The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 02, No. 13, November, 1858: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and PoliticsVarious
History
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 02, No. 13, November, 1858: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
The prolific hint of "E.K." set the commentators at work,--but
hitherto without success. The author of the life prefixed to
Church's edition conjectures Rose Linde,--forsooth, because it
appears from Fuller's "Worthies," that in the reign of Henry the
Sixth--only eight reigns too early for the birth of our rural
beauty--there was one John Linde, a resident in the County of Kent!
Not satisfied with this conjecture, Malone suggests that she may
have been an Eliza Horden--the _z_ changed, according to Camden's
rules, into _s_, and the aspirate sunk. Malone's foundation for this
theory is, that one Thomas Horden was a contemporary of John Linde,
aforesaid, and resided in the same county! Both these conjectures
are absurd and unsupported by any collateral evidence. To have given
them the remotest air of probability, the critics should have proved
some acquaintance or connection between the parties respectively,
--some courtship, or contiguity of residence, which might have
brought the young people within the ordinary sphere of attraction.
Wrong as they were in their conclusions, the search of these
commentators was in the right direction. The anagram, "well-ordered,"
will undoubtedly bewray the secret. Let us try if we may not follow
it with better success.
_Rosalinde_ reads, anagrammatically, into Rose Daniel; for,
according to Camden, "a letter may be doubled, or rejected, or
contrariwise, if the sense fall aptly"; we thus get rid of the
redundant _e_, and have a perfect anagram. Now Spenser had an
intimate and beloved friend and brother-poet, named Samuel Daniel,
author of many tragedies and comedies, an eight-canto poem called
"The Civil Wars of England," "A Vision of Twelve Goddesses," a prose
history of England, and "Musa," a defence of rhyme. Spenser alludes
to his poetic genius with high praise in his "Colin Clout." This
Daniel had a sister named Rose, who was married in due time to a
friend of her brother's,--not, indeed, to Spenser, but to a scholar,
whose eccentricities have left such durable tracks behind them, that
we can trace his mark through many passages of Spenser's love
complaints, otherwise unintelligible. The supposition that Rose
Daniel was Rosalinde satisfies every requisite, and presents a
solution of the mystery; the anagram is perfect; the poet's
acquaintance with the brother naturally threw him into contact with
the sister; while the circumstance of her marriage with another
justifies the complaint of infidelity, and accounts for the
"insurmountable barrier," that is, a living husband. Daniel was the
early _protégé_ of the Pembroke family, as was Spenser of the house
of Leicester. The youthful poets must often have met in the company
of their mutual friend, Sir Philip Sidney,--for the Countess of
Pembroke was the "Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother," celebrated by
Ben Jonson, and consequently niece, as Sir Philip was nephew, of
Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Rose and Edmund were thus thrown
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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