There is more material for a life of Falstaff than for a life of
Shakespeare, though for both there is a lamentable dearth. The
difficulties of the biographer are, however, different in the two cases.
There is nothing, or next to nothing, in Shakespeare's works which
throws light on his own story; and such evidence as we have is of
the kind called circumstantial. But Falstaff constantly gives us
reminiscences or allusions to his earlier life, and his companions also
tell us stories which ought to help us in a biography. The evidence,
such as it is, is direct; and the only inference we have to draw is that
from the statement to the truth of the statement.
It has been justly remarked by Sir James Stephen, that this very
inference is perhaps the most difficult one of all to draw correctly.
The inference from so-called circumstantial evidence, if you have enough
of it, is much surer; for whilst facts cannot lie, witnesses can, and
frequently do. The witnesses on whom we have to rely for the facts are
Falstaff and his companions--especially Falstaff.
When an old man tries to tell you the story of his youth, he sees the
facts through a distorting subjective medium, and gives an impression of
his history and exploits more or less at variance with the bare facts as
seen by a contemporary outsider. The scientific Goethe, though truthful
enough in the main, certainly fails in his reminiscences to tell a plain
unvarnished tale. And Falstaff was _not_ habitually truthful. Indeed,
that Western American, who wrote affectionately on the tomb of a
comrade, 'As a truth-crusher he was unrivalled,' had probably not
given sufficient attention to Falstaff's claims in this matter. Then
Falstaff's companions are not witnesses above suspicion. Generally
speaking, they lie open to the charge made by P. P. against the wags
of his parish, that they were men delighting more in their own conceits
than in the truth. These are some of our difficulties, and we ask the
reader's indulgence in our endeavours to overcome them. We will tell
the story from our hero's birth, and will not begin longer _before_ that
event than is usual with biographers.
The question, _Where_ was Falstaff born? has given us some trouble.
We confess to having once entertained a strong opinion that he was a
Devonshire man. This opinion was based simply on the flow and fertility
of his wit as shown in his conversation, and the rapid and fantastic
play of his imagination. But we sought in vain for any verbal
provincialisms in support of this theory, and there was something in the
character of the man that rather went against it. Still, we clung to
the opinion, till we found that philology was against us, and that the
Falstaffs unquestionably came from Norfolk.
The name is of Scandinavian origin; and we find in 'Domesday' that a
certain Falstaff held freely from the king a church at Stamford. These
facts are of great importance. The thirst for which Falstaff was always
conspicuous was no doubt inherited--was, in fact, a Scandinavian thirst.
The pirates of early English times drank as well as they fought, and
their descendants who invade England--now that the war of commerce has
superseded the war of conquest--still bring the old thirst with them,
as anyone can testify who has enjoyed the hospitality of the London
Scandinavian Club. Then this church was no doubt a familiar landmark in
the family; and when Falstaff stated, late in life, that if he hadn't
forgotten what the inside of a church was like, he was a peppercorn
and a brewer's horse, he was thinking with some remorse of the family
temple.
Of the family between the Conquest and Falstaff's birth we know nothing,
except that, according to Falstaff's statement, he had a grandfather
who left him a seal-ring worth forty marks. From this statement we might
infer that the ring was an heirloom, and consequently that Falstaff was
an eldest son, and the head of his family. But we must be careful in
drawing our inferences, for Prince Henry frequently told Falstaff that
the ring was copper; and on one occasion, when Falstaff alleged that his
pocket had been picked at the Boar's Head, and this seal-ring and three
or four bonds of forty pounds apiece abstracted, the Prince assessed the
total loss at eight-pence.
After giving careful attention to the evidence, and particularly to the
conduct of Falstaff on the occasion of the alleged robbery, we come to
the conclusion that the ring _was_ copper, and was not an heirloom. This
leaves us without any information about Falstaff's family prior to his
birth. He was born (as he himself informs the Lord Chief Justice) about
three o'clock in the afternoon, with a white head and something a round
belly. Falstaffs corpulence, therefore, as well as his thirst, was
congenital. Let those who are not born with his comfortable figure sigh
in vain to attain his stately proportions. This is a thing which Nature
gives us at our birth as much as the Scandinavian thirst or the shaping
spirit of imagination.
Born somewhere in Norfolk, Falstaff's early months and years were no
doubt rich with the promise of his after greatness. We have no record of
his infancy, and are tempted to supply the gap with Rabelais' chapters
on Gargantua's babyhood. But regard for the truth compels us to add
nothing that cannot fairly be deduced from the evidence. We leave the
strapping boy in his swaddling-clothes to answer the question _when_ he
was born. Now, it is to be regretted that Falstaff, who was so precise
about the hour of his birth, should not have mentioned the year. On this
point we are again left to inference from conflicting statements. We
have this distinct point to start from, that Falstaff, in or about
the year 1401, gives his age as some fifty or by'r Lady inclining to
three-score. It is true that in other places he represents himself as
old, and again in another states that he and his accomplices in the
Gadshill robbery are in the vaward of their youth. The Chief Justice
reproves him for this affectation of youth, and puts a question (which,
it is true, elicits no admission from Falstaff) as to whether every part
of him is not blasted with antiquity.
We are inclined to think that Falstaff rather understated his age when
he described himself as by'r Lady inclining to three-score, and that we
shall not be far wrong if we set down 1340 as the year of his birth. We
cannot be certain to a year or two. There is a similar uncertainty about
the year of Sir Richard Whittington's birth. But both these great men,
whose careers afford in some respects striking contrasts, were born
within a few years of the middle of the fourteenth century.
Falstaff's childhood was no doubt spent in Norfolk; and we learn from
his own lips that he plucked geese, played truant, and whipped top,
and that he did not escape beating. That he had brothers and sisters we
know; for he tells us that he is _John_ with them and _Sir John_ with
all Europe. We do not know the dame or pedant who taught his young idea
how to shoot and formed his manners; but Falstaff says that _if_ his
manners became him not, he was a fool that taught them him. This does
not throw much light on his early education: for it is not clear
that the remark applies to that period, and in any case it is purely
hypothetical.
But Falstaff, like so many boys since his time, left his home in the
country and came to London. His brothers and sisters he left behind
him, and we hear no more of them. Probably none of them ever attained
eminence, as there is no record of Falstaff's having attempted to
borrow money of them. We know Falstaff so well as a tun of man, a
horse-back-breaker, and so forth, that it is not easy to form an idea of
what he was in his youth. But if we trace back the sack-stained current
of his life to the day when, full of wonder and hope, he first rode into
London, we shall find him as different from Shakespeare's picture of him
as the Thames at Iffley is from the Thames at London Bridge. His figure
was shapely; he had no difficulty _then_ in seeing his own knee, and
if he was not able, as he afterwards asserted, to creep through an
alderman's ring, nevertheless he had all the grace and activity
of youth. He was just such a lad (to take a description almost
contemporary) as the Squier who rode with the Canterbury Pilgrims:
'A lover and a lusty bacheler,
With lockes crull as they were laid in presse,
Of twenty yere of age he was, I gesse.
Of his stature he was of even lengthe,
And wonderly deliver, and grete of strengthe.
* * * * *
Embrouded was he, as it were a mede,
All ful of freshe floures, white and rede;
Singing he was, or floyting alle the day,
He was as freshe as is the moneth of May.
Short was his goune, with sleves long and wide,
Wel coude he sitte on hors, and fayre ride,
He coude songes make, and wel endite,
Juste and eke dance, and wel pourtraie and write.
So hot he loved that by nightertale,
He slep no more than doth the nightingale.'
Such was Falstaff at the age of twenty, or something earlier, when he
entered at Clement's Inn, where were many other young men reading law,
and preparing for their call to the Bar. How much law he read it is
impossible now to ascertain. That he had, in later life, a considerable
knowledge of the subject is clear, but this may have been acquired like
Mr. Micawber's, by experience, as defendant on civil process. We are
inclined to think he read but little. _Amici fures temporis:_ and he had
many friends at Clement's Inn who were not smugs, nor, indeed, reading
men in any sense. There was John Doit of Staffordshire, and Black George
Barnes, and Francis Pickbone, and Will Squele, a Cotswold man,
and Robert Shallow from Gloucestershire. Four of these were such
swinge-bucklers as were not to be found again in all the Inns o' Court,
and we have it on the authority of Justice Shallow that Falstaff was
a good backswordsman, and that before he had done growing he broke
the head of Skogan at the Court gate. This Skogan appears to have been
Court-jester to Edward III. No doubt the natural rivalry between the
amateur and the professional caused the quarrel, and Skogan must have
been a good man if he escaped with a broken head only, and without
damage to his reputation as a professional wit. The same day that
Falstaff did this deed of daring--the only one of the kind recorded of
him--Shallow fought with Sampson Stockfish, a fruiterer, behind Gray's
Inn. Shallow was a gay dog in his youth, according to his own account:
he was called Mad Shallow, Lusty Shallow--indeed, he was called
anything. He played Sir Dagonet in Arthur's show at Mile End Green; and
no doubt Falstaff and the rest of the set were cast for other parts
in the same pageant. These tall fellows of Clement's Inn kept well
together, for they liked each other's company, and they needed each
other's help in a row in Turnbull Street or elsewhere. Their watchword
was 'Hem, boys!' and they made the old Strand ring with their songs
as they strolled home to their chambers of an evening. They heard the
chimes at midnight--which, it must be confessed, does not seem to us a
desperately dissipated entertainment. But midnight was a late hour in
those days. The paralytic masher of the present day, who is most alive
at midnight, rises at noon. _Then_ the day began earlier with a long
morning, followed by a pleasant period called the forenoon. Under modern
conditions we spend the morning in bed, and to palliate our sloth call
the forenoon and most of the rest of the day, the morning. These young
men of Clement's Inn were a lively, not to say a rowdy, set. They would
do anything that led to mirth or mischief. What passed when they lay all
night in the windmill in St. George's Field we do not quite know; but
we are safe in assuming that they did not go there to pursue their legal
duties, or to grind corn. Anyhow, forty years after, that night raised
pleasant memories.
John Falstaff was the life and centre of this set, as Robert Shallow was
the butt of it. The latter had few personal attractions. According to
Falstaff's portrait of him, he looked like a man made after supper of a
cheese-paring. When he was naked he was for all the world like a forked
radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it with a knife: he was so
forlorn that his dimensions to any thick sight were invincible: he was
the very genius of famine; and a certain section of his friends called
him mandrake: he came ever in the rearward of the fashion, and sung
those tunes to the over-scutched huswives that he heard the carmen
whistle, and sware they were his fancies or his good-nights. Then he had
the honour of having his head burst by John o' Gaunt, for crowding among
the Marshal's men in the Tilt-yard, and this was matter for continual
gibe from Falstaff and the other boys. Falstaff was in the van of the
fashion, was witty himself without being at that time the cause that wit
was in others. No one could come within range of his wit without being
attracted and overpowered. Late in life Falstaff deplores nothing so
much in the character of Prince John of Lancaster as this, that a man
cannot make him laugh. He felt this defect in the Prince's character
keenly, for laughter was Falstaff's familiar spirit, which never failed
to come at his call. It was by laughter that young Falstaff fascinated
his friends and ruled over them. There are only left to us a few scraps
of his conversation, and these have been, and will be, to all time the
delight of all good men. The Clement's Inn boys who enjoyed the feast,
of which we have but the crumbs left to us, were happy almost beyond
the lot of man. For there is more in laughter than is allowed by the
austere, or generally recognised by the jovial. By laughter man is
distinguished from the beasts, but the cares and sorrows of life have
all but deprived man of this distinguishing grace, and degraded him to
a brutal solemnity. Then comes (alas, how rarely!) a genius such as
Falstaff's, which restores the power of laughter and transforms the
stolid brute into man. This genius approaches nearly to the divine power
of creation, and we may truly say, 'Some for less were deified.' It is
no marvel that young Falstaff's friends assiduously served the deity
who gave them this good gift. At first he was satisfied with the mere
exercise of his genial power, but he afterwards made it serviceable to
him. It was but just that he should receive tribute from those who were
beholden to him, for a pleasure which no other could confer.
It was now that Falstaff began to recognise what a precious gift was his
congenital Scandinavian thirst, and to lose no opportunity of gratifying
it. We have his mature views on education, and we may take them as an
example of the general truth that old men habitually advise a young one
to shape the conduct of his life after their own. Rightly to apprehend
the virtues of sherris-sack is the first qualification in an instructor
of youth. 'If I had a thousand sons,' says he, 'the first humane
principles I would teach them should be to forswear thin potations, and
to addict themselves to sack'; and further: 'There's never none of these
demure boys come to any proof; for their drink doth so over-cool their
blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male
green sickness; and then when they marry they get wenches: they are
generally fools and cowards, which some of us should be too but for
inflammation.' There can be no doubt that Falstaff did not in early life
over-cool his blood, but addicted himself to sack, and gave the subject
a great part of his attention for all the remainder of his days.
It may be that he found the subject too absorbing to allow of his giving
much attention to old Father Antic the Law. At any rate, he was never
called to the Bar, and posterity cannot be too thankful that his great
mind was not lost in 'the abyss of legal eminence' which has received so
many men who might have adorned their country. That he was fitted for
a brilliant legal career can admit of no doubt. His power of detecting
analogies in cases apparently different, his triumphant handling of
cases apparently hopeless, his wonderful readiness in reply, and his
dramatic instinct, would have made him a powerful advocate. It may
have been owing to difficulties with the Benchers of the period
over questions of discipline, or it may have been a distaste for the
profession itself, which induced him to throw up the law and adopt the
profession of arms.
We know that while he was still at Clement's Inn he was page to Lord
Thomas Mowbray, who was afterwards created Earl of Nottingham and Duke
of Norfolk. It must be admitted that here (as elsewhere in Shakespeare)
there is some little chronological difficulty. We will not inquire too
curiously, but simply accept the testimony of Justice Shallow on the
point. Mowbray was an able and ambitious lord, and Falstaff, as page to
him, began his military career with every advantage. The French wars of
the later years of Edward III. gave frequent and abundant opportunity
for distinction. Mowbray distinguished himself in Court and in camp,
and we should like to believe that Falstaff was in the sea-fight when
Mowbray defeated the French fleet and captured vast quantities of sack
from the enemy. Unfortunately, there is no record whatever of Falstaff's
early military career, and beyond his own ejaculation, 'Would to
God that my name was not so terrible to the enemy as it is!' and the
(possible) inference from it that he must have made his name terrible in
some way, we have no evidence that he was ever in the field before the
battle of Shrewsbury. Indeed, the absence of evidence on this matter
goes strongly to prove the negative. Falstaff boasts of his valour,
his alacrity, and other qualities which were not apparent to the casual
observer, but he never boasts of his services in battle. If there had
been anything of the kind to which he could refer with complacency,
there is no moral doubt that he would have mentioned it freely, adding
such embellishments and circumstances as he well knew how.
In the absence of evidence as to the course of his life, we are left to
conjecture how he spent the forty years, more or less, between the time
of his studies at Clement's Inn and the day when Shakespeare introduces
him to us. We have no doubt that he spent all, or nearly all, this time
in London. His habits were such as are formed by life in a great city;
his conversation betrays a man who has lived, as it were, in a crowd,
and the busy haunts of men were the appropriate scene for the display of
his great qualities. London, even then, was a great city, and the study
of it might well absorb a lifetime. Falstaff knew it well, from the
Court, with which he always preserved a connection, to the numerous
taverns where he met his friends and eluded his creditors. The Boar's
Head in Eastcheap was his headquarters, and, like Barnabee's, two
centuries later, his journeys were from tavern to tavern; and, like
Barnabee, he might say '_Multum bibi, nunquam pransi_.' To begin
with, no doubt the dinner bore a fair proportion to the fluid which
accompanied it, but by degrees the liquor encroached on and superseded
the viands, until his tavern bills took the shape of the one purloined
by Prince Henry, in which there was but one halfpenny-worth of bread to
an intolerable deal of sack. It was this inordinate consumption of sack
(and not sighing and grief, as he suggests) which blew him up like a
bladder. A life of leisure in London always had, and still has, its
temptations. Falstaff's means were described by the Chief Justice of
Henry IV. as very slender, but this was after they had been wasted for
years. Originally they were more ample, and gave him the opportunity of
living at ease with his friends. No domestic cares disturbed the even
tenor of his life. Bardolph says he was better accommodated than with a
wife. Like many another man about town, he thought about settling down
when he was getting up in years. He weekly swore, so he tells us, to
marry old Mistress Ursula, but this was only after he saw the first
white hair on his chin. But he never led Mistress Ursula to the altar.
The only other women for whom he formed an early attachment were
Mistress Quickly, the hostess of the Boar's Head, and Doll Tearsheet,
who is described by the page as a proper gentlewoman, and a kinswoman of
his master's. There is no denying that Falstaff was on terms of intimacy
with Mistress Quickly, but he never admitted that he made her an offer
of marriage. She, however, asserted it in the strongest terms, and with
a wealth of circumstance.
We must transcribe her story: 'Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt
goblet, sitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal
fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when the Prince broke thy head for
liking his father to a singing-man of Windsor; thou didst swear to me
then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady thy
wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech, the butcher's wife,
come in then, and call me Gossip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of
vinegar; telling us she had a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst
desire to eat some; whereby I told thee they were ill for a green wound?
And didst thou not, when she was gone downstairs, desire me to be no
more so familiarity with such poor people; saying that ere long they
should call me madam? And didst thou not kiss me, and bid me fetch
thee thirty shillings? I put thee now to thy book-oath; deny it if thou
canst!'
We feel no doubt that if Mistress Quickly had given this evidence
in action for breach of promise of marriage, and goodwife Keech
corroborated it, the jury would have found a verdict for the plaintiff,
unless indeed they brought in a special verdict to the effect that
Falstaff made the promise, but never intended to keep it. But Mistress
Quickly contented herself with upbraiding Falstaff, and he cajoled her
with his usual skill, and borrowed more money of her.
Falstaff's attachment for Doll Tearsheet lasted many years, but did not
lead to matrimony. From the Clement's Inn days till he was threescore he
lived in London celibate, and his habits and amusements were much like
those of other single gentlemen about town of his time, or, for that
matter, of ours. He had only himself to care for, and he cared for
himself well. Like his page, he had a good angel about him, but the
devil outbid him. He was as virtuously given as other folk, but perhaps
the devil had a handle for temptation in that congenital thirst of his.
He was a social spirit too, and he tells us that company, villainous
company, was the spoil of him. He was less than thirty when he took the
faithful Bardolph into his service, and only just past that age when he
made the acquaintance of the nimble Poins. Before he was forty he
became the constant guest of Mistress Quickly. Pistol and Nym were later
acquisitions, and the Prince did not come upon the scene till Falstaff
was an old man and knighted.
There is some doubt as to when he obtained this honour. Richard II.
bestowed titles in so lavish a manner as to cause discontent among many
who didn't receive them. In 1377, immediately on his accession, the
earldom of Nottingham was given to Thomas Mowbray, and on the same day
three other earls and nine knights were created. We have not been able
to discover the names of these knights, but we confidently expect to
unearth them some day, and to find the name of Sir John Falstaff among
them. We have already stated that Falstaff had done no service in
the field at this time, so he could not have earned his title in that
manner. No doubt he got it through the influence of Mowbray, who was in
a position to get good things for his friends as well as for himself.
It was but a poor acknowledgment for the inestimable benefit of
occasionally talking with Falstaff over a quart of sack.
We will not pursue Falstaff's life further than this. It can from this
point be easily collected. It is a thankless task to paraphrase a great
and familiar text. To attempt to tell the story in better words than
Shakespeare would occur to no one but Miss Braddon, who has epitomised
Sir Walter, or to Canon Farrar, who has elongated the Gospels. But we
feel bound to add a few words as to character. There are, we fear, a
number of people who regard Falstaff as a worthless fellow, and who
would refrain (if they could) from laughing at his jests. These people
do not understand his claim to grateful and affectionate regard. He
did more to produce that mental condition of which laughter is the
expression than any man who ever lived. But for the cheering presence
of him, and men like him, this vale of tears would be a more terrible
dwelling-place than it is. In short, Falstaff has done an immense deal
to alleviate misery and promote positive happiness. What more can be
said of your heroes and philanthropists?
It is, perhaps, characteristic of this commercial age that benevolence
should be always associated, if not considered synonymous, with the
giving of money. But this is clearly mistaken, for we have to consider
what effect the money given produces on the minds and bodies of human
beings. Sir Richard Whittington was an eminently benevolent man,
and spent his money freely for the good of his fellow-citizens. (We
sincerely hope, by the way, that he lent some of it to Falstaff without
security.) He endowed hospitals and other charities. Hundreds were
relieved by his gifts, and thousands (perhaps) are now in receipt of his
alms. This is well. Let the sick and the poor, who enjoy his hospitality
and receive his doles, bless his memory. But how much wider and
further-reaching is the influence of Falstaff! Those who enjoy his good
things are not only the poor and the sick, but all who speak the English
language. Nay, more; translation has made him the inheritance of the
world, and the benefactor of the entire human race.
It may be, however, that some other nations fail fully to understand and
appreciate the mirth and the character of the man. A Dr. G. G. Gervinus,
of Heidelberg, has written, in the German language, a heavy work
on Shakespeare, in which he attacks Falstaff in a very solemn and
determined manner, and particularly charges him with selfishness and
want of conscience. We are inclined to set down this malignant attack
to envy. Falstaff is the author and cause of universal laughter. Dr.
Gervinus will never be the cause of anything universal; but, so far as
his influence extends, he produces headaches. It is probably a painful
sense of this contrast that goads on the author of headaches to attack
the author of laughter.
But is there anything in the charge? We do not claim anything like
perfection, or even saintliness, for Falstaff. But we may say of him, as
Byron says of Venice, that his very vices are of the gentler sort. And
as for this charge of selfishness and want of conscience, we think that
the words of Bardolph on his master's death are an overwhelming answer
to it. Bardolph said, on hearing the news: 'I would I were with him
wheresoever he is: whether he be in heaven or hell.' Bardolph was a mere
serving-man, not of the highest sensibility, and he for thirty years
knew his master as his valet knows the hero. Surely the man who could
draw such an expression of feeling from his rough servant is not the man
to be lightly charged with selfishness! Which of us can hope for such an
epitaph, not from a hireling, but from our nearest and dearest? Does Dr.
Gervinus know anyone who will make such a reply to a posthumous charge
against him of dulness and lack of humour?