JOHN HARRINGTON. 1564. Father of Sir John Harrington, this gentleman is distinguished for the following poem, written, as he informs us, "on ISABELLA MARKHAM, when he first thought her fair; as she stood at the Princess's window, in goodly attire, and talked to divers in the court-yard." He was the friend and admirer of Queen Elizabeth, who rewarded his attachment to her cause, by the reversion of a grant of lands at Thelston, near Bath. He died in 1582."If," says Mr. Ellis, "the poem here selected be rightly attributed to him, he cannot be denied the singular merit of having united an elegance of taste with an artifice of style which far exceeded his contemporaries." WHENCE Comes my Love?-oh, heart disclose! The blushing cheek speaks modest mind, Why thus, my Love, so kind bespeak Make nought so fair to cause our moan, EDMUND SPENSER. 1586. Of the gentle and the generous SPENSER, who was the prin cipal poet of an age distinguished for its poetical productions, scanty is the information which posterity at present possesses. He whose merit would confer splendour on any name, cannot be traced in his family connections. It is, however, ascertained that ROSALIND was no imaginary mistress; but that she first awakened in his heart the passion he has so tenderly displayed in his writings, by which he attracted the notice of Sir Philip Sidney, his earliest and noblest patron. Nothing can be more exquisitely touching than the kindness with which ROSALIND is mentioned by a lover who had long despaired of obtaining her affection. But who can tell what cause had that fair maid Rashly to censure creatures so divine! From heaven, though graft in frailness feminine. This is the language of a noble and a tender heart. It is not possible for a mind rightly constituted ever to recol lect with resentment even the wrongs that have been inflicted by a beloved object. Love will always seek to extenuate the faults of those whom it would believe to be faultless. In his "Faery Queen," SPENSER thus eloquently vindicates this part of his character, against those who seem to have charged him with effeminacy of spirit. Such ones ill judge of love, that cannot love; For fault of few that have abus'd the same. The root; and brings forth glorious flowers of fame, That crown true lovers with immortal bliss! The meed of them that love, and do not live amiss. But the sonnets of SPENSER are addressed principally, if not entirely, to a lady of whom he became enamoured in Ireland, and who frequented the banks of the Mulla, where he resided in the meridian of his life. If poetry may in such cases be credited, he had now less cause to deplore the unsuccessfulness of his suit to Rosalind; happy in the possession of one, whose accomplishments, whose beauty, and whose virtue were by no means of a common description. What were the matrimonial fruits of this union, which the bard has commemorated by an animated epithalamium, we are hitherto uninformed. His wife was the daughter of a rich Irish merchant. SPENSER died about the year 1598; after a chequered, but, on the whole, not a disastrous life. It would be ridicu lous to represent him as miserable, who had been loved and patronized by Sidney and Raleigh; whose talents were acknowledged while he was living, and honoured when he was dead. Conformably to his own request, he was interred in Westminster-abbey, near the remains of his admired Chaucer, the funeral being attended by many men both of rank and abilities; and copies of verses, sacred to his memory, thrown into his grave. A monument was afterwards erected to him, by the noble but unfortunate Earl of Essex, who thus honourably repaid the Sonnet addressed to him by the poet, on the publication of his "Faery Queene." It is at length believed that Spenser was born about the year 1553. 970 SONNETS. FAIR eyes, the mirror of my mazed heart! For when ye mildly look with lovely hue, WAS it the work of Nature or of Art, And, with stern count'nance, back again doth chase Her smile me draws, her frown me drives away: SONNETS. ONE day, as I unwarily did gaze On those fair eyes my Love's immortal light, FRESH Spring! the herald of Love's mighty king, |