Chapter XVIII: Part 18

(3) Even if he had done so, it is very unlikely that the incongruous words would have been grossly indecent. (4) Even if they had been, surely they would not have been _irrelevantly_ indecent and evidently addressed to the audience, two faults which are not in Shakespeare's way. (5) The lines are doggerel. Doggerel is not uncommon in the earliest plays; there are a few lines even in the _Merchant of Venice_, a line and a half, perhaps, in _As You Like It_; but I do not think it occurs later, not even where, in an early play, it would certainly have been found, _e.g._ in the mouth of the Clown in _All's Well_. The best that can be said for these lines is that they appear in the Quartos, _i.e._ in reports, however vile, of the play as performed within two or three years of its composition.

(_b_) I believe, almost as decidedly, that the second passage, III. ii. 79 ff., is spurious. (1) The scene ends characteristically without the lines. (2) They are addressed directly to the audience. (3) They destroy the pathetic and beautiful effect of the immediately preceding words of the Fool, and also of Lear's solicitude for him. (4) They involve the absurdity that the shivering timid Fool would allow his master and protector, Lear and Kent, to go away into the storm and darkness, leaving him alone. (5) It is also somewhat against them that they do not appear in the Quartos. At the same time I do not think one would hesitate to accept them if they occurred at any natural place _within_ the dialogue.

(_c_) On the other hand I see no sufficient reason for doubting the genuineness of Edgar's soliloquy at the end of III. vi. (1) Those who doubt it appear not to perceive that _some_ words of soliloquy are wanted; for it is evidently intended that, when Kent and Gloster bear the King away, they should leave the Bedlam behind. Naturally they do so. He is only accidentally connected with the King; he was taken to shelter with him merely to gratify his whim, and as the King is now asleep there is no occasion to retain the Bedlam; Kent, we know, shrank from him, 'shunn'd [his] abhorr'd society' (V. iii. 210). So he is left to return to the hovel where he was first found. When the others depart, then, he must be left behind, and surely would not go off without a word. (2) If his speech is spurious, therefore, it has been substituted for some genuine speech; and surely that is a supposition not to be entertained except under compulsion. (3) There is no such compulsion in the speech. It is not very good, no doubt; but the use of rhymed and somewhat antithetic lines in a gnomic passage is quite in Shakespeare's manner, _more_ in his manner than, for example, the rhymed passages in I. i. 183-190, 257-269, 281-4, which nobody doubts; quite like many places in _All's Well_, or the concluding lines of _King Lear_ itself. (4) The lines are in spirit of one kind with Edgar's fine lines at the beginning of Act IV. (5) Some of them, as Delius observes, emphasize the parallelism between the stories of Lear and Gloster. (6) The fact that the Folio omits the lines is, of course, nothing against them.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 270: I ignore them partly because they are not significant for the present purpose, but mainly because it is impossible to accept the division of battle-scenes in our modern texts, while to depart from it is to introduce intolerable inconvenience in reference. The only proper plan in Elizabethan drama is to consider a scene ended as soon as no person is left on the stage, and to pay no regard to the question of locality,--a question theatrically insignificant and undetermined in most scenes of an Elizabethan play, in consequence of the absence of movable scenery. In dealing with battles the modern editors seem to have gone on the principle (which they could not possibly apply generally) that, so long as the place is not changed, you have only one scene. Hence in _Macbeth_, Act V., they have included in their Scene vii. three distinct scenes; yet in _Antony and Cleopatra_, Act III., following the right division for a wrong reason, they have two scenes (viii. and ix.), each less than four lines long.]

[Footnote 271: One of these (V. i.) is not marked as such, but it is evident that the last line and a half form a soliloquy of one remaining character, just as much as some of the soliloquies marked as such in other plays.]

[Footnote 272: According to modern editions, eight, Act II., scene ii., being an instance. But it is quite ridiculous to reckon as three scenes what are marked as scenes ii., iii., iv. Kent is on the lower stage the whole time, Edgar in the so-called scene iii. being on the upper stage or balcony. The editors were misled by their ignorance of the stage arrangements.]

[Footnote 273: Perhaps three, for V. iii. is perhaps an instance, though not so marked.]

NOTE W.

THE STAGING OF THE SCENE OF LEAR'S REUNION WITH CORDELIA.

As Koppel has shown, the usual modern stage-directions[274] for this scene (IV. vii.) are utterly wrong and do what they can to defeat the poet's purpose.

It is evident from the text that the scene shows the _first_ meeting of Cordelia and Kent, and _first_ meeting of Cordelia and Lear, since they parted in I. i. Kent and Cordelia indeed are doubtless supposed to have exchanged a few words before they come on the stage; but Cordelia has not seen her father at all until the moment before she begins (line 26), 'O my dear father!' Hence the tone of the first part of the scene, that between Cordelia and Kent, is kept low, in order that the latter part, between Cordelia and Lear, may have its full effect.

The modern stage-direction at the beginning of the scene, as found, for example, in the Cambridge and Globe editions, is as follows:

'SCENE vii.--A tent in the French camp. LEAR
on a bed asleep, soft music playing; _Gentleman_, and others
attending.

Enter CORDELIA, KENT, and _Doctor_.'

At line 25, where the Doctor says 'Please you, draw near,' Cordelia is supposed to approach the bed, which is imagined by some editors visible throughout at the back of the stage, by others as behind a curtain at the back, this curtain being drawn open at line 25.

Now, to pass by the fact that these arrangements are in flat contradiction with the stage-directions of the Quartos and the Folio, consider their effect upon the scene. In the first place, the reader at once assumes that Cordelia has already seen her father; for otherwise it is inconceivable that she would quietly talk with Kent while he was within a few yards of her. The edge of the later passage where she addresses him is therefore blunted. In the second place, through Lear's presence the reader's interest in Lear and his meeting with Cordelia is at once excited so strongly that he hardly attends at all to the conversation of Cordelia and Kent; and so this effect is blunted too. Thirdly, at line 57, where Cordelia says,

O, look upon me, sir,
And hold your hands in benediction o'er me!
No, sir, you must not kneel,

the poor old King must be supposed either to try to get out of bed, or actually to do so, or to kneel, or to try to kneel, on the bed. Fourthly, consider what happens at line 81.

_Doctor._ Desire him to _go in_; trouble him no more
Till further settling.

_Cor._ Will't please your highness _walk?_

_Lear._ You must bear with me;
Pray you now, forget and forgive; I am old and
foolish. [_Exeunt all but Kent and Gentleman_.

If Lear is in a tent containing his bed, why in the world, when the doctor thinks he can bear no more emotion, is he made to walk out of the tent? A pretty doctor!

But turn now to the original texts. Of course they say nothing about the place. The stage-direction at the beginning runs, in the Quartos, 'Enter Cordelia, Kent, and Doctor;' in the Folio, 'Enter Cordelia, Kent, and Gentleman.' They differ about the Gentleman and the Doctor, and the Folio later wrongly gives to the Gentleman the Doctor's speeches as well as his own. This is a minor matter. But they agree in _making no mention of Lear_. He is not on the stage at all. Thus Cordelia, and the reader, can give their whole attention to Kent.

Her conversation with Kent finished, she turns (line 12) to the Doctor and asks 'How does the King?'[275] The Doctor tells her that Lear is still asleep, and asks leave to wake him. Cordelia assents and asks if he is 'arrayed,' which does not mean whether he has a night-gown on, but whether they have taken away his crown of furrow-weeds, and tended him duly after his mad wanderings in the fields. The Gentleman says that in his sleep 'fresh garments' (not a night-gown) have been put on him. The Doctor then asks Cordelia to be present when her father is waked. She assents, and the Doctor says, 'Please you, draw near. Louder the music there.' The next words are Cordelia's, 'O my dear father!'

What has happened? At the words 'is he arrayed?' according to the Folio, '_Enter Lear in a chair carried by Servants._' The moment of this entrance, as so often in the original editions, is doubtless too soon. It should probably come at the words 'Please you, draw near,' which _may_, as Koppel suggests, be addressed to the bearers. But that the stage-direction is otherwise right there cannot be a doubt (and that the Quartos omit it is no argument against it, seeing that, according to their directions, Lear never enters at all).

This arrangement (1) allows Kent his proper place in the scene, (2) makes it clear that Cordelia has not seen her father before, (3) makes her first sight of him a theatrical crisis in the best sense, (4) makes it quite natural that he should kneel, (5) makes it obvious why he should leave the stage again when he shows signs of exhaustion, and (6) is the only arrangement which has the slightest authority, for 'Lear on a bed asleep' was never heard of till Capell proposed it. The ruinous change of the staging was probably suggested by the version of that unhappy Tate.

Of course the chair arrangement is primitive, but the Elizabethans did not care about such things. What they cared for was dramatic effect.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 274: There are exceptions: _e.g._, in the editions of Delius and Mr. W.J. Craig.]

[Footnote 275: And it is possible that, as Koppel suggests, the Doctor should properly enter at this point; for if Kent, as he says, wishes to remain unknown, it seems strange that he and Cordelia should talk as they do before a third person. This change however is not necessary, for the Doctor might naturally stand out of hearing till he was addressed; and it is better not to go against the stage-direction without necessity.]

NOTE X.

THE BATTLE IN _KING LEAR_.

I found my impression of the extraordinary ineffectiveness of this battle (p. 255) confirmed by a paper of James Spedding (_New Shakspere Society Transactions_, 1877, or Furness's _King Lear_, p. 312 f.); but his opinion that this is the one technical defect in _King Lear_ seems certainly incorrect, and his view that this defect is not due to Shakespeare himself will not, I think, bear scrutiny.

To make Spedding's view quite clear I may remind the reader that in the preceding scene the two British armies, that of Edmund and Regan, and that of Albany and Goneril, have entered with drum and colours, and have departed. Scene ii. is as follows (Globe):

SCENE II.--_A field between the two camps.

Alarum within. Enter, with drum and colours_, LEAR, CORDELIA,
_and_ Soldiers, _over the stage; and exeunt._ _Enter_ EDGAR
_and_ GLOSTER.

_Edg._ Here, father, take the shadow of this tree
For your good host; pray that the right may thrive:
If ever I return to you again,
I'll bring you comfort.

_Glo._ Grace go with you, sir!

[_Exit_ Edgar

_Alarum and retreat within._ _Re-enter_ EDGAR.

_Edg._ Away, old man; give me thy hand; away!
King Lear hath lost, he and his daughter ta'en:
Give me thy hand; come on.

_Glo._ No farther, sir; a man may rot even here.

_Edg._ What, in ill thoughts again? Men must endure
Their going hence, even as their coming hither:
Ripeness is all: come on.

_Glo._ And that's true too. [_Exeunt_.

The battle, it will be seen, is represented only by military music within the tiring-house, which formed the back of the stage. 'The scene,' says Spedding, 'does not change; but 'alarums' are heard, and afterwards a 'retreat,' and on the same field over which that great army has this moment passed, fresh and full of hope, re-appears, with tidings that all is lost, the same man who last left the stage to follow and fight in it.[276] That Shakespeare meant the scene to stand thus, no one who has the true faith will believe.'

Spedding's suggestion is that things are here run together which Shakespeare meant to keep apart. Shakespeare, he thinks, continued Act IV. to the '_exit_ Edgar' after l. 4 of the above passage. Thus, just before the close of the Act, the two British armies and the French army had passed across the stage, and the interest of the audience in the battle about to be fought was raised to a high pitch. Then, after a short interval, Act V. opened with the noise of battle in the distance, followed by the entrance of Edgar to announce the defeat of Cordelia's army. The battle, thus, though not fought on the stage, was shown and felt to be an event of the greatest importance.

Apart from the main objection of the entire want of evidence of so great a change having been made, there are other objections to this idea and to the reasoning on which it is based. (1) The pause at the end of the present Fourth Act is far from 'faulty,' as Spedding alleges it to be; that Act ends with the most melting scene Shakespeare ever wrote; and a pause after it, and before the business of the battle, was perfectly right. (2) The Fourth Act is already much longer than the Fifth (about fourteen columns of the Globe edition against about eight and a half), and Spedding's change would give the Fourth nearly sixteen columns, and the Fifth less than seven. (3) Spedding's proposal requires a much greater alteration in the existing text than he supposed. It does not simply shift the division of the two Acts, it requires the disappearance and re-entrance of the blind Gloster. Gloster, as the text stands, is alone on the stage while the battle is being fought at a distance, and the reference to the tree shows that he was on the main or lower stage. The main stage had no front curtain; and therefore, if Act IV. is to end where Spedding wished it to end, Gloster must go off unaided at its close, and come on again unaided for Act V. And this means that the _whole_ arrangement of the present Act V. Sc. ii. must be changed. If Spedding had been aware of this it is not likely that he would have broached his theory.[277]

It is curious that he does not allude to the one circumstance which throws some little suspicion on the existing text. I mean the contradiction between Edgar's statement that, if ever he returns to his father again, he will bring him comfort, and the fact that immediately afterwards he returns to bring him discomfort. It is possible to explain this psychologically, of course, but the passage is not one in which we should expect psychological subtlety.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 276: Where did Spedding find this? I find no trace of it, and surely Edgar would not have risked his life in the battle, when he had, in case of defeat, to appear and fight Edmund. He does not appear 'armed,' according to the Folio, till V. iii. 117.]

[Footnote 277: Spedding supposed that there was a front curtain, and this idea, coming down from Malone and Collier, is still found in English works of authority. But it may be stated without hesitation that there is no positive evidence at all for the existence of such a curtain, and abundant evidence against it.]

NOTE Y.

SOME DIFFICULT PASSAGES IN _KING LEAR_.

The following are notes on some passages where I have not been able to accept any of the current interpretations, or on which I wish to express an opinion or represent a little-known view.

1. _Kent's soliloquy at the end of_ II. ii.

(_a_) In this speech the application of the words 'Nothing, almost sees miracles but misery' seems not to have been understood. The 'misery' is surely not that of Kent but that of Lear, who has come 'out of heaven's benediction to the warm sun,' _i.e._ to misery. This, says Kent, is just the situation where something like miraculous help may be looked for; and he finds the sign of it in the fact that a letter from Cordelia has just reached him; for his course since his banishment has been so obscured that it is only by the rarest good fortune (something like a miracle) that Cordelia has got intelligence of it. We may suppose that this intelligence came from one of Albany's or Cornwall's servants, some of whom are, he says (III. i. 23),

to France the spies and speculations
Intelligent of our state.

(_b_) The words 'and shall find time,' etc., have been much discussed. Some have thought that they are detached phrases from the letter which Kent is reading: but Kent has just implied by his address to the sun that he has no light to read the letter by.[278] It has also been suggested that the anacoluthon is meant to represent Kent's sleepiness, which prevents him from finishing the sentence, and induces him to dismiss his thoughts and yield to his drowsiness. But I remember nothing like this elsewhere in Shakespeare, and it seems much more probable that the passage is corrupt, perhaps from the loss of a line containing words like 'to rescue us' before 'From this enormous state' (with 'state' cf. 'our state' in the lines quoted above).

When we reach III. i. we find that Kent has now read the letter; he knows that a force is coming from France and indeed has already 'secret feet' in some of the harbours. So he sends the Gentleman to Dover.

2. _The Fool's Song in_ II. iv.

At II. iv. 62 Kent asks why the King comes with so small a train. The Fool answers, in effect, that most of his followers have deserted him because they see that his fortunes are sinking. He proceeds to advise Kent ironically to follow their example, though he confesses he does not intend to follow it himself. 'Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with following it: but the great one that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after. When a wise man gives thee better counsel, give me mine again: I would have none but knaves follow it, since a fool gives it.

That sir which serves and seeks for gain,
And follows but for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain,
And leave thee in the storm.
But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly:
The knave turns fool that runs away;
The fool no knave, perdy.

The last two lines have caused difficulty. Johnson wanted to read,

The fool turns knave that runs away,
The knave no fool, perdy;

_i.e._ if I ran away, I should prove myself to be a knave and a wise man, but, being a fool, I stay, as no knave or wise man would. Those who rightly defend the existing reading misunderstand it, I think. Shakespeare is not pointing out, in 'The knave turns fool that runs away,' that the wise knave who runs away is really a 'fool with a circumbendibus,' 'moral miscalculator as well as moral coward.' The Fool is referring to his own words, 'I would have none but knaves follow [my advice to desert the King], since a fool gives it'; and the last two lines of his song mean, 'The knave who runs away follows the advice given by a fool; but I, the fool, shall not follow my own advice by turning knave.'

For the ideas compare the striking passage in _Timon_, I. i. 64 ff.

3. '_Decline your head._'

At IV. ii. 18 Goneril, dismissing Edmund in the presence of Oswald, says:

This trusty servant
Shall pass between us: ere long you are like to hear,
If you dare venture in your own behalf,
A mistress's command. Wear this; spare speech;
Decline your head: this kiss, if it durst speak,
Would stretch thy spirits up into the air.

I copy Furness's note on 'Decline': 'STEEVENS thinks that Goneril bids Edmund decline his head that she might, while giving him a kiss, appear to Oswald merely to be whispering to him. But this, WRIGHT says, is giving Goneril credit for too much delicacy, and Oswald was a "serviceable villain." DELIUS suggests that perhaps she wishes to put a chain around his neck.'

Surely 'Decline your head' is connected, not with 'Wear this' (whatever 'this' may be), but with 'this kiss,' etc. Edmund is a good deal taller than Goneril, and must stoop to be kissed.

4. _Self-cover'd_.

At IV. ii. 59 Albany, horrified at the passions of anger, hate, and contempt expressed in his wife's face, breaks out:

See thyself, devil!
Proper deformity seems not in the fiend
So horrid as in woman.

_Gon._ O vain fool!

_Alb._ Thou changed and self-cover'd thing, for shame,
Be-monster not thy feature. Were't my fitness
To let these hands obey my blood,
They are apt enough to dislocate and tear
Thy flesh and bones: howe'er thou art a fiend,
A woman's shape doth shield thee.

The passage has been much discussed, mainly because of the strange expression 'self-cover'd,' for which of course emendations have been proposed. The general meaning is clear. Albany tells his wife that she is a devil in a woman's shape, and warns her not to cast off that shape by be-monstering her feature (appearance), since it is this shape alone that protects her from his wrath. Almost all commentators go astray because they imagine that, in the words 'thou changed and self-cover'd thing,' Albany is speaking to Goneril as a _woman_ who has been changed into a fiend. Really he is addressing her as a fiend which has changed its own shape and assumed that of a woman; and I suggest that 'self-cover'd' means either 'which hast covered or concealed thyself,' or 'whose self is covered' [so Craig in Arden edition], not (what of course it ought to mean) 'which hast been covered _by_ thyself.'

Possibly the last lines of this passage (which does not appear in the Folios) should be arranged thus:

To let these hands obey my blood, they're apt enough
To dislocate and tear thy flesh and bones:
Howe'er thou art a fiend, a woman's shape
Doth shield thee.

_Gon._ Marry, your manhood now--

_Alb._ What news?

5. _The stage-directions at_ V. i. 37, 39.

In V. i. there first enter Edmund, Regan, and their army or soldiers: then, at line 18, Albany, Goneril, and their army or soldiers. Edmund and Albany speak very stiffly to one another, and Goneril bids them defer their private quarrels and attend to business. Then follows this passage (according to the modern texts):

_Alb._ Let's then determine
With the ancient of war on our proceedings.

_Edm._ I shall attend you presently at your tent.

_Reg._ Sister, you'll go with us?

_Gon._ No.

_Reg._ 'Tis most convenient: pray you, go with us.

_Gon._ [_Aside_] O, ho, I know the riddle.--I will go.

_As they are going out, enter_ EDGAR _disguised._

_Edg._ If e'er your grace had speech with man so poor,
Hear me one word.

_Alb._ I'll overtake you. Speak.

[_Exeunt all but_ ALBANY _and_ EDGAR.

It would appear from this that all the leading persons are to go to a Council of War with the ancient (plural) in Albany's tent; and they are going out, followed by their armies, when Edgar comes in. Why in the world, then, should Goneril propose (as she apparently does) to absent herself from the Council; and why, still more, should Regan object to her doing so? This is a question which always perplexed me, and I could not believe in the only answers I ever found suggested, viz., that Regan wanted to keep Edmund and Goneril together in order that she might observe them (Moberly, quoted in Furness), or that she could not bear to lose sight of Goneril, for fear Goneril should effect a meeting with Edmund after the Council (Delius, if I understand him).

But I find in Koppel what seems to be the solution (Verbesserungsvorschläge, p. 127 f.). He points out that the modern stage-directions are wrong. For the modern direction 'As they are going out, enter Edgar disguised,' the Ff. read, 'Exeunt both the armies. Enter Edgar.' For 'Exeunt all but Albany and Edgar' the Ff. have nothing, but Q1 has 'exeunt' after 'word.' For the first direction Koppel would read, 'Exeunt Regan, Goneril, Gentlemen, and Soldiers': for the second he would read, after 'overtake you,' 'Exit Edmund.'

This makes all clear. Albany proposes a Council of War. Edmund assents, and says he will come at once to Albany's tent for that purpose. The Council will consist of Albany, Edmund, and the ancient of war. Regan, accordingly, is going away with her soldiers; but she observes that Goneril shows no sign of moving with _her_ soldiers; and she at once suspects that Goneril means to attend the Council in order to be with Edmund. Full of jealousy, she invites Goneril to go with _her_. Goneril refuses, but then, seeing Regan's motive, contemptuously and ironically consents (I doubt if 'O ho, I know the riddle' should be 'aside,' as in modern editions, following Capell). Accordingly the two sisters go out, followed by their soldiers; and Edmund and Albany are just going out, in a different direction, to Albany's tent when Edgar enters. His words cause Albany to stay; Albany says to Edmund, as Edmund leaves, 'I'll overtake you'; and then, turning to Edgar, bids him 'speak.'

6. V. iii. 151 ff.

When Edmund falls in combat with the disguised Edgar, Albany produces the letter from Goneril to Edmund, which Edgar had found in Oswald's pocket and had handed over to Albany. This letter suggested to Edmund the murder of Albany. The passage in the Globe edition is as follows:

_Gon._ This is practice, Gloucester:
By the law of arms thou wast not bound to answer
An unknown opposite: thou art not vanquish'd,
But cozen'd and beguiled.

_Alb._ Shut your mouth, dame,
Or with this paper shall I stop it: Hold, sir;
Thou worse than any name, read thy own evil:
No tearing, lady; I perceive you know it.
[_Gives the letter to Edmund._

_Gon._ Say, if I do, the laws are mine, not thine:
Who can arraign me for't?

_Alb._ Most monstrous! oh!
Know'st thou this paper?

_Gon._ Ask me not what I know. [_Exit._

_Alb._ Go after her: she's desperate: govern her.

_Edm._ What you have charged me with, that have I done;
And more, much more; the time will bring it out.
'Tis past, and so am I. But what art thou
That hast this fortune on me?

The first of the stage-directions is not in the Qq. or Ff.: it was inserted by Johnson. The second ('Exit') is both in the Qq. and in the Ff., but the latter place it after the words 'arraign me for't.' And they give the words 'Ask me not what I know' to Edmund, not to Goneril, as in the Qq. (followed by the Globe).

I will not go into the various views of these lines, but will simply say what seems to me most probable. It does not matter much where precisely Goneril's 'exit' comes; but I believe the Folios are right in giving the words 'Ask me not what I know' to Edmund. It has been pointed out by Knight that the question 'Know'st thou this paper?' cannot very well be addressed to Goneril, for Albany has already said to her, 'I perceive you know it.' It is possible to get over this difficulty by saying that Albany wants her confession: but there is another fact which seems to have passed unnoticed. When Albany is undoubtedly speaking to his wife, he uses the plural pronoun, 'Shut _your_ mouth, dame,' 'No tearing, lady; I perceive _you_ know it.' When then he asks 'Know'st _thou_ this paper?' he is probably _not_ speaking to her.

I should take the passage thus. At 'Hold, sir,' [omitted in Qq.] Albany holds the letter out towards Edmund for him to see, or possibly gives it to him.[279] The next line, with its 'thou,' is addressed to Edmund, whose 'reciprocal vows' are mentioned in the letter. Goneril snatches at it to tear it up: and Albany, who does not know whether Edmund ever saw the letter or not, says to her 'I perceive _you_ know it,' the 'you' being emphatic (her very wish to tear it showed she knew what was in it). She practically admits her knowledge, defies him, and goes out to kill herself. He exclaims in horror at her, and, turning again to Edmund, asks if _he_ knows it. Edmund, who of course does not know it, refuses to answer (like Iago), not (like Iago) out of defiance, but from chivalry towards Goneril; and, having refused to answer _this_ charge, he goes on to admit the charges brought against himself previously by Albany (82 f.) and Edgar (130 f.). I should explain the change from 'you' to 'thou' in his speech by supposing that at first he is speaking to Albany and Edgar together.

7. V. iii. 278.

Lear, looking at Kent, asks,

Who are you?
Mine eyes are not o' the best: I'll tell you straight.

_Kent._ If fortune brag of two she loved _and_ hated (Qq. _or_),
One of them we behold.

Kent is not answering Lear, nor is he speaking of himself. He is speaking of Lear. The best interpretation is probably that of Malone, according to which Kent means, 'We see the man most hated by Fortune, whoever may be the man she has loved best'; and perhaps it is supported by the variation of the text in the Qq., though their texts are so bad in this scene that their support is worth little. But it occurs to me as possible that the meaning is rather: 'Did Fortune ever show the extremes _both_ of her love _and_ of her hatred to any other man as she has shown them to this man?'

8. _The last lines._

_Alb._ Bear them from hence. Our present business
Is general woe. [_To Kent and Edgar_] Friends of my
soul, you twain
Rule in this realm, and the gored state sustain.

_Kent._ I have a journey, sir, shortly to go;
My master calls me, I must not say no.

_Alb._ The weight of this sad time we must obey;
Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.
The oldest hath borne most: we that are young
Shall never see so much, nor live so long.

So the Globe. The stage-direction (right, of course) is Johnson's. The last four lines are given by the Ff. to Edgar, by the Qq. to Albany. The Qq. read '_have_ borne most.'

To whom ought the last four lines to be given, and what do they mean? It is proper that the principal person should speak last, and this is in favour of Albany. But in this scene at any rate the Ff., which give the speech to Edgar, have the better text (though Ff. 2, 3, 4, make Kent die after his two lines!); Kent has answered Albany, but Edgar has not; and the lines seem to be rather more appropriate to Edgar. For the 'gentle reproof' of Kent's despondency (if this phrase of Halliwell's is right) is like Edgar; and, although we have no reason to suppose that Albany was not young, there is nothing to prove his youth.

As to the meaning of the last two lines (a poor conclusion to such a play) I should suppose that 'the oldest' is not Lear, but 'the oldest of us,' viz., Kent, the one survivor of the old generation: and this is the more probable if there _is_ a reference to him in the preceding lines. The last words seem to mean, 'We that are young shall never see so much _and yet_ live so long'; _i.e._ if we suffer so much, we shall not bear it as he has. If the Qq. 'have' is right, the reference is to Lear, Gloster and Kent.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 278: The 'beacon' which he bids approach is not the moon, as Pope supposed. The moon was up and shining some time ago (II. ii. 35), and lines 1 and 141-2 imply that not much of the night is left.]

[Footnote 279: 'Hold' can mean 'take'; but the word 'this' in line 160 ('Know'st thou this paper?') favours the idea that the paper is still in Albany's hand.]

NOTE Z.

SUSPECTED INTERPOLATIONS IN _MACBETH_.

I have assumed in the text that almost the whole of _Macbeth_ is genuine; and, to avoid the repetition of arguments to be found in other books,[280] I shall leave this opinion unsupported. But among the passages that have been questioned or rejected there are two which seem to me open to serious doubt. They are those in which Hecate appears: viz. the whole of III. v.; and IV. i. 39-43.

These passages have been suspected (1) because they contain stage-directions for two songs which have been found in Middleton's _Witch_; (2) because they can be excised without leaving the least trace of their excision; and (3) because they contain lines incongruous with the spirit and atmosphere of the rest of the Witch-scenes: _e.g._ III. v. 10 f.:

all you have done
Hath been but for a wayward son,
Spiteful and wrathful, who, as others do,
Loves for his own ends, not for you;

and IV. i. 41, 2:

And now about the cauldron sing,
Like elves and fairies in a ring.

The idea of sexual relation in the first passage, and the trivial daintiness of the second (with which cf. III. v. 34,

Hark! I am call'd; my little spirit, see,
Sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me)

suit Middleton's Witches quite well, but Shakespeare's not at all; and it is difficult to believe that, if Shakespeare had meant to introduce a personage supreme over the Witches, he would have made her so unimpressive as this Hecate. (It may be added that the original stage-direction at IV. i. 39, 'Enter Hecat and the other three Witches,' is suspicious.)

I doubt if the second and third of these arguments, taken alone, would justify a very serious suspicion of interpolation; but the fact, mentioned under (1), that the play has here been meddled with, trebles their weight. And it gives some weight to the further fact that these passages resemble one another, and differ from the bulk of the other Witch passages, in being iambic in rhythm. (It must, however, be remembered that, supposing Shakespeare _did_ mean to introduce Hecate, he might naturally use a special rhythm for the parts where she appeared.)

The same rhythm appears in a third passage which has been doubted: IV. i. 125-132. But this is not _quite_ on a level with the other two; for (1), though it is possible to suppose the Witches, as well as the Apparitions, to vanish at 124, and Macbeth's speech to run straight on to 133, the cut is not so clean as in the other cases; (2) it is not at all clear that Hecate (the most suspicious element) is supposed to be present. The original stage-direction at 133 is merely 'The Witches Dance, and vanish'; and even if Hecate had been present before, she might have vanished at 43, as Dyce makes her do.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 280: _E.g._ Mr. Chambers's excellent little edition in the Warwick series.]

NOTE AA.

HAS _MACBETH_ BEEN ABRIDGED?

_Macbeth_ is a very short play, the shortest of all Shakespeare's except the _Comedy of Errors_. It contains only 1993 lines, while _King Lear_ contains 3298, _Othello_ 3324, and _Hamlet_ 3924. The next shortest of the tragedies is _Julius Caesar_, which has 2440 lines. (The figures are Mr. Fleay's. I may remark that for our present purpose we want the number of the lines in the first Folio, not those in modern composite texts.)

Is there any reason to think that the play has been shortened? I will briefly consider this question, so far as it can be considered apart from the wider one whether Shakespeare's play was re-handled by Middleton or some one else.

That the play, as we have it, is _slightly_ shorter than the play Shakespeare wrote seems not improbable. (1) We have no Quarto of _Macbeth_; and generally, where we have a Quarto or Quartos of a play, we find them longer than the Folio text. (2) There are perhaps a few signs of omission in our text (over and above the plentiful signs of corruption). I will give one example (I. iv. 33-43). Macbeth and Banquo, returning from their victories, enter the presence of Duncan (14), who receives them with compliments and thanks, which they acknowledge. He then speaks as follows:

My plenteous joys,
Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves
In drops of sorrow. Sons, kinsmen, thanes,
And you whose places are the nearest, know,
We will establish our estate upon
Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter
The Prince of Cumberland; which honour must
Not unaccompanied invest him only,
But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine
On all deservers. From hence to Inverness,
And bind us further to you.

Here the transition to the naming of Malcolm, for which there has been no preparation, is extremely sudden; and the matter, considering its importance, is disposed of very briefly. But the abruptness and brevity of the sentence in which Duncan invites himself to Macbeth's castle are still more striking. For not a word has yet been said on the subject; nor is it possible to suppose that Duncan had conveyed his intention by message, for in that case Macbeth would of course have informed his wife of it in his letter (written in the interval between scenes iii. and iv.). It is difficult not to suspect some omission or curtailment here. On the other hand Shakespeare may have determined to sacrifice everything possible to the effect of rapidity in the First Act; and he may also have wished, by the suddenness and brevity of Duncan's self-invitation, to startle both Macbeth and the audience, and to make the latter feel that Fate is hurrying the King and the murderer to their doom.

And that any _extensive_ omissions have been made seems not likely. (1) There is no internal evidence of the omission of anything essential to the plot. (2) Forman, who saw the play in 1610, mentions nothing which we do not find in our play; for his statement that Macbeth was made Duke of Northumberland is obviously due to a confused recollection of Malcolm's being made Duke of Cumberland. (3) Whereabouts could such omissions occur? Only in the first part, for the rest is full enough. And surely anyone who wanted to cut the play down would have operated, say, on Macbeth's talk with Banquo's murderers, or on III. vi., or on the very long dialogue of Malcolm and Macduff, instead of reducing the most exciting part of the drama. We might indeed suppose that Shakespeare himself originally wrote the first part more at length, and made the murder of Duncan come in the Third Act, and then _himself_ reduced his matter so as to bring the murder back to its present place, perceiving in a flash of genius the extraordinary effect that might thus be produced. But, even if this idea suited those who believe in a rehandling of the play, what probability is there in it?

Thus it seems most likely that the play always was an extremely short one. Can we, then, at all account for its shortness? It is possible, in the first place, that it was not composed originally for the public stage, but for some private, perhaps royal, occasion, when time was limited. And the presence of the passage about touching for the evil (IV. iii. 140 ff.) supports this idea. We must remember, secondly, that some of the scenes would take longer to perform than ordinary scenes of mere dialogue and action; _e.g._ the Witch-scenes, and the Battle-scenes in the last Act, for a broad-sword combat was an occasion for an exhibition of skill.[281] And, lastly, Shakespeare may well have felt that a play constructed and written like _Macbeth_, a play in which a kind of fever-heat is felt almost from beginning to end, and which offers very little relief by means of humorous or pathetic scenes, ought to be short, and would be unbearable if it lasted so long as _Hamlet_ or even _King Lear_. And in fact I do not think that, in reading, we _feel Macbeth_ to be short: certainly we are astonished when we hear that it is about half as long as _Hamlet_. Perhaps in the Shakespearean theatre too it appeared to occupy a longer time than the clock recorded.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 281: These two considerations should also be borne in mind in regard to the exceptional shortness of the _Midsummer Night's Dream_ and the _Tempest_. Both contain scenes which, even on the Elizabethan stage, would take an unusual time to perform. And it has been supposed of each that it was composed to grace some wedding.]

NOTE BB.

THE DATE OF _MACBETH_. METRICAL TESTS.

Dr. Forman saw _Macbeth_ performed at the Globe in 1610. The question is how much earlier its composition or first appearance is to be put.

It is agreed that the date is not earlier than that of the accession of James I. in 1603. The style and versification would make an earlier date almost impossible. And we have the allusions to 'two-fold balls and treble sceptres' and to the descent of Scottish kings from Banquo; the undramatic description of touching for the King's Evil (James performed this ceremony); and the dramatic use of witchcraft, a matter on which James considered himself an authority.

Some of these references would have their fullest effect early in James's reign. And on this ground, and on account both of resemblances in the characters of Hamlet and Macbeth, and of the use of the supernatural in the two plays, it has been held that _Macbeth_ was the tragedy that came next after _Hamlet_, or, at any rate, next after _Othello_.

These arguments seem to me to have no force when set against those that point to a later date (about 1606) and place _Macbeth_ after _King Lear_.[282] And, as I have already observed, the probability is that it also comes after Shakespeare's part of _Timon_, and immediately before _Antony and Cleopatra_ and _Coriolanus_.

I will first refer briefly to some of the older arguments in favour of this later date, and then more at length to those based on versification.

(1) In II. iii. 4-5, 'Here's a farmer that hang'd himself on the expectation of plenty,' Malone found a reference to the exceptionally low price of wheat in 1606.

(2) In the reference in the same speech to the equivocator who could swear in both scales and committed treason enough for God's sake, he found an allusion to the trial of the Jesuit Garnet, in the spring of 1606, for complicity in the Gunpowder Treason and Plot. Garnet protested on his soul and salvation that he had not held a certain conversation, then was obliged to confess that he had, and thereupon 'fell into a large discourse defending equivocation.' This argument, which I have barely sketched, seems to me much weightier than the first; and its weight is increased by the further references to perjury and treason pointed out on p. 397.

(3) Halliwell observed what appears to be an allusion to _Macbeth_ in the comedy of the _Puritan_, 4to, 1607: 'we'll ha' the ghost i' th' white sheet sit at upper end o' th' table'; and Malone had referred to a less striking parallel in _Caesar and Pompey_, also pub. 1607:

Why, think you, lords, that 'tis _ambition's spur_
That _pricketh_ Caesar to these high attempts?

He also found a significance in the references in _Macbeth_ to the genius of Mark Antony being rebuked by Caesar, and to the insane root that takes the reason prisoner, as showing that Shakespeare, while writing _Macbeth_, was reading Plutarch's _Lives_, with a view to his next play _Antony and Cleopatra_ (S.R. 1608).

(4) To these last arguments, which by themselves would be of little weight, I may add another, of which the same may be said. Marston's reminiscences of Shakespeare are only too obvious. In his _Dutch Courtezan_, 1605, I have noticed passages which recall _Othello_ and _King Lear_, but nothing that even faintly recalls _Macbeth_. But in reading _Sophonisba_, 1606, I was several times reminded of _Macbeth_ (as well as, more decidedly, of _Othello_). I note the parallels for what they are worth.

With _Sophonisba_, Act I. Sc. ii.:

Upon whose tops the Roman eagles stretch'd
Their large spread wings, which fann'd the evening aire
To us cold breath,

cf. _Macbeth_ I. ii. 49:

Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky
And fan our people cold.

Cf. _Sophonisba_, a page later: 'yet doubtful stood the fight,' with _Macbeth_, I. ii. 7, 'Doubtful it stood' ['Doubtful long it stood'?] In the same scene of _Macbeth_ the hero in fight is compared to an eagle, and his foes to sparrows; and in _Soph._ III. ii. Massinissa in fight is compared to a falcon, and his foes to fowls and lesser birds. I should not note this were it not that all these reminiscences (if they are such) recall one and the same scene. In _Sophonisba_ also there is a tremendous description of the witch Erictho (IV. i.), who says to the person consulting her, 'I know thy thoughts,' as the Witch says to Macbeth, of the Armed Head, 'He knows thy thought.'

(5) The resemblances between _Othello_ and _King Lear_ pointed out on pp. 244-5 and in Note R. form, when taken in conjunction with other indications, an argument of some strength in favour of the idea that _King Lear_ followed directly on _Othello_.

(6) There remains the evidence of style and especially of metre. I will not add to what has been said in the text concerning the former; but I wish to refer more fully to the latter, in so far as it can be represented by the application of metrical tests. It is impossible to argue here the whole question of these tests. I will only say that, while I am aware, and quite admit the force, of what can be said against the independent, rash, or incompetent use of them, I am fully convinced of their value when they are properly used.

Of these tests, that of rhyme and that of feminine endings, discreetly employed, are of use in broadly distinguishing Shakespeare's plays into two groups, earlier and later, and also in marking out the very latest dramas; and the feminine-ending test is of service in distinguishing Shakespeare's part in _Henry VIII._ and the _Two Noble Kinsmen_. But neither of these tests has any power to separate plays composed within a few years of one another. There is significance in the fact that the _Winter's Tale_, the _Tempest_, _Henry VIII._, contain hardly any rhymed five-foot lines; but none, probably, in the fact that _Macbeth_ shows a higher percentage of such lines than _King Lear_, _Othello_, or _Hamlet_. The percentages of feminine endings, again, in the four tragedies, are almost conclusive against their being early plays, and would tend to show that they were not among the latest; but the differences in their respective percentages, which would place them in the chronological order _Hamlet_, _Macbeth_, _Othello_, _King Lear_ (König), or _Macbeth_, _Hamlet_, _Othello_, _King Lear_ (Hertzberg), are of scarcely any account.[283] Nearly all scholars, I think, would accept these statements.

The really useful tests, in regard to plays which admittedly are not widely separated, are three which concern the endings of speeches and lines. It is practically certain that Shakespeare made his verse progressively less formal, by making the speeches end more and more often within a line and not at the close of it; by making the sense overflow more and more often from one line into another; and, at last, by sometimes placing at the end of a line a word on which scarcely any stress can be laid. The corresponding tests may be called the Speech-ending test, the Overflow test, and the Light and Weak Ending test.

I. The Speech-ending test has been used by König,[284] and I will first give some of his results. But I regret to say that I am unable to discover certainly the rule he has gone by. He omits speeches which are rhymed throughout, or which end with a rhymed couplet. And he counts only speeches which are 'mehrzeilig.' I suppose this means that he counts any speech consisting of two lines or more, but omits not only one-line speeches, but speeches containing more than one line but less than two; but I am not sure.

In the plays admitted by everyone to be early the percentage of speeches ending with an incomplete line is quite small. In the _Comedy of Errors_, for example, it is only 0.6. It advances to 12.1 in _King John_, 18.3 in _Henry V._, and 21.6 in _As You Like It_. It rises quickly soon after, and in no play written (according to general belief) after about 1600 or 1601 is it less than 30. In the admittedly latest plays it rises much higher, the figures being as follows:--_Antony_ 77.5, _Cor._ 79, _Temp._ 84.5, _Cym._ 85, _Win. Tale_ 87.6, _Henry VIII._ (parts assigned to Shakespeare by Spedding) 89. Going back, now, to the four tragedies, we find the following figures: _Othello_ 41.4, _Hamlet_ 51.6, _Lear_ 60.9, _Macbeth_ 77.2. These figures place _Macbeth_ decidedly last, with a percentage practically equal to that of _Antony_, the first of the final group.

I will now give my own figures for these tragedies, as they differ somewhat from König's, probably because my method differs. (1) I have included speeches rhymed or ending with rhymes, mainly because I find that Shakespeare will sometimes (in later plays) end a speech which is partly rhymed with an incomplete line (_e.g. Ham._ III. ii. 187, and the last words of the play: or _Macb._ V. i. 87, V. ii. 31). And if such speeches are reckoned, as they surely must be (for they may be, and are, highly significant), those speeches which end with complete rhymed lines must also be reckoned. (2) I have counted any speech exceeding a line in length, however little the excess may be; _e.g._

I'll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked.
Give me my armour:

considering that the incomplete line here may be just as significant as an incomplete line ending a longer speech. If a speech begins within a line and ends brokenly, of course I have not counted it when it is equivalent to a five-foot line; _e.g._

Wife, children, servants, all
That could be found:

but I do count such a speech (they are very rare) as

My lord, I do not know:
But truly I do fear it:

for the same reason that I count

You know not
Whether it was his wisdom or his fear.

Of the speeches thus counted, those which end somewhere within the line I find to be in _Othello_ about 54 per cent.; in _Hamlet_ about 57; in _King Lear_ about 69; in _Macbeth_ about 75.[285] The order is the same as König's, but the figures differ a good deal. I presume in the last three cases this comes from the difference in method; but I think König's figures for _Othello_ cannot be right, for I have tried several methods and find that the result is in no case far from the result of my own, and I am almost inclined to conjecture that König's 41.4 is really the percentage of speeches ending with the close of a line, which would give 58.6 for the percentage of the broken-ended speeches.[286]