In the seventh chapter, he gives a fantastic account of his travels1, and owns, that his metre deserves no higher appellation than ryme dogrell. But this delineation of the fickle Englishman is perhaps to be restricted to the circumstances of the author's age, without a respect to the national character; and, as Borde was a rigid catholic, there is a probability, notwithstanding in other places he treats of natural dispositions, that a satire is designed on the laxity of principle, and revolutions of opinion, which prevailed at the reformation, and the easy compliance of many of his changeable countrymen with a new religion for lucrative purposes. I transcribe the character of the Welshman, chiefly because he speaks of his harp. I am a Welshman, and do dwel in Wales, I have loved to serche budgets, and looke in males : For my harpe is made of a good mare's skyn, The strynges be of horse heare, it maketh a good dyn. Yet in my country I do make pastyme In tellyng of prophyces which be not in ryme.1 Prefixed to which, is a wooden cut of the author Borde, standing in a sort of pew or stall, under a canopy, habited in an academical gown, a laurel-crown on his head, with a book before him on a desk. That is, toasted cheese, next men castels and the country of the people of Castyle and Biscayn." In describing Gascony, he says, that at Bordeaux, "in the cathedrall church of Saint Andrews, is the fairest and the greatest payre of orgyns [organs] in al Chrystendome, in the which orgins be many instrumentes and vyces [devices] as gians [giants] heads and starres, the which doth move and wagge with their jawes and eis [eyes] as fast as the player playeth." ch. xxiii. I have before mentioned "A ryght pleasant and merry History of the MYLNER Of AbingtonTM, with his wife and his faire daughter, and of two poor scholars of Cambridge," a meagre epitome of Chaucer's MILLER'S TALE. In a blank leaf of the Bodleian copy, this tale is said by Thomas Newton of Cheshire, an elegant Latin epigrammatist of the reign of queen Elisabeth, to have been written by Borde". He is also supposed to have published a collection of silly stories called SCOGIN'S JESTS, sixty in number. Perhaps Shakspeare took his idea from this jest-book, that Scogan was a mere buffoon, where he says that Falstaffe, as a juvenile exploit, "broke Scogan's head at the court-gate"." Nor have we any better authority, than this publication by Borde, that Scogan was a graduate in the university, and a jester to a king?. Hearne, at the end of Benedictus Abbas, has printed Borde's ITINERARY, as it may be called; which is little more than a string of names, but is quoted by Norden in his SPECULUM BRITANNIÆ. Borde's circulatory peregrinations, in the quality of a quack-doctor, might have furnished more ample materials for an English topography. Beside the Breviary of HeALTH, mentioned above, and which was approved by the university of Oxford, Borde has left the DIETARIE OF HEALTH, reprinted in 1576, the PROMPTUARIE OF MEDICINE, the Doctrine OF URINES, and the PRINCIPLES OF ASTRONOMICAL PROGNOSTICATIONS': which are proofs of attention to his profession, and show that he could sometimes be serious. But Borde's name would not have been now remembered, had he wrote only profound systems in medicine and astronomy. He is known to posterity as a buffoon, not as a philosopher. Yet, I think, some of his astronomical tracts have been epitomised and bound up with Erra Pater's Almanacs. Of Borde's numerous books, the only one that can afford any degree of entertainment to the modern reader, is the DIETARIE OF Helthe; where, giving directions as a physician, concerning the choice of m A village near Cambridge. "See supr. vol. ii. p. 197. Henry IV., Part Second, act iii. sc. 2. P It is hard to say whence Jonson got his account of Scogan, Masque of the Fortunate Isles, vol. iv. p. 192. Merefool. Skogan? What was he? Of Henry the Fourth's time, that made For the king's sones, and writ in baladroyal Daintily well. Merefool. But wrote he like a gentleman? Johphiel. In rhyme, fine tinkling rhyme, and flowand verse, With now and then some sense; and he was paid for 't, houses, diet, and apparel, and not suspecting how little he should instruct, and how much he might amuse, a curious posterity, he has preserved many anecdotes of the private life, customs, and arts, of our ancestors. This work is dedicated to Thomas duke of Norfolk, lord treasurer under Henry the Eighth. In the dedication, he speaks of his being called in as a physician to sir John Drury, the year when cardinal Wolsey was promoted to York; but that he did not choose to prescribe without consulting doctor Buttes, the king's physician. He apologises to the duke, for not writing in the ornate phraseology now generally affected. He also hopes to be excused, for using in his writings so many wordes of mirth: but this, he says, was only to make your grace merrie, and because mirth has ever been esteemed the best medicine. Borde must have had no small share of vanity, who could think thus highly of his own pleasantry. And to what a degree of taste and refinement must our ancient dukes and lords treasurers have arrived, who could be exhilarated by the witticisms and the lively language of this facetious philosopher? John Bale, a tolerable Latin classic, and an eminent biographer, before his conversion from popery, and his advancement to the bishoprick of Ossory by king Edward the Sixth, composed many scriptural interludes, chiefly from incidents of the New Testament. They are, the life of Saint John the Baptist, written in 1538*. Christ in his twelfth year. Baptism and Temptation. The Resurrection of Lazarus. The Council of the High-priests. Simon the Leper. Our Lord's Supper, and the Washing of the feet of his Disciples. Christ's Burial and Resurrection. The Passion of Christ. The Comedie of the three Laws of Nature, Moses, and Christ, corrupted by the Sodomites, Pharisees, and Papists, printed by Nicholas Bamburg in 1538; and so popular, that it was reprinted by Colwell in 1562". God's Promises to Man". Our author, in his Vocacyon to the Bishoprick of Ossory, informs us, that his COMEDY of John the Baptist, and his TRAGEDY of God's Promises, were acted by the youths upon a Sunday, at the market cross of t In his rules for building or planning a House, he supposes a quadrangle. The Gate-house, or Tower, to be exactly opposite to the Portico of the Hall. The Privy Chamber to be annexed to the Chamber of State. A Parlour joining to the Buttery and Pantry at the lower end of the Hall. The Pastry-house and Larder annexed to the Kitchen. Many of the chambers to have a view into the Chapel. In the outer quadrangle to be a stable, but only for horses of pleasure. The stables, dairy, and slaughter-house, to be a quarter of a mile from the house. The Moat to have a spring falling into it, and to be often scowered. An Orchard of sundry fruits is convenient; but he rather recommends a Garden filled with aromatic herbs. In the Garden a Pool or two, for fish. A Park filled with deer and conies. "A Dove-house also is a necessary thyng about a mansyon-place. And, among other thynges, a Payre of Buttes is a decent thynge about a mansyon. And otherwhyle, for a great man necessary it is for to passe his tyme with bowles in an aly, when al this is finished, and the mansyon replenished with implemens." Ch. iv. Sign. C. ii. Dedication dated 1542 [7]. *[See Harleian Miscell. vol. i.-PARK.] " Both in quarto. At the end is A song of Benedictus, compiled by Johan Bale. w This was written in 1538; and first printed under the name of a Tragedie or Interlude, by Charlewood, 1577. 4to. Kilkenny. What shall we think of the state, I will not say of the stage, but of common sense, when these deplorable dramas could be endured? of an age, when the Bible was profaned and ridiculed from a principle of piety? But the fashion of acting mysteries appears to have expired with this writer. He is said, by himself, to have written a book of Hymns, and another of jests and tales; and to have translated the tragedy of PAMMACHIUS; the same perhaps which was acted at Christ's college in Cambridge in 1544, and afterwards laid before the privy council as a libel on the reformation2. A low vein of abusive burlesque, which had more virulence than humour, seems to have been one of Bale's talents: two of his pamphlets against the papists, all whom he considered as monks, are entitled the MASS OF THE GLUTTONS, and the ALCORAN OF THE PRELATES". Next to exposing the impostures of popery, literary history was his favorite pursuit; and his most celebrated performance is his account of the British writers. But this work, perhaps originally undertaken by Bale as a vehicle of his sentiments in religion, is not only full of misrepresentations and partialities, arising from his religious prejudices, but of general inaccuracies, proceeding from negligence or misinformation. Even those more ancient Lives which he transcribes from Leland's Commentary on the same subject, are often interpolated with false facts, and impertinently marked with a misapplied zeal for reformation. He is angry with many authors, who flourished before the thirteenth century, for being catholics. He tells us, that lord Cromwell frequently screened him from the fury of the more bigoted bishops, on account of the comedies he had published". But whether plays in particular, or other compositions, are here to be understood by comedies, is uncertain. Brian Anslay, or Annesley, yeoman of the wine cellar to Henry the Eighth about the year 1520, translated a popular French poem into English rhymes, at the exhortation of the gentle earl of Kent, called the CITIE OF DAMES [Ladyes*], in three books. It was printed in 1521, by Henry Pepwell, whose prologue prefixed begins with these unpromising lines, So now of late came into my custode This forseyde book, by Brian Anslay, Yeoman of the seller with the eight king Henry. Another translator of French into English, much about the same time, is Andrew Chertsey. In the year 1520, Wynkyn de Worde print * Fol. 24. [Still acted at the marketcross of Bury, but not on a Sunday.ASHBY.] y Cent. viii. 100. p. 702. And Verheiden, p. 149. See supr. vol. ii. p. 523. Bale says, "Pammachii tragoedias transtuli." a See supr. vol. ii. p. 523. b"Ob editas COMEDIAS." Ubi supr. *[Mr. Ellis conjectures this to be a translation of the Trésor de la Cité des Dames, by Christian of Pise. Hist. Sketch, ii. 20. -PARK.] ed a book with this title, partly in prose and partly in verse, Here foloweth the passyon of our lord Jesu Crist translated out of French into Englysch by Andrew Chertsey gentleman the yere of our lord MDXX. I will give two stanzas of Robert Copland's prologue, as it records the diligence, and some other performances, of this very obscure writer. The godly use of prudent-wytted men With two other of the sevyn sacraments, The seconde the craft to lyve well and to dye. With dyvers other to mannes lyfe profytable, The Floure of God's Commaundements was printed by Wynkyn de Worde, in folio, in 1521. A print of the author's arms, with the name CHERTSEY, is added. The Lucydayre is translated from a favorite old French poem called Li Lusidaire. This is a translation of the ELUCIDARIUM, a large work in dialogue, containing the sum of christian theology, by some attributed to Anselm archbishop of Canterbury in the twelfth century d. Chertsey's other versions, mentioned in Copland's prologue, are from old French manuals of devotion, now equally forgotten. Such has been the fate of volumes fayre and large! Some of these versions have been given to George Ashby, clerk of the signet to Margaret queen of Henry the Sixth, who wrote a moral poem for the use of their son prince Edward, on the Active policy of a prince, finished in the author's eightieth year. The prologue begins with a compliment to "Maisters Gower, Chaucer, and Lydgate," a proof of the estimation which that celebrated triumvirate still continued to maintain. I believe it was never printed. But a copy, with a small mutilation at the end, remains among bishop More's manuscripts at Cambridge. In the dispersed library of the late Mr. William Collins, I saw a thin folio of two sheets in black letter, containing a poem in the octave stanza, entitled, FABYL'S GHOSTE, printed by John Rastell in the year c in quarto. d Wynkyn de Worde printed, Here begynneth a lytell treatyse called the Lycydarye. With wooden cuts. No date. In quarto. e MSS. More, 492. It begins, "Right [high] and myghty prince and my ryght good lorde." |