HIS HOME LIFE
[Illustration: SHAKESPEARE HOUSE, RESTORED]
THE DWELLING-HOUSES OF THE TIME
The house in Henley Street in which William Shakespeare was
probably born and spent his early years has undergone many changes;
but, as carefully restored in recent years and reverently preserved
for a national memorial of the poet, its appearance now is
doubtless not materially different from what it was in the latter
part of the 16th century.
There are a few houses of the same period and the same class still
standing in Stratford and its vicinity, which, according to the
highest antiquarian authority, are almost unaltered from their
original form and finish. Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps mentions one
in particular in the Rother Market, "the main features of which
are certainly in their original state," and the sketches of the
interior given by him closely resemble those of the Shakespeare
house.
These houses were usually of two stories, and were constructed of
wooden beams, forming a framework, the spaces between the beams
being filled with lath and plaster. The roofs were usually of
thatch, with dormer windows and steep gables. The door was shaded
by a porch or by a _pentice_, or _penthouse_, which was a narrow
sloping roof often extending along the the front of the lower story
over both door and windows, as in Shakespeare's birthplace on
Henley Street.
In the _Merchant of Venice_ (ii. 6. 1) Gratiano says:--
"This is the penthouse under which Lorenzo
Desired us to make stand."
In _Much Ado About Nothing_ (iii. 3. 110) Borachio says to Conrade:
"Stand thee close, then, under this penthouse, for it drizzles
rain." We find a figurative allusion to the penthouse in _Love's
Labour's Lost_ (iii. 1. 17): "with your hat penthouse-like o'er the
shop of your eyes"; and another in _Macbeth_ (i. 3. 20):--
"Sleep shall neither night nor day
Hang upon his penthouse lid";
the projecting eyebrow being compared to this part of the
Elizabethan dwelling.
[Illustration: ROOM IN WHICH SHAKESPEARE WAS BORN]
The better houses, like New Place, were of timber and brick,
instead of plaster, though sometimes entirely of stone. Shakespeare
appears to have rebuilt the greater part of New Place with stone.
The roofs of this class of dwellings were usually tiled, but
occasionally thatched. We read of one Walter Roche, who in 1582
replaced the tiles of his house in Chapel Street with thatch. The
wood-work in the front of some houses, as in a fine example still
to be seen in the High Street (page 59 below), was elaborately
carved with floral and other designs.
The gardens were bounded by walls constructed of clay or mud and
usually thatched at the top. Fruit-trees were common in these
gardens, and the orchard about the Guild buildings was noted for
its plums and apples. When the mulberry-tree was first introduced
into England, Shakespeare bought one and set it out in his grounds
at New Place, where it grew to great size. It survived for nearly
a century and a half after the death of the poet, but in 1758 was
cut down by the Rev. Francis Gastrell, who had bought the estate in
1756.
There was little of what we should regard as comfort in those
picturesque old English houses, with their great black beams
chequering the outer walls into squares and triangles, their small
many-paned windows, their low ceilings and rude interior wood-work,
their poor and scanty furnishings.
Chimneys had but just come into general use in England, and, though
John Shakespeare's house had one, the dwellings of many of his
neighbors were still unprovided with them. In 1582, when William
was eighteen years old, an order was passed by the town council
that "Walter Hill, dwelling in Rother Market, and all the other
inhabitants of the borough, shall, before St. James's Day, 30th
April, make sufficient chimneys," under pain of a fine of ten
shillings.
This was intended as a precaution against fires, the frequent
occurrence of which in former years had been mainly due to the
absence of chimneys.
William Harrison, in 1577, referring to things in England that
had been "marvellously changed within the memory of old people,"
includes among these "the multitude of chimneys lately erected,
whereas in their young days there were not above two or three, if
so many, in most uplandish towns of the realm (the religious houses
and manor places of their lords always excepted), but each one
made his fire against a reredos[1] in the hall, where he dined and
dressed his meat."
In another chapter Harrison says: "Now have we many chimneys; and
yet our tenderlings complain of rheums, catarrhs, and poses. Then
had we none but reredosses; and our heads did never ache. For as
the smoke in those days was supposed to be a sufficient hardening
for the timber of the house, so it was reported a far better
medicine to keep the goodman and his family from the quack or pose,
wherewith, as then, very few were acquainted."
THE HOUSEHOLD FURNITURE.
Of the furniture in these old houses we get an idea from
inventories of the period that have come down to us. We have, for
instance, such a list of the household equipment of Richard Arden,
Shakespeare's maternal grandfather, who was a wealthy farmer;
and another of such property belonging to Henry Field, tanner, a
neighbor of John Shakespeare, who was his chief executor.
From these and similar inventories we find that the only furniture
in the hall, or main room of the house--often occupying the whole
of the ground floor--and the parlor, or sitting-room, when there
was one, consisted of two or three chairs, a few joint-stools--that
is, stools made of wood jointed or fitted together, as distinguished
from those more rudely made--a table of the plainest construction,
and possibly one or more "painted cloths" hung on the walls.
These painted cloths were cheap substitutes for the tapestries
with which great mansions were adorned, and they were often found
in the cottages of the poor. The paintings were generally crude
representations of Biblical stories, together with maxims or
mottoes, which were sometimes on scrolls or "labels" proceeding
from the mouths of the characters.
Shakespeare refers to these cloths several times; for instance,
in _As You Like It_ (iii. 2. 291), where Jaques says to Orlando:
"You are full of pretty answers; have you not been acquainted
with goldsmiths' wives and conned them out of rings?"--referring
to the mottoes, or "posies," as they were called, often inscribed
in finger-rings. Orlando replies: "Not so; but I answer you right
painted cloth, from whence you have studied your questions."
Falstaff (_1 Henry IV._ iv. 2. 28) says that his recruits are
"ragged as Lazarus in the painted cloth."
In an anonymous play, _No Whipping nor Tripping_, printed in 1601,
we find this passage:--
"Read what is written on the painted cloth:
Do no man wrong; be good unto the poor;
Beware the mouse, the maggot, and the moth,
And ever have an eye unto the door," etc.
When carpets are mentioned in these inventories, they are coverings
for the tables, not for the floors, which, even in kings' palaces,
were strewn with rushes. Grumio, in _The Taming of the Shrew_
(iv. 1. 52) sees "the carpets laid" for supper on his master's
return home. A Stratford inventory of 1590 mentions "a carpet for
a table." Carpets were also used for window-seats, but were seldom
placed on the floor except to kneel upon, or for other special
purposes.
The bedroom furniture was equally rude and scanty, though better
than it had been when the old folk of the time were young. Harrison
says:--
"Our fathers and we ourselves have lien full oft upon straw pallets
covered only with a sheet, under coverlets made of dagswain or
hopharlots [coarse, rough cloths], and a good round log under their
heads instead of a bolster. If it were that our fathers or the good
man of the house had a mattress or flock-bed, and thereto a sack
of chaff to rest his head upon, he thought himself to be as well
lodged as the lord of the town, so well were they contented."
But feather beds had now come into use, with pillows, and "flaxen
sheets," and other comfortable appliances. Henry Field had "one
bed-covering of yellow and green" among his household goods.
Kitchen utensils and table-ware had likewise improved within the
memory of the old inhabitant, though still rude and simple enough.
Harrison notes "the exchange of treen [wooden] platters into
pewter, and wooden spoons into silver or tin."
He adds: "So common were all sorts of treen stuff in old time that
a man should hardly find four pieces of pewter (of which one was
peradventure a salt) in a good farmer's house"; but now they had
plenty of pewter, with perhaps a silver bowl and salt-cellar, and a
dozen silver spoons.
The table-linen was hempen for common use, but flaxen for special
occasions, and the napkins were of the same materials. These
napkins, or towels, as they were sometimes called, were for wiping
the hands after eating with the fingers, forks being as yet unknown
in England except as a curiosity.
Elizabeth is the first royal personage in the country who is known
to have had a fork, and it is doubtful whether she used it. It was
not until the middle of the 17th century that forks were used even
by the higher classes, and silver forks were not introduced until
about 1814.
Thomas Coryat, in his _Crudities_, published in 1611, only five
years before Shakespeare died, gives an account of the use of forks
in Italy, where they appear to have been invented in the 15th
century. He says:--
"The Italian and also most strangers do always at their meals use
a little fork when they do cut their meat. For while with their
knife, which they hold in one hand, they cut the meat out of the
dish, they fasten the fork, which they hold in their other hand,
upon the same dish; so that whosoever he be that, sitting in the
company of others at meals, should unadvisedly touch the dish of
meat with his fingers, from which all the table do cut, he will
give occasion of offence unto the company, as having transgressed
the laws of good manners."
Coryat adds that he himself "thought good to imitate the Italian
fashion by this forked cutting of meat," not only while he was in
Italy, but after he came home to England, where, however, he was
sometimes "quipped" for what his friends regarded as a foreign
affectation.
The dramatists of the time also refer contemptuously to "your
fork-carving traveller"; and one clergyman preached against the use
of forks "as being an insult to Providence not to touch one's meat
with one's fingers!"
Towels, except for table use, are rarely noticed in inventories of
the period, and when mentioned are specified as "washing towels."
Neither are wash-basins often referred to, except in lists of
articles used by barbers.
Bullein, in his _Government of Health_, published about 1558, says:
"Plain people in the country use seldom times to wash their hands,
as appeareth by their filthiness, and as very few times comb their
heads."
Their betters were none too particular in these matters, and in
personal cleanliness generally. Baths are seldom referred to in
writings of the time, except for the treatment of certain diseases.
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF ANNE HATHAWAY'S COTTAGE]
Reference has already been made to the use of rushes for covering
floors. It was thought to be a piece of unnecessary luxury on the
part of Wolsey when he caused the rushes at Hampton Court to be
changed every day. From a letter of Erasmus to Dr. Francis,
Wolsey's physician, it would appear that the lowest layer of
rushes--the top only being renewed--was sometimes unchanged
for years--the latter says "twenty years," which seems hardly
credible--becoming a receptacle for beer, grease, fragments of
victuals, and other organic matters.
Perfumes were used for neutralizing the foul odors that resulted
from this filthiness. Burton, in his _Anatomy of Melancholy_, 1621,
says: "The smoke of juniper is in great request with us at Oxford,
to sweeten our chambers." [See also page 25 above.]
From the correspondence of the Earl of Shrewsbury with Lord
Burleigh, during the confinement of Mary Queen of Scots at
Sheffield Castle, in 1572, we learn that she was to be removed
for five or six days "to cleanse her chamber, being kept very
uncleanly."
In a memoir written by Anne, Countess of Dorset, in 1603, we read:
"We all went to Tibbals to see the King, who used my mother and my
aunt very graciously; but we all saw a great change between the
fashion of the Court as it was now and of that in the Queen's, for
we were all lousy by sitting in Sir Thomas Erskine's chambers."
FOOD AND DRINK.
The food of the common people was better in some respects than
it is nowadays, and better than it was in Continental countries.
Harrison says that whereas what he calls "white meats"--milk,
butter, and cheese--were in old times the food of the upper
classes, they were in his time "only eaten by the poor," while all
other classes ate flesh, fish, and "wild and tame fowls."
Wheaten bread, however, was little known except to the rich, the
bread of the poor being made of rye or barley, and, in times of
scarcity, of beans, oats, and even acorns.
Tea and coffee had not yet been introduced into England, but wine
was abundant and cheap. It is rather surprising to learn that from
twenty to thirty thousand tuns of home-grown wine were then made in
the country.
Of foreign wines, thirty kinds of strong and fifty-six of light
were to be had in London. The price ranged from eightpence to a
shilling a gallon. The drink of the common people, however, was
beer, which was generally home-brewed and cheap withal.
Harrison, who was a country clergyman with forty pounds a year,
tells how his good wife brewed two hundred gallons at a cost of
twenty shillings, or less than three halfpence a gallon. When
nobody drank water, and the only substitute for malt liquors was
milk, the consumption of beer was of course enormous.
The meals were but two a day. Harrison says: "Heretofore there hath
been much more time spent in eating and drinking than commonly
is in these days, for whereas of old we had breakfasts in the
forenoon, beverages or nuntions [luncheons] after dinner, and
thereto rear-suppers [late or second suppers] generally when it
was time to go to rest, now these odd repasts--thanked be God--are
very well left, and each one in manner (except here and there some
young hungry stomach that cannot fast till dinner time) contenteth
himself with dinner and supper only."
[Illustration: OLD HOUSE IN HIGH STREET]
Of the times of meals he says: "With us the nobility, gentry,
and students do ordinarily go to dinner at eleven before noon,
and to supper at five, or between five and six at afternoon. The
merchants dine and sup seldom before twelve at noon and six at
night, especially in London. The husbandmen dine also at high noon,
as they call it, and sup at seven or eight; but out of the term in
our universities the scholars dine at ten. As for the poorest sort,
they generally dine and sup when they may, so that to talk of
their order of repast it were but needless matter."
Rising at four or five in the morning, as was the custom with the
common people, and going until ten or even noon without food must
have been hard for other than the "young hungry stomachs" of which
Harrison speaks so contemptuously.
THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN.
In the 16th century, children of the middle and upper classes were
strictly brought up. The "Books of Nurture," published at that
time, give minute directions for the behavior of boys like William
at home, at school, at church, and elsewhere. These manuals were
generally in doggerel verse, and several of them have been edited
by Dr. F. J. Furnivall for the Early English Text Society.
Among them is one by Francis Seager, published in London in 1557,
entitled _The Schoole of Vertue, and booke of good Nourture for
Chyldren and youth to learne their dutie by_. Another is _The
Boke of Nurture, or Schoole of good maners for men, servants, and
children_, compiled by Hugh Rhodes, of which at least five editions
were printed between 1554 and 1577.
The _Schoole of Vertue_ begins thus[2] (the spelling being
modernized):--
"First in the morning when thou dost awake
To God for his grace thy petition then make;
This prayer following use daily to say,
Thy heart lifting up; thus begin to pray,"
A prayer of eighteen lines follows, with directions to repeat the
Lord's Prayer after it. Then come rules "how to order thyself when
thou risest, and in apparelling thy body."
The child is to rise early, dress carefully, washing his hands and
combing his head. When he goes down stairs he is to salute the
family:--
"Down from thy chamber when thou shalt go,
Thy parents salute thou, and the family also."
Elsewhere, politeness out of doors is enjoined:--
"Be free of cap [taking it off to his elders] and full of
courtesy."
At meals his first duty is to wait upon his parents, after saying
this grace:--
"Give thanks to God with one accord
For that shall be set on this board.
And be not careful what to eat,
To each thing living the Lord sends meat;
For food He will not see you perish,
But will you feed, foster, and cherish;
Take well in worth what He hath sent,
At this time be therewith content,
Praising God."
He is then to make low curtsy, saying "Much good may it do you!"
and, if he is big enough, he is to bring the food to the table.
In filling the dishes he must take care not to get them so full
as to spill anything on his parents' clothes. He is to have
spare trenchers and napkins ready for guests, to see that all
are supplied with "bread and drink," and that the "voiders"--the
baskets or vessels into which bones are thrown--are often emptied.
When the course of meat is over he is to clear the table, cover the
salt, put the dirty trenchers and napkins into a voider, sweep the
crumbs into another, place a clean trencher before each person,
and set on "cheese with fruit, with biscuits or caraways" [comfits
containing caraway seeds, which were considered favorable to
digestion, and, according to a writer on health, in 1595, "surely
very good for students"], also wine, "if any there were," or beer.
The meal ended, he is to remove the cloth, turning in each side
and folding it up carefully; "a clean towel then on the table to
spread," and bring basin and ewer for washing the hands. He now
clears the table again, and when the company rise, he must not
"forget his duty":--
"Before the table make thou low curtsy."
The boy can now eat his own dinner, and equally minute directions
are given as to his behavior while doing it. He is not to break his
bread, but "cut it fair," not to fill his spoon too full of soup,
nor his mouth too full of meat--
"Not smacking thy lips as commonly do hogs,
Nor gnawing the bones as it were dogs.
Such rudeness abhor, such beastliness fly,
At the table behave thyself mannerly."
He must keep his fingers clean with a napkin, wipe his mouth before
drinking, and be temperate in eating--"For 'measure is treasure,'
the proverb doth say."
The directions "how to behave thyself in talking with any man" are
very minute and specific:--
"If a man demand a question of thee,
In thine answer-making be not too hasty;
Weigh well his words, the case understand,
Ere an answer to make thou take in hand;
Else may he judge in thee little wit,
To answer to a thing and not hear it.
Suffer his tale whole out to be told,
Then speak thou mayst, and not be controlled;
Low obeisance making, looking him in the face,
Treatably speaking, thy words see thou place,
With countenance sober, thy body upright,
Thy feet just together, thy hands in like plight;
Cast not thine eyes on either side.
When thou art praised, therein take no pride.
In telling thy tale, neither laugh nor smile;
Such folly forsake thou, banish and exile.
In audible voice thy words do thou utter,
Not high nor low, but using a measure.
Thy words see that thou pronounce plaine,
And that they spoken be not in vain;
In uttering whereof keep thou an order,
Thy matter thereby thou shalt much forder [further];
Which order if thou do not observe,
From the purpose needs must thou swerve,
And hastiness of speed will cause thee to err,
Or will thee teach to stut or stammer.
To stut or stammer is a foul crime;
Learn then to leave it, take warning in time;
How evil a child it doth become,
Thyself being judge, having wisdom;
And sure it is taken by custom and ure [use],
While young you be there is help and cure.
This general rule yet take with thee,
In speaking to any man thy head uncovered be,
The common proverb remember ye ought,
'Better unfed than untaught.'"
Though this may be very poor poetry, it is very good advice; and
so is this which follows, on "how to order thyself being sent of
message":--
"If of message forth thou be sent,
Take heed to the same, give ear diligent;
Depart not away and being in doubt,
Know well thy message before thou pass out;
With possible speed then haste thee right soon,
If need shall require it so to be done.
After humble obeisance the message forth shew,
Thy words well placing, in uttering but few
As shall thy matter serve to declare.
Thine answer made, then home again repair,
And to thy master thereof make relation
As then the answer shall give thee occasion.
Neither add nor diminish anything to the same,
Lest after it prove to thy rebuke and shame,
But the same utter as near as thou can;
No fault they shall find to charge thee with than [then]."
[Illustration: ANNE HATHAWAY'S COTTAGE]
Similar counsel is added "against the horrible vice of swearing":
"In vain take not the name of God;
Swear not at all for fear of his rod.
* * * * *
Seneca doth counsel thee all swearing to refrain,
Although great profit by it thou might gain;
Pericles, whose words are manifest and plain,
From swearing admonisheth thee to abstain;
The law of God and commandment he gave
Swearing amongst us in no wise would have.
The counsel of philosophers I have here exprest,
Amongst whom swearing was utterly detest;
Much less among Christians ought it to be used,
But utterly of them clean to be refused."
There are also admonitions "against the vice of filthy talking" and
"against the vice of lying"; and a prayer follows, "to be said when
thou goest to bed."
The rules laid down in the _Boke of Nurture_ are similar and in the
same doggerel measure. It is interesting, by the bye, to compare
the alterations in successive editions as indicating changes in the
manners and customs of the time. A single illustration must suffice.
When the first edition appeared, handkerchiefs had not come into
general use; and how to blow the nose without one was evidently
a difficulty with the writer and other early authorities on
deportment. Even in 1577, when handkerchiefs began to be common,
Rhodes says:--
"Blow not your nose on the napkin
Where you should wipe your hand,
But cleanse it in your handkercher."[3]
The _Booke of Demeanor_, printed in 1619, says:--
"Nor imitate with Socrates
To wipe thy snivelled nose
Upon thy cap, as he would do,
Nor yet upon thy clothes:
But keep it clean with handkerchief,
Provided for the same,
Not with thy fingers or thy sleeve,
Therein thou art to blame."
The introduction of toothpicks, the gradual adoption of forks,
already referred to, and sundry other refinements, can be similarly
traced in these interesting hand-books.
It would appear that this _Schoole of Vertue_, or some other book
with the same title, was used in schools for boys. John Brinsley,
in his _Grammar Schoole_ of 1612 (quoted by Dr. Furnivall),
enumerates the "Bookes to be first learned of children." After
mentioning the Primer, the Psalms in metre--"because children
will learne that booke with most readinesse and delight through
the running of the metre"--and the Testament, he adds: "If any
require any other little booke meet to enter children, the
_Schoole of Vertue_ is one of the principall, and easiest for the
first enterers, being full of precepts of civilitie, and such as
children will soone learne and take a delight in, thorow [through]
the roundnesse of the metre, as was sayde before of the singing
Psalmes: and after it the _Schoole of good manners_, called _the
new Schoole of Vertue_, leading the childe as by the hand, in the
way of all good manners."
INDOOR AMUSEMENTS.
Of the indoor amusements of country people we get an idea from
Vincent's _Dialogue with an English Courtier_, published in 1586.
He says: "In foul weather we send for some honest neighbors, if
haply we be with our wives alone at home (as seldom we are) and
with them we play at Dice and Cards, sorting ourselves according
to the number of players and their skill; ... sometimes we fall to
Slide-Thrift, to Penny Prick, and in winter nights we use certain
Christmas games very proper, and of much agility; we want not also
pleasant mad-headed knaves, that be properly learned, and will read
in divers pleasant books and good authors; as Sir Guy of Warwick,
the Four Sons of Aymon, the Ship of Fools, the Hundred Merry Tales,
the Book of Riddles, and many other excellent writers both witty
and pleasant. These pretty and pithy matters do sometimes recreate
our minds, chiefly after long sitting and loss of money."
"Slide-thrift," called also "slip-groat" and "shove-groat," is
a game frequently mentioned by writers of the 16th and 17th
centuries. Strutt, in his _Sports and Pastimes of England_,
describes it thus:--
"It requires a parallelogram to be made with chalk, or by lines
cut upon the middle of a table, about twelve or fourteen inches
in breadth, and three or four feet in length: which is divided,
latitudinally, into nine sections, in every one of which is placed
a figure, in regular succession from one to nine. Each of the
players provides himself with a smooth halfpenny, which he places
upon the edge of the table, and, striking it with the palm of his
hand, drives it towards the marks; and according to the value of
the figure affixed to the partition wherein the halfpenny rests,
his game is reckoned; which generally is stated at thirty-one,
and must be made precisely: if it be exceeded, the player goes
again for nine, which must also be brought exactly or the turn is
forfeited; and if the halfpenny rests upon any of the marks that
separate the partitions, or over-passes the external boundaries,
the go is void. It is also to be observed that the players toss
up to determine which shall go first, which is certainly a great
advantage."
[Illustration: SHILLING OF EDWARD VI]
Shovel-board, or shuffle-board, which some writers confound with
slide-thrift, was also played upon a table with coins or flat
pieces of metal; but the board was longer and the rules of the game
were different.
In _2 Henry IV._ (ii. 4. 206), when Falstaff wants Pistol put out
of the room, he says to Bardolph: "Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a
shove-groat shilling."
In _The Merry Wives of Windsor_ (i. 1. 159), Slender, when asked
if Pistol had picked his purse, replies: "Ay, by these gloves,
did he ... of seven groats in mill-sixpences and two Edward
shovel-boards, that cost me two shillings and twopence apiece."
"Edward shovel-boards" were the broad shillings of Edward VI. which
were generally used in playing the game. It has been suggested
that Slender was a fool to pay two shillings and twopence for a
shilling worn smooth; but it is possible that these old coins
commanded a premium on account of being in demand for this game.
The silver groat (fourpence) was originally used for the purpose,
but the shilling, especially of this particular coinage, came to
be preferred by players. Taylor the Water Poet makes one of these
coins say:--
"You see my face is beardless, smooth, and plain,
Because my sovereign was a child 't is known,
When as he did put on the English crown;
But had my stamp been bearded, as with hair,
Long before this it had been worn out bare;
For why, with me the unthrifts every day,
With my face downward, do at shove-board play."
"Penny-prick" is described as "a game consisting of casting oblong
pieces of iron at a mark." Another writer explains it as "throwing
at halfpence placed on sticks which are called hobs." It was a
common game as early as the fifteenth century, and is reproved by a
religious writer of that period, probably because it was used for
gambling.
Card-playing had become so general in the time of Henry VIII. that
a statute was enacted forbidding apprentices to use cards except
in the Christmas holidays, and then only in their masters' houses.
Many different games with cards are mentioned by writers of the
time, but few of them are described minutely enough to make it
clear how they were played.
Backgammon, or "tables," as it was called, was popular in
Shakespeare's time. He refers to it in _Love's Labour's Lost_ (v.
2. 326), where Biron, ridiculing Boyet, says:--
"This is the ape of form, monsieur the nice,
That, when he plays at tables, chides the dice
In honourable terms."
"Tick-tack" was a kind of backgammon; alluded to, figuratively, in
_Measure for Measure_ (i. 2. 196): "thus foolishly lost at a game
of tick-tack."
"Tray-trip" was a game of dice, in which success depended upon
throwing a "tray" (the French _trois_, or three); mentioned
in _Twelfth Night_ (ii. 5. 207): "Shall I play my freedom at
tray-trip, and become thy bond-slave?"
"Troll-my-dames" was a game resembling the modern bagatelle. The
name is a corruption of the French _trou-madame_. It was also
known as "pigeon-holes." Dr. John Jones, in his _Ancient Baths of
Buckstone_ (1572) refers to it thus: "The ladies, gentlewomen,
wives and maids, may in one of the galleries walk; and if the
weather be not agreeable to their expectation, they may have in the
end of a bench eleven holes made, into the which to troll pummets,
or bowls of lead, big, little, or mean, or also of copper, tin,
wood, either violent or soft, after their own discretion: the
pastime _troule-in-madame_ is called."
In _The Tempest_ (v. 1. 172) Ferdinand and Miranda are represented
as playing chess; but there is no other clear allusion to the game
in Shakespeare's works. It was introduced into England before the
Norman Conquest, and became a favorite pastime with the upper
classes, but appears to have been little known among the common
people.
POPULAR BOOKS.
Of books there were probably very few at the house in Henley
Street. Some of those mentioned by Vincent were popular with all
classes. The story of Guy of Warwick had been told repeatedly in
prose and verse from the twelfth century down to Shakespeare's
day, and some of the books and ballads would be likely to be well
known in Stratford, which, as we have seen, was in the immediate
vicinity of the hero's legendary exploits. The _Four Sons of Aymon_
was the translation of a French prose romance, the earliest form of
which dated back to songs or ballads of the 13th century. Aymon,
or Aimon, a prince of Ardennes whose history was partly imaginary,
and his sons figure in the works of Tasso and Ariosto, and other
Italian and French poets and romancers.
The _Hundred Merry Tales_ was a popular jest-book of Shakespeare's
time, to which he alludes in _Much Ado About Nothing_ (ii. 1. 134),
where Beatrice refers to what Benedick had said about her: "That
I was disdainful, and that I had my wit out of the Hundred Merry
Tales."
The _Book of Riddles_ was another book mentioned by Shakespeare
in _The Merry Wives of Windsor_ (i. 1. 205), in connection with a
volume of verse which was equally popular in the Elizabethan age:--
"_Slender._ I had rather than forty shillings, I had my book of
Songs and Sonnets here.--
_Enter_ Simple.
How now, Simple! Where have you been? I must wait on myself, must
I? You have not the Book of Riddles about you, have you?
_Simple._ Book of Riddles? why, did you not lend it to Alice
Shortcake upon Allhallowmas last, a fortnight afore Michaelmas?"
The title-page of one edition reads thus: "The Booke of Merry
Riddles. Together with proper Questions, and witty Proverbs to make
pleasant pastime. No lesse usefull than behoovefull for any yong
man or child, to know if he bee quick-witted, or no."
A few of the shortest riddles may be quoted as samples:--
"_The_ li. _Riddle_.--My lovers will
I am content for to fulfill;
Within this rime his name is framed;
Tell me then how he is named?
_Solution._--His name is William; for in the first line is
_will_, and in the beginning of the second line is _I am_, and
then put them both together, and it maketh _William_.
_The_ liv. _Riddle_.--How many calves tailes will reach to the
skye? _Solution._--One, if it be long enough.
_The_ lxv. _Riddle_.--What is that, round as a ball,
Longer than Pauls steeple,
weather-cocke, and all?
_Solution._--It is a round bottome of thred when it is unwound.
_The_ lxvii. _Riddle_.--What is that, that goeth thorow the wood,
and toucheth never a twig? _Solution._--It is the blast of a
horne, or any other noyse."
A _bottom_ of thread was a ball of it. The word occurs in _The
Taming of the Shrew_ (iv. 3. 138), where Grumio says, in the
dialogue with the Tailor: "Master, if ever I said loose-bodied
gown, sew me in the skirts of it, and beat me to death with a
bottom of brown thread; I said a gown." The verb is used in _The
Two Gentlemen of Verona_ (iii. 2. 53):--
"Therefore, as you unwind her love from him,
Lest it should ravel and be good to none,
You must provide to bottom it on me."
This old meaning of _bottom_ doubtless suggested the name of Bottom
the Weaver in the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_.
STORY-TELLING.
If books were scarce in the homes of the common people when
Shakespeare was a boy, there was no lack of oral tales, legends,
and folk-lore for the entertainment of the family of a winter
evening. The store of this unwritten history and fiction was
inexhaustible.
In Milton's _L'Allegro_ we have a pleasant picture of a rustic
group listening to fairy stories round the evening fire:--
"Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How fairy Mab the junkets eat.
She was pinch'd and pull'd, she said,
And he, by Friar's lantern led,
Tells how the drudging goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn
That ten day-laborers could not end;
Then lies him down the lubber fiend,
And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength,
And crop-full out of doors he flings
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep."
Of "fairy Mab" we have a graphic description from the merry
Mercutio in _Romeo and Juliet_ (i. 4. 53-94); and the "drudging
goblin," or Robin Goodfellow, is the Puck of the _Midsummer-Night's
Dream_, to whom the Fairy says (ii. 1. 40):--
"Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck,
You do their work, and they shall have good luck."
In the same scene Puck himself tells of the practical jokes he
plays upon "the wisest aunt telling the saddest tale" to a fireside
group, and of many another sportive trick with which he "frights
the maidens" and vexes the housewives.
The children had their stories to tell, like their elders; and
Shakespeare has pictured a home scene in _The Winter's Tale_ (ii.
1. 21) which may have been suggested by his own experience as a
boy. As Mr. Charles Knight asks, "may we not read for Hermione,
Mary Shakespeare, and for Mamillius, William?"
"_Hermione._ What wisdom stirs amongst you? Come, sir, now
I am for you again; pray you, sit by us,
And tell 's a tale.
_Mamillius._ Merry, or sad shall 't be?
_Hermione._ As merry as you will.
_Mamillius._ A sad tale 's best for winter. I have one
Of sprites and goblins.
_Hermione._ Let's have that, good sir.
Come on, sit down; come on, and do your best
To fright me with your sprites; you're powerful at it.
_Mamillius._ There was a man--
_Hermione._ Nay, come, sit down; then on.
_Mamillius._ Dwelt by a churchyard:--I will tell it softly;
Yond crickets shall not hear it.
_Hermione._ Come on, then,
And give 't me in mine ear."
Just then his father, Leontes, comes in, and the tale is
interrupted, never to be resumed.
Mr. Knight assumes, with a good degree of probability, that William
had access to some of the books from which he drew material for the
story of his plays later in life, and that he may have told these
tales, whether "merry or sad," to his brothers and sisters at home.
"He had," says this genial biographer, "a copy, well thumbed from
his first reading days, of 'The Palace of Pleasure, beautified,
adorned, and well furnished with pleasant histories and excellent
novelles, selected out of divers good and commendable authors; by
William Painter, Clarke of the Ordinaunce and Armarie.' In this
book, according to the dedication of the translator to Ambrose Earl
of Warwick, was set forth 'the great valiance of noble gentlemen,
the terrible combats of courageous personages, the virtuous minds
of noble dames, the chaste hearts of constant ladies, the wonderful
patience of puissant princes, the mild sufferance of well-disposed
gentlewomen, and, in divers, the quiet bearing of adverse fortune.'
Pleasant little apothegms and short fables were there in the book;
which the brothers and sisters of William Shakespeare had heard
him tell with marvellous spirit, and they abided therefore in
their memories. There was Æsop's fable of the old lark and her
young ones, wherein 'he prettily and aptly doth premonish that
hope and confidence of things attempted by man ought to be fixed
and trusted in none other but himself.' There was the story, most
delightful to a child, of the bondman at Rome, who was brought into
the open place upon which a great multitude looked, to fight with
a lion of a marvellous bigness; and the fierce lion, when he saw
him, 'suddenly stood still, and afterwards by little and little,
in gentle sort, he came unto the man as though he had known him,'
and licked his hands and legs; and the bondman told that he had
healed in former time the wounded foot of the lion, and the beast
became his friend. These were for the younger children; but William
had now a new tale, out of the same storehouse, upon which he had
often pondered, the subject of which had shaped itself in his mind
into dialogue that almost sounded like verse in his graceful and
earnest recitation. It was a tale which Painter translated from
the French of Pierre Boisteau.... It was 'The goodly history of
the true and constant love between Romeo and Julietta.' ... From
the same collection of tales had the youth before half dramatized
the story of 'Giletta of Narbonne,' who cured the King of France
of a painful malady, and the king gave her in marriage to the
Count Beltramo, with whom she had been brought up, and her husband
despised and forsook her, but at last they were united, and lived
in great honor and felicity.
"There was another collection, too, which that youth had diligently
read,--the 'Gesta Romanorum,' translated by R. Robinson in
1577,--old legends, come down to those latter days from monkish
historians, who had embodied in their narratives all the wild
traditions of the ancient and modern world. He could tell the story
of the rich heiress who chose a husband by the machinery of a gold,
a silver, and a leaden casket; and another story of the merchant
whose inexorable creditor required the fulfilment of his bond in
cutting a pound of flesh, nearest the merchant's heart, and by the
skilful interpretation of the bond the cruel creditor was defeated.
"There was the story, too, in these legends, of the Emperor
Theodosius, who had three daughters; and those two daughters who
said they loved him more than themselves were unkind to him, but
the youngest, who only said she loved him as much as he was worthy,
succoured him in his need, and was his true daughter....
"Stories such as these, preserved amidst the wreck of time, were
to that youth like the seeds that are found in the tombs of ruined
cities, lying with the bones of forgotten generations, but which
the genial influence of nature will call into life, and they shall
become flowers, and trees, and food for man.
"But, beyond all these, our Mamillius had many a tale 'of sprites
and goblins'.... Such appearances were above nature, but the
commonest movements of the natural world had them in subjection:--
"'I have heard,
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
Awake the god of day; and at his warning,
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air,
The extravagant and erring spirit hies
To his confine.'
"Powerful they were, but yet powerless. They came for benevolent
purposes: to warn the guilty; to discover the guilt. The belief in
them was not a debasing thing. It was associated with the enduring
confidence that rested upon a world beyond this material world.
Love hoped for such visitations; it had its dreams of such--where
the loved one looked smilingly, and spoke of regions where change
and separation were not. They might be talked of, even among
children then, without terror. They lived in that corner of the
soul which had trust in angel protections, which believed in
celestial hierarchies, which listened to hear the stars moving in
harmonious music....
"William Shakespeare could also tell to his greedy listeners, how
in the old days of King Arthur
"'The elf-queene, with her jolly compagnie,
Danced full oft in many a grene mede.'
"Here was something in his favorite old poet for the youth to work
out into beautiful visions of a pleasant race of supernatural
beings; who lived by day in the acorn cups of Arden, and by
moonlight held their revels on the greensward of Avon-side, the
ringlets of their dance being duly seen, 'whereof the ewe not
bites'; who tasted the honey-bag of the bee, and held counsel by
the light of the glowworm; who kept the cankers from the rosebuds,
and silenced the hootings of the owl.... Some day would William
make a little play of Fairies, and Joan should be their Queen, and
he would be the King; for he had talked with the Fairies, and he
knew their language and their manners, and they were 'good people,'
and would not mind a boy's sport with them.
"But when the youth began to speak of witches there was fear and
silence. For did not his mother recollect that in the year she was
married Bishop Jewell had told the Queen that her subjects pined
away, even unto the death, and that their affliction was owing to
the increase of witches and sorcerers? Was it not known how there
were three sorts of witches,--those that can hurt and not help,
those that can help and not hurt, and those that can both help and
hurt? It was unsafe even to talk of them.
"But the youth had met with the history of the murder of Duncan
King of Scotland, in a chronicler older than Holinshed; and he told
softly, so that 'yon crickets shall not hear it,' that, as Macbeth
and Banquo journeyed from Forres, sporting by the way together,
when the warriors came in the midst of a laund, three weird sisters
suddenly appeared to them, in strange and wild apparel, resembling
creatures of an elder world, and prophesied that Macbeth should be
King of Scotland; and Macbeth from that hour desired to be king,
and so killed the good king his liege lord.
"And then the story-teller would pass on to safer matters--to
the calculations of learned men who could read the fates of
mankind in the aspects of the stars; and of those more deeply
learned, clothed in garments of white linen, who had command over
the spirits of the earth, of the water, and of the air. Some of
the children said that a horseshoe over the door, and vervain
and dill, would preserve them, as they had been told, from the
devices of sorcery. But their mother called to their mind that
there was security far more to be relied on than charms of herb or
horseshoe--that there was a Power that would preserve them from
all evil, seen or unseen, if such were His gracious will, and if
they humbly sought Him, and offered up their hearts to Him in all
love and trust. And to that Power this household then addressed
themselves; and the night was without fear, and their sleep was
pleasant."
CHRISTENINGS.
In the olden time the christening of a child was an occasion of
feasting and gift-giving. It was an ancient custom for the sponsors
to make a present of silver or gilt spoons to the infant. These
were called "apostle spoons," because the end of the handle was
formed into the figure of one of the apostles. The rich or generous
gave the whole twelve; those less wealthy or liberal limited
themselves to the four evangelists; while the poor contented
themselves with the gift of a single spoon.
There is an allusion to this custom in _Henry VIII._ (v. 3.
168), where the King replies to Cranmer, who has professed to be
unworthy of being a sponsor to the baby Elizabeth, "Come, come, my
lord, you'd spare your spoons,"--a playful insinuation that the
archbishop wants to escape making a present to the child.
[Illustration: ANCIENT FONT AT STRATFORD]
It is related that Shakespeare was godfather to one of Ben Jonson's
children, and said to his friend after the christening, "I' faith,
Ben, I'll e'en give him a dozen good Latin spoons, and thou shalt
translate them." That is, as Mr. Thoms explains it, "Shakespeare,
willing to show his wit, if not his wealth, gave a dozen spoons,
not of silver, but of _latten_, a name formerly used to signify a
mixed metal resembling brass, as being the most appropriate gift to
the child of a father so learned."
After baptism at the church a piece of white linen was put
upon the head of the child. This was called the "chrisom" or
"chrisom-cloth," and originally was worn seven days; but after the
Reformation it was kept on until the churching of the mother. If
the child died before the churching, it was buried with the chrisom
upon it. In parish registers such infants are often referred to
as "chrisoms." In _Henry V._ (ii. 3. 12), Dame Quickly says of
Falstaff, "A' made a finer end, and went away an it had been any
christom child"; that is, his death was like that of a young
infant. "Christom" is the old woman's blunder for "chrisom."
The "bearing-cloth" was the mantle which covered the child when
it was carried to the font. In the _Winter's Tale_ (iii. 3. 119),
the Shepherd, when he finds the infant Perdita abandoned on the
sea-shore, says to his son: "Here's a sight for thee; look thee, a
bearing-cloth for a squire's child! Look thee here; take up, take
up, boy; open 't." John Stow, writing in the closing years of the
16th century, says that at that time it was not customary "for
godfathers and godmothers generally to give plate at the baptism of
children, but only to give 'christening shirts,' with little bands
and cuffs, wrought either with silk or blue thread. The best of
them, for chief persons, were edged with a small lace of black silk
and gold, the highest price of which, for great men's children,
was seldom above a noble [a gold coin worth 6_s._ 8_d._], and the
common sort, two, three, or four, and six shillings apiece."
The "gossips' feast" (or sponsors' feast) held in honor of those
who were associated in the christening, was an ancient English
custom often mentioned by dramatists and other writers of the
Elizabethan age. In the _Comedy of Errors_ (v. 1. 405) the Abbess,
when she finds that the twin brothers Antipholus are her long-lost
sons, says to the company present:--
"Thirty-three years have I but gone in travail
Of you, my sons; and till this present hour
My heavy burthen ne'er delivered.--
The duke, my husband, and my children both,
And you the calendars of their nativity,
Go to a gossip's feast, and go with me;
After so long grief, such nativity!"
And the Duke replies, "With all my heart I'll gossip at this feast."
In the _Bachelor's Banquet_ (1603) we find an allusion to these
feasts: "What cost and trouble will it be to have all things
fine against the Christening Day; what store of sugar, biscuits,
comfets, and caraways, marmalet, and marchpane, with all kinds of
sweet-suckers and superfluous banqueting stuff, with a hundred
other odd and needless trifles, which at that time must fill the
pockets of dainty dames." It would appear from this that the women
at the feast not only ate what they pleased, but carried off some
of the good things in their pockets.
A writer in 1666, alluding to this and the falling-off in the
custom of giving presents at christenings, says:--
"Especially since gossips now
Eat more at christenings than bestow.
Formerly when they used to trowl
Gilt bowls of sack, they gave the bowl--
Two spoons at least; an use ill kept:
'T is well now if our own be left."
He insinuates that some of the guests were as likely to steal
spoons from the table as to give gilt bowls or "apostle spoons" to
the infant.
The boy Shakespeare must have often seen this ceremony of
christening. His sister Joan was baptized when he was five years
old; his sister Anna when he was eight; his brother Richard when he
was ten; and Edmund when he was sixteen.
SUPERSTITIONS CONNECTED WITH BIRTH AND BAPTISM.
In the time of Shakespeare babies were supposed to be exposed to
other risks and dangers than the infantile disorders to which they
are subject. Mary Shakespeare, as she watched the cradle of the
infant William, may have been troubled by fears and anxieties that
never occur to a fond mother now.
Witches and fairies were supposed to be given to stealing beautiful
and promising children, and substituting their own ugly and
mischievous offspring. Shakespeare alludes to these "changelings,"
as they were called, in the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_ (ii. 1. 23),
where Puck says that Oberon is angry with Titania
"Because that she as her attendant hath
A lovely boy, stolen from an Indian king;
She never had so sweet a changeling."
This "changeling boy" is alluded to several times afterwards in the
play.
In the _Winter's Tale_ (iii. 3. 122), when the Shepherd finds
Perdita, he says: "It was told me I should be rich by the fairies;
this is some changeling"; and the money left with the infant he
believes to be "fairy gold." As the child is beautiful he does not
take it to be one of the ugly elves left in exchange for a stolen
babe, but a human changeling which the fairy thieves have for some
reason abandoned. If it were not for the gold left with it, he
might suppose that the stolen infant had been temporarily hidden
there. We have an allusion to such behavior on the part of the
fairies in Spenser's _Faerie Queene_ (i. 10. 65):--
"For well I wote thou springst from ancient race
Of Saxon kinges, that have with mightie hand,
And many bloody battailes fought in face,
High reard their royall throne in Britans land,
And vanquisht them, unable to withstand:
From thence a Faery thee unweeting reft,
There as thou slepst in tender swadling band,
And her base Elfin brood there for thee left:
Such men do Chaungelings call, so chaung'd by Faeries theft.
Thence she thee brought into this Faery lond [land],
And in a heaped furrow did thee hyde;
Where thee a Ploughman all unweeting fond [found],
As he his toylesome teme that way did guyde,
And brought thee up in a ploughmans state to byde."
In _1 Henry IV._ (i. 1. 87), the King, contrasting the gallant
Hotspur with his own profligate son, exclaims:
"O that it could be proved
That some night-tripping fairy had exchang'd
In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
And call'd mine Percy, his Plantagenet!
Then would I have his Harry, and he mine."
The belief in the "evil eye" was another superstition prevalent
in Shakespeare's day, as it had been from the earliest times.
It dates back to old Greek and Roman days, being mentioned by
Theocritus, Virgil, and other classical writers. In Turkey passages
from the Koran used to be painted on the outside of houses as a
protection against this malignant influence of witches, who were
supposed to cause serious injury to human beings and animals by
merely looking at them.
Thomas Lupton, in his _Book of Notable Things_ (1586) says: "The
eyes be not only instruments of enchantment, but also the voice and
evil tongues of certain persons." Bacon, in one of his minor works,
remarks: "It seems some have been so curious as to note that the
times when the stroke or percussion of an envious eye does most
hurt are particularly when the party envied is beheld in glory and
triumph."
Robert Heron, writing in 1793 of his travels in Scotland, says:
"Cattle are subject to be injured by what is called an _evil
eye_, for some persons are supposed to have naturally a blasting
power in their eyes, with which they injure whatever offends or
is hopelessly desired by them. Witches and warlocks are also much
disposed to wreak their malignity on cattle.... It is common to
bind into a cow's tail a small piece of mountain-ash wood, as a
charm against witchcraft."
As recently as August, 1839, a London newspaper reports a case in
which a woman was suspected of the evil eye by a fellow-lodger
merely because she squinted.
In this case, as in many others, the possession of the evil eye
may not have been supposed due to any evil purpose or character.
Good people might be born with this baleful influence, and might
exert it against their will or even unconsciously. It is said that
Pius IX., soon after his election as Pope, when he was perhaps
the best loved man in Italy, happened while passing through the
streets in his carriage to glance upward at an open window at which
a nurse was standing with a child. A few minutes afterward the
nurse let the child drop and it was killed. Nobody thought that the
Pope wished this, but the fancy that he had the evil eye became
universal and lasted till his death.
In the _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (v. 5. 87) Pistol says to Falstaff:
"Vile worm, thou wast o'erlook'd even in thy birth." In the
_Merchant of Venice_ (iii. 2. 15) Portia playfully refers to the
same superstition in talking with Bassanio:--
"Beshrew your eyes,
They have o'erlook'd me and divided me;
One half of me is yours, the other half yours."
CHARMS AND AMULETS.
Against these dangers, and many like them which it would take
an entire volume to enumerate, protection was sought by charms
and amulets. These were also supposed to prevent or cure certain
diseases. Magicians and witches employed charms to accomplish their
evil purposes; and other charms were used to thwart these purposes
by those who feared mischief from them.
In _Othello_ (i. 2. 62) Brabantio, the father of Desdemona,
suspects that the Moor has won his daughter's love by charms. He
says to Othello:--
"O thou foul thief, where hast thou stow'd my daughter?
Damn'd as thou art, thou hast enchanted her."
In the preceding scene, talking with Roderigo, he asks:--
"Is there not charms
By which the property of youth and maidhood
May be abused? Have you not heard, Roderigo,
Of some such thing?"
And Roderigo replies: "Yes, sir, I have indeed." When Othello
afterward tells how he had gained the maiden's love, he says in
conclusion:--
"She loved me for the dangers I had pass'd,
And I loved her that she did pity them.
This only is the witchcraft I have used."
In the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_ (i. 1. 27) Egeus accuses Lysander
of wooing Hermia by magic arts: "This man hath bewitch'd the bosom
of my child."
In _Much Ado About Nothing_ (iii. 2. 72) Benedick, when his friends
banter him for pretending to have the toothache, replies: "Yet this
is no charm for the toothache."
John Melton, in his _Astrologaster_ (1620), says it is vulgarly
believed that "toothaches, agues, cramps, and fevers, and many
other diseases may be healed by mumbling a few strange words over
the head of the diseased."
[Illustration: PORCH, STRATFORD CHURCH]
Written charms in prose or verse--or neither, being nonsensical
combinations of words, letters, or signs--were in great favor then,
as before and since. The unmeaning word _abracadabra_ was much used
in incantations, and worn as an amulet was supposed to cure
or prevent certain ailments. It was necessary to write it in the
following form, if one would secure its full potency:--
A B R A C A D A B R A
A B R A C A D A B R
A B R A C A D A B
A B R A C A D A
A B R A C A D
A B R A C A
A B R A C
A B R A
A B R
A B
A
A manuscript in the British Museum contains this note: "Mr.
Banester saith that he healed 200 in one year of an ague by hanging
_abracadabra_ about their necks."
Thomas Lodge, in his _Incarnate Divels_ (1596) refers to written
charms thus: "Bring him but a table [tablet] of lead, with crosses
(and 'Adonai' or 'Elohim' written in it), he thinks it will heal
the ague."
Certain trees, like the elder and the ash, were supposed to furnish
valuable material for charms and amulets. A writer in 1651 says:
"The common people keep as a great secret the leaves of the elder
which they have gathered the last day of April; which to disappoint
the charms of witches they affix to their doors and windows." An
amulet against erysipelas was made of "elder on which the sun
never shined," a "piece betwixt two knots" being hung about the
patient's neck.
In a book published in 1599 it is asserted that "if one eat three
small pomegranate-flowers, they say for a whole year he shall be
safe from all manner of eye sore." According to the same authority,
"it hath been and yet is a thing which superstition hath believed,
that the body anointed with the juice of chicory is very available
to obtain the favor of great persons."
Wearing a bay-leaf was a charm against lightning. Robert Greene,
_Penelope's Web_ (1601), says: "He which weareth the bay leaf is
privileged from the prejudice of thunder." In Webster's _White
Devil_ (1612) Cornelia says:--
"Reach the bays:
I'll tie a garland here about his head;
'T will keep my boy from lightning."
Burton, in his _Anatomy of Melancholy_ (1621), remarks: "Amulets,
and things to be borne about, I find prescribed, taxed [condemned]
by some, approved by others.... I say with Renodeus, they are not
altogether to be rejected."
Reginald Scot, in his _Discoverie of Witchcraft_, published in
1584, in which he exposed and ridiculed the pretensions of witches,
magicians, and astrologers, tells an amusing story of an old woman
who cured diseases by muttering a certain form of words over the
person afflicted; for which service she always received a penny and
a loaf of bread. At length, terrified by threats of being burned as
a witch, she owned that her whole conjuration consisted in these
lines, which she repeated in a low voice near the head of the
patient:--
"Thy loaf in my hand,
And thy penny in my purse,
Thou art never the better,
And I--am never the worse."
Scot was one of the few men of that age who dared to assail the
general belief in witchcraft and magic; and James I. ordered his
book to be burned by the common hangman. That monarch also wrote
his _Demonology_, as he tells us, "chiefly against the damnable
opinions of Wierus and Scot; the latter of whom is not ashamed in
public print to deny there can be such a thing as witchcraft."
Eminent divines and scientific writers joined in the attempt to
refute this bold attack upon the ignorance and superstition of the
time.
We infer, from certain passages in the plays, that Shakespeare had
read Scot's book; and we have good reason to believe that, like
Scot, he was far enough in advance of his age to see the absurdity
of the popular faith in magic and witchcraft. In his boyhood we
may suppose that he believed in them, as his parents and everybody
in Stratford doubtless did; but when he became a man he appears
to have regarded them only as curious old folk-lore from which he
could now and then draw material for use in his plays and poems.
The illustrations here given of the vulgar superstitions of
Shakespeare's time are merely a few out of thousands equally
interesting to be found in books on the subject, or scattered
through the dramatic and other literature of the period.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] A _reredos_ was a kind of open hearth or brazier. _Pose_,
just below, means a cold in the head, and _quack_ a hoarseness or
croaking caused by a cold in the throat.
[2] In the original each of these lines is divided into two, thus:
"First in the mornynge
when thou dost awake
To God for his grace
thy peticion then make;" etc.
To save space, I arrange the lines as Dr. Furnivall does.
[3] The spelling _handkercher_, common in these old books, and in
the early editions of Shakespeare, indicates the pronunciation
of the time. In _As You Like It_, _The Taming of the Shrew_,
_Hamlet_, _Othello_, and other plays, _napkin_ is equivalent to
_handkerchief_. This, indeed, is the only meaning of the word in
Shakespeare, as often in other writers of the period.