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designed to celebrate the principal virtues. Only six of the original twelve books now remain, the rest having been lost by a servant on the passage from Ireland to England. Each of these is divided into twelve cantos, and the versification of the whole is in a peculiar stanza of nine lines, now commonly called the Spenserian, and remarkable for its elegance and harmony. Each book is devoted to the adventures of a particular knight, who personifies a certain virtue, as Holiness, Temperance, Courtesy, &c., and who moves in the midst of a whole host of sentiments and ideas, personified in the same way, the whole bearing the appearance of a chivalrous tale. The work, though upon the whole too tedious for the rality of modern readers, is justly regarded as one of the greatest compositions in English poetry. Spenser formed his manner, in some degree, upon the model of the Italian poets; and yet he is not only unlike them in many respects, but he is like no other English writer. The Faery Queen,' says a modern critic, is a peculiar world of itself, formed out of the extraordinary fancy of the author. His invention was without limit. Giants and dwarfs, fairies, and knights, and queens, rose up at his call. He drew shape after shape, scene after scene, castle and lake, woods and lawns, monstrous anomalies and beautiful impossibilities, from the unfathomable depths of his mind; yet all of them intended to represent some shade or kind of emotion, passion, or faculty, or the things upon which these are continually operating. Some critics, while allowing the beauty of these creations, are of opinion that their very profusion, and the minuteness with which they are described, lessen their value, and give a tediousness to the whole poem. Perhaps it is fortunate for the Faery Queen, that one half of it was lost; and it might have even been improved in value by the want of a half of that which remains; for it is allowed that the strength of the work lies in the first three books.

As a specimen of the allegorical manner of Spenser,

may be given his description of that chamber of the brain which he supposes to be the residence of

MEMORY.

That chamber seemed ruinous and old,

And therefore was removed far behind ;*
Yet were the walls that did the same uphold

Right firm and strong, though somewhat they declin'd;
And therein sat an old old man, half blind,

And all decrepid in his feeble corse,

Yet lively vigour rested in his mind,
And recompensed him with a better scorce:
Weak body well is chang'd for mind's redoubled force.

This man of infinite remembrance was,

And things forgone through many ages held,
Which he recorded still as they did pass,

Nor suffer'd them to perish through long eld,
As all things else, the which this world doth weld,
But laid them up in his immortal scrine,

Where they for ever incorrupted dwell'd;
The wars he well remember'd of King Nine,
Of old Assaracus and Inachus divine.

The years of Nestor nothing were to his,
Nor yet Methusalem, though longest liv'd;

For he remember'd both their infancies:

Nor wonder, then, if that he were depriv'd
Of native strength, now that he them surviv'd.

His chamber all was hung about with rolls,

And old records from ancient times deriv'd,

Some made in books, some in long parchment scrolls. That were all worm-eaten, and full of canker holes.

Spenser wrote several other poems of considerable extent, and also some works in prose, the chief of which was a View of the State of Ireland, in which he endeavoured to point out a way for the settlement of that country. In consequence of the Earl of Tyrone's rebellion, which took place in 1598, he was forced to fly from his estate and seek refuge in England, where he died in penury and dejection of mind, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

*It was formerly supposed that memory lay in the hinder portion of the head.

SYDNEY- SHAKSPEARE.

27

SIR PHILIP SYDNEY (1554-1586), is chiefly known as the author of an allegorical prose romance called Arcadia, which, though now held as dull and antiquated, was the favourite light reading of the court ladies in the time of Elizabeth. His verses are not of remarkable merit, though the power of writing them must have been an agreeable addition to his character as a soldier and a gentleman. Owing to his singular union of accomplishments and amiable qualities, Sydney was the most admired and popular man of his times. At the early age of thirty-two, he received a mortal wound at a battle near Zutphen, in the Netherlands, when his generous character was manifested by an incident which will never be forgotten in the history of England, and of humanity. Being overcome with thirst from excessive bleeding, he called for drink, which, though not easily procured, was brought to him. At the moment he was lifting it to his mouth, a poor soldier was carried by, desperately wounded, who fixed his eyes eagerly upon the cup-Sydney, observing this, instantly delivered the beverage to him, saying, Thy necessity is yet greater

than mine.'

Spenser, Sydney, and Shakspeare, may be considered as the chief poetical names which fall more particularly under the reign of Elizabeth. The last, who will be noticed more at large in the department of the Dramatists, published, in early life, two poems of considerable length, one of which referred to the story of Venus and Adonis, and the other to the story of Lucretia; but his best productions in miscellaneous poetry are his sonnets, one hundred and fifty-four in number, in which he embodies much of his own character and daily thought, with a pathos in in the highest degree interesting. As specimens, the following may be given:-

CONSOLATION FROM FRIENDSHIP.

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought,
I summon up remembrance of things past,

I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,

And with old thoughts new wail my dear time's waste:
C

Then can I drown an eye unused to flow,

For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long-since cancell'd woe,
And moan th' expense of many a vanish'd sight.
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,

And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of sore-bemoaned moan,
Which I now pay as if not paid before;
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restor'd, and sorrows end.

SELF-ABANDONMENT.

No longer mourn for me when I am dead,
Then you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world, with viler things to dwell:
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it; for I love you so,
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot,
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O if (I say) you look upon 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.

Other poets immediately belonging to the reign of Queen Elizabeth, were Sir Walter Raleigh, who will presently be spoken of as a prose-writer; John Lylly, author of several plays, and originator of an affected and conceited style of speech called Euphuism; Sackville, Earl of Dorset; George Gascoigne; Thomas Lodge; and Robert Southwell; in all of whose works are to be found some strikingly beautiful pieces. It may be mentioned that this was the age when collections of fugitive and miscellaneous poetry first became common. Several volumes of this kind were published in the latter part of the reign of Elizabeth, and contain some lyrical poetry of the greatest merit, without any author's name. As a specimen of one of the forms

of composition, and one of the styles of thinking, followed in this age, we may give Southwell's little poem, entitled,

SCORN NOT THE LEAST.

Where wards are weak, and foes encountering strong,
Where mightier do assault than do defend,
The feebler part puts up enforced wrong,

And silent sees that speech could not amend;
Yet higher powers must think, though they repine,
When sun is set, the little stars will shine.

While pike do range, the silly tench doth fly,
And crouch in privy creeks with smaller fish;
Yet pikes are caught when little fish go by,

These fleet afloat, while those do fill the dish;
There is a time even for the worms to creep,
And suck the dew while all their foes do sleep.
The marline cannot ever soar on high,

Nor greedy greyhound still pursue the chase,
The tender lark will find a time to fly,

And fearful hare to run a quiet race.
He that high growth on cedars did bestow,
Gave also lowly mushrooms leave to grow.
In Haman's pomp poor Mordocheus wept;
Yet God did turn his fate upon his foe.
The Lazar pin'd, while Dives' feast was kept,
Yet he to heaven, to hell did Dives go.
We trample grass, and prize the flowers of May;
Yet grass is green when flowers do fade away.

Among the poets more immediately belonging to the seventeenth century, or the reigns of James and Charles, the earliest presented to our notice is SAMUEL DANIEL (1562-1619), who spent the greater part of his life under the protection of noble and royal personages, and was distinguished as a writer of masques-namely, a dramatic kind of entertainment which, at this period, became fashionable at court, consisting chiefly of a few dialogues, supported by allegorical characters. The miscellaneous poems of Daniel were in general so applicable only to the persons and circumstances of his own age, that they