PREFATORY NOTE HE three volumes of The Cambridge History of English Literature which are to follow the present will consist of two concerned with the history of dramatic writing in England to the middle, or thereabouts, of the seventeenth century, preceded by one dealing with poetry and prose other than dramatic to the end, approximately, of the first quarter of the seventeenth century. We find that it will be more convenient to publish the volume concerned with Elizabethan and Jacobean prose and poetry from Sir Thomas North to Michael Drayton so soon as may be after that now issued, with which it immediately associates itself, rather than to defer it until after the issue of the two drama volumes. These last, in a sense, will be complete in themselves, and we hope to publish them without loss of time. We have not cared to draw a hard and fast line between the contents of volumes III and IV; the two should be taken together as covering the sixteenth century and the early decades of the seventeenth, apart from the drama. The process of compression has had to be applied more severely than we might have wished; but, in accordance with the intentions expressed in the preface to volume I, we have not scrupled to devote less space to well known writers, in order to treat at greater length subjects concerning which difficulty may be experienced in obtaining assistance elsewhere; neither have we hesitated to limit the space devoted to generalisation rather than restrict unduly that required for bibliographies. We cannot deny ourselves the pleasure of acknowledging the continued assistance received from scholars engaged in the teaching of English literature at home and abroad, on both sides of the Atlantic. And especially welcome has been the evidence of their kindly-expressed appreciation of our aims offered by several distinguished continental scholars-by Dr Richard Wilker of Leipzig, himself eminent alike as a historian of English literature and as a professor of the subject, whose criticisms thus possess a twofold value; by Dr Cino Chiarini of Florence, to the continuation of whose most welcome articles in La Cultura we are looking forward; by Professor Albert Feuillerat of Rennes, a literary critic of high reputation on both sides of the Channel, in the Revue de l'Enseignement des Langues Vivantes and elsewhere; and by others. The effective support given us in our endeavours to provide a history for both the general reader and the student by the combination of a text abstaining as much as possible ← m technicalities, with bibliographies as full as possible of, has been a source of great encouragement to us in carrying task. We are convinced that it is the duty of a university press to endeavour both to meet the highest demands that can be made upon its productions by men of learning and letters, and to enable the many to share in the knowledge acquired by the few. Our It may interest our readers to know that, by permission of the Syndics of the Press, copies of Professor Manly's chapter on Piers the Plowman, in our second volume, have been circulated among its members by the Early English Text Society-the body of scholars best qualified to estimate the importance of this contribution. The offprint is accompanied by a few pages of pregnant 'forewords' from the pen of the veteran founder and director of the Society, and by the article on the same subject contributed to Modern Philology in January 1906 and Dr Henry Bradley's letter in The Athenæum of 21 April 1906. CAMBRIDGE, 28 December 1908. A. W. W. A. R. W. CONTENTS ENGLISHMEN AND THE CLASSICAL RENASCENCE V By the Rev. T. M. LINDSAY, D.D., Principal of the Glasgow College of the United Free Church of Scotland. The birth of the classical renascence. Erasmus. His first visit to England. Thomas Linacre. William Grocyn. English students at Paris. John Colet. William Lily. John Fisher. Sir Thomas More. The spread of the classical renascence. Sir Thomas Elyot. PAGE REFORMATION LITERATURE IN ENGLAND By the Rev. J. P. WHITNEY, B.D., King's College, Cambridge; Professor of Ecclesiastical History, King's College, London. Simon Fish. Erasmus and Cambridge. Aspects of the reformation. Thomas Cranmer. His influence. EARLY GERMAN INFLUENCES ON ENGLISH LITERATURE By ARTHUR KOELBING, Ph.D., Freiburg im Breisgau. Alexander Barclay. Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff. Barclay's additions to Brant. The influence of The Ship of Fools. Barclay's Eclogues. John Skelton. Phyllyp Sparowe. The Bowge of Courte. Colyn Clout. Speke, Parrot. Why come ye nat to courte? Magnyfycence. Characteristics of Skelton. THE PROGRESS OF SOCIAL LITERATURE IN TUDOR TIMES By HAROLD V. ROUTH, M.A., Peterhouse, Professor of Latin in Trinity College, Toronto. Cocke Lorell's bote. Mock testaments. Fraternities, orders and dances of death. The boke of Mayd Emlyn. Widow Edith. Satires and disquisitions on women. The Schole-house of women. The Proude Wyves Paternoster. Jest-books. The Geystes of Skoggan. Howleglass. Riddles and broadsides. Transition of society. The Complaynt of Roderyck Mors. Robert Crowley. The Hye Way to the Spyttel Hous. Awdeley's Fraternitye of vacabones. Harman's Caveat. Cosmopolitanism. Andrew Boorde. William Bullein. A Dialogue against the Fever Pestilence. Superstition in the sixteenth century. Scot's Discoverie of Witch- REFORMATION AND RENASCENCE IN SCOTLAND By P. HUME BROWN, M.A., LL.D., Scottish Historiographer Royal ; Professor of Ancient (Scottish) History and Palaeography in The reformation in Scotland. Patrick Hamilton. Alexander Alane. Plays. The Gude and Godlie Ballatis. John Knox. Historie of the reformatioun in Scotland. Robert Lindesay of Pitscottie. The Diary of Mr James Melville. Historians. Political ballads. By HAROLD H. CHILD, sometime Scholar of Brasenose Tottel's Miscellany. Sir Thomas Wyatt. Wyatt's sonnets. Wyatt's treatment of love. Wyatt's epigrams, satires and devotional pieces. Henry Howard, earl of Surrey. 'Poulter's measure.' Surrey's translations from Vergil and blank verse. Nicholas Grimald. Thomas lord Vaux. 'Uncertain' authors in Tottel's Miscellany. Thomas Churchyard. Thomas Tusser. Barnabe Googe. George Turbervile. Thomas Howell. Humfrey Gifford. Miscellanies. By JOHN W. CUNLIFFE, M.A., D.Lit. (London), Professor of English in the University of Wisconsin, U.S.A. The original design. Contents of the parts. Its popularity and |