_Shylock_
The Ninety-fifth Declamation of “The Orator,” of Alexander Silvayn,
treats “Of a Jew who would for his debt have a pound of the flesh of a
Christian.” This is classed by J. Payne Collier among the romances,
novels, poems, and histories used by Shakespeare as the foundation of
his dramas. It first appeared in 1596. According to Gregorio Leti, the
biographer of Pope Sixtus V, the question of Shylock’s Judaism had been
anticipated by others. In the eleventh book of his history of the Pope,
Leti tells the following story:
“In the year of 1587, ten years before the probable date of the
production of Shakespeare’s play, a Roman merchant named Paul Maria
Secchi, a good Catholic Christian, learned that Sir Francis Drake had
conquered San Domingo. He imparts his news to a Jewish trader, Simson
Ceneda, who either disbelieved it or had an interest in making it appear
so. He obstinately contested the truth of the statement, and to
emphasize his contradiction added that he would stake a pound weight of
his flesh on the contrary. The Christian took him at his word, staking
one thousand scudi against the pound of flesh, and the bet was attested
by two witnesses. On the truth of Drake’s conquest being confirmed, the
Christian demanded the fulfilment of the wager. In vain the Jew offered
money instead of the stake he had agreed to. The Jew appealed to the
governor, and the governor to the Pope, who sentenced them both to the
galleys—a punishment they were allowed to make up for by a payment of
two thousand scudi each to the Hospital of the Sixtine Bridge.” A more
interesting fact connected with the “pound of flesh” is that the
conception is found in different shapes in Hindoo mythology.
_Figaro_
The music of the opera of “Le Barbier de Seville” (Il Barbiere di
Siviglia) is by Rossini, and the words are by Sterbini. The music of “Le
Mariage di Figaro” (Le Nozze di Figaro) is by Mozart, and the libretto
by Lorenzo da Ponte. But both operas are based on Beaumarchais’s
satirical comedies, which had acquired popularity all over Europe.
_The Malaprops_
Theodore Hook’s series of “Ramsbottom Papers” were the precursors of all
the Mrs. Malaprops, Tabitha Brambles, and Mrs. Partingtons of a later
generation. Let Dorothea Julia Ramsbottom speak for herself, in a few
sentences from her “Notes on England and France:”
“Having often heard travellers lamenting not having put down what they
call the memorybilious of their journey, I was determined, while I was
on my tower, to keep a dairy (so called from containing the cream of
one’s information), and record everything which occurred to me.
“Resolving to take time by the firelock, we left Montague Place at 7
o’clock by Mr. Fulmer’s pocket thermometer, and proceeded over
Westminster Bridge to explode the European continent. I never pass
Whitehall without dropping a tear to the memory of Charles II., who was
decimated after the rebellion of 1745, opposite the Horse Guards.
“We saw the inn where Alexander, the Autograph of all the Russias, lived
when he was here; and, as we were going along, we met twenty or thirty
dragons mounted on horses. The ensign who commanded them was a friend of
Mr. Fulmer’s: he looked at Lavinia as if pleased with her _tooting
assembly_. I heard Mr. Fulmer say he was a son of Marr’s. He spoke as if
everybody knew his father: so I suppose he must be the son of the poor
gentleman who was so barbarously murdered a few years ago near Ratcliffe
Highway: if so he is uncommon genteel.
“Travellers like us, who are mere birds of prey, have no time to waste:
so we went to-day to the great church which is called Naughty Dam, where
we saw a priest doing something at an altar. Mr. Fulmer begged me to
observe the knave of the church; but I thought it too hard to call the
man names in his own country.”
_The Pen and the Sword_