from the Italian) the one which was subsequently used by Shakspere,
consisting of three independent quatrains followed, as with Wyatt, by a
couplet which sums up the thought with epigrammatic force, thus: _a b a b
c d c d e f e f g g_.

Wyatt and Surrey set a fashion at Court; for some years it seems to have
been an almost necessary accomplishment for every young noble to turn off
love poems after Italian and French models; for France too had now taken up
the fashion. These poems were generally and naturally regarded as the
property of the Court and of the gentry, and circulated at first only in
manuscript among the author's friends; but the general public became
curious about them, and in 1557 one of the publishers of the day, Richard
Tottel, securing a number of those of Wyatt, Surrey, and a few other noble
or gentle authors, published them in a little volume, which is known as
'Tottel's Miscellany.' Coming as it does in the year before the accession
of Queen Elizabeth, at the end of the comparatively barren reigns of Edward
and Mary, this book is taken by common consent as marking the beginning of
the literature of the Elizabethan period. It was the premature predecessor,
also, of a number of such anthologies which were published during the
latter half of Elizabeth's reign.

THE ELIZABETHAN PERIOD. [Footnote: Vivid pictures of the Elizabethan period
are given in Charles Kingsley's 'Westward, ho!' and in Scott's
'Kenilworth.' Scott's 'The Monastery' and 'The Abbot' deal less
successfully with the same period in Scotland.] The earlier half of
Elizabeth's reign, also, though not lacking in literary effort, produced no
work of permanent importance. After the religious convulsions of half a
century time was required for the development of the internal quiet and
confidence from which a great literature could spring. At length, however,
the hour grew ripe and there came the greatest outburst of creative energy