1complaynte: Either the formal
literary genre of Colin’s song (7-156) or its mode, or both.
2God Pan: See Jan 17n and Dec 7n.
2–3he proportioneth his life to the foure seasons of the
yeare: The major trope of Colin’s song, a reversal
of the pathetic fallacy, attributing natural qualities to the human, the cycle of
the seasons to the stages of the life-cycle.
6blasinge The alternate reading, ‘blastinge’, is also
plausible, but E.K.'s gl 17 refers to ‘a blaſing [ſt]arre’. Moreover, other
variants in outer forme M, most notably the correct designation of this as the
‘Ægloga Duodecima’ (as opposed to the ‘Ægloga Vndecima’ as it is designated in state
1) confirm ‘blasinge’ as the corrected reading,
although the alteration may not have entailed consultation of copy.
10–11last ende: Has apocalyptic overtones.
See 2 Esd 12:25 (an apocalyptic apocryphal book). The phrase also appears twice in
Ecclus: at 2:3 (where it refers to death) and at 38:20 (where it is linked to the
Last Judgment at 38:22). The apocalypse is the signature feature of the cycle of
poems in Theatre .
1–18The gentle . . . Colinet:
Imitates the opening of Marot, Eglogue au Roy 1-14,
which in turn imitates the opening of Virgil, Eclogues 1. Marot’s
pastoral persona, Robin, sits in the shade of beech trees, reviewing the seasons of
his life in order to persuade his sovereign of the need for patronage. Even though
E.K. never mentions Marot in December, Spenser revises Eglogue au Roy carefully (see headnote; Hoffman 1977:
34-41; Prescott 1978: 10-13; Patterson 1987: 106-32), making three major changes: 1)
Spenser ‘eliminates the request for a specific favor from Pan’ (the request of
patronage); 2) he makes the poet-figure ‘Petrarchan’ in featuring Colin’s unrequited
love for Rosalind; and 3) ‘While Robin serves Pan, Colin challenges him’: ‘In
December, Colin finally realizes that his refusal to be like Robin, i.e. his
pride, is the direct and sole cause for all the suffering and losses he has endured’
(Moore 1982: 108-10).
1satte beside a springe: Colin’s
preferred locale (see Apr 35-6n), and it distinguishes him
from both Virgil’s Tityrus and Marot’s Robin, who sit under the beech tree, ‘the
tree of patronage’ (Brooks-Davies 1995; 187), no water in sight. The word ‘alone’ in
line 5 draws attention to another distinguishing feature: where Tityrus occupies the
pastoral locale in dialogue with Meliboeus, and Robin ends up receiving a reward
from Pan, Colin sings his song to Pan in a state of solitude and alienation (cf. June 72), echoing only himself, for Pan is silent.
2–5shadowe . . . shade: The traditional
site for the otium or leisure required for the making of
pastoral song; however, Spenser specifies the site because Colin sits in the shadow ‘a
bushy brere’, associated with Rosalind (see note below on ‘brere’).
2brere: The change from Virgil’s and
Marot’s beech tree gestures to Colin’s love of Rosalind, a sweet love that causes
pain. The briar joins the waterfall as a defining feature of Colin’s private
pastoral landscape (see June 7-8 and note, and June 20). The briar also appears in the Februarie Tale of the Oak and Briar, as well as at Maye 10 as part of the landscape for youth celebrated by
Palinode.
4Tityrus: The name of Virgil’s pastoral persona in the Eclogues, which Spenser throughout the Calender transfers to Chaucer, as E.K. notes. Cf. Epistle 4-5nn.
5secreate: The word occurs elsewhere
in the Calender only at Sept 156, but here it
constitutes an important adjective for the Virgilian site of pastoral, ‘shade’ (L
umbra), since it evokes Spenser’s advertisement for
himself as a ‘secretary’, a keeper of secrets among powerful patrons (Rambuss 1993:
29-61). See 17n. The secrecy also suggests that Colin has something to hide, and may
gesture to his author’s own anonymity in the publication of the Calender.
6Thus gan . . . mone: Marking a
distinction from Marot, whose Robin sings of love only incidentally.
7–12O soueraigne . . . ward: Cf. Marot,
Eglogue au Roy 6-14, which Spenser follows but
changes slightly, from a political discourse of patronage and kingship (Pan as
Francis I) to a scriptural language of care and salvation (Pan as Christ). To make
this change, Spenser relies on a second Marot poem, La
Complaincte d’un Pastoureau Chrestien (1549), which addresses Pan as
Christ at length (28-40).
7O soueraigne Pan: Here, the Christian
God, not (strictly) the pagan lover of Syrinx or the god of pastoral (Montrose 1979:
58): if in Januarye Colin sees Pan as the lover of Syrinx,
here he presents Pan ‘sav[ing]’ the ‘flock’ from ‘mischiefe’ (9-10).
8takest keepe: Echoes Chaucer, CT Gen Pro 303.
14–16Rude ditties . . . fancie feede:
Colin may repeat Cuddie’s unsuccessful ‘amateur’ art from Oct 13-15 (see note), but he also transposes that art to the Virgilian
‘laureate’ genre of pastoral. Similarly, the phrase ‘Rude ditties’ replaces
‘dolefull dittie’ from Jan 16, troping pastoral as a
Virgilian literary form. Cf. Apr 29.
14Oaten reede: The pastoral pipe. Cf.
Oct 8.
15sonet: At this time, the term could
designate a short lyric poem. Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 12 for
‘chansonnettes’.
17–18Hearken awhile . . . carefull
Colinet: A resounding translation of Marot, Eglogue au Roy 13-4: Escoute ung peu, de ton vert
cabinet, / Le chant rural du petit Robinet (‘Then listen, from within
your green cabinet, / To little Robinet’s rural song’; trans. Usher). Spenser
translates almost exactly, changing only petit to
‘carefull’: the alliteration with ‘Colin’ draws attention both to the poet’s mind
(which is full of care) and his art (which is made with care).
17greene cabinet: Spenser
translates Marot’s vert cabinet (Eglogue
au Roy 13), which Robin later compares with the verte
maison (green house) of the court (259). Spenser’s English phrase
is so striking it ‘can be made to fit the locus amoenus of
Greek pastoral poetry’ (Rosenmeyer 1969: vii). The word ‘cabinet’ has three
meanings: 1) ‘a rustic summertime bower’; 2) ‘a private chamber of the privileged,
for reading, writing, or keeping one’s treasures’; and 3) ‘a private place for
conducting business, especially of state’ (Patterson 1987: 107-8; see also 128-30).
For Marot, the green cabinet is ‘a symbol both of intellectual privacy and of
artistic liberty’ (Patterson 1987: 114). For Spenser, the cabinet is principally the
private, secret cabinet of the English secretary, trained to keep secrets for the
politically powerful, as Spenser was doing as secretary to John Young, Bishop of
Rochester, while writing the Calender (Rambuss 1993: 29-61; see esp.
48-9). Notably, the ‘greene cabinet’ is Pan’s, and Colin calls on the god to
‘Hearken’ to his ‘rurall song’ from the arboreal locus, suggesting a space in which
poet and government official meet.
18rurall song: In the 1586 edition,
someone (we do not know who) changed ‘rurall song’ to ‘laurell song’, which in 1801
Todd found to be evidence of Spenser’s status as a national or laureate poet (Var 7: 419; see D. Cheney 1989: 146).
19–138Derived from Marot’s Eglogue au Roy (see notes
below), Colin’s complaint compares the four stages of his life to the four
seasons of the year, lines 19-54, to spring; lines 55-96, to
summer; lines 97-126, to autumn; and lines 127-38, to winter.
19–36Whilome in . . . lyfe: Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 15-32. Colin follows Robin in several
details: the swallow, the recklessness of youth, wolves, nut-gathering, and the
dislodging of birds from nests. In this passage, Colin is ‘a threat to the peace of
the green world’ (Berger 1988: 351).
20–22LikeSwallow. . . feare: The swallow is the
bird of spring, and often a symbol of lust, but here it is a more complex figure of
impetuous youthful desire and daring energy, a veering from the swallow-like
faithful soul in Ps 84.1-3. Cf. Mar 11 and note; Nov 138-42n.
22doubted: Cf. Oct 41.
23I went the wastefull woodes and forest
wyde: Colin’s entry into the forest as the principal
pastime of his spring, ‘withouten dreade’ (24), has Orphic intimations, as he
demonstrates an adolescent (and comical) version of controlling nature, represented
metaphorically in his athletic prowess: gathering nuts, hunting a buck deer, scaling
the oak tree to rob a raven of its nest, and knocking nuts out of a walnut tree.
26And gather . . . Christmas game:
Locates Colin’s springtime game of gathering nuts in the woods during the Christmas
season, a logical impossibility, yet evidently justified because he sings his song
in December, and signaling the wintery disaster of such heedless sport. The double
time-scheme also shows Colin's metaphorical four seasons seeming to turn into a
single calendar year, telescoping his life dramatically. Cf. Jan 27-30, which anticipates the telescoping of Colin's life into 'my
yeare'.
27Pricket: A male deer in its second year with straight,
unbranched antlers. The pricket replaces Marot’s ‘exotic wolf’ at Eglogue au Roy 27-8 (Renwick, Var 7: 420).
29–30What . . . euer laste: Colin’s
youthful belief in his own immortality has no basis in Marot. Cf. Jan 29-30.
31–32craggie Oke . . . Rauen of her neste:
The image of the oak tree with its raven’s nest is concrete and particular, and does
not appear in Marot, who leaves the tree general and refers to pies and jays. The
oak is the tree of epic, associated with imperial power (see Feb 102-114n and Nov 125n). Like the swallow, the
raven has both classical and biblical associations. See Virgil Ecl 9.14-6, where Moeris says to Lycidas, quod nisi
me quacumque novas incidere lites / ante sinistra cava monuisset ab ilice
cornix / nec tuus hic Moeris, nec viveret ipse Menalcas (‘So, had not a
raven on the left first warned me from the hollow oak to cut short, as best I might,
this new dispute, neither your Moeris here nor Menalcas himself would be alive’).
See also 1 Kings 17:6 where the Lord tells Elijah that ravens will care for him, as
well as Luke 12:24 when Christ says, ‘Consider the ravens: for they nether sowe nor
reape: which nether have store house nor barne, & yet God fedeth them: how muche
more are ye better than foules’. If for Virgil the raven is a bird of prophecy
serving the shepherd-poet, in Scripture the raven is a sign of God’s providential
care for the faithful. The image of the youthful Colin robbing the oak tree of its
raven’s nest may signify the folly of premature epic ambitions. For direct allusion
to those ambitions, see 43-8 and note.
33–36Howe haue I wearied . . . libertee and
lyfe: One of the most enigmatic of Colin’s utterances,
combining two acts by Marot’s Robin, who used his bow to shoot down nuts from trees
and climbed other trees to throw down the nests of jays and pies, so that his
companions below could reap the benefits. Colin says that he climbed the oak to rob
the raven of its nest (see 31-2n) and used ‘many a stroke’ to ‘wearie’ the ‘stately
Walnut tree’, while down below ‘the rest’ (evidently, his companions) fell at
‘strife’ over the ‘nuts’ he dropped. Metaphors of politics and government intrude.
First, the walnut tree is ‘stately’, a word that nominally means ‘tall’ and
‘dignified’ but also ‘of the state’ (see Oct 112n about the
‘stately stage’ of tragedy). The walnut, like the oak, is a tree of political power
(see 33n below), and Colin’s wearying of it with his stroke suggests a naïve art
addressing government, one that evidently causes civil ‘strife’.
34stately Walnut tree: A likely
allusion to Nux (‘The Walnut-Tree’), a poem attributed to
Ovid in the Renaissance, one that ‘reads persuasively as an allegory of Ovid’s own
fate’, exiled at the hands of Augustus Caesar (Pugh 2005: 31).
37–42And for . . . in the same: Dilates on
the topic of what makes a poet, with three possibilities identified: 1) the Muse
‘wrought’ Colin as a poet ‘from . . . birth’ (38), corresponding to the idea that a
poet is born a poet; 2) Colin has listened ‘tomuch’ to his ‘peers’, who have praised
him (39), corresponding to the idea that a poet is made by his reputation in
society; and 3) Colin has been educated by ‘Wrenock’ (41), corresponding to the idea
that a poet is made by learning. The three possibilities enlarge the famous question
of whether a poet is born or made; see note in Nov Arg on
‘no arte, but a divine gift’. Cf. Virgil, Ecl 9.32-4: et me fecere poetam / Pierides, sunt et mihi carmina, me
quoque dicunt / vatem pastores; sed non ego credulus illis (‘Me, too,
the Pierian maids have made a poet; I, too, have songs; me also the shepherds call a
bard, but I trust them not’). Cf. also Marot, Eglogue au Roy
40-8, who singles out education by his father, also a successful poet. Spenser
changes the educator to ‘a shepherd with a bird’s name’ (Berger 1988: 380; see note
on ‘Wrenock’ at 41).
41Wrenock: Likely Richard Mulcaster, Spenser’s headmaster at Merchant Taylor’s
School. Mulcaster published two influential treatises on
education, The Positions (1581) and The
Elementarie (1582; see Hadfield 2012: 29-38).
42Made me by arte: Resonant phrasing
suggesting that Colin has been made by the art of poetry, as well as by the art of
Wrenock.
43–48Fro . . . ranne: From Wrenock’s
education, Colin acquires the confidence to compete with other shepherd-poets, and,
if he can trust his friend Hobbinol’s ‘judgement’, he can even defeat Pan in a
singing contest, on the merit of his ‘wiser’ song. Cf. June
57-64.
43derring to We retain the 1579 reading, despite its conflict with E.K.’s lemma and
with the gloss implied by E.K’s reference to an earlier gloss (at Oct gl 86). That the 1579 reading is allowed
to stand across the early quartos and the 1611 folio argues
less strongly for retaining the reading than does the sense of the eclogue itself:
context makes it plain that Colin is daring to compete in the arts of Pan and the
Muses; he is not competing in 'daring-do'. E.K.'s gloss misrepresents the
eclogue.
45Hobbinol: See notes on Jan 55, Apr Arg. Hobbinol is a literary figure who tends to
represent Spenser’s Cambridge friend, Harvey.
46–48To Pan . . . after Colin
ranne: A complex depiction, in
which Colin puts himself in the position of Apollo in his mythic singing contest
with Pan: ‘Colin’s myth of vocational anxiety’ (Montrose 1979: 43). Specifically,
the depiction suggests ‘the urge to abandon pastoral for higher genres’
(Brooks-Davies 1995: 190); that urge is intimated in the tropes at 31-6 when Colin
scales the oak and shoots at the walnut tree (see notes).
52lorne: Cf. Sept 57.
53gaue me checkmate: Made a winning
move against me—a metaphor from chess often used to signify trouble in love. Cf.
Chaucer, BD 618-69, especially 652-4: ‘At the ches with me
she [Fortune] gan to pleye; / With hir false fraughtes dyvers / She staal on me and
tok my fers [queen]’; Skelton, Why come ye nat to Courte?
585-9: ‘Set up a wretche on hye / In a trone triumphantlye, / Make him a great
astate, / And he wyll play checke mate / With royall majeste’.
55–60Tho gan…Venus seate: ‘The emphasis is clearly on a heat much in excess
of the moderate warmth that is beneficial to the “Aristotelian” melancholic: Venus
(a hot planet according to some astrologers) is in Leo (a fire sign—hot, dry,
barren, ruled by the Sun) in the “raging fyre” of summer, and a comet adds its
scorching influence. This configuration promises nothing but trouble for Colin’
(Richardson 1989: 116).
57Lyons house: Cf. Julye 21.
60reigned: Like ‘seate’, an
astrological term: ‘Of a celestial object, esp. a planet, or a sign of the zodiac:
to be in the most influential position; to exert a powerful or predominating
influence’ (OED).
61–66Forth . . . stowre: Cf. June 9-16.
63–64vnbridled . . . bitte: Cf. Plato, Phaedrus, 246a-b, 253c-254e, the famous description of
the two charioteers, one bridling the passions and the other failing to do so. See
Maye woodcut (and headnote) for the possible
depiction of the Platonic horses.
66The Woodes . . . stowre: Cf. Jan 51.
67–72Where I was . . . keepe: E.K. singles
this stanza out as a ‘fine description’. It records the change in Colin’s life via
two metaphors. In the first, where once Colin sought the bee making its honeycomb,
now he finds an ugly toad lording over its stool. The honeybee is a figure for civic
order (Virgil, Aen 1.430-6) but also for lyric poetry
(Plato, Ion 534A; Philostratus, Imagines 2.12; cf. Frye 1963: 69;
Alpers 1972: 366-7; Hoffman 1977:
42). In contrast, the toad is a figure of poison, which suggests the evil with which the
Calender opens, ‘Envie’ (To His Booke 5), arch-enemy of
the poet, perhaps alluding topically to Alençon, whom Elizabeth called her Frog
(Adler 1981; see Dec 70n). In contrast, the owl is a
traditional figure of ill-omen (Isa 34:15), and is such always for Spenser (see June 24 and note). Todd may be right that ‘ynne’ is a
‘Cambridge phrase . . . by the students to signify the apartments which they
inhabit’ (Var 7: 423); but the word also puns on inwardness, the ‘ghastlie’ condition of melancholy and
envy that threatens the poet’s springtime poetry.
70Paddocks: See Dec gl 75. John Guillim, Display of Heraldrie (1611),
writes, ‘Toades and Frogs doe
communicate this naturall property, that when they sit, they hold their heads steady
& without motion: which stately action, Spencer in his
Sheapheards Calender calleth the Lording of Frogs’. Guillim also connects the
bearing of frogs and toads to men of a ‘cholerik’ humor who have ‘an inbred poison’
(150).
73–90Then as the springe . . . worke eternall
sleepe: Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy
107-23, which inventories various summertime activities. Marot’s inventory has more
realism than Spenser’s, which, in turn, more formally evokes Colin’s maturation in
literary art. If during the spring Colin wandered out of doors into the natural
world, during the summer he spent his time pursuing industrious projects connected
with architectural forms: the formal rooms of the honeycomb; the grievous inn kept
by the owl; the sheepcotes; and the nightingale cages and bulrush baskets mentioned
in the next stanza.
77lighter timber cotes to frame: Smaller strips of wood
rather than the more solid blocks used for larger construction. Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 111-4.
Spenser uses the word ‘frame’ eight times in the Calender (see, e.g., Dec 115).
79–82To make . . . hont?: Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 118-22 (see individual notes below).
79Nightingale: The image of making
cages for nightingales (not in Marot) continues the figuration of the poet framing
poetic forms for the expression of his song, a sweet mournful poignancy; but the
image also evokes the Philomela myth, and thus speaks to a series of violations
against females (and the feminine) throughout Colin’s account (e.g., 28 and 32; see
Berger 1988: 347-77). For the nightingale, see Feb 123, Aug 183-6, Nov 25, 141, and
notes, including Colin’s close association with the nightingale.
80And Baskets of bulrushes was my wont:
The basket is a traditional figure for the poem made as a work of art: see
especially the crowning image of Virgil, Ecl 10.71-2; but
also Marot, Eglogue au Roy 39, 42 (cf. Theocritus, Idylls 1.52-3). None of these baskets contains flowers.
For flowers in November as a figure for poetry, see 109n.
81entrappe thefish in winding sale: As E.K.’s gloss
allows, the image of the net catching fish continues the ‘wodde’ metaphors for the
making of verse. However, the image may be tempered by an allusion to Venus’
metamorphosis into a fish as an emblem of lust (Ovid, Met
5.331).
83–90I learned . . . sleepe: Colin’s
learning here takes in the three major divisions of the universe: sky, ocean, and land
(Hardie 1986: 50), and suggests knowledge of, respectively, cosmology, cartography,
and topography. Spenser’s details nonetheless evoke traditional roles for the poet:
as a cosmologist, he is able to read the signs of the zodiac (83-4; see Richardson
1989); as a cartographer, he is able to chart the ocean (cf. Helgerson 1992:
149-91); as a prophet, he is able to read the signs of birds (cf. A. Fletcher 1971);
and as a physician, he is able to use herbs to heal the stricken (cf. P. Cheney
1993: 135-6)—this last being specified in the next stanza with respect to the
illness of eros that plagues Colin. Cf. Marot, Eglogue au
Roy 124-30: Je apprins les noms des quatre parts du
monde; / J’apprins les noms des ventz qui de là sortent, / Leurs qualitiez,
et quels temps ils apportent, / Dont les oyseaulx, saiges devins des champs,
/ M’advertissoient par leurs vols et leurs chantz. / Je apprends aussi . . .
A éviter les dangereux herbages (‘I learned the names of the four parts
of the world. / I learned the names of the four corresponding winds, / Their
qualities, and what weather each brings— / The birds, wise soothsayers of the
fields, / Would tell me this through their flights and songs. / I also learned . . .
/ To avoid dangerous plants’; trans. Usher).
85–94And tryed . . . bleede: Cf. Ovid,
Met 1.521-4, spoken by the god Apollo in his attempt to ravish Daphne: inventum medicina meum
est, opiferque per orbem / dicor, et herbarum subjecta potentia nobis. / ei
mihi, quod nullis amor est sanabilis herbis / nec prosunt domino, quae
prosunt omnibus, artes! (‘The art of medicine is my discovery. I am
called the Help-Bringer throughout the world, and all the potency of herbs is given
unto me. Alas, that love is curable by no herbs, and the arts which heal all others
cannot heal their lord!’)
93ene: Archaic.
97–98Thus . . . rathe: Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 199-200: Mais
maintenant que je suis en l’autonne / Ne sçay quell soing inusité
m’estonne (‘But now that I am in my autumn, / I know not what new care
now surprises me’; trans. Usher).
101–102Of all . . . mowne: Cf. Isa 5:6 and
32:13 for briars and thorns as symbols of divine punishment for sin; Heb 6:7-8 for
‘the earth . . . which beareth thorns and briars, is reproved, and is nere unto
cursing, whose end is to be burned’; Matt 13:5-7, for the seed cast on the ground
amid thorns.
103boughes with bloosmes While
many of the adjustments in 1586 are ingenious and persuasive, the reading at this
juncture, ‘boughes and blooſmes’, is inferior. The further change of ‘blooſmes’ to
‘blo[ſſ]omes’ in 1597 instances one of many moments in the
early quartos in which a distinctive Spenserian lexical or orthographic choice is
normalized.
109The fragrant flowres: E.K.’s gloss
identifies the fragrant flowers as ‘sundry studies and laudable partes of learning’:
in other words, as figures for the sweet conceits in the poet’s learned work. The garden
metaphor evokes the locus amoenus (place of pleasure) as a
locus poeticus (place of poetry), but its healthy state is here
reserved for a young poet’s art, its decline for the art of the poet sabotaged by eros.
113Ah who . . . spight: A change from
Colin’s complaint in Januarye and June, where Colin blames Rosalind. The change of heart begins in
Colin’s August sestina (see Aug
180-6n and Dec 145-56n).
114spil: Not just ‘waste’, but also
‘destroy, ruin’, including morally, and thus here (possibly) ‘deprive of chastity’
(OED). Cf. Florimell being assaulted by the Fisher
at FQ III.viii.26.8-9: ‘Beastly he threwe her downe, ne
car’d to spill / Her garments gay with scales of fish, that all did fill’.
114should her girlond dight: Love has
specifically impeded Colin’s ambition to be a poet.
116shifting . . . foote: Referring to
the shepherds’ dance, with a pun on metric ‘foot’.
119–120loser Lasse . . . One if I please:
Ambiguous, prompting questions about the identities of both the looser lass and the
preferred ‘One’. The former may be Rosalind and the latter Hobbinol (Shore 1985:
100); or, conversely, the lass may refer to a girl whom Colin addressed before he
fell in love with Rosalind, and the ‘One’ may be Rosalind herself (Herford, Var 7: 425; McCabe 1999: 573); or perhaps the lass is
Rosalind and the ‘One’ both God and Colin (Maclean and Prescott 1993: 540). In any
case, the lines notably represent Colin’s attitude toward Rosalind at the end of the Calender.
121–122And thus . . . care: Cf. Virgil, Ecl 5.36-7: grandia saepe quibus
mandavimus hordea sulcis, / infelix lolium, et steriles nascuntur
avenae (‘Often in the furrows, to which we entrusted the big
barley-grains, luckless darnel springs up and barren oat straws’).
124Cockel: Corncockle, harmful to wheat. Cf.
Gerard, Herball 1597:1086-7, ‘a common and hurtfull weede in
our corne’ (i.e., wheat). Cf. Job 31:40: ‘Let thistles growe in stead of wheat,
& cokle in the stead of barly’; Isa 33:11, Ps 1:4, 35:5.
127–132So now . . . scoure: Cf. Marot,
Eglogue au Roy 223-4: D’autre
costé j’oy la bise arriver, / Qui en soufflant me prononce l’yver
(‘From elsewhere I hear the northern wind, / Which as it blows pronounces “winter”’;
trans. Usher).
132coste: Cf. June 15 and Julye 42.
134pight: Medievalism.
135My head . . . fynd: Cf. Marot, Eglogue au Roy 237-8: l’yver qui
s’appreste, / A commencé à neiger sur ma teste (‘the arriving winter /
Has started to freeze above my head’; trans. Usher).
136And by . . . wright: A self-reflexive
inscription of crow’s foot, or wrinkles at the edge of the eyes: ‘Spenser has
written the year by giving it form and meaning; Colin has been written by the year, his life rehearsing the script of the
seasons and his body inscribed, finally, with images of winter’s death’ (D.L. Miller
1979: 235). Cf. Chaucer, TC 2.402-3: ‘So longe mote ye lyve,
and alle proude, / Till crowes feet be growe under youre yë’. Sir John Davies, Eglogue between Willy & Wernocke (1614), may glance
at Spenser: ‘The crow-feet neere mine Eyne’ (134). On the crow as a traditional
enemy of the poet, see Feb 40n.
139Now leaue ye shepheards boyes:
Evidently, a farewell to fellow shepherd-poets. The address is unusual, given
Colin’s (and Spenser’s) penchant for addressing a female audience: e.g, ‘shepheards
daughters’ at Apr 127 and Nov 77.
139glee: Cf. Feb 224 and Maye 282.
140My Muse . . . stounde: Cf. Oct 49-50, where Piers tells Cuddie that ‘the stubborne
stroke of stronger stounds’ may eventually slack ‘the tenor of thy [pastoral]
string’.
141Here will I hang my pype vpon this
tree: The climactic act of the Calender, a
reworking of Jan 72, where Colin breaks his pipe. Here,
Colin imitates Robin in Marot, Eglogue au Roy, who uses the
image three times. The last two (209 and 245-7) cohere: in the fall of his life, Robin
sees his bagpipe hung in a tree, which emphasizes his lack of poetic productivity,
while at the end, in the winter, he tells Pan/Francis I that he will take the
bagpipe down from the tree to honor the god/king with new songs. Yet in the first instance
(158-61) Robin says he will honor his beloved by hanging his pipe in a tree as a
challenge to poetic rivals. In Arcadia, Sincero/Sannazaro
uses the figure twice at the end (Nash, Chapter 10, p. 105; Epilogue, p. 152) to
signal the poet’s Virgilian turn from pastoral to epic. In Shepheards Garland, Drayton interprets Colin’s act as such a turn: ‘In
thy sweete song so blessed may’st thou bee, / For learned Collin laies his pipes to gage, / And is to fayrie gone a Pilgrimage’
(3.13-5). As with Colin’s breaking of his pipe in Januarye
(see note), the climactic act here challenges interpretation (cf. Hamilton 1968: 35;
Cullen 1970: 79; Montrose 1979: 61-2). Spenser will replay versions of the event in
FQ: at I.x.60.6, where the hermit Contemplation
prophesies that the Redcrosse Knight will shun earthly conquest by hanging up his
shield; at II.xii.80.2, where the young knight Verdant has hung up his arms in a tree
to sleep with the enchantress Acrasia in the Bower of Bliss; and at VI.v.37.8, where the
old Hermit has hung up his arms to turn to the life of contemplation.
145–156 Colin’s final address to those he cares for and values: his flock, his
pastoral delights, Rosalind, the woods, and his friend Hobbinol. Colin’s final
affection for Rosalind contrasts with his earlier call for revenge after she betrays
him by taking up with Menalcus (June 97-104), but the
affection here is prepared for by Colin’s subsequent care for her ‘voyces silver
sound’ (Aug 181). The soft-sounding communal address closing
the eclogue belies the nominal fiction Colin narrates: isolation, alienation,
valediction.
157Colins Embleme: The emblem seems
enigmatically to be missing. In 1715, Hughes speculated that the missing emblem read
Vivitur ingenio, caetera mortis erunt (‘He lives on
in his works, the rest was mortal’), from an epigram once attributed to Virgil,
which coheres with E.K.’s gloss on the emblem. Yet the omission may be deliberate,
since Colin’s emblem in November, ‘La
mort ny mord’ (‘death biteth not’, as E.K. translates it), was Marot’s
well-recognized motto; it is appropriate for November; and
therefore it need not be repeated in December (Renwick, Var 7: 424). Cain proposes that ‘Colin has no emblem
because with the eclogue’s last line he dies’ (Cain in Oram 1989: 202). See note on
‘merce non mercede’ below. Finally, the emblem may
not be missing, but simply displaced. Colin’s emblem may be the two lines misquoted
from Ovid and printed in 1579 at the conclusion of E.K.’s
gloss on the emblem; see Dec gl 86-7n.
4Pan . . . magistros: From Virgil,
Ecl 2.33: ‘Pan cares for the sheep and the shepherds of
sheep’.
11Derring doe: On the mismatch of lemma and gloss to the eclogue,
see Dec 43n. E.K.'s 'aforesayd' refers the reader to Oct gl 86.
9Qui . . . musicam: From Terence,
Phormio, prologue 17: ‘those who practice the dramatic art'.
E.K.’s equation of music with poetry may be a commonplace, but it is also
an important directive for reading metaphors of music throughout the Calender.
37Theocritus: See Idylls 7.52-3 and 13.255-6.
45Liuie: Livy, Ab
Urbe Condita 9.36.3-4. In fact, E.K. cites Cicero, De Devinatione 1.41.92.
53Dea . . . herbis: From Virgil,
Aen 7.19: ‘with her potent herbs Circe, cruel goddess
[turned men into beasts]’.
81–82Exegi . . . vorax: Adapted from
Horace, Odes 3.30.1-3: Exegi monumentum
aere perennis / regalique situ pyramidum altius, / quod non imber edax, non
Aquilo impotens / posit diruere aut innumerabilis / annorum series et fuga
temporum (‘I have finished a monument more lasting than bronze, more
lofty than the regal structure of the pyramids, one which neither corroding rain nor
ungovernable North Wind can ever destroy, nor the countless series of the years, nor
the flight of time’).
86–87[Embleme] Grande . . . vetustas:
Misquoted from Ovid, Met 15.871-2: Iamque
opus exegi, quod nec Jove ira ignis nec poterit ferrum nec edax abolere
vetustas (‘And now my work is done, which neither that wrath of Jove,
nor fire, nor sword, nor the gnawing tooth of time shall ever be able to undo’). See
Envoy 7-12n. These lines might well be the text of the ‘missing’ emblem to December, mistakenly displaced here, where they stand
between what seems to be framed as an introduction to the Envoy and the Envoy
itself. Were the lines printed as the emblem, it would explain why E.K. does not
specifically introduce them here, as he does the quotation from Horace above (Dec gl
78-80). It would also explain the comparison implied in E.K.’s characterization of
Horace’s Odes as 'a work . . . of no so great weight and importaunce’: were these
lines in the foregoing position of emblem, they would serve as an appropriate
comparandum.