(“desiderio”)–André’s blindness (“oculis captus”) enables him to“see”the
event, kindled by bardicfurorand by sovereign love.^25 Poetry comes from the
desire for Henry, who has himself already beenfigured as poetry.
This ode inaugurates the series of occasional poems noted earlier: a poem
on Arthur’s birth, one on the death of the Earl of Northumberland in a 1489
tax riot ( 48 – 49 ; a topic of course also treated by Skelton), one on Henry’s
return to London after the battle at Stoke ( 52 – 54 ), one addressed to the
Papal Legate, and two“gratulationes”on the king’s return from the brief
and unglamorous French campaign, along with addresses to the city of
London on the same occasion ( 61 – 64 ). These are typical of André’s Roman
style; the city is commanded to twine its brows with laurel at its king’s
return, and Henry himself is raised to the stature of a veritable sun king:
“quod, si privatus Apollo / Paverit Admeti rursus et ipse boves, / Principis hic
nostri vultus Jovialis abunde / Lumina, crede mihi, Phoebe recede, dabit”“if
Apollo, god no more, should return to pasture the herds of Admetus, then
trust me, even with Phoebus gone, the Jove-like countenance of our king
would shed light in plenty”. In all these instances, André includes
himself in the terms described, only once stepping back to suggest coyly that
his vocal effusion comes from“quidam”–a certain person ( 39 ).
In such verse, André and his confrères body forth their ruler’s interests.
Their very allusiveness, however, gravitates to areas of danger even as they
sustain the order that produces the danger. When Henry is about to set sail
for England to claim the throne, André characterizes the episode through
extensive allusions to Lucan’sPharsalia, in particular those passages in Book
One where Caesar, having crossed the Rubicon, is coming within sight of
Rome, and hisfirst centurion (“primipilus”) Laelius speaks on behalf of the
army. When Henry/Caesar has addressed his forces, justifying his claim to
the crown, the earl of Oxford replies:
Quare vetustissimi instituti consuetudo sane laudabilis est, ut bellorum imperatores
commilitones suos ad fortiter pugnandum admoneant, non quod de illorumfide
dubitent, sed ut ad rem gerendam avidius excitentur. Sic ille diligentissimus ac
victoriosissimus Julius Caesar ante Pharsalicam expeditionem, sic Pompeius Magnus,
sic Lucius Catilina, sic quicunque perlegitur optimus dux fecit...Ignosce mihi
precor, optime princeps, si hanc respondendi provinciam ante alios omnes susceperim.
Nampostquammeprimipilumprimaequeacieiductoremordinasti,utLaeliusille
Caesari, sic ego excellentiae tuae verbis illius respondere iubeor in hunc modum
Britanni ô vere successor et haeres imperii, veras exprimere voces ubi jubes, quod
tam lenta tua tenuit patientia vires, conquerimur. Deeratne tibifiducia nostri? ( 27 – 28 )
[And so we should highly praise that custom established far in antiquity, according
to which commanders exhort their fellow soldiers tofight boldly, not because they
Beginnings: André and Dunbar 29