Shakespeare and Precious Stones Part 5

In spite of certain evident faults of proportion, the portrait of Shakespeare engraved by Martin Droeshout for the t.i.tle page of the 1623 Folio bears internal evidence of being a fairly good likeness, for the face possesses a marked individuality. There is a belief that it was taken from the so-called "Flower" portrait, now in the Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-upon-Avon, and which is conjectured to have been painted in 1609, at least during Shakespeare's lifetime, possibly by another Martin Droeshout, a Fleming, uncle of the engraver of the same name. This portrait was discovered, painted on a panel at Peckham Rye, bearing the inscription "Will Shakespeare^n, 1609". That it should be the original from which the Droeshout engraving was taken has been doubted, since it appears rather to resemble later states of the plate than earlier ones. While Ben Jonson, who had seen Shakespeare so often, may have been partly moved to bestow undue praise upon the Folio portrait, in the lines he furnished the publishers to be placed immediately facing it, by his wish to say a good word for their publication, he would scarcely have made use of such superlative terms had he not considered it to be at least a fairly good likeness. Jonson's lines have been so often printed that few are unacquainted with them, but as ill.u.s.trating the above remarks they can be repeated here, in the old spelling and form of the First Folio:

TO THE READER.

This Figure, that thou here seest put, It was for gentle Shakespeare cut; Wherein the Graver has a strife With Nature, to out-doo the life: O, could he but have drawne his wit As well in bra.s.se, as he hath hit His face; the Print would then surpa.s.se All, that was ever write in bra.s.se.

But, since he cannot, Reader, looke Not on his Picture, but his Booke.

B.I.

A most attractive and instructive exhibition of reproductions of the portraits of Shakespeare, or supposedly of him, was shown at the rooms of the Grolier Club, April 6-29, 1916. The catalogue[28] embraces 436 numbers, ill.u.s.trating all the princ.i.p.al types. The exhibition also comprised the princ.i.p.al editions of the poet's plays, from the First Folio of 1623 to the great Variorum Edition by Dr. Furness, begun in 1871.

[Footnote 28: Catalogue of an exhibition ill.u.s.trative of the text of Shakespeare's plays, as published in edited editions, together with a large collection of engraved portraits of the poet. New York, The Grolier Club, April 6-29, 1916, vi+114 pp.]

For the Tercentenary of Shakespeare's birth, celebrated in April, 1864, a special commemorative medal was struck in England, designed by Mr. J. Moore. The obverse shows a profile head of the poet, in the modelling of which the artist seems to have been chiefly influenced by the Stratford bust. This fundamental type he has not unskilfully combined with that of the Droeshout print in the First Folio, the dome-like forehead being evidently suggested by the latter. The nose is more accentuated than in the bust, and the mouth, though still small, is somewhat firmer. Toward the edge of the field are disposed the t.i.tles of his various works, as though radiating from the head, and in the exergue is his signature, framed by a half-garland over which extends a mace. The tribute offered to Shakespeare by the Muses, figured on the reverse, is a rather stiff and conventional composition.[29]

[Footnote 29: W. Sharp Ogden, "Shakspere's Portraits: painted, graven, and medallic", in The British Numismatic Journal, and Proceedings of The British Numismatic Society, 1910, London, 1911, pp. 143-198; see p. 189.]

For those who may wish to see the original form of the pa.s.sages regarding precious stones in the text of the First Folio, of 1623, the page and column references have been given here. In this text the three sections into which the plays have been divided, Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies, are separately paged; moreover, the pagination offers a number of irregularities. _Troilus and Cressida_, added at the end of the "Histories", has page numbers on a couple of leaves neither connected with what precedes nor with what follows, the remainder of the pages bearing no figures; furthermore, there are several obvious, though unimportant, misprints. _Pericles_, first issued in Folio, in the Third Folio, of 1664, is therein separately paged, as are the other of the plays attributed to Shakespeare printed therein, in continuation of the series of the First and Second Folios.

This play had, however, previously appeared six times in quarto in the years 1609, 1611, 1619, 1630, 1635 and 1639.

PRECIOUS STONES MENTIONED IN THE PLAYS OF SHAKESPEARE

PRECIOUS STONES MENTIONED IN THE PLAYS OF SHAKESPEARE

DIAMOND

I see how thine eye would emulate the diamond.

_Merry Wives of Windsor_, Act iii, sc. 3, l. 59.

"Comedies", p. 58 [50], col. A, line 31.

DIAMOND

Give me the ring of mine you had at dinner, Or, for my diamond, the chain you promised.

_Comedy of Errors_, Act iv, sc, 3. l. 70.

"Comedies", p. 94, col. B, lines 61, 62.

DIAMOND

Sir, I must have that diamond from you.-- There, take it.

_Comedy of Errors_, Act v, sc. 1, l. 391.

"Comedies", p. 99, col. B, line 58.

DIAMOND

A lady walled about with diamonds!

_Love's Labour's Lost_, Act v, sc. 2, l. 3.

"Comedies", p. 137, col. A, line 6.

DIAMOND

A diamond gone, cost me two thousand ducats in Frankfort!

_Merchant of Venice_, Act iii, sc. 1, l. 87.

"Comedies", p. 173, col. A, line 62.

DIAMOND

Set this diamond safe In golden palaces, as it becomes.

_Henry VI_, Pt. I, Act v, sc. 3, l. 169.

"Histories", p. 116, col. B, line 54.

DIAMOND

A heart it was, bound in with diamonds.

_Henry VI_, Pt, II, Act iii, sc. 2, l. 107.

"Histories", p. 134, col. A, line 46.

DIAMOND

Not deck'd with diamonds and Indian stones, Nor to be seen.

_Henry VI_, Pt. III, Act iii, sc. 1, l. 63.

"Histories", p. 158, col. B, line 25.

DIAMOND