f idle hopes, which still doe fly away
Like empty shaddowes, did afflict my brayne.

Those who marvel at such language perhaps forget what a
dreary exile the poet's life in Ireland must in fact
have been. It is true that it was relieved by several
journeys to England, by his receiving at least one
visit from an English friend, by his finding, during at
any rate the earlier part of his absence, some
congenial English friends residing in the country, by
his meeting at length with that Elizabeth whose
excelling beauty he has sung so sweetly, and whom he
married; it is also true that there was in him--as in
Milton and in Wordsworth--a certain great self-
containedness,{1} that he carried his world with him
wherever he went, that he had great allies and high
company in the very air that flowed around him,
whatever land he inhabited; all this is true, but yet
to be cut off from the fellowship which, however self-
sufficing, he so dearly loved--to look no longer on the
face of Sidney his hero, his ideal embodied, his living
Arthur, to hear but as it were an echo of the splendid
triumphs won by his and our England in those glorious
days, to know of his own high fame but by report, to be
parted from the friendship of Shakspere--surely this
was exile. To live in the Elizabethan age, and to be
severed from those brilliant spirits to which the fame
of that age is due! Further, the grievously unsettled,
insurgent state of Ireland at this time--as at many a
time before and since--must be borne in mind. Living
there was living on the side of a volcanic mountain.
That the perils of so living were not merely imaginary,
we shall presently see. He did not shed tears and
strike his bosom, like the miserable Ovid at Tomi; he
'wore rather in his bonds a cheerful brow, lived, and
took comfort,' finding his pleasure in that high
spiritual communion we have spoken of, playing
pleasantly, like some happy father, with the children
of his brain, joying in their caprices, their
noblenesses, their sweet adolescence; but still it was
exile, and this fact may explain that tone of
discontent which here and there is perceptible in his
writings.{2}

When in 1580 Arthur, Lord Grey of Wilton, was
appointed Lord Deputy of Ireland, he--perhaps through
Lord Leicester's influence, perhaps on account of
Spenser's already knowing something of the country--
made Spenser his Private Secretary. There can be no
doubt that Spenser proceede