At London, Printed by J. C. for S. Watersonne, 1592. 4to, pp. 96.

This is the second edition of Daniel's Delia, published in the same year as the first, but varying from that in having the title within the arch of an architectural design, with two small heads in circles at the top, and the inscription AIO AITIOXION on the architrave. It commences with a prose dedication to the Countess of Pembroke as before, which we have already quoted. This edition contains fifty four Sonnets, being four more than the first, and has the errors of the press in that impression corrected. The new additional Sonnets are the 27th, 28th, 29th and 30th. At the end of the Sonnets, on folio 55, is the "Ode," on the reverse of which, within the same architectural compartment as before, is the title to "The Complaynt of Rosamond," in one hundred and six seven-line stanzas, which was now printed for the first time.

We have been very particular and exact in describing these early editions of Daniel's Delia, as, from their great rarity, they are exceedingly difficult to meet with, and the notices of them in Lowndes, even by his latest Editor, are far from correct.

A copy of this second edition was sold in Mr. Heber's Collection, pt. iv. No. 534, for 3l. 4s. There is another in Malone's Collection in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and Mr. Collier is in possession of a third.

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Collation: Sig. A, two leaves; then B to M 4, in fours. Sig. H is repeated at the commencement of "The Complaynt of Rosamond". 1 and 2 being blank leaves, which in this copy are preserved. If these are reckoned the number of pages will be 100.

This fine and beautiful copy, pure as when it first came from the printer's hands, is bound by Bedford.

In Calf Extra; gilt leaves.

DANIEL, (SAMUEL.) Delia and Rosamond augmented. By Samuel Daniel.

Ætas prima canat veneres postrema tumultus.

Printed at London for Simon Waterson, and are to be sold in Paules Church-yarde at the signe of the Crowne, 1594. Sm. 8vo, pp. 196.

VOL. III. PART I.

D

In the present beautiful and exceedingly rare edition of Daniel's Delia, which is the third, the title is within an architectural compartment, similar to the last. The number of the Sonnets in this impression is increased to fifty-five, and the prose dedication to the Countess of Pembroke in the former is displaced, and turned into a Sonnet, which thus gracefully acknowledges his obligations to that lady:

Wonder of these, glory of other times,

O thou whom Enuy eu'n is forst t' admyre:
Great Patroness of these my humble Rymes,
Which thou from out thy greatness doost inspire:
Sith onely thou hast deign'd to raise them highe",
Vouchsafe now to accept them as thine owne,
Begotten by thy hand, and my desire.

Wherein my Zeale, and thy great might is showne.
And seeing this vnto the world is knowne,

O leaue not, still to grace thy worke in mee:
Let not the quickning seede be ouer-throwne
Of that which may be borne to honour thee.
Whereof, the trauaile I may challenge mine,
But yet the glory (Madam) must be thine.

Daniel is a beautiful and elegant writer of Sonnets, and is supposed by Mr. Malone to have afforded a model of imitation to Drayton and other writers, and even to Shakespeare himself. His Sonnets differ in their structure from those of Watson, Spenser, Sidney and others, and are nearly all composed of three elegiac verses in alternate rhyme, with a closing couplet. The quotation of one or two from this edition will not offend the reader, in addition to those before selected for the purpose of exhibiting the variations in the text. The first of these, with the exception of the second line, is tenderly and gracefully expressed, and will afford a pleasing example of the sweetness and purity of his language in this peculiar composition:

Sonnet IX.

If this be loue, to draw a weary breath,

Paint on floods, till the shore cry to th' ayre:
With downward lookes, still reading on the earth,
The sad memorials of my loue's despayre:

If this be loue, to warre against my soule,

Lie downe to waile, rise vp to sigh and grieue,

The neuer-resting stone of care to roule,

Still to complaine my griefes, whilst none relieue.

When men shall find thy flower, thy glory passe,
And thou with carefull brow sitting alone,
Receiued hast this message from thy glasse,
That tells the truth, and saies that all is gone.
Fresh shalt thou see in mee the wounds thou madest,
Though spent thy flame in me the heat remaining,
I that haue lou'd thee thus before thou fadest,
My faith shall waxe, when thou art in thy waining.
The world shall finde this myracle in mec,

That fire can burne when all the matter's spent:
Then what my faith hath beene thy selfe shalt see,
And that thou wast vnkind, thou maist repent.
Thou maist repent that thou hast scorn'd my teares,
When winter snowes vpon thy goldent haires.

Sonnet XLV.

Beaulie (sweet Loue) is like the morning dewe,
Whose short refresh vpon the tender greene,
Cheeres for a time, but till the Sunne doth shew,
And straight 'tis gone as it had neuer beene.
Soone doth it fade that makes the fairest florish,
Short is the glory of the blushing Rose:
The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish,
Yet which at length thou must be forc'd to lose.
When thou surcharg'd with burthen of thy yeeres,

Shall beud thy wrinkles homeward to the earth,
When time bath made a pasport for thy feares,
Dated ia age, the Kalends of our death.
But ah! no more, this hath beene often tolde,
And women grieue to thinke they must be olde.

The date of Age, the Kalends of our death." · Edition 1602.

Two of the Sonnets in this edition, and in this alone, are distinguished by having headings prefixed to them. Sonnets XLVII. and XLVIII. are thus headed: "At the Authors going into Italie;" and, "This Sonnet was made at the Authors beeing in Italie." And Mr. Collier was the first to observe, from this circumstance, that none of Daniel's biographers had noticed the fact that he had travelled into Italy, no doubt in early life, and perhaps in the capacity of tutor to the son of the Countess of Pembroke. The former of these Sonnets, which is given below, is not in the first edition of Delia : Sonnet XLVII.

O whither (poore forsaken) wilt thou goe,

To goe from sorrow, and thine owne distresse,
When euery place presents like face of woe,
And no remoue can make thy sorrowes lesse?
Yet goe (forsaken) leaue these woods, these playnes,
Leaue her and all, and all for her that leaues

Thee and thy loue forlorne, and both disdaines :
And of both, wrongfull deemes, and ill conceaues.

Seeke out some place, and see if any place

Can giue the least release vnto thy griefe:

Conuay thee from the thoughts of thy disgrace,
Steale from thy selfe; and be thy cares own thiefe.

But yet what comfort shall I heereby gaine?

Bearing the wound, I needs must feele the paine.

Mr. Ellis is wrong in stating that "the text of this third edition of Delia corresponds exactly with that of edition I.," as there are not only changes in the number of the Sonnets, but considerable variations in the readings also; the text of some of the Sonnets being materially altered, as we have already shown in Sonnet XVI. Sonnet XXIIII. in the first edition is not in the MS., and is omitted in the third and all posterior editions. Sonnets XVII., XXVII., XXVIII., XXX., XLVII. and LI. in the present, are none of them in the first edition. This part concludes with the Ode, as printed before. "The Complaynt of Rosamond," which next occurs, has a separate title within an architectural compartment similar to the first, and is here said to be "Augmented," having been before printed in 1592. This Poem, which in the first edition consisted of one hundred and six seven-line stanzas, and in this is increased to one hundred and twenty-nine, is in imitation of the Legends in the Mirror for Magistrates, and is related in the first person by the complaining ghost of Rosamond. Allusion is made in the fourth stanza to the Legend of Shore's Wife, which had been written by Churchyard,

and published in 1559, and perhaps to the same under the title of Beautie Dishonoured, by Anthony Chute, printed in 1593, 4to:

No Muse suggests the pittie of my case,

Each penne doth over-passe my iust complaint,
Whilst others are prefer'd, though farre more base;
Shores wife is grac'd, and passes for a Saint;

Her Legend iustifies her foule attaint.

Her wel-told tale did such compassion finde,

That shee is pass'd and I am left behind.

There is much taste and eloquence in the following description of the great power and soul-subduing influence of female beauty:

Looke how a Comet at the first appearing

Drawes all mens eyes with wonder to behold it;

Or as the saddest tale at suddaine hearing
Makes silent listning vnto him that told it,

So did my speech when Rubies did vnfold it.

So did the blazing of my blush appeare,

T'amaze the world, that holds such sights so deer.

Ah! beauty Syren, faire enchaunting good,
Sweet silent rethorique of perswading eyes :

Dumbe eloquence, whose power doth moue the blood,
More then the words, or wisedome of the wise;
Still harmonie, whose diapason lies

Within a brow, the key which passions moue,
To rauish sence, and play a world in loue.
What might I then not doe whose power was such ?
What cannot women doe that know their powre?
What women knowe it not (I feare too much)
How blisse or bale lyes in their laugh or lowre?
Whilst they enioy their happy blooming flowre,
Whilst nature decks her with her proper faire,

Which cheeres the world, ioyes each sight, sweetens th' ayre.

The whole story of Rosamond is gracefully and pathetically told, and both at the beginning and the close, and in other parts of the Poem, the Author pays a passing compliment to the charms of his Delia.

"The Tragedie of Cleopatra" is here first published, with a separate title similar to the others, and is preceded by a most interesting and touching poetical dedication of fourteen octave stanzas to Mary Countess of Pembroke, stating the reasons which had induced him to compose this work, viz. the command of his great Patroness, who, having published her Tragedy of Antonie in 1592, required from him this as a companion play.