ut would not
apply to her as his wife.

The Rosalinde indicated by Spenser was undoubtedly a north of England
girl, while Samuel Daniel belonged to a Somerset family. While it is
certain that Florio was married before 1617, it is evident he did not
marry a Miss Daniel, and that Menalcas had not married Rosalinde in
1596; yet it is practically certain that Spenser refers to Florio as
Menalcas, and that Shakespeare recognised that fact in 1592 and
pilloried Florio to the initiated of his day as Parolles in _Love's
Labour's Won_ in this connection. Florio habitually signed himself
"Resolute John Florio" to acquaintances, obligations, dedications, etc.
When he commenced this practice I cannot learn, but the use of the word
was known to Spenser in 1579, as the Greek word Menalcas means Resolute.
It is not difficult to fathom Spenser's meaning in regard to the
relations between Menalcas and Rosalinde, and it is clear that he had a
poor opinion of the moral character of the former, and plainly charges
him with seduction.

"And thou, Menalcas, that by treacheree
Didst underfong my lasse to waxe so light,
Shouldest well be known for such thy villanee.
But since I am not as I wish I were,
Ye gentle Shepheards, which your flocks do feede,
Whether on hylls, or dales, or other where,
Beare witnesse all of thys so wicked deede:
And tell the lasse, whose flowre is woxe a weede,
And faultlesse fayth is turned to faithlesse fere,
That she the truest shepheards hart made bleede,
That lyves on earth, and loved her most dere."

The very unusual word "underfong" which Spenser uses in these verses,
and the gloss which he appends to the verses of _The Shepheards
Calendar_ for June, were not lost upon Shakespeare. Spenser, in the
glossary, writes: "Menalcas, the name of a shephearde in Virgile; but
here is meant a person unknowne and secrete, against whome he often
bitterly invayeth. _Underfonge_, undermyne, and deceive by false
suggestion." The immoral flippancy of the remarkable dialogue between
the disreputable Parolles and the otherwise sweet and maidenly Helena,
in Act I. Scene i. of _All's Well that Ends Well_, has often been
noticed by critics as a peculiar lapse in dramatic congruity on the part
of Shakespeare. This is evidently one of several such instances in his
plays where he sacrificed his objective dramatic art to a subjective
contingency, though by doing so undoubtedly