As Phebus in the orient
Lichtnis 9 in haist the occident,
Sa plesandlye he sall appeir
Amang the hevinlye cluddis cleir..
The angellis of the ordouris nyne
Inviron sall that throne devyne.-
In his presens thare sal be borne
The signis' of cros, and croun of thorne,
Pillar, naillis, scurgis, and speir,
With everilk thing that did him deirs,
The tyme of his grym passioun:
And, for our consolatioun,
Appeir sall, in his handis and feit,
And in his syde the prent compleit
Of his fyve woundis precious

Schynand lyke rubies radious. When Christ is seated at the tribunal of judging the world, he adds,

Thare sall ane angell blawe ane blast

Quhilk sall mak all the warld agast. Among the monarchies, our author describes the papal see: whose innovations, impostures, and errors, he attacks with much good sense, solid argument, and satirical humour; and whose imperceptible increase, from simple and humble beginnings to an enormity of spiritual tyranny, he traces through a gradation of various corruptions and abuses, with great penetration, and knowledge of history.“

Among antient peculiar customs now lost, he mentions a superstitious idol annually carried about the streets of Edinburgh.

Of Edinburgh the greit idolatrie,
And manifest abhominatioun !
On thair feist day, all creature may see,
Thay beir ane auld stok-image w throuch the toun,

With talbrone*, trumpet, schalme, and clarioun,
Quhilk hes bene usit mony ane yeir bygone,
With priestis, and freiris, into processioun,

Siclyke Y as Bal wes borne throuch Babylone. 2 He also speaks of the people flocking to be cured of various infirmities, to the auld ride, or cross, of Kerrail. a

Our poet's principal vouchers and authorities in the MoNARCHIE, are Livy, Valerius Maximus, Josephus, Diodorus Siculus, Avicen the Arabic physician, Orosius, saint Jerom, Polydore Virgil, Cario's chronicle, the FascicULUS TEMPORUM, and the CHRONICA CHRONICARUM. The FASCICULUS TEMPORUM is a Latin chronicle, written at the close of the fifteenth century by Wernerus Rolewinck, a Westphalian, and a Carthusian monk of Cologne; a most venerable volume, closed with this colophon. “ FascicuLUS TEMPORUM, a Carthusiense compilatum in formam cronicis figuratum usque in annum 1478, a me Nicolao Gatz de Seltztat impressumb." The CHRONICA CHRONICARUM or CHRONICON MUNDI, written by Hartmannus Schedelius, a physician at Nuremburgh, and from which our author evidently took his philosophy in his DREME, was printed at Nuremburgh in 1493. This was a most popular compilation, and is at present a great curiosity to those who are fond of history in the Gothic style, consisting of wonders conveyed in the black letter and wooden cuts.

y

so as.

wood. [The auld stock-image which is Than kittock thare als caidgie as ane here reprobated by Lyndsay, was the con, image of St. Giles the patron saint of Without regarde outher to sin or schame, Edinburg; and which was yearly, on Gave Lawrie leif at laiser to loup on, the first of September, carried through Far better had bene till have biddin at the town in grand procession.—CUAL hame. MERS.) tabor.

I will here take occasion to explain two 2 SIGNAT. H. iii.

lines, Signat. I. iii. a Signat. H. i. For allusions of this kind the following stanza may be cited,

Nor yit the fair maydin of France

Danter of Inglis ordinance. which I do not entirely understand. SIGNAT. H. ii.

That is, Joan of Are, who so often

daunted or defeated the English army. This wes the practick of sum pilgra- To this heroine, and to Penthesilea, he mage,

compares Semiramis. Quhen fillokis into Fyfe began to fon See it also among SCRIPTOR. GER. With Joke and Thom than tuke thai max. per J. Pistorium, tom. i. p. 580.

• Again, ibid. by Joh. Schensperger. In Angus till the feild chapell of Dron: 1497. fol.

thair vayage

Cario's chronicle is a much more rational and elegant work: it was originally composed, about the beginning of the sixteenth century, by Ludovicus Cario, an eminent mathematician, and improved or written anew by Melancthon. Of Orosius, a wretched but admired christian historian, who compiled in Latin a series of universal annals from the creation to the fifth century, he cites a translation.

The translatour of Orosius

Intill his cronicle wryttis thus.d I know of no English translation of Orosius, unless the Anglosaxon version by king Alfred, and which would perhaps have been much more difficult to Lyndesay than the Latin original, may be called such: yet Orosius was early translated into French and Italianf. For the story of Alexander the Great, our author seems to refer to Adam Davie's poem on that subject, written in the reign of Edward the Second : a work, which I never remember to have seen cited before, and of which, although deserving to be printed, only two public manuscripts now remain, the one in the library of Lincoln's-inn, and the other in the Bodleian library at Oxford.

Alexander the conquerour,
Gif thow at lenth wald reid his ring",
And of his crewell conquessing,
In INGLIS TOUNG IN HIS GREIT BUKE,

At lenth his LYFE thare thow may luke, He acquaints us, yet not from his own knowledge, but on the testimony of other writers, that Homer and Hesiod were the inventors in Greece, of poetry, medicine, music, and astronomy." & Signat. F. i.

must have been Mattheus Palmerius By Philip Le Noir. Paris, 1526. above mentioned, author of the CITTA DI fol.

VITA, who wrote a general chronicle By Benaccivoli. Ven. 1528, 4to, from the fifth century to his own times, 8 See supr. vol. ii. p. 53.

entitled DE TEMPORIBUS, and, I believe, ► If thou at length would read his first printed at Milan, 1475. fol. After reign.

wards reprinted with improvements and Signat. K. iii. He also cites Lucan continuations. Particularly at Venice, for Alexander, Sirxat. L. i. For an 1483. 4to. And by Grynæus at the account of the riches of pope John, he end of Eusebius, fol. 1570. quotes Palmerius. Sırsai. N, i. This Signat. K. iji,

EXPERIENCE departs from the poet, and the dialogue is ended, at the approach of the evening; which is described with these circumstances.

Behald, how Phebus dounwart dois discend,
Towart his palyce in the occident !-
The dew now donkis: the rosis redolent:
The mariguldis, that all day wer rejosit
Of Phebus heit, now craftily ar closit".-
The cornecraik in the croft, I heir hir cry;
The bak, the howlatt", febyl of thair eis,
For thair pastyme, now in the evinning fleis.
The nichtingaill with myrthful melody

Hir naturall notis, peirsith throuch the sky.° Many other passages in Lyndesay's poems deserve attention. Magdalene of France, married to James the Fifth of ScotlandP, did not live to see the magnificent preparations made for her public entry into Edinburgh. In a poem, called the Deith OF QUENE MAGDALENE, our author, by a most striking and lively prosopopeia, an expostulation with Death, describes the whole order of the procession. I will give a few of the stanzas.

Theif, saw thow nocht the greit preparatyvis
Of Edinburgh, the nobill famous toun ?
Thow saw the pepill lauboring for thair lyvis,
To mak tryumphe with trump and clarioun !

Thow saw makande richt costlie scaffalding,
Depaintit weill with gold and asure fyne,
Reddye prepairit for the upsetting,
With fontanis flowing water cleir and wyne:

Disagysit' folkis, lyke creaturis divyne, moistens.

are closed.

into France to address the princess, to owlet, owl.

• SIGNAT. R. Leander swimming through the HelleNot inelegantly, he compares James spont to Hero. naking frequent and dangerous voyagez . making * men,

disguised.

m

On ilk scaffold to play ane sundrie stories:
: Bot all in greiting' turnit thow that glorie.

Thow saw mony ane lustie fresche galland
Weill ordourit for resaiving of thair quene,
Ilk craftisman with bent bow in his hand,
Ful galzeartlie in schort clething of grene, &c.-

Syne nyxt in ordour passing throw the toun,
Thow suld haif hard the din of instrumentis,
Of tabrone, trumpet, schalme, and clarioun,
With reird u redoundand throw the elementis ;
The herauldis with thair awful vestimentis,
With maseris w upon ather of thair handis,
To rewle the preis, with burneist silver wandis, &c.-
Thow suld haif hard * the ornate oratouris,
Makand hir hynes salutatioun,
Baith of the clergy town and counsalouris,
With mony notabill narratioun.
Thow suld haif sene hir coronatioun,
In the fair abbay of the haly rude,
In presence of ane myrthfull multitude.
Sic banketting, sic awfull tornamentis
On hors and fute, that tyme quhilk suld haif bene,
Sic chapell royall with sic instrumentis,

And craftie musick, &c. YExclusive of this artificial and very poetical mode of introducing a description of these splendid spectacles, instead of saying plainly that the queen's death prevented the superb ceremonies which would have attended her coronation, these stanzas have another merit, that of transmitting the ideas of the times in the exhibition of a royal entertainment2.

plays and pageants acted on moveable scaffolds. to grief.

sound.

* heard. Sienar. K. iii.

2 The curious reader may compare “ The ordynaunce of the entre of quene Isabell into the towne of Paris," in Froissart. Berners's Transl. tom. ii. c. elvii, f. 172. b.

w

maces.