which the want of a leading interest is imperfectly supplied by a mere collection of incidents. The great fault of the old play is, that it gives a very inadequate idea of what it professes to represent. If the reader be not previously acquainted with the history, he will in vain seek a knowledge of it from the progress of the scene. It is scarcely ever clear, for instance, whether the barons are in arms against the king in defence of their own liberties, or as the tools of Philip and partisans of Lewis, and thus the supporters of the cause of the pope. Throughout the play, indeed, John's disagreement with his nobility, and their extensive confederacy against him, for the protection of their independence, are kept too much out of sight; and of an event so important as the signature of Magna Charta, there is a total neglect. With almost implicit fidelity, Shakspeare copied the old play in its story and scenic arrangement of circumstances. He seldom corrects his author, but with him attributes the death of Richard the First to the Duke of Austria, and names that duke " Lymoges." Richard was, indeed, imprisoned on his return from Palestine, by Leopold Duke of Austria; but he met his death, several years * Act III. sc. 1. . afterwards, from the hand of Bertrand de Gourdon, while besieging Vidomar, vicount of Limoges, in the castle of Chalus. Holinshed re lates that Arthur was imprisoned in Falais, and afterwards at Rouen, and in this latter place he was supposed to be murdered: in the old play, Arthur is confined somewhere in England, and there Shakspeare also confines him. Shakspeare has forcibly displayed the art, sophistry, insincerity, and ambition of the court of Rome; but it is singular that he has not, like the author of the old play, exhibited the depravity of the monastic orders, and the horrid tendency of papistical principles. In The same view is taken of John's character by Shakspeare, and by the anonymous author. prosperity he is bold and insolent, and overbearing; in adversity, an abject coward; weak in judgment, precipitate in action. With no views beyond the exigency of the moment, he eagerly attempts the accomplishing of his desires, unrestrained by religious awe, and unchecked by moral principle. Devoid of talent, he reaps not the benefit of his villainy: superior ability overreaches him; he succumbs to the power he insolently defies, and affectedly despises, and he is at once the object of hatred and contempt. The old play makes John an usurper, and not, as represented by Holinshed, the legal possessor of the throne under the dying testament of his predecessor, and brother, Richard. It was the object of both the dramatists to excite pity in favour of Arthur, and they, therefore, judiciously suppressed the facts recorded by Holinshed, that the nobility "willingly took their oaths of obedience" to John, and that the pretensions of his nephew were at one time so little insisted upon, that "a peace was concluded upon betwixt King John and Duke Arthur." The most celebrated, and, indeed, the best scene in Shakspeare's play, is that in which the tyrant insinuates to Hubert his wishes for the death of Arthur: its whole merit is Shakspeare's, the bare hint for such an interview in the original play being comprised in the following lines: "Hubert de Burgh, take Arthur here to thee, Be he thy prisoner: Hubert, keep him safe, The sequel to this scene, Hubert's explanation to John that Arthur had not been sacrificed, is generally illustrative of Shakspeare's method of The treating his predecessor's composition. * beautiful passage descriptive of the general and deep sensation excited by the report of the death of Arthur is entirely Shakspeare's, as are, also, John's ungrateful reflections on Hubert's supposed obedience to his command. + The remainder of the scene is inimitably amplified from the following passage of the old play: "Art thou there, villain? Furies haunt thee still, For killing him whom all the world laments. Hub. Why, here's, my lord, your highnes hand and seal, Charging, on life's regard, to do the deed. John. Ah, dull, conceited peasant, know'st thou not It was a damned execrable deed? Shew'st me a seal? Oh, villain, both our souls Shakspeare's representation of John suffering under poison, and desiring winter and the bleak winds of the north to cool his internal heat, is a circumstance borrowed from the old play: how eloquently he has amplified the idea of his predecessor, requires not to be pointed out. * Act IV. sc. 2. + "It is the curse of kings to be attended By slaves," &c. "Philip, some drink; oh! for the frozen Alps, To tumble on and cool this inward heat That rageth as the furnace seven-fold hot." Few scenes of deeper pathos occur in Shakspeare than the triumph of humanity over sternness in the breast of Hubert, and the glory is due to Shakspeare only. The pleadings of Arthur, in the old play, are the reasonings of an adult, harsh, quaint, and cold. Shakspeare has converted the young man into a child, and artfully invested his supplications with the beautiful simplicity of infantine innocence. One specimen of the style of the old play will be sufficient. "Then do thy charge, and charged be thy soul |