Daniel was the last of the Volunteer Laureates, for although Michael Drayton has been sometimes called by that title, he does not appear to have had any just claim to it.

Ben Jonson, who succeeded Daniel, held the office by virtue of Royal Letters Patent, and with him, therefore, commences the history of the officially appointed Poets Laureate.

THE POETS LAUREATE.

BEN JONSON,

(1619-1637.)

"Then Jonson came, instructed from the school,
To please in method, and invent by rule,
His studious patience and laborious art,

By regular approach essay'd the heart;

Cold approbation gave the lingering bays,

For those who durst not censure, scarce could praise.
A mortal born, he met the gen'ral doom,

But left, like Egypt's king, a lasting tomb.”

Dr. Johnson.

Of the early life of Ben Jonson (or Johnson, as his name was then commonly spelt) but little is known, except that he was the posthumous son of a minister of the Reformed Church, and was born in 1573 (Gifford says 1574, but this is probably an error), in Hartshorn-lane, Charing-cross.

He was educated at Westminster School, under Master Camden, the antiquary, whence, it is said, he proceeded for a short time to St. John's, Cambridge, of which circumstance, however, the College books make no mention. His step-father, Thomas Fowler, was a bricklayer by trade, and Jonson appears to have served a short apprenticeship under him; but as it is said that he was seen in the exercise of his trade, building the garden wall of Lincoln's

Inn, Chancery-lane, with a trowel in one hand and a copy of Virgil in the other, it is highly probable that he was but an indifferent workman with bricks and mortar, whatever success he may have attained with his pen.

It

is evident that the building trade was not to his taste, for he quitted it very shortly, and went as a Volunteer to the army then serving in Flanders, where he distinguished himself by his bravery in the field; and although but a youth, he slew an enemy in single combat, and bore off his arms as trophies, a circumstance to which he afterwards referred with pride, in the lines

TO TRUE SOLDIERS.

"Strength of my country, whilst I bring to view
Such as are miscalled captains, and wrong you
And your high names, I do desire that hence
Be nor put on you, nor you take offence.

I swear by your true friend, my muse, I love
Your great profession, which I once did prove,
And did not shame it with my actions then,
No more than I dare now do with my pen."

Unfortunately for Jonson, his courageous disposition was accompanied by an obstinate pugnacity, impatience of contradiction, overbearing pride, and great self-assertionan unlucky combination of qualities to which he owed most of the misfortunes he experienced in a rough and stormy life.

Gifford, in his memoir, somewhat softens down these harsh outlines by remarking "that Jonson, far from being vindictive, was one of the most placable of mankind. He blustered, indeed, and talked angrily, but his heart was turned to affection: his enmities appear to have been shortlived, whilst his friendships were durable and sincere."

On his return from the army, he directed his attention to the stage, and wrote his first play, Every Man in his Humour, which was very successful. It was produced at the Globe theatre, in Southwark, and Shakespeare played a chief part in it. Jonson also tried the boards, but was not at all successful as an actor. About the same period that this comedy was produced, in 1598, Jonson fought a duel with a fellow-actor named Gabriel Spenser, whom he killed, being himself wounded in the encounter.

In Mr. Collier's Memoirs of Edward Alleyn, the founder of Dulwich College, he inserts a letter from "Philip Henslowe to Mr. Edward Alleyne, at Mr. Arthure Langworthes, at the Brille, in Sussex," dated the 26th September, 1598, which contains the following remarkable passage:

"Sence you weare with me I have lost one of my company, which hurteth me greatly, that is Gabrill, for he is slayen in Hogesden fylldes (Hoxton Fields) by the hands of Bengemen Jonson, bricklayer, therefore I wold fayne have a littell of your counsell yf I could."

For this crime he was thrown into prison, and narrowly escaped hanging; whilst thus confined, and in fear of death, his thoughts very naturally turned upon religion, and "taking the priest's word for it," as he said, he became a Roman Catholic, of which church he remained a member for twelve years.

On regaining his liberty, Jonson composed some plays, and many masques and pageants for the court entertainments of James I.; but it was not long before he gave that monarch affront through some unguarded expressions he introduced in the comedy of Eastward Hoe!

What were the objectionable passages cannot now be settled with any certainty; whether it was that his expressions were construed into a satire on the lavish

patronage the Scotch received from the King, and his courtiers; or whether it was that Jonson ridiculed the indiscriminate sale and granting of knighthoods and baronetcies, which was unpleasant to the King, is a disputed point. But the following speech which occurs in the first scene of the fourth act of Eastward Hoe! seems sufficient to explain the displeasure of so arbitrary a man as James :

“1st Gentleman.-On the coast of Dogges, sir; y'are i'th Isle o' Dogges, I tell you. I see y'ave been washed in the Thames here, and I believe ye were drowned in a tavern before, or else you would never have toke boat in such a dawning as this was. Farewel, farewel; we will not know you, for shaming of you. Iken the man weel; he's one of my thirty-pound knights."

Chapman and Marston, Jonson's co-partners in the work were apprehended, and poor Jonson, with characteristic magnanimity, gave himself up to participate in the punishment of his friends.

They were all three sentenced to have their ears and noses slit, but by the interposition of their friends they escaped this mutilation on their undertaking to mutilate the play by erasing the objectionable passages.

Great were the rejoicings on the liberation of Ben and his friends, and a merry banquet was given in honour of the event, at which Camden and Selden were present.

At the conclusion of this festival, Jonson's mother drank to his health and long life, at the same time producing a packet of poison, which she had intended to have administered to her son and herself, had the barbarous sentence of the court been carried out.

In the course of the next few years Jonson produced the most celebrated of his plays, which made him very popular with the frequenters of the theatre; in the estima