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.To bear and make demonstration of the same blazon or achievement upon their shields, targets, escutcheons …‘In this strange country,’ said Florio, ‘a gentleman may be a poet.Indeed, gentility has been taken as the primal qualification for making poetry.It is rarer to see that a poet may be a gentleman.’‘But the letter itself,’ said WS, ‘apart from the seal——’‘He has not seen the letter,’ said Florio.‘And I think it better that he do not.He is not well, he is not solely sick of his body but also most profoundly melancholic——’‘Following the fashion.’‘Alas, no.He caught some pestilential thing in France.Alone in bed in the dark a man has no audience.As for what you say in your letter, I perceive its justice.Shall we say that my lord was careless and that my lord’s friend the Earl of T desired copies of these most exquisite and mellifluous etcetera etcetera and that these then fell into the hands of Sir John F and then descended rung by rung to——’‘To some impoverished master of arts or other.’ Dick Field may have talked of them in Stratford but he had not desired to print them.Some small anonymous fellow had brought them, saying he had been sent by a gentleman whose name he had been forbidden to disclose.Not Master Chapman, said Dick Field.Indeed, Master Chapman was not impoverished; his new plays of humours were doing well at the Rose.‘As you say,’ said Florio.Florio looked fatter: something to do with the content of love, with Rosa, a poet’s daughter.‘And you may also say, if you think about it, that if my lord showed your sonnets to any of his friends it would in no wise be out of malice; rather out of pride.I think you may understand that.’‘Well——’ WS felt, in a kind of despair, the whole matter of bitterness and high feeling begin to slide off; he was always an actor quitting old parts for new.‘We have been somewhat estranged of late.I sent sonnets, as you will know, and the sonnets bounced rudely back.’‘I was instructed to return them,’ said Florio.‘Nor was it in mine office to add aught that might explain his rejection of them.But, to speak plainly now, he was in one of these states of his — states that belong more to his rank than to the man that holds that rank.He is naturally, as you well know, free and honest.Sometimes, though, he must remember what he is, especially when great lords are going forth to wage war against the Queen’s enemies.Her Majesty would not let him follow my lord Essex to Cadiz, and that rankled.He would not have it then that he was sick.And he has been much importuned by small poets and smaller players.Then there was some question of a woman, not a lady.He has had her hidden away somewhere.There has been, in fine, a fit of revulsion against what he termed the lowness of his life.’ Florio gave an Italianate shrug.‘Guilt is a word you might use.The English are given to guilt.It is something to do,’ he said vaguely, ‘with the English being a sort of twofold people.’‘Tell me more of this lady — woman, I would say.’‘I know little.Some very dark creature, I am told.He had her taken into the country.But he has been railing against drabs, poet’s drabs, as he calls them.There are times when he has a very low opinion of poets.’‘And what of this poet?’Florio sat back comfortably in his great leather chair, black legs crossed.Behind him was a table littered with the materials for the dictionary he was making; his shelves were full of fat books.It had been a good life for him, a watching life.Symbol of his philosophical content, a fat black cat slept by the spitting pearwood fire.Autumn was cold this year.He said:‘Yourself? It is time, I would say, for you to be his friend again.The ranks close.’ He grinned at that.‘Your respective ranks grow nearer, I mean.I think you have, looking back on it all, done him more good than harm.’ Florio did not know everything, that was quite certain.‘You lacked authority to enforce your precepts, no more.I will send word that you have been.Do you send words, a sonnet or so.This time they will not be rejected, that I can promise.’… And for his crest or cognizance a falcon his wings displayed argent standing on a wreath of his colours; supporting a spear gold steeled as aforesaid set upon a helmet with mantels and tassels as hath been accustomed….WS, gentleman, went back to Bishopsgate, his head buzzing with images [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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