Mr. Black's Lecture.

Last night the usual large audience heard Mr. E. Charlton Black's lecture on "Spenser and Drummond of Haw hornden." Mr. Black first spoke of the events which preceded and prepared the way for Spenser's writings.

The fifteenth century was the poorest in literature which England has known; for there was no poet worthy of note from the time of Chancer to the latter part of the reign of Henry VIII. This can easily be explained by the Law of Leisure. In a time of national rest, literature, and especially poetry, flourishes much better than when a country is thrown into confusion by political disputes. "Poetry", as Wordsworth says, "is the expression of emotion recollected in tranquility. "Now the age which followed Chaucer was one of unusual political activity. Either men did not write at all, or they wrote in a serious, controversial style, removed as far as possible from poetical sentiment. With their minds full of the important disputes going on around them, what wonder that they found no time for poetry.

With the reign of Elizabeth there came a time of sound government when men had leisure to look around them. England was then taking an active part in the affairs of the world. The reformation was bringing before men's minds new and glorious thoughts of freedom. Above all, America was being explored and settled. It was a new country. People felt that antiquity had not exhausted everything, but that here were new fields for investigation opened to them. It was a time of great and general animation such as was very favorable to poetry.

In December, 1579, there appeared a quarto volume of poetry entitled "The Shepherd's Calendar" and dedicated to Sir Philip Sidney. Edmond Spenser was twenty-seven years old and this was his first work. It was enthusiastically received and from that time dates the popularity of pastorals in England.

Spenser was not born of a rich family, but in 1569 he went to Cambridge University, where he spent seven years. After that he lived in nothern England, where he fell in love with one Rosalind. His suit was not fortunate, so he returned to London and there became very intimate with Sir Philip Sidney. Chance carried him to Ireland and here he was forced to pass most of his time, away from the London that he loved. Queen Elizabeth granted him a large estate near Cock, but he was never popular there and was eventually driven out. His castle was burned and one his children (for he had married an Irish wife) perished in the flames. His own death followed soon, on January 16, 1599. He was carried to Westminster.

Spenser's great work. of course, is the "Fairy Queen" which remained unfinished at his death. In it he tries to represent in an allegory a perfect gentleman in search of glory.

Drummond was the greatest of the poets who followed Spenser's style. He had started his career as a lawyer, but on inheriting his father's estate he devoted himself to poetry. His first works appeared about 1615 and after that he wrote a good deal. "The Flowers of Zion" is his best book. In all his works there is a religious solemnity noticeable which we find in no other poet of the time.