has been said above, made poetry the confidante of all
his joys and sorrows, is remarkable.
Whoever they were, he was well connected on his
father's side at least. 'The nobility of the
Spensers,' writes Gibbon, 'has been illustrated and
enriched by the trophies of Marlborough; but I exhort
them to consider the "Faerie Queen" as the most
precious jewel of their coronet.' Spenser was
connected with the then not ennobled, but highly
influential family of the Spencers of Althorpe,
Northamptonshire. Theirs was the 'house of auncient
fame,' or perhaps we should rather say they too
belonged to the 'house of auncient fame' alluded to in
the quotation made above from the _Prothalamion_. He
dedicates various poems to the daughters of Sir John
Spencer, who was the head of that family during the
poet's youth and earlier manhood down to 1580, and in
other places mentions these ladies with many
expressions of regard and references to his affinity.
'Most faire and vertuous Ladie,' he writes to the
'Ladie Compton and Mountegle,' the fifth daughter, in
his dedication to her of his _Mother Hubberds Tale_,
'having often sought opportunitie by some good meanes
to make knowen to your Ladiship the humble affection
and faithfull duetie, which I have alwaies professed
and am bound to beare to that house, from whence yee
spring, I have at length found occasion to remember the
same by making a simple present to you of these my idle
labours, &c.' To another daughter, 'the right worthy
and vertuous ladie the Ladie Carey,' he dedicates his