And why is she so calm under this bitter reproach, which she believes to be real? Why shows she no after resentment against her cousin for the representation which she has drawn of her? Simply because she knows she has been playfully wearing a mask to hide the real strength of her sympathies. "Contempt, farewell! and maiden pride, adieu!" She is not a thing of mere negations; a fashionable, brilliant, untrusting thing. It is she whom we next encounter, all heart, presenting to us the poetical side of human nature, when all around her is prosaic; who, when her cousin's wedding "looks not like a nuptial," and that poor innocent Hero is deserted by lover and father, has alone the courage to say "O, on my soul my cousin is belied." It is the injury done to Hero which wrings from Beatrice the avowal of her love for Benedick. Is it a reproach to her that she would have her lover peril his life against the false accuser of her cousin? She has thrown off her maidenly disguises, and the earnestness of her soul will have vent. She and Benedick are now bound for ever in their common pity for the unfortunate. The conventional Beatrice has become the actual Beatrice. The "subjective appearance" has become the "objective reality." The same process is repeated throughout the character of Benedick, for the original groundwork of the character is the same as that of Beatrice. "Would you have me speak after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their sex," presents the same key to his character as "I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow, than a man swear he loves me," does to that of Beatrice. They are each acting; and they have each a shrewd guess that the other is acting; and each is in the other's thoughts; and the stratagem by which they are each entrapped-not, as we think, into an unreal love, as Ulrici says,-is precisely in its symmetrical simplicity what was necessary to get rid of their reciprocal disguises, and to make them straightforward and in earnest. The conclusion of the affair is the playful echo of all that is past :-- "Bene. Come, I will have thee; but, by this light, I take thee for pity. Beat. I would not deny you;-but, by this good day, I yield upon great persuasion." The Much Ado about Nothing was acted under the name of 'Benedick and Beatrice,' even during the life of its author. These two characters absorb very much of the acting interest of the play. They are star-characters, suited for the Garricks and Jordans to display themselves in. But they cannot be separated from the play without being liable to misconstruction. The character of Beatrice cannot be understood, except in connection with the injuries done to Hero; and except, once again, we view it, as well as the characters of all the other agents in the scene, with reference to the one leading idea, that there is a real aspect of things which is to be seen by the audience and not seen by the agents. The character of Don John, for example, and the characters of his loose confederates, are understood by the spectators; and their villainy is purposely transparent. Without Don John the plot could not move. He is not a rival in Claudio's love, as the "wicked duke" of Ariosto: he is simply a moody, ill-conditioned, spiteful rascal ;-such a one as ordinarily takes to backbiting and hinting away character. Shakspere gets rid of him as soon as he can he fires the train and disappears. He would be out of harmony with the happiness which he has suspended, but not destroyed; and so he passes from the stage, with "Think not on him till to-morrow." But his instrumentality has been of the utmost importance. It has given us that beautiful altarscene, that would be almost too tragical if we did not know that the "Much Ado" was "about Nothing." But that maiden's sorrows, and that father's passion, are real aspects of life, however unreal be the cause of them. The instrumentality, too, of the hateful Don John has given us Dogberry and Verges. Coleridge has said, somewhat hastily we think," any other less ingeniously absurd watchmen and night-constables would have answered the mere necessities of the action." Surely not. Make Dogberry in the slightest degree less self-satisfied, loquacious, full of the official stuff of which functionaries are still cut out, and the action breaks down before the rejection of Hero by her lover. For it is not the ingenious absurdity that prevents the detection of the plot against 124 Hero; it is the absurdity which prevents the prompt disclosure of it after the detection. Let us take a passage of this inimitable piece of comedy to read apart, that we may see how entirely the character of Dogberry is necessary to the continuance of the action. When Borachio and Conrade are overheard and arrested, the spectators have an amiable hope that the mischief of Don John's plot will be prevented; but when Dogberry and Verges approach Leonato, the end, as they think, is pretty sure. Let us see how the affair really works : "Leon. Neighbours, you are tedious. Dogb. It pleases your worship to say so, but we are the poor duke's officers; but, truly, for mine own part, if I were as tedious as a king I could find in my heart to bestow it all of your worship. Leon. All thy tediousness on me! ha! Dogb. Yea, and 't were a thousand times more than 'tis : for I hear as good exclamation on your worship, as of any man in the city; and though I be but a poor man I am glad to hear it. Verg. And so am I. Leon. I would fain know what you have to say. Verg. Marry, sir, our watch to night, excepting your worship's presence, have ta'en a couple of as arrant knaves as any in Messina. Dogb. A good old man, sir; he will be talking; as they Leon. Indeed, neighbour, he comes too short of you. Leon. I must leave you." Truly did Don Pedro subsequently say, "this learned constable is too cunning to be understood." The wise fellow, and the rich fellow, and the fellow that hath had losses, and one that hath two gowns and everything handsome about him, nevertheless holds his prisoners fast; and when he comes to the Prince, with "Marry, sir, they have committed false report; moreover, they have spoken untruths; secondarily, they are slanders; sixth and lastly, they have belied a lady; thirdly, they have verified unjust things; and, to conclude, they are lying knaves," though his method be not logical, his matter is all-sufficient. And so we agree with Ulrici, that it would be a palpable misunderstanding to ask what the noble constable Dogberry and his followers have to do with the play. Dogberry is as necessary as all the other personages;-to a certain degree more necessary. The passionate lover, the calm and sagacious Prince, the doting father, were the dupes of a treachery, not well compact, and carried through by dangerous instruments. They make no effort to detect what would not have been very difficult of detection: they are satisfied to quarrel and to lament. Accident discovers what intelligence could not penetrate; and the treacherous slander is manifest in all its blackness to the wise Dogberry : "Flat burglary as ever was committed." Here is the crowning irony of the philosophical poet. The players of the game of life see nothing, or see minute parts only: but the dullest by-stander has glimpses of something more. In studying a play of Shakspere with the assurance that we have possessed ourselves of the fundamental "idea" in which it was composed, it is remarkable how many incidents and expressions which have previously appeared to us at least difficult of comprehension are rendered clear and satisfactory. As believers in Shakspere we know that he wrought in the spirit of the highest art, producing in every case a work of uni'y, out of the power of his own "multiformity." But, as we have before said, we have not always, as in the case of the natural landscape, got the right point of view, so as to have the perfect harmony of the composition made manifest to us. Let us be assured, however, that there is an entirety, and therefore a perfect accordance in all its parts, in every great production of a great poet,—and above all in every production of the world's 125 greatest poet; and then, studying with this conviction, when the parts have become familiar to usas in the case before us the sparkling raillery of Benedick and Beatrice, the patient gentleness of Hero, the most truthful absurdity of Dogberry-they gradually fuse themselves together in our minds, and the whole at last lies clear before us, |