treats of the vices of the city, not the least of them being religious
persecution. In the next Melibeus relates how Dametas, having as we now
learn killed himself for love, appeared to him amid hell-fire. Eclogue V
contains the pitiful tale of Faustus who courted Claudia through the
agency of Valerius. Claudia unfortunately fell in love with the messenger,
and finding him faithful to his master slew herself. This is imitated, in
part closely, from the tale of the shepherdess Felismena in the second
book of Montemayor's _Diana_, the identical story upon which Shakespeare
is supposed ultimately to have founded his _Two Gentlemen of Verona_,
though it is difficult at first sight to trace much resemblance between
the play and Googe's poem. In the sixth eclogue Faustus--the Don Felix of
the Spanish and the Proteus of Shakespeare--himself appears, for no better
reason it would seem than to give his interlocutor an opportunity of
enlarging on the delights of country life and introducing the remarks on
fowling borrowed from Sannazzaro by way of Garcilaso's second eclogue. The
next is a discussion somewhat after the manner of the _Nut-Brown Maid_,
again paraphrased from the _Diana_ (Book I); while the eighth, lastly, is
a homily on the superiority of Christianity over Roman polytheism, in
which under obsolete forms the author no doubt intended an allusion to
contemporary controversies. Thus it will be seen that Googe follows Latin
and Spanish traditions almost exclusively: the only point in which it is
possible to see any native inspiration is in his partiality for some sort
of narrative ballad motive as the subject of his poems.

So far the literary quality to be registered has not been high among those
owing allegiance to the regular pastoral tradition. The next step to be
taken is a long one. The pastoral writings of Spenser not only themselves
belong to a very different order of work, but likewise brings us face to
face with literary problems of a most complex and interesting kind.