£40,000, upon condition that he was not to stir out of the lines of communication without a pass from the speaker. His liberal spirit, in furnishing men with horses and arms for the credit of the king's cause-in relieving the necessities of ingenious men-scholars, musicians, and soldiersin supporting and assisting his brothers Francis and William, who were engaged in the king's service and the education of his younger brother Dudley, had already impaired his fortune. - After the surrender of Oxford in 1646, he formed a regiment for the service of the French king, commanded it himself, and was wounded at Dunkirk; previous to this he had paid his addresses to a lady of great beauty and fortune, whose name was Lucy Sacheverell, whom he usually called LUX CASTA; to his misfortune the report of his death of wounds received at Dunkirk reaching her, and being believed, she was soon after married to another. It was principally to her, and in her praise, that the following poems were written; and it is supposed the print prefixed, engraved by Faithorne from a design of Sir Peter Lely's, contains her portrait, and in compliment to her they bear the name of LUCASTA. In 1648 he returned to England with his brother Dudley, then a captain in his regiment, and upon their arrival in London they were both committed prisoners to Peterhouse in that city, where he amused himself with arranging and committing his poems to the press; they were published in 1649; but many of them had previously been printed in musical publications, having been composed by Lawes, Gamble, and other eminent composers. His liberality and his loyalty had entirely consumed his estate, so that when upon the death of the king he was set at liberty, he found himself in the world without the means of support, and reduced to such a hopeless condition, that in the words of his biographer "he grew very melancholy (which brought him into a consumption), became very poor in body and purse, was the object of charity, went in ragged cloaths (whereas when he was in his glory he wore cloth of gold and silver), and mostly lodged in obscure and dirty places, more befitting the worst of beggars, than poorest of servants, &c." In this sad reverse of fortunes did this gallant and spirited being linger out his wretched existence until 1658, when death terminated his sufferings; he expired at very mean lodgings in Gunpowder-alley, near Shoe-lane, and was buried at the west end of St. Bride's church. He appears to have been a finished gentleman in all respects, was well versed in the Greek and Latin poets, understood both the theory and practice of music, of which he seems to have been a fond and liberal patron; his common discourse was not only significant and witty, but incomparably graceful, and he is said to have commanded the love and respect of all who knew him. Beside the poems contained in this collection he was author of the Soldier, a play, beforementioned; the Scholar, a comedy, composed at the age of 16, and afterward acted with applause at the theatre in Salisbury-court, but never published: after his death his brother Dudley collected his remaining poems, and published them under the same general title of Lucasta, or posthume poems, in 1659, to which are affixed many poems on his death by eminent persons of the time. These will at a future period be printed uniform with the present volume. His verses, which were merely the amusements of an active soldier, are for the most part amatory, and are many of them marked with spirit, ease, and elegant fancy; they are not however exempt from the defects of his age, and are of very unequal merit; yet it was thought that a new edition of them would be no unacceptable offering to the admirers of our early poets, and would be a step toward securing him a place in the next complete body of English poetry, as there seemed no good reason for excluding him from the last. Besides his Althea, there is much beauty in the pieces enumerated beneath*, as to make us wish that he had always written from his own impulses, without falling into the metaphysical and antithetical manner of Cowley and his followers. The Ode to the Grasshopper may also be mentioned as possessing much of the spirit and manner of Horace; and there are other scattered beauties in his inferior pieces which it is presumed will justify the present revival of one of the rarest, if not the best of the minor poets of his age. In the present instance it has not been deemed necessary to follow the orthography of the original, which is very capricious and not systematic as in Milton, it has therefore been modernised throughout; nor do the same reasons apply to Lovelace, which have been assigned for preserving it in Spencer and Fairfax. * Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind, p. 2. S. W. S. Why should you swear I am forsworn, p. 10. |