Such was the world of pomp and pageant that lived
round Tasso in his dismal cell at Ferrara, when he conceived the
splendid scenes of his Jerusalem; and we may consider The King's
Quair,* composed by James during his captivity at Windsor, as
another of those beautiful breakings forth of the soul from the
restraint and gloom of the prison-house.
The subject of the poem is his love for the lady Jane Beaufort,
daughter of the Earl of Somerset, and a princess of the
blood-royal of England, of whom he became enamoured in the course
of his captivity. What gives it a peculiar value, is, that it may
be considered a transcript of the royal bard's true feelings, and
the story of his real loves and fortunes. It is not often that
sovereigns write poetry or that poets deal in fact. It is
gratifying to the pride of a common man, to find a monarch thus
suing, as it were, for admission into his closet, and seeking to
win his favor by administering to his pleasures. It is a proof of
the honest equality of intellectual competition, which strips off
all the trappings of factitious dignity, brings the candidate
down to a level with his fellow-men, and obliges him to depend on
his own native powers for distinction.
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