in line 4, the old reading is, "lies hid." Compare page 78, line 9, where the old editions have," By her the virtue of the stars down slide." v. p. 132. The old editions used omit " in " in the second line, and in line 3, begin "The most of all." In line 21, I have followed Ellis and others in reading" Fear " for " Few." VII. P. 135. The smoothness and ingenuity of this piece, at so early a date, have caused some suspicions. "If these are genuine," says Mr. Hallam, "and I know not how to dispute it, they are as polished as any written at the close of the Queen's reign." It is confessed that there is one mistake already in the date; but Park's proposal to support a legend prefixed to them by substituting one still earlier, would only increase the marvel. In one or two words I have followed the readings of Dr. Nott, Surrey," p. cclxxix. 66 VIII. p. 136. The scattered verses ascribed to Queen Elizabeth are collected in Park's Walpole, "R. and N. A.,” i. 84-109, and in Mr. Dyce's "British Poetesses,” pp. 15-23. In line 21 of this piece, "The daughter of debate" is Mary Queen of Scots. The last couplet, as it stands in Puttenham, is imperfect. I have supplied the deficiency from the Oxford MS. Percy reads, "shall quickly poll;" Brydges, "for lawless joy." IX.-X. pp. 137–141. It is impossible to represent properly the Courtly Poets of Elizabeth without an extract from the writings of Sir Philip Sidney; in whose case I have therefore made a brief exception to the rule, which has led me generally to exclude specimens from those poets whose works have already been collected and edited. All requisite information on the version of the Psalms ascribed to Sidney and his sister is given in Park's edition of Walpole's "Royal and Noble Authors," vol. ii, pp. 203-4, and in the Preface prefixed to the first printed edition in 1823. XI-XV. pp. 142-7. Edward, Earl of Oxford. To the five pieces here ascribed to Lord Oxford, the following sixteen may be added, making twentyone in all: 6. "A crown of bays shall that man wear. Par. of D. D., p. 70; “E. O.” 7. "Doth sorrow fret thy soul? O, direful spirit!" Six lines in "England's Parnassus," 1600, p. 26, reprint; "E. of O." Also anon. with Astrophel and Stella,” 1591. 66 8. "Even as the wax doth melt, or dew consume away."-P. of D. D., p. 77; "E. O." 9. "Faction that ever dwells in court where wit excels."-Printed with Sidney's "Astrophel and Stella;" and reprinted in Collier's "Bibl. Cat.," Additions, p. ii.; "E. O." Cf. ib., vol. i. p. 37. 10. "Framed in the front of forlorn hope past all recovery."-P. of D. D., p. 24 (corrected); "E. O." 11. "I am not as I seem to be."-P. of D. D., p. 76; "E. O." 12. "If care or skill could conquer vain desire." -P. of D. D., p. 74; "M. B.," but ascribed to Lord Oxford in ed. 1578 (Collier), and in ed. 1580. 13. " Love is a discord and a strange divorce." -Eighteen lines in "England's Parnassus," p. 208; "E. O." 14. "My meaning is to work what wonders love hath wrought."-P. of D. D. p. 78; “E. O." 15. "Sitting alone upon my thought in melancholy mood."—"Verses made by the Earl of Oxford;" MS. Rawl. 85, fol. 11. 16. "The lively lark did stretch her wing." R P. of D. D. p. 69; "E. O." MS. Rawl. 85, fol. 14, verso. "Earl of Oxford." 17. "The trickling tears that fall along my cheeks."-P. of D. D. p. 75; "E. O." 18. " What plague is greater than the grief of mind?"-Six lines in "England's Parnassus,” p. 252; "E. of Ox." Anon. with "Astrophel and Stella." 19. "What shepherd can express."-England's Helicon, p. 87; "Earl of Oxenford." 20. "When I was fair and young, then favour graced me."-Lord Orford's Works, i. 552, "from an ancient MS. Miscellany." Also in Ellis. But in MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 1, signed "Elysabetha regina." 21. "Who taught thee first to sigh, alas! my heart."-MS. Rawl. 85, fol. 16, verso. "Earl of Oxenford." XI. p. 142. The copies of this piece differ widely. That which Ellis has printed resembles the text of the Harleian MS. The following readings may be worth observing: line 6, "pride of May;" line 14, "unsavoury lovers' tears;" line 32, "Ten thousand times a day." XII. p. 143. In the third line, Mr. Palgrave rightly corrected Dr. Bliss's reading, "make me bond," into "make men bond." It is 66 " in the copy printed by Byrd in 1587. men XIII. p. 144. This singular poem looks like an exercise in alliteration. In line 6, "or" probably means "before ;"" before I suffer wrong again." XIV. p. 146, line 1. Manchet is fine bread, which is constantly, as here, contrasted with cheat, or coarse bread. In the "proportion for a royal dinner," in the time of Philip and Mary, the first three items are," Fyne manchett, fyne chett, and other chett;" Gutch, "Collect. Cur." vol. ii. init. "No manchet can so well the courtly palate please, xv. p. 147, Epig. 2, line 1, evidently means, "yet thou could'st not command content." The ellipsis occurs also in Walpole's printed copy. In line 2 of the third stanza, p. 148, "swad" is a countryman; a rude clown. XVI.-XIX. pp. 149-160. Sir Edward Dyer. Dyer is another member of the Elizabethan court-circle whose poetry was so early lost in the mass of unappropriated and fugitive verses, that though Puttenham had praised him in 1589 as "for elegy most sweet, solemn, and of high conceit," Edmund Bolton in the next reign said, that he had "not seen much of Sir Edward Dyer's poetry" (see other references in Park's edition of Warton, H. E. P. iii. 230). We are fortunately now in a position to give a rather more complete account of it. Mr. Collier has discovered and described two rare works by Dyer; "The Praise of Nothing," 1585, which is chiefly in prose, and "Six Idyllia of Theocritus," 1588, a metrical translation (see his 66 Life of Spenser,” p. lxxvi. note, and his “Bibl. Cat." i. 237; ii. 24, 60). Of Dyer's minor poetry, I have here printed four very characteristic specimens; two of which possess the special interest, that the replies and imitations annexed to them remind us that Sidney, Dyer, and Greville formed a close brotherhood of poets; as Sidney himself has recorded in a poem printed in Davison's "Poetical Rhapsody,"-"upon his meeting with his two worthy friends and fellow poets, Sir Edward Dyer and Mr. Fulke Greville." To these four, the following pieces may be added: 5. "Alas, my heart, mine eye hath wronged thee."-England's Helicon, p. 88; "S. E. Dyer." 6. "Amaryllis was full fair."-MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 98, verso, "E. Dier." Also in MS. Tann. 306, p. 174. 7. 66 Among the woes of those unhappy wights." -A long elegy on Sidney, containing from fiftyfour to sixty-one stanzas of six lines each; printed from Breton, but without any author's name, in Bishop Butler's " Sidneiana," pp. 41-53; and identified as Dyer's in Chetham MS. 8012, pp. 143— 153, where the title is "An epitaph composed by Sir Edward Dyer of Sir Philip Sidney." As Breton's in MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 23. 8. "As rare to hear as seldom to be seen.' MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 7, verso. "M. Dier." 9. "Divide my times and race my wretched hours."-MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 37; " M. Dier." 10. "If pleasures be in painfulness.”—P. of D. D. p. 20; "M. D." Dyer's claim is admitted by Ritson and Dyce. 11. "I would it were not as it is."-MS. Rawl, Poet. 85, fol. 6. "M. Dier." 66 Another piece beginning 66 O more than most fair, full of the living fire," which is signed M. Dier" in MS. Rawl. Poet. 85, fol. 7, verso, is really one of Spenser's Sonnets; No. VIII., vol. v., p. 119, Collier. A poem of Lord Brooke's begins in the same way, Works," 1633, p. 162, but the pieces are different. It is only another instance of the poetical intercourse between these writers. 66 We may also add several quotations in Puttenham's "Art of Poesy," 1589, pp. 141, 176, 198. The following pieces have been ascribed to Dyer, |