had disgusted her first husband by her gallantries, was no less offensive to her second by her jealousy; thus carrying to extremity, in the different parts of her life, every circumstance of female weakness. She had several sons by Henry, whom she spirited up to rebel against him; and endeavouring to escape to them disguised in man's apparel in 1173, she was discovered and thrown into a confinement which seems to have continued till the death of her husband in 1189. She however survived him many years: dying in 1204, in the sixth year of the reign of her youngest son, John." See Hume's History, 4to, vol. i. pp. 260, 307; Speed, Stowe, etc.

It is needless to observe, that the following ballad (given, with some corrections, from an old printed copy) is altogether fabulous; whatever gallantries Eleanor encouraged in the time of her first husband, none are imputed to her in that of her second.

QUEENE ELIANOR was a sicke woman,
And afraid that she should dye :
Then she sent for two fryars of France
To speke with her speedilye.

The king calld downe his nobles all,

By one, by two, by three; "Earl marshall, Ile goe shrive the queene, And thou shalt wend with mee."

A boone, a boone; quoth earl marshall,
And fell on his bended knee;
That whatsoever queene Elianor saye,
No harme thereof may bee.

Ile pawne my landes, the king then cryd,
My sceptre, crowne, and all,

That whatsoere queen Elianor sayes

No harme thereof shall fall.

Do thou put on a fryars coat,

And Ile put on another;
And we will to queen Elianor goe
Like fryar and his brother.

Thus both attired then they gce:

When they came to Whitehall,

The bells did ring, and the quiristers sing,
And the torches did lighte them all.

When that they came before the queene
They fell on their bended knee;

A boone, a boone, our gracious queene,
That you sent so hastilee.

Are you two fryars of France, she sayd,
As I suppose you bee?

But if you are two Englishe fryars,
You shall hang on the gallowes tree.

We are two fryars of France, they sayd,
As you suppose we bee,

We have not been at any masse

Sith we came from the sea.

The first vile thing that ever I did
I will to you unfolde;
Earl marshall had my maidenhed,
Beneath this cloth of golde.

Thats a vile sinne, then sayd the king;
May God forgive it thee!
Amen, amen, quoth earl marshall;

With a heavye heart spake hee.

The next vile thing that ever I did,
To you Ile not denye,

I made a boxe of poyson strong,
To poison king Henrye.

Thats a vile sinne, then sayd the king,
May God forgive it thee!
Amen, amen, quoth earl marshall;
And I wish it so may bee.

The next vile thing that ever I did,
To you I will discover ;

I poysoned fair Rosamonde,

All in fair Woodstocke bower.

Thats a vile sinne, then sayd the king;
May God forgive it thee !
Amen, amen, quoth earl marshall;
And I wish it so may bee.

THIS poem, subscribed M. T. [perhaps invertedly for T. Marshall], is preserved in The Paradise of Daintie Devises. The two first stanzas may be found accompanied with musical notes in An howres recreation in musicke, etc., by Richard Alison, Lond. 1606, 4to: usually bound up with three or four sets of Madrigals set to music, by Tho. Weelkes, Lond. 1597, 1600, 1608, 4to. One of these madrigals is so complete an example of the bathos, that I cannot forbear presenting it to the reader. "Thule,† the period of cosmographie,

Doth vaunt of Hecla, whose sulphureous fire
Doth melt the frozen clime, and thaw the skie,

Trinacrian Ætna's flames ascend not hier:

These things seeme wondrous, yet more wondrous I,
Whose heart with feare doth freeze, with love doth fry.

"The Andalusian merchant, that returnes

Laden with cutchinele § and china dishes,

Reports in Spaine how strangely Fogo || burnes

Amidst an ocean full of flying fishes :

These things seeme wondrous, yet more wondrous I,

Whose heart with feare doth freeze, with love doth fry."

Mr. Weelkes seems to have been of opinion with many of his brethren of later times, that nonsense was best adapted to display the powers of musical composure.

THE sturdy rock for all his strength

By raging seas is rent in twaine :
The marble stone is pearst at length,

With little drops of drizling rain:
The oxe doth yeeld unto the yoke,
The steele obeyeth the hammer stroke.

*She means that the eldest of these two was by the earl marshall, the youngest by the king.

The stately stagge, that seemes so stout,
By yalping hounds at bay is set :
The swiftest bird, that flies about,

Is caught at length in fowlers net :
The greatest fish, in deepest brooke,
Is soon deceived by subtill hooke.

† Here meant for Iceland.
+ Sicilian.

Terra del Fuego.

§ Cochineal.

Yea man himselfe, unto whose will
All things are bounden to obey,
For all his wit and worthie skill,

Doth fade at length, and fall away.
There is nothing but time doeth waste;
The heavens, the earth consume at last.

But vertue sits triumphing still

Upon the throne of glorious fame :
Though spiteful death man's body kill,
Yet hurts he not his vertuous name:
By life or death what so betides,
The state of vertue never slides.*

X. THE BEGGAR'S DAUGHTER OF BEDNALL GREEN.

THIS popular old ballad was written in the reign of Elizabeth, as appears not only from the verse where the arms of England are called the Queenes armes," but from its tunes being quoted in other old pieces written in her time.

It is chiefly given from the Editor's folio MS. compared with two ancient printed copies the concluding stanzas, which contain the old beggar's discovery of himself, are not, however, given from any of these, being very different from those of the vulgar ballad, which informs us, that at the battle of Evesham (fought August 4, 1265), when Simon de Montfort, the great Earl of Leicester, was slain at the head of the barons, his eldest son Henry fell by his side, and, in consequence of that defeat, his whole family sunk for ever, the king bestowing their great honours and possessions on his second son Edmund, Earl of Lancaster.

"It was an extremely popular ballad, and no wonder. This very house," writes Pepys in his diary, June 25, 1663, of Sir W. Rider's place at Bethnall Green, "was built by the blind beggar of Bednall Green so much talked of and sung in ballads; but they say it was only some outhouses of it (apud Mr. Chappell's Popular Music of the Olden Time, where the tune is given ").

"The story is pretty, and is told unaffectedly. Each part has its own surprise: the one revealing the wealth, the other the high birth of the beggar. These denouements are not supremely noble; but they are such as please the crowd. Such reverses are always delightful."