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 Shakespeare and America, 
 
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SHAKESl'EARE. 
 
Shakespeare 
 
 AND 
 
 America 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANK M. BRISTOL 
 
 CHICAGO 
 i8g8 
 
Copyright iSgS.by Frank M. Bristol 
 
 Press of Wm. C. Hollister & Bro. 
 Chicago 
 
NEW WORLD DISCOVERIES. 
 
 The "New World^' was the dominant thought 
 in the secular mind of England from the time 
 of Henry VII. to that of James I. The explora- 
 tions and discoveries of John and Sebastian 
 Cabot, following the voyages of Columbus and 
 Vespucius, created a spirit of adventure and col- 
 onization which all the religious controversies 
 of the redgns of Henry VIII. and Edward VI. 
 could not allay. 
 
 The old explorers had filled the world with 
 their renown and had opened doors of opportu- 
 nity, to enter which a whole generation of brave, 
 ambitious men sprang forth in the glorious age 
 of Elizabet<h. 
 
 The thought uppermost throughout Europe 
 in that epoch of progressive ideas was "Amer- 
 ica. 
 
 The adventurer spoke the word with awe; the 
 financier conjured with it until fortunes rose from 
 the depths of his excited imagination; colonists 
 planned settlements and their development; re- 
 ligionists saw new fields open for the propagation 
 of Christianity among the heathen; statesmen 
 reckoned on conquests and territorial acquisition, 
 while Kings on their thrones dreamed of vaster 
 empires. 
 
The press was teeming with the literature of 
 the all-important subject. "Voyages," "Travels," 
 "Discoveries," new maps of the world, and de- 
 scriptions of new-found countries were filling the 
 old world with excitement and speculation. The 
 intellectual, political and financial atmosphere 
 was saturated with "America." 
 
 While William Shakespeare was at the gram- 
 mar school of Stratford-on-Avon, learning his 
 
 Small Latin and less Greek, 
 
 Drake was circumnavigating the globe; Fro- 
 bisher was seeking a northwest passage; Gil- 
 bert was voyaging to Newfoundland, having 
 through Raleigfa obtained from Elizabeth a grant 
 to make settlements in the northern regions. 
 
 From this time on, one great enterprise fol- 
 lowed fast upon the heels of another. Virginia 
 was discovered in 1584 by expeditions which 
 Raleigh had organized and sent out, and the new 
 country was named in honor of the Virgin Queen. 
 Cavendish in 1586, following the lead of Drake, 
 started to circumnavigate the globe, and success- 
 fully completed his voyage in 1588. Davis dis- 
 covered the Straits which bear his name in 1585. 
 The Spanish Armada was destroyed in 1588, and, 
 as a consequence, England gained that naval 
 control of the seas which secured her commer- 
 cial supremacy and determined the character of 
 the colonization of the North American Con- 
 tinent, which was destined thereby to become 
 Anglo-Saxonized. Raleigh made his voyage to 
 South America in 1592. Hudson, in 161 o, dis- 
 
covered the Bay which took his name. Baffin 
 found Baffin's Bay in 1612. Henry May discov- 
 ered the Bermudas, where he was shipwrecked, 
 in 1591; and Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George 
 Somars, on their way to Virginia with colonists 
 from England, were driven upon this island by a 
 storm, in 1609. 
 
 The books which were eagerly read at that 
 time, and which stimulated the spirit of adven- 
 ture, were such as Eden's "Collection of Voy- 
 ages;" "The History of Travayle in the West and 
 East Indies;" Hakluyt's "Principal Navigations, 
 Voiages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the Eng- 
 lish Nation;" Linschoten's "Discours of Voyages 
 into ye Easte & West Indes;" "Purchase, His 
 Pilgrimage;" Gilbert's "Discourse of A Discov- 
 erie for a new Passage to Cataia;" Harlot's 
 "Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land 
 of Virginia;" Jourdan's "Discovery of the Ber- 
 mudas, otherwise called the Isle of Devils;" Ra- 
 leigh's "Discoverie of the large, rich and bewtiful 
 Empire of Guiana." 
 
 In these cjoUections of Voyages and Travels 
 may be found gathered together, and, where nec- 
 essary, translated, or "done into Englyshe," such 
 important works as Peter Martyr's Decades, the 
 voyages of Columbus, Cabot, Vespucius, Magel- 
 lan, Balboa, Cartier, Frobisher, Verrazzano, Gil- 
 bert, and all the illustrious Spanish, Italian, 
 Dutch, French and English explorers of the 
 western world from the earliest times. 
 
 In Shakespeare's day the two most important 
 branches of literature, those most eagerly sought 
 
for and read, were the plays of the dramatists 
 and the voyages and travels of the American 
 explorers. The latter had an influence on the 
 former. Shakespeare, Jonson, Beaumont, Fletch- 
 er, Green and Marlowe must have felt the influ- 
 ence of Drake, Frobisher, Cavendish, Hawkins, 
 Gilbert, Davis, Hudson, Baffln, and Raleigh, the 
 voyagers and explorers of their own age and 
 country. 
 
 The discovery of America had much to do 
 with the revival of English learning and litera- 
 ture, and aroused the Anglo-Saxon mind to that 
 creative activity which produced her immortal 
 drama. 
 
 Columbus, Cabot, Drake, Raleigh, and — 
 America, made possible a Shakespeare. They 
 lifted the horizon of the human mind no less than 
 of the seas, and widened the intellectual view of 
 man to a larger world. If the enlargement of the 
 world furnished inspiration for a Bacon's mind 
 and for the new philosophy, and the new science, 
 much more did it awaken the new song and 
 arouse the poetic genius of a Shakespeare. In 
 none of its functions did the English nund of 
 that age become more active and productive than 
 in its imagination. 
 
 A "new world," with its revelations, its mar- 
 vels, its riches, its promises and possibilities, 
 helped to Shakespearize English thought and lan- 
 guage, helped to give them imagination, poetry, 
 dramatic character. A more interesting and ex- 
 citing epoch in the history of English exploration 
 and discovery cannot be mentioned than that 
 
which includes the time from Shakespeare's birth 
 in 1564 to his death in 1616. 
 
 If, as Hazlitt remarks, Shakespeare shook 
 hands with Nature and the circumstances of his 
 time, then must he have been familiar with and 
 profoundly interested in the uppermost theme at 
 that time agitating the public mind, and his lit- 
 erary work must have been somewhat colored 
 by the prevailing "new world" ideas. That he 
 was acquainted and even intimate with Raleigh 
 would seem to admit of no doubt. Two men of 
 such transcendant ability, living in the same city 
 or country, could not have been ignorant each of 
 the other, nor is it possible that they could have 
 had no interest in each other. Shakespeare moved 
 in the highest literary circles of his time, in friend- 
 ly relations with Drayton, Jonson, Chapman, 
 Fletcher, Beaumont and Marlowe; he was also 
 patronized by the Earl of Southampton, if not by 
 Essex and the Cecils, while he recited his own 
 poetical compositions in the presence of the ap- 
 preciative Queen Elizabeth and of King James 
 I. If it is not probable that he was personally 
 acquainted with Sir Philip Sidney, who fell at 
 ZutpHen when Shakespeare was 22, it is more 
 than probable that he knew Edmund Spenser, 
 who was eleven years his senior and who was in 
 London in 1589 and there published the first 
 three books of "Faerie Queene", in 1590. It is 
 equally probable that Shakespeare was acquaint- 
 ed with Sir Walter Raleigh the traveler, poet, his- 
 torian, soldier and courtier, one of the most con- 
 spicuous men of his age. 
 
Whatever Sir Walter said or wrote on any sub- 
 ject must have commanded the attention of the 
 literary men of the time no less than of the states- 
 men, merchants, and scientists. Shakespeare 
 could not have been indifferent to the achieve- 
 ments of a man so influential with chart and com- 
 pass, sword and pen. What Raleigh had to say 
 on American subjects must have been eagerly 
 read by the poet. It is evident from his plays that 
 Shakespeare was awake to the stirring events of 
 his time, and that he was very greatly interested 
 in the discoveries which the English voyagers 
 were making in all the western world. Indeed, he 
 seems unable to shake off these American influ- 
 ences when he sits down to write. He often un- 
 consciously lets slip a word or sentence, a simile, 
 or metaphor which reveals to what an extent his 
 mind has been infected with the all-engrossing 
 theme. In these new world expressions he is 
 often guilty of his most ludicrous anachronisms, 
 even having Thersites in the time of Troy men- 
 tion the potato, a vegetable that was not known 
 to civilization until Raleigh introduced it from 
 America into Munster, in 1584. 
 
 In no less than twelve plays does Shakespeare 
 use expressions which were inspired by America 
 and by the results of its discovery. If it is in- 
 structive to gather out of his plays the medical, 
 classical, legal, botanical, entomological, script- 
 Ural, military and nautical terms and references 
 which abound therein, it is no less instructive to 
 study those expressions which may be called the 
 "Americanisms'' of Shakespeare's works. 
 
As the plots of these plays are mostly cast iii 
 times anterior to the discovery of America, any 
 allusions which are suggested by the New 
 World can be used in them only by poetic li- 
 cense which disregards the dramatic unities. It 
 must be acknowledged, however, that our Shake- 
 speare has been remarkably careful in this mat- 
 ter. Nearly all his references to America, and 
 the larger number of those figures which are sug- 
 gested to the poet in the New World discover- 
 ies, are to be found in his comedies, in which the 
 date of the plot is of much less consequence than 
 in historical plays, and in which anachronisms 
 are less objectionable even than in tragedies. 
 Manifestly, there should be no references to 
 America, or to anything which the discovery of 
 America made familiar to the age of Shakespeare 
 in such plays as "Julius Caesar", "Anthony and 
 Cleopatra", "Timon of Athens", "Coriolanus", 
 "Titus Andronicus", "Pericles", "Troilus and 
 Cressida." The same may be said of plays found- 
 ed on early English history, at least of those 
 which dramatize the reigns of English JCings up 
 to the time of Henry VIII. Shakespeare himself 
 must have felt this, and he must have carefully 
 guarded against making use of figures in his his- 
 torical plays, which would even indicate that the 
 writer knew anything whatever of the existence 
 of America. In this he succeeded most admira- 
 bly, so that we are able to catch him in only a few 
 trifling instances. In the comedies, however, he 
 takes greater liberties, and scatters his anachron- 
 isms broadcast. Many of his references to Amer- 
 
10 
 
 ica are out of time, as when the New World is 
 known to some of his dramatic characters before 
 it is known to Columbus, Vespucius, Magellan 
 or Balboa! 
 
tl 
 
 AMERICA. 
 
 The name of the new world as "America" oc- 
 curs but once in the writings of Shakespeare. It 
 is used in "The Comedy of Errors", Act III., 
 Scene 2. In describing a certain "Kitchen- 
 wench", Dromio of Syracuse says: 
 
 "She is spherical like a globe; I could find out coun- 
 tries in her. 
 
 Ant. S. In what part of her body stands Ireland? 
 
 Dro. S. Marry, sir, in her buttocks: I found it out 
 by the bogs. 
 
 Ant. S. Where Scotland? 
 
 Dro. S. I found it by the barrenness; hard in the 
 palm of the hand. 
 
 Ant. S. Where France? 
 
 Dro. S. In her forehead; armed and reverted, mak- 
 ing war against her hair. 
 
 Ant. S. Where England? 
 
 Dro. S. I looked for the chalky cliffs, but I could 
 find no whiteness in them; but I guess it stood in her 
 chin, by the salt rheum that ran between France and it. 
 
 Ant S. Where Spain? 
 
 Dro. S. Faith, I saw it not; but I felt it hot in her 
 breath. 
 
 Ant. S. Where America, the Indies? 
 
 Dro. S. O, sir, upon her nose, all o'er embellished 
 with rubies, carbuncles, sapphires, declining their rich 
 aspect to the hot breath of Spain, who sent whole arm- 
 adas of carracks to be ballast at her nose." 
 
 This comparison of a human form to the map 
 of the world was doubtless borrowed from Rabe- 
 
lais, but the reference to America is Shake- 
 speare's, although it is quite possible that the en- 
 tire comparison was original with the English 
 poet, and was suggested by his knowledge of 
 globes. Nell's spherical form was suggestive of 
 the spherical shape of the earth as illustrated in 
 the globes which were coming into use in Shake- 
 speare's time. The sphericity of the earth, which 
 had been theoretically demonstrated before the 
 time of Strabo and Erathosthenes, had been ex- 
 perimentally proven by the circumnavigations of 
 the surviving companions of Magellan, and later 
 by the voyages of Drake and Cavendish. New 
 maps were now accompanied with globes in 
 which the positions of the countries of the earth 
 were indicated. Martin Behaim invented the 
 globe in 1492 while Columbus was on his voyage 
 of Discovery. Nordenskiold claims that Be- 
 haim's globe was the most important invention 
 since the Ptolemy Atlas of 150 A. D. Victor 
 Hugo gives a description of this globe and pays 
 a just tribute to its inventor, in his "William 
 Shakespeare." "In Nuremberg, near the Aegid- 
 ienflatz, in a room on the second floor of a house 
 facing the church of St. Aegidius, there lies upon 
 an iron tripod a wooden globe, twenty inches in 
 diameter, covered with a dingy vellum, streaked 
 with lines which were once red and yellow and 
 green. Upon this globe is a sketch of the earth's 
 divisions as they could be conceived in the fif- 
 teenth century. At the twenty-fourth degree of 
 latitude, under the sign cancer, there is vaguely 
 indicated a kind of island called 'Antilia' which 
 
t3 
 
 attracted one day the attention of two men. The 
 one who had made the globe and drawn AntiHa, 
 showed this island to the other, laid his finger 
 upon it and said: "There it is'. The man looking 
 on was Christopher Columbus; the man who 
 said, 'There it is', was Martin Behaim; Antilia 
 was America. Of Fernando Cortez, who rav- 
 aged America, history speaks, but not of Mar- 
 tin Behaim, who guessed its existence."* 
 
 In a letter to the Duke of Milan, Raimondus 
 conveys intelligence of the discoveries made by 
 John Cabot, and writes, "This Master John has 
 a description of the world in a chart, and also in 
 a solid globe, which he has made". The use of 
 the globe had became very common by Shake- 
 speare's time, and the idea of the earth's spheric- 
 ity, associated with the important discoveries in 
 all the world, may have suggested the name of 
 one of the theatres in which Shakespeare was in- 
 terested, "The Globe". When "The Comedy of 
 Errors" was written, the name of the New World 
 as "America" was conspicuous on the maps and 
 globes. But as yet the name "Indes" seemed to 
 be in more common use than "America", hence 
 Antipholus of Syracuse asks : 
 
 Where America, the Indes? 
 
 Antipholus seems to add, "the Indes" by way 
 of definition or explanation, indicating that if 
 Dromio does not know where "America" is he 
 certainly knows where to find "the Indes". 
 
 This, however, is one of Shakespeare's most 
 
 * Melville B. Anderson's translation. 
 
14 
 
 glaring anachronisms. The scene of the comedy 
 is cast in "the ancient city of Ephesus", before the 
 time of Plautus, or more than seventeen hundred 
 years before Columbus discovered America. The 
 name "America" had been in use a little more 
 than eighty yeairs when Shakespeare wrote the 
 play in which it occurs. This name for the new 
 world was first suggested by Martin Waldsee- 
 miiller in his Cosmographic Introductio, 1507. 
 Although Columbus had called the new world, 
 "Indes", and Vespucius had given it the name, 
 "New World", Waldseemiiller argued that it was 
 due to Vespucius to name the new world "Amer- 
 ica" after the explorer's own name, Amerigo. 
 
 The first appearance of the name "America" on 
 a map was in 1512-1515; this is found on a man- 
 uscript attributed to Leonardo Da Vinci. On 
 this map the name "America" is given to the 
 South American continent. At about the same 
 time, 1515, the Schoner map appeared with 
 "America" on the South American region. This 
 is perhaps the most authentic first printed map 
 bearing the name. The globe known as the Tross 
 Gores appeared almost simultaneously with the 
 Schoner map and bore the name "America" on 
 the same southern region. These were followed 
 by the Apian map in 1520, the Phrysius in 1522, 
 and the map of Munster in 1532, all with "Amer- 
 ica" on the southern continent. Mercator's map, 
 or Gores for a globe, was the first to represent 
 "America" covering both the northern and south- 
 ern hemispheres. This map was published in 
 1541, only twenty-three years before Shakespeare 
 
15 
 
 was born. The name "America", however, does 
 not seem to have been in common use when 
 Shakespeare wrote the play in which it is men- 
 tioned. "The Indes" was still the more familiar 
 name. 
 
 This "Kitchen-wench", Nell, fat and buxum, 
 is "spherical like a globe", and Antipholus, who 
 boasts that he can "find out countries in her", 
 imagines her nose to resemble America. Evi- 
 dently this has no reference to America's shape 
 or outline on the globe, but rather to her fabulous 
 products. 
 
 The common impression which the new world 
 had made on the public mind is well preserved 
 in this dialogue between Antipholus and Dromio. 
 America was regarded as a land of fabulous 
 riches, a world abounding in gold, rubies, 
 sapphires, carbuncles, pearls and all manner of 
 precious stones. Even Spain's enterprise in send- 
 ing "whole armadas" to fetch cargoes of riches 
 from this new country is turned into a figure for 
 a jest, and the Kitchen-wench's nose, as the re- 
 sult of deep drinking, if not of high living, is 
 ablaze, as if adorned, with the rich treasures of 
 America! ' 
 
i6 
 
 THE INDIES. 
 
 The new world was named "The Indies" by 
 Columbus, and for a century thereafter this was 
 its most familiar name in the literature of ex- 
 ploration and discovery. By "The Indies" was 
 meant the "West Indies". When the East Indies 
 and West Indies are mentioned together, the 
 former refers to India of the Orient. When the 
 expression "The Indies" is used it almost inva- 
 riably means America, the new world. In Shake- 
 speare's time, although the East India Company 
 was organized in 1600, "The Indies", or "West 
 Indies", were attracting more attention than old 
 India. The discoveries, conquests and coloniza- 
 tions by the Europeans, and especially by the En- 
 glish, were directed to the new world, the West 
 Indies, while the attention given to Asia, or East 
 India, was almost entirely commercial. Although 
 the name "America" occurs but once in Shake- 
 speare's writings, "The Indies", or "West Indies", 
 are mentioned in five or six of his plays, indicat- 
 ing, it would seem, that even in the age of Eliza- 
 beth and James this was the most common, gen- 
 eral name for the new world. In "Henry VIII." 
 Shakespeare uses a metaphor Which may indicate 
 not only the desire which prevailed in his own 
 time among the English people to possess the 
 Indies, but may, without incongruity, show that 
 such an ambition existed in the time of Henry. 
 
17 
 
 In Act IV., Scene I., Queen Katherine passes in 
 procession along a street in Westminster. In the 
 order of procession, the seventh is, 
 
 A canopy borne by four of the Cinqueports; 
 under it, the Queen in her robe; in her hair, 
 richly adorned with pearl, crowned. On each 
 side of her, the Bishops of London and Winches- 
 ter. 
 
 Two gentlemen meet and exchange remarks on 
 the procession and on the disitinguished person- 
 ages as they advance. The Queen appears. 
 
 2. Gen. (Looking on the Queen.) Heaven bless 
 thee! Thou hast the sweetest face I ever looked on. — 
 Sir, as I have a soul, she is an angel : Our king has all 
 the Indies in his arms, and more and richer, when he 
 strains that lady: I cannot blame his conscience. 
 
 The sentiment seems to be this, the greatest 
 fortune that can befall a king is to possess "the 
 Indies". If in Shakespeare's time England had a 
 large portion of the Indies, or, of the whole world, 
 in her arms as the result of the work of Drake, 
 Raleigh, Hudson, Clifford and other discoverers, 
 in the time of Henry VIII., she could not boast of 
 such extended possessions. Nevertheless, Eng- 
 land's eyes were upon the Indies even then with 
 an ambition to embrace "all the Indies" in her 
 arms. 
 
 In "The Merchant of Venice" Shakespeare 
 touches upon the commerciaJ relations which had 
 been established between the old world and the 
 new. 
 
 Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Shy. Oh, no, no, no, no;— my meaning, in saying 
 he is a good man, is to have you understand me, that he 
 
i8 
 
 is sufficient. Yet his means are in supposition: He 
 hath an argosy bound to Tripolis, another to the In- 
 dies. 
 
 On the Rialto, then, "the Indies" has a com- 
 mercial importance and becomes a theme of con- 
 versation "where merchants most do congre- 
 gate". 
 
 Our poet puts a metaphor into the mouth of 
 Falstaff, which is a bold anachronism, as "Merry 
 Wives of Windsor" is cast in the time of Henry 
 IV. 
 
 Falstaff is determined to win the love of both 
 Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Page, to whom he writes 
 gushing letters, expressing his passion. Meeting 
 Host, Bardolph, Nym, Pistol, and Robin at the 
 Garter Inn, he tells them of his letters and gives 
 his estimate of the women: 
 
 Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Falstaff: I will be cheater to them both, and they 
 shall be exchequers to me: they shall be my East and 
 West Indies, and I will trade to them both. Go, bear 
 thou this letter to Mistress Page; and thou this to Mis- 
 tress Ford. We will thrive, lads, we will thrive. 
 
 It is remarkable that Jack Falstaff should have 
 known of the "West Indies" before Columbus or 
 Vespucius, or Cabot, but it is not so remarkable 
 that Shakespeare's mind should have had an ex- 
 alted notion of the wealth of the West Indies and 
 of the good fortune of possessing them, nor is it 
 remarkable that he should have used them in 
 simile and metaphor as the highest possible stand- 
 ard of imaginary value. 
 
19 
 
 In the comedy of "As You Like It", Shake- 
 speare again lets slip an Americanism. Orlando 
 writes poetically to Rosalind, and fastens the 
 paper, bearing his lines, to a tree in the forest 
 
 Hang there, my verse, in witness of my love. 
 
 When Rosalind finds_the poem, in Act III., 
 Scene 2, she reads: 
 
 ■ From the east to western Ind, 
 
 No jewel is like Rosalind. 
 
 Her worth being mounted on the wind, 
 
 Through all the world bears Rosalind. 
 
 All the pictures, fairest lin'd, 
 
 Are but black to Rosalind. 
 
 Let no face be kept in mind, 
 
 But the fair of Rosalind. 
 
 There may be no anachronism in this refer- 
 ence to "Western Ind", as the plot of this comedy 
 is cast in the time of Louis XII., which included 
 the period of the discovery of America. As in the 
 reference to America in "The Comedy of Errors", 
 so here, the new world, "Western Ind", seems to 
 have made the impression on Shakespeare's mind, 
 and on the public mind, generally, that it abound- 
 ed in gold, pearls and precious stones, and that 
 those products above all other considerations, 
 constituted her desirability and value in the eyes 
 of the old world. 
 
 One of the most interesting references to the 
 Indies made by Shakespeare is to be found in 
 "Twelfth Night". The time of the action of this 
 comedy may be fixed in the poet's own age, and 
 only a slight anachronism, if any, is committed by 
 
the simile introducing the Indies. In Act III., 
 Scene 2, Maria, describing Malvolio, says; 
 
 He does smile his face into more lines than are in the 
 new map, with the augmentation of the Indies. 
 
 Opinions differ as to which map is here intend- 
 ed by "the new map with the augmentation of the 
 Indies". Knight artd Steevens claim that it was 
 the map publisihed with the English edition of 
 Linschotan's Voyages in 1598. Quaritch argues 
 for the Mollineauk map engraved for Hakluyt's 
 "Principal Navigations", 1599-1600. Henry 
 Stevens thinks the map referred to by Shake- 
 speare was one of th^ nineteen maps found in 
 Wytfliet's Descriptionis Ptolenaicae, 1597- 1598. 
 The comedy was acted for the first time in 1602. 
 So far as the date is concerned, therefore, any one 
 of these maps would answer the description, but 
 by a glance at their peculiarities one must be con- 
 vinced that the MolUneaux map in particular 
 gives us the meaning of Maria's description of 
 Malvolio's face when in a smile. The MolUneaux 
 map was never widely circulated and could not 
 have become as familiar to the ordinary reader 
 as the Linschoten map, although it was a famous 
 map with the navigators. It was widely adver- 
 tised, however, as a great map and as the "new 
 map" of the world. Only three copies of this map, 
 in the original State, are now known to exist. As 
 it was not ready for Hakluyt's Navigations whert 
 the book issued from the press, but was furnished 
 to subscribers at a later date, it is now wanting 
 in many copies of the book. Althot^gh the Ltit« 
 
THE NEW MAP WITH TH 
 

 ON OF THE INDIES. 
 
schoten map was never so scarce, it was never so 
 famous, nor does it so accurately illustrate' 
 Maria's witticism as the MoUineaux map. The 
 felicity of the poef s simile is apparent when we 
 look upon this great map of many lines. This 
 reference to the latest map "with the augmenta- 
 tion of the Indies" reveals 'how well Shakespeare 
 kept himself informed on all the new-world hap- 
 penings and how thoroughly acquainted he was 
 with the latest literature of the subject 
 
 The love of adventure and discovery which per- 
 meated all ranks of society, and the good repute 
 in which explorers were held in Shakespeare's 
 day evidendy suggested a well-known line in 
 "Two Gentlemen of Verona." The period of the 
 action of this play must be placed between 1525 
 and 1535 or in the time of Francis I. and Charles 
 V. 
 
 Shakespeare was justified in supposing that the 
 discoverer was then looked upon with admiration. 
 The names of Columbus, Vespucius, Magellan, 
 Balboa, Verrazzano, Corterial, Ponce de Leon, 
 Vasco de Gama, Marco Polo and Cabot were on 
 every tongue. Several of these heroes of adven- 
 ture were still living in the time of Francis I., 
 others had then but recently passed away, leav- 
 ing an immortal fame. Their achievements placed 
 the voyager and discoverer on a footing of equal 
 dignity and distinction with the scholar and the 
 soldier, hence the lines in "Two Gentlemen of 
 Verona," Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Pant. He wonder'd that your lordship 
 Would suffer him to spend his youth at home; 
 While other men, of slender reputation, 
 
Put forth their sons to seek preferment out; 
 
 Some to the wars, to try their fortune there; 
 
 Some to discover islands far away; 
 
 Some to the studious universities, 
 
 For any, or for all these exercises, 
 
 He said that Proteus your son was meet; 
 
 And did request me to importune you 
 
 To let him spend his time no more at home. 
 
 Which would be great impeachment to his age. 
 
 In having known no travel in his youth. 
 
 Thus, any one of three courses was worthy 
 the ambition of noble youth. 
 
 The discoveries which had brought a new 
 world to light had made it seem as worthy of 
 one's ambition to "discover islands far away" as 
 to seek the field of battle or retire to the classic 
 shades of the University. This was doubtless the 
 opinion of Shakespeare himself, and he was open- 
 eyed enough and sufficiently quick of hearing to 
 know that men like Raleigh, Gilbert, Cavendish 
 and Drake, were as highly honored for their dis- 
 coveries as were Bacon, Jonson, Spenser and 
 himself, for their writings. It is difficult to resist 
 the conviction that Shakespeare had many an 
 ambitious impulse to emulate the deeds of the 
 great discoverers. Had he not been a poet he 
 surely would have been an adventurer. Nay, as 
 the adventurer must be in a sense a poet, as he 
 must have a splendid imagination, the poetic ge- 
 nius of "Sweetest, Shakespeare, Fancy's Child", 
 fitted him the better to "discover islands far 
 away" had he emulated a Columbus or a Cabot. 
 These "islands far away" were suggested by the 
 Indies, or the outlying islands of the new world. 
 
»3 
 
 GUIANA. 
 
 In Sir John Falstaflf's conversation with Pistol 
 and others in the iGarter Inn, already referred to, 
 he characterizes Mrs. Page in a metaphor which 
 shows how Shakespeare's mind had been im- 
 pressed by a recent event when he wrote the 
 "Merry Wives of Windsor". Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Fal. O, she did so course o'er my exteriors with 
 such a greedy intention, that the appetite of her eye did 
 seem to scorch me up like a burning-glass! Here's an- 
 other letter to her; she bears the purse too; she is a 
 region in Guiana, all gold and bounty. 
 
 In the year 1596 an interesting book was pub- 
 lished, bearing the following title, "The Discov- 
 erie of the large, rich and bewtiful Empire of 
 Guiana, with a relation of the Great and Golden 
 Citie of Manoa (which the Spaniards call El Do- 
 rado) — ^Performed in the yeare 1595, by Sir W. 
 Raleigh". "The Merry Wives of Windsor" was 
 first published in 1602 and was probably written 
 in 1601. Although we must again accuse Shake- 
 speare of anachronism in putting the word "Gui- 
 ana" into the mouth of Falstaff, we can not fail 
 to notice the interest which the poet seems to 
 take in every event connected with discoveries 
 in America, and it is again manifest that he keeps 
 well read up in the latest literature on western ex- 
 ploration. He had certainly read Raleigh's book 
 
and the reading doubtless suggested the compari- 
 son of Mrs. Page to "a region in Guiana" and to 
 the "West Indies", and also inspired the beautiful 
 figure used by Falstaff : 
 
 Fal. (To Robin). Hold, sirrah, bear you these 
 letters tightly: 
 Sail like my pinnace to these golden shores. — 
 
n 
 
 MEXICO. 
 
 One pf the qio^t important events, or series of 
 events, that followed the discovery of America 
 was the conquest of Mexico by Cortez. This con- 
 quest resulted in opening the country to Euro- 
 pean commercial adventurers. Spain, Portugal, 
 Italy, France, Holland and England had their 
 greedy, speculative eyes on the land of the Mon- 
 tezumas. Shakespeare was sufficiently well ac- 
 quainted with Mexico's attraction to the mer- 
 chants of the old world to represent her as lying 
 in full view of the speculative considerations of 
 the Rialto, which was the Bourse or Board of 
 Trade of Venice. Shylock knows all about Mex- 
 ico, and has cunningly weighed the probabilities 
 of successful commerce with the distant country, 
 while 'Antonio risks a fortune in commercial 
 ventures in various countries, including Mexico. 
 Shylock refers to Antonio's ventures rather dep- 
 recatingly. 
 
 "The Merchant of Venice", Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Shylock: I understand, moreover, upon the Rialto, 
 he hath a third at Mexico, a fourth for England,— and 
 other ventures he hath, squandered abroad. 
 
 These ventures scattered abroad proved to be 
 quite as questionable in financial policy as Shy- 
 lock had intimated, and their unsuccessful issue 
 brought Antonio to such straits, that but for the 
 
26 
 
 wit and wisdom of Portia he might have been 
 compelled to forfeit to Shylock a pound of his 
 own flesh. 
 
 Act III., Scene 2: 
 
 Bassanio. But is it true Salanio? 
 Hath all his ventures failed? What, not one hit? 
 From Tripolis, from Mexico, and England, 
 From Lisbon, Barbary, and India? 
 And not one vessel 'scape the dreadful touch 
 Of merchant-marring rocks? 
 
 Salan. Not one, my lord. 
 
 Thus the fictitious argosy of the poet's fancy, 
 bound for Mexico, met with disaster, as possibly 
 many a real business venture to that country 
 proved a failure in Shakespeare's time, to his own 
 knowledge. 
 
47 
 
 VIRGINIA. 
 
 The name "Virginia" is not found in any of 
 Shakespeare's writings, but the commentators 
 have found in "Henry VIII." a reference to the 
 new country which was discovered in the reign 
 of Elizabeth and named in honor of the Virgin 
 Queen. In 1606 a charter of colonization was 
 granted to Virginia and in 1607 Jamestown was 
 founded and named in honor of King James I. 
 Whether the play was written in Elizabeth's time, 
 or in the time of James and as late as 1613, has 
 no bearing on the subject in hand. The refer- 
 ence to America, and specifically to Virginia, is 
 so evident that no scholar has cared to question 
 it. In Cranmar's prophecy, Shakespeare appar- 
 ently eulogizes the virtues of Elizabeth and the 
 glories of her reign while he praises the continu- 
 ance of prosperity and happiness experienced by 
 the nation during the reig^ of King James. 
 
 "Henry VIIL", Act V., Scene 4: 
 
 Cranmar: She shall be lov'd and fear'd: her own shall 
 
 bless her; 
 Her foes shake like a field of beaten corn, 
 And hang their heads with sorrow: good 
 
 grows with her: 
 In her days every man shall eat in safety. 
 Under his own vine, what he plants; and sing 
 The merry songs of peace to all his neighbors: 
 God shall be truly known; and those about her 
 From her shall read the perfect ways of honour. 
 
>8 
 
 And by those claim their greatness, not by 
 
 blood. 
 Nor shall this peace sleep with her; but as 
 
 when 
 The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix. 
 Her ashes new create another heir 
 As great in admiration as herself; 
 So shall she leave her blessedness to one, 
 (When heaven shall call her from this cloud of 
 
 darkness,) 
 Who, from the sacred ashes of her honour. 
 Shall star-like rise, as great in fame as she was. 
 And so stand fi^'d: peace, plenty, love, trifth, 
 
 terror. 
 That were the servants to this chosen infant. 
 Shall then be his, and like a vine grow to him: 
 Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine. 
 His honour and the greatness of his name 
 Shall be, and m^ke new nations: he sh^U 
 
 flourish. 
 And, like a mountain cedar, react) his branch«$ 
 To all the plains about him. 
 
 It is very probable th^t the loutu^ng ot Vir- 
 ginia suggested the line which refers to the maic- 
 ing of "new nations" which Shakespeare put iqtQ 
 the prophecy of Cranmar. 
 
29 
 
 THE SOUTH SEA. 
 
 In the comedy "As You Like It", the poet 
 makes use of a figure which shows his familiarity 
 with another part of the New World. 
 
 Act IILi Scene 2: 
 
 Ros. Good my complexion! dost thou think, 
 thouKh I am caparison'd like a man, I have a doublet 
 and hose, in my disposition? One inch of delay more 
 is a South-sea of discovery. 
 
 Rosalind's meaning here is somewhat vague. 
 "A Sou^-sea of discovery" may mean a very 
 wide, boundless world in which one might sail in 
 vain in quest of the truth and be lost or wrecked 
 in a limitless sea of mere speculation. Another 
 accepted reading changes the figure and the 
 meaning contained in the language of Rosalind: 
 
 One inch of delay more is a South-sea off discovery. 
 
 The meaning here would seem to be one inch 
 of delay more will put the discovery as far off as 
 the South-sea, to the end of the world, and make 
 it a hopeless task. In order, therefore, that the 
 possibility of. discovering who this man (Orlatido) 
 is may not be put as far off as the South Sea, 
 Rosalind further cries: 
 
 I pr'ythee, tell me who is it quickly, and speak apace. 
 I would thou couldst stammer, that thou might' st pour 
 this concealed man out of thy mouth, as wine comes 
 
3P 
 
 out of a narrow-mouth'd bottle — either too much at 
 once, or none at all. I pr'ythee, take the cork out of 
 thy mouth, that I may drink thy tidings. 
 
 It is Shakespeare's reference to this South Sea, 
 however, that we are interested in, and either 
 reading makes that reference equally important 
 with the other as further showing the poet's fa- 
 miliarity with the geographical features of the 
 new world. 
 
 The discovery of the South Sea by Balboa in 
 1 5 13 was one of the most important steps toward 
 the circumnavigation of the globe, which was 
 achieved by the companions of Magellan in 1522, 
 and twice again in Shakespeare's own time by 
 Drake and Cavendish. As the great body of 
 water, discovered by Balboa, washed the south 
 shore of the Isthmus of Panama, from which it 
 was first seen by the explorer, it was named, "the 
 South Sea". It did not receive another name 
 until Magellan discovered and sailed through the 
 straits which bear his name and which connect it 
 with the Atlantic Ocean. Sailing out upon the 
 calm waters of this great sea after his ship had 
 struggled through the turbulent waters of the 
 Atlantic and of the Straits, Magellan called it "the 
 Pacific Ocean". The first name which it received 
 from its discoverer, however, was used more fa- 
 miliarly up to the time of Shakespeare than the 
 name which is now given it in common parlance. 
 On the Hakluyt map of 1599 it is given the orig- 
 inal name, "South Sea." Nor did that name go 
 out of use until the close of the last century. The 
 South Sea Company was organized in 1711 to 
 
31 
 
 control the Spanish South American trade; the 
 financial policy of this notorious company proved 
 to be a fraud and failure which involved the ruin 
 of many English speculators and gave to the vis- 
 ionary scheme the name of "The South Sea Bub- 
 ble". From that time the name "South Sea" lost 
 its popularity, fell into disrepute, and gradually 
 gave way to the present name, "Pacific Ocean". 
 In Shakespeare's time such terms as "America", 
 "Mexico", "Guiana", "The Indies", were not 
 more familiar than "The South Sea". Drake and 
 Cavendish had explored it, plundered the coun- 
 tries along its shores, crossed it in their circum- 
 navigations of the globe and had returned to 
 England to be received with highest honors. 
 When Drake returned, in 1580, he was knighted 
 on board his ship by Queen Elizabeth in person, 
 to whom a magnificent banquet was given. These 
 stirring events gave the name "South Sea" both 
 glamour and popularity, and when Shakespeare 
 wrote "As You Like It", in 1600, this name had 
 then but recently again been made prominent by 
 Raleigh's travels and by the publications of Hak- 
 luyt, Linschotan, and Eden. 
 
 The use of the name "South Sea", which 
 Shakespeare makes in the language of Rosalind, 
 woiild indicate that the distant region was com- 
 monly talked about and was familiar to the 
 thought of the people in the poet's time. 
 
32 
 
 THE ANTIPODES. 
 
 The inhabitants of America, or the new worid, 
 were called the Antipodes. In Hakluyf s voyages 
 the marginal reading runs: "The Indians are 
 antipodes to the Spanyards". As this is a gloss 
 on Peter Martyr's statements, we may conclude 
 that had the historian been referring to English 
 explorations and discoveries the gloss would have 
 indicated that the Indians were antipodes to the 
 English. This expression was at first used to 
 designate a people rather than a locality. The 
 circumnavigation of the globe had brought every 
 country into communication with its antipodes, 
 hence the common use of the term after the west- 
 ern discoveries. The manufacture and use of 
 globes had also brought the word into familiar 
 parlance, at least in a pedantic fashion. It is 
 claimed that Behaim's globe "is the first which 
 adopts unreservedly the existence of antipodes", 
 the existence of lands and peoples on the opposite 
 side of the globe. Shakespeare used the word 
 several times, having been impressed with the 
 importance of the discoveries which proved Be- 
 haim to be correct and which also realized the 
 dreams of Pulci and Petrarch, and proved Seneca 
 to be a seer. 
 
 The word "Antipodes" is used by Shakespeare 
 to designate the peoples, the Indians, on the other 
 
33 
 
 side of the world, rather than the countries. In 
 this sense the woiid is used by Hakluyt in his 
 First Decade of Peter Martyr, "Therefore doubt- 
 lesse Spayne hath deserved great prayse in these 
 our dayes, in that it hath made knowen unto us 
 so many thousandes of Antipodes which lay hid 
 before, and unknowen to our forefathers". 
 
 In another passage reference is made to the 
 "Portugales'*. "Tliey sayle yeerly to the inhab- 
 itants of the south pole, being in maner Antipodes 
 to the people called Hyperborei under the North 
 pcAe, and exercise merchandize with them. And 
 here have I named Antipodes, forasmuch as I am 
 not ignorant that there hath bin men of singular 
 witte and great learning, which have denyed 
 that there is AntipodeSj that is, such as walke 
 feete to feete. But it is certaynei, that it is not 
 given to any one manne to knowe all things, for 
 even Biey also were men, whose propertie is to 
 erre, and be deceived in many thinges". 
 
 The felicity of the term "Antipodes" was ap- 
 parent to Shakespeare, and he used it several 
 times with fine effect. In the Third Part of "King 
 Henry VI.", Act I., Scene 4, York says to Queen 
 Margaret, 
 
 Thou art as opposite to every good. 
 As the Antipodes are unto us. 
 
 In "A Midsummer Night's Dream", Act III., 
 Scene i, Hermia, speaking to Demetrius of Lys- 
 ander, says: 
 
 If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep, 
 Being o'er Shoes in Uood, plunge in the deep, 
 
34 
 
 And kill me top. 
 
 The sun was not so true unto the day. 
 
 As he to me: would he have stol'n away 
 
 From sleeping Hermia? I'll believe as soon, 
 
 This whole earth may be bor'd; and that the moon 
 
 May through the centre creep, and so displease 
 
 Her brother's noon-tide with th' Antipodes. 
 
 Bassanio, in Act V., Scene i, of "The Merchant 
 of Venice", flatteringly says to Portia: 
 
 Bass. We should hold day with the Antipodes, 
 If you would walk in absence of the sun. 
 
 King Richard II. makes use of words which 
 came into the common language only with the 
 discovery of America, and with the circumnavi- 
 gations of the globe following that discovery, 
 more than a century after the time of Richard. 
 
 "Richard II.", Act III., Scene 2: 
 
 K. Rich. Disconifortable cousin! know'st thou not, 
 That when the searching eye of heaven is hid 
 Behind the globe, and lights tTie lower world. 
 Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen. 
 In murders and in outrage, boldly here; 
 But when, from under this terrestrial ball. 
 He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines. 
 And darts his light through every guilty hole, 
 Then murders, treasons, and detested sins, 
 The cloak of night being pluck'd from off their backs, 
 Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves? 
 So when this thief, this traitor, Bolingbroke, — 
 Who all this while hath revell'd in the night, 
 Whilst we were wandering with the antipodes, — 
 Shall see us rising in our throne, the east. 
 His treasons will sit blushing in his face, 
 Not able to endure the sight of day. 
 But, self-affrighted, tremble at his sin. 
 
35 
 
 All such expressions as "the globe", "the lower 
 worM", "terrestrial ball", and "the antipodes", 
 belong to post- Columbian parlance, but Shake- 
 speare forgets that Richard could not have used 
 them, nevertheless this very forgetfulness shows 
 how the poet appropriated the new ideas which 
 the American discoverers had introduced to the 
 literature of his own time. The civilized world 
 was manifesting a great interest in "the Antipo- 
 des", This term was a general designation of the 
 new-found races of men, and more particularly 
 those discovered by Columbus, Cabot, Ponce de 
 Leon, Cortez, and their successors, and included 
 the people called Indians, Mexicans, Peruvians, 
 Cannibals, and Savages. 
 
36 
 
 INDIANS. 
 
 The frequent mention of Indians in the plays 
 of Shakespeare indicates that the poet had seen 
 specimens of the new-world inhabitants as they 
 were brought into England by Frobisher and Ra- 
 leigh, as Columbus had taken them to Spain. It 
 shows that in his reading on American subjects 
 , he had been impressed with the appearance and 
 1 characteristics of these new-found peoples. Show- 
 Imen had them on exhibition with freaks and 
 monsters, and great curiosity was excited by the 
 illustrated curtains on which were portrayed the 
 serpents. Mermaids, birds, wild beasts, and In- 
 dians from America. 
 
 The Indians mentioned in the literature of 
 Shakespeare's time were the aborigines of the 
 new world, American Indians. On the supposi- 
 tion that Columbus had found India the inhab- 
 itants were at an early period called Indians, and 
 from that time on, and especially from Drake's, 
 Frobisher's and Raleigh's first voyages, "Indi- 
 ans" meant almost exclusively the savages of 
 America, as distinguished even from the inhab- 
 itants of India of the Orient. The published de- 
 scriptions of the western world included interest- 
 ing descriptions of the new-found nations, or 
 races, dwelling in tAe West Indies, in Mexico, 
 Guiana, Florida, Virginia and other regions of 
 America. The learned world, England in par- 
 
37 
 
 ticular, was manifesting a deep interest in these 
 strange and savage beings. In Hakluyt's Peter 
 Martyr we find several pages devoted to a disqui- 
 sition on the color of Indians and on the origin 
 of their name. 
 
 "Some thinke that the people of the new world 
 were called Indians, because they are of the 
 colour of the East Indians, And although (as it 
 seemeth to me) they differ much in colour and 
 fashions, yet it is true, that of India they were 
 called Indians." 
 
 "One of the marveylous things that God useth 
 in the composition of man, is colour; which doubt- 
 lesse cannot bee considered without great admira- 
 tion, in holding one to be white, and another 
 blacke, being colours utterly contrary; some like- 
 wise to be yelow, which is betweene blacke and 
 white; and other of other colours, as it were of 
 divers liveries. And as these colours are to be 
 marveyled at, even so is it to be considered, howe 
 they differ one from another, as it were by de- 
 grees, forasmuch as some men are white after 
 divers sorts of whitenesse, yelowe after divers 
 manners of yelow, & blacke after divers sorts of 
 blacknesse & howe from white they goe to yelowe 
 by discolouring to browne and redde, and to 
 blacke by ashe colour, and murry, somewhat 
 lighter tEan blacke, and tawny like unto the West 
 Indians, whiche are altogether in generall either 
 purple or tawny, like unto sodd Quinces, or of 
 the colour of Chesnuttes or Olives, whiche colour 
 is to them naturall; and not by their going naked, 
 
38 
 
 as many have thought; albeit their nakednesse 
 have somewhat helped thereunto." 
 
 Thus in Martyr's Decades, and in the many 
 ''travels" and "voyages" published in English 
 during Shakespeare's time, the appearance, 
 habits, domestic, governmental, and warlike cus- 
 toms, and the religious notions, rites and cere- 
 monies of the various Indian nations of America 
 were extensively described. This must have been 
 good reading to so omnivorous a reader as 
 Shakespeare, who does not seem to have let any 
 branch of literature or any book of importance 
 escape his notice. It is not remarkable therefore 
 that so interesting a being as the Indian should 
 find a place in the plays of the dramatist even if 
 it be in the majority of cases only by way of refer- 
 ence, simile, or metaphor. 
 
 In "A Midsummer Night's Dream" mention is 
 made of an Indian boy, the son of an Indian 
 King. From the description given of the mother 
 of this boy, we are inclined to take him for an 
 American Indian. 
 
 It was not unusual for adventurers to the New 
 World to steal Indian boys and take them as curi- 
 osities to Spain or England. Raleigh acknowl- 
 edges that he did this. Seeing one of these kid- 
 napped Indian boys from the wilds of America 
 may have given Shakespeare his conception of 
 the character as found in the comedy. 
 
 Act II., Scene i: 
 
 Puck. The king doth keep his revels here tonight; 
 Take heed the queen come not within his sight; 
 For Oberon is passing fell and wrath, 
 
39 
 
 Because that she, as her attendant, hath 
 A lovely boy, stol'n from an Indian king; 
 She never had so sweet a changeling: 
 And jealous Oberon would have the child 
 Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild; 
 But she, perforce, withholds the loved boy. 
 Crowns him with flowers, and makes him all her joy; 
 And now they never meet in grove or green. 
 By fountain clear, or spangled star-light sheen, 
 , But they do square; that all their elves, for fear, 
 , Creep into acorn cups, and hide them there. 
 
 Act III., Scene 2: 
 
 Whiles I in this affair do thee employ, 
 I'll to my queen, and beg her Indian boy; 
 
 It is not likely that this "lovely boy" had been 
 stolen from an East Indian King. Moreover, the 
 fact that Oberon "would have the child Knight 
 of his train, to trace the forests wild", indicates 
 that the Indian boy was from the wild forests of 
 America. 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Obe. Do you amend it, then; it lies in you: 
 
 Why should Titania cross her Oberon? 
 
 I do but beg a little changeling boy, 
 
 To be my henchman. 
 
 Tita. Set your heart at rest; 
 
 The fairy land buys not the child of me. 
 
 His mother was a votaress of my order; 
 
 And, in the spiced Indian air, by night. 
 
 Full often hath she gossip'd by my side; 
 
 And sat with me on Neptune's yellow sands. 
 
 Marking the embarked traders on the flood; 
 
 When we have laugh'd to see the sails conceive, 
 
 And grow big-bellied, with the wanton wind; 
 
 Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait 
 
Ao 
 
 Pollowing (her womb then rich with my young 
 
 squire). 
 Would imitate and sail upon the land. 
 To fetch me trifles, and return again. 
 As from a voyage, rich with merchandize. 
 But she, being mortal, of that boy did die; 
 And for her sake I do4'ear up her boy; 
 And for her sake I will not part with tum. 
 
 This description of the mother of the Indian 
 Boy is certainfy not a description of an East In- 
 dian woman, but rather of an American Indian. 
 She was a votaress of Tltania's order and be- 
 longed to the forests. References to 
 
 the embarked traders on die flood, 
 
 and to the soling ships, and returning 
 
 As from a voyage, rich with merchandize, 
 
 wotild all seem to indicate that this Indian mother 
 was interested in the unustial appearance of the 
 ships which had begun to sail the waters of the 
 new world- The freedom of this child of Nature, 
 this daughter of the forest and the wilderness, 
 comports more exactly with the character, cus- 
 toms and acticms of the simple, tmtutored Ameri- 
 can Indian woman than with those of a woman of 
 East India. 
 
 Never, since the English have known them, 
 have the women of the Orient been of such a 
 character as Titania here describes. 
 
 Doubtless a line in Act IL, Scene 2, has led 
 some readers to suppose this Indian boy was of 
 East India. Titania says to Oberon: 
 
41 
 
 Why art thou here, 
 Come from the farthest steep of India? 
 But that forsooth, the bouncing Amazon, 
 Your buskin'd mistress, and your warrior love, 
 To Theseus must be wedded; and you come 
 To give their bed joy and prosperity. 
 
 Undoubtedly, Shakespeare refers to the class- 
 ical legend of the possession by Theseus of An- 
 tiope, queen of the Amazons. Nevertheless the 
 "bouncing Amazon" may have been suggested 
 anew to the poet's mind and the ancient legend 
 revived by the descriptions of the Amazons of 
 America which were to be read in every book of 
 western travels. Shakespeare had read Hak- 
 luyt's "Voyages" and found therein this interest- 
 ing passage: 
 
 "By the way, there appeared from the north a 
 great Hand which the captives that were taken 
 in Hispaniola, called Madanino, or Matinino, af- 
 firming it to be inhabited only with women, to 
 whom the Canibales have accesse at certain times 
 of the year, as in old time the Thracians hadde 
 to the Amazones in the Island of Lesbos. * * * 
 They have great and strong caves or dennes in 
 the grounde, to which they flee for safeguard if 
 any men resort unto them at any other time than 
 is appoynted, and there defende themselves with 
 bowes and arrowes, against the violence of such 
 as attempt to invade them." 
 
 Whether such descriptions suggested the old 
 Greek legend to Shakespeare's mind or not, there 
 seems no incongruity in supposing that "the 
 farthest steep of India" refers to West India; but 
 
44 
 
 even if it does not, there can be no argument in it 
 against the theory that the "lovely boy, stol'n 
 from an Indian King", was an American Indian 
 boy. 
 
 Several commentators think "The Midsummer 
 Night's Dream" was written to celebrate the mar- 
 riage of Shakespeare's friend and patron, the Earl 
 of Southampton. The German critic, Elze, 
 argues that it was written in honor of the wedding 
 of the Earl of Essex. If either were the case it 
 would seem quite appropriate for the poet to 
 make some allusion to the new world in the 
 colonization of which Southampton and Essex 
 had taken great interest. 
 
 In "Love's Labor Lost" the appellation "Sav- 
 age" is given to the "man of Inde", wthich indi- 
 cates that Shakespeare was thinking of the Amer- 
 ican Indian and meant no other by the language 
 put into the mouth of Biron. 
 
 Act IV., Scene 3: 
 
 King. What, did these rent lines show some love of 
 
 thine? 
 Biron. Did they, quoth you? Who sees the heavenly 
 
 Rosaline, 
 That, like a rude and savage man of Inde, 
 
 At the first opening of the gorgeous east. 
 Bows not his vassal head; and, stricken blind. 
 
 Kisses the base ground with obedient breast? 
 What peremptory eagle-sighted eye 
 
 Dares look upon the heaven of her brow. 
 That is not blinded by her majesty? 
 
 llie East Indians could hardly have been called 
 "rude and savage", but these terms were very" ap- 
 propriately applied to the Indians of America. 
 
43 
 
 Act v., Scene 2: 
 
 Biron. We number nothing that we spend for you; 
 Our duty is so rich, so infinite. 
 That we may do it still without account. 
 Vouchsafe to show the sunshine of your face, 
 That we, like savages may worship it 
 
 These "savages" are represented as Sun-wor- 
 shipers. Of the East Indians proper, this could 
 not have been said in the time of Shakespeare, but 
 the writers of his time on American discoveries 
 and explorations described many of the West 
 Indian tribes or nations as sun-worshipers. In 
 Hakluyt's Peter Martyr it is written of the In- 
 dians of Guadalupea, "they know none other God 
 then the Sunne and moone, although they make 
 certaine images of gossampine cotton to the Si- 
 militude of such phantasies as they say appeare 
 to them in the night". The Peruvians and Flor- 
 idians were worshipers of the sun, as were other 
 new-world Indians. 
 
 This same custom of the American Indians is 
 referred to by Shakespeare in "All's Well That 
 Ends Well". 
 
 Act I., Scene 3 : 
 
 Helena. Then, I confess. 
 
 Here on my knee, before high heaven and you, 
 
 That before you, and next unto high heaven, 
 
 I love your son: — 
 
 My friends were poor, but honest; so's my love: 
 
 Be not ofifended; for it hurts not him. 
 
 That he is lov'd of me; I follow him not 
 
 By any token of presumptuous suit; 
 
 Nor would I have him till I do deserve him. 
 
 Yet never know how that desert should be. 
 
44 
 
 I know I love in vain, strive against hope; 
 
 Yet, in this captious and intenible sieve, 
 
 I still pour in the waters of my love. 
 
 And lack not to lose still: thus, Indian-like 
 
 Religious in mine error, I adore 
 
 The sun, that looks upon his worshipper. 
 
 But knows of him no more. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the American In- 
 dian was in Shakespeare's mind when he wrote 
 the lines for the Porter in Henry VIII., Act V., 
 Scene 3: 
 
 Port. What should you do, but knock them down 
 by the dozen.s? Is this Moorfields to muster in? or 
 have we some strange Indian with the great tool come 
 to court, the women so besiege us? 
 
 The "strange Indian with the great tool" is a 
 wild American Indian with his weapon of war- 
 fare. "Tool", in Chaucer's time, and in Shake- 
 speare's time as well, was used as the synonym 
 for "weapon", although the term with that mean- 
 ing is now obsolete. It was not unusual in those 
 days for travelers to America to bring back with 
 them and present to the Court splendid specimens 
 of Indians accoutred in the fantastic ornaments 
 and the "great weapons" of savagery. Evidently 
 on such occasions the curiosity of the women was 
 greatly excited and they turned out in large num- 
 bers to catch a sight of the half-naked, feather- 
 crowned, painted and curiously armed Indian. 
 Scenes of this description probably suggested the 
 Porter's question. 
 
 The stories told in the "voyages" and "travels" 
 of the day about the small value which the In- 
 
45 
 
 djans of America placed on gold, pearls and pre- 
 cious stones, giving them in great abundance for 
 the cheap trinkets of the Spaniards and English- 
 men, gave Shakespeare the suggestion for a well- 
 known line in "Othello". 
 Act v., Scene 2: 
 
 Oth. Soft you; a word or two, before you go, 
 
 I have done the state some service, and they know it; — 
 
 No more of that. — I pray you, in your letters, 
 
 When you shall these unlucky deeds relate. 
 
 Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate. 
 
 Nor set down aught in malice: then, must you speak 
 
 Of one that lov'd, not wisely, but too well; 
 
 Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought, 
 
 Perplex'd in the extreme; of one, whose hand. 
 
 Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away. 
 
 Richer than all his tribe; 
 
 If we substitute the word "Judean" for "In- 
 dian", this passage has no bearing upon the sub- 
 ject in hand. Such a substitution is in harmony 
 with the first folio, but not with the first quarto, 
 which has it, "Indian". Malone's argument that 
 the word "tribe" in this passage has a Jewish 
 meaning which would favor the substituting of 
 "Judean" for "Indian", has no force in view of 
 the fact that the word "tribe" is used to designate 
 a community of American Indians. Coleridge 
 favors the use of "Indian", saying, "Indian — 
 means American, a savage in genere". Richard 
 Grant White, who at one time favored "Judean", 
 changed his mind on maturer judgment, and 
 thinks the American Indian's ignorance of the 
 value of gold, pearls, and precious stones is re- 
 ferred to by Othello. Knight, who accepts "In- 
 
46 
 
 dian", quotes from the poems of Habington and 
 Howard, in vvhich the same idea is set torth. 
 
 In the "Castara" by Habington are these lines: 
 
 So the unskilful Indian those bright gems 
 Which might add majesty to diadems 
 'Mong the waves scatters." 
 
 Howard, in "The Woman's Conquest", writes: 
 
 Behold my queen — 
 Who with no more concern I'll cast away 
 Than Indians do a pearl, that ne'er did know 
 Its value. 
 
 Shakespeare's reading of Hakluyt's voyages 
 made him famihar with the remarkable indiffer- 
 ence of American Indians toward gems and gold, 
 so highly prized by the new-world discoverers. 
 In Martyr's First Decade it is recorded, "while 
 hee (the admiral) was building, the inhabitantes 
 beeing desirous of hawkes belles, and other of 
 our thinges, resorted daily thither, to whom the 
 Admirall declared, that if they would bring golde, 
 they should have whatsoever they woulde aske. 
 Forthwith turning their backes, and turning to 
 the shore of the next river, they returned in a 
 shorte time, bringing with them their handes full 
 of golde. Amongst all other, there came an olde 
 man, bringing with him two pibble stones of 
 golde, weighing an ounce, desiring them to give 
 him a bell for the same; who when hee sawe 
 our men marvele at the bignesse thereof, he made 
 signs that they were but small and of no value in 
 respecte of some that he had scene, and taking in 
 his hande foure stones, the least whereof was as 
 
47 
 
 bigge as a Walnut, and the biggest as bigge as 
 an Orange, hee sayd that there was founde peaces 
 of gold as bigge in his country. * * * Beside 
 this old man, there came also divers other, bring- 
 ing with them pybble stones, of golde, weighing 
 X or XII drammes, & feared not to confesse, that 
 in the place where they gathered that golde, there 
 were found sometime stones of golde as bigge as 
 the head of a Child". 
 
 Of the Indians on the Island of Hispaniola, 
 Peter Martyr writes : 
 
 "A great multitude of them came running, to 
 the shore to behold this new nation whom they 
 thought to have descended from heaven. They 
 cast themselves by heaps into the sea and came 
 swimming to the shippes, bringing gold with 
 them, which they changed with our men for 
 earthen pottes, drinking glasses, poyntes, pinnes, 
 hawkes bels, looking glasses, & such other trifles". 
 
 Again, writing of the voyage of Petrus Alphon- 
 sus, this author says concerning Curiana: 
 
 "He brought with him at this time, many 
 haukes belles, pynnes, needles, braselettes, 
 cheynes, garlandes, and rynges, with counterfet 
 stones and glasses, and such other trifelles, the 
 which within the moment of an houre, he had ex- 
 changed for fifteene ounces of pearls, which they 
 wore aboute their neckes and armes. Then they 
 yet more earnestly desired him to sayle to their 
 coastes, promising him that he should there have 
 as many pearles as he would desire. * * * 
 These swarmed therefore to the ship as faste as 
 they might, bringing withe them great plenty of 
 
48 
 
 pearles (which they call Tenaros) exchanging 
 the same for our merchandise". 
 
 "When they departed from Curiana — to re- 
 turne to Spayne, they had threescore an XVI. 
 pounds weight after VIII. unces to the pound of 
 pearls, which they bought for exchange of our 
 thinges amounting to the value of five shillinges. 
 * * * At the length they came home so laden 
 with pearles, that they were with every mariner, 
 in maner as common as chafTe. * * * Many of 
 these pearles were as bigge as hasell nuttes and 
 as oriente (as we call it) as they be of the East 
 partes". 
 
 Of another island it is written: 
 
 "In the sea neere about this Ilande sea muscles 
 are engendred, of such quantitie, that many of 
 them are as brode as bucklers. In these are 
 pearles founde oftentimes as bigge as beanes, 
 sometimes bigger than Olives and such as sump- 
 tuous Cleopatra might have desired." 
 
 Writing of King Tennaccus, Peter Martyr fur- 
 ther says: 
 
 "After that hee knewe that our menne desired 
 golde and pearles, hee sent for six hundred and 
 fourteene Pesos of golde, and two hundred and 
 fourtie of the byggest and fayrest pearles, besides 
 a great number of the small sort." 
 
 Of another King, Teaocha, the historian 
 writes : 
 
 "He gave Vaschus twentie pounds waight of 
 wrought golde, after eight ounces to the pounde; 
 also two hundred bigge pearles". 
 
49 
 
 Another "base Indian" "brought foorth a 
 basket of curious workmanship, and full of 
 pearles, which hee gave them. The summe of 
 these, pearles amounted to the weight of a hun- 
 dred & ten pounds. * * * They say that these 
 pearles were marvelous precious, faire, orient, 
 & exceeding big: Insomuch that they brought 
 many with them bigger than hasell nuttes. Of 
 what pryse & value they may be I consider by 
 one pearle the whiche Paulus predecessour to 
 your holines, bought at the second hand of a 
 marchant of Venice for foure & fourtie thousand 
 ducats. Yet among those which were brought 
 from this Hand, there was one bought even in 
 Dariena, for a thousand & two hundred Castel- 
 lans of gold this was almost as big as a meane 
 walnut, & came at the length to the handes of 
 Petrus Aries the governor, who gave it to that 
 noble and faithful! woman his wife. * * * We 
 must then needes thinke that this was very pre- 
 cious, which was bought so deare among such 
 a multitude of pearles, where they were not 
 bought by one at once, but by poundes." 
 
 Was Shakespeare thinking of this pearl from 
 Darien which a base Indian threw away with 
 hundreds of others in exchange for the worthless 
 trinkets of the Spaniards? Whether this be the 
 pearl or not, it was probalbly from stories like 
 these that Shakespeare found many illustrations 
 of "the base Indian" that "threw a pearl away, 
 Richer than all his tribe". 
 
 In "The Tempest" two or three unmistakable 
 references to the American Indian are made. 
 
50 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Trinculo. Were I in England now, (as once I was,) 
 and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there 
 but would give a piece of silver: there would this mon- 
 ster make a man ; any strange beast there makes a man : 
 when they will not give a doit to relieve a lame beg- 
 gar, they will lay out ten to see a dead Indian. 
 
 Of the exhibition of Indians made by showmen 
 in London, mention has been made. Steevens 
 thinks Shakespeare found his suggestion for the 
 reference to the "dead Indian" in the probability 
 that one of the Indians brought home to England 
 by Frobisher, and who died, was brought to I>on- 
 don for burial and was there exhibited. One of 
 Raleigh's Indians also died in England, and so 
 great a curiosity was an Indian at that time, either 
 alive or dead, it is possible a showman would not 
 have scrupled to make gain by the exhibition of 
 a dead Indian. Possibly an Indian died on the 
 showman's hands at about the time of the play, 
 and was exhibited after his death. This may have 
 caused comment and criticism, hence the signifi- 
 cance of Shakespeare's reference. 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Ste. What's the matter? Have we devils here? Do 
 you put tricks upon us with savages, and men of Inde? 
 
 The appearance of Caliban suggests a com- 
 bination of forms, human and animal, among 
 them the Indian, and particularly the Cannibal 
 Indian or Anthropophagi. 
 
 There can be no doubt that Shakespeare had in 
 his mind the American Indian when he conceived 
 
SI 
 
 the character of Caliban, but the Indian element 
 is so mixed up with elements of monstrosity as 
 to be lost. In his defense of Darwin's theory of 
 evolution, Daniel Wilson, LL. D., instances Cali- 
 ban as the missing link. Stephano thought of 
 "devils", "savages", "men of Inde", when he first 
 caught sight of the "freckled whelp", which tp 
 Trinculo seemed a combination of "fish", "mon- 
 ster" and "Indian". 
 
 Of Caliban more will be said in our treatment 
 of "The Tempest", which play has an entirely 
 American basis and character. 
 
52 
 
 ANTHROPOPHAGI. 
 
 Shakespeare in several instances refers to the 
 Cannibals or Anthropophagi which travelers had 
 described as inhabiting certain regions in Amer- 
 ica. 
 
 "Othello", Act I., Scene 3: 
 
 Othello. And of the Cannibals that each other eat, 
 The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads 
 Do grow beneath their shoulders. 
 
 "The Tempest", Act III., Scene 3: 
 
 "Gon. Faith, sir, you need not fear. When we were 
 
 bovs. 
 Who would believe that there were mountaineers 
 Dew-lapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging 
 
 at them 
 Wallets of flesh? or that there were such men, 
 Whose heads stood in their breasts? which now we 
 
 find, 
 Each putter-out of five for one, will bring us 
 Good warrant of." 
 
 Reference is here made to the relations of ad- 
 venturers who insured themselves against their 
 living rather than, as in life insurance, against 
 their death. That is to say, they were to be paid 
 if they survived, and the chances taken were as 
 five to one. This is evidently a fling at the trav- 
 elers and adventurers who told incredible stories. 
 Certain commentators, and Hunter in particular, 
 think this a satire on Raleigh. Shakespeare had 
 
S3 
 
 unquestionably read Raleigh's description of the 
 Cannibals of the new world, he had also doubt- 
 less read Peter Martyr's description as found in 
 Hakluyt's voyages before he wrote "Othello" or 
 "The Tempest". Raleigh's book on "The Dis- 
 coverie of the Large, Rich and Bewtiful Empire 
 of Guiana", 1596, contains the following credu- 
 lous description of these remarkable creatures: 
 
 "Next unto Ami there are two rivers Atoica 
 and Caova and on that braunch which is called 
 Caova are a nation of people, whose heades ap- 
 peare not above their shoulders, which though it 
 may be thought a meere fable, yet for mine owne 
 parte I am resolved it is true, because every child 
 in the provinces of Arromaia and Canuri aflirme 
 the same; they are called Ewaipanoma; they are 
 reported to have their eyes in their shoulders, and 
 their mouths in the middle of their breasts, and 
 that a long train of haire groweth backward be- 
 tween their shoulders. The sonne of Topiawari, 
 which I brought with mee into England tolde mee 
 that they are the most mightie men of all the 
 lands, and use bowes, arrowes and clubs thrice 
 as big as any of Guiana, or of the Orenoqueponi 
 and that one of the Inarawakeri tooke a prisoner 
 of them the years before our arrivall there, and 
 brought him into the borders of Arramaia his 
 father's country; and farther when I seemed to 
 doubt it, hee told me that it was no wonder 
 among them, but that they were as great a nation 
 and as common as any other in all the provinces, 
 and had of late years slaine manie hundreds of 
 his fathers people, and of other nations their 
 
54 
 
 neighbors, but it was not my chaunce to heare of 
 them til I was come away, and if I had but spoken 
 one word of it while I was there, I might have 
 brought one of them with me to put the matter 
 out of doubt." 
 
 Raleigh evidently writes seriously, but he cer- 
 tainly manifests a credulity which Shakespeare 
 seems to ridicule in "The Tempest". Peter Mar- 
 tyr was by no means so credulous. His account 
 of these Indians does not represent them as 
 
 Men whose heads 
 Do grow beneath their shoulders. 
 
 They are, however, of sufficiently savage 
 aspect, and are man-eating Indians, or Cannibals. 
 Martyr tells us: "There is no man able to be- 
 hold them, but he shall feele his bowels grate 
 with a certayne horrour, nature hath endued 
 them with so terrible menacing and cruell aspect." 
 
 "Or ever you can come thither, you muste 
 passe over the mountaynes inhabited of the cruell 
 Canibales, a fierce kinde of men, devourers of 
 mans fleshe, lyving without lawes^ wandering 
 and without Empire." 
 
 Writing of the island called Hispaniola and of 
 its inhabitants, Martyr says: 
 
 "The wilde and mischievous people called Can- 
 ibales or Caribes, which were accustomed to eate 
 mans flesh (and called of the old writers. Anthro- 
 pophagi) molest them exceedingly, invading their 
 countrey, taking them captive, killing & eating 
 them." 
 
55 
 
 It is more probable that Shakespeare was in- 
 fluenced by Raleigh, Halduyt, Eden and other 
 authors of his own time than by Pliny or Sir 
 John Maundevil, who had also described this 
 "folk of foule stature, and of cursed kynde." 
 
 "Merry Wives of Windsor", Act IV., Scene 5: 
 
 Sim. Marry, sir, I come to speak with Sir John 
 Falstaff from Master Slender. 
 
 Host. There's his chamber, his house, his castle, 
 his standing bed and truckle bed, 'tis painted about 
 with the story of the prodigal, fresh and new. Go, 
 knock and call, he'll speak like an Anthropophaginian 
 unto thee, knock I. say. 
 
 Here again Shakespeare reveals the American 
 ideas which are in his mind, and we are almost 
 certain that we knoiw what authors suggested the 
 idea that FalstaflE will "speake like an Anthropo- 
 phaginian". 
 
 Pigaifetta, a companion of Magellan, describes 
 the cannibals or Anthropophagi. In Eden's col- 
 lection of voyages it runs: "They found a great 
 ryver of fresshe water and certain canibales. Of 
 these they sawe one out of theyr shyppes, of stat- 
 ure as bigge as a giante, havynge a voyce lyke a 
 bul". 
 
 Of some of these giant cannibals, taken cap- 
 tive and put in chains, this author says : "When 
 they sawe how they were deceaved they rored 
 lyke buUes". When Shakespeare has Host af- 
 firm that FalstaflE will "speak like an Anthropo- 
 phaginian unto thee", he means that he has "a 
 voyce lyke a bul", he will resemble the Canni- 
 bals who "rored lyke buUes". 
 
56 
 
 POTATOES. 
 
 One vegetable, at least, mentioned by Shake- 
 speare is of American origin and the poet's meta- 
 phorical use of this now very common product 
 shows again the influence of the new-world dis- 
 coveries upon ihis imagination. 
 
 "Merry Wives of Windsor", Act V., Scene 5: 
 
 Fal. My doe with the black scut! — Let the sky rain 
 Potatoes. Let it thunder to the tune of Green Sleeves, 
 hail Kissing-comfits, and snow eringoes. 
 
 "Troilus and Cressida", Act V., Scene 2: 
 
 Then How the devil luxury, with his fat rump and 
 potato finger, tickles these together! 
 
 The potato was discovered by the Spaniards in 
 South America, where it was cultivated by the na- 
 tives. It was introduced into England according 
 to some authorities, by John Hawkins about 
 1563. Others give the credit for its introduction 
 to Sir Francis Drake. This, however, must have 
 been the sweet potato, a native of Brazil. The 
 common potato was introduced from Virginia 
 into Ireland and first cultivated there by Sir Wal- 
 ter Raleigh in 1584. Gerard's Herbal, which was 
 published in 1597, gives the first English descrip- 
 tion and the first engraved illustration of the po- 
 tato. In this book we read: "It groweth natu- 
 rally in America, where it was first discovered". 
 Thus we find that the potato was introduced into 
 
57 
 
 England in Shakespeare's own time. Falstaff's 
 language seems to indicate that the vegetaible was 
 considered a delicious luxury to be classed with 
 choice confections, "kissing-comfits" and "erin- 
 goes". Gerard writes of it as "A foode as also 
 a meate for pleasure equall in goodnesse and 
 wholesomenesse unto the same, being either 
 roasted in the embers, or boiled and eaten with 
 oile, vinager and pepper, or dressed any other 
 way by the hand of some cunning in cookerie". 
 Of course FalstaflE never ate i potato. In the 
 time of Henry IV. it was not known in Europe; 
 as yet only the unknown Indians of undiscovered 
 America cultivated the ^succulent bulb. But 
 doubtless Shakespeare had tried the new vege- 
 table and found it to be fit for the most civilized 
 palate, and, although he never makes mention of 
 tobacco, which was also introduced into Eng- 
 land during 'his life time, he twice speaks of po- 
 tatoes, in each instance committing an outrage- 
 ous anachronism. Think of Falstail imagining a 
 shower of potatoes in his day! Think of Ther- 
 sites in the time of Troilus and Cressida of An- 
 cient Greece speaking of "potato-finger"! In 
 this figure reference is probably made to the 
 shape of the elongated sweet potato, but how 
 could Thersites know the shape of an American 
 sweet potato? Shakespeare had seen it, and it 
 suggested the bloated "potato-finger" of "devil 
 luxury". 
 
58 
 
 THE WEST. 
 
 The discovery of America, the opening up of 
 the western world, and the consequent circum- 
 navigation of the globe in Shakespeare's time 
 must have suggested to the poet's fancy one of 
 the fine passages in "A Mid-summer Night's 
 Dream". 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Obe. That very time I saw (but thou couldst not) 
 Flying between the cold moon and the earth, 
 Cupid all arm'd; a certain aim he took 
 At a fair vestal throned by the west; 
 And loos'd his love-shaft smartly from his bow, 
 As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts; 
 But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft 
 Quench'd in the chaste beams of the watery moon. 
 And the imperial votaress passed on 
 In maiden meditation, fancy free. 
 Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell: 
 It fell upon a little western flower. — 
 Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound — 
 And maidens call it, love-in-idleness. 
 Fetch me that flower; the herb I show'd thee once 
 The juice of it on sleeping eyelids laid. 
 Will make or man or woman madly dote 
 Upon the next live creature that it sees. 
 Fetch me this herb; and be thou here again. 
 Ere the leviathan can swim a league. 
 Puck. I'll put a girdle round about the earth in 
 forty minutes. [Exit] 
 
 Puck must go into the west and fetch "a little 
 western flower". This may require the girdling 
 
59 
 
 of the eardi. Does it not mean that he must visit 
 the new western world, America, and in her wilds 
 find the "little western flower" of occult influ- 
 ence? A more evident reference to the new 
 world, however, is found in "The Tempest". The 
 scene of this comedy is laid in America. 
 
6o 
 
 THE BERMUDAS. 
 "The Tempest", Act I., Scene 2: 
 
 Ariel. Safely in harbour 
 Is the king's ship; in the deep nook, where once 
 Thou call'dst me up at midnight to fetch dew 
 From the still-vex'd Bermoothes, there she's hid; 
 
 Shakespeare's interest in America is quite 
 cleariy manifest in his comedy of "The Tempest", 
 which was very probably inspired by the ship- 
 wreck of a company of Virginia colonists on the 
 Bermudas in 1609. It would strike one as most 
 remarkable if none of the many stirring events 
 connected with the discovery, exploration and 
 colonization of America had engaged Shake- 
 speare's pen or furnished materials for at least 
 one of his immortal compositions. Toward the 
 close of the poet's career one event excited the 
 public mind to such a degree that Shakespeare 
 was moved to take advantage of its truly dra- 
 matic features and write a comedy based upon its 
 general outlines. If we could agree with Camp- 
 bell in looking upon "The Tempest" as the last 
 child of the poet's brain we might have addi- 
 tional inspiration to rhapsody in the thought that 
 Shakespeare's last dramatic dream was of Amer- 
 ica! 
 
 The Bermuda Islands were discovered by John 
 Bermudez in 1522. This is the inaccurate state- 
 
\J 
 
 r 
 
 t ^ 
 
 z 
 
 5 
 
 «9SftS9l9| 
 
 x^ 
 
 t"-^^ 
 
6i 
 
 ment of nearly all the historia.ns. Various spell- 
 ings and pronunciations are given to this "still- 
 vex'd" locality, such as Bermudas, Bermuda, 
 Belmuda, Barmuda, Bermude, Belmudo, and 
 Bermoothes, as Shakespeare pronounces it in 
 phoneticizing the Spanish. Henry May, the first 
 Englishman to visit the island, was shipwrecked 
 off the northwest shore Dec. 17, 1591. He de- 
 clares that he found there the wrecks of Spanish, 
 Dutch and French ships. The island came by 
 its name, acording to May, from a Spanish ship 
 called Bermudez, which was carrying hogs to the 
 West Indies and was wrecked there. Ogil'by says 
 the Bermudes were "probably so term'd from 
 certain black hogs, by the Spaniards call'd Ber- 
 mudas". Pilkington likewise tells us that Ber- 
 mudas in the old Spanish tongue signified black 
 hog. 
 
 The record in "Purchase, His Pilgrimage" is as 
 follows : "It was called Bermuda as Oviedo saith, 
 of John Bermudez which first discovered it, and 
 Garza of the Shippes name wherein he sailed". 
 On Mercator's map of 1541 it is printed "'Bar- 
 muda Sive Garca". 
 
 Oviedo, as translated in Eden's History of 
 Travylye, says: "A thousand fyve hundreth fif- 
 tene, I sayled above the Island Bermuda other- 
 wyse cauled Garza, beyinge the furtheste of all 
 the Ilandes that are found at this daye in the 
 worlde". Oviedo wrote this in 1526, but he tells 
 us he sailed "above the island Bermuda" in 1515. 
 This was seven years before John Bermudez is 
 said to have discovered it. The maps also con- 
 
6a 
 
 tradict the statement that the above-named voy- 
 ager discovered the island and gave it his own 
 name in 1522. Not only was Oviedo acquainted 
 with the island in 1515, but Peter Martyr knew 
 it much earlier and it appears on his map, pub- 
 lished in 151 1. How it came by its name and who 
 really discovered the island remain debatable 
 questions. 
 
 The Bermudas seem to have had a history quite 
 in keeping with Shakespeare's description. The 
 poet had doubtless read Eden, May, Jourdan, 
 Purchase, Raleigh and other authorities on the 
 historic or traditional characteristics of this dan- 
 gerous region in the new world. 
 
 May, who it will be remembered suffered ship- 
 wreck there in 1591, says it was called "Isle of 
 Devils for the number of black hogs that all men 
 did shim as hell and perdition". 
 
 Purchase says: "It is also called the Island of 
 Devils which they suppose inhabette there and 
 the inchanted island, but these are inchanted con- 
 ceits." 
 
 Captain John Smith, in his History of Virginia, 
 says: "It hath been to the Spaniards more fear- 
 ful than an utopean pergatory, and to all seamen 
 no less terrable than an enchanted den of furies 
 and devils, the most dangerous, unfortunate and 
 forlorne place in the world." 
 
 Sir Walter Raleigh gave the place this bad 
 reputation: "The rest of the Indies are calmes 
 and diseases very troublesome, and the Bermu- 
 das a hellish sea for thunder, lig'htening and 
 stormes. This verie yeare there were seventeen 
 
63 
 
 sayle of Spanish shipps lost in the channell of Ba- 
 hama, and the grccft Philip like to have sunke at 
 the Bermudas was put back to Saint Juan de 
 puerto rico." 
 
 This part of the new world kept up its reputa- 
 tion when in 1609 Sir Thomas Gates was sent 
 out from England to assume the governorship of 
 Virginia. Five hundred colonists went with him. 
 The fleet consisted of eight ships exclusive of 
 the Admiral's ship, The Sea Venture. 
 
 There accompanied Gates, in the Admiral's 
 ship, Sir George Somers, Admiral, and Captain 
 Newport, vice-admiral, besides one hundred and 
 fifty souls. A tempest scattered the fleet; the 
 Admiral's ship was driven upon the Bermudas 
 and the rest of the fleet made Virginia in safety, 
 although certain writers claim that several of the 
 ships returned to England. The news of the dis- 
 aster soon reached England, and, as five hundred 
 persons had gone out from English homes to 
 Virginia with this fleet, the storm and shipwreck 
 were the talk and sensation of the day with the 
 anxious friends at home in England. The earl of 
 Southampton, Shakespeare's friend and patron, 
 was a promoter of the colonization of Virginia, as 
 were Raleigh and members of the leading fami- 
 lies of England, so that it may reasonably be sup- 
 posed that Shakespeare himself was interested in 
 the outcome of the venture and in the news of the 
 tempest and shipwreck. 
 
 The news of the disaster was followed by pub- 
 lished details in pamphlet form which were eager- 
 ly read by the people. 
 
64 
 
 Certain critics and enemies of the Virginia 
 enterprise tried to fasten the blame for the ship- 
 wreck on Sir Thomas Gates, and an investiga- 
 tion was evidently suggested which brought out 
 a pamphlet vindicating Gates. Shakespeare 
 probably read this pamphlet and upon the ac- 
 count igiven therein of the storm and shipwreck 
 off the Bermudas he quite as probably founded 
 his comedy of "The Tempest". 
 
 From Malone's time, the commentators gener- 
 ally have attributed the inspiration of the com- 
 edy to Sylvester Jourdan's pamphlet, "A Discov- 
 ery of the Bermudes, otherwise called the Isle of 
 Devils. 1610". This tract appeared again in 
 1 61 3 with additions, as "A Plaine Description of 
 the Barmudas, now called Sommers Hands, with 
 the manner of their discoverie. Anno 1609, by 
 shipwrack and admirable deliverance of Sir 
 Thomas Gates, and Sir George Sommers". In 
 his chronology of the plays of Shakespeare, Chal- 
 mers fixes upon the year 161 3 as the date of the 
 appearance of "The Tempest", thus giving the 
 poet the advantage of both the Jourdan tracts. 
 Mr. Malone, however, dates the play, 16111, 
 nearer the time of the shipwreck and very soon 
 after the publication of the first Jourdan pamph- 
 let, hence the supposition that the play was in- 
 spired by the news and account of the Bermuda 
 tempest and shipwreck. 
 
 The Jourdan pamphlet contains the following 
 account: 
 
 "I being in ship called the sea-venture, with 
 Sir Thomas Gates our Governor, Sir George 
 
65 
 
 Sommers & Captain Newport, three most 
 worthy honoured gentlemen, bound for Virginia, 
 in height of thirty degrees of northerly latitude, 
 or thereabouts: We were taken with a most 
 sharpe and cruell storme upon the five and twen- 
 tieth day of July, Anno 1609, which did not onely 
 separate us from the residue of our fleet (which 
 were eight in number) but with the violent work- 
 ing of the seas our ship became so shaken, 
 torn and leaked, that shee received so much water 
 as covered two tire of hogsheads above the bal- 
 last; that our men stood up to the middles, with 
 buckets, baricos and kettles, to baile out the 
 water and continually pumped three dayes and 
 three nights together without any intermission; 
 and yet the water seemed rather to increase than 
 to diminish; in so much that all our men, being 
 utterly spent, tyred and disabled for longer la- 
 bour, were even resolved, without any hope of 
 their lives, to shut up the hatches, and to have 
 committed themselves to the mercie of the sea. 
 It pleased God to worke so strongly as the water 
 was staid for that little time and the ship kept 
 from present sinking, when it pleased God to 
 send her within half an English mile of that land 
 that Sir George Sommers had not long before 
 descried, which were the Islands of the Barmu- 
 das. And there neither did our shippe sincke, but 
 more fortunately in so great a misfortune fell, in 
 between two rockes where shee was fast lodged 
 and locked for further budging; whereby we 
 gained not only sufficient time with the present 
 help of our boate and skiflfe safelye to set and 
 
66 
 
 convey our men ashore, but afterwards had time 
 and leasure to save some good part of our goods 
 and provisions, &c." 
 
 This published account appeared first in 1610. 
 "The Tempest", although it did not appear in 
 print until 1623, in the first folio, was acted in 
 1611. 
 
 We cannot admit, as Campbell with much sen- 
 timent would have us, that "The Tempest" was 
 Shakespeare's last work, much less can it be 
 maintained, as Hunter argues, that it was one of 
 the poet's earliest compositions. Malone, and 
 following him. Collier, Hallewell-Phillips, Ger- 
 vinus, Staunton and Furness believe "The Tem- 
 pest" was in existence in 1611, but not earlier. 
 As to the locality of the action, Capel, Malone, 
 Chalmers, Gervinus, Thomas Moore, Washing- 
 ton Irving, Mrs. Jameson, Lady Brassey and 
 others agree on the Bermudas. Hunter favors 
 Lampedusa in the Mediterranean, while Knig'ht 
 thinks Shakespeare had no particular spot in 
 mind. 
 
 If the poet had in thought any definite locality 
 for the scene of "The Tempest" the evidences 
 are multiplied times greater in favor of the Ber- 
 mudas than of any other place in the world, while 
 it is difficult to resist the conviction that the ship- 
 wreck of Sir Thomas Gates inspired the comedy. 
 
 I venture to suggest, however, that Shake- 
 speare depended less upon the Jourdan tract than 
 upon another tract of considerable importance 
 which was published in 1610, and now, to quote 
 
67 
 
 from Huth's Catalogue, "A tract of the utmost 
 rarity". This was: 
 
 "A True Declaration of The Estate of the Col- 
 onic in Virginia. With confutation of such scan- 
 dalous reports as have tended to the disgrace of 
 so worthie an enterprise. Published by advise 
 and direction of the Councell of Virginia." 
 
 This was an official document, as the title-page 
 shows. "Published by advise and direction of 
 the Councell of Virginia," 
 
 In this tract Sir Thomas Gates is defended 
 against the charge of having been responsible for 
 the shipwreck on the Bermudas, &c. 
 
 Although Malone quotes from this tract, he 
 does not give it the prominence of the Jourdan 
 tract, while the other commentators seem to have 
 almost ignored it. 
 
 From this rare pamphlet Shakespeare may 
 have taken the "The Tetapest". 
 
 It is interesting to observe how closely the ac- 
 count of Sir Thomas Gates' shipwreck agrees 
 with Henry (May's account of his own shipwreck 
 in The Bermudas in 1591, and published in Hak- 
 luyt's voyages ten years before the Jourdan tract. 
 If Shakespeare read May's graphic account he 
 certainly found as good material therein for the 
 invention of such a play as "The Tempest" as the 
 later tracts and the disaster which they describe 
 could possibly have furnished him. The two 
 shipwrecks of English vessels on The Bermudas 
 in Shakespeare's time, and the several accounts 
 of them whicfh were soon published probably sug- 
 gested the play. The Gates disaster and the 
 
68 
 
 pamphlets of 1610 were the more immediate 
 sources of Shakespeare's inspiration. 
 
 Although the details of the shipwreck are not 
 as full in the "True Declaration" as they are in 
 "A Discovery of the Bermudas" they are more 
 tersely and forcibly written. 
 
 "When Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Sum- 
 mers, and Captain Newport were in the height of 
 27, and the 24, of July, 1609, there arose such a 
 storme, as if Jonas had been flying unto Tarshish; 
 the heavens were oibscured and made an Egyp- 
 tian night of three dales perpetuall horror; the 
 women lamented; the hearts of the passengers 
 failed; the experience of the sea Captains was 
 amazed; the skill of the marriners was confound- 
 ed; the ship most violently leaked. * * * But 
 God that heard Jonas crying out of the belly of 
 hell, he pittied the distresses of his servants; For 
 behold, in the last period of necestitie. Sir George 
 Summers descryed land. * * * fhe Islands 
 on which they fell were the Bermudos, a place 
 hardly accessable through the environing rocks 
 and dangers; notwithstanding they were forced to 
 runne their ship on shoare, which through God's 
 providence fell betwixt two rockes, that caused 
 her to stande firme and not immediately to be 
 broken, God continuing his mercie unto them, 
 that with their long Boats they transported to 
 land before night, all their company, men, wom- 
 en, and children, to the number of one hundred 
 and fiftie, they carryed to shoare all the provisions 
 of unspent and unspoyled victules, all their fur- 
 niture and tackling of the ship, leaving nothing 
 
69 
 
 but bared ribs, as a pray unto the ocean. These 
 Islands of the Bermudos, have ever beene ac- 
 counted as an inchanted pile of rockes, and a 
 desert inhabitation for Divels; but all the Faries 
 of the rocks were but flocks of birds, and all the 
 Divels that haunted the woods were but beards of 
 swine." 
 
 After giving these and other details of hardship 
 and dangers through which the Virginia colonists 
 had struggled the pamphlet contains the follow- 
 ing very striking question which must have 
 caught the eye of Shakespeare as he read it: 
 "What is there in all this tragical Comaedie that 
 should discourage us with impossibilities of the 
 enterprise?" Did not the very words, "tragical 
 Comaedie" suggest to Shakespeare's mind "The 
 Tempest"? Did not the dramatist see rising be- 
 fore the fine eye of his imagination all the essen- 
 tial elements of a "tragical Comaedie" 
 
 Whatever dramatic material for his plot he may 
 have found in literature, the title of the play, with 
 its opening incident of storm and shipwreck, the 
 place of action, many of the minor elements, at 
 least one character prominent in the play, and 
 anothe^ mentioned, were very probably sug- 
 gested by new-world happenings, by the Gates 
 shipwreck on the .Bermudas and by descriptions 
 of the new world found in the current literature 
 of Shakespeare's age and country. 
 
 When we compare the play with the history of 
 the Ga:tes shipwreck these parallels appear: In 
 the history, as in the play, there is a Tempest, ac- 
 companied with thunder and lightning such as 
 
70 
 
 the Bermudas are noted for; the Tempest scat- 
 ters the fleet of Sir George Somers and also the 
 fleet of King Alonzo; one ship of each fleet is 
 driven upon an uninhabited, rock-bound, almost 
 inaccessible island; in each case this is the ship 
 of the Commander of the fleet; in the history, as 
 in the play, the ship finally lodges in a nook or 
 between the rocks and is not wholly wrecked; no 
 lives are lost in either shipwreck, all get safely 
 to land, "and for the rest o' the fleet, they all have 
 met again". The island in the play is like the 
 island described in the history of the Gates ship- 
 wreck, uninhabited, fertile in spots and in other 
 parts barren, with pits, springs, caves, trees, coral 
 reefs, &c. Again, the Bermudas, "the still-vex'd 
 Bermoothes", is represented as an enchanted 
 island. In the play, it is subject to Prospero's 
 power of enchantment, and fairies, furies, mon- 
 sters and devils inhabit the place. In obedience 
 to Prospero's command, Ariel raised the storm 
 of lightning and thunder. 
 
 Act I., Scene 2 : 
 
 Pros. Approach, my Ariel, come. 
 
 [Enter Ariel.] 
 Ari. All hail, great master! grave sir, hail! I come 
 To answer thy best pleasure; be't to fly 
 To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride 
 On the curl'd clouds, to thy strong bidding task 
 Ariel and all his quality. 
 
 Pros. Hast thou, spirit, 
 
 Perform'd to point the tempest that I bade thee? 
 Ari. To every article. 
 I boarded the king's ship; now on the beak, 
 Now in the waist, the deck, in every cabin. 
 
71 
 
 I flamed amazement: sometime I'll divide, 
 And burn in many places; on the topmast, 
 The yards and bowsprit, would I flame distinctly. 
 Then meet and join. Jove's lightnings, the precursors 
 O' the dreadful thunder-claps, more momentary 
 And sight-outrunning were not: the fire and cracks 
 Of sulphurous roaring the most mighty Neptune 
 Seem to besiege, and make his bold waves tremble. 
 Yea, his dread trident shake. 
 
 The fearful meteoric display accompanying the 
 tempest filled the shipwrecked men with such 
 alarm that they imagined the region was under 
 demoniacal enchantment. 
 
 Ariel. The King's son, Ferdinand, 
 
 With hair up-staring, — ^then like reeds, not hair, — 
 Was the first man that leap'd; cried, "Hell is empty, 
 And all the devils are here." 
 
 The concqjtion of the demoniacal enchant- 
 ment of the island was suggested to Shakespeare 
 by Jourdan's tract, in which he speaks of the 
 Bermudas as "a habitation of Divells". 
 
 "Who did not thinke till within these foure 
 years, but that those Hands had beene rather a 
 habitation of Divells, then fit for men to dwell 
 in? who did not hate the name when hee was on 
 Land, and shunne the place when he was on the 
 Seas? But behold the misprision and miscon- 
 ceits of the world! For true and large experi- 
 ence hath told us, it is one of the sweetest Para- 
 dises that be upon the earth. * ■" * Oh hap- 
 pie men who there find God and angels, where 
 the world thoug'ht had been nothing, but the 
 Devill and his swine into which he entered." 
 
72 
 
 "The Hand of the Barmudas, as every man 
 knoweth that hath heard or read of them, were 
 never inhabited by any Christian or Heathen 
 people, but ever esteemed, and reputed, a most 
 prodigious and inchanted place, aflfoording noth- 
 ing but gusts, stormes, and foule weather; w'hich 
 made every Navigator and Mariner to avoide 
 them, as Scylla and Charibdis; or as they would 
 shun the Devill himselfe." 
 
 Captain John Smith gives us to understand that 
 it was considered "an enchanted den of furies and 
 devils". 
 
 May, as we have noticed, says it was called, 
 "Isle of Devils for the number of black hogs, 
 &c." Sir Walter Raleigh called it "hellish". 
 
 Stow says the Bermudas were "said and sup- 
 posed to be inchanted and inhabited with witches 
 and devils, which grew by reason of accustomed 
 monstrous thunder, storme, and tempest". 
 
 The impression which Caliban made upon 'his 
 discoverers was that he had the form of a devil. 
 So Trinculo and Stephano regarded him, and 
 Prospero called him a "demi-devil". 
 
 This frequent use of the name "devil" or 
 "devils" suggests the traditions current about 
 the devil-enchanted Bermudas and convinces us 
 that Shakespeare had these traditions in mind 
 when he wrote "The Tempest". 
 
 Act II., Scene i : 
 
 Adr. Though this island seem to be desert, — 
 
 Seb. Ha, ha, ha! — So, you're paid. 
 
 Adr. Uninhabitable, and almost inaccessible,— 
 
73 
 
 Here there is hardly room for doubt that 
 Shakespeare is unconsciously or consciously re- 
 peating almost the very words of "A True Decla- 
 ration", mentioned above. "The Island on 
 which they fell were the Bermudos, a place hardly 
 accessible * * * ^ desert inhabitation". In 
 the Jourdan tract of 1613 we read: "If any had 
 said seven yeares agoe, the Barmuda Hands are 
 not only accessible but 'haibitable how loudly 
 would he have been laught at and hist out of 
 most mens companies." 
 
 Act I., Scene 2 : 
 
 Cal. Thou strokedst me, and madest much of me; 
 
 wouldst give me 
 Water with berries in 't; 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Cal. I'll show thee the best springs; I'll pluck 
 thee berries; 
 
 The Bermudas abounded in berries; according 
 to those early tracts, there were "great plenty of 
 Mulberries white and red". Jourdan also writes: 
 "There is a tree called a Palmito tree which haith 
 a very sweet berry." 
 
 "There are an infinite number of Cedar 
 trees, and these bring forth a verie sweete 
 berrie, and wholesome to eat." 
 
 Act. II., Scene 2: 
 
 Cal. I'll fish for thee, and get thee wood enough. 
 
 Again we read from "A True Declaration": 
 "They found the berries of Cedar, the Palmeto 
 tree, the prickle peare, sufficient fisih. * * * 
 
74 
 
 They found diversity of wood. * * * H there 
 had not been fuell, they had perished by want 
 of fire, &c." 
 
 Jourdan says: "Fish is there as abundant that 
 if a man steppe into the water they will come 
 round about him." 
 
 This writer represents Sir George Somers as 
 going out, and in a very short time making a big 
 catch. 
 
 Caliban gathers wood, catches fish, picks ber- 
 ries, does, in fine, just what those English Col- 
 onists to Virginia did when cast on the Bermu- 
 das. Moreover, the very trees mentioned in "The 
 Tempest" are found in this island, especially 
 "Many tall and goodly Cedars", as Smith writes. 
 
 Ogilby says, "The Bermudas produce Cedars, 
 the like of which are not to be found in the whole 
 world". 
 
 Caliban in Act I., Scene 2, speaks of all the 
 "qualities o' th' isle, 
 
 "The Fresh springs, brine-pits, barren place and 
 fertile", and of "toads, beetles, bats". 
 
 Sebastian in Act II., Scene 1, says : 
 
 We would so, and then go a bat-fowling. 
 
 Here we are reminded of Pinkerton's statement 
 that in the Bermudas bats are very common, and 
 we also recall the reference which Ogilby makes 
 to "The Pits and wells" of the island. It is prob- 
 able, moreover, that these) pits, "brine pits", were 
 used by the sihip-wrecked English in 1609, as in 
 Jourdan's tract we read: 
 
75, 
 
 "Having powdered some store of Hogges 
 flesh for provision thither, but were compelled to 
 make salt for the same purpose, for all our salt 
 was spent and spoiled." 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Cal. I prithee, let me bring thee where crabs grow; 
 And I with my long nails will dig thee pig-nuts; 
 Show thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how 
 To snare the nimble marmoset; I'll bring thee 
 To clustering filberts, and sometimes I'll get thee 
 Young scamels from the rock. Wilt thou go with 
 me? 
 
 This passage is a most remarkable illustration 
 of the Bermudan theory of "The Tempest". The 
 "crabs" mentioned are not crab-apples, as some 
 have supposed, but marine Crustacea, and these 
 abounded in Bermudan waters. They are called 
 cray-fish, craw-fish, or crabs, and are mentioned 
 by nearly every old writer who has described the 
 Bermudas. If the ground-nut, or "pig-nut", did 
 not grow there, there was doubtless some root or 
 nut indigenous to the soil which furnished food 
 for the hogs for which the island was famous, or 
 infamous, and was therefore called "pig-nut". 
 
 The early writers also mentioned the great va- 
 riety and tameness of the birds of the Bermudas. 
 "A jay's nest" was easily found in that island and 
 the bird was doubtless identical with the well- 
 known Florida jay. 
 
 "The nimble mormoset" was a small South 
 American monkey, not far out of its habitat when 
 in the Bermudas. 
 
76 
 
 "Clustering filberts" describe our American 
 hazel-nuts which grow wild in clusters on bushes 
 or shrubs from two to five feet in height. 
 
 "Young scamels from the rocks" have given 
 the commentators i much perplexity. Steevens 
 identifies them as "sea-mels", what Sir Joseph 
 Banks classified as gulls. 
 
 The bird which Caliban had in mind, and the 
 bird Shakespeare had in mind, was very probaibly 
 the very bird which Captain John Smith describes 
 in the manuscript published by Lefroy; it is 
 called the Cahow and found in the Bermudas. 
 
 This fowl, says Smith, "all the daye long lies 
 hidd in holes of the rocks, whence both them- 
 selves and their young are in great numbers ex- 
 tracted with ease, and prove (especially the 
 young) so pleaseinge in a dish, as ashamed I am 
 to tell, 'how many dosen of them have bin de- 
 voured by some one of our northern stomacks, 
 even at one only meale". 
 
 Were not these the "young scamels from the 
 rock" which Caliban proposed to get for Trin- 
 culo and Stephano? 
 
 Act IV., Scene i : 
 
 Ariel. So I charm'd their ears, 
 
 That, calf-like, they my lowing follow'd through 
 Tooth'd briers, sharp furzes, pricking goss, and thorns, 
 Which enter'd their frail shins. 
 
 Here Ariel describes to Prospero the influence 
 which he had over the shipwrecked persons on 
 the island, Alonzo, Gonzalo, Sebastian and 
 others. > 
 
77 
 
 The peculiar reference to "briars" and "thorns" 
 calls to mind the references which many of the 
 writers on the Bermudas have made to the prick- 
 ly-pear which grows so abundantly in that island. 
 In "A True Declaration" it is called "the prickle 
 peare". Ogilby mentions "the Plant Neichtly, 
 which bears speckled Pears". Pinkerton calls it 
 the "Prettle pe'are" and says it "grows like a 
 shrub by the ground, with broad thick leaves, all 
 over around, with long and sharpe dangerous 
 thornes". It was doubtless through this growth 
 that Ariel's enchantment caused the shipwrecked 
 arrivals to follow his "lowing" and with which 
 they wounded their "frail shins". It is not rea- 
 sonable to suppose that even these trifling allu- 
 sions to the fauna and flora of the enchanted 
 island are accidental or simply co-incidental 
 when they are so true to the authentic descrip-. 
 tions of the Bermudas which were given by 
 writers in Shakespeare's time and have since 
 been corroborated by later authorities. 
 
 Act IV., Scene i : 
 
 Ceres. Earth's increase, foison plenty. 
 Barns and garners never empty; 
 Vines with clustering bunches growing; 
 Plants with goodly burthen bowing; 
 Spring come to you at the farthest 
 In the very end of harvest? 
 Scarcity and want shall shun you; 
 Ceres' blessing so is on you. 
 
 The bearing of Ceres' song upon the discussion 
 of the Bermudan locality of "The Tempest" is 
 manifest when we keep in mind the fact that the 
 
78 
 
 Bermudas are so situated that the favored island 
 enjoys two seasons of growth, one tropical and 
 the other temperate; one producing the vegeta- 
 tion of the Indies, the other the vegetation of 
 England. 
 
 Pinkerton tells us that the Bermudes enjoy 
 "perpetual spring". Ogilby says: "Their har- 
 vest is twice a year; for that which they sowe in 
 March is ripe and gathered in June; then what 
 they sowe again in August they gather in Janu- 
 ary". Thus Ceres describes most accurately the 
 succession of the two harvests of the Bermudas 
 when she sings: 
 
 Spring come to you at the farthest 
 In the very end of harvest! 
 
 Act II., Scene i : 
 
 Adr. It must needs be of subtle, tender and delicate 
 
 temperance. 
 
 Ant. Temperance was a delicate wench. 
 
 Seb. Ay, and a subtle; as he most learnedly delivered. 
 
 Adr. The air breathes upon us here most sweetly. 
 
 Seb., As if it had lungs, _and rotten ones. 
 
 Ant. Or as 'twere perfumed by a fen. 
 Gem. Here is eversrthing advantageous to life. 
 
 Ant. True; save means to live. 
 
 Seb. Of that there's none, or little. 
 
 Gon. How lush and lusty the grass looks! how green! 
 
 Ant. The ground, indeed, is tawny. 
 
 Seb. With an eye of green in't 
 
 In this scene, and in this very dialogue, it will 
 be remembered Adrian has just spoken of the 
 island as "desert", "uninhabitable", and "inacces- 
 sible", the very description of the Bermudas 
 
79 
 
 which is found in "A True Declaration". The 
 Jourdan tract, "A discovery of the Bermudes", 
 contains descriptions and even verbal expressions 
 which must have been the inspiration of the con- 
 versation between Adrian and his companions. 
 The peculiar play on the word "temperance" im- 
 mediately suggests a passage in Jourdan's tract 
 on the Bermudas: "Yet did we finde there the 
 ayre was temperete and the country so abundant- 
 ly fruitful of all fit necessaries for the sustentation 
 and preservation of man's life, that notwithstand- 
 ing we were there for the space of nine months 
 we were not only well refreshed, comforted, and 
 with good satiety contented, but out of the 
 aboundance thereof provided us some reason- 
 able quantity and proportion of provision to 
 carry us for Virginia, and to maintain ourselves 
 and that company we found there." 
 
 The "subtle, tender and delicate temperance" 
 of the atmosphere which Adrian notices, is no- 
 ticed by Jourdan in the Bermudas where "we 
 finde the ayre so temperate". Ogilby also uses 
 this expression in speaking of the Bermudas: 
 "The air is of a good temper". Where did Shake- 
 speare find his expression, "temperance"? Not in 
 Ogilby, but in the earlier works where doubtless 
 Ogilby himself found his own expression, "good 
 temper", and most probably in Jourdan's tract, 
 which speaks of "the ayre so temperate". 
 
 Again, the line which Shakespeare puts into 
 the mouth of Gonzales was most probably sug- 
 gested by a line from Jourdan. 
 
8o 
 
 Gonzales says: 
 
 Here is everything advantageous to life. 
 
 Jourdan speaks of the Bermudas as a "country 
 aboundantly fruitful! of all fit necessaries for the 
 sustentation and preservation of man's life". 
 Shakespeare seems to have simply thrown Jour- 
 dan's statements about the temperate air and the 
 fruitfulness necessary to sustain life into dialogue 
 and poetic form. 
 
 Act I., Scene 2, Ariel sings: 
 
 Full fathom five thy father lies; 
 
 Of his bones are coral made; 
 Those are pearls that were his eyes; 
 
 Nothing of him doth fade, 
 But doth suffer a sea-change 
 
 Into something rich and strange. 
 Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell; 
 
 Burthen: Ding-dong. 
 
 The Bermudas are coral islands, and are sur- 
 rounded by extensive coral reefs. The early de- 
 scriptions of the island also mention the abun- 
 dance and fine quality of pearls to be found in the 
 waters. 
 
 In "A discovery of the Bermudes" Jourdan 
 says : "There is a greate store of Pearls and some 
 of them very faire, round and oriental". Ogilby 
 says: "The sea produces some quantity of 
 pearls". May writes: "In this island is as good 
 fishing for pearles as is any in the West Indies". 
 With these facts Shakespeare must have been 
 familiar, and the song of Ariel is quite appro- 
 priate on the Bermudas. 
 
8i 
 
 Act I., Scene II. Enter Caliban: 
 
 Cal. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd 
 With raven's feather from unwholsome fen 
 Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye 
 And blister you all o'er! 
 
 Caliban's mention of the "dew" recalls the lines 
 which Shakespeare put into the mouth of Ariel: 
 
 "Thou call'dst me up at midnight to fetch dew 
 From the still-vex'd Bermoothes." 
 
 But there is greater significance in the words 
 
 A south-west blow on ye and blister you all o'er! 
 
 The two prevailing winds of the Bermudas 
 were and are the north-east and the south-west. 
 When this south-west trade wind prevails the 
 heat is intense, producing the tropical vegetation 
 which flourishes during one season of the year 
 on the island. With the heavy dews falling and 
 the blistering south-west blowing in this locality, 
 Shakespeare found suggestion here for the lan- 
 guage of Caliban. 
 
 Several of the names w'hich Shakespeare gives 
 to the Dramatis Personse of "The Tempest" are 
 very familiar to readers of early American voy- 
 ages and explorations. "Gonzalo" suggests 
 Gonzales Cemenes; "Anthonio" suggests An- 
 thonio Bereo; "Alonzo" suggests Alonzo, Chief 
 Governor of 'Grand Canada; and "Ferdinand" 
 suggests Ferdinand de Soto. Malone thinks all 
 the principal names may be found in Eden's 
 "History of Travayle". 
 
 One character in this comedy is the most start- 
 ling and suggestive combination and embodi- 
 
82 
 
 ment of new-world suggestions imaginable. Cali- 
 ban is an American. 
 
 Pros. Thou poisonous slave, got by the devil himself 
 Upon thy wicked dam, come forth! 
 
 Shakespeare's knowledge of the cannibal, de- 
 rived from reading the "new world" literature, 
 suggested the character of Caliban. The name 
 which Shakespeare gives to this monster is but a 
 varient of "Canibal". 
 
 The descriptions of Indians, giant cannibals, 
 land and sea monsters, found in the books of 
 voyages and travels enabled Shakespeare to make 
 up a character which suggested all these crea- 
 tures to the men who found Caliban on the en- 
 chanted island with Prospero and Miranda. 
 
 Act II., Scene 2: 
 
 Trinculo. What have we here? a man or a fish? 
 dead or alive? A fish: he smells like a fish; a very 
 ancient and fish-like smell; a kind of not of the newest 
 Poor- John. A strange fish! Were I in England 
 now, as once I was, and had but this fish painted, not 
 a holiday fool there but would give a piece of silver; 
 there would this monster make a man; any strange 
 beast there makes a man; when they will not give a 
 doit to relieve a lame beggar, they will lay out ten to 
 see a dead Indian. Legged like a man! and his fins 
 like arms! Warm o' my troth! I do now let loose my 
 opinion; hold it no longer; this is no fish, but an 
 islander, that hath lately suflfered by a thunderbolt 
 
 When Stephano comes upon Caliban he cries: 
 
 What's the matter? Have we devils here? Do you 
 put tricks upon's with salvages and men of Ind, ha? 
 
83 
 
 Caliban's appearance suggests to Trinculo and 
 Stephano "salvages", "men of Ind", a "dead In- 
 dian". Shakespeare had the American Indian in 
 mind when he invented the character and the 
 form of Caliban, and although Caliban is not 
 represented in the comedy as a man-eating In- 
 dian, he is called "a monster", "a most perfidious 
 and drunken monster", a "puppy-headed mons- 
 ter", a "most ridiculous monster", "a howling 
 monster", and a "bully-monster". These terms 
 remind us of the characteristics of the giant can- 
 nibals described by Pigafetta, as we found in 
 Eden's translation "having a voyce like a bul". 
 
 In "Purchase His Pilgrimage" occurs a pas- 
 sage in which there is preserved the tradition of a 
 sea-monster, with which Shakespeare may have 
 become familiar in his extensive reading. 
 
 "Job Hortop relateth that in the height of Ber- 
 muda they had sight of a sea-monster which three 
 times showed himselfe from the middle upwards, 
 in shape like a man of the complexion of a Mu- 
 lato or tawnie Indian". 
 
 Shakespeare seems to have fashioned Caliban 
 somewhat after this description as would appear 
 from the language of Trinculo. 
 
 Act III., Scene 2: 
 
 Trin. Thou liest, most ignorant monster; I am in 
 case to justle a constable. Why, thou deboshed fish, 
 thou, was there ever man a coward that hath drunk 
 so much sack as I today? Wilt thou tell a monstrous 
 lie, being but half a fish and half a monster? 
 
 It will be remembered that the Bermudas 
 was called "The Isle of Divels", "A desert inhab- 
 
84 
 
 itation for Divels", "The Island of DevUs", etc., 
 from its first discovery by the EngUsh. In mak- 
 ing up Caliban therefore, Shakespeare associated 
 the devil with the Indian and cannibal, and all 
 three are found in America according to the voy- 
 agers and explorers of the poet's time. The very 
 name of the Bermudas as "The isle of Devils" 
 evidently suggested the question which Shake- 
 speare puts into the mouth of Stephano on first 
 catching sight of Caliban. 
 
 What's the matter? Have we devils here? 
 
 Trinculo cries: 
 
 and these are devils; O, defend me! 
 
 Stephano again explains: 
 
 Mercy, mercy! This is a devil, and no monster; 
 I will leave him; I have no long spoon. 
 
 Reference has been made to Wilson's sugges- 
 tion that Caliban is the "connecting link" to 
 complete Darwin's hypothesis of Evolution. 
 
 Another character is mentioned in "The Tem- 
 pest" which certainly belonged to the new world. 
 The use of his name, in view of the characteris- 
 tics given to Caliban and the relation of the be- 
 ing named to him, indicates that Shakespeare 
 was writing the play under the influence of the 
 American discoveries. 
 
 Act I., Scene 2: 
 
 Cal. No, pray thee. 
 
 (Aside) I must obey; his art is of such power, 
 It would control my dam's god, Setebos, 
 And make a vassal of him. 
 
8s 
 
 Who was Setebos? The devil-god of the Pat- 
 agonians. Shakespeare found the name in Eden's 
 translation of Pigafetta. In giving an account 
 of the capture of giant cannibals by Magellan, 
 that author says: 
 
 "When they felt the shakels faste abowte 
 theyre legges, they begunne to doubt, but the 
 Captayne dyd put them in comforte and badde 
 them stande style. In fine when they sawe how 
 they were deceaved they rored lyke bulles and 
 cryed uppon theyre great devyll Setebos to help 
 them." 
 
 Caliban claims Sycorax for his mother or dam, 
 and Setebos for his dam's god. On one occa- 
 sion he addressed this "great devyll" as did the 
 giant cannibals captured by Magellan. 
 
 Act v.. Scene i: 
 
 Cal. O Setebos, these bfe grave spirits indeed! 
 How fine my master is! I am afraid 
 He will chastise me. 
 
 By introducing Setebos the devil-god of the 
 cannibals of America, by relating him to Cali- 
 ban as his god and his "dam's god", and by hav- 
 ing the men who discover Caliban call him a 
 devil, Shakespeare indicates that Caliban in 
 character and form was suggested to him by the 
 descriptions of cannibals which were to be found 
 in much of the new-world literature of his time. 
 
 Sycorax, the dam of Caliban, has occasioned 
 much discussion. 
 
 Act I., Scene 2: 
 
 Prospero. Hast thou forgot 
 
 The foul witch Sycorax, who with age and envy 
 
86 
 
 Was grown into a hoop? hast thou forgot her? 
 
 Ari. Noj sir. 
 
 Pros. Thou hast. Where was she born? speak; 
 
 tell me 
 Ari. Sir, in Argier. 
 
 Pros. O, was she so? I must 
 
 Once in a month recount what thou hast been. 
 Which thou forget' st. This damn'd witch Sycorax, 
 For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries terrible 
 To enter human hearing, from Argier, 
 Thou know'st, was banish'd: for one thing she did 
 They would not take her life. Is not this true? 
 Ari. Ay, sir. 
 
 Cal. This island's mine, by Sycorax my mother, 
 Which thou takest from me. 
 
 Act III., Scene 2: 
 
 Caliban. I never saw a woman. 
 But only Sycorax my dam and she; 
 But she as far surpasseth Sycorax 
 As great' St does least. 
 
 This Sycorax is a strange being who does not 
 belong to any known pantheon of witches or of 
 goddesses. She is a creature of Shakespeare's 
 imagination. Nevertheless, classical scholars 
 have tried to find the interpretation of her char- 
 acter in the etymology of her name. The name 
 is of Greek construction, though Shakespeare 
 doubtless invented it, and yet the meaning of the 
 name may have come from what Shakespeare 
 knew of the Bermudas. 
 
 The two most reasonable etymological ex- 
 planations of the name "Sycorax" have been sug- 
 gested by Clement and Hales. The former 
 argues that the name is composed of the two 
 words Sukon, a fig, and Rex, a spider. 
 
87 
 
 Hales constructs the name out of Sus, a sow, 
 and Korax, a raven. If Dr. Clement is correct, 
 it is interesting to know that the insect whose 
 name enters into the name "Sycorax" was the 
 only very conspicuous and noticeable insect 
 found in the Bermudas. In Lefroy's publica- 
 tion of the Captain John Smith Manuscript we 
 learn that in the Bermudas "Certaine spiders, 
 indeed, of a very large size, are found hangeinge 
 upon the trees, and their webbs are found to be 
 of perfect silk — and so stronge they are gener- 
 ally that birds bigger and by much stronger 
 than sparrowes, are often taken and snarled in 
 them as in netts". Are these spiders "found 
 hangeinge" upon fig trees? If so possibly this 
 fact and the further fact that ^ these spiders are 
 harmless gave Shakespeare suggestions for his 
 creation of Sycorax. Of this Bermudan spider, 
 Ogilby writes : "These Islands breed no hurtful 
 Creatures; nay, the yellow Spider which spins 
 silken Cobwebs, is free from Poyson." We know 
 not how much this spider, spinning strong silken 
 webs, had to do with inspiring the creation of 
 
 The foul witch Sycorax, 
 
 This damn'd witch Sycorax, 
 For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries terrible. 
 To enter human hearing, from Angier, 
 Thou know'st, was banish'd. 
 
 If we favor Hales' etymology of the name 
 Sycorax and find it made up of the words "sow" 
 and "raven", it is not uninteresting to know that 
 both the sow and raven belong to the Bermu- 
 das. One passage from "The Tempest" would 
 
88 
 
 seem to favor this interpretation of the name of 
 the "foul witch". This passage has already been 
 quoted in support of another point. 
 
 Caliban. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd 
 With raven's feather from unwholesome fen 
 Drop on you both! 
 
 If Sycorax combined and embodied the char- 
 acteristics of the sow and the raven she must 
 indeed have been a "foul witch". 
 
 The Bermudas from the day of its discovery 
 was described as full of black hogs, and abound- 
 ing in birds among which the raven, or the large 
 black crow, a bird at least of the species Corvus, 
 was conspicuous. 
 
 Shakespeare might have found in these crea- 
 tures which gave the Bermudas a bad name just 
 the foul characteristics which suggested Sy- 
 corax. One word let fall by Caliban is signifi- 
 cant in view of the fact that the Bermudas 
 abounded in hogs. 
 
 Act I., Scene 2: 
 
 Caliban: And here you sty me 
 
 In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me 
 The rest of the island. 
 
 To "sty" is to keep in a hog pen. Shakespeare 
 uses the word "sty" as a verb but once. The 
 questions which the use of the word suggests 
 are: were not the hogs which abounded in the 
 Bermudas kept in such rocky places as furnished 
 them a natural shelter and "sty", or pen? anc} 
 did not this swine-cursed or swine-favored island 
 suggest,, not only the swinish character of Sy- 
 
S9 
 
 corax but also the swinish character of her 
 monstrous "freckled whelp" Caliban, and the 
 very idea of stying him "In this hard rock"? 
 
 All such expressions as "Salvage men of 
 Inde", "dead Indian", "Setebos", "men whose 
 heads stood in their breasts", are suggestive of 
 "new world" ideas, and these, taken in connec- 
 tion with Caliban's name, form, and character, 
 and with Prospero's power of enchantment, and 
 with the topography and fauna of the island, the 
 meteorological conditions prevailing in the vi- 
 cinity, the account of the shipwreck of Gates & 
 Somers, published in 1610, just before "The 
 Tempest" was written, leave little or no doubt 
 that Shakespeare had in mind the Bermudas of 
 the new world as the scene of action of his "trag- 
 ical comedy". 
 
 It may not be uninteresting, if it is not amus- 
 ing, to read a certain German critic's notes on 
 the subject of the occasion which prompted 
 Shakespeare to write "The Tempest". Dr. 
 Clement, or Klement, holds that the comedy was 
 written to celebrate the marriage of Count Pala- 
 tine and the Princess Elizabeth in i6i(2. He 
 would have us believe that Ferdinand was Count 
 Palatine; Miranda, the Princess Elizabeth; Pros- 
 pero, ICing James I; Sycorax, Queen Elizabeth; 
 and Caliban, Virginia, set forth in the nature of 
 the American Indian! 
 
 Shakespeare survived the production of "The 
 Tempest" only five years. Had he lived and 
 continued to write he might have .taken up other 
 new-world plots. One cannot but regret that 
 
90 
 
 this master mind had not dramatized some of the 
 more important beginnings of American history. 
 The illustrious achievements of Columbus; the 
 discoveries and the tragic fate of Magellan, or 
 Sir Humphrey Gilbert, or Henry Hudson; the 
 conquest of Pizzaro and Cortez with the fall of 
 the Incas and the Montezumas, — ^what a world 
 of material for the drama! Surely the legends, 
 traditions and histories which inspired "King 
 Lear", "Cymbeline", "Othello", "Macbeth", 
 "Hamlet", "Julius Caesar", and "Henry VHI." 
 furnish no better material for the dramatist's in- 
 vention than is found in those splendid and im- 
 posing events which make up the series of Amer- 
 ican discoveries, conquests and colonizations. 
 Would that to his list of incomparable and im- 
 mortal plays Shakespeare had also added 
 "Columbus", "Cortez", "Hudson", "Drake", 
 "Cabot", and had been spared to bring his 
 dramatic triumphs to a climax in the historical 
 tragedy, "Sir Walter Raleigh"!