  Although, on the whole, this play is exquisitely respondent to its title, and even in the fault I am about to mention, still a winter's tale; yet it seems a mere indolence of the great bard not to have provided in the oracular response (Act ii. sc. 2.) some ground for Hermione's seeming death and fifteen years' voluntary concealment. This might have been easily effected by some obscure sentence of the oracle, as for example:— “ ‘Nor shall he ever recover an heir, if he have a wife before that recovery.’ ” The idea of this delightful drama is a genuine jealousy of disposition, and it should be immediately followed by the perusal of Othello, which is the direct contrast of it in every particular. For jealousy is a vice of the mind, a culpable tendency of the temper, having certain well-known and well-defined effects and concomitants, all of which are visible in Leontes, and, I boldly say, not one of which marks its presence in Othello;—such as, first, an excitability by the most inadequate causes, and an eagerness to snatch at proofs; secondly, a grossness of conception, and a disposition to degrade the object of the passion by sensual fancies and images; thirdly, a sense of shame of his own feelings exhibited in a solitary moodiness of humour, and yet from the violence of the passion forced to utter itself, and therefore catching occasions [pg 244] Act i. sc. 1, 2.— Observe the easy style of chitchat between Camillo and Archidamus as contrasted with the elevated diction on the introduction of the kings and Hermione in the second scene: and how admirably Polixenes' obstinate refusal to Leontes to stay,— “There is no tongue that moves; none, none i' the world So soon as yours, could win me;”— prepares for the effect produced by his afterwards yielding to Hermione;—which is, nevertheless, perfectly natural from mere courtesy of sex, and the exhaustion of the will by former efforts of denial, and well calculated to set in nascent action the jealousy of Leontes. This, when once excited, is unconsciously increased by Hermione,— ... “Yet, good deed, Leontes, I love thee not a jar o' the clock behind What lady she her lord;”— accompanied, as a good actress ought to represent it, by an expression and recoil of apprehension that she had gone too far. “At my request, he would not:”— The first working of the jealous fit;— “Too hot, too hot:”— The morbid tendency of Leontes to lay hold of the merest trifles, and his grossness immediately afterwards,— “Paddling palms and pinching fingers;”— followed by his strange loss of self-control in his dialogue with the little boy. Act iii. sc. 2. Paulina's speech:— “That thou betray'dst Polixenes, 'twas nothing; That did but show thee, of a fool, inconstant, And damnable ingrateful.” Theobald reads “soul.” I think the original word is Shakespeare's. 1. My ear feels it to be Shakespearian; 2. The involved grammar is Shakespearian—“show thee, being a fool naturally, to have improved thy folly by inconstancy;” 3. The alteration is most flat, and un-Shakespearian. As to the grossness of the abuse—she calls him “gross and foolish” a few lines below. Act iv. sc. 3. Speech of Autolycus:— “For the life to come, I sleep out the thought of it.” Fine as this is, and delicately characteristic of one who had lived and been reared in the best society, and had been precipitated from it by dice and drabbing; yet still it strikes against my feelings as a note out of tune, and as not coalescing with that pastoral tint which gives such a charm to this act. It is too Macbeth-like in the “snapper up of unconsidered trifles.” Ib. sc. 4. Perdita's speech:— “From Dis's waggon! daffodils.” An epithet is wanted here, not merely or chiefly for the metre, but for the balance, for the Æsthetic [pg 246] Ib.— ... “Pale primroses That die unmarried.” Milton's— “And the rathe primrose that forsaken dies.” Ib. Perdita's speech:— “Even here undone: I was not much afraid; for once or twice I was about to speak, and tell him plainly, The self-same sun, that shines upon his court, Hides not his visage from our cottage, but Looks on alike. Will't please you, Sir, be gone! (To Florizel.) I told you, what would come of this. Beseech you, Of your own state take care: this dream of mine, Being now awake, I'll queen it no inch farther, But milk my ewes, and weep.” O how more than exquisite is this whole speech! And that profound nature of noble pride and grief venting themselves in a momentary peevishness of resentment toward Florizel:— ... “Will't please you, Sir, be gone!” Ib. Speech of Autolycus:— “Let me have no lying; it becomes none but tradesmen, and they often give us soldiers the lie; but we pay them for it with stamped coin, not stabbing steel;—therefore they do not give us the lie.” As we pay them, they, therefore, do not give it us. |
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