Part 47 (1/2)

Later on when you come to read more in English literature, you will learn to know many of these poets. In this book we have not room to tell about them or even to mention their names. Their stories are bound up with the stories of the times, and many of them fought and suffered for their king. But I will give you one or two poems which may make you want to know more about the writers of them.

Here are two written by Richard Lovelace, the very model of a gay cavalier. While he was at Oxford, King Charles saw him and made him M.A. or Master of Arts, not for his learning, but because of his beautiful face. He went to court and made love and sang songs gayly. He went to battle and fought and sang as gayly, he went to prison and still sang. To the cause of his King he clung through all, and when Charles was dead and Cromwell ruled with his stern hand, and song was hushed in England, he died miserably in a poor London alley.

The first of these songs was written by Lovelace while he was in prison for having presented a pet.i.tion to the House of Commons asking that King Charles might be restored to the throne.

TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON

”When love with unconfined wings Hovers within my gates, And my divine Althea brings To whisper at the grates; When I lye tangled in her haire, And fettered to her eye, The G.o.ds, that wanton in the aire, Know no such liberty.

”When (like committed linnets) I With shriller throat shall sing The sweetness, mercy, majesty, And glories of my King.

When I shall voyce aloud, how good He is, how great should be, Enlarged winds, that curle the flood, Know no such liberty.

”Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage; Mindes innocent and quiet take That for an hermitage; If I have freedome in my love, And in my soule am free, Angels alone that soar above Enjoy such liberty.”

TO LUCASTA GOING TO THE WARRES

”Tell me not (sweet) I am unkinde, That from the nunnerie Of thy chaste heart and quiet minde To warre and armes I flie.

”True: a new Mistresse now I chase, The first foe in the field, And with a stronger faith embrace A sword, a horse, a s.h.i.+eld.

”Yet this inconstancy is such As you, too, shall adore; I could not love thee, dear, so much, Lov'd I not Honour more.”

James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, was another cavalier poet whose fine, sad story you will read in history. He loved his King and fought and suffered for him, and when he heard that he was dead he drew his sword and wrote a poem with its point:

”Great, Good, and Just, could I but rate My grief, and thy too rigid fate, I'd weep the world in such a strain As it should deluge once again: But since thy loud-tongued blood demands supplies More from Briareus' hands than Argus' eyes, I'll sing thy obsequies with trumpet sounds And write thine epitaph in blood and wounds.”

He wrote, too, a famous song known as Montrose's Love-song. Here it is:--

”My dear and only love, I pray This n.o.ble world of thee, Be governed by no other sway But purest monarchie.

”For if confusion have a part Which vertuous souls abh.o.r.e, And hold a synod in thy heart, I'll never love thee more.

”Like Alexander I will reign, And I will reign alone, My thoughts shall evermore disdain A rival on my throne.

”He either fears his fate too much Or his deserts are small, That puts it not unto the touch, To win or lose it all.

”But I must rule and govern still, And always give the law, And have each subject at my will, And all to stand in awe.

”But 'gainst my battery if I find Thou shun'st the prize so sore, As that thou set'st me up a blind I'll never love thee more.

”If in the Empire of thy heart, Where I should solely be, Another do pretend a part, And dares to vie with me:

”Or if committees thou erect, And goes on such a score, I'll sing and laugh at thy neglect, and never love thee more.

”But if thou wilt be constant then, And faithful to thy word, I'll make thee glorious with my pen And famous by my sword.