of Shakspeare, was undoubtedly that which first struck his own age. Like our Corneille, he created eloquence, and became powerful through its means. Behold the great charm which suddenly caused his dramatic pieces to be distinguished in the midst of a multitude of other plays, equally inordinate and rude, with which the English stage was at that time filled. This epoch, in truth, was peculiarly fertile in dramatic productions. Although the exterior pomp of the spectacle was very gross and imperfect, the representations were flocked to with passionate eagerness. The rage for festivals which had been created by Elizabeth, and the encreasing public prosperity of her reign, multiplied the want of such recreations. A celebrated nobleman of her court, even he whom she employed to pronounce the odious sentence on Mary Stuart, Lord Dorset had composed, and had brought upon the London stage, a tragedy entitled Gorboduc. About the same period,' Marloe produced his Tamberlaine the Greate, The Massacre of Paris, and The Tragicall Historie of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus.

It is certain, besides, that, independently of

Thomas Sackville, Earl of Dorset, was one of the commissioners for the trial of the Queen of Scots, but not present at her condemnation at Fotheringay castle. On the confirmation of her sentence, he was chosen, from the gentleness of his manners, and the tenderness of his disposition, to communicate to her the fatal tidings.

Assuredly not, for Gorboduc was acted in 1561, and the earliest of the pieces mentioned here by Marloe, not until 1590.

these works known and published, there were, in the repertory of the theatres of this epoch, certain pieces by several hands, which were often retouched by the comedians themselves. It was in a labour of this kind that the dramatic genius of Shakspeare first exercised itself; and it is amongst these works of the theatrical treasury that we must range several pieces published under his name, rude indeed, like his own, but rude without genius. Such are The Life and Death of Thomas Lord Cromwell, The London Prodigal, Pericles, &c. We do not find them included in the chronological list which the scrupulous Malone has given of the works of Shakspeare, where, going back as far as the year 1590, he commences with Titus Andronicus."

From this period, Shakspeare, residing altogether in London, excepting some occasional visits which he made to his native town, gave annually to the world one or two theatrical pieces, tragedy, comedy, pastoral or fairy drama. It is very probable that his way of life was similar to that which, there is reason to think, fell to the lot of a

a

Pericles, and the Second and Third Parts of Henry VI. are, doubtless, specimens of what Shakspeare could early achieve in this task of emending the works of others. But of Titus Andronicus, and the First Part of Henry VI., of Locrine, The London Prodigal, The Puritan, Lord Cromwell, Sir John Oldcastle, and A Yorkshire Tragedy, I do not believe he wrote a line, notwithstanding Schlegel, to the astonishment of all who better know these miserable dramas, has declared that "they deserve to be classed among his best and maturest works!''

comedian under the manners of that age, that is to say, obscure and free, and indemnifying himself for the want of dignity and consideration by the pursuits of pleasure.

Nevertheless his contemporaries, without giving us any of those precious details, any of those familiar anecdotes which one would wish to be able to relate of Shakspeare, render homage to his uprightness and benevolence of soul. He has himself preserved very few memorials of his theatrical career. We know that in Hamlet he represented the ghost in a very striking manner. He filled many other characters of the theatre, often even several in the same piece; and it is not now an uninteresting subject of curiosity, to observe on those lists of actors which precede old editions of ancient plays, the great name of Shakspeare modestly figuring amongst so many obscure ones at the head of an almost forgotten work.

There remains no detail of the favours and protection which he received from the court. We only know that Elizabeth admired his talents, and that she particularly enjoyed the humorous character of Falstaff in his Henry IV. It seems to our modern delicacy that the admiration of the stern Elizabeth might have been better placed, and that she whom Shakspeare gratefully calls

A fair vestal throned by the west,

might have found something else to praise in the greatest painter of the revolutions of England.

What appears more meritorious on the part of this princess, is the happy freedom which Shakspeare enjoyed in the choice of his subjects. Under the absolute power of Elizabeth, he disposes at his pleasure of the events of the reign of Henry VIII., describes his tyranny with a simplicity quite historical, and paints, in the most touching colours, the virtues and the rights of Catherine of Arragon, driven from the throne and the bed of Henry VIII. to make room for the mother of Elizabeth.

James the First showed himself not less favourable to Shakspeare. He listened with pleasure to the flattering predictions for the Stuarts which the poet had contrived to introduce into the very midst of his terrible tragedy of Macbeth; and as he was himself employed in protecting the theatre, that is to say, in rendering it less free, he wished to confide to Shakspeare the new office of director of the comedians of Black-Friars; but it was at this very period that Shakspeare, scarcely fifty years old, quitted London, and retired to his native town. He had enjoyed there for but two years the little fortune which he had amassed by his labours, when he died. His will, which has been published, and which bears the date of the year 1616, was made, he says, in the commencement of this deed, in perfect health. Shakspeare, after having expressed himself in a strain of much piety, disposes of several legacies in favour of his daughter Judith, of a sister, and a niece, and

finally of his wife, to whom he bequeaths his best bed with the furniture.

But

The reputation of Shakspeare has greatly encreased in the course of the two centuries which have elapsed since his death; and it is during this period that the admiration of his genius hath be come, as it were, a national superstition. even in his own age his loss had been deeply felt, and his memory, honoured by the most striking proofs of respect and enthusiasm. Ben Jonson, his timid rival, paid homage to him in some verses where he compares him to Eschylus, to Sophocles, and to Euripides, and where he cries out with all the same admiration, and nearly the same emphasis as the English critics of our own time:

Triumph, my Britain! thou hast one to show,
To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
He was not of an age, but for all time;—
Nature herself was proud of his designs,
And joy'd to wear the dressing of his lines;
Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit.

This enthusiasm is sustained throughout the entire poem of Ben Jonson, and finishes by a kind of apotheosis of the star of Shakspeare, placed, he

"Ben-Johnson, son timide rival." There could scarcely be an epithet more inappropriate, when applied to Ben Jonson, than what this adjective conveys; for, in fact, the warmest eulogists of honest Ben must allow that an overweening, and at times almost offensive confidence in his own talents was amongst the most glaring of his defects.