t long:
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song.

* * * * *

At length they all _to merry London came,
To merry London, my most kindly nurse,
That to me gave this life's first native source,
Though from another place I take my name,
A house of ancient fame_.
There, when they came, whereas those bricky towers
The which on Thames broad aged back do ride,
Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers,
There whilome wont the Templar Knights to bide,
Till they decayed through pride:
Next whereunto there stands a stately place,
_Where oft I gained gifts and goodly grace[5:2]
Of that great Lord, which therein wont to dwell;
Whose want too well now feels my friendless case;
But ah! here fits not well
Old woes, but joys, to tell_
Against the bridal day, which is not long:
Sweet Thames! run softly, till I end my song:
Yet therein now doth lodge a noble peer,[5:3]
Great England's glory and the wide world's wonder,
Whose dreadful name late through all Spain did thunder,
And Hercules two pillars, standing near,
Did make to quake and fear.
Fair branch of honour, flower of chivalry!
That fillest England with thy triumph's fame,
Joy have thou of thy noble victory,[5:4]
And endless happiness of thine own name
That promiseth the same.
That through thy prowess, and victorious arms,
Thy country may be freed from foreign harms;
And great Elisa's glorious name may ring
Through all the world, filled with thy wide alarms.

Who his father was, and what was his employment we know not. From one of
the poems of his later years we learn that his mother bore the famous
name of Elizabeth, which was also the cherished one of Spenser's wife.

My love, my life's best ornament,
By whom my spirit out of dust was raised.[6:5]

But his family, whatever was his father's condition, certainly claimed
kindred, though there was a difference in the spelling of the name, with
a house then rising into fame and importance, the Spencers of Althorpe,
the ancestors of the Spencers and Churchills of modern days. Sir John
Spencer had several daughters, three of whom made great marriages.
Elizabeth was the wife of Sir George Carey, afterwards the second Lord
Hunsdon, the son of