The doubtfull damzell DARE not yet committ
Her fingle perfon to their barbarous TRUTH;
They, in compaffion-

Are wonne with pitty and unwonted RUTH;] I am certain all is not right here, firft 'tis very plain DARE fhould be DARES, or DAR'D. Next if the words were to change place, how much more proper and elegant would the sense appear?

The doubtful damzel DARES not yet commit Her fingle perfon to their barbarous RUTHShe dared not to truft herself to their barbarous, uncivilized, undifciplined pity; RUTH; Whatever compaffion they might poffibly have, yet it was undisciplined, and barbarous, to that therefore she would not commit her single per

fon.

They in compaffion-And wonder

Are wonne with pity and unwonted TRUTH

But

If we follow the old reading then 'tis, Are won
with pity and unwonted PITY; or RUTH.
fee how elegant TRUTH comes in here, as I
have altered it, for fhe was TRUTH: Thus
therefore let us read the whole paffage,

"The doubtfull damzell DARES not yet commit
• Her fingle perfon to their barbarous RUTH;
But ftill twixt feare and hope amaz'd doth fitt,
• Late-learn'd what harme to hafty truft enju'th:
They, in compaffion of her tender youth,
And wonder of her beautie foveraine

• Are wonne with pity and unwonted TRUTH.
XIV.

SYLVANUS.] In this ftanza, and that above
St. 7. He is called Old Sylvanus: and fo below
and worshipped anciently, by the countrymen,
St. 16. He was the ancient god of the woods,
Agricolae prifci-Silvanum lacte piabant, Hor. ii.
Epift. i. 143. Te, pater Silvane tutor finium.
Epod. ii. 22. And fee Virgil. viii. 600. Old is
his epithet in Virgil, G. ii. 494.
Panaque, Silvanumque Senem.

Ovid characterizing him (Met. xiv. 639.)
makes him a young-old man.
Silvanúfque, fuis femper juvenilior annis.

But our poet varies in these little circumstances and adapts them to his own mythology and story.

And aged limbs on cypreffe ftadle flout-
His weake Steps governing,
Virg. G. i. 20.

Et teneram ab radice ferens, Silvane, cupressum.
He is faid to carry the cypress tree on account
of the love he bore to Cyparisus, who was
changed into a tree of that name. The story
vius, on Virg. G. i. 20.
of his transformation is told differently by Ser-
And by Ovid Met.
x. Fab. 3. Spenfer follows chiefly Servius,
riffum nomine, qui habebat manfuetiffimam cervam.
Silvanus deus eft filvarum. hic amavit puerum Cypa-
hanc cum Silvanus nefcius occidiffet, puer eft extinétus
dolore: quem amator deus in cupreffum arborem ejus
naminis vertit, quam pro folatio portare dicitur.
Compare Natal. Com. L. v. C. x. He carries
the cypress in his hand in memory of his love,
and for fupport of his steps.

follow. The 2d quarto and the folio editions, read, Of Bacchus.Hughes in his edition,

If Bacchus

He wonders what makes them fo glad, OR furely they had been drinking wine, [invent, is Latin; they had found grapes, and had been drinking their juice.] OR they had been celebrating the mad rites of Cybele. But what have thefe Satyrs with the rites of Cybele? Silvanus might think them intoxicated with wine, or frantick with celebrating the orgies of Bacchus: and this fuppofition is highly proper, the other not fo. What fhall we fay then? that the poet wrote one name for another? which is no unusual thing. Or that the half-learned printer miftook his copy? Or that he, in revifal of his work, would have altered it?-Certainly the repetition of the name would not have been without its elegance,

Far off he wonders, what them makes fo glad, OR BACCHUS merry fruit they did invent, OR BACCHUS franticke rites have made them mad. We offer our various conjectures to the reader, which we might fupport with numberlefs authorities, but he is to judge for himself.

During which time her gentle wit fhe plyes, To teach them truth, which worshipt her in vaine, And made her th' image of idolatryes: But when their bootleffe zeal fhe did reftrayne From her own worship, they her Affe would worship fayn.] Spenfer is fcriptural in his expreffions;

-Which worshipt her in vain.

i. e. falfely. Exod. xx. 7. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. i. e. Thou fhalt not forfwear thyfelf. Prov. xxx. 9. Left I be poor and fleal, and take the name of my God in vain. Vanities in the scripture language are idols, falfe gods. 'Tis to be remembered that

UNA reprefents Chriftian Truth: forfaken by the great, fhe goes amongst the ignorant, where not only the creature inftead of the creator, but the image, for the thing imaged, is mistaken and adored. 'Twas objected to the ancient Chriftians that they worshipped an Affe. So in Minucius Felix, Sect. ix. Audio eos turpiffimae pecudis caput afini confecratum ineptâ nefcio qua perfuafione venerari. And in Sect. xxviii. Inde eft quod audire te dicis caput afmi rem nobis effe diviAnd thus Epiphanius of the Gnofticks, φασὶ δὲ τὸν Σαβαὼθ οι μὲν ἕνα μορφὴν ἔχειν, οἱ δὲ χόιρα. The poet's mentioning these Satyrs or rufticks, worshipping her Affe, feems to hint at what is above cited from Minucius Felix and Epiphanius. Confider likewise the diftreffed picture of the church at this time; Una is feparated from her Knight who should defend her; and is forced to take up her abode in the woods, among wide falvages: Tis a continued allegory: And these Satyrs allegorized are ignorant Chriftians.

nam.

XX.

It fortuned a noble warlike knight-] If I have the right clew to this poem, Spenfer feems to have in view fome hiftorical allufion. Who then is Sir Satyrane in this continued allego

ry? Some knight perhaps belonging to the court of the Faery Queen: and the character given of Sir John Perrot, exactly fuits to his type, Sir Satyrane: he was thought to have been a fon of K. Henry VIII. which explains, St. 21, 22. Queen Elizabeth made him Lord Deputy of Ireland; and his behaviour like that of Sir Satyrane was always rough and honeft: his breeding had but little of the courtier. And as he knew not what was ill in himself, fo he never fufpected it in others: Effe quàm videri bonus malebat. See B. iii. C. 7. St. 29.

Pilgrims were those who were going their pilgrimages; Palmers, thofe who returned from their pilgrimages, and carried a staff or bough of a palm-tree, in token of their having performed their vows. But this diftinction is not always obferved. Their furniture was (fomewhat like the Cynicks of antiquity) a fcrip to put their needments in; a fcollop fhell to drink out of; and a staff to walk with. The following from P. Plowman, Fol. xxviii. 2. might not be unacceptable to the reader,

Tyll late was and longe ere they a leode mette
Appareled as a paynime in pylgraimes wyfe:-
He bare a burden bounden wyth a brode lyfte,
In a wythe wandis wyfe wounden aboute;
A bole and a bagge he bare by his fide,
An hundred amples on his hatte fette
Signes of Sinai, and fhelles of Galice,
And many a crouch on his cloke and keyes of Rome,
And the vernicle before, for men should knowe,
And fe by hys fignes, whom he fo fought hadde.

And I would hence explain Milton, who has borrowed this epithet from Spenfer, for he calls the chaos, a BOYLING gulf the foaming deep-a boggy fyrts, neither fea, nor yet dry land-whofe BOYLING gulf Tamely endur'd a bridge of wondrous length.

B. ii. v. 1027. Boyling, i. e. rifing in furges like the troubled feas. But Spenfer may include the meaning of burning hot, from the idea of water boyling in a cauldron.

Quos notus ficco violentus aeftu

Torret ardentes RECOQUENS arenas.

Boet. Confol. Phil.

XXXVIII.

A forry fight-] Shakespeare has the fame expreffion, where Macbeth, looking on his hands, after the murder of the king, fays,

This is a forry fight.' Prefently after we have a fcriptural phrafe, Their blades drunk with blood, Deut. xxxii. 42. I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, Jerem. xlvi. 10. The fword fhall be made drunk with their blood. Thus metaphorically Homer calls the skin of a bull drunk with fat, ebriam pinguedine, i. e. valde perfusam, madentem pinguedine, μεθύεσαν αλοιφῇ. 11. ς'. 390. -What more? Quid plura? riigooa;-With paynim knife, i. e. a sword, from tips. This word frequently occurs with this meaning. XXXIX.

Ah! deareft lord, quoth fhe, how might that beeAh! dearest dame, quoth he-] One would imagine that Una never would have addreft this poor pilgrim with, dearest lord-I have not altered the pointing; but fuppofing one should alter it, and think that Una, lifting her eyes to heaven, fhould in a kind of exclamation fay, Ah deareft Lord! Good God, how might that be? -The wicked Archimago, with malicious wit, takes it to himself, and farcaftically replies, Ab deareft dame-Is not all this decorum, and agreeable to the characters of both?

Ah dearest Lord! quoth fhe, how might that beHere are two words in this ftanza fpelt the fame Ab; dearest dame! quoth he, how might I feebut different in fignification, the floutest knight that ever wonne, i. e. that ever conquered in battle-not farr away he hence doth wonne, i. e. doth dwell. Germ. wonen habitare. Chaucer ufes it, and Milton has admitted it in his Poem, vii. 457.

-out of the ground up rofe, As from his laire, the wild beaft, where he wonns In foreft wilde. XLI.

Faire knighthood fowly shamed, and doeft vaunt-] If we fuppofe a word to be left out here either in hafty writing, or by the printer; with much greater fpirit, and with better metre, we may thus read,

That haft with knightlesse guile, and trecherous traine,
Faire knighthood fowly fhamd. And doft thou vaunt
That good knight of the redcroffe to have flain?
XLII.

But had he beene, where earft his armes were lent-] But had he been in the place of Archimago [fee C. 3. St. 37, 38.] He and not the enchaunter fhould have rued for it.

XLIV.

As when two bores-] This fame comparison the poet has introduced in B. 4. C. 4. St. 29. As two wild bores together grapling goe, Chaufing and foming choler, each against his foe.

But he seems to have borrowed it from Chaucer, where he describes the combat between Palemon and Arcite; in the knight's tale, 1160.

As wild bores gan they to fight and fmite,
That frothen white as fome for ire wode;
Up to the ancle fought they in ther blade.

Let me add Eurip. Phaeniff. v. 1402.
Κάπροι δ' ὅπως θήγοντες αγρίαν γένυν,
Συνῆψαν, ἀφρῷ διάβροχοι γενειαδας.

And Statius Theb. xi. 530, from Euripides,
Fulmineos veluti praeceps cum cominus egit
Ira fues, ftrictifque erexit pectora fetis :
Igne tremunt oculi—

Fyrfte he muft of very force and myght Unto oultrance with these bulles TO FIGHT. Where you fee the very words of Spencer; and to is expreffive of violence and energy: Chaucer ufes it very frequent,

For thy fpeche I woll thee to race.

Plowman's Tale, 3204.

Alas, quoth fhe, my herte woll to breake.

Cuck. and Nighting. 206.

His field to dafbed was with fwerds and maces. Troil. and Creff. ii. 640.

So in Judges, ix. 53. And a certain woman caft a piece of a milftone upon Abimilechs head, and all to brake his full. You fee that to thus prefixed to verbs gives them force and energy. See Somner in To and æl. This old expreffion, in all the editions but the first, is brought down to the lowest profe, So they two fight-where we fee the plain marks of a half-learned corrector of the prefs.

XLVIII.

But for to tell her lamentable cace,

And eke this battels end, will need another place.] The poet foon returns to Una, and her lamentable cafe; but no mention is made of Satyrane till B. iii. C. vii. St. 28. Where he attacks the monster that purfued Florimel. This is plainly an omiffion, if not a forgetfulness. Our poet in imitation of Boyardo and Ariofto often leaves

entire.

Or as I rather think in this place to is augmentatively or expletively, as Dr. Hicks obferves, to non raro ut a ge y eft merum augmentum fyllabicum. Thus Lydgate of the wars of Troy, B. i. C. ii.

fuch a manner, as feeming rather too perplexing to the breaking off of the story, and to the to the reader, if he does not diligently attend connexion of it again. But I cannot vindicate thus entirely leaving the reader at a lofs to guess this battles end, when he tells us too that it will need another place.