The Press.
London, England, 1856-03-29 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

signification has nearly been lost through
disuse.
Other corrections from the same source,
though generally affirmed, are open in Mr.
Kinght's opinion to question. Such is the one
in Cymbeline. Imogen is lamenting the incon-
stancy of Posthumous :

Some jay of Italy
Whose mother was her painting, hath betrayed him.
Poor I am stale, a garment out of fashion.
The MS. corrector would read :
Who smothers her with painting.
Mr. Knight adheres to the original, not with-
out some show of reason. The " jays of Italy"
so altered nature by their tricks that their art
became their parent, and their mother was
their painting. In this sense the passage is
intelligible, though we think far-fetched. The
case is one of those which an editor must deal
with according to his own discretion. We should
feel inclined to adopt the more obvious read-
ing, in spite of Mr. Knight's sneer, that the
" correction is prosaic enough to suit any
" Shakspere made easy." We may notice that
Mr. Singer has previously entered the field
against some of the absurdities adopted by
Mr. Collier. Neither in his past nor his pre-
sent position does the latter gentleman show
that he possesses sufficient sagacity to consti-
tute him an authority on the text of his
author.

Without going more at large into the critical
merits of the editions by Mr Singer and Mr.
Knight, we will take the first play in each, The
Tempest, to show that the text of Shakespeare
is not yet nearly so clear as we may one day
hope to possess it. In act i., sc. 2, Caliban
appears at the mandate of his master with
curses on his lips, and Prospero threatens him
with punishment. Mr. Singer prints the
passage :

Prospero. For this, be sure, to-night thou shalt have
cramps,
Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up ; urchins
Shall, for that vast of night that they may work
All exercise on thee ; thou shalt be pinch'd
As thick as honey-comb, each pinch more stinging
Than bees that made them.
" That vast of night" is correctly explained
by Mr Singer to mean midnight, as in
Hamlet :

In the dead waist and middle of the night.
But the passage as it stands is not intelligible.
Mr. Knight adds a comma to "work," at the
end of the line, and the passage has then a
kind of meaning, though not satisfactory. It
amserts that urchins shall all exercise on Cali-
ban during that vast of night that they are
permitted to work. But Prospero would then
limit his power over spirits at the time when
he is asserting it; and the expression "urchins
shall all exercise on thee," wants definiteness.
We propose to read :
Urchins
Shall forth at vast of night, that they may work
All exercise on thee.
The correction only requires the movement
of " th" from the beginning of " that" to the
end of " for." Prospero would then declare
authoritatively that urchins shall forth at mid-
night to work all exercise on Caliban ;—that
is, to torment him to the utmost extent of
their power. We have no doubt that this is
the true reading, and we commend it to the
attention of our Shakesperian friends, with the
belief that it will hereafter pass into the text.

In act ii., sc. 1, Antonio tempts Sebastian to
murder his brother Alonzo while he sleeps.
Sebastian, only imperfectly comprehending
the drift of Antonio's discourse, yet thinking it
too strange and horrible for reality, regards it
as language spoken in a dream, and says :

Surely
It is a sleety language; and thou speak'st
Out of thy sleep: What is it thou didat say?
This is a strange repose, to he asleep
With eyes wide open ; standing, speaking, moving,
And yet so fast asleep.
Antonio. Noble Sebastian,
Thou leest thy fortune sleep—die rather; wink'at
Whiles thou art. sleeping.
Sebastian. Thou dolt snore distinctly.
What is the meaning of " " at the
end of the line ? Shall we read it inter-
rogatively as a question addressed to Sebas-
tian, " Wink'st, whilst thou art waking?"
Our editors do not sanction this reading, yet
they give us no other. We propose to omit
the word altogether, reading the passage
thus :

SATURDAY,

Antonio. Noble
Thou let'st thy fortune sleep—.die rather--whiles
Thou art waking.
Seba4lian. Thou dost snore distinctly.
Sebastian asserts that Antonio is performing
the actions of waking life—standing, speaking,
moving, while he is asleep ; and Antonio retorts
that Sebastian lets his fortune sleep—die rather
—while he is waking. Sebastian persists in his
metaphor, and returns, " Thou dost snore dis-
tinctly." We appeal to the candour of our
readers, whether this correction should not, bo
incorporated with the text in future editions?
We are not favorable to that sty le of criti-
cism which would justify all necessary changes
by showing how an author may have omitted
to dot his i s and loop his l's, or how the com-
positor may have transposed a letter or a
space, because we think that the sources of
error are too numerous to be cleared up by
any such mode of explanation; yet it may
sometimes be resorted to, in order to
strengthen probabilities. If we suppose that
through inadvertence " whiles," or " whilst,'
was, either by author or transcriber, after
having been written at the end of one line,
repeated at the beginning of the next, we can
easily understand how the printer should
have taken it for " wink'st ;" and on the prin-
ciple that,

Your true meaning puzzles more than wit;

so it may have remained to this day.
Twenty lines further on Antonio reasons
upon the improbability of the persuasion used
by Gonzalo to show the King that his son
Ferdinand may be still alive. The text given
by Mr. Singer runs:—

r-- '

MARCH 29, 1856.

--

of the text may yet lead to further consider-
able improvement in it. From all past expe-
rience we are warranted in concluding that
one mind alone can effect little towards this
end. But if a number of the admirers of
Shakespeare could be brought to contribute
their observations, and throw them into a
common stock, we think it likely that, under
sagacious superintendence, a much more satis-
factory text might be formed than at present
exists. At all events, recent discoveries have
been so numerous as to call for a new variorum
edition.

()riselda. A Tragedy. And Other Poems.

By Edwin Arnold London : Bogue.
THE last story of Boccacio, relating the trials
of the patient Griselda, is the purest and most
toucbing of his " Hundred Tales." We must all
agree in the conclusion that the Marquis was
"cruelly severe," and that the trials of his lady
ware "intolerable ;" but as the story relates to a
period when, in spite of all the fine professions
of chivalry, ladies were often the mere sport
of their stern lords, and the slaves of their
caprice, we can understand that such things
might have happened as Dioneus relates, and
can appreciate the worth of that virtue which
was woman's only resource under the calami-
ties they had to endure—Patience. Our stun
dard of female excellence is different now
from that which prevailed early in the four-
teenth century. An admirable female writer
of our day has said that " resignation is weak-
ness, until the capacity of resistance has been
exhausted ; it then becomes fortitude." But
five hundred years ago patience in woman
seems to have been esteemed a virtue in all
conditions of life, and under every imaginable
provocation.

Mr. Arnold, in his " tragedy," hair closely
adhered to the tale in the " Decameron,"
and as all our readers may not bear it
in their memory, we give an outline of it,
following Mr. Arnold's version. Walter,
Marquis of Saluzzo, a beneficent and popular
ruler, is petitioned by his people to take a
wife He had previously fallen in lova with
a poor country girl, the daughter of Janicola,
villager, and their request is consequently
in no other way disagreeable to him than
from fear that they may not approve his choice.
Accordingly, us the condition of complying
with their wishes, he exacts from them an
oath that they will honour aid obey whom-
soever he may present to them as their queen.
He then conducts them to the abode of Jani-
cola, and introduces theni to his daughter,
whom he forthwith demands is marriage, and
bears off to his palace amid great pomp and
rejoicing. Griselda had leanied to love him
waen he visited her father's cottage in dis-
guise ; and on their wedding-day she vows
that her love shall ever be leal and true,

Whatever chance or change in life betided.
In due time Griselda bears him two children.
a girl and a boy. In the novel, the Marquis de-
termines to put his wife's fidelity to the severest
test from mere wantonness, but in this poem the
Marquis receives a letter from his sister, tell-
ing him that all Italy is wondering at his
marriage, and that he is at all events bound to
subject the character and fidelity of his low-
born bride to sonic adequate test. The Mar-
quis then gives orders for conveying away his
children from their mother, leading her to
believe that she will never see them again
save in heaven, and alleging as a reason for
his cruelty the discontent of his people at the
low origin of their mother. She is permitted to
languish in secret sorrow for twelve years. At
the end of that time, her husband, thinking a
further trial necessary, pretends to divorce
her, and sends her borne to her father. She
is shortly after, by way of a crowning insult,
recalled to the palace to make preparations
for the new queen, a youthful princess of
thirteen, years of age. The marriage proves
a fiction of the Marquis, as the princess
is Griselda's daughter, whom, together
with her brother, he had chosen to restore in
this singular manner, Grisdda's troubles are
now oVer, and she is rewarded for her unswerv-
ing constancy by the recovery of her former
rank, and a permanent hold upon her Will
baPera!,Steeln and affection.