[80] Of AKENSIDE few particulars have been recorded, for the friend
who best knew him was of so cold a temper with regard to
public opinion, that he has not, in his account, revealed a
solitary feature in the character of the poet. Yet Akenside's
mind and manners were of a fine romantic cast, drawn from the
moulds of classical antiquity. Such was the charm of his
converse, that he even heated the cold and sluggish mind of
Sir John Hawkins, who has, with unusual vivacity, described a
day spent with him in the country. As I have mentioned the
fictitious physician in "Peregrine Pickle," let the same page
show the real one. I shall transcribe Sir John's forgotten
words--omitting his "neat and elegant dinner:"--"Akenside's
conversation was of the most delightful kind, learned,
instructive, and, without any affectation of wit, cheerful and
entertaining. One of the pleasantest days of my life I passed
with him, Mr. Dyson, and another friend, at Putney--where the
enlivening sunshine of a summer's day, and the view of an
unclouded sky, were the least of our gratifications. In
perfect good-humour with himself and all about him, he seemed
to feel a joy that he lived, and poured out his gratulations
to the great Dispenser of all felicity in expressions that
Plato himself might have uttered on such an occasion. In
conversations with select friends, and those whose studies had
been nearly the same with his own, it was a usual thing with
him, in libations to the memory of eminent men among the
ancients, to bring their characters into view, and expatiate
on those particulars of their lives that had rendered them
famous." Observe the arts of the ridiculer! he seized on the
romantic enthusiasm of Akenside, and turned it to _the cookery
of the ancients_!
[81] This pamphlet has been ascribed to John Lilly, but it must be
confessed that its native vigour strangely contrasts with the
famous _Euphuism_ of that refined writer. [There can, however,
be little doubt that he was the author of this tract, as he is
alluded to more than once as such by Harvey in his "Pierce's
Supererogation;"--"would that Lilly had alwaies been _Euphues_
and never _Pap-hatchet_."--ED.]
[82] Tarleton appears to have had considerable power of extemporising
satirical rhymes on the fleeting events of his own day. A
collection of his Jests was published in 1611; the following
is a favourable specimen:--"There was a nobleman asked
Tarleton what he thought of soldiers in time of peace. Marry,
quoth he, they are like chimneys in summer."--ED.
[83] A long list of Elderton's popular rhymes is given by Ritson in
his "Bibliographia Poetica." One of them, on the "King of
Scots and Andrew Browne," is published in Percy's "Reliques,"
who speaks of him as "a facetious fuddling companion, whose
tippling and whose rhymes rendered him famous among his
contemporaries." Ritson is more condensed and less civil in
his analysis; he simply describes him as "a ballad-maker by
profession, and drunkard by habit."--ED.
[84] Harvey, in the title-page of his "Pierce's Supererogation," has
placed an emblematic woodcut, expressive of his own
confidence, and his contempt of the wits. It is a lofty
palm-tree, with its durable and impenetrable trunk; at its
feet lie a heap of serpents, darting their tongues, and filthy
toads, in vain attempting to pierce or to pollute it. The
Italian motto, wreathed among the branches of the palm,
declares, _Il vostro malignare non giova nulla_: Your
malignity avails nothing.
[85] Among those Sonnets, in Harvey's "Foure Letters, and certaine
Sonnets, especially touching Robert Greene and other parties
by him abused, 1592," there is one, which, with great
originality of conception, has an equal vigour of style, and
causticity of satire, on Robert Greene's death. John Harvey
the physician, who was then dead, is thus made to address the
town-wit, and the libeller of himself and his family. If
Gabriel was the writer of this singular Sonnet, as he
undoubtedly is of the verses to Spenser, subscribed Hobynol,
it must be confessed he is a Poet, which he never appears in
his English hexameters:--
JOHN HARVEY the Physician's Welcome to ROBERT GREENE!
"Come, fellow Greene, come to thy gaping grave,
Bid vanity and foolery farewell,
That ouerlong hast plaid the mad-brained knaue,
And ouerloud hast rung the bawdy bell.
Vermine to vermine must repair at last;
No fitter house for busie folke to dwell;
Thy conny-catching pageants are past[86],
Some other must those arrant stories tell;
These hungry wormes thinke long for their repast;
Come on; I pardon thy offence to me;
It was thy living; be not so aghast!
A fool and a physitian may agree!
And for my brothers never vex thyself;
They are not to disease a buried elfe."
[86] Greene had written "The Art of Coney-catching." He was a great
adept in the arts of a town-life.
[87] Sir Egerton Brydges in his reprint of "Greene's Groatsworth of
Wit," has given the only passage from "The Quip for an Upstart
Courtier," which at all alludes to Harvey's father. He says
with great justice, "there seems nothing in it sufficiently
offensive to account for the violence of Harvey's anger." The
Rev. A. Dyce, so well known from his varied researches in our
dramatic literature, is of opinion that the offensive passage
has been removed from the editions which have come down to us.
Without some such key it is impossible to comprehend Harvey's
implacable hatred, or the words of himself and friends when
they describe Greene as an "impudent railer in an odious and
desperate mood," or his satire as "spiteful and villanous
abuse." The occasion of the quarrel was an attack by Richard
Harvey, who had the folly to "mis-term all our poets and
writers about London, _piperly make-plays_ and _make-bates_,"
as Nash informs us; "hence Greene being chief agent to the
company, for he writ more than four other, took occasion to
canvass him a little,--about some seven or eight lines, which
hath plucked on an invective of so many leaves."--ED.
[88] Nash was a great favourite with the wits of his day. One calls
him "our true English Aretine," another, "Sweet satyric Nash,"
a third describes his Muse as "armed with a gag-tooth (a
tusk), and his pen possessed with Hercules's furies." He is
well characterised in "The Return from Parnassus."
"His style was witty, tho' he had some gall;
Something he might have mended, so may all;
Yet this I say, that for _a mother's wit_,
Few men have ever seen the like of it."
Nash abounds with "Mother-wit;" but he was also educated at
the University, with every advantage of classical studies.
[89] _Bombast_ was the tailors' term in the Elizabethan era for the
stuffing of horsehair or wool used for the large breeches then
in fashion; hence the term was applied to high-sounding
phrases--"all sound and fury, signifying nothing."--ED.
[90] These were the loose heavy breeches so constantly worn by Swiss
soldiers as to become a national costume, and which has been
handed down to us by the artists of the day in a variety of
forms. They obtained the name of _galeaze_, from their
supposed resemblance to the broad-bottomed ship called a
galliass.--ED.
[91] A cade is 500 herrings; a great quantity of an article of no
value.
[92] Harvey's love of dress, and desire to indulge it cheaply, is
satirically alluded to by Nash, in confuting Harvey's
assertion that Greene's wardrobe at his death was not worth
more than three shillings--"I know a broker in a spruce
leather jerkin shall give you thirty shillings for the doublet
alone, if you can help him to it. Hark in your ear! he had a
very fair cloak, with sleeves of a goose green, it would serve
you as fine as may be. No more words; if you be wise, play the
good husband, and listen after it, you may buy it ten
shillings better cheap than it cost him. By St. Silver, it is
good to be circumspect in casting for the world; there's a
great many _ropes_ go to ten shillings? If you want a greasy
pair of silk stockings to shew yourself in the court, they are
there to be had too, amongst his moveables."--ED.
[93] This unlucky Venetian velvet coat of Harvey had also produced a
"Quippe for an Vpstart Courtier, or a quaint dispute between
Veluet-breeches and Cloth-breeches," which poor Harvey
declares was "one of the most licentious and intolerable
invectives." This blow had been struck by Greene on the
"Italianated" Courtier.
[94] "Pierce's Supererogation, or a new praise of the Old Asse,"
1593.
[95] Harvey's opponents were much nimbler penmen, and could strike
off these lampoons with all the facility of writers for the
stage. Thus Nash declares, in his "Have with you to Saffron
Walden," that he leaves Lilly, who was also attacked, to
defend himself, because "in as much time as he spends in
taking tobacco one week, he can compile that would make
Gabriell repent himself all his life after."--ED.
[96] He had written an antiquarian work on the descent of Brutus on
our island.--The party also who at the University attacked the
opinions of Aristotle were nicknamed the _Trojans_, as
determined enemies of the _Greeks_.