But little pride of prelacy;
More pleased that in a barbarous age
He gave rude Scotland Virgil’s page,
Than that beneath his rule he held
The bishopric of fair Dunkeld.”
Canto VI.
Bishop Gawain was compelled by the troubles in Scotland to flee from his native country, and to take refuge at the court of Henry VIII., where he lived for years an honored exile, dying in 1522, at London, of the plague. He was born in 1474. Each canto of his translation of Virgil was preceded by an original prologue; the address to Spring—whence the extract on flowers is taken—is one of the most pleasing of these, and forms his introduction to the 12th Canto of the Æneid. Far from regretting the Scotticisms of his style, the bishop only mourned that his verses were still so English in their aspect: a defect which will not be likely to strike the modern reader. But in spite of the obsolete words and rugged style, the touch of a poetical spirit, and something of the freshness of the natural blossoms still lingers about Bishop Gawain’s Spring chaplet.
FLOWERS.
Through their beauty, and variety of coloure, and exquisite forme, they do bringe to a liberal and gentle minde the remembrance of honestie, comelinesse, and all kinds of virtues; for it would be an unseemly thing (as a certain wise man saith) for him that doth look upon and handle faire and beautiful things, and who frequenteth and is conversant in faire and beautiful places, to have his minde not faire also.
John Gerarde, 1545–1607.