Elegie upon the death of the noble and vertuous Douglas Howard, daughter and heire of Henry Lord Howard, Viscount Byndon, and wife of Arthur Georges, Esquire.' This elegy was no doubt written before Spenser returned to Ireland. It is marked by his characteristic diffuseness, abundance, melody. Certainly before the close of the year 1591 Spenser found himself once more in his old castle of Kilcolman. A life at Court could never have suited him, however irksome at times his isolation in Ireland may have seemed. When his friends wondered at his returning unto This barrein soyle, Where cold and care and penury do dwell, Here to keep sheepe with hunger and with toyle, he made the answer that he, Whose former dayes Had in rude fields bene altogether spent, Durst not adventure such unknowen wayes, Nor trust the guile of fortunes blandishment; But rather chose back to my sheepe to tourne, Whose utmost hardnesse I before had tryde, Then, having learnd repentance late, to mourne Emongst those wretches which I there descryde. That life, with all its intrigues and self-seekings and scandals, had no charms for him. Once more settled in his home, he wrote an account of his recent absence from it, which he entitled _Colin Clouts Come Home Again_. This poem was not published till 1595; but, whatever additions were subsequently made to it, there can be no doubt it was originally written immediately after his return to Ireland. Sitting in the quiet to which he was but now restored, he reviewed the splendid scenes he had lately witnessed; he recounted the famous wits he had met, and the fair ladies he had seen in the great London world; and dedicated this exquisite diary to the friend who had introduced him into that brilliant circle. It would seem that Raleigh had accused him of indolence. That ever-restless schemer could not appreciate the poet's dreaminess. 'That you may see,' writes Spenser, 'that I am not alwaies ydle as yee think, though not greatly well occupied, nor altogither undutifull, though not precisely officious, I make you present of this simple pastorall, unworthie of your higher conceipt for the meanesse of the stile, but agreeing with the truth in circumstance and matter. The which I humbly beseech you to accept in part of paiment of the infinite debt in which I acknowledge myselfe bounden unto you for your singular favours and sundrie good turnes shewed to me at my late being in England, &c.' The conclusion of this poem commemorates, as we have seen, Spenser's enduring affection for that Rosalind who so many years before had turned away her ears from his suit. It must have been some twelve months after those lines were penned, that the writer conceived an ardent attachment for one Elizabeth. The active research of Dr. Grosart has discovered that this lady belonged to the Boyle family--a family already of