Whose thoughts are legible in the eie.'
The 'Epitaph' beginning, 'To praise thy life, or waile thy worthie death' appears to have been written by Sir Walter Ralegh. Sir John Harington, in the notes appended to the sixteenth book of his translation of Orlando Furioso (1591), refers to 'our English Petrarke, Sir Philip Sidney, or (as Sir Walter Rawleigh in his Epitaph worthily calleth him) the Scipio and the Petrarke of our time' (see the last stanza of the poem). Harington had evidently seen the 'Epitaph' in ms.; and there is not the slightest reason for questioning the accuracy of his ascription, for he was well acquainted with the poets of the time, and curious information may be gathered from his Notes. I find Ralegh's elegy somewhat obscure; pregnant, but harshly worded. Nor can I profess any great admiration for 'Another of the same,' where the vehemence of the writer's grief choked his utterance.
Of the first edition of Alcilia: Philoparthen's Loving Folly, 1595 (pp. 319-362), only one copy is known, preserved in the public library at Hamburgh. On the last page are subscribed the author's initials 'J.C.', which have been altered in ink to 'J.G.' in the Hamburgh copy. The poem was reprinted in London in 1613, 1619, and 1628, being accompanied by Marston's Pygmalion's Image and Samuel Page's Amos and Laura. Who 'J.C.' may have been is unknown; for the wild conjecture that he was John Chalkhill, author of Thealma and Clearchus and friend of Izaak Walton, is chronologically untenable. For the space of two years the unknown poet had pressed his attentions upon the lady whom he called Alcilia. She finally rejected his addresses, and young 'J.C.' was not sorry to escape from bondage. Hardly a trace of genuine passion can be found in Alcilia, which is merely (as the author freely admits) a collection of odds and ends written 'at divers times and upon divers occasions.' It is somewhat surprising that there was a demand for new editions. 'J.C.' wrote with elegance and facility, but the note of originality is wanting. Had the poem appeared a few years earlier, it would have been entitled to more consideration; but the achievements of Greene, Lodge, and others had made it possible in the closing years of the sixteenth century for any young writer of respectable talents to compose such verse as we find in Alcilia.
Daiphantus, or The Passions of Love, 1604 (pp. 363-404), is described on the title-page as 'By An. Sc. Gentleman,' assumed to stand for Antony Scoloker. In the days of Henry VIII there was an Antony Scoloker, a printer and translator, with whom 'An. Sc.' was doubtless connected In the humorous prose address there is an interesting reference to Shakespeare:—'It should be like the never-too-well-read Arcadia where the Prose and Verse, Matter and Words, are like his Mistress eyes, one still excelling another and without corrival; or to come home to the Vulgar's element, like friendly Shake-speare's Tragedies, where the Comedian rides when the Tragedian stands on tiptoe. Faith it should please all like Prince Hamlet. But, in sadness, then it were to be feared he would run mad. In sooth I will not be moonsick to please, nor out of my wits though I displease all. What? Poet, are you in passion or out of Love? This is as strange as true.' In the poem itself there is another reference to 'mad Hamlet,' though Scoloker there seems to be glancing at the older play on the subject of Hamlet. For the reader's guidance an 'Argument' is obligingly prefixed, but it is to be feared that even with the help of this Argument he will not find the poem very intelligible or of engrossing interest. Daiphantus, of which only one copy (in the Douce Collection) is known, was perhaps intended merely for circulation among the author's friends, who may have been able to read between the lines. Appended is the fine poem, 'The Passionate Man's Pilgrimage,' beginning:—
'Give me my Scalop Shell of quiet,
My Staff of faith to walk upon,
My Scrip of joy, immortal diet,
My Bottle of salvation,
My Gown of glory, hope's true gage,