a more perfect copy printed in "Ancient Songs, from the Time of King Henry III. to the Revolution," page 87. This little piece, which perhaps ought rather to have been printed in stanzas of eight short lines, is written in imitation of a poem of Chaucer's that will be found in Urry's Edit. 1721, p. 555, beginning thus: Alone walkyng, In thought plainyng, My death wishyng Bothe erly and late. That wrote ye what, Out of mesure In such pcre estate, Doe I endure, &c. SUMWHAT musyng, And more mornyng, Is now to sese My wofull chaunce. And no redress, Me doth avaunce, With displeasaunce, To my grevaunce, Me thynks truly, Bowndyn am I, My lyff was lent Me to on intent, Hytt is ny spent. Welcome fortune!1 But I ne went 2 Thus to be shent, But sho hit ment; Such is hur won. VIII. CUPID'S ASSAULT BY LORD VAUX The reader will think that infant poetry grew apace between the times of Rivers and Vaux, though nearly contemporaries; if the following song is the composition of that Sir Nicholas (afterwards Lord) Vaux, who was the shining ornament of the court of Henry VII. and died in the year 1523. 1 "That fortune." Rossi Hist. 2 i. c. weened. And yet to this Lord it is attributed by Puttenham in his "Art of Eng. Poesie," 1589. 4to. a writer commonly well informed: take the passage at large. "In this figure [Counterfait Action] the Lord Nicholas Vaux, a noble gentleman and much delighted in vulgar making, and a man otherwise of no great learning, but having herein a marvelous facilitie, made a dittie representing the Battayle and Assault of Cupide, so excellently well, as for the gallant and propre application of his fiction in every part, I cannot choose but set downe the greatest part of his ditty, for in truth it cannot be amended. "When Cupid scaled,' &c." p. 200. For a farther account of Nicholas Lord Vaux, see Mr. Walpole's Noble Authors, Vol. i. The following copy is printed from the first edition of Surrey's Poems, 1557, 4to. See another song of Lord Vaux's, Series I. Book ii. No. 2. WHEN Cupide scaled first the fort, Wherein my hart lay wounded sore; The batry was of such a sort, That I must yelde or die therfore. There sawe I Love upon the wall, And bad his souldiours kepe aray. The armes, the which that Cupide bare, The stedfast love, he alwayes ment. There might you se his band all drest To bring the fort to spoile and sacke. Stode in the rampire brave and proude, There might you heare the cannons rore; And even with the trompettes sowne Then first Desire began to scale, And shrouded him under 'his '1 targe; Then pushed souldiers with their pikes, And, as it is the souldiers use When shot and powder gins to want, And pleaded up for my livès grant. When Fansy thus had made her breche, Then Beautie bad to blow retrete, Madame, quoth I, sith that this day Here of the fortresse all the kayes. And sith that I have ben the marke, Since the foregoing song was first printed off, reasons have occurred, which incline me to believe that Lord Vaux the poet was not the Lord Nicholas Vaux, who died in 1523, but rather a successor of his in the title. For in the first place it is remarkable that all the old writers mention Lord Vaux, the poet, as contemporary or rather posterior to Sir Thomas Wyat and the Earl of Surrey, neither of which made any figure till long after the death of the first Lord Nicholas Vaux. Thus Puttenham, in his "Art of English Poesie," 1589, in p. 48, having named Skelton, adds, "In the latter end of the same kings raigne [Henry VIII.] sprong up a new company of courtly makers [poets], of whom Sir Thomas Wyat th' elder, and Henry Earl of Surrey, were the two chieftaines, who having travailed into Italie, and there tasted the sweet and stately measures and stile of the Italian 1 "Her." Ed. 1557. "So." Ed. 1585. And poesie. greatly polished our rude and homely manner of vulgar poesie. In the same time, or not long after was the Lord Nicholas Vaux, a man of much facilitie in vulgar makings.' Webbe in his Discourse of English Poetrie, 1586, ranges them in the following order, "The Earl of Surrey, the Lord Vaux, Norton, Bristow.' Gascoigne, in the place quoted in Series I. Book ii. No. 2. mentions Lord Vaux after Surrey. Again, the style and measure of Lord Vaux's pieces seem too refined and polished for the reign of Henry VII. and rather resemble the smoothness and harmony of Surrey and Wyat, than the rude metre of Skelton and Hawes; but what puts the matter out of all doubt, in the British Museum is a copy of his poem, "I lothe that I did love," (vid. ubi supra) with this title, "A dyttye or sonet made by the Lord Vaus, in the time of the noble Quene Marye, representing the image of Death." Harl. MSS. No. 1703, § 25. It is evident then that Lord Vaux the poet was not he that flourished in the reign of Henry VII. but either his son, or grandson: and yet, according to Dugdale's Baronage, the former was named Thomas, and the latter William: but this difficulty is not great, for none of the old writers mention the Christian name of the poetic Lord Vaux, except Puttenham; and it is more likely that he might be mistaken in that lord's name, than in the time in which he lived, who was so nearly his contemporary. Thomas Lord Vaux, of Harrowden in Northamptonshire, was summoned to parliament in 1531. When he died does not appear; but he probably lived till the latter end of Queen Mary's reign, since his son William was not summoned to parliament till the last year of that reign, in 1551. This lord died in 1595. (See Dugdale, vol. ii. p. 304.) Upon the whole I am inclined to believe that Lord Thomas was the poet. IX. SIR ALDINGAR This old fabulous legend is given from the Editor's folio manuscript with conjectural emendations, and the insertion of some additional stanzas to supply and complete the story. It has been suggested to the Editor that the author of this poem seems to have had in his eye the story of Gunhilda, who is sometimes called Eleanor, and was married to the Emperor (here called King) Henry. OUR king he kept a false stewàrde, Sir Aldingar they him call; A falser steward than he was one, Servde not in bower nor hall. He wolde have layne by our comelye queene, Her deere worshippe to betraye: Our queene she was a good womàn, And evermore said him naye. 1 i. e. Compositions in English. 2 In the Paradise of Dainty Devises, 1596, he is called simply "Lord Vaux the elder." Sir Aldingar was wrothe in his mind, There came a lazar to the kings gate, "Lye still, lazar, wheras thou lyest, Then went him forth Sir Aldingar, And hyed him to our king: "If I might have grace, as I have space, Sad tydings I could bring. Say on, say on, Sir Aldingar, "Our queene hath chosen a new new love, "If shee had chosen a right good knight, But she hath chose her a lazar man, If this be true, thou Aldingar, The tyding thou tellest to me, But if it be false, Sir Aldingar, As God nowe grant it bee! Thy body, I sweare by the holye rood, Shall hang on the gallows tree. He brought our king to the queenes chamber, A lodlye love, King Harry says, 1 He probably insinuates that the king should heal him by his power of touching for the King's Evil. |