so-called heroic verse, it bears no resemblance to any other poem in that metre composed before, nor, perhaps, is there any written since which decidedly recalls it, unless it be Endymion. 'Pagan' it is in a sense, with the Paganism of the Renascence: the more pagan the better, considering the subject. Nothing ! the deeper thought of the time, no 'looking before and after,' no worship of a Gloriana or hostility to an Acrasia, interferes with its frank acceptance of sensuous beauty and joy. In this, in spite of much resemblance, it differs from Endymion, the spirit of which is not fruition but unsatisfied longing, and in which the vision of a vague and lovelier ideal is always turning the enjoyment of the moment into gloom. On the other hand, a further likeness to Keats may perhaps be traced in the pictorial quality of Marlowe's descriptions. His power does not lie in catching in the aspect of objects or scenes those deeper suggestions which appeal to an imagination stored with human experience as well as sensitive to colour and form; for this power does not necessarily result in what we call pictorial writing; but his soul seems to be in his eyes, and he renders the beauty which appeals directly to sense as vividly as he apprehends it. Nor is this the case with the description of objects alone. The same complete absorption of imagination in sense appears in Marlowe's account of the visit to Hero's tower. This passage is in a high degree voluptuous, but it is not prurient. For prurience is the sign of an unsatisfied imagination, which, being unable to present its object adequately, appeals to extraneous and unpoetic feelings. But Marlowe's imagination is completely satisfied; and therefore, though he has not a high theme (for it is a mere sensuous joy that is described, and there is next to no real emotion in the matter), he is able to make fine poetry of it. Of the metrical qualities of the poem there can be but one opinion. Shakespeare himself, who quoted a line of it', never reached in his own narrative verse a music so spontaneous and rich, a music to which Marlowe might have applied his own words

That calls my soul from forth his living seat
To move unto the measures of delight.'

'Dead shepherd, now I find thy saw of might:
"Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?'

As You Like It, iii. 5.

Marlowe had many of the makings of a great poet: a capacity for Titanic conceptions which might with time have become Olympian; an imaginative vision which was already intense and must have deepened and widened; the gift of style and of making words sing; and a time to live in such as no other generation of English poets has known. It is easy to reckon his failings. His range of perception into life and character was contracted: of comic power he shows hardly a trace, and it is incredible that he should have written the Jack Cade scene of Henry VI; no humour or tenderness relieves his pathos; there is not any female character in his plays whom we remember with much interest; and it is not clear that he could have produced songs of the first order. But it is only Shakespeare who can do everything; and Shakespeare did not die at twenty-nine. That Marlowe must have stood nearer to him than any other dramatic poet of that time, or perhaps of any later time, is probably the verdict of nearly all students of the drama. His immediate successors knew well what was lost in him; and from the days of Peele, Jonson, Drayton, and Chapman, to our own, the poets have done mort than common honour to his mem ry.

A. C. BRADLEY,

VOL L

EC

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE.

Come live with me, and be my love;
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
Woods or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses,
And a thousand fragrant posies;
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle;

A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair-lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw and ivy-buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs:
An if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.

The shepherd-swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

FRAGMENT.

[From England's Parnassus, 1600.]

I walk'd along a stream, for pureness rare, Brighter than sun-shine; for it did acquaint The dullest sight with all the glorious prey That in the pebble-pavèd channel lay.

No molten crystal, but a richer mine,

Even Nature's rarest alchymy ran there,Diamonds resolv'd, and substance more divine, Through whose bright-gliding current might appear A thousand naked nymphs, whose ivory shine, Enamelling the banks, made them more clear Than ever was that glorious palace gate Where the day-shining Sun in triumph sate.

Upon this brim the eglantine and rose,

The tamarisk, olive, and the almond tree, As kind companions, in one union grows, Folding their twining arms, as oft we sce Turtle-taught lovers either other close,

Lending to dulness feeling sympathy; And as a costly valance o'er a bed,

So did their garland-tops the brook o'erspread.

Their leaves, that differ'd both in shape and show, Though all were green, yet difference such in green, Like to the checker'd bent of Iris' bow,

Prided the running main, as it had been

FROM THE FIRST SESTIAD OF HERO AND LEANDER.

On Hellespont, guilty of true love's blood,
In view and opposite two cities stood,
Sea-borderers, disjoin'd by Neptune's might;
The one Abydos, the other Sestos hight.
At Sestos Hero dwelt; Hero the fair,
Whom young Apollo courted for her hair,
And offer'd as a dower his burning throne,
Where she should sit, for men to gaze upon.
The outside of her garments were of lawn,
The lining purple silk, with gilt stars drawn ;
Her wide sleeves green, and bordered with a grove,
Where Venus in her naked glory strov

To please the careless and disdainful eyes
Of proud Adonis, that before her lies;

Her kirtle blue, whereon was many a stain,
Made with the blood of wretched lovers slain.

Upon her head she ware a myrtle wreath,

From whence her veil reach'd to the ground beneath:
Her veil was artificial flowers and leaves,

Whose workmanship both man and beast deceives:
Many would praise the sweet smell as she past,
When 'twas the odour which her breath forth cast;
And there for honey bees have sought in vain,
And, beat from thence, have lighted there again.
About her neck hung chains of pebble-stone,
Which, lighten'd by her neck, like diamonds shone.
She ware no gloves; for neither sun nor wind
Would burn or parch her hands, but, to her mind,
Or warm or cool them, for they took delight
To play upon those hands, they were so white.
Buskins of shells, all silver'd, usèd she,
And branch'd with blushing coral to the knee;
Where sparrows perch'd, of hollow pearl and gold,
Such as the world would wonder to behold:
Those with sweet water oft her handmaid fills,
Which as she went, would cherup through their billa
Some say, for her the fairest Cupid pin'd,
And, looking in her face, was strooken blind.
But this is true; so like was one the other,
As he imagined Hero was his mother;
And oftentimes into her bosom flew,
About her naked neck his bare arms threw,
And laid his childish head upon her breast,
And, with still panting rockt, there took his rest.

On this feast-day,-O cursèd day and tour !—
Went Hero thorough Sestos, from her ower
To Venus' temple, where unhappily,

As after chanc'd, they did each other spy.
So fair a church as this had Venus none:
The walls were of discolour'd jasper-stone,