Part 26

We have here in substance the first of the articles exhibited by the lords of the privy council and two of the judges against Wolsey. They had been unfaithfully recorded in some of our histories, but were at length printed by Lord Coke from the originals in his fourth Institute, chap. 8.

SCENE 2. Page 127.

NOR. Then, that, in all you writ to Rome, or else To foreign princes, _Ego et rex meus_ Was still inscrib'd; in which you brought the king To be your servant.

The nature of this supposed offence has been apparently misconceived by Shakspeare and others whom he might have followed. The original article against Wolsey, states, that "the Lord Cardinall of his presumptuous mind, in divers and many of his letters and instructions sent out of this realme to outward parts had joyned himself with your Grace, as in saying and writing, _The king and I would ye should do thus. The king and I doe give unto you our hearty thankes_. Whereby it is apparent that he used himself more like a fellow to your Highnes, then like a subject." Wolsey's crime therefore was not in degrading the king beneath himself, but in assuming a degree of consequence that seemed to place him on a level with his sovereign. The offensive language when put into Latin would be more striking and apt to deceive; but the idiom of the language required the above arrangement of the words.

SCENE 2. Page 128.

SUF. Then that without the knowledge Either of king or council, when you went Ambassador to the emperor, you made bold To carry into Flanders the great seal.

SUR. Item, you sent a large commission To Gregory de Cassalis, to conclude, Without the king's will, or the state's allowance, A league between his highness and Ferrara.

Both these charges seem included in the third article. "Also the said Lord Cardinall being your ambassador in France, sent a commission to Sir Gregory de Cassalis under your great seale in your grace's name to conclude a treaty of amity with the Duke of Ferrara, without any commandment or warrant of your highnes, nor your said highnesse advertised or made privy to the same."

SCENE 2. Page 129.

SUF. That out of mere ambition you have caus'd Your holy hat to be stamp'd on the king's coin.

An absurd and frivolous allegation against the unfortunate Cardinal, being the substance of the fortieth article. The episcopal privileges of coining money had been long established, and were conceded in this reign to Bainbrigge and Lee the predecessor and successor of Wolsey, as well as to the archbishops of Canterbury, Warham and Cranmer. But the great offence was placing the _Cardinal's hat_ under the king's arms, "which like deed," says the article, "hath not been seen to be done by any subject within your realm before this time." It may be asked how could it, Wolsey being the only English cardinal to whom the privilege of striking money had been granted? Nor could there be any substantial reason for regarding the cardinal's hat as more offensive than the bishop's mitre, which had already appeared on the coins of Durham.

SCENE 2. Page 129.

SUF. Lord Cardinal, the king's further pleasure is,-- Because all those things, you have done of late By your power legatine within this kingdom, Fall into the compass of a _præmunire_,-- That therefore such a writ be sued against you.

The poet was under the necessity of introducing the _præmunire_ immediately after the articles; but we learn from Cavendish that "Maister Cromwell inveighed against the byll of articles with such wittie persuasions and depe reasons that the same could take none effect. _Then were his enemyes constrained to indite him in a_ PREMUNIRE," &c.

SCENE 2. Page 131.

WOL. And when he falls, he falls like _Lucifer_.

Manifestly borrowed from that fine passage in _Isaiah_, xiv. ver. 12: "How art thou _fallen_ from heaven, O _Lucifer_, son of the morning!"

SCENE 2. Page 135.

WOL. And sleep in _dull cold_ marble.

Mr. Gray seems to have remembered this line in his _elegy_,--

"Or flattery sooth the _dull cold_ ear of death."

SCENE 2. Page 137.

WOL. Had I but serv'd my God with half the zeal I serv'd my king, he would not in mine age Have left me naked to mine enemies.

Dr. Johnson remarks, that "this sentence was really uttered by Wolsey." The _substance_ of it certainly was. The words themselves have been preserved in the valuable Life of Wolsey by _George_ Cavendish his gentleman usher, which Shakspeare might have used either in Stowe's chronicle or in manuscript; for several copies are still remaining that were transcribed in the reign of Elizabeth. Mr. Malone has already taken due notice of their very superior value, and of the omissions and interpolations in the printed editions. In the latter, the work has been abridged of many details of great curiosity with respect to the manners of the times. A new and correct edition would be well deserving of the patronage of an enlightened public. The real words uttered by Wolsey were these; "Yf I hadd served God as diligently as I have done the kinge, he wolde not have geven me over in my graye heares."

ACT V.

SCENE 3. Page 193.

MAN. ... and hit that woman, who cry'd out, _Clubs_!

It has been observed, in illustration of this practice of crying out _clubs_, that it was usually adopted in any quarrel or tumult in the streets; but it remains to point out the persons that were so called, because the watchmen's weapon was the _bill_. Stowe informs us, that "when prentizes and journeymen attended upon their masters and mistresses in the night, they went before them carrying a lanthorne and candle in their hands, and a _great long club on their neckes_."--_Annales_, p. 1040, edit. 1631. The frequency of this exclamation in nocturnal quarrels might in process of time adapt the expression to general occasion.

SCENE 4. Page 199.

It is submitted that the stage exhibition of Elizabeth's christening should be conducted according to the curious and circumstantial details of the manner in which it was really performed, to be found in Halle's _Chronicle_, and copied from him by Stowe into his _Annales_.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

PROLOGUE.

... Priam's six-gated city.

In this, as well as in Dr. Farmer's subsequent note, it might have been better to have quoted Caxton's translation of the _Recuyles or destruction of Troy_, instead of _Lydgate_. In the edition of 1607 of the former work, which, in all probability, is that used by the author of the play, the gates of Troy are thus named; _Dardan_, _Timbria_, _Helias_, _Chetas_, _Troyen_, _Antenorides_. These are nearer to the text than those in the other quotation from Lydgate, whose work the author does not seem to have consulted. Should the curious reader be desirous of seeing the manner in which Troy was formerly represented, he may be gratified by an inspection of it in its full glory; the gates inscribed with their names, and fortified with portcullises, in the edition of Jaques Milot's _Mystere de la destruction de Troye_, Lyon, 1544, folio; or in Raoul le Fevre's _Recueil des hystoires Troyennes_, Lyon, 1510, folio. This was also a favourite subject in old tapestry, a very fine and ancient specimen of which remained a long time in the painted chamber that separates the two houses of parliament, till it was removed during the repairs of Saint Stephen's chapel for the accommodation of the Irish members. A copy of it was fortunately taken by that ingenious artist, Mr. John Carter, draughtsman to the Society of Antiquaries.

ACT I.

SCENE 1. Page 223.

TRO. Thou lay'st in every gash that love hath given me The _knife_ that made it.

When poets speak of the wounds inflicted by love, they generally make the instrument to be an _arrow_; how a _knife_ came here to be introduced is not easy to account for. Is it possible that our author has transposed the old saying that _a knife cuts love_?

SCENE 3. Page 245.

NEST. ... and, anon, behold The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut, Bounding between the two moist elements, Like _Perseus' horse_.

Mr. Steevens, admitting the curiosity of his colleague's note on this passage, is unwilling to allow that its design to prove the horse of Perseus a ship, and not an animal, has been accomplished. The learned editor observes, that "Shakspeare would not have contented himself with merely comparing one ship to another;" and that "unallegorized _Pegasus_ might be fairly stiled _Perseus'_ horse, because the heroism of _Perseus_ had given him existence." That one thing is compared to another which resembles it, can surely be no solid objection to the justice of a comparison; and though the birth of the unallegorized Pegasus was doubtless the result of Perseus's bravery in conquering Medusa, it was incumbent on the objector to have demonstrated how this _horse of Perseus_ had "bounded between two moist elements," to have made good the poet's comparison. There can be no doubt that the author of the simile has alluded to the fact concerning the _ship_ Pegasus adduced by Mr. Malone; and every thing leads to the supposition that he used the _authority_ of Caxton's Troy book, though, as will be seen presently, _that_ was not the most ancient of the kind.

It is undoubtedly a well justified poetical license to compare a ship to a horse, on account of its speed. In the translation of an old Celtic ballad called _The maid's tragedy_, the monarch who pursues the flying damsel is sometimes said to traverse the waves on _an enchanted steed_; "which," say the Edinburgh reviewers, "probably arises from some equivocal expression in the original, as the Scalds term a ship the rider, and sometimes the horse of the ocean."--_Edinb. review_, 1805, p. 439.

Mr. Malone has stated in the beginning of his valuable note, that "we nowhere hear of Perseus's horse;" and that "Pegasus was the property not of Perseus but of Bellerophon." This is not quite accurate. It is certain that _Ovid_ has _not_ mounted Perseus on any horse in his combat with the monster which was to devour Andromeda; and therefore it is matter of wonder that the mythological dictionary of Chompré, and particularly that most excellent one by Lempriere, should positively affirm that he has. This error has been likewise adopted by other writers. But though classic authority be wanting that Perseus made use of a horse, Boccaccio, in his _Genealogia Deorum_, lib. xii. c. 25, has quoted Lactantius as saying, that when Perseus undertook his expedition against Gorgon, at the instance of king Polydectus, he was accompanied by the winged horse Pegasus, but not that he used him in delivering Andromeda. Boccaccio adds that others were of opinion that he had a _ship_ called Pegasus. The liberties which the old French translators of Ovid's Metamorphoses have taken, and their interpolations, are unaccountable. Some have caused Perseus at the instant of his birth, to bestride Pegasus, and travel away to Helicon. In the cuts to many of the early editions of Ovid, the designers have not only placed him on Pegasus in the adventure with Andromeda, but even in his attack upon Atlas. These facts may serve to account for the multiplied errors of artists, who, neglecting to consult proper authorities, have trusted to the erroneous examples of their predecessors. Achilles Tatius, in his third book of _The loves of Clitophon and Leucippe_, has described a picture of Perseus delivering Andromeda, in which he is made to descend by means of wings to his feet; and another on the same subject is spoken of by Lucian in his description of a house. In neither of these is there any mention of a horse.

ACT II.

SCENE 1. Page 276.

THER. ... an _assinego_ may tutor thee.

Some doubt having arisen whether an _assinego_ is an _ass_ or an _ass-driver_, the following passages from Ligon's _History of Barbadoes_, 1673, will serve to decide the question in favour of the _four-legged animal_; and demonstrate at the same time that the above term is not exclusively applied to a male ass, as Mr. Ritson had supposed. "We found it was far better for a man that had money, goods, or credit, to purchase a plantation there ready furnish'd, and stockt with servants, slaves, horses, cattle, _assinigoes_, camels, &c." And again, "And though I found at Barbadoes some who had musical minds; yet I found others, whose souls were so fixt upon, and so riveted to the earth, and the profits that arise out of it, as their souls were lifted no higher; and those men think, and have been heard to say, that three whip-sawes going all at once in a frame or pit, is the best and sweetest musick that can enter their ears; and to hear a cow of their own low, or an _assinigo bray_, no sound can please them better."--pp. 22, 107.

SCENE 3. Page 309.

ULYSS. Praise him that got thee, _she_ that gave thee suck.

This ungrammatical line, though perhaps the property of Shakspeare, might as well be corrected.

SCENE 3. Page 309.

ULYSS. Let Mars divide eternity in twain And give him half.

How Mars was to accomplish this the metaphysicians must decide. The idea is an odd compound of grandeur and absurdity. It might have turned to some account in the hands of the ingenious Edgworths.

ACT III.

SCENE 2. Page 329.

CRES. ... For to be wise, and love, Exceeds man's might; that dwells with gods above.

If this be Shakspeare's, he got it from Taverner's translation of _Publius Syrus_, at the end of _Catonis disticha_, 1553, 12mo, where it stands thus, "To be in love and to be wyse is scarce graunted to God. It is not one man's propertie both to love and also to be of a sounde mynde."

SCENE 2. Page 333.

PAN. ... let all pitiful _goers-between_ be call'd to the world's end after my name, call them all _Pandars_.

Although the above is, no doubt, the real etymology of the word _pandar_, the original use of it does not rest with Shakspeare. An earlier instance occurs in Gabriel Harvey's _Pierce's supererogation_, 1593, 4to, in which "the pandars stew" is mentioned. All other derivations must be rejected, because the term occurs in no language but our own. Nashe, in his _Have with you to Saffron Walden_, has most extravagantly deduced it from _Pandora_; and he adds that Sir Philip Sidney fetches it from Plautus. In Sir Philip's _Defence of poesie_, the author, speaking of Terence's _Gnatho_ and Chaucer's _Pandar_, says, "we now use their names to signifie their trades."

SCENE 3. Page 338.

CAL. ... But this Antenor I know is such a _wrest_ in their affairs.

If a former explanation should be thought to stand in need of further authority, the following may suffice.

In _A treatise between trouth and information_, by W. Cornishe, printed among the works of Skelton, are these lines:

"A harpe geveth sounde as it is sette, The harper may _wrest_ it untunablye; A harper with his _wrest_ may tune the harpe wrong, Mystunyng of an instrument shal hurt a true songe."

The same instrument was used for tuning other stringed instruments, as appears from the same poem:

"The claricord hath a tunely kynde, As the wyre is _wrested_ hye and lowe; So it turnyth to the players mynde, For as it is _wrested_ so must it nedes showe, Any instrument mystunyd shall hurt a trew song, Yet blame not the claricord the _wrester_ doth wrong."

Again,

"With golden strings such harmonie His harpe so sweet did _wrest_; That he reliev'd his phrenesie Whom wicked sprites possest."

Archb. Parker's _Psalter_, sign. B. 1. b.

In King James's edict against combats, &c., p. 45, is this passage, "this small instrument the tongue being kept in tune by the _wrest_ of awe," &c.

And in Swetnam's _Arraignment of women_, 1615, 4to, "They are always tempering their wits, as fidlers do their strings, who _wrest_ them so high, that many times they stretch them beyond time, tune, and reason."

ACT IV.

SCENE 5. Page 383.

ULYSS. ... set them down For sluttish spoils of opportunity, And _daughters of the game_.

This expression seems borrowed from the _maister of the game_, the ancient title of the king's game-keeper. There was also a treatise on hunting, so called, which Shakspeare had often read of, or might perhaps have seen.

ACT V.

SCENE 3. Page 425.

TRO. Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you Which better fits a _lion_ than a man.

See a preceding note pp. 189, 190.

SCENE 9. Page 444.

HECT. I am unarm'd; forego this vantage, Greek.

The author of this play, in his account of the death of Hector, has undoubtedly departed from his original; and, as it should seem, without necessity. Mr. Steevens, on this occasion, takes notice of _Lydgate's_ vehement reprehension of Homer's praise of Achilles, and of his gross violation of the characters drawn by the Grecian poet; but he has censured the wrong person. Lydgate has only followed his predecessor Guido of Colonna, who, (or perhaps the original writer Benoit de Saint More,) adopting the statement in the prologue to Dares Phrygius, appears to regard the latter as a more correct and veracious historian than Homer.

SCENE 9. Page 451.

PAN. Some _galled goose of Winchester_ would hiss.

If Mr. Mason had accidentally consulted the English part of Littelton's excellent dictionary, he would not have doubted that "any symptom of the venereal disease was called a Winchester goose."

ON THE STORY OF THIS PLAY.

Of Lollius, the supposed inventor of this story, it will become every one to speak with diffidence. Until something decisive relating to him shall occur, it is better to conclude with Mr. Tyrwhitt, that Chaucer borrowed the greatest part of his admirable story from Boccaccio's Philostrato; and that he either invented the rest altogether, or obtained it from some completer copy of the Philostrato than that which we now possess. What Dryden has said of Lollius is entirely destitute of proof, and appears to be nothing more than an inference from Chaucer's own expressions.

It would be a matter of extreme difficulty to ascertain, with any sort of precision, when and in what manner the story of Troilus and Cressida first made its appearance. Whether the author of the Philostrato was the first who detailed it so minutely as it is there found, remains to be decided; but it is certain that so much of it as relates to the departure of Cressida from Troy, and her subsequent amour with Diomed, did exist long before the time of Boccaccio. The work in which it is most known at present is the _Troy book_ of Guido of Colonna, composed in 1287, and, _as he states_, from Dares Phrygius, and Dictys Cretensis, neither of whom mentions the name of Cressida. Mr. Tyrwhitt, as it has eventually proved, had, with his usual penetration and critical acuteness, suspected that Guido's Dares was in reality an old Norman French poet named _Benoit de Saint More_, who wrote in the reign of our Henry the Second, and who himself made use of Dares. This work seems to be the earliest authority now remaining. The task which Mr. Tyrwhitt had declined, has on this occasion been submitted to; and the comparison has shown that Guido, whose performance had long been regarded as original, has only translated the Norman writer into Latin. It is most probable that he found _Benoit's_ work when he came into England, as he is recorded to have done; and that pursuing a practice too prevalent in the middle ages, he dishonestly suppressed the mention of his real original. What has been advanced by Mr. Warton and some other writers respecting an old French romance under the name of Troilus and Cressida, will not carry the story a moment higher; because this French romance is in fact nothing more than a much later performance, about the year 1400, compiled by _Pierre de Beauvau_ from the Philostrato itself. This has been strangely confounded with several other French works on the Troy story related with great variety of circumstance, all or most of which were modelled on that of Guido of Colonna or his original; citing, as they had done, the supposititious histories of Dictys and Dares. It is worth while to embrace this opportunity of mentioning, for the first time, that there is a _prose_ French version of _Benoit's_ metrical romance; but when made, or by whom, does not appear in a MS. of it transcribed at Verona in 1320.

Lydgate professedly followed Guido of Colonna, occasionally making use of and citing other authorities. In a short time afterwards _Raoul le Fevre_ compiled from various materials his _Recueil des histoires de Troye_, which was translated into English and published by Caxton; but neither of these authors has given more of the story of Troilus and Cressida than any of the other romances on the war of Troy; Lydgate contenting himself with referring to Chaucer. Of _Raoul le Fevre's_ work, often printed, there is a fine MS. in the British museum, Bibl. Reg. 17, E. II., under the title of _Hercules_, that must have belonged to Edward the Fourth, in which _Raoul's_ name is entirely and unaccountably suppressed. The above may serve as a slight sketch of the romances on the history of the wars of Troy; to describe them all particularly would fill a volume.

It remains to inquire concerning the materials that were used in the construction of this play. Mr. Steevens informs us that Shakspeare received the greatest part of them from the _Troy book of Lydgate_. It is presumed that the learned commentator would have been nearer the fact had he substituted the _Troy book or recueyl_ translated by _Caxton_ from _Raoul le Fevre_; which, together with a translation of Homer, supplied the incidents of the Trojan war. Lydgate's work was becoming obsolete, whilst the other was at this time in the prime of its vigour. From its first publication to the year 1619, it had passed through six editions, and continued to be popular even in the eighteenth century. Mr. Steevens is still less accurate in stating _Le Fevre's_ work to be a translation from Guido of Colonna; for it is only in the latter part that he has made any use of him. Yet Guido actually had a French Translator before the time of Raoul: which translation, though never printed, is remaining in MS. under the whimsical title of "La _vie_ de la _piteuse destruction_ de la noble et supellative cité de Troye le grant. Translatée en Francois lan MCCCLXXX;" and at the end it is called "Listoire _tres plaisant_ de la destruction de Troye la grant." Such part of our play as relates to the loves of Troilus and Cressida was most probably taken from Chaucer, as no other work, accessible to Shakspeare, could have supplied him with what was necessary.

TIMON OF ATHENS.

ACT I.

SCENE 1. Page 481.

Enter APEMANTUS.

"See this character of a cynic finely drawn by Lucian in his _Auction of the philosophers_; and how well Shakspeare has _copied_ it," says Dr. Warburton; who took it for granted that our author could read Lucian _out of English_. Until this can be proved, or that any English translation of the above piece existed in Shakspeare's time, we are at liberty to doubt how far Apemantus is a copy from Lucian, or rather to believe that he is a highly finished portrait after a very slight sketch by Plutarch.

ACT IV.

SCENE 3. Page 587.

TIM. She, [her] whom the spital-house and ulcerous sores Would cast the gorge at, this embalms and spices To the _April day_ again.

It had been better to have withdrawn Dr. Johnson's note, for he has entirely misconceived the meaning of this part of Timon's speech. He has mistaken the _person_ who was to be _embalmed to the April day again_, and supposed, without reason, that the wedding day is here called _April_ or _fools day_. Mr. Tollett has already corrected the first of these errors, and properly explained the _April day_ to mean the _freshness_ of youth. See a description of April from an old calendar in p. 45. The word _day_ in this instance is equivalent with _time_.

SCENE 3. Page 593.