No More Learning

It seems to me probable that the _Elegie_, 'Sorrow, who to this
house', was an early and tentative experiment in this kind of poetry,
on the death of some one, we cannot now say whom, perhaps the father
of the Woodwards or some other of his earlier correspondents and
friends.

The _Elegie_ headed _Death_ is also printed in a somewhat puzzling
fashion. In _1633_ it follows the lyrics abruptly with the bald
title _Elegie_. It is not in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, nor was it in the MS.
resembling this which _1633_ used for the bulk of the poems. In _HN_
also it bears no title indicating the subject of the poem. The
other MSS. all describe it as an _Elegie upon the death of M^{ris}
Boulstred_, and from _1633_ and several MSS. it appears that it was
sent to the Countess of Bedford with the verse _Letter_ (p. 227), 'You
that are shee and you, that's double shee'. It is possible that the
MSS. are in error and that the dead friend is not Miss Bulstrode
but Lady Markham, for the closing line of the letter compares her to
Judith:

Yet but of _Judith_ no such book as she.

But Judith was, like Lady Markham, a widow. The tone of the poem too
supports this conclusion. The Elegy on Miss Bulstrode lays stress on
her youth, her premature death.
In this and the other Elegy
(whose title assigns it to Lady Markham) the stress is laid on the
saintliness and asceticism of life becoming a widow.


PAGE =267=. ELEGIE UPON . . . PRINCE HENRY.

The death of Prince Henry (1594-1612) evoked more elegiac poetry Latin
and English than the death of any single man has probably ever done.
See Nichols's _Progresses of James I_, pp. 504-12. He was the hope of
that party, the great majority of the nation, which would fain have
taken a more active part in the defence of the Protestant cause in
Europe than James was willing to venture upon. Donne's own _Elegie_
appeared in a collection edited by Sylvester: '_Lachrymae Lachrymarum,
or The Spirit of Teares distilled from the untimely Death of the
Incomparable Prince Panaretus_. By Joshua Sylvester. The Third
Edition, with Additions of His Owne and Elegies. 1613. Printed by
Humphrey Lownes. ' Sylvester's own poem is followed by poems in Latin,
Italian, and English by Joseph Hall and others, and then by a
separate title-page: _Sundry Funerall Elegies .