Con. Dead! Fred. Even so. Last night Count Lindorf died. Countess. No, no, he lives! the real Count Lindorf lives! My son! my son! my own, my very son! Thou, for whose sake I have endured to live In prison and in sorrow-thou art mine, My Theodore! In the face of all the world I will proclaim thee rightful Count of Lindorf. The. Mother! I do not ask if this be real, My heart has always claim'd thee. Yes; I am Thy son, thy very son. Ber. What then is she? Countess. And the poor Bertha My daughter, still my daughter. The. Bertha, my sister! Countess. No; thy wife. Will that Please thee as well? And our dear Conrade's child. Con. My own sweet child. Countess. My son, thy speaking eyes Demand my story. Briefly let me tell A grief which eighteen years have left as fresh Born to lead all hearts captive. Such he was As thou art now. Look at the features, Frederick- Countess. I loved him-we were in our bridal year— Oh, how I loved him! So did all the world, Except his envious brother. They went forth Together, at the break of day, to hunt Here in this very forest; and at eve, One-only one-return'd. Mine-Mine-O God! When he at last was brought!-O God! The. My mother! Con. Pay it to my Bertha. The. She is herself that debt! What was the life Of fifty, such as I, compared to Bertha? A paltry boon, scarce worth my thanks, dear father! Theodore, my son, How proud I am of that unwonted word! Let us go meet the Baron. Bertha, Conrade, Daughter and friend, come with me; this kind cousin [Exeunt. ON SPENSER'S SUPPOSED ACQUAINTANCE WITH SHAKSPEARE. Few of our readers are aware, we dare say, of the late launch of Mr. Malone's Shakspeare, in twenty-one thick 8vo. volumes; but a Shakspearian feels it to his cost. We are not so wealthy as to deem 12. 12s. a trifle for the mere additions made by Mr. Malone, to the late Variorum Shakspeare; nor can a plain man's library contain twice twenty-one volumes on the same subject, without inconvenience. The booksellers should have given us the additional notes and other amplifications in two or three volumes of appendix; and when a new edition of Johnson and Steevens's Shakspeare was required, which is said to be even now the case, they might then have invested the body corporate with the shreds and patches of Mr. Malone's latest accumulation. Perhaps this may be done hereafter; for it is unreasonable to expect, that when a man calls for a few more nuts to crack over his wine, he should be compelled to pay for an additional dinner. So far as we have looked over the novelties of this last work, we must confess that our expectation is not gratified by finding any discovery made, worthy of the ingenuity and perseverance of Mr. Malone; but the investigation is, no doubt, barren, from the exhaustion of materials; and nothing new appears, because research has reached the bot tom of the sack. If this should be so, how happy a circumstance will it prove for the real admirers of Shakspeare; they may henceforth quote beauties, without fear of being detected in admiring a faulty reading; for it is a fact, that many of the passages which make the best stuff for quotation, are most closely allied to absurdity, either in conception or expression; and if they were now presented to the world, for the first time, as the production of a living poet, he would scarcely survive the "bolts" which would be shot at him. But if research be at an end, we are still not out of jeopardy, for conjecture is more alive than ever. Her wings being no longer clipped to keep her on the ground with her companion, she may now beat the thin air with them in the regions of imagination. We have proof of this excursiveness in the work before us, where Mr. Malone introduces Spenser's works, and comments on his allusions with somewhat less felicity than he was wont. He finds that though" our pleasaunt Willy who is dead of late," could not be Shakspeare, he was, doubtless, John Lyly, the dramatic poet, the first letter of his name being altered, according to the conceited custom of that age; that for the same reason, Lobbin stands for Robin (Robert Dudley), 266 On Spenser's supposed Acquaintance with Shakspeare. the Earl of Leicester; that Dido And then, though last, not least, is Ætion, vention, Doth, like himself, heroically sound. Having made these discoveries, which fill no less than 112 pages of the Life of Shakspeare, Mr. Malone adds: "For this long, but, I trust not wholly uninteresting, disquisition, no apology is necessary. Every poetical reader, I am confident, will be gratified by an endeavour to pluck out the heart of this mystery,' to penetrate the thick veil of words,' [Sept. under which, for more than two cen- We are sorry that we cannot feel the satisfaction which our warmhearted commentator must have experienced, when he penned this concluding paragraph. He sits down happy, with having accomplished a great undertaking, and invites his poetical readers to repose with him ; but facts, substantial facts, rise up and push us from our stools. We have very little confidence generally in the explications which have been heretofore given of Spenser's meaning; but in Mr. Malone's opinion, that the name of Ætion is a mask for Shakspeare, we cannot for a moment agree. Our reasons are neither few, nor soon stated; but perhaps the reader will grant us his patience while we produce them. The poem of Colin Clout's Come Home Again, in which the above lines appear, was dedicated to Sir Walter Raleigh, on the 27th of De cember, 1591. Now we have not the least evidence adduced by any of his biographers, to show that Shakspeare was known as a writer at that time. The earliest supposed allusion to him is in Greene's Groatsworthe of Witte, published between September and December, 1592, and written when Greene was on his death-hed: advising some of his " fellow scollers about this city" to " let these apes,' the players, imitate only their "past excellence," and never more acquaint them with their "admired inven"Yes, trust them tions," he says, not, for there is an upstart crow beautified with our feathers, that, with his tiger's heart wrapt in a play " with Shakspeare er's hide, supposes he is as well able There was another poet living at This was the opinion Sir Philip Sydney entertained of the genius of Sackville; but the words of Spenser himself vouch for our application of the character of Ætion to that nobleman. Prefixed to the Fairy Queen, and written fortunately at the time (1590) when we may most fairly compare the description it gives of Sackville, with that under the name of Ætion, is the following sonnet. To the Right Honourable the Lord of Buckhurst, one of Her Majestie's Privie Counsell. In vain I think, Right Honourable Lord, By this rude rhyme to memorize thy name, Whose learned muse hath writ her own record In golden verse, worthy immortal fame. How much more fit (were leisure to the same) Thy gracious Sovereign's praises to compile, Aud her imperial Majestie to frame In lofty numbers, and heroic style. But sith thou mayst not so, give leave awhile To baser wit his power therein to spend, Whose gross defaults thy dainty pen may file, And unadvised oversights amend. But evermore vouchsafe it to maintain Against vile Zoilus' backbitings vain. To suppose that Spenser would, in the year after this was written, omit to name this nobleman among the poets of the time, is too much at variance with probability not to require some excuse; and, accordingly, Mr. Malone imputes to Spenser, a regard for his immediate friends which blinded his judgment, under the influence of which partiality he overlooked "Richard Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, and Edward Earl of Oxford." We fear Mr. Malone's "friendly partiality " is more in fault than Spenser's on this occasion. Mr. Malone had game in view; he thought he could connect his author with Spenser; and the wish which was father to that thought, robbed him of his accustomed discretion: he could not otherwise have mentioned Sackville as he has, without perceiving the true drift of the verse in question. The argument by which he attempts to support his own opinion is too curious to be omitted; and the insertion of it here is also due to the fair understanding of the subject. poem was written, Shakspeare had produced It may be conjectured that before this on the stage one or more of his historical plays, probably King Richard the Second and Third. Spenser, therefore, while he distinguished him by that characteristick epithet which several of his contemporaries have applied to him," A gentler shepherd may no where be found," and alluded to the brandished spear from which his name, so congenial with heroick song, was originally derived, may be supposed to have had in contemplation these imperial tragedies, then perhaps performing with applause at the Curtain Theatre, as well as his Venus and Adonis, and the newly published poem of the Rape of Lucrece, which had appeared in the middle of the year 1594, and may, with perfect propriety, be referred to under the denomination of heroick verse. In Richard the Second, the challenge of Bolingbroke and the Duke of Norfolk in the first act, and the contention in the fourth act between the various noble disputants assembled in the lists at Coventry, being conducted with all the forms and pomp of chivalry, furnished, doubtless, a very splendid spectacle; and indeed the whole drama, as well as that of Richard the Third, doth, like its author, "heroically sound." Vol. II. p. 274— 276. Our unpoetical readers will wonder to see by what a slender thread this whole episode concerning Spenser is connected with the proper subject of Mr. Malone's investigation; but we must do him the justice to say, that he certainly would not have produced this argument, had he not fancied that, by some mistake, the poem of Colin Clout's Come Home Again was dated 1591, instead of 1594. His reasons for supposing this are, as we have observed, wholly unsatisfactory to us, and easy to be combated; but the opening of the question of dates would lead us into too long a disquisition at the present time. We shall endeavour to introduce this subject in another number, when we may probably show that the above is not the only instance, apparently unknown to the commentators, in which Sackville, as a poet, has been alluded to by Spenser in terms of high commendation; and that Lyly has no better title than Shakspeare to the compliment paid "our pleasaunt Willy" in the Tears of the Muses. |