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COSTUME.

THE Costume of this Comedy is, of course, the same with that of the two parts of Henry IV.,' and, therefore, for its general description we must refer our readers to the notice affixed to Part I. of that play. Chaucer, however, who wrote his 'Canterbury Tales' towards the close of the previous reign, gives us a few hints for the habit of some of the principal characters in the Merry Wives.' Dr. Caius, for instance, should be clothed, like the Doctor of Physic, "in sanguine and in perse," (i. e., in purple and light blue) the gown being "lined with tafata and sendal." In 'the Testament of Cresseyde' Chaucer speaks of a Physician in "a scarlet gown," and "furred well, as such a one ought to be;" but scarlet and purple were terms used indifferently one for the other, and the phrase "scarlet red" was generally used to designate that colour which we now call scarlet.

The Franklin or Country gentleman the Master Page, or, Master Ford of this play-is merely said to have worn an anelace or knife,

and a white silk gipciere or purse hanging at his girdle.

The Young 'Squire may furnish us with the dress of Master Fenton. He is described as wearing a short gown, with sleeves long and wide, and embroidered "as it were a mead, all full of fresh flowers white and red." Falstaff, when dressed as Herne the Hunter, should be attired like his Yeoman, in a coat and hood of green, with a horn slung in a green baldrick.

The Wife of Bath is said to have worn, on a Sunday, or holyday, kerchiefs on her head of the finest manufacture, but in such a quantity as to weigh nearly a pound.-When abroad, she wore "a hat, as broad as is a buckler or a targe." Her stockings were of fine scarlet red, and her shoes "full moist and new." The high-crowned hats and point lace aprons, in which the Merry Wives of Windsor have been usually depicted, are of the seventeenth, instead of the fifteenth, century.

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Associates, by chance or circumstances, peculiarly teaches;-these, as they sank down into the depths of his great mind, seem not only to have inspired into it the conception of "Lear' and 'Timon,' but that of one primary character, the censurer of mankind. This type is first seen in the philosophic melancholy of Jaques, gazing with an undiminished serenity, and with a gaiety of fancy, though not of manners, on the follies of the world. It assumes a graver cast in the exiled Duke of the same play." Mr. Hallam then notices the like type in 'Measure for Measure' and the altered 'Hamlet,' as well as in Lear' and 'Timon;' and adds, "In the later plays of Shakspere, especially in 'Macbeth' and 'The Tempest,' much of moral speculation will be found, but he has never returned to this type of character in the personages." Without entering into a general examination of Mr. Hallam's theory, which evidently includes a very wide range of discussion, we must venture to think that the type of character first seen in Jaques, and presenting a graver cast in the exiled Duke, is so modified by the whole conduct of the action of this comedy, by its opposite characterisation, and by its prevailing tone of reflection, that it offers not the slightest evidence of having been produced at a period of the poet's life "when his heart was ill at ease and ill content with the world or his own conscience." The charm which this play appears to us to possess in a most remark able degree, even when compared with other works of Shakspere, is that, while we behold "the philosophic eye, turned inward on the mysteries of human nature"-(we use Mr. Hallam's own forcible expression)-we also see the serene brow and the playful smile, which tell us that "the philosophic eye" belongs to one who, however above us, is still akin to us who tolerates our follies, who compassionates even our faults, who mingles in our gaiety, who rejoices in our happiness; who leads us to scenes of surpassing loveliness, where we may forget the painful lessons of the world, and introduces us to characters whose generosity, and faithfulness, and affection, and simplicity, may obliterate the sorrows of our "experience of man's worser nature." It is not in Jaques alone, but in the entire dramatic group, that we must

seek the tone of the poet's mind, and to that have our own minds attuned. Mr. Campbell, speaking of the characters of this comedy, says, "Our hearts are so stricken by these benevolent beings that we easily forgive the other more culpable but at last repentant characters."

"Ay, now am I in Arden!" Touchstone thought that when he was at home he was in a better place. But here is the home of every true lover of poetry. What a world of exquisite images do Shakspere's pictures of this forest call up! He gives us no positive set descriptions of trees, and flowers, and rivulets, and fountains, such as we may cut out and paste into an album. But a touch here and there carries us into the heart of his living scenery. And so, whenever it is our happy lot to be wandering

"Under the shade of melancholy boughs," we think of the oak beneath which Jaques lay along,

"whose antique root peeps out

Upon the brook that brawls along this wood;" and of the dingle where Touchstone was with Audrey and her goats; and of the

"Sheepcote fenc'd about with olive-trees," where dwelt Rosalind and Celia; and of the hawthorns and brambles upon which Orlando hung odes and elegies. In this delicious pastoral the real is blended with the poetical in such intimate union, that the highest poetry appears to be as essentially natural as the most familiar gossip; and the loftiest philosophy is interwoven with the occurrences of every-day life, so as to teach us that there is a philosophical aspect of the commonest things. It is this spirit which informs Shakpere's forest of Arden with such life, and truth, and beauty, as belongs to no other representation of pastoral scenes; which takes us into the depths of solitude, and shows us how the feelings of social life alone can give us

"tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in everything; " which builds a throne for intellect "under the greenwood tree," and there, by characteristic satire, gently indicates to us the vanity of the things which bind us to the world; whilst he teaches us that life has its happiness in the cultivation of the affections,-in content and independence of spirit.

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

DUKE, living in exile.

Appears, Act II. sc. 1; sc. 7. Act V. sc. 4.

FREDERICK, brother to the Duke, and usurper

of his dominions.

Appears, Act I. sc. 2; sc. 3. Act II. sc. 2.
Act III. sc. 1.

AMIENS, a lord attending upon the Duke in his banishment.?

Appears, Act II. sc. 1; sc. 5; sc. 7. Act V. sc. 4. JAQUES, a lord attending upon the Duke in his banishment.

Appears, Act II. sc. 5; sc. 7. Act III. sc. 2; sc. 3. Act IV. sc. 1; sc. 2. Act V. sc. 4.

LE BEAU, a courtier attending upon Fre

derick.

Appears, Act I. sc. 2.

CHARLES, wrestler to Frederick.
Appears, Act I. sc. 1; sc. 2.

OLIVER, son of Sir Rowland de Bois. Appears, Act I. sc. 1. Act III. sc. 1. Act IV. sc. 3. Act V. sc. 2; sc. 4.

JAQUES, son of Sir Rowland de Bois.
Appears, Act V. sc. 4.

ORLANDO, son of Sir Rowland de Bois. Appears, Act L sc. 1; sc. 2. Act II. sc. 3; sc. 6; sc. 7. Act III. sc. 2. Aet IV. sc. 1. Act V. sc. 2; sc. 4.

ADAM, servant to Oliver.

Appears, Act L. sc. 1. Act II. sc. 3; sc. 6; se.7.

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Audrey.

Appears, Act V. sc. 1.

A person representing Hymen.
Appears, Act V. sc. 4.

ROSALIND, daughter to the banished Duke.
Appears, Act I. sc. 2; sc. 3. Act II. sc. 4
Act III. sc. 2; sc. 4; sc. 5. Act IV. sc. 1; sc. 3.
Act V. sc. 2; sc. 4.

CELIA, daughter to Frederick. Appears, Act I. sc. 2; sc. 3. Act II. sc. 4. Act III. sc. 2; sc. 4; sc. 5. Act IV. sc. 1; se. 3. Act V. sc. 4.

PHEBE, a shepherdess.
Appears, Act III. sc. 5. Act V. sc. 2; sc. 4.
AUDREY, a country wench.

Appears, Act III. sc. 3. Act V. sc. 1; sc. 3; sc. 4.

SCENE, FIRST, NEAR OLIVER'S HOUSE; AFTERWARDS, PARTLY IN THE USURPER'S COURT, AND PARTLY IN THE FOREST OF ARDEN.

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