Pastoral Poetry & Pastoral Drama Part 47

[273] In 1658 there appeared a Latin translation, under the t.i.tle of _La Fida pastora,_ by 'FF. Anglo-Britannus,' namely, Sir Richard Fanshawe, as appears from an engraved monogram on the t.i.tle-page.

[274] As Fleay points out, the prologue and epilogue are not suited to court representation.

[275] Randolph's familiarity with Guarini is evident throughout, and there is at least one distinct reminiscence, namely Thestylis' humorous expansion of Corisca's remark about changing her lovers like her clothes:

Other Nymphs Have their varietie of loves, for every gowne, Nay, every petticote; I have only one, The poore foole Mopsus! (I. ii.)

[276] A word borrowed by Randolph from the Greek, ?f?, a divine voice or prophecy. He may possibly have a.s.sociated the word with the Delphic ?fa???.

[277] It is possible that Laurinda's indecision may owe something to the _doppio amore_ of Celia in the _Filli di Sciro_. See especially III. i. of that play.

[278] Homer Smith quotes as Halliwell's the description of the play as 'one of the finest specimens of pastoral poetry in our language, partaking of the best properties of Guarini's and Ta.s.so's poetry, without being a servile imitation of either.' He has been misled into supposing that the comments in the _Dictionary of Plays_ are original. The above first appears in the _Biographia Dramatica_ of 1812, and may therefore be ascribed to Stephen Jones. All Halliwell did was to omit the further words, 'its style is at once simple and elevated, natural and dignified.'

The whole description is of course in the very worst style of critical claptrap. Halliwell reprinted the 'fairy' scenes in his _Ill.u.s.trations of the Fairy Mythology of A Midsummer Night's Dream_ (Shakespeare Soc., 1845), though how they were supposed to ill.u.s.trate anything of the kind we are not informed.

[279] 1822, p. 61. This, the only modern edition of Randolph, is one of the worst edited books in the language, and no literary drubbing was ever better deserved than that administered by the _Sat.u.r.day Review_ on August 21, 1875. As the text is quite useless for purposes of quotation, I have had recourse to the very correct first edition of the _Poems_, 1638, checked by a collation of the numerous subsequent issues.

[280] The sense in the original is defective.

[281] i.e. Tethys, a very common confusion.

[282] The fact that the play was never published as a separate work makes it difficult to estimate its popularity with the reading public. The whole collection was freqnently reprinted, 1638, 1640, 1643, 1652, 1664 and 1668 twice. In 1703 appeared the _Fickle Shepherdess_, 'As it is Acted in the New Theatre in Lincolns-Inn Fields. By Her Majesties Servants. Play'd all by Women.' This piece is said in the epistle dedicatory to Lady Gower to be 'abreviated from an Author famous in his Time.' It is in fact a prose rendering, much compressed, of the main action of Randolph's play, the language being for the most part just sufficiently altered to turn good verse into bad prose.

[283] Vide post, p. 382.

[284] For a detailed discussion of the evidence I must refer the reader to the Introduction to my reprint of the play in the _Materialien zur Kunde des alteren Englischen Dramas_ (vol. xi, 1905). The following summary may be quoted. '(i) There is no ground for supposing that there ever existed more of the _Sad Shepherd_ than we at present possess. (ii) The theory of the substantial ident.i.ty of the _Sad Shepherd_ and the _May Lord_ must be rejected, there being no reason to suppose that the latter was dramatic at all. (iii) The two works may, however, have been to some extent connected in subject, and fragments of the one may survive embedded in the other.

(iv) The _May Lord_ was most probably written in the autumn of 1613. (v) The date of the _Sad Shepherd_ cannot be fixed with certainty; but there is no definite evidence to oppose to the first line of the prologue and the allusion in Falkland's elegy [in _Jonsonus Virbius_], which agree in placing it in the few years preceding Jonson's death.'

[285] The play has no doubt been somewhat lost in the big collected editions of the author's works, and has also suffered from its fragmentary state. Previous to my own reprint it had only once been issued as a separate publication, namely, by F. G. Waldrou, whose edition, with continuation, appeared in 1783. One of the best pa.s.sages, however (II.

viii), was given in Lamb's _Specimens_. In quoting from the play I have preferred to follow the original of 1640, as in my own reprint, merely correcting certain obvions errors, rather than Gifford's edition, in which wholly unwarrantable liberties are taken with the text.

[286] Waldron, in his continuation, matches her with Clarion.

[287] It involves, moreover, the critical fallacy of supposing that poetry is a sort of richly embroidered garment wherewith to clothe the nakedness of the underlying substance. This may be so in certain cases in which the poet is made and not born, or in which he forces himself to work at an uncongenial theme. But in a genuine work of art the substance cannot so be separated from the form without injury to both. The poetry in this case is not an external adornment, but a necessary part of the structure, without which it would be something else than what it is. Verse, when in organic relation with the subject, modifies the character of that subject itself, and the subject can only be rightly apprehended through the medium of the verse. I contend that the _Sad Shepherd_ is a case in point, and Mr.

Swinburne's remarks, I conceive, bear out my view. I shall not, therefore, seek to a.n.a.lyse the types represented by the characters--styling poor little Amie a modification of the type of the 'forward shepherdess'!--nor count the number of lines a.s.signed respectively to the shepherds, to the huntsmen, or to the witch; but shall endeavonr to ascertain the particular object Jonson had in view in adopting a particular presentation of the subject, the means he employed, and the measure of success he achieved.

[288] The distinction which appears to belong peculiarly to the drama is most likely a survival of the influence of the mythological plays, in which the huntress nymphs of Diana frequently appear. We find, however, a tendency to a similar dualism in Mantuan's upland and lowland swains.

[289] It has recently been argued with much ingenuity that Marian is originally none other than the familiar figure of French _pastourelles_.

However this may be, it is a question with which I am not here concerned.

It was the English Robin Hood tradition that formed part of Jonson's rough material. See E. K. Chambers, _The Mediaeval Stage_, i. p. 175.

[290] The author, however, is at fault in his terms of art. If the quarry to which he likens Aeglamour had a dappled hide, it was a fallow and not a red deer. In this case it should have been called a buck, and not a hart.

Again, the female should have been a doe: deer is a generic name including both s.e.xes of red, fallow, and roe alike.

[291] A translation of the _Astree_ appeared as early as 1620, but the French fashion obtained no hold over the popular taste till the later days of the Commonwealth.

[292] I may say that this section was written as it stands before K.

Brunhuber's essay on _Sidneys Arcadia und ihre Nachlaufer_ came into my hands. He gives a superficial account of several printed plays, but was unaware of the existence of those in MS.

[293] The quotations are from the Gifford-Dyce edition of Shirley's Works (1833), the only collected edition that has appeared. The text stands badly in need of revision, but I have had to content myself with a few obvious corrections. For instance, in the pa.s.sage quoted above, the editors have followed the quarto in reducing l. 13 to nonsense, by reading 'no man,' and l. 20 by reading 'And the imagination.'

[294] So at least in the printed play. In the original draft, and probably also in the acting version, as Fleay has pointed out, they were king and queen, and of this traces remain. Thus we twice find Gynetia addressed as 'Queen,' while elsewhere 'Duke' rimes with 'spring,' and 'd.u.c.h.ess' with 'spleen.' The alteration was no doubt made from motives of prudence. Even so the play was, according to Fleay, published surrept.i.tiously, i.e. it does not appear on the Stationers' Register.

[295] A. H. Bullen's reprint of Day's works was privately printed in 1881.

Though the text is not in all respects satisfactory, I have thought myself justified in quoting from it as the only edition available.

[296] Not tennis, as Mr. Bullen states (Introd. p. 17), oblivious for the moment of the impossibility of representing a tennis match on the stage, as well as of the fact that the game was never, in Elizabethan times, played by ladies.

[297] There is one printed play, the relation of which to the _Arcadia_ is not very clear. The t.i.tle, _Mucedorus_, at once suggests some connexion, but it is difficult to follow it out in detail. Mucedorus, 'the king's sonne of Valentia,' leaves his father's court and goes disguised as a shepherd to win the love of Amadine, 'the king's daughter of Arragon.' He twice rescues the princess, is sentenced to banishment, and reveals his ident.i.ty just as his father arrives in search of him. The play was originally printed in 1598, but no doubt originated some years earlier, _c._ 1588 according to Fleay. Most of the resemblances with the _Arcadia_, however, are due to scenes which first appeared in 1610, in which edition the king of Valentia first plays a part. Beyond Mucedorus' disguise there is absolutely nothing pastoral in the play. With the exception of some of the additional scenes, which are undoubtedly by a different hand from the rest, the play is unrelieved rubbish. Probably the original author utilized in the composition of his piece such elements and incidents of the _Arcadia_ as he had gathered orally while the unfinished work still circulated in MS. Later the reviser, being aware of this source, expanded the play from a knowledge of the completed work. It cannot be said to be a dramatization of the romance, though it is undoubtedly in a manner founded upon it.

[298] Egerton MS. 1994. Not _Love's Changelings Changed_, as usually quoted.

[299] _Old Plays_, ii. p. 432.

[300] Rawl. Poet, 3.

[301] In the Bodleian MS. Ashmole 788 is a Latin epistle by Philip Kynder, a miscellaneous writer and court agent under Charles I, born in 1600 at latest, which was 'prefixt before my _Silvia_, a Latin comedie or pastorall, translated from the _Archadia_, written at eighteen years of age.' (See Halliwell's _Dic. of Plays_.) The 'Archadia' might, of course, refer either to Sannazzaro's or Lope de Vega's romances, though this is highly improbable.

[302] So much we learn from the t.i.tle-page itself. The play had very likely been acted at court some years earlier, but the doc.u.ment mentioning such a performance, printed by Cunningham, is of doubtful authenticity, while Fleay contradicts himself upon the subject. The question is, happily, immaterial to our present purpose.

[303] Here, as in the _Isle of Gulls_, the t.i.tles of Duke and d.u.c.h.ess have been imperfectly subst.i.tuted for King and Queen, probably for court performance.

[304] The story in the romance is very different. Erona, after many adventures, marries her lover. Both episodes are related in Book II, chapters xiii and following (ed. 1590). They are epitomized by Dyce, whose edition I have of course used.

[305] Here, again, the catastrophe of the play bears no resemblance to the romance.

[306] See III. v. According to Chetwood (_British Theatre_, 1752, p. 47), the play was revived in 1671, with a prologue attributing it to Shirley.

This is, of course, possible, but it requires more than Chetwood's unsupported authority to render it probable. Fleay suggests that the author is the same as the J. S. of _Phillis of Scyros_, namely, as I have shown, Jonathan Sidnam. This seems to me highly improbable. The play is printed in Hazlitt's Dodsley, vol. xiv, whence I quote, with necessary corrections.

[307] Bk. I. chaps. v-viii, Bk. III. chap. xii, in the edition of 1590.

[308] Quotations are taken, with corrections, from Pearson's reprint of Glapthorne's works (1874).

[309] K. Deighton's emendation, undoubtedly correct, for 'Love' of the original. (_Conjectural Readings_, second series, Calcutta, 1898, p. 136.)

[310] I have been unable to trace this work beyond a reference to Heber's sale given in Hazlitt's _Handbook_. The original story will be found in _Albion's England_, Book IV, chap. xx, of the first Part, published in 1586. As Dr. Ward points out, it is a variant of the old romance of Havelok. Edel, with a view to disinheriting his niece Argentile, heir to Diria (?Deira), of which he is regent, seeks to marry her to a base scullion. This menial, however, is really Curan, prince of Danske, who has sought the court in disguise, in the hope of obtaining the love of the princess, who is mewed up from intercourse with the world. Of this Argentile is ignorant, and when she hears of her uncle's purpose, she contrives to escape from court and lives disguised as a shepherdess. After her flight Curan also leaves the court and a.s.sumes a shepherd's garb, and meeting Argentile by chance again falls in love with her without knowing who she is. After a while he reveals his ident.i.ty, and she hers; they are married, and he conquers back her kingdom from the usurping Edel.

[311] So far as I am aware, A. B. Grosart was the first to point this out.

(_Spenser_, iii. p. lxx.)

[312] It is printed in Hazlitt's _Webster_, vol. iv. Fleay, with characteristic a.s.surance, identifies the _Thracian Wonder_ with a lost play of Heywood's, known only from Henslowe's Diary, and there called 'War without blows and love without suit.' He argues: 'in i. 2, "You never shall again renew your suit;" but the love is given at the end without any suit; and in iii. 2, "Here was a happy war finished without blows."' The identification, however, will not bear examination. No battle, it is true, is fought at Sicily's first appearance, but the t.i.tle, _War without Blows_ could hardly be applied to a play in which the whole of the last act is occupied with fierce fighting between three different nations. So with the second t.i.tle, _Love without Suit_. Serena indeed grants her love in the end without any reason whatever, but only after her lover has 'suited'

himself clean out of his five wits. Moreover, it is not certain that this second t.i.tle should not be _Love without Strife_. Heywood's play, I have little doubt, was a mere love-comedy (cf. such t.i.tles as _The Amorous War_, and similar expressions in the dramatists _pa.s.sim_). The identification, moreover, would necessitate the date 1598, though this does not prevent Fleay from stating that the piece is founded on William Webster's poem published in 1617. So early a date seems to me rather improbable. Since William Webster's poem has nothing to do with the present piece, the suggestion that Kirkman's attribution of the play to John Webster was due to a confusion of course falls to the ground.

[313] According to S. L. Lee in the _Dic. Nat. Biog._, who follows the _Biographia Dramatica._

[314] It will be found in Mr. Bullen's admirable collection, _Lyrics from the Dramatists_, 1889, p. 231.

[315] Reprinted in 1882 by A. H. Bullen in the first volume of his _Old English Plays_, and more recently by R. W. Bond in his edition of Lyly. In quoting, I have generally followed the latter, though I have preferred my own arrangement of certain pa.s.sages. None of the suggestions that have been put forward as to the authorship of the play appear to me to carry much weight. The ascription of the whole to Lyly, first made by Archer in 1656, and repeated by Halliwell as late as 1860, is now utterly discredited. The view, first advanced by Edmund Gosse, that the author was John Day, has been tentatively endorsed by both editors of the piece; but I agree with Professer Gollancz in thinking it unlikely on the ground of style. Fleay a.s.signs the serious (verse) portion of the play to Daniel, and the comic (prose) scenes to Lyly. It seems to me unlikely, however, that Daniel, who was shortly to appear as the chief exponent of the orthodox Italian tradition, should at this date have been concerned in the production of a typical example of the hybrid pastoral of the English stage. Nor do I believe that Lyly was in any way concerned in the piece, though some scenes are evident imitations of his work. This, however, involves the question of the authorship of the lyrics found in Lyly's plays, and I must refer for a detailed discussion to my article upon the subject already cited (p. 227).