"Master Page, fit; good Mafter Page, fit; Proface. What you want in meat, we'll have in drink,' fays Juftice Shallow's fac totum, Davy, in the Second Part of Henry IV. Proface, Sir Thomas Hanmer obferves to be Italian, from profaccia, much good may it do you. Mr. Johnson rather thinks it a mistake for perforce. Sir Thomas however is right; yet it is no argument for his author's Italian knowledge. Old Heywood, the epigrammatift, addressed his readers long before, "Readers, reade this thus: for preface, proface, And Dekker in his play, If it be not good, the Diuel is in it, (which is certainly true, for it is full of devils,) makes Shackle-foule, in the character of Friar Rufh, tempt his brethren with "choice of dishes," "To which proface; with blythe lookes fit yee." Nor hath it escaped the quibbling manner of the Water-poet, in the title of a poem prefixed to his Praife of Hempfeed: "A Preamble, Preatrot, Preagallop, Preapace, or Preface; and Proface, my Mafters, if your Stomacks ferve." But the editors are not contented without coin ing Italian. "Rivo, fays the drunkard,” is an expreffion of the madcap Prince of Wales; which Sir Thomas Hanmer corrects to Ribi, drink away, or again, as it fhould be rather tranflated. Dr. Warburton accedes to this; and Mr. Johnfon hath admitted it into his text; but with an obfervation, that Rivo might poffibly be the cant of English taverns. And fo indeed it was: it occurs frequently in Marston. Take a quotation from his comedy of What you will, 1607: "Muficke, tobacco, facke, and fleepe, "Rivo, drink deep, give care the mate." In Love's Labour Loft, Boyet calls Don Armado, on us. A Spaniard that keeps here in court, "A phantafme, a monarcho. " Here too Sir Thomas is willing to palm Italian upWe fhould read, it feems, mammuccio, a mammet, or puppet: Ital. Mammuccia. But the allufion is to a fantastical character of the time."Popular applaufe," fays Meres, "dooth nourish fome, neither do they gape after any other thing, but vaine praife and glorie,-as in our age Peter Shakerlye of Paules, and MONARCHO that liued about the court." P. 178. I fancy, you will be fatisfied with one more inftance. "Baccare, You are marvellous forward," quoth Gremio to Petruchio in the Taming of a Shrew. "But not fo forward," fays Mr. Theobald, "as our editors are indolent. This is a ftupid corruption of the prefs, that none of them have dived into. We must read Baccalare, as Mr. Warburton acutely obferved to me, by which the Italians mean, Thou ignorant, prefumptuous man.”—“ Properly, indeed," adds Mr. Heath, "a graduated fcholar, but ironically and farcaftically, a pretender to scholarfhip." This is admitted by the editors and criticks of every denomination. Yet the word is neither wrong, nor Italian it was an old proverbial one, ufed fre quently by John Heywood; who hath made, what he pleases to call, epigrams upon it. Take two of them, fuch as they are: "Backare, quoth Mortimer to his fow: "Went that fow backe at that biddyng trowe you?” "Backare, quoth Mortimer to his fow: fe Howel takes this from Heywood, in his Old Sawes and Adages: and Philpot introduces it into the Proverbs collected by Camden. We have but few obfervations concerning Shakfpeare's knowledge of the Spanish tongue. Dr. Grey indeed is willing to fuppofe, that the plot of Romeo and Juliet may be borrowed from a COMEDY of Lopes de Vega. But the Spaniard, who was certainly acquainted with Bandello, hath not only changed the catastrophe, but the names of the characters. Neither Romeo nor Juliet; neither Montague nor Capulet, appears in this performance: and how came they to the knowledge of Shakfpeare?-Nothing is more certain, than that he chiefly followed the tranflation by Painter, from the French of Boifteau, and hence arife the deviations from Bandello's original Italian. It seems, however, from a paffage in Ames's Typographical 6 It is remarked, that "Paris, though in one place called earl, is most commonly ftiled the countie in this play. Shakspeare feems to have preferred, for fome reafon or other, the Italian conte to our count:-perhaps he took it from the old English novel, from which he is faid to have taken his plot."-He certainly did fo: Paris is there firft ftiled a young earle, and afterward, counte, countee, and county; according to the unfettled orthograpy of the time. The word however is frequently met with in other writers; particularly in Fairfax: Antiquities, that Painter was not the only translator of this popular story: and it is poffible therefore, that Shakspeare might have other affiftance. In the Induction to The Taming of the Shrew, the Tinker attempts to talk Spanish: and confequently the author himfelf was acquainted with it. "Paucus pallabris, let the world flide, feffa." But this is a burlefque on Hieronymo; the piece of bombaft, that I have mentioned to you before: "What new device have they devised, trow? Mr. Whalley tells us, the author of this piece hath the happinefs to be at this time unknown, the remembrance of him having perifhed with himfelf:" Philips and others afcribe it to one William Smith: but I take this opportunity of informing him, that it was written by Thomas Kyd; if he will accept the authority of his contemporary, Heywood. More hath been faid concerning Shakspeare's acquaintance with the French language. In the "As when a captaine doth befiege fome hold, "And trieth waies and wiles a thoufand fold, Godfrey of Bulloigne, Book VII. ft. 9o. "Fairfax," fays Mr. Hume, hath tranflated Taffo with an elegance and ease, and at the fame time with an exactness, which for that age are furprising. Each line in the original is faithfully rendered by a correfpondent line in the tranflation." The former part of this character is extremely true; but the latter not quite fo. In the book above quoted Tallo and Fairfax do not even agree in the number of flanzas. play of Henry V. we have a whole scene in it, and in other places it occurs familiarly in the dialogue. We may obferve in general, that the early editions have not half the quantity; and every fentence, or rather every word moft ridiculously blundered. Thefe, for feveral reafons, could not poffibly be published by the author; and it is Every writer on Shakspeare hath expreffed his aftonishment, that his author was not folicitous to fecure his fame by a correct edition of his performances. This matter is not understood. When a poet was connected with a particular playhouse, he conftantly fold his works to the Company, and it was their interest to keep them from a number of rivals. A favourite piece, as Heywood informs us, only got into print, when it was copied by the ear, "for a double fale would bring on a fufpicion of honeftie." Shakspeare therefore himfelf published nothing in the drama: when he left the stage, his copies remained with his fellow-managers, Heminge and Condell; who at their own retirement, about feven years after the death of their author, gave the world the edition now known by the name of the first folio; and call the previous publications"ftolne and furreptitious, maimed and deformed by the frauds and ftealths of injurious impoftors." But this was printed from the playhouse copies; which in a feries of years had been frequently altered, through convenience, caprice, or ignorance. We have a fufficient inftance of the liberties taken by the actors, in an old pamphlet by Nath, called Lenten Stuffe, with the Prayfe of the red Herring, 4to. 1599, where he affures us, that in a play of his, called The Isle of Dogs, "foure acts, without his confent, or the leaft gucffe of his drift or scope, were fupplied by the players." This however was not his first quarrel with them. In the Epiftle prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, which I have quoted before, Tom. hath a lafh at fome "vaine glorious tragedians," and very plainly at Shakspeare in particular; which will ferve for an anfwer to an obfervation of Mr. Pope, that had almoft been forgotten: "It was thought a praise to Shakspeare, that he scarce ever blotted a line:-1 belieue the common opinion of his want of learning proceeded from no better ground. This too might be thought a praife by fome."-But hear Nash, who was far from praising: "I leaue all these to the mercy of their mother-tongue, that feed on nought but the crums that fall from the tranflator's trencher.-That could fcarcely Latinize their neck verfe if they should haue neede, yet English Seneca read by candlelight yeelds many good sentences→→ |