A Biography of Edmund Spenser by John W. Hales
page 62 of 106 (58%)
page 62 of 106 (58%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
was
. . . vpon the highest hights Of _Arlo-hill_ (Who knowes not _Arlo-hill?_) That is the highest head (in all mens sights) Of my old father _Mole_, whom Shepheards quill Renowmed hath with hymnes fit for a rurall skill. His poem called _Colin Clouts Come Home Again_, written in 1591, and dedicated to Sir W. Raleigh 'from my house at Kilcolman the 27 of December, 1591'{5}-- written therefore after a lengthy absence in England-- exhibits a full familiarity with the country round about Kilcolman. On the whole then we may suppose that his residence at Kilcolman began not later than 1588. It was to be roughly and and terribly ended ten years after. We may suppose he was living there in peace and quiet, not perhaps undisturbed by growing murmurs of discontent, by signs of unrepressed and irrepressible hostility towards his nation, by ill-concealed sympathies with the Spanish invaders amongst the native population, when the Armada came and went. The old castle in which he had lived had been one of the residences of the Earls of Desmond. It stood some two miles from Doneraile, on the north side of a lake which was fed by the river Awbeg or Mulla, as the poet christened it. 'Two miles north-west of Doneraile,' writes Charles Smith in his _Natural and Civil History of the |
|