Thus the Poet disposes us to like things as they come, and at the same time takes care that they shall come as we like. Much has been said by one critic and another about the improbabilities in this play. We confess they have never troubled us; and as we have had no trouble here to get out of, we do not well know how to help others out. Wherefore, if any one be still annoyed by these things, we will turn him over to the poet Campbell, wishing him nothing worse or better than that he may find that author's charming criticism just as he likes it. "Before I say more of this dramatic treasure, I must absolve myself by a confession as to some of its improbabilities. Rosalind asks her cousin Celia,-'Whither shall we go?' and Celia answers, To seek my uncle in the forest of Arden.' But, arrived there, and having purchased a cottage and sheepfarm, neither the daughter nor niece of the banished Duke seem to trouble themselves much to inquire about either father or uncle. The lively and natural-hearted Rosalind discovers no impatience to embrace her sire, until she has finished her masked courtship with Orlando. But Rosalind was in love, as I have been with the comedy these forty years; and love is blind,-for until a late period my eyes were never couched so as to see this objection. truth, however, is, that love is wilfully blind; and now that my eyes are opened, I shut them against the fault. Away with your best-proved improbabilities, when the heart has been touched, and the fancy fascinated! The "In fact, though there is no rule without exceptions, and no general truth without limitation, it may be pronounced, that if you delight us in fiction, you may make our sense of probability slumber as deeply as you please. But it may be asked, whether nature and truth are to be sacrificed at the altar of fiction? No! in the main effect of fiction on the fancy, they never are or can be sacrificed. The improbabilities of fiction are only its exceptions, while the truth of nature is its general law; and unless the truth of nature were in the main observed, the fictionist could not lull our vigilance as to particular improbabilities. Apply this maxim to As You Like It, and our Poet will be found to make us forget what is eccentric from nature in a limited view, by showing it more beautifully probable in a larger contemplation." Finally, we have to confess that, upon the whole, As You Like It is our favorite of Shakespeare's comedies. Yet we should be puzzled to tell why; for our preference springs, not so much from any particular points or features, wherein it is surpassed by several others, as from the general toning and effect. The whole is replete with a beauty so delicate, yet so intense, that we feel it every where, but can never tell especially where it is or in what it consists. For instance, the descriptions of forest scenery come along so unsought, and in such easy, natural touches, that we take in the impression, without once noticing what it is that impresses us. Thus there is a certain woodland freshness, a glad, free naturalness, that creeps and steals into the heart before we know it. We are persuaded, indeed, that Milton had this play especially in his mind when he wrote, "And sweetest Shakespeare, fancy's child, Add to this, that the kindlier sentiments here seem playing out in a sort of jubilee. Untied from set purposes and definite aims, the persons come forth with their hearts already tuned, and so have nothing to do but let off their redundant music. Envy, jealousy, avarice, revenge, all the passions that afflict and degrade society, they have left in the city behind them. And they have brought the intelligence and refinement of the court, without its vanities and vexations; so that the graces of art and the simplicities of nature meet together in joyous loving sisterhood. Thus it answers to Ulrici's fine description: "The whole is a deep pervading harmony, while sweet and soul-touching melodies play around; all is so ethereal, so tender and affecting, so free, fresh, and joyous, and so replete with a genial sprightliness, that I have no hesitation in pronouncing it one of the most excellent compositions in the whole wide domain of poesy." COMMENTS By SHAKESPEAREAN SCHOLARS THE ATMOSPHERE OF THE PLAY Shakspere, when he wrote this idyllic play, was himself in his Forest of Arden. He had ended one great ambition-the historical plays and not yet commenced his tragedies. It was a resting-place. He sends his imagination into the woods to find repose. Instead of the courts and camps of England, and the embattled plains of France, here was this woodland scene, where the palm-tree, the lioness, and the serpent are to be found; possessed of a flora and fauna that flourish in spite of physical geographers. There is an open-air feeling throughout the play. The dialogue, as has been observed, catches freedom and freshness from the atmosphere. "Never is the scene within-doors, except when something discordant is introduced to heighten as it were the harmony." 1 After the trumpet-tones of Henry V comes the sweet pastoral strain, so bright, so tender. Must it not be all in keeping? Shakspere was not trying to control his melancholy. When he needed to do that, Shakspere confronted his melancholy very passionately, and looked it full in the face. Here he needed refreshment, a sunlight tempered by forestboughs, a breeze upon his forehead, a stream murmuring in his ears. DoWDEN, Shakspere-His Mind and Art. ROSALIND Though Rosalind is a princess, she is a princess of Arcady; and notwithstanding the charming effect produced 1 C. A. Brown. Shakespeare's Autobiographical Poems. by her first scenes, we scarcely ever think of her with a reference to them, or associate her with a court, and the artificial appendages of her rank. She was not made to "lord it o'er a fair mansion," and take state upon her like the all-accomplished Portia ; but to breathe the free air of heaven, and frolic among green leaves. She was not made to stand the siege of daring profligacy, and oppose high action and high passion to the assaults of adverse fortune, like Isabel; but to "fleet the time carelessly as they did i' the golden age." She was not made to bandy wit with lords, and tread courtly measures with plumed and warlike cavaliers, like Beatrice; but to dance on the green sward, and "murmur among living brooks a music sweeter than their own."-JAMESON, Shakespeare's Heroines. We are introduced to Rosalind as a poor bird with a drooping wing; her father is banished, she is bereft of her birthright, and is living on sufferance as companion to the usurper's daughter, being, indeed, half a prisoner in the palace, where till lately she reigned as princess. It is not until she has donned the doublet and hose, appears in the likeness of a page, and wanders at her own sweet will in the open air and the greenwood, that she recovers her radiant humor, and roguish merriment flows from her lips like the trilling of a bird. Nor is the man she loves an overweening gallant with a sharp tongue and an unabashed bearing. This youth, though brave as a hero and strong as an athlete, is a child in inexperience, and so bashful in the presence of the woman who instantly captivates him, that it is she who is the first to betray her sympathy for him, and has even to take the chain from her own neck and hang it around his before he can so much as muster up courage to hope for her love. So, too, we find him passing his time in hanging poems to her upon the trees, and carving the name of Rosalind in their bark. She amuses herself, in her page's attire, by making herself his confidant, and pretending, as it were in jest, to be his Rosalind. She cannot bring her |