CHAPTER IX

CLAIUS AND STREPHON: URANIA: THE "ASTROPHEL AND

I come now to the second edition of the Arcadia, which was published in 1593.

In the Eclogues to Book I. in that edition two new poems appear which throw further light on the problem of the author's love-motive, one spoken by Dorus and Zelmane, "Lady reserved by the heavens," etc., the other by Lamon, relating to the loves of Claius and Strephon for Urania. We will take the second first.

The Arcadia, as originally published, introduces us at the beginning to two shepherds, Claius and Strephon, names formed from the Greek for weeping and agitation of mind, who are lamenting the loss of Urania with whom they are both in love. After a few pages they give place to Pyrocles and Musidorus, and are not heard of again in the first edition; but the Eclogue in the second edition, where they reappear, shows them in such close analogy with Pyrocles and Musidorus, as representing the author under two aspects, that it seems possible that they were originally designed for a subplot in which the same aspects were to be represented under pastoral forms. As it is, these two characters are left in the air, and (apart from the Eclogue) are only alluded to again at the end of the work-" the strange continuance of Claius and Strephons desire "-as among the subjects which "may awake some other spirit to exercise his pen." The Eclogue opens :

A Shepherds tale no height of style desires,
To raise in words what in effect is low:

and proceeds on this principle to narrate, in a pedestrian style of poetry under pastoral forms,

The poor-clad truth of loves wrong-ordered lot.

The story which follows will be sufficiently indicated in the following extracts:

There was

A pair of friends, or rather one called two,

He that the other in some years did pass,
And in those gifts that years distribute do,
Was Claius called

The latter born, yet too soon Strephon height.

Both free of mind, both did clear dealing love,
And both had skill in verse their voice to move.
Their cheerful minds, till poisoned was their cheer,
The honest sports of earthly lodging prove;
[Pastoral occupations and pleasures follow.]
The poem continues:

While thus they ran a low, but levelled race,
While thus they lived, this was indeed a life,
With nature pleased, content with present ease,
Free of proud fears, brave beggary, smiling strife,
Of climb-fall court, the envy hatching place.

[A young maid appears on the scene.]

Well for to see, they kept themselves unseen,
And saw this fairest maide of fairer mind:
By fortune mean; in nature born a queen.

She troubled was (alas that it might be !)
With tedious brawling of her parents dear,
Who would have her in will and word agree
To wed Anataxius their neighbour near.
A herdman rich, of much account was he,
In whom no evil did reign, nor good appear.
In some such one she liked not his desire,
Fain would be free, but dreadeth parents ire.

Kindly (sweet soul) she did unkindness take
That bagged baggage of a misers mind,
Should price of her, as in a market, make;
But gold can gild a rotten piece of wood;
To yield she found her noble heart to ache,
To strive she feared how it with virtue stood,
Thus doubtings clouds o'er casting heavenly brain,
At length in rows of kiss-cheeks tears they rain.

[At the sight of her they both fall in love.]

Claius straight fell, and groaned at the blow,
And called, now wounded, purpose to his aid:
Strephon, fond boy, delighted did not know

That it was love that shined in shining maid :
But lickrous, poisoned, fain to her would go,
If him new learned manners had not stayed.
For then Urania homeward did arise,
Leaving in pain their well-fed hungry eyes.

Claius would fain have pulled away this mote from out his eye," but Strephon "did leap with joy and jollity." Claius purposes to absent himself, but Strephon

Even unto her home he oft would go,
Where bold and hurtless many play he tries,
Her parents liking well it should be so,
For simple goodness shined in his eyes.

There did he make her laugh in spite of woe,

So as good thoughts of him in all arise,

While into none doubt of his love did sink,
For not himself to be in love did think.

At a game of " Barley-break," however, he falls in love :

It ended, but the other woe began,

Began at least to be conceived as woe,
For then wise Claius found no absence can
Help him who can no more her sight forego.
He found mans virtue is but part of man,
And part must follow where whole man doth go.
He found that reasons self now reasons found
To faster knots, which fancy first had bound.

So doth he yield, so takes he on his yoke,

Not knowing who did draw with him therein;
Strephon, poor youth, because he saw no smoke,
Did not conceive what fire he had within :
But after this to greater rage it broke,
Till of his life it did full conquest win,

First killing mirth, then banishing all rest,
Filling his eyes with tears, with sighs his breast;

Then sports grow pains, all talking tedious:

On thoughts he feeds, his looks their figure change,

The day seems long, but night is odious,

No sleeps, but dreams; no dreams, but visions strange,

Till finding still his evil increasing thus,

One day he with his flock abroad did range :

And coming where he hoped to be alone,
Thus on a hillock set, he made his moan :

Alas, what weights are these that load my heart,
I am as dull as winter-starved sheep,

Tired as a jade in over-laden cart,

Yet thoughts do fly, though I can scarcely creep.
All visions seem, at every bush I start:
Drowsy am I, and yet can rarely sleep.
Sure I bewitched am, it is even that,
Late near a cross I met an ugly cat.

For but by charms how fall these things on me,
That from those eyes, where heavenly apples been,
Those eyes which nothing like themselves can see,
Of fair Urania, fairer than a queen.

Proudly bedecked in Aprils livery,

A shot unheard gave me a wound unseen;

Her cherry lips, milk hands, and golden hair
I still do see, though I be still alone.

Sometimes to her news of myself to tell

I go about, and then is all my best

Wry words, and stammering, or else doltish dumb;
Say then, can this but of enchantment come?

Thus lamenting he rose, and looking round,

He saw behind a bush where Claius sat:
His well-known friend, but yet his unknown mate.
Claius the wretch, who lately yielden was

To bear the bonds which time nor wit could break,
(With blushing soul at sight of judgments glass,
While guilty thoughts accused his reason weak)
This morn alone to lovely walk did pass,
Within himself of her dear self to speak,

Till Strephons plaining voice him nearer drew,
Where by his words his self-like case he knew.

Now in a composition of this kind, which, though written with great facility and scope of ideas, has slender artistic merits, there is no point apart from its use as a means of giving expression to some personal experience. That experience is, as I read it, evidently the same as that recorded in the "Mira' poem and in the loves of Pyrocles and Musidorus. Strephon corresponds with Pyrocles and represents the imaginative and youthful side of the author's character, Claius, like Musidorus, standing for his maturer judgment. Before love befell them they were free in mind and taken up with studies of nature; the tenour of their life was even and they loved the clear dealing.

The girl who is described has the same physical features as those specially attributed to Mira, Pamela, Philoclea, and Stella, namely brilliant eyes and golden hair. The evidence of the poem goes to show that this was Mary Sidney. "By fortune mean" is explained by the financial embarrassments of Sir Henry; "in nature born a queen," by her worth and exalted position. The "brawlings" of her "parents about her marriage, read with what follows, is explicit, and would not apply to Penelope Devereux, whose father was dead. The correspondence of Sir Henry Sidney affords evidence of his anxiety to repair his fortunes through the marriages of his children. The allusion, in this view, is to the marriage of Mary Sidney to the Earl of Pembroke in 1577, who was a widower twenty years her senior.

The author alludes to his early visits to the lady's home, that is to Penshurst, where he was liked by the parents, "for simple goodness shined in his eyes." This use of the term "simple" might only be a coincidence. On the other hand there are so many examples of it in connection with Francis Bacon's writings, acknowledged as well as unacknowledged,1 that it cannot be passed by without notice. The expression also occurs in the Mira" poem.

The course of love described in the poem corresponds with that of the Astrophel avd Stella sonnets.

Lastly a particular feature in the description of the

1 See my "Spenser " volume.