in England long before Shakespeare designed his comedy. According to the accounts of the court revels, "a Historie of Ariodante and Ginevra was shown before her Majestie on Shrovetuesdaie at night" in 1583. In 1591, Ariosto's account was turned into English by Sir John Harrington in his spirited translation of the of the Orlando Furioso. Shakespeare probably made use both of this and the dramatised "Historie," which has disappeared, and he no doubt also knew the metrical version by George Turbervile and the prose translation by Beverly in 1565. The story also appears in Spenser's Faerie Queene, and was made the subject of a play called Beautiful Phænicia by a German contemporary of Shakespeare, Jacob Ayrer. The first quarto edition of Much Ado about Nothing was published from an actingversion in 1600. It is noticeable that Shakespeare makes Don Pedro quote, as a proverbial saying, a line from Kyd's Spanish Tragedie-"In time small wedge will cleave the sturdiest oak."

In the next play, As You Like It, a similar tribute is paid to Marlowe by the quotation of a line from Hero and Leander, "Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?" The oft-repeated dictum, "All the world's a stage," was already common to European literature. The Duke's allusion to a "wide and universal theatre" may have had reference to the famous book, Theatrum Vita Humana, published at Metz in 1596. Gratiano in The Merchant of Venice uses a similar phrase, and the Latin "Totus Mundus agit histrionem" was inscribed over the entrance to the "Globe" theatre. The notion of the " seven

ages of man was also quite a common idea, and may be found symbolically treated in the seven mosaics on the pavement of Sienna Cathedral, and elsewhere in medieval and Renaissance art. But, in seeking his dramatic material for As You Like It, Shakespeare reaches the founts of genuine English romance in the Robin Hood cycle of legends, haunting his native country and the forest of Arden. Local tradition says that he wrote the play at the house of his uncle, Thomas Shakespeare, on the edge of the forest-a house now known as Shakespeare Hall, Rowington. In any case, his knowledge of the historic woodland which the Avon separated from the open pastures of South Warwickshire was intimate, and dated from his earliest years. He shows, moreover, a detailed mastery of the "legal incidents of sylvan economy." The marshes or margins on the outskirts of the forest were known as "purlieus"; and here the forest laws were only partially enforced, and the individual owner's rights established. Thus Corin's master could sell "his cote, his flock, and bounds of feed," and Celia and Rosalind could buy "the cottage, the pasture, and the flock" (Dr. T. Spencer Baynes). But, to balance this privilege, such owners gave up their right of common pasture in the forest, and had to keep their sheep well folded and shepherded, lest they should injure the deer. Only privileged persons could hunt venison in the forest, but any deer straying beyond its borders were held to be "fair game,' " and it was the business of the forest ranger to keep them within bounds.

One of the very few traditions that survive to us

of Shakespeare's career as an actor is that he played Adam in As You Like It, and that his younger brother, Gilbert, recalled this performance with peculiar pleasure in his old age. "Hints for the scene of Orlando's encounter with Charles the Wrestler" (says Mr. Lee), "and for Touchstone's description of a lie, were clearly drawn from Saviolo's Practise, a manual of the art of selfdefence, by an Italian fencing-master in the service of the Earl of Essex." Mr. Israel Gollancz, in his analysis of the play, discovers slips in dramatic construction which seem to point to its being hurriedly written, and suggests also that the part of Hymen was added by another hand. It incorporates the old tale of Gamelyn the Outlaw (wrongly attributed to Chaucer) in which the hero is certainly the prototype of Orlando; but the plot itself is almost directly taken from a famous contemporary novel by Thomas Lodge-" Rosalynde, Euphues' Golden Legacie; found after his death in his cell at Silexedra; bequeathed to Philautus' sons nursed up with their father in England: fetcht from the Canaries by T. L. Gent." To the characters herein provided, Shakespeare added the delightful Audrey; Touchstone, the best and wittiest of his jesters; and Jacques, his finest study of the egotist, the dilletante, the amateur in life. Comparing him, in a fine analogy, with Falstaff, in his perpetual evasion of realities, Professor Dowden says: "Jacques knows no bonds that unite him to any living thing. He lives upon novel, curious, and delicate sensations; to him sentiment stands in the place of passion. But real knowledge of life is not gained by the curious seeker for experiences." ESTHER WOOD.