her husband; jealousy; raiment; walkyng abroad; home; of children; of step-mothers; behaviour to kinsfolks; of living with married son or daughter; and of a wife well worn in age."

The third book has seven chapters. "Of widows mourning; burying the husband; mynding her husband; chastity and honesty of a widow; behaviour at home; abroad; and of seconde marriages.'

Curiosity naturally turns from the contents to inquire, by a virgin, "what bokes be to be redde, and what not," and then conclude with an extract.

"There is an use nowe a daies worse than amonge the Pagans, that bokes written in our mother's tongcs, that be made but for idel men and women to reade, have none other matter but of war and love; of the whiche bokes I thinke it shall not nede to geve any preceptes. If I speak unto Christen folkes, what nede I to tell what a mischiefe is towarde, whan strawe and dry woode is caste into the fyre. Yea, but these be written, saie they, for idell folke, as though idelness were not a vice great enough of it selfe, without firebrondes be put unto it, wherewith the fyre maie catch a man all together, and more hote. What shoulde a maid do with armoure? Which ones

*

to name were a

shame for hir. I have hearde tell, that in some places gentiiwomen behold merveilous busily, the plaies and justinges of armed men, and geve sentence and iudgement of them, and that the men feare and set more by their judgmentes than the mens. It cannot lyghtly bee a chaste maide, that is occupied with thinking on armoure, and turney, and mans raliaunce, what places among these before chastite unarmed and weake. A

* Oace.

woman

woman that useth those feates, drinketh poyson in hir herte, of whom this cure and these woordes bee the playne saieynges. This is a deadlye sickenes, nor yet oughte to be shewed of me, but to be covered and holden under, least it hurt other with the smel, and defile theim with the infection. Therfore whan I can not tell, whether it bee mete for a Christen man to handle armour, howe shulde it be leafull for a woman to loke upon theim; yea, thoughe she handle them not, yet to bec conversante among theim, with herte and mynde, which is worse. Moreover, wher to readest thou other mennes love and glosynge wordes, and by littell and littell drinkest the enticementes of the poyson unknowing, and many times ware and wittinglye; for many, in whome ther is no good mynd al redy, reden those bokes, to kepe them selfe in the thoughtes of love. It were better for them not only to have no learning at all, but also to lese theyr cies, that thei shuld not reade, and theyr eares, that they shulde not here. For as our Lorde saith in the gospel (Mat. xviii) It were better for them to go blind and deffe into life, than with ii eies to be cast into hell.' This mayde is so vyle unto Christen folkes, that she is abominable unto Pagans, wherfore I wonder of the holy preachers, that whan they make great a do about many small matters, many times, they cry not out on this in every sermone. I mervaile, that wyse fathers will suffre their doughters, or that husbandes wyll suffre their wyves, or that the maners and customes of people wyll dissemble and over loke, that women shall use to reade wantonnes. It were fyttynge, that common lawes and officers shulde not onely loke upon the

courtes

Courtes and matters of sute, but also máttiers bothe commune and private. Therfore it were convenient by a commune law to put awaie foule rebaudy songes, out of the peoples mouthes, which bee so used as thoughe nothyug ought to bee songen in the citée, but foule and fylthy songes, that no good manne can heare withoute shame, nor no wyse man without dyspleasure. They that made suche songes, seeme to have none other purpose, but to corrupte the maners of yonge folkes, and they dooe none other wyse, than they that infecte the common welles wyth poyson. What a custome is thys, that a song shall not be regarded, but it bee full of fylthynes, and this the lawes ought to take hede of, and of those ungracious fokes, suche as bee in my countrey in Spayne; Amadise, Florisande, Tirante, Tristane, and Celestina the baude, mother of naughtynes. In Fraunce; Lancelote du Lake, Paris and Vienna, Ponthus and Sidonia, and Melucyne. In Flaunders; Flory and Whyte flowre; Leonell and Canomoure, Curias and Florete, Pyramus and Thisbe. In England; Parthenope, Genarides, Hippomadon, Willyam and Meliour, Livius and Arthur, Guye, Bevis, and many other, and some translated out of Latyne into vulgare speaches, as the unsavery conceites of Pogius, and of Aneas Silvius, Gurialus and Lucretia. Whiche bokes but ydle men wrote unlearned, and set

As those "ydle men" Mister Ritson and Mister Ellis have lately again invited us to waxe more ungraciously subtyle by readynge of such bokes," let it be added "what bookes oughte to bee reade, as the Gospelles, the Actes, the Epistoles of the Apostels, and the Olde Testament, Sainct Hieronyme, Sainct Ciprian, Augustyne, Ambrose, Hillary, Gregorye, Plato, Cicero, Senec, and suche other on holy daies continually, and sometyme on workynge dayes."

al upon fylth and viciousnes, in whome I wonder what shulde delyte men, but that vice pleaseth them so muche. As for learnyng, none is to be loked for in those men, whiche sawe never so muche as a shadowe of learning them selfe. And whan they tel ought, what delyte can be in those thynges, that be so playne and folyshe lies. One kylleth xx hym selfe alone, an other xxx, an other wounded with c woundes and left deade, ryseth up agayne, and on the nexte daie made hole and strong, over cometh ii gyauntes, and than goeth awaie loden with golde, and sylver and precious stones, mo than a galy wolde cary awaie. What a madness is it of folkes, to have pleasure in these bokes!" Conduit street.

:

J. H.

ART. VI. The first foure Bookes of Virgil's Æneis, &c. translated by Richard Stanyhurst: with other poeticall devises thereto annexed, &c. London. 1583.

[CONTINUED FROM P. 240.]

Of Stanyhurst's strange version of the Mantuan bard, more than enough may perhaps have been said. His poctical devices immediately succeed, and consist of the following particulars.

"Hereafter ensue certaine Psalmes of David, translated into English according to the observation of the Latine verses.

1. The first psalme of David, named in Latin, Beatus vir, translated into English iambical verse.*

• Amongst us (says Meares) I name but two iambical poets, Gabriel Harvey and Richard Stanyhurst; because I have scene no mo in this kind." Palladis Tamia, 1598. It seems odd that Mears should have overlooked the Iambicum Trimetrum of Spenser, printed in 1580.

2. The second psalme, Quare fremuerunt gentes, translated into English heroical and elegiacal

verse.

3. The third psalme, named Domine quid multiplicati sunt, translated into English asclepiad

verse.

4. The fourth psalme, named Cum invocarem, paraphrastically into English saphick versé. 5. A prayer to the Trinitie (in the same measure.)

"Hereafter ensue certayne Poetical Conceites.

1. A devise made by Virgil, or rather by some other, upon a river so harde frozen, that waynes for dyd passe over it. Varied sundrye wayes, commendacions, as it should seeme, of the Latin tongue, and the same varietie doubled in the English. (In Latin hexameter and pentameter verses.)

2. The same Englished.

3. Ib. So many times is the Latin varied, and yet as many times more, for the honoure of the English.

4. The description of Liparen, expressed by Virgil in the eight booke of his Æneis, in which place the poet payed, as it weare, his price, by advauncing at ful the loftines of his veyne. Done into English by the translatour for his last farewel too the sayd Virgil."

It was this detached version which supplied most of the passages ridiculed by Nash, in the following couplet: