lxxvi
their friendship was the result of family intimacy and common race.
Other of Daniel's friends were Italians. In Wright's Elizabeth and her Times (Vol. II, p. 315), we hear of a Samuel Daniel abroad and in the company of an Italian doctor, Julio Marino. His Description of Beauty translated out of Marino can hardly be connected with the doctor, since the poet's given name was Giambattista, but it serves to illustrate Daniel's knowledge of Italian and interest in Italian literature. That he travelled in Italy in his youth is shown by the headings of two sonnets in the Delia sequence, "At the Author's going into Italie" (sonnet LII), and "This Sonnet was made at the Author's beeing in Italie" (sonnet LI). His first published work, entitled Imprese, was a translation of a Latin tract on crests and seals by the contemporary Italian historian, Paulus Jovius. His friendship with the poet Guarini is indicated by the following sonnet addressed to Sir Edward Dimmock, Daniel's first patron, on an English translation of Guarini's Il Pastor Fido:—
"I do rejoyce learned and worthy Knight,
That by the hand of thy kinde Country-man
(This painfull and industrious Gentleman)
Thy deare esteem'd Guarini comes to light;
Who in thy love I know tooke great delight
As thou in his, who now in English can
Speake as good English as Italian,
And here enjoyes the grace of his owne right.
Though I remember he hath oft imbas'd
Unto us both the vertues of the North,
Saying our costes were with no measures grac'd,
Nor barbarous tongues could any verse bring forth.
I would he sawe his owne, or knew our store,
Whose spirits can yield as much, and if not more."[1]
Lines 9-12 of the sonnet refer clearly to conversation with Guarini, and apparently to a personal friendship. Fur-
- ↑ Works, ed. Grosart, Vol. I, p. 263.
