BY two o’clock that afternoon all was in readiness for the performance
of the new comedy before Gloriana and her Court. A pavilion had been
raised in the middle of one of the great lawns, in order that the
spectators might be shielded from the sunshine which beat fiercely from
a cloudless July heaven. At the edge of the lawn was a thicket of fine
trees and heather, a veritable Forest of Arden in miniature. From the
depths of this glade emerged the performers in this woodland pastoral.
It was a great ordeal for Anne. On an occasion of far less importance
she might have been overcome by fear. But now she was strung up almost
to the breaking point. So grave was her pass and so much was at stake
that a supreme call was made upon her will. And she responded nobly. No
human being could have exercised a greater power of mind or brought a
finer resolution to bear upon her task.
The success of the play was never in doubt. To begin with it was one of
the Queen’s “good days.” At this time Elizabeth was past sixty. And a
temper which was not particularly mild even in the heydey of its youth
had grown severe. But even this old and sour woman could not remain
insensible to the wit and poetry of this new “interlude,” performed
with the highest skill and grace in charmingly appropriate surroundings.
The Queen made no pretensions to literary taste as did King James, her
successor. But she knew what she liked. And her untutored but extremely
shrewd faculty seldom led her astray. There were those, and Heming
and Burbage had been among them, who had been inclined to deplore the
fact that the author had not prepared stronger food for Gloriana’s
palate. A play of delicacy and fantasy, all lightness and grace, would
surely miss the mark. She who had held her sides at the broad humors of
_Juliet’s_ nurse and of _Hostess Quickly_ would hardly appreciate the
melancholy _Jacques_, _Touchstone_ and above all, the subtle charm of
_Rosalind_.
But this was not the case. Those finely accomplished actors, William
Kemp and Richard Burbage, had very wisely been intrusted with the
two chief male characters. To be sure, it was hardly Nature’s design
that they should interpret them, but players of their genius dignify
and embellish every rôle for which they are cast. The noble voice,
the manly bearing, the persuasive ease of style, that choicest fruit
of many a victory hardly won, tells just as surely in a whimsical
impersonation a little away from the main lines of human development,
as in the delineation of some incomparably drawn world figure such as
_Hamlet_, _Falstaff_, _Lear_.
Unaided, these great men would have carried through a weaker play. And
yet they did but serve as a kind of heavy relief, a somber frame for
the central figure. _Rosalind_ has stood for three centuries as the
symbol of womanhood in its youthful glory. That embodiment of the
divinity of girlhood still remains without a peer. And none could have
given it more powerful, more appealing expression than Anne Feversham.
From the moment the slight figure came out of the depths of the
forest and spoke her first magic lines in a voice as clear as a bell,
a hush seemed to fall upon all. The occupants of the pavilion, no
less than the humbler spectators who were privileged to sit upon
the grass were spellbound. The tall figure, trim and slender, yet
exquisite in outline, looked a little gaunt, a little fine-drawn in its
close-fitting boy’s dress. The eyes shone out of the pale face with a
luster that fascinated those the least sensitive to beauty. And the
voice thrilling with a nameless music ravished ears which knew it not
for a cadence borne upon the long night of the soul.
In that great and gallant company, however, were those who had eyes to
see and ears to hear. And when all was said, the Queen was foremost
among them. Harsh, crabbed, difficult, narrow, insensible to many
things as she was to the very end of that long life that was now so
near its close, she retained her force of judgment and her power of
seeing things in their true relation. _Rosalind_ spoke to her; spoke to
her not in her capacity as the sovereign of a great people, but of that
even more sacred, more universal thing, which every woman verging upon
seventy has once been herself. Of a sudden the raddled old cheeks were
wet.
Men, too, were spellbound. Cecil, Raleigh, Pembroke, Southampton and
many others almost equally famous were gazing upon that scene. These
were first-rate minds, and in all ages, in all countries, the eternal
verities address them in the same way. Sir Fopling knew that the Queen
was weeping, and was amazed that she should not have more regard for
the havoc of her cheeks; Cecil knew why she was weeping and held her so
much more a Queen.
Anne was strung to the breaking point. And not the Queen, and not
the Lord Treasurer, with all their power of mind, knew that. Richard
Burbage and William Kemp for all that they evoked the magic phrases
from her lips, for all that they were thrilled by the touch of her
fingers and the luster of her eyes were also unaware of it. One man
alone knew the perilous truth. And he was the individual in the doublet
slashed with bars of yellow who stood leaning against one of the noble
oaks of the Forest of Arden, in full view of the play but out of the
sight of the audience.
Shakespeare never once allowed his eyes to stray from _Rosalind_. He
watched her every movement, her every gesture. He had an intensity of
solicitude that a father might have shown for a beloved but fragile
daughter. At the end of each scene he led her apart from the others and
made her sit in the inner shade of the thicket. Here while she rested
the playwright encouraged her with word and deed. He was all kindness,
all tenderness, all forethought and concern.
Not far away was Gervase. Still in his disguise he had been placed
among the musicians. At Shakespeare’s behest he was biding his hour.
Before that day was out he had made up his mind to reveal himself
to the Queen. But the hour was not yet. It had been agreed between
Shakespeare and himself that the time and the manner of the confession
should be left to the player. And among the audience was the man
Grisewood narrowly watching all that passed. He too felt that the hour
was near in which the truth should be declared. But in his case he was
determined that the dramatic revelation should turn to his own personal
advantage.
In the meantime all went well with the play. Moreover, as it proceeded
the Queen began to show the liveliest interest in the personality of
the new _Rosalind_.
“Tell me, my lord,” she said, turning to Pembroke, an acknowledged
authority in all matters relating to the theater, “who is that sweet
chit in the doublet and trunk hose who cannot counterfeit manhood for
all her strivings?”
“By the bill of the play, your grace, she is called _Rosalind_ and is
apparently of the sex of which she is so poor an imitation.”
“Pshaw, my lord!” said the Queen contemptuously, “do you think I have
neither ears nor eyes? This is a _Rosalind_ that will never be able to
grow a beard. She is of my own sex and a sweeter chit I never saw in
all my life.”
“Far be it from me to gainsay your grace,” said Pembroke with an
elaborate air, “but according to the bill of the play I have in my
hand this _Rosalind_ is impersonated by a young Italian gentleman, one
Signor Arrigo Bandinello by name.”
“A young Italian fiddlestick!” said the Queen. “I tell you that girl is
as much an Italian gentleman as I am. She shall attend us when the play
is at an end. We will go into this matter more fully.”
However, when the play was over, it was the author who was first
honored with a summons to the royal pavilion. The Queen received
him with high good humor. For the time being she had forgotten the
personality of _Rosalind_ in the charm and glamour of the play itself.
In the graciousness of her mood she paid many compliments to the author
of “As You Like It” and was fain to admit “that she liked it very well.”
“You are a wonderful man, Master Shakespeare,” said the Queen. “And I
think you must be the happiest man alive.”
But there was nothing in the face of the player to suggest that
destiny. The somber eyes framed a question which the august lady was
quick to read and in the expansiveness of her mood was even prepared to
answer.
“You inhabit an enchanted world, Master Shakespeare. All the persons
in it are of your creation. You can order their natures and their
destinies exactly as it pleases you.”
“Alas, your grace!” The poet shook his head.
“Tell me, is it not so?” said the Queen.
“The world I inhabit, your grace, is that of human experience. It is
neither less nor more than that which we all know. A maker of plays
must depict life in its verity, and that is a hard matter and one which
tears the soul.”
The playwright spoke with the slow precision of one whom has felt in
his inmost fibers the long drawn agony of mortal life. The Queen was a
little amazed. In such a bearing and in such a speech there was not a
trace of that enchanted mind, all airy lightness, all delicate fantasy,
which had wrought such ravishment. Nor was there any sign of personal
satisfaction in the triumph which had been gained or in the fruits
of success which now he was beginning to gather in ample measure.
The Queen, being a woman, was a little inclined to be piqued by the
aloofness of the dramatist.
“Would you have us believe, Master Shakespeare,” she said, “that the
glad world which your inimitable fancy creates for the pleasuring of
your fellow-men is not a source of joy and delight to its possessor?
And would you have us believe that the homage which all the world has
come to pay to you brings not pride nor happiness?”
The playwright who stood before his sovereign with a throng of great
persons gathered round him, answered these rather embarrassing
questions with a curiously unstudied humility. Such a modesty of
bearing made an effect of perfect sincerity. Moreover, there was a
complete absence of self-regard. Few ordeals could have been more
trying for a man of small education, who knew but little of courts,
than to be exposed to the gaze of many sharp and jealous eyes, and
to be compelled to answer on the spur of the occasion a series of
most intimate questions concerning himself and his art. Such an
ordeal would have been a tax upon the alert readiness of mind and the
self-possession of a highly trained courtier. But there was not a trace
of awkwardness in the bearing of this singular man in the black doublet
barred with yellow. Indeed, there was nothing to suggest that the
situation in which he found himself was in any way unusual. And there
was no evidence that the presence of others, of even the highest in the
land, was a source of embarrassment to him. No man could have been more
completely at his ease or more completely master of himself.
“I will answer the second of your questions first, your grace,” he
said, speaking very slowly and looking directly at the Queen. “I am
indeed a very proud man that the travail of my mind should have given
pleasure to those whose favorable opinion must ever be coveted by all
honorable men. I unfeignedly rejoice and I am filled with gratitude
that your grace and those about you are pleased to approve my labors.
And whatever of happiness comes to me comes to me in that.”
“That is well spoken, Master Shakespeare,” said the Queen. “You do well
to allow that. And now touching the first of these questions I would
put to you. Is it that you take no happiness from the possession and
the exercise of your most noble gifts?”
“None, your grace. They are but the mirror and the counterfeit of life.
We makers of plays live in a world of shadows--a world of shadows woven
out of our own vitals as a spider weaves his web, and from which by
night or day there is no escape.”
“Would you escape them, Master Shakespeare, these inimitable children
of your fancy?”
“Yes, your grace, I would on occasion; I would almost yield life itself
to do so.”
The Queen was astonished by the almost passionate nature of the answer.
This man was no shallow deviser of masques to speed a summer’s day, but
one to whom existence was an almost intolerable burden, which admitted
of very little alleviation. And he was one who read its riddles with
the eyes of a seer.
“I begin to take your meaning, Master Shakespeare,” said the Queen.
“I had supposed that when these children of your fancy laughed and
made merry, you also rejoiced. But I had forgotten that even in these
plays of yours the sadness outweighs the mirth as is the case with life
itself, whereby a double burden is laid upon the endurance of their
creator.”
“Yes, your grace, that is indeed true. And yet that is not the full
measure of a poet’s unhappiness.”
“In what does a poet’s unhappiness consist, Master Shakespeare?”
“It consists, your grace, in this. A poet sees too much, feels too
much, knows too much. He is stretched perpetually on the rack of his
excess. He reads more into life than life itself will hold. Of a most
private grief he will make a little song. He will amuse the groundlings
with the tale of some deep injury he has suffered in his bones. When he
moves the crowd to tears, his fees are paid in blood.”
There was something in the nature of the answer which held the Queen.
Good sense was her highest quality, and it was that quality in others
which never failed to speak to her. She was captivated by the bearing
of this man, in whom she recognized not only the master of his craft,
but also what pleased her even more, a mature mind which had much to
say to her own acute and worldly wise one.
Indeed, so gratified was the Queen with the demeanor and the mental
quality of Mr. William Shakespeare, that, as a signal mark of her
favor, he was commanded to sit in her presence. The sovereign was prone
to carry her Tudor sense of importance to ridiculous lengths, but there
was some subtle instinct lurking within her which sought equality
between “the fair vestal throned by the west” and the monarch of an
empire infinitely wider than her own.