68 Charles G. Osgood, 



The Fourth Book presents the Temple of Venus, and what may 

 be described as the purest example of pageant which Spenser has 

 given us; that is, a procession devoid of symbolism or implied 

 significance. So purely spectacular is it that, in at least one 

 critic's opinion, it may have been modeled after some contem- 

 porary mask.^ It is the pageant of sea-gods, rivers, and nymphs 

 coming to attend the marriage of the river Medway with the 

 Thames in the hall of Proteus. First appear the sea-gods— Nep- 

 tune and Amphitrite, Phorcys, Brontes, Orion, the many ruling 

 sons of Neptune, and the rest. Then follow the great rivers, the 

 Nile, the Rhone, the Ister, and some dozen more, including Orin- 

 oco, 'though but knowen late.' In another group are enumerated 

 the many English rivers, led by the bridegroom, Thames. *Ne 

 thence the Irishe rivers absent were,' but are told to the number 

 of nearly twenty. Following these is the bride, attended by her 

 tributaries, after whom troops a host of sea-nymphs, over fifty 

 of whom Spenser calls by name, and the air is astir with the roar 

 of Triton's horn or the softer murmurings of Amphion's harp. 



In a learned and charming article in Fraser's Magazine for 

 1878,^ P. W. Joyce has considered that part of the eleventh canto 

 of the Fourth Book^ which deals with the Irish rivers, identifying 

 those which are not apparent, and explaining epithets and allu- 

 sions. He writes with the authority of one who has traversed the 

 ground, and viewed with his own eye the regions of which he 

 speaks. This was necessary to a full explanation of the passage, 

 since it is evident that Spenser himself depended in writing it 

 much less upon printed accounts and hearsay than upon his own 

 observation, and his familiarity with the scenes themselves. 



The case of the English rivers is dififerent. Though the pas- 

 sage devoted to them — stanzas 23-39 — is more than three times 

 as long as that which describes the Irish rivers, it wants the 

 peculiar freshness and spontaneity of the other, which doubtless 

 came from the poet's familiarity with the rivers themselves, and 

 indeed from his undisguised love of his Irish home. The passage 

 about the English rivers, for all its lovely movement and cadence, 



' O. Elton, Introduction to Michael Drayton, Spenser Soc. Pub., extra 

 number, p. 38. Cf. H. R. Patch, Modern Language Notes 35. 178. 

 = N. S. vol. 17, pp. 315-333. 

 * Stanzas 40-44. 



