(1.) The Prose Translators. The part which was played by the translators in the formation of English literature already has been pointed out : their influence on English prose too often has been underrated. The work of translation was not marked by any process of selection, and much of the result shows, as we might reasonably expect, a lack of literary art. But it is a mistake to imagine that the net outcome of all this labour was merely a supply of stories which furnished the dramatists with plots for their plays. Even the storybooks show, in many cases, a sense of the value of style, a harmony in the arrangement of their sentences, which places them high in the earliest chapter of modern prose. Further, of the manifold intellectual tendencies of the Elizabethan age, there was hardly one which was not, in one way or another, controlled or helped by the work of the translators. SIR THOMAS HOBY'S (15301566) translation of Castiglione's treatise, Il Cortegiano (The Courtier), published in 1561, was among the works which settled the standard of conduct in Elizabeth's Court, represented, on the side of accomplishments, by Sidney and Ralegh; and on the side of sheer intellectual vigour, by statesmen like Burghley. This influence must not be taken as immediate and direct, for a single book cannot be said to change the spirit of a whole age: but, just as Castiglione's book-the mirror of Italian society during the Renaissance-was one of the means by which the principal features of those social conditions were transferred to the rest of Europe, so Hoby's translation took its part in extending its authority. There can be very little doubt that its influence on Lyly and on Euphuism generally was very considerable.

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The most important translations before 1600 were those from the Italian and Spanish novelists. Late Greek and Latin romances also turned into English-for ex ample, THOMAS UNDERDOWN'S translation (1569?) of the Theagenes and Chariclea of Heliodorus of Tricca. But the most important foreign books at this time were by the long succession of Italian storytellers, from the anonymous writer of the Novellino to the Renaissance novelist, Bandello, whose collection of anecdotes was, on the whole, the most popular, if we are to judge from their employment by both translators and dramatists. Bandello's novels had been published, in definitive form, in 1554: the Frenchman, François de Belleforest, had used them freely for his Histoires Tragiques (1559): and, doubtless, the English translators used Belleforest as much as Bandello. In 1562, ARTHUR BROKE (d. 1563) had translated one of Bandello's stories into English verse, giving it the title of The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Julieit, which, in its ultimate result, is familiar to every English reader. In 1566 and 1567, appeared WILLIAM PAINTER'S (1540?-1594) Palace of Pleasure, an admirable treasure-house of stories drawn from Bandello, Belleforest, Boccaccio, and other sources, including the Ecatomithi of Giraldo Cinthio, which had been published in Italian two years before (1565). BARNABE RICH, in 1581, drew upon Bandello and Cinthio for his story of Apollonius and Silla. In the next year (1582) GEORGE WHETSTONE (1544?-1587?), who had previously (1578) founded his Promos and Cassandra on the same theme, introduced a translation of one of Cinthio's romances into his Heptameron of Civil Discourses, a collection of tales on the usual plan of the Italian novelists and their imitators,

Again, in 1590, we find a book of tales called Tarlton's News out of Purgatory, which purports to come from the ghost of Richard Tarlton, the famous comic actor, then two years dead. These are all, of course, popular adaptations rather than translations, but the amount of original work in them is a hardly perceptible minimum. The translation of Spanish novelists was more seriously undertaken. Pedro Mexia's novel of Timur was translated in Fortescue's Forest (1571), from which it was taken by Marlowe for the foundation of Tamburlaine the Great. The Diana Enamorada of Montemayor, which Sidney had already laid under contribution for his Arcadia, was twice translated between 1595 and 1600, first, in manuscript, by THOMAS WILSON; secondly (1598), by BARTHOLOMEW YOUNG. Cervantes appeared in English in THOMAS SHELTON'S translation (1612), seven years later than the original. Of other foreign authors, Rabelais, in the quaint and admirable translation of SIR THOMAS URQUHART (16111660), came out in 1653. This, which was completed by P. A. Motteux and others in 1708, is somewhat beyond the scope of our present period. Similarly, Machiavelli, whose influence on the political life of the period was so considerable, was not seen in English till 1640, when EDWARD DACRES translated The Prince and one or two of the miscellaneous essays, such as the life of Castruccio Castracane. Up till that time, his work must have been known either from the Italian editions (first in 1532), the four Latin editions, or Guillaume Cappel's French translation (1553).

The finest English translation of a classical author appeared in 1579, and again, in its second edition, in 1595. This was the Plutarch of SIR THOMAS NORTH (1535?-1601?), which, for the splendid vigour and severity of its style, must be reckoned the chief contribution to English prose before Hooker. North cannot be said to be a plain writer: the height of his subject and its antiquity drove him, not unwillingly, into intricacies of construction and a

somewhat confused disregard of his periods: and one is hardly surprised that his Plutarch, in the eighteenth century, became obsolete and was supplanted by the perspicuous but commonplace translation of the brothers Langhorne. It is also to be noted that he translated, not from the Greek, but from the French of Jacques Amyot. Had North, however, been an original author instead of a translator, his fame among the writers of Elizabeth's reign would be equal to that of Hooker; and, for the student of English prose, his position is not dissimilar. His most important follower in classical translation was the voluminous PHILEMON HOLLAND (1552-1637), fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, who, beside his famous version of Livy (1600), translated everything else he could lay his hands on, including Camden's Britannia (1610).

Another great Elizabethan was JOHN FLORIO (1553?-1625), whose parents were refugees from the Valtellina. Florio lived in England all his life, and was in touch with the chief literary men of his day. He was a singular Euphuist, and shared in the strained eccentricities of his tribe-the love for punning and other affectations. But his translation of Montaigne's Essays, published, twenty-three years after the original, in 1603, although it is not free from some pedantry of this kind, is, in one way, the ideal of a translation. It is fluent, and at the same time literal: but, above everything else, Florio has managed to catch the very spirit of Montaigne and to reproduce it in an exact facsimile, with just that amount of freedom which emphasises his own individuality. No writer has probably been so handled by a thoroughly congenial spirit as Montaigne has been handled by Florio. This admirable work is now accessible to the student in several popular editions; and, as a specimen of Elizabethan translation, he can find nothing that can excel it. Florio's Italian dictionary, A World of Words, was first published in 1598,

(2.) The Pamphleteers. The most important feature in the ordinary prose-writing of the day is furnished by the pamphleteers. The most famous of these were, with more glory to their reputation, concerned in the foundation of the English drama, and their names will be found in their proper place. The pamphlets, which exist in immense numbers, do not in any sense connect themselves with the splendid traditions of Elizabethan prose: but they are most important in their exhibition of the copious vocabulary of the age. More definitely literary than any are the Euphuistic dialogues and romances, in which John Lyly was followed by Robert Greene and Thomas Lodge, to say nothing of lesser writers. Again, there were the numerous semi-religious pamphlets, like Greene's Groats-worth of Wit, in which the egregious sinners of the age openly lamented their wickedness-perhaps very sincerely for the time being. Thomas Dekker, the dramatist, was very fertile in prose work of this kind; and his Gull's Horn-Book and Seven Deadly Sins of London are, with his plays, an invaluable addition to our knowledge of London life at this period. But by far the most interesting of all the pamphlets are those concerned with literary and religious controversies. These masterpieces of scurrilous abuse-not by any means without humour-were written by University men whose education had in every case been excellent. THOMAS NASH (1567-1601), for example, was a Cambridge man. He, like Greene, wrote plays but certainly his reputation stands upon the ground of the pamphlet. No one has ever shown so brilliant a genius for calling names as this contentious scholar. Attention to grammar was not requisite in a style like Nash's: the sine quâ non was to be voluble, expressive, and vivid; to know how to ring changes on the most offensive phrases, to insert adroit epithets here and there, and to keep up a breathless and perpetual strain of abuse. There is plenty of Latin in these pamphlets, plenty of Euphuised

Italian and Spanish-plenty, too, of gutter-English. Nash's most famous achievement is his attack upon Spenser's friend, the exclusive arbiter of taste with a certain clique, the bombastic and frigid Gabriel Harvey. The only reason for this onslaught could have been that Nash was an noyed by the good conceit which Harvey certainly had of himself and his position; and the chief argument which Nash used was the fact that his adversary's father had been a rope-maker at Saffron Walden. On this ground, however, he constructed a splendid edifice of abuse, to which Harvey, with less humour and a less versatile command of English, was incapable of replying coherently. One would think, after reading Have with you to Saffron Walden (1596), that the force of invective could go no farther. But the choicest flowers of language belong to the Martin Marprelate controversy, in which Nash almost certainly took a part. The history of this pamphleteering war is intricate and unprofitable. It is sufficient to say that it rose out of the great quarrel between the Puritan and Episcopalian sections of the Church, and its subject was the fruitful topic of Church government. The Episcopal order was, on the one hand, attacked (1588-9) by an anonymous writer-or syndicate of writers-who called himself Martin Marprelate, and is generally identified with a Welsh parson, one JOHN PENRY (1559-1593): on the other, it responded through the mouth of Thomas Cooper, Bishop of Winchester, and a number of other writers. John Udall, not to be confounded with the more famous Nicholas Udall, Provost of Eton, took an early part in the controversy on the Puritan side, and died (1592) in the prison to which he was sent in consequence of his unruly action. The dispute raged hotly from 1588 to 1590, the Martinists evading their pursuers by carrying their printingpress about the country; and it finally died-unfortunately, only in the form of pamphlets-of sheer exhaustion. As might be expected, the point of these pamphlets lies, not in their theological discrimination-although

The histories of this age are plentiful, but have no degree of interest. One of the earliest of these is the

Abridgement of the Chronicles of England (1562), by RICHARD GrafTON (d. 1572?), a printer, and the editor and continuator of Hall's Chronicle. He was thrown into prison for printing the proclamation of Lady Jane Grey's succession to the throne. Later on (1568) he published a Chronicle compiled from older historians. Of the chief chroniclers who succeeded him, and of Stow, his contemporary, and the object of his constant attacks, we have spoken in the text. In con

nection with them should be mentioned WILLIAM HARRISON (15341593), whose Description of England (1577) belongs to the Universal Cosmography projected and begun by Reginald Wolfe, the Queen's printer, and appeared in front of Holinshed's Chronicle. The book is full of value to the student of English manners and customs. Harrison also translated Bellenden's Scottish version of Hector Boece into English, and compiled a Great Chronology in manuscript.

GEORGE BUCHANAN (1506-1582) wrote his History of Scotland (Rerum Scoticarum Historia, 1582) in Latin. He was one of the most learned men of his age, and had studied at St. Andrews and Paris. In 1569 the Council of Regency appointed him tutor to the young James VI. addition to his history and other Latin prose works, he made a metrical Latin version of the Psalms, and satirised the Secretary Maitland of Lethington in Chameleon, a piece

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of vernacular prose. His translation of the Psalms found a rival in the next century (1637) in that made by ARTHUR JOHNSTON (1587-1641), physician to Charles I.

SIR JOHN HAYWARD (1564?-1627) published (1599) The First Part of the Life and Reign of King Henry IV, dedicated to the Earl of Essex. Elizabeth was offended by the book, and threw the author into prison; but James I afterwards patronised and knighted him. His subsequent histories were The Lives of the Three Norman Kings of England, William I, William II, and Henry I (1613), which he dedicated to Charles, Prince of Wales; and The Life and Reign of King Edward VI, with the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, which was pub lished after his death (1630).

RICHARD KNOLLES (d. 1610), master of the grammar school at Sandwich in Kent, published (1603) a History of the Turks, which Johnson highly extolled in the Rambler. "He has displayed all the excellencies that narrative can admit. His style, though somewhat obscured by time, and vitiated by false wit, is pure, nervous, elevated, and clear. Nothing could have sunk this author into obscurity but the remoteness and barbarity of the people he relates." The history was continued by the dramatist Thomas Nabbes.

In 1612 and 1617 SAMUEL DANIEL, the poet, published two parts of a History of England from the Conquest to the Reign of Edward III. Hallam's criticism is well worth quoting: "It is written with a freedom from all stiffness, and a purity of style, which hardly any other work of so early a date exhibits. These qualities are indeed so remarkable that it would require a good deal of critical observation to distinguish it even from writings of the reign of Anne; and where it differs from them, (I speak only of the secondary class of works, which have not much individuality of manner,) it is by a more select idiom, and by an absence of the Gallicism or vulgarity which are often found in that age."

Another species of history is represented by the Britannia (1586) of WILLIAM CAMDEN (1551-1623), head master of Westminster School and Clarenceux King-at-Arms. As a topographical description of Great Britain from the earliest times, the Britannia forms one of the most valuable sources of antiquarian knowledge. Camden endowed a historical chair at Oxford, and was the patron of Ben Jonson in his early years. He also wrote a Latin history of the reign of Elizabeth, which was published in 1615.

A later antiquary of some eminence was SIR HENRY SPELMAN (1564?1641), who published in Latin various works upon legal and ecclesiastical antiquities. One of the principal of these is a history of the English Councils, which began to appear in 1639, and was continued (1664) under the editorship of Sir William Dugdale.

In addition to the collectors of travellers' tales, many private gentlemen of this period left accounts of their travels. The Scotchman, WILLIAM LITHGOW (1582-1645?), brought out a book in 1614, which, in a greatly enlarged form (1632), described nineteen years of travelling on foot through Europe, Asia, and Africa. GEORGE SANDYS (15781644), the youngest son of Edwin Sandys, Archbishop of York, wrote an account (1615) of his Travels in the East, which was very popular, and was repeatedly published in the seventeenth century. He also produced a metrical version of Ovid's Metamorphoses (1621-6).

GEORGE PUTTENHAM'S (d. 1590) Art of English Poesy (1589) is the chief critical work of Elizabeth's reign. It is not by any means the only work of its kind. Gascoigne had furnished instruction in the difficult art in 1575; and Sir Philip Sidney wrote the work eventually known as The Defence of Poesy about 1579; and, besides these, a number of lesser writers had debated the question of quantity versus accent and rhyme. Puttenham's book is not very valuable as prose, but it shows a very enlightened attitude towards the disputed standard of poetry; and, without doubt, it had its share in the rejection of Gabriel Harvey's uncouth attempt to naturalise Latin prosody in England, and in settling the elastic criterion of Elizabethan poetry.

Although JOHN SELDEN (15841654), that gulf of learning," the friend of Camden and Ben Jonson, and by far the most learned of Elizabethan jurists, is scarcely of the number of the historians, yet his Table-Talk (1689), published long after his death, gives him a place among those men of letters whose mere conversation has contributed something to literature. The TableTalk is an anthology of his wit and wisdom, and is intensely valuable as the revelation of a mind whose whole course of thought was directed and strengthened by the political and religious spirit of England immediately after the Reformation. Selden's remaining works are very voluminous, and are chiefly in Latin.