delicate arts of poetry and
music, the graces of conversation and manners, were now as requisite to
the full accomplishment of the knight, as his horsemanship, or his skill
in the management of his lance. In a word, the sterner characteristics
of the ancient knight were softened down, in the age of Elizabeth, into
the more perfect and graceful attributes of the gentleman. The perfect
gentleman was more completely exhibited in the days of Elizabeth than at
any time before; for the chivalry and the accomplishments which were
then united in the same individual, had been formerly divided between
the noble and the churchman or the clerk.

Were we called upon to characterize the age in which Spenser lived, by a
single word, we could find none that would better express its combined
attributes, than the word which the poet uses in describing his principal
hero: "In the person of Prince Arthure," says he in his letter to Raleigh,
"I set forth magnificence." The age of Elizabeth was distinguished by
magnificence, in the highest sense of the word, by the most brilliant
display of great qualities of all kinds; and the hero of the _Faerie
Queene_ seems to be the personification of the splendid attributes of the
age. A prevailing sentiment, in the mind of Spenser, was the perfectness
of character to which the gentlemen of his time aspired, and on this
model he fashioned his hero. He observes that "the general end, therefore,
of all the books is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in gentle and
virtuous discipline." And again, "I labor to pourtraict in Arthure,
before he was King, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve
moral virtues." And as we read the gorgeous description of the prince,
when he first meets the forsaken Una, we could fancy that the magnificent
characteristics of the golden age of England had blended together, and
blazed forth in one dazzling form before us.

JOHN KNOX HEADS THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS

A.D. 1559

P. HUME BROWN THOMAS CARLYLE

In the year of Martin Luther's death (1546) Protestant doctrines
were preached in Scotland by George Wishart. This reformer was
burned at St. Andrew's, in the same year (March 12th), at the
instigation of Cardinal Beaton. Two months later the Cardinal
himself, who practically controlled the Scottish government, was
murdered in the castle of St. Andrew's. Be