66

My good Lo: what retorne to make for so many noble favors and kindnes, both to my sonne and my selfe, I must needs bee to seeke, but I assuer your Lp what defect so ever may bee in my words is supplied in my hart; and my thankfulnes is to bee conceved far other then I can any way expres. Your Lps fine token is to mee of infinight esteeme, and no less in regard of the sender then the vertu in it self. It is indeed a cordiall and precious present, not unlyke to proove a speciall remedy of the sadd spleene, for of lyke effect do I alredy find what so ever is of lykely succes proseeding from the cause whence this proseeded: wherin I now may boldly promis to my selfe that hopefull comfort which, but thence, I protest I coold [not] expect so much to joy in as I do. So farr foorth I find my sonns best lykeing affection and resolution to answere my desire heerein, as, if the late interview have mutually wrought, it is sufficient: suer I am ther needes no more to your assurance and satisfaction hence; wishing the same to your Lp there, accompaned with as many comforts and blessings of health and happines as this earth may yeeld you. God have you in his safe keeping according to my hartest praiers. I rest

Your Lps affectionatly assured

M. PEMBROKE."

To the above is appended a letter from the Earl (who seems to have left the matter much to his wife and Massinger) dated Fallerston, 16th Aug. 1597. At this period the young man was only 17 years old, and the intended bride 13, but after the union the gentleman was to be sent on his travels for several years, while the lady was to continue to reside with her parents. The offer seems to have proceeded from Lord Burghley, who was always anxious to ally his family with the most wealthy and powerful houses. II. 148. The execution of Peters, which took place on 16th Aug. 1660.]-The date here given of the execution of Hugh Peters does not agree with the entry in Smyth's Obituary, published by the Camden Society in 1849, where the memorandum is this (p. 52):

"Octob. 16. Cook and Hugh Peters executed at Charing Cross." III. 151. The Earl of Surrey's second and fourth Books were printed by Richard Tottel, with the date of "xxi day of June, An. 1557."]-In fact Tottel brought out the Virgil in the interval between the appearance of two editions of Surrey and Wyat's Poems, which are dated respectively 5th June and 31st July, 1557. As nobody, not even Bishop Percy, has ever yet given the title of the book they were reprinting, we subjoin it in the very words and letters of the original :-" Certain Bokes of Virgiles Aenæis turned into English meter by the right honorable lorde Henry Earle of Surrey. Apud Ricardum Tottel. Cum priuilegio ad imprimendum solum. 1557." The day of the month does not stand upon the title-page, but in the colophon, thus:-"Imprinted at London in flete strete within Temple barre, at the sygne of the hand and starre, by Richard Tottell the xxi day of June An. 1557."

II. 159. John Phillips wrote two separate poems at the same date.]-From the title "Phillippes Venus," it might be supposed that that prose tract was by a person of the name of Phillips; but such is not the fact, the author signs the dedication "to Maister Henry Prannell," Jo. M. "Phillippes Venus" is a most rare, and we may almost say worthless production, of which only one perfect copy is known, but of which an exemplar, wanting both beginning and end, is now before us: we therefore give the title from the complete work in the Bodleian Library-"Philippes Venus. Wherein is pleasantly discoursed sundrye fine and wittie Arguments in a senode of the Gods and Goddesses assembled for the expelling of wanton Venus from among their sacred societie. Enterlaced with many merrye and delightfull Questions and wittic answers: Wherin Gentlemen may finde matter to

purge melanchollye and pleasant varietie to content fancye.-At London Printed for John Perrin and are to be solde in Paules Churchyard at the signe of the Angell, 1591." 4to. B. L. The body of the work is hardly worth attention, the whole import being, that the Gods and Goddesses expel the "wanton Venus" from their society, in order to substitute a chaste Venus described by the author-perhaps a compliment to some lady who is no where designated. Quite at the end the writer promises a continuation, which, not much to our surprise, never appeared.

II. 160. In its complete state it consists of 63 seven-line stanzas.]-The number of stanzas of R. G.'s "Most rare and excellent Dreame," as reprinted in Heliconia," is only 54, instead of 60, as in the original edition of "The Phoenix Nest," 1598.

44

II. 166. Mr. Utterson's reprint of Barnfield's "Cynthia," 1595, has several mistakes.]-Mr. Utterson's private printer's mistakes in the reproduction of Barnfield's "Cynthia," 1595, are some of them more serious than the mere mis-spelling of the author's name, which is never given as it stands in the original impression. We will only point out two or three errors in the preliminary matter in the address "To the curteous gentlemen Readers" we have by for "for," and reed for "breed:" in T. T's commendatory verses we have reave for "reare," and waiving for "waining:" in the opening of "Cynthia' we have honour for "horror," glistning for "glistring," and that for "thus The greatest fault of the reprint is, however, the omission of 20 sonnets, certainly of an ambiguous character, and the loss of which Mr. Utterson afterwards so much regretted that he finally had them also reprinted, and added to four copies, out of the sixteen to which his impression was limited. To one of the four we have resorted.

II. 166. Which is mentioned in Maunsell's Catalogue.]-We apprehend that the following memorandum, in one of the Stationers' Registers, respecting Maunsell's Catalogue, published in 1595, is new :

"19 Aprilis 1596. Whereas Andr. Mansell hath taken paines in collectinge and printinge a Catalogue of bookes, which he hath dedicated to the Companye, havinge also been a petitioner to them for some consideration towardes his paines and charges, Be yt remembered that thereupon the Companye, of their meer benevolence, have bestowed uppon him in money and bookes the summe of for whiche he yeildeth thankes, holdinge hym selfe fully contented without expectation of any further matter or benefit for the same, or any like thinge of or in the companye, or any particular parties of the same. The particulars of which money and bookes appere in the booke thereof made, conteyning the names of the particular persons that contributed the same."

Only the two first parts of the Catalogue are now known, or perhaps ever were printed. T. Nash speaks of " Andrew Maunsell's English Catalogue" in his "Have with you to Saffron Walden," 1596, sign. T. 2.

II. 172. Henry Peacham having originally published his "Garden of Eloquence" in 1577.]-Of course we allude to Henry Peacham the elder: see a former note, p. xxxi*.

II. 173. See also a Prayer by John Pyttes, 1559, noticed in Ritson.]-It is the only work by Pyttes, Pits, or Pitts, of which Ritson had any knowledge: see Bibl. Poet. p. 305.

II. 174. Philip Stubbes' Anatomy of Abuses, 1583.]—We ought, perhaps, to have added to this list of productions for and against the Stage, a tract by an author who has been mentioned in Vol. I. p. 282, as, probably, the father of Theophilus Field, and of a very popular actor and author, Nathaniel Field. John Field, the puritan divine and Rector of Cripplegate, who died in 1587, had published in 1583 a tract called for by a fearful accident at a bear-baiting on a Sunday morning, at Paris Garden: he entitled

it "A godly exhortation by occasion of the late judgement of God shewed at Parris Garden, the thirteenth day of Januarie," when a crowded scaffold fell down, and many spectators were "killed, maimed, or hurt." From thence the author diverges to the representation of Plays, and is very vehement in his denunciation of a practice that had prevailed, and continued more or less to prevail, for several years afterwards-the performance of stage-plays on the Sabbath. He himself bears witness (sign. Ciij) that plays on Sunday had at that time been forbidden, but this injunction was evaded, and John Field was for the total abolition of such "heathenish interludes." "For surely (he observes) it is to be feared, besides the distruction bothe of bodye and soule that many are brought unto by frequenting the Theater, the Curtin, and such like, that one day those places will likewise be cast downe by God himselfe." Therefore he would not for a moment tolerate them, and he dates his tract 17th Jan. 1583, only four days after the calamity. It was "printed by Robert Waldegrave," by authority, but two other stationers, Richard Jones and William Bartlet, without authority, published a piece upon the same melancholy event, and we learn from the Registers of the Stationers' Company, that on 21st Jan. 1583, they were not only fined 108 each for so doing, but were actually committed to prison: how long they were detained in custody does not appear. John Field dedicated his tract to the Lord Mayor and Recorder Fleetwood, and there he gives the date of his Epistle as 18th Jan. 1583-of course meaning, at that period, 1584. I. 183. It had been, as he himself states, represented on the stage.]-Brooke's words upon this curious and important point are not doubtful and ambiguous, but clear and certain: he says, "Hereunto if you applye it, ye shall deliver my dooing from offence, and profit your selves; though I saw the same argument lately set foorth on Stage with more commendation then I can looke for (being there much better set forth then I have or can dooe) yet the same matter, penned as it is, may serve to lyke good effect, if the readers do brynge with them lyke good myndes to consider it, which hath the more incouraged me to publishe it, such as it is." The above concludes the address" to the Reader," which is subscribed Ar. Br.

II. 198. Ritson erroneously gives the date of 1570 to this miscellany.]—This is true as regards p. 320 of his Bibl. Poet.; but it must there be a misprint, because on page 302 he assigns to it the right date, 1578.

II. 204. The author appears to have been a puritanical divine.]-The name of Pygge sounds somewhat ridiculously in English, but we are to recollect that in 1552 the Pope had a Cardinal of a very similar name, viz. Pigghin, as Sir Richard Morysine, the Ambassador to Charles V. writes it, and Pigghini, as it reads in Italian -"Il Cardinal di Monte is appointed to oversee the Bishop's revenues, and take order for things of his Holiness chamber. Cardinal Pigghin is appointed to matters of judgment, to appoint consistories and the like." P. F. Tytler's "England under Edw. VI. and Mary," II. 139. Pope Sergius IV. was nick-named Bocca di Porco.

II. 217. They cancelled the reprint of this curious and rare production.]-A still rarer poem met the same fate at the same time, viz. Charles Bansley's "Treatise shewiug and declaring the pryde and abuse of Women, now a dayes" it was printed by Thomas Raynalde, and the last stanza shows that Edward VI. was then on the throne:

"God save kyng Edward, and his noble counsail al,

and sende us peace and reste,

And of thys pryde and devylyshe folye

full soone to have redresse."

Ritson tells us that it was printed about 1540, but he erred by at least ten years. We quote a brief specimen of the author's style :—

"For lyke as thee jolye ale house

is alwayes knowen by the good ale stake,
So are proude Jelots sone perceaved to[o]
by theyr proude foly and wanton gate.
Take no example by shyre townes,
nor of the Cytie of London,
For therin dwell prowde wycked ones,
the poyson of all this region.

For a stewde strumpet can not so soone,
gette up a lyght lewde fashyon,

But everye wanton Jelot wyll lyke it well,
And catche it up anon."

So that Bansley allowed himself considerable freedom with regard to rhymes, as well as with regard to expressions, in spite of his many references to Scripture. In the following stanza he mentions Gosenhyll's celebrated "School-house of Women."

"The scole house of women is nowe well practysed,

and to[o] moche put in ure,

Whych maketh manye a mans hayre to growe
thorowe hys hoode, you maye be verye sure.

For there are some prancked gosseps every where
able to spyll a whole countrie,

Whyche mayntayne pryde, ryot and wantonnes
lyke mothers of all iniquitie."

The author was a violent enemy of the Catholics, and among other things very seriously complains that foolish mothers made "Romische monsters" of their children.

II. 226. The inheritance of Sir Walter Raleigh's children.]-The following letter from Sir Robert Cecil to the Dean of Winchester (?) relates to some proceeding regarding Sherborne Castle which was pending in 1598, after Sir Walter Raleigh had been for years in possession of the estate. It both reproves and threatens the Dean, and Sir Robert Cecil was anxious that his letter should be returned to him for reasons which we can very well understand, although it is the only matter quite clear in the transaction. The name of the person in whose favour the letter was written is studiously concealed, and the name of the writer carefully torn away: we only learn the names of the writer and the receiver from the indorsement -S[ir] R[obert] C[ecil] to D[ean of] W[inchester]. The original was formerly in the State Paper Office, where we copied it many years ago :—

"Mr. Dean. The matter for which you were moved concerning Sherborne is now like to be granted; for the Q[ueen] resolving of Mr. Cotton, I conceave he will not find upon due examination the same scrupule which you did, and therefore, I hope, will yeald it. But Mr. Dean this is the cause of my letter to you. It is geven out that you are minded to scandalise him if he grant it and the Act, by all meanes you can; yea, notwithstanding that it shall now no way concerne you. Suerly, as it was very just and honest in you (when your own mind was unsatisfied) to refuse it, and as he should deale very unjustly with you that should mislike your refusall upon lack of satisfaction, so must I freely tell you, as one with whom I would be loth to have cause of unkindness, that if his sute shall speed the worse by any course of yours in this, now when you are no wayes interessed on it, I will thinke your refusal before was not of zeale, but of humor, and meddling in it now, rather opposition to him (and me that love him) then to the matter. Thus you see that out of the accompt I make of you, I yeald you accompt of what I heare, which I would not do thus if I did not believe it. I require therefore to this letter

only such answer as I may trust to, which shalbe a defensative to all such suggestions, whereby you shall make me not repente my former good will towards you, but shall confirme hereafter my desire to do you further pleasure in any cause where your name shall come in question. I pray you returne me my letter againe for some respects; but upon your answer I will send you one that shall satisfy you in any proportion that you shall write to me. And so I commit you to Gods protection. From the Court this 19th of September 1598.

"Your very loving frend."

II 230. Printed by J. C. for T. H. in Anno Do. 1587.]-The initials are those of John Charlewood as the printer, and of Thomas Hacket as the publisher of the tract.

As

II. 240. We do not believe in the existence of any impression of "Reynard the Fox" in 1638.]-Since the text was written we have met with two other black-letter editions of "Reynard the Fox," one in 1620 and the other in 1629. The title-page of the former is "The most delectable Historie of Reynard the Fox. Newly corrected and purged in phrase and matter. also augmented and inlarged with sundrie excellent Morals and Expositions upon every several Chapter. Never before this time imprinted.-London, Printed by Edward All-de and are to be solde by Robert Aldred dwelling in Southwarke neere the Market-place. 1620." 4to. B. L. The words "Never before this time imprinted" can, of course, only refer to the "Morals and Expositions." The edition of 1629 omits those words, but in all other particulars the titles conform, and it has the following imprint: "London, Printed by Elizabeth All-de, dwelling neere Christ-Church, 1629." 4to. B. L. Each of these editions is divided into 24 chapters, enumerated at the end. It deserves remark, that, when the copy of 1620 boasts that it is purged from all grossness of " phrase and matter," it is a misrepresentation, for the text there remains with all its real or supposed deformities. II. 242. A right excelent and pleasaunt Dialogue.]-The following we have not seen in any list of Barnabe Rich's numerous works : A Martiall Conference, pleasantly discoursed between two Souldiers only practised in Finsbury Fields, in the modern Wars of the renowned Duke of Shoreditch, and the mighty Prince Arthur. Newly translated out of Essex into English by Barnaby Rich, gent., and servant to the Queenes most Excellent Matie.Printed for Jo. Oxenbridge, dwelling in St. Pauls Church Yard at the sign of the Parrot. 1598." 4to. See Bagford's MSS. (Harl. 5900, p. 38). We may add, that in a list of Captains who had served in the Low Countries, and now without charge, i.e. in 1593, we read the name of Captain Barnaby Riche: he afterwards obtained employment.

II. 247. Has attracted a good deal of attention.]-For" attention," in the second instance, read notice.

II. 257. We never heard of more than two copies, &c.]-It has been usual to attribute to Barnabe Rich an early translation of the two first Books of Herodotus, which came out under the following title:"The Famous Hystory of Herodotus. Conteyning the Discourse of dyvers Countreys, the succession of theyr Kyngs: the actes and exploytes atchieved by them: the Lawes and customes of every Nation; with the true Description and Antiquitie of the same. Devided into nine Bookes, and intituled with the names of the nine Muses.-At London, printed by Thomas Marshe, 1584." 4to. With his usual title-page ornaments.

It was entered at Stationers' Hall on 13th June, 1581, but not published till three years afterwards. We are convinced that it was not translated by Barnabe Rich, but by some person who had the same initials, or who borrowed those of Rich on account of his popularity. Rich nowhere speaks of it as his work, and he was not sufficient scholar (as his other productions show) for such an undertaking. The translation is of only two Books of