is kept up by a very artful admixture of styles and subjects. Legends, fancy pieces such as that of the Marriage of Thame and Isis, with its unmatched floral description, accounts of rural sports and the like, ingeniously diversify the merely topographical narrative. Had the Polyolbion been its author's only work, Goldsmith's sneer would still have been most undeserved. But the variety of Drayton's performance is almost as remarkable as its bulk. This variety it is impossible to represent fully either in this notice or in the extracts which accompany it. But to the foregoing remarks it may be added that Drayton was master of a very strong and at the same time musical decasyllabic line. His practice in Alexandrines and in complicated stanzas seems to have by no means injured his command of the ordinary heroic couplet. His series of Sonnets to Idea is perhaps his least successful work if we compare him with other men, just as The Barons' Wars is his worst performance if his own work only be considered. The Nymphidia has received higher praise than any other of his poems, and its fantastic conception and graceful tripping metre deserve this praise well enough. The curious poems of The Owl and The Man in the Moon show, if they show nothing else, his peculiar faculty of raising almost any subject to a certain poetical dignity by dint of skilful treatment. Lastly, his prose Prefaces deserve attention here, because many of them display the secret of his workmanlike skill. It is evident from them that Drayton was as far as possible from holding the false and foolish improvisation-theory of poetry, and they testify to a most careful study of his predecessors and contemporaries, and to deliberate practice in the use of the poet's tools of language and metre.

G. SAINTSBURY.

QUEEN MARGARET TO WILLIAM DE LA POOL,
DUKE OF SUFFOLK.

What news (sweet Pool) look'st thou my lines should tell
But like the tolling of the doleful bell

Bidding the deaths-man to prepare the grave?
Expect from me no other news to have.

My breast, which once was mirth's imperial throne,
A vast and desert wilderness is grown:

Like that cold region, from the world remote,

On whose breem seas the icy mountains float;

Where those poor creatures, banished from the light, Do live impris'ned in continual night.

No object greets my soul's internal eyes

But divinations of sad tragedies;

And care takes up her solitary inn

Where youth and joy their court did once begin.

As in September, when our year resigns

The glorious sun to the cold wat❜ry signs

Which through the clouds looks on the earth in scorn;

The little bird yet to salute the morn

Upon the naked branches sets her foot,
The leaves then lying on the mossy root,

And there a silly chirriping doth keep

As though she fain would sing, yet fain would weep,
Praising fair Summer, that too soon is gone,

Or sad for Winter, too fast coming on:

In this strange plight I mourn for thy depart,
Because that weeping cannot ease my heart.
Now to our aid who stirs the neighb'ring kings?
Or who from France a puissant army brings?
Who moves the Norman to abet our war?
Or brings in Burgoyne to aid Lancaster?
Who in the North our lawful claim commends
To win us credit with our valiant friends?
VOL. I.

M m

To whom shall I my secret griefs impart?
Whose breast shall be the closet of my heart?
The ancient heroes' fame thou didst revive,
As from them all thyself thou didst derive :
Nature by thee both gave and taketh all,
Alone in Pool she was too prodigal ;-

Of so divine and rich a temper wrought,

As Heav'n for thee perfection's depth had sought.
Well knew King Henry what he pleaded for,
When he chose thee to be his orator;
Whose angel-eye, by powerful influence,
Doth utter more than human eloquence:
That if again Jove would his sports have tried,
He in thy shape himself would only hide;
Which in his love might be of greater pow'r,
Than was his nymph, his flame, his swan, his show'r.

TO THE CAMBRO-BRITONS AND THEIR HARP,

· HIS BALLAD OF AGINCOURT.

Fair stood the wind for France,
When we our sails advance,
Nor now to prove our chance

Longer will tarry;

But putting to the main,

At Caux, the mouth of Seine,
With all his martial train,
Landed King Harry.

And taking many a fort,
Furnished in warlike sort,
Marcheth tow'rds Agincourt
In happy hour;
Skirmishing day by day,

With those that stopp'd his way,
Where the French gen'ral lay

With all his power.

Which in his height of pride,
King Henry to deride,

His ransom to provide

To the king sending.

Which he neglects the while,
As from a nation vile,
Yet with an angry smile
Their fall portending.

And turning to his men,
Quoth our brave Henry then,
Though they to one be ten,
Be not amazed.

Yet have we well begun,
Battles so bravely won,
Have ever to the sun

By fame been raised.

And for myself (quoth he),
This my full rest shall be,
England ne'er mourn for me,
Nor more esteem me.

Victor I will remain,

Or on this earth lie slain,

Never shall she sustain

Loss to redeem me.

Poitiers and Cressy tell,

When most their pride did swell,

Under our swords they fell,

No less our skill is,

Than when our grandsire-great,
Claiming the regal seat,

By many a warlike feat

Lopp'd the French lilies.

The Duke of York so dread
The eager vaward led,

With the main, Henry sped,
Amongst his hench-men.

Exeter had the rear,

A braver man not there,
O Lord, how hot they were,
On the false Frenchmen!

They now to fight are gone,
Armour on armour shone,
Drum now to drum did groan,

To hear, was wonder;
That with the cries they make,
The very earth did shake,
Trumpet to trumpet spake,
Thunder to thunder.

Well it thine age became,
O noble Erpingham,
Which didst the signal aim
To our hid forces;
When from a meadow by,
Like a storm suddenly,

The English archery

Stuck the French horses.

With Spanish yew so strong,
Arrows a cloth-yard long,
That like to serpents stung,
Piercing the weather;
None from his fellow starts,
But playing manly parts,
And like true English hearts,

Stuck close together.

When down their bows they threw,

And forth their bilbos drew,

And on the French they flew,

Not one was tardy;

Arms were from shoulders sent, Scalps to the teeth were rent, Down the French peasants went, Our men were hardy.