PAGE 14
The Ruines Of Time
by
Ver. 260.–His sister. Lady Mary Sidney.
Ver. 261.–That good earle, etc. This Earl of Bedford died in 1585.– TODD.
Ver. 267.–He, noble bud, etc. Edward Russell, grandson of Francis Earl of Bedford, succeeded in the earldom, his father, Francis, having been slain by the Scots.–OLDYS.
Ver. 275.–That goodly ladie, etc. Lady Mary Sidney, mother of Sir Philip Sidney and the Countess of Pembroke.
Ver. 281.–Most gentle spirite. Sir Philip Sidney.
Ver. 317.–Thine owne sister, etc. The Countess of Pembroke, to whom this poem is dedicated. “The Dolefull Lay of Clorinda” (Vol. IV. p. 426) appears to have been written by her.
Ver. 436.–Good Melibae. Sir Francis Walsingham, who died April 6,1590. The poet is Thomas Watson.–OLDYS.
Ver. 447-455.–These lines are aimed at Burghley, who was said to have opposed the Queen’s intended bounty to the poet. C.
Ver 491.–These allegorical representations of the vanity of exalted position, stately buildings, earthly pleasures, bodily strength, and works of beauty and magnificence, admit of an easy application to the splendid career of the Earl of Leicester,–his favor and influence with the Queen, his enlargement of Kenilworth, his princely style of living, and particularly (IV.) his military command in the Low Countries. The sixth of these “tragick pageants” strongly confirms this interpretation. The two bears are Robert and Ambrose Dudley. While Leicester was lieutenant in the Netherlands, he was in the habit of using the Warwick crest (a bear and ragged staff) instead of his own. Naunton, in his Fragmenta Regalia, calls him Ursa Major. C.
Ver. 497.–The holie brethren, etc. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Daniel, ch. iii. C.
Ver. 582-586.–A paraphrase of Sir Philip’s last words to his brother. “Above all, govern your will and affection by the will and word of your Creator, in me beholding the end of this world with all her vanities.” This is pointed out by Zouch, Life of Sidney, p. 263. C.
Ver 590.–This second series of pageants is applicable exclusively to Sir Philip Sidney. The meaning of the third and fourth is hard to make out; but the third seems to have reference to the collection of the scattered sheets of the Arcadia, and the publication of this work by the Countess of Pembroke, after it had been condemned to destruction by the author. The fourth may indeed signify nothing more than Lady Sidney’s bereavement by her husband’s death; but this interpretation seems too literal for a professed allegory. The sixth obviously alludes to the splendid obsequies to Sidney, performed at the Queen’s expense, and to the competition of the States of Holland for the honor of burying his body. C.
L’ENVOY: L’Envoy was a sort of postscript sent with poetical compositions, and serving either to recommend them to the attention of some particular person, or to enforce what we call the moral of them.– TYRWHITT.