COMPLAINT OF A LOVER THAT DEFIED LOVE, W AND WAS BY LOVE AFTER THE MORE TORMENTED. HEN Summer took in hand the winter to assail, With force of might, and virtue great, his stormy blasts to quail: And when he clothed fair the earth about with green, And every tree new garmented, that pleasure was to seen: Mine heart 'gan new revive, and changed blood did stir, Me to withdraw my winter woes, that kept within my dore. 6 'Abroad,' quoth my desire, assay to set thy foot; Where thou shalt find the savour sweet; for sprung is every root. And to thy health, if thou were sick in any case, Nothing more good than in the spring the air to feel a space. [ywrought, There shalt thou hear and see all kinds of birds Well tune their voice with warble small, as nature hath them taught.' Thus pricked me my lust the sluggish house to leave, And for my health I thought it best such counsel to receive. So on a morrow forth, unwist of any wight, I went to prove how well it would my heavy burden light. And when I felt the air so pleasant round about, Lord! to myself how glad I was that I had gotten out. There might I see how Ver1 had every blossom hent," And eke the new betrothed birds, y-coupled how they went; 1 Spring. This involves a contradiction with the word summer in the first line, obviously intended for spring. 2 Seized, held, taken. And in their songs, methought, they thanked Nature much, [such, That by her licence all that year to love, their hap was Right as they could devise to choose them feres' throughout: [about. With much rejoicing to their Lord, thus flew they all Which when I 'gan resolve, and in my head conceive, What pleasant life, what heaps of joy, these little birds receive; 2 And saw in what estate I, weary man, was wrought, By want of that they had at will, and I reject at nought; Lord! how I gan in wrath unwisely me demean! I cursed Love, and him defied; I thought to turn the stream. But when I well beheld, he had me under awe, I asked mercy for my fault, that so transgrest his law: "Thou blinded God,' quoth I, 'forgive me this offence, Unwittingly I went about, to malice thy pretence." Wherewith he gave a beck, and thus methought he swore: 93 [more.' 'Thy sorrow ought suffice to purge thy fault, if it were The virtue of which sound mine heart did so revive, That I, methought, was made as whole as any man alive. But here I may perceive mine error, all and some, For that I thought that so it was; yet was it still undone; 4 And all that was no more but mine expressed mind, That fain would have some good relief, of Cupid well assigned. 1 Mates. 2 Dr. Nott is of opinion that this ought to read revolve. 3 Pretence must here mean power.'-Dr. NOTT. It was more frequently used to imply intention or design, and generally in that sense by Shakspeare. 4 By what sophistry of the ear the old writers reconciled themselves to such rhymes as this, it is difficult now to determine, for the pronunciation could not have differed in such cases very materially from our own. 1 turned home forthwith, and might perceive it well, That he aggrieved was right sore with me for my rebel. My harms have ever since increased more and more, And I remain, without his help, undone for evermore. A mirror let me be unto ye lovers all; Strive not with Love; for if ye do, it will ye befall. thus L COMPLAINT OF A LOVER REBUKED.' f OVE, that liveth and reigneth in my thought, COMPLAINT OF THE LOVER DISDAINED. IN N Cyprus springs, whereas dame Venus dwelt, 1 Translated from the 109th Sonnet of Petrarch, also translated by Wyatt. Whose moist poison dissolved hath my hate. DESCRIPTION AND PRAISE OF HIS LOVE ROM Tuscane came my lady's worthy race; FROM Fair Florence was sometime their2 ancient seat. The western isle whose pleasant shore doth face Wild Camber's cliffs, did give her lively heat. Fostered she was with milk of Irish breast: Her sire an earl; her dame of prince's blood. From tender years, in Britain doth she rest, With kinges child; where she tasteth costly food. 1 This is the biographical sonnet on which Nash and Drayton founded the Florentine origin of Geraldine, and which, partly by misinterpretation, and partly by speculation, suggested much of the romance adopted as matter of fact by Walpole and Warton. 2 In all the editions this word is printed her, the old Saxon possessive pronoun. By substituting the pronoun their the real meaning is made clear. The supposition that her referred personally to Geraldine, instead of to her race, led to the commonly received notion, so audaciously amplified into circumstantial details by Nash, that Geraldine was born in Florence. 3 There is a curious variance in the editions respecting this expression. Some of them read 'ghostly food,' which Dr. Nott prefers' as descriptive of education; especially if religious education were intended.' His reason for the preference will probably be considered as odd as the phrase he prefers. Hunsdon did first present her to mine eyen: THE FRAILTY AND HURTFULNESS OF BEAUTY.3 BRITTLE beauty, that Nature made so frail, 1 Nature-the nature of a species. 2 Impudent as the romance was which Nash built out of this sonnet, it was certainly not more imaginative than the circumstantial details of Dr. Nott. For the whole of the following statement, excepting the allusions to the Princess Mary, there is no authority whatever but this much persecuted sonnet, to which Dr. Nott actually refers as the source of his information. I have ventured to distinguish by italics those passages for which we are exclusively indebted to the fancy of the biographer. He tells us that he first saw Geraldine at Hunsdon, where she was living then as a child, under the eye of the Princess Mary. Of course he beheld her there with no other sentiment than that of pity for her early misfortunes. But having frequent opportunities of seeing her, and of observing in her promise of future loveliness, he allowed himself the dangerous indulgence of contemplating her charms as they gradually unfolded, until he was surprised by feelings of a more tender nature than simple admiration. Meanwhile, the lovely Geraldine grew to be of an age to attend upon her Royal Mistress's person. She then, as one of the ladies of her chamber, accompanied her constantly to court, whither the princess generally went when Henry gave those splendid entertainments in which he seems to have delighted. On one of those occasions Surrey saw the fair Geraldine at Hampton Court. That meeting decided his fate. He was hurried away by the impulse of his feelings, and was surprised perhaps to learn their nature and their extent.' -Life, cxxii.-iv. 3 Ascribed to Lord Vaux in the Harrington MS. The occurrence of double rhymes in this sonnet is noted by Dr. Nott as a ground for doubting it to have been written by Surrey. If this poem be Surrey's,' he observes, it is the only piece of his in which double rhymes occur.' This is an oversight. See Poems, pp. 80, 85, 92, 104, 107. 4 and shorter is the season,' in some editions. 5 Unsteady, uncertain, tottering; equivalent to the provincialism ticklish, as, it is a ticklish point.' |