Chapter IV: Dramatic Origins of the English Pastoral Drama (1)

I

Having at length arrived at what must be regarded as the main subject of this work, it will be my task in the remaining chapters to follow the growth of the pastoral drama in England down to the middle of the seventeenth century, and in so doing to gather up and weave into a connected web the loose threads of my discourse.

Taking birth among the upland meadows of Sicily, the pastoral tradition first assumed its conventional garb in imperial Rome, and this it preserved among learned writers after its revival in the dawn of the Italian renaissance. With Arcadia for its local habitation it underwent a rebirth in the opening years of the sixteenth century in Sannazzaro's romance, and again towards the close in the drama of Tasso. It became chivalric in Spain and courtly in France, and finally reached this country in three main streams, the eclogue borrowed by Spenser from Marot, the romance suggested to Sidney by Montemayor, and the drama imitated by Daniel from Tasso and Guarini. Once here, it blended variously with other influences and with native tradition to produce a body of dramatic work, which, ill-defined, spasmodic and occasional, nevertheless reveals on inspection a certain character of its own, and one moreover not precisely to be paralleled from the literary annals of any other European nation.

The indications of a native pastoral impulse, manifesting itself in the burlesque of the religions drama and the romance of the popular ballads, we have already considered. The connexion which it is possible to trace between this undefined impulse and the later pastoral tradition is in no wise literary; in so far as it exists at all and is one of temperament alone, a bent of national character. In tracing the rise of the form in Italy upon the one hand, and in England upon the other, we are struck by certain curious contrasts and also by certain curious parallelisms. The closest analogy to the ballad themes to be discovered in the literature of Italy is in certain of the songs of Sacchetti and his contemporaries, but it would be unwise to insist on the resemblance. The more suggestive parallel of the _novelle_ has to be ruled out on the score of form, and is further differentiated by the notable lack in them of romantic spirit. Again, in the _sacre rappresentazioni_, the burlesque interpolations from actual life, which with us aided the genesis of the interlude, and through it of the romantic comedy, are as a rule so conspicuously absent that the rustic farce with which one nativity play opens can only be regarded as a direct and conscious imitation from the French. It is, on the other hand, a remarkable fact, and one which, in the absence of any evidence of direct imitation,[205] must be taken to indicate a real parallelism in the evolution of the tradition in the two countries, that in England as in Italy the way was paved for pastoral by the appearance of mythological plays, introducing incidentally pastoral scenes and characters, and anticipating to some extent at any rate the peculiar atmosphere of the Arcadian drama.

* * * * *

The earliest of these English mythological plays, alike in date of production and of publication, was George Peele's _Arraignment of Paris_, 'A Pastorall. Presented before the Queenes Majestie, by the children of her Chappell,' no doubt in 1581, and printed three years later.[206] It partakes of the nature of the masque in that the whole composition centres round a compliment to the Queen, Eliza or Zabeta--a name which, as Dr. Ward notes, Peele probably borrowed along with one or two other hints from Gascoigne's Kenilworth entertainment of 1575. The title sufficiently expresses its mythological character, and the precise value of the term 'pastoral' on the title-page is difficult to determine. The characters are for the most part either mythological or rustic; the only truly pastoral ones being Paris and Oenone, whose parts, however, in so far as they are pastoral, are also of the slightest. It is of course impossible to say exactly to what extent the fame of the Italian pastoral drama may have penetrated to England--the _Aminta_ was first printed the year of the production of Peele's play, and waited a decade before the first English translation and the first English edition appeared[207]--but no influence of Tasso's masterpiece can be detected in the _Arraignment_; still less is it possible to trace any acquaintance with Poliziano's work.

After a prologue, in which Atè foretells in staid and measured but not unpleasing blank verse the fall of Troy, the silvan deities, Pan, Faunus, Silvanus, Pomona, Flora, enter to welcome the three goddesses who are on their way to visit 'Ida hills,' and who after a while enter, led by Rhanis and accompanied by the Muses, whose processional chant heralds their approach. They are greeted by Pan, who sings:

The God of Shepherds, and his mates,
With country cheer salutes your states,
Fair, wise, and worthy as you be,
And thank the gracions ladies three
For honour done to Ida.

When these have retired from the stage there follows a charming idyllic scene between the lovers Paris and Oenone, which contains the delightful old song, one of the lyric pearls of the Elizabethan drama:

_Oenone._ Fair and fair, and twice so fair,
As fair as any may be;
The fairest shepherd on our green,
A love for any lady.

_Paris._ Fair and fair, and twice so fair,
As fair as any may be;
Thy love is fair for thee alone,
And for no other lady.

_Oenone._ My love is fair, my love is gay,
As fresh as bin the flowers in May,
And of my love my roundelay,
My merry, merry, merry roundelay,
Concludes with Cupid's curse--
They that do change old love for new,
Pray gods they change for worse!

_Both._ They that do change old love for new,
Pray gods they change for worse!

The second act presents us the three goddesses who have come to Ida on a party of pleasure with no very definite object in view, and are now engaged in exercising their tongues at one another's expense. The scene consists of a cross-fire of feminine amenities, not of the most delicate, it is true, and therefore not here to be reproduced, yet of a keenness of temper and a ringing mastery in the rimed verse little less than brilliant in themselves, and little less than a portent at the date of their appearance. Then a storm arises, during which, the goddesses having sought refuge in Diana's bower, Atè rolls the fatal ball upon the stage. On the return of the three the inscription _Detur pulcherrimae_ breeds fresh strife, until they agree to submit the case for judgement to the next man they meet. Paris arriving upon the scene at this point is at once called upon to decide the rival claims of the contending goddesses. First Juno promises wealth and empery, and presents a tree hung as with fruit with crowns and diadems, all which shall be the meed of the partial judge. Pallas next seeks to allure the swain with the pomp and circumstance of war, and conjures up a show in which nine knights, no doubt the nine worthies, tread a 'warlike almain.' Last Venus speaks:

Come, shepherd, come, sweet shepherd, look on me,
These bene too hot alarums these for thee:
But if thou wilt give me the golden ball,
Cupid my boy shall ha't to play withal,
That whenso'er this apple he shall see,
The God of Love himself shall think on thee,
And bid thee look and choose, and he will wound
Whereso thy fancy's object shall be found.

Whereupon 'Helen entereth in her bravery' attended by four Cupids, and singing an Italian song which has, however, little merit. As at a later day Faustus, so now Paris bows before the sovereignty of her beauty, and then wanders off through Ida glades in the company of the victorious queen of love, leaving her outraged rivals to plot a common revenge. Act III introduces the slight rustic element. Hobbinol, Diggon, and Thenot enter to Colin, who is lamenting the cruelty of his love Thestylis. The names are obviously borrowed from the _Shepherd's Calender_, but while Colin is still the type of the hopeless lover, there is no necessity to suspect any personal identification. The _Arraignment_ was probably produced less than two years after the publication of Spenser's eclogues, and Peele, who was an Oxford man, may even have been ignorant of their authorship[208]. Still more unnecessary are certain other identifications between characters in the play and persons at court which have been propounded. Such identifications, at any rate, have no importance for our present task, which is to ascertain in what measure and in what manner Peele's work paved the way for the advent of the Italian pastoral; and we note, with regard to the present scene, that the more polished and more homely elements alike--both Colin on the one hand, and Diggon, Hobbinol, and the rest on the other--are inspired by Spenser's work, and by his alone. Meanwhile Oenone enters, lamenting her desertion by Paris. There is delicate pathos in the reminiscence of her former song which haunts the outpouring of her grief--

False Paris, this was not thy vow, when thou and I were one,
To range and change old loves for new; but now those days be gone.

She is less happy in a set lament, beginning:

Melpomene, the Muse of tragic songs,

in which we may perhaps catch a distant echo of Spenser's:

Melpomene, the mournfull'st Muse of nine.

As she ends she is accosted by Mercury, who has been sent to summon Paris to appear at Juno's suit before the assembly of the gods on a charge of partiality in judgement. A pretty dialogue ensues in broken fourteeners, in which the subtle god elicits a description of the shepherd from the unsuspecting nymph--it too contains some delicate reminiscences of the lover's duet.

_Mercury._ Is love to blame?

_Oenone._ The queen of love hath made him false his troth.

_Mer._ Mean ye, indeed, the queen of love?

_Oen._ Even wanton Cupid's dame.

_Mer._ Why, was thy love so lovely, then?

_Oen._ His beauty height his shame;
The fairest shepherd on our green.

_Mer._ Is he a shepherd, than?

_Oen._ And sometime kept a bleating flock.

_Mer._ Enough, this is the man.

In the next scene we find Paris and Venus together. First the goddess directs the assembled shepherds to inscribe the words, 'The love whom Thestylis hath slain,' as the epitaph of the now dead Colin. When these have left the stage she turns to Paris:

Sweet shepherd, didst thou ever love?

_Paris._ Lady, a little once.

She then warns him against the dangers of faithlessness in a passage which is a good example of Peele's use of the old rimed versification, and as such deserves quotation.

My boy, I will instruct thee in a piece of poetry,
That haply erst thou hast not heard: in hell there is a tree,
Where once a-day do sleep the souls of false forsworen lovers,
With open hearts; and there about in swarms the number hovers
Of poor forsaken ghosts, whose wings from off this tree do beat
Round drops of fiery Phlegethon to scorch false hearts with heat.
This pain did Venus and her son entreat the prince of hell
T'impose on such as faithless were to such as loved them well:
And, therefore, this, my lovely boy, fair Venus doth advise thee,
Be true and steadfast in thy love, beware thou do disguise thee;
For he that makes but love a jest, when pleaseth him to start,
Shall feel those fiery water-drops consume his faithless heart.

_Paris._ Is Venus and her son so full of justice and severity?

_Venus._ Pity it were that love should not be linkèd with indifferency.[209]

Then follow Colin's funeral, the punishment of the hard-hearted Thestylis, condemned to love a 'foul crooked churl' who 'crabbedly refuseth her,' and the scene in which Mercury summons Paris before the Olympian tribunal. Here we find him in the next act. The gods being seated in the bower of Diana, Juno and Pallas, and Venus and Paris appear 'on sides' before the throne of Jove, and in answer to his indictment the shepherd of Ida delivers a spirited speech. Again the verse is of no small merit. Defending himself from the charge of partiality in the bestowal of the prize, he argues:

Had it been destinèd to majesty--
Yet will I not rob Venus of her grace--
Then stately Juno might have borne the ball.
Had it to wisdom been intitulèd,
My human wit had given it Pallas then.
But sith unto the fairest of the three
That power, that threw it for my farther ill,
Did dedicate this ball--and safest durst
My shepherd's skill adventure, as I thought,
To judge of form and beauty rather than
Of Juno's state or Pallas' worthiness--...
Behold, to Venus Paris gave the fruit,
A daysman[210] chosen there by full consent,
And heavenly powers should not repent their deeds.

After consultation the gods decide to dismiss the prisoner, though we gather that he is not wholly acquitted.

_Jupiter._ Shepherd, thou hast been heard with equity and law,
And for thy stars do thee to other calling draw,
We here dismiss thee hence, by order of our senate;
Go take thy way to Troy, and there abide thy fate.

_Venus._ Sweet shepherd, with such luck in love, while thou dost live,
As may the Queen of Love to any lover give.

_Paris._ My luck is loss, howe'er my love do speed:
I fear me Paris shall but rue his deed.

_Apollo._ From Ida woods now wends the shepherd's boy,
That in his bosom carries fire to Troy.

This, however, does not settle the case, and the final adjudication of the apple of beauty is entrusted by the gods to Diana, since it was in her grove that it was found. Parting company with classical legend in the incident which gives its title to the play, Peele further adds a fifth act, in which he contrives to make the world-famous history subserve the courtly ends of the masque. When the rival claimants have solemnly sworn to abide by the decision of their compeer, Diana begins:

It is enough; and, goddesses, attend.
There wons within these pleasaunt shady woods,
Where neither storm nor sun's distemperature
Have power to hurt by cruel heat or cold, ...
Far from disturbance of our country gods,
Amid the cypress springs[211], a gracions nymph,
That honours Dian for her chastity,
And likes the labours well of Phoebe's groves;
The place Elizium hight, and of the place
Her name that governs there Eliza is,
A kingdom that may well compare with mine,
An auncient seat of kings, a second Troy,
Y-compass'd round with a commodious sea.

The rest may be easily imagined. The contending divinities resign their claims:

_Venus._ To this fair nymph, not earthly, but divine,
Contents it me my honour to resign.

_Pallas._ To this fair queen, so beautiful and wise,
Pallas bequeaths her title in the prize.

_Juno._ To her whom Juno's looks so well become,
The Queen of Heaven yields at Phoebe's doom.

The three Fates now enter, and singing a Latin song lay their 'properties' at the feet of the queen. Then each in turn delivers a speech appropriate to her character, and finally Diana 'delivereth the ball of gold into the Queen's own hands,' and the play ends with a couple of doggerel hexameters chanted by way of epilogue by the assembled actors:

Vive diu felix votis hominumque deumque,
Corpore, mente, libro, doctissima, candida, casta.

The jingle of these lines would alone suffice to prove that Peele's ear was none of the most delicate, and he particularly sins in disregarding the accent in the rime-word, a peculiarity which may have been noticed even in the short passages quoted above. Nevertheless, even apart from its lyrics, one of which is in its way unsurpassed, the play contains passages of real grace in the versification. The greater part is written either in fourteeners or in decasyllabic couplets with occasional alexandrines, in both of which the author displays an ease and mastery which, to say the least, were uncommon in the dramatic work of the early eighties; while the passages of blank verse introduced at important dramatic points, notably in Paris' defence and in Diana's speech, are the best of their kind between Surrey and Marlowe. The style, though now and again clumsy, is in general free from affectation except for an occasional weakness in the shape of a play upon words. Such is the connexion of Eliza with Elizium, in a passage already quoted, and the time-honoured _non Angli sed angeli_--

Her people are y-clepèd Angeli,
Or, if I miss, a letter is the most--

occurring a few lines later; also the words of Lachesis:

Et tibi, non aliis, didicerunt parcere Parcae.

With regard to the general construction of the piece it is hardly too much to say that the skill with which the author has enlarged a masque-subject into a regular drama, altered a classical legend to subserve a particular aim, and conducted throughout the multiple perhaps rather than complex threads of his plot, mark him out as pre-eminent among his contemporaries. We must not, it is true, look for perfect balance of construction, for adequacy of dramatic climax, or for subtle characterization; but what has been achieved was, in the stage of development at which the drama had then arrived, no mean achievement. The dramatic effects are carefully prepared for and led up to, reminding us almost at times of the recurrence of a musical motive. Thus the song between Paris and Oenone, just before the shepherd goes off to cross Dame Venus' path, is a fine piece of dramatic irony as well as a charming lyric; while the effect of the reminiscences of the song scattered through the later pastoral scenes has been already noticed. Another instance is Venus' warning of the pains in store for faithless lovers, which fittingly anticipates the words with which Paris leaves the assembly of the gods. Again, we find a conscious preparation for the contention between the goddesses in their previous bickerings, and a conscious juxtaposition of the forsaken Oenone and the love-lorn Colin. Lastly, there are scattered throughout the play not a few graphic touches, as when Mercury at sight of Oenone exclaims:

Dare wage my wings the lass doth love, she looks so bleak and thin!

Such then is Peele's mythological play, presented in all the state of a court revel before her majesty by the children of the Chapel Royal, a play which it is more correct to say prepared the ground for than, as is usually asserted, itself contained the germ of the later pastoral drama. In spite of the care bestowed upon its composition, the _Arraignment of Paris_ remains a slight and occasional production; but it nevertheless claims its place as one of the most graceful pieces of its kind, and the ascription of the play to Shakespeare, current in the later seventeenth century, is perhaps more of an honour to the elder than of an insult to the younger poet. Nor, at a more recent date, was Lamb uncritically enthusiastic when he said of Peele's play that 'had it been in all parts equal, the Faithful Shepherdess of Fletcher had been but a second name in this sort of Writing.'

Before leaving Peele, mention must be made of one other play from his pen, namely the _Hunting of Cupid_, known to us unfortunately from a few fragments only. This is the more tantalizing on account of the freshness of the passages preserved in _England's Helicon_ and _England's Parnassus_, and in a commonplace-book belonging to Drummond of Hawthornden, and also from the fact that there is good reason to suppose that the work was actually printed[212]. So far as can be judged from the extracts we possess, and from Drummond's jottings, it appears to have been a tissue of mythological conceits, much after the manner of the _Arraignment_, though possibly somewhat more distinctly pastoral in tone[213].

About contemporary with the _Arraignment of Paris_ are the earliest plays of John Lyly, the Euphuist. Most of these are of a mythological character, while three come more particularly under our notice on account of their pastoral tendency, namely, _Gallathea, Love's Metamorphosis_, and the _Woman in the Moon_[214].

Although Lyly's romance itself lay outside the scope of this inquiry, we have already had, in the pastoral work of his imitators, ample opportunities of becoming acquainted with the peculiarities of the style he rendered fashionable. Its laborious affectation is all the more irritating when we remember that its author, on turning his attention to the more or less unseemly brawling of the Martin Mar-prelate pasquilade, revealed a command of effective vernacular hardly, if at all, inferior to that of his friend Nashe; and its complex artificiality becomes but more apparent when applied to dramatic work. Nevertheless in an age when prose style was in an even more chaotic state than prosody, Euphuism could claim qualities of no small value and importance, while as an experiment it was no more absurd, and vastly more popular, than those in classical versification. Its qualities, when we consider the general state of contemporary literature, may well account for the popularity of Lyly's attempt at novel-writing, but the style was radically unsuited for dramatic composition, and the result is for the most part hardly to be tolerated, and can only have met with such court-favour as fell to its lot, owing to the general fashion for which its success in the romance was responsible. It is indeed noteworthy that Lyly is the only writer who ever ventured to apply his literary invention _in toto_ to the uses of the stage, while even in the romance he lived to see Euphuism as a fashionable style pale before the growing popularity of Arcadianism[215]. The opening of _Gallathea_ may supply a specimen of the style as it appears in the dramas; the scene is laid in Lincolnshire, and Tyterus is addressing his daughter who gives her name to the piece:

In tymes past, where thou seest a heape of small pyble, stoode a stately
Temple of white Marble, which was dedicated to the God of the Sea, (and
in right being so neere the Sea): hether came all such as eyther
ventured by long travell to see Countries, or by great traffique to use
merchandise, offering Sacrifice by fire, to gette safety by water;
yeelding thanks for perrils past, and making prayers for good successe
to come: but Fortune, constant in nothing but inconstancie, did change
her copie, as the people their custome; for the Land being oppressed by
Danes, who in steed of sacrifice, committed sacrilidge, in steede of
religion, rebellion, and made a pray of that in which they should have
made theyr prayers, tearing downe the Temple even with the earth, being
almost equall with the skyes, enraged so the God who bindes the windes
in the hollowes of the earth, that he caused the Seas to breake their
bounds, sith men had broke their vowes, and to swell as farre above
theyr reach, as men had swarved beyond theyr reason: then might you see
shippes sayle where sheepe fedde, ankers cast where ploughes goe,
fishermen throw theyr nets, where husbandmen sowe their Corne, and
fishes throw their scales where fowles doe breede theyr quils: then
might you gather froth where nowe is dewe, rotten weedes for sweete
roses, and take viewe of monstrous Maremaides, in steed of passing faire
Maydes.

The unsuitability of the style for dramatic purposes will by this be somewhat painfully evident, and, as may be imagined, the effect is even less happy in the case of dialogue. To pursue: the offended deity consents to withdraw his waters on the condition of a lustral sacrifice of the fairest virgin of the land, who is to be exposed bound to a tree by the shore, whence she is carried off by the monster Agar, in whom we may no doubt see a personification of the 'eagre' or tidal wave of the Humber. At the opening of the play we find the two fairest virgins of the land disguised as boys by their respective fathers, in order that they may escape the penalty of beauty. While they wander the fields and graves, another maiden is exposed as the sacrifice, but Neptune, offended by the deceit, rejects the proffered victim, and no monster appears to claim its prey. In the meanwhile, Cupid has eluded the maternal vigilance, and, disguised as a nymph, is beginning to display his powers among the followers of Diana. Here is an example of a euphuistic dialogue. Cupid accosts one of the nymphs:

Faire Nimphe, are you strayed from your companie by chaunce, or love
you to wander solitarily on purpose?

_Nymph._ Faire boy, or god, or what ever you bee, I would you knew
these woods are to me so wel known, that I cannot stray though I would,
and my minde so free, that to be melancholy I have no cause. There is
none of Dianaes trayne that any can traine, either out of their waie, or out
of their wits.

_Cupid._ What is that Diana? a goddesse? what her Nimphes?
virgins? what her pastimes? hunting?

_Nym._ A goddesse? who knowes it not? Virgins? who thinkes it not?
Hunting? who loves it not?

_Cup._ I pray thee, sweete wench, amongst all your sweete troope, is
there not one that followeth the sweetest thing, sweet love?

_Nym._ Love, good sir, what meane you by it? or what doe you call it?

_Cup._ A heate full of coldnesse, a sweet full of bitternesse, a paine ful
of pleasantnesse; which maketh thoughts have eyes, and harts eares;
bred by desire, nursed by delight, weaned by jelousie, kild by dissembling,
buried by ingratitude; and this is love! fayre Lady, wil you any?

_Nym._ If it be nothing else, it is but a foolish thing.

_Cup._ Try, and you shall find it a prettie thing.

_Nym._ I have neither will nor leysure, but I will followe Diana in the
Chace, whose virgins are all chast, delighting in the bowe that wounds
the swift Hart in the Forrest, not fearing the bowe that strikes the softe
hart in the Chamber.

The nymphs are soon in love with the two girls in disguise, and what is more, each of these, supposing the other to be what her apparel betokens, falls in love with her. After a while, however, Diana becomes suspicious of the stranger nymph, and her followers make a capture of the boy-god, whom they identify by the burn on his shoulder caused by Psyche's lamp, and set him to untie love-knots. There follows one of those charming songs for which Lyly is justly, or unjustly, famous[216].

O Yes, O yes, if any Maid,
Whom lering Cupid has betraid
To frownes of spite, to eyes of scorne,
And would in madnes now see torne
The Boy in Pieces--Let her come
Hither, and lay on him her doome.

O yes, O yes, has any lost
A Heart, which many a sigh hath cost;
Is any cozened of a teare,
Which (as a Pearle) disdaine does weare?--
Here stands the Thiefe, let her but come
Hither, and lay on him her doome.

Is any one undone by fire,
And Turn'd to ashes through desire?
Did ever any Lady weepe,
Being cheated of her golden sleepe,
Stolne by sicke thoughts?--The pirats found,
And in her teares hee shalbe drownd.
Reade his Inditement, let him heare
What hees to trust to: Boy, give eare!

This is the position of affairs when Venus appears in search of her wanton, and is shortly followed by the irate Neptune. After some disputing, Neptune, to quiet the strife between the goddesses, proposes that Diana shall restore the runaway to his mother, in return for which he will release the land for ever from its virgin tribute. This happily agreed upon, the only difficulty remaining is the strange passion between the two girls. Venus, however, proves equal to the occasion, and solves the situation by transforming one of them into a man. An allusion to the story of Iphis and Ianthe told in the ninth book of the _Metamorphoses_ suggests the source of the incident[217]. Otherwise the play appears to be in the main original. The exposing of a maiden to the rage of a sea-monster has been, of course, no novelty since the days of Andromeda, but it is unnecessary to seek a more immediate source[218]; while the intrusion of Cupid in disguise among the nymphs was doubtless suggested by the well-known idyl of Moschus, and probably owes to this community of source such resemblance as it possesses to the prologue of the _Aminta_. A comic element is supplied by a sort of young rascals, and a mariner, an alchemist, and an astrologer, who are totally unconnected with the rest of the play. The supposed allusions to real characters need not be taken seriously. Lyly's rascals are generally recognized as the direct ancestors of some of Shakespeare's comic characters, and we not seldom find in them the germ at least of the later poet's irresistible fun. Take such a speech as Robin's: 'Why be they deade that be drownd? I had thought they had beene with the fish, and so by chance beene caught up with them in a Nette againe. It were a shame a little cold water should kill a man of reason, when you shall see a poore Mynow lie in it, that hath no understanding.' As regards the euphuistic style, the passages already quoted will suffice, but it may be remarked that the marvellous natural history is also put under requisition. 'Virgins harts, I perceive,' remarks one of Diana's nymphs, 'are not unlike Cotton trees, whose fruite is so hard in the budde, that it soundeth like steele, and beeing rype, poureth forth nothing but wooll, and theyr thoughts, like the leaves of Lunary, which the further they growe from the Sunne, the sooner they are scorched with his beames.' At times one is almost tempted to imagine that Lyly is laughing in his sleeve, but as soon as he feels an eye upon him, his face would again do credit to a judge. The following is from a scene between the two disguised maidens:

_Phillida._ It is pitty that Nature framed you not a woman, having
a face so faire, so lovely a countenaunce, so modest a behaviour.

_Gallathea._ There is a Tree in Tylos, whose nuttes have shels like fire,
and being cracked, the karnell is but water.

_Phil._ What a toy is it to tell mee of that tree, beeing nothing to the purpose:
I say it is pity you are not a woman.

_Gall._ I would not wish to be a woman, unless it were because thou art a man. (III. ii.) _Gallathea_ may be plausibly enough assigned to the year 1584[219]. The date of the next play we have to deal with, _Love's Metamorphosis_, is less certain, though Mr. Fleay's conjecture of 1588-9 seems reasonable. All that can be said with confidence is that it was later than _Gallathea_, to which it contains allusions, that it is an inferior work, and that it has the appearance at least of having been botched up in a hurry[220]. The story is as follows. Three shepherds, or rather woodmen, are in love with three of the nymphs of Ceres, but meet with little success, one of the maidens proving obdurate, another proud, and the third fickle. The lovers make complaint to Cupid, who consents at their request to transform the disdainful fair ones into a rock, a rose, and a bird respectively. Hereupon Ceres in her turn complains to the God of Love, who promises that the three shall regain their proper shapes if Ceres will undertake that they shall thereupon consent to the love of the swains. She does so, and her nymphs are duly restored to their own forms, but at first flatly refuse to comply with the conditions. After a while they yield:

_Nisa._ I am content, so as Ramis, when hee finds me cold in love, or
hard in beliefe, hee attribute it to his owne folly; in that I retaine some
nature of the Rocke he chaunged me into....

_Celia._ I consent, so as Montanus, when in the midst of his sweete
delight, shall find some bitter overthwarts, impute it to his folly, in that
he suffered me to be a Rose, that hath prickles with her pleasantnes, as
hee is like to have with my love shrewdnes....

_Niobe._ I yeelded first in mind though it bee my course last to speake:
but if Silvestris find me not ever at home, let him curse himselfe that gave
me wings to flie abroad, whose feathers if his jealousie shall breake, my
policie shall imp.[221] (V. iv.)

This plot, at once elementary and violent, is combined with the fantastic story of Erisichthon, 'a churlish husband-man,' who in the nymphs' despite cuts down the sacred tree of Ceres, into which the chaste Fidelia had been transformed. For this offence the goddess dooms him to the plague of hunger. The ghastly description of this monster, who may be compared with Browne's Limos, was probably suggested by some similar descriptions in the _Faery Queen_ (I. iv. and III. xii). Erisichthon is put to all manner of shifts to satisfy the hunger with which he is ever consumed, and is at last forced to sell his daughter Protea to a merchant, in order to keep himself alive. Protea, it appears, was at one time the paramour of Neptune, who now in answer to her prayer comes to her aid in such a way that, when about to embark on the vessel of her purchaser, she justifies her name by changing into the likeness of an old fisherman. The deluded merchant, after seeking her awhile, is obliged to set sail and depart without his ware. She returns home to find her lover Petulius being tempted by a 'syren,' who is evidently a mermaid with looking-glass and comb and scaly tail, disporting herself by the shore--the scene being laid, by the way, on the coast of Arcadia. Protea at once changes her disguise to the ghost of Ulysses, and is in time to warn her lover of his danger. Finally, at Cupid's intercession her father is relieved of his affliction by the now appeased goddess. This plot is even more crudely distinct from the principal action of the play than is usual with Lyly[222].

It will be noticed that in the play we have just been considering the nymphs are no longer treated with the same respect as was the case in _Gallathea_; we have, in fact, advanced some way towards the satirical conception and representation of womankind which gives the tone to the _Woman in the Moon_. It would almost seem as though his experience of the inconstancy of the royal sunshine had made Lyly a less enthusiastic devotee of womanhood in general and of virginity in particular, and that with an unadvised frankness which may well account for his disappointments at court, he failed to conceal his feelings. The play is likewise distinguished from the other dramatic works of its author by being composed almost entirely in blank verse. Certain lines of the prologue--

Remember all is but a Poets dreame,
The first he had in Phoebus holy bowre,
But not the last, unlesse the first displease--

have not unnaturally been taken to mean that the piece was the first venture of the author; but on investigation this will be seen to be impossible, since the constant reminiscence of Marlowe in the construction of the verse points to 1588 or at earliest to 1587 as the date. Mr. Fleay's suggestion of 1589-90 may be accepted as the earliest likely date[223]. To my mind it would need external proof of an unusually cogent description to render plausible the theory that the year, say, of the _Shepherd's Calender_ saw the appearance of such lines as:

What lack I now but an imperiall throne[224],
And Ariadnaes star-lyght Diadem? (II. i.)

or:

O Stesias, what a heavenly love hast thou!
A love as chaste as is Apolloes tree,
As modest as a vestall Virgins eye,
And yet as bright as Glow wormes in the night,
With which the morning decks her lovers hayre; (IV. i.)

or yet again:

When will the sun go downe? flye Phoebus flye!
O, that thy steeds were wingd with my swift thoughts:
Now shouldst thou fall in Thetis azure armes[225],
And now would I fall in Pandoraes lap. (IV. i.)

Nor are these isolated passages; from the opening lines of the prologue to the final speech of Nature the verse has the appearance of being the work of a graceful if not very strong hand writing in imitation of Marlowe's early style. We must, therefore, it seems to me, take the words of the prologue as signifying not that the play was the first work of the author, but that it was his earliest adventure in verse.

The plan of the work is as follows. The shepherds of Utopia come to dame Nature and beg her to make a woman for them. She consents and fashions Pandora, whom she dowers with the virtues of the several Planets. These, however, are offended at not being consulted in the matter, and determine to use their influence to the bane of the newly created woman. Under the reign of Saturn she turns sullen; when Jupiter is in the ascendant he falls in love with her, but she has grown proud and scorns him; under Mars she becomes a vixen; under Sol she in her turn falls in love, and turns wanton under Venus; she learns deceit of Mercury when he is dominant, and runs mad under the influence of Luna. At length, since the shepherds will no longer have anything to do with the lady, Nature determines to place her in the heavens. Her beauty makes each planet desire her as companion. Nature gives her the choice:

Speake, my Pandora; where wilt thou be?
_Pandora._ Not with old Saturne for he lookes like death;
Nor yet with Jupiter, lest Juno storme;
Nor with thee Mars, for Venus is thy love;
Nor with thee Sol, thou hast two Parramours,
The sea borne Thetis and the rudy morne;
Nor with thee Venus, lest I be in love
With blindfold Cupid or young Joculus;
Nor with thee Hermes, thou art full of sleightes,
And when I need thee Jove will send thee foorth.
Say Cynthia, shall Pandora rule thy starre,
And wilt thou play Diana in the woods,
Or Hecate in Plutos regiment?
_Luna._ I, Pandora.
_Pand._ Fayre Nature let thy hand mayd dwell with her,
For know that change is my felicity,
And ficklenesse Pandoraes proper forme.
Thou madst me sullen first, and thou Jove, proud;
Thou bloody minded; he a Puritan:
Thou Venus madst me love all that I saw,
And Hermes to deceive all that I love;
But Cynthia made me idle, mutable,
Forgetfull, foolish, fickle, franticke, madde;
These be the humors that content me best,
And therefore will I stay with Cynthia....
_Nat._ Now rule, Pandora, in fayre Cynthias steede,
And make the moone inconstant like thy selfe;
Raigne thou at womens nuptials, and their birth;
Let them be mutable in all their loves,
Fantastical, childish, and foolish, in their desires,
Demaunding toyes:
And stark madde when they cannot have their will.
Now follow me ye wandring lightes of heaven,
And grieve not, that she is not plast with you;
Ail you shall glaunce at her in your aspects,
And in conjunction dwell with her a space. (V. i.)

And so Pandora becomes the 'Woman in the Moon.' The play, in its topical and satiric purpose, and above all, in its utilization of mythological material, bears a distinct relationship to the masque. The shepherds are in their origin philosophical, standing for the race of mankind in general, rather than pastoral; Utopian, in fact, rather than Arcadian. These early mythological plays stand alone, in that the pastoral scenes they contain are apparently uninfluenced by the Italian drama. The kind attained some popularity as a subject of courtly presentation, but it did not long preserve its original character. The later examples, with which we shall be concerned hereafter, always exhibit some characteristics which may be immediately or ultimately traced to the influence of Tasso and Guarini. This influence we must now turn to consider in some detail, as evidenced as well in translations and imitations as in the general tone and machinery of an appreciable portion of the Elizabethan drama.[226]

II

In any inquiry involving the question of foreign influence in literature it is obviously necessary to treat of the work done in the way of translation, although when the influence is of at all a widespread nature, as in the present instance, such discussion is apt to usurp a position unjustified by its intrinsic importance. In most cases, probably, the energy devoted to the task of rendering the foreign models directly into the language they influenced is rather useful as supplying us with a rough measure of their popularity than itself significant as a step in the operation of that influence. We may safely assume that, in the case of the English pastoral drama, the influence exercised directly by the Italian masterpieces was beyond comparison greater than that which made itself indirectly felt through the labours of translators.

Having thus anticipated a possible misapprehension it will be worth our while to devote some little attention to the history of the attempts at translation in this line. The first English writer to venture upon the task of turning the choice music of Tasso into his native language was the eccentric satellite of the Sidneyan circle, Abraham Fraunce, fellow of St. John's College in Cambridge. It so happened that he was at the time pursuing that elusive phantasm, the application of the laws of classical versification to English poetry. The resuit was at least unique, in English, at any rate, namely a drama in hexameter verse. It also occurred to him that Watson's _Lamentations of Amyntas_, a translation of which he had himself published in 1587, might be made to serve as an appendix to Tasso's play. With this object in view he changed the name of the heroine from Silvia to Phillis. This appears to have been the exact extent to which he 'altered S. Tassoes Italian' in order to connect it with 'M. Watsons Latine Amyntas' and 'to make them both one English.'[227] Certain other changes were, however, introduced upon other considerations. Various unessential points were omitted, notably in connexion with Tirsi, whose topical character disappears; the name Nerina is altered to Fulvia; frequent allusions are introduced to the nymph Pembrokiana, to whom among other things is ascribed the rescue of the heroine from the bear which takes the place of the wolf in Tasso. Lastly, we have the addition of a whole scene immediately before the final chorus. Phillis and Amyntas reappear and carry on a conversation, not unamiably, in a sort of hexametrical stichomythia. The maiden modestly seeks to restrain the amorous impatience of her lover, and the scene ends with a song between the two composed in 'Asclepiades.'[228] Of this literary curiosity Amyntas' opening stave may be quoted:

Sweete face, why be the hev'ns soe to the bountifull,
Making that radiant bewty of all the starrs
Bright-burning, to be fayre Phillis her ornament?
And yet seeme to be soe spytefuly partial,
As not for to aford Argus his eyes to mee,
Eyes too feawe to behould Phillis her ornament?

It is, perhaps, not a little strange that the pedant who made the preposterous experiment of turning the _Aminta_ into English hexameters should nevertheless have been capable of clearly perceiving, however incapable he was of adequately rectifying, the hopelessly undramatic character of the last act of Tasso's play. As an example of the style of the translation we may take the following rendering of the delicate _Chi crederia_, with which the original prologue opens:

Who would think that a God lay lurking under a gray cloake,
Silly Shepheards gray cloake, and arm'd with a paltery sheephooke?
And yet no pety God, no God that gads by the mountaines,
But the triumphantst God that beares any sway in Olympus:
Which many times hath made man-murdring Mars to be cursing
His blood-sucking blade; and prince of watery empire
Earth-shaking Neptune, his threeforckt mace to be leaving,
And Jove omnipotent, as a poore and humble obeissant,
His three-flak't lightnings and thunderbolts to abandon.

This is in some respects not wholly inadequate; indeed, if it happened to be English it might pass for a respectable translation, for the exotic pedantry of the style itself serves in a way to render the delicate artificiality of the original, and such an expression as a 'God that gads by the mountaines' is a pithy enough paraphrase of _dio selvaggio_, if hardly an accurate translation. The unsatisfactory nature of the verse, however, for dramatic purposes becomes evident in passages of rapid dialogue; for example, where Daphne tells the careless nymph of Amyntas' resolve to die.

_Phillis._ As to my house full glad for joy I repayred, I met thee
Daphne, there full sad by the way, and greately amased.

_Daphne._ Phillis alas is alive, but an other's gone to be dying[229].

_Ph._ And what mean's this, alas? am I now so lightly regarded,
That my life with, Alas, of Daphne must be remembred?

_Da._ Phillis, I love thy life, but I lyke not death of an other.

_Ph._ Whose death?

_Da._ Death of Amyntas.

_Ph._ Alas how dyed Amyntas?

_Da._ How? that I cannot tell; nor yet well whether it is soe:
But noe doubt, I beleeve; for it is most lyke that it is soe.

_Ph._ What strange news doe I heare? what causd that death of Amyntas?

_Da._ Thy death.

_Ph._ And I alive?

_Da._ Thy death was lately reported,
And he beleevs thy death, and therfore seeketh his owne death.

_Ph._ Feare of Phillis death prov'd vayne, and feare of Amyntas
Death will proove vayne too: life eache thing lyvely procureth. (IV. i.)

Even in such a passage as this, however, those strong racy phrases which somehow find their way into the most uninspired of Tudor translations, are not wholly wanting. Thus when the careless nymph at last goes off to seek her desperate lover, Daphne in the original remarks:

Oh tardi saggia, e tardi
Pietosa, quando ciò nulla rileva;

a passage in translating which Fraunce cannot resist the application of a homely proverb, and writes:

When steedes are stollen, then Phillis looks to the stable.

It may, at first sight, appear strange that at a time when the Italian pastoral was exercising its greatest influence over the English drama this translation by Fraunce of Tasso's play should have satisfied the demand for more than thirty years. The explanation, of course, is that the widespread knowledge of Italian among the reading public in England rendered translation more or less superfluous[230], while at the same time it should be remembered that in this country Tasso was far surpassed in popularity by Guarini. So far as we can tell no further translation of the _Aminta_ was attempted till 1628, when there appeared an anonymous version which bibliographers have followed one another in ascribing to one John Reynolds, but which was more probably the work of a certain Henry Reynolds[231]. However that may be, the translation is of no inconsiderable merit, though this is more apparent when read apart from the original. It bears evidence of having been written by a man capable of appreciating the poetry of Tasso, and one who, while unable to strike the higher chords of lyric composition, was yet able to render the Italian into graceful and unassuming, if seldom wholly musical or adequate, verse. Thus the version hardly does itself justice in quotation, although the general impression produced is more pleasing and less often irritating than is the case with translations which many times reveal far higher qualities. The following is a characteristic specimen chosen from the story of Aminta's early love for Silvia.

Being but a Lad, so young as yet scarce able
To reach the fruit from the low-hanging boughes
Of new-growne trees; Inward I grew to bee
With a young mayde, fullest of love and sweetnesse,
That ere display'd pure gold tresse to the winde;...
Neere our abodes, and neerer were our hearts;
Well did our yeares agree, better our thoughts;
Together wove we netts t' intrapp the fish
In flouds and sedgy fleetes[232]; together sett
Pitfalls for birds; together the pye'd Buck
And flying Doe over the plaines we chac'de;
And in the quarry', as in the pleasure shar'de:
But as I made the beasts my pray, I found
My heart was lost, and made a pray to other. (I. ii.)

Many a translator, moreover, has failed to instil into his verse the swing and flow of the following stanzas from the golden age chorus, which, nevertheless follow the metrical form of the original with reasonable fidelity[233]:

O happy Age of Gould; happy' houres;
Not for with milke the rivers ranne,
And hunny dropt from ev'ry tree;
Nor that the Earth bore fruits, and flowres,
Without the toyle or care of Man,
And Serpents were from poyson free;...
But therefore only happy Dayes,
Because that vaine and ydle name,
That couz'ning Idoll of unrest,
Whom the madd vulgar first did raize,
And call'd it Honour, whence it came
To tyrannize or'e ev'ry brest,
Was not then suffred to molest
Poore lovers hearts with new debate;
More happy they, by these his hard
And cruell lawes, were not debar'd
Their innate freedome; happy state;
The goulden lawes of Nature, they
Found in their brests; and them they did obey. (Ch. I.)

Before leaving the _Aminta_ it will be worth while straying beyond the strict chronological limits of this inquiry to glance for a moment at the version produced by John Dancer in 1660, for the sake of noting the change which had come over literary hack-work of the kind in the course of some thirty years. Comparing it with Reynolds' translation we are at first struck by the change which long drilling of the language to a variety of uses has accomplished in the work of uninspired poetasters; secondly, by the fact that the conventional respectability of production, which has replaced the halting crudities of an earlier date, is far more inimical to any real touch of poetic inspiration. Equally evident is that spirit of tyranny, happily at no time native to our literature, which seeks to reduce the works of other ages into accordance with the taste of its own day. Thus, having 'improved' Tasso's apostrophe to the _bella età dell' oro_ almost beyond recognition, Dancer complacently closes the chorus with the following parody:

We'l hope, since there's no joy, when once one dies
We'l hope, that as we have seen with our eies
The Sun to set, so we may see it rise. (Ch. I.)

Again, while all the spontaneity and reverential labour of an age of more avowed adolescence has disappeared, there is yet lacking the justness of phrase and certainty of grammar and rime, which later supply, however inadequately, the place of poetic enthusiasm. The defects of the style, with its commonplace exaggeration of conceits, the thumbed token-currency of the certified poetaster, are well seen in such a passage as the following:

Weak love is held by shame, but love grows bold
As strong, what is it then can it with-hold:
She as though in her ey's she did contain
Fountains of tears, did with such plenty rain
Them on his cheeks, and they such vertue had,
That it reviv'd again the breathlesse lad;...
Aminta thought 'twas more then heav'nly charms,
That thus enclasp'd him in his Silvia's armes;
He that loves servant is, perhaps may guesse
Their blisse; but none there is can it expresse[234]. (V. i.)