had he not risen. He was by his mother related to the queen, besides being of noble lineage by the father,circumstances which Elizabeth never overlooked. His guardian was her great minister Burleigh; his tutor the famous Whitgift, afterwards primate of England; and at ten years old, soon after his father's death, it was said of him by Waterhouse, who was no mean judge, that there was then no man so strong in friends as the little Earl of Essex. The principal cause, no doubt, of his rapid exaltation to power, greater than any former favourite possessed, was the romantic partiality of his royal mistress; but, independently of this, his own abilities, fortune, and station must have brought him into notice. At the time of which we now write (the expedition to Lisbon) his age was not above twenty-two, and Elizabeth had already loaded him with favours, created him general of horse in the camp at Tilbury, and given him the order of the Garter.

To return to Raleigh: It is the opinion of some authors, that about this time a coolness, perhaps an actual quarrel, had occurred between him and Essex; and there is a contemporary letter preserved by Birch, which affirms that "My Lord of Essex had chased Raleigh from court;" but the whole story is obscure. It is certain that, whether from necessity or convenience, he repaired to Ireland, and after examining his estates there, visited Spenser at Kilcolman, where the poet then resided. Amid all his cares and ambition, Sir Walter had never deserted the muses; and he now renewed with ardour his friendship with their favourite son. He and the bard had become acquainted during the havoc and tumult of war. But the country was now at peace; and in the romantic castle, which the royal bounty had made the property of the poet, their literary studies were pursued with mutual profit and delight. Of this meeting Spenser, in his beautiful pastoral, entitled "Colin Clout's come Home again," has left an account, disguised indeed by the colouring of a poetical imagination, but "agreeing," he informs us, "with the truth in circumstance and matter."*

* Dedication of Colin Clout to Sir Walter Raleigh.

He represents himself, while seated under the green alders by the romantic river Mulla meditating his rural minstrelsy, as suddenly addressed by a stranger who calls himself the Shepherd of the Ocean,-describing Raleigh under this fanciful appellation.

"One day (quoth he) I sat, as was my trade,
Under the foot of Mole, that mountain hore,
Keeping my sheep amongst the cooly 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 knew not right,-
Whom, when I asked 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 that same shade,
Provoked me to play some pleasant fit;
And when he heard the musick which I made,
He found himself full greatly pleased at it."*

The stranger soon after borrows the pastoral reed of Colin Clout, and in tuneful rivalry displays his cunning in the art :

"Yet, æmuling my pipe, he took in hond

My pipe, before that æmuled of many,
And played thereon, (for well that skill he conn'd,)
Himself as skilful in that art as any.

He piped, I sung; and, when he sung, I piped;
By change of turns, each making other merry;
Neither envying other, nor envied :

So piped we, until we both were weary."+

Thestylis, one of the "swains that did about him play," inquires what was the ditty sung by Raleigh; and Spenser's answer, making allowance for its poetical drapery, corroborates the idea that he was suffering under the temporary displeasure of Elizabeth, whom he styles Cynthia the Lady of the Sea :

:

"That shall I eke (quoth he) to you declare,

His song was all a lamentable lay

Of great unkindness and of usage hard,

Of Cynthia the Lady of the Sea,

Which from her presence, faultless, him debarr'd:

*Todd's Spenser, vol. viii. p. 8.

+ Ibid. p. 9.

And ever and anon with singulfs rife,

He cried out, to make his undersong,

Ah! my love's queen, and goddess of my life!
Who shall me pity when thou dost me wrong?"*

The Shepherd of the Ocean, pitying that luckless lot which had banished Colin into a waste where he was forgotten, persuaded this tuneful wight to wend with him to behold his Cynthia,-in plain prose, Raleigh invited Spenser to court, that he might be introduced to the queen. The voyage to England, the wonders of the deep, and the noble description of the vessel huge "that danced upon the waters back to lond," must be familiar to all the lovers of English poetry in its best days. The description of the happiness of his country under the maiden queen, as contrasted with the miseries which the poet had lately witnessed, is striking and beautiful:

"Both heaven and heavenly graces do much more
(Quoth he) abound in that same land than this;
For there all happy peace and plenteous store
Conspire in one to make contented bliss.
No wailing there-nor wretchedness is heard ;
No bloody issues-nor no leprosies;
No griesly famine-nor no raging sweard;
No nightly bordragst-nor no hue and cries.
The shepherds there abroad may safely lie

On hills and downs, withouten dread or danger.
No ravenous wolves the good man's hope destroy;
No outlaws fell affray the forest ranger;
There learned arts do flourish in great honour:
And poets' wits are had in peerless price;
Religion hath lay power to rest upon her,
Advancing virtue and suppressing vice.
For end, all good, all grace there freely grows,
Had people grace it gratefully to use;
For God his gifts there plenteously bestows,

But graceless men them greatly do abuse." +

But the visit of Raleigh had more important consequences. During his residence at Kilcolman, Spenser submitted to him the three first cantos of his Fairy Queen, then in an unfinished state. It is a common

*Todd's Spenser, vol. viii. p. 13.

Bordrags, border ravages. Todd's Spenser, vol. viii. p. 20.