Of selyness", whyche flyethe with the nyghte; ELINOUR. yn thoughte. Ah, woe-bementynge wordes; what wordes can fhowe! Thou limed river, on thie linche mai bleede Champyons, whose bloude wylle wythe thie waterres flowe, Hafte gentle Juga, trippe ytte o'ere the meade Or whythe oure fallen knyghte be menged onne the plain. Or twain of cloudes that holdeth stormie raine, Theie moved gentle o'ere the dewe mees 2; To where Seynête Albon's holie fhrynes remayne. There dyd theye finde that bothe their knyghtes were sleyne; Distraughte', theie wandered to fwollen Rudborne's fyde, Yelled theyre leathalle knelle, fonke in the waves and dyde. In a DIALOGUE, or ECLOGUE, fpoken by two ladies, are thefe lines. Sprytes of the blafte, the pious Nygelle fedde, To ken fyke' large a flete, fyke fyne, fyke breme *: The barkis heofods coupe the lymed "ftreme : Conteke' the dynninge ayre, and reche the skies. Sprytes of the blaste, on gouldenn trones aftedde, Powre oute your pleasaunce on mie fadres hedde! I am of opinion, that none of these pieces are genuine. The EXECUTION of SIR CHARLES BAUDWIN is now allowed to be modern, even by those who maintain all the other poems to be antient. The ODE TO ELLA, and the EPISTLE to Lydgate, with his ANSWER, were written on one piece of parchment; and, as pretended, in Rowlie's own hand. This was fhewn to an ingenious critic and intelligent antiquary of my acquaintance; who affures me, that the writing was a grofs and palpable forgery. It was not even skilfully counterfeited. The form of the letters, although artfully contrived to wear an antiquated appearance, differed very effentially from every one of our early alphabets. Nor were the characters uniform and confiftent: part of the same manuscript exhibiting some letters shaped "Polished. Bright. w Waters. * Oak. Ship. y Contend with. z Noify. a Reach, b Seated. It contains 98 ftanzas, and was printed at London, in the year 1772. 4to. I am told, that in the abovementioned cheft, belonging to Radcliffe-church, an antient Record was difcovered, containing the expences for Edward the fourth to fee the execution of fir Charles Baldwin; with a description of a canopy under which the king fate at this execution. This Record feems to have given rife to the poem. A bond which fir Charles Baldwin gave to king Henry the fixth, I fappofe about feizing the earl of Warwick, is faid to have been mentioned X in one of Rowlie's manufcripts, called the YELLOW ROLL, perhaps the fame, found in Cannynge's cheft, but now loft. See Stowe's CHRON. by Howes, edit. fol. 1615. p. 406. col. 2. And Speed's, p. 669. col. 2. edit. 1611. Stowe fays, that king Edward the fourth was at Bristol, on a progrefs through England, in the barveft feaJon of the year 1462. And that he was moft royally received. Ibid. p. 416. col. 2. Cannynge was then mayor of Bristol. Sir Charles Baldwin is faid to have been executed at Bristol, in the prefence of Edward the fourth, in the year 1463. MS. Wantn. Bibl. Bodl. ut fupr. The fame king was at Bristol, and lodged in faint Auguftine's abbey, in 1472, when he received a large gratuity from the citizens for carrying on the war against France. Wantner, ibid. according according to the prefent round hand, while others were traced in imitation of the antient court and text hands. The parchment was old; and that it might look still older, was stained on the outside with ochre, which was easily rubbed off with a linen cloth. Care had also been evidently taken to tincture the ink with a yellow caft. To communicate a stronger ftamp of rude antiquity, the ODE was written like profe: no diftinction, or termination, being made between the several verfes. Lydgate's ANSWER, which makes a part of this manufcript, and is written by the fame hand, I have already proved to be a manifest impofition. This parchment has fince been unfortunately loft. I have myfelf carefully examined the original manufcript, as it is called, of the little piece entitled, ACCOUNTE OF W. CanNYNGE'S FEAST. It is likewife on parchment, and, I am forry to say, that the writing betrays all the fufpicious fignatures which were observed in that of the ODE TO ELLA. I have repeatedly and diligently compared it with three or four authentic manufcripts of the time of Edward the fourth, to all which I have found it totally unlike. Among other smaller veftiges of forgery, which cannot be so easily described and explained here, at the bottom are added in ink two coats of arms, containing empalements of Cannynge and of his friends or relations, with family-names, apparently delineated by the fame pen which wrote the verses. Even the style and drawing of the armorial bearings discover the hand of a modern herald. This, I believe, is the only pretended original of the poetry of Rowlie, now remaining. d At the fame time, another manufcript on parchment, written, as pretended, by Rowlie, was fhewn to this gentleman: which, tallying in every refpect with the ODE to ELLA, plainly appeared to be forged, in the fame manner, and by the fame modern hand. It was in profe; and contained an account of Saxon coins, and the rife of coining in England, with a list of coins, poems, antient infcriptions, monuments, and other curiofities, in the cabinet of Cannynge abovementioned. This parchment is alfo loft; and, I believe, no copy remains. As As to internal arguments, an unnatural affectation of antient fpelling and of obfolete words, not belonging to the period affigned to the poems, ftrikes us at first fight. Of thefe old words combinations are frequently formed, which never yet existed in the unpolifhed ftate of the English language and sometimes the antiquated diction is most inartificially mifapplied, by an improper contexture with the prefent modes of speech. The attentive reader will alfo difcern, that our poet fometimes forgets his affumed character, and does not always act his part with confiftency: for the chorus, or interlude, of the damfel who drowns herself, which I have cited at length from the TRAGEDY of ELLA, is much more intelligible, and free from uncouth expreffions, than the general phrafeology of thefe compofitions. In the BATTLE OF HASTINGS, faid to be tranflated from the Saxon, Stonehenge is called a Druidical temple. The battle of Haftings was fought in the year 1066. We will grant the Saxon original to have been written foon afterwards: about which time, no other notion prevailed concerning this miraculous monument, than the fuppofition which had been delivered down by long and conftant tradition, that it was erected in memory of Hengift's maffacre. This was the established and uniform opinion of the Welsh and Armorican bards, who most probably received it from the Saxon minstrels: and that this was the popular belief at the time of the battle of Haftings, appears from the evidence of Geoffrey of Monmouth, who wrote his history not more than eighty years after that memorable event. And in this doctrine Robert of Gloucester and all the monkish chroniclers agree. That the Druids constructed this ftupendous pile for a place of worship, was a difcovery referved for the fagacity of a wifer age, and the laborious difcuffion of modern antiquaries. In the EPISTLE to Lydgate, prefixed to the TRAGEDY, our poet condemns the abfurdity and impropriety of the religious dramas, and recommends X 2 commends SOME GREAT STORY OF HUMAN MANNERS, as most suitable for theatrical representation. But this idea is the refult of that tafte and difcrimination, which could only belong to a more advanced period of fociety *. But, above all, the caft of thought, the complexion of the sentiments, and the structure of the composition, evidently prove thefe pieces not antient. The ODE TO ELLA, for inftance, has exactly the air of modern poetry; such, I mean, as is written at this day, only disguised with antique fpelling and phrafeology. That Rowlie was an accomplished literary character, a fcholar, an historian, and an antiquarian, if contended for, I will not deny'. Nor is it impoffible that he might write English poetry. But that he is the writer of the poems which I have here cited, and • It would be tedious and trifling to defcend to minute particulars. But I will mention one or two. In the ODE TO ELLA, the poet fuppofes, that the spectre of Ella fometimes appears in the mynfter, that is Briftol-cathedral. But when Rowlie is fuppofed to have lived, the present cathedral of Bristol was nothing more than an Auguftine monaftery, in which Henry the eighth established long afterwards a bishop, and a dean and chapter, in the year 1542. Minter is a word almoft appropriated to Cathedrals: and I will venture to fay, that the church of this monaftery, before the prefent foundation took place, never was called Bristol-minfter, or The minfter. The inattention to this circumstance, has produced another unfortunate anachronifm in fome of Rowlie's papers. Where, in his panegyric on Cannynge he fays, "The favouryte of godde, the fryende of "the chyrche, the companyonne of kynges, " and the fadre of hys natyve CITIE, the grete and good Wyllyamme Canynge." Briftol was never ftyled a CITY till the erection of its bishoprick in 1542. See Willis's NOTIT. PARLIAMENT. p. 43. Lond. 1750. See alfo king Henry's Patent for creating the bishoprick of Bristol, in Rymer, dat. Jun. 4. A. D. 1542. An. reg. 34. 66 Where the king orders, "Ac quod tota "Villa noftra Briftolliæ exnunc et deinceps "imperpetuum fit Civitas, ipfamque C1"VITATEM BRISTOLLIE appellari et "nominari, volumus et decernimus, &c." FOED. tom. xv. P. 749. Bristol was proclaimed a CITY, an. 35 Henr. viii. MS. Wantner, ut fupr. In which manuscript, to that period it is constantly called a town. The description of Cannynge's feast, is called an AccCOUNTE of CANNYNGE'S FEAST. I do not think, that fo early as the year 1470, the word Accounte had loft its literal and original fenfe of a computus, or computation, and was used in a loofer acceptation for narrative or detail. Nor had it even then loft its true fpelling accompt, in which its proper and primary fignification is preferved and implied. f He is also faid to have been an eminent mechanic and mathematician. I am informed, that one of Rowlie's manuscripts discovered in Cannynge's iron cheft, was a plan for fupporting the tower of the Temple-church in Bristol, which had greatly declined from its perpendicular. In a late reparation of that church, fome fubterraneous works were found, minutely corresponding with this manuscript. |