Lucasta [15]
maintaine the field courageously against Envy, nay come off with honour; if you, Sir, please to rest satisfied that it marches under your ensignes, which are the desires of "Your true honourer, "Hen. Glapthorne."
<2.28> It has never, so far as I am aware, been suggested that the friend to whom Sir John Suckling addressed his capital ballad:--
"I tell thee, Dick, where I have been,"
may have been Lovelace. It was a very usual practice (then even more so than now) among familiar acquaintances to use the abbreviated Christian name in addressing each other; thus Suckling was JACK; Davenant, WILL; Carew, TOM, &c.; in the preceding generation Marlowe had been KIT; Jonson, BEN; Greene, ROBIN, and so forth; and although there is no positive proof that Lovelace and Suckling were intimate, it is extremely probable that such was the case, more especially as they were not only brother poets, but both country gentlemen belonging to neighbouring counties. Suckling had, besides, some taste and aptitude for military affairs, and could discourse about strategics in a city tavern over a bowl of canary with the author of LUCASTA, notwithstanding that he was a little troubled by nervousness (according to report), when the enemy was too near.
<2.29> From Andrew Marvell's lines prefixed to LUCASTA, 1649, it seems that Lovelace and himself were on tolerably good terms, and that when the former presented the Kentish petition, and was imprisoned for so doing, his friends, who exerted themselves to procure his release, suspected Marvell of a share in his disgrace, which Marvell, according to his own account, earnestly disclaimed. See the lines commencing:--
"But when the beauteous ladies came to know," &c.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
LUCASTA:
Epodes, Odes, Sonnets, Songs, &c.
TO WHICH IS ADDED
Aramantha, a PASTORALL.
BY RICHARD LOVELACE, Esq.
LONDON, Printed by Tho. Harper, and are to be sold by Tho. Evvster, at the Gun, in Ivie Lane. 1649.
THE DEDICATION.
TO THE RIGHT HON. MY LADY ANNE LOVELACE.<3.1>
To the richest Treasury That e'er fill'd ambitious eye; To the faire bright Magazin Hath impoverisht Love's Queen; To th' Exchequer of all honour (All take pensions but from her); To the taper of the thore Which the god himselfe but bore; To the Sea of Chaste Delight; Let me cast the Drop I write. And as at Loretto's shrine Caesar shovels in his mine, Th' Empres spreads her carkanets, The lords submit their coronets, Knights their chased armes hang by, Maids diamond-ruby fancies tye; Whilst from the pilgrim she wears One poore false pearl, but ten true tears: So among the Orient prize, (Saphyr-onyx eulogies) Offer'd up unto your fame, Take my GARNET-DUBLET name, And vouchsafe 'midst those rich joyes (With devotion) these TOYES. Richard Lovelace.
<3.1> This lady was the wife of the unfortunate John, second Lord Lovelace, who suffered so severely for his attachment to the King's cause, and daughter to the equally unfortunate Thomas, Earl of Cleveland, who was equally devoted to his sovereign, and whose estates were ordered by the Parliament to be sold, July 26, 1650. See PARLIAMENTS AND COUNCILS OF ENGLAND, 1839, p. 507.
VERSES ADDRESSED TO THE AUTHOR.
TO MY BEST BROTHER ON HIS POEMS CALLED "LUCASTA."
Now y' have oblieg'd the age, thy wel known worth Is to our joy auspiciously brought forth. Good morrow to thy son, thy
<2.28> It has never, so far as I am aware, been suggested that the friend to whom Sir John Suckling addressed his capital ballad:--
"I tell thee, Dick, where I have been,"
may have been Lovelace. It was a very usual practice (then even more so than now) among familiar acquaintances to use the abbreviated Christian name in addressing each other; thus Suckling was JACK; Davenant, WILL; Carew, TOM, &c.; in the preceding generation Marlowe had been KIT; Jonson, BEN; Greene, ROBIN, and so forth; and although there is no positive proof that Lovelace and Suckling were intimate, it is extremely probable that such was the case, more especially as they were not only brother poets, but both country gentlemen belonging to neighbouring counties. Suckling had, besides, some taste and aptitude for military affairs, and could discourse about strategics in a city tavern over a bowl of canary with the author of LUCASTA, notwithstanding that he was a little troubled by nervousness (according to report), when the enemy was too near.
<2.29> From Andrew Marvell's lines prefixed to LUCASTA, 1649, it seems that Lovelace and himself were on tolerably good terms, and that when the former presented the Kentish petition, and was imprisoned for so doing, his friends, who exerted themselves to procure his release, suspected Marvell of a share in his disgrace, which Marvell, according to his own account, earnestly disclaimed. See the lines commencing:--
"But when the beauteous ladies came to know," &c.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
LUCASTA:
Epodes, Odes, Sonnets, Songs, &c.
TO WHICH IS ADDED
Aramantha, a PASTORALL.
BY RICHARD LOVELACE, Esq.
LONDON, Printed by Tho. Harper, and are to be sold by Tho. Evvster, at the Gun, in Ivie Lane. 1649.
THE DEDICATION.
TO THE RIGHT HON. MY LADY ANNE LOVELACE.<3.1>
To the richest Treasury That e'er fill'd ambitious eye; To the faire bright Magazin Hath impoverisht Love's Queen; To th' Exchequer of all honour (All take pensions but from her); To the taper of the thore Which the god himselfe but bore; To the Sea of Chaste Delight; Let me cast the Drop I write. And as at Loretto's shrine Caesar shovels in his mine, Th' Empres spreads her carkanets, The lords submit their coronets, Knights their chased armes hang by, Maids diamond-ruby fancies tye; Whilst from the pilgrim she wears One poore false pearl, but ten true tears: So among the Orient prize, (Saphyr-onyx eulogies) Offer'd up unto your fame, Take my GARNET-DUBLET name, And vouchsafe 'midst those rich joyes (With devotion) these TOYES. Richard Lovelace.
<3.1> This lady was the wife of the unfortunate John, second Lord Lovelace, who suffered so severely for his attachment to the King's cause, and daughter to the equally unfortunate Thomas, Earl of Cleveland, who was equally devoted to his sovereign, and whose estates were ordered by the Parliament to be sold, July 26, 1650. See PARLIAMENTS AND COUNCILS OF ENGLAND, 1839, p. 507.
VERSES ADDRESSED TO THE AUTHOR.
TO MY BEST BROTHER ON HIS POEMS CALLED "LUCASTA."
Now y' have oblieg'd the age, thy wel known worth Is to our joy auspiciously brought forth. Good morrow to thy son, thy