322 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



[2»« S. No 95., Oct. 24. '67. 



controller Dr. Feme," whom he accuses of "play- 

 ing fast and loose," or to John Fox the martyr- 

 ologist, is not clear ; but if to the latter, the fact 

 itself, and the possession of such influence as is 

 here supposed, have nowhere, as I am aware of, 

 been noticed by his biographers. 



In 1580 appeared the celebrated Letters between 

 Harvey and Spenser the poet, entitled : 



"Three Proper, and wittie, familiar Letters; lately 

 passed betvveene two Yniuersitie men: touching the 

 Earthquake in Aprill last, and our English refourmed 

 Versifying. With the Preface of a well wilier to them 

 both." 



To these were added shortly after, — 



" Two other, very commendable Letters, of the same 

 mens writing: both touching the foresaid Artificiall 

 Versifying and certain other Particulars." 



These letters would appear to have originated 

 from his failure to obtain the Oratorship of the 

 University. Shortly before this he had — 



" curiously laboured some exact and exquisite points of 

 study and practice, and greatly niisliked the preposterous 

 and untoward courses of divers good wits ill directed : 

 there wanted not some sharp undeserved discourtesies to 

 exasperate my mind." — Harvey's Four Letters, Reprint, 

 p. 147. 



Urged forward by various causes, (dislike, 

 young and hot blood, and an invective vein,) 

 these letter?, written and circulated probably in 

 manuscript amongst the friends of both, at last 

 were surreptitiously printed. 



" Letters may be privately written, that Avould not be 

 publicly divulged. . . . Many communications and 

 writings may secretly pass between friends, even for an 

 exercise of speech and style, that are not otherwise con- 

 venient to be disclosed ; it was the sinister hap of those 

 unfortunate letters to fall into the hands of malicious 

 enemies, or undiscreet friends, who ventured to imprint 

 in earnest that was scribbled in jest (for the moody fit 

 was soon over), and requited their private pleasure with 

 my public displeasure : oh ! my inestimable and infinite 

 displeasure. 



" When there was no remedy but melancholy patience, 

 and the sharpest part of those unlucky letters had been 

 over-read at the Council Table, 1 was advised, by certain 

 honourable and divers worshipful persons, to interpret my 

 intention in more express terms; and thereupon dis- 

 coursed every particularity by way of articles or positions, 

 in a large Apology of my dutiful and entire aflTection to 

 that flourishing University, my dear Mother; which 

 Apolotpj, with not so few as forty such academical ex- 

 erci.=es, and sundry other politic discourses, I have hi- 

 therto suppressed,' as unworthy the view of the busy 

 world, or the entertainment of precious time : but per- 

 adventure these extraordinary provocations maj' work 

 extraordinarily in me; and though not in a passion, yet 

 in conceit stir me up, to publish many tracts and dis- 

 courses, that in certain considerations I meant ever to 

 conceal, and to dedicate unto none but unto obscure 

 darkness, or famous Vulcan." — G. Harvey's Four Letters, 

 Reprint, p. 15. 



This " Apology" of Harvey does not appear to 

 have been printed, and is probably for ever lost 

 to us. 



It must have been in the " Discourse touching 

 the Earthquake in Aprill last," that the libellous 

 matter was found which led to the interference 

 of the Privy Council ; and to this Lyly evidently 

 alludes in the following sentence in Pap with a 

 Hatchet : 



" And one will we coniure vp, that writing a familiar 

 Epistle about the naturall causes of an Earthquake, fell 

 into the bowells of libelling, which made his eares quake 

 for feare of clipping, he shall tickle you with taunts ; all 

 his works bound close, are at least sixe sheetes in quarto, 

 and he calls them the first tome of his familiar Epistle. 

 ... If he ioyne with us perijsti Martin, thy wit wil be 

 massacred: if the toy take him to close with thee, then 

 haue I my wish, for this tenne yeres haue Ilookt to lam- 

 hacke him." — Reprint, 17, 18. 



Amongst the Letters between Harvey and 

 Spenser is a poem by the former, entitled " Spe- 

 culum Tuscanismi," which by Harvey's enemies 

 was construed into a libel on Edward Vere, Earl 

 of Oxford, the story of whose exile and residence 

 at Florence has been told by D'Israeli. Harvey 

 says that it was Lyly who betrayed him : 



" And that was all the fleeting that ever I felt, saving 

 that another company of special good fellows (whereof he 

 was none of the meanest that bravely threatened to con- 

 jure up one which should massacre Martin's wit, or 

 should be lambacked himself with ten years' provision) 

 would needs forsooth very courtly persuade the Earl of 

 Oxford, that something in those letters, and namely, the 

 Mirror of Tuscanismo was palpably intended against 

 him." — Four Letters, p. 17. 



Though Harvey goes on to disclaim all re- 

 ference to the Earl of Oxford, Nash tells us that 

 he was " compelled to secrete himself for eight 

 weeks in that noble mans house, for whom he had 

 thus bladed," and that he afterwards was im- 

 prisoned in the Fleet, quoting the evidence of 

 Thomas Watson in confirmation : 



" But what news of that good Gabriel Harvey 

 Knowne to the world for a foole, and clapt in the 

 Fleet for a rimer." 



In one of his Sonnets Harvey replies : 



" Whose eye but his that sits on slander's stool 

 Did ever him in Fleet or prison see." 



He also alludes to this charge of Nash in Pierce's 

 Supererogation : 



"As for his lewd supposals, and imputations of coun- 

 terfeit praises they are, like my imprisonment in the 

 Fleet, of his strong phantasy, and do but imitate his own 

 skill in falsifying of evidence, and suborning of witnesses 

 to his purpose." — Reprint, p. 57. 



Harvey and Lyly were in early life friends. 

 The former, in the second book of Pierce's Su- 

 pererogation, thus commences : 



" Paf- HATCHET (for the name of thy good nature is 

 pitifully grown out of request) thy old acquaintance in 

 the Savoy when young Euphues hatched the eggs that 

 his elder friends laid, (surely Euphues was somewaj- a 

 pretty fellow : would God, Lilly had always been Euphues 

 and never Pap-hatchet) that old acquaintance, now some- 

 Avhat strangely sainted with a new remembrance, is 



