laiisus, whom he himself had slain as he came to the rescue of his aged father. ' At vero ut vultum vidit morieutis, et ora, Ora modis Anchisiades pallentia miris ; lugemuit, miserans graviter, dextramque tetendit,* &c. * The pious prince beheld young Lausus dead ; He gi'iev'd, he wept ; then grasp'd his hand, and said, Poor hapless youth ! Wliat pi-aises can be X'aid To worth so gi'eat ! ' " (Addison, Spectator, No. 70.) 2 " Of all the descriptive parts of this song, there axe none more beautiful than the foiu- following stanzas, which have a great force He had a bow bent in his hand Made of a trusty tree ; An arrow of a cloth yard long Unto the head di'ew he. Against Sir Hugli Jhmtgomery So right his shaft lie set; The grey goose-wing that was thereon, In his heart-blood was wet. 18^ This fight did last froui break of day Till setting of the sun ; For when they rung the evening bell The battle scarce was done. With stout Earl Piercy there was slain Sii" John of Ogerton, Sir Robert Ratcliife and Sir William, Sir James that bold baron ; 192 And with Sir- George and good Sli" James, Both knights of good account, Good Sir Ralph Raby there was slain, ^^^lose prowess did surmount. For AVitherington needs must I wail As one in duleful duuips. For when his legs were smitten off, He fought upon his stumps.-* 20O And with Earl Douglas there was slain Sir Hugh jMontgomery, Sir- Charles Can-el that from the field One foot would ne^■er fly ; Sir Charles Hurray of Ratcliif too, — His sister s son was he, — Sir David Lamb, so well esteemed, Yet saved eoidd not be ;■* 20S And the Lord Maxwell in like case Did with Earl Douglas die; Of twenty hundi-ed Scottish spears, Scarce fifty-five did fly ; and spiiiu in them, and are fllled with very natural circumstances. The thought in the third stanza was never touched by any other poet, and is such an one as would have shiued iu Homer or iu Vii'gil." (Addison, Spectator, No. 74.) ^ " Iu the catalogue of the English who fell, "WitheiTugtou's behaviour is in the same manner particularised very artfully, as the reader is prepared for it by that account whicli is given of him [lines 94— 100] iu the beginning of- the battle (though I am satisfied your little buttoon readers, who have seen that passage ridiculed iu Hudibras, will not he able to take the beauty of it : for which reason I dai'e not so much as quote itj. We meet with the same heroick sentiments in Vugil — * Non pudet, O Kutuli, cunctis pi'O taliJ U5 unam Objectare animam ? numerone an viribus iEqui Non sum us ? ' " (Addison, Spectator, No. 74.) * " One may observe likewise, that in the catalogue of the slain the author has followed the esami^le of the greatest ancient poets, not only iu giving a long list of the dead, but by diversifying it with little characters of iJarticular persons. The familial* sound in these names destroys the nwjesty of the description : for this reason I do not mention this pai't of the poem but to shew the natiu'al cast of thought which ax^peai's iu it, as the two last verses look almost like a translation of Vugil— ' C.idit et Ripheus justissimus unus Qui fuit in Teucris et servantissimus oequi, Diis aliter visum est ' " (Addison, Spectator, No. 74. ) TO A.D. 1508.] SHORTER POEMS. 109 Of fifteen hundi'cd Englishmen Went homo but fifty-tlirco ; The rest were slain in t'he\-j- Chase, TJuUrr the gTcenwood tree. 21G Next day did many widows come Theh- husbands to bewail : They washed theii- wounds in brinish tears, But all would not prevail. Their bodies bathed in jjiu-jde blood, They bore with them away ; They kissed them dead a thousand times WTien they were clad in clay.' 'i'2i This news was brought to Edinbm-gh Where Scotland's king did reign, That brave Earl Douglas suddenly Was with an arrow slain. " heavy news !" King James did say, " Scotland can witness be I have not any captain more Of such account as he ! " 232 Like tidings to King Hcmy came Within as shoi't a space, That riercy of Xortliumberland Was slain in Chevy Chase, " Now God be with him ! " said our king, " Sith 'twill no better bo, I trust I have within ray realm Five hundi'cd as good as he ! 240 " Yet shall not Scot nor Scotland say But I will vengeance take, And be revenged on them all For brave Lord Piercy's sake." This vow full well the king performed After on Humble Down ; In one day fifty kniglits were slain, With lords of great renown, 24S And of the rest of .small account. Did many hundi'cds die : '- Thus ended tlie hunting in Cho^'v Chase Made by the Earl Piercy. God save the King, and bless the land In plenty, joy, and peace ; And gr.ant henceforth that foul debate Twi.xt noblemen mav cease.' 256 1 *' "What can be more natural or more moving than the circum- stances in which he describes the behaviour of those women who had lost their husbands ou tbis fatal day ? " (Addison, SpectatoVt No. 74.) 2 On the passage from line 225 to line 250 Addison's note is that *' the Eughsb are the first who t.ake the field, and the last who quit it. The Eii^^Ush briner only fifteen hundred to the battle, the Scotch two thousand. The Enirlish keep the field with fifty-three ; the Scotch retire with fifty-five : all the rest ou each side beint,' slain in battle. But the most remarkable circumstance of this kind, is the different manner in which the Scotch and EngUsh kiufjs receive the news of this fight, and of the great men's deafhs wlio commanded in it." (Addison. Spcdatoi-, No. 70.) " *'Thus we see how the thoughts of this poem, which naturally CHAPTER VII. William Dunbar and Gavin Douglas. (a.d. 1480 TO A.D. 15-22.) William Dunbar and Uavin Douglas were Scottisli poets of higli mark in the first years of tlie sixteentli centtiry, when Seotlaiul was rich in song. Dunbar was boru about tlie year 14G0 ; graduated in 1477 as Bachelor of Arts, and in Ufi) as M.A. at St. Andrews, in St. Salvator's College ; was, for a time, a Franciscan ; afterwards was employed much in the service of James IV., King of Scotland, and received from him, in 1.500, a pension of £10 Scots. The buying power of money was much greater then than now, but ten pounds in Scottish currency were not quite three pounds English. The pension was doubled in 1.507, and raised from twenty to eighty pounds in 1510. Dunbar wrote, in May, 150;5, an allegorical court-poem, " The Thistle and the Rose," on the marriage of King James IV. to Margaret Tudor; and before 1508, when it was first printed, with his " Lament for the Makars," another alle- gorical poem, on Reason as " The Golden Terge," or shield, by which man is defended against the assaults of Love, till Presenfte throws her blinding dust into his eyes. Dunbar, with a little body, and a large, free mind, with vigour, humour, tenderness — a range of power found only in few — was the best poet who had yet arisen since the days of Chaucer. How rich the Scottish nation was in song may lie inferred from Dunbar's lines, written in 1507 or 1508, as a " Lament for the Makars," or jioets, who had died in his time, and whom then, because lie was dangerously ill, and in expectation of death (Thnor mortis contvrhat me — "The fear of death disquiets me "), he believed that he was soon to follow. LAMENT FOR THli MAKARS.' WHEN- HE W.^S SEIK. I that in heill' was and glaidness, Am troublit now with great sciloiess, And feeblit ^^-ith infli'mitie : Timor mortis eoiitiirbaf mv. arise from the subject, are always simple, and sometimes exquisitely noble; that tlie language is often very sounding, and that the whole is wiitten with a tnie poetical spii'it. If this song had been wTitteu in the Gothic m,anner, which is the delight of all oiu- little wits, whether winters or readers, it would not have hit the taste of so many ages, and have pleased tl'c readers of all ranks and conditions. I shall only beg pai'don for such a i>rofusion of Latin quotations ; which I should not have made use of, but that I feared my oi^-u judg- meut would have looked too singular on such a subject, had not I suiiported it by the practice and authority of Virgil." (Addison, Sjiecfdfor, No. 74.) + Malarfi, poets. The Greek word 7roitiTt;c means a nialwr, and maker was the Old English name for jjoet. Thus Sir Philip Sidney wrote in his " Apologie for Poetrie :" " The Greeks called him a xioet, which name bath, as the most excellent, gone thi-ough other liiu- guages. It Cometh of this word, jiotcrn, which is, to make; wherein, I know not whether by luck or iv-isdom, we Englislimen have met with the Greeks in calling him a maker ; which name, how high and incomparable a title it is, I had rather were known by marking the scope of other sciences than by my allegation." 5 ilfill (First Eughsh " hffi'lu "), health. no CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1480 Our pleasance here is all vain glory, This false -warld is hut transitory, The flesh is hrueklc,' the Fiend is slee : ^ Timor mortis contitrbat mc. The state of man does change and vary, Now sound, now seik, now- hlj-th, now sarj',' Now dansand merry, now like to die : Timor mortis conturbat mc. No state in erd ■• here standis sicker ; As with the wind wavis the wicker,' So wa\'is this warld's vanitie : Timor mortis contKrbnt mc. 16 W"^ Gradientes is teUrEHBIA. {From Kolhcin's " Bancc of Death.") Unto the Deid goes all estates, Princes, Prelates, and Potestatos,'^ Baith rich and piiir of all degi'ce : Timor mortis conturbat me. 1 Bx-iLckXc {First Engrlisli *' brecan," to break), brittle. 2 Sice, sly, crafty. Icelandic '* slfegi'." 3 Sary (First Eujrlish " sarig: "), from *' sar," a sore, wound, soiTOW. ■* EyA, earth. First En^Iisli ** card." 5 Wicker (Danish "Tigre," from " viger," to be pliant), a twig-. ^ Foiesiaics, potentates. Latin " potestas," power; pliu-al, " potes- tates/' powers, and also persons in power. The seven stanzas beginning- "Unto the Deid" (Death) "gois all Estaitis " were evidently suggested by the embleuiatic religions spectacle known as the " Dance of Macaber," or the "Dance of Death," once probably set forth by living actors in churches of France, and in the fifteenth centui'y a common subject of religious painting and sciilpture. It usually appeared with api)ropriate texts or descriptive verses, illus- trating each representation of death as the leader of the dance of life with men of eveiy degree. In a Latin poem of the twelfth cen- tiu'y, ascribed to Walter Map, there is a series of lines in which men of different estates, beginning with the Pope and ending with the l>auper, pass before the mind's eye in procession, each declaring that he is on his way to death. It is called a '* Lament for Death, and Coimsel as to the Living God." The name " Macabre " probably arose from the association of this subject with a painting that illns- ti*ated a thii-teenth ceutuiy legend of the lesson given by certain hideous spectres of Death to three noble youths when hunting in a forest. They aftei-wartls arrived at the cell of St. Macarius, an Egyx^tian anchorite, who was sho^vn in a painting by Andi-ew Orgagna jiresenting them with one hand a label of admonition on the vain glory of life, and mth the other hand pointing to three open coffins. In one coffin is a skeleton, in one a king. A painting of a Dance of Death at Mindcu, in Westphalia, had for a traditional date 1383. Another, iu the churchyard of the lunoceuts, at Paris, was certainly pointed in 1434. One of the most famous was the Dance irEllCUllAjI fASiOl.Eil. He taks the knichtis into" field, Anarmit" under helm and shield ; Victor he is at aU melee ; ' Timor mortis conturbat me. •24 ^Lm SriiiT" Miji;ir:NTL"i;. of Deatli at Basle, said to have been painted hy order of the prelates who were at the Grand Coimcil of Basle, between the years 1431 and 1443, and also wrongly ascribed to Hans Holbein. It went its o^vu way to death ; its destruction was completed in 18(15 : and it is now known only by such coi)ies as were made. There were such paintings in England also ; one was iu the cloister of Old St. Paul's, pulled down iu 1549, of which Sii* Thomas More wi-ote, " If we not only hear this word Death, but also let it sink into our hearts, the vei-y fantasy and deep imagination thereof, we shall perceive thereby that we were never so greatly moved by the beholding of the Dance of Death pictxired in St.- Paul's as we shall feel ourselves stUTcd and altei-ed by the feeling of that imagination in our hearts." Although the evidence is not beyond all question, there is very little doubt that the Dance of Death shown iu a series of woodcuts illustiutiug a volume published at Lyons in 1538 as *' Les Simulachres et Histori('^es Faces de la Mort, autant elegamment pourtraictcs que artificiellement imagindes," was fi-om designs by Holbein. From this book, there- fore, I have taken illustrations to the stanzas of Dunbar. " Inio^ in. ^ Atxarmii, armed. 'J Mdce (French " m^de "), conflict. TO ».D. 1522.J SHORTER POEMS. lil That Strang' unmerciful tjTand Takes, on the mother's breast soukund,- The halie, full of hcniynitie : Timor iiiorfix conlurbat me. Homo natcs de Mulieke. He takes the champion in the stour,^ The captain closit in the torn','' The lady in hoiu- ^ full of beautie : Timoy mortis contnrbat me. Ddctjnt in Bonis Dies suos. He spares no lord for his piscence,' Nor clerk for his intelligence ; His a-wf id straik^ may no man flee : Timor mortis conturbat mc. * Strong, stronf?- 2 Sonltnnf\, swckinf?. 3 Stour (Icelumlic " styr "), * Tour, tower. 5 Bom- (First English " biir s Fi&cence, puissance. ' SUaik, stroke. fight. , chamber. 32 Indice mihi si nosti omnia. Art -magicians, and astrologis, Rethors, logicians, theologis, Them heljMS no conclusions slee :' Timor mortis conturbiit mc. 40 Medice, ctra teipsum. In medicine tlie most practicians, Leeches, siu'gcons, and physicians. Them self fra death may not supplic : Timor mortis conturbat me. I see that Makais, amang the lave,' Plays here their ijadyancs,'" syne" goes to grave, Spairit '- is not theu' facultiu : Timor mortis conturbat me. -18 ' Cojiclusi'oiis tlee, subtle deductions. A syllogism in lo^ic con- sists of two premises and a conclusion deduced from them. lu another sense "conclusions slee" helped Cleopatra, for, observes Octavius, at the close of the play — " Her physician tells me She hatli pursued conclusions infinite Of easy ways to die." 5 Die lave, the rest, those left. '<> Paiyancs, pageants, formed from the spelling " padgean." 1' Sync, afterwards. ^ Spairit, spirit. 112 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 148D He has done pitcously devour, The noble Chaucer, of Makars flow'r, The Monk of Bury,' and Gower, all thi'ee : Timor mortis coiiturbut inc. The gude Sir- Hew of Eglintoun, Etrik, Hcryot, and Wyntoun, He has ta'en out of this countrie : Timor mortis conturbat me. That scorpion fcll= has done infck' JIaistcr John Clerk, and James Afflek, Frae ballat-niaking and tragedie : * Timor mortiy conturbat me. Holland and Barbour he has bcrcvit ; * Alacc I that ho nocht with us leavit Sir JIungo Lockhart of the Leo : Timor mortis conturbat me. Clerk of Tranent cik he has ta'en. That made the awnteris'' of Ga\v;inc ; Sir Ciilbcrt Hay ondit has he : Timor mortis conturbat me. He has Blind Hariy, and Sandy Traill Slain with his shot of mortal hail, Whilk Patrik Johnstoun micht not flee : Timor mortis conturbat me. He has reft Mcrscir- his endite,' That did in love so lively write, So short, so quick,^ of sentence hie : ' Timor mortis conturbat me. Ho has ta'en RouU of Aberdeen, jVnd gentle Eoull of Corstorphine ; Two better fallows'" did no man see: Timor mortis conturbat me. In runfermline he has ta'en Broun, With ilaistcr Kobert Ilennsoim ; Sir John the Ross embraced has he : Timor mortis conturliat me. 56 64 72 And ho has now ta'en last of aw, Good gentle Stobo, and Quintine Schaw, Of whom all wichtis" has pitie : 'Timor mortis conturbat mc. 88 Ciood Slaister Walter Kennedy, In point of deid'- lies veiily. Great ruth it were that so suld be : Timor mortis conturbat me. Sen he has all my Brother ta'en, He will not let me live alane. On forso I maun '■* his next prej' be : Ti/nor mortis conturbat mc. 96 Sen ''' for the Death remeid is none, Best is that we for death dispone,'* -Vfter oui' death that live may we : Timor mortis conturbat me. Let us next take two short poems Ly Dunbar upon life and its cares. 80 1 The Monfc of Bury, Lydgate. ' Fell, cruel. s In/rfc, infect, with liis scorpion sting. * Tragedie, metrical tales — not yet dramatic — of men fallen gi-ievously from higli estate. = Berevit (First Euglisli "bereaflan." to seize, rob, spoil), snatched from us. 6 Awntens, adventures. 7 Eildite, composino: in verse. 8 Quick (First English *' cwic." living), lively. s SeiitciiM hie, high thought, weighty rnd terse in expressiou. In Putteuham's "Arte of English Poesie " (158DI "sentence" is thus defined : " In weighty causes and for great piu^ioses, wise persuaders r.S8 grave and weighty speeches, specially in matter of advice or counsel, for which piu*pose there is a manner of speech to allege texts or authorities of witty sentence, such as smack moral doctrine and teach wisdom and good hehavioiir : by the Greek origin-Al we call him the Director, by the Latin he is called Sententia : we may call him the Sage Sayer, thus .... and what our sovereign lady (Quteu Eliz.abeth) writ in defiance of fortune — ' Never think you Fort vine can bear the sway Where Virtue's force can cause her to obey.' '* 10 fancies, fellows. The Wheel of Forti'ne. (From KctttJi's " Mavjarita Pltilosophica.") THE CHANGES OF LIFE. T seek about this warld unstable, To find ane sentence conveneable; But I can not, in aU my wit, Sa true ane sentence find of it, .As say it is deceivable. n Wlcliiis (First English " wiht "), wights, beings. 12 In jHiint of dfld, at point of death. Walter Kennedy was a fellow- poet with whom Dunbar had " Flj^ines." or poetical scolding matches, a rough representation of the " teusous " of the South. The scoldings broke no bones, as the tournaments sometimes did. and were as free as the mock contests of animal strength from any personal ill wilL '3 On forsc I mavu, of need I must. So in Bacon's " Advancement of Learning :" " If they had considered .... the rest of those extern chaj'acters of things, as philosophers and in nature, their inquiiaes must of force have been of a far other kind than they are." 1* .Sen. since. 1^ Dinjyo-nc, dispose, set ourselves in order. TO i.D. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. 113 For yesterday, I did declari' How that the time was safl and fair. Come in as fresh as peacock feddar ; Th'3 day it stangis like anc cddar. Concluding- ali in my conti-air. Yesterday fair up sprang the flowers. This day they are all slain with showns ; And fowlis in forest that sang clear, Now weepis with ane dreary cheer, Full cauld are baith their hcds ami hewers 10 1.3 So next to Summer, Winter bein : Xext after comfort, caris keen ; Next after dark night, the miitlif ul morrow ; Next after joy, aye comis soitow : So is this warld, and aye has been. 20 NO TREASURE AVAILS WITHOl'T GLADNESS. P.i' merry, man, and tak not .sair in mind The wavering of this wretfhit warld of sorrow ; To God be humble, and to thy friend be kind. And with thy neighbours gladly lend and bonow ; His chance to nicht, it may Vie thine to-morrow ; r.c blj-th in lieai't for ony aventure ' I'or oft with wise men 't has been said aforrow^ ■Without Gladness avaUis no Treasure. 8 Male thee gude cheer of it that-'' God thee scndis. For warldis wrak'' but" weilfare nocht a\ailis ; Nac gude is thine, saveonly that tliou sjicndis, Uemenant all thou brukis but with bailis : " Seek to solace when sadness thee iissailis ; In dolour lang thy life may not indure, \Vlierefore of comfort set up aU thy sailis ; Without Gladness availis no Treasui-e. IG Follow on pity, flee trouble and debate. With famous' folkis hald thy company : Be charitable and humble in thine estati-. For warldly honour lastis but a cry : For trouble in erd tak no melancholy ; " l!e rich in patience, gif thou in guids In- puiv. Who livis merry he livis michtily ; Without Gladness availis no Treasui-c-. Thou sees thir' wretches set with sori'ow and (-are To gather guids in all their livis spai-e : And when theu- bags are full, their selves arc- Ijarc, .\nd of their riches but the keeping has : Wliilc others come to spend it that has grace, Whilk of thy winning'" no labour had nor cure," Tak thou example, and spend with merriness : Without Gladness availis no Treasure. 24 32 1 Fill* ony nvcntuTCt notwitlistimcUng aiiythinsr that raa.v hai>pen. - Aforww, ufore. :> /( tliat, that which. ■' Wi-al:, what is thrown up by the waves. '■ hnt, without. '■- "All the rest you possess only with sorrows" {hrvlnSt First Eiiiflish " bi-ucan." German *' brauchen," to possess or use). 7 Famous, of good chai-acter, the opposite to infamous in credit and reputation. It is n t meant in the sense of " celebrated." « " Do not be cast down because of earthly trouitles." ^ Tl'r, these. "> Winning, toil to procure. 1' t'ura (Latin "cura"), care. 15 Though all the work that e'er had living wieht Were only thine, no more thy part does fall But meat, di-ink, dais, and of the lave a sieht,'- Yet to the Judge thou sail give compt of all ; Ane reckoning richt comes of ane ragment '^ small : Be just and joyous, do to none inj6re. And Truth sail mak thee Strang as ony wall ; " Without Gladness availis no Treasure. 40 Tlie vigour of Dunbar may be repi-esented by a poem iutrodiicmg such personifications as are liardly to be found in our literature, although it abounds in allegorical verse, before the date of Spenser's "Faerie Queen." This is THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS. Of Fcbruar the fifteen nii-ht. Full lang before the dayis liclit, I lay infill '^ a trance ; And then I saw baith Heaven and HeU : Me thoeht, amangs the fiendis fell,'^ Mahoun " gart cry '''' ane Dance Of shrewis" that were never shriver, Agains the feast of Fastem's even,-" To mak their observance. The Oli> Draikin. Hnrifinii MS. i.V9, p. 1U9. " Of the lave a sicht, of the rest a sight. Meat and drink enter into a man, his clothing attaches to him in life as another skin; the rest is all the outward show of life, he has sight of it only. The fancy bred of it is — " Engendered in the eyes With gazing fed ; and fancy dies In the cradle where it lies. Let us all ring fancy s knell ; I'U begin it.— Ding, doug, bell. Ding, dong. bell. So may the outward shows be least themselves, The world is still deceived with ornament." (" Merchant of Venice," " " A small bill makes a straight reckoning " (" ragman,' ment," a long piece of writing, a document, an account to be settled i . In the" Vision of Piers Plowman" the Pope's bull is a "ragman" with which the Pardoner " raught rings and brooches." From "ragman-roll" comes "rigmarole." » Compare Chaucer's " And ti-uth thee shall deliver it is no drede," page 50. li Ijitd!, in. « Fi-li, crael. " Jlnhoiin, Mahomet, identified with the Fiend. " Giivt ci'!), caused to be cried or proclaimed. •^ Sltrea-s, evildoers. 2» Fastenis even, the evening before Lent began, when caniival wa.« kept to say good-bye to delights of the flesh with a last bout of mirtU and feasting. ' Act iii.l ' rag- lU CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. ;.A.D. iiso He bad gallants gae graith* a g>'es,- And cast up gamountis^ in the skies, As varlets*' do in France. ^Lct see, quoth he, now wha begins, With that the foul Seven Deadly Sins Begouth to leap at anis."^ 12 •2-i 31 Phide. From HarJcian MS. 4379. p. 113. And fil■:^t of all in Dance was Pi-ide, With hail- wyld' back, and bonnet on side, Like to make vaistie wanis;^ And round about him, as a wheel, Hang all in rumples to the heel His kethat^ for the nanis : ^^ Mony proud trumpoiu'^^ with him trippit ; Thi-oug-h scaldand fire aye as they skippit They giraed with hideous gi-anis.^- ****** Then Ire came in with stm-t^^ and strife : His hand was aye upon his knife. He brandished ^^ lilvc a beu* :^^ 1 Graith ,tc nanis, wasteful (extravagant) fashions. ""Wane" (First English " wime '*), a mode or fashion. 9 Kcthat, cassock. *<> For Die nanis, for the nonce, 11 Trtuujtour (French " trompem-"), deceiver. 12 They grinned with hideous gidus. ^3 Stiu-t (D;\nish "slyi-t," strife), wrath. 1* Brandi'ihLd (French "bmndir"), shook. ^^ Bcir, stoim-wind. Icel:ndic "byre," tempest; Old Swedish ■*boer," the wind. Boasters, braggars, and bargainers, After him passit in to '** paii's. All bodin ^^ in feii' of weir : '^ Wrath. From HarUian MS. 4379, p. 146. In jackis,^^ and scryjitpis,-" and bonnets of steel, Theii- legs wei-e ehainit to the heel,-^ Frawart" was theii- aft'eii- : -^ Some upon other with brandis beft,-^ Some jaggit-^ others to the heft,-^ With kni\4s that shai-p could shear. 42 Envt. From Earlcian MS. 4379, p. 29. Next in the Danee followit Envy, Filled full of feud and felony, Hid maliec and despite : For privy hatred that traitor tremlit : -' Him followit mony fi'oik-^ dissemlit. With fenyeit wordis quite : -^ IS In to, in. 17 Bodni, f^imished (Icelandic " boa,'' to i^repare, provide). "Well or ill boden " was an old Scottish law term for well or ill provided. is^n/in- ofn-cir, or " in feare of were" (war), was another technical term (from First English " faran," to go ; " far," a journey) for a w..i- march. '3 Jacks, coats, either of mail or quilted with stout leather. ^ Scri/ppis, bags or pouches used as knapsacks. -1 Oiainit to the heel, iu chain armour to the heel. — Frau-a^-t, froward. 25 Affeir, aspect. First English "feorh," the life, the man, the face or aspect. 24 WiOi hrandis heft, beat with swords (to "beff" and **baff,"lo beat ; " baff," a blow ; Old French " bufEe," a stroke ; whence English " buffet " and *' rebuff"). 25 Jaggit, pierced. =6 Hcff, hilt. ^ Tremlit, trembled. ^ Freik, a strong man, sometimes used specially of a man apt to find offence ; energetic strength having of old been commonly aggres- sive. 25 Fenyeit, feigned. — Wordis quite, innocent words {qiUtey French " cpiitte," acquitted of offence). TO i.D. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. 115 jVnd tiattereris in to men's faces ; .Vnu backbitcris in secret places, To lie that had delight ; And rownaris' of false Icsings,- Alace ! that courtis of noble kings Of them can ne'er be quite.' 54 ^^^ ^ ^ ^^F 1 i^^K ^^2 p 1 6n Earleian MS. 4379, p. 36. Next him in Dance came C'ovetyce, Root of all evil, and ground of ^'ice, That never could be content : Cativis, "wretchis, and ockt-raris,* Hudpikis,* hoarders, and g-adderaris. All with that warlock* went : Out of their throats they shot on other Het,^ molten gold, me thocht, a futher,'' As fire-flaucht ' maist fervent ; Aye as they toomit'" them of shot. Fiends filled them new up to the tlu'ot With gold of allkin prent." Sync SwciiTiess,'- at the second bidiling, Came like a sow out of a midding. Full sleepy was his gnmyie : " Mony sweir bumbard" belly huddi'oun,'^ ' Rownaris, wliisperers (" rune," a si^ in writing:, a secret mart, a mystery: '* runian," to speak mysteriously, to whisper). Attlieeudof Act ii. of " Kin? John," Faulconbrid^e speaks of the King of France *' Whom zeal and charity brought into the field As God's own soldier, rounded in the ear With that same piuT^ose changer, that sly devil tickling Commodity." - Lesings, lies. ^ Quite, quit, free. * Ockeraris (" okerers," from " ecan." to eke or increase), usurers. 5 Hiidpifcis, misers. " Hoddypeke" was also a general term of con- tempt (perhaps from Danish " hud," tlie skin, and "pikere," to nip). 6 Warlocli, wizard, one in compact with the devil. ■ Het, hot. ^ Futher. First a horse-load of fodder, then a weight of 128 lbs., here used indefinitely for any great quantity. » Fire-flaucht, fire-flash. "> Toomit, emptied. Icelandic " tom," emptiness. " Allkin prent, all kinds of print ; die, or coinage. '2 Sirc(Vnes.s, laziness. First English " swse'r," lazy. ^■^ Grnn;/iV, a contemptuous word for the mouth. French " groin," snout. '* Bnvihard, perhaps droning ("bumbart," Italian "bombare," the drone bee, bumble bee). In Piers Plowmau it is said of Rose the Eegrater's best ale that "wlioso bummed thereof boughte it there- after," where bumming seems to mean tasting with smaxik of the lips. '^' Bellii huddroim, old Scottish term for a gluttonous sloven. " Huddroun " means one flabby and slovenly. Jamiesou derives the corresponding word "hudderin" from the Teutonic " huyderen," to have the udder distended. Mony slut, daw,'^ and sleepy duddroun,'^ Him ser\-it aye with sonnyic ; '^ He di-ew them f urth intill ''■" a chain, And Belial with a bridle rein E'er lashed them on the lunj-ie : -" In Dance they were so slaw of feet, They gave them in the fire a heat, And made them quicker of cunyie.-' 78 Then Lecheiy, that laithly corpse,"^ Came berand-' like a baggit horse,'-* And Idleness did him load ; There was with him ane ugly sort,-^ And mony stinkand foul tramort,-* That had in sin been dead : '\\'Tien they were cnterit in the Dance, They were full strange of countenance, Like torches bumand red. G7 [Three lines omitted.] Then the foul monster, Gluttony, Of wame-' insatiable and greedy, To Dance he did him dress : '^ Him followit mony foul di'unkart. With can and collop, cup and quart. In surfeit and excess ; Full mony a waistless wally-drag,-' With wamis unwieldable, did furth wag. In creesh™ that did incress : Drink I aye they cried, \\'ith mony a gaij). The fiends gave them bait lead to laip. Their levcray '■ was na less. 102 Nae minsti-els plajat to them but doubt,'^ For gleemen there were balden out, Be day, and eik by nicht ; Except a minstrel that slew a man. So to his heritage he wan, And cnterit by brief of richt. 108 Then cried Mahoun for a Hielan' Padyane : ^ Sj-ne ran a fiend to fetch JMakfadyane, Far northwart in a ncuch ; '' Be he^ the coronach had done shout, Ersche men's so gatherit him about, 16 Daw, sluggard; applied like "slut" to a woman. The word is allied to doze, &c., and means deadening of vital powers. 1^ Buddromi, drab. Icelandic " dudra," to be slovenly. 18 Soiinyjc (Old French " soign," modem French '* soin "), care. 19 Intill, in. ^ Lunyie, loin. 21 Cvnyie, apprehension. 22 Corpse (French " corps"), body ; word not originally limited to the dead body. 23 Berand or beirand, roaring. 24 Baggit horse, stalhon. 2* Sort, set or company. 2*' Tramorf, dead body in state of corruption. 2- Wame, stomach. 28 Dress, prepare. 29 Wally-drag, feeble, puny person. Lord Hailes suggested as deri- vation " wallowit dreg," a withered outcast ; Macphei-son, " drochil," diminutive of " droch," a pigmy. ^ Creesli, grease. 31 Their leveray, that which was given to them (livr(?e," delivered : a servant's livery is so called because given to him by his employer). 32 Bui doubt, without doubt. Poets have no place in bell. Six lines are deficient in .aU the MSS. at the beginning of this stanza. 33 A Hielan' Padyane, a Highland jjageant or entertainment. The Highlanders were in those days little loved by the lowland Scots, on whom they made descents for plunder, and who were used as auxi- liaries in the rough court feiids of the Lowlanders. 3* Neuch, nook, comer. 3", jjg hg^ by the time that he. 36 Ersche men. Erse men, Gaels, aa the Highlanders were. IIG CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. Fetching the Piper. Earlcian MS. ^"g, \\ 125. In hell great room they took : Thae tarmigantis,' with tag and tatter, Full loud in Erscho begowth to clatter, And roup- like raven and rook. The Devil sae deavit ' was with their yell. That in the deepest pot^ of hell He smorit'' them with sinook 1 120 Two allegorical i)oeins, besides his translation made in 1.513-13 — the first in our literature — of N'irgil's " »Eneid," form the substance of the literary work of Dunbar's contemporary, Ga\in Douglas, liishoj) of Dunkeld, who was born about the year li74. His father was Archibald. Earl of Angus, known as " Bell-the-Cat." In 14'J4 he graduated as M. A. in the University of St. Andrew.s. Among his earlier church preferments was the office of Provost of St. Giles in Edinburgh. This he received about the year 1501, in which the longer of his two alle- gorical poems, the " Palace of Honour," was com- pleted ; and " King Hai-t," by which he is here to be, represented, lielongs to the yeare between 1.501 and 1512. Gavin Douglas lost afterwards his two elder brothers at Flodden Field, where fell also the Arch- bishop of St. Andrews. Queen Margaret nominated Douglas to the primacy, but, iniable to make good the appointment against other claimants, he retired, and was made Bishop of Dunkeld in 1515. But his after life was much troubled, and in 1521 he was driven to take refuge in England, whei-e Henry VIII. received him well, but he died of the plague in the next year, 1522. Dunkeld, with Biesam Wood and Dunsisane in the Distance. (F.-oik Pcmitint's " Tour in Scotland," 1772.) KING HART. King Heart, into liis comely castle strong Closit* about with craft and mickle m-e,'' So seemly was he set his folk among, That he no dout " had of misadventure : 1 Tamigants, termagants. The Crusaders looked upon Mahouud as one of the gods of the infidels, and Termagant as another. As Spenser writes {" Faerie Queene," VI. vii. 47): " And oftentimes by Termagant and Mahoimd they swore." - Roup, shouted hoarsely. * Veavit, deafened. * Pot, pit. s Smorit, smothered. ^ Closit. I retain the past in it instead of t'd throughout, and the phu^ of nouns in i.*! instead of cs ; into = in. ' Urc, use, labour. - Tin u I. feir. So proudl}- was ho polisht, plain and pure, AVith Youth-head and liis lusty IcaWs green. So fair, so fresh, so likely to endm-e, And als' so blithe as bird in summer sheen. I'or was he never yet ^^-ith showris shot., Xor yet o'errun with rouk,'" or any rain; III all his lusty Iccam" not a spot, Xc never had experience into pain, '■' ATs, also. I" Roul-, mist. First English "raeu," min. u Lccaui (First English "lichamx"), bod,v. TO A.D. 1522.] SHORTEE P0EM8. 117 But alway into liking, not to layne; ' Only to love, and very gentleness, Ho was inclinit cleanly- to remain. And wonn^ under the w-ing of wantonness. Hi Yet was this worthy wight King under ward; For was ho not at freedom utterly. Nature had Ij-nunit'' folk, for their reward'' This goodly king to govern and to gy ; ^ For so they east' their time to occupy. In welthis for to wjTie '^ for they him teacliit, All lustis for to lave," and \mder-he ; .So privily they press him and him prcachit. 24 First [there were] Strength and Wantonness, Orecn Lust, Disport, Jealousy, and Envy ; Freshness, New Gate,'" Waste-good, and Wilfulness, Delivemess," Foolhardiness thereby : Gentrice,'- Fi-eedom, Pitie-privie I espy, Want-wit, Vain-glory, Prodigahty, Unrest, Night-walk, and felon Gluttony, Unright, Dim-sight, with Slight, and Suljtilty. 3'J These were the inward ythand'^ servitoris. Which governors were to this noble King, And keepit him ineUnit to their curls ; So was there nought in earth that e'er might bring One of those folk away from his dwelling. Thus to their term they serve for their reward • Dancing, disport, singing, revelling, "W^ith Busyness all blithe to please the laird. 40 These folk, with all the femell " they might fang,'* A\niich numbcrit a million and well mo. That were upbred as servitoris of lang. And with this King would wonn,"' in weal and woe. For favour, nor for ferd,'' would found'* him fro ; Unto the time their date be run and past : That gold, nor good, might gar" them from him go. No grief, nor grame,-" should grayth-' them so aghast. 48 Five servitors this King he had without. That teachit were aye treason to espy. They watchit aye the walhs round about For enemies that of hajOTing aye come by. One for the day,-- wliich judgit certainly, With care to ken the colour of all hue : One for the night,-^ that hearknit busily Out of what aii-t-^ that ever the winds blew. o6 ' Not io laync, not to lie. - Clcanhi, altos^ether ; as iu " cleau forgotten ■'' iroiiJi (First English " wunian "), dwell. ^ Foi- their reward, for tlieir own profit. 7 Cast, reckoned. ^ iVijnc, dwell. ^ Lave, abase himself to. 10 New Gate, new f ngledness. 11 DeUvcrness, nimbleuess (from "libre," free). 1- Gentricc, generosity. 13 Tthand, busy (Icelandic " ithinn," assiduous, from " itli 1* FemcU, family, race. '^ Fang, seize. « H'07iii, dwell. >' Ferd, force. Old Swedish " faerd." '8 Found (First English " tundian "), depart. '^ Gar, make. ■^ Gramc (First English), wrath, trouble. -1 Graiilh, make (them so terriiied) ready to go. 22 Sight. 23 Henrin?. ^ Airt (Gnelic "aird," cardinal point; German " ort," placi q« Li-ter of the heavens. * Lummit, cailght. *■ Gij, guide. ' a-doing). Syne was there one to taste all nutriment That to this King was ser\*it at the deiss ; ^ Another was all fovellis for scent,'*' Of liquor, or of any lusty-' meiss : The lifth"'' there was which could all-' but leiss,=» The hot, the cold, the hard, and eke the soft, A ganand^' servant both for war and peace. Yet have these folk their King betrasit off. (i-t Honour percei\-it at^^ the Kingis gate. These folk said all they would not let him in ; Because they said their bjrd to feast was set. With all his lusty servants more and myn : ■'^ But he a port^'' had cntcrit with a gyn,^^ And up he can in haste to the great tower, -Vnd said he .should it paralP'' all with fine And fresh delight with uiany florist-^' flower. 72 So strong this King him thought his castle stood, With many tower and turret crownit hie : About the wall there ran a water void,^'* Black, stinking, sour, and salt as is the sea, That on the wallis wiskit,^' gre by gre '"' Boldening to rise the castle to confound ; But they within made so great melody. That for their rcird'" they might not hear the sound. 80 With feastis fell,^^ and full of jollity, This comely coirrt their King they cast''^ to keep. That noy ''■' have none but newly novelty. And are not wont for woe to woun'* and weep, FuU seldom sad'"' ere*' soundly set to sleep, No wandreth wait,''* aye weenis wealth enduio Beholdis not, nor lookis not, the deep. As them to keep froui all misadventure. 88 Bight as the rose iipspringis from the roof. In ruby coloirr red most rich of hue ; Nor waindis'" not the lea\is to outshoot, For shining of the sun that does renew Those other flouris gi-cenc, 'white, and blue, Which have no ciaft to know the 'winter woit, Suppose that siunmer .sheen does them rc:scuc, That docs them while*" o'erhail with snaw and sleit. 06 Dame Plesaunce had a pretty place beside, AVith fresh effeii-,*' and many folk in fere ; *- The which was parellit*^ all about with pride, So precious that it prysit was but** peer, 25 Deiss, dais or high table. 2'' All fovellis for scent, for the smelling of all provisions. 27 Litsty, pleasant. 28 Feeling. 23 Could all, knew all. 30 But Icisfi, without falsehood. 31 Ganand, fit, belonging to ; of the same Northern root as '* gaia " in the sense of ^t or near — " the gainest way." the nearest woy. 32 Perceivit at, 2»crscu'it to. 3a Mijn, less. 3'* Port, gate. 35 Gijn, contrivance, stratagem. 3fi Parall, adorn. 37 Florist, floiu-isliuig. 38 Fold, uusupplied ; having no springs to freshen it. 3' Wisk:t, plashed. '10 Gre 6y gre, boldening step by step, gi'aduully swelling. *i Reird (First English " reord "J, speaking. *2 Fell, mettlesome, of much endurance. *3 Cast, reckoned. ** Noy, annoyance. *^ Woun^ to lament aloud, ci-y wow. **• Sendill sad, seldom serious. *7 Ere. or. ** No wandreth wait, expect no difficulty. Icelandic " vandr," bad. *® IFaindis, fears (First English " wandian") ; is in no fe:ir that s^c will not put out her leaves by help of the sunshine. '•0 Tr'i'Je, at times. ^i Ej/cir, condition. sa /n /ere, together. ^ Parcilit, adorned. ^ Bat, without. 118 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a v. 1-480 With bulwarks broad, aud many bitter beir.' Sj-n -n-as a bridjic, that hcdgit was, and Strang And all that could attain the castle near. It made them fer to mer - amiss, and mang-.^ With towers great, and strong for to behold. So craftily witli Icirnels ■• carven high : The titehand* chainis floreist all of gold. The grounden dartis sharp, and bright to see, Would make a heart of flint to fald^ and flee For terror, if they would the castle saU ; • So carven clear that might no cruelty It for to win in all tliis world avail. 104 112 The Castle of Pleasadnce. From Sarleian MS. 4431, page 321. Servit this Queen Dame Plcsaunce, all at right,' First High Apport, Beauty, and Himibleness ; With many others, maidens fair and bright, Euth, and Good Fame, Freedom, and Gentleness; Constancy, Patience, Kaddour,' and Meekness, Conning,'" Kindness, Hendness." and Honest}', Mirth, Lusthcad,'- Liking, and Nobleness, Bliss and BUthcncss, and pure Pictie. These were the statis worthiest and ding,'^ With many more, that servit to this Queen. A legion leil''' was at her leading, WTien her court list scmble fair and clean. In their offeir '* Fair Service might be seen : For was there nought that seemed by a-\-ise "• That no man might the pointing of a preno Eeprove; nor piece, but paintit at de^yse.'' 120 128 1 Bitter heir, sharp palisiKle. 2 Mei- (Icelandic " mei-ja "1. fall iuto cnisli or coufusiou. ^ Mang (First English " niengan," to mix), niu into disorder. * Kii-nels (French " crcneler." to indent), the embrasures of battle- ments. 5 Pitchnnd, hoisting. ^ FflM, bow. ' Sai/,, assail. 8 At Hght, by right. ^ Baddom; modesty. '" Conning, knowledge. u Heiidnc.'is, gentle coiu'tesy. ^'^ Lnsihead, cheerfulness. 13 Ding, desen-ing. '* Lcil, loyal. '^ EJfcir, quality. '6 Old use of double negative : be avinc, by its manner, such that nny man could find a pin's point of objection to, or piece but what was l>aiuted. '" At devyse, with all skill. Happcnit this worthy Queen, upon a daj-. With her fresh court arraj-it well at right,'" Hunting to ride, her to disport and play, Witli many a lusty lady, fail- and briglit. Her banner sheen displaj-it, and on hight " \\'as seen above their headis where they rade ; The green ground was illuminit of the Ught ; Fresh Beauty had the vanguard and was guide. 13(5 A legion of these lusty ladies schene -" FoUowit this (liueen (truly this is no nay) ; Hard by tliis castle of this King so keen This worthy folk have walit-' them a way ; 'Wliich did the dayis watches to effray," For seldom had they seen such folks before. So merrily tiiey muster, and they play, Withouten either brag, or boast, or schore.-^ 144 Tlie watchis of the sight were so effrayit. They ran and told the King of their intent : " Let not tliis matter, sir, be long delayit ; It were speidful some folk ye outward sent, That could rehearse what tiling yon people meant ; Sync you again thereof to certify. For battle bid-'' they boldly on yon bent : It were but shame to feinj-ie-^ cowardly." 152 Youth-head upstart, and cleikit-* on his cloak. Was broudin -" aU with lusty lea^-is gi-een : " Rise, fresh Delight, let not this matter soke ; -' We will go see what may this muster mean ; So well we shall us it cope -^ between. There shall nothing pass away unsp>-it. Sj-n shall we tell the King as we have seen, And there shall nothing truly be den>-it." 160 Youth-head fortli past, and rode on Innocence, A milk-white steed that amblit as the wind ; And fresh Delight rode on Benevolence, Throughout the mead that would not bide behind. The beamis bright almost had made them blind. That from fresh Beauty spread under the cloud ; To her they sought, and soon they could her find. Nor saw they none never was half so proud. 168 The bernis^" both were basit of 3' the sight. And out of measure marrit ^- in their mood ; As spriteless folks on blonkis ^' hufBt on hight,^'' Both in a study staring still they stood. Fair Calling freshly on their wa}-is yode,^^ And both their reinis cleikit ^^ in her hands ; Sj-n to her castle rode, as she were wood.^'" And fastenit up those folks in Venus' baiids. 176 " At right, as it should fee. " On hight, on high. =» ScIiCTie, fair, bright. German " schiin." '^ Walit, chosen. *^ Did to effray, caused to feel tear. 23 Schorc. threatening. . -* Bid, offer. 'i Fciiiyin (First English " fsegnian "), to flatter; to flatter yott cowai'dly with a denial of the danger. -^ CleiUt, snatched. ^ Broiicltii, embroidered. 28 SoTie, slacken. ^ Cope (French " couper"). divide. 30 Bemis (First English " beomas," chiefs, men), nobles. - 31 Basit of, abashed at. 32 jyfdrrit (First English "mearrian," to err), bewildered. 33 Blonkin, horses ; perhaps originally white horses. 3< Enffit on hight, hove or lifted on high. 3; Yode, went. 3S CleiMt, caught. 37 (food, mad. TO A.D. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. ll'J Because there come no bodwart' soon again, The King outscnt New Gate, and Wantonness, Green Love, Disport, Waste-good that nought can lane," And with them freshly feii-^ Foolhardiness : He hade them spy the case how that it Was, And hring bodwart, ere liimsclf outpast. They said they shoidd ; and soon they ean them dri.'ss. Full glad thev ghdc as gromis'' unaghast. 184 192 The Scouts. From Harlcian MS. 4380, p. 27. On ground no greif ^ while they the great host see, Would they not rest, the rinkis,* so they ride. But fra' they saw their suit,* and their semblv,' It could them hre,'" and liiggit " them to liidr. Dread of Disdain on foot ran them beside. Said them, " Beware, sen '- Wisdom is away ; For an ye prick among these folk of pride '^ A pane '■* ye shall be restit '^ by the way." Foolhardiness f idl freshly forth he flang, A fure "^ length far before his feris '' five ; And Wantonness, suppose he had the vn.-a.ng, Him followit on as fast as he might drive. So they were like among themselves to strive : The fourcsum '^ bade," and huvit -" on the green. Fresh Beauty with a whisk came belj-ve,-' And them all restit wore they never so keen. With that the fouresum fain they woidd liave fled Again unto theii- castle, and theii- King ; They gave a shout, and soon they have them shed,"-- And busily they ean them bounden bring I Bodicart, message. ^ Zane (First English "lienau"), lend. * Fef'r, companion. * Groiais unaijlmst, men without fear. ^ Greif, fault. "^ JiuiAi'.s, brave men. 7 Fra, from tlie time that. * Su-tf followinir. 9 SciidiJif, appearance. 10 Bre (First Emrlish " bregean "), cause fear. II Bifigit (First EjagUsh " bygan," to bow or bendK inclined. 12 Sen, since. '^ Qf pride, in or tlirough pride. 1* A pane, in ptinisliment. 15 Restit, arrested. 1^ Furc, furrow. i" Fcris, compajiious. 18 Fouresum, four together (left after Wantonness had followed Foolhardiness). 19 Bade, remained. ^ Huvit, tarried. 21 Bclijve, quickly 22 Shed, divided. First English " sceadan ;" German " scbeideu.' 200 Again unto their Queen ; and bandis tluing -^ -Vliout their handis and feet so fast,'-'* \\'hile that they made them with theii- tormenting \\'hony of the'ii- Uvis half aghast.'-* The watehis on the Kingis walls have seen The chasing of the folk, and their surprise. Up start King Heart in proper ire and teen,-' -Vnd boldly bade his folk all with him rise. " I shall not sit," he said, " and see them thrice Discomfit clean my men, and put at under ; No, we shall wreak us on another wise. Set'-' we be few to them be fifty hunder!" Then out they rode all to a randoun'-* right, This courtly King, and all his comely host. His buirtlie banner -' brathit "" up on higlit ; " And out they blew with brag and miekle boast That Lady and her lineage .should be lost. They cried on bight their seinge ^- wonder loud : Thus come they keenly earpand on the cost ; ^^ They prick, they prance, as princes that were wood.'* •208 218 221 Then out they Rode. From Hni-lciaii JUS. 4380, p. £8. Dame Plesaunee has her folk an-ayit ^' well, Fra that she saw they woidd battel abide, 80 Beauty ^\'ith her vanguard gan to reill,"*' The greatest of their host she ean o'cnide. S_\-ne fresh Apport eame on the tother side ; So busUy she was to battle boune,^^ That all that e'er she might o'ertake that fidi', Horses and men with brunt'*" .she struck all down. 232 -3 Thrinij, press. -"i Fast, firmly. -■'' Atjltast, afraid. -^ Teen, vexation. 2' Set, tbouirh. ^ To a randoioi, in swift coufxisiou. '^ BuirtVte hanner, war banner. French "bohourt," " bord " in Chaucer, Icelandic "bui-t," a tUt. lu Icelandic "ritha hurt" is to ride a tilt, " bui-t-stong" is a lance for tilting, and the " biiirtly banner " is spread with the gay pomp of a tournament day. *' Brathit, unfurled. Icelandic, '* breitha," to broaden, luifold. ^1 On hi'jht, on high. ^2 Sciiuje, signal, wai--cry. ^ Carpandon the cost : possibly, speaking of the chiirge. In acts of James II. " coist" was the provision made for watching the borders (Jamieson's Dictionary') ; but " cost " may he used iu the sense of risk, of manner or business, of coast side or region ; end the way out is by the stagnant water mentioned in line 75. ■'** irood, mad. 35 Airajit, aiTanged. ^^ Reill, roll forward. ■'' Bounc, ready. »s Brunt, fiery flash. IL'O CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 14S0 Eight there King Heart she has in handis ta'en, And piiirly ' was he present - to the Queen ; And she had fairly with a tcatherit fiaj-ne ■■* Wouudit the King right wonderfid to ween. Dolivcrit him Dame Beauty unto seno'' His wound to wash, in solicnng of his sore ; But always as she castis it to clean. His malady increases more and more. 240 ■\VoHndit he was, and wliere yet he na wait ;^ And many of his folk have ta'en the flight. He said, " I j-ield me now 'to your estate, Fair Queen ! sen" to resist I have no might. What will ye save me now for what plight r '' For that I wot^ I did you ne'er offence. And if I have done aught that is unright, I offer me to your benevolence." 248 By this battel were near vanquishit all ; The Kingis men are ta'en, and many slain. Dame Plesaunce can on frcshe Beauty call, Bade her command the folk to prison plain. King Heart sore wounded was. hut he was fain,' For well he trustit that he should ivcure.'" The Lady and her host went home again. And many prisoner taken " under her ciU'C.'- 2.3C King Heart his castle lea^-it has full waste. And Heaviness made captain it to keep. Eadoxu- " ran home- full fleyit " and forchasit. Him for to hide crap in the dungeon deep. Langour he lay upon the walls but '^ sleep. But meat, or drink ; the watch honi he blew ; Ire was the porter, that full sore can weep. And Jealousy ran out : lie was ne'er true. 2(i4 He said he should bu spy, and bod wart '^ bring. Both night and day, how that his master fiu'c.''' He followit fast on foot after the King Unto the castle of Dame Plesaunee pure. In the prison found he many creiitiire ; Some fetterit fast, and others free and large A\'Tiere'er them list within the wallis fure.'* Soon .Tealousy him hid under a tai-ge.''-" 272 There saw he Lust by law under lock. In streinye-" strong fast fetterit foot and hand ; Green Love lay bound with a felloun -' block, About the crag was claspit '" with a band ; Youth-head was loose, and aye about waverand ; Desire lay stockit by a dungeon dure ; -^ Yet Honesty keip him fa'ir farrand,'-'' And AVaste-good followina: him where'er he fure.-^ 280 1 Pmrhi, luunhly. - Prencni, preseuteil. ^ Ftaintc iFirst English " daii"). itrrow, * Delivered him aft^nvartls inito Dame Beauty. 5 Na ii'fltf, did BOt know. •* Sf», since. " PViglii (plycht), punishment. f" For thtit I irof, for nil that I know. -^ Vatn (Fii-st English " fsegen "), glad. *" Secure, recover. " T(i;:fn. Prouoiuiced ta'pTi. ^- Cure, cnre. '-* Radoif, shame. '♦ Fleyit, put to flight. ^^ Bui, without. *° Bodifai-f, message. ^" Furc, fare Scouiirr (First English "scuuiim"), shim. 3' Begouth. _ ^ Man of good, good man. 124 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. U'D. 1480 What have I done that thus has crabbit you ? I f ollowit counsel alway for the best ; And if they were untrue, I dare avow, Nature did miss ' such folk upon mo cast. COO " Nature me bred a beast into - ray nest, And gave to me Youth-head first servitor ; That I no foot might find, by east nor west, But e'er in ward, in tutorship and cure ;^ And Wantonness who was to me more sure : .Such Nature to me brought, and first de\'isit 3Ie for to keep from all misiidvcnturc. AVTiat blame serve ■* I, this way to be surprisit ? COS " Ye did great miss. Fair Conscience, by youi- leave, If that ye were of kin and blood to me. That slothfuUy .should let your time o'er sleif,' And come thus late. How should ye ask your fee ? The steed is stolen, steik^ the door; let see What may avail ; Got wot ! the stall is toom ! ' And if ye be a counsellor sle,^ Why should ye slothfully your time forsume?' CIC " Of my harm and dreary indigence. If there be ought amiss, methink, perde,'" That ye are cause verray " of my offence, And should sustain the better part for me. Jlake answer now. What can ye say ? Let see ! Yourself excuse, and make you foul or clean. Reason, come here, ye shall our judge now be. And in this cause give sentence us between." G24 " Six, by your leave, into my proper '- cause Suppose'^ I speak, ye should not be displeasit." Said Conscience, " This is a villainous cause, If I should be the cause ye are discasit. No, young counsel in you so long was seisit,''' That has yoiu' trcasui-o and your good destroj-it. Kighf fain would I with mcasm-e it were meisit,'* For of your harm God wot if I be noj-it. G32 " Ye put great wite '^ that I so long abade. If that I eould with counsel you avail; Sir, trust well a vcrrio cause I had. Or ellis were no reason in my tale. My term was set by order natural. To what work alway I must obey ; Nor dare I not by no way make travaO, Hut where I see my master get a sway. G40 " For stand he on his feet, and stagger not. These hundi-od year shall come into his hald.'^ But nevei'thcloss, sii', all thing ye have wi'ought With help of Wisdom, and his wUUs wald,'^ I shall refonn it blithely. Be ye bald," And Youth-head shall have witc-" of your misdeed. Therefore require ye Reason mony fald,"' That he his rollis rathely^- to you read." 648 * Miss, fault. 2 Into, in. 3 Cure, care. * Serve, deserve. ^ Q'cr sleij, oversleeiJ. c gteik, shut. " Toom, empty. s g/^, cunniug, skilful- ^ Forsume (German " versuumen "), lose by delay. '" PcrdiS, pax Dieu. " Fcrrai/ (French "vrai"), true. ^- Into ray jiropcr, in my own. ^3 Suppose, although. ** Seisit, settled, in possession. i^ Mcisit, mitif^ted. "■ Wite, blame. " Hald, hold. 18 Wald, power. " Bald, bold. 2" Wite, blame. Observe in line 638 " wo-rk," as in line 617 " ha-nn. " ilouijfaU, many times. 2= Rathelti, promptly. Reason rose up, and in his rollis he brought. " It I shall say, the sentence shall be plain; Do ne'er the thing that e'er may scathe thee ought ; Keep measure and truth, for therein lies no train.^^ Discretion should aye with King Heart remain ; These other young folk-servants are but fools. Experience makes Knowledge now again. And bamis young should learn at old men's schools. 656 / CI 111 f "I "; — ! ° < I •■' f ^ Reason Pleads. Front Hnrlcian ilS. 4431, p. 134. " ^\^lo gustis sweet, and felt ne'er of the sour, What can he say ';" How may he season juge ? ^^^lo slftis hot, and felt ne'er cold an horn-, 'WHiat weather is thereout under the luge -'' How should he wit ': "* That were a marvel huge ! To buy right blue, that never a hue had seen ! A servant be, that never had seen a f uge ! -^ Suppose -"^ it rhjTne it accordis not all clean.^' 664 " To wiss the right, and to disuse the wi-ong, That is my school to all that hst to lore." '' " But, AVisdom, if ye should dwell us among, Jlethink ye dwell o'er long ; put down your sj^ear; Ye might well make an end of aU fhis weu-,^" Woidd ye forth show your worthy document. For is there none that can forbear The work of Vice, withoutin your assent." 672 Wit said, " Sir King, be ware ere ye be woe, For Foresight has now full long been flemit ; ^' Learn to^- know thy friend forby^^ thy foe. If thou will have thy country all well yemit ; ^ ^ Trayne, enticement astray. ^ Luge, arbour of leaves. 25 ;p.;t, know. 26 Fuge (French " fouaige"), pick or shovel. 2" Suppose, although. 58 Accordis, not all c'can, does not exactly agree. ^ List to Icrc, like to learn. ^ Weir, war. 31 Flemit, banished. Icelandic " flffima." 32 Learn to. In MS. Vnto. 3^ Forhy, besidea 3* Yciuit, (First Euglish "giman"), governed. TO i.o. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. 125 And 1)0 thou well, to hold thee so it seemit ; ' [Ne'er weening ought to do that was amiss :] - After thy death thy deedis must he demit, By thy desert either to bale or bliss." 680 Honour he rode the castle round about, Upon a steed that was as white as milk. " Is Ease therein ? " cryit ho with a shout. Dame Plesaunce spake, her face liid with a silk : " He is a governor of oms that ilk." •* Wit said, " Come in ! fidl welcome to these wanis I"* ' I count not all your workis worth a wilk ; ' Ye shall not harbour me and Ease at once." 688 AVorship of War came on the tother side, Upon a steed rampand was red as blood. He ciyit on Strength, " Come out man ! Be my guide ; I cannot ride out o'er this water wood." ^ Dame Plesaunce heard, and on her way she yeid' Kight to the King, and bade him Strength aiTCst ; " I would not, sii', for micklc worldly good. Want Strength an hour whene'er wo go to feast. 696 •" In all disport he may us greatly 'vail ; Give him no leave, but hold him while ye may." The King full well had heard Dame Plesaunce' tale, And Strength he has an-estit by the way. " Abide ! " he said : " We shall another day Seek Worship at oiu' will and us advance. I dread me sore, Sir Strength, of that delay ; For armcs has both happy time and chance." 704 Strength said : " Now I am green, and in my flowers. Fain would I foUow Worship, an I might ; For, if I bide, in faith the fault is yours, I must obey to you since that is right. Now see I well. Dame Plesaunce has gi'eat sleight ; ^ And fie on Ease that holdis Honour out. He is the man might bring us all to height ; Lo where he ridis backward with his rout ! " 712 With this Beauty came in the Kingis sight ; Fidl reverently she kneelit in his presence : "Dame Plesaunce says, sii', that }'0 do umight; Durst I it say unto your high reverence. Ye have displeasit her liigh mag-nificence, That should let Conscience in her castle come ; He is her foe, and does her great offence. And oft-times can her ser^^tors o'crcome." 720 Therewith tlie King iipstart, and turned aback On Conscience, and all his court in fere ; ' And to the Queen the right way can he take. Full suddenly in armis hint the clear ; '" She wTjat about, to kiss she was full sweir." Then he again full f ;iirly to her spake ; " No I be not wTath with me, my lady dear ! For as I may I shall you merry make. 728 * It seemit, it beseems you. 2 TMs line, wanting in the MS., was added eonjecturally by Pin kerton : some otber words in this poem, between square brackets, are .of his addition, 3 Bk, same. * ITajii.s-, dwellings. ^ Wil^, wbelk. 6 Wood, furious. " Fcid (First English "eode"), went. 8 SIcigJit, cunning. ^ In fere, together. ^" Hint the clear, took the fair one. "' Sit'eir, slow, heavy. German "schwer." " Though Conseienco and Wisdom mo to keep Be cunning both, I shall them well beguile ; For truely, when they are gone to sleep, I shall be hero within a bonny while ; My solace shall I slyly thus o'ersyle.'-' Ivight shall not rest ''' me alway with his rule.; Though I be whilom buxom '■* as a waUe,'» I shaU be crooked while I make [him fule]." '* 73G Dame Plesauuce : " Jly friendis now arc fled; The lusty folk that ye forth with you brouglit. JMethink these carlis are not courtly clad I What joy have I of them ? I count them nought. Youth-head, and Fresh Dehght, might they be brought ; For with theu' service I am right well kend. Fain woidd I that ye send men and them sought, Although it were unto the worldis end." 744 The Queen woui-de'' wrath; the King was sore adrcd, For her disdain he could not goodly bear. They suppit soon, and syne '" they bownit " to bed ; Sadness came in and rownit "" in his ear ! Dame Plesaunce has iserceivit her new fere ;-' And early, afore the sun, she gan to rise Out of the bed, and trussed up all her gear. The King was sound asleep, and still he lies. 752 Horses and harness hint^- she has in haste ; With all [her] folk she gan her wajas fare. By this it was fuU near mid-day almaist. Then came Disease -' in riding with a rail' : '* .^^ ^^*i "^M.,-!" The Queen Departs. From HavUian MS. 4431, p. 155. " The Queen is went, alas ! I wot not whei-p ! " The Iving began to wake, and heard the heir : -* Then Jealousy came strekand-*"' up the stair, To serve the Ivinff, and di'ew him wonder near. 7G0 ^2 O'ersyle, conceal. ^^ Rest, arrest, stay. 1* Buxom, beuding, yieldiuer, or bow-some (First English •' bugsam "). •^ Wailc, woud. "* Close of tbe line dropped in the original, I'' Wourdc^hecame. ^'^ Syne, afterwards. ^^ Pou-nit, made ready. ^ Rownit, wbispered. ^i pcre, companion. 22 Sint, taken. ^ Disease, tlie reverse of ease. ** Rair, roar. ^ Beir, cry. Icelandic "byre," stonn-wind. -^ Strckandy quickly moving. 126 CAfeSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1480 Reason came : " Sir King, I rede ye rise, There is a great part of this fair day run. The sun was at the height, and downward hies. AATiere is the treasure now that ye have won 'i This diink was sweet ye found in Venus' tun ! Soon after this it shall be stale and sour ; Therefore of it I rede no more ye cun : ' Let it lie still an please your paramour." 768 Then "Wisdom says, " Shape for some governance, Sen- fair Dame Plesaunce on her waj'S is went. In your last days ye may youi-self advance, If that }-e woiirde of the same indigent. Go to your place, and you therein present ; The castle yet is strong enough to hold." Then Sadness Siiid, " Sir King, ye must assent ; "WTiat have ye now ado in this waste fold ?" 776 The King has heard their coimscl at the last, And halelie ^ assentit to their saw. " Make ready soon," he says, " and speed you fast." Full suddenly they gan the clarion hlaw ; On horse they leapt, and rode them all on raw * To his own castle, therein he was bred. Langour the watch out o'er the kimal* fiaw;^ And Hea\-ines3 to the great dungeon fled. 784 He crj-it, " Sir King, welcome to thy own place ! I have it keepit truely sen thou past. But I have mickle man-el of thy face, That changit is Uke ^vith a ^\Tnter blast." " Yea, Heai-iness," the King said at the last, " Now have I this with far more harmis hint,' Which grieris me, when I my comptis cast, How I fresh Youth-head and his fellows tint." * 792 Strength was as then fast fadit of his flowers But still yet with the King he can abide ; WhUe at the last in the hochis' he cowers, Then privily out at the gate can slide. He stole away and wont on wayis ■wide. And sought where Youth-head and his feris wouned : '" Full suddenly, suppose" he had no guide, Behind a hill he has his feris found. 800 So, on a day, the daj-is watches two Came and said they saw a felloun '- mist. " Y'ea," said Wisdom, " I wist it would be woe : That is a sign before a heaN-y trist 1 '^ That is peril to come, who it ■n'ist, For, on some side, there shall us folk assaO." The King sat stUl ; to travaU he nought Hst ; And hearkened sj-ne a while to Wit his tale. 808 Desire was daily at the chamber dure,'^ And Jealousy was ne'er of his presence : Ire keepit aye the gate, with mickle cure ; '^ And Wretchedness was hied into the spence.'^ » Cun, learn, try. = Scn, since. ^ HaMic, wholly. ■• On ran-, in row, in order. ^ ffii-nal (crenel), battlement. « Fiair, flew. ' Hiiif. taken. « Xi„f_ lost. * In (?ie Jioclii?, in tlie (treasure) chests, w Fens irouncd. companions dwelt. n ^u-p^se, although. " Fdloun, dreadful. 13 Tri5f, sorrow. i* Dure, door. *^ Cure, care. 1^ Spcjice, place where provisions were kept ; sometimes also the room in which they were eateu. " Such folk as these," he said, " to make defence, With all their family fully hundreds five ! " Sir Ease he was the greatest of reverence ; Best lo-i-it ^\-ith the King of leid aUve.'? 816 Unto the gate came riding on a day Worship of War, which sows Honouris high : " Go to the King," w-ith sture "* voice gan he saj', " Spcir if any office he has for me ; For, !m him list, I ^^-ill him serve for fee." AVisdom came to the wall, crj-and o'er again : " Man, seek thy fortune with Adversity ; It is nought here such thing as thee should gain. 824 " Strength is away, out-stealing Uke a thief, Which keepit aye the treasure of estate ; There is no man should cherish thee so lief. These other flock of worship are full blate." " Worship of War again with Wisdom flate : •^' " WTiy would ye not me see when Strength ye had P" Therewith came Ease ; said, " I sit warm and halt,-' WTien they thereout shall be -n-ith stouris stade.~ 83i Worship says, " War I wot ye have at hand, A\Tiich w-ill assail yom- wallis high and strong." Then Wisdom said, '■ Dame Plesaunce, sweet sembland. In youth-head would not thole us Worship fang.'-'' Adieu, farewell 1" AVorship says, " Now I gang To seek my craft unto the worldis end." AVisdom saj-is, " Take you Disease amang, And wait on me, as whilom, where j-e wend. 840 " For, do ye not, ye may not well eft heave." -^ " A\Tiat is your name P" " AA''isdom, forsooth I hight." " AU -HTong, God wot ! Oft-times, sir, by j'our leave, Bline aventure -will shape out of your sight : But ne'ertheless may fall that ye have right. Ruth have I none, out-take-^ fortune and chance, That man I aye pursue both day and night ; Ease I defy so hangis in his balance." 84S Eight as these two were talkand in fere,-^ A hideous host they saw come o'er the moor : Decrepitus, his banner shone not clear, AVas at the hand, with many chieftains sture.-'" A crudgeback-' that careful caitiff bure. And crooldt were his loathly limbis baith. But-' smirk, or smUe, but rather for to smui-e,-"' But scoup,^' or skift,^- his craft is all to scathe. 85G Within a while the castle all about. He siegit fast ^^-ith many sow *' and gine : And they w-ithin gave many hideous shout. For thev were wonder woe King Heart to tync !^* " Best loved of living people by the King. >' Sture, strong. " Blaie, shy. =° Flnlc, contested. ^i Hai(_ hot. — Wil'h &ir)uri& sXaAe, encumbered with tumults of battle. 23 Tho\c u& Trors?tiV/aiig, suffer us to take Worship. 2* "Efi heave, again do labour. "^ Oui-iakc, except. 26 Infers, together. ^ S^u-e, strong. 23 Cnidgebacfc, crouchback, hump. ^y jjijf^ without. 30 SiHure or uixore, choke, smother. 31 Scoup, freedom of movement. "To scoup " (Icelandic "skopa,"" to run hither and thither) was to leip or move quickly from place to place. 32 stiy^^ facility in making anything. 33 Sow, a machine used in sieges to cover those who were under* mining. ** Tyne, lose. TO A.D. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. 127 They grounden ganyeis,' and great gunnis sj-ne They shot without; within they stanis= cast. King Heart says, " Hold the house, for it is mine : Give it not o'er as long as we may last." 864 Thus they within had made full great defence, Aye while they might the wallis have yeniit,-' Till, at the last, they wantit them dispense,-* EWl pm-veyit folk, and so well stemit '. ' Then- tunnis, and their tubbis, were all temit,' And faiht was the flesh that was thcii- food ; And at the last Wisdom the best has deemit Comfort to bid them keep, that he ne goude.' 872 An he be tynt,* in peril put we all ; Therefore hold wait,' and let him not away. By this they heard the miekle fore-tower fall, Which made them in the dungeon to effray. Then rose there miekle dirdum '" and deray ! " The bai-mekin '- burst, they entered in at large : Headwork, Hoast, and Parlasy,'^ made great pay," And JIm-murs more with many spear and targe. 880 When that they saw no boot '■' was to defend. Then in they let Decrepitus full t>ie.« He sought King Heart, for he fuU well him kenned, And with a sword he gan him smartly smite His back in two, right pertly '^ for despite : And with the brand brake he both his sliins. He gave a cry, then Comfort fled out quite ; And thus this baleful bargain '* he begins. 888 Eeaeon fort'oughten" [was] and evil drest ;-" And Wisdom was aye wandering to the door : Conscience lay [him] down a while to rest. Because he saw the King wourd =' weak and poor ; For so in dule^ he might no longer dm-e. " Go send for Deid," -' thus said he verament ; " Yet for I will dispone of my treasure. Upon this wise make I my testament. 896 1 GanyeiSt arrows. 3 Stanis, stones. » remit, guarded. First English " giman," to take care of. * Until at last they were without supplies. ^ Stemit, hemmed in. TTfiir. wool. " Foil', full. 8 To aUo}r. to praise. ^ Voky (French " vogue "), Vain Fashion. ^0 Roirm, spacious. " Morsels on the mof, bites on the mouth. '-' Fcid, feud. '^ Causing rude people all to shine with the most goodness, i.e., by softening their manners and lifting their minds. Yone is the court of plesaud steidf astnes, Yonc is the court of constant merines, Yone is the comt of joyous discipline, Quhilk causis folk thair purpois to e.xpres In ornate wise, prouokand ^\'ith glaidnes All gentill hartis to thair lair incline, Euerie famous poeit men may diuine Is in yonc rout, lo yonder thair princes Thospis, the mother of the musis nine. IS [63 lines omitted.] Sa greit ane preis of pepill drew vs neir The hundreth part thair names ar not heir, Yit saw I thair of Brutus Albion, Geifray Chauceir, as Ov-ir strek, too stiff, tense. -= Buhhis, bhasts. 2= Lek, leak. 2" Cap, to direct one's course at sea. German " kape,"' a landmark, 28 Wnic, wave. 29 roio- .s(^^■ ouir j>re,s, too much press of sail. *• BLosts may come down from the highlands. 31 Foir saill, foresail. 1" Eid, counsel. " Sole, saUed TO A.D. 1522.] SHORTER POEMS. li'l) Be thou vexit, and at undir. Your frt-inds will fre' and on you wondii. Thaii-foir bewar with our hio lands, Sic slags- may fall, sui^pois a liundir War you to help thai have no hands.-' Dreid this danger, gud freind and hriulir. And tak example hefoir of utlu-r. Knaw Courtis and wyad has oftsys \areit.^ Keip Weill yciu- cours, and rewle yoiu- rudu- ; And tiunk with kingis ye are not mareit. Quod Qivxtexe Sch.wv. CHAPTER VIII. John' Skelto.v and Sir David Lixdsay, with others. a.d. 1.500 to a.d. 1.550. At the l)egiiining of the sixteenth century allegorical j>oetry abounded. An allegory of human life, much lai-ger than " King Heart," was finished in 1506 in England by Stephen Hawes, Groom of tlie Chamber to King Hemy VII. It was " The History of Graund Amoure and La Bel Pucell, called The Pastime of F/easure, conteyning the Knowledge of the Seven Sciences, and the Course of Man's Life in this Worlde." While there was in the North William Dunbar writing such allegories as the ''Thistle and the Rose," " The Golden Terge," in the South there was John Skelton, who set forth the corrujitions of court life in " The Bowge of Court." Jloirije (from the French botiche, mouth) was the word foi- a courtier's right of eating at the king's expense, and " Bowge of Court " in the poem was the name of an allegorical ship with Court vices on board. But we care most for John Skelton, as Spenser cared for him, because he was a poet who, in Henry VIII. 's time, expressed some of those energetic feelings which were hastening a reformation in the Englisli Church. He was rector of Diss, in Norfolk. The date of his institution to that office is not on recoixl ; but he was holding it in 1504, when lie \\'itnessed as rector the will of one of his parishioners, and he retained it until his death in 1529, for in July of that year Thomas Clerk was instituted as Skelton's successor. By opposition to corruptions of the Romisli Church, and by marrying, although a priest, Skelton made the Dominicans his enemies. His .-icholai-ship was honoured by Erasmus, and Henry VII. chose him to l)e tutor to the royal children. Henry VIII. retained good will for his old master, and Skelton was much at his court. Bu' outspoken denuncia- tions of the spiiitual pride and pomp of the higher clergy, and their neglect of sniritual duties, advanced in Skelton to a courageous attack on Wolsey when lie was at the lieight of liis power. Wolsey, when only a rising scholar, had been his friend ; but as a jjrelate who seemed to have become the impereona- ' Pre, inquire. ^ Slags, blasts. =' Although there were a hundred to help you, they have no hands. They are powerless a^iust the frowu of the es.ilted, whose ill-will comes down as the blast from the hiirlilauds to wreck the ship. * Know conrts und winds have ofttimes varied. 17 tion of that worldliness in spiritual cliiefs agairist wliich tlie best men in England were jnotesting, Skelton joined in attack on liim. In a verse of liis own — called after him, Skeltonical — that was like tlie Fii-st English in its short lines of varying accentuation, and had occasional allit^'ratioii, but to which he added rhymes thot danced forward in little sliifting torrents — a rustic verse, as he called it, that served admirably to exin-ess either a rush of wrath, or the light freaks of playfulness — the scholar poet, whom his enemies called a buffoon, spoke home truths for lus countrymen. His fearless speech obliged him to take refuge from the power of Wolsey by claiming the right of sanctuarj' in Westminster Abbey, and he died sheltered by Abbot Islip in June, 1.529. In the following October Wolsey was deprived of the Great Seal, and lie survived his fall little more than a year, dying in November, 1530. Cardinal Wolset. (From Holbein's Podniit.) Skelton's most direct and bitterest attacks on Wolsey are in his two poems called " Speak, Parrot," and " Why come ye not to Court V In the latter part of " Colin Clout " Wolsey is pointed at again and again, but there is less in this poem of the mere bitterness of the conflict, although not less of religious earnest- ness in its delicate blending of the voice of the psople with touches of irony. What Skelton battled for in the days of Henry VIII., Spenser sought under Elizabeth, and Milton under the Stuarts. Spenser, indeed, in his first published book was so full of the same zeal that appears in Skelton's " Colin Clout," that he adopted from tliat poem the name by which he always spoke of himself in his verses. Under the name of " Colin Clout " John Skelton in the followTng poem represented the ap])eal made to grandees of the Church by a poor Englishman. It seems to liave been cun-ent in maniiscri]>t and on the lips of men for some years before it was suffered to be printed (see lines 1230 — 32). After the 130 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. ISIK) Refoi-mation Skelton's populai- wi-itings fii-st became cun-ent in little prir.ted books, like the undated one " imjjiuited at London by me, Richard Kele, dwell- ying in the Powltrie at the long shop under Saynt Myklredes Chyrehe." COLIN CLOUT. What can it avail To (h-ivo forth a snail, Or to make a sail Of an herring's tail ? To i-hyme or to rail, To write or to incUte, Either for delight Or else for despite ; Or hooks to compile Of divers manner stylo, 10 Vice to revile And sin to exile, To teach and to preach As reason will reach 'i Say this, and say that : — ' " His head is so fat. He wotteth never what. Nor whereof he speaketh : '' " He cryeth and he creaketh," " He pryeth and he pceketh," 2(1 " He chides and ho chatters," " He prates and he patters," " He clitters and he clatters," " He meddles and he smattois," " He gloscs and he flatters. " Or if ho speak plain, Then " He lacketh brain, He is hut a fool. Let him go to school On a three-footed stool 00 That he may down sit, For he lacketh wit." And if that ho hit 1 Skeltou proceeds to illustrate some courtesies of critics towards a book intended earnestly to do true service in its day. With such comments before the wi-iter, what avails it, he says, that he should nsk speed of the snail, or hope to reach the desired port when the common censures of men hoist for him no better sail than a herring's tail to help his good ship on her way. Two contemporaries of Skelton were the (iermau Sebastian Brandt— who died in 1520, and who led the way in sixteenth century satire with his " Navis Stultifera," or "Narrenschiff." in Latin and German — and Alexander Barclay, who made of it a '* Ship of Fools" in English verse. The iirst fool in Brandt's collectieu is the sort of reader from whom narrow criticism comes, whom Pepe called "the bookful blockhead ignorantly read," and whom I reproduce above as figured in Brandt's book. Such illustrations of the text as are drawn from " The Ship of Fools " are copied direct from the origin.al Nuremberg edition of 149-t. The illustrations to Barclav are weak copies of them. Another of Skelton's contemporaries was '.i^e great scholar Erasmus, who, indeed, knew Skelton x^ersouall^, and spoke of him as a light and ornament of Briti.sh literature. Erasmus, when in England ui 1509, wrote, not without some suggestion from Brandt's " Ship of Fools," a " Moriffi Encomium " — a Praise of Folly — with like purpose of help to society through satire. Hans Holbein, delighted with this book, adorned the margin of one copy of it with pen-and-ink sketches in illusti-ation of passages that caught bis fancy. He em*iched the voliune with eighty-three such sketches in ten days. The volume is now in the library at Basle. Where any of these sketches are used to illustrate the text they are taken from the best reproductions of them, those in C. Patin's edition of the " Moriee Encomium," pubhshed at Basle in 16/1). The Fool in Books. FvoiM ^cha^ian Brandt's "^arrciwcJii^." The nail on the head, It standoth in no stead, " The devil," they say, " is dead ; The devil is dead." It may well so Ije, ( )r else they would sec ()therv\'iso, and ilee From worldly vanity, .\nd foul covctousncss, .\nd other wretchedness, Fickle falseness, Variableness With unstahlcness. .\nd if ye stiind in doubt Who brought this rh\Tne about, Jly name is Colin C'lovt. I purpose to shake out \\\ my conning bag- Like a clerkly hag.^ For though my rhyme be ragged. Tattered and jagged, Iviidely rain-beaten, liusty and moth-eaten. If ye take well therewith It liatli in it some pith. For, as far as I can sec, It is wrong with each degree : For the temporaltie Accuseth the spiritvialtie ; Tlie sj^tii-itual again Doth grudge and comiilaic Upon the temporal msn : 40 50 60 - Conntnfj bnfj, bag of knowledge. ^ Knq, First English " hse'g-steald, " a bachelor, yoi'th, soldier, and pi'ince; "hiBghed," bachelorhood. So ir the oth i passages where Skelton uses the wore, not meamng what we now understand by it. " Ye cast all your courage upon such courtly hags; * and " Thou canst not but brag Like a Scottish hag." Mr. Dyce, in his admirable edition of Skelton's ** Poetical Works," published in 1843, gives the word up. TO A.l>. 155U.] SHORTER POEMS. Kfl Thus each of other blether' In their provincial cure The tone against the tothcr. They maki: but little sure, Ahis, thev make me shudder ! And meddle very light For in hodor modcr, In thir Church's right ; The church is put in faute ; * ' 70 But iro and venire The prelates ben so haut. And sol-fa so a-la-ini-ro,' They sav, and look so hisjh That the prcmuniro As they would flv Is like to be set a-firo Above the starry skv. In their j urisdietions IK Lay men sav, indeed. Through temporal afflictions ; How they to.ke no hecil Men say they have pre,scri])tions Their sely cheep to feed. Against spiritual contradictions, But pluck away and pull Accounting them as fictions. The fleeces of their wui>l. , TTnethes-' they leave a lode SO And while the heads do this, Of wool amongst their Hock ; The remenaunt is amiss And as for their conning. ^ Of the clergy all A gloraraing ^ and a mumming, Both great and small. And make thereof a jape." I wot never how they wark, They gasp and they gape But thus the people bark, I2C All to have promotion. And surely thus they say : There is their whole devotion, Bishoppes if they may With raonev, if it will hap, Small houses would keep. To catch the forked cap." But slumber forth and sli cp Forsooth they are too lewd 90 And assay to creep To say so, all beshrewd ! Within the noble walls Of the kinges halls. What trow ye thev sav more. To fat their bodies full. Of the bishoppes lore ': Their soules lean and dull. How in matters they be raw, And have full httle can- 130 They lumber forth the law How e^-il their sheep fare. To hearken Jack and Gill The temporalitie say plain When they put up a bill. How bishops disdain. QtrirriNR the Pulpit. And judge it as they will. For other mennes skill, ■* E.xponding out thtir clauses. And leave their own causes. 100 ' Blof/ier, make wiudy tali. = Faufe, fuult. = [Jncthf; * Con7ii7ig, knowledere. ■'' Giommin*7, puttiu^ on a ghmi face. *■ .rape, jest. 7 Forted f fj)), mitre, ^ In spite of otlier men's reasouiui:. " Blore," a blast of wind, not easily. Sermons for to make. Or such labour to tak(! ; And, for to say troth, A great part is for sloth, But the greatest part Is for they have but small an . And right slender conning, Within their heads wonning.'" ' A-\a-itd-n, notes in the scale of music, w froniiing. dweUinsr. no 132 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 15u0 But this reason they take How they are able to make With their sold and treasure Clerks out of measure, And yet that is a pleasure. Howbeit some there bo Of that dignity Full worshipful clerks, As appcareth by their works, 150 Like Aaron and Urc,' The wolf from the door To wcrrpi- and to keep From their fjhostly sheep, And their spiritual lambs Sequestered from rams And from the boarded goats With their hairy coats ; Set nought by gold ne groats, Their names if I durst tell. 160 But they are loth to mell,^ And loth to hang the bell About the cattos neck, For dread to have a check ; They are fain to play deux decke, They are made for the beck ; Howbeit they are good men Much hearted like an hen ; Their lessons forgotten they have That Becket them gave : 170 Thomas ma7ium tuittit ad fortia^ Spernit damna, spernit opprohria, Nulla Thomam frangit injuria.^ But now every spiritual father, Men say, they had rather Spend much of their share Than be cumbered with care. Spend ! nay, nay, but spare, For let see who dare Shoe the mockish mare ; 180 They make her wince and keko,* But it is not worth a leek. Boldness is to seek ^ The church for to defend. Take me as I intend. For loth I am to offend In this that I have penned. I tell you what men say ; Amend when ye may For usque ad montem Seir 7 190 Men say ye cannot appeii-e,' * Vrc, TJrias. 2 Werrtjn (First English " warian "), ward off. 2 JkTell, meddle. * TTiomas puts forth his haud to what is strong, he contemns losses, contemns insults ; no wrong causes Thomas to hrealc down. 5 ifcl-c, liick. « To seek, wanting. So in Milton's " Comus : "— " I do not think my sister so to seek, Or so unprincipled in Virtue's book." ' As far as Mount Scir (named in Joshiia xv. 10, ,is on the borders of Judah, " From Baahih westwiu'd uuto Mount Seir *'). " re cannot aj)iieirc (French " pire," Latin *' pejor"), become worse than you are. This is Mr. Dyce's reading of the lines— *' For nsQuc a^ ntOTifem SarQ Ye cannot appore," For some say ye hunt in parks ,Vnd hawk on hobby' larks .\nd other wanton warks WTicn the night darks. \\'hat hath lav-meu to do 'ITic grey goose for to shoe ? "• Like houndcs of hell 'ITiey cry and they yell I low that ye .scU '['he grace of the Holy Ghost : " Thus they make their boast Throughout every coast ; How some of you do cat In Lenten season flesh meat. Pheasants, partridge and cranes. Men call you therefore profanes. Ye pick no shrimjis nor pranes,''- Salt fish, stock fish nor herring. It is not for your werjmge ; '^ Nor in holy Lenten season Ye will neither beans ne peason But ye look to be let loose To a pig or to a goose, Yi im- gorge '^ not endowed ^\'ithout a capon stewed. 200 210 'Go YE ALSO IKTO THE "VlNETARD." {Holhein.) And how when ye give orders In your provincial borders. As at SiticMcs}^ Some are insufficicntes, SomejUarHWi sapientes^^ Some nihil inUllif/entes,^^ '.* The liohhy was a small hawk (only the merlin smaller), and was used in catching larks, l)ecause, through fear of it, they would not rise while the net was being ili"awn over them. 10 " He that meddleth with all things may shoe the gosling." (Heywood.) 11 Simony. i^ Pfa^ies, prawns. 13 Werijiige, restriction, covenant. First English "wEe'ron'* and " werian," to defend, check; ** was't," a caution, compact, pledge, covenant. 1* The crop of a hawk was called ilte gorge, and Dame Juliana Bemers, in the "Book of St. Allmn's " (quoted liy Mr. D,vce), says " she cndinjth when her meate in her bowelles falle to dygestyon." 1^ Sitioitp^, ye who thirst. First word of the Introit of the mass for Passion Sunday. Siiietitcs Saturdaij was here, and is still abroad, the name for the day before Passion Sxmday. (Dyce.) "■ Little wise. 1" Understanding nothii.* TO A.D. 1550.] SHORTEK POEMS. 133 Some valde negligentes,^ Some nullum sciisiim habcntesf But bestial and untaught ; But when they have onco caught Domlmts voliiscidH'^ hy the head, Then run they in every stead,* (rod wot, with (hunkc-'n uoUs,'' Yet take the)' cure of souls And wotteth never what they read, Paternoster, Ave nor Creed, Construe not worth a whistle Neither Gospel nor 'Pistle, Theii' matins madly said, Xothing devoutly prayed ; Their learning is so small, Their piimcs and houres fall And leap out of their lips lAke. sawdust or dry chips. I speak not now of all, But the most part in general. Of such vagabundus Speaketh totiis mmidiis ,■'• How some sing Lmtabiindus'' At every ale stake ^ With Welcome hake and make ! " By the bread that God brake I am sorry for your sake. I speak not of the good wife. But of thcii' apostles' life ; "ruiL 230 12.50 The Good Wife. (Hoftein.) ^ Extremely negligent. 2 Having no sense. 2 " The Lord be with you," the closing words of tlie service. * Stead, place. s ^olis, beads. So Spenser (" Faerie Queene," VII., vii. 39) : — *' Tbeu came October, full of meny glee ; For yet Iiis uonle was totty of the must Wbicb be was treading." '■ All the world. ' Greatly i-ejoiiing. ^ Ale stake. The old sign tor ai^ alehouse was a stake with a gai'land or bush of twigs at the end of it. Hence our saying that good wine needs no bush, because all take care to remember where they found it ; and " banging out the broom," which is a stake with twigs at the end of it, also has become a phrase for turning one's house into a place of public entertainment. '' Hake and inalic, loiterer and mate or comrade. Ilnlcc, perhaps allied to the Dutch " hachelyk," German " hiikeUg," difficult, troublesome, ugaiust one's will. From the root " hage," wbicli is hooked or crooked. In Scottish dialect " hashy " means slovenly, and " hash " or '* hachal," a sloven. Cum ipsis vel illis Qui muncnt in villis Est uxor vel ancilla, Welcome .Jack and GyUa '. JFy pretty Petronilla, An you will be stilla You shall have your willa. Of such Paternoster peaks "■' .\11 the world speaks. In you the fault is supposed^ For that they are not appose,. " By just examination In conning and conversation, '- They have none instruction To make a true construction. A priest without a letter. Without his virtue be grettcr," Doubtless were much better Upon him for to take A mattock or a rake. Alas, for very shame ! iSome cannot decline their name ; Some cannot scarcely read, And yet he wiU not dread For to keep a cui-e. This Doininus voliscum. As wise as Tom a Thi-um, A chaplain of trust Lity'tli all in tlie dust. Thus I, Colin Clout, As I go about. And wandering as I waUr, I hear the people talk. Men say. For silver and gold Mitres are bought and sold ; Then shall no clergy '■* appose A mitre nor a croso,'^ But a full purse. A straw for tJoddes curse ! What arc they the worse 'i For a Simoniac Is but a Hermoniac, And no more ye make Of Simony, men say. But a child's play. Over this the foresaid lay Report how the Pope may An holy anker '^ call Out of the stony wall jVnd him a bishop make, If he on him dare take To keep so hard a rule. To ride upon a mule With gold all betrapped In purple and pall bclapped ; 26D -'70 2S0 290 300 1° Fmlis, simpletons. " AirposeA, questioned. ^- Knowledge and conduct in life. So in the Bible, as in Ps. 1. 2.3, *' To liim that ordereth his conversation ai'ight will I show the salvation of God." " Gretter, greater. " C'crgy, learning, i- Crose, crozier. So in Milton's ** Lycidas : " — " Eliud nioiitbs I that .scarce themselves know bow to hold A sbeeiJ-book. or have learu'd aught else the least That to the faithful herdnnn's nrr. belongs. Wbat recks it theui ? What need they ? They are sx>ed." ^^ Aiikci\ anchorite. 134 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1500 Some hatted and some capped. Richly and wannly bewrajipi'il, God wot to thoii- tri-f-at pains. In rochets of fine lia^-nes' 310 White as morrow's- milk ; Their tabards of fine sUk, Their stirrups of mixt gold hegared,' There may no cost ho spared ; Their miiles gold doth eat. Their neighbours die for moat. What care they though Gill sweat Or Jack of the Noke 'r The poor people they yoke With summons and citations 320 And excommimications About churches and market ; The bishop on his carpet At home fuU softe doth sit. This is a farly frt • To hear the people jangle. How warcly they wrangle : Alas ! why do ye not handle, And them all to-mangle. FuU faksely on you they Iw 330 And shamefully you ascr>-e. And say as untruly As the biittcrily A man might say in mock' Were the weathercock Of the steeple of Ponies :^ And thus they hurt their' souls In slandering you for truth. Alas, it is great ruth I Some say, Ye sit in thrones ,"40 Like princes aquilonis,^ And shrine your rotten bones AVith pearls and precious stones ; But how the commons groans And the people moans For prestos, and for loans '' Lent and never paid. But from daj' to day delayed, Th(! commonwealth decayed, lien say ye are tongue tayde" 3.)0 And thereof speak nothing ^ Baynes, a fine linen made in Reuues, in Brittany. - iforrrtic's, morning's. ^ Bewared, adoraed. * Farly fit, strange song. First EngKsli "fe'rlic," sudden, sur- prising:. So in the opening of the vision of " Piers Plowman : " — *' Me hefel a fei-ly, of fairy luethougbt." ^ Old St. Paul's, of which varioixs parts were in building during 224 years l>efore its completion in 1312, had a tower and spu'e .'ilj-i feet high, with a baU on the top that coidd contain ten bushels of grain, and over the ball a cross that was fifteen feet high. In 1444 this spii'e was fired by hghtning, and the damage thxis caused was not fidly repaii-ed till 1462. The refitted spire was then sunnonnted with " a stately eagle weathercock of gilt copper," which the mocker from below, missing the ball and cross, coxUd liken to a bright butteiily settled npon it. *' Aqnilf^nis, on the sides of the north. *' Thou hast said in thine heart. I will ascend into heaven, I will esalt my throne above the stars of God : I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sidesof the north." (Isaiah x;v. 13.) ' PiTsffs, forced payments ?f ready money in advance, and loans. In 1522 Wolsey levied a loan of a tenth on lay subjects, and a fourth on the clergy. In 1523 he got a subsidy from the clergy of half their year's revenue, and asked foiu: shillings in the pound of the laity, g?tting half that stun. s Taijdc, tied. But dissimuling and glosing. Wherefore men be supposing That ye give shrewd counsel Against tho commune-well By poUing and pQluge In cities and -i-illage By taxing and toUage, Ye make monks to have the culerage For covering of an old cottagi,' 360 That committed is a collage In the charter of dotage Tenui'e par ser\'ice de sottage And not par ser^-ice de socage ' After old seigniors And the learning of Lyttleton Tenures ; " Ye have so overthwarted That good laws are subverted And good reason perverted. Keligious men are fain 370 For to turn again lit seciila scrft/oi-nm, And to forsake their quorum And vagabimdare per fonim,'* Anil take a tine mcrifo7-fnn Contra ri'finlam inontitj,^'-^ Aitt black mo»(icliorii)ii, A"t ffino}iicor'fm, Aift Ber}}ar(rinorttm, ^hit crticifixoriini, .'iSO And to .sing from place to place Like Apostatas. And the .selfsame game Begun is now with shame Amongst tlie sely nuns : My lady now she runs, Dame Sybil our abbess. Dame Dorothy and Lady Bess, Dame Sare our prioress. Out of their cloi.ster and quere '•* S90 With an heavy cheer. Must cast up thtir black veils iVnd set up their fore sails To catch wind with their ventalcs — " \\Tiat, Colin, there thou shales ! " '- Yet thus with ill hails The lay ])COple i-ails. And all tlie fault they lay On you, prelates, and say You do them wrong and no right To put them thus to flight : No matins at midnight. Book and chalice gone quite ; 400 ^ Tenure by socage was on condition of fixed services. It is used here for the play on words with service of sottage or folly. '" Thomas Littleton, of a good Worcestershire family, became serjeant-at-law in 1455, a Justice of Common Pleas in 14C6. a Knight of the Bath a few years later, died in 1481, and was buried in Worcester Cathedral. He compiled, perhaps when judge of Common Pleas, the famous book on Tentires, which was afterwards the subject of a com- mentary by Sir Edward Coke, who looked upon Littleton's " Tenures " as " the most perfect and absolute book that was ever written in any science." o Vagabondize through the market-place. ^~ Against the rule of manners, or disciidiue, either of the black monks or. &c &c. '^ Q'tere. choir. 1* '* I shayle as a man or horse dothe that gothe croketl with his legges : Je vas eschays. . . A i^hnyle with y* knees togj'ther and the fete outwarile : .4 eschays.** (Palsgrave, 15.30, quoted by Dyce.) TO A.D. 1550.] SHORTER POEiMS. 133 Aad pluck away the leads Even over their heads, And sell away their bells And all that they have ellos : Thus the people tells, KaOes like ri^hels. Reads shrewdly and spells, -ilO And with foundations niells, And talks liko Titiwls ' How ye break the dead's wiUs, Turn monasteiies into water-iuill';, Of an abbey ye make a tcransje ; Your works, they say, are strany;e ; .So that theu' founders' souls Have lost theii' bcad-rolls,'- The money for theii' masses Spent amoni^ wanton lasses ; i'lO The Birigcs are forgotten, Their founders lie there I'otten, But where their soidcs dwell Therewith I will not mell. What could the Turk do moro AVith aU his false lore, Turk, Saracen or Jew ? I repoit me to you, t) merciful Jesu, You support and rescue 4 •JO Jly stj'lo, for to direct It may take some eifeet ! For I abhor to w^^tc How the lay fee'' despite You prelates, that of light Should be lanterns of liglit. Ye live, they say, in delight Drowned in dHic'us In gloria et divitiis In adhtirabili /lonorr, 4 Id In gloria^ ct iijilctidore Fnlgurantis hastrayed for. ■^ Lay fee, laity, holders of by fee or property. * Drowned in delights, in glory and riches, in honoiu* to lie wondered at ; in glory and the shining of the glittering spear (Habakkuk iii. 11) : living with little ptlrity. ^ Glory, praise. ^ EyscUj vinegar. ' Hippoci-as was wine spiced and sugared. •- By like to like, each being rewarded after his deeds. Some men think that ya vShall have penalty For your iuicjuity. Nota, what I say And bear it well away. If it please not theologys It is good for astrologys. 460 An Astrologer. (Holbcui.) For Ptolemy told me The sun sometime to be In Ariete Ascendent a degree When Scorpion descending, Was so then portending A fatal fall of one That should sit on a throne And rule all things alone.' Y'our teeth whet on this bone Amongst you every one. And let Colin Clout have nune Manner of cause to moan ; Lay salve to youi- own sore, For else, as I said befoic, After gloria, laus, May come a sour sauce ; Sorry therefore am I, But truth can never lie. With language thus polluted Holy Chui'ch is bruited -Vnd shamefully confuted. My pen now wUl I sharp And wrest up my harp With sharp, twinkling tretlsa Against all such rebels That labour to confound And bring the Church to the ground ; As ye may daily see How the lay fee 470 4SU 490 ' The reference here is to Wolsey, of whose downfall this was called Skelton's prophecy. ]3fi CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. loOO Of one affinity L'unsent and agrer Against the Church to be And the dignity Of the Bishop's see. And either ye bo too ba" Or else they are mad Of this to report : 5(10 But, under your support. Till my dying day I shall both write and say, And ye shall do the same, How they are to blame You thus to defame : For it maketh me sad How that the people ai-e glai The Church to deprave ; And some there are that rave, 510 Presuming on their wit "When there is never a whit, To maintiiin arguments Against the sacraments. Some make epilogation Of high predestination. And of recidivation' They make interpretation Of an awkward fashion, And of the prescience 520 Of divine essence. And what hj-postasis Of Christes manhood is. Such logic men will chop And in their fury hop 'Ulien the good ale-sop Doth dance in their foretop. Both women and men 8uch ye muy well know and ken That against pricsthode 530 Their malice spi-ead abroJ-, Railing heinously And (Usdainously Of piicstlv dignities. But their malignities. And some have a smack Of Luther's sack And a brenning spark Of Luther's wark, And are somewhat suspect 540 In Luther's sect ; And some of them baik. Clatter and carj) Of that heresy .art Called AViclevista, The devilish dogmatista, And some be Russians And some be Aiians, Some be Pelagians, And make much v,ariance HHO Between the Clergie And the Temporaltie. How the Church hath too mickel Ajid they have too little. And bring in materialities And qualified qualities ^ Recidivationy backsliding. Of pluralities, Of trialities,= And of tot quots' They conmiune Uko sota As cometh to thcii' lots, Of prebendaries and deans. How some of them gleans And gathereth up the store For to catch more and more. 5G0 The Pluralist. (Brandt,) Of parsons and vicaries That make many outcries They cannot keep their wives From them for their Uves. And thus the losels'' strives 570 And lewdly says,^ by Christ, Against the sely pi-iest. Alas ! and well a way, AATiat aUs them thus to say 'r They might be better advised Than to be so disguised. But they have enterprised And shamefully siu-mised How prelacy is sold and bought And come up of nought ; 580 And where the prelates be Come of low degi'ee And set in majesty And spiritual dignity. Farewell Benignity ! Farewell Sim'^Ucity I Farewell Humility I Farewell good Charity ! Ye are so puffed with prida That no man niav abide 590 - TrlaJities, tlu-ee benefices in one holdius-. " Tol qiiots. So in Barclaj's " Sbip of Fools." quoted by Dyce :— *• Tben if this lord bath him in favour, be bath hope To have another benefice of '-reater di^nitie. And so maketh a false suggestion to the Pope For a tot quot, or else a plur.alitie, " * Lo$eh or loreU, good-for-notbiner fellows. ^ Letnihj says, speak without knowledge, as lay people. Tt' A.D. iOOO.] SHOETER POEMS. 137 Your high and lordly looks. Ye cast up then your books And virtue is forgotten : For then ye will be wroken Of every light quarrel, And call a lord a javcl,' A knight a knave ye make, Ye boast, ye face, ye crake," And upon you ye take To rule both king and kaiser, 600 And if ye may have laiser^ Ye will bring all to nought. And that is all yoiu' thought. For the lords temporal Their- rule is very small, Almost nothing at aU. Men say how ye appal The noble blood royal. In earnest and in game Ye arc the less to blame, 610 For lords of noble blood If they well understood How conning * might them advance They would pipe you another dance. But noblemen born. To learn they have scorn But hunt and blow an horn,* Leap over lakes and dikes, Set nothing by politikcs. Therefore ye keep them base 620 And mock them to their face. This is a piteous case, To you that over the wheel Great lords must crouch and kneel And break their hose at the knee, As daily men may see And to remembrance call Fortune so turneth the ball And ruleth so over all That honour hath a great fall. 630 Shall I tell j-ou more ? Yea, shall. I am loth to tell all, But the commonalty j'ou call Idols of Babylon De terra Zebulon, De terra Naphtalim.^ For ye love to go trim. Brought up of poor estate With pride inordinate, Suddenly upstart 6t0 From the dung-cart The mattock and the shide To reign and to rule. And have no gi'ace to think How ye were wont to diink Of a leather bottle With a knavish stopple When mammocks' was yoiu' meat, With mouldy bread to eat, * Javel, once a common term of contempt ; etymologj- doul'tful. - Cralce^ crack, talk big. ^ Laiscr, leisure. * Conniuri, knowledge. ■'■ Scorn to leam anything except liiuiting, hom-blowin^^, &c. ' Of the land of Zebulon, of the land of Naphtali. The allusion is to Isaiah \-iii. 19 — 22 : is. 1, 2. ' Mfimmnclix, scraiJS, leaviugs. 18 Ye could none other get 650 To chew and to gnaw To fill therewith ycjur ni.-nv ; Lodging in fail' straw. Couching your di'owsy licads Sometime in lousy beds. Alas, this is out of mind ! Ye grow now out of kind. Many one ye have untwined^ And made the commons blind. But qui se existimat stare" 660 Let him well beware Lest that his foot slip, And have such a trip And fall in such decay That all the world may say, " Come do%vn, in the devil way 1 " Yet over all that Of bishops they chat, That though ye round your hair An inch above j'our ear 670 And have uiircs patentes And pariiin iiiteiideiites,^" And your tonsures be cropped. Your ears they be stopped ; For Slaster Adulator And Doctor Assrntator And B/aiidior i/ani/iris " AVith Mentior meiifiris^^' They follow your desu'es, And so they blear '^ your eye 680 That ye cannot espy How the male doth wry.'^ Alas, for G-oddes will, AAliy sit ye, prelates, stUl And suffer all this ill r Ye bishops of estates Should open the broad gates Of yoiu' spiritual charge And come forth at large Like lanterns of light 690 In the people's sight, 8 Unfu'ined, destroyed. 5 He who thinketh that he standeth. 1" Ears open and little on the stretch. u I fawn, thou fawnest. '" I lie, thou liest. '^ Blear, blur. Probably fi'om the Cymric "pluor," dust. Tho ima^e of throwing dust in the eyes associated " blear " with magical delusion. An old Latin-German dictionary defines " Prcestigiae " as "Pier vor den Augeu," blear before the eyes; and Milton m-ikes Comus hurl his " Dazzling spells into the spungy air Of power, to cheat the eyes with blear illxision. " ' ' How the male doth u-ry. So in Skelton's " Philip Sparrow : "— *' Yet there was a thing That made the male to wring. She made him to sing The song of lovers lay." And in *' Why come ye not to Coxu't ? " — ** The countrynge at Cales Wraog us on the males." The phrase seems to mean being reduced to extremitj-. Travellers carried, as we have seen in the " Geste of Robin Hood" (line 98il, the money, &c., needed for their journey, in their mails or travelling bags. Squeezing or twisting the mail would, therefore, be equivalent to pinching the pocket, and the traveller would be in extremity when his bag was empty enough to be wrung. This is but a doubtful guess at the origin of a s.i3-ing that iias yet to be decisively interpreted. 138 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1500 lu pulpits autentike For the weal publike Of priesthood in this case ; And always to chase Such manner of schismatii'S And half heretics That would intoxicate. That would coinquinate,' That would contaminate 700 And that would \'iolate And that would derogate And that would abrogate The Church's high estates After this manner rates, The which should he Both frank and free, And have their liberty As of antitjuity It was ratified, 710 And also gratified By holy synoJals And hulls papals As it is n:s irrfff'^ Contained in ilagim Vhartu. But Master Damian Or some other man That clerkly is and can "Well .Scripture expound And his tcxtes gi-ound — 720 His benefice worth ten ]iound, Or scant worth twenty mark, And yet a noble clerk — He must do tliis werk ; As I know a part — Some Masters of Art, Some Doctors of Law, Some learned in other saw, As in Divinity — That hath no dignity 730 But the poor degree Of the University : Or else friar Frederick, Or else friar Dominick, Or friar Hugulinus, Or friar Augustinus, Or friar C'ai-melus That ghostly can heal us; Or else if we may Cret a friar gray, 740 Or else of the order Upon Greenwich border Called Observants,^ Or a friar of France ■ Or else the poor Scot It must come to his lot To shoot forth his shot, ■ Or of Badwell* beside Bury To postel upon a Kyi'ic,"* That would it should be noted 7J0 ' Coinf/uiuatc, defile. - A thiujr certain. 3 The Fraiiciscaus called Observauts liad a settlement by the ting's palace at Greenwich, upon laud first triven to them by Edward IV. Queeu Katheriue was o;ood to the Greenwich trial's : and they so strongly opposed her divorce that Henry VIII. suppressed the order ■ if the Observants thronfrliout England. ' Badwell Ash, in Snft'olk, which is not far from Bury. ■' Po.sf cl njwn a Kyi"if, winte a s'aort gloss (a i)0stil) on a Kijrie Klcisov. How Scripture should be quoted, And so clerkly promoted ; And yet the friar doted. But, men say, your authoritie And your noble see Aiid your dignitie Should be imprinted better Thau all the friar's letter; For if ye would take pain To preach a word or twain. Though it were never .so plain, "With clauses two or three So that it might Iji^ t!ompendiously conveyi'd, These words should he more weighed And better pci'ceived And thankfuUerly received, And better should remain jVmong the people plain That would youi' words i-ctain. Than a thousand thousand other That blabber, bark, and blother. And make a Welshman's hose' Of the le.xt and of the glose. 7(30 r70 Wisdom is Preacher. (Brandf.) For protestation made That I will not wade Farther in this brook, Nor farther for to look In devising of this book, But answer that I may For myself alway Either mialogice Or else ctifft/ortre. So that in divinitie Doctors that learned be Nor Bachelors of that Facultie That hath taken degree 7S0 fi ITelsIiman's hosf, also sliiimian's hose, able to suit every leg. *' Hereunto they add also a similitude not very agreeable, how the Scriptures he lilie to a nose of wax or a shipmau's hose ; how they may be fashioned and phed all manner of ways and serve all men's tiuTis." (Jewel's Defence of Ms Apologj-, i(uoted by Dyce.) TO A.D. 155U. SHOKTER POEMS. 139 In the University Shall not be object at by me. But Doutorl5ulliitus' Varum Hlrrnliis- Domhitis (loclorntiis'-' At the broud gatus, Doctor Daupatiis ^ And Bachelor barlirloratiis (Drunken as a mouse) At the ale house, Taketh his pillion ■■ and his cap At the p;ood ale tap For lack of good wine : As wise as Robin Swine, Under a notary's sign AVas made a divine ; As wise as Waltham's calf ; '' Must preach on Goddcs half In the pulpit solemnly. More meet in the pillory, For by Saint Hilary He can nothing smatter Of logic or school matter; Neither sijUogisiirv Nor CHthiimcninrr, Nor knowcth his clenches Nor his predicaments, And yet he will mell To amend the gospel. And will preach and tell What they do in hell ; 790 8(111 81(1 The Devil is Teacher And he dare not well ncveii'' AVliat they do in heaven, Nor how far Temple Bar is 820 ' BvVatus, swollen aa a bubble. = Little lettered. •'' Doctoratns, made doctor. * DdnpnfKs. daw-p;ite, blockliead. 5 PiUion, from *' pilexia," a cap, here used for the doctor's bat or cap. '* Ray gives the proverb, *' As wise as Waltham's calf, that rau iiiue miles to suck a bull." ' Holbein here illnstrates a superstition that the Devil taught St. Bernard the use of seven verses out of the Psalms. -•» jWiTii. name. From the seven stari'is. Now will I go And tell of other nu) ' Semper ^jrotcatandi) De non impmininulii^^ The four orders of Friars, Though some of th(Mu be liars. As Limitoura" at largo Will charge and discharge; 8o0 As many a friar, trod wot. Preaches for his groat, Flattering for a new coat And for to have his fees ; Some to gather cheese. Loth ,iro they to lese'- Either corn or malt ; Sometime meal and salt. Sometime a bacon iiick '•' That is three fingers thii-k 810 Of lard and of grease, Their convent to increase. I put yo" out of doubt This cannot be brought about But they their tongues file And make a pleasant style To Margery and to Maud How they have no fraud ; And sometime they provoki' Both Gill .and Jack at Nok,' «•")() Their duties to withdi'aw That they ought '■" by the law Their curates to content In open time'^ and in Lent. God wot, they take great pain To flatter and to fayne,'" But it is an old said saw That need hath no law. Some walk jibout in nu'lote>''' In gray russet and hairy coats, 8(10 Some will neither gold nc groats. Some pluck a partridge in remotes. And by the bars of her tail Will know ii raven from a rail, A quail, the rail and the old raven : Sed libera nos a wrt/o.^^ Amen. And by Dudmn " their Clementine Against curates they repine, ^ Mo, more. '" Always protesting aboutmot impugning. " Chaucer's Hubert the Friar, in the Canterbuiy Pilgrimaue, was a Limitoiu-, that is to say, licensed to heai- confession and perform offices of the Chiu-ch within a certain limit. '- Ifsc lose. '= Flirt-, flitch. " Owj\\t. owed. The friars in a parish sometimes got to themselves the dues payable to its ciu'ate. >= Ojifii (I'mc, when there w;is no fast. '° Fa\)m. fawn. 17 MdoU. " Circuiernnt in viclotis" is the form in the Vulgate for what stands in the Authorised Version, " They w.andered about in sheepskins and goatskins." It is from a Greek word /itiAwTi'/, meaning sheepskin or other skin. The melotes worn by monks were usually on>adgerskin, reached from the neck to the loins, and were worn in time of active labom-. " But deliver us fr m evil. " Dudum (lately)— by Pope Boniface VIII., our predecessor— was the beginning of a section of a compilation of decrees, &c., by Clement v., known as the " Clementines." It w.is the section giving a Papal decree, foimded upon the dissension between curates, or pirish clergy, and the friars who interfered with their work as hearers of confession and intercepted many of their dues. The Pope backed the Limitoiu's, and g;ive, by his apostolic power, right to receive confessions, where h prelate refused to grant it to a friar who had been duly presented to him. 140 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.B. IWJ And say, properly they are aaeerdotis To shrive, assoil and release S70 Dame Margery's soul out of hell. But when the friar feU in the well He eould not siny himself thereout But by the help of Christian Clout. Another Clementine also, How Friar Fabian with others mo Exh^it dc Faradiso^^ WTien they again thither shall come Dc hoc petitiiitu coHsiiiinti.' And through all the world they go 880 AVith Diriije and Plocibu. But now my mind ye understand, For they must take in hand To preach and to withstand AJl manner of objections ; For bishops have protections, They say, to do corrections, But they have no att'ections To take the said directions. In such manner of cases, 890 Men say, they bear no faces To occupy such places, To sow the seed of graces ; Theii' hearts are so fainted And they be so attainted AVith covctise and ambition And other superstition That they be deaf and dumb And l^lay silence and glum, Can say nothing but Mum. 900 They occupy them so With singing Placebo They ^-ill no farther go. They had liever to please And take their worldly ease Than to take on hand Flinching from Duty, {ht-andt.) WorshipfuUy to withstand Such tempor.al war and bate As now is made of late Against Holy Church estate Or to maintain good quarrels. The lay men call them banels Full of gluttony And of hypocrisy. That counterfeits and paints As they were very saints. In matters that them like They show them politike. Pretending gravitie And seignioritie With all solenmitie For their indemnitie. For they will have no loss Of a penny nor of a cross * Of their predial lands That cometh to their hands. And as far as they dare set All is fish that cometh to net. 910 Vain Cake. \lU\ind(.) Building royally Their mansions curiously With tuiTets and with towers With halls and \\-ith bowers, Stretcliing to the stars With glass windows and bars ; Hanging aVtout the walls Cloths of gold and palls. Arras of rich array Fresh as flowers in 5Iay, With Dame Diana naked. How lusty Venus quaked And how Cupid shaked His dart and bent his bow For to shoot a crow, And how Paris of Troy Danced a lege de moy, Made lusty sport and joy With Dame Helen the queen. With such stories bidene Their chambers well beseen ; With triumphs of Ca;s5r And of Pompeius war. 920 930 940 9oC * Departed out of Paradise. 2 As to tliis we ask for counsel. 3 TLecrosson pieces of money led to a saying of an empty purse thai the devil might dance in it. TO A.D. 1550.] SHORTER POEMS. n Of renown and of famo By them to get a name ; Now all the world stares, How they ride in goodly chaii'S Conveyed by elephants With laureate garlants, And hy unicorns With their seemly horns : Upon these beastes riding, yOO Naked boyes striding, With wanton wenches winking. Now truly to my thinking That is a speculation And a meet meditation For prelates of estate Their courage to abate From worldly wantonness Then- chambers thus to di'ess With such perfectness D70 And all such holiness, Howbeit they let down fall Their chm'ches cithedi'al. Squii'e, knight, and lord Thus the chiu-ch remord ; With all temporal people They run against the steeple, Thus talking and telling How some of you are melling. Yet soft and fair for sweUing, S80 Beware of a queen's yelling. It is a busy thing For one man to rule a king Alone and make reckoning To govern over all And rule a realm royal By one man's very "wit. Fortune may chance to flit, And when he weeneth to sit Yet may he miss the quysshon : ' 990 For I read a proposition Cmit reylbus ain'ware Et omnibtis dominari, Et fiiipra tc pravair ; ^ Wherefore he hath good lire That can liimselt assui-e How fortune 'will endure. Then let reason you support. For the Commonalty doth report That they have great wonder 1000 That ye keep them so under. Yet they marvel so much loss For ye play so at chess. As they suppose and guess. That some of you but late Hath j}layed so checkmate With lords of great estate, After such a rate. That they shall mell^ nor make, Nor upon them take 1010 For king nor kaiser's sake. But at the pleasure of one That ruleth the roast alone. ' Quyss}ton, cushion. " To be friend with the hintr. and master over all, and tyrant over tiyself. ^ Men, meddle. Vain Fokce. Alas, I say, alas '. How may this come to pass. That a man shaU hear a mass And not so hardy ■* on his head To look on God in fonn of bread, But that the parish clerk Thei'eupon must hark. And grant him at his asking For to see the sacring ? And how may this accord. No man to oui- sovereign lord So hardy to make suit, Nor yet to execute His commandment. Without the assent Of our President ; Nor to express to his person, AVithout your consentation Grant him his license To press to his presence. Nor to ^peak to him secretly, Oiienly nor privily, Without his President bo by Or else his substitute Whom he will depute '^ Neither Earl nor Duke Pei-mitted ? By Saint Luke And by sweet Saint Hark, This is a wondrous wark ! That the people talk this Somewhat there is amiss. The devil (-mnot stop their mouths But they will talk of such uncouths,* All that ever they ken Against spuitual men. A\Tiethcr it be wrong or right Or else for despite, Or however it hap Their tongues thus do clap, 1020 1030 104O 1030 * Hai-dy, bold. * Uncouths, things hitherto xmlmown. 142 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATUEE. (_A.D. 15m And thi-ough such dctmction Thoy put you to your action ; And whether they say tndy As they may abide thereby, Or else that they do lie. Ye know better than I. But now (h'bttis scire ^ And f>:roundly iixdlrc,- 1060 In your eonvenire^ Of this prenmnire. Or else in the nure They say they ^^■ill you cast ; Therefore stand sure and fast. Stand sure and take good footing-, ' And let be all your mooting-,'' Yoiu- gazing and your touting,'' And your partial promoting Of those that stand in yoiu- grace ; 1070 But old servants ye chase, And put them out of their place. Make ye no murniuration Though 1 write after tliis fashion : Though I, CoUn Clout, Among the holy rout Of yo\i that clerks be Take now upon me Thus copiously to -m-ite ; I do it for no despite. 1080 ^Vhcrefore take no disdain At my style rude .and plain. For I rebuke no man That virtuous is ; why than "Wreak ye your anger on me ? For those that rirtuous be Have no cause to siiy That I speak out of the way. Of no good bishop speak I, Nor good priest I esery,^ 1090 Good friar nor good ■ luuii, Good monk nor good clerk. Nor yet of no good werk. But my recounting is Of them that do a-mis Tn speaking and rebelling, In hindering and disavailing Holy Church om- mother One against another ; To use such despiting 1100 Is all my whole writing ; To hinder no man. As near as I can, For no man have I named ; Wherefore should I be blamed ? Ye ought to be ashamed Against me to be gramed,' And can tell no cause why But that I wr\ic, truly. Then if .any there be 111 Of high or low degree. Of the spiritualtie * Ye ougM to know. 2 Hear. ^ Comiug to^etlier. ■* Koofing, contestiBg. ^ Touiint}, prying, seetiug. ^ Escry (Old French "escrier"), cry out against. 7 Gramedt angered. Or of the temporaltie. That doth think or wcon That his conscience be not clean, And feeleth himself sick Or touched on the quick. Such gi-ace God them send Themself to amend. For I will not pretend 1120 Any man to offend. "\Micref ore as thinketh mo Great idiots they be. And little grace they have This treatise to deprave : Nor will hear no preaching Nor no vii-tuous teaching. Nor -will have no reciting Of any vii'tuous writing-. Will know none intelligence 1130 To reform their negligence. But live still out of fa.shion To their own d.amnation. To do shame they have no shame. But they would no man should them blame ; Thoy have an c\-il name. But yet they will occupy the sauu-. With them the Word of God Is coimted for no rod. They count it for a railing 1 1 tO That nothing is availing. " The preachers with evil hailing Shall they daunt us prelates That be their primates '^ Not so hardy on their pates '. * Hark, how the losel prates With a wide weasand 1 Avaunt, Sir Guy of Gaunt !' Avaunt, lewd priest, avaunt ! A-raunt, Sir Doctor Deuyas '. '" 1 l5Ci Prate of thy matins and thy mass. And let our matters pass I How darcst thou, dawcock, mell ! How darest thou, losel, AUegate the Gospel Against us of the Counsel ? Avaunt, to the devil of hell I T.ake him. Warden of the Fleet, Set him fast by the feet I I say. Lieutenant of the Tower. 1 1 GO Make this Im-duin for to lower 1 Lodge him in Little Ease ! " Feed him with beans and pease I 8 Not so bold, on pain of their heads. 5 Mr. Dyce has pointed out that the Sir Guy refeirerl to once or t-wice by Dunbar, in reference to "the spreit of Gy," once also by Sir David Lindsay, when be tells James V. bow he played with him in his childhood, and appeared " sumtime like the grislie gaist of Gy," is not the Sir Guy of romance, but a Guy of Alost, who. in the yeiir 1423, much troubled his widow by appearing to her eight days after his death, whereupon she took counsel ^rith the friai-s of her city, &c. Dyce adds : " As Gaunt is the old name of Ghent, and as Alost is about thirteen miles from that city, perhaps the reader may be inclined to think — what I should greatly doubt— that Skeltcn also alludes to the same story." In one of the flyting poems agidnst G.tmische, Skeltou refers to the same ghost in the lines — " She callyd yow Sir Gy of Gaunt, Nosyd lyke an olyfaunt." '" Dcnifrt.*. deuce-ace. u Little Ease, a term for the pillory or stocks, or an ingeui/JUS union of both. TO i.D. 1550.] SHOETER POEMS. U:5 The King's Bunch or Marshulsy Have him tliithor by anil by ! The villain pioachcth openly Anil ileclaveth our villainy, And of our free simpleness He says that we arc reckless' And full of wilfulness, Shameless and merciless. Incorrigible and insatiate; And after this rate Against us doth jjrate. *■ At Paul's Cross or elsewhere, Openly at "Westiuiustcre. And Saint JIary Spital They set not by us a wliittle.- At the Austen Friars They count us for liars, And at Saint Thomas of Ackers ■' They carp us like crackers. How we will rule all at will Without good i-eason or skiU, And say how that we be Full of paitialitie. And how at a prong- ■* AVe turn right into wi'ong. Delay causes so long That light no man can f ong ; ' They say many matters bo bora By the right of a ram's horn.'' Is not this a shameful scorn To bo teared thus and torn •' How may we this endure ':■ Wherefore wo make you sui-e. 1170 IISO 1190 One of the Heretics. [HoJhcht.) 1 Rickhss (First English " regol-leas." Cterman "regel-los"), out of rule. " First English *' hwytel," a whittle, knife. Dyce's test lias "whistle." MS., "slietyll.*" - St. Thomas of Aeon or Acars (Acre, in the Holy Land) was near the condiut in Clieapside. * At ajirong, at a prank, freakishly. ^ Fomj, get hold of. *• The right of a ram's horn, crookedness. Ye preachers shall be yawed,' And some shall be sawed,' As noble E/.cchils' The lioly prophet was; 120O And some of you shall die Like holy Jeremy ; '" Some hanged, some slain. Some beaten to the lirain ; And wo will rule and reign And oiu' matters maintain WTio dare say thereagain Or who dare disdain At our plcasm'e and will ':' For bo it good or be it ill, 1210 As it is, it shall be still. For all JIaster Doctor of (ivil < )r of Divine, or Doctor Drivel. T ict him eoTigh, rough or snivel, Ixun God, run Devil, Kun who may run best. And let take all the rest : We set not a nutshell The way, to Heaven or to Hell." Lo, this is the guise nowadays 1 I2'J0 It is to di'cad, men says, Lest they be Sadduces, As they be said saj-ne" MHiieh determined plain We should not rise again At dreadful doomis day. And so it soemeth tliey ]ilay Which hate to be corrected Wlien they be infected. Nor will suifcr this book 1230 By hook nor by crook Printed for to be. For that no man shall see Xor read in any scrolls Of their drunken noils, Xor of their noddy ])olls. Nor of their scly souls, Nor of .some witless pates Of divers great estates. As well as other mm. 1240 Now to withdraw my pen, And now awhile to i-est, Jle soemeth it for the lj(>st. The forecastle of my sliip Shall glide and smoothly shp Out of the waves wood '- Of the stormy flood, Shoot anchor and lie at road. And sail not far abroad Till the coast be clear 1250 And the lode-star appear. 3Iy ship now will I steer " Yawed, hewed. * It was Isaiah who, according to a Jewish ti-adition, was sawn in two by order of King Maiiasseh. ■J Ezekiel is said to have been murdered in Babylon by a Jewish l>riuce whom lie had convicted of idolatry. '" There was a tradition of Jeremi ih that the Jews at Tahpanhes, in-itated at his rebukes, at liust stoned him to death. *' Said sayiic, said to be. '2 Hood, raging. 144 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1550 Toward the Port Salu Of oiu' Saviour Jesu, Such gi-aco thut He us send To rectify and amend Thingcs that are amis "Wlicn that Ilis pleasure is. Amen. Fac-simile of Woodcut from the Last Page of R. Kele's Edition of "Colin Clout." There are charming passages in Skelton's book of " Philip S})aiTO\\-,"' written in the ]ierson of a simple- liearted nun, who laments the death of a pet bird ; but that poem is too long to be added to " Colin 1 Well-cliosen extracts from "Philip Sparrow" and from "Why come ye nat to Court ? " will be found in " Specimens of English Literature, from 1394 to 1579," with introduction, notes, and glossarial iiides, by the Rev. Walter W. Skeat. This Librart of English Literature is not meant to supply students with text -books, but to bring, if it may be, into many thousand homes a sense of the dehirht- fiiluess and helpfulness of the best English writing in aU times. I seek, as far as I can, to bi-ing the soul of England near even to the poorest handicraftsman who can read, and am not afraid to ask any .sensible boy or girl to take so much trouble a.s the notes show to be necessary for a reasonable understanding of each piece. Some readei"s who have here had their first taste of our old literatm-e, and desire jloser acquaintance with it, may be glad now to be told where they can get the necessary help. In 1867 Dr. Richard Morris published a volume of " Specimens of Eai-ly English selected from the Chief English Authors, a.d. 1250 — a.d. 1400, with Gramm.atical Introduction, Notes and Glossary." The work nest apjieared in two volumes or parts, imder the joint editorship of Dr. MoiTis and the Rev. Walter W. Skeat, our two foremost workers at old English ; Part I. contain- ing specimens of the earliest literature of England to the end of the thirteenth century ; Part II. illustrating the literatm-e of the fom-- teenth centm-y, a.d. 1298— a.d. 1393. Mr. Skeat has added to these the book just cited, foi-ming practically a P.Trt III., as " Specimens of English Literatiu-e fi-om a.d. 1394 to a.d. 1579." These three books give a series of specimens of Early English Literatiu'e taken, without change of spelling, from the old MSS. and books, and fiunished with due aids to a full study of their language. By thorough use of them any one may go far on the way to an exact knowledge of Early EngUsh. Clout." Let us hear a little song of Skelton's before parting from him, and let it b? written without eluinge of its old spelling. He was laureated as poet by his university — that being a kind of graduation common in his time — and at court answered with these lines the question, " Why wear ye Calliope embroidered with letters of sold I " Calliope As ye may se Kcgent is she Of poetes al. Which gave to mo The high dcgre Laurcat to bo Of fame royall ; '\^^losc name enrolde With sUke and golde I dare be bolde Thus for to were. Of her I holde And her housholde ; Though I wax olde And somdcle sere, Yet is she fayne, Voyde of disda>Ti, Me to retayne Her serviture. With her ecrta\Tie I wyll remaTOC, As my souerayne Moost of jdeasure, M/ftf/r/re tons malhettrt'ux. la 20 The Scottish poet WiUiam Dunbar served James IV. of Scotland. The career of the Scottish poet Da^-id Lindsay — called sometimes the poet of the Scottish Reformation — is associated ^^'ith the life of James Y. When, in August, 1-513, James lY. fell at Flodden, Lindsay, second son of Lord Lindsay of Bj-res, was a young man of about three-and-twenty, page in immediate attendance upon the one-year-old son of the fallen king. He remained in attendance on the child, who had become King James Y. In the spring of 1514, the mother of the infant king married again. She was sister to King Henry YIIL, being that Margaret of England whose Scottish marriage WilHani Dunl.'ar had celebrated in liis jjoem of " The Tliistle and the Rose." She took in second marriage the young Archibald, Earl of Angus, nephew to Gavin Douglas, the poet. As Regent, in the interests of England, she was sujierseded in May, 151.5, by the Duke of Albany, who was of royal Scottish blood and of French training. Feuds fol- lowed. The Douglases, into whose family the Queen Dowager had married, were identified with the English or unpatriotic party. The Duke of Albany, more Frenchman than Scot in training, escaped when he could to Paris. In A])ril, 1520, there was a battle in the streets of Edinburgh between Douglases and Hamiltons ; the encounter known as '■ Cleanse the Causewa)-," in which seventy-two were killed. Archibald Ajigus then held Edinburarh -w-ith an TO A.D. 1550.] SHORTER POEMS. 145 armed force ; but his Tudor ■sv'ife had turned against him, and in November, 1521, she warmly welcomed the Duke of Albany back to his Regency after a five yeai-s' absence. Her brother, King Henry of Eng- land, bade the Scots banish Alliany. They met his thi-eats by threatening the English border, in 1522, with an army of eighty thousand men. That army did nothing. Feuds and disti-actions tilled the laud with confusion, which we find painted in a little poem In* Dunbar's friend and ojiponent in many a lively flj-ting-match, Walter Kennedy, a younger son of the tirst Lord Kennedy. Jack Upland was, m England as in Scotland, the name that stood for the poor countiyman. The Uponlandis Mous, it will l)e remembered, was Robert Henryson's name for the Country Mouse, who visited in timi her cousin the Burges Mous. Thus "Walter Kennedy represented JOCK UP-A-LANDS COMPLAINT AGAINST THE COURT IN THE NONAGE OF KING JAMES V. Now is the king in tender age, O Christ, conser\'e him in his yld^ To do justice to man and page That gars- our land lie lang untilied, Though we do doubly paj* their wage, Puir commons presently are pill'd. Thoy ride about in sic a rage, By firth and forest, muir and field. With bow, buckler, and brand. ^ So where they rido intUI the rye 10 The deil mot sane'' the company, I pray it fra my heart truly. This said Jock XJp-a-land. He that was wont to bear the barrows Betwiit the bakehus and the brewhus. On twenty shilling now he tarrows^ To ride the hiegait^ by the plews. But were I king, and had good fallows, In Norway they should hear of news ; I should him take, and all his man'ow.s," 20 And hang them high upon yon }-ews, And thereto plights my hand. And all those lords and barons grit' Upon a gallows should I knit. That thus down-trcadit has our whit.' This said Jock Up-a-land. But would ilk lord that our law leads To husbands'" reason do with skill. To chack" those chieftains by the heads And hang them high upon a hiU, 30 Then hiLsbands labour might their steads '" And priests might patter and pray their fill ; For husbands should not have sic pleads, '3 And sheep and nolt '■• might lie f uU stiU ' In his yld, when old, ^ Gars, make. 3 Brand, sword. * Sane, bless. 5 TarrorKS, delays. ^ Siegait, highway. ' Marroii:s, companions. ^ Grit, ^eat. ^ TFhif, wheat. "* Husbands, cultivators of the ground about their homes. " C/tact, seize. '- Might cultivate their homesteads. " Pleads, disputes, sorrows. 1* Nolt, black cattle. Icelandic " naut ; " English " neat ; " Scottish *'nout. And stacks and ricks might stand. For sen they raid amang o\ir doors, With splent " on spald '* and jousty spurs, There grew na fruit imtil'^ our furs.'* This said Jock Up-a-land. Tak a pmr man " a sheep or twae 40 For hunger, or for fault of food To five or sax woe bairns or mae, They will him hang in halters rude ; But gif ane tak a flock or sae, A bow of ky,-" and let them blood, Full safely may he ride or gae ; I wit not gif these laws be good, I shrew them first them fand. Jesu, for thy holy passioun Grant to him grace that wears the crovni .30 To ding these mony kings all down ! This said Jock Up-a-land. One way of beating down " these many kings " seemed to the English party to be a prompt investi- ture of James V. in his royal office. In 1524, " . the age of thirteen, the boy was " erected " king and held in a captivity that hardly pretended to be freedom. Until tlie year 1524 David Lindsay had always been the child's friend and companion, but his new keepers parted the king from those of his old followers who too faithfully represented Scottish nationality, Lindsay among them. In May, 1528, the king, who was then seventeen years old, escaped to Stirling, asserted - his authority, drove Angus to England, confiscated his estates, and began to reign as independent sovereign. Tlien Lindsay returned to him, and through poem after poem poured into the king's ear faithful and strict reminders of his duty. One of these poems — the only one in which the poet speaks to the king for himself as well as for his country — was " Lindsay's Complaint." Tliis and all else that his friend wrote in the way of admonition the king took in good part ; indeed, it seems to have been after the address to him of the "Complaint" that James, in 15.30, made Lindsay Sir- Da^id, and gave liini office as Lion King of Arms, with security for the pajTnent of his salary. From that date, tlierefore, at the age of forty, he became Sir David Lindsay ; Lindsay of the Mount, an estate bought by him a few miles from Cupar Fife. All Lindsay's poems are didactic, and in his "Complaint," even while the professed object of the poem is to remind the king of liis own claims, he wi'ites as one whose care is above all things for the claims of Scotland on her king. LINDS.W'S COMPLAINT. Sir, I beseech thine excellence Hear my complaint mth patience. My dolent heart docs me constrain Of my infortune to complain, 19 15 Splent. hanging sleeve. 16 Spald (Frencli *' espaule "), shoulder. 18 Furs, furrow. First Eng-hsh "furh." 1' Tit a puir vian, if a poor inau should take. -0 A how of ky, a herd of cattle. 1" rutn, unto. 146 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1500 Howboit I stand in great doubtance Whom I shall -n-j-te of my mischance : "Wiether Saturnis cruelty Eegnand in my nati\'ity By bad aspect which works vengeance, Or others' heavenly influence ; 10 Or gif I be predestinate In court to be inl'ortunate, ■^Tiich has so long in ser-vice been Continually with king and queen, And enterit to thy majesty The day of thy nativity. \Vherethi-ough my friendis ben ashamit And with my foes I am defamit, Seeand that I am not .regardit Nor with my brcther in court rewardit ; 20 Blamand my slothful neghgence That seekis not some recompence. When divers men does me demand, " Why gettis thou not some piece of land As well as other men has gotten ? " Then -n-ish I to be dead and rotten, With sic extreme discomforting That I can make no answering. I would some %\-ise man did me teach Whether that I should flatter or fleich." 30 I will not flyte, that I conclude. For crabbing of thy colsitude ; ^ And to flatter I am defamit : Want I reward, then am I shamit. But I hope thou shall do as weill As did the father of fameill Of whom Christ makis mentioun, Whilk, for a certain pensioun, Fet men to work in his vineyard. But who came last got first reward ; 40 "V\Tierethrough the first men were displeasit, But he them prudently amesit,* For though the last men fii-st were servit Yet gat the first that they deservit. So I am sure thy Majesty Shall once reward me ere I die. And rub the rust oft' my ingine * Which ben, for languor, like to tine,'' Although I beii-' not hke a bard. Long service eamis aye reward. 50 I cannot blame thine excellence That I so long want recompence. Had I soUstit^ like the lave' My reward had not been to crave ; But now I may weU understand A dimib man yet wan never land. And in the court man gets no thing Without inopportune asking. Alas ! my sloth and shamefulness Debarrit fra me aU greediness. CO Greedy men that are diUgent Eight oft obtainis their intent, 1 Wytc of, blame for. 2 Fleich, wheedle. 3 "I resolve that I will not scold lest I should iri'itate your Mghness." * Atiiesit, appeased. * Ingine {" ingenium "), wit. c Tine, perish. ^ heir, roar. "^ Solistit, solicited. y iaue, rest. And f ailyeis '" not to conqueis " lands. And namely '- at young princes' hands. But I took ne'er none other cure In special but for thy plcsour. But now I am na niair despaii'd But I shall get princely reward, The whilk to me shall be mail' glore Nor them thou did reward afore. When men does ask ought at a king. Should ask his grace a noble thing. To his excellence honorabill And to the asker prof itabill. Though I be in my asking hdder,''' I pray thy grace for to consider : Thou has made both lords and lairds. And has gi'en mony rich rewau'ds To them that was fuU far to seek When I lay nightly by thy cheek. I take the Queenis grace, thy mother. My Lord Chanc'laie and mony other. Thy nowreis '■* and thy old mistress I take them aU to bear witness. And WilHe Dile, were he alive. My life full weiU he could descrive : How as a chapman bears his pack, I bore thy grace upon my back, And sometimes straddlings on my neck Dansand with mony bend and beck. The first syUabis that thou did mute '» Was " Pa Da Lin ;" " upon the lute Then plart I twenty springis '' perqueir,'^ WTiich was great piete '^ for to hear. From play thou never let me rest But gj-nkartoun-" thou lo^dt aye best : j\jid aye when thou come from the school Then I behovit to plaj' the fool : As I at length into my Dreme -' My sundry serrice did expreme. Though it ben better, as sa>-is the wise, Hap to the court than good servise,^ I wait-'' thou lovit me better than Nor-^ now some wife does her gude man. Then men to other did record, Said Lindsay would be made a lord : Thou has made lords, sir, by Saint GeiU,-' Of some that has not servit so wciU. To you, my lords, that standis by, I shall you show the causes why ; 70 80 90 100 110 1'' Failyeis, fail. n Ctynqueis, acquire whether by art or valour. 12 Namely, especially. 13 Lidder, sluggish, behind others. 1* Nowreis (French "nourrice"), nurse. 'j Mute, articulate. Latin " mutire," to mutter. 1*^ Pa Da Lin, — play, Da\id Lindsay. 1" SpHngis, quick cheerful tunes. French " espringier," to dance. '8 Pcrijitcir (French "par cceur"), by heart, from memory. 1' Picti (French "^iiti"), affection, love, piety. -0 Gynkarioun, a dance tune. 21 Into my Itreme, iu my Dream. Lindsay's *' Dream" was the first poem he wrote for King James after his escape to independence. It contained a vision of Earth, Hell, and Heaven, and of the misery of the people, i>ersonified in John tlie Commonweal, as earnest warning to the young king of his duty. The "Dream" was followed by the " Complaint." '^ At court chance is better than good service. -^ Wait, wot, know. -» Than— 1101; then— than. « GciU, Giles. TO A.D. 1550.] SHORTER POEMS. 147 Gif yc list tarry, I shall tcU How my mfortiine first befell. I prayit daily on my laiee, Jly young maister that I might see Of cUd in his estate royal Having power imperial ; Then trustit I, nvithout demand, To be promoTit to some land. But my asking I gat o'er soon Because a clips ' fell in the moon The whilk all Scotland made asteir. Then did my purpose run arroar, The which were longsome to declare, And als my heart is wonder sare^ AVTien I have in remembrance The sudden change to my mischance. The King was but twelve years of age^ When new rulers come in their rage. For CommonweiU makand no cair But for their profit singulair. Imprudently, like witless fools, They took that young Prince from the schools Where he, under obedience, Was lemand virtue and science, And hastUy plat in his hand The governance of aU Scotlind. As who would, in a stormy blast, When mariners ben all aghast Through danger of the seis* rage, Would take a child of tender age Whilk never had been on the sey And to his bidding all obey, Gi\ing him whole the govemal Of ship, marchand and maiinal," 120 130 140 The Ship uf IVuls. {B>-oke his mind on life. In the autumn of 1542 he died of a fever, caught in riding fast through bail weather to meet, at King Henry's command, an amljassador fix)ra Charles V. The fii-st of Wyatt's three Satires is based upon Horace's story of the Town and Country Mouse, which we ha^e had already from Robert Henryson ; the second is a free version from the Florentine jioet Luigi Alemanui, who lived and wrote in Wyatt's 20 time, and was only about eight years his senior. The fitness of this Satire, as an utterance of Wyatt's own mind, when, after his imprisonment in the Tower, he withdi-ew to Allington, will be found to account fidly for his choice of model. OF THE courtier's LIFE. (tO JOHN POINS.) Jline own John Poins, since ye delight to know The causes why that homeward I me di-aw. And flee the press of Courts, whereso they go, Bather than to live thrall under the awe Of lordly looks ; wrapped within my cloak. To will and lust learning to set a law : It is not that, because I scorn or mock The power of them to whom fortdne hath lent Charge over us, of right to strike the stroke ; But true it is, that I have always meant 10 Less to esteem them than the common sort Of outward things that judge in their intent. Without regard what inward doth resort. I grant sometime of glory that the fire Doth touch my heart. Me list not to report Blame Ijy honour, and honour to desire. But how may I this honour now attain, That cannot dye the colour hlack a liar ? My Poins, 1 cannot frame my tongue to feign ; To cloke the truth for praise, without desert, 20 Of them that list all vice for to retain. I cannot honour them that set their part With Venus and Bacchus all theii' life long ; Nor hold my peace of them, although I smart. I cannot crouch nor kneel to such a wrong. To worship them like God on earth alone. That are as wolves these sely lambs among. I cannot with my words complain and moan, And suffer nought ; nor smart without complaint ; Nor turn the word that from my mouth is gone. 30 I cannot speak and look like as a saint ; Use wiles for wit, and make deceit a pleasure ; And call craft, counsaile ; for lucre still to paint. I cannot wrest the law to fill the coffer. With innocent blood to feed my self fat, And do most hurt, where that most help I offer. I am not he that can allow the state Of high Ca3sar, and danui Cato to die. That with his de.ath did scape out of the gate From C'a?sar's hands, if IJvy doth not lie, 40 And would not live where liberty was lost : So did his heart the common wealth apply. I am not he, such eloquence to boast. To make the crow in singing as the swan ; Nor caU the lion of coward beasts the most. That cannot take a mouse, as the cat can ; And he that dieth for hunger of the gold. Call him Alexander ; and say that Pan Passeth Apollo in music many fold ; Praise Sir Thopas for a noble tale, 50 And scorn the story that the Knight told ; ' Praise him for counsel that is drimk of ale ; * The allusion is to two pieces in Chaucer's " Canterbury Tales : '* (1) the rhyme of Sir Thopas, ^ven by Chaucer as a caricature of the prolix conventionality of many of the old romances, and cut short by Harry Bailly, host of the Tabard, as unendurable ; and (2) the " Knight's Tale " of Palemou and Arcite. wherein Chaucer has smitj in his own best way of love and chivalrous adventure. 154 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. La.d. 1520 Grin when he laughs that beareth all the sway, Frown when ho frowns, and prroan when he is pale ; On others' lust ' to hang both niglit and day. None of these points would ever frame in me : My •"'it is nought, I cannot learn the way. And much the less of things that greater be ; That asken help of colours- to devise To join the mean -n-ith each extremity ; 60 "With nearest virtue aye to cloke the vice ; And, as to purpose likewise it shall fall, To press the via"tue that it may not rise. As, drunkenness good fellowship to call ; The friendly foe, -n-ith his fair double face, Say he is gentle and courteous therewithal ; Affir m that favel^ hath a goodly grace In eloquence ; and cruelty to name Zeal of justice, and change in time and place ; And he that sufiereth offence without blame, 70 Call him pitiful ; and him true and plain That raileth reckless unto each man's shame ; Say he is rude, that cannot lie and feign ; The lecher, a lover ; and tyi'anny To be the right of a prince's reign. I cannot, I, no, no ! it will not be. This is the cause that I could never yet Hang on their sleeves that weigh, as thou mayst see, A chip of chance more than a pound of wit. This maketh me at home to hunt and hawk, SO And in foul weather at my book to sit. In frost and snow, then with my bow to stalk. No man doth mark whereso I ride or go. In lusty leas'* at liberty I walk ; And of these news I feel nor weal nor woe. Save that a clog doth hang yet at my heel. No force* for that ; for it is ordered so That I may leap both hedge and dike fuU wele. I am not now in France to judge the ■n-ine, AVith savoury sauce the delicates to feel ; 90 Nor yet in Spain, where one must him incline Rather than to be, outwardly to seem. I meddle not with wits that be so fine. Nor Flanders cheer lets* not my sight to deem Of black and white, nor takes my wit away With beastliness ; such do those beasts esteem. Nor I am not where truth is given in prey For money, poison, and treas6n, of some A common practice, used night and day. But I am here in Kent and Christendom, 100 Among the Muses, where I read and rhyme : Where if thou Ust, mine own John Poins, to come. Thou shalt be judge how I do spend my time. To this let us add a few of Wyatt's smaller poems : — A DESCRIPTION OP SUCH A ONE AS HE WOULD LOVE. A face that should content me wond'rous well vShould not be fair-, but lovely to behold ; Of lively look, all grief for to repel ; With right good gi-ace so would I that it should 1 iiisf, pleasure. See Note 2, ijatre 38. ^ Colours, outward seeniings as distin^iiislied from the inner truth. The word used in that sense in Latin was commonly so applied in old English (as hy Bacon when he -m-ote of the "Colours of Good and Evil "), and still lives in such phrases as " a colourable pretext," &c. 3 Favel, ihittei-y. * Leas, pastures. ' Wo force, no matter. « Lets, hinders. Speak, without word, such woi-ds as none can tel'. : The tress also should be of crisped gold. With wit and these perchance I might be tried, And knit again with knot that should not slide. OF HIS RETURN FROM SPAIN. Tagus, farewell 1 that westward with thy sti'eams Turns up the gTiiins of gold ah-eady tried ; For I, with spui' and sail, go seek the Thames, Gainward the sun that sheweth her wealthy pride ; And to the town that Brutus sought by dreams,' Like bended moon that leans her lusty side. My King, my Country, I seek, for whom I live. mighty Jove, the winds for this me give. THAT PLEASURE IS .MIXED WITH EVERY PAIN. Venomous thorns that are so sharp and keen Bear flowers, we see, full fresh and fair of hue. Poison is also put in medicine. And unto man his health doth oft renew. The fire that aU things eke consumeth clean 3Iay hurt and heal ; then if that this be true, 1 trust sometime my harm may be my health, Since every woe is joined with some wealth. OF DISSEMBLING WORDS. Throughout the world, if it were sought, Fair words enough a man shall find : They be good cheap ; they cost right nought ; Their substance is but only ^-ind. But well to say, and so to mean, That sweet accord is seldom seen. THE CAREFUL LOVER COMPLAINETH, AND THE HAPPY LOVER COUNSELLETH. " Ah : Robin ! Jolly Robin ! TeU me how thy leman doth. And thou shalt know of mine." " 3Iy lady is unkind, pierdie 1" — " Alack, why is she so I'" — " She loveth another Ijetter than me. And yet she livill say, no." — " I find no such doubleness ; I find women true. My lady loveth me doubtless. And will change for no new." — " Happy art thou while that doth last ; But I say as I find : That woman's love is but a blast, And turneth like the -n-ind." Hispoiise. " But if thou wilt avoid thy harm, This lesson learn of me : At others' fires thyself to warm, And let them wai-m with thee." 7 That Brutus sortght hy dreams. Brut or Brutus, great-gi-audson of the Trojan .Sbieas, was, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth's chronicle, and the old poems formed from it by Wace and Layamon, the foimder and name-father of Britain. As he was leadintr the captive Trojans from Greece he had in a temple of Diana a prophetic dream of the fair land in the West (Britain) that he was to win, and where he was to build a new Ti-oy, Troy-novaut, or London. TO A.D. 1558.] SHORTER POEMS. 155 Le I'laintif. " Such folks sh;ill take no harm by love, That can abide their turn ; But I, alas 1 can no ^vay prove In love, hut lack and niouiu." AN EARNEST SUIT TO HIS UNKIND MISTRESS NOT TO FORSAKE HIM. Acd wilt thou leave me thus ? Say nay ! say nay ! for shame ! To save thee from the blame Of all my gi-ief and grame. And wilt thou leave me thus ? Say nay ! say nay ! And wilt thou leave me thus, That hath lov'd thee so long, In wealth and woe among r' And is thy heart so strong As for to leave me thus ':" Say nay ! say nay ! 10 20 And wilt thou leave me thus, That hath given thee my heart Never for to depart. Neither for pain nor smart y And wilt thou leave me thus r' Say nay ! say nay 1 And wilt thou leave me thus. And have no more pity Of him that loveth thee ? Alas ! thy cruelty ! And wilt thou leave me thus ? Say nay ! say nay ! THE LOVER BESEECHETH HIS MISTRESS NOT TO FORGET HIS STEADFAST FAITH AND TRUE INTENT. Forget not yet the tried intent Of such a truth as I have meant ; My great travail so gladly spent. Forget not yet ! Forget not yet when first began The weary life ye know, since whan The Slut, the service none tell can. Forget not yet ! 8 Forget not yet the great assays. The cruel wrong, the scornful ways. The painful patience in delays. Forget not yet ! Forget not, oh ! forget not this. How long ago hath been and is The mind that never meant amiss : Forget not yet ! 1 G Forget not then thine own approv'A, The which so long hath thee so lov'd, Whose steadfast faith yet never mov'd : Forget not this 1 THE COMPLAINT OF A DESERTED LOVER. " How should 1 Bo so jjleasant In my semblant As my fellows be ? " Not long ago It chanced so. As I did walk alone, I hoard a man That now and than Himself did thus bemoan. 10 " Alas ! " he said, " I am betray'd And utterly outdone ; 'Whom I did trust. And think so just. Another man hath won. " My service due And heart so true On her I did bestow ; I never meant 20 For to repent In wealth, nor yet in woe. " Each western wind Hath turned her mind. And blown it clean away ; Thereby my wealth. My mirth, and health, Ai'e driven to great decay. " Fortflne did smile A right short while, 30 And never said me nay ; With pleasant plays And Joyful days My time to pass away. " Alas 1 alas ! The time so was ; So never shall it be, — • Since she is gone. And I alone Am left, as you may see. 40 " T\Tiere is the oath ? \\Tiere is the troth That she to me did give ? Such feigned words, With sely boui'ds. Let no wise man believe. " For even as I Thus woefully Unto myself complain ; If ye then trust, 50 Needs loam ye must To sing my song in vain. " How should I Be so pleasant In my semblant As my fellows bo ?" 156 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1530 THE KE-CURED LOVER EXULTETH IN HIS FREEDOM. I am as I am, and so will I "be ; But how that I am none knoweth truly. Be it evU, he it well, be I bond, be I free, I am as I am, and so will I be. I lead my life indifferently ; I mean no thing but honesty ; And though folks judge full diversely I am as I am, and so will I die. 1 I do not rejoice, nor yet complr.:_", Both mii-th and sadness I do retrain, And use the mean, since folks will feign ; Yet I am as I am, be it pleasure or pain. Divers do judge as they do trow. Some of pleasure and some of woe ; Yet for aU that no thing they know ; But I am as I am, wheresoever I go. 16 But since judgcrs do thus decay, Let every man liis judgment say; I will it take in sport and play, For I am as I am, whosoever say nay. ■WTio judgeth well, well God him send ; 'Who judgeth e-vil, God them amend; To judge the best therefore intend ; For I am as I am, and so will I end. Yet some there he that take delight To judge folks' thought for envy and spite ; But whether they judge me wrong or right, I am as I am, and so do I write. Praj-ing you all that this do read To trust it as you do your creed ; And not to think I change my weed, For I am as I am, howe'er I speed. But how that is, I leave to j-ou ; Judge as ye list, false or true. Ye know no more than afore ye Imew ; Yet I am as I am, whatever ensue. And from this mind I will not flee ; But to you all that misjudge me I do protest, as ye may see, That I am as I am, and so will be. 24 32 40 Sir Thomas Wyatt and the Earl of Surrey were, in Hemy VIII. 's reign, the first introducers of the Sonnet into English Literature. Wyatt, the elder man, was also a more exact imitator of the form of the sonnet as the practice of Petrarch had main- tained and established it. The Earl of Surrey's imitations of the Petrarchan sonnet were defective as to their mechanism in several respects. Wyatt overlooked only one condition, namely, tliat the last two lines should not rhyme as a couplet; and for his use of a closing couplet he had authority in the practice of Dante's contemporary, Cmo da Pistoia, and of other Italian masters. In Wyatt's somiets there is always a couplet at the close, in Petrarch's never. Otherwise Wyatt observed accurately the division of the fourteen lines into two q>u\trains, forming eight lines of opening, and two terzettes, forming six lines for the delivery of the thought. He observed that there should be only two rhymes running through the two quatrains, that the second quatrain shoidd echo the rhJ^ning of the first, and that the two rhjanes have, with Petrarch, an arrange- ment that he preferred and seldom departed from {a h h a). Wyatt observed also that there should be three rhymes running through the two terzettes. Sm-rey not merely ended his sonnets with couplets, but was essentially irregular in tlie arrangement of their rhymes. Here, for instance, is one of Wyatt's sonnets : — ■ A RENOUNCING OF LOVE. Farewell Love ! and all thy laws for ever ; Thy baited hooks shall tangle me no more. Senec and Plato call me from thy lore To perfect wealth my wit for to endeavour. In hUnd errour when I did persever. Thy sharp repulse, th.at pricketh aye so sore. Taught me in trifles that I set no store. But scape forth thence, since Hberty is lever.' Therefore, farewell I go, trouble younger hearts. And in me claim no more authority. With idle youth go use thy property. And thereon spend thy many brittle darts ; For, hitherto though I have lost all my time, ^Mo Hst no longer rotten boughs to clime. His fellow-poet, the Earl of Surrey, wi'ote these lines — ON THE DEATH OF SIR THOMAS WYATT. Wyatt resteth here, that quick could never rest : Whose heavenly gifts increased hy disdain ; And virtue sank the deeper in his breast : Such profit he hy envy could obtain. A head, where wisdom mysteries did frame ; Whose hammers beat still in that Uvely brain, As on a stifhe.- where that some work of fame Was daily wrought, to turn to Britain's gain. A visage stern, and mild ; where both did grow Vice to contemn, in virtue to rejoice : 10 Amid great storms, whom grace assured so. To live upright, and smile at fortune's choice. A hand, that taught what might be said in rhyme; That reft Chaucer the glory of his wit. A mark, the which (unpcrfected for time) Some may approach, but never none shall hit. A tongue, that served in foreign realms his king ; Whose coxirteous talk to virtue did inflame Each noble heart ; a worthy guide to bring- Our EngUsh youth by travail unto fame. 20 An eye, whose judgment none afi^ect could bUnd, Friends to alhu'c, and foes to reconcile ; Whose piercing look did represent a mind With virtue fraught, reposed, void of guile. 1 Xerer, dearer. » Stitlui, anvil. TO A.D. 155S.] SHORTER POEMS. 157 A heart, -where dread was never so imprest To hide the thought that might the trutli advance I In neither fortune loft, nor yet roprcst. To swell in wealth, or yield unto niischanee. A valiant corpse,' where force and heauty met : Happy, alas ! too happy, but for foes, 30 Lived, and ran the race that nature set ; Of manhood's shape, where she the mould did lose. But to the hcavens.that simple soul is fled. Which left, with such as covet Christ to know. Witness of faith, that never shall be dead ; Bent for our health, but not received so. Thus for our guilt this jewel have we lost ; The earth his bones, the heavens possess his ghost. Heney Howard, Earl of Surret. From the Copj of Holbein's Podrait in Cliamhcrlaine^ Hemy Howard, Earl of Surrey, who was about fourteen years j'ounger tlian Sir Thomas Wyatt the poet, and survived him but five years, was tlie elder son of Thomas, Earl of Surrey, by his second \vife, daughter of Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham. Hemy Howard became Earl of Surrey in 1.526, at the age of about seven, when his father succeeded to the dukedom of Norfolk. Two years later the boy served as cupbearer to King Hemy VIII., and from the time when he was fifteen he was in regular attendance upon the king's person. His father loved literature ; his mother had been an especial friend to Skelton ; and the Earl of Surrey soon acquu'ed fame at court as a poet who could -WTite skilfully in the Italian fashion, and vigorously too in his own way as a high-s]iirited, energetic, and somewhat headstrong young lord. His exercises in the WTiting of love- scnnets were inscribed to a little gii-1 at couii;, the ' Corpse (French "corps"), the body, sarily the dead body. In old Engliab, not neces- Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald, daughter of Gerald Fitz- gerald, ninth Earl of KUdare, whoso famUy claimed affinity with the Tuscan line of the Giraldi of Florence. Gerald Fitzgerald and his five uncles had risen in rebellion ; he had l>ecn made jirisoner, and attainted as a traitor. He died in the Tower in 153-1, lea-viug little Elizabeth (Surrey's " Geralditie"), aged six, an object of compassion to the court. She was brought to England, and placed at Hunsdon with her second cousin, the Princess Mary. The Earl ot Sm-rey was then seventeen years old, and had been contracted in marriage, a year or two before, to the Earl of Oxford's daughter, Lady Frances Vere. In the folio-wing year, 1535, when Surrey's age was eighteen, and Geraldiae's was seven, Surrey man-ied. In 1536 his fii-st .son, Thomas, was born; and in 1539 his second son, Henry. Geraldine also manied early, and was Lady Antony Brown, though but nineteen years of age, iii 15-47, the year of Surrey's execution. It had always been requu-ed that sequences of son- nets showing a poet's skill in running up and down the scale of the one chiefly-appointed theme, should be inscribed to ladies who were not in any close personal relation of love to the poet. Without that under- standing, reputations would have been continually compromised. Ladies were, doubtless, as un-vvilling then as now to be courted aloud on the housetops, and the old Courts of Love had, in fact, kept strict girard over the line between publicity of rhyming and the privacies of personal aflection. Dante's Beatrice first appeal's in his sonnets as a child of eight, and she died young, Simon dei Bardi's -wife, to whom honour was added by the poet who associated her with his ideal verse. Laui'a was in her eighteenth year when she married Hugnes de Sades, and she was the mother of eleven children when she died at the age of about forty, Petrarch still celebrating her in a form of verse by which no one could be oflended, because in its own day it was seldom misunderstood. The world never saw a line of verse -written by Dante to his o-wii wife, or by Petrarch to the mother of his son John and his daughter Francesca. Fol- lowmg, therefore, what had become an established fashion, when Surrey pro\ed his courtly skill in the wi'iting of love-sonnets, he dedicated them, not to his wife — his words to her were for her ear alone — but to a child of the court, whom it was kindly to distinguish as the theme of his exercises in conven- tional love i-hetoric. The following sonnet is that which proves Elizabeth Fitzgerald to have been the Earl of Surrey's Geraldine : — DESCRIPTION AND PRAISE OF HIS LOVE GERALDINS From Tuseane came my lady's worthy race; Fair Florence was sometime their ancient seat. The western isle whose pleasant shore doth face Wild Camber's cliffs, did give her lively heat. Fostered she was with milk of Irish breast : Her sire an earl, her dame of prince's blood. From tender years, in Britain doth she rest, With king's child ; where she tasteth costly food. Hunsdon did first present her to mine ej-ne : Bright is her hue, and Geraldine she hight. 158 CASSEI.L'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad. 1520 Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine ; And Windsor, alas 1 doth chase me from her sight. Her lieauty of kind ; her ra-tues from above ; Happy is he that can obtain her love I The next piece vnW serve to illustrate Surrey's skill as an imitator of Petrarch. It is translated from Petrarcli's tirst canzone, which is placed between his tenth and eleventh sonnets, and consists in the original, as here, of fourteen lines, although it is not a true sonnet in its structure. It is, nevertheless, as near an approach to a sonnet as anything else left us by SuiTey : — • COMPLAINT THAT HIS LADY, AFTER SHE KNEW OF HIS LOVE, KEPT HER FACE ALWAY HIDDEN FROM HIM. I never saw my lady lay apart Her comet black, in cold nor yet in heat, Sith first she knew my grief was grown so great ; "Which other fancies diiveth from my heart. That to myself I do the thought reseiwe. The which unwares did wound my wof ul breast ; But on her face mine eyes might never rest. Yet since she knew I did her love and ser\-e, Her golden tresses clad alway with black, Her smiling looks that hid thus evermore, And that restrains which I desire so sore. So doth this cornet govern me alack '. In summer, sun, in winter's breath, a frost ; Whereby the light of her fair looks I lost I In 1.512 Surrey served luider his father, who led an English force across the border, and was at the burning of Kelsal. After his return he was im- prisoned awhile in the Fleet for breaking citizens' windows. One of his two comrades in that freak was the only son of Wyatt the poet, Thomas Wyatt the younger, who was about three j'ears younger than Surrey, and who w-as executed in 15.5-t for rebellion against the marriage of Queen Mary with Philip of S])ain. Surrey playfidly excused his ofleuce of window-breaking in this SATIRE AGAINST THE CITIZENS OF LONDON. London ! hast thou accused me Of breach of laws ? the root of strife ! Within whose breast did boil to see. So fer\'ent hot, thy dissolute life ; That even the hate of sins that grow Within thy wicked walls so rife. For to break forth did convert so, That terror could it not repress. The which, by words since preachers know What hope is left for to redress. By unkno^Ti means it liked me My hidden burthen to exjiress. WTiereby it might appear to thoe That secret sin hath secret sjiite ; From Justice' rod no fault is free. But that all such as work unright In most quiet, are next ill rest. In secret silence of the night This made me, with a reckless breast. To wake thv sluggards with my bow : A figure of the Lord's behest, Whose scourge for sin the Scriptures shew. That as the fearful thunder's clap By sudden flame at hand we know ; Of pebble stones the soundless rap, The di-eadful plague might make thee see Of God's wi-ath that doth thee enwrap. That Pride might know, from conscience free, How lofty works may her defend ; And Env}- find, as he hath sought. How other seek him to offend : And Wrath taste of each cruel thought The just shape, higher in the end : And idle Sloth, that never wrought, To heaven his spii-it lift may begin : And greedy Lucre live in dread. To see what hate ill got goods win. The lechers, ye that lusts do feed, Perceive what secrecy 's in sin : And gluttons' hearts for sorrow bleed, Awaked, when their fault they find. In loathsome ^ice each cb-unken wight To stir to God, this was my mind. Thy windows had done me no spight ; But proud pcojjle, that th'cad no fall, Clothed with falsehood and unright Bred in the closures of thy wall, Wrested to wrath my fervent zeal Thou hast ; to strife, my secret call. Indured hearts no warning feel. ! shameless ! is dread then gone ? Be such thy foes, as meant thy weal f 1 member of false Babylon ! The shop of craft ! the den of ire ! Thy cU'cadful doom di'aws fast upon. Th}' martyrs' blood by sword and fire, In heaven and earth for justice call. The Lord shall hear their just desire ! The flame of wrath shall on thee fall ! With famine and pest lamentably Stricken shall be thy lechers all ; Thy proud towers, and turrets high Enemies to God, beat stone from stone ; Thine idols burnt that wrought iniquity ; WTien none thy ruin shall bemoan. But render imto the righteous Lord, That so hath judged Babylon, Immortal praise ^vith one accord. In October, 1.54.3, the Earl of Surrey was a volun- teer with the army in France before Landrecy. In the following July, 1.544, he went to the wars again, and, as marshal of the English camp, he conducted the retreat from Montreuil. In August, 1545, he crossed the Channel again in command of an expedi- tion for defence of Boulogne. He was recalled from Boulogne in April, 1546; found enemies at coui-t; and in December, 1546, was arrested and sent to the Tower. A royal quartering in his arms was made the gi'ound of an accusation of treason, and in the last days of Henry VIII., on the 21st of January, 1547, only a week before the king's deatli, the Earl of Surrey was beheaded on Tower Hill. His father, who had also been arrested, escaped a similar end because his death-warrant was not yet signed when King Hemy died. TO A.D. 1558.] SHORTER POEMS. l.W A much-loved follower of Surrey's was Thomas Clere, youngest son of Sir Robert Clere, of Ormesliy, in Norfolk, and Alice, daughter of Sir William Boleyn. Clere, whose ftvmily traced its origin back to the coinits of C'leremont, in Normandy, before the Conquest, was present at the coronation of his cousin, Anne Boleyn ; loved a daughter of Sir John Shelton, in Norfolk ; but died, aged twenty-eight, of a hurt received while he was protecting his woimded master from danger at one of the gates of Montreuil. He was buried in a chapel at Lambeth, -with these lines by the Earl of Surrey jilaced over his tomb : — EPITAPH OS CLERE. Norfolk sprung thee, Lambeth holds thee dead ; Clere, of the Count of Clercmont, thou hight ; Within the womb of Ormond's race thou bred. And saw'st thy cousin crowned in tliy sight. Shelton for love, Surrey for lord thou chase ; ' (Aye, me ! whilst life did last that league was tender ! ) Tracing whose steps thou sawest Kelsal blaze, Landrecy burnt, and battered Boulogne render. At Montreuil gates, hojielcss of all recure," Thine Earl, half dead, gave in thy hand his ■will ; Which cause did thee this pining death procure, Ere summers four times seven thou couldst fulfil. Ah ! Clere ! if love had booted, care, or cost, Heaven had not won, nor earth so timely lost. Surrey paraphrased some of the Psalms, and the ■first live chapters of Ecclesia-stes. He also trans- lated the second and fourth books of Virgil's .^-Eneid into blank verse, a measure then being tried in Italy, and by him first introduced into our literature. These opening lines of the second book were the first lines of blank verse written in English : — They whisted all, w'ith fixed face attent, When prince ^-Eneas from the royal seat Thus gan to speak. Queen ! it is thy will I .should renew a woe cannot be told : How that the Greeks did spoil, and overthrow The Phrygian wealth, and wailful realm of Troy : Those ruthf ul things that I myself beheld ; And whereof no small part fell to my share. Wliich to express, ■who could refrain from tears ? What MjTinidon ? or yet what Dolopes ? What stem ITIysses' waged soldier ? And lo ! moist night now from the welkin falls ; And stars declining coimscl us to rest. But since so great is thy delight to hear Of ovu- mishaps, and Troye's last decay : Though to record the same my mind .abhors. And plaint eschews, yet thus will I begin. The two following pieces by the Earl of Surrey are in a favourite metre of Henry VIII. 's time, con- sisting of alternate lines of twelve syllables (Alexan- drines) and fotirteen (service metre, or long measure, the common measure of the early versions of the Psalms). This combination has been called Poulterer's measure. ^ Oiase, ckose. ^ JJccufe, recovery. HOW NO AGE IS CONTENT WITH HI.S OWN ESTATE, AND HOW THE A(iE OF CHILDKEN IS THE HAPPIEST IF THEY HAD SKILL TO UNDERSTAND IT. Laid in my quiet bed, in study .-iR I were, I saw within my troubled bead a heap of thoughts appear. And every thought did shew so lively in mine eyes, [rise. That now I sighed, and then 1 smiled, as cause of thought did I saw the little boy in thought how oft that ho Did ■wish of God to scape the rod, a tall young man to be. The young man eke that feels his bones with pains opprest. How he would be a rich old man, to live and lie at rest. The lich old man that sees his end draw on so sore. How he would be a boy again, to live so much the more. Whereat full oft 1 smiled, to see how all these thi-ee, [degree. From boy to man, from man to boy, would chop and change And musing thus I think, the case is very strange. That man from wealth, to Uve in woe, doth ever seek to change. Thus thoughtful as I lay, I saw my -n-ithered skin. How it doth show my dented chews, the flesh was worn so thin. And eke my toothless chaps, the gates of my right way, That opes and shuts as I do speak, do thus unto me say : " Thy white and bearish hairs, the messengers of age. That shew, Uke lines of true belief, that this life doth assuage ; Bid thee lay hand and feel them hanging on thy chin ; The which do write two ages past, the third now coming in. Hang up therefore the bit of thy young wanton time : And thou that therein beaten art, the happiest life define." Whereat I sighed, and said : " Farewell ! my wonted joy ; Truss up thy pack, and trudge from me to ever}' little boy ; And tell them thus from me : their time most happy is, If, to theii- time, they reason had, to know the truth of this." A CARELESS MAN SCORNING AND DESCRIBING THE SUBTLE USAGE OF WOMEN TOWARD THEIR LOVEU.S. Wrapt in my careless cloak, as I walk to and fro, I sec how Love can shew what force there reigTicth in his bow : And how he shooteth eke a hardy heart to wound ; And where he glanceth by again, that little hmi is found. For seldom is it seen he woundeth hearts alike ; The one may rage, when t'other's love is often far to seek. All this I see, with more ; and wonder thiuketh me How he can strike the one so sore, and leave the other free. I see that wounded wight that siili'ercth all this wrong. How he is fed with yeas and nays, and Uveth all too long. In silence though I keejj such secrets to myself, Yet do I see how she sometime doth j-ield a look by stealth. As though it seemed, " Iwis, I will not lose thee so : " When in her heart so sweet a thought did never truly grow Then say I thus : Alas ! that man is far from bliss, That doth receive for his relief none other gain but this. And she that feeds him so, I feel and find it plain. Is but to glory in her power, that over such can reign. Nor are such graces spent but when she thinks that h(>, A weai'ied man, is fully bent such fancies to let flee. Then to retain him still, she wrasteth new lier grace, [brace. And smileth, lo ! as though she would fortliwith the man em- But when the proof is made, to tr}- such looks ■n-ithal, He findeth then the place all void and freighted full of gall. Lord ! what abuse is this ! "WHio can such women praise, That for their glory do devise to use such crafty ways 'f I, that among the rest do sit and mark the row. Find that in her is gi-eater craft, than is in twenty mo*, Whose tender years, alas 1 with wiles so well are sped : What will she do when hoary hairs are powdered in her head ? 160 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. is* The same measiu-e was used by Thomas, Lord Vaux, of HaiTowden, in Northamptonshii'e, who WTote iu Thomas, Second Lord Vacx. From the Copy of Solheiii's Portrait in Chamherlaine. Queen Mary's reign. The following lines by Lord Vaiix were tirst printed in " The Paradise of Dainty Devices" (1576). OF A CONTENTED MIND. When all is clone and said, in the end thus shall you find, He most of all doth bathe in bliss that hath a quiet mind : And, clear from worldly cares, to deem can be content The sweetest time in all his life in thinking to be spent. The body subject is to fickle Fortune's power, And to a million of mishaps is casual every hour : And Death in time doth change it to a clod of clay ; "Whenas the mind, which is di\'ine, rims never to decay. Companion none is like imto the mind alone ; [or none. For many have been harmed by speech, through thinking, few. Fear oftentimes restraincth words, but makes not thought to cease ; [peace. And he speaks best, that hath the skill when for to hold his Our wealth leaves us at death ; our kinsmen at the grave ; But -i-irtues of the mind unto the heavens with us we have. Wherefore, for virtue's sake, I can be well content, The sweetest time of all my life to deem in thinking spent. The introduction of a rhyme at the cesura, or musical pause, of the longer line in tliis measure breaks each of its couplets into a four-lined stanza. "VVe have an example of this, by the same poet, h\ what a MS. copy describes as "a dytte or sonet made by the Lord Vans, in the time of the noble queue Marye, representing the image of Death." The first, thii-d. and eighth stanza.s of this poem, -with a line from the last but one transferred to the third, were chosen by Shakespeare for tlie grave-digger's song in the fiftli act of "Hamlet;" the clov\ai giving, of coiu'se, his rudely remembered version of them : — In youth when I did love, did love, Methought it was very sweet To contract, 0, the time, for, ah, my behove, 0, methought there was nothing meet. But Age, with his stealing steps. Hath claw'd me in his clutch, And hath shipjied me into the land. As if I had never been such. A pickaxe and a epude, a spade. For and a shi-ouiling sheet : 0, a pit of clay for to be made For such a guest is meet. So Shakespeare's clown quoted it. This is the poem itself, as written in Queen Mary's reign by Lord Vaux : — THE IMAGE OF DEATH. I loathe that I did love, In youth that I thought sweet. As time requii'es for my behove Mcthinks they are not meet. My lusts they do me leave, My fancies all are fled. And tract of time begins to weave Grey haiis upon my head. 8 For Age with stealing steps Hath clawed me with his crutch. And lusty Life away she leaps As there had been none such. My Muse doth not delight Me as she did before ; My hand and pen are not in plight. As they have been of yore. 16 For Reason me denies This youthly idle rhyme ; And day by day to me she cries, " Leave off these toys in time." The wrinkles in my brow, The furi'ows in my face, Say, limping Age will lodge him now. "Where Youth must give him place. 24 The harbinger of Death, To me I see him ride ; The cough, the cold, the gasping breath Doth bid me to pro\ide A pickaxe and a spade, And eke a shi'ouding sheet, A house of clay for to be made For such a guest most meet. 32 Methinks I hear the clerk, That knolls the careful knell. And bids me leave my woeful work, Ere Nature me compel. TO A.D. 1558.J SHORTER POEMS. lOl My keepers knit the knot That Youth did Uugh to scom, Of me that cUian shall he forgot, As I had not been bom. Thus must I Youth give up, ■Whose badge I long did wear ; To them I yield the wanton cup That better may it hear. Lo, here the bared skull, By whose bald sign I know. That stooping Age away shall pull "Which youthful years did sow. For Beauty \^-ith her band These crooked cares hath m-ought, And shipped me into the land From whence I first was brought. And ye that bide behind. Have ye none other trust : As ye of clay were cast by kind, So shall ye waste to dust. 40 48 56 Beitttt and the Babsd Seuix. From a Monument in the Church of St. Marn-le-Savoy.^ Tliis piece was first printed in Tottel's Miscellany, a collection issued in June, 15.57, wliicli gathered into itself poem.s from many minds, but was chiefly remarkable as including the fir.st printed collection of the poems of the Earl of Surrey and of Sir Thomas Wyatt. Tottel's Miscellany — " Songes and Son- nettes, written by the rj^ght honorable Lorde Henry Haward, late Earle of Surrey, and other. Ajnid Richardum Tottel, 1557. Cum privilegio " — went through eight editions in Elizabeth's reign, and was followed by other gatherings of fugitive verse into books with various names. Richard Tottel, the printer who issued the collection, seems to have had it made for him by Nicholas Grimald, a Huntingdon.shire man, who had studied at both Universities, was a Fellow of Mei-ton, and lectured on Rhetoric at Christchurch. > The monument is figured in Mr. J. T. Smith's " Antiqmties of Loudon." The lady to whom it was erected died iu 1572. 21 He is said to have been imprisoned as a Protestant in Mary's reign, to have saved his life by recantation, and to have died about tive years after the accession of Elizabeth. One of Grimald's own contributions to Tottel's Miscellany is this : — OF FRIENDSHIP. Of all the heavenly gifts that mortal men commend, ^Vhat trusty treasure iu the world can countervail a friend ? Wealth that Passes. From Geffrey iniifnci/'s " EmUemes" (1586). Our health is soon decayed ; goods, casual, light, and vain : Broke have we seen the force of power, and honour- suffer stain. In body's lust man doth resemble but base brute ; Ti-ue 1-irtue gets and keeps a friend, good guide of oiu- pursuit, ^^'llose hearty zeal with ours accords in everj' case ; No term of time, no space of place, no storm can it deface. When fickle fortune fails, this knot endureth still ; Thy kin out of theii- kind may swen'e, when friends owe thee good mil. "■* What sweeter solace shaU befall than one to find Upon whose breast thou mayst repose the secrets of thy mind ? He waileth at thy woe, his tears with thine be shed ; With thee doth he di\-ide his joys, so Icfe'- a Ufe is led. Behold thy friend, and of thyself the pattern see, One soul a wonder shall it seem in bodies twain to be ; In absence present, rich in want, in sick-n£ss sound, Yea, after death alive, mayst thou by thy sure friend be foimd. Each house, each town, each roahn, by steadfast love doth stand : WTiile fold debate breeds bitter bale in each divided land. 20 Friendship, flower of flowers I lively sprite of life ! O sacred bond of bUssf ul peace, the stalworth staunch of strife ! Scipio -n-ith Ladius^ didst thou conjoin in care ; At home, in wars, for weal and woe, with equal faith to faro ; 2 Lefe, loved. First Ennlish " leof." 3 Lajlius, called the Wise. distingnisUed himself iu war and peace ; served Rome as General, as Consul, and as Ambassador ; is said to have helped Terence in his comedies ; and was the intimate fnend of Scipio Africanus the younger. In this last character he is made to appear in Cicero's treatise " De Amicitia " as the interpreter of Friendship. Cicero even compared Lajlius with Socrates m a passage of his "De Officiis," which Nicholas Grimald, who translated the 162 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1520 Gisippiis eke with Tite, Damon with Pythias ; And with Mcntctius' son Achill by thee combined was : Eiuialus and Nisus gave Virgil cause to sing ; Of Pyladcs do many rh>-mcs, and of Orestes, ring : Down Theseus went to hell, Pirith his friend to find : Oh that the wives in these our days were to their mates so kind! 30 Cicero, the friendly man, to Atticus, his friend. Of Friendship wrote : such couples, lo ! doth lot but seldom lend. Recount thy race now run, how few there shalt thou see whole book, thus rendered :— " As it is a point of lightness ua- measurably to bear adversity : so it is no less, immeasurably to use prosperity: and a continual evenness in all a man's life, and one cheer evermore and one manner of face, it is commendable, as we have heard of Socrates, and also of Caius Lselius." The friendship of Titus and Gisippus is the theme of the eighth novel of the tenth day in Boccaccio's " Decameron." Their story was known in many versions. It was in the " Clericalis Disciplina " of Petrus Alphonsus, a collection formed in the twelfth century from old Arabian and other tales. It foimd its way into the " Gesta Eomauormn;" it was used by Boccaccio, by Gower, and by Lydgate. These are the incidents of the tale as told in the " Decameron." When Octavius Ctesar, afterwards Emperor Augustus, was a triumvir, young Titus Quintus Fulvius, a Eoman gentleman's son, was sent to Athens to study philosophy. There he was feUow-studeut with an Athenian youth, Gisippus, son of Chremes, an old family friend, at whose house in Athens Titus Mved. For three yeai-s Titus and Gisippus learnt philosophy together under Aristippus, and they became fast friends. Chremes then died, and his son Gisippus was soon aftei-- wards persuaded that he ought to maiTy. He was betrothed, there- fore, to the fair Sophronia. But when Titus saw that damsel, he fell sick of love for her. Gisippus, having found the cause of his friend's malady, to save him from unhappiness, resigned to him his bride ; but he contrived secretly to transfer her by a stratagem, lest, if he resigned her simply and openly, she might be given to a third person, and Titus still left in despaii-. Soon afterwards, the death of his father obhged Titus to rettu-n to Kome. His secret marriage had then to be disclosed, and he successfully opposed philosophy and stout words to the rage of all objectors. But Gisippus, left at Athens, fell so much into discredit with his friends, and into such poverty, that at last he went to Eome to see what his friend Titus could do for him. He put himself in his friend's way, but was not recognised. He thought himself slighted, became desperate, careless of hfe, and went hungry aud moneyless into a cave. Int« the same cave, towards daybi-eak, came two thieves, who fought over their plunder until one killed his companion and fled. When Gisippus had seen this, he resolved to end life without laying hands upon himself, by suffering the ofacers of justice to an-est him for the murder. He declaj-ed himself guilty, was taken to the judgment-hall, and there received sentence to be crucified. But Titus had come into the hall, and Titus recognised in the condemned man his fiiend Gisippus. To save his friend, Titus declared himself to be the murderer. Then said the Prietor to Gisippus, "How could you, not under tortm'e, accuse yoiu-selt of the crime another has committed?" Gisippus hfted up his eyes, and saw that it was Titus who was offering his life to save him. A contest then began between the friends, each urgently declaring himself guilty and the other innocent. But the real murderer had also come into the hall, and the contest of the two friends sjuured him to confession. When these things were told to Octarius Csesar he had all three brought before him, heard from each his motive for the accusation of himself, and freed the two friends because they were innocent, the thief also for their sakes. Boccaccio ended his elaboration of this tale with praise of Friendship. Of the fiiendships cited in this poem by Nicholas Grimald, that of Damon and Pythias is of Damon condemned to death by Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, but allowed to visit his home before execution, on condition that his fiiend Pythias should suffer for him if he did not return by an appointed time. The time came ; Pythias offered his life ; Damon returned ; the friends contended, each anxious to die for the other ; and the wondering tyi'ant, who had no friends, p.ardoned both. Homer saug of the friendship of Achilles for Pa- troclus, son of Mencetius. Nisus, in the ninth book of Virgil's " .31ueid," died in battle while seeking the rescue of his frieud Euryalus. Their friendship became proverbial, like that of Dnmon and Pythias ; like that between Oi'estes and Pylades, who helped him to avenge the murder of Agamemnon, and who married his sister Electra ; or like the fabled friendship between Theseus and Pirithous. Of whom to say, " This same is he that never failed mu." So rare a jewel then must needs be holden dear. And as thou wilt esteem thyself, so take thy chosen fcrc ; ' The ti,-rant in despair no lack of gold bewails. But " Out, I am undone," saith he, " for all ray friendship fails!" WTierefore, since nothing is more kindly for our kind. Next wisdom, thus that teacheth us, love we the friendly mind. Akin to tlie theme of Friendship is this poem ui Tottel's collection : it is by an unknown author : — OF THE CHOICE OF A WIFE. The flickering Fame that flieth from ear to ear, And aye her strength increaseth with her flight, Gives first the cause why men to hear delight Of those whom she doth note for beauty bright. And with this Fame, that flieth on so fast, Fancy doth hie when Reason makes no haste. And yet, not so content, they wish to see And thereby know if Fame have said aright. More trusting to the trial of their Eye Than to the bruit that goes of any wight. Wise in that point — that lightly will not 'lieve ; Unwise, to seek that may them after grieve. 10 ■20 Who knoweth not how Sight may Love allure And kindle in the heart a hot desire : The Eye to work that Fame could not procm-e ? Of greater cause there cometh hotter fire. For, ere he wit, himself he feeleth wai-m. The Fame and Eye the causers of his harm. Let Fame not make her kno^vn whom I shall know, Nor yet mine Eye therein to be my guide : Sufiiceth me that ^•irtue in her gi'ow, WTiose simple life her father's walls do hide. Content with this I leave the rest to go, And in such choice shall stand my wealth and woe. Two of Grimald's contributions to the Miscellany ai-e in blank veree ; and as these are oiu- first original poems in a form of verae that, as perfected by Shake- speare and Milton, has become distinctly English, one of them is here given : — THE DEATH OF ZOROAS, AN EGYPTIAN ASTRONO.MER, IN THE FIRST FIGHT THAT ALEXANDER HAD WITH THE PERSIANS. Now clattering arms, now raging broils of war, " Gan pass the noise of dreadful trumpets' - clang Shrouded ^^•ith shafts, the heaven ; with cloud of darts Covered, the au- : against fuU fatted bulls As forceth kindled ire the lions keen, ^Miose greedy guts the gnawing hunger pricks. So Macedons against the Persians fare.^ Now corpses hide the pm-pm-de ■* soil with blood : Large slaughter on each side, but Parses more 1 Fire (First English "fera" and "gefera"), companion. ~ Dreadful trumpets were first written and printed " taratantars." 2 Fare, go. Fu-st English " farath " and " fare," from " fai-an," to go. • Piirpurdc, purpled. TO A.D. 155S.J SHOETER POEMS. 163 10 Moist fields bebled ; ' their hearts and numbers bate, Fainted while they give baek, and fall to flight : The lightning JIacedon, by swords, by gleavcs,- By bands and troops of footmen with his guard Speeds to Darie ; but him his nearest kin, Oxate, preserves with horsemen on a plump •* Before his ear, that none the charge could give. Here grunts, here groans, eachwhcre strong youth is spent. Shaking her bloody hands, Bellone among The Perses soweth all kind of cruel death : With thi-oat ycut he roars ; he Ueth along, 20 His entrails with a lance through gu-ded quite ; Him smites the club ; him wounds far-striking bow, And him the sling, and him the shining sword ; Ho dieth ; he is aU dead ; he pants ; he rests. Right over stood, in snow-white armour brave, The Slemphite Zoroas, a cunning clerk, To whom the heavens lay open, as his book ; ■• 1 Bchled, stained with blood. 3 Gh:av€s (Freuoh " glaives "), broad swords. Tlie word may also liave been applied sometimes to halberds. 3 On a }>lump, m a cluster or mass. So in Beaumont and Fletcher's *' Double MaiTiage," " Here's a whole ijlump of rogues ; " and Geor-je Chapman wi-ites of visiting "islands and the plumps of men." The notion of mass or thickness is in the word in its modem sense, as when cheeks are said to be plump. • The old romance of Alexander esjiatiated with much lelish upon incidents of battle ; — " All that Alisaundre hit, Horse and mon down he smit. He rode forth thi-ough the press, "Was there none to his prowess." Grimald.'in this poem, develops in romance fashion — except as to metre — an incident suggestive of the thought that some folks' brains are too good to be spilt. In the following lines, meant to express the reach of human wisdom to the stars, such knowledge includes, as it did in Elizabeth's reign and long after, a study of the " aspect " and ** influence " of the heavenly bodies. In all mundane things, it was believed, the heavenly idea works through the soul of the world. This was an imagined spii*it not composed of the four elements, but a fifth essence— and therefore called quintessence— a certain lirst thing above and beside them. Such spirit animates the body of the world and works in it, producing all its powers, as the soul works in the body of a man. There is nothing so base as to contain no spark of this virtue ; but where it abounds most, power is greatest. It abounds most in the heavenly bodies. The purest light or fire was supposed to be in the highest heaven, called, therefore, from the Greek word for fire, the '* empyrean " — " He maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flaming fire " (Psalm civ. 4). All that lives, it was said, lives by its inclosed fire. Such power, therefore, came down with utmost force in the pure light of the stars, so that things influenced {i.e. flowed in upon) by their rays, were conformed to their natiu-e. By this spirit the several powers of the planets, and stars higher than the planets, were poured into herbs, stones, metals, and animals, each having such qualities or tendencies as the combination of the heavenly bodies at some specially infiuential time, as in the moment of a man's birth, or the predominance of certain aspects dui"ing any time, might cause to predominate. Thus the planet Saturn was of a dark leaden hue, and its influence was stronffest upon lead and heavy metals ; upon the black bile — cause of melancholy, which word signifies hUick hile in a man; among animals, its influence was strongest upon reptiles, and such creatures as are nocturnal, solitary, slow, unclean ; upon hoarse birds, as the ravens ; upon plants Like mandragora, me, hellebore, pine, cypress, yew ; upon such as bear fruit black, bitter, or repulsive to the smell — all such things are saturnine. To this belief Milton refers in " Lycidas," when he woxild have a vale full of sweet flowers, r.nd therefore as little as may be under the dark " aspect " of Saturn : " Call the vales, and bid them hither cast Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues. Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks. On whose fresh lap tlie swart star sparely looks." Then follows the muster -roU of flowers opposite to the saturnine : prinu"ose, jessamine, pink, violet, musk-rose, &c. Zoroas knows also, it may be observed, whether the circle can be squared. Re knows in And in celestial bodies he would toll The moving, meeting, light, aspect, eclipse, And intiuouco, and constellatious all ; 30 What earthly chances would betide, wliat year Of plenty stored, wliat sign forewarned dearth : How winter gendreth snow ; what temperature In the prime-tide doth season well the soil ; ^\'hy summer burns ; why autmnn hath ripe grapes ; "\\niether the circle quadrate may become ; AMiether our tunes heaven's harmony can }-ield ; Of four begins ,among themselves how great Proportion is ; what sway the erring lights Doth send in course 'gain that first moving heaven ; 40 AVliat grees one from another distant be ; Wh.at star doth let the hui'tful fire to rage, Or bim more mild what opposition makes ; "SATiat fire doth qu,alify Mavors's fire ; T\liat house each one doth seek ; what planet reigns Within this hemisphere or that ; small things I speak : whole h&aveu he closeth in his breast. This sage, then, in the stars had spied : the fates Threatened him death, without delay ; and, sith* He saw he could not fatal order change, 60 Forward he pressed in biittle, that he might Meet with the ruler of the Macedons, Of his right hand desirous to be slain. The boldest beorn,* and worthiest in the field. And as a wight now weary of his life, And seeking death, in first front of his rage Comes desperately to Alexander's face ; At him, with darts, one after other, throws, With reckless words and clamour him provokes ; And saith, "Nectanab's bastard,' shameful stain 60 what proportions the " four begins " — that is, the four elements — are blended to build up the difterent parts of the world. The Pytha- goreans looked on the number four as the fountain of Nature, the Tetractys, and by it they swore. Zoroas knows how the erring or wandering lights— i.e., the planets, so called from a Greek word meaning to wander— affect by their courses " the first moving heaven," the priinum. mohile. In the astronomy of Elizabeth's days— Ptolemy's — the Earth, itself motionless, was in the centre of our world, sur- rounded by successive spheres : first that of the revolution of the Moon about us (the Moon being reckoned first of the Seven Planets) ; then the successive spheres of the six other " eiTing lights"— Mer- cury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn ; then an eighth sphere, the Firmament, in which the Fixed Stars were set. Beyond these was a starless sphere, the outermost, having for its centre tho centre of the Earth ; and since the outermost sjihere was supposed to originate the movements of the rest, it was called " the first movinj heaven"— "the ])n?iiuiii iiioliifc." Zoroas knows " what grees " — i.e., how many degrees — one sphere was distant from another, and whether earthly music could sound like the music of the spheres. It was a doctrine of the ancients that harmonies of sound and motion ruled the world. According to the severiil virtues of the planets were their several sounds that blended to produce the heavenly diapason. Our earthly music, when akin to that of any planet, would di-aw down especially that planet's influence. It two planets in the sky together shed opposing influences, then Zoroas can tell how the opposition of one would affect the power of the other. " Wliat house each one doth seek" is a reference to the ancient division of the zodiac into twenty-eight days, or mansions, each giving some special power to the planet that is in it. Tims the Moon being in the first house. Alnath, or the Eam's horns, was said to cause discords, journeys. In the second house, farther on in Aries, Allothaim, she was said to favour the finding of treasures or the holding fast of captives. "Small things I speak," said Grimald. I suggest as well as I can that Zoroas has human wisdom reaching to the stars. He knows more than my words can tell—" whole heaven he closeth in his breast." 5 Sith, since. « Bforn (in the Miscellany spelt "beum"), chieftain. A First English word. 7 The mediaaval romance of Alexander made him in magical way son of Philip's wife Olympia and the magician Nectanabus. 164 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.B. 1558 Of mother's bed ! Why losest thou thy strokes Cowards among ? Turn thou to mo, in case Manhood Uiere be so much left in thy heart ! Come, fight with me, that on my helmet wear Apollo's laurel, both for learning's laud. And eke for martial praise ; that in my shield The seven-fold sophie' of Minerve contain ; A match more meet, sir king ! than any here." The noble prince amoved, takes ruth upon The wilful \vight, and -n-ith soft words again, 70 " monstrous man," quoth he, " whatso thou art, I pray thee Hve ! ne do not vdih thy death This lodge of lore, the lluses' mansion mar 1 Tliat treasure-house this hand shall never spoil. My sword shall never bruise that skilful brain, Long gathered heaps of science soon to spill ; how fair fruits may you to mortal men From wisdom's garden give ! How many may By you the wiser and the better prove ! What error, what mad mood, what frenzy, thee 80 Persuades to be down sent to deep Averne, Where no arts flourish, nor no knowledge 'vails ?" For all these saws, when thus the sovereign said. Alighted Zoroas ; with sword unsheathed The careless king there smote above the greave,^ At the opening of his cuisses^ wounded him. So that the blood down railed'' on the ground. The Macedon, perceiving hurt, gan gnash ; But yet his mind he bent, in any wise. Him to forbear ; set spurs unto his steed, 90 And turned away, lest anger of his smart Should cause revenger hand deal baleful blows. But of the Macedonian chieftain's knights. One, Meleager, co\ild not bear this sight, But ran upon the same Egyptian renk,' And cut him in both knees : — he fell to ground ; Wherewith a whole rout came of soldiers stern, And all in pieces hewed the sely seg.* But happily the soul fled to the stars, Where, under him, he hath full sight of all 100 Whereat he gazed here with reaching look. The Persians wailed such sapience to forego j The very fone," the Macedonians, wished 1 Sophie, wisdom sevenfold, because wisdom was said to be com- prised in the seven sciences, three fox*ming the tKrium. and fonr the quadrivimn. 2 Crreauc, from the old French " greve," the shank, " gi'eves," armour for the legs. 3 Cuisses, armour for the thighs. So in Part I. of " Heni-y IV. : " — " I saw young Harry with his heaver on, His cuisses on his thighs," . . . * Railed, rolled. So Spenser, " Faerie Queene," I. vi. 43 : — '* made wide fxun-ows in their fleshes frail. That it would pity any living eye. Large floods of blood adown their sides did rail. But floods of blood could not them satisfy ; Both hungered after death ; both chose to win or die. 5 JJciit, wan-ior. First English " rinc." ^ Scbj (First English "sae'hg"), blessed, innocent, simple. — Scg (First English " secg "), soldier. ' FonCt foes. He woidd have lived : — King Alexander self Deemed him a man unmeet to die at all ; Who won lilse praise for conquest of his ire, As for stout men in field that day subdued ; Who princes taught how to discern a man That in his head so rare a jewel bears. But over all, those same Camenes,^ those same 110 Divine Camenes, whose honour he procured. As tender parent doth his daughter's weal. Lamented ; and for thanks, all that they can. Do cherish him deceased, and set him free From dark oblivion of devouring death. Among the additional poems of uncertain anthor- sbip that appeared in the .second edition of Tottel's Miscellany, published a few weeks after the first, is another of THE PRAISE OK A TEUE FRIEND. Whoso that wisely weighs the profit and the price Of things wherein delight by worth is wont to rise, Shall find no jewel is so rich ne yet so rare That with the friendly heart in value may compare. 'What other wealth to man by Fortune may befall But Fortune's changed cheer may reave a man of all ? A friend no wreck of wealth, no cruel cause of woe, Can force his friendly faith unfriendly to forego. ■ 8 If Fortune friendly fawn and lend thee wealthy store. Thy friend's conjoined joy doth make thy joy the more , If frowardly she frown and drive thee to distress. His aid reheves thy ruth and makes thy sorrow less. Thus Fortune's pleasant fruits by friends increased bo The bitter, sharp, and sour by friends allayed to thee : That when thou dost rejoice, then doubled is thy joy ; And eke in cause of care, the less is thy annoy. 16 Aloft if thou do Hve as one appointed here A stately part on stage of worldly .state to bear. Thy friend, as only free from fraud, will thee advise To rest within the rule of mean, as ao the wise. He seeketh to foresee the peril of thy fall ; Ho findcth out thy faults and warns thee of them all ; Thee, not thy luck, he loves ; whatever be thy case. He is thy faithful friend, and thee he doth embrace. 24 If churlish cheer of chance have thrown thee into thrall. And that thy need ask aid, for to relieve thy fall : In him thou secret trust assui-cd art to have. And succour not to seek, before that thou can crave. Thus is thy friend to thee the comfort of thy pain, The stayer of thy state, the doubler of thy gain. In wealth and woe thy friend. :tnothcr self to thee, Such man to man a God, the proverli saith to be. 32 As wealth will bring thee friends in lowering woe to prove. So woe .shall yield thee friends in laughing wealth to love. With wisdom choose thy friend, with virtue him retain : Let virtue he the ground, so shall it not be vain. 8 Camenes, the Muses. TO i.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. ifir> Gascoigne feesentikg a Book to Qdeen Elizabeth. (From the King's MS. 18, A. xlviii.) CHAPTER X. Reign of Elizabeth — "The Paradise of Dainty Devices;" The "Mirror for Magistrates;" Gascoignb's "Steel Glass;" Minor Poets. — From a.d. 15.58 to a. d. 1579. From Lyhj's Enphucs First Edition (1579). REAT energies of thought, quick- ened and diffused by the spread of the art of printing, had given new impulse to every form of human work during the half cen- tury before Elizabeth was queen. The first book printed with movable tyjies, a Bible, liad been completed in 1-155, two years after the fall of the Roman Empire in the East. The taking of Constantinople by the Turks in 1153 had driven into exile learned Greeks, who maintained themselves by teaching their language, and making the philosophy of Plato known in Florence, Paris, and elsewhere. Spread of Greek studies made Plato an ally of those who were battling against corruptions of Church disci- pline. Advance of thought added questions of Cihurch doctrine to questions of Church discipline. Debate about the limit of authority rose higher as it won new ground. In 1492 Columbus first discovered for Spain the "West India Islands. In 1497 Sebastian Cabot first saw the mainland of America. In 150G Columbus died, and the power of Spain — much used to sustain in Europe the principle of absolute autho- rity in Church and State — was backed by the wealth of a New World. Personal desires of Henry VIII. made a way by which the best thought of England could lead swiftly onward towards the reformation of the Church. The short reign of Edward VI. gathered into one power many of the forces thus developed. Reaction under Mary strengthened and embittered in many earnest minds such resolution as helped England's advance under Elizabeth. Eliza- beth came to the throne young, queen of a people beset by strong enemies, and not yet in the fii-st rank among tlie nations ; but in her time her country grew in stature mightily. As energies of thought thus quickened brought England into conflict with the power of Spain, new force and freedom came into our literature." All the gi-eat conflicts of the time dealt with essentials of life, about which, how- ever we may differ, it is good for men to care. Occupation upon low care lowers life, but it is lifted to its highest by tiiie care about essentials. A reli- gious sense of duty is the mainspring of the English character. It is a mainspring that has many a flaw of human imperfection in it ; but tliere it is, and we 166 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1558 are safe imtil it breaks. England is strong by labour of many generations, with all inevitable drawbacks from the pi'ejudices, ignorances, and shortcomings of men, to find out the right and do it for the love of God. As the right sought by a nation in a day of conilict and the peril dared for it is greater, greater also and livelier will be the expression of its himian energies, and higher heavenward will be its reach of thought. Whoever tells the story of our literature, has to show that the development of English power during the reign of Elizabeth, along almost every line of thought, was of this kind. These volumes are plamied only to illustrate what I endeavour else- whei-e to describe ; ' the brief narrative in which the series of specimens is set being designed only to tell v.rhen and by whom each piece was written, as far as that can be told, adding here and there such informa- tion as may serve to secure fuller enjoyment of good fare. The land was full of song in Elizabeth's time. Music of the voice was cultivated, part songs and madrigals were a common social pleasure. Educated men, who had no thought of calling themselves men of letters, could write pleasant verse, and sing it too. To be able to write pleasant verse was a mark of good breeding in England as in Italy, and this was caused, in some degree, by imitation of Italian fashions. Much of the verse ■written, and more or less valued, in Elizabeth's reign, has passed away. . The very good remains ; but of the good, perhaps there has been as much lost as preserved. Miscel- lanies like that of Richard Tottel, already described, served to retain for ns many pieces that woidd other- wise have passed out of memory. Tottel's was very popular, and went through eight editions, the last being in 1.587. Next to that came, in 1576, "The Paradise of Dainty Devices," collected by Richard Edwai'ds, a Somersetshire man and a musician, who was master of Queen Elizabeth's Chapel Ro}'al. As he trained the children of the chapel to act, for her Majesty's pleasure, interludes and plays of his own writing, he will appear, also, in another volume, among our first dramatists. Here is a song of his own, from " The Pai-adise of Dainty Devices : " — WISDOM. \\Tioso will be accounted wise, and truly claim the name. By joining ^tue to his deeds he must achieve the same. But few there be that seek thereby true wisdom to attain : God, so rule oiu- hearts therefore such fondness to refrain. The wisdom which we most esteem, in this thing doth consist, With glorious talk to show in words our wisdom when we list : Yet not in talk but seemly deeds our wisdom we should place, To speak so fair and do but ill doth wisdom quite disgi'ace. To bargain wcU and shun the loss, a wisdom counted is, And thereby through the greedy coin no hope of grace to miss. To seek by honour to advance his name to brittle praise. Is wisdom which we daily see increaseth in our days. 1 In " A First Sketch of English Literature," published by Messrs. Cassell, Fetter, and Galpin, and in " Ena:lish Writers," published by IVIessrs. Chapman and Hnll, a much Ioniser work which is iu pros^ress, and of which the sections hitherto published are at present (1875) out of print But heavenly wisdom sour seems, too hard for them to mn, But weary of the suit they seem, when they do once begin : It teacheth us to frame our life, while vital breath we have. When it dissolvcth earthly mass, the soul from death to save. By fear of God to rule our steps from .sliding into vice A ^-isdom is which we neglect, although of greater price : A point of wisdom also this we commonly esteem, That every man should Be indeed that he desires to Seem. To bridle that desire of gain which forceth us to ill, Our haughty stomachs. Lord, repress, to tame presuming will : This is the wisdom that we should above each thing desire, heavenly God, from sacred thi-one, that grace in us inspire ! And print in our repugnant hearts the rules of wisdom true, That all our deeds in worldly life may like thereof ensue : Tliou only art the living spring from whom tins wisdom flows. Oh wash therewith our sinful hearts from ™e that therein grows ! From Richard Edwards's contributions to the miscellany of his own collection let us take also a song of May : — JIAT. Wlien May is in his prime, then may each heart rejoice ; ■WTien Jlay bedecks each branch with green, each bird strains forth his voice. The lively sap creeps up into the blooming thorn. The flowers, which cold in prison kept, now laughs- the frost to scorn. All Nature's imps triilmphs, while J0}-ful May doth last ; When May is gone, of all the year the pleasant time is past. May makes the cheerful hue, Jlay breeds and brings new blood. May marcheth throughout every limb. May makes the merry mood. May pricketh tender hearts, their warbling notes to tune. Full strange it is, yet some, we see, do make their May in June. Thus things are strangely wrought, whiles joyful May doth last; Take 3Iay in time, when May is gone, the pleasant time is past. All ye that live on earth, and have your May at -n-ill, Eejoice in May, as I do now, and use your May with skOI. 2 Flowers . . . laughs ; imps . . . triinnpTis. This is not a false con- cord, but use of the Northern jjhiral in s. A chief mark of dis- tinction between Northem, Midland, and Southern Eutrhsh was the plural of the indicative present : Northern, es ; Midland, en ; Southern, cth. The plural in s was frequent in Shakespeare, though it is, of course, seldom retained in modem editions. Many examples will be foimd in Dr. Abbott's " Shakespearian Grammar," a book most valuable, not only to all who read Shakespeare with care, but to the good student of gi-ammar, for its systematic illustration of Elizabethan EngUsh. In "Hamlet," act iii., sc. 2, Shakespeare wrote — *' The great man down, you mark his favourites flies, The poor advanced makes friends of enemies." Here, because of the rhyme, the passage is only to be accommodated to modern gi-ammar by making the noiui singixlar and damaging the sense. In "Macbeth," act ii., sc. 1, both sense and rh^-me are too stubboi-n to allow of change ; printer must pi-int, and reader must read to the end of time — " Whiles I threat he lives ; Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives." TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 167 Use Ma}', while that you may, for May hath but his time ; When all the fruit is gone it is too late the tree to climb. Your liking;, and your lui See page 160. 2 Px-onounced \i:\'r. See Note 18, pasre &i. 3 Behold {First Eusrlish '* liehealden ") may be used here in a sense still attaclied to the coiTespondin^ German word "behalten." As throusrh sun's heat wax melts or dew consumes, so I, through careful thoughts, behold decay. But there is ejaculated ** lo " in the last line, to which this " behold," used in the common sense, may correspond. If so read, it should be placed between commas. FANCY AND DESIRE. Come hither, shejiherd's swain. — " Sir, what do you require ? " I pray thee, show to me thy name. — " 3Iy name is Fond Desire." \\'Tien wert thou bom. Desire ? — " In pomp and pride of May." By whom, sweet boy, wert thou begot :■' — " By Fond Conceit, men say." Tell me, who was thy nui-se !' — " Fresh yotith in sugared joy." What was thy meat and daily food ': — " Sad sighs with great annoy." What hadst thou then to drink f — " The savoury lover's tears." What cradle wert thou rocked in? — " Hope devoid of fears." What Itill'd thee then asleep ': — " Sweet speech, which likes me best." TeU me, where is thy dwelling-ijlace i — " In gentle hearts 1 rest." What thing doth please thee most ? — " To gaze on beauty stiU." Wlom dost thou think to be thy foe .'• — " Disdain of my good will." Doth company displease? — "Yes, surely, many one." Where doth Desire delight to live ? — " He loves to live alone." Doth either time or age bring him unto decay ': — " No, no. Desire both Kves and dies a thousand times a day." Then, Fond Desire, fai-ewell, thou art no mate for me ; I should be loth, mcthinks, to dwell with such a one as thee. The author of the next two pieces, also taken from Richard Edwards's collection, was William Humiis : — IF THOU DESIRE TO LIVE IN QUIET REST, GIVE EAR AND SEE BUT SAY THE BEST. If thou delight in quietness of life. Desire to shun from broils, debate, and strife, To live in love with God, \Wth friend and foe, III rest shalt sleep when others cannot so. Gire car to all, yet do not all beKeve, And see the end, and then do sentence give : But saij, for truth, of happy lives assigned The best hath he that quiet is in mind. HOPE WELL AND HAVE WELL. In hope the shipman hoisteth sail, in hope of passage good; In hope of health the sickly man doth suffer loss of blood ; In hope the prisoner linked in chains hopes liberty to find : Thus hope breeds health, and health breeds ease to every troubled mind. In hope desire gets \'ictory, in hope great comfort springs ; In hope the lover lives in joys, he fears no dreadful stings : In hope we live, and may abide such storms as are assigned : Thus hope breeds health, and health breeds ease to every troubled mind. In hope we easily suffer harm, in hope of futm-e time ; In hope of frtiit the pain seems sweet that to the tree doth climb ; In hope of love such glory grows, as now by proof I find. That hope breeds health, and health breeds ease to every troubled mind. The next piece taken to illustrate the ■siugiiig in 168 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a d. 1558 " The Paradise of Dainty Devices " is also by a poet little known to fame, Francis Kinwelmarsh : — WHO WILL ASPIRE TO DIGNITY, BY LEARNING MUST ADVANCED BE. The poor that live in needy rate By Learning do great riches gain ; The rieh that live in wealthy state By Learning do theii- wealth maintain : Thus rich and poor are furthered still By sacred rules of learned skill. All fond conceits of frantic youth The golden gist of Learning stays ; Of doubtful things to search the truth Learning sets forth the ready ways: 10 O happy hiin do I repute "WTioso breast is fraught with Learning's fruit. There grows no corn within the field That ox and plough did never till ; Eight so the mind no fruit can yield That is not led by Learning's skill : Of Ignorance comes rotten weeds, Of Learning springs right noble deeds. Like as the captain hath respect To train his soldiers in array ; So Learning doth man's mind direct By Virtue's staff his life to stay : Though friends and fortune waxeth scant, Yet learned men shall never want. You imps, therefore, in youth be sm-e To fraught your minds with learned things ; For Learning is the fountain pm-e Out from the which all glory springs : Whoso therefore will glory win. With Learning first must needs begin. 20 30 Lll\TS INDOCTUS.* No. 189 of Alciat's Emblems. 1 Bices Indoctus. PlirjTnis of the Greek lesrend stands here for the rich man without leaniina: who commits himself to the wide seas upon the Golden Fleece ; but the Golden Fleece, being a sheep's, has only a sheep's head to guide it. Andrea Alciat, or Alzate (for Alciatui was the Latin form of a name derived from his birthplace, The next piece, taken from the same collection, is l>y Jasper Hey^vood, a Roman Catholic, tlie son of John Hey wood, a celebrated ^^Titer of interhide.s. Jasper Heywood translated al.so several of the plays of Seneca. LOOK OR- Y'OU LEAP. If thou in surety safe wilt sit, If thou delight at rest to dwcU, Spend no more words than shall soem fit, Let tongue in silence talk expel : In aU things that thou scest men bent, See all, say naught, hold thee content. In worldly works degrees are three, Makers,' Doers, and Lookers-on ; The Lookers-on have liberty. Both the others to judge upon : 10 ■WTierefore in all, as men are bent, See all, say naught, hold thee content. The Makers oft are in fault found ; The Doers doubt of praise or shame ; The Lookers-on find sui'est ground. They have the fruit set free from blame : This doth persuade in all here meant, See all, say naught, hold thee content. The proverb is not south and west, "V\nuch hath be said long time ago,— 20 Of little meddling cometh rest, The busy man ne'er wanted woe : The best way is in all world's sent,'* See all, say naught, hold thee content. H ere is, also from the " Paradise of Dainty Devices," a fi-iendly admonition by one Richard Hill:— A FRIENDLY ADMONITION. Ye stately wights that live in quiet rest Thi-ough worldly wealth which God hath gi^■en to you, Lament with tears and sighs from doleful breast. The shame and power that vice obtaineth now. Behold how God doth dail}' proffer grace. Yet we disdain repentance to embrace. The suds of sin* do suck into the mind, And cankered vice doth \Ti-tuo quite expel. Alzate, in the district of Como), was a great Italiaji lawyer who died in 1559, and produced in the course of his life a famous volume of emblematic pictures, each with a few Latin verses to explain it. The book was very frequently reprinted, and produced a taste for such emblem writing that we shall aftei"wards find illustrated in the verse of Wither and Quarles. I add Alciat's lines to the above emblem. They mean : — Phrysus swims over the waters sitting on the precious Fleece, and fearless mounts through the sea the yellow Sheep. And what is that ? The man dull in perception, but with a rich treasure, whom the judgment of a wife or servant rules. *' Tranat aquas residens pretioso in vellere Phryxus, Et flavam unpavidus per mare scandit ovem. Et quid id est ? Vu* seusu hebeti. sed divite gaza, Coujugis aut servi quern rCLjit avbitrium." - Or, ere, before. 3 Maimers, those who invent things to be done. The makers plan, the flot'rs execute. * Sent, assent, agreement. 5 Suds of sin. *'Suds," from "seethe" (First English " seothan," to boil, past pai-ticiple "sodeu," modem " sodden ") . Association of the word with soap of the washtub is an accident. " In the suds" TO A.D. 1559.] SHORTER POEMS. 169 No change to good, alas ! can resting find, Our wicked hearts so stoutly do rebel. 10 Not one there is that hasteth to amend, Though God from heaven his daily threats do send. We are so slow to change our blameful life, We are so pressed to snatch alluring i-ice. Such greedy hearts on every side be rife, So few that guide their will by counsel wise To let cm- tears lament the wi-etehed case, And call to God for undeserved gi-ace. You worldly wights that have your fancies fixed On slipper joy of terrain' plcasiu-e here, 20 Let some remorse in all youi' deeds bo mixed, Whiles you have time let some redi-css appear : Of sudden death the hour you shall not know. And look for death, although it seemeth slow. Oh be no judge in other men's offence. But pui'ge thyself and seek to make thee free, Let every one apply his diligence, A change to good ^^^thin himself to see. God, direct our feet in such a stay, From cankered Wee to shame the hateful way ! 30 Here, still from the same collection, are some Golden Preceirts by A. Boucher : — GOLDEN PRECEPTS. Perhaps you think me bold that dare presume to teach, As one that runs beyond his race, and rows beyond his reach : Sometime the bUnd do go where perfect sights do fall, The simijle may sometimes instruct the wisest heads of all. If needful notes I give that imto -iai-tue tend, [lend • Methinks you should of rights vouchsafe your listening ears to A whetstone cannot cut, yet sharjis it well we see. And I though blimt may whet yom- wit, if you attentive be. First these among the rest I wish you warely heed, That God be served, your prince obeyed, and friends relieved at need : 10 Then look to honest thrift both what and how to have. At night examine so the day that bed be thought a grave. Seek not for others' goods, be just in word and deed, For got with shifts arc spent with shame, believe this as thy creed : Boast not of nature's gifts, nor yet of parents' name. For \nitue is the only mean to win a worthy fame. Ere thou dost promise make, consider well the end. For promise passed be sure thou keep, both with thy foe and friend : Thi'cat not revenge too much, it shows a craven's kind, But to prevail and then forgive declares a noble mind. 20 Forget no friendship's debt, wish to requite at lea.st, For God and man, yea all the world, condemns the ungrateful beast : Wear not a friendly face with heart of .Judas' kiss. It shows a base and vile conceit, and not where valour is. was an old phrase of bemsr in diiBculty, akin to the modem phrase " in hot water," to represent esposui-e to the seethings of passiou. 1 Terrain, earthly. 22 Fly from a fawning tlii-t, and from a cogging mate, Their- love breeds loss, theii- praise reproach, their friendship breeds but hate : Seek not to loose by wiles that law and duty binds. They be but helps of bankrupts' heads, and not of honest minds. The motions of the flesh, and choler's heat restrain. For heaps of harms do daily hap, where lust or rage doth reign : 30 In diet, deeds, and words, a modest mean is best, Enough suflicetb for a feast but riot finds no rest. And so, to make an end, let this be borne away. That vh-tue always bo thy guide, so .shalt thou never stray. The last selection from the " Paradise of Daiuty Devices " shall be this jjiece by Master Thorn : — NOW MORTAL MAN BEHOLD AND SEE, THIS WORLD IS BUT A VANITY. Who shall profoundly weigh or scan the assured state of man. Shall well perceive by reason than,- That where is no stability, remaineth nought but vanity. For what estate is there think ye throughly content with his degree, 'Wliereby we may right clearly see. That in this vale of misery, remaineth nought but vanity. The great men wish the mean estate, mean men again their state do hate. Old men think children fortunate ; A boy a man would fainest^ be : thus wandereth man in vanity. The countryman doth dailj- swell with great desire in com-t to dweU ; 10 The courtier thinks him nothing well TOI he from court in countrj' be, he wandereth so in vanitj-. The sea doth toss the merchant's brains to wish a farm and leave those pains. The farmer gap'th at merchant's gains : Thus no man can contented be, he wandereth so in vanity. If thou have lands or goods great store, consider thou thy charge the more. Since thou must make account therefore ; They are not thine but lent to thee, and yet they are but vanity. If thou be strong or fair of face, sickness or age doth both disgrace. Then bo not proud in any case ; 20 For how can there more folly be, than for to boast of vanity ': Now finally be not infect with worldly cares, but have respect How God reward'th his true elect. With glorious felicity, free from all worhlly vanity. Another poet who, like Richard Edwards, ranks with our first dramatists, was Thomas Sackville, ~ Than, then. 3 Fainest, most fain, most crladly (Fii'st Eug:lish "fse^en," glad). As the II between two weak vowels was softened to y, *' fain" is the old word spelt as pronoimced quickly. 170 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1558 Lord Buckhm-st. He was a poet only in his early manliood ; in his later years he was a grave states- man, became under Elizabeth High Treasurer of England, and was Earl of Dorset under James I. Thouas Saceville, in Later Life. from a Painting engraved for " Lodge's Portraits,*' He died in 1608, nearly half a century after the date of his taking part with Thomas Norton in the writing of " Gorboduc," our first EugUsh tragedy, and when he had lived to see the greatest works of Shakespeare first produced upon the stage. In the days when he wrote " Gorboduc " he was studying law in the Inner Temple as Mr. Thomas SackvUle ; for the play was first acted at Christmas, 1561, and he was not knighted and made a baron as Lord Buck- hurst imtil 1.5G7. In the present -i-olume Thomas Saekville is to be remembered not as dramatist but as author of an introduction or Induction to a proposed series of poems moralising for the admonition of men high in power the falls of those who had in former time I'isen as high as they, and been degraded from theii* .'ligh estate. The plan of such a series of narratives had been first conceived by Boccaccio, and developed in a Latin prose book, " Of the Falls of Illustrious Men" ("De Casibus Illustrium Virorum "). This had been very popular in the latter part of the fourteenth and throughout the fifteenth centiu-y. It suggested to Chaucer the series of " Tragedies," or records of re- verse of happy fortune, in liis '' Monk's Tale." From a version of it by a French poet, Laurent de Premier- fait, Lydgate had rhymed his "Falls of Princes."' In Queen Maiy's time, when such reverses were always befoi'e men's eyes, a printer suggested a series of such tales from English history, that was to be called a " Mirror for Magistrates," whereby they might see as in a glass the instability of power and the need of a wise use of it. Thomas Saekville who was then a youth of nineteen or twenty — his age was but twenty- two at the accession of Eli&ibeth, and the " Mii-ror " * See page 53. was planned in 1555 — fastened upon this idea, and presently wrote a prologue or induction to the proposed series, in which Sorrow herself, personified, letl the poet to the shades below, whei'e the ghosts of the dead, as they passed by, told the sad stories of their lives on earth. Saekville wrote besides his Induction one "tragedy," the " Complaint of Henry Stafibrd, Duke of Buckingham," but he wrote no more. The "Mirror" was worked out by others who introduced the book with a less lofty pi-elude of their own in prose. To Sackville's verses Edmund Spenser paid high tribute when in a sonnet he addressed him as one " Whose learned Muse hath writ her own record In golden verse, worthy immortal fame." The series was enlarged from time to time during Elizabeth's reign by the work of different men, but none rose to the level of THOMAS sackville's " INDUCTION TO THE MIRROR FOR MAGISTRATES." The wrathful Winter, 'preaching on apace, With blustering blasts had all ybar'd the treen. And old Satumus, with his fi'osty face, With chilling cold had pierc'd the tender green ; The mantles rent, wherein enwrapped been The gladsome groves that now lay overthrown. The tapets - torn, and every bloom down blown. The soil, that erst so seemly was to seen, Was all despoiled of her beauty's hue ; And soot^ fresh flowers, wherewith the summer's queen 10 Had clad the earth, now Boreas' blasts down blew ; And small fowls flocking, in their song did rue The winter's wrath, wherewith each thing defac'd In woeful wise bewaU'd the summer past. Hawthorn had lost his motley livery. The naked twigs were shivering all for cold, And dropping down the tears abundantly ; Each thing, methought, with weeping eye me told The cruel season, bidding me withhold Myself within ; for I was gotten out 20 Into the fields, whereas I walk'd about. When lo, the night with misty mantles spread, 'Gan dark the day, and dim the azure skies ; And Venus in her message Hermes sped To bloody Mars, to will him not to rise, "WTule she herself approach'd in speedy wise ; And Virgo hiding her disdainful breast. With Thetis now had laid her dovm to rest. Whiles Scorpio dreading Sagittarius' dart, ■\Miose bow presf bent in sight, the string had sUpp'd, 30 Down slid into the Ocean flood apart, The Bear, that in the Irish .seas had dipp'd His grisly feet, with speed from tlicuce he whipp'd ; For Thetis, hasting from the A'irgin's bed, Pursued the Bear, that ere she came was fled. And Phaeton now, near reaching to his race AVith glisfring beams, gold streaming where they bent. Was prest to enter in his resting place : » Tapctn, tapestries, used metanhnrically for foliairc. 5 Soot, sweet. * Prest iFrencb " prat"), ready. TO A.D. 1570.] SHORTER POEMS. 17] Erj-tliius, that in the cart first ■n-ent,' Had even now attain'd his journey's stent : - 40 And, fast declining, hid away liis head, A\Tiile Titan coueh'd him in his purple bed. Ajud pale Cynthea, -with her borrow'd light. Beginning to supply her brother's place. Was past the noonstead six degrees in sight, WTicn sparkling stars amid the heaven's face ■With t-n-inkling light shone on the earth apace, That, while they brought about the nightes chai'C,^ The dark had dinun'd the day ere I was ware. And sorrowing I to see the summer flowers, 60 The lively green, the lusty leas forlorn. The sturdy trees so shatter'd -with the showers. The fields so fade that flourish' d so befom, It taught me well, aU earthly things be bom To die the death, for nought long time may last ; The sunmier's beauty yields to winter's blast. Then looking upward to the heaven's learns,'' With nightes stars thick powder' d everywhere. Which erst so gUsten'd with the golden streams That cheerful Phoebus spread down from his sphere, 60 Beholding dark oppressing day so near : The sudden sight reduced * to my mind The sundry changes that in earth we find. That musing on this worldly wealth in thought, Which comes, and goes, more faster ' than we see The flickering flame that with the fire is wTought, My busy mind presented unto me Such fall of peers as in this realm had be ; That oft I wish'd some would their woes descrive. To warn the rest whom fortune left alive. 70 And straight forth stalking with redoubled pace, For that I saw the night drew on so fast, In black aU clad, there fell before my face 1 The foremost horse in tlie sun's chariot. ' Stent, place of rest. See Note 15 on this page. 3 Nightes chave, the car of Night. * Learns, rays of light. First English " ledma," a ray or beam of hght; "leuman" (Icelandic "Ijoma"), to gleam or shine. Modem English " loom," as when a sliip looms in the distance. Allied to the Latin " luK " and " Incere." 5 Bedticed. led back. So, in the closing lines of Shakespeare's *' Eichard III.," Kichard says : — " Abate the edge of traitors, gracious Lord, That would reduce these bloody days again, And make poor England weep in streams of blood ! " 6 More faster, a common Elizabethan form. In "King Lear," for example, we have (act i., scene II — " Avert your liking a more worthier way." " That she ... . Mo3t best, most dear'st should, in this trice of time. . . ." Act ii., scene 2 ; — " Harbour more craft and more corrupter ends." " My sister may receive it much more worse." Act ii., scene 3 : — "To take the basest and most poorest shape." Act ii., scene 4 : — " And am fall'n oxxt with my more hardier will." A^t iii., scene 3 : — *' More harder than the stones whereof 'tis raised. Act iv., scene 6 : — " Let not my worser spirit tempt me again." A piteous ■night,' whom woe had all forwast ; ' Forth from her eyen the crystal tears out brast ; ' And sighing sore, her hands she wrung and fold,"* Tare all her hair, that nith was to behold. Her body small, for\\-ither'd, and forspent, As is the stalk that summer's di-ought oppress'd ; Her welked " face with woeful tears besjuent ; '- 80 Her colour pale : and, as it seem'd her best, In woe and plaint reposed was her rest ; And, as the stone that di'ops of water wears, So dented were her cheeks with fall of tears. Her eyes swoll'n ^vith flowing streams afloat. Wherewith, her looks thro-mi up full plteously. Her forceless hands together oft she smote. With doleful shrieks, that echoed in the skj- ; Whose plaint such sighs did straight accompany. That, in my doom,'' was never man did see 90 A wight but half so woebegone as she. I stood aghast, beholding all her plight, 'Tween dread and dolour so distraiu'd in heart That, while my hairs upstarted with the sight. The tears outstream'd for soitow of her smart : But when I saw no end that could apart The deadly dewle '■* which she so sore did make, With doleful voice then thus to her I spake : " Unwrap thy woes, whatever wight thou be. And stint '° in time to spill '" thyself with plaint : 100 Tell what thou art, and whence, for well I see ' Wight (First English "wiht"), a creature, thing, anything. Tha same word takes another form in the phrase " not a whit," and enters into the composition of the words " aught " and '* naught." 8 Fonmst, utterly wasted. The First English prefix for is equiva- lent to German rcr. The ed in " forewasted," according to common Ehzabethan usage, is dropped after the final t of the verb. Where it was not written it was often not pronounced. See Notes 4, page 88, and 7, page 96. Compare also " lament," in hne 222. 3 Brast, burst. First EngUsh "berstan," past "baerst. sitions of r and s were common in First Enghsh. " Grses, also "giers;" "frost," fi-ost, was also"forst;" so also " bird," the young of any bird or animal. '" Fold, folded. First English " fealden," past tense " feold." '1 W'rificd, withered. German "welken," to wither. 12 Besprent, sprinkled. Fu-st English " sprangan," to spring, shoot forth, strew, sprinkle. 13 Doom, judgment. 1* Dewle (French "deuil"), monming. Dole/iil, in the next line, means full of " deuil," or dole. 15 Stint, cease. The meaning is, in the modern vulgarism, "cut it short." Icelandic "stytta," to make short ; " stytting," a shortening —"stinting" in food is a shortening of the allowance; Icelandic " stuttr," stimted, scanty. A stutter in speech consists of words broken short before ompletion. "Stuttr" is closely akin to Fu^t English " stunt," of which the first sense is blunt, i.e., short of its head, then stupid and fooUsh ; and the First English verb " stintan ' took the same senses. Icelandic " st.rtti," a shortening, appears in the Morkinskinna, an old velhun containing Uves of kings, as "styttni" (Cleasby and Vigfusson's Icelandic Dictionary). Inser- tion of n is illustrated by the relation in English and Gennan of (/i tonii in such words as "muth" (mouth 1 and "mnnd," "geoguth" (youth) and " jugeiid," "du-.nith" (virtue or valour) and "tngend." In such cases there is usually nn in Icelandic, the th or ci taking its place or being joined to it in English and Gennan. In " stytta " and "stint " there is t( in Icelandic, and the n becomes associated with it in our language. i« Sfill, destroy. First English " spillan," to spill, spoU, kill. So in the "Faerie Queene " (I iii. 43) Spenser represents Una in the power of Sansloy, her Hon slain — " Her faithful guard removed, her hope dismayed. Herself a yielded prey to save or spill." Transpo- grass, was brid " and 172 CASSELL'S LIBRAE Y OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1558 Thou canst not dure,' with sorrow thus attaint: "- And, with that word of Sorrow, all forfaint She looked up, and, prostrate as she lay, With piteous sound, lo, thus she gan to say : '"Alas, I wretch, whom thus thou seest distrain'd "With wasting woes that never shall aslake. Sorrow I am; in endless torments paiu'd Among the Furies in the infernal lake. Where Pluto, god of hell, so grislj' black. Doth hold his throne, and Lethe's deadly taste Doth reave remembrance of each thing forepast ; 110 " Whence come I am, the dreary destiny And luckless lot for to bemoan of those Whom Fortune, in tliis maze of misery. Of wretched chance , most woeful Mirrors chose ; That, when thou seest how lightly they did lose Their pomp, their power, and that they thought most sure, Thou mayst soon deem no earthly joy may dure." SOBROW. No. 48 of Alciat's Emhlems, Whose rueful voice no sooner had out bray'd Those woeful words wherewith she sorrow' d so, But out, alas, she shright,' and never stay'd. Fell down, and all to-dash'd* herself for woo : The cold pale dread my limbs gan overgo. And I so soiTow'd at her sorrows eft,* That, what with grief and fear, my wits were reft. I stretch'd myself, and straight my heart revives. That dread and dolour erst did so appale ; Like him that with the fervent fever strives. When sickness seeks his castle health to scale ; 120 130 1 Dure, last, hold out (Latin ** dui-are," to mate hard). What is hard can hold together, lasts, is durable. 8 Attaint^ attainted (the ed dropped after the final t), hathed, soaked • in, stained, dyed through. Latin " tingere ; " French *' teindre." * ShrigM, shrieked, cried aloud. Gennan " schreien." * To-daslicd, The io was an intensive prefix to verbs, like the German zer. Verbs with this prefix were often doubly emphasised by the use of the word all. 5 Eft (First English "ffift" and "eft"), again. It was very com- monly used as a First English prefix to verbs, equivalent to Latin re-. " I 30 re-sorrowed at her sorrow," With gather' d spirits so forc'd I fear t' avalc : " And, rearing her, with anguish all fordone, jVIy spirits return' d, and then I thus begun : " Sorrow, alas ! sith Sorrow is thy name, And that to thee this drear doth well pertain, In vain it were to seek to cease the same : But, as a man himself with soitow slain, So I, alas 1 do comfort thee in pain. That here in sorrow art forsunk so deep, That at thy sight I can but sigh and weep." WO I had no sooner spoken of a stike,' But that the stoixa so rumbled in her breast As .^bluB could never roar the like ; And showers down rained from her eyen so fast, That aU bedrent* the place, tUl at the last. Well eased they the dolour of her mind. As rage of rain doth swage the stormy wind : For forth she paced in her fearful tale : " Come, come," quoth she, " and see what I shall show ; Come, hear the plaining and the bitter bale 150 Of worthy men by Fortune overthrow : ' Come thou, and see them rueing all in row. They were but shades that erst in mind thou roll'd : Come, come with me, thine eyes shall them behold." 'What could these words but make mo more aghast, To hear her tell whereon I mus'd whilere ?'" So was I maz'd theremth, till, at the last. Musing upon her words, and what they were, All suddenly well lesson'd was my fear ; <• Avdle, let fall, lower. French *'avaler;" Latin "ad vallem," to the lower ground. The word is in avalanche^ and is English still in the abbreviation vail, as when Sir Walter Scott wi-ites of a man's " vading his bonnet," Observe in reading this line and two lines lower that spirits has only the value of a mouosyllahle. So other poets have used it, including Milton — *' Laid thus low. As far as gods and heavenly essences Can perish : for the mind and spirit remains Invincible. " (" Paradise Lost," I. 139). And again, line 146— "^Have left us this our spirit and strength entire." 7 Spoken of a sfifce, spoken of a sigh, or stifled groan. The last line had been " That at thy sight I can but sigh and weep." " Steigh " is still used in Scotland, as defined by Jamieson, as " a stifled gi-oan as from one in distress or bearing a heavy load ; " " stech " and " stegh " meaning to piiif and groan. Or the word may be First English **stice," a stab or piercing; "Scarcely had I spoken of myself as pierced with grief" (referring to the line in which Sackville had said he was "a man himself with sorrow slain "), and thereat, or at the naming of a heavy sigh, as before, at the naming of sorrow, Soitow laments with keen renewal of her pain. Another word " stike " means a stanza, the sense given in Nares's Glossary to this word, vrith the remark, " He had exactly spoken a stanza before he says this." Such an interpretation might have served for a bad poet. s Bcdrent, drenched. First English " di-incan " was to drink ; "drencan," to make drink, or drench. The prefix he, once common before verbs and often but weakly intensive, was aftenvards retained or employed where it had force, and usually with a sense of " all round" completeness, as in hcsci, set about on all sides; hcsprinkled. So here hcdrent, drenched all round about — with showers from the eyes of Sorrow. ^ Overthrow, overthrown. There is similar elision of the final n in line 68 : " Such fall of peers as in this realm had be." 10 While ere. First English "hwil," a space of time; " hwile," for a space of time : " ^r," ere, before. TO A.D. 1579.] SHOETER POEMS. 173 For to my niind returned, how she tell'd ' 160 Both what she was, and where her won- she held. Whereby I knew that she a-goddess was, And, therewithal, resorted to my mind My thought, that late presented me the Glass Of brittle state, of cai'es that here we find, Of thousand woes to sUly men assign'd : And how she now bid me come and behold. To see -n-ith eye that erst in thought 1 roll'd. Flat down I fell, and with all reverence Adored her, perceiving now that she, 1 70 A goddess, sent by godly Providence, In earthly shape thus show'd herself to me. To waU and rue this world's uncertainty : And while I honom''d thus her godhead's might, ■With plaining voice these words to me she shi-ight.' " I shall thee guide first to the grisly lake. And thence unto the bhssful jjlace of rest. Where thou shall see, and hear, the plaint they make That whilom here bare swing '' among the best : This shalt thou see : but great is the imrest 180 That thou must bide, before thou canst attain Unto the dreadful place where these remain." And, with these words, as I upraised stood. And gan to follow her* that straight forth pac'd, Ere I was wai-e, into a desert wood We now were come, where, hand in hand embrac'd. She led the way, and thi'ough the thick so trao'd, As, but I had been guided by her might. It was no way for any mortal wight. But lo, while thus amid the desert dark 190 We passed on with steps and pace unmeet, A rumbling roar, confus'd with howl and bark Of dogs, shook all the gi-oimd under oiu- feet. And struck the din ■within our ears so deep, As, half distraught, unto the ground I feD, Besought return, and not to ■s-isit heU. But she, forthwith, uplifting me apace, Remov'd my dread, and with a steadfast mind Bade me come on ; for here was now the place. The place where we our travail end should find : 200 "Wherewith I rose, and to the place assign'd Astoin'd I stalk,' when straight we ajiproached near The dreadful place, that j-ou will dread to hear. 1 Tcll'df " tealde," modified here into "telde," instead of "tolde," •whicli was the nsiial form. So " feahte " (fetchedl was modified into ** fet," and " creap " (from " creopan," to creep) into " crep," 2 Won or u'ini, dwelling. First English '*wunian" (Gennan *' wohnen"), to dwell. 3 Shright. See line 122. * Swing, sway. =» To follow her. Sackville is led by SoiTow to the shades as .SIneas was led by the Sibyl and Dante by Virgil. SackviUe had both Virgil and Dante in his mind as he went on his own way to the classical Hell, and peopled it, according to the tone of his poem, with personifi- cations all his o^vn, not inferior to those of Dunbar in " The Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins," and worthy precui'sors of those of Spenser in "The Faerie Queene." ^ Astoin'd 1 dalle. "Astoined" is used in the original sense of the word. Servius, the gi-ammarian, wrote, at the beginning of the fifth century, " He is properly called * attonitus ' (astonished), in whom the flash of lightning and the sonnd of thimders near him have caused stupor." The root, as in " thunder " (Latin " tonitru," French " ton- An hideous hole all vast, withouten shape. Of endless dejith, o'erwhelmed with ragged stone. With ugly mouth and grisly jaws doth gape, And to our .sight confounds itself in one : Here enter'd we, and yeding forth,? anon An hon-ible loathly lake we might discern, As black as pitch, that cleped" is Avem. 210 A deadly gulf ; where nought but rubbish grows. With fo>d black swelth' in thicken'd hunps that lies, Which up in th' aii- such stinking vapours throws. That over there may fly no fowl but dies Choak'd with the pestilent eavoui'a that cise : Hither we come ; whence forth we still did pace. In dreadful fear amid the dreadful place : And, first, within the porch and jaws of hell, Sat deep Remorse of Conscience, all besprent With tears ; and to herself oft would she teU 220 Her wi-etchedness, and cursing never stent To sob and sigh ; but ever thus lament. With thoughtful care, as she that, all in vain, Woidd wear and waste continually in pain. Her eyes unsteadfast, roUing here and there, Whu'l'd on each place, as place that vengeance brought, 8o was her mind continually in fear, Toss'd and tonnented with the tedious thought Of those detested crimes which she had wrouglit ; With di-eadful cheer,'" and looks thrown to the sky, 230 Wishing for death, and yet .she could not die. Next saw we Dread, all trembling how he shook, With foot imcertain, proft'er'd here and there : Benumb' d of speech, and with a ghastly look Search' d every place, all pale and dead for fear, His cap borne up with staling of his hair, neiTe," German **donner"), is ton = din, noise. First English " stuniau," to stiuj, make stupid with noise. Milton itsed the word — and the word " amazed," lost in a gitlf (Fu'St English " mase," a gulf or whirlpool) — most accurately when he said of the angels prone on the gulf of iire with the pursuing thunders at their back that they lay "astounded and amazed." Here, also, Sackvdle stalks on — I'.t-,, ad- vances waiily — astoined with the " rumbling roar " and din struck in his ear so deep that had caused him to fall to the ground and flinch from advance. To stalk (First English " stselcan ") is to go softly or warily, as in deer-stalking ; so a " stalking-horse " was used that one might advance wai-ily under cover of it. One form of wary advance was by the use of stilts, and from this the modem sense of stalking for walking, as if upon very tall legs, is derived. That is not the sense in which Sackville used the word. ' Yeding forth, going forward. " Yede " is equivalent to " eode," went, the past of " gan," to go. It is here transfoi-med into an independent verb, meaning to go, and was so used also by Spenser. When the Red Cross Knight was about to fight his crowning battle with the Dragon, " then bade the knight his lady yede aloof." When it had resigned, or aU but resigned, its original place as a past tense to "went," yede seems to have set up as a verb on its own account. 8 Cleped, called. First English " clypian," to call. 9 Swclth, perished matter. Fu'st English " sweltan," to die; " swylt," death. "^ Chdi; the countenance. Old French " chere " and "chiere;" Italian " cera " and"ciera," face, aspect; Greek xapa ; Low Latin " cara," the head. " Faij'e bonne chere " is to entei'tain with a friendly faee ; "faire mauvaise chere," to hold down the head. According to the presence or absence of the face of kindly welcome, the "cheer" for a guest was good or bad. The tenn afterwards was transferred from the spii-it to the substance, and "good cheer" soon meant abundance of good food. So in Marlowe's "Fanstus," Mephistopheles proposes a %isit to the Pope ; Fanstus doubts their welcome. Mephistoi»heles says that does not matter, they will take his food, and uses "good cheer" for food in dii-ect antithesis to its 174 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1558 'Stoin'd ;ind amaz'd' at his own shade for dread, And fearing greater dangers than was need. And next, within the entry of this lake, Sat fell Revenge, gnashing her teeth for ire, 240 Devising means how she may vengeance take, Never in rest till she have her desire : But fi-ets within so far forth with the fire Of -n-reaking flames, that now determines she To die by death, or veng'd by death to be. When fell Revenge, -ndth bloody foul pretence Had show'd herself, as next in order set. With trembling limbs we softly parted thence, TUl iu our eyes another sight we met : Wlien from my heart a sigh forthwith I fet,- 250 Rueing, alas ! upon the woeful plight Of IMisery, that next appear'd in sight. His face was lean, and somedeal ' pin'd away. And eke his hands consumed to the bone ; But what his body was I cannot say, J"or on his carcass raiment had he none Save clouts and patches, pieced one by one : With staff in hand, and scrip on shoulders cast. His chief defence against the winter's blast. His food, for most, was wild fruits of the tree, 260 Unless sometimes some crumbs fell to his share, Which in liis wallet long, God wot, kept he. As on the which full daint'ly would he fare : His drink, the running stream ; his cup, the bare Of his palm clos'd ; his bed, the hard cold ground : To this poor life was Misery ybound. ■Wliose wretched state when we had well beheld, With tender ruth on him, and on his feres,'' In thoughtful cares forth then our pace we held : And, by and by, another shape appears, 270 Of greedy Care, still brushing up the breres. His knuckles k-nobb'd, his flesh deep dented in. With tawed ^ hands, and hard y tanned skin. I hope his Holiness will hiH us welcome." tis no matter, man ; we'll be bold with his original sense. Faust : Mephistopheles : " Tut, good cheer." 1 Stoined and, amazed (see Note 6, page 173). Amaze, amay (aUied to dismaw), and amatc seem to have been three words of similar but not absolutely like meaning, each from a different source. The image iu amaze was of the " mase " or whirlpool ; amay was from *' magan," to have power, with a negative prefix. Danish " afmagt," a swoon ; Italian " smagare," to discourage; Spanish " desmayer ; " Proven9al *' esmager ; " French *' s'esmaier." to be sad with care ; " " esmay," cai-eful thought, and of such relationship dismay, amay. But in amate, there is a making "mat." the word used by Chaucer in the " Knight's Tale," in speaking of the pity of Theseus for the suppliant women, *' when he saw them so pitous and so maat." This was an old word with a fh-st sense of dead, as in Middle Latin " matare," to kill, then of being di-iven into a comer and beaten (as in check-mate, i.e., shah-maat. the king is dead, or dead-beaten', or of utmost deprival of powers, whether of bodily power, as in the Gennan " matt," weary, or of power of mind, as in the Italian " matto" and Enghsh " mad." Even beer or wine that has lost its liviug force— become flat— is called by the Germans " matt." All these etymologies produced words similar in sense— amaze, amay, amate ; and the precise sense of one might now .and then be given to another in the winter's mind. 2 Fet, fetched. First Enghsh "fecean," to fetch ; past, "feahte." » Somedeal, some part ; deal meaning a part (" doe'lan," to deal, or divide). * Feres, companions. First English "fera," a companion. 5 Taa-ed, hardened by toil aud erjiosure. First English " tawian," to taw or prepare hides, by soaking and beating them. The morrow gray no sooner hath begun To spread liis hght, even peeping^ in om' eyes, \Vhen he is up, and to his work jTun : But let the night's black misty mantles rise. And with foul dark never so much disguise The fail- bright da}-, yet ceaseth he no while, But hath his candles to prolong his toil. 280 By him lay hea-vy Sleep, the cousin of Death, Flat on the ground, and still as any stone, A very corpse, save jnelding forth a breath : Small keep '' took he, whom Fortune frowned on, Or whom she lifted up into the thi'one Of high rcno^^Ti ; but, as a liviug death, So, dead alive, of life he di'ew the breath. The body's rest, the quiet of the heart, The travail's ease, the still night's fere^ was he, And of our life in earth the better part ; 290 Reaver of sight, and yet in whom we see Things oft that tide, and oft that never be ; Without respect, esteeming equally King Crcesus' pomp and Irus' poverty.' And next, in order sad Old Age we foimd : His beard all hoar, his eyes hollow and blind. With drooping cheer still poring on the ground. As on the place where Natm'e him assign'd To rest, when that the sisters had untwiu'd ' His \-ital thread, and ended with their knife 300 The fleeting course of fast declining life. There heard we him with broke and hollow plaint Rue with himself his end approaching fast. And all for nought liis wi'etched mind torment With sweet remembrance of his pleasui-es past. And fresh delights of lusty youth forwaste : Recounting which, how would he sob and shriek. And to be young again of Jove beseek. But and'" the cruel f ites so fixed be That time forpast cannot return again, 310 This one request of Jove yet prayed he : That, in such wither'd plight and wretched pain As eld," accompanied with his loathsome train. Had brought on him, all were it woe and grief, He might a while yet linger forth his life, And not so soon descend into the pit, ^ATiere Death, when ho the mortal corpse hath slain. With reckless hand in g-i-ave doth cover it ; Thereafter never to enjoy again The gladsome light, but, in the ground ylain, 3'30' In depth of darkness waste and wear to nought, As he had ne'er into the world been brought. ^ Even peeping (even pronounced e'en), peeping in our eyes fi'om the horizon as from ground low as ourselves, level with us as we lie. " Keep, heed. To " take keep " was to pay attention, to lay hold of a thing by giving attention to it. * Fere, companion. 5 Irus. The type of poverty is taken from the beggar in the eighteenth book of Homer's " Odyssey." Croesus and Irus had been paired by Ovid as the types of wealth and povei-ty : " Irus et est subitb qui mode Croesus erat " (And suddenly he is Inis who just now was Croesus). !*• And or an, if. 1' Eld, age. First English *' yld " and " eld." TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. yto But who had seen him sobbing, how he stood Unto himself, and how he would bemoan ■ His youth forpast, as though it wrought him good To talk of youth all were his youth forgone, He woidd have nius'd and marvell'd mueh whereon This ^^"retchcd Age should life dosii'e so fain. And knows full well life doth but length his pain. Crookback'd he was, tooth-shaken, and blear-eyed, 330 Went on thi'eo feet, and sometime crept on four, With old lame bones that rattled by his side, His scalp all pill'd,' and he with eld forlore ; His -n-ither'd fist still knocking at Death's door. Fumbling and di-iveUing as he draws his breath ; For brief, the shape and messenger of Death. And fast by him pale Malady was plac'd, Sore sick in bed, her colour all forgone. Bereft of stomach, savour, and of taste, Ne could she brook no meat, but broths alone : 340 Her breath coiTupt, her keepers every one Abhorring her, her sickness past recure,^ Detesting physick and all physick's cure. But, oh, the doleful sight that then we see ! We tum'd our look, and, on the other side, A grisly shape of Famine might we see. With greedy looks, and gaping mouth, that cried And roar'd for meat, as she should there have died ; Her body thin, and bare as any bone, Whereto was left nought but the case alone. 350 And that, alas ! was gnawn on CTerywhere, All full of holes, that I ne might refrain From tears, to see how she her arms could tear, And with her teeth gnash on the bones in vain. When, all for nought, she fain would so sustain Her starven corpse, that rather seem'd a shade Thau any substance of a creatm'e made. Great was her force, whom stone wall could not stay,' Her tearing nails snatching at all she saw ; With gaping jaws, that by no means j-may 360 Be satisfied from hunger of her maw, But eats herself, as she that hath no law : Gnawing, alas 1 her carcass all in vain, Where you may count each sinew, bone, and vein. On her while we thus firmly fix'd our eyes, That bled for ruth of such a dreary sight, Lo, suddenlj' she shright in so huge ^"ise. As made heU-gates to shiver with the might : Wherewith, a dart we saw, how it did Ught Eight on her breast, and, therewiihal, pale Death 370 Enthrilling ■* it, to reave her of her breath. 1 PnVd, bald, deprived of hail-. In Part I. of " King Henry VI.," act i., sc. 3, the Duke of Gloucester calls tlie Bishop of "Wincliester a "pield priest," alliidin<; contemptuously to liis bald shaven crown. In line 534, Henry of Buckingham's pilVd cloak means a cloak bare of wool, threadbare. ^ Rccnre, recovery. 3 "Hunger eats through stonewalls" ("Honger eet door steenen muuren") was a Dutch proverb cuirent also in England. It is recog- nised as a proverb in " Coriolanus." where Cains Marcius says that the people " said they were an.huugiy, sighed forth proverbs ' That hunger broke stone walls,' that ' dogs must eat,' that ' meat was made for mouths,' " &c. * Enthrilling it. drilling or forcing it in. First English "thirlian," to make a hole, drill, pierce ; "thirel" and "thyrl," a hole; *' uasu- thyi-1," the nose.thrill or nostiH. A sound or tale is thrilling when it pierces us. And, by and by, a dimib dead corpse we saw, Heavy, and cold, the shape of Death aright, That daunts all earthly creatures to his law ; Against whose force iu vain it is to fight : Ne peers, ne princes, nor no mortal ^^■ight, No to\\'ns, ne realms, cities, ne strongest tower, But all, perforce, must yield unto his power. His dart anon out of the corpse he took. And in his hand (a dreadful sight to see) 380 With great triumph eftsoons the same he shook, That most of aU my fears aifrayed me : His body dight with nought but bones, pardc. The naked shape of man there saw I plain, AU save the flesh, the sinew, and the vein. Lastly, stood War, in glittering amis yclad. With visage grim, stern looks, and blackly hucd ; In his right hand a naked sword he had, That to the hilts was aU with blood imbrued ; And in his left (that kings and kingdoms rued) 390 Famine and fire he held, and therewithal He razed towns, and threw down towers and aU. Cities he sack'd, and realms (that whilom flower'd In honour, gloi-y , and rule, above the best ) He overwhelm'd, and aU theii' fame devour'd, Consum'd, destroy'd, wasted and never ceas'd, TiU he their wealth, their name, and aU oppress'd : His face forhew'd* with wounds, and by his side There hung his targe, with gashes deep and wide. In midst of which, depainted there, we found 400 Deadly Debate, aU full of snaky hair That with a bloody fiUet was ybound. Out breathing nought but discord everyi\'here : And round about were portray' d, here and there. The hugy hosts, Darius and his power. His kings, princes, his peers, and aU his flower Whom great Macedo vanquish'd there in fight, With deep slaughter, despoiling aU his pride, Pierc'd through his realms and daimted aU his might : ^ Duke Hannibal beheld I there beside, 410 In Canna's field victor how he did ride, And woeful Romans that in vain withstood, And consul Paulus cover' d aU in blood.' Yet saw I more the fight at Trasimene, And Treby field,' and eke when Hannibal And worthy Scipio last in ai'ms were seen Before Carthago gate, to try for aU The world's empire, to whom it should befaU. There saw I Pompey and Ca;sar clad in arms. Their hosts aUied and aU their civil hamis ; 420 With conqueror's hands, forbath'd in theii- own blood, And Caesar weeping over Pompey' s head ; Yet saw I Sylla and Marius' where they stood, Their great cruelty, and the deep bloodshed Of friends : Cjtus I saw and his host dead, 5 Forhew'd, all hewed or hacked about. Use of the prefix for as an intensive runs through the poem. « Battle of Arbela. B.C. 331. 7 Lucius .SmiUus Paulus, defeated by Hannibal at Canute, B.C. 216. 8 Hannibal won the battle of Trebia B.C. 218. that at Lake Trasi- menus B.C. 217, but was overcome by Scipio B.C. 202. * Sylla and Marius, The a in Sylla suffers elision before the a in find. 176 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 155? And how the queen with great despite hath flung His hc:id in Wood of them she overuome.' Xerxes, the Persian king, yet saw I there, "VTith his huge host that drank the rivers di-y, Dismounted hills, and made the vales uprear, 430 His host and all yet saw I slain, perdy : Thebes I saw,- all raz'd how it did lie' In heaps of stones, and Tjtus put to spoil, With walls and towers flat even'd with the soil. But Troy, alas ! methought, above them all, It made mine eyes in very tears consmne : WTien I beheld the woeful werd ^ bef aU, That by the wrathful will of gods was come ; And Jove's unmoved sentence and foredoom On Priam king, and on his town so bent, 440 I could not lin,^ but I must there lament. And that tlio more, sith destiny was so stem As, force perforce, there might no force avail, But she must fall : and by her fall we learn That cities, tow'rs, wealth, world, and all shall quail : No manhood, might, nor nothing mought prevail : All were there prest * full many a prince and peer. And many a knight that sold liis death full dear : Not worthy Hector, worthiest of them all. Her hope, her joy; his force is now for nought. 450 O Troy, Troy, there is no boot but bale,^ The hugy horse within thy walls is brought ; Thy turrets fall, thy knights, that wMlom fought In arms amid the field, are slain in bed, Thy gods defil'd, and all thy honour dead. The flames upspring, and cruelly they creep From wall to roof, tiU all to cinders waste : Some fire the houses where the wretches sleep. Some rush in here, some run in there as fast ; In everywhere or sword or fire they taste : 460 The walls are torn, the tow'rs whirl'd to the groimd ; There is no mischief, but may there be foimd. Cassandra yet there saw I how they haled From PaUas' house with spercled' tress undone. Her wrists fast bound, and with Greeks' rout empaled : ^ And Priam eke, in vain how he did run To amis, whom PjTrhus with despite hath done To cruel death, and bath'd him in the bajTie' Of his son's blood before the altar slain. But how can I describe the doleful sight, 470 That in the shield so Krelike fair did shine ? Sith in this world, I think was never wight Could have set forth the half, not half so fine : ' Tomyiis, queen of a Scythiau tribe, in battle with whom Cyrils the elder was killed B.C. 529, was said to have thrown his head into a Teasel filled with human blood, that it might dx-ink its fill of what it loved. = T}iehes I sau-. Reference is to the story in the "Thebaid" of Statins, one of the most popular Latin books in and before Sackville's time. 3 Werd (Fu-st English "wyrd"), fate. "Wyrd" takes also the form u-cird, as in " the u-cird sisters " of Macbeth who became rulers of his destiny. * iiii, cease. First English "linnan," to cease or jiart from. 5 Prest, ready. * No hoot hnt hnU, no remedy but woe. First English " hot," a remedy; " bealu," bale, woe, evil. " Bad is your best." ^ Sperded, scattered. From Latin " spargere," to scatter. * Empaled, enclosed, surrounded. ' Baijjie, bath. I can no more, but tell how there is seen Fair Ilium fall in burning red gledes'" down, And, from the soil, great Troy, Neptunus' town. Herefrom when scarce I could mine eyes withdraw. That fiU'd with tears as doth the springing well, We passed on so far forth till we saw Rude Acheron, a loathsome lake to tell, 4S0 That boils and bubs iiji swelth" as black as hell; Where grisly Charon, at theii- fixed tide,'- StUl ferries ghosts unto the farther side. The aged god no sooner Sorrow spied But, hasting straight unto the bank apace, With hollow call unto the rout he cried. To swerve apart, and give the goddess place : Straight it was done, when to the shore we pace. Where, hand in hand as we then linked fast, Within the boat we are together plac'd. 490 And forth we launch full fraughted to the brink : A\Tien, with the imwonted weight, the rusty keel Began to crack as if the same should sink : We hoise up mast and sail, that in a while We fetch'd the shore, where scarcely we had while" For to arrive, but that we heard anon A three-sound bark confounded all in one. We had not long forth pass'd, but that we saw Black Cerberus, the hideous hoimd of hell. With bristles rear'd, and with a three-mouth'd jaw 500 Fordinning the air ^vith his horrible yell, Out of the deep dark cave where he did dwell : The goddess straight he knew, and by and by. He peas'd'^ and couch'd, while that we passed by. Thence come we to the horrour and the hell. The large great kingdoms, and the di'eadf ul reign Of Pluto in his throne where he did dwell ; The wide waste places, and the hugy plain ; The waiUngs, shrieks, and sundry sorts of pain ; The sighs, the sobs, the deep and deadly groan ; £10 Earth, air, and all resounding plaint and moan. Here piUed the babes, and here the maids imwed With folded hands then- sony chance bewailed ; Here wept the guiltless slain, and lovers dead That slew themselves when nothing else availed ; A thousand sorts of sorrows here, that wailed With sighs, and tears, sobs, shrieks, and all j'fere,'' That, oh, alas I it was a hell to hear. We stayed us straight, and -with a rueful fear Beheld this heavy sight, while from mine eyes 520 The vapoirr'd tears do-wn stilled '* here and there. And Sorrow eke. in far more woeful wise. Took on with plaint, iipheaving to the skies Her wretched hands, that, Tvith her cry, the rout Gan aU in heaps to swarm us round about. 1" Gledes, glowing embers, coals of fire. First English *' gl^d," a hve coal, a burning. u SkcUU, dead matter. « Tide (First EngUsh "tfd"), time. 13 ll'Jn7c ("hwil"). space of time. 1* Peos'd, became quieted, appeased. ^^ Yfcre, together. IS Stilled, dropped (Latin " stillare," to di'op). From the condensing of the vapoui* formed into drops are derived the words still, distil, distillenj, &c. ro A.D. 157y.J SHORTER POEMS. li " Lo here," quoth borrow, " pi-inces of renown, That whilom sat on top of Fortune's wheel, Now laid full low ; like wretches whii'lcd down Ev'n with one frown, that stay'd but with a smile : And now hehold the thing that thou erewhile 530 Saw only in thought ; and, what thou now shalt hear, Eecount the same to kesar, king, and peer." Then first came Henry, Duke of Buckingham, His cloak of black all pill'd, and quite forworn. Wringing liis hands, and Fortune oft doth blame. "Which of a duke hath made liim now her scorn : With ghastly looks, as one in manner lorn. Oft spread liis ai-ms, stretch'd hands he joins as fast. With rueful cheer and wipour'd eyes upcast. His cloak he rent, his manly breast he beat, . 540 His hau- all torn, about the place it lay ; Jly heart so molt to see his grief so great, As feelingly, mcthought, it dropt away : His eyes they whirl'd about withouton stay. With stormy sighs the place did so complain, As if his heart at each had biu'st in twain. Thrice he began to tell his doleful tale. And tlu-ico the sighs did swallow up his voice, At each of which he shrieked so withal. As though the heavens rived with the noise : 550 Till at the last, recovering his voice, Supping the tears that all his breast berained. On cruel Fortune, weeping, thus he plained. The printing of a " MiiTor for Magistrates," so introtluced, was begun under Queen Mary, in 1555, but stopped by Stephen Gardiner, who was then Chancellor. The accession of Elizabeth made its appearance possible, and the book was iii-st issued in 1559, edited by William Baldwin and George Ferrers, both poets, one a printer's son, bred as an ecclesiastic, and the other bred to law. Sackville's contribution, wliich appeared in tlie second part, j)ublished in 1563, was introduced with tliis in- formation about it : — Baldwin says to his fellow- workei-s, "I have here the Duke of Buckingham, King Richard's chief instiiiment, written by Master Thomas Sack\ille." " Read it, we pi'ay you," said they. " With a good will," quoth I, " but first you shall hear his preface or induction." " Hath he made a preface?" quoth one. "What meaneth he thereby, seeing that none other hath used the like order!" "I will tell you the cause thereof," quotli I, " which is tliis. After that he tmderstood that some of the Council would not suffer the book to be printed in such order as we had agi-eed and deter- mined, he pui-jiosed with himself to have gotten at my hands the Tragedies that were before the Duke of Buckingham's, which he would have preser\ed in one vokmie, and from that time backward, even to tlie time of William the Conqueror, he determined to continue and perfect .-ill the stoiy himself, in such order as Lydgate (following Bochas) had already u.sed. And therefore, to make a meet Induction into the matter, he devised this poesy ; which, in my judgment, is so well penned that I would not have any verse thereof left out of our volume." As fii-st issued in 1559, the "Mirror for Magis- trates " contained nineteen tragedies m verse, follow- 23 ing a prose introduction, setting forth that Richard Baldwin took the place of Boccaccio, to whom the complaints of the unfortimate had been addressed in the book on " The Falls of Pi-inces ; " that certain friends " took upon themselves every man foi' his part to be sundry peraonages ; " that as Boccaccio — and therefore Lydgate — left otf at a time coiTespond- ing to the end of our Edward III.'s reign, they would carry on the series from that date, beginning with Richard II.'s reign ; and as Boccaccio forgot among liis miserable princes such as were of our ovni nation, in this Mirror which was to be held up for the admonition of Enghind, all the examples should be drawn from English liistory. The series was then opened by George Fen-ei-s with the tragedy of HE FALL OF ROBERT TRESILIAN, CHIEF JUSTICE OF ENGLAND, AND OTHER HIS FELLOWS, FOR MIS- CONSTRUING THE LAWS, AND E.XPOUNDING THEM TO SERVE THE prince's AFFECTIONS, ANNO 1388.' From LyJy's Euphucs, 1579. In the sad register of mischief and mishap, Bald'^'in Tve beseech thee with oui' names to hegin, Whom unfiiendly Fortune did train unto a traj), Whenas we thought our state most stable to have bin. So Hghtlv lose they all, which all do ween to win. * In 1386, the chief favourites of Ricliard n. — tlien twenty years old — were Sir Michael de la Pole, wliom the King had just made Earl of Sutfolk, and Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford, who had been created Marquis of Dublin. His uncle Thomas, whom he had at the same time created Duke of Gloucester, headed an opposition to misgovem- ment by profligate advisers. De la Pole was impeached by the Houae of Commons, fined, and imprisoned ; and in November the authority of the king^ was superseded by a Commission of Regency that was to reform the state during its year of power. Richard consulted secretly with Robert TresUiau, his Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and other of his jtidges, who told him that the abettors of the Commission were traitors ; and he resolved, if he could secure a majority in the nest Parliament, to bring them to trial before these judges, who had already pronounced against them. But the Duke of Gloucester and those who acted with him were iufoi-med of the king's plans. They raised a force, followed Richard to London, were joined at Waltham Cross by the Earls of Derby and Warwick, and there, on the 14tli of November, 1387, before a Commission of State tliat went out to meet them, they " appealed," or challenged, the chief advisers of the king as traitors. On the following Simday, the lords appellant, backed by strong military force, came in full armour, but with all outward show of homage, before the king in Westminster Hall, to tell him that they sought to remove the traitors who were about him, and that these were Alexander Nevile, Aj'chbishop of York ; Robert de Vere, Duke of Ireland ; Michael de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk ; Robert Tresilian, false judge ; and Sir Nicholas Bramber, false knight, of London. The king promised to call a Parliament to decide the quarrel. Meanwhile the threatened men escaped. De Vere raised 5,000 men in Lancashire, Cheshire, and Wales, but was de- feated at Radcot Bridge, on the 20th of December. Sis days after- wards the lords appellant were at Clerkeuwell with 40,000 men. The Lord Mayor gave up to them the keys of the City ; the King gave up to them the keys of the Tower. When Parliament met there was but one possible residt of the impeachment of the Archbishop of York, Vere, De la Pole, Tresilian, and Bramber. They were im- peached as traitors who had conspired for the overthrow of the Commission and the destruction of its membera, and " by falsehood induced the king to give them Ids love, trust, and credence; making him hate his faithful lords and lieges, by whom he ought of right rather to be govenied," All the accused were found guilty, and Tresilian was one of those who were immediately executed. Tb<^ other judges, who are supposed to appear with him in the poem— Locktou, Holt, Belknap, &c.— were banished. 1.8 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1558 Learn by us ye Lawj-crs and Judges of this Land, Upright and uncorrupt in doom alway to stand. And print yo this precedent to remain for ever, Enroll and record it in tahles made of brass, Engrave it in marble that may he razed never, 1 Where Judges of the Law may see, as in a glass, What guerdon is for guile, and what our wages was Who for our Prince's ■mU, corrupt with meed and awe, Gainst Justice wretchedly did wrest the sense of Law. A change more new or strange wlien Avas there ever seen, Than Judges from the Bench to come down to the Bar, And Councillors that were most nigh to King and Queen Exiled their country, from coirrt and council far ? But such is Fortune's play, which can both make and mar. Exalting to most high that was before most low, 20 And turning tail again, the lofty down to throw. And such as, late afore, could stoutly speak and plead Both in court and country, careless of the trial. As mummers mute do stand without advice or rede. All to seek of shifting, by traverse or denial, Which have seen the day when, for a golden ryal,' By finesse and cunning, coidd have made black seem white. And most extorted wrong to have appeared right. Whilst thus on bench above we had the highest place, Our reasons were too strong for any to confute : 30 But when at bar beneath we came to plead our case, Our wits were 'in the wane, oui' pleading very brute. Hard it is for prisoners with judges to dispute : \Vlicn all men against one, and none for one shall speak, \\Tio weens himself most Avise may chance be too too weak. To you therefore that sit, these few words will I say. That no man sits so sure but he may haply stand : WTiercfore whilst you have place, and bear the SA\-ing anil sway, By favom' mthout force let points of Law be scaun'd. I'ity the poor prisoner that holdeth up Iris hand, 40 Ne lade him not with law who least of law hath known, Remember ere ye die, the case may be yom- own. Behold me one unfortunate amongst this flock, Ti-esihan call'd sometime. Chief Justice of this land, A gentleman by birth, no stain was in my stock, Locketon, Holte, Belknap, with other of my band, Which the Law and Justice had wholly in our hand. Under the second Richai'd a Prince of great estate. To whom, and us also, blind Fortune gave the mate. In all our Common Laws our skill was so profound, .30 Our credit and authority such and so high esteemed. That wh.at we did conclude was taken for a gi'ound. Allowed was for Law what so to us best seemed. Both life, death, lands, and goods, and all by us was deemed : A\Tiereby -nnth easy pain, gxeat gain we did in fet,° And everything was fish that came unto oui' net. ^ A (joWcn ryal. Of gold coins once cun-ent, the George Noble weighed three pennyweight; the Angel Noble, three pennyweight seven grains and a quarter ; the Real, four pennyweight twenty-three grains, which was abont foui-teen grains more than the old Noble. "A table of the weight and valuation of several pieces of gold" is in Arthur Hopton's " Concordaucy of Yeares," printed for the Stationers' Company in 1612. 2 Fct, fetch. At sessions and sizes we bare the stroke and sway, In patents and commission of quorum still chief : So that to whether side soever we did weigh. Were it by right or wTong, it passed without reprief .^ 60 The true man we let hang somewhiles to save a thief ; Of gold and of silver om- hands were never empty ; Offices, fanns, and fees, fell to us in great plenty. But what thing may suffice unto the greedy man? The more he hath in hold, the more he doth desire : Happy and twice happy is he, that wisely can Content himself with that wliich reason doth require. And moileth for no more than for his needfid hii'e : But greediness of mind doth seldom keep the size, To whom enough and more doth never well suffice. 70 For like as di-opsy patients drink and stUl be di-y, WTiose unstanch't greedy tlui'st no liquor can allay, And di-ink they ne'er so much, yet thirst they by and by, So catchers and snatchers do toil both night and day. Not needy, but greedy, still prowUng for theii- prey. O endless thirst of gold, corrupter of all laws, "WTiat mischief is on mould * whereof thou art not cause 'r Thou madest us forget the faith of our profession, AVhen Serjeants we were sworn to serve the conmion law, WTiich was, that in no point we should make digression SO From approved principles, in sentence nor in saw : But we imhappy wights without all ch-ead and awe Of the Judge eternal, for world's^ vain promotion, More to man than God did bear om- whole devotion. The Laws we did interpret and statutes of the land. Not tridy by the text, but newly by a glose : And words that were most plain, when they by us wci'e scanned, We tm-ned by construction to a Wclchman's hose,* Whereby many a one both life and land did lose : Yet this we made our mean to movmt aloft on mules, yO And ser\Tng times and tm-ns, perverted laws and rules. Thus climbing and contending alway to the top. From high unto higher, and then to be most high. The honey dew of Fortune so fast on us did drop. That of King Richard's counsel we came to be most nigh : Whose favour to attain we were full fine and sly. Alway to his profit where anything might sound. That way (all were it wrong) the laws we did expound. So working law like wax, the subject was not sure Of life, of land, nor goods, but at the Prince's wUl, 100 AVhich caused his kingdom the shorter time to dure ; For claiming power absolute both to save and spill. The Prince thereby presumed his people for to piU, And set his lusts for law, and will had reason's place. No more but hang and draw, there was no better grace. Thus the King outleaiung the limits of his Law, Not reigning but raging, as j-outh did him entice, Wise and worthy persons from coiu-t did daily di'aw, Sage counsel set at nought, proud vaimters were in price. And roisters bare the r>de, which wasted all in vice : 110 Of riot and excess grew scarcity and lack. Of lacking came taxing, and so went wealth to -m-ack. 3 Reprief, l*eproof. * On mould, on the earth. ^ World's, pronounced as two syllables by rolling of the 'i lines above. " po-int." f- A Wdchman'R hose. See Note 6, page 138. so three TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 179 The Barons of the Land, not bearing this abuse, Conspiiing with the Commons, iissembled by assent, And seeing neither reason nor treaty could induce The King in anything his rigour to relent. Maugre liis kingly might they call'd a Parliament, Frank and free for all men without check to debate As well for weal publique as for the prince's state. In thi» high assembly great things were proponed 120 Touching the Prince's state, his regalty and cro^-n. By reason that the King (which much was to be moned) Without regard at all of honom- or renown, Misled by ill advice, had turn'd all upside down. For surety of whose state, them thought it did behove His counsellors con-upt by reason to remove : Among whom, Robert Vere, call'd Duke of Ireland, With Michael Dclapole of Suffolk new made Earl, (If York also the Archbishop, dispatch'd out of hand, ^\'ith Brember of London a full uncoui-teous chirrl: 130 Some learned in the law in exile they did hurl : But I poor Trcsilian (because I was the chief) Was damn'd to the gallows most vilely as a thief. Lo the tine of falsehood, stipend of corruption. The fee of double fraud, the fruits it doth procure ! Ye Judges upon earth, let our just punition Teach you to shake off bribes and keep your hands still piu'e ! Riches and promotion be vain things and imsure, The favom- of a Prince is an untrusty stay, But Justice hath a fee that shaU remain alway. 140 A\'hat glory can be greater before God or man. Then by paths of Justice in judgment to proceed r So duly and so truly the laws for to scan. That right may take his place without regard or meed. Set apart all flattery and vain worldly dreed. Set C4od before your eyes, the most just Judge supreme, Remember well your reckoning at the day extreme. Abandon all affray, he soothfast in your saws, Be constant and careless of mortals' displeasure. With eyes shut and hands close you should pronounce tlic laws. l.)0 Esteem not worldly goods, think there is a treasure More worth then gold a thousand times in valure, Reposed for all such as righteousness ensue, AXTiereof you cannot fall ; the promise made is true. If Judges in our days would ponder well in mind The fatal fall of us for wTcsting law and right. Such statutes as touch life should not be thus defin'd I'>y senses constrained, ag.ainst true meaning quite. As well they might affirm the black for to be white : Wherefore we wish they would our act and end compare. And weighing well the case, they will, we trust, beware. G. Febueks. George Ferrers wTote also the next piece, show- ing " How Sir Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, uncle to King Richard II., was unlaw- fully murdered. An. Dom. 1.397." Then followed Thomas Churchyard, who showed " How the Lord Mowbray, promoted by King Richard II. to the state of a Duke, was by him lianished the Realm, the year of Christ 1398, and after died miserably in exile." George Fen-el's then took for his theme the deposition of Richard II. in 1399 and his murder Ln prison the year following. The next theme ^^•;l,s Owen Glendower, represented by Thomas Phaer, a Welshman, who, after studying at Oxford and Lincoln's Inn, became fii-st a lawyer and afterwards a physician. Phaer \VTote on law and physic, and when he contributed this tragedy to " The Mirror for Magistrates " lie was earning fame in literature as a translator of Virgil's " ^^Cneid." His " Se\-en First Books of the Eneidos of Virgil " appeared in May, 1.558, six months before Elizabeth's accession, and he had made his waj' into the tenth book when he died Ln l.'iGO. Thus Phaer tells " How Owen Glen- dower, .seduced by False Prophesies, took upon him to be Prince of Wales, and was by Henry Piiiice of England chased to the Mountains, where he miserably cUed for lack of food, an. 1401." WEN GLENDOUK.' Italian Initial, 1563.2 I pray thee, Baldwin, sith thou do.st intend To show the Fall of such as climb too high. Remember me, whose miserable end May teach a man his Weious life " to fly. O Fortune, Fortune, out on thee I cry: My lively corps thou hast made lean and slender For lack of food, whose name was Owen Glendour. A Welchman bom, and of the Trojan blood, But ill brought up, whereby full well I find. That neither bir-th nor linage make us good, 10 Though it be true that cat will after kind. Flesh gendreth flesh, but not the soid or mind. They gender not, but foully do degender, 'WTien men to vice from virtue them surrender. Each thing by natirre tendeth to the same Whereof it came, and is disposed like : Down sinks the mould, up mounts the fiery flame. With horn the hart, with hoof the horse doth strike. The wolf doth spoil, the subtle fox doth pike,^ And to conclude, no fish, flesh, fowl or jilant, 20 Of their true dame the property doth want. But as for men, sith severally they have A mind whose manners are by learning made. Good bringing up all only doth them save In honest acts, which with their parents fade : So that true gentry standeth in the trade ^ Oiven Glendour. Passages in this poem recall scenes in Shake* speare's " First Part of Kinfj Heur>^ IV." - This little concert of flute, viol, and voices, is a Venetian example of the printers' initial letters, that in the 16th centtu-y replaced the old MS. illumination. In the earliest printed hooks spaces were left for the insertion of these decorated letters by hand. English examples of such printers* ornament have been given from the unique copy of the first edition of Enphues. This Italian specimen is from the Letters of Marsilio Ficino, in a Venetian edition of the year 15t>3. Tlie same book in earlier editions, as in one printed at Florence in 1494, liad blanks left by the printers for illumination of hand-dniwn initials. 3 Pike, pick, steal. 180 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1558 Of virtuous life, not in the fleshly line : For blood is brute, but gentry is divine. Experience doth cause me thus to say, And that the ratlier for my coimtrj-men 30 Which vaunt and boast themselves above the day If they may strain their stock from worthy men ; Which let be true, are they the better then ? Nay far the worse if so they be not good. For why, they stain the beauty of their blood. How would we mock the bui-den-bearing mule, If he would brag he were an horse's son, To press his pride (might nothing else him rule). His boasts to prove, no more but bid him run : The horse for swiftness hath his glory won, 40 The bragging mule could ne'er the more aspire, Though he should prove that Pegas was his sire. Each man may crack ' of that which was liis own ; Our parents' good is thcii's, and no whit ours : Who, therefore, will of noble birth be known, Or shine in virtue like his ancestours, Cientry consisteth not in lands and towers : He is a chm-1 though ;tll the world were his. Yea Arthm-'s heir, if that he live amis. For virtuous life a gentleman doth make 50 Of her possessor, all be he poor as Job, Yea though no name of elders he can take : For proof take MerUn fathered by an Hob.'- But whoso sets his mind to spoil and rob. Although he come by due descent from Brut,^ He is a chml, ungentle, vile, and brute. Well, thus did I, for want of better wit, Because ray parents naughtly brought me up : For gentlemen (they said) was nought so fit As to attaste by bold attempts the cup (iO Of conquest's wine, whereof I thought to sup: And therefore bent myself to rob and rive And whom I could of lands and goods deprive. Henry the Fom'th did then usurpe the crown. Despoil' d the King, with Mortimer the heh-: For which his subjects sought to put him down. And I, while Fortune offered me so fair. Did what I might his honour to appair : "* And took on me to be the Prince of Wales, Enticed thereto by prophesies and tales. 70 For which, such mates as wait upon the spoU From every part of Wales unto me drew : For loitering youth, imtaught in any toU, Are ready aye all mischief to ensue. Through help of these so great my glory grew. That I defied my King through lofty heart. And made sharp war on all that took his part. ^ Crack, toast. 3 Fathered hij an Hoh. Accordin!;f to legend. Merlin, renowned for his Avisdom, bad no better father than an incubus or boba:oblin. Hob was a nistic name used to represent a clown. Shakespeare made Coriolanus scoi-n " to beg of Hob and Dick ; " and hobgoblin implied something of a " lubber fiend." 3 Brut, the mythical great-gi*andson of -^neas, by whom the British nation was said to have been founded. See Note 7, page 154. * Appair, impair. See luck, I took Lord Rajmold Gray of Rithen, And him enforced my daughter to espouse, And so ])crforce I held him still, and sithen 30 In Wigmore land through battle rigorous, I caught the right heu- of the crowned house, The Earl of JIarch, Sir Edmund Jloitimer, And in a dungeon ki'pt him prisoner. Then all the Marches 'longing unto Wales, By Severn west I did invade and biu'n : Destroyed the towns in mountains and in vales. And rich in spoils did homeward safe return : Was none so bold dm-st once against me .spurn. Thus prosperously doth Fortune forward call ijO Those whom she minds to give the sorest fall. \\Tien fame had brought these tidings to the King (Although the Scots then vexed him right sore) A mighty ai-my 'gaiast me he did bring: WTiereof the French King being warn'd afore, Who mortal hate against King Heni-y bore, To grieve om- foe he quickly to me sent Twelve thousand Frenchmen, unto the tight all ber.t. A part of them led by the Earl of March, Lord James of Burbon, a renowned Knight, 100 Withheld liy winds, to Wales-ward forth to march. Took land at Plymouth pri^■ily on night : And when he had done all he durst or might, After that many of his men were slain, He stole to shiji and sailed home again. Twelve thousand moe in Milford did arrive. And came to me then lying at Denbigh : With ai-mcd Wclchmen thousands double five. With whom we went to Worcester well nigh, And there encampt us on a moimt on high, 110 T' abide the King, who shortly after came. And pitched down his field, hard by the same. There eight days long oiu' hosts lay face to face. And neither other's power durst assail : But they so stopt the passages the space. That vitailes could not come to our avail, \\Tierethi-ough constrain'd, our hearts began to fail, So that the Frenchmen shrank away by night. And I with mine to the mountains took oui- flight . The King pui-sucd greatly to his co.st, 120 From hills to woods, from woods to valleys plain : And by the way his men and stirft' he lost. And when he saw he gained nought but pain. He blew retreat and gat him home again : Then with my power I boldly came abroad. Taken in my country for a very god. Immediately there fell a jolly jar-'' Betweene the King and Percy's worthy bloods. 5 A joUy jar. Tins is an early example of what now seems to be a common misuse of the woi"d derived from the French " joli." Inno- cent fascination of a joyous youth was first associated with it, the sense in which Milton uses the word in "L'Allegro," "jest and youthful jollity." The idea would easily be transfen-ed to joyous mu-th, and as in much mii'th there is loudness and confusion, we might get to such a combination of ideas as jolly discord. But it is. probably, enough to say that when jolly, like good, came to be used simply for giving force to a word, "a jolly jar " would be no gi-eater conti'adiction of tenns than *'a good tlirasbiug." Indeed, the two TO i.D. 1579. J SHORTER POEMS. 181 I Which grew at last unto a deadly war : For like as drops engender niighty floods, 130 And httle seeds sproit forth great leaves and buds, Even so small strifes, if they be suffered run, Breed wi'ath and war and death ere they be done. The King would have the ransom of suih Scots As these the Percics ta'en had in the field : But see how strongly Lucre knits her knots. The King will have, the Percies will not yield, Desire of goods some craves, but granteth sceld : Oh cursed goods, desire of ynu hatli wrought AU wickedness, that hath or can be thought. 140 The Pereies deemed it meeter for the King To have redeemed theii- Cousin Mortimer, Who in liis quaiTel all his power did bring To fight with me, that took him prisoner. Than of theu- prey to rob his soldier : And therefore wUl'd him see some mean were found. To quite forth him whom I kept vilely boimd. Because the King misUked their request, They came themselves and did accord with me, (.'omplaining how the Kingdom was opiirest 1.50 My Hemy's rule : wherefore we did agree To pluck him down, and part the Realm in thi'oe : The north part theu's, Wales wholly to be mine. The rest, to rest to th' Earl of March's line. And for to sot us hereon more agog, A Prophet came (a vengeance take them all) Affirming Hemy to be Gogmagog, A\liom Merlin doth a Moiddwarp ' ever call, Aceur.st of God, that must be brought in thrall By a Wolf, a Dragon, and a Lion strong, liiO Which should divide his Ivingdom them among. This crafty dreamei- made us thi-ee such beasts. To think we were the foresaid beasts indeed : And for that cause our badges and our crests We searched out, which scarcely well agi'eed : Howbeit the Heralds, apt at such a need. Drew down such issues from old ancestors As prov'd these ensigns to be surely ours. Ye crafty Welc'hraen, wherefore do ye mock The noblemen thus with yom' feigned rimes ? 1 70 Ye noblemen, why fly ye not the flock Of such as have sedue'd so many times ? False prophesies ai-e plagiujs for divers crimes, inteusives may be joined in such a phrase as " a jolly good thi-ashin^. " ' Still, it is just possible to question whether the word " jolly " in the test be really derived from " joh." There was an old word, " joll," "joul," or "jowl," meaning to stinke against anything, to clash violently. It occui-s in the ^'aveyard scene in "Hamlet:" — "That skull had a tongue in it, and coxdd sing once : how the knave ' jowles ' it to the ground, as if it were Cain's jawbone that did the tirst mur- der ! " Again, in " As You Like It." " They may joll horns together like any deer in the herd." In Palsgi'ave's " Dictionary " there is "jolle." meaning to heat; and Mr. Halliwell, in his " Dictionary of Arcliaic and Provincial Words." quotes, in illustration, the line, " Ther they joUede Jewes thorow." It is conceivable that such a word may point to an origin for the phrase "joUy jar" that would make the adjective du-ectly tit. 1 Moldd^l:arp, mole, so called from its throwiug up the earth. First Enghsh " molde," earth, and " weoi-pan " (Genuan "werfen"), to throw. •200 Which God doth let the devilish sort devise. To trouble such as are not godly wise. And that appeared by us three beasts indeed, Through false persuasion highly borne in hand That in om- feat we could not choose but Bjjeed, To kill the King and to enjoy his land : For which exploit wo bound ourselves in band 180 To stand contented each man with his part. So folly did assm-e om- foolish heart. But such, they say, as fish before the net Shall seldom surfeit of the prey they take : Of things to come the haps be so imset That none but fools may warrant of them make : The full assur'd success doth oft forsake. For Fortime findeth none so fit to flout As careless sots,- which cast no kind of doubt. How say'st thou, Hemy Hotspm-, doe I lie ? ICO For thou right manly gav'st the King a field, And there wast slain because thou wouldst not fly : Thine uncle Thomas Percy, forced to yield, Did cast his head (a wonder seen but seeld) From Shrewsbury town to the top of London Bridge. Lo thus fond hope did both theii- lives abridge. When Hemy this great victory had won. Destroyed the Percies, put their power to flight, He did" appoint Prince Hem-y his eldest son. With aU his power to meet me if he might : But I, discomfit through my partner's fight, Had not the heart to meet him f.aco to face, But fled away, and he pm-sued the chase. Now, Baldwin, mark, for I, call'd Prince of Wales, And made believe I should be he indeed. Was made to fly among the hills and dales. Where all my men forsook me at my need ; Who trusteth loiterers seeld hath lucky speed : And when the Captain's courage doth him fail, His soldiers' heai-ts a little thing may quaO. And so Prince Hem-y chased me, that lo I found no place wherein I might abide : For as the dogs pursue the silly doe. The brache^ behind, the hounds on every side. So traced they me among the moimtains wide : * Whereby I foimd I was the hearties hare, And not the beast the prophet did declare. And at the last ; Ukc as the little roach Must else be eat or leap upon the shore When as the htmgry pikerel doth approach. And there find death which it escaped before : So double death assaulted me so sore That either I must tmto mine enemy j-ield, Or starve for hunger in the barren field. Here shame and pain awhile were .at a strife, Pain bade me yield, shame bade me rather fast : The one bade spai-e, the other bade spend my life. But shame (shame have it) overcame at last. Then hunger gnew, that doth the stone wall brast. 210 220 2 SotiS, fools. See Note 1, page 17. 3 Bradic, a dog for ti-acking game. French " l)ruquei-," to du-ect, bend ; " braconnier," a poacher. > Glendower's la.st refuge was among the mountiiins of Snowdou, 182 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 15* And made mo eat both gravel, dirt, and mud, '230 And last of all, my dung, my flesh, and blood. This was mine end, too horrible to hear, Yet good enough for life that -n-as so ill, WTiereby, Baldwin, warn aU men to bear Their- youth such love, to bring them up in slriU. Bid Princes fly false prophet's lying bill, And not presume to climb above their states : Tor they be faults that foil men, not their fates. Th. Phaer. The next piece tells " how Henry Percy, Earl of Northnmberland, was, for his covetous and traiterous attempt, put to death at York, anno 1407;" and the next, being the shortest of his various contri- butions, will serve as a specimen of the work of Baldwin himself He tells in it HOW RICHARD PLANTAGENET, EARL OF CAMBRIDGE, INTENDING THE KING's DESTRUCTION, WAS PUT TO DEATH AT SOUTHAMPTON, ANNO DOM. 1415.' Haste maketh waste, hath commonly been said, And secret mischief selde hath lucky speed : A miu'dering mind with proper poise is weigh'd, All this is true, I find it in m}- creed. And therefore, Baldwin, warn all states take heed How they conspii-e another to hetrap, Lest mischief meant light in the miner's lap. For I Lord Richard heii- Plantagenct Was Earl of Cambridge and right fortunate, If I had had the grace my wit to set 10 To have content me with mine own estate : But false honors, breeders of debate, The love of you our lewd hearts doth alliu'e. To lose oui'selves by seeking you imsure. Because my brother Edmund Jlortimer Whose eldest sister was my wedded wife, — I mean that Edmimd that was prisoner In Wales so long, through Owen's busy strife, — Because I say that after Edmund's life. His rights and titles must by law be mine, 20 For he ne had, nor could encrease his Une ; Because the right of Realm and Crown was ours, I searched means to help him thereunto : And where tlie Hem-ies held it by their powers, I sought a shift their teniu-es to undo. Which being force, sith force or sleight must do, I void of might, because their power was strong. Set privy sleight against their open wrong. But sith the death of most jjart of my kin Did dash my hope, throughout the father's ilays 30 I let it slip, and thought it best begin Whenas the son should dread least such assays : For force through speed, sleight specdeth through delays. And seeld doth treason time so fitly find, As when all dangers most be out of mind. Wherefore while Hcnrj- of that name the fift, Prepar'd his army to go conquer France, Lord Scroope and I thought to attempt a drift 1 See iict ii., scene 2, of Shakespeare's " Kini? Henry V." To put him down, my brother to advance : But wer 't God's will, my luck, or his good chance, iO The King wist wholly whereabout we went, The night before to shipward he him bent. Then were we straight as traitors apprehended, Our purpose spied, the cause thereof was hid. And therefore, lo, a false cause we pretended, WTierethrough my brother was from danger rid : We said for hire of French King's coin we did Behight'- to kiU the king : and thus with shame We stain' d ourselves, to save our friend from blame. "When we had thus contest so foul a treason, 50 That we deserved wo suffered by the law. See, Baldmn, see, and note, as it is reason, How wicked deeds to wofid ends do di'aw. All force doth fail, no craft is worth a straw To attain things lost, and therefore let them go, For might rules right, and will though truth say no. W. Baldwin. The first series ended with a nobly written j)oem on Edward IV., sleeping in dust after the pomps and pains of life, which had been written by John Skelton, when he was a yoiuig man of about five-and- twenty. soon after King Edward's death in 1483. It was so good and so apt to the purpose of his l)Ook, that Baldwin could not easilj' know it and leave it unused. Four years later, in 1563, there was a new edition of " The Mirror for JSIagistrates," with eight new tragedies ; and it is in this that Sackville's " Induction " and his tragedy of " Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham," first appeared. The next step towards pro^'iding in " The Mirror " a series of moralised tragedies drawn from the whole sequence of English history was made liy John Higgins, a clergyman and sclioolmaster at Winsham, in Somersetshire. John Higgins published, in 1576, a series of tragedies, rhymed and moralised by him- self, beginning with Albanact (who was son of Brut, the mythical Trojan founder of Britain, and tirat king of Albany or Scotland), and telling how he was slain by King Hmnber in the year before Christ 1085. From this date Higgins carried his .sequence down to the tune of Roman Britain. It w.is called " The First Part of the Mirror for Magistrates," and opened by John Higgins, its author, with the following INDUCTION. 'When Summer sweet witli all her pleasures past. And leaves liegan to leave the shady tree, The winter cold increased on fidl fast, And time of year to sadnes moved me : For moisty blasts not half so mir-thful be As sweet Aurora brings in spring-time fair, OiU' joys they dim, as winter damps the aii-. The nights began to grow to length apace, Sir Phfebus to th' Antarctique gan to fare : From Libra's lance to the Crab he took his race 10 Beneath the line, to lend of light a share. For then with us the days more darkish are. 2 Behight, promise, promise, vow. First English " beliatun " or " behse'tun," fco TO A.D. 157D.J SHORTER POEMS. 183 More short, cold, moist, and stomiy cloudy elit,' For sadness more than mii'ths or pleasures fit. Devising then what hooks were best to read, Both for that time and sentence gxave also. For conference of fHend to stand in stead. When 1 my faithful friend was parted fro, I gat me straight the Printer's shop unto, To seek some work of price I siu-cly meant, 20 That might alone my cai'efid mind content. Amongst the rest I found a book so sad As time of year or sadness could require : The Jlirrui- named for Magistrates he had. So iincly penned as heart coiUd weU desire : Which when I read so set my heart on lire, Eftsoons it me constrain' d to take the pain, Not left with once, to read it once again. And as again 1 riewed this work with heed. And mai'kcd plain each party paint his Fall : 30 Methought in mind, I saw those men indeed. Eke how they came in order Princely all ; Declaring well, this life is but a thr'all, Sith those on whom for Fortune's gifts we stare Oft soonest sink in gr'eatest seas of care. For some perdie, were Kings of high estate, And some were Dukes, and came of regal race : Some Princes, Lords, and Judges great that sate In counsel still, decreeing every case ; .Some other Knights that vices did embrace, 40 Some Gentlemen, some poor exalted hie : Yet every one had played his tragedie. A Mirror well it might be called, a glass As clear as any crystal under sun : In each respect the Tragedies so pass, Their names shall live that such a work begun. For why, with such deconmi is it done. That Momus' spite with more than Argus' eyes. Can never watch to keep it from the wise. 1 Cllt, dirty, sticky with mud, or, if a verb, daubed, soiled, or darkened. In literatiu-e, the word "clit" is known only in this passage, and Nares gave it up. But in Scottish dialect "clytrie" is filth; to "cloiter" is to be engaged in dirty work, and Jamieson de- fines *' cloitery " as " work which is not only wet and nasty, but slimy." In the very valuable series of " Original and Reprinted Glossaries," edited by the Rev. "W. W. Skeat for the English Dialect Society, Captain Hai-laud gives, among Swaledale words, " clart " (sounded Idaat), to daub, and "clarty" (sounded Maati), dirty, clammy. In the same series, the "Reprinted Thanet Glossary "of the Rev. J. Lewis (1736) gives the noim " elite " as meaning " a clay mii-e ; " and the "Glossary" of the Rev, John Button's " Tour to the Caves in the West Riding of Yorkshire " (1781), gives the verb "elate," to daub. Probably the root is that of clay. First English "clse'g," from "clifian," German "kleben," to cleave or stick. It may be serviceable to some readers if in this place I call attention to the substantial help given by the English Diiilect Society to those who study words. It was founded in 1873. It establishes a common centre for the collection of material towards a complete record of the words used in Provincial English, and of the limits of the use of each. It publishes (subject to proper revision) MS. collections of Provincial Words made by private observers, reprints glossaries not genei-ally accessible, and is issuing a Bibliographical List of the works that have been published, or are known to exist in MS., illustrative of the various dialects of EuE:lish. The work of the society is under Mr. Skeat's direction, and the publications make, in quantity and quality, a liberal return for an annual half-guinea. The treasurer of the English Dialect Society is the Eev. J. W. Cai-tmell, Christ's College, Cam- bridge. E.xamples there for aU estates you find : h\i For Judge (I say) what justice he should use. The Nobleman to hear a noble mind, And not himself ambitiously abuse ; The Gentleman ungentleness refuse ; The rich and poor and every one may see Which way to love and live in due dcgi-ee. I wish them often well to read it than,'- And mark the causes why those Princes fell. But let me end my tale that I began : When I had read these Tragedic^s fidl wcU, 60 And past the winter evenings long to teU, One night at last I thought to leave this use, To take some ease before I changed my Muse. Wherefore away from reading I me gate. My heavy head waxt didl for want of rest : I laid me down, the night was waxed late. For lack of sleep mine eyes were sore opprest : Yet fancy stiU of all their deaths increast, Methought my mind from them I could not take. So worthy wights, as caused me to wake. 70 At last appeared clad in pm-ple Ijlac'K Sweet Somnus' rest which comforts each alive, By ease of mind that wears away all wrack, That noisome night from weary wits doth drive, Of labours long the pleasures we achieve ; Whereat I joy'd, sith after labour's past I might enjoy sweet Somnus' sleep at last. But he by whom I thought myself at rest, Revived all my fancies fond before : I more desirous, humbly did request 80 Him shew th' unhappy Albion Princes yore : For well I wist, that he could tell me more, Sith unto divers Somnus erst had told What things were done in elder times of old. Then straight he forth his servant Morpheus ^ call'd, " On Higgins here thou must" (quoth he) "attend; The Britain Peers to bring (whom Fortune thraU'd) From Lethean lake, and th' ancient shapes them lend ; That they may shew why, how, they took their end." " I T\ill" (quoth Morpheus) " shew him what they were ;" And so methought I saw them straight appear. One after one they came in strange attu-e. But some with wounds and blood were so disguis'd. You scarcely could by reason's aid aspii'e To know what war- such sundi'y deaths dcvis'd; And severally those Piiuces were surpris'd. Of fonner state these states gave ample show, Which did relate thou- lives and overthi-ow. Of some the faces bold and bodies wore Distain'd with woad, and Tui-kish hc.irds they had : lOo On th" over lips mutchatoes '' long of hair. And ^^■ild they sccm'd. as men despairing mad ; Theii- looks might make a constant heart full sad, " Thnn, then. 3 Morpheus, god of dreams, was so called from the shapes seen in dreams. Greek fiopiptj, form, shape, figui-e. * Mutchatoes, comipted from Italian " mustacchio." or Spanish " mostacho." Our woi'd was not first taken from the French " mous- tache," and trace of the final o is common still in oui' pronunciation of it. 18i CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1558 And yet I could not so forsake the vio^T, Nor presence, ere their minds I likewise knew. For Morpheus bade them each in order tell Theii- names and lives, their haps and hapless days And by what moans from Fortune's wheel they fell. Which did them erst imto such honors raise. Wherewith the fii-st not making moe delays, 110 A noble Prince, broad woimded breast that bare. Drew near, to tell the cause of all his care. Which when methought to speak he might be bold. Deep from his breast he threw an uncouth soimd : I was amaz'd his gestures to behold. And blood that freshly trickled from his woimd AVith echo so did half his words confound That scarce a while the sense might plain appear : At last, me thought, he spake as you shall hear. This priiice was King Albunact. Higgiiis's Fii'st Part euded in Romau Britisli times, and as the series before issued by BaldwT-n and Ferrers began in the latter part of the fourteenth century, there was a gap between them which was partly tilled up in 1-578 by Thomas Blenerhasset, with a few tragedies drawai from our history betw-een the times of the Romans in Britain and the Norman Conquest. The several parts were afterwards joined and harmonised ; Drayton's " Life and Deatli of Thomas Cromwell " was included in it, and the book was completed in the next reign, in IGIO, with "A Winter Night's Vision : being an addition of such Princes especially famous, who were exempted in the former Historie," by Richard Niccols, of Magdalene Hall, Oxford. When the Elizabethan dramatists arose, this " Miri'or for Magistrates," showing high truths of life in homely phrase with many a proverb inter- mixed, became one of the sources wherefrom tragic stories could be drawn. These dramatists, also, soon made blank verse their own. The mea.sure was, as we have seen, first used among its in Henry VIII.'s reign, by the Earl of Surrey, at a time when it was being tried in Italy, and it was adopted in two short poems by Grimald ; but it took no root in om- literature, outside the drama, before Milton wrote " Paradise Lost." In Queen Elizabeth's time it was established among the dramatists by Marlowe, and perfected by Shakespeare. But off the stage there was in her i-eign no poem of any length written in blank verse except Gascoigne's "Steel Glass" in 1576, and, fourteen years later, a topographical poem on the River Lea. George Gascoigne was a scholar and a soldier, as his portrait indicates, and his frequent use of a motto in which Mara and Merciu-y were blended : "As well by Mars as by Mercury" {Tarn Marti qtiMm Mercurio). After training at Cambridge and Gray's Inn, he translated a comedy from Ariosto and a tragedy from Euripides, published original poems, and fought as a captain under William of Orange against tyranny of Spain in the Netherlands. He was about forty years old when he jiublished his satire in blank verse, designed, as its title expi'essed, to liold up an honest old-fashioned Mirror — true as I George Gascoigne. Frojji the Edition of Itis " Steele Glas," published in 1576. steel — to the faults and vices of his countiymen. Hi,s patron was Loi'd Grey of Wilton, a sturdy Elizabethan Puritan, whom yoiuig Edmund Spenser, a few years later, served as secretary in Ireland ; and to this nobleman George Gascoigne dedicated — THE STEEL GLASS. ^ The Nightingale, whose happy noble heart. No dole can daunt, nor fearful force affright ; "\\Tiose cheerful voice doth comfort saddest wights, A\Tien she herself hath little cause to sing ; Whom lovers love because she plains their griefs. She wi-ays their woes and yet relieves their pain ; WTiom worthy minds always esteemed much. And gravest years have not disdained her notes : (Only that king, proud Tereus by his name. With murdering knife did carve her pleasant tongue, 10 1 The Steel Glass^ Polished metal was the first fonn of artificial miiTor. Moses *' made the laver of Ijrass, and the foot of it of brass, of the looking-glasses of the women" (Exodus sssviii. 8). Silver mii-rors were nsed by the Romau ladies, often large enough to reflect the whole figure ; they used, also, mirrors of a white metal, formed of copper and tin, that needed sponge and powdered pumice-stone to keep them bright. Not only the costliness of silver caused an artificial white metal to be used, although that metal is the most powerfxil reflector; silver absorbs, it is said, only uiue per cent, of the incident light, while specxilum metal (an alloy of two jmrts copper to one of tin) absorbs thii-ty-seven per cent,, but the silver is more liable to tai-nish. Reflecting siu-faces were made also of pohshed stone, and of glass coloiu-ed to desti-oy its transparency and give it a reflecting power Uke that of highly-iiolished marble, akin to which was "the beryl glass with foils of lovely brown" that Gascoigne praises. The use of bui-nished steel as a reflector was too obvious to be long overlooked. Oiu- first min"or was usually a round hand-min-or, kept in a case to preserve it from rust. Gascoigne speaks, in his " Epilogue," of having shut his glass too hastily. Exposed mirrors on walls and tables were not common until they ceased to be of metal. The first mention of the use of transparent glass, made to reflect by covering its back with lead, is in the " Per- spectiva " of John Peckham, who was Ai-chbishop of Cauterbiuy from 1279 to 1292. But these early glass mirrors were little ;xsed. Perhaps tliey were inferior to those of metal, being made at first by pouring molten lead over the glass plate while yet hot from the furnace, and afterwards by the use of an amalgam of tin. It was not until the TO i.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 185 I To cover so his ovm foul filthy fault) : Tliis worthy bii-d hath taught my weary 5Iu.se To sing a song, in spite of their despite '^Tiieh work my woe, withouten cause or crime, And make my back a ladder for their feet By slanderous steps and stairs of tickle talk To climb the thi-one wherein myself should sit. U Philomene, then hell) me now to chant 1 And if dead beasts or li\-ing birds have ghosts AMiich can conceive the cause of careful moan, 20 AMien wrong triumphs and right is overtrod. Then help me now, O bii'd of gentle blood. In barren verse to teU a fruitful tale, A tale, I mean, which may content the tfiinds Uf learned men, and grave philosophers.' And you, my lord ; whose hap hath heretofore Been, lovingly to read my reckless rh^^nes, And yet have deigned with favour to forget The faults of youth which passed my hasty pen. And therewithal, have gi-aciously vouchsafed 30 To yield the rest much more than they deserved ; Vouchsafe, lo now, to read and to peruse This rh\-meless verse which flows from troubled mind. i^ince that the line of that false caitiff king ^^'hich ravished fail- Philomene for lust, And then cut out her trusty tongue for hate. Lives yet, my lord, which words I weep to write. sixteentli centtlry tliat glass niin-ors were brought into more general use, liy improvement of theii- maniifactiu'e in the famous Venetian glassworks, establislied originally in 1291, at Murauo. It occurred to tUe glasswoi-kers at Miu-ano to cover the back of a mirror-plate, by a very simple process, with a smooth tin-foil saturated with quicksilver. Glass mirrors of rare brilliancy were thus obtained, and Miu-auo, in Gascoigne's time, was beginning to draw customers for its looking-glasses from all parts of Europe. These glasses could be set against a wall as ornaments, could be as much as even four feet long for the luxiu-ious, and were not only beautiful themselves, but seemed to give some of their lustre to the faces tbey so perfectly reflected ; whereas it could certainly be said for the old steel hand- mirrors that they did not flatter. ' Procne and Philomela (Philomene), says the stoi-y, were two daughters of Pantlion, king of Athens, and Procne married Tereus. king of Thrace. When Philomela went to see her sister she was cruelly maltreated by her brother-in-law, who flnally cut out her tongue, closely imprisoned her, and told her sister that she was de.ad. Twelve years afterwards she told her story by a piece of needlework that was sent to Procne. Procne, in wild guise of a bacchanal, released her sister, and dished up for Tereus his son Itys to eat. Then Tereus, when he knew what had been done, pursued the women, but was changed by the gods into a lapwing. Procne was at the same time tiuned into a swallow, Itys into a pheasant, and Philomel into a nightingale, " And nightingale now named which Philomela hight Delights, for fear of force, to sing always by night ; But when the sun to west doth bend his weary course. Then Philomene records the ruth which craveth just remorse, And for her foremost note Tereu ! Tereu ! doth sine, Complaining still upon the name of that false Thracian king." George Gascoigne wrote a poem iiixju Philomene, from which those lines are quoted, and in the dedication of it to his singular good lord (Lord Gray of Wilton), he says that, having written the opening lines of his " Steel Glass," " I called to mind that twelve or thirteen years past I had begun an elegy or sorrowful song called ' The Complaint of Philomene,* the which I began to devise riding by the highway between Chelmsford and London, and being overtaken by a sudden dash of rain, I changed my copy and stmck over into the ' De Profundis,' which is placed among my other poesies, leaving 'The Comiilaint of Philomene ' unfinished, and so it hath continued until this present mouth of April, 1575, when I begun my ' Steel Glass.' And because I have in mine exordium to ' The Steel Glass ' begun with nightingale's notes, therefore I have not thought amiss now to finish and piece up the said ' Complaint of Philomene,' " &c., which he did, and by the 16th of April had it finished. 24 40 50 CO They live, they live, alas I the worse my luck, "WTiose greedy lust, unbridled from their breast, Hath ranged long about the world so wide To find a prey for their wide open mouths, And me they found, woeful tale to tell I Whose harmless heart perceived not their deceit. But that my lord may idainly understand The mysteries of all that I do mean, I am not he whom slanderous tongues have told (False tongues indeed, and crafty subtle brauis) To be the man which meant a common spoil Of lo\'iDg dames whose ears would hear my words Or trust the tales de%-ised by my pen. I nam a man, as some do think I am ; (Laugh not, good lord) , I am indeed a ckme. Or at the least, a right hei-maplu-odite. And who desires at large to know my name, My birth, m}- line, and every circumstance, Lo read it here, — Plain-dealing was my sii'e, And he begat me by Simplicity ; A pair of twins at one self bm-den boi-n My sister and I into this world were sent. My sister's name was pleasant Poesis, And I myself had Satira to name ; Whose hap was such, that in the pi-ime of youth, A lusty lad, a stately man to see. Brought up in place where pleasures did abound (I dare not say, in court, for both mine ears) Began to woo my sister, not for wealth. But for her face was lovely to behold. And there^-ithal her speech was pleasant still. This noble's name was called Vain DeUght, And in his train he had a comely crew Of guilefid wights : False Semblant was the first, The second man was Fleering ^ Flattery, Brethren belike, or vei-j- near of kin. Then followed them Detraction and Deceit. Sim Swash did bear a buckler^ for the first. False Witness was the second sternly'' page; And thus weU armed, and in good equipage. This gaUant came unto my father's court And wooed my sister, for she elder was And fairer eke, but out of doubt at least Her pleasant speech surijassed mine so much, That Vain Delight to her addressed his suit. Short tale to make, she gave a free consent. And forth she go'th to be his wedded make,^ Enticed, percase, with gloss of gorgeous show, Or else, perhaps, persuaded by his peers That constant love had harboured in his breast. Such errors grow where such false prophets preach Howso it were, my sister liked liim well, And forth she go'th, in com-t with him to dwell, Where when she had some years y-sojoiu'ned. And saw the world, and marked each man's mind, A deep desire her loving heart inflamed To see me sit bv her in seemlv wise. ' Fleering, blandly false. Icelandic " fljerth," falsehood, falsehood with the notion of blandness ; so " fliErthar-senna," siren song. (Cleasby and Vigfussen's " Icehindic Dictionary.") 3 Sim Sii-asJi did hear a buckler. Swashbuckler was a common Eliza- bethan name for a bully. " Swash " meant noise and bluster. German "schwiitzen," Dutch " zwetsen," to chatter idly; or from "swash," meaning a noisy sound, by addition of intensive s to ira.sh. * Stemlii, vapoiu-iug or fuming. First English " stcSm," steam, vapour, smoke. ^ Make, mate. See Note 13, page 104. 70 80 90 186 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1558 That company might comfort her sometimes And sound adWce might ease her weary thoughts. And forth mth speed, even at her first request, Doth Vain Delight his hasty coiu'se direct, To seek me out his sails are fully bent, And wind was good to bring me to the bower 100 Whereas she lay, that mom-ned days and nights To see herself so matched and so deceived. And when the wTctch, I cannot term him bet,' Had me on seas full far from friendly help, A spark of lust did kindle in his breast. And bade him hark to songs of Satira. I sUly soul, which thought nobody hai-m, 'Gan clear my throat, and strave to sing my best ; Which pleased him so and so enflamed his heart, That he forgot my sister Pocsis, 110 And ra'S'ished me to please his wanton mind. Not so content, when this foul act was done, Y-fraught with fear lest that I shoidd disclose His incest, and his doting dark desire, He caused straightways the forcmcst of his crew. With his compeer, to try me with their tongues : And when their guiles could not prevail to win My simjjle mind from track of trusty truth. Nor yet Deceit could blear mine eyes through fraud, Came Slander then, accusing me,- and said, 120 That I enticed Delight to love and lust. Thus was I caught, poor wretch, that thought none iU. And fui'thermore, to cloak their own offence. They clapjjed me fast in cage of Misery, And there I dwelt, fidl many a doleful day. Until this thief, this ti'aitor. Vain Delight, Cut out my song, with razor of Restraint, Lest I should \\Tay this bloody deed of his. And thus, my lord, I live a weary life. Not as I seemed, a man sometimes of might, 130 But womanlike, whose tears must 'venge her harms. And }-et, even as the mighty gods did deigTi For Philomele, that though her tongue were cut. Yet should she sing a pleasant note sometimes : So have they deigned, by then- divine decrees, That with the stumps of my reproved tongue, I may sometimes Reprover's deeds reprove. And sing a verse to make them see themselves. Then thus I sing this siQy song by night, Like Philomene, since that the shining sun 140 Is now eclipsed, which wont to lend me light. And thus I sing, in comer closely couched. Like Philomene, since that the stately coiu'ts Are now no place for such jioor birds as I. And thus I sing, with prick against my breast, Like PliUonienc, since that the pri\-j' worm ^ Set, "better, the original fonn of compai'ative. ' Gascoigne's allegory here is levelled against those who in his day were saying that poetry and satire only ministered to vain delight. He says that where they have no higher calling, it is because they have been forced out of then- true x>ath ; but speaking in the character of satire, he holds it slander to say that the English satu-ist exists only for false pleasure of the idle. Five or six years after the ('.ate of the " Steel Glass " — when the attacks on poetry bad gi-owu more violent — Sir Philip Sidney wi-ote in prose his " Defence of Poesy" — the first piece of high criticism in onr language — to repel '.ne accusations made against the poets by those who declared them to he connipters of the commouwealth. Sidney not only replied to every clause of the indictment, hut he ai'gued that the jjoet's place was foremost among men who we helpers of manMnd. AVhich makes me see my reckless youth misspent May well suffice to keep me waking still. And thus I sing, when jjlcasant spring begins,^ Like Philomene, since every jangling bii-d 1.50 WOiich squeaketh loud shall never triimiph so As though my muse were mute and dmst not sing. And thus I sing, with harmless true intent, Like Philomene, whenas, percase, meanwhile The cuckoo sucks mine eggs by foul deceit. And licks the sweet which might have fed me fii'st. And thus I mean in mournful wise to sing A rare conceit, God grant it like my lord,'' A trusty tune fi'om ancient cliffs conveyed, A plain-song note which cannot warble well. 160 For whiles I mark tliis weak and wretched world. Wherein I see how every kind of man Can flatter still and yet deceives himself, I seem to muse from whence such eiTor springs, Such gross conceits, such mists of dark mistake, Such Sm'cudric,^ such weening over well. And yet indeed such dealings too too bad. And as I stretch my weary wits to weigh The cause thereof, and whence it should proceed, My battered brains, which now be shi'ewdly bruised, 1 70 With cannon-shot of much misgovemment. Can spy no cause but only one conceit. Which makes me think the world go'th still awry. I see, and sigh, because it makes me sad That peevish pride doth all the world possess. And everj- wight will have a looking-glass To see himself yet so he seeth him not : ^ Yea shall I say? a Glass of common glass, ^Vhich glistereth bright and shows a seemly show. Is not enough ; the days are past and gone, 180 That beryl glass, with foils of lovely brown. Might serve to show a seemly favom-ed face. That ago is dead and vanished long ago Which thought that Steel both trusty was and true, And needed not a foil of contraries, But showed all things even as they were in deed. Instead whereof, our curious years can find The Crystal Glass which glimpseth brave and bright. And shows the thing much better than it is, Beguiled with foils of sundry subtle sights, 190 So that they Seem, and covet not to Be. This is the cause, believe me now, my lord. That realms do rue ' from liigh prosperity ; That kings decline from princely government ; That lords do lack their ancestors' good wiU ; 3 Mlicn spi-ing bcgjii.t. Gascoigne is writing this early in April. See Note 1, page 185. * God grant my Lord may like it. 5 Surcudrtc, presumjition. See Note 13, page 50. ' To see himself in such toi-m that it shaU not he himself as he really is. " Oh wad some power the giftie gie ns To see oursels as others see us ! It wad frae mony a blunder free us And foolish notion ! What aii'S in dress and gait wad lea'e us, And e'en devotion ! " sang Robei-t Bui-ns long afterwards. 7 Rue, fall. Latin " nio." TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 187 That knights consume their patrimony still , That gentloinen do make the merchant rise ; That plfKighmen beg:, and craftsmen cannot thrive : That clergy quails and hath small reverence ; That laymen live hy moving miscluef still ; 200 That courtiers thiive at latter Lammas day ; ' That officers can scarce enrich their heii-s ; That soldiers starve, or preach at Tybum cross ; - That lawyers buy, and purchase deadly hate ; That merchants climb, and fall again as fast ; That roisterers brag above their betters' room : That sycophants are counted jolly guests ; That Lais leads a Lady's life aloft, And Lucrcce lurks with sober bashful grace. This is the cause, or else my Muse mistakes, 210 That things are thought which never yet were wrought. And castles built above in lofty skies Which never yet had good foundation. And that the same may seem no feigned dream. But words of worth and worthy to be weighed, I have presumed my lord for to present With this poor Glass, which is of trusty Steel. And came to me by will and testament Of one that was a glass-maker indeed. Lucilius^ this worthy man was named, 220 Who at his death bequeathed the Crystal Glass To such as love to Seem but not to Be ; And unto those that love to see themselves. How foul or fair soever that they are. He gan bequeath a Glass of trusty Steel, Wherein they may be bold always to look Because it shows all things in their degree. And since myself, now pride of youth is past, Do love to Be, and let all Seeming pass, Since I desire to see myself indeed 230 Not what I would but what I am or should, Therefore I Hke this trusty Glass of Steel, 1 Latter Lommns Bny. Lammas Day was the 1st of Au^ist, ou wliich day, in Fii'st Enjjlish times, votive offerings were made in chiircli of loaves as the first fniits of harvest. Hence the name Hlaf- maesse, the Lo.af-mass, Lammas, from First English " hlaf," a loaf. Lammas Day was one of the four cross quarter days ; Whitsuntide, Lammas, Martinmas, and Candlemas, once not less familiar than Lady Day, Midsummer, Michaelmas, and Christmas. Latter Lammas Day was a proverbial word for a Lammas Day that came after all the loaves were gaven. ^ Preach at Tiihxtrn Cross, in allusion to the dying speeches often made at the gallows. ' LMiUus. At Eome, Caius Lucilius (B.C. 148 — 103) was the in- ventor of satire. The banter of rude verses of the people developed among the Greeks into idyllic i>oetry, bat in Rome took commouly the form of personal lampoons. There was also in Kome the satura, said to be named fi'om the " satura lans," a plate of various fruits offered to the gods, and to mean, like the plate of many fniits, a medley. The satura was, in jocular verse, dialo^ie with music and dancing, but without connected plot or ruiity of pur^wse. In one direction these mde beginnings of literature were associated with the rise of a regular drama ; in another direction they were developed into such work as the metrical miscellanies of Ennius and Pacuvius ; in another they prepared the way for the new satire of LucUiiis. Professor Sellar, in his " Roman Poets of the EepubUc," writes of Lucilius, that although his art appears to have been nrde and incomplete, " yet he was undoubtedly the first Roman writer who used his materials with the aim and in the manner which poetical s.atire has permanently assumed. . . The new satire differed from Latin comedy in form and style, and still more in its earnest national puii>ose." This is exactly what George Gascoigne meant in citing him as " one that was a glass-maker indeed," from whoF» he derived as a satirist his own "poor glass." WTiei'oin I see a froUe favour frounced ■* With foul abuse of lawless lust in youth ; ^Vl^erein I see a Samson's grim regard Disgraced yet with Alexander's beard : • WTierein I see a corpse of comely shape, And such as might beseem the court full well, Is cast at heel by courting aU too soon ; Wherein I see a quick capacity 240 Bewrayed with blots of light inconstancy ; " An age suspect, because of youth's misdeeds ; A poet's brain jwssessed with lays of love ; A Cajsar's mind and yet a Codrus' might ; A soldier's heart suppressed with fearful dooms : A philosopher fooUshly fordone. And to be plain, I see Myself so plain. And yet so much unlike that most I Seemed, As were it not that reason ruleth me, I shoidd in rage this face of mine deface, 250 And east this corpse down headlong in despair, Because it is so far unlike itself. And therewithal, to comfort me again, I see a world of worthy government : A commonwealth with policy so rided As neither laws are sold, nor justice bought, r^Tor riches sought, unless it be by right ; No cruelty nor tyranny can reign : No right revenge doth raise rebellimi No spoils are ta'en although the sword prevail ; 26(1 No riot spends the coin of commonwealth ; No riders hoard the countrj-'s treasure up ; No man grows rich by subtlety nor sleight ; All people di'ead the magistrate's decree. And all men fear the scourge of mighty Jove. Lo this, mj' lord, may well deserve the name Of such a land as milk and honey flows. And this I see, within my Glass of Steel, Set forth even so, by Solon, worthy wight, Who taught King Crcosus what it is to Seem, 270 And what to Be, by proof of happy end.' The like Lycurgus,* Lacedemon king. Did set to show, by view of this my Glass, And left the same, a Mirror to behold. To everj- prince of his posterity. But now, aye me,' the glozing C'rj-stal Glass * Frounced trimmed with plaits and puckers. French " fron^er," to wrinkle : — " Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career Till civil-suited Morn ai>pear. Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont With the Attic boy to himt, But kercheft in a comely cloud." (" II Penseroso.") 5 AUrander's heard. Here there is a side-note to the first edition of the " Steel Glass : "—"Alexander Magnus had but a small beard." ^ The side-note here is, " He which will rebuke men's faults shall do well not to forget his own imperfections." 7 In the fabled interview between Solon and Croesus (Wisdom and Wealth), the last words of Solon were : " He, therefore, whom Heaven blesses with success to the last we hold to be the happy man. But the happiness of him who stUl Uves and has the dangers of life to meet seems to us no better than that of a champion before one knows how the strife will end, and wliile the crown is doubtful." » The famous laws of Lycurgns were designed, says Plutarch, to secure within Sparta the conquest of luxury and to exterminate the love of riches. No man was at liberty to live as he pleased. " each man concluding that he was born not for liimself but for his coimtry," and the lawgiver considered the happiness of a state " like that of a private man, as flowing from virtue and self -consistency." ^ The preceding paragi'aph had for its marginal note, " Common Wealth." This paragraph had wi-itteu in its margin " Common Woe." CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a-D. 1558 Doth make ns think that realms and towns are rich ^^^lero favour sways the sentence of the law ; Where all is fish that cometh to the net ; Where mighty power doth overrule the right ; Where injuries do foster secret grudge ; Where hloody sword makes every hooty piize ; Where banqueting is counted comely cost ; Where officers grow rich by pi-inccs' pens ; Where pui'chase comes by covine and deceit ; And no man dreads, but he that cannot shift, Nor none serve God but only tongue-licd men. 280 The Knight should fight for to defend the same. The Peasant he should labour for their ease, And Pkiest.s should pray for them and for themselves. But out alas, such mists do blear our eyes, And crystal gloss doth glister so therewith. That Kings conceive their care is wondi'ous great Whenas they beat their busy restless brains. To maintain pomp and high triumphant sights ; To feed their fill of dainty delicates ; 300 To glad their hearts with sight of pleasant sports ; Queen Elizabeth's Visit to Hunsdon House, 1571.' Prom a Paintinri ascribed (o Marie Gcraris, and engraved in Fcrtiic's " JKstoi-ical Prints." Again I see, within my Glass of Steel, But fom- estates to serve each country soil. The King, the Knight, the Peasant, and the Priest. 290 The King should care for all the subjects still. The reader will observe that its description is, line for line, the re- verse of that which preceded : " As neither Jnws are sold nor justice ■bought ■■ has for its opposite, " Where favour sways the sentence of the law ; " " Nor riches sought, xmless it be by right," has for its opposite, "Where all is fish that Cometh to the net;" and so with each succeedmg line in the two pictures of " Commou Wealth " and " Commou Woe." ' This copy from the pictxu-e supposed by George Vertue, who en- paved it, to represent a visit of Queen EUzabeth to Himsdon House m 1571, and certainly representing a stately reception of her Majesty about that time, ivill serve to illustrate v.arious points in the luxury of costume, &c., condemned by Gascoigne. The Queen, in her canopy Chan-, IS being conveyed into the house by six gentlemen, preceded by the nobleman who is her host, and Knights of the Garter in their collars, followed by the hostess in her best raff and stomacher, and by a train of ladies. To fill their ears with sound of instruments ; To break with bit the hot com-agcous horse ; To deck their halls with sumptuous cloth of gold ; To clothe themselves with silks of strange device ; To search the rocks for pearls and precious stones, To delve the ground for mines of glistering gold, And never care to maintain peace and rest ; To yield relief when needy lack appears ; To stop one ear until the poor man speak ; To seem to sleep when Justice still doth wake To guard their lands from sudden sword and fire ; To fear the cries of guiltless suckling babes. Whose ghosts may call for vengeance on their blood. And stir the ^\Tath of mighty thundering Jove. I speak not this by any English King, Nor by our Queen, whose high foresight provides That dire debate is fled to foreign realms 310 TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 189 Whiles wo enjoy the golden lioccu of peace. But there to turn my tale from whence it came, 3'J.O In olden days, good Kings and worthy Dukes CWlio saw themselves, in Glass of trusty Steel) Contented were with pomps of little price, And set their thoughts on Kegal Government. An order was,' when Rome did flom-ish most, That no man might triflmph in stately wise. But such as had, with blows of bloody blade. Five thousand foes in foughten field fordone. Now he that likes to look in Crystal Gkiss, May sec proud pomps in high triumphant wise 330 WTiere never blow was dealt with enemy. When Sergius - devised first the mean To pen up fish witliin the swelling flood And so coutcut his mouth \rith dainty fare, Then followed fast e.\coss on Piinees' boards, And every dish was charged with new conceits To please the taste of uncontented minds. But had he seen the strain of strange device AATiich epicivrcs do now-a-days invent To yield good smack unto their dainty tongues, 340 Could he conceive how Prince's paunch is filled With secret cause of sickness oft unseen, Wbiles lust desii'cs much more than natm'c craves, Then would he say that all the Roman cost Was conmion trash, compared to sunch'y sauce WMch Piinces use to pamper appetite. Crystal Glass, thou settest things to show. Which ai'c, God know'th, of little worth indeed! All eyes behold, with eager deep desire. The falcon fly, the greyhound run his course, 350 The baited bull, the bear at stately stake, These interludes, these new Italian sports. And every gawd, that glads the mind of man : But few regard their needy neighbour's back. And few behold by contemplation The joys of heaven, ne yet the pains of hell, Few look to law, but all men gaze on lust. A sweet consent of Music's sacred sound Doth raise om- minds, as rapt, all up on high : But sweeter sounds, of concord, peace, and love, 360 Are out of tune and jar in every stop. To toss and turn the sturdy trampling steed. To bridle him, and make liim meet to serve, Deserves, no doubt, gi-cat commendation. But such as have their stables full y-fraught 1 Here there is a side reference iu the original edition to the third chapter of the second book of " Valei-ius Masimus." ^ Thoiisch there is no side reference here, it is again from " Valeiius Maximus " that Gascoi^e takes his illustration. The iirst chapter of the ninth book of " Memorable Sayings and Doings" illustrates luxm-y ; and its iirst example is that lover of fish dinners, C. Sergius Grata, who invented hanging baths, and who also, " that his gullet might not be subject to the will of Neptune," made private seas of his own, by intercepting the tides, and stocked them with varieties of fish, that his table might be well supplied however the wind blew. Sergius Grata built for himself houses by the Lucrine Lake that he might get his shell-fish the fresher ; and when an action was brought against him by Considius, a public officer, for encroachment on the public rights of water, L. Crassus, in pleading against him, said that " his friend Considius was wrong in supposing that if Grata were away fi'om the lake he would want oysters, for if he was not allowed to look for them there he would discover them among the tiles upon bis house-top." With pampered jades, ought therewithal to weigh What great excess upon them may be spent, How many poor, which need not brake nor bit, iMight therewithal in godly wise be fed, And Kings ought not so many horse to have. 370 The sumptuous house declares the prince's state, But vain excess bewrays a ])rinee's faults. Om- bombast hose,' our treble double rufi's, Our suits of sUk, om- comely guarded capes,* 3 Our bombast hose were " slops" or " ti-unk-hose," stufled often to an enormous size with bombast or cotton (Latin " bombax," cotton). It is the idle stuffing of which the name was applied figiu-atively to bombastic speech. Doublets known as " pease-cod-bellied doublets " were also slashed, quilted, and stutted with four or five pounds of bombast in each ; silk, satin, tafl'eta, gold and silver stuff being among the material iised for them. At the beginning of Elizabeth's reign an arrangement was planned in the Parliiimeut House to enable those to sit who were most gorgeously stufi'ed. Sometimes the hose were Btutted with hail-, or with other things. Witness a stoi^ told in Harleian MS. 2014 (" Historical Collections concerning Chester,* ivi-itten about 1656, by one of the family of Eandle Holme). In a chapter upon changes of fashion this writer says:— "About the middle of Queen Elizabeth's reign, a.d. 1578, the slops or trimk-hose mth pease-cod-bellied doublets were much esteemed, which young men used to stuff with rags and other like things, to extend them in compass, with as great eagerness as women did take pleasiu-e to wear great and stately verdingales, for this was the same in effect, being a kind of verdingale breeches ; and so excessive were they herein, that a law was made against such as did so stuff' their breeches to make them stand out. "Whereof, when a certain prisoner in those times was accused of wearing his breeches contrary to the law, he began to excuse himself of the offence, and endeavoured by little and little to discharge himself of that which he did wear within them. He drew out of his breeches a pair of sheets, two table-cloths, ten napkins, four shii-ts, a brush, a glass, a comb, and nightcaps, mth other things of use, saying, ' Your lordship may understand that, because I have uo safer a storehouse, these pockets do serve me for a home to lay by my goods in ; and though it be a strait prison, yet it is a storehouse big enough for them, for I have many things more yet of value within them.' And so his discharge was accepted and well laughed at. And they commanded him th.at he should not alter the fiuTiitm-e of his storehouse, but that he should rid the hall of his stuff' and keep them as it pleased him." The use of lawn and cambric for rufls began in the second year of Elizabeth, and Mistress Dingham van der Plasse came to London, where she taught for twenty shillings the art of making starch, and for five pounds the art of using it. But i-ufls gi-ew to be so large and complicated that wire skeletons, called " sup- portasses," became requisite to keep them duly spread. A prose censor of fashion, Philip Stubbes, in his " Anatomic of Abuses," pub- lished in 1.585, called starch the devil's liquor ; and he told how at Antwerp, on the 22nd of May, 1582, a fearful judgment fell on a rich merchant's daughter who, in adorning herself for her wedding, lost patience over the difficulty of getting her ruffs stai-ched to her mind'. At last she wished that the devU might take her if she wore any of these iirffs again. A gentleman then entered, asked the cause of her annoyance, and politely set her raffs so much to her taste, that she not only wore them again, but admired herself iu them, and admired also the young man who had so pleased her. Then the yoimg man kissed her, and iu so doing wrung her neck asimder. She died ; she became black and blue, with a f.ice " ogglesome to behold ; " and when she was to be carried out for burial, her coffin was so heavy that five strong men were unable to lift it. The stauders-by marvelled at this, and caused the coffin to be opened, "when they found the body to be taken away, and a black cat, very lean and deformed, sitting in the coffin, a setting of gi'eat ruffs and frizzling of hah- to the great fear and wonder of all the beholders." * Guarded capes were the little cloaks, various in colour and rich material, worn over the doublets, and guaixled or trimmed with velvet, lace, or gold or silver fringe. Such fringes were called "guards," because originally meant to protect the edge of the material ; but, as lusiu-y advanced, they were superfluous fiTugings and lacings. In the " Merchant of "Venice," Bassauio says of Lancelot, " Give him a hvery more guarded than his fellows'." The Icnit silk stocks were the nether stocks or stockings which had parted from the upiser stocks in the hose that once clothed the whole leg, and were now made of all available materials, including silk, and of all colours. They were " cunningly knit," said Stubbes, and " curiously indented in every point with quirks, clocks, open seams, and everything els© I'JO CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d, 1553 Our knit silk stocks, and Spanish leather shoes, (Yea velvet serves oft-times to trample in) Our plumes, oiu- spangs,' and all our quaint array, Are pricking spurs provoking tilthy jiride. And snares unseen wlueh lead a man to hell. How live the Moors which spm-n at glistering pearl, 380 And scorn the costs which we do hold so dear ? How ? how but well ? and wear the precious pearl Of peerless truth amongst them published. Which we enjoy, and never weigh the worth. They would not then the same, like us, despise, Which, though they lack, they live in better wise Than we, which hold the worthless pearl so dear. But glittering gold, — which many years lay hid. Till greedy minds 'gan search the very guts Of earth and clay to find out sundi'y moidds, 390 As rod and white, which are by melting made Bright gold and silver, metals of mischief, — Hath now enflamed the noblest Piinees' hearts With foulest fire of filthy avarice ; And seldom seen that Kings can be content To keep their bounds which their forefathers left : What causeth this, but greedy gold to get ? Even gold, which is the very cause of wars, The nest of strife, and nom-ice of debate, The bar of heaven and open way to hell. 400 But is this strange ? when Lords, when Knights and Squires, Which ought defend the state of conunonwealth, Ai-e not afraid to covet like a King 'i blind desire ! high aspiring hearts ! The country Squire doth covet to bo Knight, The Knight a Lord, the Lord an Earl or Dirke, The Buke a King, the King would Jlonarch be, And none content mth that which is his own. Yet none of these can see in Crystal Glass, Which glistereth bright, and blears their gazing eyes, 410 How every life bears with him his disease. But in my Glass, which is of trusty Steel, 1 can perceive how Kingdoms breed but care. How Lordship lives, with lots of less delight (Though cap and knee do seem a reverence, And court-like life is thought another heaven) Than common people find in every coast. The gentleman, which might in country keep A plenteous board, and feed the fatherless With pig and goose, ■n'ith mutton, beef, and veal, 420 Yea, now and then, a capon and a chick. Will break up house and dwell in market towns A loitering life, and like an epicure. But who, meanwliile, defends the commonwealth ? WTio r\iles the flock, when shepherds so are fled ? Who stays the staff, which should uphold the state ? Forsooth good sir, the lawj-er leapeth in, accordingly." The shoes of the meu were as elaborate as those of the women, wliich were " some of black velvet, some of white, some of green and some of yellow, some of Spanish leather and some of English, stitched with silk, and embroidered with gold and silver all over the foot, with other gewgaws innumei-able." * Spangs, clasps or buckles. First English {and Modem German) *'spange," a clasp buckle or stiul. But the name was applied gene- rally to small dress ornaments of glittering metal, and acquired the sense of " spangle " befoi-e that word was formed from it by help of the diminutive siiiEx. Nay rather leaps both over hedge and ditch. And rules the roast," but few men rule by right. V(i(fsi(i(iii(Si(si(siki(i(?(t:^^ Prosperous Law. Ftom the Monument of Judge Glanville in Tavistock Church.^ 430 Knights, Squires, O gentle bloods y-born. You were not bom all only for yourselves : Yoiu' country claims some part of all yoiu' pains. There shoidd you hve, and therein should you toil To hold up right and banish cruel wTong, To help the poor to bridle back the rich, To punish vice and vii'tue to advance. To see God served and Belzebub suppressed. You shoidd not trust lieutenants in your room, And let them sway the sceptre of your charge, WliUes you, meanwhile, know scarcely what is done, 44 9 Nor yet can j-ield account if you were called. The stately Lord, which wonted was to keep A court at home, is now come up to court. And leaves the country for a common prey To pilling, poUing, bribing, and deceit : All which his presence might have pacified, Or else have made offenders smell the smoke. And now the youth which might have served him In comely wise with country clothes y-clad, (And yet thereby been able to prefer 450 Unto the prince, and there to seek advance) Is fain to sell his lands for courtly clouts. Or else sits still, and livoth like a lout ; Yet of these two, the last faidt is the less. And so those imps'* which might in time have sprung Aloft, good lord, and served to shield the state, Are either nipped with such untimely frosts, Or else grow crookt, because they be not pruned. These be the Knights, which shoiild defend the land. And these be they which leave the land at large. 460 Yet here, percase, it will be thought I rove And run astray besides the king's high way. Since by the Knights, of whom my text doth tell. And such as show most perfect in my Glass, ~ Rules the roast. Has the chief place at the table, with its meat at his disposal. ^ Judge Glanville, here figured from Polwhele's History of Devon- shire, died in the year 1600. The very comfortable figure on his monument was painted to resemble life, and there was a superstitious belief that its eyes moved sometimes as aji omen of coming mischief in the parish. * Those imps. From First English " impun," to engraft, came the sense of "imp," as shoot or scion, son of a house. Thus Lord Bacon spoke of " those most virtuous and goodly young imps, the Duke of Suffolk and his brother." See Note 2, page 30. TO i .D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 191 Is meant no more but worthy soldiers Whose skill in arms and long experience Should stiU uphold the pillars of the world. Yes, out of doubt, this noble name of Knight May comprehend both duke, carl, lord, knight, squire, Yea Gentlemen, and every gentle bom. 470 But if you will constrain me for to speak What soldiers are, or what they ought to be (And I myself of that profession), I see a crew, which glister in my Glass, The bravest band that ever yet was seen : Behold, behold, where Pompey comes before, Wliere JIanlius and Marius ensue, jEmilius and Curius I see, Palamcdes and Fabius Maximus, And eke theu' mate Epaminondas, lo, 480 ProtesUaus and Phocion are not far, Pericles stands in rank amongst the re.st, Aiistomenes may not be forgot Unless the list of good men be disgraced. Behold, my lord, these soldiers can I spy Within my glass, within my true Steel Glass. I see not one therein which seeks to heap A world of pence by pinching of dead pays,' And so beguiles the prince in time of need When muster day and foughten field are odd, 490 Since Pompey did enrich the common heaps, And Paulus, he TF.milius sumamed, Ketui-ned to Eome no richer than ho went. Although he had so many lands subdued. And brought such treasui-e to the common chests, That foiu'scoie years the state was after fice Prom grievous task and imposition. Yea since, again, good Marcus Curius Thought sacrilege himself for to advance And see his soldiers poor or live in lack. 500 I see not one ■n'ithin this Glass of mine, Whose feathers ilaunt and flicker in the wind As if he were all only to bo marked ; WTicn simple snakes, which go not half so gay, Can leave him yet a furlong in the field. And when the pride of all his peacock's plumes Is daunted down with dastard dreadfulness. And yet, in town, he jetted" every street. As though the god of wars, even Mars himself. Might well by him be lively counterfeit, 5 1 Though much more Uke the coward Constantine. I see none such, my lord, I see none such. Since Phocion, which was indeed a Mars, And one which did much more than he would vaunt, Contented was to be but homely clad. And Marius, whose constant heart could bide The very veins of his forwearied legs To be both cut, and carved from his corpse, Could never yet contented be to spend One idle groat in clothing nor in cates. 520 1 Pinchintj of Head pays. Taking money from frovemmeut for pay- ment of his men, and leaving tlie names of dead men in the register that he m.Ty put into his o^vn pocket the pay sent for them. An officer who does this betrays his pi-ince when the day of battle comes, and the troop an-ayed against the public enemy does not accord with his official mnster-roll. - Jutted (French "Jeter," to throw), stnitted, affectedly threw his body about in walking. So in " Twelfth Night," Fabian says of Malvoho, " How he jets under liis advanced plumes ! " I see not one, my lord, I sec not one Which stands so much upon his jiainted sheath, Because he hath perchance at Boulogne ■' been And loitered since then in idleness. That ho accounts no soldier but himself ; Nor one that can despise the learned brain Which joineth reading with experience.^ Since Palamcdes and Ulysses both Were much esteemed for their policies. Although they were not thought long trained men. 530 Epaminodas eke was much esteemed. Whose eloquence was such in all respects As gave no place unto his manly heart. And Fabius, sumamed Maximus, Could join such learning with experienco As made his name more famous than the rest. These bloody beasts appear not in my Glass Wliich cannot rule their sword in furious rage Nor have respect to ago nor yet to kind. But down go'th all where they get upper hand ; 540 Whose greedy hearts so hungry are to .spoil, That few regard the very wrath of God Which grieved is at cries of guiltless blood. Pericles was a famous man of war, And wctor eke in nine great foughten fields Whereof he was the general in charge. Yet at his death he rather did rejoice In clemency than bloody victory. " Be still," quoth he, " you grave Athenians," Who whispered and told his valiant facts, 050 " You have forgot my greatest glory got : For yet by me, nor mine occasion. Was never seen a mourning garment worn." noble words, well worthy golden writ ! Believe me, lord, a soldier caimot have Too great regard whereon his Icnife .should cut. Ne yet the men which wonder at their wounds, And show their scars to every comer by, Dare once be seen within my Glass of Steel, For so the faults of Thraso and his train » 560 (Whom Terence told to be but bragging brutes) Might soon appear to every skilful eye. Bold Manlius could close and well convey Full thii-ty wounds and three upon his head. Yet never made nor bones ° nor brags thereof What should I speak of drunken soldiers. Or lechers lewd, which fight for filthy lust ? Of whom that one can sit and bib his fill. Consume his coin, which might good courage yield To such as march and move at his command, 57C And makes himself a worthy mocking stock. Which might deserve by sober life great laud. 3 At Boulogne. He was at the captiu:e of Boulogne, in Henry VIII.'s time, September 15, 15M, and has passed aU the thirty years since in idleness. ' So Gascoigneis pi-oud to do, Tciiii Sfa?-!; quam Mcrcurio ; and ha is now exercising his " learned brain " upon citation of many ancient Greeks and Romans, whose deeds are recorded in all Greek and Roman histories. But Gascoigue's allusions are very commonly di-awu from his readings in the nine books of " Memorable Sayings and Doings," collected by Valerius Maximus in the days of Tiberius. 5 Diraso, a bragging soldier in " Eunuchus," one of the comedies of Terence. 6 Made no honcs^ made no difficulty in discussing. On the other hand, giving one " a boue to gnaw," was giving something that would keep him occupied. 192 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1558 That other dotes, and driTeth forth his days In vain delight and foul concupiscence, When works of weight might occupy his head. Yea therewithal, he puts his own fond head Under the belt of such as should him serve, And so becomes example of much evil. Which should have served as lantern of good life, And is controlled, whereas he should command. 580 Augustus C'oesar, he which might have made Both feasts and banquets bravely as the best. Was yet content in camp ^Wth homely cates. And seldom di'ank his wine unwatered. Aristomenes deigned to defend His dames of pi-ize whom he in wars had won, And rather chose to die in their defence Than filthy men should soil their chastity. This was a wight well worthy fame and praise. O captains come, and soldiers come apace, 590 Behold my Glass, and you shall see therein Proud Crassus' bags consimied by covetise. Great Alexander drowned in drunkenness, Caisar and Pompey spht with privy grudge, Brennus beguiled with lightness of belief, Cleomenes by riot not regarded,' Vespasian disdained for deceit, Demetrius light set by for his lust. Whereby at last he died in prison pent. Hereto, percase, some one man will allege, COO That princes' pence are pursed up so close. And fairs do fall so seldom in a year. That when they come provision must be made To fend the frost in hardest ^\Tnter nights. Indeed I find, -n-ithin this Glass of mine, Justinian, that proud ungrateful prince, 'WTiich made to beg bold Belisarius His trusty man which had so stoutly fought In his defence with evcrj- enemy ; And Scipio condemns the Roman rule 610 ■UTiich suifered him that had so truly served To lead poor life, at his Linteruum fai-m, \\Tiich did deserve such worthy recompense ; Yea herewithal, most soldiers of our time Believe for tinith that proud Justinian Did never die without good store of heirs ; And Roman's race cannot be rooted out, — Such issue springs of such unpleasant buds. But, shall I say ? this lesson learn of me, AMien drums are dumb and sound not dub-a-dub, 620 Then be thou eke as mewet- as a maid, (I preach this sermon but to soldiers). And leam to live -within thy bravery's bounds. Let not the mercer pull thee by the sleeve For suits of silk, where cloth may serve thy turn ; Let not thy scores come rob thy needy purse ; Make not the catchpole rich by thine arrest. Ai-t thou a gentle ? live with gentle friends, 'WTuch will be glad thy company to have. If manhood may with manners well agree. 630 1 Retjavdcd, pronounced ' (i of the root-word. 2 Mcii-ct (Freueli " muet ' regard," the final ed being lost in the final Art thou a serring man ? then serve again. And stint to steal as common soldiers do. Ai't thou a craftsman ? take thee to thine art. And cast off sloth, which loitereth in the camps. Art thou a ploughman pressed for a shift ':' Then leam to clout thine old cast cobbled shoes. And rather bide at home with barley bread Than leam to spoil, as thou hast seen some do. Of truth, my friends, and my companions eke, \Mio lust by wars to gather lawful wealth 640 And so to get a right renowned name Must cast aside all common trades of war. And leam to live as though he knew it not. Well, thus my Knight hath held me aU too long Because he bare such compass in my glass. High time were then to tui'n my weary pen Unto the Peasant coming next in place. And here to write the sum of my conceit, I do not mean alonely^ husbandmen, [650 WTiich till the ground, which dig, delve, mow and suw, 'Which swink"* and sweat whiles we do sleep and siioit, And search the guts of earth for gi'eedy gam. But he that labours any kind of way To gather gains and to enrich himself, Bj- King, by Knight, by holy helping Priests, And all the rest that live in commonwealth. So that his gains by gi-eedy guiles be got. Him can I count a Peasant in his place. All oflicers, all advocates at law, AU men of art which get goods greedily, 660 Must be content to take a Peasant's room. A strange de\'ice, and sui'e my lord will laugh To see it so digested in degrees. But he which can in office di'udge and drag And crave of all, although even now-a-days Most officers command that should be craved ; He that can share from every pension paid A Peter penny ^ weighing half a poimd; He that can pluck Sir Bennet ' by the sleeve, And find a fee in his plurality ; 67C He that can -wink at any foul abuse. As long as gains come troUing in the^e^^•ith, Shall such come see themselves in this my Glass, Or shall tliej' gaze, as godly good men do ? Yea, let them come : but shall I tell you one thing ? How e're then- gowns be gathered in the back With organ pipes of old Eng Henrj-'s clamp. How e'er their caps be folded ■with a flap. * Alonely, alone. Gascoigue, it will be observed, keeps to the plan of his satire, and deals successively with the foiu* orders into which he had divided society : Kings, Kuiglits, Peasants, and Priests. He makes his division comprehensive by reckoning under the Knights every man, whatever Ms station in life, who has the spirit of a gentle- man ; and imder the Peasants, every man who is not a gentleman at heart, whatever the world may call him. These two classes are set between the civil and spiritual powers, the Kings he began with, and the Priests with whom he means to end. * SwinJc, labour. First English "swincan," to toil. 5 A Peter penny. The original Peter penny was a penny to the Pope from tliirty jience of yearly rent in land. ^ Sir Bennd. The pluralist clergyman, of whom a share is asked from the new living corruptly given to him. The title "Sir" was once commonly given to priests and ciu-ates. The Christian nam? Bennet. being a form of *' Benedictus," was apt for the representa- tion of a priest. TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 193 How e'er their beards be clipj:ied by the chin, How e'er they ride or mounted are on mules, 6S0 I count them worse than hannlcss homely hinds Which toil in deed to serve our common use. Strange tale to tell, all officers be bUnd, And yet their one eye, sharp as Lj-nceus' ' sight, That one eye winks as though it were but blind, That other pries and peeks in every place. Come naked Need, and chance to do amiss. He shall be sure to drink upon the whip. But privy Gain, that bribing busy wretch. Can find the means to creep and couch so low, 090 As officers can never see him slide Nor hear the trampling of his stealing steps. He comes, I think, upon the blind side still. Misused Acthohity. From the TToodcuf in "Fore's Martyrs" (edition 1576) of the burmiig o/ Rose Allen's hand by Edmund Tyrrell^ as she was goin^ to fetch drink for her Mother lying sick in her bed. These things, my lord, my Glass now sets to show, Whereas long since aU officers were seen To be men made out of another mould. Epaminond, of whom I spake before, 'WTiich was long time an officer in Thebes And toUed in peace as well as fought in war, Would never take or bribe or rich reward, 700 And thus he spake to such as sought his help : " If it be good," quoth he, " that you desire, Then wiU I do it for the 'virtue's sake : If it be bad, no bribe can me infect. If so it be for this my Commonweal, Then am I borne and bound by duty both To see it done withouten further words ; But if it be unprofitable thing, And might impair, offend, or j-ield annoy Unto the State which I pretend- to stay, 710 Then all the gold," quoth he, " that grows on earth Shall never tempt my free consent thereto." ^ Lynceus was one of the Arcronauts, famous as the most keen.eyed of mortals. He killed Castor and was killed by Pollux. Some said that he killed both, spying: them from the top of Mount Taygetus when they were bidden f;ir away below within the trunk of a hollow oak. 2 Pretend (Latin "prsetendo "), I set myself forth. 25 How many now will tread Zalcucus' ' steps ? Or who can bide Cambyses' ■• cruel doom '^ Cruel ;•' nay just (yea soft and peace, good Sir), For Justice sleeps, and Truth is jested out. Oh that all kings would, Alexander like, Hold evermore one finger straight stretched out. To thrust in eyes of all their master thieves ! But Brutus died without posterity, 720 And Marcus Crassus had none issue male ; Cicero sUpt unseen out of this world. With many mo which pleaded Roman pleas. And were content to use their eloquence In maintenance of matters that were good. Demosthenes in Athens used his art. Not for to heap himself great hoards of gold. But still to stay the town from deep deceit Of Philip's wiles, which had besieged it. Where shall we read that any of these four 730 Did ever plead, as careless of the trial ? Or who can say they buildcd sumptuously. Or wrung the weak out of his own by wQes ? They were, I trow, of noble houses bom. And yet content to use their best devoir In furthering each honest hai-mless cause. They did not rout like rude unringed swine To root nobUity from heritage ; They stood content, with g.ain of glorious fame Because they had respect to equity, 740 To lead a life like true Philosophers. Of all the bristle-bearded Advocates That ever loved their fees above the cause, I cannot see scarce one that is so bold To show his face, and feigned physnomy In this my Glass : but if he do, my lord, He shows himself to be by very kind A man which means, at every time and tide. To do small right, but sure to take no wrong. And master Merchant, he whose travail ought 750 Commodiously to do his country good And by his toil the same for to emich, Can find the mean to make monopolies ■ Of every ware that is accounted strange. And feeds the vein of courtier's vain desires Until the court have courtiers cast at heel. Quia non hnbent vestes Kitptiales.^ painted fools, whose harebrained heads must have Slore clothes at once than might become a king ; For whom the rocks^ in foreign realms must spin. "GO For whom they card, for whom they weave their webs. For whom no wool appeareth fine enough, (I speak not this by English courtiers Since English wool was ever thought most worth) For whom all seas are tossed to and fro, 3 Zalencns, a legislator of Locris, declared that, for a certain offence, the penalty should be loss of two eyes. His own son was found guilty of that oti'euce. "When he had been deprived of one of his eyes, Zaleucus, to save his son from complete blindness and yet keep the laws unbroken, gave one of his own eyes to complete the payment of the penalty. * Cambyses sentenced an unjust judge to be skinned, had liis skin made into a covering for the judge's bench, and required the con- demned man's own son to sit as a judge uixm it. ^ Because they have not wedding garments ou. s Rocks, distaffs. Tlie rock, or distatf, is the stalf from which the flax was pulled in spinning. 194 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1558 For whom these purples come from Persia, The crimosine and lively red from Inde : Tor whom soft silks do sail from Sericane, And all quaint costs do sail from fai-thest coasts : Whiles in meanwhile, that worthy Emperor ' 770 Which ruled the world, and had all wealth at will, Could be content to tu-c his weary wife. His daughters and his nieces every one. To spin and work the clothes that he should wear, And never cared for silks or sumptuous cost. For cloth of gold, or tinsel figur)', For baudkin,- broidry, outworks, nor conceits. He set the ships of merchantmen on work With bringing home oil, grain, and savoury salt, And such like wares as served common use. 780 Yea, for my life, those merchants were not wont To lend their wares at reasonable rate To gain no more but cento por centu,^ To teach young men the trade to sell brown paper, Yea morrice bells, and billets too sometimes. To make their coin a-net to catch young fry. To bind such babes in father Derby's bands,'' To stay their steps by statute-staple's* staff. To rule young roisterers with recognisance. To read arithmetic once every day 790 In Wood Street, Bread Street, and in Poultry,^ Where such schoolmasters keep their counting-house' To feed on bon«s when flesh and fell^ is gone. To keep their birds full close in caitiff's cage (Who being brought to liberty at lai'ge. Might sing perchance, abroad, when sun doth shine, Of theii- mishaps, and how their feathers fell) Until the canker may theii- corpse consume. These knacks,' my lord, I cannot call to mind, Becau.se they show not in my Glass of Steel. 800 ^ Cliarlemagne. In tlie life of Charlemagne, left by his seci'etary, Egiubard, there is a record of the spiuuiu^ and weaving required by him from his daughters ; his wearing golden raiment ou state days, but otherwise home-spun, so that "his dress differed little from that of the common people ; " aud of his energy in developing all the resources of the empii-e that had passed away from Rome, and under him extended from the Baltic to the Ebro, from the Atlantic to the Lower Danube, from the Adriatic to the German Ocean. 2 Baiidkln, a rich Persian web of silk and gold. 2 A hundred per cent, ijrofit. * FafJicr Derby's bdiid,-*, handcuffs ; still vulgai'ly called " Darbies." In the absence of any known origin for the word, it may be observed that while bi/, as a Northern suilis, means a dwelling-i)lace, Hd repre- sents, in Icelandic, the state of one who cannot stir a limb, and dar is its adjective. A playful word might have been formed out of such elements ; but probably was not. ^ By fitatutc sfiijjfc's stuff. " Statute-staple *' or " statute-merchant " was a bond .acknowledged before the Mayor of the Staple and one of the clerks of the statutes-merchant, or other appointed persons, and sealed with the seals of the debtor and of the king. ^ Wood Street aud the Poultry remained for some time the City Counters, or debtors' prisons. Poultry is here pronounced in three syllables, " Poul-tr-y." ' Counting-Jioiisc. Gascoigne is suggesting that by "recognisance" — obligation of record to pay a debt by a cei"taiu day — extravagant yoiith may be bi-ought to learn arithmetic in the coiuitei-s, where they have schoolmasters who will keep their bones in when theii" flesh is gone ; will hold them caged until they rot. The cruelty of the old laws of imprisonment for debt survived the reign of Elizabeth through many genex'ations. 8 Fell, skin. 9 Knncks, little ti'icks or dexterous ways. Nares, upon this word, quotes from Tyrwhit a reference to Cotgrave's interpretation of mafissiiicr dcs viains, " to move, Icnacke, or waggle the fingers like a juggler, player, jester," &c., aud agi-ees with Tynvhit in oiiinion that the juggler's crackiug or snapping of his fingers while showing his sleight of hand gave rise to the word. The word is formed from But holla : here I see a wondi'ous sight, I see a swarm of saints within my Glass : Behold, behold, I see a swarm indeed Of holy saints, which walk in comely wise, Not decked in robes, nor garnished with gold. But some unshod, yea some full thinly clothed. And yet they seem so heavenly for to see As if their eyes were all of diamonds. Their face of rubies, sapphires, and jacints, Theii' comely beards and hair of silver wires, 810 And to be short, they seem angelical. What should they be, my lord, what should they be ? gracious God, I see now what they be. These be my Priests, which pray for every state; These be my Priests, divorced from the world. And wedded yet to heaven and holiness ; Which are not proud, nor covet to be rich ; WTiich go not gay, nor feed on dainty food ; Wliich envy not, nor know what malice means; Which loathe all lust, disdaining di-unkenness ; 8'20 Which cannot feign, which hate hypocrisy ; Which never saw Sir Simonie's deceits ; ■Ufiich preach of peace, which carp '" contentions ; Which loiter not, but labour all the year ; Which thunder threats of God's most grievous wrath. And yet do teach that mercy is in store. Lo these, my lord, be my good praying Priests, Descended from Melchisedec by line. Cousins to Paul, to Peter, James, and John : These be my Priests, the seasoning of the earth 830 Which will not lose their savom'iness, I trow. Gascoigne's Pkiests. Prom the Engraved Title-iiage to Vol. II. o/ "Fo.ic's Martyrs" {Edition 1576). Not one of these, for twenty hundred groats, Will teach the text that bids him take a wife. And yet be ciunbered with a concubine. the sound. In Danish "knek" is a crack, and "knekke," to crack; " knekke med Pingeme," to make the fingers snap. From this would come the secoudary sense of an ingenious trifle, " a knack, a toy, a trick, a baby's cap." (" Taming of the Shrew," iv. 3.1 '"J Carp cojitcntion.s. Latin "carpere." to pluck. Pluck off and remove contentions, as one plucks the blighted I'Oses from a bush. To " cari>," in the sense of favoiu'iug contention, is to pick quaiTels, as one may pick roses for one's recreation. TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. 195 Not one of these ■n-ill read the holy writ WTiiuh doth forbid all greedy usury, And yet receive u shilling for a pound. Not one of these will preach of patience, And yet be found as angry as a wasp. Not one of these can bo content to sit 840 In taverns, inns, or ale-houses all day, But spends his time devoutly at his book. Not one of these will rail at riders' wrongs. And yet be blotted with extortion. Not one of these will paint out worldly pride, And he himself as gallant as he dare. Not one of these rebukcth avarice. And yet procui'eth proud plui'alities. Not one of these reproveth vanity "\\Tiiles he himself, with hawk upon his fist 850 And hounds at heel, doth quite forget his text. Not one of these corrects contentions For trifling things, and yet will sue for tithes. Not one of these, not one of these, my lord. Will be ashamed to do even as he teacheth. My Priests have learned to pray unto the Lord, And )-et they trust not in their lip-laboiir. My Priests can fast, and use all abstinence From vice and sin, and yet refuse no meats. My Priests can give, in charitable wise, 860 And love also to do good almes deeds. Although they trust not in their own deserts. My Priests can place all penance in the heart. Without regard of outward ceremonies. My Priests can keep their temples undefilod. And yet defy all superstition. Not Gascuiiine's Priests. From the EngrmccL Title-page to I'ol. II. of'Foxe's MaHyrs" {Edition 1576). Lo now, my lord, what think you by my Priests ? Although they were the last that showed themselves, I said at first, their office was to pray ; And since the time is such e'en now-a-days, 870 As hath great need of prayers truly prayed. Come forth my Priests, and I mil bid your bedes.' I will presume (although I bo no priest) To bid you pray as Paul and Peter i)rayed. ■ Bcciai, prayers. First English "b&l," n prayer. Then pray, my Priests, yea pray to God himself, That he vouchsafe, even for his Clirist's sake, To give His Word free passage here on earth, And that his church which now is militant May soon be seen triumphant over all. And that he deign to end this wicked world, 880 Which walloweth still in sinks of filthy sin. Eke pray, my Priests, for princes and for kings. Emperors, monarchs, dukes, and all estates. Which sway the sword of royal government, (Of whom our Queen, which lives without compare, Blust be the chief in bidding of my bedes. Else I deserve to lose both bedes and boons) That God give light unto then' noble minds. To maintain Truth, and therewith still to weigh. That here they reign not only for themselves, 890 And that they be but slaves to Commonwealtli, Since all their toils and all their broken sleeps Shall scant suffice to hold it still upright. Tell some in Spain" how close the)' keep their closets, How sold the wind doth blow upon their cheeks, Whileas meanwhile their sunburnt suitors starve And pine before their process be preferred. Then pray, my Priests, that God will give his grace To such a prince, his fault in time to mend. Tell some in France how much they love to dance, 900 While suitors dance attendance at the door. Yet pray, my Priests ; for prayers princes mend. Tell some in Portugal how cold they be. In setting forth of right religion : 'Which more esteem the present pleasures here Than stabhshing of God his holy Word. And pra}-, my Priests, lest God such princes spit And vomit them out of his angry mouth. Tell some Italian princes, how they wink At stinking stews, and say they are, forsooth, 910 A remedy to quench foul filthy lust, Whenas indeed they be the sinks of sin. And pray, my Priests, that God will not impute Such wilful acts unto such princes' charge. When he himself commandeth every man To do none ill that good may grow thereby. And pray likewise for all that rulers be By king's commands, as their lieutenants here, All Magistrates, all Counsellors, and all That sit in office or authority. 920 Pray, pray, my Priests, that neither love nor meed Do sway their minds from furthering of right. That they be not too faintish nor too sour,' But bear the bridle evenly between both. That still they stop one ear to hear him speak Which is accused, absent as he is : That evermore they mark what mood doth move The mouth which makes the infonnation. That faults forpast (so that they lie not huge. Nor do exceed the bounds of loyalty) 930 Do never quench their charitable mind Whenas they see repentance hold the reins Of heady youth, which wont to run astray : 2 Gascoigne has not left Englnnd out of sight, while he names here Spain, France, Portugal, and Italy, or presently afterwards Liege and Rome. 5 Too faintish nor too sour, equivalent to too slack nor too strict. 196 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. La.d. 1558 That malice make no mansion in their minds Nor envy fret to see how vii'tue climbs. The greater bii-th the greater glory sure, If deeds maintain their ancestors' degree. Eke pra)', my Priests, for them and for yoirrselves, For Bishops, Prelates, Archdeans, Deans, and Priests, And aU that preach or other-n-ise profess 940 God's holy word, and take the cure of souls. Pray, pray that j-ou, and every one of you, May walk upright in youi' vocation, And that you shine Hke lamps of perfect life. To lend a light and lantern to our feet. Say therewithal, that some (I see them, I, Whereas they fling in Flanders all afar ; For why, my Glass 'will show them as they be) I>o neither care for God nor )'et for devil. So liberty may launch about at large. 9.50 And some again (I see them well enough And note their names, in Liege land where they lui'k) Under pretence of holy humb'e hearts. Would pluck adown all princely diadem. Pray, pray, my Priests, for these ; they touch you near. ' Skrink not to say that some do Roman like Esteem their pall and habit overmuch. And therefore pray, my Priests, lest pride prevail. Pray that the souls of sundry damned ghosts Do not come in and bring good evidence 960 Before the God which judgeth all men's thoughts Of some whose wealth made them neglect their charge, Till secret sins untouched infect- their flocks And bred a scab which brought the sheep to bane. Some other ran before the greedy wolf And left the fold unfended from the fox, ^ Gascoigne began tlie Steel Glass early in April, 1575, and, as a Memorandum at the side shows, he was two-thirds of the way through it. — at the reference to Charlemagne, line 770 — on the 9th of August. Probably, therefore, he writes these Hues about September, 1575. In the preceding July, while Gascoigne was at work upon his poem, the Conferences at Breda for the establishment of peace in Holland had come to an end. While the conferences were going on, the imion between Holland and Zealand was completed, and in July, 1575, Prince William of Orange formally accepted the government of Zealand. Complete refusal of allegiance to Spain was only at that time being resolved upon, and help was being sought from Queen Elizabeth. Gascoigne had shown his sympathy with the struggle for religious liberty by embarking for Holland in March, 1572, and, after a narrow escape from shipwreck, taking a captain's commission under Prince William of Orange. It wos in such war that he saw service, and earned his right to call himself a votary of Mars as well as Mercury. He won honour as a soldier, but quarrelled with his colonel, and was not happy in his camp. There were men in it with a spirit opposed to his, who derided and distrusted him. He wished to throw up his commission, but William had faith in him, and gave him 30O guilders beyond his pay, with promise of promotion, for his personal valour at the siege of Middleburg, Aftei*wards, when Gascoigne was surprised by 3,000 Spauiai-ds while shai-ing the com- mand of 500 Englishmen lately lauded, :iud withdrew with them at night under the walls of Leyden, the Dutch refused to open their gates, and left the httle band to fjU into the bauds of the enemy. George Gascoigne remained four months a prisoner, and then returned to England. He had thus eiqierience of the weak side of the spirit of freedom even in the Dutch for whom he had fought, and he had no respect whatever for the Flemish rioters, who sacked hundreds of chtu-ches, but after the capitulation of Mons. in September. 1572, disavowed the Prince of Orange, and gave back to Spain what Mr. Motley calls "their ancient hypocritical and cowardly allegiance." Gascoigne also, strong in the reverence of his time for royal authority, was out of accord with any suggestion of a Dutch Repubhc ' Infect for infcctei. See Note 7, page 96 ; also Notes 6, page 29, and 4, page 88. Which diu'st not bark nor bawl for both their ears. Then pray, my Priests, that sui'h no more do so. Pray for the nurses of our noble reahn, I mean the worthy Universities, 970 (And Cantabridge shall have the dignity, A\Tiereof I was unworthy member once) That they bring up their babes in decent wise : That Pliilosophy smell no secret smoke ^^'hich Magic makes in wicked mysteries : That Logic leap not over eveiy stUe Before he come a furlong near the hedge, With cui'ions quids to maintain argument ; That Sophistrj' do not deceive itself. That Cosmography keep his compass well, 980 And such as be Historiogi'aphers HlSTOmOUUAPHEttS. Fro^n " HoUnslicd's Chyonldc" {Edition 0/1577). Trust not too much in every tattling tongue Xor blinded be by partiality. That Physic thrive not ovcrfast by mtu-der : That Numbering men, in all their evens and odds Do not forget that Only Unity Unmeasurable, Infinite, and One. That Geometrj' measure not so long Till all their measures out of measure be ; That Music with his heavenly hai-mony Do not allure a heavenly mind from heaven, Nor set men's thoughts in worldly melody Till heavenly hierarchies be quite forgot ; That Rhetoric learn not to over-reach ; That Poetrj- presume not for to preach And bite men's fatdts with Satii-e's corrosives, Yet pamper tip her o-wn with potdtices, Or that she dote not upon Erato,' \\'Tiich should invoke the good Calliope ; ■* That Astrology look not over high, And "light meanwhile in every puddled pit : That Grammar grudge not at our EngUsh tongue Because it stands by monosyllaba And cannot be declined as others are. 990 1000 ' Erato was the Muse of Amatory Poetry. * CallioiK, so named as of sweet voice (Greek, Muse of Eloquence and of Heroic Song. cuXTit oTToc), was the TO A.D. 1670.] SHORTER POEMS. 197 Pray thus, my Priests, for Universities ; And if I hare forgotten any Art Which liath been taught or exercised there, Pray you to God the good be not abused With glorious show of overloading skill. Now these bo past, my Priests, yet shall you pray 1010 For Common People, each in his degree, That God vouchsafe and grant them all His grace. Where should I now begin to bid my bodes ? Or who shall first be put in conunou ]ilace ? 3Iy wits be weai-y, and my eyes are dim, 1 cannot see who best deserves the room. Stand forth good Piers, thou Plougimian by thy name, — Yet so the Sailor saith I do him wrong ; That one contends his jwins are without peer ; That other saith that none be like to his. 1020 Indeed they labour both exceedingly. But since I see no shipman that can Hve Without the plough, and yet I many see Which live by land that never saw the seas : Therefore I say, stand forth Piers Ploughman first,' Thou winn'st the room by very worthiness. Behold him. Priests, and though he stink of sweat Disdain him not : for shall I tell you what ? Such climb to heaven before the shaven croAvns. But how f Forsooth, with true humility. 1030 Not that they hoard their grain when it is cheap ; Not that they kill the calf to have the milk ; Not that they set debate between their lords By earing up the baulks- that part their bounds; Nor for because they can both crouch and creep. The guilefulcst men that ever God yet made, Whenas they mean most mischief and deceit ; Nor that they can cry out on landlords loud. And say they rack their rents an ace too high, Wlien they themselves do sell their landlord's lamb 1040 For gi-eater price than ewe was wont be worth. I see you, Piers ; my Glass was lately scoured. But for they feed, with fruits of their great pains, Both king and knight and priests in cloister pent : Therefore I say, that sooner some of them Shall scale the walls which lead us up to heaven Than corn-fed beasts, whose belly is their god, Although they preach of more perfection. And yet, my Priests, pray you to God for Piers, As Piers can pinch it out for him and j'ou. 10.50 And if you have a Paternoster spare. Then shall you pray for Sailoi-s (God them send More mind of Him whenas they come to land. For towiird shipwreck many men can pray) That they once learn to speak without a lie, And mean good faith \\-ithout blaspheming oaths ; ' WWle Piers Ploughman is here, as in Piers Ploughman's Creed, simply representative of the poor labom-er upon the soil, phi-ases in Oascoigne's lines about him show that he had read Langrland's great poem in which the "Vision of Piers Plowman" was identified with a vision of Christ and the heavenward labour upon earth. The Reformation had caused a revival of the book. It had been printed in 1550 by Robert Crowley, vicar of St. Giles's, Cripplegate, when there were three editions of it ; it had been again printed by Reginald Wolfe in 1553, aud again by Owen Rogers in 1561. 2 Edi-ing up ihe baulks, ploughing up the ridges, removing the land- marks. First English " erian," to plough. In Scotland a strip of land two or three feet broad left unploughed is still called a bauk or bawk (Jamieson). That they forget to steal from every freight, And for to forge false cockets,' fi-ee to pass ; That manners make them give their betters place, And use good words though deeds be nothing gay. 1060 But hero, metliinks, my Priests begin to frown. And say, that thus they shall be overcharged, To pray for all which seem to do amiss ; And one T hear, more saucy than the rest, ■WTiich asketh me, when shall our prayers end ? I tell thee. Priest, when Shoemakers make shoes That are weU sewed, with never a stitch amiss. And use no craft in uttering of the same ; When tailors steal no stuff from gentlemen ; ^V^len tanners are with curriers well agreed, 1070 And both so di-ess theu- hides that we go dry. WTicn cutlers leave to sell old rusty blades. And hide no cracks with solder nor deceit ; When tinkers make no more holes than they foimd ; When thatchers think their wages worth their work ; When coUiers put no dust into their sacks ; When maltmen make us drink no ftmienty ; ■* When Davie Diker digs and dallies not ; WTien smiths shoe horses as they would be shod ; When millers toll not w-ith a golden thumb ; 1080 When bakers make not barm bear price of wheat ; When brewers put no baggage in their beer ; \ATien butchers blow not over all theii' flesh ; When horse-coursers beguile no friends with jades ; Wlien weaver's weight is found in housewife's web. But why dwell I so long among these louts '^ \\Tien mercers make more bones to swear and lie ; When vintners mix no water with their wine ; When printers pass none errors in then- books ; When hatters use to buy none old cast robes; 1090 When goldsmiths get no gains by soldered crowns ; When upholsters sell feathers without dust ; When pewterers infect no tin with lead ; When drapers draw no gains by giving day ; ' When parchmenters put in no fen-et sUk : When surgeons heal all woimds without delay. Tush, these are toys, but yet mj' Glass show'th all. When pflrs-eyors provide not for themselves ; 3 Coctff.«, certificates that their cargoes had paid duty. The name is derived from the seal on them — cokct meaning a seal. * Finnenty, from Latin "frumentum," com. As a foo-? this is whole wheat, free from husk, boiled in milk, sweetened and flavoured. Here it means grain merely boiled or steeped, aud not made into good malt by giving time and care to produce germination, aud the conse- quent development of its sugar. ^ Gains ^1/ gii'iug day, perhaps by giving credit, but I rather think by yielding or failing of day, "giving" in the sense iu which ice is said to give, the sense George Herbert applies to the word in the lines — " Only a sweet and virtuous soul Like seasoned timber never gives ; " or, in " Timon of Athens " — " Flinty mankind ; whose eyes do never give But thorough lust and laughter." Drapers were said to take advantage of failure of light, and to keep their shops purposely dark, that they might more reachly deceive customers iu seUing their fabrics. This was the charge made iigainst them in Gower's " Vox Clamantis," when Gower recited, as Gnscoigne is reciting here, the evils of society that called for cure. Gower's words ai-e (" Vox Clamantis," bk. v., Knes "79, 780) :— " Fraus etiam pnnnos vendet quos lumiue fusco Cemere te faciet ; tu magis inde cave." (" Fraud also sells clotb.'^ that he will make you see aud choose in a dusk light ; let that make you more wary.") 198 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1558 When takers take no bribes, nor use no brags : When customers conceal no co'\'ine used ; 1100 "When searchers see all corners in a ship, Anil spy no pence by any sight they see ; When shi-ives do serve all process as they ought ; When bailiffs strain ' none other thing but strays ; When auditors their coimters cannot change : When proud surveyors take no parting pence ; AVhen silver sticks not on the teller's fingers. And when receivers pay as they receive : When all these folk have quite forgotten fraud. Again, my Priests, a little, by yom- leave ! 1110 When sycophants can find no place in coui-t. But are espied for echoes, as they are ; When roisterers ruffle not above their rule, Nor colour craft by swearing precious coles : - When fencers' fees are like to apes' rewards, A piece of bread, and therewithal a bob ; ^ When Lais lives not like a lady's peer. Nor useth art in dyeing of her hair. When all these things are ordered as they ought. And see themselves within my Glass of Steel, 1120 Even then, my Priests, may you make holiday. And pray no more but ordinary prayers. And yet therein, I pray you, my good Priests, Pray still for me, and for my Glass of Steel, That it nor I do any mind offend Because we show all coloiu's in their kind. And pray for me, that since my hap is such To see men so, I may perceive myself : O worthy words to end my worthless verse ! Pray for me; Priests, I pray you pray for me."' 11.30 These closing Hues, in accord with the tone of tlie whole poem, clistinguisli from the petty spite of tlie self-.satisfied mocker, who miscalls himself a satirist when striving to make all tilings appear lower than 1 Sfmiii, distrain. 2 Coles. The sense is doubtful. ^ A "cole-prophet" was a false prophet. Coles may be only •' caules," cole, cabbage ; and the roysterer may " swear cabbage is precious," as the false prophet sets us crying *' in the name of the prophet, figs." 3 Boh, jerk or rap. * Gascoigne's " Steele Glas," and his " Complainte of Phylomene," are given exactly as first published, together with " Certain Notes of Instruction," by Gascoigue, on the making of English verse, and George Whetstone's metrical " Remembrance of the well-imployed liife and Godly End of George Gascoigne, Esq.," in one of Mr. Edward Arber's "Enghsh Reprints," at the ijrice of one shilling. Prefixed to this edition is an excellent digest of what is known about Gascoigne. Mr. Arber has made it the pleasiu-e of his life to work hard for the diffusion among English readers of many good old English books that were, before his time, seen only by the veiy few. It occun-ed to him boldly to publish, at the cost even of cheap rail- way literatiu'e, such scarce books as it had been thought only possible to print expensively by private and limited subscrixition. Without wealth to support the enterprise, or more time for it than the well- used intervals of leisure from the work he lived by, Mr. Arber began Ills labours on behalf of English hterature with indomitable energj' and English pluck. He not only edited all his books himself, taking the greatest pains to give, true to every stop and letter, accurate texts of their original editions, and furnishing each with a bio- gi"aphical and bibliographical summary that condensed a biography of his own ascertaining — or carefully verified by himself at every point — into a few images of small print, but he became himself their publisher, and took on himself the whole business of diffusing what he had himself produced. More than a hundred thousand little volumes of such books as even students twenty years ago might read about and talk about but seldom hoped to see, have been diffused in this way, and Mr. Arber's enterprise has grown vdtli its success. His himself, the voice of the man wliose mind is fixed on essentials of life, and who .seeks by satire to lift others above a tyranny of mean cares to a chief care for the truth that makes them free. The fresh luxuri- ance of thought and fancy in Elizabeth's reign showed itself even in dress, and was busy over tlie small uses of society while occupied intently also with essentials. Then rose the satirists and prophets wlio dealt with the tri'V'ial excesses as if that had been a time when all the emphasis of life was laid on these. By some it was. A trifler might excel in trifling, as a statesman might excel in statesman- ship. Frivolity in dress and walk and way of speech was intensified into a fine art that requii'ed much occupation of the idler's time. But human life was rich in its ovni music. As men sing at their work when health is vigorous, and the world's cares are gladly made occasions for the exercise of strength, so in the days of Elizabeth strength and activity made poets, the much thinking came of much to do. The very care over the soil was sung about, and in a way th,at blended, even with the homely rhyming of agricultural maxims, the religious undertone that had Man's Duty for its never-ending theme. It was in 1.5.57 that Thomas Tusser, then about forty years old, first publislied liis "Hundreth Good Pointes of Husbandrie." He had been trained at Eton and Cambridge, had begun his career m life at Court, but settled down, at la.st, upon a Suifolk fiirni. His hundred points of good husbandry, aiTanged in quatrains, became " Five Hunch'ed " by 1.573, and seven years aftei'wards he died. Tusser's book has its place among our longer English poems. The first kno'svn verse of Walter Raleigh was praise of Gascoigne's " Steel Glass," prefixed to the first edition of it. These are the lines by " Walter Rawely of the Middle Temple." IN COMMENDATION OF THE STEEL GLASS. Sweet were the sauce would please each kind of taste ; The life likewise were pure that never swerved : For spiteful tongues in cankered stomachs* placed Deem worst of things which best, percase, deserved. But what for that ? This medicine may suffice, — To scorn the rest and seek to please the wise. name is now, through his good work, honoui-nbly known to all close students of English, and his " English Reprints" are here heartily com- mended to the knowledge of all readers who take interest in English literature. As he is liis own publisher, the simplest way of getting one of his books is by wi-iting for it to his address, and enclosing to him its price, for which the book is returaed post free. The address is, Edwai'd Arber, F.S.A., Fallharrow, Bowes, Sonthgate, Herts. The only work of his in which, from its nature, Mr. Arber has been obliged to fall back on the old method of publishing by subscription is his "Transcript of the Registers of the Company of Stationei-s of London, a.d. 1554 to a.d. IfrW." This includes the whole Elizabethan time, and is valuable chiefiy to the student of hterary histoiy. To him it is indispensable ; and although its subscription price may be beyond the purse of a poor scholar, the poor scholar will have ground of complaint against any public library to which he looks for means of knowledge if it has neglected to secure a copy. To compensate for the high price by giving a commercial vsilue to the copies of this "Transcript." no more will be issued after the subscription list Inis closed with the publication of the last of the four volumes. 5 Tonijues in .... stmnacha. Stomach originally meant the tliroat (Greek arofia, the mouth ; uTonaxor, Latin " stomachus," the tliroat or gullet, as connected with the mouth). The word is used hera in TO A.D. 1579. J SHORTER POEMS. 199 10 Though sundry minds in sundry sort do deem, Yet worthiest wights j-ield praise for every pain ; But em-ious brains do nought or light esteem Sueh stately steps as they cannot atUiin. For whoso reaps renown above the rest With heaps of hate shall sm-ely be opprest. Wherefore, to write my censure' of this book, This Glass of Steel unpartially doth show Abuses aU to such as in it look. From prince to poor, from high estate to low. As for the verse,- who list like trade to try, I fear mo much, shall hardly reach so high. We must not part from Gascoigne without showing how he could write a song. Here, therefore, is a song of his ; — THE LULLABY. Sing lullabies, as women do. With which they charm their babes to rest ; And luUahy can I sing too. As womanly as can the best. With lullaby they still the child, And, if I be not much beguiled, Full many wanton babes have I "Which must be still' d with lullaby. Fii-st lullaby my youtliful j-ears ; It is now time to go to bed ; 10 For crooked age and hoary hairs Have wore the haven within mine head. With lullaby, then. Youth, be still. With lullaby content thy wiU ; Since courage quails and comes behind. Go sleep, and so beguile thy mind. Next lullaby my gazing Eyes A^Tiich wonted were to glance apace ; For every glass may now suffice To shew the furrows in my face. 20 With luUaby, then, wink awhile ; With lullaby yom- looks beguile ; Let no fair face or beauty bright Entice you eft" with vain delight. And lullaby my wanton Will, Let Reason's rule now rein thy thought. Since all too late I find by skiU^ How dear I have thy fancies bought. tliat sense, and with the old association of pride, &c. . with movements or sensations in the throat — " the rising gorge." So in Shakespeare's " King Richard II.," it is said of Bolingbroke and Mowbray. " High- stomach'd are they both and full of ire;" and in French, " s'esto- macher " is to acconnt one's self oifended. This use of the word stomach did not point lower than the mouth and throat, and Raleigh is only shaping an old metaphor to his mind when he speaks of " Spiteful tongues in cankered stomachs placed." 1 Censure, opinion or judgment. Latin " censiu-a," from " censeo," I reckon, estiiiiate, assess, judge, think. So we speak of a " census " of the population. In minds nnstrengthened by right culture there is a perverse belief that they can only raise themselves by lowering whatever stands beside them. Therefore, when all the world turned critical before the schoolmaster was well abroad, "censure," that simply meant expression of oxnuion, with a sense even of some admitted value to be ascertained, came to mean chiefly or only condemnation. * 2 Eft, again. s Skill, reason. See Note 21, page 76, and Note 26, page 121. With lullaby now take thine ease, With lullaby thy doubt appease ; For, trust in this, if thou be still. My body shall obey thy \W11. Thus lullaby my Youth, mine Eyes, Jly WiU, my ware and all that was ; I can no more delays devise. But welcome pain, let pleasure pass. With lullaby now take your leave, With lullaby your dreams deceive : And when you rise with waking eye. Remember then this lullaby. 30 40 "We turn to other poets, and still find the true note in them all, however various the form of utterance or measure of the skill in song. Barnaby Googe, son of a Recorder of Lincoln, was bom about 15.38 at AlvTngham, in Lincolnshu-e, and received part of his education at each of the old universities. In ,1.560 he translated a Latin satirical poem called " The Zodiac of Life," then newly produced by an Italian writer — probably Piero Angelo Manzolli, calling himseK Marcellus Palingenius, because his name made by an anagram Marzello Palingenio. In 1562-3, while Barnaby Googe was in Spain, a little volume of his " Eclogues, Epitaphs, and Sonnets " was printed by his friend L. Blundeston, who gave it to the world. After he came home from Spain Googe man-ied, produced more verse, chiefly in translations, and had eight children, the eldest a son who was twenty-eight years old when his father died in 1594-. Barnaby Googe's eight Eclogues deserve honom-able remembrance as almost or altogether the earliest pas- torals in Southern English. In the North they were preceded by Robert Henryson's " Robin and Makyn."'' Clement Marot, who died in 1544, had introduced pastoral poetry into France, blending it subtly with the religious thought bred of the contests of his time. His shepherds were the good and bad pastors of the Church ; his god Pan was the God whom the contend- ing Christians alike worshipped; and the plea for purity of life and for the charities of Christian inter- course was warmly felt in Marot's ver.se by the English Protestants who read him. They applied liis lines to the persecutions of the Huguenots in France and to the persecutions suffered — not by Protestants alone — by many in England for that which they held to be the sacred truth. The days were yet to come, and they are not yet altogether come, when among signs of a love of Tiiith there shall be none more familiar than a brotherly regard for all who seek it faithfully, though many believe that they find it where we think it is not to be found. In the follo-n-iug eclogue — third of his set of eight — Barnaby Googe preludes with a dialo.gue of war between two rams, the heads of rival flocks, and the sore crip- pling of one ; then pa.sses, in a strain not unlike that of Marot, to a pastoral image of the bitter strife between the creeds and of the persecution in the reign of Mary. * See pages 74 — 76. 200 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1558 ECLOGUE. MEX.VLCAS. CUltYDOX. Mcnalvas. A pleasant weather, Corj'don, and fit to keep the field This moon hath hrought ; hear'st you the birds, what joj-ful tunes they >-ield ;- [prick, Lo how the lusty Iambs do course, whom springtime heat doth Behold again the aged ewes with bouncing leaps do kick ; Amongst them all, what ails thy ram, to halt so much behind r Some sore mischance hath liim befall'n, or else some grief of mind. For wont he was of stomach stout and courage high to be. And looked jiroud amongst the flock, and none so stout as he. Corijdo)!. A great mishap and grief of mind is him befall'n of late. Which causcth him, against his will, to lose his old estate. 10 A lusty flock hath TitjTus that him Damoetas gave, Dama?tas he, that martjT, died, whose soul the heavens have 1 And in this flock full many ewes of pleasant form do go. With them a mighty ram doth run that works aU wooers woe. My ram, when he the pleasant dames had viewed round about. Chose ground of battle with his foe and thought to fight it out. But aU too weak, alas ! he was, although his heart was good, For when his enemy him spied he ran with cruel mood, And with his crooked weapon smote him sore upon the side A blow of force, that staid not there but to the legs did gUde, 20 And almost lamed the wooer quite ; such haps in love there be. This is the cause of all his grief and wailing that you see. Moialcas. Well, Corydon, let him go halt, and let us both go lie In yonder bush of juniper ; the beasts shall feed hereby. A pleasant place here is to talk. Good Corydon, begin. And let us know the Town's estate that thou remainest in. Corydon. The Town's estate? Menalcas, oh, thou mak'st my heart to groan. For Vice hath every place possess'd, and Virtue thence is flown ! Pride bears herself as goddess chief, and boasts above the sky. And Lowliness an abject lies with Gentleness her by ; 30 Wit is not joined with Simpleness, as she was wont to be, But seeks the aid of Ai-rogance and Crafty Policy ; Nobility begins to fade, and carters up do sjiring, [thing. Than which no greater plague can hap, nor more pernicious Blenalcas, I have knoiivn myself, within this thirty year, Of lords and ancient gentlemen a hundred dwelling there. Of whom we shepherds had relief, such gentleness of mind Was placed in their noble hearts as none is now to find : But haughtiness and jiroud disdain hath now the chief estate. For Sir John Straw and Sir John Cur will not degenerate. 40 And yet they dare account themselves to be of noble blood : But fish bred up in dirty pools will ever stink of mud. I promise thee, Menalcas, here I would not them en%y If any spot of gentleness in them I might espy. For if their natures gentle be, though birth be ne'er so base. Of gentlemen, for meet it is, they ought have name and place. But when liy bii-th they base are bred, and churlLsh heart retain. Though place of gentlemen they have, yet churls they do remain. A proverb old hath oft been heard, and now full true is tried : An ape will ever be an ape, though pui'ple garments hide. 50 For seldom will the mastiff course the hare or else the deer. But stUl, according to his kind, will hold the hog by th' ear. Unfit are dunghill knights to serve the to'svn with spear in field, [shield.' Nor strange it seems, a sudden chop, to leap from whip to The chiefest man in aU our town, that bears the greatest sway. Is Coiydon (no kin to me), a neat-herd th' other day. This Coiydon, come from the cart, in honour chief doth sit, And governs us, because he hath a crabbed clownish wit. Now sec the churlish cruelty that in his heart remains ; The sclio sheep that shepherds good have fostered up with pains, CO And brought awa)' from stinking dales on pleasant hiUs to feed, O cruel, clownish Corydon ! cm-sed carlish seed ! The simple sheep constrained he their pasture sweet to leave, And to their old corrupted grass- enforceth them to cleave. Such sheep as would not them obey, but in then- pasture bide, With cruel flames they did consume and vex on every side ; And iWth the sheep the shepherds good — hateful hounds of hell !— They did torment, and drive them out in places far to dwell. A Martyrdom under Mary. from " Fo.vc's Martyrs " (Edition of 1576;. There died Daphnis for his sheep, the chiefest of them aU ; And fair Alexis flamed in fire who never perish shall. ^ "0 1 From wftip io shie/d, from tlie carter's whip to bearing arms as a geutleman. AU this is introduction to the character of Corydon, Ity whom Edmund Bonner, Bishop of Loudon, is represented. The reference is to the burning of heretics under Mary. Stephen Gardiner was the illegitimate son of a bishop aud the brother-in-law of a king ; but Edmund Bonner was the son of a poor sawyer's wife in Worcester- shire. At the accession of Elizabeth he refused to take the oath of allegiance, ceased to be Bishop of London, and was imprisoned. As he died in 1569, he was living, and a prisoner, when this eclogue was published. Bamaby Googe was a youth of eighteen or more at the time of the bumin;; of Cranmer, aud the eclogue, although published iu 1563, may have beeu written in Marj''s reign. If it was not then written, he is tliinking himself back into her days. The sheep .are the congregations. - Their ohl corrupted 31'n.s.s. The iiocks of the clergy brought, under Edward VI., " away from stinking dales, on pleasant hills to feed," were sent back, under Mary, to "their old corrupted grass," and those were burnt who refused to quit the better spiritual pasture, while the pastors who sustained them were either burnt or exiled — driveu out " in places far to dwell." 3 Daphnis .... Alexis. Daphnis, "the chiefest of them all," was Latimer; Alexis, perhaps Ridley, probably Cranmer. TO A.D. 1579.] SHORTER POEMS. •201 shepherds, wail for Daphnis' death, Alexis' hap lament. And curse the force of cruel hearts that them to death have sent 1 I, since I saw such sinfiU sights, did never like the town. But thought it best to take my sheep and dwell upon the down Whereas I live a pleasant life, and free from cruel hands. 1 would not leave the pleasant field for all the townish lands, For sith that pride is placed thus, and \-ico set up so high. And cruelty doth rage so sore, and men live all awry, Think' st thou that God will long forhcar his scourge and plague to send To such as Him do stiU despise and never seek to mend 'i 80 Let them be sure He will revenge when they think least upon. But, look ! a stormy show'r doth rise which will fall here anon. Menaleas, best we now depart. My cottage us shall keep, For there is room for thee and me and eke for all oiu' sheep. Some chestnuts have I there in store, with cheese and plea- sant whey ; God sends me victuals for my need, and I sing care away.' George Turbervile, a scliolar lilierally trained, who served as secretary with an English ambassador at St. Petersburg, and was living iir 1.594, published "Translations from Ovid" in 1567, "Poems" in 1570, and " Translations of Tragical Tales from the Italian" in 1576. The two next poems were wi'itten by him. ALL THINGS ARE AS THEY ARE USED. Was never aught, by Nature's art Or cunning skill, so wisely wrought. But man by practice might convart To worser use than Nature thought ; Ne yet was ever thing so ill. Or may be of so small a price, But man may better it by skill, And change his sort by sound advice. So that by proof it may be seen That all things are as is their use, 10 And man may alter Nature clean. And things eon-upt by his abuse. '\^^lat better may be found than flame. To Nature that doth succour pay 'i Yet we do oft abuse the same In bringing buildings to decay : For those that mind to put in use Their malice, moved to wTath and ire, To wreak their mischief will bo sure To spill and spoil thy house Arith tire. 20 So Physic, that doth serve for ease And to reeure- the grieved soul, The painful patient may disease. And make him sick that erst was whole. The true man and the thief are leeke,' For sword doth serve them both at need, Save one by it doth safety seek And th' other of the spoil to speed. As law and learning doth redress That otherwise would go to wi-aek, 30 E'en so doth it oft times oppress And bring the true man to the rack. ^ There are only three known copies of the edition published in Mai-cb, 1563, of "Eijlogs, Epytaphes and Souuettes. Newly written by Baruabe Grooge." From one of these copies Mr. Arber has E?iveu a,u exact repi-oduction of the text, in one of his " English Reprints," for a shilling. 2 BecioT, recover. 3 x,ee/:c, like. 26 Though poison pain the di-inker sore By boiling in his fainting breast. Yet is it not refused therefore. For cause sometime it brecdeth rest ; And mixed with medicines of proof According to llachaon's'' art. Doth sen-e right wi 11 for our behoof And succour sends to dying heart. Y'et these and other things were made By Nature for the better use. But wo of custom take a trade By wilful will them to abuse. So nothing is by kind so void Of vice, and with such virtue fraught. But it by us may be annoyed,* And brought in track of time to naught. Again there is not that so iU Below the lamp of Phcobus' light. But man may better, — if he will Applj- his wit to make it right. ■SO 50 THAT NO MAN SHOULD WRITE BUT SUCH AS DO E.XCEL. Should no man write, say you, but such as do excel ? This fond device of youi'S deserves a bauble and a bell. Then one alone should do, or very few indeed. For that in every art there can but one alone exceed. Should others idle be, and waste their age in vain. That mought, perhaps, in after time the prick and price attain ? By practice skill is got, by practice wit is won ; At games you see how many do to ^\'in the wager run ; Yet one among the moe^ doth bear away the bell ; Is that a cause to say the rest in running did not well ':■ If none in physic shoidd but only Galen deal. No doubt a thousand perish would whom physic now doth heal. Each one his talent hath, to use at his device, Wliieh makes that many men as well as one are counted ^N'ise. For if that wit alone in one should rest and reign, Then God the skulls of other men did make but all in vain. Let each one try his force, and do the best he can, For thereimto apijointed were the hand and leg of man. The poet Horace speaks against thy reason plain. Who says 'tis somewhat to attempt, although thou not attain The scope in every thing : to touch the high'st degree Is passing hard ; to do thy best sufficing is for thee. Of those wi'iters who in seeking their own highest work have done the liighest service to their kind, Thomas Churchyard wrote a short poem tliat may follow this of Turbervile's. Churchyard, who con- tributed the story of " Jane Shore " to tlie " Mirror for Magistrates," was born of a good family in Shrewsbury, and liberally trained. When he had spent mucli of his means at Court, he was in the household of the Earl of Surrey. He went after- wards to the wai's, and was twice a prisoner. He * Machoon's art. Machaou, son of .Sl^cnlapius, was a famous phy- sician, who took part in the Trnj;in w.u-. His name was used by the poets for a physician generally. So Martial wrote, '* Quid tibi cum medicis ? Dimitte Machaonas omnes." (What have you to do with doctors ? Pack oif all the Machaons.) ^ Annoyed, made hiu^ful or hateful. Anvoii has been traced by Diez to the Latin " in odio," in hate. The old derivation was from " uoxa," hurt or harm, noxious, liurtful ; and that seems to be the sense in the word as used by Tnrbervile. ^ Moe, more. 202 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURl!.. [a.d. 1579 lived tln-OTigh Elizabeth's reign; died, more than eighty years old, in IGO-i ; aiid is said to have been buried near the gi-ave of Skelton, whose praise he blended in this piece with reminder of the duty of Englishmen to hold by the memory of OUR ENGLISH POETS. If sloth and tract of time that wears each thing away Should rust and canker worthy Arts, each thing would soon decay. If such as present are forego the people past. Ourselves should soon in silence sleep and lose renown at last. No soil, no land, so rude but some wise men can show : Then should the learned pass unkno\\Ti whose pens and skill did flow ? Ood shield our sloth were such or world so simple now That knowledge 'scaped without reward, which searcheth virtue through jVnd paints forth vice aright and blames abuse in men. And shows what life deserves rebuke and who the praise of pen. 10 You see how foreign realms advance their Poets all, And ours are dro-n-ned in the dust or flung against the wall. In France did Marot reign, and neighbour thereunto Was Petrarch marching fuU with Dante. "Who erst did wonders do Among the noble Greeks was Homer full of skiU, And where that Ovid nourisht was the soil did flourish still With letters high of style ; but Virgil won the bays And past them aU for deep engyne,' and made them all to gaze Upon the books he made. Thus each of them, you see, Won praise and fame, and honour had each one in their degree. 20 I pray you then, my friends, disdain not for to view The works and sugar'd \'erscs fine of our rare poets new. Whose barb' reus language rude perhaps ye may mislike. But blame them not that rudely play if they the ball do strike. Nor scorn your JIother-Tongue, babes of English breed I I have of other language seen, and you at full may read. Fine verses trimly wrought and couched in comely sort, But never I, nor you, I trow, in sentence plain and short Did yet behold with eye in anj' foreign tongue A. higher verse, a statelier style that may be read or sung SO Than is this day in deed our English verse and rh\-me. The grace whereof doth touch the Gods and reach the clouds sometime. Through earth and waters deep the pen b_y skill doth pass, ,Vnd featly nips the world's abuse, and shows us in a glass The virtue and the vice of everj' wight alive. The honeycomb that bee doth make is not so sweet in hive As are the golden leaves that drop from poet's head A^^lic■h do surmount our common talk as far as gold doth lead. The flour is sifted clean, the bran is cast aside. And so good com is known from chafE and each fine grain is spied. 40 " Piers Plowman" was full plain, and Chaucer's spreet- was great, * Engyne (Latin " ingenium"), inborn ability. - Spreety spiiit. Earl Surrey had a goodly vein. Lord Vaux the mark did beat ; And Phaer did hit the prick in things he did translate ; ^■Vnd Edwards had a special gift ; and divers men of late Have helped oiu- EngUsh tongue that first was base and brute. Oh, shall I leave out Skelton' s name, the blossom of my fruit. The tree whereon indeed my branches all might grow ! Nay, Skelton wore the laurel wi-eath and passed in schools, ye know ; A poet for his art whose judgment sure was high, And had great practice of the pen ; his works they wiU not Ke. 50 His terms to taunts did lean, his talk was as he wrate, — Full quick of wit, right sharp of words, and skilful of the state ; Of reason ripe and good, and to the hateful mind, That did disdain his doings still, a scomer of his kind, ilost pleasant every way, as Poets ought to be, .\nd seldom out of Prince's gTace, and gxeat with each degree. Thus have you heard at full what Skelton was indeed : A further knowledge shall you have if you his books do read. I have of mere good-will these verses written here To honom- virtue as I ought, and make his fame appear 60 That won the garland gay of Laurel-leaves but late. Small is my pain, great is his praise that did such honour- get. Thomas Churchyard, as a Shropshire man when Shropshii-e was within the jurisdiction of the Lord President of Wales, wrote a long poem descriptive of Welsh places and people, called " The Worthiness of Wales." The following lines from it — which serve as prelude to the mention of a ruined castle — form by themselves a little poem : — A DISCOURSE OF TIME. O Tract of Time, that all consumes to dust, We hold thee not for thou art bald behind ; The faii-est sword or metal thou wilt rust. And brightest things bring quickly out of mind. The trimmest towers and castles great and gay. In process long, at length thou dost decay ; The bravest house and princely buildings rare Thou wastes and wears, and leaves the walls but bare. O canker vile that creeps in hardest mould, The marble stone or flint thy force shall feel : Thou ha.st a power to pierce and eat the gold, Fling down the strong, and make the stout to reel. wasting worm, that eats sweet kernels all. And makes the nut to dust and powder fall : O glutton great, that feeds on each man's store. And yet thyself no better art therefore. Time all consumes, and helps itself no wliit. As fire by flame bums coals to cinders small : Time steals in man much like an ague fit, That wears the face, the flesh, the skin and all. wi-etched rust that wilt not scoured be, (h-eadful Time, the world is feared of thee ! Thou flingest flat the highest tree that grows, And triumph makes on pomp and painted shows. TO A.r. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 203 PiiAISE OF ElIZABETK. Illustration to the Ain-il Eclogue in the First Editions oj Spenser's " Sliepherd's Calendar." CHAPTER XI. Eeign of Elizabeth, from a.d. 1579 to a.d. 1603. Section I. SPENSEE, RALEIOH, SIDNEY, DYEIt, FVLKE GREVILLE, AXIl OTHERS. In the year 1579 Edmund SpeiLser -w-as firet known i as a poet by the publication of liis " Sheplierd's i Calendar." In 1579 the reign of Elizabeth attained the age of twenty-one ; and the young men who then came to years of discretion had been born and ! bred vmder the influences of her time. After 1579 [ we may say that the Elizabethan literature rapidly attained to its full breadth and depth and force ; the wi-iters multiplied, their jiower rose. Spenser's first book, " The Shepherd's Calendar," associated -ndth this date the promise that one of those gi'eat poets, who are rarely born into the world, was about to speak the best thought of his countiy. And lie did. Spenser's gi-eat poem, the "Faerie Queene," is not, as some take it to be, a work of bright imagination seldom touching earth, a lovely pUe of castles in the ail- : he dealt m it, after his own manner, •\\dth the vital concerns of England in his time — religious, social, and political ; his point of ^iew bemg that of an Elizabethan Puritan, earnest as his successor, MUton, in a later day. He was, indeed, in more senses than one, the Elizabethan Milton. Milton was afterwards m a worthy sense what Dryden called him, " the poetical son of Spenser ; Milton," Dryden added, " has confessed to me that Spenser was his original." Out of this sjnnpathy -with Spenser came IVlilton's emijhatic reference to liuu in the " Ai-eopa- gitica" as "the sage and serious Spenser, whom I dare be known to think a better teaoher than Scotus or Aquinas." Of the four gi-eatest English poets — Chaucer, Sjienser, Shakespeare, Milton — two may be said to Ije ours only, and two the world's. Spenser and Milton were individually English, and each fought on the same side in the same battle, though they were in action at different hours of the long day, and under different conditions of the con- test. Chaucer and Shakespeare were universal poets, representing not the struggle of a nation, but, for all himianity, the essence of the life of man, with clieei'- ful faith in the great heaven that is broader than the storm about our ears. Yet that knowledge of theirs does not forbid battle with the storm — it warns us rather not to let it beat us down into despau'. To conquer evil, or that which he thinks evil, is man's work in life. To lowest minds few ills are kno\\'n but those which trouble their owni bodies, hunger, thii'st, or privation of enjo_\nnents that make up their earthly good : but higher minds see farther, and, kno\\'ing those ills to be worst that touch the soul, rise to a nobler life in labour for their overthrow. Thus, high or low, we are all com- batant ; oiu' best poets are but a part of us ; our battle-cries are in theii- songs. Few only in the life- time of a world can rise as Shakespeare did to the pure heaven of essential truth, and, while so far re- moved and yet near to us all, look on our struggles 204 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 with a peaceful trust iii God and an unbounded goodwill towards man. Edmund Spenser, Walter Raleigli, Philip Sidney, and Sidney's friends Fulke Greville and Edward Dyer, were all children of three, four, or five years old when Elizabeth came to the throne. In 1579 they were in the full vigour of early manhood, and all poets, though not poets of equal mark. Spenser belonged to a poor branch of a good family, and was at home in the north of England, although lie wai3 born and sent to scliool in London. As a youth of about sixteen he had shown his interest in Edmund Spensee. From George Vcrtue*s Engraving of his Portrait, the chief struggle of liis time by contributing some poetical translations from the visions of Petrarch and of Bellay to a religious book published in the ytar 1.569 by a refugee from Brabant. The book was called "A Theatre, wherein be represented a-s well the Miseries and Calamities that follow the Voluptuous Worlillings, as also the gi-eat Joys and Pleasures wliich the Faithful do enjoy. An Argu- ment both Profitable and Delectable to all that sincerely love the Word of God." Young Spenser was a contributor to such a book as that, in the year of his going to Cambridge. Soon after he had finished his university course, a taithful college friend of his, named Gabriel Harvey, caused him to leave his home in the North for London, and enter the service of the Earl of Leicester. Then it was that Spense«''s friendship w;vs formed ^vith a young man of about his own age, earnest a,s he was himself, and like himself a poet, the Earl of Leicester's nephew, Philip Sidney. Edmund Spenser had but just formed these new relations, and was looking for advancement in life by the help of his new friends, who had influence at Court, when he com- jileted the ^\Titing of " The Shepherd's Calendar." Part of this work he is said to have written while with Sidney at Penshurst, and at Penshurist a tree has been associated with his memory as Spenser's oak, the, tradition being that one or two eclogues of "The Shei)herd's Calendar" were written under it. There is also still shown Sidney's oak, said to have been planted on the day of Philip Sidney's bii-th. A certain tree-worship has often been associated vfith the memories of poets. In the name of Shake- speare, homage was paid to a mulberry-tree, and there was a tree under which Spenser's forerunner in pastoral verse, Clement Marot, was said to have written. "The Shepherd's Calendar" is in twelve eclogues, corresponding to the twelve months of the year ; each eclogue beLug a complete and indepen- dent poem. Spenser took for himself, from John Skelton, the name of Colin Clout, wliich he held liy in after years as his poetical name ; and he showed himself in sympathy %vith the spirit of Skelton's " Colin Clout," while he ^vl■ote these pastorals as one who was strongly influenced by the genius of Clement Marot. The two last of Spenser's eclogues were, indeed, simply paraphi'ases of two eclogues by the French poet, who gets little credit from his countrymen for that in him which our English Spenser felt and understood. In his " Shepherd's Calendar " Spenser provided one essential element by giving Colin Clout a hapless love for Rosalind to pipe about sometimes. Here also lie tried his .skill as a poet in a variety of measures ; and Chaucer was to him, as in all his after years, the great Master, in whose steps he sought humbly to follow. Years afterwards, in the " Faerie Queene " (book iv., canto 2), Spenser wove into his work a thread of fiction derived, as he said, from " Dan'' Chaucer, Well of English vmdefiled ;" and in the June eclogue of the " Shepherd's Calendar," using the pastoral name of Tityiiis, which stands always for Chaucer in these eclogues, yomig Spenser AvTote the following lines : — " The p;od of shepherds, Tityrus, is dead, \Mio taught me homely, as I can. to make : - He, whilst he lived, was the sovereign head Of shepherds aU that ben with love j'take. * * # * * * Ivow dead he is, and licth wTapt in lead, — Oh, why should Death on him suoh outrage show f And all his passing skill with him is fled. The fame whereof doth daily greater grow. But if on me some little drops would flow Of that the Spring was in his learned head, I soon would learn these woods to wail my woe. And teach the trees their trickling tears to shed." Spenser's homage to Chaucer was showni, at a time when fashion tended to outlandish and afiected speech, by a steady cultivation of jilain one-syllabled English. In the few lines just quoted, for example, tliei'e are eighty-seven monosyllables, fourteen words of two syllables, all of the very simplest kind, such as livkl, learned, little, lieth ; and the only word of more syllables than two is sovereign, except, of course, the name Tityrus. Spenser's second eclogue 1 Ban was a contraction of '* dominus," master. 2 To malic, to write verses. See Note in reference to the woi'd nxakars on page 109. TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTEE POEMS. 205 contained a story of the Oak and the Briar, wbich, being an exercise in imitation of the style of Chaucer, was ofiered as a tale by Tityrus. In this the poet made a shepherd say — " To nought more, Tlicnot, my mimi is bent Than to hear novels of his devise : They bene so well thewed and so wise What ever that good old man bcspake." Spenser's earliest book included also his poetical homage to Queen Elizabeth ; but its chief character •was and is the religious earnestness that aeaui and the Piu-itan party, ani.1 in high favour with Queen Elizabeth for zeal in the enforcement of her owi_ church policy. ECLOGUE. Thomalin. Mokuell. Tlwmaliii. Is not thills ' same a goat-herd proud, That sits on yonder bank, AVhose straj-ing herd themself doth shroud Among the bushes rank ? Thomalin and Mokkell. Illustration to the July Eclogue in the First Editions of " The Shejjherd's Calendar again makes the eclogue, as in Clement Marot's poems, a pastoral myth toucliing closely the reli- gious controversies of the time in which he lived. Wlien it is so used shepherds stand for pastors of the Church, and Spenser's zeal for what he looked upon as necessary thoroughness of Church refomi leads him, regardless of all private interests at court, not only to make his Puritanism known, but to take part against the Queen herself on a Church question of the day, the question of the relations between her and Edmund Grindal, Arch- bishop of Canterbury. In the follo\\-ing eclogue the good Algriud is Grindal, with no more disguise of his name than a transposing of its syllables. But Giindal, when the poem appeared, was Archbishop of Canterbui-y censured by the Queen, and seques- tered by her from the exercise of his authority. Morrell, the goatherd proud, who has allowed his flock to stray, has his name formed in a similar manner by a transposition of the syllables of the name of Elmore, Elmer, or Aylmer. But Aylmer was at this particular time Bishop of London, wielding gi-eat part of the authority that had been taken from Grindal. He was gi'eatly disliked by Jlorrell. "What ho, thou jolly shepherd's swain, Come up the hill to me : - 1 ThilTc, the snme. A word taken from Cliaucei- ; but Spenser*s use of words older tUau Ixis own time is often no more than the imitation of rustic dialect by use of old forms, then not only to be read in Cliaucer but to be heard among the country folk. ~ Come up the hill to mc. You, lowly pastor, follow my example ; seek to climb to a bishop's seat ! But Morrell's flock is said to be astray in the rank grass, in what Baruaby Googe had called the "old corrupted grass " of the unreformed faith (see his " Eclogue," on page 64, line 200). Spenser desired root and branch reform in the Church. The Queen and her first archbishoii — the learned Matthew Parker, who died in 1575 — desired to maintain Unity of the Church, by reforming only what they held to be essential eiTors, and leaving the outside fashions of worship, if not evil in themselves, untouched. Much, therefore, of old ceremonial was kept, partly because Parker had a scholar's reverence for ancient usages ; partly because it seemed to him wise to avoid changes that to the countrj- people, of wit slow to understand a transformation of the fonns to which they had been bred, would seem like taking their religion from them. That was the ix)int of view of earnest and religious men whose minds were con- servative in tendency. Othei-s, as earnest and rehgious— but, if we compare, as we should always, the best men of one side with the best men of their opponents, differing only in sense of the way to the well- being of England, not in heiirtiness of labour for it— were disposed by natiu-e to dwell most on the reforms to be effected and made lasting. These held that the outward ceremonial, which had been 206 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 Better is, than the lowly jjlain, Als^ for thy flock and thee. Thoiaartn. Ah ! God shield, man, that I should clime, And learn to look aloft : 10 This rede- is rife, that oftentime Great climhers fall imsoft. In humble dales is footing fast, The trode is not so tickle ;3 And thoug-h one fall through heedless haste. Yet is his miss not mickle. And now the sun hath reared up His fiery-footed teme. Making his way between the Cup And golden Diadome : 20 The rampant Lion-* hunts he fast, With dogs of noisome breath, Whose baleful barking brings in haste Pine, plagues, and di-ery death. Against his cruel scorching heat, WTiere thou hast covei-ture, The wasteful hills imto his thi-eat Is a plain overture. But if thee lust to holden chat With seely shepherd's swain, 30 Come down, and learn the little what That Thomalin can sain.* joined for g-enerations with certain comiptions of the Church, would, if retained, retain, or in time recall, the iUs with which it had been so long identified. Elizabethan Piuitans, continuing one line of thought from Wiclif's Bible-men to the Ironsides of the Civil War, desired, therefore, that all xisage and ceremony founded on tradition should give place to the establishment of a reformed Church only based upon the deep and strong foundation of the Scriptures. This was Spenser's view throughout his life, but blended with a not less resolute upholding of royal authority, and a severe contempt for theorists who undertook the reconstruction of society. John Aylmer, Bishop of London when this pastoral was published, is represented in Morrell as the Puritans saw him. He was a man of fifty-eight : in earlier life the kindly scholar who, as her tutor, made Plato a delight to Lady Jane Grey ; under Mary, a Protestant exile at Zurich ; under Elizabeth, a divine inclined to can-y out the Queen's policy, by repression of extreme opinions on either side, whether of those who opposed all the reforms or of those who demanded many more ; and he was, therefore, equally disliked by Catholics and Piu-itans. He had been made Bishop of London tlu'ee years before "The Shepherd's Calendar" appeai-ed, and at the date of its ap- pearance he was doubly unpopular with men of Spenser's way of thinking, because he had risen to the power that should have been Grindal's, and wns, with the Queen, ojiposed to the disgraced arch- bishop. The nest following argument is, in pastoral disguise, a commendation of the simple lives of the first heads of the Church — the Apostles— as examples to those bishops who sought lordship and the pomps of life. 1 Ms, as, also. 2 Rede, counsel. 3 The U-ode is not so tickle. The footing is not so unsure. *' Tickle " was frequently used in the sense of unstable, tottering, overthrown by a slight touch. The word "tick," meaning a slight touch, is well kaown in boy's play. * Cup. . . Diademe . . . Li'om. "The Cup and Diadem be two signs in the fii-mament tlu-ough which the sun maketh his coui-se in the month of July," says " E. K.," who supplied notes to the first editions of the " Shei>herd's Culendixr." He is supi>osed to have been Edward Kirke, a college friend of Spenser's. Leo, the constellation of the month, appears in the woodcut at the head of the poem. Each of the twelve pictures was, in like manner, fitted to its mouth by having one of the twelve constellations in its sky. This passage represents July astronomically, and the reign of the Dog-star, Siinus, with the pesti- lences then abroad, aud tui-ns the season to account by adding the suggestion that Moirell being on the " wasteful hills," the overture, or open space of the hills with waste land on their tops, offers no shelter against the perils from above. s Sain, say. MornlL Sicker'' thou's hut a lazy lourd,^ And rekes much of thy s^x-ink,^ That -^N-ith fond terms and \\-itIess words To blear mine eyes dost think. In evil hour thou hent'st in hond'-* Thus holy hills to blame ; For sacred unto saints they stond, And of them han^" theii* name. 40 St. Michel's IMount who does not know, That wards the -western coast P And of St. Biidget's bow'r, I trow, All Kent can rightly boast : And they that con of Muses' skill, Sain most-what, that they dweU (As goat-herds wont) upon a hill, Beside a learned well. And wonned'^ not the great god Pan^'-^ Upon Mount Olivet ; 50 Feeding the blessed flock of Dan,'^ WTiich did himself beget ? Thomalhi. blessed sheep ! Shepherd great ! That bought his flock so dear : And them did save with bloody sweat, From wolves that would them tear. Morrell. Beside, as holy fathers sain. There is a holy place, Where Titan ^"^ riseth from the main, To ren his daily race : 60 Upon whose tops the stars been stafcd, And aU the sky doth lean ; There is the cave where Phwbe laied The shepherd*^ long to dream. fi Sicker, surely. 7 Loiird, a lumpish fellow; French "lourd," heavy; "lonrdin," a heavy clumsy man. There was an old notion that our form of this word, **lourden" and " hu'dane," originated in hatred of Danish con- querors. So Richard Nicols, in his i>oem on Edmund Ironside in the "Mirror for Magistrates," ended a stanza with " In everj' house Lord Dane did then rule all. Whence lazy losels Lni'danes now we call." " E. K.," iu his gloss on the word lourd, gives the same etymology, and adds that the people " for more reproach " called the quartan ague " the Fever Lurdaue." s Rekes much of thy swink, count much of thy pains. 3 Hent'st in hond, took'st in hand. ^^ Han, have. u Wonned, dwelt. 12 The great god Pan, "Christ" (E. K.). Spenser here follows Marot in his religious pastoral, and uses the name of Pan for God or Christ. " How long, O Lord, how long ? " Marot cried in the days ol persecution:— " Jusques ii quand, 6 Pan grand et sublime, Laisseras-tu cette gent tant infime ? Et faux pasteurs parjures et meschans, Dessus troupeaux domiuer en tes champs ? Jusques a quand, o Pan tres-debonnaire, Permettras-tu cette gent nous mal faire ? Et que tons jours en ce poinct ils deschassent Ceux qui ton loz et ta gloire poiu-chasseut ? " 13 Dan. *'One tribe is put for the whole nation per stjnecdochen" (E. K.). Synecdoche is the name in rhetoric for a form of speech which putsa i)art forthe whole, as "hands," for " workmen ; " " sail," for ships. '■* " ]Vlicrc Titan, the sun; which stoiy is to be read in Diodorus Siculus of the hill Ida; from whence, he saith, all night time is to be seen a mighty fire as if the sky burned, which toward morning beginneth to gather into a round form, and thereof riseth the sun, whom the poets call Titan." (E. K.) '5 " The shepherd is Endj-mion, whom the poets feign to have been. TO i.D. 1603.] SHOETER POEMS. 207 Whilom there ' used shepherds all To feed their flocks at ^^■ill, Till by his foUy one did fall, That all the rest did spill. And sithence shepherds been forsaid From places of delight ; 70 For-thy, I ween thou be afraid, To clime this hilles hight, Of Sinah can I tell thee more. And of Our Lady's bow'r:^ But little needs to strow my store : Suffice this hill of our.^ Here han the holy faims'' recoui-se, And sylvans haunten rathe ; Here has the salt Medway his sourse. Wherein the njnnphs do bathe : 80 The salt Sledway, that trickUng streams Adown the dales of Kent, TUl with his elder brother Thames, His brackish waves be meynt.* Here grows melampode'' every where. And terebinth, good for goats : The one, my madding kids to smear, The next to heal their throats. Hereto, the hills been nigher heaven, And thence the passage eath : ' 90 As well can prove the piercing levin,' That seldom falls beneath. so beloved of Phcebe, that is to say, tlie Moon, that he was by her kept asleei> in a cave by the space of thirty years for to enjoy his company." (E. K.) 1 " There, that is, in Paradise, where through error of the shep- herd's understanding, he saith, that all shepherds did use to feed their flocks, till one (that is Adam) by his folly and disobedience made all the rest of his offspiTug be debaiTed and shut out from thence." (E. K.) But there is distinctly Mount Ida, where Paris, the son of Priam and Hecuba, brought up .as a shepherd's son, gave the golden apple to Venus and forsook CEnone, to bring about, by the carrying away of the wife of his host Menelaus, the utter destruction of Troy. The allusion is designedly so worded as to suggest a transition of thought to the fall of Adam. ^ Our Lady's bower. " A place of pleasure so called," says E. K., who is by no means an infallible informant. How should a mere " place of pleasm-e " be paired with Sinai ? The reference is to Mount Zion. This was described by Sir John Mandeville as "Mount Ziou, where there is a fair church of Our Lady, where she dwelt and died. . . From thence she was carried by the apostles to the valley of Jehosha- phat, and there is the stone which the angel brought to Our Lady from Mount Sinai." 3 T?n's hill of our ; the supremacy of the Archbishop of Canterbui-y, which Aylmer practically had after Grindal, though left with the nominal rank, had been suspended from the exercise of his authority. In the manner of pastoral poets Spenser represents by rivers the region to which he refers. So Milton in the *' Epitaphium Damouis " (Cowper's Translation), when he speaks of content with fame among his own countrymen for a British song : — " A British ? — even so — the pow'rs of man Are bounded ; little is the most he can ; And it shall well suffice me, and shall be Fame, and proud recompense enough for me, If Usa, golden-haired, my verse may learn, If Alain bending o'er his chrystal urn. Swift whirling Abra, Trent's o'ershadowed stream, Thames, lovelier far than all in my esteem, Tamar's ore-tinctured flood, and, after these. The wave-worn shores of utmost Orcades." * " FauTis or sylva)is be of poets feigned to be gods of the wood." (E. K.) - Meynt, mingled. ^ " Melampode and terehlnth be herbs good to cure diseased goats : of the one speaketh Mautuau, and of the other Theocritus." (E. K.) ' Eath. The First-EngUsh word for " easy." ^ Levin, hghtning. Thomalin. Siker thou spcakcst like a lewd lorol,' Of heaven to dcemen so : How be I am but rude and boiTcl,'" Yet nearer ways I know. To kii-k the nan-e," to God more fan-e, Has been an old said saw ; And he that strives to touch a starre. Oft stumbles at a straw. 100 Alsoon may shepherds clime to sky, That leads in lowly dales ; As goat-herd proud that, sitting high, Upon the mountain sails. My seely sheep Uke well below, They need not melampode ; For they been hale enough, I trow. And liken their abode. But if they -n-ith thy goats .should ycde,'^ They soon might be con-upted ; 110 Or like not of the f rowy '•• fcde. Or with the weeds be glutted. The hills, where dwelled holy saints, I re ,'erence and adore ; Not for themself , but for the saints. Which han been dead of yore. And now they been to heaven forewent, Their good is with them go ; '^ Their sample " only to us lent. That als we mought do so. 120 Shepherds they weren of the best, And lived in lowly leas. And sith '^ their souls be now at rest, Why doen we them disease ? Such one he was (as I have heard Old Algrind '^ often sain) That whUom was the first shepherd, And Uv'd with little gain : And meek he was, as meek mought be ; Simple, as simple sheep ; 130 Humble, and like in each degree The flock which he did keep. Often he used of his keep A sacrifice to bring ; Now with a kid, now with a sheep. The altars hallowing. So louted'' he imto the Lord, Such favour couth he find. That never sithence was abhor'd The simple .shepherds' kind. 140 And such I ween the brethren were That came from Canaan ; The brethren twelve, that kept yferc " The flocks of mighty Pan. ' lore! or losel, a good-for-nothing fellow. Interchange of r and s as in lorn and lost, from 7o.se. If Borrel, clownish ; " biu-ellus," coarse cloth. u 2>fnrre, nigher. •2 Yede, go. 13 " Frowy, musty, or mossy." (E. E.) 1* Tlicir good is with them go— i.e., it does not remain in the shrines and holy places to which pilgrimages are made, and by which miracles are said to be wrought. 15 Sample, example. i*- Sith, since. 1' Old Algrind. What Spenser regarded as sound teaching is here put in the mouth of the disgraced Archbishoi> Grindal. The first reference is to Abel. 18 Loided, bowed. Fii'St-Euglish " hliitau," to bovi. " Yfere, together. 208 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1579 But nothing: such thilk shepherd ' was "\\Tiom Ida hill did bear, That left his flock to fetch a lass, "NMiosc love he bought too dear : For he was proud, that ill was p;iid (Xo such mought shepherds be), 150 And with lewd lust was overlaid ; Tway things doen ill agree. But shepherds mought be meek and mild, ^Vell eyed, as Argus ^ was, ^ith fleshly follies undefil'd. And stout as steed of brass. Sikc one ^ (s,aid Algi-iud) Moses was. That saw his Maker's face. Tfis face more clear than crystal glass. And spake to him in place. 160 This had a brother* (his name I knew). The first of aU his coat : A shepherd true, yet not so true,* As he that earst I bote.' "\Miilom all these were low, and lief," And lov'd their flocks to feed. They never stroven to be chief. And simple was theii' weed.* But now (thanked be God therefore). The world is well amend : 170 Their weeds been not so nighly wore, Such simpless mought them shend.' They been yclad in purple and pall,'" So hath their God them blist ; They reign and rulen over all. And lord it as they list : Ygirt with belts of glitterand gold, (Mought they good shepherds been f) Their Pan" their sheep to them has sold, I say, as some have seen. 180 For Palinode'- (if thou him ken), Yode late on pilgrimage To Rome (if such be Rome) and then He saw thilk misusage. For shepherds (said he) there doen lead, As lords doen otherwhere ; 1 Thilk shepherd . . . tehom Ida hiU did hear, Paris. - " Argtis was of the poets devised to be full of eyes, and therefore to him was committed the keeping of the transformed cow lo ; so called, because that, in the print of a cow's foot, there is figured an I in the middest of an O." (E. K.) Extremely keen. The discoverer of that had eyes of Ai^us for an etymology. Fable said that the hundred eyes of Argus were transferred to the peacock's tail. 5 Sike one, such one. * Brother, pronounced "bro'r." " He meaneth Aaron, whose name, for more decoram, the shepherd saith he hath forgot, lest his remem- brance and skill in antiquities of holy writ should seem to exceed the meanness of the person." (E. K.) 5 Not so truj, "for Aaron, in the absence of Moses, started aside, and committed idolatry." (E. K.) 6 Hote, named. ' Lief, dear, willing through love. ^ iTeed, dress. ' Shend, shame. '0 " In purple, spoken of the popes and cardinals, which use such tyrannical colours and pompous painting." (E. K.) " " Their Pan, that is, the Pope, whom they account their God and greatest shepherd." (E. K.) ^ " Palinode, a shepherd of whose report he seemeth to speak all this." ( E. K.) The word Palinode means a recantation, and in the fifth eclogue, where Palinode and Piers were the sjieakers. Piers had qnoted Algrind's doctrine against Palinode's hankerings Eomeward — *' Ah, Palinodie, thou art a world's child ! Who touches pitch, mought needs be defiled ; But shepherds (as Algrind used to s.iy> Mought not live ylike as men of the lay." Their sheep ban crusts, and they the broad ; The chips, and they the cheer : They han the fleece, and eke the flush, (0 secly sheep the whUe 1) 190 The coi-n is theirs, let other thresh, Theii' hands they may not file.'^ They han great stores, and thrifty stocks, Great fi-iends and feeble foes : TNTiat need them caren for their flocks. Their boys can look to those i These wisai-ds'* welter '* in wealth's waves, Pamper' d in pleasures deep ; They han fat kerns '^ and leany knaves. Their fasting flocks to keep. 200 Sike mister men '^ been all misgono. They heapen hills of wrath ; Sike surly shepherds han we none. They keepen all the path. Morre/l. Here is a great deal of good matter Lost for lack of telling : Now sicker I see thou dost but clatter. Harm may come of meUing.'* Thou meddlest more than shall have thank, To witen " shepherd' s wealth : 210 When folk been fat, and riches rank. It is a sign of health. But say me, what is Algrind, he That is so oft bynempt 1'"-* Tliomalln. He is a shepherd great in gree,-' 'S FUe, soil. '* " ITisnni?, great, learned heads." (E. K.) '> To \eelter is to roll. First Euglish ** wgeltan," to roll or tumble about. Of the same root is " waltz." '® '* Kern, a churl or farmer." (E. £.) '■ " Sike mister men, such kind of men." (E. E.) 's Milling, meddling. '^ To \eiten, to blame. First English " wi'tan," to blame, past "witode," is to be distinguished from "witau," to know, past " wiste." Morrell tells Thomalin he will do himself no good by meddling with these matters. So in the September eclogue, Hobbinol (Gabriel Harvey) says to Di^on, who is expressing Spenser's thoughts of the Church — *' Now, Diggon, I see thou speakest too plain ; Better it is a Uttle to feign And cleanly cover that cannot be cured ; Such ill as is forced mought needs be endured." *" Bynempt, named. 21 A shepherd great in gree, great in degree, or rank. Edmtind Grindal, who >vas sixty years old in 1579, had been chaplain to Ridley, and was an exile under Mary. After the accession of Elizabeth he become Master of Siieuser's own college at Cambridge, Pembroke Hall, and Bishop of London. In 1570 he became Archbishop of York, and in 1575 Arch- bishop of Canterbury. He obeyed the admonition " Search the Scrip- tures," and encouraged to the utmost of his power such obedience in others. Especially he encouraged among the reformed clergy what were called (after the " schools of the prophets " named in the Old Tes- tament) prophesyings or meetings for the free discussion and solution of ditEculties in the s;\cred text. The divine, he held, should seek fully to tmderstand himself what he expl a i n ed to his people, and should boldly face whatever doubts arose. The custom of the prophesyings was that the ministei-s within a precinct met on a week day in some principal town where there was some ancient and grave minister that was president, and a lay auditory was admitted. Then the ministers, beginning at the yotmgest, discussed some passage of Scripture that contained a difficulty, each speaking for about a quarter of an hour. The whole meeting, which opened and closed with prayer, lasted for about two hours. Before the assembly dissolved, the president gave out the passage that was to be discussed on the nest occasion. Grindal, and all who were of Spenser's way of thought, followed TO A.l>. 1J0:J.J SHOKTEE POEMS. 209 But hath been long ypcnt.^ One day he siitc upon a hill (■As now thou wuuUlest mo. But I am tauglit hy Algrind'-s ill To love the low aegiec) : '220 For sitting so with harud scal[i. An eagle soared high, Thatj weening his white head was chalk, A shell-fish down lot fly ; She ween'd the shell-fish to have broke, But therewith bruis'd his brain :- So now astoniod with the stroke. He lies m ling'ring pain. Mornll. Ah ! good Algrind I his hap was ill, But shall be better in time. 230 Now farewell, shepherd, sith this hill Thou hast such doubt to clime. Latimer in dwelling rniicli aipon tlie need of faithful preaching as a foremost office of the Church. Others, aiuoug whom was the Queen, held that free preaching' led to the multiplication of divei*sities of doctrine, the encouragement of doubts and heresies, and loss of peace by the weakening of Unity witliin the Church. For that reason Eliza- beth, who had also the strongest political reason for desiring to abate I'eligious feuds, would have liked even the restriction of all preaching to the Homilies appointed by the Chiu'ch, for thus there would be assiu'ed the preaching of the same opinions to all the people. She called upon the Archbishop of Canterbury to issue an injunction against the prophesjT.ngs. In reply to this requii-emeut Grindal, as archbishop, addressed to her in 1576 a letter of exT>ostiUation, and said in it, " Surely I cannot man-el enough how this sti-ange opinion should once enter your miud, that it should be good for the Chiu-ch to have few preachers." He maintained in the letter his opposite opinion from Scripture and from the daily experience of their time ; then he described and justified the prophcsyiugs, and said, *' I am forced with all humility, and yet plainly, to profess, that I cannot with safe conscience, and without the offence of the Majesty of God, give my assent to the suppressing of the said exercises ; much less can I send out any injunction for the utter and universal subversion of the same. I say with Saint Paiil, ' I have no i^ower to destroy, but only to edify ; ' and with the same apostle, ' I can do nothing agrainst the truth, but for the truth." H it be your Majesty's pleasure, for this or any other cause, to remove me out of this place, I will with all humility yield thereunto, and render again to 3"our Majesty that I received of the same. I consider with myself QnoJ hocvendnni est incidere in manus dei viventh " [That it is a fearfid thing to fall into the hands of the hving Grod]. "I consider also, Quod qui facit contra conncietdiam {diviuis jurihus nixam) adlficat ad Gehcnnam" [That he who acts against conscience (resting on God's laws) builds for Gehenna. — Quoted from Cyprian]. "'And what should I win, if I gained' (I will not say a bishopric, but) 'the whole world, and lose mine own soul?' Bear with me, I beseech you, Madam, if I choose rather to offend your earthly Majesty thnn offend the heavenly Majesty of God." The Queen held by her resohition, and sent her o^vw command by her letters to the rest of the bishops wholly to put down the exercises. In Jime, 1577, Grindal was, by order of the Privy Coimcil, confined to his house and sequestered for sis mouths. In the following January, since, " still esteeming himself not to have done amiss, he would not ask pardon wliich supposed a fault," there was a question of depriving him ; but he remained under sequesti-a- tion only, and in 158l>— the year after the publication of this poem of Spenser's— Archbishop Grindal being still under sequestration, Aylmer, Bishop of Loudon, presided at the Convocation of the Clergy. In 1582, vnrits were again issued in the archbishop's own name, but Grindal had been losing his eyesight, and was by that time permanently blind, besides being still distasteful to the Queen. He offered resignation of his see. As Thomas Fuller afterwards described his position, " being really blind more with grief than age, he was willing to put off his clothes before he went to bed. and in his lifetime to resign his pla^^e to Dr. Whitgift ; who refused such acceptance thereof. And the Queen, commiserating his con- dition, was graciously pleased to say, that as she hatl made him so he should die an archbishop ; as he did, July 6th, 15&3." 1 I'pcnt, pent up, confined. 2 ^ji eagle, &c. The royal eagle, wh'^ gave a fatal blow to the good Algrind by not understanding whr.t his head was for, represents, of 27 In the next year (1.580) Spenser went to Ireland as secretary to the new Lord Deputy, Lord Grey of Wilton, the friend and patron to whom George Gas- coigne addressed his "Steel Glass." Spenser took with him the " Faerie t^ueene," already for some time begun. In Ireland, before the end of tlie j'ear 1.560, Edmund Spenser, who had been with Sidney in London, first came into contact ^\^th Walter Raleigh ; Spenser, not yet housed at Kilcohnan, was then acting as secretary to Lord Grey, who was cnish- ing a hostile settlement of Spaniards ar»d Italians in a fort upon the coast, and Walter Rah-igli was there as a captain emploj-ed in the enter]irise. KiLCOLMAN Tower. Raleigh was of like age with Spenser. At seven- teen he had left Oxford to fight in France as a volunteer with the Huguenots. He had come home and was in the Middle Temple, twenty-four years old, when he wi'ote the lines we read lately in praise of George Gascoigne's " Steel Glass," liis earliest known verse. Then Walter Raleigh fought against Spain, side by side with the Reformers in the Netherlands ; made a venture at sea wtli his half brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert; and in 1580 went with a captain's commission into Ireland, wheie Gilbert also wivs serving. In 1583 Gilljert and Raleigh were ofi' asrain to found a colonv bevond the seas. Again they were without good fortune, and it was on his way home from Newfoundland that Sir Humj)hrey Gilbert was lost in his little ship, the course, Elizabeth ; and Si)enser contrives to utter bis opinion by making an old story of the manner of the deatb of .Eschylus serre for a parable. The original story was thus told by the writer of the short life of iEschylus in the Medicean MS. of his Tragedies, at Florence :— iEschyliis having left Athens for Sicily, was there '• held in hiijb honour by the tyrant Hiero and the people of Gela, but survived only three years, and died at an advanced age in the following manner : — An eagle having picked up a tortoise, and not being able to get at its prey, dropped it down on the rocks by way of smashing the shell, when it fell on the poet and killed him. He had been forewarned by the oracle, A stroJ^e from Heaven shall slaij flier." Thomalin, as " E. K." would put it, "lest his remembrance and skill in zoology should seem to exceed the meanness of the Ijerson," describes the tortoise as a shell-fish. 210 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. La.u. 1579 Squirrel, of ten tons, his last words being the gallant cry to a companion boat, " Courage, my friends ! We are as near heaven by sea a.s on the land." Still Raleigh did not lluich from tlie resolve to colonise, and he next made choice of the shores which it pleased our maiden c(neen to name, after herself, Vu-ginia. Tlie boUl spirit of adventure made Ocean's Love to Cynthia." The Queen gave him ricli monojiolies and offices of state. He had married wlien (in 1.5'J5) he made his wonderful voyKge up the Orinoco, and wrote his account of "the Discovery of the Empire of Guiana, with a relation of the city of Manoa, which the Spaniards call El Dorado." His life was a part of the life of the great Elizabethan ._^.ii \\'ALri;K 1;alki liiiu ricli. His ]irivateers took wealth from Spain. Tlie Queen favoured him, knighted Jiim in 1.58.5. She gave him also forfeited lands in Ireland, and he was again near Spenser when he went to \-isit them. Spenser, an English ci^^l servant in Ireland, re- ceived about the same time his gi'ant of a castle witli some three thousand acres forfeited by the Earl of Desfficnd at Kilcolman, and sang of Raleigh when he Yisited him tliere as " the Sliepherd of the Ocean." It was Raleigh wlio brought Spenser to court when, in 1590, the first tlu'ee books of the " Faerie Queene " were published. Raleigh had then written his lost poem " Of the time, his history is blended with its chronicles. His energy, disdainful in its strength, made enemies. Under Elizabeth, Raleigh served England and himself as well, being a shepherd of the ocean, chiefly occu- ))ied on that broad plain in fleecing the flocks of Spain. The cause of God was to be helped and his own pocket filled by raids upon the great upliolder of civil and religious despotism ; he seemed to have dis- covered among otlier things the way to serve both God and Mammon. It was after the deatli of Eliza- beth that Raleigli's ruin came. In this Elizabctliau time he joined thouglit with deed, and was only the more strenuous in action because as a poet he could feel and dare. These vei-ses are his : — ,0 A.l/, loOJ.J SHOETER POEilS. 211 Tell Fortune of her blindness ; THE soul's ERUAXI). Toll Nature of decay ; Go, Soul, the body's guest, Tell Friendship of imkindncss ; Upon a tliaiikless arrant : Tell .Justice of delay : Fear not to touch the best ; And if they will reply, The truth shall he thy warrant ; Then give them all the lie. 60 Go, since I needs must die, And give the -world the lie. Tell Arts they have no soundness. But vary by esteeming ; Say to the Court, it glows TeU Schools they want profoundness, And shines like rotten wood ; And stand too much on seeming : Say to the Church, it shows If Arts and Schools reply. What's good, and doth no good : 10 Give arts and schools the Ue. If Church and Court reply. Then give them both the lie. Tell Faith it's fled the city : TeU how the country erreth; Tell Potentates, thc>- live TeU, manhood shakes off pity : Acting by others' action ; TeU, ^•irtue least prefen-cth : 70 Not loved unless they give, Not strong, but by a faction : And if they do reply, Spare not to give the lie. If Potentates reply. Give Potentates the Ue. So when thou hast, as I Commanded thee, done blabbing,— Tell men of high condition, Although to give the lie That manage the estate. 2(; Deserves no less than stabbing :— Their purpose is ambition, Stab at thee he that wiU, Theii' practice only hate : No stab the Soul can kiU. And if they once reply. Then give them all the He. He wrote tliis also : — THE ADVICE. Tell them that bravo it most. They beg for more by spending, Many desire, but few or none deserve ■SMio, in their greatest cost. To win the fort of thy most constant will ; Seek nothing but commending : Therefore take heed ; let fancy ne\-er swerve And if they make reply, But unto him that wUl defend thee still : Then give them all the lie. 30 For this be sure, the fort of fame once won. FareweU the rest, thy happy days are done! Tell Zeal it wants devotion ; Tell Love it is but lust ; Many desire, but few or none deserve Tell Time it is but motion ; To pluck the flowers, and lot the leaves to faU ; Tell Flesh it is but dust : Therefore take heed ; let fancy never swerve And wish them not reply. But unto him that wiU take leaves and all : 10 For thou must give the lie. For this be sure, the flower once plucked away. Farewell the rest, thy happy days decay I Tell Age it daily wasteth ; Tell Honoivr how it alters ; Many desire, but few or none deserve Tell Beauty how she blasteth ; To cut the com, not subject to the sickle ; TeU Favour how it falters : 40 Therefore take heed ; let fancy never swerve. And as they shall reply. But constant stand, for mowers' minds are fickle : Give everj' one the lie. For this be sure, the crop being once obtained. Farewell the rest, the soil will be disdained. Tell Wit how much it wrangles In tickle points of nieeness; And this : — TeU Wisdom she entangles THE SILENT LOVER. Herself in over-wiseness : And when they do reply, Straight give them both the lie. Passions are Ukened best to floods and streams : The shaUow murmur, but the deep are dimrb ; So, when affections >-ield diseoirrse, it seems Tell Physic of her boldness ; The bottom is but shallow whence they come. Tell Skill it is pretension ; Tell Charity of coldness ; 50 They that are rich in words, in words discover That they are poor in that which makes a lover. Tell Law it is contention : And as they do reply. Wrong not, sweet empress of my hetul, So give them stiU the lie. The merit of true passion. With thinking th.it he feels no smart 1 A.mnf, erraud. That sues for no compassion; !0 212 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. U-O. 15'9 ."^iiice if my plaints serve not to approve The conquest of thy hcauty, It comes not from defect of love But from excess of duty. For knowing that I sue to serve A saint of such perfection, As all desire, but none deserve, A place in her afi'ection, I rather choose to want relief Than venture the revealing ; ^^^lere glory recommends the gi'ief, Despair distrusts the healing. 20 He smarteth most that hides his smart, And sues for no compassion. On the iiight before King James I. obliged Spain by sending Sii' Walter Raleigh to the block, the snnfl' of Jiis candle snggesting to him a thonght like Otliello's " Put out the light, and then — put out the light," he made tliis coujilet : — SIR AV. RALEIGH ON THE SNUFF OF A CANDLE THE NIGHT BEFORE HE DIED. " Cowards fear to die ; but corn-age stout, Kather than live in snufi, will be put out." Fekshurst Castle. (From Biatjlcij's " Beauties of England and TTaifs.") Thus those desires that aim too high For any mortal lover, \\'Tien reason cannot make them die, Discretion doth them cover. Yet, when discretion doth bereave The plaints that they should utter. Then thy discretion may perceive That silence is a suitor. Silence in love bewrays more woe Than words, though ne'er so witty : A beggar that is dumb, you k-now, Slay challenge double pity. Then wrong not, dearest to my heart, ily true, though secret, passion : 30 Philip Sidney was born in 1.5.54, at Pensluirst Castle, in Kent. The castle luul l)een granted to Philip's grandfather. Sir William Sidney, by King Edward VI., and was inherited by Sir William's only son, Henry Sitbiey, Philip's father. Sir Henry mai-ried Lady Maly Dudley, sister to the Robei-t Dudley who in 1.564 became Earl of Leicester. In the time of Plnlip Sidney's boyhood his fother lived at Ludlow Castle a.s Lord President of Wales ; Pliilip was, therefore, bred in Shrop.shire, and became one of the first pupils in the famous scliool at Shrewsbury. Shrewsb\n-v School was opened in 1502, raid its tirst liead-master entered during his seven j'ears of office 875 scholars ; Philiji Sidney and his friend Fulke Gre\-ille, afterwards Lord Brooke, being among them. TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. When Sitbiey had passed from Shrewsbury to Christ- cliurch, Oxford, his father served the Queen as repre- sentative of lier authority in Irehmd as well as in Wales. Sidney left Oxford at seventeen, without a Botli Gosson's " School of Abuse " nntl Sidney's " Defence of Poesy" are ^ven hy Mr. Arber, in liis " English Reprints," with full introductory details, each for sisiience. some called the Reformed Poetry. This was Englisii verse written in I^atin measures, with abandonment of rhyme. Here, for exani]ile, are two poems taken from the "Arcadia," the first written in Latin elegiac verse, the second in sapphics. That we may not miss any suggestion of quantity, the old spelling is left unaltered. DORUS PL.WING ON THE LUTE. Fortune, Naturc,'Loue, long haue conteniletl about nio, \\Tiich should most miseries cast on a wormo that 1 am. Fortune thus 'gan say : " Jliserye and misfortune is all one, And of misfortfine Fortune hath onoly the gift. With strong foes on land, on sea with eontraric tempests. Still doe I crosse this wretch, whatso he takoth in hand." " Tush, tush," said Nature, " this is all but a trifle ; a man's selfe Giues haps or mishaps, cu'n as lie ordcreth his heart. But so his humor I frame, in a mould of eholer adustcd," That the delights of Hfe shall be to him dolorous." 10 Loue smiled, and thus said : " AVant ioyn'd to dcsu-e is \-nhappie ; But if he nought doe desire, what can HeracHtus aile ? None but I workes by Desire : by Desire haue I kindled in his soule Infernall agonies into a beautie diuine : ^^'^lcre thou, poore Nature, left'.st all thy due glorie to Fortime, Her vertue is soucraignc, Fortune a vassall of hers." Nature abasht went backe : Fortune blusht : yet she rcplide thus : " And eu'n in that Loue shall I rcserue liim a spite." Thus, thus, alas, wofuU by Nature, vnhappi(> by Fortune, But most wretched I am, now Loue awakes my Desire. 20 ZELM.\XE. If mine eyes can spcake to doe heartie ciTand, Or mine eyes' language she doe hap to iudge of, So that eyes' message be of her receiued, Hope, we doe hue yet. But if eyes faile then when I most doe need them, Or if ej-es' language be not ^-nto her knowne, So that eyes" message doe returne reiected, Hope, we do both die. Yet dj-ing and dead, doe we sing her honour ; So become our tombes monuments of her praise, 10 So becomes our losse the trimnph of her gaine : Hers be the glorie. If the spheares senselcsso doe yet hold a musiqtK^ If the swan's sweete voice be not heard but at death. If the mute timber when it hath the life lost Yeeldeth a lute's tune ; Ar-e then humane mindes priuiledg'd so meanly. As that hatefull Death I'an abridge tlieui of powro "With the vowe of truth to record to all worlds That we be her spoiles ? "20 Thus, not ending, ends the due jiraise of her praise : Fleshly vaile eonsivmes : but a soule hath his life, ■\\Tiieh is held in loue : loue it is that have ioynd Life to tliis our soule. But if eye.s can speake to doe hearty errand, Or mine eyes' language; she doth hap to iudge of, So that eyes' message be of her receiued, Hope, we doe Uue yet. 2 yldy, there was a pomp to follow, and there was the love of ti"ue friends by its side. - See page 156. In the first-quoted Sonnet-—" True Beauty Virtue is " — the order of the two rhymes in the quatrains is not Petrarclian (Petrarch's order being a, h, h, a; n, '-, h, a). When the order of rhyme in one quatrain is varied, as it may be, the other should answer to it exactly — that is to say, a, b, a, h must be paired with «, b, a, h, not, as here, with b, a, h, a. Modem cliange of pronuncia- Astrophel and Stella series. The suggestion in that which is first quoted runs through the series, identi- fying, although not by any niinute straining of allegory, Stella with Virtue. Literaiy clubs in Italy were in Sidney's time torturing Petrarch's verses into shapes of forced ingenuity. He warns us against so dealing with his verse. It speaks for itself if we ^vill suffer it to do so. TRUE BEAUTY VIRTUE IS. It is most true that eyes are fomi'd to servo The inward hght, and that the heavenly part Ought to be King- ; from whose rules who do swcr\'e, Rebels to nature, strive for their own smart. It is most true, what we call Cupid's dart An image is, which for ourselves we carve, And, fools, adore in temple of our heart, Till that good god make church and churchmen starve. True, that True Beauty Virtue is ijideed, A\Tiereof this Beauty can be hut a shade tion has also in this Sonnet accidentally parted one pair of rhymes, "carve" and "starve," from its fellows, "serve" and "swerve." The other Sonnets are all regular. lu that on " Stella," and that on " Her Eyes," the two in which the rhymes of the first eight lines are not arrauflred in Petrarch's manner, the quatrains are perfectly sjnnmetrical, and the riprht structure of the Sonnet is preserved. Observe also how, as to its inner life, each Sonnet of Sidney's is true to the structiu-e that allows the two quatrains, forming the first eight lines, for the introduction of the thought, and the two terzettes, forming the last six lines, for its delivery. 216 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 W'liich elements w-itli mortal mixture breed. True, that on earth we arc hut pilgTims made, And should in sold up to our coimtry move : True : and yet true — that I must Stella love. These are from the same series — viktue's couet. Queen Virtue's Court, which some call Stella's face, Prepar'd by Nature's choicest firmitui-e, Hath his front built of alabaster pm-e ; Gold is the covering; of that stately jjlace ; The door, by which sometimes comes forth her grace. Red porphyr is, which lock of pearl makes sure, AVhose porches rich — which name of cheeks endure — Marble, mixt red and white, do interlace. The «-indows now, through which this heav'nly guest Looks o'er the world, and can find nothing such "Which dare claim from those lights the name of best. Of touch they are, that without touch do touch, 'N^Tiich Cupid's self from Biauty's mind did draw : Of touch tiiey are, and poor I am their straw. love's lessoss. Alas, have I not pain enough, my friend. Upon whose breast a fiercer gripe doth tire Than did on him who first stale down the tire,' ■\\'hile Love on mo doth all his quiver spend, — But with yom- rhubarb words ye must contend, To grieve me worse, in saying that desire Doth plunge my well-form'd soul even in the mire Of sinful thoughts, which do in ruin end ? If that be sin which doth the manners frame. Well staid with truth in word and faith of deed, Ready of wit, and fearing nought but shame ; If that be sin, wliich in tixt hearts doth breed A loathing of all loose unchastitie, — Then Love is sin, and let me sinful be. Next let us take an image of Virtue that eau bear the heat and burden of the day while otlier eartlily fairnesses fiincli, as Spenser' s Duessa did, wlien she had beguiled the Red Cross Knight into receiving her, — " For golden Phcebus, now that mounted high From fiery wheels of his fair chariot, Hm'led his beams so scorching cruel hot That living creatures mote it not abide ; A/id his tn'ir hdt/ if onliired noty This is Sidney's version of the thought : — THE sun's kiss. In highest way of heaven the sun did ride. Progressing then from fair Twins' golden place, ' Wlio first stale dotrn the fii-e. Pi-omethens, for stealiiiir fire from heaven, was cbaiued, by commaud of Jove, to a rock ou Mount Caucasus, wliere (in tlie "Prometheus Bound" of .^schyhis ; Miss Swanwick's translation) Hermes thus pronounced his doom ; — " Zeus' winged hound, the eagle red with gore. Shall of thy flesh a huge flap rudely tear ; Coming, luibiddeu guest, the live-long day He on thy black-gnawed liver still shall feast. But of such pangs look for no term, until Some god. successor of thy toils, appear. Willing- down Hades' royless gloom to wend. And round the murky depths of Tartaros." Hav'ing no mask of clouds before his face. But streaming forth of heat in his chief pride ; Wlien some fair latlies, by hard promise tied, On liorseback met liim in liis furious race ; Yet each prepar'd, with fans' well-shading grace, From that foe's wounds their tender skins to hide. Stella alone with face unarmed marcht, Either to do Uke him which open shone, Or careless of the wealth, because her own. Yet were the hid and meaner beauties parcht ; Her dainties bare went free : the cause was this, — The sun, that others burn'd, did her but kiss. A few more of these sonnets must suffice : — STELLA. The wisest scholar of the wight most wise By Pluebus' doom,- \s-ith sugared sentence says, That Virtue, if it once met with our eyes, Strange flames of Lo\'e it in oiu- souls would raise. But for that man with pain this truth descries, — Mliiles he each thing in Sense's balance weighs, And so nor will nor can behold those skies A\Tuch inward sun to heroic mind displays, — Virtue of late, with ^■il-tuous care to stir Love of herself, took Stella's sliape, that she To mortal eyes might sweetly shine in her. It is most true ; for since I her did see, Virtue's great beauty in that face I prove. And find th' effect, for I do burn in Love. STELLA XO ALLEGORY. You that with Allegory's curious frame (_)f others' chikb-en changelings use to make, With me those pains, for God's sake, do not take ; I list not dig so deep for brazen fame. AMien I say Stella, I do mean the same Princess of beauty, for whose only sake The reuis of Love I love, though never slake,^ - Plato, the disciple of Socrates. The reference is to Plato's " Sym- posixim," in wliieh there is a festival at the house of the young poet Agatbo, who celebi-ates his achievement of a tragic victory. A minsti-el girl comes ; is dismissed ; the guests agree that to-day tliey will drink only as they please, and have use of their brains. They undertake to use them in the piuise of Love. When it comes to the turn of Socrates, he professes to repeat what he has heard from Diotime, the Mautineiau stranger, skilled in divination. I give the substance of the doctrine as Dr. E. D. Hampden briefly worded it in liis book on "The Fathers of Greek Philosophy." Socrates said Diotime had taught liim " that Love had not for its true object the gratification of this or that particular desire, but only ' the good,' with the possession of that good for ever. How he had further learned fi-om her that all that effort of love which is observed in the world was a seeking, to the utmost, an iiumortahty of being and happiness ; that which in itself is mortal, thus preserving its identity, and realising its immortal existence by successive renovations of self : jxtst as personal identity rem.aius. whilst changes are constantly proceeding in the mind and body of the individual. Whilst (as she explained to him further, he said) this etiort manifested itself in various ways in the world — in some, in sensual indidgence ; in some, in the love and care of their offspring ; in some, in the pui'suit of fame ; in some again, in works of intellect, or in labours for the benelit of men, by implanting in other minds the principles of know- ledge and virtue, it could never obtain its full gi-atification in the present condition of being, but must go on, striving still, from low to higher gi-ouud, step by step, becoming larger and more general in its aim, imtil at length it realises to itself the bright vision of the intrinsically beautiful and divine." This energj- is " Platonic love," of which, even in connecting it vnth Astrophel and Stella sonnets the name h;is been misapplied, and made to stand, as it does, viUgarlyi for a mere stagnant pool of passion without manliness. ^ Slake, slack. TO A. P. IfiW.] SHORTER POEMS. 217 And joy therein, though nations count it shame. I lieg no subject to use elixjuence, Xor in hid ways do guide philosophy ; Look at my hands for no such quintessence : But know that I in pm-e simplicity Breathe ovit the flames which liurn within my heart. Love only reading unto me this art. HER EYES. O eyes, which do the spheres of beauty move : A\Tiose beams be joys, whose joys all Virtues be ; "WTio, while they make Love conquer, conquer Love ; The schools where Venus hath Icarn'd chastity : O eyes, where humble looks most glorious prove, Onely-lov'd tjTants, just in cnielty ; — Do not, do not, from poor me remove. Keep still my zenith, ever shine on me ! For though 1 never see them, but straightways Mv life forgets to noiu-ish languisht sprites ; Yet still on me, eyes, dart down your rays I And if from majesty of sacred lights Oppressing mortal sense my death proceed. Wrecks triimiphs be which Love high set doth breed. SILENT WORSHIP. Because I breathe not love to every one, Nor do not use set coloiu's for to wear. Nor nomish special locks of vowed hair. Nor give each speech a full point of a groan, The courtly m-mphs, acquainted ■nith the moan Of them which in their lips Love's standard bear : A^Tiat, he ! (say they of me) : now I dare swear He cannot love ; no, no, let him alone I And think so still, so Stella know my mind. Profess in deed I do not Cupid's art ; But you, fair maids, at length this true shaU find. That his right badge is but worn in the heart : Dumb swans, not chattering pies, do lovers prove ; They love indeed who quake to say they love. Stella, still one %vitli Yii-tue, rebukes lower passions of the Ln^er, expi-essed only to teaeli liow a true nature triumphs over them ; and these two detached sonnets may lie read as summing up a series that is in no discord with the poet's life : — EARTHLY DESIRE. Thou blind man's mark, thou fool's self-chosen snare. Fond fancy's scum, and dregs of scattered thought : Band of all erils ; cradle of causeless care ; Thoti web of will, whose end is never \\Tought : Desire 1 Desire ! I have too dearly bought, With price of mangled mind, thy worthless ware ; Too long, too long, asleep thou hast me brought, "\\T\o should' st my mind to higher things prepare. But yet in vain thou hast my ruin sought : In vain thou mad'st me to vain things aspire : In vain thou kindlest all thy smoky fire ; For Virtue hath this better lesson taught, — Within myself to seek my only hire, Desiiing nought but how to kill Desire. ETERNAL LOVE. Leave me, Love which reachest but to dust. And thou, my Mind, aspire to higher things ; Grow rich in that which never taketh rust : Whatever fades but fading pleasure brings. 28 Draw in thy beams, and humble all thy might To that sweet yeke where lasting freedoms bu : "WTiich breaks the clouds, and opens forth the light That doth both shine, and give us sight to see ! O take fast hold : let that Ught be thy guide In this small course which birth draws out to dc;ath ; And think how c\t1 becometh him to slide, ■\Vho seekcth heav'n and comes of heav'nly breath. Then farewell, world ; thy uttermost 1 see : Eternal Love, maintain thy Life in me 1 In the following lines Sidney left record of his affection for his two chosen friends and fellow-poets, Fulke Greville and E2i. His successor, Richard Whiting, who objected to the dissolution of the monasteries, was seized at Sharpham, kept about two months a prisoner, then dragged on a hurdle to the top of Tor Hill, and there hanged and quartered for " robbing Glastonbury Church." Henry VIII. took all, without being hanged for it, and granted Sharpham to Edward Dyer, the poet's father. There, no very long time afterwards, Sidney's friend was boi-n. Dyer was sent in due trine to Oxford, left the Univereity without having graduated, travelled beyond seas, came home, and served in the court of Elizabeth, by whom he was employed in several embassies. He was one of an embassy to Denmark in the year 1589, three years after Sidney's death ; and in that year George Putteidiam published an " Art of English Poesy," in which Dyer is praised as " for elegy most sweet, solemn and of high conceit." Mr. Edward Dyer was not a knight in his friend Sichie3-'s life-time. He was not knighted until the year 1596, when he was also made Chancellor of the Garter. He died in 1607, and was buried in the chancel of St. Saviour's, Southwark. From among the few pieces that remain in evidence of his genius, let us take these two : — .MV JIIXD TO JIE A KINGDOM IS. j\Iy mind to me a kingdom is, .Such present joys therein I find. That it excels all other bliss That earth affords or grows by kind : Though much I want which most would have, Yet still mv mind forbids to crave. No princely pomp, no wealthy store. No force to win the victory, No wily wit to salvo a sore. No shape to feed a loving eye ; To none of these I j-ield as thrall : For why ': My mind doth ser\'e for all. 10 I see how plenty suffers oft. And hasty climbers soon do fall , I see that those which are aloft Mishap doth thi-eaten most of all ; They get with toil, they keep ,vith fear : Such c;iros my mind could never bear. Content I live, this is my stay ; I seek no more than may suffice ; I press to bear no haughty sway : Look, what I lack my mind suppHes ; Lo, thus I triumph like a king. Content with that my mind doth bring. Some have too much, yet still do crave ; I little have, and seek no more. They are but poor, though much they have. And I am rich with little store : They poor, I lich ; they beg, I give ; They lack, I leave ; they pine, I live. I laugh not at another's loss ; I grudge not at another's pain ; No worldly waves my mind can toss ; My state at one doth still remain : I fear no foe, I fa^vn no fiiond ; I loathe not life, nor dread my end. Some weigh their pleasure by their lust. Their wisdom by their rage of wQl ; Their treasm'e is their only trust, A cloaked craft their store of skill : But all the pleasure th.at I find Is to maintain a quiet mind. 20 :J0 40 TO i.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 219 My wealth is health and pert'ect ease ; My conscience clear my choice defence ; I neither seek by bribes to please. Nor by deceit to breed offence : Thus do I Uve ; thus -n-iU I die ; Would all did so as well as I ! He that his mirth hath lost, 'WTiose comfort is dismayed, Whose hope is vain, whose faith is scorned, AVhose trust is aU betrayed, If he have held them dear. And cannot cease to moan, Come, lot him take his place by me ; He shall not rue alone. But if the smallest sweet Be mixed with aU his sour ; 10 If in the daj-, the month, the year, He find some lightsome hour, Then rest he by himself ; He is no mate for me, "UTiose hope is fallen, whose succour void, "Whose heart his death must be : Yet not the ^\-ished death, "Which hath no plaint nor lack, "Wliich, making free the better part. Is only nature's sack : 20 Oh me I that were too well ; My death is of the mind, "Which always )-iclds extreme pains. Yet keeps the worst behind. As one that lives in show, But inwardly doth die ; Wliose knowledge is a bloody field "Where all hope slain doth lie ; Whose heart the altar is ; A\Tiose spii-it, the sacrifice 30 Unto the powers, whom to appease No sori'ows can suffice ; "UTiosc fancies are like thoi-ns. On which I go by night ; "Wliose arguments arc like a host That force hath put to flight : "Whose sense is passion's spy ; "Whose thoughts like ruins old Of Carthage, or the famous town.- That Sinon bought and sold, 40 "UTiich still before my face My mortal foe doth laj- ; "UTiom love and fortune once advanced, jVnd now hath cast away. thoughts, no thoughts, but wounds, Sometimes' the seat of joy. Sometimes the chair of quiet rest. But now of all annoy. 1 Sometimes. "We still use " some time" in the same seiise of some Other time. I sowed the field of peace, My bliss was in the si)ring, 50 And day by day I ate the fruit That my life's tree did bring. To nettles now my com. My field is turned to flint, Where, sitting in the cypress shade, I read the hyacint." The joy, the rest, the life That I enjoyed of yore Came to my lot, that by my loss My smart might smart the more. 60 Thus to irahappy men The best frames to the worst ; O time, O place, words, looks. Dear then, but now accur.st ! In u-nx stood my delight. In is and x/iri/l my woe 1 My hoiTors fasten' d in the yea ; My hope hangs on the no. I look for no delight : Belief wiU come too late : 70- Too late I find, I find too well, Too well stood mj- estate. Behold, here is the end. And no thing here is sm-e ; Ah ! nothing else but plaints and cares Doth to the world endure. Forsaken first was I, Then utterly foi'gotten ; And he that came not to my faith, Lo ! my reward hath gotten. 8© Now, Love, where are thy laws. That make thy torments sweet ? "What is the cause that some through thee Have thought their death but meet i Thy stately chaste disdain. Thy secret thankfulness. Thy gi-ace reserved, thy common light That shines in worthiness, Oh that it were not so. Or that I could excuse ! 90 Oh that the wrath of jealousy My judgment might abuse ! frail unconstant kind, And safe in trust to no man ! No women angels are, and lo ! My mistress is a woman ! Yet hate I but the fault. And not the faulty one. Nor can I rid me of the bonds "Wherein I lie alone. 100 2 I read the hijacinth. Hyacinth was a youth in whom Zephyr and ApcOlo (wind and sirn) both delighted. But as he prefeiTed Apollo's company, jealous Zephyr, when Apollo sported with his favourite and threw the disc, raised such a breeze that Apollo's disc turned in its flight, struck Hyacinth upon the head, and killed him. Then the Earth, loving the sun-god, soothed his grief by changing the slain youtk's blood into the flowers called after him Hyacinths. 220 GASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [4. D. lo79 Alone I lie, whose like By love was never yet ; Xor rich, nor poor, nor old, nor young, Nor fond, nor full of -n-it. Hers still remain must I, By -n-rong, by death, liy shame ; 1 cannot blot out of my mind That love wTought in her name. I cannot set at nought That I have held so dear ; I cannot make it seem so far That is indeed so near. Nor that I mean henceforth This strange wUl to profess, I never wiU betray such trust. And fall to fickleness. Nor shall it ever fail That my word bare in hand ; I gave my word, my word gave me ; Both word and gift shall stand. Sith then it must lie thus, And this is all-to ill, I j-ield me captive to my cui'se, My hard fate to fulfil. The soKtary woods Jly city shall become ; The darkest den shall be my lodge, ^Vhereto no light shall come. Of heben black my board ; The woi-ms my meat shall be, "WTierewith my carcass shall be fed Till these do feed on me ; My wine, of Niobe, 1 INIy bed the craggy rock, My harmony the serpent's hiss, The shrieking owl my cock. 110 120 130 1 Wine, of Niohe. Tears. Niobe, daiigliter of Tantalus and wife of King Amphion, "being overproud of ber six sous and seven daughters thougbt herself greater than Lltoua, the mother of Apollo and Diana Tberefore Latona slew with darts of Apollo .and Diana tbe cbildi-en of Niobe, and her husband Amphion killed himself. Her grief is told by Ovid in a passage of the sixth book of his " Metamorphoses," which I give as trauslated iu Elizabeth's reign by Arthur Golding. The translation was first iniblished iu 1567. Niobe's sous were dead, her husband was dead, six of her seven daughter's were dead — *' At last as yet remained one ; and for to save that one. Her mother with her body whole did cliug about her fast, And wi'yiug her did over her her garments wholly cast. And cried out, ' Oh, leave me one, this little one yet save ; Of many but this only one, the least of all, I crave ! * But while she prayed for whom she prayed was killed. Then down she sat, Bereft of all her childl-en quite and dra.wing to her fate. Among her daughters and her sons and husband newly dead. Her cheeks wax hard ; the air could stir no hair- upou her head ; The colour of her face was dim, and clearly void of blood ; And sadly, under opeu .-^ds, her eyes itnmoved stood. In all her body was no life ; for even her very tongue And palate of her mouth was hard, aud each to other clung. Her pulses ceased for to beat, her neck did cease to bow. Her arms to stir, her feet to go, all power forwent as now. And into stone her very womb and bowels also bind, But yet she wept ; and being hoist by force of whirhng wiud, Was carried into Phi-ygie. There upon a mountain's top She weepeth still, in stone; fi-om stone the drerie tears do drop." My exercise nought else But raging agonies ; My books of spiteful Fortune's foOs And dreary tragedies. 140 15C 160 My walk the paths of plaint, My prospect into hell. With yisyphus and all his feres - In endless pains to dwell. And though I seem to use The poet's feigned style. To figui'o forth my woful plight, My fall and my e.xile, Yet is my grief not feigned. Wherein I starve and pine ; Who feeleth most shall find it least Comparing his with mine. My Song, if any ask. Whose grievous case is such ? Dv EKE thou let'st his name be known ; His foUy shows too much. But best were thee to hide, And never come to light ; For in the world can none but thee These accents sound aright. And so an end : my tale is told ; His life is but disdained Whose sorrows present pain him so His pleasures are full feigned. Fulke Gre^'ille, born in 1.5.34, was the only son of a father of the same name, who.se family seat was at Beaucliamp Court, in Warwicksliu-e, and who had married a daughter of Ralph Nevile, Earl of West- moreland. Fulke Greville, the poet, was born at Beaiieliamp Court ; he was eleven years old when his father was knighted, and over tifty when his father died. In his tenth year he was sent to Shrewsbury School. A boy of the same age, Philip Sidney joined the school at the same time, and on the roll of scholars Greville's name was the next entered after Sidney's. At Shrewsbury began the friendship that strengthened until death made it imperishable. In 1-568 Fulke GreAille, aged foui-teen, was admitted to Jesus College, Cambridge. When he had left Cam- bridge his heart stirred him to join the combatants in the Low Coiuitries, and he had already shijiped Ms horses when he Avas stopped by the Queen's man- date, her messenger being his friend Edward Dj^er. In other like attempts he was checked by the Queen, until he quietly jiermitted her to shut him ofl' from enterprise abroad. GreA-ille's close friendship for Philip Sidney, and his own worth, that we find proved by his poems, cau.sed Philip's fathex-, Sir Heniy Sidney, as Lord President of Wales, to secure - Feres, companions. 3 Dy ere thoii let'st his name he kno\en. The conceit of teUing his uame while declaring that he will not tell it, is of a piece with the rest of this " Fancy," which is but au exercise in the aii; of ingenious lamentation, a pleasant trial of skill upon the knightly theme to wliich, by convention, a lar-ge class of fashionable poems was still, iu Elizabeth's time, restricted. TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 221 to his son's friend veiy lucrative employment in the ci\al sei'vice of the Prmcipality. As Clerk of the Signet to the Council of Wales, Fulke Gre\-ille liad more than two thousand a year, when money Iiad at least four times its j)resent value ; and in 1583 — the year of Philip Sidney's marriage — he obtained a grant for life of the more valuable post of Secretary for the Principality. Thus well pro- vided for, and with ample private estate, Greville remained thi-oughout a long life lumiarried. In 1599 he was appointed for life Treasurer of the Navy; in 1G03, at the coronation of James I., he was made Knight of the Bath, and he had after- wards a grant of Warwick Castle. In 1G14 began a swift rise, from Under Treasurer to Treasui-er, and thence to the offices of Chancellor of the Exchequer and Frivj Councillor. In 1820 Fulke Greville became Lord Brooke ; taking his title from the family of Elizabeth, daughter and sole heu-ess of Fulke Gketille, Lord Brooke. From an Oi'l'jinal in the possession of Lord WiUoughhy dc BrokCt enfjravedfor "Lodge's Portraits." Robert Lord Brooke, who had married Sii- Fulke Greville, his grandfather, and added Brooke House, in Warwickshii-e, to his inheritance. Fulke Gi'e- ^•ille had been Lord Brooke for eight years when, in Brooke House, Holborn, at the age of seventy-four, he was stabbed in the back by an old servant wlio found that he had been left out of his master's will, and, therefore, in a crazy fit killed lioth Ids master and himself. The love of Greville's boyhood, of his j'outh, and of his maidiood, was the love still of his age ; for he directed that he .should be described on his monument only as " FuUce Greville, Servant to Queen Elizabeth, Councillor to King James, Friend to Sir Philip Sichiey." There were but two added words, and they described the stately tomb he had himself prepared in St. Mary's Church at War- wick : — " TropliEeum Peccati " (the trophy of sin). Sin brought into the world death, and tluis the stately marble raised over the dead was but sin's trophy. Except a few short poems that found their way into Miscellanies of Ids time, and the play of "Mu.stapha," published in 1G09, but not of his own pubUshiug, no verse of Fulke Greville's was prmted before his death. That he did wish his works to live and serve the world, is slio\\m by the fact that he revised and transcribed them all for publication. " Certaine learned and elegant Works," by Frdke Greville, Lord Brooke, apjieared in a folio volume in 1633, and his "Life of Sir Philip Sidney" was first published in 1G52, but there was no complete collection of his pi-ose and verse till the Rev. A. B. Grosart, in 1870, gave to them foiu- volumes of Hs privately printed " Fuller Wortliies' Library."' Yet Lord Brooke is a poet of real mai'k, weighty with thought always, hard to follow sometimes, and not .seldom quickened by the fire of genius, aglow ^\^th life and feeling, and flashing a wisdom like Bacop's into pithy musical Imes. It is to be remembered that Fidke Gre\'ille's verse represents forty years of mature life added to the measure of his friend Sidney's years. There is a sei'ies of a hundreoem with th& merely poetical suggestion of extreme emotion by a mind itself un- moved in the piece last quoted, Dyer's " Fancy." One might com- pare in like manner the two pieces quoted from Dyer himself. Tlie one of them that is strong with a real energy of thought and feeling finds its way straight to our hearts, and ranks with the best lyrics in the language. - M'eV-fare nothing, once a year. I am ready once a year, if need be, to say farewell to a Cynthia, who is nothing to me if her love be for another. TO A.D. l^iO'■^ J SHORTER POEMS. 223 The worth that 'svorthincss should move, Is Love, that is the how of Love ; And love as well the foster can, As can the mighty noble-man : — Sweet saint, 'tis true, you worthy be. Yet, without love, nought wortli to me. 30 Here men : — is ii strain of pliilosopliy on the desires of THE EABTHLY GLORIES. 10 20 Who worshii^s Cupid doth adore a boy ; Boys earnest are at first in their- delight, But for a new soon leave their deai-est toy, And out of mind as soon as out of sight : Their joys he dallyings and their wealth is play, They cry to have, and cry to cast away. JIars is an idol, and man's lust his sky. Whereby his glories still are full of woimds ; Who worships him, their fame goes far and nigh. But still of ruin and distress it sounds : Yet cannot all be won, and who doth live, Must room to neighbours and to strangers give. Those Mercuiists that upon humours work, And so make others' skill and power theii" own, Are like the climates wliich far northward lurk, And tlirough long winters must reap what is so'rni ; CIr like the masons, whose art, building well, Yet leaves the house for other men to dwell. -Alcrcury, Cupid, Mars, they be no gods. But himian idols, built up by Desii'e ; Fruit of oiu' boughs, whence heaven maketh rods. And babies too for child-thoughts that aspire : ^^^lo sees their glories, on the earth must piy; ^\^lo seeks true glory must look to the sky. The next is a delicate little strain that asserts man's constancy in love : — CCELICA AND PHILOCELL. In the time when herbs and flowers, Springing out of melting powers. Teach the earth that heat and rain Do make Cupid live again ; Late when Sol, like gxeat hearts, shows Largest as he lowest goes ; Crelica with Philoeell In fellowship together fell. C'O-'Hca her skin was fair. Dainty auburn was her hair ; Her hair Natm-e dyed brown To become the mom-ning gown Of Hope's death, which to her ej'es Offers thoughts for sacrifice. Philoeell was true and kind, Poor, but not of poorest mind : Though mischance, to harm affected, Hides and holdeth woi-tli suspected. He, good shepherd, loved well ; But Ccelica scom'd Philoeell. Through enamell'd meads they went. Quiet she, he passion-rent. Her worths to him hope did move ; Her worths made him fear to love. 10 20 His heart sigh'd and fain would show That which all the world did know : His heart sigh'd the sighs of fear. And dui-st not tell her, love was there. But as thoughts in troubled sleep Dreaming fear, and fearing weep, When for help they fain would cry, Cannot speak, and helpless lie. So while his heart full of pain Would itself in words complain, Pain of all pains, lover's fear. Makes his heart to silence swear. Strife at length those dreams doth break. His despair' taught Fear thus speak : " Ca'lica, what shall 1 say ? Y'ou, to whom all passions pray. Like poor flies that to the tire Where they burn themselves, aspire ; You, in whose worth men do joy That hope never to enjoy ; Where both grace and beauties framed That love being might be blamed : — Can true worthiness be glad To make hearts that love it, sad ? What meanB Nature in her jewel, To show Mercy's image cruel i" Dear, if ever in my days, Jly heart joy'd in others' praise; If I of the world did borrow Other ground for joy or sorrow ; If I better wish to be But the better to please thee ; I say, if this false be proved. Let me not love or not be loved ! But when Reason did invite All my sense to Fortune's light ; If my love did make my reason. To itself for thyself treason ; If, when Wisdom shewed me Time and thoughts both lost for thee, In those losses I did glory. For I could not more lose, sorry ; Ca>hca then do not scorn Love in humble humour borne ! Let not Fortune have the power Cupid's godhead to devour ; For I hear the wise-men tell. Nature worketh oft as well In those men whom Chance disgraceth, As in those she higher placeth. CoeUca, 'tis near a god To make even fortunes odd ; And of far more estimation Is creator than creation : Then, dear, though I worthless he. Yet let them to you worthy be, Whose meek thoughts are highly graced By your image in them placed." Herewithal, like one opprest With seU-bm-thens, he did rest ; Like amazed were his senses. Both with pleasure and offences. C'adica's cold answers show- That which fools feel, wise men know: ao 40 58 00 70 80 224 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 How self-pities have reflection Back into their own infection, 90 And that passions only move Stiings tun'd to one note of Love. She thus answers him with reason (Never to Desire in season) : " PhiloceU, if you love me, For you would beloved be, Your own will must be your hire, And Desire reward Desire. Cupid is in my heart sped, Where all desires else are dead ; 100 Ashes o'er Love's flames are cast. All for one is there disgrac'd. Make not then your own mischance ; Wake yourself from Passion's trance, And let Reason guide aifcction From despah' to new election." PhiloceU that only felt Destinies which Cupid dealt, Ko laws but Love-laws obejang, Thought that gods were won vnth. praying, 110 And with heart tix'd on her eyes, 'WTiere Love, he thinks, lives or dies, His words his heart with them leading, Tlius unto her dead love pleading : '• CccKca, if ever j-ou Loved have, as others do. Let my present thoughts be glassed In the thoughts which you have passed ; Let self-pity which you know. Frame true pity now in you ; 120 Let your forepast woe and glory Make you glad them you make sorry : Love revengeth like a god, When he beats he bums his rod : Who refuse alms to Desire, Die when drops would quench the fire. But if you do feel again Wliat peace is in Cupid's pain, Grant me, dear, your wished measure. Pains, but pains that be of pleasure; 130 Find not these strange things in me Which within yom- heart we see : For true honour never blameth Those that Love her servants nameth. But if your heart be so free As you would it seem to he, Nature hath in free hearts placed Pity for the poor disgraced." His eyes great with child with tears. Spies in her eyes many fears : 140 Sees, he thinks, that sweetness vanish Which all fears was wont to banish. Sees, sweet Love, there wont to play, Arm'd and drest to run away To her heart, where she alone Scometh all the world hut one. Ccelica, with clouded face Giving unto anger grace, T\Tiile she threat' ned him displeasure Making anger look like pleasure, 150 Thus in fury to him spake Words which make even hearts to quake : " PhiloceU, far from me get j-ou ! Men are false, wc cannot let j'ou Hiunble, and yet fidl of pride, Earnest, not to ho denied ; Now us, for not loving, blaming, Now us, for too much, defaming. Though I let you posies bear, ^\^lerein my name ciphered were. For I bid you in the tree Cipher down your name by me : For the bracelet pearl-Uke white. Which you stale from me by night, I content was you should carry Lest that you should longer tarry : Think you that you might encroacli To set kindness more abroach ? Think you me in friendship tied. So that notliing' be denied r Do you think that j-ou must live Bound to that which you will gi\r 'f PhiloceU, I say, depart 1 Blot my love out of thy heart I Cut my name out of the tree ! Bear not memory of me 1 My delight is all my care, AU laws else despised are. I will never rumour move. At least for one I do not love." Shepherdesses, if it prove, PhiloceU she once did love. Can kind doubt of true affection Merit such a sharp con'ection Y WTien men see you faU away. Must they \\-ink to see no day f Is it worse in him that speaketh Than in her that friendship brcaketh r Shepherdesses, when you change. Is your fickleness so strange •" Are you thus impatient still 'f Is yoiu' honoiu' slave to wiU ? They to whom you guilty be, Must not they yom- eiTor see ? May true mart>Ts at the tire Not so much as Ufe desire ? Shepherdesses, yet mark well, The martyrdom of PhiloceU : Rumour made his faith a scorn, Him, example of forlorn ; Feeling he had of his woe. Yet did love his overthi'ow ; For that she knew Love would boar, She to ■wrong him did not fear ; Jealousy of rival's grace In his passion got a place. But Love, lord of aU his powers, Doth so ride this heart of ours. As for our belo v' d abuses, It doth ever find excuses. Love tears Reason's law in sunder. Love is god, let Reason wonder For nor scorns of his affection. Nor despaii' in his election. Nor his faith damn'd for obeying. Nor her change, his hopes bctra_\-ing, 160 179 180 190 200 210 TO A.D 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 225 C;m make rhilocfU remove, But he CVrlica will love. Here my silly song is ended. Fair njTiiphs, be not you ofl'ouded, For as men that travell'd far For seen truths oft scorned are By their neighboiirs' idle lives, Who scarce know to please their wives ; So, though I have sung you more Than your hearts have felt before, Yet that Faith in Men doth dwell Who travels Constancy can tell.' 220 Tailpiece. From LyUj's " Eui^hiies" {Edition of 1£79). The next poem illustrates the spirit in which Lord Brooke looked at the relation of society to govern- ment ; despised tlie impotence of courtiers who stoop to power for the glory of displaying themselve.s chained with gold ; and saw the weakness of despotic rule : — THE SLAVES AND DARLINGS OF AUTHORITY. The little hearts where light- wing'd Passion leigns Move easily upward, as all frailties do ; Like straws to jet these follow princes' veins. And so by pleasing do corrupt them too : Whence as their raising proves kings can create. So states prove sick where toys bear staple-rate. Like atomi they neither rest, nor stand, Nor can erect ; because they nothing be But baby-thoughts, fed with Time-present's hand. Slaves and yet darlings of Authority ; 10 Echoes of \vTong, shadows of princes' might, AMiich glow-worm like by shining show 'tis night ; Curious of fame, as fold is to be fair ; Caring to Seem that which they would not Be ; Wherein Chance helps, since praise is Power's heir, Honour the creature of Authority : So as home high in giddy orbs of grace, These pictures are, which are indeed but Place. 1 Whoever sees mucli of the ways of the world can tell Constancy that there is faith in men. 29 And as the bird in hand, with freedom lost, Serves for a stale his fellows to betray, 20 So do these darlings rais'd at princes' cost Tempt man to tlu'ow his liberty away. And sacrifice Law, Church, all real things To soar, not in his own, but eagle's wings. Wliereby, like iEsop's dog, men lose their meat To bite at glorious shadows wliich they see ; And let fall those strengths which make all states great By free truths chang'd to servile flattery. Whence, while men gaze upon this blazing star. Made slaves, not subjects, they to tyrants are. 30 MYSTERIES OF NOBILITY. Virgiila ditina sorcerers call a rod Gather'd with vows and magic sacrifice Wliich, borne about, by influence doth nod Unto the silver, where it hidden lies ; WTiich makes poor men to these black arts devout, Rich only in the wealth which Hope finds out. Nobility, this precious treasure is. Laid up in seeiet mj'steries of state, King's creatiu'e, subjection's gilded bKss, Where grace, not merit, seems to govern fate : 10 Mankind I tliink to be tliis rod divine. For to tlie greatest ever they incline. Eloquence, that is but wisdom speaking well, The poets feign, did make the savage tame ; Of ears and heaits chain'd unto tongues they tell. I think Nobility to be the same : For be they fools, or speak they without wit, We hold them wise, we fools be-wonder it. In\-isible there is an art to go, They say that study Natme's secret woiks, 20 And art there is to make things gi eater show ; In Nobleness I think this seciet lurks: For place a coronet on whom you will. You straight see all gieat in him but his ill. DECLINE OF STATES. Man's Youth, it is a field of large desires Which, pleas'd within, doth all without them please ; For in this love of men live those sweet files That kindle woith and kindness unto praise : And where self-love most from her selfness gives, Man greatest in himself and others lives. Old Age, again, which deems this pleasure vain, Dull'd with experience of unthankfulness, Scornful of fame, as but effects of pain, Folds up that freedom in her nan-owness : 10 And for it only loves her omi dreams best, Scorned and contemned is of all the rest. Such working Youth there is, again, in Stjjie, Which at the first with justice, piety. Fame and reward, true instruments of fate. Strive to improve this frail humanity : By whicli as kings enlarge true woilh in us. So ci'owns again are well enlarged thus. CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 But States grow Old, when pi-inces turn away From honour, to take pleasure for their end ; -d For that a large is, this a nanow way, That wins a world, and this a few dark friends : The one, improving worthiness, spreads far; fnder the other good things prisoners are. Thus sceptres, shadow-like, grow short or long, As worthy or unworthy princes reign ; And must contract, cannot be large or strong, If man's weak humom-s real powers restrain : So that when Power and Nature do oppose, All hut the worst men are assur'd to lose. £0 For when respect, which is the strength of States, Grows to decline by kings' descent within, That Power's baby-creatures dare set rates Of scorn upon woi'th, honour upon sin : Then though kings, player-like, act Glory's part, Yet all within them is hut fear and art. The last illustrations of tlie genius of Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, shall be these two short poems on the state of man : — DESIRE OF THE EYES. Men that delight to multiply desire Like tellers are that take coin but to pay ; Still tempted to be false with little hire, Black hands except, which they would have away : For where Power wisely audits her estate, The exchequer-men's first recompense is hate. The little maid thrit wearoth out the day To gather flowers still covetous of more. At night when she with her desire would i>^ay And let her pleasure wanton in her store, 10 Discerns the first laid underneath the last, Wither'd, and so is all that we have past : Fix then on good desire, and if you find Ambitious dreams or fears of overthwart,' Changes, temptations, blooms of earthy mind, Yet wave not, since each change halh change of smart : For lest man should think flesh a seat of bliss, God works that His joy mixt with sorrow is. THE heart's desire. Three things there be in man's opinion dear, Fame, many Friends, and Fortune's dignities : False visions all, which in our sense appear, To sanctify Desire's idolatries. For what is Fortune but a wat'rj' glass Whose crystal forehead wants a steely back ? 'WTiere rain and storms bear all away that was, ^\'^lose ship alike both depths and shallows wrack ? Fame, again, which from blinding Power takes light. Both Cipsar's shadow is and Cato's friend; 10 The child of humour, not allied to right ; Li\-ing by oft exchange of winged end. 1 Ovcrfhwart, thwarting, cross, coutradictlon. ' tliweor," oblique, cross ; " thweorian," to thwart. First-Enjlish And many Friends, false strength of feeble mind, Betraying equals as true slaves to might. Like echoes still send voices down the wind, But never in adversity find right. Then JIan, though Virtue of extremities The middle be,- and so hath two to one By place and Natme constant enemies. And against both these no strength but her own, 20 Yet quit thou for her. Friends, Fame, Fortune's throne ; Devils, there many be, and gods but One. Such men as these — Raleigh and Philip Sidney, Greville and Dyer — were the near friends of Spenser. Sjienser, while earning his bread as an PJnglish official in Ireland, worked on at the "Faerie Queene," a poem of which enough had been written before he went to Ireland to enaVile his friend Harvey to express opinions about it. He had written also comedies in the manner of Ariosto whicli Harvey thought much better than the " Faerie Queene," but which the poet himself did not care to print. After serving for a time as private secretary to Lord Grey of Wilton, Spenser was, from 1581 to 1588, Clerk of Degrees and Recognizances in the Irish Court of Chancery, and for a few months in 1581 he had a lease of the lands and abbey of Enniscorthy in Wexford. He gave up the Clerkship in tlie Chancery Court for the office of Clerk to the Council of INIun- ster, which he held tUl aliout the time of the publication of the first three liooks of his "Faerie Queene" in the earlier part of the year 1590. In 1589 Raleigh had come into his neighbourhood, and, with Raleigh, Spenser came to London to aiTange the publication of his poem, and present it to the Queen. Spenser's whole plan comprehended two great poems, in one of which Arthur was to appear as Prince, in the other as King. One — that of which he has left us half — was to be in twelve books, and (corre.sponding to Ethics, or a study of the virtues of a man) was in allegorical form to paint man through all his jwwers for good striving heavenward. The Faerie Queen — Gloriana — for whom tlie knight win typifies each virtue is militant on earth, is the Glory of God. Each Virtue in combat with its opposing vices and impediments, also tyjjified in romance forms, finds at some point of the conflict a danger from the failure of its unassisted strength, and is then helped by the intervention of Prmce Arthur, who bears the shield of adamant, the shield of the Grace of God. In the working out of the allegory, not only is every page alive with the most prac- tical reference to the soul's battle in this life, but the battle Spenser painted was that of a soul born to the England of his time. The " Faerie Queene,'' rightly 2 Thougli Viriuc of c.itrcmitics t}ie mi'ddle be. Aristotle in his " Ethics," book ii., defined Virtue to be "a habit, with delibei*ate pre- ference, in a mean relatinir to ourselves, a mean defined by reason, and as the prndent man would define it. It is a mean habit between two vices, one on the side of excess, the other on the side of defi- ciency ; and becans*^ one set of ^aces falls short, and the other exceeds propriety, both in passions and actions, while Vjtue discovers the mean and prefers it. Wherefore, according to its essence, and the definition which d clares its uitu-e. Virtue is a m2an habit; but according to its excellence and goodness, it is a summit." TO A.r. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 227 read, is the poem of a grand Elizabethan Puritan, intensely interested in the life of his own day, and never forgetting what he held to be its vital conflicts and its most immediate needs. How practical a book it is, in its essence, we shall iiiid when we come to speak of it among our longer ]>ocms. In the companion poem to tliat which he left unfinished, Spenser meant to illustrate the science of life in community — Polities — with Arthur as king. In that he would have given us his image of human society bound firmly together by the Christian spirit in obedience to the laws of God. The first three books of the "Faerie Qiieene," pub- lished Ln 1590, set in the midst of the life out of which the poem came, were received most JieartUy. No Elizabethan reader fiiiled to see under the sur- face references of compliment to Elizabeth, and under surfiice forms of the sort of romance then popular, the relation of the poem to the highest hopes of Englislunen for this world and the next. What was apparent in the first three books was, it may be added, still more apparent in the next three, published six years later ; especially in the fifth book, which was as direct as the first had been in its application to current events, and had in its alle- gory fewer depths. Poblisher's Mark of William Ponsonist on the Title-page of THE Second Part of the "Faerie Qceene," 159S. Queen Elizabeth promptly and heartily rewarded Spenser for the first instalment of his poem by giving him, in the spring of the year 1.591, a pension from the C'ro%vn of £50 a year. He wi-ote other verse before he left London, his " Ruins of Time," addressed to Sidney's sister, the Countess of Pem- broke, on her brother's death and other signs of the world's passing glory ; also his " Daplmaida," an elegy on the death of a friend's wife ; and he enabled a bookseller to publish under the title of " Complaints, containing sundrie small Poems of the World's Vanitie," several pieces written by him in earlier years. One lately written was "The Tears of the Muses," a lament foi- the stupidities of men, and for all that tlegradeil in his day the pure e.vercise of thougjit. One of the most interesting pieces in this collec- tion was his " Mother llubberd's Tale," a story told in Chaucer's manner, in the rhymed coupletii fir.st u.sed by him, and called, from his use of them in describing the rule of his I'ilgiims to Canterbury, "riding rhyme." It was a cheery, easy, homely measure, destined afterwards to be dressed in a full- bottomed French wig, taught to pufl' and blow with conscious dignity and walk as if all its bones were one bone, before its re-introduction to its native land as the Heroic measure just arrived from France. Spenser, in his " Mother Hubberd's Tale," used this measure for quick and lively satire on corruptioiLS in Church and State, by showing how a Fox and an Ape went out into the world, and what they did. Now the Fox is a priest, and the Ape liLs parish-clerk ; now the Ape is a grand person at court, and the Fox his man, gathering bribes for him from poor suitors ; now the Ape catches the Lion sleeping, steals his skin, and plays King in it with the Fox for minister. When the Ape stands for a courtier of meaner sort, Spenser, with Pliilip Sidney in his mind, paints the true courtier in a passage so complete in itself that we may fairly take it from its context : — THE TRUE COURTIER. [Al]though the vulgar }-ield an open ear. And common coui-tiers love to gibe and flear At ever}- thing which they hear spoken ill, And the best speeches with ill-meaning spiU ; Yet the hrave courtier, in whose beauteous thought Eegard of honoiu' harbours more than aught. Doth loathe such base condition, to backbite Any's good name for envy or despite. He stands on terms of honourable mind, Ne wiU be carried with the common wind 10 Of Court's incon.stant mutability, Ne after every tattling fable fly ; But hears and sees the follies of the rest. And tliereof gathers for himself tlic best. He will not creep, nor crouch with feigned face. But walks upright with comely steadfast ^lace. And unto all doth yield due courtesie ; But not with kissed hand below the knee, As that same apish crew is wont to do : For he disdains himself t' cmbase thereto. 20 He hates foul leasings and vile flattery, Two filthy blots in noble gentery ; And loathful idleness he doth detest, Tlie cankerwonu of every gentle breast, The wliich to banish with fair exercise Of knightly feats, he daily doth devise: Now mcnaging the mouths of stubboni steeds, Now practising the proof of warlike deeds, Now his bright arms assaying, now his spear, Now the nigh-aimed ring ' away to bear. 30 ' 'FlfC niijli-fiimfd riv(j. Tilfinf? .at tlie ring is described in Strutt*s "Sports and Pastimes of the People of Eugliind," with illustrations from Plnviuel's " Art de nionter h clieval." An uprii^ht post was fixed uuiir the cud of a roiu\sc carefully prcparcil and measured. At the ui)pcr pai't of the post were holes, like those for the ycj^ of au 228 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1579 At other times he casts to sue the chace Of swift wild beasts, or run on foot a race, T' enlarge his hrcath (large breath in arms most needful), Or else by wrestling to wax strong and heedful ; Or his stiff arms to stretch with yewen how, And manly legs, still passing to and fro, - "Without a gowned beast him fast beside, A vain ensample of the Persian pride, AVho after he had won th' Assyrian foe Did ever after scorn on foot to go. 40 Thus when this courtly gentleman with toil Himself hath wearied, he doth recoil TJnto his rest, and there with sweet delight Of music's skill revives his toiled spright ; Or else with loves, and ladies' gentle sports. The joy of youth, himself he recomforts : Or lastly, when the body list to pause. His mind unto the JIuses he withdi'aws ; Sweet lady Muses, ladies of delight. Delights of life, and ornaments of light, 50 "With whom he close confers vriih wise discourse, Of Nature's works, of Heaven's continual coui-se. Of foreign lands, of people different. Of kingdoms' change, of divers government, Of di-eadf ul battails, of renowned knights ; "With w-hich he kindleth his ambitious sprights To like desire and praise of noble fame, The only upshot whereto he doth aim. For all his mind on honour fixed is. To which he levels all his purposes, 60 And in his prince's service spends his days. Not so much for to gain, or for to raise Himself to high degree, as for his gi'ace, And in his lildng to win worthy place, easel, to adjust the height of the cross-har from wliich the ring was hung, as iu this fi^ire — Tilting Ring and Sheath. Froiri Stfutt's " Spoi-ts and Fastimes." A represents the detached ring, with the two springs by which it was so inserted iu its sheath that it could readily be di'awn out and carried forward on the point of the rider's lance whenever the lance pierced it. B represents the ring in its sheath. Care was used in adjusting the height of the ring for each horse and rider. It was to be somewhat above the eye-brow of the mounted knight who ran at it. ■I, s ^ ^^ 1 3=*-=^- \^^- Tilting at the Elng, Fi-oiii SIrutt's " Sport.s and Pastimes." Eighty paces were allowed for the ran of a good horse, and twenty paces more beyond the mark as space witliiu which to pull iu. I Through due deserts, and comely carriage. In whatso please employ his personage. That may be matter meet to gain liim praise ; For he is fit to use in all assays, "Whether for arms and warlike amenance,' Or else for wise and civil governance. 70 For he is piactis'd well in policy. And thereto doth his courting most apply : To learn the enterdeal- of princes strange, To mark th' intent of counsels, and the change Of states, and eke of private men some-while, Supplanted by fine falsehood and fair guile; Of all the which he gathereth what is tit, T' enrich the storehouse of his powerful wit, AVhich through wise speeches and grave conference He daUy ekes,^ and brings to excellence. 80 It is in Spenser's " Mother Hubberd's Tide," and in relation to the practices at court of Fox and Ape, that the well-known lines occur — So pitiful a thing is suitor's state ! IMost miserable man, whom wicked fate Hath brought to coui-t, to sue for had-I-wist,* That few have found, and many one hath mist ; Full little kuowest thou that hast not tried, ^\^lat hell it is, in suing long to bide ; To lose good days that might be better spent ; To waste long nights in pensive discontent ; To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow ; To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow ; 10 To have thy prince's grace, yet want her peer's ; To have thy asking, yet wait many years ; To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares ; To eat thy heart thi'oug-h comfortless despairs ; To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run. To spend, to give, to want, to be undone. "Uidiappy wight, bom to disastrous end. That doth his life in so long tendance spend. "Whoever leaves sweet home, where mean estate In safe assurance, without strife or hate, '20 Finds all things needful for contentment meek. And will to court, for shadows vain to seek. Or hope to gain, himself a daw will try:* That curse God send unto mine enemy. For none but such as this bold ape unblest Can e\-er thrive in that unlucky quest ; Or such as hath a Reynold to his man. That by his shifts his master fm-nish can. Spenser ha^•ing returned to Ireland, the grant was made or confirmed to him in October, 1591, of Kil- colman Castle, where he was living in the following I .tiTicnanre, can-iage, behaviour. So Phineas Fletcher wTites iu " The Piuiile Islaud :'— *' The Island's king, with sober countenance, Aggrates the knights who thus his right defended ; And with grave speech and graceful amenance Himself, his state, his spouse, to them commended." ^ Enterdeal, dealing between one another. 3 J-.kcs, increases. First-English " t^can," to increase. ^ H'ad-r-u'i.sf, spelt often as one word, was a phrase to express the mood of a man who has thoughtlessly got himself Id a difficulty through "unforeseen circumstances." and cries, "If I had ouly known," &c. &c. A poem in the "Paradise of Dainty Devices" is called " Beware of Had-I-Wyst." 5 Uimself a dam Kill ii'ij. A daw was proverbial for a foolish bird. TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 229 December, when he finished " Colin Clout's Come Home Again," describing therein what he liad seen at the English court. This jioem wa.s not published imtil 1595, and in the same j'ear appeared his love sonnets entitled •'Anioretti," and his "Ejiithalamion, or JIarriage Song." Spenser was too profoundly earnest to write merely conventional verse. His "Amoretti" were poems designed to represent pin-e love as it shoidd be, and as his O'WTi was, the true man's helper to the love of God. Although not formally so divided, they are in two parts, representhig such love both during the suit and after the acceptance and the marriage. A line of division may be drawn between the sixty- tirst and sixty-second sonnets. His own marriage was on St. Barnabas Da_y, the 11th of June, 1594, and in his works it is associated by the " Amoretti " and the " Epithalamion " \\-ith verse that paints for all eyes and all days the beauty of the marriage of true minds. His queen, his mother, and his wife, who was golden-haired (sonnets 37, 73, 81), were all Elizabeths, and the gift he ascribed to his wife's love was the lifting of his mind. THE THREE ELIZABETHS. Most happy letters, fram'd by skilful trade, With which that happy name was first designed. The which thi'ee times thi-ice happy hath me made, With gifts of body, fortune, and of mind. The first, my being to me gave by kind. From mother's womb deriv'd by due descent ; The second is my sovereign queen most kind. That honoui- and large riches to me lent ; The thud, my love, my life's last ornament, By whom my spirit out of dust was rais'd ; 10 To speak her praise and glory excellent. Of all alive most worthy to be prais'd. Ye three Elizabeths for ever live. That three such graces did unto me give. From the Sonnets" of Love, during the suit for a return of love, let us take seven. love's living fire. More than most fair, full of the li's'ing fire, Kindled above, unto the Maker near. No EYES, but joys, in which all powers conspire, That to the world nought else be counted dear : Thro' your bright beams doth not the Blinded Guest Shoot out his darts to base aft'ection's wound, — But Angels come to lead frail minds to rest In chaste desii'es, on heavenlv beautv bound. type of a foolisli man. "Try" was iised in the sense of "fare." In Mr. Halliwell's "Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words," " How de try ? " is given as Exnioor for " How d'ye do ? " 1 The structure of Spenser's sonnets, it will be observed, is of his own devising. With rare exception (as in the one here named " Love's Living Fire"), each consists of three interlaced quatrains of alternate rhj-me and a final couplet. The quatrains are interlaced by making the second rhyme of one the first rh3^ne of the nest that follows, thus : a i a h, h c h c, c d c d, ee. The consequence of this arrangement is that the first eight bnes of such a sonnet answer to the measure known in France as that of the chant-royal, which is the You frame my thoughts, and fashion me within ; You stop my tongue, and teach my heart to speak ; 10 You Glim the storm that passion did begin, Strong tliro' your cause, but by your virtue weak. Dark is the world, where your light shined never ; WeU is he born, tliat may bcl>jld you ever. A MIND UNSETTLED. Great wrong I do, I can it not deny, To that most sacred empress my dear dread. Not finisliing her Queen of Faery, That mote enlarge her Hving praises dead : But Lodwick," this of grace to me aread ; Do ye not think th' accomplishment of it Sufficient work for one man's simple head, All were it as the rest, but rudely writ i* How then should I, without another wit, Think ever to endure so tedious toil ? 10 Sith that this one is tost with troublous fit Of a proud love, that doth my spirit spoil. Cease then, tUl she vouchsafe to grant me rest. Or lend you me another hving breast. SILENT SPEECH. Shall I then silent be, or shall I speak ? And if I speak, her wrath renew I shall : And if I sUent be, my heart wtII break. Or choked be with overflowing gall. What tjTanny is this, ray heart to thrall. And eke my tongue with proud restraint to tie ; That neither I may speak nor think at all, But like a stupid stock in silence die ? Yet I my heart with sUence secretly Will teach to speak, and my just cause to plead ; 10 And eke mine e\-e3 with meek humility. Love-learned letters to her eyes to read : WTiich her deep wit, that true heart's thought can spell, Will soon conceive, and learn to construe well. HARD TO WIN. Do I not see that fairest images Of hardest marble are of purpose made. For that they should endure through many ages, Ne let theh famous monuments to fade 'r "Why then do I, untrain'd in lover's trade. Her hardness blame, which I should more commend ? Sith never aught was e.xccUent assayed. Which was not hard f atchieve and bring to end ; Ne aught so hard, but he that would attend, Mote soften it and to his will allure : 10 So do I hope her stubborn heart to bend, And that it then more steadf;ist will endure ; Onlv my pains will he the more to get her, But having her my joy will be the greater. measure of a Spenserian stanza down to the ninth line, its closing Alexandrine. 2 Loiluicl-, Lodovick or Lewis Bryskett, a familiar friend of Spen- ser's, from whose translitiou of Uiraldi's Ethics, set in a framework of original dialogue, we have an often quoted reference to Spenser's ethical purpose in wi-iting the " Faerie Queeue." 230 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 TO HER THAT IS MOST ASSURED TO HEESELF. 1. Weak is th' assurance that weak flesh reposeth In her ovm power, and scorneth others' aid ; That soonest falls when as she most supposcth Herself assur'd, and is of nought afraid. All flesh is frail, and all her strength unstaid. Like a vain bubble blowen up with air ; Devouring time and changeful chance have prey'd Her glorious pride, that none may it repair-. Ne none so rich or wise, so strong or fair, But faileth, trusting on his own assurance ; 10 And he that standeth on the highest stair Falls lowest : for on earth nought hath endm-ance. "Wliy then do ye, proud fair, misdeem so far, That to youi-self ye most assured are ? II. Thrice happy she, that is so weU assm-'d Unto herself, and settled so in heart, That neither will for better be aUur'd, Xe fears to worse with any chance to start ; But like a steady ship, doth strongly part The raging waves, and keeps her course aright ; Ne aught for tempest doth from it depart, Ne aught for faii'er weather's false delight. Such self-assurance need not fear the spight Of grudging foes, no favour seek of friends ; 1 But in the stay of her own steadfast might. Neither to one herself nor other bends. Most happy she that most assur'd doth rest. But he most happy who such one loves best. WEITTEN IN 1593. They that in course of heavenly spheres are skill'd, To every planet point his sunch'y year. In which her circle's voyage is fulfiU'd, As Mars in threescore years doth run his sphere. So since the winged god his planet clear Began in me to move, one year is sjieut ; The which doth longer unto me appear Than all those forty ' which my Hfe outwent. Then by that count, which lovers' books invent, The sphere of Cupid forty years contains, 10 Which I have wasted in long languishracnt, That seem'd the longer for my greater pains. But let my love's fail' planet short her ways This year ensuing, or else short my days. The next sonnets are from those which celebrate love happily returned : — Th. NEW YEAR, NEW LIFE, wearv- year his race now ha^-ing run, The new begins his compass'd course anew : "With .'ibcw of morning mild he hath begun. Betokening \ cacc and plenty to ensue : ' All those forty. If Spenser was forty years old in 1593, lie was bora in 1553 ; but as a poet of tbii-ty-nine or foi-ty-one would assuredly not pwt tlie odd number into his sonnet, but wi-ite himself *' forty," this evidence of the sonnet does not fix a date conclnsively. So let us, which this change of weather view, Change eke our minds, and former lives amend ; The old year's sins forepast let us eschew, And fly the faults -nith which we did offend. Then shall the new year's joy forth freshly send Into the glooming world his gladsome ray ; 10 And aU these storms which now his beauty blend Shall turn to calms, and timely clear away. So likewise. Love, cheer you yotrr hea\-y spright, • And change old year's annoy to new delight. love's league. The doubt which ye misdeem, fan- Love, is vain, Tliat fondly fear to lose your liberty ; When losing one, two liberties ye gain, And make him bound that bondage erst did fly. Sweet be the bands, the which true love doth tie, Without constraint, or di'ead of any ill : The gentle bird feels no captivity Within her cage, but sings, and feeds her fill. There Pride dare not approach, ncr Discord spiU The league 'twixt them, that loyal Love hath bound-, But simple Truth and mutual Good- will Seeks with sweet Peace to salve each other's wound : There Faith doth fearless dwell in brazen tower, And spotless Pleasure biulds her sacred bower. EASTER DAY. Most glorious Lord of Life, that on this day Didst make thy triumph over Death and Sin ; And having harrow' d hell, didst bring away CaptiWty thence captive, us to -win : This joyous day, dear Lord, with joy begin. And grant that we for whom thou diddest die. Being witli thy dear blood clean wash'd fi-om sin. May live for ever in fehcity ; And that thy love we weighing worthily. May likewise love thee for the same again : 10 And for thy sake, that all like dear didst buy, AVith love may one another entertain. So let us love, dear Love, like as we ought. Love is the lesson which the Lord us taught. TRUE BEAUTY. Men call you fair, and you do credit it, For that yoursoH ye daily such do see ; But the true fair, that is, the gentle wit. And i-irtuous mind, is much more prais'd of me. For all the rest, however fair it be. Shall turn to naught, and lose that glorious hue ; But only that is permanent and free From frail corruption, that doth flesh ensue : ^ That is true beauty ; that doth argue you To be di\-ine, and born of heavenly seed : 10 Dcriv'd from that fair Spirit, from whom all true And pci-fect beauty did at first proceed. He only fair, and what he fair hath made ; All other fair, like flowers, untimely fade. 2 That doth Jlcsh ensue, that follows the life of the flesh. TO i.r. 16^3.] SHORTER POEMS. 231 WHEN SUES AWAY. Like as the culver on the bared Ijough, Sits mourning for the absence of her mate ; And ill her songs sends many a wishful vow, For his return that seems to Unger late : So I alone, now left disconsolate, Mourn to myself the absence of my love ; And wandering here and there all desolate, Seek with my plaints to match that niouniful dove. Ne joy of aught that imder heaven doth hove,' Can comfort me but her own joyous siglit; 10 "Whose sweet aspect both God and man can move, In her unspotted pleasance to delight. Dark is my day whiles her fair light I miss, And dead my life that wants such Kvely bliss. Spenser's love for liis wife ran over into the sixth book of the "Faerie Qneene," that he finished after hLs marriage in June, 1.594. lu its tenth canto he set lier dancing with the Graces in a passage of the daintiest of his own music : — Those were the Graces, daughters of delight, Handmaids of A'cnus which are wont to liaunt L'pon this hill, and dance tliere day and niglit ; Those three to men all gifts of gmce do giant, And all that Venus in herself doth vaunt Is borrowed of them. But that fair one, 'ITiat in the midst was placed puravaunt. Was she to whom that shepherd piped alone, That made him jiipe so merrily, as never none. She was to vet that jolly .sliepherd's lass, 10 Wliich piped there unto that merry rout : Poor Colin Clout (who knows not Colin Clout ?) He pip'd apace, whilst they him danced about. Pipe, jolly shepherd, ])ipe thou now ajiace Unto thy Love, that made thee low to lout Thy Love is present there with thee in place. Thy Love is there advanc'd to be another Giace. What marriage bells were ever rung more sweetly than Spenser's iii t'.iis, his own song upon his wed- ding day 1 CiPHEH OF Elizabeth, and Emblems of her Eeign. From (fie/rst Folio o/Spcnsei-'s Works (1611). EPITHALAMION. Ye learned sisters, which have oftentimes Been to me aiding, others to adorn, "\Miom ye thought worthy of your graceful rimes. That ev'n the greatest did not greatly scorn To hear their names sung in your simple lays. But joyed in their praise ; And when ye list your own mishaps to mourn, "WTiich Death, or Love, or Fortune's wreck did raise, Your string could soon to sadder tenour turn, And teach the woods and waters to lament 10 Your doleful di'erimcnt : Now lay those sorrowful Complaints aside. And having all your heads with garlands rro\\'n'd. Help me mine own love's praises to resound, Ne let the same of any be enWde. So Orpheus did for his own bride : So I unto myself alone will sing ; The woods shall to me answer, and my echo ring. Early before the world's light-gi\'ing lamp His golden beam upon the hills doth spread, 20 Having dispers'd the night's uncheerful damp ; Do ye awake, and with fresh lustihed, 1 ZTotT, hover. Go to the bower of my beloved love. My truest turtle dove. Bid her awake; for Hymen is awake, And long since ready forth his mask to move, AVith his bright tead- that Hamcs with many a flake, And man}' a bachelor to wait on him. In their fresh gannents trim. Bid her awake therefore, and soon her dight, 30 For lo, the wished day is come at last That shall for all the pains and sorrows past Pay to her usury of long delight : And whilst she doth her dight, Do ye to her of joy and solace sing. That aU the woods may answer, and your echo ring. Bring with you all the nymiJis that you can hear. Both of the rivers and the forests green. And of the sea tliat neighbours to her near, All with gay garlands goodly well beseen. 40 And let them also with them bring in hand Another gay garland, For my fau- love, of lilies and of roses. Bound true-love wise, with a blue silk ribind ' Tcad, torch. Lltiu " tODila." 232 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [ad. 1579 And let them make great store of bridal posies, And let them eke bring- store of other flowers To deck the bridal bowers ; And let the ground whereas her foot shall tread, For fear the stones her tender foot should wrong. Be strew' d with fragrant flowers all along, 50 Anil diapred like the discoloured mead : Whieli done, do at her chamber door await, For she will waken strait. The whiles do ye this song unto her sing ; The woods shall to you answer, and your echo ring. Ye n\Tnphs of MuUa, which with careful heed The silver scaly trouts do tend full well. And greedy pikes which use therein to feed (Tliose trouts and pikes all others do excel). And ye likewise which keep the rushy lake, 60 "Where none do hshes take. Bind up the locks the which hang scattered light. And in his waters which your mirror make Behold your faces as the crystal bright ; That when you come whereas my love doth lie. No blemish she may spy. And eke ye light-foot maids which keep the deer,' That on the hoary mountain use to tower. And the wild wolves which seek them to devour With your steel darts do chace from coming near, 70 Be also present here. To help to deck her, and to help to sina- ; That all the woods may answer, and your echo ring. Wake now my love, awake ; for it is time ! The rosy mom long since left Tithon's bed, AU ready to her silver coach to climb, And Phoebus 'gins to shew his glorious head. Hark how the cheerful birds do chant their lays, And carol of Love's praise ! Tlie merry lark her matins sings aloft, 83 The thrush replies, the mavis descant plays. The ousel shrills, the ruddock^ warbles soft; So goodly all agree, with sweet consent. To this d;iy's merriment. Ah ! my dear love, why do ye sleep thus limg. When meeter were that ye should now awake, T' await the coming of your joyous make. And hearken to the birds' love-learned song The dewy leaves among ? For they of Joy and pleasance to you sing, 90 That all the woods them answer, and their echo ring. My love is now awake out of her dreams. And her fair eyes, like stars that dimmed were With darksome cloud, now shew their goodly beams. More bright than Hesperus his head doth rear. Come now, ye damsels, daughters of delight. Help quickly her to dight : ^ But first come ye fair Hours,'' which were begot. In Jove's sweet paradise, of day and night ; "WTiich do the seasons of the year allot, 100 And all that ever in this world is fair * Beer. Hitherto always misprinted " dore " or " door ! " 2 Rnddock, redbreast. First-Englisli " radduc," from " rude," red. 3 Dight, prepnre. First-English " dihtan." * I'e /air Hours, Goddesses of the changing seasons of the year or day. In Greek mythology they were three— Eunomia, Good Order ; Dik6, Natural Justice ; and Eiiiiue, Peace. These " all that ever in the world is fair Do make and still repair." Do nurke and still repair. And ye three handmaids of the Cj-prian queen,* The which do stiU adorn her beauty's pride. Help to adorn my beautif uUest bride ; And as ye her array, still thi'ow between Some graces to be seen : And as ye use to Venus, to her sing. The whiles the woods shall answer, and your echo ring. Now is my love all ready forth to come, 110 Let all the virgins therefore well await ; And ye fresh boys that tend upon her groom. Prepare yotu-selves, for he is coming strait. Set all your things in seemly good array, Fit for so joyful day; The Joyful'st day that ever sun did see ! Fair sun, shew forth thy favourable ray, And let thy lifefid heat not fervent be. For fear of biu'ning her sunshiny face, Her beauty to disgrace. 120 fairest Phrj?bus, father of the Muse, If ever I did honour' thee aright. Or sing the thing that mote thy mind delight, Do not thy servant's simple boon refuse. But let this day, let this one day be mine. Let all the rest be thine ! Then I thy sovereign praises loud will sing. That all the woods shall answer, and their echo ring. Hark how the minstrels 'gin to thrill aloud Tlieir merry music that resounds from far, 130 The pipe, the tabor, and the trembling croud,^ Tliat well agree withouten breach or jar. But most of all tlie damsels do delight Wlien they their timbrels smite. And thereunto do dance and carol sweet, Tliat all the senses they do ravish quite; The whiles the boys run up and down the street. Crying aloud with strong confused noise. As if it were one voice ; " Hymen, lo Hymen,^ Hymen," they do shout, 140 That even to the heavens their shouting shrill Doth reach, and all the firmament doth fill ; To which the people standing all about. As in approvance do thereto applaud. And loud advance her laud. 5 Three handmaids of tJie Cyprian Queen. The Graces — Aglaia, Kadiiiut Beauty ; Euphrosyne, Cheerful Sense ; Thalia, Aboxmding Joy. ^ The pipe, the tahor, and the tremhling croud. The tabor was a little di'um, played with one stick, and tapped usually as an accompani- ment to the fife or pipe. The crowd, Celtic " crwth," Latinized "chrotta," was the stringed fiddle used in ancient times by the Britons. Venantius Fortuuatns, Bishop of Poitiers, refen-ing to the mnsicLil instruments of ililfereut peoples, gave the crowd to the Britons, "Chrotta Brit.anua canat." Croird remained in common US2 as a popular woi*d for the fiddle luitil the seventeenth century ; — *' The fiddler's crowd now squeaks aloud, His fiddling strings begin to troll ; He loves a wake and a wedding cake, A bride house and a brave Maypole." (" Cupid's Biuiishment," 1617.) The crowd played with a bow is thought by Messrs. Sandys and Forster, historians of the violin, to have been invented in Britain, to have found its way to the East, been moditied there, and then re- introduced. 7 Jo Hiimcn ! " lo " (iu'O was among the Gr'eeks an exclamation of joy. So also in Latin, " lo triumphe ! " " lo H.vmen ! ' where it wrs equivalent to our " Hurrah ! " The cry was used also in Attic Greek, and in Latin sometimes to esjiress soiTow, as onr "Oh" and "Ah." Our English '* Oh " can also be u>ed to express either joy or s^n-ow. TO A.D, 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 233 And evermore they "Hj-mon, H)-mon" sing, That all the woods them answer, and their ceho ring. Lo, where she comes along vdth. portly ' paeo. Like Phcebe,- from her chamber of the east, Aiising forth to run her mighty raee, 150 Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best. So well it her beseems, that ye would ween Some angel she had been ; Her long loose yellow locks like golden wire. Sprinkled with pearl, and peai-ling flowers atween, Do like a golden mantle her attire. And being crowned with a garland green, Seem like some maiden queen. Her modest eyes abashed to behold So many gazers as on her do stare, 100 Upon the lowly ground affixed are : Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold. But blush to hear her praises sung so loud. So far from being proud. Nathless do ye still lOud her praises sing. That all the woods may answer, and your echo ling. Tell me, ye merchants' daughters, did ye see So fair a creature in your town before ? So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as she, Adorn'd with beauty's grace and virtue's store; 170 Her goodly eyes like sapphires shining bright. Her forehead ivory white. Her cheeks like apples which the sun hath rudded, Her lips like cherries, channing men to bite, Her breast like to a bowl of cream imcrudded. Her paps U'kc lilies budded. Her .snowy neck like to a marble tower, Anil all her body like a palace fair. Ascending up with many a stately stair, To Honour's seat and Chastity's sweet bower. 180 Why stand ye still, ye virgins, in amaze, Upon her so to gaze, A^Tiiles ye forget your former lay to sing, To which the woods did answer, and your echo ring ? But if ye saw that which no eyes can see, The inward licauty of her lively spright, Garnish' d with heavenly gifts of high degree. Much more then would ye wonder at that sight. And stand astonish' d like to those which read Medusa's mazeful head. 190 There dwells sweet Love and constant Chastity, Unspotted Faith, and comely Womanhood, Regard of Honour, and mild Modesty ; There Virtue reigns as queen in royal throne, And giveth laws alone. The which the base affections do obey, And 5'ield their services unto her wOl ; Ne thought of things uncomely ever may Thereto approach to tempt her mind to ill. Had ye once seen these her celestial treasures, 200 And unrevealed pleasures. Then wo>ild ye wonder, and her praises sing. That all the woods should answer, and your echo ring. 1 Portly, of good carriage. The use of the word has now slipped down into association chiefly with the movements of a bin person. " Buxom," bow-some, which meant one who was pliable of manners, one who could yield with easy courtesy, has suffered a like change. * Pha-hc, a name of Diana, sister of Phoebus ; the Moon, sister of the Sun. The word means " the pure shining one.'* 30 Open the temple-gatca unto my love. Open them wide that she may enter in. And all the posts adorn as doth behove. And all the pillars dock with garlands trim. For to receive this saint with honour due. That Cometh in to you. With trembling steps and humble reverence 210 She Cometh in, before th' Almighty's view: Of her, ye virgins, learn obedience, AXTienso ye come into those holy places, To humble your proud faces. Biing her up to th' high altar, that she may The sacred ceremonies there partake, The which do endless matrimony make : And let the roaring organs loudly play The praises of the Lord in lively notes ; The whiles, with hoUow throats, 220 The choristers the joyous anthem sing. That all the woods may answer, and theu- echo ring. Behold, whiles she before the altar stands, Hearing the holy priest that to her speaks And blesses her with his two happy hands. How the red roses flush up in her cheeks. And the pure snow with goodly venneil stain, Like crimson dyed in grain : That even the angels, which continually About the sacred altar do remain, 230 Forget their service and about her fly, Oft peeping in her face, that seems more fair The more they on it stare. But her sad eyes, still fastened on the ground, Are governed with goodly modesty That suffers not one look to glance awry, Which may let in a little thought unsound. Wliy blush ye, love, to give to rae your hand. The pledge of all our band ? Sing, ye sweet angels, Allcluya sing, 240 That all the woods may answer, and your echo ring. Now all is done ; bring home the bride again. Bring home the triumph of our victory. Bring home with you the glory of her gain. With joyance bring her, and with jollity. Never had man more jo>-ful day than this. Whom Heaven would heap with bliss. Make feast therefore now all this live-long day, This daj' for ever to me holy is ; Pour out the wine without restraint or stay, 250 Pour not by cups b>it by the bellyful. Pour out to all that \\nill. And sprinkle all the posts and walls with wine. That they may sweat and drunken be withal. Crown ye god Bacchus with a coronal. And Hymen .also crown with wreaths of vine ; And let the Graces dance unto the rest. For they can do it best : The whiles the maidens do their carol sing. To which the woods shall answer, and their echo ring. 260 Ring ye the bells, ye young men of the town. And leave your wonted labours for this day ■ This day is holy; do you -mite it down. That ye for ever it remember may. This day the sun is in his chiefest height, With Bamaliy the bright : ^ > Bamahy tlie hright. Barnabas, called an apostle by St. Luke aud 234 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1579 From whence declining; daily by degrees, He somewhat loseth of his heat and light, AVhen once the Crab behind his back he sees. But for this time it iU ordained was, 270 To chuse the longest day in all the year, And shortest night, when longest fitter were ; Yet never day so long but late would pass. Ring ye the bells, to make it wear away, And bonfires make all day. And dance about them, and about them sing, That all the woods may answer, and your echo ring. Ah I when will this long weaiy day have end, And lend me leave to come imto my love ? How slowly do the hours their numbers spend ! 280 How slowly doth sad Time his feathers move ! Haste thee, fairest planet, to thy home, Within the western foam ; Thy tired steeds long since have need of rest. Long tho' it be, at last I see it gloom. And the bright evening star, with golden crest. Appear out of the east. Fair child of beauty, glorious lamp of Love, That aU the host of heaven in ranks dost lead. And guidest lovers through the night's sad dread, 290 How cheerfully thou lookest from above, And seem'st to laugh atween thy twinkling Kght, As joying in the sight Of these glad many, which for joy do sing, That all the woods them answer, and their echo ling. Now cease, ye damsels, your delights forepast, Enough it is that all the day was yours. Now day is done, and night is nighing fast. Now bring the bride into the bridale bowers ; Now night is come, now soon her disarray, 300 And in her bed her lay : Lay her in lilies and in volets, And silken curtains over her display. And odour'd sheets, and arras coverlets. Behold how goodly my fair love does Ue, In proud humility : Like unto JIaia, whenas Jove her took In Tempe, lying on the flow'ry grass, 'Twixt sleep and wake, after she weary was With bathing in the .\cidalian brook. 310 Now it is night, ye damsels may be gone. And leave my love alone. And leave likewise your former lay to sing : The woods no more shall answer, nor your echo ring. Now welcome Night, thou night so long expected. That long ilay"s labour doth at last defray. And all my cares, which cruel Love collected, Hast summ'd in one, and cancelled for aye ; Spread thy broad wing over m}- love and me, That no man ma}' us see ; 320 And in thy sable mantle us enwrap. From fear of peril and foul horror free. Let no false treason seek us to entrap, Nor any dread disquiet once annoy The safety of our joy : by the primitive Fathers, was said to have been the first Bishop of Milan, and to have gone about as a missionary, preaching from a copy of Matthew's ijospel written by that saint's own hand. St. B.'u-nabas Day, the 11th of June, was once a great Enghsh festival, if being the longest day according to Old Style. But let the night be calm and quietsome. Without tempestuous storms, or sad afli'ay ; Like as when Jove with fair Alcmena lay, When ho begot the great Tirynthian gi-oom ; Or like as when ho with thyself did Ue, :J30 And begot Majesty. And let the maids and j'oung men cease to sing : Ne let the woods them answer, nor their echo ring. Let no lamenting cries, n^or doleful tears, Be heard all night within, nor yet without ; Ne let false whispers, breeding hidden fears, Break gentle sleep with misconceived doubt. Let no deluding dreams, nor dreadful sights. Make sudden, sad aifi-ights ; Ne let house-fires, nor lightnings' helpless harms, 340 Ne let the puck,' nor other evil sprights, Ne let mischievous witches with their charms, Ne let hobgoblins, names whose sense we see not. Fray us with things that be not ; Let not the screech-owl nor the stork be heard, Nor the night-raven that stiU deadly ycUs, Nor damned ghosts, caU'd up with mighty spells, Nor grisly %mltures make us once affeard : Ne let th' unpleasant quire of frogs still croaking Make us to wish their choking. 3.50 Let none of these theh- dreary accents sing, Ne let the woods them answer, nor theii' echo ring. But let still Silence true night-watches keep. That sacred Peace may in assui'anee reign. And timely Sleep, when it is time to sleep, Jlay pour his limbs forth on your pleasant plain ; The whiles an hundred little winged loves. Like divers-feathered doves. Shall fly and flutter round about yoiu- bed ; And in the secret dark, that none reproves, 300 Their pretty stealths shall work, and snares shall spreed. To filch away sweet .snatches of delight, Conceal'd through covert night. Ye sons of Venus, play your sports at will ; For greedy Pleasure, careless of your toys. Thinks more upon her paradise of joys. Than what ye do, all be it good or Ql. All night therefore attend your merrj- play, For it ■will soon be day : Now none doth hinder you, that say or sing, 070 Ne will the woods now answer, nor your echo ring. AVTio is the same, which at my window peeps ':■ Or whose is that fair face which sliines so bright 1- Is it not Cynthia, she that never sleeps. But walks about high heaven all the night ? ' The puck. This word is misprinted *' ponke " in the original, for " pouke," or " Puck." The word also was written " Pug," and that was therefore the name given to the imp in Ben Jousou's *' The Devil is an Ass." One of "Three Notelets on Shakespeare," by Mr. "Wilham J. Thorns— for whose m.any services to good litei-ature, as founder of " Notes and Queries," and otherwise, all students are gi'ateful — is in the " Folk Lore of Shakespeare," iuchiding a section "of Puck's several names." The word "Poiik" is first found in Piers Plowman, where it signifies the devil, " Pseccan " meant in First English to deceive by false appearances. " In the cognate Nether Saxon," wrote Sir Francis Palgrave (quoted by Mr. Thorns), "the verb ' Picken ' signifies to gambol; and when inflected into ' Pickeln ' and * Paeckeln,' to play the fool. From the Anglo-Saxon (First English) root we have 'Pack' or 'Patch.' the fool; whilst from 'Pickeln' and 'Paeckeln' are derived 'Pickle,' a mischievous hoy. ... * Pueke ' and ' Puck ' are the sportive devds of the Goths and Teutons." TO A.D. IGvS.j SHORTER POEMS. 235 1 fairest goddess, do thou not cn\y My love with me to spy : For thou likewise didst love, though now untliouglit. And for a fleece of wool, which privily The Latmian shepherd once unto thee brought, 380 His pleasures with thee WTOught. Therefore to us be favourable now ; And sith of women's labours thou hast charge. And generation goodly dost enlarge. Incline thy will t' effect oiu' wishful vow, And the chaste womb inform with timely seed, That may our comfort breed : TiU which we cease oui- hopeful liap to sing, Ne let the woods us answer, nor our echo ring. And thou, great Juno, which with aweful might 390 The laws of wedlock still dost patronize, And the religion of the faith first plight With sacred rites hast taught to solemnize ; And eke for comfort often called art Of women in their smart ; Eternally bind thou this lovely band, And all thy blessings imto us impart. And thou, glad Genius, in whose gentle hand The bridale bower and genial bed remain, AVithout blemish or stain, 400 And the sweet pleasures of their love's delight With secret aid dost succoui' and supply, Till they bring forth the fruitful progeny, 8end us the timely fruit of this same night. And thou fair Uebe, and thou HjTnen free. Grant that it so may be. TiU which we cease your fui-thcr prais ■ to sing, Ne any woods shall answer, nor your echo ring. And ye high Heavens, the Temple of the Gods, In which a thousand torches, flaming bright, ilO Do bum, that to us WTotched earthly clods In dreadful darkness lend desired light : And aU ye powers which in the same remain. More than we men can feign. Pour out yoiir blessing on us plenteously. And happy influence upon us rain, That we may raise a large posterity, "WTiich from the earth, which they may long possess With lasting happiness. Up to your haughty palaces may mount, 420 And for the guerdon of their glorious merit. May heavenly tabernacles there inherit, Of blessed saints for to increase the coimt. So let us rest, sweet \ovc, in hope of this, And cease till then our timely joys to sing, The woods no more us answer, nor our echo ring. Song made in lieu of many ornaments With which my love should duly have been deckt. \Miich cutting off through hasty accidents, Ye would not stay your due time to expect, 430 But promis'd both to recompence. Be unto her a goodly ornament. And for short time an endless monument. Tailpiece to the Epithalamion. (Prom the first Folio of Sjvciiscr, IGll.) A favourite writer of love sonneis in Elizabetli's reign was Thomas Watson, a Londoner, born about 1-557, who, as a student at Oxford, became noted for liis skill in song, and seems in later life to have lieen drawn away from common law by love of literature. Before 1.581 lie was in Paris, and he liad for a friend Philiii Sidney's fi\ther-in-law. Sir Thomas Walsingliam, upon whose deatli, in 1.590, lie wrote an Eclogue. He published both Latin and English verse, and died in 1592. In the same year appeared soon aftei-wards, in Latin, his " Amintse Gaudia;" and in 159.3 " Tlie Tears of Fancy," fifty-two sonnets on Love disdained. Among publications during his life-time was that of the " 'EKaToixiraOLa " (hun(h-ed passions), " or Passionate Centurie of Love," wliicli professed only to be " a Toy " in a prefatory " Quatorzain of the Aiithoiu- unto this liis Booke of Lovepassions." The passions fomi a series of little poems, loosely called sonnets, some of them imitations or translations from other writers, and each consisting of three six-lined .stanzas, witli an introductory prose description in the Italian manner. Tlie following tliree passions are given with their several introductions, and left without change of spelling as example of the form of printed English in Elizabeth's reign (1582). THREE SONNETS. XLVII. This passion conteinetli a relation through out from line to line ; as, from euery line of the first staffe as it standeth in order, vnto euery line of the second stafle t and from the second stafie vnto the third. The oftener it is read of him that is no (fveat cUirke, the more pleasure he shuU haue in it. And this posie a schoUer set down ouer this Sonnet, when he had well considered of it ; Tail! casu, qudm arte ct iniustria. The two first lines are an imita- tion of Serajihine, Sonndto 10;I. Col temi>n el yUhmeUo al giogo mena El Tor si firm, e si criido animaU\ Col tempo el Falcou s'vsa a menar Vale E Htomare d tc chiamando d pena. In time the bidl is brought to weare the yoake ; In time all haggred haukes will stoooe the lures ; 236 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1570 In time small wedge -n-ill cleaue the stui'diest oake ; In time the marhle weares w-ith weakest shem-res : More fierce is my sweete loiie, more hard -ft-ithaU, Then beast, or hii'de, then tree, or stony -n-aU. Ko yoake preuailes, shee w-ill not yeeld to might ; Ko lure will cause her stoope, she beares full gorge ; No wedge of woes make printe, she reakes no right ; Ko shewre of tears can moue, she thinkes I forge : Helpe therefore Heaii')dif Boy, come perce her brest With that same shaft, which robbes me of my rest. So let her feele thy force, that she relent ; So keepe her lowe, that she vouchsafe a pray ; So frame her -will to right, that pride be spent ; So forge, that I may speede without delay ; "Which if thou do, I'le swcare, and singe with ioy, That Loue no longer is a blinded boy. LXXIX. The Anplhour in this Passion seemetli vppon mislike of his -weari- some estate in loue to enter into a deepe discourse with him selfe touching the particular miseries which befall him that loueth. And for his sense in tliis place, hee is very like vnto him selfe, where in a Theame diducted out of the boweUes of Antigone in Sophocles (which he lately translated into Latine, and published in print) he writeth in very like manner as followeth, Mali qwando Ciipidinis I'eims asius edax occupat tnttmas, Aries ingenimn lahitur in malas; Jaciaiiir varie, nee Cereris suhit Ncc Bacchi udiuvi ; peruigiles irahit Nodes ; cura antmum soUicita atterit, etc. And it may appeare by the tenour of this Passion that the Authour prepareth him selfe to fall from Loue and all his lawes as will weU appeare by the sequell of his other Passions that followe, which are aU made vpon this Posie, if y Loue is past. Where heate of loue doth once possesse the heart. There cares oppresse the minde with wondro\is ill, JTit nmns awryc not fearing future smarte, And fond disii-e doth ouermastcr will : The lielli/ neither cares for meate nor drinke, Nor ouerwatchcd ei/is desire to winkc : Footesteps are false, and waur'ing too and froe ; The brightsome ^o«''r of biaiitij fades away : Reason retyres, and pleasure brings in woe : And icisedome yeldeth phice to black dccaij • Coiinsell. and. fame, a.T\i frieudsh'ip are contem'nd: And bashfull shame, and Gods them selues condem'nd. Watchful! stispirt is linked with despaire : Inconstant hope is often drown'd infcarcs : "WhiA folly hurtes noi fortune can repaj-re; And misery doth swimme in seas of tearcs: Long vse of life is hut a lingring foe, And gentle death is only end of woe. LXXXIX. The two first staffes of this Sounet are altogether sententiall, and euerie one verse of them is jrrownded \-pon a diuerse reason and authoritie from the rest. I haue thought good for breuitie sake, onelie to set downe here the authorities, with figures, whereby to applie euerie one of them to his due Ij-ne in order as they stand. 1. Hieronimus ; In deXici}^ df/ffcilc fst seriiore costilafein. 2. Auso. nius : disptdit inconsultxts anxov, etc. 3. Seneca : Amor est ociosenser's sonnets are fouiieen-lined poems consLsting of three quatrains and a coujilet, and Watson's are poems of three six-lmed stanzas, Con- stable's are true sonnets in their construction. In some of them he even avoids the pairing of rhyme in the last two lines. These sonnets are .some of Henry Constable's : — THE BEC4GAR AT THE DOOR. Pity refusing my poor Love to feed, A Beggar starv'd for want of help he lies, And at your mouth, the Door of Beauty, cries, That thence some alms of sweet gi-ants may proceed. But as he waiteth for some almes-deed A cherry-tree before the door he spies : " Oh dear," quoth he, " two cherries may suffice. Two only life may save in this my need." " But beggars can they nought but chcnies eat ? " " Pardon my Love, he is a goddess' son. And never feedeth but on dainty meat. Else need he not to pine as he hath done : For only the sweet fruit of this sweet tree Can give food to my Love, and life to me." ■ Hifrom. " Alison. » Seneca. '" JfariiJl. " Tifciill. « Propcrt. s Horat. « Xcnoph. " Virgil, dc Tim et Vencre. " ColCTit. 8 Oiiid. ' Pont. (Watson's Note.) " In the -ISth poem of his " Underwoods, An Ode." " Hath our gi-eat Sidney Stella set Where never stai" shone brighter yet ? Or Constable's ambrosiac muse Made Dian not his notes refuse ?" TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 237 TO HIS LADY S HAND. Sweet Hand ! the sweet yet cruel bow thou nvi From whence at me five ivory arrows fly ; So with live wounds at once I wounded Ue, Bearing in breast the print of every dart. Saint I'rancis had the like — yet felt no smart, Where I in living torments never die ; His wounds were in his hands and feet, whore I All these sjime helpless wounds feel in my heart. Now as Saint Francis (if a sidut) am I : The bow that shot these shafts a relique is, 10 I mean the Hand — which is the reason why So many for devotion thee would kiss : And I thy glove kiss as a thing divine — Thy ai-rows' quiver, and thy reliques' shrine. OF THE EXCELLENCY OF HIS LADY'S VOICE. Lady of ladies, the delight alone For which to heaven earth doth no en-t'j' bear ; Seeing and hearing thee, we see and hear Such voice, such light, as never sung nor shone. The want of heaven I giant yet we may moan. Not for the pleasure of the angels there. As though in face or voice they like thee were. But that they many be. and thou but one. The basest notes which fi-om thy voice proceed The treble of the angels do exceed. 10 So that I fear, their quire to beautif)'. Lest thou to some in heaven shall sing and shine : Lo ! when I hear thee sing, the reason why Sighs of my breast keep time with notes of thine. Tlie following sonnet is one of three iaiscribed by Heniy Constable TO SIR PHILIP Sidney's soul. Great Alexander then did well declare, How gi-eat was his united kingdom's might, ^\'hen ev'ry captain of his army might After his death with mighty kings compare. So now we see after thy death, how far Thou dost in worth surjiass each other knight, "When we admire him as no mortal wight In whom the least of all thy vii-tues are. One did of JIacedon the king become. Another sate in the Egj^itian throne; 10 But only Alexanders self had all. So courteous some, and some be liberal. Some witty, wise, valiant, and learned some, But king of all the \-ii-tues thou alone ! Tlie last ilhistration of Henry Constaljle's " am- brosiac muse " shall lie a piece that first appeared in one of the iioetical Miscellanies of Elizabeth's reign, " England's Helicon." THE shepherd's song OF VENUS AND ADONIS. Venus fair did ride, Silver doves they drew her. By the pleasant lawns Ere the sim did rise : Vesta's beauty rich Opened wide to view her, Philomel records Pleasing harmonics. Every bird of spring Cheerfully did sing 10 Paphos' goddess they salute : Now Love's Queen so fair Had of mirth no care : For her son had made her mute. In her breast so tender He a shaft did enter, ■When her eyes behold a boy : Adonis was he named. By his mother shamed ; Yet he now is Venus' joy. 20 Him alone she met Eeady bound for hunting ; Him she kindly gi'eets. And his journey stays; Him she seeks to kiss, No devices wanting ; Him her eyes still woo ; Him her tongue still prays. He with blushing red Hangeth down the head, 30 Not a kiss can he aft'ord ; His face is turned away, Silence said her nay. Still she woo'd him for a word. " Speak," she Siiid, " thou fairest ; Beauty thou impairest. See me, I am pale and wan : Lovers all adore me, I for love implore thee ; " Crystal tears with that dowTi ran. -10 Him herewith she forced To come sit down by her, She his neck embrac'd. Gazing in his face : He, like one transformed, StiiT'd no look to eye her; Ever}- herb did woo him. Growing in that place, Each bud with a ditty Prayed him for jiity 50 In behalf of Beauty's Queen : Water's gentle mui-mur Craved him to love her : Yet no liking could be seen. " Boy," she said, " look on me. Still I gaze upon thee. Speak, I pray thee, my delight : " Coldly he replied. And in brief denied To bestow on her a sight. 60 " I am now too young To be won by beauty, Tender are my years, I am yet a bud." " Fair thou art," she said ; " Then it is thy duty, Wert thou but a blossom, To effect my good. Eveiy beauteous flower Boastcth in my power, 70 Birds and beasts my laws effect ; Mjan'ha, thy fair mother. 238 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. IWU Jlost of any other, Did my lo\'ely hosts ri'speet. ]!l' with me doUghtcd, Thou shall he requited, Every njTuph on thee shall tend : All the gods shall love thee, Man shall not reprove thee ; Love himself shall be thy friend." 80 " Wend thee from me, Venus. I am not disposed ; Thou wTing'st me too hard. Prithee let me go ; Fie I what a pain it is Thus to he enclosed ; If love begin in labour. It will end in woe." — " Kiss me, I wiU leave." — " Here a kiss receive." — 90 " A short kiss I do it find : AVilt thou leave me so ? Yet thou shalt not go : Breathe once more thy bahny wind. It smelleth of the m\-iTh-tree, That to the world did bring thee, Never was perfume so sweet ! " "WTien she had thus spoken. She gave him a token. And their naked bosoms meet. 100 " Now," he said, " let's go ; Hark, the hounds are cr}"ing, Grisly hoar is up, Huntsmen follow fast." At the name of boar, Venus seemed dying, Deadly coloured pale, Eoses overcast. " Speak," said she, " no more, Of following the boar, 110 Thou unfit for such a chase ; Course the fearful hare, Ven'son do not spare, If thou wilt }-ield Venus grace. Shun the hoar I pray thee, — Else I still will stay thee." Herein he vowed to please her mind ; Then her arms enlarged, Loth she him discharged ; Forth he went as swift as wind. 120 Thetis Phwbus steeds In the west retained. Hunting sport was past : Love her love did seek : Sight of him too soon. Gentle Queen she gained. On the ground he lay, Blood had left his cheek. For an orped swine Smit him in the groin, 130 Deadly wound his death did bring : A\'hich when A'enus foimd. She fell in a swound. And awak'd, her hands did wring, K>-niphs and satyrs skipping, Came together tripping, Echo every cry exprest : Venus by her power Tum'd him to a flower, A\Tiich she weareth in her crest. UO Initial Letter. From Atithon]! Mnndaij's " i MutabiUtij" (1679). lirror of CHAPTER XI. (continued). Reign of Elizabeth, from a.d. 1579 to a.d. lGO.!i. Section 2. rOETIC.lL MISCELL.\XIES. — SOXGS OF THE ELIZ.-lBETH.tN- DR.\M.\- TISTS. SH.lKESrE.UiE. UUAYTOX, DANIEL, AST) OTHEUS. NTHONY MUN- DAY was an industrious pro- ducer of both prose and verse in Elizabetli'.s reign. His ini- tials were in 1-578 set to the intro ductory lines tliat recom- mended to the world the third of the poetical Miscel lanies, that following Tottel's (1557). and the " Para- dise of Dainty Devices" (1576). It was called " A Gorgious Gallery of Gallant Im-en- tions, garnislied and decked witli divers dayntie deWces, right delicate and delightfull, to recreate eche modest minde withall. First framed and fashioned in sundrie formes, by divers worthy worke- men of late dayes : and now, ioyned together and builded up by T. P.," that is to say, Tlioinas Proctor. Anthony Munday's opening lines e.xplained the title : — " A. M. UNTO ALL YOUNG GENTLEMEN IN COMMENDATION OF THIS GALLERY AND WORKMEN THEREOF." See, gallants, see, this GaUeiy of delights, AVith buildings brave imbost of various hue AVith dainties deckt, devised by worthy wights A\Tiich, as tinie sen-ed, unto perfection grew. By study's toil with phrases fine they fraught This peerless piece fiU'd full of pretty pith : And tiimm'd it with what skill and learning taught In hope to please your longing minds therewith. AMiich workmanship, by worthy workmen wrought, Perus'd lest in oblivion it should lie, 10 A willing mind each part together sought. And termed the whole a Gorgeous Gallery, A\Tierein you may, to recreate the mind. Such fine inventions find for youi- delight. That for desert their doings mU you bind. To yield them praise so well a work to wright. The pieces in this collection are chief!}' such love poems as we have been iUusti-ating by some of the TO A.D. 1C0:3.] SHORTER POEMS. 239 best examples of theii- kiiul. Munclay began his career in 1579 with a religions comi)anion to the " Mirror for Magistrates " called " The Mirroin- of Mutabilitie ; or, principal part of the Mii-ror of Magistrates, selected ont of tlie sacred scriptnres." It was a series of metrical tragedies in two parts, the first illustrating the Seven Deadly Sins with seven stones : Pride, with the story of Nebucliad- nezzar; Envy, with that of Herod; Wrath, by Pharaoh ; Lechery, by David ; Gluttony, Ijy Dives, in the parable ; Avarice, by Judas ; and Sloth, by Jonah, ■' for his slothful slackness in obeying the commandment of the Lord, being sent to preach to the Nine-sites." In the next book were eleven Complaints : as of Absalom, for vain aspiring : of Jephthah, for his rash vow ; and so forth. Each poem liad its moral theme set forth before it in an acrostic ; the poems illustrating the seven deadly sins tlius sfive occasion for seven prefatory acrostics on their names, of which these are four : — Pride is the root from whence all ^■ice doth spring, Rich is that man that can avoid the same, I ni'cmal woes for guerdon it doth bring, D csei'ved due to their perpetual shame : Each one therefore regard his ra-tuous name. Envye disdains his neighliour's prosperous state, N love can Uve where envye beareth sway : V se therefore so your dealings in such rate, Y ou need not shame your h ving to display : E xile all fraud, serve God, thy Prince obey. WR.^THE. Where wTathful wights in commonweal remain Regarded small is unity of Ufe, All vice aboimds. Discord doth reason stain, Truth lies in dust, and still increaseth strife : Have good regard in all thou gocst abovit, E steem Dame Truth, for she will bear thee out. SLOTHE. Sloth is a foe unto all virtuous deeds, L earning smTiiounts the golden heaps of gain : Of idle life therefore destroy the weeds, T hink what renown Dame Science doth maintain : H enceforth subdue all idle thoughts in thee, E xample good to all thy life will be. Anthony Munday, who became a zealous Protestant after having been bred in the English College at Rome, greatly oftended the Catholics in 1.582 by publishing "The Discovery of Edward Campion, the Jesuit." He compiled much for the booksellers, and in his later days was a great planner of pageants for the City. The booksellers were becoming active as thought grew more busy, and still there was singing throughout all the land. The next of the Miscellanies was a very little book that did not claim to be a gorgeous galleryof witty invention, but was a gather- 'ng of pieces good and bad, set to popular tunes. This was called " A Handefull of Pleasant Delites," and was by Clement Robinson and others. It ap- peared in 158-4, and tickled Shakespeare's fancy with its goodness and its badness. Tlie tune of Green- sleeves is twice mentioned in the " Midsummer Night's Dream," and in the " Handful of Pleasant Delights " and here we have— .\ NEW COURTLY SONNET OF THE L.\DY GREENSI.DEVCS. Alas, my love, ye do me wrong. To cast me off discourteously. And I have loved for so long. Delighting in your company. Greensleeves was all my joy, Greensleeves was my delight : Greensleeves was my heart of gold, And who but Lady Greensleeves. I have been ready at yom- hand. To grant whatever you w-ould crave, I have both waged life and land, Yom- love and goodwill for to have. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. I bought thee kerchers to thy head. That -n-ere wrought fine and gallantly : ' I kept thee both at board and bed. Which cost my purse well favouredly. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. I bought thee petticoats of the best. The cloth so fine as fine might be : I gave thee jewels for thy chest. And all this cost I spent on thee. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. Thy smock of silk, both fair and white, With gold embroidered gorgeously : Thy petticoat of scndal - right : And thus I bought thee gladly. Greensleeves was all my jo\-, &c. Thy girdle of gold so red. With pearls bedecked sumptuously : The like no other ladies had, And yet thou wouldst not love mo. Greensleeves was all my joy, \-c. Thy purse and eke thy gay gilt knives, Thy pincase gallant to the eye : No better -wore the burgess' wives. And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. Thy crimson stockings all of silk, With gold all wrought above the knee, Thy pumps as white as was the milk, And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, •Src. 1 " Then must they have their silk scarfs cast about their faces, and fluttering in the wind, with inreat lapels at every end, either of gold, or silver, or silk, which they say they wear to keep them from sun- linming," {Stubbes's " Anatomy of Abuses.") 2 ,St'»(Ia?. This was the sliu^htest of the fonns of tatfeto, which was itself the lis^htest form of silk, usunlly with much gloss. The Middle Latin was " cendnlum," or " sandale," allied probiiltly to the Greek invii'ov, a fine Indian cloth or muslin, and perhaps also to the Arabic " ceudali," a very thin leaf. 240 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1579 Thy gown -n-as of the grassy green, Thy sleeves of satin hanging by : ' AVhich made thee be oiu' harvest queen, And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleevcs was all my joy, &c. Thy garters fringed with the gold. And sUver aglets - hanging by, Which made thee blithe for to behold, And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. My gayest gelding I thee gave, To ride wherever liked thee : No lady ever was so brave. And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. My men were clothed all in green. And they did ever wait on thee : All this was gallant to be seen. And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was aU my joy. &c. They set thee up, they took thee down. They sers'ed thee with humility, Th}' foot might not once touch the ground, And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. For everj- morning when thou rose, I sent thee dainties orderly. To cheer thy stomach from all woes, And yet thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. Thou couldst desire no earthly tiling. But still thou hadst it readily : Thy music stiU to play and sing. And j'et thou wouldst not love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. 1 " Some ** (gowns) *'be of the new fashion, and some of the old ; some with sleeves Imnging down to the skirts, trailing on the gi-ound, and cast orer their shoulders like cow-tails ; some have sleeves much shorter, cut up the arm, dx'awn out with sundry colours, and pointed with silk ribbons, and very gallantly tied with love knots, for so they call them" (Stubbes's "Anatomy of Abuses"). The green satin hanging sleeves that were the conspicuous mark of the lady who could resist this most lavish of lovers must have been of the " cow-tail " variety. 2 A'jJctc, or aygulets. Tags of laces ; from French aiguillette." The word was applied also to small spangles woni only for oraameut. The gold or silver tags of the points or laces used in tying any part of the dress served both for ornament and use. They were ornaments only in Canto 3, Book ii. (stanza 26), of Spenser's " Faerie Queene," upon the dress of Belphoebe, who " — was yclad, for heat of scorching ah', AU in a silkeu camus lily white, Purfled upon with many a folded plight, "Which aU above besprinkled was throughout With golden aygulets, that glistered bright Like twinkling stars, and all the skirt about Was hem'd with golden fringe." Belphoebe's buskins, described in the next stanza, would have made a very satisfactory present to the Lady Greensleeves. They were " gilded buskins of costly cordwain. All baiT'd with golden bends, which were eutail'd With curious antics, and fidl fair aumaitd : Before they fast'ned were under her knee In a rich jewel, and therein entnul'd The ends of all the knots, that none might see How they wthin their foldings close cnwTapped be." And who did pay for all this gear. That thou didst spend when pleased thoc ; Even I that am rejected here, And thou disdain' st to love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, iSrc. Well, I will pray to God on high. That thou my constancy may'st see : And that yet once before 1 die. Thou wilt vouchsafe to love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, &c. Greensleeves now farewell adieu, God I pray to prosper thee ; For I am still thy lover true. Come once again and love me. Greensleeves was all my joy, ic. " There'.? rosemary, that's for remembrance," says Ophelia ; " pray you love, remember ; and there's pansies, that's for thoughts. There's fennel for you and columbines." The people's poetry of flowers is thus set forth in the "Handful of Pleasant Delights." A NOSEGAY ALWAYS SWEET. A Nosegay lacking flowers fresh. To you now I do send. Desiring you to look thereon ^^'hen that you may intend : For flowers fresh begin to fade. And Boreas in the field. Even with his hard congealed frost, No better flowers doth yield. But if that winter could have spnmg A sweeter flower than this, 10 I would have sent it presently To you withouten miss : Accept this then as time doth serve. Be thankful for the same. Despise it not, but keep it well. And mark each flower his name. Lavender is for lovers true. Which evermore be fain : Desiring always for to have, Some pleasure for theii- pain : 20 And when that they obtained have, The love that they require. Then have they aU theii' perfect joy, And quenched is the fire. Rosemary is for remembrance. Between us day and night ; Wishing that I might always have You present in my sight. And when I cannot have, As I have said before, SO Then Cupid with his dcailly dart Doth woimd my heart full sore. Sage is for sustenance. That .should man's life sustain, For I do still lie languishing Continually in pain. And shall do still imtil I die. Except thou favour show : My pain and all my grievous smart Full well you do it know. 40 TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 241 Fennel is for flatterers, An evil thing 'tis sine : But I have always moiint truly, With constant heart most pure : And will continue in the same As long as life doth last, Still hoping for a joyful day When all our pains he past. Violet is for faithfulness, Which in me shall abide : .00 Hoping likewise that from youi' heart, You will not let it slide. And will continue in the same As you have now begim ; And then for ever to abide Then you my heart have won. Thj-mc is to try me, As each be tried must : You know while life doth last I will not be unjust, CO And if I shoidd, I would to God To hell my soul should bear, And eke also that Belzebub With teeth he should me tear. Roses is to rule me With reason as you will, For to be still obedient, Yoiu' mind for to fulfil : And thereto will not disagree. In nothing that you say, 70 But will content your mind truly In all things that I may. Gillyflowers is for gentleness, Which in me shall remain : Hoping that no sedition shall Depart oirr hearts in twain. As soon the sun shall lose his course, The moon against her kind Shall have no light, if that I do Once put you from my mind. 80 Carnations is for graciousness : JIaA that now by the way, Have no regard to flatterers, Nor pass not ' what they say ; For they will come with lying tales, Youi- ears for to fulfil : - ' Pass not. Care not. The plirase was ouce very common in that sense. So Latimer wi-ote *' that men do not pass for their sins, do lightly i-egard them," meaning tliat their sins cause them no passio, no suffering, care, or concei-u. The word "pass," fi'om Latin "patior," participle " passus," or from the root of " patior," is to be distinguished from the other word "pass," in the sense of passing along a road, or passing by another, wliich is from Latin " pando," I stretch out, whence " passus," a pace or step. " Pass " is from " pando," where it means going beyond. " Why this passes ! Master Ford, yon are not to go loose any longer," says Master Page of Master Ford's new fury of jealousy, meaning that it extends beyond what had been seen in him before. To let anything pass, again, is simply equivalent to letting- it go by. "Pa-ss" in the sense ("patior") of suffering any care o:- trouble about a thing, is another word with a distinct root. In this sense Jack Cade exclaims in the " Second Part of King Henry VI.," act iv., sc. 2 — " As for tliese silken-coated knaves, I pass not : It is to you, good people, that I speak." The phrase was commonly negative, and is explained in Cotgrave's " French and English Dictionary " (1611). " I i)ass not for it. Jl wc iii'en chant, ic iic m'en soitcifi point," 2 FulfiJ. Fill full. 31 In any case do you consent No thing unto their will. Marigolds is for marriage. That would our minds suffice, 90 Lest that suspicion of us twain By any means should rise : As for my part, I do not care, Slyself I will still use That all the women in the world For you I wiU refuse. PcnnjToyal is to print your love So deep within my heart. That when you look this Nosegay on. My pain you may impart ;'■' 100 And when that you have read the same, Consider well my woe. Think ye then how to recompense Even him that loves you so. Cowslips is for counsel. For secrets us between, That none but you and I alone Should know the thing we mean : And if you will thus wisely do, As I think to be best. Then have you surely won the field, 310 And set my heart at rest. I pray you keep this Nosegay well, And set by it some store ; — And thus farewell, the gods thee guide, Both now and evermore ! — Not as the common sort do use, To set it in your breast. That when the smell is gone away On ground he takes his rest. 120 Most anmsinp; in its artlessness is tlie piece in tlie " Handful of Pleasant Delights " which seems to have suggested the theme that was to be adorned by the genius of Bottom and his friends, in the " Mid- summer Night's Dream : " — A NEW SONNET OF PYRAMUS AND THISBIE. (To the Tuncof " The Hownright Squire") You dames, I say, that climb the mount of Helicon, Come on with me, and give account what hath been done: Come tell the chance ye Muses all, and doleful news, AMiich on these lovers did befall, which I accuse. In Babylon not long agone a noble prince did dwell, Whos» daughter bright dimm'd each one's sight so far she did c.xcell. 10 Another lord of high renown who had a son. And dwelling there withtn the town gi-eat love begun : Pp'amus this noble knight I tell you true : Who with the love of Thisbie bright did cares renew : * Impart here means share with me, by having it communicated to you. To impart is to share with another, or communicate. 242 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.r. 1579 It came to pass their secrets was bcknown unto them hoth : And then in mind they place do find where they their love unclothe. This love they use long tract of time, till it befell At last they jiromised to meet at prime by Ninus' well,' Where they might lovingly embrace in love's delight, That he might see his Thisbie"s face and she his sight. In joj-ful case, she approach'd the place where she her Pyramus Had thought to view'd hut was rcncw'd to them most dolorous. Thus while she stays for Pyramvis there did proceed Out of the wood a lion fierce, made Thisbie di-ead : And as in haste she fled away her mantle fine The lion tare instead of prey, till that the timi- That P\Tanuis proceeded thus and see how lion tare The mantle this of Thisbie his, he desperately doth fare. For why he thought the lion had fair Thisbie slaine. And then the beast with his bright blade he slew certain : Then made he moan and said alas, (0 wretched wight) Now art thou in a woful case for Thisbie bright : gods above, my faithful love shall never fail this need : For this my breath by fatal death shall weave Atropos thread. - Then from his sheath he drew his blade and to his heart He thrust the point, and life did vade ' with painful smart. Then Thisbie she from cabin came with pleasui-e great, And to the well apace she ran there for to treat : And to discuss to Pyramus of all her former fears. And when slain she foimd him truly, she .shed forth bitter tears. WTien sorrow great that she had made she took in hand The bloody knife to end her life by fatal band.* 20 30 40 50 60 70 ?>ftni(s' n-eV. Misprinted " Miuus " in the orif^.al. - " O, Fates ! come, come ; Cut thread .and thrum ; Quail, crush, couclude, and quell !" (" Midsummer Night's Dream," Act v. sc. 1.) ' Vadc, de:^art hastily. Latin " vado." * " O sisters three, Come, come to me Witli hands as pale as milk : Lay them in gore. Since you have shore "With shears hie thread of silli. You ladies all peruse and see the faithfidness, How these two lovers did agTee to die in distress : You Muses wail, and do not fail, but still do you lament Those lovers twain who with such pain did die so well content. FtNIS. 80 I. TOMSON. I. Tom-son might be Bottom himself. The next piece — the hist we will take — from the same collec- tion, is of higher flight. THE LOVER COMPAEETH HIMSELF TO THE PAIXFUL FALCONER. The soaring hawk, from fist that flies. Her Falconer doth constrain Sometime to range the ground unknown To find her out again ; And if by sight or sound of bell His falcon he may sec : " Wo ho ! " he cries, with cheerful voice, The ghiddest man is he. By lure then in finest sort He seeks to bring her in, 10 But if that she full gorged be He cannot so her win ; Although with becks and bending eyes She many profEers makes : " Wo ho ho I " he cries, away she flies. And so her leave she takes. This woeful man with weary limbs Runs wandering roimd about ; At length by noise of chattering pies, His hawk again found out, 20 His heart was glad his eyes had seen His falcon swift of flight : " Wo ho ho ! " he cries, she empty gorged. Upon his lure doth light. How glad was then the Falconer there. No pen nor tongue can tell ; He swam in bliss that lately felt Like pains of cruel hell. Tongue, not a word : — Come, trust}- sword ; Come, blade, my breast imbnie; And farewell, friends ; — Thus Thisby ends : Adieu! adieu! adieu!" Shakespeare took the story from Arthur Golding's version of it, in his translation of Ovid, where it also has its comic side : — " Dwelt hard together two young folke in houses iojiide so nere, That under all one roof well uie both twaine couuayed were. The name of him was Pyramus, and Thisbe call'd was she. The wall that parted house from bouse had riueu therein a cranie. Which shroonke at making of the wall ; this fault not markt of auie Of many hundred yeerea before (what doth not love espie ?) These lovers first of all found out, and made a way whereby To talke together secretly, and through the same did go Their loving whisprings very light and safely to and fro. Now as on one side PjTamus. and Thisbe on t'other Stood often drawing one of them the pleasant breath from other : O thou enuious wall (they sayd), why leist thou lovers thus ?" and so forth. TO A.D. 1603] SHORTER POEMS. 243 His hand sometime upon her train, Sometime upon her breast : 30 " Wo ho ho ! " he erics with chcei-ful voice, His heart was now at rest. My dear likewise, behold thy love, WTiat pains ho doth endure ; And now at len:j;th let pity move To stoop unto his lui-e. A hood of silk, and silver bells. New gifts I promise thee : " Wo ho ! " I cry. " I come ! " then say ; Make me as srlad as he. 40 And when ho soeth how they fare He steps amonj;; them now and then, Whom when his foe presumes to check, His servants stand, to give the neck.' The Queen. The Queen is Quaint and Quick Conceit, Which makes her walk which way she list. And roots them up that lie in wait To work her treason, ere she wist : Her force is such against her foes That whom she meets she overthrows. 10 The Falcoxee, (From TiirbcrriJc's " Book of Faidmiiric," 1011.) Tlie next of the Miscellanies appeared in 1593 as " The Phoenix Nest. Built up with the most rare and retined workes of Noblemen, woorthy Knights, gallant Gentlemen, Masters of Arts, and braue Schollers. Full of varietie, excellent inuention, and singular delight. Never before this time published. Set foorth by R. S. of the Inner Temple, gentleman." Its chief poets seem to have been Thomas Lodge and Nichola.s Breton. This is by Breton : — THE CHESS PLAY. A secret many years unseen In play at chess, who knows the gume, First of the King, and then the Queen, Knight, Bishop, Rook, and so by name Of every Pawn I will descrj-, The nature with the quality. The King. The King himself is Haughty Care Which ovflooketh aU his men. The Knight. The Knight is Knowledge how to Fight Against his Prince's enemies, 20 He never makes his walk outright, But leaps and skips in wily wise. To take by sleight a trait' reus foe Might slily seek their overthrow The Bishop. The Bishop, he is Witty Brain That chooses crossest paths to pace. And evermore ho pries with pain To see who seeks him most disgrace : Such stragglers when he finds astray He takes them up and throws away. 30 The Mooks. The Rooks are Reason on both sides. Which keep the com(.T houses stiU, 1 To giti the neck. To do execution on the enemy. First-English " Imseccan," or " nteccan," was to strike on the neck, to Mil. :?14 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. Ta.d ;579 And warely stand to watch their tides By secret art to work their will, To take sometimrs a thief unseen Might mist'liief mean to King or Queen. The Pawns. The Pawn before the King is Peace, Which ho desires to keep at home ; Practice the Uueen's, which doth not cease Amid the world abroad to roam, 40 To find and fall npon each foe Whereas his mistress means to go. Before the Knight is Peiil placed, Which he by skipping overgoes, And yet that Pa^\Tl can work a east To overthrow his greatest foes ; The Bishop's, Prudence, prying still Which way to work his master's will. The Rooks' poor Pawns are siUy swains \Vliich seldom serve, except by hap, 50 And yet these Pawns can lay their trains To catch a great man in a trap : So that I see sometimes a groom May not be spared from his room. The Nature uf the Chess iiieii. The King is stately, looking high ; The Queen doth bear like majesty : The Knight is hardy, vahant, wise ; The Bishop prudent and precise ; The Rooks are rangers out of ray ; ' The Pawns the pages in the play. (iO L'Eiiroi/. Then rule with Care and Quick Conceit, And fight with Knowledge as with Force, So bear a Brain to dark deceit. And work with Reason and Remorse : Forgive a fault when young men play. So give a mate, and go your way. And when you play beware of check. Know how to save and give a neck. And with a check beware of mate. But chief ware " Had-I-wist " - too late : 70 Lose not the Queen, for ten to one If she be lost, the game is gone. Nicholas Breton, the writer of this. wa.s probably the second son of ,i William Breton of London, who died ill 15.59, and whose widow married George Gascoigne the poet. He perhaps served in the Low tJountries, under the Earl of Lei„estei-, before he married a daughter of Sir Edward Leigh of Itushall, had nine children, and died in 1624. The following piece is also by Nicholas Breton, and taken from " England's Helicon :" — PHILUD.\ AND CORYDON. In the merry month of May, In a morn liy break of day, 1 Bay, order of battle, sUorter form of array. •' So when that Lotli the armies were in ray" (Cassibellane to Csesar in tlie "Mirror for Magistrates"). * Had.f-u'isf. " If I had only kno\vTi." See Note 4, page 228. AVith a troop of damsels playing. Forth I yode forsooth a maying. When anon by a wood side. Where that May was in his pride, I espied, all alone, PhiUida and Corydon. Much ado there was, God wot. He would love and she would not. ]0 She said, " Never man was true ; " He says, " None was false to you." He said, he had lo'\''d her long ; She says, " Love should have no ■nTong." Corydon would kiss her then. She says, " Maids must kiss no men, Till they do for good and all;" When she made the shepherd call AU the heavens to witness truth Never lov'd a truer youth ; 20 Then with many a pretty oath. Yea and nay, and faitli and troth. Such as seely shepherds use When they will not love abuse, Love that had been long deluded. Was with kisses sweet concluded : And Phillida with garlands gay. Was made the Lady of the May. Henry Willobie published in 159-1: his " Avisa, or the True Picture of a Modest Maid and of a ( 'haste and Constant Wife," from which the follow- ing short poem is taken : — TO AVISA. I find it true, that some have said, " It's hard to love and to be wise," For wit is oft by love betray'd. And brought asleep by fond devise. Sith faith no favour can prociu'e. My patience must my pain endure. As faithful friendship mov'd, my tongue Your secret love and favour crave. And, as I never did you wrong. This last request so let me have : — 10 Let no man know that I did move ; Let no man know that I did love. That will I say, this is the worst, AVhen this is said, then all is past : — Thou, proud A\'isa, wert the first. Thou, hard Avisa, art the last. Though thou in sorrow make me dwell. Yet love wiU make me wish thee well. The "Phoeni.x Nest" was followed in 1600 by " England's Helicon," which contains pieces by famous writers with their names attached ; among them Marlowe's "Passionate Shepherd" with the "Nymph's Reply," and some other pieces that have been already quoted. In the same year 1600 there was another collection entitled " England's Parnassus : the Choysest Flowei-s of our Moder.ie Poets, with theii- Poeticall Comparisons," a book lai'gely consisting of extracts. Its editor signed himself " R. A." to two introductory sonnets. Then followed, in 1602, a " Poetical Rhapsody," edited by Francis Da\dson. TO A.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 245 Besides these there were song-books by musicians who could luiirry sweet thoughts to sweet sounds ; foremost among them Thomas Morley, wlio became in 1592 a gentleman of the Royal Clui})el, and ditl not long survive Elizabeth. He died in 16(I4. Thomas^Morley's first " Book of Ballets," ' published in 1595, was introduced by Master Michael Drayton, with these lines : — M. M. D. TO THE AUTHOR. Such was old Orpheus cunning That sensL'Iess things (h'ew nrnr him. And herds of beasts to hear him — The Stock, the Stone, the Ox, the Ass— came running. Morley, but this enchanting To thee, to be the music god, is wanting, And yet thou need'st not fear him. Draw thou the Shepherds still, and Bonny Lasses, And envy him not Stocks, Stones, Oxen, Asses. Shepherd and Bagpipe. Fvtmi the Engraved Title-'page to thejirst Folio of Draijton's Poems. This is one of the songs : — INVITATION TO MAY. Now is the month of Maying Wlien meiTy lads are pLaying. Fa, la, la. Each with his bonny lass Uiion the greeny grass. Fa, la, la. The Spring, clad all in gladness. Doth laugh at Winter's sadness. Fa, la, la. And to the bag]>ipe*s soimd The njTiiphs tread out their gTound. Fa, la, la. Fie then, why sit wc musing. Youth's sweet delight refusing ? Fa, la, la. Say, dainty nymphs and speak. Shall we play at barley break ? Fa, la, la. 10 * Ballets, songs ; from the Italian ** ballata," a dance or a song, or commonly, as in the pieces above quoted, a song that may be accom. pauied with dancing. And this is another : — THE MAY POLE.- About the May-pole new. With glee and merriment, Whiloas the bagpipe tooted it ThjTsis and Chloris finely footed it ; Fa, la, la. And to the wanton instrument Still they went to and fro ; And thus they ehaunted it. And finely flaunted it. And then both met again. Fa, la, la. The shepherds and the nj-mphs 10 Them round enclosed had, Wond'ring with what facility About they turned them in such strange agility. Fa, la, la. And when they enclosed had. With words fidl of delight they gently kissed them. And thus sweetly to sing they never missed them. K:i, la, la. The Mokkice Dance. Ffom Ficiuyes introdnced itito a Picture of Richmond Palace by I'i;a'/.-t'ii. boom ; copied in Douce's *' Illustrations of Shakespeare." - The Mai/polc. In Stubbes's " Anatomy of Abuses." the " order of May gumes " during Elizabeth's reign is thus described :— " Against May, Whitsuntide, or some other time of the year, every parish, to«-n and village assemble themselves together, both men, women, and children ; and . . . they go, some to the woods and gi-oves, some to the hills and mountains, . . . and return bringing with them birch boughs and branches of trees to deck their assemblies withal. . . . But their chiefest jewel they bring from thence is their May-pole, which they bring home with great veneration as thus : They Lave twenty or forty yoke of oxen, every ox having a sweet nosegay of flowers tied to the tip of his hoi-ns ; and these oxen draw home this May-ix»le, which is covered all over with flowers and herbs bounil round about with strings from the top to the bottom, and sometimes painted with variable colours, with two or three hundred men, women and children folloi\-iug it with grcv devotion. And thus being reared up, with handkerchiefs and fla:^s .streaming on the top, they strew the ground about, bind gi-een boughs about it, set up summer halls, bowers and ;irbours hard by it, and then fall thej' to banquet and feast, to leap and dance about it." 246 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. La.d. 1679 The next is from Thomas Morley's "Madrigals to Four Voices," publislied in 1600 : — THE JIORRICE DANCE.' Ho ! who comes here along with hagpiping and di-umming ? O 1 the Morrice 'tis I see, the niorrice danee a-coniing. Come, ladies, come, come quickly. And see how trim they dance and trickly. Hey, there again ! hey ho, there again ! How the hells they shake it ! Now for our town ; there, and take it. Soft awhile, not away so fast ; they melt them : Piper, piper, piper 1 be hanged awhile, knave, the dancers swelt them ! Out there, out awhile ! you come too far, I say, in : 10 Give the hohhy horse more room to play in. The Hobby Hokse. From the same tjroup of Mo Vi- ice Dancers. ' 'Die Morrice (or " Morris," a con-uptiou of " Moorisli " ) Dauce is said liy some to have been derived from the Moors in Spain, when John of Gaunt, in the days of Edward III., returned from his exiiedi- tion thither ; but it did not become a dance of the people here before the reign of Henry VIII., and we then probably received it from the French or Flemings. In the " Comedy of En-ors," Act iv., scene 3, is reference to " a morris pike," meaning the Moorish pike then used in the English army ; and in the " Second Piu-t of King Henry IV.," Act iii, scene 1, a Morrice dancer is called a Morisco : — " I have seen Him caper upright like a wild Morisco, Shaking the bloody darts as he his beUs." The bells fastened to tlie feet and legs, as in the ^voodcut. sometimes also to the arms and other parts of the dress, ana to the caps, were of different size and tone. There were the fore bell, the second bell, the treble, the meun or counter tenor, the tenor, and the bass ; the duty of the dancer being so to skip that the bells played tunefully. The chief dancer, or foreman of the "morrice," was brilliantly di-essed, and two other characters were the " Fool," with a wooden ladle, and the "Man Daucing in the Hobby-horse," which had a pasteboard head and tail upon a wicker frame. In Mny the chief female dancer in a " mon-ice " was the lady of the May. Sometimes the " morrice " was associated with Robin Hood festivals, when Robin Hood and Maid Marian were the chief dancers, and Friar Tuck was added to the company, which, of coiu-se, included the Hobby-horse and the Fool. The main feature of Elizabethan poetry wjis that grand development of the English Drama which will be illustrated in another section of this work. Here it is only to be remembered of the dramatists that, since the greater must include the less, every true dramatic ])oet is a lyric jioet of necessity. There was no dramatist of Elizabeth's day who could not ■wi-ite songs. It was John Lyly whose earnest prose novel, " Euphues," published in the same year as Spenser's "Shepherd's Calendar" (1579), gave the name of Euphuism to the form of ingenious writing, with antitheses, alliteration, and ingenious conceits of metaphor and simile, that became fashionable under Elizabeth. John Lyly also wrote court plays, mytho- logical and witty, in which there are daintily con- ceited songs like this from his " Campaspe :" — CUPID AND CAMPASPE. Cupid and my Campaspe played At cards for kisses — Cupid paid ; He stakes his quiver, bow and an'ows, His mother's doves, and team of sparrows ; Loses them too ; then down he throws The coral of his Up, the rose Growing on 's cheek (but none knows how). With these, the crystal of his brow, And then the dimple of his chin : — All these did my Campaspe win. 10 At last he set her both his eyes ; She won, and Cupid blind did rise. O Love ! has she done this to thee ? What shall, alas ! become of me ? This is a night-catch of Lyly's from Endymion, sung by young pages and the ancient watchmen, relatives of Dogbeny and Verges : — THE WATCH. Watch. Stand ! who goes there ? We charge you ajjpeai- 'Fore our constable here. In the name of the Man in the Jloon. To us billmen relate, Why you stagger so late. And how you came drunk so soon. rages. WTiat are ye, scabs ? V'atch. The watch: This the consfcible. 10 Fages. A patch. Const. Knock 'em down unless they all stand ; If any run away, 'Tis the old watchman's play, To reach them a 1 11 of his hand. Pages. O gentlemen, hold. Your gowns freeze with cold, And your rotten teeth dance in your head. Wine nothing shall cost ye ; Nor huge tires to roast ye ; 20 Then soberly let us be led. Const. Come, my brown bills, we'll roar, Bounce loud at tavcm door. Omnes. And in the morning steal all to bed. The plays of George Peele, whicli are among the earliest of those contemporaries of Shakesj)eare who TO A.D. 1»>03.] SHORTEE POEMS. 247 were somewhat older than he and wi-ote before him, are full of gi-ace. The following song from the '" Arraignment of Paris " is represented as sung on . Mount Ida by Paris and Qinone, before Juno, Venus, and Minerva have found the shepherd youth, and sight of Venus has wrought change of love. They sit under a tree together, says the stage direction. Paris has asked GSnone for a song. She has run thi-ough her little stock of subjects, and says to him — All these are old and known I know, yet, if tlion wilt h-Avv any, Choose some of these, for, trust me, else ffinono hath ncit many. Far. Nay, what thou wilt : but sith my cunning not com- pares with thine. Begin some toy that I can jilay upon this pipe of mine. (E«. There is a pretty sonnet, then, we caU it CKpid's Cio'se, " The!/ that do chninje old tore for new, pray gods they chriiiijv for worse ; ' ' The note is fine and quick withal, the ditty will agree, Paris, with that same vow of thine upon oui- poplar-tree. Par. No better thing ; begin it, then : CEnone, thou shalt see Our music figure of the love that grows 't^dxt thee and me. They sing ; and whi/e QSnone sings, he pipes. cupid's cvrse. (En. Fair and fair, and twice so fair. As fair as any may be ; The fairest shepherd on our green, A love for any lady. Far. Fair and fair, and twice so fail-, A.s fair as any may be ; Thy love is fair for thee alone. And for no other lady. (En. My love is fair, my love is gay, As fresh as bin the flowers in May, And of my love my roundelay. My meiTy, merry, merry roundelay, Concludes with Cupid's curse, — They that do change old love for new, Pray gods they change for worse ! Soth. They that do change, &c. (En. Fair and fair, &c. Par. Fair and fair, &c. Thy love is fair, &c. (Eti. My love can pipe, my love can sing, My love can many a pretty thing. And of his lovely praises ring Bly merry, merrj- roundelays. Amen to Cupid's curse, — They that do change, &c. Par. They that do change, &c. Both . Fair and fair, and twice so fair, As fair as any may he ; Thy love is fair for thee alone, And for no other lady. The song being ended, they rise. (En. Sweet shepherd, for ffinone's sake be cunning in this song. And keep thy love, and love thy choice, or else then dost her wrong. Par. My vow is made and witnessed, the poplar will not start. Nor .shall the nj-mph (Enoni's love from forth my breathing heart. I will go bring thee on thy way, my flock are here behind. And I will have a lover's foe; thev sav, unkiss'd unkind. A Martialist. From the Title-page of George niietstone's ** HonourahU Reindalion of a Soldier" (1585). George Peele, full as he was of grace and sweet- ness, could exchange the flute for the trumpet when hi.s English heart was stirred. Witness this God- speed to the armament of 180 vessels and 21,000 men that on the 18th of April, 1589, after the defeat of the Spanish Amiada, sailed from Plymouth, under Sir Francis Drake and Sir John Norris, to thwart Spain by placing Don Antomo on the throne of Portugal. A FAREWELL To the Most Famous and Fcrtunntc Generals of our English Forces: Sir John Norris and Sir Francis Dralce, Knights, and all their hrave and resolute Followers. Have done with care, my hearts ! aboard amain, With stretching sails to plough the swelling waves : Bid England's shore and Albion's chalky cliffs Farewell : bid stately Troynovant • adieu. Where pleasant Thames from Isis' silver head Begins her quiet glide, and runs along To that brave bridge, the bar that thwarts her coiu-so, Near neighbour to the ancient stony Tower, The glorious hold that Julius Ca?sar built. Change love for arms ; girt-to your blades, my boys ! 1 Your rests and muskets take, take helm and targe, And let god Mars his consort make you mirth, — The roaring cannon, and the brazen trump, The angrj'-sounding drum, the whistling fife, The shrieks of men, the princely courser's neigh. Now vail your bonnets to your friends at home : Bid all the lovely British dames adieu, ' Troi/jioi'diif. London, the New Troy, founded by Trojan Brut, of j the race of JEneas, who was in old fable since Geoffrey of Mou- I mouth's time (1147) first king of the luud named after Mm, Britain. 248 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [J.u. 1579 That iinder many a standard well-advanc'd Have hid the sweet alarms and braves of love ; Bid theatres and proud tragedians, 20 Bid Mahomet, Scipio, and mighty Tamhurliiine, King Charlemaine, Tom Stukcley,' and the rest, Adieu. To arms, to arms, to glorious arms ! With noble Norris, and victorious Drake, Under the sanguine cross, brave England's badge, To propagate religious piety, And hew a passage -with your conquering swords By land and sea, wherever Phcebus' eye. Th' eternal lamp of heaven, lends us light ; By golden Tagus, or the western Inde, 30 Or through the spacious bay cf Portugal, The wealthy ocean-main, the TyiThene sea, From gi'eat Alcides" pillars branching forth Even to the gulf that leads to lofty Eome ; Whether to Europe's bounds, or Asian plains, To Afiic's shore, or rich America, Down to the shades of deep Avemus' crags, Sail on, pursue your honours to yoiu- graves : Heaven is a sacred covering for your heads. And every climate virtue's tabernacle. To arms, to arms, to honourable anns ! 50 Hoise sails, weigh anchors up, plough up the seas With flying keels, plough up the land with swords : In God's name venture on ; and let me say To you, my mates, as Ciesar said to his. Striving with Neptune's hills ; " You bear," quoth he, " C;csar and Caesar's fortune in your ships." You follow them, whose swords successful are : You follow Drake, by sea the scourge of Spain, The dreadful dragon, terror to j'our foes, Victorious in his return from Inde, 60 The Master Gditner. From Edward Wcbbc's Travels (1590). There to deface the pride of Antichrist, And pull his paper walls and popery down. A famous enterprise for England's strength, To steel your swords on Avarice' triple crown. And cleanse Augeas' stalls in Italy. To arms, my fellow-soldiers ! Sea and land Lie ojjen to the voyage you intend ; And sea or land, bold Britons, far or near. Whatever course your matchless virtue shapes. 40 * Tom Stvl:cle]i. Peele himself was author of the play upon Tom Stukeley. It is his " Battle of Alcazar." Stukeley was a younger brother of a good Devonshire family near Ilfracombe. He made up his mind that he would he a king of somewhere ; thought first of Florida, then went to Italy, and won favour from Pope Pins V. by undertaking with :J,000 soldiers to beat the English out of Ireland. The Pope gave him, with his blessing, a string of titles. Baron, Vis- count, Karl, Marquis, a holy peacock's tail, and 800 soldiers paid by Spain. On his way to Ireland Stukeley landed in Portugal, when the king there, Sebastian, was on his way to Africa with two Moorish kings. Stukeley went with them, and advised them on their arrival to rest before fighting. They would not, and on the 4th of August, 1578, fought and lost the battle of Alcazar, in which the vainglorious Tom Stukeley was killed. '* A fatal fight, where in one day was slain Three kings that were, and one that would be fain." In all his high attempts un vanquished : You follow noble Norris, whose renown. Won in the fertile fields of Belgia, Spreads by the gates of Europe to the courts Of Christian kings and heathen potentates. You fight for Christ, and England's peerless queen, Ehzabeth, the wonder of the world. Over whose throne the enemies of God Have thunder'd erst their vain successless braves. O ten-timcs-treble happy men, that tight 70 Under the cross of Christ and England's queen. And follow such as Drake and Norris are ! All honours do this cause accompany ; All glory on these endless honours waits : These honours and this glory shall He send, Whose honour and whose glory you defend. The songs of Elizabeth's time in which the note of war is struck are all alive in their fine eai'nest- ness. In 1.58.5 Qneen Elizabeth signed a treaty at Nonsuch engaging to supply 5,000 foot-soldiers and 1,000 horse in aid of the contest in the Netherlands. TO i.D. 1603.] SHORTER POEMS. 249 In the same year George Whetstone expressed the s])mt in which Englishmen prepared to meet all perils of a contest between their little nation weakened by past discords, and not yet in the fulness of its power, and Spain at the height of its material power. He jmblished a little prose book on " The Honour- able Reputation of a Souldier : with a Morall Report of the Vertues, Offices, and (by abuse) the Disgrace of his Profession. Drawn out of the lines, docu- ments and disci})lines of the most renowned Romaine, Grecian, and otlier famous Martialistes. By George Whetstone, Gent." The woodcut upon the title-page is the bookseller's ideal of a Mai-tialist (see page 247). Prefixed to the volume is this poem : — TO THE RIGHT VALIANT (JENTLEMEN AND SOLDIERS TH.iT ARE OR SHALL BE ARMED UNDER THE ENSIGN OF ST. GEORGE : In recompense of worthy adventiu'es, Heaven, and everlasting Honour. God with St. George I Allons, brave gentlemen ! Set spears in rest, renew yoiu- ancient fame : Press midst the pikes, the cannon do not sheu.' Your ancestors, with passage through the same, This proverb raised among the French, their Foes, VoKS es sijter que iin Anglois. Thou art as fierce as is an Englishman, The French stiU say, and proof the same did teach : Turn you the French into t'astilian : It hath a grace in such a lofty speech : Your cause is good and Englishmen you are, Your foes be men, even as Frenchmen were. The force of death, that raiseth many fears In craven hearts, which courage do despise ; Long lives the man that dies in lusty years. In actions wherein honour may arise. And wherein may you honour more expect Than wronged men to succour and protect ? The Lion preys upon the stoutest beast. Yet licks the sheep, the which the WoU hath wovmd, So worthy minds, proud looks that feareth least. Doth help to raise the wounded from the ground. Like Lions then, the Ai-ms of England shield. Prey on your foes, and pity those that yield. I say no more, but God be your good speed, .\nd send you help, which I did never taste ; And if this book you do witsafe - to read, You cannot think your labour spent in waste, Which doth contain the moral rules of those That followed Mars in thickest press of foes. Humi)hrey Gifford, a Devonshire man of good family, who lived in London, puljlished in 1.580 — the year in which the seven northern provinces of Holland declared their independence — a collection of his own poems enphuistically called " A Posie of Gilliflowers," in which there is this poem FOR SOLDIERS. Ye buds of Brutus' land, courageous youths, now play your parts, Unto your tackle stand, abide the brunt with valiant hearts. ^ Shen, shun. 32 2 Wiisafc, vouchsafe. For news is carried to and fro, that we must forth to warfare go: Men muster now in every place, and soldiers arc prest forth apace. Faint not, spend blood, to do your Queen and country good: Fail- words, good pay, will make men cast all caro away. The time of War is come, prepare your corslet, spear, and shield, Mcthinks I hear the drum strike doleful marches to the field: Tantara, tantara, the trumpets sound, wliich makes om- lu;arts with joy abound. The roaring guns are heard afar, and everything dcnounccth War; Id Serve God, stand stout, bold courage brings this gear about. Fear not, forth run; faint htart fair lady never won. Ye curious carpet knights, that spend the time in sport and play. Abroad, and see new sights, your country's cause calls yuu away : Do not to make your ladies game, bring blemish to your worthy name. Away to field and win renown, with courage beat your enemies down : Stout hearts gain praise, when dastards sail in Slander's seas : Hap what hap shall, we sure shall die but once for all. Alaiin^ me thinkes they ciy, be packing mates, be gone witli speed, Oiu' foes are very nigh, shame have that man that shrinks at need ; 20 Unto it boldly let us stand, God will give right the upper hand. Our cause is good we need not doubt; in sign of <'Ourage give a shout : March foi-th, be strong, good hap will come ere it be long. Shrink not, fight well, for lusty lads must bear the bell : All you that will shun devil,'' must dwell in wai-faro every day ; The world, the flesh, and devU, always do seek our soul's decay. Strive with these foes with all your might, so shall j'ou ti;;ht a -worthy fight. That conquest doth desei-ve most praise where vice do yiild to virtue's ways. Beat down foul sin, a worthy crown then shall ye win : If ye live well, in heaven with Christ our souls shall dwell. We return to the dramatists, and find Robert Greene, at the close of a life in which he felt that he had fought weakly in that battle to which Humphrey Gifford last referred, wi'iting on his death-bed these pathetic lines. They are from his last book, the " Groatsworth of Wit bought with a MUlion of Repentance : " — TIME LOST. Deceiving world, tliat with alluring toys Hast made my life the subject of thy scorn, And scomest now to lend thy fading joys T' outlength my Ufe, whom friends have left forloni ; How well are they that die ere they be born, And never see thy sleights, which few men shun Tin unawares they helpless are undone ! •■> Alarm (Italian "all'nnni," To Arms!). SoiiinlinK the alarm-ber. is soimfliDg the hell that calls to arms. * Devil, proiiouuced "de'il." 250 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 157i Oft h:tve I sung or Love and of his fire ; But now I find that poet was ad-\-is'd, "SVTuih made full feasts incrcasers of desire, 10 And proves weak Love was with the poor despis'd : For when the life with food is not suihc'd, MTiat thoughts of love, what motion of delight. ^\^lut pleasanee can proeeed from sueh a wight r Witness my want, the murderer of my wit : My ra%ish'd sense, of wonted furj- reft. Wants sueh conceit as should in poems fit Set down the sorrow wherein I am left : But therefore have high heavens their gifts hereft. Because so long they lent them me to use, 20 And I so long their bounty did abuse. Oh that a year were granted me to live. And for that year my former T\-its restor'd ! What rules of Hfe. what counsel would I give. How shoidd my sin ^\'ith soitow be deplor'd ! But I must die of every man ahhorr'd : Time loosely spent will not again be won; My time is loosely spent, and I undone. The sweet spirit of poetiy remamed by Greene, though he sank in life, perhaps not so deeply as he is willing to let men think, that thej' may be warned to avoid the rocks on which he struck. This whispered to him of the purity and beauty of a true and simple Ufe. It kept the veil from falling between man and God. Here is a dainty little pastoral from one of many little prose works that he wrote in euphuistic fashion : — THE shepherd's wife's soxg. Ah, what is love ': It is a pretty thing. As sweet imto a shepherd as a king : • And sweeter too, For kings have cares that wait upon a crown. And cares can make the sweetest love to frown : Ah then, ah then. If countn- loves such sweet desires do gain, What lady would not love a shepherd swain ? His flocks are folded, he comes home at night. As merTT,' as a king in his delight ; 10 And merrier too. For kings bethink them what the state require, A\'here shepherds careless carol by the fire : Ah then, ah then. If countrj- loves such sweet desires do gain, ^V'hat lady would not love a shepherd swain ? He Idsseth first, then sits as blithe to eat His cream and curds as doth the king his meat : And blither too, For kings have often fears when they do sup, 20 'NA'here shepherds di-ead no poison in their cup : Ah then, ah then. If coimtry loves sueh sweet desires do gain. ^^^lat lady would not love a shepherd swain r [Eight lines omitted.] ITpon his couch of straw he sleeps as sound As doth the king upon his bed of down ; More soimder too. For cares cause kings fuU oft their sleep to spill, ■ftliere weary shepherds lie and snort their fiU : Ah then, ah then, If countrj' loves such sweet desu'es do gain. \\Tiat lady would not love a shepherd swain? 40 Thus with his wife he spends the year, as blithe As doth the king at every tide or sithe ; ' And bhther too, For kings have wars and broUs to take in hand. \\Tiere shepherds laugh and love upon the land : Ah then, ah then, If coimtry loves such sweet desires do gain, A\'Tiat lady would not love a shepherd swain ? Not daintier than this, in its half artificial Ijeauty, is the famous little pastoral written by Marlowe of the "mighty line."- Christopher Marlowe was of like age with Shakespeare, but coming from his University to London, he leajst while yet young into feme as a dramatist, and raised the drama to the point beyond which Shakespeare only could advance it. It was the genius of JVIarlowe that established blank verse as the measure of English dramatic poetiy, leaving only to Shakespeai'e the task of developing the fidl variety of force and beauty that is within the compass of its music. This is 3Iarlowe's song, from which Shakespeare, in the " Merry Wives of Windsor," made Sir Hugh Evans, waiting for his adversary, sing a line or two : — " By shallow rivers, to whose falls Melodious birds sing madiigals." THE passionate SHEPHERD. Come live with me, and be my love ; jVnd we will all the pleasures prove That hiUs and valleys, dales and fields. Woods, or steepy mountain j-ields. And we will sit upon the rocks. Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks By shallow rivers, to whose falls Melodious birds sing madrigals. And I will make thee beds of roses, And a thousand fragrant posies ; 10 A cap of flowers, and a kutle Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle ; A gown made of the finest wool 'Wliich from our pretty lambs we pull ; Fair lined slippers for the cold. With buckles of the purest gold ; A belt of straw and ivy -buds, AVith coral clasps and amber studs : And if these pleasures may thee move. Come live with me, and be mv love. 20 ' Siihe, occasion. First- English " sitU," a path or journey, time or occasion. 2 The phrase is from Ben Jonson's Poem to the Memory of Shake- speare: — *' And tell thee how far thou didst our Lyiy outshine. Or sporting Kyd, or Marlowe's mighty line," TO A.D. 1603. SHORTER POEMS. 251 The shepherd-swains shall dance and sing For thy delight each Jlay-moiiung : If these delights thy niind may move, Then live with me, and he my love. The touch of unreal in these fancies was played nywn by Sir Walter Raleigh in this — THE nymph's reply TO THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD. If all the world and love were young. And truth in every sheplierd's tongue, These pretty pleasures might me move To live with thee and he thy love. But time drives flocks from field to fold, AVhon rivers rage and rocks grow cold ; And Philomel beeometh dumb, The rest complains of cares to come. The flowers do fade, and wanton fields To wayward winter reckoning yields ; 1 A honey tongue, a heart of gaU, Is Fancy's Spring, but Sorrow's Fall.' Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses. Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies, Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten, — In folly ripe, in season rotten. Thy belt of straw and ivy buds. Thy coral clasps and amber studs, — All these in me no means can move To come to thee and be thy love. 20 But could youth last, and love still breed, Had joys no date, nor age no need ; Then those delights my mind might move To live with thee and be thv love. Of the gi-eat beauty of Marlowe's " Hero and Leander," finished by George Chapman, as well as of Shakespeare's " Venus and Adonis " and " Lucrece," illustrations will be given when we discuss the longer English Poems. The next piece is a pastoral bj' another of the dramatists who wrote plays liefore Shakespeare was known, Thomas Lodge, a Roman Catholic, who afterwards practised as a physician, and where all were smging he did not want jiatients because he had proved himself to be a poet. The piece was printed in 1600 in " England's Helicon." TO PHILLIS, THE FAIR SHEPHERDESS. 3Iy Phillis hath the morning sun At first to look upon her ; And Phillis hath mom-waking birds Her rising stiU to honour. My Phillis hath prime-feather'd flow"rs That smile when she treads on them ; And Phillis hath a gaUant flock That leaps when she doth own them. But Phillis hath too hard a heart, Alas that she should have it 1 10 It jaelds no mercy to desert. Nor grace to those that crave it. 1 Pall, Autiimu. Sweet sun, when thou look'st on. Pray her regard my moan ! Sweet birds, when you sing to her, To jield some pity woo her ! Sweet flowers that she treads on. Tell her, her beauty di'ads one. And if in life her love she nil agree mc," I'rav her, liefore I die she will come see me. 20 "William Shakespeare, CJtundos Portrait.) From the songs in the plays of Shakespeare let us take one or two to blend his music with that of his friends. This is from the " Two Gentlemen of Verona," one of his earliest comedies : — SILVIA. WTio is Silvia ? What is she. That all our swains commend her r Holj', fair, and wise is she. The heavens such grace did lend her. That she might admired be. Is she kind as she is fair. For beauty Uves with kindness r Love doth to her eyes repair. To help him of his blindness ; And, being helped, inhabits there. 10 Then to SiUna let us sing. That SUvia is excelling : She excels each mortal thing. Upon the dull earth dwelling : To her let us garlands bring. This is from '■ Much Ado aliout Nothing : " — SIGH NO MORE. Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more. Men were deceivers ever; One foot in sea, and one on shore. To one thing constant never : 2 mi, will not. The First-English tive in " nyllan." 'willan," to will, had its nejra- 252 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. La.d. 157a Then sigh not so. But let them go, And be you bhtho and honny ; Convei-ting all your sounds of woo Into, hey nonny, nonny. Sing no more ditties, sing no mo, Of dumps so dull and heavy ; The fraud of men was ever so. Since summer first was leavy ; Then sigh not so, But let them go, And he you blithe and bonny ; Converting all youi' sounds of woe Into, hey nonny, nonny. This is from " As You Like It : " — M.\X'.S INGRATITUDE. Blow, blow, thou winter wind. Thou art not so unkind As man's ingratitude ; Thy tooth is not so keen. Because thou art not seen. Although thy breath be rude. Heigh ho 1 sing, heigh ho ! unto the green holly : Most friendship is feigning, most lo^iag mere foUy : Then, heigh ho ! the holly ! This life is most jolly. Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, Thou dost not bite so nigh As benefits forgot : Thougli thou the waters warp. Thy sting is not so sharp As friend remembered not. Heigh ho ! sing, heigh ho ! unto the green holly : Most friendship is feigning, most loxing mere folly : Then, heigh ho ! the hollj' ! This life is most jolly. This is from the " Tempest : " — aeiel's song. Where the bee sucks, there suck I ; In a cowslip's bell I lie ; There I couch when owls do cry ; On the bat's back I do fly- After summer merrily : Merrily, merrily, shall I Uve now, Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. These are from " Cpubeliiie : " — A SERENADE. Hark ! hark I the lark at heaven's gate sings, And Pha'bus 'gins arise. His steeds to water at those springs On chaUoed flowers that lies ; And winting Marj'-buds begin To ope their golden eyes ; ■\Vith every thing that pretty bin, My lady sweet, arise ; Arise, arise. 10 10 A DIRGE. Fear no more the heat o' the sun, Nor the furious winter's rages ; Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone and ta'en thy wages : Golden lads and girls aU must, As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. Fear no more the frown o' the great. Thou art past the tyrant's stroke ; Care no more to clothe and eat ; To thee the reed is as the oak : 10 The sceptre, learning, physic, must All follow this, and come to dust. Fear no more the lightning-flash. Nor the all-dreaded tlumder-stone ', Fear not slander, censure rash ; Thou hast finished joy and moan : All lovers young, all lovers must Consign to thee, and come to dust. No exerciser harm thee ! Nor no witchcraft charm thee ! 20 Ghost imlaid forbear thee 1 Nothing ill come near thee ! Quiet consimimation have ; And renowned be thy grave ! Shakespeare's Sonnets were lii-.st described in his own time — by Francis Meres in 1598 — as his " sugared sonnets among his private friends." Tliey were fir.st published in 1609, se^'en years before his death, and dedicated l)y Thomas Thorpe, the book- seller, to " Mr. W. H.," in words that have sent critics upon many a wihl-goose chase. The first de- scription of tlieni was the best, and the best modern editor of Shakespeare, Alexander Dyce, said in the account of Shakespeare prefixed in 1866 to a second edition of liis works, "For my own j^art repeated perusals of the Sonnets have well nigli convinced me that most of them were composed in an assumed character on different subjects, and at different times, for the amusement, if not at the suggestion of the autlior's intimate associates (hence described by Meres as ' his sugred sonnets among his private friends ') ; and though I would not deny that one or two of them reflect his genuine feelings, I contend that allusions scattered through tlie wliole series are not to lie hastily referred to the personal circumstances of Shakespeare." This is wholesome truth, and ac- cords ■with what we have seen of the nature of the sonnet, and the original use of it. As to their structui-e, Shakespeare's somiets are not technically true sonnets, but foiirteen-lined poems of exquisite variety and beaut}', each consisting of three quatrains of alternate rhyme and a closing couplet. These are examples : — TIME. Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore. So do our minutes hasten to their end ; Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. TO A.D. 1603.1 SHORTER POEMS. 253 Nativity once in the main of light,' Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crowned. Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight, And time that gave, doth now his gift confoimd. Time doth transfix the flourish set on j-outh, And delves the parallels in beauty's brow, 10 Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth. And nothmg stands but for his sc\i,he to mow. And yet, to times in hope, my verse shall stand. Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand. THE SECOND SELF. Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye. And all my soul, and all my every part ; And for this sin there is no remedy. It is so grounded inward in my heart. Methinks no face so gracious is as mine. No shape so true, no truth of such account : And for myself mine own worth do define. As I all other in all worths surmount. But when my glass shows me myself indeed, Beated and chopped with tanned antiquity. 10 Mine own self-love quite conti-ary I read. Self so .self-lo^Tiig were iniquity. 'Tis thee (myself) that for mj-sclf I praise. Painting my age with beauty of thy days. ENVY. That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect. For slander's mark was ever yet the fau- : The ornament of beauty is suspect. A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. So thou be good, slander doth but approve Thj- worth the greater, being wooed of time : For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love. And thou present' st a pure, imstaincd prime. Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days. Either '- not assailed, or Wctor being charged ; 1 Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise. To tie up env}', eveiinore enlarged : If some suspect of ill masked not thy show. Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe.^ LOVE FROM THE DYING. No longer mourn for me when I am dead. Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell Give warning to the world that I am fled From this vile world, with vilest womis to dwell. Nay, if you read this line, remember not The hand that wTit it ; for I love yoxi so. That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot. If thinking on me then .should make you woe. 1 In the main of light. In the full flood of light. Main (First. English "mse^en"), strength, force, energy. Thus, in the "Mer- chant of Venice," Act v. ;— " A substitute shines brightly as a king Until a king be by, and tliPn his state Empties itself as doth an inland brook Into the main of waters." 2 EiiheTt pronounced as one syllable *' ei'er." 3 OwBt own. 0, if (I say) you look ujjon this verse. When I perhaps compounded am with clay. Do not so much as my poor name rehearse : But let your love even ■* with my life decay ; Lest the wise world should look into your moan, And mock you with me after I am gone. FIRM LOVE. Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with tlie remover to remove : O, no ; it is an ever-fixed mark. That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ; It is the star to every wandering bark, .Whose worth's unknown, although his height betaken. Love's not Time's fool, though rosj' lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come : 10 Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks. But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error, and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved. Michael Drayton and Samuel Daniel were two poets alike in age, one born in 1.5G2, the other in 1563. Each in his own way, they ran as poets somewhat parallel to one another. Drayton, a Warwickshire man, produced in 1591 a volume of sacred poetry, " The Harmonie of the Church." In 1592 Daniel, a Devonshii-e man, published some love-poems, and one founded on history, " Delia, containing certain Sonnets, with the Complaint of Rosamond." In 1593 Drayton published love-poems as " Idea," followed in 1594 by one founded on history, " Matilda," with " Idea's Mirronr, Amoin-s in Quatorzains." In 1595 Daniel produced the hi'st four books of a historical poem, in octave rhyme, taking one of our most memorable civil ware for its theme, "The Civille Wan-es betweene the Two Houses of Lancaster and Yorke;" chosen because, in the hust yeai-s of the reign of the Maiden Queen, there was present to men's minds a possibility of civil war after her death to settle the succession to her throne. In the very next year, 1590, Drayton produced his " Mortimeriados," the first instalment of a historical poem, also in octave rhyme, on our other famous civil war, " The Lamentable Civil Wars of Edward the Second and the Barons," a poem commonly known as "tlie Barons' Wai-s." Both jioets went on vdth their poems while Elizabeth lived, but after her death, and the peaceful accession of James I., into whose reign their lives passed, they left them unfinished, because their theme, Civil War, had lost its liiing interest. In 1598 Drayton founded upon Ovid's " Heroides," a book of similar poetical epistles, " England's Heroical Epistles," in which the writei-s were pereons of whose love there is record in English History, and he opened witli fair Rosamond. Daniel, wlio had produced in 1597 the Tragedy of PhUotas, published in 1599 " Musophilus," a poem in defence of learning and poetry, which he dedicated to Fulke * Even, prononnced " e'en." 254 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 157S Gi-eville, with sundry poetical essays. Of Drayton's poem on tlie Barons' War.s, and Daniel's son the Civil Wars of York and Lancaster, account will be given in another volume. Of their shorter poems some exam I lies follow. Samuil DA^itL. {Fi-o:ii a Porti-aii d I'l-i 1609.) These are seven of Daniel's sonnets to Delia. The mechanism of their verse is that of Shakespeare's sonnets. SONNETS TO DELIA. XXXVI. Look, Delia, how we esteem the half-blown rose. The image of thy blush, and Summer's honour ! Whilst yet her fender bud doth undisclose That full of beauty Time bestows upon her. No sooner spreads her glory in the air But strait her wide-blown pomp eomcs to decline ; She then is scorned, that bite adorned the fail' : So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine ! No April can revive thy withered flowers, Whose springing grace adorns the glory now. 10 Swift speedy Time, feathered with flying hours. Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow : Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain ; But love now, whilst thou may'st be loved again. XXXVII. But love whilst that thou may'st be lov'd again. Now whilst thy May hath filled thy lap with flowers : Now whilst thy beauty bears without a stain ; Now use the Summer smiles, ere Winter lowers. And whilst thou spread' st unto the rising sun. The fairest flower that ever saw the light. Now Joy thy time before thy sweet be done. And, Delia, think thy morning must have night ; And that thy brightness sets at length to west. When thou wilt close up that whieli now thou show'.st. And think the same becomes thy fading best WTiieh then shall most inveil and shadow most. Men do not weigh the stalk for that it was, When once they find her flower, her glory, pass. ^\^len men shaU find thy flower, thy glory, pass, And thou with careful brow sitting alone. Received hadst this message from thy glass, That tells the truth and says that all is gone, — Fresh shalt thou see in me the wounds thou mad'st ; Tho' spent thy flame, in me the heat remaining : tliat have lov'd thee thus before thou fad'st, 3Iy faith shall wax, when thou art in thy waning. The world shall find this miracle in me. That fire can bui-n wlien all the matter's spent : 10 Then what my faith hath been, thyself shaU see. And that thou wast unkind, thou may'st repent. Thou may'st repent that thou hast scorn'd my tears, When Winter snows upon thy sable hairs. XXXIX. \\nicn Winter snows upou thy sable hairs. And frost of age hath nipt thy beauties near ; ■SVlien dark shall seem thy day that never cleai-s. And all lies wither'd that was held so dear ; Then take this picture which I here present thee, ■ Limned with a pencil not all unworthy : Here see the gifts that God and Natm-e lent thee, Here read thyself, and what I sufier'd for thee. This may remain thy lasting monument, Which happily posterity may cherish ; 10 These eoloiu's with thy fading are not spent, These may remain, when thou and I shall perish. If they remain, then thou shalt live thereby : They will remain ; and so thou canst not die. XL. Thou canst not die, whilst any zeal abound In feeling heai-ts, that can conceive these lines ; Tho' thou a Laura, hast no Petrarch found. In base attire yet clearly beauty shines. And I, tho' bom within a colder clime. Do feel mine inward heat as great, I know it : He never had more faith, altho' more rhyme ; I love as well, though he could better show it. But I may add one feather to thy fame, To help her flight throughout the fairest isle ; 10 And if my pen could more enlai'ge thy name, Then shouldst thou Kve in an immortal style. For tho' that Laura better limned be, .Suflice thou shalt be lov'd as weU as she. XLVII. Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew, Whose short refresh upon the tender gi-cen Cheers for a time, but till the sun doth show. And strait 'tis gone, as it had never been. Soon doth it fade that makes the fairest flourish ; Short is the glory of the Mushing rose, The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish. Yet which at length thou must be fore'd to lose When thou, surcharged with burthen of thy years, Shalt bend thy wrinkles homeward to the earth ; 1 .Vnd that, in Beauty's lease expir'd, appears The date of age, the calends of our death. TO A.O. 160:!.] SHORTER POEMS. 255 But ah ! no more ; this must not be foretold : For women grieve to think thoy must lio old. XLVIII. I must not grieve my love, whose eyes would reail Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile ; Flowers have time before they come to seed, And she is young, and now must sport the whik'. And sport, sweet maid, in season of these years. And learn to gather flowers before they wither ; And where the sweetest blossoms first appears, Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither. Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air. And calm the tcmi)est which my sighs do raise ; 1 Pity and smiles do best become the fair; Pity and smiles must only yield thee praise. Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone, Happy the heart that sigh'd for such a one. From Drayton's " Idea " let us now take seven SONNETS TO IDEA. II. My heart was slain, and none but you and I ; Who should I think the murder should commit '' Since but yourself there was no creatiu'c by. But only I, guiltless of murd'ring it. It slew itself ; the verdict on the view Do quit the dead, and me not accessary : Well, well, I fear it will be prov'd by you. The evidence so great a proof doth carry ; But oh, see, see, we need inquire no further. Upon yoiu- lips the scarlet di-ops are found. 10 And in your eye, the boy that did the muidcr ! Your cheeks yet pale, since first he gave the wound. By this I see, however things be past, Tet Heav'n will still have murder out at last. There's nothing grieves me, but that age should haste. That in my days I may not see thee old. That where those two clear sparkling eyes arc plac'd. Only two loopholes then I might behold ; That lovely, arched, ivory, polish'd brow Defac'd with wrinkles that I might but see ; Thy dainty hair, so curl'd and crisped now, Like giizzled moss upon some aged tree ; Thy cheek, now flush with roses, sunk and lean ; Thy lips, with age, as any wafer thin, 10 Thy pearly teeth out of thy head so clean. That when thou feed'st, thy nose shaU touch thy chin : These lines that now thou scorn' st, which should delight thee. Then would I make thee read, but to despite thee. XIX. You cannot love, my pretty heart, and why ': There was a time you told me that you would : But now again you ■nnll the same deny, If it might please you, would to God you could. What, wiU you hate ? nay that you will not neither : Nor love, nor hate, how then ? what will you do 'r What, will you keep a mean then betwixt either ':" Or will you love me, and yet hate me too !" Yet serves not this. 'WTiat next, what other shift ': You will and will not, what a coil is here ? 10 I see your craft, now 1 perceive your drift, And all this while, I was mistaken there : Your love and hate is this, I now do prove you, You love in hate, by hate to niak(^ me love you. XXIIl. Love banish'd heaven, in earth was held in scorn. Wand' ring abroad in need and beggary ; And wanting friends, though of a goddess born. Yet crav'd the alms of such as passed by ; I, like rf/iacicable simplicity in the verse ; and yet because the sentiments appear genuine luid unatfected, they are able to move the mind of the most polite reader with inward meltings of humanity and compassion. The incidents grow out of tlie subject, and are such as Virgil himself would have touched upon, had the Hke story been told by that divine poet. For which reason the whole narration has something in it very moving, notwithstanding the author of it (whoever he was) has delivered it in such an abject plu"ase and poorness of expression, that the quoting any part of it would look like a design of turning it into ridicule. But though the language is mean, the thoughts from one end to the other are wonderfully natural, and therefore cannot fail to please those who ai'e not judges of language, or those who, notwithstanding they are judges of language, have a genuine and unprejudiced taste of nature. The condition, speech, and behaviour of the dying parents, with the age, innocence, and distress of the children, are set forth in such tender circumstances, that it is impos- sible for a good-natured reader not to be affected with them. As for the circumstance of the robin-red-breast, it is indeed a little poetical ornament ; and to shew what a genius the author was master of amidst all his simphcity, it is just the same kind of fiction which one of the greatest of the Latin poets has made use of upon a pai'allel occasion ; I mean that passage in Horace, where he describes himself when he was a child, fallen asleep in a desert wood, and covered with leaves by the turtles that took pity on him. * Me fabulosa vulture in Apulo, Altricis estra hmen ApuliaB, Ludo fatigatumque somno Fronde novfi puerum palumhes Texere ' I have heard that the late Lord Dorset, who had the greatest xri*: With that bcspake their mother dear : " O brother kind," quoth she, " You are the man must bring oui' babes To wealth or misery. " And if you keep them carefully, Then God wiU you reward ; 50 But if you otherwise should deal, God win your deeds regard.' With lips as cold as any stone. They kiss'd their children small : " God bless you both, my childien dear ! " With that the tears did fall. These speeches then thou- brother spake To this sick couple there : " The keeping of your little ones. Sweet sister, do not fear ; 60 God never prosper me nor mine. Nor aught else that I have. If I do wrong your children dear \\Tien you are laid in grave I " The parents being dead and gone. The chUdien home he takes. And brings them straight unto his house, AVhere much of them he makes. He had not kept these pretty babes A twelvemonth and a day, 70 But, for their wealth, he did devise To make them both away. He bargain'd with two ruffians sti'ong, ^\Tiich were of furious mood, That they should take these children young. And slay them in a wood. He told his wife an artfid tale, He would the children send To be brought up in London town With one that was his friend. 80 Away then went those pretty babes, Ecjoicing at that tide, Eejoicing with a mem' mind They should on cock-horse ride. They prate and prattle pleasantly. As they ride on the way. To those that should their butchers be And work their lives' decay : temper'd with the greatest humanity, and was one of the finest criticks as well as the best poets of his age, had a numerous collection of old English ballads, and took a particular pleasm-e in the reading of them. I can affirm the same of Mr. Prydeu, and know several of the most refined writers of our present age who .are of the same humour. I might likewise refer my reader to Moliere's thoughts on this sub- ject, as he has expressed them in the character of the misanthrope ; but those only who are endowed with a true greatness of soul and genius can divest themselves of the little images of ridicule, and admire Nature in her simplicity and nakedness. As for the little con- ceited wits of the age, who can only shew their judgment by finding fault, they cannot be supposed to admire these productions that have nothing to recommend them hut the beauties of nature, when they do not know how to relish even those compositions that, with all the beauties of nature, have also the additional advantages of art." The ornaments here used for illustration of "The Children in the Wood "are portions of two very beautiful examples of Renaissance decoration, figured by Friedrich Arnold in his unfinished work " Die Renaissance." TO A.D. 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 265 So that the pretty spcuch they had Made Murder's heart relent : 90 And they that undertook the deed Full sore did now repent. Yet one of them, more hard of heart, Did vow to do his charp;e, Beeause the wretch that hired him Had paid him very large. The other won't agree thereto, So here they fall to strife ; With one another they did fight About the children's life : 100 And he that was of mildest mood Did slay the other there, "Within an imfrequented wood ; The habes did quake for fear ! He took the children hy the hand, Tears standing in their eye. And bade them straightway follow him, And look they did not cry ; And two long miles he led them on, ^\^lile they for food complain : 110 " Stay here," quoth he ; " I'll bring you bread "WTien I come back again." These pretty babes, with hand in hand. Went wandering up and down ; But never more could see the man Approaching from the town. Their pretty lips with blackberries Were all besmear' d and dyed; And when they saw the darksome night. They sat them down and cried. 120 Thus wander'd these poor innocents, Till death did end their grief ; In one another's arms they died. As wanting due relief : No biuial this pretty pair Fiom any man receives, Till Kobin Kedbreast piously Did cover them with leaves. And now the heavy wTath of God Upon their uncle fell ; 130 Yea, fearful fiends did haunt his house. His conscience felt an hell : His barns were fired, his goods consumed. His lands were barren made. His cattle died within the field. And nothing with him stay'd. And in a voyage to Portugal Two of his sons -om \]ie Poiirait bf/oi'e ?us translation o/Ko»icr. An elder poet and dramatist who first joined his juniors in their singing towards the close of Eliza- beth's reign was George Chapman, whose jiortrait as here given appeared before his Homer mtli an inscription that made his age fifty-seven in 1G16, the year in which Shakespeare died at the age of fifty- two. He was born at Hitchin, as he himself says, " on the hill Next Hitchin's left hand," and is descrilied liy William Browne, in the second book of " Britannia's Pastorals," as " the learned shepherd of fair Hitching Hill." He was nearly forty years old when, in L598, his first play was printed, but it had been acted two yeai-s before, and he had published his first poem, the " Shadow of TO A.D. 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 271 Niglit," in 1594. In the same year with his iii'st printed ])lay appeared the beginning of his tnuisla- tiou of Homer, being an instahnent of seven books of the Iliad. In James I.'s reign he published twelve books of the Iliad, in 1610, and in the follow- ing year all twenty-four, to which tlie twenty-four books of the Odyssey and all known poems ascribed to Homer afterwards were added. Let lis read the good vei-se jirefixed to the "Twelve Books of the Iliad," which were dedicated to King James's son, Prince Hemy ; but allow a few minutes to take breath before starting, as the first sentence is twenty- eight lines long, large in structure as in thought. EPISTLE DEDICATORY TO THE HIOH-BOllN PRINCE OP MEN, HENRY, THRICE ROYAL INHERITOR TO THE UNITED KINGDOMS OP GREAT BRITAIN, ETC. Since perfect happiness, by Princes sought. Is not with birth bom, noi' exchequers bought, Nor follows in groat trains, nor is possessM With any outward state : but makes him blest That governs inward and Ijelioldeth there All his affections stand about him bare, That by his power can send to Tower and death All traitorous passions, marshalling beneath His justice his mere will, and in his mind Holds such a sceptre as can keep confined 10 His whole life's actions in the royal bounds Of ■virtue and religion, and then- grounds Takes in to sow his honours, his delights. And complete empire : you should learn these rights, Great Prince of Men, by princely precedents "Which here, in all kinds, my true zeal presents To furnish your youth's groundwork and first state, And let you see one godlike Man create All sorts of worthiest Men, to be contrived In youi- worth only, giving him revived 20 For whose Hfe Alexander would have given One of his kingdoms, who (as sent from heaven. And thinking well that so di-sTne a creature Would never more enrich the race of nature) Kei)t as his crown His Works, and thought them still His angels, in aU power to rule his wUl ; And would affii-m that Homer's poesy Did more advance his Asian \-ictory Than all his armies. Oh, 'tis wondrous much, Though nothing prized, that the right virtuous touch 30 Of a well-written soul to virtue moves ; Nor have we souls to piu-pose, if thcu' loves Of fitting objects be not so inflamed. How much then were this kingdom's main soul maim'd. To want this gi'eat inflamcr of all powers That move in human souls ! All realms but yours Are honour'd witli him, and hold blest that state That have His Works to read and contemplate : In which humanity to her height is raised, Which all the world, yet none enough, hath praised. 40 Seas, earth, and heaven, he did in verse comprise. Out-sung the Muses, and did equalise Their king Apollo ; being so far from cause Of Princes' light thoughts, that their gravest laws May find stuff to be fashion'd by his lines. Thi'ough all the pomp of kingdoms still he sliines, And graceth aU his graeers. Then let Uo Youi- lutes and viols, and more loftily Jlake the heroics of your Homer sung ! To (h-ums and trumpets set his angel's tongue ! oO And, with the iiriucely .sport of hawks you use, Behold the kingly flight of his high Muse, And sec how, hkc the phamix, she renews Her age and starry feathers in your sun, Thousand.s of years attending, every one Blowing the holy fire, and throwing in Their seasons, kingdoms, nations that have been Subverted in them; laws, religions, all Oft'er'd to change and greedy funeral : Yet still your Homer lasting, living, reigiiing, And proves how fii-m Truth builds in poets' feigning. 60 A Prince's statue, or in marble carved Or steel or gold, and shrined, to be preserved, Aloft on pillars or pjTamides, Time into lowest ruins may depress ; But drawn -n-itli all his virtues in leam'd verse, Fame shall resound them on oblivion's hearse, Till graves gasp with her blasts, and dead men rise. No gold can follow where true Poesy flies. Then let not this Divinity in earth, 70 Dear Prince, be shghted as she were the birth Of idle fancy, since she works so high ; Nor let her poor disposer, Learning, lie Still bed-rid. Both which being in men defaced In men with them is God's bright image rased. For as the Sun and Moon are figures given Of His refulgent Deity in heaven, So Learning, and, her lightener, Poesy, In eai'th present His fiery Majesty. Nor are kings like Him since their diadems 80 Thunder and lighten and project brave beams, But since they His clear ■(■irtues emulate. In truth and justice imaging His state, In bounty and himianity since they shine, Than which is nothing like Him more diWne : Not fire, not light, the sun's admired com-se, The rise nor set of stars, nor all their force In us and all this cope beneath the sky. Nor great Existence, term'd His Treasury; Since not for being greatest He is blest, !)0 But being just, and in all \-ii'tucs blest. AVhat sets His justice and his truth best forth. Best Prince, then use best, which is Poesy's worth. For, as great Princes, well inform' d and deck'd With gracious virtue, give more sure efl^ect To her persuasions, jJeasiu'cs, real worth. Than all th' inferior subjects she sets forth ; Since tlierc she shines at fidl, hath birth, wealth, .state. Power, fortune, honour, fit to elevate Her heavenly merits, and so fit they arc, 100 Since she was made for them, and they for her ; So Truth, with Poesy graced, is fairer far. More proper, moving, chaste, and regular. Than when she runs away with untruss'd Prose ; Proportion, that doth orderly dispose Her \-irtuous treasui-e, and is queen of graces. In Poesy decking her w-ith choicest phi-ascs. Figures and numbers ; when loose Prose puts on Plain letter-habits, makes her trot upon Dull cartlily business, she being mere di\'ine, 1 10 Holds her to homely cates and harsh hcdgc-winc, That should di-ink Poesy's nectar, every way One made for other, as the sun and day. Princes and virtues. And, as in a spring, 272 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1603 The pliant water, moved with anything Let fall into it, puts her motion out In perfect circles, that move round about The gentle fountain, one another raising ; So Truth and Poesy work ; so Poesy, blazing All subjects fall'n in her exhaustless fount, 120 Works most exactly, makes a true account Of all things to her high discharges given, Till all be circular and round as heaven. And lastly, great Prince, mark and pardon me : As in a flomishing and ripe fruit-tree. Nature hath made the bark to save the bole, The bole the sap, the sap to deck the whole With leaves and branches, they to bear and shield The useful fruit, the fruit itself to yield Guard to the kernel, and for that all those, 130 Since out of that again the whole tree grows ; So in our tree of man, whose neny root Springs in his top, from thence even to his foot There runs a mutual aid through all his parts. All join'd in one to serve his Queen of Arts, In which doth Poesy like the kernel lie Obscured, though her Promethean faculty Can create man, and make even death to live. For which she should live honour'd. Kings should give Comfort and help to her that she might still 140 Hold up their spirits in 'N'irtue, make the will That governs in them to the power confonn'd. The power to justice ; that the scandals, storm'd Against the poor dame, clear' d by yoiu' fair grace. Your grace may shine the clearer. Her low place, Not showing her, the highest leaves obscure. Who raise her raise themselves ; and he sits sure 'UTiom her wing'd hand advanceth, since on it Eternity doth, crowning virtue, sit. All whose poor seed, like violets in theii' beds, 150 Now grow with bosom-himg and hidden heads ; For whom I must speak, though their fate convinces Me worst of poets, to you best of princes. By the most himible and faithful implorcr for all the graces to yoiir highness eternised by your divine Homer, Geo. CiurjiAN. The prince full of liigli promi.se to "wliom this dedication was addressed died in the following year, in November, 1611, and was lamented in ver.se l)y many of the poets. We have lyric verse also from a pair of dramatists who worked together, and whose plays, like those of Cyril Tournenr, belong entirely to the reign of James I. , while most of theii- fellow-playwrights either began under Elizabeth, or ended under Charles I., or, like Ben Jonson, "wrote in all three reigns. There was ten years' difteience of age between them : John Fletcher, the elder, born in 1576, survived his friend nine years, continued to wi'ite, and died at the end of James's reign in 1625, aged forty-nine. Francis Beaumont died at the age of thirty, in 1616, the same year as Shakespeare. Their tirst jirinted verses were in praise of Ben Jonson, prefixed in 1607 to the tirst edition of his " Volpone," and for the re- maining nine years of Beaumont's life, from twenty- one to thirty, they wrote jjlays together. Beaumont's poetical taste, it was said, co)itrolled, in their joint work, Fletcher's luxuriance of wit and fancy. From Fletcher's " Faithful Shepherdess " this is a SONG TO PAN. All ye woods, and trees, and bowers. All ye virtues and ye powers That inhabit in the lakes. In the pleasant springs or brakes. Move your feet To oui' sound, A\Tiilst we greet All this groimd With his honour and his name That defends our flocks from blamo. 10 He is great, and he is just. He is ever good, and must Thus be honoured. Daifodillies, Roses, pinks, and loved lilies. Let us fling. Whilst we sing. Ever holy. Ever holy. Ever honoured, ever young I Thus great Pan is ever sung. 20 The next is a song from " The Mad Lover :" — THE BATTLE OF PELD.SIUM. Arm, arm, ann, ai-m 1 the scouts are all come in; Keep yoiu- ranks close, and now your honours win. Behold from yonder hill the foe appears ; Bows, bills, glavcs, arrows, shields, and spears ! Like a dark wood he comes, or tempest pouring ; Oh, ^aew the wings of horse the meadows scouring. The vanguard marches bravely. Hark, the drums ! Bub, diih. They meet, they meet, and now the battle comes : See how the arrows fly. That darken all the sky ! 10 Hark how the trumpets sound, Hark how the hills rebound. Tarn, tarn, tarn, tarn, tara .' Hark how the horses charge I in, boys, boys, in ! The battle totters ; now the wounds begin : Oh, how they ciy ! Oh, how they die ! Eoom for the valiant Memnon, aimed with thunder ! See how he breaks the ranks asunder 1 They fly ! they fly ! Eumenes has the chase, And brave Polybius makes good his jjlace. 20 To the plains, to the woods. To the rocks, to the floods, They fly for succour. Follow, follow, foUow! Hark how the soldiers hoUoa '. Bey, hey ! Brave Diodes is dead. And all his soldiers fled ; The battle's won, and lost, That many a Ufe hath cost. The next is from " The Woman Hater :" — Come, Sleep, and, with thy sweet deceiving, Lock me in delight awhile ; TO i.D, 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 273 Let sonic ploasinfr Jrc;ims beguile All my faucius ; that from thonco I may foel an influence, All my powers of care bereaving ! Though hut a shadow, hut a sliding, Let me know some little Joy; We that suffer lung annoy Are contented with a thought, Through an idle fancy wrought : Oh, let my joys have some abiding! 1(1 Think how many royal bones Sleep within these heaiis of stones ; Here they lie, had realms and lands. Who now want strength to stir their hands, Where from their puli>its seal'd with dust They preach, " In greatnc'ss is no trust." Here's an acre sown indeed With the richest royallest seed That the earth did e'er suck in Since the first man died for sin : Here the bones of birth have cried. 10 Fkancis Beavmont. Prom the Portrait engraved h'j VeHue. And tins from " The Nice Valour :" — MELANCHOLY. Hence, all you vain delights. As short as are the nights Wherein you spend your folly ! There's nought in this life sweet, If man were ^vise to see 't. But only melancholy. O sweetest melancholy ! Welcome, folded arms, and fixed eyes, A sight that piercing mortities, A look that's fastened to the ground, A tongue chained up without a sound. Fountain heads, and pathless groves. Places which pale jiassion loves, Jloonlight walks, wlien all the fowls Are wamily housed, save bats and owls I A midnight bell, a pai'ting gi'oan. These are the sounds we feed upon ; Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley. Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy '. This is by Francis Beaumont — ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. Mortality, behold and fear What a change of flesh is here ! 35 10 J<.IHN FhETCHKK. From the Portrait cii'jraeed hij Veiiue. "Though gods they were, as men they died !" Here are sands, ignoble things, Dropt from the ruined sides of kings : Here's a world of pomp and state Buried in dust, once dciid by fate. Another dramatist of the time of James I. was Thomas Middleton, who began to write in the latter part of Elizabeth's reign, was about tliirty-three years old at James's acces.sion, and lived until 1627. This song of his is from a play first jirinted in 1002 : — WHAT LOVE IS LIKE. Love is Uke a lamb, and Love is like a lion ; Fly from Love, ho fights : fight, then does he fly on ; Love is all on fire, and yet is ever freezing ; Love is much in winning, yet is more in loosing : Love is ever sick, and yet is never dying ; Love is ever true, and yet is ever lying : Love docs doat in liking, and is mad in loathing; Love indeed is anything, yet indeed is nothing. This is from a j)lay of " The Widow," written by Ben Jonson, Fletclier, and Middleton : — THE thieves' song. How round the world goes, and every tiling that's in it ! The tides of gold and silver ebb and flow in a minute : 274 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1603 From the usurer to Ms sons, there a current swiftly runs ; From the sons to queans in chief, from the gallant to the thief ; From the thief unto his host ; from the host to hushandmen ; From the country to the court ; and so it comes to us again. How round the world goes, and every thing that's in it ! The tides of gold and silver ebb and liow in a minute. John Webster, who lived on into the time of the Commonwealth, wrote two of his tinest i)lays in the reign of James I. From one of them, " The White Devil, or Vittoria Corombona," we take a dirge, of which Charles Lamb said that he knew nothing like it, except the ditty that reminds Ferdinand of his drowned lather in "The Tempest." "As that is of the water, watery ; so this is of the earth, earthy. Both have that intenseness of feeling which seems to resolve itself into the elements which it con- templates." A DIRGE. Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren, Since o'er shady groves tliey hover. And with leaves and flowers do cover The friendless bodies of unburied men. Call unto liis funeral dole The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole. To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm. And (when gay tombs are robbed) sustain no hann ; But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men. For with his nails he'll dig them up again. Thomas Heywood, who also began to \\Tite in Elizabeth's reign, said that he had a hand in two hundred and twenty plays ; but only twenty-three I'.ave reached ns. From his " Fair Maid of the Exchange" let ns take A MESSAGE TO PHILLIS. Ye little birds that sit and sing Amidst the shady valleys. And see how Phillis sweetly walks. Within her garden-alleys ; Go, pretty birds, about her bower ; Sing, ijretty birds, she may not lower. Ah, me ! methinks I see her frown ! Ye pretty wantons, warble. Go, tell her, through your chirping bills. As you by me are bidden. To her is only known my love, Which from the world is hidden. Go, pretty birds, and tell her so ; See that your notes strain not too low, For still, methinks, I see her frown ! Y'e pretty wantons, warble. Go, tune your voices' harmony, And sing, I am her lover ; Strain loud and sweet, that every note With sweet content may move her. And she that hath the sweetest voice Tell her, I will not change my choice. Yet still, methinks, I see her frown ! Ye pretty wantons, warble. 10 Oh, fly 1 make haste ! see, sec, she falls Into a prettj' slumber. Sing round about her rosy bed, That waking, she may wonder. Say to her, 'tis her lover true That sendeth love to you, to you ; 30 And when you hear her kind reply, Return with pleasant warblings. In this reign also Philip Massinger and Jolin Ford liegan to write, but the greater number of their plaj's belong to the reign of Charles I. Although his jJace is ^vith the greatest of our prose writers, the spirit of song caught even Francis Bacon, who has left to us this glum piece of verse : — Francis Bacon. From the Portrait prefixed to his Posthumous Works (1657). LIFE. The world's a bubble, and the life of man Less than a span ; In his conception \vi-etched, from the womb So to the tomb ; Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years With cares and fears : A^Tio then to frail mortality shall trust. But limns on water, or but ^\i"ites in dust. Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest, What life is best ? Courts are but only supcriicial schools To dandle foois : The rural parts are turn'd into a den Of savage men ; And Where's a city from foul vice so free But may be term'd the worst of all the three ? Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed. Or pains his head : Those that live single take it for a curse, Or do things worse ; 10 20 TO A.D. 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 271 Some would have children ; those that have them moan Or wish them gone : TV^hat is it, then, to have or have no wife. But single thraldom or a double strife ? Our own affections still at homo to please Is a disease ; To cross the seas to any foreign soil, Peril and toil ; "Wars \\"ith their noise afEright us ; when they cease We are worse in peace : — 30 ■\Miat then remains, but that we still should cry For being boiii, or, being bom, to die ? Tlie light and gi-aceful Eupliuism which in Eliza- beth's reign filled our jioetry with dainty conceit that disarmed criticism by its lively turns of wit and fiincy, hardened under James I., in many wiitei-s, into a pedautio strain to be ingenious. If the king's clumsy trifling was according to liis nature, it was also according to his time. Italian influence upon the outward forms of literature was not yet superseded, but was in decay ; and the charactei-s of that Later Euphuism which gave rise among the poets to what Dr. Johnson, not knowing what it was or what to call it, styled, for inscrutable reasons, " metaphysical poetry," were manifest at the same time iu the literatures of Italy hei-self, of Spain, and of France. In Italy Marino, in Spain Gongora, had about the same time like characters iu literary liistory to those which distinguished in this country Dr. John Donne a-s a type of the later euphuistic style. In Spain those whom we called in England Euphuists were called Conceptistas, and our Later Euphuists (mLscalled " metaphysical " poets) corre- sponded to those men of their own day who live in the history of Spanish literature as the " Cultos." In France such vTOtere were kno-mi as the Pleiades, and in Italy, after Marino, whose style was not cause but consequence of the suiTounding change — and who was a better poet than Donne — they were called Mariuisti. Here is Donne wi-iting upon a primrose : — THE PRIMROSE, BEING AT MONTGOMERY CASTLE, rpON THE HILL ON WHICH IT IS SITUATE. Upon this primrose hill. ^Vhere, if Heav'n would distil A shower of rain, each several drop mifjht go To his own primrose, and grow manna so ; And where their form and their infinity M.ake a terrestrial galaxy. As the small stars do in the sky : I walk to find a true love, and I see That 'tis not a mere woman, that is she. But must or more or less than woman be. 10 Yet know I not which flower I wish, a six, or four ; For should my true love less than woman be. She were scarce anj-thing ; and then .should she Be more than woman, she would get above All thought of sex, and think to move My heart to study her, not to love ; Both these were monsters. Since there must reside Falsehood in wouKin, I could more abide She were by art than natui-o falsify'd. 20 Live, Primrose, then, and thrive "With thy true numbLT five ; And women, whom this flower doth represent, With this mysterious number be content ; Ten is the farthest number, if half ten Belongs unto each woman, then Each woman may take half us men. Or if this will not serve their turn, since all Numbers are odd or even, since they fall First into five, women may take us all. 30 We seem to have left Marlowe very far behind when we find Doime echoing his music in this fashion : — THE BAIT. Come live with me, and be my love. And we ■will some new pleasures prove Of golden sands and crystal brooks, With silken lines and silver hooks. There will the river whisp'ring run Warm'd by thy eyes more than the sun. And there th' enamoured fish will stay. Begging themselves they may betray. "When thou wilt swim in that live bath, Each fish, which every channel hath, 10 Will amorously to thee swim, Gladder to catch thee than thou him. If thou to be so seen beest loath. By sun or moon, thou dark' nest both ; And if myself have leave to see, I need not their light, having thee. Let others freeze with angling reeds, And cut their legs with shells and weeds. Or treacherously poor fish beset With strangling snare or windowy net : 20 Let coarse bold hands from slimy nest The bedded fish in banks out-wTcst, Or curious traitors, sleavesilk flies, Bewitch poor fishes' wand' ring eyes. For thee, thou need'st no such deceit, For thou thyself art thine ovm bait. That fish, that is not catch'd thereby, Alas, is wiser far than I. John Domie, bom in l.')72, son of a London merchant, was trained at both Oxford and Cambridge, travelled on the Continent, and then became secretary to Chancellor Ellesmere. But he offended Lady Ellesmere by marrying her niece, and suffered many troubles while a sickly family increased about him. For some years Sir Fi-ancis Woolley, of Pirford in Surrey, befriended him, and afterwards Sir Robert Drury. His long and careful study of the points in controvei-sy between the English Reformed Church and the Church of Rome, and his loyal views upon 276 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a-D. 1603 the oatlis of supremacy and allegiance, brought him King James's favour. After a conscientious delay of three yeai's that reflects honour upon him, Doiuie John Donne. From ilte Porli'ait pvpfixed to his Poems (1669). yielded to the king's suggestion that he should enter the Church. By the king's command, Cambridge gave the degree of Doctor of Divinity, and in a few years James had conferred on Donne the Deanery of St. Paul's in a fashion that, no doubt, seemed witty .md pleasant to them both. The king invited Donne to dinner, sat down himself, and said, " Dr. Donne, I have invited you to dinner ; and though you sit not down with me, I will carve you of a dish I know you love well ; for, kno^ving you love London, I do tlierefore make you Dean of St. Paul's. And when I have dmed, then take your beloved dish home to your study, say grace there to yourself, and much good may it do you." Another illustrator of the decay of Euphuism wa-s Joshua Sylvester. He expected to be remem- bered by remote posterity as translator of the works of a now neglected French Protestant poet, Guil- laume Saluste du Bartas, whose chief work, " La Sepmaine," was a religious poem in highest repute from the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign until the time of Charles I. Prefixed to his translation were " shaped verses," arranged as columns, altars, pyra- mids, for which the fashion was extending in the reign of James. Ben Jonson, Samuel Daniel, Joseph Hall, and other good -^^Titers, highly praised Joshua Sylvester's version of Du Bartas. This is its praise as sounded by John Davies, of Hereford : — IN PRAISE OF THE TRANSL.\TOR. If divine Bartas (from whose blessed braines Such works of grace or graceful! workcs did stream) Wore so adniir'd for wit's celestiall strains As made their vertues seat the high'st e.xtream ; Then, Josuah, the sun of thy bright praise Shall fixed stand in Ai-t'x fair timiament Till dissolution date Time's nights and dayes, Sith right thy lines are made to Bartas bent. Whoso compass circumscribes (in spacious words) The Universal! in particulars ; 10 And thine the same, in otlicr tearms, aifords : So, both your tearms agree in friendly wars : If thine be only hi,s, and tiis lie tliine, They are (like God) etemaU, sith divine. Here are some of Joshua Sylvester's secular inge- nuities : — AN ACROSTIC SONNET ©N HIS OWN NAME. J n paine 'tis painc past pleasures to record ; how it grieves in grief to think of gladnesse, S miu-t after smiles ingenders treble sadnesse : IT se of delight makes dolour more abhon^'d. A h, what availes meo (then) thy wonted fa\our ? II igh hopes dejected double in despaire, 8 o ev'ry smile-beame of thy sun-shine faire, Y f now thou frowne, makes ev'ry torment graver: L ove, think not, then, ah think not it suihceth V nto thy merit, that thou didst aifect mee ; E ven that remembrance, if you now neglect mee, 10 ST ings more than all-else sorrow that ariseth. E asie's his pain, who never pleasure proved, K ougher, disdaine, to him that hath beene loved. ACROSTITELIOSTICHON. R are type of genti-ie, and true Vertues star R ne entire pajTnent of the zeale wee O B reake stOl the best threades of oui- busie we B E ^ill the Sluses with griev'd mindes agre E R uth, more than youth, and rather crie than quave E T is said of some things, that the last is bes T N praise, but pardon to oui- new-found strai N 1 will enforce my leaden thoughts to fl I C loude-high, to grave it, in a diamond ro C n every thing, forbeares the Muses th O L ost with their lives, their lives memorial L S weet learning, yet, keeps fresh their famous storie S O ur verse, yom- vertues shall eternize to O N othing a whit more cleare than radiant su N But this sonnet is daintier : — THE BROKEN CHARM. Thrice toss these oaken ashes in the air, And thrice three times tie-up this true love-knot ; Thrice sit thee down in this enchanted chair, And murmur soft. She wiU, or she will not. Go burn these poisoned weeds in that blue fire, This cj-prcss gathered at a dead man's grave ; These screech-owl's feathers, and this pricking briar. That aU thy thorny cares an end may have. Then come you fairies dance with me a round : Dance in this circle, let my love be centre ; Melodiously breathe out a charming sound : Melt her hard heart, that some remorse may enter. In vain are all the charms I can devise ! She hath an art to break them with her eyes. 10 TO A.D. 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 277 And this:- ABIDING LOVE. Were I as tase as is the lowly plain, And you, my Love, as high as heaven above, Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love. Were I as high as heaven above the plain. And you, my Love, as humble and as low As are the deepest bottoms of the main, A\Ticrosoe'er you were, with you my love should go. Wore you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies, My love should .shine on you like to the sun, And look upon you ■n-ith ten thousand eyes Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done. WTieresoe'er I am, below, or else above you, WTieresoe'er you are, my heart shall trul}- love you. 10 Thomas Overbuiy, born in Wai-wicksliii-e in 1581, was knighted by King James in 1608 ; but his endea- vours to dissuade the king's base favourite, Thomas Sir Thomas Overbdry. From a PoHrait engraved in Nichols's *' Progresses of James the First." Carr, whom .James made Earl of Somerset, from marrjring the divorced Countess of Essex, brought on him the vengeance of those creatures of the king. Tliey procured his committal to the Tower, and there poisoned him in September, 1613. His poem of " The Wife " was lirst published in the following year, with the suggestive title of "A Wife, now a Widow." The tone of the poem is throughout high, Jnit I omit stanzas in several places — eighteen in all — that insist chiefly on what a poet of the present day would take for granted : — THE WIFE. Each woman is a brief of womankind. And doth in little even as much contain ; As in one day and night all life we find. Of either more is but the same again. God fram'd her so, that to her husband she, As Eve, should all the world of woman be. So fram'd ho both, that neither power he gave Use of themselves but by cxcliange to make : AVhcncc in their face the fair no plcasui-o have But by refle.x of what thence other take. 10 Oui- lips in their own kiss no pleasure find : Toward theii- proper face oui- eyes ari' blind. So God in Eve did perfect ' man begun ; Till then, in vain much of himself lie had ; In Adam God created only one. Eve and the world to come in Eve he made. We are two halves : whiles each from other strays Both liarren are ; join'd, both their like can raise. At first, both sexes were in man combin'd, Man, She-Man did within his body breed ; 20 Adam was Eve's, Eve mother of mankind, Eve from live-flesh, Man did from dust proceed. (.)uc, thus made two, man-iage doth re-imite. And makes them both but one hei-maphiodite. Man did but the well-being of this life From woman take ; her being she from man : And therefore Eve created was a wife. And at the end of all her sex began : Marriage their object is; their being, then. And now perfection, they receive from men, 30 Marriagi', to all whose joys two parties be. And doubled are by being parted so ; 'Wherein the vei-y act is chastity. Whereby two souls into one body go, WTiich makes two, one, while here they living be. And after death in their posterity. God to each man a private woman gave. That in that centre his desires might stint. That he a comfort like himself might have, And that on her his like he might imprint : 40 Double is woman's use, part of their end Doth on this age, part on the next depend. We fill but part of time, and cannot die. Till we the world a fresh supply have lent : Children are body's sole eternity ; Nature is God's, Art is man's instrumrnt. Now all man's art but only dead things makes, But herein man in things of life partakes. Or rather let me love, than be in love ; 73 >So let me choose, as wife and friend to find. Let me forget her sex when I approve : Beast's likeness lies in shape, but ours in mind : Our souls no sexes have, their love is clean. No sex, both in the better part are men. Birth less than beaut}- shall my reason blind, Her bii'th goes to mj' children, not to me : 110 Rather had I that active gentrj' find, A'^irtue, than pas.sive from her ancestry ; Rather in her alive one virtue see Than all the rest dead in her pedigree. 1 Mate pei-fect the Man who in Adam had only been be^in. 278 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1603 In the degrees high rather be she placed, Of nature, than of art and policy : Gentry is but a relique of time past, And Love doth only but the present see ; Things were tirst made than words ; she were the same With or without that title or that name. 120 As for (the odds of sexes) Portion, Nor will I shun it nor my aim it make ; Birth, beauty, wealth, are nothing worth alone. All these I would for good additions take ; Nor for goud parts ; those two are ill combin'd Whom any third thing from themselves' hath join'd. Kather than these the object of my love. Let it be good when these with \-irtue go, They (in themselves indifferent) virtues prove, For good, like fire, turns all things to be so. Crod's image in her soul, let me place My love upon! not Adam's in her face. 130 Good is a fairer attribute than white, 'Tis the mind's beauty keeps the other sweet. That's not stiU one, nor mortal with the light, Nor gloss, nor painting can it counterfeit. Nor doth it raise desires which ever tend At once to their perfection and their end. Give me next good, an imderstanding wife, By nature wise, not learned by much art, Some knowledge on her side will all my life More scope of conversation impart, Piosides her inborn virtue fortify : 'I'hey are most firmly good, that l)est know why. A passive understanding to conceive. And Judgment to discern, I wish to 6nd : Beyond that all as hazardous I leave : Learning and pregnant wit in woman-kind, Wlxat it finds malleable, makes frail, jVnd doth not add more ballast, but more sail. Domestic charge doth best that sex befit. Contiguous business ; so to fix the mind. That leisure space for fancies not admit : Their leisure 'tis eon-upteth woman-kind. Else, being plac'd from many vice* free, They had to Heav'n a shorter cutT'.han we. Books are a part of man's prerogative. In formal ink they thoughts and voices hold, That we to them our solitude may give And make time-present travel that of old. Our life Fame picceth longer at the end, And books it farther backward do extend. As good and knowing, let her bo discreet. That, to the others' weight doth fashion bring ; Discretion doth consider what is fit, Goodness but what is lawful, but the thing. 180 190 200 ^ From themselves, that is, m a way foi-eign to tlieir natiu-e. So in Hamlet's advice to the players, " Anything so overdone is /rom the purpose of playing ; " and in " Troiliis and Cressida," when Achilles "will not to the field to-morrow," Agamemnon suggests that Ajax should urge him — *' "Tis said he holds you well, and will be led. At your request, a little from himself." Not circumstances ; learning is and wit, In men, but curious foUj' without it. Now since a woman wo to marry are, A soul and body, not a soul alone. When one is good, then be the other fair ; Beauty is health and beauty, both in one ; Be she so fail- as change can j-ield no gain. So fair as she most women else contain. So fair at least let me imagine her ; That thought to me is truth : opinion Cannot in matter of opinion err ; ■ With no eyes shall I see her but mine own, And as my fancy her conceives to be. Even such my senses both do feel and see. The face we may the seat of beauty call, In it the relish of the rest doth lie. Nay ev'n a figure of the mind withal : And of the face the life moves in the eye ; No things else, being two, so like we see. So like that they two but in number he. Beauty in decent shape and colours lies. Colo>irs the matter arc, and shape the soul ; The soul, which fi-om no single part doth rise, But from the just proportion of the whole, And is a mere spiritual harmony. Of every part united in the eye. No circumstance doth beauty beautify. Like graceful fashion, native comeliness ; Nay ev'n gets pardon for defomuty ; Art cannot aught beget, but may increase : When Nature had fixt Beauty, perfect made. Something she left for Motion to add. All these good parts a perfect woman make : Add love to me, they make a perfect wife. Without her love, her beauty should I take As that of pictures, dead ; that gives it life : Till then her beauty like the Sun doth shine Alike to all ; that makes it only mine. And of that Love let Reason father be. And Passion mother ; let it from the one His being take, the other his degree ; Self-love (which second loves hath built upon) Will make me if not her her love respect ; No man but favours his own worth's effect. As good as wise ; so she be fit for me. That is. to will and not to will the same, Jly wife is my adopted self, and she As me, so what I love, to love must frame. For when by marriage both in one concur, Woman converts to man, not man to her. 220 230 •240 250 270 280 Michael Drayton and other good Elizabethan poets were still -wTiting under James I., to whose reign belong some of the best plays of Shakespeare — "Macbeth," "Lear," "Cymbeline," "The Tempest," and more. Drayton lived on, like Ben Jonson, into the next reign, and died in 1G31. Under James he continued writing, and in his long poem on England TO A.n. 1G25.] SHORTER POEMS. 279 miinj'-ways-happy (Polyo)bion), he lovingly described his native Warwiikshire and tlie wooded region called, therefore, Arden, north-west of the Tame, near his own hirthjilace, Hart's-hill, by Atherstone, which is on the Anker celebrated in his vei-se, a stream flowing from above Nuneaton to Tamworth. The fulness with which he dwelt in this part of his 23oem on the luinting of the hart was probably sug- gested by the fact that his bii-thplace was named fi'om it. There is a lively strength in Drayton's vei-se that creates pei-sonal liking for the poet. What plaj'ful grace is in the fiiiry fancies of Njinphidia ! Chaucer's jesting strain of Sir Thopas evidently struck the note for him, which he tried lii'st in the plaj-ful pastoral poem of "Dowsabell" ("douce et belle") in the fourtli of his eclogues. Tlie pleasure found in writing that piece probably tempted him on to sing the jealous^' of Oberon, and play in Nymphidia with Ariosto's song of the madness of Orlando, as Cluwcer had jilayed in Sir Thopas with the prattle of old metrical romancers. Here is DOWSABELL. FiU- in the country of Ai-den There woncd a knight, hight Cassamen, As bold as Isenbras : l*\'ll was he and eager bent In battle and in tournament As was the good Sir Topis. He had, as antique stories tell, A daughter cleped Dowsabell, A maiden fair and free. And for she was her father's heir, 10 Fidl well she was y conned the leu'' Of mickle coiu-tesie. The silk well couth she twist and twine. And make the fine march-pine,- And with the needle work ; And she couth help the priest to say His matins on a holiday. And sing a psalm in kirk. She ware a frock of frolic green Slight well become a maiden queen, '20 Which seemly was to see ; A hood to that so neat and fine, In colour like the columbine, Inwrought full featously.' Her features all as fresh .above As is the grass that grows by Dove, And lithe as lass of Kent. 1 Tconned the Icir, taught the lesson, made know the lore. - March-pine, march-pane, sweet biscuit of susrnr and almond, like macaroon. There are various etymologies of the word. lu mediseval Latin such cakes were called Martii panes. March-pane paste was used by the comfit-makers for letters, knots, arms, escutcheons, Leasts, birds, and other fancies. - Featously, neatly, formed from " feat ; " as in " The Tempest " — " Look how well my garments sit upon me, Much feater than before," Her skin as soft as Lemster'' wool, And white as snow on Piakisli hull,* Or swan that swims in Trent. 80 This maiden, in a nuirn betirae. Went forth, when Hay was in the prime, To got sweet setiwall,'' The honeysiukle, the harlock,' The lily and the lady-smock, To deck her sumnier-hall. Thus, as she wandered here and there And picked of the bloomy brere. She chanced to espy A shepherd sitting on a bank, 40 Like chanticleer he crowed crank,' And piped fully merrily. He learn' d' his sheep as he him list, When he would whistle in his fist. To feed about him round. Whilst he full many a cai-ol sang. Until the fields and meadows rang, And that the woods did sound. In favour'" this same shepherd swain Was like the beiUam Tamburlaine .50 A\Tiich held proud kings in awe. But meek as any lamb mought be, And innocent of ill as he Whom his lewd brother slaw." This shepherd ware a sheep-gray cloke Which was of the finest loke '- That could be cut with shear ; His mittens were of bauzon's'^ skin. His cockers '■* were of cordiwin, His hood of minivcre. 60 His awl and Ungell '* in a thong. His tarbox on his broadbelt hung. His breech of Cointree blue. Full crisp and curled were his locks. His brows as white as Albion rocks. So like a lover true. And piping still he spent the day So merry as the popinjay, Whicii likC'd DowsabeU, That would she ought, or would she nought, 70 This lad would never from her thought. She in love-longing fell. * Lemsicr, Leominster. 5 reakifh hM. A Peak hill iu Derbyshire. *> SetinaU, garden valerian. ■ HuTlock, probably charlock. The word is used also by Shake- speare, where King Lear is said to be crowned "with horloc'KS, hemlocks, nettles, cuckoo flowers." 8 Crank, livel.v. ^ Learned, taught. ■" Pdroitr, appeanuice of the face. 11 Abel. " Lock. 1* BauzoH (French " bausin "), badger, ** Cockers, rustic half-boots. 1^ LingeU, from Latin. '* lintnila," a thong used by shoemakers. In Beaumont and Fletcher's burlesque play, " The Knight of the Burning Pestle," was — " espy'd a lovely dame. Whose master wrought with lingcU and witli aule, And undergroimd he vampiJd many a boot." 280 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1603 At longtli she tucked up her frock, White as the lily was her smock ; She drew the shepherd nigh ; But then the shepherd piped a good, That all the sheep forsook their food To hear his melodic. " Thy sheep," quoth she, " cannot be lean That have a jolly shepherd swain 80 The which can pipe so well." " Yea but," saith he, "their shepherd may, If piping thus he pine away In love of Dowsabell." " Of love, fond boy, take thou no keep," Quoth she ; " Look well unto thy sheep, Lost they should hap to stray." Quoth he, " So had I done full well. Had I not seen fair Dowsabell Come forth to gather may." 90 With that she 'gan to vail her head. Her cheeks were like the roses red. But not a word she said. With that the shepherd 'gan to frown, He throw his pretty pipes adown. And on the ground him laid. Saith she, " I may not stay till night And leave my summer-hall ' undight, And all for love of thee." " My cote," saith he, " nor yet my fold 100 Shall neither sheep nor shepherd hold, Except thou favour me." Saith she, " Yet licver were I dead Than I should [}-ield me to be wed], And aU for love of men." Saith he, " Yet are you too unkind If in your heart you cannot find To love us now and then." " And I to thee will be as kind As Colin was to Rosalind 110 Of courtesy the flower."^ " Then will 1 be as true," quoth she, " As ever maiden yet might bo Unto her paramour." ^ With that she bent her snow-white knee, Down by the shepherd kneeled she, And him she sweetly kist. With that the shepherd whooped for joy. Quoth he, "There's never shei^herd's boy That over was so bUst." 120 This evidently was a tuning of the poet's reeds for the delicately sportive music of NYMPHIDIA, THE COURT OF FAIRY. Old Chaucer doth of Topas teU, Mad Rabelais of Pantigruel, A later third of Dowsabel With such poor trifles playing ; 1 Summer-hair See Note 2. pa^e 245. - The reference is to Spenser. 3 The o.ie beloved. The word used in a ^ood sense, as by Spenser iiud others. Others the likhidia overheard. That on this mad king had a guard. Not doubting of a great reward. For first this business broaching; And through the air away doth go, Swift as an arrow from the bow. To let her sovereign Mab to know \^Tiat peril was approaching. 320 The Queen, bound with Love's powerful charm Sato with Pigwiggin arm in arm ; Her merry maids, that thouglit no hann. About the room were skii)ping ; A humble-bee, their minstrel, ])lay'd Upon his hautboy, ev'ry maid Fit for this revel was array'd. The hornpipe neatly tripping. In comes NjTuphidia, and doth cry, " My sovereign, for your safety fly, 330 For there is danger but too nigh : I posted to forewarn you : The King hath sent Hobgoblin out, To seek you aU the fields about. And of your safety you may doubt. If he but once discern you." When, like an uproar in a town. Before them every thing went down ; Some tore a ruff, and some a gown, 'Gainst one another justling : 340 • Roh, a diminutive of Robert., was a uame usjil familiurly for a clowB ; and ^obliu is from the Latin "cobalus." Greek K<)f3a\ov, a ciinniu^ ro^e ; Ko0a\cveiv, to play knavish or wa^f?ish tricks. So lie is tlescribed in the " Midsummer Night's Dream "— " Eitlier I mistake your shape lutl makinir quite. Or else yoiz are that shrewd and knavish sprite Call'd Robin Goodfellow, Are you not he That fi-ights the maidens of the villagery ; Skims milk," &c. '■ Lin, cease. They flow about like chaff i' th' wind ; For haste some left their masks behind ; Some could not stay their gloves to find ; There never was such bustling. Forth ran they, by a secret way. Into a brake that near them lay ; Yet much they doubted there to stay, Lest Hob should hap to find them ; He had a sharp and piercing sight. All one to him the day and night ; And therefore were resolv'd, by flight, To leave this place behind tliem. 350 At length one ehanc'd to find a nut, In th' end of which a hole was cut, Which lay upon a hazel root, There'scatter'd by a squirrel Which out the kernel gotten had ; \\Tien quoth this Fay, " Dear Queen, he glad ■ Let Oberon he ne'er so m.ad, I'll set you safe from peril. 360 " Come all into this nut," quoth .she, " Come closely in ; he rul'd by me ; Each one may here a chooser be. For room ye need not wrastle : Nor need j'e be together beaii'd ; " So one by one therein they crept. And lying down they soundly slept. And safe as in a castle. Nymphidia, tliat this while doth watch, Perceiv'd if Puck the Queen should catch 370 That he should be her over-matcli. Of which she well bethought her ; Found it must bo some powerful charm. The Queen against him that must arm, Or surely he would do her harm. For throughSy he had sought her. And listening if she aught could hear. That her might hinder, or might fear ; But finding still the coast was clear ; Nor ci-eature had descried her : 380 Each cii-cumstance and having scann'd. She came thereby to understand. Puck would be with them out of hand ; When to her chamis she hied her. And first her fern-seed doth bestow. The kernel of the mistletoe ; And here and there as Puck shoiUd go. With terror to affright him. She night-shade strews to work liim ill. Therewith her ven^ain and her dill. 390 That hind'reth witches of their will. Of purpose to despight him. Then sprinkles she the juice of rue. That groweth underneath the yew ; With nine drops of the midnight dew. From lunaiy distilling : The molcwarp's' brain mixt therewithal: And with the same the pismire's gall : ■* Molewari>, niole. mould. First-English "moldwearp," thrower up of 284 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1603 For she in nothing short would fall, The Fairy was so willing. 400 Thon thrice under a hriar doth creep, Which at hoth ends was rooted deep, And over it three times she leap ; Her magic much availing : Then on Proserpina doth call, And so upon her sjjell doth fall, WTiich here to you repeat I shall. Not in one tittle faUing. " By the croaking of a frog ; By the howling of the dog ; 410 By the crying of the hog Against the storm arising ; By the evening curfew bell, By the doleful dying knell, let this my direful spell. Hob, hinder thy surprising ! " By the mandrake's dreadful groans ; By the luhrican's ' sad moans ; By the noise of dead men's bones In charnel-houses rattling ; 420 By the hissing of the snake, The rustling of the fire-di-akc,^ 1 charge thee thou this place forsake, Nor of Ciueen Mab be pi-atthng ! " By the whirlwind's hollow sound, By the thunder's dreadful stound. Yells of spii'its underground, I charge thee not to fear us ; By the screech-owl's dismal note, By the black night-raven's throat, 430 1 charge thee, Hob, to tear thy coat With thorns, if thou come near us I" Her spell thus spoke, she stept aside. And in a chink herself doth hide. To see thereof what would betide. For she doth only mind him : When presently she Puck espies, And well she mark'd his gloating eyes. How under every leaf he pries. In seeking still to find them. 440 But once the circle got within. The charms to work do straight begin, And he was caught as in a gin ; For as he thus was busy, A pain he in his head-piece feels. Against a stubbed tree he reels. And up went poor Hobgoblin's heels, Alas ! his brain was dizzy ! A-t length upon liis feet he gets. Hobgoblin fumes, Hobgoblin frets; 450 And as again he for\vard sets, And through the bushes scrambles, A stump doth trip him in his pace; Down comes poor Hob upon his face, And lamentably tore his case. Amongst the briars and brambles. * Xubrtcan, a spirit whose groans were ominous. 2 Fire-drake, fire-dragon. " A plague upon Queen Mab ! " quoth he, '* And all her maids where'er they be : I think the devil guided me. To seek her so provoked ! " 460 Where stumbling at a piece of wood, He fell into a ditch of mud. Where to the very chin he stood. In danger to be choaked. Now worse than e'er he was before. Poor Puck doth yell, poor Puck doth roar, That wak'd Clucen Mab, who doubted sore Some treason had been wrought her : Until Njmiphidia told the Queen, What she had done, what she had seen, 479 Who then had well-near crack' d her sjdeen With very extreme laughter. But leave we Hob to clamber out. Queen Mab and all her Fairy rout. And come again to have a bout With Oberon yet madding : And with Pigwiggin now distraught. Who much was troubled in his thought. That he .so long the Queen had sought, And through the fields was gadding. 480 And as he runs he still doth cry, " Iving Oberon, I thee defy. And dare thee here in ai-ms to try, For my dear lady's honour: For that she is a Queen right good. In whose defence I'll shed my blood, And that thou in this jealous mood Hast laid this slander on her." And quickly arms him for the field, A little cociclc-shcU his shield, 490 Which ho could veiy bravely wield ; Yet could it not be perced : His spear a bent both stiff and strong, And well-near of two inches long : The pile was of a horse-fly's tongue, Whose sharpness nought reversed. And put.s him on a coat of mail. Which was of a fish's scale. That when his foe should him assail. No point should be prevailing : aOC His rapier was a hornet's sting; It was a veiy dangerous thing, For if he chanc'd to hurt the King, It woidd be long in healing. His helmet was a beetle's head, Most horrible and full of dread. That able was to strike one dead. Yet did it well become him ; And for a pliune a horse's hair, Which, being tossed with the air, 510 Had force to strike his foe with fear. And turn his weapon from him. Himself he on an earwig set. Yet scarce he on his back could get. So oft and high he did curvet, Ere he himself could settle : TO A.D. lUi'S.J SHORTER POEMS. 285 He made him turn, and stop, and bound, To gallop, and to trot the round, He scarce could stand on any ground, He was so full of mettle. o:!0 When soon he met with Tomalin, One that a valiant knight had been, And to King Oberon of kin ; Quoth he, "Thou manly Fairy, Tell Oberon I come prcjjar'd, Then bid him stand upon liis guard ; This hand his baseness shall reward. Let him be ne'er so wary. " Say to him thus, that I defy His slanders and his infamy, 530 And as a mortal enemy Do publicly proclaim him : Withal that if I had mine own, He should not wear the Fairy crown. But with a vengeance should come down. Nor we a king should name him.'' This Tomalin could not abide, To hear his sovereign \'ihfied ; But to the Fairy Court him hied, (Fvdl furiously he posted,) .540 With every thing Pigwiggin said : How title to the crown he laid, And in what arms he was array' d, As how himself he boasted. Twixt head and foot, from point to point, He told the ai-ming of each joint. In every piece how neat and quoint,' For Tomalin could do it : How fair he sat, how sure he rid. As of the courser he bestrid, 550 How managed, and how well he did. The King which listen'd to it. Quoth he, " Go, Tomalin, with speed, Pro\-ide me arms, provide my steed, And everj-thing that I shall need ; By thee I will be guided : To straight account call thou thy wit; See there be wanting not a whit. In everything see thou me fit, Just as my foe's provided." 560 Soon flew this news thi'ough Fairy-land, Which gave Queen Mab to understand The combat that was then in hand Betwixt those men so mighty : 'Which greatly she began to rue, Percci\-ing that all Fairy knew The first occasion from her gi'cw Of these affairs so weighty. AVherefore attended with her maids. Through fogs, and mists, and damps she wades, .570 To Proserpine the Queen of Shades, To treat, that it would please her The cause into her hands to take, For ancient love and friendship's .sake, ^ Quoint (Frencli ' carefully prepared. coint "), quaint; from " comptus," combed oat, And soon thereof an end to make. Which of much care would ease her. A while there let we Mab alone. And come we to King Oberon, "Who, ami'd to meet Iiia foe, is gone. For proud Pigwiggin crying : 580 WTio sought the Fairy King as fast. And had so well his jouniies cast,'- That he amved at the last. His puissant foe cs))ying. Stout Tomalin came with the King, Tom Thumb doth on Pigwiggin biing. That perfect were in everything To single fights belonging : And therefore they themselves engage, To see them exercise their rage, 590 With fair and comely equipage. Not one the other wTonging. So like in arms these champions were, As they had been a very pair. So that a man would almost swear. That either had been either ; Their furious steeds began to neigh. That they were heard a mighty way ; Their staves upon their rests they lay ; Yet ere they flew together 609 Their seconds minister an oath. Which was indiii'crent to them both. That on their knightly faith and troth No magic thorn supplied ; And sought them that they had no charms, "Wherewith to work each other hai-ms, But came with simple open arms To have their causes tried. Together furioiisly they ran. That to the ground came horse and man ; 61# The blood out of their helmets span, So sharp were their encounters ; And though they to the earth were thrown, Yet quickly they regain'd their own, Such nimbleness was never shown. They were two gallant mounters. "When in a second course again They forward cami; with might and main, Yet which had better of the twain. The seconds could not judge yet ; 6'20 Their shields were into pieces cleft. Their helmets from their heads were reft. And to defend them nothing left. These champions would not budge yet. Away from them theii- staves they threw. Their cruel swords they quickly drew. And freshly they the fight renew. They every stroke redoubled : ■Which made Proserpina take heed. And make to them the greater speed, 6.30 For fear lest they too much should bleed, "S^Tiich wondrously her troubled. Casi, eoJculated. 28(J CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 161)3 When to th' infernal Styx she goes. She tates the fofjs from thence that rose, And in a bag dotli them enclose : When well she had them blended. She hies her then to Lethe spring, A bottle ana tncreof doth bring, Wherewith she meant to work the thing Which only she intended. (JlO Now Proserpine with Jlab is gone, X'nto the place where Oberon And proud Pigwiggin, one to one, Both to be slain were likely : And there themselves they closelj- hide, Because they would not be espied ; For Proserpine meant to decide The matter very quicklj-. And suddenly unties the poke, 'WHiich out of it sent such a smoke, 650 As ready was them all to choke. So grievous was the pother ; So that the knights each other lost. And stood as still'as any post ; Tom Thumb nor Tomalin could boast Themselves of any other. But when the mist 'gan somewhat cease, Proserpina conimandeth peace ; And that a while they should release Each other of their peril : (i60 "Which here." quoth she. " I do procliiim To all in dreadful Pluto's name, That as ye vdU eschew his blame. You let me hear the quarrel : " But here yourselves you must engage, Somewhat to cool your spleenish rage ; Your grievous thirst and to assuage That first you drink this liquor. Which shall your understanding clear, As plainly shall to you appear; 670 Those things from me that you shall hear. Conceiving much the quicker." This Lethe water, you must know. The memory dcstroyeth so. That of our weal, or of our woe. Is all remembrance blotted ; Of it nor can you ever think. For they no sooner took this drink. But nought into their brains could sink Of what had them besotted. 680 King- Oberon forgotten had. That he for jealousy ran mad. But of his Queen was wondrous glad. And ask'd how they came thither : Pigwiggin likewise doth forget That he Queen Mab had ever met ; Or that they were so hard beset. When they were found together. Nor neither of them both had thought. That e'er they each had other sought. 690 Much less that they a combat fought. But such a di-eam were lothing. Tom Thumb had got a little sup, And Tomalin scarce kist the cup. Yet had their brains so sui'e lockt up, That they remember'd nothing. Queen Mab and her light maids, the while, Amongst themselves do closely smile. To see the King caught with this wile. With one another jesting : And to the Fairy Court they went, With mickle joy and merriment, ^\^lich thing was done with good intent, And thus I left them feasting. 700 Samuel Daniel, who died in 1G19, missed in James'.s reign the sjiirit of the high-heaited Eliza- bethan time. He was made a gentleman extra- ordinary to the king at court, and a groom of the privy -chamber to the queen ; but he hid himself for months at a time among books and congenial friends in his house and garden in Old Street, St. Luke's, before he left London to end his days on a Somerset- shii-e farm, at Beckington, near Philip's Norton. His sense of change of tinies, with a regi'etful glance back to the "spirit for vei-se" that was "in late Eliza's reign," we hud expressed in this dedication of his tragedy of " Philotas '' to Prince Heniy : — TO THE I'KIXCE. To you, most hopeful Prince, not as you are, But as you may be, do I give these lines : That when your judgment shall arrive so far As to overlook the intricate designs Of uncontented man, you may behold With what encounters greatest fortunes close, What dangers, what attempts, what manifold Encumbrances ambition undergoes, How hardly men digest felicity ; How to th' intemperate, to the jirodigal, 10 To wantonness, and unto luxiu-y. JIany things want, but to ambition all. And you shall find the greatest enemy That man can have, is his prosperity. Here shall you see how men disguise their ends, And plant bad courses under pleasing shews, How well presumption's broken ways defends. Which elcar-ey'd judgment gravely doth disclose. Here shaU you see how th' easy multitude Transported, take the party of distress, "JO And only out of passions do conclude. Not out of judgment, of men's practices : How powers are thouglit to ■nxong, that «Tongs debar. And kings not held in danger, tho' they are. These ancient representments of times past, TeU us that men have, do, and always run The self -same line of action, and do cast Their course alike, and nothing can be done. Whilst they, their ends, and Nature ai'e the same, But will be wrought upon the self-same frame. 30 This benefit, most noble Prince, doth yield The sure records of books, in which we find The tenure of our state, how it was held By aU our ancestors, and in what kind TO A.D. lt;25.] SHORTER POEMS. 2«7 We hold the same, and likewise how in th' end This frail possession of felicity Shall to our late posterity descend By the same patent of like destiny. In them we find that nothing can accrue To man and his condition that is new. 4(1 Which images, hero figur'd in this wise, I leave unto your more matm-e survey. Amongst the vows that others sacrifico Unto the hope of you, that you one day Will give grace to this kind of harmony. For know, great Prince, when you shall come to know, How that it is the fairest ornament Of worthy times, to have those which may .show The deeds of power, and lively represent The actions of a glorious government. .50 And is no lesser honour to a crown T' have writers, than have actors of rcnowTi. And tho' you have a swannet of your own. Within the hanks of Doven, meditates Sweet notes to you, and unto your renown The glory of his music dedicates. And in a softy tune is set to sound The deep reports of suUen tragedies : Yet may this last of me be likewise found Amongst the vows that others sacrifice 60 Unto the hope of you, that you one day May grace this now neglected harmony, Which set unto your glorious actions may Record the same to all posterity. Tho' I, the remnant of another time. Am never like to see that happiness. Yet for the zeal that I have home to rhyme. And to the Muses, wish that good success To others' travail, that in better place And better comfort they may be inchear'd 70 Who shall deserve, and who shall have the grace To have a Muse held worthy to be heard. And know, sweet Prince, when you shall come to know. That 'tis not in tho pow'r of kings to raise A spirit for verse, that is not bom thereto, Nor are they bom in every prince's days : For late Eliza's reign gave birth to more Than all the kings of England did before. And it may be, the genius of that time Would leave to her the glory in that kind, ,sil And that the utmost powers of English rhyme Should be \vithiu her peaceful reign oontin'd ; For since that time, our songs could nevei' tlirive, But lain as if forlorn ; tho' in the prime Of this new raising season we did strive To bring the best wo could unto the time. And I, altho' among the latter train. And least of those that sung unto this land, Have borne my part, tho' in an humble strain. And pleased the gentler that did understand : 90 And never had my harmless pen at all Distain'd with any loose immodesty, Nor ever noted to be touch'd with gall. To aggravate the worst man's infamy. But still have done the fairest offices To Virtue and the time ; yet nought prevails. And all our labours are without success. For either favoitr or our virtue fails. And therefore since I have outliv'd the date Of former grace, acceptance and delight, 100 I would my lines late bom beyond the fate Of her spent line, had never come to light ; So had I not been tax'd for wisliing well. Not now mistaken by the censuring stage, Kor in my fame and reputation fell, Wlrich I esteem more than what all the ago Or th' earth can give. But years hath done this wrong, To make me write too much, and live too long. And yet I grieve for that unfinish'd frame,' Which thou dear Muse didst vow to .sacrifice 110 Unto the bed of peace, and in tlie same Design our happiness to memorize, Must, as it is, remain ; tho' as it ia It shall to after-times relate my zeal To kings and unto right, to quietness. And to the union of the commonweal. But this may now seem a superfluous vow. We have this peace ; and thou hast sung enow, And more tlian will be heard, and then as good Is not to write, as not be understood. Ii'O William Browne, of Tavistock, Lii Devonshire, had studied at Oxford when, at the age of twenty-three, in the year 1613, he published the first part of a poem called " Britannia's Pastorals." The second part followed in 1616. As this is a continuous work of some length, I do not describe it here; but a collection of a dozen pastoral love-gifts, eacli with a posy or paper of verses to it, is so characteristic of one feature in tlie polite taste of the time, tliat it may at once be given. It is from tlie third song of the first book. Each copy of verses is set in a border of such ornaments as the printer had in stock, except the eleventh and twelfth, which have original designs. Shepherd.s have been enclosed in a circle of shep- herdesses, who dance round them. Upon this there has been a song, and then come the lovers' gifts. Each swain his thoughts thus to his love commended. T/ie fi'rsf presents /lis Dog, if'Uh these: When I my flock near you do keep. And bid my dog go take a sheep. He clean mistakes what I bid do. And bends his pace still towards you. Poor -nTetch, he knows more care I keep To get you, than a silly sheep. The second, his pipe, icith these : Bid me to .sing (fail- maid), my song .shall pro\'i' There ne'er was truer pipe sung truer love. The third, a pair of (jlores, thus : These will keep your hands from burning. Whilst the sun is swiftly turning : But who can any veil devise To shield my heart from your fair eyes ? The fourth, rin aiinyriim : Maiden aidMen Maidens should be aiding men. And for love give love agen : 1 Hia poem on the Civil Wars. 288 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1603 Learn this lesson from your mother, One good wish requires another. They deserve their names best, when •Maids most willingly aid men. The fifth, a ring, with a picture in a Jewel oh it : Nature hath fram'd a gem beyond compare ; The world's the ring, but you the jewel are. The sixth, a nosegay of roses, with n nettle in it : Such is the posy Love composes, A stinging-nettle mix'd with roses. The seventh, a girdle : This during light I give to clip yoiu' waist : Fail', grant mine arms that place when day is past. The eighth, a heart : You have the substance, and I live But by the shadow which you give ; Substance and shadow, both are due And given of me to none but you. Then whence is life but from that part Which is possessor of the heart .!•' The ninth, a shepherd's hool; : The hook of right belongs to you, for when I take but siUy sheep, you still take men. 77(15 tenth, a eonili : L ovely maiden, best of any f our plains, though tluice as many : V ail to Love, and leave denying, E ndlcss knots let fates be tj-ing. S uch a face, so fine a featme (K indest, fairest, sweetest creatui-e) N ever yet was found, but loving ; then let my plaints be moving I T rust a shepherd though the meanest, T ruth is best when she is plainest. 1 love not with vows contesting : F aith is faith without protesting. T imo that all things doth inherit R enders each desert his merit. I f that fail in me, as no man D oubtless Time ne'er won a woman. M aidens still should be relenting, A nd once flinty, still repenting. Y outh with youth is best combined, E ach one with his like is twined, B eauty should have beauteous meaning, E ver that hope easoth plaining. U nto you whom Nature dresses N eeds no comb to smooth your tresses. T his way it may do his duty I n your locks to shade your beauty. D o so, and to Love be turning, E Ise each heart it will be burning. The elerenth : (These lines written in the shape of a trae-lovo-knot.) This is Love and worth commending, Still beginning, never ending. Like a wily net ensnaring. In a roimd shuts up all squaring. In and out whose every angle More and more doth stUl ent.angle, Keeps a measure stiU in moring. And is never light but loving : Troyning arms, exchanging kisses, Each partaking other's blisses; Laughing, weeping, still together, Bliss in one is mirth in either ; Nevei; breaking, ever bending ; This is Love, and worth commending. The twelfth : Lo Cupid leaves his bow, his reason is Because your eyes wound when his shafts do miss. CcpiD Leaving his Bow. Frtym Broiaie's" Britannia's Pastorals." George Wither, born at Bentwortli, neai' Alton, Hampshire, in L588, was educated at Oxfoi-d, went home to help in managing lii.s father's farm, and then went to London, where he excited wTath by the fearlessness of his satu'es, published in 11)13 under the name of "Abuses Strij)t and Whipt." The satu-es were named after the human passions. He oflendeil great men, and was locked up in the Marshalse-a, and there, dauntless, he sang of the Shephei-ds' Hunting, his own hunting as Philarete (Lover of Vii'tue), with ten couple of dogs, his satires, let loose upon the wolves and beasts of prey that spoU human society. Tliis is THE FIRST ECLOGUE OF " THE SHEPHERD'.S HUNTING." The ARGrsiENT. Willy leaves his flock awhile. To lament his fiiend's exile ; WHicrc, though prison'd, he doth find He's still free that's free in mind : And that there is no defence HaU so firm as innocence. Philabete. 'Willy. Philarete. AVill}' ! thou now full jolly tun'st thy reeds. Making the njinphs enamour'd on thy strains ; And whilst thy harmless flock unscared feeds. Hast the contentment of hills, groves, and plains. Trust me, I joy thou and thy muse so speeds In such an age, where so much mischief reigns ; And to my care it some redress will be. Fortune hath so much grace to smile on thee. TO A.D. Itj:!i5.] SHOETER POExM.S. 289 Willi/. To smile on me ? I ne'er yet knew her smile, Unless 'twere when she purpos'd to deceive me : 10 Many a train and many a painted wile She casts, in hope of freedom to hereave me ; Yet now, because she sees 1 scorn her iifuile, To fawn on fools she for my muse doth leave me ; And here of late, her wonted spite doth tend To work me care by fro^^-ning' on my friend. Pliilarcte. Why then I see her copper-coin's no sterhng : 'Twill not be cm-rent still, for all the gilding. A knave, or fool, must ever be her darling ; For they have minds to all occasions yielding. 20 If we get any thing by all oiu' parling. It seems an apple, but it proves a wilding. But let that pass. Sweet shepherd 1 tell me this, For what beloved friend thy sorrow is. Willy. Ai't thou, Philai'ete, in durance here. And dost thou ask me for what friend I grieve ? Can I suppose thy love to me is dear, Or this thy joy for my content believe, ^\^len thou tliink'st thy cares touch not me as near. Or that I pin thy sorrows at my sleeve ? 30 I have in thee reposed so much trust, I never thought to find thee so unjust. Philarctc. Why, AViUy ? Will;/. Prithee do not ask me why ? Doth it diminish any of thy care, That I in freedom maken melody ? And think' st I cannot as well somewhat spare From my delight to moan thy misery f 'Tis time om- loves should these suspects forbear : Thou art that fi-iend, which thou, uimam''d, should' st And not have di'a\vn my love in question so. [know, Fhilantc. Forgive me, and I'll pardon thy mistake ; And so let this thy gentle anger cease. I never of thy love will question make "Wliilst that the number of our days increase. Yet to myself I much might seem to take. And something near imto presiunption preasc. To think me worthy love from such a spirit, But that I know thy kindness past my merit. Besides, methought thou spak'st now of a friend, 50 That seem'd more grievous discontents to bear : Some things I find that do in show offend. Which to my patience Kttle trouble are ; And they ere long I hope will have an end ; Ur though they have not, much I do not care. So this it was made me that question move. And not suspect of honest WUly's love. wail/. Alas ! thou art exiled from thy flock. And quite beyond the deserts here confin'd. Hast nothing to converse with but a rock, 60 Or at least outlaws in their caves half-pin'd ; 37 And dost thou at thy own misfortune mock. Making thyself too to thyself imkind ': When heretofore we talk'd, we did embrace " But now I scarce can come to see thy face. rhihtrcti: Yet all that, Willy ! is not worth thy sorrow. For I have mirth here thou would' st not believe : From deepest cares the highest joys I borrow. If aught chance out tliis day may make me grieve, I'll learn to mend or scorn it by to-morrow. 70 This barren place yields somewhat to relieve. For I have found sufiicient to content me, And more true bliss than ever freedom lent me. Willy, Ai'C prisons then grown places of delight f Flularete, 'Tis as the conscience of the prisoner is : The verj' grates are able to affright The guilty man, that knows his deeds amiss ; All outward pleasm'cs are exiled quite. And it is notliing of itself but this : Abhorred lonencss, darkness, sadness, pains, 80 Nimib-cold, sharp hunger, scorching thirst, and chains. Willy. And these are nothing 'i Philarcte. Nothing yet to me : Only my friend's restraint is all my pain; And since I truly find my conscience free From that my loneness too, I reap some gain. Willy. But grant in tliis no discontentment be, It doth thy wished liberty restrain ; And to thy soul I think there's nothing nearer, For I could never hear thee prize aught dearer. 90 Ph ilarctc. True, I did ever set it at a rate Too dear for any mortal's worth to buy : 'Tis not our greatest shepherd's whole estate Shall piu'chase from me my least liberty ; But I ani subject to the powers of fate, And to obey them is no slavery : They may do much, but when they have done all. Only my body they may bring in tlu-all. And 'tis not that, my Willy ! 'tis mj' mind. My mind's more precious freedom I so weigh ; 100 A thousand ways thej- may my body bind. In thousand thralls, but ne'er my mind betray ; And thence it is that I contentment find, And bear with patience this my load away : I'm still myself, and that I'd rather be. Than to be lord of all these downs in fee. Willy. Nobly resolv'd ! and I do joy to hear 't; For 'tis the mind of man indeed that's all : There's nought so hard but a bra\'e heart will bear 't ; The guiltless men count gi-eat afllictions small : 110 Thcj-'U look on death and torment, yet not fear't. Because they know 'tis rising so to fall. 290 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1603 Tj-rants may boast they to much power are bom, Yet he hath more that tyrannies can scom. PhlUinte. 'Tis right ; but I no tjTannies endure, Nor have I suffer' d aught worth name of care. WiUy. Whate'er thou'lt call't, thou may'st, but I am sui'e Many more pine, that much less pained arc. Thy look, methinks, doth say thy meaning's pure, And by this past I find what thou dost dare; 120 But I could never yet the reason know, Why thou art lodged in this house of woe. Ph llnrcte. Nor I, by Pan ! nor never hope to do ; But thus it pleases some, and I do guess Partly a cause that moves them thereunto ; Which neither will avail me to express, Nor thee to hear, and therefore let it go : We must not say, they do so that oppress ; Yet I shall ne'er, to soothe them or the times. Injure myself by bearing others' crimes. 130 Willy. Then now thou may'st speak freely : there's none hears, But he whom, I do hope, thou dost not doubt. JPhilarcte. True ; but if doors and walls have gotten cars, And closet-whisperings may be spread about. Do not blame him that in such causes fears What in his passion he may blunder out : In such a place, and such strict times as these, Where what we speak is took as others please. But yet to-morrow, if thou come this way, I'll tell thee all my story to the end : HO 'Tis long, and now I fear thou canst not stay. Because thy flock must water'd be and penn'd, And night begins to muffle up the day ; Which to inform thee how alone I spend, I'll only sing a sorry prisoner's lay I fram'd this morn ; which, though it suits no fields, Is such as fits me, and sad tliraldom yields. Willy. WeU ; I will set my kit another string. And play imto it whilst that thou dost sing. Sonnet. Ph ilarete. Now that my body, dead-alive, 150 Bereav'd of comfort, lies in thrall. Do thou, my soul ! begin to thrive, And unto honey turn this gall ; So shall we both, through outward woe. The way to inward comfort Icnow. As to the flesh we food do give To keep in us this mortal breath ; So souls on meditations live, And shun thereby immortal death ; Nor art thou ever nearer rest, 1 60 Than when thou find'st me mcst opprest. First think, my soul ! if I have foes That take a pleasure in my care. And to procure these outward woes Have thus cntrapt me unaware. Thou should' st by much more careful be. Since greater foes lay wait for thee. Then, when mew'd up in grates of steel. Minding those joys mine eyes do miss. Thou find'st no tomient thou dost feel 170 So grievous as privation is ; JIuse how the damn'd, in flames that glow. Pine in the loss of bUss they know. Thou seest there's given so great might To some that are but clay as I, Their very anger can alfright ; WTiich, if in any thou espy. Thus think : if mortal's frowns strike fear. How dreadful will God's wrath appear ! By my late hopes, that now are crost, I S3 Consider those that firmer be ; And make the freedom I have lost A means that may remember thee Had Christ not thy redeemer been, AMiat horrid thrall thou hadst been in ! These iron chains, these bolts of steel, \\Tiich other poor offenders grind, The wants and cares which they do feel. May bring some greater thing to mind ; For by their grief thou shalt do well 190 To think upon the pains of hell. Or, when thi'ough me thou seest a man Condemn'd unto a mortal death. How sad he looks, how pale, how wan. Drawing with fear his panting breath ; Think, if in that such grief thou see. How sad will " Go, ye cursed !" be. Again, when he that fear'd to die, Past hope, doth see his pardon brought, Read but the joy that's in- his eye, '200 And then convey it to thy thought ; There think, betwi.\t my heart and thee, How sweet wiU " Come ye bTessed !" be. Thus if thou do, though closed here, My bondage I shall deem the less, I neither shall have cause to fear. Nor yet bewail my sad distress ; ^ For whether live, or pine, or die. We shall have bliss eternally. Willy. Ti'ust me '. I see the cage doth some birds good ; 210 And, if they do not sufl'er too much wTong, Will teach them sweeter descants than the wood. BeUeve't I I like the subject of thy song : It shews thou art in no distemper' d mood. But 'cause to hear the residue I long. My sheep to-morrow I will nearer bring. And spend the day to hear thee talk and sing. Yet ere we part, Philai-etc, arced' Of whom thou leam'dst to make such songs as these. ' Arced (Pirst-Euijlisli " arsedi-in " ) . tell. 10 A.D. 1625.] SHORTER POEMS. 291 I never yet heard any shepherd's reed 220 Time in mishap a strain that more could please. Surely thou dost invoke, at this thy need, Some power that we neglect in other lays ; For here's a name and words, that hut few swains Have mention'd at thcu- meeting on the plains. Pkilarctc. Indeed, 'tis true ; and they arc sore to blame That do so much neglect it in their songs ; For thence proceedeth such a worthy fame As is not subject unto envy's wrongs; That is the most to be respected name 230 Of oiu' true Pan, whose worth sits on all tongues, And what the ancient shepherds used to praise In sacred anthems upon holidays. He that first taught his music such a strain Was that sweet shepherd who, imtil a king. Kept sheep upon the honey-milky plain. That is enrich' d by Jordan's watering : He in his troubles eas'd the body's pains. By measures rais'd to the soul's ra^shing; And his sweet numbers only, most divine, 240 Grave first the being to this song of mine. Tl'iHi/. Let his good spiiit ever with thee dwell, That I might hear such music every day ! Philarc'tc. Thanks, swain ! But hark, thy wether rings his bell, And swains to fold or homeward diive away. mil;/. And yon goes Cuddy ; therefore fare thou well ! I'll make his sheep for me a little stay ; And, if thou think it fit, I'll bring him too Next morning hither. F/ti/aytff. Prithee, Willy '. do. 250 " Wither's Motto," as true iii its tone, was piib- li.slied ill 1618 ; in 1622 poems of bis were collected as "Juvenilia," and be publisbed a delicate strain, " Fau' Virtue, tbe Mistress of Pbilarete," which includes this among its interspersed songs : — THE MANLY HEART. Shall I, wasting in despaii-. Die because a woman's fair. Or make pale my cheeks mth care, 'Cause another's rosy are ? Be she fairer than the day. Or the flowery meads in May, If she be not so to me. What care I how fair she be ! Should my heart be grieved or pined 'Cause I see a woman kind ? Or a well-disposed natm-e Joined with a lovely feature ? Be she meeker, kinder than Turtle-dove or pelican ; If she be not so to me. What care I how kind she be ! 10 Shall a woman's virtues move Sle to perish for her love ? Or her well-deserving known Make me quite forget mine own ? 20 Be she with that goodness blest. That may gain her name of Best, If she be not such to me. What care I how good she be 1 'Cause her fortune seems too high, Shall I play the fool and die r Those that boar a noble mind. Where they want of riches find. Think what with them they would do Tliat without them dare to woo ; 30 And unless that mind I see. What care I though great she be 1 Great or good, or kind, or fair, I will ne'er the more despair. If she love me, this believe, I will die ere she shall grieve. If she slight me when I woo, I can scorn ;uid bid her go : For if she be not for me. What care I for whom she be I 40 CHAPTER XIII. Under Charles I. and the Commonwealth : John Milton, and Others. — a.d. 162.5 to a.d. 1660. Francis Quarles, like George Wither, began to write in the reigu of James I., and in tbe reign of Charles I. in the same year, 1635, each produced a volume of " Emblems." Quarles, four years yoimger than Wither, was much less stirred by political excitement. He was bom at Romford in 1592, educated at Christ's College, Camlnidge, became cupbearer to the Queen of Bohemia, daughter of James I., and afterwards secretary to Ai-cbbishop Usher. This is one of Ins Emblems, written to the picture of one clippmg the round World within bis arms : — There is no end of all his labour; neitlief is his cije satiaficd Kith riches. — EccLES. iv. 8. how our widen' d arms can over-.stretch Their own dimensions ! How our hands can reach Beyond their distance 1 How our yielding breast Can shrink to be more full and full possest Of this inferior orb ! How earth refin'd Can cling to sordid earth ! How kind to kind I We gape, we grasp, we gripe, add store to store ; Enough requires too much ; too much craves more. We charge our souls so sore beyond their stint. That we recoil or burst : the busy mint 10 Of our laborious thoughts is ever going. And coining new desires ; desires not knowing Where next to pitch ; but, like the boimdlcss ocean. Gain, and gain ground, and grow more strong by motion. The pale-fac'd lady of the black-eyed night First tips her homed brows with easv light. 292 UASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 Whose curious train of spangled nymphs attire Her next night's glory with increasing fii'c ; Each evening adds more lustre, and adorns The growing beauty of her grasping horns : 20 Francis Quarles. From the Portrait yi-efixcd to his " Divine Poems,' She sucks and draws her brother's golden store, Until her glutted orb can suck no more. E'en so the vultm-e of insatiate minds StOl wants, and wanting seeks, and seeking finds New fuel to increase her rav'nous fire. The grave is sooner cloy'd than men's desire: We cross the seas, and midst her waves we bum, Transporting lives, perchance that ne'er retmn : We sack, we ransack to the utmost sands Of native kingdoms, and of foreign lands ; We travel sea and soU, we pry, we prowl. We progress, and we prog from pole to pole : We spend our mid-day sweat, our midnight oil, We tire the night in thought, the day in toil : We make art ser\-ile, and the trade gentile (Yet both corrupted with ingenious guile), To compass earth, and with her empty store To till our anns, and gTasp one handful more. Thus seeking rest, our labours never cease. But, as oiu' years, our hot desires increase ; Thus we, poor Uttle worlds ! with blood and sweat. In vain attempt to comprehend the great ; Thus, in our gain, become we gainf id losers, And what's inclos'd, incloses the inclosers. Now, reader, close thy book, and then advise ; Be wisely worldly, be not worldly wise ; Let not thy nobler thoughts be always raking The world's base dunghill : vermin's took by taking Take heed thou trust not the deceitful lap Of wanton Dalilah ; the world's a trap. 30 40 .50 Under James Poems," and founded on an episode in Sidney's "Arcadia." In the reign of Charles I. lie suffered by the Irisli insurrec I. Quarles hrrd wi-itteu " Divine a poem " Argalus and Parthenia," tion of 164 L He had by the first of his two wives ei>'hteen children, and died much troubled in 164-1. Philip Massinger, who began to wi-ite in the reign of James I., was an active dramatist during fifteen years of the reign of Charles I. John Ford, who bet^an to produce plays towards the close of James's reit'u, was a chief dramatist under Charles I. while ISIassinger was writing. Ford died about 1631), and Massinger in March, 1640. Here is a short song from Massinger's " Emperor of the East :" — WAITING FOR DEATH. Why art thou slow, thou rest of trouble, Death, To stop a wi-ctch's breath That calls on thee, and offers her sad heart A prey rmto thy dart ':' I am nor young nor fail- ; be therefore bold : Son-ow hath made me old, Defoi-m'd, and wrinkled; all that I can crave Is, quiet in my grave. .Such as live happy, hold long life a jewel ; But to me thou art cruel If thou end not my tedious misery, And I soon cease to be. Strike, and strike home, then ; pity unto me, In one short hour's delay, is tyranny. 10 The next is from Ford's " Broken Heart :" — DIRGE. C/torns. Glories, pleasures, pomps, delights and case, Can but please Outward senses, when the mind 's untroubled, or by peace refined. First voice. Crowns may flourish and decay, Beauties shine, but fade away. SecoiitL Youth may revel, yet it must Lie down in a bed of dust. T/ilrd. EartMy honours flow and waste, Time alone doth change and last. C/iu. Son-ows mingled with contents, prepare Rest for care ; Love only reigns in death ; though art Can find no comfort for a broken heart. 10 James Shii-ley, born in the latter years of the reign of Elizabeth, was the youngest of those Stuart Elizabethan dramatists who brought into the play- house of the time of Charles I. sweet echoes of tlie grand Elizabethan music. Shirley lived on into the reign of Charles II., and died after the Fire of London. This is a song of his : — death'.s triumphs. The glories of our liirth and state Are shadows, not substantial things ; There is no armour against fate ; Death lays his icy hands on kings. Sceptre and crown Slust tumble down. And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade. TO A.l>. lUlJJ.] SHORTER POEMS. 293 Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh lam-els where they kill ; Id But their strong nerves at last must yield ; They tame but one another stUl. Early or late, They stoop to fate. And must give up theii- mui-miuiug breath. When they, pale captives, creep to death. The garlands wither on your brow. Then boast no more your mighty deeds; Upon death's pm'ple altar now, .See where the \-ictim victor bleeds. 20 AH heads must come To the cold tomb ; Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, ami blossom in the dust. Sir Henry Wotton. From the Portrait prefixed to the " Il,e\iri\us TTotfoniamc." Sir Henry Wotton, who was made pi'ovcst of Eton ill 1624, left a few poems among tliose papers that were jniblished by his friend Izaak Walton as " Reliquire Wottoniaiia?." This is one: — THE CHAR.iCTER OF \ HAPPY LIFE. How happy is he bom and taught, That serveth not another's will 1 ^\'hose armour is his honest thought, -■Vnd simple truth his utmost skill I Whose passions not his masters are, "\Mi03e soul is still prepar'd for death, Tntied ' imto the world by care Of public fame or private breath ; Who envies none that chance doth raise, Xor who hath ever understood How deepest wounds are given by priiisc, Nor rules of state, but rules of good. 10 1 Untied, not tied. Who hath his life from rumom-s freed, WTiose conscience is his strong retreat ; AVTiose state can neither llatterers feed, Xor ruin make oppressors gieat. Who Uod doth late and early pray, Jlore of his graei; tlian gilts to lend : And entertains the haiudess day With a religious book or friend. 20 This m;in is freed from servile bands Of hopt! to rise, or fear to fall : Lord of himself, though not of lands, And having notliin;;-, vet hath all. Ben .Jonson lived until 1G37, and one of the most interestmg of the yoiiug men of genius who gathered about him, and whom he distinguislied as his "sons," was William Cai-twright, the son of a wasteful Gloucestershire gentleman, who was reduced to iiin- keepmg at Cii'encester. Cartwright had a lilieral education, went to Christ Church, Oxford, became a famous Oxford preacher as well as lecturer on meta- physics, yet -^i-ote 13'ric poems aiul four plays, while studying sixteen houi-s a day. He worked also for the king's cause in the Civil Wai- time, and died in 164.3 of camp fever, when he was hut thirty-two years old. " My son Cartwright writes all like a William Cartwright. From the Fovtrait a^xcd. to his " Poems," man," said Ben Jonson. Rows of books are placed over the studious young face, and other reminders of his scholarly life are associated with the portrait of WUliani Cai-twriglit prefixed to the collection of his poems made after his death. These are three poems of his : — ■WTiiles I this standing lake, Swath'd up with yew and cypress boughs, Do move by sighs and vows. Let .sadness only wake ; 294 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 That wliilos thick darkness blots the light, My thoughts may cast another night ; In which douhle shade, By Hcav'n, and me made, O let me weep, And fall asleep, 10 And forgotten fade. Hark ! from yond' hoUow tree, Sadly sing two anchoret owls, Whiles the hermit wolf howls. And all bewailing me ; The raven hovers o'er my bier, The bittern on a reed I hear Pipes my eleg)-, And warns me to die ; Whilst from yond' graves 20 5Iy wrong' d love craves My sad company. Cease, Hylas, cease thy call ; Such, such was thy parting groan, Breath' d out to me alone When thou disdain'd didst fall. Lo ! thus unto thy silent tomb. In my sad winding sheet, I come, Creeping o'er dead bones. And cold marble stones, 30 That I may mourn Over thy \ui\. And appease thy gi'oans. LESBIA ON HER SPARROW. Tell me not of joy : there's none Now my little sparrow's gone ; He, just as you, Wou'd toy and woo, He would chirp and flatter me. He would hang the wing awhile, Till at length he saw me smile, O, how suUcn he would be '. He would catch a crumb, and then Sporting let it go again ; 10 He from my lip Woidd moisture sip, He would from my trencher feed. Then would hop, and then would nm, And cry " I'hilip '." ivhen he had done, whose heart can choose but bleed ? how eager would he fight ! And ne'er hurt though he did bite ; No mom did pass But on my glass 20 He would sit, and mark, and do \^Tiat I did ; now ruffle all His feathers o'er, now let 'em fall. And then straightway sleek 'em too. ■UTiencc wiU Cupid get his darts Feather'd now to pierce our hearts ■• A wound ho may. Not love conve^■, Now this faithful bird is gone, O let mournful tm-tles join 30 With lo\-ing red-breasts, and combine To sing dirges o'er his stone. SHORT COMMONS. Expect no strange or puzzling meat, no pie, Built by confusion, or adultery. Of forced Nature ; no mysterious dish Requiring an interpreter, no fish Found out by modem luxury : our coarse board Press' d with no spoils of elements, doth afford Meat, like our himger, without art, each mess Thus differing from it only, that 'tis less. Imprimis, some rice porridge, sweet and hot. Three knobs of sugar season the whole pot. 10 Item, one pair of eggs in a great dish. So ordered that they cover all the fish. Item, one gaping haddock's head, which will At least affright the stomach, if not fill. Item, one thing in circles, which we take Some for an eel, but th' wiser for a snake. We have not stUl the same, sometimes we may Eat muddy plaice, or wheat ; perhaps ne.xt day Red or white herrings, or an apple pie : There's some variety in misery. 20 To this come twenty men, and though apace We bless these gifts — the meal's as short as grace. Nor eat we yet in tumult : but the meat Is broke in order ; himgei' here is neat : Di\'ision, subdiWsion, yet two more Members, and they divided, as before. O what a fury would your stomach feel To see us vent our logic on an eel !' And in one hen'ing to revive the art Of Keckennan,' and shew the eleventh part ? Hunger in arms is no gi'cat wonder, we Suffer a siege without an enemy. On Mid-Lent Sunday, when the preacher told The prodigal's return, and did unfold His tender welcome, how the good old man Sent for new raiment, how the servant i-an To kiU the fatling calf ; O how each ear List'ned unto him, greedy ev'n to hear The bare relation ; how was every eye Fixt on the pvdpit ; how did each man pry And watch, if, whiles he did this word dispense, A capon or a hen would fly out thence. " Happy the Jews 1 " cry we, when quails came down In di'y and wholesome showers, though from the frown Of Heaven sent, though bought at such a rate ; To perish full is not the worst of fate. We fear we shall die empty, and enforce The grave to take a shadow for a corse ; " For, if this fasting hold, we do despair Of life ; all needs must vanish into air. Air, which now only feeds us, and so be Exhal'd, like viipours to eternity. We're much refin'd already, that dull house Of clay, om' body, is diaph.anous ; 30 40 50 * Bartholomew Keckei-mann, a Calviuist wi-iter who died in 1609. aged thirty-six, after teaching Hebrew at Heidelhersr, and philosophy at Dantzic, his birthplace, was the author of treatises ou Ehetcinc and Logic, then used as test-books in the University. 2 Corse (French " corps "), body, living or dead. TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 295 And if the doctor would but take the pains To read upon us, sinews, bones, j^uts, veins, All would appeiir, and he might shew each one, AVithout the help of a dissietion. In the abunjanee of this want, you will Wonder pirhaps how I can use my (piill. 60 Troth I am like small biids, which now in spring, When they have nought to eat, do sit and sing. Thomas Randolpli, of Northamptonsliii-e, who became a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, also wrote plays, lived gailj', and died in 1639, before he was thirty. Among his poems is — A GRATUL.\TORY TO BEN JONSON FOR ADOPTION OF HIM TO BE HIS SON. I was not bom to Helicon, nor dare Presume to think myself a Muse's heir'. I have no title to Parnassus' hill. Nor any acre of it, by the will Of a dead ancestor, nor could I be Aught but a tenant imto poetry. But thy Adoption quits me of aU fear. And makes me challenge a child's portion there ; I am akin to heroes being- thine. And part of my alliance is diWne, 1 Orpheus, 31usa.'us, Homer too beside^ Thy brothers by the l-ioman mother's side. As Ovid, Virgil, and the Latin IjTe That is so like thee, Horace ; the whole quire Of poets are by thy Adoption, all 3Iy uncles ; thou hast given me power to call Phcnbus himself my gi-.andsire : by this grant Each sister of the Nine is made my aunt. Go you that reckon from a large descent Youi' lineal honoiu's, and are well content 20 To glory in the age of your great name. Though on a herald's faith you biuld the same, I do not envy you, nor think you blest Th( )Ugh you may bear a Gorgon on your crest By direct line from Perseus ; I will boast Xo farther than my father — that's the most I can or could be proud of ; and I were Unworthy his Adoption, if that here I should be duly modest ; boast I must Being son of his Adoption, not his lu.st. SO And to say truth, that which is best in me May call you father, 'twas begot by thee. Have I a sp,ark of that celestial flame Within me, I confess I stole the same, Prometheus like, from thee : and may I feed His ^-ulture, when I dare deny the deed. Many more moons thou hast that shine by night. All bauki-upts wer 't not for a borrow'd light ; Yet can forswear it ; I the debt confess, And think my reputation ne'er the less, 40 For, father, let me be resolv'd by you : Is 't a disparagement from rich Peru To ravish gold ; or theft, for wealthy ore To ransack Tagus, or Pactolus' shore ': Or does he wrong Alcinous, that for -nant Doth take from him a sprip; or two. to plant A lesser orchard !' sure it cannot be : Nor is it theft to steal some flames from thee. Grant this, and I'll cry guilty, as I am. And pay a filial reverence to thy name ; -iO For when my muse on obedient knees Asks not a father's blessing, let her lease' The Fame of this AdoiJtion ; 'tis a curse I wish her 'cause I cannot think a worse. And here, as piety bids me, I entreat Pha'bus to lend thee some of his own heat. To ciu-e thy palsy ; else I will complain He has no skill in herbs ; poets in vain Make him the god of physic, 'twere his praise To make thee as immoital as thj- bays, 60 As his o«Ti Daphne ; 'twere a shame to see The god not love liis priest more than his tree. But if Heaven take thee, envj-ing us thy lyro, 'Tis to pen anthems for an angels' quire. William Drummoud, son of Sir John Drummond of Hawthornden, was born in 1.58.'). He became M.A. of the Uiiivei-sity of Edinburgh, studied civD law at Bourges, retuined to Hawthornden, liut went abroad again after the loss of a lady who died on the day after her engagement to be married to him. He remained for eight years. on the Continent, chiefly in Italy and France, then settled at Hawthornden, married in 1620, had several children, was a firm royalist in principles, but kept as clear as he could of risks and troubles of the Civil War, and died in 1649, not long surviving the execution of Charles I. His delight was in literature ; Drayton and Ben Jonson were among his friends, and his genius was shown in verse refined by the full cultivation of his taste. Drammond well rejnoduced the charm of the conventional Italian lo^'e-sonnet. These are two sonnets of his : — DISSUADING WORDS. sacred blush-empurpling cheeks, piu-e skies. With crimson wings which spread thee like the mom ! O bashful look sent from those shining eyes. Which though slid down on earth doth heaven adorn : tongue, in which most luscious nectar lies. That can at once both bless and make forlorn ! Dear coral lip which beauty beautifies, That trembling stood before her words were bom ! .Vnd you her words I words ? no, but golden chains AA'hich did enslave my cars, ensnare my soul, 10 Wise image of her mind, mind th.it contains A power all power of senses to control : So sweetly you from love dissuade do me. That I love more, if more mj- love can be. THE XIGHTINCALE. Sweet bird, that sing'st away the early hours Of winters past, or coming, void of care. Well pleased with delights which present are. Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling flowers : > Lease, lose. First-Euglish "leosan." 296 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a. I.. 1625 To I'OC'ks, to springs, to lills, from leafy towers Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare And what dear gifts on thee he did not spare, A stain to human sense in sin that lowers. \\niat sold can be so sick, which by thy songs Attir'd in sweetness sweetly is not di'ivcn 10 Quite to forget earth's tunnoils, spites, and wrongs. And lift a reverent eye and thought to heaven 'r Sweet, artless songster, thou my mind dost raise To aii-s of spheres, yes, and to angels' lays ! Among artiticial foi'iiis of verse that arose with the sonnet, but were not, like the sonnet, apt for vigorous expression of thought, and therefore died out of literature, is the sixtine or sextain. This is a poem in six stanzas of six lines ending witli six words which are repeated in place of rhyme as the closing words tliroughout every stanza, with an artful variation of their order. If the words at the close of the six lines ill tlie first stanza he represented hy tlie letters a, h, c, d, e, f, tlien the word closing the last line, /, begins the next stanza, followed by the word closing the first line, «, then followed by the words that had closed the last line but one and the tirst line but one, e, b, and then, on the same principle, by d, c. The same method of variation being applied throughout, the per- mutations become : a, b, c, d, e,/; J] a, e, b, d, c ; c, f, d, a, b, e; e, e, b,f, a, d; d, e, a, c,f, b; b, d,f, e, c, a. A late exam})Ie of such verse is among Drummond's poems : — A SEXTAIN. Sith gone is nij' delight and only pleasiu-e. The last of all my hopes, the cheerful sim That clear'd my hfe's d.-irk sphere, nature's s%veet treasure, More dear to me than all beneath the moon ; What resteth now, but that upon this mountain I weep, till Heaven transform me to a fountain •" Fresh, fair, delicious, crystal, pearly fountain. On whose smooth face to look she oft took pleasm'c. Tell me (so may thy streams long cheer this mountain, So serpent ne'er thee stain, nor scorch thee sim, 10 So may with wat'ry beams thee kiss the moon 1) Dost thou not moiun to want so fair a treasure r While she here gaz'd on thee, rich Tagus' treasure Thou needcdst not envy, nor yet the fountain. In which tliat hunter saw the naked moon ; Absence hath robh'd thee of thy wealth and jilcasurc. And I remain, Uke marigold, of sun Depriv'd, that dies by shadow of some mountain. Nymphs of the forests, nymphs who on this mountain Are wont to dance, showing yoiu: beauty's treasure 20 To goat-feet sylvans, and the wond'ring sun, "WTienas you gather flowers about this fountain, Bid her farewell who placed here her pleasure, And sing her praises to the stars and moon. Among the lesser lights as is the moon. Blushing through m\iffling clouds on Latmos' mountain ; Or when she views her silver locks for pleasure In Thetis' streams, proud of so gay a treasure : Such was my fair, when she sate by this fountain 30 With other nymphs, to shun the amorous sun. As is oui- earth in absence of the sun. Or when of sun deprived is the moon ; As is without a verdant shade a fountain. Or, wanting grass, a mead, a vale, a mountain ; Such is my state, bereft of luy dear treasure, To know whose only worth was all my pleasure. Ne'er think of pleasure, heart ; eyes, .shun the sun ; Tears lie your treasiu-e, which the wand'ring moon Shall see you shed by mountain, vale, and fountain. These are a few of William Drummond's madri- gals :— THE BUBBLE. This life, wluch seems so fair, Is like a bubble blown up in the air, B}- sporting childi-en's breath. Who chase it everywhere And strive who can most motion it bequeath. And though it sometimes seem of its own might Like to an eye of gold to be fix'd there And fii'm to hover in that empty height. That only is because it is so light. But in that pomp it doth not long appear ; 1(1 For when 'tis most admired, in a thought. Because it erst was nought, it tm'ns to nought. THE HUXT. This world a hunting is. The prey, poor man ; the Num-od fierce, is Death ; His speedy greyhounds are Lust, Sickness, Envy, Care, Strife that ne'er falls amiss, /V'ith all those iUs which haunt us while we breathe. Now, if by chance we fly Of these the eager chace, Old Age with stealing pace Casts on his nets, and- there we panting die. 10 Richard (_'i-ashaw, who was born about the time when Shakespeare died, was educated at Charterhouse School, and obtained a Fellowship at Peterhouse in the University of C'ambridge. He was one of sixty- five Fellows expelled from the LTniversity in 1644 for refusal to subscribe the Covenant. He then became a Roman Catholic and went to Paris, where the fiiendship of Cowley recommended him to the exiled Queen Henrietta, who gave him letters to Rome. In Rome he became secretary to Cardinal Palotta, and aftei-wards a canon of the church of Loretto till his death in 165CI. His i-eligious feeling animates liis verse in " Sacred Poems" and " Steps to the Temple." From his secular verse, "Delights of the Muses," these pieces are taken : — AN EPITAPH UPON HTSBAND AND WIFE, WHO DIED AND WERE BURIED TOGETHER. To these whom death again did wed. This grave's the second marriage-bed. For though the hand of Fate could force 'Twi.\t soul and body a divorce, It could not sever man and wife. Because tliev both lived but one life. TO A.u. ItitiO.] SHORTER POEMS. 29V Peace, good reader, do not weep ; Peace, the lovers are asleep ! They, sweet turtles, folded lie In the lust knot that love could tie. 10 Lot them sleep, let them sleep on, Till the stormy night be gone. And the eternal morrow davra : Then the cm'tains will be di'awn, And they wake into a light "Whose day shall never die in night. IN PRAISE OF LESSIUS's' RULE OF HEALTH. Go now, and with some daring drug. Bait the disease, and, while they tug. Thou to maintain their precious strife Spend the dear treasure of thy life ; Go, take physic, doat upon Some big-uamed composition — The oraculous doctors' mystic bills,- Certain hard words made into pills : And what at last shalt get by these ? Only a costlier disease. 10 Go, poor man, think what shall be Remedy against thy remedy. That which makes us have no need Of physic, that's physic indeed. Hark hither, reader; would' st thou see Nature her own physician be. Would' st see a man all his.own wealth. His own physic, his own health Y A man whose sober soul can tell How to wear her garments well — 20 Her garments, that upon her sit. As garments should do, close and fit ; A well-clothed soul, that's not oppress'd. Nor choked with what she should be dress'd : A soul sheathed in a crystal shrine. Through which all her bright features shine As when a piece of wanton'' lawn, A thin aerial veil, is drawn O'er beauty's face, seeming to hide, More sweetly shows the blushing bride ; 30 A soul whose intellectual beams No- mists do mask, no lazy streams ? • Leonard Lessir.s wa.s not a physician, but a famotis Jesuit. He was born near Antwerp in 1554, taugbt philosophy and theology at Louvain, and died in 1623, aged sixty-nine. Two books of his on justice and law, and on the Papal authority, in which he sustained its highest pretensions, were proscribed by the French parliaments- He wrote on the existence of God, and on the immortality of the soul. He and his colleague Hamelius also sustained, in 1586, theses on grace and predestination, that excited wide discussion. They were censured by the Universities of Louvain and Douay, and were brought to the notice of Popes Sixtus V. and Innocent XI. , who took no action a^^uinst them. Among the books of Lessius was one on the Ti-ue Rule of Health (" Hygiasticou, sen Vera Ratio Valetudinis "). An English translation of this book by T. S. Cambridge, " Hygeasticon, or the Course of Preser\-ing Life and Health to Extreme Old Age," was pxiblished in 1634, and the lines by Crashaw, bidding the reader hear good counsel and be what it would make him, were written in com- meudation of it. '■^ Miistic hills, prescrii>tions. A bill is properly a signed a.nd sealed instrument, from Latin " bulla," a seal. From the seal affixed, a Papal rescript was called a " bull." and a bill in Parliament, a bill of exchange, or any other official writing or authenticated list —as '* Bill of Rights," "bill of lading," "bill of health," "bill of fare" — is so called from the association of sealing and signing with official work. In this way viie signed prescriptions of physicians were formerly called their " bills." =* Wanton. This word is from the Celtic. In Welsh " gwantu " is to sever, and " gwautan " is tliat which easily separates itself, is 38 A happy soul, that all the way To heaven hath a summer's diiy l' Would' st see a man whoso wcU-warm'd blood Bathes him in a genuine flood Y A man wliose tuned humours ■* be A seat of rarest hamiony '( Would'st SCO bHthe looks, fresh cheeks beguile Age ? Would'st see December smile ? Would'st see a nest of roses grow In a bed of reverend snow •■ Warm thoughts, free spirits, flattering Winter's self into a spring 'f In sum, would'st sec a num that can Live to bo old, and still a man y Whose latest and most leaden hours Fall with soft wings, stuck with soft ilow'rs ; And, when life's sweet fable cuds. Soul and body part hke fiicnds : — No quarrels, munnurs, no delay ; A kiss, a sigh, and so away ? This rare one, reader, would' .st thou see, Hark, hither; and — thyself be he 1 40 50 William Habington, born in 1605, wa.s a Roman Catholic. He was of a family that owned Hindliji Hall, four miles from Worcester, was educated at St. Omer's and Paris, and after his return to England married the lady, Lucy, daughter of William Herbert, lir.st Lord Powis, who is the " Castara " of his volume of poems published in 1634. He died in 1654. These poems are his : — DESCRIPTION OF CASTARA. Like the violet which alone Prospers in some happy shade. My Castara lives unknowTi, To no looser eye betray'd : For she's to herself untrue. Who delights i'the public view. variable, quick in shifting place. In this sense it was applied to the eels in " King Lear," act ii., scene 4 : — Lear. Oh me ! my heart, my rising heart ! — hut, down. Fool. Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels, when she put them i' the paste alive ; she rapp'd 'em o' the coxcombs with a stick, and cried, " Down, wantons, down ! " In Milton's "L' Allegro" ("quips and cranks and wanton wiles "), the word is used to express the quick variable playfulness of innocent and liappy youth. In Crashaw's poem above quoted, the word indicates the light variable movement of a muslin veil. It is only in later English that the use of the word has been restricted to a bad sense. • Tuned fiiivaoiivs. Tlie " harmony of the tuned humours" is here a reference to the doctrine, once dominant in medicine for many generations, that health and character depended very much upon the natiire and relation to one another of the " humours " of the body. There were four humours stiid to have their foiu- seasons of predomi- aance:— (1) The red bile, clioler, in summer; wliere that generally predominated, the temper or temperament (which means the mixture, as in tempering of mortar, &c.) was choleric. (2) The lymph in winter ; where that predominated in the mixture of the humoiu-s, it caused the lymphatic temperament. (3) The blood (Latin " sanguis") in spring ; whenever that predominated, men were " sangiiine." (4) Black bile (Greek fi.i>.atva xo^'/l, melancholy in autumn ; and genera! predominance of that gave rise to tlie melancholic temperament. When all the humours are hanuoniously blended, there was " good temper " or "good humour." When there was inward disturbance caused by movement of vapours from these fluid humours— which were affected easily by heat and cold— people s\itterea, as ladies were often said to suffer, from " the vapom-s." Lively dread ol the sudden condensation of such vapour m so dehcate an organ as the Dram, 298 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. Iti25 .Such is her beauty, as no arts Have emichcd 'with boiTowcd grace ; Her high birth no pride imparts, For she blushes in lier place : Folly boasts a glorious blood, She is noblest being good. Cautious, she knew never yet What a wanton com-tship meant ; Xor speaks loud to boast her wit, In her silence eloquent : Of herself survey she takes, But 'tween men no diiference makes. She obeys with speedy will Her grave parents' wise commands ; And so innocent, that ill .She nor acts nor uuder.stands : Women's feet run still astray, If once to ill they know the way. She sails by that rock, the Couit, A\Tiere oft Honour splits her mast ; And retir'dness thinks the port WTiere her fame may anchor cast : Virtue safely cannot sit WTiero Vice is enthron'd for wit. She holds that day's pleasure best, A^Tiere sin waits not on delight ; Without mask, or ball, or feast. Sweetly spends a winter's night : O'er that darkness whence is thrust Prayer and sleep oft governs lust. She her throne makes Reason climb, \\TiiIe wild jmssions captive lie ; And each article of time, Her pure thoughts to heaven fly : All her vows religious be. And her love she vows to mo. STARLIGHT. When I siu-vey the bright Celestial sphere, So rich with jewels hung, that night Doth like an ^Ethiop bride appear, 3Iy soul her wings doth spread And heavt^nward flies, Th' Almighty's mysteries to read In the large volumes of the skies. For the bright firmament Shoots forth no flame So silent, but is eloquent In speaking the Creator's name. Xo unregarded star Contracts its light Into so small a character, Kcmov'd far from our human sight. 10 20 30 40 10 caused some to fear too rash an application of cold water to the head, for which reason they often washed their beards only, and dry-rubbed their faces. Br. Lemuius, a physician of note, whose " Occulta Naturse Miracula " were published at Antwerp in 1564, woraed men against venturing to wash their feet without advice from a physician. General " tnbbini; " would have seemed to this pnuient man an institution only for a people with strong tendencies to suicide. But if we steadfast look We shall discern In it, as in some holy book, How man may heavenly knowledge learn. It tells the conqueror That far-stretched power Which his proud dangers trattic for Is but the triumph of an heaks of a thiu^ ridiculously understood in direct opposition to its nature, lie says, " We shall sometimes lau;?h to find a matter quite mistaken, and go down the liill against the bias." came back, and .shone among cavaliers of the court of Charles I. until his death in 1642. These are songs of Suckling's : — SIGNS OF LOVE. I. Honest lover whatsoever. If in all thy love there ever Was one wav'ring thought, if thy flame Wore not still even, still the same : Know this. Thou lov'st amiss. And to love true. Thou must begin again, and love anew. If when she appears i' th' room. Thou dost not quake, and art struck diunb, 10 And in striving this to cover Dost not speak thy words twice over. Know this, Thou lov'st amiss. And to lo\e true, Thou must begin again, and love anew. If fondly thou dost not mistake. And all defects for graces take, Persuad'st thyself that jests are broken. When she hath little or nothing spoken, 20 Know this. Thou lov'st amiss. And to love true. Thou must begin again, and love anew. If when thou appcarcst to be within, Thou lett'at not ask and ask again ; And when thou answerest, if it be To what was ask'd thee properly. Know this, Thou lov'st amiss, 30 And to love true. Thou must begin again, and love anew. If when thy stomach calls to eat, Thou cutt'st not fingers 'stead of meat. And with much gazing on her face. Dost not rise hungry from the place. Know this. Thou lov'st amiss. And to love true. Thou must begin again, and love anew. 40 If by this thou dost discover That thou art no perfect lover, And desiring to love true. Thou dost begin to love anew : Know this. Thou lov'st amiss. And to love true. Thou must begin again, and love anew. 300 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 CONSTANCY. Out upon it, I h;ivc lov'd Thi-ee whole days together ; And am like to love three more, If it prove fair weather. Time shall moult away his wings Ere he shall discover In the whole wide world again Such a constant lover. But the spite on 't is, no praise Is due at all to me : Love with me had made no stays, Had it any been but she. Had it any been but she And that very face. There had been at least ere this A dozen dozen in her place. TWO HEARTS. I prithee send mo back my heart. Since I cannot have thine : For if from yoiu's you will not part, Why then shouldst thou have mine ? Yet now I think on't, let it lie, To find it were in vain. For th' hast a thief in either eye Would steal it back again. "ttliy should two hearts in one breast lie, And yet not lodge together r Love ! where is thy sympathy, If thus oui' breasts thou sever ? But Love is such a mystery, I cannot tind it out : For when I think I'm best resolv'd, I then am in most doubt. Then farewell care, and farewell woe, I will no longer pine : For I'U believe I have her heart. As much as she hath mine. 10 10 20 A poet of the Court of Charles I., who had been born lit Queen Elizabeth's reign, was Thomas Carew. He was fifty years old in the year of his death, 1639. Of the lyi-ic genius of Carew these are examples : — UNGRATEFUL BEAUTY THREATENED. Know, Celia, since thou art so proud, 'Twas I that gave thee thy reno^\Ti : Thou hadst, in the forgotten crowd Of common beauties, liv'd imknown. Had not my verse e.xlial'd thy name. And with it imped ' the wings of fame. Iiiijjcd the mngs of fame. First-Englisli " impan," to engraft. That killing power is none of thine, I gave it to thy voice and eyes ; Thy sweets, thy graces, all are mine ; Thou art my star, shin'st in my skies : Then dart not from thy borrowed sjihere Lightning on him that fixed thee there. 10 Temjit me with such affrights no more. Lest what I made I imcreate ; Let fools thy mystic fomis adore, I'll know thee in thy mortal state : Wise poets that wrap't Truth in tales, Knew her themselves tlu'ough all her veils. DISDAIN RETURNED. He that loves a rosy cheek, Or a coral lip admires, Or from star-like eyes doth seek Fuel to maintain his fii-es ; As old Time makes these decay, So his flames must waste awaj-. But a smooth and steadfast miird, Gentle thoughts and c.ahn desires, - Hearts with equal love combined. Kindle never-dying fires. Where these are not, I de.spise Lovely cheeks, or lips, or eyes. No tears, Celia, now shnll win My resolv'd heart to retm'n : I haye searched thy so\il within, And find nought but pride and scorn ; I have learned thy arts, and now Can disdain as much as thou. Some power in my revenge convey That love to her I cast away. 10 20 A sister of John Hampden, who had married Robert Waller, of Agmondesham, in Buckingham- shire, became the mother of Edmrmd Waller, the poet. Edmund Waller was born in 160.5, and in- herited a large fortune, by the death of his father, while he was still young. His mother sent him to Eton and to Cambridge, and he was member for Agmondesham, when yet but a youth of seventeen, in the last Parliament of James I. In the earlier yeai's of Charles I., Edmund Waller-, who, when in the country, was living at Beaconsfield, shone at Court, and married a lady of great fortune. She added to his wealth and died. Then as a widower of five-and-twenty he sang of the beauty of the Lady Dorothy Sidney, wlio afterwards was married to the Eai'l of Sunderland. She is celebrated as Waller's Sacharissa. Waller married a lady named Bresse, and had thu'teen children. Both he and Lady Sunderland, his Sacharissa, lived to be very old, and were fiiends in old age. " When, Mr. Waller," Imping a hawfs wing was repairing it by inserting a strong feather in place of a broken or a weak one, to secure a bolder flight. From the same root came the word " imp " as a graft, or offspring from a stock. See Notes 2, page 30 ; -4, page 190. TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 301 said the old la'dy once, " will you write such fine verses to me again I " To which the poet I'eplied, " Oh, madam, when your ladyship is as youug again." Lady Dorothy Sidney (Waller's Sacharissa). From a Portrait by Vandijkc, ON MY LADY DOROTHY SIDNEY S PICTURE. .Such was Philoclea, such Musidorus' flame.' The matchless Sidney that immortal frame 1 IfusJdonis" flame. Painelii. The references are to Sir Plulip Sidney's romance of " Ai'cadia." In this romance two cousins, Musidorus, Prince of Thessaly, and Pyrocles, Pi-ince of Macedou, were shixiwrecked together, when Musidorus was about twenty years old and Pyi-ocles seventeen. Musidorus was saved by two shepherds on the Lacouian shore, and carried by them to the home of a noble old Arcadian named Kalauder. Kalauder's son Clitophon was made prisouer in the Spartan war against the Helots. Musidorus, grateful to Kalauder for his kindness, at once raised an army of Arcadians, attacked the Helots, and was astonished by the valour of then' captain. But their captain, when at last he had struck oif the helmet of Musidorus, aud had seen his face, knelt to him : for it was Pyi-ocles who had become leader of the Helots. In consequence of this discovery Clitophon was released ; Musidorus returned with his friend PjTocles to the house of Kalauder ;" and presently the two youus: m^n resolved to seek Philoclea and Pamela, the two daughters of Basileus, king of Ai'cadia, and his wife Gynecia. They were jealously shut up fi'om the world, and are, of course, the heroines of the romance. Pyrocles loved Philoclea, " Musidorus' flame" was Pamela. As for theii- charms, which Waller says were joined by Lady Dorothy in the blood of the Sidneys, Sir Philip had said of them, " Methougbt there was (if, at least, such perfections may receive the word of more) more sweetness in Philoclea, but more majesty in Pamela. Methought love played in Phdoclea's eyes, and threatened in Pamela's ; methought Philoclea's beauty only persuaded,' but so persuaded as all hearts must yield ; Pamela's beauty used violence, and such violence as no heart could resist. And it seems that such proportion is between their minds. Philoclea, so bashful, as though her excellences had stolen in to her before she was aware ; so humble, that she will put all pride out of countenance ; in sum, such proceeding as will stu* hope, but teach hope good manners. Pamela of high thoughts, who avoids not pride by not kno%ving her escellences. but by making it one of her escelleuces to be void of pride." This kind of parallel Waller imitates in the poem "To Amoret." Lady Dorothy Sidney, Waller's Sacharissa, was Sir Philip's niece, daughter to Philip's brother Robert, who became the second Earl of Leicester. She married Lord Spencer, aftei-wards Earl of Sunderland. Of perfect beauty on two pillars placed ; Not his high fancy could one pattern graced With such extremes of excellence compose, Wonders so distant in one face disclose : Such cheerful modesty, such humhle state. Moves certain love, but w-ith a doubtful fate, As when beyond our greedy reach we see. Inviting fruit on too sublime a tree. All the rich flow'rs through his Arcadia found, Amaz'd we see, in this one garland bound. Had but this copy, which the artist took From the fair pictui'e of that noble book, Stood at Kalander's, the brave friends had jarr'd. And, rivals made, th' ensuing story marr'd. Just Nature, first instructed by this thought. In his own house thus practised what ho taught. This glorious piece transcends what he could think : So much his blood is nobler than his ink. TO A5I0RET. Fair, that you may truly know What you imto Thirsis owe ; I win tell you how I do Sacharissa love and you. Joy salutes me, when I set My blest eyes on Amoret : But with wonder I am strook. While I on the other look. If sweet Amoret complains, I have sense of all her pains : But for Sacharissa I Do not only grieve, but die. All that of myself is mine. Lovely Amoret, is thine : Sacharissa' s captive fain Would untie his iron chain, And, those scorching beams to shun, To thy gentle shadow run. If the soul had free election To dispose of her affection, I would not thtis long have borne Haughty Sacharissa' s scorn : But 'tis sure some Power above. Which controls oui' wills in love. If not love, a strong desire To create and spread that fire In my breast solicits me. Beauteous Amoret, for thee. 'Tis amazement more than love. Which her radiant eyes do more : If less splendour wait on thine. Yet they so benignly shine, I would tiu-n my dazzled sight To behold their milder light. But as hard 'ti.s to destroy That high flame, as to enjoy : "Which, how eas'ly I may do Heav'n (as eas'ly scaled) docs know. 10 10 20 30 Amoret' s as sweet and good As the most delicious food, 40 302 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 \\liich l)ut tasted does impart Life and gladness to the heart : iSaeliarissii's beauty's wine, Which to madness doth incline ; iSuch a liquor as no brain That is mortal can sustain. Scarce can I to Heaven excuse The devotion which I use Unto that adored dame, For 'tis not unlike the same, ^Miich I thither ought to send : So that if it could take end, 'Twould to Heav'n itself be due To succeed her, and not you, A\'Tio ali'cady have of me All that's not idolatry ; Which, though not so fierce a flame, Is longer like to be the same. Then smile on me, and I will prove, Wonder is shorter lived than Love. This is a fumovis song of Waller's : — THE MESSAGE OF THE ROSE. Go, lovely Eose, Tell her that wastes her time and me, That now she knows, When I resemble her to thee, How sweet and fair she seems to be. Tell her that's young, And shuns to have her graces spied. That hadst thou sprung In deserts, where no men abide. Thou must have uncommended died. Small is the worth Of Beauty from the light retii-ed ; Bid her come forth. Suffer herself to be desired, And not blush so to be admired. Then die, that she The common fate of all things rare May read in thee : How small a jiart of time they share That are so wondrous sweet and fan-. And this — ox A GIRDLE. That which her slender waist confin'd, Shall now my joyful temples bind ; Ko monarch but would give his crown, His arms might do what this has done. It was my heaven's extremest sphere. The pale which held that lovely deer ; My joy, my grief, my hope, my love. Did all within this circle move. A narrow compass, and yet there Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fail- ; Give me but what this riband bound. Take all the rest the sun goes round. 50 60 10 20 10 The next is a piece written to the dance music of a saraband ' : — CHLORIS AND HYLAS. Chtoris. Hylas, Hylas, why sit we mute, Now that each bird saluteth the spring ? Wind up the slacken' d strings of thy lute, Never canst thou want matter to sing : For Love thy breast doth fill with such a fire, That whosoe'er is fair moves thy desii'e. Sweetest, you know the sweetest of things Of various flow'rs the bees do compose. Yet no particular taste it brings Of violet, woodbine, pink, or rose : 10 So Love the result is of all the graces Which flow from a thousand several faces. Chloris. Hylas, the birds which chant in this grove. Could we but know the language they use, They would instruct us better in love, And reprehend thy inconstant muse : For Love their breasts does fill with such a fire. That what they once do choose, bounds their desire. Sylas. Chloris, this change the birds do appi-o\'C, Which the warm season hither docs bring ; Time from yourself does further remove You, than the winter from the gay spring. She that like lightning shin'd while her face lasted. The oak now resembles which lightning hath blasted. 20 Roliert Herrick, bom in the year 1591, lived into the reign of Charles II. He was the fourth son of a rich London silversmith, was educated for the Chiu'ch, and pre.sented, in 1629, to the living of Dean Prior, near Buckfastleigh, among the hills of Devonshire. He found Devonshire dull, and ^\Tote poems, which he pul)lished in London as " Hes- perides " — West of England fruits — in 1648, when his loyalty caused him to be ejected from his living. He went back to Dean Prior at the Restoration, and lived until 1674. This was HIS GRANGE, OR PRIVATE WEALTH. Though clock. To tell how night di-aws hence, I've none, A cock I have to sing how day draws on : I have A maid, my Prue, by good luck sent. To save That little. Fates me gave or lent : A hen I keep, which, creeking day by day, 10 • A snrnhand (Spanisli *' zarabauda,'* from Persiau " zerbeud," a kind of song). A Spanisb dauce to au air of slow movement in triple time. It is a form of the minuet, wliicb also is danced slowly to au air in triple time. TO A.D. 1G60.] SHORTER POEMS. 303 Tells when She goes her long white egg to lay : A goose I have, which, with a jealous ear, Lets loose Her tougue to tell what danger's near : A lamb I keep, tame, with my morsels fed, AXTiose dam An orphan left him, lately dead : 20 A eat I keep, that plays about my house, Grown fat With eating many a miching ' mouse ; To these A Trasy- I do keep, whereby I please The more my rural piivacy : Which are But toys, to give my heart some ease. 30 "WTicrc care None is, slight things do lightly jilease. And these are .snatches of his siuffinj' : — CHERRY RIPE. Cherry-ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry. Full and fair ones ; come, and buy : If so be you ask me where They do grow ? I answer, there, Where my Julia's lips do smile, There's the land, or cherry-isle ; Whose plantations fully show All the year where cherries grow. TO THE MAIDENS, TO MAKE MUCH OF TIME. Ciather ye rose-buds while ye may, ( )ld Time stUl is a-tlying ; And this same flower that smiles to-day. To-morrow will be d)'ing. The glorious lamp of heaven, the smi. The higher he's a-getting. The sooner will his race be run. And nearer he's to setting. That age is best which is the first, ■\\lieu youth and blood are warmer ; 1 But being spent the worse and worst Times stUl succeed the fomier. Then be not coy, but use your time. And while ye may, go marry : For having lost but once your prime, You may for ever tarry. 1 Miching, stealthy. So iu *' Hamlet " (act hi., scene 2) : " MaiTy, this is micliing uiallecho," secret wickeduess. In Florio's Italian Dictionary (quoted by Dyce) is '* Acciai'inafe, to niiche, to shrnj; or sueak iu some comer." So iu Beaumont and Fletcher's "Scornful Lady " — " Sure she has Some meechin^ rascal iu her house." ^ His spaniel. TO DAFFODILS. Fair daifodils, we weep to see You haste away so soon ; As yet the early rising sun Has not attain' d his noon. Stay, stay. Until the hasting day Has run But to the even-song ; And, having priiy'd together, we Will go with you along. IU A\'c huw short time to stay as you. We have as short a spring ; As quick a growth to meet decay, As you or any thing. We die As your hours do, and dry Away, Like to the smumer's rain ; Or as the pearls of morning's dew, Ne'er to be found again. 20 THE HAG. The hag is astride. This night for to ride. The devil and she together ; Through thick and through thin. Now out and then in. Though ne'er so foul be the weather. A thorn or a burr She takes for a spur ; With a lash of a bramble she rides now. Through brakes and through briars, 10 O'er ditches and mires, She follows the .spirit that guides now. No beast for his food Dares now range the wood. But hushed in his lair he Ues lurking ; While mischiefs, by these. On land and on seas. At noon of night are a- working. The storm will arise And trouble the skies, 29 This night ; and, more for the wonder, The ghost from the tomb Affrighted shall come, C'all'd out by the claji of the thunder. CEREMONIES OF CHRISTM.\S. Come, bring with a noise, My men-y, merry boys. The Christmas log to the firing ; ^\^lile my good dame, she Bids ye all bo free. And drink to your heart's desiring. With the last yeai-'s brand Light the new block, and For good success in Iiis spending. 304 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 On yuui- psalteries play, 10 That sn-eet luck may Come while the log is a-teending.' Drink now the strong beer, Cut the white loaf here, The while the meat is a-shreJding For the rare minee-pie. And the plums stand by To fill the paste that's a-kneading. From a play by Jasper Mayne, called "The Amorous War," this is the strophe of a song : — OUR TIME PASSES. Time is a feather' d thing ; And whilst I praise The sparklings of thy looks, and call them rays, Takes wing ; Leaving behind him, as ha.Sies, An unperceived dimness in thine eyes. His minntes, whUst they're told. Do make us old, And every sand of his fleet glass. Increasing age as it doth pass, 10 Insensibly sows wrinkles there Where flowers and roses did appear. A\Tiilst we do speak, our fii-e Doth into ice expire ; Flames tiu'n to frost. And ere we can Know how our crow turns swan. Or how a silver snow Springs there where jet did grow, Oiu' fading spring is in dull winter lost. 20 And from a play called "Technogamia," by Bai-ten Holiday, another divine, and an archdeacon to boot, this is a song of TOBACCO. Tobacco's a musician. And in a pipe delighteth ; It descends in a close. Through the organ of the nose. With a relish that in\-iteth. This makes me sing. So ho, ho ! So ho, ho, boys ! Ho boys I sound I loudly ; Earth ne'er did breed Such a jo^'ial weed. Whereof to boast so proudly. 10 Tobacco is a lawyer. His pipes do love long cases, When our brains it enters Our feet do make indentures. Which we seal with stamping paces. This makes me sing, &c. ' Teendiiig, kiudling ; from First-English wnence " tiuder," tliat whicli kindles. 'tyndan," to kindle; Tobacco's a physician. Good both for sound and sickly ; 'Tis a hot perfume That expels cold rheum. And makes it flow down quickly. This makes me sing, &c. Tobacco is a traveller. Come from the Indies hither ; It passed sea and land Ere it came to my hand. And 'scaped the ^\-ind and weather. This makes me sing, &c. Tobacco is a critic. That still old paper tumeth. Whose labour and care Is as smoke in the air. That ascends from a rag when it bumeth. This makes me sing, ke. Tobacco's an ignis fatuus — A fat and fiery vapour, * That leads men about Till the fire be out, Consuming like a taper. This makes me sing, &c. Tobacco is a whiffler,^ And cries Hiilf Snuff 1 with fnrj' ; His pipe' s his club and link ; He's the visor that does drink ; Thus arm'd I fear not a jmy. This makes me sing, lic. 30 40 50 60 In the year after King Cliarles I. had erected his standard at Nottingham — when the Earl of Essex had just taken Readmg ; when, in Bedfordshii-e, John Hampden had just fallen in the skirmi.sh at Chal- grove Field ; when the royalist cause prospered in the West of England, and Edmund Waller, the poet, naiTOwly escaped the gallows for his plot to bring the Parliament to terms of peace — in that year, 1643, Sir John Denham published a poem, " Cooper's Hill," that received unbounded praise foi' a few generations, and still pleiises its reader by blending human interests with some feeling for Nature, in a piece part descriptive, part didactic, to whose verse one of its o\vn lines has been applied, " Strong without rage, without o'erflo\ving full." Sir John Denham, son of a Baron of Exchequer, was born in Dublin, and was ten years old at the accession of Charles I. His tragedy of " The Sophy," produced in 1641, was so successful, that Edmund Waller said of him, " he broke out, like the Irish rebellion, three score thousand strong, when nobody was aware, or in the least suspected it." Two years afterwards came the poem of " Cooper's Hill," on the view over the Thames towards London, from the neighbourhood of Windsor. Deidiam, an active royalist, was knighted at the coronation of 2 A whiter went before to clear the way for a procession. In ' Henry V.," chorus to act v., Shakespeare speaks of the sea — " Which like a mig:hty wliiifler 'fore the king, Seems to prepare his way." Kinic TO A.D. 1(36J.] SHORTER POEMS. 305 Cliarles II., lived until the year of the Revolution, and in his latter days was much honoured by younger writers. Dryden said of his " Cooper's Hill," that " for the majesty of the style it is, and ever will be, the exact standard of good writing ; " and young Pope, in his " Windsor Foi'est," asked to be borne by the " ssicred nine " To Thames's bank, which fragrant breezes fill. Or where ye Muses sport on Cooper's Hill. (On Cooper's Hill eternal wreaths shall grow, While lasts the mountain, or while Thames shall flow.) I seem thi-ough conseurated walks to rove, I hear soft music die along the grove ; Led by the sound, I roam from shade to shade. By godlike poets venerable made : Here his first lays majestic Dunham sung. Here the last numbers flowed from Cowley's tongue. For Cowley, in the early years of the Restoration, ended his life in quiet retreat at Chertsey. This is Denham's jjoem : — COOPERS HILL. Sm-e there are poets which did never dream Upon Parnassus, nor did taste the stream Of Helicon ; we therefore may suppose Those made not poets, but the poets those. And as courts make not kings, but kings the court, So where the Muses and their train resort, Parnassus stands ; if I can be to thee A poet, thou Parnassus art to me. Nor wonder, if (advrintag'd in my flight By taking wing from thy auspicious height) 1 Through uutrac'd ways and airy paths I fly. More boundless in my fancy than my eye : M}' eye which, swift as thought, contracts the space That lies between and first salutes the place Crown'd with that sacred pile so v.a.st, so high. That whether 'tis a part of earth or sky Uncertain seems, and may be thought a proud Aspiiing mountain, or descending cloud, — P.wl's, the late theme of such a Muse whose flight Has bravely reach'd and soar'd above thy height ; 20 Now shalt thou stand, tho' sword or time or fire Or zeal more fierce than they thy fall conspire, Secm'e, whilst thee the best of poets' sings, Preserv'd from ruin by the best of kings. Under his proud survey the city lies. And like a mist beneath a hill doth rise ; Whose state and wealth, the business and the crowd. 1 Edmund Waller, who wrote a poem " Upon His Majesty's re- pairing of St. Piuil's iu the year 16;J1." The work had heen plaimed by James I., whom Waller, fur the uuiou iu his person of Enj^lish and Scottish soverei^ties, c ills " the first monarch of this happy isle " While Charles I. was .accomplishing the restoration of St, Paul's there was a drou^-ht, of which sang Denham's " best of poets" — *' While the propitious heavens this work attend, Long-wanted showers they forgot to send ; As if they meant to make it understood Of more importance than oirr vital food." Now-a-days we should hold a " best of poets " bound to rank tinath above ingennity. 39 Seems at this distance but a darker cloud. And is, to liim wlio rightly things esteems. No other in effect than wliat it seems : 30 Where, with like haste, tho' sev'ral ways, the}- run, Some to undo and some to be undone, Wliile luxiuy and wealth, like war and peace, Are each the other's ruin and increase. As rivers lost in seas, some secret vein Thence reoonveys, there to be lost again. happiness of sweet retir'd content. To be at once secui'e and innocent ! Windsor the next (where Mars with Venus dwells, Beauty with strength) above the valley swells 40 Into my eye, and doth itself present With such an easy and unforc'd ascent, That no stupendous jirecipice denies Access, no horror turns away our eyes, But such a rise as doth at one invite A pleasm-e and a reverence from the sight. Thy mighty master's emblem, in whose face Sate meekness, heighten'd with majestic grace ; Such seems thy gentle height, made only proud To be the basis of that pompous load, 50 Than which a nobler weight no mountain bears. But Atlas only which supports the spheres. When Nature's hand this ground did thus advance, 'Twas guided by a wiser pow'r than Chance ; Mark'd cut for such an use, as if 'twere meant T' invite the builder, and his choice prevent. - Nor can we call it choice, when what we choose. Folly or blindness only could refuse. A crown of such majestic tow'rs doth grace The gods' gi-cat mother,' when her heav'nly race 60 Do homage to her. Yet she cannot boast Among that num'rous and celestial ho.st More heroes than can Windsor, nor doth Fame's Immortal book record more noble names. Not to look back so far, to whom this isle Owes the first glory of so brave a pile, Whether to Ca'sar, Albanact, or Brute, The British Ai-thirr, or the Danish Knute, Tho' this of old no less contest did move. Than when for Homer's birtli seven cities strove ; 70 Like him in birth, thou should' st be like in fame. As thine his fate, if iJiine had been his flame ; But whosoe'er it was. Nature design'd First a brave jilace, and tlicn as brave a mind. Not to recount those sev'ral kings, to whom It gave a cradle, or to whom a tomb ; But thee, great Edward, and thy greater son, (The lilies which his father wore, he won) And thy BcUona,'' who the consort came Not only to thy bed, but to thy fame, 80 She to thy triumph led one captive king, And brought that son which did the second bring. Then didst thou found that order, whether love Or victory thy royal thoughts did move. Each was a noble cause, and nothing less Than the design has been tlie great success, ■\\niich foreign kings and emperors esteem The second honour to their diadem. Had thy great Destiny but given thee skill To know, as well as pow'r to act her will, 90 2 Prevent, go before, forestall; whence the sense to wliich the word is now limited. > "The tower'd Cybele." * PhiHppa, Queen of Edward III. 30G CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. I(i25 That from those kings, who then thy captives were, In after times should spring a royal pair Who should possess all that thy mighty pow'r, Or thy desires more mighty, did devour ; To whom their better fate reserves whate'er The factor hopes for, or the vanquish'd fear : That hlood, which thou and thy great grandsir-e shed. And aU that since these sister nations bled. Had been unspQt, and happy Edward known That aU the blood he spilt had bion his own. 100 When he that patron chose, in whom are join'd Soldier and martjT, and his arms confin'd Within the azure circle, he did seem But to foreteD, and prophesy of him. Who to his realms that azure round hath join'd Which nature for theu- bound at first design'd. That bound, which to the world's extremest ends. Endless itself, its liquid arms extends. Nor doth he need those emblems which we paint. But is himself the soldier and the saint. 110 Here should my wonder dwell, and here my praise. But my fix'd thoughts my wandering eye betrays, Viewing a neighb'iing hill, whose top of late A chapel crown'd, 'til in the common fate Th' adjoining abbey fell : may no such stoim Fall on our times, where ruin must reform. Tell me, my muse, what monstrous dire offence, Wliat crime could any Christian king incense To such a rage ? Was 't luxury, or lust 'i Was he so temperate, so chaste, so just 'r 120 Were these their crimes ? They were his own much more ; But wealth is crime enough to him that's poor. Who having spent the treasures of his crown. Condemns their luxury to feed his own. And yet this act, to varnish o'er the shame Of sacrilege, must bear Devotion's name. No crime so bold, but would be understood A real, or at least a seeming good : Who fears not to do Ul, yet fears the name. And free from conscience, is a slave to fame, 1.30 Thus he the church at once protects and spoUs ; But princes' swords are sharper than their styles', And thus to th' ages past he makes amends, Theii- charity destroys, their faith defends. Then did religion in a lazy cell. In empty, airy, contemplations dwell ; And like the block, immoved lay : but ours. As much too active, like the stork devours. Is there no temp' rate region can be known Betwixt their frigid and our torrid zone ? 140 Could we not wake from that lethargic di-eam But to be restless in a worse extreme ? And for that lethargy was there no cure But to be cast into a calenture ? Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance So far, to make us wish for ignorance. And rather in the dai-k to grope our way Than, led by a false guide, to err by day ? Who sees these dismal heaps, but would demand 'What barbarous invader sack'd the land : 1.50 But when he hears, no Goth, no Turk did bring This desolation, but a Christian king, '\^^len nothing, but the name of zeal, appears 'Twixt our best actions and the worst of theii-s, What does he think our sacrilege would spare, AVhen such th' effects of our devotions are 'i Parting from thence 'twixt anger, shame, and fear, Those for what's past, and this for what's too near, My eye, descending from the hill, surveys Where Thames among the wanton valleys strays. 160 Thames, the most lov'd of all the Ocean's sons By his old sire, to his embraces runs ; Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea. Like mortal life to meet eternity. Tho' with those streams he no resemblance hold Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold ; His genuine and less gmlty wealth t' explore. Search not his bottom but survey his shore, O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing And hatches plenty for th' ensuing spring. 170 Nor then destroys it with too fond a stay. Like mothers which their infants overlay, Nor with a sudden and impetuous wave. Like profuse kings, resumes the wealth he gave. No unexpected inundations spoil The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's toil, But godlike his unwearied bounty flows. Fust loves to do, then loves the good he does ; Nor are his blessings to his banks confin'd, But free, and common, as the sea or wind ISO ^^^len he, to boast or to disperse his stores, Full of the tributes of his grateful shores Visits the world, and in his flying tours Brings home to us nml makes both Indies ours, Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants. Cities in deserts, woods in cities plants. So that to us no thing, no place is strange iWhile his fair bosom is the world's exchange. Oh could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme ! lilO Tho' deep, yet clear ; tho' gentle, yet not dull : Strong without rage, without o'crflowing full. Heav'n her Eridanus no more shall boast, 'WTiose fame in thine like lesser current's lost ; Thy nobler streams shall visit Jove's abodes. To shine among the stars and 1 athe the gods. Here "Nature, whether more intent to please Us for herself with strange varieties, For things of wonder give no less delight To the wise maker's than beholder's sight ; 200 Tho' these delights from several causes move, For so our children, thus our friends we love ; Wisely she knew, the harmony of things As well as that of sounds from discord springs. Such was the discord which did first disperse Form, order, beauty through the universe ; While dr}-ness moisture, coldness heat resists, All that we have, and that we are, subsists ; While the steep horrid roughness of the wood Strives with the gentle calmness of the flood, 2 1 Such huge extremes when nature doth unite. Wonder from thence results from thence delight. The stream is so transparent, pure, and clear, That had the self-enamoured youth gazed here. So fatally deceived he had not been While he the bottom, not his face had seen. But his proud head the airy mountain hides Among the clouds ; his shoulders and his sides A shady mantle clothes ; his cm-led brows Frown on the gentle stream, which calmly flows. 220 While winds and storms his lofty forehead beat : The common fate of all that's high or great. Low at his foot a spacious plain is placed, -a i.D. 1660.] SHOETER POEMS. 307 Between the mountain and the stream embraced, A\Tiifh shade and shelter from tlie hill derives, A\Tiile the kind liver wealth and beauty gives; And in the mixtm-e of all these appeal's Variety, which all the rest endears. This scene had some bold Greek, or British bard Beheld of old, what stories had we heard 230 Of fairies, satjTS, and the nymphs their dames. Their feasts, their revels, and their am'rous flames ? 'Tis still the same, altho' their airy shape All but a quick jjoetic sight escape. There Faunus and .Sylvanus keep their courts, And thither all the horned host resorts To graze the ranker mead, that noble herd On whose subUme and shady fronts is rear'd Nature's great masterpiece, to show how soon Great things are made, but sooner are undone. 240 Here have I seen the king, when great affairs Gave leave to slacken, and unbend his cares. Attended to the chase by aU the tlow'r Of youth, whose hopes a nobler prey devour : Pleasure with praise, and danger they would buy, And wish a foe that would not only fly. The stag now conscious of his fatal growth, At once indulgent to his fear and sloth, To some dark covert his retreat had made Where nor man's eye nor Heaven's should invade 250 His soft repose ; when th' unexpected sound Of dogs and men his wakeful ear does wound. Eoused with the noise, he scarce believes his ear, Willing to think th' illusions of his fear Had given this false alarm, but straight his view Coniirms that more than all he fears is true. Betrayed in all his strengths, the wood beset. All instruments, all arts of ruin met. He calls to mind his strength, and then his speed. His winged heels and then his aimed head, 260 With these t' avoid, with that his fate to meet ; But fear jirevails, and bids him trust his feet. So fast he ilies, that his re\-iewing ej-e Has lost the chasers, and his ear the crj-; Exidting, till he finds their nobler sense Their disproportioned speed doth recompense ; Then cm-ses his conspiring feet, whose scent Betrays that safety which their swiftness lent ; Then tries his friends, among the baser herd Where he so lately was obej'ed and feared 270 His safety seeks ; the herd, unkindly wise, Or chases him from thence, or from him flies ; Like a declining statesman, left forlorn To his friends' pit)' and pursuers' scorn. With shame remembers, while himself was one Of the same herd, himself the same had done. Thence to the coverts, and the conscious groves. The scenes of his past triumphs and his loves ; Sadly surveying where he ranged alone Prince of the soU, and all the herd his own, 280 And like a bold knight-errant did proclaim Combat to all, and bore away the dame. And taught the woods to echo to the stream His dreadful challenge and his clashing beam ; Yet faintly now declines the fatal strife. So much his love was dearer than bis life. Now ev'ry leaf and ev'ry moving breath Presents a foe, and ev'rv foe a death. Wearied, forsaken, and pursued, at last All safety in despair of safety placed, 290 Courage he thence resumes, resolved to bear All their assaults, since 'tis in vain to fi ar. And now too late he wishes for the fight That strength he wasted in ignoble flight : But when he sees the eager chase renewed, Himself by dogs, the dogs by men pursued. He straight revokes his bold resolve, and more Repents his courage than his fear before ; Finds that uncertain ways unsafest are, And doubt a greater mischief than despair. 300 Then to the stream, when neither friends, nor force, Nor sjieed, nor art prevail, he shapes his course ; Thinks not their rage so desperate to assay An element more merciless than they. But fearless they pursue, nor can the flood Quench their dire thirst ; alas ! they thirst for blood. So towards a ship the oar-finned galleys ply, "WTiich wanting sea to ride, or wind to fly, Stands but to fall revenged on those that dare Tempt the last fmy of extreme despair. 310 So fares the stag, among th' eni'aged hounds, Repels their force, and wounds returns for wounds. And as a hero, whom his baser foes In troojis surround, now these assails, now those. Though prodigal of life, disdains to die By common hands, but if he can descry Some nobler foe approach, to him he calls. And begs his fate, and then contented falls : So when the king a mortal shaft lets fly From his imerring hand, then glad to die, 320 Proud of the wound, to it resigns his blood, And stains the crystal with a purple flood. This a more innocent and happy chase. Than when of old, but in the self-same place, Fair Liberty pursued, and meant a prey To lawless power, here tum'd, and stood at bay. When in that remedy all hope was plac'd. Which was, or shoidd have been at least, the last. Here* was that charter seal'd, wherein the crown All marks of arbitrary pow'r laj's down : 330 TjTant and slave, those names of hate and fear, The happier style of king and subject bear. Happy, when both to the same centre move, ^\Tien kings give liberty and subjects love ! Therefore not long in force this charter stood ; Wanting that seal, it must be seal'd in blood. The subjects ami'd, the more their princes gave, Th' advantage only took, the more to crave, Till kings by giving, give themselves away, And e'en that pow'r, that should deny, betray. 340 " Who gives constrain'd, but his own fear re-viles, Not thank' d, but scom'd; nor are they gifts, but spoils." Thus kings, by grasping more than they could hold. First made their subjects, by oppression, bold ; And popular sway, by forcing kings to give More than was fit for subjects to receive. Ran to the same extremes ; and one excess Made both, by striving to be greater, less. When a calm river rais'd with sudden rains. Or snows dissolv'd, o'erflows th' adjoining plains, 3.50 ■ The husbandmen with high-rais'd banks secure Their greedy hopes, and this he can endure. But if with bays and dams they strive to force 1 At Runnymede. 308 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. U-D. 1625 His (.•haimel to a new or narrow course, No longer then within liis banks he dwells, Fii-st to a torrent, then a deluge swells ; Stronger and fiercer hy restraint he roars, And knows no bound, but makes hig pow'r his shores. Abraham Cowley, three year.s younger than Sir John Denham, was tlie posthumous son of a London grocer. His mother struggled successfully to give Viim a good education, and when he was a West- minster schoolboy only tifteen years old his first vei-se was printed, " Poetical Blossoms," with this poi-trait of the author at the age of thirteen. Here Abraham Cowley. FrotR his " Poeficnl P?o.s.«om.s." is a song from " Constantia and Philetus," printed among these Blossoms, and written by Cowley at the age of twelve : — CONST.'iXTIA S SOXG. Time fly with g:reatcr speed away, Add feathers to thy wings. Till thy haste in ilying brings That wishcd-for and expected Day. Comfort's Sun we then shall see. Though at first it darkened be "With dangers yet, those clouds but gone. Our Day will put hi; lustre on. Then though Death's sad night appear, And we in lonely silence rest; 10 Oiu- ravish'd Souls no more shall fear, But with lasting day be blest. And then no friends can part us more. Nor no new death extend its power ; Thus there's nothing can dissc\'or Hearts whioli Love hath joined together. Cowley went from Westminster Seliool to Trinity College, Cambridge, and his marvellous precocity did not foreshadow, as it sometimes does, a feeble manhood. He had written a play at school, and he wrote plays at college. When the (Jivil War had broken out, in the year of the pulilishing of Denham's " Cooper's Hill," which ends with a inference to it, Cowley was ejected from Camliridge, and went to St. John's College, O.xford. Afterwards he went with the Queen to Paris, and was active in managing the cipher cori'espondence between King Charles and his wife. In 1647 appeared his love [loems under the name of " The Mistress." They are pure works of imagmation. He never married, and it is said that although he was once, and only once, in love, he was too shy to tell his passion. These are two poems from Cowley's " Mistress : " — THE CHANGE. Love in her sunny eyes does basking play. Love walks the pleasant mazes of her hair. Love does on both her lips for ever stray. And sows and reaps a thousand kisses there : In all her outward parts Love's always seen; But, oh 1 he never went within. Within Love's foes, his greatest foes, abide, Malice, Inconstancy, and Pride ; So the earth's face, trees, herbs, and Howers do diess, With other beauties numberless : IC But at the centre darkness is and hell ; There wicked spirits, and there the damned dwell. With me, alas ! quite contrary it fares ; Darkness and death lies in my weeping eyes. Despair and paleness in my face .appears. And gi-ief and fear, Love's greatest enemies ; But, Uke the Persian tyrant, Love within Keejis his proud court, and ne'er is seen. Oh take my heart, and by that means you'll prove Within too stor'd enough of love : 20 Ctivb me but yom-s, I'll by that change so thrive That Love in all my parts sliall live : So powerful is this change, it render can. My outside woman, and your inside man. MY PICTURE. Here, take my likeness with you, whilst 'tis so; For when from hence you go, The next sun's rising will behold Me pale, and lean, and old. The man who did this picturi' draw. Will swear next day my face he never saw. T really believe, ■\^'ithin .a while, If 5'ou upon this shadow smile, Your presence will such %'igour give (Your presence which makes all things live) 10 And absence so miich alter me. This will the substance, I the shadow be. When from youi' well-wrought cabinet you take it, And your bright looks awake it. TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 300 Ah, be not frighted, if you see The new-soul'd picture gaze on thee, And hear it breathe a sigh or two ; For those are the first things that it will do. My rival-image will be then thought blest, And laugh at me as dispossest ; 20 But thou, who (if I know thee right) I'th' substance dost not much delight, Wilt rather send again for me. Who then shall but my picture's pict\u-e be. Cowley was mucli admii-ecl in his own day for the irregular poems which he called Pindaric odes. One of them cut him off from the favour of Charles II. at the Restoration. He had praised Brutus, ami after that ofl'ence the son of Charles I. is reported to have said of his father's helpful follower, that it was reward enough for Mr. Cowley to be forgiven. This was the ode : — BRUTUS. Excelkut Brutus, of all human race The best till Xature was improved by Grace, Till men above themselves Faith raised more Than lieason above beasts before! Virtue was thy life's centre, and from thence Did silently and constantly dispense The gentle vigorous influence To all the wide and fail' circumference : And aU the parts upon it Ican'd so easily, Obcy'd the mighty force so willingly, 10 That none could discord or disorder see In all their contrariety ; Each had his motion natui-al and free. And the whole no more mov'd than the whole world could be. From thy strict rule some think that thou didst swerve (Jlistaken honest men) in C;esar's blood : 'WTiat mercy coidd the tjTant's life deserve From him who kiU'd himself rather than serve ? Th' heroic exaltations of good Are so far from understood, 20 We count them vice : alas ! our sight's so ill That things wliich swiftest move seem to stand still ' We look not upon Virtue in her height. On her supreme idea, brave and bright. In the original light : But as her beams reflected pass Through oiu' own nature or ill custom's glass. And 'tis no wonder so If with dejected eye In stantUng pools we seek the sky, 30 That stars so high above should seem to us below. Can we stand by and see Om- mother robbed, and bound, and ravished be, Yet not to her assistance stir, Pleas'd with the strength and beauty of the ravisher ? Or shall we fear to kill him, if before The cancel!' d name of friend he bore ? Ingrateful, Brutus do they call ? Ingrateful Caesar, who could Rome enthral! An act more barbarous and unnatural, -10 In th' exact balance of true yii tue tried, Than his successor Nero's parri('ide. There's none but Brutus could deserve That all men else should wish to serve, And Ciusar's usurpt jilace to him shoidd proffer: — None can deserve 't l)ut he who would refuse the offer. Ill Fate assumed a body thee t' affright, And wrapt itself i'th' terrors of the night, "I'll meet thee at Philippi," said the sprite ; " I'll meet thee there," saidst thou, 50 With such a voice, and such a brow. As put the tremlding ghost to sudden flight ; It vanished as a taper's light Goes out wlxen spirits appear in sight. One would have thought 't had heard the Morning crow, Or seen her well-appointed star Come mai-ching up the eastern lull afar. Nor durst it in PhUippi's field appear, But unseen attacked thee there. Had it presumed in any shape thee to oppose, 60 Thou wouldst have forced it back upon thy foes. Or slain 't Uke Ca'sar, though it be A conqueror and a monarch mightier far than he. What joy can human things to us afltord, When we see perish thus by odd events, 111 men and wretched accidents. The best cause and best man that ever drew a sword ? When wo see The false Octavius and wild Antony, God-like Brutus, conquer thee ? 70 What can we say but thine own tragic word. That Virtue, which had worshipped been by thee As the most solid good, and gi-eatest Deity, By this fatal proof became An idol only, and a name ? Hold, noble Brutus, and restrain The bold voice of thy generous disdain : These mighty gulfs are yet Too deep for all thy judgment and thy wit. The time's set forth already, which shall quell 80 Stiff Reason, when it oft'ers to Rebel ; WTiich these great secrets shall unseal. And new philosophies reveal. A few years more, so soon hadst thou not died. Would have confounded Human Virtue's pride. And .showed thee a God Crucified. It was ill the memorable year of the battle of Naseby, 1645, that John :Milton, then thirty-seven years old, published his first volume of collected poems, "Poems both Latin and English, by John Milton." When Charles I. came to the throne, Milton was a youth of little more than sixteen, who had been educated at St. Paul's School, and was just entering to his college at Cambridge. He had been admitte'd to Christ's College in February, 162.5, when James I. was still living, Viut returned to London and did not come into residence at Cambridge until twelve days after the accession of King Charles. After five or six years of study, on his birthday, the 9th of December, le.Sl, the young poet wi-ote a sonnet that reads like his gi-ace before the active work of life : — 310 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLIt^H LITERATURE. [a.d. u;25 SONNET. ON HIS ItEIXG ARRIVED AT THE AGE OT TWENTY-THREE. How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth, Stol'n on his w'mg my thi-ee and twentieth year ! jMv hastini!; days i\y on with full career, But my late spring no bud or blossom shew'th. Perhaps my semblance might deceive the truth, That I to manliood am an-iv"d so near, And inward ripeness doth much less appear. That some more timely-happy spirits indu'th. Yet be it less or more, or soon or slow. It shall be still in stnctcst measure even, To that same lot, however mean, or high, Toward which Time leads me, and the will of Heaven All is, if I have grace to use it so, As ever in my great Task-Master's eye. 10 John Milton. \ From the Cast of his Face, taken ahottt 1654, tiou? in Trinity College, Cambridge. To tlie closing resolve Milton was true until his death. John Milton remained at Cambridge \intil July, 1632, when he graduated as Master of Arts, and then obtained leave from his father to join him in his retirement at Horton, near Windsor, while adding to his period of study more years — tliey came to l)e another seven years ; nearly six at Horton, followed by fifteen months of foreign travel— that were to prepare him for the full use of whatever talent God might have entrusted to him. During those years he wrote his " Arcades," his " Comus," and that exquisite pair of poems, *' L' Allegro " and " II Pen- seroso," written to represent the gay and grave sides of one innocent and healthy mind : — l'allegro.^ Hence loathed IMelancholy, Of Cerberus and blackest midnight bom. In Stygian cave forlorn : 'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy : 1 L'Allegro. In Glierardini's '* Supplimento a' Vocabolarj Italiani " (six vols., Milau, 1852), a work desired for precise definition of the Find out some uncouth cell, "Wlicrc brooding Darkness spreads his jealous "^'ings, And the night-raven sings ; There under ebon shades, and low-brow' d rocks, As ragged as thy locks. In dark Cinunerian desert ever dwell. 10 But come - thou goddess fan- and fi-ee, In Heav'n yclep'd Euphros}-ne, sense in which Italian words are used, " L'Allegro " is defined as one *' who has iu his heart cause for contentmeut " ('* che ha in cuore cagione di couteutezza "). Suice Milton designed in this poem to represent the cheerful mood of one whose "bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne," the Italian word made a more suitable title than the English word " Mirth " standing alone. When used in the poem it does not stand alone ; the poem essentially consists in its limitation, " These dehghts if thou canst give, Mirth, with thee I mean to Uve." The word " Mirth " means origiuiilly softness. (See Note 8, page 18.) For a like reason Melancholy, which means only the mood produced by a state of the bile (see Note i, page 297), coidd not stand alone as title to the companion poem. But the Italian word " Pensieroso»" which describes a man who is grave while his mind is weighing and considering, precisely expresses Milton's thought. The true life has its hours of innocent Hght-hearted enjoyment and its hours of grave, but not less happy, meditation. He who is never " L'Allegro," is likely to be " II Penseroso " to but Uttle purjiose, and may know too much of the " loathed melancholy" born of the black dog; while he who never is " H Penseroso," may know less of the mood of " L'Allegro " than of the " vain deluding joys " that Milton shuts out of his picture. Each piece liegins with a bauniug of the opposite to its companion. The loathed Melancholy ("loathed," from Fu-st-English "lath," evil), bom of darkness and the dog of hell, which is banished at the opening- of " L'Allegro," might even more fitly have been placed at the opening of " II Penseroso," since it is the precise opposite to that '• divinest Melancholy " of which that poem paints the pleasures. In like manner the " vain deluding joys, the brood of Folly " which ai"e banished at the opening of " II Penseroso," might have been placed at the opening of *' L'AUegro," since they are the precise opposite to the freedom of '* unreproved pleasures " painted iu that poem. It is, in- deed, not improbable that the two poems were first so written, and that by a fine art their openings were transposed to tlu'ow the substance of each into more vivid relief. However that muy be, it must not for a moment be supposed that the opening of each of these poems con- tradicts the substance of the other. There are two things praised : innocent joyousness — that which springs not from the wine-cup or from idle frivolities of life, but from a heart open to the smile of Grod on his creation ; innocent thoughtfulness — that adds to hfe the happi- ness of quiet contemplation rested on the beauty or the wisdom of God's works, and of those works in which man has put his intellect to noblest use. These are the two things praised. The two con- demned are, the sullen mood of a gloom that comes of evil, aud the light mood that causes a man to lose his foothold in Hfe by the pur- suit of empty and deluding pleasures. The two moods welcomed are alike common to every wholesome mind, and are joined by Words- worth when he sings in his " Excursion " of the sun— " fixed. And the infinite magnificence of heaven Fixed, within reach of evei*y human eye ; The sleepless ocean miuTuurs for all ears ; The vernal field infuses fresh delight Into all hearts. Throughout the world of sense, Even as an object is sublime or fair, That object is laid open to the view Without reserve or veil ; and as a power Is salutary, or an influence sweet, Are each and all enabled to perceive That power, that influence, by impartial law. Gifts nobler are vouchsafed alike to all ; Reason, and with that reason smiles and tears ; Imagination, freedom in the will ; Conscience to guide and check ; and death to be Foretasted, immortality conceived By all." ~ But come, &c. Each poem having opened with the banning of a hostile mood, proceeds to a poet's fancy of the parentage of that mood welcomed. I mark by slight breaks the successive sections, that their correspondence in the pair of poems may be the more readily observed. TO i.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 311 And by men, heart-easing Mirth ; Whom lovely Venus at a birth With two sister Graces more, To ivj'-crowncd Bacchus bore ; Or whether (as some sager sing) The frolic wind that breathes the spring, ZephjT with Aurora playing, As he met her once a-llaying, -0 There on beds of \-iolets blue, And fresh-blown roses washt in dew, FQl'd her with thee a daughter fail-. So buxom, blithe, and debonaii'. Haste thee, nymph,' and bring with thee Jest and youthful Jollity, Cluips and cranks, and wanton wiles, Nods, and becks, and wTcathed smiles, Such as hang on Hebe's cheek. And love to live in dimple sleek ; 30 Sport that wrinkled Care derides. And Laughter holding both his sides ! Come, and trip it as ye go On the light fantastic toe ; And in thy right hand lead with thee The mountain nymph, sweet liberty ; And if I give thee honour due, Mirth, admit me of thy crew. To live with her, and live with thee, In unreproved pleasui'es free ! 40 To hear the lark- begin his flight. And singing startle the dull night From liis watch-tower in the skies. Till the dappled dawn doth rise ; Then to come in spite of sorrow, And at my window bid good morrow, Through the sweet-briar, or the vine. Or the twisted eglantine, While the cock with lively din. Scatters the rear of dai'kness thin, 50 And to the stack, or the barn-door. Stoutly struts his dames before. Oft list'ning how the hounds and horn Cheerly rouse the slumb'iing morn, From the side of some hoar hUl, Thi-ough the high wood echoing shrill. Some time walking, not unseen, By hedge-row elms on hillocks green. Right against the eastern gate, Where the great sun begins his state, 60 Rob'd in flames, and amber light. The clouds in thousand liveries dight ; While the ploughman near at hand, Wliistles o'er the furrow'd land. And the milkmaid singeth blithe. 1 Haste thee, nymfh. Here begins a third section arising naturally from the second, painting the companions of uinoceut mirth. A fon-esponding section of the other poem paints the companions of *' divinest " Melancholy. - To hear Ulc Jai-k, Here a new section begins a series of images of cheerful day with the morning soug of the lark and gladness of one who is abroad under the sun. The con'esponding section of the other poem begins with the nightingale's even-song a series of images that suggest thoughtfulness abroad under the moon. The passage in this section of "L'Allegro" is through the course of the day from dawn to midday, and to Corydon and Thyrsis happy in their dinner of herbs where love is ; then with suggestions of happy holiday follow dances uutil dusk. The passage in one poem is of morning that leads on to night ; in the other it is of night that ends with morning. And the mower wets his scythe, And every shepherd tells his tale Under the hawthorn in the dale. Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures Whilst the landscape round it measiu'es ; 70 Russet lawns, and fallows gray. Where the nibbling flocks do stray ; Mountains on wliose barren breast The labouring clouds do often rest ; Meadows trim with daisies pied. Shallow brooks, and rivers wide. Towers and battlements it sees Bosom'd high in tufted trees; Where perhaps some beauty lies. The cynosui'e ^ of neighbom-ing eyes. 80 Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes From betwixt two aged oaks ; Where Corydon and Thyrsis * met, Are at their savoury dinner set Of herbs, and other country messes, Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses ; And then in haste her bower she leaves, With Thestyhs to bind the sheaves ; Or if the earlier season lead To the tann'd haycock in the mead. 90 Sometimes with secure delight The upland hamlets will invite. When the merry bells ring round, And the jocund rebecks sound To many a youth, and many a maid. Dancing in the chequer' d shade ; And young and old come forth to play On a sunaluno holiday. Till the live-long daylight faO. Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,* 100 With stories told of many a feat, How fairy Mab the junkets eat. She was pinched and pulled, she said ; And he by friars' lantern led. Tells how the drudging gobUn sweat To earn his cream-bowl duly set, When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, His shadowy flail hath thresh' d the com That ton day-labourers could not end ; Then lies him down the lubbar fiend, 110 And stretch'd out all the chimney's length, Basks at the fir-e his haiiy strength. And crop-full out of doors he flings, Ere the first cock his matin rings. 5 Cynosure {Greek Kuvor oupa, dog's tail), one name for the constel- lation of the Lesser Bear, iu which is the Pole-star, to which all eyes of men on the wide seas were turned. * Corydon and ThyrMs. These names, and also that of the " neat- handed PhilMs," are from the seventh eclogue of Virgil. Thestylis, presently named, comes from the second eclogue : — ** The sheep enjoy the coolness of the shade, And Thestylis wild thyme imd gallic beats For harvest hinds, o'erspent with toil and heats." (Drydeu's translation.) 5 Then to the spicy iiu(-broic» ale. The close of dayhght brings the poem naturally to the next section of thought, the cheerfulness of human society when night draws in, first painted among the villagers, with their tales of wonder by the social fireside ; then in the barons" halls among the knights and ladies, at the masque or wedding ; or at the theatre when it can furnish something better than a vain deluding joy, that is, " If Jonson's le.arned sock be on. Or sweetest Shakesi)eare, Fancy's child. Warble his native wood-notes wild." 312 OASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 16-5 Thus, done the tales, to bed they creei). By whispering winds soon luU'd asleep. Towered cities please us then. And the busy hum of men ; "Where thi'ongs of knights and barons bold, In weeds of peace high triumiihs hold, 120 With stores of ladies, whose bright eyes Eain influence, and judge the prize Of wit, or arms, while both contend To win her grace, whom all commend. There let Hj-mon oft appear, In saffron robe, with taper clear ; And pomp, and feast, and reveliy, "With mask, and [intique pageantry ; Such sights as youthful poets dream. On summer eves by haunted stream. 130 Then to the well-trod stage anon. If Jonson's learned sock be on. Or sweetest .Shakespeare, Fancy's child, "Warble his native wood-notes wild. And ever against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs,' Married to immortal verse. Such as the meeting soul may pierce In notes with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long di-awn out ; 140 "With wanton heed, and giddy cimning. The melting voice through mazes running. Untwisting all the chains that tie The hidden soul of harmony ; That. Orpheus' self may heave his head From golden slumber on a bed Of heaped Elysian flowers, and hear Such strains as would have won the ear Of Pluto to have quite set free His half -regained Eurydice. loO These deUghts if thou canst give. Mirth, with thee I mean to live. IL PENSEROSO. Hence vain deluding joys. The brood of Folly without father bred ; How little you bestead, Or fiU the fixed mind with all your toys ! Dwell in some idle brain, And fancies fond with gaudy shapes - possess. As thick and numberless As the gay motes that people the sun-beams ; Or likest hovering di-eams. The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. 10 ' Soft Lydinn airs. In tills section each poem closes with a setting of eacli mood to music, before tlie two closing lines of conditional acceptance of Mii-tU and Melancholy. Eaoli is welcome only if it be sncli as fbe poem has defined. 2 Gatid'j sha^ics. The word " ^udy " as used in this line is not from the Latin " gaudinm." I derive it from the Cymric "gau," false, and its derivative " geiiawd," falsifying deception. Thei-e are traces of this word from such a root iu modern Scottish use of "gaudy" for tricky or mischievous ; in the use of the word " gaud " by Chaucer as a trick, iu " Ti'oilus and Cressida," and by the Pardoner who s lys of his trade iu relics — *' By this gaud have I wonnen yere by yere An hundred mark since I was Pardonere ; ' ' and in the definitiou of " gaud " in the *' Promptorinni Paft-vulomm." about A.D. 1440, *• gaud or jape, nuga." Milton's " gaudy shapes " are, therefore, delusive shapes. But hail, thou Goddess, sage and holy, Hail, divinest Melancholy, Whose saintly visage is too bright To hit the sense of human sight ; And thei'cf ore to our weaker view, O'crlaid with black, staid -wisdom's hue; Black, but such as in esteem Prince Memnon's sister might beseem. Or that Starr' d Ethiop queen that strove To set her beauty's praise above 20 The sea-nymphs, and their powers offended. Yet thou art higher far descended : Thee bright-hair' d Vosta, long of yore. To solitary Saturn bore ; His daughter she, in Satm-n's reign, Such mixture was not held a stain ; Oft iu glimmering bowers, and glades He met her, and in secret shades Of woody Ida's inmost grove, Wliile yet there was no fear of Jove. 30 Come, pensive nun, devout and pure, Sober, stedfast, and demure ; All in a robe of darkest grain. Flowing with majestic train ; And sable stole of C)-prus '' lawn, Over thy decent shoulders drawn. Come, but keep thy wonted state. With even step, and musing gait, And looks commercing with the skies ; Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes. 40 There held in holy passion still. Forget thyself to marble ; tUl With a sad leaden downward cast Thou fix them on the earth as fast. And join with thee calm Peace and Quiet, Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet. And hears the Muses in a ring Aye round about Jove's altar sing. And add to these retired Leisure, That in trim gardens takes his pleasure. 50 But first, and chiefest, with thee bring Him that soars on golden wing. Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne, The cherub Contemplation ; And the mute Silence hist along, Less Philomel will doig-n a song,'' In her sweetest, saddest plight. Soothing the rugged brow of Night, While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke Gently o'er th' accustom'd oak. GO Sweet bird that shimn'st the noise of foUy, Most musical, most melancholy. Thee, chauntress, oft the woods among, I woo to hear thy even-song ; And missing thee, I walk unseen* On the dry smooth-shaven green. 3 Cupriis laien. " Shadow their glory as a milliner's wife doth her wrought .'itomacher, with a smoky lawn or a black Cyprus." (Ben Jonson's " Evei7 Man in his Humour," act i., scene 2.) * Less Philomel iriU deign a song. "Less" is not a contraction of " unless," but the Tirst-Euglish " laes," still used in Scotland, as " les " or " less " for " lest." 5 Unseen. This pairs with the " not unseen " in line 57 of " L'Allegi-o." The two poems abound in p.arallels of word and thought as well as general design, and one of the pleasures they yield is a tracing of the concealed art that has heightened theii- charm. TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 313 To behold the waud'riug moon Hiding uuar her highest noon Like one tliiit hud been led astray Through the heaven's w-ide pathless way ; 70 And oft, as if her head she how'd, Stoopiug through a fleecy eloud. Oft ou a plat of rising groimd I hear the far-off curfew sound, Over some wido-water'd shore, Swinging slow with sullen roar. Or if tile ail" avUI not permit, Some still removed place will fit AMiere glowing embers through the room Teach light to counterfeit a gloom ; 80 Far from all resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth. Or the bellman's drowsy charm To bless tile doors from nightly harm. Or let my lamp at midnight hour Be seen in some high lonely tower, Where I may oft out- watch the Bear With thi'ice-grcat Hei-mes ; or unsphere The spiiit of Plato to unfold ^A^lat worlds or what vast regions hold 90 The immortal mind that hath forsook Her mansion in this fleshly nook : And of those da-mons that are found In tire, aii-, flood, or underground, Whose power hath a true consent AVith planet or with element. Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy In scepter'd pall come sweeping by ; Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line. Or the tale of Troy divine, 100 Or what (though rare) of later age Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage. But, sad virgin, that thy power Might raise Mus;eiis from his bower ; ^ Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing Such notes as, warbled to the string. Drew iron tears do\vn Pluto's cheek ; And made Hell grant what Love did seek ; Or call up him that left half told- The story of (''ambirsean bold, 1 1 (I Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife, That own'd the ^-irtuous ring and glass. And of the wondrous horse of brass On which the Tartar king did ride : And if aught else great bards beside' In sage and solemn tunes have sung. Of tumeys and of trophies hung. Of forests, and enchantments drear, \\Tiere moi-e is meant than meets the ear. 120 Thus Night oft see me in thy pale career. Till civil-suited JMoi-n appear ; ' H!s boH-f r. The Musaeum, on the hill near the citadel of Athens, to which this sou of Orpheus retired to put into song the oracles and story of the j?ods. - Him that left Jin?/ tciU. Chaucer, in the unfinished " Squii-e's Tale." 3 Grmt hanh hcsidc. The chief reference is to Spensei-, whose " Faerie Queene " caused Milton in his greatest prose work. " Aveo- pagitica, or the Defence of the Liberty of Unhceused Printins," to describe him as "the snse and serious Spenser, whom I dare be kno\7n to think a better teacher than Scotus or Aquinas." 40 Not triclct and frouuc't, as she was wont With the Attic boy" to hunt, But kercliief'd in a comely cloud. While rocking winds are piping loud ; Or usher'd with a shower still When the gust hath blown his fill, Ending on the rustling leaves With minute drops from off the eaves. And when the sun begins to fling His flaring beams, me. Goddess, bring To arched walks of twilight gi-oves. And shadows brown that sylvan loves, Of pine or monimiental oak. Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke. Was never heard the nymphs to dairat, Or fright them from their h.allow'd haunt. There in close covert by some brook. Where no pi'ofaner eye may look, Hide me from day's gfirish eye ; While the bee with honied thigh. That at her flow'ry work doth sing. And the waters murmuring, With such consort as they keep Entice the dewy-feather'd Sleep. And let some strange mysterious dream Wave at his wings in airy stream Of lively portraiture disiilay'd, Softly on my eye-lids laid ; And as I wake, sweet music breathe Above, about, or underneath. Sent by some spirit to mortals good. Or th' unseen Genius of the wood. But let my due feet never fail To walk the studious cloister's pale ; And love the high enibowed roof. With antique pillars massy pioof. And storied windows richly dight, Casting a dim religious light. There let the pealing organ blow To the full-voic'd quire below, In ser\ace high, and anthems clear. As may with sweetness, through mine ear. Dissolve me into ecstacies. And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes. And may at last my weary age Find out the peaceful hemiitage, The haiiy go\^^l and mossy cell ; Where I may sit, and rightly spell Of every star that Heav'n doth show. And every herb that sips the dew ; Till old experience do attain To something like prophetic strain. These pleasures Melancholy .give. And I with thee will choose to live.^ 130 140 150 160 170 Richard Corbet, who became Bishop of Oxford in 1629, and of Norwicli in 1632, died in 1635. Some of the verses which had obtained him high social * Tlic Attic bo!(. CephaluB, whose story closes the seventh book of Ovid's " Metam»i-i>hoses." 5 Milton's " L'Allegi'o " and "H Penseroso " have been carefully edited, with many notes, by Mr. J. W. Hales. M.A., in a volume entitled " Longer English Poems, with Notes Philological and Ex. planatory, and an Introduction on the Teachin'.r of English" (Mnc- 314 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. lli2o repute as wit and poet, were printed m 16-t8. He was the son of a famous gardener. This — which is left in the old spelling — is the kindly Bishop's ELEGY VPOX THE 1)E.\TH OF HIS OWN F.ITHER. Vincent Corbet, furtlier kjiowue By Poy-nters n.iine then by his owne, Here lyes higaged till the day Of raising bones and quickning clay. Nor wonder, reader, that he hath Two surnames in his epitaph, For this one did comprehend All that two familyes could lend. And if to know more .arts then any Could multiply one into many, 10 Here'a colony lyes then Both of qualityes and men. Yeares he liv'd well nigh fourscore. But coimt his vertues he liv'd more ; And nimiber liim by doeing good. He liv'd then- age beyond the flood. Should wee nndei'take his stoiy Truth would seeme fain'd and plainesse glory : Beside this tablet were to small. Add to the pillers and the wall. 20 Yet of this volume much is found Written in many a fertiU gi'ound ; Where the printer thee aft'ords Earth for paper, trees for words. He was natures factour here. And legier ' lay for every sheii-e To supply the ingenious wants Of some sprung fruites and forraigne plants. Simple he was and wise withaU ; His purse nor base nor prodigal! ; 30 Poorer in substance then in frcinds. Future and pubKcke were his endes. His conscience, like his dyett, such As neither tooke nor left too much : Soe that made lawes were uselesse gTowne To him, he needed but his owne. Did he his neighbours bid, like those That feast them only to enclose ? Or with their rest meate racke their rents And cozen them with their consents 'r 40 Noe ; the free meetings at his boord Did but one littcraU sence afforde, Noe Close or Aker understood, But only loue and neighbourhood. Besides his fame, his goods, his life, He left a greiv'd sonne. and a wife. millan & Co.). Botli teacliers aud students of English viU find this book pleasantly useful, ilr. Hales, who was «-ith Mi-. Purnivall joint editor of the MS. Folio from which Percy drew his " Eeliques," who has also edited most thoroughly Milton's " Areopagitica," and who has done and is doing much more good work for the difiFiision of a soivnd knowledge of English literature, edits in this volume of "Longer English Poems," Spenser's " Prothalamion." foiu- pieces from Hilton, two from Dr\-deu. Pope's " Rape of the Lock," Johnson's "Loudon" and " The T.anity of Human Wishes," CoUins's " Ode to the Passions," Gray's "Elegy in a Country Chiu'chyard" and two other pieces of his. Goldsmith's "Traveller" and "Deserted Vil- lage," Bums's "Cotter's Sattu-day Night" and " Twa Dogs," two IXiems by Cowper, Coleridee's "Ancient Mariner." nnd specimens from other modem poets. In all his work Mr. Hales joins taste with scholarship, aud this hook of his might be used with advantage in many schools. 1 Legier, agent, ambassador. Straunge son-ow, not to be beleiv'd, AMien the sonne and heii-e, is greiv'd. Keade then and mom-nc, what ere thou aii That doost hope to haue a part oO In honest epitaphs, least, being dead, Thv life bee «"iitten and not read. Richard Lovelace. (From his " Zucasta.") The pattern of a Virilliant cavalier poet of the time of Charles I. was Richard Lovehtce, eldest son of Sir WUliam Lovelace, of Woolwich. He was born in 1618, educated at Charterhouse School, and Gloucester Hall, Oxford. When only of two years' standing, and eighteen years old, the king ^■isiting Oxford is said to have made him M.A. for his beauty, at the request of a gi-eat lady. He went to court, went to the wars, came into possession of his estate, Lovelace Place, in the parish of Bethersden. at CanterVmry, and was in April, 10-12, committed to the Gatehouse Prison for carrying up the Kentish Petition to the House of Commons. In the prison he wrote his sons TO A L T H E A . PKOM PKISOX. When Love with unconfined wings Hovers within my gates, ■ And my divine Althca biings To whisper at the grates ; When I lie tangled in her hair, And fetter'd to her eye, The birds th.at wanton in the air Know no such liberty. 'V\*hen flownng cups run swiftly rouni With no allaying Thames, Our careless heads with roses bound, Our hearts with loyal flames ; Wlien thirsty grief in wine we steep, AATren healths and draughts go free, Fishes, that tipple in the deep, KAow no such libertv. 10 TO A.D. 1660.] SHOETER POEMS. 315 When, like committed linuets, I With shi'iller throat shall sing' The sweetness, mercy, maje-sty. And glories of my King ; ANTien I shall voice aloud Imw good He is, ho«- great should he. Enlarged winds that curl the flood Know no such liherty. Stone walls do not a prison make, Is or iron bars a cage ; Jlinds iimocent and quiet take That for an heimitage : If I have freedom in my- love, And in my soul am free. Angels alone that soar above Enjoy such liberty. 20 30 Lovelace, released on lieavy bail, .spent his fortune in the service of the king and aid of poorer friends. In 1648 he was imprisoned again, this time in Peter House, in Aldersgate Street, and there arranged for the press his poems, published in 16-19, as " Lucasta : Epodes, (_^des. Sonnets, Songs, ike." The Lucasta (^Lii.v casta, pure light) of his verse was Lucy Saclieverell, whom he loved, but who married another suitor, after hearing false reports that Lovehioe had been killed at Dunkirk. Under Cromwell Lovelace was set free, but lived in extreme poverty, and died in an alley in Shoe Lane. This is his : — TO LUCASTA. GOIXG TO THE W.IKS. Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind, That from the nunnery Of thy chaste breast and quiet nund To war and arms I fly True, a new mistress now I cliase. The first foe in the field ; And with a stronger faith embrace A sword, a horse, a shield. Tet this inconstancy is such As you too shall adore : I could not love thee, dear, so much, Loved I not honour more. 10 One of the heartiest attackers of the Puritans in Lis veree was John Cleveland, wlio joined the royal army in the Civil Wai-s, and was made judge-advocate to the troops in Newark. He escaped when the town surrendered, and was not taken till 1655, when Cromwell assented to his plea, tliat he had been what his conscience made him, an honest opponent, and released him. Cleveland died in 1659. This is one of his pieces : — THE PURITAX. With face and fashion to be known For one of sure election. With eyes all white and many a groan, With neck aside to di'aw in tone, With harp in 's nose, or he is none : See a new teacher of the town. the town. O the town's new teacher! With pate cut shorter- than the brow, With little ruff starch'd you know how, With cloak like Paul, no cape I trow ; 10 With surplice none, but lately now : With hands to thump, no knees to bow : See a new teacher of the town, O the town, the town's new teacher ! With coz'ning cough and hollow check. To get new gatherings every week. With paltry change of and to cl;c. With some small Hebrew, and no Greek, To find out words where stuff's to seek : See a new teacher of the town, 20 the town, the town's new teacher ! . '\^^'.- John C'levchnd. From the 1661 £tnt. 16G0.] SHORTER POEMS. 317 The [juLlic faith shall save our souls, And good out-works together. And ships shall save our lives, that stay Only for -n-inu and weather. But when our faith and works fall down. And all our hopes decay, Our acts will bear us up to heaven The clean contrary way. THE MAD LOVER. I have heen in love and in debt and in drink This many and many a year ; And those three arc plagues enough, one would think, For one poor mortal to bcai\ "Twas di'iuk made mo fall into love. And love made me run into debt : And though I have struggled and struggled and strove, I cannot get out of them yet. There's nothing but money can cure me And rid me of all my pain. 10 'Twill pay all my debts, And remove all my lets, And my mistress that cannot endure me Will love me, and love me again ; Then I'll fall to loving and di'inkin;;- amain. A SERIOUS BALLAD. I love my king and country well, Religion and the laws, Which I'm mad at the heart that e'er we did sell To buy the good old cause. These unnatm-al wars And brotherly jars Are no delight or joy to me ; But it is my desire That the wars should expire And the Tdng and his realnis agree. 1 I never yet did take up arms. And yet I dare to die ; But I'll not be seduc'd by fanatical charms Till I know a reason why. Why the king and the state Shoidd fall to debate I ne'er could yet a reason see. But I iind many one Why the wars should be done And the king and his realms agree. 20 I love the King and the Parliament, But I love them both together ; And when thc-y by division asunder are rent, I know 'tis good for neither ; Whichsoe'cr of those Be 1-ictorious, I'm sure for us no good 't^dll be : For our jJagues will increase Unless we have peace And the king and his realms agree. 30 The long without them can't long stand. Nor they without the king ; 'Tis they must ad\-ise, and 'tis he must command. For their pov.-er from his must spring. i 'Tis a comfortless sway ^\^lere none will obey ; Jf the king ha' n't 's right, which way shall we ? They may vote and make laws But no good they will cause Till the king and his realms agree. 40 A pure religion I would have. Not mixed with human wit ; And I cannot endm'c that each ignorant knave Should dare to meddle with it. The tricks of the law I would fain withdiuw. That it may be alike to each degree. And I fain would have such As do meddle so much With the king and the church agree. 50 We have prayed and paid that the wars might cease And we be free men made : I would fight, if my fighting woxdd bring any peace, But war has become a trade. Oiu- servants will ride With swords by their' side, And made their masters foot-men be ; But we'll be no more slaves To the beggars and knaves, Now the king an'l the reahns do agi-ee. 60 William Da veuant, born in ICiO.T, was the son of an Oxford innkeeper. He was educated in the Grammar School and University of his native town, and then attached to the court as page to the Duchess of Richmond. Afterwards he was m the household of Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, until his murder in 1628. He then wrote for the stage, and accjuii-ed reputation among dramatists of the time of Charles I., ^\Tote court mascpies as well as plays, and became Master of the Revels. In the Civil War he served the king zealously, and was knighted for his ser\dce at the siege of Gloucester in 1043. These are two of his songs : — THE SOLDIER GOING TO THE FIELD. Preserve thy sighs, unthrifty gill. To purify the air : Thy tears, to thread instead of pearl On bracelets of thy hail-. The trumpet makes the echo hoarse And wakes the louder drum ; Expense of grief makes no remorse A\Tien sorrow should be dumb. For I must go where lazy I'eace Will hide her drowsy head, And, for the sport of Icings, increase The number of the dead. But first I'U chide thy cruel theft: Can I in war dcUght "Who, being of my heart bereft, Can have no heart to figlit ? 10 318 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1625 Tliou know'st the sacred laws of old ( )rdain'd a thief should pay, To quit liim of his theft, sevenfold Wliat he had stol'n away. 20 Thy pajinent .sliall Ijut douhlc be ; O then with speed resign My own seduced heart to me, Acuompanicd with thine. THE DYING LOVER. Dear love, let me this evening die, .smile not to prevent it ! Dead with my rivals let me lie, Or we shall hoth repent it. Frown quickly then, and break my heart, That so my way of dying May, though my life was full of smart. Be worth the world's envying. Some, stri\-ing knowledge to refine. Consume themselves with thinking ; 10 And some, who friendship seal in wine. Are kindly killed %\'ith drinking. And some are ^vracked on th' Indian coast, Thither by gain invited ; Some are in smoke of battles lost. Whom drums, not lutes delighted. Alas, how poorly tlicsc depart. Their graves still unattended I Who dies not of a broken heart Is not of death conmiended. 20 His memory is only sweet. All praise and pity moving, \^^lo kintUy at his mistress' feet Does die with over-loving. And now thou frown'st. and now I die. My corpse by lovers followed. Which straight shall by dead lovers lie, — That ground is only hallowed. If priests are grieved I have a grave, My death not well npproving, 30 The poets my estate shall have To teach them th' art of loving. And now let lovers ring their bells For me poor youth departed, Who kindly in his love excels By dying brokenhearted. My grave witli flowers let virgins strew, WTiich, if thy tears fall near them. May so transcend in scent and show As thou ^^•ilt shortly wear them. 40 Such flowers how much will florists prize AAHiich, on a lover gro^"ing, Ale watered with his nustress' eyes With pity ever flowing. A grave so decked will, though thou art Yet fearful to come nigh me, Provoke thee straight to break thy he.art And lie down boldly by me. • Then ever\-where all bcUs shall ring. All light to darkness turning ; 50 A\"liilst every quire .shall sadly sing. And Natui-e's self wear mourning. Yet we hereafter may bo found, By Destiny's right placing, Making, like flowers, love underground, A\1iose roots are still embracing. Henry More, who published m 1042 a " Platonical Song of the Soul " in four books, was nine years younger than Davenant, and six years younger than Milton ; moreover lie was a Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge, Milton's College. He was tutor for a time in noble families, held a prebend in Glouce.ster until he ga\e it up to a friend ; then having means enough to enable him to live simply a meditative life, he did so, and delighted in Platonic asjiirations, as interpreted by the Neojjlatonists. His verse is all ]ihilosophical, and he was troubled to find lan- guage for his thoughts, as we may read in this sliort poem of his "To Paro." Paro is Latin for a small light ship, and certainly Hem-y More's freight was a heavy one. AD PARONEM. Eight Avell I wot, my rhymes seem rudely di-cssed In the jiice judgment of thy shallow mind That mark'st expressions more than what's expressed, Busily billing 1 the rough outward rind. But reaching not the pith. Such surface skill 's unmeet to measure the profounder quill. Yea I, alas 1 myself too often feel Thy indisposedness ; when my weakened soul, I'nsteadfast, into this out-world doth reel. And lies immersed in my low vital mould. 10 For then my mind, from th' inward spright- estranged, Sly muse into an uncouth hue hath changed- A rude confused heap of ashes dead My verses seem, when that fcelestial flame That sacred spirit of life 's extinguished In my cold breast. Then 'gin I rashly blame My rugged hnes : this word is obsolete. That boldly coined ; a third too oft doth beat Sline hiunorous cars. Thus fondly curious Is the faint reader, that doth want that fire 20 And inward ^Hgour, tea venly furious, That made my enrag'd spirit in strong desire Break through such tender cobweb niceties That oft entangle these blind buzzing flies. Possessed with li\-ing sense I inly rave. Careless how outward words do from mr flow. So be the image of my mind they ha\i' Truly expressed, and do my visage show As doth each river decked Avith PlKvbus' beams Faudy reflect the viewer of his streams. 30 '^Mio can discern the moon's asperity From off this earth, or could this earth's discover If from the earth he raised were on high Among the stars and in the sky did hover ? 1 BiUhift, hackiug with a bill. ^ Spy>old, spirit, as in "spxigrlitly.' TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. 319 The hills and valleys would together flow, And the rough earth one smooth-faced roimd would show. Nor ean the lofty soul, snatched into heaven, Busied above in th' intellectual world. At such a distance see my lines uneven ; At such a distance was my spirit hurled, 40 And to my trembling quill thence did indite What he from thence must read who would read right. Fair fields and rich enclosures, sliady woods, Large populous towns, with strong and stately towers. Long cr.'iwling rivers, far distended floods, "\\niatevcr 's great, its shape these eyes of ours And due proportions from high distance see The Lest ; and Pare ! such my rhyme 's to thee. Thy grovelling mind and moping purblind eye. That to move up unmeet, this to sec far. The worth or weakness never can descry Of my large winged muse. But not to spare Till thou canst well disprove, proves well enough Thou'rt rash and rude howe'er my rhjTnes are rough. ao Henry More lived iii a seventh heaven high ibove care for the Civil War. Not so young Andrew Marvell, who in the Civil War time acted as tutor to Fairfax's only daugliter. Andrew Marvell, boi'u in 1620, was not tliii'ty in the year of the execution of Charles I. He was tlie .son of a clerg)Tnan and Master of the Grammar School at Kingston-on- Hull, was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, and acquired skill in several foreign tongues by travel on the Continent before he was received at Billirough, in Yorkshu'e, as teacher of languages to the daughter of the house. There was a tine strain of thought in Marvell's earlier verse, as these pieces witness : — BERMUDAS.' \\Tiere the remote Bermudas ride In the ocean's bosom unespied, From a small boat, that rowed along The li.stening winds received this song. '• '\^niat should we do liut sing his praise That led us throiigh the watery maze Unto an isle so long imknown. And yet far kinder than our own ? A^Tiere he the huge sea-monsters «-racks That lift the deep upon theu- backs, 1 He lands us on a grassy stage Safe from the storms and prelate's rage. ' lu Hakliiyt'a " Voyages " there is a descriijtiou of Bermuda by Henry May, who was shipwrecked there in 1593. The Bennudas then first became known. In 1609 the admiral-ship of a fleet to Virginia was separated and wr*ecked on the island of Bermuda. The disaster called forth two tracts in 1610. and from that time attention was more strongly drawn to the group of about 300 islands in the North Atlantic, among which Bermuda — sixteen miles long, but nowhere more than a mile and a half broad — t.akes chief rank. Representative government was introduced into the Bermudas in 1620. and in 1621 the Bermuda Company of London issued a sort of chai'ter to the colony, including rights and hbei'ties, among them liberty of worsliip, that attracted many of those English emigi-ants whose feeling Marvell has here fashioned into Bong. Their rights were annulled by the English Government in 1685. He gave us this ctei-nal spring Which here enamels every thing. And sends the fowls to us in care On daily \-isits tlu-ough the air. He hangs in shades the orange bright, Like golden lamps in a green night, And does in the pomegranates close Jewels more rich than Ormus shows. 20 He makes the figs om- mouths to meet, And throws the melons at our feet, But apples pl.ants of such a price No tree could ever bear them twice. With cedars chosen by his hand From Lebanon, he stores the land, And makes the hollow seas that roar Proclaim the ambergrease on shore. He cast, of which we rather boast, The Gospel's jiearl upon our coast, 30 And in these rocks for us did frame A temple where to sound his name. Oh 1 let om- voice his praise exalt 'Til it airive at heaven's vault. Wliich, then, perhaps, rebounding, may Echo beyond the Mexique Bay." Thus sung they, in the English boat, A holy and a cheerful note. And all the way. to guide their chime. With falling oars they kept the time. 40 TO A FAIR SINGER. To make a final conquest of all me Love did compose so sweet an enemy In whom both beauties to my death agree, Joining themselves in fatal harmony. That, while she with her eyes my heart does bind She with her voice might captivate my mind. I could have fled from one but singly fan-. My disentangled soul itself might save, Breaking the curled trammels of her hair. But how should I avoid to be her slave 10 WTiose subtle art invisibly can wreathe My fetters of the very air I breathe I- It had been easy fighting in some plain Where victory might hang in equal choice. But all resistance against her is vain Who has the advantage both of eyes and voice : And all mv forces needs must be undone. A DIALOGUE BETWEEN THE RESOLVED SOUL AND CREATED PLEASURE. Courage, my soul ! now learn to -nielil The weight of tliine immortal shield ; Close on thy head thy helmet bright ; Balance thy sword against the fight ; See where an aimy, strong as fair. With sUken banners spread the au- ! Now, if thou be'st that thing di\nne. In this day's combat let it sliiue. And show that nature wants au art To conqnc-r one resolved heart. '1 320 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITEEATUEE. [A.D. 1625 F/tiisiii-c. Welcome, the creation's guest, Lord of earth, and heaven's heir ! Lay aside tliat warlike crest. And of nature's hanquet share, "Where the soids of fruits and flowers Stand prepared to heighten yours. Hon/. I sup above, and cannot stay To bait so long upon the way. T/i-asftir. On these downy pillows lie, "WTiose soft plumes will tliithcr fly ; 20 On these roses, strewed so plain Lest o«ie leaf thy side should strain. Soil/. My gentle rest is on a thought. Conscious of doing what I ought. Th'aaiire. If thou be'st witli perfumes pleased Such as oft the gods appeased. Thou in fragrant clouds shalt show Like another god below. SoitL A soul that knows not to presume Is Heaven's and its own perfume. 30 I^h-tisitrc. Every thing does seem to vie ■\\"Iiic!i should first attract thine eye ; But since none deserves thiit grace. In this crystal view thy face. Soul. ■WTicn the Creator's slcill is prized. The rest is all but earth disguised. r/fasiirc. Hark how music tlien prepares For thy stay these charming airs, WTiich the posting winds recall. And suspend the river's fall. 40 Suiil. Had I but any time to lose. On this I would it all dispose. Cease tempter ! None can chain a mind Whom this sweet cordage cannot bind. C/ionifi. Earth cannot show so brave a sight. As wlien a single soul docs fence The battery of alluring Sense, And Heaven views it with delight. Then persevere I for still new charges sound : And if thou ovcrcom'st thou shalt be cro-mied! 50 T/fiifiiirf. All that's costly fair and sweet \^^l^^ll scatteringly doth shine, Shall within one Beauty meet, And she be oniv thine. Soul. If tilings of sight such heavens be. What heavens arc those we cannot see 1 I^lcdsiiri;. AMiercsoe'er thy foot .shall go The minted Gold shall lie, Till tliou purchase all below, And want now worlds to buy. GO Soul. AVer 't not for price who 'd value gold ? And that's worth naught that caa be sold. Tleiisiirc. Wilt thou all the Glory have That war or peace commend ? Half the world shall be thy slave, The other half thy friend. Soul. AMiat friends, if to myself untrue ? AMiat slaves, unless I captive you r P'et'siire. Thou shalt Know each hidden cause And see the future time, 70 Try what depth the centre draws. And then to heaven climb. Soul. None thither mounts by the degree Of knowledge, but humility. Chorus. Triumph, trimnph, "\-ictorious soul ! The world has not one pleasure more : The rest docs lie beyond the pole. And is thine everlasting store. Under the Commonwealth Marvell became the assistant to Milton as Foreign Secretary, recom- mended bj' his knowledge of French, Italian, Dutch, and Spanish, as well as Latin and Greek, and by his ]iure and earnest patriotism. Under Charles 11. he shone out as a satirist, putting his ^^^t only to the highest usee. HLs opinions never suffered change. John Dryden, born in 16.31, was eleven years younger than Marvell, and he went from Westminster "Scliool to the same college at Cambridge in which Marvell had been educated. Dryden was born into a good Northamptonshire family, both on his father's and his mother's side ojiposed to that theory of royal authority which was involved in the stand made by Charles I. against the Parliament. Bred in such a family, although his was a mind naturally inclined to rest on authority, lie held at first the family ojunion. Since he was not eighteen years old at the date of the king's execution, he was studying at Cambridge under the Commonwealth, anil after he had left the university he went to London to begin life in the house of his cousin, Sii- Gilbert Pickering, a close TO A.D. 1660.] SHORTER POEMS. ;521 pei-sonal friend of Cromwell's. While Cromwell lived the state stood Urm, and nothing occurred to detach Dryden from the opinions in which he hax:l heen bred. He had reached his twenty-eighth year when, after the funeral of " the Protector, who died on the 3rd of September, 16.58 — adopting a measure used by Sir William Davenant in a heroic poem called " Gondibert," that had been published in the year 1651 — he wrote, as a tribute to his memory, these — HEROIC STANZAS OX THE DEATH OF OLIVER CROMWELL. And now 'tis time ; for their officious haste. Who would hefore have borne Mm to the sky, Like eager Romans, ere all rites were past. Did let too soon the sacred eagle flv. His gi-andeur ho derived fi-om heaven alone ; For he was gi'eat ere fortune iniide liim so ; And wars, like mists that rise against the sun. Made him but greater seem, not greater grow. No borrowed bays his temples did adorn, But to our crown he did fresh jewels bring ; Nor was his virtue poisoned soon as born With the too early thoughts of being king. Fortune (that easy mistress to the yoimg, But to her ancient servants coy and hard) Him at th;»t age her favourites ranked among AVhen she her best-loved Pompey did discaid. He, private, marked the faults of others' sway, And set as sea-marks for himself to shim ; Not like rash monarchs who their youth betray By acts their age too late would wish undone. 30 Cbomwell Lying is State at Somerset House. (F.o.u a Coiilciiiiiorary Prinl.) Though oiu' best notes are treason to his fame, Joined with the loud applause of public voice ; Since Heaven what praise we offer to his name Hath rendered too authentic by its choice . Though in his praise no arts can liberal be. Since they whose Muses have the highest flown 10 Adil not to his immortal memory. But do an act of friendship to theii' own ; Yet 'tis our duty, and our interest too. Such monuments as we can build to raise. Lest all the world prevent what we should do, And claim a title in him by their praise. How shall I then begin, or where conclude. To draw a fame so truly circukir r For in a round whfit order can be shewed. Where all the parts so equal perfect are i 20 41 And yet dominion was not his design ; | We owe that blessing not to him but heaven. Which to fair acts unsought rewards did join, Ke wards, tliat less to hini than us were given. 40 (Jiir former chiefs, like sticklers of the war. First sought to inflame the parties then to poise ; The quarrel loved, but did the cause abhor ; And did not strike to hurt, but make a noise. War, our consumption, was their gainful trade, We inward bled, whilst they prolonged our jain : He fought to end our fighting, and essayed To stanch the blood by breathing of the vein. Swift and resistless through the land he past. Like that bold Greek who did the East subdue ; ■iO And made to battles such heroic haste As if on wings of ^^ctorv he flew. 322 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 He fought, secure of fortune as of fame, Till by new maps the island might be shewn Of conquests whijh he strewed where'er he came. Thick as the galaxy witli stars is sown. His palms, though under weights tlicy did not stand, Still thrived ; no winter could his laurels fade : Heavin in his portrait shewed a workman's hand, And drew it perfect yet without a shade. GO Peace was the prize of all his toil and care, AVhich war had banished and did now restore : Bologna's walls thus mounted in the air. To seat themselves more surely than before.' Her safety rescued Ireland to him owes ; And treacherous Scotland, to no interest true, Yet blest that fate which did his arms dispose Her land to civilise as to subdue. Nor was he Uke those stars which only shine When to pale mariners they stonns poitend : 70 He had his calmer iniluenee, and his mien Did love and majesty together blend. 'Tis true, his countenance did imprint an awe, And naturally all souls to his did bow ; As wands of di\'ination downward draw And point to beds where sovereign gold doth grow. 'NMien past all offei'ings to Feretiian ,Tove, He liars deposed, and ai-ms U gowns made jneld, Successful councils did him sooii approve As fit for close intrigues as open field. 80 To suppliant Holland he vouchsafed a peace, Our once bold rival of the British main Now tamely glad her unjust claim to cease And buy our friendship with her idol, gain. Fame of the asserted sea, through Europe blown, JIade France and Spain ambitious of his love : Each knew that side must conquer he would own. And for him fiercely, as for empire, strove. No sooner was the Frenchman's cause embraced, Than the light Jlonsieur the grave Don outweighed : His fortune tm-ned the scale where'er 'twas cast, 91 Though Indian mines were in the other laid. When absent, yet we conquered in his right : For though some meaner artist's skill were .shown In mingling colours or in placing light. Yet still the fair designment was his own. For from all tempers he could seri'ice draw. The worth of each with its alloy he kne'^'. And, as the confidant of Nature, saw How she complexions did di\4de and brew. 100 ■Or he their single virtues did survey By intuition in his own large breast, Where all the rich ideas of them lay That were the rule and measure to the rest. 1 This, iu the bad style of later Euphuism, draws an image from a fabled incident of the siege of Bologna in 1512, when a mine blew up part of the wall including the Cluu-ch of Santa Maria del Baracano, which went up into the air and came down unliurt, fixing itself fii-mly to its old foundations. ^\Tien such heroic virtue heaven sets out, The stars, like Commons, sullenly obey, Because it drains them when it comes about, And therefore is a tax they seldom pay. From this high spring our foreign conquests flow, "WTiich yet more glorious triumplis do portend; 110 Since their commencement to his anns they owe, If springs as high us fountains may ascend. He made us free men of the Continent, \\liom natm-e did like captives treat before ; To noliler preys the English lion sent. And taught him first in Belgian walks to roar. That old imquestioned pirate of the land. Proud Rome, with dread the fate of Dunkirk heard ; And, trembling, wished Ijehind more Alps to stand, Although an Alexander- were her guard. 1^20 By his command we boldly crossed the line. And bravely fought where southern stars arise ; We traced the far-fetched gold unto the mine. And that which bribed our fathers made our prize. Such was om- prince ; yet owned a soul above The highest acts it could produce to show : Thus poor mechanic arts in public move WTiilst the deep secrets beyond practice go. Nor died he when his ebbing fame went less. But when fresh laurels courted him to live : He seemed but to prevent some new success. As if above what triumphs earth could give. His latest \-ictories still thickest came. As near the centre motion doth increase ; Till he, pressed down by his own weighty name. Did, like the vestal, imder spoils decease. But first the ocean as a tribute sent The giant prince of all hi'r water}- herd ; And the isle, when her protecting genius went. Upon his obsequies loud sighs conferred.' No civil broils have since his death arose. But faction now by habit does obey ; And wars have that respect for his repose, As winds for halcyons whi'n they breed at sea. His ashes in a peaceful urn shall rest : His name a great example stands, to show How strangely high cndcavoiu's may be blessed, WTiere pietj' and valour jointl)' go. 130 140 CHAPTER XIV. From the Restoration to the Revolution: -John Dryden and Others. — a.d. 16G0 to a.d. 1689. Abraham Cowley, neglected Ly Charles II., retired soon after the Restoration first to Barn-Elms, after- wards to Chertsey, where he died, aged forty-nine. = Pope Alexander VII. * The references are to tlie stranding of a whale and to a storm at the time of Ci'omwell's death. TO A.D. 1G89.] SHORTER POEMS. 323 at the Porch House iii July, 1GG7. His genius was at its best in these years of cahn retirement by the Thames. His rijjer mind had put off some of its aflection for conceits of hiter Euphuism in which he liad shone, and his prose Essays written at this time with interspersed verse, partly translations of passages from Latin poets apt to his mood, are 3«s- Cowley in Later Life. Fj'om a Portrait prefixed to his Works in 1681. full of his best thought in his best English. These lines are a version of an ejjigram from Martial, the 47th of the 10th book :— A HAPPY LIFE. Since, dearest friend, 'tis your desire to see A true receipt of happiness from mo. These are the chief ingredients, if not aU : Take an estate neither too great nor small, \^^lich qnantiim siifficit the doctors call : Let this estate from parents' care descend, The getting it too much of 'ife does spend. Take such a ground, whose gi-atitude may he A fair encouragement for industry ; Let constant fires the winter's fury tame, 10 And let thy kitchens lie a vestal flame ; Thee to the town let never suit at law, And rarely, very rarely, business draw; Thy active mind in equal temper keep. In undisturbed peace, yet not in sleep ; Let exercise a vigorous health maintain, Without wliich all the composition's vain. In the same weight prudence and innocence take, Ana of each docs the just mixtiue make. But a few friendships wear, and let them bo 20 By nature and by fortune tit for thee ; Instead of art and luxury in food, Let mirth and freedom make thy table good. If any cares into thy day-time creep, At night, without wine's opium, let them sleep ; Let rest, which Nature does to d.iikness wed. And not lust, reconnnend to thee thy bed. Be satisfied, and pleased ^^^th what thou art, Act cheerfully and well th' allotted part. Enjoy the present hour, be thankful for the past, 30 And neither fear, nor wish tli' approaches of the last. In the latter days of Charles I. and during the Commonwealth there was a development of French literature with which exiled English royalists in Paris were brought into contact. They were edilied by the refinements of the fine ladies whose work was accounted precious, who were politely called the Precieuses, and who had taken language under their especial patronage. They made acquaintance with the first lal>ours of the French Academy in word sifting ; with the first and best plays of Corneillc, written before the time of our Commonwealth, and his critical essays written during the Commonwealth ; with the genius of Moliere and the lise of the re- action against faded conceits and tasteless extra- vagance in writing. The decayed influence of Italy was passing away, and there was a growing energy of French thought that had been busy in legisla- tion upon language, and was about to launch into criticism upon forms of writing also. The death- blow to the perishing Italian influence was given b}^ Boileau, wliose career began with his satires in the year of the Restoration. He puljlished his "Art Poetique" in 1(374, and thenceforth became the king of the French critical world. That supremacy of criticism made writers in France and in all adjacent countries emulous of the glory of writing well about writing. If they do anything, said Reg- nard, it is prosing about rhyme and ihyming about jjrose.' The service done by Boileau's vigorous and healthy genius was substantial. The Precieuses and the Gnxmmarians and the Academicians had been dealing with language. They found an unsettled vocabulaiy between the two dialects of North and South, and had resolved to establish a good standard of French that, since French is a Romance tongue, was to be made as homogeneous as possible by a general preference of words ^^-ith Latin roots. Added to this, and gi-eatly encouraged by the ladies who concerned themselves with the new questions of criticism, was a notion that the language of litera- ture should lie protected from mean associations, and acquire dignity by avoidance of the homely ■ •ords and idioms of daily life. Literatiu'e was lieli' o be for the select and cultivated few, not for the many. It must on no account be " low." Without stoop- ing to all the absurdities of this new school, but rather satirising such of them as might claim nearer kindi-ed with the outgoing than with the incoming influence, Boileau taught waiters to avoid the paste brilliants of Italy, to aim at Good Sense. That they might express their good thoughts like good artists in clear manly phrase, he bade them take for models the Latin writers of the Augustan age. All this was excellent corrective doctrine, but the teaching of small critics, who soon swarmed in all our quarters, Ijred a servile imitation of the Latin authoi-s. So we were led to a perverse avoidance of the native elements of our Teutonic English, and that we might follow our neighbours to the letter, v/e took, so far as the I " S'ils font quelque chose C'est proser de la rime et rimer de la prose." 324 C'ASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 .spirit of the counsel was concerned, a course precisely opposite to theii'S. Our fine gentlemen, already in Charles II.'s time, became as skilful in critical slang on the points of a poem as some now are in stable slang on the points of a horse. They wrote assiduously about writing ; Lord Roscommon wrote on Writina; Verse Translations, besides translating Horace's " Ai-t of Poetry ; " the Earl of Mulgi-ave, John Sheffield, afterwards Duke of Buckingham, wrote on Writing Satire, and on Writing Poetry ; Lord Lansdowne wrote on Umiatural Flights in Poetry ; Sir William Soame translated Boileau's " Art of Poeti-y," and so forth. As the critical swarm began to thicken, the fields of literature that were darkened by them lost their verdure. Where there had been depths of earnestness there were too often only shallows of conceit ; the pedants constituted them- selves I'epresentatives of what they called the Under- standing Age. Ignorant of most things, including all our literature before the Commonwealth, they glorified themselves and their immediate s\u-round- ings. Tliey saw only what they could touch, and touched nothing they could understand. This is, of co\irse, said only of the thousands of small critics who followed, as Dryden said — " The mode of France ; without whose rules None must presume to set up here for fools." The strength of the French influence was in such writers as Moli^-e, Corneille, Lafontaine, Racine, and in the critical supremacy of one so honest and so able as Boileau, who lived on until 1711, the year Bl-ILLAU DLblB^ACX. From the Portrait before Saint-Marc's Edition of his Worl;s. in which, in England, young Pope followed his lead with a poetical " Essay on Criticism." the most healthy of all the ofispring of the French "Art Poetique." Tlie best of the jiieces of this kind written in Charles II.'s reign was the " Essav on Translated Verse," by Wentworth Dillon, grandson to the Earl of Strafford. He was born in 1633, and by the death of his father Ijecame Earl of Roscommon at the age of ten. Until the R&storation he was much abi'oad in Italy and France. After 1660 he was a gay English courtier with love of literature, strong faith in French critics, and a desire to establish in England (for the supposed good of literature) an Academy like that of Fi'ance. He died in 1684, and this excellent jjoem of his must serve as sufficient example of the versifying about versifying that begins now to abound ; — AN ESSAY ON TRANSLATED VERSE. Happy that author, whose correct Essay ' Repairs so well our old Horatian way ; And happy you, who (by propitious fate) On great Apollo's sacred standard wait, And with strict discipline instructed right. Have learn' d to use your arms before you fight. But since the press, the pulpit, and the stage Conspire to censure and expose our age : Provoked too far, we resolutely must, To the few virtues that we have, be just. 10 For who have long'd, or who have labour' d more To search the treasures of the Eoman store. Or dig in Grecian mines for purer ore Y The noblest fruits transplanted in our isle AVith early hope and fragrant blossoms smile. Familiar (Jvid - tender thoughts in.spires. And Xatui'e seconds all his soft desires ; Theocritus ^ does now to us belong, And Albion's rocks repeat his rui-al song. Who has not heard how Italy was blest, 20 Above the Modes, above the wealthy East f Or Gallus' song, so tender, and so true. As ev'n Lycoris might with pity view ? \\Tien mourning nymphs attend their Daphnis' herse, AXTio does not weep, that reads the moving verse ? But hear, oh hear, in what exalted strains \ Sicilian Muses ■* through these happy plains, S Proclaim Saturnian times ; our own ApoUo reigns. ' Wlien Franco had breath' d, after intestine broils. And peace and conquest crown'd her foreign toils, 30 There, cultivated by a royal hand,* Learning grew fast, and spread, and blest the land ; The choicest books that liome or Greece have known Her excellent translators made her own. And Europe still considerably gains. Both by their good example and theii- pains. ' Lord Mnlgrave in his poem called an " Essay on Poetry." " Ovid's " Metamori'lioses " had been translated by Arthur Goldiu^ (15:i7), and by Georsre Sandys (1626); his "Epistles" by George Turbervile (1567), Sir Edward Sherburne (16.391, and others ; the "Ele^ries" by Christopher Marlowe (159S) and others; the "Ai-t of Love " by many bauds. 3 The translation of Theocritus by Thomas Creech was published iu 1681, about which time Roscommon's Essay is supposed to have been wi-itteu. * Pastoral poetry was called, from its origin, Sicilian. '"• In the reiarn of Francis I. famous translations appeared that were one sig:u of the revival of letters. Jaqvies Amyot received an abbey from Francis for his translation of Thea^enes and Chariclea — the " sugared invention " that deliijlitpd Sir Philip Sidney — from the .SItbiopica of the Greek Bishop Heliodonis, and Amyot's tl-anslation of Plutarch was one of the most famous works of its time. TO A.D. 1689.] SHORTER POEMS. 325 From hence our gcn'roiis emulation came, We undertook and we perform' d the same : But now we shew the world a nobler way, And in translated verse do more than they, Serene, and clear, harmonious Horace flows,' With sweetness not to be expressed in prose ; DegTadinc- prose explains his meaning ill, Anil shows the stuff, but not the workman's skill ; I who have served him more than twenty years Scarce know my master as he there appears. Viiin are om- ncig-hbours' hopes, and vain their cares The fault is more their language's, than theirs; 'Tis courtly, florid, and abounds in words Of softer sound than ours perhaps afli'ords, But who did ever in French authors see The comiirehcnsive Enghsh energy 'i The weighty buUion of one sterling line. Drawn to French wire, woidd through whole pages shine. I speak my private, but impartial sense. With freedom, and 1 hope without offence. For I'll recant, when France can show me wit As strong as ours, and as succinctly writ. 'Tis true, composing is the nobler part. But good translation is no easy art. For though materials have long since been found. Yet both your fancy and your hands are bound ; And by improving what was writ before, Invention labours less, but judgment more. The soil intended for Pierian seeds JIust be well purged from rank pedantic weeds. Apollo starts, and all Parnassus shakes. At the rude rumbling Baralipton- makes. For none have been with admiration read. But who beside their learning were well-bred. 10 50 GO 70 The first great work, a task perform'd "by few. Is that yourself may to youi'self be true : No mask, no tricks, no favour, no reserve : Dissect your mind, examine every nerve. '\^^loever vainly on his strength depends. Begins like Virgil, but like Jlsevius'' ends. That wTetch (in spite of his forgotten ihymes) Condemned to live to all succeeding times, With pompous nonsense and a bellomng sound Sung lofty Ilium tumbling to the ground.'' And ^if my muse can through past ages see) That noisy, nauseous, gaping fool was he ; Exploded, when with universal scorn, The mountains laboured and a mouse was bom. 80 1 Horace's "Art of Poetry " had been translated by Ben Jouson 1640); his "Odes" by Barteu Holiday (1652), and others. Eos- conimou himself translated the" Art of Poetry" when all the rhymers of the day were set upon Horace, ~ Baralipton^ the name of an imperfect syllogism, chosen as an example of pompoiis sound, and suggested by the old Latin verse on fonns of syllogism, " Barbara, celarc^nt, darii. ferio, baralipton." 3 The reference is to the Unes in Virgil's tliird eclogue — " Qni Bavium non edit amet tua carmim. Mjevi ; Atque idem jiuigat vulpes, et miilgeat hircos." Let him who can stand Bavins delight in your verse, Msevins ; and let him be the man to yoke foxes and milk the he-goats. * The reference is to lines 126—30 of Horace's " Art of Poetry," in which Roscommon .assumes Mseviixs to be the bad poet refeiTed to. Roscommon's own version of the lines is — *' Begin not as th' old Poetaster did. •Troy's famous w.ar and Priam's fife I sing ! ' In what will all this ostentation end ? The lab'ring mountain scarce brings forth a mouse." Learn, loam, Crotona's brawny -nTestlor* cries, Audacious mortals, and be timely wise ! 'Tis I that call, remember Jlilo's end, Wedg'd in that timber which he strove to rend. Each poet with a different talent writes, One praises, one instructs, another bites. 90 Horace did ne'er aspire to epic bays, Nor lofty ilaro stoop to lyric lays. Examine how your humour is inclin'd. And which the ruling jiassion of your mind ; Then seek a poet who your way does bend. And choose an author as you choose a friend. United by this sympathetic bond, You grow familiar, intimate, and fond ; Youi' thoughts, j-our words, your styles, your souls agi-ee. No longer his interpreter, but he. 100 With how much ease is a young Muse betray'd, How nice the reputation of the maid ! Y'^our early, kind, paternal care appears By chaste instruction of her tender years ; The first impression in her infant breast Will be the deepest, and should be the best ; Let not austerity breed servile fear. No wanton sound offend her virgin car ; .Secure from foolish pride's affected state. And specious flattery's more pernicious bait, 110 Habitual innocence adorns her thoughts. But your neglect must answer for her faults. Immodest words admit of no defence, For want of decency is want of sense. What mod' rate fop would rake the park or stews. Who among troops of faultless nymphs may choose ? Variety of such is to be found ; Take then a subject proper to expound. But moral, great, and worth a poet's voice ; For men of sense despise a tri\aal choice, 120 And such applause it must expect to meet, As would some painter busy in a street. To copy bulls and bears, and every sig'n Tlmt calls the staring sots to nasty wine. Yet 'tis not all to have a subject good, It must delight us when 'tis understood. He that brings fulsome objects to my view, (As many old have done, and many new) With nauseous images my fancy fills, And .all goes down Uke oxj-mel of squills. 130 Instruct the list'ning world how Maro sings Of useful subjects and of lofty things. These will such true, such bright ideas raise, As merit gratitude as well as praise : But foul descriptions are offensive still. Either for being Uke or being ill. For who, without a qualm, hath ever looked On holy garbage, though by Homer cooked ? AVhose railing heroes, and whose wounded gods. Make some suspect he snores as well as nods. 140 But I ofltend Virgil begins to frown, And Horace looks with indignation down ; 5 Milo of Crotona was a strong man who is said to have carried an ox a furlong without resting, then killed it at a blow and eaten it at a meal. He tried to split an oak in the forest, had his .arms caught in the cleft, and was so held tUl the wild beasts came and ate him up. 326 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 My blushing Muse with conscious fear retires, And whom they like, implicitly admires. On sure foundations let your fabric rise, And with attractive majesty siu-prise. Not by affected, meretricious arts. But strict harmonious symmetry of parts, "Which through the whole insensibly must pass, With rital heat to animate the mass, 150 A pure, an active, an auspicious flame. And bright as heaven, from whence the blessing came ; But few, oh few souls, preordain'd by fate. The race of gods, have reach'd that envied height. No rebel Titan's sacrilegious einme By heaping hills on hills can thither climb. The gTizzly ferry-man of hell denied J5neas entrance, 'til he knew his guide ; How j ustly then wiU impious mortals fall, Whose pride would soar to heaven without a call ? 160 Pride, of all others the most dangerous fault, Proceeds from want of sense or want of thought ; The men who labour and digest things most AVill be much apter to despond than boast. For if your author be profoundly good, 'TwiU cost you dear before he's understood. How many ages since has A'ii'gil writ ? How few are they who understand him yet ? Approach his altars with reUgious fear. No vulgar Deity inhabits there : 170 Heaven shakes not more at Jove's imperial nod. Than poets should before their Slantuan god. HaU mighty Maro ! may that sacred name Kindle my breast with thy celestial flame. Sublime ideas, and apt words infuse. The Muse instruct my voice, and thou inspire the Muse. "WTiat I have instanced only in the best. Is, in proportion, true of all the rest. Take pains the genuine meaning to explore : There sweat, there strain, there tug the laborious oar : ISO Search every comment that your care can find. .Some here, some there, may hit the poet's mind. Yet be not bUndly guided by the tlu-ong ; The multitude is always in the wrong. WTien things appear unnatural or hard, Consult your author, with himself compar'd ; Who knows what blessing Phu>bus may bestow, And future ages to youi- labour owe ? Such secrets are not easily found out. But once discovered leave no room for doubt, 190 Truth stamps con^-iction in your ravish'd breast. And peace and joy attend the glorious guest. Truth still is one. Truth is divinely bright. No cloudy doubts obscure her native light : While in your thoughts you find the least debate. You may confound, but never can translate ; Yoirr style will this through all disguises show, For none explain more clearly than they know. He only proves he understands a te.xt, AATiose exposition leaves it unpcrplex'd. 200 They who too faithfully on names insist, Eather create than dissipate the mist. And grow unjust by being over-nice. For superstitious ^•irtue turns to vice. Let Crassus' ghost and Labienus tell How twice in Parthian plains their legions fell. Since Rome hath been so jealous of her fame, That few know Pacorus' or Mona'ses' ' name. Words in one language elegantly used. Will hardly in another be excused, 210 And some that Rome admired in Ca'sar's time. May neither suit oui- genius nor om' clime ; The genuine sense, intelligibly told. Shows a translator both discreet and bold. Excursions are inexpiably bad ; And 'tis much safer to leave out than add. Abstruse and mystic thoughts you must express ^ With painful care, but seeming easiness ; . For Truth shines brightest through the plainest di'ess. J Th' ^-Enean Muse, when she appears in state, 220 Makes all Jove's thunder on her verses wait. Yet writes sometimes as soft and moving things As Viinus epeaks or Philomela sings. Your author always will the best advise : Fall when he falls, and when he rises rise. Affected noise is the most wTctched thing That to contempt can empty scribblers biing. Vowels and accents, regularly plac'd. On even syllables, and still the last. Though gross innumerable faults abound, 230 In sjnte of nonsense, never fail of sound. But this is meant of even verse alone, As being most harmonious and most known ; For if you will imequal numbers try, There accents on odd syllables must lie. Whatever sister of the learned Nine Does to your- suit a willing ear incline. Urge j-oiu' success, deserve a lasting name. She'll crown a grateful and a constant flame ; But if a wild uncertainty prevail, 240 And turn yom- veering heart with every gale. You lose the fruit of all your former care, For the sad prospect of a just despair. A quack too scandalously mean to name- Had, by man-midwifery, got wealth and fame ; As if Lucina had forgot her trade, The lab' ring wife invokes his sm'cr aid ; Well-seasoned bowls the gossips spirits raise, ^^^lo while she guzzles, chats the doctor's praise. And largely, what she wants in words, supplies 250 With maudlin eloquence of trickling eyes. But %v''it a thoughtless animal is man, How very active in his own trepan I For, gi-eedy of physicians' fi-equent fees. From female mellow praise he takes degrees. Struts in a new unhcens'd go^vn, and then. From saving women falls to killing men. Another such had left tlie nation thin. In spite of all the children he bi'ought in. His pills as thick as hand-granadoes flew, 260 And where they fell, as certainly they slew ; His name struck everywhere as great a damp. As Ai-chimedes thi-ough the Roman camp. 1 The reference is to lines 9—12 of tlie sixtli ode in Horace's Tliii-d Book. 2 This is adapted from a passage in the fourtli canto of Boileau's "Art Poetique." TO A.D. 16S9.] SHORTER POEMS. 527 With this the doctor's prido began to cool ; For smarting soundly may convince a fool. But now repentance came too late for gi'ace, And meagre famine stared him in the face ; Fain would he to the wives be reconciled, But found no husband left to own a child. The friends, that got the bi'ats, were poisoned too ; 270 In this sad case what could our vermin do 'i AVorried with debts and past all hope of bail, Th' unpitied wretch lies rotting in a jail, And there with basket-alms, scarce kejit alive, Khows how mistaken talents ought to thrive. I pity, from my soul, unliappy men Compelled by want to prostitute their pen ; Whu must, like lawyers, either starve or plead. And follow, right or wrong, where guineas lead. But you, Pompilian, wealthy, pamper'd heirs, 280 AVho to your country owe your swords and cares, Let no vain hope your easy mind seduce. For rich ill poets are without e.xcuse. 'Tis very dangerous, tampering with a Muse, The profit's small, and you have much to lose : For though true wit adorns your birth or place, Degen'rate lines degrade th' attainted race. No poet any passion can excite But what they feel transport them when they write. Have you been led through the Cumjcan cave, 290 And heard th' impatient maid divinely rave i" I hear her now ; I see her rolling eyes : And panting ; " Lo ! the God, the God ! " she cries; With words not hers, and more tlum human sound, .She makes th' obedient ghosts peep trembling through the gi'ound. But though we must obey when Heaven commands, .\nd m.an in vain the sacred call withstands, Beware what spirit rages in your breast ; For ten inspired, ten thousand are possest. Thus make the proper use of each extreme, 300 And write with fury, but f orrect with phlegm. As when the cheerful hoiu's too freely pass. And sparkling wine smiles in the tempting glass, Your pulse advises, and begins to beat Through every swelling vein a loud retreat : 8o when a JIuse propitiously invites. Improve her favours, and indulge her flights ; But when you find that rigorous heat .abate, Leave off, and for another summons wait. Before the radiant sun a glimmering lamp, 310 Adult' rate metals to the sterling stamp. Appear not meaner than mere human lines Compar'd with those whose inspiration shines; These, nervous, bold : those, languid and remiss ; There cold salutes; but here a lover's kiss. Thus have I seen a rapid, headlong tide. With foaming waves the passive 8aone divide ; A\Tio.sc lazy waters without motion lay, AMiile he, with eager force, urged his impetuous way. The privilege that ancient poets claim, Now turned to license by too just a name. Belongs to none but an established fame, A\'Tiich scorns to take it Absurd expressions, crude, abortive thoughts All the lewd legion of exploded faults. Base fugitives, to that asylum fly, And sacred laws with insolence defy. .320 Not thus our heroes of the fonner days. Deserved and gained their never-fading bays ; Fur I mistake, or far the greatest l>art 330 (_>f what some call neglect, was studied art. A\Tien Virgil seems to trifle in a line, 'Tis like a warning piece, which gives th<; sign To wake your fancy, and prejjare your sight To reach the noble height of some unusual flight. I lose my patience, when with saucy pride, By untimed ears I hear his numbers tried. Reverse of nature 1 shall such copies then AiTaign th' originals of JIaro's pen, xVnd the rude notions of pedantic schools 340 Blaspheme the sixcred founder of our rules ? The delicacy of the nicest ear Finds nothing harsh or out of order there. Sublime or low, unbended or intense. The sound is still a comment to the sense. A skilful ear in numbers should preside, And all disputes without appeal decide. This ancient Rome and elder Athens found, Before mistaken stops debauch' d the sound. MTien, by impulse from heaven, Tyrt;uus sung, 3.50 In di'ooping soldiers a new courage spnmg ; Reviving Sparta now the tight maintain' d. And what two generals lost, a poet gained. By secret influence of indulgent skies, Empire and poesy together rise. True poets are the guardians of a state. And when they fail, portend approaching fate. For that which Rome to conquest did inspire, Was not the Vestal, but the JIuse's Are ; Heaven joins the blessings ; no declining age 360 E'er felt the raptures of poetic rage. Of many faults, rhyme is perhaps the cause ; Too strict to rhyme, we slight more u.seful laws. For that in Greece or Rome was never known. Till by barbarian deluges o'erflown : Subdued, undone, they did at last obey. And change their own for their invaders' way. I grant that from some mossy idol oak In double rhymes our Thor and Woden spoke; And by succession of unlearned times, 370 As bards began, so monks rung on the chimes. But now that Ph(ebus and the sacred Nine With all their beams on our blest island shine. Why should not we their ancient rites restore, And be what Rome or Athens were before ': Have we forgot how Raphael's numerous prose Led our exalted souls through heavenly I'auips, -Vnd marked the ground where proud apostate thrones Defy'd Jehovah '. ' Here, 'twixt host and host, (.\ narrow but a dreadful interval) 380 Portentous sight 1 before the cloudy van Satan with vast and haughty strides advanced, Came tow' ring ann'd in adamant and gold. There bellowing engines, with their flery tubes, Dispers'd a'thereal fonns, and down they fell By thousands, angels on archangels rolled ; 1 Lord Roscommon here, chanjrinir liis own rhyme to blank verse, honours himself by appreciating Milton wlieu his " Paradise Lost," published in 1667, was littb understood by men of fashion. 328 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURlE. [i.D. 1660 Recovered, to the hills they ran, they flew, Which with their pond'rous load, rocks, waters, woods From thcii' firm seats torn by the shagfj)- tops, They hoi-c Uke shields before them througli the ail-, 'TU more ineens'd they hurled 'em at their foes. All was confusion, heaven's foundations shook. Threatening: no less than universfil wreck. For Michael's ann main promontories tlimg, And over-prest whole legions weak ■with sin : Yet they blasphem'd and struggled as they lay, *Til the great ensign of ilessi;ih blaz'd, And, arm'd with vengeance, God's \-ictorious son. Effulgence of paternal Deity, Grasping ten thousand thunders in his hand Drove th' old original rebels headlong down, And sent them flaming to the vast abyss. may I live to haQ the glorious day, And sing loud p;eans through the crowded way. When in triumphant state the British JIuse, True to herself, shall barb'rous aid refuse. And in the lloman majesty appear. Which none know better, and none come so near. 3G0 400 George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, the lively favourite of Charles II., " Who in the coiu'se of one revolving moon, Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon," was twenty-two years older than that Earl of Mulffrave who did not become Duke of Buckiufr- ham until 1703, fifteen years after the death of Villiers. The " Rehearsal" will give George Villiers a place in another volume of this Libraiy. But here is a criticism of his in little UPOX THE FOLLOWING PASSAGE IN THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA. " For as old Selin was not mov'd by thee. Neither will I by Selin's daughter be." A pye a pudding, a pudding a pye, A pye for me, and a pudding for thee ; A pudding for me, and a ijye for thee, And a pudding-pye for thee and me. John Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave, afterwards Duke of Bvickingham, shall be represented, not by his " Essay on Poetry," or liLs " Essay on Satire." Let us see liow little of a jjoet was this fine authority on Poetry, by his loyal controversial reply to Cowley's " Ode to Brutus " in another ODE TO BRUTUS. 'Tis said, that favourite, mankind. Was made the lord of all below ; But yet the doubtful are concern'd to find, 'Tis only one man tells another so. And, for this great dominion here, M'hich over other beasts we claim, Reason, our best credential does appear. By which indeed we domineer. But how absurdly, we may see with shame. Reason, that solemn trifle ! light as air, 10 Driv'n up and down, by censure or applause ; By partial love away 'tis blown. Or the least prejudice can weigh it down : Thus GUI' high privilege becomes our snare. In any nice and weighty cause. How weak, at best, is reason ! yet the grave Impose on that small judgment which we have. In all those wits, whose names have spread so wide. And cv'n the force of time defied. Some failings yet may be descried. 20 Among the rest, with wonder be it told That Brutus is admired for C;esar's death. By which he yet surWvcs in Fame's immortal breath ; Brutus, ev'n he, of all the rest. In whom we should that deed the most detest. Is of mankind esteem' d the best. As snow descending from some lofty hill. Is by its rolling course augmenting still ; So from illustrious authors down have roll'd Those great encomiums he receiv'd of old : 30 Republic orators still show them esteem. And gild their eloquence with praise of him ; But Truth unvcil'd like a bright smi appears, To shine away this heap of sev'nteen hundred years. In vain 'tis urg'd by an illustrious wit (To whom in aU besides I wiUingly submit). That Caesar's life no pity could deserve From one who killed himself, rather than serve. Had Brutus chose rather himself to slay. Than any master to obey, 40 Happy for Rome had been that noble pride ; The world had then remain'd in peace, and only Brutus died. For he. whose soul disdains to own Subjection to a tyrant's frown. And his own life would rather end ; Would, sure, much rather kiU himself, than only hurl his friend. To his own sn-ord in the Philippian field Brutus indeed at last did yield ; But in those times self-killing was not rare, And his proceeded only from despair : 50 He might have chosen else to Hve, In hopes another C;esar would forgive ; Then for the good of Rome he could once more Conspire against a life which had spared his before. Our country challenges our utmost care. And in our thoughts deserves the tender' st share; Her to a thousand friends we should prefer : Yet not betray 'cm tho' it be for her. Hard is his heart whom no desert can move A mistress or a friend to love, 60 Above whate'er he does besides enjoy ; But may he for their sakes his sire or sons destroy .- For sacred justice, or for public good, Scom'd be our wealth, oiu' honour, and oiu' blood ; In such a cause, want is a happy state, Ev'n low disgrace would be a glorious fate ; And death itself, when noble fame survives. More to be valu'd than a thousand Uves. But 'tis not, sm'ely, of so fair renown, To spill aoother's blood, as to expose our own ; 70 TO i.D. 1()89.] SHORTER POEMS. 329 fall that's oui's we cannot give too much ; 13ut what belongs to friendship, oh, 'tis sacrilegi to touch. Can we' .stand by unniov'd, and see Our niothei' robb'd and ravish' d •' Can we bo Excus'd, if in her cause we never stir, Pleas'd with the strength and beauty of the ravisher ; Thus sings our bard with almost heat di\Tne : 'Tis pity that his thought was not as strong as fine. AVould it more justly did the case e.vpress, Or that its beauty and its grace were less. 80 Thus a nymph sometimes we see, Who so chamiiug seems to be. That, jealous of a soft suii^rise, We scarce durst trust our eager eyes. Such a fallacious ambush to escape. It were but vain to plead a willing rape ; A raUant son would be provok'd the more : A force we therefore must confess, but acted long before ; A maniage since did intervene. With all the solemn and the sacred scene ; 90 Loud was the H\inenean song ; The violated dame walk'd smilingly along. And in thi' midst of the mo^t sacred dance. As if enamour' d of liis sight, Often she cast a kind admiring glance .On the bold struggler for delight ; ^\^lo afterwards appear'd so moderate, and cool, As if for public good alone he so desii'ed to rule. But oh, that this were all which we can urge Against a Roman of so great a soul ! 100 And that fair Truth permitted us to purge His fact, of what appears so foul 1 Friendship, that sacred and sublimest thing I The noblest quality and chiefest good, (In this dull age scarce understood) Inspires us with unusual wamith, her injiu''d rites to sing. Assist, ye angels, whose immortal bliss, Tho' more refin'd, chiefly consists in this ! How plainly your bright thoughts to one another shine ! Oh, how ye all agree in harmony divine ! 110 The race of mutual love with equal zeal ye run : A couree as far from any end as when at first begun, Ye saw, and smiled upon this matcliless pair, MTio still betwixt them did so many ™-tues share, Some which belong to peace, and some to strife, Those of a calm, and of an active life. That all the excellence of human kind Conciur'd to make of both but one united mind; "Which friendship did so fast and closely bind. Not the least cement could ajipear, by which their souls were join'd. 120 That tie which holds our mortal frame, \^"hich poor uulcnowing we a soul and body name, Seems not a composition more divine. Or more ab.struse, than all that does in friendship shine. ' Cnn ice. "In repentiDgr tliese four verses of Mr, Cowley, I have done an imusiial tbiu^' ; for notwithstanding that he is my adversary in the argument, and a very famous one, too, I could not endure to let so fine a thought remain as ill express'd in this Ode, as it is in his ; which any body may find by comparing? them together. Bl^t I would not be understood as if I pretended to correct Mr. Cowley, tho' ex- pression was not his best talent : for, as I have mended these few vei-ses of his, I doul't not but he could have done as much for a great many of mine." [Author's Note.] — If any were worth mending. [Editor.] 42 From mighty Ciesar, and his boundless grace, Tho' Brutus once, at least, his life receiv'd ; Such obligations, tho' so high believ'd, Ai'e j'ct but slight in such a case. MTierc friendship so possesses all tho place. There is no room for gratitude, since he, 130 WIio so obliges, is more pleased than his sav'd friond can Just in the midst of all this uoblo heat, [be. ^\^lilo their great hearts did both so kindly beat. That it amaz'd the lookers-on, And fore'd them to suspect a father and a son (Tho' here ev'n Natm-e's self still secm'd to be outdone) ; From such a friendship unprovok'd to fall. Is horrid, yet I wish that fact were all. Which does with too much cause ungrateful Brutus call. In coolest blood he laid a long design 140 Against his best and dearest friend ; Did ev'n his foes in zeal exceed. To spirit others up to work so black a deed ; Himself the centre where they all did join. Caesar meantime, fearless and fond of liim. Was as industrious all the while To give such ample marks of fond esteem, As made the gravest Komans smile. To see with how much ease love can the wife beguile. He whom thus Brutus doom'd to bleed, 150 Did, setting his own race aside. Nothing less for him proWde, Than in the world's great empire to succeed ; Which we are bound in justice to allow Is all-sufiicient proof to show That Brutus did not strike for his own sake : And if, alas, he fail'd, 'twas only by mistake. John Sheffield, born in 1649, lived until 1721, during all the latter part of wliich time we were being so highly refined by French-classicism, that JuUN SUEFFIELD. this was the figure he made in his widow's elaborate design for a monument to him engraved before a posthumous edition of his collected works. The jest of George Villiers upon Dryden's lines in the " Conquest of Granada " re|)resenteil a good side of the reaction produced by the higher French 330 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 criticism. Boileau's plea for good sense was urged in jjlaj-fid satire while there was, cliietly upon the stage, a new tendency towards big sounding sen- tences, empty as drums. Tlie " heroic " drama of the time of Charles II. was j^'^i'tly derived from France, and in France it had been modified by in- fluence of tlie Spanish stage. Corneille had, about the time of the Restoration, resumed work as a dramatist, and he then began to jiroduce a second group of " heroic " dramas, less simple in dignity, more intricate in plot and bombastic in style than those which he had written in the days before our Commonwealth. But this was all in the teeth of Boileau's teaching, and our shrewder wits made war upon the tendency. The critics had pretty well made uji theu' minds to exclude blank verse from English literature, and even in drama follow the French lead by writing the rhymed couplet (Chaucei''s old riding rhyme with its joints stiffened) and calling it heroic, when, in the year 1667, John Milton startled them by throwing into the midst of their controversy "Paradise Lost " in blank verse. It was the first English heroic poem written in that measure. Milton, a thorough scholar, did not clip liis genius to the fashion of French taste ; and though fallen on evil days, " on evil days though fallen, and evil tongues," he closed his life with the fulfilment of its early promise. Not only did he produce in tlie reign of Charles II. his gi-and poem designed to "justify the ways of God to men," but in lG71 he published, in one volume, two poems, " Paradise Regained " and " Samson Agonistes," both designed to bid discouraged fellow-labourei's bow to tlie will of God with cliild-like faith, " and all our fears Lay on His provitlence, He will not fail." Upon the blind Milton the celestial light had indeed shone inward, and there planted eyes. He died before he liad seen how the very acts that discouraged some of his companions, and made them fear lest God had changed his countenance towards them, were producing, far more swiftly and more surely than any combat of their own could have produced, tlie end for which they had been strugglmg. Charles II. and James II. achieved for us the settlement of the Revolution of 1688. Milton in 1671, not knowing how Time would show the gathered clouds over the land to be full of benediction, in those two poems bowed his head, and closed his life's music with these words of perfect trust — ■ " All is tiest, tlioui!;h wo oft doubt What the unsoarcliahle dispose Of Highest AVisdom brings about, And ever best found in the close." This is a sonnet of Milton's, first jniblished in the second edition of his " Poems " (1673) : — ON HIS BLINDNESS. TMicu I consider how my light is spent, Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true accou ~- lest he returning chide ; ' Doth Ctod exact day-labom-, light denied 'i ' I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent That mm'miu', soon replies, ' God doth not need Either man's work, or his own gifts ; who best 10 Bear his mild j-oke, they serve him best. His state Is kingly ; thous;inds at his bidding speed. And post o'er land and ocean without rest : They also servo who only stemd and wait.' And this is another, indicating genial sweetness of the man who gave two evening hours of every day to the companionship of friends. It was first jirinted like that just quoted, in 1673, but written in the days of Cromwell, when Milton was occupied with state affairs. It is addressed to an old pupil whom he invites to take holiday with luin : — TO CYKIACK SKINNER. CjTiack, whose grandsire ' on the royal bench Of British Themis with no mean applause Pronounced, and in his volumes taught om" laws, Which others at thcij- bar so often wrench ; To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to di-euch In mirth that after no repenting draws. Let Euclid rest and Archimedes pause, And what the Swede intends, and what the French ; To measure life learn thou betimes, and know Towai-d solid good what leads the nearest way : IC For other things mild Heav'n a time ordains, And disapproves that care, though \vise in show, That with superfluous burden loads the daj'. And when God sends a cheerful horn-, refrains. Very different in tone is the cle^'erly idle strain of Charles Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, afterwards Earl of Dorset, and one of those courtiers active in bringing about the Revolution. On the night before a sea-fight with the Dutch, in which many must perish, and in which the flag-ship of the Dutch Admii-al, Opdani, was blowai up with all on board, Charles Sackville wrote this song in the tone made fashionable by the king's taste foi- trifling : — • SONG WRITTEN AT SEA, III the First Dutch JVar, on the 2«rf of June, 1665, the Night before an Engagement. To all you ladies now at land. We men, at sea, indite ; But first would have you understand . How hard it is to write : TKe Muses now, and Neptune too. We must implore to write to you. With a Fa, la, la, la, la. For though the Muses shoild prove kind, And fill our empty brain. Yet if rough Xeptune rouse the wind To wave the azure main. Our paper, pen, and ink. and we, EoU up and down our ships at sea, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. 10 1 Cyriack was tMnl son of Willifim Skinner, Esq., of Lincolnshire, by Bridget, second d-iughter of Sir Edwai-d Coke, the " grandsire " here refeiTed to. TO A.D. 1689.] SHORTER POEMS. 331 Tlieu if we write not by each post. Think not we are unkind ; Nor yet conclude our ships are lost, By Dutchmen, or by wind : Oui* tears we'll send a speedier way, The tide shall bring 'cm twice a day, 20 With a Fa, la, la, la, la. The King with wonder, and siu'priac, Will swear the seas grow bold. Because the tides will higher rise, Than e'er they used of old : But let him know, it is o>ir tears Bring floods of grief to Whitehall stairs, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. Should foggy Opdam chance to know Oui- sad and dismal story, 30 The Dutch would scorn so weak a foe, And quit their fort at Goree : For what resistance can they find From men who've left then- hearts behind I With a Fa, la, la, la, la. Let wind and weather do its worst, Be you to us but kind ; Let Dutchmen vapour, Spaniards curse. No sorrow we shall fiud ; 'Tis then no matter how things go, 40 Or who's our friend, or who's oui' foe, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. To pass our tedious hom-s away, We thi'ow a merry main ; Or else at serious ombre play : But why should we in vain Each other's ruin thus pui-sue ? We were undone when we left you, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. But now our fears tempestuous grow, 50 And cast our hopes away ; ■WTiilst you, regardless of oui- woe, Sit careless at a play : Perhaps permit some happier man To kiss your hand or flii't your fan, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. When any mournful tune you hear. That dies in every note, As if it sigh'd with each man's care, For being so remote ; 60 Think then how often love we've made To you, when all those tunes were play'd, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. In justice you cannot refuse, To think of our distress ; When we for hopes of honour lose Our certain happiness : All those designs are but to prove Ourselves more worthy of your love, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. 70 And now we've told you all oui' loves And likewise all our fears ; In hopes this declaration moves Some pity from your tears : Let's hear of no inconstancy, We have too much of that at sea, With a Fa, la, la, la, la. John Dryden made success in the Dutch war, and the Fire of London, liis chief themes in the poem, "Annus Mirabilis," on the year 166G. It was produced in 16G7, and was the hist that lie em- bellished with conceits in the manner of the Later Euphuists. Otlier volumes of this Library will in- clude specimens from Dryden's plays, and the im- portant group of poems in which, maintaining, as it was in his nature to do, for both State and Church the principle of absolute authority, he dealt ■wiih essentials of the struggle of thought preceding tlie English Revolution. Here he is lepreseuted only Ijy some shorter poems. He was true poet enough to feel the strength of Milton, and wrote — UNDER Milton's picture, before his " paradise LOST." Three poets in thi-ee distant ages born, Greece, Italy, and England did adorn. The first in loftiness of thought siu'pass'c' ; The next in majesty ; in both the last. The force of Natui-e could no f ui-ther go ; To make a third, she join'd the former two. Dryden's famous Ode for St. Cecilia's Day was written in 1697 at request of the stewards of the Musical Meeting which had been held for some years on that day. They paid Dryden £40 for it, and the music for it, composed by Jeremiah Clarke, one of the stewards, proved a failure. It was not set worthily till 173G, when "Alexander's Feast" was performed at Covent Garden Theatre with music by Handel. " I am glad to hear from all liands," Dryden wi-ote to his publisher, " that my Ode is esteemed the be.st of all my poetry, by all the town. I thought so myself when I writ it ; but, being old " his age was sLxty-six), " I mistrusted my o\vn judg- ment." Alexander's feast. I. 'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won B)' Philip's warlike son : Aloft in awfid state The godlike hero sate On his imperial throne ; His valiant peers were placed around, Their brows with roses and -with mjTtks bound : So should desert in arms be crown'd. The lovely Thais, by his side. Sate like a blooming Eastern bride 10 In flower of youth and beauty's pride. Happy, happy, happy pair '. None but the brave. None but the brave. None but the brave deserves the fair. Cliorus. Happy, happy, happy pair ! None but the brave. None but the brave, None but the bravo deserves the fan-. 332 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 20 30 Timotheus, placed on high Amid the timeful quire, With flying fingers touch'd the Ij^re : The trembling notes ascend the sky, And heavenly joys inspire. The song began from Jove, Who left his blissful seats above, Such is the power of mighty love. A di-agon's fiery form belied the god, Sublime on radiant spires he rode, When he to fair Olymjiia press'd. And while he sought her snowy breast ; Then, round her slender waist he curl'd, [world. And stamp'd an image of himself, a sovereign of the The listening crowd admire the lofty sound, " A pi'esent deity 1 " they shout around : " A present deity I " the vaulted roofs rebound. With ravish'd ears The monarch hears ; Assumes the god, Affects to nod, 40 And seems to shake the spheres. Chorus. With ravish'd ears The monarch hears ; Assumes the god. Affects to nod, And seems to shako the spheres. The praise of Bacchus then the sweet Musician sung. Of Bacchus ever fah- and ever young : The jolly god in triimiph comes ; Sound the trumpets ; beat the di-ums ! 50 Flush'd ^vith a pm-ple grace He shows his honest face. Now give the hautboys breath : he comes, he comes ! Bacchus, ever fair and young, Blinking joys did first ordain : Bacchus' blessings are a treasure. Drinking is the soldier's pleasm-e : Rich the treasure. Sweet the pleasm-e. Sweet is pleasure after pain. 60 Chorus. Bacchus' blessings are a treasure. Drinking is the soldier's pleasure : Rich the treasure. Sweet the pleasure, Sweet is pleasm-e after pain. Soothed with the sound the king grew vain ; Fought all his battles o'er again : [the slain. And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew The Master saw the madness rise ; His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes ; And, while he heaven and earth defied. Changed his hand and check'd his pride. He chose a mournful muse Soft pity to infuse : He sung Darius great and good, By too severe a fate 70 Fallen, faUen, fallen, fallen. Fallen from his high estate. And welt' ring in his blood; Deserted, at his utmost need, 80 By those his former boimty fed, (_)n the bare earth exposed he lies. With not a friend to close his eyes. With downcast looks the joyless victor sate. Revolving in his alter' d soul The various tm-ns of chance below ; And now and then a sigh he stole, And tears began to flow. Chorus. Revolving in his alter' d soul The various turns of chance below ; 90 And now and then a sigh he stole. And tears began to flow. The mighty Slastcr smiled, to see That love was in the next degree : 'Twas but a kindred sovmd to move. For pity melts the mind to love. Softly sweet, in Lydian measures. Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures. War, he sung, is toil and trouble ; Honour, but an empty bubble ; 100 Never ending, still beginning. Fighting still, and stUl destro)"ing. If the world be worth thy winning. Think, oh think it worth enjoj-ing : Lovely Thais sits beside thee. Take the good the gods provide thee. The many rend the skies with loud applause ; So Love was crown'd : but Music won the cause. The prince, unable to conceal his pain. Gazed on the fair 119 WTio caused his care, And sigh'd and look'd, sigh'd and look'd, Sigh'd and look'd, and sigh'd again : At length, with love and wine at once oppress' d. The vanquish' d victor sunk upon her breast. Chorus. The prince, imable to conceal his pain. Gazed on the faii- "Who caused his care, And sigh'd and look'd, sigh'd and look'd, Sigh'd and look'd, and sigh'd again : 120 At length, with love and wine at once oppress' d. The vanquish' d victor simk upon her breast. Now strike the golden lyre again ; A louder yet, and yet a louder strain. Break his bands of sleep asimder. And rouse him, like a rattHng peal of thunder. Hark, hark, the horrid sound Has raised up his head : As awaked from the dead. And amazed, he stares around. 130 " Revenge ! revenge I ' ' Timotheus cries, See the Furies arise ; See the snakes that they rear. How they hiss in their hair. And the sparkles that flash from their eyes I !•] SHORTER POEMS. 333 Behold a ghastly band, Each a torch in his hand : Those are Grecian ghosts that in battle were slain, And unbui'ied remain Ingloiious on the plain : HU Give the vengeance due To the valiant crew. Behold how they toss their torches on high ! How they point to the Persian abodes, And ghttcring temples of their hostile gods ! The princes applaud with a furious joy; And tlie king seized a ilambeau with zeal to destroy ; Thais led the way, To Uglit him to liis prey. And, Uie another Helen, fired another Troy. 150 CJionis. And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy ; Thais led the way. To light liim to his prey, And, like another Helen, fired another Troy. Thus long ago, Ere heaving bellows loam'd to blow, \\Tiile organs yet were mute ; Timotheus, to his breathing flute, And soimding lyre. Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire. 160 At last divTne Cecilia^ came, Inventrcss of the vocal frame ; The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store, Enlarged the fonner narrow bounds. And added length to solemn sounds. With nature's mother- wit, and arts unlcnown before. Let old Timotheus yield the piizo, Or both diWde the crown : He raised a mortal to the skies; She di'ew an angel down. 170 Grand Chorus. At last divine Cecilia came, Inventress of the vocal frame ; ^ St. Cecilia is said to have been a Roman lady bom about a.d. 295, bred in tlie Christian faith, and maiTied to a Pagan nobleman Valeriamis. She told her husband that she was visited nightly by an angel, whom he was allowed to see, after his own conversion. The celestial youth had brous^ht from paradise two wreaths, which he gave to them. One was of the lihes of heaven, the other of its roses. They both suffered martyi'dom at the beginnina^ of the third century, in the reign of Septimus Severus. The angel by whom Ceciha was visited is refeiTcd to in the closing lines of Dryden's " Ode," coupled with a tradition that he had been drawn down to her from heaven by her melodies. In the earliest traditions of Cecilia there is no mention of skiU in music. This part of her story seems to have been de- veloped by a little jjlay of fancy over her relations with the angel ; and the great Italian painters— Raffaelle, Bomeuichino, and others — fixed her position as the patron saint of Music by representing her always with symbols of hannony — a harp or organ-pipes. Then came the suggestion adopted in Dryden's "Ode," that the organ was invented by St. Cecilia. The practice of holtling Musical Festivals on Cecilia's Day, the 22nd of November, began to prevail in England at the close of the seventeenth century. The earUest piece composed for such a meeting was produced in 1683, and was by Heni-y Purcell. From that date to about 1740 there was an annual Cecilian Festival in London, and the fashion spread into the provinces. Poets, Dryden and Pope among them, were apphed to for odes which were to cele- brate the power of Music, and be set to music for performance as a special feature of the anniversary. The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store. Enlarged the fonner narrow bounds. And added length to solemn sounds, With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before. Let old Thnotheue j'ield the prize, Or both divide the crown : He raised a mortal to the skies ; She drew au angel down. 180 John Drtden. From Ills Portrait by Sir Godfrey Ki]eller. Thomas Sliadwell, on the Whig side, had, in the controversy that preceded the Revolution, provoked Dryden by a very coarse attack, and received puni.sh- ment in a poem by which he was elevated to the tlu'one of pretentions Dulness, left vacant by Richard Flecknoe, who had written many works, most various in topic, and made his name a by- word for the wits : — MAC FLECKNOE. All human things are suljject to decay, And when Fate summons, monarchs must obey. This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young Was call'd to empire, and had govem'd long ; In prose and verse, was oivTi'd, without dispute, Thi-ough all the realms of Nonsense, absolute. This aged prince, now flourishing in jjeace. And bless'd with issue of a large increase. Worn out with business, did at length debate To settle the succession of the state; 10 And, pondering which of all his sons was fit To reign and wage immortal war with wit. Cried, " 'Tis resolved; for Nature pleads, that he Should only rule, who most resembles me. Shadwell alone my perfect image bears. Mature in dulness from his tender years : ShadwcU alone, of all my sons, is he Who stands confirm'd in full stupidity. The rest to some faint meaning make pretence, But Shadwell never deviates into sense. 20 Some beams of wit on other souls may fall. Strike through, and make a lucid inter\ al ; 334 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 16fi0 But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray, His lising fogs prevail upon the day. Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye, And seems dosign'd for thoughtless majesty : Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain. And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign. Heywood and Shii'ley ' were hut types of thee, Thou last great prophet of tautology. 30 Ev'n I, a dunce of more renown than they. Was sent before but to prepare thy way. And, coarsely clad in Norwich drugget,- came To teach the nations in thy greater name. My warbling lute, the lute I whilom strung When to King John of Portugal I sung. Was but the prelude to that glorious day, When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way. With well-timed oars before the royal barge, Swell' d with the pride of thy celestial charge; 40 And big with hymn, commander of an host, The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets toss'd. Methinks I see the new Ai-ion ' sail. The lute still trembling underneath thy nail. At thy well-sharpen' d thumb from shore to shore The trebles squeak for fear, the basses roar ; Echoes from [Pudding]-Alley Bhadwell call, And Shadwell they resound from Aston-Hall. About thy boat the little fishes tlu-ong As at the morning toast that floats along. 50 Sometimes, as piTnce of thy hannonious band. Thou wield' st thy papers in thy thi-eshing hand, St. Andre's feef ne'er kept more equal time. Not ev'n the feet of thy o^ti Psyche's rhyme : Though they in number as in sense excel ; So just, so like tautology, they fell. That, pale with envy. Singleton ' forswore The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore. And vow'd he ne'er would act Villerius^ more." Here stopp'd the good old sire, and wept for joy, 60 In silent raptures of the hopeful boy. All arguments, but most his plays, persuade, That for anointed dulnoss he was made. Close to the walls which fair- Augusta ' bind, (The fair Augusta much to fears inclined) An ancient fabric raised to inform the sight. There stood of yore, and Barbican it bight : A watch-tower once ; but now, so fate ordains. Of all the pile an empty name remains. Near [this] a Niu'scry ^ erects its head. Where queens are form'd, and future heroes bred ; 1 Hci/u'ood and Shirlcj. See pages 274! and 292. Dryden is unjust to tliese poets. 2 J^oru-wli ilnig'jd. A coarse material used for clotlies. ""W". G.," in a letter to the GentUinan's Maijazine for 1745, wi-ote : — " I re- member plain John Dryden, before he paid his court with success to the ^'eat, in one iiniform clothing of Norwich diiigget. I have ate tarts \vith him and Madam Reeve at the MulbeiTy Garden when oiu* author advanced to a sword and Chadi-eux wig. . . . Though forced to be a satirist he was the mildest creatui-e breathing, and the readiest to help the yoiuig and deserving." 3 Tlte neii: virion. Shadwell had skill in music, and paid much attention himself to th'e mtisic of his opera of " Psyche " — his earliest essay in rhyme — imitated from Moliere, and first produced with gi'eat magnificence in 1675. * St. ^iidr-t; was a dancing master of the time. * SingJeton was a famous singer of the time. His fame is alluded to in Shadwell's " Bm-j' Fair," act iii., scene i. 6 ViUenus was a part in Davenant's opera, " The Siege of Rhodes." ' A\igufita, London. ^ The A'tovstTi;. This was a building in Golden Lane, Barbican, said Where unfledged actors learn to laugh and cry, A\'herc infant [rakes] their- tender voices try, And little Maximins ^ the gods defy. Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here. Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear ; 80 But gentle Simkin just reception finds Amidst this monument of vam.sh'd minds : Pm-e clinches the subm-ban muse afilords, And Panton waging hannless war with words. Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known, Ambitiously design' d his Shadwell's thi'one. For ancient Decker prophesied long since. That in this pile should reign a mighty prince. Bom for a scourge of wit, and flail of sense ; To whom true dulness should some Psyches owe, 90 But words of Jlisers from his pen should flow ; Htunorists and Hypocrites it should produce, "\\Tiole llaj-mond families, and tribes of Bruce.'" Now empress Fame had pubUsh'd the renown Of Shadwell's coronation tlu-ough the town ; Roused by report of Fame, the nations meet. From near Bunhill, and distant Watling Street. No Persian carpets spread the imperial way. But scatter' d limbs of mangled poets lay : From dusty shops neglected authors come, 100 MartjTS of pies, andreliques of the [slum]. Much Heywood, Shiiicy, Ogicby " there lay. But loads of Shadwell almost choked the way. Bilked stationers for yeoman stood prepared. And Herringman ''- was captain of the guard. to have been used as a niu-sery for the children of Henry VIII. It wiis a playhouse in i)art of the reigns of EUzabeth and James, and afteiTvards a place for the training of young actors. ^ Maximiii is a tyrant in Dryden's own play of *' Tj-rannic Love," who dies defying the gods iu this fashion : — Max. Now I am down the gods have watched their time. You think To save your credit, feeble Deities ; But I will give myself the strength to rise. [Hf strives to get up, and being up, staggers. It wonnot be My body has not iKiwer my niind to bear, I must retiu^n again and conquer here. {^Slts doini again upon the body of Placidilis. My coward body does my will control ; Fa^'ewell, thou base deserter of my soul. I'll shake this carcase off and be obeyed ; Reign, an imperial ghost, without its aid. Go, soldiers, take my ensigns with you, fight. And vanquish rebels in yoiu: sovereign's right. Before I die Bilug me Poii>hyrius and my Empress dead : I would brave Heaven, in each hand a head. Pla. Do not regard a dying tyi-aut's breath. He can but look revenge on you in death. Mar. Vanquished, and dar'st thou yet a rebel be ? Thus — I can more than look revenge on thee ! [Sta&s him again, Pla, Oh, I am gone ! Max, And after thee I go, Revenging still, and following even to the other world my blow. [Stabs him again. And shoving back this Earth on which I sit, I'll moimt, and scatter nil the gods I hit. [Dies. "* Raymond is " a gentleman of wit and honour, in love with Theo- dosia," in Shadwell's *' Hi;niorists." Brxice is "a gentleman of wit and sense, in love with Clarinda," in Shadwell's " Virtuoso." *' John Ogilby published, in splendid editions, bad versions of Homer, Virgil, and .aisop, also various cosmogi-aj)hical and other works. *- Henry Hen-iugman was a prosperous pubhsher, and had published for Dryden. He made a fortiuie by his industry, and retired to Car- shalton. In Cjrshaltou Chiu'ch is to be seen a costly marble monu- ment, ei'ected to his memory, and that of Alice, his wife, "v/ho," TO A.B, 11)89.] SHOETER POEMS. 335 The hoary piincc in majesty appear' d, High on a thi-one of his own laboui-s rcar'd. At his right hand onr young Ascanius sato, Home's other hope, and pillar of the state ; His brows thiek fogs, instead of glories, grace, 110 And lambent duhiess play'd around liis face. As Hannibal did to the altai-s come. Swore by his sire, a mortal foe to Home, So Shadwell swore, nor should his vow be vain. That ho till death true dulness would maintain. And, in his father's right, and realm's defence. Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense. The king himself the sacred unction made. As king by office, and as priest by trade. In his sinister hand, instead of ball, 120 He placed a mighty mug of potent ale ; Love's Kingdom' to his right he did convey. At once his sceptre, and his rule of sway ; AVhoso righteous lore the prince had practised young. And fi-om whose loins recorded Psyche sprung. His temples, last, with poppies were o'erspread, That nodding seem'd to consecrate his head. Just at the point of time, if Fame not lie. On his left hand twelve reverend owls did fly : So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tyber's brook, 130 Presage of sway from twice six vultui'cs took : The admiring thi-ong loud acclamations make, And omens of his futm-e empire take. The sire then shook the honours of his head, And from his brows damps of oblivion shod Full on the filial didness : long he stood, Repelling from his breast the raging god ; At length bm-st out in this prophetic mood : — " Heavens bless my son, from Ireland let him reign To far Barbadoes on the western main ; 140 Of his dominion may no end be known. And greater than his father's be his throne ; Beyond Love's Kingdom let him stretch his pen ! " — He paused, and all the people cried, "Amen," Then thus continued he : " My son, advance Still in new impudence, new ignorance. Success let others teach, learn thou from mo Pangs without bu-th, and fruitless industry. Let Virtuosos in five years be writ : '- Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit. 150 says the inscription on it, " by tlie blessing? of God upon their mutual care and industry, acqnii-ed a competent estate in the space of twenty years, and then came and settled in this parish, whei-e they lived handsomely and hospitably above thirty years, doing frood to their relations, to the parish, to their neighbours, to all that knew them. They were mairied September 29, 1659, and lived fifty-eight years and upwards very happily and comfortably together, and died within sis weeks and two days of one imother. He died January the 15th ; she, February 28, 1703, in the seventy-sixth year of their age." ' Love's Kingdom. Fleckuoe's writings showed wha* dulness could achieve in most of the departments of literature. He wrote a play called " Love's Kingdom, a Pastoral Tragi-Comedy," which was acted at the theatre near Lincoln's Inn Fields, and published in 1664. Its failure surprised him, for it was so regular a play that all the niles of time and place were exiujtly observed in it. The scene was Cyprus, the action was comprised within as many hours as acts, and the place never was out of the prospect of Love's Temple. ^ Drj'den seems to have inferred hastily from a careless reading of SbadwelVs preface to "The Virtuoso," that he claimed to have had it five years in hand. He only refers to having shown a part of it, when no more was wi-itten, to the Duke of Newcastle, at Welbeck, and then, after talking about its " hnmours," says (writing in June, 1676) th.at " the artificial folly of those who are not coxcombs by nature, but with great art and industry make themselves so, is a proper object for comedy, as I have discoursed at large in the preface to ' The Humorists,' written five years since." He goes on to say that Let gentle George ' in triumph tread the stage. Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage ; Let CuUy, Cockwood, l''opling, eh.inu the pit. And in their foUy show the writer's wit : Yet still thy fools sliall stand in thy defence, And justify their author's want of sense ; Let them be all by thy own model made Of dulness, aud dcsii-o no foreign aid. That they to future ages may be known, Not copies drawn, but issue of thy o«ti. 1 60 . Nay, let thy men of wit too be the same. All fuU of thee, and dift'ering but in name. But let no alien Sedley interpose, To lard with wit thy hungry Ejisom prose."* And when false flowers of rhetoric thou would'st cull. Trust nature : do not labour to be dull. But write thy best, and top ; aud, in each line. Sir Formal' s oratory * will be thine : Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill, And does thy northern dedications* fill. 170 Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame, By aiTogating Jonson's hostile name ; Let Father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise, And imde Ogleby thy cn^y raise. Thou art my blood, where Jonson has no part : AVliat share have we in nature, or in art i Where did his wit on learning fix a brand. And rail at arts ho did not understand ? Where made he love in Prince Nieander's vein,' Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain 'f ISO ^Vhen did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin, As thou whole Etherege dost transfuse to thine, he had rather be the author of one scene in one of the best of Ben Jonson's comedies than of any play his own age could produce, aud to regret that, its he had no pension, and his profits from the theatre were insufficient, he could not afford to allot his whole time to the writing of plays. '* Had I as much money aud as much time for it, I might perhaps wi*ite as correct a comedy as any of my coutempo- raries." At the end of the prologue he says that — " If with new fops he can but please, He'll twice a year produce as new as these." 3 Gentle Georije, Sir George Etherege. Dorimant intrigues with Mistress Loveit in his ** Man of Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter." Sir Nicholas CiUly is a character in Etherege's *' Love in a Tub." Sir Oliver Cockwood is in Etherege's " She Would if She Could." The lines refer therefore to each of Sir George Etherege's three comedies. * ShadweU's "Epsom Wells" (1673). ^ Siv Formal's oyatorij. la ShadweU's " Virtuoso " one of the cha- racters is "Sir Formal Trifle, the orator, a florid coxcomb." An example of Sii* Formal's oratory may be taken from ShadweU's second act, where one scene discovers the vii-tuoso, Sir Nicholas Gimcrack, " learning to swim upon a table, Sii- Formal and the swimming-master standing by : — " Sir Formal. In earnest, this is very fine : 1 doubt not, sir, but in a short space of time you will ai-rive at that curiosity in this watery science, that not a frog breatliing will exceed you. Though I coufess it is the most curious of all amphibious animals in the art— shaU I say, nature ? — of swimming. "Sa-imminri.mri.otcf. Ah! weU strack, Sir Nicholas ; that was admir- able, thiit was as weU swruu as any man in England cau. Observe the frog. Draw up your arms a little nearer, and then thrust 'em out strongly-gather up your legs a little more-so, very weU-incom- parable." « Northern iteikattons. There wiis no one to whom Shadwell dedi- cated so often as to William. Duke of Newcastle. (See page :il9.) " The Virtuoso," " Epsom Wells." " Tlie Libertine," and " The Sullen Lover," are aU so detUcated ; " The Humorists " is decUcated to Mar- garet. Duchess of NewcasUe. and " The Woman Captain " to this his chief patron's grandson, Henry, Lord Ogle, son to Henry, Duke of Newcastle. ' Prince Hicandcr's »cin. The following short extract includes also 336 CASSELL'S LIBKAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1060 But yo trau.sfusod, as oil and waters flow, His always floats above, thine sinks below. This is thj- province, this thy wondrous way. New humours to invent for each new play : * This is that boasted bias of thy mind, By which one way to dulness 'tis inclined : 190 AATiich makes thy writings lean on one side still, And, in all changes, that way bends thy will. Nor let thy mountain-boUy make pretence Of likeness: thine' s a t^onpany of sense. A tun of man in thy large bulk is vnit, But sine thou 'rt but a kilderkin of wit. Like mine, thy gentle numbers feebly creep ; Thy tragic muse gives smiles, thy comic sleep. "With whate'er gall thou sett'st thyself to write, Thy inofl'ensive satires never bite. 200 In thy felonious art though venom lies, It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies. Thy genius calls thee not to purchase fame In keen Iambics, but mild Anagram. Leave writing plays, and choose for thy command. Some peaceful province in Acrostic land. There thou may'st Wings display and Altars raiso,- And torture one poor word ten thousand ways. Or, if thou would' st thy different talents suit, Set thine own songs, and sing them to thy lute." 210 He said ; but liis last words were scarcely heard : For Bruce and Longvil had a trap prepared,^ enough of "Psyche's humhle strain!" lu Shadwell's "Psyche" Prince Nicauder's vein as a lover is this : — Enter Pfince Nicandcr. 2nd Laded vei-ses " passing out of fashion when Dryden wi-ote. See page 276, 3 A traj) prepared. The allusion is to a scene in the third act of the " Virtiioso," where a trap is prepared for Sii- Formal Trifle, to whom D- yden has likened Shadwell, aud who sinks when rising to his utmost height of eloquence : — " Sir Formal. We orators speak alike upon nil subjects— my speeches ore all so suhtilly desired, that whatever I speak in praise of any- thing, with very little alteration will serve in praise of the contrary. " CJarinda. Let it be ujion seeing a Mouse enclosed in a Trap. " Sir Formal. 'Tia all one to me, X am ready to speak upon all occa- sions. " Clarifldn. Stand there, sir, while we place ourselves on each side. And down they sent the yet declaiming bard. Sinking: he left his drugget robe behind, Borne upwards by a subterranean wind. The mantle fell to the young prophet's part, With double portion of his father's art. We turn from the substantial workers to Court wits again, and take from John Wilmot, Earl ol Hochester, a jjoem UPON NOTHING. Nothing ! thou elder brother ev'n to shade, That hadst a being e'er the word was made. And (well fixt) art, alone, of ending not afraid. Ere time and place were, time and place were not, When primitive Notliing Something straight begot, Then all proceeded from the great united — what ?' Something, the gen'ral attribute of all, Sever'd from thee, its sole original, Into thy boundless seK must undistinguish'd fall. Yet Something did thy mighty power command, 10 And from thy fruitful Emptiness's hand Snatch'd men, beasts, birds, tire, aii', and land. IMatter, the ^-icked'st offspring of thy race, By Fonn assisted, Hew from thy embrace ; And rebel Light obscured thy reverend dusky face. With Form and flatter, Time and Place did join ; Body, thy foe, with thee did leagues combine, To spoil thy peaceful realm, and ruin all thy line. But turncoat Time assists the foe in vain, And, brilt'd by thee, assists thy short-liv'd reign, 20 And to thy hungry womb drives back tliy slaves again. Tho' mysteries are barr'd from laic eyes, And the divine alone, with warrant, pries Into thy bosom, where the truth in private lies, ** Sir Formal. I kiss youi- hand, madam. Now I am inspired with eloquence. Hem ! hem ! Bein? one day, most noble auditors, musing: in my study upon the too fleeting- condition of i>oor human kind, I observed, not far from the scene of my meditations, an excel- lent machine, called a mouse-trap, which my man had placed there, which had included in it a solitary mouse, which pensive prisoner, in vain bewailing its own misfortunes and the precipitation of its too unadvised attempt, still strug-g-lina: for liberty against the too solid opposition of solid wood and more obdurate wire ; at last, the pretty malefactor having tired, alas ! its too feeVde limbs till they became languid in fruitless endeavours for its excarceratiou. The pretty felon, since it could not break prison, and its offence being beyond the benefit of the clergy, could hope for no bail, at last sate still pen- sively lamenting the severity of its fate, and the uaiTowness of its, alas ! totrai> as he would in praise of Alexander." I.] SHORTER POEMS. 337 Yet this of thee the wise may freely say — Thou from the virtuous nothing tak'st away, And to he part with thee the wicked wisely pray. (treat Negative, how vainly would the wise Enquii'e, deiiae, distinguish, teach, devise, Didst thou not stand to point their dull philosophies I 30 Is, or Is Not, the two great ends of fate, .Vnd, tiTze or false, the suhjoct of debate, That perfect or destroy the vast designs of fate, 'NMien they have rack'd the politician's breast, Within thy bosom most seciu-ely rest ; And, when reduc'd to thee, are least rmsafe and best. But, Nothing, why does Something .still pemiit That sacred monarchs should at coimcil sit With persons highly thought at best for nothing tit ; AAliilst weighty Something modestly abstains 4(1 From princes' coffers and from statesmen's brains, And nothing there like stately Nothing reigns ? Nothing, who dwell' st with fools in grave disguise, For whom they rev'rend shapes and forms devise, Lawn sleeves, and fui'S, and gowns, when they like thee look wise ; French truth, Dutch prowess, British policy, Hibernian learning, Scotch civility, •Sijaniards' dispatch, Danes' wit, are mainly seen in tliee. The great man's gi-atitude to his best friend. Kings' promises, frail vows, tow'rds thee they bend. Flow swiftly into thee, and in thee ever end. .50 John Wiluiot, son of Henry, Earl of Rochester, Was born m 1647 ; went, when only twelve years old, to Wadliam College ; and in 1661 was, at the age of fourteen, made Master of Arts with some other persons of rank. He distinguished liimself at the Court of Charles II. for wit and jjrofligacy, and died at the age of thirty-four. Yet Rochester gave time also to study. That it became a gentleman to be a wit and a patron of wits, to read and judge intellectual work, and even to write himself, was an opinion with which the Court of Charles II. must be distinctly credited. Tlie king himself was shrewd in repartee, and relished wit even in an ojiponent. He would have liked to win to his side Andrew Marvell, whose earnest mind was fighting the frivolous with their own weapon of light raillery. Denhaui lived until 1668, and Waller nearly twenty years beyond that date, enjoying supreme praise from j'ounger writers. Sir George Etherege, whose three comedies reflect with painful fidelity the degeneracy of Com-t life iii the time of Charles II., celebrated the introduction of a taste for gambling at cards among fashionable women wth this SONG OF BASSET.' Let equipage and dress despair. Since basset is come in ; For nothing can oblige the fair Like money and moriue. ' Bassei . Giimbliui; mth cards rose high in France under Louis XrV. Cardinal Mazarin, wlao played deei», introduced from Italy a game 43 Is any countess in distress, SJie iiies not to the beau ; 'Tis only cony can redi'ess Her grief with a rouleau. By this bewitching game betray'd, Poor love is bought and sold, 10 And that which should be a free trade Is now engross' d by gold. Ev'n sense is brought into disgrace, WTiere company is met ; Or silent stands, or leaves the place, While all the talk's basset. "Why, ladies, will you stake your hearts. Where a plain cheat is found ? You first are rook'd out of those darts. That gave yourselves the wound. 20 The time, which should be kindly lent To plays and witty men, In waiting for a knave is spent, Or wishing for a ten. Stand in defence of your own channs, Thi'ow down this favourite. That threatens, with his dazzling amis, Yom' beauty and your wit ; AATiat pity 'tis, those conqu'ring eyes. Which all the world subdue, 30 Should, while the lover gazing dies. Be only on alpue. Etherege is said to have been killed about the time of the Revolution by falling downstairs when, overcome with wine, he was showing friends from his room after a merrymaking. Sii- Charles Sedley, who also was wit and courtier, writing plays and poems, lived until 1701. These are two songs of his:— STRE.SS OF LOVE. Love stiU has something of the sea. From whence his mother rose ; No time his slaves from doubt can free. Nor give their thoughts repose : Tliey are becalm'd in clearest days. And in rough weather tost ; They wither under cold delays. Or are in tempests lost. One while they seem to touch the port. Then straight into the main 10 Some angry wind, in cruel sport. The vessel diives again. called Hocca, wUicb spread so much rain that a strict order against it was issued in 1660, the year of tlie Restoration of Charles II, , during whose reign in England hocca died out in France, and hassette, also introduced from Italy, reigned in its stead. Both the game and the French fashion for deep play spread from the French court and those who set their lives to its frivolities to the English court and all whom its esiample tainted. 338 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.p. 1060 At first disdain and i^ride they fear, "WTiich if they chance to 'scape, Eivals and falsehood soon appear In a more dreadful shape. By such degrees to joy they come, And are so long withstood. So slowly they receive the sum, It hardly docs them good. Tis cruel to prolong a pain, And, to defer a joy, BeUeve me, gentle Celemene, OSends the winged hoy. An hundred thousand oaths your fears Perhaps would not remove ; And if I gaz'd a thousand years, I could no deeper lore. SILENCE BROKEN. AVhen Amelia first became The mistress of his heart. So mild and gentle was her reign, Thyrsis in hers had part. Eeservcs and care he laid aside. And gave his love the reins ; The headlong course he now must bide, No other way remains. At first her cruelty ho fear'd, But that being overcome. No second for a while appear'd, And he thought all his own. He call'd himself a happier man Than ever loved before ; Her favours stUl his hopes outran, What mortal can have more ? Love smiled at first, then looking grave, Said, " ThjTsis, leave to boast : More joy than all her kindness gave, Her fickleness will cost." Ho spoke ; and from that fatal time, All ThjTsis did, or said, Appear'd unwelcome, or a crime. To the ungratefid maid. Then ho, despairing of her heart, Would fain have had his own. Love answered, iS\ich a nj-mph could part With nothing she had won. 20 10 20 The next song i.s by Charles Cotton, who died in ir)S7. In 1076 he had added a second part to the fifth edition of Izaak Walton's " Complete Angler," by winch work his name lives, rather than by his verees, which included a Travestie of the First and Fourth Books of Virgil, which is in Hudibrastic verse, with none of Samuel Butler's wit and wisdom, but with a coarseness far removed from wit, then spreading as thick scum over the shallows of Restoration litera- ture. MONTROSS. Ask not why sorrow shades my brow. Nor why my sprightly looks decay : Alas ! what need I beauty now, Since he that loved it died to-day. Can ye have ears, and yet not know Mirtillo, brave Mirtillo's slain 'i Can ye have eyes, and the}' not flow, Or hearts, that do not share my pain ? He's gone ! he's gone 1 and I will go ; For in my breast such wars I have. And thoughts of him perplex me so, That the whole world appears my grave. But I'll go to him, though he lie Wrapt in the cold, cold arms of death : And under yon sad cypress-tree, I'U moura, I'll mourn away my breath. 10 The wit and -svisdom of Samuel Butler will be illustrated in the volume of this Library that speaks of his " Hudibras " among our larger works. Here are only a few of the detached stanzas prepared for apt use, and placed among his shorter poems, as MISCELLANEOUS THOUGHTS. The truest characters of ignorance Are vanity and pride and arrogance, As blind men use to bear their noses higher Than those that have their eyes and sight entire. All smattercrs are more brisk and pert Than those that understand an art ; As little sparkles slune more bright Than glowing coals that give them li^■ht. Love is too great a happiness For wretched mortals to possess ; For could it hold inviolate Against those cruelties of Fate Which all felicities below By rigid laws are subject to. It would become a bliss too high For perishing mortality, Translate to earth the joys above ; For nothing goes to heaven but love. An ass will with his long ears fray The flies that tickle him away ; But man delights to have his ear^ Blown maggots in by flatterers. ON A CLUB OF SOTS. The jolly members of a toping club. Like pipestaves, are but hooped into a tub. And in a close confederacy link For nothing else but only to hold diink. 10 20 Margaret, yomigest daughter of Sir Charles Lucas, a loyal gentleman who lived near Colchester, became TO A.D. lG8i} ] SHORTER POEMS. 339 in 1643, when her age was about twenty, one of the maids of lionour to Queen Henrietta IMaria. She liad strong inclination towards literature, and this added to her charms in the eyes of William Cavendish, then Marquis, afterwards Duke of Newcastle, a foremost friend of the king's. Under Cavendish, her ftither, Sir Charles Lucas, served in command of the cavalry, when Sir Charles, on the arrival of Prince Rupert, joined in the movement that secured the relief of York from siege. But in July followed the battle of Marston Moor ; and the Marquis of Newcastle, who liad been owner of vast estates, with the young Margaret, whom he had made his second wife, once had to pawn then- clothes for a dinner. After the Restoration, the Marquis became Duke of Newcastle, and his wife, as Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle, wi-ote indefatigably. Her books were all the children she had — a little family of ten folios. She was an excel- lent wife, and a kind friend ; though she kept young ladies about her who might be called up in the night to conmiit to paper any ideas that crossed her brain. The duke survived his duchess some three years ; and as his age was eighty-one when she died — early in 1674, aged about fifty — it must, in their latter days, have been a blessing to him when she slept soinidly, and called nobody up to address her night thouglits to ])osterity. Her most interesting work was the life of her husband, published in 1667. Her " Poems and Phancies" aft'ect, firstly, in a comical way high natural i)hilosophy ; secondly, to be ethical ; and thu-dly, fourtlily, and fifthly, poetical Fancies of Nature and Love, of Fairies, War, and Moumfulness. The samples here given of her strained ingenuity were ^vritten under the Commonwealth, when the reaction against it was yet to be felt in England ; but to this Mari aret Dttchess of Newcastle From Iter " Poem$ and Phancies" (166i). her taste was fiishioned, and by this it abided. She was too well satisfied with that image of herself engi-aved before the edition of her " Poems and Phancies," published in 1664, which shrined her in a niche with A])ollo and Minerva right and left, gazing up at her in respectful admiration. Yet she was really clever, though if she called uj) any one in the night to receive the inspii-ation of this jjoem of Nature's Wheel, we may suppose that she began with lively energy, and was dropping to sleep again by the time she reached the "shirts of judgment." nature's wheel. The Tongue's a wheel to spin words from the mind, A thi-ead of sense hy th' Understanding's twin'd ; The Lips a loom, these words of sense to weave Into discourse, which to the Ears they leave. This cloth i'th' chest of memory up is shut Till into shirts of judgment it be cut. A POSSET FOR nature's BREAKFAST. Life scums the cream of heauty with Time's spoon, And draws the clarct-'nTne of blushes soon ; Then boils it in a skillet clean of youth, And thicks it well with crumbled bread of truth ; Sets it upon the fu-e of life which does Burn clearer much when Health her bellows blows ; Then takes the eggs of fair and bashful eyes, And puts them in a countenance that's wise, Cuts in a lemon of the sharpest ^\'it — Discretion as a knife is used for it. A handful of chaste thoughts, double refined, Six .spoonfuls of a noble and gentle mind, A grain of mii-th to give 't a little taste, Then takes it off for fear the substance waste, And puts it in a basin of good health. And \\ith this meat doth Nature please herself. Other women wrote verse in the reign of Charles II. There was merit in Anne Killigrew, genius and generosity of mind in Aphra Behn. Though, writing for the Court, she did abase her pen to bring her wit into fashion, let it not be forgotten that from her womanly heart came, in her novel of " Oroonoko," the first protest in our literature against negro slavery. 'This is a song by Mivs. Behn : — •SILENT LOVE. Break, break, sad heart, unload thy grief, Give, give, thy son-ows way : Seek out thy only last relief, And thy hard stars obey : Those stars that doom thee to revere AVliat does themselves outshine. And placed her too in such a sphere That she can ne'er be mine. Because Endymion once did move Night's goddess to come down, 10 And listen to his tale of love, Aim not thou idly at the moon. Be it thy pleasure and thy jn-ide That, wreck'd on stretch'd desire, Thou canst thy fiercest torments hide, And silently expire. A poetess of purest strain was in those days Katherine Philips, who had married a Welsh gentle- man, and preferred liome in Wales to all the allure- 340 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITEEATUEE. [a.d. llM-l ments of Court life. Friendship was her chief theme ; and slie had Jeremy Taylor for a friend. Her life was slioi-t, for she died of small-] >ox four yeare after the Eestoration at the age of thirty-one. Following the fashion of the Precieuses, she called herself, and was called, Oriiida. Her verse and her life were praised in the strains of Cowle,y and Roscommon. Here is her picture of maidenly life : — THE VIRGIN". The things that make a vu'gin please, She that seeks will find them these : A beauty, not to Art in deht, Eather agreeable than great : An eye, wherein at once do meet The beams of kindness and of wit ; An undissembled innocence. Apt not to give nor take offence ; A conversation at once free From passion and from subtlety ; 10 A face that's modest, yet serene, A sober and yet lively mien ; The ™'tue which does her adorn. By honour guarded, not by scorn ; With such wise lowliness endu'd As never can be mean or rude ; That prudent negligence ' em-ich. And times her silence and her speech ; Whose equal mind does always move, Neither a foe nor slave to love ; 20 And whose religion's strong and plain. Not superstitious, nor profane. The next Uvo pieces show her as the mother moiu'uing for her only child : — ORIXDA UPON LITTLE HEITOR PHILIPS. ■Wliat on earth deserves our tru.st ? Youth and beauty both are dust ; Long we gathering are with pain. What one moment calls again. Seven years childless man'iage past, A son, a son is born at last : So exactly limb'd and fair. Full of good spii'its, mien, and air, As a long Hfe promised, — Yet, in less than six weeks dead. 10 Too promising, too great a mind In so small room to be confin'd. Therefore, as fit in heaven to dwell. He quickly broke the prison shell. So the subtle alchymist Can't with Hennes' seal resist The powerful spirit's subtler flight. But 'twill bid him long good night. And so the sun, if it arise Half so glorious as his eyes, 20 Like this infant, takes a .shroud, Buried in a morning cloud. * Ncgh(lciKc. A plui-al wi'itteu as prououuced iu Freucli, and then in English by dropping the repeated sibilant, as we do still in a phrase like " for conscience' sake." Perhaps the next piece was her last, for she soon lay beside her little one again, after a Life as iimocent. Her heart spoke in this poem upon How weak a star doth rule mankind, ^\^lich owes its ruin to the same Causes which Nature had desigu'd To cherish and preserve the frame I As Commonwealths may be scem-e And no remote invasicm dread. Yet may a sadder fall endure From traitors in their bosom "bred : So while we feel no «olence And on our active health do trust, A secret hand doth snatch us hence And tiunbles us into the dust. Yet carelessly we run our race As if we could Death's siunmons wave ; And think not on the narrow space Between a table and a gi-ave. But since we cannot death reprieve. Our souls and fame we ought to mind. For they our bodies will survive ;■ That goes beyond, this stays bchuid. If I bo sure my soul is safe, And that my actions will provide My tomb a nobler epitaph Than that I only Uv'd and died ; So that in various accidents I conscience may and honour keep : I with that ease and innocence Shall die, as infants go to sleep. 10 20 If Thoma-s Sprat, who was born in 1G36, and became Bishop of Rochester iu 168-1:, had ever really loved a lady who was drowned, could he have written .such a cold lament as this ON HIS MISTRESS DROWNED. Sweet stream, that do.st with equal pace Both thyseH Hy, and thyself chase. Forbear awhile to flow, And listen to my woe. Then go, and tell the sea that all its brine Is fresh, compar'd to mine ; Inform it that the gentler dame. Who was the life of all my flame. In th' glory of her bud Has pass'd the fatal flood, 10 Death by this only stroke tritlmphs above The greatest power of love : Alas, alas 1 I must give o'er, My sighs will let me add no more. Go on, sweet stream, and henceforth rest No more than does my troubled breast ; And if my sad complaints have made thee stay. These tears, these tears shall mend thy way. TO A.n. 1689.] SHOliTER rOEMS. ■Ml Poor as the verse is, Sprat's " Plague of Athens," the most amliitions of his pieces, is no better. This by Edward Sherburne (who was born in 1618, served as Clerk of the Ordnance, translated Seneca's plays and the " Astrononiica " of Mauilius, was knighted by Charles II., and died iu 1702) is as artiticial, but far moi'e ingenious : — A MAIDEN IN LOVE WITH A YOUTH liLIXD OF ONE EVE. Though a sal)le cloiid benight One of thy fau' twins of light, Yet the other brighter seems As 't hud robbed its brother's beams. Or both lights to one were rim Of two stars, now made one sun. Cunning Archer ! who knows yet But thou wink'st my heart to hit ! Close the other too, and all Thee the god of Love ■n-ill call. 10 Thomas Flatman, born in London about 16.33, was educated for the bar, entered the Inner Temi)le, turned to poetry and painting, and pulilished, in IGOl, " Don Juan Lamberto ; or, A Comic History of These Last Times," a satire upon Richard Cromwell, which was reprinted in the same year with a second part. Flatman succeeded as a miniature painter, and won some reputation among the poets of the Restoration. When he married in 1672, he was serenaded with this song of his own : — THE bachelor's SONG. Lite a dog with a bottle fast tied to his tail, Like vermin in a trap, or a thief in a jaQ : Or Uke a Tory in a bog,' Or an ape with a clog ; Such is the man, who when he might go free, Does his liberty lose For a matrimony noose, And sells himself into capti'vity. The dog he does howl when his bottle docs Jog, The vermin, the thief, and the Tory in vain 10 Of the trap, of the jail, of the quagmu'e complain. But well fare poor Pug ! for he plays with his clog ; And tho' he would be rid on't rather than his life. Yet he lugs it, and ho hugs it, as a man does his wife. Flatman is chiefly rememljered now for a poem from which Pope borrowed without acknowledg- ment : — * A Tory in a hog. The bogs of Ireland yielded refuge to Popish outlaws, who were called Tories ns beins: hunted men, from a Gaelic word *' toil-," pursuit, diligent search. Bands of thieves— also hunted men — found likewise safe retreat in the Iiish bogs, and the word Tory began to he applied contemptuously about 1680 to the party that maintained royal absolutism, and was accused of a tendency to make Roman Catholicism dominant in England. Out of the same spirit of irreligious hatred arose at the same time the name of Whitr for those who opposed claims of absolute authority in Church and State. Whig was originally a name of contempt given by Epi^copahans to Presbj'terian Dissenters— a scoff at the sourness of the Precisian — Wliig being the acid liquor out of cream that has trumed sour. The word is alUed to whey. When chui-ned milk begins to thi'ow olf whey vt is said to " whig." A THOUGHT OF DEATH. When on my sick bed I knguish, l''iill of sorrow, full of anguish. Fainting, gasping, trembUng, crying. Panting, gi-oaning, speechless, dying, My soul just now about to take her flight Into the regions of eternal night ; Oh tell mo you. That have been long below, "What shall I do ! AVhat .shall I think, when cruel Death apiTcars, That may extenuate my fears. Methinks I hear some gentle spirit say. Be not fearful, come away ! Think with thyself that now thou shalt be free. And find thy long-expected liberty. Better thou mayest, but worse thou canst not be Thau in this vale of tears and misery. Like C'a!sar, with assurance then come on, And unamaz'd, attempt the laurel crown That Kcs on th' otlier side Death's Kubicon. 10 20 Not only John Milton, but John Bunyaii and many another earnest man of lower genius uttered the deeper thoughts of England when a corrupt Court was doing its worst ;us an example to the people. The genius of Bunyan will be illustrated 111 another volume ; but here let us blend one note from him with the music of his time, by taking a piece or two from a little rhymed book of his called "Divine Emiilems, or Temporal Things Spii-itualized, Fitted for the Use of Boys aiul Girls : " — • upon APPAREL. God gave us clothes to hide our nakedness. And we by them do it expose to ■view ; Our pride and unclean minds, to an excess. By our apparel we to others shew. ON THE MOLE IN THE GROUND. The mole's a creature veiy smooth and slick. She cUgs i' th' dii-t, but 'twill not on her stick. So 's he who counts this world his greatest gains. Yet nothing gets but labour for his pains. Earth "s the mole's element, she can't abide To be above groimd, dirt-heaps are her pride : And he is like her, who the worldling plays. He imitates her in her works and ways. Poor silly mole, that thou shouldst love to be AMiero thou nor sun, nor moon, nor stars canst see. 10 But oh ! how siUy 's he who doth not care. So he gets cartli, to have of heaven a share 1 Let me add also from John Bunyan's book for children tliis little paraphrase UPON THE lord's PRAYER. Our Father which in heaven art, Thy name bo always hallowed ; - Thy kingdom come. Thy wiU be done ; Thy heavenly path be followed - /rnl/fniTd, pronounced, as it used sometimes to be written, "lioUowed." So the adjective fonn "halig" is now always wintten "holy." 342 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 By us on eartli, as 'tis witli Thee, Wc humbly pray ; And let our bread to us be giv'n From day to day. Forgive our debts, as we forgive Those that to us indebted dre ; Into temptation lead us not. But save us from the wieked snare. The kingdom's Thine, the power too, AVe Thee adore ; The glory also shall be thine For evermore. 10 Jolin Oldham, sou of a Nonconformist minister at Sliipton, in Gloucestersliii-e, died of .small-pox, in 1683, aged only tliirtj-. After graduating at Oxford, he became an usher in the Free School at Croydon, but some verses of his were seen in manu- script by the Earls of Rochester and Dorset and Sir Charles Sedley, which (paused them to go over to Croydon and make his acquaintance. This was one •of the pieces they had read : — SOME VERSES WRITTE?} IN SEPTEMBER, 1676. PRESENTIXG A 1500K TO COSMELIA. Go, hiunble gift, go to that matchless saint Of whom thou only wast a copy meant. And all that's read in thee more richl}^ find Comprised in the fail- volume of her mind. That li\Tiig system, where are fuUy writ All those high morals which in books we meet : Easy, as in soft air, there writ they are, Yet firm, as if in bi-ass they graven were. Nor is her talent lazily to know As dull di^•ines and holy canters do ; 10 She acts what they only in pulpits prate, And theoiy to practice does translate. Not her own actions more obey her will. Than that obeys strict vu-tue"s dictates stUl : Yet does not vii-tue from her duty flow, But she is good because she will be so. Her wtue scorns at a low pitch to fly, 'Tis all free choice, nought of necessity : By such soft rules are saints above confin'd, Such is the tie which them to good does bind. 20 The scattered glories of her happy sex In her bright soul as in their centre mix, And that which they possess'but by retail, She hers by just monopoly can call. Whose sole example does more ^Trtues shew. Than schoolmen ever taught or ever knew. No act did e'er within her practice fall, WTiich for th' atonement of a blush could call ; No word of hers e'er greeted any ear, But what a saint at her last gasp might hear. 00 Scarcely her thoughts have ever suUied been With the least print or stain of native sin ; Devout she is, as holy hcnnits are, Who share their time 'twixt ecstasy and praj'er, Modest, as infant roses in their bloom. Who in a blush thcu- fragrant lives consume ; So chaste, the dead themselves are only more, Who lie divcrc'd from objects and from power; So pure, could \Trtue in a shape aiqjear, 'Twould choose to have no other fonn but her. 40 So much a saint, I scarce dare call her so For fear to wrong her with a name too low : Such the seraphic brightness of her mind, I hardly can believe her womankind. But think some nobler being does appear, , AVhieh to instruct the world has left the sphere, } And condescends to wear a body here. ; Or, if she mortal be, and meant to show The greater art by being form'd below : Sure Heaven preserved her by the fall uucurst, 50 To teU how good the sex was made at fii-st. In 1678 Oldham left Croydon and was afterwards tutor in two good families ; he thought of medicine as a profession, but was always drawn to poetry. The Earl of King.stou made Oldham his guest and friend at Holme Pierrepoint until his death, and would have made him his chaplain if he had entered the C'iurch ; but what he thought of the servile gentility of chaplainship as then too commonly under- stood, he tells in a satire addressed to a friend about to leave the univei-sity and come abroad into the world. These are the lines, which form only PART OF A SATIRE. Some think themselves exalted to the sky. If they light in some noble family : Diet, an horse, and thirty pounds a year. Besides th' advantage of his lordship's car, The credit of the business, and the state. Are things that in a youngster's sense sound great. Little the imexperienc'd -n-retch does know ■\\Tiat slavery he oft must undergo. Who tho' in silken scarf and cassock drest, AVears but a gayer livery at best. 10 AMien dinner calls, the implement must wait AVith holy words to consecrate the meat. But hold it for a favour seldom known. If he be deign' d the honour to sit down ; Soon as the tarts appear. Sir Crape, withdraw ! Those dainties are not for a spii'itual maw. Observe your distance, and be sm-e to stand Hard by the cistern with your cap in hand. There for diversion you may pick your teeth Till the kind voider comes for your reKef. 20 For mere board-wages such their freedom sell. Slaves to an hoiu', and vassals to a bell ; And if th' enjoj-ment of one day be stole. They are but prisoners out upon parole : Always the marks of slavery remain. And they, tho' loose, still di'ag about their chain. And where's the mighty prospect after all? A chaplainship serv'd up, and seven years' thi-all. The menial thing perhaps for a reward Is to some slender benefice preferr'd, 30 AVith this proviso bound, that he must wed \ My lady's antiquated waiting-maid, ) In di-essing only skill' d, and marmalade. ' Let others who such meannesses can brook, Strike countenance to every gi-eat man's look ; Let those that have a mind turn slaves to eat. And live contented by another's plate : I rate my freedom higher, nor will I For food and raiment truck my liberty. TO A.D. 1C89.] SHORTER POEMS. 343 The movements that led immediately to the Revo- lution after the lirst sharp conflict for the exclusion of James, Duke of York, from the succession to the throne, are expressed vigorously in the literature of the time ; in Dryden's "Absalom and Achitophel," Samuel Pordage's " Azaria and Husliai," Dryden's " Medal," Samuel Pordage's " Medal Reversed," and many other pieces upon the endeavour of the king to crush opposition in the person of Lord Shaftesburj'. The reasoning on Church questions in Dryden's " Religio Laici," though nominally Pro- testant, maintained the same principle of authoiity as the safeguard of unity that he asserted live years later in the " Hind and Panther," when the natural bias of his mind towards that i^rinciple of authority which had brought him to the king's side carried him on into sincere Catholicism. Every change in Dryden's mind was natural as that of a ball placed on a high slope, stationary till the impulse came that set it mo^Tug, and then true to its one possible course. There is no instance in his life of change against the bias, and he stood fitrm on the gi'ound to which he at last came, when others, ■svhom none blame for it, varied opinions with the times. After the Revolution John Drydeu ceased to be laureate, by his own act, because he would not take the formal oaths required of one who held a post under the crown upon the change of sovereign. Charles Montague, who was to be a foremost statesman of the Whigs, first earned his credit as a wit by fulsome verses on the death of Charles II., at the beginning of whose reign he had been born. He was fourth son of the Hon. George Montague, of Harton, in Northamptonshire, and grandson to the first Earl of Manchester. At Westminster School he formed a strong friendship with George Stepney, known afterwards as a poet, and became, in the year 1682, his fellow-student in Trinity College, Cambndge. On the death of Charles II., in Febn7ary, 1G85, Charles Montague contiibuted the following poem to tlie book of condolence and congi-atulation pre- sented by the University to James II. : — ON THE DEATH OF HIS MOST SACRED MAJESTY KING CHARLES II. Farewell, great Charles, monarch of blest renown. The best good man that ever fill'd a throne : Whom Nature, as her highest pattern, wrought. And mi.x'd both sexes' viiiues in one draught : Wisdom for councils, bravery in war, With all the mild good-nature of the fair ; The woman's sweetness tomper'd manly wit. And loving power did crown' d with meekness sit ; His awful person reverence engaged. Which mild address and tenderness assuaged : 10 Thus the Almighty Gracious Iving above Does both command our fear and win our love. With wonders bom, by miiaclcs preserv'd, A heavenly host the infant's cradle serv'd. And men his healing empire's omen read. When sun with stars and day with night agreed. His youth for valorous patience was renown' d, Liko David, pcrsccutc^d first, then crown'd. Lov'd in all co>ats, admir'd where'er ho came. At once oiu- nation's glory and its shame : 20 They blest the i.sle where such great spiiits dwell, Abhorr'd the men that could such worth expel. To spare oui' lives, he meekly did defeat Those Sauls whom wand' ring asses made so great; Waiting tUl Heaven's election should be shown, And the Almighty should his miction own. And own He did — His powerful arm display'd. And Israel, the bclov'd of God, obey'd ; CaU'd by his people's tears, he came, he eas'd The groaning nation, the black storms appeas'd ; 30 Did gi-eatcr blessings, than he took, afford, England itself was, more than he, restor'd. Unhappy Albion, by strange ills opprest. In various fevers toss'd, coidd find no rest; Quite spent and wearied, to his arms she fled, And rested on his shoulders her fair bending head. In conc[uests mild, he ctme from exile kind. No climes, no provocations, chang'd his mind ; No malice show'd, no hate, revenge, or pride, But rul'd as meekly as his father died ; 40 Eas'd us from endless wars, made discords cease ; Eestor'd to quiet, and maintaiu'd in peace, A mighty series of new time began. And rolling years in joyful circles ran. Then wealth the city, bus'ness fill'd the port, To mirth our tumults tiu-n'd, our wars to sport. Then learning flourish' d, blooming arts did spring, And the glad Muses prun'd their drooping wing. Then did oirr fl)ang towers improvement know. Who now command as far as winds can blow ; 50 With canvas wings roun^ all the globe they fly. And, built by Charles's art, all storms defy. To ev'ry coast with ready sails are hiu'l'd. Fill us with wealth, and \vith our fame the world. From whose distractions seas do us di^•ide, Their riches here in floating castles ride ; We reap the swarthy Indian's sweat and toO, Their fruit, without the mischiefs of their soU, Here in cool shades their gold and pearls receive. Free from the heat which does thcu- lustre give ; 60 In Persian silks eat Eastern spice, secure From burning fluxes and their calentiu-e ; Under our vines upon the peaceful shore, We see all Europi; toss'd, hear tempests roar. Rapine, sword, wars, and famine rage abroad, ^A^lLle Charles their host, lOce Jove from Ida, aw'd. Us from our foes, and from ourselves did shield, Oiu' towns from tumults, and from arms the field. For when bold factions Goodness could disdain, Unwillingly he us'd a straiter rein : 70 In the still gentle voice he lov'd to speak. But could with thunder harden' d rebels break. Yet though they wak'd the laws, his tender mind Was undisturb'd, in WTath severely kind. Tempting his power, and lu-ging to assume, Thus Jove in love did Somele consiune. As the stout oak, when round his trunk the vine Does in soft wreaths and amorous foldings twine, Easy and slight appears : the winds from far Summon their noisy forces to the war ; 80 But though so gentle seems his outward form, His hidden strength outbraves the loudest stoi-m : 344 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1660 Firmer ho stands, and boldly keeps the field, ShowiBg stout minds, when unprovok'd, are mild. So when the good man made the crowd presume, He show'd himscH, and did the king assiune ; For goodness in excess may he a sin. Justice must tame, whom Jlercy cannot win. Thus winter fixes the unstable sea, .\nd teaches restless water constancy, !)0 Which, under the wai-m influence of blight days. The tickle motion of each blast obeys. To bridle factions, stop rebellion's course, By easy methods vanquish without force, Relieve the good, hold stubborn foes subdue, j MOdness in wrath, mcelaiess in anger show, Were arts great Charles's prudence only knew. To fright the bad, thus awful thunder rolls ; "While the bright bow secures the faithful souls. I Such is thy glory, Charles, thy lasting name lou Brighter than our proud neighbour's guilty fame ; More noble than the spoils that battles jnold, Or all the empty triumphs of the field. 'Tis less to conquer than to make wars cease, And without fighting awe the world to peace. For proudest triumphs from contempt arise ; The vanquish'd first the conqueror's arms despise. Won ensigns are the gaudy marks of scorn. They brave the \-ictor first, and then adorn : But peaceful monarchs reign like gods ; while none 110 Dispute, all love, bless, reverence their throne. Tigers and bears, with all the savage host. May boldness, strength, and daring conquest boast ; But the sweet passions of a generous mind Are the prerogative of human-kind. The god-like image on our clay impress' d, The darling attribute which Heaven loves best, In Charles, so good a man and king, we see A double imago of the Deity. Oh! had he more resembled it ! oh, why 120 Was he not stiU more like, and could not die I Now do om- thoughts alone enjoy liis name, And faint ideas of our blessing frame. In Thames, the ocean's darling, England's pride, The pleasing emblem of his reign does gUde : Thames, the support and glory of our isle. Richer than Tagus or Egyptian Nile, Though no rich sand in him, no pearls are found. Yet fields rejoice, his meadows laugh around ; Less wealth his bosom holds, less guUty stores, 130 For he exhausts himself t' enrich the shores : Mild and serene the peaceful current flows, No angry foam, no raging surges knows : No dreadful -nTcck upon his banks appears, \ His crystal stream imstain'd by widows' tears, ' His channel strong and easy, deep and clear ; No arbitrary inundations sweep The ploughman's hopes and life into the deep ; The even waters the old limits keep ; ' But oh ! he ebbs, the smUing waves decay, HO (For ever, lovely stream, for ever stay !) To the black sea his silent coiu'se does bend, AATaere the best streams, the longest rivers, end. His spotless waves there imdistinguish'd pass. None see how clear, how hoimtcous, sweet, he was. No difference now (though late so much) is seen 'Twixt him, fierce Rhino, and the impetuous Seine. ( But lo 1 the joj-ful tide our hopes restores. And dancing waves extend the wid'ning shores. James is our Charles in all things but in name : Thus Thames is daily lost, yet still the same. loO This poein procured for INIontague an invitation to town from the Earl of Dorset and Sii- Charles Sedley, by whom it liad been admired ; the Earl of Dorset was active afterwards as a promoter of the Revolution. When Dryden's " HLnd and Panther" appeared, in 1687, it was promptly followed by a lively and vvitty caricature in the manner of Buck- ingham's "Rehearsal," "The Hind and the Panther Transvers'd to the Story of the Covmtry Mouse and the City Mouse." The writers were Chai'les Mon- tague and Matthew Prioi-, two or three years younger, whom the Earl of Dorset had discovered as a clever Westminster boy reading Horace in the " Rummer Tavern," kept by the lad's uncle and guardian, Samuel Prior. It was, as we have seen, one mark of a gentleman in those days to be prompt in recognition of good wit, and liberal in its encouragement. The Earl of Dorset, tlierefore, sent Matthew Prior, at Ids own cost, to St. John's College, Cambridge, in the same year in which ]\[ontague entered at Trinity. In the year of the Revolution, three collections were made " of the Newest and most Ingenious Poems, Satyrs, Songs, ikc, against Popery and Tp-anny relating to the Times." One example of contemptuous irony will suffice to show how low the king had fallen, when he was trusting to the sujaport of an armed force on Hounslow Heath, in the year before he was held to have vacated the throne : — - HOUNSLOW HEATH. Near Hampton Com-t there lies a Common, Unknown to neither man nor woman ; The Heath of Hounslow it is styled : A^Tiich never was with blood defiled, Though it has been of war the seat. Now three campaigns, almost complete. Here you may see Great James the Second, (The greatest of our kings he's reckoned !) A hero of such high reno^\'n, Whole nations ti'emble at his frown ; And when he smiles men die away, In transports of excessive joy. A prince of admii-able learning ! Quick wit ! of judgment most discerning ! His knowledge in all arts is such. No monarch ever laiew so much : Not that old blust'ring king of Pontus,' A\Tiom men call learned, to aiiront us. With all his tongues and dialects Could equal him in all respects ; 10 20 1 Mithridates Eupator, according to Cicero the greatest monarch who ever mled. He spoke fluently the lani^iages of twenty-five nations ; he also invented a famous antidote against poison, of which he took a dose every morning, and which was called after him, Mith- ridatium. Serenus Samonicus says that when Pompey took the baggTige of this famous king he was suii^rised to find that his antidote consisted only of twenty leaves of me, a little salt, two walnuts, and two figs. The medicine called Mithridate in later time was made up from snch a prescription as might drive a modem dmggist mad. There were various proportions of about fifty veg'etable gums, seey Jeremy Collier's " Short View of the Im- morality and Profaneness of the Stage." There was gross wilting by small poets whose ephemeral fame has come down to us with their books ; and there was a stifling fog of French-classical criticism, in which none but the most vigorous ■\vit could draw breath heartily. But the native vigour was there also to assert itself. With Daniel Defoe, who had written pamphlets in the time of James II., and who became conspicuous in literature through his rhjones of " The True Born Englishman" in the latter days of William III., our stream of literature took a new bend in its coui-se, and began to broaden into the great exjianse now about us. The French-classical influence long weakened the tone of cun-ent criticism, and formed the style of courtly fastidious second-rate writers, who looked only on the polite world for their public. But with Defoe we begin the renewal of a race of greater men who dealt with essentials of life, as all true thinkers do. They sjioke straiglit home to the main body of the people, created by degrees a more national audience, and wrote under influence of a sense that they had to touch the minds and hearts of Englishmen at large. Their matter rose in worth, their manner became more direct, and there was gradual paling of French-classical moonshine in the dawn of what may be called an English Popular Influence. It was, indeed, such influence of the people at large upon its writers that had helped to give power to the Eliza- bethan drama. Successive stages of this change will be observed more readily in illustrations of our jirose literature. Steele and Addison were becoming young men dui'mg William III.'s reign, and each at the end of this reign was upon the threshold of his literary life ; Steele was then ready to follow De Foe's lead, and help his friend Addison into the work by which he served his countrymen and vtm his fame. Daniel Foe, a Dissenter's son, was born in 1661, and after training at a good school for Dissenters became a factor in the hosiery trade. H(i was dis- tinguished from his father, who lived long, by constant use of his Christian name or its initial, and it has been reasonably suggested that a playful impulse led to the transformation of D. Foe into De Foe, From the first, De Foe eared intensely for the issue of the contest that led to the Revolution of 1688. He joined Monmouth in insurrection, he wrote pamphlets upon vital questions in the reign of James II., he was heart and soul with the Revolution, and when, towards the close of William III.'s reign, a poem called the " Foreigners " echoed the cry then common agamst the King, who for men like Defoe and j'oung Steele personifled the blessing of the Revolution, Defoe re})lied in 1701 with his satire called "The True "Bora Englislnuau." Of this many thousands TO A.D. 1727.] SHORTER POEMS. 347 wei-e sold in the streets, and it turned the guns of the adverse satirists with steady aim upon tliem- selves. Defoe, though a great master in prose, achieved in verse no more than the best doggrel in the woi-Id, sprinkh-d with lines instinct with the vigour of a man of genius who deals with realities and gi\-es his whole mind to them. The opening of " The True Born Englishman " is thoroughly characteristic : — FIRST LINES OF " THE TRUE BORN ENGLISHMAN. Whorovor God erects a house of jjrayer, The devil always builds a chapel there : And 'twill be found upon examination, The latter has the largest congregation ; For ever since he first debauched the mind. He made a perfect conquest of mankind. With uniformity of service, he Reigns with a general aristocracy. No nonconforming sects distm-b his reign, For of his yoke there's very few complain ; He knows the genius and the inclination. And matches proper sins for ev'ry nation. He needs no standing army government ; He always rules us by our own consent ; His laws are easy, and his gentle sway Makes it exceeding pleasant to obey. The list of his \'ice-gerents and commanders Outdoes your C;psars or your Alexanders; They never fail of his infernal aid, And he's as certain ne'er to be betray' d. Thro' all the world they spread his vast command. And Death's eternal empire is maintain' 10 20 Dry den's career had just closed when " The True Born Englishman " was written. He translated Virgil in William's reign, and at the close of his life, in his " Fables," showed the light of his genius nndimmed. Though true to the fallen cause, he was recognised in the first years after our Revolution as beyond question the great English poet of that time. Pope was born when the Stuai-ts were dethroned, in 1688, and was a boy who wrote verse and worship])ed Dry den. When at school in London, he is said to have gone where he might see John Dryden before he passed away. Doctor Richard Blaekmore, a physician, who became Sir Richard in 1097, wrote an epic of "Prince Arthur" in 169.5, and an epic of "King Arthur" in 1097, besides other verse, in which he made creditable endeavours to restore the tone of literature. We may, therefore, respect his good intentions. A much better poet was John Pomfret, a clergyman, who was born in 1007, and died in 1703. Pomfret's "Choice," first published in 1699, was accounted one of the best poems of its day, and remained very popular throughout the eighteenth century. It is here given, as corrected by the author — who is said only to be " By a Person of Quality " — for the fourth edition, published in 1701, a pamphlet of six leaves. Pecu- liarities of spelling, jnnictuation, and initial ca]iitals are retained for illustration of the printed English of that time.' * Emiiliatic words as well lis nouns begin with capitals ; sometimes the capital is omitted accidentally wliere due. Punctuation is usua'ly THE CHOICE. I. IF Heav'n the gKiteful Liberty wou'd give. That I might chuse my Method how to live : And AU those Hours propitious Fate shou'd lend, In Missful Ease and Satisfaction spend. Near some fair Town I'd have a private Seat, B\iilt uniform, not little nor too great. Better, if on a rising Ground it stood. Fields on this side, on that a Neighb'ring Wood. It shou'd within no other Things contain. But what are Useful, Necessary, Plain : 10 Mothinks, 'tis Nauseous, and I'd ne'er nnduro The needless Pomp of gawdy Furniture : A little Garden, grateful to the Eye, And a cool Rivulet run Murmm'ing by : On whose delicious Banks a stately Row Of shady Lymes, or Sycamores, shou'd grow. At th' end of which a silent Study plae'd, Shou'd with the noblest Avithors there bo grac'd. Horace and Virgil, in whose mighty Lines, Immortal Wit, and solid Learning Shines. 20 Sliurp Juvenal, and am'rous Ovid too, WIio all the turns of Loves soft Passion knew : He, that with Judgment reads his charming Lines, In which strong Art, with stronger Nature joyns. Must grant, his Fancy do's the best Excel : His Thoughts so tender, and exprest so well ; With all those Moderns, Men of steady Sense, Esteem' d for Learning, and for Eloquence : In some of These, as Fancy shou'd advise, I'd always take my Morning Exercise. 30 For siu-e, no Minutes bring us more Content, Than those in pleasing useful Studies spent. I'd have a Clear and Competent Estate, That I might live Genteelly, but not Great. As much as I could moderately spend, A little more sometimes t' oblige a Friend. Nor shou'd the Sons of Poverty Repine Too much at Fortune, they shou'd taste of Jline ; And all that Objects of true Pity were, Shou'd be reliev'd with what my Wants cou'd spare ; 40 For what our Maker has too largely giv'n, Shou'd be retiu-n'd in gratitude to Heav'n. A frugal Plenty shou'd my Table spread. With healthful, not luxurious Dishes, fed : Enough to satisfy, and something more To feed the Stranger, and the Neighb'ring Poor. Strong Meat indulges Vice, and pampering Food Creates Diseases, and inflan>es the blood. But what's sufficient to make Natirre Strong, And the bright Lamp of Life continue long, CO I'd freely take, and as I did possess The bounteous Author of my Plenty bless. I'd have a little Cellar, Cool, and Neat, With Humming Ale, and Virgin Wine Kepleat. bad during tbe period of French influence iii«n our literature : there are too many large stops in the reader's way. This fault secma to liave come of contact with the style of many French writers who think they are pithy if they speak in jerks. 348 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1C89 60 Wine whets the Wit, improves its Native Force, And jjives a pleasant Flavour to Discourse; By making all our Spirits Debonair, Thi-ows o£E the Lees, the Sedemcnt of Care. But as the greatest Blessing Heaven lends Maybe debauch' d, and serve ignoble Ends; So, but too oft, the Grapes refreshing Juice, Does many mischievous Effects produce, My House, shou'd no such rude Disorders know, As from high Drinking consequently flow. Nor wou'd I use what was so Idndly giv'n, To the dishonour of Indulgent Heav'n. If any Neighbour came ho shou'd be free, \ Us'd with respect, and not Tncasy be, J In my Retreat, or to himself, or me. ' What Freedom, Prudence, and Right Reason give, 70 All Men, may with Impimity receive : But the least swerving from theii- Rules too much ; For what's forbidden Us, 'tis Death to touch. That Life might be more comfortable yet. And all my Joys rcfin'd, sincere and great, I'd chuse two Friends, whose Company wou'd be A great Advance to my Felicity. WoU born, of Humoui-s suited to my own ; Discreet, and Men as well as Books have known. Brave, Gen'rous, Witty, and exactly fi-ee 80 Fi-om loose Behaviour, or Formality. Airy, and Prudent, Merry, but not Light, Quick in discerning; and in Judging Right ; Secret they shou'd be, faithful to their Trust, In Reasoning Cool, Strong, Temperate and Just. Obliging, Open, without huffing. Brave ; Brisk in gay Talking, and in sober Grave. Close in Dispute, but not tenacious, try'd By solid Reason, and let that decide ; Not prone to Lust, Revenge, or envious Hate ; 90 Nor busy Medlers with Intrigues of State. Strangers to Slander, and sworn Foes to Spight, Not Quarrelsome, but Stout enough to Fight : Loyal and Pious, Fiiends to Ciesar true. As dying Martyrs to their Maker too. In their Society I cou'd not miss, A permanent, sincere, substantial Bliss. Wou'd bounteous Heav'n once more indulge, I'd cliuse (For, who wou'd so much Satisfaction lose, As Witty Nymphs in Conversation give) 100 Near some obliging Modest-Fair to live ; For there's that sweetness in a Female Mind, Which in a Man's we cannot find ; That by a secret, but a pow'rful Art, j Winds up the Spring of Life, and do's impart Fresh Vital Heat to the transported Heart. I'd have her Reason, and her Passions sway. Easy in Company, in private Gay. Coy to a Fop, to the Deserving free, Still constant to her self, and just to me. 110 She shou'd a Soul have for great Actions fit. Prudence, and Wisdom to direct her Wit. Courage to look bold danger in the Face ; Not Fear, but only to be proud, or base : Quick to advise by an Emergence prest. To give good Counsel, or to take the best. I'd have th" Expressions of lier Thoughts be such, She might not seem Reserv'd, nor talk too much ; ) That shows a want of Judgment and of Sense : More than enough, is but Impertinence. 120 Her Conduct Regular, her Mirth Refin'd, Ci\il to Strangers, to her Neighbours kind. Averse to Vanity, Revenge, and Pride, In all the Methods of Deceit untry'd: So faithful to her Friend, and good to all. No Censure might upon her Actions fall. Then wou'd e'en Envy be compell'd to say. She goes the least of Womankind astray. To this fair Creature I'd sometimes retire. Her Conversation wou'd new Joys inspire, 130 Give Life an Edge so keen, no surly Care Wou'd venture to assault my Soul, or dare Near my Retreat to hide one secret Snare. But so Divine, so noble a Repast, I'd seldom, and with Moderation taste. For highest Cordials all their Virtue lose. By a too frequent, and too bold an use ; And what would cheer the Spirits in distress. Ruins our Health when taken to Excess. I'd be concera'd in no litigious Jarr, 140 Belov'd by all, not vainly popular : Whate'er Assistance I had pow'r to bring T' oblige my Country, or to serve my King. Whene'er they call'd, I'd readily afford. My Tongue, my Pen, my Coun.sel, or my Sword.. Law Suits I'd shun with as much Studious Care, As I wou'd Dens, where hungxy Lyons are; And rather put up Injuries, than be A Plague to him, who'd be a Plague to me. I value Quiet, at a Price too great, 150 To give for my Revenge so dear a Rate : For what do we by all our Bustle gain, But counterfeit delight for real Pain .** If Heav'n a date of many years wou'd give, Thus I'd in Pleasure, Ease, and Plenty live. And as I near approach the Verge of Life, Some kind Relation (for I'd have no Wife) Shou'd take upon him all my Worldly Care, While I did for a better State prepare. Then I'd not be with any trouble vext, 160 Nor have the Evening of my Da\'s perplext. But by a silent, and a peaceful Death, Without a Sigh, Resign my Aged Breath : And when committed to the Dust, I'd h.ave Few Tears, but Friendly dropt into my Grave. Then wou'd my Exit so propitious be. All Men would wish to live and dye like me. As Pomfret's ideal of happy life excluded a wife, there was a companion jiieoe published by another writer, called " The Virtuous Wife. A Poem. In Answer to the Choice, That would have no Wife. Containing, I. The A-^irtuous Wive's Character. II. Her Person. III. Her Parts. IV. Her Religion. V. Her Temper. VI. Her Conduct. VII. "Her Conversation." This answer was advertised on the back of the last leaf of this fourth edition of " The Choice." Garth's " Dispensary," ])ublis;hed in 1099, will be described among the longer Eiiglish poems, and the TO 4.D. 1727.] SHORTER POEMS. 349 place of Steele and Addison is among prose- writers, who will be ilhistrated in another volume. Addison wrote verse, and had received from the Lord Keeper Somers and from Charles Montague a pension to enable him to prepare himself for jiolitical service when, in 1701, he addressed to Charles Montague a " Letter from Italy," of which Dr. Johnson said that it "has been always praised, but has never been praised beyond its merit. It is more correct with less appearance of labour, and more elegant with less api)earancu of ornament, than any other of his poems." A LETTER FROM ITALY. To the Right Hunotirnblt' Charles Lord Halifax, While you, my lord, the rural shades admire. And from Britannia's public posts retire, Nor longer, her ungrateful sons to please. For her advantage sacrifice your ease ; lie into foreign realms my fate conveys. Through nations fruitful of inmiortal lays. Where the soft season and inviting clime Conspire to trouble your repose with rhyme. For wheresoe'er I turn my ravish' d eyes, Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise, 1 Poetic fields encompass me around, And still I seem to tread on classic ground ; For here the Muse so oft her harp has strung. That not a mountain rears its head unsung ; Eenown'd in verse each shady thicket grows. And ev'ry stream in heavenly numbers flows. How am I pleas'd to search the hills and woodo For rising springs and celebrated floods ! To view the Nar, tumultuous in his course. And trace the smooth Clitumuus to his source, 20 To see the !Mincio draw his wat'ry store Through the long windings of a fruitful shore. And hoary Albula's infected tide O'er the warm bed of smoking sulphur glide. Fir'd with a thousand raptures I survey Ei-idanus through flowr'y meadows stray. The king of floods ! that rolling o'er the plains The tow' ring Alps of half then- moisture drains, And proudly swoln ■nith a whole winter's snows. Distributes wealth and plenty where he flows. 30 Sometimes, misguided by the tuneful throng, I look for streams immortahs'd in song. That lost in silence and oblivion lie, (Dumb are their fountains and their channels dry) , Yet run for ever by the JIuse's skill. And in the smooth description murmur still. Sometimes to gentle Tiber I retire. And the fam'd river's empty shores admire, That destitute of strength dci-ives its course From thrifty urns and an unfruitful source, 40 Yet, sung so often in poetic lays, With scorn the Danube and the Nile surveys ; So high the deathless Muse exalts her theme 1 Such was the Bojtic, a poor inglorious stream, Tliat in Hibernian vales obscurely stray' d. And unobser\-'d in wild meanders play'd. Till by your lines and Nassau's sword renown'd,' Its rising billows through the world resound, MTicre'er the hero's godlike acts can pierce. Or where the fame of an immortal verse. oO * Halifax's poem was a somewhat ambiticu3 one in the form of " An Oh, could the Muse my ravish'd breast inspire With warmth like yours, and raise an equal fire, Unnumber'd beauties in my verse should shine, And Virgil's Italy should j-ield to mine ! Sic how the golden groves around me smile. That shun the coast of Britain's stoi-my islo. Or when transplanted and prcserv'd with care, Curse the cold clime and starve in nortlicrn air. Here kindly warmth their mounting juice feniK.-nts To nobler tastes and more exalted scents : 60 Ev'n the rough rocks with tender myrtle bloom. And trodden weeds send out a rich perfume. Bear me, some god, to Baia's gentle seats. Or cover me in Umbria's green retreats. Where western gales eternally reside. And all the seasons lavish all their pride. Blossoms, and fruits, and flowers together rise, And the whole year in gay confusion lies. Immortal glories in my mind revive. And in my soul a thousand passions strive, 70 When Rome's exalted beauties I descry Magnificent in piles of ruin lie. An amphitheatre's amazing height Here fills my eye with terror and delight. That on its public shows unpeopled Kome And held uncrowded nations in its womb : Here pillars rough with sculptiu-e pierce the skies. And here the proud triumphal arches rise, Where the old Romans' deathless acts displayed Theii' base degenenvte progeny upbraid ; 80 Whole rivers here forsake the fields below. And wond'ring at their height through airy diannels flow. Still to new scenes my wand' ring Muse retires, And the dumb show of breathing rocks admires, Where the smooth chisel all its force has shown, And soften' d into flesh the rugged stone. In solemn silence, a majestic band. Heroes, and gods, and Roman consuls stand, Stem tyrants, whom then- cruelties renown, And emperors in Parian marble frown, 90 While the bright dames, to whom they humbly sued, StiU show the charms that their proud hearts subdued. Fain would I Raphael's godlike art rehearse. And show th' immortal labours in my verse Where from the mingled strength of shade and light A new creation rises to my sight. Such heavenly figures from his pencil flow. So warm with life his blended colours glow. From theme to theme with secret pleasur'e tost. Amidst the soft variety I'm lost : 100 Here pleasing au-s my ravish'd soul confoimd With circling notes and labyrinths of sound ; Here domes and temples rise in distant views, And opening palaces invite my muse. How has kind Heaven adorn'd the hajipy land. And scatter'd blessings with a wasteful hand ! But what avail her unexhausted stores. Her blooming mountains, and her sunny shores, Epistle to the Ripht Honourable Charles, Eirl of Dorset and Midtllc- sex, occasioned by his Majesty's V ctory in Irelniul." *' See, see, iii)on the banks of Boyne he stands, Bv liis own view adjustius his comuinuds ; Calm and serene the armdd coast surveys, And in cool thout,'hts the ditf'rent cli nces weijyhs. Then, fired witli Fame, and ea?er of renown. Resolves to end the War and fix the Throne." 350 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d, 1702 110 no With all the gifts that heav'n and earth impart, The smiles of Nature, and the charms of Art, While proud oppression in her valleys reigns, And tyranny usurps her happy plains ? The ]ioor inhabitant beholds in vain Tlie redd'ning orange and the swelling grain; Joyless he sees the growing oils and wines, And in the myrtle' s fi-agrant shade repines ; Starves, in the midst of Nature's hoimty curst. And in the loaded vineyard dies for thirst. Liberty, thou goddess heav'nly bright. Profuse of bliss, and pregnant with delight I Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign. And smiling Plenty leads thy wanton train ; Eas'd of her load Subjection grows more light, And Poverty looks cheerful in thy sight ; Thou mak'st the gloomy face of Nature gay, Giv'st beauty to the sun, and pleasure to the day. Thee, goddess, thee, Britannia's isle adores ; How has she oft exhausted all her stores, How oft in fields of death thy presence sought. Nor thinks the mighty prize too dearly bought I 130 On foreign mountains may the sun refine The grape's soft juice, and mellow it to wine. With citron groves adorn a distant soil. And the fat olive swell with floods of oil : We envy not the wai'mer clime, that lies In ten degrees of more indulgent skies. Nor at the coarseness of oui- heav'n repine. Though o'er om- heads the frozen Pleiads shine : 'Tis liberty that crowns Britannia's isle. And makes her ban-en rocks and her bleak mountains smile. HO Others with tow' ring piles ma)' please the sight, And in their proud aspiring domes delight ; A nicer touch to the streteh'd canvas give, Or teach their animated rocks to live : 'Tis Britain's care to watch o'er Europe's fate. And hold in balance each contending state. To threaten bold presmnptuous kings with war. And answer her afflicted neighbour's pray'r. The Dane and Swede, rous'd up by tierce alarms. Bless the wise conduct of her pious amis ; 1 oO Soon as her fleets appear their terrors cease. And all the northern world lies bush'd in peace. Th' ambitious Ciaul beholds with secret dread Her thunder aim'd at his aspiring head, And fain her godlike sons would disunite By foreign gold, or by domestic spite ; But strives in vain to conquer or divide "WTiom Nassaii's arms defend and counsels guide. Fir'd with the name, which I so oft have found The distant climes and diff'rent tongues resound, IGO I bridle in my struggling muse with pain. That longs to launch into a bolder strain. But I've already troubled you too long. Nor dare attempt a more advent'rous song. Jly humble verse demands a softer theme, A painted meadow, or a pvirling stream ; Unfit for heroes, whom immortal lays. And lines like Virgil's, or like yours, should praise. INIatthew Prior, eight years older than Addison, wlio had begun Ins career in literature by joining Mon- tague in ridicule of Dryden's "Hind and Panther," was also being provided for in diplomatic life, an J secured high fame as a poet in the reign of Queen Anne, to which we may now pass. Prior had been made a gentleman of the bedchamber to King William, and employed by him as secretary to more than one embassy. It is said that when in Paris Le Brun's pictures of the victories of Louis XIV. were shown to him, and he was asked whether the King of England's palace had the like to show. Prior's answer was, " The monuments of my master's actions are to be seen everywhere but in his own house." Prior became also a Commissioner of Trade, and in 1701 entered Parliament as member for East Grin- stead. Under Queen Anne Prior was jioet and politician. Acting with the Tories, he was sent to Paris in 1711 on a secret mission to arrange jjre- liminaries for the peace of Utrecht. With the history of this peace his name is associated. He rose with the Tories at the end of Anne's reign, and was for the last year virtually her ambassador at Paris. Matthi:\v Pkior. From his " Foetus " {1725). After Anne's death Prior fell with tlie Tories, and spent the rest of his life till 1721 in retirement, with no fixed income except from the fellowship of his college, which he had retained with a sense that days might come when he would have to live on it. Among Prior's poems is this clever epitome of life slipped through, its time iniused : — AN EPITAPH. Interred beneath this marble stone, Lie sauntering Jack and idle Joan. While rolling threescore years and one Did roimd this globe their courses run ; If himian things went ill or well ; If changing empires rose or fell ; The morning past, the evening came. And found this couple still the same. They walked and ate, good folks : what then : Why then they walked and ate again : 1 They soundly slept the night aw-ay : They did just nothing all the day : And having buried children four. Would not take pains to try for more. TO i.D. 1727.] SHORTER POEMS. 351 Nor sister either had, nor hrother ; They seemed just tally'd for each other. Theii' moral and economy Most perfectly they mside agree : Each virtue kept its projier boimd, Nor tresjiass'd on the other's ground. 20 Kor fame nor ccnsm-o they regarded : They neither punished nor rewarded. He cared not what the footmen did : Her maids she neither praised nor chid : So every servant took his cour.se, And bad at first, they all grew worse. Slothful disorder fiUed his stiihle ; And sluttish plenty decked her table. Their beer was strong ; their wino vcas port ; Their meal was large; theii' grace was short. 30 They gave the poor the remnant-me.at, Just when it grew not fit to eat. They paid the church and parish rate ; And took, but read not the receipt : For which they claimed their Sunday's duo, Of slumbering in an upper pew. No man's defects sought they to know ; So never made themselves a foe. No man's good deeds did they commend ; So never raised themselves a friend. 40 Nor cherished they relations poor : Tliat might decrease their present store ; Nor barn nor house did they repair : That might oblige their future heir. They neither added nor confounded ; They neither wanted nor abounded. Each C'hristmas they accomits did clear, And wound their bottom round the year. Nor tear nor smile did they employ At news of public grief or joy. 50 WTien bells were rung, and bonfires made. If asked, they ne'er denied their aid : Their jug was to the ringers carried, AN'hoever either died or married. Their billet at the fire was found, AMioever was deposed or crowned. Nor good, nor bad, nor fools, nor wise ; Tliey would not learn, nor could advise. Without love, hatred, joy, or fear. The)' led a kind of as it wei'o ; 60 Nor wished, nor cared, nor laughed, nor cried : And so they lived ; and so they died. Prior's transposition of " The Nut-brown Maid " into the sort of poem that our age does not agree with hi.s in thinking Ijeautiful, is too long to be given as an example of the tedionsness of verse bewigged. The fresh vigour of " The Nut-lirown Maid " is not in Piior's "Henry and Emma." Henry of tue " Augustan age of English litei-ature " wore a wig, no doubt, in the imagination of his poet, and Emma's eyebrows ma}' have been of motise-skin. Prior has several epigiums on that part of a lady's dress : — A REASONABLE AFFLICTION. From her own native France as old Alison past, She reproached English Nell with neglect or with malice, Tliat the slattern liad left, in the huiTy and haste, Her lady's complexion and cj'c-brows at Calais. ANOTHER. Her eyebrow-box one morning lost, (The best of folks are oftcnest crossed) Sad Helen thus to .Jeiuiy said. Her careless but afilicted maid ; " Put me to bed then, wretched Jane ! Alas ! when shall I rise again ? I can behold no mortal now : For what's an eye without a brow 'r " ON THE SAME SUBJECT. In a dark comer of the house Poor Helen sits, and sobs and cries ; She will not see her loving spouse. Nor her more dear picquet -allies : Unless she finds her eyebrows. She'll e'en weep out her eyes. ON THE SAME. Helen was just slipt into bed, Her eyebrows on the toilet lay, Away the kitten with them fled. As fees belonging to her prey. For this misfortune careless Jane, Assure yourself, was loudly rated ; And madam getting up again, With her o\\ n hand the Mouse-trap baited. On little things, as sages write. Depends our human joy or son-ow : If we don't catch a mouse to-night, Alas ! no eyebrows for to-mon'ow. Queen Anne's time in literature is riglitly called Augustan, inasmuch as one of its characteristics was mtich talk abotit Augustus. Under Frencli-cLussical influence it professed to take the Latin writers of the Atigustan age for models, began to affect strongly the Latin side of English, and to look on home- liness as "low." There were great writers in Queen Anne's day, chiefly prose writers, but they were all men who were strong enough to break bounds — Defoe, Swift, Steele, Addison, tliougli Addi- son was only drawn by the strong ai-m of his friend Steele into tlie jiatli by wliich he foinid liis way to our aflections. Yet he to tlie last yiehled so much to the fashion of the time that when lie souglit to win goodwill to " t'hevy Chase " and the " Babes in the Wood," and justify his admiration of those ballads, he sought to do it by finding parallels for lines in them from Virgil and Horace. Tliere had been attention jiaid by several poets to the lines of the Emperor Adrian which had suggested Flatman's " Thouglit of Death " already quoted. Prior tried his hand at the same subject : — APRIANI ."IIORIENTIS. Al) AXIM.\M SIAM. AnimuLa, vagula, blandula, Hospes Comesque Corporis, Qua2 nunc abibis in loca, Pallidula, rigida, nudula ? Nee, ut soles, dabis joca. 352 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1702 BY MONSIKUR PONTENELLE. Ma petite Ame, ma Miguonne, Tu t'en vas done, ma Fille, et Dicu s(,'a(,'hc ou Tu vas Tu pars seulette, nue, et treniblotante, Helas ! Que deviendi'a ton huniciu' foIi(,'houne ? Que deviendront tant de jolis ebats 'i IMITATED BY PRIOR. Poor little, pretty, flutt'ring thing, Must we no longer live together ? And dost thou prune thy trembling wing, To take thy ilight thou know'st not whither 't Thy humorous vein, thy pleasing folly Lies all negleeted, all forgot : And pensive, wav"ring, melancholy. Thou di-ead'st and hop'st thou know'st not what. Young Po])e followed suit, contributed a letter about Adrian's lines to the Spectator for Novem- ber 10th, 1712, and presently afterwards made this metrical version of his own : — Ah, fleeting Spu'it ! wand' ring fire. That long hast warm'd my tender breast, Must thou no more this frame inspu-e No more a pleasing, cheerful guest ? Whither, ah wldther art thou flying I To what dark, undiscover'd shore." Thou see'st all trembhng, shiv'ring, djang. And Wit and Humour are no more. After a private note or two on this subject had passed, Steele, then about to drop the Spectator and set up the Guardian, \vi-ote to Pope on the 4tli of December, " This is to desire of you that you would please to make an ode as of a clieerful, dying spirit ; that is to say, the Emperor Adrian's aitlmula vagula put into two or tlii'ee stauzas for music." Pope replied -with the three stanzas known as THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL. Vital spark of heav'nly flame ! Quit, oh quit this mortal frame ; Trembling, hoping, hng'ring, flying. Oh the pain, the bliss of dying ! Cease, fond Nature, cease thy strife, And let mo languisli into life. Hark ! they whisper ; angels say. Sister spirit, come away. What is this absorbs me quite ':" Steals my senses, shuts my sight, 10 Drowns my spirits, draws my breath ? Tell me, my soul, can this be death ': The world lecedes ; it disappears ! Heav'n opens on my eyes ! my ears With sounds seraphic ring : Lend, lend yoiu' wings ! I mount I I lly ! Grave ! where is thy victory ? O Death ! where is thy sting ? Pope sent this to Steele, with a note, saying, " I do not send you word I will do, but have already (lone the thing you desired of me. You have it, as Cowley calls it, just warm from the brain. It came to me the first moment I waked this morning. Yet, 3'ou will see, it was not so absolutely insjjiration, but that I had in my head not only the verses of Adrian, but the fine fragment Sappho, &c." Here we must take " ifcc." to be Pope's alias for Thomas Flatman.' Alexander Pope was born in May, 1688, only child of a London linendraper, who retired from business after the boy's birth, and lived at Binfield, on the bordeins of Windsor Forest, and about nine miles from Windsor. Pope's father and mother were Roman Catholics. He was a child of delicate health and precocious genius, taught at home by a priest who lived \\'ith the family, and for a shoi't time at two small Roman Catholic schools — one at Twyford, the other in London. He came home from the second of these schools a boy of twelve or thirteen, in forwardness another Cowley, with already a develojied skill in verse. These lines, the earliest we have of his, are said to have been written when he was a boy of twelve : — ODE ON SOLITUDE. Happy the man whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound. Content to breathe his native air In his own ground. Whose herds with milk, ^^■hosc fields with bread. Whose flocks supply him with attire. Whose trees in summer yield hiin shade. In winter fire. Blest, who can unconcern' dly find Hours, days, and years slide soft away, 10 In health of body, peace of mind, Quiet by day. Sound sleep by night, study and ease, Togetlier mixt, sweet recreation. And innocence, which most does please A\'ith meditation. Thus let me Uve, unseen, unknown. Thus uiilameuted let me ilio. Steal from the world, and not a stone TeU where I lie. 20 Pope worked at home in his own way, teaching himself, and his father encouraged him in wi-iting verse. He imitated in verse ancient and modern poets, learning the mechanism of his art from his predecessors ; as the young poet, not less than the young blacksmith, must. His " Pastorals," written in 1704, at the age of sixteen, were publishcil in May, 1709, at the age of twenty-one, in Tonson's " Miscellany." In the same volume was his version, from Homer, of the " Episode of Sarpedon ;" and his " January and May," which modernised a tale of Chaucer's, in imitation of Dryden, who, at the close of his life, published modernised tales from Chaucer in his "Fables." In 1711, at the age of twenty- three. Pope published his " Essay on Criticism," writing about the writing about writing, as the taste of the time impelled. Weaknesses of expres- 1 See iia^-e 311. TO A.D. ITi?.] SHORTER POEMS. 353 sion ill tlie first, edition of this poem were afterwards expunged, but at its weakest it surpassed Boileau, from wlioni Poi)e had the chief impulse to that form of thought. In 1712, when Pope's age was twenty -four, appeared his " Rape of the Lock " in its first form, in two cantos, without any " machinery " of sylphs. It was then published in Lintot's " Miscellany," which also contained translations of his from Statins aud Ovid. In its second form — as we now have it — expanded into five cantos, the " Rape of the Lock " appeared in 1714 as a separate publication. The "Essay on Criticism" and the "Rape of the Lock" will be illustrated in the volume set apart for larger works. These and the other pieces named, with the "Messiah," contributed in 1712 to No. 378 of the SpectcUor, "Windsor Forest," published early in 1713, and another poem, derived from Chaucer, " The Temple of Fame," form the main part of Pope's work in the first of the three periods of his literary Alexander Pope. Fi-om the Portrait engraved by Vertue, life, that which fixlls within Queen Aniie's reign. The second period corresponds pretty closely with the reign of George I., in which Pope made money by his translations of Homer, and found it less profitable to edit Shakespeare. In the reign of George II., until Pope's death in 1744, we have the third period of his poetry, with riper character and deeper thought, that accords not only with gro\vt.h of his ovra mind, but also with the advancing movement of thought in the eighteenth century. To that we shall come presently, when a little more has been shown of the verse literature of Queen Anne's reign, to which we may now join that of the reign of George I., from 1714 to 1727. Jonathan Swift, over twenty years old when Pope was born, and in later life one of Pope's best friends, ^vl■ote vigorous verse, although his fame rests on his 45 prose : we reserve, therefore, the fuller illustration of his genius. One short iioem of his, written in Queen Aiuie's reign, '• Baucis and Philemon," may serve to illustrate not only liis skill, but the power that could take a friend's weak counsel gracefully in what was no more to hun than pleasant trifling. Swift's " Baucis and Philemon," as it has come down to us, is good ; but his biographer, John Forster,' having found a copy of the poem as Swift wrote it, shows how much better it was before he assented to his friend Addison's suggestions for its improvement. Addison's suggestions, in accordance with that weaker tone of criticism in his time from which, as we have seen, he could not wholly free himself, aimed generally at the French polishing of his friend's work. Good as the following poem is, it is worth any one's while to turn to the published volume of John Forster's " Life of Swift," where he may see, now first recovered for us, the unaltered work. Of the lines of this, said Swift, with a touch of pride in his critical friend, " Mr. Addison made me blot out fourscore, add fourscore, and alter fourscore." As Forster wrote, " In the poem printed as it was altered for Addison, the story is very succinctl}' told, ■\vith completeness as of an epigi'am ; . . . as originally written, the naiTative is not so terse or clo.se, but has more detail and a greater wealth of humour." This is the poem as Swift, after dealing with it in accordance with his friend's advice, let it go forth to the world : — BAUCIS AND PHILEMON.- In ancient times, as story tells. The saints would often leave their cella, And stroll ahout, hut hide their quality, To try good people's hospitality. It happened on a winter's night, As authors of the legend write, Two hrothcr hermits, saints hy trade. Taking then- tour in masquerade, Disguised in tattered hahits, went To a small village down in Kent, 10 Where, in the stroller's canting strain, They begged from door to door in vain. Tried every tone might pity win, But not a soul would let them in.'* Our wand'ring saints in woful state, Ti-eatcd at this ungodly rate. Having through aU the \'illage pass'd, ' Died 1876. It is not Swift only who has lost in John Forster his best friend. The wise, wann-hearted wi-iter, the tnie scholar rich in human sympathies, the firmest and the teuderest of friends, speaks to us hencefoi-th only in the laboiu-s of his noble life. 2 BI1UCI.S and Phikmon. The original tale here playfully modernised is in the Eighth Book of Ovid's " Metamori)hoses," where Jove aud Mercury are the originals of the two brother henuits. Finding hospitality ouly in the thatched cottage of the poor old couple, Baucis and Philemon, the gods, after their entertainment, took the old couple to the top of a hill, whence they saw the houses and lands of their imcharitable neighbours all swallowed in a late. Only their little home remained, which expanded to a temple. lu this they served as the priests of Jove, until they were changed into companion trees, hung ever witli fresh garlands hy their worshippers. 3 From Forster's "Life of Swift," in which the ori-ginal draught is now iii'St given, I quote its opening for compai-isou of Swift's free. 354 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1702 To a small cottage came at last AMicrc dwelt a good old honest yeoman, Called in the neighbom-hood I'liilemon, 20 AV'ho kindly did these saints invite In his poor hut to pass the night. And then the hospitable sii-e Bid Goody Baucis mend the fire, While he from out the chimney took A iiiteh of bacon off the hook, And freely from the fattest side Cut out large slices to be fried ; Then stepped aside to fetch 'em drink. Filled a large jug up to the brink, 30 And saw it fairly twice go round ; Yet (what is wonderful) they found 'Twas still replenished to the top. As if they ne'er had touched a di-op ! The good old couple were amazed And often on each other gazed ; For both were frightened to the heart, And just began to cry, "WTiat art ? " Then softly turned aside to view Whether the lights were burning blue. 40 The gentle pilgi-ims, soon aware on 't. Told 'em their calUng and their errant : " Good folks, you need not be afi-aid. We are but saints," the hermits said ; " No hurt shall come to you or yours ; But for that pack of chiudish boors, racy humour, as it came fresll from his mind, with the result of Addison's advice about it : — " It hajjpened on a winter's ui?ht, As authors of the legend wi-ite. Two brother heniiits, saints by trade. Taking their tour in masquerade, Came to a village hard by Rixham, Bagged, and not a groat betwixt 'em. It rained as hard as it could pour. Yet they were forced to walk an hour From house to house, wet to the skin Before one soul would let 'em in. They called at evei-y door — ' Good people ! My comrade's blind, and I'm a creeple ! Here we lie starving in the street, 'Twould grieve a body's heart to see 't. No Christian woidd turn out a beast In such a dreadful night at least ! Give lis but straw, and let us lie In yonder bam to keep us dry ! ' Thus, in the strollers' usual cant They begged relief, which none would gi'ant. No creature valued what they said. One family was gone to bed ; The master bawled out, half asleep, * You fellows, what a noise you keep ! So many beggars pass this way "We can't be quiet, night nor day ; We cannot serve you every one ; Pray take your answer, and be gone ! ' One swore he'd send 'em to the stocks : A third could not forbear his mocks, But bawled as loud as he could roar, * You're on the wrong side of the door ! * One sui-ly clown looked out and said, * I'd fling a brickbat on your head ! You shan't couie here, nor get a sons ! You look like folks would rob a house. Can't you go work, or seive the king ? You blind and lame ? 'Tis no such thing ! That's but a counterfeit sore leg ! For shame ! Two sturdy rascals beg ! If I come down, I'll sijoil your trick. And cure you both with a good stick ! "* Not tit to live on Clu'istian ground. They and then- houses shall be di'own'd ; Whilst you shall see yoiu' cottage rise And grow a chiu'ch before youi' eyes." 50 They scarce had spoke when, fair and soft. The roof began to mount aloft ; Aloft rose every beam and rafter. The heavy wall rose slowly after. The chimney widened and grew higher, Became a steeple with a spire. The kettle to the top was hoist. And there stood fastened to a joist ; But with the upside down, to show Its inclination for below ; 60 In vain, for a superior force. Applied at bottom, stops its course ; Doomed ever in suspense to dwell, 'Tis now no kettle, but a bell. A wooden jack, which had ahnost Lost, by disuse, the art to roast, A sudden alteration feels, Increased by new intestine wheels ; And what exalts the wonder more. The number made the motion slower. 70 The flyer, tho 't had leaden feet, Tm'ned round so quick, you scarce could see 't, But slackened by some secret power. Now hardly moves an inch an hour. The jack and chimney near allied. Had never left each other's side ; The chimney to a steeple grown. The jack would not be left alone. But up against the steeple reared. Became a clock, and still adhered ; 80 And still its love to household cares. By a shrill voice at noon declares. Warning the cook-maid not to burn That roast-meat which it cannot turn. The groaning chair began to crawl Like a huge snail along the wall ; There stuck aloft in public ™w And with small change a pidpit grew. The pon-ingers, that in a row Hung liigh and made a glitt'ring show, 90 To a less noble substance changed. Were now but leathern buckets ranged. The ballads pasted on the wall. Of Joan of France and English Moll, Fail' Rosamond and Robin Hood, The Little Childr-en in tho Wood, Now seemed to look abundance better. Improved in picture, size, and letter ; And high in order placed, describe The heraldry of every tribe. 100 A bedstead of the antique mode, Compact of timber, many a load. Such as our ancestors did use. Was metamorphosed into pews, "Wniicli stiU theii- ancient nature keep, By lodging folks disposed to sleep. The cottage, by such feats as these, Grown to a church by just degi'ces. The hermits then desri-ed their host To ask for what he fancied most. 110 Philemon, having paused awhile, Eetui'ned 'em thanks in homely style, TO A.D. 17-7. J SHORTER POEMS. 35.5 Then said, " My house has gi-own so fine, Mi'thinks I still would call it mine : I'm old, and fain would live at case, Make me the parson, it' you please." Ho spoke, and presently he feels His grazier's coat fall down his heels ; He sees, yet hardly can helieve, Ahout each ann a pudding sleeve ; 120 His waistcoat to a cassock grew, And both assumed a sable hue ; But heing old, continued just As thi'eadlmre, aiid as full of dust. His talk was now of tithes and dues : He smoked his pipe and read the news ; Knew how to preach old sermons next, Vamped in the preface and the text : At chi-ist'nings coidd well act his part. And had the service all by heart ; 130 Wished women might have children fast And thought whose sow had farrowed last ; Against Dissenters would repine. And stood up fimi for right divine ; Found his head tilled with many a system. But classic authors — he ne'er miss'd 'em. Thus ha\'ing furbished up a parson. Dame Baucis next they played theii' farce on. Instead of homespun coifs were seen Good pinners edged with Colberteen ' ; 140 Her petticoat transformed apace. Became black satin flounced with lace. Plain Goody would no longer down, 'Twas Madam in her grogram gown. Philemon was in great sui'prise, And hardl}' could believe his eyes, Amazed to see her look so trim ; And she admired as much at him. Thus, happy in their change of life, Were several years this man and wife, 150 When on a day, which proved theii' last, Discoursing o'er old stories past. They went by chance amidst their talk. To the churchyard to take a walk ; When Baucis hastily cried out, " My dear, I see your forehead sprout ! " "Sprout," quoth the man, " what's this you tell us; I hope you don't believe me jealous : But yet, methinks, I feel it true ; And really, yours is budding too. 160 Nay, now I cannot stir my foot ; It feels as if 'twere taking root." Description would but tire my Muse ; In short, they both were turned to yews. Old Goodman Dobson of the Green Remembers he the trees has seen ; He'll talk of them from noon tiU night, And goes vdth folks to show the sight. On Sundays, after evening prayer. He gathers all the parish therb ; 170 Points out the place of either yew ; Here Baucis, there Philemon grew. * Colberteen, or Colbertaiu. ' Academy of Aruiory,' 1688.' Provmcial Woi'ds.") ' A kind of lace mentioned in Holme's ("HiilliweU's Dictionary of Archaic Till once a parson of our town. To mend his barn cut Baucis down ; At which 'tis hard to be believeil How much the other tree was grieved. Grew scrubby, died a-top, was stunted ; So the next parson stulibrd and burnt it. Dr. Tliomas Paniell, an Irish tliviue, who, in 170-"), at the age of six-and-twenty, became Arclideacon of Clogher, died in 1717 at the age of thirty-eight. He numbered the best wits and poets of Queen Anne's I'eign among his friends, and after liis death Pope collected and jiulilished his jioems, dedicating them in 1721 to Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, who had been his friend. " Such were the notes," said Pope in this dedication — Such were the notes thy once-lov'd poet sung, TiU death imtiniely stop'd his tuneful tongue, O just beheld, and lost! admir'd, and moum'd' With softest manners, gentlest arts, adorn'd ! Blest in each science, blest in ev'ry strain ! Dear to the Muse, to Harley dear — in vain ! For him, thou oft hast bid the world attend. Fond to forget the statesman in the friend ; For S«ift and him dospis'd the farce of state. The sober follies of the wise and gi-eat ; Dextrous, the craving, fawning crowd to quit. And pleas'd to 'scape from flattery to wit. The best of Parnell's jioems is this modern version of a mediajval tale fi'om the "Gesta Romanorum-':" — THE HERMIT. Far in a wild, unknown to public view. From youth to age a reverend hermit grew ; The moss his bed, the cave his hiunlile cell. His food the fruits, his drink the crystal well : Remote from man, with God he passed the days, Prayer all his business, all his pleasure praise. A life so sacred, such serene repose. Seemed heav'n itself, till one suggestion rose : That Vice should triumph. Virtue Vice obey, This sprung some doubt of Providence's sway. 10 His hopes no more a certain prospect boast. And all the tenor of his soul is lost : So when a smooth expanse receives imprest Calm Nature's image on its watery breast, 2 Gesta Emnaiwnun. was the name of a medisBval collection of Latin tales, moralised for the use of preachers, each tale having a reli- £rious " Api>hcatiou " fitted to it. Here, for example, is one of its short stories, with the application in the iisual fonn :—" Saint Augustine tells that by an ancient cnstom emjierors, after death, were laid on a funeral pile and hiimt, and their ashes placed in an urn. But it happened that one of them died whose heart the fire could not touch. This caused astonishment, and all the wise men were summoned to council. The question was put to them, and they said, ' This emperor died intoxicated, and hecause of a latent iwison his heart cannot bum.' When this was understood, they drew the heart from the fire and covered it with theriac [see Note 11, page 21], and at once the poison was expelled. The hejivt, being put back into the flames, was immediately reduced to ashes. Aiyidon fau'. And soft in graceful ringlets waved his hail'. Then near approaching, " Father, hail 1 " he cried ; And " Hail, my son," the reverend sii'e rephed; Words follow' d words, from question answer flowed, And talk of various kind deceived the road ; TiU each with other pleased, and loth to part, Wliile in theii- age they differ, join in heart : 40 Thus stands an aged el a in ivy bound. Thus youthful ivy clasps an elm around. Now sunk the sun ; the closing hour of day Came onward, mantled o'er with sober gray ; Nature in silence bid the world repose : When near the road a stately palace rose. There by the moon tlu-o' ranks of trees they pass. Whose verdure crowned thoii- sloping sides of grass. It chanced the noble master .of the dome StiU made his hoiise the wand' ring stranger's home, 50 Yet still the kindness, from a thii-st of praise. Proved the vain flourish of expensive ease. The pair an-ive ; the liv'ried servants wait ; Then- lord receives them at the pompous gate. The table groans with costly piles of food. And all is more than hospitably good. Then led to rest, the day's long toil they di-own. Deep simk in sleep, and sillc, and heaps of down. At length 'tis moni, and at the dawn of day Along the wide canals the zeph\Ts play ; 60 Fresh o'er the gay pai'tcrres the breezes creep. And shake the neighb'ring wood to banish sleep. Up rise the guests, obedient to the call : An early banquet dcck'd the splendid hall, Eich luscious wine a golden goblet graced. Which the kind master forced the guests to taste. Then pleased and thankful, from the porch they go. And, but the landlord, none had cause of woe ; His cup was vanished ; for in secret guise The younger guest purloined the glittering prize. 70 As one who spies a scrjieut in his way. Glistening and basking in the summer ray. Disordered stops to shim the danger near. Then walks with faintness on, and looks with fear, So seemed the sire when far upon the road The shining spoil his wily partner showed. He stopped with silence, walked with trembling heart. And much he wished, but durst not ask to part : Murm'ring he lifts his eyes, and thinks it hard That generous actions meet a base reward. 80 While thus they pass, the sun his glory shrouds. The changing skies hang out their sable clouds, A sound in ail' presaged approaching rain. And beasts to covert scud across the plain. Warned by the signs, the wand' ring pair retreat. To seek for shelter at a neighb'ring scat. 'Twas built with tm-rets, on a rising ground. And strong, and large, and unimproved aroimd ; Its owner's temper, tim'rous and severe. Unkind and griping, caused a desert there. 90 As near the miser's heavy doors they di'cw. Fierce rising gusts with sudden fiu-y blew ; The nimble lightning mixed with showers began. And o'er their heads loud-rolling thunder ran. Here long they knock, but call or knock in vain. Driven by the wind, and battered by the rain. At length some pity w-armed the master's breast, ('Twas then his thi-eshold first received a guest) Slow creaking turns the door with jealous care. And half he welcomes in the shivering pair. 100 One frugal fagot lights the naked walls. And Natm-o's fervom- thro' their limbs recalls ; Bread of the coarsest sort, with eager wine,' (Each hardly granted) served them both to dine ; And when the tempest first appeared to cease, A ready warning bid them pai-t in peace. With stiU remark the pondering hermit viewed In one so rich, a life so poor and rude ; And why should such (within liimself he cried) Lock the lost wealth a thousand want beside ': 110 But what new marks of wonder soon took place, ■In every settling feature of his face, ^^^len from his vest the young companion bore That cup the generous landlord owned before, And paid profusely with the precious bowl The stinted kindness of this chui-iish soul 1 But now the clouds in airy tumult fly. The sun emerging opes an aziu'c sky : A fresher green the smelling leaves display. And glittering as they tremble, cheer the day : 120 The weather courts them from the poor retreat. And the glad ma,ster bolts the wary gate. ■WTiOc hence they walk, the pilgrim's bosom wrought With all the travail of uncertain thought. His partner's acts without their cause appear, 'Twas there a vice, and seemed a madness here : Detesting that, and pit>-ing this he goes. Lost and confounded with the various shows. Now night's dim shades again involve the sky ; \ Again the wanderers want a place to lie, ' 130 Again they search, and find a lodging nigh, / The soil improved around, the mansion neat. And neither poorly low, nor idly great : 1 Eager u-ine, Freuch " aierre," sliai"p, acid. — " Witli eager com- pouuds we our X'alate urge " (Sliakespeai'e, Souuet 118). SHORTER POEMS. 357 It seemed to speak its master's turn of mind, Content, and not for praise but vii'tue kind. Hither the walkers turn with weary feet, Then bless the mansion, and the master gi-eet. Their greeting fair, bestowed with modest guise. The courteous master hears, and thus replies : " Without a vain, withmit a grudging heart, 140 To Him who gives us all, I yield a part ; From Him you oomc, for Him accept it here, A frank and sober, more than costly cheer." He spoke, and bid the welcome table spread,' Then talked of viituc till the time of bed, ^\^len the grave household round his hall repair, Warned by a bell, and close the hom'S with prayer. At length the world renewed by calm repose Was strong- for toil, the dappled morn arose. Before the pilgrims part, the yoimger crept l.iO Near the closed cradle where an infant slept. And writhed his neck : the landlord's little pride, strange return ! grew black, and gasped, and died. Horror of horrors ! what ! his only son 1 How looked our hermit when the fact was done ? Not hell, though hell's black jaws in sunder part And breathe blue fire, could more assault his heai-t. Confused, and struck with silence at the deed, He flies, but trembling fails to fly with speed. His steps the j-outh pursues. The coimtry lay ICO Perplexed with roads, a servant showed the way. A river crossed the path ; the passage o'er Was nice to fiiul ; the servant trod before. Long amis of oaks an open bridge supplied. And deep the waves beneath the bending glide. The Youth, who seemed to watch a time to sin. Approached the careless guide, and thi'ust him in. Plimging he falls, and lising lifts his head, Then flashing tm-ns, and sinks among the dead. Wild, sparkling rage inflames the father's eyes, 170 He Jjursts the bands of fear, and madly cries, " Detested wretch ! " but scarce Ms speech began, ■When the strange partner seemed no longer man. His youthful face grew more serenely sweet ; His robe tm-ncd white, and flowed upon his feet ; Fair rounds of radiant points invest his hair ; Celestial odours breathe through purpled air ; And wings, whose colours glittered on the day, Wide at his back their gi'adual plumes display. The foi-m ethereal bui-sts upon his sight, 180 And moves in all the majesty of light. Though loud at first the pilgrim's passion grew, Sudden he gazed, and wist not what to do ; Surprise in secret chains his words suspends. And in a calm his settling temper ends. But silence here the beauteous Angel broke, The voice of music ravished as he spoke. " Thy prayer, thy praise, thy life to vice unknown. In sweet memorial rise before the Throne. These charms success in our bright region find, 190 And force an angel down to cabu thy mind ; For this commissioned, I forsook the sky : Nay, cease to kneel — thy fellow-servant I. " Then know the Truth of Government DiWne, And let these scruples be no longer thine. " The Maker justly claims that World He made. In this the Right of Providence is laid ; Its sacred Majesty through all depends On using second means to work His ends. 'Tis thus, witbdiawn in state from human eye, 200 The Power e.xerts His attributes on high. Your actions uses, nor controls your will, And bids the doubting sons of men be still. "What strange events can strike with more surjjrise, Than those which lately struck thy wondering eyes ': Yet taught by those, confess the Almighty just, And where you can't unriddle, leam to trust! " The great, vain man, who far'd on costly food, A\liose life was too luxui'ious to be good ; "WTio made his ivory stands with goblets shine, 210 And forced his guests to morning draughts of wine ; Has. -n-ith the cup, the graceless custom lost. And still he welcomes, but with less of cost. " The mean, suspicious wretch, whose bolted door Ne'er mov'd in dutj' to the wand' ring poor, With him I left the cup, to teach his nund That Heaven can bless, if mortals will be kind. Conscious of wanting worth, he views the bowl, And feels compassion touch his grateful soul. Thus artists melt the sullen ore of lead, 220 With heapmg coals of fire upon Ms head : In the kind warmth the metal learns to glow. And loose from dross, the silver runs below. " Long had our pious friend in virtue trod. But now the child half- weaned his heart from God ; ChUd of his age, for him he lived in pain. And measured back his steps to earth again. To what excesses had Ms dotage run ? But God, to save the father, took the son. To all but thee, in fits he seemed to go, 230 And 'twas my ministry to deal the blow. The poor fond parent, humbled in the dust, Now owns in tears the punishment was just. "But how had all Ms fortune felt a wrack. Had that false servant sped in safety back ': TMs mght his treasm-ed heaps he meant to steal, And what a fund of charity would fail ! " Thus Heaven instructs thy mind. TMs trial o'er, Depart in peace, resign, and sin no more." On sounding pinions here the youth withdi-ew, 240 The sage stood wond'ring as the seraph flew. T'nus looked Elisha. when to mount on high His master took the chariot of the sky ; The fiery pomp ascending left the view ; The prophet gazed, and -svished to follow too. The bentUng hennit here a prayer begun, " Lord ! as in heaven, on earth tliy will be done." Then gladly tm-ning, sought Ms ancient place, And passed a life of piety and peace. 358 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 17)2 Another of Pope's friends was John Gay, who was of his own age, born in 1688, at Barnstaple, in Devon. He began acti\'e life in the shop of a sUk mercer, but published poetry iu 1711 — "Rural Sports " — and iledieated his verse to young Pope. The friendship then began. Gay was taken from the shop, and became Secretary to the Duchess of Monmouth. Afterwards he was taken care of by the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry. When Pope was annoyed at some attentions paid to the " Pastorals " of Ambrose Pliilips that were ■s\-ithheld from his own, tliough both appeared in the same Miscellany,' he suggested to his friend Gay that Philips's "Pastorals" might be caricatured. Pliilips had looked for his ins])U'ation to Spenser's "Shepherd's Calendar" instead of Theocritus or Virgil. This was to be accounted " low," and tlie attempt at an Englisli rustic homeliness was thought open to ridicule. Modern ciitics would say that Ambrose Philips's " Pastorals" were written upon a better principle than Pope's ; but the difference between the jioets made what Philips wrote as a man weaker than what Pope wrote as a boy. Gay, how- ever, had poetry in him, and a sense of natural life under his outward assent to critical myths, so that his caricature of homeliness had touches that went liome to many readers, and his " Shepherd's Week," published in ITl-l, was very popular. This is one of its eclogues, inwoven jjlayfully with superstitions of the country folk : — THURSDAY ; OR, THE SPELL. HOllNELIA. Hobnelia, seated in a dreary vale, In pensive mood rehearsed her piteous tale ; Her piteous tale the winds in si^hs bemoim, And pining Echo answers groan for groan. " I rue the day, a rueful day I trow, The woeful day, a daj' indeed of woe ! When Lubberkin to town his cattle drove, A maiden fine bcdight he hapt to love ; The maiden fine bedight his love retains, And for the \'illage he forsakes the plains. 10 Return, niy Lubberkin, these ditties hear ; Spells will I try, and spells shall ease my care. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, aroimd, around. When first the year I heard the cuckoo sing, And caU with welcome note the budding spring, I straightway set a running with such haste, Deb' rah that won the smock scarce ran so fast ; Till spent for lack of breath, quite weary grown. Upon a rising bank I sat adown, 20 Then doffed my shoe, and by my troth I swear. Therein I spied this yellow frizzled hair, 1 The Miscellany was sixth in a. series hegiui hy Dryden— " Poetical Miscellanies : the Sixth Part, containing a Collection of Original Poems, with several new Translations by the most Eminent Hands. London : Printed for Jacob Tonson, ivithiu Gray's Inn Gate, next Gray's Inn Lane, 1709, where you may have the Five former Parts." The Tolnme opened with " Pastorals, by Mr. Phihps. Printed m the year 1708 ;" and it closed ivith " Pastorals, by Mr. Alexander Pope. Printed in the year 1709." As like to Lubberkin' s in curl and hue, As if upon his comely pate it grew. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground. And turn me thrice around, around, around. At eve last Midsummer no sleep I sought, But to the field a bag of hempseed brought ; I scattered round the seed on every side, And three times in a trembling accent cried : 30 ' This hempseed with my virgin hand I sow, AVho shall my true-love be, the crop shall mow.' I straight looked back, and, if my eyes speak truth, With his keen scj-the behind me came the youth. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, around, around. Last Valentine, the day when birds of kind Their paramours with mutual chiqjings find, I early rose, just at the break of diiy, Before the sun had chased the stars away ; 40 A-field I went, amid the morning dew, To mdk my kine (for so shoidd huswives do) ; Thee first I spied ; and the first swain we see, In spite of fortune, shall our true-love be. See, Lubberkin, each bird his partner take ; And canst thou then thy sweetheart dear forsake ? With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground. And turn me thrice around, around, around. Last May-day fair I searched to find a snail. That might my secret lover's name reveal: .30 Upon a gooseben'y-bush a snail I found, (For always snails near sweetest fruit abound). 1 seized the vermin, whom I quickly sped. And on the earth the milk-white embers spread. Slow crawled the snail, and, if I right can spell. In the soft ashes marked a cmious L. Oh may this wondrous omen lucky prove ! For L is found in Lubberkin and Love. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, around, around. 60 Two hazel-nuts I threw into the flame, And to each nut I gave a sweetheart's name . This with the loudest bounce me sore amazed, That in a flame of brightest colour blazed. As blazed the nut, so may thy passion grow ; For 'twas thy nut that did so brightly glow. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, around, around. As peasecods once I plucked, I chanced to see, One that was closely filled with three times three, 70 ■Which when I cropped I safely home conveyed. And o'er the door the spell in secret laid ; JIv wheel I tiuTied, and sung a ballad new. While from the spindle I the fleeces drew ; The latch moved up, when who shoidd first come in, But, in his proper person, Lubberkin. I broke my yam, surinised the sight to see ; Sure sign that he woidd break his word with me. Eftsoons I joined it ^dth my wonted sleight : So may again his love with mine unite ! 80 TO A.D. 1727.^ SHORTER POEMS. 359 With my sharp heel I tlu-ee times mark the ground, iVnd turn me tlirice around, around, around. This lady-fly 1 take from off the grass, Whose spotted back might scarlet red siu-pass. ' Fly, lady-bii-d, north, south, or east, or west ; Fly where the man is found that I love best.' He leaves my hand ; see 1 to the west he's flown. To call my true-love from the faithless town. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn mo thrice around, around, aroimd. 90 I pare this pippin round and romid again, My shepherd' s name to flourish on the plain, I fling th' imbroken paring o'er my head. Upon the grass a perfect L is read ; Yet on my heart a fairer L is seen Than what the paiing makes upon the green. With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, around, around. This pippin .shall another trial make ; See from the core two kernels bro^NTi I take. 100 This on my cheek for Lubbcrkin is worn ; And Booby clod on t'other side is borne. But Boobj'clod soon di-ops upon the gTOimd, A certain token that his love's unsound ; "While Lubberkin sticks firmly to the last : Oh were his Ups to mine but joined so fast I With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground, And turn me thrice around, around, around. As Lubberkin once slept beneath a tree, I twitch' d his dangling garter from his knee. 110 He wist not when the hempen string I drew. Now mine I quickly doft', of inkle ' blue. Together fast I tie the garters twain ; And while I knit the knot repeat this strain : ' Three times a true-love's knot I tie secui-e. Firm be the knot, fltrm may his love endure ! ' With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground. And turn me thrice around, around, around. As I was wont, I trudged last market-day To town, with new-laid eggs preserved in hay. 120 I made my market long before 'twas night, My purse grew heavy and my basket light. Straight to the "pothecai-y's shop I went, And in love-powder all my money spent. Behap what will, next Sunday after prayers, When to the ale-house Lubberkin repair's, These golden flies into his mug I'll throw, And soon the swain with fervent love shall glow. With my shaip heel I three times mark the ground. And turn me thrice around, around, around. 130 But hold ! our Lightfoot barks, and cocks his ears, O'er yonder stile see Lubberkin appears. He comes ! he comes ! HobneKa's not bewrayed, Nor shall she, crowned with willow, die a maid. He vows, he swears, he'll give me a green gown : Oh dear ! I fall adown, adown, adown 1" 1 " Irikle. Inferior tape. See Florio, p. 124. Harrison, p. 222." (*' Halliwell's Dictionary of Axcliaic and Provincial Words.") Gay's " Beggar's Opera " was a success of a like kind. He was a poet witli natural tastes, and liis simplicity in caricature was real. His " Fables " pro- posed to amuse and edify the young Prince William, Duke of Cumberland. Tliis is one of them : — THE H.\RE AND MANY FRIENDS. Friendship, like love, is but a name. Unless to one you stint the flame. The child whom many fathers share Hath seldom known a father's care. "Tis thus in fiiendships : who depend On many, rarely flnd a friend. A hare who in a civil way Complied with every thing, like Gay, Was kno^\Ti by all the bestial train WTio haunt the wood or graze the plain. 10 Her care was never to offend ; And every creatui'e was her friend. As forth she went at early dawn To taste the dew-besprinkled lawn. Behind she hears the hunter's cries. And from the deep-mouthed thunder flies. She starts, she stops, she pants for breath ; She hears the near advance of death ; She doubles to mislead the hoimd, And measmes back her mazy round : 20 Till, fainting in the public way, Half dead with fear she gasping lay. "V^Hiat transport in her bosom grew, "When first the Horse appeared in view ! " Let me," says she, " your back ascend, And owe my safety to a friend. You know my feet betray my flight ! To friendship every burden's light." The Horse replied, " Poor honest puss, It grieves my heart to see thee thus : 30 Be comforted, relief is near. For all youi' friends are in the rear." She next the stately BuU implored ; And thus replied the mighty lord : " Since every beast alive can tell That I sincerely wish you well, I may, without offence, pretend To take the freedom of a friend. Love calls me hence ; a favourite cow E.xpects me near yon barley-mow : 40 And when a lady's in the case. You know, all other tilings give place. To leave you thus might seem unkind ; But see, the Goat is just behind." The Goat remarked her pulse was high, Her languid head, her heavy eye. " My back," says he, " may do you harm ; The Sheep's at hand, and wool is wann." The Sheep was feeble, and complained His sides a load of wool sustained. 50 Said he was slow, confessed his fears, " For hounds cat sheep as wcU as hares." She now the trotting Calf addi-essed. To save from death a friend distressed. " Shall I," says he, " of tender age, In this important care engage ? Older and abler passed you by ; How strong are those ! how weak am I ! 360 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 1702 Should I presume to tear you hence. Those friends of mine may take offence. Excuse me, then ; you know my heart ; But dearest friends, alas ! must part. How shall we all lament ! Adieu, For see the hoimds are just in view." 60 Hynins of Isaac Watts belong to tlie clays of Queen Anne and George I., but these will be represented in the volume of this Library that illustrates English Religion. A much better poet than Ambrose PhUips, who is by no means to be confounded with him, was John Philips. Addison, comrade of Ambrose Philips, ])raised all that he wrote, and praised higlily his translation from Sappho. His skUl was perhaps at liis best in the following FRAGMENT OF SAPPHO. Blessed as the immortal gods is he. The youth who fondly sits by thee, And hears and sees thee all the while .Softly speak and sweetly smile. 'Twas this deprived my soul of rest, And raised such tumults in my breast ; For while I gazed, in transport tossed, My breath was gone, my voice was lost ; 5Iy bosom glowed ; the subtle ilame Ean quick through all my vital frame ; O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung, My ears with hoUow murmurs i-ung ; In dewy damps my limbs were chilled. My blood with gentle horrors thrilled ; My feeble pulse forgot to play, I fainted, sunk, and died ;iway. 10 JuON PuiLIPS. From tlw PoHrait pnfixi.d to ha Collected Works (1720). John Pliilips, son of an Archdeacon of Salop, was born in 1676 in the parsonage at Bampton, Oxford- sliire. He was consumptive and precocious, went to Winchester School, and as a boy there acquii'ed enthusiasm for Milton. He went from Winchester School to Christ Chiirch, Oxford, a good scholar and still an enthusiast for Milton. He won his I'eputa- tion by the " Splendid Shilling," a playful imitation of the poet he loved, in warning to a college friend who had not learnt the value of a sliilling in the pocket. The reference in it to the tobacco-pipe came naturally from a student of Christ Church when Dean Aldrich was its Lead and set a great example to the college. A young student once laid a wager that if he called on the doctor at ten o'clock in the morning, he should find him smoking. He went to the good-humoui'ed dean in his study, and told why he had come. "Ah," said the Dean, "then your my pipe, bet is lost ; for I am not smoking, but filling THE SPLENDID SHILLING. Happy the man who, void of cares and strife. In silken or in leathern purse retains A splendid shilling. He nor hears -with pain New oysters cry'd, nor sighs for cheerful ale ; But with his friends, when nightly mists arise. To Juniper's Magpie or Town-haU repairs, "Wlicre, mindful of the njTnph whose wanton eye Transfix'd his soul and kindled amorous flames, Cloe, or Philips, he, each circling glass, Wisheth her health, and joy, and equal love. 10 Jleanwhile he smokes, and laughs at merry tale Or pun ambiguous or conundrum quaint. But I, whom griping penury .surrounds. And hunger, sm-e attendant upon want. With scanty oifals, and small acid tiff (Wretched repast !) my meagre corps sustain ; Then solitary walk, or doze at home In garret 'idle, and with a wanning puff Regale chill'd fingers, or from tube as black As wintei'-chinmey, or weU-poUsh'd jet, '20 Exhale mundungus, ill-pcrfimiing scent. Not blacker tube, nor of a shorter size. Smokes Cambro-Briton (vers'd in pedigree. Sprung from Cadwalador and Arthur, kings Full famous in romantic tale) when he O'er many a craggy hill and barren cliff, Upon a cargo of fam'd Costrian cheese High over-shadowing rides, with a design To vend his wares or at th' Arvonian mart Or Maridunum,' or the ancient town 30 Yclip'd Brechinia, or where Vaga's stream Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil I Whence flow nectareous ■wines, that well may vie With Massic, Setin, or rcnown'd Falern. Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow, With looks demure, and silent pace, a dun. Horrible monster 1 hated by gods and men ! To my aerial citadel ascends. With vocal heel thrice thund'ring at my gate, With hideous accent thrice he calls ; I know 40 The voice ill-boding, and the solemn sound. '\^^lat should I do ? or whither turn ? Amaz'd, Confounded, to the dark recess I fly 1 Maridumim, Caermartlien ; Brechiiita, Brecknock ; Vagay the Wye; Jn'coniuiu, Hereford. TO A.D. 1727.1 SHORTER POEMS. 361 Of woodhole. Straight my bristling hairs erect Thro' sudden fear ; a chilly sweat bedews My shudd'ring Hmbs, and (wonderful to tell !) My tongue forgets her faculty of speech, So horrible he seems ! His faded brow Entrench'd with many a frown, and conic beard, And spreading band, admii-'d by modem saints, 50 Disastrous acts forebode ; in Ms right hand Long scrolls of paper solemnly he waves. With characters and figures dire inscrib'd. Grievous to mortal eyes ; ye gods avert Such plagues from righteous men ! Behind him stalks Another monster not unlike himself, Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar caU'd A Catchpole, whose polluted hands the Gods With force incredible and magic charms Fii'st have endued. If he his ample palm 60 Should haply on ill-fated shoulder lay Of debtor, straight his body, to the touch Obsequious, as wliilom knights were wont, To some enchanted castle is convey'd. Where gates impregnable and coercive chains In durance strict detain him, tiU in fonu Of money Pallas sets the captive fi'ee. Beware, ye debtors, when ye walk, beware, Be circumspect ! Oft with insidious ken This caitiff eyes your steps aloof, and oft 70 Lies perdue in a nook or gloomy cave. Prompt to enchant some inadvertent wretch With his unhallow'd touch. So (poets sing) Grimalkin to domestic vermin sworn An everlasting foe, with watchful eye Lies nightly brooding o'er a chinky gap, Protending her feU claws, to thoughtless mice Sure ruin. So her disembowell'd web Arachne in a hall or kitchen spreads, Obvious to vagrant flies : she secret stands 80 Within her woven cell ; the humming prey, Eegardless of their fate, rush on the toils Inextricable, nor will aught avail Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue ; The wasp insidious, and the buzzing drone. And butterfly proud of expanded wings Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares. Useless resistance make : with eager strides, She tow' ring flies to her expected spoils, Then with envenom'd jaws the vital blood 90 Drinks of reluctant foes, and to her cave Their bulky carcasses triumphant di-ags. So pass my days. But when nocturnal shades This world envelope, and th' inclement ail- Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts With pleasant wines and crackling blaze of wood, Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light Of make-weight candle, nor the joyous talk Of loving friend delights ; distress'd, forlorn. Amidst the horrors of the tedious night, 100 Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts My anxious mind, or sometimes mournful verse Indite, and sing of groves and myi-tle shades. Or desp'rate lady near a purling stream. Or lover pendent on a willow-tree. Meanwhile I labour with eternal drought. And restless wish, and rave, my parched throat Finds no relief, nor hea\-v- eyes repose : But it a slumber haply does invade My wearv limbs, mv fancv's still awake, 110 46 Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream, Tipples imaginary pots of ale. In vain ; awake I find the settled thirst Still gnawing, and the pleasant phantom curse. Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debaix'd. Nor taste the fruits that the sun's genial rays Mature, John-apple, nor the downy peach. Nor walnut in rough-furrow' d coat secure, Nor medlar, fruit delicious in decay. Aiflictions great I yet greater still remain : 120 My galligaskins' that have long withstood The winter's fui-y, and encroaching frosts. By time subdued, (what wiU not time subdue !) An horrid chasm disclose with orifice Wide, discontinuous ; at which the winds Eurus and Austcr, and the dreadful force Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronian waves," Tumultuous enter, with dii-e chilling blasts, Portending agues. Thus a well-fraught ship Long sail'd secure or thi-o' th' Mgenn deep 130 Or the Ionian tUl, cruising near The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush On Scylla, or Charj'bdis (dang'rous rocks !) She strikes rebounding, whence the shatter'd oak. So fierce a shock unable to withstand. Admits the sea : in at the gaping side The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage, Resistless, overwhelming ; horrors seize The mariners, death in their eyes appears. They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, they pray : Vain efforts ! still the batt'ring waves rush in, [140 Implacable till, delug'd by the foam. The ship sinks found' ring in the vast abyss. The credit earned by this piece caused Robert Harley and Henry St. John to befriend the young poet. He came to London, lived much in St. John's house, was invited to wi-ite on Blenlieim, ^Tote also an excellent little poem in two books on " Cyder," and died young in 1708. We come now to three poets who at the end of the reign of George I. represent the revival of a sense of beauty in the outside world that blended with then- inteiest in man. These were Alhm Ramsay, John Dyer, and James Thomson. Allan Ramsay was fifteen years older than Dyer and Tliomson, who were both born in the year 1 700. Ramsay was the son of a poor worker in Lord Hopetoun's lead mines among the hUIs between Clydesdale and Aimandale. He washed ore as a child, then was apprenticed to a barber, then his delight in the old songs of his country and his skill in making new songs gave liim love for books. He began in a small way as a bookseller, and won friends by his genial nature and the pleasant uses to which he put his wit. In 1720 appeared the follow- ing eclogue, which is the first thought afterwards 1 Galligasl'ins, loose trousers. ~ The Crouian Sea, called also Concrete or Conirealed, was a Northern Sea, said to be called Cronian because under Kronos or Saturn, wliose star was said by astroloirers to be of cold nature, and to govern tilings that were cold and slow of motion. 362 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1702 20 developed into his five-act pastoral play, the " Gentle Shepherd," produced in 1725: — PATIE AND ROGER. Beneath the south side of a eraigy bield,' ■WTiero a clear spring did healsome water yield, Twa youthfou shepherds on the gowans - lay, Tenting ^ their floeks ae bonny mom of May : Poor Roger gran'd till hollow echoes rang, ^^^lile meny Patio humm'd himsel a sang : Then turning to his friend in blithesome mood, Quoth ho, " How does this sunshine cheer my blood 1 How heartsome is't to see the rising plants ! To hear the birds chii-m ^ o'er their morning rants ! * 10 Haw tosio* is't to snuff the cauller'' air, And a' the sweets it bears, when void of care I "UTiat ails thee, Roger, then f what gars thee grano r ' Tell me the cause of thy ill-season'd pain." lioi/cr. I'm bom, O Patie, to a thrawart ' fate ! I'm bom to strive with hardships dire and great ; Tempests may cease to jaw "* the rowan flood," Corbies and tods to grein '- for lambkins' blood : But I, opprest with never-ending grief. Maun ay despair of lighting on relief. I'lifie. The bees shall loathe the flower and quit the hive, The saughs '^ on boggy ground shall cease to thi-ive, Ere scomfou queans,''' or loss of warldly gear. Shall spill my rest, or ever foi-ce a tear. Jtoffcr. Sae might I say ; but it's nae easy done By ane wha's saul is sadly out o' tune : You have aae saft a voice and slid '* a tongue. You are the darling of baith auld and young. If I but ettle '^ at a sang, or speak, They dit their lugs, s%-n up their legions clcek,'" 30 And jeer me hameward frae the loan'* or bught," "WTiile I'm confus'd with mony a ve.xing thought : Yet I am tall, and as well-shap'd as thee. Nor mair unlikely to a lassie's eye : For ilka sheep ye have, I'll number ten. And should, as ane might think, come farer ben.'-" Tfifie. But abUns,'-' nibour, ye have not a heart. Nor downa eithly wi' your cunzie part : -- ' Bi'eld and betid, shelter. ' Oowans, daisies. 3 TciitiTij, watching. ' Chirm, warble. ^ Rants, cheerful sougs. A " rant " in Scottish dialect is a fi-olic, n merry meeting with dancing, or a lively song. * Tosie, enlivening, intoxicating. ^ CauUer, cool. 8 Gars thee grant-, makes thee groan. ^ Thvav:art, perverse. '0 To jaw, to dash. " Jaw" a wave. 1' The roivan Jiood, the iiishing flood. 1^ Corbies and tods to ijfcln, ravens and foxes to long. *3 Saiirjhs, willows. '* Queans, young women. 1^ Slid, smooth. '6 Ettle, aim at. attempt. 1" They stop their ears, then snatch up their milk-pails. I'* Loan, an opening between the corn-tields for milking cows or driving home the cattle. ''^ Bnght, the pen in which cows are milked. 2" Come hen, come to the inner part of the house ; whence to be *' far ben " is to be intimate, and " fai'er ben " more intimate. 2' .ablins, perhiips. ^ Do not easily part with your coins. If that be true, what signifies yotir gear i A mind that's scrimpit-' never wants some care. Hor/er. My byar-'' tumbled, nine braw nowt were smoor'd,-^ Three elf-shot were, yet I these ills endur'd. In winter last my cares were very sma, Tho' scores of wedders perish'd in the sna.'-^ Tatie. Were your bein^' rooms as thinly stock'd as mine. Less you wad loss, and less you wad repine : He wha has just enough can soundly sleep. The o'ercome only fashes fowk to keep.'-* liot/fr. May plenty flow upon thee for a cross. That thou may'st thole -^ the pangs of frequent loss ; may'st thou dote on some fair paughty '"' wench, Wha ne'er will lout thy lowan cb-outh to quench," 'Til, birs'd ■*'- beneath the burden, thou cry dool,^^ And awn that ane may fret that is nae fool. Sax good fat lambs, I said them ilka cloot ^* At the West Port, and bought a winsome flute. Of pltmi-troe made, with iv'ry virles^* round, A dainty whistle wi' a pleasant soimd ; I'll be mair canty ^* wi't, and ne'er cry dool. Than you with a' your gear, ye dowie ^' fool. Jioffrr. Na, Patie, na, I'm nae sic churlish beast. Some ither things lie heavier at my breast ; 1 tlream'd a dreery dream this hinder night. That gars my flesh a' creep yet wi' the fright. Fcitie. Now to your friend how silly 's this pretence, To ane wha you and a' your secrets kens ; Daft are your dreams, as daftly wad ye hide Your well-seen love, and dorty ^* Jenny's pride. Take courage, Roger, me your sorrows tell. And safely think nane kens them but yoursol. Hof/cf. O Patie, ye have guest indeed o'er true, And there is naething I'll keep up frae you ; Me dorty Jenny looks upon asquint. To speak but till ^' her I dare hardly mint ; ■*" In ilka place she jeers me air and late. And gars me look bumbas'd and tmco' blate ; *" Btit yesterday I met her yont a know,*- She fled as frae a shellycoat ■'^ or kow : She Bauldy loo's, Bauldy that drives the car, But geeks at me, and says I smell o' tar. 40 50 CO 70 80 2* Biiar, cow-liouse. 2^ Wethers perished iu the snow. 23 Scrimpit, narrow, nigrgurdly. 25 Oseu were smothered. 2" Biin. rich. 29 What is beyond their needs g-ives folk the mere trouble of keeping it. ^9 Thole, suffer. ^o Panghty, haughty. 31 Who never -will stoop to quench your flaming thirst. 32 Birs'd, bi-uised. ^.i crtj iJoo?. lament. ^ Cloot, hoof. 35 Firles, rings. ^^ Confi*. cheerful. ^ Dou-tc, dull. 38 DoHy, pettish, saucy. ^9 xiU, t«. *<• Mint, attempt. ■*' Dazed and very bashful. *2 yont a know, on the other side of a knoll. *3 Shi'lhjcoat, water-spiite. TO A.D. 1727.] SHORTER POEMS. 363 Patie. But Bauldy loo's nae her, right well I wat, He sighs for Neps : — Sae that may stand for that. Eager. I wish I cou"d na loo her — but in vain, I still maun dote and thole her proud disdain. Jly Bauty is a cur I dearly like, Till he youl'd sair, she strak the poor dumb tyke : If I had fill'd a nook within her breast. She wad ha'e shawn mair kindness to my beast. When I begin to tune my stock and horn. With a' her face she shaws a cauldi'ife ' scorn : 90 Last time I play'd, ye never saw sic spite. O'er Bogie was the spring ^ and her delyte, Yet tauntingly she at her nibour speer'd tJin she cou'd tell what tune I play'd, and sneer'd. Flocks wander where ye like, I dinna care ; I'll break my reed, and never whistle mair. Fatie. E'en do sae, Eoger, wha can help misluck, Saebeins ' she be sic a thrawn-gabet * chuck ; Yonder's a craig, since ye have tint a' hope,' Gae tiU't ye'r ways, and take the lover's loup. 100 Roger. I need na make sic speed my blood to spill, I'll warrand death come soon enough a will. Patie. Daft gowk ! leave aff that silly whindging way. Seem careless, there's my hand ye'll win the day. Last morning I was unco' airly out. Upon a dyke I lean'd and glowr'd about ; I saw my Meg come linkan ' o'er the lee, I saw my Meg, but Meggie saw nae me : For yet the sun was wading throw the mist. And she was closs upon me e'er she wist. 110 Her coats were kiltit, and did sweetly shaw Her straight bare legs, which whiter were than snaw : Her cokemony ' snooded up fou sleek. Her haff et locks * hung waving on her cheek : Her cheek sae ruddy ! and her een sae clear ! And oh ! her mouth's like ony hinny' pear. Neat, neat she was in bustin'" waistcoat clean. As she came skiffing o'er the dewy green ; Blithesome I cried, " My bonny Meg, come here, I fairly" wherefore j'e're sae soon astecr: 120 But now I guess yc'er gawn to gather dew." She scour'd awa, and said, " WTiat's that to you ?" " Then fare ye well, Meg Dorts,'- and e'en's ye like," I careless cried, and lap " in o'er the dyke. I trow, when that she saw, within a crack With a right thieveless " errand she came back ; ' Cttu!dn/e, chill. ^ .Spring, a quick cheerful tune, that might be danced to. ■ Saebeins (so being), since. * Hiravn-tjixhct (twisted mouthed^ ill-tempered. ^ Tint a' hope, lost all hope. Go your ways to it, and take the lover's leap. <• LMcan^ tripping. ' Cocfeemont/, the lump of hair gathered up by a band or snood. ^ Haffet lodes, side curls, ^ Hinny, houey. 10 BiLttin, fustian. ii Fairhj, marvel. 12 Vorf, sullen, pettish. 13 j^^j), leai>t. 13 Tliicveh^, make believe, useless. Miscau'd me " first— then bade me hound my dog To weer up three waif '* ews were on the bog. I leugh, and sae did she, then wi' great haste I clasp' d my arms about her neck and waist : 1 30 About her yielding waist, and took a fouth '^ Of sweetest kisses frac her glowan mouth : While hard and fast I held her in my grips, My very saul came louping to my lips. Sair, sair she flete '* wi' me 'tween ilka smak. But well I kend she mean'd na as she spak. Dear Eoger, when your jo puts on her gloom. Do ye sae too, and never fash your thumb ; Seem to forsake her, soon she'll change her mood ; Gae woo anither, and she'll gang clean wood." HO Jtoger. Kind Patie, now fair faw your honest heart, Ye're ay sae kedgie,-" and ha'e sic an art To hearten ane : — for now as clean's a leek Ye've cherisht me since ye began to speak : Sae for your pains I'll make you a propine,'' My mither, honest wife, has made it fine ; A tartan plaid, spun of good hauslock woo. Scarlet and green the sets, the borders blue. With spraings Hke gou'd and siller, cross'd wi' black, I never had it yet upon my back. 150 Well are ye wordy o't, wha ha'e sae kind Redd up *" my ravel'd doubts, and clear'd my mind. Piitie. Well, had ye -^ there, and since ye've frankly made A present to me of your bra '* new plaid, Ny flute's be yours, and she too that's sae nice Shall come a will, if you'll take my advice. Poger. As ye ad^nse, I'll promise to observ't. But ye maun keep the flute, ye best descrv't ; Now take it out, and gi'es a bonny spring, For I'm in tift '* to hear you play or sing. 160 Pntie. But first we'U take a turn up to the hight. And see gin a' our flocks be feeding right : Be that time bannocks and a shave of cheese Will make a breakfast that a laird might please ; Might please our laird, gin he were but sae wise To season meat wi' health instead of spice : When we ha'e ta'en the grace-drink at this well, I'll whistle fine, and sing t'ye like mysel. Allan Ramsay's homely wit and wisdom are well represented ui his fable of THE CLOCK AND DIAL, Ae day a Clock wad brag a Dial, And put his qualities to trial ; Spake to him thus, " My neighbour, pray, C'an'st tell me what's the time of day 'r " 1= Miscmi'il mc, called me names. ■" W"ff, strayed. " Foiith. plenty. '* Flete, scolded. " Wood, mad. 2» Kedgie, cheerful. " Proinnc, present. 22 Rcii np, disentangled, put into order. "s Had ye, liold ye. 2« Bra and braic, brave, handsome. '^ Tift, condition. 364 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1725 The Dial said, " I dinna ken. " — " Alake ! what stand ye there for then ■■ " — " I wait here till the sun shines bright, For nought I ken but by his light :" " Wait on," quoth Clock, " I scorn his help, Baith night and day my lane ' I skelp.- 10 Wind up my weights but anos a week, Without him I can gang and speak ; Nor like an useless sumph I stand. But constantly wheel round my hand : Hark, hark, I strike just now the hour; And I am right, ane — twa — three — four." \Vhilst thus the Clock was boasting loud, The bleezing sun brak throw a cloud ; The Dial, faithf u' to his guide, Spake truth, and laid the thumper's pride. 20 " Ye see," said he, " I've dung you fair, 'Tis four hours and three quarters mair." " My friend," he added, " count again. And learn a wee to he less vain : Ne'er brag of constant clavering cant, And that you answers never want ; For you're not ay to be believ'd : W'ha trust to you may be deceiv'd. Be counsell'd to behave like me ; For when I dinna clearly see, 30 I always own. I dinna ken. And that's the way of wisest men." Tliis piece, too, is cluiracteristic : — THE poet's wish. Frae gi-eat Apollo, Poet, say. What is th)- wish, what wadst thou hae, When thou bows at his shi-ine ? Not Carse o' Gowrio's fertile field. Nor a' the flocks the Grampians yield, That are baith sleek and fine ; Not costly things brought frae afar, As ivorj% pearl, and gems ; Nor those fail- straths that water'd are With Tay and Tweed's smooth streams, 10 Which gentily and daintily Eat down the flow'ry braes, As greatly and quietly They wimple to the seas. Whatever by his canny fate Is master of a good estate. That can ilk thing aiiord. Let him enjoy 't withoutten care. And with the wale ' of ciuious fare Cover his ample board. 20 Much dawted '' by the gods is he, ^\Tia to the Indian plain Successfu' ploughs the wally° sea. And safe returns again. With riches that hitches Him high aboon the rest Of sma' fowk, and a' fowk That are with poortith * prest. For me, I can be well content To eat my bannock on the bent,' And kitchen' t wi' fresh air; Of lang-kail I can make a feast, And cantily baud up my crest. And laugh at dishes rare. Nought frae ApoUo I demand, But throw a lengthen' d life My outer fabric firm may stand. And saul clear without strife. May he then but gie then Those blessings for my skair,' I'll fairlj and squaijly (iuite s' and seek nae mair. 30 40 ^ My ]awe, by myself. ^ Wale, choice. = Wally, billowy. - Skclj), beat, as a cloct c * Vairtcil, caressed, fi Fooi-lith, poverty. Allan Raijisav. from his " Potms " (17611. James Thomson began witli " Winter " in March 1726, the work being completed in 1728 with this HYMN OF THE SEASONS. These, as they change. Almighty Father, these, Are but the varied God. The rolling year Is fuU of Thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring Thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love. Wide flu.sh the fields ; the softening air is balm ; Echo the mountains round : the forest smiles ; And every sense and every heart is joy. Then comes Thy glory in the simimer months. With light and heat refidgent. Then Thy sun Shoots full perfection through the swelling year : 10 And oft Thy voice in dieatlful thunder speaks — And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve. By brooks and groves, in hollow- whispering gales. Thy bounty shines in Autumn imconfincd. And spreads a common feast for all that lives. In Winter, awful Thou ! with clouds and storms Around Thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest roUed, ' My oat-cake on the grass of the hillside. ' Skair, share. TO A.D. 1728. J SHORTER POEMS. 365 Majestic darkness ! on the whiihvind's wing Riding sublime, Thou bidd'st the world adore, And humblest Natiire with Thy northern blast. 20 Mysterious round ! what skill, what force divine, Deep felt, in these appear ! a simple train. Yet so delightful mixed, with such kind art, Such beauty and beneficence combined ; Shade, unpereeived, so softening into shade. And all so forming an hannonious whole, That, as they stUl succeed, they ransh still. But wandering oft, with brute unconscious gaze, Man marks not Thee, marks not the mighty hand. That, ever-busy, wheels the silent spheres : 30 Works in the secret deep, shoots, steaming, thence The fair profusion that o'crspreads the Spring : Flings from the sun direct the flaming day ; Feeds every creature ; hurls the tempest forth ; And, as on earth this grateful change revolves, With transport touches all the springs of life. Nature, attend ! join every living soul, Beneath the spacious temple of the sky In adoration join, and, ardent, raise One general song ! To Him, ye vocal gales, 40 Breathe soft, whose Spirit in your freshness breathes! Oh talk of Him in solitary glooms Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely waving pine Fills the brown shade with a religious awe ! And ye whose bolder note is heard afar. Who shake the astonished world, lift high to heaven The imjKituous song, and say from whom you rage. His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills ; And let me catch it as I muse along. Ye headlong torrents, rapid, and profound ; 50 Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze Along the vale ; and thou, majestic main, A secret world of wonders in thyself, Sound His stupendous praise — whose greater voice Or bids you roar, or bids your roarings fall. Soft-roU your incense, herbs, and fruits, and flowers. In mingled clouds to Him — whose sun exalts, A\Tiose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil paints. Ye forests bend, ye harvests wave to Him ; Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart, Gil As home he goes beneath the joyous moon. Y''e that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep Unconscious lies, efltuse your mildest beams. Ye constellations, while your angels strike, Amid the spangled sky, the silver IjTe. Great source of day, best image here below Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide. From world to world, the vital ocean round, . On Nature write with every beam His praise ! The thunder roUs : be hushed the prostrate world, 70 While cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn. Bleat out afresh, ye hills ; ye mossy rocks. Retain the sound ; the broad responsive low. Ye valleys, raise : for the Great Shepherd reigns, And his unsuffering kingdom j'ct will come. Ye woodlands all, awake : a boundless song Burst from the groves ; and when the restless day, Expuing, lays the warbling world asleep. Sweetest of birds, sweet Philomela, charm The listening shades, and teach the night His praise ! 80 Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles, At once the head, the heart, and tongue of all. Crown the great hymn ! In swarming cities vast, Assembled men, to the deep organ join The long-resounding voice oft breaking clear, At solemn pauses, thi-ough the swelling base, And, as each mingling flame increases each, In one united ardour rise to heaven. Or if you rather choose the rural shade. And find u fane in every .sacred grove, 00 There let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's lay, The prompting seraph, and the poet's IjTe, Still sing the God of Seasons, as they roll. For me, when I forget the darling theme, A\Tiether the Blossom blows, the Summer-ray Russets the plain, inspiring Autumn gleams, Or Winter rises in the blackening east, Be my tongue mute — my fancy paint no more, And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat ! Should fate command me to the farthest verge 100 Of the green earth, to distant ku'barous climes, Rivers imknown to song — where first the sun GUds Indian mountains, or his setting beam Flames on the Atlantic isles — 'tis nought to me : Since God is ever present, ever felt, In the void waste as in the city full ; And where He vital spreads there must be joy. When even at last the solemn horn- shall come, And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, I cheerful will obey; there, with new powers, lU) WUl rising wonders sing : I cannot go Where Universal Love not smiles around. Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their sons ; From seeming evil still educing good. And better thence again, and better still, In infinite progression. But I lose Jlyself in Him, in light ineffable ! Come then, expressive silence, muse His praise. TliomHOii wrutf the Latin-English then in favour, ind delighted in the resonance of thought in triplets. Snow-Halves "fall (1) broad and (2) white and (3) fast;" the red-breast (1) "pecks and (2) .starts and (3) wonders where lie is." The hare is beset " by death in various, forms, (1) dark snares, and (2) dogs, and (3) more nnpitying men ; " the man in a snow-drift dies, (1) "his wife, (2) his children, and (3) liis friends unseen ; " and of such things, •' Ah ! little think the (1) gay, (2) licentious, (3) proud, whom (1) pleasure, (2) power, and (3) affluence suiTound ; " there is distress even where ^\dsdom dwells in the vale "with (1) friendship, (2) peace, and (3) contemplation joined," — life being " one ■icene of (1) toil, of (2) suffering, and of (3) fate." Thomson's rhetoric in " The Seasons " is not unlike lohnson's in " The Rambler," and reflects one of I he passing faults that came of French influence on ( lur literature. But in this style the words, though chosen too exclusively from the Latin side of English, are well chosen ; each is used in its true sense, and under a form of rhetoric now obsolete theie is a lo\'e of nature that has grown from minute observation, and will for ever be us fresh as it i.s true. In John Dyer there was the sense of natui'e ex- pressed without any of the att'ectations of false dig- nity then held by the critics to be as necessai'y as the wigs they wore. Thomson, putting liLs fresh thought into the form of language that the " under- standing age " thought good, could win at once a wide popularity that was not conceded to John 366 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1726 Dyer's " Grongar Hill," which appeared in the same year as " Winter," and at the time when Pope was busy on the " Dunciad." But from the nineteenth century we look back upon the natural music of this poem as the simplest and the sweetest strain that has come down to iis from the days of the first Georges. It is wonderful that in the age of the " Dunciad " there should have been one who could blend depths of human thought with an expression of a poet's sense of nature simple and true as Words- worth's. This true singer passed almost into obli- vion, but when Wordsworth came upon his poems, no wonder that they stin-ed his fellow feeling and caused him to dedicate a sonnet to John Dyer's memory. Dyer was a young Welshman, son of a prosperous attorney. He was born at Aberglasney, educated at Westminster School, gave up his father's profession for the love of art, hoped at first to be a painter, and went to Rome to study. But he gave up the profession in wliich he found he could not rise to his ideal, took orders, and became a quiet country clergyman. Grongar Hill was near his birthplace in Carmarthenshire, and he sang of it at the age of .six-and-twenty. A longer poem on " The Ruins of Rome" was published "in 1740, and his " Fleece," which in four books traces the wool from the sheep in the fields to the loom, appeared just before his death in 1758. GRONGAR HILL. Silent nymph, with curious eye, Who, the purple evening, lie On the mountain's lonely van, Beyond the noise of busy man, Tainting fair the form of things, WhUe the yellow linnet sings, Or the tuneful nightingale Charms the forest with her tale, Come with all thy various hues, Come, and aid thy sister Muse ; 10 Now while Phcpbus riding high Gives lustre to the land and sky ! Grongar Hill invites my song, Draw the landscape bright and strong ; Grongar, in whose mossy cells Sweetly-musing Quiet dwells ; Grongar, in whose silent shade, For the modest Muses made. So oft I have, the evening still, At the foimtain of a riU, 20 Sate upon a flowery bed. With my hand beneath my head, While strayed my eyes o'er Towy's flood, Over mead, and over wood, From house to house, from hill to hill, Till Contemplation had her fill. About his chequered sides I wind. And leave his brooks and meads behind, And groves and grottoes where I lay, And vistoes shooting beams of day. 30 Wide and wider spreads the vale, As circles on a smooth canal ; The mountains round, unhappy fate ! Sooner or later, of all height, Withdraw their summits from the skies, And lessen as the others rise. Still the prospect wider spreads. Adds a thousand woods and meads, Still it widens, widens still, And sinks the newly-risen hill. Now, I gain the mountain's brow, AVTiat a landscape Hes below ! No clouds, no vapours intervene. But the gay, the open scene Does the face of nature show. In all the hues of heaven's bow. And, swelling to embrace the light. Spreads around beneath the sight. Old castles on the cliffs arise. Proudly towering in the skies ; Rushing from the woods, the spires Seem from hence ascending fires ; Half his beams Apollo sheds On the yellow mountain-heads, GilJs the fleeces of the flocks, And glitters on the broken rocks. Below me trees unnumbered rise. Beautiful in various dyes : The gloomy pine, the poplar blue, The yellow beech, the sable yew. The slender fir that taper grows. The sturdy oak with broad-spread houghs. And beyond the purple grove. Haunt of PhiUis, queen of love, Gaudy as the opening dawn, Lies a long and level lawn On which a dark hill, steep and high. Holds and charms the wandering eye : Deep are his feet in Towy's flood. His sides are clothed with wa\nng wood, And ancient towers crown his brow. That cast an awful look below, Whose rugged walls the i^y creeps, And with her arms from faUing keeps. So both a safety from the wind On mutual dependence find. 'Tis now the raven's bleak abode ; 'Tis now th' apartment of the toad ; And there the fox securely feeds ; And there the pois'nous adder breeds | Concealed in ruins, moss and weeds ; While, ever and anon, there falls Huge heaps of hoary moulder'd walls. Yet time has seen, that lifts the low And level lays the lofty brow. Has seen this broken pile complete. Big with the vanity of state : But transient is the smile of fate. A little rule, a little sway, A sunbeam in a winter's day. Is all the proud and mighty have Between the cradle and the grave. And see the rivers how they run. Through woods and meads, in shade and sun, Sometimes swift and sometimes slow. Wave succeeding w.ive, they go A various journey to the deep, Ijike human life to endless sleep. Thus is Nature's vesture wrought. To instruct our wandering thought ; 40 .70 60 SO flO 100 TO A.D. l"! I-] SHORTER POEMS. 367 Thus she dresses green and gay, To disperse our cares away. Ever charniing, ever new, ■\\Tien will the landscape tire the yievf '. The fountain's faU, the river's flow, The woody valleys, wami and low ; The windy sinnniit, wild and high, Roughly rushing on the sky ; The pleasant seat, the ruined tower, The naked rock, the shady bower ; The town and village, dome and farm ; \ Each give each a double charm, i As pearls upon an .Ethiop's arm. ' See on the mountain's southern side, AMiere the prospect opens wide, 'WTiere the evening gilds the tide. How close and small the hedges lie 1 AMiat streaks of meadows cross the eye ! A step methinks may pass the stream, So little distant dangers seem : So we mistake the future's face. Eyed through hope's deluding ghiss, As yon summits soft and fair Clad in colours of the air, AVhich to those who journey near. Barren, brown, and rough appear ; Still we tread the same coarse way, The present's still a cloudy day. O may I with myself agree. And never covet what I see ; Content me with an humble shade, Jly passions tamed, my wishes laid ; For while our wishes wildly roll, AVe banish quiet from the soul ; 'Tis thus the busy beat the air. And misers gather wealth and care. Now, even now, my joys run high, As on the mountain-turf I lie, "WTiile the wanton Zephj-r sings, And in the vale perfumes his wings ; AVTiile the waters munnur deep ; AATiile the shepherd charms his sheep : 'While the birds imbounded fly, > And with music fiU the sky ; ' Now, even now, my joys run high I I Be full, ye courts, be great who will. Search for Peace with all your skill. Open wide the lofty door, Seek her on the marble floor. In vain you search, she is not there : In vain ye search the domes of cave 1 Grass and floweiv; Quiet treads, On the meads and mountain-heads. Along with Pleasure, close allied, Ever by each other's side : And often, by the nnirmuring rill, \ Hears the tlirush, while all is still, [ 'Within the grove« of Grongar Hill. ' CHAPTER XVI. 110 I'JII 130 140 1.50 Pope, Johnson, Gray, -A.D. 1727 TO A.D. 1760. Reign of George II. Collins, and Others.- The reigii of Louis XIV. in France ended just after the close of the reign of Queeu Anne in England. Anne died on the l.st of August, 1714, Louis on the 1st of September, 1715. Louis XV. came to the throne a cliild of Hve, and France was imder the regency of the Duke of Orleans, a man of corrupt life, until 1726. The young King of France liad just come of age, and begun to govern in his own right, at the time when George II. became King of England. Voltaire was then a young man, thirty-one years old, and Jean Jacques Rousseau a boy ot fifteen. That movement of thouglit which, by the end of George II. 's reign, would bring Voltaiie and Rousseau to the front as leaders, each in his own way, of a reaction against formalism had been slowly gathering strength, in France and elsewhere, since the date of the English Revolution. From the English Revolution of 1688-9 to the French Revo- lution of 1788-9 is a perio I of just a hundred years, full of significance for stadents of the present age. The essence of the eighteenth centiuy does not lie in the fact that it was an age of shams and windy sentimentalism. There were many shams and there was much windy sentimentalism ; but the work of the century is to be studied in the rise of protest against shams, the ever-growing sense that human society had fallen into a way of life un- worthy of the aims and powers of true men. Coriiipt forms of truth stood for the truth itself. Religion rested on authority of men who sought ahurch offices corruptly, and disgi-aced them by their lives. Liberty in France rested upon the will of a sovereign with a sei-aglio in the Pare aux Cerfs, and whose whole machinery of government showed the political system to be rotten to the core. At the same time there had been developed in France a thriving middle class that became bold of thouglit, and the audacity of French speculation carried many on into a desire to act the multiplying dreams of their best thinkers. Of tlie rising of this tide of opinion there is abun- dant indication in the later poetry of Pope. His " Dunciad," published in its first form in three books at the begiiuimg of George II.'s reign in 1728, was still wi-iting about wi-iting. It did for the petty critics and poets of that time what BoUeau had done for their fraternity in France by his satii-es liegim in tlie year 1660. Lewis Theobald was made the hero of the " Dunciad " in this its first fomi because he had dealt cavalierly with Pope's editing of Shakespeare. But wth the "Dimciad" Pope swept from liimself the world of petty writing upon petty themes, and turned to essentials of life, to poems tliat represented the advancing tide of thought, whicli occupied all the rest of his life as a poet; excei)t tliat in 1741 — three years before liis death — tlie " Dunciad " was re-issued in a second form, with C'olley Gibber substituted for Theobald in the phice of hero, and a fourth book added. In 1697 Pierre Bayle first published at Rotterdam his "Historical and Critical Dictionaiy." Its dis- cussions raised gra\e doubts of the justice of God's rule in human aff'airs, if indeed God ruled at all. The Ijook was able and rich in interest ; bold ques- tioning was taken up by others, who saw church authority too commonly rejiresented by the mandates of ignorant self-seeking men, in whom there was not the spu-it of religion, Bayle's Dictionary 'was 368 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. U.D. 1727 translated into English in 1710, and the religious Addison made constant use of it, delighting in the stores of information it contained. In the same year (1710) the philosopher Leibnitz published in Paris and in French a book called " Theodicee" (from two Greek words meaning God's justice), in which his pui-pose was to confront the doubts of Bayle. Bayle, he said (for he was then dead), is now in heaven, and sees Truth at its source. What was dark to him here is clear to him there : and Leibnitz argued that wherever God's ways seem unequal and ours equal, it is because our field of view is too limited to take in the whole design of God in His creation. If we saw all we should understand all, and know that, as Milton expressed it, " All is best, though we oft doubt what tlie unsearchable dispose of Highest Wisdom brings about, and ever best found in the close," or as Pope more weakly worded it, in accord with the adopted French method of phrase-making, "Whatever is, is right." Pope meant only what Milton meant, and what Leibnitz, from whom he took his reasoning, had said ; but he suffered for his fault of style the penalty of a complete mis- consti-uction of his meaning. The chief religious doubts of Pope's day were not, as in Milton's, upon the consonance of Calvinistic or other tenets of theology ^vith God's goodness and justice. The question was whether Man and Natm-e were not evidences against the justice or against the veiy existence of a Supreme Being. Parnell we have seen touching it in the " Hermit ; " Thomson referred to it often in his "Seasons." In Pope's " Satii-es," " Moral Essays," and " Essay on Man," produced between 17.31 and 1738, there is continued dwelling upon social questions, with incidental vindications of Di^ane justice in pieces not written, like the " Essay on Man," for the direct purpose of meeting doubt. It is a significant fact that Pope, then the chief living English poet, was from 1732 to 1734 publishing the four epistles of his " Essay on Man" to meet, according to the measure of his knowledge and his skill, the same form of doubt which in 1736 the ablest English di\'ine of the day, Joseph Butler, sought to meet in his "Analogy of Religion, Natuiul and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Natui-e." Let us follow Pope's argument on the relation of man to society in THE THIRD EPISTLE OF THE " ESS.W OX MAN." Here then we rest : ' ' The Universal Cause Acts to one end, hut acts by various laws." In all the madness of superfluous health. The trim of pride, the impudence of wealth. Let this great truth he present night and day : But most he present if we preach or pray. Look round our World ; behold the chain of Love Combining all below and all above. See plastic Nature working to this end. The single atoms each to other tend, 10 Attract, attracted to, the next in place Form'd and impell'd its neighbour to embrace. See Matter next, witli various life endu'd. Press to one centre still, the gen'ral Good. See djnng vegetables life su.stain, See life dissolving vegetate again : AU forms that perish other forms supply, (By turns we catch the vital breath, and die,) Like bubbles on the sea of Matter bom, They rise, they break, and to that sea return. 20 Nothing is foreign : Parts relate to whole ; One all-extending, all-preser\Tiig Soul Connects each being, greatest with the least ; Made Beast in aid of Man, and Man of Beast : All serv'd, all serving : nothing stands alone ; The chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown. Has God, thou fool ! work'd solely for thy good, Thy joy, thy pastime, thy attire, thy food ? Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn, For liim as kindly spread the flow'ry lawn : 30 Is it for thee the lark ascends and sings 'i Joy tunes his voice, joy elevates his wings. Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat ? Loves of his own and raptures swell the note. The bounding steed you pompously bestride, Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride. Is thine alone the seed that strews the plain ? The birds of heav'n shall ^-indicate their grain. Thine the full harvest of the golden year ? Part pays, and justly, the deserving steer: 40 The hog, that ploughs not nor obeys thy call. Lives on the labours of this lord of all. Know, Nature's children all diNnide her care ; The fur that warms a monarch, warm'd a bear. While Man exclaims, " See all things for my use 1 " " See man for mine ! " replies a pamper' d goose : And just as short of reason he must faU, Who thinks all made for one, not one for all. Grant that the pow'rf ul stiU the weak contr' il ; Be Man the Wit and TjTant of the whole : 50 Nature that Tyrant checks ; he only knows. And helps, another creature's wants and woes. Say, will the falcon, stooping from above, Smit with her varying plumage, spare the dove ? Admires the jay the insect's gilded wings ? Or hears the hawk when Philomela sings ? Man cares for all : to birds he gives his wood*?, To beasts his pastures, and to fish his floods ; For some his int'rest prompts him to provide. For more his pleasure, yet for more his pride : GO All feed on one vain Patron, and enjoy Th' extensive blessing of his luxury. That very life his learned hunger craves, He saves from famine, from the savage saves ; Nay, feasts the animal he dooms his feast. And, till he ends the being, makes it blest ; Which sees no more the stroke, or feels the pain. Than favour'd Man by touch ethereal slain. The creature had his feast of hfe before : Thou too must perish when thy feast is o'er I 70 To each unthinking being Heav'n, a friend. Gives not the useless knowledge of its end : To Man imparts it ; but with such a view As, while he dreads it, makes him hope it too : The hour conceal'd, and so remote the fear. Death still draws nearer, never seeming near. Great standing miracle I that Heav'n assign'd Its only thinking thing this turn of mind. Whether with Reason, or with Instinct blest. Know, all enjoy that pow'r which suits them best, 80 To bliss alike by that direction tend. And find the means proportion' d to their end. TO A.D. 1760.] SHORTER POEMS. 3Gt) Say, where full Instinct is th' unerring guide, "Wiiat Pope or CoimcU can they need beside ':■ Ecason, however able, cool at best. Cares not for service, or but serves when prest, Stays till we call, and then not often near ; But honest Instinct comes a volunteer, Sure never to o'ershoot, but just to hit ; Wliile still too wide or short is human Wit ; 90 Sure by quick Nature happiness to gain, ^\^lich heavier Ecason labours at in vain. This too serves always, Reason never long : One must go right, the other may go wrong. See then the acting and comparing pow'rs (3ne in then- nature, which are two in oiu's ; And Reason raise o'er Instinct as you can. In this 'tis God directs, in that 'tis Man. Who taught the nations of the field and wood To shun their poison, and to choose their food ':' 100 Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand. Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand ? Who made the spider parallels design, Sure as Demoivre, ' without rule or line ? Who bid the stork, Columbus-like, e.'cplore Heav'ns not his own, and worlds unknown before f Who calls the council, states the certain day; Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way ? God in the nature of each being founds Its proper bUss, and sets its proper bounds : 110 But as he frani'd a "V^Tiole, the Whole to bless, On mutual Wants built mutual Happiness, So from the first, eternal Order ran. And creature link'd to creature, man to man. Whate'er of life all-quick' niug aether keeps, Or breathes thi'o' air, or shoots beneath the deeps, Or pours profuse on earth, one nature feeds The vital flame, and swells the genial seeds. Not 5Ian alone, but aU that roam the wood. Or wing the sky, or roll along the flood, 120 Each loves itself, hut not itself alone. Each sex desires alike, till two are one. Nor ends the pleasure with the fierce embrace ; They love themselves, a third time. La their race. Thus beast and bird their common charge attend. The mothers nurse it, and the sires defend ; The young dismiss'd to wander earth or air. There stops the Instinct, and there ends the care ; The link dissolves, each seeks a fresh embrace, Another love succeeds, another race. 130 A longer care Plan's helpless kind demands ; That longer e;ire contracts more lasting bands : Eeflection, Reason, stiU the ties improve. At once extend the int'rest and the love ; With choice we fix, with sympathy we bum, Each Virtue in each Passion takes its turn. And still new needs, new helps, new habits rise, That graft benevolence on charities. Still as one brood, and as another rose, These nat'ral love maintain' d, habitual those ; 140 The last, scarce ripen' d into perfect Slan, Saw helpless him from whom their life began : ^ Abraham De Moivre was living when this poem was written. He was a French Protestant driven to Eue-land by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes ; a mathematician ; and a friend of Newton. He died inl7M. Mem'ry and forecast just retiu'ns engage. That pointed back to youth, this on to ago ; While pleasure, gratitude, and hope combin'd, StOl spread the int'rest, and preserv'd the kind. Nor think, in Natui-o's state they blindly trod ; The state of Natiu'e was the reign of God : Self-love and Social .at her birth beg.an. Union the bond of all things, and of Man. 1-50 Pride then was not ; nor Ai-ts, that Pride to aid ; Man walk'd with beast, joint tenant of the shade ; The same his table, and the same liis bed ; No murder cloth' d him, and no murder fed. In the same temple, the resounding wood. All vocal beings hj-mn'd their equal God, The shrine with gore unstain'd, with gold imdrest, Unbrib'd, unbloody, stood the blameless priest : Heav'n's attribute was Universal Care, And Man's prerogative to rule, but spare. 160 Ah ! how unlike the man of times to come ! Of half that live the butcher and the tomb ; ^Tio, foe to Nature, hears the gen'ral groan, Murders their species and betrays his own. But just disease to luxury succeeds. And ev'ry death its own avenger breeds ; The Furj'-passions from that blood began. And tum'd on ]\Ian a fiercer savage, Man. See him from Nature rising slow to Art ! To copy Instinct then was Reason's part ; 170 Thus then to Man the voice of Nature spake — " Go, from the Creatures th}- instructions take : Learn from the birds what food the thickets yield ; Learn from the beasts the physic of the field ; Thy arts of building from the bee receive ; Learn of the mole to plough, the worm to weave ; Learn of the little nautilus to sail. Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale. Here too aU forms of social imion find. And hence let Reason, late, instruct Mankind : 180 Here subterranean works and cities see ; There towns aerial on the waving tree. Learn each small People's genius, policies. The Ant's republic, and the realm of Bees ; How those in common all theii' wealth bestow, And Anarchy -Nvithout confusion know ; And these for ever, tho' a Monarch reign. Their sep'rate cells and properties maintain. Mark what unvarj-'d laws preserve each state, Laws wise as Nature, and as fix'd as Fate. 190 In vain thy Reason finer webs shall draw, Entangle Justice in her net of Law, And right, too rigid, harden into wrong ; StiU for the strong too weak, the weak too strong. Yet go ! and thus o'er all the creatm-es sway. Thus let the wiser make the rest obey ; And, for those Arts mere Instinct could afltord, Be crown'd as Monarchs, or as Gods ador'd. Great Nature spoke ; observant Men obey'd ; Cities were built. Societies were made. Here rose one little state ; another near Grew by like means, and join'd, thro' love or fear. Did here the trees with ruddier burdens bend. And there the streams in purer riUs descend ? What War could ravish. Commerce could bestow, And he retum'd a friend who came a foe. 200 47 370 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1727 Converse and Love mankind might strongly draw, When Love was Liberty, and Nature Law. Thus States were fomi'd ; the name of King miknown. Till common int'rest placed the sway in one. 210 'Twas Virtue only or in arts or arms, Diffusing blessings, or averting harms; The same which in a Wire the Sons obey'd, A Prince the Father of a People made. TiU then, by Nature crown' d, each Patriarch sate, King, priest, and parent of his growing state ; On him, their second Providence, they himg, Theii- law his eye, thcii- oracle his tongue. He from the wond'ring furrow call'd the food, Taught to command the fire, control the flood, 220 Draw forth the monsters of th' abyss profound. Or fetch th' aerial eagle to the ground. Till drooping, sick'ning, dying, they began "Whom they rever'd as God to mourn as Man : Then, looking up from sire to sire, explor'd One great First Father, and that first ador'd. Or plain tradition that this All begun, Convey'd unbroken faith from sii-e to son : The Worker from the Work distinct was known, And simple licason never sought but one. 230 Ere Wit oblique had broke that steady light, Man, like his JIaker, saw that all was right, To Virtue in the paths of Pleasure trod. And own'd a Father when he own'd a God. Love all the faith, and all th' allegiance then ; For Nature knew no right divine in Men, No iU could fear in God ; and understood A sov'reign being but a sov'reign good. True faith, true policy, united ran. This was but love of God, and tliis of JIan. 240 Who first taught souls enslav'd, and reabns undone, Th' enormous faith of many made for one : That proud exception to all Nature's laws, T' invert the world, and counterwork its Cause ? Force first made Conquest, and that conquest, Law : Till Superstition taught the tjTant awe, Then shar'd the Tyranny, then lent it aid ; And Gods of Conqu'rors, Slaves of Subjects made. She 'midst the lightning's blaze, and thimder's sound. When rock' d the mountains, and when gi-oan' d the ground. She taught the weak to bend, the pi-oud to pray, 251 To Pow'r unseen, and mightier far than they ; She, from the rending earth and bursting skies, Saw Gods descend, and fiends infernal rise ; Here fix'd the di-eadful, there the blest abodes : Fear made her Devils, and weak Hope her Gods ; Ciods partial, changcfiJ, passionate, imjust. Whoso attributes were Kage, Revenge, or Lust, Such as the souls of cowards might conceive, And, form'd like tyrants, tyrants would believe. 260 Zeal then, not charity, became the guide. And hell was built on spite, and heav'n on pride ; Then sacred seem'd th' ethereal vault no more ; Altars grew marble then, and reek'd \vith gore ; Then first the FLamen tasted liN-ing food ; Next his grim idol smear' d with human blood: With Heav'n's own thunders shook the world below, And play'd the God an engine on his foe. So di'ives Self-love, thro' just and thro' unjust, To one Man's pow'r, ambition, lucre, lust : 270 The same SeU-lovc, in all, becomes the cause Of what restrains him, Government and Laws. For what one likes, if others like as well, ^Vhat sen'es one wiU, when many wills rebel, How shall he keep, — what, sleeping or awake, A weaker may surprise, a stronger take ? His safety must his hberty restrain : All join to guard what each desires to gain. Forc'd into virtue thus by Self-defence, Ev'n Kings learn'd justice and benevolence : 280 Self-love forsook the path it first pursu'd, And found the private in the public good. 'Twas then, the studious head or gen'rous mind, Follower of God or friend of human-kind, Poet or Patriot, rose but to restore The Faith and Moral Nature gave before ; Ee-lum'd her ancient light, not kindled new ; If not God's image, yet his shadow drew : Taught Pow'r's due use to People and to Kings, Taught nor to slack, nor strain its tender strings, 290 The less, or greater, set so justly true. That touching one must strike the other too ; TiU jaiTing int' rests, of themselves create Th' according music of a well-mix'd State. Such is the World's great harmony, that springs From Order, L'nion, full Consent of things : A\Tiere small and gi-eat, where weak and mighty, made To serve, not suffer, strengthen, not invade, — More pow'rful each as needful to the rest, And, in proportion as it blesses, blest, — 300 Draw to one point, and to one centre biing Least, Mrm, or Angel, Servant, Lord, or King. For Forms of Government let fools contest ; Whate'er is best administer'd is best : For Modes of Faith let graceless zealots fight ; His can't be wrong whose life is in the right. In Faith and Hope the world -wiU. disagree, Hut all Mankind's concern is Charity: All must be false that thwart this One gi'eat End : And all of God that bless Mankind or mend. :U0 Man, like the gen'rous vine, supported lives ; The strength he gains is from th' embrace he gives. On their own axis as the Planets run, Yet make at once their circle round the Sun : So two consistent motions act the Soul : And one regards Itself, and one the Whole. Thus God and Nature link'd the gen'ral frame, ^^d bade Self-love and Social be the same. Montesquieu, Iiorii ui tlie year when William III. came to the English throne, was in England when, in 1733, this "Third EpLstle of the Essay on Man" was pnlilished. He was studying English institu- tions, looking to reforms at home, and dwelling on the needs of his own country. He went home in 1734, and wrote a book on "The Causes of the Grandeur and Declension of the Romans," then set himself to fourteen years' work at his book on the " Spirit of the Laws," based on his studies of the foundations of English liberty. This book, published ill 1748, was followed in 1751 by the first volume of the famous French Encyclopedie, planned by Denis Diderot, who was born towards the close of Queen Anne's reign in 1712. This work was in course of production during the next fourteen j^ears, and w-;i.s still in course of issue at the close of George II. '.s reign. It dealt with the whole round of knowledge in the boldest way, and marked the surging of the TO A.D. 1760.] SHORTER POEMS. 371 tide of thought during the rise of the great storm then, gathering. The Rev. "William Broome, of St. John's College, Cambridge, wlio became vicar of Eye, in Suflblk, and died in 174-5, shared with Elijah Fenton half the work of the translation of the " Odyssey," produced by Pope in 1725 and 1726. Broome, who had con- tributed notes to the " Iliad," translated the 2nd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 12th, 16th, 18th, and 2:3rd books of the " Odyssey," and compiled the notes. He was a fair poet, and some of his verse bears witness to warm friendship between him and Fenton. These lines are by William Broome : — COURAGE IN LOVE. " 5Iy eyes with, floods of tears o'crflow. My bosom heaves mth constant woe ; Those eyes, which thy unkindness swells. That bosom, where thy imago dwells. How coiild I hope so weak a flame Could ever warm that matchless dame. When none Elysium must behold. Without a radiant bough of gold 'i 'Tis hers, in distant spheres to shine. At distance to admire, is mine : 10 Doom'd, like the enamour'd youth, to groan For a new goddess form'd of stone." While thus I spoke. Love's gentle power Descended from th' ethereal bower ; A quiver at his shoulder hung, A .shaft he grasp'd, and bow unstrung. All nature own'd the genial god. And the spring flourish' d where he trod : lly heart, no stranger to the guest, Flutter'd, and labour'd in my breast; 20 When, mth a smile that kindles joy Ev'n in the gods, began the boy : ' ' How vain these tears 1 Is man decreed, By being abject, to succeed ':■ Hop'st thou by meagre looks to move? Are women frighten'd into love ? He most prevails who nobly dares, In love a hero, as in wars : Ev'n Venus may be kno-svn to j-ield. But 'tis when Mars disputes tho field. 30 Sent from a daring hand my dart Strikes deep into the fair one's heart : To winds and waves thy cares bequeath, A sigh is but a waste of breath. What though gay youth, and every grace That beauty boasts, adorn her face, Yet goddesses have deign' d to wed, And take a mortal to their bed : And heaven, when gifts of incense rise, Accepts it, though it cloud their skies. 40 Mark I how this marigold conceals Her beauty, and her bosom veils. How from the didl embrace she flies Of Phfebus, when his beams arise : But when his glory he displays. And darts aroimd his fiercer rays. Her charms .she opens, and receives The vigorous god into her leaves." The books of the " Odyssey " translated by Fenton were the 1st, 4th, 19th, and 20th, liut Pope re\'ised the work of his fellow-labourers. Pope paid his fellow-translators .£700 or £800, and took for his o\n\ share about £3,700, since it was his reputation that produced the large sale of the work. Few readers have been critical enough to observe in Pope's " Odyssey " when they are reading Broome or Fenton and when Pope. Another minor poet of those days, like Broome a clergyman, was Christopher Pitt, a man of high cha- racter, with natural good taste, who held the living of Pimperne, in Dorsetshire. He iiubiished in 1740 a good translation of Virgil's '• ^neid," and he trans- lated also the " Art of Poetry," written in Latia by the Italian poet Girolamo Vida, in the days of Leo X. Pitt was prompted to this translation by Pope's reference to Vida in his "Essay on Criticism." Among Pitt's original poems is an unfinished imita- tion of Horace that applies half playfully to the art of ^^Titing sermons, in which he took a professional interest, the art of writing about vTitmg, in which he was interested as a poet of his time : — ON THE ART OF PREACHING. Should some fam'd hand, in this fantastic age, Draw Rich, as Rich appears upon the stage, With aU his postures, in one motley plan. The god, the hound, the monkey, and the man; Here o'er his head high brandisliing a leg, And there just hateh'd, and breaking from his egg; While monster crowds on monster through the piece, MTio could help laughing at a sight like this 'i Or as a drunkard's dream together brings A court of cobblers, and a mob of kings ; 10 Such is a sermon, where, confus'dly dark. Join Hoadly, Sharp, South, Sherlock, Wake, and Clarke. So eggs of different parishes will run To batter, when you beat six yolks to one ; So six bright chemic liquors if you mi-x, In one dark shadow vani.sh all the six. This license priests and painters ever had. To rim bold lengths, but never to run mad ; For those can't reconcile God's grace to sin. Nor these paint tigers in an ass's skin ; 20 No common dauber in one piece would join A fox and goose, — unless upon a sign. Some steal a page of sense from TiUotson. And then conclude divinely ^^'ith their own ; Like oil on water mounts the prelate up, His grace is always siu'e to be at top ; That vein of mercury its beams will spread. And shine more strongly through a mine of lead. With such low arts your hearers never bdk. For who can bear a fu.stian Uned with silk 'r 30 Sooner than preach such stulf, I'd walk the town. Without my scarf, in ^\^liston's draggled gown ; Ply at the Chapter, and at Child's, to read For pence, and bury for a gi-oat a head. Some easy subject choose, within your power. Or you will ne'er hold out for half an hour. Still to your hearers all your sermons sort ; Who'd preach against corruption at a court '■: Against church power at visitations bawl "i Or talk about damnation at "WTiitehaU 'i 40 372 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1727 ) Harangue the Horse Guards on a cure of souls Condemn the quirks of Chancery at the Rolls ? Or rail at hoods and organs at St. Paul's ? Or be, like David Jones, so indiscreet, To rave at usurers in Lombai-d Street ? Begin with care, nor, like that curate vile, Set out in this high prancing stumbling style : ' ' 'Whoever with a piercing eye can see Through the past records of futurity 'i" All gape, no meaning : — the puffed orator 50 Talks much, and says just notliing for an hour. Truth and the text he labours to display, Till both are quite interpreted away : !So frugal dames insipid water pour, TiU green, bohea, or coffee, are no more. His arguments in giddy circles run Stin round and round, and end where they begun : So the poor turnspit, as the wheel runs round. The more he gains, the more he loses groimd. No parts distinct or general scheme we find, (iO But one \^Tld shapeless monster of the mind : So when old Bruin teems, her childi'cn fail Of limbs, foiTn, figure, features, head, or tail ; Nay, though she licks the ruins, all her cares Scarce mend the lumps, and bring them but to bears. Ye country -i-icars, when you preach in town A turn at Paul's, to pay your journey down, If you would shun the sneer of every prig, Lay by the little band, and rusty wig : But yet be sure, your proper language know, 70 Nor talk as born within the sound of Bow. Speak not the phrase that Drury Lane afi^ords, Nor from 'Change Alloy steal a cant of words. Coachmen will criticise your style ; nay further, Porters will bring it in for wilful murther ; The dregs of the canaille will look askew, To hear the language of the town from you ; Nay, my lord mayor, with merriment possest, \ Will break his nap, and laugh among the rest, [ And jog the aldermen to hear the jest. ) SO The taste for these iniitiitions of Horace's "Art of Poetry " gave rise, in 1 709, to a playful " Art of Cookery," by a witty lawyer, William King, LL.D., who was born in 166.3, and educated at Westminster .School and Christchurch. His wit drew him away from opportunities of solid gain. His " Ai-t- of Cookery " begins with the flavour of Horace, in this fashion : — Ingenious Lister, were a pictiu'e drawn With Cj-nthia's face, but with a neck like bra-mi; With wings of tiu-key, and with feet of calf. Though drawn by Knellcr, it would make you laugh ! Such is, good sir, the figure of a feast. By some rich farmer's wife and sister drest; \Miich, were it not for plenty and for steam, Might be resembled to a sick man's dream. Where all ideas huddling rim so fast, That syllabubs come first, and soups the last. 10 Not but that cooks and poets still were free. To use their power in nice variety ; Hence mackerel seem delightful to the ej-es. Though dressed -nHth incoherent goosebori'ies. Crabs, sahnon, lobsters, are -ndth fennel spread, "WTio never touch'd that herb till they were dead ; Yet no man lards salt pork with orange-peel, Or garnishes his lamb with spitchcock'd eel. But as this poem is too long to be given complete, let it be represented by a finished work in praise of APPLE-PIE. Of all the delicates which Britons try, To please the palate, or delight the eye ; Of all the several kinds of sumptuous fare. There's none that can with apple-pie compare, For costly flavour or substantial paste. For outward beauty or for inward taste. When first this infant-dish in fashion came, Th' ingredients were but coarse, and rude the frame ; As yet unpolish' d in the modern arts, Oui" fathers ate bro^\-n bread instead of tarts : 10 Pies were but indigested liunps of dough. Till time and just expense improv'd them so. King Cole (as ancient British annals tell) Eenown'd for fiddling and for eating well. Pippins in homely cakes with honey stew'd, " Just as he bak'd," the proverb says, "he brew'd 1" Their greater art succeeding princes show'd. And modelled paste into a neater mode ; Invention now grew lively, palate nice. And sugar pointed out the way to spice. 20 But here for ages unimprov'd we stood. And apple-pie was still but homely food ; WTien god-like Edgar, of the Saxon lino, Polite of taste, and studious to refine. In the dessert perfuming quinces cast, And perfected with cream the rich repast. Hence we proceed the outward parts to trim, With crinkumcranks adorn the polish' d brim. And each fresh pie the pleas' d spectator greets With vii-gin-fancies, and with new conceits. 30 Dear Nelly, learn with care the pastry art, And mind the easy precepts I impart : Draw out youi- dough elaborately thin. And cease not to fatigue your rolling-pin ; Of eggs and butter see you mix enough : For then the paste will swell into a puff. Which will, in crumpling sounds, your praise report, And eat, as housewives speak, " exceeding short." Kang'd in thick order let your quinces Ue ; They give a charming reUsh to the pie. 40 If }-ou are msc, you'll not brown sugar slight. The browner (if I form my judgment right) A deep vennilion tinctui-e will dispense, And make your pippin redder than the quince. WTien this is done, there will be wanting still, The just reserve of cloves and candied peel; Nor can I blame you, if a drop you take Of orange- water, for pei-fuming-sake. But here the nicety of art is such, There must not be too little nor too much : 50 If -with discretion you these costs employ. They quicken appetite : if not, they cloy. Next, in your mind this maxim finnly root, " Never o'ercharge your pie with costly fruit : " Oft let your bodkin through the lid be sent, To give the kind imprison'd treasure vent ; Lest the fermenting liquor, closely press' d, Insensibly, by constant fretting, waste. And o'er-infonn your tenement of paste. TO A.D. 17t30.] SHORTER POEMS. 373 To choose your baker, think, and think again (You'll scarce one honest haker find in ten) : Adust and bruis'd, I've often seen a pie, 'in rich disguise and costly ruin lie, While pensive crust beheld its form o'erthrowTi, Exhausted apples griev' d, their moisture flown, And S)Tup from the sides ran trickling do^sTi. Oh be not, be not tempted, lovely Nell, While the hot-piping odours strongly smell. While the delicious fume creates a gust. To Uck th' o'erflowing juice, or bite the crust. You'll rather stay (if my advnce may rule) Until the hot's corrected by the cool; TiU you've infused the luscious store of cream. And chang'd the purple for a silver stream ; Till that smooth viand its mild force produce. And give a softness to the tarter jnicc. Then shalt thou, pleas'd, the noble fabric view. And have a slice into the bargain too ; Honour and fame alike we will partake, So wcU I'll cat what you so richly make. 60 80 C'hi'istoj>lier Pitt's natural good taste did not liinder liim from living a man's life in the world, and doing liis duty till his death in 1748. William Sheustone looked upon his good taste as something by which he was overweighted in the race of life. He had a form 1). Hales Owen, wliich would be worth £300 a year to liim if he farmed it as his forefathers had done. But Shenstone had been to college, picked up French- classical notions about taste and refinement, and, by way of improving his little good, he wasted his whole substance in transforming it into an oraa- mental gai-den, with temples, inscriptions, and so fortli. It did not concern him if the rain came in through the roof of his house. All his concern was for its watering his garden. Perhaps he had been disajipointed in love ; and if so, we may give a per- sonal turn to the " Pastoral Ballad " which is one of his best pieces of verse : — A PASTORAL BALLAD, IN FOUR PARTS. I. AUSEN'CE. Ye shepherds so cheerful and gay, Whose flocks never carelessly roam ; Should Corydon's happen to stray, Oh ! call the jjoor wanderers home. Allow me to muse and to sigh. Nor talk of the change that yc find ; None once was so watcliful as I ; — I have left my dear PhyUis beliind. Now I know what it is, to have strove With the torture of doubt and desire ; 10 ^Vhat it is, to admire and to love, And to leave her we love and admire. Ah lead forth my flock in the morn. And the damps of each ev'ning repel ; Alas ! I am faint and forlorn : — I have bade my dear Phyllis farewell. Since Phyllis vouchsaf'd me a look, I never once dreamt of my vine ; May I lose both my pipe and my crook. If I knew of a kid that was mine. 20 I priz'd every hour that went by, Beyond all that had pleas'd me before ; But now they arc past, and I sigh ; And I grieve that I priz'd them no more. But why do I languish in vain ? Why wander thus pensively here ? Oh ! why did I come from the plain. Where I fed on the smiles of my dear ? They tell me, my favoiu'ite maid. The pride of that valley, is flown ; 30 Alas ! whore -svith her I have stray'd, I could wander with pleasui'o, alone. When forc'd the fair nymph to forego. What anguish I felt at my heart ! Y'et I thought — but it might not be so — 'Twas with pain that she saw me depart. She gaz'd, as I slowly withdrew ; My path I could hardly discern ; So sweetly she bade me adieu, I thought that she bade me return. 40 The pilgrim that journ^ ys all day To visit some far-distant sluine, If he bear but a relique away, Is happy, nor hoard to repine. Thus widely remov'd from the fair, Where my vows, my devotion, I owe. Soft hope is the relique I bear. And my solace wherever I go. 374 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1727 My tanks they arc furnish' J with hccs, '\\Tiose murmm- invites one to sleep ; 50 My grottos are shaded -with trees, And my hills are white-over \rith sheep. I seldom have met with a loss, Sueh health do my fountains hestow ; My fountains all border' d with moss, Where the hare-bells and violets grow. Kot a pine in my grove is there seen. But with tendrils of woodbine is bound : Not a beech's more beautiful green, But a sweet-briar entwines it around. 60 Not my fields, in the prime of the year, More charms than my cattle unfold : Not a brook that is limpid and clear, But it glitters with fishes of gold. One would think she might like to retii'e To the bow'r I have labour'd to rear ; Not a shi-ub that I heard her admii'e. But I hasted and planted it there. Oh how sudden the jessamine strove With the Ulac to render it gay ! 70 Already it calls for my love. To prune the wild branches away. Fi-om the plains, from the woodlands and groves. What strains of wild melody Uow 'i How the nightingales warble their loves From thickets of roses that blow ! And when her bright fonn shall appear, Each bu-d .shall harmoniously join In a concert so soft and so clear, As she may not be fond to resign. 80 I have found out a gift for my fair ; I have fo\md where the wood-pigeons breed : Bnt let me that plunder forbear. She will say 'twas a barbarous deed. For he ne'er could be true, she avcrr'd. Who could rob a poor bu-d of its yoimg : And I lov'd her the more, when I heai-d Such tenderness fall from her tongue. I have heard her with sweetness unfold How that pity was due to — a dove : 90 That it ever attended the bold. And she call'd it the sister of Love. But her words such a pleasure convey. So much I her accents adore, Let her speak, and whatever she say, Methinks I should love her the more. Can a bosom so gentle remain Unmov'd, when her Corydon sighs I Will a njnnph that is fond of the plain. These plains and this valley despise 'r 100 Dear regions of silence and shade 1 Soft scenes of contentment and ease I Where I could have pleasingly stray" d. If aught, in her absence, could please. ■ But where does my Phyllida stray ? And where are her grots and her bow'rs ? Ajtc the groves and the valleys as gay, And the shepherds as gentle as oui'S ? The groves may perhajis be as fair, And the face of the valleys as fine ; 110 The swains may in manners compare. But their love is not equal to mine. III. SOLItlTVDE. \^^ly wm j-ou my passion reprove ? "Why term it a foUy to grieve ? Ere I .show you the charms of my love, She is fairer than )-ou can believe. With her mien she enamours the brave ; With her wit she engages the free ; With her modesty pleases the grave ; She is ev'ry way pleasing to me. 1'20 you that have been of her train. Come and join in my amorous lays : 1 coidd lay down my life for the swain That will sing but a song in her praise. When he sings, may the nymphs of the town Come trooping, and listen the while ; Nay on him let not Phyllida frown ; — But I cannot allow her to smile. For when Paridel' tries in the dance Any favour with PhyUis to find, 130 O how, with one trivial glance, Might she ruin the peace of my mind \ In ringlets he dresses his hair, And his crook is bestudded around ; And his pipe— oh may Phyllis beware Of a magic there is in the soimd. 'Tis his with mock p;ission to glow ; 'Tis his in smooth talcs to unfold, ' • How her face is as bright as the snow, And her bosom, bo sure, is as cold? 140 How the nightingales labour the strain, With the notes of his cliaraier to vie ; How they vary their accents in vain, Repine at their triumphs, and die." To the grove or tho garden he strays, And pillages every sweet ; Then, suiting tho wreath to his lays. He throws it at PhyUis'sfcet. "U Phyllis," he whispers, "more fair. More sweet than the jessamine's fiow'r! l->0 ■What are pinks, in a mom, to compare '? What is eglantine, after a show'r ? ■'Then the lily no longer is white ; Then the rose is depriv'd of its bloom; Then the violets die with despite. And the woodbines give up their perfume." 1 Sbenstone sliows liis reading of Speuser by use of the name of Paridel, a character in the '* Faerie Queene " (bk. iii,, canto s.), that suits the person he is painting : — *' And otherwbile with amorous delicrhts And pleasing toys he would her entertain ; Now singing sweetly to sui-prise her sprights. Now mailing lays of love and lovers' pain, Bransles, ballads, virelays, and verses vain," Ac. 1760.] SHORTER rOEMS. 375 Thus glide the soft numbers along, And he fancies no shcphei-d his peer ; Yet I never should envy the song, Were not Phyllis to lend it an ear. 160 Let his crook be \rith hj-acinths bound, So Ph}-llis the trophy despise ; Jyct his forehead with laui-els be cruwn'd, So they shine not in Phyllis's eyes. The language that flows from the heart Is a stranger to Paridel's tongue ; Yet may she beware of his art, Or sure I must envy the song. IV. DIS.IPPOINTMEN'T. Y'o shepherds give ear to my laj-. And take no more heed of my sheep : 170 They have nothing to do, but to stray ; I have nothing to do, but to weep. Yet do not my foUy reprove . t)he was fair — and my passion begun ; She smil'd — and I could not but love ; She is faithless — and I am undone. Perhaps I was void of aU thought ; Perhaps it was plain to foresee^, That a nymph so complete would be sought By a swain more engaging than me. 180 Ah I love ev'ry hope can inspire : It banishes wisdom the while ; And the lip of the nymph we admii-e Seems for ever adorn" d -n-ith a smile. She is faithless, and I am undone ; Y'e that witness the woes I endure, Let reason instruct you to shun "WTiat it cannot instruct you to cure. Beware how ye loiter in vain Amid WTnphs of an higher degree : 190 It is not for me to explain How fair and how fickle they be. Alas 1 from the day that we met, What hope of an end to my woes ? When I cannot endure to forget The glance that undid my repose. Y'et time may diminish the pain : The flow'r, and the shrub, and the tree, "WTiich I rear'd for her pleasure in vain, In time may have comfort for me. 200 The sweets of a dew-sprinkled rose, The sound of a mumiiuing stream. The peace which from solitude flows, Henceforth shall be Corj-don's theme. High transports are shown to the sight. But we are not to find them our own ; Fate never bestow' d such delight, As I with my Phyllis had kno«Ti. ( ) ye woods, spread your branches apace ; To your deepest recesses I fly ; 210 I would hide with the beasts of the chase ; I would vanish from every eye. Y'et my reed shall resound thro' the gi-ove With the same sad complaint it begun ; How she smil'd, and I could not but love; Was faithless, and I am undone ! There was a glancing Lack into Elizabeth's reign ill these clays, with a faiiit revival of interest in Spenser that niaj-, jjerhaps, be associated with the signs of a returning sense of what is beautiful in the gi-eat world of which we are a part. Ambrose PhUips had imitated Spenser's " Pa.storals ; " Shen- stone's •' Schoolmistress " attempted to describe a tillage dame-school in Spenserian stanzas, with some efforts at an imitation of Spenserian English, that by no means rose to the level of John Pliilips's imitation of Milton in " The Splendid Shilling," or of the best of all work formed on the manner of Spenser, one of the longer poems produced in the time of George II., Thomson's " Ciistle of Indolence." Great indeed was the contrast between Shenstone's elegant weakness and the healthy battle of brave, tender-hearted Samuel Johnson with the ills of life. Among the prose writers Johnson will be spoken of more fully, but he was a poet and he lived a poem. He had two worlds to concpier : that ■within wa.s disputed against his resolute religious will by a disease that threatened at times even to deprive him of his reason ; while in the oviter world poverty strove in vain to lay him low. Disease could make liim ungainly, seam his face, twitch his arms, .strip him of all physical attributes of dignity ; poverty could close against him all the conventional ways to social rank : but he won all that a true man most prizes by the sterling worth that made Samuel Johnson, even in his poverty, the backbone of the literature of liis time. He was born in Queen Anne's reign, in 1 709, and as a yotmg child was touched by Queen Aime for his scrofula, when touching for " King's Evil " was re- vived as a side suggestion of Right Divine in kings. In 1738, after a preceding life of straggle, Johnson began his career in London with a poem upon " London " that attracted Pope's attention. It was liased on the third satire of Juvenal, but the strength and tenderness of his o^vn nature gave it life. For ten yeare more he battled on, and then, in 1749, when he was forty years old. published an imitation of the Tenth Satii-e of Juvenal — THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES. -■ Let observation with extensive view, Survey mankind, from ("hina to Peru ; Eemark each aruxious toil, each eager strife, And watch the busy scenes of crowded life : Then say how hope and fear, desire and hate, O'erspread with snares the clouded maze of fate, Where wav'ring man, betray' d by vent' reus pride To tread the di'eary paths without a guide, As treach'rous phantoms in the mist delude. Shuns fancied ills, or chases airy good ; 10 How rarely Reason guides the stubborn choice, Rules the bold hand, or prompts the suppliant voice ; How nations sink, by darling schemes oppress' d, AVhen vengeance listens to the fool's request. Fate wings with ev'rj' wish th' afilictive dart. Each gift of Nature, and each grace of Art : 37G CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1727 With fatal heat impetuous courage glows, With fatal sweetness elocution flows, Impeachment stops the, speaker's powerful breath. And restless fire precipitates on death. 20 But, scarce obsorv'd, the knowing and the bold Fall in the gen'ral massacre of Gold ; Widc-wa.sting pest, that rages unconfin'd, And crowds with crimes the records of mankind ! For gold his sword the hia-eling ruifian draws. For gold the liireling judge distorts the laws ; Wealth heap'd on wealth, nor truth nor safety buys, The dangers gather as the treasures rise. Let hist'ry tell where rival kings command And dubious title shakes the madded land, 30 When statutes glean the refuse of the sword. How much more safe the vassal than the lord ; Low skulks the hind beneath the rage of pow'r, And leaves the wealthy traitor in the Tow'r, TJntouch'd his cottage, and his slumbers sound, Tho' confiscation's vultures hover round. The needy traveller, serene and gay. Walks the wild heath, and sings his toil away. Does envy seize thee ? crush th' upbraiding joy. Increase his riches and his peace destroy : 40 New fears in dire vicissitude invade. The rustling brake alarms, and quiv'ring shade, Nor light nor darkness bring his pain relief, One shows the phmdor, and one hides the thief. Yet still one gen'ral cry the skies assails. And gain and grandeur load the tainted gales ; Few know the toihng statesman's fear or care, Th' insidious rival and the gaping heir. Once more, Democritus, arise on earth, With cheerful wisdom and instructive mii'th, 50 See motley Life in modern trappings dress'd, And feed with varied fools th' eternal jest : Thou wlio couldst laugh where Want enchain' d Caprice, Toil crush'd Conceit, and man was of a piece ; Where Wealth unlov'd without a mourner died; And scarce a sycophant was fed by Pride ; Where ne'er was known the form of mock debate, Or seen a new-made mayor's im wieldly state ; Where change of fav' rites made no change of laws, And senates heard before they judg'd a cause : 60 How wouldst thou shake at Britain's motlish tribe, Dart the quick taunt, and edge the piercing gibe ? Attentive Truth and Nature to descry. And pierce each scene with phQosophie eye, To thee were solemn toys or empty show. The robes of pleasure and tho veils of woe : All aid the farce, and all thy mirth maintain Whose joys are causeless, or whose griefs are vain. Such was the scorn that fiU'd the sage's mind, Renew'd at ev'ry glance on, human kind ; 70 How just that scorn ere yet thy voice declare. Search every state, and canvass ev'ry pray'r. TJnnumbor'd suppliants crowd Prefei-ment's gate, Athirst for wealth, and burning to be great ; Delusive Fortune hears th' incessant call. They mount, they shine, evaporate, and fall. On ev'ry stage the foes of peace attend. Hate dogs their flight, and Insult mocks their end ; Love ends with hope, the sinking statesman's door Pours in the morning worshipper no more. 80 For gro'n-ing names the weekly scribbler lies ; To growing wealth the dedicator flies ; From ev'ry room descends the painted face. That hung the bright Palladium of the place. And smok'd in kitchens, or in auctions sold. To better features yields the frame of gold : For now no more we trace in ev'ry lino Heroic worth, benevolence di'^dne ; Tlie form distorted justifies the fall. And detestation rids th' indignant wall. 90 But mil not Britain hear the last appeal. Sign her foes' doom, or guard lier fav'rites' zeal ? Thro' Freedom's sons no more remonstrance rings, Degi-ading nobles and controUing kings : Our supple tribes repress theii' patriot throats. And ask no questions but the price of votes ; With, weekly libels and septennial ale. Their -wish is full to riot and to raQ. In fidl-blown dignity see Wolsey stand, Law in his voice, and fortune in his hand : 100 To him the Chm-ch, the Reabn, their pow'rs consign, Tlrrough him the rays of regal boimty shine. Still to new heights his restless wishes tow'r. Claim leads to claim, and pow'r advances pow'r. Till conquest uni-esisted ccas'd to please. And rights submitted, left' him none to seize. At length his sov'rcign frowns — the train of state Mark the keen glance, and watch the sign to hate. Where'er ho tm-ns he meets a stranger's eye. His suppliants scorn him, and his followers fly : 110 At once is lost the pride of awfid state, The golden canopy, the glitt'ring plate. The regal palace, the luxiuious board, The liv'ried army, and the menial lord. With age, with cares, with maladies opprcss'd. He seeks the refuge of monastic rest ; Crrief aids disease, remember' d folly stings. And his last sighs reproach the faith of kings. Speak thou, whose thoughts at humble peace repine. Shall Wolsey' s wealth, with Wolsey' s end, be thine 'r 120 Or liv'st thou now, with safer pride content, The wisest justice on the banks of Trent ? For why did Wolsey, near the steeps of fate, i")n weak foimdations raise th' enormous weight ? "WHiy but to sink beneath jMisfortune's blow. With louder ruin to the gulfs below ? "^Tiat gave great Villiers to th' assassin's knife, And fix'd disease on Harley's closing life ^ What mm-der'd Wentworth, and what exil'd Hyde, By kings protected, and to kings allied ? 130 AMiat but their wish indulg'd in courts to shine. And pow'r too great to keep, or to resig-n ? When first the college rolls receive his name. The yoimg enthusiast quits his ease for fame ; Through all his veins the fever of renown Spreads from the strong contagion of the gown : O'er Bodley's dome Ms future labours spread, And Bacon's mansion trembles o'er his head. Are these thy views ? proceed, illustrious youth. And Virtue guard thee to the throne of Truth ! 140 Yet should thy soul indulge the gen' reus lieat. Till captive Science yields her last retreat ; Should Reason guide thee with her brightest ray. And pour on misty Doubt resistless day ; Should no false Kindness lure to loose delight, Nor Praise relax, nor Difficulty fright ; Should tempting Novelty thy cell refrain, And Sloth efiuse her opiate fumes in vain ; TO A D. 1760.' SHORTER POEMS. 377 Should Beauty blunt on fopa her fatal dart, Nor claim the triumph of a letter'd heart ; liiO Should no Disease tliy torpid veins invade, Nor Melancholy's phantoms haunt thy shade;' Yet hope not Ufe from grief or danger free, Nor think the doom of man revers'd for thee : Deign on the passing world to turn thine eyes, And pause awliile from letters, to he wise ; There mark wliat ills the scholar's Ufe assail, Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail. See nations slowly wise, and meanly just, To hurled merit raise the tardy bust. 160 If dreams yet flatter, once ag'ain attend. Hear Lydiat's- life, and Galileo's end. Nor deem, when Learning her last prize bestows. The giitt'ring eminence e.xempt from woes ; See when the vulgar 'scape, despis'd or aw'd, Rebelhon's vengeful talons seize on Laud. From meaner minds the' smaller fines content. The plunder'd palace or sequester'd rent, Mark'd out by dang' reus parts he meets the shock. And fatal Learning leads him to the block : 170 Around his tomb let Art and Genius weep. But hear his death, ye blockheads, hear and sleep. The festal blazes, the triiunphal show, The ravish'd standard, and tlie captive foe. The senate's thanks, the gazette's pom|ious tale. With force resistless o'er the brave prevail. Such bribes the rapid Greek o'er Asia wliirl'd, For such the steady Romans shook the world ; For such in distant lands the Britons shine. And stain with blood the Danube or the Rhine; 180 This pow'r has praise, that viitue scarce can warm. Till Fame supplies the universal charm. Yet Reason frowns on War's unequal game, AATiere wasted nations raise a single name. And mortgag'd states their grandsires' wi-eaths regret, From age to age in everlasting debt ; Wreaths which at last the dear bought right convey To rust on medals, or on stones decay. On what foundation stands the warrior's pride. How just his hopes let Swedish Charles'* decide. I'JO A frame of adamant, a sold of fire. No dangers fright him, and no labours tire ; O'er love, o'er fear extends his wide domain, TJnconquer'd lord of pleasure and of pain; No joys to him pacific sceptres yield. War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field ; Behold surrounding kings their pow'rs combine, And one capitulate, and one resign ; Peace courts his hand, but spreads her chai-ms in vain ; " Think nothing gain'd," he cries, "till nought remain. On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly, 201 And all be mine beneath the polar sky ! " The march begins in military state. And nations on his eye suspended wait ; ^ In these lines there is a touching reference to his own suffering. 2 Thomas Lydiat, "bom in 1572, and educated at Winchester School and New College, w.as cosmogi-aplier to Prince Henry, son of James I. He was a great scholar, at one time, at Dublin, under Usher. Made answerable for debts of a friend, he suffered imprisonment and want : petitioned in vain to travel into Tiu'key, Abyssiuia, and Ethiopia, in search of manuscripts ; suffered afterwards greatly as a Eoyalist in the Civil Wai-s ; and died poor in 1646. 3 Charles XII. of Sweden, defeated at the battle of Pultowa, iu Jidy, 1709, was shot at Frederickshall, on the coast of Norway, iu December, 1718. 48 stem Famine guards the solitary coast, And Winter barricades the realms of Frost ; He comes, not want and cold his course delay : — Hide, blushing Glory, hide Pultowa's day ! The vanqidsh'd hero leaves his broken bands, And shews his miseries in distant lands; 210 Condemn' d a needy supplicant to wait, While ladies intei'pose, and slaves debate. But did not Chance at length her error mend ? Did no subverted empire mark his end ? Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound ? Or hostile millions press him to the ground ? His fall was destin'd to a barren strand, A petty fortress, and a dubious hand ; He left the name, at which the world grew pale. To point a moral, or adorn a tale. 220 All times their scenes of pompous woes afliord. From Persia's tyTant to Bavaria's lord. In gay hostiUty. and barb'rous pride. With half manlrind embattled at his side. Great Xerxes comes to seize the certain prey, And starves exhausted regions in his way ; Attendant Flatt'ry counts his myriads o'er. Till counted myriads soothe his pride no more ; Fresh praise is tried till madness fires his mind. The waves he lashes, and enchains the wind ; 230 New pow'rs are claim'd, now pow'rs are still bestow'd. Till rude resistance lops the spreading god : The daring Greeks deride the martial show. And heap theu- valleys with the gaudy foe ; Th' insulted sea with humbler thoughts he gains, A single skiff to speed his flight remains ; Th' encumber' d oar scarce leaves the dreaded coast Through purple billows and a floating host. The bold Bavarian, in a lucldess hoirr, Tries the dread summits of Cassarean pow'r, 240 With unexpected legions bursts away. And sees defenceless realms receive his sway : Short sway ! fair Austria spreads her mournful charms. The Queen, the Beauty, sets tlie world in arms ; From hill to liill the beacon's rousing blaze Spreads wide the hope of plunder and of praise ; The fierce Croatian, and the wild Hussar, And all the sons of ravage crowd the war ; The baffled prince in Honoiu''s flatt'ring bloom Of hasty greatness finds the fatal doom, 250 His foes' derision and his subjects' blame. And steals to death from anguish and from shame. " Enlarge my life with multitude of days," In health, in sickness, thus the suppliant prays ; Hides from himself his state, and sliuns to know That life protracted, is protracted woe. Time hovers o'er, impatient to destroy. And shuts up all the passages of joy ; In vain their gifts the bounteous seasons pour, The fruit autumnal, and the venial flow'r : 260 With Hstless eyes the dotard views the store. He views, and wonders that they please no more ; Now paU the tasteless meats, and joyless wines. And Luxuiy with sighs her slave resigns. Approach, ye minstrels, try the soothing strain. And yield the tuneful lenitives of pain : No sounds, alas I would touch th' impervious ear, Tliough dancing mountains witness'd Orpheus near; Nor lute nor lyre his feeble pow'r attend, Nor sweeter nmsic of a virtuous friend, 270 378 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1727 But everlasting dictates crowd his tongue, Perrersely grave or positively wi-ong. The stUl returning tale and ling' ring jest Perplex the fawning niece and pamper' d guest, AVhile growing hopes scarce awe the gath'ring sneer. And scarce a legacy can bribe to hear ; The watchful guests still hint the last oilence, The daughter's petulance, the son's expense. Improve his heady rage ^-ith treach'rous skill, And mould his passions till they make his wUl. 2S0 Unnumber'd maladies his joints invade. Lay siege to life, and press the dire blockade ; But unextinguish'd Av'rice still remains. And dreaded losses aggravate his pains ; He turns, with anxious heart and crippled hands. His bonds of debt, and mortgages of lands ; Or views his coffers with suspicious eyes, Unlocks his gold, and counts it till he dies. But grant, the virtues of a temp' rate prime Bless with an age exempt from scorn or crime ; 290 An age that melts in unpcrceiv'd decay, And glides in modest innocence away ; WTiose peaceful day Benevolence endears, MTiose night congratulating Conscience cheei'S ; The gen'ral fav'rite as the gen'ral friend : Such age there is, and who could wish its end ? Yet ev'n on this her load Misfortune flings, To press the weary minutes' flagging wings ; New sorrow rises as the day returns, A sister sickens, or a daughter mourns. 300 Now kindred Merit fills the sable bier. Now lacerated Friendship claims a tear. Year chases year, decay pursues decay. Still drops some joy from with' ring life away : New forms arise, and diff'rent views engage. Superfluous lags the veteran on the stage, Till pitying Nature signs the last release, And bids afflicted worth retii-e to peace. But few there are whom hours like these await. Who set unclouded in the gulfs of Fate. 310 From Lydia's monarch should the search descend. By Solon cautioned to regard his end, In life's last scene what prodigies surprise, Fears of the brave, and follies of the wise ? From Marlb' rough's eyes the streams of dotage flow. And Swift expires a driveller and a show. The teeming mother, anxious for her race, Begs for eacli birth the fortune of a face : Yet Vane could toll what ills from beauty spring ; And Sedley curs'd the form tliat pleas'd a king. 320 Ye nymphs of rosy lips and radiant eyes, AVliom Pleasure keeps too busy to be wise, AVhora joys with soft varieties invite. By day the frolic, and tlie dance by night ; AVho frown with vanity, who smile with art, And ask the latest fashion of the heart, WTiat care, what rules your heedless charms shall save. Each m-mph your rival, and each yoiith your slave ? Against your fame with fondness Hate combines. The rival hatters, and the lover mines. 330 With distant voice neglected Vii'tue calls. Less heard and less, the faint remonsti'ance falls ; Tir'd with contempt, she quits tlie slipp'ry reign. And Pride and Prudence take her seat in vain. In crowd at once, where none the pass defend, Tlic liannlcss Freedom, and the private Friend, The guardians yield, by force superior plied : By Int'rest, Prudence ; and by Flatt'ry, Pride. Now Beauty falls betray'd, despis'd, distross'd, Arid liissing Infamy proclaims the rest. 3 10 Where then shall Hope and Fear their objects findi-' Must dull Suspense corrupt the stagnant mind ? JIust helpless man, in ignorance sedate. Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate ? Must no dislike alarm, no wishes rise. No cries attempt the mercies of the skies ? Enquirer, cease, petitions yet remain \Aliich Heav'n may hear, nor deem religion vain. Still raise for good the supplicating voice. But leave to Heav'n the measure and the choice. 3.30 Safe in His pow'r, whose eyes discern afar The secret ambush of a specious pray'r, Implore His aid, in His decisions rest. Secure whate'er He gives. He gives the best. Yet when tlie sense of Sacred Presence fires, And strong devotion to the skies aspires. Pour forth thy fervom-s for a healthful mind, Obedient passions, and a will resign'd ; For love, which scarce collective man can fill ; For patience, sovereign o'er transmuted ill ; 360 For faith, tliat panting for a happier seat. Counts death kind Natirre's signal of retreat : These goods for man the laws of Heav'n ordain. These goods He grants, who gi'ants the pow'r to gain ; With these celestial AVisdom calms the mind. And makes the happiness she does not find. Thomas Gray, who was about seven years younger than Samuel Jolmson, was the only surviving son of a money-scrivenei" in Cornhill. An uncle, on his mother's side, was an assistant-master at Eton. Gray, Thomas Gray. From the Portrait prefixed to liia WorliS (.1807). therefore, was sent to Eton, where he formed a frieud- sliip with young Horace Walpole. From Eton he was sent to his uncle's college, Peterhouse, at Cambridge. TO A.D. 1760.] SHORTER POEMS. 379 His mother, left a widow, liad gone to live with Miss Antrobus, her unmarried sister, and a married sister, Mrs. Rogers, also left a widow. The thi-ee sistei-s lived in a liouse left to Mrs. Rogers at Stoke Pogis, near Windsor. This was Gray's home when he was not at Cambridge, and so it happened to be the church- yard at Stoke Pogis that suggested to him the writing of his famous "Elegy." Gray was a fine scliolar, with sensiti\'e taste, who found pleasui'e in science as well as in poetry. In his Odes he raised into true poetry the feeble classicism of the time. Comparison of John Sheffield's " Ode to Brutus " with Gray's " Ode to Adversity " shows all the differencs between a poetaster and a j)oet : — ODE TO ADVERSITY. Daughter of Jove, relentless Power, Thou tamer of the human breast, A\'Tio.se iron scourge and tort'ring hour, The bad affright, afflict the best. Bound in thy adamantine chain The proud are taught to taste of pain. And purple tj-rants vainly groan With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone. AMiea first thy sire to send en earth Virtuj, his darling child, design' d, 10 To thee he gave the heav'nly birth, And bade to form her infant mind. Stern rugged nirrse ! thy rigid lore AVith patience many a year she bore : What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know. And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe. Scared at thy frown terrific, fly Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood, Wild Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy, And leave us leisure to be good. 20 Light they disperse, and with them go The summer friend, the flatt'ring foe ; By vain Prosperity receiv'd. To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd. Wisdom in sable garb array' d Immers'd in rapt' reus thought profoimd. And Melancholy, silent maid, With leaden eye, that loves the ground. Still on thy solemn steps attend. Warm Charity, the general friend, 30 With Justice, to herself severe, And Pity dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear. Oh, gently on thy suppliant's head. Dread goddess, lay thy chast'ning hand I Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad. Nor circled with the vengeful band (As by the impious thou art seen) With thund'ring voice, and threat'ning mien, With screaming Horror's funeral cry, Despah', and fell Disease, and ghastly Poveitj'. 40 Thy form benign, goddess, wear, Thy milder influence impart. Thy philosophic train be there To soften, not to wound my heart. The generous spark e.Ntinct revive, Teach me to love and to forgive, E.xact my own defects to scan. What others are to feel, and know myseU a Man. The " Elegy in a Country Churchyard," as first written, was not clear of reference to Tully and Cresar. But Gray's true feeling as a poet caused him to labour for a simplicity of truth that should suit his theme, though, in his day, men were astray from the knowledge that high thinking of whatever kind gains power by an unafleoted utterance. And so it came to pass that the ])oem from which, for a par- ticular reason, Gray removed wliute%er inteifered with a direct simplicity in the expression of his thought, touches the hearts of me)i in aftertime more surely than any of his odes. ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD.' The curfew tolls the knell of parting day. The lowing herds wind slowly o'er the lea. The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds. Save where the beetle wheels his choning flight, And^ drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds ; Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower. The moping owl does to the moon complain 10 Of such as wand' ring' near her secret bower, Molest her ancient ■* soUtary reign. Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, AATiere heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet^ sleep. The breezy call of incense-breathing mom,^ The" swallow twitfring from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill claiion, or the echoing horn,^ No more shall rouse them from theh lowly bed. '20 For them no more the blazing hearth shall bum, Or busy housewife ply her evening care. No chilchen run to lisp then- sire's return. Or cUmb his knees the envied ' kiss to share. Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield, Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke ; 1 Tliere is a MS. in Gray's handwriting of this poem as it stood before it had received the final xJOlish. The variations indicated in tlie following notes show what was stnick out or corrected, and will enable the reader to see how Gray gave the last touches to a work that underwent many revisions before it attained to the full 'ueauty of the form in which it lives. 2 "Or." 3 " Stray too " written over " wand'ring," as for consideration. * "And pry into" written, in like mauuer, over "Molest her ancient." ^ " Village " erased, " hamlet " written over. 6 " For ever sleep, the breezy call of Mom." ' "Or." 8 " Or chanticleer so shrill, or echoing horn." " " Envied " written over " coming" for consideration, and, as we see, prefen'cd. 380 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1727 How jocund did they drive their team afield ! How bowed the woods beneath theii- stui'dy stroke I Let not Ambition mock their useful toil, Their homely' joys, and destiny obscure, 30 Nor Grandeiu' hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor. The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power. And all tliat beauty, all that wealth e'er gave. Await aUlce th' inevitable hour : The paths of glory lead but to the grave. Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,- If Memory o'er their tomb^ no tropliies raise. Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. 40 Can storied urn or animated bust Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ? Can Honour's voice provoke'' the silent dust. Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death ? Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire ; Hands, that the rod* of empire might have sway'd, Or wak'd to eostaoy the living IjTe.^ But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll ; 50 Chill Penury repr^ss'd ' their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul. Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark uufathom'd caves of ocean bear; Full many a flower is born to blush imseen. And waste its sweetness on the desert air. Some village Hampden,'* that with dauntless breast The little tyrant of his fields withstood ; Some mute inglorious Milton,' here may rest. Some Cromwell '" guiltless of his country's blood. 60 Th' applause of list'ning senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes. Their lot" forbad: nor circumscrib'd alone Their growing'^ virtues, but their crimes confin'd; Forbad '■' to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind ; ^ " Rustic," 2 " Forgive, ye proud, tli' involuntary fault." 3 " If Memoi"y to tliese." * "Awake " underlined for consideration. ^ " Reins." ^ After tliis stanza came that now tegiuning " Some village Hamp- den," and figures at tlie side indicate tlmt it was to be cari'ied down into its present place. '' "Had danip'd," and over tMs " depress'd, repressed" written for consideration. 8 The original word has heen almost obliterated, as this line fall? ou a fold of the paper j it seems to have been " Gracchus." 9 "TvOly." » "Cj!3Tr." u " Fate" with "lot" written over. 1* " Struggling" with " growing" wi-itten over " "Forbid." The struggling pangs of conscious Truth to hide. To quencli the blushes of ingenuous Shame, 70 Or heaiJ the shrine of Luxmy and Pride With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.?' Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never leai'n'd to stray; Along the cool sequester' d vale of life They kept the noiseless '» tenor of their way. Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect Some frail memorial stiU erected nigh, With micouth rhymes""' and shapeless sculpture deck'd, Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. 80 Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd Muse, The place of fame and elegy '^ supply : And many a holy text around she strews That teach the rustic moraUst to die. For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing anxious being e'er resign' d. Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing ling' ring look behind !-■ On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious ch'ops the closing eye requires ; 90 Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fii'es."* For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd dead Dost in these lines theii' artless tale lelate ; If chance, by lonely Contemplation led. Some kindred spirit shall iuquii'e thy fate," 1* " And at the shi-ine of Luxury and Pride, Burn incense hallowed in the Muse's iiame." "Crown" wi'itten over "at," and "with" over "bum," "by" written over " in," and " kindled at " then written underneath. Between tliis stanza and that begiuuing " Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife," came, in Gray's earher MS. draft, these four stanzas marked at the side for omission, of which one is used, in an altered form, lower down : — " The thoughtless "World to Majesty may bow. Exalt the brave and idolise success, But more to Innocence their safety owe Than Power and Genius e'er conspired to bless. • *' And thou who, mindful of th' uuhonoured dead. Dost in these notes their artless tale relate By Night and lonely Contem' lation led To hnger in the gloomy walks of Fate, " Hark how the sacred cnlm that broods around Bids ev'ry fierce tumultuous passion cease. In still small accents wliisp'ring from the ground A giuteful earnest of etei-nal peace, " No more, with Reason and thyself at strife, Give anxious cares and endless wishes room ; But tliro' the cool, sequester'd vale of life. Pursue the silent tenor of thy doom." " " Silent," "noiseless" written over. 16 " Rhyme." " " Epitaph." 18 "And buried ashes glow witli social fires." 19 This is a motliticatiou of the second stanza in the omitted passage given in Note 14 in this page. The following ai'e the four lines in the MS. for which this stanza was substituted ; — " If chance that e'er some pensive spirit more By sympathetic musings here dcliy'd, "With vain tho* kind enquiry shall ex|]lore Thy much-loved haunt, this long-deserted shade." TO AD. 176).] SHORTER POEMS. 381 Haply some hoary-headed swain may ' say, " Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn Brushiu.g with hasty steps- the dews away To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.^ 1 00 "There at the foot'* of yonder nodding* heech That wreatlies its old fantastic roots so high, . His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the hrook that bahblos by. " Hard by yon wood,^ now smiling as in scorn. Mutt' ring his wayward fancies'' he would rove; Now drooping, woeful wan,'* like one forlorn, Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love. " One mom I' missed him on the 'custom'd hill. Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree;'" 110 Another came ; nor yet beside the rill. Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he ; " The next with dirges due" in sad array Slow tlu'o' the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay, Grav'd on''- the stone beneath yon aged thorn." The Epitaph. Here rests his head upon the lap of earth, A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown : Fair Science frown'd not on his humble bu-th. And Melancholy mark'd him for her own. 120 Large was his bounty, and his soul'^ sincere, Heav'n did a recompense as largely send : He gave to Mis'ry all he had, a tear, He gain'd from Heav'n ('twas all he wish'd) a fiiend. No farther seek his merits to disclose. Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike in trembling hope repose) The bosom of his Father and his God.'* 1 "Shall." 2 " With hasty fo.otsteps biiish." s " Ou the liiarh brow of youder hanging lawn." * " Oft at the foot." Before this stanza the MS. has one that Gray afterwards omitted : — " Him have we seen the greenwood side along. While o'er the heath we hied, our labours done, Oft as the woodlark piped her farewell song With wistful eyes pursue the setting sun." ^ " Hoary," with " spreading " written over. ^ " With gestures quaint." 7 " Fond conceits," with " w.iyward fancie=? " written over. In next words "wont to rove " first written, " wont " erased, " loved " written over, also erased, and " would lie " written beside it. 8 " Now woeful wiin lie di'ooped," corrected by erasure and trans- position of " di'ooped." 9 "We." 10 " gy the heath side and at his fav'rite tree," with corrections to the present form of the line. " "Meet." 12 "There on" with "grav'd" and " carv'd " written over. This stanza is followed in the MS. by one that Gray had begun to write before it, then erased before completing the first line and placed after it : — " There scatter'd offc the earliest of tbe year By hands unseen are frequent violets found ; The roliin loves to build and warble there. And littl-! footsteps lightly print the ground." *' Showers of" is written over "frequent." and "redbreast" over ** robin ; " but, as we see, Gray did not retain the stanza. " "Heart." '* The closing stanza runs thus in the MS., with " think " written over " seek : ' — This " Elegy" was first printed iu 17.51, and Gray- died in 1771, the year after the birth of Wordsworth. 10 William Collins, who was about four years younger than Gray, died insane at the age of thirty-nine, in 1759. He was the son of a hatten at Chichester; was educated at Winchester and O.xford ; showed liLs genius as a poet when only a Winchester boy, iu Persian Eclogues ; and came from Oxford to London with rare genius, wild impulse, and high ambition, but without the steadiness of industry by which a man of genius may hope to win what is seldom other- wise attainaljle. His Odes were published in 1747 ; in 1750 his reason began to fail, and in 1754: he had become hopelessly insane. In earlier defects of cha- racter there may have been foreshadowings of the disease that was to end his career in mid-life, but there was judgment as well as genius in the poet who could follow Dryden in his highest lyric flight with this ODE TO THE PASSIONS. When Music, heavenly maid, was young, AVliilo yet in early Greece she sung. The Passions oft, to hear her shell, Throng'd aromid her magic cell, E.xulting, trembling, raging, fainting, Possest beyond the Muse's painting: By turns they felt the glowing mind Disturb'd, delighted, raised, refined ; Till once, 'tis said, when all ■n-ere fired. Fill' d with fury, rapt, inspired. From the supporting myrtles romid They snatch'd her instrimients of sotind ; And, as they oft had heard apart Sweet lessons of her forceful art, Each (for Madness ruled the hour) Would prove his own e.xpressive power. First Fear his hand, 'ts skill to try, Amid the chords be vilder'd laid. And back recoil' d, he knew not why. E'en at the sound liiniself had made. Next Anger rush'd ; his eyes on fire. In lightnings own'd his secret stings : In one rude clash he struck the lyre. And swept with hurried hand the strings. With woful measures wan Despair, Low, sullen sounds, liis grief beguiled ; A solemn, strange, and mingled air ; 'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild. But thou, Hope, -n-ith eyes so fair, VTiiat was thy delighted measure ? Still it whisper' d promis'd pleasure. And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail I Still would her touch the strain prolong ; And from the rocks, the woods, the vale, She call'd on Echo still, through all the song ; " No farther seek his merits t^ disclose. Nor seek to draw them fr m their dread abode, (His frailties there in trembling hope repose) Tne bosjm of his Father and liis God." 20 30 382 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1727 And, where lier sweetest theme she chose, A soft responsive voice was lieard at every close, And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair. 40 And longer had she sung ; — but, with a frown, Revenge impatient rose : He threw his blood-stain'd sword, in thunder, down ; And with a withering look The war-denouncing trumpet took. And blew a blast so loud and dread Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe ! And, ever and anon, he beat The doubling drum with furious heat ; And though sometimes, each cb'eary pause between, Dejected Pity, at his side. Her soul-subduing voice applied, 50 Yet still he kept his wild unalter'd mien, While each strain' d ball of sight seem'd bursting from his head. Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix'd ; Sad proof of thy distressful state ; Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd. And now it courted Love, now raving call'd on Hate. With eyes upraised, as one inspired, Pale Melancholy sate retired ; And from her wild sequester'd seat, In notes by distance made more sweet, GO Pour'd through the mellow horn her pensive soul : And, dashing soft from rocks around, Bubbling runnels join'd the sound ; Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole, Or, o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay, Round an holy cabn diffusing. Love of Peace and lonely musing, In hoUow muimurs died away. But oh ! how alter'd was its sprightlier tone, When Cheerfulness, a njTiiph of healthiest hue, 70 Her bow across her shoulder flung, Her buskins genim'd with morning dew. Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung, The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad Icnown ! The oak-crown'd Sisters, and their chaste-eyed Queen, Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen. Peeping from forth their alleys green : Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear ; And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear. Last came Joy's ecstatic trial : 80 He, with viny crown advancing. First to the lively pipe his hand addrest ; But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol. Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best ; They would have thought who heard the strain They saw, in Tempo's vale, her native maids, Amidst the festal sounding shades. To some unwearied minstrel dancing, WTiile, as his fl}-ing fingers kiss'd the strings. Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round ; 90 Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound ; And he, amidst his frolic play. As if he would the charming air repay. Shook thousand odoiu-s from his dewy winga. Music ! sphere-descended maid, Friend of Pleasure. Wisdom's aid I Why, goddess ! why, to us denied, Lay'st tliou thy ancient lyre aside ? As, in that loved Athenian bower. You learn'd an aU-commanding power, Thy mimic soul, Nymph endear' d, Can well recall what then it heard ; Where is thy native simple heart, Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art ? Arise, as in that elder time. Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime ! Thy wonders, in that godlike age, Fill thy recording Sister's page — 'Tis said, and I believe the tale, Tliy humblest reed could more prevail, Had more of strength, diviner rage. Than all which cliarms this laggard E'en all at once togetlier found, Cecilia's mingled world of sound. — Oh bid our vain endeavours cease ; Revive the just designs of Greece : Return in all thy simple state 1 Confirm the tales her sons relate ! 100 110 age; We pass out of the reign of George II. without Iia3-iiig much attention to the minor poets of that reign. Of Mark Akenside's " Pleasures of Imagina- tion " something will have to be said in another volume. As published when he was a youth of about one-and-twenty, it was full of promise. Instead of leaving that behind him and advancing with the years, Akenside spent much of his after life in stuffing his first successfid poem with intellectual horsehair; he became a ph\'sician, and, over-mastered by his wig, struggled to live \\\> to the full dignity of that incumbrance ujion nature. Akenside died in 1770, the year of Wordsworth's birth. That which Akenside I'epresented was then going out, and that which Wordsworth was to represent was slowly coming in. Akenside was Smollett's original for the pedantic doctor who gave a dinner after the manner of the ancients to Peregrine Pickle. The doctor's dishes of meat are like many dishes of verse that were dre.ssed, in his time and before it, according to the classical receipts imposed on us by the French cooks of literature. His attemjit at the salacacabia of the ancients was matched Ijy many a small poet's attempt at the Pindaric Ode. But Akenside was a poet, though a small one. Thus he .sang TO THE MUSE. Queen of my songs, harmonious maid ! Ah, why hast thou withdrawn thy aid ? Ah, why forsaken thus my breast AVith inauspicious damps opipress'd? AVhere is the dread prophetic heat. With which thy bosom wont to beat ':" AMierc all the bright mysterious dreams Of hairated groves and tuneful streams, That woo'd mv genius to divinest themes ? Say, goddess, can the festal board, Or young Olympia's form ador'd ; Say, can the pomp of promis'd fame Relume thv faint, thv dving flame? 10 TO A.D. 17G0.] SHOETER POEMS. 383 Or have melodious airs the power To give one free, poetic horn- 'i Or, from amid th' Elysian train. The soul of Milton shall I gain, To win thee back with some celestial strain ? powerful strain ! sacred soul ! His numbers every sense control ; 20 And now again my bosom burns ; The Muse, the Muse herself returns. Such on the banlcs of Tyne, confess'd, 1 hail'd the fair immortal guest, When first she seal'd me for her own. Made aU her blissful treasures known. And hade me swear to follow her alone. To the reign of George II. belongs the masque, " Alfred," produced before the Prince and Princess of Wales, at C'lifden, on the 1st of August, 1740. Frederick, Prince of Wales, was then thirty-three years old, had been four years married, and for the last three years had been living in open opposition to his father, gathering jioets and wits to a court of his own, and advocating Lil:>erty in the tone that caused Bolingliroke to ^v^•ite his " Patriot King," with Frederick in mind. In October, 1739, war with Spain was forced upon Walpole. In November, Admii'al Vernon took Porto Bello, in the Isthmus of Darien ; and in 1740, when "Rule, Britannia" was written, a great armament of 11-^ ships, carry- ing 15,000 sailors and 12,000 troops, was assembled at Jamaica, and another squadron was being made ready, which set oiit in September, 1740, under Anson, to go round Cape Horn and attack Peru. The results of the two armaments were Vernon's failure to take C'arthagena, and Anson's return in 1744, with one remaining sliip, after his memorable voyage round the world. The patriotic masque of " Arthur " was written by James Thomson and his friend, David Malloch, a cle^'er fellow-student of Thomson's at Edinljurgh, who had found his way a little earlier to London, and had changed his name of Malloch into Mallet for euphony. Which of the autlior-s of this masque contributed to it the ode now become national as "Rule, Britannia," cannot be determined. We must be content to say that either Thomson or Mallet was its author. The scene of " Alfred " " represents a jtlain, surrounded with woods. On one side a cottage, on the other flocks and herds in distant prospect. A hermit's cave is in full view, overhung with trees, wild and grotesque." The king is here, at Athelney, in habit of a peasant, living with the shepherd C'orin and Corin's wife, Emma. The Danes hold Chippenham; the English have deserted their king ; all seems to be lost. The Earl of Devon, finding his sovereign in his seclusion, rouses his slumbering vij-tue. Spirits of the air then call to Alfred :— SONG. First Spirit. Hear, Alfred, father of the state, Thy genius Heaven's high will declare ! Wliat proves the hero truly great, Is never, never, to des])air, Is never to despair. ISi'conti Spirit. T)iy hope awake, thy heart expand With all its vigom', all its lires. Arise ! and save a siulcing land I Thy country calls, and Heaven insph-es. Both Spirits. Earth calls, and Heaven inspu-es Then the Hermit comes out of his care, welcomes the king to his cell, tells a vision of the future power of England, and teaches fortitude with a high aim for the future of his country. Next enters Alfred's queen, Eltruda, with his young children. Minds are exercised, and the Hermit shows the blessings of afflic- tion. The genius of England appears in her radiant charms, and summons visions of Edward III. and the Black Prince; of Elizalieth ; and of William III. ; on each of wliich the Hermit delivers a short patriotic lecture. Then comes the Earl of Devon with men whom he has gathei'ed, and who have already fleshed their weapons on the Danes. The spirit of their ancestors is up. Alfred resumes his royalt}^ and, leaving Eltruda with the shepherd's wife, is setting out '' to pay the debt of honour to the public," with his wife's encouragement to do so ; whereupon thus the piece ends with RULE BRITANNIA. Alfred. Matchless woman ! Love, at thy voice, is kindled to ambition. Be this my dearest triumph, to approve mo A husband worthy of the best Eltruda 1 Hermit. Behold, my lord, our venerable bard. Aged and blind, him whom the Muses favour. Yet ere you go, in our lov'd country's praise. That noblest theme, hear what his rapture breathes. .\N onK. Wlien Britain first, at Heaven's conmiand. Arose from out the azure main ; This was the charter of the land, And guardian angels sung this strain : " Rule, Britannia, rule the waves; Britons never will lie slaves." The nations, not so blest as thee, Jlust, in their turns, to tyrants fall ; ^\^lile thou shalt flourish great and free, Tlie di-ead and envy of them aU. '■ Kule, Britannia, rule the waves ; Britons never will be slaves." Still more majestic shalt thou lise. More dreadful from each foreign stroke ; As the loud blast that tears the skies, Serves but to root thy native oak. " Rule, Britaunia, rule the waves ; Britons never will be slaves." 384 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1740 Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame : All their attempts to bend thee down Will but arouse thy generous flame, But work their woe and thy renown. " Kule, Britannia, rule the waves ; Britons never will be slaves." To thee belongs the rural reign ; Thy cities shall with commerce slrine : All thine shall be the subject main, And eveiy shore it circles thine. "Kule, Britannia, rule the waves; Bi'itons never will be slaves." The Muses, still -n-ith freedom found. Shall to thy happy coast repair : Blest isle ! with matchless beauty crown'd. And manly hearts to guard the fail-. "Rule, Britaimia, rule the waves; Britons never will be slaves." Hermit. Alfred, go forth ! lead on the radiant years, To thee reve.al'd in vision. — Lo ! they rise I Lo ! patriots, heroes, sages, crowd to bii-th : And bards to sing them in immortal verse ! I see thy commerce, Britain, grasp the world : All nations serve thee ; every foreign flood, Subjected, pays its tribute to the Thames. Thither the golden South obedient pours His surmy treasures : thither the soft East Her spices, delicacies, gentle gifts : And thither his rough trade the stormy Xorth. See, where beyond the vast Atlantic surge. By boldest keels untouched, a di'eadful space ! Shores, yet unfound, arise ! in youthful prime, With towering forests, mighty rivers crown'd: These stoop to Britain's thunder. This new world, Shook to its centre, trembles at her name : And there her sons, with aim exalted, sow The seeds of rising empire, arts, and arms. Britons, proceed, the subject deep command. Awe with youi' navies every hostile land. Vain are their threats, their armies all are vain : They rule the balanced world who rule the main. Upon the death of tlie prmce for \\hom " Alfred ' was produced, Thomas Wartoii wrote this elegy : — OS THE DEATH OF FREDERICK, PRINCE OF WALES. March 20, 1751. Oh for the warblings of the Doric ote, ' That wept the youth- deep-whehn'd in ocean's tide! Or MuUa's muse,^ who changed her magic note To chant how dear the laui-cUed Sidney ■• died 1 Then should my woes in worthy strain be sung, And with due cjiu-css-crown thy hearse, Frederick, hung. But though my novice hands are all too weak To grasp the sounding pipe, my voice unskilled The tuneful phrase of poesy to speak, Uncouth the cadence of my carols wild : Milton's. * Lycidas. ' Si>eu3ei''s. ' AsttBphel. A nation's tears shall teach my song to trace The prince that decked Ms crown with every milder grace. How well he knew to sliun false flattery's shrine. To spurn the sweeping pall of sceptercd pride ; Led by calm thought to patlis of eglantine. And rural walks on Isis' tufted side : To rove at large amid the landscapes still, Where Contemplation sate on CUfden'a beech-clad liill. How, locked in pure affection's golden band. Through sacred wedlock's unambitious ways, With even step he walked, and constant hand, His temples binding with domestic bays :* Rare pattern of the chaste connubial knot. Firm in a palace kept, as in the clay-built cot ! How with discerning choice, to natiu'e true, He cropped the simple flowers, or violet Or crocus-bud, tliat with ambrosial hue The banks of silver Helicon beset : Nor seldom waked the muse's living lyre To sounds that called around Aonia's Hstening quire. How to the few, with sparks ethereal stored, He never ban-'d his castle's genial gate, But bade sweet Thomson share the friendly board, Soothing with verse divine the toil of state : Hence fired, the bard forsook the flowery plain. And decked the regal mask, and tried the tragic strain.^ " Rule, Britannia" has perhaps more affinity to the verse of Mallet than to that of 'Thomson. There was a turn in jNIallet for the simplicity of the ballad : witness his " William and IMargaret," which he said was suggested by a snatch of a ballad sung by Old Merrythought in Beaumont and Fletclier'.s burlesque play of the " Knight of the Burning Pestle : " — AATien it was grown to dark midnight. And all were fast asleep, In came Margaret's grimly ghost, And stood at William's feet. But Mallet's piece looks like a version of the older ballad of " Sweet William's Ghost," gi\'en by Allan Ramsay in h(S "Tea Table Miscellany." As in all the English ballad making or mending of this time, the charm of simplicity is not thoroughly felt, and the work suffers accordingly. It is the same with Shenstone's " Billy Dawson," an original ballad really less pathetic than the short newspaper paragrajih upon which it was founded. Still the production of such poems must be added to other indications of a coming change of taste, and we have a good illus- tration of their form in Mallet's WILLIAM AND MARGARET. 'Twas at the silent, solemn hour, AVTien night and morning meet ; In glided JIargaret's grimly ghost. And stood at William's feet. 5 He left seven cliildren. and an ei^Mh soon to "be bom. ^ T/ic rcgni 7im.st," Alfred." The iragtc strain,*' Edward and Eleonara," produced the year before "Alfred," and supposed to imply jrlorifica- tiou of the Prince and Princess of Wales at tlie expense of the king, for which reason its i>ublic representation w.is forbidden. TO A.D. 1760.] SHORTER rOEMS. 385 Her face was like an April morn, Clad in a wintry cloud : And clay-cold was her lily-hand, That held her sable shroud. 80 shall the fairest face appear, A\Tieu youth and years are flown : 111 8uch is the robe that kings must wear, When death has reft their crown. Her bloom was like the springing flower. That sips the silver dew ; The rose was budded in her cheek, Just opening to the Wew. But Lore had, like the canker-worm, Consum'd her early prime : The rose grew pale, and left her cheek ; .She died before her time. 20 "Awake!" she cried, "thy true lore caUs, Come from her midnight grave ; ^ow let thy jiity hear the maid Thy love refus'd to save. ** This is the dumb and dreary hour AMien in jiu-cd ghosts complain ; When yawning graves give up their dead To haunt the faithless swain. ' ' Bethink thee, William, of thy fault. Thy pledge and broken oath : 30 And give me back my maiden vow. And give mo back my troth. ■"Why did you promise love to me. And not that promise keep ;■' Why did you swear my eyes were bright. Yet leave those eyes to weep ? "How could you .say my face was fair. And yet that face forsake ': How could you win my \-ii-gin heart, Yet leave that heart to break ': 40 " ^^Tiy did you say my lip was sweet, -\nd made the scarlet pale ? And why did I. young witless maid ! Believe the flattering tale ? "Tliat face, alas 1 no more is fair ; Those lips no longer red : Dark are my eyes, now clos'd in death. And every chami is fled. ■"The hungry worm my sister is ; This winding sheet I wear : .jO And cold and weary lasts our night. Till that last morn appear. " But liark ! the cock lias warn'd me hence ; A long and late adieu ! Come, see, false man, how low she lies. Who died for love of you." The lark sung loud : the morning smiled, With beams of rosy red ; Pale William quak'd in every limb. And raving left his bed. 60 49 He hied him to the fatal place \Vhero JIargaret's body lay : -Ajid stretch'd him on the grass-green tui^f That wrapp'd lier breathless elaj'. .\nd thrice he call'd on JIargaret's name, And thrice he wept full sore : Then laid his cheek to her cold grave, -ind word spoke never more. To Richard Savage, natural son of Earl Rivers and the Coiinte.ss of Macclesfield, life -svas made painful by the cruelty of his mother and the ills he brought upon himself He died in gaol in 1 743, and Samuel Johnson told the story of his life with pity for his sullerings, and a wise comment that comes nobly from the strong heai-t which had borne also its Qvnx share of bitter trial without failing under it as Savage failed. " Those," observed Johnson, " are no proper judges of his conduct who have slumbered away their time on the down of plenty ; nor will any wise man presume to say, ' Had I been in Savage's con- dition, I should have lived or written Ijetter than Savage.' " Tliis is one of his poems : — THE GENTLEMAN'. A decent mien, an elegance of cU-ess, W(nds ivhich at ease each winning grace express ; A life where love, by wisdom poUsh'd, shines, WTiere wisdom's self again, by love, refines; Wliere we to chance for friendship never trust, Nor ever di^ead from sudden wliim disgust ; To social manners and the heart himiane, A nature aver great, and never vain ; A -n-it that no Ucentious pertness knows. The sense that unassuming eandom- shows ; Reason, by narrow principles unchcck'd. Slave to no party, bigot to no sect ; Knowledge of various life, of leai-ning too. Thence taste, thence truth, which ■will from taste ensue UnwiUing censure, though a Judgment clear, A smile indulgent, and that smile sincere ; An humble, though an elevated mind ; A pride, its pleasure but to serve mankind : If these esteem and admiration raise, Ciive true delight and gain unflattering praise. In one -wish'd ■view th' accompKsh'd man we see : These graces all are thine, and thou art he. 10 20 Edward Young will Ije rejiresented by reference to his " Night 'Thoughts " in anotlier volume ; but here are lines in wluch he dedicates some of his verse to Voltaii-e : — DEDICATION TO VOLTAIRE. 5Iy muse, a bii-d of passage, flies From frozen climes to milder skies ; From chilling blasts she seeks thy cheering beam, A beam of favour, here denied : Conscious of faidts, her blushing pride Hopes an asyliun in so great a name. 386 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 10 To divo fall d('i>p in ancient days, The warrior's ardent deeds to raise, And momirch's aggrandize ; — the glory, thine ; Thine is the di-ama, how renown' d! Thine, Epic's loftier trump to sound; — But let Arion's sea-strung harp be mine. But Where's his dolphin? Know'st thou where ■ jMa}' that he found in thee, Voltaire ': Save thou from harm my plunge into the wave: How will thy name illustrious raise My sinking song ! Mere mortal lays So patronis'd, are rescu'd from the grave. " Toll me," say'st thou, " who oom-ts my smile? AVhat stranger stray'd from }-onder isle?" — 20 No stranger, Sir ! tho' born in foreign climes. On Dorset downs, when Milton's page, AVith Sin and Death, provok'd thy rage, Thy rage provok'd, who .sooth' d with gentle rhjTnes? Wlio kindly couch'd thy censure's eye. And gave thee clearly to descry Sound Judgment giving law to Fancy strong : "V\Tio half inclin'd thee to confess, Nor could thy modesty do less. That Milton's blindness lay not in his song ? 30 40 But such debates long since are flown ; For ever set the suns that shone On aixy pastimes, ere our brows were grey : How shorth" shall we both forget, To thee niy patron, I, my debt. And thou to thine, for Prussia's golden key. The present, in oblivion cast, Fidl soon shall sleep, as sleeps the past ; Full soon the wide distinction die between Tho frowns and favoiu-s of the great : High-flush' d success, and pale defeat ; The Gallic gaiety, and British spleen. Ye wing'd, ye rapid moments! sta}': friend ! as deaf as rapid, they ; Life's little ch-ama done, the curtain falls ! Dost thou not hear it ? I can hear. Though nothing strikes the listening ear : Time groans his last ! Eternal loudlv calls I Nor calls in vain ; tho call inspii'es . . Far other counsels and desires .50 Than once prevail" d. We stand on higher ground. AAHiat scenes we see ! — Exalted aim ! With ardours new our spii'its fiame : Ambition bless' d, with more than laivrels crown'd. Wlieii tliese lines were written, Francois Marie Arouet, who called himself Voltaire, had produced his " Q5dipe " and published his " Henriade " in 1728 — his age then being thu'ty-four — during a residence in England, wliich had made him per- .sonally known to Young. He had produced two jilays, his "Pucelle" and his "History of Charles XII. ;" but when Edward Young paid homage to liis genius liis name was not yet associated with the battle-cries of a day then near at hand. The day was then so near that Young in this poem truly expressed a sense of liuman life advancing by " far other counsels and desii'es than once prevailed." It hojied at least to " stand on higher ground." CHAPTER XVIL Before and After the French Revolution : G0LD,SMITH, COWPER, BURNS, AND OtHERS. — A.D. 1760 to a.d. 1800. It was in 1750 that Jean Jacques Rousseau, then thirty-eight years old, obtained the prize offered by the Academy of Dijon for an essay showing the origin of inequality among men, and whether it was authorised by the laws of nature — in short, whether man was- the better for civilisation. Rousseau argued that he was not ; and Voltaire, in comjjlimenting him upon his success, said, " Really, the reading of your work makes one anxious to go on all-fours." They are in the wrong, said Rousseau, who call man by nature cruel, and say that he needs government control ; " when there is nothing .so gentle as he in his primi- tive state, because, placed by nature at equal distances from the stupidity of the Ijrutes and the baleful lights of the civilised man, and led equally by instinct and reason to avert tlie liarm that threatens him, he is withheld by natural pity from doing harm himself to anj' one, with nothing to lead him to it, not even the suflering of hurt. For, according to the axiom of the wise Locke, there can be no wrong where there is no property." This is a wliimsical perver- sion of the doctrine of the fiftli chapter of the really wise Locke's " Essay concerning the True Original Extent and End of Civil Government." Rousseau dealt as fancifully with the principles of the English Constitution and of the Dutch Declaration of In- dependence when he ptiblished, in 1762, his famous treatise on the social contract, " Du Contrat Social, on Principes du Droit Politique." This book was the soiu'ce of much of the active sentiment tliat shaped afterwards the course of the French Revo- lution. Resistance against despotisms, great and small, was gathering wild force, and vague aspu-a- tions were being blended with the growing sense that man was not all that he should be to his fellow. Imagined meiits of the noble savage were contrasted with the known demerits of the bewigged formalist who lived a life of shams, and many hearts in many lands were throbbing with desii-e for the recovery or the attainment of an innocence and love and truth. Never liefoi'e in the histoiy of the woi'ld had sense of wrongs and tyrannies led to the wide diffusion of an energetic wish to place humanity abo'S'e the reach of wars and tyrannies, of lust and greed, and raise the standard of life to such a level as it would attain if all men ruled their actions by the Sermon on the Mount. Wild theories, imjjossible schemes- for the sudden elevation of the race of men, associated sometimes with an abjuration of religion, had yet in their first impulses a yearning such as this. While tliought is taking wider range and dealing TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 387 more with the essentials of life, there is more and more of the truth of nature in our ])OPms. William Falconer's " Shipwreck," published in 171)2, is faithful work to be remembered when we sjieak of Longer Poems. The author himself perished by shipwreck .seven years later. In the same year, 1762, James -Nlacpherson published " Fingal," called an " Epic," iind other poems, which he ascribed to Oisin or Ossiau. Maepherson had published in 1758, when he was twenty years old, a poem called the " Highlander," which he had not ascribed to anybody but himself Two years later, when he was pri\'ate tutoi' in a gentleman's family, he jniblished " Fragments of Ancient Poetry, collected in the Highlands of Scot- laud, and translated from the Gaelic or Erse Lan- ^guage." A subscription was raised to enable Mac- pherson to leave his employment and discover other remains ; whereupon he '" discovered " " Fingal," and liavmg produced that " Epic " at the age of foui-- smd-twenty, followed it up with another epic next yeai', also ascribed to Ossian, and he called this '• Temora." Fragments of ancient poetry there are among the Celts of Scotland and Ireland — possibly here and there tradition has preserved with more or less of change some snatches of the songs of Oisin — ])ut such remains as we have of old Gaelic poetry' rised : many of them, ou that account, were called Selama. The famous Selma of Fingal is derived from the same root. *- Cox-mac, the young king of Irehiud, who was privately murdered by Cairbar. ■" That is, the love of Cairbar. 388 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 flowing hair 1 " Sucli were thy words, Dar-thula, in Selama's mossy towers. — But, now, the night is around thee. The winds have deceived thy sails. The winds have deceived thy sails, Dar-thiila I Their blustering sound is high. Cease a little while, north wind I Let me hour the voice of the lovely. Thy voice is lovely, Dar-thula, between the rustling blasts ! " Arc these the rocks of Nathos '■: " she said, " this the roar of his mountain streams ? Comes that beam of light from Usnoth's niglitly hall? The mist spreads around; the beam is feeble, and distant far. But the light of Dar-thula's soul dwells in the chief of Etha ! Son of the generous Usnoth, why that broken sigh Y Are we in the land of strangers, chief of echoing Etha 'r " " These are not the rocks of Nathos," he replied, " nor tliis the roar of his streams. No light comes from Etha's halls, for they are distant far. We are in the land of strangers — in the land of cniel Cairbar. The winds have deceived us, Dar- thula! Erin lifts here her hills. Go towards the north, Althos : be thy steps, Ardan, along the coast ; that the foe may not come in darkness, and oui' hopes of Etha fail. I will go towards that mossy tower, to see who dwells about the beam. Rest, Diir-thula, on the shore ! rest in peace, thou lovely light ! the sword of Nathos is around thee, like the lightning of heaven ! " He went. She sat alone ; she heard the rolling of the wave. The big tear is in her ej'e. She looks for returning Nathos. Her soul trembles at the blast. She tmns her ear towards the tread of his feet. The tread of his feet is not heard. " Where art thou, son of my love ? The roar of the blast is around me. Dark is the cloudy night. But Nathos does not retm-n. ^^'^lat detains thee, chief of Etha ? Have the foes met the hero in the strife of the night ': ' ' Ho rotm-ned, but his face was dark. He had seen his departed friend ! It was the wall of Tura. The ghost of CuthuUin stalked there alone : the sighing of his breast was frequent. The decayed flame of his eyes was terrible. His spear was a column of mist. The stars looked dim through his foim. His voice was hke hollow wind in a cave : his eye a light seen afar. He told the tale of grief. The soul of Nathos was sad, hke the sun in the day of mist, when his face is watery and dim. " Wliy art thou sad, O Nathos ?" said the lovely daughter of CoUa. " Thou art a piUar of light to Dar-thula. The joy of her eyes is in Etha's chief. AMiere is my friend, but Nathos ? My father, my brother is fallen 1 Silence dwells on Selama. Sadness spreads on the blue streams of my land. My friends have fallen with Cormac. The mighty were slain in the battles of Erin. Hear, son of Usnoth ! hear, O Nathos ! my tale of grief : — " Evening darkened on the plain. The blue streams failed before my eyes. The imfrequent blast came ru.stling in the tops of Selama's groves. My seat was beneath a tree, on the walls of my fathers. Truthil passed before my soul : the brother of my love : he that was absent in battle, against the haughty Cairbar ! Bending on his spear, the gray-haired Colla came. His downcast face is dark, and soitow dwells in his soul. His sword is on the side of the hero : the helmet of his fathers on his head. The battle grows in his breast. He strives to hide t'ne tear. " ' Dar-thula, my daughter,' he said, ' thou art the last of CoUa's i-ace ! Truthil is fallen in battle. The chief of Selama is no more ! Cairbar comes, with his thousands, towards Selama's w.alls. Colla wiU meet his pride, and re- venge his son. But where shall I find thy safety, Dar-thula with the dark-broTVTi hair ? thou art lovely as the simbeam of heaven, and thy friends are low 1 ' Is the son of battle fallen. I said, with a bursting sigh ! Ceased the generous soul of Truthil to lighten through the field ! Mj' safety, Colla, is in. th,at bow. I have learned to pierce the deer. Is not Cairbar like the hart of the desert, father of fallen Truthil V " The face of age brightened vnih joy. The crowded tears of his eyes poured down. The lips of CoUa trembled. His gray beard wliistlcd in the blast. ' Thou art the sister of Truthil,' he said, ' thou burnest in the fire of his soul. Take, Dar-thula, take that spear, that brazen shield, that bm-nished helm : they are the spoils of a warrior, a son of early youth- Wlien the light rises on Selama, we go to meet the car-borne Cairbar. But keep thou near the arm of CoUa — beneath the shadow of my shield. Thy father, Dar-thida, coidd once defend thee ; but age is trembling on his hand. The strength of his arm has failed. His soul is darkened ■with grief.' " We jjassed the night in sorrow. The Kght of morning rose. I shone in the arms of battle. The gray-haired herO' moved before. The sons of Selama convened around the sounding shield of CoUa. But few were they in the plain,, and their locks were gray. The youths had faUen with Truthil, in the battle of car-home Connac. ' Friends of my youth ! ' said Colla, ' it was not thus you have seen me in arms. It was not thus I strode to battle, when the great Confaden feU. But ye are laden with grief. The darkness of age comes hke the mist of the desert. My shield is worn with years 1 my sword is fi.xed ' in its place ! I said to my soul, thy evening shaU be calm : thy departure Uke a fading Ught. But the stonn has returned. I bend like an aged oak. My boughs are faUen on Selama. I tremble in my place, 'WTiere ai't thou, with thy faUen heroes, my beloved Tru- thil ? Thou answerest not fi-om thy rushing blast. The soul of thy father is sad. But I wiU be sad no more — Cairbar or Colla must faUl I feel the returning strength of my arm. My heart leaps at the soimd of war.' " The hero drew his sword. The gleaming blades of his- people rose. They moved along the plain. Their gray hair streamed in the wind. Cau'bar sat at the feast, in the silent pl.ain of Lena.- He saw the coming of the heroes. He caUed his chiefs to war. WTiy shoidd I tell to Nathos, how the strife of h.attle grew 1 ^ I have seen thee, in the midst of thousands, Uke the beam of heaven's fire. It is beautiful, but terrible : the people faU in its dreadful course. The spear of CoUa flew. He remembered the battles of his youth. An arrow came with its sound : it pierced the hero's side. He feU on his echoing shield. My soul started with fear. I stretched my buckler over him ; but my heaving breast was- seen. Cairbar came, -with his spear. He beheld Selama's maid. Joy rose on his dark-brown face. He stayed the lifted steel. He raised the tomb of Colla. He brought uie, weeping, to Selama. He spoke the words of love, hut my soul was sad. I saw the shields of my fathers ; the sword of car-home Truthil. I saw the arms of the dead ; the tear was on my cheek ! Then thou didst come, O Nathos 1 and gloomy Cairbar fled. He fled Uke the ghost of the desert before the 1 It was the custom of ancient times tliat every warrior, at a certain) age, or when he became imiit for the field, lixed his anns in the great hall, where the tribe feasted upon joyfnl occasions. He was after- wards never to appear in battle ; and this stage of Ufe was called the time (t//.i-i'H give him battle. ^ The poet, by an artifice, avoids the description of the battle of Lona, as it would be improper in the month of a woman, and could have nothing new, after the numerous descriptions of that kind iu the rest of the poems. He at the same time gives au opportunity to- "Dar-thula to pass a fine compliment on her lover. TO i.D. 1800.1 SHORTER POEMS. 3Sy morning's beam. His host was not near; and feeble was bis arm against thy steel ! Why art thou .sad, Nathos 'i " said the lovely daughter of Colla. "I have met," replied the hero, "the battle in my youth. My ai-m could not lift the spear, when danger first arose. Jly soul brightened in the iM'esence of war, as the green narrow vale, when the sun pom-s his streamy beauis, before he hides his head in a storm. The lonely traveller feels a mournful joy. He sees the darkness, that slowly comes. Sly soul brightened in danger before I saw Sclama's fair; before I saw thee, like a star, that shines on the hiU, at night : the cloud advances and threatens the lovely light ! We are in the land of foes. The winds have deceived us, Dar-thula ! The strength of our friends is not near, nor the mountains of Etha. Where shall I find thy peace, daughter of mighty Colla ? The brothers of Nathos arc brave ! and his own sword has shone in fight. But what are the sons of Usnoth to the host of dark-browed Cairbar 1 O that the winds had brought thy saUs, Oscar,' king of men ! Thou didst promise to come to the battles of fallen Coi-mac ! Then would my hand be strong, as the flaming arm of death. Cairbar would tremble in his halls, and peace dwell roimd the lovely Dar-thula. But why dost thou fall, my soul 'i The sons of Usnoth may prevail 1 ' ' " And they will prevail, Nathos ! " said the rising soul of the maid. " Never shall Dar-thula behold the halls of gloomy Cairbar. Give me those amis of brass, that glitter to the passing meteor. I see them dimly in the dark-bosomed ship. Dar-thula will enter the battle of steel. Ghost of the noble Colla, do I behold thee on that cloud ? Who is that dim beside thee ? Is it the car-borne Truthil ? Shall I behold the halls of him that slew Selama's chief ? No : I will not behold them, spirits of my love ! " Joy rose in the face of Nathos, when he hoard the white- bosomed maid. "Daughter of Selama! thou shincst along my soul. Come, with thy thousands, Cairbar ! The strength of Nathos is returned ! Thou, aged Usnoth ! shalt not hear that thy son has fled. I remember thy words on Etha, when my sails began to rise — when I spread them towards Erin — towards the mossy walls of Tura 1 ' Thou goest,' he said, ' Nathos 1 to the king of shields. Thou goest to Cuthidlin, chief of men, who never fled from danger. Lot not thine arm be feeble ; neither bo thy thoughts of flight, lest the sou of Semo should say, that Etha's race are weak. His words may come to Usnoth, and .sadden his sold in the hall.' The tear was on my father's cheek. He gave this shining sword ! " I came to Tm-a's bay ; but the halls of Tura wore silent. I looked around, and there was none to tell of the son of generous Semo. I went to the hall of shells, where the aims of his fathers hung. But the ai-ms were gone, and aged Lamhor- sat in tears. ' Whence are the arms of steel 'i ' said the rising Lamlior. ' The Ught of the spear has long been absent from Tm'a's dusky walls. Come j'e from the rolling- sea ? Or from Tomora's^ mournful halls '^ ' "We come from the sea," I said, "from Usnoth's rising towers. We are the sons of Slisama,^ the daughter of car- 1 Oscar, tlie sou of Ossiau, liad long resolved on the exi>edition into Ireland, against Cairbar, who had assassinated his friend Cathol, the son of Moran, an Irishman of noble extraction, and in the interest of the family of Cormac. 2 Lamh-tfiJiov, mighty hand. 3 Temora was the residence of the supreme kings of Ireland. It is here called moiUTiful, on account of the death of Corma<3, who was murdered there by Caii-bar, who usui-ped liis throne. * SlU-senmlw, soft bosom. She was the wife of Usnoth, and daughter 'sf Semo, the chief of the isle of mist. borne Some. WTiere is Timi's chief, son of the silent hall ? But why should Nathos ask ! for I behold thy tears. How dill the mighty fall, son of the lonely Tm-a ! ' He tell not,' Lamlior repUed, * like the silent star of night, when it flies through darkness, and is no more. But he was like a meteor that shoots into a distant land. Death attends its dreary coiu'se. Itself is the sign of wars. Slourirful are the banks of Lego, and the roar of streamy Lara ! There the hero fell, son of the noble Usnotli ! ' The hero fell in the midst of slaughter, I said with a burstiug sigh. His hand was strong in war. Death dimly sat behind his sword. "We came to Lego's soimding banks. We found his rising tomb. His friends in battle are there : his bards of many songs. Thi'ce days we mourned over the hero : on the foiu'th, I struck the shield of Caithbat. The heroes gathered aroimd with joy, and shook their beamy spears. Corlath was near with his host, the friend of car-home Caii'bar. We came like a stream by night . His heroes fell before us. When the people of the vaUey rose, they saw their blood with morning's light. But we rolled away, like wreaths of mist to Coi-mac' s echoing hall. Our swords rose to defend the king. But Temora's halls were empty. Cormac had fallen in his youth- The king of Erin was no more. " Sadness seized the sons of Erin. They slowly, gloomily retia'ed ; like clouds that long ha^dng threatened rain, vanish behind the hUls. The sons of Usnoth moved in their grief, towards Tura's sounding bay. We passed by Selama. Cair- bar retired like Lano's mist, when driven before the winds. It was then I beheld thee, Dar-thula ! like the light of Etha's sun. Lovely is that beam ! I said. The crowded sigh of my bosom rose. Thou earnest in thy beauty, Dar-thula, to Etha's moumful chief. But the winds have deceived us, daughter of Colla, and the foe is near." " Yes, the foe is near," said the rushing strength of Althos.* " I heard theii- clanging arms on the coast. I saw the dark wreaths of Erin's standard. Distinct is the voice of Caii-bar.^ Loud as Cromla's falling stream. Ho had seen the dark ship on the sea, before the dusky night came down. His people watch on Lena's plain. They lift ten thousand swords." " And let them lift ten thousand swords," said Nathos, -with a smile. " The sons of car-borne Usnoth will never tremble in danger ! Why dost thou roll with aU thy foam, thou roaring- sea of Erin ? Why do ye rustle, on your dark wings, ye wliistling storms of the sky i Do ye think, ye storms, that you keep Nathos on the coast Y No : his soul detains him, childi-en of the night ! Althos ! bring- my father's amis : Thou seest them beaming to the stars. Bring the spear of Semo.' It stands in the dark-bosomed ship ! " He brought the arms. Nathos covered his limbs, in all their shining steel. The stride of the chief is lovely. The joy of his eyes was terrible. He looks towards the coming of Cairbar. The wind is rustling in his hail-. Dar-thula is silent at his side. Her look is fi.\ed on the chief. She stiives to hide the rising sigh. Two tears swell in her radiant eyes ! "Althos I" said the chief of Etha, "I see a cave in that 5 Althos had just retm-ued from viewing the coast of Lena, whither he had been sent l>y Nathos, the beginning of the night. " Cairbar had gathered an army to the coast of Ulster, in order to oppose Fingal, who prepared for an exiieditiou into Ireland to re- establish the house of Cormac on the throne which Cairbar had iisuri)ed. Between the wings of Cairbar's army was the bay of Tura, into which the ship of the sons of Usnoth was driven ; so that there was no ix)ssibility of their escaping. 7 Semo was grandfather to Nathos by the mother's side. The spear mentioned here was given to Usnoth on his mali-iage, it being the custom then for the father of the lady to give his ai-ms to his son-in-law. 390 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 rock. Place Dar-thula there. Let thy arm, my brother, be strong. Ai'dan ! we meet the foe ; call to battle gloomy Cairbar. O that he came in his sounding steel,, to meet the son of Usnoth ! Dar-thula ! if thou shalt escape, look not on the fallen Nathos ! Lift thy sails, Althos ! towards the echoing groves of my land. "Tell the chief,' that his son f cU with fame ; that my sword did not shun the fight. TeU him I fell in the midst of thousands. Let the joy of his grief be great. Daughter of C'olla ! call the maids to Etha's echoing hall ! Let their songs arise for Nathos, when shadowj' autumn retm'ns. that the voice of Cona, that Ossian, might be heard in my praise ! then would my spiiit rejoice in the midst of the rushing winds." And my voice shall praise thee, Nathos, chief of the woody Etha ! The voice of Ossian shall rise in thy praise, son of the generous Usnoth ! "Why was I not on Lena, when the battle rose 'i Then would the sword of Ossian defend thee ; or himself fall low ! We sat, that night, in Sclma, roxmd the strength of the shell. The wind was abroad in the oaks. The spirit of the mountain- roared. The blast came rustling thi'ough the hall, and gently touched my harp. The sound was mournful and low, like the song of the tomb. Fingal heard it the fii'st. The crowded sighs of his bosom rose. " Some of my heroes are low," said the gray-haired king of Morven! " I hear the sound of death on the harp. Ossian, touch the trembling string. Bid the soitow rise ; that their spirits may fly, with joy, to Morven's woody hills! " I touched the harp before the king, the sound was mom-nf id and low. ' ' Bend forward from your clouds," I said, "ghosts of my fathers! bend! Lay by the red terror of your com'se. Receive the falling- chief ; whether he comes from a distant land, or rises from the rolling sea. Let his robe of mist be near his spear that is formed of a cloud. Place an half-extinguished meteor by his .side, in the form of the hero's sword. And, oh! let his coun- tenance be lovely, that his friends may delight in liis presence. Bend from your clouds," I said, "ghosts of my fathers! bend! " Such was mj' song, in Sclma, to the lightly-trembling harp. But Nathos was on Erin's shore, surrounded by the night. He heard the voice of the foe, amidst the roar of tumbling waves. Silent he heard then- voice, and rested on his spear ! Morning rose, with its beams. The sons of Erin appear, like gray rocks, with all their trees, they spread along- the coast. Caii-bar stood in the midst. He grimly smiled when he saw the foe. Nathos rushed forward, in his .strength : nor could Dar-thula stay behind. She came mth the hero, lifting her shining spear. And who are these, in their ai-nioiu', in the pride of youth \ Who but the sons of Usnoth, Althos, and dark-haired Arden ': " Come," said Nathos, " come ! chief of high Temora ! Let our battle be on the coast, for the wliite-bosomed maid. His people are not with Nathos ; they are beliind these rolling seas. Why dost thou bring thy thousands against the chief of Etha? Thou didst fly' from him in battle, when his friends were around liis spear." "Youth of the heai-t of pride, shall Erin's king fight with thee 'i Thy fathers were not among the renoAvned, nor of the Icings of men. Are the arms of foes in then- halls ': Or the shields of other times 'i Cairbar is renowned in Temora, nor does he fight with feeble men!" The tear started from car-bome Nathos. He tm-ned his 1 Usnoth. ~ By tlie iqilvii of the mountain is meant tliat deep and melanclioly sound which precedes a storm, -well known to those who live in a high country. =^ Ha alludes to the flight of Cairbar from Selama. eyes to his brothers. Their spears flaw at once. Three heroes lay on earth. Then the light of their swords gleamed on high. The ranks of Erin yield ; as a ridge of dark clouds before a blast of -wind! Then Cairbar ordered his people, and they ch-ow a thousand bows. A thousand an-ows flew. The sons of Usnoth fell in blood. They fell like three yoimg oaks, which stood alone on the hOl : the traveller saw the lovely trees, and wondered how they grew so lonely : the blast of the desert came, bj' night, and laid their green heads low ; next day he returned, but they were -n-ithered, and the heath was bare ! Dar-thula stood in silent grief, and beheld their fall. No tear is in her eye. But her look is wUdly sad. Pale was her cheek. Her trembling lips broke short an half-foi-med -n-ord. Her dark hair flew on wind. The gloomy Caii'bar came. " AAnicre is thy lover now, the car-borao chief of Etha ':" Hast thou beheld the haUs of Usnoth !' Or the dark-brown hills oi Fingal 'f My battle would have roared on IMorven, had not the winds met Dar-thula. Fingal himself would have been low, and sorrow dwelling in Selma ! " Her shield feU from Dar-thula'sai-m. Her breast of snow appeared. It appeared ; but it -was stained with blood. An arrow was fixed in her side. She fell on the fallen Nathos, like a T\Teath of snow ! Her hair .spreads wide on his face. Their blood is mixing round. " Daughter of CoUa ! thou art low ! " said Cau-bar's hundi-ed bards. " Silence is at the blue streams of Selama. Truthil's* race have faOed. "When wUt thou rise in thy beauty, first of Erin's maids ? Thy sleep is long in the tomb. The morning- distant far. The sun shall not come to thy bed, and say, ' Awake, Dar-thula ! awake, thou fii'st of women ! The wind of spring is abroad. The flowers shake their heads on the green hills. The woods wave their growing leaves.' Retire, s>m ! the daughter of Colla is asleep. She will not come forth in her beauty. She wiU not move in the steps of her lovcUncss !" Such was the song of the bards, when they raised the tomb. 1 simg over the grave, when the king- of jMorven came ; when he came to green Erin to fight -with car-boi-ne Caii'bar ! Thomas Cliatterton, born at Bristol, iii 1752, son of the sexton of St. Mary Redclilfe, learned old handwriting as clerk to an attorney, and used some of his real and precocious genius iii manufacturing mock ancient poems, -which he ascribed to an old monk of Bristol, -wliom he called Thomas Rowley, and placed in the times of Lydgate. Cliatterton came, he said, of a fimily of hereditary sextons of Redclilfe Church, where, in an old chest, these MSS. had been found. He had real genius, and seeking, witli the inexperience of youth, prompt recognition of it, -went to London at the age of seventeen. A year later, being unrecognised, he poisoned himself. A volume of the " Poems supposed to have been ■written at Bristol by Thomas Rowley and others in the tifteentli century," apj)earecl in 1777, and this specimen is taken from it : — TO JOHNE LADGATE. {Si'iit with the foUoiviiig Soiiffe to ^E/!a.) Well thanne, goode Johne, sythe ytt must needes be soe, Thatt thou & I a bowt}-ngc matche must have, Lette j'tt ne breakyngc of ouldc friendshyppe bee, Thys ys the onelie all-a-boone I crave. * Truthil was the founder of Dar-thnla's family. TO A.D. 180O.] SHORTER POEMS. 391 Rememberr Stowe, the Brj-ghtstowo Cfiniiiilytc, Who whannc Johne t'laikynge, one of inyckle lore, Dydd throwo hys gauntlettc-penne, wyth hym to fyghtc, Hee showd smalle -n-ytto, and showd hys weaknosse more. Thys ys mie fomiance, whyche I nowc have wi-j-tte, The hest porforinance of niio lyttel wn'ttc. SOJJGE TO jELLA, LORDE OV THE CASTEL or liRYSTOWE YXXE DAIES OF YOBE. Oh thou, orr what rcmaynos of thee, JElla, the darlyngc of futurity, Lett thys mie songe bolde as thie oourago be. As everlastynge to posteritye. 'Wliarme Dacya's sounes, whose hayres of blonde rodde hue Lyche kj-nge-cuppes brastynge wythe the morning due, ■ Arraimg'd jTine dreare arraie, TJpponno the lethale daie, Sjiredde f an-e and wyde onne Watchets shore : Than dyddst thou fui-iouse stande. And bie thie valyante hande Beesprengedd all the mees wythe gore. Dra\vne bie thyne anlace felle, Downe to the depthe of helle Thousandes of Dacyanns went ; Brystowannes, menne of myghte, Ydar'd the bloudie fyghte. And actedd deeds full qucnt. Oh thou, whereer (thie bones att rcste) Thye Spryte to haunte delyghteth beste, Whetherr upponne the bloude-embrcwcdd plej-ne. On- whare thou kennst fromm farro The dysmall crye of warre, OiT seest somme mountajiie made of eorsc of slcyne ; Orr seest the hatchcdd stede, Ypraimcerage o'er the mede, And neighe to be amenged the pojTictedd spccres : Orr ynnc blacke armoure staulke arounde Embattel'd Brystowe, once thie grounde. And glowe ardurous oira the Castle steeres ; Orr fierye roimd the niynstcn- glare ; Letto Brystowe styllo bo made thie care ; Guarde j-tt fromme foemenne & consumyngc f jTe ; Lyche Avones streme ensyrke rttc rounde, Ne lette a flame enharme the grounde, Tylle jTmo one flame all the whole worldc c.xpvTC. The imderwi-ittcn Lines were composed by Johx Ladgate, a Priest in London, and sent to Rowlie, as an Answer to the preceding Soiii/c of ^Tilla. HavvTige wj-the mouche attentyonn rcddo Whatt you dydd to mee sende, AdmjTe the varscs mouche I dydd, And thus an answerr lende. Amongs the Cireeces Homer was A Poett mouche renownde, Amongs the Latyns Y\Tgilius Was beste of Poets founde. The Brytish Jlerlyn oftenne hanne The gN-f'to of inspyratiou. And Atlcd to the Sexonne menne Dydd syuge wythe elocation. Ynne Norman tymes, Turgotus and Goode Chaucer dydd oxcellc, Thcnn Stowe, the Bryghtstowe Carmelyte, Dydd bare awaio the belle. Nowc Rowlie jnine these mokic daj-es Lcndos owte hys shccnjTige lyghtes. And Tui'gotus and Chaucer lyves Yime ev'ry lyne ho wrytes. Another young poet, less famous than Chatterton, but of great interest, since he was the forerunner of Burns, is Robert Fergusson. He was boi-n in one of the alleys of Edinburgh, in 1750, third son of a linendraper's clerk, who kept a family of five on twenty pounds a yeai-. He was educated in the High School of Edinbui'gh, and then (by presentation to a bursary for the maintenance and education of two poor male children of the name of Fergusson), in the Grammar School of Dundee, and College of St. Andrews. He was rather a wild student, but a quick scholar, and when he left St. Andrews for Edinburgh, in 1768 — a year after his father's death - — there was the same tendency to wildness while Robert FEEGCssoif {Fioni 1 I' ulniit qiven by httn to Ruddhnan, his Publisher.}^ earning scanty means as extracting-clerk in the Commissary Clerk's Otfice, and by copying law-papers for bread. In 1771 Fergusson began to publish poems ill Ruddiman's " Weekly Magazine." They 1 This portrait is en^^raved in a very good edition of Robert Fer- fruason's Poems, edited by A. B. G., and published in 1851 by A. FuUartou and Co. An appearance of bad drawing tempts to correc- tion, but this woiUd involve sa<:rifice of character. And there is no accounting for any turn that a man's nose may take. 392 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 won local fame, and the publisliei' gave for them small but regular payment, with two suits of clothes a year. Allan Ramsay, said one, seemed to have come again : — Is Allan risen frae the deid, AVhit aft has tun'd the aitcn reed. And by the Muses was decreed To gxace the thistle ? Xa; Fergusson's come in his stead To blaw the whistle. In 1773 his jneces were collected into a small volume of " Poems by R.Fergusson." This is one of them: — BR.A.ID CLAITH. Ye wha are fain to hae your name Wrote in the bonny book of fame, Let merit nae pretension claim To laiu'cl'd wreath, But hap yo' weel, baith back and wame," In g-ude Braid C'laith. He that some eUs o' this may fa", An' slae black hat on pow'' like snaw, Bids bauld to bear the grce* awa', \Vi' a' this graith,^ Whan bcinly" clad wi' shell fu' braw O' gude Braid C'laith. Wacsuck' for him wha has nae fek'' o't ! For he's a gowk' they're sure to geek'" at, A chield that ne'er will be respekit Wliile he di'a^s breath, Till his four quarters are bedeckit Wi" gude Braid C'laith. On Sabbath-days the barber spark, Wlian he has done wi' scrapin wark Wi' siller broachie" in his sark,'' Ciangs trigly, faith ! irc, cow-house. 21 Stccb, stilts. 23 Bnji(/.s, g-ets mastei'y of. -'■> Doiric, "beaumbed. -' Ponrtith, poverty. •^ Sincclc, smoke. 1^ Skaitli, damag-e, trouble. -" Diinij, overcome ■with fatis^iie. -- Dighting, winuowing:. -* Garn, makes. -G Flctj'd, frightened. 2^ Divets tlieckit, turfs thatched. ^'^ Lift, upper air. 3' HalUind, an inner wall built in old cottages as a screen between the fire-place and the door. (Icelandic " hallandi," a slope ; " halla," to lean or turn sideways.) ^'~ Cosh, snug, well-fenced. ^ Looos, loves. TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEIMS. ;593 Weel kens the gudewil'e ' that the ploughs requii-o A heartsome meltith, and refreshing sjTid 20 0' nappy liquor, o'er a bleczing fire : Sair wark and poortith douna weel be join'd. Wi' buttor'd bannocks now the girdle- reeks, I' the far nook ^ the bowie briskly reams ; The readied kail stand by the chimley cheeks, And had the riggin hot wi' welcome steams, ^^^1ilk than the daintiest kitchen nicer seems. Frae this lat gentler gabs ■* a lesson lear ; AVad they to labouring lend an eidant ^ hand, They'd rax fell Strang upo' the simplest fare, 30 Nor find their stamacks ever at a stand. Fu' hale and healtliy wad they pass the day. At night in uabncst slumbers dose fu' sound, Xor doctor need their weary life to spae,^ Nor di-ogs their noddle and theii' sense confound, TiU death slip sicoly on, and gi'e the hindmost wound. On sicken^ food has mony a doughty deed By Caledonia's ancestors been done ; By this did mony \vight fu' weirUke bleed In brulzics ^ frae the dawn to set o' sun : 4 'Twas this that brac'd their gardies,' stiff and Strang, That bent the deidly yew in antient days. Laid Denmark's daring sons on yird'" alang, Gar'd Scottish thistles bang the Eoman bays ; For near our crest their heads they doughtna raise. The couthy cracks" begin whan supper's o'er. The cheering bicker '- gars them glibly gash O' simmer's showery blinks and winters sour, Whase floods did erst their mailins'^ produce hash :'^ 'Bout kirk and market eke their tales gae on. 50 How Jock woo'd Jenny here to be his bride, And there how Marion, for a bastard son, Upo' the cutty-stool was forced to ride, The wacf u' scald o' our Mess John '^ to bide. The fient a chiep's amang the baimies'^ now; For a' their anger's wi' their hunger gane : Ay maun the childer, wi' a fastin mou'. Grumble and greet, and make an unco mane. In rangles'" round before the ingle's low, Frae gudame's mouth auld warld tale they hear, 60 O' warlocks, louping round the wirrikow," G' ghaists that win in glen and kirk-yard drear, 'Whilk touzles a' their tap, and gars them shak vn fear. ' Tlie "gudeman" is the master of the "gude," or holding; the "gudewife," its mistress. She " knows well that the i>loughmen re- quire a cheery meal and a refreshing drink of strong liquor." ^ Girdle, a round iron pkite for toasting cakes over the fii'e. 3 In the far corner the little beer barrel creams richly, the kail made ready stand by the side of the Are, and all the roof steams hot with welcome. ' Gabs, mouths. s Eidant, diligent. ' Spac, see into the future of. ' Sicken, such like. * Brulzics, frays. s Gariies, arms. i» rird, earth. 1^ Cotithjy cracks, familiar talks. '^ Bicker, the wooden driuking bowl. 's Maiiins, farms. " Hash, spoil. " Ifcss John, the minister. lu the Scottish Church offenders stood forward to be publicly admonished from the pulpit. "^ Bairiiics, children. i' RamjUs, heaps, as heaps of stones. " Wirrikoie, bugbear, devil. 50 For woel she rows " that fiends and fairies bo Sent frae the do'il to fleeteh™ us to our iU; That ky hae tint-' their milk-wi' ev-il cie. And corn been scowder'd-^ on the glowing kiU.-^ O mock na this, my friends '. but rather moum. Ye in life's brawest spring wi' reason clear, Wi' eild our idle fancies a' retui-n, "0 And dim our dolef u' days wi' baimly fcvir ; The mind's ay cradled whan the grave is near. Yet thrift, industrious, bides her latest days, Tho' age her sau- dow'd^-" front wi' nmcles-* wave, Y'et frae the russet lap the spindle plays. Her e'enin stent-" reels she as weel's the lave.-' On some feast-diiy, the wee-things buskit braw Shall heeze her heart up wi' a silent joy, Fu' cadgie that her head was up and saw Her ain spun cleething on a darling oy,-' 80 Careless tho' death should make the feast her foy.-' In its auld lerroch'" yet tho deas^' remains, "Wliare the gudeman aft strecks him at his ease, A warm and canny lean for weary banes, 0' lab'rers doil'd upo' the wintry leas. Eoimd him will badrins^- and the colly '^ come. To wag their tail, and cast a thankfu' eie To hinr wha kindly flings them mony a crum 0' kebbock whang'd, and dainty fadge to prie ;''■' This a' the boon they crave, and a' the fee. IJO Frae him the lads their morning counsel tak, What stacks he wants to thrash, what rigs to till. How big a birn''* maun lie on bassie's^'' back. For meal and multure ■•" to the thirling ^' mill. Niest ^' the gudewife her Mreling damsels bids Glowr ^o thro' the byre, and see the hawkies ■" bound, Take tent case Crummy tak her wonted tids,*'- And ca' *^ the laiglen's treasure on the ground, A\Tiilk spills a kcbbuck nice, or yellow pound. Then a' the house for sleep begin to grein,''^ Theii- joints to slack frae industry a while ; The leaden god fa's heavy on their- ein, And haSiins steeks •■» them frae their dailv toil ; 100 ■9 Eoif.'i, rolls (the tale). *> Fleetcli, flatter. =' Tint, lost. 22 Scoicder'd, scorched. ^' Kill, kiln. 2* Sair dow'd, sore faded. 25 Runcfcs, wrinkles. 26 Her e'entrt stent, the quantity allotted to be done in an evening. 2" As u'cel's tltc lave, as well as the rest. 28 Oil, grandson. 29 Foy, an entertainment given to one about to change home, or go on a far journey. ^" Lerroch, site. 31 Bees, the turf seat outside a cottage. 32 Biidritis, the cat. ^3 Colly, the dog. 3* Of cheese cut in large slices, and dainty bannock to taste. 3^ J?irn, burden. ^6 Bassie, an old horse. 3" Mnltnre, the fee for grinding grain. 38 Tldrlinfj. with turning sails. 33 Niest, next. •" Gloirr, look intently. *l Hau'kics, cows. ^2 Tnfc her irontcd fids, be seized with her usual perverse humour. " C'l', drive; laifl/i'ii, milk-pail. Take heed lest Crummy (one of the cows^ be in her usual t.antmm9 and ttpset the milk-pail, whereby we may lose a nice cheese or a pouad of butter, " Grtin, long. " Hafflim sleeks, half shuts. 394 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 The cruizy ' too can only blink and bleer, The restit ingle's" done the maist it dow; Tacksman and cottar •* eke to bed maun steer, XJpo' the cod •* to clear their di-imily pow,* TiU -wauken'd by the dawning' s ruddy glow. Peace to the husbandman and a' his tribe, Whase care fells a' our wants frae year to year ; 110 Lang may his sock and coutcr ^ tui'n the gleyb. And banks o' corn bend down wi' laded ear. May Scotia's simmers ay look gay and green, Her yellow har'sts frae scowry blasts decreed; May a' her tenants sit fu' snug and bien, Frae the hard grip of ails and poortith freed, And a lang lasting train o' peaceful hours succeed. One niglit a cat slipping into Lis bed-room killed a favourite starling of the poet's. He was awakened by its cries too late to save it, and remained awake torturing himself with sense of the suddenness of death. The words haunted him, "I ^vill come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee." He turned from society, lapsed into religious gloom, and his mind was failing when a fall upon tlie head caused frenzy, and Fer- gusson was taken to the public lunatic asylum, in which he tlied. He died iii October, 177i, when only twenty-four years old. Oliver Goldsmith had died in the same year, 1774. on the 4tli of April, and, at the age of forty-two, had published in 1770, the year of the bii-th of Words- worth, liis " Deserted Village." It appeared on the 26th of May, and was in a fifth edition on the 1 6th of August. That sense of the unequal lots of men which had been the theme of Rousseau's essay for the Academy of Dijon prompted the jjoem. Destruc- tion of small holdings to enlarge the great estates was an old gi-ievance set forth in Lord Bacon's " Hi.story of Heiuy VII." as one cause of the distress of the people in that reign ; small households which the plough maintained having to yield place for the extension of large sheep-farms. But in the latter half of the eighteenth centm-y there was a surging of tliought which gathered into itself even the soft music of Goldsmith, and gave a tone sometimes to his speech and poetry that caused one who knew him in her youth — the daughter of his friend, Lord Clare — to describe him in her old age as a man who "was a strong republican in principle, and would have been a very dangerous writer if he had lived to the times of the Fi-ench Revolution." Goldsmith was no violent politician, but he was a poet with deep feeling and quick sensibility, that would have impelled him to share any generous emotion of his time ; and the delight -with wliich, in Gei-many, Goethe — then a youth of one-and-twenty — ^^liailed " The Deserted Village " was due in great part to its harmony in style and sub- ^ Cruizy, small iron lamp. ^ Ingle. The word is allied to " ifrnis," fire. 3 Tnckxman is a leasekolding farmer, a supenor tenant ; coHar who lives in a cottage dependent on the fami. * Cod, i>illow. 5 Drumhj poll", confused head. * Sock and coiiter, ploughshare and coulter. stance with the new spirit of reaction against despotic forms in literature and in life. The verse is the rhymed couplet, but its conventional aii" is gone ; indeed, it moves again with easy grace, and is once more a homely English measm-e ; the words also are living English words, all apt and true, mthout a trace of artificial diction ; and the thoughts, all wai-m with a poet's sense of the essentials of life, swell the rising note of lament for " what man has made of man." As essayist, as dramatist, as novelist, Goldsmith will have a place in other volumes of this Library. Here he speaks only through his "Deserted Village," a poem which had been foreshadowed in 1764 by these lines of his " Prospect of Society" (" The Traveller ") :— Have we not seen round Britain's peopled shore Her useful sons exchanged for useless ore ? * # » * * Seen Opulence, her gi-andcur to maintain, Lead stem Depopulation in her train. And over fields where scattered hamlets rose In barren solitary pomp repose ? Have we not seen, at Pleasure's lordlj- call, The smiling, long frequented Village fall ': Beheld the duteous son, the she decayed. The modest matron and the blushing maid, Forced from theu' homes, a melancholy train, . To traverse climes beyond the western main ? The picture in " The Deserted Village " of the Village Preacher, Goldsmith probably sketched in June, 1768, shortly after the death of liis brother Henry, whose chai'acter it paints with so much tenderness. The village supposed to have been The Parsonage at Lissot. chiefly in Goldsmith's mind was Lissoy, the old home of his childhood, in the county of Westmeath ; but Goldsmith told Sir Joshua Repiolds that, four or five yeai-s before the poem was published, he had TO A.D. ISOO.] SHORTER POEMS. 39.5 satisfied himself of the tnith of liis complaint by country excursions into several parts of England. " Some of my friends," he said, " think this depopu- lation of villages does not exist ; but I am myself satisfied of the fact. I remember it in my own countrj', and liiiA'e seen it in tliis." THE DESERTED VILLAGE. Sweet Aul]iu-n ! loveliest rillage of the plain, WTiere health and plenty cheer'd the labouring swain, '\\Tierc .smiling spring its eiirliest visit paid, And parting summer's lingering blooms delay'd : Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease. Seats of my youth, when every sport could please, How often have I loiter'd o'er thy green, Where humble happiness endear' d each scene ! How often have I paused on every charm, The shelter'd cot, the cultivated farm, 10 The never-failing brook, the busy mill. The decent church that topt the neighboming hill. The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade. For talking age and whispering lovers made ! How often have I blest the coming day. When toil remitting lent its turn to play, And all the village train, from laboui' free, Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree, While many a pastime circled in the shade. The young contending as the old survey' d, 20 And many a gambol frolick'd o'er the ground. And sleights of art and feats of strength went round. And still as each repeated pleasure tii'ed. Succeeding sports the mii-tlrful band inspired ; The dancing pair that simply sought renown, By holding out to the each other down ; The swain mistrustlcss of his smutted face. While secret laughter tittcr'd round the place ; The bashful vii-gin's sidelong looks of love, 29 The matron's glance that would those looks reprove : — These were thy charms, sweet village ! sports Hkc those, With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please : These round thy bowers then' cheerful influence shed. These were thy charms — but all these charms are fled. Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn. Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn ! Amidst thy bowers the tj-rant's hand is seen, And Desolation saddens aU thy green : One only master grasps the whole domain. And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain. 40 No more thy grassy brook reflects the day. But, choked mth sedges, works its weedy way ; Along thy glades, a solitary guest. The hollow-sounding bitteni guards its nest ; Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies, And tires their echoes with unvaried cries ; Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all. And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall : And, trembling, shi-ink-ing from the spoiler's hand. Far, far away thy childi-en leave the land. .50 111 fares the land, to hastening IDs a prey, 'Where wealth accumulates, and men decay : Princes and lords may flomish, or may fade ; A breath can make them, as a breath has made ; But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, 'When once destroyed, can never be supplied. A time there was, ere England's griefs began, When every rood of ground maintain' d its man : For him light Labour spread her wholesome store, Just gave what life required, but gave no more; GO His best companions, innocence and liealth. And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. But times are alter'd : trade's unfeeling train Usurp the land, and dispossess the swain ; Along the lawn, where scatter' d hanikts rose, L"n\Weldy wealth and cumbrovis pomp repose, And every want to luxury allied. And every pang that folly pays to pride. Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom. Those calm desires that ask'd but little room, 70 Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene, Lived in each look, and brighten'd all the green, — These, far departing, seek a kinder shore. And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Aubura ! parent of the blissful hour, Thy glades forlorn confess the tj-rant's power. Here as I take my sohtary rounds. Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds. And, many a j'ear elapsed, return to view Where once the cottage stood, the hawthom grew, SO Remembrance wakes with all her busy train. Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care, In aU my griefs — and God has given my share — I still had hopes, my latest hours to crown. Amidst these humble bovvers to kiy me dov\'n ; To husband out life's taper at the close. And keep the flame from wasting, by repose : I still had hopes — for pride attends us still — Amidst the swains to show my book-leam'd skill, 90 Around my fire an evening group to draw, And tell of all I felt and all I saw ; And, as a hare, whom hounds and homs pursue. Pants to the place from whence at fu'st she flew, I still had hopes, mj' long vexations past, Here to return, and die at home at last. blest retirement, friend to life's decline. Retreat from cares, that never must be mine ! How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these, A youth of labour with an age of ease ; 100 Who quits a worid where strong temptations try, And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly I For him no ■nTetches, born to work and weep. Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep. No surly porter stands in guilty state To spurn imploring famine from the gate ; But on he moves to meet his latter end, Angels around befriending vh-tue's friend, Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay, 'WliUe resignation gently slopes the way, 110 And, all his prospects brightening to the last. His heaven commences ere the world bo past. Sweet was the sound, when oft, at evening's close, Up yonder hill the village murmur rose : There, as I past with careless steps and slow. The mingling notes came soften'd from below ; The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung. The sober herd that low'd to meet theii- young, The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool. The playful children just let loose from school, 120 The watch-dog's voice that bay'd the whispering wind, And the loud laugh that siioke the va<-ant mind,— These all in sweet confusion sought the shade. And fiU'd each pause the nightingale had made. 396 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. nm But now the sounds of population fail, No cheerful munnurs fluctuate in the gale, No busy steps the grass-grown footway ti'ead, But all the bloomy flush of life is fled : All but yon widow' d, solitary thing, That feebly bends beside the plashy spring ; 130 She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread, To strip the brook mth mantling cresses spread, To pick her wintry fagot from the thorn, To seek her nightly shed, and weep tiU moiii : She only left of all the harmless train, The sad historian of the pensive plain. Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled, And stm where many a garden flower grows wild, There, where a few torn shi'ubs the place disclose, The village preacher's modest mansion rose. 140 A man he was to all the country dear, And passing rich with forty pounds a year : Remote from towns he ran his godly race, Nor e'er had changed, nor wish'd to change, his place ; Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for power. By doctrines fashion' d to the varj-ing horn' : Far other aims his heart had learn' d to prize. More bent to raise the wretched than to rise. His house was known to all the vagrant train, He chid their- wanderings, but relieved their pain : 150 The long-remember'd beggar was his guest. Whose beard descending swept his aged breast ; The ruin'd spendthrift, now no longer proud. Claim' d kindi-ed there, and had his claims allow' d ; The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay, Sat by his tii'e, and talk'd the night away, Wept o'er his wounds, or tales of sorrow done, Shoulder'd his crutch, and shew'd how fields were won. Pleased with his guests, the good man learn' d to glow. And quite forgot their vices in their woe : 160 Careless their meiits or theii' faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And e'en his failings lean'd to virtue's side ; But in his duty prompt at every call. He watch'd and wept, ho pray'd and felt, for all : And as a bird each fond endearment tries To tempt its new-fledged off.spring to the skies, He tried each art, reproved each duU delay, AUured to brighter worlds, and led the waj-. 170 Beside the bed where parting life was laid. And sorrow guilt and pam by turns dismay'd, The reverend champion stood. At his control, Despair and angui.sh fled the struggling soul ; Comfort came do\\'n the trembling wretch to raise. And his last faltering accents whisper' d praise. At church, with meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorn' d the venerable place; Truth from his Ups prevail' d with double sway. And fools, who came to scoff, remain'd to pray. 180 The service past, around the pious man. With ready zeal, each honest rustic ran ; E'en children follow' d, vrith. endearing wile. And pluck'd his gown, to share the good man's smile ; His ready smile a parent's wamith exjjress'd. Their welfare pleased him, and theii' cares distress'd ; To them his heart, his love, his griefs, were given. But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven. As some taU cliff that lifts its avriul form. Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, 190 Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread. Eternal sunshine settles on its head. Beside j'on straggling fence that skirts the way, With blossom'd fui-ze unprofitably gay. There in his noisy mansion, skill'd to rule. The ^dllage master taught his little school. A man severe he was, and stern to ^•iew ; I knew him well, and every truant knew : AVell had the boding tremblers learn' d to trace The day's disasters in his morning face; 200 Full well they laugh'd, %vith counterfeited glee, At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ; Full well the busy whisper, cu'cling round, Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd : Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught. The love he bore to learning was in fault. The village all declared how much he knew, 'Twas certain he could write and cipher too ; Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage. And e'en the story ran — that he could gauge : 210 In arguing, too, the parson own'd his skill. For e'en though vanquish' d, he could argue still; "WTiile words of learned length, and thund'ring soimd. Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around. And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew. That one small head coidd carry all he knew. But past is all his fame. The very spot \\Tiere many a time he triumph' d is forgot. Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high. Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye, 220 Now lies that house where nut-brown di'aughts inspued. Where graj'beard mirth and smiling toil retired, Where village statesmen talk'd with looks profoimd. And news much older than theii" ale went round. Imagination fondly stoops to trace The parlour splendom-s of that festive place : The white-wash'd wall, the nicely-sanded floor. The vamish'd clock that clicked behind the door; The chest, contrived a double debt to pay, A bed by night, a chest of di-awers by day ; 230 The pictures placed for ornament and use. The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose ; The hearth, except when winter chill' d the day. With aspen boughs, and flowers, and fennel gay, AVTiile broken tea-cups, wisely kept for show, Banged o'er the chinmey, gU.sten'd in a row. Vain transitorj' splendours I Coidd not all Reprieve the tottering mansion from its fall ? Obscm'e it sinks, nor shall it more impart An hoirr's importance to the poor man's heart. 240 Thither no more the peasant shall repah', To sweet obhvion of his daily care ; No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale. No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail ; No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear, Relax his pond' reus strength, and lean to hear ; The host himself no longer shall be found Careful to see the mantling bliss go round ; Nor the coy maid, half-willing to be prest, Shall kiss the ciip to pass it to the rest. 2.50 Yes ! let the rich deride, the proud disdain. These simple blessings of the lowly train ; To me more dear, congenial to my he.art. One native charm, than all the gloss of art. Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play, The soul adopts, and owns theii- first-born sway ; Tu i.D. 1800. J SHORTER POEMS. 397 Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant miud, Unciiviud, unmolested, unconfinod : lUit thi^ long pomi), the midnight masquerade, With all the freaks of wanton wealth array' d, — "200 Jn these, ere triilers half their wish obtain, The toiling pleasiu'e sickens into pain ; And e'en wliile fashion's brightest arts decoy. The hciU't, distrusting, asks if this be joy? Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen, who survey The rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay, 'Tis yom's to judge how wide the limits stand Between a splendid and a happy land. Proud swells the tide -with loads of fi-eighted ore, And shouting Folly hails them from her shore ; 270 Hoards, e'en beyond the miser's wish, abound. And rich men flock from all the world around. Yet coimt our gains : this wealth is but a name That leaves our useful products stUl the same. Not so the loss : the man of wealth and pride Takes up a space that many poor supplied ; Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds, Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds. The robe that wraps his Umbs in silken sloth, Has robb'd the neighbom-ing fields of half their growth ; His seat, where soUtary sports are seen, 281 Indignant spurns the cottage from the green ; Around the world each needful product flies, For all the luxuries the world supplies : — ^^^lLle thus the land, adorn' d for pleasure all, In baiTcn splendour feebly waits its fall. As some fair female, unadom'd and plain, Scciure to please while youth confii'ms her reign. Slights every borrow'd charm that dress supplies, Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes ; 290 But when those chai-ms are past — for charms are frail — When time advances, and when lovers fail, She then .shines forth, solicitous to bless. In all the glaring impotence of dress ; Thus fares the land, by luxury betray'd. In nature's simplest charms at first array' d. But verging to decline, its splendours rise. Its \-istas strike, its palaces surprise, "WTiile, scourged by famine from the smiling land. The mournful peasant leads his humble band ; 300 And while he sinks, without one arm to save. The country blooms — a garden and a grave. ■\Vhere, then, ah ! where shall poverty reside. To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride 'i If to some common's fenceless limits stray'd. He di-ives his flock to pick the scanty blade. Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide, And e'en the bare-worn common is denied. If to the city sped, what waits him there ? To see profusion that he must not share : 310 To see ten thousand banefid arts combined To pamper luxur\-, and thin mankind ; To see each joy the sons of pleasure know Extorted from his fellow-creatures' woe. Here while the corn-tier glitters in brocade. There the pale artist plies his sickly trade ; Here while the proud their long-drawn pomps display. There the black gibbet glooms beside the way. The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight reign, Here, richly deck'd, admits the gorgeous train, 320 Tumidtuous grandeur crowds the blazing square. The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare. Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy ! Sure these denote one universal joy ! Are these thy serious thoughts ': — Ah, tura thine eyes \\1iere the poor houseless shivering female lies : She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest. Has wept at tales of innocence distrest ; Her modest looks the cottage might adorn. Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thora ; 330 Now lost to all — her friends, her ^-irtue tied. Near her betrayer's door she lays her head. And, pinch'd with cold, and shrinking from the shower, With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour, AVlien idly first, ambitious of the town, She left her wheel, and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet Aubm-n, thine, the loveliest train, Do th)" fair tribes particijjate her pain ; E'en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led, At proud men's doors they ask a little bread 1 340 Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene, Where half the convex world intrudes between, Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go, 'WTiere wild Altama miu'murs to their woe. Far different there from all that chami'd before. The various terrors of that horrid shore ; Those blazing sims that dart a downward ray. And fiercely shed intolerable day ; Those matted woods where birds begin to sing. But silent bats in cb'owsy chistere cHng ; 350 Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crown'd, WTiere the dark scorpion gathers death around ; "Where at each step the stranger fears to wake The i-attling terrors of the vengeful snake ; AVhere crouching tigers wait their hapless prey. And savage men, more miu'd'rous stdl than they; WhUe oft in whirls the mad tornado flies, JlingUng the ravaged landscape with the skies. Far different these from every former scene. The cooling brook, the grass}-- vested green, 300 The breezy covert of the w-arbling grove. That only shelter'd thefts of hai-mless love. Good Heaven ! what soi-rows gloom" d that parting day That call'd them from their native -walks aw-ay ; When the poor exiles, every pleasure past. Hung roimd the bowers, and fondly look'd their last. And took a long farewell, and -wish'd in vain For seats like these beyond the westei-n main ; And, shuddering still to face the distant deep, Retum'd and wept, and still retui-n'd to weep ! 370 The good old sire the first prepared to go To ne-w-found w-orlds, and wept for others' woe : But for himself, in conscious virtue brave. He only w-ish'd for worlds beyond the grave. His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears. The fond companion of his helpless yeai-s. Silent -n-ent next, neglectful of her chaiius. And left a lover's for her father's arms. With louder plaints the mother spoke her w-oes. And blest the cot w-here every pleasure rose, 380 And kiss'd her thoughtless babes with many a tear, And clasji'd them close, in sorrow doubly dear; ■V\Tiilst her fond husband strove to lend relief In all the silent manliness of grief. O Luxur>- 1 thou curst by Heaven's decree. How ill exchanged are things like these for thee ! How do thy potions, with insidious joy, Dift'use their pleasures only to destroy 1 398 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OP ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 Kingtloms by thee, to sickly greatness grown, Boast of a florid vigour not their own : At every draught more large and large they grow, A bloated mass of rank imwieldy woe ; Till, sapp'd their strength, and every part vmsound, DowTi, down they sink, and spread a ruin round. E'en now the devastation is begun. And half the business of destruction done ; E'en now, methinks, as pondering here I stand, I see the rural Virtues leave the land. Down where j'on anchoring vessel spreads the sail Tliat idly waiting flaps with every gale. Downward they move, a melancholy baud. Pass fi-om the shore, and darken all the strand. Contented Toil, and hospitable Care, And kind connubial Tenderness, are there ; And Piety mth mshes placed above. And steady Loyalty, and faithful Love. And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maid, StiU first to fly where sensual joys invade ; Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame. To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame ; Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried. My shame in crowds, my solitary pride ; Thou source of aU my bliss, and all my woe. That found' st me poor at first, and keep'st me so; Thou guide, by which the nobler arts excel, Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well ! Farewell ; and oh '. where'er thy voice be tried, On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side, Wliether where equinoctial fervours glow. Or winter wi-aps the polar world in snow, StiU let thy voice, prevailing over time. Redress the rigoui's of th' inclement cUme ! Aid slighted trutli with thy persuasive strain ; Teach erring man to spiu'n the rage of gain ; Teach him, that states of native strength possest. Though very poor, may still be very blest ; That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay. As ocean sweeps the labour' d mole away ; While self- dependent power can time defy. As rocks resist the bUlows and the sky.' 390 400 410 420 430 Sir William Jones, the famous Oriental scholar — not knighted until 1783 — as a schoolboy at Harrow Lad shown the turn for poetry that graced hLs busy and honourable life. One of his odes — it was ^vi-itten in 1781 — was AN ODE IN IMITATION OF ALC^US. \\Tiat constitutes a State ? Not high rais'd battlement or labour'd mound. Thick wall or moated gate ; Not cities proud with spires and tuiTets crowni'd ; Not bays and broad-arm'd ports. Where, laughing at the storm, rich na\-ies ride : Not Starr' d and spangled courts. Where low-brow'd baseness wafts perfume to pride. No : Men, high-minded Men, AVith pow'rs as far above dull brutes endued 10 In forest, brake, or den. As beasts e.xcel cold rocks and brambles rude ; Men, who their Duties know. But know their Eights, and knowing, dare maintain, 1 The last fom- lines were added by Dr. Jolinson to the MS. Prevent the long-aini'd blow. And crush the tyi'ant while they rend the chain : These constitute a State, .Vnd sov'reig-n Law, that State's collected wUl, O'er thrones and globes elate Sits Empress, crowning good, repressing ill ; Smit by her sacred frown The fiend. Discretion, like a vapour sinks, And e'en th' all-dazzling Crown Hides his faint rays, and at her bidding shrinks. Such u-iis this heav'n-lov'd isle, Than Lesbos faiiXT and the Cretan shore ! No more shall freedom smile •- Shall Britons languish, and be Men no more ? Since aU must life resign. Those sweet rewards, which decorate the brave, 'Tis folly to decline. And steal inglorious to the silent grave. ■JO 30 William Cowper. {Fi-om the Portrait bi/ Sir Tliomas Lawrence.) Even the gentle Cowper, withdrawn from the world at Olney, since he had a poet's sympathy with man, felt not less keenly than the men in cities the new impulse of the time. William Cowj^ei' was born in 1731, at the rectory of Great Berkhampstead, educated at Westminster School, entered of the Middle Temple, and called to the bar in 1754. He was half-engaged to his cousin, Theodora Cowper, whose sister afterwards became Lady Hesketh. Too nervous and sensitive for jiractice at the bar, Cowper was driven into actual insanity by the prospect of an examination by the House of Lords, as to his fitness for an office in tlie House, to which his cousin. Major Cow])er, had presented him. He was received into a lunatic asylum at St. Albans, in December, 17G3. Wlien he left it he gave up active life, and retired on a small pension from members of his family to a quiet town, where he liecamc acquainted with the Rev. Mr. Unwin and his wife, and presently lodged with them. In June, 17G7, Mr. Unwin was killed by a fall from his horse, and Cowjier removed with Mrs. Unwin to Olney, in Buckinghamshire. There the TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER rOEMS. 399 vicar was non-resident, and the cnrate, Mr. Newton, was an energetic man who had once commanded a vessel in the slave-trade, and after a life fidl of adventure had become intensely religious, in a form that would tend to increase rather than lighten the innocent and cheerful Cowper's tendency to a disease in which the faith that was the stay and blessing of his life became a source of terrors. Cowper helped Mr. Newton in the composition of a volume of " Olney Hymns." In 1773 he had another attack of insanity, and, as he had done at the accession of the first attack, attempted suicide. In 1779 Mr. Newton left Olney, and the " Olney Hjnoins" were published. Mrs. TJnwin suggested, by way of pleasantly en- gaging Cowper's mind, that he should make a book of verse. Mr. Ne\vton found a publisher, and in 17S2, Cow])er, then fifty years old, produced his " Table Talk," and other pieces, his first volume of poems. A new friendsliip had then been formed with Latly Austen, who, when visiting her sister, a clei'gy- man's wife, near Olney, made her way into the good-will of Cowper and Mrs. Unwin. Lady Austen fomid herself a summer home at the vicarage, which was to let, and of which the garden joined the garden of Mrs. Unwin's house — Cowper's house — in Cowper's House at Olney. the market-place. The new friends were much together. They read together in the evening, and talked cheerfully of their reading. One evening. Lady Austen advised Cowper, whose book had been written in I'hyming coujilets, to try blank verse. He doubted, she persuaded. "On what subjects" he asked. " Oh," she replied, " you can write on anything. Take the sofa." That was his " Task." It was begun in the summer of 178.3, finished in 1784, and published in 178.5, four years Ijefore the fall of the Bastille. The poem will l:>e described among longer works, but it will serve to illustrate the tendency of thought if we here take from it a passage showing how keenly even Cow|)er in his retii-ement felt what the world outside was feeling. THE B.\STILLE. Yo lioiTid towers, the abode of broken hearts, Ye dungeons, and ye cages of despair, Tluit munarebs have supplied from ago to ago With music such us suits their sovereign cara. The sighs and groans of miserable men ! There's not an English heart that would not leap To hear that ye were fallen at last ; to know 390 That even oiu' enemies, so oft employed In forging chains for us, themselves were free. For he who values Liberty confines His zeal for her predominance within No narrow hoimds ; her cause engages him Wherever pleaded. 'Tis the cause of man. There dwell the most forlorn of human kind, Immiu'ed though unaccused, condemned untried. Cruelly spared, and hopeless of escape. There, like the visionary emblem seen 400 By him of Babylon, life stands a stump. And, fiUeted about with hoops of brass, 8tiU lives, though all its pleasant boughs are gone. To count the hom'-bell, and expect no change ; And ever as the suUon sound is heard, StQl to reflect, that though a joyless note To Mm whose moments all have one dull ijace, Ten thousand rovers in the world at large Account it music ; that it summons some To theatre or jocvmd feast or ball; 410 The wearied hireling finds it a release From labour ; and the lover, who has chid Its long delay, feels every welcome stroke Upon his heart-strings, trembling vnth delight : To fly for refuge from distracting thought To such amusements as ingenious Woe Contrives, hard shifting and without her tools : To read engraven on the mouldy walls, In staggering types, his predecessor's tale, A sad memorial, and subjoin his own : 420 To turn pui-veyor to an overgorged And bloated spider, till the pampered pest Is made familiar, watches his approach, Comes at his call, and serves him for a friend : To wear out time in numbering to and fro The studs that thick emboss his iron door. Then downward, and then upward, then aslant, And then alternate, with a sickly hope By dint of change to give his tasteless task Some relish, tUl the sum exactly found 430 In all directions, he begins again : — O comfortless existence ! henmied around With woes, which who that suft'ers would not kneel And beg for exile, or the pangs of death r That man should thus encroach' on feUow-man, Abridge him of his just and native rights. Eradicate him, tear him from'his'hold Upon the endearments of domestic life And social, nip his fruitf ulness and use. And doom him, for perhaps a heedless word. 440 To barrenness, and solitude, and tears, Moves indignation, makes the name of King (Of King whom such prerogative can please) As dreadfid as the JIaniehcan god. Adored through fear, strong only to destroy. It was the same kindly andiively Lady Au.stea who one evening told Cowper the story of " John 400 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITEL'ATURE. [i.D. 17G0 Gilpin," which, as told by her, tickled his fancy so much that he was kept awake by fits of laughter during gi-eat part of the night after hearing it, and must needs turn it into a ballad when he got up. Mrs. Unwin's .sou sent it to the Public Advertiser, where it appeared without an author's name. John Henderson, an actor from Bath, who took the London playgoers by storm in the year 1777, as Shylock, Hamlet, and Falstaff, was then giving readings at the Freemason's Tavern. He had succeeded almost to Garrick's fame. His feeling was so true, his voice so flexible, that Mrs. Siddons and Jolm Kemble often went to hear him read. Henderson, finding "John Gilpin" in print, but not yet famous, chose it for recitation. Mrs. Siddons heard it with delight, and in the sjiring of 1785 its success was the event of the season. It was repi'inted in many forms, and talked of in all circles ; prints of "John Gilpin" were familiar in shop- windows ; and Cowpei', who was finishing the " Task," felt that his more serious work would be helped if it were published with this " John Gilpin," as an avowed piece by the same author. Thus he wrote on the 30tli of April, 1785, to Mrs. Unwin's son : — " I return you thanks for a letter so -n-arm with the intelli- gence of the celebrity of ' John Gilpin.' I little thought, when I mounted him upon mj' Pegasus, that he would hecome so famous. I have learned also, from Mr. Newton, that he is equally renowned in Scotland, and that a lady there had undertaken to vrrite a second part, on the subject of Mrs. Gilpin's return to London, but not succeeding in it as she washed, she dropped it. He tells me likewise, that the head-master of St. Paul's school (who he is I know not) has conceived, in consequence of the entertainment that John has afforded him, a vehement desii-e to wTite to me. Let us hope he will alter his mind ; for should we even exchange eivDities on the occasion. Tirocinium ' will spoil all. The great estimation, however, in which this knight of the stone-bottles is held, may turn out a cii'cumstancc propitious to the volume of which his history wiU make a part. Those events that prove the prelude to our greatest success are often apparently trivial in themselves, and such as seemed to promise nothing. The disappointment that Horace mentioned is reversed — We design a mug, and it proves a hogshead. It is a little hard, that I alone should be unfm-nished with a printed copy of this facetious story. A\lien you visit London next, you must buy the most elegant impression of it, and bring it with yciu. JOHN GILPIN. John Gilpin was a citizen Of credit and renown, A train-band captain eke was he Of famous London town. John Gilpin's spouse said to her dear, " Though wedded we have been These twice ten tedious years, yet we No holidav have seen. " To-morrow is our wediUng-day, And we will then repair Unto the ' Bell ' at Edmonton, All in a chaise and jjair. 10 1 In •' Tirocinium BcllOOls. ' Cowper liad eix^ressed Lis objection to public " My sister, and my sister's child. Myself, and children three, WiU fill the chaise ; so j-ou must ride On horseback after we." He soon replied, " I do admire Of womankind but one. And you are she, my dearest deal", Therefore it shall be done. " I am a linen-draper bold. As all the world doth know. And my good friend the calender Will lend his horse to go." Quoth Jlrs. Gilpin, " That's well said ; And for that wine is dear. We will be furnished with our own, AMiich is both bright and clear." John Gilpin kissed his loi"ing wife ; O'erjoyed was he to find, That though on pleasure she was bent, She had a fi-ugal mind. The morning came, the chaise was brought, But yet was not allowed To di-ive up to the door, lest all Should say that she was proud. So three doors off the chaise was stayed, AMiere they did all get in ; Six precious souls, and all agog To dash thi-ough thick and tliin. Smack went the whip, round wont the wheels. Were never folk so glad. The stones did rattle underneath. As if Cheapside were mad. John Gilpin at his horse's side Seized fast the flowing mane. And up he got, in haste to ride, But soon came down again ; For saddle-tree scarce reached had he. His journey to begin, "V\"hcn, turning round his head, he saw Three customers come in. So down ho came ; for loss of time Although it grieved him sore, Yet loss of pence, full well he knew, Woidd trouble him much more. 'Twas long before the customers Were suited to their mind, "V^Hien Betty screaming came down stairs, " The wine is left behind ! " " Good lack I " quoth he, " yet bring it mr My leathern belt Ukc\\-isc. In which I bear my trusty sword, "Wlien I do exercise." Now Jlistross Gilpin (careful soul \) Had two stone bottles found, To hold the liquor that .she lorcd. And keep it safe and sound. 40 .in TO i.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 401 Each bottle had a cm-ling: car, Through which the helt he drew, 70 And hung a hottlc on each side, To make his balance true. Then over all, that he might be Equijiped from top to toe. His long red cloak, well brushed and neat. He manfully did throw. Xow see him mounted once again Upon his nimble steed. Full slowly pacing o'er the stones. With caution and good heed. SO But finding soon a smoother road Beneath his well-shod feet, The snorting beast began to trot, WTiich galled him in his seat. So, " Fair and softly," John he cried, But John he cried in vain ; That trot became a gallop soon, In spite of curb and rein. So stooping down, as needs ho must Who cannot sit upright, 90 He grasped the mane with both his hands, And eke with all his might. His horse, who never in that sort Had handled been before, AVhat thing upon his back had got Did wonder more and more. Awaj' went GUpin, neck or nought ; Away went hat and wig ; He little dreamt, when he set out. Of running such a rig. 100 The wind did blow, the cloak did fly. Like streamer long and gay. Till, loop and button failing both, At last it flew away. Then might all people well discern The bottles he had slung ; A bottle swinging at each side, As hath been said or sung. The dogs did bark, the children screamed, TJp flew the windows all ; 110 And ever}' soul cried out, "Well done ! " As loud as he could bawl. Away went Gilpin — who but he ? His fame soon spread around ; " He carries weight ! " " He rides a race ! " " 'Tis for a thousand pound 1 " And stiU, as fast as he drew near, 'Twas wonderful to view. How in a trice the tumijike men Their gates wide open threw. 120 And now, as ho went bowing down His reeking head full low, The bottles twain behind his back Were shattered at a blow. 51 Down ran the wine into the road, Most piteous to be seen, Which made his horse's flanks to smoke As they had basted been. But still he seemed to carry weight, With leathern girdle braced ; 130 For all might see the bottle-necks Still dangling at his waist. Thus all through merry Islington These gambols he did play, Until he came unto the Wash Of Edmonton so gay ; And there he threw the Wash about On both sides of the way. Just like unto a trundling mop. Or a wild goose at play. 140 At Edmonton his loving wife From the balconj- spied Her tender husband, wondering much To see how he did ride. " Stop, stop, John Gilpin 1 — Here's the house ! " They all at once did cry ; " The dinner waits, and we are tired." Said Gilpin, " So am I ! " But yet his horse was not a whit Inclined to tarry there 1 150 For why 'i — his owner had a house FuU ten miles off, at Ware. So like an an-ow swift he flew, Shot by an archer strong ; So did he fly — which brings me to The middle of my song. Away went Gilpin, out of breath. And sore against his will, TOl at his friend the calender's His horse at last stood stiU. 160 The calender, amazed to see His neighbour in such trim. Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate. And thus accosted him : " What news ? what news ? youi- tidings tell ; Tell me you must and shall — Say why bareheaded you are come, Or why you come at all .^ " Now Giljiin had a pleasant wit. And loved a timely joko ; 170 And thus unto the calender In merry guise he spoke : " I came because your horse would come. And, if I well forebode, lly hat and wig will soon be here — Thej" are upon the road." The calender, right glad to find His friend in mcn-y pin, Eetumcd him not a single woi'd. But to the house went in ; 180 402 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATUEE. [i.D. i7a» "\^^lenc■e straight he came with hat and wig ; A wig that Mowed behind, A hat not much the worse for wear, Each comely in its kind. He held them up, and in his turn Thus showed his ready wit, " My head is twice as big as yours, They therefore needs must fit. " r.ut let me scrape the dirt away That hangs upon your face ; 190 And stop and eat, for well you may Be in a himgry case." Said John, " It is my wedding-day. And all the world would stare, If wife should dine at Edmonton, And I shoidd dine at Ware." So turning to his horse, he said, " I am in haste to dine ; 'Twas for your pleasui-c you came here, You shall go back for mine." 200 Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast I For which he paid full dear ; For, while he spake, a braj-ing ass Did sing most loud and clear ; Whereat his horse did snort, as he H;id heard a lion roar. And galloped off with all his might. As he had done before. Away went Gilpin, and away Went Uilpin's hat and ^\'ig : 210 He lost them sooner than at first ; For why 'i — they were too big. Now Mistress Gilpin, when she saw Her husband posting down Into the coimtry far away. She pulled out halt-a-crown ; And thus unto the youth she said, That drove them to the " Bell," " This shall be yours, when you bring back Sly liusband safe and well." 220 The youth did ride, and soon did meet John coming back amain : Whom in a trice ho tried to stop. By catching at his rein ; But not performing what he meant, And gladly would have done, The frighted steed he frighted more. And made him faster run. " Stop thief 1 stop thief !— a highwayman ! " Not one of them was mute ; And all and each that jjassed that way Did join in the pursiut. 240 And now the turnpike gates again Flew open in short space ; The tollmen thinking, as before, That GUpin rode a race. And so he did, and won it too. For he got first to town ; Nor stopped till where he had got up He did again get down. Now let us sing, Long live the king ! And Gilpin, long live he ! And when he next doth ride abroad Mav I be there to see 1 25a Away went Gilpin, and away Went postboy at his heels. The postboy's horse right glad to miss The lumbering of the wheels. Six gentlemen upon the road, Thus seeing Gilpin fly, With postboy scampering in the rear, Thev raised the hue and crv : 230 Mrs. Unwin became jealous of Lady Austen's cheerful influence over her friend, and, to please her, C'owpei- had to ask Lady Austen not to return tcv Olney. But an older friendship had been actively revived. His cousin Theodora had remained un- married, and her sister, Lady Hesketh, was much about Cowjier, showering kindnesses upon him, of which Theodora may have known more mysteries than Cowper suspected, when he wrote in playful tenderness the lines entitled " Gratitude." How a gift in later life touched Cowjier's heart with memo- ries of childhood, these pathetic verses tell : — ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHEe'.S PICTURE. Oh that those lips had language ! Life has passed With me but roughly since I heard thee last. Those lips are thine — thy o\\'n sweet smile I see, The same that oft in chiUlhood solaced me ; Voice only fails, else how distinct they say. " Grieve not, my child, chase all thy fears away ! " The meek inteUigence of those dear eyes (Blessed be the art that can immortalize. The art that battles Time's t>Tannic claim To quench it) here shines on me still the same. Iff Faithful remembrancer of one so dear, welcome guest, though imexpected here ! A\lio bidst me honour with an artless song. Affectionate, a mother lost so long, 1 wiU obey, not willingly alone. But gladly, as the precept were her own : jVnd, while that face renews my filial grief. Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief, Shall steep me in Elysian reverie, A momentary di-eam that thou ai't she. 2f) My mother I when I learnt that thou wast dead, Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed ? Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son, Wretch even then, life's journey just begun ? Perhaps thou gavest me, though imfelt, a kiss : Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss — Ah, that maternal smile ! It answers, Yes. I heard the bell tolled on thy burial day, I saw the hearse that bore thee slow away, And, turning from my nm-sery window, drew 30 A long, long sigh, and wept a last adieu ! TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 403 But was it such ': — It was. — Where thou art gone Adiims and farewells are a sound unknown. Jlay 1 b>it meet thee on tliat jjeaceful shore, The parting word shall pass my lijts no more ! Thy maidens, g;rii'ved themselves at my concern, <_*ft gavi' nie promise of thy quick rctiu-n. What ardently 1 wished I Ion;;' believed, And, disiippointcd still, was still deceived. By expectation every day beguiled, 40 IXipo of to-morrow even from a child. Thus many a sad to-morrow Ciime and went. Till, all my stock of infant sorrow spent, I Icanit at last submission to my lot ; But, though I less deplored thee, ne'er forgot. Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more. Children not thine have trod my nm-sery floor ; And whore the gardener Robin, day by day, Drew me to school along the public way. Delighted with my bauble coach, and wrapped 50 In scarlet mantle wann, and velvet capped, 'Tis now become a history httle known, That once we called the pastoral house om- own. .Short-lived possession I but the record fan- That memory keeps, of all thy kindness there, .Still outlives many a stomi that has effaced A thousand other themes less deeply traced. Thy nightly visits to my chamber made, That thou mightst know me sjife and warmly laid ; Thy moniing boimties ere I left my home, 60 The biscuit, or confectionery plum ; The fragi-ant waters on my check bestowed By thy own hand, till fresh they shone and glowed ; All this, and more endearing still than all. Thy constant flow of love, that knew no fall. Ne'er roughened by those cataracts and brakes That humour interposed too often makes ; All this still legible in memory's page, And still to be so to my latest age. Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay 70 Such honom'S to thee as my numbers may ; Perhaps a fi-ail memorial, but sincere, Not scorned in heaven, though little noticed here. Could Time, his flight reversed, restore the hours, AXTien, ]]la\-ing with thy vestiu-e's tissued flowers. The violet, the pink, and jes.samine, I in'icked them into paper with a pin (And thou wast hajipier than myself the while, Wouldst softly speak, and stroke my head and smile), <_'ould those few pleasant days again appear, 80 flight one wish bring them, would I wish them here ? I would not trust my heart — the dear delight Seems so to be desired, perhaps I might. — But no — what here we call our life is such, So little to he loved, and thou so much, That I should ill requite thee to constrain Thy unbound spirit into bonds again. Thou as a gallant bark from Albion's coast (The stonns all weathered and the ocean crossed) Shoots into port at some well-havened isle, 90 Where spiees breathe, and brighter seasons smile. There sits quiescent on the floods that .show Her beauteous fonn reflected clear below, A\Tule airs impregnated with incense play Around her, fanning light her streamers gay ; So thou, with sails how swift ! hast reached the shore, " Where tempests never beat nor billows roar," And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide ( If life long .since has anchored by thy side. But me, scarce ho])ing to attain tliat rest, 100 Always from port withheld, always distressed — JIo howling blasts drive devious, tempest tost. Sails ripped, scams opening wide, and comjiass lost, And day by day some current's tliwarting force Sets me more distant from a pro.sjierous course. Yet, oh, the thought that thou art safe, and ho ! That thought is joy, arrive what may to nu.'. My boast is not, that I deduce my birth From loins enthroned and rulers of the earth ; But higher far my proud pretensions rise — 1 10 The son of parents passed into the skies I And now, farewell — Time unrevoked has run His wonted course, yet what I wished is done. By contemplation's help, not sought in vain, I seem to have lived my childhood o'er again; To have renewed the joys that once were mine, Without the sin of debiting thine ; And, while the wings of Fancy still are free. And I can view this mimic show of thee, Time has but half succeeded in his theft — 120 Thyself removed, thy power to soothe me left. Cowper's Lust work was on liis translation of Homer into blank verse, and there was then another battle with insanity before him. He died in 1800. George Crabbe, born in 17.t4, began his work as a faithful painter of the miseries and trials of the poor, when, in 1783, he gave in his "Village" this view of " the cold charities of man to man : " — THE VILLAGE POOR. Ye gentle souls, who di'eam of riu'al ease, ^^^lom the smooth stream and smoother sonnet please ; Go 1 if the peaceful cot your praises share. Go look within, and ask if peace be there ; If peace be his — that th'ooping weary sire. Or theirs, that oft'spring round their feeble fire ; Or hers, that matron pale, whose trembling hand Tunis on the wretched hearth th' expiring brand ! 1 80 Nor yet can Time itself obtain for these Life's latest comforts, due respect and case ; For yonder see that hoary swain, whose ago Can with no cares except its own engage ; Who, propt on that rude staff', looks up to see The bare amis broken from the withering tree, On which, a boy, he climb'd the loftiest bough. Then his first joy, but his sad emblem now. He once was chief in all the rustic trade ; His steady hand the straightcst furrow made ; 190 Full many a prize he won, and still is proud To find the triumphs of his youth allow'd ; A tran.sicnt pleasure sjiarkles in his eyes. He hears and smiles, then thinks again and sighs : For now he journeys to his grave in p.ain ; The rich disdain him ; nay, the poor disdain : Alternate masters now their slave conunand, Urge the weak cft'orts of his feeble hand. And, when his age attempts its task in vain. With ruthless taunts, of lazy poor complain. 200 Oft may you see him, whim he tends the sheep. His winter charge, beneath tlie hillock weep ; 40-t CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 Oft hear him miinnur to tho winds that blow O'er his white locks and bury them in snow, When, rous'd by rage and mvittcring in the morn, He mends the broken hedge with icy thorn : — " Why do I live, when I desire to bo At once from life and life's long labour free ? Like leaves in spring, the yoirng are blown away. Without tho sorrows of a slow decay ; 210 I, like yon wither' d loaf remain behind. Nipt by the frost, and shivering in the wind ; There it abides till younger buds come on, As I, now all my fellow-swains are gone ; Then from the rising generation thrust. It falls, like me, unnoticed to the dust. These fruitful fields, these numerous flocks I see, Are others' gain, but killing cares to me ; To me the chUdi'on of my youth are lords. Cool in their looks, but hasty in thoii- words : 220 Wants of their own demand their care ; and who Feels his own want and succours others too ? A lonely, -nTctchcd man, in pain I go. None need my help, and none relieve my woe ; Then let my bones beneath the turf be laid. And men forget the wretch they would not aid." Thus groan the old, till by disease oppress'd, They taste a final woe, and then they rest. Theirs is yon house that holds the parish poor. Whose walls of mud scarce bear the broken door ; 230 There, where tho putrid vapours, flagging, play, And the dull wheel hums doleful through the day ; — There chilcb'cn dwell who know no parents' care ; Parents, who know no chikb-en's love, dwell there I Heart-broken matrons on their joyless bed, Forsaken wives, and mothers never wed ; Dejected widows with unheeded tears, And crippled age -n-ith more than childhood fears ; The lame, the blind, and — far the happiest they ! — The moping idiot, and tho madman gay. 240 Here too the sick theii' final doom receive. Here brought, amid the scenes of grief, to grieve, AVhere tho loud groans from some sad chamber flow, Mixt with tho clamours of the crowd below ; Here, sorrowing, they each kindred sorrow scan, And the cold charities of man to man : Whose laws indeed for ruin'd age pro'i'ide. And strong compulsion plucks the scrap from pride ; But still that scrap is bought with many a sigh. And pride embitters what it can't deny. 250 Say, ye, opprest by some fantastic woes. Some jarring nerve that baffles your repose ; WTio press the downy couch, while slaves advance With timid eye to read tho distant glance ; Wlio with sad prayers tho weary doctor tease, To name the nameless ever new disease ; Who with mock patience dire complaints endure, Wiiich real pain and that alone can cure ; How would ye bear in real pain to lie, Despised, neglected, left alone to die ? 260 How would ye bear to draw your latest breath AVhere aU that's wretched paves tho way for death f Such is that room which one rude beam dirides. And naked rafters form the sloping sides 'WTiere the Wle bands that bind the thatch are seen. And lath and mud are all that lie between ; Save one dull pane, that, coarsely patch' d, gives way To the rude tempest, yet excludes the day : Here, on a matted flock, with dust o'ersproad. The di-ooping -n-rctch recUnes his languid head ; 270 For him no hand the cordial cup applies. Or wipes the tear that stagnates in his eyes : No friends with soft discourse his pain beguile, Or promise hope, till sickness wears a smile. But soon a loud and hasty summons calls. Shakes the thin roof, and echoes round the walls ; Anon, a figure enters, quaintly neat, AH pride and business, bustle and conceit ; With looks unalter'd by these scenes of woe. With speed that, entering, speaks his haste to go, 280 He bids the gazing throng aroimd him fly. And carries fate and physic in his ej-e : A potent quack, long versed in human ills, \\Tio first insults the victim whom he kills ; Whose murd'rous hand a drowsy Bench protect. And whose most tender mercy is neglect. Paid by the parish for attendance here, He wears contempt upon his sapient sneer ; In haste he seeks the bed where Jlisery Has, Impatience mark'd in his averted eyes ; 290 And, some habitual queries hurried o'er, Without reply, he rushes on the door. His di'ooping patient, long inui'ed to pain. And long unheeded, knows remonstrance vain ; He ceases now the feeble help to crave Of man ; and silent sinks into the grave. But ere his death some pious doubts arise. Some simple fears, which "bold bad" men despise; Fain would he ask the parish priest to prove His title certain to the joys above. 300 For this he sends the murmuring nurse, who calls The holy stranger to these dismal walls : And doth not he, the pious man, appear, He, "passing rich, with foriy pounds a year ? " Ah ! no ; a shepherd of a different stock. And far unUke him, feeds this little flock : A jovial youth, who thinks his Sunday's task As much as God or man can fairly ask ; The rest he gives to loves and labours light. To fields the morning, and to feasts the night ; 310 None better skill' d the noisy pack to guide. To urge their chace, to cheer them or to chide ; A sportsman keen, he shoots through half the day. And, sldll'd at whist, devotes tho night to play : Then, while such honoiu'S bloom around his head. Shall he sit sadly by the sick man's bed. To raise the hope he feels not, or with zeal To combat fears that e'en the pious feel ? Now once again the gloomy scene explore, Less gloomy now ; the bitter hour is o'er, 320 The man of many sorrows sighs no more. — Up yonder hill, behold how sadly slow Tho bier moves winding from the vale below. There lie the happy dead, from trouble free. And the glad parish pays the frugal fee. No more, Death ! thy victim starts to hear Churchwarden stem, or kingly overseer : No more the fanner claims his humble bow : Thou art his lord, the best of tyrants thou I Now to the church behold the mourners come, 330' Sedately torpid and de^'outly dumb : The village children now their games suspend. To see the bier that bears their ancient friend ; TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 405 For he was one in all their idle sport, And like a monarch ruled their little court ; The pliant how he form'd, the flj-ins; ball, The hat, the -n-ickct, were his lahoiu-s all ; Him now they follow to his grave, and stand, Silent and sad, and gazing hand in hand, AMiile bending low, their eager eyes explore 340 The mingled relicts of the p;msh poor. The beU toUs late, the moping owl flies round, Feajr marks the flight and magnifies the sound ; The busy priest, detained by weightier care, Defers his duty till the day of prayer ; And, waiting long, the crowd retire distrest, To think a poor man's hones should lie unhlest. Crabbe liacl liimself seen and felt disti-e.ss of poverty. He was the son of a poor and ill-temiiered but not iU-ediicated wareliouse-keeper and collector of salt duties at Aldborougli, then a dreary, squalid village on the coast of Sulfolk, now a polite watering-place. He struggled up in life, tried to become a country doctor, next plunged into London with his poems, and was nearly sinking in the flood of life wlien Edmund Burke heard the faint cry for help to which other ears had been deaf, and held out the firm liand that lifted Crabbe out of despair, caused him to take ordei-s in the Church, and set him on the road to ease and happiness. Robert Burns, bom on the 2-5th of January, 1759, was about five years younger than Crabbe. His father was a gentleman's gardener, who, by help of ^100 lent by his employer, set up a fann of his own at Mount Oliphant, when Robert was six or seven yeare old. It was not a profitable undertaking, but William Buraess — the name shortened into Burns — maintained an honest home : he valued knowledge, as the poor Scot usually does, and did what he could for the education of his sons Robert and Gilbert. When old enough they helped to work on the poor fami. At nineteen Robert went to leai-n mensuration at Kirkoswald that he might Ije qualified to take a place in the Excise, and he went afterwards to Tar- bolton to learn flax-dressing, with a hope that flax- gi-owing might be made a soui'ce of better profit. At the end of 1783 — three months before their father's death- — the two young men took tlie fivrm of Moss- giel, in the parish of Mauchline. There they sought to maintain themselves and their mother, but still they ploughed and sowed, and reaped little but bitterness. At this time the genius of Biirns — the greatest IjtIc poet who has ever lived — was pouring itself out in song, coloured with every mood of his rich sympathetic nature. Religious depths and moods of recklessness, wild snatches of mirth born of melan- choly, scorn of hypocrisy ; love-singing, gay, idle, earnest, tender ; the new spirit of defiance for autho- rity ; the rising claims on behalf of human fellowship and freedom and the dignity of man ; with toucliing utterances from the depths of a soul beset by dangers, and looking out into the darkness that shrouds all its future path, are in the songs of Burns, that rose within him as lie went to and fro about his daily work, or followed his plough over the unfruitful field. Wliile he poured scorn upon the hypocrite in " Holy Willie's Prayer," this was his own " Prayer in Prospect of Death :" — PRAYER IX PROSPECT OF DEATH. O Thou unknown. Almighty Cause Of all my hope and fear ! In whoso dread presence, ere an hour. Perhaps I must appear ! If I have wander'd in those paths Of life I ought to shim ; As something, loudly, in my breast, Remonstrates I have done ; Thou know'st that Thou hast formed me With passions wild and strong ; 10 And listening to their witching voice Has often led me wrong. AATiere himian weakness has come short, Or frdUty stept aside. Do Thou, All-good ! for such Thou art, In shades of darkness hide. Where with intention I have crr'd, No other plea I have. But Thou art good ; and goodness still Delighteth to forgive. 20 At Mossgiel, when he was half-resolved on aban- doning the struggle here, and going to the West Indies as manager of a plantation, common incidents of the plough-field caused him to blend the cares of his own life with tender regard for the humblest of God's creatures. This was shaped during his work, after his plough had broken its way through the little nest of a field-mouse : — TO A MOUSE. Wee, sleekit, cowrin', tim'rous beastie, Oh, what a panic 's in thy breastie ! Thou needna start awa' sao hasty, Wi' bickering brattle '.' I wad he laith to rin and chase thee, Wi' murd'ring pattle I- I'm truly sorrj' man's dominion Has broken nature's social union, And justifies that ill opinion Which maks thee startle At me, thy poor earth-bom companion. And fellow-mortal ! 10 I doubt na, whyles, hut thou may thieve ; "What then ': poor beastie, thou maun live ! A daimcn icker^ in a tlirave* 's a sma' request : I'U get a blessin' wi' the lave,' And never miss 't ! 1 BratHc, the noise of rapid motion. 2 PnHlf, the stick used to clear earth from the iilough. 3 Daiincn. rarely. IMimcii ictcr, on earof oom now and then. First- Eufflish, " sBcliir," an ear of com. ♦ TJirave, tweuty-four sheaves, iucludiui^ two shocks. The word also means a considerable nnmber. ■ ' Lnrc, rest. 40G CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin 1 Its silly wa's the win's are strewin' ! An J nacthing now to hig' a new ane O' foggage green ! And bleak Deeember's winds cnsuin', Baith sneU and keen ! Thou saw the fields laid bare and waste, And weary winter eomin' last, And eozie here, beneath the blast, Thou thought to dwell, TiU, crash ! the cruel coulter past Out through thy cell. That wee bit heap o' leaves and stibble Hast cost thee mony a weary nibble ; Now thou's turn'd out for a' thy trouble. But- house or hauld. To thole the winter's sleety dribble, And ci-ani-euch ' cauld ! But, Jlousie, thou art no thy lane,'' In pro\-ing foresight may be vain : The best-laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft a-gley,^ And lea'e us nought but grief and pain For promised joy. Still thou art blest, compared wi' me ! The present only toucheth thee : But, och 1 1 backward cast my ee (Jn prospects drear ! And forward, though I canna see, I guess and fear. And this is of like strain : — TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY. Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower. Thou 's met me in an evil hour ; For I maun crush amang the stoure'' Thy slender stem : To spare thee now is past my power. Thou bonny gem. Alas ! it's no thy neibor sweet. The bonny lark, companion meet, Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet,' Wi' speckled breast, When upward springing, blithe, to greet. The purpling east. Cauld blew the bitter-biting north Upon thy early, humble birth ; Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth Amid the stonn. Scarce rear'd above the parent earth Thy tender form. 1 Big, build. 2 Bid, witliout. 3 Cranrcnch, hoar-frost. * Tluj lane, alone b.v thyself. 5 A-(ilcy, off the right Hue. To " gley " is to squint. *- Stoure, dust. ' Weet, rain, wetness. •20 30 40 10 The flaunting flowers our gardens yield, High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield; 20 But thou, beneath the random bield '^ 0' clod or stane. Adorns the histic' stibble-lield. Unseen, alanc. There, in thy scanty mantle clad, Thy snawie bosom sun- ward spread, Thou lift.s thy unassuming head In humble guise : But now the share uptears thy bed. And low thou lies ! 30 Such is the fate of artless maid. Sweet floweret of the rural shade ! By love's simplicity betray'd And guileless trust, Tin she, Uke thee, aU soil'd, is laid Low i' the dust. Such is the fate of simple bard. On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd ! Unskilful he to note the card Of prudent lore, 40 TiU bUlows rage, and gales blow hard. And whelm him o'er ! Such fate to suft'ering worth is given. Who long with wants and woes has striven, By human pride or cunning driven. To misery's brink, Till, wrench'd of every stay but Heaven, He, ruin'd, sink ! Even thou who mourn' st the Daisy's fate, That fate is thine — no distant date ; 50 Stem Kuin's ploughshare drives, elate. Full on thy bloom, TiU, crush'd beneath the furrow's weight, Shall be thy doom ! To enable him to leave the country, Burns hoped that he might earn a few pounds by publishing some poems. They apjjeai-ed at Kilmarnock in the autumn of 1786, and among them — Fergusson's "Fanner's Ingle" having suggested the theme, and sacred memo- lies of his own father giving it dignity — was THE COTTAR'.S ,S.\TURDAY NIGHT. My loved, my honom-'d, niueh-respected friend! No mercenary bard his homage pays ; With honest pride, I scorn each selfish end : Jly dearest meed, a friend's esteem and praise : To you T sing, in simple Scottish lays, The lowly train in life's scquester'd scene ; The native feelings strong, the guileless ways : "\\Tiat Aiken in a cottage would have been ; Ah ! though his worth unknown, far happier there, I ween ! November chill Ijlaws loud wi' angry sugh ; '" 10 The short' ning winter-day is near a close; The miry beasts retreating frae the plough ; The black' ning trains o' craws to their repose ; 8 Bicld, shelter. » mdic, dry. '" Sujft, whistle. TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 407 The toil-worn cotter frae his laboiu' goes, This night his weekly moil is at an end, Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes, Hojnng the morn in ease and rest to spi^nd. And, weary, o'er the moor his coui-sc does hanicward bend. At length his lonely cot appears in view. Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ; 20 Th' expi'ctant wee tilings, toddlin' , stacher ' through To meet their dad, wi' tlichtci-ui' - noise and glee. His wee bit ingle," blinking bonnily, His clean hearthstane, his thi-ifty wifie's smile, The lisping infant prattling on his knee. Does a' his weary earking cares beguile. And makes him quite forget his labour and his toil. Belyve,* the elder baii'ns come drapping in. At serWce out, among the farmers roun' : Some ca' the plcugh, some herd, some tentic rin' 30 A canny en-and to a neibor town ; Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown. In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her ee. Comes hame, perhaps to show a braw new gown, Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee, To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. Wi' joy unfeign'd, brothers and sisters meet. And ciich for other's weelfare kindly spiers : * The social hoiirs, swift- wing'd, unnoticed, fleet; Each tells the imcos^ that he sees or hears ; 40 The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years ; Anticipation forward points the view. The mother wi' her needle and her shears. Gars auld claes look amaist as weel 's the new — The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. Their master's and their mistress's command, The younkers a' are warned to obey ; And mind their labours wi' an eydent^ hand. And ne'er, though out o' sight, to jauk or play : " And oh I be sure to fear the Loi'd alway ! .50 And mind your duty, duly, mom and night ! Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray. Implore His counsel and assisting might : They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright ! " But, hark I a i-ap comes gently to the door, Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same. Tells how a neibor lad cam o'er the moor. To do some errands, and convoy her hame. The wily mother sees the conscious flame Sparkle in Jenny's ee, and flush her check, 60 Wi' heart-struck anxious care, inquires his name. ^^'^lile Jenny hafflins' is afraid to speak ; Weel pleased the mother hears it 's nae -wild, worthless rake. Wi' kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben;'" A strappin' youth ; he taks the mother's eye : Blithe Jenny sees the \-isit's no ill ta'en ; The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye. ^ Stacher, .stagger. ^ Flichterin'y fluttei-ing; specially applied to the gleeful ramiing of children towards those to irhom they are much attached. ' Ingle, fire. » Beltivc, quickly. ^ Tentie rin, attentively nm. <• Sj'icr.s, asks. ' Vncos, strange things. » Eijdciit (or " ithand "), diligent. ' Ho^liiis, half. lo Ben, within the house. The youngster's artless heart o'erflows vd' joy, But blatc and lathefu'," scarce can weel behave ; The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can sjiy 70 \\liat makes the youth sac bashfu' and sac grave; Weel pleased to think her bairn 's respected like the lave.'- happy love !— where love like this is found I — O heart-felt raptures 1 — bliss beyond compare ! 1 've paced much this weary, mortal round. And sago experience bids nic this declare — If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasm-e spare. One cordial in this melancholy vale, 'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair. In other's arms, breathe out the tender tale, 80 Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale. Is there, in human form, that bears a heart, A wretch 1 a villain ! lost to love and truth 1 That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art. Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth !' Curse on his perjured arts ! dissembling smooth 1 Ai-e honour', nrtue, conscience, all exiled i Is there no pity, no relenting ruth, Points to the parents fondling o'er their cliild r Then paints the ruin'd maid, and their distraction wild '. 90 But now the supper crowns their simple board. The halesome parritch, chief of Scotia's food : The soupe their only hawkie'" does afford. That 'yont the hallan''' snugly chows her cood : The dame brings forth, in complimental mood. To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck fell,'* And aft he's prest, and aft he ca's it guid : The frugal wifie, garrulous, -n-ill tell. How 'twas a townrond aidd, sin' lint was i' the bell."' The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, 100 They, round the ingle, form a eirile ^vide ; The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace. The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride; His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside, His lyart haffets'^ wearing thin and bare ; Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide. He wales'" a portion with judicious care ; And " Let us worship G-od 1" he says, with solemn air. They chant their artless notes in simple guise ; They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim : 110 Perhaps " Dundee's " wild-warbling measures rise, C)r plaintive " Martyrs," worthy of the name ; Or noble " Elgin " beets" the heaven-ward flame. The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays: Compared with these, Italian trills are tame ; The tickled ear no heartfelt raptures raise ; Xae unison hae they with our Creator's praise. The priest-like father reads the sacred page, How Abram was the friend of God on high ; Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage 120 With Amalek's ungracious progeny : n Blate and lathcfii\ bashful and shy. '- TJic lave, the rest. '^ Hau-l:ie, cow. '* Hallan, inner wall between the fire-place and door. See Note .11, page .392. ^^ Her u-eel-hain'd liehhucl: fell , her well-saved stinging cheese. "^ A twelvemonth old since flax was in flower. '" Ltiart hnfelf, gray temples. '^ Trafcs, chooses. '■' Beels, adds fuel to. 408 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1760 Or how the royal bard did groaning lie Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire; (1r Job's pathetie plaint, and wailing cry ; Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire ; Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. Perhajis the Chi-istian volume is the theme, How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed ; How He, who bore in heaven the second name, Had not on earth whereon to lay His head : 130 How His first followers and servants sped, The precepts sage they wrote to many a land : How he who lone in Patmos banished. Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand. And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command. Then kneeling down, to Heaven's eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays : Hope " springs exulting on triumphant wing," ' That thus they all shall meet in future days : There ever bask in uncreated rays, 140 No more to sigh or shed the bitter tear. Together hymning their Creator's praise. In such society, yet still more dear ; While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere. Compared with this, how poor religion's pride, In all the pomp of method, and of art. When men display to congregations wide Devotion's every grace, except the heart ! The Power, incensed, the pageant will desei't, The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole : 150 But, haply, in some cottage far apart. May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul ; And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol. Then homeward all take off their several way ; The youngUng cottagers retire to rest : The parent-pail- their secret homage pay. And proffer up to Heaven the warm request That He, who stills the raven's clamorous nest. And decks the lily fair in flowery pride. Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best, 160 For them and for their little ones pro\nde ; But, chieHy, in their hearts with grace divine preside. From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, That makes her loved at home, revered abroad : Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, " An honest man 's the noblest work of God ;" - And certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, The cottage leaves the palace far behind. What is a lordling's pomp — a cumbrous load, Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, 170 Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined ! Scotia ! my dear, my native soil ! For whom my wannest wish to Heaven is sent ! Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content ; " See from tlie brake the whin*ing pheasant springs And mounts exulting on triumphant wiua:s." (Pope's '* Windsor Forest," lines 111, 112.) '* A wit's a feather, and a chief a rod ; An honest man's the noblest work of God." (Pope's " Essay on Man," E^j. iv., line 2-17.) And, oh ! may Heaven their simple lives prevent From luxury's contagion, weak and vile ! Then, howe'er crown and coronets be rent, A virtuous populace may rise the while, And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved isle. 180 Thou ! who pour'd the patriotic tide That stream' d through Wallace's undaunted heart : ^\^lo dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride. Or nobly die, the second glorious part, (The patriot's God, pecuharly Thou art. His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward !) Oh, never, never, Scotia's realm desert; But still the patriot, and the patriot-bard. In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard I The volume ])i-mte(l at Kilmarnock found friends strong enough to keep Burns w-ithin his native Scot- Land. In April, 1787, a new edition of his poems was publislied at Edinburgh, and handsomely subscribed for. Thus encouraged, Burns was now able to send £200 to help his brother Gilbert at Mossgiel, take a farm of his own at Elliesland in March, 1787, and five months afterwards marry Jeau Armour. He still poured out music ; sending his lyrics as free gifts to Johnson's " Museum of Scottish Song," and giving his " Tam o' Shanter " to Captain Grose, as a legend of Alloway Kuk. The farm being unfruitful, he EOBEKT BDEKS. Fi'om a Sketch bi; A. Nasmyih. Engraved for Locfchart's " Life of Burns " in " CoiistaUc's Miscellany " (1828). tried to supplement it with a place in the Excise ; but the duties of exciseman weakened still more his chance of tliriving as a fanner, and in 1791 Burns gave up Elliesland, and obtained for the wliole main- tenance of his famil}' a po.st in the Dumfries division of the Excise, witli a salary of seventy pounds a year. Society at Dumfries liad little symjjatliy with Burns's fervid interest in the French Revolution then afoot. Sad days of poverty and failing health came to their end for him in July, 179G, and those who had neglected him in life then found themselves a day's pleasure by making a great show of his funeral TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 409 Twelve tliousauJ came to follow the great ^loet to the grave. In old (lays Burns had exchanged Bibles with a Mary Campbell, who died suddenly when they were about to marry. On the third anniversary of her death, sad memories had prompted this poem to one whom Burns was now to meet again : — • TO MARY IN HEAVEN. Thou ling' ring star, -with less'ning ray, That lovest to greet the early morn, Again thou usher' st in the day My JIary from my soul was torn. O Maiy ! dear departed shade ! Where is thy place of blissful rest ? See'st thou thy lover lowly laid 'i Hearst thou the groans that rend his breast 'i That sacred hour can I forget. Can I forget the hallow'd grove, 10 \\Tiere hy the winding Ayr we met, To live one day of par-ting love ! Eternity wQl not efface Those records dear of transports past ; Thy image at our last embrace ; Ah ! little thought we 'twas cm- last ! Ayr, gurgUng, kiss'd his pebbled shore, O'erhung with wild woods thick'ning green ; The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar Twined amorous round the raptured scene ; 20 The flowers sprang wanton to be prest, The bii'ds sang love on every spray — Till too, too soon, the glowing west Proclaim'd the speed of winged day. Still o'er these scenes my memory wakes, And fondly broods with miser care ! Time but the impression stronger makes. As streams their channels deeper wear. My Mary ! dear departed shade ! Where is thy place of blissful rest ? 30 See'st thou thy lover lowly laid 'i Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast ? Many a tender home-feeling has found its utterance in Burns's JOHN ANDERSON, MY JO. John Anderson, my jo, John, When we were first acquent, Your locks were like the raven, Yoiu' bonny brow was brent.' But now your brow is held,* John, Your locks are like the snow : But blessings on your frosty pow, John Anderson, my Jo. John Anderson, my jo, John, We clamb the hill thegither ; And mony a canty^ day, John, We've had wi' ane anither : 10 52 1 Rrerif, smooth. = BcM, bald. 3 Cdjify, cheerful. Now we maun totter down, John, But hand in hand we'll go. And sleep thegither at the foot, .John Anderson, my jo. And here is from Burns again the vigorous expres- sion of that main thought of his time, which we have seen uttered in many forms by many wx-iters : — A MAN 'S A MAN FOR a' THAT. Is there for honest poverty That hangs his head, and a' that ? The coward slave, we pass him by. We dare be poor for a' that ! For a' that, and a' that, Our toils obscure, and a' that ; The rank is but the guinea-stamp. The man 's the gowd for a' that ! WTiat though on hamely faro we dine. Wear hodden gray,' and a' that ; Gie fools theii' silks, and knaves their wine, A man 's a man for a' tliat ! For a' that, and a' that. Their tinsel show, and a' that : The honest man, though e'er sae poor. Is king o' men for a' that ! Ye see yon birkie," ca'd a lord, Wha struts, and stares, and a' that ; Though hundreds wor.ship at his word. He 's but a coof '' for a' that : For a' that, and a' that. His riband, star, and a' that ; The man of independent mind, He looks and laughs at a' that ! A king can mak a belted knight, A marquis, duke, and a' that : But an honest man 's aboon his might, Guid faith, he maunna fa' that ! For a' that, and a' that. Their dignities, and a' that. The pith o' sense, and piide o' worth. Are higher ranks than a' that. Then let us pray that come it may — As come it will for a' that — That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth, May bear the gree,'' and a' that ; For a' that, and a' tliat, It's comin' yet for a' thiit. That man to man, the warld o'er, Shall brothers be for a' that ! 10 20 30 -10 Coleridge was influenced in early years by the sonnets of the Rev. William Lisle Bowles, and iu his " Biographia Literaria" he gave to Bowles a share in the ])raise due to Co^v|)er, as a ■\\Titer of natural English verse in days of "diction." But there was Goldsmith before Co^vper, and before ^ KoiUcn gi'ay, cloth worn hy the peasantry of the uatural colour of the wool. ^ Bii-kit--, brisk youus fellow. 3 Coof, simpleton. * Grcey pre-eminence. 410 CASSELL'S LIBKARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 17i Wordsworth there was also Burns. The return of the sonnet — which had taken its flight from our shores on the establishment of French influence — was at the close of the last century one of the pleasant signs of a new spring for literature, and the first of the new sonnet writers were Charlotte Smith and W. L. Bowles. Of the sonnets also of Charlotte Smith, Coleridge had grateful recollection. Her life was a sad one, and its griefs inteusitied in all her Aeree the gloom that was in fashion. She was born in 17i9, daughter of Mr. Nicliohis Turner, of Stoke House, Surrey, and Bignor Park, Sussex. Her mother died when she was four years old. She was ill-educated at a fiishionable school in Kensington till twelve years old, then brought into society, and manied at fifteen to the stujiid and dissipated son of a West India mei-chant, who took her to a dull house in the City. Her husband found his way into prison, where she spent seven months witli him ; she sufiered poverty, she wrote for bread ; parted from her husband, she worked for her family, and saw all her children die as they came to maturit_v. She was hast}-, generous, romantic, and still patient in duty, writing sonnets in the character of Werter. whose sentimental sorrows i-epresented faithfully the sick- ness of the time, and writing novels to support her children while they lived. In 180(3 she followed all slie had loved to the grave. She addressed one of her sonnets TO THE SHADE OF BURNS. Mute is thy vdld harp now, hard suhlime 1 Whom amid Scotia's mountain solitude Great Nature taught to "huild the lofty rh\Tne ;" And even heneath the daily pressure, rude, Of laboui-ing poverty, thy generous Wood Fired with the love of freedom, not suhducd Wert thou hy thy low fortime. But a time Like this we live in, when the ahjeet chime Of echoing parasite is best approved. Was not for thee. Indignantly is fled 10 Thy noble spirit, and, no longer moved By all the ills o"er which thine heart has bled. Associate worthy of the illustrious dead. Enjoys with them "the liberty it loved." Many in those days apostrophised the moon, but the plaint in the next sonnet — conventional may look- came from the writer's heart : — TO THE MOOS. Queen of the silver bow ! — by thy pale beam. Alone and pensive, I delight to stray. And watch thy shadow trembling in the stream Or mark the floating clouds that cross thy way. And while I gaze, thy mild and placid light Sheds a soft calm upon my troubled breast: And oft I think, fair planet of the night. That in thy orb the wretched may have rest : The sufferers of the earth perhaps may go. Released by death, to thy benignant sphere : And the sad children of Despair and Woe Forget in thee their cup of sorrow hero. Oh ! that I soon may reach thy world serene, Poor wearied pilgrim, in this toiling scene ! as it 10 Let us add this : — TO FORTITUDE. Npnph of the rock I whose dauntless spirit braves The lieating .storm, and bitter winds that howl Kound thy cold breast; and hear'st the bursting waves And the deep thunder with unshaken soul ; Oh come ! and show how vain the cares that press On my weak bosom, and how little worth Is the false fleeting meteor. Happiness, That still misleads the wanderers of the earth ! Strengtheu'd by thee, this heart shall cease to melt O'er Uls that poor Himranity must bear; 10 Nor friends estranged or ties dissolved be felt To leave regret and fruitless anguish there : And when at length it heaves its latest sigh. Thou and mild Hope shall teach me how to die I This echoes other feelings of the time : — TO A YOUNG MAN ENTERING THE WORLD. Go now, ingenuous youth ! — The trj-ing hour Is come : the world demands that thou shouldst go To active life ; there titles, wealth, and power May all be pm'chased ; yet I joy to know Thou wilt not pay their- price. The base control Of petty despots in their pedant reign Ah-eady hast thou felt ; and high disdain Of tjTants is imprinted on thy soul — Not where mistaken Glory in the field Eears her red banner be thou ever foimd ; 10 But against proud Oppression raise the shield Of patriot daring. So shalt thou renowned For the best vii-tues live ; or that denied, May'st die, as Hampden or as Sidney died I William Lisle Bowles, son of the vicar of King's Sutton, in Northamptonshire, wa.s born in 1762. His sonnets wei'e first jjublished in 1789, and when Coleridge felt his young genius quickened by them, their author was a curate in Wiltshire. He obtained in 1833 a canomy in Salisbury Cathedral, and soon afterwards became rector of Bremhill, in Wiltshire. So he remained until his death in 18.50. These are four of his sonnets : — AT DOVER CLIFFS. On these white cliffs, that calm above the flood t'pKft their shadowing heads, and, at their feet, Scarce hear the surge that has for ages beat. Sure many a lonely wand'rer has stood; And, whilst the lifted murmur met his ear. And o'er the distant billows the still eve Sarl'd slow, has thought of all his heart must leave To-moiTow; of the friends he lov'd most dear; Of social scenes, from which he wept to part : But if, like me. he knew how fruitless all 10 The thoughts that would full fain the past recall. Soon would he (juell the risings of his heai't. And brave the wild winds and unhearing tide — The world his eoimtry, and his God his guide. THE TOUCH OF TIME. Time 1 who know'st a lenient hand to lay Softest on Sorrow's wound, and slowly thence (Lulling to sad rejiose the weary sense) The faint pang stealest unperceiv'd away; . TO A.D. 18,10.] SHORTER POEMS. 411 On Thee I rest my only hope at last, Anil think, when thou hast dried the bitter ti-iir 'L'hat flows in vain o'er all my soul held dear, I may look back on every sorrow past, And meet life's peaceful evening with a smile — As some lone bird, at day's departing hour, lU Sings in the sunbeam, of the transient show'r Forgetful, though its wings are wet the while: — Yet ah ! how much must that poor heart endm-e, Wliich hopes from thee, and thee alone, a cure I HOPE. As one who, long by wasting sickness worn, Weary has watch'd the ling' ring night, and heard Heartless the carol of the matin bird Salute his lonely porch, now first at morn Goes forth, leaving his melancholy bed ; He the green slope and level meadow views. Delightful bath'd with slow-ascending dews ; Or marks the clouds, that o'er the mountain's head In varying forms fantastic wander white ; Ov timis his ear to every random song, 10 Heard the green river's winding marge along, The whilst each sense is steep'd in still delight : With such delight, o'er all my heart I feel. Sweet Hope ' thy fragrance pure and healing incense steal : DEATH IN THE HOME. How blest w-ith thee the path could I have trod Of quiet life, above cold want's hard fate, (And little wishing more) nor of the great Envious, or their proud name ! but it pleas' d God To take thee to His mercy : thou didst go In youth and beauty, go to thy death-bed ; Ev'n whilst on di-e^ims of bhss we fondly fed, Of years to come of comfort. 1 — Be it so. Ere this I have felt soitow ; and ev'n now (Tho' sometimes the unbidden thought must start, 10 -\nd half unman the miserable heart) The cold dew I shall wip ■ from my siid brow, .tVnd say, since hopes of bliss on earth are vain, " Best friend, farewell, till we do meet again!" The tone of .sadness here also is partly reflected from tlie time, although it is the unaffected tone of a true voice that can blend hope with its sorrow. Let us compare with it the artificial verse of sentimental- ists who think themselves sincere, and doubtless are so, but wanting jiower for deep thought or feeling, cut worthless thought into the patterns they admire as honest followers of fashion. There was a Mi\ Merry, who wTote verse in a newspaper called The World, ])ublished by John Bell, Librarian to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. He called himself Delia Crusca. There was a Countess t'owper, who metrically adored Delia Crusca through that journal, and was in like manner adored by him. She called herself Anna Matilda. There was Mr. Parsons, who called himself Arley; Mr. Greathead, who called himself Bertie ; Mr. Adney, who turned his name upside down, and was Yenda ; Mr. Wil- liams, who was Pasquin ; Mrs. Robinson lisped verse with them as Julia, and all these people deluged Tlie World with sentimental jioems which the fashionable world of Loudon greatly praised. They were collected by Mr. Bell, in 1790, into two volumes, as "The British Album." Young Goethe's "Sorrows of the Young Werter," published in 1774, and young Schiller's " Robbers," ])ubli.shed in 1781, were not without influence upon the feelings of these ladies and gentlemen. In The Wurhl of the 26th of July, 1787, Delia Ci'usca produced this ELEGY H'ri/leii nfttr rcuillii;/ the Sorroics of ll'trttr. Alas, poor Werter ! to himself a prey. The heart's excessive workings could not bear; But sought his native heaven the nearest way. And tied from giief, from anguish, and despair. Thi> joys of prejudice he scornc-d to own. He pitied pride, and avarice, and power ; But oft on some rude rock at random thrown, He welcomed midnight's melancholy hour. To view the moon's pale glimpse Uliune the wave, To list the sweeping blasts that sadly blow ; 1 Down the rough steep, to hear the cat'racts rave : Such were the pleasures of this man of woe. An isolated being here he stood, His strong sensations with how few could blend ! Tho wise, the great, the gay, perhaps the good. They knew him not — they could not comprehend. ( 'harlotte alone, by nature was designed To till the vacuum of his generous breast ; He loved her beauty, he admired her mind; He lost that Charlotte, and he sought for rest 1 -(> Siu-e he was right, for if th' Abnighty hand, That gave his pulse to throb, his sense to glow. Gave him not strength his passions to withstand, jVh ! who shall blame him ': he was forced to go. For when the heart from every hope is torn. When in another's arms the fair one lies ; While vii-tue goads with unrelenting thorn. The frantic lover bears it not, but dies. And since there are, amid this wond'rous world, Some of a class distinct, of ardent mind, oO Through woe's wild waves, by keen emotions hurled As the tossed harks before the boisfrous wind ; Th' Eternal Power, to whom all thoughts arise, WTio every secret sentiment can view. Melts at theii- flowing tears, their swelling sighs. Then gives them force to bid the world adieu. Anna Matilda hael said to Delia Ciiisca — '■ O I seize again thy golden quill. And with its point my bosom thrill." By such in\itations he wa.s roused as much as an idle sentimentalist can be roused. This is, if 1 may so entitle the lines — DELLA CRUSCA ROUSED. On the sea-sbore with folded anns I stood. The sun just sinking shot a level ray. Luxuriant crimson glowed upon the flood. And the curled surf was tinged with golden spray. 412 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1760 Far off I faintly tracked the feathery sail : When thy sweet numbers caught my yielded ear, Borne on the bosom of the fluttering gale. They struck my heart, and roused me to a tear. These are lines of Anna Matilda TO DELLA CRUSCA. I hate the tardy elegiac lay — Choose me a measure jocund as the day 1 Such days as near the ides of June Meet the lark's elab'rate tune, "WTien his downy fringed breast Ambitious on a cloud to rest, He soars aloft ; and from his gurgling thi'oat Darts to the earth the piercing note — Which softly falling with the dews of mom (That bless the scented pink and snowy thorn) 10 Expands upon the zephj-r's wing, And wakes the bui-nished finch and linnet sweet to sing. And be thy lines irregular and free, Poetic chains should fall before such bards as thee, Scorn the dull laws that pinch thee round. Raising about thy verse a mound, O'er which thy Muse, so lofty ! dares not boimd. Bid her in verse meand'ring sport : Her footsteps quick, or long, or short, Just as her various impulse wUls — 20 Scorning the frigid square, which her fine fervour chills. And in thy verso meand'ring wild. Thou, who art Fancy's favourite child, May'st sweetly paint the long past hour, WTien, the slave of Cupid's pow-er, Thou couldst the tear of rapture weep, And feed on agonj-, and banish sleep. The quantity of agony taken at a meal by this faA^ourite child of Fancy is grievous. Perhaps it might dispose some sympathetic reader to aim a tliiixl drop at the sod — if still to be found — on which Anna IMatilda took much pains to liit vdth a tear of her own the same liit of dust that was wetted by a tear of Delia Crusca's, as herein set forth : — Sj-mpathy, of birth divine, Descend, and round my heart-strings twine ! Touch the fine nerve whene'er I breathe 'WTiere Delia Crusca dropt his wreath ! Lead me the sacred way of Eome, Lead me to kneel at Virgil's tomb, A,\Tiere he th' enduring marble round AVith fresh-wove laurels, gi-aceful bound. Then guide where still with sweeter note Than flowed from Petrarch's tuneful throat, 10 On Laura's grave he poured the lay Amidst the sighs of sinking day : Then point where on the sod his tear Fell from its crystal source so clear. That there mj- mingling tear may sink. And the same dust its moisture drink. There is a beautiful frankness in this fragment from lines of Delia Crusca TO ANNA MATILDA. Canst thou, so keen of feeling ! ui'ge my fate. And bid me mourn thee, yes, and mourn too late f O rash severe decree ! my madd'ning brain Cannot the pond'rous agony sustain, But forth I rush, as varying Frenzy leads. To eavem'd lakes, or to the diamond meads, O'er which the sultry noon-beams wide diffuse, And slake their eager thirst with ling' ring dews ; Or to yon suUeu slope that shuns the Ught, AATiere the black forest weaves meridian night. Disorder'd, lost, from hill to plain I rim. And with my mind's thick gloom obscure the sun ! There was fog enough in his miud for that. One piece in " The British Alljum " has survived — ■ the song of " "Wapping Old Stairs," by Mr. Parsons. Its attempt at the simplicity of nature, though artificial, has given it currency. The harmJess, necessary tear duly appears in the third stanza, and the days of the French Revolution show in the last stanza the weak side of their reaction against ceremony. CHARACTERISTIC SONG. YolU' Molly has never been false, she declares. Since last time we parted at Wapping Old Stairs ; When I swore that I stiU would continue the same. And gave you the 'bacco-box — mark'd with my name. \^'^len I pass'd a whole fortnight between decks with you. Did I e'er give a buss, Tom, to one of the crew ? To be useful and kind to my Thomas I staid. For his trowsers I wash'd, and his bumbo I made. Though you threaten'd last Sunday to walk in the Mall, With Susan from Deptford, and Billingsgate Sal, 10 In silence I stood, your unkindness to hear. And only upbraided my Tom with .i tear. Still faithful and fond from the first of my life, Tho' I boast not the name, I've the truth of a wife ; For falsehood in wedlock too often is priz'd, And the heart that is constant should not be despis'd. Floods of such sentiment provoked the ridicule of men who were in no sympathy with even the Ijest dreams of the revolutionary time, aud dwelt rather on the dangers that might come of them tluin on the hopes of which they came. William Gitt'ord first made liis mai-k in literature by attack ujion the poets of " The British Album." Gilford was born at Ashburton in 17.') 7, of poor parents, and at thirteen was a penniless orphan, whom his godfather first sent to sea as cabiiiboy in a coasting vessel, then apprenticed to a shoemaker in his native town. He was a boy of eager intellect. with a ta-ste for verse aud also for matheiuatics, that, since paper was dear, he gratified by working problems ^^'ith an awl upon wa,ste scraps of leather. Mr. C'ookesley, a surgeon of the towii, became his active heljier, freed him from his indentm-es, placed him at school, and got him, when already twenty- two or twenty -three, to Exeter College, Oxford. Tlie chance reading of a letter made Earl Grosvenor TO A.D. 18*.] SHORTER POEMS. 413 Gifl'onl's friend. He was brought into Lord Gros- venor's house, and entrusted with the education of the Marquis of Westminster. This was his position when he acquired fame as a satirist by jnililishing, m 17'J 1, the following satii-e upon the false sentiment of " Bell's whole chou- : " — THE B.WIAD.' p. When I look round on man, and find how vain His passions I'. Have us from this canting strain ! "Why, who will read it ? P. Say'st thou this to mo ? F. None, hy my Hfe. F. \\Tiat, none ? Nay, two or three ■ F. No, no ; not one. 'Tis sad ; but F. "Sad ; hut "—Why f Pity is insult here. I care not, I, 10 Tho' BoswcU, of a song and supper vain, And Bell's whole choir (an ever-jingling train). In si)lay-foot madi-igals then- pow'rs combine, To praise Miles Andrews' verse, and ccnsiu'c mine — No, not a jot. Let the besotted town Bestow, as fashion prompts, the laiu-el crown : But do not Thou, who mak' st a fair pretence To that best boon of Heaven, common sense, Eesign thy judgment to the rout, and pay Knee-worship to the idol of the day : 20 For aU are^ F. What ? Speak frcelj- ; let me know. F. Oh, might I ! durst I ! Then but let it go. Yet, when I view the follies that engage The full-grown chilch-en of this piping age ; See snivelling Jerningham at fifty weep O'er love-lorn oxen and deserted sheep ; (See Cowley frisk it to one ding-dong chime. And weekly cuckold her poor spouse in rhyme ;) See Thrale's gi'ey widov .■^itii a satchel roam, 30 And bring in pomp her labour'd nothings home ; See Robinson forget her state, and move On crutches tow'rds the grave, to " Light o' Love ; " See Parsons, while all sound advice he scorns. Mistake two soft excrescences for hoi-ns ; And butting all he meets, with awkward pains. Lay bare his forehead and expose his brains : I scarce can rule my spleen F. Forbear, forbear : And what the gi-eat delight in learn to spare. tO P. It must not, cannot be ; for I was born To brand obtrusive ignorance with scorn ; On bloated pedantry to pour my rage. And hiss preposterous fustian from the stage. Lo, Delia Crusca ! In his closet pent, He toils to give the crude conception vent. Abortive thoughts that right and wrong confound. Truth sacritic'd to letters, sense to sound, False glare, incongi'uous images, combine ; And noise and nonsense clatter through the line, oO 'Tis done. Her house the generous Piozzi lends. And thither summons her blue-stocking friends : The summons her blue-stocking friends obey, Lur'd by the love of Poetry — and tea. 1 The name of Bavins for a dunce is taken from VirgH's line — *' Qui Bavixim non odit amet tiia carmina Mtevi." S?e Note o, page 325. Gifford's poem is an imitation of tlie first satire of Persiiis. The bard steps forth in birthday splendour di.-t, His right hand graceful waving o'er his breast ; His left extending, so that all may see, A roll inserib'd "Tho Wreath of Liberty." '- So forth he steps, and with complacent air. Bows round the circle, and assumes the chair : 60 With lemonade he gargles first his throat. Then sweetly preludes to the liquid note : And now 'tis silence all. " Genius or Muse " — Thus while the flow'ry subject he pui-sucs, - The " Baviad " was published with amusing notes by the author, of which one is the following criticism on " The Wreath of Liberty : " — " Of this poem no reader (provided he can read) is ot this time ignorant ; but as there are various opinions concerning it, and as I do not choose perhaps to dispute with a liuly of Mrs. Eobiuson's critical abilities, I shall select a few passages from it, and leave the world to judge how truly its author can be said to be * gifted with the sacred lyi-e, Wbose soimds can more than mortal thoughts inspu'e.' " This supernatural effort of genius, then, is chiefly distinguished by three very promineut featiu-es— 1. Downright nonsense. 2. Down. right frigidity. 3. Downright doggi-el. Of each of these in its tiu-n ; and tirst of the first. ' Hang o'er his eye the gossamery tear.' ' Wreath roimd her airy bail) the tini'rous joy.' ' Recumbent eve rock the reposing tide.' * A web-work of despair, a mass of woes.' ' And o'er my hds the scalding tumoiu- roll.' " 'Tiunour, a morbid swelling.' (Johnson.) An excellent thing to roU over an eye, especially if it happen to be hot and hot, as in the present case. ' summer-tints begemm'd the scene. And silky ocean slept in glossy green." ' While air's nocturnal ghost, in paly shroud, Glances with grisly glare from cloud to cloud.' 'And gauzy zephyrs, flutfring o'er the phiin, On twilight's bosom drop their tilmy rain." " Unus instar omnium ! This couplet staggered me. I should be loth to be found correcting a madman ; and yet mere foUy seems imeqnal to the production of such exquisite nonsense. " 2do. ' the explosion came And hurst the o'ercharg'd cidverin of shame.' ' days of old, Their perish'd, proudest, pageantry uufold." * * nothing I descry, But the bare boast of baixen heraldi-y.' ' The himtress queen, Showers her shafts of silver o'er the scene." "To these add "moody monarohs,' 'turgid tyrants," 'pampered popes," 'radiant rivers," 'cooling cataracts," 'lazy Loires ' (of which, by-the-by, there are none), 'gay Gitronnes,' 'gloomy glass," ' minghng murder," ' dauntless day," 'lettered hghtnings," ' deUcioua dilatings,' ' sinking son-ows," ' blissful blessings," ' rich reasonings," 'mehorating mercies," 'vicious venalities," 'sublunary suns," 'dewy vapours damp, that sweep the silent swamp," and a world of others, to be found in the compass of half-a-dozen pages. " 3tio. ' In phosphor bUize of genealogic line.' " N.B.— Written to ' the tiu-ning of a brazen candlestick." ' O better were it ever to be lost In black negation's sea, than reach the coast.' " This couplet may be pkiced to advantage under the first head. ' Should the zeal of parliament be empty words." ' txuTi to France, and see Yovx million men in arms for hljerty." ' doom for a breath A hundred reasoning hecatombs to death." " A hecatomb is a sacrifice of a hundred head of oxen. Where did this gentleman hear of their rmsoniwj .' ' Awhile I'll ruminate ou time and fate ; And the most probable event of things" ^— - Euge, magne poeta ! Well may Laura Maria say— ' Tlait Genius glows in every cl.issic line. And Natiu'e dictates— every thing that's thine.' 414 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 17GU A -n-ild delirium round th' assembly flies ; Unusual lustre shoots from Emma's eyes ; Luxurious Arno drivels as he stands ; And Anna frisks, and Laiu'a claps her hands. O wretched man I And dost thou toil to please, At this late hoiu', such prurient ears as these ? 70 Is thy poor pride contented to receive Such transitory fame as fools can give ? Fools who, unconscious of the critics' laws, Rain in such show'rs theii' indistinct applause. That thou, even thou, who liv'st upon renown. And with eternal puffs insult' st the town, Art forc'd at length to check the idiot roar. And cry, " For heaven's sweet sake, no more, no more ! " "But why (thou say'st), why am I leaiTi'd, why fraught With all the priest and all the sage have taught, SO If the huge mass, within my bosom pent, Must struggle there, despairing of a vent r " Thoulearn'd? Alas, for Learning ! She is sped. And hast thou dimm'd thy eyes, and rack'd thy head. And broke thy rest for this, for this alone ." And is thy knowledge nothing if not known ? fool, fool, fool ! But still thou criest, 'tis sweet To hear " That's he ! " from every one we meet ; That's he, whom critic liell declares divine, For whom the fair diurnal laurels twine : !M) "WTiom magazines, reviews, conspire to praise. And Cireathead calls the Homer of oiu' days. F. And is it nothing, then, to hear our name Thus blazoned by the general voice of fame ■ F. Xay, it were everything, did that dispense The sober vtu'dict found by taste and sense. But mark our jury. O'er the flowing bowl, When wine has drown' d all energy of soul, Ere Faro comes (a dreary interval 1 ) For some fond fashionable lay they call. 1 00 Here the sjjruce ensign, tottering on his chair. With lisping accent, and affected air, Recounts the wayward fate of that poor poet. Who born for anguish, and dispos'd to shew it, Did yet so awkwardly his means employ. That gaping fiends mistook his grief for joy. Lost in amaze at language so divine. The audience hiccup, and e.xelaim, " Damn'd timi ! " And are not now the author's ashes blest r Now lies the turf not lightly on his breast 'i 110 Do not sweet violets now around liim bloom r Laurels now bur.st sjiontaneoiis fronr his tomb ': F. This is mere mockery : and (in your ear) Reason is iU refuted by a sneer. Is praise an evil 'i Is there to be found One so indift'ercnt to its soothing sound, As not to wi.sh hi-reafter to be known, And make a long futurity his fjwn, Hather than F. With 'Sf|uire .lemingham descend 120 To pastry-cooks and moths, " and there an end ! " O thou that deign' st this homely scene to share. Thou know'st, when chance (tho' this indeed be rare) With random gleams of wit has grac'd my lays. Thou know'st too well how I have relish'd praise. Not mine the soul that pants not after fame — Ambitious of a poet's envied name, I haunt the sacred fount, athirst to prove The grateful influence of the stream I love. And yet, my friend (though still at praise bostow'd Jline eye has glisten'd, and my cheek has glow'd), 131 Yet when I prostitute the lyre to gain The eidogies that wait each modish strain, Jlay the sweet Muse my grovelling hoijes withstand, And tear the strings indignant from my hand ; Nor think that, while my verse too much I prize, Too much th' applause of fashion I despise ; For mark to what 'tis given, and then declare, Mean tho' I am, if it be worth my care. Is it not given to Este's unmeaning dash, 140 To Topham's fustian, RejTiolds' flippant trash. To Andi'ews' doggrcl, where tlrree wits combine, To Morton's catch-word, Greathead's idiot line, ^Vnd Holcroft's Shug-lane cant, and Merry's Jloor- fields whine. Skill' d in (me useful science at the least. The gi'eat man conies, and spreads a sumptuous feast : Then when his guests behold the prize at stake, And thirst and hunger only are awake, My friends, he cries, wdiat do the galleries say. And what the boxes, of my last new play I- loO Speak freely, tell me all — come, be sincere ; For truth, you know, is music to my ear. They speak y Alas, they cannot ! But shall I — I, who receive no bribe, who dare not lie ':' This then — "that worse was never writ before. Nor worse will bo — till thou shalt write once more." Blest be " two-headed Janus 1 " tho' inclin'd, No waggish stork can peck at him behind ; He no wry mouth, no lolling tongue can fear. Nor the brisk twinkling of an ass's ear. 100 But you, ye St. Johns, curs'd with one poor head, Alas ! what mockeries have not ye to dread ! Hear now our guests : — " The critics. Sir," they cry — '• Merit like yours tho critics may defy ; " But this, indeed, they say — " Yom- varied rhjTnes, At once the boast and envy of the times. In every page, song, soimet, what you will. Show boundless genius, and uurivall'd skill. If comedy be yours, the searching strain Gives a sweet pleasm-e, so chastis'd by pain, 170 That e'en the guilty at their suft'erings smile. And bless the lancet, tho' they bleed the while. If tragedy, th' impassion'd numbers flow In all the sad variety of woe. With such a liquid lapse, that they betray The breast unwares, and steal the soul away." Thus fool'd, the moon-struck tribe, whose best essays Sunk in acrostics and in roundelays. To loftier labours now pretend a call, And bustle in heroics, one and all. ISO E'en Bertie bums of gods and chiefs to sing^ Bertie who lately twitter'd to the string His namby-pamby madrigals of love. In the dark dingles of a glittering grove, MTiere airy lays, wove by the hand of morn, Were hung to dry upon a cobweb thorn ! ! ! Happy the soil Sfhere bards like mushrooms rise, And ask no culture but what Byshe supplies ! Happier the bards who, write whate'er they will. Find gentle readers to admire them still! 190 Some love the verso that like Maria's flows. No rubs to stagger, and no sense to pose ; Which read, and read, you raise your eyes in doubt. And gi'avely wonder what it is about. These fancy " Bell's Poetics" only sweet TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 415 And intereopt his liawkors in tho street ; There smoking liot, iulialo Mit Yenda's strains, And tile rank fiune of Tony Pastjuin's hrains. Others, likt' Kemble, on bhiek-U'tter pore, And what they do not understand, adore ; 200 Buy at vast sums the irasit of ancient days. And draw on prodigality for praise. These, when some lueky hit, or lueky price. Has blcss'd them with '"The Bohr of (joud (idvlcc," For ekes and ahjates only deign to seek. And live upon a whilomc for a week. And can we, when such mope-eyed dolts are [ilae'd By thoughtless fashion on the thi-one of tastt — Say, can we wonder whence this jargon flows. This motley fustian, neither verse nor prose. 'JIO This old, new, language that defiles our page ; The refuse and the scum of every age ': Lo, Beaufoy tells of Afric's barren sand In all the flow'ry phi'ase of fairy land : There Fezzan's thrum-eapp'd tribes, Turks. ( 'hristianis, Jews, Aceommodate, ye godsl their' feet with shoes. There mvnijre shrubs inrctcratv mountains grace. And brushwood breaks the niiiplititde of spare. Perplex'd with terms so vague and undefin'd. I blimder on; till wilder' d, giddy, blind. 2-'0 Where'er 1 tm'n, on clouds I seem to tread ; And call for JIandoville to ease my head. Oh for the good old times ! ^\^len all was ni'W. And every hour brought prodigies to \-iew. Oiu' sires in unaffected language told Of streams of amber, and of rocks of gold : Full of their theme, they spm'n'd all idle art : And the plain tale was trusted to the heart. Now all is changed ! We fume and fret, ])tile accurs'd! memorable long. If there be force in virtue or in song, (J injur'd bardl accept the gi-ateful strain, Tluit I, the humblest of the tuneful train. With glowing heart, yet trembling hand, repay For many a pensive, many a sprightly lay : So may thy varied verse, from age to age, Inform the simple, and delight the sage ! 270 ^^'hile canker'd Weston, and his loathsome rhymes, Stink in the nose of all succeeding times ! Enough. But where (for these, you seem to say, Ai'e samples of the high, heroic lay) '\\'here are the soft, the tender strains, that call For the moist eye, bow'd head, and lengthen'd drawl.'' Lo 1 here — " Canst thou, JIatilda, urge my f.ate. And bid me moirrn thee 'r — yes, and mourn too late I O rash, severe decree 1 my maddening brain Cannot the ponderous agony sustain ; 280 But forth I rush, from vale to mountain run. And with my mind's thick gloom obscure the sun." Heavens ! if our ancient vigour were not fled. Could verse like this be written, or be read i Verse I that's the mellow fruit of toil intense, In.spu-'d by genius, and inform' d by sense; This, the abortive progeny of Pride And Didness, gentle pair, for aye allied ; Begotten without thought, born without pains. The ropy drivel of rheumatic brains. 200 F. So let it be : and yet, methinks, my friend. Silence were wise, where s;itire will not mend. '\^^ly wound the feelings of om' noble youth. And grate their tender ears with odious truth f They cherish Amo, and his flux of song, And hate the man -n-ho tells 'em they are '«TOng. Your fate already I foresee. My Lord With cold respect will freeze you from his board ; And his Grace cry, " Hence with your sapient sneer 1 Hence ! "we desire no currish critic here." 300 F. Enough. Thank heaven ! my eiTor now I see. And all shall be divine, henceforth, for me : Y'es, Andi'ews' doggrel, Greathead's idiot line, And Morton's catch-word, all, forsooth, divine! F. 'Tis well. Here let th' indignant stricturi' cease. And Leeds at length enjoy his fool in peace. -P. Come then, around their works a circle draw, And near it plant the dragons of the law ; With labels writ, "Critics far hence remove. Nor dare to censm-e what the great approve." 310 I go. Y'et Hall could lash with noble rage The pm'blind patron of a former age, And laugh to scorn th' eternal sonnetteer, ^\'ho made goose-pinions and white rags so dear. Yet Oldham, in his rude, unpolish'd strain. Could hiss the clamoroiis, and deride the vain. Who bawl'd theii' rhymes incessant thro' the town. Or brib'd the hawkers for a day's renown. Whate'er the theme, with honest warmth they wrote. Nor card what Mutius of their freedom thought: .*i20 Yet prose was venial in that happy time. And life had other business than to rhyme. And may not I — now this pernicious pest, Tliis metromania creeps thro' every breast ; Now fools and children void their brains by loads. And itching grandams spawl lasci\'ious odes : Now lords and dukes, cm's'd with a sickly taste. 416 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.b. 17UU While Bums' pure healthful nurture runs to waste, Lick up the spittle of the hed-rid muse, And riot on the sweepings of the stews ; 330 Say, may not I expose F. No — 'tis unsafe. Prudence, my friend. /'. MTiat I not deride, not laugh ;•' Weill tliought at least is free F. Oh, yet forbear. P. Nay, then, I'll dig a pit, and bury there The tli'eadf ul truth that so alarms thy fears : The town, the town, good pit, has asses' cars ! Thou think' st perhaps, this wayward fancy strange : So think thou still ; yet would not I exchange 34 1 The secret humour of this simple hit For all the wVlbums that were ever writ. Of this no more. thou (if yet there be One bosom from this vile infection free), Thou who canst thrill with joy, or glow with ire, As the great masters of the song inspire. Canst bend enraptur'd o'er the magic page. Where desperate ladies desperate lords engage. Gnomes, sylphs, and gods, the tierce contention share. And heaven and earth hang trembling- on a hair- ; 3.5 1 Canst quake with horror while Emilia's charms Against a brother point a brother's arms, And trace the fortune of the varying fray, While hour on horn- flits unperceiv'd away — Approach: 'twLxt hope and fear I wait. Oh deign To cast a glance on this incondite strain : Here, if thou find one thought but wcU exprcst, One sentence higher finish' d than the rest. Such as may win thee to proceed awhile, 360 And smooth thy forehead with a gracious smile, I ask no more. But far from me the throng. Who fancy fire in Laiu'a's vapid song. Who Anna's Bedlam-rant for sense can take. And over Edwin's mewlings keep awake ; Yes, far from me, whate'r their birth or place, These long-ear'd judges of the Phrygian race. Their censure and their praise alike I scorn. And hate the laurel by their followers worn ! Let such, a task congenial to their powers, 370 At sales and auctions waste the morning hours. While the dull noon away in Christie's fane, .\jid snore the evening out at Drury I^ane ; LuU'd by the twang of Bensley's nasal note, And the hoarse croak of Kemble's foggy thi'oat. Let 11.S tm-n now to a piece of true sentiment above the reacli of .satire. Lady Anne Barnard, eldest of eleven children of James Liiidsay, Earl of Balcarres, was born in 17.50. The sister next her in age, Margaret, married at eighteen, and left Anne miss- ing her company ; wherefore she wrote much for a time to amuse herself, and among other things she wrote "Auld Robin Gray." Robin Gray chanced to be the name of a shepherd at Balcarres. While she was writing this ballad, a little sister Elizabeth, aged about nine, looked in on her. " What more shall I do," Anne asked, "to trouble a poor girl .' I've sent her Jamie to sea, broken her father's arm made her mother ill, and given her an old man for a lover. There's room in the four lines for one sorrow more. What shall it bel" "Steal the cow, sister Anne." AccordLngly, the cow was stolen. It was not until she was forty years old that Lady Anne Lindsay married Mr. Andrew Barnard, son to the Bishop of Limerick, and she went with him in 1797, when he attended Lord Macartney to the Caj)e of CJood Hope as his private secretary. There, as always, she was a ha])]iy wife, and she went up Table IMountain in a pair of her husband's trousers. She lived until 182.5, and found, the year before her death, a verse from the second part of her " Auld Rolsin Gray " quoted in Scott's " Pirate." Scott praised the poem known then to very few, and named her as the writer of it. The second part she had written to please her mother, who often asked "how that unlucky business of Jeanie and Jamie ended." AULD ROBIN tiRAY. FIRST r.\RT. When the sheep are in the fauld, when the kye's a' at hame, And a' the weary warld to rest are gane, The woes o' my heart fa' in showers frae my e'e, Unkent by my gudeman, wha sleeps sound by me. Young Jamie lo'ed me weel, and sought mo for his bride, But saving a crown he had naething else beside ; To mak the crown a pound my Jamie gaed to sea. And the crown and the pound — they were liaith for me. He hadna been gane a twelvemonth and a day AVhen my father brake his arm, and the cow was stown away ; ]My mother she fell sick — my Jamie was at sea — And Auld Robin Gray came a-coiu-ting me. My father couldna work, my mother couldna spin, I toiled day and night, l)ut their bread I coiddna win ; Auld Rob maintained them baith, and, wi" tears in his e'e. Said, " .leanie, for their sakes, will ye no marry me ':" My heart it said na, and I looked for Jamie back. But hard blew the winds, and his ship was a wrack ; His ship was a wTack — why didna Jamie dee ? Or why am I spared to cry. Woe is me ? My father urged me sair — my mother didna speak. But she looket in my face till my heart was like to break ; They gied him my hand — my heart was in the sea — And so Robin Gray he was gudeman to me. I hadna been his wife a week but only four. When, moui'nfu" as I sat on the stane at my door, I saw my Jamie's ghaist. for I couldna think it he, Till he said, " I'm come hame, love, to marry thee." Oh! sail', sair did we greet, .and mickle say o' a", I gi'ed him ae kiss and bade him gang awa'. I wish that I were dead, but I'm no like to dee. For tho' my heart is broken, I'm young, woo 's me ! I gang like a ghaist, and I carena to spin, I darena tliink on Jamie, for that would bo a .sin ; But I'll do my best a gude wife to be. For oh I Eobin Gray he is kind to me. TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 417 SECOND r.UlT. The winter -was come, 'twas simmer nae mail-, And, trembling-, the leaves were fleeing thro' th' air ; " mnter," says Jeanic, " we kindly agree, For the sun he looks wac when he shines upon me." Nae longer she mourned, her tears were a' spent. Despair it was come, and she thought it content — •She thought it content, hut her cheek it grew pale, And she bent like a lily broke down by the gale. Her father and mother observed her decay ; " What ails ye, my bairn ?" they ofttimes would say; " Ye turn round your wheel, but you come little speed. For feeble's your hand and silly's your thread." She smiled when she heard them, to banish their fear, But wae looks the smile that is seen through a tear, And bitter's the tear that is forced by a love \\liich honour and i-irtue can never approve. Her father was vexed and her mother was wac, But pensive and silent was auld Robin Gray ; Ho wandered his lane, and his face it grew lean. Like the side of a brae where the torrent has been. Nae questions he spiered ' her concerning her health, He looked at her often, but aye 'twas by stealth ; When his heart it grew grit,'^ and often he feigned To gang to the door to see if it rained. He took to his bed — nae physic he sought. But ordered his friends all around to be brought ; While Jeanie supported his head in its place. Her tears trickled down, and they fell on his face. " Oh, greet nae mair, .Jeanie," said he wi' a gxoan, ■" I'm no worth your sorrow — the truth maun be known ; Send round for your neighbours, my hour it di-aws near, And I've that to tell that it's fit a' should hear. " I've -nrong'd her," he said, " but I kent ^ it owcr late ; I've wronged her, and sorrow is speeding my date; But a' for the best, since my death will soon free A faithfu' yoimg heart that was ill matched wi' me. " I lo'ed and I courted her mony a day, The auld folks were for me, but still she said nay ; I kentna o' Jamie, nor yet of her vow. In mercy forgive me — 'twas I stole the cow. " I cared not for Crummie, I thought but o' thee — I thought it was Crummie stood 't^^-ixt 5*ou and me ; AVhile she fed your parents, oh, did you not say You never would marry vd' auld Robin Gray ? " But sickness at hame and want at the door — You gied me your hand, while yoiu' heart it was sore ; I saw it was sore, — why took I her hand ? Oh, that was a deed to my shame o'er the land ! ^ Spiered, risked. First-English " spcir," a track; "spiriau," to traxjk out, inquire. 2 Grit, great, swollen. "The heart is said to be grit when one is ready to cry." (Janiiesou.) 3 Kent, knew. " How truth soon or late comes to open daylight 1 For Jamie cam' hack, and your checlj it gr(!W white — AVliitc, white grew your cheek, but aye true unto me— Ay, Jeanie, I'm thankfu' — I'm thunkfu' to dee. " Is Jamie come here yet ?" — and Jamie they saw — " I've injured you sair, lad, .so leave you my a' ; Be kind to my Jeanic, and soon may it be ; Waste nae time, my dautics,-" in mom-ning for nie." They kissed his cauld hands, and a smile o'er his face Seemed hopefu' of being accepted by grace ; " Oh, doubtna," said Jamie, "forgi'en he will be — Wha wouldna be tempted, my love, to win thee I'" # * * « * The first days were dowie^ while time sUpt awa'. But saddest and sairest to Jeanie o' a' Was thinkin' she couldna be honest and right, Wi' tears in her e'e whUo her heart was sac light. But nae guile had she, and her sorrow away, The wife of her Jamie, the tear couldna stay ; A bonnie wee baii'n — the auld foUcs by the fire — Oh, now she has a' that her heart can desire. Words-wovth, Coleridge, and Soutbey were young in the latter years of the eigliteenth century, sharing its hopes and its emotions. Wordsworth was born 53 William Wordsworth. From ail Earbj PoHvait painted Jor Sou/Jtfi/." on the 7th of April, 1770, Coleridge on the 21st of October, 1772, and Soutliey on tlie 12th of August, 177-4. Wordsworth's father lived at Cockermoutli, and was law-agent to Sir James Lowtlier, after- wai-ds Lord Lonsdale. His mother died when lie ■> Daidks, darlings. * Uoii'iV, doleful. « I am indebted to the Rev. A. B. Grosart for penuission to copy this portrait of Wordsworth in early manhood from a steel engraving of it in the subscription copies of his most valuable edition of the Prose Works of Wordsworth. The original is in the possession of Mrs. Stanger, Fieldside, Keswick. The finer shade of expression reproduced in Mr. Grosarfs steel iilate cannot be wholly represented by a -wood engi'aving. 418 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1770 was eight yeai'S of age his father when he was thirteen and a schoolboy at Hawkshead, in the -I'ale of Esthwaite. He went to St. John's College, Cam- bridge, in October, 1787, and was a student at Cam- bridge, aged nineteen, at the time of the Fall of the Bastille. What he felt in those days, he paints when he represents the lost hopes of the Solitary in " The Excursion." For lo ! the dread Bastile, With ill! the chambers in its horrid towers, Fell to the ground ; by violence overthrown Of indignation and with shouts that drowned The crash it made in falling ! From the -m-eck A golden palace rose, or seemed to rise. The apjiointed seat of equitable law And mild paternal sway. The potent shock I felt : the transformation I perceived. As marvellously seized as in that moment 10 "WTien, from the blind mist issuing, I beheld Glory, beyond all glory ever seen. Confusion infinite of heaven and earth. Dazzling the soul. Meanwhile, prophetic harps In every grove were ringing " War shall cease ; Did ye not hear that conquest is abjured '^ Bring gai'lands, bring forth choicest flowers to deck The tree of Liberty." My heart reboimded ; My melancholy voice the chorus joined — " Be joyful all ye nations, in all lands 20 Ye that are capable of joy be glad ! Henceforth, whate'er is wanting in yourselves In others ye shall promptly find ; and all. Enriched by mutual and reflected wealth. Shall with one heart honour- their common kind." In the following year, 1790, Wordsworth and his college friend, Robert Jones, took their holiday in France, where they saw the exulting hopes of the people after the first anniversary of the Fall of the Bastille, and how glad a face is worn " A\Tien joy of one Is joy for tens of millions." In 1791 Wordsworth graduated, and having aban- doned the thought of entering the Church, since literature was not a recognised career, he agreed to try law. But in November he was in France again, and remained there for more than a year, sympa- thising strongly with the aspirations that, to minds like his, the French Revolution was still represent- ing. The sjmipathy was such as he has uttered in this little poem : — THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. Oh! pleasant exercise of hope and joy'. For mighty were the auxiliars which then stood TTpon our side, we who were strong in love. Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very heaven 1 — Oh 1 times In which the meagre, stale, forbidding ways t)f custom, law, and statute, took at once The attraction of a country in romance ; When Reason seemed the most to assert her rights, ■\Vhen most intent on making of herself 10 A prime Enchantress — to assist the work \\Tuch then was going forward in her name 1 Not favoured spots alone, but the whole earth, The beauty wore of promise, that which sets (As at some moment might not be unfelt Among the bowers of paradise itself) The budding rose above the rose full Idown. What temper at the prospect did not wake To happiness unthought of 'i The inert Were roused, and lively natures rapt away. 20 They who had fed their childhood upon dreams, The playfellows of fancy, who had made All powers of swiftness, subtilty, and strength Their ministers, who in lordly wise had stirred Among the grandest objects of the sense. And dealt with whatsoever they found there As if they had within some lurking right To wield it ; — they, too, who, of gentle mood. Had watched all gentle motions, and to these Had fitted their o\\-n thoughts, schemers more mild, 30 And in the region of their peaceful selves : — Now was it that both found, the meek and lofty Did both find, helpers to their heart's desire. And stuff at hand, plastic as they could wish ; Were called upon to exercise their skill. Not in Utopia, subterranean fields. Or some secreted island. Heaven knows where. But in the very world which is the world Of all of us, — the place where in the end We find our happiness or not at all. 40 Wordsworth was iii Paris a month after the Sep- tember massacre, and felt that hope was failing only because the better minds could not secure then- mastery over the passions of a people set suddenly free after centm-ies of degradation. His desire then was to vise liis knowledge of French liy throwing in his lot with the men who were seeking to direct the storm ; he would have wa-itten, spoken, and acted ■with the thouglitful section of the Revolu- tionists. But his friends wisely compelled his return to England. Soon after his i-eturn there was- the exectition of the king on the 21st of January, 1793, and on the 1st of the next month began the war against the Revolution, which lasted until the Peace of Amiens on the 27th of March, 1802. The spirit of Wordsworth rebelled strongly against this war ; England seemed to him to Ije leagued ^\ith the despotic powere of Europe for extinction of what- ever chance was left of good to come from the great effort that had stirred so many hopes. At Christmas, in 1794, Wordsworth was at Penrith by the bedside of a young friend, Raisley Calvert, like himself the son of a law agent, and fatherless. Calvei-t died in January, 1795." He had £900 to leave, and left them to his friend Wordsworth to enable him to give up vain labour towards other life than that for which he seemed to have been born, and be a poet free to shape his own career. With frugality Wordsworth could make .£900 last long : he did, in foct, with aid of a little that came to him from other sources, make it last nearly eight years. Within that time he found his place in life ; and then there was the long-delayed payment of a debt due to his father, that was all the father had to leave, and William and his brothers and his sister Dorothy received about £1,800 each. After Raisley TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 419 Calvert's death Worclswortli culled his sister Dorotliy — one ye:u- younger than himself — to his side, to be with liim thencefoi-th, and so they lived together until death, for a short time, divided them. They first settled near Crewkerne, in a (juiet i)lace where the post only came in once a week, and then Words- worth began to prepare himself for the fulfilment of whatever he might find to be his highest duty as a poet, with a religious earnestness like that of Milton when he said, with his life yet before him — '■ All is, if I have grace to use it so, As ever in my great Taskmaster's eye." To Wordsworth and Dorothy in their quiet home at Racedown, near Crewkerne, suddenly there entered Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, born in October, 1772, was the youngest of thii-teen children — ten being by the second wife — of the Rev. John Coleridge, vicar «f Ottery, in Devonshire, and head-master of the Grammar School there, known as the King's School, or Heiuy VIII. 's Free Grammar School. Before Coleridge had reached his seventh year the father, w^hose health was delicate, died at the age of sixty- two. Judge BuUer, who had been one of his father's ])upils, obtained the child a presentation to Christ's Hospital, and thither he was sent in July, 1782. There he had Charles Lamb for a schoolfellow, and the friendship between Lamb and Coleridge was begun. In February, 1791, Coleridge, in his nine- teenth year, entered at Jesus College, Cambridge. In his school days he had been stirred by the hopes of the time. The Bastille fell when he was a youth of seventeen, and in his first year at Cambridge he obtained the prize for a Greek Ode on the subject of ■" The Slave Trade." But in his first year also, by passive want of discretion in management of affairs, rather than by any active imprudence, he slipped into debt to the amount of about a hundred jiounds. With this load on his conscience he went home in the summer of 1793, and it was then that "The Songs ■of the Pixies " came of one day's holiday that gave a lighter heart. When he returned to Cambridge he had so changed his religious opinions that he could neither enter the Church nor hope for a college fellow- ship. Resoh^ing, therefore, to give all up and be no more a burden on his family, he left Cambridge and enlisted, as Silas Titus Cumberbatch, in the 15th Light Dragoons. After some months he was dis- covered and retiu-ned to Cambridge ; but as there still seemed to be no career before him there, and as he heard of the fame of Citizen Southey at Oxford, he resolved to take counsel with that young sage. Robert Southey, born in August, 1774, was the son ■of a linen-dra])er at Bristol. The father was un- prosperous, and the child was educated chiefly under the care of a maiden aunt, Miss Tyler, who was a half-sister of his mother's. A brother of his mother's, the Rev. Herljert Hill, Chaplain to the English factoiy at Lisbon, joined Aunt Tyler in sending Southey to Westminster School. When near the end of his time there — in his eighteenth year — Southey ■was expelled from Westminster School by Dr. Vin- cent, the headmaster, for a youthful jest upon the despotism of the rod. In the little world of school, as in the great world, the uj)holders of constituted authority believed it necessary to crush out revo- tionary sentiment. Uncle Hill resolved that his nephew's career should not be stayed by a boyish indiscretion, and sent Southey to Oxford, where he was refused at Christ Church, but admitted at Balliol early in 1793. Here he soon showed his re\olu- tionary tendencies by refusing to have liis hair cut, or to use hair-powder, and he wrote to a friend : " Would you think it possible that the wse founders of an English University should forbid us to wear boots 1 Wliat matters it whether I study in shoes or boots 1 To me it is a matter of indifference ; but folly so ridiculous puts me out of conceit with the whole." With Southey and other congenial s])ii-its at Oxford, Coleridge jjresently develojied the plan of an escape from the forms of an old society, hopelessly coriiipt. They would go — a band of jiure spirits — across the Atlantic, and, on freer ground, would found a Pantisocracy (an All-Equal-Government) on the banks of the Suscpiehainia. Robert Lovell, George Bennett, and others enrolled themselves as Pantiso- crats. Some of them went with Southey to Bristol, where of the four daughters of a small tradesman of the place, the three who were marriageable became the chosen brides of three poets, who were to be among the founders of the new and happy commonwealth. Robert Lovell was to marry and did marry Miss Fricker, who was an actress in a small way. He wi'ote verse with promise in it, and died young, leav- ing a widow and infant, who owed much to Southey's kindness. Southey was to marry and did marry Edith Fricker, who kept a small day-school ; and Coleridge married Sarah Fricker, who was a mantua- maker. Southey, invited by his Uncle Hill to go with him for a few months to Lisbon, married before he left, and came home to acknowledge his wfe, and work hard for his li\-ing. Divers dilliculties, to say nothing of the main difficulty of finding jiassage-money to the Susquehanna, put an end to the Pantisocracy, and Coleridge lectured for a time on revolutionary history. He was living at Clevedon when, in 1795, he published his " Conciones ad Populum," and said in the preface, " The two following addres.ses were delivered in the month of February, 1795. and were followed by six others in defence of natural and revealed religion. ' There is a time to keep sUence,' saith King Solomon ; but when I proceeded to the first verse of the fourth chapter of the Eccle- siastes, ' and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun ; and behold the tears of .such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter ; and on the side of the oppressors there was power,' I con- chided this -".-a-s not the ' time to kee)> silence,' for truth should be spoken at all times, but more espe- cially at those times when to sjieak truth is dan- gerous." To be near a generous friend, Mr. Thomas Poole, of Nether Stowey, Coleridge had settled in Nether Stowey, by the Bristol Channel, when he heard that Wordsworth, author of "The Descriptive Sketches," which he had read and liked when a Blue- Coat boy, was living not far off'. Therefore, he went to see him at Racedown, and close friendship wa.s 420 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [A.D. 17U0 established soon between tliein. To be near Cole- ridge, Wordswortli and his sister removed to Alfbxden, about three miles from Nether Stowey ; and out of their intercourse there, arose "The Lyrical Ballads," first published in 1798. They agreed on a holiday walk by the shore of the Bristol Channel, towards Linton, and would pay the cost of it by producing a poem that might be sent to a magazine. A friend of theirs, Mr. Cruikshauk, had been dreaming about a skeleton ship — they would take his dream for ground- work of a poem. Wordsworth had been reading Shelvocke's " Voyage round the World by Way of the Great South Sea " (published in 1726), and had there met with the sailors' superstition about alba- trosses ; he, therefore, suggested the shooting of an albatross. In this way " The Ancient Mariner " was planned by both, and produced by Coleridge, with only about two touches in the verse from Words- worth's hand. It proved to be too important to be sent to a magazine, and gave rise to the suggestion that it might form part of a book. Work at the " Lyrical Ballads " thus began. Coleridge tells us in Ids " Biographia Literaria " how the division of labour was first planned : — " Daring the first year th.it Mr. Wordsworth and I were neighbours, our conversations turned frequently on the two cardinal points of poetry, — the power of exciting the sympathy of a reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature, and the power of giving the interest of novelty by the modifying colours of imagination. The sudden charm which accidents of light and shade, which moonlight or sim- set diffused over a known and familiar landscape, appeared to represent the jiracticability of combining both. These are the poetry of nature. The thought suggested itself (to which of us I do not recollect) that a series of poems might be com- posed of two sorts. In the one the incidents and agents were to be, in part at least, supernatural ; and the excellence aimed at was to consist in the interesting of the affections by the dramatic truth of such emotions as would naturally accom- pany such situations, supposing them real ; and real in t^is sense they have been to every human being who, from what- ever source of delusion, has at any time believed himself under supernatural agency. For the second class, subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life : the characters and incidents were to be such as will be found in every village and its vicinity, where there is a meditative and feeling mind to seek after them, or to notice them when they present themselves. " In this idea originated the plan of the ' Lj-rical Ballads,' in which it was agreed that my endeavoiurs shoidd be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic ; yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment which constitutes poetic faith. Mr. "Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself, as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention from the lethargy of Custom, and dii'ecting it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us, — an inexhaustible treasure ; but for which, in consequence of the feeling of familiarity and selfish solicitude, we have eyes yet sec not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand. " With this view I wrote the ' Ancient Mariner,' and was preparing, among other poems, the ' Dark Ladio ' and the ' Christabel,' in which I should have more nearly realised my ideal than I had done in my fii'st attempt : but Mr. Words- worth's industry had proved so much more successful, and the number of liis poems so much greater, that my compositions, instead of forming a balance, appeared rather an interpola- tion of heterogeneous matter." The first piece in the volume was " The Ancient Mariner," but " Christabel," being unfinished, was not included, and so chanced to I'emain uni>ublished until 181 G. It never was completed. Samuel Taylor Coleridge. From an Early Portrait (1803). CHRISTABEL. P.\RT I. 'Tis the middle of night by the castle clock. And the owls have awakened the crowing cock ; Tu— whit !— ^Tu— whoo ! And hark, again 1 the' crowing cock. How drowsily it crew. Sir Leoline, the Baron rich, Hath a toothless mastiff bitch ; From her kennel beneath the rock She makes answer to the clock, Four for the quarters, and twelve for the hour ; Ever and aye, moonshine or shower. Sixteen short howls, not over loud ; Some say, she sees my lady's shroud. Is the night chilly and dark y The night is chill, but not dark. The thin gray cloud is spread on high, It covers but not hides the sky. The moon is behind, and at the full ; And yet she looks both small and dull. The night is chill, the cloud is gray ; 'Tis a month before the month of Jlay, And the Spring comes slowly up this way. lO 20 TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 421 The lovely ladj-, Christabol, Whom her father loves so well, What makes her in the wood so late, A f mionsj from the castle gate 'i She had dreams all yesternight Of her own betrothed knight ; Dreams that made her moan and leap. As on her bed she lay in sleep ; 30 And she in the midnight wood will pray For the weal of her lover that's far away. Sho stole along, she nothing spoke. The breezes they were still also ; And nought was green upon the oak, But moss and rarest mistletoe : She kneels beneath the huge oak-tree. And in silence prayeth she. The lady leaps up suddenly. The lovely lady, Chiistabel ! 40 It moaned as near, as near can be. But what it is, she cannot tell. — On the other side it seems to be Of the huge, broad-breasted, old oak-tree. The night is chill ; the forest bare ; Is it the wind that moaneth bleak 'r There is not wind enough in the ail' To move away the ringlet curl From the lovely lady's cheek ; — There is not wind enough to twirl 50 The one red leaf, the last of its clan. That dances as often as dance it can, Hanging so light, and hanging so high, On the topmost twig that looks up at the sky. Hush, beating heart of Christabel ! Jesu, Slaria, shield her well ! She folded her arms beneath her cloak. And stole to the other side of the oak. "WTiat sees she there 'i There she sees a damsel bright, 60 Brest in a silken robe of white. That shadowy in the moonlight shone : Her neck, her feet, her arms were bare ; And the jewels disordered in her hair. I guess, 'twas frightful there to see A lady so richly clad as she — Beautiful exceedingly ! "Mary mother, save me now 1 " Said Christabel, " and who art tho\i ?" The lady strange made answer meet, 70 And her voice was faint and sweet : — " Have pity on my sore distress, I scarce can speak for weariness." "Stretch forth thy hand, and have no fear," Said Christabel, " how camest thou here ?" And the lady, whose voice was faint and sweet. Did thus pursue her answer meet : — ' ' My sire is of a noble line. And my name is Geraldine : Five wan-iors seized me yestermorn, SO Me, even me, a maid forlorn : They choked my cries with force and fright, And tied me on a palfrey white. The palfrey was as lleet as wind, And they rode furiously behind. They spurred amain, their steeds wore white ; And once wo crossed the shade of night. As sure as Heaven shall rescue me, I have no thought what meu they be ; Nor do I know how long it is 90 (For I have lain in fits I wis) Since one, the tallest of the five, Took me from the palfrey's back, A weary woman, scarce alive. Some muttered words his comi-ades spoke : He placed me underneath this oak ; He swore they would return with haste ; Whither they went I cannot tell — I thought I heard, some minutes past. Sounds as of a castle bell. lOO Stretch forth thy hand," thus ended she, "And help a wretched maid to flee." Then Cliristabel stretched forth her hand And comforted fair Geraldine : And sajang that she should command The service of Sir Leoline, And straight be convoyed, free from thrall. Back to her noble father's hall. So up sho rose : and forth they passed With hurrying stops, yet nothing fast; 110 Her lucky stars the lady blest, And Christabel she sweetly said — "All our household are at rest. Each one sleeping in his bed ; Sir Leoline is weak in health. And may not well awakened be. So to my room we'll creep in stealth. And you to-night must sleep with me." The}' crossed the moat, and Christabel Took the key that fitted well ; 120 A little door she opened straight, All in the middle of the gate ; The gate that was ironed within and without, ^^'^lere an army in battle array had marched out. The lady sank, belike through pain, And Christabel with might and main Lifted her up, a weary weight. Over the threshold of the gate : Then the lady rose again, And moved, as she were not in pain. 139 So free from danger, free from fear. They crossed the court : right glad they were. And Clu-istabel devoutly cried To the lady by her side, " Praise we the Virgin all divine Who hath rescued thee from thy distress !" "Alas, alasl" said Ger.aldinc, " I cannot speak for weariness." So free from danger, free from fear. They crossed the court : right glad they were. 140 Outside hi-r kennel the mastiff ola Lay fast asleep, in moonshine cold. CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. LA.D. 1790 The mastiff old did irot awake, Yet she an angry moan did make ! And what can ail the mastiff bitch ? Never till now she uttered yell Beneath the eye of Christabel. Perhaps it is the owlet's scritch : For what can ail the mastiff bitch ? They passed the hall, that echoes still, l."j(i Pass as lightly as you will ! The brands were flat, the brands were dj-ing, Amid their own white ashes Ijang ; But when the lady passed, there came A tongue of light, a fit of flame ; And Christabel saw the lady's eye, And nothing else saw she thereby, Save the boss of the shield of Sir Leoline tall, Which hung in a murky old niche in the wall. " Oh, softly tread," said Christabel, IGO " My father seldom sleepeth well." Sweet Chi'istabel her feet she bares. And they are creeping up the stairs ; Now in glimmer, and now in gloom, And now they pass the Baron's room, As still as death with stifled breath 1 And now have reached her chamber door ; And now doth Geraldine press down The rushes of the chamber floor. The moon shines dim in the open air, 170 And not a moonbeam enters here. But they without its light can see The chamber carved so curiously, Carved with figures strange and sweet. All made out of the carver's brain, For a lady's chamber meet : The lamp with twofold silver chain Is fastened to an angel's feet. The silver lamp burns dead and dim ; But Christabel the lamp wiU trim. ISO She trimmed the lamp, and made it bright, And left it swinging to and fro. While Geraldine, in wTetched plight, Sank down upon the floor below. " weary lady, Geraldine, I pray you, drink this cordial wine I It is a wine of vii'tuous powers ; My mother made it of wild flowers." "And will your mother pity me, AVho am a maiden most forlorn ?" 190 Christabel answered, " Woe is me ! She died the hour that I was bom. I have heard the grey-haired friar tell, How on her death-bod she did say. That she should hear the castle-beU Strike twelve iipon my wedding-day, mother dear ! that thou wcrt here ! " " I would," said Geraldme, " she were !" But soon with altered voice, .'0 And crouched her head upon her breast. And looked askance at Christabel Jesu, JIaria, shield her well ! A snake's small eye blinks dull and shy. And the lady's eyes they sbi'unk in her head. Each shrunk up to a serpent's eye. And with somewhat of malice, and more of di'oad, At Christabel she looked askance ! — One moment — and the sight was fled I But Christabel in dizzy trance 580 Stumbling on the unsteady ground Shuddered aloud, with a hissing sound ; And Geraldine again tm'ncd round. And like a thing, that sought relief. Full of wonder and full of grief. She rolled her large bright eyes di«no Wildly on Sir Leoline. The maid, alas ! her thoughts arc gone, She nothing sees — no sight but one ! The maid, devoid of guile and sin, 590 I know not how, in feai-ful ■n'ise So deeply had she drunken in That look, those shrunken serpent eyes. That all her featui'es were resigned To this sole image in her mind ; And passively did imitate That look of dull and treacherous hate ! And thus she stood, in dizzy trance. Still picturing that look askance W^ith forced unconscious sympathy 000 Full before her father's view — As far as such a look could be. In eyes so innocent and blue ! And when the trance was o'er, the maid Paused awhile, and inly prayed : Then falling at the Baron's feet, " By my mother's soul do I entreat That thou this woman send away ! " She said : and more she could not say : For what she knew she could not tell, 610 O'er-mastered by the mighty spell. ■WTiy is thy cheek so wan and wild. Sir Leoline ? Thy only child Lies at thy feet, thy joy, thy pride. So fair, so innocent, so mild ; The same, for whom thy lady died ! Oh, by the pangs of her dear mother Think thou no evil of thy child 1 For her, and thee, and for no other. She jn-ayed the moment ere she died : 620 Prayed that the babe for whom she died, Jlight prove her dear lord's joy and pride! That prayer her deadly pangs beguiled. Sir Leoline I And wouldst then wrong thy only cliild, Her child and thine ? 426 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1790 Within the Baron's heart and brain If thoughts, like these, had any share, They only swelled his rage and pain, And did but work confusion there. 630 His heart was eleft with pain and rage. His cheeks they quivered, his eyes were wild, Dishonoured thus in his old age ; Dishonoured by his only child, And all his hospitahty To th' insulted daughter of his friend By more than woman's jealousy Brought thus to a disgraceful end ; — He rolled his eye with stern regard Upon the gentle minstrel bard, 640 And said in tones abrupt, austere — " A\Tiy, Bracy ! dost thou loiter hero ? I bade thee hence I " The bard obeyed ; And turning from his own sweet maid, The aged knight. Sir Leoline, Led forth the lady Geraldine ! COSCLrSIOX TO P.\HT II. A little child, a limber elf. Singing, dancing to itself, A faii-y thing with red round cheeks. That always finds, and never seeks, 650 Makes such a vision to the sight As fills a father's eyes with light ; And pleasures flow in so thick and fast Upon his heart, that he at last Must needs express his love's excess With words of unmeant bitterness. Perhaps 'tis pretty to force together Thoughts so all unlike each other ; To mutter and mock a broken charm. To dally -with wrong that does no harm. 660 Perhaps 'tis tender too and pretty At each wild word to feel within A sweet recoil of love and pity. And what, if in a world of sin (0 sorrow and shame should this be true 1 ) Such giddiness of heart and brain Come seldom save from rage and pain, So talks as it's most used to do. Coleridge's friend, Mr. Gillman, with whom he spent much of the latter part of his life, and who began his biography, tells us that " The following relation was to have occupied a third and fourth canto, and to have closed the tale. " Over the mountains, the Bard, as directed by Sir Leoline, ' hastes ' with his disciple ; but in consequence of one of those inundations supposed to be common to this country, the spot only where the castle once stood is discovered — the edifice being washed away. He determines to return. Geraldine being acquainted with all that is passing, like the Weird Sisters in Macbeth, vanishes. Re-appeai'ing, how- ever, she waits the return of the Bard, exciting in the mean- time, by her wily arts, all the anger she could rouse in the Baron's breast, as well as that jealousy of which he is described to have been susceptible. The old Bard and the youth at length arrive, and therefore she can no longer personate the character of Geraldine, the daughter of Lord Roland de A'aux. but changes her appearance to that of the accepted though absent lover of Christabel. Next ensues a courtship most distressing to Christabel, who feels — she knows not why — great disgust for her once favoui-ed knight. This coldness is very painful to the Baron, who has no more conception than herself of the supernatural transformation. She at last jnelds to her father's entreaties, and consents to approach the altar with this hated suitor. The real lover returning, enters at this moment, and jiroduces the ring which she had once given him in sign of her betrothmeut. Thus defeated, the supernatural being, Geraldine, disap- pears. As predicted, the castle bell tolls, the mother's voice is heard, and to the exceeding great joy of the parties, the rightful marriage takes place, after which follows a reconciliation and explanation between the father and daughter." These musical lines are by Coleridge : — ANSWER TO A CHILD'.S QUESTION. Do you a.sk what the birds say ':' The sparrow, the dove. The linnet and thnish say, " I love and I love ! " In the winter they're silent — the wind is so strong ; 'V\Tiat it saj's I don't Icnow, but it sings a loud song. But gi'ccn leaves, and blossoms, and sunny wami weather, And singing, and lo\"ing — all come back together. But the lark is so brimfid of gladness and love. The green fields below him, the blue sky above, That he sings, and he sings, and for ever sings he — " I love my Love, and my Love loves me ! " And here is a piece of his playfubiess : — AN ODE TO THE RAIN, Composed before Daij-Vu/ht, on the Moriiiiiff apjminfed for the Departure of n Tery worthy, but not rery pleasant Visitor; whom it was feared the Jtaiii mi;/ht detain. I know it is dark ; and though I have lain Awake, as I guess, an hour or twain, I have not once opened the lids of my eyes, But I lie in the dark, as a blind man lies. Rain ! that I lie listening to, You're but a dolefirl sound at best : 1 owe you little thanks, 'tis true. For breaking thus my noeilful rest ! Yet if, as soon as it is light, Rain 1 you will but take your flight, I'll neither rail, nor malice keep. Though sick and sore for want of sleep ; But only now, for this one day. Do go, dear Rain I do go away ! 10 Rain ! with your dull twofold sound, The clash hard by, and the murmur all roimd ! You know, if you know aught, that we. Both night and day, but ill agree : For days, and months, and almost years, Have limped on through this vale of tears. Since body of mine, and rainy weather. Have lived on easy terms together. Yet if, as soon as it is light, Rain 1 you will but take yoiu- flight. 20 TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 427 Though you should come again to-morrow, And tiring with you both pain and sorrow ; Though stomach should sicken, and kuees should swcU — I'll nothing speak of you but well. But only now for this one day, Do go, dear Rain ! do go away ! 30 Dear Rain ! I ne'er refused to say You're a good ereatui'e in your way. Nay, I could wi-ite a liook myself. Would fit a parson's lower shelf, Shewing, how very good you are — What then ■ sometimes it must be fair ! And if sometimes, why not to-day ? Do go, dear Rain 1 do go away ! Dear Rain! if I've been cold and shy, Take no offence ! I'll teU you, why. 40 A dear old Friend e'en now is here, And with him came my sister dear ; After long absence now first met. Long months by pain and grief beset— We three dear friends ! in truth, we groan Impatiently to be alone. We three, yon mark ! and not one more ! The strong msh makes my spii'it sore. We have so much to talk about, So many sad things to let out ; 50 So many tears in our eye-comers. Sitting like little Jacky Homers — In short, as soon as it is day.. Do go, dear Kain ! do go away. And this I'll swear to you, dear Rain! Whenever you shall come again. Be you as dull as e'er you could (And by the bye 'tis understood, You're not so pleasant, as you're good). Yet, knowing well your worth and place, 60 I'U welcome you with cheerful face ; And though you stayed a week or more, Were ten times duller than before. Yet ^vith kind heart, and right good will, I'U sit and Ksten to you still ; Nor should you go away, dear Rain ! Uninvited to remain. But only now, for tliis one day. Do go, dear Rain I do go away. Wlieu Woixlsworth and COlei'idge were at work ou the " Lyrical Ballads," Wordsworth one day, being at Nether Stowey, produced the poem known as "We are Seven," all but the first .stanza, in a little wood near by. It was based on actual talk with a child met when he had visited Goodrich Castle some years before, the dialogue jaelding fit matter for a poem since it involved suggestion of the natural instinct of immortality. When Wordsworth repeated what he had munnured out to himself in the open air (the mamier of producing nine-tenths of his poems), and it was written down, he said that it wanted an opening verse, and lie should sit do\vn to tea more comfortably if that were first supplied. " I'll give it you," said Coleridge, and gave at once the first stanza which — as addressed to a friend, James Tobin, witli whom they were on terms of playful familiarity — he began, "A little child, dear brother Jim." So the poem was printed in the earlier editions, until it occurred to Wordsworth that the original I'hymo to " limb " might be struck out ; since there was grace of its own in an opening half line with pause on the words '• A simple cliild :" — WE ARE SEVEN. A simple child, That Bghtly draws its breath, And feels its life in every limb. What shoidd it know of death 'i I met a little cottage girl : She w'as eight years old, she said : Her hair was tliick with many a curl That clustered round her head. She had a rustic, woodland ail'. And she was wildly clad : 10 Her eyes were fail-, and very fair ; — Her beauty made me glad. " Sisters and brothers, little maid. How many may you be ? " — " How many 't Seven in all," she said, And wondering looked at me. " And where are they ? I pray you tcU." She answered, ' ' Seven are we I And two of us at Conway dwell. And two arc gone to sea. 20 " Two of us in the church-yard lie, My sister and my brother ; And, in the church-yard cottage, I Dwell near them with my mother." " You say that two at Conway dwell, And two are gone to sea. Yet ye are seven I — I pray you tell, Sweet maid, how this may be." Then did the little maid reply, * ' Seven boys and girls are we ; 30 Two of us in the chiu'ch-yai-d lie. Beneath the chui'ch-yard tree." "You run about, mj' little maid, Youi- limbs they are alive : If two are in the church- yard laid. Then ye are only five." " Their graves are green, Ihcy may be seen," The little maid replied, '• Twelve steps or more from my motlicr's dour. And they are side by side. 40 " Jly stockings there I often knit. My kerchief there I hem : And there upon the ground I sit, And sing a song to them. 428 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1790 " And often after sun-sot, sii-, When it is light and fair, 1 take my little porringer, And cat my supper there. " The first that died was sister Jane ; In bed she moaning lay, 50 TiU God released her of her pain ; And then she -went away. " So in tile ehurch-yard she was laid ; And, when the grass was di-y, Together round her grave we played, My brother John and I. "And when the ground was white with snow. And I could rim and slide. My brother John was forced to go, And he lies by her side." 60 " How many are you, then," said I, " If they two are in heaven ':" Quick was the little maid's reply, " Master 1 wc are seven." " But they are dead ; those two are dead '. Their spirits are in heaven !" 'Twas thi'owing words away ; for still The little maid woidd have her will. And said, " Nay, we arc seven 1" Wordswortli's principle of reliance on the thought of a poem expressed simpl}' but worthily by a selection of the words in common use, without excluding any just metaphor or grace of fancy, is completely illustrated by this little poem : — SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTRODDEN WAYS. She dwelt among the untrodden w-ays Beside the springs of Dove, A maid whom there were none to praise And very few to love : A violet by a mossy stone Half hidden from the eye '. — Fair as a star, when only one Is shining in the skv. •She lived unlaiown, and few could know ^\^len Lucy ceased to be ; But she is in her grave, and, oh ! The difference to me I 10 And the desire of his time, that Wordsworth shared with all its truest poets, is in these LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING. I heard a thousand blended notes, AVhile in a grove I sate reclined. In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts Bring sad thoughts to the mind. To her fair works did Xature link The human soul that thi'ough me ran ; ' And much it grieved my heart to think What man has made of man. Through primrose tufts, in that green bower. The periwinlde trailed its wrreaths : 1 And 'tis my faith that every flower Enjoys the air it breathes. The birds around me hopped and played, Their thoughts I cannot measui-e ; But the least motion wliich they made, It seemed a thi-ill of pleasure. The budding twigs spread out their fan, To catch the breezy air ; And I must think, do all I can, That there was pleasm-e there. 20 If such belief from heaven be sent. If such be Natm-e's holy plan. Have I not reason to lament What man has made of man ? In one of two volumes of " British Anthology," published in 1799 and 1800 by Southey, to which Coleridge, Charles Lamb, Lovell, Humphrey Da^•y, and others contributed, Southey himself writing most, there was this sonnet, by Robert Lovell, on THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. The cloudy blackness gathers o'er tlie sky Shadowing these realms with that portentous storm Ere long to bm-st and haply to deform Fair Nature's face : for Indignation liigh Might hurl promiscuous vengeance witli wild hand ; And Fear, with fierce precipitation, throw Blind ruin wide : while Hate with scowling brow Feigns patriot rage. O Priestley, for thy wand. Or, Franklin, thine, with calm expectant joy To tame the storm, and with mysterious force 10 In -i-iewless channel shape the lightning's coiu-sc To purify creation, not destroy. So should fair Order from the tempest rise And Freedom's sunbeams gild unclouded skies. In gi-avest days the gravest men must dine. Southey, in whom no trouble ever quite over- weighted the light heart that his kindly nature gave him, could play with verse, as in this ode from his " British Anthology," upon GOOSEBERRY PIE. Gooscbeny pie is best. Full of the theme, O Muse begin the song 1 AVhat tho' the sunbeams of the west Slatiu-e within the turtle's breast Blood glutinous and fat of verdant hue i What tho' the deer bound sportively along O'er springy turf, the park's elastic vest? Give them their honours due — But gooseberry pie is best. Behind his oxen slow 10 The patient ploughman plods. And as the sower followed by the clods Earth's genial womb received the swelling seed. Tlie rains descend, the grains tliey grow ; TO i.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 4l!'J Saw ye the vegetable ocean Roll its green billows to the Ajiril gale r The ripening gold with multitudinous motion Sway o'er the summer vale 'i It flows thro' alder banks along Beneath the copse that liides the hill ; 20 The gentle stream you cannot see, You only hear its melody, The stream that turns the mill. Pass on, a little way pass on. And you shall catch its gleam anon ; And hark ! the loud and agonising groan That makes its anguish known, AVhere tortur'd by the tj-rant lord of meal The brook is broken on the wheel ! Blow fail-, blow fair, thou orient gale 1 30 On the white bosom of the sail Ye winds enamom'd, lingering lie ! Y'e waves of ocean spare the bark ! \'e tempests of the sky 1 From distant realms she comes to bring The sugar for my pie. For this on Gambia's arid side The viUtirre's feet are scaled with blood. And Beelzebub beholds with pride His darling planter brood. 40 First in the spring thy leaves were seen. Thou beauteous bush, so early green ! Soon ceas'd thy blossom's little life of love. Oh, safer than the Aleides-eonquer'd tree That grew the pride of that Hesperian grove — - No dragon does there need for thee With quintessential sting to work alarms, And guard thy fruit so fine. Thou vegetable porcupine ! And didst thou scratch thy tender amis, 50 O Jane, that I should dine I The flour, the sugar, and the fruit. Commingled well, how well they suit, ' And they were well bestow'd. O Jane, with truth I praise your pie. And will not you in just reply Praise my Pindaric ode 'i Soutliey could blend also jest with earnest, as in this piece, which was first printed in his " British Anthology " for the year 1800 : — ST. RO.M.\ULD. One day, it matters not to know How many hundred years ago, A Spaniard stopt at a posada door : The landlord came to welcome liim. and chat Of this and that. For he had seen the traveller there before. " Does holy Romauld dwell Still in his cell'?" The ti-aveller ask'd, " or is the old man dead ':" " No, he has left his lo\-ing flock, and we 10 So good a Christian never more shall see," The landlord answer'd, and he shook'his head. " Ah, sir ! wo knew his worth. If ever there did live a siiint on earth ! Why, sir, lie always used to wear a shirt For thii'ty days, all seasons, day and night : Good man, he knew it was not right For d\ist and aslies to fall out with dirt : And tlicn he only hung it out in the rain. And put it on ag.ain. 20 " There used to be rare work With him and the di'\il there in yonder cell. For Satan used to maul hini like a Turk. There they would sonu'timcs fight All tlirough a winter's night. From sunset imtil morn. He with a cross, the devil with his horn. The devil spitting fire with might and main Enough to make St. Jlichael half afraid. He spla.shing holy water till he made 30 His red hide hiss again. And the hot vapour fiU'd the little cell. This was so common that his face became All black and yellow with the brimstone flame. And then he smelt — Lord I how he did smell I " Then, sir ! to sec how he would mortify The flesh. If any one had dainty fare. Good man he would come there, And look at all the delicate things, and cry, ' O belly, belly ! 40 You would be goi-mandising now I know. But it shall not be so. Home to yoiir bread and water — homo 1 tell ye 1' " " But," quoth the traveller, " wherefore did he U'ave A flock that knew his saintly worth so well 'r" " AVhy," Siiid the landlord, " sir, it so befell He heard unluckily of our intent To do him a great honour, and you know He was not covetous of fame below. And so by stealth one night away he went." oO " What was this honour then I'" the traveller cried; "Why, sir," the host replied, " We thought perhaps that he might one day leave us, And then should strangers have The good man's grave, A loss like that would naturally gi-ieve us. For he'll be made a saint of to be sure. Therefore we thought it prudent to secure His relics while we might ; And so we meant to strangle him one night." CO George Canning, wlio was of tlie .same age as Wordsworth, started in November, 1797, The Avfi- Jacobin, to attack by argument and ridicule what he and others looked upon as the false logic and false sentiment of English sympathisers with the French Revolution. William Giffbrd, who had made his reputation as author of the "Baviad" and "Ma^viad," was appointed editor, and among the writers who, with Canning, shone in verse caricature, were John Hookham Frere and George Ellis. The poetry of th(^ 430 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENCxLTSH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1790 Anti-Jacobin became so fiimoiis that it was collected in 1800 into a handsome quarto volume. Southey William Gifforu. from the Portrait bi/ Hofimir, prefixci to (lis " JuwnaX " (1802). was one of the writers caricatured. He had wi-itten this " Inscription " for the prison of Marten : — INSCRIPTION For the Apartment in Chepstow Castle, where Henry Marten, the Regicide, tvas imprisoned thirty years. For thirty years secluded from mankind Here Marten linger' d. Often have these walls Echoed his fotsteps, as with even tread He paced around his prison ; not to him Did Nature's fair varieties e.xist ; He never saw the sun's delightful teams, Save when through yon high bars he pour'd a sad And broken splendour. Dost thou ask his crime ': He had rebeU'd against the king, and sat In judgment on him ; for his ardent mind Shaped goodUest plans of happiness on earth, And peace and liberty. Wild dreams ! but such As Plato loved ; such as with holy zeal Our Milton wor.shipp'd. Blessed hopes I a while From man withheld, even to the latter days WTien Christ shall come, and all things be fultill'd ! It was tluis wittily parodied, Canning, Frere, and Ellis each having a hand in the biu-lesque : — INSCRIPTION For the Door of the Cell in Newgate, where Mrs. Brownrigg, the Prcnticc-cide, was confined prerious ta her Execution. For one long term, or e'er her trial came. Hero Brownrigg linger'd. Often have these cells Echoed her blasphemies, as with shrill voice She scream'd for fresh geneva. Not to her Did the biithe fields of Tothill, or thy street, St. Giles, its fair varieties expand. Till at the last, in slow-dj-awn cart, she went To execution. Dost thou ask her crime ? She whipp'd two female 'prentices to death. And hid them in the coal-hole ; for her mind Shaped strictest plans of discipline. Sage schemes ! Such as Lyciu'gus taught, Avhen at the shrine Of the Orthyan goddess he bade flog The little Spartans ; such as erst chastised Our Milton, when at college. For this act Did Brownrigg swing. Harsh laws ! But time shall come. When France shall reign, and laws be all repeal' d ! Southey, in 1795, had expressed in this poem the miseries of war : — THE soldier's wife. Dactylics. Weary way-wanderer, languid and sick at heart, Travelling painfully over the rugged road, Wild-visaged wanderer ! ah, for thy heavy chance ! Sorely thy little one drags by thee bare-footed, Cold is the baby that hangs at thy bending back, Meagre and livid and screaming its wTetchedness. Woe-begone mother, half anger, half agony, As over thy shoulder thou lookest to hush the bab.e, Bleakly the blinding snow beats in thy haggard face. Thy husband will never retui'n from the war again. Cold is thy hopeless heart, even as Charity ! — Cold arc thy famished babes. God help thee, widowed one 1 Thus ridiculed by Giflford : — quintessence of all the d.\ctylics. Wearisome sonnetteer, feeble and querulous. Painfully di-agging out thy demo-cratic lays — Moon-stricken sonnetteer, " ah 1 for thy heavy chance ! ' Sorely thy dactylics lag on imevcn feet : Slow is the syllable which thou would' st urge to speed. Lame and o'erburthen'd, and •' screaming its wretched Ne'er talk of ears again ! look at thy speUing-book ; Dilworth and Dyche are both mad at thy quantities— DactyUcs, caU'st thou 'em ? — " God help thee, silly one ! ' Southey, in 1796, had expressed also in tliis poem his sense of the miseries of war : — the widow. Cold was the night wind, drifting fast the snow fell, Wide were the do\vns and shelterless and naked. When a poor wanderer struggled on her journey, Weary and way-sore. Drearj' were the downs, more dreary her reflections ; Cold was the night-wind, colder was her bosom : She had no home, the world was all before ner, She had no shelter. TO A.D. 1800.] SHORTER POEMS. 431 Fast o'er the heath a chariot rattled by hor, " Pity me 1 " feebly cried the lonely wanderer. " Pity me, strangers ! lest with cold and hunger Here I should perish. " OncG I had friends, but they have all forsook me ! Once I had parents — they are now in heaven ! I had a home once — I had once a husband — Pity me, strangers ! " I had a home once — I had once a husband — I am a widow poor and broken-hearted! " Loud blew the wind, unheard was her complaining, Oil drove the chariot. Then on the snow she laid her down to rest her ; She heard a horseman — " Pity me! " she groaned out ; Loud was the wind, unheard was her complaining, On went the horseman. "Worn out with anguish, toU and cold and hunger, Down sunk the wanderer, sleep had seized her senses There did the traveller find her in the morning ; God had released her. Thus ridiculed by Canning and Frere in THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER. Friend of Hiimanitij. " Needy knife-grinder ! whither arc you going ? Eough is the road, your wheel is out of order — Bleak blows the blast ; — your hat has got a hole iu't. So have your breeches ! " "Weary knife-grinder ! Uttle think the proud ones, "Who in their coaches roll along the tumpike- -road, what hard work 'tis crying all day, " Knives Scissars to grind, O ! " and "Tell me, knife-grinder, how you came to grind knives 'i Did some rich man t\TannicaUy use you 'i "Was it the squire ': or parson of the parish ': Or the attorney 't " Was it the squire for killing of his game ? or Covetous parson for his tithes distraining i Or roguish lawyer made you lose your little All in a lawsuit !-' " (Have you not read the Rights of Man, by Tom Paine ? ) Drops of compassion tremble on my eyelids, Ready to fall as soon as you have told your Pitiful stor^-." Kinfe-grinder. " Story ! God bless you ! I have none to tell, sir. Only last night a-drinking at the Chequers, This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were Tom in a scuffle. "Constables came up for to take me into Custody : they took me before the justice : Justice Oldmixon put me in the parish- -Stocks for a vasrant. " I should be glad to drink your honour's health in A pot of beer, if you wiU give me sixpence ; But for my part, 1 never love to meddle With politics, sir." Frit'nd of Kitmaiutij, " I give thee sixpence ! I will see thee damn'd first — "Wretch ! whom no sense of ^vrongs can rouse to ven- geance — Sordi'd, unfeeling, reprobate, degraded. Spiritless outcast ! " \_Kicks the I;nife-grbide}\ overt urns his whcel^ and exit in a transport of Itepubliean enthusiasm and universal phitanthropij.^ The sentimental drama, with its head-qnartere in German}', will be described in another of these volumes ; but the caricatm-e of it in the Anti- Jacobin (levelled at Schiller's "Robbers" and Goethe's " Stella,") called " The Rovei-s ; or, the Double Arrangement," inckides a lyric that may be given in its original setting. The soliloquy is by Frere, the song by Canning and Ellis : — SCENE FROM " THE ROVERS." Scene changes to a subterraneous vault in the Abheij of Qued- linburgh ; with coffins^ ^ scutcheons^ Death's heads and cross-bones. — Toads and other loathsome reptiles are seen traversing the obscurer parts of the stage. — Rogero appears in chains, in a suit of rusty armour, with his beard grown, and a cap of a grotesque form upon his head. — Beside him a crock, or pitcher, supposed to contain his daily alloxcance of sustenance. — A long silence, during which the wind is heard to whistle through the caverns. — Rogero rises, and comes slowly foricard, with his arms folded. Rog. Eleven years ! it is now eleven years since I was first immured in this living sepulchre — the cruelty of a minister — the perfidy of a monk — yes, Matilda ! for thy sake — aUve amidst the dead — chained — coffined — confined — cut off from the converse of my fellow-men. Soft ! — what have we here 'i ^Stumbles over a bundle of sticks.l This cavern is so dark that I can scarcely distinguish the objects under my feet. Oh ! — the register of my capti\'ity — Let me see, how stands ths account? l^Tahts up the sticks, and turns them over with a melancholy air; then stands silent for a few moments, as if absorbed in calculation.^ Eleven years and fifteen days ! — Ha ! the twenty-eighth of August ! How does the recollection of it ribrate on my heart ! It was on this day that I took my last leave of my Matilda. It was a siunmer evening — her melting hand seemed to dissolve in mine, as I pressed it to my bosom — some demon whispered me that I should never see her more. I stood gazing on the hated vehicle which was conveying her away for ever. The tears were petri- fied under my eyelids. My heart was crystallized with agony. Anon, I looked along the road. The diligence seemed to diminish evei-y instant. I felt my heart beat against its prison, as if anxious to leap out and overtake it. My soul whirled round as I watched the rotation of the hinder wheels. A long trail of glorj- followed after her, and mingled with the dust— it was the emanation of divinity, luminous with love and beauty — like the splendour of the setting sun — but it told me that the sun of my joys was sunk for ever. Yes, here in the depths of an eternal dimgeon — in the nursing cradle of hell — the suburbs of perdition — in a 432 CASSELL'S LIBEARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. Li.D. 1790 nest of demons, where despair, in vain, sits brooding over the ])utrid eggs of hope ; where agony wooes the embrace of death ; where patience, beside the bottomless pool of des- pondency, sits angling for impossibilities: — yet even here to behold her, to embrace her — yes, Matilda, whether in this dark abode, amidst toads and spiders, or in a royal palace, amidst the more loathsome reptiles of a Court, would be indifferent to me. Angels would shower down their hymns of gratulation upon our heads — whQe fiends would envy the eternity of suffering love Soft, what air was that r it seemed a sound of more than human warblings. Again [listens attentively for some minutes']. Only the wind. It is well, however — it reminds me of that melancholy air, which has so often solaced the houi-s of my captivity. Let me see whether the damps of this dungeon have not yet injm-ed my guitar. [Takes his giutar, times it, and begins the following air, with n fall aeeonipaniment of violins front the orehestra : — [Air, Lanterna Magica.] SONG, BY EOGERO. I. Whene'er with haggard eyes I view This dungeon that I'm rotting in, I think of those companions true Who studied with me at the V — — niversity of Gottingen — — niversity of Gottingen. [ IFeeps, and palls oat a blue kerchief, with which he wipes his eyes ; gazing tenderly at it, he proceeds — ■ Sweet kerchief, cheek' d with heavenly blue. Which once my love sat knotting in ! — Alas ! Matilda then was true ! — At least I thought so at the U — — niversity of Gottingen — — niversity of Gottingen. [At the repetition of this line, Rogcro clanks hii chains in cadence] Barbs ! barbs 1 alas ! how swift you flew. Her neat post-wagon trotting in ! Ye bore Matilda from my view ; Forlorn I languish' d at the TJ — — niversity of Gottingen — — niversity of Gottingen. This faded form 1 this pallid hue ! This blood my veins is clotting in. My years are many — they were few When first I enter' d at the U — — niversity of Gottingen- — niversity of Gottingen. There first for thee my passion grew. Sweet ! sweet Matilda Pottingen ! Thou wast the daughter of my Tu — — tor, Law Professor at the U — — niversity of Gottingen— — niversity of Gottingen. Sun, moon, and thou, vain world, adieu. That kings and priests are plotting in : Here doom'd to starve on water gru — — el, never shall I see the U — — niversity of Gottingen — — niversity of Gottingen. [Daring the last stanza, Jiogero dashes his head repeatedly against the walls of his prison ; and,Jinalhj, so hard as to j^rodace a visible contasion. Se then throu-s himself on the floor In an agony. The curtain drops, the music still continuing to play, till it is wholly fallen.] But the young English writers, who delighted in wild German imaginings, and, among other things, dealt much like Matthew Gregory Lewis, in " Tales of Terror," and " Tales of Wonder," could jest at theii- own fancies as cheerfully as any satii'ist. M. G. Lewis's "Tales of Terror," in 1799, fascinated Walter Scott, and caused him to make his tii-st venture with original song as a contributor to the succeeding " Tales of Wonder." But thus its editor played with his own legend of the " Cloud King," as Southey parodied his own ballad of the " Old Woman of Berkeley : " — CJRIM, KING OF THE GHOSTS. ■' Why, how now, old se.xton ? why shake you with dread ? Why haunt you this street, where j'ou're siu-e to <-atch cold J FuU wann is your blanket, full snug is yoiu' bed 1 And long since, by the steeple-chimes, twelve has been told."— "Tom Taji, on this night my retreat you'll approve. For my ehurch-yard will swarni with its shroud- eovcr'd hosts : Who will tell, with loud sluick, that resentment and love. Still nip the cold heart of Grim, King of the Ghosts. " One eve, as the fiend wander'd thrnugli the thick gloom. Towards my newly-tQed cot he directed his sight : And, casting a glance in my little back room. Gazed on Nancy, my daughter, with wanton delight. • ' Yet Nancy was proud, and disdainful was she, In affection's fond speech she'd no pleasure or joy ; And vainly he sued, though he knelt at her knee, Bob Brisket, so comely, the young butcher's boy ! " ' For you, dearest Nancy, I've oft been a thief. Yet my theft it was venial, a theft if it be ; For who could have eyes, and not see you loved beef 't Or who see a steak, and not steal it for thee ':" " ' Remember, dear beauty, dead flesh cannot feel, With frowns you my heart and its passion requite ; Yet oft have I seen you when hungry at meal. On a dead buUock's heart gaze with tender delight. TO A.D. 1800." SHORTER POEMS. 4:?3 " ' When you dress it lor dinner, so hard and so toush, I wish the employ yoiu' stem hreast would improve ; And the dead buUoek's heart while with onions you stuif. You would stuff your own lieiirt, eruel virgin, with love.' — "'Young rascal! presum'st thou, with butehcr-likc phi-aso, To foul stinking onions my love to compare ; Who have set Wick, the candle-man, all in a hlaze, And Alderman Paunch, who has since been the Mayor ? " ' You bid mo remember dead flesh cannot feel. Then I vow by my father's old pick-axe and spade, Till some prince from the tombs shall behave so genteel As to ask me to wed, I'll continue a maid ! " ' Nor him will I wed till (these terms must he own) Of my two first commands the performan •^ he boasts. ' — Straight, instead of a footman, a deep-pealing groan. Announced the approach o f Grim, King of the Ghosts ! " No flesh had the spectre, his skeleton skull Was loosely wrapp'd rouud with a brown, shrivcU'd skin; His bones, 'stead of marrow, of maggots were full, And the worms they crawled out, and the worms they crawled in. " His shoes they were coffins, his dim eye revsal'd The gleam of a grave-lamp with vapoui'S oppress'd ; And a dark crimson necklace of blood-drops congoal'd Reflected each bone that jagg'd out of his breast. *' In a hoarse hollow whisper — ' Thy beauties,' he cried, ' Have drawn up a spirit to give thee a kiss ; No butcher shall call thee, proud Nancy, his bride ; The grim King of Spectres demands thee for his. " ' My name frightens infants, my word raises ghosts, My tread wakes the echoes which breathe tluough the aisle ; And lo ! here stands the Prince of the Chui'ch-yard, who boasts The will to perform thy commands for a smile' "He said, and he ki.s3'd her: she pack'd up her clothes. And straight they eloped through the window with joy ■• Yet long in her ears rang the curses and oaths. Which growl'd at his rival the gruff butcher's boy. ** At the charnel-house palace soon Nancy arrived, When the fiend with a grin which her soul did appal, E.xclaim'd — ' I must warn my pale subjects I'm wived, And bid them prepare a grand supper and ball I ' " Thrice swifter than thought on his heel round he turns. Three capers he cut, and then motionless stood : Then on cards made of dead men's skins, Nancy discerns His lank fingers to scrawl invitations in blood. " His quill was a wind-pipe, his ink-horn a skull, A blade-bone his pen-knife, a tooth was his seal ; Soon he order'd the cards, in a voice deep and dull. To haste and invite all his friends to the meal. 55 " Away flew the cards to tho south and the nortli. Away flew the cards to tlie east and tlie west ; Straight witli groans from their tombs the pale spectres stalk' d forth. In deadly apparel and slirouding sheets dress'd. "And quickly scar'd Nancy, with anxious aff'right. Hears the tramp of a steed and a knock at the gate ; On a hell-horse so gaunt, 'twas a grim ghastly sprite, On a pillion behind a slio-skeloton sate ! " The poor maiden she thought 'twas a dream or a trance, While the guests they assembled gigantic and UiU ; Each sprite asked a skeleton lady to dance. And King Grim with fair Nancy now opcn'd the b;ill. " Pale spectres send music from dark vaults above, Wither'd legs, 'stead of drum-sticks, they brandish on high; Grinning ghosts, sheeted spirits, skipping skeletons mo^'e, ^\^lile hoarse whispers and rattling of bones shake the sky. " With their pliable joints tho Scotch steps they do well, Nancy's hand with their cold clammy fingers they squeeze ; Now sudden appalled, the maid hears a death-bell. And straight, dark and dismal, the supper she sees ! " A tomb was the table : now each took his seat, Every sprite next his partner so pale and so wan. Soon as ceased was the rattling of skeleton feet. The clattering of jaw-bones directly began ! " Of dead aldermen's fat the mould candles were made. Stuck in sockets of bone they gleam'd dimly and blue ; Their dishes were scutcheons, and corses decay' d Were the viands that glutted this ravenous crew 1 •' Through the nostrils of skulls their blood-liquor they pour, The black draught in the heads ef young infants tliey quail; The vice-president rose, with his jaws dripping gore. And address'd the pale damsel with horrible laugh. " ' Feast, Queen of the Ghosts, tho repast do not scorn ; Feast, Queen of the Glio.sts, I perceive thou hast food ; To-mori'ow again shall we feast, for at noon Shall we feast on thy flesh, and drink of thy bloodj , '• Tlien cold as a cucumber Nancy she grew, Her proud stomach came down, and she blared, and she cried, ' Oh, tell me, dear Grim, does that spectre speak true. And will you not save from Iris clutches your bride ':' — '■ ' Vain your grief, silly maid, when the nuitin bells ring. The bond becomes due, which long since did I sign ; For she, who at night weds the grizzly Ghost King, Next mom must be dress'd for his subjects to dine.' — " ' In silks and in satins for you I'll be dress'd. My soft tender limbs let their fangs never crunch.' — ' Fair Nancy, yon ghosts, should I grant your request. Instead of at diimer, would eat you at lunch 1 ' — • 434 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. ISIH). " ' But vain, ghostly King, is your cunning and guilo, That hond must be void which you never can pay : Lo ! I ne'er will be yours, tUl, to purchase my smile, My two first commands (as you swore) you obey.' — " ' Well say'st thou, fair Nancy, thy wishes impart. But think not to puzzle Grim, King of the Ghosts.' Straight she tui-ns o'er each difficult task in her heart, And — ' I've found out a poser,' exultingly boasts. " ' You vow'd that no butcher should call me his bride. That this vow you fulfil my first asking shall be ; And since so many maids in your clutches have died, Than your.self show a [butcher more] butcher,' said she. " Then .shrill scream the spectres ; the charnel-house gloom Swift ligiitnings disperse, and the palace destroy; Again Nancy stood — in the little back room. And again at her knee knelt the young butcher's boy ! " ' I'll have done with dead husbands,' she Brisket bespeaks, ' I'll now take a live one, so fetch me a ring ! ' And when press'd to her lips were his red beefin cheeks. She loved him much more than the shriveU'd Ghost King. " No longer his steaks and his cutlets she spurns. No longer he fears his grim rival's palo band; Yet still when the famed first of April returns, The sprites rise in squadrons, and Nancy demand. "This informs you, Tom Tap, why to-night I remove. For I dread the approach of the shroud-cover'd hosts ! 'Who tell, with loud shriek, that resentment and love Stm nip the cold heart of Grim, King of the Ghosts ! " CHAPTER XVIII. First Quarter op the Nineteenth Century. — Wordsworth, Scott, Byron, Shelley, Keats, AND others. A.D. 1800 TO A.D. 1825. The deaths of Keats in 1821, SheUey in 1822, and Byron in 1824, bring to a natural close the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Tliis was one of the great perioi.s of English jjoetr}^, and it owed its grandeur" to a stirring of the depths of life. When- ever the condition of society brings men to feel deeply and to think liabitually and intently upon questions that touch it to the quick, the soul of a nation rises to the highest utterance, in action and in song. The eighteenth century closed with a noble aspiration. Its voice was in young Thomas Campbell's " Pleasiu-es of Hope," the master poem of a youth of two-and-twenty, published in the last year of the last century. Such hope as was there painted was our century's inheritance ; and how to realise it became the first problem of our time. During the first quarter of this century, while Byron's passionate genius came to express much of the new tumult of thought; full of defiance of old forms, full also of impulsive sympathies and generous impatience for the freedom of nations ; and while Shelley a^ose to give shapes of beauty and sometimes of grandeur to vague yearning for all that was high and pure in the fii'st dream of the Revolution, William Wordsworth quietly passed with the same ideal from the world of dreams into the world of fact, and already in 1805 had set down in his then unpublished poem, " The Prelude," the conviction on which all his after-work was based. He gathered from the failure of the French Revolution not despair-, but faith. By the daily influences to which his heart was open, he was taught trust in the gi-eat processes of nature, in the providence of God. " What man has made of man " did not become to him a less present evil ; but he leamt, and made it his Hl'e's work as a poet to lead othere into, the one way towards the ideal that was still before him, on which his mind was fixed more calmly, but only the more intently, — the day of "the crowning race " when, human degradation seen no more at every turn of life, all shall become what only a few now can be. It is not for ns by violent and sudden change in constitution of the State that this end is to be achieved ; the way to it is by looking to each Individual, each atom in the mass. Let every child be taught ; let the worth of a man be felt, and, as far as may be, every help given to those who are low to rise ; take away hindrances ; secure as far iis possible that every mind in the social mass shall become sounder and larger. In that way, and in that way only — having once obtained enough of civil liberty to lay such a way open — can we show the nations " To what end The powers of civil poHty are given." Thus Wordsworth, while the revolutionary stir was still about him, and few heeded his quiet voice, marked out the lines along which in the England of to-day action and thought are alike travelling. Such movements of thought will be most readily observed in the volume of this Library that illusti-ates the substance of our larger works ; for upon Cami)beirs " Pleasures of Hope," upon Wordsworth's " Prelude" and " Excursion," upon Byron's " ChOde Harold." upon Shelley's "Prometheus Bound," ;ind upon other poems of like range, this is not the place to dwell. Success of his " Pleasures of Hope " brought Thomas Campbell to London, and in June, 1800, twenty-three years old, he started on a trip to Ger- many, where he saw scenes of war that painfully recurred to him in after years when he was fevered and iU. He sent from Germany some strains of patriotic song to the Morning Chronicle. One of them, written at Altona, in the winter of 1800, was signed " Amator Patrioe," and entitled " Alteration of the Old Ballad ' Ye Gentlemen of England,' com- posed on the Prospect of a Russian War : " — ye mariners of ENGLAND. Ye mariners of England ! That guard our native seas : "Whose flag has braved, a thousand years, The battle and the breeze ! Y'our glorious standard launch again Ti match another foe ! TO A.D. 1825.] SHORTER POEMS. 435 And sweep through the deep. While the stormy winds do blow ; While the battle rages loud and long, And the stomiy winds do blow. 10 The spirits of your fathers Sh:Ul start from every wave ! — For the deck it was their field of fame, And Ocean was their grave : Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell, Your manly hearts shall glow, As ye sweep tlii'ough the deep, While the stormy winds do blow ; ^V^lile the battle rages loud and long. And the stormy winds do blow. 20 Britannia needs no bulwarks, No towers along the steep ; Her march is o'er the mountain- waves, Her home is on the deep. With thunders from her native oak, She quells the floods below, — As they roar on the shore. When the stormy winds do blow ; When the battle rages loud and long, And the stormy winds do blow. 30 The meteor flag of England Shall yet terrific bum ; Till danger's troubled night depart, And the star of peace return. Then, then, ye ocean-warriors ! Our song and feast shall flow To the fame of your name. When the storm has ceased to blow ; AVTien the fierj' fight is heard no more. And the storm has ceased to blow. 40 During his tour iii Germany, Campbell saw a battle from a convent near Ratisbon, and he saw the field of Ingolstadt after a battle, from such experiences he deiived his poem on the battle in which the French defeated the Austrians at Hohen- linden, on the 3rd of December, 1800. Ten thousand Austrians were kUled or woiuided, and as many were nuide prisoners. HOHENLINDEX. On Linden, when the sun was low. All bloodless lay the untrodden snow. And dark as winter was the flow Of Iser, rolling rapidly. But Linden saw another sight. When the drum beat, at dead of night. Commanding fires of death to light The darkness of her scenery. By torch and trumpet fast array'd, Each horsenian drew his battle-blade. And furious every charger neigh'd, To join the dreadful revelry. Then shook the hills with thunder riven. Then riish'd the steed to battle driven. And louder than the bolts of heaven. Far flash'd the red artillery. 10 But redder yet that light shall glow On Linden's Iiills of stained snow. And bloodier yet tlio torrent flow Of Iser, rolling rapidly. 20 'Tis mom, but scarce yon level sun Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun. Where fiu-ious Frank and fiery Hun Shout in their sulph'rous canopy. The combat deepens. On, ye bravo. Who rush to glory, or the grave ! Wave, Munich ! all thy bamic: ; wave. And charge with all thy chivalry ! Few, few, shall part where many meet ! The snow shall he their winding-sheet, 30 And every turf beneath their feet Shall be a soldier's sepulchi-e. Wordsworth produced his first sonnets in 1801, after hearing sonnets of INIilton read to him by his sister Dorothy. One of them was on Na]ioleon. In 1797 Bonaparte had said, "What the French want is Glory, and to have their vanity gratified. As to Liberty, they don't know what to do with it." In 1800 he made himself First Consul for ten yeai-s with two shadows, a second and third Consid with consultative powers, Cambaceres and Lebrun. Thus Wordsworth wrote of liim in 1801 : — NAPOLEON. I grieved for Buonaparte, with a vain And an unthinking grief ! The tendcrest mood Of that Man's mind — what can it be ? what food Fed his first hopes ? what knowledge could he gain ? 'Tis not in battles that from youth we train The Governor who must be wise and good, And temper with the sternness of the I)rain Thoughts motherly, and meek as womanhood. Wisdom doth live with childi-en round her knees : Books, leisiu'e, perfect freedom, and the talk 19 Man holds with week-day man in the hourly walk Of the mind's business : these are the degrees By which true Sway doth moimt ; this is the stalk True Power doth grow on ; and her rights are these. In 1802, the year of his marriage with Mary Hutchinson, Wordswortli, after the Peace of Amiens, visited France. That peace was signed on the 27th of March, 1802. On the 2nd of August, it was declared by three and a half millions of votes that France had chosen Napoleon Bonaparte Consul for life. Whereon Wordsworth wrote, at Calais, AUGUST 15. 1802. Festivals have I sGen that were not names : This is young Biionaparte's natal day. And his is henceforth an established sway — Consul for life. With worship France proclaims Her approbation, and with pomps and games. Heaven grant that other cities may be gay '. Calais is not : and I have bent my way To the sea-coast, noting that each mnn frames 136 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1800 10 His business as he likes. Far other show My youth here witnessed, in a prouder time ; The senselessness of joy was then sublime ! Happy is he, who, curing not for Pope, Consul, or King, can sound himself to know The destiny of Man, and live in hope. But Wordswoi'th expressed then also his sense of England's need, if she was to rise to her fall height for the impending struggle : — SONNETS WRITTEN IN 1802. O Friend ! I know not which way I must look For comfort, b'.'ing, as I am, opprest. To think that now our life is only drest For show ; mean handywork of craftsman, cook. Or gi'oom ! — We must run glittering like a brook In the open sunshine, or we are unblest : The wealthiest man among us is the best : No grandeur now in natui'e or in book Delights us. Rapine, avarice, expense, This is idolatry : and these we adore : Plain living and high thinking are no more : The homely beauty of the good old cause Is gone ; our peace, our fearful innocence, And pure religion breathing household laws. 10 Milton ! thou should' st be living at this hour : England hath need of thee : she is a fen Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, Have forfeited their ancient English dower Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ; Oh ! raise us up, return to us again ; And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power. Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart : Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea : 1 Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,* So didst thou ti'avel on life's common way. In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart The lowliest duties on herself did lay- Great men have been among us ; hands that penned And tongues that uttered wisdom — better none : The later Sidney, JIarvcll, Harrington, Young Vane, and others who called Milton friend. These moralists could act and comprehend : They knew how genuine glory was put on ; Taught us how rightfully a nation shone In splendour : what strength was that would not bend But in magnanimous meekness. France, 'tis strange, Hath brought forth no such souls as we had then. 1 Perpetual emptiness I unceasing change ! No single volume paramount, no code, No master spirit, no determined road ; But equally a want of books and men ! It is not to be thought of that the Flood Of British Freedom, which, to the open sea Of the world's praise, from dark antiquity Hath flowed, " witli pomp of waters, unwithstood,' Roused though it be full often to a mood \\Tiich spurns the cheek of salutary bands. That this most famous Stream in bogs and sands Should perish ; and to e\Tl and to good Be lost tor ever. In our halls is hung Armoury of the invincible knights of old : 10 AVe must be free or die, who speak the tongue That Shakespeare spake ; the faith and morals hold Which Milton held. — In every thing we are sprung Of Earth's first blood, have titles manifold. On the 13th of May, 1803, strife was lesumed between England and France. Then began the war against Napoleon which ended with the battle of Waterloo, and with wliich Wordsworth was in patriotic sympathy. In Jlay, 1804, France was declared an empire. On the 2nd of the following December, Napoleon was crowned Emperor. In May, 1805, he was crowned King of Italy in Milan. On the 14th of October, 1806, followed the battle of Jena, after which Napoleon entered Berlin in triumph. From Berlin he issued, on the 21st of November, his famous decrees against England. To these last events Words- worth referred in the soimet dated NOVEMBEE, 1806. Another year ! — another deadly blow ! Another mighty empire overthrown 1 And We are left, or shall be left, alone ; The last that dare to struggle with the Foe. 'Tis well ! from this day forward we shall know That in ourselves our safety must be sought ; That by our own right hands it must be wrought ; That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low. O dastard whom such foretaste doth not cheer ! We shall e.xult, if they who rule the land 10 Be men who hold its many blessings dear, Wise, upright, valiant ; not a servile band, Who are to judge of danger which they fear, And honour which they do not underatand. In A])ril of the yesr 1 802 — the year of his marriage — Wordsworth wrote his poem of "The Daffodils." That poem gives words to a feeling expressed by his sister Doi-othy, and the two best lines in it — " They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude," were contributed by Mai-y Hutchinson, then about to become the poet's wife, herself the subject of the lines beginning " She was a ])hantom of delight," of the lines written in 1824, •' Oh, dearer far than light and life are dear," and of the lines " To a Painter," written after si.x-and-thirty }'ears of marriage. SHE W.\S A PH.^NTOM OF DELIGHT. She was a phantom of delight A\Tien first she gleamed upon my sight; A lovely apparition, sent To be a moment's ornament ; Her eyes as stars of twilight fair. Like twilight's, too, her dusky hair; But all things else about her drawn From Jlay-time and the cheerful dawn , A dancing shape, an image gay, To haunt, to startle, and waylay. 10 TO A.D. 1S25.] SHORTER POEMS. 437 I saw her upon nearer view, A spirit, yet a woman too '. Her household motions light and free, And steps of vii'gin-libcrty ; A countenance in which did meet Sweet records, promises as sweet ; A creature not too bright or good For human nature's daily food ; For transient sorrows, simple wiles. Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and smiles. 20 And now I see with eye serene The very pulse of the machine : A being breathing thoughtful breath, A traveller between life and death ; The reason firm, the temperate will. Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill : A perfect woman, nobly planned. To warn, to comfort, and conunand ; And yet a spirit still, and bright With something of angelie light. 30 Of the five children of the marriage, two died in 1812. Their health had been a cause of care. One of them {Catherine) died in June, when the family wa.s living in the Grasmere Parsonage. The other (Thomas), a boy of .six, who made it his care in the autumn to sweep fallen leaves from his little sister's grave, followed her in December. The mother .could not remain in the Parsonage, with the little graves always in view, and a removal to some short distance from Gra.smere seemed best. Therefore it was that, in the spring of 1813, the household was transferred to Rydal Mount, which became thenceforth Words- worth's liome until his death, in 1850. Rydal Mount. In 1801 Walter Scott contributed "The Fire King," " Glenfinlas," " The Eve of St. John," and otlier short pieces, to M. G. Lewis's "Tales of Wonder." His first great success as a poet Wiis won in 180,"), Viy his first long romance — " The Lav of the La,st Min- strel " — in a measure suggested to him, Ijy having heard John Stoddart read Coleridge's " Christabel." Scott's place is an ini]iortant one in other volumes of this Library, Ijut he must be rejjresentod here by one or two short jioems. This was written in LSI. 5: — LULLABY OF AN I.VFANT CHIEF. Oh, hush thee, my babic, thy sire was a knight. Thy mother a lady both lovely and bright ; The woods and the glens, from the towers which we see. They all are belonging, de;ir babie, to thee. ho ro, i ri ri, cadul gu lo, ho ro, i ri ri, &c. ] Oh, fear not the bugle, though loudly it blows, It calls but the warders that guard thy rejjose ; Their bows would be bended, theii' blades would be red, Ere the step of a foeman draws near to thy bed. ho ro, i ri ri, kc. Oh, hush thee, my babie, the time soon will come, ^\Tien thy sleep shall be broken by trumpet and drum ; Then hush thee, my darling, take rest while you may. For strife comes with manhood, and waking with day. ho ro, i ri ri, &c. ThLs wa.s written in 1816 : — PIBROCH OF DONALD DHU. Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, Pibroch of Uonuil, AVake thy wild voice anew. Summon Clan Conuil. Come away, come away. Hark to the summons '. Come in your war anay, Gentles and commons. Come from deep glen, and From mountain so rocky. The war-pipe and pennon Ale at Inverloeky. Come every hill-plaid, and True heart that wears one. Come every steel blade, and Strong hand that bears one. Leave untended the herd, The flock without shelter ; Leave the corpse uninterr'd, The bride at the altar ; Leave the deer, leave the steer, Leave nets and barges : Come with your fighting goar, Broadswords and targes. Come as the winds come, when Forests arc rendod ; Come as the waves come, when Navies are stranded : Faster come, faster come. Faster and faster. Chief, vassal, ]«ge, and groom, Tenant and master. 10 20 30 438 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1801 Fast thoy oome, fast they come ; See how they gather ! Wide waves the eagle plume, Blended with heather. Cast your plaids, draw your blades. Forward each man set ! Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, Knell for the onset .' 40 The next is from Scott's novel of published in 1820 :— ' The Monastery," BORDER BALLAD. March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale, Why the doll dinna ye march forward in order ? March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale, All the Blue Bonnets are hound for the Border. Many a banner spread Flutters above your head. Many a crest that is famous in story. Mount and make ready then, Sons of the mountain glen. Fight for the Queen and our old Scottish glory. Come from the bilk where your hirsels ' are grazing. Come from the glen of the buck and the roe ; Come to the crag where the beacon is blazing, Come with the buckler, the lance, and the bow. Trumpets are sounding. War-steeds are bounding. Stand to your arms, and march in good order, England shall many a day Tell of the bloody fray. When the Blue Bonnets came over the Border. 10 20 Robert Bloomfield, whose " Farmer's Boy " came as song to hLs lips while he was among journeymen shoemakers in a London alley, and was published in 1800, thus described fashion at Ranelagh rejoicing in the peace of 1802 :— RANELAGH. To Ranelagh, onc« in my life. By good-natur'd force I was driven ; The nations had ceas'd their long strife, And Peace bcam'd her radiance from heaven. What wonders were there to be found That a clown might enjoy or disdain ': First we trac'd the gay ring all around. Aye — and then we went round it agiiin. A thousand feet rustled on mats, A carpet that once had been green ; 10 Men bow'd with their outlandish hats. With corners so fearfully keen 1 Fair maids, who at home in their haste Had left all clothing else but a train, Swept the floor clean, as slowly they pac'd. And then — walk'd round and swept it again. * UirseU, flocks of sheep. The music was truly enchanting ! Right glad was I when I came near it ; But in fashion I found I was wanting — 'Twas the fashion to walk and not hear it ! l!0 A fine youth, as beauty besot him, Look'd smilingly round on the train ; '• The king's nephew," they criod, as they met him ; Then — we went round and met him again. Huge paintings of heroes and Peace Seem'd to smile at the soimd of the fiddle, Proud to fill up each tall shining space Eoimd the lanthom that stood in the middle. And George's head too; Heaven screen him J May he finish in peace his long reign ! 30 And what did we when we had seen him 'i Why — went round and saw him again. A bcU rang, announcing new pleasures, A crowd in an instant prest hard. Feathers nodded, perfumes shed their treasm-es. Round a door that led into the yard. 'Twas peopled all o'er in a minute. As a white flock would cover a plain ! We had seen every soul that was in it. Then we went roimd and saw them again. 40 But now came a scene worth the showing, The fireworks ! midst laughs and huzzas. With explosions the sky was all glowing. Then down stream' d a million of stars; With a rush the bright rockets ascended. Wheels spurted blue fires like a rain ; We tum'd with regret when 'twas ended, Then star'd at each other again. There thousands of gay lamps aspired To the tops of the trees and beyond ; 50 And, what was most hugely admired. They look'd all upside-down in a pond ! The blaze scarce an eagle could bear ; And an owl had most surely been slain ; We retum'd to the circle, and there — And there we went round it again. 'Tis not wisdom to love without reason, Or to censure without knowing why : I had witness'd no crime, nor no treason, " O Life, 'tis thy picture," said I. 60 'Tis just thus we saunter along, Months and years bring their pleasures or pain ; We sigh 'midst the right and the wrong, And then we go round them again ! And here Bloomfield is telling a true story of THE FAKENHAM GHOST. The lawns were dry in Euston Park ; (Here Truth inspires my tale) The lonely footpath, still and dark. Led over lull and dale. Benighted was an ancient dame. And fearful haste she made To gain the vale of Fakenham, And haU its wiUow shade. TO i.D. 1825.] SHORTER POEMS. 439 Her footsteps know no idle stops, But foUow'd faster stiU 10 And echo'd to the dai'ksome copse That whisper' d on the hill ; Where clam'rous rooks, yet srarLT'Iy hush'd, Bespoke a peopled shade, And many a wing the foliage brush'd, And hov'ring circuits made. The dappled herd of gi-azing- deer That sought the shades by day. Now started from her path with fear, And gave the stranger way. 20 Darker it grew ; and d:uker f eai-s ■ Came o'er her troubled mind : — When now, a short quick step she hears Come patting close behind. She tum'd ; it stopt ! — nought could she see Upon the gloomy plain ! But as she strove the sprite to flee, She heard the same again. Now terror seized her quaking frame : For, where the path was bare, .30 The ti'otting Ghost kept on the same ! She mutter'd many a pray'r. Yet ouee again, amidst her fright, She tried what sight could do ; When through the cheating glooms of night, A monster stood in view. Regardless of whate'er she felt, It follow' d down the plain ! She owu'd her sins, and downi she knelt, And said her prayers again. 40 Then on she sped : and hope grew strong, The white park gate in view ; Which pushing hard, so long it swung That ghost and all pass'd through. Loud fell the gate against the post ! Her heart-strings like to crack : For much she fear'd the grisly ghost Would leap upon her back. Still on, pat, pat, the goblin went, As it had done before : — .00 Her strength and resolution spent, She fainted at the door. Out came her husband, much surpris'd ; Out came her daughter dear : Good-natur'd souls ! all unadvis'd Of what they had to fear. The candle's gleam pierc'd thi-ough the night, Some short space o'er the green ; And there the little trotting sprite Bistinctly might be seen. 60 An ass's foal had lost its dam Within the spacious I'ark ; And simple as the playful Iamb, Had follow 'd in the dark. No goblin he ; no imp of sin : No crimes had ever known. They took the shaggy stranger in, And roar'd him as their own. His little hoofs would rattle round Upon the cottage floor : The matron leam'd to love the sound That frighten'd her before. A favourite the ghost became, And 'twas his fate to thrive ; And long he liv'd and spread hia fame. And kept the joke alive. For many a laugh went through the vale ; And some conviction too : Each thought some other goblin tale, Perhaps, was just as true. 70 S» Here we find place for one of the sea songs of Charles Dibdin, who was bred for the Church, but took to music and the stage, gave entertainments at which he sang his own songs, and died in 1814, aged about seventy : — POOR JACK. Go patter to lubbers and swabs, d'ye see, 'Bout danger, and fear, and the like ; A tight water-boat and good sea-room give me, And it ain't to a little I'U strike : Though the tempest topgallant-masts smack smooth should smite. And shiver each splinter of wood, Clear the wreck, stow the yards, and bouze everytliing tight, And under reef 'd fore-saU we'll scud : Avast ! nor don't think me a milksop so soft To be taken for trifles aback ; 1 For, they say, there's a Providence sits up aloft. To keep watch fcj the life of poor Jack. I heard our good chaplain palaver one day. About souls, heaven, mercy, and such ; And, my timbers ! what lingo he'd coil and belay, Why, 'twas all one to me as High Dutch : But he said how a sparrow can't founder, d'ye see. Without orders that come down below ; And a many fine tilings, that proved clearly to me That Providence takes us in tow : 20 For, says he, do you mind me, let storms e'er so oft Take the top-sails of sailors aback, There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft. To keep watch for the life of poor Jack. I said to our Poll, for, d'ye see, she would cry When last we weigh'd anchor for sea, What argufies sniv'Uing and piping your eye ? ■ttliy, what a [j-oung] fool you must be ! 440 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1800 Can't you see the world's wide, and there's room for us all, Both for seamen and lubbers ashore P 'M And if to Old Davy I go, my dear PsU, Why, you never will hear of me more : What then ? all's a hazard — come, don't be so soft, Perhaps I may, laughing, come back ; For, d'ye see, there's a cherub sits smiling aloft. To keep watch for the life of poor Jack. D'ye mind me, a sailor should be every inch All as one as a piece of the ship, And with her brave the world, without offering to flinch, From the moment the anchor's a-trip ; As for mo, in all weathers, all times, sides, and ends Nought's a trouble from duty that springs ; For my heart is my Poll's, and my rhino's my friend'.- And as for my life, 'tis the King's. Even when my time comes, ne'er believe me so soft As for grief to be taken aback : For the same little cherub that sits up aloft. Will look out a good berth for poor .lack ! 40 .James Graliame, the author of longer poems on " Tlie Sabbath " and " The Birds of Scotland," gave up practice at tlie bar for the service of the Church, and died in 1811 curate of Sedgfield, near Durham. HLs fi-iend John Wilson (Christopher North, of Blackwood's Ma^azirie) honoured his memory witli an elegy that far outweighs the sneer of Byron at " .sepulchral Grahame." Thus Grahame wrote of the thanksgiving of the fleet after the battle of Trafalgar, in October, 1805 :— THE THANKSGIVING OFF CAPE TRAFALGAR. Upon the high, yet gently rolling wave, The floating tomb that heaves above the brave. Soft sighs the gale, that late tremendous roared. Whelming the ■n'retched remnants of the sword. And now the cannon's peacefid sunmions calls The \'ictor bands to mount their wooden walls. And from the ramparts, where their comrades fell. The mingled strain of joy and gi-ief to swell : Fast they ascend, from stem to stem they spread. And crowd the engines whence the lightnings sped : The white-robed priest his upraised hands extends. Hushed is each voice, attention leaning bends ; Then from each prow the grand hosannas rise. Float o'er the deep, and hover to the skies. Hciven fills each heart ; yet Home will oft intrude. And tears of love celestial joys exclude. The wounded man, who hears the soaring strain. Lifts his pale visage, and forgets his pain ; A\Tiile parting spirits, mingling with the lay. On hallelujahs wing their heavenward way. 10 20 James Montgomery, born in 1771, son of a Mora- vian missionary in Ayi-shire, was at a school in York- shire when both his parents died in the Ea,st Indies. He began life as assistant in a village shop, but found his way into the sen-ice of a Sheflield bookseller, who printed a newspaper which, in the days of the French Revolution, brought on him Government prosecution for its frealom of speech. Montgomei-y afterwards, edited it, and sufl'ered also for the love of freedom that in his later life blended with healthy religion in a series of longer poems. This is one of Jume.s Montgomery's shoiter pieces ; — TO AGNES. Time will not check his eager flight, Though gentle Agnes scold. For 'tis the sage's dear delight To make young ladies old. Then listen, Agnes, friendship sings ; Seize fast his forelock grey. And pluck from his careering wings A feather every day. Adom'd with these, defy his rage. And bid him plough your face, 1ft For every fun-ow of old age Shall be a line of grace. Start not ; old age is Virtue's prime ; Most lovely she appears. Glad in the spoils of vanquish'd Time, Down in the vale of years. Beyond that vale, in boundless bloom. The eternal mountains rise ; Virtue descends not to the tomb. Her rest is in the skies. The James Montgomery who wrote poetry is not to be confoxuided with a Robert of like name who wrote veree. " The Remains of Henry Kirke White," who died in 1806, aged twenty-one, were published, with a memoir, by kindly Robert Southey, who had been first to collect Chatterton's poems. Kii-ke White was the son of a butcher at Notting- ham, and was placed in early boyhood at a stocking- loom, with the hope of getting him some day into a hosier's warehouse. But he yearned for " something to occupy his brain," and, at fifteen, was placed in the oflice of a respectable firm of attorneys at Not- tingham. At seventeen he issued, in 1802, a little book of verse. A cruel review of it caused Southey to befriend him. Strong convictions of religion very soon afterwards led him to give up the law, and hope for entrance in some way to one of the univei-sities. With an unsound constitution, he worked a,s no healthy youth should work. " He now allowed him- self," says Southey, " no time for relaxation, little for his meals, and scai-cely any for sleep. He would read till one, two, or three o'clock in the morning ; then throw himself on the bed, and rise again to his work at five, at the call of a 'larum which he had fixed to a Dutch clock in his chamber. IMany nights lie never laid down at all." That soi't of life means death. Means were found, by the aid of many friends, to enable Kirke White to go to St. John's College, Cambridge, and there he finished killing TO A.D. ItSiS.J SHOKTEll POEMS. 441 himself by over-work for examination, gives patlios to this poem of liis : — Sucli a lift TO MY LYRK. Thou simple Lyro 1 — Tliy music wild Has serv'd to chann tlie wean" hour. And many a lonely night has 'guil'd, AVTien oven pain has own'd and smil'd. Its fascinating power. Yet, oh my Ljto I the busy crowd Will little heed thy simple tones : Them, mightier minstrels harping luud Engross ; and thou, and I, must sliroud Where dark obli«on 'tlirones. No hand, thy diapason o'er. Well skiU'd, I throw with sweep sulilimc ; For me, no academic lore Has taught the solemn strain to poui'. Or build the polish'd rhj-mc. Yet thou to sylvan themes canst soar ; Thou know'st to charm the woodland train : The rustic swains believe thy power Can hush the wild winds when they roar. And still the billowy main. These honours, Ljtc, wc yet may keep ; I, still unknown, may live with thee ; And gentle zephyr's wing will sweej) Thy solemn string, where low I sleep. Beneath the alder-tree. This little dirge will please me more Than the full requiem's swelling peal ; I'd rather than that crowds should sigh For me, that from some kindred eye The trickling tear should steal. Yet dear to mo the wreath of bay. Perhaps from me debarr'd ; And dear to me the classic zone. Which snatch'd from learning's labour'd tlu'om- Adorns the accepted bard. And oh ! if yet 'twere mine to dwell WTiere Cam or Isis winds along. Perchance, inspir'd with ardour chaste, I yet might call the ear of taste To listen to my song. Oh '. then, my little friend, thy styli.' I'd change to happier lays. Oh ! then, the eloister'd glooms .should smile. And through the long the fretted aisli/ Should swell the note of praisi'. 10 no 4U Leigh Hunt, .i rear older than Kirke Wliite, was a theatrical critic when Kirke White died. In 1808, he joined his brotlier John in foundinif and editing the Examiner newsjiaper, became the friend of many of the chief ]ioets of the day, and was imi)risoned in 1812 for being unable to conceal his opinion of the 56 person who, as Prince Kegent, was then entitled to. his little term of worship. Leigh Hunt became dear to .lohn Keats, went to Italy, and was tliero a friend of Shelley and Byron, and afterwards lived on to tho year 18.59, working througliout his long and active career, in all that he wrote of jjrose or veree, with, the temper of a poet. This is vei-se of his : — ABOU BEN ADUEM. Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase !) Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace, And saw, witliin the moonlight in his room. Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom, An angel writing in a book of gold : — E.xcceding peace had made Ben Adhem bold. And to the presence in the room he said, "■What writest thou ':' " — The vision rais'd its head. And with a look made of all sweet accord, Answcr'd, " The names of those who love the Lord." 10 " And is mine one ? " said Abou. " Nay, not so," Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low. But cheerly still ; and said, " I pray thee then. Write mo as one that loves his fellow-men." The angel wrote, and vanish' d. Tho next night It came again with a great wakening light. And show'd the names whom love of God had bless'd. And lo ! Ben Adhem' s name led all the rest. Byron in 1800 -wan a boy of twelve, and Walter Scott a man of nine-and-twenty. Byron was born on the 22nd of January, 1788 — the son of a disso- lute father and a foolish mother, who jiarted from each other not very long after his birth. The mother had been a Scotch heiress, but lier fortune was squandered, and she went Itack, with the scrap of income that had been beyond her husb;ind's reach, to live cheapl}^ at Aberdeen. The old lord at New- stead, whose heir the boy became after his father's death, took no notice of mother or son. When George Gordon, whose mother had ca.st otf even his father's name, became Lord Byron at the age of ten, there was a sudden change from poverty to wealth. Then followed education : preparation for HaiTow ; Harrow ; Cambridge. At nineteen, when still a student at Cambridge, Byron published his exercises in verse as " Houi-s of Idleness." A touch of lordly conceit at the close of the ]ireface to this little liook caused the EJhihunih Hevieir to laugh at it. Byron felt this, and it fetched out of him the first evidence of his power in the " English Bards and Scotch Re- viewers." In September, 1808, he had left Cam- bridge, and taken up his residence at Newstead, where he was preparing this piece of retaliation. In Jan>iary, 1809, lie came of age; on the l.'kh of March following he took his seat in the House of Lords ; and three days afterwards his " English Banls and Scotch Reviewers " made its appearanct;. Nothing of its kind could be cleverer, although it was full of opinions that Byron's after knowlcilge caused him to retract. That does net matter to us. We should all be soriy to miss the lines that so ingeniously write down Wordsworth an idiot, and Coleridge an ass. Ridicule is without power to abase 445 CASSELL'S LIBEAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURK [a.d. 1800 the sovereignty of tnie genius and faithful work. It may even be that tlie more we appreciate Words- worth, the more we enjoy those lively harmless jokes ■once made at liis expense by men of all degrees, from Byron down to the author of the second Peter Bell, with his " Here lies W. W., Who never more will trouble you, trouble you." His debts caused Byi-on to leave England a few months after he had come of age. He left England in June, 1809, for Lisbon, Seville, and Greece. His impressions of Spain and Greece, at a time when all L(.u;l> iivicON. From a Portrait bij W. E. West. eyes were towai-ds those countries, are in the first two cantos of " Childe Harold," begun in October, 1809, and finished at the end of March, 1810. They were written, in fact, at the age of two-and-twenty. In 1810 and the beginning of 1811 Bp-on was in and about Greece, deepening impressions soon to be repro- duced in a series of metrical romances. It was at this time that he wrote his MAID OF ATHENS. ZwTj fJ.0Vy tTus ayaTTui. Maid of Athens, ero we part, Give, oh give mo back my heart ! Or, since that has left my breast, Keep it now, and take the rest ! ' Hear my vow before I go, ZtijTj juou, 0"ny d7airaj. By those tresses unconfined, Woo'd by each iEgean wind ; By those Hds whose Jetty fringe Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge ; 10 By those wild eyes Uke the roe, Zc$7j jUoD, ffas dyaTroi. ' ^^ Siicliliug's " Two Hearts," on page 300. The Greek line, Zoe mou, sa.s aonpo, means, " My Ufe, I love you." By that lip I long to taste ; By that zone-encircled waist ; By all the token-flowers that tell What words can never speak so well ; By love's alternate joy and woe, ZwTj /lou, fftts ayairuj. llaid of Athens '. I am gone : Think of me, sweet ! when alone. 20 Though I fly to Istambol, Athcus holds my heart and soul : Can I cease to love thee ? No ! ZuiH] IJLOV, cus ayaTTW. In February, 1811, when staying at the Fran- ciscan convent in Athens, Byron expressed the deep feeling of his synqjatliy with the new hopes of the nations in this TRANSLATION OF A FAMOUS GREEK WAB-SONG. Sons of the Greeks, arise ! The glorious houi-'s gone foith. And, worthy of such ties. Display who gave us buth. Chorus. Sons of Greeks ! let us go In arms against the foe, Till their hated blood shall flow In a river past om- feet. Then manfully despising The Turkish tyrant's yoke, Ijet youi- country see you rising. And all her chains are broke. Brave shades of chiefs and sages. Behold the coming stiife ! Hellenes of past ages. Oh, start again to life ! At the sound of my trumpet, breaking Your sleep, oh, join with me 1 And the seven-hill'd city seeking. Fight, conquer, tUl we're free. Sons of Greeks, &c. Spaita, Sparta, why in sliunbers Lethai'gic dost thou He ? Awake, and join thy numbers With Athens, old ally ! Leonidas recalling, Th.at chief of ancient song. Who s.aved ye once from falHng, The terrible ! the strong ! Wlio made that bold diversion In old Thci-mopyla>, And warring with the Persian To keep his country free. With his three hundred waging The battle, long he stood, And like a lion raging, Expired in seas of blood. Sons of Greeks, &c. Lord Bvron returned to England in July, 1811, but just in time to see his mother die. In 1812, on TO k.D. 1825.] SHORTER POEMS. 443 the 27th of February, he made his first speech in the House of Lords, and two days afterwards tlie fii-st two cantos of " Cliilde Harold " were published. These made him famous. Of "Childe Harold," and of Byron's longer i>oems, somethinj;; will be said in another volume. The success of " Childe Harold " w;is followed up by poem after poem. In March, 1813, " The Waltz ;" in IMay, " The Giaour ;" in December, " The Bride of Abydos ;" and in the second half of that month there was "The Gorsair" written. That was soon followed by " L-.ira/" Then it was that Scott put aside his verse-writing, and published "Waverley." In January, 1815, Byron married Miss Milbanke. His daughter, Augusta Ada, was born on the 10th of the following December, and two months afterwards, in February, 181 G, his wife parted from him. There is no reason for imagining any mysterious grounds of separation. Byron was full of generous feeling, and among hLs impulses was many an emotional sense of a higher life than he could touch ; but a nature that had in its childhood needed tender and wse home care had suffered more than a mere deprivation of it. His father had been called " Mad Jack " by his companions, and the gi-eat uncle, from whom Newstead was inherited, had in his latter days been scarcely sane. Byron was passionate and fitful ; he was painfully conscious of himself, affected fantastic moods, and tried, perhaps, to live a sort of poem in the eyes of men by setting himself up, at times, as one of the wretched creatures of the Werther breed ; a sickly breed which wa.s then thought, in sentimental fiction, to have been improved by a cross with some interesting monster, who had on his dear dark soul murder and other crimes not to be mentioned. That was all very unreal, and lay upon the surface of a weak personal chai'acter alive with genius and passion. There was a nobler life within ; a vigorous wit that Byron could have brought to the attack of his o'lvn weakness, a real hatred of tyi'anny, a real sjTupathy with the reviving hopes of many a people long oppressed. But if thei'e was any woman who could have discovered how to draw such a life out of the death that lay about it, how to feed the true impulses and starve the false, it was not Mi.ss Milbanke. He was a wise friend who coun- selled separation. Byi'on fed publicly on agony in the newspapere. He felt and he affected feeling. About two months after the separation he left Eng- land, in April, 1816, never to return. He went first to Switzerland, where he ^vrote in the same year the third canto of "Childe Harold," and " The Prisoner of Chillon." He also began " Manfred," designed as a play into which he might put his impressions of Swiss scenery. Also in July, 1816, he compared his luckless marriage with another that might have been in THE DREA.M. Our life is twofold : Sleep hath its own world, A boundarj- between the things misnamed Death and existence : Sleep hath its own world. And a wide realm of vdld recility. And dreams in their development have hreath. And tears, and tortiu-es, and the touch of joy ; They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts, They take a weight from off our waking toils, They do divide our being ; they become A portion of omaelves as of our time, 1 And look like heralds of eternity ; They pass like spirits of the past, — they spoak Like Sibyls of the future : they have power — Tile tyranny of pleasure and of pain ; They make us what we were not — what they will, And shake oding — " What Adonais is, why fear we to become V The One remains, the many change and pass ; Heaven's light for ever shines, Earth's shiidows fly ; Life, like a dome of many-colour' d glass, Stains the white radiance of Eternity, TO i.D. 1825.] SHORTER POEMS. 447 Until Death tramples it to fragments. — Die, If tliou wouldst bo witli that which thou dost seek ! FoUow where uU is fled ! — Homo's azure sky, Flowers, ruins, statues, music, words, are weak The glory they transfuse with fitting truth to spc'ak. Why linger, why turn back, wliy .shrink, my Heart h 10 Thy hopes are gone before : from all things here They have dei)arted ; thou shouldst now depart I A light is passed from tlie revolving year, And man and woman ; and what still is dear Attracts to crush, repels to make thee wither. The soft sky smiles, — the low wind whispers near ; 'Tis Adonais calls ! oh, hasten hither, No more let Life div'ide what Death can join togi'ther. storm ;i])}(i-oachiiig, was drowiu'd in llu; S(jual], iiud washed ashore witli one liand witliiii the bosom of his ib'ess, still holding a volume of Keats's poems o]ieii at the " Eve of St. Agnes." Surely the spirit then hatl risen to the unveiled brightness of the love it sought. Its uj)ward striving, everywliere felt in Sh(>lley's verse, makes no small part of the beauty we all find in his song of THE SKYL.\RK. Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! Bird thou never wert. That from heaven, or near it, Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremi'ditati'd art. noil /^i 1 The i>K.vii Shelley, i'.u uMcnt bij H. Wo'kcs, Ji.,1., al ijfinsl./u Hants. That Light whose smile kindles the Universe, That Beauty in which all things work and move, 20 That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love Which, through the web of being blindly wove By man and beast and earth and air and sea. Bums bright or dim, as each are mirrors of The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me. Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality. The breath whose might I have invoked in song Descends on me ; my spirit's bark is di-iven Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng .30 Whose sails were never to the tempest given ; The massy earth and sphered skies are riven ! I am borne darkty, fearfully, afar; Whilst burning througli the inmost veil of Heaven, The soul of Adonais, like a star, Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are. Shelley wintered at Pisa ; in spring was at Lerici, in the Gulf of Spezia ; in summer went to Leghorn to welcome Leigh Hunt, and on the 8th of July em- barked to return, against advice of those who saw a Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest Like a cloud of fire ; The blue deep thou wingest. And singing stUl dost soar, and soaring ever singest. In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun. O'er which clouds arc brightening. Thou dost lloat and run ; Like an unbodied joy whose race has just begun. The pale purple even Melts around thy flight ; Like a star of heaven. In the broad day-light Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight. Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere. Whose intense lamp narrows In the white dawn clear, Until we hardly see, wc foci tbnt it is there. 10 44» C'ASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. ISOli All the lurth and iiir With thy voice is loud. As, when night is bare, From one lonely cloud The moon mins out her beams, and heaven is overflowed. 30 AMiat thou art we know not : MTiat is most like thee f From rainbow clouds there flow not Drop.s so liright to see, As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. Like a poet hidden In the light of thought. Singing hymns unliidden. Till the world is wrought To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not : 40 Like a high-born maiden In a jialace tower. Soothing her love-laden Soul in secret horn' With music sweet as love, which oveiilows her bower : Like a glow-worm golden In a dell of dew, Scattering unbeholden Its aerial hue Among the flowers and gi-ass, which screen it from the view : 50 Like a rose embowered In its own green leaves, By wanu winds deflowered. Till the scent it gives Makes faint with too much sweet these hea's'y-wingcd thieves. Soimd of vernal showers On the twinkling grass, Kain-a w.-ikened flowers. All that ever was Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth siirpa.ss : (iO Teach us, sprite or bird, What sweet thoughts are thine : I have never heard. Praise of love or wine That jjanted forth a flood of rapture so divine. Chorus Hj-meneal, Or triumphant chaunt, Matched with thine woidd be all But an empty vaunt, A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want. What objects are the fountains Of thy happy strain? ^ATiat fields, or waves, or mountains f AATiat shapes of sky or plain r 'What love of thine own kind, what ignorance of pain : With thy clear keen joyance Iianguor cannot be : Shadow of annoyance Never came near thee : Thou lovest : but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. 70 80 Waking or asleep, Thou of death must deem Things more true and deep llian we mortals dream. Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream i We look before and after. And pine for what is not : Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught ; Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought. 90' Yet if we could scorn Hate, and pride, and fear ; If we were things born Not to shed a tear, I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. Better than all measure Of delightful sound. Better than all treasure That in books are found. Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground ! lOO Teach me half the gladness That thy brain must know, Such harmonious madness From my Ups would flow. The world should listen then, as I am listening now. Tliis i.s another of Shelley's shorter poems : — THE CLOUD. I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowera. From the seas and the streams ; I bear light .shade for the leaves when laid In the noon-day dreams ; From my wings are shaken the dews that awaken The sweet birds every one. When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, As she dances about the sun. I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the gicen plains under, 19 And then again I dissolve it in rain. And laugh as I pass in thunder. I sift the snow on the mountains below. And their great pines groan aghast ; And all the night 'tis my pillow white. While I sleep in the arms of the blast. Sublime on the towers of my skiey bowers. Lightning my pilot sits. In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, It struggles and howls at fits ; 20 Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, This pilot is guiding me. Lured by the love of the genii that move In the depths of the purple sea ; Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills. Over the lakes and the plains, AMierever he dream, under mountain or stream. The Spirit he loves remains ; And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, Whilst he is dissolving in rains. SO The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes And his burning plumes outspreaii, TO A.D. 1825.1 SHORTER POEMS. 449 Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, \\lien the morning star shines dead : As on the jag of a mountain crag, While an earthquake rocks and swings. An eagle alit one moment may sit In the light of its golden wings • And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath, Its ardoiu's of rest and of love, 40 And the crimson pall of eve may fall From the depth of heaven above. With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest, As stiU as a brooding dove. That orbed maiden with white tire laden, Whom mortals call the moon, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor. By the midnight breezes strewn ; And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, 'Wliieh only the angels hear, 5(1 Hay have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, The stars peep behind her and peer ; And I laugh to see them whirl and flee. Like a swarm of golden bees, AMien I widen the rent in my wind-built tent. Till the calm rivers, lakes and seas. Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high. Are each paved with the moon and these. I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, And the moon's with a girdle of pearl; 60 The voleanos are dim, and the stars reel and swim, AATien the w'hirlwiuds my banner unfurl. From cape to cape, with a bridge-lik" shape, Over a toiTent sea. Sunbeam-proof, I bang like a roof. The mountains its columns be. The triumplnl arch tlirough which I march With hurricane, fire, and snow, ^^'^len the ijowers of the air arc chained to my chau-. Is the miUion-coloiu'ed bow ; 70 The sphere-fire above its soft coloui'S wove. \\1iile the moist earth was laughing below. I am the daughter of earth and water. And the nui-sling of the sky •, I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores ; I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain when, with never a stain. The pavilion of heaven is bare. And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams. Build up the blue dome of air, 80 I silently laugh at my own cenotaph. And out of the caverns of rain. Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. In his latter days, wliile, blindeil by excess of light, he was still impatient for a sudden transformation of the race of man, Shelley could little understand the change that came over Wordsworth's tone, when in Wordsworth like enthusiasms had been sobered by hard experience and schooled by riper thought into a clear ]ierception of the need of doing highest woi-k 57 in life by help both of the far sight and the near. Does a man really care less for the glory of the distant hills because he has ceased from sighing after angel's wings, and takes the sure and simple way of travelling towards them at the pace of human feet I Shelley in this sonnet sup]>osed Wordsworth to be a deserter from the cause for which he spent his life, doubted him at the very time when he became its truest leader : TO WORDSWORTH. Poet of Nature, thou hast wvpt to know- That things depart which never may return ! Childhood and youth, friendship and love's first glow. Have fled hkc sweet dreams, leaving thee to mourn. These common woes I feel. One loss is mine Wliich thou too feel'st ; yet I alone deplore. Thou wert as a lone star, whose light did shine On some frail bark in winter's midnight roar : Thou hast like to a rock-built refuge stood Above the blind and battling multitude. 10 In honoui-'d poverty thy voice did weave 8ongs consecrate to truth and Ubert}', — Deserting these, thou leavest me giieve. Thus having been, that thou shouldst cease to be. The tumult of the revolution was in Byron ; its pin-est aspirations were in Shelley. Wordsworth sur- vived the tumult, retained throughout life the aspi- rations, and learnt the one way to their fulfilment. In John Keats there was a non-combatant's delicious sense of all beauty that lies around, above, below the battle-field of life. He was born in October, 1795, son of a staljleman, who had married his master's daughter and so become himself master of the Swan and Hoop Livery Stables, No. 28, Pavement, Moor- fields. In 1810 the four children of the family were left fatherless and motherless, with about .£8,000 of property to divide among them. John Keats, who had been to school at Enfield, was apprenticed by his guardian to a surgeon at Enfield, but his mind turned more and more to poetiy. He read, and tells how he felt OK FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPM.\x's HOMER. Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold. And many goodly states and kingdoms seen ; Round many westeiTi islands have I been ■\Miich bards in fealty to Apollo hold. Oft of one wide expanse had I been told Tliat deep-brow' d Homer ruled as his demesne : Yet did I never breathe its pure serene Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold : Then felt I like some watcher of the skies ^\^len a new planet swims into his ken ; 10 Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He stai-ed .at the Pacific— and all his men Look'd at each other with a wild surmise- Silent, upon a peak in Darien. Keats came from Edmonton to lodge in London, that he might attend hos]iital practice, and he ])ub- lished, in 1817, a small volume of ])oems. In April of that year he was in tlie Isle of Wight, delighting 450 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. LA.D, 1800 his imagination with pursuit of beauty in his longer poem of " Endymion," which opens with the familiar and characteristic line, "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever." "Endymion" was published in 1818, and in the spring of that year John Keats was with a brother who was dying, at Teignmouth, of consumption. He was himself to die eai'ly in life of the same disease, and not of the savage review of " Endymion" in the Quarterli/. Keats was known to be a devoted friend of Leigh Hunt's. Leigh Hunt wrote politics to which it became good Tory journals to show no mercy ; and according to the common custom of that ■day, men known to be of the " set" of an obnoxious politician were, as occasion offered, unceremoniously ■ cried down by his opponent. Keats was thus sacri- ficed to the customs of the country in the two chief Tory journals, the Quarterly and Blackwood. If he had been in a Toiy set, then he would have been hunted and scalped by Whigs. Men of the time are much the same sort of beings, from whatever camp they may chance to sound their war-cries. Keats did not write politics, but he had a friend who did. He suffered less than Shelley supjjosed from censure that he know to be unjust, but modestly admitted to himself and others the shortcomings of his early work. " I have written," he said, " inde- pendently wthout judgment. I may write indepen- dently and with judgment hereafter. The genius of poetry must work out its own salvation in a man." It was at the end of this year, 1818, that spitting of blood indicated the advance of a more deadly peril. Life was slowly ebbing away, when some of his most .beautiful veree was written. AVhen I have fears that I may cease to he Before my pen has gloan'd my teeming brain, Before high piled books, in charact'ry, Hold like full gamers the fuU-ripcn'd grain ; Wlien I behold, upon the night's starr'd face. Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And feel that I may never live to trace Tlieir shadows, with the magic hand of chance ; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour 1 That I shall never look upon thee more, 1 Never have relish in the faery iJower Of um'cflecting love ! — tlien on the .shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till Love and Fame to nothing-ness do sink. In 1820 Keats published "Lamia," "Isabella," ■" The Eve of St. Agnes," and other poems ; and in the September of that year he left England for Italy, where he died in February, 1821, aged twenty-five years and four months. THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. St. Agnes' Eve ! Ah, bitter chill it was ! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass. And silent was the flock in woolly fold : Numb were the Beadsman's fingers while he told His rosary, and while his fro.sted breath, Like pious incense from a, censer old, Seem'd taking flight for heaven without a death. Past the sweet Virgin's picture, while liis prayer he saith. His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ; 10 Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees, Anil back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan, Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees ; The sculptured dead, on each side seem to fi'eeze, Eniprison'd in black, purgatorial rails : Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'rics, He passeth by ; and his weak spii'it fails To think how they may ache in icy hoods and mails. Northward he tumeth through a Uttle door. And scarce three steps, ere llusic's golden tongue 20 Flatter'd to tears this aged man and poor ; But no — already had his death-bell rung ; The joys of all his life were said and sung : His was hai-sh penance on St. Agnes' Eve : Another way he went, and soon among Kough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve. And all night kept awake, for sinner's sake to grieve. That ancient Beadsman heard the prelude soft ; And so it chanced, for many a door was wide, From hurry to and fro. Soon, uj) aloft, 30 The silver, snarling trumpets 'gan to chide : The level chambers, ready with theii- pride, Were glowing to receive a thousand guests : The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests, With hair blown back, and wings put cross-wise on their breasts. At length burst in the argent revelry, AVith jdume, tiara, and all rich array. Numerous as shadows haunting fairily The brain, new stuff' d, in youth, mth triumphs gay 40 Of old romance. These let us wish away, And turn, sole-thoughted, to one Lady there, WTiose heart had brooded, all that wintry day, On love, and wing'd St. Agnes' saintly care, As she had heard old dames full many times declare. They told her how, upon St. jignes' Evo, Young virgins might have visions of deUght, And soft adorings from then- loves receive Upon the honcy'd middle of the night. If ceremonies due they did aright ; As, supperless to bed they must retire, And couch supine their beauties, lily white ; Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require Of Heaven with upward eyes for all that they desire. 50 Full of this whim was thoughtful iladeUne : The music, j'eaming like a God in pain. She scarcely heard : her maiden eyes dii'ine, Fi.x'd on the floor, saw many a sweeping train Pass by — she heeded not at all : in vain fame many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, And back retired; not cool'd by high disdain, But she saw not : her heart was otherwhere ; She sigh'd for Agnes' di-eams, the sweetest of the year. She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, .'viLxious her lips, her breathing quick and short ; The haUow'd hour was near at hand: she sighs Amid the timbrels, and the throng'd resort 60 TO A.D. 1S25.] SHORTER POEMS. 451 Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ; 'Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn, Hoodwink'd with faery fancy ; all amort, 70 Save to St. Agnes and her lambs un.shorn, And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn. So, purposing each moment to retii-e, She linger'd still. Meantime, across the moors. Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, Buttress'd from moonlight, stands he, and implores All saints to give him sight of Madeline, But for one moment in the tedious hour's. That he might gaze and worship all unseen ; 80 •Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss — in sooth sudi things have been. He ventures in : let no buzz'd whisper tell : All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords Will storm his heart. Love's feverous citadel : For him, those chambers held barbarian hoi'des. Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords. Whose very dogs would execrations howl Against his lineage : not one breast affords Him any mercy, in that mansion foul, Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. 90 Ah, happy chance ! the aged ereatru-e came. Shuffling along mth ivory-headed wand, To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame, Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond The sound of merriment and chorus bland : He startled her ; but soon she knew his face, And grasp'd his fingers in her palsied hand. Saying, " Mercy, PorphjTO ! liie thee from this place : They are all here to-night, the whole blood-thirsty race ! " Get hence ! get hence ! there 's dwarfish HUdrbraml : He had a fever late, and in the fit 101 He cursed thee and thine, both house and land : Then there 's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit More tame for his grey hairs — Alas me ! flit ! Flit like a ghost away." — " Ah, Gossip dear. We're safe enough; here in this arm-chair sit. And teU me how " — " Good Saints ! not here, not here : Follow me, chUd, or else these stones will be thy bier." He follow'd through a lowly arched way. Brushing the cobwebs with liis lofty plume ; 1 10 And as she mutter'd " WeU-a — well-a-day '. " He found him in a little moonlight room, Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb. " Now tell mc where is iladcline," said he ; " O tell me Angela, by the holy loom 'tt'hich none but secret sisterhood may see. When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously." " St. Agnes 1 Ah ! it is St. Agnes' Eve — Yet men will murder upon holy days : Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, 120 And be licge-lord of all the Elves and Fays, To venture so : it fills me with amaze To see thee, Porph%TO ! — St. Agnes' Eve ! God's help 1 my lady fail- the conjuror plays This very night : good angels hor deceive ! But let mc laugh awhile, I 've mickle time to grieve." Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon, While Poqihyro upon her face doth look. Like puzzled urchin on an aged crom; Who koopeth closed a wondrous riddlc-hoolc, 130 As .spectacled she sits in chinmey nook. But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she tnld His lady's purpose ; and he scarce could brook Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold. .iVnd Madeline asleep in lap of legends old. Sudden a thought came Uk(^ a full-blown rose, Flushing his brow, and in his pained heart Made pirrple riot : then doth lie propose A stratagem, that makes the hcldamn start : " A cr\icl man and impious thou art : 1 1 (1 Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep and dream Alone \\'ith her good angels, far apart From wicked men like thee. Go, go ! I deem Thou canst not surely be the same that thou didst seem." ' I will not harm her, by all saints I swear," Quoth Porphp-o : " may I ne'er find grace TMien my weak voice shall whisper its last prayer. If one of her soft ringlets I displace. Or look with ruflnan passion in her face : Good Angela, believe me by these tears ; loO Or I wlU, even in a moment's space, Awake, with horrid shout, my foemcn's ears, And beard them, though they be more fang'd than wolves and bears." " Ah ! why wilt thou affright a feeble soid ? A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing, ^Miose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll ; "Wbose prayers for thee, each morn and evening. Were never miss'd." Thus plaining, doth she bring A gentler speech from burning Porphyro ; So woeful, and of such deep sorrowing, ICO That Angela gives promise she will do Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe. Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy. Even to JIadelinc's chamber, and there hide Him in a closet, of such privacy That he might see her beauty unespied, And win perhaps that night a peerless bride, While legion' d fairies paced the coverlet, And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed. Never on such a night have lovers met. Since Merlin paid his Demon all the monstrous drbt. " It shall be as thou wishcst," said the Dame : " All cates and dainties shall be stored there Quicklj' on this feast-night : by the tambour fr.iiii Hor own lute thou wilt see : no time to spare. For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare On such a catering trust my dizzy head. Wait here, my child, with patience kneel in prayer The wliilc : Ah ! thou nuist needs the lady wed. Or may I never leave my gTavo among the dead." So saying she hobbled off with busy fear. Tlie lover's endless minutes slowly pass'd ; The dame retum'd, aud whisper'd in his ear To follow her ; with aged eyes aghast 170 ISG 452 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1800 From fright of dim espial. Safe at last, Thi-ough many a dusky gallery, they gain The maiden's chamber, silken, hush'd and chaste; "Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain. His poor guide hurried hack with agues in her brain. 19U Her faltering hand upon the balustrade, Old Angela was feeling for the stair, When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid, Rose, like a mission'd spu-it, unaware : With sQver taper's hght, and pious ciire, She turn'd, and down the aged gossip led To a safe level matting. Now prepare, Young PorphjTO, for gazing on that bed ; She comes, she comes again, like ringdove fray'd and fled. 200 Out went the taper as she hurried in ; Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died : She closed the door, she panted, all akin To spirits of the air, and visions wide : No utter'd syUahle, or, woe betide ! But to her heart, her heart was voluble, Paining with eloquence her babny side ; As though a tonguelcss nightingale should swell Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled, in her dcU. A casement high and triple-arch'd there was, All garlanded with carven imageries Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass, '^lO And diamonded with panes of quaint device, Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes. As are the tiger-moth's decp-damask'd wings ; And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldi-ies. And twilight saints, and dim omblazonings, A shielded scutcheon blush' J with blood of queens and kings. Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, And threw warm gules on JIadeline's fair breast. As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon; Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest, 220 And on her silver cross soft amethyst, And on her hair a glory, like a saint : She seem'd a .splendid angel, newly di'esit. Save wings, for heaven : — Porphyi-o grew faint : She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal taint. Anon his heart revives : her vespers done. Of aU its wreathed pearls her hair she frees ; Unclasps her w'anncd jewels one by one ; Loosens her fragrant bodice ; by degrees Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees : Half-hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed. Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees. In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed, But dares not look beliind, or all the ehanii is fled. 230 Soon, tremljling in her soft and chilly nest. In sort of wakeful swoon, perplex'd she lay. Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppress' d Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away ; Flown, like a thought, until the morrow-day ; Blissfully haven'd both from joy and pain ; Clasp' d like a missal where swart PajTiims pray : Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain. As though a rose should shut, and be a bud again. 240 Stolen to this paradise, and so entranced, PorphjTO gazed upon her empty dress. And listen' d to her breathing, if it chanced To wake into a slumberous tenderness ; Which when he heard, that minute did ho bless, And breathed himself ; then from the closet crept. Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness, ' 250 And over the hush'd cai'pet, sUent, stept. And 'tween the cui-tains peep'd, where, lo ! — how fast she slept. Then by the bed-side, where the faded moon JIade a dim, silver twihght, soft he set A table, and, haU anguish'd, threw thereon A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet : — Oh for some di'owsy llorphean amulet ! The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion. The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet, jUfray his ears, though but in dying tone ; — 260 The hall-door shuts again, and all the noise is gone. .\nd stiU she slept an azure-lidded sleep. In blanched Unen, smooth, and lavender' d. While he from forth the closet brought a heap Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and goui-d ; With jeUies soother than the creamy cui-d, .\nd lucent sjTops, tinct with cinnamon ; Manna and dates, in argosy transferr'd From Fez ; and spiced dainties, every one. From silken Samarcand to cedar'd Lebanon. 270 These delieates he heap'd with glowing hand On golden dishes and in baskets bright Of wreathed silver : sumptuous they stand In the retired quiet of the night. Filling the ehiUy room with perfume light. — " And now, my love, my seraph fan-, awake ! Thou art my heaven, and I thine eremite ; Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes' sake, Or I shall di-owse beside thee, so my soul doth ache." Thus whispering, his warm, unnerved arm 280 Sank in her pillow. Shaded was her dream By the dusk curtains : — 'twas a midnight charm Impossible to melt as iced stream : The lustrous salvers in the moonUght gleam ; Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies : It seem'd he never, never could redeem From s\ich a steadfast spell his lady's eyes ; So mused awhile, entoil'd in woofed phantasies. Awakening up, he took her hoUow lute, — Timiultuous, — and, in chords that tenderest be, 290 He play'd an ancient ditty, long since mute. In Provence caU'd " La belle dame sans mercy : " Close to her ear touching the melody : — ^Vherewith disturb'd, she utter'd a soft moan : He ceased — she panted quick — and suddenly Her blue affrayed eyes wide open shone : Upon his knees he sank, p;de as smo ♦li-sculptm-'d stone Her eyes were open, hut she still beheld. Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep : There was a painful change, that nigh expell'd 300 The blisses of her dream so pure and deep. ( TO A.D. 1825.J SHORTER POEMS. 4f)3 At which fail' Madeline began to weep, And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ; ^Vhilc still her gaze on Porphyro wmdd keep ; ^^^lo Imelt, with joined hands and piteous eye, Feariny to move or speak, she look'd so ih'eamingly. '■ Ah, Porphyro I " said she, '-but even now i'hy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear, JIado tuneable with every sweetest vow ; And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear : 310 How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and di'car ! Give me that voice again, my Porphyro, Those looks immortal, those comphiinings dear '. Oh leave me not in this eternal woe, For if thou dicst, my Love, I know not where to go." Beyond a mortal man impassion' d far At these voluptuous accents, he arose, Ethereal, flush' d, and like a throbbing star Seen 'mid the sappliire heaven's deep I'cpose ; Into her di'cam he melted, as the rose 320 Blcndeth its odour with the violet, — Solution sweet : meantime the frost-wind blows Like Love's alarum pattering the sharp sleet Against the window-panes ; St. Agnes' moon hath set. 'Tis dark : quick pattereth the flaw-blown sic"' : " This is no di'eam, my bride, my JIadeline ! " 'Tis dark : the iced gusts still rave and beat : " Xo dream, alas ! alas ! and woe is mine I Porphyi'o wUl leave me here to fade and pine. — Cruel ! what traitor could thee hither bring ': 330 I cui'se not, for my heart is lost in thine. Though thou forsakcst a deceived thing ; — A dove forlorn and lost with sick unprimed wing." " My Madeline ! sweet dreamer 1 lovely bride ! Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest ? Thy beauty's sliield, heart-shaped and vei-mcil dycdf Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest After so many houi-s of toil and quest, A famish'd pilgi'im, — saved by miracle. Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest 340 Saving of thy sweet self ; if thou think' st wcU To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel. " Hark ! 'tis an elfin stoi-m from faery land. Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed : Arise — arise 1 the morning is at hand ; — The floated wassailers will never heed ; — Let us away, my love, \vith happy speed ; There are no cars to hear, or eyes to see, — Drown'd all in Ehenish and the sleepy mead ; Awake ! arise 1 my love, and fearless be, 350 For o'er the southera moors I have a homo for thee." She huiTied at his words, beset with fears, For there were .sleeping tlragons all around, At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears — Down the wide staii-s a darkling way they found, In all the house was heard no human sound. A chain-droop'd lamp was flickering by each door ; The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hoimd, Flutter'd in the besieging wind's uproar ; And the long cai'pets rose along the gusty floor. 360 They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall ! Like phantoms to the ii'on porch they glide, 'WHierc lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl, With a huge empty flagon by his side : The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his liide, But his sagacious eye an inmate owns : By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide : — The chains lie silent on the footworn stones ; The key turns, and the door upon its liingcs groans. And they arc gone : ay, ages long ago 370 These lovers fled away into the storm. That night the Baron dieanit of many a woe. And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form Of witch, and demon, and large coflin-worm. Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old Died palsy-t«-itch'd, with meagre face deform ; The Beadsman, after thousand aves told. For aye unsought-for slept among his aslies cold. There was a liopelews love in Keats's life. A letter came when he was dying, that he wished placed in his coffin, with a jmrse and an nnojiened letter ot" his sister's. " Keats knew from the tirst little drop of blood that he mnst die," wi-ote a friend who was watching his last hours in Rome. In his short life there had been more than promise of one of the great jjoets of England. The fragment of his longer poem of '■ Hyperion," attempted in blank verse, drew from the despair of the Titans who gave jjlace to the new race of gods a lesson of the world's growth towards higher beavity, that accorded with the aspii-ation of his time. And Keats lives yet to speed the change \vith poems wedded to all loveliness of the surround- ing world. We may almost apiply to him his own FAERY SONG. Shed no tear ! Oh, shed no tear ! The flower will bloom another year. Weep no more 1 Oh, weep no more ! Young buds sleep in the root' s white core. Dry your eyes ! Oh, di-y your- eyes ! For I was taught in Paradise To ease my breast of melodies — Shed no tear. Overhead ! look overhead ! 'Mong the blossoms white and I'ed — Look up, look up. I flutter now On this flush pomegranate bough. See me ! 'tis this silvery biU Ever cures the good man's ill. Shed no tear ! Oh, shed no tear 1 The flower will bloom another year. Adieu, adieu — I fly, adieu, I vanish in the heaven's blue — Adieu, adieu! Among lesser writers of the lirst quarter of the nineteenth century were James and Horace Smith, sons of a London solicitor. James, born in 177.5, followed his father's jirofession ; Horace, who was nearly five years younger, |>rospered as stockbroker. Druiy Lane Theatre having been burnt down, was 454 OASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.n. ISM rebuilt, and re-opened in October, 1812. In the pre- ceding August this advertisement appeared in most of the daily papers ; — Rebuilding of Driirij Lane Theatre. " The Committee are desirous of promoting a free and fail- eompctition for an Address to be spoken upon tlie opening of the Theatre, which will take place on the 10th of October next. They have therefore thought fit to announce to the public, that they will be glad to receive any such composi- tions, addressed to their Secretary, at the Treasury-office, in Drury Lane, on or before the 10th of September, sealed up, with a distinguishing word, number, or motto, on the cover, corresponding with the inscription on a separate sealed paper containing the name of the author, which will not be opened, luiless containing the name of the successful candidate." Hereupon James and Horace Smith amused them- selves with mock Addresses, in the style of the chief poets of the time, -which appeared in a little book under the name of " Rejected Addresses ; or, the New Theatrum Poetarum." The following carica- ture of the style of Byron, in the measm-e of " Childe Harold," is — except the tirst stanza — by Horace Smith : — c u I bono! 1};/ Lord B. Sated w^th home, of wife, of children tired. The restless soul is ch-iven abroad to roam : Sated abroad, all seen, yet nought admired. The restless soul is driven to ramble home ; Sated with both, beneath new Drm-y's dome The fiend Ennui awhile consents to pine. There growls and curses like a deadly Gnome, Scorning to view fantastic Columbine, Viewing with scorn and hate the nonsense of the Nine. Ye reckless dupes, wlio hither wend your way, 10 To gaze on puppets in a painted dome, Pui'suing pastimes glittering to betray. Like falling stars in life's eternal gloom. What seek ye here ? Joy's evanescent bloom ': Woe 's me 1 the brightest wreaths she ever gave Are but as flowers that decorate a tomb. Man's heart the mournful urn o'er which they wave. Is sacred to despair, its pedestal the grave. Has life so little store of real woes. That here ye wend to taste fictitious giief f 20 Or is it that from truth such anguish flows. Ye court the lying (h-ama for relief ? Long shall ye find the pang, the respite brief. Or if one tolerable page appears In folly's volume, 'tis the actor's leaf, \S"ho dries his own by di-awing others' tears, .\nd, raising pleasant mirth, makes glad his future yeare. Albeit how like young Betty doth he flee ! Like as the mote that danccth in the beam, He Hveth only in man's present e'e, 30 His life a flash, his memory a dream, Oblivious down he drops in Lethe's stream ; Yet what are they, the learned and the great ? Awhile of longer wonderment the theme ; Who shall presume to prophesy their date, "S\Ticre nought is certain, save the uncertainty of fate. This goodly pile, upheav'd bj' Wyatt's toil. Perchance than Holland's edifice more fleet. Again red Lemnos' artisan may spoil ; The fire alarm and midnight drum may beat, 40 And aU be strew'd ysmoking at your feet. Start ye ? Perchance Death's angel may be sent Ere from the flaming temple ye retreat, And ye who met on revel idlesse bent May find in plcasm'c's fane your grave and monument. Your debts mount liigh — ye plunge in deeper waste ; The tradesman calls — no warning voice ye hear ; The plaintiff sues — to public shows ye haste , The baiUff threats — ye feel no idle fear. "Who can aiTest youi- prodigal career '? 50 ■\Vho can keep down the levity of youth ? 'Uliat sound can startle age's stubborn car ? 'WTio can redeem from ^vretchedness and ruth Men true to falsehood's voice, false to the voice of truth. To thee, blest saint ! who doff 'd thy skin to make The Smithfield rabble leap from theirs with joy, We dedicate the pile, arise ! awake ! — Knock down the Muses, wit and sense destroy. Clear our new stage from reason's didl alloy, Charm hobbling age, and tickle capering youth CO With cleaver, marrow-bone, and Timbridge toy ; WTiile, vibrating in unbelieving tooth, Harps twang in Driury's walls, and make her boards a booth. For what is Hamlet, but a hare in March ? And what is Brutus, but a croaking owl ? And what is RoUa, Cupid steeped in starch, Orlando's helmet in Augustine's cowl. Shakespeare, how true thine adage, " fair is foul ; " To him whose soul is with fruition fraught. The song of Braham is an Irish howl, 70 Thinking is but an idle waste of thought. And nought is every thing, and every thing is nought. Sons of Parnassus ! whom I view above. Not laurel-crown'd, but clad in rusty black. Not spurring Pegasus thi-ough Tempo's grove, But pacing Grub-street on a jaded hack. What reams of foolscap, while your brains ye rack. Ye mar to make again 1 for sm-e, ere long, Condemned to tread the bard's time-sanctioned track. Ye aU shall join the bailiff-haunted throng, SO And reproduce in rags the rags ye blot in song. So fares the follower in the Muses' train. He toils to starve, and only lives in death ; Wo slight him till our patronage is vain. Then round his skeleton a garland vn-eathe. And o'er his bones an empty requiem breathe — Oh ! with whit tragic horror would he start (Could he be conjured from the grave beneath) To find the stage again a Tliespian cart, And elephants and colts down-trampling Shakespeare's • art. 90 ' TO A.D. 1825.] SHORTER POEMS. 455 Hence, pedant Xature ! with thy Grecian rules ! Centaiu'S (not fabulous) those rules cSace ; Back, sister JIuses, to your native schools ; Here booted grooms usurj) Apollo's place, Hoofs shame the boards tliat tnirrick used to grace, The play of limbs succeeds the play of wit ; Man yields the di-ama to the Hoiiyhnhnm race, His prompter spui-s, his licenser the bit. The stage a stable-yard, a jockey-club the pit. 100 Is it for these ye rear tliis proud abode ? Is it for these your superstition seeks To build a temple worthy of a god. To laud a monkey, or to worship leeks ? Then be the stage, to recompense your freaks, A motley chaos. Jumbling age and ranks, A\'here Punch, the hgnum vita: Koscius, squeaks, .tVnd Wisdom weeps, and Folly plays his pranks, And moody Bladness laughs, and hugs the chain he clanks. Tliomas Moore was bom in May, 1779, sou of the keeper of a small wine-store iu Dubliu. He was a quick child, aud rhymed and recited early. A careful mother secured him the best education she could get. By 1800 he had graduated at Trinity College, Dublin, aud accpiii'ed much social repute as a singer to his own accompaniment at the piano. He arrived iu Loudon with a fiee translation of " Auacreon," to which thei-e were classical-convivial notes expatiating Tipon mne aud kisses. It was dedicated to the Prince Regent, and followed by origmal poems of like humour entitled " The Poetical Works of the late Thomas Little." In 1S(I3 ISIoore went to a post in Bermuda, which Lord Moira had obtained for him, but left it iu charge of a dejDuty, whose misconduct aftei'wards gave him trouble. He came home ; wrote lively Whig satire ; became a diner out, much iii request at Holland House, and with the world of fashion, for his singing of his own songs to his own accompaniment. He was kindly and emotional ; he loved his mother and he loved his wife, whom he married in 181.3, and lie loved Ireland ; but dining out did not deepen his character. His satire and his sentiment played equally ujion the surface of things. He won by his " Irish Melodies," which began to appear in 1807, reputation enough to induce a publisher to give 3,000 guineas for his long poem, "Lalla Rookh," published in 1817. " Lalla Rookh " gratified the public of its day, though, beside poems that rank with the powers of Nature, it looks like an Oriental sugar-candy temjile of such confec- tioner's work as was also fashionable in the days when " Lalla Rookh " wa.s read. Moore was at his best in his " Irish Melodies," which required him to use all the powers through which he could e.xcel, and made the least demand on qualities in which he was deficient. Dainty poetical thoughts are not wanting, though some even of these jjieces will not bear reading with close attention, and they are all insepai'able from the melodies to wlrich their author wedded them. As a lyric poet, Thomas Moore was ■ibove all things a musician — one of the best writers we have ever had of " words for music." these will always be familiar suugs of his : — Such as THE ilAKP TU.Vr 0N( li THROL'GII T.VR.V S HALLS. The harp that once througli Tara's halls The soul of music shed. Now hangs as mute on Tarn's walls As if tliat sold were fled : So sleeps the pride of former days, So glory's thi-ill is o'er. And hearts that once beat high for praise Now feel that pulse no more. No more to chiefs and ladies bright The harp of Tara swells ; 10 The chord alone, that breaks at night, Its tale of ruin tells : Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes, The only tlu-ob she gives Is when some heart indignant breaks To show that still she Uves. RICH AND R.A.KE WERE THE GEMS SHE WORE. Hich and rare were the gems she wore. And a bright gold ring on her w.and she bore ; But oh 1 her beauty was far beyond Her sparkling gems or snow-white wand. " Lady ! dost thou not fear to stray- So lone and lovely through tliis bleak way ? Ai-e Erin's sons so good or so cold As not to be tempted by woman or gold ': " '• Sir Kniglit ! I feel not the least alai-m, No son of Erin will offer me harm : — 10 I'or though they love woman and golden store. Sir Knight ! they love honour and virtue more 1" On she went, and her maiden smile In safety lighted her round the Green Isle ; And blest for ever is she who relied ITpon Erin's honour and Erin's pride. BELIEVE ME. IF ALL THOSE ENDEARING YOUNG CHARMS. Believe me, if all those endearing young charms WTiich I gaze on so fondly to-day "Were to change by to-morrow and fleet in my arms Like fairy-gifts fading away. Thou wovddst still be ador'd, as this moment thou aii. Let thy loveliness fade as it will, -And aroimd the dear ruin each wish of my heart Would entwine it.sclf verdantly still. It is not while beauty and youth arc tliine own. And thy cheeks unprofan'd by a tear, Tliat the fervour .and faith of a soul can be known To which time will but make tliee more dear ; No, the heart that has truly lov'd never forgets, But as truly loves on to the close. As the sim-flower turns on her god wlien he sets The same look which she tuni'd when ^u■ rose. 10 •156 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1800 LOVES YOUNG DREAM. Oh ! the days are gone, -n-hen Beauty bright Sly heart's chain wove ; When my dream of life, from morn till night, Was love, stiU love. X e\v hope may bloom, And days may come Of milder, calmer beam. But there's nothing half so sweet in life As Love's young di-cam : No, there's nothing half so sweet in life Id As Love's J'oung di-eam. Though the bard to purer fame may soar When wild youth's past ; Though he win the wise, who frown' d before. To smile at last ; He'll never meet A joy so sweet. In all his noon of fame, As when first he sung to woman's ear His soul-felt flame, 20 And at every close she blush'd to hear The one lov'd name. No 1 that hallow'd form is ne'er forgot Which first love trac'd ; Still it lingering haunts the gi-eenest spot On memory's waste. 'Twas odour tied As soon as shed ; 'Twas morning's winged dream: 'Twas a light tliat ne'er can shine again 30 On life's dull stream : Oh! 'twas light that ne'er can shine again On life's dull stream. THE L.\ST EOSE OF SUMMER. 'Tis the last rose of summer Left blooming alone : All her lovely companions Are faded and gone ; No flower of her kindred No rose-bud is nigh, To reflect back her blushes Or give sigh for sigh. I'll not leave thee, thou lone one. To pine on the stem ; 1 Since the lovely are sleeping. Go, sleep thou with them. Thus kindly I scatter Thy leaves o'er the bed Where thy mates of the garden Lie scentless and dead. So soon may I follow. When friendships decay. And from Love's shining circle The gems drop away. 20 WTien true hearts lie \Wther'd, And fond ones are flown. Oh 1 wlio would inhabit This bleak world alone f A lyric poet of Scotland not to be overlooked is James Hoga;, who was born in 1770, in a cottage at Ettrick Hall. His mother had good humour and rich store of song. His father was a shepherd, who took a farm after his marriage and failed in it so utterly that the family lost all and was for a time homeless when James was a child of six. Tlien Robert, the father, became shepherd once more, and James, after a fair share of schooling, began to qualify for the higher grade of a shepherd by herding ewes. An enthusiastic love of music caused him when he was fourteen, and had saved live shillings, to give them for an old fiddle. Upon this he worked at Scottish tunes in the cow-shed. Once there was a dance at the farm-house in which he was employed, and a tiddler had been brought from a distance. Young Hogg was among the farm-servants looking on. When the feast was over, and the tiddler went out into the night, soon afterwards he heard in the air all his tunes murdered, as if the fiends were mocking him. The shepherd-boy hail retired to his cow-shed, and as the tiddler looked in vain for anj' other tiddle than his own, he took to his heels in extreme terror. At sixteen James Hogg attained the object of his ambition, and assumed the shepherd's plaid, with charge over a full flock. His tirst piiblication was in 1801, about sixty pages of " Scottish Pastorals, Poems, Songs, ifec." Not long afterwards, Walter Scott made his acquaintance, and helped greatly to advance the literary fortunes of the Ettrick ShejJierd. Scott aided the pulilication of Hogg's " Mountain Bard," and this put into the shepherd's pocket .£'300, wherewith he bought for himself three years' misery in farming speculation. It was in 1810 that Hogg ceased to be either shepherd or farmer by the hill-side, and went to Edinburgh to get his living as the Ettrick Shep- herd of Literature. He wrote much in prose and vei-se, and in his longer poems, like the " Queen's Wake," wisely relied upon his \yc\c power. The " Queen's Wake " is only a de^-ice for introducing a series of Scottish songs and short Ijallad romances. Queen Marj', having returned from Fi-ance, is wel- comed by a minstrel, whose song, she is told, can be sui'passed by Highland bards. So she pro- claims a royal wake, at which Highland and Lowland minstrels are to compete in Scottish song, a harp being the prize. Two or three of his lyrics may here illustrate the Ettrick Shepherd's skill. There was a Scottish strathspey, known as "Athol Cummers,"' at which, says Hogg, he was one whiter evening " sawing away on the fiddle with great energy and elevation." His mother asked whether there were any words to that tune. " No that ever I heard, mother." " O man, it's a shame to hear sic a good tune, an' nae words till't. Gae awa' ben the house, like a good lad, and mak' me a verse till't." He set to work at once and pi-oduced ATHOL CUMMERS. Duncan, lad, blaw the cummers. Play me round the Athol cummers ; 1 CHHinicrs, uiaiden«. TO A.D. 18:i5.] SHORTER POEMS. 457 A' the din o' a" the diummors Canna rouse like Athol cumriKTS. AVhen I'm dowic,' wet or weary. Soon my heart gi'ows light an' chei'ry, When I hear the sprightly nummers O' my dear, my Athol cummei-s ! AVlien the fickle lasses vex me, ■WHicn the cares o' life perplex me, 10 When I'm lley'd- wi' I'rightfu' rumour!-, Then I lUt ■' o' Athol cummers. 'Tis my cure for a' disasters, Kcbbit "* ewes an' crabbit masters, Drift}- ° nights an' dripping summers — A' my joy is Athol cummers 1 Ettrick banks an' braes are bonnic, Yarrow hills as green as ony ; But in my heart nao beauty nummers Wi' my dear, my Athol cummers. "20 Lomond's beauty nought surpasses, Save Breadalbane's bonnie lasses; But deep within my spirit shimmers Something sweet of Athol cummers. The.se are two more of the Ettrick Shepherd'.s songs ; — THE LAST CR.\DLE SOXG. Bawloo, my bonnie baby, bawlililu. Light be thy care and cumber ; Bawloo, my bonnie baby, bawlililu. Oh, sweet be thy sinless slumber. Ere thou wert bom my youthful heart Yearned o'er my babe with sorrow : Long is the night-noon that we must jiart. But bright shall arise the morrow. Bawloo, my bonnie baby, bawlililu, Here no more will I see thee ; 1 Bawloo, my bonnie baby, bawlililu, Oh, sair is my heart to lea' thee. But far within yon sky so blue. In love that fail shall never, In valleys beyond the land of the di/w, I'll sing to my baby for ever. WHEN MAGGY GANGS AWAY. Oh. what will a' the lads do 'WTien Maggy gangs away r Oh, what will a' the lads do When Maggy gangs away r There's no a heart in a' the glen That disna di-ead the day : Oh, what will a' the lads do AV'hcn Maggj' gangs away ? Young Jock has ta'en the hill for't — A waefu' wight is he ; 10 Poor HaiTy's ta'en the bed for't, An' laid liim down to doe ; 1 Bowie, sad. - Fley'dt frightened. ^ hilt, siu^.? cheerfully. * Kehhii. " A ewe is said to teb when she has abandoned her lamb, or lost it by death, or in any other way." (Jamieson.) ^ Vyi/fy, blowing .=now.di-ifts. 58 An" Sandy's gane unto the kiik. An' learnin' fast to pray : And oh, wliat will the lads do ^^'hen Maggy gangs away ? The young laird o' the Lang-Shaw Has drunk her health in wine ; The priest has said — in confidence — The lassie was divine. And that is mair in maiden's praise Than ony priest should s.'iy : But oh, what will the lads do When JIaggy gangs away ? The wailing in our green glen That day will quaver high ; 'Twill diaw the redbreast frae the wood. The laverock frae the sky ; The fairies frae their beds o' dew- Will rise an' join the lay : An' hey ! what a day will be AATien Maggy gangs away ! •lit 3« The banker poet Samuel Rogers was born in 1762 to a fortune very unlike that of the Ettrick She])- herd. His father was a banker, and he hiui.self entered the banking-lionse, in which he remained a partner until his death in 1855. Rogers had literary and artistic tastes that he could aHbrd to indulge freely. What reputation he had as a poet was made by his "Pleasures of Memory," jjublished in 171)2. In 1812, he produced the " Voyage of Columbus" as a fragment; in 1814, "Jacqueline, a Tale," which was printed in the same -volume with Bvron'.'^ "Lara;" in 1819, "Human Life;" and in 1822, a blank verse poem on " Italy." Here is one from a collection of Rogers's short jwems, included in an edition of the " Pleasures of Memory " published in 1810, with wood engravings from designs by Thomas Stothard, R.A, It is here set lietween the sketcli Stothard designed for it and that with which he closed the little volume : — Cupids is a Boweo. Mine be a cot beside the hill, A bee-hive's hum shall soothe my ear ; A willowy brook that turns a mill With many a fall shall linger near. 458 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1825 The swallow oft beneath my thatch Shall twitter from her clay-huilt nest ; Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch, And share my meal, a welcome guest. Around my ivied porch shall spring Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew ; And Lucy at her wheel shall sing. In russet gown and apron blue. The village church among the trees. Where first our marriage-vows were giv'n, With merry peals shall swell the breeze. And point with taper spire to heav'n. 10 CHAPTER XIX. The Second Quarter of the Nineteenth Cen- tury : Wordsworth, Tennyson, Browning, AND Others. — a.d. 1825 to a.d. 1850. In the quai-ter of a century lietween the death of Byron (1824) and tlie death of Wordsworth (1850), the .stream of English Literature, that had passed the rapids, broadened and flowed on with less grandeur of imjiatient force. The number of writei's began greatly to multiply, and the liest of them still faithfully expressed, each in his own w-ay, the higliest aspirations of the time. It was during these years that the two writer.s who next took foremost place among the poets of their day — Alfred Tennyson and Robert Browniing — first won recognition. Tenny- son's " In Memoriani," and Bi'owning's " Christmas Eve and Easter Day," both ajipeared in the year of Wordswortli's death. Wlten Wordsworth, in 1821, was visiting Sir George Beaumont, at Coleorton, he found his old friend busy over the building of a church on his estate. That led to many conversations on church history, and of these came the design of the series of " Ecclesiastical Sonnets," tracing the course of English religion. The third book of the series opened with a sonnet describing a real dream of his beloved daughter Dora, which caused a dread that, in the next sonnet, he likened to such dread as belonged to any thought of tlie decay of England : — A DREAM. I saw the figure of a lovely Maid Seated alone beneath a darksome tree. Whoso fondly-overhanging canopy Set off her brightness with a pleasing shade. No Spirit was she ; that my heart betrayed. For she was one I loved exceedingly ; But while I gazed in tender reverie (Or was it sleep that with my Fancy played ':) The bright corporeal presence — fomi and face — Eemaining still distinct grew thin and rare. Like sunny mist ; — at length the golden hair. Shape, limbs, and heavenly features, keeping pace Each with the other in a lingeiing race Of dissolution, melted into air. Wordsworth's children had been — John, born in 1803; Dora, born in 1804, on lier mother's birth- day, the 16th of August; Thomas, born in 1806; Catherine, in 1808; and William, in 1810. When, in 1812, Thomas and C'atherlne died, there remained onl}' two sons and Dora. In 1827 Su' George Beaumont died, and be- queathed to his friend Wordsworth .£100 a year to defray the expenses of a yearly summer tour. Lady Beaumont died in 1829, and Wordsworth's " Elegiac Musings in the Grounds of Coleorton," written in 1830, expressed the poet's sense of what had passed, with them, out of his life. In that year his eldest son, who liad become rector of Moresby, married. In the autumn of 1831 Wordsworth went with his daughter to see Sir Walter Scott before his departure for Italy. Broken down by five years of heroic struggle that liad made his life a poem, Scott was about to seek in Italy some faint renewal of health utterly spent in fulfilment of resolve that the burden of debt heaped on him when his fortunes fell, in a year of much commercial disaster, should be lifted only by his labours for the honest payment of it all. Wordsworth found Scott, in 1831, for other than he had been when he once said playfully, in Patterdale, " I mean to live till I am eighty, and wTite as long as I live." Scott went with las friends to Newark Castle, on the Yarrow. Upon their return the Tweed had to be crossed ojjposite Abbots- ford. The wheels of their carriage grated on the pebbles of the river-lied ; there was a purple light upon the hills ; and Wordsworth's heart was full. as he thought that this might be the last time Scott would ever cross that stream. Then it was that in the trouble of his mind lie began the sonnet on the DEPARTURE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT FROJI ABBOTSFORD FOR NAPLES. A trouble, not of clouds, or weeping rain, Nor of the setting sun's pathetic light Engendered, hangs o'er Eildon's triple height: Spirits of Power, assembled there, complain For Icindred Power, departing from their sight ; While Tweed, best jjleased in chanting a blithe strain, Saddens his voice again and j'et again. Lift up your hearts, ye Mourners 1 for the might TO A.D. 1850.] SHORTER P0P:MS. 459 Of the -whole world's good wishes with him goes ; Blessings :ind prayers in nobler retinue 10 Thau sceptred king or laurelled conqueror knows, Follow this wondrous Potentate. Be true, Ye winds of ocean, and the midland sea, AVafting your Charge to soft rartlicmipe ! Both this sonnet and the " Yarrow Revisited," written during the same visit to Scotland, were sent to Scott before liis departure on the journey from which he hurried back only to die in 1832. In 1834 Coleridge died. In 183G Wordsworth's okl house companion, liis wife's sister, Sarali Hutcliinson, died. In 18-41 Wordswortli's daughter Dora mar- ried Edwartl Quillinan. In 1843 Southey died, and Wordsworth, then seventy-three years old, succeeded deductions. In 1813, upon the death of Mr. Pye, the office of Poet Laureate was declined by Sir Walter Scott, at whose suggestion it was accepted by Soutlicy. Considering what small poets had lately made of it, the office wiis so fallen in esteem that it conferred no credit until Southey honoured it by his acceptance, and a greater poet became his successor. In 1816, Southey lost his only son Herbert, a boy of ten. Two years later another son, his last child, was born to him. The death of his youngest daughter and the marriage of his eldest jireceded the last Olness of his wife. He had made his homo for many years the home of his wife's sisters. Mrs. Lovell and INIrs. Coleridge. In 1829, Mrs. Coleridge went to live with her daughter, who then married. Soon afterwards Mrs. Southey was afflicted with mentiil Gheta Hall. him as poet laureate. Southey was thii-ty when he settled down at Greta Hall, near Keswick, in the year 1804, and there his home was fixed imtil his death. In a pleasant home by Skiddaw, upon vantage- ground that gave him a broad view of the scenery of Derwentwater, he worked steailily day by day, gathering a large library about him, while he wrote reviews for aid to housekeeping expenses, and in books that sometimes failed to benefit the house- keeping account, he added treasures of his own mind to the libraries of others. But of such work, when he knew that it would be ill-paid, Southey wrote to Coleridge, that £10,000 would not induce him to forego it, " for twice the sum could not purchase me half the enjoyment." In one of Miss Seward's letters we read that the first year's balance in Southey's favour on the sale of his "Madoc" was .£3 17.s. Id. Southey had friends able to help him in two of his old Westminster schoolfellows, Charles Wynn and Gro.s- venor Bedford. In 1807, when Charles Wynn became an Under-Secretary of State, he obtained for Southey a pension of £200, which became £144 by official disease, and had to be placed in an asylum. " I have been parted from my wife," wrote Southey, " by something worse than death ; forty j'eai-s she has been the life of my life." Her death followed in 1837. "During more than two-thirds of mj- life," he wrote, "she has been the chief object of my thoughts, and I of hers. No man had a truer help- mate ; no children a more cai-efid mother." Southey went abi'oad for a time to recover health, and came back with dread of the failure of his own mind. Another daughter had married, only one remained at home, and his son was at Oxford. In Jiiue, 1831), he mari'ied again, taking for his wife a poetess. Miss Caroline Bowles. But the malai-Chains-tuid-tJuir-Xubks- with'Links-of-Jron, Serjeant in JretorCs Itcgimetit. Oh ! wherefore come ye forth, in triumph from the North, With your hands, and your feet, and your raiment aU red '; And wherefore doth your rout send forth a joyous shout ■" -Vnd whence be the grapes of the wine-press which ye tread? Uh evil was the root, and bitter was the fruit, And crimson was the juice of the vintage that we trod ; For we trampled on the throng of the haughty and the strong. Who sate in the high places, and slew the saints of God. It was about the noon of a glorious day of June, That we saw their banners dance, and their cuirasses shine, And the Man of Blood was there, with his long essenced hair, And Astley, and Sir Marmaduke, and Rupeii of the Rhine. Like a servant of the Lord, with his Bible and his sword, The General rode along us to form us to the fight, When a murmuring sound broke out, and sweU'd into a shout, Among the godless horsemen upon the tyrant'.s right. And hark ! Uke the roar of the billows on the shore, The cry of battle rises along their eharging line ! For God ! for the Cause 1 for the Church, for the Laws ! For Charles King of England, and Rupert of the Rhine ! The furious Geiman comes, with his clarions and his drums. Ilia bravoes of Alsatia, and pages of \\'Tiitehall ; They are bursting on our flanks. Grasp your pikes, close your ranks ; For Rupert never comes but to conquer or to fall. They are here ! They rush on 1 AVe .are brolcen ! We arc gone! Our left is borne before them like stubble on the blast. Lord, put forth thy might ! Lord, defend the right 1 Stand back to back, in God's name, and fight it to the last. Stout Skippon hath a wound ; the centre hath given ground : Hark ! hark ! — What means the trampling of horsemen on our rear ? Whose banner do I see, boys ? "Tis he, thank God, 'tis he, boys. Bear up another minute : brave Oliver is here. Their heads all stooping low, their points all in a row, Like a whirlwind on the trees, like a deluge on the dykes. Our cuirassiers have burst on the ranks of the Accurst, And at a shock have scattered the forest of his pikes. Fast, fast, the gallants ride, in some safe nook to liidc Their coward heads, predestined to rot on Temple Bar : And he — he turns, he flies : — shame on those cruel eyes That bore to look on torture, and dare not look on war. Ho ! comrades, scour the plain ; and, ere ye strip the slain, First give another stab to make your search secure. Then shake from sleeves and pockets their broad-pieces and lockets. The tokens of the wanton, the plunder of the poor. Fools ! your doublets shone with gold, and your hearts wen- gay and bold, \Mien you kissed your lily hands to your lemans to-day ; .^d to-mon-ow shall the fox, from her chambers in the rocks. Lead forth her tawny cubs to howl above the prey. Where be your tongues that late mocked at heaven and In 11 and fate. And the fingers that once were so busy with your blades, Yoiu- perfum'd satin clothes, yoiu- catches and your oaths, Youi- stage-plays and your sonnets, your diamonds and youi' spades ? Down, down, for over down with the mitre and the crown. With the Belial of the Court, and the Mammon of thi Pope ; There is woe in O.-cford Halls; there is wail in Durham's Stalls : The Jesuit smites his bo.^om : the Bishop rends his cope. And She of the seven hills shall mourn her children's ills, And tremble when she thinks on the edge of England's sword ; And the Kings of earth in fear shall shudder when they hear Wliat the hand of God hath wrought for the Houses and the Word. In 182-t, when this appeared, Macaulay's age wjus four-and-twenty. Campbell's "Pleasures of Hope" appeared when its author was but two-and-twenty. Keats at four-and-twenty wrote the " Eve of St. Agnes" and the "Pot of kisil," had wTitten "Endy- mion," and was writing "Hyperion." There were no depths of thought in Macaulay's lively verse rhetoric, but there was some forecast of the brilliant success to be achieved liy liim hereafter as a prose historian wlio could fascinate the many and the few. Thomas Hood was but about a year older than Macaulay. He was born in 1799, and died in 184;"). Thomas Hood — whom we may distinguish as the elder, from a clever son, now also passed away — made 4G2 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1S25 his mark firet as a writer in 1825, by jomiiig John Hamilton Reynolds, whose sister he hail lately married, in a playful little ^•olume of " Odes and Adch-esses to Great People :" — such as Graham, the aeronaut ; !M'Adam, the improver of roads ; and W. Kitchiner, M.D., author of "The Cook's Oracle," " Obsei"4"ations on Vocal Music," ■' The Art of In- vigorating and Prolonging Life," " Practical Obser- vations on Telescopes, Opera-glasses, and Spectacles," " Tlie Housekeeper's Ledger," and " The Pleasure of Making a Will." In 1826 Hood ptiblished his fii-st series of " Whims and OdcUties," a second series in 1827, and then a volume, "The Plea of the Mid- summer Fairies," ^vith other poems, and among them these : — RUTH. She stood breast high amid the com Clasp'd by the golden light of mom, Like the sweetheart of the sun, A^Tio many a glowing kiss had won. On her cheek an autumn flush. Deeply ripen' d ; — such a blush In the midst of brown was bom. — Like red poppies grown with com. Round her eyes her tresses fell, 'Which were blackest none couM tell, 10 But long lashes veil'd a light, That had else been all too bright. And her hat, with shady brim, JIade her tressy forehead dim : — Thxis she stood amid the stooks. Praising God with sweetest looks : — Sure, I said, Hear'n did not mean, Where I reap thou shoiddst but glean, Lay thy sheaf adown and come. Share mv har^■est and mv home. 20 I REMEMBER, I REMEMBfZR. I remember, I remember. The house where I was bom. The little window where the sun Came peeping in at mom ; He never came a wink too soon, Jsor brought too long a day. But now, I often wish the night Had borne my breath away ! I remember, I remember. The rose.s, red and white, 10 The A-iolet.s, and the lily-cups. Those flowers made of light '. The lilacs where the robin built, And where my brother set The laburnum on his birth-day, — The tree is li\Tng yet 1 I remember, I remember, AVhere I was used to swing. And thought the air must rush as fi-esh To swallows on the wing : 20 ?0 My spu-it flew in feathers then, That is so heavy now. And summer pools could hardly cool The fever on my brow ! I remember, I remember The fir-trees dark and high ; I used to think their slender tops AVere close against the sky : It was a childish ignorance, But now 'tis little joy To know I'm farther off from heav'n Than wlien I was a boy. There w;as another piece in like strain beginning — " I remember, I remember How mv childhood fleeted bv," which was written by W. ]M. Praed in June, 18.33. Among other poems in Thomas Hood's volume of 1827 is this, in which his playful humour blends with the .serious feeling that gave worth to his wit : — A RETROSPECTI'S-E REVIEW. Oh, when I was a tiny hoy, Jly nights and days were full of joy, 3Iy mates were blithe .and land 1 — No wonder that I sometimes sigh, -\nd dash the tear-drop from mj- eye, To cast a look heliind 1 A liooj) was an eternal round Of pleasure. In those days I found A top a joyous thing ; — But now those past delights I drop. My head, alas '. is all my top. And careful thoughts the string ! 10 My marbles — once my bag was stored, — I\ow I must play with Elgin's lord, With Theseus for a taw 1 My plaj-f ul horse has slipt his string. Forgotten all his capering. And hamess'd to the law ! My kite — how fast and far it flew 1 Whilst I, a sort of Franklin, drew My pleasure from the sky I 'Twas paper'd o'er with studious themes, The tasks I wrote — my present dreams Will never soar so high I My joys are wingless all and dead ; My dumps arc made of more than lead ; My flights soon find a fall : My fears iTevail, my fancies droop, Joy never cometh with a hoop. And seldom with a call I My football's laid upon the shelf ; I am a shuttlecock myself The world knocks to and fro : — My archery is all unleam'd. And grief against myself has tum'd Mv arrow.^ and mv bow I ■20 SO TO A.D. 1850.] SHOKTER POEMS. 403 Xo more in noontide sun I bask ; lly authorship's an cndk'ss task, 31y head's ne'er out of school : Jly heart is pain'd with scorn and slight, 40 I have too many foes to fight. And friends grown strangely cool 1 The very chum that shared my cake Holds out so cold a hand to shake, It makes me shi-ink and sigh : — On this I will not dwell and hang, — The changeling would not feel a pang Though these should meet his eye ! Xo skies so blue or so serene As then ; — no leaves look half so green oO As clothed the playground tree ! All things I loved are altcr'd so, Xor docs it ease my heart to laiow That change resides in me 1 Oh for the garb that mark'd the boy, The trousers made of corduroy, "Well ink'd with black and red ; The crownless hat, ne'er deem'd an ill — It only let the sunshine still Repose upon my head '. GO Oh for the riband round the neck I The careless dogs' -ears ajjt to deck My book and collar both 1 How can this formal man be styled Merely an Alexandi-ine child, A boy of larger growth ? Oh for that small, small beer anew ! And (heaven's own tj-pe) that mild sk}--blue That wash'd my sweet meals down ; The master even ! — and that small Tui'k 70 That fagg'd me ! — worse is now my work — A fag for all the town I Oh for the lessons leam'd by heaii ! Ay, though the verj- birch's smart Should mark those hours again ; I'd " kiss the rod," and be resign'd Beneath the stroke, and even tind 8ome sugar in the cane I The Ai-abian Xights rehearsed in bed ! The Fairy Tales in school-time road, 80 By stealth, 'twixt verb and noun ! The angel form that always walk'd In all my dreams, and look'd and talk'd Exactly like Miss Brown I The ointic bene — Christmas come I The prize of merit, won for home — ilerit had prizes then ! But now I write for days and days, For fame — a deal of empty praise, Without the silver pen 1 '.'0 Then " home, sweet home !" the crowded coach — The joyous shout — the loud apjiroach — The winding horns like rams' I The meeting sweet th.it made me tlirill, The sweetmeats, almost sweeter still, Xo " satis" to the " jams '. " — ^\^len that I was a tiny boy My days and nights were full of joy, My mates were blithe and kind ! No wonder that I sometimes sigh. And dash the tear-drop from my eye, To cast a look behind ; 100 Walter Savage Landor, born to sub.stantial means in 1775, and educated at Eugby and Oxford, pub- lished his "Gebir" in 1797, at Warwick, a.s a six- penny pamphlet. Robert Southey was the first to declare its merit, and it ranks now with those longer poems, as his "Count Julian" ranks with the plays, which will be referred to in another part of this Library. From the edition of his " Gebii-," published with '-Count Julian" and other poems in 1831,1 take a little sigh for the early death of a member of Lord Aylmer's family, who went to India. Charles Lamb wrote of it to Landor in 1832, " Many things I had to say to jou which there was not time for. One, why should I forget ? 'Tis for ' Rose Aylmer,' which has a charm I cannot explain. I lived npon it for weeks." ROSE AYLMER. Ah, what avails the sceptred race, -\h, what the fomi divine ! "VMiat every virtue, every grace ! Rose Aylmer, all were thine. Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes May weep, but never see ; A night of memories and of sighs I consecrate to thee. This was another of the poems in the volume pub- lished in 1831 :— AN ARAB TO HIS MISTRESS. Against Anffcr. Look thou yonder, look and tremble. Thou whose passion swells so high ; See those ruins that resemble Flocks of camels as they lie. 'Twas a fair but fix)wai-d city, Bidding tribes and chiefs obey, 'Till he came who, deaf to pity. Tost the imploring arm away. Spoil'd and pi-ostrato, she lamented What her jiride and folly wrought ; 10 But was ever Pride contented. Or would Folh- e'er be taught? Strong are cities: Rage o'erthrows 'em ; Kage o'erswells the gallant ship : Stains it not th(^ cloud-white bosom, Flaws it not the ruby lip ': 404 CASSELL'S LIBRAEY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1825 All thiit shields us, all that charnis us, Brow of ivory, tower of stone, Yield to wrath ; another's harms us. But we perish by our own. 20 Night may send to rave and ravage Panther and hyena fell ; But their manners, harsh and savage, Little suit the mild gazelle. When tlie waves of life surround thee. Quenching oft the light of love, "WTien the clouds of doubt confound thee. Drive not from thy breast the dove. Ill 18.31 tliero appeared also the "Com -Law Rhymes" of Ebenezer Elliot, who was born in 1781, son of a commercial clerk in the iron-works at Masborougli, near Rotherham. Elliot himself lived to earn success in the iron trade. He died in 1849. His rhymes dealt certainly with an essential of life, when dear bread was their theme, and they strongly illustrate the spirit of the time when the Reform Bill was impending, and from year to year, now (juietly, and now through long strife of opinion, waj' was being made towards the fulfilment of some hopes bequeathed by the eighteenth to the nineteenth century. From Elliot's " Corn-Law Rhymes " let us take a SONG. Tunc — Eobin Adair. " Child, is thy father dead?" " Father is gone ! " " 'WTiy did they tax his bread f " " God's will be done '. Jlother has sold her bed ; — Better to die than wed ; — ■\Vhere shall she lay her head 'r Home wo have none. " Father clamm'd thrice a week, God's will be done : 10 Long for work did he seek, Work he found none : Tears on his hollow cheek Told what no tongue could speak." " Why did his master break '; " " God's will be done 1 " Doctor said, .\ir was best. Food we had none ; Father, with panting breast, Groan'd to be gone. 20 Now he is with the blest ; — Mother says, Death is best ; — We have no place of rest." — " Yes, ye have one." In 1833, a year before his fother's death, ap- peared a volume of poems by Coleridge's eldest son Hartley, who was born at Cle^•edon, in 1796. Both Hartley Coleridge and Sara his sister inherited a measure of tlieii- father's genius. Hartley's youth was passed under the influence of his father and his father's friends at the lakes. He went to Oxford in 1815, became Fellow of Oriel, and lost his fellow- ship by fault of his own. His after life, until his death at Rydal in 1849, was very sad, and its melan- choly tone is in his verse. His verse indicates more than a skill acquired bv much communion with poets. He has a delicate strain of liis own, which is not the less true for its want of power to compel a wide attention. These are two poems from the volume published by Hartley Coleridge at Leeds, in 1833:— NIGHT. The crackling embers on the hearth are dead ; The indoor note of industry is still ; The latch is fast ; upon the window-sill The small birds wait not for their daily bread ; The voiceless flowers — how ([uietly they shed Their nightly odours ; — and the household rill JIurmurs continuous dulcet sounds that fill The vaciint expectation, and the dread Of listening Night. And haply now she sleeps : For all the gan-ulous noises of the ail' Are hush'd in peace ; the soft dew silent weeps. Like hopeless lovers for a maid so fair — Oh ! that I were the happy dream that creeps To her soft heart, to find my image there. 10 SONG. Tis sweet to hear the merry lark, That bids a blithe good morrow ; But sweeter to hark in the twinkling dark, To the soothing song of sorrow. O nightingale ! What doth she ail f And is she sad or jolly ? For ne'er on earth was sound of mirth So like to melancholy. The merry lark, he soars on Irigh, No worldly thought o'ertakes him ; He sings aloud to the clear blue sky. And the daylight that awakes him. As sweet a lay, as loud, as gay. The nightingale is trilling ; With feeling bliss, no less than his, Her little heart is thrilling. Yet ever and anon a sigh Peers through her lavish mirth ; For the lark's bold song is of the sky. And hers is of the earth. By night and day she tunes her lay To drive away all sorrow ; For bliss, alas ! to-night must pass, And woe may come to-morrow. 10 20 Alfred Tennyson, born in 1809, in the rectory of Somersby, a Lincolnshire village, published in 1827, at Louth in Lincolnshire, with his brother Charles, a little volume entitled " Poems by Two Brothers." Of the two brothers, Chdrles, who has taken the name of Turner, is known to a tit audience as author of several \-olumes of verse delicate and true ; while Alfred Tennyson succeeded Wordsworth TO A.D. 1850.] SHORTER POEMS. 465 as poet laureate in tlie year 18.50. Early in 1821) Alfred Tennyson entered Trinity College, Cambridge. Ai'thur Henry Hallam, born in February, 1811, son of Henry Hallam, the historian, had joined the same college in the preceding terra. Arthur Hallam had also the temperament, and, as the " Memorials " jiublished after his death show, no small measure of the skill of a poet, and between Arthur Hallam and Alfred Tennyson a warm friendship arose. They competed, in 1829, for the Chancellor's Gold Medal, each writing a poem on the assigned subject, Tim- buctoo. Tennyson won the prize, and " Timbuctoo " was published, with his name u)ion the title-page, in July, 1829. In 1830 followed a volume entitled " Poems, chiefly Lyrical," which contained fifty-three pieces. Of these only twenty-five are retained, and these are the fii'st twenty-five in the current volume of Tennyson's Poems, including "Claribel," "Lilian," and " Mariana." In one of its pieces is this sense of his calling, as that of one who has hate only for the spirit of hate, scorn only for the spirit of scorn, ex- pres.sed by a true poet at the opening of his career. When the volume in which it apjieared was pub- lished, its author's age was only twenty-one. THE POET. The poet in a golden eUino was born, "Witli golden stars above : Dower'd with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn. The love of love. He saw tlu'o' life and death, thi-o' good and iU, He saw thro' his o^\ti soul. The marvel of the everlasting will, An open scroll, Before him lay : with echoing feet he threaded The secretest walks of fame : 10 The -s-iewless arrows of his thoughts were headed And wing'd with fiame. Like Indian reeds blown from his silver tongue, And of so fierce a flight, From Calpe unto Caucasus they sung, Filling with light And vagrant melodies the winds which bore Them earthward till they lit : Then, like the arrow-seeds of the field flower, The fruitful wit 20 Cleaving, took root, and springing forth anew "Where'er they fell, behold, Like to the fliother plant in semblance, grew A flower all gold, And bravely furaish'd all abroad to fling The winged shafts of truth. To throng with stately blooms the breathing spring Of Hope and Youth. So many minds (Ud gird their orbs with beams, Tho' one did fling the fire. 30 Heaven flow'd u])on the soul in many dreams Of high desire. 59 Tlius truth was m\iltiplied on truth, tho world Like one great garden show'd, And thro' the wreath.s of floating dark upcurl'd, liare sunrise flow'd. And Freedom rear'd in that august sunrise Her beautiful bold brow, AVlien rites and forms before his burning oyes Melted like snow. 40- There was no blood upon her maiden robes Sunn'd by those oi-ient skies ; But round about the circles of the globes Of her keen eyes And in her raiment's hem was traced in flame Wisdom, a name to shake All cv-il dreams of power — a sacred name. And when she spake. Her words did gather thunder as they ran. And as the bghtning to the thunder .50 ■WTiich follows it, rii-ing the spirit of ma'n. Making earth wonder. So was their meaning to her words. No sword Of wTath her right arm whirl' d. But one poor poet's scroU, and with Jiis word She shook the world. In 1833, or at the end of 1832. when not yet twenty-four, Alfred Tennyson published a seooml volume of " Poems," which included the " Lady of Shalott," the "Miller's Daughter," the "May Queen" and " New Year's Eve," and the " Lotos Eaters." About a dozen of the pieces in that volume have been since withdrawn, and those allowed to remain follow the pieces that appeared in 1830, from the "Lady of Shalott" to the poem "To J. S. ;" except that " Lady Clara Vere de Vere," the " Conclusion to the May Qtieen," and " The Blackbird," all first printed in 1842, are now placed among them. In September, 1833, Arthur Hallam died, and Alfred Temiyson did not produce another volume for ten years. The lasting monument raised by him over the grave of the dead friend was "In Memoriam," not published until 18-50, a poem on Immortality whicli represents the gradual lifting of the soul from the fii'st mood of grief, when Darkness must needs have her raven gloss, to the highest sense of the future of the individual and of the race. Here we have again the full voice of the time ; and labour for the growth of each is recognised as the true way towards the gro^^■th of all. The spirit of Words- worth's question, the vital question of our century, "What one is, Wby may not millions bo '^" reappears in Tennyson's hope for the future of the world, that what" Arthur Hallam had been, the millions might in some day of a crowning race be- come : "I would the great world gi-ew like thee." It is in " In Memoriam" and " Idylls of the King " that the close harmony between Alfred Tennyson's poetry and the main labour of our time is most 466 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1825 inanifest, and there will V)e record of these in another volume. But in his minor poems there is not less true reflection of much that is best in his time. After a pause of ten years there appeared in 1842, " Poems by Alfred Tennyson, in Two Volumes," and from the pieces then first published let us take one as an illustration of the change that has come over our literature since the days of French-classical influ- ence, when writing about writing, in Latin-English, was especially in fiivour. The chief theme is again human love, the chief interests of life are agam love and duty, and the English is such as Wordsworth bade us wi-ite, a selection from that really used by men ; with j^reference like Spenser's for short simple words, and frequent nse of a musical line in which there is no word more than two syllables long, and sometimes all the words are monosyllables. DORA. "With fai-mer Allan at the fai-m abode WilUam and Dora. William was his son, And she his niece. He often look'd at thorn, And often thought " I'll make them man and wife." Now Dora felt her uncle's will in all, And yearn' d towards "William ; but the youth, because He had been always with her in the house, Thought not of Dora. Then there came a day AVhen Allan call'd his son, and said, " My son : lO I married late, but I would wish to see My grandchild on my knees before I die : And I have set my heart upon a match. Now therefore look to Dora ; she is well To look to ; thrifty too beyond her age. She is my brothei''s daughter ; he and I Had once hard woi'ds, and parted, and he died In foreign lands ; but for his sake I bred His daughter Dora : take her for your wife ; For I have wish'd this marriage, night and day, 20 For many years." But Wilham answer' d short: "*' I cannot many Dora ; by my life, I will not marry Dora." Then the old man Was wroth, and doubled up his hands, and said : " You will not, boy ! you dare to answer thus ! But in my time a father's word was law. And so it shall be now for me. Look to it ; Consider, William : take a month to think, And let me have an answer to my wi.sh ; Or, by the Lord that made me, you shall pack, 30 And never more darken my doors again." But William answer'd madly ; bit his lips, And broke away. The more he look'd at her The less he liked her ; and his ways were hai-sh ; But Dora bore them meekly. Then before The month was out he left his father's house, And hired himself to work within the fields ; And half in love, half spite, lie woo'd and wed A laboui-cr's daughter, Mary Jlorrison. Then, when the bells were ringing, Allan call'd 40 His niece and said : " My girl, I love you well ; But if you speak with him that was my son. Or change a word with her he calls his wife, My home is none of yours. My will is law." And Dora promised, being meek. She thought, *• It cannot be : ray >mcle's mind will change! " And days went on, and there was born a boy To William ; then distresses came on him ; And day by day he pass'd his father's gate. Heart-broken, and his father help'd hiiu not. oO But Dora stored what little she could save. And sent it them by stealth, nor did they know ^\^lO sent it ; till at last a fever seized On William, and in harvest time he died. Then Dora went to Maiy. Mary sat And looked with tears upon her boy, and thought Hard things of Dora. Dora came ami said: " I have obey'd my uncle until now. And I have sinn'd, for it was all thro' me This evil came on William at the iirst. GO But, Mary, for the sake of him that's gone. And for your sake, the woman that he chose, And for this orphan, I am come to you : You know there has not been for these five years So full a harvest : let me take the boy, And I will set him in my uncle's eye Among the wheat ; that when his heart is glad Of the full harvest, he may see the boy. And bless him for the sake of him that's gone." And Dora took the child, and went her way 70 Across the wheat, and sat upon a mound That was unsown, where many poppies grew. Far off the farmer came into the field And spied her not ; for none of all his men Dare tell him Dora waited with the child ; And Dora would have risen and gone to him, But her heart fail'd her ; and the reapers reap'd. And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. But when the morrow came, she rose and took The cliild once more, and sat upon the mound ; S(l And made a Uttle wreath of all the flowers That gi-ew about, and tied it round his hat To make him pleasing in her uncle's eye. Then when the fanner pass'd into the field He spied her, and he left his men at work, And came and said, " ^\^lere were you yesterday !- Whose child is that ? "V^^lat are you doing here i " So Dora cast her eyes upon the ground, And answer'd softly, " This is William's child 1 " " And did I not," said Allan, " did I not 00 Forbid you, Dora ?" Dora said again, "Do with me as you will, but take the child And bless him for the sake of him that's gone ! " And Allan said, " I see it is a trick Got up bet^vixt you and the woman there. I must be taught my duty, and by you ! You knew my word was law, .and yet you dared To slight it. Well— for I will take the Ijoy ; But go you hence, and never see me more." So saying, he took the boy, that cried aloud 1 00 And struggled hard. The wreath of flowers fell At Dora's feet. She bow'd upon her hands, ,\nd the boy's cry came to her from the field. More and more distant. She bow'd down her head Eemembering the day when first she came. And all the things that had been. She bow'd down And wept in secret ; .and the reapers reap'd, And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. Then Dora went to JIary's house, and stood TJpon the threshold. Mary saw the boy 110 Was not with Dora. She broke out in praise To God, that help' d her in her widowhood. And Dora said, " My uncle took the ^oy ; But, Mary, let me live and work with yon : TO A.D. 1850.] SHORTER POEMS 407 120 130 140 Ho says that ho will never see me more." Then answer'd Mary, "This shall never he, That thou shouldst take my trouble on thyself : And, now I think, ho shall not have the hoy. For he will teach him hardness, and to slight His mother ; therefore thou and I will go, Ajitl r will have my hoy, and bring him home ; And I vdU beg of liim to take thee back : But if he will not take thee back again. Then thou and I will live \vithin one house And work for AVilliam's child, until he grows Of age to help us." So the women kiss'd Each other, and set out, and roayh'd the farm. The door was off the latch : they peep'd, and saw The boy set up betwi.\t his grandsii-e's knees. Who thi'ust him in the hollows of his ami, •Vnd clapt him on the hands and on the cheeks, Like one that loved him : and the lad stretch' d out And babbled for the golden seal, that himg From Allan's watch, and sparkled by the tire. Then they came in : but when the boy beheld His mother, he cried out to come to her : And Allan stit him down, and Mary said : " Father 1 — if you let me call you so — I never came a-begging for myself. Or William, or this child ; but now I come For Dora : take her back ; she loves you well. Oh, sh', when William died, he died at peace With all men ; for I ask'd him, and he said, He could not ever rue his marrying me — I had been a patient wife : but, sh-, he said That he was wrong to cross his father thus : ' God bless him ! ' he said, ' and may he never know The troubles I have gone thro' ! ' Then ho turn'd His face and pass'd — unhappy that I am I But now, sir, let me have my boy, for you Will make him hard, and he will learn to slight His father's memory ; and take Dora back, And let all this be as it was before." So Mary said, and Dora hid her face By Mary. There was silence in the room ; And all at once the old man burst in sobs : — ■' I have been to blame — to blame. I have Idll'd m\' son. I have kill'd him — but I loved him — my dear son. May God forgive me 1 — I have been to blame. Kiss me, my children." Then they clung about The old man's neck, and kiss'd him many times. And all the man was broken with remorse; And all his love came back a hundredfold ; And for three hours he sobb'd o'er William's Thinking of William. So those four abode AVithin one house together ; and as yeans AVent forward, Jlarv took another mate ; But Dora lived unmarried till her death. l.JO I GO child. 170 ■ Robert Browninf;, born in 1812, procluced in 18.3.5, at tlie age of three-and-twentv, liis poem of '■ Paracelsus," and in tliis he at once dealt with a main thouglit in tlie life of our own day. Words- worth liad learnt and taught that by wild effort to reach at once the far ideal, society gains less tlian by the quiet labour of each one to do his daily duty. In accordance with this teacliing Robert Browning made )io(;tic use of the troubled life of a .self-confident aspirant, who lived in the si.xteenth century, and fasliioned him into the typo of a man yearning with an indefinite sense of power and filled with a hope not unlike that of many a young heiut in Europe in the days of the Frejich "Revolution. His aspii-ation, compared with that of others, " was so vast In scope that it included their best flights. Combined them, and desired to gain one prize In phice of many, — the secret of the world. Of man, and man's true pui-pose, path and fate." Paracelsus said that he " seemed to long At once to trample on, yet save mankind. To make some unexampled sacrifice In their behalf, to wring some wondrous good From heaven or earth for thcni .... Once the feat achieved, I would wthdraw from their oiKcious praise, AVoidd gently put aside their profuse thanks." With such aspirations he is sitting in a quiet garden with his old college friend Fe.stus and his friend's wife Michal, a pair whose loving hearts are satisfied with faithful doing of the duties they find ill a quiet path of life. Festus asks his friend " How can that course be safe which from the first Produces carelessness to human love ? " But Paracelsus still aspires only to know, and says, " Make no more giants, God, But elevate the race at once ! AVe ask To put forth just our strength, our hiiman strength, All starting fairly ; all equipped alike, Gifted alike ; all eagle-eyed, true-hearted, — See if we cannot beat the angels yet ! Such is my task. I go to gather this The sacred knowledge, here and there dispersed About the world, long lost or never foimd." Ill the house of a Greek conjuror, liowed by failure, seeking weak encouragement to win him "but one hour of his first energy," he meets the poet Aprile — " Paracelsus. — I am he that aspired to kxow, and thou ': A]>ri!e. — I would love infinitely, and be loved. Faraeclsiis. — Poor slave ! I am thy king indeed." But from Aprile's speech he learns the need of lo^'e, and also this :— " Knowing ourselves, our world, oiu- task so great. Our time so brief, 'tis clear if we refuse The means so limited, the tools so rude To execute oitr pur^)Ose, life will fleet And we shall fade, and leave oui' task undone. AA'e will be wise in time." Aprile dies in the arms of Paracelsus : — 4Db CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1825 " Paracelsus. — Die not, Aprile ! We must never pai-t. Are we not halves of one dissevered world, Whom this strange chance unites once more ? Part never Till thou, the Lover, know ; and I, the Knower, Love — untU both are saved." Presently these are Aprile's dyiiig words : — " Stay, I know, I know them. WTio should know them well as I ? White brows lit up with glory; poets all. I'aracelsus. — Let him but live, and I have my reward. Aprile. — Yes ; I see now. God is the Perfect Poet, WTio in His person acts His own creations. Had you but told me this at first. Hush I hush 1" Thau Paracelsus is with Festus again, aud in loving converse tells how he was warned by " a man With aims not mine, and yet pursued like mine. With the same fervour- and no more success, Perishing in my sight ; who summoned me, As I would shun the ghastly fate I saw, To serve my race at once ; to wait no longer That God should interfere on my behalf, But to distrust myself, put pride away. And give my gains, imperfect as they were, To men." He has learnt that he shonkl be with men as their leader and fellow-vvoi-ker, yet he feels before his .age :— " 'Tis in the advance of indi-sadual minds That the slow crowd should ground their expectation, Eventually to follow." And he despairs of himself : — '• Love, hope, fear, faith — these make humanity ; These are its signs, and note and character. And these I have lost ! gone, shut from me for ever. Like a dead friend safe from unkindncss more." He begins to work with men, through " A trust in them and a respect — a sort Of sjTnpathy for them : I must needs begin To teach them, not amaze them." But when he speaks out, mean ojiposition rises, and he feels the duluess of the material on which he has to work. Then, become reckless, Paracelsus will " seek to know and to enjoy at once :"■ — " Suppose my labour should seem God's own cause Once more, as first I dreamed, — it shall not baulk me Of the meanest, earthliest, sensualest delight That may be snatched ; for every joy is gain. And gain is gain however small. IMy soul Can die then, nor be taunted — ' A^Tiat was gained ?' The whole plan is a makeshift, but will last My time." Yet he sings mournfully — " The sad rhyme of the men who proudly clung To their first fault, and withered in theii- pride." Michal is dead, and Paracelsus speaks his confused sense of her immortality, " For I believe we do not wildly die." He attains to his own highest earthly knowledge, dying as a madman in the hospital of 8t. Sebastian, with the love of Festus ministering to him, — " Festus you loved of old, Festus you know, you must know !" When the mists clear from his mind in the hour of death, he says, — " I would have had one day, one moment's space. Change man's condition, push each slumbering claim Of mastery o'er the elemental world At once to full maturity, then roll ObUvion o'er the tools, and hide from man What night had ushered morn. Not so, dear child Of after days, wilt thou reject the Past, Big with deep warnings of the proper tenure By which thou hast the earth ; the Present for thee Shall have distinct and trembling beauty, seen Beside that Past's own shade whence, in reUef, Its brightness shall stand out : nor on thee yet Shall burst the Future, as successive zones Of several wonder open on some spirit Flying secure and glad from hca\-en to heaven : But thou shalt painfully attain to joy. While hope, and fear, and love shall keep thee man." In the following poem of " Sordello," published in 18i0, Mr. Browning, liaving taken Dante as the standard of the poet who should be a worker with the men whose thought he helps to shape and raise, makes a representative figure of a poet before Dante, and paints the development of the poetic energy in this direction. Thus dealing from another point of view with human aspiration, he teaches a like lesson : — " God has conceded two sights to a man — One of men's whole work, time's completed plan ; The other of the minute's work, man's iu'st Step to the plan's completion." In all his subsequent poetry Mr. Browning has been faithful in his maintenance of the true human relation between the far ideal and the near. No conception of a better future for humanity can be too perfect ; but the way to the realising is only by patient use of ordinary powers for the sm-e foot- ing of each day's journey to the distant heights. The longer poems of Robert Browning show how steadily he brings liis own individuality to the enforcement of some of the chief truths of his time. Entliusiastic fellow-feeling for the poetry of Shelley, with all its yearning for a higher life in men, is in the mind of Robert Browning, as in the minds of all right readei-s, consistent with a firm adoption of the principle that gives life to the TO A.D. 1850.J SHORTER POEMS. 409 poetry of Wordsworth, memory, expressed in short poem : — The reverence for Shelley's ' Sordello," is also in this MEMORABILIA. Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, And did he stop and speak to you ? And did you speak to him agam :■ How strange it seems, and new ! But you were living before that, And you are living after. And the memory I started at — Jly starting moves j-oui- laughter ! I crossed a moor, with a name of its own And a use in the world no doubt, 10 Tet a hand's-breadth of it shines alone 'Mid the blank miles round about : Por there I picked up on the heather, And there I put inside my breast, A moulted feather, an eagle-feather — "Well, I forget the rest. The dramatic form of Mr. Browning's genius u-ill be illustrated in another volume. It enters into his shorter poems, which are rich in studies of human life. Let lis take, for example, one of which the pathos lies in a sense of the difference between what is desired and what is done. ANDREA DEL SARTO. Called " The Perfect I'liiiiter." But do not let us quarrel any more, Xo, my Lucrezia ; bear with me for once : iiit down and all shall happen as you wish. You tirrn youi- face, but does it bring yoiu- heart ': I'll work then for youi- friend's friend, never fear. Treat his own subject after his own way, Fi.v his own time, accept too his own price, And shut the money into this small hand When ne.xt it takes mine. "Will it ? tenderly Y 'Oh, I'll content him, — but to-morrow, Love I 10 I often am much wearier than you think, This evening more than usual, and it seems As if — forgive now — should you let me sit Here by the window with yom* hand in mine. And look a half-hour forth on Fiesole, Both of one mind, as married people use, •Quietly, quietly, the evening through, I might get up to-morrow to my work Cheerful and fresh as ever. Let us try. To-morrow how you shall be glad for this ! I'O Your soft hand is a woman of itself. And mine the man's bared breast she curls inside. Don't count the time lost, either ; you must serve For each of the five pictures we requii-e — It saves a model. So ! keep looking so — My serpentining beauty, rounds on rounds ! — How could you ever prick those perfect ears. Even to put the pearl there 1 oh, so sweet — Sly face, my moon, my everybody's moon, Which everybody looks on and calls his, 30 And, I suppose, is looked on by in turn, While she looks — no one's: very dear, no less! You smile ? why, there's my picture ready made. There's wliat we painters <:all our hannouy ! A common greyncss silvers everything, — All in a twilight, you and I alike . — You, at the point of your first pride in me (That's gone you know), — but I, at every point ; My youth, my hope, my art, being all toned down To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole. 1 There's the bell clinking from the chapel-top ; That length of convent- wall across tlio way Holds the trees safer, huddled more inside ; The last monk leaves the garden ; days decrease And autunm grows, autumn in everything. Eh ? the whole seems to fall into a shape As if I saw ;ilike my work and self And all that I was born to bo and do, A twihght-pieci!. Love, we are in God's hand. How strange, now, looks the life He makes us lead ! 50 .So free we seem, so fettered fast we are ! I feel He laid the fetter : let it lie ! This chamber for example — turn your head — All that's behind us ! you don't understand Nor care to understand about my art. But 3'ou can hear at least when people speak ; And that caitoon, the second from the door — It is the thing. Love 1 so such things should be — Behold Madonna, I am bold to say. I can do with my pencil what I know, 60 WTiat I see, what at bottom of my heart I wish for, if I ever -ivish so deep — Do easily, too — when I say perfectly, I do not boast, perhaps ; yourself are judge A\Tio Ustened to the Legate's talk last week, And just as much they used to say m France. At any rate 'tis easy, all of it. No sketches first, no studies, that's long past — I do what many di-eam of all their lives . — Dream ? strive to do, and agonise to do, 70 And fail in doing. I could count twenty such On twice your fingers, and not leave this town. Who strive — you don't know how the othei-s strive To paint a little thing like that you smeared Carelessly passing with your robes afloat, — Yet do much less, so much less. Someone says, (I know his name, no matter) so much less ! Well, less is more, Lucrezia! I am judged. There bm-ns a truer Ught of God in them, In their vexed, beating, stuffed and stopped-up brain. Heart, or whate'er else, than goes on to prompt 81 This low-pulsed forthright craftsman's hand of mine. Their works drop groundward, but themselves, I know, Reach many a time a heaven that's shut to me. Enter and take their place there sui-e enough. Though they come back and cannot tell the world. My works are nearer heaven, but I sit here. The sudden blood of these men ! at a word — Praise them, it boils, or blame them, it boils too. I, painting from myself and to myself, 90 Know what I do, am unmoved by men's blame Or their praise cither. Somebody remarks Morello's outline there is wTongly traced. His hue mistaken — what of that ? or else. Rightly traced and well ordered— what of that ? Speak as they please, what does the mountain care ? Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, Or what's a Heaven for f aU is silver-grey. Placid and perfect with my heart — the worse ! >) CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [iD. 1?: I know both \vh;ct I want and what might gain — 100 And yi't how jjrotitloss to know, to sigh, " Had 1 been two, another and myself, Our head would have o'erlooked the world!" Xo douht. Yondor's a work, now, of that famous youth The Urbinate who died five yrars ago. ('Tis copied, George Vasari sent it me.) "Well, I can fancy how he did it all, Pouring his soul, with kings and popes to sec, lieacliing, that Heaven might so replenish him, Above and through his art — for it gives way : 110 That arm is wrongly put — and there again — A faidt to pardon in the drawing's lines, Its body, so to speak : its soul is right, He means right — that, a child may understand. Still, what an arm ! and I could alter it. But all the play, the insight and the stretch — Out of me ! out of me ! And wherefore out ': Had you enjoined them on me, given me soul, We might have risen to Rafael, I and you. Xay, Love, j'ou did give all I asked, I think — r20 More than I merit, yes, by many times. But had you — oh, \\'ith the same perfect brow. And perfect eyes, and more than perfect mouth, And the low voice my soul hears, as a bii'd The fowler's pipe, and follows to the snare — Had you, with these the same, but brought a mind I Some women do so. Had the mouth there urged " God and the glory 1 never care for gain. The Present by the Futiu-e, what is that ': Live for fame, side by .side with Angelo — 1;J0 Pafael is waiting. Up to God all three '. " I might have done it for you. So it seems — Peihaps not. All is as God oveiTules. Beside, incentives come from the soul's self; The rest avail not. Why do I need you ': A\'hat wife had Rafael, or has Angelo ? In this world, who can do a thing, will not — And who would do it, cannot, I perceive : Yet the will's somewhat — somewhat, too, the power — And thus we half -men struggle. At the end, HO God, I conclude, compensates, punishes. 'Tis safer for me, if the award be strict, That I am something underrated here. Poor this long while, despised, to speak the truth. I dared not, do you know, leave home all day. For fear of chancing on the Paris lords. The best is when they pass and look aside : But they speak sometimes ; I must bear it all. Well may they speak ! That Francis, that first time, And that long festal year at Fontainebleau I 1-50 I surely then could sometimes leave the ground. Put on the glory, Rafael's daily wear. In that humane great monarch's golden look, — One finger in his beard or twi.sted curl Over his mouth's good mark that made the smile. One arm about my shoulder, round my neck. The jingle of his gold chain in my car, I painting proudly with his breath on me. All his court round him, seeing with his eyes, Such frank French eyes, and such a fire of soids 160 Profuse, my hand kept phn'ng by those hearts, — And, best of all, this, this, this face beyond. This in the background, waiting on mj' ^\ork, To erown the issue with a last reward I A good time, was it not, my kingly day ? And had you not gi-own restless — hut I know — 'Tis done and past ; 'twas right, my instinct .said : Too live the life gi'ew, golden and not grey. And I'm the weak-eyed bat no sun should tenipt Out of the grange whose four walls make his \\orld. How could it end in any other way ;- 171 You called me, and I came home to your heart.. The triumph was, to have ended there ; then if I reached it ere the triumph, what is lost ': Let my hands frame your face in your hair's gold,. You beautiful Lucrezia that are mine ! ' ' Rafael did this, Andrea painted that — The Roman's is the better when you pray, But still the other's Virgin was his fl-ife " Men will e.xcuse me. I am glad to judge ISO' Both pictures in your presence ; clearer gi'ows My better fortune, I resolve to think. For, do you know, Lucrezia, as God lives, Said one day Angelo, his verj^ self. To Rafael ... I have known it all these years . . . (Wlien the young man was flaming out his thoughts TJiJon a palace- wall for Rome to see, Too lifted up in heart because of it) " Friend, there's a certain soitv little scrub Goes up and down our Florence, none cares how, 100 Who, were he set to plan and execute As you are, pricked on by your popes and Wngs, Woidd bring the sweat into that brow of yoiu-s 1 " To Rafael's 1 — And indeed the ann is wrong. I hardly dare — yet, only you to see. Give the chalk here — quick, thus the line should go ! Ay, hut the soul ! he's Rafael 1 rub it out ! Still, all I care for, if he spoke the truth, (^^^lat he ? why, who hut Michael Angelo ? Do you forget ali-eady words like those '■) 200 If really there was such a chance, so lost, — Is, whether you're — not grateful — but more pleased. Well, let me think so. And you smile indeed I This hour has been an hour ! Another smile ': If you would sit thus Tty me every night I should work better, do you comprehend ? I mean that I should earn more, give you more. See, it is settled dusk now ; there's a star ; Morello's gone, the watch-lights show the wall. The cue-owls speak the name we call them by. 'J 10 Come from the window. Love, — come in, at last. Inside the melancholy little house AVe built to be so gay with. God is just. King Francis may forgive me. Oft at nights AMien I look up from painting, eyes tired out. The walls become illumined, brick from brick Pistinct, instead of mortar, fierce bright gold. That gold of his I did cement them with ! Let us hut love each other. Must you go ? That Cousin here again ? he waits outside ? '220 Must see you — you, and not with me ? Those loans ':' More gaming debts to pay ? you smiled for that ': Well, let smiles buy me I have you more to spend ': MTiile hand and eye and something of a heart Ai-e left me, work 's my ware, and what's it worth ': I'U pay my fancy. Only let me sit The grey remainder of the evening out. Idle, you caU it, and muse perfectly How I coidd paint, were I but back in France, One picture, just one more — the Virgin's face, 230' Not yours this time I I want you at my side To hear them — that is, Jliehael Angelo — TO iL.l'. 1850] SHORTER POEMS. 471 Judge all I do and tell you of its worth. Will you !' To-moiTow, satisfy your frioud. I take tlie subjects for his eorridor, Finish the porti'ait out of hand — there, there, Aud throw him in another thing or two If he demur's ; the whole should prove enough To pay for this same Cousin's freak. Beside, What's better and what's all I care about, 'itO (_iet you the thirteen seudi for the ruif. Love, does that please you ': Ah, but what does he. The Cousin 1 what docs he to please you more ': I am gi-own peaceful as old age to-night. I regret little, I woidd change still less. .Since there my past life lies, why alter it ? The very wrong to Francis ! — it is true 1 took his coin, was tempted and complied. And built this house and sinned, and all is said, ily father and my mother died of want. '2o0 "\\'ell, had I riches of my ovm ? you see How one gets lich ! Let each one hear his lot. They were bom poor, lived poor, and poor they died : And I have laboured somewhat in my time And not been paid pirofusely. Some good son I'aint my two hundred pictures — let him try ! No doubt, there's something strikes a balance. Yes, You loved me quite enough, it seems to-night. This must suffice me hei"e. \Vliat would one have ? In Heaven, perhaps, new chances, one more chance — Four great walls in the New Jerusalem 2G1 Jleted on each side bj- the angel's reed, For Leonard, Rafael, Angelo and me To cover — the three first without a wife, While I have mine I So — still they overcome Because there's still Lucrezia, — as I choose. Again the Cousin's whistle ! Go, my Love. Tlie Englisliwoman who stands fir.st among the poetesses of her country closed her career as the "wife of Robert Browning. Elizabeth Barrett was born at Hope End, near Ledbury, Herefordshire, in 1809. Her genius became soon manifest. Before ^he appearance of Robert Browning's " Paracelsus " Elizalieth Barrett had published not only original poems, but also a translation of the grandest of Greek dramas, the " Prometheus Bound of ^-Eschy- lus." Of her dramatic iioem, the " Seraphim," and •her longer narrative jjoem, " Aurora Leigli," jiub- lished in 18.56, we sjieak in other volumes. The fii-st collected edition of her jioems appe;ired in 1844. •One beautiful poem in it, " Lady Geraldme's Court- ship," had a passage telling how a lover read in Spenser, Petrarch — •*' Or at times a modem volume, Wordsworth's solcnm- thoughted idyll, Howitt's biillad verse, or Tennj-son's enchanted reverie, — 'Or from Browning some 'Pomegranate,' which, if cut deep down the middle. Shows a heart within blood-tinctiu-ed, of a veined hu- manity." In November, 184G, Miss Barrett became Robert Rro\vning's wife and fellow-worker. For health she ihad been taken to Torquay, and there had received an almost fatal shock by witnessing the drowning of a mucli-lo\ed brother. Her liealth hiiil been jiartly lestored, and was maintained after marriage by long residence in Italy. She ended at Florence, in June, 1861, a life tliat yielded much of its beauty to the uses of the world in poems warm with all womanly sympathies, alive with genius refined by liighest culture, and devoted only to tlie liighest aims. In Mrs. Browning's longest poem there is a thought closely akm to that enforced so variously in lier hus- band's verse, that the imaginative and the active life must be wedded to each other for the world's well- being, the highest powers of imagination aiding the most strenuous desii'e to work out the problem of life, not by words only, but by deeds. Her tine imaguiation was ]mt to the light use, as a light ui)on the path of daily life — a friend and guide to all who seek j)lain living and liigh tliinking, and labour towards fulfilment of the highest aspiration, by life in the si)iiit of liim whose heart " tlie lowliest duties on herself did lay." Mrs. Browning's verse touches the toil about our doors with an aii- from heaven, aud jiuts the poet's soul into our sense of it. Her verse is haunted by tliat sense of the far ideal which often fla.shes suddenly from passages of Robert Browning's poetry wliile he seems only to play witli a half-grotesque humour about the dullest of realities. Tliey are not only sad hearts that can echo sucli a poem as this • the happiest, perhaj)s, feel it most keenly : — THE BEST THING IN THE WORLD. AVhat's the best thing in the world ? June-rose, by JIay-dew impearled: Sweet south-wind, that means no rain ; Truth, not cruel to a friend ; Pleasiu'e, not in haste to end ; Beauty, not self-decked and curled Till its jn-ide is over-plain ; Light, that never makes you wink ; Slemoiy, that gives no jrain ; Love, when, so, you're loved again. 10 What's the best thing in the world ': — Something out of it, I think. The same tendency of our time to look straight at each stunted human growth, and seek to lielp all by lielping each, which caused Tliomas Hood to con- tribute to P'uncli, ill 1843, his "Song of the Shirt." jiroduced from Mrs. Browning tliis true woman's jirotest, which helpeised to blaw ! I'm baith like to huigh and to greet AMien I think o' her manied at a' !" 2« 30 473 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURK [a.d. 1825 Then out spak the wily hridegroom ; Weel waled were his wordies I ween : " I'm rich, though my coffer he toom, AVi' the hlink o' your honny blue e'en. I'm prouder o' thee by my side, Though thy ruffles and ribbons be few, Than if Kate o' the Craft were my bride, Wi purples and pearlins enou'. Dear and dearest of ony ! Ye're woo'd and buiket and a' ! And do ye think scorn o' your Johnny, And grieve to be married at a' ?" She tum'd, and she blush' d, and she smiled. And she lookit sae bashfully down ; The pride o' her heart was beguiled, And she play'd vd' the sleeve o' her gown. She twirled the tag o' her lace, And she nippit her boddice sae blue, Syne blinkit sae sweet in his face. And aif like a mawkin she tlew. Woo'd and married and a' I \Vi' Johnny to roose her and a' ! She thinks hei-scl' very weel aff To be woo'd and married and a' ! THE WEAEY FUND O TOW. A yoirng gudewife is in my house, And thrifty means to be : But aye she's runnin' to the town Some ferlie there to see. The weary pund, the weary pund, The weary pund o' tow, I soothly think ere it be spun I'E wear a lyart pow. And when she sets her to the wheel, To draw the threads wi' cai'e, In comes the chapman wi' his gear, And she can spin nae mair. The weary pund, &c. And she, like mony meiTy May, At fairs maim still be seen ; At kirkyard preachings near the tent, At dances on the green. The weary pund, &c. Her dainty car a fiddle charms, A bagpipe's her deUght ; But for the croonings o' her wheel She disna care a mite. The weary pund, &c. You spak, my Kate, of snow-white webs, Made o' your linkum-twine, But ah ! I fear our bonny bum Will ne'er lave web o' thine. The weary pund, kc. Nay, smile again, my winsome Kate ! Sic jibings mean nae iU ; Should I gae sarkless to my grave, I'U lo'e and bless thee stiU. The weary pund, &c. 40 50 60 One of the best of the later additions to the treasury of Scottish song is the " Land o' the Leal," by Lady Nairne, -who died at the age of seventy- nine in 1845. She was born in 176G in the house of the Oliphants of Gask, and while unwilling to lose dignity by being known as a song-writer, made free use of her gift by writing humorous songs, Jacobite and pati'iotic songs, pathetic songs, before her man-iage to her cousin. Captain Nairne, in 1806. After marriage she still wrote. When in 1821 Mr. Purdie, a music-dealer, proposed to bring out as " The Scottish Minstrel " a series of national airs, Mrs. Nairne became an active contributor as " B. B.," Mrs. Bogan of Bogan. In 1824: Major Nairne was restored to a barony that had been granted to his family in the time of Charles I. . and his wife became Carolina Baroness Nairne, with full appreciation of the dignity. THE LAND o' THE LEAL. I'm wearin' awa', John, Like snaw-wreaths in thaw, John, I'm wearin' awa' To the land o' the leal. There's nae sorrow there, John, There's neither cauld nor care, John, The day is aye fair In the land o' the leal. Our bonnie barm's there, John, She was baith gude and fair, John, 10 And, oh ! we grudged her sair To the land o' the leal. But sorrow's sel' wears past, John, And joy is comin' fast, John, The joy that's aye to last In the land o' the leal. Sae dear's that joy was bought, Jolin, Sae free the battle fought, John, That sinfu' man e'er brought To the land o' the leal. 20 Oh 1 dry yoirr glist'nin' e'e, John, My soul langs to be free, John, And angels beckon me To the land o' the leal. Oh ! baud ye leal an' true, John, Your day it's wearin' thi-o', John, And I'll welcome you To the land o' the leal. Now fare ye weel, my ain John, This warld's cares are vain, John, 30 We'll meet, and we'll be fain. In the land o' the leal. These also are songs by Lady Nairne : — THE LAIRD o' COCKPES. The Laird o' Cockpen, he's proud an' he's great, His mind is ta'en up wi' things o' the State ; TO A.D. 1S50.] SHORTER POEMS. 477 He wanted a wife his braw house to keep, But favour wi' wooin' was fashious to keep. Down by the dvke-side a lady did dwell, At his table-head he thought she'd look well jMcCUsh's ae daughter o' Claverse-ha'-Lee, A penniless lass wi' a lang pedigree. His wig was weel pouthered and as gude as new, His waistcoat was white, his coat it was blue. He put on a ring, a sword, and cock'd hat — And wha could refuse the laird wi' a' that ? He took the grey mare, and rade cannily. An' rapp'd at the gate o' Claverse-ha'-Lee : '! " Gae tell Mistress Jean to come speedily ben, She's wanted to speak to the Laird o' Cockpen." Mistress Jean was makin' the elder-flower wine : " An' what brings the laird at sic a like time ?" She put a£E her apron, and on her silk gown. Her mutch wi' red ribbons, an' gaed awa' down. An' when she cam ben he bowed fu' low, An' what was his errand he soon let her know ; Amazed was the laird when the lady said " Na," And wi' a laigh cmtsie she turned awa' Dumfoundered was he, nae sigh did he gie. He mounted his mare, and rade cannily. An' aften he thought, as he gaed thro' the glen, She's daft to refuse the Laird o' Cockpen. CALLER HEREIN . ■Wha'll buy my caller herrin' ? They're bonnie fish and halesome farin' ; Wha'll buy my caller herrin' New drawn frae the Forth ? 'When ye were sleepin' on your pillows, Dreamed ye aught o' our puir fellows, Darkling as they faced the bUlows, A' to fill the woven willows ? Buy my caller herrin', New drawn frae the Forth. "Wha'll buy my caller herrin' ? They're no brought here ■n'ithout brave darin' Buy my caller herrin', Haul'd thi'o' wind and rain. Wha' 11 buy my caller herrin' f &o. "Wha'll buy my caller herrin' ? Oh, ye may ca' them vulgar farin' : "Wives and mithers, maist despairin', Ca' them lives o' men. "Wlia'U buy my caller herrin' f iScc. "When the creel o' herrin' passes. Ladies, clad in silks and laces, Gather in their braw pelisses. Cast their heads, and screw their faces. "Wha'U buy my caUer herrin' ? &c. 10 Caller herrin' s no got lightUe, "Ve can trip the spring fu' tightlie ; Spite o' tauntin', tlauutin', fiingin', Gow has set you a' a-singin'. "Wha'll buy my caller herrin' ? &c. Neebour wives, now tent my tellin', When the bonnie fish ye're sellin' At ae word be in yer dealin' — Truth will stand when a' thing's failiu'. "Wha'll buy my caller herrin' ? They're bonnie fish and halesome farin' Wha'll buy my caller herrin' New drawn frae the Forth? 20 A channing song-writer, in the second half of our century, was Bryan "Waller Procter, who wrote him- self on his title-pages by an anagram of his name, less five of its letters — Barry Cornwall. He was born about 1790, and died in 1874. Quiet, genial, earnest, all moods of his mind were expi'essed in little poems that had caught some of their grace and melody from loving commune of the singer with the poets of the days before the Commonwealth. Let this song sevva for an example ; — SOXG IN PRAISE OF SPRING. "When the wind blows In the sweet rose-tree, And the cow lows On the fragrant lea. And the stream flows All bright and free, 'Tis not for thee, 'tis not for me ; 'Tis not for any one here, I trow : The gentle %vind bloweth. The happy cow loweth, 10 The merry stream floweth. For all below ! the Spring, the bountiful Spring 1 She shineth and smiloth on every thing. "Where come the sheep ? To the rich man's moor. WTiere cometh sleep ? To the bed that's poor. Peasants must weep, And kings endure ; That is a fate that none can cure : Yet Spring doeth all she can, I trow : She bringoth bright hours. She weaveth sweet flowers, She dresscth her bowers, For aU below ! the Spring, &c 20 Arthur Hugh Clough, born at Liverpool in 1819, died at Florence in 1861. He was educated at Rugby under Dr. Arnold's influence, and won the affection of that noblest of modern teachei-s as a foremost jiupil. His career at Oxford was distin- guished. In 1842 he obtained a Fellowship at Oriel ; 47S CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [i.D. 1825 and he was one of those who represented in its many forms of thouglit the deeper life of the Univei-sit.y. In 1848, when he was leaving Oxford, Clough pub- lished, as a Long Vacation Pastoral, "The Bothie of Tober-na-Viiolich," a i)la)^ul romance iii English hexameter of the sayings and doings of an Oxford reading party in the Braes of Lochaher — a poem rich with evidence of his own yearning for the higher truths of life, "wrestlings of thought in the moun- tains." One feature in this poem of "The Bothie of Tol>er-na-Vuolich " is the idyllic beauty of its painting of the grace, tenderness, and young love of a High- land maid. But most characteristic is its author's sense of the reality of life, and the mixed playfid- ness and thouglitfulness with which it represents young minds attacking some of its problems. Arthur Hugh Clough felt much as Richard Steele felt, tliat a man is but as much as he can do, and that whoever does nothing is nothing. His worth is measux-ed by the genuineness of his work. The young men and the tutor of the Highland reading party vary m opinion on divers points, but thus writes the lover of the Highland maid : — This is a letter written by Philip at Christmas to Adam. There may he beings, perhaps, whose vocation it is to be idle, Idle, sumptuous even, lu.xurious, if it must be : Only let each man seek to be that for which nature meant him. If you were meant to plough. Lord Marquis, out with you, and do it ; If you were meant to be idle, O beggar, behold, I will feed you. If you were bom for a groom, and you seem, by your dress, to believe so. Do it like a man. Sir George, for pay, in a livery stable ; Yes, you may so release that slip of a boy at the comer. Fingering books at the window, misdoubting the eighth commandment. Ah, fair Lady Maria, God meant you to live, and be lovely ; Be so then, and I bless you. But ye, ye spurious ware, who Might be plain women, and can be by no possibility better \ — -Ye unhappy statuettes, and miserable trinkets. Poor alabaster chimney-piece ornaments imder glass cases, Come, in God's name, come down! the very French clock by you Puts you to shame with ticking ; the fire-irons deride you. You, young girl, who have had such advantages, leamt so quickly. Can you not teach ? O yes, and she likes Sunday school extremely. Only it's soon in the morning. Away 1 if to teach be your calling. It is no play, but a business : off 1 go teach and be paid for it. Lady Sophia's so good to the sick, so timi and so gentle. Is there a nobler sphere than of hospital nurse and matron ': Hast thou for cooking a turn, little Lady Clarissa ? in with them, In with your fingers 1 their beauty it spoils, but yoiu- own it enhances ; For it is beautiful only to do the thing we are meant for. This was the answer that came from the Tutor, the grave man, Adam. When the armies arc set in array, and the battle beginning, Is it well that the soldier whose post is far to the leftward Say, I will go to the right, it is there I shall do best sei-vicc ': There is a great Field-Marshal, my friend, who arrays our battalions ; Let us to Providence trust, and abide and work in oiu' stations. This was the final retort from the eager, impetuous Philip. I am sorry to say your Providence puzzles me sadly ; Children of Circumstance are we to be '^ you answer. On no mse ! AMiere does Circumstance end, and Providence, where begins it'' \\Tiat are we to resist, and what are we to be friends with ': If there is battle, 'tis battle by night, I stand in the darkness. Here in the melee of men, Ionian and Dorian on both sides. Signal and password known ; which is friend and which is foeman ? Is it a friend ? I doubt, though he speak with the voice of a brother. Still you are right, I suppose : }-ou always are, and will be ; Though I mistrust the Field-Marshal, I bow to the duty of order. Yet is my feeling rather to ask, where is the battle ? Yes, I could find in my heart to cry, notwithstanding my Elspie, O that the armies indeed were arrayed ! O joy of the onset 1 Sound thou Trumpet of God, come forth. Great Cause, to- aiTay us, King and leader appear, thy soldiers sorrowing seek thee. AVould that the ai-mies indeed were arrayed, O where is the- battle ! Neither battle I see, nor arraj-ing, nor King in Israel, Only infinite jumble and mess and dislocation. Backed by a solemn appeal, " For God's sake do not stii', there !" Yet you are right, I suppose ; if you don't attack my con- clusion. Let us get on as we can, and do the thing we arc fit for ; Every one for himself, and the common success for us all, and Thankful, if not for our own, why then for the triumph of others. Get along, each as we can, and do the thing we are meant for. That isn't likely to be by sitting still, eating and drinking. The shorter poems, published in 1849 under the name of " Ambarvalia," have in them the best feature of English thought in the midst of the nine- teenth century, a faithful search for truth. This, for example, upon work as prayer : — QUI LABORAT, DRAT. O only Source of all our light and life, AVhom as our truth, our strength, we see and feel. But whom the hours of mortal moral strife Alone aright reveal ! Mine inmost soul, before Thee inly brought. Thy presence owns ineffable, divine : Chastised each rebel self-encentered thought, Sly will adoreth Thine. With eye do-n-n-dropt, if then this earthly mind Speechless remain, or speechless e'en depart ; 19 Nor seek to see — for wiiat of earthly kind Can see Thee as Thou art ? — TO i.D. 1S50.] SHORTER rOEMS. 479 If ■wcU-assiu-cd 'tis but profanely bold In thought's abstructeat forms to soom to sec, It ilan: not dare the di'ead eonmiunion liold In wajs unworthy Thee. ( ) not uno\\Tied, Thou shalt unnamed forgive, In ■worUlly -walks the prayerless Iieart prepare ; And if in work its life it seem to live, Shalt make that -work be prayer. 20 Xor times shall lack, wlu>n wliile the work it plies, Unsummoned powers the blinding- film shall part. And scarce by happy tears made dim, the ej'cs In recognition start. But, as thou wiliest, give or e'en forbear The beatific supersensual sight, .So, with Thy blessing blest, tliat humbler prayer Ajiproach Thee mora and night. And in like spirit tins : — When the enemy is near thee, Call on us ! In om- hands we -will upbear thee. He shall neither scathe nor scare thee, He shall fly thee and shall fear thee. Call on us ! Call when all good friends have left thee. Of all good sights and sounds bereft thee, Call -when hope and heart arc sinking, AVhcn the brain is sick with thinking, 10 Help, oh help ! Call, and following close behind thee, There shall haste and there shall find thee. Help, sure help. When the panic comes upon thee, "When necessity seems on thee, Hope and choice have all foregone thee. Fate and force are closing o'er thee. And but one way stands before thee. Call on us ! 20 Oh, and if thou dost not call. Be but faithful, that is aU ; Go right on, and close behind thee. There shall follow still and find thee. Help, sure help. And tliiis, which marks the poet's place in life : — Come, Poet, come ! A thousand labourers ply their task. And what it tends to scarcely ask, And trembling thinkers on the brink Shiver, and know not how to think. To teU the pui-port of their pain, And what our siUy joys contain ; In lasting lineaments portray The substance of the shadowy day ; Our real and inner deeds rehearse, 10 And make our meaning clear in verse : Come, Poet, come ! for but in vain We do the work or feel the pain, And gather up the seeming gam, Unless before the end thou come To take, ere tliey are lost, tlicir sum. Come, Poet, come ! To give an utterance to the dumb. And make vain babblei's silent, come ; A thousand dupes point here .-md there. Bewildered by the show and glare ; And wise men half liave learnt to doubt Wliether we are not best without. Come, Po<-t : both but wait to see Their error proved to them in thee. Come, Poet, come I In vain I seem to call. And yet Think not the living times forget. Ages of heroes fought and fell That Homer in the end might tell ; O'er grovelling generations past Upstood the Doric fane at last ; And countless hearts on countless years Had wasted thoughts, and hopes, and fears, Kudo laughter and immeaning tears ; Ere England Shakespeare saw, or Kome The pure perfection of her dome. Others, I doubt not, if not we, The issue of our toils shall see ; And (they forgotten and unknown) Young children gather as their own The harvest that the dead had sown.' 20 !0 Many -works of imagination prochiced during the second quarter of oiu- century bear witness to its fruits fulness of wholesome thought. In 1S27 appeared John Keble's " Christian Year," of whicli something will have to be said in the next section of this Library, that which illustrates English Religion. In 18:28 appeared the tliii'd volume of W. S. Lander's "Imaginary Convereations ;" in 1829, Mr. Tennyson obtained his University Prize for the poem on Tim- buctoo, and in 1830 first ajipeared his ])oenis. There were produced, in 18.31, Ebenezer Elliott's "Corn- Law Rhymes;" in 1832, Ban-y Cornwall's "English Songs;" "in 1833, Elizabeth Barrett's (Mrs. Brown- ing's) translation of " Prometheus Bound," and Robert Browning's earliest verse, "Pauline;" in 1834, Henry (not then Sir Henry) Taylor's "Philip van Artevelde;" and in 183"), Talfourd's "Ion," works to be spoken of in the volume of this series which illustrates English Plays. In 1836, Charles Dickens — a poet in his own way — began his career of success with " Sketches by Boz," and the next year (1837) was the year of "Pickwick," as well as of Robert Browning's tragedy of "Strafford." In 1838 appeared new "Sonnets" by Wordsworth, and Mrs. Browning's " Seraphim " and other i)oems. Mr. Philip Bailey published, in 1839, his "Festus;" Mr. * Heartiest thanks are due to authors and publishers who have met with luifailin^ courtesy any request of mine for leave to use their copyrights. In a few cases, for accidental reasons, I have been unable to quote what I wished to quote, but in no case have I found anything but a kind readiness to make the work of illustratinf? current literature by pieces extracted from copyright books as httle diilicuU as iKissible. This makes me confident that if in any case I should inadvertently infringe a right, I shall be pardoned for the unintended oversight. 480 CASSELL'S LIBRARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. [a.d. 1825 BrowTiing, in 1840, his " Sonlello ;" and in 1841 Mr. Westland Marston produced his play of " The Patrician's Daughter." 1842 was the year of Macaulay's " Lays of Ancient Rome," and in that year Mi'. Browning began with " Pippa Passe.s," the publication of cheap sldllmg parts under the common title of " Bells and Pomegranates," wliich included a fine series of plays thoroughly jjoetical, two of them — " Luria" and the " Return of the Druses " — thoroughly actable in any theatre that cares to cater for the educated public. In 1843, Thomas Hood battled against cruelty to starving seamstresses, by contributing to Punch his " Song of the Shirt." In 1844, appeared a collection of Mrs. Browning's Poems; in 1845, Robert Browning's "Dramatic Romances and Lyrics;" in 1846, Charles Kingsley's " Saint's Tragedy ;" and in 1847, Alfred Tennyson's " Princess." Arthur Hugh Clough's " Bothie of Tober-na-VuoIich " appeared in 1848, and his poems under the common name of " Ambar- valia." These were circuits — originally sacrificial circuits — of the cultivated fields. It is not yet hard to trace the bounds of our best civilisation ; only our aspirations remain boundless. In 18.50, Alfred Tennyson uttered the highest hopes of man in his " In Memoriam ;" Robert Browning looked to the highest life in his " Cliristmas Eve" and •' Easter Day;" Wordsworth had just closed his years of labour for the bettering of man, and his " Prelude," which is the true key to his life and poetry, and to the life of England in the nineteenth century, was published in that year 1850. CHAPTER XX. The Third Quarter of the Nineteenth Cen- tury : Tennyson and Browning, Algernon Swinburne, William Morris, and Others. — A.D. 1850 to a.d. 1875. Problems of society were boldly treated by Charles Kingsley in liis novel entitled " Yeast," which aj)- peared in 1851. He was then thirty-two years old, had taken rank as a poet three years before with his " Saint's Tragedy," and united jioetical enthusiasm, religious feeling of a kind that deepened human sympathies, and wide-reaching intellectual activity in one of the gentlest and most vigorous of natures. He was born in the vicarage of Holne, on the high ground about Dartmoor, within a walk of a famous chase, and some of the best scenery of Devonshire. He graduated at Cambridge in 1842, taking a first- class in classics, and a senior optime in mathematics ; and in the same year he became curate (two years afterwards rector) of Eversley, the parish he held until his death in Januaiy, 1875. From 1859 to 1869 Charles Kingsley was Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge. In 1869 he was preferred to a Canoniy in Chester Cathedral, and transferred in 1873 to a Canonry in Westminster. His " Saint's Tragedy," on the story of Elizabeth of Hungaiy, places him among dramatists ; and as a prose writer, his lively imagination and his generous feeling gave him a popularity of which he sought advantage only in the power of doing tlie best day's work to which God enabled him to set his hand. Of the true-hearted man who went to his rest in the last year of the last quarter of a century, let due praise be spoken, though of living labourers, with whom it is still noon in the harvest-field, the time for such remembrance is not yet. Of Charles Ivingsley's lyric power these are examples :— the three fishers. Three iisliera went sailing away to the West, Away to the West as the sun went down ; Each thought on the woman who loved him the hest, And the children stood watcliing them out of the town ; For men must work, and women must weep. And there's little to earn, and many to keep, Though the hiirboiu' har bo moaning. Tlu'ee wives sat up in the lighthouse tower. And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went down ; They looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower. And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and brown. But men must work, and women must weep. Though storms he sudden, and waters deep, And the harbour bar be moaning. Three corpses lay out on the shining sands In the morning gleam as the tide went down. And the women are weeping and wringing their hands For those who will never come home to the town ; For men must work, and women must weep. And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep ; And good-bye to the bar and its moaning. ODE TO THE NORTH-EAST WIND. Welcome, wild North-easter ! Shame it is to see Odes to every zephjT ; Ne'er a verse to thee. Welcome, black North-easter ! O'er the Gennan foam ; O'er the Danish moorlands, From thy frozen home. Tii-cd we are of summer. Tired of gaudy glare, 10 Showers soft and steaming, Hot and breathless air. Tired of listless dreaming, Through the lazy day : Jovial wind of winter Tm-ns us out to play ! Sweep the golden reed-beds ; Crisp the lazy dyke ; Hunger into madness Every plimging pike. 2r Fill the lake with wild-fowl ; Fill the marsh with snipe ; While on di'eary moorlands Lonely curlew pipe. Thi-ough the black fir-forest Thunder harsh and dry, Shattering down the snow-flakes Oft' the curdled skv. TO A.D. 1875.] SHORTER POEMS. 481 llai-k ! The brave North-oastor ! Hrcast-high lius tliu scent, Uu by holt aud hcadlanil, Over heath and bent. Chime, ye dappled darlings, Tlu-ough the sleet and snow. AVho can over-ride you 'i Let the horses go 1 Chime, ye dappled darlings, Down the roaring blast ; You shall sec a fox die Ere an hour be past. Go 1 and rest to-morrow, Hunting in your dreams, ^\^lLle our skates are ringing O'er the frozen streams. Let the luscious South-wind Breathe in lover's sighs. While the lazy gaUants Bask in ladies' eyes. ^\'^lat does ho but soften Heart aUke and pen Y 'Tis the hard grey weather Breeds hard English men. ■What's the soft South-wester ? 'Tis the ladies' breeze. Bringing home their true-loves Out of all the seas ; But the black North-easter, Through the snowstorm hurled, Drives our English hearts of oak Seaward round the world. Come, as came oiu" fathers. Heralded by thee, Conquering from the eastward, Lords by land and sea. Come ; and strong within us Stir the Vikings' blood ; Bracing brain and sinew ; Blow, thou wind of Ood ! THE ^^•ORLD S AGE. ■NATio will say the world is dying ? Who will say our prime is past 'i Sjjai'ks from Heaven, within us lying. Flash, and will flash tiU the last. Tools ! who fancy C'lirist mistaken ; Man a tool to buy and sell : Earth a failure, God-forsaken, Ante-room of Hell. Still the race of Hero-spirits Pass the lamp from hand to hand ; Age from age the words inherits — "Wife, and Child, and Fatherland." Still the youthful hunter gathers Fiery joy from wold and wood ; He will dare as dared his fathers Give him cause as good. While a slave bewails his fetters : While an orphan pleads in vain : While an infant lisps his letters. Heir of all the age's gain ; 30 ■10 .50 60 10 20 While a lip grows ripe for kissing ; While a moan from man is wrung ; Know, by every want and blessing, That the world is young. A FAKIiWELL. My fairest child, I have no song to give you ; No lark could pipe to skies so dull and grey : Yet, ero we part, one lesson I can leave you For every day. Be good, sweet nuud, and let who will be clever ; Do noble things, not dream them, all day long : jViid so make life, death, and that vast for-cver One gi-and, sweet song. What of the thousand voices of song tliat expressed the music of our life in the third qnarterof the nine- teentli century'? Master singers were scai'ce, hut there was no hick of good hibourers. Increase of popidation, increase in the proportion of those who had cvdtui-e enougli for such utterance, inci'ease in the facilities of publication, produce increase in the number of the singers. A miscellany which should gather into itself from each living p