Now fare thee well, sayd the heire of Linne; tit In the present edition of this ballad several ancient readings are restored from the folio manuscript. VI. GASCOIGNE'S PRAISE OF THE FAIR BRIDGES, AFTERWARDS LADY SANDES, ON HER HAVING A SCAR IN HER FOREHEAD George Gascoigne was a celebrated poet in the early part of Queen Elizabeth's reign, and appears to great advantage among the miscellaneous writers of that age. He was author of three or four plays, and of many smaller poems; one of the most remarkable of which is a satire in blank verse, called the "Steele-glass," 1576, 4to. Gascoigne was born in Essex, educated in both universities, whence he removed to Gray's-inn; but, disliking the study of the law, became first a dangler at court, and afterwards a soldier in the wars of the Low Countries. He had no great success in any of these pursuits, as appears from a poem of his, intitled, "Gascoigne's Wodmanship, written to Lord Gray of Wilton." Many of his epistles dedicatory are dated in 1575, 1576, from "his poore house in Walthamstoe;" where he died a middle-aged man in 1577, if he is the person meant in an old tract, intitled, A remembrance of the well employed Life and godly End of George Gascoigne, Esq. who deceased at Stamford in Lincolnshire, Oct. 7, 1577, by Geo. Whetstone, Gent. an eye-witness of his godly and charitable end in this world," 4to. no date. [From a manuscript of Oldys.] But Mr. Thomas Warton thinks" Gascoigne has much exceeded all the poets of his age, in smoothness and harmony of versification."1 the truth is, scarce any of the earlier poets of Queen Elizabeth's time are found deficient in harmony and smoothness, though those qualities appear so rare in the writings of their successors. In the "Paradise of Dainty Devises "2 (the Dodsley's Miscellany of those times) will hardly be found one rough, or inharmonious line: whereas the numbers of Jonson, Donne, and most of their contemporaries, frequently offend the ear, like the filing of a saw. Perhaps this is in some measure to be accounted for from the growing pedantry of that age, and from the writers affecting to run their lines into one another, after the manner of the Latin and Greek poets. The following poem (which the elegant writer above quoted hath recommended to notice, as possessed of a delicacy rarely to be seen in that early state of our poetry) properly consists of alexandrines of 12 1 Observations on the Faerie Queen, vol. ii. p. 168. 2 Printed in 1578, 1596, and perhaps oftener, in 4to. black-letter. The same is true of most of the poems in the "Mirrour of Magistrates," 1563, 4to, and also of Surrey's Poems, 1557. and 14 syllables, and is printed from two quarto black-letter collections of Gascoigne's pieces; the first intitled, "A hundreth sundrie flowres, bounde up in one small posie, &c. London, imprinted for Richarde Smith: " without date, but from a letter of H. W. (p. 202.) compared with the printer's epistle to the reader, it appears to have been published in 1572, or 3. The other is intitled, "The Posies of George Gascoigne, Esq. corrected, perfected, and augmented by the author, 1575. Printed at London, for Richard Smith, &c.' No year, but the epist. dedicat. is dated 1576. In the title page of this last (by way of printer's, or bookseller's device) is an ornamental wooden cut, tolerably well executed, wherein Time is represented drawing the figure of Truth out of a pit or cavern, with this legend, "Occulta veritas tempore patet" [R. S.] This is mentioned because it is not improbable but the accidental sight of this or some other title page containing the same device, suggested to Rubens that well-known design of a similar kind, which he has introduced into the Luxemburg gallery, and which has been so justly censured for the unnatural manner of its execution. IN court whoso demaundes What dame doth most excell; Upon whose lively cheeke, To prove my judgement true, And therewithall so well Hir graces all agree! No frowning cheere dare once presume Although some lavishe lippes, Which like some other best, Thereto I thus replie; God wotte, they little knowe For when dame Nature first 1 Henrie Binneman. 8 Le Tems decouvre la Verité. It lyked hir so well: Lo here, quod she, a peece This bayt may chaunce to catche But out, alas! those wordes Close in a corner stoode, Not blyndfold then, to gaze on hir: Yet when he felte the flame And herd dame Nature boast by hir His hot newe-chosen love And sodeynly with mightie mace Gan rap hir on the pate. It greeved Nature muche To see the cruell deede: To see hir dearling bleede. Wel yet, quod she, this hurt Shal have some helpe I trowe: Wherwith Dan Cupide fled, For feare of further flame, Lo, thus was Bridges hurt In cradel of hir kind.1 The coward Cupide brake hir browe To wreke his wounded mynd. 1.6. in the cradle of her family. See Warton's Observations, vol. ii. p. 137. The skar there still remains; No force, there let it bee: So bright a sunne, as she. The Lady here celebrated was Catharine, daughter of Edmond second Lord Chandos, wife of William Lord Sands. See Collins's Peerage, vol. ii. p. 133, ed. 1779. VII. FAIR ROSAMOND Most of the circumstances in this popular story of King Henry II. and the beautiful Rosamond have been taken for fact by our English historians; who, unable to account for the unnatural conduct of Queen Eleanor in stimulating her sons to rebellion, have attributed it to jealousy, and supposed that Henry's amour with Rosamond was the object of that passion. Our old English annalists seem, most of them, to have followed Higden the monk of Chester, whose account, with some enlargements, is thus given by Stow. "Rosamond, the fayre daughter of Walter Lord Clifford, concubine to Henry II. (poisoned by Queen Elianor, as some thought) dyed at Woodstocke [A. D. 1177.] where King Henry had made for her a house of wonderfull working; so that no man or woman might come to her, but he that was instructed by the king, or such as were right secret with him touching the matter. This house after some was named Labyrinthus, or Dedalus worke, which was wrought like unto a knot in a garden, called a Maze;1 but it was commonly said, that astly the queen came to her by a clue of thridde, or silke, and so dealt with her, that she lived not long after: but when she was dead, she was buried at Godstow, in an house of nunnes beside Oxford, with these verses upon her tombe: Hic jacet in tumbâ, Rosa mundi, non Rosa munda : In English thus: The rose of the world, but not the cleane flowre, In this grave full darke nowe is her bowre, That by her life was sweet and redolent: Though she were sweete, now foully doth she stinke. Stowe's Annals, ed. 1631, p. 154. How the queen gained admittance into Rosamond's bower is differently related. Holinshed speaks of it, as "the common report of the people, that the qu ene founde hir out by a silken thread, which the king had drawne after him out of hir chamber with his foot, and 1 Consisting of vaults ander ground, arched and walled with brick and stone, according to Drayton See note on his Epistle of Rosamond dealt with hir in such sharpe and cruell wise, that she lived not long after." Vol. iii. p. 115. On the other hand in Speede's Hist. we are told that the jealous queen found her out "by a clew of silke, fallen from Rosamond's lappe, as shee sate to take ayre, and suddenly fleeing from the sight of the searcher, the end of her silke fastened to her foot, and the clew still unwinding, remained behinde: which the queene followed, till shee had found what she sought, and upon Rosamond so vented her spleene, as the lady lived not long after." 3d edit. p. 509. Our ballad-maker, with more ingenuity, and probably as much truth, tells us the clue was gained by surprise, from the knight, who was left to guard her bower. 1 It is observable, that none of the old writers attribute Rosamond's death to poison (Stowe, above, mentions it merely as a slight conjecture); they only give us to understand, that the queen treated her harshly; with furious menaces, we may suppose, and sharp expostulations, which had such an effect on her spirits, that she did not long survive it. Indeed on her tomb-stone, as we learn from a person of credit, among other fine sculptures, was engraven the figure of a Cup. This, which perhaps at first was an accidental ornament, (perhaps only the Chalice) might in after-times suggest the notion that she was poisoned; at least this construction was put upon it, when the stone came to be demolished after the nunnery was dissolved. The account is, that "the tombstone of Rosamund Clifford was taken up at Godstow, and broken in pieces, and that upon it were interchangeable weavings drawn out and decked with roses red and green, and the picture of the Cup, out of which she drank the poison given her by the queen, carved in stone.' ... " Rosamond's father having been a great benefactor to the nunnery of Godstow, where she had also resided herself in the innocent part of her life, her body was conveyed there, and buried in the middle of the choir; in which place it remained till the year 1191, when Hugh Bishop of Lincoln caused it to be removed. The fact is recorded by Hoveden, a contemporary writer, whose words are thus translated by Stowe: "Hugh Bishop of Lincolne came to the abbey of nunnes, called Godstow, and when he had entred the church to pray, he saw a tombe in the middle of the quire, covered with a pall of silke, and set about with lights of waxe: and demanding whose tomb it was, he was answered, that it was the tombe of Rosamond, that was some time lemman to Henry II. . . . who for the love of her had done much good to that church. Then quoth the bishop, Take out of this place the harlot, and bury her without the church, lest Christian religion should grow in contempt, and to the end that, through example of her, other women, being made afraid, may beware, and keepe themselves from unlawfull and advouterous company with men.' Annals, p. 159. History further informs us that King John repaired Godstow nunnery, and endowed it with yearly revenues, "that these holy virgins might releeve with their prayers, the soules of his father King Henrie, and of Lady Rosamund there interred." 2 In what situation her remains were found at the dissolution of the nunnery, we learn from Leland, "Rosamundes tumbe at Godstow nunnery was taken up [of] late; it is " 1 Tho. Allen, of Gloc. Hall, Oxon. who died in 1632, aged 90. See Hearne's rambling discourse concerning Rosamond, at the end of Gul. Neubrig. Hist. vol. iii. p. 739 2 Vid. Reign of Henry II. in Speed's History, writ by Dr. Barcham, Dean of Bocking. |