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Ethel Mary Boyce, winner of various prizes, has composed "Young Lochinvar," "The Sands of Corriemie," and other cantatas, as well as a March in E for orchestra. Miss Heale, another London aspirant, is credited with "Epithalamion," "The Water Sprite," and other choral works.
Soon after his return, Spenser fell in love with his beautiful Elizabeth, an Irish girl; wrote his Amoretti, or sonnets, in her honor; and afterwards represented her, in the Faery Queen, as the beautiful woman dancing among the Graces. In 1594 he married Elizabeth, celebrating his wedding with his "Epithalamion," one of the most beautiful wedding hymns in any language.
Est levis hæc jactura tamen, ruat hoc quoque quicquid Est reliquum, juvet et nudis habitare sub antris, Vivere dura liceat tecum pulcherrima virgo. Ludovici Areosti Ferrariensis Epithalamion, in vol. i of Carmina Illustrium Poetarum Italorum, p. 342-346.
The real cause of this modern vagueness is rather to be found in shallow and unsound culture, and in that inability, or carelessness about seeing any object clearly, which besets our poets just now; as the cause of antique clearness lies in the nobler and healthier manhood, in the severer and more methodic habits of thought, the sounder philosophic and critical training, which enabled Spenser and Milton to draw up a state paper, or to discourse deep metaphysics, with the same manful possession of their subject which gives grace and completeness to the "Penseroso" or the "Epithalamion."
In honor of that event, he composed the Epithalamion, the noblest marriage song in any literature. So strong are early impressions that even in its lines he seems to be thinking of Rosalind and fancying that she is his bride. After returning from the north, he spent some time with Sir Philip Sidney, who helped fashion Spenser's ideals of a chivalrous gentleman.
"The glorious portrait of that Angel's face" can be expressed by any art, by pen or pencil. Again, she is "Of the brood of Angels heavenly born." And yet again, she is "Divine and born of heavenly seed." Once more we are bid "Go visit her in her chaste bower of rest, Accompanied with Angel-like delights." Turn we next to the "Epithalamion."
It would be difficult to mention any man about the court of Charles II who could have appreciated the pure and enduring passion which in the century before had breathed through the noble lines of Spenser's "Epithalamion," and in the century that followed inspired "John Anderson, my jo' John."
It is likewise said, he had written a treatise in prose called the English Poet: as for the Epithalamion Thamesis, and his Dreams, both mentioned by himself in one of his letters, Mr. Hughes thinks they are still preserved, tho' under different names. It appears from what is said of the Dreams by his friend Mr. Harvey, that they were in imitation of Petrarch's Visions.
When Spenser poured forth his warmest love-notes in the "Epithalamion," he adopted the very words of the Psalmist, as he bade the gates open for the entrance of his bride. When Cromwell saw the mists break over the hills of Dunbar, he hailed the sun-burst with the cry of David: "Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered. Like as the smoke vanisheth, so shalt thou drive them away!"
Other noteworthy poems are "Mother Hubbard's Tale," a satire on society; "Astrophel," an elegy on the death of Sidney; Amoretti, or sonnets, to his Elizabeth; the marriage hymn, "Epithalamion," and four "Hymns," on Love, Beauty, Heavenly Love, and Heavenly Beauty. There are numerous other poems and collections of poems, but these show the scope of his work and are best worth reading.
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