Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama by Walter W. Greg

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[255] The similarity between Silvia and Shakespeare's Viola and Beaumont's
Euphrasia-Bellario is too obvious to need comment. It may, however, be
remarked that in Noci's _Cintia_ (1594) the heroine returns home disguised
as a boy, to find her lover courting another nymph. See p. 212.

[256] This narrative has been much admired, notably by Lamb and Coleridge,
critics from whom it is not good to differ; but I must nevertheless
confess that, to my taste, Daniel's sentiment, here as elsewhere, is
inclined to verge upon the fulsome and the ludicrous.

[257] It is evident that this pompous inflation of style damaged the piece
upon the stage, for on Feb. 10, 1613-4, John Chamberlain, writing to Sir
Dudley Carleton, described the performance as 'solemn and dull.'

[258] The corresponding passage in the _Aminta_ (I. ii.) is marred by a
series of rather artificial conceits.

[259] Architecture or building. A very rare use not recognized by the New
English Dictionary, though it is also found in Browne's _Britannia's
Pastorals_ (I. iv. 405):

To find an house ybuilt for holy deed,
With goodly architect, and cloisters wide.

[260] Guarini had already called dreams (_Pastor fido_, I. iv):

Immagini del di, guaste e corrotte
Dall' ombre della notte.

[261] Saintsbury, in his _Elizabethan Literature_, insists, not
unnaturally, on Daniel's lack of strength. Upon this Grosart commented in
his edition (iv. p. xliv.): 'This seems to me exceptionally uncritical....
One special quality of Samuel Daniel is the inevitableness with which he
rises when any "strong" appeal is made to ... his imagination.' The
partiality of an editor could surely go no further.

[262] The prodigality of _Oh's_ and _Ah's_ is an obvious characteristic of
his verse, which may possibly have been in Jonson's mind when, in the
prologue to the _Sad Shepherd_, he wrote:

But that no stile for Pastorall should goe
Current, but what is stamp'd with _Ah_, and _O_;
Who judgeth so, may singularly erre.

[263] This could hardly be maintained as literally true were we to include
the Latin plays of the Universities. Of these, however, I propose to take
merely incidental notice. In no case do they appear to be of considerable
importance, and they are, as a rule, only preserved in MSS. which are
often difficult of access. I may here mention one which reached the
distinction of print, and is of a more regularly Italian structure than
most. The title-page reads: 'Melanthe Fabula pastoralis acta cum Iacobus
Magnae Brit. Franc. & Hiberniae Rex, Cantabrigiam suam nuper inviseret,
ibidemq; Musarum, atque eius animi gratia dies quinque Commoraretur.
Egerunt alumni Coll. San. et Individuae Trinitatis. Cantabrigiae.
Excudebat Cantrellus Legge. Mart. 27. 1615.' The play was acted, according
to the invaluable John Chamberlain, on March 10, 1614-5, and appears to
have made a very favourable impression. It belongs to the series of
entertainments which included the representation of _Albumazar_, and was
to have included that of Phineas Fletcher's _Sicelides_, had the king
remained another night. The author of _Melanthe_ is said to have been 'Mr.
Brookes,' probably the Dr. Samuel Brooke who had produced the
already-mentioned translation of Bonarelli's _Filli di Sciro_ two years
before. See Nichols' _Progresses of James I_, iii. p. 55.

[264] Fleay considers the _Faithful Shepherdess_ a joint production of
Beaumont and Fletcher. The only external evidence in favour of this theory
is a remark of Jonson's reported by Drummond: 'Flesher and Beaumont, ten
yeers since, hath [_sic_] written the Faithfull Shipheardesse, a
Tragicomedie, well done.' Considering that the same authority makes Jonson
ascribe the _Inner Temple Masque_ to Fletcher, his statement as to the
_Faithful Shepherdess_ cannot be allowed much weight, while I hardly think
that the fact of Beaumont having prefixed commendatory verses to Fletcher
in the original edition can be set aside as lightly as Fleay appears to
think. He relies chiefly upon internal evidence, but in his _Biographical
Chronicle_, at any rate, does not venture upon a detailed division. For
myself, I can only discover one hand in the play, and that hand
Fletcher's. Fleay places the date of representation before July, 1608, on
account of an outbreak of the plague lasting from then to Nov. 1609, but
A. H. Thorndike (_The Influence of Beaumont and Fletcher on Shakspere_,
Worcester, Mass., 1901, p. 14) has shown good reason for believing that
dramatic performances were much less interfered with by the plague than
Fleay imagined.

[265] Most of these, it may be remarked, as well as the character of
Thenot and the unconventional role of the satyr, find parallels in the
earlier stages of the Italian pastoral. The transformation-well recalls
the enchanted lake of the _Sacrifizio_; the introduction of a supernatural
agent in the plot reminds us of the same play, as well as of Epicuro's
_Mirzia_; the friendly satyr, of this latter, which may be, in its turn,
indebted to the revised version of the _Orfeo_; the character of Thenot is
anticipated in the _Sfortunato_. I give the resemblances for what they are
worth, which is perhaps not much; it is unlikely that Fletcher should have
been acquainted with any of the plays in question, though of course not
impossible. The magic taper appears to be a native superstition, a
survival of the ordeal by fire.

[266] Certain critics have suggested that the _Pastor fido_ might more
appropriately have borne the title of Fletcher's play. This is absurd,
since it would mean giving the title-role to the wholly secondary Dorinda.
Perhaps they failed to perceive that Mirtillo and not Silvio is the hero.
With Fletcher's play the case stands otherwise. There is absolutely
nothing to show whether the title refers to the presiding genius of the
piece, Clorin, faithful to the memory of the dead, or to the central
character, Amoret, faithful in spite of himself to her beloved Perigot. I
incline to believe that it is the latter that is the 'faithful
shepherdess,' since it might be contended that, in the conventional
language of pastoral, Clorin would be more properly described as the
'constant shepherdess.' (Cf. II. ii. 130.)

[267] See Homer Smith's paper on _Pastoral Influence in the English
Drama_. His theory concerning the _Faithful Shepherdess_ will be found on
p. 407. Whatever plausibility there may be in the general idea, the
detailed application there put forward would appear to be a singular
instance of misapplied ingenuity in pursuance of a preconceived idea.

[268] 'Poems' [1619], p. 433. Compare Boccaccio's account of pastoral
poetry already quoted, p. 18, note.

[269] One fault, which even the beauty of the verse fails to conceal, is
the introduction of all sorts of stilted and otiose allusions to
sheepcraft, which only serve to render yet more apparent the inherent
absurdity of the artificial pastoral. These Tasso and Guarini had had the
good taste to avoid, but we have already had occasion to notice them in
the case of Bonarelli. Daniel is likewise open to censure on this score.

[270] I quote, of course, from Dyce's text, but have for convenience added
the line numbers from F. W. Moorman's edition in the 'Temple Dramatists.'

[271] The officious critic must be forgiven for remarking that the satyr
is not, as might be supposed from this speech, suddenly tamed by Clorin's
beauty and virtue, but shows himself throughout as of a naturally gentle
disposition. Consequently Clorin's argument that it is the mysterious
power of virginity that has guarded her from attack and subdued his savage
nature appears a little fatuous.

[272] Specifically from 'wanton quick desires' and 'lustful heat.' One is
almost tempted to imagine that the author is laughing in his sleeve when
we discover of what little avail the solemn ceremony has been.

[273] In 1658 there appeared a Latin translation, under the title of _La
Fida pastora,_ by 'FF. Anglo-Britannus,' namely, Sir Richard Fanshawe, as
appears from an engraved monogram on the title-page.

[274] As Fleay points out, the prologue and epilogue are not suited to
court representation.

[275] Randolph's familiarity with Guarini is evident throughout, and there
is at least one distinct reminiscence, namely Thestylis' humorous
expansion of Corisca's remark about changing her lovers like her clothes:

Other Nymphs
Have their varietie of loves, for every gowne,
Nay, every petticote; I have only one,
The poore foole Mopsus! (I. ii.)

[276] A word borrowed by Randolph from the Greek, [Greek: o)mphe/], a
divine voice or prophecy. He may possibly have associated the word with the
Delphic [Greek: o)mphalo/s].

[277] It is possible that Laurinda's indecision may owe something to the
_doppio amore_ of Celia in the _Filli di Sciro_. See especially III. i. of
that play.

[278] Homer Smith quotes as Halliwell's the description of the play as
'one of the finest specimens of pastoral poetry in our language, partaking
of the best properties of Guarini's and Tasso's poetry, without being a
servile imitation of either.' He has been misled into supposing that the
comments in the _Dictionary of Plays_ are original. The above first
appears in the _Biographia Dramatica_ of 1812, and may therefore be
ascribed to Stephen Jones. All Halliwell did was to omit the further
words, 'its style is at once simple and elevated, natural and dignified.'
The whole description is of course in the very worst style of critical
claptrap. Halliwell reprinted the 'fairy' scenes in his _Illustrations of
the Fairy Mythology of A Midsummer Night's Dream_ (Shakespeare Soc.,
1845), though how they were supposed to illustrate anything of the kind we
are not informed.

[279] 1822, p. 61. This, the only modern edition of Randolph, is one of
the worst edited books in the language, and no literary drubbing was ever
better deserved than that administered by the _Saturday Review_ on August
21, 1875. As the text is quite useless for purposes of quotation, I have
had recourse to the very correct first edition of the _Poems_, 1638,
checked by a collation of the numerous subsequent issues.

[280] The sense in the original is defective.

[281] i.e. Tethys, a very common confusion.

[282] The fact that the play was never published as a separate work makes
it difficult to estimate its popularity with the reading public. The whole
collection was freqnently reprinted, 1638, 1640, 1643, 1652, 1664 and 1668
twice. In 1703 appeared the _Fickle Shepherdess_, 'As it is Acted in the
New Theatre in Lincolns-Inn Fields. By Her Majesties Servants. Play'd all
by Women.' This piece is said in the epistle dedicatory to Lady Gower to
be 'abreviated from an Author famous in his Time.' It is in fact a prose
rendering, much compressed, of the main action of Randolph's play, the
language being for the most part just sufficiently altered to turn good
verse into bad prose.

[283] Vide post, p. 382.

[284] For a detailed discussion of the evidence I must refer the reader to
the Introduction to my reprint of the play in the _Materialien zur Kunde
des aelteren Englischen Dramas_ (vol. xi, 1905). The following summary may
be quoted. '(i) There is no ground for supposing that there ever existed
more of the _Sad Shepherd_ than we at present possess. (ii) The theory of
the substantial identity of the _Sad Shepherd_ and the _May Lord_ must be
rejected, there being no reason to suppose that the latter was dramatic at
all. (iii) The two works may, however, have been to some extent connected
in subject, and fragments of the one may survive embedded in the other.
(iv) The _May Lord_ was most probably written in the autumn of 1613. (v)
The date of the _Sad Shepherd_ cannot be fixed with certainty; but there
is no definite evidence to oppose to the first line of the prologue and
the allusion in Falkland's elegy [in _Jonsonus Virbius_], which agree in
placing it in the few years preceding Jonson's death.'

[285] The play has no doubt been somewhat lost in the big collected
editions of the author's works, and has also suffered from its fragmentary
state. Previous to my own reprint it had only once been issued as a
separate publication, namely, by F. G. Waldrou, whose edition, with
continuation, appeared in 1783. One of the best passages, however (II.
viii), was given in Lamb's _Specimens_. In quoting from the play I have
preferred to follow the original of 1640, as in my own reprint, merely
correcting certain obvions errors, rather than Gifford's edition, in which
wholly unwarrantable liberties are taken with the text.

[286] Waldron, in his continuation, matches her with Clarion.

[287] It involves, moreover, the critical fallacy of supposing that poetry
is a sort of richly embroidered garment wherewith to clothe the nakedness
of the underlying substance. This may be so in certain cases in which the
poet is made and not born, or in which he forces himself to work at an
uncongenial theme. But in a genuine work of art the substance cannot so be
separated from the form without injury to both. The poetry in this case is
not an external adornment, but a necessary part of the structure, without
which it would be something else than what it is. Verse, when in organic
relation with the subject, modifies the character of that subject itself,
and the subject can only be rightly apprehended through the medium of the
verse. I contend that the _Sad Shepherd_ is a case in point, and Mr.
Swinburne's remarks, I conceive, bear out my view. I shall not, therefore,
seek to analyse the types represented by the characters--styling poor
little Amie a modification of the type of the 'forward shepherdess'!--nor
count the number of lines assigned respectively to the shepherds, to the
huntsmen, or to the witch; but shall endeavonr to ascertain the particular
object Jonson had in view in adopting a particular presentation of the
subject, the means he employed, and the measure of success he achieved.

[288] The distinction which appears to belong peculiarly to the drama is
most likely a survival of the influence of the mythological plays, in
which the huntress nymphs of Diana frequently appear. We find, however, a
tendency to a similar dualism in Mantuan's upland and lowland swains.

[289] It has recently been argued with much ingenuity that Marian is
originally none other than the familiar figure of French _pastourelles_.
However this may be, it is a question with which I am not here concerned.
It was the English Robin Hood tradition that formed part of Jonson's rough
material. See E. K. Chambers, _The Mediaeval Stage_, i. p. 175.

[290] The author, however, is at fault in his terms of art. If the quarry
to which he likens Aeglamour had a dappled hide, it was a fallow and not a
red deer. In this case it should have been called a buck, and not a hart.
Again, the female should have been a doe: deer is a generic name including
both sexes of red, fallow, and roe alike.

[291] A translation of the _Astree_ appeared as early as 1620, but the
French fashion obtained no hold over the popular taste till the later days
of the Commonwealth.

[292] I may say that this section was written as it stands before K.
Brunhuber's essay on _Sidneys Arcadia und ihre Nachlaufer_ came into my
hands. He gives a superficial account of several printed plays, but was
unaware of the existence of those in MS.

[293] The quotations are from the Gifford-Dyce edition of Shirley's Works
(1833), the only collected edition that has appeared. The text stands
badly in need of revision, but I have had to content myself with a few
obvious corrections. For instance, in the passage quoted above, the
editors have followed the quarto in reducing l. 13 to nonsense, by reading
'no man,' and l. 20 by reading 'And the imagination.'

[294] So at least in the printed play. In the original draft, and probably
also in the acting version, as Fleay has pointed out, they were king and
queen, and of this traces remain. Thus we twice find Gynetia addressed as
'Queen,' while elsewhere 'Duke' rimes with 'spring,' and 'Duchess' with
'spleen.' The alteration was no doubt made from motives of prudence. Even
so the play was, according to Fleay, published surreptitiously, i.e. it
does not appear on the Stationers' Register.

[295] A. H. Bullen's reprint of Day's works was privately printed in 1881.
Though the text is not in all respects satisfactory, I have thought myself
justified in quoting from it as the only edition available.

[296] Not tennis, as Mr. Bullen states (Introd. p. 17), oblivious for the
moment of the impossibility of representing a tennis match on the stage,
as well as of the fact that the game was never, in Elizabethan times,
played by ladies.

[297] There is one printed play, the relation of which to the _Arcadia_ is
not very clear. The title, _Mucedorus_, at once suggests some connexion,
but it is difficult to follow it out in detail. Mucedorus, 'the king's
sonne of Valentia,' leaves his father's court and goes disguised as a
shepherd to win the love of Amadine, 'the king's daughter of Arragon.' He
twice rescues the princess, is sentenced to banishment, and reveals his
identity just as his father arrives in search of him. The play was
originally printed in 1598, but no doubt originated some years earlier,
_c._ 1588 according to Fleay. Most of the resemblances with the _Arcadia_,
however, are due to scenes which first appeared in 1610, in which edition
the king of Valentia first plays a part. Beyond Mucedorus' disguise there
is absolutely nothing pastoral in the play. With the exception of some of
the additional scenes, which are undoubtedly by a different hand from the
rest, the play is unrelieved rubbish. Probably the original author
utilized in the composition of his piece such elements and incidents of
the _Arcadia_ as he had gathered orally while the unfinished work still
circulated in MS. Later the reviser, being aware of this source, expanded
the play from a knowledge of the completed work. It cannot be said to be a
dramatization of the romance, though it is undoubtedly in a manner founded
upon it.

[298] Egerton MS. 1994. Not _Love's Changelings Changed_, as usually
quoted.

[299] _Old Plays_, ii. p. 432.

[300] Rawl. Poet, 3.

[301] In the Bodleian MS. Ashmole 788 is a Latin epistle by Philip Kynder,
a miscellaneous writer and court agent under Charles I, born in 1600 at
latest, which was 'prefixt before my _Silvia_, a Latin comedie or
pastorall, translated from the _Archadia_, written at eighteen years of
age.' (See Halliwell's _Dic. of Plays_.) The 'Archadia' might, of course,
refer either to Sannazzaro's or Lope de Vega's romances, though this is
highly improbable.

[302] So much we learn from the title-page itself. The play had very
likely been acted at court some years earlier, but the document mentioning
such a performance, printed by Cunningham, is of doubtful authenticity,
while Fleay contradicts himself upon the subject. The question is,
happily, immaterial to our present purpose.

[303] Here, as in the _Isle of Gulls_, the titles of Duke and Duchess have
been imperfectly substituted for King and Queen, probably for court
performance.

[304] The story in the romance is very different. Erona, after many
adventures, marries her lover. Both episodes are related in Book II,
chapters xiii and following (ed. 1590). They are epitomized by Dyce, whose
edition I have of course used.

[305] Here, again, the catastrophe of the play bears no resemblance to the
romance.

[306] See III. v. According to Chetwood (_British Theatre_, 1752, p. 47),
the play was revived in 1671, with a prologue attributing it to Shirley.
This is, of course, possible, but it requires more than Chetwood's
unsupported authority to render it probable. Fleay suggests that the
author is the same as the J. S. of _Phillis of Scyros_, namely, as I have
shown, Jonathan Sidnam. This seems to me highly improbable. The play is
printed in Hazlitt's Dodsley, vol. xiv, whence I quote, with necessary
corrections.

[307] Bk. I. chaps. v-viii, Bk. III. chap. xii, in the edition of 1590.

[308] Quotations are taken, with corrections, from Pearson's reprint of
Glapthorne's works (1874).

[309] K. Deighton's emendation, undoubtedly correct, for 'Love' of the
original. (_Conjectural Readings_, second series, Calcutta, 1898, p. 136.)

[310] I have been unable to trace this work beyond a reference to Heber's
sale given in Hazlitt's _Handbook_. The original story will be found in
_Albion's England_, Book IV, chap. xx, of the first Part, published in
1586. As Dr. Ward points out, it is a variant of the old romance of
Havelok. Edel, with a view to disinheriting his niece Argentile, heir to
Diria (?Deira), of which he is regent, seeks to marry her to a base
scullion. This menial, however, is really Curan, prince of Danske, who has
sought the court in disguise, in the hope of obtaining the love of the
princess, who is mewed up from intercourse with the world. Of this
Argentile is ignorant, and when she hears of her uncle's purpose, she
contrives to escape from court and lives disguised as a shepherdess. After
her flight Curan also leaves the court and assumes a shepherd's garb, and
meeting Argentile by chance again falls in love with her without knowing
who she is. After a while he reveals his identity, and she hers; they are
married, and he conquers back her kingdom from the usurping Edel.

[311] So far as I am aware, A. B. Grosart was the first to point this out.
(_Spenser_, iii. p. lxx.)

[312] It is printed in Hazlitt's _Webster_, vol. iv. Fleay, with
characteristic assurance, identifies the _Thracian Wonder_ with a lost
play of Heywood's, known only from Henslowe's Diary, and there called 'War
without blows and love without suit.' He argues: 'in i. 2, "You never
shall again renew your suit;" but the love is given at the end without any
suit; and in iii. 2, "Here was a happy war finished without blows."' The
identification, however, will not bear examination. No battle, it is true,
is fought at Sicily's first appearance, but the title, _War without Blows_
could hardly be applied to a play in which the whole of the last act is
occupied with fierce fighting between three different nations. So with the
second title, _Love without Suit_. Serena indeed grants her love in the
end without any reason whatever, but only after her lover has 'suited'
himself clean out of his five wits. Moreover, it is not certain that this
second title should not be _Love without Strife_. Heywood's play, I have
little doubt, was a mere love-comedy (cf. such titles as _The Amorous
War_, and similar expressions in the dramatists _passim_). The
identification, moreover, would necessitate the date 1598, though this
does not prevent Fleay from stating that the piece is founded on William
Webster's poem published in 1617. So early a date seems to me rather
improbable. Since William Webster's poem has nothing to do with the
present piece, the suggestion that Kirkman's attribution of the play to
John Webster was due to a confusion of course falls to the ground.

[313] According to S. L. Lee in the _Dic. Nat. Biog._, who follows the
_Biographia Dramatica._

[314] It will be found in Mr. Bullen's admirable collection, _Lyrics from
the Dramatists_, 1889, p. 231.

[315] Reprinted in 1882 by A. H. Bullen in the first volume of his _Old
English Plays_, and more recently by R. W. Bond in his edition of Lyly. In
quoting, I have generally followed the latter, though I have preferred my
own arrangement of certain passages. None of the suggestions that have
been put forward as to the authorship of the play appear to me to carry
much weight. The ascription of the whole to Lyly, first made by Archer in
1656, and repeated by Halliwell as late as 1860, is now utterly
discredited. The view, first advanced by Edmund Gosse, that the author was
John Day, has been tentatively endorsed by both editors of the piece; but
I agree with Professer Gollancz in thinking it unlikely on the ground of
style. Fleay assigns the serious (verse) portion of the play to Daniel,
and the comic (prose) scenes to Lyly. It seems to me unlikely, however,
that Daniel, who was shortly to appear as the chief exponent of the
orthodox Italian tradition, should at this date have been concerned in the
production of a typical example of the hybrid pastoral of the English
stage. Nor do I believe that Lyly was in any way concerned in the piece,
though some scenes are evident imitations of his work. This, however,
involves the question of the authorship of the lyrics found in Lyly's
plays, and I must refer for a detailed discussion to my article upon the
subject already cited (p. 227).

[316] _Metamorphoses_, ix. 667, &c. Ward is moved to characterize the plot
as a theme of 'Ovidian lubricity.' I question whether any such censure is
merited. That the theme is one which would have become intolerably
suggestive in the hands of the Sienese Intronati, for instance, may be
admitted, but the author has treated the story with complete _naivete_.
The obscene passages referred to later on (p. 345) occur in the comic
action, and are in no way connected with the point in question. Ward
further informs us that the play is 'throughout in rime,' notwithstanding
the fact that something approaching a quarter of the whole is in prose.