Cornell IntttetHttg i&ihtanj Strata, Nrm fork BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1891 PR2894.S88 ne " UniVerSi,yLlbrary S^Jjespeare's industry, by Mrs. C.C. Sto 3 1924 013 148 733 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013148733 SHAKESPEARE'S INDUSTRY SHAKESPEARE'S INDUSTRY BY MRS. C. C. STOPES HON. F.R.S.L. AUTHOR OF "THE BACON SHAKESPEARE QUESTION ANSWERED,'' "BRITISH FREEWOMEN," "SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY," " SHAKESPEARE'S WARWICK- SHIRE CONTEMPORARIES," " WILLIAM HUNNIS AND THE REVELS OF THE CHAPEL ROYAL," " BURBAGE, AND SHAKESPEARE'S STAGE," "SHAKESPEARE'S ENVIRONMENT," etc., EDITOR OF " SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS " (KING'S CLASSICS) etc. " Plautus sighed, Sophocles wept Teares of anger, for to heare. After they so long had slept So bright a genius should appear. Where thy honoured bones do He, As Statius once to Maro's urn, Thither every year will 1 Slowly tread and sadly turn." Samuel Sheppard's " Epigrams.' LONDON G. BELL AND SONS Ltd, 1916 ^, * i , ,' ij U l\!| \/ /vmvbx Francis & Co., 11 and 13 Bream's Buildings, Chancery Lane, K.C. CONTENTS. PAGE I. Shakespeare's Industry 1 II. Shakespeare's Treatment of His Originals . 12 III. The Amleth of the Story and the Hamlet of the Stage 43 IV. Hamlet and Macbeth, an Intended Contrast . 72 V. The Scottish and English Macbeth. . . 78 VI. Is Lady Macbeth really a " Fiendlike Queen " ? 1 1(T VII. Sir Thomas Lucy not the Original of Justice Shallow 125 VIII. The Taming of the Shrew . . . .139 IX. The Kenilworth Festivities . . . .152 X. The Midsummer Night's Dream . . . .168 XI. Captain Cox's ' Booke of Fortune ' . . . 181 XII. The Italian and English Books of Fortune . 197 XIII. Elizabethan Stage Scenery .... 204 XIV. The Earliest Official Record of Shakespeare's Name 218 XV. The Introduction of Shakespeare to Queen Elizabeth 227 XVI. Shakespeare and War 237 XVII. Shakespeare's Legal Transactions . . . 257 XVIII. Shakespeare, Homager of Rowington . . 267 XIX. Shakespeare of the Court . . . .271 XX. The Paradise of Dainty Devices . . . 277 XXI. The Metrical Psalms and the Court of Venus . 291 XXII. The Old and " Newb Court of Venus " . .305 XXIII. Snt Thomas Wyat and the " Newe Court of Venus" 320 Terminal Notes : Art. V. Note 1. List of Scottish Kings . » 334 Art. V. Note 2. The Oxford Interlude of Banquo 335 Art. V. Note 3. Quotations from Stewart's Metrical History . . 336 Art. XXIII. Note 1. Sir Thomas Wyat's Poems . 340 Art. XXIII. Note 2. Echoes 342 Inpex 346 T PREFACE. SHAKESPEAREAN writers are wont to make apologies for the books they add to the pile, pending the passing of the proposed Bill that the Censor should be given powers to stay for nine years at the printers, all Shakespeare books which have not taken nine years at least in the writing. My apology is this, that for more thai) nine years I had been collecting materials for a book., which I meant to appear in Shakespeare's Commemoration year. Fate has made it impossible to finish it in time (perhaps impossible to finish it at all). But in defiance I said to myself that a book there should be, and I have brought together a- series of papers, new and old, all bearing to some extent upon our great Poet. I have always tried to specialise in studies relating to his personal character, so that I may as much as possible un- derstand the man. For this purpose I had brought out a twin volume in 1914, called (for lack of a better title) ' Shakespeare's Environment.' This present one sticks more closely to its title of 'Shakespeare's Industry.' It was difficult for myself or my fellow-students to bring together my various papers, scattered 'in many periodicals, and it is the general idea which one requires to follow. Every one of the papers, at the time of publication, contained something new. These little. new points are of some importance taken together, even to those who only borrow their work, for they may be used, fragments as they are, to design a beautiful mosaic. But to those who do all their work for themselves, these little points are found to be living seeds, which may be planted and bear fruit. The introduction of some of the articles under the title * « may be criticised. I acknowledge this. The first part of my Macbeth paper, for instance, has no bearing on Shake- speare, but on Macbeth. But the second part of the paper, on the contrary, discusses Shakespeare and his Industry, and his conception of Macbeth. I have included fragments from .the lost ' Book of Fortune,' and though the Metrical vi PREFACE vii Psalms were not likely to have appealed to his ear, he must have heard them, for attendance at the Parish Church was then compulsory. And they did profoundly affect his con- temporaries. I have sought the author of most of the poems in the preserved fragment of ' The New Court of Venus ' — because Shakespeare must have read these. So my last three articles dwell on my discovery that Sir Thomas Wyat was the chief author of ' The New Court of Venus.' Shakespeare is associated with Sir Thomas in his sonnets, he trained him- self upon his pioneer's models, and he gave a copy of ' Songs and Sonets ' to Slender, to help him to express the inexpressible (m.w.w.i. i.). The "Introduction to Queen Elizabeth " is only imaginary as regards the one situation. The facts and characters are, however, real. I trust that those of my readers who take the trouble to finish, may feel that they are a little more intimate with Shakespeare through considering some of his attributes, and dwelling leisurely over some of his labours, even though my papers are not associated with the higher textual criticism. Yet I have not rushed .into print to express in superlative adjectives my wonder and delight at a first reading of Shake- speare (as too many have dene). My studies, though always under difficulties, have been life-long. I called for Shake- speare before I was able to pronounce his name. There was an edition accessible, a four-volumed illustrated folio ; and through it, by pictures and afterwards by the text, I formed strong views about Prince Arthur and his wicked Uncle John ; I have worked in and around Shakespeare all my life since. If this prove my last effort in the field, I do it full of the desire to help to keep Shakespeare's flag flying during the Commemoration year., while so many of my fellow- students are torn away from their studies, to defend " This blessed spot, this earth, this realm, this England." In their name and my own I dedicate my work to Shakespeare. Chaelottb Carmichael Stopjss. 1st January, 1916 DEDICATION. TO SHAKESPEARE. O Fount of Poesy perennial, Thy Torrent of the rapturous Joy of Life, Thy Lake of Calm, reflecting nature's moods Thy broad deep river of experience, Ocean of Dreams reaching from shore to shore, Thou dost unite what lesser seas divide, Binding far nations in one common bond : All those that love thee, come to thee and draw, And gladly drink, with recognised content. Thou dost pervade us. The Metropolis Haunted by memories of thee, records Thy mighty makings, rendered by fit friends. The Mecca for our pilgrims is the home Where thy bright soul chose earth by Avon-side To nurse its growth to ripe humanity. Thy footsteps walk with ours through Stratford glades, Ariel, thine own immortal, guiding them That are akin to thee. Through perfume speech Our flowers can trace their pedigree to thine, Thy music echoes in the nightingales, Who, whispering to each other through the years, Date, by thy dates, their coming. All who live Within " this isle, set in the silver sea," Are somewhat moved by thy fine influence ; Thy pregnant words enrich our common speech, Thy thoughts help in the moulding of men's lives, Ev'n when they are unconscious. Seeking souls Reach to thy inner depths. They hear thee cry— " When in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes I all alone beweep my outcast state," — Then, acquiescent in the after peace, " There's a divinity that shapes our ends, Rough-hew them how we will." For thou hadst learned Rebuffs of Fortune, disappointed hopes Were tools for " shaping." Then the Shaper bade Thee walk the proud earth in despised weeds, Until thou gav'st them honour, bidding thee Drink deep the cup of discontent divine Till thou becam'st content to do the work, And shape Thy End, to show men to themselves ,' viii DEDICATION ix We have rejoiced upon thy natal day, Which, half a hundred busy years and two Three centuries ago, returned to mark Thy steps through thy rich life, then bore thee hence, To live for ever in the hearts of men. We would " remember thee," thou glorious ghost, Here, at our point of time, looking to thine. O, from some starry corner of the sky, What time " the young-eyed cherubins " take rest, In making music with the rhythmic spheres, Look down and see thy crowding lovers come Together for thy sake ; and bridge the space ; Hear our deep-throated quire of gratitude, For to thy rich inheritance, thy Will Makes all who love thee to be lawful heirs : May every wind blow to thee our accord, And in our hearts Love hath no Labours Lost. In remembrance of 23rd April, 1616. Shakespeare' s * * Industry.' ' ERRATA. P. 98, line 10, delete "in." P. 99, line 24, for " Dibdsin'" read " Dibdin's/' P. 137, line 12 from foot, for " Juutice" read "Justice." P. 170. line 3, for "Chapmant" read "Chapman"- line 12 /or"Malgree"™«d«Malgre." ' ' P. 199, lines 20 to 24, and p. 201 , last line, for " de " read " di " P. 202, line 2, for " Alhezen " read " Alhazen." P. 203, line 6 from foot, for " Albuatharb" read " Albubather." P. 220, line 14, for "to Earl Essex "read" to the Earl of Essex." Among the many attributes applied to Shakespeare in words and phrases by his contemporaries, none is so necessary to our full understanding of his nature as that of Webster's " industrious." Let us glance at some of the others, beginning with Greene's scorn of " the Upstart," " in his own conceit, the onlyShakescene inacountrie; " others call him " honest/' " sweet," " with facetious grace in writing," " Aetion," " the most victorious pen," " Adonis," " Will you read Catullus ? B Shakespeare' s ' ' Industry.' ' i. " T~XETRACTION is the sworn friend to ignorance; | j for mine owne part, I have ever truly cherished my good opinion of other men's worthy labours, especially of that full and heightened style of Maister Chapman, the labored and understanding workes of Maister Jonson, the no less worthy composures of the both worthily excellent Maister Beaumont and Maister Fletcher, and lastly (without wrong to be last named) the right, happy and copious industry of Maister Shakespeare, Maister Dekker, and Maister Heywood, wishing what I write may be read by their light, protesting that, in the strength of mine own judgement, I know them so worthy, that though I rest silent in my owne worke, yet to most of theirs I dare (without flattery) fix that of Martiall, " Non norunt, Hsec monumenta mori." — Preface to the "White Devil or Vittoria Corombona," by John Webster, 1610. Among the many attributes applied to Shakespeare in words and phrases by his contemporaries, none is so necessary to our full understanding of his nature as that of Webster's " industrious." Let us glance at some of the others, beginning with Greene's scorn of " the Upstart," " in his own conceit, the only Shakescene in a countrie ; " others call him " honest/' " sweet," "with facetious grace in writing," " Aetion," "the most victorious pen," " Adonis," " Will you read Catullus 1 B 2 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" Take Shakespeare," " sweet Mr. Shakespeare." Meres com- pares him to Homer, Hesiod, Virgil, Ovid, Horace, to Plautus and Seneca, " Shakespeare the most excellent ; " " Mellifluous and honey-tongued Shakespeare ; " " Shake- speare's fine-filed phrase ; " " The most passionate to bewail the perplexities of love," " Shakespeare's honey-flowing vein," " Honey-tongued Shakespeare," " His sweeter verse contains hart-robbing life," " Brave Shakespeare," " The silver-tongued Melicert." " He wanted Art, and sometimes sense," " Ingenious Shakespeare," " An elegant poet," " Friendly," " One of the most pregnant wits of our own time, whom succeeding ages may justly admire," " That made the dainty playes," " His song was worthy merit," " Our ever-living poet." " Hadst thou not played some kingly parts in sport, Thou hadst been a companion for a king." "With good parts, and all good," "Yet generous ye are in mind and mood." " Shakespeare, that nimble mercury thy brain Lulls many hundred Argus-eyes asleep." " Among our modern and present excellent poets which worthily flourish, William Shakespeare." " Judicio Pylium, Genio Socratem, Arte Maronem." " Shakespeare with whome Quick nature dide." " Sleep brave Tragedian, Shakespeare, sleep alone." " Be sure our Shakespeare, Thou canst never die, But crowned with laurel live eternally." " He was not for an age, but for all time." " Sweet swan of Avon." " Shine forth, thou star of poets." " Which made the globe of Heaven and Earth to ring." " Whom neither man nor muse can praise too much." " Soule of the age." " The applause, delight and wonder of our stage." " Though thou hadst small Latin and less Greek." " I loved the man," " He was indeed honest and of an open and free nature ; had an excellent phantasy, brave notions and gentle expressions ; wherein he flowed with that facility that sometimes it was necessary he should be stopped." SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" 3 " Great heir of fame," " Spenser and Shakespeare did in art excel." " Dear Son of Memory." 1 " Gentle Shakespeare." To all these attributes Webster here adds Industry, that is, the determined bending of a man's will to acquire those things he does not have. Genius is a rare gift of the Gods, and comes to few. Too often its developments are warped through vanity or self-indulgence, or starved through in- dolence. But when a genius hungers after further knowledge than comes by intuition, and after perfections, that are only given as the reward of labour, then indeed we see human powers at their highest. " Philosophy," says Novalis, " is properly home-sickness, the wish to be everywhere at home." Such a hunger, and such a home-sickness possessed Shake- speare. We could have inferred it from his work, but it is comforting to know it by external testimony. " For a good poet 's made, as well as born," said Ben Jonson, referring to Shakespeare himself. For thus was man's best combined with God's best, and we have received of his double inheritance. We know absolutely nothing of his degree of industry in Stratford. We can. base nothing on the oft-repeated lines, " Going like snail unwillingly to school " — " As You Like It," ii. 7. " As schoolboys to their books " — " Romeo and Juliet," ii. 1, a feeling which has been supposed to arise from an internal experience, but might as well have been something he had noted in other boys. Professor T. S. Baynes published in Fraser's Magazine, 1879, " What Shakespeare learnt at school." That should have been put as, what he might have learned at school. He might have had the chance of all, but he might not have attended, he might have been dreaming of his future. And immediately after his school days there does not seem to have been for him much chance of systematic intellectual industry in Stratford before or after his over-early marriage. Even if he devoured all the books in the place that he could " beg, 1 See J, J. Munro's '' Shakespeare Allusion Book." 4 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" buy, borrow, or steal " (and there were more than are generally supposed), the supply was limited. 1 But fate drove him to London, where books were abundant, and we are told by a friend there that he was ' industrious " ! The industry may have been stimulated or even started by a desire to earn money, whereby to save his family from the debts and difficulties that his father's family had known. 2 And that in itself was a good motive, inculcated by holy writ. It might have been further stimulated by the desire to meet his rivals on more nearly equal terms, because most of the playwrights of the day had been at a University, and he had not. Therefore London became to him one great University where every man, and book, and circumstance helped him as a teacher. The first " subjects " of his private course of studies were Plays, the play-books of his theatre and of other theatres ; the econd " subjects " were Histories, and the " feigned histories " of poems and novels, as foundations for plays ; his third " subject " was Literary Criticism, which we can infer from that censorious old Greene who charged him, as with a fault,, that he thought he could bumbast out a blank verse as well as the best of us. His chief national " Histories " were those of Holinshed, Grafton, Stow, Speed; his "feigned histories " were legion. He had one immediate chance when he came to London, and it is evident that the Providence that shaped his ends determined that. The only man we know that he knew there was Richard Field, the apprentice, son-in-law, and successor of Thomas Vautrollier, the great French printer. He was allowed to keep six foreign journeymen printers in his pay, mostly French, and in his shop Shakespeare had a chance of acquiring at least colloquial French, sufficient perhaps to translate for himself some of the still untranslated works in that language. The treasures that lay in Vautrollier and Field's back shop — one can hardly realise them. He must have read 1 See my "Shakespeare's Environment," p. 55. 2 Ibid. p. 37. SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" 5 them ; all his works bear traces of them. They had a mono- poly of publishing all the most highly estimated classic books which Shakespeare best knows, all the translations which specially guided him to new lines of work and thought. Only look at the list of their books I 1 The new Ovid 3 from which the motto of " Venus and Adonis " was taken, and which gave him the subject for his first poem ; George Puttenham's " Arte of English Poesie " which advised him to use blank verse in plays, and yet gave him a liberal education in other rhymes and rhythms ; Sir Thomas North's translation of " Plutarch's Lives " from the French of Amyot, on which he based all his Roman plays ; and many another source of thought beside, the best music books of the time ; books on Logic and Philo- sophy, including Aristotle, Peter Ramus, and Giordano Bruno, some of them in selections, as " The Elegant Latin Phrases of Manutius," " Tully's Orations " ; medical books, among them, " Timothy Blight's Treatise on Melancholy, containing the causes thereof, and reasons of the strange effects it worketh on our minds and bodies " ; Cogan's " Haven of Health " ; works on religion of all shades, on Astrology, on the teaching of Languages, " The Flourie Field of the foure Languages " ; treatises on the discoveries of Science ; of Geography, of Francis Drake's voyages; "The Book of Witches"; Thomas Campion's poems ; and John Harington's " Orlando Furioso." Also a whole library of little book's and pamphlets on con- temporary history, chiefly relating to France and Spain, about the French King, the King of Navarre, the Due d' Aumale, the Sieur Battagny, the Due de Lohgueville, Philip of Spain, 1 See my " Shakespeare's Warwickshire Contemporaries," p. 16. 2 It is interesting here to note a coincidence. The 'copy of Speght's " Chaucer " printed 1598, containing Gabriel Harvey's marginal notes (long supposed to have disappeared), concludes the well-known reference to Shakespeare's " Venus and Adonis " ; but his " Lucrece " and his " Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," have it in them to please the wiser sort. Or such poets or better, or none. Vilia miretur vulgus: mihi flavus Apollo Pocula castalio plena minastrat aqua;, quoth Sir Edward Dier between jest and earnest, whose written devises farr excell most of the sonets and cantos in print." Now this was the motto chosen by Shakespeare for his first poem, 1593. 4 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" buy, borrow, or steal " (and there were more than are generally supposed), the supply was limited. 1 But fate drove him to London, where books were abundant, and we are told by a friend there that he was ' : industrious " ! The industry may have been stimulated or even started by a desire to earn money, whereby to save his family from the debts and difficulties that his father's family had known. 2 And that in itself was a good motive, inculcated by holy writ. It might have been further stimulated by the desire to meet his rivals on more nearly equal terms, because most of the playwrights of the day had been at a University, and he had not. Therefore London became to him one great University where every man, and book, and circumstance helped him as a teacher. The first " subjects " of his private course of studies were Plays, the play-books of his theatre and of other theatres ; the econd " subjects " were Histories, and the " feigned histories " of poems and novels, as foundations for plays ; his third " subject " was Literary Criticism, which we can infer from that censorious old Greene who charged him, as with a fault,, that he thought he could bumbast out a blank verse as well as the best of us. His chief national " Histories " were those of Holinshed, Grafton, Stow, Speed; his "feigned histories " were legion. He had one immediate chance when he came to London, and it is evident that the Providence that shaped his ends determined that. The only man we know that he knew there was Richard Field, the apprentice, son-in-law, and successor of Thomas Vautrollier, the great French printer. He was allowed to keep six foreign journeymen printers in his pay, mostly French, and in his shop Shakespeare had a chance of acquiring at least colloquial French, sufficient perhaps to translate for himself some of the still untranslated works in that language. The treasures that lay in Vautrollier and Field's back shop — one can hardly realise them. He must have read 1 See my " Shakespeare's Environment," p. 55. 2 Ibid. p. 37. SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" 5 them ; all his works bear traces of them. They had a mono- poly of publishing all the most highly estimated classic books which Shakespeare best knows, all the translations which specially guided him to new lines of work and thought. Only look at the list of their books I 1 The new Ovid 2 from which the motto of " Venus and Adonis " was taken, and which gave him the subject for his first poem ; George Puttenham's " Arte of English Poesie " which advised him to use blank verse in plays, and yet gave him a liberal education in other rhymes and rhythms ; Sir Thomas North's translation of " Plutarch's Lives " from the French of Amyot, on which he based all his Roman plays ; and many another source of thought beside, the best music books of the time ; books on Logic and Philo- sophy, including Aristotle, Peter Ramus, and Giordano Bruno, some of them in selections, as " The Elegant Latin Phrases of Manutius," " Tully's Orations " ; medical books, among them, " Timothy Bright's Treatise on Melancholy, containing the causes thereof, and reasons of the strange effects it worketh on our minds and bodies " ; Cogan's " Haven of Health " ; works on religion of all shades, on Astrology, on the teaching of Languages, " The Flourie Field of the foure Languages " ; treatises on the discoveries of Science ; of Geography, of Francis Drake's voyages; "The Book of Witches"; Thomas Campion's poems ; and John Harington's " Orlando Furioso." Also a whole library of little book's and pamphlets on con- temporary history, chiefly relating to France and Spain, about the French King, the King of Navarre, the Due d'Aumale, the Sieur Battagny, the Due de Lohgueville, Philip of Spain, 1 See my " Shakespeare's Warwickshire Contemporaries," p. 16. 2 It is interesting here to note a coincidence. The 'copy of Speght's "Chaucer" printed 1598, containing Gabriel Harvey's marginal notes (long supposed to have disappeared), concludes the well-known reference to Shakespeare's "Venus and Adonis" ; but his "Lucrece " and his "Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," have it in them to please the wiser sort. Or such poets or better, or none. Vilia miretur vulgus : mihi flavus Apollo Pocula castalio plena minastrat aquae, quoth Sir Edward Dier between jest and earnest, whose written devises farr excel! most of the Sonets and cantos in print." Now this was the motto chosen by Shakespeare for his first poem, 1593. 6 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" Admiral Coligny, and even " Giucciardini's History, con- taining the wars of Italy and the history of the Low Countries, in Master Geoffrey Fenton's translation." It can be found that he was able to have gained by far the largest proportion of his learning from that one shop alone, and when he met his " Sweet boy," the learned and cultured young Earl of Southampton, is it not more than possible he was made free of his notable library too? For thou art all my art, and dost advance As far as learning my rude ignorance. Field published also two books which testified to Shake- speare's " Industry," his " Venus and Adonis," and his " Rape of Lucrece." I do not agree with Professor Churton Collins as to his full and critical knowledge qf Greek and Latin lore. Too many collections were abroad, too many quotations introduced into every day literature, too many translations made, published and unpublished, to permit us to assert that because Shakespeare knew a phrase from a rare author, he had mastered the whole of the productions of that author. His magnetic mind attracted new and striking particles to itself, unconsciously, and he interwove them with his own. The " Republic of Letters " had socialistic characteristics then ; figures and forms were common property, only completed entities could be challenged as individual property, Heywood challenged Jaggard for his poetic Epistles " Paris to Helen," and " Helen to Paris," annexed by that voracious publisher in 1599 for the " Passionate Pilgrim," the volume for which some of Shakespeare's own poems were stolen to be pub- lished under his increasingly valuable name. Heywood in his " Apology for Actors," 1612, clears Shakespeare from any complicity in the theft, as he says, " But as I acknow- ledge my lines not worthy his patronage under whom he hath published them, so the author I know much offended with Mr. Jaggard, that altogether unknown to him presumed to make so bold with his name." One so absorbed in acquiring would be kept out of mis- chief even in London, thus his industry would be able to SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY- 7 confer a moral dignity upon his character. A curious suggestion that he noted this coincidence may be gleaned from his first poem. Adonis was so absorbed with the charms of the chase, he had no ears for the pleadings of Venus, no susceptibility to her temptations, overpowering to the indolent, and luxury- prepared. It is not impossible that he might have even attended some of the Gresham Lectures, and thus really have been a member of that nucleus of the earlier London University. 1 " The lecturers began their readings in the month of June, 1597 ; whose names were Master Anthonie Wotton for Divinity, Master Doctor Mathew Gwyn for Phisicke ; Doctor Henrie Mountlow for the Civill Law ; Doctor John Bull for Musicke ; Master Beerwood for Astronomie ; Master Henrie Bridges for Geometrie, and Master Caleb Willis for Rethorick. These lectures are read dayly." Some of these names touch the poet's biography later. Shakespeare's memory must have been as marvellous as his industry and as his sympathetic insight. He exposed, as it were, a Tabula Rasa to Nature. He understood the loves of the flowers, and the energies of the trees, and he introduced them always in due season ; he knew the ways of the beasts of the forest, and of the birds of the day and night ; the Sweet Influence of Pleiades fell on him, and moved him in his work. Music inspired his fancy, he felt it as he felt all Nature's thought transference from every sphere of her dominion to his own listening soul, but he borrowed and he had moulded from Pythagoras the thought, There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st But in his motion like an angel sings, Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins ; Such harmony is in immortal souls ; But, while this muddy vesture of decay Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it. ' Merchant of Venice,' V. i. Above all things Shakespeare understood human beings. He was the first dramatist to understand " What a piece of 1 See Stow, ed. 1618, p. 123, "Of Schools and Houses of Learning." 8 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" work is man," and he was the first who understood woman. If any one doubts this, let him read the women's characters in other men's plays, and then come back to Shakespeare to understand the human beings that he creates. But he did not do this only by experience. He studied. Read the books that Vautrollier and Field printed, and you will be able to trace the thoughts he selected to dwell on. Read the books by other printers, and you will soon know which of them Shakespeare had read. Well for him that dramatic literature does not lend itself to footnotes of references, or the text of his work would be fringed with details. " He came, he saw, he conquered," in the fields of Literature, as in the hearts of men. Hazlitt and Collier have collected some of the novels which Shakespeare must have known, in six volumes called " Shakespeare's Library," and many others have noted other books that he must have read. But I hardly think that the general public realise how very many of the current un- classified books of the period have left their traces on Shake- speare's thought, from Thomas Wilson's Art of Rhetoric to " resolute John Florio's " literary efforts. It would be impossible even to name them here, but perhaps I may be allowed to dwell a little, for various reasons, on some of the works of the last mentioned author. John Florio was the son of a Florentine, driven for religion's sake to England, where he supported himself by teaching Italian to the English and by preaching to the Italian colony on Sundays. John composed a book of Dialogues, in which he incorporated many of the best known Italian proverbs. He called this his " First Frutes," and dedicated it to the Earl of Leicester, 1578. Bound up with this is the Induction to the Italian and Latin tongues. In 1580, he published a translation of Ramuzio's travels, ded. to Edmund Bray, and in 1591, the " Giardino di Recreatione," containing over 6150 Italian proverbs, ded. to Nicholas Sanders and also, apparently another edition ded. to Sir Edward Dyer. His more important book, "The Second Frutes," came out in the same year, to which was annexed SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" 9 his " Giardino di Recreatione," dedicated to Nicholas Sanders. This is a much more interesting volume than his "First Frutes " and there are many valuable suggestions associated with it. In his dedicatory address he speaks of his two books. " My elder I have married for preferment and honour. But this younger hath voluntarily made her choyce (plainly telling me that she will not lead apes in hell), and matched with such a one as she best Jiketh," &c. A poem prefixed, by Phaeton to his friend Florio, has been conjectured to have beeu written by Shakespeare. Without any satisfactory testimony to the truth of this assumption, I can only say that it is possible. The date would suit well enough the beginning of Shake- speare's Sonnet Season. " Phaeton to his friend Florio." " Sweete friend, whose name agrees with thy increase How fit a riuall art thou of the Spring? For when each branche hath left his flourishing And green-lockt Sommer's shadie pleasure's cease ; She makes the Winters stormes repose in peace And spends her franchise on each living thing, The dazies sprout, the litle birds doo sing, Hearbes gummes and plantes doo vaunt of their release. So when that all our English witts lay dead (Except the laurell that is euer greene) Thou with thy Frutes our barrenesse o'erspread And set thy flowrie pleasuance to be seene. Sutch frutes, sutch flowrrets of moralitie Were nere before brought out of Italy. — Phceton. " A World of Wordes," 1598, a Dictionarie dedicated to the Right Honorable Patrons of Vertue, Patterns of Honor, Roger Earl of Rutland, Henrie Earl of Southampton, and Lucie Countess of Bedford, has exceedingly interesting remarks addressed to each, verses being prefixed by II Candido, supposed to be Matthew Gwynne. This volume was re-issued in 1611, with a portrait, and dedicated to Queen Anne, who had made Florio a gentleman of her Privy Chamber, her Italian Secretary, and her teacher of Italian. He published a translation of Montaigne's Essays in 1603. A copy of this 10 SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" in the British Museum bears the name of Shakespeare, but it is uncertain who put it there. There is no difficulty in believing that Shakespeare knew Florio personally, as they were both proteges of the Earl of Southampton. Some have suggested that the poet took off Florio in ' Holof ernes,' but I cannot see the satire fitting him. It is clear, however, that Shakespeare had read Florio's works, and profited by them. One interesting point is that Bacon must have also read them, and taken notes of them in his ' Promus ' or Note-book. The Baconians sometimes triumphantly assert that Bacon had been preparing these notes to write " Shakespeare," not realising that they both had borrowed from the pages of Florio. The Dialogues and Proverbs in the ' First Frutes ' contain many commonplace sayings as " I see sometimes that man doth purpose but God doth dispose." " It is always good for one to have two strings to his bow." "It is good to strike the iron when it is hote." " He robbeth Peter to pay Paul." " The burned child dreadeth the fire." " He putteth the cart before the horse." It is from Florio that Holof ernes gets " Venetia, Venetia, Chi non ti vede, non ti pretio." " One nayle is driven out by another." " Death is nought else but an eternal sleope, a dissolution of the body, an un- certayne pilgrimage." He talks about Fortune, gives several chapters of philosophical disquisitions, and one in praise of Henry VIII. and his daughter Elizabeth. There are some conversations which may interest us, 1 though they would 1 " Shall we go to a playe at the Bull, or else to some other place ? Duo Comedies like you wel 1 " " Yea, Sir, on holydayes." "They please me also wel. but the preachers will not allow them." "Wherefore? Knowe ye it?'' "They say they are not good," "And wherefore are they used?" " Because every man delites in them." " We will go into the Fields." " Let us go to the Theatre to see a Comedie." " What pastimes use they (in England} on holidayes?" "Of all sortes of pastyme ; as Comedies, Tragedies, leapmg, daunsyng, playes of defence, Baiting of Bears, &c." p. 12. " O, Gentlewoman, whither go you ? " " I go to the Schoole," " Where and with whom 1 " " With a Frenchman." " And what do you learne ? " "I learne to read, to write, sow, play upon the Virginalls " " What pay you by the weeke 1 " " I pay a shilling a week." "Methinks that is too much." " So methink too." He also praises Queen Elizabeth's eloquence in Italian, and speaks of the gorgeousness of the citizen's houses and the magnificeut clothes of the citizen's wives. SHAKESPEARE'S "INDUSTRY" 11 have taught Shakespeare nothing. Among them is one early reference to the Theatre in 1578. The 'Second Frutes' 1591, also contains things worth noting. 1 Its form is also conversational, and proverbs are interspersed, p. 11. " Soft fier makes Sweet malt." p. 29. " Put not thy confidence in any woman, For like the moon she changeth to undoo men." Again, " He that drinks wine, drinks blood, and he that drinks water drinks steam ... .1 love to drink wine in the Dutch fashion.. . .in the morning pure, at dinner without water, and at night, as it comes from the vessell." " Who loves content hath all the world at will." " Haste makes waste, and waste the worse speed." " Be Romane if in Rome you bide." p. 99. " And he that will not when he may, When he would he shall have nay." p. 105. " The fairest and the sweetest rose In time must fade, and beauty lose." " One swallow does not make a summer, nor one devil hell." " Thy wits are gone a wooll gathering." " Opportunitye makes a man committ larceny." " Open chests do cause to sin The holliest man that looketh in." " Cat after kind will either hunt or scratch." " Even of prickles roses do proceede, And whitest lilies from a stinking weede." There were many such wildernesses in existence for Shake- speare in which to let his industry run loose, that he might go a gleaning for phrases that would tell in later work. l"The plaies that they plaie in England are not right comedies. "Yet they do DOthing else but plaie every daye." "Yea I but they are neither right comedies nor right tragedies." " How would you name them then ? " "flepreaentatious of histories without any decorum." 12 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT II. SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT OP HIS ORIGINALS. IF we may learn something of the industry of Shake- speare by noting the traces of his reading in his works, we may learn still more of his character, when we study his methods of utilizing his reading. He was not a pioneer in dramatic art, he was not always even the first to manipulate the materials that he used. He often borrowed plots, some- times characters, and even language. In the difference between what he had received and what he gives, we can learn something of the thoughts and feelings and art of Shake- speare. " There is nothing new under the sun," said the preacher. But there are new combinations and new transmuta- tions. To him had been revealed the two great secrets that the philosophers of the day vainly sought, the secret of the Philosopher's Stone, which would turn the baser metals into pure gold ; and the secret of the Elixir of Life, which could secure to his work the gifts of immortal life and eternal youth. " Spirits are not finely touched, but to fine issues." His spiritual insight showed him how to vivify the processes by which he presented his thought to the world and to make even dry bones five. If it is true that he was a student before he was a writer, it is also true that he was an actor before he was a dramatist. Tradition has it that he was a " servitor," that is an apprentice, and probably what we would call an understudy at first. Dissatisfied with, or tired of some of his Company's plays, he altered them, to the satisfaction of the owners, and of their audiences, until he altered them so much as to remake them altogether, and they grew popular as his own work. All this we can read between the fines in the bitter tirade by which Robert Greene introduces him to us in 1592. He warns his fellow dramatists not to trust to the OP HIS ORIGINALS 13 " Puppits that speak from our mouths, those antics garnished in our colours," "/or there is an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Niger's Heart wrapt in a Player's Hide, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you, and being an absolute Johannes Factotum, is in his own conceit the only Shakescene in a countrie. O, that I might intreate your rare wits to be employed in more profitable courses, and let these Apes imitate your past excellence, and never more acquaint them with your admired inventions Whilst you may, seeke you better maisters, for it is pittie such rare wits should be subject to the pleasures of such rude groomes painted monsters " (Greene's * Groatsworth of Wit ' 1592). It may be presumed that the early plays which he recast (most of them have now vanished) were treated in a manner somewhat similar to that by which he afterwards utilised the originals which he used in his own work. When he faced the question of writing a play, he con- sciously or unconsciously, set himself at least four special laws or limitations, under which he must work, considering its probable effect, 1st, on the Censor, and on the Public, 2nd, Its suitability to the acting powers of his own company 3rd, Its satisfaction of his own critical taste, and 4th, Its truth to its originals, this the last and least important to him. To these at times might be added, " a second intention " such as Spenser elaborates in the explanation of the allegories in his " Faerie Queene," where he had both a general and par- ticular meaning. For we have Shakespeare's own authority that he had at times " gored his own thoughts, made old offences of affections new " in his dramatic works. The very clue to much of this is now lost, but sufficient remains to make us remember the possibilities of other suggestions. These five determinants influenced him in different proportions at different times of his life, as by his work and experience he gradually 1 See "0 Tyger's heart wrapt in a woman's hide," 3rd part, Hen. VI., I, 4, and compare Wyat's " Tiger's hert who hath thus cloked the That art so cruel, covered with bewtie," 14 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT educated not only himself, but his public. By degrees he came to consider bis public less, and himself more. He taught them what they ought to want. He could risk it. He laboured against what may be called the " sensationalism " of the pre -Shakespearean Stage, by throwing an interest into character, apart from, as well as through the plot. The blood and horrors which were supposed necessary to give force to a tragedy, were generally connected with feeble characterisa- tion. Character was drowned in a great flood of action. He only once followed the people's tastes, in ' Titus Andronicus,' (if indeed he wrote it) and after that he made the prevailing taste follow him. The special Censorship of plays had only been instituted in 1589, and was to our poet a staying and protective power, while the people, like those of Athens, were ever seeking after some new thing. Novelty, in their eyes, covered a multitude of sins, but it roused the suspicious attentions of the Censor. He had to study the powers of his expressers. We can glean something of the changes in and comparative strength of his company from various external sources. We know that as Richard Burbage grew, his wonderful histrionic powers developed ; his special genius for Tragedy became more pro- nounced, 1 and to that, I think, rather than to the " dark period " in the Dramatist's life, may we attribute a tragic period in his plays. We know when Will Kemp the broad humorist, left the Company, we know when Will Osteler, the chief actor of women's parts, died, and other changes are reflected in his plots. When we imagine Shakespeare in his study, with his plastic material in his hand, he is more than Vulcan in his smithy. He does not only weld, he creates. " None merits the name of Creator," cries Tasso " save God and the poet." For the poet also can take of the dust of the ground, and breathe into it the breath of life. He was creating characters of men and women. It was necessary for him to change his stories by condensation, because only the doubly distilled X See my " Burbage, and Shakespeare's Stage," OF HIS ORIGINALS 15 interest of a novel can be given in a play. There we can only see the supreme crises of men's lives. Sometimes the compelling force of a character dragged him out of the ruts of his story, and he had to finish it off the lines, and try again, in some other situation, how he might alter it. We can, to a certain extent, trace the course of his development through changes in his thought, method, rhythm, rhyme, language, but we must not be too certain of our conjectures concerning him, for his thoughts are not our thoughts nor his ways our ways. I am aware that some writers of the day claim as a discovery that Shakespeare never gives us women's characters so great or interesting or complex as those of his men, because he was preparing parts which would not be played by women, but by boy actors. The discovery, if discovery it be, is at least as old as Queen Anne, a commonplace of thought to every student of Shakespeare. None of us forget that boys acted the parts of women, and that this had an effect on the scheme and work- ing out of his Drama. Probably that is the reason why there are so few mothers, grandmothers, aunts, or other superfluous women in Shakespeare's plays. We can see that Shakespeare creates a specially good set of women suitable for the Stage, none such came before them, and none even approaching such came after him, at least until very long after his date. Of the principal parts, it took the prophetic insight of a Ruskin to discover that " there are no heroes in Shakespeare's plays, only heroines," and that in spite of their being presented by boys. Another limitation affected Shakespeare as an author. He was painting nature as he saw it. It was the custom of his time to reckon women's highest duty and beauty that of obedience to some other will, to a father's in her earlier years and to a husband's in her riper life. How is it possible to see or under- stand a true human being, whose thoughts and words and actions are dominated by the will of another human being ? Shakespeare saw some of it. Within these limitations, how well he understood women, and how well he expressed them, free of these limitations ! Except when history or the ex- 16 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT igencies of a plot compels otherwise, he makes them dutiful to their fathers, faithful to their husbands, loyal to other women, courageous beyond the courage of men, when need be ; free and independent in action, when their souls recognise a higher law than mere man-made law. We see this most clearly in those women that the poet did not find in his originals, but created in order to fulfil a role that men feared to under- take. Though he paints the weak submissive women because such there were, his own ideal characters in women are always fearless, independent, and self -determining. One is driven to study his originals in order to learn what is truly his own views. The proportion of his changes is very different in different plays. Sometimes he only polishes and strengthens, as in " Romeo and Juliet," some- times he recasts, as in ' Hamlet.' It is sometimes the circum- stances, more often the characters, that he alters according to the degree in which they satisfy his critical demands. " Nothing of (them) that doth fade But doth suffer a (soul- )change Into something rich and strange." — Tempest i., 2. And to all his changes in construction he adds the change of style. Rough and uncouth, heavy and lifeless, some originals might have been, but when he has touched them, his readings move us, " Like perfect music set to noble words." Not that he always eschewed the very phrases used in his originals, but he interweaves them with his own, till they be- come his own. There seems to have been a Republic of Letters in his time, everybody was ready to borrow from everybody else, and such " unconsidered trifles " as words and phrases were apt to be treated as common property. In his Comedies Shakespeare generally contents himself with the ordinary poetic providence, of protecting the good, and punishing the evil. In his tragedies the chief characters are generally made to do some deed, great or little, which directly leads to their own destruction. But among the secondary characters the innocent often suffer helplessly with and because of the guilty leading characters. In his OF HIS OEIGINALS 17 wonderful tragedy of ' King Lear,' we watch the evolution of all his sorrows from his own act of folly ; other stories show this with a Cordelia to conquer evil and set him right again. But here the poet, with his fine sense of the needs of high tragedy, and the causes that determine results, foreshortens her life, neglecting the three years Lear had to reign, and the eight years of Cordelia, so as to bring her lifeless body to her father's arms — slain in doing the duty of a daughter to him, slain, not for her own sins, but because he, in his passionate pettiness had neglected to do the duty of a father to her. He might, had he so chosen, like the old play based on the history, have made the climax come in her prosperous years. That sense of Nemesis in the affairs of Kings and of nations is always present, when he deals with his English Histories, a stalking Nemesis, cold, stern, implacable, dominates the series, like the veiled Fate of the Greek Tragedies. The first History with which he was associated was that of Henry VI. From it he worked backwards into causes, and he sketches for the people the dealings of Fate in the chronicles of the reigns which followed the death of Edward the Black Prince. Even in the story of his favourite King- warrior Henry V. he does not forget to note the philosophy of things. At the triumphant conclusion of his heroic wars in France he shews him commit the incredible folly, for the sake of extending his dominion in foreign lands, of marrying the daughter of a lunatic. Hence comes the weak-minded Henry VI., a puppet for his nobles to fight about, and then to destroy. Meanwhile he paints a gallery of brave warriors that bear high the banner of England. What passionate and powerful fife he puts into the stories of departed heroes ! And the effect they had upon the people is told us in the pages of contemporary writers, as Nash in " Pierce Pennilesse," speaking of their glory, says : " How would it have joyed brave Talbot to thinke that after he had lyen two hundred yeares in his tombe, hee should triumphe againe on the stage, and have his bones newe embalmed with the teares of 10,000 spectators at least (at several times) who, in the tragedian that represents c 18 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT his person, imagine they see him fresh-bleeding." And he definitely tries meanwhile to keep alive the spirit of patriot- ism. Shakespeare reads his histories faithfully, and, to a very different degree than he does in his novels, keeps to their facts. But he does not bind himself as historians proper do, to such trifles as date, or place, or even sometimes of circum- stances. He makes heroes arise from their cradles to fight the battles of their country, sometimes even from their graves, he foreshortens the events in time, so as to make telling pic- tures and a powerful scene ; he sometimes colours facts to suit a purpose. This may be noted in the play of Richard III, who certainly was not quite so old, nor so deformed, nor so black, as he has painted him. Into his histories he sometimes throws his inimitable original underplots, chief among which is always remembered that of the merry rogue in Henry IV., invention of his own brain, who was able to spirit away two sober historical cha- racters, first Sir John Oldcastle, and afterwards Sir John Fal- staff, into scenes of mirth and mischief so unbecoming their estate. The creation had life enough given it to be carried out of the real to the imaginary history of ' The Merry Wives of Windsor,' where Shakespeare combines a whole gallery of fresh interacting characters with the sordid love story of the genial old reprobate. If he had any originals for his plot, he washes away from them all the foul tales of loose-living women, and with the cleansing brush of a true artist records his belief that " Wives can be merry and yet honest too." In his Roman Plays, he is bound to follow his text more closely, ' Plutarch's lives ' (printed by Vautrollier and Field). His central point of interest is Julius Csesar. But even there he shows some study and changes, and a strange selection of the incident at which he begins. Suetonius tells the story of Csesar leaping into the sea. Plutarch does not give the incident of Anthony's oration. M. Guizot pointed out that Shakespeare found this in the text of Appian of OF HIS ORIGINALS 19 Alexandria, of which Newbury published a translation in 1578. He must have read and compared that authority, and to it he owed much of the life and go of his play. Space makes it impossible that I should analyse, or even note all Shakespeare's plays, even if I were able in any wise to do so. But I should like to make a few points in regard to some of them. Shakespeare evidently best enjoyed dealing with real light comedy, that was his holiday-work. Perhaps the story which he borrows with least change for that purpose is that of Lodge's ' Rosalynd, or Euphues Golden Legacie.' Still he adds even to it his creation of Jaques, to moralise, Hamlet-like, over the words and actions of mere men ; he introduces Touchstone and Audrey, for no very clear purpose, except to echo Armado and Jacquenetta, or to serve as an earthly balance among Bub- limatcd affections. He cuts down the literary effusions of William to reduce him to his due proportion in the secondary plot, and he converts, instead of killing, the usurping Duke, as he had done to the usurping brother. This was possibly because he could not have anything approaching tragedy in his lightsome play, but it seems to me that he also felt a little bit of sympathy with the tender-hearted Aliena. How could she join in the general chorus of happiness, if her heart was sore with the news of her father's cruel death ? He knew that her broad cloak of charity was able to cover a multitude of sins, and that she would be able to heal and help both of the villains, (after they were converted). There was no risk of her remind- ing them of former sins, should they ever worry her with future queer ways. He could not have risked the situation with a Rosalind. In the popular Drama of ' The Merchant of Venice ' woven from at least three stories, separate and seemingly incongruous, we have the double plot, one entirely joyful, the other approaching very near to tragedy. He gives the choice of the caskets to a man rather than to a woman, as more congruous, and he makes the right man choose. But he feels, as most of us feel, that Bassanio is not good enough 20 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT for Portia, and he had to give him a little vicarious suffering, on account of his past extravagant ways, to deepen his nature, and teach him the meaning of sorrow, through the apparently unavoidable murder of his dearest friend before his eyes. The charming Portia has held the stage in triumph ever since she was created. She is made a little too conventional in her entire submission to the will of her deceased father, and to the power of her selected husband. (I think that Bassanio should be played as a little older than he is generally made, to account for this.) Shakespeare however puts her in the right at the very beginning of her married life, by letting her send off her husband to his paramount duty, and by making her outwit him, (as well as the Jew), save his friend's life, and spare the money he was flinging about. He shows, by the way, that all her meekness and submission was entirely conditional, as in the merry encounter of the rings, (a remembrance of the little ways of Beatrice). On the deeper side of the other plot, he paints a wonderful psychological character of his Jew. He tries to teach his contemporaries the effect of keep- ing Jews out of all power and interest in the state. It narrowed the field of their activities to the mere making of money. Through money skilfully used they acquired the only form of power to which they could attain, and, therefore, they learned to place on it an undue value. He also shewed that scorn, hate, insults perpetual, could not but embitter their souls and foster a desire of revenge. When, to all these general irritants, to Shylock was added the peculiar loss of his treasure and the destruction of all that his heart knew of human affections, a tragic cataclysm carried away his soul when he was outwitted and stripped bare. Shylock could only stagger home to die in the darkness of his deserted house, and Shakespeare pitied him. Had his daughter been a Cordelia of healing and support, how different a life had Shylock's been. The dramatist could have had no suggestive thought of the Jew, Dr. Lopez, supposed to have planned the murder of the Queen in 1594, when he drafted the psychologic characteristics of his Jew of Venice, to weave into this wonderful drama of OF HIS ORIGINALS V. Friendship, Love, Hate, Revenge, Avarice, Liberality, Humour, and Bad Law. At the beginning of his career, the time came when Shake- speare wanted to write a play of his very own, for he had some- thing to say that he had not found treated by others. He was familiar with human nature in a little town, in the sur- rounding villages, and in the lonely farmhouses in the country- side. He had been at the Cotswold Games, he had seen many plays. But it was a new experience to be among the heroes, the wits, the rogues, and the fools of London. In the gossip centre of St. Paul's aisles, at the ordinaries where lawyer's clerks met to dine, and the taverns where scholars and poets went to sup, and boasted and quarrelled like ordinary men, in extraordinary language ; in the noble houses where he with his company went to act plays, and to hear afar off the sharp aristocratic encounters which passed for wit ; or in the rich houses of the burghers, who gave dinners to those above their rank, to gain glory and polish, and to those beneath them to secure flattery ; he learned how differently they all looked at life, and smiled at the way they used and abused their mother tongue. It was not all admiration which was induced in him by metro- politan ways, and by the gibing criticism of some of the gay Lordings who sat at times in the Lord's boxes at the Theatre, to scorn the players and to laugh at their plays. He wanted to show them to themselves, and he drifted somehow into the construction of ' Love's Labour's Lost.' It was not bitter. He was saved from that by the friendship of one of themselves, with a heart of pure gold, but even he could laugh at their hfe, with its vanities and superficialities, its thin thought and strong euphuism. He had no plot. Hunter proved from the French Chronicles of Monstrelet, Ch. 17 that there was one very thin thread of history in it. At one time the King of France did have to pay money to the King of Navarre, when they made an exchange of territory. He knew for himself that the French Princess Margaret of Valois had gone to Navarre to become its Queen ; he had read Sir Philip Sidney's ' Arcadia,' and the ' Lady of the May ' ; Lily's 22 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT ' Euphues,' and ' Rabelais,' (where he found the name Holo- frnes). The talk of Academies was in the air (see Dr. Furni- vall's ' Queen Elizabeth's Achademy,' E.E.T.), 1 and through his friend Southampton had come adumbrations of the Areopagus, the Literary Society formed by Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Edward Dyer, Sir Fulke Greville, and Gabriel Harvey, to criticise the literature of the day. He transported an English " Academy " to Navarre, but he had no fear of using the names of living Frenchmen of note, as the King of Navarre, Longueville, Biron, and others, whose deeds were printed in Richard Field's shop. They slipped easily on his audacious tongue, when he composed in prose, rhyme, and doggerel, a light fantastic series of scenes, rather than a drama, its dialogues sparkling with verbal wit, breathing of youth, sunshine and satire. It was something new on the stage, and its under- lying theme, if there were any, was the relation between the sexes, later, in a similar manner, but approached from the other side, treated by Tennyson in his Princess. ' Love's Labour's Lost ' was full of contemporary allusion. Ambassadors had been sent from Russia to the English Court, bearing indeed a suggestion of marriage from the Emperor, which may be aimed at by the ladies turning their backs on their Masque of Russians, or perhaps he thought of the Masque of Russians in Gray's Inn Festivities, 1594tt5. We must not think that we hold in the hollow of our hand Shakespeare's first play, when we read it in the quarto of 1598 " As it was presented before her Highness the Last Christmas. Newly corrected and aug- mented." We can see traces both of the corrections and augmentations, and believe that they were improvements. Major Martin Hume, in an interesting lecture before the Royal Society of Literature (Proceedings 1909), on " Spanish In- fluences on English Literature," shows that the Armado of that date must represent Antonio Perez. He had been private Secretary to Philip II. of Spain, offended his Master, fled to England in 1593, where he was welcomed at Essex II know that Dr. Smedley has found the story of a French Academy, to which he thinks that Bacon had access. OP HIS ORIGINALS 23 House for what he knew. " He was overdressed, extravagant and inflated in his speech, making even ' Euphues ' simple in comparison with his affected pedantry, and his posturings and gestures were ridiculous in the extreme." He had a wonderful fascination withal, the great ones of the earth vied with each other to try to attach him to themselves, though they could join in the laugh against him as soon as his back was turned. He deceived and sold everybody associated with him. In 1597 he had to return to France and Henry of Navarre, when he became despised as well as laughed at. " This Armado is a Spaniard that keeps here in court, a phantasm a Monarcho, and one that makes sport, to the Prince and his book-mates (iv. 1)." So Major Hume says that he could not have been fitted into this play before 1597. The role in the early play must have been filled by the English " Braggart," or the Italian Monarcho, " who wore crowns in his shoes," and made mirth in the English Court (see my paper, ' Elizabeth's Fools and Dwarfs ' (Athenceum, August 30th, 1913). Holofernes calls Armado " too peregrinate," and " the Peregrino " (or pilgrim) was the favourite pseudonym of Antonio Perez. Several people have been suggested as the original of Holofernes. I think that there is some reason to believe that he was invented, as a skit on the rival poet Chapman, who had worried Shakespeare in his sonnet period. The magisterial ways, the pompous pedantry, the heavy humour, pointed by Armado's query, " Do you not educate youth at the Charge-house 1 on the top of the mountain ? " " I do," v. 1. When Nathaniel consoles him for the flippant scorn, " Sir, I praise the Lord for you, and so do my parish- ioners ; for their sons are well tutored by you, and their daughters profit very greatly under you," iv. 2. Holofernes writes verses too, " a gift that I have, simple, simple, a foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms, figures, shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, resolutions. I am thankful for it." Shakespeare brings fun from him even out of his use of Lily's 1 Private School. 24 SHAKESPEARE'S TREATMENT Grammar, which every school-boy was bound to know, and learned language out of the class-books used in the different forms. (It was the clown, however, who had got hold of and stuck to the longest word.) 1 Holofernes also played Judas Maccabeus in the Masque of the Nine Worthies, and was most mercilessly gibed and baited in the act, winning the sym- pathetic pity of the Princess. The group of young people are early sketches of types which he loved well enough to use again, deepened and strengthened in his later style. He did not succeed in plot-making so well as he expected, he attended to the unities, but he did not manage the gradual entangle- ment and disentanglement of the action. The end is no denouement, but a cessation of speeches. The youth who took his lady love to see the play, found that it was " Love's Labour's Lost ; to him, and believed that the characters did not feel what they talked about. 2 It was only words, words, words, to him. " Yet all was f, lined, it was not from the hart." Euphuism had done its work. And ' Love's Labours Lost ' helped to laugh it out of court, as Cervantes laughed away the artificial vagaries of decadent chivalry by the humours of his Don Quixote. The play was amended again, for when Sir Walter Cope was helping Lord Cranborne to arrange performances suitable to play before the new Queen in 1605, Burbage told him that he had " no new play, but that they had revived an old one, called ' Love's Labours Lost," which " for wytt and mirthe he sayes will please her exceed- ingly. And thys ys apointed to be played to-morow night at my Lord of Southampton's." (See my " Burbage, and Shakespeare's Stage," p. 102.) The point of the satire would have died out of it by then. There was a moral in it, however, the moral of the nearness of death to all, and of the suffering of others which makes frivolity at times ghastly. Shakespeare, ,<,A See "HZ. paper, " HonoriSoabilitudinitatibus in Warwickshire." "Athenajuin," September 19th, 1908. Lover " e i e o98° bert T ° fte ' S " Alba ' Th