[114] Wolsey had previously been named a Cardinal in 1515.—Fiddes (Life of Wolsey, p. 99. ed. 1726) says that he became Legate a latere in 1516: but see State Papers (1830), i. 9 (note). Lingard’s Hist. of Engl. vi. 57. ed. 8vo, &c.—Hoping to ascertain the exact date of the Replycacion, &c. (which contains the first of the passages now under consideration), I have consulted various books for some mention of the “young hereticks” against whom that piece was written; but without success.

[115] We cannot settle this point by a comparison of old editions, the poem against Albany and the two L’Envoys which follow it being extant only in the ed. of Marshe.—It may be doubted, too, if the L’Envoy which I have cited at p. xli, “Perge, liber,” &c. belongs to the Garlande of Laurell, to which it is affixed in Marshe’s edition as a second L’Envoy: in Faukes’s edition of that poem, which I conceive to be the first that was printed, it is not found: the Cott. MS. of the Garlande is unfortunately imperfect at the end.

[116] i. e. sword.

[117] Chron. (Hen. viii.) fol. cx. ed. 1548.

[118] “Ob literas quasdam in Cardinalem Vuolsium inuectiuas, ad Vuestmonasteriense tandem asylum confugere, pro uita seruanda, coactus fuit: ubi nihilominus sub abbate Islepo fauorem inuenit.” Bale, Script. Illust. Brit. p. 651. ed. 1559.—“Vbi licet Abbatis Islepi fauore protegeretur, tamen vitam ibi, quantumuis antea iucunde actam, tristi exitu conclusit.” Pits, De Illust. Angl. Script. p. 701. ed. 1619.—“But Cardinal Wolsey (impar congressus, betwixt a poor Poet and so potent a Prelate) being inveighed against by his pen, and charged with too much truth, so persecuted him, that he was forced to take Sanctuary at Westminster, where Abbot Islip used him with much respect,” &c. Fuller’s Worthies (Norfolk), p. 257. ed. 1662.—“He [Skelton] was so closely pursued by his [Wolsey’s] officers, that he was forced to take sanctuary at Westminster, where he was kindly entertained by John Islipp the abbat, and continued there to the time of his death.” Wood’s Ath. Oxon. i. 51. ed. Bliss, who adds in a note; “The original MS. register of this sanctuary, which must have been a great curiosity, was in Sir Henry Spelman’s library, and was purchased at the sale of that collection by Wanley for Lord Weymouth. MS. note in Wanley’s copy of Nicholson’s Historical Library in the Bodleian.”

[119] John Islip was elected abbot in 1500, and died in 1532: see Widmore’s Hist. of West. Abbey, 119, 123. “John Skelton ... is said by the late learned Bishop of Derry, Nicholson (Hist. Lib. chap. 2.) to have first collected the Epitaphs of our Kings, Princes, and Nobles, that lie buried at the Abbey Church of Westminster: but I apprehend this to be no otherwise true, than that, when he, to avoid the anger of Cardinal Wolsey, had taken sanctuary at Westminster, to recommend himself to Islip, the Abbot at that time, he made some copies of verses to the memories of King Henry the Seventh and his Queen, and his mother the Countess of Richmond, and perhaps some other persons buried in this church.” Account of Writers, &c., p. 5, appended to Widmore’s Enquiry into the time of the found. of West. Abbey.—Widmore is mistaken: neither in Marshe’s ed. of Skelton’s Workes, 1568, nor in the Reges, Reginæ, Nobiles, &c., 1603, is there any copy of verses by our author on the Queen of Henry the Seventh: see in vol. i. 178, 179, 195, the three pieces which I have given from those sources: two of them at least were composed before the poet had sought refuge at Westminster, for one (written at Islip’s request) is dated 1512, and another, 1516; the third has no date.

[120] See p. xxix.

[121] “De morte Cardinalis uaticinium edidit: & eius ueritatem euentus declarauit.” Bale, Script. Illust. Brit. p. 652. ed. 1559.—“The word Vates being Poet or Prophet, minds me of this dying Skeltons prediction, foretelling the ruine of Cardinal Wolsey. Surely, one unskilled in prophecies, if well versed in Solomons Proverbs, might have prognosticated as much, that Pride goeth before a fall.” Fuller’s Worthies (Norfolk), p. 257. ed. 1662.—Did not this anecdote originate in certain verses of Cotyn Cloute? See the fragment from Lansdown MSS., vol. i. 329, note.

[122] “Vuestmonasterii tandem, captiuitatis suæ tempore, mortuus est: & in D. Margaritæ sacello sepultus, cum hac inscriptione alabastrica: Johannes Skeltonus, uates Pierius, hic situs est. Animam egit 21 die Junii, anno Dn̄i 1529, relictis liberis.” Bale, Script. Illust. Brit., p. 652. ed. 1559. See also Pits (De Illust. Angl. Script., p. 703. ed. 1619) and Fuller (Worthies, Norfolk, p. 257. ed. 1662), who give Joannes Sceltonus vates Pierius hic situs est as the whole of Skelton’s epitaph. Weever, however (Fun. Momum., p. 497. ed. 1631), makes “animam egit, 21 Junii 1529” a portion of it, and in a marginal note substitutes “ejicit” for “egit,” as if correcting the Latinity!! So too Wood (Ath. Oxon. i. 52. ed. Bliss.), who places “ejicit” between brackets after “egit,” and states (what the other writers do not mention) that the inscription was put on the tomb “soon after” Skelton’s death.

In the Church-Wardens Accompts of St. Margaret’s, Westminster (Nichols’s Illust. of Manners and Expences, &c. 4to. p. 9), we find this entry;

£. s. d. “1529. Item, of Mr. Skelton for viii tapers 0 2 8”

The institution of the person who succeeded Skelton as rector of Diss is dated 17th July: see first note on the present Memoir.

[123] See note, p. xxxvi.

[124] e. g. the portrait on the title-page of Dyuers Balettys and Dyties solacyous (evidently from the press of Pynson; see Appendix II. to this Memoir) is given as a portrait of “Doctor Boorde” in the Boke of Knowledge (see reprint, sig. I); and (as Mr. F. R. Atkinson of Manchester obligingly informed me by letter some years ago) the strange fantastic figure on the reverse of the title-page of Faukes’s ed. of the Garlande of Laurell, 1523 (poorly imitated in The Brit. Bibliogr. iv. 389) is a copy of an early French print.

[125] “Warton has undervalued him [Skelton]; which is the more remarkable, because Warton was a generous as well as a competent critic. He seems to have been disgusted with buffooneries, which, like those of Rabelais, were thrown out as a tub for the whale; for unless Skelton had written thus for the coarsest palates, he could not have poured forth his bitter and undaunted satire in such perilous times.” Southey,—Select Works of Brit. Poets (1831), p. 61.

[126] Amen. of Lit. ii. 69.

[127] Vol. i. 313.

[128]

“Satire should, like a polish’d razor, keen, Wound with a touch that’s scarcely felt or seen: Thine is an oyster-knife that hacks and hews,” &c.

Verses addressed to the imitator of the First Satire of the Second Book of Horace (the joint-composition of Lord Hervey and Lady M. W. Montagu).

[129] Remains, ii. 163.

[130]

“Of Vertu also the souerayne enterlude.”

Garlande of Laurell, vol. i. 408.

[131]

“His commedy, Achademios callyd by name.”

Id. p. 409.

[132] See Appendix II. to this Memoir.—Mr. Collier is mistaken in supposing Skelton’s “paiauntis that were played in Ioyows Garde” to have been dramatic compositions: see Notes, vol. ii. 330.

[133] A writer, of whose stupendous ignorance a specimen has been already cited (p. xxx, note 3), informs us that Magnyfycence “is one of the dullest plays in our language.” Eminent Lit. and Scient. Men of Great Britain, &c. (Lardner’s Cyclop.), i. 281.

[134] See Appendix III. to this Memoir, and Poems attributed to Skelton, vol. ii. 385.

[135] Amen. of Lit. ii. 69.

[136] Hist. of E. P. ii. 356.

[137]

“In hevyn blyse ye xalle wyn to be Amonge the blyssyd company omnium supernorum Ther as is alle merth joye and glee Inter agmina angelorum In blyse to abyde.”

Coventry Mysteries,—MS. Cott. Vesp. D. viii. fol. 112.

A reprint of Marshe’s ed. of Skelton’s Workes having appeared in 1736, Pope took occasion, during the next year, to mention them in the following terms,—casting a blight on our poet’s reputation, from which it has hardly yet recovered;

“Chaucer’s worst ribaldry is learn’d by rote, And beastly Skelton Heads of Houses quote”—

Note—“Skelton, Poet Laureat to Hen. 8. a Volume of whose Verses has been lately reprinted, consisting almost wholly of Ribaldry, Obscenity, and Billingsgate Language.” The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace imitated, 1737. But Pope was unjust to Skelton; for, though expressions of decided grossness occur in his writings, they are comparatively few; and during his own time, so far were such expressions from being regarded as offensive to decency, that in all probability his royal pupil would not have scrupled to employ them in the presence of Anne Bulleyn and her maids of honour.

Since the Memoir of Skelton was sent to press, Mr. W. H. Black (with his usual kindness) has pointed out to me the following entry;

23d Feb. 12 Edw. iv. [1473]. “Tribus subclericis, videlicet Roberto Lane, Nicholao Neubold, et Johanni Skelton, videlicet prædicto Roberto l._s._ et prædictis Nicholao et Johanni cuilibet eorum xl._s._” (A like payment was made to John Skelton on the 9th of Dec. preceding, when he is mentioned with others under the general denomination of clerks.) Books of the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer,—A 4. 38. fols. 26, 27. (Public Record Office).