  Act i. sc. 1. “Oli. What, boy! Orla. Come, come, elder brother, you are too young in this. Oli. Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?” There is a beauty here. The word “boy” naturally provokes and awakens in Orlando the sense of his manly powers; and with the retort of “elder brother,” he grasps him with firm hands, and makes him feel he is no boy. Ib.— “Oli. Farewell, good Charles. Now will I stir this gamester: I hope, I shall see an end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why, hates nothing more than him. Yet he's gentle; never school'd, and yet learn'd; full of noble device; of all sorts enchantingly beloved! and, indeed, so much in the heart of the world, and especially of my own people, who best know him, that I am altogether misprised: but it shall not be so long; this wrestler shall clear all.” This has always appeared to me one of the most un-Shakespearian speeches in all the genuine works of our poet; yet I should be nothing surprised, and greatly pleased, to find it hereafter a fresh beauty, as has so often happened to me with other supposed defects of great men.—1810. It is too venturous to charge a passage in Shakespeare with want of truth to nature; and yet at first sight this speech of Oliver's expresses truths, which it seems almost impossible that any mind should so distinctly, so livelily, and so voluntarily, have presented to itself, in connection with feelings and intentions so malignant, and so contrary to those which the qualities expressed would naturally have called forth. But I dare [pg 108] Ib. sc. 2.— “Celia. If your saw yourself with your eyes, or knew yourself with your judgment, the fear of your adventure would counsel you to a more equal enterprise.” Surely it should be “our eyes” and “our judgment.” Ib. sc 3.— “Cel. But is all this for your father? Ros. No; some of it is for my child's father.” Theobald restores this as the reading of the older editions. It may be so: but who can doubt that it is a mistake for “my father's child,” meaning herself? According to Theobald's note, a most indelicate anticipation is put into the mouth of Rosalind without reason;—and besides, what a strange thought, and how out of place and unintelligible! Act iv. sc. 2.— “Take thou no scorn To wear the horn, the lusty horn; It was a crest ere thou wast born.” I question whether there exists a parallel instance of a phrase, that like this of “horns” is universal in all languages, and yet for which no one has discovered even a plausible origin. |
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