Kenilworth | Page 5

Leicester gave a bottle of liquor to his Lady, which he willed her to use in any faintness, which she, after his returne from court, not knowing it was poison, gave him, and so he died."--BEN JONSON'S INFORMATION TO DRUMMOND OF HAWTHORNDEN, MS., SIR ROBERT SIBBALD'S COPY.]
The same accusation has been adopted and circulated by the author of Leicester's Commonwealth, a satire written directly against the Earl of Leicester, which loaded him with the most horrid crimes, and, among the rest, with the murder of his first wife. It was alluded to in the Yorkshire Tragedy, a play erroneously ascribed to Shakespeare, where a baker, who determines to destroy all his family, throws his wife downstairs, with this allusion to the supposed murder of Leicester's lady,--
"The only way to charm a woman's tongue Is, break her neck--a politician did it."
The reader will find I have borrowed several incidents as well as names from Ashmole, and the more early authorities; but my first acquaintance with the history was through the more pleasing medium of verse. There is a period in youth when the mere power of numbers has a more strong effect on ear and imagination than in more advanced life. At this season of immature taste, the author was greatly delighted with the poems of Mickle and Langhorne, poets who, though by no means deficient in the higher branches of their art, were eminent for their powers of verbal melody above most who have practised this department of poetry. One of those pieces of Mickle, which the author was particularly pleased with, is a ballad, or rather a species of elegy, on the subject of Cumnor Hall, which, with others by the same author, was to be found in Evans's Ancient Ballads (vol. iv., page 130), to which work Mickle made liberal contributions. The first stanza especially had a peculiar species of enchantment for the youthful ear of the author, the force of which is not even now entirely spent; some others are sufficiently prosaic.
CUMNOR HALL.
The dews of summer night did fall; The moon, sweet regent of the sky, Silver'd the walls of Cumnor Hall, And many an oak that grew thereby,
Now nought was heard beneath the skies, The sounds of busy life were still, Save an unhappy lady's sighs, That issued from that lonely pile.
"Leicester," she cried, "is this thy love That thou so oft hast sworn to me, To leave me in this lonely grove, Immured in shameful privity?
"No more thou com'st with lover's speed, Thy once beloved bride to see; But be she alive, or be she dead, I fear, stern Earl, 's the same to thee.
"Not so the usage I received When happy in my father's hall; No faithless husband then me grieved, No chilling fears did me appal.
"I rose up with the cheerful morn, No lark more blithe, no flower more gay; And like the bird that haunts the thorn, So merrily sung the livelong day.
"If that my beauty is but small, Among court ladies all despised, Why didst thou rend it from that hall, Where, scornful Earl, it well was prized?
"And when you first to me made suit, How fair I was you oft would say! And proud of conquest, pluck'd the fruit, Then left the blossom to decay.
"Yes! now neglected and despised, The rose is pale, the lily's dead; But he that once their charms so prized, Is sure the cause those charms are fled.
"For know, when sick'ning grief doth prey, And tender love's repaid with scorn, The sweetest beauty will decay,-- What floweret can endure the storm?
"At court, I'm told, is beauty's throne, Where every lady's passing rare, That Eastern flowers, that shame the sun, Are not so glowing, not so fair.
"Then, Earl, why didst thou leave the beds Where roses and where lilies vie, To seek a primrose, whose pale shades Must sicken when those gauds are by?
"'Mong rural beauties I was one, Among the fields wild flowers are fair; Some country swain might me have won, And thought my beauty passing rare.
"But, Leicester (or I much am wrong), Or 'tis not beauty lures thy vows; Rather ambition's gilded crown Makes thee forget thy humble spouse.
"Then, Leicester, why, again I plead (The injured surely may repine)-- Why didst thou wed a country maid, When some fair princess might be thine?
"Why didst thou praise my hum'ble charms, And, oh! then leave them to decay? Why didst thou win me to thy arms, Then leave to mourn the livelong day?
"The village maidens of the plain Salute me lowly as they go; Envious they mark my silken train, Nor think a Countess can have woe.
"The simple nymphs! they little know How far more happy's their estate; To smile for joy, than sigh for woe-- To be content, than to be great.
"How far less blest