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NOTES:

CANTO III

I. The Plot: Una wandering in quest of her Knight is guarded by a Lion.
With difficulty they gain entrance to the cottage of Corceca and her
daughter Abessa, the paramour of Kirkrapine. The latter is killed by the
Lion. Fleeing the next day, Una falls in with Archimago disguised as the
Redcross Knight. They journey on and meet a second Saracen knight, Sansloy.
In the fight which ensues Archimago is unhorsed and his deception unmasked.
The Lion is slain, and Una becomes the captive of Sansloy.

II. The Allegory: 1. Truth finds temporary protection in Reason, or
Natural Honor (Lion), and with its help puts a stop to the Robbing of
Churches (Kirkrapine), which is connived at by Blind Devotion (Corceca) and
Secret Sin (Abessa). Truth is then associated with Hypocrisy under the
guise of Holiness, but it is soon unmasked by Lawlessness (Sansloy), with
which Truth is forced into an unnatural alliance.

2. “The lion is said to represent Henry VIII, overthrowing the monasteries,
destroying church-robbers, disturbing the dark haunts of idleness,
ignorance and superstition.”–Kitchin. The battle between Archimago and
Sansloy refers to the contests of the Catholic powers with the Moslems. The
whole canto also has a hint of the violence and lawlessness connected with
the English conquest of Ireland.

LINE 14. THOUGH TRUE AS TOUCH, though true as if tested on the touchstone
(by which true gold was distinguished from counterfeit).

18. AND HER DUE LOVES, etc., the love due to her diverted, etc.

27. YET WISHED TYDINGS, etc., yet none brought unto her the wished-for
tidings of him. An awkward transposition.

34. THE GREAT EYE OF HEAVEN, the sun. Cf. Paradise Lost, v. 171.

38. A RAMPING LYON. Reason or Natural Honor; also Henry VIII. According to
the ancient belief, no lion would attack a true virgin or one of royal
blood. Similar scenes are found in Sir Bevis of Hampton, The Seven
Champions of Christendom, etc. Cf. I Henry IV, ii, 4. The allegory
signifies that man guided merely by reason will recognize Truth and pay it
homage.

51. WHOSE YEELDED PRIDE, etc., object of had marked, l. 52.

77. HE KEPT BOTH WATCH AND WARD, he kept awake and guarded her.

89. A DAMZELL SPYDE, Abessa, who symbolizes Flagrant or Secret Sin.

99. HER CAST IN DEADLY HEW, threw her into a deathly paleness.

101. UPON THE WAGER LAY, was at stake.

102. WHEREAS HER MOTHER BLYND, where her blind mother, Corceca, or Blind
Devotion.

109. UNRULY PAGE. This refers to the violence with which Henry VIII forced
Protestantism upon the people. In his Present State of Ireland (p. 645),
Spenser speaks of the ignorance and blind devotion of the Irish Papists in
the benighted country places.

116. PATER NOSTERS, the Lord’s Prayer; AVES, prayers to the Virgin.

136. ALDEBORAN, the Bull’s Eye, a double star of the first magnitude in the
constellation Taurus.

137. CASSIOPEIAS CHAIRE, a circumpolar constellation having a fancied
resemblance to a chair.

139. ONE KNOCKED AT THE DORE, Kirkrapine, the plunderer of the Church.
Spenser represents in him the peculiar vices of the Irish clergy and laity.

166. STAY HIM TO ADVIZE, stop to reflect.

172. HIM BOOTETH NOT RESIST, it does him no good to resist. This whole
passage refers, perhaps, to Henry VIII’s suppression of the monasteries and
convents in 1538-39.

185. THAT LONG WANDRING GREEKE. Ulysses, or Odysseus, the hero of Homer’s
Odyssey, who wandered ten years and refused immortality from the goddess
Calypso in order that he might return to Penelope.

xxii. Note the rhymes deare, heare, and teare (air). This 16th
century pronunciation still survives in South Carolina. See Ellis’s Early
English Pronunciation, III, 868. This stanza reads like the description of
an Irish wake.

238. OR OUGHT HAVE DONE, or have done something to displease you.

239. THAT SHOULD AS DEATH, etc., that should settle like death, etc.