Volume Ii Part 20 (1/2)

[297] Book II. c. 9.

[298] See Sidney's ”Defence,” and Puttenham's ”Art of English Poesy,”

Book I. c. 8.

[299] We can fancy how he would have done this by Jeremy Taylor, who was a kind of Spenser in a ca.s.sock.

[300] Of this he himself gives a striking hint, when speaking in his own person he suddenly breaks in on his narrative with the pa.s.sionate cry,

”Ah, dearest G.o.d, me grant I dead be not defouled.”

_Faery Queen_, B. I. c. x. 43.

[301] Was not this picture painted by Paul Veronese, for example?

”Arachne figured how Jove did abuse Europa like a bull, and on his back Her through the sea did bear: ...

She seemed still back unto the land to look, And her playfellows' aid to call, and fear The das.h.i.+ng of the waves, that up she took Her dainty feet, and garments gathered near....

Before the bull she pictured winged Love, With his young brother Sport, ...

And many nymphs about them flocking round, And many Tritons which their horns did sound.”

_Muiopotmos_, 281-296.

Spenser begins a complimentary sonnet prefixed to the ”Commonwealth and Government of Venice” (1599) with this beautiful verse,

”Fair Venice, flower of the last world's delight.”

Perhaps we should read ”lost”?

[302] Marlowe's ”Tamburlaine,” Part I. Act V. 2.

[303]

Grayheaded Thought, nor much nor little, may Take up its lodging here in any heart; Unease nor Lack can enter at this door; But here dwells full-horned Plenty evermore.

_Orl. Fur._, e. vi. 78.

[304] B. I. c. iii. 7. Leigh Hunt, one of the most sympathetic of critics, has remarked the pa.s.sionate change from the third to the first person in the last two verses.

[305] B. II. c. viii. 3.