Spensers The Faerie Queene | Page 4

Court of Chancery in Dublin, and then was appointed clerk
to the Council of Munster. In 1586 he was granted the forfeited estate
of the Earl of Desmond in Cork County, and two years later took up his
residence in Kilcolman Castle, which was beautifully situated on a lake
with a distant view of mountains. In the disturbed political condition of
the country, life here seemed a sort of exile to the poet, but its very
loneliness and danger gave the stimulus needed for the development of
his peculiar genius.
"Here," says Mr. Stopford Brooke, "at the foot of the Galtees, and
bordered to the north by the wild country, the scenery of which is
frequently painted in the Faerie Queene and in whose woods and
savage places such adventures constantly took place in the service of
Elizabeth as are recorded in the Faerie Queene, the first three books of
that great poem were finished." Spenser had spent the first three years
of his residence at Kilcolman at work on this masterpiece, which had
been begun in England, under the encouragement of Sidney, probably
before 1580. The knightly Sidney died heroically at the battle of
Zutphen, in 1586, and Spenser voiced the lament of all England in the
beautiful pastoral elegy Astrophel which he composed in memory of
"the most noble and valorous knight."
Soon after coming to Ireland, Spenser made the acquaintance of Sir
Walter Raleigh, which erelong ripened into intimate friendship. A
memorable visit from Raleigh, who was now a neighbor of the poet's,
having also received a part of the forfeited Desmond estate, led to the
publication of the _Faerie Queene_. Sitting under the shade "of the
green alders of the Mulla's shore," Spenser read to his guest the first
books of his poem. So pleased was Raleigh that he persuaded the poet
to accompany him to London, and there lay his poem at the feet of the
great queen, whose praises he had so gloriously sung. The trip was
made, Spenser was presented to Elizabeth, and read to her Majesty the

three Legends of Holiness, Temperance, and Chastity. She was
delighted with the fragmentary epic in which she heard herself
delicately complimented in turn as Gloriana, Belphoebe, and Britomart,
conferred upon the poet a pension of £50 yearly, and permitted the
Faerie Queene to be published with a dedication to herself. Launched
under such auspices, it is no wonder that the poem was received by the
court and all England with unprecedented applause.
The next year while still in London, Spenser collected his early poems
and issued them under the title of Complaints_. In this volume were the
Ruins of Time_ and the Tears of the Muses, two poems on the
indifference shown to literature before 1580, and the remarkable
Mother Hubberds Tale, a bitter satire on the army, the court, the church,
and politics. His Daphnaida was also published about the same time.
On his return to Ireland he gave a charming picture of life at Kilcolman
Castle, with an account of his visit to the court, in Colin Clout's Come
Home Again. The story of the long and desperate courtship of his
second love, Elizabeth, whom he wedded in 1594, is told in the
Amoretti, a sonnet sequence full of passion and tenderness. His
rapturous wedding ode, the Epithalamion, which is, by general consent,
the most glorious bridal song in our language, and the most perfect of
all his poems in its freshness, purity, and passion, was also published in
1595. The next year Spenser was back in London and published the
Prothalamion, a lovely ode on the marriage of Lord Worcester's
daughters, and his four Hymns on Love and Beauty, Heavenly Love,
and Heavenly Beauty. The first two Hymns are early poems, and the
two latter maturer work embodying Petrarch's philosophy, which
teaches that earthly love is a ladder that leads men to the love of God.
In this year, 1596, also appeared the last three books of the Faerie
Queene, containing the Legends of Friendship, Justice, and Courtesy.
At the height of his fame, happiness, and prosperity, Spenser returned
for the last time to Ireland in 1597, and was recommended by the queen
for the office of Sheriff of Cork. Surrounded by his beloved wife and
children, his domestic life was serene and happy, but in gloomy
contrast his public life was stormy and full of anxiety and danger. He
was the acknowledged prince of living poets, and was planning the

completion of his mighty epic of the private virtues in twelve books, to
be followed by twelve more on the civic virtues. The native Irish had
steadily withstood his claim to the estate, and continually harassed him
with lawsuits. They detested their foreign oppressors and awaited a
favorable opportunity to rise. Discord and