PERDITA.

Even so it was with me when I was young!This thornDoth to our rose of youth rightly belong,It is the show and seal of nature's truth,When love's strong passion is impress'd in youth.

Her fond, maternal love for Helena, whom she has brought up: her pride in her good qualities overpowering all her own prejudices of rank and birth, are most natural in such a mind; and her indignation against her son, however strongly expressed, never forgets the mother.

What angel shallBless this unworthy husband? he cannot thriveUnlessherprayers, whom heaven delights to hearAnd loves to grant, reprieve him from the wrathOf greatest justice.Which of them bothIs dearest to me—I have no skill in senseTo make distinction.

This is very skilfully, as well as delicately conceived. In rejecting those poetical and accidental advantages which Giletta possesses in the originalstory, Shakspeare has substituted the beautiful character of the Countess; and he has contrived, that, as the character of Helena should rest for its internal charm on the depth of her own affections, so it should depend for itsexternalinterest on the affection she inspires. The enthusiastic tenderness of the old Countess, the admiration and respect of the King, Lafeu, and all who are brought in connection with her, make amends for the humiliating neglect of Bertram; and cast round Helen that collateral light, which Giletta in the story owes to other circumstances, striking indeed, and well imagined, but not (I think) so finely harmonizing with the character.

It is also very natural that Helen, with the intuitive discernment of a pure and upright mind, and the penetration of a quick-witted woman, should be the first to detect the falsehood and cowardice of the boaster Parolles, who imposes on every one else.

It has been remarked, that there is less of poetical imagery in this play than in many of the others. A certain solidity in Helen's character takes place of the ideal power; and with consistent truth of keeping, the same predominance of feeling over fancy, of the reflective over the imaginative faculty, is maintained through the whole dialogue. Yet the finest passages in the serious scenes are those appropriated to her; they are familiar and celebrated as quotations, but fully to understand their beauty and truth, they should be consideredrelatively to her character and situation; thus, when in speaking of Bertram, she says, "that he is one to whom she wishes well," the consciousness of the disproportion between her words and her feelings draws from her this beautiful and affecting observation, so just in itself, and so true to her situation, and to the sentiment which fills her whole heart:—

'Tis pityThat wishing well had not a body in'tWhich might be felt: that we the poorer born,Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes,Might with effects of them follow our friends,And act what we must only think, which neverReturns us thanks.

Some of her general reflections have a sententious depth and a contemplative melancholy, which remind us of Isabella:—

Our remedies oft in themselves do lieWhich we ascribe to heaven; the fated skyGives us free scope; only doth backward pullOur slow designs when we ourselves are dull.Impossible be strange events to thoseThat weigh their pains in sense; and do supposeWhat hath been cannot be.He that of greatest works is finisher,Oft does them by the weakest minister;So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown,When judges have been babes.Oft expectation fails, and most oft thereWhere most it promises; and oft it hits,Where hope is coldest, and despair most sits.

Our remedies oft in themselves do lieWhich we ascribe to heaven; the fated skyGives us free scope; only doth backward pullOur slow designs when we ourselves are dull.

Impossible be strange events to thoseThat weigh their pains in sense; and do supposeWhat hath been cannot be.

He that of greatest works is finisher,Oft does them by the weakest minister;So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown,When judges have been babes.

Oft expectation fails, and most oft thereWhere most it promises; and oft it hits,Where hope is coldest, and despair most sits.

Her sentiments in the same manner are remarkable for the union of profound sense with the most passionate feeling; and when her language is figurative, which is seldom, the picture presented to us is invariably touched either with a serious, a lofty, or a melancholy beauty. For instance:—

It were all oneThat I should love a bright particular star,And think to wed it—he's so far above me.

And when she is brought to choose a husband from among the young lords at the court, her heart having already made its election, the strangeness of that very privilege for which she had ventured all, nearly overpowers her, and she says beautifully:—

The blushes on my cheeks thus whisper me,"We blush that thou shouldst choose;—but be refused,Let the white death sit on that cheek for everWe'll ne'er come there again!"

In her soliloquy after she has been forsaken by Bertram, the beauty lies in the intense feeling, the force and simplicity of the expressions. There is little imagery, and wherever it occurs, it is as bold as it is beautiful, and springs out of the energy of the sentiment, and the pathos of the situation. She has been reading his cruel letter.

Till I have no wife I have nothing in France.'Tis bitter!Nothing in France, until he has no wife!Thou shalt have none, Roussillon, none in France,Then hast thou all again. Poor lord! is't IThat chase thee from thy country, and exposeThose tender limbs of thine to the eventOf the none-sparing war? And is it IThat drive thee from the sportive court, where thouWast shot at with fair eyes, to be the markOf smoky muskets? O you leaden messengers,That ride upon the violent speed of fire,Fly with false aim! move the still-piercing air,That sings with piercing, do not touch my lord!Whoever shoots at him, I set him there;Whoever charges on his forward breast,I am the caitiff that do hold him to it;And though I kill him not, I am the causeHis death was so effected; better 'twereI met the ravin lion when he roaredWith sharp constraint of hunger; better 'twereThat all the miseries which nature owes,Were mine at once.No, no, althoughThe air of paradise did fan the house,And angels officed all; I will be gone.

No, no, althoughThe air of paradise did fan the house,And angels officed all; I will be gone.

Though I cannot go the length of those who have defended Bertram on almost every point, still I think the censure which Johnson has passed on the character is much too severe. Bertram is certainly not a pattern hero of romance, but full of faults such as we meet with every day in men of his age and class. He is a bold, ardent, self-willed youth, just dismissed into the world from domestic indulgence, with an excess of aristocratic and military pride, but not without some sense of true honor and generosity. I have lately read a defence of Bertram's character, written with much elegance and plausibility. "The young Count," says this critic, "comes before us possessed of a good heart, and of no mean capacity, but with a haughtiness which threatens to dull the kinder passions, and to cloud the intellect. This is the inevitable consequence of an illustrious education. The glare of his birthright has dazzled his young faculties. Perhaps the first words he could distinguish were from the important nurse, giving elaborate directions about his lordship's pap. As soon as he could walk, a crowd of submissive vassals doffed their caps, and hailed his first appearance on his legs. His spelling book had the arms of the family emblazoned on the cover. He had been accustomed to hear himself called the great, the mighty son of Roussillon, ever since he was a helpless child. A succession of complacent tutors would by no means destroy the illusion; and it is from their hands that Shakspeare receives him, while yet in his minority. An overweening pride of birth is Bertram's great foible. To cure him of this, Shakspeare sends him to the wars, that he may win fame for himself, and thus exchange a shadow for a reality. There the great dignity that his valor acquired for him places him on an equality with any one of his ancestors, and he is no longer beholden to them alone for theworld's observance. Thus in his own person he discovers there is something better than mere hereditary honors; and his heart is prepared to acknowledge that the entire devotion of a Helen's love is of more worth than the court-bred smiles of a princess."[33]

It is not extraordinary that, in the first instance, his spirit should revolt at the idea of marrying his mother's "waiting gentlewoman," or that he should refuse her; yet when the king, his feudal lord, whose despotic authority was in this case legal and indisputable, threatens him with the extremity of his wrath and vengeance, that he should submit himself to a hard necessity, was too consistent with the manners of the time to be calledcowardice. Such forced marriages were not uncommon even in our own country, when the right of wardship, now vested in the Lord Chancellor, was exercised with uncontrolled and often cruel despotism by the sovereign.

There is an old ballad, in which the king bestows a maid of low degree on a noble of his court, and the undisguised scorn and reluctance of the knight and the pertinacity of the lady, are in point.

He brought her down full forty poundTyed up within a glove,"Fair maid, I'll give the same to thee,Go seek another love.""O I'll have none of your gold," she said,"Nor I'll have none of your fee;But your fair bodye I must have,The king hath granted me."Sir William ran and fetched her then,Five hundred pounds in gold,Saying, "Fair maid, take this to thee,My fault will ne'er be told.""'Tis not the gold that shall me tempt,"These words then answered she;"But your own bodye I must have,The king hath granted me.""Would I had drank the water clear,When I did drink the wine,Rather than my shepherd's bratShould be a ladye of mine!"[34]

He brought her down full forty poundTyed up within a glove,"Fair maid, I'll give the same to thee,Go seek another love."

"O I'll have none of your gold," she said,"Nor I'll have none of your fee;But your fair bodye I must have,The king hath granted me."

Sir William ran and fetched her then,Five hundred pounds in gold,Saying, "Fair maid, take this to thee,My fault will ne'er be told."

"'Tis not the gold that shall me tempt,"These words then answered she;"But your own bodye I must have,The king hath granted me."

"Would I had drank the water clear,When I did drink the wine,Rather than my shepherd's bratShould be a ladye of mine!"[34]

Bertram's disgust at the tyranny which has made his freedom the payment of another's debt, which has united him to a woman whose merits are not towards him—whose secret love, and long-enduring faith, are yet unknown and untried—might well make his bride distasteful to him. He flies her on the very day of their marriage, most like a wilful, haughty, angry boy, but not like a profligate. On other points he is not so easily defended; and Shakspeare, we see, has not defended, but corrected him. The latter part of the play is more perplexing than pleasing. We do not, indeed, repine with Dr. Johnson, that Bertram, after all his misdemeanors, is "dismissed to happiness;" but, notwithstanding the clever defence that has been made for him, he has our pardon rather than our sympathy; and for mine own part, I could find it easier to love Bertram as Helena does, than to excuse him; her love for him is his best excuse.

In Viola and Perdita the distinguishing traits are the same—sentiment and elegance; thus we associate them together, though nothing can be more distinct to the fancy than the Doric grace of Perdita, compared to the romantic sweetness of Viola. They are created out of the same materials, and are equal to each other in the tenderness, delicacy, and poetical beauty of the conception. They are both more imaginative than passionate; but Perdita is the more imaginative of the two. She is the union of the pastoral and romantic with the classical and poetical, as if a dryad of the woods had turned shepherdess. The perfections with which the poet has so lavishly endowed her, sit upon her with a certain careless and picturesque grace, "as though they had fallen upon her unawares." Thus Belphœbe, in the Fairy Queen, issues from the flowering forest with hair and garments all besprinkled with the leaves and blossoms they had entangled in their flight; and so arrayed by chance and "heedless hap," takes all hearts with "statelypresence and with princely port,"—most like to Perdita!

The story of Florizel and Perdita is but an episode in the "Winter's Tale;" and the character of Perdita is properly kept subordinate to that of her mother, Hermione: yet the picture is perfectly finished in every part;—Juliet herself is not more firmly and distinctly drawn. But the coloring in Perdita is more silvery light and delicate; the pervading sentiment more touched with the ideal; compared with Juliet, she is like a Guido hung beside a Georgione, or one of Paesiello's airs heard after one of Mozart's.

The qualities which impart to Perdita her distinct individuality, are the beautiful combination of the pastoral with the elegant—of simplicity with elevation—of spirit with sweetness. The exquisite delicacy of the picture is apparent. To understand and appreciate its effective truth and nature, we should place Perdita beside some of the nymphs of Arcadia, or the Chloris' and Sylvias of the Italian pastorals, who, however graceful in themselves, when opposed to Perdita, seem to melt away into mere poetical abstractions;—as, in Spenser, the fair but fictitious Florimel, which the subtle enchantress had moulded out of snow, "vermeil tinctured," and informed with an airy spirit, that knew "all wiles of woman's wits," fades and dissolves away, when placed next to the real Florimel, in her warm, breathing, human loveliness.

Perdita does not appear till the fourth act, andthe whole of the character is developed in the course of a single scene, (the third,) with a completeness of effect which leaves nothing to be required—nothing to be supplied. She is first introduced in the dialogue between herself and Florizel, where she compares her own lowly state to his princely rank, and expresses her fears of the issue of their unequal attachment. With all her timidity and her sense of the distance which separates her from her lover, she breathes not a single word which could lead us to impugn either her delicacy or her dignity.

FLORIZEL.These your unusual weeds to each part of youDo give a life—no shepherdess, but FloraPeering in April's front; this your sheep-shearingIs as the meeting of the petty gods,And you the queen on't.PERDITA.Sir, my gracious lord,To chide at your extremes it not becomes me;O pardon that I name them: your high self,The gracious mark o' the land, you have obscuredWith a swain's bearing; and me, poor lowly maid,Most goddess-like prank'd up:—but that our feastsIn every mess have folly, and the feedersDigest it with a custom, I should blushTo see you so attired; sworn, I thinkTo show myself a glass.

FLORIZEL.

These your unusual weeds to each part of youDo give a life—no shepherdess, but FloraPeering in April's front; this your sheep-shearingIs as the meeting of the petty gods,And you the queen on't.

PERDITA.

Sir, my gracious lord,To chide at your extremes it not becomes me;O pardon that I name them: your high self,The gracious mark o' the land, you have obscuredWith a swain's bearing; and me, poor lowly maid,Most goddess-like prank'd up:—but that our feastsIn every mess have folly, and the feedersDigest it with a custom, I should blushTo see you so attired; sworn, I thinkTo show myself a glass.

The impression of her perfect beauty and airy elegance of demeanor is conveyed in two exquisite passages:—

What you doStill betters what is done. When you speak, sweet,I'd have you do it ever. When you sing,I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms,Pray so, and for the ordering your affairsTo sing them too. When you do dance, I wish youA wave o' the sea, that you might ever doNothing but that; move still, still so, and ownNo other function.I take thy hand; this handAs soft as dove's down, and as white as it;Or Ethiopian's tooth, or the fann'd snow,That's bolted by the northern blasts twice o'er.

I take thy hand; this handAs soft as dove's down, and as white as it;Or Ethiopian's tooth, or the fann'd snow,That's bolted by the northern blasts twice o'er.

The artless manner in which her innate nobility of soul shines forth through her pastoral disguise, is thus brought before us at once:—

This is the prettiest low-born lass that everRan on the green sward; nothing she does or seems,But smacks of something greater than herself;Too noble for this place.

Her natural loftiness of spirit breaks out where she is menaced and reviled by the King, as one whom his son has degraded himself by merely looking on; she bears the royal frown without quailing; but the moment he is gone, the immediate recollection of herself, and of her humble state, of her hapless love, is full of beauty, tenderness, and nature:—

Even here undone!I was much afeard: for once or twice,I was about to speak; and tell him plainlyThe self-same sun, that shines upon his courtHides not his visage from our cottage, butLooks on alike.Will't please, you Sir, be gone?I told you what would come of this. Beseech you,Of your own state take care; this dream of mine—Being now awake—I'll queen it no inch further,But milk my ewes, and weep.How often have I told you 'twould be thusHow often said, my dignity would lastBut till 'twere known!FLORIZEL.It cannot fail, but byThe violation of my faith; and thenLet nature crush the sides o' the earth togetherAnd mar the seeds within! Lift up thy looks.* * * *Not for Bohemia, nor the pomp that mayBe thereat glean'd! for all the sun sees, orThe close earth wombs, or the profound seas hideIn unknown fathoms, will I break my oathTo thee, my fair beloved!

Even here undone!I was much afeard: for once or twice,I was about to speak; and tell him plainlyThe self-same sun, that shines upon his courtHides not his visage from our cottage, butLooks on alike.

Will't please, you Sir, be gone?I told you what would come of this. Beseech you,Of your own state take care; this dream of mine—Being now awake—I'll queen it no inch further,But milk my ewes, and weep.

How often have I told you 'twould be thusHow often said, my dignity would lastBut till 'twere known!

FLORIZEL.

It cannot fail, but byThe violation of my faith; and thenLet nature crush the sides o' the earth togetherAnd mar the seeds within! Lift up thy looks.

* * * *

Not for Bohemia, nor the pomp that mayBe thereat glean'd! for all the sun sees, orThe close earth wombs, or the profound seas hideIn unknown fathoms, will I break my oathTo thee, my fair beloved!

Perdita has another characteristic, which lends to the poetical delicacy of the delineation a certain strength and moral elevation, which is peculiarly striking. It is that sense of truth and rectitude, that upright simplicity of mind, which disdains all crooked and indirect means, which would not stoop for an instant to dissemblance, and is mingled with a noble confidence in her love and in her lover. In this spirit is her answer to Camilla, who says, courtier like,—

Besides, you knowProsperity's the very bond of love;Whose fresh complexion, and whose heart togetherAffliction alters.

To which she replies,—

One of these is true;I think, affliction may subdue the cheek,But not take in the mind.

In that elegant scene where she receives the guests at the sheep-shearing, and distributes the flowers, there is in the full flow of the poetry, a most beautiful and striking touch of individual character: but here it is impossible to mutilate the dialogue.

Reverend sirs,For you there's rosemary and rue; these keepSeeming and savor all the winter long;Grace and remembrance be to you both,And welcome to our shearing!POLIXENES.Shepherdess,(A fair one are you,) well you fit our agesWith flowers of winter.PERDITA.Sir, the year growing ancient,Nor yet on summer's death, nor on the birthOf trembling winter, the fairest flowers o' the seasonAre our carnations, and streaked gilliflowers,Which some call nature's bastards: of that kindOur rustic garden's barren; and I care notTo get slips of them.POLIXENES.Wherefore, gentle maiden,Do you neglect them?PERDITA.For I have heard it said,There is an art, which in their piedness, sharesWith great creating nature.POLIXENES.Say there be;Yet nature is made better by no meanBut nature makes that mean; so o'er that artWhich, you say, adds to nature, is an artThat nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marryA gentle scion to the wildest stock;And make conceive a bark of baser kindBy bud of nobler race. This is an artWhich does mend nature, change it rather; butThe art itself is nature.PERDITA.So it is.POLIXENES.Then make your garden rich in gilliflowers,And do not call them bastards.PERDITA.I'll not putThe dibble in earth to set one slip of them;No more than were I painted, I would wishThis youth should say 'twere well.

Reverend sirs,For you there's rosemary and rue; these keepSeeming and savor all the winter long;Grace and remembrance be to you both,And welcome to our shearing!

POLIXENES.

Shepherdess,(A fair one are you,) well you fit our agesWith flowers of winter.

PERDITA.

Sir, the year growing ancient,Nor yet on summer's death, nor on the birthOf trembling winter, the fairest flowers o' the seasonAre our carnations, and streaked gilliflowers,Which some call nature's bastards: of that kindOur rustic garden's barren; and I care notTo get slips of them.

POLIXENES.

Wherefore, gentle maiden,Do you neglect them?

PERDITA.

For I have heard it said,There is an art, which in their piedness, sharesWith great creating nature.

POLIXENES.

Say there be;Yet nature is made better by no meanBut nature makes that mean; so o'er that artWhich, you say, adds to nature, is an artThat nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marryA gentle scion to the wildest stock;And make conceive a bark of baser kindBy bud of nobler race. This is an artWhich does mend nature, change it rather; butThe art itself is nature.

PERDITA.

So it is.

POLIXENES.

Then make your garden rich in gilliflowers,And do not call them bastards.

PERDITA.

I'll not putThe dibble in earth to set one slip of them;No more than were I painted, I would wishThis youth should say 'twere well.

It has been well remarked of this passage, that Perdita does not attempt to answer the reasoningof Polixenes: she gives up the argument, but, woman-like, retains her own opinion, or rather, her sense of right, unshaken by his sophistry. She goes on in a strain of poetry, which comes over the soul like music and fragrance mingled: we seem to inhale the blended odors of a thousand flowers, till the sense faints with their sweetness; and she concludes with a touch of passionate sentiment, which melts into the very heart:—

O Proserpina!For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fallFrom Dis's wagon! daffodils,That come before the swallow dares, and takeThe winds of March with beauty; violets dim,But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses,That die unmarried, ere they can beholdBright Phœbus in his strength, a maladyMost incident to maids; bold oxlips, andThe crown imperial; lilies of all kinds,The flower-de-luce being one! O, these I lack,To make you garlands of; and my sweet friendTo strew him o'er and o'er.FLORIZEL.What! like a corse?PERDITA.No, like a bank, for Love to lie and play on;Not like a corse: or if,—not to be buried,But quick, and in mine arms!

FLORIZEL.

What! like a corse?

PERDITA.

No, like a bank, for Love to lie and play on;Not like a corse: or if,—not to be buried,But quick, and in mine arms!

This love of truth, thisconscientiousness, which forms so distinct a feature in the character of Perdita,and mingles with its picturesque delicacy a certain firmness and dignity, is maintained consistently to the last. When the two lovers fly together from Bohemia, and take refuge in the court of Leontes, the real father of Perdita, Florizel presents himself before the king with a feigned tale, in which he has been artfully instructed by the old counsellor Camillo. During this scene, Perdita does not utter a word. In the strait in which they are placed, she cannot deny the story which Florizel relates—she will not confirm it. Her silence, in spite of all the compliments and greetings of Leontes, has a peculiar and characteristic grace and, at the conclusion of the scene, when they are betrayed, the truth bursts from her as if instinctively, and she exclaims, with emotion,—

The heavens set spies upon us—will not haveOur contract celebrated.

After this scene, Perdita says very little. The description of her grief, while listening to the relation of her mother's death,—

"One of the prettiest touches of all, was, when at the relation of the queen's death, with the manner how she came by it, how attentiveness wounded her daughter: till from one sign of dolor to another, she did, with analas! I would fain say, bleed tears:"—

her deportment too as she stands gazing on the statue of Hermione, fixed in wonder, admiration and sorrow, as if she too were marble—

O royal piece!There's magic in thy majesty, which hasFrom thy admiring daughter ta'en the spirits,Standing like stone beside thee!

are touches of character conveyed indirectly, and which serve to give a more finished effect to this beautiful picture.

As the innate dignity of Perdita pierces through her rustic disguise, so the exquisite refinement of Viola triumphs over her masculine attire. Viola is, perhaps, in a degree less elevated and ideal than Perdita, but with a touch of sentiment more profound and heart-stirring; she is "deep-learned in the lore of love,"—at least theoretically,—and speaks as masterly on the subject as Perdita does of flowers.

DUKE.How dost thou like this tune?VIOLA.It gives a very echo to the seatWhere love is thron'd.

DUKE.

How dost thou like this tune?

VIOLA.

It gives a very echo to the seatWhere love is thron'd.

And again,

If I did love you in my master's flame,With such a suffering, such a deadly life—in your denial I would find no sense,I would not understand it.OLIVIA.Why, what would you do?VIOLA.Make me a willow cabin at your gate,And call upon my soul within the house;Write loyal cantons[35]of contemned love,And sing them loud even in the dead of night.Holla your name to the reverberate hills,And make babbling gossip of the airCry out, Olivia! O you should not restBetween the elements of air and earth,But you should pity me.OLIVIA.You might do much.

If I did love you in my master's flame,With such a suffering, such a deadly life—in your denial I would find no sense,I would not understand it.

OLIVIA.

Why, what would you do?

VIOLA.

Make me a willow cabin at your gate,And call upon my soul within the house;Write loyal cantons[35]of contemned love,And sing them loud even in the dead of night.Holla your name to the reverberate hills,And make babbling gossip of the airCry out, Olivia! O you should not restBetween the elements of air and earth,But you should pity me.

OLIVIA.

You might do much.

The situation and the character of Viola have been censured for their want of consistency and probability; it is therefore worth while to examine how far this criticism is true. As for her situation in the drama, (of which she is properly the heroine,) it is shortly this. She is shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria: she is alone and without protection in a strange country. She wishes to enter into the service of the Countess Olivia; but she is assured that this is impossible; "for the lady having recently lost an only and beloved brother, has abjured the sight of men, has shut herself up in her palace, and will admit no kind of suit." In this perplexity Viola remembers to have heard her father speak with praise and admiration of Orsino, the Duke ofthe country; and having ascertained that he is not married, and that therefore his court is not a proper asylum for her in her feminine character, she attires herself in the disguise of a page, as the best protection against uncivil comments, till she can gain some tidings of her brother.

If we carry our thoughts back to a romantic and chivalrous age, there is surely sufficient probability here for all the purposes of poetry. To pursue the thread of Viola's destiny;—she is engaged in the service of the Duke, whom she finds "fancy-sick" for the love of Olivia. We are left to infer, (for so it is hinted in the first scene,) that this Duke—who with his accomplishments, and his personal attractions, his taste for music, his chivalrous tenderness, and his unrequited love, is really a very fascinating and poetical personage, though a little passionate and fantastic—had already made some impression on Viola's imagination; and when she comes to play the confidante, and to be loaded with favors and kindness in her assumed character, that she should be touched by a passion made up of pity, admiration, gratitude, and tenderness, does not, I think, in any way detract from the genuine sweetness and delicacy of her character, for "she never told her love."

Now all this, as the critic wisely observes, may not present a very just picture of life; and it may also fail to impart any moral lesson for the especial profit of well-bred young ladies; but is it not in truth and in nature? Did it ever fail to charm orto interest, to seize on the coldest fancy, to touch the most insensible heart?

Viola then is the chosen favorite of the enamoured Duke, and becomes his messenger to Olivia, and the interpreter of his sufferings to that inaccessible beauty. In her character of a youthful page, she attracts the favor of Olivia, and excites the jealousy of her lord. The situation is critical and delicate; but how exquisitely is the character of Viola fitted to her part, carrying her through the ordeal with all the inward and spiritual grace of modesty. What beautiful propriety in the distinction drawn between Rosalind and Viola! The wild sweetness, the frolic humor which sports free and unblamed amid the shades of Ardennes, would ill become Viola, whose playfulness is assumed as part of her disguise as a court-page, and is guarded by the strictest delicacy. She has not, like Rosalind, a saucy enjoyment in her own incognito; her disguise does not sit so easily upon her; her heart does not beat freely under it. As in the old ballad, where "Sweet William" is detected weeping in secret over her "man's array,"[36]so in Viola, a sweet consciousness of her feminine nature is for ever breaking through her masquerade:—

And on her cheek is ready with a blushModest as morning, when she coldly eyesThe youthful Phœbus.

She plays her part well, but never forgets nor allows us to forget, that she is playing a part.

OLIVIA.Are you a comedian?VIOLA.No, my profound heart! and yet by the very fangs ofmalice I swear, I am not that I play!

OLIVIA.

Are you a comedian?

VIOLA.

No, my profound heart! and yet by the very fangs ofmalice I swear, I am not that I play!

And thus she comments on it:—

Disguise, I see thou art wickedness,Wherein the pregnant enemy does much;How easy is it for the proper falseIn women's waxen hearts to set their forms!Alas! our frailty is the cause, not we.

The feminine cowardice of Viola, which will not allow her even to affect a courage becoming her attire,—her horror at the idea of drawing a sword, is very natural and characteristic; and produces a most humorous effect, even at the very moment it charms and interests us.

Contrasted with the deep, silent, patient love of Viola for the Duke, we have the lady-like wilfulness of Olivia; and her sudden passion, or rather fancy, for the disguised page, takes so beautiful a coloring of poetry and sentiment, that we do not think her forward. Olivia is like a princess of romance, and has all the privileges of one; she is, like Portia, high born and high bred, mistress over her servants—but not like Portia, "queen o'er herself." She has never in her life been opposed; the first contradiction, therefore, rouses all the womanin her, and turns a caprice into a headlong passion; yet she apologizes for herself.

I have said too much unto a heart of stone,And laid mine honor too unchary out;There's something in me that reproves my fault;But such a headstrong potent fault it is,That it but mocks reproof!

And in the midst of her self-abandonment, never allows us to contemn, even while we pity her:—

What shall you ask of me that I'll deny.That honor, saved, may upon asking give?

The distance of rank which separates the Countess from the youthful page—the real sex of Viola—the dignified elegance of Olivia's deportment, except where passion gets the better of her pride—her consistent coldness towards the Duke—the description of that "smooth, discreet, and stable bearing" with which she rules her household—her generous care for her steward Malvolio, in the midst of her own distress,—all these circumstances raise Olivia in our fancy, and render her caprice for the page a source of amusement and interest, not a subject of reproach.Twelfth Nightis a genuine comedy;—a perpetual spring of the gayest and the sweetest fancies. In artificial society men and women are divided into castes and classes, and it is rarely that extremes in character or manners can approximate. To blend into one harmonious picture the utmost grace and refinementof sentiment, and the broadest effects of humor; the most poignant wit, and the most indulgent benignity;—in short, to bring before us in the same scene, Viola and Olivia, with Malvolio and Sir Toby, belonged only to Nature and to Shakspeare.

A woman's affections, however strong, are sentiments, when they run smooth; and become passions only when opposed.

In Juliet and Helena, love is depicted as a passion, properly so called; that is, a natural impulse, throbbing in the heart's blood, and mingling with the very sources of life;—a sentiment more or less modified by the imagination; a strong abiding principle and motive, excited by resistance, acting upon the will, animating all the other faculties, and again influenced by them. This is the most complex aspect of love, and in these two characters, it is depicted in colors at once the most various, the most intense, and the most brilliant.

In Viola and Perdita, love, being less complex, appears more refined; more a sentiment than a passion—a compound of impulse and fancy, while the reflective powers and moral energies are more faintly developed. The same remark applies also to Julia and Silvia, in the Two Gentlemen ofVerona, and, in a greater degree, to Hermia and Helena in the Midsummer Night's Dream. In the two latter, though perfectly discriminated, love takes the visionary fanciful cast, which belongs to the whole piece; it is scarcely a passion or a sentiment, but a dreamy enchantment, a reverie, which a fairy spell dissolves or fixes at pleasure.

But there was yet another possible modification of the sentiment, as combined with female nature; and this Shakspeare has shown to us. He has portrayed two beings, in whom all intellectual and moral energy is in a manner latent, if existing; in whom love is an unconscious impulse, and imagination lends the external charm and hue, not the internal power; in whom the feminine character appears resolved into its very elementary principles—as modesty, grace,[37]tenderness.Withoutthese a woman is no woman, but a thing which, luckily, wants a name yet;withthese, though every other faculty were passive or deficient, she might still be herself. These are the inherent qualities with which God sent us into the world: they may be perverted by a bad education—they may be obscured by harsh and evil destinies—they may be overpowered by the development of some particular mental power, the predominance of some passion—butthey are never wholly crushed out of the woman's soul, while it retains those faculties which render it responsible to its Creator. Shakspeare then has shown us that these elemental feminine qualities, modesty, grace, tenderness, when expanded under genial influences, suffice to constitute a perfect and happy human creature: such is Miranda. When thrown alone amid harsh and adverse destinies, and amid the trammels and corruptions of society, without energy to resist, or will to act, or strength to endure, the end must needs be desolation.

Ophelia—poor Ophelia! O far too soft, too good, too fair, to be cast among the briers of this working-day world, and fall and bleed upon the thorns of life! What shall be said of her? for eloquence is mute before her! Like a strain of sad sweet music which comes floating by us on the wings of night and silence, and which we rather feel than hear—like the exhalation of the violet dying even upon the sense it charms—like the snow-flake dissolved in air before it has caught a stain of earth—like the light surf severed from the billow, which a breath disperses—such is the character of Ophelia: so exquisitely delicate, it seems as if a touch would profane it; so sanctified in our thoughts by the last and worst of human woes, that we scarcely dare to consider it too deeply. The love of Ophelia, which she never once confesses, is like a secret which we have stolen from her, and which ought to die upon our hearts as upon herown. Her sorrows ask not words but tears; and her madness has precisely the same effect that would be produced by the spectacle of real insanity, if brought before us: we feel inclined to turn away, and veil our eyes in reverential pity and too painful sympathy.

Beyond every character that Shakspeare has drawn, (Hamlet alone excepted,) that of Ophelia makes us forget the poet in his own creation. Whenever we bring her to mind, it is with the same exclusive sense of her real existence, without reference to the wondrous power which called her into life. The effect (and what an effect!) is produced by means so simple, by strokes so few, and so unobtrusive, that we take no thought of them. It is so purely natural and unsophisticated, yet so profound in its pathos, that, as Hazlitt observes, it takes us back to the old ballads; we forget that, in its perfect artlessness, it is the supreme and consummate triumph of art.

The situation of Ophelia in the story,[38]is that of a young girl who, at an early age, is brought from a life of privacy into the circle of a court—a court such as we read of in those early times, at once rude, magnificent, and corrupted. She is placed immediately about the person of the queen, and isapparently her favorite attendant. The affection of the wicked queen for this gentle and innocent creature, is one of those beautiful redeeming touches, one of those penetrating glances into the secret springs of natural and feminine feeling which we find only in Shakspeare. Gertrude, who is not so wholly abandoned but that there remains within her heart some sense of the virtue she has forfeited, seems to look with a kind yet melancholy complacency on the lovely being she has destined for the bride of her son; and the scene in which she is introduced as scattering flowers on the grave of Ophelia, is one of those effects of contrast in poetry, in character and in feeling, at once natural and unexpected; which fill the eye, and make the heart swell and tremble within itself—like the nightingales singing in the grove of the Furies in Sophocles.[39]

Again, in the father of Ophelia, the Lord Chamberlain Polonius—the shrewd, wary, subtle, pompous, garrulous old courtier—have we not the very man who would send his son into the world to see all, learn all it could teach of good and evil, but keep his only daughter as far as possible from every taint of that world he knew so well? So that when she is brought to the court, she seems in her loveliness and perfect purity, like a seraph that had wandered out of bounds, and yet breathed on earth the air of paradise. When her father and her brother find it necessary to warn her simplicity,give her lessons of worldly wisdom, and instruct her "to be scanter of her maiden presence," for that Hamlet's vows of love "but breathe like sanctified and pious bonds, the better to beguile," we feel at once that it comes too late; for from the moment she appears on the scene amid the dark conflict of crime and vengeance, and supernatural terrors, we know what must be her destiny. Once, at Murano, I saw a dove caught in a tempest; perhaps it was young, and either lacked strength of wing to reach its home, or the instinct which teaches to shun the brooding storm; but so it was—and I watched it, pitying, as it flitted, poor bird hither and thither, with its silver pinions shining against the black thunder-cloud, till, after a few giddy whirls, it fell blinded, affrighted, and bewildered, into the turbid wave beneath, and was swallowed up forever. It reminded me then of the fate of Ophelia; and now when I think of her, I see again before me that poor dove, beating with weary wing, bewildered amid the storm. It is the helplessness of Ophelia, arising merely from her innocence, and pictured without any indication of weakness, which melts us with such profound pity. She is so young, that neither her mind nor her person have attained maturity; she is not aware of the nature of her own feelings; they are prematurely developed in their full force before she has strength to bear them; and love and grief together rend and shatter the frail texture of her existence, like the burning fluid poured into a crystal vase.She says very little, and what she does say seems rather intended to hide than to reveal the emotions of her heart; yet in those few words we are made as perfectly acquainted with her character, and with what is passing in her mind, as if she had thrown forth her soul with all the glowing eloquence of Juliet. Passion with Juliet seems innate, a part of her being, "as dwells the gathered lightning in the cloud;" and we never fancy her but with the dark splendid eyes and Titian-like complexion of the south. While in Ophelia we recognize as distinctly the pensive, fair-haired, blue-eyed daughter of the north, whose heart seems to vibrate to the passion she has inspired, more conscious of being loved than of loving; and yet, alas! loving in the silent depths of her young heart far more than she is loved.

When her brother warns her against Hamlet's importunities—

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