The queen rested, during the heat of the day, at the antique royal palace of Holdenby, which she examined.' The intense heat of that midsummer forced the royal party to proceed, in the cool of the evening, to Althorpe. "That night," says Anne Clifford, "we went along with the queen's train, in which was an infinite number of coaches." As the royal cortège advanced through Althorpe park, concerts of wind instruments played at various stations; and as they approached a copse of young wood near the gardens, the Masque of the Fairies was commenced by a satyr perched in a tree, who thus expressed himself:"Here, there, and everywhere, Some solemnities are near;

As these changes strike mine ear,
My pipe and I a part will bear."

He leaped down from the tree, and peered in the faces of prince Henry and the queen; then resumed

"That is Cyparissus' face,

And the dame hath Syrinx grace

Sure they are of heavenly race."

He then hid himself in the wood again, while, to the sound of soft music, hidden in the copse, a bevy of fairies and their queen, (who were acted by the fairest young ladies of Northamptonshire,) appeared, and after dancing various roundels on the park-sward, queen Mab addressed her majesty―

"Hail and welcome fairest queen!
Joy hath never perfect been
To the fays that haunt this green,
Had they not this evening seen.
Now they print it on the ground,
With their feet, in figures round,

Marks which ever will be found."

The satyr peeped out of the thicket, and interrupted Mab by saying to the queen

"Trust her not, you bonni-belle,
She will forty leasings tell;

Queen Mab. Satyr, we must have a spell

For your tongue, it runs too fleet.
I do know your pranks right well.

Satyr. Not so nimbly as your feet,

When about the cream-bowls sweet,
You, and all your elves do meet.

'Here were curious figures of giants among the ornaments, like those at Guildhall; but giants, palace, and all, were demolished by Cromwell and his destructives.

Fairy.

This is Mab, the mistress fairy,
That doth nightly rob the dairy.
She can start our franklins' daughters
In their sleep with shrieks and laughters,
And on sweet St. Agnes' night
Feed them with a promised sight-
Some of husbands, some of lovers,
Which an empty dream discovers;
And in hopes that you would come here,
Yester eve, the lady Summer,1
She invited to a banquet.

Mistress, this is only spite,

For you would not, yesternight,
Kiss him at the cock-shut light.

Queen Mab. Fairies, pinch him black and blue!

Now you have him make him rue."

The fairies pinched him, and he ran away, crying for mercy, into the wood. Queen Mab then addressed her majesty :

"Pardon, lady, this wild strain,
Common to the sylvan train,
That do skip about this plain-
Elves apply to your gyre again.
And whilst some do hop the ring,
Some shall play, while some shall sing
Oriana's welcoming.

SONG TO THE QUEEN.

This is she, this she,

In whose world of grace,
Every season, person, place
That receives her happy be.
For with no less

Than a kingdom's happiness

Doth she our households bless,

And ours above the rest.

Long live Oriana 2

T'exceed (whom she succeeds) our late Diana.”

The masque then led to the desirable incident of presenting the queen with a jewel, which was thus elegantly effected:

"Queen Mab. Madam, now, an end to make,

Deign a simple gift to take,

Only for the fairies' sake,

Who about you still shall wake.

From these lines, it appears that Anne of Denmark was expected at Althorpe, on Midsummer eve, but did not come till the evening of Midsummer day.

2 Ben Jonson, the poet of Anne of Denmark, celebrated her under the names of Oriana and Bellanna; by "our late Diana," he alluded to queen Elizabeth.

"Tis done only to supply
His impaired courtesy,
Who, since Thamyra did die,1
Hath not brook'd a lady's eye,
Nor allowed about his place,
Any of the female race;
Only we are free to trace
All his grounds, as he to chase,
For which bounty to us lent

Of him, un'knowledged or unsent,
We prepared this compliment."

Mab then presented her majesty with the jewel, and after due warning that fairy-gifts were never to be mentioned, she and her elves performed fantastic roundels, and departed into the thicket, with these words:

The satyr, on the departure of his fair enemies, then skipped out of the wood, and, after some preamble, introduced the heir of sir Robert Spencer, a boy of twelve years old, leading a dog at the head of a troop of young foresters, the sons of the neighbouring gentry, dressed in hunters' garb. The youthful lord was presented to prince Henry, and made obeisance to his royal guests, while the satyr pronounced these words:

"See, for instance, where he sends

His son, his heir, who humbly bends
Low as is his father's earth

To the queen that gave you birth.
Rise up, sir, I will betray
All I think you have to say:
That your father gives you here
(Freely as to him you were),
To the service of this prince;

And with you these instruments

Of his wild and sylvan trade.

The bow was Phoebe's, and the horn

By Orion often worn;

The dog of Spartan breed, and good,
As can ring within a wood-

The grief of sir Robert Spencer, for the loss of his beloved consort Thamyra, the daughter of sir Francis Willoughby, thus beautifully alluded to, by Ben Jonson, was no poetic fiction. He lost her in 1597: she left him several children; but though he survived her thirty years, he never made a second choice. Sir Robert Spencer was ennobled soon after this elegant reception of the queen; he is supposed to have been absent at this juncture. See Nichols' Progresses of James I., vol. i. p. 182, for the whole of this rare masque.

Thence his name is1-you shall try
How he hunteth instantly.

But perhaps the queen, your mother,
Rather doth affect some other
Sport than coursing. We will prove
Which her highness most doth love.
Hunters, let the woods resound;

They shall have their welcome crown'd
With a brace of bucks to ground."

At this point, the woods of Althorpe rang with the music of horns, and a brace of fine deer being turned out, "were fortunately killed," adds Ben Jonson, "just as they were meant to be, in the sight of her majesty, queen Anne."

The next day was Sunday, and it is emphatically noted, that the queen rested. But little rest there was for her on the morrow, when the population of the mid-counties thronged to Althorpe, and sought audience in such numbers, that the rest of Ben Jonson's entertainment could not be heard or seen. A comic address was prepared, to be spoken by Nobody, who ushered in a ballet of country morrisdancers. Nobody was attired in a pair of trunk hose, which came up to his neck; his arms were put through the pockets; his face was extinguished with a hat that came down to his chin. His address commenced with

"If my outside move your laughter,
Pray, Jove, my inside be thereafter.
Queen, prince, duke, earls,
Countesses, you courtly pearls!
And I hope no mortal sin
If I put less ladies in.

Fair, saluted be ye all,
At this time it doth befall;

We are usher to a morris,

A kind of masque, where of good store is,

In the country here about."

But here the throng of country gentry, pressing to pay their homage to their new queen, overwhelmed the morrisdancers above-mentioned, and reduced Mr. Nobody to his original insignificance, by cutting short the remainder of his harangue. There was likewise an address to the queen, prepared for a youth who headed a deputation of boys, the sons of the neighbouring gentry:—

1 The name of the dog presented to prince Henry was "Ringwood." The whole of this masque raises alternate remembrances, of Shakespeare and Milton; but the Midsummer Night's Dream certainly preceded it.

"And will you, then, mirror of queens, depart?
Shall nothing stay you? Not my master's heart,
Which pants to lose the comfort of your light,
And see his day ere it be old grow night ?"

Prince Henry was then addressed:

"And you, dear lord, on whom my eager eye.
Doth feed itself, but cannot satisfy;

Oh, shoot up fast in spirit as in years,

That when upon her head proud Europe wears
Her stateliest tire, you may appear thereon
The richest gem, without a paragon;
Shine bright and fixed as the Arctic star,

And when slow Time hath made you fit for war,
Look over the salt ocean, and think where
You may but lead us forth, who grow up here,'
Against a day when our officious swords

Shall speak our actions better than our words."

Such was the first introduction, to Anne of Denmark, of the poetic genius of her era, which shone so brightly during the reigns of her husband and her son. To do her

justice, she appreciated the noble powers of him who was only second to Shakespeare: Ben Jonson was henceforth the queen's poet, par excellence, and the author of most of the beautiful masques with which she afterwards amused her court.

queen

"From Althorpe," continues the journal of lady Anne Clifford, "the queen went to sir Hatton' Fermor's, where the king met her, and there were such an infinite company of lords and ladies, and other people, that the country scarcely could lodge them. From thence, the court removed, and were banqueted, with great royalty, by my father, (George, earl of Cumberland,) at Grafton, where the king and were entertained with speeches and delicate presents." Grafton, the ancient royal seat, so linked to the memory of queen Elizabeth Woodville, was now the property of that splendid noble, George Clifford, earl of Cumberland, who, in a singular manner, distinguished himself, on land and sea, as "chevalier at tournaments, ruffling gallant at court, gambler, author, pirate, and maritime discoverer." It may

'It will be remembered, that these majestic verses were written for the young gentlemen of Northamptonshire, who were about the age of prince Henry.

2

* Mr. Nichols, in his Progresses, says sir George Fermor.