virtue, of female beauty and goodness, floated richly through his mind. The imperial Gloriana, the heavenly Una,
"Whose angel face,
As the great eye of Heaven, shinéd bright,
And made a sunshine in the shady place;"
the sweet Belphœbe, the gallant Britomart, and the brave troop of knights, Arthur the magnanimous, the Red-Cross Knight, the holy and hardly-tried, the just Artegall, and all their triumphs over Archimagos, false Duessas, and the might of dragon natures. This was a life, a labor which clothed the ground with golden flowers, made heaven look forth from between the clouds and the mountain tops, and songs of glory wake on the winds that swept past his towers. Here he accomplished and saw given to the world half his great work—a whole, and an immortal whole as it regarded his fame and great mission in the world—to breathe lofty and unselfish thoughts into the souls of men; to make truth, purity, and high principle the objects of desire.
Here, too, he married the woman of his heart, chosen on the principle of his poetry, not for her lands, but for her beauty and her goodness. Nothing is known of her, not even her name, except that it was Elizabeth, that she was eminently beautiful, and of low degree. Some conjecture her to be of Cork, and a merchant's daughter, but Spenser himself says she was a country lass. Thus, in the Faërie Queene:
"Such were these goddesses which you did see:
But that fourth maid, which there amid them traced Who can aread what creature may she bee; Whether a creature, or a goddess graced With heavenly gifts from heaven first enraced! But whatso sure she was, she worthy was To be the fourth with these three other placed: Yet was she certes but a country lasse; Yet she all other country lasses far did passe.
So far, as doth the daughter of the day
All other lesser lights in light excell:
So far doth she in beautiful array
Above all other lasses bear the bell:
Ne less in virtue that beseemes her well
Doth she exceede the rest of all her race;
For which the Graces that there wont to dwell
Have for more honor brought her to this place,
And gracéd her so much to be another Grace.
Another Grace she well deserves to be,
In whom so many graces gathered are,
Excelling much the mean of her degree;
Divine resemblance, beauty sovereign rare,
Firm chastity, that spight no blemish dare;
All which she with such courtesie doth grace
That all her peres can not with her compare,
But quite are dimméd when she is in place;
She made me often pipe, and now to pipe apace.
Sunne of the world, great glory of the sky,
That all the earth doth lighten with thy rayes,
Great Gloriana, greatest majesty,
Pardon thy shepherd, 'mongst so many lays
As he hath sung of thee in all his days,
To make one mencine of thy poor handmaid,
And underneath thy feet to place her praise,
That when thy glory shall be far displayed
In future age, of her this mention may be made."
Faërie Queene, b. xii., c. x.
These were known in Spenser's days to be an affectionate monument of immortal verse to his wife, still more nobly erected in his Epithalamion; and to identify it more, in his Amoretti he tells us that his queen, his mother, and his wife were all of the same name.
"The which three times thrice happy hath me made
With gifts of body, fortune, and of minde,
Ye three Elizabeths forever live, That thus such graces unto me did give."
Here, too, he enjoyed the memorable visit of Sir Walter Raleigh, which he commemorates in Colin Clout. He had now ready for the press the first three books of his Faërie Queene; and these he read to Raleigh during his visit, probably as he has described it in pastoral style, as they sat together under the green alders on the banks of the Mulla.
"I sate, as was my trade,
Under the foot of Mole, that mountain hore,
Keeping my sheep among the coolly shade
Of the green alders by the Mulla's shore.
There a strange shepherd chanced to find me out;
Whether allured with my pipe's delight,
Whose pleasing sound yshrilled far about,
Or thither led by chance, I know not right,
Whom when I askéd from what place he came,
And how he hight, himself he did ycleep
The Shepherd of the Ocean by name,
And said he came far from the main sea deep.
He, sitting me beside in the same shade,
Provoked me to play some pleasant fit," &c.
Raleigh was enchanted with the poem. He was just returned from a voyage to Portugal, and was now bound for England. He was, it appears, himself weary of his own location, for he soon after sold it to the Earl of Cork. He pressed Spenser to accompany him, put his poem to press, and by means of its fame to win the more earnest patronage of Queen Elizabeth.
"When thus our pipes we both had wearied well,
Quoth he, and each an end of singing made,
He 'gan to cast great liking to my lore,
And great disliking to my luckless lot,
That banished had myself, like wight forlore,
Into that waste, where I was quite forgot.
The which to leave, thenceforth he counseled me,
Unmeet for man in whom was aught regardful,
And wend with him, his Cynthia to see;
Where grace was great, and bounty most rewardful.
So what with hope of good, and hate of ill,
He me persuaded forth with him to fare.
So to the sea we came."
Here it comes out that,
