LA. BEVILL,2 LA. EL. HOWARD,4 LA. SUS. VERE.5 6 5.1 rain dropping. urn sphered LA. WORTH, GHAM.7} 6. {BARYTHERE. LA. WALSINGHAM. Rich, and afterwards to lord Thomas Howard, first earl of Suffolk. She was more famed for accomplishments than virtues, and is said to have trafficked for more favours than those of her lord. 2 Lady Bevill.] This lady, I believe, (for I have but little skill in these matters) was Frances, sister of the countess of Suffolk, just mentioned. She was the wife of sir William Bevill, a gentleman of Cornwall; after his death, she married Roger, fifth earl of Rutland, and brought him one daughter, who married the favourite, Villiers, duke of Buckingham. 3 Lady Effingham.] Probably Anne, the daughter of lord St. John, married in 1597 to William, eldest son of Charles, second lord Howard of Effingham, Lord High Admiral at the period of the Spanish invasion. 4 Lady Elizabeth Howard.] Daughter of the lady just mentioned. She married lord Mordaunt, afterwards earl of Peterborough. 5 Lady Susan Vere.] Susan Herbert, as sir Dudley calls her, daughter of Edward, earl of Oxford. About a week before this Masque was performed, she married Philip Herbert, afterwards earl of Montgomery. Her marriage was celebrated with great pomp at court, of which many particulars are recorded among the state papers of the day. 6 Lady Worth.] Lady Mary Wroth, to whom our author subsequently dedicated the Alchemist. See vol. iv. p. 5. Lady Walsingham.] Of this person I can say nothing. She appears too old for the grand-daughter of the countess of Suffolk, z Hesiod. in Theog. who married a Thomas Walsingham of Kent, and too young for the daughter of Elizabeth's celebrated minister, who had besides twice changed her name. The Oceania are not appropriated; they were probably personated by the younger branches of the noble families mentioned above. They were the "light-bearers," as the poet terms them, and he has judiciously managed to make them an integral part of the exhibition. THE MASQUE OF BEAUTY.] "The second Masque, (Jonson says,) which was of Beauty, was presented in the same Court at Whitehall, on the Sunday-night after the Twelfth-night, 1608." This masque was published together with the former in 4to. without date, but probably in 1609, and again in fol. 1616. THE MASQUE OF BEAUTY. WO years being now past, that her majesty had intermitted these delights, and the third almost come, it was her highness's pleasure again to glorify the court, and command that I should think on some fit presentment, which should answer the former, still keeping them the same persons, the daughters of Niger, but their beauties varied according to promise, and their time of absence excused, with four more added to their number. To which limits, when I had apted my invention, and being to bring news of them from the sea, I induced BOREAS, one of the winds, as my fittest messenger; presenting him thus: In a robe of russet and white mixt, full and bagg'd; his hair and beard rough and horrid; his wings gray, and full of snow and icicles: his mantle borne from him with wires, and in several puffs; his feet' ending in serpents' tails; and in his hand a leafless branch, laden with icicles. But before, in midst of the hall, to keep the state of the feast and season, I had placed JANUARY' in a throne of silver; his robe of ash-colour, long, fringed with silver; a white mantle; his wings white, and So Paus. in Eliacis, reports him to have, as he was carved in arca Cipselli. b See Iconolog. di Cesare Ripa. |