CHAPTER XII. ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE HISTORY IN THE FAERIE QUEENE, The Faerie Queene. Illustrations of the His tory. The Knight and the Lady. TH HE Faerie Queene is an allegory, in many parts capable of more than one interpretation. Some of the characters stand for two, and several of them even for three distinct historical personages. The general plan and scope of the poem may be found in the poet's letter to his friend, Sir Walter Raleigh. It is designed to enumerate and illustrate the moral virtues which should characterize a noble or gentle person -to present "the image of a brave knight perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised." It appears that the author designed twelve books, but he did not accomplish his purpose. The poem, which he left unfinished, contains but six books or legends, each of which relates the adven tures of a knight who is the patron and representative of a special virtue. Book I. gives the adventures of St. George, the Red-Cross Knight, by whom is intended the virtue of Holiness. Book II., those of Sir Guyon, or Temperance. Book III., Britomartis, a lady-knight, or Chastity. Book IV., Cambel and Triamond, or Friendship. Book V., Sir Artegal, or Justice. Book VI., Sir Calydore, or Courtesy. The perfect hero of the entire poem is King Arthur, chosen "as most fitte, for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many men's former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy and suspition of present time.” It was manifestly thus, too, that the poet solved a difficult and delicate problem: he pleased the queen by adopting this mythic hero, for who else was worthy of her august hand? And in the person of the faerie queene herself Spenser informs us: "I mean glory in my general intention, but in my particular, I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our sovereign, the Queene." Did we depend upon the poem for an explanation of Spenser's design, we should be left in the dark, for he intended to leave the origin and connection of the adventures for the twelfth book, which was never written; but he has given us his plan in the same preliminary letter to Raleigh. THE PLAN PROPOSED. "The beginning of my history," he says, "should be in the twelfth booke, which is the last; where I devise that the Faerie Queene kept her Annual Feaste XII days; uppon which XII severall days the occasions of the XII severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by XII severall knights, are in these XII books handled and discoursed." First, a tall, clownish youth falls before the queen and desires a boon, which she might not refuse, viz. the achievement of any adventure which might present itself. Then appears a fair lady, habited in mourning, and riding on an ass, while behind her comes a dwarf, leading a caparisoned war-horse, upon which was the complete armor of a knight. The lady falls before the queen and complains that her father and mother, an ancient king and queen, had, for many years, been shut up by a dragon in a brazen castle, and begs that one of the knights may be allowed to deliver them. The young clown entreats that he may take this adventure, and notwithstanding the wonder and misgiving of all, the armor is found to fit him well, and when he had put it on, "he seemed the goodliest man in all the company, and was well liked by the lady, and eftsoones taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that strounge courser, he went forth with her on that adventure; where beginneth the First Booke." In a similar manner, other petitions are urged, and other adventures undertaken. ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE HISTORY.-The history in this poem lies directly upon the surface. Elizabeth was the Faery Queen herself-faery in her real person, springing Cinderella-like from durance and danger to the most powerful throne in Europe. Hers was a reign of faery character, popular and august at home, after centuries of misrule and civil war; abroad English influence and power were exerted in a magical manner. It is she who holds a court such as no Englishman had ever seen; who had the power to transform common men into valiant warriors, elegant courtiers, and great statesmen; to send forth her knights upon glorious adventures - Sidney to die at Zutphen, Raleigh to North and South America, Frobisher with a wave of her hand as he passes down the Thames to try the northwest passage to India; Effingham, Drake, and Hawkins to drive off to the tender mercy of northern storms the Invincible Armada, and then to point out to the coming generations the distant fields of English enterprise. 66 Chivalry was dying; the abbey and the castle were soon together to crumble into ruins; and all the forms, desires, beliefs, convictions of the old world were passing away, never to return; "' but this virgin queen was the founder of a new 1 Froude, i. 65. chivalry, whose deeds were not less valiant, and far more useful to civilization. It is not our purpose, for it would be impossible, to interpret all the history contained in this wonderful poem: a few of the more striking presentations will be indicated, and thus suggest to the student how he may continue the investigation for himself. THE KNIGHT AND THE LADY. In the First Book we are at once struck with the fine portraiture of the Red Crosse Knight, the Patron of Holinesse, which we find in the opening lines: A gentle knight was pricking on the plain, As we read we discover, without effort, that he is the St. George of England, or the impersonation of England herself, whose red-cross banner distinguishes her among the nations of the earth. It is a description of Christian England with which the poet thus opens his work: And on his brest a bloodie cross he bore, The dear remembrance of his dying Lord, Upon his shield the like was also scored, For sovereign hope which in his help he had. Then follows his adventure that of St. George and the Dragon. By slaying this monster, he will give comfort and aid to a peerless lady, the daughter of a glorious king; this fair lady, Una, who has come a long distance, and to whom, as a champion, the Faery Queene has presented the red-cross knight. Thus is presented the historic truth that the reformed and suffering Church looked to Queen Elizabeth for succor and support, for the Lady Una is one of several portraitures of the Church in this poem. rent. As we proceed in the poem, the history becomes more appaThe Lady Una, riding upon a lowly ass, shrouded by a veil, covered with a black stole, "as one that inly mourned," and leading "a milk-white lamb," is the Church. The ass is the symbol of her Master's lowliness, who made even his triumphant entry into Jerusalem upon "a colt the foal of an ass;" the lamb, the emblem of the innocence and of the helplessness of the "little flock;" the black stole is meant to represent the Church's trials and sorrows in her former history as well as in that naughty age. The dragon is the old serpent, her constant and bitter foe, who, often discomfited, returns again and again to the attack in hope of her overthrow. THE WOOD OF ERROR. The adventures of the knight and the lady take them first into the Wood of Error, a noble and alluring grove, within which, however, lurks a loathsome The knight rushes upon this female monster with great boldness, but serpent. Wrapping up her wreathed body round, She leaped upon his shield and her huge train All suddenly about his body wound, That hand and foot he strove to stir in vain. God help the man so wrapt in Error's endless chain. The Lady Una cries out: ... Now, now, sir knight, shew what ye bee, Strangle her, else she sure will strangle thee. He follows her advice, makes one desperate effort, Error is slain, and the pilgrimage resumed. Thus it is taught that the Church has waged successful battle with Error in all its forms— paganism, Arianism, Socinianism, infidelity; and in all ages of her history, whether crouching in the lofty groves of the Druids, or in the more insidious forms of later Christian heresy. |