VII. Dowsabel. ..........................................................................................................
The following stanzas were written by Michael Drayton, a poet of some
eminence in the reigns of Queen Elizabeth, James I. and Charles II.[1] They are
inserted in one of his Pastorals, the first edition of which bears this whimsical title.
"Idea. The Shepheards Garland fashioned in nine Eglogs. Rowlands sacrifice to the
nine Muses." Lond. 1393, 4to. They are inscribed with the author's name at length "To
the noble and valerous gentleman master Robert Dudley," &c. It is very remarkable
that when Drayton reprinted them in the first folio edit. of his works, 1619, he had
given those eclogues so thorough a revisal, that there is hardly a line to be found the
same as in the old edition. This poem had received the fewest corrections, and
therefore is chiefly given from the ancient copy, where it is thus introduced by one of
his shepherds:--
"Listen to mee, my lovely shepheards joye,
And thou shalt heare, with mirth and mickle glee,
A pretie tale, which when I was a boy,
My toothles grandame oft hath told to me."
The author has professedly imitated the style and metre of some of the old
metrical romances, particularly that ofSir Isenbras,[2] (alluded to in v. 3.) as the
reader may judge from the following specimen:
"Lordynges, lysten, and you shal here, &c."
"Ye shall well heare of a knight,
That was in warre full wyght,
And doughtye of his dede
His name was Syr Isenbras,
Man nobler than he was
Lyved none with breade.
He was lyvely, large, and lunge,
With shoulders broade, and armes stronge,
That myghtie was to se:
He was a hardye man, and hye,
All men hym loved that hym se,
For a gentyll knight was he:
Harpers loved him in hall,
With other minstrells all,
For he gave them golde and fee, &c."
This ancient legend was printed in black-letter, 4to, byWyllyam Copland; no
date. In the Cotton Library (Calig. A. 2.) is a manuscript copy of the same romance
containing the greatest variations. They are probably two different translations of
some French original.
FARRE in the countrey of Arden,
There won'd a knight, hight Cassemen,
As bolde as Isenbras:
Fell was he, and eger bent,
In battell and in tournament,
As was the good Sir Topas.
He had, as antique stories tell,
A daughter cleaped Dowsabel,
A mayden fayre and free: