Sir John he got him an ambling nag, To Scotland for to ride-a, With a hundred horse more, all his own, he swore, No errant-knight ever went to fight With half so gay a bravado, Had you seen but his look, you'd have sworn on a book The ladies ran all to the windows to see But he, like a cruel knight, spurred on; For, till he came there, what had he to fear? The king (God bless him !) had singular hopes The Borderers they, as they met him on the way, None liked him so well as his own colonell, Who took him for John de Weart-a; But when there were shows of gunning and blows, For when the Scots army came within sight, He ran to his tent; they asked what he meant ; The colonell sent for him back agen, To quarter him in the van-a, But Sir John did swear he would not come there, But now there is peace, he's returned to increase But his honour lost must lie still in the dust; Suckling continued steadfast to the royal cause, even when it seemed desperate. He joined in a scheme to promote the escape of Strafford from the Tower; but the plot being detected, he fled in May 1641 to France, and died shortly afterwards. A hideous story is told of his death. Having robbed him, his valet is said to have put an open razorone account says a penknife, another a nail-in his master's boot, which divided an artery, and fever and death ensued. Aubrey, however, states that Suckling took poison at Paris, and family tradition confirms the statement—a sufficiently sad close to the life of the cavalier-poet. Suckling's works consist of miscellaneous poems, four plays-possessing no vivid dramatic interesta short prose treatise on Religion by Reason, and a small collection of letters written in a studied artificial style. His poems are all short, and the best of them are dedicated to love and gallantry. He writes with an irregularity which is absolutely extraordinary. In his Fragmenta Anna will be found, side by side, some of the prettiest and some of the feeblest lyrics of the age. Suckling seems to have had no self-criticism and no criterion of style. His ambitious compositions are clumsy and confused, and it is only by a few singularly brilliant songs and bursts of genuine feeling that he is able to justify the prominence which his name continues to hold. Among these happy lyrics a leading place must be given to his Ballad upon a Wedding, which is inimitable for its witty levity and artful simplicity of expression. It has touches of graphic description and sprightliness hardly surpassed by earlier or later rivals. 'Tis now, Song. since I sat down before That foolish fort, a heart, (Time strangely spent !) a year and more; Made my approaches, from her hand And did already understand I thought to undermine the heart When this did nothing, I brought down A thousand thousand to the town, I then resolved to starve the place, To draw her out, and from her strength, When I had done what man could do, And smiled at all was done. I sent to know from whence, and where, A spy informed, Honour was there, 'March, march,' quoth I; 'the word straight give; Let's lose no time, but leave her ; That giant upon air will live, And hold it out for ever. 'To such a place our camp remove I hate a fool that starves for love, A Ballad upon a Wedding. I tell thee, Dick, where I have been, Her cheeks so rare a white was on, Who sees them is undone ; The side that's next the sun. Her lips were red; and one was thin, Some bee had stung it newly; But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face, Than on the sun in July. Her mouth so small, when she does speak, But she so handled still the matter, Passion o' me! how I run on! The bus'ness of the kitchen's great, Nor was it there denied. Just in the nick, the cook knocked thrice, And all the waiters in a trice His summons did obey; Each serving-man, with dish in hand, When all the meat was on the table, To stay to be entreated? And this the very reason was, Now hats fly off, and youths carouse; And who could help it, Dick? O' the sudden up they rise and dance; By this time all were stolen aside But that he must not know: But yet 'twas thought he guessed her mind, And did not mean to stay behind Above an hour or so. The wedding thus immortalised was that in 1641 of Lady Margaret Howard, daughter of the Earl of Suffolk, with Lord Broghill, afterwards Earl of Orrery. Herrick, who had no occasion to steal, took the happy simile of the eighth verse, and spoiled it in the theft: Her pretty feet, like snails, did creep A little out. Wycherley also purloined Herrick's simile for one of his plays. The allusion to Easter-day is founded upon an old saying of English country-folk that the sun dances on Easter morning. The 'Dick' of this poem is Richard Lovelace. Constancy. Out upon it, I have loved Three whole days together; And am like to love three more, If it prove fair weather. Time shall moult away his wings, In the whole wide world again But the spite on 't is, no praise Is due at all to me; Love with me had made no stays, Had it any been but she. Had it any been but she, And that very face, There had been at least ere this Song. I prithee send me back my heart, To find it were in vain ; For th' hast a thief in either eye Would steal it back again. Why should two hearts in one breast lie, O Love! where is thy sympathy, But love is such a mystery, I cannot find it out; For when I think I'm best resolved, I then am in most doubt. Then farewell care, and farewell woe, I will no longer pine; Song. Why so pale and wan, fond lover? Prithee, why so pale? Will, when looking well can't move her, Looking ill prevail? Why so dull and mute, young sinner? Will, when speaking well can't win her, Saying nothing do 't? Prithee, why so mute? Quit, quit for shame; this will not move, This cannot take her; If of herself she will not love, Nothing can make her: The devil take her. The Rev. Alfred Suckling published Selections, with a Life (1836), reproduced by W. C. Hazlitt (1874; new ed. 1893); a Memoir is also prefixed to F. A. Stokes's edition (New York, 1885). Shackerley Marmion (1603-39), minor dramatist, was born at his father's manor of Aynho in Northamptonshire, studied at Wadham College, Oxford, squandered his fortune, and fought in the Low Countries. He left behind an epic, Cupid and Psyche, and three comedies, Holland's Leaguer, A Fine Companion, and The Antiquary. He may be accounted of the tribe of Ben,' and was a scholar of some accomplishment but next to no dramatic power. His plays, in flowing blank verse, were popular, and are not without vigour and satirical point. They have been repeatedly reprinted, as by Maidment in 1875. Jasper Mayne (1604-72), a clergyman, wrote two plays which illustrated city manners in the time of Charles I. The first of these, The City Match (1639), is easy and funny, but none too moral for the work of a clerk in holy orders; the second, entitled The Amorous War (1648), is a farcical tragi-comedy, and, like its predecessor, is spiced with improprieties. One lyric in it deserves to be better known. Mayne was born at Hatherleigh, Devon; from Westminster proceeded to Christ Church, Oxford; in 1639 became vicar of Cassington, and in 1648 of Pyrton; and at the Restoration was appointed Archdeacon of Chichester. He has even been compared to Dean Swift, though little remains to justify the comparison. Besides his plays, he wrote occasional poems and translated Lucian's Dialogues. The Puritans found no favour with this splenetic humorist, who thus makes capital of a Puritanical waiting-maid : Aurelia. Oh, Mr Bannswright, are you come? My Poor lady had such unbred holiness I' the primitive times wore ropes of pearl or rubies? Ban. Why, madam, I assure you, time hath been, However she be otherwise, when she had A good quick wit, and would have made to a lady A serviceable sinner. Pleasure your ladyship. Aur. Expect your reward. She were inspired from Ipswich, she will make The Acts and Monuments in sweetmeats; quinces, Arraigned and burned at a stake; all my banquets Are persecutions; Diocletian's days Are brought for entertainment; and we eat martyrs. Ban. Madam, she is far gone. Aur. Nay, sir, she is a Puritan at her needle too. Ban. Indeed! Aur. She works religious petticoats; for flowers She 'll make church histories. Her needle doth So sanctify my cushionets! Besides, My smock-sleeves have such holy embroideries, And are so learned that I fear, in time, All my apparel will be quoted by Some pure instructor. Yesterday I went To see a lady that has a parrot; my woman, While I was in discourse, converted the fowl; And now it can speak nought but Knox's works; So there's a parrot lost. Ban. Faith, madam, she Was earnest to come to you. Had I known Her mistress had so bred her, I would first Have preferred her to New England. Dorcas Surely, sir, You promised me, when you did take my money, To help me to a faithful service, a lady That would be saved, not one that loves profane. Unsanctified fashions. Are married, madam; of a quick-feigning head? Aur. You wrong me, Bannswright: she whom I would have Must to her handsome shape have virtue too. Ban. Well, madam, I shall fit you. I do know [Exit BANNSWRIGHT. Thomas Killigrew (1612-83), son of a knight and courtier of Cornish family, was born in London. and served as page in the household of Charles I. Afterwards a dissolute companion of Charles II. in exile and his groom of the bedchamber after the Restoration, he in 1660 received a patent along with D'Avenant to erect two new theatres and raise two new companies of actors, and finally superseded his rivals as Master of the Revels. His patent secured for him the right-new in England -to give the female parts to women. The plays include tragedies, tragi-comedies, and comedies, some of them apparently not intended for the stage. They were all printed in folio in 1664. The Parson's Wedding, reprinted by Dodsley, is outrageously coarse, and tedious as well, though not without jokes, some of which Congreve copied or imitated. A study of the plays seems to justify one part of Denham's criticism: Had Cowley ne'er spoke, Killigrew ne'er writ, yet his credit as a wit was high, in spite of Denham and his own plays.-His son, Thomas Killigrew the younger (1657-1719), was groom of the chamber to the Prince of Wales (George II.) when he published the trifling but amusing comedy Chit Chat. The elder Killigrew's brother, Sir William Killigrew (1606-95), fought in the Civil War, and wrote a comedy, Pandora, and three tragicomedies, Selindra, Ormasdes, and The Siege of Urbin. William Cartwright (1611–43) was admitted to the inner circle of Ben Jonson, who said of him, 'My son Cartwright writes all like a man.' H's contemporaries loved him living, and deplored his early death. Born at Northway, near Tewkesbury, he was the son of an innkeeper at Cirencester who had squandered away a patrimonial estate. In 1635, after completing his education at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, Cartwright took holy orders; and as a zealous royalist he was imprisoned by the Parliamentary forces when they arrived in Oxford in 1642. In 1643, when he was chosen junior proctor of the university, and was also reader in metaphysics, he was said to have studied sixteen hours a day. Stricken with the malignant fever or camp-disease' prevalent at Oxford, he died November 23, 1643king, who was then at Oxford, went into mourn ing for his death; and when his works were published in 1651, no less than fifty-six cop.es of encomiastic verses were prefixed to them by the wits and scholars of the time, including D: Fell (who was not always so amiable !), Vaughin The the Silurist, and Izaak Walton. It is difficult to conceive, after reading Cartwright's works, why he should have obtained such extraordinary applause and reputation. His pieces are mostly short occasional poems, panegyrics of the king and royal family, addresses to ladies, noblemen, and his brother - poets Fletcher and Jonson, or slight amatory effusions not distinguished for elegance or fancy, though their conceits entitle him to a conspicuous place in the 'fantastic school.' His youthful virtues, his learning and loyalty, his singularly handsome person and winning manners, seem to have mainly contributed to his popularity, and his premature death would renew and deepen the impression of his gifts and graces. He is reported by Anthony Wood 'the most florid and seraphic preacher in the university.' Cartwright was only twenty-six when Ben Jonson died, and the compliment quoted above proves that he had then been busy with his pen. He mourned the loss of his poetical father in one of his best poems, thus commending Jonson's dramatic powers: But thou still puts true passion on; dost write With the same courage that tried captains fight; Giv'st the right blush and colour unto things; Low without creeping, high without loss of wings; Smooth yet not weak, and, by a thorough care, Big without swelling, without painting, fair. His three 'tragi-comedies,' The Royal Slave, The Lady-Errant, and The Siege, are rhetorical and artificial; his comedy, more comic than really humorous, is an imitation of Jonson's manner, and handles the Puritans roughly. The title of The Lady-Errant itself suggests a dream of the new woman, and still more the opening speech: And if you see not women plead and judge, Believe the oracle. But the story resolves itself into a fantastic rebellion of the princesses and ladies of Cyprus when their lords are at the wars in Crete, to be carried out by lances, falchions, javelins and helmets, armour, and ordinary military methods, till the scheme is thwarted by the triumph of true love. In spite of the unanimous agreement of the ladies Our souls are male as theirs. That we have hitherto forborn t' assume and in spite of eloquent adjurations Let us i' th' name of honour rise unto they prove mere weak, loving women, and cheerfully return to subjection again. 'Lesbia's lament over her dead Sparrow, which picked crumbs, fed from its mistress's trencher or lip, and said "Philip," shows that Cartwright knew, or at least knew of, Skelton's Phylyp Sparowe (page 115). And his address or ode to Sir Francis Kynaston, 'upon the translation of Chaucer's Troilus and Creseide, has its own interest: Tis to your happy cares we owe that we Was dumb to strangers and his own country too, Parthenia and Argalus shows that the Arcadia was still a source of inspiration. To a Lady Veiled. So Love appeared, when, breaking out his way Such doubtful light had sacred groves, where rods Thus looks the country virgin, whose brown hue O fear ye no assaults from bolder men ; A Valediction. Bid me not go where neither suns nor showers Where, amongst happy lovers, I might see How showers and sunbeams bring One everlasting spring; Nor would those fall, nor these shine forth to me. Nature herself to him is lost, Who loseth her he honours most. Then, fairest, to my parting view display Your graces all in one full day; Whose blessed shapes I'll snatch and keep, till when I do return and view again : So by this art, fancy shall fortune cross, |