Part 6 (1/2)
By his translation of Sall.u.s.t (so popular an author at that period, that the learned virgin queen is reported to have amused her leisure with an English version), Barclay obtained the distinction of being the first to introduce that cla.s.sic to English readers. His version bears the reputation of being executed not only with accuracy, but with considerable freedom and elegance, and its popularity was evinced by its appearance in three additions.
Two other works of our author are spoken of as having been in print, but they have apparently pa.s.sed entirely out of sight: ”The figure of our holy mother Church, oppressed by the Frenche King,” (Pynson, 4to), known only from Maunsell's Catalogue; and ”The lyfe of the glorious martyr, saynt George translated (from Mantuan) by Alexander Barclay, while he was a monk of Ely, and dedicated to N. West, Bishop of Ely,” (Pynson, 4to), (Herbert, Typ. Antiquities.) West was Bishop of Ely from 1515 to 1533, and consequently Barclay's superior during probably his whole stay there.
Whether these two works were in verse or prose is unknown.
There are two other books ascribed to Barclay, but nothing satisfactory can be stated regarding their parentage except that, considering their subject, and the press they issued from, it is not at all unlikely that they may have been the fruit of his prolific pen. The first is ”The lyfe of the blessed martyr, Saynte Thomas,” in prose, printed by Pynson, (Herbert, Typ.
Ant. 292), regarding which Ant. Wood says, ”I should feel little difficulty in ascribing this to Barclay.” The other is the English translation of the Histoire merveilleuse du Grand Khan (in Latin, De Tartaris siue Liber historiarum partium Orientis) of the eastern soldier, and western monk, Haytho, prince of Georgia at the end of the 13th, and beginning of the 14th centuries. The History which gives an account of Genghis Khan, and his successors, with a short description of the different kingdoms of Asia, was very popular in the 15th and 16th centuries, as one of the earliest accounts of the East, and the conjecture of the Grenville Catalogue is not improbable, though there is no sufficient evidence, that Barclay was the author of the English version which appeared from the press of Pynson.
Bale further enumerates in his list of Barclay's works ”Contra Skeltonum, Lib. I.; Quinq: eglogas ex Mantuano, Lib. I; Vitam D. Catherinae, Lib. I., [Libros tres, Pits]; Vitam D. Margaritae, Lib. I.; Vitam Etheldredae, Lib.
I.; Aliaq: plura fecit.” Tanner adds: ”Orationes varias, Lib. I.; De fide orthodoxa, Lib. I.”
Of these various fruits of Barclay's fertility and industry no fragment has survived to our day, nor has even any positive information regarding their nature been transmitted to us.
The ”Orationes varias,” probably a collection of sermons with especial reference to the sins of the day would have been historically, if not otherwise, interesting, and their loss is matter for regret. On the other hand the want of the treatise, ”De fide orthodoxa,” is doubtless a relief to literature. There are too many of the kind already to enc.u.mber our shelves and our catalogues.
The Lives of the Saints, the work, it is stated, of the author's old age, were, according to Tanner, and he is no doubt right, translations from the Latin. Barclay's reputation probably does not suffer from their loss.
”Quinque eglogas ex Mantuano,” though Bale mentions also ”De miserijs aulicorum; Bucolicam Codri; Eglogam quartam,” apparently the five, but really the first four of the eclogues known to us, are, I am strongly inclined to believe, nothing else than these same five eclogues, under, to use a bibliographical phrase, ”a made up” t.i.tle. That he mentions first, five from Mantuan, and afterwards adds ”Bucolicam Codri” and ”Eglogam quartam,” as two distinct eclogues, apparently not from Mantuan, while both t.i.tles must refer to the same poem, an imitation of Mantuan's fifth eclogue, is proof enough that he was not speaking with the authority of personal knowledge of these works.
Johannes Baptista Spagnuoli, commonly called from his native city, Mantuan, was the most popular and prolific eclogue writer of the fifteenth century, to which Barclay himself testifies:--
”As the moste famous Baptist Mantuan The best of that sort since Poetes first began.”
Barclay's Eclogues being the first attempts of the kind in English, Bale's ”Ex Mantuano,” therefore probably means nothing more than ”on the model of Mantuan;” otherwise, if it be a.s.sumed that five were the whole number that ever appeared, it could not apply to the first three, which are expressly stated in the t.i.tle to be from aeneas Sylvius, while if ten be a.s.sumed, his statement would account for nine, the ”quinque eglogas” being the five now wanting, but if so, then he has omitted to mention the most popular of all the eclogues, the fifth, and has failed to attribute to Mantuan two which are undoubtedly due to him.
The loss of the ”Contra Skeltonum,” is a matter for regret. That there was no love lost between these two contemporaries and chief poets of their time is evident enough. Skelton's scathing sarcasm against the priesthood no doubt woke his brother satirist's ire, and the latter lets no opportunity slip of launching forth his contempt for the laureate of Oxford.
The moralist in announcing the position he a.s.sumes in opposition to the writer of popular tales, takes care to have a fling at the author of ”The boke of Phyllyp Sparowe”:--
”I wryte no Ieste ne tale of Robyn Hode, Nor sawe no sparcles, ne sede of vyciousnes; Wyse men loue vertue, wylde people wantones, It longeth nat to my scyence nor cunnynge, For Phylyp the sparowe the (Dirige) to synge.”
A sneer to which Skelton most probably alludes when, enumerating his own productions in the Garlande of Laurell, he mentions,
”Of Phillip Sparow the lamentable fate, The dolefull desteny, and the carefull chaunce, Dyuysed by Skelton after the funerall rate; Yet sum there be therewith that take greuaunce, And grudge thereat with frownyng countenaunce; But what of that? harde it is to please all men; Who list amende it, let hym set to his penne.”
The following onslaught in Barclay's Fourth Eclogue, is evidently levelled at the abominable Skelton:
”Another thing yet is greatly more d.a.m.nable: Of rascolde poetes yet is a shamfull rable, Which voyde of wisedome presumeth to indite, Though they haue scantly the cunning of a snite; And to what vices that princes moste intende, Those dare these fooles solemnize and commende Then is he decked as Poete laureate, When stinking Thais made him her graduate; When Muses rested, she did her season note, And she with Bacchus her camous did promote.
Such rascolde drames, promoted by Thais, Bacchus, Licoris, or yet by Testalis, Or by suche other newe forged Muses nine, Thinke in their mindes for to haue wit diuine; They laude their verses, they boast, they vaunt and iet, Though all their cunning be scantly worth a pet: If they haue smelled the artes triuiall, They count them Poetes hye and heroicall.
Such is their foly, so foolishly they dote, Thinking that none can their playne errour note; Yet be they foolishe, auoyde of honestie, Nothing seasoned with spice of grauitie, Auoyde of pleasure, auoyde of eloquence, With many wordes, and fruitlesse of sentence; Unapt to learne, disdayning to be taught, Their priuate pleasure in snare hath them so caught; And worst yet of all, they count them excellent, Though they be fruitlesse, rashe and improuident.
To such ambages who doth their minde incline, They count all other as priuate of doctrine, And that the faultes which be in them alone, And be common in other men eche one.
Thus bide good poetes oft time rebuke and blame, Because of other which haue despised name.
And thus for the bad the good be cleane abject.
Their art and poeme counted of none effect, Who wanteth reason good to discerne from ill Doth worthy writers interprete at his will: So both the laudes of good and not laudable For lacke of knowledge become vituperable.”