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his hopeful abilities, as for a reason infinuated by lord Herbert, and at which those who know Henry's history and character will not be surprised, because he equally and strongly resembled both his father and mother.

A friendship of the closest kind commencing between these two illuftrious youths, about the year 1530, they were both removed to cardinal Wolfey's college at Oxford, then universally frequented, as well for the excellence as the novelty of its inftitution; for it was one of the first seminaries of an English university, that profeffed to explode the pedantries of the old barbarous philofophy, and to cultivate the graces of polite literature. Two years afterwards, for the purpose of acquiring every accomplishment of an elegant education, the earl accompanied his noble friend and fellow-pupil into France, where they received king Henry, on his arrival at Calais to vifit Francis the first, with a moft magnificent retinue. The friendship of these two young noblemen was foon ftrengthened by a new tie; for Richmond married the lady Mary Howard, Surrey's fister. Richmond, however, appears to have died in the year 1536, about the age of feventeen, having never cohabited with his wife. It was long, before Surrey forgot the untimely lofs of this amiable youth, the friend and affociate of his childhood, and who nearly resembled himself in genius, refinement of manners, and liberal acquifitions.

The FAIR GERALDINE, the general object of lord Surrey's paffionate fonnets, is commonly faid to have lived at Florence, and to have been of the family of the Geraldi of that city. This is a mistake, yet not entirely without grounds, propagated by an easy misapprehenfion of an expreffion in one of our poet's odes, and a paffage in Drayton's heroic epiftles. She was undoubtedly one of the daughters of Gerald Fitzgerald, earl of Kildare. But it will be neceffary to transcribe what our author himself has faid of this celebrated lady. The history of one

b Wood, ATH. Oxon. i. 68.

who

who caused fo memorable and so poetical a paffion naturally excites curiofity, and will justify an investigation, which, on many. a fimilar occafion, would properly be cenfured as frivolous and impertinent.

From Tuskane came my ladies worthy race;

Faire Florence was fumtyme her auncient seat :
The westerne yle, whose plefant shore doth face
Wild Camber's cliffs, did gyve her lively heate:
Foftred fhe was with milke of Irishe breft;
Her fire an earle: her dame of princes blood:
From tender yeres in Britain fhe doth rest
With kinges child, where the tafteth coftly food.
Hunsdon did first present her to mine yien :
Bright is her hewe, and Geraldine she hight.
Hampton me taught to wish her first mine,

And Windfor alas! doth chafe me from her fight.

These notices, it must be confeffed, are obfcure and indirect. But a late elegant biographer has, with the most happy fagacity, folved the difficulties of this little enigmatical ode, which had been before either neglected and unattempted as inexplicable, or rendered more unintelligible by falfe conjectures. I readily adopt Mr. Walpole's key to the genealogy of the matchless Geraldine *.

Her poetical appellation is almost her real name. Gerald Fitzgerald, abovementioned, earl of Kildare in the reign of Henry the eighth, married a fecond wife, Margaret daughter of Thomas Gray, marquis of Dorfet: by whom he had three daughters, Margaret, Elifabeth, and Cicely. Margaret was born deaf and dumb; and a lady who could neither hear nor answer her lover, and who wanted the means of contributing to the most endearing reciprocations, can hardly be fupposed to have

ci. e. their.

• Fol. 5. edit. 1557.

CATAL. Roy. and Noble Authors, vol. i. p. 105. edit. 1759.

been

been the cause of any vehement effufions of amorous panegyric. We may therefore fafely pronounce Elifabeth or Cicely to have been Surrey's favorite. It was probably Elifabeth, as she feems always to have lived in England.

Every circumstance of the fonnet evidently coincides with this state of the cafe. But, to begin with the first line, it will naturally be asked, what was lady Elifabeth Gerald's connection with Tuscany? The beginnings of noble families, like those of nations, often owe fomewhat to fictitious embellishment: and our genealogifts uniformly affert, that the family of Fitzgerald derives its origin from Otho, a defcendant of the dukes of Tuscany: that they migrated into England under the reign of king Alfred, whose annals are luckily too fcanty to contradict fuch an account, and were from England fpeedily transplanted into Ireland. Her father was an Irish earl, refident at his earldom of Kildare; and fhe was confequently born and nursed in Ireland. Her mother, adds the fonnet, was of princely parentage. Here is a no less exact correspondence with the line of the lady's pedigree: for Thomas, marquis of Dorset, was fon of queen Elisabeth Gray, daughter of the duchess of Bedford, defcended from the royal house of Luxemburgh. The poet acquaints us, that he first saw her at Hunfdon. This notice, which feems of an indifferent nature and quite extraneous to the queftion, abundantly corroborates our conjecture. Hundfdon-house

in Hertfordshire was a new palace built by Henry the eighth,. and chiefly for the purpose of educating his children. The lady Elifabeth Fitzgerald was fecond cousin to Henry's daughters the princeffes Mary and Elifabeth, who were both educated at Hunfdon f. At this royal nursery she therefore tafted of coftly foode with kinges childe, that is, lived while a girl with the young princeffes her relations, as a companion in their education. the fame time, and on the fame plan, our earl of Surrey refided at Windfor-castle, as I have already remarked, with the young

f Strype, EccL. MEM. vol. i. APPEND. Numb. 71.

At

duke

duke of Richmond. It is natural to suppose, that he sometimes vifited the princeffes at Hunfdon, in company with the young duke their brother, where he must have alfo feen the fair Geraldine: yet by the nature of his fituation at Windsor, which implied a degree of confinement, he was hindered from visiting her at Hunfdon so often as he wished. He therefore pathetically laments,

Windfor, alas, doth chase me from her fight!

But although the earl first beheld this lady at the palace of Hunfdon, yet, as we further learn from the fonnet, he was first ftruck with her incomparable beauty, and his paffion commenced, at Hampton-court.

Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine!

That is, and perhaps on occafion of some splendid masque or caroufal, when the lady Elifabeth Fitzgerald, with the princesses Mary and Elifabeth, and their brother Richmond, with the young lord Surrey, were invited by the king to Hampton-court.

In the mean time we must remember, that the lord Leonard Gray, uncle to lord Gerald Fitzgerald, was deputy of Ireland for the young duke of Richmond: a connection, exclufive of all that has been faid, which would alone account for Surrey's acquaintance at least with this lady. It is alfo a reason, to say no more, why the earl should have regarded her from the first with a particular attention, which afterwards grew into the most paffionate attachment. She is fuppofed to have been Maid of honour to queen Catharine. But there are three of Henry's queens of that name. For obvious reafons, however, we may venture to fay, that queen Catharine Howard was Geraldine's queen.

It is not precifely known at what period the earl of Surrey began his travels. They have the air of a romance. He made the tour of Europe in the true fpirit of chivalry, and with the

ideas of an Amadis; proclaiming the unparalleled charms of his mistress, and prepared to defend the cause of her beauty with the weapons of knight-errantry. Nor was this adventurous journey performed without the intervention of an enchanter. The first city in Italy which he proposed to vifit was Florence, the capital of Tuscany, and the original feat of the ancestors of his Geraldine. In his way thither, he paffed a few days at the emperor's court; where he became acquainted with Cornelius Agrippa, a celebrated adept in natural magic. This vifionary philofopher fhewed our hero, in a mirror of glass, a living image of Geraldine, reclining on a couch, fick, and reading one of his most tender fonnets by a waxen taper. His imagination, which wanted not the flattering representations and artificial incentives of illufion, was heated anew by this interesting and affecting spectacle. Inflamed with every enthusiasm of the most romantic paffion, he haftened to Florence: and, on his arrival, immediately published a defiance against any person who could handle a lance and was in love, whether Chriftian, Jew, Turk, Saracen, or Canibal, who fhould prefume to dispute the fuperiority of Geraldine's beauty. As the lady was pretended to be of Tuscan extraction, the pride of the Florentines was flattered on this occafion and the grand duke of Tuscany permitted a general and unmolested ingress into his dominions of the combatants of all countries, till this important trial fhould be decided. The challenge was accepted, and the earl victorious ". The shield which he prefented to the duke before the tournament began, is exhibited in Vertue's valuable plate of the Arundel family, and was actually in the poffeffion of the late duke of Norfolk'.

These heroic vanities did not, however, fo totally engross the time which Surrey spent in Italy, as to alienate his mind from letters: he studied with the greatest success a critical knowledge

g Drayton, HER. EPIST.-HOWARD to GERALDINE, V. 57.

h Wood, ubi fupr.

i Walpole, ANECD. PAINT. i. 76.

VOL. III.

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