Donne's _Elegye_: 'What [_sic_] that in Color it was like thy
haire,' his _Obsequies Upon the Lord Harrington yt last died_, and the
_Elegie of Loves progresse_.
haire,' his _Obsequies Upon the Lord Harrington yt last died_, and the
_Elegie of Loves progresse_.
John Donne
The stressed syllables are less weighted emotionally and
vocally. Compare
Sweetest love, I do not goe,
For wearinesse of thee
Nor in hope the world can show
A fitter Love for me;
or
Draw not up seas to drowne me in thy spheare,
Weepe me not dead, in thine armes, but forbeare
To teach the sea, what it may doe too soone;
with the more tripping measure, in which one touches the stressed
syllables as with tiptoe, of
By absence this good means I gaine,
That I can catch her
Where none can watch her,
In some close corner of my braine.
There are more of Hoskins' poems extant, but the manuscript volume of
poems which he left behind ('bigger than those of Dr. Donne') was lost
in 1653.
Four poems were first printed as Donne's by Mr. Chambers (op. cit. ,
Appendix B). They are all found in Addl. MS. 25707 (_A25_), and, so
far as I know, there only. I have placed them first in Appendix C,
as the only pieces in that Appendix which are at all likely to be by
Donne. _A25_ is a manuscript written in a number of different hands,
some six within the portion that includes poems by Donne. The relative
age of these it would be impossible to assign with any confidence.
What looks the oldest (I may call it A) is used only for three poems,
viz.
Donne's _Elegye_: 'What [_sic_] that in Color it was like thy
haire,' his _Obsequies Upon the Lord Harrington yt last died_, and the
_Elegie of Loves progresse_. It is in Elizabethan secretary's hand,
and seems to me identical with the writing in which the same poems are
copied in C, the Cambridge University Library MS. A second hand, B,
inserts the larger number of the poems unquestionably by Donne in
close succession, but a third hand, C, transcribes several by Donne
along with poems by other wits, as Francis Beaumont. A fourth hand,
D, seems to be the latest because it is the handwriting in which the
Index was made out, and the poems inserted in this hand are inserted
in odd spaces left by the other writers. Now of the poems in question,
one, _A letter written by S^{r} H: G: and J. D. alternis vicibus_,
is copied by D, and the same hand adds immediately _An Elegie on the
Death of my never enough Lamented master King Charles the First_, by
Henry Skipwith. The poem attributed to Donne was therefore not entered
here till after 1649. But of course it may have come from an older
source, and it has quite the appearance of being genuine. Whoever made
the collection would seem to have had access to some of Goodyere's
work, for this poem is almost immediately preceded by an _Epithalamion
of the Princess Mariage_, by S^{r} H. G. , and a little earlier the
_Good Friday_ poem by Donne is headed _Mr J. Dun goeing from Sir H. G.
on good friday sent him back this Meditacon on the waye_. That reads
like a note by Goodyere himself.
vocally. Compare
Sweetest love, I do not goe,
For wearinesse of thee
Nor in hope the world can show
A fitter Love for me;
or
Draw not up seas to drowne me in thy spheare,
Weepe me not dead, in thine armes, but forbeare
To teach the sea, what it may doe too soone;
with the more tripping measure, in which one touches the stressed
syllables as with tiptoe, of
By absence this good means I gaine,
That I can catch her
Where none can watch her,
In some close corner of my braine.
There are more of Hoskins' poems extant, but the manuscript volume of
poems which he left behind ('bigger than those of Dr. Donne') was lost
in 1653.
Four poems were first printed as Donne's by Mr. Chambers (op. cit. ,
Appendix B). They are all found in Addl. MS. 25707 (_A25_), and, so
far as I know, there only. I have placed them first in Appendix C,
as the only pieces in that Appendix which are at all likely to be by
Donne. _A25_ is a manuscript written in a number of different hands,
some six within the portion that includes poems by Donne. The relative
age of these it would be impossible to assign with any confidence.
What looks the oldest (I may call it A) is used only for three poems,
viz.
Donne's _Elegye_: 'What [_sic_] that in Color it was like thy
haire,' his _Obsequies Upon the Lord Harrington yt last died_, and the
_Elegie of Loves progresse_. It is in Elizabethan secretary's hand,
and seems to me identical with the writing in which the same poems are
copied in C, the Cambridge University Library MS. A second hand, B,
inserts the larger number of the poems unquestionably by Donne in
close succession, but a third hand, C, transcribes several by Donne
along with poems by other wits, as Francis Beaumont. A fourth hand,
D, seems to be the latest because it is the handwriting in which the
Index was made out, and the poems inserted in this hand are inserted
in odd spaces left by the other writers. Now of the poems in question,
one, _A letter written by S^{r} H: G: and J. D. alternis vicibus_,
is copied by D, and the same hand adds immediately _An Elegie on the
Death of my never enough Lamented master King Charles the First_, by
Henry Skipwith. The poem attributed to Donne was therefore not entered
here till after 1649. But of course it may have come from an older
source, and it has quite the appearance of being genuine. Whoever made
the collection would seem to have had access to some of Goodyere's
work, for this poem is almost immediately preceded by an _Epithalamion
of the Princess Mariage_, by S^{r} H. G. , and a little earlier the
_Good Friday_ poem by Donne is headed _Mr J. Dun goeing from Sir H. G.
on good friday sent him back this Meditacon on the waye_. That reads
like a note by Goodyere himself.
