EVERAL of the conjectural chronologists of the plays of Shakspere assign a very late date to the first appearance of the "TWELFTH NIGHT;" considering it, indeed, to have been the last-written of all his wondrous dramas: and, certainly, of his many marvellous works, there is not one upon which the seal of that consummate perfection for which even the most exalted genius must stand indebted to all-maturing Time, is more lovelily and vividly set. But the truth is, little is positively known as to the actual order in which the plays of Shakspere were either written or acted and of his numerous commentators, the figural labours have been equally futile and superfluous with the great bulk of their verbal ingenuities. The story of the serious portions of this fine play, "the right happy and copious industry" (as his contemporary Webster somewhat sneeringly phrases it) of its great author may have derived from one of Belleforest's "HISTOIRES TRAGIQUES," or from its Italian original, the thirty-sixth novel of the second part of the "TALES OF BANDELLO;" a novelist in whose rich mine all the dramatists of the age of Elizabeth wrought deeply for the materials of their incessant gorgeous poetic coinage; from one of the "EGLOGS" of Barnaby Googe, whose poems were published in 1563; or from the "HISTORY OF APOLLONIUS AND SILLA," which was printed in 1583, in a miscellany entitled, "RICH, HIS FAREWELL TO MILITARY PROFESSION." It was, however, the mere form of which Shakspere availed himself: the subtle spirit of the work is his, and his alone: and the exquisitely comic characters of the drama that prince-royal of joyous topers, Sir Toby Belch, a joker worthy to have been the intimate of Sir John Falstaff: the foolish, prodigal, conceited, quarrelsome, cowardly, super-silly fortune-hunter, Sir Andrew Aguecheek (a distant cousin, we have always thought, of Master Abraham Slender), who "harms his wit" by his "great eating of beef;" who has "an excellent head of hair,” that "hangs like flax on a distaff;" who, in dancing, has "the back-trick simply as strong as any man in Illyria;" and who "delights in masks and revels sometimes altogether:" the exuberantly witty Clown, Festo the Jester, "a fool that the lady Olivia's father took much delight in," and whose veriest freedoms are, therefore, rendered permissive, and even sacred, to the lady Olivia; he, the pathetic vocalist, who "takes pleasure in singing:" Malvolio, the fantastic, ill-natured, self-admiring, and sadly but deservedly betricked steward: and the vivacious little Maria, "the youngest wren of nine," the "nettle of India:”these admirable creations are Shakspere's, soul, body, and all! As we abandon ourselves to the poetry of this play, the sweetest spirit of love floats balmily over the heart and imagination, -"Like the sweet south, That breathes upon a bank of violets, The sense is saturated with it. We are canopied with bowers," under the fragrant beauty of which our love-thoughts "lie rich" beyond richness. By the "rich golden shaft" of the heavenliest of human passions, are killed "the flock of all affections else that live in us;" and in its sole and omnipotent power we are chained, entranced, spell-bound: "It gives a very echo to the seat and one which, in the mysterious distance, we hear calling to us alluringly for ever. T. W. SCENE I.-An Apartment in the DUKE's Palace. Enter VALENTINE. Val. So please my lord, I might not be admitted, But from her handmaid do return this answer: The element itself, till seven years heat, Shall not behold her face at ample view; But, like a cloistress, she will veiled walk, And water once a-day her chamber round With eye-offending brine: all this to season A brother's dead love, which she would keep fresh And lasting in her sad remembrance. Duke. O, she that hath a heart of that fine frame To this debt of love but to a brother, pay How will she love when the rich golden shaft Cap. A virtuous maid, the daughter of a count That died some twelvemonth since; then leaving her In the protection of his son, her brother, Vio. O, that I served that lady: Cap. That were hard to compass, Because she will admit no kind of suit, No, not the duke's. Vio. There is a fair behaviour in thee, captain; And though that nature with a beauteous wall Doth oft close in pollution, yet of thee I will believe thou hast a mind that suits Cap. Be you his eunuch, and your mute I'll be; SCENE III-A Room in OLIVIA's house. Enter SIR TOBY BELCH and MARIA. Sir Toby. What a plague means my niece, to take the death of her brother thus ? I am sure care's an enemy to life. Mar. By my troth, Sir Toby, you must come in earlier o' nights; your cousin, my lady, takes great exceptions to your ill hours. Sir Toby. Why, let her except before excepted. Mar. Ay, but you must confine yourself within the modest limits of order. Sir Toby. Confine? I'll confine myself no finer than I am; these clothes are good enough to drink in, and so be these boots too! an' they be not, let them hang themselves in their own straps. Mar. That quaffing and drinking will undo you: I heard my lady talk of it yesterday; and of a foolish knight, that you brought in one night here to be her wooer. Sir Toby. Who? Sir Andrew Aguecheek? Sir Toby. He's as tall a man as any 's in Illyria. a-year. Mar. Ay; but he 'll have but a year in all these ducats; he's a very fool and a prodigal. Sir Toby. Fye, that you'll say so! he plays o' the viol-de-gambo, and speaks three or four languages. word for word without book, and hath all the good gifts of nature. Mar. He hath, indeed,-almost natural: for, besides that he's a fool, he's a great quarreller; and, but that he hath the gift of a coward to allay the gust he hath in quarrelling, 't is thought among the prudent, he would quickly have the gift of a grave. |