There is one sonnet in this collection which has often been quoted (even in Germany) as a proof of Shakespeare's appreciation of the innate relations of poetry and music. It runs:

"If Music and sweet Poetry agree,

As they must needs, the Sister and the Brother,
Then must the love be great 'twixt thee and me,
Because thou lov'st the one and I the other.
Dowland' to thee is dear, whose heavenly touch
Upon the Lute doth ravish human sense;
Spenser to me, whose deep conceit is such,
As passing all conceit, needs no defence.
Thou lov'st to hear the sweet melodious sound,
That Phoebus' lute, the queen of music, makes;
And I in deep delight am chiefly drowned,
Whenas himself to singing he betakes.

One god is god of both, as poets feign;

One knight loves both, and both in thee remain.”

It is a pity to spoil so much of good quotation and comment, but this poem, together with the charming "As It Fell upon a Day" (also frequently attributed to Shakespeare), is probably the work of Richard Barnfield, whose poetical volumes were published between 1594 and 1598. The thought embodied in the verse is, however, very much like that of Shakespeare, and it is not impossible that he had some hand in it.

'John Dowland, was the chief lutenist of the time; he was also an excellent composer for this instrument and in the vocal forms. He was born 1562, died 1626. His son, Robert Dowland, also became famous in the same field as his father.

The close connection between poetry and music, thus voiced in the sixteenth century, has had many echoes in our own time. Wagner has said, "Music is the handmaid of Poetry," and "in the wedding of the two arts, Poetry is the man, Music the woman; Poetry leads and Music follows;" and Herbert Spencer himself, in his essay on Education," thus arraigns modern compositions where music and poetry disagree:

They are compositions which science would forbid. They sin against science by setting to music ideas that are not emotional enough to prompt musical expression, and they also sin against science by using musical phrases that have no natural relation to the ideas expressed: even where these are emotional. They are bad because they are untrue, and to say they are untrue is to say they are unscientific."

Robert Franz, in a letter written, just before his death, to the author, says: "I am convinced that there is a much closer relationship between poetry and music than the average mind can comprehend."

The above are not the only instances of Shakespeare's love of counterpoint, or of the combination

of poetry and music. In "Richard II." (Act ii. Sc.1), the dying Gaunt sends message to the king thus:

“Gaunt. O, but they say, the tongues of dying men Enforce attention like deep harmony:

Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain;
For they breathe truth, that breathe their words in pain.

He, that no more must say, is listen'd more

Than they, whom youth and ease have taught to glose;
More are men's ends mark'd, than their lives before:
The setting sun, and music at the close."

In "Henry V." (Act i. Sc. 2) Exeter compares good government to the interlacing of parts in wellconstructed music.

"For government, though high, and low, and lower,
Put into parts doth keep in one consent;

Congruing in a full and natural close,

Like music.

Through many other allusions one might trace this comprehension of the balance and symmetry of music, but the quotations already cited are the most important, although one may question the Shakespearian right to the citation from "The Passionate Pilgrim."

CHAPTER VI.

Musical Knowledge of Shakespeare (continued) - Surer in Vocal than in Instrumental Work - Technical Vocal Terms "Set

ting" a Tune - Burdens Division, Key, and Gamut - Plain

song.

THE statement made at the beginning of the preceding chapter, that Shakespeare was surer of his ground in the vocal than in the instrumental field, is borne out by the ease and frequency with which he employs terms taken from the singer's technique. If we may judge by a sentence placed in the mouth of Viola ("Twelfth Night," Act i. Sc. 2), the poet even knew of voices that were seldom heard in England. in his time, and the duke, speaking to the heroine, in the fourth scene of the same act, describes her voice with

Is as the maiden's organ, shrill, and sound
And all is semblative a woman's part."

One of the scenes that is brimful of musical terms, and one in which almost all these terms belong to the singer's art, is found in "Two Gentlemen of Verona" (Act i. Sc. 2), where Lucetta endeavours, by trickery, to bring the note written by Proteus

to the all too willing, yet seemingly recalcitrant, Julia. Lucetta lets the note drop, and picks it up in a manner to attract Julia's attention.

"Julia. What is't you took up so gingerly?

Lucetta. Nothing.

Julia. Why didst thou stoop, then?

Lucetta. To take a paper up, that I let fall.

Julia. And is that paper nothing?

Lucetta. Nothing concerning me.

Julia. Then let it lie for those that it concerns.
Lucetta. Madam, it will not lie where it concerns,

Unless it have a false interpreter.

Julia. Some love of yours hath writ to you in rhyme.
Lucetta. That I might sing it, madam, to a tune:

Give me a note: your ladyship can set.

Julia. As little by such toys as may be possible:

Best sing it to the tune of Light o' love.'

Lucetta. It is too heavy for so light a tune.

Julia. Heavy? belike, it hath some burden then. Lucetta. Ay; and melodious were it, would you sing it Julia. And why not you?

Lucetta. I cannot reach so high.

Julia. Let's see your song. How now, minion?
Lucetta. Keep tune there still, so you will sing it out;

And yet, methinks, I do not like this tune.

Julia. You do not?

Lucetta. No, madam, it is too sharp.

Julia. You, minion, are too saucy.
Lucetta. Nay, now you are too flat,

And mar the concord with too harsh a descant:
There wanteth but a mean to fill your song.

Julia. The mean is drown'd with your unruly bass.
Lucetta. Indeed, I bid the base for Proteus.

Julia. This babble shall not henceforth trouble me.