Other noteworthy poems are “Mother Hubbard’s Tale,” a satire on society; “Astrophel,” an elegy on the death of Sidney; Amoretti, or sonnets, to his Elizabeth; the marriage hymn, “Epithalamion,” and four “Hymns,” on Love, Beauty, Heavenly Love, and Heavenly Beauty.  There are numerous other poems and collections of poems, but these show the scope of his work and are best worth reading.

IMPORTANCE OF THE SHEPHERD’S CALENDAR.  The publication of this work, in 1579, by an unknown writer who signed himself modestly “Immerito,” marks an important epoch in our literature.  We shall appreciate this better if we remember the long years during which England had been without a great poet.  Chaucer and Spenser are often studied together as poets of the Renaissance period, and the idea prevails that they were almost contemporary.  In fact, nearly two centuries passed after Chaucer’s death,—­years of enormous political and intellectual development,—­and not only did Chaucer have no successor but our language had changed so rapidly that Englishmen had lost the ability to read his lines correctly.[125]

This first published work of Spenser is noteworthy in at least four respects:  first, it marks the appearance of the first national poet in two centuries; second, it shows again the variety and melody of English verse, which had been largely a tradition since Chaucer; third, it was our first pastoral, the beginning of a long series of English pastoral compositions modeled on Spenser, and as such exerted a strong influence on subsequent literature; and fourth, it marks the real beginning of the outburst of great Elizabethan poetry.

CHARACTERISTICS OF SPENSER’S POETRY.  The five main qualities of Spenser’s poetry are (1) a perfect melody; (2) a rare sense of beauty; (3) a splendid imagination, which could gather into one poem heroes, knights, ladies, dwarfs, demons and dragons, classic mythology, stories of chivalry, and the thronging ideals of the Renaissance,—­all passing in gorgeous procession across an ever-changing and ever-beautiful landscape; (4) a lofty moral purity and seriousness; (5) a delicate idealism, which could make all nature and every common thing beautiful.  In contrast with these excellent qualities the reader will probably note the strange appearance of his lines due to his fondness for obsolete words, like eyne (eyes) and shend (shame), and his tendency to coin others, like mercify, to suit his own purposes.

It is Spenser’s idealism, his love of beauty, and his exquisite melody which have caused him to be known as “the poets’ poet.”  Nearly all our subsequent singers acknowledge their delight in him and their indebtedness.  Macaulay alone among critics voices a fault which all who are not poets quickly feel, namely that, with all Spenser’s excellences, he is difficult to read.  The modern man loses himself in the confused allegory of the Faery Queen, skips all but the marked passages,