I was minded also to have sent you some English verses, or rymes, for a farewell; but, by 282 my troth, I have no spare time in the world to thinke on such toyes, that, you knowe, will demaund a freer head than mine is presently. I beseeche you by all your curtesies and graces, let me be answered ere I goe; which will be (I hope, I feare, I thinke) the next weeke, if I can be dispatched of my Lorde. I goe thither, as sent by him, and maintained most what of 290 him: and there am to employ my time, my body, my minde, to his Honours service. Thus, with many superhartie commendations and recommendations to your selfe, and all my friendes with you, I ende my last farewell, not thinking any more to write unto you before I goe: and withall committing to your faithfull credence the eternall memorie of our everlasting friendship, the inviolable memorie of our unspotted friendshippe, the sacred memorie of our 300 vowed friendship: which I beseech you continue with usuall writings, as you may, and of all things let me heare some newes from you: as gentle Master Sidney, I thanke his good worship, hath required of me, and so promised to doe againe. Qui monet, ut facias, quod jam facis, you knowe the rest. You may alwayes send them most safely to me by Mistresse Kerke, and by none other. So once againe, and yet once more, farewell most hartily, mine owne good Mas- 310 ter H., and love me, as I love you, and thinke upon poore Immerito, as he thinketh uppon you. Leycester House, this 5 [16?] of October, 1579. Per mare, per terras, Vivus mortuusque, Tuus Immerito. To my long approoved and singular good frende, Master G. H. GOOD MASTER H.: I doubt not but you have some great important matter in hande, which al this while restraineth your penne, and wonted readinesse in provoking me unto that wherein your selfe nowe faulte. If there bee any such thing in hatching, I pray you hartily, lette us knowe, before al the worlde see it. But if happly you dwell altogither in Justinians courte, and give your selfe to be devoured of secreate studies, as of all likelyhood you doe, yet at 10 least imparte some your olde or newe, Latine or Englishe, eloquent and gallant poesies to us, from whose eyes, you saye, you keepe in a manner nothing hidden. Little newes is here stirred: but that olde greate matter still depending. His Honoure never better. I thinke the earthquake was also there wyth you (which I would gladly learne) as it was here with us; overthrowing divers old buildings and peeces of churches. Sure verye straunge to be hearde 20 of in these countries, and yet I heare some saye (I knowe not howe truely) that they have knowne the like before in their dayes. Sed quid vobis videtur magnis philosophis? I like your late Englishe hexameters so exceedingly well, that I also enure my penne sometime in that kinde: whyche I fynd, indeede, as I have heard you often defende in worde, neither so harde, nor so harshe, that it will easily and fairely yeelde it selfe to oure moother tongue. For the onely 30 or chiefest hardnesse, whych seemeth, is in the accente: whyche sometime gapeth, and as it were yawneth ilfavouredly, comming shorte of that it should, and sometime exceeding the measure of the number: as in carpenter, the middle sillable being used shorte in speache, when it shall be read long in verse, seemeth like a lame gosling, that draweth one legge after hir: and heaven, beeing used shorte as one sillable, when it is in verse, stretched out with a diastole, 40 is like a lame dogge that holdes up one legge. But it is to be wonne with custome, and rough words must be subdued with use. For why, a Gods name, may not we, as else the Greekes, have the kingdome of oure owne language, and measure our accentes by the sounde, reserving the quantitie to the verse? Loe! here I let you see my olde use of toying in rymes, turned into your artificial straightnesse of verse by this tetrasticon. I beseech you tell me your 50 fancie, without parcialitie. See yee the blindefoulded pretie god, that feathered archer, Of lovers miseries which maketh his bloodie game? Wote ye why his moother with a veale hath coovered his face? Trust me, least he my loove happely chaunce to beholde. I would hartily wish, you would either send me the rules and precepts of arte which you observe in quantities, or else followe mine, that Master Philip Sidney gave me, being the very same which Master Drant devised, but enlarged with Master Sidneys own judgement, and augmented with my observations, that we might both accorde and agree in one: leaste we overthrowe one an other, and be overthrown of the rest. Truste me, you will hardly beleeve what 70 greate good liking and estimation Maister Dyer had of your Satyricall Verses, and I, since the viewe thereof, having before of my selfe had speciall liking of Englishe versifying, am even nowe aboute to give you some token, what and howe well therein I am able to doe: for, to tell you trueth, I minde shortely, at convenient leysure, to sette forth a booke in this kinde, whyche I entitle Epithalamion Thamesis, whyche booke I dare undertake wil be very 80 profitable for the knowledge, and rare for the invention and manner of handling. For in setting forth the marriage of the Thames, I shewe his first beginning, and offspring, and all the Countrey that he passeth thorough, and also describe all the rivers throughout Englande, whyche came to this wedding, and their righte names, and right passage, &c. A worke, beleeve me, of much labour: wherein, notwithstanding, Master Holinshed hath muche furthered and go advantaged me, who therein hath bestowed singular paines, in searching onte their firste heades and sourses, and also in tracing and dogging oute all their course, til they fall into the sea. O Tite, siquid ego, Ecquid erit pretij? But of that more hereafter. Nowe, my Dreames and Dying Pellicane being fully fin- 99 ished (as I partelye signified in my laste letters) and presentlye to bee imprinted, I wil in hande forthwith with my Faery Queene, whyche I praye you hartily send me with al expedition, and your frendly letters, and long expected judgement wythal, whyche let not be shorte, but in all pointes suche as you ordinarilye use and I extraordinarily desire. Multum vale. Westminster. Quarto Nonas Aprilis, 1580. Sed, amabo te, meum Corculum tibi se ex animo commendat plurimum: jamdiu mirata, te nihil 110 ad literas suas responsi dedisse. Vide, quæso, ne id tibi capitale sit: mihi certe quidem erit, neque tibi hercle impune, ut opinor. Iterum vale, et quam voles sæpe. Yours alwayes to commaunde, IMMERITO. Postscripte. I take best my Dreames shoulde come forth alone, being growen by meanes of the Glosse (running continually in maner of a paraphrase) full as great as my Calendar. Therin be some 120 things excellently, and many things wittily, discoursed of E. K. and the pictures so singularly set forth and purtrayed, as if Michael Angelo were there, he could (I think) nor amende the beste, nor reprehende the worst. I knowe you woulde lyke them passing wel. Of my Stemmata Dudleiana, and especially of the sundry apostrophes therein, addressed you knowe to whome, muste more advisement be had, 129 than so lightly to sende them abroade: how beit, trust me (though I doe never very well,) yet in my owne fancie, I never dyd better: Verun tamen te sequor solum: nunquam vero assequar. Extract from Harvey's Reply. But ever and ever, me thinkes your great Catoes Ecquid erit pretij, and our little Catoes Res age quae prosunt, make suche a buzzing and ringing in my head, that I have little joy to animate and encourage either you or him (his small brother] to goe forward, unlesse ye might make account of some certaine ordinarie wages, or at the leastwise have your meate and drinke for your dayes workes. As for my selfe, howsoever I have toyed and trifled heretofore, I 10 am now taught, and I trust I shall shortly learne (no remedie, I must of meere necessitie give you over in the playne fielde) to employ my travayle and tyme wholly or chiefely on those studies and practizes that carrie, as they saye, meate in their mouth, having evermore their eye uppon the title De pane lucrando, and their hand upon their halfpenny. For, I pray now, what saith Master Cuddie, alias you know who, in the tenth Eglogue of the foresaid famous new Cal- 20 ender? Piers, I have piped earst so long with payne, That all myne oten reedes been rent and wore, And my poore Muse hath spent her spared store, Yet little good hath got, and much lesse gayne, Such pleasaunce makes the grashopper so poore, And ligge so layde, when winter doth her strayne. 30 The dapper ditties, that I woont devize, But Master Collin Cloute is not every body, and albeit his olde companions, Master Cuddy and Master Hobbinoll, be as little beholding to their Mistresse Poetrie, as ever you wist, yet he peradventure, by the meanes of hir speciall favour, and some personall priviledge, may happely live by Dying Pellicanes, and purchase great 40 landes and lordshippes with the money, which his Calendar and Dreames have, and will affourde him. Extra jocum, I like your Dreames passingly well and the rather, bicause they savour of that singular extraordinarie veine and invention, whiche I ever fancied moste, and in a manner admired onelye in Lucian, Petrarche, Aretine, Pasquill, and all the most delicate and fine conceited Grecians and Italians: (for the Romanes to speake of are but verye ciphars in 50 this kinde :) whose chiefest endevour and drifte was, to have nothing vulgare, but, in some respecte or other, and especially in lively hyperbolicall amplifications, rare, queint, and odde in every pointe, and, as a man woulde saye, a degree or two, at the leaste, above the reache and compasse of a common schollers capacitie. In whiche respecte notwithstanding, as well for the singularitie of the manner as the divinitie of the matter, I hearde once a divine preferre 60 Saint Johns Revelation before al the veriest metaphysicall visions and jollyest conceited dreames or extasies that ever were devised by one or other, howe admirable or superexcellent soever they seemed otherwise to the worlde. And truely I am so confirmed in this opinion, that when I bethinke me of the verie notablest and moste wonderful propheticall or poeticall vision that ever I read, or hearde, me seemeth the proportion is so unequall, that there hardly appeareth anye semblaunce of comparison: no 71 more in a manner (specially for poets) than doth betweene the incomprehensible wisedome of God and the sensible wit of man. But what needeth this digression betweene you and me? I dare saye you wyll holde your selfe reasonably wel satisfied, if youre Dreames be but as well esteemed of in Englande as Petrarches Visions be in Italy: whiche, I assure you, is the very 79 worst I wish you. But see how I have the arte memorative at commaundement. In good faith, I had once again nigh forgotten your Faerie Queene: how beit, by good chaunce, I have nowe sent hir home at the laste, neither in better nor worse case than I founde hir. And must you of necessitie have my judgement of hir in deede? To be plaine, I am voyde of al judgement,if your Nine Comadies, wherunto, in imitation of Herodotus, you give the names of the nine Muses, (and in one mans fansie not unworthily), 90 come not neerer Ariostoes comedies, eyther for the finenesse of plausible elocution, or the rarenesse of poetical invention, than that Elvish Queene doth to his Orlando Furioso, which, notwithstanding, you wil needes seeme to emulate, and hope to overgo, as you flatly professed your self in one of your last letters. Besides that you know, it hath bene the usual practise of the most exquisite and odde wittes in all nations, and specially in Italie, rather to shewe 100 and advaunce themselves that way, than any other as namely, those three notorious dyscoursing heads, Bibiena, Machiavel, and Aretine did, (to let Bembo and Ariosto passe,) with the great admiration and wonderment of the whole countrey: being, in deede, reputed matchable in all points, both for conceyt of witte, and eloquent decyphering of matters, either with Aristophanes and Menander in Greek, or with Plautus and Terence in Latin, or with any 110 other in any other tong. But I wil not stand greatly with you in your owne matters. If so be the Faerye Queene be fairer in your eie than the Nine Muses, and Hobgoblin runne away with the garland from Apollo, marke what I saye: and yet I will not say that I thought, but there an end for this once, and fare you well, till God or some good aungell putte you in a better minde. A LIST OF REJECTED READINGS For the various publications of Spenser the following texts have been adopted as standard: - Whenever a reading given by these texts has been departed from, it is recorded in the following list, together with the substitute adopted. Other variants are ignored, except for incidental purposes; as are evident misprints (unless these have some glimmering of sense or the support of another editor) and (except occasionally) changes in punctuation. In each case, the first reading given is that which has been adopted, the second is that which has been rejected. It should be remembered that different copies of the same edition not infrequently give different readings. It may well be, therefore, that the present list will be found to conflict here and there with others more authoritative. Such differences will hardly be of importance, except for bibliographical controversy. PAGE THE SHEPHEARDES CALENDER [Quartos of 1581 & 1536 not collated.] 6 Epistle 157. it (1591, 1597). Omitted 1579. 7 235. sc. Substituted here and elsewhere for obsolete s. of old editions. 8 Generall Argument 13. more shepherds then (1597): 1579 =most shepheard's and. 8 42. containe (1597): 1579= conceive. 8 96. Abib. Old editions = Abil. 16 March 4. nigheth (1611): 1579, 1591, 1597= 25 Maye 150. saye (1597): 1579 = sayd. 34 Emblems. Thomalins. Palinodes. Old editions = 34 Glosse 38. a Dane. Old editions by confusion with next line. 37 August 84. thy (1597): 1579= my. the Dane, 37 104. curelesse. Collier's emendation for carelesse of old editions. 41 September 145. yeed. 1579, 1591, 1597= 43 Glosse 59. The dates are omitted in old 46 October Glosse 68. Arcadian. 1579= Ara- 52 November Glosse 89. signe (1591, 1597). 53 December 29. recked (1611): 1579 wreaked. 53 43. derring doe (v. Glosse 13). 1579 derring to. 55 Emblem. Vivitur, etc. Not in any of the 78 Teares of the Muses 600. living (1611): 1591 =loving. 85 Virgils Gnat 406. fluttering (1611): 1591= flattering, which is contradicted by fou lie them upbraydes. 86 511. Rhatean (1611): 1591 Rhetoan. The 87 575. billowes. Old editions = billowe, but 91 Mother Hubberds Tale 87. worldes (1611): 1591 worlds. Cf. Ruines of Time 675, Epithalamion 290. 94 308. winges. Old editions = wings. Cf. 1. 87. 98 648. at all. 1591 drops at. 103 1025. lord. Old editions = lords. 108 Ruines of Rome IV, 6. The old giants. 1591 =Th'old giants; 1611=The giants old. In Spenser's text, the is often, before a vowel, contracted to th', when the metre unmistakably demands the full form. Cf. F. Q. Bk. V, c. iii, st. 11. 111 xv, 14. To have become. 1591 To become; 1611 (in attempted emendation of metre) Now to become. The French N'estre plus rien' suggests the reading adopted. = 136 A Letter of the Authors. Together with the Commendatory Verses and the Dedicatory Sonnets, this letter is placed, in 1590, at the close of the volume, for the reason that it was written while the work was in press, as the date 'January, 1589' (modern style 1590) denotes. In 1596, when the enlarged poem appeared in two volumes, the letter and the verses were left where they had been, at the close of the first. It has seemed better to follow modern usage by placing them at the outset. 137 162. vi. Ephes. Old editions = v. Ephes. 145 Bk. I, c. i, st. 4, 1. 5 f. For the colon after throw the early editions give a comma, and for the comma after mournd a colon. The interchange adopted makes better sense. For the use of a colon between strictly correlative clauses, see c. iv, st. 16, where the early editions give one after call (1, 5). 148 st. 28. passed (1590): 1596=passeth. 156 c. ii, st. 29. him thither (1590): 1596 drops him. 157 st. 40. unweeting (1590): 1596 = unweening. 163 c. iii, st. 34. spurd (1590): 1596=spurnd. 166 c. iv, st. 12. a queene (1590): 1596 drops a. realme (1590): 1596= realmes. 166 st. 16. glitterand (1590): 1596=glitter and. 167 st. 20, 1. 3. From (1590): 1596 For. 171 c. v, st. 1. did he (1590): 1596 drops he. 176 st. 41. nigh weary (1590): 1596=high weary. 180 c. vi, st. 15. Or Bacchus (1590): 1596 = Õƒ Bacchus. 191 c. vii, st. 48. yee (1590): 1596=you. A typical example of numerous variants in 1596. It is simply inconceivable that, having once written yee, Spenser should have substituted, deliberately, you, which half spoils the line. 195 c. viii, st. 21. his forces (Church). Old editions their forces. 196 st. 27. equali eye (1590): 1596=equall eyes. Cf. c. ix, st. 47. 198 st. 41. and helmets (1590): 1596 drops and. PAGE 198 st. 44. dislike. Old editions delight, which spoils the obvious sense of the passage, and which was obviously caught from the preceding line. The substitute was suggested by Daniel's Delia liv: 'Like as the lute delights or else dislikes, As is his art that plays upon the same, etc.' 201 c. ix, st. 18. as pledges (1590): 1596=the pledges. 206 st. 53. feeble (1590): 1596= seely. 209 c. x, st. 20. Dry-shod. tway. This line first appears in the folio of 1609. 211 st. 36. Their gates (1609): 1590, 1596= There gates. call in commers by. 1590, 1596= call incommers by. 213 st. 50. quoth she (1590): 1596=quoth he. 214 st. 52. Brings (1609): 1590, 1596= Bring. 215 st. 61. peaceably thy (1590): 1596= peaceably to thy. 215 st. 62. they' are (1590): 1596 drops they'. 215 st. 64. doen nominate (1590): 1596=doen then nominate. 217 c. xi, st. 8. vaste (1590): 1596=wast. 220 st. 27. vaunt (1590): 1596=daunt. 221 st. 37. yelled (1609): 1590,1596=yelded. This and several other misprints have been recorded only because they are deliberately adopted by Dr. Grosart. 223 st. 51. the deawy (1590): 1596= her deawy. 226 c. xii, st. 16. pleasure (1590): 1596=plea 236 st. 40. 236 st. 44. avenging (1590): 1596= revenging, a change that clogs the verse. 238 st. 59. equall (1590): 1596 = evill. 240 c. ii, st. 7. pray (Collier). Old editions = chace, caught from the line below. 240 st. 9. whose (1590): 1596=those. 242 st. 21. cald (1590): 1596= calth. 242 st. 23. boldly (1590): 1596=bloudy. 243 st. 28. their champions. 1590 her champions; 1596=their champion. 244 st. 34. thought her. 1590=though ther; 1596 =thought their. 244 st. 40. peaceably (1590): 1596=peaceable. 245 st. 42. hold. For rhyme. 'Old editions = make. |