Their horses and good horsemanship their pride; But now, of late, by course they leave the thing The Irishmen, strong and robustious, Use for offensive weapons armed darts: No people equalize them in these parts. Makes them most famous in these arts alone." Wood has given a copious list of Norden's productions, but does not specify the present fully, under either of its denominations. He conceives him to have been one of the surveyors of the King's lands, in 1614, and the same person who put forth a chorographical description of Middlesex and of Hertfordshire. Sylvester has a copy of verses, addressed in the way of an Epistle to his friend, Master John Norden," in the folio edition of his works. THE following is a list of extant tracts, which seem to fall under the class of antiquated Merriments. The Sack-full of Newes. 1673. London, printed by Andrew Clark, and are to be sold by Tho. Passinger, upon London Bridge. b. 1. (a book of tales.) See Langham's letter, 1575, reprinted in Queen Elizabeth's Progresses. This had long been a desideratum with the antiquary Ritson, in his research after oddities. The mad Pranks of Tom Tram, Mother Winter's Sonin-law. tit. car. Witty William of Wilt-shire, &c. his birth, life, and education, and strange adventures, &c. with merry songs and sonnets. Printed for C. Passinger, next door to the Spur Inn, Southwark, 1674. The Witch of the Woodlands, or the Cobler's new Translation. Written by L. P. Printed for W. T. and are to be sold by C. Passinger (as before). "Here Robin the Cobler, for his former evils, The merry Dutch Miller, and new invented Windmill. London, printed by E. Crouch, 1672. "The miller and the mill, you see, How throng'd with customers they be; Hey for Horn Fair: the general Market of England: or Room for Cuckolds, &c. with the Marriage of Jockie and Jenny. Printed for E. Coles, 1674 The arraigning and indicting of Sir John Barley-corn, &c. Thomas Robins the Author. Printed for T. Passinger, 1675. The History of Mistris Jane Shore, &c. Concubine to K. Edward the fourth, who was wife to one Matthew Shore, a goldsmith in London. Date, &c. cut off. No Jest like a true Jest: being a compendious record of the merry life and mad exploits of Capt. James Hind, the great rober of England. Together with the close of all at Worcester, where he was hang'd, drawn, and quartered for high-treason against the common-wealth, Septemb. 24, 1652. London, printed by A. P. for T. Vere, and to be sold at his shop, at the sign of the Angel without Newgate, 1674. FOWLER'S TARANTULA OF LOVE. Mr. Editor, A SHORT time before the learned Dr. Leyden departed for India, in the spring of 1803, he put forth an interesting volume, entitled, " Scottish Descriptive Poems, with some Illustrations of Scottish Literary Antiquities." At the close of that volume were inserted extracts from two MS. volumes in the library of Edinburgh College, comprising translations of the "Triumphs of Petrarke" and " Triumph of Love," with Sonnets, entitled "The Tarantula of Love," by WILLIAM FOWLER; one of the poets who frequented the court of James VI. before his accession to the throne of England; and who appears, after his accession, to have been made Secretary and Master of the Requests to Queen Anne; and to have had the presumption (as Mr. Lodge infers from some passages in the Talbot papers*) to become an inferior pretender to that persecuted state-sufferer, the Lady Arabella Stewart. Mr. Lodge has printed a sonnet of his, addressed to that most verteous and treulye honorable Ladye," and another, "uppon a horologe of the clock." Mr. George Ellis, (a name which will never be mentioned without a throb of tender regard, and a sigh of deep regret, by those who were honoured with his friendship) in his Specimens of the early English Poets, has inserted a sonnet from a transcript of part of the Tarantula of Love, politely communicated to him by the late Lord Woodhouselee. With that transcript Mr. Ellis amicably favoured your correspondent. It contains eighteen sonnets, one of which only has been printed by Mr. Ellis, and another by Dr. Leyden: the remaining sixteen it may be in consonance with the plan of RESTITUTA to introduce. Lord Woodhouselee observes that they were copied with little regard to critical selection, and merely with the view of ascertaining * See Illustr. of Brit. Hist. iii. 169. Fowler's general merits as a poet. His Lordship adds, that Fowler is very remarkable for the harmony of his numbers; that all his sonnets shew an intimate acquaintance with Petrarch, and a refinement on his defects-his quaintness and concetti. .I. "O you, who heare the accents of my smart Through which great greiffs and gente, in bothe abounds: 'O iff his haples thought he stil sould sing, 'Breid him not, Deathe! that glore to thee does bring.” II. The fyres, the cordes, the girnes, the snaws, and dart, The maist fair face and the maist cruell hart And therewith all the beauties that rebound Of my loth'd love, and undeserv'd despaire. |