Daniel,
Drayton, and others were, it is well known, indefatigable revisers
of their poems; they "added and altered many times," mostly
for the better, occasionally for the worse. We can scarcely
picture to ourselves Lovelace blotting a line, though it would
have been well for his reputation, if he had blotted many.
In the poem of the LOOSE SARABAND (p. 34) there is some resemblance
to a piece translated from Meleager in Elton's SPECIMENS OF CLASSIC
POETS, i. 411, and entitled by Elton "Playing at Hearts."
"Love acts the tennis-player's part,
And throws to thee my panting heart;
Heliodora! ere it fall,
Let desire catch swift the ball:
Let her in the ball-court move,
Follow in the game with love.
If thou throw me back again,
I shall of foul play complain."
And an address to the Cicada by the same writer, (IBID. i. 415)
opens with these lines:--
"Oh, shrill-voiced insect that, with dew-drops sweet
Inebriate, dost in desert woodlands sing."
In the poem called "The Grasshopper" (p. 94), the author speaks
of the insect as
"Drunk ev'ry night with a delicious tear,
Dropped thee from heaven."----
The similarity, in each case, I believe to have been entirely
accidental: nor am I disposed to think that Lovelace was under any
considerable or direct obligations to the classics.
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