entirely devoid of interest. Lysander and Demetrius, and Hermia and Helena, scarcely merit notice except on account of the frequent combination of elegance, delicacy, and vigour, in their complaints, lamentations, and pleadings, and the ingenuity displayed in the management of their cross-purposed love through three several changes. In the first place, there is a mutual passion between Lysander and Hermia: Demetrius loves Hermia, he having previously loved Helena, who returned his love. In the second stage, Lysander deserts Hermia, and urges his suit to Helena, who remains faithful to Demetrius; and, thirdly, Lysander disclaims his love for Helena, and renews his vows to his first love, Hermia; Demetrius relinquishes Hermia, and renews his affection for Helena. Bottom and his companions are probably highly drawn caricatures of some of the monarchs of the scene whom Shakspeare found in favour and popularity when he first appeared in London, and in the bickerings, jealousies, and contemptible conceits which he has represented, we are furnished with a picture of the greenroom politics of the Globe. After perusing any half-dozen dramas of the early part of Elizabeth's reign, we can readily concur with Steevens, in thinking that the doggerel nonsense of Bottom and his worthies, is only an extract from "the boke of Perymus and Thesbye," printed in 1562. The conjecture, however, is equally plausible, that Shakspeare emulated the style in which the story of these unhappy lovers is narrated in the fourth book of Golding's version of Ovid's Metamorphoses: "Within the towne of whose huge walles so monstrous high and thick, (The fame is given Semyramis for making them of bricke,) Dwelt hard together two young folke in houses joynd so nere That under all one roofe well nigh both twayne convayed were. The name of him was Pyramus and Thisbe call'd was she, Manifold are the opinions that have been advanced respecting the origin of the fairy mythology of our ancestors. The superstitions of the East and of the North, and of Greece and of Rome have been resorted to in search of a clue which would lead to a consistent history of its rise and growth. It appears safe to assume that the oriental genii in general, and the Dews and Peries of Persia in particular, are the remote prototypes of modern fairies. The doctrine of the existence of this peculiar race of spirits was imported into the north of Europe by the Scythians, and it forms a leading feature in the mythology of the Celts. Hence was derived the popular fairysystem of our own country, which our ancestors modified by the mythology of the classics. The Peries and Dews of the orientals were paralleled by the Scandinavian division of their genii, or diminutive supernatural beings, with which their imaginations so thickly peopled the earth, into bright or beneficent elves, and black or malignant dwarfs; the former beautiful, the latter hideous in their aspect. A similar division of the fairy tribe of this country was long made, but, by almost imperceptible degrees, the qualities of both species were ascribed to fairies generally. They were deemed intermediate between mankind and spirits; but still as they partook decidedly of a spiritual nature, they were, like all other spirits, under the influence of the devil; but their actions were more mischievous than demonaical, more perplexing than malicious, more frolicksome than seriously injurious. Possessing material bodies, they had all the wants and passions of human nature: being spiritual, they had the power of making themselves invisible, and of passing through the smallest aperture. Of the diminutiveness of these interesting sprites, Shakspeare presents a pleasing idea, by his representation of them as in danger of being overwhelmed by the bursting of a honey-bag newly gathered from the bee*; as seeking refuge from peril in the beds of acorn cups†; and as, in comparison with the cowslip, short in stature; but he has left it to the imagination to paint that unfading and unalterable beauty of form and feature for which they were celebrated, and to clothe them in the tasteful apparel which they arranged and wore with matchless delicacy and grace. The long yellow ringlets that waved over their shoulders, were restrained from concealing the delicacy of their complexions, or the beauty of their brows, by combs of gold. A mantle of green cloth, inlaid with wild flowers, reached to their middle; green pantaloons, buttoned with tags of silk, and sandals of silver, formed their under-dress. On their shoulders hung quivers stored with pernicious arrows; and bows, tipped with gold, ready bent for warfare, were slung by their sides. Thus accoutred, they set forward on their perambulations, mounted on milk-white steeds, so exquisitely light of foot, that they left not the print of their hoofs on land newly ploughed, nor even dashed the dew from the cup of a harebell. * Act IV. sc. 1. † Act II. sc. 1. + Ibid. The employments assigned to these beautiful diminutives are at once appropriate and elegant. Of some, says Shakspeare, it is the business to seek dew-drops," " "And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear*;" Of others, to Of "fetch jewels from the deept;" "Some, to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds; Some war with rear-mice for their leathern wings, Titania's commands are admirably adapted to the capabilities of the delicate and fragile forms on which they are laid; the tasks she assigns them yielding delight in their performance : "Be kind and courteous to this gentleman; And pluck the wings from painted butterflies, The government of fairy-land was strictly * Act II. sc. 1. † Act III. sc. 1. f Act III. sc. 1. ‡ Act II. sc. 3. |