Ilk bird rejoicing with their mirthful makes.
In corners and clear fenestres1 of glass,
Full busily Arachne weaving was,
To knit her nettis and her webbis sly,
Therewith to catch the little midge or fly.
So dusty powder upstours2 in every street,
While corby gasped for the fervent heat.
Under the boughis bene3 in lovely vales,
Within fermance and parkis close of pales,
The busteous buckis rakis forth on raw,
Herdis of hartis through the thick wood-shaw.
The young fawns following the dun does,
Kids, skipping through, runnis after roes.
In leisurs and on leais, little lambs

Full tait and trig sought bleating to their dams.
On salt streams wolk1 Dorida and Thetis,
By running strandis, Nymphis and Naiadis,
Such as we clepe wenches and damasels,
In gersy5 groves wandering by spring wells;
Of bloomed branches and flowers white and red,
Platting their lusty chaplets for their head.
Some sang ring-songës, dances, leids, and rounds.
With voices shrill, while all the dale resounds.
Whereso they walk into their carolling,
For amorous lays does all the rockis ring.
One sang, 'The ship sails over the salt faem,
Will bring the merchants and my leman hame.'
Some other sings, I will be blithe and light,
My heart is lent upon so goodly wight.'7
And thoughtful lovers rounis to and fro,

8

To leis9 their pain, and plain their jolly woe;

1 'Fenestres:' windows.-2 Upstours:' rises in clouds.—3 'Bene:'

snug.

4 Wolk:' walked.-5 'Gersy:' grassy.-6 Leids:' lays.- Songs then popular.

After their guise, now singing, now in sorrow,
With heartis pensive the long summer's morrow.
Some ballads list indite of his lady;

Some lives in hope; and some all utterly
Despaired is, and so quite out of grace,
His purgatory he finds in every place.
Dame Nature's minstrels, on that other part,
Their blissful lay intoning every art,

*

And all small fowlis singis on the spray,
Welcome the lord of light, and lamp of day,
Welcome fosterer of tender herbis green,
Welcome quickener of flourish'd flowers sheen,
Welcome support of every root and vein,
Welcome comfort of all kind fruit and grain,
Welcome the birdis' bield1 upon the brier,
Welcome master and ruler of the year,
Welcome welfare of husbands at the ploughs,
Welcome repairer of woods, trees, and boughs,
Welcome depainter of the bloomed meads,
Welcome the life of every thing that spreads,

Welcome storer of all kind bestial,

Welcome be thy bright beamis, gladding all. **

HAWES, BARCLAY, &c.

STEPHEN HAWES, a native of Suffolk, wrote about the close of the fifteenth century. He studied at Oxford, and travelled much in France, where he became a master of French and Italian poetry. King Henry VII., struck with his conversation and the readiness with which he repeated old English poets, especially Lydgate, created him groom of the privy chamber. Hawes has written a number of poems, such as 'The Temple of

1 'Bield:' shelter.

Glasse,' 'The Conversion of Swearers,' 'The Consolation of Lovers,' 'The Pastime of Pleasure,' &c. Those who wish to see specimens of the strange allegories and curious devices of thought in which it abounds, may find them in Warton's 'History of English Poetry.'

In that same valuable work we find an account of Alexander Barclay, author of 'The Ship of Fools.' He was educated at Oriel College in Oxford, and after travelling abroad, was appointed one of the priests or prebendaries of the College of St Mary Ottery, in Devonshire—a parish famous in later days for the birth of Coleridge. Barclay became afterwards a Benedictine monk of Ely monastery; and at length a brother of the Order of St Francis, at Canterbury. He died, a very old man, at Croydon, in Surrey, in the year 1552. His principal work, 'The Ship of Fools,' is a satire upon the vices and absurdities of his age, and shews considerable wit and power of sarcasm.

SKELTON.

JOHN SKELTON is the name of the next poet. He flourished in the earlier part of the reign of Henry VIII. Having studied both at Oxford and Cambridge, and been laureated at the former university in 1489, he was promoted to the rectory of Diss or Dysse, in Norfolk. Some say he had acted previously as tutor to Henry VIII. At Dysse he attracted attention by satirical ballads against the mendicants, as well as by licences of buffoonery in the pulpit. For these he was censured, and even, it is said, suspended, by Nykke, Bishop of Norwich. Undaunted by this, he flew at higher game-ventured to ridicule Cardinal Wolsey, then in his power, and had to take refuge from the myrmidons of the prelate in Westminster Abbey. There Abbot Islip kindly entertained and protected him till his dying day. He breathed his last in the year 1529, and was buried in the adjacent church of St Margaret's.

Skelton as well as Barclay enjoyed considerable popularity in his own age. Erasmus calls him 'Britannicarum literarum

lumen et decus!' How dark must have been the night in which such a Will-o'-wisp was mistaken for a star! He has wit, indeed, and satirical observation; but his wit is wilder than it is strong, and his satire is dashed with personality and obscenity. His style, Campbell observes, is almost a texture of slang phrases, patched with shreds of French and Latin.' His verses on Margaret Hussey, which we have quoted, are in his happiest vein. The following lines, too, on Cardinal Wolsey, are as true as they are terse :—

'Then in the Chamber of Stars
All matter there he mars.
Clapping his rod on the board,
No man dare speak a word.
For he hath all the saying,
Without any renaying.
He rolleth in his recòrds;

He sayeth, How say ye, my Lords?

Is not my reason good?

Good even, good Robin Hood.

Some say, Yes; and some

Sit still, as they were dumb.'

It is curious that Wolsey's enemies, in one of their charges against him in the Parliament of 1529, have repeated, almost in the words of Skelton, the same accusation.

TO MISTRESS MARGARET HUSSEY.

Merry Margaret,

As midsummer flower,

Gentle as falcon,

Or hawk of the tower;
With solace and gladness,
Much mirth and no madness,
All good and no badness;
So joyously,

So maidenly,
So womanly,
Her demeaning,

In everything,
Far, far passing,
That I can indite,
Or suffice to write,
Of merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,

Or hawk of the tower;
As patient and as still,
And as full of good-will,
As fair Isiphil,
Coliander,

Sweet Pomander,

Good Cassander;
Steadfast of thought,
Well made, well wrought.
Far may be sought,

Ere you can find

So courteous, so kind,
As merry Margaret,
This midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,

Or hawk of the tower.

SIR DAVID LYNDSAY.

RETURNING to Scotland, we find a Skelton of a higher order and a brawnier make in Sir David Lyndsay, or, as our forefathers were wont familiarly to denominate him, 'Davie Lyndsay.' Lyndsay was descended from a noble family, a younger branch of Lyndsay of the Byres, and born in 1490, probably at the Mount, the family-seat, near Cupar-Fife. He entered the University of St Andrews in the year 1505, and four years later left