The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia
some hours longer in the trance than it would have done a younger. But
a while it was before the good Basilius could come again to himself:
in which time Euarchus more glad than of the whole world’s monarchy to
be rid of his miserable magistracy, which even in justice he was now
to surrender to the lawful prince of that country, came from the
throne unto him, and there with much ado made him understand how these
intricate matters had fallen out. Many garboils passed through his
fancy before he could be persuaded Zelmane was other than a woman. At
length remembering the oracle, which now indeed was accomplished, not
as before he had imagined, considering all had fallen out by the
highest providence, and withal weighing in all these matters his own
fault had been the greatest; the first thing he did was with all
honourable pomp to send for Gynecia, who, poor lady, thought she was
leading forth to her lively burial, and, when she came, to recount
before all the people, the excellent virtue was in her, which she had
not only maintained all her life most unspotted, but now was content
so miserably to die, to follow her husband. He told them how she had
warned him to take heed of that drink: and so with all the exaltings
of her that might be, publicly desired her pardon for those errors he
had committed. And so kissing her, left her to receive the most
honourable fame of any princess throughout the world, all men
thinking, saving only Pyrocles and Philoclea, who never betrayed her,
that she was the perfect mirror of all wifely love. Which though in
that point undeserved, she did in the remnant of her life duly
purchase, with observing all duty and faith to the example and glory
of Greece: so uncertain are mortal judgments, the same person most
infamous, and most famous, and neither justly. Then with princely
entertainment to Euarchus, and many kind words to Pyrocles, whom still
he dearly loved, though in a more virtuous kind, the marriage was
concluded, to the inestimable joy of Euarchus, towards whom now
Musidorus acknowledged his fault, betwixt the peerless princes and
princesses. Philanax for his singular faith ever held dear of Basilius
while he lived, and no less of Musidorus, who was to inherit that
kingdom, and therein confirmed to him and his the second place in that
province, with great increase of his living to maintain it. With like
proportion he used to Kalodulus in Thessalia: highly {630} honouring
Kalander while he lived, and after his death continuing in the same
measure to love and advance his son Clitophon. But as for Sympathus,
Pyrocles, to whom his father in his own time gave the whole kingdom of
Thrace, held him always about him, giving him in pure gift the great
city of Abdera. But the solemnities of these marriages, with the
Arcadian pastorals, full of many comical adventures happening to those
rural lovers; the strange stories of Artaxia and Plexirtus, Erona and
Plangus, Helen and Amphialus, with the wonderful chances that befell
them; the shepherdish loves of Menalcas with Kalodulus’s daughter; the
poor hopes of the poor Philisides in the pursuit of his affections;
the strange continuance of Claius and Strephon’s desire; lastly, the
son of Pyrocles, named Pyrophilus, and Melidora, the fair daughter of
Pamela by Musidorus, who even at their birth entered into admirable
fortunes; may awake some other spirit to exercise his pen in that
wherewith mine is already dulled.
[End of Book V]
A SIXTH BOOK TO THE COUNTESS OF
PEMBROKE’S ARCADIA
{631}
By R.B., of Lincoln’s-Inn, Esq.
{632}
TO THE READER
To strive to lessen the greatness of the attempt, were to take away
the glory of the action. To add to Sir Philip Sidney, I know is
rashness; a fault pardonable in me, if custom might as well excuse the
offence, as youth may prescribe in offending in this kind. That he
should undergo that burthen, whose mother-tongue differs as much from
this language, as Irish from English, augments the danger of the
enterprise, and gives your expectation, perhaps, an assurance what the
event must be. Yet, let no man judge wrongfully of my endeavours: I
have added a limb to Apelles’s picture; but my mind never entertained
such vain hopes, to think it of perfection sufficient to delude the
eyes of the most vulgar, with the likeness in the workmanship. No, no,
I do not follow Pythagoras’s opinion of transmigration: I am well
assured divine Sidney’s soul is not infused into me, whose judgment
was only able to finish what his invention was only worthy to
undertake. For this, courteous reader, let it suffice I place Sir
Philip Sidney’s desert (even in mine own esteem) as far beyond my
endeavours, as the most fault-finding censor can imagine this essay of
mine to come short of his Arcadia. Vale.
R. B.
ARCADIA
BOOK VI
{633}
[_This Sixth Book was written in the Year 1633._]
What changes in fortune the princes of Macedon and Thessaly have
passed, together with what event the uncertain actions of so blind a
goddess have been crowned, they may remember, whose ears have been fed
with the eloquent story, written by the never-enough renowned Sir
Philip Sidney.
Basilius, therefore, having beheld with the eye of success, the
accomplishment of his misinterpreted oracle, hastened (together with
Euarchus) to his court of Mantinea; where the infinite assembly, and
the public sacrifices of his subjects, did well witness what joy did
possess their hearts, whose eyes were restored to the sight of long
eclipsed sovereignty. Fame, also, proud to be the messenger of such
royal news, had soon (with speedy flight) passed the limits of
Arcadia, so that in few days the court was filled with foreign
princes, whom either the tie of a long observed league of amity, or a
nearness in blood to Basilius, at such a time, brought thither to
congratulate with him, or were such, whose honour-thirsty minds hunted
after occasions to make known their acts in chivalry.
And now was the marriage-day come, when Pamela, attired in the stately
ornament of beauteous majesty, led by the constant forwardness of a
virtuous mind, waited on by the many thoughts of his fore-past crosses
in her love, which now made up a perfect harmony in the pleasing
discord of endeared affection, was brought to church; whom, soon
after, her sister Philoclea (being in the same degree of happiness,
clad in the bashful innocency of an unspotted soul, guided by the
shame-faced desire of her Pyrocles’s satisfaction, attended on by many
graces of a mild cheerfulness) followed; both equally admired, both
equally looked on.
{634}
The temple (whereto in triumph beauty and majesty were led prisoners
by the famous sisters) was a fit dwelling-place for the Arcadian
deities, fenced from the sun and winds’ too free access, by many ranks
of even-grown, even-set trees, near which, in divided branches, ran
two clear streams, whose sweet murmur (as they tumbled over their bed
of pebble stones) did much adorn the religious solitariness of that
place. And, that nothing should be wanting that might set forth the
careful judgment of the builder, it was seated in such a near distance
from the palace, as might not presently bury the gloriousness of the
show, nor cloy the beholders with the tediousness of the sight. In the
way, on both hands, were many altars, on which the crowned entrails of
the much-promising sacrifices were laid. At the door the two sisters
were received by as many virgins, attired in a white lawn livery, with
garlands on their heads of lilies and roses intermixed, holding in
their left hands a pair of pigeons, the grateful offering to the queen
of love. Soon after, the accustomed rites in the Arcadian nuptials
being ended, the King and Euarchus, with the rest of the princes,
returned unto a stately palace, sumptuously furnished, where both art
and nature seemed to be at variance, whether should bestow most
ornaments to enrich so rare a work: seated where the earth did rise a
little (as proud to be the supporter of so curious a building) by
means whereof, the sight had freedom to overlook a large territory,
where the green level of the Arcadian plains, beautified by the
intercourse of many forests, represented the delightful mixture of a
civil wilderness. The building of marble, where, whether the art in
carving into many forms the in vain resisting hardness of the stone,
the cunning in knitting these disjointed members, or the invention in
contriving their several rooms, did excel, was hard to be judged of.
The inside also might well be the inner part of so glorious an
outside; for, besides the well-matched largeness of the rooms, and
lightsome pleasantness of the windows, it was all hung with the choice
rareness of far-fetched arras, in which the ingenious workman, with
the curious pencil of his little needle, had limned the dumb records
of revived antiquity. Here did he present the memorable siege of
Thebes, where the ruins of her walls seemed yet to hang, and make the
beholders fear the downfall of the lively stones. There you might see
how cunningly he had expressed the constrained flight of the Trojan
prince, and the cruel sacrifice of enraged Dido’s love. Nor was the
story of Scylla forgotten, who there stood before Minos, with the
present of her father’s fatal hair; while you might perceive, by his
bent brows and disdainful countenance, the just reward of her
unnatural attempt. With these and others, wherein cost and invention
strove {635} for the mastery, were the hangings adorned; yet these
many stories did so stealingly succeed each other that the most
curious observer’s eye (though his admiration might dwell on each
piece) could find no cause of stay until he had overlooked them all.
But neither these, nor what art or nature could have added, did set
forth so much the palace, as the graceful presence of the Arcadian
sisters; whose beauties, till now, of long time had borne a part with
their troubled minds, in a sweet pilgrimage to a happy event; and
therefore at this present, so far disburdened of those thoughts, as it
was to be settled in the most desired enjoying of unspeakable bliss,
the imagination would needs persuade, if it were possible, were
bettered.
Dinner being set and ended, while the knights (who, to honour that day
with tilting, and to show what they dared and could effect in the
service, as they thought, of unresistable beauties) were putting on
their armour, there entered the hall a page, who, with submissive
humbleness, told the King, he was sent from his master, the naked
knight, who desired there to be received as a challenger, to eternize,
as the justness of his cause required, the famous memory of his
deceased mistress Helen, the Queen of Corinth. Basilius, much pitying
the before-unheard death of so excellent a queen, willed the page to
relate the circumstance, which being strange in itself, and of so
great a subject, wrought a passionate willingness in the hearers to be
attentive.
“After that fortune,” said he, “had bestowed, by the conquest of
Amphialus, at Cecropia’s castle, the victory on his adversary the
black knight, this queen (having long time, by the command of love,
her inward tyrant, made all Greece a stage for her wandering passions)
at length went thither, where the end of her search was the beginning
of her sorrows. Finding the curtains of eternal night ready to close
up his eyes, who (in the voyage her affection made) had alway been the
port she steered to; yet hoping she knew not what, that if perhaps
Proserpine should meet in Elysium his departed soul, she would in mere
compassion of her sorrow, send it back to reinhabit her ancient seat;
she carried the life little-desiring body, to Corinth, where, at that