NOTES.

LAWES'S DEDICATION OF THE FIRST EDITION OF COMUS.

Henry Lawes, 1595-1662, sometime a "Gentleman of the Chapel Royal" (i.e. one of the royal choir), and a member of the king's "private music" (orchestra), was the chief composer of his age. He was specially noted as a composer of incidental music for Masques and of songs. He composed in 1633 part of the music for Shirley's great Masque The Triumph of Peace, and all the music for Carew's equally famous Calum Britannicum. He wrote the music for Comus (and probably for Arcades), acted the part of "the Attendant Spirit" when the piece was first performed at Ludlow Castle in 1634, and was responsible for the publication of the first edition in 1637. He seems to have been one of Milton's earliest and most intimate friends, thanks, no doubt, to their common love of music.

Milton addressed the following Sonnet to him.

"TO MR H. LAWES ON HIS AIRS.

HARRY, whose tuneful and well-measured song
First taught our English music how to span
Words with just note and accent, not to scan
With Midas' ears, committing short and long,
Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the throng,
With praise enough for Envy to look wan;
To after age thou shalt be writ the man

That with smooth air couldst humour best our tongue.

Thou honour'st verse, and verse must lend her wing
To honour thee, the priest of Phœbus' quire,
That tunest their happiest lines in hymn or story.

Dante shall give Fame leave to set thee higher
Than his Casella, whom he wooed to sing,
Met in the milder shades of Purgatory."

Its

This Sonnet appeared as an introduction to a volume of "Choice Psalmes, put into Musick for three Voices : composed by Henry and William Lawes, Brothers, and Servants to his Majestie: 1648." The date of the composition of the Sonnet was Feb. 1646, as we learn from the Cambridge Ms. familiar tone shows that the intimacy between the poet and the musician had not been affected by political differences, though Lawes, like his brother (who fell fighting for the king at Chester in 1645), was an ardent Royalist, and the volume of Psalms to which Milton's poem was prefixed was dedicated to Charles. After 1648 we do not hear of Lawes in connection with Milton, so that the force of circumstances may have driven them apart. It is significant that Lawes's dedication of Comus, which was reprinted in the 1645 edition of the poem, was omitted from the 1673 edition; though the omission may have been due to another

cause.

The first four lines of the Sonnet, which should be compared with Comus, 86-88 and 494-496, give a very precise and musicianly description of Lawes's songs. He was content to make his music subordinate to the words, preserving their rhythm and accent with fidelity; so that the poetry, not the music (very often, a kind of recitative), was the chief element. This quality explains his great popularity with the poets of the period, many of whom, e.g. Herrick, Cartwright, Waller, had songs set to music by him. See Grove's Dictionary of Music.

Lord Brackley. The second Earl of Bridgewater, born in 1622; he succeeded his father in 1649, and died in 1686. This dedication was omitted (as we have said) from the edition of 1673; not unnaturally, since the Earl and the poet had taken opposite sides in the civil troubles. The former was arrested in 1651 on suspicion of being a Royalist. Milton's polemical tract Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio appeared in that year, and Todd says that the Earl of Bridgewater wrote on the title-page of his copy "Liber igne, author furca dignissimi" (i.e. 'the book well deserves burning and the author hanging'). For the rest he seems to have been a genial, learned man, who patronised literature and "delighted much in his library." See the National Dictionary of Biography. Of the younger brother, Mr Thomas Egerton, who took part in the Masque, little is known. The sister, Lady Alice, married Richard Vaughan, Earl of Carberry.

SIR HENRY WOTTON'S LETTER.

This letter is interesting as one of the earliest extant testimonies to Milton's genius. That he valued it much and thought that it would be a weighty recommendation of Comus is shown by his causing it to be prefixed to the 1645 edition of the poem. And in the Second Defence he says: "On my departure for Italy, the celebrated Henry Wotton gave me a signal proof of his regard, in an elegant letter which he wrote, not only breathing the warmest friendship, but containing some maxims of conduct which I found very useful in my travels " (P. W. 1. 255).

Sir Henry Wotton, 1568-1639, was a man of some note in diplomacy and literature. He represented the English Court at Venice for some years; and afterwards (1625) became Provost of Eton, and took orders in the Church. He was a friend of Isaac Walton, who wrote his life. Wotton's chief work was published posthumously in 1651, under a title which explains its miscellaneous contents: "Reliquia Wottoniana; or, a Collection of Lives, Letters, Poems, with Characters of sundry Personages, and other incomparable Pieces of Language and Art: By the curious Pencil of the ever-memorable Sir Henry Wotton, Knt., late Provost of Eaton College, 1651."

At least one of his poems ("You meaner beauties of the night") is familiar to lovers of Jacobean verse; and his definition of an ambassador as "an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country" is still fresh. The équivoque had more point then than now, because "to lie" was technically used of an ambassador's residence abroad (Hannah). Wotton seems to have had a turn for aphorism. His favourite motto-engraved on his tombstone-was disputandi pruritus ecclesiarum scabies ('an itching for discussion is the mania of churches'). Sir

Henry Wotton admirably represents the type of courtier, wit and scholar. A sympathetic account of his career was published by Dr A. W. Ward; and recently his letters have been edited elaborately, with a full Life, for the Clarendon Press.

2. Horton being so close to Eton, it is curious that Sir Henry had not met his neighbour between 1632 and 1638.

6. Mr H. Commonly identified, and no doubt rightly, with the Broad Church divine John Hales, who was for some years a Fellow of Eton and Canon of Windsor. His learning won for him the title "the ever-memorable." There are allusions to him in Wotton's Reliquia. banded, discussed.

10.

16. Doric, i.e. Theocritean. Cf. Lyc. 189, "With eager thought warbling his Doric lay." Wotton shows his critical faculty in singling out the lyric portions of Comus for special commendation. Contrast Johnson's criticism.

23. Mr R. This "common friend" was probably John Rouse, of Oriel College, sometime (1620-1652) Bodley's Librarian. Milton had been incorporated M.A. at Oxford in 1635, according to the common practice, and on one of his visits to the University must have found his way to the Bodleian Library. Some years later (1647) the poet addressed Rouse in an elaborate Latin ode, celebrating the blissful silence and treasures of the great Library.

in the very close. Sir Henry Wotton means that a copy of Lawes's edition of Comus was inserted at the end of a volume of poems by "the late R": probably the Cambridge poet Thomas Randolph, who died in 1634 and whose poems were published by his brother in 1638, the year in which Sir Henry wrote the letter. Randolph was one of the ablest of the followers (intellectual "sons," as they called themselves) of Ben Jonson, and wrote several amusing plays. He was contemporary with Milton at Cambridge.

26. con la bocca dolce, i.e. with a pleasant taste in the mouth. Cf. French bonne bouche.

27, 28. Sir Henry modestly implies that he has more right to speak as an authority on travel than on literature.

29. blanch, omit, pass by. If we used the verb at all we should treat it as intransitive, inserting from.

Paris. Milton arrived there in April or May, 1638. Не seems to have stayed some time, not reaching Florence till August.

30. Mr M. B. Identified with Michael Branthwaite. Sir Henry Wotton mentions him in the Reliquiæ as "heretofore his Majesties Agent in Venice, a gentleman of approved confidence and sincerity," p. 546. This was in 1626. Afterwards Branthwaite became diplomatic agent at Paris.

Page 5, line 1. Lord S., i.e. Lord Scudamore, son of the English ambassador, Viscount Scudamore, who showed Milton much courtesy in Paris; as we learn from his Second Defence of the People of England. (This was one of Milton's political treatises, written in Latin to justify the English Civil War, and more especially the execution of Charles I., in the eyes of Europe. Milton's first pamphlet on the subject had elicited violent attacks upon himself, his life and character; in his reply he gave a sketch of his career. The Second Defence therefore has very great autobiographical interest.)

governor; we should say 'tutor.'

7. Marseilles...to Genoa. The route that Addison took; see his Travels. But Milton entered Italy by way of Nice, coasted thence to Genoa, and went on to Florence, the favourite restingplace of English travellers, where he spent some months.

8, 9. a Gravesend barge. Cf. Hasted's History of Kent, vol. I. p. 450: "King Richard II. granted to the Abbat and Convent of St Mary Graces, that the inhabitants of Gravesend and Milton should have the sole privilege of carrying passengers by water from hence to London, on condition that they should provide boats for that purpose, and carry all passengers either at 2d. per head with their bundle, or let the hire of the whole boat at 4s. This charter was confirmed several times afterwards by succeeding kings, and under proper regulation by the legislature they still (1778) enjoy the privilege."

12. At Siena. This was in the autumn of 1592. "I am here," Sir Henry writes to Lord Zouch from Siena, Oct. 25, 1592, "by the means of certain Persons (to whom I was recommended) gotten into the House of Scipione Alberti, an ancient Courtier of the Popes, and a Gentleman of this Town, at whose Table I live." In a letter dated August 22, 1593, he mentions his Siena host again, and also refers to the Duke of Pagliano.