the rest,

The roaring of the cannon shot, that makes the Thus Love, as victor of the field, triump

piece to shake, Or terror, such as mighty Jove from heaven And joys to see his subjects lie with livi. above can make:

in breast ; All these, in fine, may not compare, experience But dire Disdain lets drive a shaft, and

E so doth prove,

bragging fool, Unto the torments, sharp and strange, of such as He plucks his plumes, unbends his bow, be in love.

him new to school; Love looks aloft, and laughs to scorn all such as Whereby this boy that bragged late, as co griefs annoy,

over all, The more extreme their passions be, the greater Now yields himself unto Disdain, his vas is his joy ;

1

his thrall.

2

THOMAS SACKVILLE,

BARON BUCKHURST, AND EARL OF DORSET,

(Born, 1536. Died, April 19, 1608.)

Was the son of Sir Richard Sackville, and was compose the poetical history of Sackville born at Withyam, in Sussex, in 1536. He was The rest of it was political. He had been educated at both universities, and enjoyed an to parliament at the age of thirty. Six early reputation in Latin as well as in English afterwards, in the same year that his Inc poetry. While a student of the Inner Temple, and legend of Buckingham were publish he wrote his tragedy of Gorboduc, which was went abroad on his travels, and was, for played by the young students, as a part of a reason that is not mentioned, confined, for Christmas entertainment, and afterwards before as a prisoner at Rome ; but he returned Queen Elizabeth at Whitehall, in 1561. In a on the death of his father, in 1566, and wa subsequent edition of this piece it was entitled after promoted to the title of Baron Buclthe tragedy of Ferrex and Porrex. He is said Having entered at first with rather too to have been assisted in the composition of it by prodigality on the enjoyment of his patri Thomas Norton ; but to what extent does not he is said to have been reclaimed by the appear. T. Warton disputes the fact of his being nity of being kept in waiting by an alde at all indebted to Norton. The merit of the from whom he was borrowing money, a piece does not render the question of much have made a resolution of economy, from importance. This tragedy and his contribution he never departed. The queen employed of the Induction and Legend of the Duke of in the fourteenth year of her reign, in a Buckingham to the “Mirror for Magistrates*," bassy to Charles IX. of France. In 1587 he

as ambassador to the United Provinces, * The « Mirror for Magistrates" was intended to cele

their complaint against the Earl of Leica brate the chief unfortunate personages in English history, in a series of poetical legends spoken by the characters

but, though he performed his trust with themselves, with epilogues interspersed to connect the grity, the favourite had sufficient influence stories, in imitation of Boccaccio's Fall of Princes, him recalled ; and on his return, he was or which had been translated by Lydgate. The historian

to confinement in his own house, for nine of English poetry ascribes the plan of this work to Sackville, and seems to have supposed that his Induction and

months. On Leicester's death, however, h legend of Henry Duke of Buckingham appeared in the immediately reinstated in royal favour, and first edition : but Sir E. Brydges has shown that it was made knight of the garter, and chancello not until the second edition of the Mirror for Magistrates

Oxford. On the death of Burleigh he be that Sackville's contribution was published, viz. in 1563. Baldwin and Ferrers were the authors of the first edi.

lord high treasurer of England. At Q tion, in 1559. Higgins, Phayer, Churchyard, and a crowd Elizabeth's demise he was one of the privyo of inferior versifiers, contributed successive legends, not cillors on whom the administration of the 1 confining themselves to English history, .but treating

dom devolved, and he concurred in proclai the reader with the lamentations of Geta and Caracalla, Brennus, &c. &c. till the improvement of the drama

the scene, like Dante, in Hell, and makes his chara superseded those dreary monologues, by giving heroic

relate their history at the gates of Elysium, under history a more engaging air. Sackville's contribution to

guidance of Sorrow; while the authors of the other les " The Mirror for Magistrates," is the only part of it are generally contented with simply dreaming o that is tolerable. It is observable that his plan differs

unfortunate personages, and, by going to sleep, of materially from that of other contribu Helays

powerful inducement to follow their example.

King James. The new sovereign confirmed him Chamber. As a poet, his attempt to unite allein the office of high treasurer by a patent for gory with heroic narrative, and his giving our life, and on all occasions consulted him with con language its earliest regular tragedy, evince the fidence. In March 1604, he was created Earl of views and enterprise of no ordinary mind; but, Dorset. He died suddenly (1608) at the council though the induction to the Mirror for Magistrates table, in consequence of a dropsy on the brain. displays some potent sketches, it bears the comFew ministers, as Lord Orford remarks, have plexion of a saturnine genius, and resembles a left behind them so unblemished a character. bold and gloomy landscape on which the sun His family considered his memory so invulner never shines. As to Gorboduc, it is a piece of able, that when some partial aspersions were monotonous recitals, and cold and heavy accuthrown upon it, after his death, they disdained to mulation of incidents. As an imitation of classical answer them. He carried taste and elegance tragedy it is peculiarly unfortunate, in being even into his formal political functions, and for without even the unities of place and time, to his eloquence was styled the bell of the Star circumscribe its dulness.

FROM SACKVILLE'S INDUCTION TO THE COMPLAINT OF HENRY, DUKE

OF BUCKINGIIAM.

The wrathful Winter, 'proaching on apace,
With blust'ring blasts had all ybared the treen,
And old Saturnus, with his frosty face,
With chilling cold had pierced the tender green;
The mantles rent wherein enwrapped been
The gladsome groves that now lay overthrown,
The tapets torn, and every tree down blown.

And sorrowing I to see the Summer flowers,
The lively green, the lusty leas forlorn ;
The sturdy trees so shatter'd with the showers,
The fields so fade that flourish'd se beforne ;
It taught me well all earthly things be borne
To die the death, for nought long time may last ;
The Summer's beauty yields to Winter's blast.

The soil that erst so seemly was to seen,
Was all despoiled of ber beauty's hue ;
And sootea fresh flow'rs, wherewith the Summer's

Queen
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 defaced
In woeful wise bewail'd the Summer past.

Then looking upward to the Heaven's leams,
With Nightè's stars thick powder'd every where,
Which erst so glistend with the golden streams,
That cheerful Phoebus spread down from his

sphere,
Beholding dark oppressing day so near ;
The sudden sight reduced to my mind
The sundry changes that in earth we find.

Hawthorn had lost his motley livery,

That musing on this worldly wealth in thought, The naked twigs were shivering all for cold, Which comes and goes more faster than we see And dropping down the tears abundantly ; The fleckering flame that with the fire is wrought, Each thing, methought, with weeping eye me told My busy mind presented unto me The cruel season, bidding me withhold

Such fall of Peers as in this realm had be", Myself within ; for I was gotten out

That oft I wish'd some would their woes descrive, Into the fields, whereas I walk'd about.

To warn the rest whom fortune left alive.

SORROW THEN ADDRESSES THE POET.

shew;

1

*

*

*

*

ALLEGORICAL PERSONAGES DE3CRIBED IN HELL.

His face was lean and some-deal pined aw.

And eke his handes consumed to the bone For forth she paced in her fearful tale :

But what his body was I cannot say ; Come, come," quoth she, “and see what I shall For on his carcass raiment had he none,

Save clouts and patches, pieced one by on
Come, hear the plaining and the bitter bale With staff in hand, and scrip on shoulders
Of worthy men by Fortune overthrow :

His chief defence against the winter's blas
Come thou, and see them rewing all in row,
They were but shades that erst in mind thou roll'd,

His food, for most, was wild fruits of the t

Unless sometime some crumbs fell to his Come,come with me, thine eyes shall them behold.”

Which in his wallet long, God wot, kept h

As on the which full daintily would he far
And with these words, as I upraised stood, His drink the running stream, his cup the
And 'gan to follow her that strait forth paced, Of his palm closed, his bed the hard cold gr
Ere I was ware, into a desart wood

To this poor life was Misery ybound.
We now were come, where, hand in hand embraced,
She led the way, and through the thick so traced,

Whose wretched state, when we had well E
As, but I had been guided by her might,

With tender ruth on him and on his ferest,
It was no way for any mortal wight.

In thoughtful cares forth then our pace we
And, by and by, another shape appears,
Of greedy Care, still brushing up the brere

His knuckles knob'd, his flesh deep dented
And first within the porch and jaws of Hell

With tawed hands and hard ytanned skin.
Sat deep Remorse of Conscience, all besprent The morrow gray no sooner had begun
With tears; and to herself oft would she tell

To spread his light, even peeping in our eye
Her wretchedness, and cursing never stente When he is up and to his work yrun ;
To sob and sigh ; but ever thus lament

And let the night's black misty mantles rise
With thoughtful care, as she that all in vain And with foul dark never so much disguise
Would wear and waste continually in pain. The fair bright day, yet ceaseth he no while

But hath his candles to prolong his toil.
Her eyes unstedfast, rolling here and there,
Whirld on each place, as place that vengeance By him lay heavy Sleep, the cousin of Deat
brought,

Flat on the ground, and still as any stone,
So was her mind continually in fear,

A very corps, save yielding forth a breath ;
Toss'd and tormented by the tedious thought Small keep took he whom Fortune frowned
of those detested crimes which she had wrought : Or whom she lifted up into the throne
With dreadful cheer and looks thrown to the sky, ! Of high renown : but as a living death,
Wishing for death, and yet she could not die. So dead, alive, of life he drew the breath.
Next saw we Dread, all trembling how he shook, The body's rest, the quiet of the heart,
With foot uncertain proffer'd here and there; The travail's ease, the still night's fere was ]
Benumm'd of speech, and with a ghastly look, And of our life in earth the better part,
Search'd every place, all pale and dead for fear ; Reever of sight, and yet in whom we see
His cap upborn with staring of his hair,

Things oft that tideh, and oft that never be ;
Stoynidd and amazed at his shade for dread, Without respect esteeming equally
And fearing greater dangers than was need. King Croesus' pomp, and Irus' poverty.
And next within the entry of this lake

And next in order sad Old Age we found,
Sat fell Revenge, gnashing her teeth for ire, His beard all hoar, his eyes hollow and blind
Devising means how she may vengeance take, With drooping cheer still poring on the groun
Never in rest till she have her desire ;

As on the place where Nature him assign'd
But frets within so far forth with the fire

To rest, when that the sisters had entwined
Of wreaking flames, that now determines she His vital thread, and ended with their knife
To die by death, or venged by death to be. The fleeting course of fast declining life.
When fell Revenge, with bloody foul pretence, Crook’d-back dhewas,tooth-shaken,andblear-ey
Had shew'd herself, as next in order set,

Went on three feet, and sometime crept on fo
With trembling limbs we softly parted thence, With old lame bones that rattled by his side,
Till in our eyes another sight we met,

His scalp all pill'di, and he with eld forlore, When from my heart a sigh forthwith I fete, His wither'd fist still knocking at Death's doo Rewing, alas ! upon the woeful plight

Trembling and driv’ling as he draws his breat Of Misery, that next appear'd in sight.

For brief, the shape and messenger of Death. € Stopped. Astonished.

Companions.

h Happen.

i Bai

e Fetched.

& Briars,

GEORGE GASCOIGNE

(Born, 1536. Died, 1577.)

Was born in 1536*, of an ancient family in turned to England, and resided generally at Essex, was bred at Cambridge, and entered at Walthamstow. In 1575 he accompanied Queen Gray's-Inn ; but being disinherited by his father Elizabeth in one of her stately progresses, and for extravagance, he repaired to Holland, and wrote for her amusement a mask, entitled the obtained a commission under the Prince of Princely Pleasures of Kenilworth Castle. He is Orange. A quarrel with his Colonel retarded generally said to have died at Stamford, in 1578; his promotion in that service ; and a circum but the registers of that place have been searched stance occurred which had nearly cost him his in vain for his name, by the writer of an article life. A lady at the Hague (the town being then in the Censura Literariat, who has corrected in the enemy's possession) sent him a letter, which some mistakes in former accounts of him. It is was intercepted in the camp, and a report against not probable, however, that he lived long after his loyalty was made by those who had seized it. 1576, as, from a manuscript in the British Gascoigne immediately laid the affair before the Museum, it appears that, in that year, he comPrince, who saw through the design of his ac plains of his infirmities, and nothing afterwards cusers, and gave him a passport for visiting his came from his pen. female friend. At the siege of Middleburgh he Gascoigne was one of the earliest contributors displayed so much bravery, that the Prince re to our drama. He wrote The Supposes, a warded him with 300 gilders above his pay; but comedy, translated from Ariosto, and Jocasta, he was soon after made prisoner by the Spaniards, a tragedy from Euripides, with some other and having spent four months in captivity, re pieces.

SWIFTNESS OF TIME.

Quoth Beauty, Well ; because I guess
What thou dost mean henceforth to be ;
Although thy faults deserve no less
Than Justice here hath judged thee ;
Wilt thou be bound to stint all strife,
And be true prisoner all thy life?

Yea madam, quoth I, that I shall;
Lo, Faith and Truth my sureties :
Why then, quoth she, come when I call,
I ask no better warrantise.
Thus am I Beauty's bounden thrall,
At her command when she doth call.

The heavens on high perpetually do move ;
By minutes meal the hour doth steal away,
By hours the days, by days the months remove,
And then by months the years as fast decay;
Yea, Virgil's verse and Tully's truth do say,
That Time flieth, and never claps her wings ;
But rides on clouds, and forward still she flings.

They pass

THE VANITY OF THE BEAUTIFUL.
FROM GASCOIGNE'S GRIEF OF JOY,
An unpublished Poem in Manuscript, in the British
Museum. 18 A. 61,-King's Library.

They course the glass, and let it take no rest;

and

spy who gazeth on their face ;

They darkly ask whose beauty seemeth best ; There is a grief in every kind of joy,

They hark and mark who marketh most their That is my theme, and that I mean to prove ;

grace ; And who were he which would not drink annoy, They stay their steps, and stalk a stately pace ; To taste thereby the lightest dram of love? They jealous are of every sight they see ;

They strive to seem, but never care to be.

Joax HARRINGTON, the father of the translator the few specimens of his father's poetry which of Ariosto, was imprisoned by Queen Mary for are found in the Nugæ Antiquæ may excite a his suspected attachment to Queen Elizabeth, by regret that he did not write more. His love whom he was afterwards rewarded with a grant verses have an elegance and terseness, more of lands. Nothing that the younger Harrington modern, by an hundred years, than those of his has written seems to be worth preserving : but i contemporaries.

VERSES ON A MOST STONY-HEARTED MAIDEN WHO DID SORELY BEGUILE THE NOBLE

KNIGHT, MY TRUE FRIEND.
J. H. MSS. 1564.-From the Nugæ Antiquæ.

II.

Why didst thou raise such woeful wail,
And waste in briny tears thy days ?
'Cause she that wont to flout and rail,
At last gave proof of woman's ways;
She did, in sooth, display the heart
That might have wrought thee greater smart.

Why, thank her then, not weep or moan ;
Let others guard their careless heart,
And praise the day that thus made known
The faithless hold on woman's art ;"
Their lips can gloze and gain such root,
That gentle youth hath hope of fruit.