Folk-lore of Shakespeare Part 74

We may quote a further allusion in "Venus and Adonis" (l. 701):

"And now his grief may be compared well To one sore sick that hears the pa.s.sing-bell."

In a statute pa.s.sed during the reign of Henry VIII., it is ordered "that clarks are to ring no more than the pa.s.sing bell for poare people, nor less for an honest householder, and he be a citizen; nor for children, maydes, journeymen, apprentices, day-labourers, or any other poare person." In 1662, the Bishop of Worcester[730] asks, in his visitation charge: "Doth the parish clerk or s.e.xton take care to admonish the living, by tolling of a pa.s.sing-bell, of any that are dying, thereby to meditate of their own deaths, and to commend the other's weak condition to the mercy of G.o.d?" It was, also, called the "soul-bell," upon which Bishop Hall remarks: "We call it the soul-bell because it signifies the departure of the soul, not because it helps the pa.s.sage of the soul."

Ray, in his "Collection of Proverbs," has the following couplet:

"When thou dost hear a toll or knell Then think upon thy pa.s.sing-bell."

[730] "Annals of Worcester," 1845.

It was formerly customary to draw away the pillow from under the heads of dying persons, so as to accelerate their departure-an allusion to which we find in "Timon of Athens" (iv. 3), where Timon says:

"Pluck stout men's pillows from below their heads."

This, no doubt, originated in the notion that a person cannot die happily on a bed made of pigeons' feathers. Grose says: "It is impossible for a person to die whilst resting on a pillow stuffed with the feathers of a dove; but that he will struggle with death in the most exquisite torture. The pillows of dying persons are therefore frequently taken away when they appear in great agonies, lest they may have pigeon's feathers in them." Indeed, in Lancashire, this practice is carried to such an extent that some will not allow dying persons to lie on a feather bed, because they hold that it very much increases their pain and suffering, and actually r.e.t.a.r.ds their departure.[731]

[731] Harland and Wilkinson's "Lancashire Folk-Lore," 1869, p.

268; see "English Folk-Lore," 1878, pp. 99, 100; also "Notes and Queries," 1st series, vol. iv. p. 133.

The departure of the human soul from this world, and its journey to its untried future, have become interwoven with an extensive network of superst.i.tions, varying more or less in every country and tribe.

Shakespeare has alluded to the numerous destinations of the disembodied spirit, enumerating the many ideas prevalent in his time on the subject.

In "Measure for Measure" (iii. 1), Claudio thus speaks:

"Ay, but to die, and go we know not where; To lie in cold obstruction and to rot; This sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice; To be imprison'd in the viewless winds, And blown with restless violence round about The pendent world."[732]

[732] Cf. Milton's "Paradise Lost," v. 595-683.

We may compare also the powerful language of Oth.e.l.lo (v. 2):

"This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven, And fiends will s.n.a.t.c.h at it. Cold, cold, my girl!

Even like thy chast.i.ty.- O cursed, cursed slave! Whip me, ye devils, From the possession of this heavenly sight!

Blow me about in winds! roast me in sulphur!

Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!

O Desdemona! Desdemona! dead!"

Douce[733] says that in the former pa.s.sage it is difficult to decide whether Shakespeare is alluding to the pains of h.e.l.l or purgatory. Both pa.s.sages are obscure, and have given rise to much criticism. It seems probable, however, that while partly referring to the notions of the time, relating to departed souls, Shakespeare has in a great measure incorporated the ideas of what he had read in books of Catholic divinity. The pa.s.sages quoted above remind us of the legend of St.

Patrick's purgatory, where mention is made of a lake of ice and snow into which persons were plunged up to their necks; and of the description of h.e.l.l given in the "Shepherd's Calendar:"

"a great froste in a water rounes And after a bytter wynde comes Which gothe through the soules with eyre; Fends with pokes pulle theyr flesshe ysondre, They fight and curse, and eche on other wonder."

[733] See "Ill.u.s.trations of Shakespeare," 1839, pp. 82, 83.

We cannot here enter, however, into the ma.s.s of mystic details respecting "the soul's dread journey[734] by caverns and rocky paths and weary plains, over steep and slippery mountains, by frail bank or giddy bridge, across gulfs or rushing rivers, abiding the fierce onset of the soul-destroyer or the doom of the stern guardian of the other world."

Few subjects, indeed, have afforded greater scope for the imagination than the hereafter of the human soul, and hence, as might be expected, numerous myths have been invented in most countries to account for its mysterious departure in the hour of death, from the world of living men to its unseen, unknown home in the distant land of spirits.

[734] Tylor's "Primitive Culture," vol. ii. p. 46.

Shakespeare several times uses the word "limbo" in a general signification for h.e.l.l, as in "t.i.tus Andronicus" (iii. 1):

"As far from help as limbo is from bliss."

And in "All's Well that Ends Well" (v. 3), Parolles says: "for, indeed, he was mad for her, and talked of Satan, and of limbo, and of furies, and I know not what." In "Henry VIII." (v. 4), "in Limbo Patrum" is jocularly put for a prison; and, again, in "Comedy of Errors" (iv. 2), "he's in Tartar limbo." "According to the schoolmen, _Limbus Patrum_ was the place, bordering on h.e.l.l, where the souls of the patriarchs and saints of the Old Testament remained till the death of Christ, who, descending into h.e.l.l, set them free."[735]

[735] Dyce's "Glossary," p. 246.

One of the punishments invented of old for the covetous and avaricious, in h.e.l.l, was to have melted gold poured down their throats, to which allusion is made by Flaminius, in "Timon of Athens" (iii. 1), who, denouncing Lucullus for his mean insincerity towards his friend Timon, exclaims, on rejecting the bribe offered him to tell his master that he had not seen him:

"May these add to the number that may scald thee!

Let molten coin be thy d.a.m.nation."

In the "Shepherd's Calendar," Lazarus declares himself to have seen covetous men and women in h.e.l.l dipped in caldrons of molten lead. Malone quotes the following from an old black-letter ballad of "The Dead Man's Song:"

"Ladles full of melted gold Were poured down their throats."

Cra.s.sus was so punished by the Parthians.[736]

[736] Singer's "Shakespeare," 1875, vol. viii. p. 291.

There is possibly a further allusion to this imaginary punishment in "Antony and Cleopatra" (ii. 5), where Cleopatra says to the messenger:

"But, sirrah, mark, we use To say, the dead are well: bring it to that, The gold I give thee will I melt, and pour Down thy ill-uttering throat."

According to a well-known superst.i.tion among sailors, it is considered highly unlucky to keep a corpse on board, in case of a death at sea.

Thus, in "Pericles" (iii. 1), this piece of folk-lore is alluded to:

"_1 Sailor._ Sir, your queen must overboard; the sea works high, the wind is loud, and will not lie till the ship be cleared of the dead.

_Pericles._ That's your superst.i.tion.

_1 Sailor._ Pardon us, sir; with us at sea it hath been still observed; and we are strong in custom. Therefore briefly yield her; for she must overboard straight."

It was also a popular opinion that death is delayed until the ebb of the tide-a superst.i.tion to which Mrs. Quickly refers in "Henry V." (ii. 3); speaking of Falstaff's death, she says: "'A made a finer end, and went away, an it had been any christom child; 'a parted even just between twelve and one, even at the turning o' the tide." Hence, in cases of sickness, many pretended that they could foretell the hour of the soul's departure. It may be remembered how Mr. Peggotty explained to David Copperfield, by poor Barkis's bedside, that "people can't die along the coast except when the tide's pretty nigh out. They can't be born unless it's pretty nigh in-not properly born till flood. He's a-going out with the tide-he's a-going out with the tide. It's ebb at half arter three, slack-water half an hour. If he lives till it turns he'll hold his own till past the flood, and go out with the next tide." Mr. Henderson[737]

quotes from the parish register of Heslidon, near Hartlepool, the subjoined extracts of old date, in which the state of the tide at the time of death is mentioned:

"The xith daye of Maye, A.D. 1595, at vi. of ye clocke in the morninge, being full water, Mr. Henrye Mitford, of Hoolam, died at Newcastel, and was buried the xvith daie, being Sondaie, at evening prayer, the hired preacher maid ye sermon."

"The xviith daie of Maie, at xii. of ye clock at noon, being lowe water, Mrs. Barbara Mitford died, and was buried the xviiith daie of Maie, at ix. of the clocke. Mr. Holsworth maid ye sermon."

[737] "Folk-Lore of Northern Counties," 1880, p. 58.

According to Mr. Henderson, this belief is common along the east coast of England, from Northumberland to Kent. It has been suggested that there may be "some slight foundation for this belief in the change of temperature which undoubtedly takes place on the change of tide, and which may act on the flickering spark of life, extinguishing it as the ebbing sea recedes."

We may compare, too, the following pa.s.sage in "2 Henry IV." (iv. 4), where Clarence, speaking of the approaching death of the king, says:

"The river hath thrice flow'd, no ebb between; And the old folk, time's doting chronicles, Say it did so a little time before That our great grandsire, Edward, sick'd and died."

This was an historical fact, having happened on October 12, 1411.

The prayers of the Church, which are used for the recovery of the sick, were, in the olden time, also supposed to have a morbific influence, to which Gloster attributes the death of the king in "1 Henry VI." (i. 1):