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Lecture the Fourth.

JOHN THE CHAPLAIN-THOMAS OCCLEVE-JOHN LYDGATE-JOHN SKELTON-HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY-SIR THOMAS WYATT-THOMAS TUSSER-ANDREW BOURD-MISCELLANEOUS POEMS-PROSE WRITERS-SIR JOHN FORTESCUE-WILLIAM CAXTON.

IN

N our last lecture we fully considered the Scottish poets who flourished between the age of Edward the Third, and that of Elizabeth, and we shall now return to review those of England during the same period. We must here, however, at the outset remark, that though a few names of some degree of eminence will pass before us, yet we should look in vain for the same order of genius among them which was displayed by Dunbar, or even by James the First.

Of these poets the two first that present themselves are John the Chaplain, and Thomas Occleve. Of the former little is now known; and of the latter comparatively nothing, farther than that he was by profession a lawyer, and though a tolerably smooth versifier, yet nothing more. John Lydgate, the third of these writers, will require a little more attention.

LYDGATE was born in Suffolk, in 1380, the fourth year of the reign of Richard the Second. He was an Augustine monk of St. Edmondsberry, and though both a philosopher and a divine, his chief attention was devoted to the muses. Having travelled in France and Italy, and carefully studied the poetry of those countries, he returned to his monastery, and there established a school for the instruction of young men of the upper ranks, in the art of versification—a fact which proves that poetry had become a favorite study among he few who acquired any tincture of letters in that age. Lydgate died at Bury, in 1440, in the sixty-first year of his age.

The genius of this author was, perhaps, not above mediocrity; but by study and care he acquired such excellence in versification, as, in this particular, to excel, according to the judgment of some critics, even Chaucer himself. His poetical compositions range over a great variety of styles, embracing besides The History of Thebes, The Fall of Princes, and The Destruction of

Troy, which are his three principal performances, many Odes, Eclogues, and Satires. 'His muse,' says Warton, 'was of universal access; and he was not only the poet of the monastery, but of the world in general. If a disguising was contemplated by the company of goldsmiths, a mask before his majesty at Eltham, a May game for the sheriffs and aldermen of London, at mumming before the Lord Mayor, or a carol for the coronation, Lydgate was consulted, and gave the poetry.' In the words of the same writer, 'there is great softness and facility' in the following passage found in his Destruction of Troy :

DESCRIPTION OF A SYLVAN RETREAT.

Till at the last, among the bowes glade,
Of adventure, I caught a pleasant shade;
Full smooth, and plain, and lusty for to seen,
And soft as velvet was the yonge green:
Where from my horse I did alight as fast,
And on the bow aloft his reine cast.
So faint and mate of weariness I was,
That I me laid adown upon the grass,
Upon a brinke, shortly for to tell,
Beside the river of a crystal well;

And the water, as I reherse can,

Like quicke silver in his streams y-ran.

Of which the gravel and the brighte stone,
As any gold, against the sun y-shone.

After Lydgate no poet appeared in England for more than a half century, whose name has been preserved from oblivion; for the reigns of Edward the Fourth, Richard the Third, and Henry the Seventh, extending from 1461 till 1509, were barren of every thing like true poetic genius. We descend, therefore, down the current of English literature without meeting with any thing to attract our attention until we reach the age of Henry the Eighth. The first name that occurs at this period is that of John Skelton.

SKELTON was born in Cumberland, but at what precise time is unknown. He was educated at the university of Oxford, and in 1489 was there invested with the laurel-a sort of poetical degree occasionally conferred upon the favorites of the muses. He took orders, and became rector of Dysse in Norfolk; but he was eventually suspended by his diocesan for writing loose and obscene verses, not only against obscure individuals, but even against Cardinal Wolsey, from whose resentment he took refuge in the sanctuary of Westminster, under the protection of abbot Islip. His death occurred on the twenty-first of June, 1529.

Skelton's poems consist chiefly of Sonnets and Satires, and his genius, according to Warton, was peculiarly suited to the low burlesque, though he occasionally assumed a more amiable and poetic manner, as in the following canzonet :

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So joyously,

So maidenly,
So womanly,
Her demeaning,
In every thing,
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;

Stedfast 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.

HENRY HOWARD, Earl of Surrey, the English poet who follows Skelton in the order of time, was a genius of a very different character. He was the eldest son of the Duke of Norfolk, and was born in 1516. He was educated at Windsor, in company with a natural son of Henry the Eighth, the future Duke of Richmond, and in early life he became accomplished not only in the learning of the times, but also in all kinds of courtly and chivalrous exercises. Having completed his studies at home, he travelled into Italy, and was there a devoted student of the poets of that country-Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Ariosto-and formed his own poetical style upon theirs.

Surrey was also a valiant soldier as well as poet, and remarkably distinguished himself on many occasions, particularly in conducting an important expedition in 1542, for the destruction of the Scottish borderers. But he finally fell under the displeasure of his fickle monarch, who caused him to be apprehended and imprisoned in Windsor Castle, whence

he was soon after removed to the Tower, and thence to the scaffold on Tower Hill, where he was beheaded on the nineteenth of January 1547, not yet having attained the thirty-first year of his age.

Surrey's attainments for the time at which he lived, were unusually great. He was entirely familiar with the Latin, the French, the Italian, and the Spanish languages, and also with all the gentlemanly accomplishments of the age. His poetry is distinguished for its flowing melody, correctness of style, and purity of expression: he has the honor also to have been the first writer of English narrative blank verse in the language.

The gentle and melancholy pathos of his manner is well exemplified in the following verses, which he wrote during his confinement in Windsor Castle, when about to yield his life a sacrifice to tyrannical caprice. They are so beautiful as to hold a permanent place among the finest poetical productions in the language. The noble poet is recounting the pleasure there enjoyed in former days:

A PRISONER IN WINDSOR CASTLE.

So cruel prison how could betide, alas!

As proud Windsor? where, in lust and joy,
With a king's son, my childish years did pass,
In greater feast than Priam's son of Troy:

Where each sweet place returns a taste full sour!

The large green courts where we were wont to hove,i

With eyes cast up into the Maiden Tower,

And easy sighs such as folks 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.
The palm-play, where, despoiled for the game,
With dazed 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.
The gravel ground, with sleeves tied on the helm
Of foaming horse,2 with swords and friendly hearts;
With cheer, as though one should another whelm,
Where we have fought, and chased oft with darts;

With silver drops the mead yet spread for ruth,
In active games of nimbleness and strength,
Where we did strain, trained with swarms of youth,
Our tender limbs that yet shot up in length:

The secret groves which oft we made resound,
Of pleasant plaint, and of our ladies' praise,
Recording oft what grace each one had found,
What hope of speed, what dread of long delays:

1 Hover, loiter.

2 A lover tied the sleeve of his mistress on the head of his horse.

The wild forest, the clothed holts with green,

With reins availed1 and swiftly breathed horse;
With cries of hounds and merry blasts between,
Where we did chase the fearful hart of force.

The wide vales, eke, that harboured us each night,
Wherewith, alas, reviveth in my breast,
The sweet accord such sleeps as yet delight,
The pleasant dreams, the quiet bed of rest:

The secret thoughts imparted with such trust,
The wanton talk, the divers change of play,
The friendship sworn, each promise kept so just;
Wherewith we passed the winter night away.

And with this thought the blood forsakes the face
The tears berain my cheeks of deadly hue,
The which, as soon as sobbing sighs, alas,
Upsupped have, thus I my plaint renew:

O place of bliss! renewer of my woes,

Give me accounts, where is my noble fere;2
Whom in thy walls thou dost each night enclose;
To other leef,3 but unto me most dear:

Echo, alas! that doth my sorrow rue,

Beturns thereto a hollow sound of plaint.
Thus I alone, where all my freedom grew,
In prison pine with bondage and restraint,
And with remembrance of the greater grief
To banish the less, I find my chief relief.

To this sweet poem we add the following stanzas on

THE MEANS TO ATTAIN HAPPY LIFE.

1 Reins dropped.

Martial, the things that do attain

The happy life, be there, I find,
The riches left, not got with pain;

The fruitful ground, the quiet mind,

The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule, nor governance ;
Without disease, the healthful life;
The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no delicate fare;

True wisdom joined with simpleness;

The night discharged of all care;
Where wine the wit may not oppress.

The faithful wife, without debate;

Such sleeps as may beguile the night;

Content with thine own estate,

Ne wish for death, ne fear his might.

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