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Assuming, then, that the circumstances of this allegory identify Mirabella with Rosalinde, and Rosalinde with Rose Daniel, and, in like manner, the Fool and Carle with Menalcas and John Florio, have we not here a thrice-told tale, agreeing so completely in all essential particulars as to leave no room for doubt of its original application to the early love-adventures in which the poet was disappointed?
Mirabella was his only child; and her mother having married again, she wanted to get rid of Mirabella, so that her little boy Gliglu might inherit the crown. So she ordered one of her servants to lead Mirabella into the pine-wood far away and leave her there, hoping the wolves would find her and eat her.
"So high in thought as she herself in place." And that she "Loatheth each lowly thing with lofty eye." Her beauty, too, is dwelt upon as a "thing celestial," her humble family alluded to, the boasted freedom of her heart; and upon Rosalinde and Mirabella an affectation of the demigoddessship, which turned their heads, is equally charged.
Perhaps, too, her expressions were the same that are given to Mirabella, 'the free lady, 'she was born free," etc. "We are now come," says Mr. G.L. Craik, by far the most acute and sagacious of all the commentators on Spenser, "to a very remarkable passage. Having thus disposed of Turpin, the poet suddenly addresses his readers, saying,
Wolf, if you would be so kind as to bring me my mamma, I would be so obliged.” Off ran the wolf without saying another word, and Mirabella commenced jumping for joy, causing her silver bell to tinkle more than ever. A fox, hearing it, came up to her and said— “Silver bell, silver bell, do not fear; To obey you, Mirabella, I am here.” Then she said, “Oh, dear Mr. Fox, I am so hungry!
The learned Upton, in his preface to the "Faëry Queen," was led to observe the striking coincidence, the absolute similarity of character, between Spenser's Rosalinde and his Mirabella.
"If the 'Faëry Queen," quoth he, "is a moral allegory with historical allusions to our poet's times, one might be apt to think, that, in a poem written on so extensive a plan, the cruel Rosalinde would be in some way or other typically introduced; and methinks I see her plainly characterized in Mirabella.
She said that as soon as she got back to the palace she would make a law that all the wolves should be killed, and that if Mirabella ever dared return she should be smothered. The poor little girl felt very miserable, and was afraid that her mother might kill her, so she stepped into the canoe, and said— “Bear me where my father dwells, Tinkle, tinkle, silver bells.”
The identity of Florio's wife and Rosalinde may be fairly inferred from some circumstances consequent upon the lady's marriage, and otherwise connected with her fortunes, which appear to be shadowed forth with great acrimony in the "Faëry Queen," where the Rosalinde of the "Shepherd's Calendar" appears before us again under the assumed name of Mirabella.
Having identified Rosalinde with Rose Daniel, it may be thought that nothing further of interest with respect to either party remains, which could lead us into further detail; but Spenser himself having chosen, under another personification, to follow the married life of this lady, and revenge himself upon the treachery of her husband, we should lose an opportunity both of interpreting his works and of forming a correct estimate of his character, if we neglected to pursue with him the fortunes of Mirabella.
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