Penshurst Castle Part 15

'A very apt simile; at least, for any attempt I was bold enow to make; but read on, Philip. I see a whole page of Edmund's somewhat cramped writing.'

'It is but a fragment,' Philip said, 'but Edmund makes a note below that he had in his mind a fair morning, when we walked together at Penshurst, and that the sounds and sights he here describes in verse are wafted to him from that time.'

'Why do you sigh as you say that, Philip? Come, man, let us have no melancholy remembrances, when all ought to be bright and gay.'

'The past time has ever somewhat of sadness as we live in it again. Have you never heard, Fulke, of the hope deferred that maketh a sick heart, nor of the hunger of the soul for the tree of life, which is to be ever denied?'

'I am in no mood for such melancholy,' was the answer. 'Let us hear what Spenser saith of that time of which you speak. I'll warrant we shall find it hard to pick out faults in what he writes therein.

Then Philip read,--

'Eftsoones they heard a most melodious sound Of all that mote delight a daintie eare, Such as att once might not on living ground, Save in this paradise, be heard elsewhere: Right hard it was for wight which did it heare, To read what manner musicke that mote bee, For all that pleasing is to living eare Was there consorted in one harmonee-- Birdes, voices, instruments, windes, waters, all agree.

'The joyous birdes, shrouded in cheerefull shade, Their notes unto the voyce attempred sweet, Th' angelicall soft trembling voyces made To th' instruments divine respondence meet; The silver-sounding instruments did meet With the base murmure of the waters' fall, The waters' fall with difference discreet, Now soft, now loud, unto the wind did call, The gentle warbling wind low answered to all.'

We may well think that these stanzas, which form a part of the 12th canto of the Second Book of the _Faerie Queene_ have seldom been read to a more appreciative audience, nor by a more musical voice. After a moment's silence, Edward Dyer said,--

'I find nought to complain of in all these lines. They flow like the stream rippling adown from the mountain side--a stream as pure as the fountain whence it springs.'

'Ay,' Fulke Greville said; 'that is true. Methinks the hypercritic might say there should not be two words of the same spelling and sound and meaning, to make the rhyme, as in the lines ending with meet.'

'A truce to such comment, Fulke,' Philip said. 'Rhyme is not of necessity poetry, nor poetry rhyme. There be many true poets who never strung a rhyme, and rhymers who know nought of poetry.'

'But, hearken; Edmund has wrote more verses on the further side of this sheet. I will e'en read them, if it pleases you to hear.'

Fulke Greville made a gesture of a.s.sent, and Philip Sidney read, with a depth of pathos in his voice which thrilled the listeners,--

'Ah! see, whoso faire thing dost faine to see, In springing flowre the image of thy day!

Ah! see the virgin rose, how sweetly shee Doth first peepe foorth with bashful modestee, That fairer seemes, the lesse ye see her may!

Lo! see soone after how more bold and free Her bared bosome she doth broad display.

Lo! see soone after how she fades and falls away!

'So pa.s.seth, in the pa.s.sing of a day, Of mortall life, the leafe, the bud, the flowre, No more doth flourish after first decay.

That erst was sought to deck both bed and bowre Of many a ladie, and many a paramoure!

Gather, therefore, the rose, whilst yet is prime, For soon comes age that will her pride deflowre; Gather the rose of love, whilst yet is time, Whilst loving thou mayst loved be with equall crime.'

These last verses were received in silence. There was no remark made on them, and no criticism.

Probably both Sidney's friends felt that they referred to what was too sacred to be touched by a careless hand; and, indeed, there was no one, even amongst Philip's dearest friends, except his sister Mary, the Countess of Pembroke, who ever approached the subject of his love for Stella--that rose which Philip had not gathered when within his reach, and which was now drooping under an influence more merciless than that of age--the baneful influence of a most unhappy marriage.

The Queen had that very morning spoken out with a pitiless bluntness, which had made Philip unusually thoughtful. The very words the Queen had used haunted him--'tale-bearers, who had neither clean hearts nor clean tongue.'

Edward Dyer, according to the custom of the friends when they met, read some verses he had lately composed, and Fulke Greville followed.

Then Philip Sidney was called upon to contribute a sonnet or stanza.

If he never reached the highest standard of poetry, and, even in his best stanzas of _Stella and Astrophel_, rivalled the sweet flow of Edmund Spenser's verse, he had the gift of making his verses vividly express what was uppermost in his mind at the moment, as many of the _Stella and Astrophel_ poems abundantly testify.

In early youth Philip Sidney had been influenced by a distinguished convert to the Reformed Faith, Hubert Languet, whom he met at Frankfort. Between this man of fifty-four and the boy of eighteen, who had gone abroad for thoughtful travel and diligent study, a strong--even a romantic--friends.h.i.+p had sprung up, and the letters which have been preserved show how unwavering Hubert Languet was in his devotion to the young Englishman, whose fine and n.o.ble qualities he had been quick to discover.

About this time Philip was anxious as to the health of his old friend. His letters had been less frequent, and the last he had received during the present year, had seemed to tell of failing powers of body, though the mind was as vigorous as ever.

Thus, the two verses which Philip now read from his _Arcadia_ had reference to his old and dearly-loved counsellor and friend, and were inspired by the lifelong grat.i.tude he felt for him. They are clothed, as was the two frequent custom of the time, in pastoral images; but Fulke Greville and Edward Dyer listened spellbound as the words were uttered, in musical tones, with a strength of feeling underlying them, which gave every line a deep significance.

'The song I sang, old Languet had me taught, Languet, the shepherd, best swift Ister knew; For, clerkly read, and hating what is naught For faithful heart, clean hands, and mouth as true, With his sweet skill my skilless youth he drew, To have a feeling taste of Him that sits Beyond the heaven, far more beyond our wits.

'He said the music best those powers pleased, Was jump accord between our wit and will, Where highest notes to G.o.dliness are raised, And lowest sink, not down to jot of ill, With old true tales he wont mine ears to fill, How shepherds did of yore, how now they thrive, Spoiling their flock, or while 'twixt them they strive.'

'There is naught to complain of in those verses, Philip,' Fulke Greville said. 'He must be a sharp censor, indeed, who could find fault with them.

We must do our best to bring good old Gabriel Harvey back to join our Areopagus, as Edmund Spenser is bold enough to call it.'

'Have you heard aught of the friend in whose praise the verses were indited?' Edward Dyer asked.

'Nay, as I said, I have had but one letter from Languet for many months.

As soon as this tourney is over I must get leave to make a journey to Holland to a.s.sure myself of his condition.'

'The Queen will rebel against your absence, Philip. You are in higher favour than ever, methinks; nor do I grudge you the honour, as, I fear, some I could name grudge it.'

Philip rose quickly, as if unwilling to enter into the subject, and, gathering together their papers, the three friends broke up their meeting and separated till the evening.

Anyone who had seen Philip Sidney as he threw himself on a settle when Fulke Greville and Edward Dyer had left him, and had watched the profound sadness of his face as he gave himself up to meditation on the sorrow which oppressed him, would have found it difficult to imagine how the graceful courtier, who that evening after the banquet at Whitehall led the Queen, as a mark of especial favour, through the mazes of the dance, could ever have so completely thrown off the melancholy mood for one of gaiety and apparent joyousness. How many looked at him with envy when the Queen gave him her hand in the dance then much in fas.h.i.+on called the 'Brawl!' This dance had been lately introduced, and the Queen delighted in it, as it gave her the opportunity of distinguis.h.i.+ng the reigning favourite with an especial mark of her favour.

This evening the ring was formed of ladies and gentlemen chosen by Elizabeth, who gorgeously attired, her hoop and stiff brocade making a wide circle in the centre of the ring, called upon Philip Sidney to stand there with her.

The Queen then, giving her hand to Philip, pirouetted with him to the sound of the music, and, stopping before the gentleman she singled out for her favour, kissed him on the left cheek, while Philip, bending on his knee, performed the same ceremony with the lady who had been the partner of the gentleman before whom the Queen had stopped. By the rules of the dance, the couple who stood in the centre of the ring now changed places with those who had been saluted, but this did not suit the Queen's mind this evening.

She always delighted to display her dancing powers before her admiring courtiers, exciting, as she believed, the jealousy of the ladies, who could not have the same opportunity of showing their graceful movements in the 'Brawl.'

The Queen selected Lord Leicester and Christopher Hatton and Fulke Greville and several other gentlemen, and curtseyed and tripped like a girl of sixteen instead of a mature lady of forty-nine.

Elizabeth's caprice made her pa.s.s over again and again several courtiers who were burning with ill-concealed anger as they saw Leicester and his nephew chosen again and again, while they were pa.s.sed over.

At last the Queen was tired, and ordered the music to cease. She was led by Leicester to the raised dais at the end of the withdrawing-room where the dancing took place, and then, at her command, Philip Sidney sang to the mandoline some laudatory verses which he had composed in her honour.

The Queen contrived to keep him near her for most of the evening, but he escaped now and then to circulate amongst the ladies of the Court and to answer questions about the coming tournament.

In one of the alcoves formed by the deep bay of one of the windows Philip found his sister, the Countess of Pembroke, who was purposely waiting there to see him alone, if possible.

'I have been waiting for you, Philip,' she said, 'to ask who will arrange the position my gentlewomen will occupy at the tourney. I have several eager to see the show, more eager, methinks, than their mistress, amongst them the little country maiden, Lucy Forrester, whom you know of.'

'I will give what orders I can to those who control such matters. But, my sweet sister, you look graver than your wont.'

'Do I, Philip? Perhaps there is a reason; I would I could feel happy in the a.s.surance that you have freed yourself from the bonds which I know in your better moments you feel irksome. You will have no real peace of mind till you have freed yourself, and that I know well.'

'I am in no mood for reproaches to-night, Mary,' Philip said, with more heat than he often showed when speaking to his dearly-loved sister. 'Let me have respite till this tournament is over at least.' And as he spoke, his eyes were following Lady Rich as she moved through the mazes of a Saraband--a stately Spanish dance introduced to the English Court when Philip was the consort of poor Queen Mary.

'I might now be in the coveted position of Charles Blount in yonder dance,'

Philip said. 'I refrained from claiming my right to take it, and came hither to you instead.'