"Then to fhryne them vp to god Cupid, and make martirres "of them both, and therwyth an ende of the matter." Afterwards, reverting to the peculiar difficulty of his own attempt, he adds, " Neyther any man which can iudge, can iudge it one " and the like laboure to tranflate Horace, and to make and "translate a loue booke, a fhril tragedye, or a fmoth and platleuyled poefye. Thys can I trulye fay of myne owne expe"ryence, that I can foner tranflate twelve verfes out of the "Greeke Homer than fixe out Horace." Horace's fatirical writings, and even his Odes, are undoubtedly more difficult to translate than the narrations of epic poetry, which depend more on things than words: nor is it to be expected, that his fatires and epiftles should be happily rendered into English at this infancy of style and tafte, when his delicate turns could not be expreffed, his humour and his urbanity justly relished, and his good fenfe and obfervations on life understood. Drant seems to have fucceeded beft in the exquifite Epistle to Tibullus, which I will therefore give entire.

Not thou a bodie without breast!

The goddes made thee t' excell

In fhape, the gods haue lent thee goodes,
And arte to vse them well.

What better thing vnto her childe

Can wish the mother kinde?

Than wisedome, and, in fyled frame ",
To vtter owte his minde:

To haue fayre fauoure, fame enoughe,
And perfect staye, and health;
Things trim at will, and not to feele
The emptie ebb of wealth.

Twixt hope to haue, and care to kepe,

Twixt feare and wrathe, awaye

Confumes the time: eche daye that cummes,
Thinke it the latter daye.

The hower that cummes unlooked for

Shall cum more welcum aye.

Thou shalt Me fynde fat and well fed,

As pubble as may be;

And, when thou wilt, a merie mate,

To laughe and chat with thee'.

Drant undertook this verfion in the character of a grave divine, and as a teacher of morality. He was educated at faint John's college in Cambridge; where he was graduated in theology, in the year 1569'. The fame year he was appointed prebendary of Chichester and of faint Pauls. The following year he was inftalled archdeacon of Lewes in the cathedral of Chichester. These preferments he probably procured by the interest of Grindall archbishop of York, of whom he was a domeftic chaplain'.

Having a comely perfon. Or, to speak with elegance.

I have never feen this word, which is perhaps provincial. The fenfe is obvious.

Signat. C iiij.

• Catal. Grad. Cant. MS.
MS. Tann.

He

a

He was a tolerable Latin poet. He tranflated the ECCLESIASTES into Latin hexameters, which he dedicated to fir Thomas Henneage, a common and liberal patron of these times, and printed at London in 1572 ". At the beginning and end of this work, are fix fmaller pieces in Latin verfe. Among these are the firft fixteen lines of a paraphrase on the book of JOB. He has two mifcellanies of Latin poetry extant, the one entitled SYLVA, dedicated to queen Elifabeth, and the other POEMATA VARIA ET EXTERNA. The last was printed at Paris, from which circumftance we may conclude that he travelled ". In the SYLVA, he mentions his new verfion of David's pfalms, I suppose in English verfe*. In the fame collection, he fays he had begun to tranflate the Iliad, but had gone no further than the fourth book'. He mentions alfo his version of the Greek EPIGRAMS of Gregory Nazianzen 2. But we are at a lofs to discover, whether the latter were English or Latin verfions. The indefatigably inquifitive bishop Tanner has col

"For Thomas Daye. In quarto. The title is, "In Solomonis regis ECCLESIAS"TEM, feu de Vanitate mundi Concio"nem, paraphrafis poetica. Lond. per Joan. "Dayum 1572." There is an entry to Richard Fielde of the "Ecclefiaftes in "Englishe verfe." Nov. 11, 1596. REGISTR. STATION. C. fol. 15. a. And, by Thomas Granger, to W. Jones, Apr. 30, 1620. Ibid. fol. 313. b.

w Drant has two Latin poems prefixed to Nevill's KETTUS, 1575. 4to. Another, to John Seton's LOGIC with Peter Carter's annotations, Lond. 1574. 12mo. And to the other editions. [Seton was of faint John's in Cambridge, chaplain to bishop Gardiner for feven years, and highly efteemed by him. Made D. D. in 1544. Inftalled prebendary of Winchester, Mar. 19, 1553. Rector of Henton in Hampfhire, being then forty-two years old, and B. D. See A. Wood, MS. C. 237. He is extolled by Leland for his diftinguished excellence both in the claffics and philofo

phy. He published much Latin poetry. See Strype's ELIZ. p. 242. Carter was alfo of S. John's in Cambridge.] Another, with one in English, to John Sadler's English verfion of Vegetius's TACTICS, done at the request of fir Edmund Brudenell, and addreffed to the earl of Bedford, Lond. 1572. 4to. He has a Latin epitaph, or elegy, on the death of doctor Cuthbert Scot, defigned bishop of Chester, but depofed by queen Elifabeth for popery, who died a fugitive at Louvaine, Lond. 1565. He probably wrote this piece abroad. There is licenced to T. Marfh, in 1565, "An Epigrame of the death of Cuthbert "Skotte by Roger Sherlock, and replyed

agaynfte by Thomas Drant." REGISTR. STATION. A. fol. 134. b. A Latin copy of verses, DE SEIPSO, is prefixed to his HORACE.

* Fol. 56. y Fol. 75. z Fol. 50.

lected

lected our tranflator's Sermons, fix in number, which are more to be valued for their type than their doctrine, and at present are of little more ufe, than to fill the catalogue of the typographical antiquary. Two of them were preached at saint Mary's hofpital. Drant's latest publication is dated in 1572.

Historical ballads occur about this period with the initials T. D. These may eafily be mistaken for Thomas Drant, but they ftand for Thomas Deloney, a famous ballad writer of these 'times, mentioned by Kemp, one of the original actors in Shakespeare's plays, in his NINE DAIES WONDER. Kemp's miraculous morris-dance, performed in nine days from London to Norwich, had been mifrepresented in the popular ballads, and he thus remonstrates against fome of their authors. "I haue "made a priuie search what priuate jig-monger of your jolly "number had been the author of these abhominable ballets

"written of me. I was told it was the great ballade maker "T. D. or Thomas Deloney, chronicler of the memorable Lives "of the SIX YEOMEN OF THE WEST, JACK OF NEWBERY, "THE GENTLE CRAFT, and fuch like honeft men, omitted

a Codd. Tanner Oxon. Two are dedicated to Thomas Heneage. Three to fir Francis Knollys. Date of the earliest, 1569. Of the latest, 1572. In that preached at court 1569, he tells the ladies, he can give them a better cloathing than any to be found in the queen's wardrobe: and mentions the speedy downfal of their "high plumy heads." Signat. K v. Lond. 1570. 12mo. I find the following note by bishop Tanner. "Thomæ Drantæ Angli Andvordingamii PRASUL. Dedicat. " to Archbishop Grindal. PR. DED."Illuxit ad extremum dies ille." -I prefume, that under the word Andvordinghamii is concealed our author's native place. His father's name was Thomas.

At faint Maries Spittle. In the statutes of many of the antient colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, it is ordered, that the candidates in divinity fhall preach a fermon, not only at Paul's-crofs, but at faint

Mary's Hofpital in Bishopfgate-street, "ad "Hofpitale beatæ Mariæ.'

Entered to T. Myllington, Mar. 7, 1596. REGISTR. STATION. C. fol. 20. b.

I prefume he means, an anonymous comedy called "THE SHOEMAKERS HO"LYDAY or the GENTLE CRAFT. With "the humorous life of fir John Eyre fhoe"maker, and Lord Mayor of London." Acted before the queen on New Year's Day by Lord Nottingham's players. I have an edition, Lond. for J. Wright, 1618. Bl. Lett. 4to. Prefixed are the first and fecond THREE MAN'S SONGS. But there is an old profe hiftory in quarto called the GENTLE CRAFT, which I fuppofe is the fubject of Harrington's Epigram, "Of a Booke called the GENTLE CRAFT." B. iv. 11. "A Booke called the GENTLE "CRAFTE intreating of Shoemakers," is entered to Ralph Blore, Oct. 19, 1597. REGISTR. STATION. C. fol. 25. a. See alfo ibid. fol. 63. a.

by

by Stowe, Hollinfhed, Grafton, Hall, Froyfart, and the rest "of those welldeferuing writers "."

I am informed from fome manuscript authorities, that in the year 1571, Drant printed an English translation from Tully, which he called, The chofen eloquent oration of Marcus Tullius Cicero for the poet Archias, felected from his orations, and now first published in English'. I have never feen this verfion, but I am of opinion that the tranflator might have made a more happy choice. For in this favorite piece of fuperficial declamation, the fpecious orator, when he is led to a formal defence of the value and dignity of poetry, instead of illuftrating his subject by infifting on the higher utilities of poetry, its political nature, and its importance to fociety, enlarges only on the immortality which the art confers, on the poetic faculty being communicated by divine inspiration, on the public honours paid to Homer and Ennius, on the esteem with which poets were regarded by Alexander and Themistocles, on the wonderful phenomenon of an extemporaneous effufion of a great number of verses, and even recurs to the trite and obvious topics of a school-boy in faying, that poems are a pleasant relief after fatigue of the mind, and that hard rocks and favage beafts have been moved by the power of fong. A modern philofopher would have confidered such a subject with more penetration, comprehenfion, and force of reflection. His excufe muft be, that he was uttering a popular harangue.

• Edit. 1600. 4to. SIGNAT. D 2.

f MSS. Coxeter.

SECT.