Gaine thou some houres to draw thy fearefull breath:
To me ignoble flight is worse than death."
Of the conclusion of Bosworth Field, Mr. Chalmers has justly observed, that "the lines describing the death of the tyrant may be submitted with confidence to the admirers of Shakspeare."[602:A]
The translations and miscellaneous poems of Sir John include several pieces of considerable merit. We would particularly point out Claudian's Epigram on the Old Man of Verona, and the verses on his "dear sonne Gervase Beaumont."
Sir John died in the winter of 1628, aged forty-six.
2. Breton, Nicholas. Of this prolific poet few authenticated facts are known. His first publication, entitled, "A small handfull of fragrant flowers," was printed in 1575; if we therefore allow him to have reached the age of twenty-one before he commenced a writer, the date of his birth may, with some probability, be assigned to the year 1554. The number of his productions was so great, that a character in Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady, declares that he had undertaken "with labour and experience the collection of those thousand pieces—of that our honour'd Englishman, Nich. Breton."[602:B] Ritson has given a catalogue of twenty-nine, independent of his
contributions to the "Phœnix Nest" and "England's Helicon," and five more are recorded by Mr. Park in the Censura Literaria.[603:A] Most of these are poetical, some a mixed composition of rhyme and prose, and a few entirely prose; they are all extremely scarce, certainly not the consequence of mediocrity or want of notice, for they have been praised by Puttenham[603:B], Meres[603:C], and Phillips; and one of his most beautiful ballads is inserted in "The Muse's Library," 1740. After a lapse of twenty-five years, Dr. Percy recalled the attention of the public to our author by inserting in his Reliques the same piece which Mrs. Cowper had previously chosen[603:D]; in 1801 Mr. Ellis favoured us with eight specimens, from his pamphlets and "England's Helicon[603:E]," and Mr. Park has since added two very valuable extracts to the number.[603:F] These induce us to wish for a more copious selection, and at the same time enable us to declare, that as a lyric and pastoral poet he possessed, if not a splendid, yet a pleasing and elegant flow of fancy, together with great sweetness and simplicity of expression, and a more than common portion of metrical harmony.
He is supposed, on the authority of an epitaph in the church of Norton, a village in Northamptonshire, to have died on the 22d of June 1624.[603:G]
3. Browne, William, was born at Tavistock, in Devonshire, in 1590, and, there is reason to suppose, began very early to cultivate his poetical talents; for in the first book of his Britannias Pastorals, which were published in folio, in 1613, when in his twenty-third year, he speaks of himself, "as weake in yeares as skill[603:H]," an expression
which leads to the supposition that his earlier pastorals were written before he had attained the age of twenty. Indeed all his poetry appears to have been written previous to his thirtieth year. In 1614, he printed in octavo, The Shepherds Pipe, in seven eclogues; in 1616, the second part of his Britannias Pastorals was given to the public, and in 1620, his Inner Temple Mask is supposed to have been first exhibited.