" From
the "Tale" Lodge borrowed and adapted the account of the death of old
Sir John of Bordeaux, the subsequent quarrel of his sons, the plot of
the elder against the younger by which the latter was to be killed in
a wrestling bout, the wrestling itself, the flight of the younger
accompanied by the faithful Adam to the Forest of Arden, and their
falling in with a band of outlaws feasting. Yet from the "Tale" Lodge
took hardly more than a suggestion. All the love story was his own.
Original also, so far as we know,[1] was the story of the two kings,
and the pastoral element--for "Rosalynde" is a pastoral romance.
[Footnote 1: It has been conjectured that Lodge drew upon some Italian
novel for the material that he did not find in "The Tale of Gamelyn."
There seems, however, no ground for denying to Lodge credit for some
originality; for the novel, if it ever existed, has been lost.]
_Form: A Pastoral Romance._ As a pastoral romance it belongs to the
class of books of which Sidney's' "Arcadia" is the most famous
representative in English. The "Arcadia" was published in 1590--the
same year as "Rosalynde"--though it had been written some ten years
earlier.
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