And of the love so hote

That made Troylus to dote
Upon faire Crescide *, &c.

In the account of Queen Elizabeth's entertainment at Kenelworth Castle, quoted above, the curious reader may find a catalogue of several old pieces in the romantic and humourous kind. Hall, Bishop of Norwich, in his Satires, published in 1597, mentions the following favourite stories.

No man his threshold better knowes, than I
Brute's first arrival, and first victory :
St. George's sorell, or his crosse of blood,
Arthur's round board, or Caledonian wood:

* The story of Troilus and Cressida became very popular from Chaucer's poem on the subject. He took it from Lollius, an historiographer of Urbino in Italy. As write mine auctour, callid Lollius.

Tr. and Cr. i. 390.

Lollius is honoured with a niche in the House of

Fame, iii. 380. as one of the writers of the Trojan story.

† Pag. 41. vol. i.

Or holie battles of bold Charlemayne,

What were * his knights did Salem's siege main

tayne:

How the mad rival † of faire Angelice,

Was physick'd for the new-found paradise ;

High stories they, &c ‡.

B. i. c. xii. s. xxxix.

Many an angels voice,

Singing before th' eternall majestie

In their trinall triplicities on hie.

Thus in An Hymne of Heavenly Love; of angels,

There they, in their trinal triplicities,

About him wait.

The image of the angels waiting in their trinal triplicities, puts me in mind of a passage in Milton's Lycidas, where the pointing seems to be wrong.

* Godfrey of Bulloigne, the subject of Tasso's Jerusalem.

+ Orlando, in Ariosto.

B. vi. sat. 1.

There entertain him all the saints above,
In solemn troops, and sweet societies,
Who sing, and singing in their glory move.

According to the present punctuation, the sense is, "The saints who are in solemn troops, and sweet societies, entertain him;" or, entertain him in [among] their solemn troops, and sweet societies: but if the comma was struck off after societies, another and more beautiful meaning would be introduced, viz. "The saints who sing in solemn troops and sweet societies, entertain him, &c."

B. ii. c. iii. s. xxiv.

Of Belphæbe speaking,

And twixt the pearles and rubies softly brake

A silver sound.

Thus in Sonnet 81.

But fairest she, when so she doth display
The gate with pearles, and rubies richly dight,
Thro' which her words so wise do make their

way.

15

Ariosto gives us pearls and corall for the

lips and teeth.

Che da i coralli, e da le pretiose
Perle uscir fanno i dolci accenti mozzi

The corall and the perle by nature wrought.

HARRINGTON.

This is common in the Italian poets.

B. ii. c. iii. s. xxv.

Upon her eyelids many graces sate
Under the shadow of her even browes.

In Sonnet 40.

When on each eye-lid sweetly doe appeare
And hundred graces as in shade sit.

*C. xii. s. ult.

And in a verse of his * pageants preserved by E. K†.

An hundred graces on her eye-lids sate.

Τρεις χαρίίας ψευσανίο πεφυκεναι. ΕΙΣ δε ΤΙΣ Ηρες ΟΦΘΑΛΜΟΣ γελόων ΕΚΑΤΟΝ ΧΑΡΙΤΕΣΣΙ τεθηλει τ.

The following passage from Sir T. More's English Works, Rastall, London, 1557, may perhaps give the reader some idea of the nature of our poet's pageants.

Mayster Thomas More in hys youth devysed in hys fathers house in London, a goodly hangyng of fyne paynted clothe, with nyne pageauntes, and verses over every one of these pageauntes: which verses expressed and declared, what the ymages in those pageauntes represented and also in those pageauntcs were paynted, the thynges that the verses over them dyd (in effecte) declare."

† Notes on June.

Ver. 63.