1). No; my lady was 'unmercifull,
but not so cruell;' she ever and anon upheld his courage, bringing
'to my succour the forces of two deare friends.' One of them
was Theodore Diodati, tutor of Lady Bedford's brother, the eldest
son of Lady Harrington whose husband also was a poet.
The grateful Florio calls this worthy colleague, 'Diodati as in name,
so indeed God's gift to me,' and a 'guide-fish' who in this
'rockie-rough ocean' helped him to capture the 'Whale'--that is,
Montaigne. He also compares him to a 'bonus genius sent to
me, as the good angel to Raimond in "Tasso," for my assistant to
combat this great Argante.'
The other welcome fellow-worker was 'Maister Doctor Guinne;' according
to Florio, 'in this perilous, crook't passage a monster-quelling
Theseus or Herkules;' aye, in his eyes the best orator, poet,
philosopher, and medical man (_non so se meglior oratore e poeta,
o philosopho e medico_), and well versed in Greek, Latin, Italian,
and French poetry. It was he who succeeded in tracing the many
passages from classic and modern writers which are strewn all over
Montaigne's Essays to the divers authors, and the several places
where they occur, so as to properly classify them.
Samuel Daniel, a well-known and much respected poet of that time, and a
brother-in-law of Florio, also made his contribution. He opens this
powerful, highly important work with a eulogistic poem.
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