Henry Thew Stephenson

“ To assert that an early play of Shakespeare's is as excellent as a later is to assume that he began his literary career a finished artist, unhumanly god-like in his perfection—a man who does, not having learned. Yet Shakespeare is of supreme value to us to-day mainly because he is so human, human in his feelings, and human in his faults. ”

“ Ghosts and fairies are wholly supernatural. They are, so to speak, creatures of the imagination. The belief in ghosts and spirits is not yet wholly dead; but the tiny fairy folk are no longer with us. However the Elizabethans may have felt, we can say with confidence that none of them ever saw Queen Mab, or actually heard the tinkly music of the moonlight revels. On the other hand, witches were creatures of flesh and blood. They lived on earth among friends and neighbours. A witch could be remembered in her own reputable days before she had sold herself to the devil. ”

“ As illustrative of life in a country town let us glance for a moment at the birthplace of Shakespeare. Stratford in early times possessed a famous guild, so famous that people from all parts of England were glad to become members of the Holy Cross. Not Stratford merchants alone, but nobles and even kings, were part and parcel of this time-honoured institution, from whose records we derive much of our information concerning ancient Stratford. If one can dissociate mountains and the sea from one's idea of natural beauty, Warwickshire leaves nothing to be desired. ”

“ Tinkers sang catches; milkmaids sang ballads; carters whistled; each trade, and even the beggars, had their special songs; the base viol hung in the drawing room for the amusement of waiting visitors; the lute, cittern and virginals, for the amusement of waiting customers, were the necessary furniture of the barber shop. They had music at dinner; music at supper; music at weddings; music at funerals; music at dawn; music at night. ”

“ We hear of ruffs that contained eighteen or nineteen yards of linen. The fashionable depth was one-fourth of a yard. Sometimes they were as much as one-third of a yard deep. Imagine the head of a man or woman, like the hub of a cartwheel, firmly gripped in the midst of a mass of starched linen extending a foot on all sides! So cumbersome were these articles of dress that it became necessary to underprop them with a framework of wire to keep them from tumbling down of their own weight, and to prevent them from dragging their wearer's head down with them. ”

“ Is it not time, then, to accept Shakespeare as a man? to look upon him in the rational way in which we look upon Thackeray or Browning, as men who produced some works better than others,—above all, as great men, the value of whose great work is not marred by the fact that at times their writing is not to be judged by their own high standard?
One of my own critics once asked me why I directed so much attention to matters connected but indirectly with the text of Shakespeare's plays. ”

“ Its lasting effect is recognised to-day in the fact that by making continental travel safe, tourists were enabled to bring home precious manuscripts and a knowledge of older and more perfect learning that, when published and conned, directly gave birth to Shakespeare and his fellows.
England had learned her own strength. She was becoming master of the ancient learning with its variety of ideas. The defeat of Spain gave her time to reflect, to study, to produce. The whole intellectual horizon was crowded with the fleeing clouds of mediæval ignorance. The earth had become round. ”

“ Peter's Eve, in bright harness, some over-gilt, and every one a jornet of scarlet thereupon, and a chain of gold, his henchman following him, his minstrels before him, his cresset light passing by him, the waits of the city, the mayor's officers for his guard before him, all in a livery of worsted or say jackets parti-coloured, the mayor himself well mounted on horseback, the swordbearer before him in fair armour well mounted also, the mayor's footmen, and the like torchbearers about him, henchman twain upon great stirring horses, following him. ”

“ Who has not at one time or another been startled by the merely accidental fulfilment of a wish? It is but a step further to him who opens the Bible at hazard and believes in the supernatural guidance to a selection of a text for the day, or to her who, having cursed her neighbour successfully, believes that the devil has supernaturally vested some of his power in her weak hands. Just as there were voices, like Reginald Scot's, occasionally crying in the wilderness against the folly of belief in witchcraft, so there were occasionally witches that were imposters. ”

“ To one of us, who may live a lifetime without seeing a man die a violent death, nothing is so difficult to comprehend as the Elizabethan callousness to bloodshed. Life with them was a rough, rude game of broil and turmoil. Every man wore commonly a sword by his side in public. When justice failed the individual did not scruple to take the law into his own hands. Here are a few illustrations taken from the old records, illustrations that show how quick every one was to shed blood upon small provocation. ”

“ If ignorance of a small detail of social usage could result in blackening the character of one of the loveliest heroines in literature, is it not fair to suppose that numerous other and similar errors could be, nay, are, made daily by critics more familiar with the text of Shakespeare than with the conditions under which those texts were written.
Shakespeare was wholly a man of the hour. Artist though he was, he never lost sight of the fact that the productions of his art were to appeal to his own people. ”

“ Indeed our parents take great care to make us ask blessing and say grace whenas we are little ones, and growing to years of judgment, they deprive us of the greatest blessing, and the most gracious things to our minds: they give us pap with a spoon before we can speak, and when we speak for that we love, pap with a hatchet: because their fancies being grown musty with hoary age, therefore nothing can relish in their thoughts that savours of sweet youth: they study twenty years together to make us grow as straight as a wand, and in the end by bowing us, make us as crooked as a cammock. ”

“ Easter-tide, or the week following Easter, was a period of such exuberant merry-making that the people popularly imagined that their own mood was shared by the heavenly bodies, and believed that the sun actually danced with joy on the day of the Resurrection. ”

“ Cards were in common use as an amusement for the assembled audience in the theatre before the play began. "Before the play begins," says Dekker to the Gallant in his Gull's Hornbook, "fall to cards; you may win or lose, as fencers do in a prize, and beat one another by confederacy, yet share the money when you meet at supper: notwithstanding, to gull the ragamuffins that stand gaping aloof at you, throw the cards, having first torn four or five of them, round about the stage, just upon the third sound, as though you had lost." ”

“ Ghosts possessed not only the supernatural powers and qualities acquired by death, but also retained certain human qualities that were peculiar to them in life. Thus, when a ghost appeared he looked as he had looked in life, save for his pale and bloodless face, and, often, the expression of pain, sorrow, or remorse, dependent upon whatever way the fates were compelling him to work out his salvation in ghost-land. ”

“ One who would comprehend the style of Elizabethan dress must, for the time being, set aside all notion of simplicity or fit. In fact, the people of that time carried their idea of what was proper in wearing apparel to such a ridiculous extreme that they were made the subject of innumerable satires; and dress was the most popular point of attack by all the abusive writers on reform. Bright colours, elaborate trimmings, and excessive padding are the most notable characteristics of Elizabethan dress. ”

“ It was the tendency to believe in the marvelous that made the age one of fortune telling and prophecy. Palmistry, alchemy, and astrology were probably then more popular than they have ever been before or since. The fact that the practice of these professions was frowned upon by the authorities, coupled with their mysterious nature, tended to make them dear to the Elizabethan heart. The very nature of these so-called arts was especially tempting to dishonest people. London swarmed with quack astrologers and alchemists who have become through lineal descent the bunco men of to-day. ”

“ Sunday was a common day for weddings. The bridal party assembled at the house of the bride whence the procession marched to the church. On one occasion the bride was "attired in a gown of sheep's russet, and a kirtle of fine worsted, her hair attired with a billement of gold, and her hair as yellow as gold hanging down behind her, which was curiously combed and plaited, she was led to the church between two sweet boys, with bride laces and rosemary tied about their silken sleeves. ”

“ Or, may we not more profitably say, that credulity was not then so foolish as it is to-day?
"The nature of an Englishman," says Sir Thomas Smith in 1621, "is to neglect death, to abide no torment; and therefore he will confess rather to have done anything, yea, to have killed his own father, than to suffer torment; for death, our nation is free, stout, haughty, prodigal of life no place shall you see malefactors go more constantly, more assuredly, and with less lamentation to their death than in England. The nature of our nation is free, stout, haughty, prodigal of life and blood ”

“ But, unless he is totally stunned with the fall, he is sure to crawl again towards the bull, with his old antipathy, come on't what will. Sometimes a second frisk into the air disables him forever from playing his old tricks. But sometimes, too, he fastens upon his old enemy, and when he has seized him with his teeth, he sticks to him like a leech, and will sooner die than leave his hold. Then the bull bellows and bounds and kicks about to shake off the dog; by his leaping the dog seems to be of no manner of weight to him, though in all appearance he puts him to great pain. ”

“ The people in the playhouse shuddered with Macbeth, who upon so lonely a heath came face to face with three weird sisters of the forbidden clan. Doubtless the witches in Macbeth are such as might have been met with in flesh and blood. Doubtless, also, they believed in themselves. What did Shakespeare think?—not of his creations, but of his examples of the popular creation? ”

“ Insomuch on a time, I heard a distemperate dicer solemnly sweare that he faithfully beleeved, that dice were first made of the bones of a witch, and cards of her skin, in which there hath ever sithence remained an enchantment that whosoever once taketh delight in either, he shall never have power utterly to leave them for, quoth he, I a hundred times vowed to leave both, yet have not the grace to forsake either." [24]
The casual allusions contained in the old plays to the thriftless indulgence in gaming by people of all classes are innumerable. ”

“ Lives there any such slow, itch-brained, beef-witted gull, who by the riveld bark or outward rind of a tree will take upon himself to forespeak how long it will stand, what mischaices of worms, caterpillars, boughs breaking, frost bitings, catel rubbing against, it shall have? As absurd is it by the external branched seams of furrowed wrinkles in a man's face or hand, in particular or in general to conjecture and foredoom his fate. ”

“ In the month of May, namely, on May-day in the morning, every man, except impediment, would walk into the sweete meaddowes and green woods, there to rejoice their spirits, with the beauty and savour of sweet flowers, praysing God in their kind. ”

“ Often the ghost returned to earth to make a revelation: sometimes of hidden treasure, sometimes to ease his conscience with a confession, sometimes to warn loved ones on earth against impending danger, perhaps more often, as in Hamlet, to demand revenge, to be enacted by those alive.
One need not go further than the accessible Elizabethan plays to learn almost the complete list of ghost traditions. Hamlet alone affords a score. From this play we learn that the appearance of a ghost implied something momentous ”

“ The members of the nobility were seldom seen abroad without their hawks and hounds. In earlier times, when bishops as well as lords followed the birds afield, the presence of the hawk was considered almost equivalent to a badge of nobility. One would die rather than give up his hawk, his especial privilege. By the time of Shakespeare, however, a mere gentleman found life hard if it had to be lived without a hawk. The sport was also, upon occasion, enjoyed by women. ”

“ Hereupon Iris scoffs at Mercury, for that he had devised a dance but of one sex, which could have no life; but Mercury, who was provided for that exception, and in token that the match should be blessed both with love and riches, calleth forth out of the groves four Cupids, and brings down from Jupiter's altar four Statuas of gold and silver, to dance with the Nymphs and Stars; in which dance, the Cupids being blind, and the Statuas having but half life put into them, and retaining still somewhat of their old nature, giveth fit occasion to new and strange varieties both in the music and paces. ”

“ Oftentimes the wares for sale were exposed in a lean-to or booth outside the house, encroaching upon the narrow street. The apprentices took turns standing to attract customers whose attention they solicited by the well known cry of "What do ye lack? What do ye lack?" People then as now often haunted shops for the purpose of satisfying curiosity rather than for the purpose of buying. Such people earned the contemporary title of "stall-troublers." The replacing of an appretice by an alluring wife or daughter was a common trick of the trade and frequently led to much scandal. ”

“ There are numerous allusions to the pancake diet in the Elizabethan dramas; and of the pancake-bell Taylor, the Water Poet, has the following to say: "Shrove-Tuesday, at whose entrance in the morning all the whole kingdom is unquiet, but by that time the clock strikes eleven, which (by the help of a knavish sexton) is commonly before nine, then there is a bell rung, cal'd pancake-bell, the sound whereof makes thousands of people distracted, and forgetful either of manners or humanity." ”

“ Perhaps the main reason why we do not to-day eat with our knives is because we are conservatively subject to the instinct that was bred into our nature when every person at the board used the weapon at his side to assist him at dinner. Whatever duty the dagger may have performed between meals is irrelevant; but once arrived at table the knife that went into the common dish could not with propriety go into the individual mouth. It may surprise some readers to know that table knives as a distinctive instrument only came into use in England about the beginning of the reign of Elizabeth ”