FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   >>  
. " 1. Ditto. " 2. Ditto. Act V. Scene 1. Shakspeare " 2. Fletcher. " 3. Ditto. " 4. Ditto. Prologue and Epilogue, Ditto. So far all is clear, and in this apportionment Mr. Urban's correspondent and myself are agreed. My conviction here is as complete as it is of my own identity. But beyond, at present, all is dark; I cannot understand the arrangement; and I doubt if my friend, who has treated the question with so much ability, is altogether satisfied with his own explanation. In the meanwhile, I would suggest one or two points for consideration. In those parts which I have set down as Shakspeare's, and in which this writer imagines he occasionally detects "a third hand," does the metre differ materially from that of Shakspeare's early plays? It will be observed that, in Act iii., Scene 2., there are _two_ farewells, the second being a kind of amplification of the first; both, however, being in the part which I ascribe to Fletcher. Is it not probable that these were written at different periods? And supposing Fletcher to have improved his part, might there not originally have been a stronger analogy than now appears between this play and the _Two Noble Kinsmen_? The more it is tested the brighter shines out the character of Shakspeare. The flatteries of James and Elizabeth may now go packing together. The following four lines which I have met with in no other edition of Shakspeare than Mr. Collier's, are worth any one of his plays for their personal value; they show how he could evade a compliment with the enunciation of a general truth that yet could be taken as a compliment by the person for whom it was intended: _Shakspeare on the King._ "Crowns have their compass; length of days their date; Triumphs, their tomb; felicity her fate; Of nought but earth can earth make us partaker, But knowledge makes a king most like his Maker." Samuel Hickson. August 12. 1850. * * * * * MINOR QUERIES. _The Abbe Strickland._--In the third volume of the _Castlereagh Correspondence_, an Abbe Strickland figures as a negotiator between the English Catholics and the court of Rome. His name is also mentioned unfavourably in the "_Quarterly_" review of that work. Will some of your readers direct me where further information can be had of him, and his ultimate destination? J.W.H. {199} _Aerostation, Works
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   >>  



Top keywords:

Shakspeare

 

Fletcher

 

Strickland

 

compliment

 

Triumphs

 
edition
 

length

 

nought

 

Collier

 

felicity


person
 

general

 

enunciation

 

personal

 

Crowns

 

intended

 

compass

 
readers
 

direct

 

review


mentioned

 

unfavourably

 

Quarterly

 

Aerostation

 

destination

 

information

 
ultimate
 
Samuel
 

Hickson

 
August

partaker

 

knowledge

 

negotiator

 
figures
 

English

 

Catholics

 

Correspondence

 

QUERIES

 
volume
 

Castlereagh


originally

 

ability

 

altogether

 

satisfied

 

explanation

 

question

 
friend
 
treated
 

writer

 

imagines