Chapter CXXXVIII: Act V: SCENE 1. Page 297

2 CLO. ... therefore make her grave _straight_.

Dr. Johnson thought this meant "From East to West, in a direct line parallel to the church; not from North to South, athwart the regular line." The frequency of the above mode of expression in Shakspeare's plays sufficiently indicates that if he had alluded to the mode of burial contended for by Dr. Johnson, he would have adopted some other. It has occurred upwards of a hundred times already in the sense of _immediately_. Nor would it be easy to show that to make a grave _straight_, or in a direct line, was to make it East and West; or that it was the designation of Christian burial. The first clown rather adverts to the _place_ where the grave should be made than to its _form_. Suicides were buried on the North side of the church, in ground purposely _unconsecrated_.

Much of this scene has been imitated in the _Valiant Welshman_, by R. A. [q. Robert Armin] 1663. See Act IV.

SCENE 1. Page 299.

2. CLO. If this had not been a gentlewoman, she should have been
bury'd out of Christian burial.

We have here a manifest satire on the partial verdicts of coroners' juries, where the suicide has been above the common condition of life. Judge Blackstone has hinted at them in his Commentaries. Nothing, however, but the partiality is reprehensible; the rest is an amiable tenderness towards the living, calculated to resist a law that justly deserves to be abhorred for a savage and impotent revenge so far as it regards the dead.

SCENE 1. Page 299.

1 CLO. Come; my _spade_. There is no ancient gentlemen but
gardeners, ditchers and grave-makers; they hold up _Adam's_
profession.

2 CLO. Was he a _gentleman_?

1 CLO. He was the first that ever bore arms.

This is undoubtedly in ridicule of heraldry. Gerard Leigh, one of the oldest writers on that subject, speaks of "Jesus Christ, a _gentleman_ of great linage, and king of the Jewes." And again, "For that it might be known that even anon after the creation of Adam, there was both _gentlenes_, and _ungentlenes_, you shall understand that the second man that was born was a _gentleman_, whose name was Abell. I say a gentleman both of vertue and of lignage, with whose sacrifice God was much pleased. His brother Cain was _ungentle_, for he offered God the worst of his fruites," &c.--_Accedence of armorie_, 1591, 4to, fo. 13. Another morsel of satire against the above science lurks in the very ancient proverbial saying,

"When Adam delv'd and Eve span,
Where was then the gentleman?"

which is found in almost every European language. It was the text on which the rebel priest John Balle preached his sermon during the insurrection of Wat Tyler. Although the first clown afterwards explains why Adam bore arms, by means of a punning allusion to his digging with arms, there is still a concealed piece of wit with respect to the _spade_. Adam's spade is set down in some of the books of heraldry as _the most ancient form of escutcheons_: nor is it improbable that the lower part of this utensil suggested the well-known form of the old triangular shields; whilst from the spindle of Eve might have originated the lozenge-like escutcheon on which the arms of females are usually emblazoned.

SCENE 1. Page 308.

HAM. ... the age is grown so _picked_, that the toe of the peasant,
&c.

Mr. Malone's note, in exclusion of the others, is sufficiently satisfactory. The fashion of wearing pointed shoes, to which Hamlet had been supposed to allude, had ceased long before the time of Shakspeare; nor is it probable that he would have transferred it to the age of Hamlet. We still say _a person treads close on the heels of another_, in the same signification as in the text.

SCENE 1. Page 310.

1 CLO. This same scull, sir, was _Yorick's_ scull, the king's
jester.

The frequency of such names as _Eric_ and _Roric_ in the Danish history, might have suggested that of the jester in question, but in a manner that may not very easily be discovered. _Roric_ was the name of the king of Denmark contemporary with Hamlet, according to Saxo Grammaticus.

SCENE 1. Page 311.

HAM. Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let her paint
an inch thick, to this favour she must come; make her laugh at
that.----

There is good reason for supposing that Shakspeare borrowed this thought from some print or picture that he had seen. There are several which represent a lady at her toilet, and an old man presenting a scull before the mirror. A print by Goltzius exhibits _Vanity_ as a lady sitting in her chamber with jewels, &c. before her, and surprised by the appearance of Death. In one of Henry the Eighth's wardrobe accounts, a picture at Westminster is thus described: "Item a table with the picture of a woman playing upon a lute, and an olde manne holding a glasse in th'one hande and a deadde mannes headde in th'other hande."--Harl. MS. No. 1419.

* * * * *

In a poem written by Anthony Scoloker, a printer, entitled _Daiphantus, or The passions of love, comicall to reade, but tragicall to act, as full of wit, as experience_, 1604, 4to, and recently quoted in p. 465, there are the following allusions to the play of _Hamlet_: In a quaint dedication he says, "It [the epistle] should be like the _never-too-well read Arcadia_, where the _prose_ and _verse_ (_matter_ and _words_) are like his _mistresses_ eyes, one still excelling another and without Corivall: or to come home to the vulgars element, like _friendly Shake-speare's tragedies_, where the _commedian_ rides, when the _tragedian_ stands on tiptoe: _Faith it should please all, like prince Hamlet_. But in sadnesse, then it were to be feared _he would runne mad_. In sooth I will not be moonesicke, to please: nor out of my wits though I displeased all."

"His breath he thinkes the smoke; his tongue a cole,
Then calls for bottell ale; to quench his thirst.
Runs to his Inke pot, drinkes, then stops the hole,
And thus growes madder, then he was at first.
Tasso he finds, by that of _Hamlet_, thinkes,
Tearmes him a _mad-man_; than of his Inkhorne drinks.

"_Calls players fooles_, the foole he judgeth wisest,
_Will learne them action_, out of Chaucers Pander:
Proves of their poets bawdes even in the highest,
Then drinkes a health; and sweares it is no slander,
Puts off his cloathes; his shirt he onely weares,
Much like _mad-Hamlet_; thus as passion teares."

FOOTNOTES:

[23] These two lines seem intended, in the original, as a kind of burden or chorus at the end of each stanza; but as they only intrude upon the measure, the translation were perhaps better without them.

[24] It was the custom at this time to serve up at entertainments peacock and pheasant pies, the forms of those elegant birds being externally preserved, and much pomp bestowed on their appearance. See what has been already said on this subject in p. 291.

[25] This is a stubborn fact against the opinion of those who maintain that wine was not made in England. See the controversy on this subject in _Archæologia_, vol. iii.

[26] The late Rev. Mr. Hole of Faringdon in Devonshire, whose loss is deplored by all who knew him, has left an essay on the character of Ulysses, which has been recently published by some kind and grateful friends. In this elegant morsel the learned author has noticed the anxiety which Homer's favourite heroes constantly manifest to give their enemies a prey to dogs, and thereby prevent the advantage of obtaining admission into the regions of happiness.

[27] sword.

[28] raps, blows.

[29] fury.

[30] they.

[31] very.

[32] malice.

[33] orient.

[34] falcon, or perhaps falchion.

[35] gorgeous.

[36] I am descended.

[37] renowned.

[38] herald.

[39] allow.

[40] burn on live coals.

[41] rave.

[42] mad.

[43] here upon, or perhaps _haro_!

OTHELLO.