The Sun.
London, England, 1856-08-19 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Shakspere's Englanc ; or; Sketches of c4ttr Siociat
History in the Iteir!:n d f Elizabeth. By G. W.
Thorubtirys. 2 vols. Longman.
The name of this work is very attractive, and its
contents fully realise the pleasant anticipations
raised by its title. t' hatispere's England "—.the
England of the eventful sixteenth century —of
Raleigh and Burleigh, of Bacon and Jenson, of
Essex and Leicester, of Drake and the Armada—
an age which stands out in brilliant relief from the
gloomy and contentious period that so soon fol-
lowed it—an age in which a comfortable feeling of
self-satisfaction seems to have been prevalent
among the good citizens of London, but in which,
notwithstanding, they seem never to have surmised
that the greatest name that should adorn the Eng-
lish literature was that of the manager of the
Globe Theatre in Southwark. To lead the reador
" a long, rambling, gossiping walk through Lud-
Bate, up Cheap, and into Paul's, then away to the
ear Garden in Southwark, and the Globe, where
As you Like it' is acting—anon past the old cross
at Charing to the Presence-chamber at Greenwich
or Richmond and back, to make a night of it at
the Devil Tavern, where the players and poets
meet, just under the chimes of St. Dunstan," is
the professed object of our author, and a very
judicious, entertaining, and pleasantly learned
guide he proves himself to be. He begins with au
introductory chapter, in which he warns us that
this world of the sixteenth century is by no means
a world whose scenes and actors have vanished
from among us, but that we shall meet many an
old friend, and recognise many a familiar locality,
among its passengers and streets. It requires, how-
ever, some exercise of the imaginative faculty for a
denizen of the modern Babyloa to picture to himself
the metropolis of those days, with " Oxford-street
a muddy country road leading to Tyburn, Hyde-
park bare and open, Islington a village, and Mary-
lebene a suburb ;" with noblemen living in Drury-
lane and Alderagate, and Spitalfields a grassy open
space. Still more singular does it appear to the
Londoner of the nineteenth century to read of the
cheerful little stream known by the name of Fleet,
the sparkling Clerken Well, the windmills in Fins-
bury fields, and the herbalist gathering his stores
in the ditches of our modern Piccadilly ! Mr.
Thornbury's magical pages soon bring this strange
city and all its attributes before our eyes, its gay
processions, its public punishments, its street fights
and 'prentice riots, its pageants of the city guilds,
its fashionable promenade at St. Paul's, its barbers'
and apothecaries' shops, whose contents might
puzzle the wisest, its Fleet-street shows, its Bear-
gardens, and Bartholomew Fair—its quaint and
gothic looking buildings, which have given the
name of the Maiden Queen to their style of archi-
tecture. The actors in these scenes are as plainly
held up before us, and the cheats and serving men
of that day might be honoured did they know how
faithfully their doings and misdoings are chronicled
nearly three centuries later. They, in common with
so many worthies or unworthies of their age, may
thank the light of that wonderful genius which has
not only proved a beacon to all posterity, but
has raised the meanest things surrounding
it from their natural obscurity. The plays of
Shakspere, it is remarked, are full of invectives
against servants, " with the exception of the
faithful steward of Timon, and Orlando's
trusty Adam, his serving men, always drawn
from the age, are generally witty, quibbling,
foolish domestics." The sketches of the whole
tribe of retainers given by our author entirely cor-
responds to this description. The list of household
fines is amusing. A servant for uttering au
oath was find ld. ; for leaving a door open, the
same ; a fine of 2d. for all in bed after six, or out
of it after ten. The jester was the dread of the
kitchen and the wit of the dinner table. Elizabeth
herself kept two. The description of robes and
fashions might astonish a modern milliner. Queen
Elizabeth, whom rumour accuses of being by no
means indifferent to this department of feminine
vanity, possessed the moderate allowance of 99
robes, 126 kirtles, 269 gowns, 96 cloaks, and many
other articles. The chapter on the interesting
class of "cheats, thieves and beggars " is the
longest in the book. This, however, is not from
the greater wickedness of those days, or the pecu-
liar interest of the writer on the subject, but from
the greater picturesqueness of their roguery and
the abundance of the materials left for our edifica-
tion. They appear to have possessed a degree of
effrontery which eclipses their successors of these
days. The business-like manner in which they
conducted their operations is really amusing at
this distance of time, though the victims of that
day might not be so easily amused. If they heard
of a youth coming into a large sum of money they
met, in solemn council, and discussed how best to
circumvent him. scouts were sent to discover his
lodgings and places of resort. The wit of the band
was chosen to scrape acquaintance with him, and
the usual tricks of gambling soon transferred die
new inheritance. The fashionable tricks of that
day, which were generally practised on coun-
trymen newly arrived in town, will afford
amusement to many. As is usually the case
the prevalence of crime kept pace with Vie
severity of punishment. In this age, when thieves
slipped into a shop with a bag of meal, flung the
dust into the shoprnan's eyes and walked off with
a bale of goods ; when cheats and gipsies lurked
in every corner, " a thirteen-penny felony" brought
the culprit's head to the axe ; sheepstealers had
their hands cut off, and poisoners were boiled to
death ! Yet innkeepers were constantly in combi-
nation with highwaymen, and it was dangerous to
let an ostler touch your bag. Villagers refused to
leave their work and assist in chasing a thief, but
would say stolidly, "God restore your loss ; I have
other business." Hawking and hunting, of course,
find a place, and the peculiarities of the ancient
spurt may be found entertaining by the sportsman
of our day. The public amusements of the lower
sort do not merit the praise that our author be-
stows on all connected with his favourite epoch.
The amusement of whipping a blind bear was a
brutal one, all must admit. The second volume
opens with ch tpter with a most interesting title,
" The Theatre." Only seven existed in Queen
Elizabeth's time, and in only two were Shakspere's
plays acted. The manners of that time were not
very encouraging to the performers, as the height
of fashion was to appear quite indifferent ; and a
fashionable lounger who wished to attract atten-
tion had resort to the most extraordinary expe-
dients to excite the wonder of the denizens of the
pit, such as whistling at the songs, finding fault
with the manager, and aiming at talking and laugh-
ing so loud that the eyes of the house should be
drawn upon him, that the poets might be provoked
into writing au epigram, or the players point him
out in the street. One plan of the devotees of this
lofty ambition was to turn away in the saddest
scenes of Lear or Othello, " as if he had seen the
thing before at Court." A discriminating audience,
certainly 1 Of one point of the life of the
great dramatist the author takes a somewha t
gloomy view. It is difficult to imagine Shak-
spere regarding with such melancholy con-
tempt that stage which he has ennobled and
glorified with the brilliancy of his comedy and
the splendour of his tragic muse. To fancy him
regarding the profession so congenial to his genius
as one that could " taint his name " is too in-
compatible with all our associations with his
Imemory to be very acceptable. The vitality of his
characters is attested by the following passage :
" Shakspere' though he ruled over all the worlds of
thought and held many planets in subjection, was a liver
in the Elizabethan age ; his characters are Elizabethan
characters, and their manners Elizabethan manners.
Trinculo and Stephano were men to be met any day in
Paul's, their clothes long since dry from the surges of
the Bermoothes and their skins quite healed from the
lashes of the boatswain ; quibbling Speed and Lance and
his dog might have lived at Charlecote ; Robin, Simple,
and Rugby have been seen running up Bucklersbury ;
Malvolio gaping at the prisoners looking out of the grat-
ing at Ludgate ; and Lancelot, tricksome, at Bartholo-
mew's Fair intent on tawdry ribbons as a present for the
sprightly Maria, Sir Toby Belch's widow, who is ex-
pectantly waiting at a roast-pig stall.
" Sir Toby Belch in his disreputable boots, good
enough for drinking in,' and Sir John Falstaff, wittiest
of the sinners, might, we dare venture to say, have been
found quaffing burnt sack cosily together on the snug
bench of some alehouse at Hogsden. Abhorsoa and
Bernardine were common inmates of the Counter, with
Shoe-tie the great traveller, and Half-can who stabbed
Pots. Costard and Bottom might have been rustics of
Stafford, and Sir Nathaniel arid Sir Oliver Martext
hedge priests not a mile from Warwick.
"In the Tempest we find him talking of the Dead
Indian,' and such penny shows as were to be seen any
day in Fleet-street or the Strand, and somewhat akin to
that motion of the Prodigious Son' that Autolycus
once compassed ; the serenades in the Two Gentlemen
of Verona and Cymbeline were strains heard at a hun-
dred terrace windows any bright morning of the Eliza-
bethan year ; the porter in Macbeth is just such a por-
ter as whipped out Lance's dog, when-he misbehaved
himself in the Duke's chamber ; Madam Silvia wears the
Elizabethan fardingale, just as the ladies mentioned by
Bassano wear wigs as Shakspere's noble mistress herself
did ; the Shrew has ruffs, and cuffs, and scarfs, and fans,
and beads, and amber bracelets, like any lady that
swam down the terraces of Windsor, swan-like in white
satin ; Hero's wedding-dress, cloth of gold laced with
silver, set with pearls, and underlaid with bluish tinsel,
would have become Elizabeth herself ; Slender brags of
his feats at hear-beating, and how he took Saccarson by
his chain ; Henry VI. is full of allusions from the scenes
in the Paris Garden adjoining Shakspere's Theatre ;
Slender the simpleton is cunning of face like Mercutio ;
and Sir Andrew Aguecheek uses the phrases of Saviolo
and the fencing masters of the day."
A chapter on the Alche mists of that day affords
some curious insight into their credulity and their
tricks. The author claims for them the right,