Alway he drinketh, and yet alway is drye, The sweat distilling with droppes abundant, &c. The poet adds, that when the noble Howard had long boldly contended with this hideous monster, had broken the bars and doors of the castle, had bound the porter, and was now pre-paring to ascend the tower of Virtue and Honour, FORTUNE and DEATH appeared, and interrupted his progress. The first modern Latin Bucolics are those of Petrarch, in number twelve, written about the year 1350%. The Eclogues of Mantuan, our author's model, appeared about the year 1400, and were followed by many others. Their number multiplied so soon, that a collection of thirty-eight modern bucolic poets in Latin was printed at Basil, in the year 1546". These writers judged this indirect and disguised mode of dialogue, consisting of simple characters which spoke freely and plainly, the most safe and convenient vehicle for abusing the corruptions of the church. Mantuan became so popular, as to acquire the estimation of a classic, and to be taught in schools. Nothing better proves the reputation in which this writer was held, than a speech of Shakespeare's pedant, the pedagogue Holofernes. "Fauste, precor, gelida quando pecus omne sub ulmo, and so forth. Ah, good old MANTUAN! I may speak of thee, as the traveller doth of Venice, Vinegia, Vinegia, chi non te vedi, ei non te pregia. Old MANTUAN! Old MANTUAN! Who understandeth thee not, loveth thee not." But although Barklay copies Mantuan, the recent and separate publication in f EGL. iv. BUCOLICORUM ECLOGA XII. h Viz. xxxviii. AUTHORES BUCOLICI, Basil. 1546. 8vo. i One of Mantuan's lines. Farnaby in his Preface to Martial says, that Fauste precor gelida, was too often preferred to Arma virumque cano. I think there is an old black letter translation of Mantuan into English. Another translation appeared by one Thomas Harvey, 1656. Mantuan was three times printed in England before the year 1600. Viz. B. Mantuani Carmelitæ theologi ADOLESCENTIA seu BUCOLICA, With the commentary of Jodocus Badius. Excud. G. Dewes and H. Marshe, 1584. 12mo. Again, for the same, the same year, 12mo. Again, for Robert Dexter, 1598. 12mo. With Arguments to the Eclogues, and Notes by John Murmelius, &c. * LOVE'S LAB. L. Act iv. Sc. 3. 89 England of Virgil's bucolics, by Wynkyn de Worde', might partly suggest the new idea of this kind of poetry. With what avidity the Italian and French poets, in their respective languages, entered into this species of composition, when the rage of Latin versification had subsided, and for the purposes above mentioned, is an inquiry reserved for a future period. I shall only add here, that before the close of the fifteenth century, Virgil's bucolics were translated into Italian", by Bernardo Pulci, Fossa de Cremona, Benivieni, and Fiorini Buoninsegni. ! BUCOLICA VIRGILII cum commento familiari. At the end, Ad juvenes hujus Maroniani operis commendatio. Die vero viii Aprilis. 4to. And they were reprinted by the same, 1514 and 1516. Viz. LA BUCOLICA DI VIRGILIO per Fratrem Evangelistam Fossa de Cremona ord. servorum. In Venezia, 1494. 4to. But thirteen years earlier we find, Bernardo PuLCI nella BUCOLICA di Virgilio: di Jeronimo BENIVIENI, Jacopo FIORINO Buoninsegni de Sienna: Epistole di Luca Pulci. In Firenze, per Bartolomeo Miscomini, 1484. A dedication is prefixed, by which it appears, that Buoninsegni wrote a PISCATORY ECLOGUE, the first ever written in Italy, in the year 1468. There was a second edition of Pulci's version, LA BUCOLICA di VIRGILIO tradotta per Bernardo PULCI con l'Elegie. In Florenza, 1494, SECTION XXX. IT is not the plan of this work to comprehend the Scotch poetry. But when I consider the close and national connection between England and Scotland in the progress of manners and literature, I am sensible I should be guilty of a partial and defective representation of the poetry of the former, was I to omit in my series a few Scotch writers, who have adorned the present period, with a degree of sentiment and spirit, a command of phraseology, and a fertility of imagination, not to be found in any English poet since Chaucer and Lydgate: more especially as they have left striking specimens of allegorical invention, a species of composition which appears to have been for some time almost totally extinguished in England. The first I shall mention is William Dunbar, a native of Salton in East Lothian, about the year 1470. His most celebrated poems are The THISTLE AND THE ROSE, and THE GOLDEN TERGE. The THISTLE AND THE ROSE was occasioned by the marriage of James the Fourth, king of Scotland, with Margaret Tudor, eldest daughter of Henry the Seventh, king of England: an event, in which the whole future political state of both nations was vitally interested, and which ultimately produced the union of the two crowns and kingdoms. It was finished on the ninth day of May in the year 1503, nearly three months before the arrival of the queen in Scotland: whose progress from Richmond to Edinburgh was attended with a greater magnificence of parade, processions, and spectacles, than I ever remember to have seen on any similar occasion. It may be * See a memoir, cited above, in Leland's COLL. tom. iii. APPEND. edit. 1770. p. 265. It is worthy of particular notice, that during this expedition there was in the magnificent suite of the princess a company of players, under the pertinent to premise, that Margaret was a singular patroness of the Scotch poetry, now beginning to flourish. Her bounty is thus celebrated by Stewart of Lorne, in a Scotch poem, called LERGES OF THIS NEW YEIR DAY, written in the year 1527. Grit God relief" MARGARET our quene! Scho wald be lerger of lufrayd For lerges of this new-yeir day." Dunbar's THISTLE AND ROSE is opened with the following stanzas, which are remarkable for their descriptive and picturesque beauties. Quhen Merche wes with variand windis past, direction of one John Inglish, who is Bodl. Oxon. Froissart, who is most commonly prolix in describing pompous ceremonies, might have greatly enriched his account of the same royal wedding, from this valuable and authentic record. See his CRON. tom. iv. p. 226. ch. 78, B. penult. Paris, 1574. fol. Or lord Berners's Translation, vol. ii. f. 275. cap. ccxvi. edit. Pinson, 1523. fol. [The presents at this marriage ascer. tain a doubtful reading in Chaucer, viz, "Un NOUCHE pr. ecc. livr.➡It. un riche NOUCHE.-Un NOUCHE priz de cynk centz marcz."-In the CLERKE'S TALE, Grisilde has a crown “full of ouchis grete and smale." The late editor acquaints us, that the best manuscripts read nouchis. ADDITIONS.] b с great God help, &c. done. If she continues to do as she has d bounty. Fr. 'Offre. any other I could speak of. f largess, bounty. e 8 St. x. h when. Qu has the force of w. taken leave. * mother. 1 Mattin orisons. From Hora in the missal. So again in the GOLDEN TERGE, Amang the tendir odouris reid and quhyt, In bed at morrow sleiping as I lay, MAY then rebukes the poet, for not rising early, according to his annual custom, to celebrate the approach of the spring; especially as the lark has now announced the dawn of day, and his heart in former years had always glaid and blissful bene Sangis" to mak undir the levis grene. * St. ii. Where he also calls the birds the chapel-clarkes of Venus, St. iii. In the COURTE OF LOVE, Chaucer introduces the birds singing a mass in honour of May. Edit. Ürr. p. 570, v. 1353, seq. On May-day, when the larke began to ryse, TO MATTINS Went the lustie nightingale. He begins the service with Domine labia, The eagle sings the Venite. The popinjay Coeli enarrant. The peacock Dominus regnavit. The owl Benedicite. The Te Deum is converted into Te Deum AMORIS, and sung by the thrush, &c. &c. Skelton, in the BOKE OF PHILIP SPARROW, ridicules the missal, in supposing various parts of it to be sung by birds. p. 226. edit. Lond. 1759, 12mo. Much the same sort of fiction occurs in Sir David Lyndesay's COMPLAYNT OF THE PAPYNGO, edit. ut infr. SIGNAT. B. iii, Suppose the geis and hennis suld cry And we sall serve secundum usum Sa- m looked. " hailed. P lovers. * attire. From Chaucer, MILLER'S TALE, t newe. brightness. U songs. * St. iv. See Chaucer's KNIGHT'S TALE, v. 1042. p. 9. Urr. She was arisin, and all redie dight, For May will have no sluggardy annight: The season prikkith every gentill herte; And makith it out of his slepe to sterte, And sayth, Aryse, and do May observaunce, &c. |