this old spot, I found that the mansion had entirely disappeared. In the centre of the lawn where so late stood that noble pile, was a heap of bricks and stones, while beneath small portions of the arched cellaring were still standing. On inquiring in the village, I was told that the house had been pulled down last year, the materials having been sold by auction; and that during this work of destruction some of the floorings had given way, burying a portion of the dwelling in the vaults below, and with it the walls of the great saloon, reputed to be the work of Salvator Rosa. We have often heard of a state of melancholy repose; and when, previous to the destruction of Lady Place, the visitor entered on the lawn with its long rank grass, and beheld a large mansion, which at the first glance appeared as if never touched since the days of Elizabeth, while around it some magnificent spreading cedars still pointed to where the pleasure grounds had been; and then passing along its vast marble hall, equalled by few for its grandeur and proportions, and through innumerable apartments, their walls attesting much of their original splendour, but in none the slightest token of habitation or the smallest mark of furniture, all alike silent and desolate,-this feeling was experienced in a very extraordinary degree. It is a little curious to mark the chances and changes of this place and its inhabitants. Of the piety of the fair Lecelina, the foundress of the priory, and of its peaceful and sluggish inhabitants for uear five hundred years, the destruction of the establishment and a noble mansion arising on its founda. tions from the legalized piracy of a successful and noble* Buccaneer, while his gallant descendant† by his secret counsel, held in a vault perhaps over the very spot where lay the mouldering remains of the fair foundress of the priory, successfully urges the complete overthrow of that form of worship of which she appears to have been so zealous and pious a supporter. With the extinction of the family of Lovelace, the glory of Lady Place appears to have departed, and one tomb in the little village church, though crumbling in decay, attests something of the former magnificence of the Lovelaces Lords of Hurley. WICCAMICUS. Yours, &c. RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW. THE PHOENIX NEST. 1593. A COPY of that very scarce miscellany of poetical rarities, The Phoenix Nest, 4to. 1593, coming to my hands lately, I was curious to ascertain how far the impression of it in vol. ii. of Heliconia; comprising a Selection of English Poetry of the Elizabethan Age, 4to. 1815, was correct. I compared the original and the reprint with great accuracy, and found, until I arrived at the poem headed "A most rare and excellent Dreame," &c. that the variations were chiefly literal and not importantly affecting the sense of any of the passages in which they occurred. Here, however, I met with most singular omissions, six whole stanzas, in different parts of the poem, being wanting in the impression in Heliconia. How to account for this defect I know not, for the late Mr. Park, who edited the work, was very accurate in his own transcripts, and where he did not copy the pieces himself, I believe, he usually went carefully over them. Sir Richard Lovelace, first Lord Lovelace, of Hurley, a companion of Sir Francis Drake. He built the mansion with the money gained in his expedition. To this nobleman Shirley dedicated his "Lady of Pleasure." † John, third Lord, an early friend of the Revolution, was taken prisoner going to join the Prince of Orange. At the accession of the Prince he was made Captain of the band of Pensioners. He lived in a most prodigal and splendid style, which involved him in much difficulty, and at his death a great part of the estates were sold. A view of Hurley church, and a full description of its architecture and sepulchral memorials, is in preparation for an early number. EDIT. There are not two editions of The Phonix Nest: the only one known is that of 1593, which Mr. Park professed to follow; but it is possible that the stanzas may be found in one copy and omitted in another even of the same year. Such variations, it will be admitted by those who are acquainted with the original copies of the productions of our ancestors, are now and then to be discovered; and an instance of the kind came to my knowledge only the other day, which it may be worth while here to point out, before I proceed to supply the defects of the impression of The Phoenix Nest as it is reprinted in Heliconia. The work I refer to is a volume of a character not very dissimilar to that of The Phoenix Nest, viz. a poetical miscellany, though the contents of it were probably all written by the same author, H. C., whom I believe to have been neither Henry Chettle according to Ritson, nor Henry Constable according to Warton. It is called The Forrest of Fancy, 4to. 1579; and I take it to be quite clear that there were not two impressions of it, although two copies I have examined of the same date differ very materially. One of these was the property of the late Mr. Bindley, and the other was sold by Evans of Pall Mall a few days ago the latter wanted the concluding leaf, but all the rest was perfect. The variation between these copies was two-fold. Directly after the titlepage of that belonging to Mr. Bindley came "The Epistle to the Reader;" whereas in the copy sold recently by Evans, after the title-page followed four pages of verses, viz. 1. An Address from Fancy to the Buyers of the Book; 2. Some stanzas headed "The Authour to the Reader;" and 3. A copy of complimentary verses to H. C. entitled "R. W. to the Reader in the Authour's behalfe." There is no great merit in these preliminary pieces, but one of them gives the information that the work was originally sold for a shilling. Another remarkable difference between the two copies is, that Mr. Bindley's, near the end, contained an epistle from "T. O. being enamored of a ritch yong Gentlewoman," &c. which is entirely omitted in the other copy of 1579. I could mention other minor dissemblances (if I may use the word), but the above will be sufficient, and they afford a curious point of bibliography connected with a work of the utmost rarity, and intrinsically of considerable value. I now return to The Phoenix Nest, 4to. 1593, in order to supply, for the information of the readers of the Gentleman's Magazine, the six stanzas wanting in the reprint in Heliconia, either because the copy used by Mr. Park had them not, or because the transcriber he employed unluckily omitted them, the important error never having been till now detected. That less than his usual care was bestowed by Mr. Park upon this work is evident from the fact, that although he professed to give the whole verbatim et literatim, in the "Dreame" alone there are not fewer than between eighty and ninety aberrations, more or less trifling, from the original. The first omission occurs on p. 47 of Heliconia, after the line- where the following charming stanza ought to be inserted : After this lapsus the transcriber went on pretty accurately for two stanzas, when we come to an omission of as many more; and there is nothing in the wording to explain how it happened. If two different stanzas terminated with the same word, a person might possibly mistake one for the other; but here we have no excuse of the sort. Heliconia, p. 47, after the line "And as they settled, backe againe retier," these two stanzas should be inserted: "Next neighbor heerunto in due discent I doubt not those that fine conceited be Sees somewhat further than mine eies might see." The reader will now please to turn to p. 50 of Heliconia, and he will there find a stanza thus ending: "The rest of that my toong had left unspoken." After this line the following stanza ought to have found a place, but did not. Without this connecting link the poem is not intelligible, and a quotation is commenced without any information who is the speaker. The mere reading over of the proof-sheets, and the finding of them inconsequential nonsense, ought to have led to the detection of this omission. On p. 52 of Heliconia one of the stanzas closes thus: - "To let all things run in communitie," which from the inverted comma would seem to be the end of a speech, while the next stanza beginning, "With favor, ladie! give me leave to speake," reads as if it were the opening of a new address by the lover to his lady; whereas the subsequent stanza, which ought to have intervened, establishes that the whole was one continued supplication. "An easie thing for you to overcome (Faire Ladie) him that is so deepe your thrall; If you do speake, or if you nought expresse, Therefore, I am authorised in saying, either that Mr. Park re-printed from a copy of the Phoenix Nest which was in itself strangely incomplete, or his impression, instead of being moderately accurate, is a melancholy mutilation of a fine poem. I have supplied five of the missing stanzas, and what follows is the sixth, which ought to come in on p. 58 of Heliconia: the line "As not to have my good but in a dreame," should precede it. 66 Why art thou not (O Dreame) the same you seeme, Or doe we of their woorthines misdeeme, The above forms the penultimate stanza of the poem, and could only have been omitted by the extreme of carelessness, unless my other supposition be well founded. However, it is useless not to admit that Mr. Park here executed his task with too much haste, and in his notes he now and then commits singular errors. The word "misdeeme" in the foregoing stanza reminds me of one of them, which it may be worth while to point out. It is in reference to a poem on p. 130 of the Phoenix Nest in Heliconia, which terminates with this line, "Such life leads Love, entangled with misdeemes." Now, it is very true, as Mr. Park observes (p. 155), that "misdeemes" is here" used as a substantive," but it is not " used in the sense of misdoings," but of misapprehensions, as is obvious not only from the line itself but from the whole context. The error is quite as remarkable when he tells us (p. 151) that " Gramercy" is "contracted from Grant me mercy." The blunder was originally Dr. Johnson's, but Mr. Park ought to have been better read in Chaucer than to have fallen into it. While upon The Phoenix Nest allow me to advert to some of the poems in it subscribed "T. L. Gent." which are from the pen of Thomas Lodge, and by Ritson erroneously asserted to be taken from Lodge's Euphues Golden Legacie, meaning his Rosalynd, first printed in 1590. Many of them are in fact to be found in Lodge's Phillis, 4to. 1593, a work of excessive rarity, of which I never saw more than one copy, with which I collated the pieces in The Phoenix Nest: as that collation has enabled me to point out sundry mis-readings, mis-prints, and other variations, a few of them may be subjoined for the information of such as are interested in matters of the kind. On p. 62 is a poem without title, beginning, "Muses! helpe me, sorrow swarmeth," in the third line of which," Haples," as reprinted in The Phoenix Nest, ought to be Heavie according to the original in Phillis. The last stanza, on p. 63 of Heliconia, in Phillis, reads thus : : "Lovely Swaine, with luckie guiding, Once (but now no more) so frended; From the morne till day was ended." I own speeding and feeding, as the words stand in The Phoenix Nest, to be an improvement, but that is not according to Lodge's copy. On p. 64 of Heliconia is an important misprint, making nonsense of the whole passage: "Philip's son can with his finger Hide his fear, it is so little," &c. The true reading is scar, which, being printed with a long s, was misread fear in Phillis it stands scarre, which could not be so mistaken. On p. 75 of Heliconia occurs another poem by Lodge, also extracted in The Phoenix Nest from his Phillis, 1593, which begins "Now I finde thy lookes were fained," and the second stanza contains the following couplet, "All thy words I counted wittie; which may be the best reading, but in the original it is pritty instead of pittie. If you consider these particulars worth inserting, I will send you next month some new and interesting information respecting that earlier and on some accounts more valuable poetical miscellany, The Paradise of Dainty Devices. 1 am, &c. J. P. C. REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. Henry of Monmouth: or Memoirs of the Life and Character of Henry the Fifth, as Prince of Wales and King of England. By J. Endell Tyler, B.D. 2 vols. 8vo. Lond. 1838. NOVEL truths in matters of history may be promulgated in two very different ways; either, by simply enouncing them, together with their proofs, and then leaving them to make their own certain way; or, by attacking and vanquishing the leaders of opposing systems, and establishing the new opinions in their stead. The former mode is that of the apostle; he goes forth to bear witness to the truth, he is careless how it clashes with preconceived opinions, and never pauses to consider how it may be received or whom it may affect. He speaks what he knows, he testifies what he has seen, and is unconcerned as to what may be the consequences to the great Diana of the Ephesians. The latter mode is that of the controversialist; his course is a perpetual warfare, he builds upon ruins, and must drive out before he can enter and enjoy. Now one of the great faults of the present work is that it partakes too much of the controversial character. The author fights his way to the establishment of the immaculacy of Henry the Fifth, overturning, or fancying that he overturns, as he proceeds, Shakspeare and Hall on the one hand, and Fox the martyrologist, and Hume, and Lingard, and Sharon Turner, and Milner, and Nicolas, and a host of smaller fry, on the other. He writes, indeed, like the Irishman in the disturbed districts, with a sword in one hand and a pistol in the other, and his book is a long quarrel, or rather a succession of quarrels, from beginning to end. We give him credit for using his weapons, except in the instance of Hume, with all possible politeness; but not even the urbanity of Mr. Tyler can make " a duel in the form of a debate" otherwise than extremely disagreeable, nor, as we think, any thing GENT. MAG. VOL. X. but a very inefficient mode of arriving at the truth. The author's opinion of " Henry of Monmouth," as he somewhat romantically calls him throughout his work, is, that "He was bold and merciful and kind, but he was no libertine, in his youth; he was brave and generous and just, but he was no persecutor, in his manhood. On the throne he upheld the royal authority with mingled energy and mildness, and he approved himself to his subjects as a wise and beneficent King; in his private individual capacity he was a bountiful and considerate, though strict and firm master, a warm and sincere friend, a faithful and loving husband. He passed through life under the habitual sense of an overruling Providence; and, in his premature death, he left us the example of a Christian's patient and pious resignation to the Divine Will. As long as he lived he was an object of the most ardent and love; and, whilst the English monarchy enthusiastic admiration, confidence, and shall remain amongst the unforgotten things on earth, his memory will be honoured, and his name will be enrolled among the NOBLE and the GOOD." (Vol. I. p. xi.) frequently reiterated throughout the These extreme praises, which are book, are well known to be much at variance with the commonly received opinions respecting the youthful irregularities of the Conqueror of Agincourt opinions immortalised by Shakspeare, and delivered down to us by a long succession of historians. On which side lies the truth-with Mr. Tyler? or with the historians? That is the question debated in these Memoirs. On the part of Mr. Tyler there is is no mention of the Boar's Head on the abundance of negative evidence. There Rolls of Parliament; the adventure on Gad's Hill is not to be found amongst the fragments of the Proceedings of the does not occur upon the Pell Records; Privy Council; Mrs. Quickly's name neither Poins nor Doll Tear Sheet is alluded to in the letters from Prince Henry to the Council; nay, although the Prince was once accused of a little 20 |