been derived. The reader who would investigate this ho subject for himself may be directed to Dr. Furness edition of Shakespeare's play.

of

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of

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German critics have sought for Shakespeare's centra in idea in Twelfth-Night; let us not try to rival them W in profundity; let us rather be satisfied if we say that Shakespeare's central idea was to conjoin a love romance with the passion of loud mirth, to charm or imagination with beauty, and at the same time to make laughter hold his sides. Is not this a sufficient ambition for one who was primarily a playwright and not a critical philosopher? Twelfth-Night, like the Italian comedy, is a drama of deceptions and of the deceived We are cheated by our fellow-mortals, by fortune, by accident; but always the chief deceiver is ourselfour sentimentality, our vanity, our fears, our egoism Even Viola, whose tender and loyal woman's heart goes straight to the mark, must be brought within the com pass of the law, and must take Sir Andrew for a formidable fire-eater. Orsino is doubly deceived-first by his own love-in-idleness, and secondly by his counterfer page. Olivia is in love with grief and is speedily con victed of her error, whereupon she falls in love with one of her own sex, and by and by is again betrayed into her happiness. If Puck were busy squeezing the magic Juice into the eyes of mortals the confusion could not be greater. And among these wanderers in the wood of error stalks the solemn figure of Malvolio, whose decep tion could never have proceeded from Maria's devices had it not first a source in his self-love.

Of Shakespeare's pretty disguisers in male attire, setting apart the incomparable Imogen, the prettiest is Viola. She is not, like Rosalind, uncommon tall,' nor, like her, uncommon brilliant of speech. To us she has the charm of for ever betraying her girlhood, though it is so effectually concealed from Olivia and the Duke:

Diana's lip

Is not more smooth and rubious; thy small pipe
Is as the maiden's organ, shrill and sound;

And all is semblative a woman's part.

Yet Viola plays her page's rôle with unfaltering courage; she bears her messages to Olivia without a moment's

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hostility or ill-will; she throws a veil of gaiety over her wistfulness, and knows how to be patient and to wait.

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Master Feste, the Fool, is perhaps the wisest person in the play-for what says Quinapalus ? Better a witty fool than a foolish wit." He sees the fooling of all the others, and himself preserves a perspicacity in his folly Now, the melancholy god protect thee,' he cries to the Duke, and the tailor make thy doublet of changeable taffeta, for thy mind is a very opal!' He can, like other wits, turn a sentence like a cheveril glove, but he is only the Lady Olivia's corrupter of words, not her fool to play his part requires some wisdom. Moreover he has the gift of a very sweet and contagious' breath; he sings songs that are both wise and gay, and has the honour of praise in departing, when the play closes, and his voice, telling of the rain that raineth every day, is the last utterance and is heard while he alone occupies the stage.

Some critics have imagined that in Malvolio we find the satire of Shakespeare upon Puritanism. Now and again, for a moment in passing, Shakespeare can utter his comment on that form of Puritanism which would banish cakes and ale from the world or deny that ginger is hot in the mouth; but it was not his way to satirize any body of contemporary religious opinion or sentiment. Malvolio stands for something of wider range-the self-deception of self-love. He does not err in perceiving the disorder that has invaded the household of his mistress; he has a consciousness of superiority to the roistering toper and the lean-witted gentleman his companion. But Malvolio is not aware that he himself is the victim of a deeper form of intoxication, the intoxication of self-esteem; and he is made to play more fantastic tricks before high heaven than ever the drunken Sir Toby or the brainless Sir Andrew perform. The high pretensions of Malvolio's folly lend it a certain dignity, and the dignity enhances its absurdity. It is a little cruel-and the cruelty is Shakespeare's-when in the Samson-like strength of his delusion so respectable an officer is made sport for the godless Philistine crew. Sir Andrew even, who catches some faint gleams of intelligence from Sir Toby, as does Slender in the Merry Wives from Shallow, can gird at him. Could

6

there be a greater indignity? Our comfort is that Sir Andrew is himself almost at the same momer befooled, is stripped of his valiant trappings, and exhibited in his naked cowardice. Who had so good! a right to restore Malvolio to our respect as that gentlest of critics, Charles Lamb, in the well-known essay which recalls the performance of the part by Bensley? Ma volio,' he comments, is not essentially ludicrous. He becomes comic but by accident. He is cold, austere repelling; but dignified, consistent, and, for what appears, rather of an over-stretched morality. Mari describes him as a sort of Puritan; and he might have worn his gold chain with honour in one of our old roundhead families, in the service of a Lambert, or a Lady Fairfax. But his morality and his manners are misplaced in Illyria. He is opposed to the proper levities of the piece. and falls in the unequal contest. Still his pride, or h gravity (call it which you will), is inherent, and native to the man, not mock or affected, which latter only are the fit objects to excite laughter. His quality is at the best unlovely, but neither buffoon nor contemptible. His bearing is lofty, a little above his station, but probably not much above his deserts. We see no reason why he should not have been brave, honourable, accom plished.' And the critic, as will be remembered, proceeds delightfully with much more to the like effect. It is to be feared that Shakespeare was less indulgent than Lamb. Malvolio's pile of egoistic folly, however high it may rise, is intended to be desperately and completely overthrown. He may not himself perceive its overthrow. His last word in the play is one of fierce indignation—‘T be reveng❜d on the whole pack of you.' The Duke, indeed, as Lamb has observed, follows his departure with the command' Pursue him, and entreat him to a peace, but we are left to conjecture whether a peace ensued o whether Malvolio carried his wounded self-esteem inte another and a soberer region where they did not dance so wildly the Illyrian bacchanals.

To Shakespeare we owe the invention of Malvolie Maria, Feste, Fabian, Sir Toby, and Sir Andrew. It is evident towards which side he leaned in order to balance the romantic interest of his original. He fel that laughter should be allied to romance.

And as

a fact it seems to have been the broad comic elements of the play which most impressed the spectators. In the copy of the Second Folio which belonged to King Charles I he altered the title of the play in his own. handwriting to that of Malvolio. Why Shakespeare had named the comedy Twelfth-Night we cannot say with certainty. It was the idea of Hunter that the title was suggested by a phrase which occurs in a long prologue or preface prefixed to the Italian Gl' Ingannati: The story is new, never seen nor read, and only dipped for and taken out of their own industrious noddles as your prize-tickets are dipped for and taken out on Twelfth-Night [la notte di Beffana].' There is little point in this suggestion, but if Shakespeare's comedy was first presented on Twelfth-Night, the Italian phrase may have seemed an appropriate hint for a title. The What you Will' which was added seems to mean that the first title has no sign-post descriptive character, and it declares accordingly if you are dissatisfied with my "Twelfth-Night ", give the play any name you please Shakespeare, as Hermann Conrad has well put it, wished to say merely-" Herein are to be found comicalities of all kinds, braggadocios, and chicken-hearted simpletons, roistering and revelling, ill-conditioned hypocrisy and intolerance, false love and true love, disguises and delusions and mad pranks. What to call it, I know not. Call it a masquerade', a Twelfth-Night' or 'Whatever you Like.' To any deeper meaning which posterity might find underlying this title, he gave never a thought. Here in this drama we have on one canvas a realistic picture of the life of the Renaissance, with its splendour and its joyousness, with its weaknesses and its follies, with its life of lofty development of mind and spirit— such as hardly a second picture of that time affords. In it we find every comic element united in an artistic harmony, whereof the strength and beauty stand unparalleled; in it we find all things soever that are to be asked for in a comedy-absolutely What you will.'1 Shakespeare had recently found that the unusual title As You Like It did not foretoken a failure. The title What you Will' was adopted by Marston for an incomparably inferior play.

1 Translated in Furness's edition of the play.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

ORSINO, Duke of Illyria.

SEBASTIAN, Brother to Viola.

ANTONIO, a Sea Captain, Friend to Sebastian.
A Sea Captain, Friend to Viola.

VALENTINE, Gentlemen attending on the Duke.
CURIO,

SIR TOBY BELCH, Uncle to Olivia.

SIR ANDREW AGUECHEEK.

MALVOLIO, Steward to Olivia.

Lords, Priests, Sailors, Officers, Musicians, and other Attendants.

SCENE. A City in Illyria; and the Sea-coast near it.