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 CHAUCER 
 
 SPENSER 
 
 SIDNEY 
 
 BY 
 
 GERTRUDE H. ELY 
 
 •W 
 
 fv^^ 
 
 NEW YORK AND CHICAGO 
 
 E. L KELLOGG & -CO, 
 

 Copyright, 1894, 
 
 BY 
 
 Gertrude H. Ely. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
TO MY CHILDREN j 
 
 AND j 
 
 THEIR FATHER i 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following notes made from many sources were 
 first suggested by an invalid mother and written for 
 her diversion. Later they took name and form 
 through the reading of " Plutarch for Boys and Girls " 
 and Morley's " English Men of Letters," while the 
 interest centred entirely in the home circle. 
 
 Through the urgency of William L. Stone, the his- 
 torian, they are being prepared for more general use ; 
 and one little volume is sent forth aided by the good 
 wishes, not only of Mr. Stone, but of Mrs. Fellows, 
 Mrs. Richard Grant White, Hon. Smith Ely, Mr. Am- 
 brose K. Ely, Mrs. Hunt, Mrs. Charles Caldwell, Mrs. 
 C. F. Allan, Miss Hasbrouck, Mr. and Mrs. Senff, 
 Hon. M. H. Hirschberg, Mr. and Mrs. O. M. Cleve- 
 land, Miss M. E. Salisbury, Miss Dora M. Townsend, 
 and others who have kindly read these narratives in 
 manuscript ; and also of Miss Mary L. Hagar, who 
 has assisted in preparing them for publication. 
 
 G. H. E. 
 
 March 15, 1895, 
 
 4 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Definition of letters — Chaucer's birth — Marriage — 
 Early translations — " The Romance of the Rose " 
 — Influence of foreign travel — Minor poems — 
 Elegy to the Duchess Blanche — '* Flower and 
 Leaf " — " Canterbury Tales " i 
 
 SPENSER. 
 
 Period from Chaucer to Spenser, 1400 to 1553 — Cov- 
 ering reigns of Henry IV., V., and VI., Edwards 
 IV. and v., Richard III., Henrys VII. and VIII., 
 Edward VI., Wyckliffe— Wars of the Roses— The 
 Pretenders — Columbus and the Cabots — Luther 
 and the Reformation — Gower — James I. — Caxton 
 — More — Tyndale's Bible— Latimer — Early play- 
 writers — Ascham — Customs of the time. 
 
 Spenser's family, — His childhood — Years at Cam- 
 bridge — Contributions to the Miscellany — Harvey 
 and Kirke — " Widow's daughter " — First poems 
 — Shepherd's calendar — Secretaryship in Ireland 
 — Grant of Kilcolman — Friendship with Raleigh 
 — " Colin Clout's Come Home Again " — Pension 
 
 5 
 
6 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 from Elizabeth — First three books of the " Faerie 
 Queene " printed — Miscellaneous poems — Mar- 
 riage — Plan of the " Faerie Queene " — Return to 
 London and Death 37 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 Bfl'th — Social position— School life— Oxford — Visit 
 to the Continent — Hubert Languet — Return to 
 England — L ady Penelope Devereu x — Misfor- 
 tunes of his parents — Mission to Hapsburg and 
 the Palatinate — Opposition to the Queen's Mar- 
 riage — The " Academy " — " Arcadia " — Public 
 services — Marriage — " Astrophel and Stella " — 
 " Defense of Poesy " — Sonnet to " Sleep " — The 
 end at Zutphen ^^ 
 
ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS 
 
 FOR BOYS AND GIRLS. 
 
 GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 
 
 All stories are founded on fact, from '* Rollo" 
 and " Lucy " to " Little Lord Fauntleroy '' and 
 " Sarah Crewe." They are suggested by some 
 Hfe that has shed its brightness within the cir- 
 cle of the author's notice, and from it is woven 
 a lesson of profit or pleasure for the use of oth- 
 ers. I want you to know about English men of 
 letters, and as you are too young to read them 
 in the words of the accomplished men who 
 wrote some of the books upon the library 
 shelves, I will tell you about them in my own 
 words, and we will call them " English Men of 
 Letters for Boys and Girls." Then let us leave 
 your story-book heroes behind, and take into 
 our hearts, instead, these real beings, who first 
 
 7 
 
8 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 as boys, and then as men, have brought so much 
 abiding good to us, because they were such 
 wide-awake, wholesome, manly fellows, with 
 eyes and heads that, like cameras, were con- 
 stantly making plates for future development, 
 and were such wonderful word-painters that 
 they have preserved for us sketches of how 
 people lived, thought, loved, and died in those 
 long-past days. Then, too, we must not forget 
 bright, busy boys of our own time who grew 
 to be publishers of books, and we must thank 
 them also for the clear type and well-bound 
 volumes that make it so easy for me to read 
 each night a chapter upon which to found the 
 morrow's tale. 
 
 We will begin with the first writer that we 
 can understand, for the English language that 
 we speak was in early times so different from 
 that of to-day that only scholars who have 
 studied it very closely can read what was writ- 
 ten before the time of Geoffrey Chaucer. And 
 we will also try to understand what is meant by 
 English men of letters. 
 
 Letters or literature is what men either know 
 or have learned, or imagined, carefully pre- 
 served in the form of writing, making thereby 
 a treasury of ancient and modern languages, 
 grammar, logic, rhetoric, poetry and history 
 from which we can draw aid and test the strength 
 of our own thoughts. Men of letters com- 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 9 
 
 prise all who devote themselves either to the 
 study of any one of these subjects or, in a gen- 
 eral way, to many topics. We will define some 
 of these subjects, and, understanding them, will 
 notice what these writers most excelled in, and 
 how they are going to help us. 
 
 Grammar is a number of rules or principles 
 by means of which there comes a form of speech 
 that is accepted as correct for writing and 
 speaking ; and while all languages are built upon 
 a general plan alike, each having words that 
 stand for things, and others for action, and still 
 others for the description of both action and 
 things, yet each language has points peculiar 
 to itself and its people ; and just as people grow 
 and improve, and accumulate property and 
 treasures, so their language keeps pace with 
 their prosperity and changes too : and that is 
 why I want to follow these writers in succes- 
 sion according to time, instead of taking those 
 whom you would be most interested in at first, 
 for I particularly want you to note the changes 
 in the manner of writing and expressing 
 thought. 
 
 Logic teaches us how the mind acts when 
 arguing a given point, and it also teaches how 
 to guide the mind when trying to find a true 
 reason. I see that you are greatly surprised 
 to find that there is such a science, which if 
 you could study very early in life would make 
 
lo ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 you all very modest in the expression of your 
 opinions, for it is the art of reasoning, not simply 
 to find any reason, but to find a true reason. 
 
 Rhetoric in a general way can be understood 
 as fine writing in prose ; descriptions that ex- 
 cite our feelings in some particular manner, 
 such as emotions of patriotism or reverence. 
 In a more exact way it means the art of address- 
 ing public gatherings in a manner to excite in- 
 tense interest or to gain certain advantages, 
 especially over those of an opposite opinion. 
 
 Poetry is a composition of a purely imagina- 
 tive kind, written in rhyme or measured lines 
 called metre, and designed to give pleasure, to 
 arouse tender sympathies, to express religious 
 sentiments. In all cases its duty is to present 
 thoughts that will not tire the reader, and 
 ought to have some good end in view : which 
 I have no doubt those poets who sing the 
 praises of ivory soap and sapolio and many 
 other advertised articles feel that they have ac- 
 complished. But the poetry that I mean is 
 like the " Children's Hour " and " The Building 
 of the Ship " and others that you love to re- 
 peat, which will outlive us all, and be repeated 
 by many generations of boys and girls as far 
 into the future as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales 
 come to us from the past. 
 
 And all these arts that I have been defin- 
 ing have combined to aid the scholar whose 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. il 
 
 life is spent in recording facts past and present 
 about nations, states, and people, either as 
 a whole or as individuals ; and such writing 
 we call history. There is a history of ani- 
 mals, vegetables, and minerals, known as nat- 
 ural history, while that of individual men is 
 called biography. Thus armed with an un- 
 derstanding that should help your interest, we 
 will find what can be gleaned from our histo- 
 ries about Chaucer that will not be too hard for 
 you to follow and remember. 
 
 Not much can be said about his childhood 
 because there has always been great uncer- 
 tainty as to the time of his birth, although it is 
 known that he died October 25th, 1400. He 
 spoke of himself as '' hoar and round of shape," 
 and thus we know that his hair was gray and 
 he was stout. There are many allusions in his 
 time by which we can infer that he lived to a 
 fairly good old age. 
 
 Man's allotted time of threescore years and 
 ten would place his birth at 1330 or thereabout, 
 and we know that he lived partly in the reign 
 of King Edward the Third, and partly under 
 King Richard the Second. We also presume 
 that he was born in London, and we will try to 
 imagine what London might have had to in- 
 terest an unusually bright boy, what games 
 he could have played, what kind of clothes he 
 wore, and how he came to be a writer. Eng- 
 
12 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 land's population may have been four or five 
 millions during Chaucer's childhood, because 
 after having been decreased four times by a 
 pestilential disease called the Black Death, that 
 must have been far worse than the cholera or 
 yellow fever of our times, we are told that 
 all England contained about two and a half 
 millions, and that London had about 35,000 in- 
 habitants. 
 
 We know that Windsor Castle, or that part 
 of it which marks it in a moment, the great 
 Round Tower, was built by Edward the Third, 
 and it will be a pleasant thought to picture a 
 sturdy little boy in doublet and hose, and long, 
 pointed shoes, as watching the great mass of 
 masonry rising against the sky, and he may like 
 many others have wondered that anything so 
 grand at a distance could look so rough near 
 by. We will think that he ran about the streets 
 of London, perhaps not with his hands in his 
 pockets, because we do not know whether 
 doublets had pockets for his hands to go in. 
 But I am sure you will think that life withheld 
 much from him if there was no way by which 
 acorns, stones, apples, or nuts could be kept 
 ready for use. We cannot imagine twine and 
 fish-hooks, nails, screws, and old pocket-knives 
 well powdered with cracker-crumbs and glued 
 together by contact with molasses candy, be- 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 13 
 
 cause we are not at all sure that little boys had 
 such blessings in those days. 
 
 His heart must have been touched by the 
 sad sights of the plague, although it is said that 
 onl}^ twice does he refer to it in his writings ; 
 once, that might easily have described it in 
 any other country, and once through a humor- 
 ous description of a doctor, in which he shows 
 how powerless medical men were in those days, 
 for they believed in all sorts of charms and 
 superstitious signs — the remnants of which 
 have come even into our own day, to judge by 
 the many useless farces that are called cures. 
 
 The river Thames must have been most de- 
 lightful in that early period, winding peacefully 
 in and out, all unsuggestive of the great events 
 that were to be chronicled about its shores and 
 its own flowing surface. The little author must 
 have been unconsciously refined by the balmy 
 spring days, and by the lessons that nature is 
 ever ready to teach those who will learn to 
 read her open book. He must have loved the 
 birds in the leafy shelters of the trees, old even 
 then, that shaded the banks of this historic 
 river, and he doubtless knew the luxury of 
 sporting in its cool waters by many a venture- 
 some dive and swim. Thus we could go on 
 making his boy life seem real, and yet we know 
 nothing about him until he asserts himself in 
 the full strength of manhood, by startling the 
 
14 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 world with both poetry and prose so full and 
 enjoyable that all to whom the privilege of 
 education had been granted were amazed and 
 delighted. We can picture for him no school 
 life, no college life, and yet he was an accom- 
 plished man at early maturity. 
 
 Surnames were then as often used to desig- 
 nate a trade or a profession as for the identity 
 of any particular family, and so even his name 
 of Chaucer might have meant a shoemaker. 
 The poet's grandfather, Richard le Chaucer, 
 may or may not have plied that trade. 
 
 Richard was a resident of London, and both 
 he and his son John were vintners or wine-mer- 
 chants, and so you can infer that Geoffrey was 
 not brought up to believe in temperance socie- 
 ties : and yet in one of his tales he makes a 
 protest against drunkenness, so we are glad to 
 think that it had done him but little harm. His 
 father's name was John and his mother's Agnes, 
 and they owned a house in London. I say 
 they owned, but as I do not know what a wife's 
 right of dowry was in those days it probably 
 belonged to John. If it had before marriage 
 been the property of Agnes, after marriage 
 John doubtless called it his. I draw your at- 
 tention to these little matters, because you are 
 my listeners and not the readers of history, and 
 because we are constantly rejoicing in the priv- 
 ilege of living now instead of then. This home 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 15 
 
 was not far from a great bridge over which 
 travellers went on their way to the southern 
 road, and some believe that through early ob- 
 servation of the travel that continually passed 
 he conceived the plan for his Canterbury Tales 
 when he commenced his career as a writer. 
 
 Geoffrey Chaucer's father must have had 
 enough means or influence to attract royal 
 notice, for he is mentioned in connection with 
 the royal household, and must have been 
 charged with some responsibiiity, because he 
 was one of the king's retinue or followers when 
 Edward theThird and his Queen, Philippa, made 
 an important journey into Flanders and Ger- 
 many ; and you can see that if young Geoffrey's 
 parents were prosperous enough to hold a 
 court position, it is easy to infer that they were 
 both eager to give their son all possible advan- 
 tage, and they were certainly in a position to 
 do so. He may thus have had opportunities to 
 study without attending the universities then 
 established, in which case there could be no 
 record of how his mind had become properly 
 trained. 
 
 Supposing him to have been born in 1330, 
 we find that in 1357 he is recorded as attached 
 to the household of Prince Lionel, King Ed- 
 ward's third son, and his wife, the Princess 
 Elizabeth of Ulster ; and it was doubtless as a 
 page in that princess's expedition into France 
 
i6 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 that he must have been taken a prisoner, as 
 there is a document of ransom dated in 1360, 
 wherein King Edward Third contributes six- 
 teen pounds towards Chaucer's release. 
 
 Seven years after, the records show that he 
 had left the service of his earliest friends, or, 
 as is more proper to say, his patrons, the 
 Princess Elizabeth being dead, and her hus- 
 band, now the Duke of Clarence, appointed 
 Governor of Ireland ; but he was evidently re- 
 tained by King Edward himself as valet of the 
 king's chamber, and his salary is stated as 
 twenty marks a year for life. 
 
 Thus closely attendant upon royalty, he 
 must have acquired courtesy of manner : for, no 
 matter how rough the sovereign may be, and 
 doubtless their ways would greatly shock us 
 to-day, still the habit of continual respect of 
 speech and conduct carries with it the charm 
 of gentle reserve and strength if it be tem- 
 pered by a pure heart and lofty thoughts, and 
 sinks into despicable fawning and deceit where 
 only selfish interest actuates the holder of such 
 a position. 
 
 There is much discussion about Chaucer's 
 marriage, and so little certainty as to who his 
 wife was, that but little need be said, and yet 
 writers have evidently spent more time trying 
 to find fault with her than in singing possible 
 praises to the poor woman. Certain melan- 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 17 
 
 choly lines in Chaucer's verses that might easily 
 have been about some imaginary subject, or 
 simply to make his lines sound well, lead them 
 to think tjiat Chaucer was not happily married. 
 It does not occur to them that men with their 
 brains busy weaving fictitious characters might 
 not prove very painstaking husbands, and as 
 women then rarely had as much education 
 as the men, his wife Philippa, as she is called, 
 may not have had much interest in common 
 with him. Then, too, we are told that she drew 
 ten marks a year as lady in waiting to the 
 queen, which shows that she did something 
 toward the support of herself, and she may have 
 had duties so arduous as to render domestic 
 interests not always possible. Appointments 
 like that were sometimes imperative, and 
 alw^ays considered so desirable that all other 
 claims were laid aside to meet the dubious and 
 ofttimes dangerous honors that kings and 
 queens thus bestowed. At any rate we will 
 differ from the writers and think tenderly of 
 her, until we have plenty of time in later years 
 to read more about her, because it ^vill be 
 nicer to imagine her proud of her brilliant 
 husband, who came in time to be called " The 
 Father of English Poetry," than that she was 
 indifferent to the honors she must thus have 
 shared. 
 
 People rarely commence as authors by writ- 
 
1 8 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 ing- their own thoughts, just as girls and boys 
 try sewing for dolls and whittling flat boats 
 before they venture to follow the dictates of 
 their own taste in dress, or shape a graceful 
 boat of their own design. And so we find 
 Chaucer translating from the French poets 
 long and fanciful poems which he is said in 
 places to have altered to suit his own fancy 
 or the circumstances of his surroundings, that 
 it might better please English readers, for in 
 those days it was not wise to incur the dis- 
 pleasure of kmgs and queens. 
 
 Ever since the time of William the Con- 
 queror, who came, as you know, from Nor- 
 mandy and brought his French courtiers with 
 him, French had been spoken at court and by 
 all cultivated people. Poor prisoners had been 
 tried and condemned in that tongue, often 
 when they could not understand a word of the 
 justice that was supposed to ensue, and it was 
 only in 1363 that the English language had 
 been restored to courts of justice and ordered 
 for general use. Of course it came back much 
 changed, having been softened by the addition 
 of many French words, and we find it a 
 medium for Chaucer's genius, so nearly like 
 our own English of to-day that it is not at all 
 hard to read. 
 
 Just like the young swimmer who keeps 
 near the shore, Chaucer tried to fit his mother 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 19 
 
 tongue to other people's thoughts for a founda- 
 tion, before he struck out into the deep waters 
 of his own conceptions, and he often had to 
 keep some French word or ending of a word 
 that he was sure would be understood to make 
 his lines complete. Talented and popular he 
 certainly was, and, his genius early attracting 
 the notice of King Edward Third, he soon be- 
 came a great favorite at that brilliant court, 
 where it is generally believed that he met his 
 wife, who though she left scarcely any record 
 of herself, was doubtless a younger sister of the 
 wife of the Duke of Lancaster, generally known 
 as John of Gaunt, and thus Chaucer obtained 
 the support of a powerful family, the Lancas- 
 trians, and his fortunes seem to have ebbed and 
 flowed with theirs. Besides his courtly ac- 
 complishments, his mind was greatly strength- 
 ened by foreign travel, and as, on those travels, 
 he was always charged with some commission 
 for his government, he had the broadest op- 
 portunities held out to him, by being thus 
 thrown mto contact with the courtiers and 
 distmguished people of the countries that he 
 visited, and his writings soon began to show 
 the influence that all such privileges gave him. 
 Particularly did he profit by a commission of 
 great state importance at Genoa, given him by 
 Edward in 1372, for it was during that time 
 that he became acquainted with Petrarch, a 
 
20 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 most learned and wonderful poet of his day, 
 and also with Boccaccio, a writer of equally 
 lasting fame. 
 
 On his return, having stored his mind well 
 with gems of richest thought, as well as having 
 brought to a successful completion that task 
 with which he was charged, he was continued 
 in the favor of his king by being appointed 
 Controller of the Customs of Wines and Wools, 
 and the income, or revenue, as it is called, from 
 that ofhce, together with a pension that was 
 granted to him, must have given him a substan- 
 tial support. /With the ofhce of Controller of 
 Customs and Wools added to his court position 
 he must have been daily thrown in contact 
 with foreign and domestic manufacturers and 
 merchants of all classes and perhaps many 
 countries, from which he has drawn the varied 
 pictures of life, from the highest to the lowest, 
 and to that observation of the humors, opinions, 
 and even the speech of such a variety of char- 
 acters is due the great value of his Canterbury 
 Tales, giving as they do descriptions of the 
 usages and customs, of the social, business, cler- 
 ical, and political life of his time^ And were it 
 not for those very wonderful tales, we could 
 never have known how much like humanity 
 was in those far-off years, to our own weak 
 selves of to-day. 
 
 As I have said, Chaucer began by translat- 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 21 
 
 ing- before he wrote entirely with original 
 thought. There was a very popular poen^ 
 called " Romance of the Rose," written by a 
 French poet, and it became a great favorite, so 
 that in every country where the French lan- 
 guage was understood it was known and ad- 
 mired, and many other poems were written in 
 the same style. Heretofore, battles, crusades, 
 tournaments, and all the exciting details of war 
 had been the principal subjects written upon, 
 and after that, fables, or allegories in which 
 beasts and birds and even precious stones were 
 given speech ; and satires, which are witty 
 writings that expose follies and vices, and also 
 humorous stories of a more kindly nature, were 
 composed, after the fashion of ^sop's fables, 
 with which you are familiar, only these objects 
 were made the characters in quite long stories. 
 This Frenchman took instead the Rose for a 
 heroine, and grouping around that queen flower 
 other blossoms and naming them after good 
 and evil spirits, such as Mirth, Gladness, Com- 
 pany, Love, Despair, Hatred, Villainy, Old Age 
 and many others, he wrote a tale that was to 
 contain twenty-two thousand verses, and when 
 about one fifth was written the poet died, and 
 who could wonder ! I am sure a coroner's in- 
 quest to-day would have decided that he killed 
 himself with verse ! Another Frenchman took 
 the unfinished work and wrote not only the full 
 
22 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 quota but much more, turning a simple and 
 kindly meant romance into a severe satire, par- 
 ticularly against the Church, as well as many 
 social customs. Chaucer was a fearless fellow 
 to attack such a work as that to translate, and 
 he must have done it to practice himself in the 
 use of his own language. He had the good 
 taste to cut down the first part very much and 
 in the latter part he took the liberty of altering 
 it, as well as cutting it still more, appljang his 
 genius in such a manner as to produce a poem 
 most acceptable to English readers, and open- 
 ing for himself a ready acceptance of his own 
 more gifted verses. In the translation he re- 
 tained French names and places, and helped 
 himself to a rhyme by a French word, and" 
 sometimes put in an illustration of his own. 
 He compares a bachelor to the lord's son at 
 Windsor, and, as a hit at a recent Irish law that 
 had been passed, he called the character 
 " Wicked Tongue," an Irishman. He was very 
 careful not to translate some of the criticisms 
 passed upon kings and their counsellors, which 
 shows how much tact he had, as well as loyalty 
 to the interests of his noble patron, King 
 Edward. 
 
 John of Gaunt, whose wife Blanche we be- 
 lieve to be a sister of Chaucer's wife, was 
 nearly Chaucer's age, and they appear to have 
 been very good friends. After ten years of 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 23 
 
 married life the Duchess Blanche died, and, be- 
 side many services at the grave, an elegy, 
 which is a funeral song or poem, was composed 
 by Chaucer, probably at the Duke's request, 
 setting forth her virtues, and it was doubtless 
 Chaucer's first entirely original composition. 
 In those times poetry descriptive of persons 
 was always disguised, that is, it was never made 
 a direct address, and the way in which Chaucer 
 sings the praises of this greatly mourned wife 
 is this : 
 
 He, the poet, represents himself as having 
 fallen asleep while reading a classical poem 
 upon the parting by death of two devoted 
 lovers, and dreamed as follows : That while 
 sleeping late one morning he was awakened by 
 the singing of birds, the sound of a hunt with 
 its neighing horses, barking of dogs and blow- 
 ing of horns ; and he, too, rises and joins the 
 sport, not as a participant, but as a witness to 
 the hunt. After the deer is started he is at- 
 tracted by a dog, who entices him, by the vari- 
 ous devices of a faithful animal, to a lonely spot, 
 where he finds a knight dressed all in black and 
 bowed with grief. He succeeds by his sympa- 
 thetic words in winning the confidence of this 
 mourner, who freely tells him of the great 
 beauty and charming character of the wife from 
 whom death has parted him. And Chaucer 
 puts into the mouth of the bereaved husband 
 
24 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 the most beautiful and lifelike picture of 
 maidenhood and dignified womanhood known 
 iu our language, which has been the model for 
 many a poem of later aspirants to fame. 
 
 In the opening lines of this poem Chaucer 
 speaks of his own love for books — of his prefer- 
 ence for their company to any pursuit of pleas- 
 ure, and often in other writings does he confirm 
 the taste he thus confesses. And just here we 
 shall find the key to the success of all these men 
 whom we are to think a great deal about in the 
 coming days. 
 
 Before I give you a description of " Canter- 
 bury Tales " that will enable you to understand 
 when you see them referred to, I want to tell 
 you that Chaucer wrote other poems of equal 
 merit. " The Romance of the Rose " I have 
 related. " Troilus and Creseide " sings of love 
 and its various fortunes. He calls it a " Littel 
 Tragedie," and, although pathetic and simple, it 
 is very tedious. 
 
 " The Temple of Fame " displays a certain 
 superficial knowledge of astronomy, which im- 
 pression is removed by a treatise which he 
 calls " On the Astrolabe," which is a little book 
 written for the instruction of a young son 
 named Lewis, who is supposed to have died 
 in early life. The poet, in the " Temple of 
 Fame," is taken by an eagle up into the signs 
 of the Zodiac, and there he is able to look 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 25 
 
 upon the universe. He describes many won- 
 ders of natural philosophy, and many sides of 
 human nature. He also sees the names of peo- 
 ple of celebrity, the names of those exposed to 
 the sun's rays as melting away into forgetful- 
 ness, but those on the other side as made per- 
 manent by perpetual ice. He is taken into the 
 presence of the Goddess of Fame, and he de- 
 scribes very cleverly how fickle and partial are 
 her judgments. 
 
 " The Flower and the Leaf " is a poem with 
 an instructive moral, and, the story being a 
 pretty idea, I will tell you about it. A noble 
 and good woman from an arbor in her grounds 
 sees in the distance a company of knights and 
 ladies dancing upon a sward, or lawn as we 
 call it. After the dance is ended they kneel 
 down and do honor to the daisy, some to the 
 flower and some to the leaf. It seems a 
 strange ceremony to her and she seeks an 
 explanation, learning that they who honor 
 the flower are those who look after beauty and 
 worldly pleasure, which, like the flower, will 
 fade in a day or at the slightest blast of cold, 
 and they who honor the leaf, which comes from 
 the root, and which neither storms nor blasts 
 can destroy, are those who rely upon virtue 
 and true merit without any regard to worldly 
 rewards. 
 
 " Canterbury Tales " were doubtless sug- 
 
26 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 gested to Chaucer by the writings of an Italian 
 named Boccaccio, who bound together a series 
 of stories by an historical frame-work that had 
 no special bearing upon the tales, but they held 
 the reader's interest by the charming manner 
 in which they were told. " Canterbury Tales " 
 are quite different, for they have a decided plot 
 or object running all through them, which is a 
 pleasant story or fancy in itself, and this is what 
 it is. 
 
 Canterbury lies fifty-three miles southeast 
 from London, and it was customary for all 
 classes of people to make what was called a pil- 
 grimage to the grand old cathedral at Canter- 
 bury, within the walls of which the Archbishop 
 Thomas a Becket was murdered. At an old 
 inn called the Tabard, in South wark, then a vil- 
 lage on the Thames River opposite London, 
 there met twenty-nine pilgrims, all on their way 
 to Canterbury. They could hardly all have 
 been journeying for the same object, for travel- 
 lers were called pilgrims in those days, although 
 many went to pay their devotions in the cathe- 
 dral. But this company must have had many 
 different objects in view, judging from their 
 various stations and occupations in life. And 
 the host of the tavern, as the innkeeper was 
 called, must have been a jolly man, popular 
 with them all, for at his suggestion it was 
 agreed that they should all go together, and 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 27 
 
 that each should amuse the others with a tale, 
 both going and returning, and that whoever 
 told the best story should have a supper at the 
 expense of the rest, and this far-seeing landlord 
 should be the judge. I call him far-seeing be- 
 cause he most cunningly secured, not only the 
 return of the whole company by the road of 
 the Tabard Inn, but also their patronage during 
 the recital of all these stories ! 
 
 Of course in such a company the very high- 
 est social rank, such as kings and titled cour- 
 tiers, and also the very lowest, because too 
 poor to travel, would not be included, but we 
 find all the grades between, and their stories 
 are so cleverly woven to show the spirit and 
 speech and interests of each traveller as he tells 
 his story, that it is easily seen that in these nar- 
 ratives we have a perfect record of the mass of 
 the people in the fourteenth century, and 
 Chaucer has thus left a contribution not only 
 invaluable to poetic fancy and conception, but 
 of still greater value to historians, who, delving 
 only among records kept by state officials, find 
 in dry facts but little upon which to frame their 
 details. 
 
 Chaucer still further shows his ability to keep 
 his characters true to themselves, for it is very 
 difficult for students of to-day to learn what his 
 real attitude was toward many of the weighty 
 questions of his time. For example, there was 
 
28 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 a monk in the party who tells his tale of self-in- 
 dulgence and luxury, mingled with admonition, 
 of the church's power, so deftly woven that the 
 reader promptly decides that Chaucer must 
 have been fully wedded to the tenets of Rome, 
 else he could not so clearly define the charac- 
 ter ; and parallel with the friar's story comes 
 the Parson's Tale, one of humility, self-sacrifice, 
 and gentleness that will stand as a true por- 
 trayal of the humble and pious working minis- 
 ter for all times. While reading this picture of 
 a good and holy life, the reader with equal 
 force pronounces Chaucer to have been in sym- 
 pathy with Wycliffe. In the one a moderate 
 but firm exposure of the follies and vices of 
 the priesthood, and in the other a strong con- 
 demnation of the destruction of church prop- 
 erty — displays a complete identity with each 
 character in turn. 
 
 And here let me explain terms that are gen- 
 erally understood to mean the same thing — 
 Lollards, Dissenters, and Puritans — as applied 
 to religious questions in England. Wyckliffe's 
 followers were called, by the adherents to the 
 Romish Church, Lollards, and at the time of 
 his death half of England's population w^as said 
 to be thus named. After the establishment of 
 the Church of England in the reign of Henry 
 the Eighth, those who were neither Roman 
 Catholics nor followers of the English Church 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 29 
 
 were called Dissenters, and the Puritans were 
 one of many sects that were formed at that 
 time. 
 
 One of the Tales, called the Pardoner's Tale, 
 is very frequently quoted or referred to, and a 
 sketch of it will be wise to relate. In the times 
 when England was under the rule of the pope, 
 there were many requirements of the church 
 that were either hard or irksome to comply 
 with, and, to meet the emergencies of such cir- 
 cumstances, persons could be excused by the 
 purchase of what were called indulgences. 
 Certain priests or officers of the church were 
 empowered to give hearing to such petitions 
 and decide on their merit, and I am forced by 
 the evidence of many writers to say that to the 
 holder of a full purse much was granted, while 
 to him whose pennies were few the advice was, 
 to wait for that forgiveness which, alas ! neither 
 knew was free to all. These officers or priests 
 were called pardoners, and, one being in that 
 company of twenty-nine, he rel-ates a tale of de- 
 feated craft, of which he doubtless had a large 
 fund to draw from. Mr. Ward in his book on 
 Chaucer tells the story very charmingly in his 
 own words, and I would like to read it to you, 
 but, as this is only a familiar talk, 1 will repeat 
 to you what I can remember. 
 
 Once there were a number of young men who 
 doubtless had riches that they were fast using 
 
so ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 up in every kind of terrible dissipation, and 
 they wandered from tavern to tavern seeking 
 new ways to eat, drink, gamble, and dance away 
 their time. And it chanced that one morning 
 three of their company were sitting in a tavern 
 drinking. While there, they heard sounds in- 
 dicating that a corpse was being carried by for 
 burial. By sounds I refer to the custom then 
 held of carrying a bell and tolling it before the 
 bier. They asked a boy who was the person 
 to be buried. He replied that it was an old 
 friend of theirs, and that he had been killed by 
 a thief called Death, who after stabbing the 
 man's heart went immediately away. The boy, 
 after the fashion of boys in general, added the 
 further information that Death was such a ter- 
 rible person that his mother had taught him 
 that he must expect to meet this fierce neighbor 
 anywhere and at any time. And the tavern- 
 keeper said that the boy must be right, for 
 there had been many hundreds slain in the next 
 town, and it must be there that he lived. 
 These half-drunken fellows loudly asserted that 
 they were not afraid of this creature called 
 Death, and would forthwith seek to slay him, 
 and they pledged themselves to be true to each 
 other, and thus by their united strength they 
 would be sure to bring this terrible murderer 
 to his just deserts. So they started on the road 
 to the next town, and on the way they met a 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 31 
 
 poor, harmless old man, whom they jeeringly 
 asked why he was so old and wrinkled ? He 
 told them that, weary of life, he had often asked 
 his mother, the Earth, to lay his tired bones to 
 rest, but she had thus far refused him ; and he 
 reproached them for their disrespect to old 
 age. But, although he spoke gently, the rude 
 fellows turned upon him, accused him of being 
 an accomplice of Death, whom they were seek- 
 ing, and told him that they would kill him on 
 the spot if he did not tell them where they 
 could find his comrade Death. He directed 
 them to a path in some woods close by, and, 
 describing a certain tree, assured them that 
 their victim was waiting there^ and would not 
 run away. In headlong haste they entered the 
 path, and instead of some fierce-looking monster 
 of humanity they found many bushels of gold, 
 and, knowing it was not theirs, they immedi- 
 ately plotted to take it away under cover of 
 the night, and one of them was chosen to go 
 into the town and buy food and drink to sustain 
 them, while they waited for the darkness which 
 they needed to cover their sin. 
 
 As soon as the one chosen had gotten well 
 started on his errand, the two who remained to 
 watch the treasure fell into a confidential plan 
 by which they could obtain the whole between 
 them without having to share it with their 
 other companion. They arranged that one 
 
32 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 should pretend to wrestle as if in sport with 
 him, as soon as he should return, and the other 
 should stab him while thus engaged, and the 
 first was also to use his dagger so as to ensure 
 his death. But the same evil spirit that lurked 
 in their bosoms was filling the brain of their 
 absent comrade with visions of the luxury of 
 possessing the whole of those golden coins him- 
 self, and he repaired to a druggist, complaining 
 that he had many rats, and asked for poison to 
 rid himself of them. Being supplied with 
 poison that was warranted to work quickly, he 
 went into a by-street and obtained three empty 
 bottles. Into two he divided the deadly drug, 
 and kept the third clean for his own use, and 
 filled them all with wine. Hastening with his 
 supplies to the retreat in the woods, he quickly 
 met his fate, for, eager to ensure to themselves 
 his share of the gold, his fellow-sinners attacked 
 him most speedily. Sure now of the prize, they 
 began by regaling themselves first with the 
 tempting wine, and the one who commenced 
 the feast chanced upon a poisoned bottle, drank 
 from it and handed it to the other, who also 
 quenched his thirst, without waiting to open a 
 fresh bottle, and soon they both had no need of 
 the treasure. Death was the name of the old 
 man whom they had so disrespectfully treated, 
 and to the misuse of gold that the}^ had at- 
 tempted to seize with dishonest greed did they 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 33 
 
 owe their own meeting with their would-be 
 victim, for through the agency of the gold had 
 Death defeated them. 
 
 All through Chaucer's writings you will 
 find strong moral truths. Some you can not in 
 youth understand, and none of them would de- 
 light you if you had to struggle with the quaint 
 spelling and verse. " The Legend of Good 
 Women " is a series of incidents showing noble 
 faith through hardships of all kinds. There is 
 in the Canterbury Tales a Man of Law's Tale ; 
 a Shipman's Tale ; one of a Summoner; a 
 Knight ; a Merchant ; a Clerk ; and enough 
 others to make twenty-nine, although the task 
 of all going both ways, which would make two 
 for each, was never completed. All through 
 them there is a cheerful, kindly spirit that 
 shows a broad and intelligent charity toward 
 all men. Two of the tales only are in prose, 
 The Parson's Tale and the Tale of the Meli- 
 beus, and in closing I shall quote from this last 
 a few words upon the getting of riches that 
 you can understand without effort and re- 
 member with profit. 
 
 UPON RICHES. 
 
 " In getting of your riches, and in using of 
 *em, ye shulen alway have three things in your 
 heart, that is to say, our Lord God, conscience, 
 
34 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 and a good name. First, ye shulen have God 
 in your heart, and for no riches ye shulen do 
 nothing that may in any manner displease God 
 that is your Creator and Maker ; for, after the 
 word of Solomon, it is better to have a little 
 good with love of God, than to have muckle 
 good and lese the love of his Lord God ; and 
 the prophet saith, that it is better to ben a good 
 man and have little good and treasure, than to 
 be holden a shrew and have great riches. And 
 yet I say furthermore, that ye shulden always 
 do your business to get your riches so that ye 
 get 'em with a good conscience. And the 
 apostle saith that there nis thing in this world 
 of which we shulden have so great joy, as when 
 our conscience beareth us good witness ; and 
 the wise man saith : The substance of a man is 
 full good when sin. is not in a man's conscience. 
 Afterward, in getting of your riches and in 
 using of 'em, ye must have great business and 
 great diligence that your good name be alway 
 kept and conserved ; for Solomon saith, that 
 better it is and more it availeth a man to have 
 a good name than for to have great riches ; and 
 therefor he saith in another place. Do great dil- 
 igence (saith he) in keeping of thy friends and 
 of thy good name, for it shall longer abide with 
 thee than any treasure, be it never so precious ; 
 and certainly he should not be called a gentle- 
 man that, after God and good conscience all 
 
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 35 
 
 things left, ne doth his diligence and business 
 to keepen his good name ; and Cassiodore saith 
 that it is a sign of a gentle heart when a man 
 loveth and desireth to have a good name." 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 
 
 Between the death of Chaucer in 1400 and 
 the birth of Edmund Spenser in 1553, there is a 
 space of one hundred and fifty-three years, cov- 
 ering the reigns of Henrys Fourth, Fifth, and 
 Sixth, Edwards Fourth and Fifth, Richard 
 Third, Henry Seventh, Henry Eighth, and Ed- 
 ward Sixth, whose reign closed the very year 
 of Spenser's asserted birth. Nine English sov- 
 ereigns who did but little else than involve in 
 continued warfare and discord, a people natu- 
 rally fond of quiet and loyal almost to a fault. 
 During the reign of Henry the Fourth the opin- 
 ions of Wycliffe, who opposed. the pope and 
 was, as you know, a reformer of religion, gained 
 great headway, and King Henry took decided 
 stand against him, denounced his views, called 
 his followers heretics, and permitted them to 
 be punished by a terrible cruelty copied from 
 the Inquisition in Spain, that of burning at the 
 stake. While such fierce factions raged there 
 was no time for the cultivation of the mind. 
 Henry the Fifth's time was also occupied in 
 warfare, chiefly in France, for it was he who 
 
 37 
 
38 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 gained the battle of Azincourt, or Agincourt, 
 as the English call it. 
 
 Henry the Sixth continued through his re- 
 gents the wars with France, and during his 
 reign the romantic incident of the French 
 army being led by a peasant girl, named Joan 
 of Arc, occurred. Also during his reign she 
 was captured and burned at the stake in the 
 city of Rouen ; while at home in England the 
 Wars of the Roses were commenced. His 
 kingdom had become divided by two factions — 
 the Lancastrians, whose badge or family emblem 
 was a red rose ; and the house of York, whose 
 badge was a white rose. And these wars were 
 terrible, because they were battles between a 
 divided nation — just like our civil war, for they 
 were not fighting a common enemy, but among 
 themselves. With Edward the Fourth the Wars 
 of the Roses still continued, and, like a national 
 see-saw, first one was up and then the other. 
 Edward the Fifth was but a child of thirteen 
 when proclaimed king, and was left to the ten- 
 der mercy of that wicked Duke of Gloucester 
 who, while pretending to protect the gentle lit- 
 tle child, caused him and his young brother to 
 be smothered to death in the Tower of London, 
 and was then himself proclaimed King Richard 
 the Third. ' 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 39 
 
 King Henry the Seventh did not relieve the 
 war-tossed people of what should have been 
 fair, merry England, because, after the ending 
 of the Wars of the Roses, one would think that 
 kings and people had learned wisdom by sad 
 experience. But two pretenders arose in his 
 reign to keep public interest and safety con- 
 stantly disturbed. The first was quickly dis- 
 covered, but the second succeeded in declaring 
 himself Richard, Duke of York, second son of 
 Edward the Fourth. When he was met by 
 the argument that he had been murdered with 
 his brother in the Tower of London by his 
 uncle King Richard Third, he told a plausible 
 story of his escape, and he craftily joined in 
 everything that was opposed to the reigning 
 king, Henry the Seventh ; and so he, too, 
 helped to keep such good things as books 
 and intellectual advancement out of the hands 
 of many a weary household. However, one 
 bright star had risen almost unheeded upon 
 the historical horizon of England, for Christo- 
 pher Columbus, aided by the generosity of 
 Queen Isabella of Spain, had discovered the 
 New World ; and this king, Henry the Seventh, 
 who had always made the obtaining of money 
 the object of all his quarrels, wars, persecutions, 
 and treacheries, for once used his love of gain 
 to a good purpose, for he interested the mer- 
 chants of London and Bristol, and induced 
 
40 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 them to fit out an English expedition for 
 further discoveries in the New World, and it 
 was intrusted to Sebastian Cabot, the son of the 
 Venetian pilot who lived in the town of Bristol. 
 His voyage was successful, and it proved 
 profitable both to him and to King Henry. 
 
 The discovery of Columbus, as we know, 
 proved the fallacy of man}^ theories about the 
 size of the world, and set scientific minds in all 
 countries working ; but while they could write, 
 study, and discuss in the privacy of their libra- 
 ries and laboratories, or in the use of their 
 crude instruments for astronomical and nautical 
 purposes, yet times were still too turbulent to 
 fit men for the quiet perusal of poetry or prose, 
 written in a gentle spirit and full of refining 
 thoughts. 
 
 Indeed there seemed no hope for the encour- 
 agement of such occupation, for in the new 
 King, Henry the Eighth, England was to place 
 on record a ruler whose life was always to be a 
 blot upon her escutcheon. 
 
 Defying every decency, he was divorced 
 from, and caused to be executed, his wives, gave 
 defiance to the rule of the Pope, while at the 
 same time he burned and beheaded all who 
 called themselves reformers. But the teaching 
 of Wyckliffe could not be stamped out, and the 
 more they burned and tortured, the more the 
 truth spread. 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 41 
 
 There arose in the early part of this Henry's 
 reign, at Wittemburg in Germany, a man 
 named Martin Luther, who, after being a priest 
 in good standing, found that there was a real 
 New Testament that people were forbidden to 
 read, and, having pondered much upon the 
 opinions of Wyckliffe, he openly began to teach 
 the people that they could read the Bible them- 
 selves. He prepared a translation of it for 
 them, and even posted pages of it in the public 
 streets, and through the country roads, de- 
 nouncing the Pope and the machinery by which 
 his church was governed. By machinery I 
 mean all the ways used in its management, and 
 among other things he denounced as imposi- 
 tions the indulgences that were sold by the 
 pardoners whose office I explained in our talk 
 about Chaucer. 
 
 And the star that had arisen by the discovery 
 of this, our now dear native land, was succeeded 
 by this other star of greater magnitude, that 
 twinkling a little through Wyckliffe grew 
 brighter by the bravery and sincerity of Martin 
 Luther, and it has continued to send its rays in 
 diverging lines ever since, for it was the light 
 of Protestantism fanning into a flame after it 
 had been smouldering under tyranny, ignorance, 
 and the rule of Rome. 
 
 Edward the Sixth was a mere child, but 
 guided by Cranmer promised some peace to 
 
42 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 poor England, had he not been persuaded to 
 appoint in his will the succession of his sister 
 Mary, instead of Elizabeth, to the throne. 
 
 Edmund Spenser was born the year that 
 King Edward the Sixth died, and during his 
 infancy Queen Mary, Bloody Mary, as she was 
 rightly named, bathed England in all the hor- 
 rors of religious persecution, for she caused to 
 be executed Lady Jane Grey and sentenced to 
 be burned at the stake Hooper, Rogers, Ridley, 
 Latimer, and Cranmer, besides men, women, 
 and little children, because they did not believe 
 in the supreme power of the Pope. 
 
 With this hasty mention of the sovereigns 
 ruling England between the death of Chaucer 
 and the birth of Spenser, I want to notice in an 
 equally short way those who did leave a mod- 
 erate literary fame during this time. Their 
 writings of course helped to make Spenser's 
 greatness, because he had the benefit of their 
 thoughts, representing, as they did, the growth 
 of the nation in wisdom, even though they had 
 not the gift of expression that points first to 
 Chaucer, and, passing them with almost forget- 
 fulness, presents Spenser as the next great Eng- 
 lish writer. 
 
 Gower was a friend of Chaucer's, and he tried 
 with some success to establish a particular style 
 of English, but he had not Chaucer's imagina- 
 tion nor perception of character, and so he was 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 43 
 
 but little read. He died eight years after his 
 friend. 
 
 James First of Scotland, second son of Robert 
 Third of Scotland, on the death of his elder 
 brother was sent, when only ten years old, into 
 France to be educated. But the vessel was 
 taken by an English squadron, and Henry 
 Fourth of England in all violation of right kept 
 the boy at Windsor Castle. However, he took 
 pains to educate him well, although he was a 
 captive fifteen years. Prince James became 
 attached to the daughter of the Duke of Som- 
 erset, and afterwards married her, and in com- 
 mendation of her he wrote a very long poem 
 called the " King's Quair " (book), which, next 
 to those of Chaucer, is considered the finest 
 poem produced in England before EHzabeth's 
 reign. 
 
 William Caxton, who lived between 141 3 and 
 1491, almost the century, seems to be the next 
 link in the chain, which was bringing to the 
 world of letters a way for the more general dis- 
 tribution of thought ; for, being apprenticed to 
 a merchant in London, and proving most trust- 
 worthy, he was given a small sum of money 
 with which to trade, and sent as an agent into 
 Holland and Flanders, between which countries 
 he spent some twenty years. Let me here say 
 that England in its literary attainments was 
 then fully a hundred years behind Italy, Greece, 
 
44 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Holland, and Germany, though the hour for her 
 elevation to the highest rank was near at hand. 
 
 While Caxton was on the Continent the art 
 of printing was everywhere spoken of, and, 
 with great expense, effort, and perseverance, he 
 not only learned to print and mastered every 
 particular respecting it, but he translated from 
 French into English selections from the '' His- 
 tories of Troy." He had these published in 
 one volume at Cologne, and sent it to England 
 as the first book that had ever been printed in 
 the English language. When he came home 
 after a year or two he wrote a book on the 
 " Game of Chess," and here you can see how 
 old that game is, for it must have been already 
 well established to warrant such a work ; and 
 that was the first book printed in England. He 
 continued in a quiet, modest way to print books, 
 many of his own translation, some sixty in all ; 
 among others, " Chronicles of England," which 
 are very deceiving, as there is as much fiction 
 as fact in them. 
 
 Sir Thomas More, poor man, for he had to 
 suffer for his sincerity, after Cardinal Wolsey 
 was disgraced w^as made Lord Chancellor. 
 But he was true to his convictions, and he 
 could not give support to all that his wicked 
 king wanted, and so he lost his head. He was 
 educated in all the learning of his time, and was 
 in correspondence with the learned men of 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 45 
 
 Europe. The great Erasmus went to England 
 on purpose to enjoy his conversation, and here 
 comes a question for you to consider. What 
 language was used between people of different 
 countries, by which ihese learned men could 
 exchange their thoughts and readily read and 
 profit by correspondence and the study of each 
 other's works? Latin was doubtless the gen- 
 eral medium, and next the French language. 
 Hence the custom of educating all destined to 
 high places, in Greek, Latin, and French ; and 
 now you live in the proud day when our tongue 
 must be studied by foreigners with equal need. 
 Sir Thomas More wrote " Utopia," which de- 
 scribed an island of that name governed with 
 all things as nearly perfect as it is possible to 
 be. When we speak of most delightful sur- 
 roundings we say that they are *' Utopian." 
 It is a witty and pleasing work, full of fancy, 
 and yet has much that to-day has been ac- 
 knowledged to be practical, although quite be- 
 yond the conception of those times. 
 
 William Tyndale, to whom all Protestants 
 owe so much, also came between Chaucer and 
 Spenser. The old Latin or Vulgate Bible was 
 printed on the Continent in 1462, and the New 
 Testament in Greek in 15 18. You can see how 
 quickly advantage was taken of the newly ac- 
 quired art of printing. And it created so great 
 a fright among the monks that they warned 
 
46 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 people against this harmful literature, and some 
 said among themselves, " We must root out 
 printing, or printing will root out us." In de- 
 fiance of all this, and at the risk of his life, Wil- 
 liam Tyndale in the reign of Henry Eighth 
 commenced to translate the Scriptures from the 
 original Hebrew and Greek into English. 
 And, although many learned men have revised 
 the sacred writings, yet it is surprising how lit- 
 tle difference there has really been made. He 
 was chaplain in the family of a wealthy knight 
 who entertained the clergy liberally. A popish 
 divine could not meet Tyndale's arguments in 
 favor of an English translation of the Bible, and 
 perceiving his defeat angrily exclaimed, " We 
 had better be without God's law than the 
 Pope's," to which Tyndale boldly replied, *' I 
 defy the Pope and all his laws, and, if God gives 
 me life, before many years the plough-boys in 
 England shall know more of the Scriptures than 
 you do." To better accomplish his aims Tyn- 
 dale went to Antwerp and industriously trans- 
 lated and had printed the Scriptures in the 
 English language, and so rapidly were they 
 sold, mostly in England, that several editions 
 of five thousand each were disposed of. That 
 was a great many, because printing then was 
 hand-work, not only in the setting of the type, 
 but in the actual printing of the book, and the 
 process was necessarily very slow. Tyndale 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 47 
 
 was finally betrayed into the hands of Henry 
 the Eighth. He was imprisoned and sentenced 
 to be burned at the stake. While awaiting the 
 time to suffer the dreadful sentence, instead of 
 bewailing his fate he prepared a version of the 
 Testament adapted to the use of the peasantry, 
 so that the plough-boys did have one for them- 
 selves, and his last prayer was that " God should 
 open the King of England's eyes." 
 
 Henry very soon after ordered the Bible 
 placed in every church for the people to read, 
 and, although done in a spirit of wicked defi- 
 ance because the Pope would not further some 
 of his heartless acts, still such great good came 
 of it that we are apt to forget the source and 
 spirit of the privilege. 
 
 Hugh Latimer was the only son of a yeoman, 
 or farmer as we say, and, promising much as a 
 lad, his father decided to send him to college. 
 He was a strict papist until thirt\^ years old, 
 when he began to discuss and examine the 
 claims of the Reformers, and became so fully 
 convinced of their right that he joined with 
 Cranmer in the spreading of their doctrines. 
 But he fell a victim to Queen Mary, and with 
 Ridley was burned at the stake. Just before 
 the fire was lighted he called cheerfully to Rid- 
 ley, '' Be of good cheer, Master Ridle}^ and play 
 the man, for we shall this day kindle such a 
 torch in England as I trust in God shall never 
 
48 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 be extinguished." His writing was so free 
 from the old style that it can be read with ease 
 and pleasure, and as a picture of his childhood 
 I will read you what he said about his father. 
 
 *^ My father was a yeoman and had no lands 
 of his own, only he had a farm of £'^ or £4. by 
 year at the uttermost, and hereupon he tilled 
 so much as kept half a dozen men. He had 
 walk for an hundred sheep, and my mother 
 milked thirty kine. He was able and did find 
 the king a harness, with himself and his horse, 
 while he came to the place that he should re- 
 ceive the king's wages. I can remember that I 
 buckled his harness when he went to Black- 
 heath field. He kept me to school, or else I 
 had not been able to have preached before the 
 king's majesty now. He married my sisters 
 with ^5 or twenty nobles apiece, so that he 
 brought them up in godliness and fear of God. 
 He kept hospitality for his poor neighbors. 
 And some alms he gave to the poor, and all 
 this did he of the said farm. ... In my time 
 my poor father was so diligent to teach me to 
 shoot, as to learn me any other thingVand so I 
 think other men did their children ; he 'taught 
 me how to draw, how to lay my body in^^y 
 bow, and not to draw with strength of arms Vs 
 divers other nations do, but with strength^f 
 the body. I had my bows taught me accord- 
 ing to my age and strength ; as I increased in 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 49 
 
 them, so my bows were made bigger and big- 
 ger, for one shall never shoot well, except they 
 be brought up in it. It is a worthy game, a 
 wholesome kind of exercise, and much com- 
 mended in physic." 
 
 This we have quoted, and all the words but 
 one are spelled as we do to-day, although that 
 was full}^ three hundred and fifty years ago, 
 and we find no difference except a quaintness 
 of expression. 
 
 Writers of plays too were not wanting. The 
 earliest plays known were called Miracle Plays, 
 which were founded upon Scriptural narrative. 
 Then came Moral plays, which portrayed the 
 triumph either of virtue or sin ; and later Inter- 
 ludes, which began to amuse the people by rep- 
 resenting their own lives from any chosen point, 
 much as to-day. 
 
 John Heywood wrote most successfully in 
 that manner, and was a favorite both with 
 Henry Eighth and his daughter Mary, and that 
 was strange too, for in his comedies he exposed 
 very plainly the vicious lives of the ecclesias- 
 tics. 
 
 Another play-writer was John Still, whose 
 comedy of '' Gammer Gurton's Needle " is still 
 quoted. It is said to be full of humor but very 
 ro«gh reading for our days, although all the 
 situations are comical in the extreme. 
 
 And now we have reached Roger Ascham, 
 
50 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 an eminent Greek scholar, and appointed to be 
 the instructor of the learned languages to the 
 princess who afterwards became Queen Eliza- 
 beth. After two years devoted to her, he went 
 abroad, coming back in three years to fill the 
 office of Latin secr.etary to Edward Sixth, and 
 at that king's death he retired to the university, 
 where he remained until Queen Elizabeth em- 
 ployed him to read with her two hours a day, 
 so that he was connected with her court until 
 his death. 
 
 These few bright people whom I have told 
 you about had left their influence upon the 
 world, so that when little Edmund Spenser 
 began to learn his letters there were much 
 greater advantages for him than there had been 
 for Chaucer ; and we are going to see now what 
 another bright boy saw and thought about, and 
 how he helped the world for you and me. 
 
 When Edmund learned the alphabet the 
 hearts of his parents had been lightened, and 
 their faces more readily responded to the smiles 
 of their little son, for Mary, bloody Mary, with 
 her cruelties to answer for, had died, and Eliza- 
 beth came with her Protestant sympathies, like 
 a healing balm to soften the terrors of the past 
 five years. 
 
 Henry the Eighth and Mary had both been 
 extravagantly fond of dress, and the fashions 
 dictated gay and elegant silks, satins, velvets. 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. $1 
 
 and gold and silver embroidered cloths ; as 
 well as jewelled girdles, hat-bands, and head- 
 dresses of every conceivable color, not only for 
 women, but for men. And this gay dress was 
 not confined to the nobility, for we find the 
 clergy of the day preaching against the wantOQ 
 extravagance of the working people, who had 
 no wealth to meet such expenses ; and so far 
 was it carried that penalties were finally im- 
 posed upon all tradesmen who made certain 
 garments for people below a stated rank, and 
 also fines and the forfeiture of the garment for 
 the hapless youth who ventured to thus deck 
 his person in imitation of his betters. 
 
 Little boys must have worn silk doublets, 
 gayly trimmed hose, embroidered shoes which 
 we are told sometimes were upon cork soles 
 that raised the dainty foot covering two inches 
 from the ground. Gay Httle velvet capes lined 
 with bright colors and small velvet caps banded 
 with gold embroidery, sometimes with jewels. 
 And with all these fine things where came the 
 fine times? Tennis they doubtless had, as it is 
 a very old game, although it may have been 
 laid aside. Archery we know they practised, 
 and riding on horseback ; but marbles — did 
 they know that delight, and how could they 
 have a grand frolic and tramp in the the woods 
 with so many fine clothes? 
 
 Thankful for the little blue and gray suits of 
 
52 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 to-day, let us decide whether Edmund Spenser 
 was in a position to have his boy life thus ham- 
 pered by the restraints of court dress. 
 
 There is literally nothing known of Spenser's 
 parentage except that his father's name was 
 Sir John Spenser, and that the family claimed 
 identity with the Spencers of Althorpe, not- 
 withstanding the difference in the spelling of 
 the name. 
 
 Edmund Spenser had three sisters who mar- 
 ried men of high degree — Elizabeth, whose 
 husband w^as Sir George Carey ; Anne first 
 was Lady Compton, and she later became the 
 wife of Thomas Sackville, who was a son of the 
 poet, the Earl of Dorset ; Alice also married 
 twice, her first husband being Lord Strange, 
 Earl of Derby, and the second was Thomas 
 Egerton, Lord Baron, and then Viscount 
 Brackley. Spenser speaks in a poem written 
 later of these as 
 
 The sisters three, 
 The honor of the noble family 
 Of which I meanest boast myself to be. 
 
 Notwithstanding the position and evident 
 luxury that surrounded these sisters, the first 
 mention we have of Edmund Spenser, their 
 young brother, was as a charity pupil at a 
 school known as the Merchant Taylor's School 
 of London. 
 
 A man of wealth named Robert Nowell gave, 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 53 
 
 after the fashion of those and later times, sums 
 of money to certain poor scholars, and when he 
 died many people of high and low degree at- 
 tended his funeral, and among the charges for 
 that ceremony is one of '' two yards of cloth to 
 make a gown for Edmund Spenser, sizer and 
 head boy at Merchant Ta34or's School." 
 
 We immediately dismiss all thoughts of him 
 as daintily decked in velvet and jewels and em- 
 broidered shoes, and think of him with perhaps 
 woollen hose, not woven but made from cloth, 
 a simple doublet, rough and none too warm, 
 food that proved wholesome, and doubtless 
 plenty of exercise, first as a fag or attendant 
 upon some higher-form boy, and later because 
 youth and health prompted it, just as it does 
 now. 
 
 Robert Nowell died in February, 1568, and 
 Spenser went to Cambridge the following May, 
 being fifteen years old. He was entered as a 
 serving-clerk at Pembroke Hall, and from time 
 to time items of small but frequent needs are 
 found as given by the Nowelis and Bishop 
 Grindal to Edmund Spenser. 
 
 He entered college just when times were 
 proving very far from smooth for Queen Eliza- 
 beth, although these troubles had not thus far 
 proved an impediment to the quiet pursuit of 
 every industry and intellectual growth. 
 
 About this time there came a Flemish doctor 
 
54 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 from Antwerp, who had fled to England on ac- 
 count of his views. He started a Miscellany, 
 which was fashionable in those days, a collec- 
 tion of poetry and prose something like our 
 magazines. And in that Miscellany appeared 
 early efforts of Spenser, mostly translations, 
 and doubtless this Dutchman employed Spen- 
 ser to do the work. Some were translations of 
 sonnets from Petrarch, and were well done. 
 Evidently to know the Italian language was 
 common among students, or else a mere school- 
 boy could hardly have used it with sufficient 
 ease. 
 
 Then, too, you must realize how much more 
 it was for young Spenser to write or translate 
 beautiful sonnets than it would be for the 
 young student of to-day, for you have the ex- 
 amples of gifted men of many generations, in- 
 cluding this very lad, while he had nothing but 
 the quaintness of Chaucer to fall back upon. 
 So he entered Cambridge with tested ability 
 as a clever rhymer. But little being known of 
 his career as a student, we will have to infer 
 that he devoted more time than was well to 
 poetical effusions, for some of his Latin compo- 
 sitions while in college are said to be very 
 clumsy and inelegant ; although he later proved 
 himself accomplished in the classics. 
 
 Two fellow-students have as his friends out- 
 lived their generation ; otherwise I am afraid 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 55 
 
 they would soon have been forgotten. One 
 was Gabriel Harvey and the other Edward 
 Kirke. Edward Kirke was his closest friend, 
 and to him Spenser confided all his literary in- 
 terests, but Gabriel Harvey for a long time ex- 
 erted a powerful influence over him. 
 
 Harvey was an authority in classical and 
 Italian literature, but he was so proud of that 
 accomplishment that he scorned the possibilities 
 of his own tongue ; and he was also quite a 
 leader in an effort to make our rugged English 
 yield to the rules of classical metres. Harvey's 
 writings were full of his vanity, and, were it not 
 for the devotion he evidenced for Spenser, we 
 would give him but little heed. 
 
 Spenser took his degree of Master in 1576, 
 being now twenty-three years old, so his course 
 there must have covered eight years instead of 
 the standard four of to-day, and it accounts, 
 too, for the early age of his admittance, — a 
 point in favor of our boys now, as we are very 
 properly jealous for our own times. 
 
 Besides Harvey and Kirke, Spenser knew 
 later Sir Philip Sidney, and was also more or 
 less influenced by him, although that led him 
 rather in the line of social indulgences than 
 literary work. Still it kept in check his lean- 
 ing toward an independent style that employed 
 only the richness of his own language and a 
 method of his own creating. 
 
$6 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 For a short time after leaving Cambridge, 
 Spenser retired to the north of England, where 
 he must have been actively engaged in the use 
 of his pen, for there he made famous the name 
 of Rosalind, the " Widow's Daughter of the 
 Glen." Rosalind, who was a real character, 
 refused his offered love and married another. 
 He was keenly disappointed, but would allow 
 no one to reproach her. Three years later he 
 emerged from obscurity, and with Sidney and 
 Harvey did much writing that was still after 
 the strained fashion that his friends urged upon 
 him the necessity of cultivating. 
 
 When Spenser appeared in London he was 
 well known as a poet of pre-eminent ability ; 
 and, in spite of friends whose learning he re- 
 spected, he had evidently begun to realize his 
 powers or gifts, and to have decided to follow 
 the dictates of his own imagination rather than 
 the bent of the times, or the paths of his com- 
 panions in letters. I wish you were old enough 
 to understand Dean Church's account of the 
 changes that had come to England during the 
 first twenty years of Elizabeth's reign, but as 
 my endeavor is to simplify the whole subject 
 for you my hardest task will be here. 
 
 Wars between the upholders of different re- 
 ligious views, as well as the battles between 
 kings and princes, had instituted a reign of 
 terror that gradually had subsided into a war 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 57 
 
 of pens and voices, so that England had been 
 living in comparative freedom from danger to 
 her firesides. Consequently the people had 
 been growing rich in comfort and the encour- 
 agement of art and manufactures. And yet the 
 veil of such recent grief and torture^ was so 
 thinly drawn that their hearts could not fail to 
 be fired by the sadness of the past and the 
 promise of the future. Hence there was every- 
 thing to tempt the spirit of romance and its 
 medium of record, poetry, and above all others 
 to be tempted was the obscure little boy of the 
 Merchant Taylor's School — now a thoughtful 
 man whose heart was alive to the tenderest 
 and grandest impressions of his time. 
 
 Spenser wrote a series of poems that he 
 named the '' Shepherd's Calendar." There 
 were twelve in all, representing the months of 
 the year, and they were in no way connected, 
 treating of subjects both grave and gay, and as 
 a key to many customs and opinions they are 
 of great value. His language is rich and his 
 descriptions vivid, but so quaint is the style 
 that it is not easily read. 
 
 Then, too, he was still held in check by the 
 wishes of his friends to adhere to Italian meth- 
 ods, so we will simply remember what the 
 ''Shepherd's Calendar " was, and turn to that 
 outburst of his genius, '' The Faerie Queen," by 
 which he must always be known, and which 
 
58 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 ranks next in progressive wonder to Chaucer's 
 " Canterbury Tales." 
 
 The autumn of 1579 found Spenser expect- 
 ing to go with the Earl of Leicester into 
 France, for, having no fortune of his own, he 
 shared the fate of all scholars of his period in 
 an inability to support himself by literary work. 
 These men could only hope for preferment to 
 lucrative offices under the government or in 
 the employ of wealthy companies transacting 
 domestic or foreign business. 
 
 If the patronage of Leicester had been se- 
 cured, Spenser might have been led into en- 
 tirely different channels of thought, for he 
 would have thus been surrounded by the in- 
 trigues and dissipations of the brilliant and yet 
 unprincipled society of the court, and then per- 
 haps we might never have known the charm of 
 the " Faerie Queen." 
 
 Ireland was at this time the most trouble- 
 some of all the queen's dominions. It was, in 
 fact, in open rebellion, and there had also set- 
 tled on the frontier a band of Spanish and 
 Italian marauders who had strongly fortified 
 themselves, and the natives were in constant 
 feud with them. To quell all this and more 
 that you can in no way understand, Queen 
 Elizabeth sent Arthur, Lord Grey of Wilton. 
 Lord Grey was Puritan in his religious beliefs ; 
 a good and noble man, with a great deal of 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 59 
 
 courage, but he had very stern views of right 
 and wrong, and believed in force where imme- 
 diate submission was not found. 
 
 He was represented to be the right man for 
 Ireland, and he chose Edmund Spenser for his 
 secretary to accompany him on a task from 
 which he at first shrank ; and so the gentle, sen- 
 sitive poet, and the strong man of arms went 
 forth together to meet and try to mould a 
 turbulent and vacillating people. Three ele- 
 ments had to be contended with. First, a ha- 
 tred of each other among the Irish — furious at- 
 tacks upon the followers of the two forms of 
 religion, that of Rome and of Protestantism ; 
 and common to them all a most intense hatred 
 of their masters, the English. No wonder, 
 then, that Lord Grey's rule was one of stern 
 and unrelenting severity, by which hundreds 
 and thoUvSands were executed, or killed in the 
 small internal warfare that was incessantly 
 kept up. So true to his beliefs was Lord Grey 
 that Spenser, knowing him in the privacy of 
 life, made a most noble defence of him, for Lord 
 Grey, while carrying out to the letter his in- 
 structions from Queen Elizabeth, was so misrep- 
 resented at home that he was finally recalled 
 and severely censured for the methods he had 
 employed. 
 
 Owing to Lord Grey's unpopular administra- 
 tion of Ireland's affairs, and Spenser's faithful 
 
6o ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 friendship, is doubtless due the meagre ap- 
 pointments under government that Spenser, 
 notwithstanding his acknowledged power in 
 the literary world, had thus far received ; as 
 he held only humble clerkships for some time 
 after. 
 
 An attempt was made to settle one important 
 part of Ireland, called Munster, by giving its 
 fine but deserted places to Englishmen who 
 were to be called undertakers ; by which we 
 are to understand that they were to undertake 
 to settle and cultivate all this section, drawing 
 around them only English society and English 
 tenants or peasantry to till the soil. But the 
 Irish made such determined opposition to this 
 that no clear titles to the estates could be ob- 
 tained. 
 
 After holding various places and becoming 
 known to Walter Raleigh, Spenser at last ap- 
 pears as an undertaker, having a grant of three 
 thousand acres on which was a manor and cas- 
 tle of Kilcolman. It w^as first assigned to some 
 one else, but finally was given to him, and this 
 became his future home. He describes it as 
 being surrounded by woods, having fine views, 
 and a stream of water that in a poem he calls 
 the Mulla. 
 
 Spenser evidently had the plan formed to 
 write the " Faerie Queen " very early in life, 
 for parts of it are found long before he per- 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 6l 
 
 fected it, and reference was often made to the 
 place in letters to his friends Edward Kirke 
 and Harvey ; but not until he was settled in 
 this home did he really work out what must 
 have been the dream of his life. 
 
 The first account we have of the general 
 bearing of the poem is found in the report by 
 Spenser's predecessor in the service of the 
 undertakers for Munster. 
 
 It describes a meeting of the council at a 
 cottage near Dublin, and gives the names of 
 eight very prominent men connected with the 
 government's various departments, such as the 
 army, navy, and diplomatic service. The 
 writer says he addressed the company, and 
 stated that he envied the Italians their litera- 
 ture, because they had books in their mother 
 tongue, that not only described the thoughts 
 of ancient philosophers, but treated of all the 
 current progress of the world, and regretted 
 that the youths of England had to wait until 
 they had learned the foreign languages before 
 their characters could be influenced by such 
 works as moral and political philosophy. He 
 said to his hearers that there was one in their 
 midst well qualified to make them a familiar 
 address upon those subjects, and he trusted that 
 it would meet the pleasure of his guests to 
 couple their request with his for the evening's 
 profitable diversion. 
 
62 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 He then turned to Edmund Spenser and most 
 charmingly presented his desire in the name of 
 the others. 
 
 Spenser replied that it was hard for him to 
 refuse so flattering a request, but he referred 
 to a work upon which he was then engaged, 
 and explained that it was to be in heroical 
 verse and to be called the " Faerie Queen," in 
 which he hoped to satisfactorily represent all 
 the virtues of life in the character of knight- 
 hood, and the vices they were to endeavor to 
 overcome ; in fact it was to contain the ethical 
 part of moral philosophy. 
 
 By heroical verse you must understand poe- 
 try that describes the brave or noble actions of 
 men, and it is in the English language gener- 
 ally written in iambic verse of ten syllables ; 
 and the ethical part of moral philosophy is 
 moral truth applied to the actions of men. 
 
 Just at this point in the history of English- 
 men, a poet had to apologize for being one. 
 He had to give a good excuse for the writing 
 of rhyme ; a lesson must be taught, a moral 
 brought out, and the object must be kept as 
 fully in view as the text of a sermon ; and we 
 must in trying to understand this noted work 
 remember this fact. Also we must note that 
 although it is an English poem by an English 
 poet, yet it was written in Ireland, and the con- 
 ditions of Ireland as compared with those of 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 63 
 
 England were such as to make it really like an 
 English child born in a foreign land. 
 
 If you stop to think what Spenser accompa- 
 nied Lord Grey to Ireland for, you can under- 
 stand that in Lord Grey, Spenser readily imag- 
 ined a good knight who had salhed forth to do 
 battle in a righteous cause, with all that was 
 evil and dreadful in the world. It was quite 
 easy for him to look back upon more peaceful 
 England as a faerie land, and Queen Elizabeth, 
 who represented his own faith, as a veritable 
 Faerie Queen. He was far removed from 
 scenes that might have disabused his mind of 
 her perfections, for it took not only days but 
 weeks for news to travel then. The wilder- 
 nesses of Ireland, all deserted as she had be- 
 come in some parts by internal warfare, easily 
 answered to the woods through which knights 
 bent upon fearful errands of prowess and dan- 
 ger had to pass. Walter Raleigh's adventures 
 with Irish chieftains in single combat, and his 
 wonderful escapes, were counterparts of the 
 Faerie Queen in real life. As Spenser chose to 
 write about knight errantry, he certainly had 
 a great deal of real life to draw his pictures 
 from, for to quote from Dean Church the '' Fae- 
 rie Queen " '' might be called the epic of English 
 wars in Ireland under Elizabeth, quite as much 
 as the epic of English virtue at the same 
 period." 
 
64 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Walter Raleigh was a friend of Spenser, and 
 they often met in Spenser's home on the Irish 
 estate, for Raleigh was an undertaker too, 
 although he varied that enterprise with Jiis 
 daring exploits upon the high seas, such as his 
 voyage from Plymouth to Cadiz to punish the 
 old Spanish king for sending his Armada to 
 invade England in the interest of the Roman 
 Church ; his voyages to North and South 
 America in search of gold, and all that throws 
 such a halo of renown around his name. The 
 scenery in Ireland is very beautiful, and this 
 bold, bright-eyed man and the dreamy poet 
 held friendly talks beside the stream that Spen- 
 ser fondly calls MuUa, and here were read to 
 Raleigh the first three books of the '* Faerie 
 Queen." 
 
 Raleigh w^as a scholar, too, of the highest 
 order, being a vigorous writer of prose, and a 
 poet whom Spenser styles the " Summer Night- 
 ingale." 
 
 To such an appreciative reader Spenser con- 
 fided this child of his imagination, and with 
 generous warmth Raleigh urged Spenser to 
 return with him to London, to be presented to 
 the queen, and to gain permission to read the 
 work in her presence. Spenser recorded all the 
 thrilling joys of this successful trip in a poem 
 called, " Colin Clout's Come Home Again." 
 If we who have read about Queen Elizabeth's 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 65 
 
 homely features and red nose could have wit- 
 nessed that scene it would have had much of 
 its dignity shorn from it, for it must have been 
 a comedy indeed for her to listen to her praises 
 sung, not only as a being semi-divine and unri- 
 valled in the art of making poetry, but also 
 beautiful in face and person. She was most 
 kind and believed every word of it, not perceiv- 
 ing that this poet, too, had caught the spirit of 
 the times, which exacted the most extravagant 
 praise as a proof of loyalty ; and in his case it 
 was, as I said, more sincere, because in his distant 
 and grief-stricken home the separation had lent 
 an enchantment to all her acts and surroundings. 
 
 Elizabeth granted him a pension of fifty 
 pounds a year, about which the Lord Treasurer 
 made much ado. He was given permission to 
 print his twelve books, but at that time only 
 three were ready, and they were speedily 
 printed. 
 
 His old friend Harvey, laying aside his early 
 objections, expressed his love and true friend- 
 ship by writing a generous and simple poem 
 about it, in which in his enthusiasm he forgot 
 his own vanity, and thereby gained a place in 
 futurity. 
 
 With the queen, Spenser took what might be 
 called in any time a high-handed liberty, for he 
 dedicated the work to her in the following lan- 
 guage : 
 
66 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 To 
 
 The Most High, Mightie, and Magnificent 
 
 Empress, 
 
 Renowned for piety, virtue, and all gratious government, 
 
 Elizabeth, 
 
 By the Grace of God 
 
 Queen of England, France, and Ireland and of Virginia, 
 
 Defender of the Faith, etc., 
 
 Her most humble servant 
 
 Edmund Spenser 
 
 Doth, in all humilitie, 
 
 Dedicate, present, and consecrate 
 
 These, his labours, 
 
 To live with the Eternitie of her fame.* 
 
 Two scholars who, beside Spenser, were fa- 
 vored with Robert Nowell's bounty at the 
 Merchant Taylor's School, were also beginning 
 to attract by their writings — Hooker in elegant 
 prose, and Andrews was leading the way for a 
 better preaching than the English clergy had 
 yet used. All England was alive with the 
 spirit of strife for better things, and their hearts 
 were ready to appreciate and take pride in the 
 best efforts of their own people, a trait England 
 has cultivated ever since, and in which we, 
 who are mostly her own by lineage, have also 
 proved most apt followers. A year after the 
 first part of the " Faerie Queen " was issued, 
 Ponsonby the publisher, finding Spenser so 
 great a favorite, gathered together in one vol- 
 ume some of Spenser's miscellaneous writings, 
 
 * From Spenser — Morley's Edition, page loo. R. W. Church. 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 67 
 
 which he called '' Complaints, containing small 
 Sundry Poems of the World's Vanity." They 
 included sacred transcriptions, " The Seven 
 Psalms," " The Sacrifice of a Sinner," and the 
 address to Sidney's sister after Sidney's death, 
 which was a '' poet's sorrow for a poet w^ho had 
 been to him as an elder brother." 
 
 But the most remarkable of these w^as called 
 " Mother Hubbard's Tale of the Ape and the 
 Fox," and it w^as a satire of the keenest kind. 
 After Spenser's quiet, dreamy life in Ireland, 
 and his sudden change to all the brilliancy of 
 Elizabeth's court, it is no wonder that w^ith his 
 perceptions alive to everything about him 
 he should soon unveil the treacheries, jealous- 
 ies, and fatal rivalries that the scramble for 
 Church and State advancement generated. 
 
 The court must have been very indifferent 
 to literature, or the characters w^hich w^ere 
 pointed out in this by no means flattering fable 
 w^ould hardly have been safe to publish ; and it 
 shows that Church and State w^ere then the 
 only inflammable subjects. 
 
 Spenser staid in England about a 3'ear and a 
 half, and went back to his Irish home to finish 
 the poem that had placed him on the pinnacle 
 of literary fame, even if it had not added to his 
 worldly possessions. 
 
 He wooed an Irish maiden named Elizabeth, 
 and took upon himself at thirty-eight years of 
 
6S ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 age domestic life, and the hope of a quiet, 
 peaceful pursuit of his favorite themes. 
 
 As it was the fashion to disguise all writing, 
 even prose, of a sentimental character in the 
 form of fables or allegories, Spenser did not 
 attempt to depart from it in his work, although 
 he used his own language with most reckless 
 freedom, often cutting part of a word to make 
 it rhyme, and expecting to be understood. In 
 the same manner he added to and invented 
 words to meet the same end. He also wrote 
 without developing his plot as the narrative 
 progressed, but evidently intended to have the 
 whole explained in the last part or canto, as 
 the divisions were called. He therefore, at the 
 suggestion of Raleigh, addressed a letter as 
 if in response to a question of Raleigh's and 
 gave an outline of the true story that is hidden 
 behind the curtain of allegorical figures of 
 speech. 
 
 He «ays that having determined to put his 
 lesson in the form of a continuous allegory, he 
 makes for his model of a knight King Arthur, 
 because Arthur lives in England's heart as an 
 example of great goodness, and because he is 
 far beyond the reach of jealousy ; and draws 
 the picture of him before he was a king. 
 
 Spenser further explains that he meant the 
 ''Faerie Queen" ''for glory in .general inten- 
 tion, but in particular " for Queen Elizabeth, 
 
EDMUND SPENSER, 69 
 
 the faerie land to be her kingdom ; after which 
 he gives the plot somewhat in this fashion. 
 
 The Faerie Queen holds an annual feast of 
 twelve days, and the events of those twelve 
 days are to be undertaken by twelve knights 
 (which outline puts us in mind of Chaucer). 
 
 The first day a very clownish fellow presents 
 himself and begs that he may be allowed to 
 enter the ranks, which according to custom the 
 queen cannot refuse, and he humbly seats 
 himself on the floor in her presence. 
 
 Soon after, a lady in mourning, riding on a 
 white pony, enters, followed by a dwarf, who 
 leads a warlike steed, bearing the armor of a 
 knight, and the dwarf carries the spear in his 
 hand. This lady, falling before the queen, be- 
 seeches help, because she says that her parents 
 are held captive by a dragon and cannot escape 
 from the castle in which they are confined ; 
 that they are an ancient king and queen, and 
 she hopes that some knight will attempt their 
 release. The clownish knight rises and offers 
 his services, and it is very plain that the more 
 handsome knights quite willingly reserve their 
 deeds for gentler work. The lady tells the 
 courageous knight that unless he can wear that 
 armor (for it was the armor of a Christian 
 man as described by St. Paul) he cannot suc- 
 ceed. He being willing it is put upon him, 
 and he immediately becomes the handsomest 
 
^o ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 knight in the whole assemblage. He mounts 
 the charger, and thus the first line of the 
 '' Faerie Queen " begins, " A gentle knight was 
 pricking on the playne." 
 
 This puts us in mind of the " Pilgrim's Prog- 
 ress," although how far they are alike we can 
 judge when we read John Bunyan. 
 
 Wherein Spenser fails in this great workis- 
 that he attempted too much. He keeps the 
 plot well for the first two books, but to carry out 
 his plan for twelve, in which he was to make as 
 many knights do wondrous deeds, was an im- 
 possible task without wearying the reader. 
 There were so many characters and events to 
 record that the plot is quite lost sight of in the 
 six books that were written ; and so the plan is 
 not well carried out, while the quaint old style 
 instead of the language that had really come to 
 be used obscures much of its beauty. 
 
 After awhile Spenser throws aside the re- 
 straint that the plot has put upon him in order 
 that the fancies and pictures of his brain may 
 Have full play, and then his writing seems like 
 a rose that has burst the green confines of the 
 bud, and opens more and more to display its 
 beauty and shed its fragrance all around. 
 
 He introduces what he pleases, and we see 
 Queen EHzabeth under several names — Glori- 
 ana first, then Britomart, Marcella, and Bel- 
 phoebe. Duessa is Mary Queen of Scots, and 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 71 
 
 in the painting of the two characters his Puritan 
 heart and his hatred of the Church of Rome 
 are very apparent. He shows his love for his 
 friends. Raleigh and Lord Grey in many ways, 
 even in a sly bit of humor or friendly censure. 
 
 Another drawback to our pleasure in reading 
 this poem is the lack of discretion in what to 
 say and what not to say, and also the habit of 
 the times to exaggerate in descriptions and even 
 statements ; and yet Spenser's brain was so full 
 of good wishes, and he saw everywhere pic- 
 tures of life- that he felt ought to be used as 
 warnings or lessons of grave or happy import, 
 that you would be quite bewildered if you tried 
 to read it before your minds were greatly ma- 
 tured. But everywhere in this great prairie of 
 thought that he left he bravely upholds the 
 right with his stately queens and knights, mak- 
 ing them achieve what no human being could ; 
 clothing triumphs, marriages, funerals, and 
 every circumstance of life with the grandeur of 
 his high purposes and lessons of good. In his 
 portrayal of Lord Grey, who, though gentle by 
 nature, was stern in time of trial, who faced 
 duty with a heavy heart, Spenser gave in his 
 allegory a touch of true history in the character 
 of this grandly loyal but severe type of manli- 
 ness who received for his reward only censure 
 and misunderstanding. Raleigh is also pic- 
 tured with the friendly pen of generous admira- 
 
72 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 tion, giving his grave mistakes a form of cari- 
 cature that shielded rather than exposed too 
 strongly the faults of an ambitious and impetu- 
 ous nature. 
 
 In 1595 Spenser took to London the second 
 part, three more books of the " Faerie Queene," 
 which, we learn from one of his sonnets, had 
 been finished before his marriage, and in that 
 sonnet he asks if, after his " race through faerie 
 land " he may not rest and refresh himself with 
 " Love's sweet praise ; " after which he prom- 
 ised to '* strictly assail the reste." But, all un- 
 conscious to himself, he had then finished his 
 task. One thing must be deeply deplored in 
 this poem, even though it was the custom of 
 the time ; and that is the shameless and untruth- 
 ful flattery of Queen Elizabeth. Englishmen 
 should have received it with censure and de- 
 rision, for not only Spenser as a man, but they as 
 a nation, were a blunt and free-speaking people. 
 
 Still, after all the imperfections of his plot 
 and the error just spoken of, his knights and 
 ladies have delighted all poets of his own day 
 and since. 
 
 Cowley discovered his own powers as a poet 
 by reading Spenser. Dryden speaks of Milton 
 as " Spenser's poetical son." Pope says he 
 loved to read the " Faerie Queene " as well late 
 in life as when only twelve years of age. 
 
 Spenser found that English, when used in its 
 own natural flow, was a musical language, and 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 73 
 
 he first discovered to the world the secret of it, 
 using it most nobly, for he employed it to por- 
 tray all virtues that spring from the root of 
 true manliness. 
 
 Dean Church says : " All Spencer's ' virtues ' 
 spring from a root of manliness. Strength, sim- 
 plicity of aim, elevation of spirit, courage, are 
 presupposed as their necessary conditions ; " and 
 he taught that they all gained their source of 
 strength from the love of beauty in nature, in 
 man, and in the service and care of good and 
 true women. In praising and deifying Gloriana, 
 Spenser painted a character that was just be- 
 coming a part of real life, and he aimed also to 
 define in the fullest sense an English gentleman. 
 From his standpoint he could not ignore the 
 importance of noble blood and family honors, 
 yet he plainly conceived the idea that aside 
 from these the man himself must have qualities 
 of mind and heart of a certain standard to make 
 the character complete. Keeping in view 
 always these high aims, errors that at first seem 
 to overshadow the possibility of reading this 
 poem with great interest fade aw^ay, and a little 
 patience in conquering the st3de and laying 
 aside the thought of it as allegory, this sweet 
 singer becomes a continual delight, and one 
 whose name all students of English must cherish 
 and honor. 
 
 Spenser should have been happy in his mar- 
 ried life. He was just at the height of his man- 
 
74 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 hood, was fond of the sweet quiet of country 
 living, and although he must have missed the 
 refinements of his English home-land, yet his 
 nature was so in touch with the beauties of 
 forest, glen, and stream that everywhere smiled 
 on the otherwise stormy Ireland, that he could 
 not fail of a certain content. But his estate was 
 upon a very insecure part of the county of 
 Munster, just on the border, where disturb- 
 ance was rife. Thirteen years of apparent 
 peace had only covered the embers of a well- 
 kindled fire, and Spenser wrote two articles de- 
 scriptive of the rebellions between 1595 and 
 1 598. This evidence of Ireland's condition, from 
 the graphic pen of one who was a witness to 
 all, is said to be a vivid picture of what Sir 
 Walter Raleigh called '' Ireland's common 
 woe," — a picture of a noble realm that neither 
 masters nor people knew what to do with ; a 
 picture of the sufferings of a destitute and yet 
 mischievous community, for w^hich every rem- 
 edy had been tried and no cure found. With 
 all this evidence before him, and while realizing 
 that England was making terrible mistakes, 
 spending money with no good results, yet he 
 never once recognizes the cruelty, injustice, or 
 greed that were everywhere heaped upon this 
 wretched community "of British subjects. The 
 time was nearly at hand when the same rebel- 
 lions that took Spenser to Ireland with Lord 
 
EDMUND SPENSER. 75 
 
 Grey should, in a later uprising, drive him out 
 of it. Castle Kilcolman was sacked and burned, 
 and Spenser and his wife and two children es- 
 caped. In the terrible experience a newly-born 
 babe was forgotten, and perished in the burning 
 house. This last catastrophe broke Spenser's 
 heart ; he reached London, sick and without 
 money or food. He refused funds sent him by 
 a friend, because he said he had no time to use 
 them, and he died in January, 1598, only forty- 
 five years of age. 
 
 His two children were named Sylvanus and 
 Peregrine. His wife is known to have married 
 again, but except that the records show her to 
 have quarrelled with one of her sons about his 
 land, she has left nothing to connect her with 
 her illustrious husband, or to show^ that she 
 honored his name. 
 
 Edmund Spenser was buried in Westminster 
 Abbey, near to Chaucer, and the following is 
 his epitaph : 
 
 Here lyes (expecting the Second 
 
 comminge of our Savior Christ 
 
 Jesus) the body of Edmund Spenser, 
 
 the Prince of Poets in his tyme, 
 
 whose Divine Spirit needs noe 
 
 other witnesse then the works 
 
 which he left behind him. 
 
 He was born in London in 
 
 the year 1553 and 
 
 Died in the year 
 
 1598. 
 
76 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS, 
 
 How he escaped from Ireland, what became 
 of his manuscripts, whether he ever finished the 
 " Faerie Queen," what he suffered, no one has 
 ever told. We only know^ that the second of 
 England's grandest poets perished miserably, 
 and adds to England's list another victim to the 
 wildness and vengeance of the Irish — an ill- 
 treated and badly-governed people. 
 
 And in turning with tenderness from the 
 pathos of Spenser's life which was so full of 
 noble aims, pure thoughts, and active sym- 
 pathies, it is a pleasure to couple his name with 
 the suggestive title of a Faerie Queene and the 
 Faerie land that she governed. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 In the county of Kent, amid the luxury of 
 England's woods, grassy meadows, and quietly 
 flowing streams, there stood an ancient manor 
 called Penhurst, which in the time of Henry 
 the Eighth was given to Sir William Sidney 
 for having served in the French wars and com- 
 manded the right wing of England's army at 
 Flodden. He belonged to a noble family, who 
 since the time of Henry the Second had held 
 prominent positions at court. His only son, 
 Sir Henry Sidney, brought to this English 
 homestead a lovely wife, Avhose name was Lady 
 Mary Dudley, and she was the daughter of the 
 Duke of Northumberland, whose family was 
 still more ancient and noble than that of the 
 Sidneys. She was also the sister of the unfor- 
 tunate Guilford Dudley. 
 
 Her husband, Sir Henry Sidney, prudently 
 took no part in his father-in-law's schemes, but 
 retired to his, country -seat, and thus saved the 
 fortunes, and possibly the heads, of his family. 
 
 So beautiful was Penhurst, that an author 
 named Ben Jonson wrote a most glowing de- 
 
 77 
 
78 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 scription of it in verse. He says it was not 
 planned for envious show, with pillars, courts, 
 and grand stairways ; but stands in rather som- 
 bre greatness, amidst the beauties of nature, 
 having waters to beguile the angler, a deer- 
 park and game-preserves to lure the hunter, 
 and a hospitality that offered all good things in 
 their season. There were gardens with flow- 
 ers and orchards laden with fruit — from the 
 early cherry to autumn's richest harvest for 
 winter cheer. 
 
 In this beautiful home there was cradled on 
 the 29th of November, 1554, an infant son, who 
 was christened Philip, in honor of Queen 
 Mary's husband, Philip of Spain. This child 
 grew in beauty of character as well as form ; 
 and everywhere, all through his life, he car- 
 ried the magnetism of goodness, intelligence, 
 and every manly virtue. Family records, 
 friendly letters, public documents, and even 
 poetic effusions all testify to the charm of this 
 wonderful man ; and yet in obscurity, poverty, 
 and struggling ambition a child born less than 
 a year before was mounting the ladder of life, 
 destined to meet him, and to be beloved, hon- 
 ored, and to carry into futurity a name far 
 greater, yet tenderly blended \vith the cher- 
 ished and petted Philip Sidney; for Edmund 
 Spenser's obscurity and struggles did not keep 
 these two congenial spirits apart, even though 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 79 
 
 they had not the happiness of a boyhood's 
 friendship to look back upon. 
 
 Jonson in his poem tells us of a tree that 
 was planted in the park at Penhurst in honor 
 of Sir Philip's birth, and the noble oak stood 
 until 1768, receiving added fame from the pen 
 of Edmund Waller. Should you ever visit 
 Penhurst as it stands now, you can picture this 
 lovely little English lad with flowing hair and 
 soft laughing eyes, flitting hither and yon in the 
 park, or pressing his bright, eager face against 
 the windows ; and you can think of him, too, as 
 dressed in gay doublet, silken hose, jewelled 
 hat band and broidered shoes, gleaming like a 
 veritable butterfly winging from flower to 
 shrub — and that, too, in just the dress that we 
 learned was worn in Spenser's time, and which 
 we had regretfully to deny him in thought; 
 because he was clothed by charity, and not as 
 his fond mother doubtless sighed to mantle her 
 darling. 
 
 When Philip was but two years old, his 
 father. Sir Henry Sidney, was sent to Ireland 
 as governor of the royal revenues, and as a 
 vice-treasurer. He repelled an invasion of the 
 Scots in Ulster, and next year was made the 
 Lord Justice of Ireland. 
 
 Two years later he was appointed the Lord 
 President of Wales. We think the simple title 
 of President quite enough ; but in those days, 
 
8o ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 and even now everywhere but under the Stars 
 and Stripes, titles counted for much. Even here, 
 too, we see a gleam of satisfaction with no more 
 than Alderman before one's name. However, 
 all titles are meant to express deserved merit, 
 and it rests with the wearer of the honor 
 whether its record is blemished or not. 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney held that office for the 
 remainder of his life ; therefore he was obliged 
 to reside at Ludlow Castle, and from there he 
 decided to send Philip to a public school in 
 Shrewsbury. So Phihp must have been nearly 
 six years old when Penhurst became a happy 
 dream of the past. 
 
 At Shrewsbury there was a thriving wool 
 trade, and much commerce between Wales and 
 Ireland, so that it was a city of no little impor- 
 tance ; and the burgesses, as the city gover- 
 nors were called, had established an ably con- 
 ducted school. Here Philip formed a lifelong 
 friendship with a boy his own age, and also a 
 distant relative. His name was Fulke Greville, 
 and to his pen we owe the very minute descrip- 
 tions of Philip Sidney's private character and 
 opinions. Greville represents Sidney as grave 
 beyond his years, and yet not bookish. There 
 was no touch of recklessness about him, for he 
 belonged to stirring and sobering times. He 
 must have realized to what he was heir, that 
 his mother had lost father and brother upon the 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 8i 
 
 scaffold, and that even his father's position was 
 by no means secure from the mandates of a 
 fickle sovereign. 
 
 There is a letter that he received from his 
 father while at school, which the author whose 
 life of Sidney we are reviewing feels the im- 
 portance of giving in full ; and we, too, will read 
 every word, that we may see how, ever the 
 same in all times, the love of a true and noble- 
 hearted father portrays itself; and the tender 
 postscript of Lady Mary, his mother, is but a 
 repetition of many, many letters that are lav- 
 ished upon absent sons all over the world. 
 And here it is : 
 
 '' I have received two letters from you, one 
 written in Latin, the other in French ; which I 
 take in good part, and wish 3^ou to exercise 
 that practice of learning often ; for that will 
 stand you in most stead in that profession of life 
 that you are born to live in. And since this is 
 my first letter that ever I did write to you, I 
 will not that it be all empty of some advices, 
 which my natural care for you provoketh me 
 to wish you to follow, as documents to you, in 
 this your tender age. Let your first action be 
 the lifting up of your mind to Almighty God 
 by hearty prayer ; and feelingly digest the 
 words you speak in prayer with continual 
 meditation and thinking of Him to whom you 
 pray, and of the matter for which you pray. 
 
82 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 And use this as an ordinary act, and at an ordi- 
 nary hour, whereby the time itself shall put 
 you in remembrance to do that which you are 
 accustomed to do in that time. 
 
 ''Apply your study to such hours as your 
 discreet master doth assign you, earnestly ; and 
 the time I know he will so limit as shall be 
 both sufficient for your learning and safe for 
 your health. And mark the sense and the mat- 
 ter of that you read, as well as the words. So 
 shall you both enrich your tongue with words 
 and your wit with matter ; and judgment will 
 grovv^ as years groweth in you. Be humble and 
 obedient to your master, for unless you frame 
 yourself to obey others, yea, and feel in your- 
 self what obedience is, you shall never be able 
 to teach others how to obey you. Be courte- 
 ous of gesture and affable to all men, with di- 
 versity of reverence according to the dignity 
 of the person ; there is nothing that winneth so 
 much with so little cost. Use moderate diet so 
 as after your meal you may find your wit 
 fresher and not duller, and your body more 
 lively and not more heavy. Seldom drink wine, 
 and yet sometimes do, lest being enforced to 
 drink upon the sudden, you should find your- 
 self inflamed. 
 
 " Use exercise of body, yet such as is without 
 peril of your joints or bones ; it will increase 
 your force and enlarge your breath. Delight 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 83 
 
 to be cleanly, as well in all parts of your body 
 as in your garments ; it shall make you grateful 
 in each company and otherwise loathsome. 
 
 " Give yourself to be merry, for you degener- 
 ate from your father if you find not yourself 
 most able in wit and bod}^ to do anything when 
 you be most merry ; but let your mirth be ever 
 void of all scurrility and biting words to any 
 man, for a wound given by a word is often- 
 times harder to be cured than that which is 
 given with the sword. 
 
 " Be you rather a hearer and bearer away of 
 other men's talk than a beginner and procurer 
 of speech ; otherwise you shall be counted to 
 delight to hear yourself speak. Let never oath 
 be heard to come out of your mouth nor word 
 of ribaldry ; detest it in others ; so shall custom 
 make to yourself a law against it in yourself. 
 
 " Be modest in each assembly ; and rather be 
 rebuked of light fellows for maidenlike shame- 
 fastness than of your sad friends for pert bold- 
 ness. Think upon every word that you will 
 speak before you utter it, and remember how 
 nature hath ramparted up, as it were, the tongue 
 with teeth, lips, yea, and hair without the lips, 
 all betokening reins or bridles for the loose use 
 of that member. Above all things, tell no un- 
 truth ; no, not in trifles : the custom of it is 
 naughty. And let it not satisfy you that, for a 
 time, the hearers take it for truth ; for after it 
 
84 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 will be known as it is, to your shame ; for there 
 cannot be a greater reproach to a gentleman 
 than to be counted a liar. Study and endeavor 
 yourself to be virtuously occupied, so shall you 
 make such a habit of well-doing in you that you 
 shall not know how to do evil, though you 
 would. 
 
 " Remember, my son, the noble blood you are 
 descended of, by your mother's side ; and think 
 only by virtuous life and good action you may 
 be an ornament to that illustrious family, and 
 otherwise through vice and sloth you shall be 
 counted labes generis, one of the greatest curses 
 that can happen to man. 
 
 '* Well, my little Philip, this is enough for me, 
 and too much, I fear, for you. But if I shall 
 find that this light meal of digestion nourisheth 
 anything in the weak stomach of your capacity. 
 I will, as I find the same grow stronger, feed it 
 with tougher food. 
 
 " Your loving father, so long as you live in 
 the fear of God, '' H. Sidney." 
 
 And here is the postscript that his mother 
 added. Letters were treasures in those days, 
 for both the conveying of them and the ma- 
 terials used were matters of no small expense. 
 
 '' Your noble and careful father hath taken 
 pains (with his own hand) to give you in this 
 his letter so wise, so learned, and most requisite 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 85 
 
 precepts for you to follow with a diligent and 
 humble, thankful mind, as I will not withdraw 
 your eyes from beholding and reverent honor- 
 ing of the same, no, not so long time as to read 
 any letter from me ; and therefore at this time 
 I will write no other letter than this ; and here- 
 by I first bless you with my desire to God to 
 plant in you His grace, and secondarily warn 
 you to have always before the eyes of your 
 mind those excellent counsels of my lord, your 
 dear father, and that you fail not continually 
 once in four or five days to read them over. 
 And for a final leave-taking for this time, see 
 that you show yourself a loving, obedient 
 scholar to your good master, and that my lord 
 and I may hear that you profit so in your learn- 
 ing as thereby you may increase our loving 
 care of you, and deserve at his hands the con- 
 tinuance of his great joys, to have him often 
 witness with his own hand the hope he hath in 
 your well-doing. 
 
 Farewell, my little Philip, and once again the 
 Lord bless you. Your loving mother, 
 
 " Mary Sidney." 
 
 We have a right to infer, when we remember 
 how full of noble aspirations Spenser was, and 
 how he honored all things that were pure in 
 purpose or act, that he, too, had a mother who, 
 if she did not admonish her son in courtly 
 words, had the same yearning love for him, and 
 
B6 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 must have done her duty as fully and as well as 
 Lady Sidney, even if from a more humble sta- 
 tion has remained only the echo of her counsel 
 in the writings of her son. 
 
 As we inferred from Spenser's course, boys 
 went to college while still very young, and Sid- 
 ney left Shrewsbury for Christchurch while 
 but fourteen years old. He stayed for about 
 three years, and left Oxford without taking a 
 degree. There was nothing unusual in that, for 
 college habits were freer then than now, yet that 
 he was a diligent student there is ample proof. 
 
 Some unknown writer sent to the "Arcadia" 
 a short essay on Sidney's life and death, and 
 quaintly says " that his tutors could not pour 
 in so fast as he was ready to receive." 
 
 Oxford was not held in so high repute as 
 Cambridge, and thus Sidney may have stood 
 more prominently alone as a student. 
 
 Here he formed another warm friendship in 
 Edmund Dyer, who made himself immortal by 
 one single line of poetry : 
 
 "My mind to me a kingdom is." 
 
 Sidney lived in the tenderest relationship 
 with these two, Greville and Dyer, and wrote 
 himself of this bond that they " make but one 
 mind, in bodies three." 
 
 There is a letter still preserved that Sidney 
 wrote from Oxford to his uncle, the Earl of 
 Leicester. The earl was Queen Elizabeth's 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 87 
 
 favorite, and it was believed at one time that 
 he intended making Sidney his heir. He used 
 his influence to bring about a marriage between 
 Sidney and Anne Cecil, Lord Burleigh's daugh- 
 ter, but it was not carried out. 
 
 Sir Henry was a brave and honest man, but 
 his administration in Ireland proved disastrous 
 in many ways. Too honorable to abuse his 
 trusts, the office cost him more than he re- 
 ceived ; his health suffered, he was misrepre- 
 sented at home by wily politicians, — who, we 
 can see, have a long lineage, — and he returned 
 to England financially and physically broken. 
 Lady Mary Sidney had lost her beauty by the 
 small-pox which she caught while nursing the 
 queen, and she shrank from social life in con- 
 sequence. Queen Elizabeth was served by 
 many noble men and women, but she rarely 
 acknowledged her indebtedness. She removed 
 Sir Henry Sidney from his position in Ireland, 
 and offered him a peerage. But he had no 
 means to support it, and as Queen Elizabeth did 
 not grant the needed tract of land, they were 
 greatly distressed lest she be offended when 
 they declined the honor. However, Elizabeth 
 was content to pay Sidney's long services by 
 empty compliment, for thus she appeased her 
 conscience. Sir Henry continued to be Lord 
 President of Wales, and Philip passed some 
 months with his father at Ludlow Castle. 
 
88 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Mr. Francis Walsingham was resident am- 
 bassador at Paris, and Sir Henry took that 
 opportunity to have his son travel, Queen Eliz- 
 abeth granting him a license of " three servants 
 and four horses, with liberty to remain two 
 years for the better attaining of foreign lan- 
 guages." 
 
 Philip carried letters to Francis Walsingham, 
 one of the best and wisest of England's states- 
 men. He remained in Paris some time, and 
 through the distinction of his family at home 
 was appointed by Charles IX. " gentleman in 
 ordinary of his bedchamber," by which I infer 
 he was admitted to the greater intimacy of the 
 king, and it may or may not have involved 
 some duties of attendance. 
 
 Philip was in Paris participating in the wed- 
 ding ceremonies of Henry of Navarre and Mar- 
 garet of Valois. She was a reluctant bride, 
 and was by her brother forced to assent at the 
 altar. It was a vain and hollow celebration, 
 and before it was over Paris was bathed in the 
 blood of the Huguenots. Young, happy, and 
 gentle, Philip Sidney was there as a British 
 subject. He took refuge at the English Em- 
 bassy, and to that he owed his life ; while it 
 was doubtless to the memory of those horrors 
 that later in life he opposed the schemes for 
 the marriage of Elizabeth to a French noble- 
 man. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 89 
 
 Lords Burleigh and Leicester despatched a 
 formal letter, that is, one authorized by govern- 
 ment, asking that " safe conduct out of the 
 country be provided for Lord Wharton and 
 young Master Philip Sidney." 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney did not think it necessary 
 that his son should return to England, and ad- 
 vised him to visit Strasburg, Heidelberg, and 
 Frankfort. Philip Sidney was but eighteen 
 years old when he had an opportunity to wit- 
 ness the dissipation and corruption of the 
 French court, and the bigotry of the Italians ; 
 yet he came home burning with patriotism — a 
 stronger, truer Protestant, and with a horror 
 of the Italian courts. 
 
 At Frankfort he met a man named Hubert 
 Languet, who had escaped from the dangers of 
 St. Bartholomew, and who gained a great influ- 
 ence over him. Languet was a Frenchman of 
 unusual learning, and was a professor of civil 
 law in an Italian city. He had made the ac- 
 quaintance of Melancthon, who influenced him 
 to become an advocate of the Reformed relig- 
 ion, and he was recognized as one of the strong- 
 est agents of the Protestant powers. He was 
 trusted and personally known, not only to 
 princes, but to the ablest men of that party in 
 Holland, France, and Germany. Languet saw 
 that Sidney was a youth of no common ability, 
 and he became almost romantically attached to 
 
90 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 him; and surely how well Sidney must have 
 heeded that loving letter of early days, or his 
 power to attract the good, noble, and learned at 
 so tender an age would have been quite impos- 
 sible ! And how much it was to him that he 
 was within the charmed influence of such men as 
 his father, Languet, and Francis Walsingham ! 
 They w^ere to him the armor that increased his 
 comeliness of mind and heart, and enabled him 
 to resist the temptations of his brilliant and 
 scheming uncle, the Earl of Leicester. With 
 so many amiable and manly qualities, so much 
 that enabled him to select the good and leave 
 the evil, — just as a bee extracts honey even from 
 poisonous flowers, — so Sidney with a few oth- 
 ers travelled and was feted, unharmed, in cities 
 of which Roger Ascham, who you remember 
 was Queen Elizabeth's tutor, says that in " Ven- 
 ice alone he saw more vice in nine days than 
 London could exhibit in nine years." Still Sid- 
 ney had one fault — that of hasty suspicion. A 
 distant relative journeyed with him, and at an 
 inn the keeper managed to collect his bill twice, 
 whereupon Sidney charged his friend with 
 having taken it. Discovering his error he made 
 proper acknowledgment, but it seems the only 
 blot upon his gracious personality. 
 
 At Venice he had his portrait painted, and 
 presented it to his friend Languet, who emphat- 
 ically praised its accuracy. What became of it 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 91 
 
 is not known, although it may even yet be dis- 
 covered in some old German collection, proudly 
 exhibited as a baron or burgher of high degree 
 and unusual beauty. The best portrait known 
 is now in Warwick Castle, — a very proper 
 place, for the Earl of Warwick was an uncle of 
 Sidney, — and it represents an elegant man, 
 with features so delicate as to seem effeminate, 
 although that impression is most emphatically 
 contradicted by his history. 
 
 His friends influenced him not to trust his 
 immaturity to the allurements of Rome ; and so 
 after visiting Genoa, he returned to Venice, 
 where he studied most industriously literature 
 and politics, and in his '' Defense of Poesy" he 
 wittily describes his progress in horsemanship, 
 and the master who taught him. 
 
 He was also permitted to attend the Emperor 
 Maximilian to Prague, and there he witnessed 
 the opening of the Bohemian Diet, and re- 
 turned to London by the way of Dresden, 
 Heidelberg, Strasburg, and Frankfort. 
 
 He found on his return that one of his sisters 
 had died, and that his remaining sister Mary 
 had been taken under the special charge of the 
 queen, and attached to her person. The time 
 for his more mature work was at hand, and he, 
 too, entered upon life at court. 
 
 And with entrance at court, and the accept- 
 ance of duties for which he had been prepared, 
 
92 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 came also the time for that phase of life that 
 romancers weave into thrilling fiction, which 
 will make you more eager than ever to trace 
 the paths he trod. 
 
 Just before Philip was twenty-one years old, 
 his uncle, the Earl of Leicester, who had 
 reached the very pinnacle of Elizabeth's favor, 
 arranged to entertain the queen at Kenilworth 
 Castle, an estate she had bestowed upon him 
 with the title. These festivities lasted nearly 
 three weeks, and Philip shared them with all 
 the ardor of his youth, and fitness to aid his 
 uncle in the task of pleasing so capricious a 
 guest as Queen Elizabeth. The court then 
 went to Chartley Castle, the seat of the Earl of 
 Essex, who was in Ireland. The Countess of 
 Essex, in the absence of her husband, received 
 the royal guest, and Philip Sidney, having been 
 . chosen to attend her Majesty hither, saw for the 
 1/ first time Lady ^enelo2^ Devereux, known 
 in literature as Sir Philip Sidney's ' i^Ste lla." 
 She was at that time only thirteen, and it is 
 not likely either of these young people dreamed 
 of the future bond that history and poetry 
 would record. 
 
 But soon after Essex returned from Ireland 
 Philip had become a frequent guest. The year 
 after, Essex went as earl-marshal to Ireland, 
 and Philip accompanied him. However, as 
 Sir Henry Sidney had again been appointed a 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 93 
 
 deput}^ to Ireland, his visit was to his father, al- 
 though he had come to regard the earl as his 
 future father-in-law. Here Essex died of a 
 sudden and painful disease, and on his death he 
 expressed his hope that Philip might choose to 
 wed his daughter, and said this : '* If he [Sid- 
 ney] go on in the course he hath begun, he will 
 be as famous and worthy a gentleman as ever 
 England bred." What prevented this mar- 
 riage must remain uncertain. Lady Essex, 
 shortly after her widowhood, married Sidney's 
 uncle, the Earl of Leicester, and perhaps then 
 learned how poor in worldly goods the Sidneys 
 were. Then, too, Sir Philip was full of court, 
 diplomatic, and studious interests, and Cupid 
 had not pierced the chamber of his heart, where 
 lay waiting that spark that in so high-minded a 
 character as Sidney could not be lighted by a 
 mere worldly ambition. 
 
 But this dreaming fancy was destined to have 
 a crude awakening; for one day it Avas an- 
 nounced that his Penelope was espoused to a 
 man entirely unworthy of her, named Lord 
 Rich ; and then Philip felt that he was poor in- 
 de^ ! for the slumbering passion burst into a 
 flame of remorseful regret, all the more poig- 
 nant because he discovered that Penelope had 
 patiently and silently loved him. 
 
 Sir Philip's sister Mary's marriage to the 
 Earl of Pembroke added to the influence of his 
 
94 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 family, and yet there were still troubles for his 
 gentle, good father. Complaints of his manage- 
 ment in Ireland by enemies at cojjrt were cred- 
 ited by Elizabeth, to w^hom Sir Henry had to 
 send in a claim for sums expended from his 
 own private income, because she found at best 
 that Ireland was a profitless and troublesome 
 portion of her realm. This gave EHzabeth and 
 some of her advisers great annoyance, and 
 Philip undertook the defence of his father by 
 demanding of the accusers proof of the charges. 
 Sir Philip in that defence showed how power- 
 fully he could use the language of controversy. 
 
 To his father it was reported as an excellent 
 discourse, and it was added : " Let no man com- 
 pare with Sir Philip's pen." 
 
 During this ordeal he wrote long and cheer- 
 ing letters to his father, promising the aid of 
 friends to unravel if possible the tangle of a 
 captious queen's displeasure, and in one he says : 
 " Among which friends, before God, there is 
 none proceeds either so thoroughly or so wisely 
 as your lady, my mother. For my own part, I 
 have had only light from her." 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney's heart must have been 
 greatly grieved at this injustice to his father, 
 and perhaps we can find more ready excuse for 
 a second mistake that he made, in accusing 
 hastily his father's secretary of unfaithful con- 
 duct. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 95 
 
 But Molineaux was true to Sir Henry, and 
 his reply to Sir Philip is a model of dignity and 
 prudent self-assertion. 
 
 Sir Philip must have made an honorable 
 apology, as good friendship continued between 
 them through many years. 
 
 So absorbed was he in work for England and 
 the affairs of Europe, in so far as it bore upon 
 his own country's welfare, that he gave neither 
 time nor thought to tender sentiments or po- 
 etic inspirations. Before his twenty-third 
 birthday Elizabeth selected him to convey her 
 congratulations to the new Emperor Rudolf o*f 
 Hapsburg, and also her condolences to the 
 two sons of the Elector Palatine, who had just 
 died. 
 
 The Palatinate as well as all the small Ger- 
 man states were torn by religious factions, so 
 that it was not a question between Catholic 
 and Protestant supremacy, but first Calvinism 
 and then the tenets of Luther. Fortunately, 
 Philip met Languet before he reached Heidel- 
 berg, and together they went to Prague, where 
 the new emperor was holding his court. 
 
 Sir Philip — as the dignity of his position sug- 
 gests he should always now be named, for we 
 have left the boy far behind — had asked permis- 
 sion to confer with German princes and states- 
 men as to a safe and practical means of resist- 
 ing the aggressive strength that Jesuits and 
 
g6 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Spanish wealth and marriages were spreading 
 all through countries where the hereditary 
 rulers were Protestants. He urged unity by 
 association for political and religious liberty, 
 and this might have been accomplished had not 
 the Protestants themselves been divided by 
 factions almost as fierce as those they had held 
 with the Catholic Church itself. They lost 
 sight of common good in their own petty dif- 
 ferences ; and just as boys and girls dispute the 
 turn of a game and throw away its conditions 
 for amusement, so each sect tried to reach the 
 desired point alone, having no regular path to 
 follow, and like the deserters of the game found 
 only disappointment and discontent. 
 
 Thus this really wise and far-seeing scheme 
 proved to be only a fleeting dream. 
 
 Protestantism was so faint that only a feeble 
 breath held it from extinction, and the bent 
 that literature was taking toward scientific and 
 philosophical subjects diverted public thought 
 from the intense excitement of the religious dis- 
 putes, and gave it time to revive in, we will 
 hope, a more healthful manner. 
 
 So great was Sir Philip's disappointment that 
 his proposals met with no success, that he 
 wanted to return to England, but Languet ad- 
 vised him to wait until he had permission from 
 the queen ; heeding which, they went to Heid- 
 elberg and Cologne, where orders awaited Sir 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 97 
 
 Philip to go to the Netherlands and congratu- 
 late William the Silent, Prince of Orange, upon 
 the birth of a son and heir. Here he met distin- 
 guished men from other countries, and it was 
 reported to Elizabeth that her " Ambassador, 
 Sir Philip Sidney, was considered one of the 
 ripest and greatest of counsellors of estate in 
 all Europe." This was high praise for so young 
 a man, and letters from his wise and faithful 
 friend Languet showed how much Sidney was 
 guarded and advised through that source, and, 
 best of all, that he accepted the counsel. Lan- 
 guet in one of his letters to Sidney saj^s : " My 
 noble Sidney, you must avoid that persistent 
 siren, sloth. Think not that God endowed you 
 with parts so excellent to the end that you 
 should let them rot in leisure. Rather hold 
 firmly that He requires more from you than 
 from those to whom He has been less liberal of 
 talents. 
 
 " There is no reason to fear lest you should 
 decay in idleness if you will employ your 
 mind ; for in so great a realm as England op- 
 portunity will surely not be wanting for its use- 
 ful exercise." 
 
 A year later he was offered active service in 
 the Low Countries, and weary of the idleness of 
 court life he was eager to go, but a gentle and 
 earnest appeal from his father induced him to 
 yield his own strong desire. His father did 
 
98 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 not oppose the plan, but presented his depend- 
 ence upon his son's presence and protection, 
 for they were now so reduced that Sir Henry 
 and Lady Mary Sidney had but one room at 
 Hampton Court, and noblemen could not work 
 and thereby earn an independent and pleasant 
 home for themselves, but, like children under 
 parental authority, must live as dictated by the 
 decree of their king and queen. 
 
 Sir Philip's friend Languet was growing old 
 and feeble, and yet so fond was he of Sidney 
 that he ventured, not knowing how great the 
 risk, to go to England and see this darling of 
 his heart. He made the journey and return 
 without injury to his health. Languet's wide 
 experience of men, cities, and courts gives 
 great weight to a letter written to Sidney 
 after he reached his home. It is a frank 
 avowal of his impressions, and as part of it 
 is quoted by Dr Symonds, so will I give it to 
 you : 
 
 " I was pleased last winter to find you flour- 
 ishing in favor and highly esteemed by all men. 
 Yet, to conceal nothing, it appears to me that 
 the manners of your court are less manly than 
 I could wish ; and the majority of your great 
 folk struck me as more eager to gain applause 
 by affected courtesy than by such virtues as 
 benefit the commonwealth, and are the chief 
 ornament of noble minds and high-born per- 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 99 
 
 sonages. It grieved me then, as also your other 
 friends, that you should waste the flower of 
 your youth in such trifles. I began to fear lest 
 your excellent disposition should at last be 
 blunted. lest you should come by habit to care 
 for things which soften and emasculate our 
 minds." 
 
 But Languet did not realize that while a truly 
 great mind deplores such conditions, it finds 
 employment that resists any contamination, and 
 in a stray poem Sir Philip verifies this charac- 
 teristic, for he writes that 
 
 " Greater was the shepherd's treasure 
 Than this false, fine, courtly pleasure ; " 
 
 and he found, to his comfort, many cultivated 
 gentlefolk with whom to spend his leisure, not 
 once forgetting his early ties with Fulke Gre- 
 ville and Edward Dyer. 
 
 When relating Sir Philip Sidney's escape 
 from the dangers of the St. Bartholomew mas- 
 sacre, it was stated that to that incident was 
 doubtless due his opposition to Queen Eliza- 
 beth's marriage to a French prince. And we 
 have now reached the point where almost alone 
 and in fearless bravery he stood and battled for 
 the protection of his religion, his country, and 
 his queen. Elizabeth had a French suitor who 
 had become the Duke of Anjou when his 
 
lOO ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 brother Henri had ascended the throne of 
 France. 
 
 Anjou hoped the English had forgotten that 
 cruel massacre, and much money and time were 
 spent in presents and the writing of courtly 
 letters, — which, unless there had been an object 
 to obtain, neither Catharine de Medici nor her 
 sons could have afforded, and their efforts were 
 rewarded by a strong inclination upon Eliza- 
 beth's part to accept the duke as her husband. 
 However, English hearts and memories were 
 aroused, and a pamphlet with this quaint title 
 appeared : '* The Discovery of the Gaping Gulf, 
 whereinto England is like to be swallowed, by a 
 French Marriage, if the Lord forbid not the 
 Banns, by letting her Majesty see the Sin and 
 Punishment thereoff." 
 
 Sympathizers at court censured the audacity 
 of the article, and Stubbs and Page, its pub- 
 lishers, were condemned each to lose his right 
 hand. When Stubbs lost his, he waved his hat 
 with the other, and cried '' God save the 
 queen ; " while Page bravely pointed to his 
 own bleeding hand, and said, *' There lies the 
 hand of a true Englishman." 
 
 Elizabeth was naturally surrounded by more 
 fiatterers than friends at her court, for vanity 
 was her chief weakness. The Earl of Leicester 
 opposed the match, but his secret marriage 
 with Lady Essex had been discovered, and had 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. lOi 
 
 SO offended the queen that he had been quietly 
 banished from court. Sir Philip Sidney had 
 already proclaimed his own alarm at the possi- 
 ble alliance ; but with so strong an ally as his 
 Uncle Leicester taken from him, and having 
 come to an open rupture in a heated discussion 
 of the subject with the Earl of Oxford, who 
 favored the scheme, Sidney's position was one 
 of peril and extreme discomfort, and the course 
 he pursued with so much fearless advocacy of 
 what he felt to be right, is more thrilling in 
 detail than fiction can create. 
 
 The Earl of Oxford had called Sidney a 
 puppy, while Sidney had accused Oxford of 
 false statement, and therefore, according to the 
 manner of the times, onlookers expected a duel. 
 But the Lords of Council begged Elizabeth to 
 mend the breach if possible. She tried to have 
 Sidney apologize to a peer of the realm, but he 
 proudly though gently reminded her that his 
 own birth and heritage made Oxford no "lord 
 over him," and '' that they were equals." 
 
 There is no record of any apology on either 
 side, but Oxford was believed to have planned 
 for Sidney's assassination to relieve his bitter 
 resentment. 
 
 Sir Philip continued to enjoy the friendship 
 of his queen until 1580, when, as a champion of 
 the opposition to the French marriage, and 
 commanding a pen with which in diplomatic 
 
102 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 phraseology no man in England could compete, 
 he believed that the hour had come when it 
 was his duty to lay his arguments before the 
 queen herself. He prepared a careful paper 
 or memorial addressed to her, couched in the 
 courteous, respectful, and yet brave language 
 of entreaty, appeal, and the discussion of every 
 point needed to make her understand the solici- 
 tude and affectionate desire of her people as a 
 nation, as well as her own duty to herself, to her 
 subjects, and to her foreign and domestic ties. 
 This wonderful address will, a few years later, 
 appeal to you as the outcome of his gentle and 
 true boyhood, his love as a son, his patriotism 
 as a British subject, and last, though far from 
 least, as an exponent of his faith in the religion 
 that had been taught him at his mother's 
 knee. 
 
 The harmony of Sidney's unselfish effort to 
 stay the impending danger was apparently lost 
 in the discord of political greed and strife for 
 preferment at court. The element of sincerity 
 and zeal, tempered by the gentle bravery of 
 Sir Philip's heart, led him to retire from court 
 and go to Wilton, the residence of his sister, 
 the Countess of Pembroke, not in the spirit of 
 sullen resentment because his loyal effort had 
 failed of recognition, but to spend those days in 
 a diversion that tended still m.ore to the per- 
 fecting of his scholarly attainments and manly 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 103 
 
 qualities. Spenser described Lady Pembroke 
 as 
 
 *' The gentlest shepherdess that lives this day, 
 And most resembling both in shape and spright 
 Her brother dear." 
 
 They were indeed tenderly congenial both 
 in affection and literary tastes, and we must 
 imagine with what genuine tact this loving 
 sister sought to divert the sad disappointment 
 of her brother by heartily joining in his work 
 of translating the Psalms of David into various 
 lyrical measures, and we can form some idea of 
 her culture and brightness when we read that 
 the first forty-two belong to Philip, while the 
 succeeding ones, credited to her, exhibit much 
 greater aptness for the work. 
 
 Two years before this Sidney had met Ga- 
 briel Harvey, Spenser's great friend, and 
 through Harvey Spenser and Sidney first 
 formed their happy friendship. These two 
 men, Harvey and Spenser, as well Sidney's boy- 
 hood's playfellows Fulke Greville and Edward 
 Dyer, formed a little *' Academy," or, as we 
 would say to-day, a " club," and, guided by 
 Harvey — who, we remember, had strong opin- 
 ions that he was fond of asserting — they made 
 many experiments with their mother-tongue. 
 They endeavored to mould it to fit Latin 
 rules, with varying success, — only one of their 
 
I04 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 number, Spenser, bursting the bonds and 
 recognizing the possibilities of its unfettered 
 consonants. 
 
 While Sidney was at Wilton he also began, 
 at his sister's request, the '* Arcadia." From 
 the Dedication, or Preface, as we now say, it is 
 plain that this was only meant for private 
 amusement, and as one of Sidney's dying re- 
 quests was to have the manuscript destroyed, 
 it shows how sincere he was in his desire to 
 have it confined within the circle of his family. 
 " The Arcadia " is a very complicated love- 
 story, having many digressions from the chief 
 points of the narrative, and useful only as a 
 type of the literature acceptable in those days. 
 Two passages are worthy of mention, the first 
 being a description of the home of the heroine, 
 which must have been his beloved Penhurst, 
 and the other is a prayer uttered by one 
 of the characters. This prayer is said to have 
 been the one uttered, with but slight alteration, 
 by King Charles the First just before his exe- 
 cution, and his bitter enemies, the dissenting 
 party, used it as proof of his hypocrisy, even 
 in his dying hour. Whatever his faults, we 
 know he did die bravely and calmly, saying 
 wise and gentle things to his poor children, 
 and sending manly messages to his absent wife. 
 Then, too, he may have read jthat prayer so 
 many times for his diversion in happier hours 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 105 
 
 that the appropriate words may have fallen 
 unconsciously from his lips. 
 
 While Sidney was at Wilton a young nephew 
 was born, named William Herbert — a babe 
 who in time became the patron and friend of 
 Shakespeare, and to whom it is supposed that 
 Shakespeare addressed several of his early son- 
 nets. It is also supposed that while Philip was 
 away from court and its gaieties his half-prom- 
 ised bride, the daughter of the late Earl of 
 Essex, was married to another and more pros- 
 perous suitor, named Lord Rich, who was the 
 son of the Lord Chancellor of England. This 
 officer of the realm had just died, bequeathing 
 to his son large estates, thus emphasizing the 
 name he bore by all that from a worldly view 
 it implied; but he was poor indeed in those 
 priceless possessions of the heart and mind that 
 had been so lavishly bestowed upon Sir Philip 
 Sidney. 
 
 This marriage showed Philip the true state 
 of his affection for Penelope, and when it be- 
 came known that she protested even at the 
 marriage ceremony against the union with 
 Lord Rich, and that long before her hand 
 could have been Philip's had he but asked for 
 it, Sidney's disappointment and sorrow nearly 
 overcame him. Penelope must have lacked 
 high moral tone and force of character, for she 
 permitted her unhappy marriage to so degrade 
 
 ^ 
 
100 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 her womanhood that she has left a record all 
 unworthy of the noble sentiment that she had 
 inspired in England's most gracious courtier. 
 
 In 1580 the Earl of Leicester returned to 
 court, having it understood that he would no 
 longer openly oppose the French match, and 
 he also urged Philip to come with him. This 
 step we find referred to in two very long let- 
 ters, written to his brother Robert, who was 
 travelling. Robert afterwards became the Earl 
 of Leicester, but he appears not only to have 
 taxed his father's slender purse to the utmost, 
 but to have been dependent upon his brother 
 Philip for a regular allowance, that must have 
 come from brotherly self-denial ; and yet we 
 find the gift accompanied by these words : " For 
 the money you have received, assure yourself 
 (for it is true) there is nothing I spend so pleas- 
 eth me as that which is for you." At this time 
 also Philip's old and respected friend Languet 
 wrote his last letter to the young man whom 
 he had so tenderly loved and cherished. He 
 congratulated Philip upon his return to court, 
 and yet warned him against the snares that 
 would there surround him. He knew that a 
 young and useful life might be embittered and 
 rendered helpless by such a captious queen, 
 and he died fully aware of the trouble that was 
 in store for both Europe and England. 
 
 On New Year's Day Philip gave the queen a 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 107 
 
 symbolic gift, in gold, of a heart, a chain, and a 
 whip with a golden handle, by which he signi- 
 fied his submission to her will ; and two months 
 after we find him one of a parliamentary com- 
 mittee to frame laws against the aggressiveness 
 of the Catholics, and for the punishment of 
 seditious words or deeds against the queen. 
 All this time Elizabeth was wavering between 
 her plans to punish Spain for her past depreda- 
 tions and the suit of the French prince for her 
 hand. When her ministers urged one she 
 would fly to the other, and then reverse her 
 decision as soon as anj^ possible agreement was 
 reached. 
 
 Finally an embassy came from France for the 
 purpose of settling the question, and in the 
 courtesies extended to the guests Philip played 
 a prominent part. He was still bitterly op- 
 posed to the match, but covering his opposition 
 with discreet silence, he, with others, prepared 
 an allegorical spectacle that was to be a last 
 protest against the dangerous alliance. 
 
 The costly dress and elegant arrangement of 
 this tournament must have been a heavy strain 
 upon Sidney's purse, that had never been 
 weighted with gold, and after the festivities 
 were ended we find Philip earnestly seeking 
 occupation. Invitations that were the outcome 
 of favorable impress made while abroad poured 
 in upon Philip, but turning them all aside he 
 
io8 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Still lingered at home true to his country and 
 his sovereign. Finally he had the satisfaction 
 of seeing the French match abandoned, and was 
 one of many English nobles who formed an 
 escort to speed the parting guest. 
 
 During the following year further settling of 
 the New World was much discussed, and Eliza- 
 beth had signed her first charter of lands to 
 various nobles, and Philip was one who re- 
 ceived three millions of acres — a gift only in 
 name, as it must be held by force, and made 
 from a wilderness into an uncertain home. 
 How little was dreamed of the fabulous value 
 of three millions of acres to-day ! Two years 
 later Philip attempted to go to America, but 
 Elizabeth would not give her consent, where- 
 upon Philip sold thirty thousand acres and sub- 
 mitted to the order; — yielding also to the 
 queen's remonstrances when the crown of Po- 
 land was placed at his command. 
 
 Then, too, Philip was about to marry Fran- 
 ces Walsingham, daughter of the good man 
 who protected Sidney in his youth, when Paris 
 was filled with the horrors of St. Bartholomew. 
 
 We find a sad yet manly letter from Philip's 
 father. Sir Henry Sidney, regretting his ina- 
 bility to do more for his noble and devoted 
 son, and he reviews at length his long- and 
 unrequited service in Ireland, whereby he 
 lost more than he received, because he in no 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 109 
 
 way would take advantage of the possible emol- 
 ument of the office which, by crafty manage- 
 ment could have been his. He refers to his 
 wife's disfigurement by smallpox, through her 
 devotion to Elizabeth, and states without com- 
 plaint that no recognition of these loyal services 
 had ever been made. He shows that he had 
 received his estate in Kent, Penhurst, in a sad 
 condition of debt, and closes this narrative of 
 '' biting necessity " with a blessing upon the 
 noble parents and sweet daughter who received 
 his son without fortune, and '' but for his good- 
 ness alone.'' 
 
 Philip and his wife lived together three years, 
 and after his death she married Robert, Earl of 
 Essex, who died on the scaffold ; and later she 
 became a Catholic and married a nobleman of 
 that faith. Philip's daughter married the Earl 
 of Rutland ; but Sidney's wife must have been 
 a woman of light affections, or she could hardly 
 have so easily forgotten the love of such a gen- 
 tle, noble knight. 
 
 Of Sidney's writings, *' Arcadia," as we know, 
 was for private pastime, to please his favorite 
 sister ; and his translation of the Psalms was a 
 noble and yet humble effort, whereby he sought 
 refuge from disappointment and chagrin ; while 
 his letter to his queen and his affectionate de- 
 fence of his father stand before the world as 
 models of sound judgment and lucid statement, 
 
no ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 couched in the most courteous and elegant 
 phrases into which the English language can 
 be constructed. 
 
 Next we find a poem, '' Astrophel and Stella," 
 wherein he is believed to have given vent to 
 his sorrow and bitter regret at the marriage of 
 Lord Rich and Lady Penelope Devereux. It 
 certainly is full of sonnets and songs that can 
 be thus explained, with that event of his life 
 before us, and yet without that knowledge the 
 poem is a collection of vividly imaginative 
 songs and lyrics, in which he exercises his pen 
 with classic Italian and French models of 
 rhyme which enabled him to give full play to 
 the intensity of his character; for strong indeed 
 he was, being a devoted son, a subject loyal 
 at all risks, a lover full of romantic devotion 
 and manly self-sacrifice, a fond and generous 
 brother, a tender husband, and a true friend. 
 Hence he could not write other than he did. 
 
 Fulke Greville, Sidney's lifelong friend, re- 
 cords that Philip did not write to become 
 great, but out of the intensity of his desire to 
 be himself, and also to make others great and 
 good, made writing one of the agents by which 
 he emphasized his opinions; and having refined 
 tastes, he employed his natural originality of 
 thought and added it to his charmingly per- 
 suasive manner and speech to clothe his argu- 
 ments in prose or poetry as seemed to him best. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. in 
 
 Indeed, all critics agree in pronouncing his 
 prose writings as his greatest poems ; and we 
 learn through his own greatest work, " The 
 Defense of Poesy," that he held the prose of 
 many writers to be fine poems. 
 
 As Sidney never wrote but for a purpose, by 
 which is meant not idly, nor to satisfy a mere 
 whim, there was of course a reason for his 
 " Defense of Poesy," and it is said to be this : 
 A writer of those times, Stephen Gosson by 
 name, dedicated to Sidney without his permis- 
 sion a tirade against " poets, pipers, and their 
 excusers," and he called his book '' The School 
 of Abuse." 
 
 Sidney did not at all agree with the sentiment 
 expressed in the book, and yet his name had 
 been used to authorize a clever attack upon 
 poets ; and hence his reply to the false position 
 he had been unconsciously placed in. 
 
 First in the Defense he calls himself a 
 " paper-blurrer," who must of necessity make a 
 defence of his *' unelected vocation," and he 
 asks permission to defend that writing which 
 he holds in " almost the highest estimation," 
 but which " is fallen to be the laughingstock of 
 children." He claims that to attack poetry is 
 to scorn the earliest germs that we have of 
 general culture. He reviews the Greek and 
 Roman writers, showing that though the 
 strength of their thought was philosophy and 
 
112 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 history, yet the surface was polished by poetry. 
 He shows that Christ used parables and fables 
 to strengthen the impression of His divine 
 teachings ; that history is confined to facts, and 
 philosophy to reason ; while poetry can lead 
 the mind into higher, purer realms than the 
 stern and ofttimes base records of man ; that 
 through poetry can be learned what might be 
 — what is attainable ; because poetic thought 
 can paint with its glowing words model condi- 
 tions which, though possible, do not fully exist. 
 He attacks boldly all affectations of speech, 
 saying of such writers that he has '' found in 
 divers small-learned courtiers a more sound 
 style than in some professors of learning." 
 
 Sidney's Sonnet to Sleep is too happy an in- 
 spiration to leave for later years before it 
 comes to your knowledge. The sonnet is a 
 short poem of fourteen lines, and has its rhymes 
 adjusted to a particular rule, as we can easily 
 see. 
 
 SONNET TO SLEEP. 
 
 *' Come, sleep, O sleep, the certain knot of peace, 
 
 The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe, 
 The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release, 
 
 Th' indifferent judge between the high and low ! 
 With shield of proof, shield me from out the prease 
 
 Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw ; 
 O make me in those civil wars to cease ! 
 
 I will good tribute pay if thou do so. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 113 
 
 Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed ; 
 
 A chamber deaf to noise, and blind to light ; 
 A rosy garland, and a weary head ; 
 
 And if these things, as being thine by right, 
 Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me, 
 Livelier than elsewhere Stella's image see." 
 
 About the time of Sidney's marriage two 
 very grave conditions threatened England, that 
 promised to fill the hearts of her people with 
 the return of bloodshed and religious conten- 
 tion. Spain was combining with the Jesuits to 
 strike a deadly blow at religious and political 
 liberty, and the suspicious death of the Duke 
 of Anjou and the murder of the Prince of 
 Orange showed how formidable this network 
 of intrigue had become. It seemed absolutely 
 necessary that England should give aid to 
 Holland, as well as prepare upon the seas 
 to attack Spain, by the strengthening of her 
 navy. 
 
 In 1584 we find Sidney in the House of Com- 
 mons working in the interest of an expedition 
 to Virginia, to be commanded by Raleigh. 
 This was a favorite project of his, and he ear- 
 nestly pleaded that the new country be not an 
 asylum for fugitives, but that a true settlement 
 be made, composed of varied social elements, 
 but all having in view the establishing of a fu- 
 ture home, and all conditions for virtuous pros- 
 
114 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 perity. These measures were first discussed in 
 the autumn, and the following spring- of 1585 
 Raleigh set out for the new world. Shortly 
 after Sidney shared with his uncle Warwick 
 the Mastership of Ordnance, and he again 
 risked the queen's displeasure b}^ insisting 
 upon the better equipment of such stores as 
 England might need in case of war. This year 
 also, Elizabeth was obliged to give substantial 
 aid to the Netherlands, which she did by send- 
 ing six thousand men to aid in their defence. 
 Meantime Sidney was planning to go with Sir 
 Francis Drake to the West Indies, and knowing 
 how reluctant the queen would be to have him 
 leave the country, he arranged to go quietly 
 away ; but Sir Francis Drake, not caring to 
 share the honors of the expedition with such a 
 brilliant officer as Sir Philip Sidney, be- 
 trayed the plan to Queen Elizabeth, and she 
 again restrained her most brilliant knight 
 from leaving court. It was, however, later 
 decided that he should go with his uncle 
 Leicester to the Netherlands as Governor 
 of Flushing and commander of the fortress 
 (Rammekins). 
 
 While he was thus away from home he was 
 called upon to bear the sorrow that so lov- 
 ing a son must have felt at the death of his 
 noble father, and shortly after, of his gentle, 
 patient, long-suffering mother, who, born of 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 115 
 
 the noblest blood, has left a fadeless picture 
 of unpretending, brave, and dignified woman- 
 hood, whose wise, sweet counsels, and hopeful 
 temperament were heeded by both husband 
 and children, and thus proved a blessing to 
 them all. 
 
 This same summer Sidney surprised and cap- 
 tured a small town, for which he was promoted 
 to the rank of colonel, which place Elizabeth 
 in one of her capricious moods wanted for a 
 drunken favorite. Later, in August, they were 
 endeavoring to reduce a fort, the entrance to 
 which was Zutphen. Siege was laid for sev- 
 eral days, and then an engagement took place. 
 During the first charge Sidney's horse was 
 killed under him, but he immediately mounted 
 another. When a third charge was made Sid- 
 ney received a wound in the thigh, and his 
 frightened horse galloped with him off the 
 field. He kept his seat until the horse was 
 stopped, and then occurs that never too oft 
 repeated story of his gentle goodness of heart : 
 ** Being very thirsty, he called for a drink ; but 
 just as he was about to take it he raised his 
 eyes and saw a poor dying soldier being carried 
 by, who looked eagerly at the cup in his hand. 
 Sidney immediately gave it to the poor man, 
 saying, ' Thy necessity is yet greater than 
 mine.' " 
 
 He lingered long, submitting to many painful 
 
Ii6 ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS. 
 
 Operations with bravery that astonished the 
 surgeons, for there was then no kindly ether to 
 lull the terrible pain. Although a great suf- 
 ferer through the three weeks and a half that 
 he lived, he gathered his brothers and friends 
 around him, made his will, which was full of 
 wise and loving arrangements for the wife that 
 was by his side, and closed his remarkable life 
 with these soothing words to his brother Rob- 
 ert, whose grief had overcome him : " Love 
 my memory, cherish my friends ; their faith 
 to me may assure you they are honest. But 
 above all, govern your will and affections by 
 the will and word of your Creator : in me 
 beholding the end of this world with all her 
 vanities." 
 
 Sidney's death was felt in all Europe, for he 
 was loved as well as admired and trusted. 
 
 Sidney's thirty-one years of life had been 
 full of incidents, so that in recalling them as we 
 can hardly fail to do, we learn how grand a 
 life not only could be, but was, lived in that 
 far-off time ; and we know, too, that with all the 
 advantages and progress of to-day it must stand 
 always as a model for us, and for future gener- 
 ations of boys and girls who as well as we 
 can read his history in books and his epitaph in 
 St. Paul's Cathedral, where was laid the beau- 
 tiful clay that had imprisoned for awhile this 
 gem of the sixteenth century. 
 
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. I17 j 
 
 I 
 
 Epitaph in St. Paul's Cathedral, London. j 
 
 < 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney, Knight, 'i 
 
 Late Governour of Flushing, in Zealand, ' 
 
 Who received his death's wound 
 At a Battell near Zutphen in Gelderland, 
 And died at Arnheim, 16 October, 1586. ] 
 
 England, Netherland, the Heavens and the Arts, ' 
 
 The souldiers and the world have made six parts ; 
 
 Of noble Sidney: For who will suppose ' 
 
 That a small heape of stone can Sidney enclose ! i 
 
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 The souldiers the griefe, the world his good name. 
 
The Best Educational Periodicals. 
 
 The School Journal 
 
 is published weekly at $2.50 a year and is in its 23rd >tjar. 
 It is the oldest, best known and widest circulated educational 
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 brain work on the work of professional teaching is found in it 
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 journals — The School Journal has its own special writers — 
 the ablest in the world. 
 
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 is published monthly from September to June at $1.00 a year. 
 It is the ideal paper for primary teachers, being devoted almost 
 exclusively to original primary methods and devices. Several 
 entirely new features this year of great value. 
 
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 ever since it was started in 1878 been the most popular educa- 
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 * " Great Teachers of Four Centuries, 
 
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 6 E. L. KELLOOG <& CO., NEW YORK d CHICAGO, 
 
 AUens Mind Studies for Young Teac h- 
 
 ERS. By Jerome Allen, Ph.D., Associate Editor of the 
 School Journal, Prof, of Pedagogy, Univ. of City of 
 N. Y. 16mo, large, clear type, 128 pp. Cloth, 50 cents ; to 
 teachers, 40 cents ; by mail, 5 cents extra. 
 
 There are many teachers who 
 Know little about psychology, 
 and who desire to be better in- 
 formed concerning its princi- 
 ples, especially its relation to the 
 work of teaching. For the aid 
 of such, this book has been pre- 
 pared. But it is not a psychol- 
 ogy — only an introduction to it, 
 aiming to give some funda- 
 mental principles, together with 
 something concerning tlie phi- 
 losophy of education. Its meth- 
 od is subjective rather than ob- 
 * "• t=a, ^ -. f y; jective, leading the student to 
 
 \ V H / * 1/ watch mental processes, and 
 
 "^1 ^ ^ Y ^ ^ draw his own conclusions. It 
 
 is wricten in language easy to 
 be comprehended, and has many 
 Verome Allen, Ph.D.,Associate Editor practical illustrations. It will 
 of the Journal and Institute. aid the teacher in his daily work 
 in dealing with mental facts and states. 
 
 To most teachers psychology seems to be dry. This book shows 
 how it may become the most interesting of all studies. It also 
 shows how to begin the knowledge of self. " We cannot know 
 in others what we do not first know in ourselves." This is the 
 key-note of this book. Students of elementary psychology will 
 appreciate this feature of " Mind Studies." 
 ITS CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 I. How to Study Mind. 
 II. Some Facts in Mind Growth. 
 in. Development. 
 IV. Mind Incentives. 
 V. A few Fundamental Principles 
 
 Settled. 
 VI. Temperaments. 
 
 VII. Training of the Senses. 
 
 VIII. Attention. 
 IX. Perception. 
 
 X. Abstraction. 
 
 XI. Faculties used in Abstract 
 Thinking. 
 
 CHAP. , • 
 
 XII. From the Subjective to the 
 Conceptive. 
 
 XIII. The Will. 
 
 XIV. Diseases of the Will. 
 XV. Kinds of Memory. 
 
 XVI. The Sensibilities. 
 XVII. Relation of the Sensibihties 
 
 to the Will. 
 XVIII. Training of the Sensibilities. 
 XIX. Relation of the Sensibilities 
 . to Morality. 
 XX. The Imagination. 
 XXI. Imagination in its Maturity. 
 XXn Education of the Moral Sense. 
 
«ENt) ALL ORDERS TO 
 
 E. L. KELLOGG & CO., NEW YORK & CHICAGO. 9 
 
 Brownings Educational Theories. 
 
 By Oscar Beq-wntng, M.A., of King's College, Cambridge, 
 
 Eng. No. 8 of Beading Circle Library Series. Cloth, 16mo, 
 
 237 pp. Price, 50 cents; to teachers, 40 cents; by mail, 5 
 
 cents extra. 
 
 fbis work has been before the public some time, and for a 
 
 general sketch of the History of Education it has no superioi. 
 
 Our edition contains several new features, mailing it specially 
 
 valuable as a text-book for Normal Schools, Teachers' Classes, 
 
 Reading Circles, Teachers' Institutes, etc., as well as the student 
 
 of education. These new features are: (1) Side-heads giving the 
 
 subject of each paragraph; (2) each chapter is followed by an 
 
 analysis; (3) a very' full new index; (4) also an appendix on 
 
 "Froebel," and the " American Common School." 
 
 OUTLINE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Education among the Greeks — Music and Gymnastic Theo- 
 ries of Plato and Aristotle; II. Roman Education — Oratory; III. 
 Humanistic Education; IV. The Realists — Ratich and Comenius; 
 V. The Naturalists — Rabelais and Montaigne, VI. English 
 Humorists and Realists — Roger Ascham and John Milton; VII. 
 Locke; VIII. Jesuits and Jansenists ; IX. Rousseau; X. Pes- 
 talozzi; XL Kant, Fichte, and Herbart; XII. The English Pub- 
 lic School ; XIII. Froebel ; XIV. The American Common 
 School. 
 
 PRESS NOTICES. 
 
 Ed. Courant. — " This edition surpasses others in its adaptability to gen- 
 eral use." 
 
 CoL School Journal.—" Can be used as a text-book in the History of 
 Education." 
 
 Pa. Ed. News.—" A volume that can be used as a text-book on the His- 
 tory of Education." 
 
 School Education, Minn.—" Begrinning with the Greeks, the author pre^ 
 eeuts a ijrief but clear outline of the leading educational theories down to 
 the present time." 
 
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 to him in his work." 
 
SEND ALL ORTHSRS Trt 
 
 18 jUJ. L. KELL^QO & CO., NEW lOIiK & CHICAGO, 
 
 Hughes ^Mistakes in Teacbing, 
 
 By James J. Hughes, Inspector of Schools, Toronto, Canada. 
 
 Cloth, l6mo, 115 pp. Price, 50 cents; to teachers, 40 cents; 
 
 by mail, 5 cents extra. 
 
 Thousands of copies of the old 
 edition have been sold. The new 
 edition is worth double the old; 
 the material has been increased, 
 restated, and greatly improved 
 Two new and important Chapten 
 have been added on "Mistakes ir 
 Aims," and "Mistakes in Moral 
 Training." Mr. Hughes says in his 
 preface: "In issuing a revised edi- 
 tion of this book, it seems htting to 
 acknowledge gratefully the hearty 
 appreciation that has been accorded 
 it by American teachers. Realiz- 
 ing as I do that its very large sale 
 indicates that it has been of service 
 to many of my fellow-teachers, I 
 have recognized the duty of enlarg- 
 
 ' j^^ -;j:.^j'isi=-"-^5^?$>4^ ing and revising it so as to make it 
 
 s^^ ^ "■%■' :^ g^ll more helpful in preventing 
 
 James L. Hughes, Inspector of the common mistakes in teaching 
 Schools, Toronto, Canada. ^^^ training. " 
 
 This is one of the six books recommended by the N. Y. State 
 Department to teachers preparing for examination for State cer- 
 tificates. 
 
 CAUTION. 
 
 Our new authorized copybight edition, entirely rewritten hy 
 ihe author, is the only one to huy. It is beautifully printed and 
 hound. Oet no other. 
 
 CONTENTS OF OUR NEW EDITION. 
 
 Chap. I. 7 Mistakes in Aim. 
 Chap. II. 21 Mistakes in School Management. 
 Chap. III. 24 Mistakes in Discipline. 
 Chap. IV. 27 Mistakes in Method. 
 Chap. V. 13 Mistakes in Moral Training. 
 Chaps. I. and V. are entirely new-^ 
 
SEND ALL ORDERS TO 
 
 20 E L. KELLOOO & CO., NEW YORK & CHICAGO. 
 
 Hughes Securing and Retaining Atten- 
 
 TTON. By James L. Hughes, Inspector Schools. Toronto, 
 Canada, author of "Mistakes in Teaching." Cloth. 116 pp. 
 Price, 50 cents; to teachers, 40 cents; by mail, 5 cents extra. 
 
 This valuable little book: has already become widely known to 
 American teachers. Our new edition has been almost entirely 
 re-written, and several new important chapters added. It is the 
 only AUTHORIZED COPYRIGHT EDITION. CautioTi. — Buy no other. 
 
 WHAT IT CONTAINS. 
 
 I. General Principles; II. Kinds of Attention; III. Characteristics of Good 
 Attention ; IV. Conditions of Attention ; V. Essential Characteristics of tlie 
 Teacher in Securing and Retaining Attention; VI. How to Control a Class; 
 VII. Methods of Stimulating and Controlling a Desire for Knowledge; VIII. 
 How to Gratify and Develop the Desire for Mental Activity; IX. Di.=;tracting 
 Attention; X. Training the Power of Attention; XI. General Suggestions 
 regarding Attention. 
 
 TESTIMONIALS. 
 
 S. P. Robbins, Pros. McGill Normal School. Montreal, Can., writes to Mr. 
 Hughes:— "It is quite superfluous for me to say that your little books are 
 admirable. I was yesterday authorized to put the ' Attention ' on the list 
 of books to be used in the Normal School next year. Crisp and attractive 
 in style, and mighty by reason of its good, sound common-sense, it is a 
 book that every teacher should know." 
 
 Popular Educator (Boston):—" Mr. Hughes has embodied the best think- 
 ing of his life in these pages." 
 
 Central School Journal (la.).—" Though published four or five years 
 since, this book has steadily advanced in popularity." 
 
 Educational Courant (Ky.).— "It is intensely practical. There isn't a 
 mystical, muddy expression in the book." 
 
 Educational Times (England).—" On an important subject, and admir- 
 ably executed." 
 School Guardian (England) —" We unhesitatingly recommend it." 
 New England Journal of Education.— " The book is a guide and a 
 manual of special value." 
 
 New York School Journal. — " Every teacher would derive benefit fronc 
 reading this volume." 
 
 Chicago Educational Weekly.— " The teacher w^ho aims at best sue- 
 cjss should study it." 
 
 Phii. Teacher.—" Many who have spent months in the school-room would 
 be benefited by it." 
 
 Maryland School Journal.—" Always clear, never tedious." 
 
 Va, Ed. Journal.— " Excellent hints as to securing attention." 
 
 Qihio Educational Monthly.— "We advise readers to send for a copy." 
 
 Pacific Home and School Journal.—" An exrellent little manual." 
 
 Prest. James H. Hoose, State Normal School. Cortland, N. Y., says:— 
 
 "The book must prove of great benefit to the profession." 
 Supt. A. W. Edson, Jersey City, N. J., says:—" A good treatise has long 
 
 been needed, and Mr. Hughes has supplied the want." 
 
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 515 New England, comprising Me., 
 N. H., Vt., Mass., R. I., Ct. 
 
 516 Middle Atlantic— N. Y., N. J., 
 Pa., Del., Md., Va., and W. Va. 
 
 517 Southern States (three groups). 
 No. I.— N. C. S. C, Ga., Fla., Ala., Miss., 
 La., and Tex. 
 
 518 No. II.— W. Va., Va., N. C, S. C, 
 Ga., Fla., Ala., and Miss. 
 
 519 No. III.— Ark., La., Tex., and In- 
 dian Ter. 
 
 520 Central States (two groups). No. 
 I— Minn., Wis., Mich., la.. 111., Ind., 
 Ohio, Mo., and Ky. 
 
 521 No. II.— Dak. Ter., Minn., Wis., 
 Mich., Neb., la., 111., Ind,, Ohio, Kan., 
 Mo., and Ky. 
 
 I 522 Western States (two groups). 
 
 I No. L— Wash. Ter., Idaho, Mon. Ter., 
 
 Dak. Ter., Oregon, Wyoming Ter., Neb., 
 
 Cal., Nev., Utah, Col., Kan., Arizona 
 
 Ter., N. Mex., Ind. Ter., and Tex. 
 
 523 No. II.— Wash. Ter., Idc,ho Ter., 
 Mon. Ter., Oregon, Wyoming Ter., Cal., 
 Nev., Utah Ter., Col., Arizona Ter., New 
 Mex. 
 
 LARGE MAPS. 
 These stencils make maps as large as 
 the largest wall maps. 
 
 572 United States, 34x56 inches. Price, 
 do cents. 
 
 573 Mercator's Eastern and Western 
 Hemisphere with Western Hemispheie 
 repeated, 34x56. Price, 50 cents. 
 
 HISTORICAL MAPS. 
 
 Please order by number. 
 
 600 Mercator's Eastern and Western 
 Hemispheres with the Western Hemis- 
 phere repeated, showing all the routes 
 of the early voyagers to A.merica and 
 around the world. Price, 50 cents. 
 
 601 Large map of the U. S. showing 
 territorial growth. Price, 25 cents. 
 
 FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 
 Five maps, each 24x36 in. Price, 10 
 cents each. Set, 50 cents. 
 
 602 Map of Va.and Pa., showing Wash- 
 ington's home, route taken in his jour- 
 ney to St. Pierre, Ft. Duquesne. 
 
 603 Map of N. Y., showing all forts on 
 the great lakes and L.ike Champlaiii. 
 
 604 Canada, showing all the principal 
 places and Nova Scotia. 
 
 605 Map .showing British possessions 
 before the War. 
 
 606 Map showing British possessions 
 after the War. 
 
 WAR OF THE REVOLUTION. 
 Five maps, each 24x36 in. Price, 50 
 cents each. 50 cents a set. 
 
 607 Boston and vicinity. N. Y. and 
 vicinitv. 
 
 60S Phila., Trenton, Valley Forge, 
 Monmouth. 
 
 609 Burgoyne's Invasion. 
 
 610 Yorktown and Southern Battle 
 Fields. 
 
 611 Map showing Territory of U. S. at 
 close of the War. 
 
 WAR OF 1812. 
 Three maps, size 24x36 in. each. Price, 
 10 cents each. 
 
 612 Great Lakes and vicinitj% showing 
 battle fields. 
 
 613 Washington and vicinity. 
 
 614 New Orleans. 
 
 CIVIL WAR. 
 Size, 24x36 in. Price, 10 cents each. 
 f 1.00 a set. 
 
 615 U. S., showing territory seceded. 
 
 616 Washington and vicinity. 
 
 617 Richmond and vicinity. 
 
 618 Charleston Harbor. 
 
 619 Miss. River, New Orleans, etc 
 
 620 Gettysburg Campaign. 
 
SEND ALL ORDERS TO 
 
 E. L. KELLOGG & GO., NEW YORK & CHICAGO. 
 
 55 
 
 621 Sherman's March. 
 
 622 Battle Fields of Ky. and Tenn. 
 
 623 Battle Field of Va. 
 
 624 Petersburg and Appotoiuax. 
 
 MISCEIiliANEOUS. 
 Size, 17x22 inches. Price, singly, 5 
 cents each. In groups with one extra 
 design, 25 cents. 
 
 Group One— CHILDREN, 
 i In a Swing. 4 Kile Flying. 
 
 2 Jumping Rope. 5 Skating. 
 
 3 Leap Frog. 
 
 Group Two— CHILDREN. 
 
 6 Feeding Doves. 9 On a Toboggan. 
 
 7 RoUingtheHoop.lO Where am I ? 
 
 8 Blowing Soap 
 
 Bubbles. 
 Group Three— CHILDREN. 
 
 11 Two Lillies. 14 Fast Friends. 
 
 12 Training Pussy. 15 Dance, Little 
 
 13 What Do I Care. Baby. 
 
 Group Four— CHILDREN. 
 
 16 Oh, How High ! 18 " My Pony Loves 
 
 17 Naughty Tab Sugar." 
 
 and Dash. 19 Can I Get Them? 
 
 20 Mud Pies. 
 Group Five— CHILDREN. 
 
 21 Saved From 23 Learning to 
 
 Drowning. Read. 
 
 22 St. Bernard Dog 24 Who Broke the 
 
 and Boy. Window ? 
 
 25 The Milkmaid. 
 Group Six-CHILDREN. 
 
 26 Wide Awake. 29 ThePetSquirreL 
 
 27 Fast Asleep. 30 Learning to 
 
 28 Have You Been Walk. 
 
 Bathing ? 
 Group Seven— ON THE SEA-SHORE. 
 81 Star Fish. 34 Jelly Fish. 
 
 32 Hermit Crab. 35 Red Coral. 
 83 Lobster. 
 
 Group Eight-PRESIDENTS. 
 
 36 Washington. 39 Lincoln. 
 
 37 Jefferson. 40 Grant. 
 
 38 Jackson. 
 
 Group Nine— POETS. 
 
 41 Whittier. 44 Bryant. 
 
 42 Longfellow. 45 Tennyson. 
 
 43 Emerson. 
 
 Group Ten— DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 
 
 46 Cow and Calf. 49 Camel. 
 
 47 Horse and Colt. 50 Reindeer. 
 
 48 Elephant and 
 
 Baby. 
 Group Eleven-DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 
 
 51 Dog. 54 Pig. 
 
 52 Cat. 55 Goat. 
 
 53 Sheep. 
 
 Group Twelve— SMALL ANIMALS. 
 
 56 Rabbit. 59 Mouse. 
 
 57 Bat. 60 Lynx. 
 
 58 Rat. 
 
 Group Thirteen— LARGE WILD ANI- 
 MALS. 
 
 61 Polar Bear. 64 Rhinoceros. 
 
 62 Lion. 65 Hippopotamus. 
 
 63 Lioness. 
 
 And many others. Full 
 
 Group Fourteen— ANIMALS. 
 
 66 Wolf. 69 Kangaroo. 
 
 67 Fox. 70 Donkey. 
 
 68 Hyena. 
 
 Group Fifteen— FLOWERS. 
 
 71 Wild Rose. 74 Laurel Spray. 
 
 72 Calla Lily. 75 Pear Blossom. 
 
 73 Solomon's Seal. 
 
 Group Sixteen— FLOWERS. 
 
 76 Wood Violet. 79 Morning Glories. 
 
 77 Pond Lilies. 80 Fuchsias. 
 
 78 Roses. 
 
 Group Seventeen— BIRDS. 
 
 81 Quails. 84 Stork. 
 
 82 Woodcocks. 85 Swan. 
 
 83 Eagle Flying, 
 
 Group Eighteen— OLD AND YOUNG. 
 
 86 Hen and Chick- 88 Duck and Duck- 
 
 ens, lings. 
 
 87 Goose and Gos- 89 Owl and Owlets. 
 
 lings. 90 Bird and Young. 
 
 Group Nineteen— BUILDINGS. 
 
 91 Light-house. 94 Bird House. 
 
 92 Castle. 95 Fort, 
 
 93 Wind Mill. 
 
 Group Twenty— PATRIOTIC LIST. 
 
 96 The American 99 The American 
 
 Flag. Eagle. 
 
 97 Liberty Bell. 100 Goddess of Lib- 
 
 98 U. S. Coat of erty. 
 
 Arms. 
 
 BORDERS. 
 
 101 Spiral Curves. 
 
 102 Greek Fi-et. 
 
 103 Triangular Combinations. 
 
 104 Greek Fret. 
 
 105 Greek Pattern Anthimion. 
 
 106 Egyptian Lotos. 
 
 107 Ivy Leaf. 
 
 108 Dog Wood. 
 
 109 Holly Leaf and Berries. 
 
 110 Holly Leaf and Berries. 
 
 ROLLS OF HONOR. 
 
 111 Script Letters, plain. 
 
 112 Script Letters, fancy. 
 
 113 Old English Letters. 
 
 114 German Text. 
 
 115 American Eagle on Shield. 
 
 116 Excelsior. 
 
 WRITING CHARTS. 
 
 117 Capitals and Small Letters. 
 
 The letters are nearly 6 in. high. Size 
 of Stencils 9x36 in. The set contains 11 
 charts. Price, 50 cents a set. 
 
 PHYSIOLOGY CHARTS. 
 
 Six charts, size 24x36 in. each. Price, 
 10 cents each. Set 50 cents. 
 
 118 Bones. 121 Lungs. 
 
 119 Skull. 123 Liver. 
 
 120 Heart. 124 Intestines. 
 NATURAL HISTORY CHARTS. 
 
 Price each, 10 cents, except No. 136. 
 Size 24x36 inches. 8 nos. 
 
 catalogue on application. 
 
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