482
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s, m, JUNE 24, m
in their most gorgeous tints, it appeared to
him lovely as a scene in Arcady. And in its
pastoral quietude it was such, with but slight
change, as it had been when the young poet
went in and out of the home of his ancestors,
and his feet trod the meadows his fore-
fathers had trodden for generations. As I
looked upon Hurstwood, with its girdling
woods and leas, 1 looked upon just such a
scene as had met the eyes of Spenser more
than three centuries ago. Beyond the hamlet
Pendle Hill, a rugged and isolated mass,
towered high, a conspicuous object. On the
topmost slopes and summits of the Yorkshire
hills, a continuation of the great Pennine
chain, stretched a vast expanse of moorland,
breeding-ground of the black-cock, peewit,
and numberless shy-winged birds to this
day, in the year's waning months a glorious
wilderness of heather and ling and wild
grasses, splendidly carpeting rounded height
and gorge-like glen, with hardly a sign of
human habitation to break the sweep of the
lofty solitudes,
In one direction in the sixteenth century the spectator standing near this hamlet and gazing across the country beheld a very differ- ent and grander scene. It was a scene that still bore traces of far-off days. In the valley, and also to some extent up the hillside towards Hurstwood, nourished the mighty forest of Pendle, haunt of wild animals and wilder witches. As seen from the elevated position of Hurstwood it was a magnificent sylvan spectacle. There was then no large town of Burnley or manufacturing village, its locality indicated by tall chimneys emit- ting volumes of smoke. It was a region that furnished glimpses of beauty and sights of savage grandeur, to be embodied in after- years in the wonderful imaginative demesne of the * Faerie Queene.'
Close to Hurstwood lived Rosalind, "the widowe's daughter of the glenne." At the foot of the glen there is a house which bears the name of Hock Hall. This house, accord- ing to tradition, was the home of the beauti- ful lady whose story is one of the most famous love episodes in poesy. It was romantically situated near the great forest. One of Spen- ser's biographers conjectures that the lady belonged to the Dynely family, of Dynely Hill, not far from the Towneley Hall estates. But it is conjecture only, nothing more. Every reader of the 'Faerie Queene' knows the story, how the young scholar pressed his suit in vain for the hand of the haughty Rosalind. It was no mere idle affection of an hour, such as any youth might have experienced and forgotten, but a deep and
absorbing passion, the fires of which never
wholly died out. Long after, when, not
without much devotion, for a time unrequited,
and many rebuffs, he sought the hand of the
Elizabeth who became his wife, he remem-
bered the maiden he had met and wooed in
the glades of Pendle. The recollections of
Rosalind, woven into his very being, were
among the most sacred memories of his life.
Rosalind was no rustic coquette. She appears to have been highly accomplished, and was able to estimate aright Spenser's abilities. Gabriel Harvey said of her, Gentle Mistress Rosalind once reported him [Spen- ser] to have all the intelligences at com- mandment; and at another christened him her Signior Pegaso" According to the writer of the " Glosse" to the 'Shepheardes Calender,' she was a gentlewoman of no mean house, and her gifts and graces were of no common kind. In worldly circumstances, though assuredly not in honourable lineage, the lady of so independent a character was probably more fortunately endowed than the struggling poet. Yet I do not think that worldly wealth- the lack of it on Spenser's part had much to do with his rejection as a lover by the fair and cultured Rosalind. Let us regard the affair from another and entirely different point of view. Spenser belonged to the Church of England, and as a party man was a thorough Puritan. But his Anglican Puritanism was not that of Cartwright, and was little coloured or moulded by the principles and influences that had their origin and root in Geneva. His refined tastes and love of the beautiful, so marked characteristics of his poetry, saved him from giving himself up heart and soul to that cold and austere creed. Also bear in mind his hatred of Rome and of all men and things connected with the Roman Catholic Church. Still he was no bigot, but simply a man of decided convictions. At no time did he so forget himself as to become intolerant.
To what part of England, in the enthusiasm of youth, at times perhaps apt to be fervent, did he bring his theological opinions and hatred of Rome, or, at least, of what he deemed Romish errors 1 To Lancashire, the most Roman Catholic county in England, and perhaps East Lancashire more emphatically so than the other portions of the shire, the Towneleys arid not a few ancient families owning thereabouts large estates, and con- sequently wielding a fair share of social in- fluence. Hither came the young Cambridge graduate, and found himself in an atmo- sphere of prejudices and traditions and a type of religious life little in harmony with his university training, and where his
