conjecture, about the year 1588. Fuller received his information from Mr. Rainsey, who married the poet's widow; and it is to be regretted that his account is so brief and uncircumstantial. Fletcher's birth may probably be carried back two or three years, for we shall presently find him hailing the accession of James in 1603, in strains such as a boy of fourteen or fifteen could scarcely be expected to produce. He was sent, it appears, at an early age, to Westminster School, from which he is said to have been elected to Trinity College, Cambridge. This is the relation of Fuller; but I am unable to reconcile it with the declaration of Giles Fletcher himself. In the dedication of Christ's Victory, to Dr. Nevil, he speaks, with all the ardour of a young and noble heart, of the kindness he had experienced from that excellent man. He mentions his having reached down as it were out of heaven, a benefit of that nature and price, than which he could wish none (only heaven itself excepted) either more fruitful and contenting for the time that is now present, or more comfortable and encouraging for the time that is already past, or more hopeful and promising for the time that is yet to come." And further on, he expressly states that he was placed in Trinity College by Dr. Nevil's "only favour, most freely, without either any means from other, or any desert" in himself. This praise could not have been consistent with truth, if Fletcher had obtained his election from Westminster School; and a careful examination of the Register Books enables me to add that he was not upon the Foundation. Nevil merited the laudatory epithet applied to him by Camden*, whether we look upon him as the public benefactor of the college over which he presided, or in the still more endearing character of the benevolent and disinterested patron of the poor and the learned. Bishop Hacket, also, was a partaker of his gene"Magnificent." rosity. Plume informs us, in his life of that prelate, that when Hacket's father, although personally unknown to Dr. Nevil, applied to him for his interest to procure his son's election from Westminster to Trinity College, the worthy master replied, that the boy should go to Cambridge," or he would carry him on his own back." I shall have occasion to recur to Nevil in the life of Herbert*. The accession of James furnished an universal theme of joy and gratulation; "the very poets with their idle. pamphlets," writes that unwearied correspondent, Mr. Chamberlain," promise themselves great part in his favourt." The University of Cambridge put forth its welcome under the ingenious title of Sorrowe's Joy‡, and the writers evinced their skill in blending their mourning with gladness, and while they lamented that "Phoebe" was gone, they remembered that a "Phoebus" was shining in her places. The contribution of Giles Fletcher-A Canto upon the Death of Eliza-is the most poetical in the collection. It is a pastoral allegory, conceived in a spirit of grace and elegance. The monosyllabic terminations of the following lines produce an inharmonious effect, but the imagery is very rural. Tell me, sad Philomel, that yonder sit'st So let the friendly prickle never dig *For an interesting notice of Dr. Nevil, the reader is referred to Todd's Account of the Deans of Canterbury. He was appointed to the mastership of Trinity College by Queen Elizabeth in 1592-3, and we learn from a MS. quoted by Mr. Todd, and in his own possession, that before the departure of James from the University in 1614-15, he visited Dr. Nevil, who was too infirm to leave his rooms, and after having thanked him for the generosity and splendour of his entertainment, he concluded by saying that he was proud of such a subject. In a letter to Sir Dudley Carleton, April 13, 1603. Printed in Nichols's Progresses of King James I. Sorrowe's Joy, or a Lamentation for our Deceased Soveraigne Elizabeth, with a Triumph for the Prosperous Succession of our Gratious King James. Printed by John Legat, printer to the University of Cambridge, 1603. § See verses in Sorrowe's Joy, by H. Campion, of Emanuel College. VOL. I. F Thy watchful breast, with wound or small or big, Th' unwary foot, while thou, perchance, hang'st half awake. The picture of the snake "sliding with shrinking silence," is very happily imagined. It would be impossible more vividly to represent the sudden rustling of the leaves, and the " shrinking" stillness that follows. The idea is partly borrowed from Virgil. The verses upon the "velvetheaded violets," sparkle with the conceits of the Italian school: So let the silver dew but lightly lie, Like little watery worlds, within your azure sky. This image might have dropped from the pencil of Spenser. Every wanderer in our green lanes on a spring morning must have seen these "little watery worlds." Phineas Fletcher has a poem in the same volume, dated from King's College, but very inferior to his brother's. Fuller says of Christ's Victory, that it discovered the piety of a saint and the divinity of a doctor; the piety is more evident than the theological skill. The first edition appeared at Cambridge in 1610, and a second was not required until 1632. It is sufficiently clear, therefore, that the poem could not have been popular; and Phineas Fletcher, in some verses addressed to his brother upon its publication, entreats him not to esteem the censure of "malicious tongues*!" That he was dissatisfied with the reception of his work, may be inferred from the circumstance of his relinquishing the cultivation of the Muse, and applying himself to the study of scholastic divinity; the biographer of the Worthies informs us, that, though "cross to the grain of his genius," he attained to "good skill therein." We learn from the same writer, that * "Upon my brother, Mr. G. F., his book intituled Christ's Victorie and Triumph." when Fletcher preached at St. Mary's, his prayer before the sermon usually consisted of one entire allegory "not driven, but led on, most proper in all particulars." The specimens we possess of his prose afford ample testimony to his learning and eloquence. After 1612 there is a blank in the poet's history, until his settlement in the rectory of Alderton, in Suffolk. Fuller says, that he was placed there "by exchange of livings;" but it seems improbable that he would have relinquished any other preferment for a situation which is supposed to have hastened the period of his death. He may have been presented to the living by Sir Robert Naunton, whose family were the patrons of the church, and had their residence in the parish*. Naunton† was Public Orator during several years of Fletcher's residence at Cambridge, and being himself a member of Trinity, was, probably, well acquainted with his piety and genius. Fletcher did not live long to reap the advantage of his new preferment; the unhealthiness of the situation combined with the ignorance of his parishioners to depress his spirits and exhaust his constitution; a lonely village in the maritime part of Suffolk, more than two hundred years ago, had few consolations to offer to one accustomed to the refined manners and elegant occupations of an University. We are told by Fuller, in the quaint manner for which he is remarkable, that Fletcher's "clownish and low-parted parishioners (having nothing but their shoes high about them), valued not their pastor according to his worth, which disposed him to melancholy, and hastened his dissolution." Fletcher's death is supposed to have taken place about *Magna Britannia, vol. 5, Suffolk, ed. 1730. + Elected Public Orator 27th July, 1594; succeeded by F. Nethersole, 10th December, 1611. the year 1623*. But Fuller, the only authority upon whom we could, in this instance, safely rely, has left a blank for the last figure. The disquiet of his later years, together with his absence from books, and the derangement of his papers, caused him to be sometimes unsatisfactory with regard to accuracy in dates; his omission cannot now be remedied. I am enabled to state, through the kindness of the Rev. Addington Norton, that no record of Giles Fletcher is preserved, either in the church or the parish, and that the register-books only go back to the year 1674. He left a widow, who was subsequently married to Mr. Rainsey, the minister of Rougham, a small village in Norfolk. From this individual, both Fuller's and Lloyd's information respecting the poet was derived, and it might have been wished, that they had allowed their curiosity greater scope. Of Mr. Rainsey I know nothing. Such is the brief amount of the imperfect intelligence I have been able to gather respecting this admirable poet. Of his manners and conversation, of all that imparts a peculiar interest to biography, no anecdotes have been preserved. The earlier years of his life were spent in the cloistered quiet of a. college, and his later days, we have reason to fear, were worn out in sorrow and sickness. His most lasting memorial exists in his poem, and in it we may discover the spirit of the author looking mildly and beautifully forth. Into the merits of this composition, I propose to enter somewhat at length. In the address To the Reader, he endeavours to conciliate the prejudices entertained by many against religious poetry. "What should I speak," he says, "of Juvencus, Prosper, and the wise Prudentius; the last of which living * Lloyd's State Worthies, vol. 1, p. 552-note, with additions by Whitworth. Fuller compares the poet's life to the half-verses in the Eneid, broken off in the middle. |