The sun., 1908-02-23

there, while almost all the per9onAges VINO
| figure in the four remaining acts. which
! arc laid in Cyprus, are Venetians. We
, know that ShaSesE eGre never crossed the
| Airs; how much. then, did he know ebout
! Venice. and whence did he procure his
knowledge? those Fra the questions which
( MIR. Brown he's under;Gken to Gnswer. IL
/ il certainly singular that notwithstanding
! tho minute scrutiny and close study Of
ShGkcsr cares works from almost every
I rOint Of view scholars have touched but
seldom the question of the poets local
knowledge OF Venice, although, as the
! author shows, the scattered illusions col
leotible from the plays prove an intimacy
with the city which is surprising in a man
who had never seen it. We must conclude
that all Shakespeare had heard about
Venice made him love her and that his
burning imagination vivified the picture of
her created by his fancy. There is no
doubt indeed, OF the depth Of the interest
which he took in Italy in general, but about
Venice in particular and the Venetian
I dominions he displays a knowledge deeper
than that which he seems to have possessed
concerning any other Italian State
Our author has found that, emitting the
references to Rome, which are just under
400 in number illusions to the chief cities
of Italy in Shakespeare's plays follow this
order: to Venice there are fifty-one refer
ences. TO Naples thirty-four, TO Milan
twenty-five, to Florence twenty-three, 10
Padua twenty-three and to Verona twenty.
Where did the poet gain his information?
Two main sources were open to him; first,
the merchant class. the relations of which
TO Venice dated back as far as the year 1925
and had subsequently been cemented by
the yearly passage of tie Venetian mer-
Chantmen known as the Flanders galleys
secondly, the travelled members OF the
aristocracy. the young gentlemen who re-
turned from the Grand Tour to England with
indelble memories of Italy and all the
charm of that pleasant land, who filed
London society with talk of Italian cities
and made Venice so TO speak, the fashion.
80 that Sir John FdLstdf, for example,
assures Mistress Ford that were she his
lady her arched brow would become ~the
ship tire, the tire valiant or any tire Of
Venetian admittance.' There is no doubt
that Queen Elizabeth was a proficient in
Italian, and could even pun in that language.
An excellent reason for her loving that city
was that it presented her ~ith a liberia
supply OF silk stockings, the first she had
ever worn. Il is also a fact that the trav-
elled aristOCracy Of England learned in
Venice to use at meals the three tined fork,
or trident which seems not to have been
known in England since the latter half Of
the twelfth century.
Our author is convinced that in one way
or another Shakespeare had learned suffi-
cient Italian to understand that language.
The fact il pointed out that in his Italian
plays he introduces enough Of that tongue
10 prove his familiarity with its Use
Mercutio, for example, cannot away with
such "antic lsping affecting fantasticoes,
these fashion mongers, these perdopGTItS
with their immortal pdssddO, the puntO
reverse, the hal" Again the greeting be.
tween Hortensio and PetrucCio is con-
Quoted for a couple Of lines in Italian
Con tutto IL cuOrc ben trOrdtO Ala casa
nOstrd ben ueRufo. mOltO hOnOrdtO Si0nor
mio Pctruccio;' and HOiOferHes quotes the
old familiar proverb, "Vsnetid, Venetid.
chi non Ii Uedc non ii pre,n' A Mr.. Brown
reminds us. the saying ia an old one, and
appears for the first time in the collection
Of Venetian proverbs known az the ten
Tables" which were ten large broadsides,
each containing $50 proverbs. These were
first printed at the beginning of the six
teenth century, and a copy may well have
found its way TO London in Shakespeare's
time In much Ado About Nothing there
is another reference to the lagoon city:
"If Cupid hath not spent all his culver in
Venice" which also sounds proverbial.
Our author holds that the abundant use
which the poet made Of Italian novelle and
the fidelity with which he has transferred
certain proper names and phrases directly
from Italian into English constitute suffi-
cient proof of his intimacy with the Ian
guage Of the peninsula.