SPENSER 



5494 



SPHERE 



After the year 1586 he lived in Kilcolman 

 Castle in Cork, as possessor of a large estate 

 given him by the government. Here he con- 

 tinued the writing of the Faerie Queene, begun 

 several years before, and upon the advice of 

 Sir Walter Ra- 

 leigh, who visited 

 him in 1589, sub- 

 mitted the manu- 

 script to the 

 court. The only 

 encourage- 

 ment given him 

 was a meager 

 pension, and his 

 Colin Clout's 

 Come Home 

 Againe shows his 

 chagrin at his de- EDMUND SPENSER 

 feat. However, he published the first three 

 books of his allegory in 1590, and they were 

 eagerly received by the public. Somewhat 

 later appeared a volume of short poems en- 

 titled Complaints. 



After his return to Ireland he married a lady 

 whose given name, Elizabeth, alone is known. 

 The courtship was described in the Amoretti, 

 a series of sonnets, and the marriage was made 

 memorable by the Epithalamion, the finest of 

 English wedding songs. The year 1596 is no- 

 table as that in which appeared three more 

 books of the Faerie Queene; Foure Hymnes, 

 celebrating love, beauty, heavenly love and 

 heavenly beauty, and the fine Prothalamion. 

 At this time, too, was written the Present 

 State oj Ireland, not published for many years. 

 All of his productions, however, did not ad- 

 vance him at the court, and he returned from 

 another visit to England more discouraged than 

 ever. Two years later his castle was broken 

 into and burned by Irish rebels, and he nar- 

 rowly escaped with his family. Not long after- 

 ward he died in a London inn. 



The Faerie Queene, though not completed, 

 ranks among the greatest narrative poems in 

 the literature not only of England but of the 

 world. It was the poet's intention to make 

 the allegory consist of twelve books, in which 

 twelve moral qualities should be embodied in 

 as many knights, who should also represent 

 some of the chief personages of the day, as 

 Raleigh, Drake and others. However, only six 

 books, and two cantos of Mittabilitie were 

 written. The form of stanza used by Spenser 

 has since been called by his name, and has been 

 used by- some of the greatest of English poets, 



as by Byron in Childe Harold, by Keats in 

 the Eve oj Saint Agnes and by Bums in the 

 Cotter's Saturday Night. (See SPENSERIAN 

 STANZA.) ' The music of the verse, the beauty 

 of sentiment, and, above all, the exquisite fan- 

 cies called into being by a wonderful imagina- 

 tion are the chief merits of Spenser's great 

 poem. Many of the great poets who followed 

 him have been profoundly impressed by the 

 Faerie Queene indeed, this is so true that 

 Spenser is called "the poet's poet." A.MC c. 



Consult Church's Spenser, in English Men of 

 Letters Series. 



.SPENSERIAN, spense'rian, STAN'ZA, a 

 verse form originated by Spenser for his Faerie 

 Queene. It is a nine-line stanza, the first eight 

 lines containing ten syllables each, the last 

 twelve syllables, while the rhyme scheme is 

 ababbcbcc. It is a very stately form of verse, 

 and while many English poets have attempted 

 to imitate it, few have known how to handle 

 it in a manner worthy of its inventor. The 

 most famous poems written in Spenserian 

 stanza since the Faerie Queen are Keats's Eve 

 of Saint Agnes and Byron's Childe Harold. It 

 is through this last poem, probably, that most 

 readers are familiar with its stately music and 

 its slow movement. 



SPERMACETI, spurmase'ti, a waxy sub- 

 stance obtained from cavities in the head and 

 blubber of the sperm whale, widely used in 

 making ointments and facial creams. In the 

 whale spermaceti occurs as thick, oily fluid. 

 By a process of trying out and cooling, this 

 fluid is separated into sperm oil and a mass of 

 flaky white crystals. The latter constitute the 

 spermaceti of commerce. An ordinary whale 

 yields about twelve barrels of the raw mate- 

 rial. When purified spermaceti is a smooth, 

 translucent solid, practically tasteless and odor- 

 less, and similar to tallow in appearance. It 

 can be dissolved in hot alcohol and ether, and 

 burns with a bright flame. Though formerly 

 employed to a considerable extent in making 

 candles and to give weight to dress goods, it is 

 now valued chiefly as an ingredient of oint- 

 ments and cosmetics. 



SPHERE, sfeer. A solid bounded by a 

 curved surface, all points of which are equally 

 distant from a point within, is called a sphere. 

 The point within from which all points of the 

 surface are equally distant is called the center. 

 The distance from the center to the surface is 

 the radius. The distance from any point on 

 the surface through the center to the opposite 

 point on the surface is the diameter. 



