'
It was for this lady Strange, who became subsequently
the wife of Sir Thomas Egerton, that one who came after
Spenser--Milton--wrote the _Arcades_. Of these three
kinswomen, under the names of Phyllis, Charillis, and
sweet Amaryllis, Spenser speaks once more in his _Colin
Clouts Come Home Again_; he speaks of them as
The honour of the noble familie
Of which I meanest boast myself to be.
For the particular branch of the Spencer or Spenser
family--one branch wrote the name with _s_, another
with _c_--to which the poet belonged, it has been well
suggested that it was that settled in East Lancashire
in the neighbourhood of Pendle Forest. It is known on
the authority of his friend Kirke, whom we shall
mention again presently, that Spenser retired to the
North after leaving Cambridge; traces of a Northern
dialect appear in the _Shepheardes Calendar_; the
Christian name Edmund is shown by the parish registers
to have been a favourite with one part of the
Lancashire branch--with that located near Filley Close,
three miles north of Hurstwood, near Burnley.
Spenser then was born in London, probably in East
Smithfield, about a year before those hideous Marian
fires began to blaze in West Smithfield. He had at
least one sister, and probably at least one brother.
His memory would begin to be retentive about the time
of Queen Elizabeth's accession.
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