The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 552, June 16, 1832

To return to Shakspeare. The objections to his style, which are many, especially to a more modern reader, are excusable from several causes. The writers of the Elizabethan age and previously, were all of them very coarse in their mode of expression, and the dramatists not very delicate in their plots, though in doing so they did but obey the dictates of fashion and the bad taste of the times. Even prolixity and circumlocution were countenanced, and the insufferable conceits we meet with in the poems of Donne, Cowley, and others, were highly relished in those days. Euphaeism (mentioned so often by Sir W. Scott in The Abbot,) was also then in vogue, and all these various peculiarities of style, language, &c. were indispensable in all that was offered to the public. Shakspeare's fondness and propensity for punning may claim the same excuse, viz. "the hoary head and furrowed face of custom;" yet there are some of these puns interspersed through his works, which are sad blots indeed to our modern fastidious eyes, and that we could well wish to see expunged; such a one now is this:

 
"Say, 'pardon,' king, let pity teach thee now."
"Speak it in French, king, say, 'pardonnez moi.'"
 

"A quibble (says Dr. Johnson,) gave him such delight that he was content to purchase it by the sacrifice of reason, of propriety, and even of truth; a quibble was to him the fatal Cleopatra for which he lost the world, and was content to lose it!"

Schiller, who is styled "the Shakspeare of Germany," and who is so ardently admired at the present day, has indeed taken our author for his model; he has in many respects been too servile a student, for his plagiarisms are both close and numerous. Thus, any one acquainted with his celebrated play of The Robbers, will readily recollect that the whole story is built upon the secondary plot in King Lear, between the Duke of Gloucester and his two sons; one of these who is a natural child, and a villain withal, contrives to poison the mind of the father, and to eject the legitimate son from his favour; it will be found exactly thus in Schiller's famous story of "The Robbers." It must be acknowledged, however, that foreigners in general have never idolized Shakspeare, or paid him that devoted adoration, which his countrymen both pay and think him entitled to. Hear Voltaire's overdrawn and even paltry criticism of Hamlet. "The tragedy of Hamlet is a gross and barbarous composition, which would not be supported by the lowest populace in France and Italy. Hamlet goes mad in the second act, Ophelia in the third; he takes the father of his mistress for a rat, and runs him through the body. In despair, the heroine drowns herself. Her grave is dug on the stage, while the grave-diggers enter into a conversation suitable (!) to such low wretches, and play, as it were, with dead men's bones! Hamlet answers their abominable stuff, with follies equally disgusting. Hamlet, with his father and mother-in-law, drink together upon the stage; they sing at table, afterwards they quarrel, and battle and death ensue. In short, one might take this performance for the fruits of the imagination of a drunken savage." (Letters on the English Nation.)

In another place, this writer says, "Shakspeare had not a single spark of good taste, or knew one rule of the drama. In one of his monstrous farces, to which he has given the name of Tragedies, we find the jokes of the Roman shoemakers and cobblers introduced in the same scene with the orations of Brutus and Antony." (See Voltaire's Essays on Tragedy and Comedy.) Here this rival dramatist again objects to any introduction of the lower orders on the stage, and seems averse to whatever is natural, and to depicting life as it is; but if any excuse is necessary for Shakspeare on this head, we must remember that the stage was in his time, and indeed is now perhaps, more particularly levelled to please the populace, and its success more immediately depends on the common suffrage; accordingly the scenes of our English drama, and Shakspeare's scenes particularly, are very often laid among tradesmen and mechanics, and though it may be contrary to all good taste, the author is compelled to indulge in bombast expressions, pompous and thundering rhymes, and sometimes even ribaldry and mean, unmannerly buffoonery.

During his lifetime, Shakspeare acquired reputation principally through his poems, which from some unaccountable cause, are now comparatively neglected, and we may add unfortunately so for the enjoyment of the public. These poems were more admired than his plays, and what speaks higher in their favour, they are more expressively alluded to by contemporary writers. The "Venus and Adonis" is a splendid piece of composition, and very touching in its sentiment; even its illustrious author was proud to call it "the first heir of his invention." We have from it one of our most popular songs, which constitutes one of its stanzas:

 
"Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine ear,
Or like a fairy, trip upon the green,
Or like a nymph with long dishevell'd hair
Dance on the sands, and yet no footing seen."
 

His ready talent for composition was singular, and perhaps unparalleled; his mind and hand ever went together, and it is reported he was never known to blot a line. He was an actor occasionally in his own plays, but it does not indeed appear that he excelled in this art.

Shakspeare never considered his works worthy of posterity, and was little careful of popularity while he lived; having acquired a competency by his labours, he retired to Stratford, and spent the remainder of his life in ease and retirement, like a private gentleman. His income was estimated at £200. The epitaph—not that on his monument, but on the rude stone actually covering his remains is to the following effect, and thus curiously written:

 
"Good friend, for Jesus SAKE forbeare
To digg T—E dust EncloAsed HERE
                   T
Blese be T—E man spares TEs stones
                    T y
And curst be hey moves my bones."
 

I conclude this rather desultory article with Lord Lyttleton's splendid eulogy on him, which in a few words expresses more than the finest Philippic to his memory—"If all human things were to perish except the works of Shakspeare, it might still be known from them what sort of a creature Man was!"

F.

SIR THOMAS FOWLER'S LODGE, ISLINGTON

Few parishes in the environs of London are so rich in architectural antiquities as the "considerable village" of Islington. Canonbury-house, of which a solitary tower remains, is said to have been the country-residence of the Priors of St. Bartholomew, and to have been rebuilt early in the 16th century. Highbury belonged also to the Priory. The existing relics are chiefly of the Elizabethan age. The lodge, represented in the cut, belonged to an old mansion; the property of the Fowler family, built in 1595, which appears on a ceiling. The house fronts Cross-street, and the lodge is at the extremity of the garden, and adjoins Canonbury Fields. It is most probable that this was built as a summer-house by Sir Thomas Fowler, the younger, whose arms are placed in the wall, with the date 1655. It has been absurdly called Queen Elizabeth's Lodge, but with no other foundation than her majesty having passed through it when on a visit to Sir Thomas Fowler.

The Fowlers appear to have been of some note. Sir Thomas Fowler, the elder, who died in 1624, was one of the jury on Sir Walter Raleigh's trial: his son, Sir Thomas, was created a baronet in 1628; the title became extinct at his death. Some coats of arms were taken out of the windows of the old mansion. Among these were the arms of Fowler and Heron. Thomas Fowler, the first of the family who settled at Islington married the daughter of Herne, or Heron, of that place.⁵

The Pied Bull, near Islington Church, is stated to have been the residence of Sir Walter Raleigh; though Oldys, in his Life of Raleigh, says there is no proof of it; and John Shirley, of Islington, another of Raleigh's biographers, records nothing of his living there. The statement is, however, renewed in a Life of Sir Walter, published in 1740.

FINE ARTS

THE PANORAMA OF MILAN

By the aid of Mr. Burford's panoramic pencil, the sight-hunter of our times may enjoy a kind of imaginary tour through the world. At one season he wafts us to the balmy climes of India—next he astounds us with the icy sublimities of the Pole (a fine summer panorama, by the way)—then to the glittering spires, minarets, and mosques of Constantinople—then to the infant world of New Holland—and back to the Old World, to enjoy scenes and sites which are hallowed in memory's fond shrine, by their association with the most glorious names and events in our history. We remember the philosophical amusement of the great Lord Shaftesbury, in contriving all the world in an acre in his retreat at Reigate: what his Lordship laboured to represent in his garden, Mr. Burford essays in his panoramas—in short, he gives us all the world on an acre—of canvass.

Reader, we do not hold the grand secret of life to be the art of hoaxing, when we tell you that for a Greenwich fare you may be transported to the classic regions of Italy—that a walk to Leicester Square will probably delight you more than a ride to Greenwich, little as we are inclined to underrate the last of the pleasures of the people. The contrast is forcible, and the intellectual advantage to be enjoyed in the metropolis too evident to be overlooked.

At the Panorama, Florence is in the upper circle, and Milan in the lower one. The main attraction of the latter is the celebrated cathedral, which forms, as it were, the nucleus of the scene. The point of view has been objected to, as the spectator is placed about mid-way up the cathedral, and thus looks down into the streets and squares of the city; but, it should be remembered, that he also enjoys the distant country, which he could not have done had the view been from the area of the city; and, as we have before said, the beauty of the paysage is one of the perfections of Mr. Burford's paintings. Its present success may be told from the Description:

"Beyond, the eye ranges to an immense distance over the rich and fertile plains of Lombardy, Piedmont, and the Venetian States, luxuriant with every description of rural beauty, intersected by rivers and lakes, and thickly studded with towns and villages, with their attendant gardens, groves, and vineyards. The Northern horizon, from East to West, is bounded by the vast chain of the Alps, which form a magnificent semicircle at from eighty to one hundred and twenty miles distant, Monte Rosa, Monte Cenis, Monte St. Gothard, the Simplon, &c. covered with eternal snow, being conspicuous from their towering height; towards the South the view is bounded by the Apennines, extending across the peninsula from the Mediterranean to the Adriatic; and on the South-west, the Piedmontese hills, in the neighbourhood of Turin, appear a faint purple line on the horizon, so small as to be scarcely visible; the purity of the atmosphere enables the eye to discern the most distant objects with accuracy, and the brilliant sunshine gives inconceivable splendour to every part of the scene; each antique spire and curiously-wrought tower sparkles brightly in its beams, whilst the dark foliage of fine trees, even in the heart of the city, relieves the eye, and produces a beautiful and pleasing effect."

The cathedral will be recollected as the finest specimen extant of pointed Gothic architecture, and termed by the Milanese, the eighth wonder of the world. It is entirely of white marble, and its highest point four hundred feet from the base. A better idea of its minute as well as vast beauty will be afforded by the reader turning to our engraving of the exterior in vol. xiv. of The Mirror. It is successfully painted in the Panorama, although it has not the dazzling whiteness that a stranger might expect; and, on it are those beautiful tinges which are thought to be shed by the atmosphere upon buildings of any considerable age. This effect is visible ever in the fine climate of Italy: it is ingeniously referred to by Sir Humphry Davy in his last work⁶ to the chemical agency of water. He speaks, however, rather of the decay produced by water, of which tinge is but the first stage. The latter is very pleasing, and, about two years since, the fine portico of the Colosseum, in the Regent's Park, was artificially coloured to produce this effect of time, as it has been poetically considered.

The City of Milan is not particularly interesting, though to an untravelled beholder, it has points of attraction. He may probably be struck with the vast extent of some of the structures when compared with the puny buildings of our own country and times; and the space occupied by the palaces will but remind him of the mistaken magnificence of Buckingham, or the gloomy grandeur of St. James's. Again, the plastered and fancifully coloured fronts of the dwelling-houses, their gay draperies, &c. but ill-assort with the heavy red-brick exteriors of our metropolis; although this contrast is to be sought elsewhere than in externals. Mr. Burford's summary, or characteristics of the city may be quoted: