GAMES AND SPORTS
[Illustration]
BOYISH GAMES
Young William may have found life at the Henley Street house and at
the Grammar School rather dull, but there was no lack of diversion
and recreation out of doors. Household comforts and attractions
were meagre enough in those days, but holidays were frequent,
and rural sports and pastimes for young and old were many and
varied. We may be sure that Shakespeare enjoyed these to the full.
His writings abound in allusions to them which were doubtless
reminiscences of his own boyhood.
Many of the children's games to which he refers are familiar to
small folk now, especially in the rural districts. Hide-and-seek,
for example--also known as "hoop-and-hide" and "harry-racket"--is
probably the play that Hamlet had in mind when he exclaimed (iv. 2.
33), "Hide, fox, and after." Blind-man's-buff is also alluded to
by Hamlet when, chiding his mother for preferring his uncle to his
father, he asks:
"What devil was 't
That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind."
A dictionary of Shakespeare's time couples this name for the
pastime with the one that has survived: "The Hoodwinke play, or
hoodmanblinde, in some places called the blindmanbuf." Hamlet's
question is evidently suggested by the practice of making the
"blind man" guess whom he has caught--as Greek and Roman boys did
when they played the game.
In the grave-digging scene (v. 1. 100) Hamlet asks: "Did these
bones cost no more the breeding but to play at loggats with them?"
This refers to the throwing of _loggats_ or _loggets_--small logs,
or sticks of wood much like "Indian clubs"--at a stake, the player
coming nearest to it being the winner.
In a poem of 1611 we find loggats in a list of games with sundry
others that are still in vogue:--
"To wrastle, play at stooleball, or to runne,
To pich the Barre, or to shoote off a Gunne,
To play at Loggets, Nine-holes, or Ten-pinnes;
To try it out at Foot-ball by the shinnes."
[Illustration: HIDE-AND-SEEK]
Stool-ball, commonly played by girls and women, sometimes in
company with boys or men, is to this day a village pastime in
some parts of England. It is essentially a lighter kind of cricket,
but is more ancient than that game.
Pitching the bar was an athletic exercise still common in Scotland.
Scott alludes to it in _The Lady of the Lake_, iv. 559:--
"Now, if thou strik'st her but one blow,
I'll pitch thee from the cliff as far
As ever peasant pitch'd a bar!"
And again, in the account of the sports at Stirling Castle, v.
647:--
"Their arms the brawny yeomen bare
To hurl the massive bar in air."
A poet of the 16th century tells us that to throw "the stone,
the bar, or the plummet" is a commendable exercise for kings and
princes; and, according to the old chroniclers, it was a favorite
diversion with Henry VIII. after his accession to the throne.
Nine-holes, a game in which nine holes were made in a board or in
the ground at which small balls were rolled, is among the rustic
sports enumerated by Drayton in the _Poly-Olbion_.
There were many ball-games besides stool-ball in the days of
Elizabeth, from the simple hand-ball, which Homer represents
the princess of Corcyra as playing with her maidens, to more
complicated exercises, among which we can recognize the germ of
the later "rounders," out of which our Yankee base-ball has been
developed.
The term _base_, as denoting a starting-point or goal, occurs
in the name of other than ball-games, especially in "prisoners'
base"--sometimes "prisoners' bars," or "prison-bars"--which was
popular long before Shakespeare was born. It is played by two
sides, who occupy opposite bases, or "homes." Any player running
out from his base is chased by the opposite party, and if caught
is made a prisoner. It belongs to a class of old games, one of the
most popular of which was called "barley-break."
Originally, this was played by three couples, male and female;
one couple was stationed in "hell" or the space between the two
goals, and tried to catch the others as they ran across. It is thus
described by Sir Philip Sidney in the _Arcadia_:--
"Then couples three be straight allotted there;
They of both ends the middle two do fly;
The two that in mid-space, Hell called, were
Must strive, with waiting foot and watching eye,
To catch of them, and them to Hell to bear,
That they, as well as they, may Hell supply."
Later it came to be played by any number of young people, of either
sex or both, with one person in "hell" at the start. The game was
kept up until all had been captured and brought into this Inferno.
In this form, under the name of "Lill-lill"--which was the signal
cry of the person between the goals for beginning the sport--it was
played by schoolboys in eastern Massachusetts fifty years ago.
Barley-break is often alluded to by the dramatists and lyrists
of Shakespeare's day, and complete poems were written upon it
by Suckling, Herrick, and others. Shakespeare does not mention
it, though he has several references to prisoners' base; as in
_Cymbeline_ (v. 3. 20):--
"lads more like to run
The country base than to commit such slaughter."
To "bid a base," or "the base," was a common phrase for challenging
to a game of this kind, and we often find it used figuratively;
as in _Venus and Adonis_, 303, in the spirited description of
the horse, which, like many other passages, shows Shakespeare's
interest in the animal:--
"Sometimes he scuds far off, and there he stares;
Anon he starts at stirring of a feather;
To bid the wind a base he now prepares,
And whether he run or fly they know not whether,
For through his mane and tail the high wind sings,
Fanning the hairs, who wave like feather'd wings."
In the _Two Gentlemen of Verona_ (i. 2. 97), Lucetta says to Julia,
with a pun upon the phrase: "Indeed, I bid the base for Proteus."
Drayton, in the _Poly-Olbion_, includes this game with others that
have been described above: "At hood-wink, barley-brake, at tick
[that is, tag], or prison-base"; and Spenser in the _Shepherd's
Calendar_ (October) refers to it among rustic pastimes: "In rymes,
in ridles, and in bydding base."
Foot-ball is mentioned by Shakespeare in the _Comedy of Errors_
(ii. 1. 82), where Dromio of Ephesus says to his mistress Adriana,
who has been chiding him:--
"Am I so round with you as you with me,
That like a foot-ball you do spurn me thus?
You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither;
If I last in this service, you must case me in leather."
In _Lear_ (i. 4. 95), Oswald says to Kent, "I'll not be struck, my
lord!" and Kent replies, "Nor tripped neither, you base foot-ball
player."
The game was popular with the common people of England at least as
early as the reign of Edward III., for in 1349 it was prohibited by
royal edict--not, apparently, from any particular objection to the
game in itself, but because it was believed to interfere with the
popular interest in archery.
The sport was, however, a rough one then as now. Alexander Barclay,
who died in 1552, in one of his _Eclogues_, tells how
"The sturdie plowman, lustie, strong, and bold,
Overcometh the winter with driving the foote-ball,
Forgetting labour and many a grievous fall."
Edmund Waller, in the next century, writes:--
"As when a sort [company] of lusty shepherds try
Their force at foot-ball; care of victory
Makes them salute so rudely breast to breast,
That their encounter seems too rough for jest."
King James I., in his _Basilicon_--a set of rules for the nurture
and conduct of Henry, Prince of Wales, the heir-apparent to the
throne--says:--
"Certainly bodily exercises and games are very commendable, as well
for banishing of idleness, the mother of all vice, as for making
the body able and durable for travell, which is very necessarie
for a king. But from this court I debarre all rough and violent
exercises; as the foote-ball, meeter for lameing than making able
the users thereof; likewise such tumbling tricks as only serve for
comedians and balladines [theatrical dancers] to win their bread
with; but the exercises that I would have you to use, although but
moderately, not making a craft of them, are, running, leaping,
wrestling, fencing, dancing, and playing at the caitch, or tenise,
archery, palle-malle, and such like other fair and pleasant
field-games."
Burton, in his _Anatomy of Melancholy_, published in 1660, mentions
foot-ball among the "common recreations of country folks," as
distinguished from the "disports of greater men," or those higher
in rank.
In _Romeo and Juliet_ (i. 4. 41) Mercutio says to Romeo, "If thou
art Dun, we'll draw thee from the mire"--that is, of love. This is
an allusion to a rural game which seems to have been a favorite for
several centuries, and to which scores of references, literal and
figurative, are to be found in writers of all classes.
In Chaucer's _Canterbury Tales_ (16936) we read:--
"Ther gan our hoste for to jape and play,
And sayde, 'sires, what? Dun is in the myre;'"
Bishop Butler, more than three hundred years later, writes: "they
mean to leave reformation, like Dun in the mire."
Gifford, in his notes on Ben Jonson's _Masque of Christmas_, tells
us (in 1816) that he himself had "often played at this game." He
describes it substantially as follows: A log of wood called "Dun
the cart-horse" is brought into the middle of the room, and some
one cries, "Dun is stuck in the mire." Two of the players try, with
or without ropes, to drag it out, but, pretending to be unable
to do so, call for help. Others come forward, and make awkward
attempts to draw out the log, which they manage, if possible, to
drop upon a companion's toes, causing "much honest mirth."
It is remarkable that so simple a diversion could have been popular
with generation after generation of British young folk, and that
they should apparently recall it with so much interest in later
years. Verily, our forefathers in the old country were easily
amused.
In _Antony and Cleopatra_ (iii. 13. 91) we find an allusion to
another game equally simple--if, indeed, it be not too simple to be
called a game. Antony says:--
"Authority melts from me; of late, when I cried 'Ho!'
Like boys unto a muss, kings would start forth
And cry 'Your will?'"
A "muss" was merely a scramble for small coins or other things
thrown down to be taken by those who could seize them. Ben Jonson,
in _The Magnetic Lady_ (iv. 1), says:--
"The moneys rattle not, nor are they thrown
To make a muss yet 'mong the gamesome suitors";
In the same author's _Bartholomew Fair_ (iv. 1), when the
costard-monger's basket of pears is overturned, Cokes begins to
scramble for them, crying, "Ods so! a muss, a muss, a muss, a
muss!"
Dryden, in the prologue to _Widow Ranter_, says:--
"Bauble and cap no sooner are thrown down
But there's a muss of more than half the town."
This is the origin of the modern colloquial or slang use of _muss_.
"Handy-dandy" was a childish play in which something was shaken
between the two hands, and a guess made as to the hand in which
it remained. It is alluded to in _Lear_ (iv. 6. 157): "See how
yond justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark, in thine ear:
change places; and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the
thief?" The game is very ancient, being mentioned by Aristotle,
Plato, and other Greek writers.
In the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_ (ii. 2. 98) Titania, lamenting the
results of the quarrel with Oberon, says:--
"The nine men's morris is fill'd up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable."
The "nine men's morris" was a Warwickshire game which is still kept
up among the rural population of the county. It is played on three
squares, one within another, with lines uniting the angles and the
middle of the sides; the opponents having each nine "men," which
are moved somewhat as in draughts, or checkers.
In the country the squares were often cut in the green turf, the
sides of the outer one being sometimes three or four yards long.
In towns, they were chalked upon the pavement. It was also played
indoors upon a board.
A woodcut of 1520 represents two monkeys engaged at it. It was
sometimes called "nine men's merrils," from _merelles_, the old
French name for the "men," or counters, with which it was played.
[Illustration: "MORRIS" BOARD]
The "quaint mazes" in Titania's speech, according to the best
English critics, refer to a game known as "running the figure of
eight."
Space would fail to describe other boyish games of the time, even
those mentioned in the writings of Shakespeare; and I need not say
anything of leap-frog, trundling-hoop, battledore and shuttle-cock,
seesaw--sometimes called "riding the wild mare"--tops, and many
other pastimes in perennial favor with boys.
Mulcaster, the head-master of Merchant-Taylors School in London
(see page 106 above), in a book printed in 1581, enumerates
as suitable exercises for boys: "indoors, dancing, wrestling,
fencing, the top and scourge [whip-top]; outdoor, walking, running,
leaping, swimming, riding, hunting, shooting, and playing at the
ball--hand-ball, tennis, foot-ball, arm-ball." William doubtless
had experience in most of these, swimming in the Avon among them.
SWIMMING AND FISHING.
The spirited description of Ferdinand swimming (_The Tempest_, ii.
1. 113-121) could have been written only by one well skilled in the
art:--
"I saw him beat the surges under him,
And ride upon their backs; he trod the water,
Whose enmity he flung aside, and breasted
The surge most swoln that met him; his bold head
'Bove the contentious waves he kept, and oar'd
Himself with his good arms in lusty stroke
To the shore, that o'er his wave-worn basis bow'd,
As stooping to relieve him. I not doubt
He came alive to land."
There are many other allusions to swimming in the plays which
indicate the writer's personal acquaintance with the exercise; as
in _Macbeth_, i. 2. 8:--
"As two spent swimmers that do cling together
And choke their art."
The swimming match between Cæsar and Cassius (_Julius Cæsar_, i. 2.
100) is described with sympathetic vigor. Cassius says to Brutus:--
"We can both
Endure the winter's cold as well as he.
For once, upon a raw and gusty day,
The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,
Cæsar said to me, 'Dar'st thou, Cassius, now
Leap in with me into this angry flood,
And swim to yonder point?' Upon the word,
Accoutred as I was, I plunged in,
And bade him follow; so, indeed, he did.
The torrent roar'd, and we did buffet it
With lusty sinews, throwing it aside
And stemming it with hearts of controversy.
But ere we could arrive the point propos'd,
Cæsar cried, 'Help me, Cassius, or I sink!'
I, as Æneas, our great ancestor,
Did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulder
The old Anchises bear, so from the waves of Tiber
Did I the tired Cæsar."
Of course William often went a-fishing in the Avon, and understood,
as Ursula says in _Much Ado About Nothing_ (iii. 1. 26), that
"The pleasant'st angling is to see the fish
Cut with her golden oars the silver stream,
And greedily devour the treacherous bait."
BEAR-BAITING.
The boy must often have seen a bear-baiting, for the cruel sport
was popular with all classes, from sovereign to peasant. Queen
Elizabeth was fond of it, as was her sister Mary; and it was one
of the "princely pleasures" provided for the entertainment of
the former at Kenilworth in 1575, when thirteen great bears were
worried by bandogs.
On another occasion, when Elizabeth gave a splendid dinner to
the French ambassadors, she entertained them afterwards with the
baiting of bulls and bears; and she herself watched the sport till
six at night. The next day the ambassadors went to see another
exhibition of the same kind. A Danish ambassador, some years later,
was entertained by the Queen at Greenwich with a bear-baiting and
"other merry disports," as the chronicle expresses it.
[Illustration: FISHING IN THE AVON]
Elizabeth was a lover of the drama, but was unwilling that it
should interfere with these brute tragedies. In 1591, a royal edict
forbade plays to be acted on Thursdays, because bear-baiting
and similar sports had usually been practised on that day. This
order was followed by one to the same effect from the lord mayor,
who complained that "in divers places the players do use to recite
their plays to the great hurt and destruction of the game of
bear-baiting and such like pastimes, which are maintained for her
majesty's pleasure."
[Illustration: THE BEAR GARDEN, LONDON]
The clergy were as fond of these amusements as their parishioners
appear to have been. Thomas Cartwright, in a book published in
1572, says: "If there be a bear or a bull to be baited in the
afternoon, or a jackanapes to ride on horseback, the minister
hurries the service over in a shameful manner, in order to be
present at the show."
It is on record that at a certain place in Cheshire, "the town bear
having died, the corporation in 1601 gave orders to _sell their
Bible_ in order to purchase another." At another place, when a
bear was wanted for baiting at a town festival, the church-wardens
pawned the Bible from the sacred desk in order to obtain the means
of enjoying their immemorial sport.
There are many allusions to bear-baiting in Shakespeare. In
_Twelfth Night_ (i. 3. 98) Sir Andrew Aguecheek says: "I would
I had bestowed that time in the tongues [that is, the study of
languages] that I have in fencing, dancing, and bear-baiting: O,
had I but followed the arts!" In the same play (ii. 5. 9) Fabian,
referring to Malvolio, says to Sir Toby, "You know, he brought me
out of favor with my lady about a bear-baiting here"; and Fabian
replies, "To anger him we'll have the bear back again." There is a
figurative reference to the sport in this play (iii. 1. 130) where
Olivia says to the disguised Viola:--
"Have you not set mine honour at the stake,
And baited it with all the unmuzzled thoughts
That tyrannous heart can think?"
In _2 Henry VI._ (v. 1. 148) we find a similar figure where York
says to Clifford:--
"Call hither to the stake my two brave bears,
That with the very shaking of their chains
They may astonish these fell-lurking curs:
Bid Salisbury and Warwick come to me."
The amusing dialogue between Slender and Anne Page, in the _Merry
Wives of Windsor_ (i. 1. 307), may be added:--
"_Slender._ Why do your dogs bark so? be there bears i' the town?
_Anne._ I think there are, sir, I heard them talked of.
_Slender._ I love the sport well; but I shall as soon quarrel at
it as any man in England.--You are afraid, if you see the bear
loose, are you not?
_Anne._ Ay, indeed, sir.
_Slender._ That's meat and drink to me, now: I have seen
Sackerson loose twenty times, and have taken him by the chain;
but, I warrant you, the women have so cried and shriek'd at it,
that it passed [passed description]; but women, indeed, cannot
abide 'em; they are very ill-favoured rough things."
_Sackerson_ was a famous bear exhibited at Paris Garden, a popular
bear-garden on the Bankside in London, near the Globe Theatre. An
old epigram refers to the place and the animal thus:--
"Publius, a student of the common law,
To Paris-garden doth himself withdraw,
Leaving old Ployden, Dyer, and Broke alone,
To see old Harry Hunkes and Sacarson;"
that is, neglecting Ployden and other writers on law for the sports
at the bear-garden.
For the bear to get loose was a serious matter. We read in a diary
of 1554 that at a bear-baiting on the Bankside "the great blind
bear broke loose, and in running away he caught a servingman by the
calf of the leg and bit a great piece away," so that "within three
days after he died."
James I. prohibited baiting on Sundays, but did not otherwise
discourage it. In the time of the Commonwealth Paris Garden was
shut up, the bear was killed, and the amusement forbidden; but
with the Restoration it was revived, and continued to be popular
until the early part of the next century. In 1802 an attempt was
made in Parliament to suppress it altogether, but the House of
Commons by a majority of thirteen refused to pass the bill. It was
not until the year 1835 that baiting was finally abolished by an
act of Parliament, forbidding "the keeping of any house, pit, or
other place, for baiting or fighting any bull, bear, dog, or other
animal."
COCK-FIGHTING AND COCK-THROWING.
Cock-fighting was another barbarous amusement that was very early
in great favor in England. Fitz-stephen, who died in 1191, records
that in London "every year at Shrove Tuesday the schoolboys do
bring cocks to their master, and all the forenoon they delight
themselves in cock-fighting"; and it is not until the 16th century
that we find Dean Colet, the founder of St. Paul's School,
objecting to it as an amusement for the pupils.
The good lady who founded the Nottingham grammar school in 1513 was
content with restricting the sport to "twice a year."
In Scotland cock-fights were sanctioned as a school recreation
till the middle of the last century, and the master received a
fee, called "cock-penny," from the boys on the occasion. As late
as 1790, at Applecross, in Ross-shire, "the cock-fight dues" were
reckoned as a part of the schoolmaster's income.
Shakespeare has only two or three allusions to cock-fighting in
his works. Antony says of Octavius (_Antony and Cleopatra_, ii. 3.
36):--
"His cocks do win the battle still of mine,
When it is all to nought; and his quails ever
Beat mine, inhoop'd, at odds."
Dr. Johnson, in a note on the passage, says: "The ancients used
to match quails as we match cocks." The birds were _inhooped_, or
confined within a circle, to keep them "up to the scratch"; or,
according to some authorities, the one that was driven out of the
hoop was considered beaten.
Hamlet, when at the point of death, exclaims:--
"O, I die, Horatio;
The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit!"
He means that the poison triumphs over him, as a victorious cock
over his beaten antagonist.
In the _Taming of the Shrew_ (ii. 1. 228), Katharina says to
Petruchio, "You crow too like a craven." This word _craven_, which
meant a base coward, was often applied to a vanquished knight who
had not fought bravely, and hence came to be used with reference to
a beaten or cowardly cock, as it is in this passage.
Another popular diversion, especially among the boys, was
"throwing at cocks," in which the bird was tied to a stake and
sticks thrown at it until it was killed. This sport, which dates
back to the 14th century, and which was not uncommon in England
less than a hundred years ago, is said to have been peculiar to
that country.
Sir Thomas More, writing in the 16th century, tells of his own
skill in his childhood in casting a "cock-stele," that is, a stick
or cudgel to throw at a cock. The amusement was regularly practised
on Shrove Tuesday.
In some places the cock was put into an earthen vessel made for the
purpose, with only his head and tail exposed to view. The vessel
was then suspended across the street twelve or fourteen feet from
the ground, to be thrown at. The boy who broke the pot and freed
the cock from his confinement had him for a reward.
According to a popular superstition of Shakespeare's day, the cock
was supposed to be a kind of devil's messenger, from his crowing
after Peter's denial of his Master. Clergymen sometimes made this
an excuse for their enjoyment in cock-throwing.
Shakespeare makes no reference to this vulgar prejudice against
the cock. On the contrary, in a very beautiful passage in _Hamlet_
(i. 1. 158), he associates the bird with the joy and hope of
Christmas:--
"Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad,
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time."
OTHER CRUEL SPORTS.
When the Chief Justice says to Falstaff (_2 Henry IV._ i. 2. 255),
"Fare you well; commend me to my cousin Westmoreland," the fat
knight mutters, "If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle." The
allusion is to a cruel sport which is said to have been common
with Warwickshire boys. A toad was put on one end of a short board
placed across a small log, and the other end was then struck with
a bat, thus throwing the creature high in the air. This was called
_filliping_ the toad. A _three-man beetle_ was a heavy rammer with
three handles used in driving piles, requiring three men to wield
it. Such a beetle would evidently be needed for filliping a weight
like Falstaff's.
Falstaff alludes to another piece of boyish cruelty to animals in
_The Merry Wives of Windsor_ (v. 1.26) when he says, after the
cudgelling he has received from Ford, "Since I plucked geese,
played truant, and whipped top, I knew not what 'twas to be beaten
till lately." The young barbarians of Shakespeare's time thought
it fine sport to pull the feathers from a live goose. If they
sometimes got whipped for it, we may suppose that it was solely
for the mischief done to private property. When their elders were
fond of bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and other brutal amusements,
the boys would hardly be punished for torturing a domestic animal
unless its value was lessened by the ill-treatment.
Whether Shakespeare in his boyhood was guilty of thoughtless
cruelty like this, as boys are apt to be even nowadays, we cannot
say; but later in life he recognized its wantonness, and more than
once reproved the brutality of children of larger growth in their
sports and amusements.
In _Lear_ (iv. 1. 38) Gloster says bitterly:--
"As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods,
They kill us for their sport."
In the same play (iv. 7. 36) Cordelia, referring to the unnatural
conduct of Goneril in turning her old father out of doors in the
storm, exclaims:--
"Mine enemy's dog,
Though he had bit me, should have stood that night
Against my fire!"
The poet did not forget that even an insect may suffer pain. In
_Measure for Measure_ (iii. 1. 79) Isabella says to her brother:--
"Darest thou die?
The sense of death is most in apprehension;
And the poor beetle, that we tread upon,
In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great
As when a giant dies."
In _As You Like It_ (ii 1. 21) the banished Duke in the Forest of
Arden laments the necessity of killing deer for food:--
"_Duke S._ Come, shall we go and kill us venison?
And yet it irks me, the poor dappled fools,
Being native burghers of this desert city,
Should in their own confines with forked heads
Have their round haunches gor'd.
_1 Lord._ Indeed, my lord,
The melancholy Jaques grieves at that,
And, in that kind, swears you do more usurp
Than doth your brother that hath banish'd you.
To-day my lord of Amiens and myself
Did steal behind him as he lay along
Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunters' aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish; and, indeed, my lord,
The wretched animal heav'd forth such groans,
That their discharge did stretch his leathern coat
Almost to bursting, and the big round tears
Cours'd one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase: and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears."
The sympathy of the Duke and the First Lord for the "poor dappled
fools" is sincere, but that of Jaques, as we understand when we
come to know him better, is mere sentimental affectation. We may
be sure that the Duke rather than Jaques represents the feeling of
Shakespeare himself for the unfortunate creatures.
In another part of the same play (i. 2) the poet, through the mouth
of Touchstone, the philosophic Fool, gives a sly rap at people who
find amusement in brutal games. Le Beau, a courtier who is really
a kind-hearted fellow, as his conduct elsewhere proves, meeting
Rosalind and Celia, tells them that they have just "lost much fine
sport," that is, as he explains, some "good wrestling." They ask
him to "tell the manner of it," and he says:--
"There comes an old man and his three sons,--three proper young
men of excellent growth and presence. The eldest of the three
wrestled with Charles, the duke's wrestler; which Charles in a
moment threw him, and broke three of his ribs, that there is
little hope of life in him: so he served the second, and so the
third. Yonder they lie; the poor old man, their father, making
such pitiful dole over them that all the beholders take his part
with weeping.
_Rosalind._ Alas!
_Touchstone._ But what is the sport, monsieur, that the ladies
have lost?
_Le Beau._ Why, this that I speak of.
_Touchstone._ Thus men may grow wiser every day! It is the first
time that ever I heard breaking of ribs was sport for ladies.
_Celia._ Or I, I promise thee."
Wrestling, by the bye, was a common exercise with the rural youth
in the time of Elizabeth, and no doubt the smaller boys often tried
their hand at it.
ARCHERY.
Archery was a popular pastime in those days with young and old.
The bow and arrow continued to be used in warfare long after the
discovery of gunpowder. As late as 1572 Queen Elizabeth promised to
furnish six thousand men for Charles IX. of France, half of whom
were to be archers. Ralph Smithe, a writer on Martial Discipline in
the reign of the same queen, says: "Captains and officers should
be skilful of that most noble weapon the long bow; and to see that
their soldiers, according to their draught and strength, have good
bows," etc. In the reign of Henry VIII. several laws were made
for promoting the use of the long bow. One of these required every
male subject to exercise himself in archery, and also to keep a
long bow with arrows continually in his house. Men sixty years
old, ecclesiastics, and certain justices were exempted from this
obligation. Fathers and guardians were commanded to teach the male
children the use of the long bow, and to have bows provided for
them as soon as they were seven years old; and masters were ordered
to furnish bows for their apprentices, and to compel them to learn
to shoot therewith upon holidays and at every other convenient time.
In 1545 Roger Ascham published his _Toxophilus, or the Schole of
Shooting_, in which he advocated the practice of archery among
scholars as among the people at large, and gave full directions for
making and using bows and arrows. He dedicated the book to Henry
VIII., who rewarded the patriotic service with a pension of ten
pounds a year.
Ascham urged that attention should be paid to training the young in
archery; "for children," he said, "if sufficient pains are taken
with them at the outset, may much more easily be taught to shoot
well than men," because the latter have frequently more trouble to
unlearn their bad habits than would suffice to teach them good ones.
One of the statutes of Henry VIII. forbade any person who had
reached the age of twenty-four years from shooting at a mark less
than 220 yards distant; and a writer of 1602 tells of Cornish
archers who could send an arrow to a distance of 480 yards.
Matches of archery were held under the patronage of Henry VIII.
and Elizabeth, to encourage skill in the art. At one of these,
held in London in 1583, there was a procession of three thousand
archers, each of whom had a long bow and four arrows. Nine hundred
and forty-two of the men had chains of gold about their necks. The
company was guarded by four thousand whifflers (heralds or ushers)
and billmen, besides pages and footmen. They went through the city
to Smithfield, where, after performing various evolutions, they
"shot at a target for honor."
There are many allusions to archery in Shakespeare's works, only
one or two of which can be mentioned here. In _2 Henry IV._ (iii.
2. 49) Shallow, referring to "old Double," who is dead, says of
him: "Jesu, Jesu, dead! a' drew a good bow; and dead! a' shot a
fine shoot: John O' Gaunt loved him well, and betted much money on
his head. Dead! a' would have clapped i' the clout at twelve score;
and carried you a forehand shaft at fourteen and fourteen and a
half, that it would have done a man's heart good to see."
To "clap in the clout" was to hit the _clout_, or the white mark in
the centre of the target. "Twelve score" means twelve score or two
hundred and forty _yards_; and the "fourteen" and "fourteen and a
half" also refer to scores of yards. The "forehand shaft" is among
the kinds of arrow mentioned by Ascham, who says: "the forehand
must have a big breast, to bear the great might of the bow"; that
is, the great strain in shooting at long range.
In _Much Ado About Nothing_ (i. 1. 39) Beatrice, making fun of
Benedick, says: "He set up his bills here in Messina and challenged
Cupid at the flight; and my uncle's fool, reading the challenge,
subscribed for Cupid, and challenged him at the bird-bolt"; that
is, he posted a challenge, inviting Cupid to compete with him
in shooting with the _flight_, a kind of light-feathered arrow
used for great distances. The fool subscribed (wrote underneath)
a challenge to Benedick to try his skill with the cross-bow and
_bird-bolt_, a short, thick, blunt-headed arrow used by children
and fools, who could not be trusted with pointed arrows. The point
of the joke is that Benedick, though he has the vanity to think he
can compete in feats of archery with an expert bowman like Cupid,
is only fit to contend with beginners and blunderers.
In _Loves Labour's Lost_ (iv. 3. 23) Cupid's own arrow is jocosely
called a bird-bolt. Biron, finding that the King has fallen in love
with the French Princess, exclaims, "Shot, by heaven! Proceed,
sweet Cupid; thou hast thumped him with thy bird-bolt."
HUNTING
Professor Baynes, in his article on Shakespeare in the
_Encyclopædia Britannica_, says: "It is clear that in his early
years the poet had some experience of hunting, hawking, coursing,
wild-duck shooting, and the like. Many of these sports were pursued
by the local gentry and the yeomen together; and the poet, as the
son of a well-connected burgess of Stratford, who had recently
been mayor of the town and possessed estates in the county, would
be well entitled to share in them, while his handsome presence and
courteous bearing would be likely to ensure him a hearty welcome."
His love for dogs and horses is illustrated by many passages in his
works. There was never a more graphic description of hounds than he
puts into the mouth of Theseus in the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_
(iv. 1. 108):--
"_Theseus._ Go, one of you, find out the forester;
For now our observation is perform'd:
And since we have the vaward of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
Uncouple in the western valley; let them go!--
Despatch, I say, and find the forester.--
We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top,
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.
_Hippolyta._ I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear
With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear
Such gallant chiding: for, besides the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seem'd all one mutual cry. I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.
_Theseus._ My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung
With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
Crook-knee'd, and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls;
Slow in pursuit, but match'd in mouth like bells
Each under each. A cry more tuneable
Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:
Judge when you hear."
[Illustration: GARDEN AT NEW PLACE]
The talk of the hunters about the dogs in _The Taming of the Shrew_
(ind. 1. 16) is in the same vein:--
"_Lord._ Huntsman, I charge thee, tender well my hounds--
Brach Merriman, the poor cur, is emboss'd--
And couple Clowder with the deep-mouth'd brach.
Saw'st thou not, boy, how Silver made it good
At the hedge corner, in the coldest fault?
I would not lose the dog for twenty pound.
_1 Hunter._ Why, Bellman is as good as he, my lord;
He cried upon it at the merest loss,
And twice to-day pick'd out the dullest scent:
Trust me, I take him for the better dog.
_Lord._ Thou art a fool: if Echo were as fleet,
I would esteem him worth a dozen such.
But sup them well, and look unto them all;
To-morrow I intend to hunt again."
In the _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (i. 1. 96) Page defends his
greyhound against the criticisms of Slender, and Shallow takes his
part:--
"_Slender._ How does your fallow greyhound, sir? I heard say, he
was outrun on Cotsall.
_Page._ It could not be judged, sir.
_Slender._ You'll not confess, you'll not confess.
_Shallow._ That he will not.--'T is your fault, 't is your fault:
't is a good dog.
_Page._ A cur, sir.
_Shallow._ Sir, he 's a good dog, and a fair dog; can there be
more said? he is good and fair."
_Cotsall_ (or _Cotswold_) is an allusion to the Cotswold downs in
Gloucestershire, celebrated for coursing (hunting the hare), for
which their fine turf fitted them, and also for other rural sports.
The description of the horse in _Venus and Adonis_ (259), a
youthful work of Shakespeare's, is famous:--
"But, lo, from forth a copse that neighbours by,
A breeding jennet, lusty, young, and proud,
Adonis' trampling courser doth espy,
And forth she rushes, snorts, and neighs aloud;
The strong-neck'd steed, being tied unto a tree,
Breaketh his rein, and to her straight goes he.
Imperiously he leaps, he neighs, he bounds,
And now his woven girths he breaks asunder;
The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,
Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven's thunder;
The iron bit he crushes 'tween his teeth,
Controlling what he was controlled with.
His ears up-prick'd; his braided hanging mane
Upon his compass'd crest now stand on end;
His nostrils drink the air, and forth again,
As from a furnace, vapours doth he send;
His eye, which scornfully glisters like fire,
Shows his hot courage and his high desire.
Sometime he trots, as if he told the steps,
With gentle majesty and modest pride;
Anon he rears upright, curvets and leaps,
As who should say, 'Lo! thus my strength is tried;
And this I do to captivate the eye
Of the fair breeder that is standing by.'
What recketh he his rider's angry stir,
His flattering 'Holla', or his 'Stand, I say'?
What cares he now for curb or pricking spur,
For rich caparisons, or trapping gay?
He sees his love, and nothing else he sees,
Nor nothing else with his proud sight agrees.
Look, when a painter would surpass the life,
In limning out a well-proportion'd steed,
His art with nature's workmanship at strife,
As if the dead the living should exceed;
So did this horse excel a common one,
In shape, in courage, colour, pace, and bone.
Round-hoof'd, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long,
Broad breast, full eye, small head, and nostril wide,
High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing strong,
Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide:
Look, what a horse should have he did not lack,
Save a proud rider on so proud a back.
Sometime he scuds far off, and there he stares;
Anon he starts at stirring of a feather;
To bid the wind a base he now prepares,
And whether he run or fly they know not whether;
For thro' his mane and tail the high wind sings,
Fanning the hairs, who wave like feather'd wings."
In _Richard II._ (v. 5. 72) the dialogue between the Groom and the
King could have been written only by one who knew by experience the
affection that one comes to feel for a favorite horse:--
"_Groom._ I was a poor groom of thy stable, king,
When thou wert king; who, travelling towards York,
With much ado at length have gotten leave
To look upon my sometimes royal master's face.
O, how it yearn'd my heart, when I beheld,
In London streets, that coronation day,
When Bolingbroke rode on roan Barbary,
That horse that thou so often hast bestrid,
That horse that I so carefully have dress'd!
_King Richard._ Rode he on Barbary? Tell me, gentle friend,
How went he under him?
_Groom._ So proud as if he had disdain'd the ground.
_King Richard._ So proud that Bolingbroke was on his back!
That jade hath eat bread from my royal hand;
This hand hath made him proud with clapping him.
Would he not stumble? Would he not fall down,--
Since pride must have a fall,--and break the neck
Of that proud man that did usurp his back?
Forgiveness, horse! why do I rail on thee,
Since thou, created to be awed by man,
Wast born to bear? I was not made a horse;
And yet I bear a burden like an ass,
Spur-gall'd and tir'd by jauncing Bolingbroke."
The description of hare-hunting in _Venus and Adonis_ (679) must
also have been based on actual experience in the sport:--
"And when thou hast on foot the purblind hare,
Mark the poor wretch, to overshoot his troubles
How he outruns the winds, and with what care
He cranks and crosses with a thousand doubles:
The many musits through the which he goes,
Are like a labyrinth to amaze his foes.
"Sometime he runs among a flock of sheep,
To make the cunning hounds mistake their smell,
And sometime where earth-delving conies keep,
To stop the loud pursuers in their yell,
And sometime sorteth with a herd of deer;
Danger deviseth shifts, wit waits on fear:
"For there his smell with others being mingled,
The hot scent-snuffing hounds are driven to doubt,
Ceasing their clamorous cry till they have singled
With much ado the cold fault cleanly out;
Then do they spend their mouths; Echo replies,
As if another chase were in the skies.
"By this, poor Wat, far off upon a hill,
Stands on his hinder legs with listening ear,
To hearken if his foes pursue him still:
Anon their loud alarums he doth hear;
And now his grief may be compared well
To one sore sick that hears the passing-bell.
"Then shalt thou see the dew-bedabbled wretch
Turn, and return, indenting with the way;
Each envious brier his weary legs doth scratch,
Each shadow makes him stop, each murmur stay:
For misery is trodden on by many
And being low never reliev'd by any."
Mr. John R. Wise comments on this passage as follows: "This
description of the run is wonderfully true; how the 'dew-bedabbled
wretch' betakes herself to a flock of sheep to lead the hounds
off the scent; how she stops to listen, and again makes another
double. Mark, too, the beauty and aptness of the epithets, 'the hot
scent-snuffing' hounds, and the 'earth-delving' conies; but more
especially mark the pity that the poet feels for the poor animal,
showing that he possessed a true feeling heart, without which no
line of poetry can ever be written."
FOWLING.
There are many allusions to fowling in Shakespeare's works. He had
evidently seen a good deal of it, probably in his boyhood, whether
he had had actual experience in it or not.
In _As You Like It_ (v. 4. 111) the Duke says of Touchstone, who
combined much philosophy with his professional foolery, "He uses
his folly like a stalking-horse, and under the presentation of that
he shoots his wit." And in _Much Ado About Nothing_ (ii. 3. 95),
when Don Pedro and his companions are talking about Benedick, whom
they know to be hid within hearing, Claudio says: "Stalk on, stalk
on; the fowl sits"; that is, go on with the practical joke, for the
victim does not suspect it.
The stalking-horse, originally, was a horse trained for the purpose
and covered with trappings, so as to conceal the sportsman from
the game. It was particularly useful to the archer by enabling him
to approach the birds, without being seen by them, near enough to
reach them with his arrows. As it was not always convenient to
use a real horse for this purpose, the fowler had recourse to an
artificial one, made of stuffed canvas and painted like a horse,
but light enough to be moved with one hand. Hence _stalking-horse_
came to be used figuratively for anything put forward to conceal
a more important object, or to mask one's real intention. Thus an
old writer describes a hypocrite as one "that makes religion his
stalking-horse."
In the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_ (iii, 2. 20) Puck, describing the
fright of the clowns when Bottom makes his appearance with the
ass's head on his shoulders, says:--
"Anon his Thisbe must be answered,
And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy,
As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye,
Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort,
Rising and cawing at the gun's report,
Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky,
So at his sight away his fellows fly."
In _1 Henry IV._ (iv. 2. 21) Falstaff says that his recruits are
"such as fear the report of a caliver [musket] worse than a struck
fowl or a hurt wild-duck." And in _Much Ado_ (ii. 1. 209) Benedick
says of Claudio, who runs away from his friend's bantering: "Alas,
poor hurt fowl! now will he creep into sedges"; that is, he will go
and brood over his vexation in solitude.
In _The Tempest_ (ii. 1. 85) we have an allusion to "bat-fowling,"
a method of fowling by night in which the birds were started from
their nests and stupefied by a sudden blaze of light from torches.
Gervase Markham, a contemporary of Shakespeare, in his _Hunger's
Prevention, or the Whole Arte of Fowling_, says: "I think meet to
proceed to Bat-fowling, which is likewise a nighty taking of all
sorts of great and small birds, which rest not on the earth, but
on shrubs, tall bushes, hawthorn trees, and other trees, and may
fitly and most conveniently be used in all woody, rough, and bushy
countries, but not in the champaign," or open country. He then
goes on to explain how it is carried on. Some of the sportsmen
have torches to start the birds, while others are armed with "long
poles, very rough and bushy at the upper ends," with which they
beat down the birds bewildered by the light and capture them.
HAWKING.
Hawking, or falconry, the art of training and flying hawks for the
purpose of catching other birds, was a sport generally limited to
the nobility; but Shakespeare's many allusions to it show that
he was very familiar with all its forms and its technicalities.
He doubtless saw a good deal of it in his boyhood rambles in the
neighborhood of Stratford.
The practice of hawking declined with the improvement in muskets,
which afforded a readier and surer method of procuring game, with
an equal degree of out-of-door exercise. As the expense of training
and keeping hawks was very great, it is no wonder that the gun
soon superseded the bird with sportsmen. The change, indeed, was
surprisingly rapid. Hentzner, in his _Itinerary_, written in 1598,
tells us that hawking was then the general sport of the English
nobility; and most of the best treatises upon this subject were
written about that time; but in the latter part of the next century
the art was almost unknown.
Shakespeare knew all the different kinds of hawks. He refers
several times to the _haggard_, or wild hawk. In _Much Ado_ (iii.
1. 36) Hero says of Beatrice:--
"I know her spirits are as coy and wild
As haggards of the rock."
In _The Taming of the Shrew_ (iv. 1. 196) Petruchio employs the
same figure with reference to Katharina:--
"Another way I have to man my haggard,
To make her come and know her keeper's call";
where _man_ means to tame. Again in the same play (iv. 2. 39) the
shrew is called "this proud disdainful haggard."
[Illustration: ELIZABETH HAWKING]
The nestling or unfledged hawk was called an _eyas_; and in
_Hamlet_ (ii. 2. 355) the boy actors, who were becoming popular
when the play was written, are sneeringly described as "an aery of
children, little eyases." In the _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (iii. 3.
22), Mrs. Ford addresses Robin, the page of Falstaff thus: "How
now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?" The eyas-musket was the
young sparrow-hawk, a small and inferior species of hawk. The word
is derived from the Latin _musca_, a fly, and probably refers to
the small size of the bird. It is curious that, as applied to the
firearm, it has the same origin. The gun was figuratively compared
to the hawk as a means of taking birds. Similarly, a kind of cannon
used in the 16th century was called a falcon; and another, of
smaller bore, was known as a _falconet_.
In _Romeo and Juliet_ (ii. 2. 160), when the lover has left his
lady and she would call him back, she says:--
"Hist, Romeo, hist! O for a falconer's voice
To call this tassel-gentle back again!"
The _tassel-gentle_, or _tercel-gentle_, was the male hawk.
Cotgrave, in his _French Dictionary_ (edition of 1672) defines
_tiercelet_ as "the Tassell or male of any kind of Hawk, so termed
because he is, commonly, a third part less than the female." The
_gentle_ referred to the ease with which the bird was trained.
We find the word _tercel_ in _Troilus and Cressida_ (iii. 2. 56):
"The falcon as the tercel, for all the ducks in the river"; that
is, the female bird is as good as the male.
The male bird, however, was seldom used in hawking, on account of
its inferiority in size and strength. In descriptions of the sport
we find the female pronoun generally applied to the bird. Tennyson
in _Lancelot and Elaine_ originally wrote:--
"No surer than our falcon yesterday,
Who lost the hern we slipt him at";
but he afterwards changed "him" to "her."
The hawk was "hooded," that is, had a hood put over its head, until
it was _slipped_, or let fly at the game; and to this we have
several allusions in Shakespeare.
In _Henry V._ (iii. 7. 121) the Constable, sneering at the Dauphin,
says of his boasted valor: "Never anybody saw it but his lackey:
't is a hooded valour; and when it appears it will bate." To _bate_,
or _bait_, was to flutter the wings, as the bird did when unhooded.
In this passage there is a pun on _bate_ in this sense and as
meaning to abate or diminish.
In _Othello_ (iii. 3. 260), when the Moor has been told by Iago
that Desdemona may be false, he says:--
"If I do prove her haggard,
Though that her jesses were my dear heart-strings,
I'd whistle her off and let her down the wind,
To prey at fortune."
Here we have several hawking terms in a single sentence. _Haggard_,
already mentioned, is used as an adjective, meaning wild or
lawless. The _jesses_ were straps of leather or silk attached to
the foot of the hawk, by which the falconer held her. The bird was
_whistled off_ when first set free for flight; and she was always
let fly against the wind. If she flew with the wind behind her,
she seldom returned. If therefore a hawk was for any reason to be
dismissed, she was _let down the wind_, and from that time shifted
for herself and _preyed at fortune_, or at random.
The legs of the hawk were adorned with two small bells, not both of
the same sound but differing by a semitone. They were intended to
frighten the game, so that it could be more readily caught. This is
alluded to in _Lucrece_, 511:--
"Harmless Lucretia, marking what he tells
With trembling fear, as fowl hear falcon's bells."
Touchstone also refers to the bells in _As You Like It_ (iii.
3. 81): "As the ox hath his bow, sir, the horse his curb, and
the falcon her bells, so man hath his desires." There is another
figurative allusion to them in _3 Henry VI._ i. 1. 47, where
Warwick, boasting of his power, says:--
"Neither the king, nor he that loves him best,
The proudest he that holds up Lancaster,
Dares stir a wing if Warwick shake his bells."
In England _mews_ is the name commonly given to a livery stable,
or place where carriage horses are kept. The word has a curious
connection with hawking. A bird was said to _mew_, when it moulted
or changed its feathers. When hawks were moulting they were shut
up in a cage or coop, which was called a _mew_. The royal stables
in London got the name of _mews_ because they were built where
the mews of the king's hawks had been situated. This was done in
the year 1537, the hawks being removed to another place. The word
_mews_, being thus used for the royal stables, gradually came to be
applied to other buildings of the kind.
It would take too much space to quote and explain all the allusions
to hawking in Shakespeare's works. The few here given may serve as
samples of this very interesting class of technical terms, most of
which became obsolete when the art ceased to be practised.
[Illustration: BOY WITH HAWK AND HOUNDS]
Before dropping the subject, however, I may remind the young reader
that many of the quotations here given to illustrate archery,
hawking, and other ancient arts, sports, and games, also illustrate
the fact that the figurative language of a period is affected by
its manners and customs. The one needs to be known in order to
understand the other. To take a fresh example, John Skelton, who
lived in the time o£ Henry VIII., refers to a lady thus:--
"Merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower;
Gentle as falcon,
Or hawk of the tower."
If we should compare a young lady nowadays to a falcon or a hawk,
she would hardly take it as a compliment; and this very simile
has been criticised by a writer who evidently did not understand
it. He says: "We would rather be excused from wedding a lady of
that ravenous class. This simile, we fear, was predictive of sharp
nails after marriage." He forgets, or does not know, that this was
written when, as we have learned, the art of hawking was in vogue.
The trained falcons were as gentle and docile as any dove. They
were domestic pets, and high-born ladies especially took delight in
them. Shakespeare in his 91st Sonnet says:--
"Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,
Some in their wealth, some in their bodies' force,
Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill,
Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse.
* * * * *
Thy love is better than high birth to me,
Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost,
Of more delight than hawks or horses be,
And, having thee, of all men's pride I boast."
And in _Much Ado_ (iii. 4. 54) when Beatrice sighs, Margaret asks:
"For a hawk, a horse, or a husband?"
Commentators on Shakespeare, like the critic quoted above, have
sometimes erred in their interpretation of a passage because
they did not understand the fact or usage upon which a figure or
allusion was founded.
THEATRICAL ENTERTAINMENTS.
When the players came to town I suspect that no Stratford boy was
more delighted than William. John Shakespeare, like his fellows
in the town council, seems to have been a lover of the drama. When
he was bailiff in 1569 he granted licenses for performances of the
Queen's and the Earl of Worcester's companies.
[Illustration: ITINERANT PLAYERS IN A COUNTRY HALL]
The Queen's company received nine shillings and the Earl's
twelvepence for their first entertainments, to which the public
were admitted free. They doubtless gave others afterwards for which
an entrance fee was charged.
Did John Shakespeare take the five-year-old William to see
them act? He may have done so, for we know that in the city of
Gloucester (only thirty miles from Stratford) a man took his
little boy, born in the same year with Shakespeare, to a free
dramatic performance similarly provided by the corporation. In his
autobiography, written in his old age, the person tells how he went
to the show with his father and stood between his legs as he sat
upon one of the benches.
The play was one of the "moralities" then in vogue, and the good
man's quaint description of it is worth quoting as giving an idea
of those curious dramas:--
"It was called The Cradle of Security, wherein was personated a
king or some great prince, with his courtiers of several kinds,
amongst which three ladies were in special grace with him; and
they, keeping him in delights and pleasures, drew him from his
graver counsellors, ... that, in the end, they got him to lie down
in a cradle upon the stage, where these three ladies, joining in
a sweet song, rocked him asleep that he snorted again; and in the
mean time closely [that is, secretly] conveyed under the clothes
wherewithal he was covered a vizard, like a swine's snout, upon
his face, with three wire chains fastened thereunto, the other end
whereof being holden severally by those three ladies, who fall to
singing again, and then discovered [uncovered] his face that the
spectators might see how they had transformed him, going on with
their singing.
"Whilst all this was acting, there came forth of another door at
the farthest end of the stage two old men, the one in blue with a
sergeant-at-arms his mace on his shoulder, the other in red with
a drawn sword in his hand and leaning with the other hand upon
the other's shoulder; and so they two went along in a soft pace
round about by the skirt of the stage, till at last they came to
the cradle, when all the court was in the greatest jollity; and
then the foremost old man with his mace struck a fearful blow
upon the cradle, whereat all the courtiers, with the three ladies
and the vizard, all vanished; and the desolate prince starting up
bare-faced, and finding himself thus sent for to judgment, made a
lamentable complaint of his miserable case, and so was carried away
by wicked spirits.
"This prince did personate in the moral the Wicked of the World;
the three ladies, Pride, Covetousness, and Luxury [Lust]; the two
old men, the End of the World and the Last Judgment.
"This sight took such impression in me that, when I came towards
man's estate, it was as fresh in my memory as if I had seen it
newly acted."
So far as the Stratford records show, the theatrical company of
1569 was the first that had visited the town, but afterwards
players came thither almost every year.
How much they had to do in awakening a passion for the drama in
the breast of young William and shaping his subsequent career,
we cannot guess; but "the boy is father of the man," and in all
that we know of Shakespeare as a boy we can detect the germinal
influences of many characteristics of the man, the poet, and the
dramatist.
[Illustration: WILLIAM KEMP DANCING THE MORRIS]