conviction that it supplies many passages, written by Shakespeare and recited by the performers, which were garbled, mangled, or omitted in the printed play of Pericles," as it has come down to us in the quartos of 1609, 1619, and 1630, and in the folios of 1664

and 1685."

The corresponding speech of Marina at this point, as given by Wilkins, is certainly confirmatory of Mr. Collier's opinion, for it exhibits a terseness of expression and a vigour of thought, which are quite Shakespearian:-"If as you say (my Lorde) you arethe Governour, let not your authoritie, which should teach you to rule others, be the meanes to make you mis-governe your selfe: If the eminence of your place came unto you by discent, and the royalty of your blood, let not your life proove your birth a bastard: If it were throwne upon you by opinion, make good, that opinion was the cause to make you great. What reason is there in your Iustice, who hath power over all, to undoe any? If you take from mee mine honour, you are like him, that makes a gappe into forbidden ground, after whome too many enter, and you are guiltie of all their evilles: my life is yet unspotted, my chastitie unstained in thought. Then if your violence deface this building, the workemanship of heaven, made up for good, and not to be the exercise of sinnes intemperaunce, you do kill your owne honour, abuseyour owne justice, and impoverish me.'

(3) SCENE VI.-But amongst honest women.] From the words, honest women, which occur in the Confessio Amantis, it is evident the author here had Gower before him :

"If so be, that thi maister wolde
That I his golde encrece sholde,
It may nott falle by this weye;
But soffre me to go my weye
Oute of this hous, where I am inne,
And I shall make hym for to wynne
In somme place elles of the towne,
Be so it be of religioun

Where that honest women dwelle."

ACT V.

(1) SCENE I.-Marina sings.] The song sung by Marina was very probably that given by Twine (an exact translation of the Latin original), and printed in Wilkins' novel, where it is introduced thus :-"Which when Marina heard, shee went boldely downe into the cabine to him, and with a milde voyce saluted him, saying; God saveyou sir, and be of good comfort, for an innocent Virgin, whose life hath bin distressed by shipwrack, and her chastity by dishonesty, and hath yet bin preserved from both, thus curteously saluteth thee: but perceiving him to yeeld her no answer, she began to record in verses, and therewithall to sing so sweetly, that Pericles, notwithstanding his. great sorrow, woondered at her, at last, taking up another instrument unto his eares she preferred this:

"Amongst the harlots foule I walke,

But harlot none am I;

The Rose amongst the Thornes doth grow,

And is not hurt thereby.

The Thiefe that stole me sure I thinke,

Is slaine before this time,

A Bawde me bought, yet am I not

Defilde by fleshly crime;

Nothing were pleasanter to me,

Then parents mine to know.

I am the issue of a King,

My blood from Kings dooth flow:

In time the heavens may mend my state

And send a better day,

For sorrow addes unto our griefes,

But helps not any way:

Shew gladnesse in your countenaunce,

Cast up your cheerefull eies,

That God remaines, that once of nought
Created Earth and Skies."

(2) SCENE I.-Thou art my child.] So Gower :

"And he tho toke here in his arme;
Bot such a joye as he tho made
Was never seen; thus be thei glade
That sorry hadden be to form.
Fro this day forth fortune hath sworne
To sett hym upwarde on the whiel:

So goth the worlde, now wo, now weel."

(3) SCENE I.-Diana disappears.] The vision is related as follows in Twine's translation:-"All things being in a readinesse, he tooke shipping with his sonne in lawe and his daughter and weyghed anchor, and committed the sailes unto the winde, and went their way, directing their course evermore towarde Tharsus, by which Apollonius purposed to passe unto his owne countrie Tyrus. And when they had sailed one whole day, and night was come, that Apollonius laide him downe to rest, there appeared an angell in his sleepe, commaunding him to leave his course toward Tharsus, and to saile unto Ephesus, and to go into the temple of Diana, accompanied with his sonne in lawe and his daughter, and there with a loude voyce to declare all his adventures, whatsoever had befallen him from his youth unto that present day."

(4) SCENE III.-Sir, lead's the way.] The leading incident in this scene, which so strikingly resembles the much grander one of the same nature in "The Winter's Tale," is related by the old poet with a simplicity and pathos which are irresistible ·

"With worthi knyhtes environed,

The kynge hym self hath abandoned
In to the temple in good entente,
The dore is uppe, and in he wente,
Where as with gret devocioun

Of holy contemplacioun

With inne his herte he made his shrifte,

And aftir that a rich yefte

He offreth with grete reverence;

And there in open audience

Of hem that stoden alle aboute

He tolde hem, and declareth owte

His happe, suche as hym is byfalle :
Ther was no thyng foryete of alle.
His wiff, as it was goddes grace,
Wich was professed in the place,
As she that was abbesse there,
Unto his tale hath leide hir ere.
She knew the voys, and the visage :
For pure joye, as inne a rage,
She strauht unto hym alle att ones,
And felle a swone upponn the stones
Wherof the temple flore was paved.
She was anon with water laved,
Til she came to here selfe ayeyn,
And thanne she began to seyn:
A bleased be the hihe soonde,
That I may se myn husbonde,
Wich whilom he and I were oone.

The kynge with that knewe here anoon,
And tooke her in his arme, and kyste,
And alle the towne the soone it wiste.
Tho was there joye many folde,
For every man this tale hath tolde
As for myracle, and weren glade."

CRITICAL OPINIONS.

"PERICLES is generally reckoned to be in part, and only in part, the work of Shakespeare. From the poverty and bad management of the fable, the want of any effective or distinguishable character, for Marina is no more than the common form of female virtue, such as all the dramatists of that age could draw, and a general feebleness of the tragedy as a whole, I should not believe the structure to have been Shakespeare's. But many passages are far more in his manner than in that of any contemporary writer with whom I am acquainted; and the extrinsic testimony, though not conclusive, being of some value, I should not dissent from the judgment of Steevens and Malone, that it was, in no inconsiderable degree, repaired and improved by his touch. Drake has placed it under the year 1590, as the earliest of Shakespeare's plays, for no better reason, apparently, than that he thought it inferior to all the rest. But if, as most will agree, it were not quite his own, this reason will have less weight; and the language seems to me rather that of his second or third manner than of his first. Pericles is not known to have existed before 1609."HALLAM.

"This piece was acknowledged by Dryden to be a work, but a youthful work of Shakspeare's. It is most undoubtedly his, and it has been admitted into several late editions of his works. The supposed imperfections originate in the circumstance, that Shakspeare here handled a childish and extravagant romance of the old poet Gower, and was unwilling to drag the subject out of its proper sphere. Hence he even introduces Gower himself, and makes him deliver a prologue in his own antiquated language and versification. This power of assuming so foreign a manner is at least no proof of helplessness."SCHLEGEL.

TWELFTH

NIGHT;

OR, WHAT YOU WILL.

PRELIMINARY NOTICE.

THIS enchanting comedy was first printed in the folio of 1623, and no quarto edition of it has ever been found. Though long supposed, upon the authority of Malone and Chalmers, to have been one of Shakespeare's very latest productions, we now know that it was acted in the Middle Temple, as early as the beginning of the seventeenth century. This fact was first made public by the Rev. Joseph Hunter, who discovered, among the Harleian Collection in the library of the British Museum, a small manuscript diary, which he ascertained to have been made by a student of the Temple, named Manningham, and contains the following interesting entry:

"Feb. 2, 1601 [2].

At our feast, wee had a play called Twelve Night or what you will, much like the Comedy of errors, or Menechmi in Plautus, but most like and neere to that in Italian, called Inganni. A good practice in it to make the steward believe his lady widdowe was in love with him by counterfayting a letter, as from his lady in general termes telling him what shee liked best in him, and prescribing his gestures, inscribing his apparaile, &c.; and then when he came to practice, making beleeve they tooke him to be mad."

This is decisive, and, as there can be no doubt that, before being acted in the Temple, it had been represented in the public theatre, and, since it is not mentioned by Meres in his list of 1598, its production may be confidently ascribed to the period between that year and February, 1602. The story whence the serious incidents of "Twelfth Night" are derived, is found in Bandello, Parte Seconda, Novella 36:-" Nicuola innamorata di Lattantio và a servirlo vestita da paggio; edopo Molti casi seco si marita, e ciò che ad un suo fratello avvenne;" but whether Shakespeare borrowed them from the fountain-head, or through the English translation of Barnabie Riche, called "The Historie of Apollonius and Silla,” or whether he found them in the Italian play referred to by Manningham, still remains a subject for investigation. The diarist notices only one comedy called Inganni, but there are two Italian plays bearing the title Gr Inganni, both founded upon Bandello's novel; one (commedia recitata in Milano l'anno 1547, dinanzi la Maestà del Re Filippo) by Niccolò Secchi, 1562; the other, written by Curzio Gonzago, and printed in 1592. To neither of these plays does our poet appear to have been under much, if

any, obligation. There is, however, a third Italian comedy of the Accademici Intronati, to which Mr. Hunter first called attention (New Illustrations of Shakespeare, vol. i. pp. 391-2), that presents much stronger claims to consideration as the immediate origin of the plot of "Twelfth Night." This drama is entitled Gl' Ingannati (Commedia celebrata ni Giuochi del Carnevale in Siena, l'anno 1531, sotto il Sodo dignissimo Archintronato), first printed in 1537, and having for its general title Il Sacrificio. "That it was on the model of this play," Mr. Hunter remarks, "and not on any of the Ingannis, that Shakespeare formed the plan of the serious part of the Twelfth Night, will appear evidently by the following analysis of the main parts of the story. Fabritio and Lelia, a brother and sister, are separated at the sack of Rome, in 1527. Lelia is carried to Modena, where resides Flamineo, to whom she had formerly been attached. Lelia disguises herself as a boy, and enters his service: Flamineo had forgotten Lelia and was a suitor to Isabella, a Modenese lady. Lelia, in her male attire, is employed in love-embassies from Flamineo to Isabella. Isabella is insensible to the importunities of Flamineo, but conceives a violent passion for Lelia, mistaking her for a man. In the third act Fabritio arrives at Modena, when mistakes arise owing to the close resemblance there is between Fabritio and his sister in her male attire. Ultimately recognitions take place; the affections of Isabella are easily transferred from Lelia to Fabritio, and Flamineo takes to his bosom the affectionate and faithful Lelia. We have in

...

the Italian play, a subordinate character named Pasquella, to whom Maria corresponds; and in the subordinate incidents we find Fabritio mistaken in the street for Lelia by the servant of Isabella, who takes him to her mistress's house, exactly as Sebastian is taken for Viola, and led to the house of Olivia. The name of Fabian given by Shakespeare to one of his characters was probably suggested to him by the name of Fabia, which Lelia in the Italian play assumed in her disguise. Malvolio is a happy adaptation from Malevolti, a character in the Il Sacrificio. A phrase occurring in a long prologue or preface prefixed to this play in the Italian [la Notte di Beffana] appears to me to have suggested the title 'Twelfth-Night.""

Sir TOBY BELCH, Uncle to the Lady Olivia.

Sir ANDREW AGUECHEEK.

MALVOLIO, Steward to Olivia.

Lords, Priests, Sailors, Officers, Musicians, and other Attendants.

SCENE, A City in Illyria, and the Sea-coast near it.