period, Tom Nash, invented a fabulous narrative of Surrey having travelled in Italy, proclaiming the beauty of his Geraldine, and defending her charms in tilt and tournament, against Turk, Saracen, and Cannibal. The whole was a fabrication, but it was believed even down to the days of Sir Walter Scott, who introduces the chivalrous fiction into his Lay of the Last Minstrel. Surrey served with the army in Scotland and France. But the whole family of Howard fell under Henry's hatred, after the execution of Queen Catherine, Surrey's sister. He and his father were thrown into the Tower, and condemned on frivolous accusations. Surrey was executed in 1547; the Duke of Norfolk narrowly escaped the same fate by the death of the tyrant.

Surrey and Sir Thomas Wyatt,' with whom his name is often associated, are sometimes ranked as the first who polished the English poetical diction and versification. The taste of Surrey, as Hallam observes, was even more striking than his genius. He was deeply imbued with the manner of Petrarch, and wrote the earliest of our English sonnets. His pieces are full of natural and beautiful feeling, without any of the affectation of his age. He was the first writer of blank verse in English, in the translation of a portion of the Æneid.

SURREY'S REFLECTIONS ON HIS IMPRISONMENT IN WINDSOR CASTLE.2

So cruel prison how could betide,3 alas,
As proud Windsor! where I in lust and joy,
With a king's son," my childish years did pass
In greater feasts than Priam's sons of Troy :6

Where each sweet place returns a taste full sour,
The large green courts where we were wont to hove,7
With eyes cast up into the maiden's Tower,
And easy sighs such as folk draw in love:

The stately seats; the ladies bright of hue,
The dances short, long tales of great delight;
With words and looks that tigers could but rue,"
Where each of us did plead the other's right:

1 The son of the Sir Thomas Wyatt executed in the beginning of the reign of Mary, Warton calls him "the first polished English satirist."

2 He had been condemned to this imprisonment for eating flesh in Lent. Henry VIII.'s theology often reduced his subjects to worse straits.

3 Be my lot.

Innate delight. The word has been noticed above. It runs through many applications in many languages, from the Greek lao downwards.

The Earl of Richmond.

A passage in the Iliad, xxiv. 260, seems to imply the gormandizing propensities of Priam's sons.

7 Hover.

8 "Maiden, a corruption of the old French magne or mayne, great. Thus Maiden head (properly Maiden hythe) in Berkshire, is the great port on the river Thames.' Warton. "Mai dun are two ancient British words, signifying great hill. Thus the Maiden Castle (Edinburgh), is not castra puellarum, but a castle on a high hill."— Ritson.

This is in the style of the exaggerated gallantry of the period; rue, pity; hence ruth, ruthless.

NO AGE CONTENT WITH HIS OWN ESTATE. 49

The palm play, where despoiléd2 for the game,
With dazéd3 eyes oft we, by gleams of love,
Have missed the ball, and got sight of our dame,
To bait her eyes which kept the leads above:5

The gravel ground, with sleeves tied on the helm,7
On foaming horse, with swords and friendly hearts,
With cheer as tho' one should another whelm,
Where we have fought and chased oft with darts:

The wild forest, the clothéd holts with green,
With reins avayled," and swift ybreathed horse,
With cry of hounds, and merry blasts between,
Where we did chase the fearful hart of force.

NO AGE CONTENT WITH HIS OWN ESTATE.

Laid in my quiet bed, in study as I were,

I saw, within my troubled head a heap of thoughts appear.

And every thought did show so lively in mine eyes,

That now I sighed, and then I smiled, as cause of thoughts did rise.

I saw the little boy, and thought how oft that he

Did wish of God, to 'scape the rod, a tall young man to be.
The young man eke, that feels his bones with pains oppressed,
How he would be a rich old man, to live and lie at rest;

The rich 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 I smiled, to see how all those three,
From boy to man, from man to boy, would chop and change
degree.

And, musing thus, I think the case is very strange,

That man from wealth to live in woe, doth ever seek to change. Thus thoughtful as I lay, I saw my withered skin ;

How it doth show my dented chewes ;10 the flesh was worn so thin.

1 At ball with the palm of the hand.

2 Rendered unfit.

3 Dazzled.

4 To catch.

5 "The ladies were ranged on the leads or battlements of the castle to see the play."-Warton. 6 The area of the training lists was strewed with gravel.

7 The sleeves or gloves of their mistresses were tied on the helmets of the champions.

"And in my helmet wear her glove.

When gallants ride the ring."-Poems by a Family Circle.

See Shakesp. Henry V. Act. iv. Sc. i. vii. viii.

Holt-a grove or forest.

Loosened: from avaller, to cast; to fell down: Barb. Lat. avallare; which, according to Menage, is formed from ad, to, and vallis, a valley, as monter is formed from mons, a mountain-Richardson.

10 Or chaws, now written jaws; dented, indented.

And eke my toothless chaps, the gates of my right way,1
That opes and shuts as I do speak, do thus unto me say,
'The white and hoarish hairs, the messengers of age
That show, like lines of true belief, that this life doth assuage,2

"Bids thee lay hand and feel them hanging on thy chin.
The which doth write, to ages past, the third now coming in.
Hang up therefore the bit of thy young wanton time;
And thou, that therein beaten3 art, the happiest life define:"

Whereat I sighed, and said, "Farewell, my wonted Toy,
Truss up thy pack and trudge from me, to every little boy,
And tell them thus from me, their time most happy is,
If, to their time, they reason had to know the truth of this."

SPRING.

The sweet season, that bud and bloom forth brings,
With green hath clad the hill and eke the vale.
The nightingale, with feathers new, she sings;
The turtle to her mate hath told her tale;
Summer is come, for every spray now springs.
The hart hath hung his old head on the pale ;
The buck in brake his winter coat he flings;
The fishes fleet with new repairéd scale;
The adder all her slough away she flings;
The swift swallow pursueth the flies small;
The busy bee her honey how she mings!5
Winter is worn, that was the flowers' bale.
And thus I see among these pleasant things
Each care decays, and yet my sorrow springs.

LORD SACKVILLE.

(1536-1608.)

THOMAS SACKVILLE, the first Lord Buckhurst and Earl of Dorset, was the son of Sir Richard Sackville, of Buckhurst, in Sussex. He is almost the only light in poetry that illuminates the gloomy reign of Mary. From his early years he manifested great vivacity of talent, He enjoyed the advantage of the education of both universities. While a student in the Inner Temple he composed his tragedy of "Gorboduc," or, as it was afterwards entitled, "Ferrex and Porrex." This is the first specimen in

1 True philosophy.

Used like the Scripture phrase, "stricken in years."
Shed his horns.

5 Mingles; see note 3, p. 40; and note 8, p. 12.

2 Draw to a close.

The first edition is dated 1565, and the title-page states that the three first acts of the play are by Thomas Norton. The internal evidence, however, does not support the assertion.

INDUCTION TO MIRROR FOR MAGISTRATES. 51

English literature of the tragic drama. "This tragedy, and his contribution of the Induction' and 'Legend of the Duke of Buckingham' to the 'Mirror for Magistrates,' compose the poetical history of Lord Sackville's life."-(Campbell). The statesman soon superseded the poet in Sackville's career. He filled various important and conspicuous situations during the reign of Elizabeth; and, on the accession of James, was confirmed for life, in his office of Lord High Treasurer of England. His career as a minister reflects great honour on the integrity and vigour of his character. He died suddenly in his vocation at the council board, of disease in the brain, in 1608.

"As to 'Gorboduc,' it is a piece of monotonous recitals, and cold and heavy accumulation of incidents.” — (Campbell). It is, however, justly praised for the purity of its language, and the dignity and correctness of its sentiments. "The Mirror for Magistrates" is a collection of narratives by several poets of the misfortunes of the great in English history. It was planned by Sackville on the scheme of Dante's "Inferno." His contributions to it, however, as above noticed, were slight. Sorrow conducts the poet through the infernal regions: the "Induction" is filled with scenic allegory, little inferior in vigour of execution to that of Spenser. This collection of tragical histories is said to have furnished hints to Shakespeare, and may have suggested the historical plays. The first edition appeared in 1559, the second, containing Sackville's portion, in 1563.

FROM THE "INDUCTION” TO THE "MIRROR FOR MAGISTRATES."

ALLEGORICAL PERSONAGES IN HELL DESCRIBED.

And first within the porch and jaws of hell
Sat deep Remorse of Conscience, all besprent
With tears and to herself oft would she tell
Her wretchedness, and, cursing, never stent1
To sob and sigh; but ever thus lament,
With thoughtful care, as she that all in vain
Would wear and waste continually in pain.

Her eyes unstedfast rolling here and there,

Whirled on each place, as place that vengeance brought ;
So was her mind continually in fear,

Tossed and tormented with the tedious thought
Of those detested crimes which she had wrought;

With dreadful cheare2 and looks thrown to the sky,
Wishing for death, and yet she could not die.

*

*

*

And next, within the entry of this lake,
Sat fell Revenge gnashing her3 teeth for ire,
Devising means how she may vengeance take,

1 Stinted, ceased. "And stint thou too, I pray thee, nurse!"
2 Countenance.

Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 3.

* Revenge is masculine in Collins's Ode on the Passions.

Never to rest till she have her desire:
But frets within so far forth' with the fire
Of wreaking flames, that now determines she
To die by death, or venged by death to be.

When fell Revenge with bloody foul pretence
Had showed herself, as next in order set,
With trembling limbs we softly parted thence,
Till in our eyes another sight we met:
When from my heart a sigh forthwith I fet,2
Rueing alas upon the woful plight

Of Misery, that next appeared in sight.

His face was lean, and some deal pined away,
And eke his hands consumed to the bone;
But what his body was I cannot say,
For on his carcase raiment had he none,
Save clouts and patches piecéd 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,
Unless sometimes some crumbs fell to his share,
Which in his wallet long, God wot, kept he,
As on the which full daintily would he fare.
His drink the running stream; his cup the bore
Of his palm closed; his bed the hard cold ground:
To this poor life was Misery ybound.

By him lay heavy Sleep, the cousin of Death,
Flat on the ground, and still as any stone,
A very corpse, save yielding forth a breath.
Small keep took he whom Fortune frowned on,
Or whom she lifted up into the throne
Of high renown; but as a living death,
So dead alive, of life he drew the breath.

And next in order sad old Age we found,
His beard all hoar, his eyes hollow and blind,
With drooping cheer still poring on the ground,
As on the place where nature him assigned
To rest, when that the sisters' had untwined
His vital thread, and ended with their knife
The fleeting course of fast declining life.

1 To such an extent.

*

*

*

2 Fetched.

"Shall he dwindle, peak, and pine."-Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 4. The Fates.-See Keightley's Mythology.