With fliding rolles, and bound his neck with ropes.
The fatal gin thus overclambe our walles,

Stuft with armd men: about the which there ran

Children and maides', that holy carolles fang.

And well were they whoes hands might touch the cordes!
With thretning chere, thus flided through our town
The fubtill tree, to Pallas temple-ward.

O native land, Ilion, and of the goddes

The mansion placce! O warlik walles of Troy!
Four times it stopt in thentrie of our gate,
Four times the harneffe clatterd in the wombe.

The shade of Hector, in the fame book, thus appears.

Ah me! What one? That Hector how unlike,
Which erft, returnd clad with Achilles spoiles !
Or when he threw into the Grekish shippes
The Trojan flame! So was his beard defiled,
His crifped lockes al cluftred with his blood:
With al fuch woundes as many he received,
About the walles of that his native towne !
Whom franckly thus, methought, I fpake unto,
With bitter teres, and dolefull deadly voice.
"O Trojan light! O only hope of thine!

"What lettes fo long thee staid? Or from what costes,
"Our most defired Hector, doft thou come?
"Whom, after flaughter of our many frends,
"And travail of thy people, and thy towne,
"Alweried, (lord!) how gladly we behold!

"What fory chaunce hath stained thy lively face?
"Or why fee I these woundes, alas fo wide!"
He anfweard nought, nor in my vain demaundes
Abode: but from the bottom of his breft
Sighing he fayd: "Flee, flee, O goddeffe fon!
"And fave thee from the furie of this flame !"

This was a noble attempt to break the bondage of rhyme. But blank verfe was now growing fashionable in the Italian poetry, the school of Surrey. Felice Figlinei, a Sanese, and Surrey's cotemporary, in his admirable Italian commentary on the ETHICS of Ariftotle, entitled FILOSOSIA MORALE SOPRA IL LIBRI D' ETHICA D'ARISTOTILE, declaims against the barbarity of rhyme, and strongly recommends a total rejection of this Gothic ornament to his countrymen. He enforces his precept by his own example; and tranflates all Ariftotle's quotations from Homer and Euripides into verse without rhyme. Gonfalvo Perez, the learned fecretary to Philip of Spain, had also recently tranflated Homer's Odyffey into Spanish blank-verse. How much the excellent Roger Afcham approved of Surrey's difufe of rhyme. in this tranflation from Virgil, appears from the following paffage in his SCHOLEMASTER, Written about the year 1566". "The noble lord Thomas earle of Surrey, FIRST OF ALL "ENGLISHMEN, in tranflating the fourth [and second] booke "of Virgill: and Gonfalvo Perez, that excellent learned man, "and fecretarie to king Philip of Spayne", in tranflating the "ULYSSES of Homer out of the Greeke into Spanish, have "both by good judgement avoyded the FAULT OF RYMING. -The fpying of this fault now is not the curiofitie of English eyes, but even the good judgement alfo of the best

"I know of no English critic befides, who has mentioned Surrey's Virgil, except Bolton, a great reader of old English books. HYPERCRIT. p. 237. Oxon. 1772.

Among Afcham's Epiftles, there is one to Perez, infcribed Clariffimo viro D. Gon

falvo Perifio Regis Catbolici Secretario primario et Confiliario intimo, Amico meo cariffimo. In which Afcham recommends the embaffador fir William Cecil to his acquaintance and friendship. EPISTOL. LIB. UN. p. 228. b. edit. Lond. 1581.

" that

your

"that write in these dayes in Italie.—And you, that be able to "understand no more than ye find in the Italian tong: and "never went further than the schoole of PETRARCH and "ARIOSTO abroade, or else of CHAUCER at home, though "you have pleasure to wander blindlie ftill in foule wronge "way, envie not others, that feeke, as wife men have done "before them, the FAYREST and RYGHTEST way. - And "therefore, even as Virgill and Horace deferve most worthie "prayfe, that they, fpying the unperfitnefs in Ennius and "Plautus, by trewe imitation of Homer and Euripides, brought "poetrie to the fame perfectnes in Latin as it was in Greeke, " even fo those, that by the fame way would BENEFIT THEIR "TONG and country, deserve rather thankes than difprayse *."

The revival of the Greek and Roman poets in Italy, excited all the learned men of that country to copy the Roman verfification, and confequently banished the old Leonine Latin verfe. The fame claffical idea operated in fome degree on the vernacular poetry of Italy. In the year 1528, Triffino publifhed his ITALIA LIBERATA DI GOTI, or, ITALY DELIVERED FROM THE GOTHS, an heroic poem, profeffedly written in imitation of the Iliad, without either rhyme, or the ufual machineries of the Gothic romance. Triffino's defign was to destroy the TERZA RIMA of Dante. We do not, however, find, whether it be from the facility with which the Italian tongue falls into rhyme, or that the best and established Italian poets wrote in the stanza, that these efforts to reftore blank-verfe, produced any lafting effects in the progrefs of the Italian poetry. It is very probable, that this specimen of the Eneid in blank-verse by Surrey, led the way to Abraham Fleming's blank-verse translation of Virgil's Bucolics and Georgics, although done in Alexandrines, published in the year 1589 ".

Lord Surrey wrote many other English poems which were never

* B. ii. p. 54. b. 55. a. edit. 1589. 4to.

* London, 4to.

D 2

published,

published, and are now perhaps entirely loft., He tranflated the ECCLESIASTES of Solomon into English verfe. This piece is cited in the Preface to the Translation of the Pfalms, printed at London in 1567. He also tranflated a few of the Pfalms into metre. Thefe verfions of Scripture fhew that he was a friend to the reformation. Among his works are alfo recited, a Poem on his friend the young duke of Richmond, an Exhortation to the citizens of London, a Translation of Boccace's Epistle to Pinus, and a fett of Latin epiftles. Aubrey has preferved a poetical Epitaph, written by Surrey on fir Thomas Clere, his faithful retainer and conftant attendant, which was once in Lambeth-church'; and which, for its affection and elegance, deferves to be printed among the earl's poems. I will quote a few lines.

Shelton for love, Surrey for lord thee chase * :
(Aye me, while life did laft that league was tender!)
Tracing whose steps, thou fawest Kelfall blase,
Laundersey burnt, and batterd Bulleyn's render*:
At Mortrell gates, hopeless of all recure,
Thine earle halfe dead gave in thy hand his Will;
Which caufe did thee this pining death procure,
Ere summers foure tymes seven thou couldst fulfill.
Ah, Clere! if love had booted care or cost,
Heaven had not wonne, nor earth so timely loft'!

John Clerc, who travelled into Italy with Pace, an eminent linguist of those times, and secretary to Thomas duke of Norfolk father of lord Surrey, in a dedication to the latter, prefixed to his TRETISE OF NOBILITIE printed at London in 1543, has mentioned, with the highest commendations, many tranflations done by Surrey, from the Latin, Italian, French, and

Spanish languages. But these it is probable were nothing more than juvenile exercises.

Surrey, for his justness of thought, correctness of style, and purity of expreffion, may justly be pronounced the first English claffical poet. He unquestionably is the first polite writer of loveverses in our language. It muft, however, be allowed, that there is a striking native beauty in fome of our love-verses written much earlier than Surrey's. But in the most favage ages and countries, rude nature has taught elegance to the lover.

SECT.