To _Cynthia_ is prefixed a copy of high-flying commendatory verses, from which very little sense can be extracted, by 'T.T.,' possibly Thomas Thorpe, the publisher of Shakespeare's Sonnets. In the address to 'The Curteous Gentlemen Readers' Barnfield claims indulgence for _Cynthia_ on the ground that it was the first 'imitation of the verse of that excellent Poet, Maister _Spencer_, in his _Fayrie Queene_.' The poem is a compliment to Queen Elizabeth, who is adjudged by Jove to have merited the golden apple wrongly given by Paris to Venus. When Barnfield mentioned that he borrowed the metre of _Cynthia_ from Spenser, he forgot to add that the matter was drawn from Peele's _Arraignment of Paris_. To _Cynthia_ succeed twenty sonnets extolling, after the fashion of the age, the beauty and virtues of an imaginary youth, Ganymede. In the last sonnet Barnfield introduces compliments to Spenser (Colin) and Drayton (Rowland):--
'Ah had great _Colin_, chiefe of sheepheards all, Or gentle _Rowland_, my professed friend, Had they thy beautie, or my pennance pend, Greater had beene thy fame, and lesse my fall: But since that euerie one cannot be wittie, Pardon I craue of them, and of thee pitty.'
The 'Ode' that follows the sonnets runs trippingly away in easy trochaics; but _Cassandra_ is laboured and languid.
_The Encomion of Lady Pecunia_ has an 'Address to the Gentlemen Readers,' in which Barnfield states that he had been at much pains to find an unhackneyed subject for his pen. After long consideration he had determined to write the praises of money, a theme both new (for none had ventured upon it before) and pleasing (for money is always in esteem). It was in pursuit of money that Hawkins and Drake had lost their lives. Barnfield wrote a fine epitaph on Hawkins:--
'The[5] Waters were his Winding sheete, the Sea was made his Toome; Yet for his fame the Ocean Sea was not sufficient roome.'
His lines on Drake are not quite so happy:--
'England[6] his hart; his Corps the Waters have; And that which raysed his fame, became his grave.'
The _Encomion_ is smoothly written, and is not without humour. A country gentleman in easy circumstances, Barnfield could dally playfully with a subject that had for him no terrors. His example probably led 'T. A.' (Thomas Acheley?) to write _The Massacre of Money_, 1602. _The Complaint of Poetrie for the Death of Liberalitie_ seems to be an imitation of Spenser's _Teares of the Muses_. More interesting are the _Poems: in divers humors_ at the end of the booklet, for among them are the sonnet 'If Musique and sweet Poetrie agree,' and the 'Ode' beginning 'As it fell upon a day,' which were long ascribed erroneously to Shakespeare. In the poem entitled 'A Remembrance of some English Poets' Barnfield praises Spenser, Daniel, Drayton, and Shakespeare. For Sir Philip Sidney he had a deep admiration, but his 'Epitaph' was a poor tribute. The verse with which the tract ends,'A Comparison of the Life of Man,' is distinctly impressive:--