SHTLOCK AND OTHERS SHYLOCK AND OTHERS By G. H. RADFORD $ NEW YORK.DODD, MEAD & COMPANY LONDON :T. FISHER UNWIN 1894 CONTENTS. 1 sk PAGE SHYLOCK . . . . -9 ROBIN HOOD .... 29 THE SOURCES OF HAMLET . . -57 HAMLET'S MADNESS ... 77 JOHNSON'S "IRENE" . . -95 PANTISOCRACY . . . II9 KING ARTHUR . . . .153 SOCRATES ON POLITICS . . -179 0?3 SHTLOCK SHYLOCK. It is proposed here to treat the character of Shylock as if Shakspeare was not an inspired writer. It is only courteous to make this announcement at the outset, so that those who do not care to read anything based on a hypothesis so grati- fying to the profane may skip the re- marks that follow. To such readers as remain to us we have to suggest that the people who say, or repeat the saying, that Shylock is a great creation do not for the most part know how great a creation it is. We are so familiar with the Jews as an element not to be ig- nored in our national life that we are apt to forget that for centuries the wisdom of our ancestors rigidly excluded them from this realm. For two cen- 9 u 10 SHYLOCK. turies after the Conquest, Jews had indifferent entertainment in this coun- try, and it was during this period that " by way of mild reminders That he needed coin, the Knight Day by day extracted grinders From the howling Israelite." But in the year 1290 Edward I. ex- pelled them all, and it was not till the Commonwealth that the decree of banishment was rescinded. The late Mr. J. R. Green goes a little too far when he says that from the time of Edward to that of Cromwell no Jew touched English ground. Now and then during these centuries a stray Jew, pro- tected by royal favour or stimulated by hopes of gain, found his way hither ; but in Shakspeare's time the business of Lon- don (incredible as this may appear) was transacted without any help from the Jews, and it is quite likely that Shak- SHYLOCK. II speare never saw a Jew in his life. It is, of course, possible that he may have met Roderigo Lopez, " a Portingale," who was chief physician to Queen Elizabeth, and was hanged in 1 594 on unsatisfactory evidence for attempting to poison her. Sir Edward Coke says, with the venal scurrility of the lawyers of that day, that he was " a perjured and murdering villain and Jewish doctor worse than Judas himself;" but Gabriel Harvey, a contemporary without a pro- fessional bias, says that, though descended of Jews, he was himself a Christian. Nearly twenty years earlier Lopez was physician to Leicester, who was patron to Burbage, who was Shakspeare's " fellow," so there are links for those who want to make a chain to prove that the doctor and the dramatist may have come together. However this may be, in presenting a Jew as one of the chief characters of 12 SHYLOCK. the Merchant of Venice^ Shakspeare was introducing a specimen of a species practically unknown both to the author and his audience. The Philistines among the latter no doubt held that the play was designed to inculcate by example the wisdom of our legislators in excluding the Jews from the country and the folly of the Venetians in ad- mitting them. Frenchmen, Welshmen, and other "mountain foreigners" Shak- speare knew, and in depicting Fluellen and Dr. Caius he had numerous models on which to work ; but in drawing Shylock he had to exercise his imagina- tion, probably unassisted by any living model. Shylock is therefore a creation in the same sense that Caliban is. But if there was no living model there was ample material to feed and stimulate imagination. Shakspeare knew the sacred writings of the Hebrews, and the traditional stories of the Jews de- SHYLOCK. 13 scended from the Middle Ages. More specially suggestive material was also ready to his hand in Marlowe's Jew of Malta, then newly written, and the Pecorone of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino. The former contains a powerful delinea- tion of a Jew turning with the fury of revenge on his Christian oppressors, and the latter has the very story which is followed in most of its details in Shak- speare's play. It is not known that there was any Elizabethan English translation of the Pecorone, and we are driven to the conclusion that Shakspeare had (notwithstanding his small Latin and less Greek) a facility for reading Italian, or that he had the help of a friend who had this facility. This presents an alternative that has no doubt been discussed by the New Shakspere Societv, and this Society can probably inform any inquiring Hebrew whether Shakspeare read Italian ; and why, among 14 SHYLOCK. Shakspeare relics, an edition of the Pecorone (Milano, 1558) with Shak- speare's autograph thriftily inscribed on the title page is not yet forthcoming, and when it may be expected ; and who among the poet's friends read the Peco- rone, and which of them translated at sight for his dramatisation. At any rate, Shakspeare had all this material out of which to construct his Shylock, and he, of course, used his material in his own masterly way. The marauding mind which possesses the English dramatist who has got hold of a likely foreign original was fully developed in Shakspeare, and no useful detail in Giovanni's story was left un- appropriated. The old Jew, however, is not a portrait, but a kind of grim conjecture. If Shakspeare had had the advantage of intercourse with the Jews now possessed by every playwright and journalist he would have turned out SHYLOCK. 15 something more lifelike and (possibly) more amiable. But it seems that Shakspeare's aim in the Merchant of Venice was not by any means solely to hold the mirror up to nature. This is one way of delighting an audience, but not the only one. To blend the agreeable with the sur- prising is an ancient prescription for producing the same result, and this is done in the character of Antonio, the Christian merchant who had scruples about usury and lent out his money gratis. Now, though Shakspeare did not know the Jews, he well knew the City, and that he had the City largely represented in his audience. They knew the Christian merchant, but the Christian merchant with these scruples was entirely new to them, and no doubt delighted them hugely. The statute- book shows us clearly what was the practice of merchants at this time. An 1 6 SHYLOCK. Acte against Usurie^ 13 Eliz. c. 8, de- clares that "all usurie being forbidden by the laws of God, is sinne and de- testable," but it does not make it illegal. It only declares all contracts void upon which " there shall be reserved or taken above the rate of X. pounds for the hundred for one yere." Recognising the hardness of heart of the Christian merchant, the legislature, while licensing the sin, merely sought to limit the evils of it by fixing ten per cent, as the maximum rate of interest. A house half-filled with usurers and borrowers was highlv amused by the wildly im- probable character of Antonio. But the role of Portia is still more improbable, and consequently more diverting. Allowing everything that can be demanded and granted for the O indulgence of dramatic illusion, the appearance of this young lady in a Court or Justice, which (to use an SHYLOCK. 17 Americanism) she proceeds to "run" herself, is an incident which the audience felt to be impossible, and enjoyed none the less on that account. The incident was at least as impossible in Shakspeare's time (or Giovanni's, for that matter) as it is now. Imagine Mary Anderson, primed with lines written for her (alas, it is difficult to imagine who could write them !), having borrowed Mr. Lockwood's wig and gown, sweeping into the Lord Chief Justice's Court, gently taking the case of the injured defendant out of the hands of the benign Chief who looks on amazed but quiescent while the extortionate plaintiff is not only non- suited but committed for trial at the Old Bailey — imagine all this, and you have a modern counterpart of the glorious day's work of the breezy Portia. Here is not realism but something much rarer and more delightful. This is not a 2 1 8 SHYLOCK. digression, as the learned (and courteous) reader may suppose. On the contrary it is intended to lead him by the pleasantest route to the conclusion that Shylock himself is not realistic, is not, as has been foolishly said, a libel on the Jews, but a personage whose character is determined by the requirements of the plot. Shakspeare wanted a villain vindictive enough to endanger the life and peace of the virtuous members of the cast, but not sufficiently heroic to interfere with a happy denouement^ and he devised just such a villain in Shylock. Let us consider the character in broad outlines. He is a great and prosperous merchant, and he has many and excellent reasons for the hatred of Antonio, which has become his ruling passion. The two are alien in race. This is something. The saying of the old Meynell that foreigners are fools is quoted with approval by the Christian SHYLOCK. 19 philosopher Johnson. But it is a second- rate patriotism which dubs a foreigner only a fool. Philologists tell us that hostis originally meant a foreigner ; but we only knew it at school as an enemy. It is all the same. This alone was reason enough for hatred, but there were other reasons. Antonio was a Christian, and the follower of one religion is ready to believe evil of the follower of another. " Some Jews are wicked, as all Christians are," says Marlowe's Jew of Malta. Moreover, the Jews were but tolerated in Venice for commercial reasons, and subject to persecution and indignity which only stopped short at the point where such treatment would have deprived the Republic of the commercial advantages obtained through the Tews. Difference of race, difference of religion, persecu- tion — this is enough to make Shylock hate any Christian at sight. But there 20 SHYLOCK. were special reasons for hating Antonio. It seems he had been accustomed to spit On Shylock. This is a practice which may violently stimulate even a slight antipathy. Antonio, too, was a rival in business, and while we do not forget the possibility of a Jewish reader, it is no breach of confidence to confess that fellow-Christians have quarrelled under such circumstances. The most galling incident of the rivalry appears to be that Antonio had cut down Shylock's profits as a usurer by lending money without interest, and so "brought down the rate of usance." We presume this is sound political economy : and there seems to be a suppressed proposition that the larger the number of borrowers at interest the higher the rate the lenders can exact. It does not matter, for an antipathy founded on an economic heresy is likely to be quite as strong as if based on a perfectly orthodox doctrine. SHYLOCK. 21 The conclusion does not seem as obvious as that drawn by Launcelot Gobbo, who found that if Lorenzo con- verted his Jewish bride to Christianity, he would be damned for raising the price of pork. This is a digression. To return to Shylock's antipathy. Besides the general grounds above hinted at and those arising from personal reasons, Shylock was at the moment irritated bv events for which Antonio was not to blame. His daughter Jessica had not only eloped in a tailor-made suit x with a detrimental Christian, but had carried with her quite a cargo of jewels and ready-money, and the young couple were living in Genoa on Shylock's money at the gorgeous rate of 80 ducats a night. With this respectable, old- established, and one may almost say 1 " Salarino : I for my part knew the tailor that made the wings she flew withal." — Act iii. Sc. i. 22 SHYLOCK. reasonable hatred intensified by Jessica's conduct, Shylock suddenly finds himself in a position to take revenge. Antonio has made default in payment on the day, and Shvlock is entitled to exact the forfeiture, "a pound of flesh to be by him cut ofF nearest the merchant's heart." He can kill his enemy, as he understands the laws of Venice, without incurring any risk of injury to himself. The temptation was great. There are several Christian merchants of blameless character (we mean they have never been in prison) at whose mercy we should be very sorry to be under similar circumstances. Shylock was ready to strike the blow. It was not murder, as he was advised, but justice. He could have Antonio's life without as much as standing an action for assault and battery. It was true that by so doing he would not recover the 3000 ducats secured by the bond, but he was ready SHYLOCK. 23 to submit to this loss and even to forego the handsome profit held out by- Antonio's friends who offered thrice the principal for his release. Shylock was avaricious, but his revenge rises superior to his avarice : he will not be balked of his revenge for money. This is the noblest point in his not very noble character. He refuses the cash and stands for the law. But it is always risky to rely on a strict view of the law when the court is dead against you on the merits. The judge, or even the jury, will lay hold of some quibble to justify a finding adverse to a suitor of whose conduct they disapprove. Such a quibble was raised by Portia on the language of the bond. It had not been drawn by an Equity draughtsman of the old school, in which case it would no doubt have stipulated that the creditor was entitled not only to the pound of flesh, but also to the epidermis, carti- 24 SHYLOCK. lages, arteries, veins, capillaries, blood or sanguinary fluid, and all other appur- tenances thereunto belonging or there- with usually held and enjoyed. This careless draughtsmanship enabled the Court, in accordance with its inclinations, to hold that Shylock was entitled to no drop of blood. The plaintiff was baffled by this quibble. By shedding a drop of blood he would break the law and commit a capital offence. He was not prepared to run this risk. His desire for revenge is strong enough to make him unusually indifferent to money, but not strong enough to make him regard- less of his life. This is not the revenge of tragedy, and Shylock is not a hero, though the vanity of certain modern actors has exalted the character to such a pitch that they cannot "climb down '* in the fourth act without being ridicu- lous. But Shakspeare's Shylock climbs down without absurdity and with reason- SHYLOCK. 25 able alacrity. He is the serviceable villain, serviceable, that is, for the action of the play, who has frightened the ladies by whetting his knife, and now gratifies them by dropping (reluctantly) all thoughts of bloodshed. Antonio must be saved. The pains and penalties with which Shylock is threatened by the Bench effectually secure this end. Then comes retribution. Both the life and fortune of Shylock, according to the laws of Venice, are held to be forfeited. But it would be distressing to kill him, and his life is spared on condition that he becomes a Christian and gives up the bulk of his fortune. Shylock accepts the terms imposed on him. He appears only to retain a life interest in half his property, and the whole of it is to go on his death to the gentleman who lately stole his daughter. Shylock leaves the stage promising to execute the necessary documents, and we hear of 26 SHYLOCK. him no more. What became of him subsequently is merely matter of con- jecture, but his conduct in court justifies us in inferring that he accepted the inevitable and made the best of it. Had he lived in our day we might conjecturally sketch his subsequent career thus : His baptism was performed with pomp in a historic temple by a distinguished ecclesiastic who knows that there is Eternal Hope for Jews if not for pub- lishers. His marriage later on with a Dowager Countess who largely endowed the Society for Propagation of the Gospel among the Jews made his social position impregnable, and the money he subsequently made by publishing a financial newspaper far exceeded any- thing ever acquired by him in his old profession of usury. ROBIN HOOD ROBIN HOOD. The late Lord Sherbrooke once re- marked that the Robin Hood ballads were perhaps the most worthless mass of literature in the world. As we cheerfully acknowledge the force of the maxim de mortuis nil nisi bonum^ we at once admit that this remark was made before he was ennobled, and we have no reason to believe that he ever re- peated it in his coronet. We will not attempt to classify the worthless in literature, but will take leave to exclude the Robin Hood ballads from the cate- gory. We find in them many good things — history, law, manners, and a vivid picture of a boisterous life that has vanished from this island. But 29 30 R.0BIN HOOD. Robin Hood has a capacity for exciting animosity in certain minds. The good Bishop Latimer denounced him as a traitor and a thief when he came by appointment to preach a sermon on May day at a certain church 'and found the church door fast locked, and the company, which he thought would have been great, gone abroad " to gather for Robin Hood." In these later days the critics have attacked him, and have proved to their satisfaction that he never existed. In the practice of their melancholy profession they are unmoved by the testimony of tradition, and of historians, poets, and playwrights ex- tending: over several centuries. It mav O J fairly be said that the effect of this mass of testimony has been to produce in the mind of Englishmen a picture of Robin Hood as distinct and familiar as that of Julius Caesar or William the Conqueror, and it is a marvellous thine that this ROBIN HOOD. 31 hero, whose form and feats have been familiar to our people for generations, should now be proved a myth by critics and lexicographers whose form and feats are unknown — creatures of whom no picture is possible — of such tenuity that they tremble on the brink of nothing, and for whom Oblivion is yawning. They know that he is a myth, and, not only this, they know what particular species of myth he is. He is not a sun- myth, and, therefore, to identify him with the dawn, or the five-o'clock tea, is almost as great a heresy as to believe in his objective existence. Nor is he a degraded manifestation of Odin, the Norse god. But he is — and this is the true faith — the wood-elf of the Teutonic folk-lore — freely treated. The seeker after truth is asked to believe, in support of this view, that the hero's name is a corruption of Robin "o' the wood." We leave this seeker to the tender 32 ROBIN HOOD. mercies of philologists, and approach the consideration of the subject with that combination of robust faith and active reason which distinguishes the Anglican Divine. Relying on our reason we distinguish between the canonical and the apocryphal books of this cult, and place first among the former the Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode^ which was printed by Wynkyn de Worde when Henry VII. was king, and probably in the year 1495. There is frequently a doubt as to the precise date of a MS., which gives critics an opportunity of differing by a century or two, but there is little or none as to the date of the printing of a book. The most sceptical, therefore, must admit that we have in the Lytell Geste a portrait of Robin Hood as he was known in the fifteenth century. Sut Wynkyn de Worde is open to the same charge that is made by Gibbon against his master Caxton — that he ROBIN HOOD. 33 " was reduced to comply with the vicious taste of his readers." In other words, he printed books regardless of their merit, but with a keen regard to the demand for them. These publishers, like their successors, printed what their public wanted, and their public wanted what they knew and appreciated. So that old favourites which were known only in MS., or in song, or by anec- dote, were put under the press, and among such old favourites was the Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode. Andrew Myllar, of Edinburgh, must be tarred with the same brush as Wynkyn de Worde, for he published an edition in 1508. How long the Lytell Geste was written or recited before it was printed is a difficult question, but there are numerous indications in its language and its law and manners that it was a very old story before Wynkyn de Worde tackled it. More than a century earlier 3 34 ROBIN HOOD. (about 1377) the author of Piers Plow- man speaks of " Rymes of Robyn Hood," so that we know that he was a hero of song at any rate as early as the fourteenth century. But the question we desire to grapple with is, how long before the fourteenth century did Robin Hood live? Hamlet was in a cynical mood when he told Ophelia that there's hope a great man's memory may out- live his life half a year — if he builds churches. Robin Hood did qualify himself for remembrance by building (of this hereafter) ; but a great man's memory really lasts much longer. Sir Edward Coke, a sufficiently grave au- thority who was three centuries nearer than we are to the tempus in quo^ says that " this Robin Hood lived in the time of Richard the First." Sir Walter Scott adopted this view, and we have no desire to disturb it, though we confess that it involves some difficulties. ROBIN HOOD. 35 We do not rely on the juxtaposition, in a poem of uncertain date, of Richard and Robin as " two pretty men ; " but the evidence (for what it is worth) looks the same way. An old writer says : — " There's mony ane sings o' grass o' grass There's mony ane sings o' corn : There's mony ane sings o' Robin Hood Kens little whar' he was born." Those who don't know exactly when he was born are equally numerous. We cannot be very certain, " but a man's reach ' in historical inquiries such as this " should exceed his grasp," else of what use is the robust faith with which we have equipped ourselves ? But while we admit that Robin Hood lived and flourished nearly two cen- turies before we have any record of him, we do not abdicate our reason. We can therefore only admire, without sharing, the simple faith of good old 36 ROBIN HOOD. Ritson, who believes in Maid Marian and Friar Tuck, and that Robin Hood was Earl of Huntingdon. The latter belief rests on a pedigree obviously forged. Little John, and Scarlet, and Much the Miller's son, and Gilbert of the White Hand we may believe to have been Robin's companions, but there is no satisfactory evidence about Maid Marian and Friar Tuck. Neither of these is mentioned in the LytellGeste^ and the earliest mention that has been discovered of the maiden is about the year 1500, and Friar Tuck does not show himself in connection with Robin Hood till the seventeenth century. They are gracious figures, and we exclude them with regret from the region of history, consoling ourselves with the knowledge that they pass into that pleasant land where dwell Cin- derella and Falstaff and the other im- mortal unrealities. ROBIN HOOD. 37 There is, however, a second historical question, which we regard as of more importance than the former, and that is, what sort of man was the Robin Hood of the ballads in which our fore- fathers delighted for many generations ? and what was the story they heard from the minstrels and read before printing was invented ? If you know a people's hero you know something important about them. The hero will not have qualities that his worshippers despise. His exploits will be such as they would perform if they could, and his faults will be such as they are tolerant of. When an indictment of the kind that Edmund Burke shrank from is prepared against this people, Mr. Mudie's library will afford a large part of the incriminating material. We are not, of course, as- serting that Robin Hood was Old England's only hero. But that he was one of them, and one of the most 38 ROBIN HOOD. popular, will not be denied by the critics who deny that he ever existed. The Lytell Geste enables us to give some answer to the question we have propounded. First as to the story. Robin Hood was an outlaw and a bandit who lived in the green-wood with a trusty troop of followers and had a lodge at Barnysdale. There he one day entertained Sir Richard at the Lee, whose estate was at Wierysdale and was worth ^400 a year. Sir Richard was exceeding sorrowful, and the cause of his sorrow was that he had borrowed ^400 of the Abbot of St. Mary's, at York, and had set his lands in pledge to him to secure the return of the money at a certain day, which fell on the morrow of his dining in the forest. Robin Hood no sooner knew of his distress than he lent him ^400, and Little John told it out to him by " two-and-twenty score." This liberal ROBIN HOOD. 39 reckoning with a borrower pleased our forefathers, as it does our children now. But Robin had some instinct of busi- ness, and before he parted with the money he suggested sureties for its repayment. Sadly the knight replies that he has none to offer except Our Dear Lady. This is enough for Robin, and he declares that if you search all England through he knows not " a moch better borowe." So the knight rides away to St. Mary's Abbey with the money, and arrives there before the day for payment is spent. In the hall is the Abbot, eagerly hoping that the knight will make default, the Prior, and the High Cellarer. Moreover, the " High Justice of England ' : is there, and he has been retained by the Abbot, " both with cloth and fee," to do justice between the Abbot and Sir Richard. The latter conceals his money and professes poverty. He has come to pray 40 ROBIN HOOD. for a longer day. The Abbot is de- lighted, for he looks forward to ac- quiring the lands of Sir Richard in discharge of his loan. They are worth ^400 a year, and he will thus acquire them at one year's purchase ! He refuses to extend the time, and the High Justice tells Sir Richard that his "day is broke," and that he will not get his land. The legal reader will observe that the law thus laid down is extremely un- familiar and archaic, but it is quite sound. There was no " equity of redemption " in the good old days. The borrower granted his land to the lender on condition that it should be granted back by the latter if the loan was repaid on the day agreed. If the money was not repaid on the day, the condition was not complied with, and the land, however great in value, re- mained the absolute property of the ROBIN HOOD. 41 lender. It was to prevent extortion in such cases as this that the Chancellor intervened with doctrines of Equity, and laid down the maxim, " Once a mortgage always a mortgage." Sir Richard lived before the Chancellor's intervention so he can only beg the Abbot to hold the lands until he has raised the ^400 out of the rents. This, too, the Abbot refuses. Like Shylock he stands there for the law. The Justice is on his side, but proposes that he shall advance a further sum, and that Sir Richard in return shall give him a "release," else the Justice thinks the Abbot will never hold the lands in peace. The Abbot is reluctant, but consents to advance another ^100. The Justice suggest ^200, but before the Abbot has time to reply the affair takes a new turn. The Knight, who has all this time been kneeling as a suppliant before his creditor, now starts 42 ROBIN HOOD. up, goes to a round table and shakes out of a bag the ^400 required. The Abbot is bitterly disappointed. He has mentally appropriated the Knight's lands and now that he only gets his money back he feels that he is robbed and plundered. Then to save some- thing out of the wreck of his hopes, he begs the Justice to return his gold. " Not a penny ! " says the Justice with an impressive oath. Sir Richard has the last word at this conference : — " Syr Abbot, and ye men of lawe Now have I holde my daye, Now shall I have my londe agayne For ought that you can saye." So he departs singing to his home, and there lives quietly till he has saved out of his rents enough to repay Robin Hood the ^400. He has his year for repayment, and the place for repayment is under the same tree in Barnysdale where the money was lent. The day ROBIN HOOD. 43 has come and Robin Hood sends Little John, Much, and Scathelock out to look for Sir Richard and bring him home to dine. They do not meet Sir Richard, but fall in with two Black Monks (Benedictines), one of whom is the "fat-heded monke," the High Cellarer of St. Mary's, York, and they are on their way to London accom- panied by fifty-two men and seven sumpter horses. After a little skilful archery on the part of Much and Little John the escort take to their heels, and the obese monk is led back to dine with Robin Hood. After dinner Robin Hood suggests, as he generally did, that his guest shall pay for his entertain- ment. The monk says he has only "twenty marke." Robin Hood says if this is true he will not take a penny, and will lend him any more that he may need, but he does not accept the state- ment without verifying it. The monk's 44 ROBIN HOOD. " mail " is searched and found to hold j£8oo and more. Robin asks the monk whence he comes, and he replies from St. Mary's. This reminds Robin that She was surety for a little money he lent a year ago to Sir Richard, and he trusted to Her for payment. She has been an excellent surety, and sent her servant the Cellarer with double the amount. Robin Hood accepts, or rather retains, it thankfully, and sends away the Monk empty but heavy of heart. He says : — " Me reweth I cum so nere For better chepe I myght have dyned In Blythe or in Dankestere." Later in the day Sir Richard arrives. He has been delayed by stopping to save from foul play a notable wrestler. He has brought the money and " a poor present" for Robin Hood and all his merry men : a hundred bows, and a ROBIN HOOD. 45 hundred sheaves of arrows, each an ell long, feathered with peacock and notched with silver. Robin assures him that the money has been already paid, and tells him with laughter the story of the fat-headed monk. It would be a shame to take the money twice, so he will have nothing from Sir Richard. Indeed he will take nothing more than his loan, and as Our Lady of her bounty has overpaid him ^400 he makes him a present of this sum. Robin will take no refusal, so Sir Richard takes the money, and the two part the best of friends. Sir Richard proves himself a fast friend when Robin Hood is in need of one later on. We have given the outline of the story thus far to show the kind of tale that pleased our forefathers in the fifteenth century or earlier. In our opinion the plot is ingenious, and the story at least as diverting as that of 46 ROBIN HOOD. some of our present novels and come- dies. We pass on now to the character of Robin Hood, again not so much for his sake as for the sake of the characters of our forefathers. It has been said that only Germany could make a professor a hero. England has certainly never done so. But she has made a hero of a forester and an outlaw, who adorns his profession with excellent qualities, being not only brave, playful, adventurous, humane and chivalrous, but extremely loyal and pious to a fault. His piety was perhaps, all things considered, his most striking quality. He built a chapel at Barnysdale, and dedicated it to Mary Magdalene, and it was a longing to get back there to worship that induced him to leave the King's Court where he was highly honoured. Not- withstanding the arduous duties of his profession, he observed punctually in the green-wood the offices of religion. ROBIN HOOD. 47 " A good maner then had Robyn, In londe where that he were, Every day or he woulde dyne Three messes wolde he here : The one in worship of the fader The other of the holy goost The thyrde was of our dere lady That he loved of all other moste." And so punctilious was he in this matter that he refused to leave mass half-said merely because the Sheriff had discovered his retreat and surrounded him while at prayers with the posse comitatus. This story is told by Fordun, who wrote about the middle of the fourteenth century ; and he adds that Robin Hood after the service was ended overcame his enemies with extraordinary facility and endowed with their spoils the church where he had worshipped. The Virgin was especially his patron saint, and the immunity of women in his forays is connected with this fact. " Robyn loved our dere lady. For doute of dedely synne 48 ROBIN HOOD. Wolde he never do company harme That ony woman was ynne." It will be remembered that he lent Sir Richard liberally on his proposing " our dere lady " as surety, and he says very frankly that he would have declined the operation if the security proposed had been that of some other saint of good standing, such as " Peter, Poule or Johan." When Sir Richard goes away to keep his day with the Abbot, Robin Hood gives him a good horse for the reason that " he is our ladyes messengere." In another place he says : — " For god is holde a ryghtwys man. And so is his dame." But there was something idiosyncratic, and as it were eclectic, about Robin Hood's piety. While he dedicated his chapel to the Magdalene, and while Our Lady was his special patroness, when he ROBIN HOOD. 49 had occasion to swear his usual oath was " by dere worthy god." This ex- pression may be criticised by some of the disciples of St. Ernulphus, the great master in this art, as slight and thin, but on the whole it will be regarded by most amateurs as ample and dignified. It compares favourably in tone and volume with the King's "By St. Austyn ! " and Sir Richard's « By St. Quinton ! " Robin Hood's devo- tion was accompanied by an aversion to the Clergy, especially of the higher orders. Whether he hated them, as Tennyson suggests, " for playing upside down with Holy Writ," we do not know. But while he warns his followers to do no harm to husbandman or knight or squire " that wolde be a good felawe," he does not bid them spare the Clergy. On the contrary he says : — " These bysshoppes, and thyse archebysshoppes Ye shall them bete and bynde." 50 ROBIN HOOD. And in his raids and expeditions he always considered as fair game an Abbot or a fat-headed monk. There is no necessary inconsistency here, for the lives of the clergy may not have been blameless. Robin Hood was in this matter like the great majority of our French neighbours of to-day, Catholic but Anti-clerical. Though an outlaw his loyalty was genuine and unquestionable. To the Stranger in a cowl he says : — " I love no man in all the worlde So well as I do my kynge." and he kneels, not only before the King when there is opportunity, but before the King's seal which the stranger pro- duces, and welcomes and entertains him " for the love of my kynge." When the King is made known to him in the Forest, Robin does him no harm, though the King has only five knights and ROBIN HOOD. 51 Robin seven-score archers, all men of whom the King said : — " His men are more at his byddinge Then my men be at myn." Robin Hood begs grace of the King for himself and his men. This is granted, and Robin Hood and all his merry men enter the King's service and return with him to his Court. It must be confessed that this loyalty to the King's person did not produce any respect for the King's game laws, nor prevent Robin Hood and his band from living on the King's deer. He confesses it : — " We be yemen of this foreste Under the greene wode tre, We live by our kynges dere, Other shyft have not we." Nor did this loyalty extend to the King's officers, or protect the Sheriff of Nottingham from Robin Hood's just revenge. 52 ROBIN HOOD. " He smote of the sheryves hede With his bryght bronde." saying, after the decapitation : — " Lye thou there, thou proud sheryf Evyll mote thou thryve , There might no man to the trust The whyles thou were alyve." If this combination of loyalty and turbulence is not chronic with our countrymen, it is perhaps characteristic of the age when Robin lived. But it is Robin Hood's practical ex- periments with the problem of property that have attracted more attention than anything else that is recorded of him. He is said to have robbed the rich to give the poor. Tennyson makes him say: — " I am a thief, ay, and a king of thieves Ay ! but we rob the robber, wrong the wronger And what we wring from them we give the poor." His method is thus described by Major ROBIN HOOD. 53 in his Britannice Historia^ printed at Paris in 1521. "About this time, as I think Robert Hood and Little John the notorious thieves lurked in the forests only plundering the goods of the rich. They killed no one unless he attacked them or resisted them in pro- tection of his property. Robert main- tained a hundred archers very apt for rapine, whom four hundred of the strongest men dared not attack. He allowed no woman to be maltreated ; nor ever took anything from the poor, but charitably fed them with the wealth he drew from the Abbots. I disapprove of the robbery of the man, but he was the most humane and the prince of all robbers." The last lines of the Lytell Gesie are : — " Cryst have mercy on his soule That dyed on the rode ! For he was a good outlawe And dyde pore men moch god." 54 ROBIN HOOD. It is clear that in following his profes- sion he showed some discrimination and did not consider all booty legitimate profit. His revenues were derived from those who could supply funds without suffering distress, and his expenditure was designed to alleviate the distresses of the poor. If any inference may be drawn from the character of their hero to that of our forefathers, we may take it that they were Catholic but anti-clerical, loyal but rowdy, and disposed to redress some- what roughly the inequalities of fortune. THE SOURCES OF HAMLET X THE SOURCES OF HAMLET, A young man who had recently seen Hamlet on the stage remarked by way of explaining and qualifying his admira- tion of the performance : "But then I had read the play ! ' We do not quote this dramatic critic for the purpose of denying his implied proposition that it is an advantage to have read a play before seeing it, but to introduce a remark of a similar character, namely, that it is an advantage to a student of Hamlet to have previously read the Danish History of Saxo Gram- maticus. There the reader will find the very names of Hamlet and Ger- trude (disguised as Amlethus and Gerutha), and most of the incidents of 57 58 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." the plot : for instance, the murder of the King of Denmark by his brother ; the brother's usurpation and his mar- riage with the late king's widow ; Hamlet's feigned madness, and his kill- ing the lurking counsellor, and his harangue to his mother ; the dispatch of Hamlet to England, his discovery of the king's crafty letter, and his substitu- tion of another letter effecting the de- struction of his two companions. We do not overlook the points in which the play differs from the history ; but that the plot of the play is substantially taken from the old story does not admit of the smallest doubt. Now Saxo Grammaticus was born in the middle of the twelfth century, and his Danorum Regum Heroumque His- toric? was first printed at Paris in 15 14, in a handsome folio by the celebrated Josse Bade d'Asch. There was an edi- tion printed at Basle in 1534, and THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 59 another at Frankfort in 1576, so that the work was in type in three impres- sions, and accessible for the dramatist in 1600, or thereabouts, when the play was written. Shakspeare's " small Latin " may have caused a difficulty in the handling of Saxo, but even if this was so, he might, as he appears to have done in other cases, have got a learned friend to help him to extract from an unfamiliar language the rough material of his art. But there is a more likely theory than this. In the year 1576 the story was printed in French (a much more tractable tongue) in the fifth volume of Histotres Tragiques of Fran- cois Belleforest, who loosely translated and copiously expanded Saxo's narrative. This volume appears to have been first printed at Lyons by Benoist Rigaud, and was again printed at Paris in 1582 by Gabriel Buon. Shakspeare may have got hold of either of these neat 60 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." little i6mo volumes, and with or with- out the assistance of a learned friend have taken the whole story out of the French version. It is not unpleasing to imagine the playwright seated in a tavern (say the " Boar's Head "), with a companion skilled in the tongues, turn- ing over the folio and the dumpy i6mos and digging out the plot by degrees from the Latin and the French. We think this exercise of the imagination legitimate ; but we cannot recommend it as an infallible implement for ascer- taining historical truth. Indeed, there is no doubt that Shak- speare was not the first to avail himself of the material thus at hand. An un- known author, whose work has perished, wrote a play of Hamlet^ which was on the boards as early as 1589, and there is good reason to believe that Shakspeare was familiar with this play. At any rate, it was acted at Newington Butts THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET. ' 6l in June, 1594, by the Lord Admiral's players and the Lord Chamberlain's players, and Shakspeare belonged to the latter company. It is clear, therefore, that when Shak- speare wrote his Hamlet^ he had no less than three sources from which he may have procured his plot : the Latin history of Saxo Grammaticus, the French version of Belleforest, and the old English play that has been lost. The question from which of these sources Shakspeare drew his plot is, like so many Shakspearian questions, incapable of an unanswerable answer. But we believe Shakspeare was indebted mainly, if not exclusively, to the old play, and we propose to give a reason or two for our belief. In the first place, there is no positive evidence that Shakspeare ever read any of the versions of the history, nor is any inference to that effect to be drawn from Shak- 62 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." speare's Hamlet. But it is extremely unlikely that a new play and a popular one should be acted in London without coming to the knowledge of an active playwright and actor, and when we know that it was acted by Shakspeare's own company, the improbability be- comes extreme. Indeed, there is no wild improbability in the suggestion that Shakspeare may have acted in the old Ha?nlet himself. We are, there- fore, practically sure that he knew the old play, but we cannot be sure that he knew the histories. The second reason for our belief is this, that there was a ghost in the old play, for we know from Dr. Lodge's Wit's Miserie and the Worlds Madnesse, Discovering the Devils Incarnate of this Age (we cannot resist the temptation to quote the full title), published in 1596, that the ghost was pale and miserably cried, like an oister wife, Hamlet re- THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 63 venge ! While there is much that is incredible in Saxo, and his imitator, there is no ghost, nothing indeed of that species of the incredible which is called the Supernatural. It is clear, therefore, that Shakspeare borrowed the ghost from the old play, and from the same source we can easily believe he borrowed anything else that he wanted. How much Shakspeare was indebted to a play that is lost it is impossible to say, for all the researches of all the Shakspearian chiffonniers have only recovered a few sentences of it. The probability is that the old play followed closely the story on which it was founded, with this important departure, that the murder of the king was not made known by the usual methods, but revealed to Hamlet by the ghost. As- suming this Shakspeare had in the old play the incidents which are common 64 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET. to his Hamlet and Saxo's story plus the revelation of the ghost. The plot was, therefore, ready-made, and the chief part of what he added was the human character of the drarnatis persona. The most ingenuous reader will not suppose that in thus tracing, or en- deavouring to trace, the source of the play, we are disparaging Shakspeare. This would be to misapprehend Shak- speare's object, which was not to write a play with an original plot, but to dramatise a well-known subject. We know that he borrowed freely and openly. North's Plutarch and Holins- hed's Chronicle were laid under contri- bution for several plays, so were several Italian Romances, and no author could claim immunity who had a good story in his published works. There are, we know, a number of earnest readers who are absolutely indifferent to all such questions as that now under considera- THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 65 tion. To them the only question of interest is : what light does Shakspeare throw on the problems of life or on the recesses of the human mind ? We are not just now writing for such persons ; but even for them the question of the source of the play- becomes important if, as is the case here, the source imposes conditions on the dramatist. It may be safely alleged that the character and actions of Shak- speare's Hamlet are partly what they are because of the previous delineation of them by Saxo. The dramatist had not an absolutely free hand in his work. He had to supply the playgoers with a version of a character with which they were familiar in a story which they knew, and while Shakspeare deviated from his original in numerous and im- portant particulars, he was bound by the conditions of his work to preserve what were considered the essential features 5 66 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." of the story. Thus it was imperative that Hamlet should pretend to be mad. But in proportion as Shakspeare and the older dramatist before him had humanised and Christianised the bloody and barbarous ruffians of the Danish story, the reason for feigning madness became less obvious, and Dr. John- son says (writing in 1765): "Of the feigned madness of Hamlet there appears no adequate cause, for he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity." The same thought has occurred to many a play- goer who has never read Johnson's criticism, and the criticism is just. But the feigned madness is the basis or the whole story in Saxo. In writing his not over true history he was perhaps thinking of Lucius Junius Brutus, who escaped from Tarquin's vengeance by feigning idiotcy, or of David who eluded Saul by the same device. It was by THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 67 feigning madness that Hamlet saved his life, and concealed his designs of revenge. The pretended madness was equally the motif 'of Belleforest's story, and doubtless also of the play founded on it. It was, therefore, a compulsory legacy left to Shakspeare by the previous dramatist. Hamlet would not have been recognised as Hamlet if he had not feigned insanity. So Shakspeare made Hamlet dissemble, though he, doubtless before he had finished his play, anticipated Johnson's criticism. He had to give us such a character as Hamlet as was compatible with his feigning madness, and he made him do so not for the purpose of saving his life, but that he might improve his opportunities of keeping watch on his father's murderer. He does not seem to have gained much by this device ; but if the view above expressed be cor- rect, the limitation imposed on Shak- speare by his sources is matter of interest 68 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." to the most earnest and transcendental of students. It is necessary in treating of the sources of Hamlet to say something of the Historie of Hamblet^ a translation of Belleforest's story which was im- printed by Richard Bradock for Thomas Pavier in 1608. As this is some years later than the writing and even the acting of Shakspeare's play, it is not easy to understand how it could ever have been considered a source of the play. But it was maintained by several Shakspearians, and particularly by the late John Payne Collier, that the edition of 1608 was a reprint of an edition several years older. The sup- posititious earlier edition has never been seen, but Collier committed himself to a belief in its existence in his Shak- speare's Library^ published in 1841, and he stuck firmly to the belief to which he was thus committed. When editing THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 69 the Trevelyan Papers for the Camden Society in 1863, he published an ex- tract from an account of disbursements made in the year 1595, containing the item, " HambleH's Hist or ie 6^." This item appeared to be a surprising verification of the conjecture he had formed more than twenty years before, and to give a quietus to his enemies, who had maintained that 1608 was the vear of the first publication of the History. But alas for truth and virtue ! There is reason to believe that the entry in the Trevelyan Papers was forged. For this was Collier's way. Not content to rely on his unsurpassed knowledge of everything relating to Shakspeare, he acquired a habit of making evidence in support of his theories by tampering with historical documents, and inter- polating passages in a simulated hand- 70 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." writing, to confirm the opinions he had expressed in controversy. It has been sadly remarked that no quotation made by him is to be accepted without verification. Let the incipient Shak- spearian beware. Shakspeare is an ab- sorbing cult, and the study of original documents is fascinating, and destroys all the moral sense. Just as cer- tain priests, at a time when they had a monopoly of the art of writing, were carried by a zeal for their order into the sin of forging charters of donation and decrees of the Councils, so the hardened Shakspearian contro- versialist makes false entries in sixteenth century writings, and swears in the journals of his society, and even in courts of law, that such entries are part of the original text. This allegation of Collier's being dis- posed of, there is no evidence whatever that the Hhtorie appeared before 1608, THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET. J I but it is a curious fact that in the Historie the anonymous courtier, and in Shakspeare's play Polonius, is made to hide behind the arras, and Hamlet in the act of stabbing him exclaims, " A rat, a rat ! " In the French version Polonius hides under a counterpane in the Queen's bedroom, and Hamlet stabs him without uttering any articu- late sound. It is clear, therefore, that Shakspeare did not take these points from Belleforest, and also that Shak- speare, or the English translator, borrowed from the other or from the old English play. The use of the arras for conceal- ment is an obvious device of the stage. It was not a novelty in Shakspeare's hands when he wrote his Hamlet. He had certainly used it in four previous plays. Did not the arras conceal (or conceal pro tanto, as the lawyers say), Sir John Falstaff in Mistress Ford's chamber when Mistress Page entered undesired, 72 THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." and again at Mistress Quickley's when the Sheriff and all the watch were at the door ? Borachio lurked behind the arras in Much Ado about Nothing, and the executioner in King yohn. Shak- speare did not need to borrow this idea from a barren rascal of a translator. The English translation is literal and faithful, except where the author's French ran short (as in the curious instance where he renders bucher (block) by nosegay), and the incident of the arras is apparently the only voluntary departure from the original. But having regard to the known date of publication of the two works, the in- ference clearly is that the translator borrowed from the playwright. The translator, in fact, like the dramatic critic we quoted at starting, had read the play, or seen it acted, and enlivened his tedious work by inserting this dramatic incident. It is most likely THE SOURCES OF " HAMLET." 73 that the popularity of Hamlet caused an interest in the " sources " at that early- date, and that for that reason Thomas Pavier saw his way to sell a translation of Belleforest to the curious. This idea of drawing money from playgoers is prevalent among booksellers to this day, and it is notorious that Henry Irving's performance of Ravenswood caused a large demand for Scott's Bride of Lammermoor. It is even possible that the sale of this little volume may be stimulated by the next run of Hamlet. HAMLETS MADNESS 31L R HZ \y^A~ 02& HAMLET'S MADNESS. A controversy has been raging for a hundred and fifty years or so as to whether Hamlet was really mad or only pretending. It is true that the con- troversy has had a limited area. The mass of Englishmen have gone on reading Hamlet almost as constantly and attentively as their Bible, and they have never suspected it to be a study in mental disease. On the contrary, they have looked on Hamlet as a philosopher, and have listened with appro al while their divines, statesmen, and critics have quoted Hamlet's sayings, not as ravings of a lunatic, but as words of profound wisdom. The controversy has been mainly confined to a section of the 77 • 78 hamlet's madness. learned and curious, known as Shak- spearian Scholars, and among them it has been very severe. This is how it happened. Aaron Hill, in his Prompter, published in 1735, asserted that besides Hamlet's assumed insanity there was in him a melancholy which bordered on madness. Later on Dr. Akenside, who wrote the Pleasures of Imagination, and died in 1770, one day suggested to Stevens that " the conduct of Hamlet was every way unnatural and indefen- sible unless he were regarded as a young man whose intellects were in some degree impaired by his own misfor- tunes." This was enough to open the debate which has continued ever since. The contention that Hamlet was really mad has been mainly supported by doctors who are experts in mental alienation, and they have been answered by writers who have no such special knowledge, but who, nevertheless, ven- —*» hamlet's madness. 79 lure to have a decided opinion. The debate has reached such a point, that Dr. Furness, in his excellent variorum edition or Hamlet, gives up forty large octavo pages to the discussion of what he calls " the one great insoluble mystery of Hamlet's sanity." " Beyond all things a baby, Is to the school-girl dear," and an editor may be excused for hugging .i mystery when he can find one ; but in our opinion there is no mystery, soluble or insoluble, in this case ; and we invite the patient reader to consider the matter m the hope that he may come to our conclusion, which is that Hamlet is at least as sane as any of his critics. I he experts have a difficult case to .! with because the patient plainly • • - es insanity. ' V, ;,'i } j im i C { W ronged Laertes ? Never Hamlet. II Hamlet from himself be ta'en away, 80 hamlet's madness. And when he's not himself, does wrong Laertes, Then Himlet does it not : Hamlet denies it. Who does it then ? His madness." This kind of confession is, we think, unusual with madmen ; but the expert will probably infer insanity from the patient's confession as readily as from his denial. Here is an unpleasant dilemma, which makes us fear for the safety of any one who comes under the diagnosis of a mad doctor. In order to put the matter in a fresh light, and to reassure the reader as to the condition of his own intellect, we propose to approach the question from the standpoint of another, namely, the legal profession. Let us suppose that Hamlet is on his trial for the murder of Polonius, and that his counsel, see- ing the case to be otherwise hopeless, raises the defence of insani /. In this course counsel would, of course, have the assistance of all the expert evidence that hamlet's madness. 8 1 money could procure. Eccentricity of conduct could without difficulty be proved, and illusions would be alleged on sufficient evidence, particularly that he had more than once seen and con- versed with his father's ghost. The evidence of his mother, that he said he saw and listened to the voice of this • spectre in her chamber, when she, being present, heard and saw nothing, would be grave and material. And something would be sought to be made of the •evidence that on one occasion he mis- took the deceased for a fishmonger, though this might be explained as no illusion, but merely a playful expression of contempt for Polonius, or, as the more learned critics now suggest, a severe reflection on his private life. It would also be proved beyond question that Hamlet soliloquised unconscionably, and this habit (however common on the stage) is not to be overlooked as 6 82 hamlet's madness. a symptom of insanity. Then the " absence of motive " would be adduced (when was there ever adequate motive for murder?) and the statement of Hamlet, that he mistook the deceased for his better, /.*., the King, would be used as showing inadequacy of motive strongly suggesting insanity. Who but a madman would expect the King to be hiding behind the arras ? And what motive could there be for killing a monarch, whose character was unstained except by the scandalous aspersions of an alleged ghost, who was not called as a witness ? Finally, there would be the evidence of a number of eminent medical experts to the effect that all the words, acts, and demeanour of the prisoner were only compatible with the theory of his insanity. This evidence, however impressive in itself, would be exactly balanced by the evidence of an equal number of equally eminent ex- hamlet's madness. 83 perts to the directly contrary effect. This being the case, the jury would set off one mass of evidence against the other, and after briefly denouncing all experts, proceed to decide as if they had not received any assistance from eminent men of science. On such lines, all the evidence of insanity that the facts afford would be marshalled for the defence, and if there were no evidence on the other side, the jury would be inclined for a moment to give the prisoner the benefit of the doubt to 1 the extent of finding him insane. But when they came to consider the evidence on the other side, which is mainly the evidence of Hamlet's own utterances, the effect of the defence would be promptly destroyed. They would find from Horatio and Marcellus that Hamlet had told them long before the murder that he intended to feign madness, and had sworn them to 84 hamlet's madness. keep his intention secret. His words were : — "As I perchance hereafter shall think meet To put an Anticke disposition on." Then there was the evidence of Rosen- crantz and Guildenstern (also before the murder) that the prisoner had told them that the Kino; and Oueen were deceived in supposing him to be mad, and that he was only mad north-north- west ; the evidence of Horatio, again, that just before the play Hamlet had said, after a most reasonable though fervent speech, " I must be idle," that is, must assume insanity ; and finally, the evidence of the Oueen that after the murder Hamlet had solemnly assured her that he was not in madness, but mad in craft, and had further shown his calm and collected mind by enjoining on her not to disclose the fact to the •'.<«.:••■■,•■