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"The ioyous birdes, fhrouded in chearefull shade, "Their notes unto the voice attempred fweet; "Th' angelicall foft trembling voyces made "To th' inftruments divine refpondence meet; "The filver-founding inftruments did meet "With the base murmure of the water's fall; "The water's fall, with difference difcreet, "Now foft, now loud, unto the wind did call ; "The gentle warbling wind low answered to all." Sir Guyon and the Palmer, refcuing the youth who was held captive by Acrafia in this delightful manfion, resembles that of the two warriours recovering Rinaldo from the charms of Armida in the Italian poem.

In the Third Book, the character of Britomartis, a lady-errant, who is the heroine, and performs the chief adventure, resembles Ariofto's Bradamante, and Taffo's Clarinda; as they are all copies of the Camilla in Virgil.

Among the chief beauties in this book, we may reckon that episode in which Britomartis goes to the cave of Merlin, and is entertained with a prophetical account of her future marriage and offfpring. This thought is remotely taken from Virgil, but more immediately from Ariofto, who has represented Bradamante on the like occafion making a vifit to the tomb of Merlin, which he is forced for that purpose to fuppofe to be in Gaul; where fhe fees, in like manner, in a vision, the heroes and captains who were to be her defcendants.

The story of Marinell, and that of the birth of Belphoebe and Amoret, in which the manner of Ovid is well imitated, are very amufing. That complaint against Night, at the end of Canto IV.

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Night! thou foule mother of annoyaunce fad, "Sifter of heavie Death, and nourse of Woe, &c." though it were only confidered as detached from

the reft, might be esteemed a very fine piece of poetry. But there is nothing more entertaining in this whole Book than the profpect of the Gardens of Adonis, which is varied from the Bower of Blif's in the former Book, by an agreeable mixture of philofophical fable. The figure of Time, walking in this garden, fpoiling the beauty of it, and cutting down the flowers, is a very fine and fignificant Allegory.

I cannot fo much commend the story of the Squire of Dames, and the intrigue between Paridell and Hellenore: these paffages favour too much of the coarfe and comick mixtures in Ariofto: but that image of Jealoufy, at the end of Canto X. grown to a favage, throwing himself into a cave, and lying there without ever fhutting one eye, under a craggy clift juft threatening to fall, is ftrongly conceived, and very poetical. There is likewife a great variety of fancy in drawing up and diftinguishing, by their proper emblems, the vifionary perfons in the Mask of Cupid, which is one of the chief embellifliments of this Book.

In the ftory of Cambel and Canace, in Book IV. the Author has taken the rife of his invention from the Squire's Tale in Chaucer, the greatest part of which was loft. The battle of Cambel with the three brethren, and the fudden parting of it by that beautiful machine of the appearance of Concord, who by a touch of her wand charms down the fury of the warriours, and converts them into friends, is one of the moft fhining paffages in this Legend. We may add to this the fiction concerning the Girdle of Florimel, which is a good Allegory; as alfo the defcription of Atè, or Difcord; that of Care, working like a fmith, and living amidst the perpetual noise of hammers; and especially the Temple of Venus, which is adorned with a great variety of

fancy. The prayer of a lover in this temple, which begins,

"Great Venus! queene of beauty, and of grace,"

is taken from Lucretius's invocation of the fame goddess in the beginning of his poem, and may be reckoned one of the moft elegant tranflations in our language. The continuation of the fable of Marinel, though not fo ftrictly to the fubject of this Legend, gives occafion to the Poet to introduce that admirable episode of the marriage of the Thames and the Medway, with the train of the fea-gods, nymphs, and rivers, and especially thofe of England and Ireland, that were prefent at the ceremony; all which are defcribed with a furprifing variety, and with very agreeable mixtures of geography; among which Spenfer has not forgot to mention his Mulla, the river which ran through his own grounds.

Befides the general morals and allegories in the Faerie Queene, there are fome parallel paffages and characters which, as I have faid, were defigned to allude to particular actions and perfons; yet no part is fo full of them as Book V. which, being framed on the Virtue of Juftice, is a kind of figurative reprefentation of Queen Elizabeth's reign. Here we meet with her again, under the name of Mercilla; we fee her fending relief to Eelge, or the Netherlands, and reducing the tyrannical power of Geryoneo, or Spain. Her court and attendants are drawn with a majesty suitable to her character. The reader will eafily perceive that the Trial of the Queen of Scots is fhadowed in Canto IX.; but the Poet has avoided the catastrophe of her death, and has artfully touched on the Queen's reluctance and tenderness in that affair, by which he has turned

the compliment on her juftice into another on her mercy.

Talus with his iron flail, who attends Artegall, is a bold allegorical figure, to fignify the execution of juftice.

The next Book, which is the Sixth, is on the fubject of Courtefy. I fhall not prolong this Difcourfe to trace out particular paffages in it, but only mention that remarkable one in Canto X. where the Author has introduced himself under the perfon of Colin Clout. That vein of paftoral, which runs through this part of the Work, is indeed different from the reft of the Poem: but Taffo, in a more regular plan, has mingled the Paftoral taste with the Heroick, in his reprefentation of Erminia among the shepherds. The picture, which Spenfer has here given us of his mistress dancing among the Graces, is a very agreeable one, and difcovers all the skill of the painter, affifted by the paffion of the lover.

Though the remaining Six Books, which were to have compleated this beautiful and moral Poem, are loft, we have a noble fragment of them preferved in the Two Cantos of Mutability. This is, in my opinion, the moft fublime and beft-invented allegory in the whole Work. The Fable of ArloHill, and of the river Molanna, which is a digreffion on this occafion, has all the beauty we admire in the Metamorphofes of Ovid: but the pedigree of Mutability, who is reprefented as a giantefs; her progrefs from the earth to the circle of the moon; the commotion fhe raises there, by endeavouring to remove that planet from the fky; and the fhadow which is caft, during the attempt, on the inhabitants

Has turned the compliment &c.] There is more of flattery than truth, however, in this compliment. TODD.

of the earth, are greatly imagined. We find feveral strains of invention in this Fable, which might appear not unworthy even of Homer himfelf. Jupiter is alarmed, and fends Mercury to know the reafon of this ftrife, and to bring the offender before him. How Homer-like are thofe lines, after he has concluded his speech among the gods?

"So having faid, he ceaft; and with his brow "(His black eye-brow, whofe doomefull dreaded beck "Is wont to wield the world unto his vow, "And even the higheft powers of heaven to check,) "Made figne to them in their degrees to speake."

And afterwards;

"With that he shooke

"His nectar-deawed locks, with which the fkyes "And all the world beneath for terror quooke, "And eft his burning levin-brond in hand he tooke."

The fimile, likewife, in which the gods are reprefented looking on Mutability with surprise,

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"Like a fort of steeres, 'Mongst whom fome beast of strange and forraine race "Unwares is chaunc't, far straying from his peeres, &c." is very much in the fimplicity of that old father of heroick poetry. Mutability appeals from Jupiter to Nature, before whom the obtains a hearing. The Poet on this occafion has, with a moft abundant fancy, drawn out to a review the four Seasons, the Months, Day and Night, the Hours, Life and Death; Change afferts her dominion over them all, and over the heavens themselves: all creatures are represented looking up in the face of Nature, in expectation of the fentence. The conclufion is great, and contains a noble moral; that though all things are varied, and shift their forms, they do not perish, but return to their first beings; and that

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