FROM THE SONNETS. 153 he was betrothed; he spent several years in seeking by travel a refuge from his sorrow. He married late in life Elizabeth Logan, attracted to her, it is said, by her resemblance to his first love. He was warmly attached to Charles I., and grief for the king's death, it is alleged, shortened his life. Drummond's works consist of sonnets, madrigals, and religious and occasional poems; among the latter is the ludicrous Latin doggrel "Polemo-Middinia." His sonnets are among the finest in the language, and approach nearest to the Italian model. Drummond's fancy is luxuriant, but tinctured with conceits. His versification is flowing and harmonious. Ben Jonson wished he had been the author of Drummond's poem, "The Forth feasting," and Milton did not disdain to copy some of his images. FROM THE SONNETS. SPRING. Sweet Spring, thou com'st with all thy goodly train, Do with thee come, which turn my sweets to sours. But she whose breath embalm'd thy wholesome air TO A NIGHTINGALE. Sweet bird, that sing'st away the early hours 1 Compare Michael Bruce's Ode on Spring. EASTER. Rise from those fragrant climes,1 thee now embrace; Fair Sun, and though contràry ways all year The night and death too long a league have made, Not from the eastern blushing seas or skies, Or any stranger worlds Heaven's concaves have, And this is that all-powerful Sun above That crown'd thy brows with rays, first made thee move. Have done for you: but now an opal hue Bepaints Heaven's crystal to the longing view: The world, and, weeping joy, forth comes the morn; The breath return'd, that bodies doth advance, Life out of death, light out of darkness springs, Far brighter beaming than the morning lamp. And she herself hath burnt, and spicy nest),2 * * The world, that wanning late and faint did lie, Applauding to our joys thy victory, To a young prime essays to turn again, 1 Supply which a frequent ellipsis, e. g. "What art thou dare?" i. e. who dare. -Fletcher, Faithful Shepherdess, Act IV. Sc. 4. 2 The Phoenix.-See Herod. ii. 73. Ovid, Met. xv. 392-407. FROM THE RIVER FORTH FEASTING. 155 And as ere soil'd with sin yet to remain ; With greater light, Heaven's temples open'd shine; The honey people leave their golden bowers, FROM "THE RIVER FORTH FEASTING."1 EULOGY OF KING JAMES. Oh, virtue's pattern, glory of our times, Sent of past days to expiate the crimes. If Pict, Dane, Norman, thy smooth yoke had seen, Even Brutus joy would under thee to live. 1 Composed on the occasion of the visit of James I. to Scotland in 1617. The Forth speaks. 2 Miracle. The youth of James was disturbed by factions. • Alluding probably to the Gowrie Conspiracy and the Gunpowder Plot. For thou thy people dost so dearly love, * * * This is that king who should make right each wrong, The man long promised by whose glorious reign And more of Fortunate deserve the style, Than those where heavens with double summers smile. Be but as gleams or lightnings of thy last. * * * * Through this thy empire range, like world's bright eye, The wanton wood-nymphs of the verdant spring, 1 Virgil, Georg. ii. 458. Compare Shakespeare's Much ado about Nothing, Act IV. Sc. 1-" that what we have," etc. 3 The poet lived to have bitter experience of the groundlessness of his flattering prophecy. 4 Alluding probably to the prophecies known under the names of Merlin, Thomas the Rhymer, Sybilla, Berlington and others; a very early reference to these prophecies if this be the case. and Compare Virgil, Eclog. iv. 7 The Greek diminutive of Pan; young Fauns, the sylvan gods; the wood nymphs, the Dryads: Pomona, the fruit-goddess. 8 The Nereids, the sea-nymphs, were the Daughters of Nereus and Doris ; Thetis was one of them. For Scandinavia, the region whence amber was supposed to have floated. Tacit. De Mor. Germ. 45. Thule, the Roman extremity of the world, is variously localized as Greenland, Iceland, Shetland, Norway. The British ocean pearls are mentioned by Tacitus, Agric. XII.; by Suetonius, Julius, XLVII.; and by Camden. 10 The Tritons were Neptune's trumpeters; the proper ocean-herdsman is Proteus. -Virg. Georg. IV. 395. FROM THE RIVER FORTH FEASTING. Shall give thee what far distant shores can yield, 157 BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER. (BEAUMONT, 1586-1615. FLETCHER, 1576-1625.) FRANCIS BEAUMONT and JOHN FLETCHER were "the most inviolable of friends; the Orestes and Pylades of the poetical world."— (Biographia Dramatica.) Both were gentlemen of good descent. Beau 1 Virgil second Georgic (115, etc.) furnishes most of the succeeding splendour. Serian fleeces may be translated Chinese silk, supposed to have been combed from the tree leaves.-See Georg. II. 120, 121. The Mare Erythraeum is the Indian Ocean; the name implies Red. 8 Southern. Ostrich Feathers; they were regarded as the richest and rarest of ornaments. Azure is the dress of river-gods. Chaucer writes the word waget (Millor's Tale); Skinner conjectures it to be from the blue dye woad. James did not often regale on confections of flattery so elegant as this, compounded as it is from Virgil's sweetmeats. H |