Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1890-07-09
shAkEsPeARe's FAIRIES.
Tho FAIRY School Had but One Chief the
Hard of ANun. -


The FAIRY School Had but One Chief. the
Bard of ASon.'t
There Is one part OF the Merry Wives"
which especially seems to favor the be-
lief that the piece was originally court
diversion. The scene with the false
fairies has tho sportive character, and
the touch OF ballet, which such courtly
pastime preferred. 1t is curious to COM
pare the false fairies of the merry
Wives with the true FAIRIES OF the Mid
summer-Night's Dream" that most fairy
piece OF writing in the world. Probably
the serious and poetic sprites are the
earlier.
The quarto OF the Dream is dated
1900, but the comedy Is mentioned two
years before In the Palladis Tamia
$685. So, to Shakespeares fancy, his
Welsh fairy, and the rest OF his mas.
querading citizens, may have been an
English rendering, almost an intention
al trayesty, of those Athenian fays,
more sweet of voice than the Mercedes.
who departed, the odding over, -
Following darkness like dream"
The Windsor sprites began by being
prosaic enough, and the very slang OF
the stage comes In when they cry:
Go, get US propsrties,
And tricking for our fairies;"
- wherein fat Falstan
Hath great scene"
But when once the fairy queen OF
these mimic imps appears, the poet can
not help himself, but must make her
poetical, nay, must show his old sympa-
thies with the fantastic folk and knowl-
edge of their world.
Fairies, black, gray, green and white,
You moonshine jewellers, and shades Of night,
You orphan-h heirs OF fixed destiny,
Attend your office, and your quality.
Crier Hobgobin, make the fairy Dyes"
Orphan-heirs of fixed destiny, these
are indeed the fairies, the shadows OF
the ancient dead, of the old classic gods,
unredeemed, who dwell in their own al
lotted half-world of reflected light and
double shadow, the court of Queen Pros
erpina.
"Pinch them, arms, legs, backs, shoul
ders, sides and shins." This is their lit
tie part in the moral government OF
things, the everyday or every-night
duty, 80 peasant belief held, of
We fairies that do run
by the triple Hecates team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like q dream"
The dread Hecate became in the mid
die ages the sovereign Of mere moonlit
mischief =
But the pure poetry of old loyalty re-
asserts itself in this cdurtly command:
." Search Windsor Castle elves within and out;
Strew good luck. ouphes, on every sacred
room;
That 1t may stand till the perpetual doom.
In state as wholesome, as in state tits fit,
Worthy the owner, and the owner IL
And Honi soit qui nal penss, write,
In emerald tufts, flowers purple, blue and
white"
pThen the poetry vanishes with the
fays, who brought it, as only to Shake
speare they could bring it. for he, too,
like Corneille, had his htin, his brownie,
who never deserted him when he sang
Of the border of the two worlds, and the
realms between highland light, between
ghosts and men.
The Ettrick Shepherd, in burst Of
confidence, once assured Sir Walter
Scott, GAVIN the chief of far higher
schulz than yours, the Mountain and
Fairy schulz"
But the good Shepherd overestimated
himself. The Fairy school hath but
one chief-Shakespeare-and Herrick
is his ancient Andrew Lang. in Har-
xar,c Mor,1ina