NOTES.

This poem was written and published towards the end of the year 1595. The word prothalamium is from Gr. pro, for, and thalamos, a bride-chamber, and would more properly be applied to a marriage-song than to "a spousall verse." Spenser had already written—earlier in the same year—the "Epithalamium" in honor of his own marriage. The singing of a hymeneal song in connection with the wedding festivities was a very ancient custom among the Greeks. Homer alludes to it in the "Iliad," XVIII, 493:

See, also, Spenser's "Faerie Queene," I, xii, 38.

1. Titans. The word is used for Helios, the son of the Titans, Hyperion and Thea. Observe that the apostrophe, as the sign of the possessive case, is never used by Spenser.

glyster. Glisten, shine. From A.-S. glisnian, glow, or shine with a soft light.

—Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice, Act ii, sc. vii.

—Gray, On a Favourite Cat, etc.

fayre. Fairly. An old form of the adverb, sanctioned by very old usage, but not current in Spenser's time.2. princes court. Spenser had had experience of the many bitter disappointments which befall him who seeks the favor of royalty. In "Mother Hubbard's Tale" he complains in this wise:

3. silver streaming Themmes. Sir John Denham's apostrophe to the Thames is well known:

—Cooper's Hill, 189.

And Pope praises the stream in still more extravagant terms:

—Windsor Forest, 227.

See, also, Spenser's "Faerie Queene," IV, xi.4. rutty. Rooty.5. Against. For, or in preparation for; to provide for. Compare Genesis xliii. 25: "And they made ready the present against Joseph came at noon." And Shakespeare's "Midsummer Night's Dream," Act iii, sc. ii:

6. Flood. This word was often used, as here, to denote simply a river. Pope addresses the river Thames:

7. all loose untyde. Steevens says: "Brides formerly walked to church with their hair hanging loose behind."8. entrayled. Twisted, interlaced.9. flasket. A long, shallow basket. Not used here as the diminutive of flask. Hales says it is the name given by the fishermen of Cornwall to the vessel in which the fish are transferred from the seine to the "tuck-net."10. cropt. Gathered, Dutch krappen, to cut off.

feateously. Neatly, skilfully. Compare Chaucer:

—Canterbury Tales, 124.

—Ibid., 3205. 11. on hye. In haste. Probably the same as hie, haste.12. pallid. Pale.13. primrose trew. Compare Milton's "Lycidas," 142:

And Shakespeare's "The Winter's Tale," Act iv, sc. iii;

14. store. Abundance.

vermeil. Vermilion. Commonly used as a noun.15. posies. "Posy originally meant verses presented with a nosegay or a bunch of flowers, and hence the term came to be applied to the flowers themselves."16. With that. At the same time.

Swannes. "Paulus Jovius, who died in 1552, describing the Thames, says: 'This river abounds in swans, swimming in flocks; the sight of whom and their noise are vastly agreeable to the fleets that meet them in their course.'"—Knight's Cyclopedia of London.17. lee. Water, or river. See "Faerie Queene," V, ii, 19:

Also, Ibid., IV, ii, 16:

The word is of Celtic origin, and is very common as a river-name in England, Ireland, France, and other parts of Western Europe.18. nor nothing near. In early English two negatives did not destroy each other, as now, but made the negation more emphatic.19. Eftsoones. Soon after. From A.-S. eft, after, and sona, soon.20. Somers-heat. The two ladies celebrated in this poem, it will be remembered, were Lady Elizabeth and Lady Katherine Somerset.21. The Peneus river, the most important stream in Thessaly, forces its way through the Vale of Tempe, between Mounts Ossa and Olympus, into the sea.22. loves couplement. Marriage.23. heart-quelling Sonne. Cupid.24. assoile. Free from, put off.

—Faerie Queene, III, i, 58. 25. bord. "Bed" and "board" are two associated terms, very frequently so used, which imply the performance of the two acts necessary for the maintenance of life—sleeping and eating. See Shakespeare's "Comedy of Errors," Act v, sc. i:

Also, "As You Like It," Act v, sc. iv:

26. redoubled. Repeated.

undersong. Refrain, burden.27. neighbour. See note 10, on Burns's "Cotter's Saturday Night."28. shend. Outshine, shame, disgrace. From A.-S. scendan.29. my most kyndly nurse. Although born in London, the poet was "descended from the ancient and honourable family of Spencer, of Althorpe in Northamptonshire."30. "When the order of the Knights Templar was suppressed in Edward the Second's reign, their London estate on the bank of the Thames was given over to the Knights of St. John; by these it was leased to the students of the Common Law, who, not finding a home at Cambridge or Oxford, were at that time in want of a habitation."—Hales.31. stately place. This stood in the gardens where the Outer Temple should have been. In 1580 it was occupied by the Earl of Leicester, and here Spenser was for a time entertained, as he asserts in the following line. The great lord whom he mentions was Leicester.32. "The want of whom I feel too well in my present friendless condition."33. fits not well. It is not proper.34. nobler peer. The Earl of Essex.35. Macaulay says of Lord Essex's expedition against Spain, in 1596, that it was "the most brilliant military exploit that was achieved on the Continent by English arms during the long interval which elapsed between the battle of Agincourt and that of Blenheim."36. Hercules two Pillors. The rocky capes on either side of the Strait of Gibraltar. It was said that Hercules erected them to mark the western limit of his wanderings.37. Hesper. Hesperus was the evening star, also sometimes regarded as the morning star, and hence called by Homer the bringer of light. See note on Lucifer, page 80 and page 189.38. Twins of Iove. Castor and Pollux. Two heroic brothers who as a reward of their devotion to each other were placed among the stars in the constellation Gemini.39. bauldricke. Belt, girdle, or sash. The "bauldricke of the heavens" is the zodiac.40. Which. In early English this pronoun was very commonly used instead of who when referring to persons.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE.

Edmund Spenser was born in London about the year 1552. He was educated at Merchant Taylor's school, and in 1569 went to Cambridge University, where he entered Pembroke Hall as a sizar. In the same year his first poetical performances—translations from Petrarch and Du Bellay—were published in a miscellaneous collection without the name of the author. At the University he was zealously devoted to the study of Latin and Greek literature, and there he made the acquaintance of several students who afterwards became men of note. In 1579 he visited Sir Philip Sidney at Penshurst, with whom he afterwards spent some time in London at the house of Sidney's uncle, the Earl of Leicester. In 1580 was published, but without his name, his first considerable poem, "The Shepheards Calendar"; and in the autumn of the same year he went to Ireland as secretary to Lord Grey of Wilton, the new Lord Lieutenant. With the exception of a few brief visits made to England, the remainder of his life was spent partly in Dublin and partly at Kilcolman Castle on a grant of forfeited land in the county of Cork. Between 1580 and 1589 he wrote the first three books of "The Faerie Queene," and in 1590 they were published in London, through the influence of Sir Walter Raleigh, who had recently visited the poet in Ireland. In the summer of 1594 he married a lady named Elizabeth, probably the daughter of some English settler in Ireland; and in the following year he carried to London and published the second three books of "The Faerie Queene." At about the same time were published his "Colin Clout's Come Home Again," and his "Amoretti Sonnets," and an "Epithalamium" relating to his courtship and marriage. Returning to Ireland, he resumed his labor upon the half-completed "Faerie Queene," but it was rudely interrupted by the breaking out of an insurrection among the Irish. In 1598 Spenser's house was sacked and burned by the rebels, and it was with the greatest difficulty that he and his family escaped with their lives. Indeed, it is stated, on the authority of Ben Jonson, that one little child perished in the flames. Spenser returned to London in poverty and great distress, and on the 16th of January, 1599, he died in King Street, Westminster. He was buried in the Abbey.

Spenser has been very appropriately named "the poets' poet." "For," says Leigh Hunt, "he has had more idolatry and imitation from his brethren than all the rest put together. The old undramatic poets, Drayton, Browne, Drummond, and Giles and Phineas Fletcher, were as full of him as the dramatic were of Shakespeare. Milton studied and used him, calling him 'sage and serious Spenser'; and adding that he 'dared be known to think him a better teacher than Scotus and Aquinas.' Cowley said he became a poet by reading him. Dryden claimed him for a master. Pope said he read him with as much pleasure when he was old as when he was young. Collins and Gray loved him. Thomson, Shenstone, and a host of inferior writers expressly imitated him. Burns, Byron, Shelley, and Keats made use of his stanza. Coleridge eulogized him."

Hazlitt says, "Of all the poets, Spenser is the most poetical." And Taine declares that no modern is more like Homer than he.

With reference to the peculiar forms of language—comparatively obsolete even when "The Faerie Queene" was composed—which are so marked a characteristic of Spenser's poetry, Hales says: "The subject he chose for his great work drew him into the midst of the old times of chivalry, and the literature that belonged to them. With such a subject the older forms of the language seemed to consort better. To him, too, perhaps, as to Virgil, the older words and word-forms seemed to give elevation and dignity. Moreover, an older dialect was probably to some extent his vernacular, as he had probably passed his youth in Lancashire. Lastly, the only great poet who had preceded him, his great model, the Tityrus of whom he 'his songs did lere,' was Chaucer. To him Chaucer's language may have seemed the one language of English poetry."

References: Warton's History of English Poetry; Hazlitt's Lectures on the English Poets; Craik's Spenser and his Poetry; Morley's English Writers.