Where the impression of mine eye infixing,
Contempt his scornful perspective did lend me,
Which warp'd the line of every other favour;
Scorn'd a fair colour, or express'd it stol'n;
Extended or contracted all proportions,
To a most hideous object: Thence it came,
That she, whom all men prais'd, and whom myself
Since I have lost have lov'd, was in mine eye
The dust that did offend it.

King.
Well excus'd:
That thou didst love her strikes some scores away
From the great compt: But love that comes too late,
Like a remorseful pardon slowly carried,
To the great sender turns a sour offence,
Crying, That 's good that 's gone: our rash faults
Make trivial price of serious things we have,
Not knowing them, until we know their grave:
Oft our displeasures, to ourselves unjust,
Destroy our friends, and after weep their dust:
Our own love waking cries to see what 's done,
While shameful hate sleeps out the afternoon.
Be this sweet Helen's knell, and now forget her.
Send forth your amorous token for fair Maudlin:
The main consents are had; and here we 'll stay
To see our widower's second marriage-day.

Count. Which better than the first, O dear Heaven, bless!

Or, ere they meet in me, O nature cesse.

Laf. Come on, my son, in whom my house's name
Must be digested, give a favour from you,
To sparkle in the spirits of my daughter,
That she may quickly come.-
.-By my old beard,
And every hair that 's on 't, Helen, that 's dead,
Was a sweet creature; such a ring as this,

The last that ere I took her leave at court,
I saw upon her finger.

Ber.

Hers it was not.

King. Now, pray you, let me see it; for mine eye, While I was speaking, oft was fasten'd to it.This ring was mine; and, when I gave it Helen, I bade her, if her fortunes ever stood Necessitied to help, that by this token

I would relieve her: Had you that craft, to reave

her

Of what should stead her most?

Ber.

King. Thou speak'st it falsely, as I love mine notour, And mak'st conjectural fears to come into me, Which I would fain shut out: If it should prove That thou art so inhuman,-'t will not prove so:And yet I know not:-thou didst hate her deadly, And she is dead; which nothing, but to close Her eyes myself, could win me to believe, More than to see this ring.-Take him away.[Guards seize BERTRAM. My fore-past proofs, howe'er the matter fall, Shall tax my fears of little vanity, Having vainly fear'd too little.-Away with him We'll sift this matter further. If you shall prove

Ber.

This ring was ever hers, you shall as easy
Prove that I husbanded her bed in Florence,
Where yet she never was. [Exit BERTRAM, guarded.
Enter the Astringer.

King. I am wrapp'd in dismal thinkings.

3

Ast. Gracious sovereign, Whether I have been to blame, or no, I know not; Here's a petition from a Florentine, Who hath, for four or five removes, come short To tender it herself. I undertook it, Vanquish'd thereto by the fair grace and speech Of the poor suppliant, who by this, I know, Is here attending: her business looks in her With an importing visage; and she told me, In a sweet verbal brief, it did concern Your highness with herself.

King. [Reads.]

Howe'er it pleases you to take it so, The ring was never hers.

Count.

Son, on my life,

I have seen her wear it; and she reckon'd it
At her life's rate.
Laf.
Ber. You are deceiv'd, my lord, she never saw it:
In Florence was it from a casement thrown me,
Wrapp'd in a paper, which contain'd the name
Of her that threw it: noble she was, and thought
I stood ingag'd: but when I had subscrib'd
To mine own fortune, and inform'd her fully,
I could not answer in that course of honour
As she had made the overture, she ceas'd,
In heavy satisfaction, and would never
Receive the ring again.

I am sure I saw her wear it.

Plutus himself,

King.
That knows the tinct and multiplying medicine,
Hath not in nature's mystery more science,

Than I have in this ring: 't was mine, 't was Helen's,
Whoever gave it you: Then, if you know
That you are well acquainted with yourself,
Confess 't was hers, and by what rough enforcement
You got it from her: she call'd the saints to surety,
That she would never put it from her finger,
Unless she gave it to yourself in bed,

Ingag'd. We think that the lady is represented by Bertram to have considered him "ingag'd"-pledged to herself.

[Exeunt the Astringer and some Attendants
I am afeard the life of Helen, lady,
Was foully snatch'd.
Count.

Now, justice on the doers!
Enter BERTRAM, guarded.

King. I wonder, sir, since wives are monsters to you,
And that you fly them as you swear them lordship,
Yet you desire to marry.-What woman 's that?

Re-enter the Astringer, with Widow and DIANA.
Dia. I am, my lord, a wretched Florentine,
Derived from the ancient Capulet;
My suit, as I do understand, you know,
And therefore know how far I may be pitied.

Wid. I am her mother, sir, whose age and honour
Both suffer under this complaint we bring,
And both shall cease, without your remedy.

King. Come hither, count: Do you know these women?

Ber. My lord, I neither can nor will deny

But that I know them: Do they charge me further? Dia. Why do you look so strange upon your wife?

a Removes-stages.

The tolling in a fair was necessary to the validity of a bar gain; and Lafen will get rid of Bertram by toll and sale, ac cording to one reading, or he will buy a son-in law, and to. laim, according to the other.

Ber She's none of mine, my lord.
Dia.

If you shall marry,
You give away this hand, and that is mine;
You give away Heaven's vows, and those are mine;
You give away myself, which is known mine;
For I by vow am so embodied yours,

That she which marries you must marry me,
Either both or none.

Lef. Your reputation [to BERTRAM] comes too short for my daughter; you are no husband for her.

Ber. My lord, this is a fond and desperate creature, Whom sometime I have laugh'd with: let your highness Lay a more noble thought upon mine honour, Than for to think that I would sink it here.

King. Sir, for my thoughts, you have them ill to friend,

Till your deeds gain them: Fairer prove your honour, Than in my thought it lies!

Dia.

Good my lord,

Ask him upon his oath, if he does think

He bad not my virginity.

King. What say'st thou to her?

Ber.

She 's impudent, my lord; And was a common gamester to the camp. Dia. He does me wrong, my lord; if I were so He might have bought me at a common price: Do not believe him: O, behold this ring, Whose high respect, and rich validity, Did lack a parallel; yet, for all that, He gave it to a commoner o' the camp, If I be one.

Count. He blushes, and 't is it:

Of six preceding ancestors, that gem

Conferr'd by testament to the sequent issue,
Hath it been ow'd and worn. This is his wife;
That ring's a thousand proofs.

King.

Methought, you said, You saw one here in court could witness it. Dia. I did, my lord, but loth am to produce So bed an instrument; his name 's Parolles. Laf. I saw the man to-day, if man he be. King. Find him, and bring him hither. Ber. What of him?

He's quoted for a most perfidious slave,

With all the spots o' the world tax'd and debosh'd;
Whose nature sickens but to speak a truth:
Am I or that, or this, for what he 'll utter,
That will speak anything?
King.

She hath that ring of yours.
Ber. I think she has certain it is I lik'd her,
And boarded her i' the wanton way of youth:
She knew her distance, and did angle for me,
Madding my eagerness with her restraint,
As all impediments in fancy's course
Are motives of more fancy; and, in fine,
Her insuit coming with her modern grace,
Subdued me to her rate: she got the ring:
And I had that which any inferior might
At market-price have bought.

Dia.
I must be patient;
You, that have turn'd off a first so noble wife,
May justly diet me. I pray you yet,
(Since you lack virtue I will lose a husband,)
Send for your ring, I will return it home,
And give me mine again.

Ber.

I have it not. King. What ring was yours, I pray you? Dia. Sir, much like the same upon your finger. King. Know you this ring? this ring was his of late. Dia. And this was it I gave him, being a-bed. King. The story then goes false, you threw it him Out of a casement.

Dia. I have spoke the truth.

• Validity-value

b Boarded-accosted

Ay, my lord.

King. Tell me, sirrah, but tell me true, I charge you Not fearing the displeasure of your master, (Which, on your just proceeding, I'll keep off,) By him, and by this woman here, what know you?

Par. So please your majesty, my master hath been an honourable gentleman; tricks he hath had in him which gentlemen have.

King. Come, come, to the purpose: Did he love this woman?

Par. 'Faith, sir, he did love her: But how?
King. How, I pray you?

Par. He did love her, sir, as a gentleman loves a

woman.

King. How is that?

Par. He loved her, sir, and loved her not. King. As thou art a knave, and no knave:-What an equivocal companion is this!

Par. I am a poor man, and at your majesty's com mand.

Laf. He's a good drum, my lord, but a naugnty

orator.

Dia. Do you know he promised me marriage? Par. 'Faith, I know more than I 'll speak. King. But wilt thou not speak all thou know'st? Par. Yes, so please your majesty : I did go between them, as I said; but more than that, he loved her,—for, indeed, he was mad for her, and talked of Satan, and of limbo, and of furies, and I know not what: yet I was in that credit with them at that time, that I knew of their going to bed; and of other motions, as promising her marriage, and things which would derive me ill will to speak of, therefore I will not speak what know.

King. Thou hast spoken all already, unless thou canst say they are married: But thou art too fine in thy evidence ; therefore stand aside.-This ring, you say, was yours?

King. Take her away.

I'll never tell you.

Dia. I'll put in bail, my liege. King. I think thee now some common customer. Dia. By Jove, if ever I knew man, 't was you. King. Wherefore hast thou accus'd him all this while? Dia. Because he 's guilty, and he is not guilty: He knows I am no maid, and he 'll swear to 't : I'll swear I am a maid, and he knows not. Great king, I am no strumpet, by my life; I am either maid, or else this old man's wife.

[Pointing to LAFEU.

King. She does abuse our ears; to prison with her. Dia. Good mother, fetch my bail.-Stay, royal sir; [Exit Widow.

The jeweller that owes the ring is sent for,
And he shall surety me. But for this lord,
Who hath abus'd me, as he knows himself,
Though yet he never harm'd me, here I quit him :
He knows himself my bed he hath defil'd;
And at that time he got his wife with child:
Dead though she be, she feels her young one kick;
So there's my riddle,-One that 's dead is quick;
And now behold the meaning.

No, my good lord;

T is but the shadow of a wife you see,
The name, and not the thing.
Ber.

Both, both; O, pardon!
Hel. O, my good lord, when I was like this maid,
I found you wond'rous kind. There is your ring,
And, look you, here's your letter: This it says,
"When from my finger you can get this ring,
And are by me with child," &c.-This is done:
Will you be mine, now you are doubly won

Ber. If she, my liege, can make me know this clearly, I'll love her dearly, ever, ever dearly.

Hel. If it appear not plain, and prove untrue,
Deadly divorce step between me and you!—
O, my dear mother, do I see you living?

Laf. Mine eyes smell onions, I shall weep anon :— Good Tom Drum [to PAROLLES] lend me a handker chief: So, I thank thee; wait on me home, I'll make sport with thee: Let thy courtesies alone, they are scurvy ones.

King. Let us from point to point this story know, To make the even truth in pleasure flow :

If thou be'st yet a fresh uncropped flower, [To DIANA.
Choose thou thy husband, and I'll pay thy dower,
For I can guess, that, by thy honest aid,
Thou kept st a wife herself, thyself a maid.—
Of that and all the progress, more and less,
Resolvedly more leisure shall express:

All yet seems well; and, if it end so meet,

The bitter past, more welcome is the sweet. [Flourish (Advancing.)

The king's a beggar, now the play is done:
All is well ended, if this suit be won,

That you express content; which we will pay,
With strife to please you, day exceeding day:
Ours be your patience then, and yours our parts;
Your gentle hands lend us, and take our hearts.

[Exeunt.

Malone has assigned the composition of A Midsummer-Night's Dream' to the year 1594. We are not disposed to dissent from this; but we entirely object to the reasous upon which Malone attempts to show that it was one of our author's "earliest attempts in comedy." It appears to us a misapplication of the received meaning of words, to talk of "the warmth of a youthful and lively imagination" with reference to 'A MidsummerNight's Dream' and the Shakspere of thirty. Of all the dramas of Shakspere there is none more entirely harmonious than A Midsummer-Night's Dream.' All the incidents, all the characters, are in perfect subordination to the will of the poet. • Throughout the whole piece," says Malone, "the more exalted characters are subservient to the interests of those beneath them." Precisely so. An unpractised author-one who had not "a youthful and lively imagination" under perfect control-when he had got hold of the Theseus and Hippolyta of the heroic ages, would have made them ultra-heroical. They would have commanded events, instead of moving with the supernatural influence around them in harmony and proportion. An immature poet, again, if the marvellous creation of Oberon and Titania and Puck could have entered into such a mind, would have laboured to make the power of the fairies produce some strange and striking events. But the exquisite beauty of Shakspere's conception is, that, under the supernatural influence, "the human mortals" move precisely according to their respective natures and habits. Demetrius and Lysander are impatient and revengeful;-Helena is dignified and affectionate, with a spice of female error ;-Hermia is somewhat vain and shrewish. And then Bottom! Who but the most skilful artist could have given us such a character? Of him Malone says, "Shakspeare would naturally copy those manners first with which he was first acquainted. The ambition of a theatrical candidate for applause he has happily ridiculed in Bottom the weaver." A theatrical candidate for applause! Why, Bottom the weaver is the representative of the whole human race. His confidence in his own power is equally profound, whether he exclaims, "Let me play the lion too;" or whether he sings alone, "that they shall hear I am not afraid;" or whether, conscious that he is surrounded with spirits, he cries out, with his voice of authority, "Where's Peas-blossom?" In every situation Bottom is the same,-the same personification of that self-love which the simple cannot conceal, and the wise can with difficulty suppress. Lastly, in the whole rhythmical structure of the versification, the poet has put forth all his strength. We venture to offer an opinion that, if any single compo

"This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard," says Hippolyta, when Wall has "discharged" his part. The answer of Theseus is full of instruction:- The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst are no worse if imagination amend them." It was in this humble spirit that the great poet judged of his own matchless performances. He felt the utter inadequacy of his art, and indeed of any art, to produce its due effect upon the mind, unless the imagination, to which it addressed itself, was ready to convert the shadows which it presented into living forms of truth and beauty. "I am convinced," says Coleridge, "that Shakspeare availed himself of the title of this play in his own mind, and worked upon it as a dream throughout." The poet says so, in express words:

"If we shadows have offended,

Think but this (and all is mended),
That you have but slumber'd here,
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,

No more yielding but a dream,
Gentles, do not reprehend."

But to understand this dream-to have all its gay, and soft, and harmonious colours impressed upon the vision-to hear all the golden cadences of its poesy— to feel the perfect congruity of all its parts, and thus to receive it as a truth-we must not suppose that it will enter the mind amidst the lethargic slumbers of the imagination. We must receive it—

"As youthful poets dream

On summer eves by haunted stream." To offer an analysis of this subtle and ethereal drama would, we believe, be as unsatisfactory as the attempts to associate it with the realities of the stage. With scarcely an exception, the proper understanding of the other plays of Shakspere may be assisted by connecting the apparently separate parts of the action, and by developing and reconciling what seems obscure and anomalous in the features of the characters. But to follow out the caprices and illusions of the loves of Demetrius and Lysander,—of Helena and Hermia;— to reduce to prosaic description the consequence of the jealousies of Oberon and Titania;-to trace the Fairy Queen under the most fantastic of deceptions, where grace and vulgarity blend together like the Cupids and Chimeras of Raphael's Arabesques ;-aud, finally, to go along with the scene till the illusions disappeartill the lovers are happy, and "sweet bully Bottom is reduced to an ass of human dimensions;-such an attempt as this would be worse even than unreverential criticism. No, the Midsummer-Night's Dream' must be left to its own influences.