And more richly beseen, by many fold, For then the nightingale, that all the day The goldfinch, eke, that fro the medlar tre And so these ladies rode forth a grete pace, I drest me forth; and happid mete, anon, And she answerid, "My doughter! gramercy!" "Madame!" (quoth I) "if that I durst enquere Of you, I wold, fain, of that company Wit what they be that passed by this harbere." And she ayen answerid, right frendly : My doughtir all tho, that passid hereby, In white clothing, be servants everichone, Unto the Lefe, and I myself am one.” "And as for hir that crounid is in grene, And not delite in no kind besinesse But for to hunt, and hawke, and pley in medes, For now I am ascertain'd thoroughly I am right glad that I have said, sothly, "Madam!" (quod I) "although I lest worthy, Unto the Lefe I ow mine observaunce." "That is," (quod she) "right well done, certainly, And I pray God to honour you advance, And kepe you fro the wickid remembraunce Of Malebouch, and all his cruiltie; And all that gode and well conditioned be. "For here I may no lengir now abide, And forthwith, as I couth, most humily And I drow homeward, for it was nigh night. * betwixt the Grecians and Troyans." They are all translations, or rather adaptations, from the Italian and French. A few extracts may serve to satisfy the reader. A perusal of any one of his productions would scarcely compensate for the necessary labour. He is now almost forgotten; although in his own day his popularity was unbounded, and his fame continued unimpaired for nearly two centuries. It is somewhat singular that an age which had received and read the poems of Geoffrey Chaucer, should have so devoutly admired the writings of John Lydgate; for although by no means "the prosaic and drivelling monk," or the "stupid poetaster," which some recent annotators have described him, he is, compared with his great predecessor, as a dull, gloomy and unproductive day, to a spring morning of alternate sun and shower. His works were originally printed by Caxton, Thinne and Pinson; and although many of them were written in early life, he appears not to have attained his highest eminence until nearly sixty years old. After Lydgate, if we except Hawes and Skelton, who whimsically but accurately described his own rhymes as "ragged, Tattered and jagged, the history of our poetry is that of a barren plain, until we receive the greeting of those twin-brothers in fame and affection-Wyat and Surrey; and are led by them into a garden, limited indeed in extent, but of exceeding richness and beauty. The Muse appears meanwhile to have quitted the South and to have sojourned, for a time, in the cold North. James the First, it is true, can scarcely be set aside from the list of English Poets-inasmuch as in England he acquired the "lore" in which he so greatly excelled, but Scotland, after this period, contended for superiority, and attained it. AND sayng after on the next nyght The Faders voyce, as clerkes oft endyte, And Crest Jesu the Faders sone entere, JOHN LYDGATE-the Monk of Bury-was a native of Suffolk, and born, it is supposed, in 1375. He was educated at Oxford, and having travelled in France and Italy, acquired such complete mastery over the languages of those countries, that he was induced to open a school in his monastery. -the Benedictine Abbey of St. Edmund's Bury. He died probably in 1461; having enjoyed during his long life a high reputation, and "found favour" in the sight of kings and people. A list of his works would be a very long catalogue of publications in every shape and on every subject to which poetry can be made subservient ballads, hymns, humorous tales, allegories, romances, legends, chronicles, histories, lives of saints, and records of heroes, masques for kings, may-games for lord mayors, pageants for holy festivals, carols for coronations, and "disguisings" for trades-companies:"cart-loads" of rubbish, according to a modern critic, who had more learning than taste, and who has enumerated his works, genuine and supposititious, to the almost incredible number of two hundred and fifty-one. He was not only a poet, but a skilful rhetorician, an astronomer, a theologian, a geometrician, and a philosopher—and in these various arts as well as those of composition and versification, instructed the sons of the nobility and the monastic students. Although the immediate successor-indeed the contemporary-of Chaucer, he is infinitely below the immortal poet in strength of intellect, richness of fancy, and purity of style; yet he is the only writer of his age, if we except Gower, to whom the English language is indebted for the maintenance of its vigour. His poetry is heavy and diffuse, and for the most part languid and elaborately tedious;-a great story he compares to a great oak, which is not to be attacked with a single stroke, but by "a longe processe;" and he disclaims the notion of composing in "a stile briefe and compendious." Nevertheless, it would be easy to find among his lengthened and numerous productions passages of exceeding beauty, descriptions natural and true, characters finely conceived and ably developed, and verse smooth, even to elegance. His principal poems are "the Fall of Princes"-which undoubtedly suggested to Sackville the idea of "the Mirrour for Magistrates;" "the Story of Thebes," written as a continuation of the Canterbury Tales of "his Master;" "the Lyfe of our Lady;" and "the Boke of Troy, being the onely trewe and syncere Chronicle of the Warres betwixt the Grecians and Troyans." They are all translations, or rather adaptations, from the Italian and French. A few extracts may serve to satisfy the reader. A perusal of any one of his productions would scarcely compensate for the necessary labour. He is now almost forgotten; although in his own day his popularity was unbounded, and his fame continued unimpaired for nearly two centuries. It is somewhat singular that an age which had received and read the poems of Geoffrey Chaucer, should have so devoutly admired the writings of John Lydgate; for although by no means "the prosaic and drivelling monk," or the "stupid poetaster," which some recent annotators have described him, he is, compared with his great predecessor, as a dull, gloomy and unproductive day, to a spring morning of alternate sun and shower. His works were originally printed by Caxton, Thinne and Pinson; and although many of them were written in early life, he appears not to have attained his highest eminence until nearly sixty years old. After Lydgate, if we except Hawes and Skelton, who whimsically but accurately described his own rhymes as "ragged, Tattered and jagged, the history of our poetry is that of a barren plain, until we receive the greeting of those twin-brothers in fame and affection-Wyat and Surrey; and are led by them into a garden, limited indeed in extent, but of exceeding richness and beauty. The Muse appears meanwhile to have quitted the South and to have sojourned, for a time, in the cold North. James the First, it is true, can scarcely be set aside from the list of English Poets-inasmuch as in England he acquired the "lore" in which he so greatly excelled, but Scotland, after this period, contended for superiority, and attained it. |