Atlantic Monthly | Page 2

JOHN DRYDEN, 1670-1689 THOMAS SHADWELL, 1689-1692

III. The LYRIC, from the reign of Laureate TATE, 1693, to the demise of Laureate PYE, 1813:--
NAHUM TATE, 1693-1714 NICHOLAS ROWE, 1714-1718 LAURENCE EUSDEN, 1719-1730 COLLEY CIBBER, 1730-1757 WILLIAM WHITEHEAD, 1758-1785 THOMAS WARTON, 1785-1790 HENRY JAMES PYE, 1790-1813

IV. The VOLUNTARY, from the accession of Laureate SOUTHEY, 1813, to the present day:--
ROBERT SOUTHEY, 1813-1843 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, 1843-1850 ALFRED TENNYSON, 1850-
Have no faith in those followers of vain traditions who assert the existence of the Laureate office as early as the thirteenth century, attached to the court of Henry III. Poets there were before Chaucer,--vixere fortes ante Agamemnona,--but search Rymer from cord to clasp and you shall find no documentary evidence of any one of them wearing the leaf or receiving the stipend distinctive of the place. Morbid credulity can go no farther back than to the "Father of English Poetry":--
"That renounced Poet, Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled, On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled":[1]
"Him that left half-told The story of Cambuscan bold; Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife":[2]
"That noble Chaucer, in those former times, Who first enriched our English with his rhymes, And was the first of ours that ever broke Into the Muse's treasures, and first spoke In mighty numbers."[3]
Tradition here first assumes that semblance of probability which rendered it current for three centuries. Edward the Third--resplendent name in the constitutional history of England--is supposed to have been so deeply impressed with Chaucer's poetical merits, as to have sought occasion for appropriate recognition. Opportunely came that high festival at the capital of the world, whereat
"Franccis Petrark, the laureat poete, ... whos rethorike swete Enlumined all Itaille of poetrie,"[4]
received the laurel crown at the hands of the Senate of Rome, with a magnificence of ceremonial surpassed only by the triumphs of imperial victors a thousand years before. Emulous of the gorgeous example, the English monarch forthwith showered corresponding honors upon Dan Chaucer, adding the substantial perquisites of a hundred marks and a tierce of Malvoisie, a year. To this agreeable story, Laureate Warton, than whom no man was more intimately conversant with the truth there is in literary history, appears in one of his official odes to yield assent:--
"Victorious Edward gave the vernal bough Of Britain's bay to bloom on Chaucer's brow: Fired with the gift, he changed to sounds sublime His Norman minstrelsy's discordant chime."[5]
The legend, however, does not bear inquiry. King Edward, in 1367, certainly granted an annuity of twenty marks to "his varlet, Geoffrey Chaucer." Seven years later there was a further grant of a pitcher of wine daily, together with the controllership of the wool and petty wine revenues for the port of London. The latter appointment, to which the pitcher of wine was doubtless incident, was attended with a requirement that the new functionary should execute all the duties of his post in person,--a requirement involving as constant and laborious occupation as that of Charles Lamb, chained to his perch in the India House. These concessions, varied slightly by subsequent patents from Richard II. and Henry IV., form the entire foundation to the tale of Chaucer's Laureateship.[6] There is no reference in grant or patent to his poetical excellence or fame, no mention whatever of the laurel, no verse among the countless lines of his poetry indicating the reception of that crowning glory, no evidence that the third Edward was one whit more sensitive to the charms of the Muses than the third William, three hundred years after. Indeed, the condition with which the appointment of this illustrious custom-house officer was hedged evinced, if anything, a desire to discourage a profitless wooing of the Nine, by so confining his mind to the incessant routine of an uncongenial duty as to leave no hours of poetic idleness. Whatever laurels Fame may justly garland the temples of Dan Chaucer withal, she never, we are obliged to believe, employed royal instrument at the coronation.
John Scogan, often confounded with an anterior Henry, has been named as the Laureate of Henry IV., and immediate successor of Chaucer. Laureate Jonson seems to encourage the notion:--
"_Mere Fool._ Skogan? What was he?
"_Jophiel._ Oh, a fine gentleman, and master of arts Of Henry the Fourth's time, that made disguises For the King's sons, and writ in ballad-royal Daintily well.
"Mere Fool. But he wrote like a gentleman?
"Jophiel. In rhyme, fine, tinkling rhyme, and flowand verse, With now and then some sense; and he was paid for't, Regarded and rewarded; which few poets Are nowadays."[7]
But Warton places Scogan in the reign of Edward IV., and reduces him to the level of Court Jester, his authority being Dr. Andrew Borde, who, early in the sixteenth century, published a volume of his platitudes.[8] There is nothing to prove that he was either poet or Laureate; while, on