Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/289

 pseudonym, and his refinement brought down on him Nash's censure. Nash speaks of Breton, in allusion to his 'Bower of Delights,' as 'Pan sitting in his Bower of Delights, and a number of Midases to admire his miserable hornpipes.' In his religious poems and tracts there is a passionate yearning and rich imagery which often suggest Southwell, or even Crashaw, but they are defaced by wire-drawn conceits and mystical subtleties. He was probably an earnest student of Spenser, for whom he wrote a sympathetic epitaph.

The enthusiasm for the Virgin Mary exhibited in a few poems, very generally attributed to Breton, has led to the belief that the poet was an ardent catholic. But it is almost certain—as we state below—that the undoubtedly catholic poems ascribed to Breton were by another hand; his long intimacy with the protestant Countess of Pembroke, which probably rested mainly on common religious sentiments, the direct attacks on Romanism which figure in many of Breton's prose tracts, and his sympathetic references to the practices of the English reformed church, point in quite the opposite direction. His description of the Virgin, saints, and angels, only noticed by him as part of the acknowledged host of heaven, and his constantly recurring comparison of his own spiritual condition to that of Mary Magdalen, merely illustrate the strength of his religious fervour (see Dr. notes in Notes and Queries, 5th series, i. 501-2).

Breton's popularity lasted through the first half of the seventeenth century. A highly eulogistic sonnet 'in authorem' is prefixed by Ben Jonson to Breton's 'Melancolike Humours,' 1600, and Francis Meres in his 'Palladis Tamia,' 1598, classes him with the greatest writers of the time. Sir John Suckling, in 'The Goblins,' iv. i. (, Old Plays, 1826, x. 143), joined his name with that of Shakespeare:—:The last a well-writ piece, I assure you,:A Breton I take it, and Shakespeare's very way.

Less respectful reference to the poet's voluminousness is made in Beaumont and Fletcher's 'Scornful Lady' (ii. 3), and 'Wit without Money' (iii. 4). At a later date, Richard Brome, in his 'Jovial Crew' (Works, iii. 372), speaks of 'fetching sweetmeats' for ladies and courting them 'in a set speech taken out of old Britain's works.' At the end of the seventeenth century Breton seems to have completely dropped out of notice, but his reputation was restored by Bishop Percy, who printed his 'Phillida and Corydon' and 'The Shepherd's Address to his Muse' (both from 'England's Helicon') in his 'Reliques of Ancient Poetry.' In most of the subsequent poetical collections Breton has been represented.

I. Breton's productions, all bibliographical rarities, are as follows:—


 * 1) 'The Workes of a young Wit trust up with a Fardell of prettie fancies, profitable to young Poetes, prejudicial to no man, and pleasant to every man to passe away idle time withall. Whereunto is joined an odde kinde of wooing with a bouquet of comfittes to make an end withall. Done by N. B., Gent.,' 1577. Only one copy of this work (entered on the Stationers' Register under date June 1577) is now extant; it belongs to Mr. Christie-Miller of Britwell. George Ellis printed two poems from it in his 'Specimens of Early English Poets' (3rd edition, 1803), ii. 270-8; and Mr. W. C. Hazlitt has reprinted 'The Letter Dedicatorie to the Reader' (dated 14 May 1577) in his 'Prefaces &c. from Early Books,' 1874.
 * 2) 'A Floorish vpon Fancie. As gallant a glose vpon so trifling a text as ever was written. Compiled by N. B., Gent. To which are annexed The Toyes of an Idle Head; containing many pretie Pamphlets for pleasaunt heads to passe away Idle time withall. By the same Authour,' London, 'imprinted by Richard Jhones,' 1577 and 1582. This work was entered on the Stationers' Register 2 April 1577; the only extant copy of the edition published in 1577 is now at Britwell; that of 1582 is carelessly reprinted in Park's 'Heliconia' (cf.  Prefaces, $c. (1874), p. 55).
 * 3) * 'The Pilgrimage to Paradise, coyned with the Countesse of Penbrooke's love, compiled in verse by Nicholas Breton, Gentleman,' Oxford, by Joseph Barnes, 1592, entered on the Stationers' Register 23 Jan. 1590-1, with the dedication to Mary, countess of Pembroke. John Case, M.D., prefixes a letter, addressed in high praise of the author, 'to my honest trve friend, Master Nicholas Breton,' and William Gager, doctor of laws, and Henry Price add Latin verses (cf. Addit. MS. 22583, f. 86).
 * 4) 'The Countess of Penbrook's Passion,' first privately printed by Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps, from a manuscript preserved in the Public Library at Plymouth in his 'Brief Description of the Plymouth Manuscripts' (1853), pp. 177-210. An anonymous writer in 'Notes and Queries' (1st series, v. 487) described another manuscript of this poem in his possession. A manuscript older than either of these is in the British Museum (Sloane MS. 1303), and this was printed for the first time in 1862, under the title of 'A Poem on our Saviour's Passion,' as the work of