ve,' and that Hermione is more or less 'serene'; but why
is it that, in our consideration of the later plays, the whole of our
attention must always be fixed upon these particular characters? Modern
critics, in their eagerness to appraise everything that is beautiful and
good at its proper value, seem to have entirely forgotten that there is
another side to the medal; and they have omitted to point out that these
plays contain a series of portraits of peculiar infamy, whose wickedness
finds expression in language of extraordinary force. Coming fresh from
their pages to the pages of _Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale_, and _The
Tempest_, one is astonished and perplexed. How is it possible to fit
into their scheme of roses and maidens that 'Italian fiend' the 'yellow
Iachimo,' or Cloten, that 'thing too bad for bad report,' or the 'crafty
devil,' his mother, or Leontes, or Caliban, or Trinculo? To omit these
figures of discord and evil from our consideration, to banish them
comfortably to the background of the stage, while Autolycus and Miranda
dance before the footlights, is surely a fallacy in proportion; for the
presentment of the one group of persons is every whit as distinct and
vigorous as that of the other. Nowhere, indeed, is Shakespeare's
violence of expression more constantly displayed than in the 'gentle
utterances' of his last period; it is here that one finds Paulina, in a
torrent of indignation as far from 'grave serenity' as it is from
'pastoral love,' exclaiming to Leontes:

What studied torments, tyrant, hast for me?
What wheels? racks? fires? what flaying? boiling
In leads or oils? what old or newer torture
Must I receive, whose every word deserves
To taste of thy most worst? Thy tyranny,
Together working with thy jealousies,
Fancies too weak for boys, too green and idle
For girls of nine, O! think what they have done,
And then run mad indeed, stark mad; for all
Thy by-gone fooleries were but spices of it.
That thou betray'dst Polixenes, 'twas nothing;
That did but show thee, of a fool, inconstant
And damnable ingrateful; nor was't much
Thou would'st have poison'd good Camillo's honour,
To have him kill a king; poor trespasses,
More monstrous standing by; whereof I reckon
The casting forth to crows thy baby daughter
To be or none or little; though a devil
Would have shed water out of fire ere done't.
Nor is't directly laid to