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"There is something in Spenser," says Pope, “that pleases us as strongly in one's old age as it did in one's youth. I read the 'Faerie Queen' when I was about twelve, with a vast deal of delight." "Without calling Spenser the greatest of all poets, we may still say that his poetry is the most poetical of all poetry." See Craik's "Sketches of Literature and Learning in England."

ON ELIZABETH L. H.

WOULD'ST thou hear, what man can say
In a little? Reader, stay.
Underneath this stone doth lie
As much beauty as could die:
Which in life did harbour give
To more virtue than doth live.
If, at all, she had a fault,
Leave it buried in this vault.

One name was Elizabeth,

Th' other, let it sleep with death:

Fitter, where it died, to tell,

Than that it liv'd at all. Farewell!

Ben Jonson.3

3 A voluminous writer of Plays, who delineates in them with faithfulness the prevailing manners of English life, poet laureate in 1616. He was the intimate friend and companion of Shakespeare; but, unfortunately, he has left us little worth knowing of England's greatest poet, if we except the high character he has given us of him in his "Discoveries," and the few lines he wrote on Shakespeare's engraved picture in

ON M. DRAYTON, THE POET, BURIED IN
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

Do, pious marble, let thy readers know
What they, and what their children owe
To Drayton's sacred name; whose dust
We recommend unto thy trust.

Protect his memory, preserve his story,
And be a lasting monument of his glory.
And when thy ruins shall disclaim,
To be the treasury of his name;
His name, which cannot fade, shall be,

An everlasting monument to thee.

B. Jonson, or Quarles.

ON MARY HERBERT, COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE.5

UNDERNEATH this sable hearse

Lies the subject of all verse;

Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother:
Death! ere thou hast kill'd another,
Fair and good, and learn'd as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee.6

B. Jonson.

See Booth's second

the first edition of his collected works. edition of Epigrams, Ancient and Modern, p. 29, and Note at the end. The rich store of elucidatory notes in Gifford's edition of Jonson's works renders it very valuable.

Drayton was the author of the "Shepherd's Garland," "The Barons' Wars," and "England's Heroical Epistles."

ON JOHN COMB, OF STRATFORD-ON-AVON, NOTED FOR HIS WEALTH AND USURY.

TEN in the hundred lies here engraved ;

'Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not saved. If any man ask, who lies in this tomb?

"Oh! oh!" quoth the devil, "'tis my John-a-Comb."

Shakespeare.

"The Barons' Wars" contain many passages of great beauty, and were imitated by Milton. His great work, "PolyAlbion," or a description of England, and to which Selden wrote notes, came out in 1613. "It exhibits, at once, the learning of an historian, an antiquary, a naturalist, and a geographer, besides being embellished with the imagination of a poet." Born, 1563; died, 1631.

5 This lady, for whose entertainment Sir P. Sidney wrote the “Arcadia,” lived to a good old age, and died in 1621. She was buried in Salisbury Cathedral, the burial place of the Pembroke family.

6 These lines are also claimed, on good grounds, for Wm. Browne, the author of "Britannia's Pastorals." See Gent. Mag. for Sept. 1845.

7 The only foundation we possess whereon to build a biography of Shakespeare are a few parish registers, wills, and title deeds. As Mr. Hallam truly observes, “All that insatiable curiosity and unwearied diligence have detected about Shakespeare, serves rather to disappoint and perplex us, than to furnish the slightest illustration of his character." "No letter of his writing, no record of his conversation, no character of him, drawn with any fulness by a contemporary, can be produced." The best lives of him seem to be Rowe's, who

Shakespeare, like some other poets, wrote his own epitaph, which everybody knows is inscribed on the flat stone in the chancel of Stratford parish church:

GOOD friend, for Jesus' sake forbear

To digg T-E dost EncloAsed Here.

Blest be T-E man YT spares TEs stones,

And curst be he YT moves my bones.

ON BEN JONSON.

HERE lies Jonson with the rest

Of the poets; but the best.

Reader, would'st thou more have known?

Ask his story, not this stone;

That will speak, what this can't tell

Of his glory. So, farewell.

ON AN IDLE FELLOW.

Rob. Herrick.

HERE lieth one that once was born and cried,
Lived several years, and then-and then he died.
Camden.

wrote it mainly from the statements and anecdotes of Betterton the actor, Charles Knight's, in the "English Cyclopædia," and Malone's commentaries and editions of Shakespeare's works.

• The events of her reign, the wisdom of her measures, the frugality of her administration, the various religious reforms she was enabled to achieve, notwithstanding all opposition, all admirably portrayed in Froude's "History of England," vols. ix. and x.-Reign of Elizabeth.

ON QUEEN ELIZABETH, OB. 1603.

SPAIN'S rod, Rome's ruin,

Netherland's relief,

Heaven's gem, earth's joy,

World's wonder, Nature's chief,
Britain's blessing, England's splendour,
Religion's nurse, the Faith's defender.

ON A CHILD.

HERE she lies, a pretty bud,
Lately made of flesh and blood,
Who as soon fell fast asleep,
As her little eyes did peep.
Give her strewings, but not stir
The earth that lightly covers her.

ANOTHER.

VIRGINS promised when I died
That they would, each primrose-tide,
Duly morn and evening come,
And with flowers dress my tomb :
Having promised, pay your debts,
Maids, and here strew violets.

9 But little is known of this celebrated poet.

Herrick.

Herrick.

"His sacred

and amatory verses display in both a luxuriant fancy, with an elegant quaintness." His collected poems, under the title "Hesperides," have been repeatedly published.

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