her fostering care. It occurs in Book iv. Canto 11, of "The Faerie Queene," enumerating the rivers who attended the marriage of the Thames and Medway

"Next these the plenteous Oufe came far from land,

By many a city and by many a towne;
And many rivers taking under hand

Into his waters as he paffeth downe,

The Cle, the Were, the Guant, the Sture, the Rowne.
Thence doth by Huntingdon and Cambridge flit,
My mother Cambridge, whom as with a crowne
He doth adorne, and is adorn'd of it

With many a gentle Muse and many a learned wit.” q

Spenfer would be pursuing his ftudies at Cambridge in 1569, and we cannot agree with those who are of opinion that, in the very fame year, he interrupted them, and was employed by the Court to bring public dispatches from Sir Henry Norris, the Queen's Ambassador in France, then at Tours. In order to have conveyed them to London, the meffenger muft, at fome previous date, have quitted this country, or perhaps have been refident with the Ambaffador, in order to be in readiness for the duty. It was certainly an Edmund Spenfer to whom the "letters," as they are called in the warrant,' were en

See vol. iii. p. 284. This paffage could hardly have been penned earlier than 1591 or 1592, unless we suppose it to have formed part of the Epithalamion Thamefis, fpoken of by Spenfer in his letter to Gabriel Harvey of April, 1580. That poem may have been written in what is now called the Spenferian stanza.

The following are the words and letters of the entry in the officebook of the Treasurer of the Queen's Chamber. We are indebted for it to the Shakespeare Society's publication of "Extracts from the Accounts of Revels at Court, in the Reigns of Elizabeth and James I." (edited by Peter Cunningham, Efq.), 8vo. 1842, Introd. p. xxx.:"Payde upon a bill, figned by Mr. Secretarye, dated at Wyndfor, xviijo Octobris, 1569, to Edmonde Spencer, that broughte lettres to the Quene's Matie from Sir Henrye Norrys, knighte, her Mats Embaffador in Fraunce, beinge then at Towars in the fayde Realme, for his charges the fome of vjli xiijs iiijd, over and befydes ixli prefted to hym by Sir Henrye Norrys." vjli xiij iiijd

trufted; and it seems to us more likely that the individual should have been the father of our poet, although we do not hear from any other quarter, that he held any office under the Queen, or connection with the government. On the other hand, we have no information whatever as to the nature of his occupations at any time; but affuredly the youth of the fon, if nothing elfe, would seem to disqualify him for fuch an important and confidential office. Gafcoigne and Churchyard, it is true, were, feven years fubfequently, employed in the fame way, according to the fame authority; but the firft was an old foldier, as well as a poet, who died the year after the discharge of this duty; and the second was a man much advanced in life, who had commenced authorship while Edward VI. was on the throne, although he outlived Elizabeth. The Edmund Spenfer, named in the warrant may, without any wide ftretch of conjecture, have

"Prefted" means that 97. had been advanced, or lent, in ready money, and the whole fum of 157. 135. 4d. would be at least equal to 75%. at prefent.

It will not here be out of place to fhow the terms in which Gafcoigne and Churchyard are spoken of in the office-book of the fame Treasurer of the Queen's Chamber. It will be remarked that they are called "gentlemen," while no such addition is made to the name of Edmonde Spencer.

"Paid upon a warrant figned by Mr. Secretaire Walfingham, dated at Hampton Court xxjo Novembr. 1576, to George Gascoigne, gent. for bringinge of Lettres in poft for her Maties affaires frome Andwarpe to Hampton Courte Xxli "Paid upon a warrant figned by Mr. Secretarie Walfingham, dated at Hampton Courte 16 January 1576, to Thomas Churcheyarde, gent. for carrying of Lettres in poft for her Maties affaires to Mr Edward Horley, and Mr. doctor Wilfon in the Lowe Contries, thone beinge at Marfhe in Luxemburghe, and the other at Bruxells or els where

xviijli

CUNNINGHAM'S Revels Accounts, Introd. p. xxxi.

In the next year Churchyard received 127. for bringing letters from Dr. Wilfon at Bruffels, but his name does not occur again.

been the father of the poet, who, by the reason of his family connection with Sir John Spencer, poffibly obtained the fituation of one of the royal meffengers. To suppose that it was fo, entirely removes the difficulty arifing not merely out of the youth of the author of "The Faerie Queene" in 1569, but out of his ftudies just commenced at Cambridge.

Much stress ought to be laid upon another circumstance, more or less connected with those studies. In spite of his youth, 1569 was the year in which Spenfer's earliest effort in verfification was printed. It is to be ranked among the oldest specimens of blank verfe in English ;' and we shall see ere long that Spenser, with the example

t

They ought, therefore, to have been included by Bishop Percy in his volume of Poems in Blank Verfe (not Dramatique) prior to Milton's Paradife Loft," which was intended to form a fupplement to his other volume of the "Songes and Sonnettes" of the Earl of Surrey and others, followed by the fecond and fourth books of Virgil by the fame noble poet, his verfion of Ecclefiaftes, &c. Thefe very curious reprints were most unfortunately burned in the fire at the office of Messrs. Nichols in 1808: only a very few imperfect copies were faved, and apparently one entire one, which is now before us. As it is neceffarily a rarity, and is of much importance in the hiftory of our early literature, we fubjoin a brief lift of its contents, premifing that the printing of it commenced before 1771, for T. Warton had a copy of a small portion of it, on which he recorded that Dr. Percy had presented it to him in that year: the work was therefore nearly forty years in the prefs, and at laft was accidentally confumed. It begins with, 1. The "Songes and Sonnettes" of Surrey, " and other," pp. 270. 2. The fecond and fourth books of " Virgiles Aenæis," Ecclefiaftes, certain Pfalms and additional poems by Surrey, pp. 112. 3. Sir T. Wyat's "profe Oration in his own defence," pp. 29. 4. A new title-page, "Poems in Blank Verfe, prior to Milton's Paradise Loft;" including Turbervile's Ovid's Epiftles; Gafcoigne's Steele Glas; Precepts of State, by B. Rich, pp. 54. 5. Afke's "Elizabetha Triumphans,” pp. 39. 6. Vallans' "Tale of Two Swannes," Breton's "Speeches at Elvetham," and Chapman's Poem on Guiana," pp. 27. 7. Marlow's "First Book of Lucan," pp. 22. Among thefe Spenfer's blank verfe poems prefixed to Vander Noodt's "Theatre for Worldlings," 1569, ought to have been included; but perhaps, as originally printed, they were not within Bishop Percy's reach. The Rev. Mr. Dyce was obviously not aware

of feveral friends, was an innovator, as regards English poetry, in other respects. John Vander Noodt published his "Theatre, &c., for Voluptuous Worldings" (the full title of which we have inferted in its proper place") in the year last above named, the dedication being dated 25th May, 1569. The work is, in a manner, introduced by certain emblems (miscalled “epigrams”) and visions, accompanied by woodcuts, tranflated by Spenfer from Petrarch and Bellay they are his, as it feems to us, upon the clearest evidence, because he afterwards published them with many alterations (one of thofe alterations being the fubftitution of rhyme for blank verfe) as his own productions. The differences are as small as, under the circumftances, could be at all expected, and the original wording is preserved by Spenfer in nearly all cafes where it was poffible to do fo.

Who Vander Noodt might be, excepting that he was a Flemish physician resident in England, and what claim he may have had upon Spenfer, nothing has come down to our day to inform us.' Another name, well known in our poetical literature, has however been

W

that Marlow's "First Book of Lucan" had ever been reprinted by Bishop Percy fee" The Works of Marlow," vol. i. p. lv; vol. iii. P. 266. u See vol. v. p. 19.

In his " Complaints," 4to. 1591, vol. iv. p. 289. The main doubt upon the fubject has been produced by the youth of Spenfer in 1569, and by the statement of Vander Noodt that he himself had rendered the poems from " the Brabant tongue." This may have been very true; he may have originally rendered them from the Brabant tongue into French, but it is certain that the poetical drefs they wear in English was given to them by Spenfer. For the fake of comparison we have inferted Spenfer's earlier verfions in vol. v. pp. 20, 24.

* As " curer of fouls," his "Theatre, &c., for Voluptuous Worldlings" had been printed in French by John Day, the year before it came from Bynneman's prefs in English: as "curer of bodies," he publifhed in 1569 a treatife for "The Governance and Preservation of them that fear the infection of the Plague." He there fpelt his name, or it was fpelt for him, Vandernote.

connected with Spenfer, and precisely at the date at which we have arrived; we mean George Turbervile, who, like Spenfer, made early efforts to bring blank verfe into use in our language: this was a fort of bond of connection between the two poets, which has not hitherto been noticed, but which renders it more likely that he and Spenfer should at this time have been intimate. Turbervile was fecretary to Sir Thomas Randolph, the English ambaffador in Muscovy, in 1569, and he dates various poems, in the shape of epiftles, from Ruffia. One of these epiftles is headed "To Spencer," but no Christian name is given : he is mentioned by his furname also in two other metrical productions in the fame volume; but there is nothing in any of the three to warrant us in diftinctly affirming that the Spencer thus diftinguished was our Edmund Spenfer. Still, the fimilarity of tastes and pursuits in the two individuals is to be taken into account, and Anthony Wood, in his Athena Oxonienfes, boldly supplies the " Edmund," as if the epiftle had certainly been addreffed to

* It does not seem clear when this volume of " Tragical Tales" by Turbervile was first published; we have used an edition in 1587, and to it are annexed "Epitaphes and Sonnettes," with the date of 1569. Anthony Wood (Ath. Oxon. i. p. 355, edit. Bliss) says that the second edition of them appeared in 1570. According to Turbervile, Spenfer, even in 1569, was in love, and he encourages him to open his mind to the lady :

He ends thus:

"My Spenfer, fpare to speake

and ever fpare to speed:

Unless thou show thy hurt, how shall

the Surgeon know thy need?"

"Wherfore be bold to boord

the fairest first of all:

Aye Venus aides the forward man,

and Cupid helps his thrall."

The above are not from the Epistle at the head of which "To Spencer' is placed, but from a separate poem to him. There were more than two editions of Turbervile's "Tragical Tales" anterior to that of 1587. Vol. i. p. 627, in the edition of the late Dr. Bliss.