“Calliope, As ye may se, Regent is she Of poetes al, Whiche gaue to me The high degre Laureat to be Of fame royall; _Whose name enrolde_ _With silke and golde_ _I dare be bolde_ _Thus for to were_,”[35] &c. In the following passage Barclay perhaps glances at Skelton, with whom (as will afterwards be shewn) he was on unfriendly terms; “But of their writing though I ensue the rate, No name I chalenge of _Poete laureate_: That name vnto them is mete and doth agree Which writeth matters with curiositee. Mine habite blacke accordeth not with _grene_, Blacke betokeneth death as it is dayly sene; The _grene_ is pleasour, freshe lust and iolite; These two in nature hath great diuersitie. Then who would ascribe, except he were a foole, The pleasaunt _laurer_ vnto the mourning cowle?”[36] Warton has remarked, that some of Skelton’s Latin verses, which are subscribed—“Hæc laureatus Skeltonis, regius orator”—“Per Skeltonida laureatum, oratorem regium,”—seem to have been written in the character of _royal_ laureate;[37] and perhaps the expression “of fame royall” in Skelton’s lines on _Calliope_ already cited, may be considered as strengthening this supposition. There would, indeed, be no doubt that Skelton was not only a poet laureated at the universities, but also poet laureat or court poet to Henry the Eighth, if the authenticity of the following statement were established; “la patente qui declare Skelton poète laureat d’Henry viii. est datée de la cinquième année de son règne, ce qui tombe en 1512 ou 1513:” so (after giving correctly the second entry concerning Skelton’s laureation at Cambridge) writes the Abbé du Resnel in an essay already mentioned; having received, it would seem, both these statements concerning Skelton from Carte the historian,[38] who, while he communicated to Du Resnel one real document, was not likely to have forged another for the purpose of misleading the learned Frenchman. On this subject I can only add, that no proof has been discovered of Skelton’s having enjoyed an annual salary from the crown in consequence of such an office. The reader will have observed that in the first entry given above from the Cambridge Univ. Regist., Skelton is described as having been laureated not only at Oxford but also “transmarinis partibus.” That the foreign seat of learning at which he received this honour was the university of Louvaine,[39] may be inferred from the title of a poem which I subjoin entire, not only because it occurs in a volume of the greatest rarity, but because it evinces the celebrity which Skelton had attained. “IN CLARISSIMI SCHELTONIS _LOUANIENSIS_ POETÆ LAUDES EPIGRAMMA.