THE PALACE OF HONOUR.

["King Hart," as the shorter of Douglas's original compositionssimpler in structure, and the product of his matured powers-has been given entire. Of the "Palace of Honour," his earliest work, an unaltered specimen, with Mr Tytler's critical estimate and modern renderings, and Dr Irving's analysis, will give a sufficient idea of the poem.]

"The Palace of Honour' cannot lay claim either to a high moral tendency or to much unity of composition and effect. It is, on the contrary, confused in its arrangement, often obscure in its transitions, and crowded with persons and scenery of all ages and countries, heaped together "in most admired disorder;"

ladies, groups of Pagan sages and Christian heroes, populous cities and silent solitudes, succeed so rapidly, that we lose ourselves in the profusion of its actors and the unconnected but brilliant variety of its scenery. Yet it is justly characterized as exhibiting, in many places, an exuberant fancy and an extraordinary extent of learning for the age in which it was written. The learning, indeed, is rather ambitiously intruded in many parts, communicating a coldness and tedium to the narrative, and betraying an anxiety in the author to display at once the whole extent of his stores; whilst making every allowance for the obscurities, which are occasioned by a purer Scottish dialect, it is impossible not to feel that the poetry is inferior in genius to Dunbar. There is not that masterly clearness of outline

and brilliancy of colouring in his grand groups-that power of keeping under all minor details-the perspective of descriptive poetry, which is necessary for the production of a strong and uniform effect. All is too much of equal size, crowded into the foreground; and the author loses his purpose in the indiscriminate prominence of his details. Yet there are many charming passages. In the month of May, the poet, as is usual with his tuneful brethren of these olden times, rises early, before dawn, and wanders into a garden of pleasance and delight. Aurora, with her countenance sweet yet pale, and her mantle bordered with sable, had not yet unclosed the curtains of the couch within which lay Flora, the goddess of flowers, but a delicious fragrance was breathed from its flowery carpet, and a rich melodious song burst from the groves around it :-"

Unaltered Specimen.

The fragrant flouris blomand in the irseis, Ourspreid the levis of Natures tapestries; Abone the quhilk, with heavenly harmonies, The birdis sat on twistis and on greis, Melodiously makand their kindlie gleis, Quhais schill notis fordinned all the skyis; Of repercust air the echo cryis,

Amang the branches of the blomed treis, And on the laurers silver droppis lyis.

Quhill that I rowmed in that paradyce, Replenishit and full of all delice, Out of the sey Eous alift his heid, I mene the hors quhilk drawis at device The assiltrie and golden chair of price Of Tytan, quhilk at morrow semis reid; The new collour that all the nicht lay deid Is restorit, baith foulis, flouris, and rice Recomfort was, throw Phoebus gudlyheid.

Was never seen so weak a living wight.

hour,

The glorious sun uprising in his power, Bathed with a kindly heat all growing things,

Nor boisterous Eolus, with blast and shower,

Nor Saturn, with his aspect sad and sour, Dar'd in that place unfurl his icy wings, But sweet Favonius thither fragrance brings,

And little streams, half hid in moss, do run, Making a pleasant chime, and glancing in the sun.

Encircled with these varied delights, the poet desires anxiously to pour forth a strain worthy of the occasion, to

Nature queen, and eke to lusty May;

when, for what reason he fails to inform us, his faculties become weak, and he is seized with a trembling which incapacitates him

Confounds the brain, and chases back the blood

Unto the sinking heart in ruby flood: And the faint members of the body, all Refuse to work-when terror doth appal.

"Twere hard to tell how long the fit did last ; At length my colour came, though sore aghast,

And a wild wondrous vision met mine ee.
Thro' a huge forest I did seem to roam,
In lonely gloom, far far from mortal home,
Fast by the margin of a sullen sea,
In whose dead waters grisly fishes be:
'Twas hideous all-yet here I shall essay
To tell mine aventure, though rude may be
the lay.

Finding himself in this doleful region (I follow Dr Irving's analysis of the "Palace of Honour")—he begins to complain of the iniquity of Fortune; but his attention is soon attracted by the arrival of a magnificent cavalcade "of ladies

fair, and guidlie men," who pass before him in bright and glorious procession. Having gone by, two caitiffs approach, one mounted on an ass, the other on a hideous horse, who are discovered to be the arch-traitors Sinon and Achitophel. From Sinon the poet learns that the brilliant assembly whom he has just beheld is the court of Minerva, who are journeying through this wild solitude to the Palace of Honour. He not unnaturally asks how such villains were permitted to attend upon the goddess, and receives for answer, that they appear there on the same principle that we sometimes find thunder and tornadoes intruding themselves into the lovely and placid month of May. The merry horns of hunters are now heard in the wood, and a lovely goddess is seen surrounded by buskined nymphs, mounted upon an elephant, cheering on her hounds after an unhappy stag, who proves to be Acteon, pursued by Diana and his own dogs. Melodious music succeeds to this stirring scene, and through an opening in the forest the court of Venus approaches, shedding a transcendent brightness over the groves, and composed of every hero and heroine of classical and romantic story. The description of Mars upon his barded courser stout and bald," is noble :

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And she her knight him call'd in woe or weal, Whilst o'er his noble form her love-lit glances steal.

This brave apparition is scarcely past, when it is succeeded by the court of Minerva, composed of "wise, eloquent fathers, and pleasant ladies of fresh beauty," all of them directing their course to the Palace of Honour, and cheering the tedium of the journey by rehearsing Greek and Latin histories, and chanting to their lyre sapphic and elegiac odes. We regret it is impossible to follow them in their progress; but some of the insulated pictures are beautiful. The poet mounts a gallant steed, caparisoned with woodbine ; and, under the guidance of a sweet nymph to whom he had been introduced by Calliope, he takes his joyous way with the Muses, and at length arrives at the Castalian fount :--

Beside that fount, with clearest crystal blest,

Alighted down the Muses, bright of hue, Themselves to solace and their steeds to

rest;

And all their followers on the instant drew To taste the stream, which sparkling leapt to view,

Thro' freshest meads with laurel canopied. Then trembling to the well renown'd I flew, But the rude crowd all passage there defied, Nor might I snatch a drop of that celestial tide.

Our horses pastured in a pleasant field, Verdant and rich, beneath a mountain

green,

Where, from the mid-day heat a shade to yield,

Some ancient cedars wove a leafy screen; On the smooth turf unnumber'd flowers

were seen

Weaving a carpet 'neath umbrageous trees, And o'er their channels, paved with jewels sheen,

The waters gliding did the senses please, Mingling their quiet tunes with hum of

honied bees.

On many an instrument of breath or string

These gentle ladies play'd or playing sung; Some sat beneath the trees in lovely ring, Some solitary stray'd the flowers among; Ev'n the rude elements in silence hung, And wooed their music with intense delight;

Whilst from their charms such dazzling rays were flung,

As utterly amazed all mortal sight,
And might have thaw'd the heart of stern-

est anchorite.

Far doth it pass all powers of living speech,

To tell the joy that from these sighs I took; And if so high the wondrous theme doth reach,

recreate them with a song; and this favoured minstrel chants the deeds of the heroes of ancient days, not forgetting a digression upon transfigurations and the art and remedy of love. He is followed by other eminent bards; but the enumeration forms rather a ludicrous catalogue than a characteristic or animated picture. It is wound up by

Poggius, who stood, a groaning, girning fallow,

Spitting, and cryand, Fy, on great Laurentius Valla.

The trumpet now sounds to horse, and the Muses, with their whole attendants and followers, throwing themselves on their steeds, gallop on at a goodly pace till they reach a charming valley, wherein a mighty rock is seen, which we immediately discover to be some sacred and glorious place, for the moment it is descried the whole as

vour brook!

We may not soar so high, my little book; But pass we on:-Upon the field I spied, Woven of silk, with golden post and hook, A goodly tent unfold its wings of pride, To whose delightsome porch me drew my lovely guide.

Obeying his sweet conductress, Master Gavin enters this rich pavilion, and there sees the Muses sitting on "deissis," or elevated seats of distinction, served by familiars with ippocras and mead, and partaking, much in the same fashion as mortal ladies, of delicate meats and varied dainties. After the feast, Calliope commands Ovid, whom she quaintly calls her "Clerk Register," to

that they are permitted to behold the end of their journey.

It is here that the allegory, in its profane admixture of the Pagan mythology with the Christian system, becomes unnatural and painful. We find that the palace built upon this rock is intended to shadow forth the bliss of heaven; and that under the word Honour, which, to our modern ears, conveys a very different idea, we are to understand that heavenly honour and distinction to which the Christian aspires.

On entering the Palace of Honour, the poet beholds Venus seated on a splendid throne, having before her a magic mirror, supported by three golden

trees :