The "poet-undertaker" had been having other troubles besides the doubts and delays of his long courtship. He was again sued by Roche, and was dispossessed, by default of ap pearance, 12 Feb. 1595 (N. S.), of three "plough lands, parcel! of Ballingrote." To con duct his case he assigned his clerkship of the Munster council to one Nicholas Curteys, who thereafter, "upon the trust of Lodowick Brys kett and Edmund Spenser," retained the "poor and troublesome place" until superseded by Richard Boyle, February 1598.
The second three books of the 'Faerie Queene) were finished by 1594 LXXX). Spenser must have carried the man uscript to Ponsonby between February 1595, when he appeared against Roche, and 20 Jan. 1596, when the poem was "entered." He dedi cates his 'Fowre Hymnes) from the Court at Greenwich, 1 Sept. 1596. On November 8 he attended —as his (Prothalamion) for it implies —the double wedding at Essex House between the Earl of Worcester's daughters, Elizabeth and Catherine Somerset, and Essex's friends, Henry Guildford and William Petre.
Now that his old patrons — Sidney, Leices ter, Grey— were all dead, Spenser was courting Sidney's widow's husband, Essex, of whom the 'Prothalamion) is principally a panegyric. Meanwhile, the (Astrophel,) an elegy for Sid ney — with companion-pieces by other hands,— had appeared with 'Colin Clouts Come Home Againe,' 1595. One piece, Bryskett's 'Mourn ing Muse of Thestylis,) had been separately "entered" 22 Aug. 1587; and possibly, the whole series was resurrected for sake of the dedica tion to Lady Essex. Her acceptance of a poem celebrating Sidney's "amour" with Lady Rich further testifies to the purely "platonic" nature of that "amour." These publications of 1595-96 emphasize the poet's growing worldliness. Sharp-tongued radical moralist gives place to polished and dis creet court laureate—by assumption if not ap pointment. Nobility for him is rather of caste than of charactcr: "court and royal citadell" are the great school-maistresse of all courtesy" (F. Q. III, vi, 1). Most of his work is °occa sional," even in the later books of the "Faerie Queene) itself, his mirror is held up less to universal humanity than to the Court; histori cal and personal allusions multiply, relatively crowding out the moral allegory. Book V is part apologia for Lord Grey, who had died in 1593. part chronicle — often chronique scandaleuse of national and social affairs "writ to the me ridian" of Hampton and Greenwich. The libel on Mary of Scots as "Duessa" brought from King James, 12 Nov. 1596, a demand for legal redress. As art, however, the best of this later work realizes to the full the Italianate Renais sance ideal of sensuous grace (leggiadria),— brilliant dissolving views drawn in "an easie running verse with tender feet.° More touched with abstract thought are the two cantos and a fragment, perhaps part of a book on 'Constancy,' and first printed in the folio works, 1609. Influenced by Burno's 'La Bestia Trionfante,' "Nature's" overthrow of "Mutability" has a touch of pantheism not quite in harmony with the rest of Spenser s frankly patchwork system. The underlying intention may be a side thrust at governmental "muta bility)) in Irish policy, parallel to the indictment in the 'Veue of the Present State of Ireland.) This was first printed by Sir James Ware in 1633, but endorsed by Spenser "flays 1596," and "entered." by Mathew Lownes, 13 April 1598.
By implication of the opening sentence, it was written in England. In the dialogue, Eudoxus, the "wisely docile," is convinced by Irenaus, the "peace-lover," that distraught Ireland needs "violent medecynes'— Machiavelli's ford.' The treatise was disseminated in manu script copies, of which several are extant. Later, early in December 1598, Spenser, a fugitive at Cork, used Tyrone's disastrous uprising as an object-lesson for the Queen of his 'Veue,) in 'A Briefe Note of Ireland,' with "Certaine points to be considered of in the recovery of the Realme of Ireland." In 1657, "Iron" Cromwell found in Spenser's sympathetic 'Veue) reason for maintaining Spenser's grandson in possession of Kilcolman.
On 30 Sept. 1598, Spenser was made sheriff of Cork. Less than a month later, Tyrone's rebels burned his house over his head; he and his family fled for their lives to Cork. Whether or no was added the horror of "a little child new born" perishing in the flames, as Jonson told Drummond, the shock and later privations undoubtedly broke the poet's frail constitution. He sailed, December 9, with despatches from Sir Thomas Norreys, president of Munster, to the Privy Council; delivered these December 24; on Saturday, 16 Jan. 1599, died at to Jonson, "for of bread in King Street," having declined Essex's aid. Jonson may have exaggerated; but con temporaries agree that the circumstances of his death were tragic.
He was given a sumptuous funeral — at Essex's expense, Camden says; and Browne, in 'Britannia's Pastorals,' declares that money given by Elizabeth for a monument was mis appropriated. The present monument, restored in 1778, was erected by Anne, Countess-of Dor set, in 1620.
The commingling of classic and romantic elements in Spenser s poetry has led — as with the Pleiade— to a curiously fluctuating appre ciation. To his own age another "Virgil," Spenser seemed to the "Augustan" age a bar barous "Goth," to the Romanticists a genius full of glamor and witchery, to later Realists a brilliant, but uneven, word-painter. Each appreciation was justified from its own view point. Milton valued the °teacher"; D'Avenant and Dr. Jonson patronized the evoker of pretty, but distempered, visions. The Taco beans — the three Fletchers, Browne, , ,,) More, Joseph Beaumont, Bunyan, Cox.," read and imitated Spenser as Jonson reek, mended, mostly "for his matter," writing didac tic allegories in heroic or pastoral vein. Mil ton and Dryden acknowledged him their spirit ual master. Prior opened a. long series of ex ternal imitation in form— verse and archaism. With Thomson's 'Castle of Indolence' and 'Seasons) begins 1.richer discipleship, which— sobered by the influence of Milton—has lasted to the present day, but culminated in the contemporaries of Wordsworth and Keats. Spenser has amply earned the title of "poet's poet," for his own exquisite art, and for the art begot in others: he has been the "Warwick" of English poets, the poet-maker. His manner has not invited translation: the few German and Italian versions from the (Faerie Queene' are unimportant. For so great a poet his influence has remained singularly national. See FAIRY