Since that in checks thus overthwart,
And coyly looks thou dost delight;
It doth suffice that mine thou wert,

Though change hath put thy faith to flight.

Alas! it is a peevish spite,

To yield thyself, and then to part;
But since thou force thy faith so light,
It doth suffice that mine thou wert.

And since thy love doth thus decline,
And in thy heart such hate doth grow;
It doth suffice that thou wert mine,
And with good-will I quite it so.

Sometime my friend, farewell my foe,
Since thou change I am not thine;
But for relief of all my woe,

It doth suffice that thou wert mine.

Praying you all that hear this song,
To judge no wight, nor none to blame;
It doth suffice she doth me wrong,
And that herself doth know the same.

And though she change it is no shame,
Their kind it is, and hath been long;
Yet I protest she hath no name;
It doth suffice she doth me wrong.

THE LOVER LAMENTS THE DEATH OF HIS LOVE.

The pillar perished is whereto I leant,
The strongest stay of mine unquiet mind;
The like of it no man again can find,

From east to west still seeking though he went,
To mine unhap. For hap away hath rent

Of all my joy the very bark and rind:
And I, alas, by chance am thus assigned
Daily to mourn, till death do it relent.
But since that thus it is by destiny,
What can I more but have a woeful heart;
My pen in plaint, my voice in care-full cry,
My mind in woe, my body full of smart;
And I myself, myself always to hate,

Till dreadful death do ease my doleful state.

·A.BARRY

Geraldine

i

W. C. JA UK MAN ·

HENRY HOWARD,

EARL OF SURREY.

1516-1547.

GERALDINE.

THE story of Surrey's love for the fair Geraldine, as related by all his early biographers, is as marvellous in its way, as any of the old knightly romances. According to Anthony à Wood, Surrey made a tour in Italy, where he proclaimed the surpassing beauty of his lady, at her express command, and maintained the same at Florence, in a tournament, after the manner of the knights errant of old, coming off victorious, of course, to his and her great glory. He also visited the palace of her ancestors, the Geraldi, and was admitted into the very chamber in which she was born, where he broke forth into magnificats in her praise! This story, which Anthony relates as a veritable bit of biography, has been traced back to Michael Drayton, from whom he professed to derive it, and to Thomas Nash, from whom he really did derive it, though he carefully avoids mentioning Nash's name. The work of Drayton, which he quotes as his authority, was published in 1598, under the name of "ENGLAND'S HEROICAL EPISTLES." It consists of a series of rhymed letters, many of them of great beauty, supposed to be written by sundry royal and noble personages, male and female. Among these are two by our hero and heroine. The epistle of Surrey purports to be written from Florence, and in addition to the incidents of the chamber and the tournament, contains an account of a visit which he paid to Rotterdam, where he saw Erasmus and Sir Thomas More, and of a visit to the famous wizard, Cornelius Agrippa, who showed him a wonderful magic mirror, wherein he saw the counterfeit presentment of the fair Geraldine, lying sick in her own chamber in England, and reading one of his poems! All this, and more of the same sort, may be found in the "ATHENE OXONIENSES," where it is laid at the door of Drayton, who obtained it from Nash, as nobody knew better than Wood, who, in many parts of his narration, adopts the very language of Nash himself! The work of Nash is in prose. It was published in 1594, four years before the appearance of Drayton's "HEROICAL EPISTLES," and was entitled "THE UNFORTUNATE TRAVELLER; or, THE LIFE OF JACK WILTON." Jack Wilton, the imaginary hero (for the whole thing bears on its face every