ENGLISH VERSION OF PALLADIUS
There is still one more versifier to be mentioned in connection with the Duke of Gloucester, though his name has not survived, and perhaps, considering the quality of his verse, he was wise not to betray his identity. Indeed, he is so conscious of his feebleness as a poet that he alludes to it more than once in the prologue which precedes his verse translation of the De Re Rustica of Palladius.[1303] This prologue, which, consists of sixteen stanzas, is not directly addressed to the Duke, nor is there any formal dedication of the poem to him. Nevertheless, frequent mention is made of the writer’s patron, and in a few introductory verses to the second book of the work it is obvious that the translation was undertaken for him.
‘I wul assay hem up to plowe and delue;
A lord to plese, how suete is to laboure,’[1304]
writes this rhymester, and there is no doubt as to the identity of this lord, for he tells us plainly,
‘My blissed lord, mene I the duc homfrey.’[1305]
The writer was well acquainted with the life of his ‘blissed lord,’ most especially with his literary leanings, and he devotes nearly two whole stanzas to retailing his benefactions to Oxford, and the nature of the books given to that University.[1306] He also mentions the famous men in the Duke’s following, making special allusion to Wheathampsted, Piero del Monte, Livius, and Antonio di Beccaria, and he further gives us a speaking picture of the extensive field which his master’s studies covered.[1307] He also makes the somewhat startling statement that ‘he taught me meter make,’[1308] which we may well discount as a poetical exaggeration, not to be taken too literally. Doubtless it was at the Duke’s bidding that the translation was undertaken, and the author was probably a member of the foundation of St. Albans. This last supposition is suggested by the placing of Wheathampsted first on the list of Humphrey’s literary friends, and by an allusion in the course of the prologue to the robber Wawe, whose crimes were only of local importance, and would be unknown to us save for the account of them given by the St. Albans chronicler.[1309] The poem must have been written between the years 1439 and 1447, that is, after the first gifts to Oxford, and before the death of the writer’s patron, who was obviously still alive at the time of writing. The literary form of the poem cannot enhance Gloucester’s reputation, but it bears interesting testimony to the important position held by him amongst the scholars of the kingdom.
The list of English poets connected with Duke Humphrey is not brilliant, but this was not his fault. There was no great light in the poetic firmament whom he could patronise in the way his grandfather had patronised Chaucer, though it may seem a strange omission that this dead poet was totally unrepresented as far as we know, in his library, We must qualify our surprise by remembering that we possess no complete list of Gloucester’s books, so that a copy of Chaucer may have been among them, but at least we have sufficient evidence to prove that he did not despise the vernacular languages as did so many of the earlier humanists. True, we can only directly connect three books written in English with his name, and he seems to have found French more natural to his use than the language of his native land, since all the inscriptions in his books are written in that language, but practically all the writers of his age who wrote in English enjoyed his patronage, and we have the evidence of the University of Oxford to prove that he encouraged the production of books in the national language.[1310] Humphrey was not so busy in the rediscovery of the forgotten poets and philosophers of the past, as not to realise that the knowledge he was acquiring was to be the basis of the vernacular literature of the future, that the spirit of the new learning, while it liberated men’s minds from bondage, must also find a means of expression for itself. Though intent on building the foundations, he did not fail to consider the nature of the edifice which should crown his labours.