not howe truely) that they haue knowne the like before in their dayes. Sed quid vobis videtur magnis philosophis? I like your late Englishe hexameters so exceedingly well, that I also enure my penne sometime in that kinde: whyche I fynd, indeede, as I haue heard you often defende in worde, neither so harde nor so harshe, that it will easily and fairely yeelde it selfe to oure moother tongue. For the onely or chiefest hardnesse whych seemeth is in the accente, whyche sometime gapeth, and as it were yawneth ilfauouredly, comming shorte of that it should, and sometime exceeding the measure of the number; as in carpenter, the middle sillable being vsed shorte in speache, when it shall be read long in verse, seemeth like a lame gosling, that draweth one legge after hir; and heauen, beeing vsed shorte as one sillable, when it is in verse, stretched out with a diastole, is like a lame dogge that holdes vp one legge. But it is to be wonne with custome, and rough words must be subdued with vse. For why, a God's name, may not we, as else the Greekes, haue the kingdome of oure owne language, and measure our accentes by the sounde, reseruing the quantitie to the verse? Loe, here I let you see my olde vse of toying in rymes, turned into your artificiall straightnesse of verse by this tetrasticon. I beseech you tell me your fancie, without parcialitie.

See yee the blindefolded pretie god, that feathered archer,
Of louers miseries which maketh his bloodie game?
Wote ye why his moother with a veale hath coouered his face?
Trust me, least he my looue happely chaunce to beholde.

Seeme they comparable to those two which I translated you ex tempore in bed, the last time we lay togither in Westminster?

That which I eate, did I ioy, and that which I greedily gorged; As for those many goodly matters leaft I for others.

I would hartily wish you would either send me the rules and precepts of arte which you obserue in quantities, or else followe mine, that M. Philip Sidney gave me, being the very same which M. Drant deuised, but enlarged with M. Sidneys own iudgement, and augmented with my obseruations, that we might both accorde and agree in one; leaste we ouerthrowe one an other, and be ouerthrown of the rest. Truste me, you will hardly beleeue what greate good liking and estimation Maister Dyer had of your Satyr

icall Verses, and I, since the viewe thereof, hauing before of my selfe had speciall liking of Englishe versifying, am euen nowe aboute to giue you some token what and howe well therein I am able to doe: for, to tell you trueth, I minde shortely, at conuenient leysure, to sette forth a booke in this kinde, whyche I entitle, Epithalamion Thamesis, whyche booke I dare vndertake wil be very profitable for the knowledge, and rare for the inuention and manner of handling. For in setting forth the marriage of the Thames, I shewe his first beginning, and offspring, and all the countrey that he passeth thorough, and also describe all the riuers throughout Englande, whyche came to this wedding, and their righte names and right passage, &c.; a worke, beleeue me, of much labour, wherein notwithstanding Master Holinshed hath muche furthered and aduantaged me, who therein hath bestowed singular paines in searching oute their firste heades and sourses, and also in tracing and dogging oute all their course, til they fall into the sea.

O Tite, siquid ego,
Ecquid erit pretij?

But of that more hereafter. Nowe, my Dreames and Dying Pellicane being fully finished (as I partelye signified in my laste letters) and presentlye to bee imprinted, I wil in hande forthwith with my Faery Queene, whyche I praye you hartily send me with al expedition: and your frendly letters, and long expected judgement wythal, whyche let not be shorte, but in all pointes suche as you ordinarilye vse and I extraordinarily desire. Multum vale. Westminster. Quarto Nonas Aprilis, 1580. Sed, amabo te, meum Corculum tibi se ex animo commendat plurimum: iamdiu mirata, te nihil ad literas suas responsi dedisse. Vide quæso, ne id tibi capitale sit: mihi certe quidem erit, neque tibi hercle impune, vt opinor. Iterum vale, et quam voles sœpe.

Yours alwayes to commaunde,

IMMERITO.

Postcripte.

I take best my Dreames shoulde come forth alone, being growen, by meanes of the Glosse (running continually in maner of a paraphrase), full as great as my Calendar. Therin be some things excellently, and many things wittily, discoursed of E. K., and the pictures so singularly set forth and purtrayed, as if

Michael Angelo were there, he could (I think) nor amende the beste, nor reprehende the worst. I knowe you woulde lyke them passing wel. Of my Stemmata Dudleiana, and especially of the sundry apostrophes therein, addressed you knowe to whome, muste more aduisement be had, than so lightly to sende them abroade: howbeit, trust me, (though I doe never very well,) yet, in my owne fancie, I neuer dyd better: Veruntamen te sequor solum : nanquam vero assequar.

Extract from Harvey's Reply.

But Master Collin Cloute is not euery body, and albeit his olde companions, Master Cuddy & Master Hobbinoll, be as little be holding to their Mistresse Poetrie as euer you wist, yet he perad uenture, by the meanes of hir speciall fauour, and some personall priuiledge, may happely liue by Dying Pellicanes, and purchase great landes and lordshippes with the money which his Calendar and Dreames haue and will affourde him. Extra iocum, I like your Dreames passingly well; and the rather, bicause they sauour of that singular extraordinarie veine and inuention whiche I euer fancied moste, and in a manner admired onelye in Lucian, Petrarche, Aretine, Pasquill, and all the most delicate and fine conceited Grecians and Italians, (for the Romanes to speake of are but verye ciphars in this kinde,) whose chiefest endeuour and drifte was to haue nothing vulgare, but, in some respecte or other, and especially in liuely hyperbolicall amplifications, rare, queint, and odde in euery pointe, and, as a man woulde saye, a degree or two, at the leaste, aboue the reache and compasse of a common scholars capacitie. In whiche respecte notwithstanding, as well for the singularitie of the manner as the diuinitie of the matter, I hearde once a diuine preferre Saint Iohns Reuelation before al the veriest metaphysical visions and iolliest conceited dreames or extasies that euer were deuised by one or other, howe admirable or super excellent soeuer they seemed otherwise to the worlde. And truely I am so confirmed in this opinion, that when I bethinke me of the verie notablest and moste wonderful propheticall or poeticall vision that euer I read, or hearde, meseemeth the pro

portion is so vnequall, that there hardly appeareth anye semblaunce of comparison: no more in a manner (specially for poets) than doth betweene the incomprehensible wisedome of God and the sensible wit of man. But what needeth this digression betweene you and me? I dare saye you wyll holde your selfe reasonably wel satisfied, if youre Dreames be but as well esteemed of in Englande as Petrarches Visions be in Italy; whiche, I assure you, is the very worst I wish you. But see how I haue the arte memoratiue at commaundement. In good faith, I had once again nigh forgotten your Faerie Queene: howbeit, by good chaunce, I haue nowe sent hir home at the laste, neither in better nor worse case than I founde hir. And must you of necessitie haue my iudgement of hir indeede? To be plaine, I am voyde of al iudgement, if your nine Comoedies, whervnto, in imitation of Herodotus, you giue the names of the nine Muses, (and in one mans fansie not vnworthily), come not neerer Ariostoes comœdies, eyther for the finesse of plausible elocution or the rarenesse of poetical inuention, than that Eluish Queene doth to his Orlando Furioso; which, notwithstanding, you wil needes seeme to emulate, and hope to ouergo, as you flatly professed yourself in one of your last letters. Besides that, you know, it hath bene the vsual practise of the most exquisite and odde wittes in all nations, and specially in Italie, rather to shewe and aduaunce themselues that way than any other; as, namely, those three notorious dyscoursing heads, Bibiena, Machiauel, and Aretine, did, (to let Bembo and Ariosto passe,) with the great admiration and wonderment of the whole countrey: being, in deede, reputed matchable in all points, both for conceyt of witte and eloquent decyphering of matters, either with Aristophanes and Menander in Greek, or with Plautus and Terence in Latin, or with any other in any other tong. But I wil not stand greatly with you in your owne matters. If so be the Faerye Queene be fairer in your eie than the nine Muses, and Hobgoblin runne away with the garland from Apollo, marke what I saye: and yet I will not say that I thought, but there an end for this once, and fare you well, till God or some good aungell putte you in a better minde.

APPENDIX III.

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES.