BEATRICE. You have stayed me in a happy hour. I was about to protest I loved you. BENEDICK. And do it with all thy heart. BEATRICE. I love you with so much of my heart that there is none left to protest." But here again the dominion rests with Beatrice, and she appears in a less amiable light than her lover. Benedick surrenders his whole heart to her and to his new passion. The revulsion of feeling even causes it to overflow in an excess of fondness; but with Beatrice temper has still the mastery. The affection of Benedick induces him to challenge his intimate friend for her sake; but the affection of Beatrice does not prevent her from risking the life of her lover. The character of Hero is well contrasted with that of Beatrice, and their mutual attachment is very beautiful and natural. When they are both on the scene together, Hero has but little to say for herself; Beatrice asserts the rule of a master spirit, eclipses her by her mental superiority, abashes her by her raillery, dictates to her, answers for her, and would fain inspire her gentle-hearted cousin with some of her own assurance :· "Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make curtsey, and say, 'Father, as it please you.' But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsey, and say, 'Father, as it please me.'” But Shakspeare knew well how to make one character subordinate to another, without sacrificing the slightest portion of its effect; and Hero, added to her grace and softness, and all the interest which attaches to her as the sentimental heroine of the play, possesses an intellectual beauty of her own. When she has Beatrice at an advantage, she repays her with interest in the severe but most animated and elegant picture she draws of her cousin's imperious character and unbridled levity of tongue. The portrait is a little overcharged, because administered as a corrective, and intended to be overheard : — "But Nature never fram'd a woman's heart All matter else seems weak: she cannot love, No, not to be so odd and from all fashions As Beatrice is, cannot be commendable; But who dare tell her so? If I should speak, She would mock me into air; O, she would laugh me Out of myself, press me to death with wit. It were a better death than die with mocks, Beatrice never appears to greater advantage than in her soliloquy after leaving her concealment "in the pleached bower where honeysuckles, ripened by the sun, forbid the sun to enter;" she exclaims, after listening to this tirade against herself, "What fire is in mine ears? Can this be true? Stand I condemn'd for pride and scorn so much ?" The sense of wounded vanity is lost in bitter feelings, and she is infinitely more struck by what is said in praise of Benedick and the history of his supposed love for her, than by the dispraise of herself. The immediate success of the trick is a most natural consequence of the selfassurance and magnanimity of her character; she is so accustomed to assert dominion over the spirits of others, that she cannot suspect the possibility of a plot laid against herself. A haughty, excitable, and violent temper is another of the characteristics of Beatrice; but there is more of impulse than of passion in her vehemence. In the marriage scene where she has beheld her gentle-spirited cousin whom she loves the more for those very qualities which are most unlike her own slandered, deserted, and devoted to public shame, her indignation, and the eagerness with which she hungers and thirsts after revenge, are, like the rest of her character, open, ardent, impetuous, but not deep or implacable. When she bursts into that outrageous speech "Is he not approved in the height a villain that hath slandered, scorned, dishonoured my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What! bear her in hand until they come to take hands; and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancour — O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market-place!" And when she commands her lover, as the first proof of his affection, to "kill Claudio," the very consciousness of the exaggeration, of the contrast between the real good-nature of Beatrice and the fierce tenor of her language, keeps alive the comic effect, mingling the ludicrous with the serious. It is remarkable that, notwithstanding the point and vivacity of the dialogue, few of the speeches of Beatrice are capable of a general application, or engrave themselves distinctly on the memory; they contain more mirth than matter; and though wit be the predominant feature in the dramatic portrait, Beatrice more charms poor and dazzles us by what she is than by what she says. It is not merely her sparkling repartees and saucy jests, it is the soul of wit, and the spirit of gaiety in forming the whole character, -looking out from her brilliant eyes, and laughing on her full lips that pout with scorn, which we have before us, moving and full of life. On the whole, we dismiss Benedick and Beatrice to their matrimonial bonds rather with a sense of amusement than a feeling of congratulation or sympathy; rather with an acknowledgment that they are well-matched and worthy of each other than with any well-founded expectation of their domestic tranquillity. If, as Benedick asserts, they are both "too wise to woo peaceably," it may be added that both are too wise, too witty, and too wilful to live peaceably together. We have some misgivings about Beatrice, some apprehensions that Benedick will not escape the "predestinate scratched face" which he had foretold to him who should win and wear this quick-witted and pleasant-spirited lady; yet when we recollect that to the wit and imperious temper of Beatrice is united a magnanimity of spirit which would naturally place her far above all selfishness and all paltry struggles for power; when we perceive, in the midst of her sarcastic levity and volubility of tongue, so much of generous affection, and such a high sense of female virtue and honour, we are inclined to hope the best. We think it possible that though the gentleman may now and then swear, and the lady scold, the native good-humour of the one, the really fine understanding of the other, and the value they so evidently attach to each other's esteem, will ensure them a tolerable portion of domestic felicity; and in this hope we leave them. COMMENTS ON TWELFTH NIGHT [From Knight's "Pictorial Edition."] THERE is something to our minds very precious in that memorial of Shakspere which is preserved in the little Table-book of the Student of the Middle Temple : "Feb. 2, 1601[2]. At our feast we had a play called Twelve night, or what you will.” What a scene do these few plain words call up before us! The Christmas festivities have lingered on till Candlemas. The Lord of Misrule has resigned his sceptre; the Fox and the Cat have been hunted round the hall; the Masters of the Revels have sung their songs; the drums are silent which lent their noisy chorus to the Marshall's proclamations; and Sir Francis Flatterer and Sir Randle Rackabite have passed into the ranks of ordinary men.1 But there is still a feast, and after the dinner a play; and that play Shakspere's Twelfth Night. And the actual roof under which the happy company of benchers and barristers and students first listened to that joyous and exhilarating play, full of the truest and most beautiful humanities, especially fitted for a season of cordial mirthfulness, is 1 Consult Dugdale's Origines Judiciales. |