Volume 10 — VOLUME X (continued 8)

The Duke of Mayenne, finding that in this last scheme, which he had believed infallible, he was disappointed as well as in the rest, placed all his future dependence upon his old friends the Parisians, and neglected no method by which he might awaken their mutinous disposition; but so far was he from succeeding in this attempt that he could not hinder them from discovering their joy at what had just passed at St. Denis. They talked publicly of peace, and even in his presence; and he had the mortification to hear a proposal to send deputies to the King to demand a truce for six months, and they obliged him to give his consent to it. The truce for three months, which had been granted them at Surêne, had only inspired them with an inclination for a longer one.

The King gave audience to the deputies in full council. The greatest number of those who composed it, listening to nothing but their jealousy of the Duke of Mayenne, whom they feared as a man that had the means in his power of purchasing favor and rewards, were of the opinion that no attention ought to be paid to this demand of the deputies, because the person who sent them persisted in his revolt against the King, even after his abjuration. Notwithstanding the justice of not confounding the Duke of Mayenne with the Parisians, I saw this advice was likely to be followed, and it certainly might have produced some very bad consequence. I therefore insisted so strongly upon the advantage of letting the people, already recovered from their first terrors, taste the sweets of a peace which would interest them still more in the King's favor, that this Prince declared he would grant the truce they demanded of him, but for the months of August, September, and October only.

The next day a prodigious concourse of the populace of Paris assembled at St. Denis. The King showed himself to the people and assisted publicly at mass; wherever he turned his steps the crowd was so great that it was sometimes impossible to pierce through it, while every moment a million of voices cried, "Long live the King!" Everyone returned, charmed with the gracefulness of his person, his condescension, and that engaging manner which was natural to him. "God bless him!" said they, with tears in their eyes, "and grant that he may soon do the same in our Church of Notre Dame in Paris." I observed to the King this disposition of the people with regard to him; tender and sensible as he was, he could not behold this spectacle without strong emotions.

Some months later, while on a mission for the King, I received from his majesty a letter, which concluded with these words: "Come to me at Senlis on the 20th of March, or at St. Denis on the 21st, that you may help to cry, 'Long live the King!' in Paris, and afterward we will do the same at Rouen."

It was upon some correspondence the King carried on in Paris that he founded his hopes of being soon admitted there, and he was on his way thither from St. Denis when I joined him. His party in that city was so firmly united, and so many persons of equal courage and fidelity had joined it, that it was almost impossible but that it should succeed. Ever since the battle of Arques, when the Count of Belin was taken prisoner by the King's forces, and had an opportunity of discovering the great qualities of Henry contrasted with the weakness of his enemies, the Duke of Mayenne perceived the inclinations of the count to lean secretly toward the King. Full of this suspicion, he did not hesitate a moment about depriving him of the government of so considerable a city as Paris, and, seeking for a man whose fidelity to himself and the League could be depended upon, to whom he might intrust the care of this great city at a time when the necessity of his affairs obliged him to repair to the frontier of Picardy, he fixed upon Brissac and made him governor.

Brissac, at first, answered his purposes perfectly well. The study of Roman history had inspired this officer, who valued himself greatly upon his penetration and judgment, with a very singular project, which was to form France into a republic upon the model of ancient Rome, and make Paris the capital of this new state. Had Brissac descended ever so little from these lofty ideas to an attention to particular applications, which in the greatest designs it is necessary to have some regard to, he would have perceived that there are circumstances under which a scheme, however happily imagined, may, by the nature of the obstacles which oppose it, by the difference of the genius and character of the people, by the force of those laws they have adopted, and by long custom, which, as it were, stamps a seal upon them, become alike chimerical and impracticable. Time only and long experience can bring remedies to defects in the customs of a state whose form is already determined; and this ought always to be attempted with a view to the plan of its original constitution: this is so certain that, whenever we see a state conducted by measures contrary to those made use of in its foundation, we may be assured a great revolution is at hand; nor does the application of the best remedies operate upon diseases that resist their force.

Brissac did not go so far; he could not for a long time comprehend from whence the general opposition his designs met with proceeded, for he had explained himself freely to the nobles and all the chief partisans of the League; at last he began to be apprehensive for his own safety lest, while, without any assistance, he was laboring to bring his project to perfection, the King should destroy it entirely by seizing his capital. Possessed with this fear, the Roman ideas quickly gave place to the French spirit of those times, which was to be solicitous only for his own advantage. When self-interested motives are strengthened by the apprehension of any danger, there are few persons who will not be induced by them to betray even their best friend. Thus Brissac acted: he entered into the Count of Belin's resolutions, though from a motive far less noble and generous, and thought of nothing but of making the King purchase at the highest price the treachery he meditated against the Duke of Mayenne in his absence. St. Luc, his brother-in-law, undertook to negotiate with the King in his name, and having procured very advantageous conditions, Brissac agreed to admit Henry with his army into Paris in spite of the Spaniards. The troops of the League were absolutely at his disposal, and there was no reason to apprehend any opposition from the people.

D'O lost no time in making application for the government of Paris and the Isle of France, and obtained his request; but now a conflict between his interest and ambition so perplexed this superintendent that, notwithstanding his new dignity, the reduction of Paris was among the number of those things he most feared should happen: he would have had it believed that the true motive of this fear was, lest the finances should become a prey to the men of the sword and gown, by whom, he said, the King, as soon as he was possessed of Paris, would be oppressed for the payment of pensions, appointments, and rewards. But this discourse deceived none but those who were ignorant of the advantage he found in keeping the affairs of the finances in their present state of confusion, and with what success he had hitherto labored for that purpose.

The King, upon this occasion, put all the friends of the Count of Belin in motion, on whom he had no less dependence than upon Brissac, and at nine o'clock in the morning presented himself, at the head of eight thousand men, before the Porte Neuve, where the Mayor of Paris and the other magistrates received him in form. He went immediately and took possession of the Louvre, the Palace, the Great and Little Châtelet, and, finding no opposition anywhere, he proceeded even to the Church of Notre Dame, which he entered to return thanks to God for his success. His soldiers, on their part, fulfilled with such exactness the orders and intentions of their master that no one throughout this great city complained of having received any outrage from them. They took possession of all the squares and crossways in the street, where they drew up in order of battle. Everything was quiet, and from that day the shops were opened with all the security which a long-continued peace could have given.

The Spaniards had now only the Bastille, the Temple, and the quarters of St. Anthony and St. Martin in their possession; and there they fortified themselves, being about four thousand in number, with the Duc de Feria and Don Diego d'Evora at their head, all greatly astonished at such unexpected news, and firmly resolved to defend themselves to the last extremity, if any attempts were made to force them from those advantageous posts. The King relieved them from their perplexity by sending to tell them that they might leave Paris and retreat in full security. He treated the Cardinals of Placentia and Pelleve with the same gentleness, notwithstanding the resentment he still retained for their conduct with regard to him. Soissons was the place whither these enemies of the King retired,[6] protected by a strong escort. His majesty then published a general pardon for all the French who had borne arms against him. When this sacrifice is not extorted by necessity, but, on the contrary, made at a time when vengeance has full liberty to satiate itself, it is not one of the least marks of a truly royal disposition.

CULMINATION OF DRAMATIC LITERATURE IN "HAMLET"

A.D. 1601

JAMES O. HALLIWELL-PHILLIPPS

The tragedy of Hamlet is generally regarded by critics as Shakespeare's masterpiece. Hence it is often referred to as the highest literary product of human genius. In the following discussion of the play, Mr. J. O. Halliwell-Phillipps, the master and dean of later Shakespearean scholars, gives 1601 as the probable date of its first production. At that time Shakespeare was a London actor, and leading shareholder in the Globe Theatre, where his play was presumably produced. He had made his first big success some five years before with Romeo and Juliet, and was, so far as we can judge, on the high tide of financial prosperity. The profession of an actor carried with it in those days much discredit, but in his far-off home at Stratford, Shakespeare had in 1601 already begun to seek the repute of a country gentleman, and had purchased the finest house and estate in the little village.

Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps' Memoranda on Hamlet were never thrown into final shape by the author. Therefore the editors have taken such slight liberties in rearranging the order of his text as were necessary to make its discourse consecutive.

The tragedy of Hamlet is unquestionably the highest effort of artistic literary power yet given to the world. There is nothing to be found in real competition with it excepting in the other works of Shakespeare, but all are inferior to this great masterpiece. There is hardly a speech in the whole play which may not fairly be made the subject of an elaborate discourse, especially when viewed in connection with its bearings, however occasionally remote, on the character of Hamlet, the development of which appears to have been the chief object of the author, not only in the management of the plot, but in the creation of the other personages who are introduced. There is contemporary evidence to this effect in the Stationers' Register of 1602 in the title there given—The Revenge of Hamlet.

There was an old English tragedy on the subject of Hamlet which was in existence at least as early as the year 1589, in the representation of which an exclamation of the Ghost—"Hamlet, revenge!"—was a striking and well-remembered feature. This production is alluded to in some prefatory matter by Nash in the edition of Greene's Menaphon, issued in that year, here given: "I'le turne backe to my first text, of studies of delight, and talke a little in friendship with a few of our triuiall translators. It is a common practise now a daies amongst a sort of shifting companions that run through euery arte and thriue by none, to leaue the trade of Nouerint whereto they were borne, and busie themselues with the indeuors of art, that could scarcelie latinize their necke-verse if they should haue neede; yet English Seneca read by candle light yeeldes manie good sentences, as Bloud is a beggar, and so foorth: and if you intreate him faire in a frostie morning, he will afoord you whole Hamlets, I should say hand-fulls of tragical speeches."

Another allusion occurs in Lodge's Wits' Miserie, "and though this fiend be begotten of his father's own blood, yet is he different from his nature; and were he not sure that jealousie could not make him a cuckold, he had long since published him for a bastard: you shall know him by this, he is a foule lubber, his tongue tipt with lying, his heart steeled against charity; he walks for the most part in black under color of gravity, and looks as pale as the visard of the ghost which cried so miserably at the theator like an oister-wife,' Hamlet, revenge'." Again, in Decker's Satiromastix, 1602: "Asini. 'Wod I were hang'd, if I can call you any names but Captaine and Tucca.' Tuc. 'No, fye'st, my name's Hamlet, revenge. Thou hast been at Parris Garden, hast not?' Hor. 'Yes, Captaine, I ha plaide Zulziman there'"; with which may be compared another passage in Westward Hoe, 1607—"I, but when light wives make heavy husbands, let these husbands play mad Hamlet and crie, revenge." So, likewise, in Rowland's Night Raven, 1620, a scrivener, who has his cloak and hat stolen from him, exclaims, "I will not cry, Hamlet, revenge my greeves." There is also reason to suppose that another passage in the old tragedy of Hamlet is alluded to in Armin's Nest of Ninnies, 1608: "There are, as Hamlet sayes, things cald whips in store," a sentence which seems to have been well known and popular, for it is partially cited in the Spanish Tragedie, 1592, and in the First Part of the Contention, 1594.

It seems, however, certain that all the passages above quoted refer to a drama of Hamlet anterior to that by Shakespeare, and the same which is recorded in Henslowe's Diary as having been played at Newington in 1594 by "my Lord Admeralle and my lorde Chamberlen men, 9 of June, 1594, receved at Hamlet, viii, 5," the small sum arising from the performance showing most probably that the tragedy had then been long on the stage. As Shakespeare was a member of the Lord Chamberlain's Company at that time, it is certain that he must have been well acquainted with the older play of Hamlet, one of a series of dramas on the then favorite theme of revenge, aided by the supernatural intervention of a ghost.

There are a few other early allusions to the first Hamlet which appear to deserve quotation. "His father's empire and government was but as the Poeticall Furie in a Stageaction, compleat, yet with horrid and wofull Tragedies: a first, but no second to any Hamlet; and that now Reuenge, iust Reuenge was coming with his Sworde drawne against him, his royall Mother, and dearest Sister to fill up those Murdering Sceanes."—Sir Thomas Smithe's Voiage and Entertainment in Rushia, 1605. "Sometimes would he overtake him and lay hands upon him like a catch-pole, as if he had arrested him, but furious Hamlet woulde presently eyther breake loose like a beare from the stake, or else so set his pawes on this dog that thus bayted him that, with tugging and tearing one another's frockes off, they both looked like mad Tom of Bedlam."—Decker's Dead Terme, 1608. "If any passenger come by and, wondering to see such a conjuring circle kept by hel-houndes, demaund what spirits they raise there, one of the murderers steps to him, poysons him with sweete wordes and shifts him off with this lye, that one of the women is falne in labor: but if any mad Hamlet, hearing this, smell villanie and rush in by violence to see what the tawny divels are dooing, then they excuse the fact, lay the blame on those that are the actors, and perhaps, if they see no remedie, deliver them to an officer to be lead to punishment."—Decker's Lanthorne and Candle-light, or the Bellman's Second Nights-Walke, 1609, a tract which was reprinted under more than one different title.

Mr. Collier, in his Farther Particulars, 1839, cites a very curious passage—"a trout, Hamlet, with four legs"—which is given as a proverbial line in Clarke's Paroemiologia Anglo-Latina (or Proverbs English and Latin), 1639. It is unnecessary to be too curious in searching for the exact meaning of the phrase, but, as Dr. Ingleby suggested to me, it is in all probability taken from the older play of Hamlet, which does not appear to have been entirely superseded at once by the new, or at least was long remembered by play-goers.

The preceding notices may fairly authorize us to infer that the ancient play of Hamlet—1. Was written by either an attorney or an attorney's clerk, who had not received a university education; 2. Was full of tragical, high-sounding speeches; 3. Contained the passage "There are things called whips in store," spoken by Hamlet; 4. Included a very telling brief speech by the Ghost in the two words "Hamlet, revenge!" 5. Was acted at the theatre in Shoreditch and at the playhouse at Newington Butts; 6. Had for its principal character a hero exhibiting more general violence than can be attributed to Shakespeare's creation of Hamlet.

As the older Hamlet was performed by the Lord Chamberlain's Company in the year 1594, it is possible that Shakespeare might then have undertaken the part of the Ghost, a character he afterward assumed in his own tragedy. There is a curious inedited notice of this personage in Saltonstall's Picturæ Loquentes, 1635: "a chamberlaine is as nimble as Hamlet's ghost, heere and everywhere, and when he has many guests, stands most upon his pantofles, for hee's then a man of some calling."

There are a number of critics, following the lead of Coleridge, who tells us that Shakespeare's judgment is commensurate with his genius; but they speak of the former generally as if it were always unfettered, and neglect to add that it was continually influenced by the conditions under which he wrote, and that it was often his task to discover a route to a successful result through the tortuous angularities of a preconceived foreground. There is every reason to believe that this was the case with the tragedy of Hamlet and, if so, it is certain that no genius but that of Shakespeare could have moulded the inartistic materials of a rude original into that harmonious composition, which, although it has certainly been tampered with by the players, and is therefore not the perfect issue of his free inspiration, is the noblest drama the world is ever likely to possess.

It must be recollected that in 1602 Shakespeare was in the zenith of his dramatic power. His tragedy of Hamlet was produced on the stage either in 1601 or 1602, as appears from the entry of it on the books of the Stationers' Company on July 26, 1602: "James Robertes—Entered for his copie under the handes of Mr. Pasfeild and Mr. Waterson, warden, a booke called the Revenge of Hamlett, Prince (of) Denmarke, as yet was latelie acted by the Lo: Chamberleyne his servantes."

No copy of this date is known to exist, but a surreptitious and imperfect transcript of portions of the tragedy appeared in the following year under the title of "The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke. By William Shakespeare. As it hath been diuerse times acted by his Highnesse seruants in the Cittie of London: as also in the two Vniuersities of Cambridge and Oxford, and elsewhere. At London, printed for N. L. and Iohn Trundell, 1603." In the next year, 1604, N. L., who was Nicholas Ling, obtained by some means a playhouse copy of the tragedy, not a copy in the state in which it left the hands of the author, but representing in the main the genuine words of Shakespeare. It was published under the following title: "The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke. By William Shakespeare. Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according to the true and perfect coppie. At London, Printed by I. R. for N. L., and are to be sold at his shoppe under Saint Dunston's Church in Fleetstreet, 1604." This impression was reissued in the following year, the title-page and a few leaves at the end, sigs. N. and O., being fresh-printed, the sole alteration in the former being the substitution of 1605 for 1604.

Hamlet is not mentioned by Meres in 1598, and it could not have been written before 1599, in which year the Globe was erected, there being a clear allusion to that theatre in act ii, sc. 2. The tragedy continued to be acted after Shakespeare's company commenced playing at the Blackfriars Theatre, it being alluded to in a manuscript list, written in 1660, of "some of the most ancient plays that were played at Blackfriars." According to Downes, Sir William Davenant, "having seen Mr. Taylor of the Black-Fryars Company act it, who, being instructed by the author, Mr. Shaksepeur, taught Mr. Betterton in every particle of it."—Roscius Anglicanus, 1708. Roberts, in his answer to Mr. Pope's Preface on Shakespeare, 1729, thinks that Lowin was the original Hamlet.

The date of 1601 for the production of Hamlet appears to suit the internal evidence very well. That evidence decidedly leads to the conclusion that it could not have been written long before that time, and, without placing too much reliance on the general opinion that Shakespeare entirely laid aside his earlier style of composition at some particular era, that year is probably about the latest in which he would have written in the strain of the following lines, which, taken by themselves, might be assigned to the period of the Two Gentlemen of Verona:

Were it not that the elder play of Hamlet did not belong to Shakespeare's company, these lines might lead to the conjecture that he had made some additions to it long before he wrote his own complete tragedy.

There was once in existence a copy of Speght's edition of Chaucer, 1598, with manuscript notes by Gabriel Harvey, one of those notes being in the following terms: "The younger sort take much delight in Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis, but his Lucrece and his tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke, have it in them to please the wiser sort." This note was first printed in 1766 by Steevens, who gives the year 1598 as the date of its insertion in the volume, but, observed Dr. Ingleby, "we are unable to verify Steevens' note or collate his copy, for the book which contained Harvey's note passed into the collection of Bishop Percy, and his library was burned in the fire at Northumberland House." Under these circumstances one can only add the opinions of those who have had the opportunity of inspecting the volume. Firstly, from the letter of Percy to Malone, 1803: "In the passage which extols Shakespeare's tragedy, Spenser is quoted by name among our flourishing metricians. Now this edition of Chaucer was published in 1598, and Spenser's death is ascertained to have been in January, 1598-1599, so that these passages were all written in 1598, and prove that Hamlet was written before that year, as you have fixed it." Secondly, from a letter from Malone to Percy, written also in 1803, in which he gives reasons for controverting this opinion: "When I was in Dublin I remember you thought that, though Harvey had written 1598 in his book, it did not follow from thence that his remarks were then written; whilst, on the other hand, I contended that, from the mention of Spenser, they should seem to have been written in that year; so that, like the two Reynoldses, we have changed sides and each converted the other; for I have now no doubt that these observations were written in a subsequent year. The words that deceive are 'our now flourishing metricians,' by which Harvey does not mean 'now living,' but now admired or in vogue; and what proves this is that in his catalogue he mixes the living and the dead, for Thomas Watson was dead before 1593. With respect to Axio Philus, I think you will agree with me hereafter that not Spenser, but another person, was meant. Having more than once named Spenser, there could surely be no occasion to use any mysterious appellation with respect to that poet. My theory is that Harvey bought the book in 1598 on its publication, and then sat down to read it, and that his observations were afterward inserted at various times. That passage, which is at the very end, and subjoined to Lydgate's catalogue, one may reasonably suppose was not written till after he had perused the whole volume."

The tragedy of Hamlet is familiarly alluded to more than once in the play of Eastward Hoe, printed in 1605, in a manner which indicates that the former drama was very well established in the memories of the audience. There is a parody on one of Ophelia's songs which is of some interest in regard to the question of the critical value of the quarto of 1604; the occurrence of the word "all" before "flaxen" showing that the former word was incorrectly omitted in all the early quartos excepting in that of 1603. One of the subordinate characters in Eastward Hoe is a running-footman of the name of Hamlet, who enters in great haste to tell the coachman to be ready for his mistress, whereupon Potkin, a tankard-bearer, says: "Sfoote, Hamlet, are you madde? Whether run you nowe? You should brushe up my olde mistresse."

There is an unsupported statement by Oldys to the effect that Shakespeare received but five pounds for his tragedy of Hamlet, but whether from the company who first acted it or from the publisher is not mentioned. This is the only information that has reached us respecting the exact emolument received by Shakespeare for any of his writings, but it cannot be accepted merely on such an authority. It is, however, worthy of remark that Greene parted with his Orlando to the Queen's Players for twenty nobles; so the sum named appears to have been about the usual amount given for a play sold direct from the author to a company, but in all probability, when Hamlet was produced, Shakespeare was playing at the Globe Theatre on shares.

Notwithstanding the extreme length of the tragedy of Hamlet, there is such a marvellously concentrative power displayed in much of the construction and dialogue that, in respect to a large number of the incidents and speeches, a wide latitude of interpretation is admissible, the selection in those cases from possible explanations depending upon the judgment and temperament of each actor or reader. Hence it may be confidently predicted that no æsthetic criticisms upon this drama will ever be entirely and universally accepted, and as certainly that there will remain problems in connection with it which will be subjects for discussion to the end of literary time. Among the latter the reason or reasons which induced Hamlet to defer the fulfilment of his revenge may perhaps continue to hold a prominent situation, although the solution of that special mystery does not seem to be attended with difficulties equal to those surrounding other cognate inquiries which arise in the study of the tragedy.

In respect to this drama, as to many others by the same author, the prophetic words of Leonard Digges may be usefully remembered—"Some second Shakespeare must of Shakespeare write." Until this miracle occurs, it is not likely that any æsthetic criticism on the tragedy will be successful; and certainly at present, notwithstanding the numbers of persons of high talent and genius who have discussed the subject, nothing has been, nor is likely to be, produced which is altogether satisfactory. The cause of this may perhaps to some extent arise from the latitude of interpretation the dramatic form of composition allows, to the appreciation of the minor details of a character, and the various plausible reasons that can often be assigned for the same line of action; something also may be due to the unconscious influence exercised by individual temperament upon the exposition of that character, and again much to the defective state of the text; but the reason of the general failure in Hamlet criticism is no doubt chiefly to be traced to the want of ability to enter fully into the inspiration of the poet's genius.

It may, however, be safely asserted that the simpler explanations are, and the less they are biassed by the subtleties of the philosophical critics, the more likely they are to be in unison with the intentions of the author. Take, for instance, the well-established fact that immodesty of expression, the recollection derived, it may often be, accidentally and unwillingly from oral sources during the previous life, is one of the numerous phases of insanity; and not only are the song-fragments chanted by Ophelia, but even the ribaldry addressed to her by Hamlet, in the play-scene, vindicated, there being little doubt that Shakespeare intended the simulated madness of the latter through his intellectual supremacy to be equally true to nature, the manners of his age permitting the delineation in a form which is now repulsive and inadmissible.

The present favorite idea is that in Hamlet the great dramatist intended to delineate an irresolute mind depressed by the weight of a mission which it is unable to accomplish. This is the opinion of Goethe following, if I have noted rightly, an English writer in the Mirror of 1780. A careful examination of the tragedy will hardly sustain this hypothesis. So far from Hamlet being indecisive, although the active principle in his character is strongly influenced by the meditative, he is really a man of singular determination, and, excepting in occasional paroxsyms, one of powerful self-control. His rapidity of decision is strikingly exhibited after his first interview with the Ghost. Perceiving at once how important it was that Marcellus, at all events, should not suspect the grave revelations that had been made, although they had been sufficient to have paralyzed one of less courage and resolution than himself, he outwits his companions by banter, treating the apparition with intentional and grotesque disrespect and jocularity at a moment when an irresolute mind would have been terrified and prostrated.

Then Hamlet's powerful intellect not only enables him to recognize almost instantaneously the difficulties which beset his path, but immediately to devise a scheme by which some of them might be overcome. The compliance with the advice of his father's spirit, in strict unison with his own natural temperament, that the pursuit of his revenge was to harmonize with the dictates of his conscience, involving of course his duties to others, was attended by obstacles apparently insurmountable; yet all were to be removed before the final catastrophe, however acutely he might feel the effort of suppressing his desire for vengeance, that obligation the fulfilment of which was postponed by subtle considerations, and by fear lest precipitate action might leave him with "a wounded name." But this duty, it is important to observe, was never sought to be relinquished. The influences practically render delay a matter of necessity with him, and leaving a murderer to contend against one who, as he must have felt, would not have scrupled to design his assassination if at any moment safety could be in that way secured, his determination to assume the garb of insanity in the presence of the King and of those likely to divulge the secret, is easily and naturally explained.

Hamlet is wildly impetuous in moments of excitement, so that his utterances are not invariably to be accepted as evidences of his general nature. Much of the difficulty in the interpretation of the tragedy arises from the oversight of accepting his soliloquies as continuous illustrations of his character, instead of being, as they mostly are, transient emanations of his subtle irritability. Even in the midst of his impetuosity the current of violent thought was subject to a controlling interruption by a sudden reaction arising from the influence of reason; but it was natural on occasions that, stirred by his desire for revenge, he should doubt the validity of his reasons for delay. A wide distinction also must be drawn in the matter of time for vengeance, between action resulting from sudden and that from remoter provocation.

There seems to have been in Hamlet, so far as regards the commands of the apparition, an almost perpetual conflict between impulse and reason, each in its turn being predominant. The desire for revenge is at times so great that it is only by the strongest effort of will he resists precipitate action, then, losing no pretext to find causes for its exercise, overpowering the dictates of his penetrative genius. It is not rashness in Hamlet on one occasion and procrastination on another, but a power of instantaneous action that could be controlled by the very briefest period of reflection, the great feature in his intellect being a preternaturally rapid reflective power, and men of genius almost invariably do meditate before action.

Among the numerous unsupported conjectures respecting this tragedy may be mentioned that, when Shakespeare drew the characters of, 1. Hamlet; 2. Horatio; 3. Claudius; 4. The Queen, he had in his mind, 1. The Earl of Essex or Sir Phillip Sydney or himself; 2. Lord Southampton or Fulke Greville; 3. The Earl of Leicester; 4. Mary, Queen of Scots. Although some of these suggestions are ingeniously supported, there is not one of them which rests on any kind of real evidence or external probability.

Burbage was the first actor of Hamlet in Shakespeare's tragedy. His performance is spoken of in terms of high commendation, but there is no record of his treatment of the character, his delineation probably differing materially from that of modern actors. Stage tradition merely carries down the tricks of the profession, no actor entirely replacing another, and, in the case of Hamlet, hardly two of recent times, whose performances I have had the opportunity of witnessing, but who are or have been distinct in manner and expression, and even in idea. Few actors or readers can be found to agree respecting Shakespeare's conception of the character. This, however, may be safely asserted, that no criticism on Hamlet will ever be permanent which does not recognize the sublimity of his nature. Horatio understood Hamlet better than anyone, and his judgment of him doubtless expressed Shakespeare's own estimate:

A "noble heart" that ever shrank from an act that would have resulted in his own aggrandizement, for, although the monarchy was elective, not hereditary, the succession of Hamlet had been proclaimed by the King and tacitly accepted.

DOWNFALL OF IRISH LIBERTY "FLIGHT OF THE EARLS"

A.D. 1603

JUSTIN McCARTHY

At the accession of Henry VIII to the English throne that portion of Ireland mainly colonized from England, the ruling country, was known as the English pale—that is, district. It comprised "the four shires" or counties of Dublin, Kildare, Meath, and Louth. Beyond this district the country was held by various Celtic clans ruled by their own chieftains. Early in Henry's reign the English lords began to show their independence of royal authority, and also to ally themselves with the native chieftains. Henry saw that the Irish, who had often before aimed at independence of England, were about to renew the struggle. He determined to forestall them, and sent one lord deputy after another to Ireland in charge of the royal interests.

Disputes between his own representatives, and their doubtful loyalty, caused the King much trouble, and Irish affairs were far from being composed when Thomas Fitzgerald, tenth earl of Kildare, renounced his allegiance to Henry and headed an unsuccessful rebellion. Fitzgerald was executed at Tyburn in 1537.

Matters were now further complicated by the introduction of the Reformation into Ireland. Most of the Irish people were stanch adherents of Catholicism, while some of the leading English Protestants in Ireland favored Irish nationality as strongly as did the Catholics. After the death of Henry VIII the religious troubles were intensified. Under Edward VI a severe policy was pursued against the Irish Catholics and Nationalists. After a brief reaction under Mary, the Catholic sovereign of England, the policy of suppression was renewed with still greater severity by Queen Elizabeth, and the condition of Ireland became one of chronic rebellion.

This time of trouble called forth some powerful champions of the Irish national cause. One of these, Shane O'Neil, has been celebrated in many a popular ballad. The head of the house to which he belonged had acknowledged allegiance to Henry VIII and received the title of Earl of Tyrone. The English title carried with it, according to English law, the principle of hereditary succession; but when the first earl died, the clan of O'Neil refused to adopt the English practice, and, according to the Irish principle of tanistry, chose as his successor the member of the house for whom they had the highest regard.

This was Shane O'Neil, who was a younger and not even a legitimate son of the Earl of Tyrone, but whose energy, courage, and strong national sentiments had already made him the hero of his sept. Shane O'Neil at once proclaimed himself the champion of Irish national independence. Queen Elizabeth, amid all her troubles with foreign states, had to pour large numbers of troops into Ireland, and these troops, as all historians admit, overran the country in the most reckless and merciless manner. Shane O'Neil, however, held his own, and began to prove himself a formidable opponent of English power.

The evidence of history leaves little or no doubt that Elizabeth connived at a plot for the removal of O'Neil by assassination. This project did not come to anything, and the Queen tried another policy. She was a woman not merely of high intellect but also of artistic feeling, and it would seem as if the picturesque figure of Shane O'Neil had aroused some interest in her. She proposed to enter into terms with the new "Lord of Ulster," as he now declared himself, and invited him to visit her court in England. O'Neil seems to have accepted with great good-will this opportunity of seeing a life hitherto unknown to him, and he soon appeared at court. We read that O'Neil and his retainers presented themselves in their saffron-colored shirts and shaggy mantles, bearing battle-axes as their weapons, amid the stately gentlemen, the contemporaries of Essex and Raleigh, who thronged the court of the great Queen. A meeting took place on January 6, 1562.

Froude tells us the effect produced upon the court by the appearance of O'Neil and his followers: "The council, the peers, the foreign ambassadors, bishops, aldermen, dignitaries of all kinds, were present in state, as if at the exhibition of some wild animal of the desert. O'Neil stalked in, his saffron mantle sweeping round and round him, his hair curling on his back and clipped short below the eyes, which gleamed from under it with a gray lustre, frowning, fierce, and cruel. Behind him followed his gallow-glasses, bareheaded and fair-haired, with shirts of mail which reached beneath their knees, a wolf's skin flung across their shoulders, and short, broad battle-axes in their hands." O'Neil made a formal act of submission to the Queen, and negotiations set in for a definite and lasting arrangement. Nothing came of it. O'Neil seems to have understood that he was acting under a promise of safe-conduct, and was to be confirmed in the ownership of his estates in return for his submission. But, whatever may have been the misunderstanding, it is certain that these terms were not carried out according to O'Neil's expectation. He was detained in London in qualified captivity, and was informed that he could only be restored to his lands when he had engaged to make war against his former allies the Scots, had pledged himself not to make war without the consent of the English government, and to set up no claim of supremacy over other chiefs in Ireland.

O'Neil seems to have proved himself skilful as a diplomatist, and he greatly gratified the Queen by paying intense deference to all her suggestions, and even by modestly requesting that she would choose a wife for him. He seems to have agreed to what he did not intend to carry out. Some terms were understood to be arranged at last, and on May 5, 1562, a royal proclamation was issued declaring that in future he was to be regarded as a good and loyal subject of the Queen. Shane returned to Ireland, and made known to his friends that the articles of agreement had been forced upon him under peril of captivity or death, and that he could not regard them as binding. He went so far to maintain the terms of the treaty as to begin a war against the Scots, and sent the Queen a list of his captives in token of his sincerity. But he still insisted that he had never made peace with the Queen except by her own seeking; that his ancestors were kings of Ulster, and that Ulster was his kingdom and should continue to be his.

He soon after applied to Charles IX, King of France, to send him five thousand men to assist him in expelling the English from Ireland. Then war set in again between the English Lord Deputy and Shane O'Neil. Defeated in many encounters, O'Neil again tried to make terms with the Queen, and again applied to the King of France for the help of an army to drive the English from Ireland and restore the Catholic faith. By this time the Scottish settlers in Ulster, who appear to have once been as much disliked by the English government as the Irish themselves, had turned completely against him. His end was not in keeping with his soldierly picturesque career. After a severe defeat he took refuge with some old tribal enemies of his, who at first professed to receive him as a friend and find a shelter for him. A quarrel sprang up at a drinking-festival during the June of 1567, and Shane and most of his companions were killed in the affray.

It is not easy to come to a satisfactory estimate of the character of Shane O'Neil. Some English historians treat him as if he were a mere monster of treachery and violent crime. Most Irish legends and stories convert him into a perfect hero and patriot; while other Irish writers of graver order are inclined to dwell altogether upon the wrongs done to him, and the perfidies employed to ensnare him by those who acted for the English government. It is necessary to keep always in mind that, in their dealings with the Irish native populations, the English government only too frequently employed deception and treachery, thus giving the Irish chieftains what they considered warrant enough for playing a similar game. Shane O'Neil was very unscrupulous in his methods of dealing with his enemies; he was a man of sensuous passions and fierce hatreds, but he was gifted with splendid courage, a remarkable capacity for soldiership, and much of the diplomatist's or statesman's art.

An Irish essayist, who writes with much judgment and moderation on the subject, describes Shane as "a thorough Celtic chief, not of the traditional type, but such as centuries of prolonged struggle for existence had made the chieftains of his nation." This seems the only fair standard by which to judge his career. No Irish family gave more trouble in its time to the English conquerors than did the O'Neils, and Shane O'Neil was in some of his qualities the most extraordinary man of the family. There were other O'Neils who bequeathed to their country's history a brighter and purer fame, and of whose characters we can form a common estimate with less chance of dispute, but in Shane O'Neil we see a genuine type of the ancestral Irish chieftain brought into dealings and antagonism with the advances and the emissaries of a newer civilization.

This prolonged period of incessant war brought about the almost complete devastation of wide tracts of country in Ireland. Historians and poets tell the same sad story. Holinshed says that except in the cities or towns the traveller might journey for miles without meeting man, woman, child, or even beast. Edmund Spenser declared that the story of many among the inhabitants, and the picture one could see of their miserable state, was such that "any stony heart would rue the same." Mr. Froude affirms that in Munster alone there had been so much devastation that "the lowing of a cow or the sound of a ploughboy's whistle was not to be heard from Valentia to the Rock of Cashel." It was made a boast by at least one of those engaged in ruling Ireland on behalf of the Queen that he had reduced some of the populations so deeply down that they preferred slaughter in the field to death by starvation. When the supposed pacification of Munster was accomplished, the province was divided into separate settlements, to be held under the crown, at hardly more than a nominal quit-rent, by any loyal settlers who were willing to hold the land as vassals of the sovereign and fight for their lives. All these lands were obtained by the confiscation of the estates of the rebellious chieftains.

A new deputy, Sir John Perrot, convened a parliament in Ireland. There was something farcical as well as grim in calling together a parliament under such conditions, when the delegates were supposed to be convened that they might give frank and sincere advice to the representative of the sovereign. Some of the Irish chieftains who had given their allegiance to the English sovereign not only accepted the Deputy's invitation, but actually presented themselves in full English costume. In former parliaments, when Irish chieftains were loyal enough to take part in the sittings, they still wore the costume of their septs; but now, after so many struggles, some of the Irish nobles thought they would do better by making a complete submission to the conqueror, and inaugurating the new season of peace and prosperity by adopting the costume of their rulers.

This parliament naturally proved most obedient. Whatever the Deputy wished, it promptly adopted. More estates were confiscated to the Crown, and the land thus obtained was parcelled out on the cheapest terms of holding to English nobles, and also to mere English adventurers, who undertook to colonize it with workmen and traders from England. But it was soon found that English traders and laborers were not easily to be persuaded into the risks of a settlement under these conditions, and the new owners were compelled in most cases either to put up with such labor as the country afforded or to allow the soil to lie barren for the time. The scheme which the rulers had in mind—a scheme which meant nothing less than the substitution of an English for an Irish population—proved a failure. An English nobleman endowed with the spirit of adventure might be tempted to accept an estate in Ireland on the chance of making a brilliant career there, winning the favor of his sovereign, and becoming a great figure in the eyes of his own court and his own country. A mere adventurer might be as ready to try his fortunes in Ireland as in some unexplored part of the New World beyond the Atlantic. But the ordinary trader or working-man of English birth and ways did not at that time feel inclined to give up his business and his home to venture on a settlement in that wild western island, where all reports told him that every man's hand was against every other man, and that the loyal subjects of the Queen were hunted like wild game by the uncivilized Irish.

Sir John Perrot was not a man qualified to make the situation any better than he had found it. A man of quick and violent temper, he succeeded in making enemies of some of the Irish chieftains who had lately been coming over to the service of the Crown, and converted some of his friends in office into his most bitter enemies. Sir John Perrot had to be withdrawn, and a new deputy appointed in his place. Such a representative of English government was not likely to encourage many of the Irish chieftains to accept the advances of an English deputy, or to believe that they could secure safety for themselves and their lands by submitting to his rule. The new Deputy, Sir William Russell, had a hard task before him.

One of the most important and famous struggles made during these years against English dominion was led by Hugh O'Neil. This celebrated Irish leader was the grandson of that Shane O'Neil whom Henry VIII had created Earl of Tyrone. He had led thus far a very different life from that usually led by an Irish chieftain. The ruling powers were at first inclined to make a favorite of him, and confirmed him in his earldom and estates. He was brought over when very young to England, and we learn that even in the brilliant court of Queen Elizabeth he was distinguished for gifts and graces of body and mind. For a long time Tyrone seemed a loyal supporter of English rule. He commanded a troop in the Queen's service, and even took part in the suppression of risings in his own country, cooperating with the Earl of Essex in the Ulster wars and the settlement of Antrim. One romantic incident of his life brought him into personal antagonism with Sir Henry Bagnal, the Lord Marshal of Ireland. Hugh O'Neil had been left a widower, and he fell in love with Bagnal's beautiful sister. Bagnal highly disapproved of the match, but, as the lady was heart and soul in love with the Irish chieftain, her brother's opposition was vain. She eloped with her lover and married him. Bagnal became O'Neil's determined enemy. It may be that Sir Henry Bagnal did his best to prejudice the ruling authorities against O'Neil, and at that time no very substantial evidence was needed to set up a charge of treason against an Irish chieftain.

Perhaps when O'Neil returned to his own country he was recalled to national sentiments by the sight of oppression there, and it is certain that he was roused to indignation by the arbitrary imprisonment of one of his kinsmen known as Red Hugh. When Red Hugh succeeded in escaping from prison he inspired Tyrone with a keen sense of his wrongs, and brought him into the temper of insurrection. O'Neil threw himself completely into the new movement for independence. A confederation of Irish chieftains was organized, and O'Neil took the command. He proved himself possessed of the most genuine military talents, and he could play the part of the statesman as well as of the soldier. The confederation of Irish chieftains soon became an embattled army, and the brothers-in-law met in arms as hostile commanders on the shores of the northern Blackwater. As one historian has well remarked, there was something positively Homeric about this struggle, in which the two men connected by marriage encountered each other as commanders of opposing armies. Events had been moving on since the marriage between Tyrone and Bagnal's sister. O'Neil's young wife had found her early grave before this last engagement between her husband and her brother. The army of Bagnal was completely defeated, and Bagnal was killed upon the field.

For a time victory seemed to follow Tyrone. Before long the greater part of Ireland was in the hands of the Irish forces. The Earl of Essex was sent to Ireland at the head of the largest army ever despatched from England for the conquest of the island. But Essex does not seem to have made any serious effort. He appears to have had some idea of coming to terms with Tyrone. The two had a meeting, over which many pages of historical description and conjecture have been spent, but it is certain that, so far as Essex was concerned, neither peace nor war came of his intervention. He was recalled to London. His failure in Ireland, and the trouble it brought upon him in England, only drove him into the wild movements which led to his condemnation as a traitor and to his death on the scaffold.

The place which Essex had so unsuccessfully endeavored to hold was given to Lord Mountjoy, who proved himself a more fitting man for the work. Mountjoy was a strong man, who made up his mind from the first that he was sent to Ireland to fight the Irish. He had a great encounter with Tyrone, and Tyrone was defeated. From that moment the fortunes of the struggle seem to have turned. The resources of the Irish were very limited, and it was almost certain that, if the English government carried on the war long enough, the Irish must sooner or later be defeated. It was a question of numbers and weapons and money, and in all these the English had an immense superiority. Tyrone had great hopes that a Spanish army would come to the aid of the Irish. A large Spanish force was actually despatched for the purpose, but the news of Tyrone's defeat reached the Spaniards on their arrival, and they promptly reëmbarked, and gave up what they considered a lost cause. Some of the Irish chiefs were compelled to surrender; others fled to Spain, in the hope of stirring up some movement there against England, or at least of finding a place of shelter. Ireland was suffering almost everywhere from famine, and in many districts famine of the most ghastly order. Tyrone found it impossible to carry on the struggle for independence under such terrible conditions. There was nothing for it but to surrender and come to terms as best he could with his conquering enemy.

The times just then might have been regarded as peculiarly favorable for Tyrone. Queen Elizabeth was dead, and the son of Mary Stuart sat on the English throne. Tyrone made a complete surrender of his estates, pledged himself to enter into alliance with no foreign power against England, and even undertook to promote the introduction of English laws and customs into any part of Ireland over which he had influence. In return Tyrone received from the King the restoration of his lands and his title by letters-patent, and a free pardon for his campaigns against England. He was brought to London to be presented to King James, and was treated with great courtesy and hospitality. This aroused much anger among some of the older soldiers and courtiers in London, who did not understand why an Irish rebel should be treated as if he were a respectable member of society. Sir John Harrington expressed his opinions very freely in letters which are still preserved. "I have lived," he wrote, "to see that damnable rebel Tyrone brought to England, honored, and well liked. Oh! what is there that does not prove the inconstancy of worldly matters? I adventured perils by sea and land, was near starving, ate horseflesh in Munster, and all to quell that man, who now smileth in peace at those who did harass their lives to destroy him; and now doth Tyrone dare us, old commanders, with his presence and protection."

When Tyrone returned to his own country he found that the reign of peace and reconciliation between England and Ireland was as far off as ever. Tyrone had believed it was fortunate for him to have made terms of peace in King James' reign and not in Elizabeth's. But he soon found that his hopes of a better time coming were premature. James no doubt thought it good policy to secure the allegiance of a man like Tyrone by apparently generous concessions. But he had no idea of adopting any policy toward Ireland other than the old familiar policy of striving to reduce her to the conditions of an English province, with English laws, customs, costumes, and religion.

The King appears to have set his mind on the complete suppression of the national religion by the enforcement of the sternest penal laws against Catholics. He was determined also to blot out whatever remained of the old Brehon laws, still dear to the memories of the people, and still cherished among the sacred traditions of the country. When King James succeeded to the throne he promised the Irish that they should have the right of practising their religion, at least in private; but he soon recalled his promise, and made it clear that those who would retain the protection of the new ruling system must abjure the faith of their fathers. Those who were put into the actual government of the country saw that this policy could not be carried out without much resistance, and therefore decreed the complete disarmament of all Irish retainers who still acknowledged the leadership of the chieftains. One of the greatest of these chieftains, O'Donnell, Earl of Tyrconnel, was called upon to conform openly to the English Church, under pain of being proceeded against as a traitor.

The state of things he found existing on his return to Ireland would naturally have driven Tyrone into rebellion, and the rulers of the country appear to have made up their minds that he must be planning some such rising. Tyrconnel was naturally regarded as an enemy of the same order, and the policy of the ruling powers was to anticipate their designs and condemn them in advance. Tyrone and Tyrconnel were accordingly proclaimed traitors to the King. The two earls determined that, as immediate insurrection had no chance of success, there was no safety for them but in prompt escape from the country.

Then followed "the flight of the earls." Tyrone and Tyrconnel, with their families and many of their friends and retainers, nearly a hundred persons in all, made their escape in one vessel from the Irish shore, and for twenty-one days were at the mercy of the sea and of the equinoctial winds, for they sailed about the middle of September. A story characteristic of the faith which then filled the hearts of Irish chieftains is told. Tyrone fastened his golden crucifix to a string and drew it through the sea at the stern of the vessel, in the hope that the waves might thus be stilled. In the first week of October they landed on the shore of France and travelled on to Rouen, receiving nothing but kindness from the French. When King James heard of their flight he at once demanded from France the surrender of the earls, but Henry IV refused to surrender them.

Henry received the exiles with gracious and friendly greeting, but it was not thought prudent by the earls, any more than by the French King, they should remain in France at the risk of involving the two countries in war. The earls, with their families and followers, went into Flanders and then on to Rome. Pope Paul V gave them a cordial welcome, and made liberal arrangements for their maintenance, while the King of Spain showed his traditional sympathy with Ireland by settling pensions on them. Tyrconnel died soon after, in the Franciscan Church of St. Pietro di Montorio, and was laid in his grave wrapped in the robe of a Franciscan friar. Tyrone lived for several years. He was filled in this later time by a passionate longing to see once more the loved country of his birth, and he appealed to the English government for permission to return to Ireland and live quietly there until the end came. His request was not granted. The English authorities, no doubt, felt good reason to believe that his return to Ireland would be the cause of profound and dangerous emotion among the people who loved him and whom he loved so well.

His later years in Rome were literally darkened, because his sight, which had been for some time failing, soon left him to absolute blindness. He died on July 20, 1616, having lived a life of seventy-six years. Tyrone's body was laid to rest in the same church which held the body of his comrade Tyrconnel. Their graves are side by side. A modern writer tells us that the church which has become the tomb of the two exiled earls stands "where the Janiculum overlooks the glory of Rome, the yellow Tiber and the Alban Hills, the deathless Coliseum, and the stretching Campagna." "Raphael had painted his Transfiguration for the grand altar; the hand of Sebastiano del Piombo had colored the walls with the scourging of the Redeemer." The present writer has seen the graves, and even the merest stranger to the spirit of Irish history must feel impressed by the story of the two exiles who found their last resting-place enclosed by such a scene.

THE GUNPOWDER PLOT

A.D. 1605

SAMUEL R. GARDINER

The "Gunpowder Plot" acquires importance from the fact that its anniversary, November 5th, is still celebrated in England with fire-crackers, burnings of "Guy Fawkes" scarecrows, and other patriotic manifestations. Historically the plot, being detected before its execution, ended in smoke, with no more terrible result than the execution of the conspirators.

James I, son of the ill-starred Mary of Scotland, succeeded Elizabeth on the English throne in 1603, and held both England and Scotland under his sway. The English Catholics had been led to hope that James would be lenient toward their faith, but in this they were disappointed, and a few desperate followers of their religion united in the Gunpowder Plot. More than one attempt has been made to prove that this really amounted to very little, and was exaggerated by James' minister, the Earl of Salisbury, to justify the harshness of the Government toward Catholics.

Father Gerard's book, What was the Gunpowder Plot? is the strongest argument yet produced in favor of this view; but the fact remains undenied and undeniable that some sort of plot existed. We present here the latest summarizing of the matter (1897) by the standard English historian, Gardiner, confining the account almost wholly to Fawkes' own confessions.

Before examining the evidence, it will be well to remind my readers what the so-called traditional story of the plot is, or, rather, the story which has been told by writers who have in the present century availed themselves of the manuscript treasures now at our disposal, and which are for the most part in the Public Record Office. With this object I cannot do better than borrow the succinct narrative of the Edinburgh Review.[1]

"Early in 1604 the three men, Robert Catesby, John Wright, and Thomas Winter, meeting in a house at Lambeth, resolved on a Powder Plot, though, of course, only in outline. By April they had added to their number Wright's brother-in-law, Thomas Percy, and Guy Fawkes, a Yorkshire man of respectable family, but actually a soldier of fortune, serving in the Spanish army in the Low Countries, who was specially brought over to England as a capable and resolute man. Later on they enlisted Wright's brother Christopher, Winter's brother Robert, Robert Keyes, and a few more; but all, with the exception of Thomas Bates, Catesby's servant, men of family and for the most part of competent fortune, though Keyes is said to have been in straitened circumstances, and Catesby to have been impoverished by a heavy fine levied on him as a recusant.[2]

"Percy, a second cousin of the Earl of Northumberland, then captain of the Gentleman Pensioners, was admitted by him into that body in—it is said—an irregular manner, his relationship to the earl passing in lieu of the usual oath of fidelity. The position gave him some authority and license near the court, and enabled him to hire a house, or part of a house, adjoining the House of Lords. From the cellar of this house they proposed to burrow under the House of Lords; to place there a large quantity of powder, and to blow up the whole when the King and his family were there assembled at the opening of Parliament. On December 11, 1604, they began to dig in the cellar, and after a fortnight's labor, having come to a thick wall, they left off work and separated for Christmas.

"Early in January they began at the wall, which they found to be extremely hard, so that, after working for about two months,[3] they had not got more than half way through it. They then learned that a cellar actually under the House of Lords, and used as a coal cellar, was to be let; and as it was most suitable for their design, Percy hired it as though for his own use. The digging was stopped, and powder, to the amount of thirty-six barrels, was brought into the cellar, where it was stowed under heaps of coal or firewood, and so remained, under the immediate care of Guy Fawkes,[4] till, on the night of November 4, 1605—the opening of Parliament being fixed for the next day—Sir Thomas Knyvet, with a party of men, was ordered to examine the cellar. He met Fawkes coming out of it, arrested him, and on a close search found the powder, of which a mysterious warning had been conveyed to Lord Monteagle a few days before. On the news of this discovery the conspirators scattered, but by different roads rejoined each other in Warwickshire, whence, endeavoring to raise the country, they rode through Worcestershire, and were finally shot or taken prisoners at Holbeche in Staffordshire."

It is this story that I now propose to compare with the evidence. First of all, let us restrict ourselves to the story told by Guy Fawkes himself in the five examinations to which he was subjected previously to his being put to the torture on November 9th, and to the letters, proclamations, etc., issued by the Government during the four days commencing with the 5th. From these we learn, not only that Fawkes' account of the matter gradually developed, but that the knowledge of the Government also developed; a fact which fits in very well with the "traditional story," but which is hardly to be expected if the Government account of the affair was cut-and-dried from the first.

Fawkes' first examination took place on November 5th, and was conducted by Chief Justice Popham and Attorney-General Coke. It is true that only a copy has reached us, but it is a copy taken for Coke's use, as is shown by the headings of each paragraph inserted in the margin in his own hand. It is therefore out of the question that Salisbury, if he had been so minded, would have been able to falsify it. Each page has the signature (in copy) of "Jhon Jhonson," the name by which Fawkes chose to be known.

The first part of the examination turns upon Fawkes' movements abroad, showing that the Government had already acquired information that he had been beyond sea. Fawkes showed no reluctance to speak of his own proceedings in the Low Countries, or to give the names of persons he had met there, and who were beyond the reach of his examiners. As to his movements after his return to England, he was explicit enough so far as he was himself concerned, and also about Percy, whose servant he professed himself to be, and whose connection with the hiring of the house could not be concealed.

Fawkes stated that after coming back to England he "came to the lodging near the Upper House of Parliament," and "that Percy hired the house of Whynniard for £12 rent, about a year and a half ago"; that his master, before his own going abroad, i.e., before Easter, 1605, "lay in the house about three or four times." Further, he confessed "that about Christmas last," i.e., Christmas, 1604, "he brought in the night-time gunpowder [to the cellar under the Upper House of Parliament]."[5] Afterward he told how he covered the powder with fagots, intending to blow up the King and the Lords; and, being pressed how he knew that the King would be in the House on the 5th, said he knew it only from general report, and by the making ready of the King's barge; but he would have "blown up the Upper House whensoever the King was there."

He further acknowledged that there was more than one person concerned in the conspiracy, and said he himself had promised not to reveal it, but denied that he had taken the sacrament on his promise. Where the promise was given he could not remember, except that it was in England. He refused to accuse his partners, saying that he himself had provided the powder, and defrayed the cost of his journey beyond sea, which was only undertaken "to see the country, and to pass away the time." When he went, he locked up the powder and took the key with him, and "one Gibbons' wife, who dwells thereby, had the charge of the residue of the house."

Such is that part of the story told by Fawkes which concerns us at present. It is obvious that Fawkes, who, as subsequent experience shows, was no coward, had made up his mind to shield as far as possible his confederates, and to take the whole of the blame upon himself. He says, for instance, that Percy had only lain in the house for three or four days before Easter, 1605, a statement, as subsequent evidence proved, quite untrue; he pretends not to know, except from rumor and the preparation of the barge, that the King was coming to the House of Lords on the 5th, a statement almost certainly untrue. In order not to criminate others, and especially any priest, he denies having taken the sacrament on his promise, which is also untrue.

What is more noticeable is that he makes no mention of the mine, about which so much was afterward heard, evidently—so at least I read the evidence—because he did not wish to bring upon the stage those who had worked at it. If indeed the passage which I have placed in square brackets be accepted as evidence, Fawkes did more than keep silence upon the mine. He must have made a positive assertion—soon afterward found to be untrue—that the cellar was hired several months before it really was. This passage is, however, inserted in a different hand from the rest of the document. My own belief is that it gives a correct account of a statement made by the prisoner, but omitted by the clerk who made the copy for Coke, and inserted by some other person. Nobody that I can think of had the slightest interest in adding the words, while they are just what Fawkes might be expected to say if he wanted to lead his examiners off the scent. At all events, even if these words be left out of account, it must be admitted that Fawkes said nothing about the existence of a mine.

Though Fawkes kept silence as to the mine, he did not keep silence on the desperate character of the work on which he had been engaged. "And," runs the record, "he confesseth that when the King had come to the Parliament House this present day, and the Upper House had been sitting, he meant to have fired the match and have fled for his own safety before the powder had taken fire, and confesseth that, if he had not been apprehended this last night, he had blown up the Upper House when the King, Lords, Bishops, and others had been there, and saith that he spake for [and provided][6] those bars and crows of iron, some in one place, some in another, in London, lest it should be suspected, and saith that he had some of them in or about Gracious Street."[7] Fawkes here clearly takes the whole terrible design, with the exception of the mine, on his own shoulders.

Commissioners were now appointed to conduct the investigation further. They were: Nottingham, Suffolk, Devonshire, Worcester, Northampton, Salisbury, Mar, and Popham, with Attorney-General Coke in attendance. This was hardly a body of men who would knowingly cover an intrigue of Salisbury's. Worcester is always understood to have been professedly a Catholic; Northampton was certainly one, though he attended the King's service, while Suffolk was friendly toward the Catholics; and Nottingham, if he is no longer to be counted among them,[8] was at least not long afterward a member of the party which favored an alliance with Spain, and therefore a policy of toleration toward the Catholics.

Before five of these commissioners—Nottingham, Suffolk, Devonshire, Northampton, and Salisbury—Fawkes was examined a second time on the forenoon of the 6th. In some way the Government had found out that Percy had had a new door made in the wall leading to the cellar, and they now drew from Fawkes an untrue statement that it was put in about the middle of Lent, that is to say, early in March, 1605.[9] They had also discovered a pair of brewer's slings, by which barrels were usually carried between two men, and they pressed Fawkes hard to say who was his partner in removing the barrels of gunpowder. He began by denying that he had had a partner at all, but finally answered that "he cannot discover the party, but"—i.e., lest—"he shall bring him in question." He also said that he had forgotten where he slept on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday in the week before his arrest.

Upon this James himself intervened, submitting to the Commissioners a series of questions with the object of drawing out of the prisoner a true account of himself, and of his relations to Percy. A letter had been found on Fawkes when he was taken, directed not to Johnson, but to Fawkes, and this among other things had raised the King's suspicions. In his third examination, on the afternoon of the 6th, in the presence of Northampton, Devonshire, Nottingham, and Salisbury, Fawkes gave a good deal of information, more or less true, about himself; and, while still maintaining that his real name was Johnson, said that the letter, which was written by a Mrs. Bostock in Flanders, was addressed to him by another name "because he called himself Fawkes," that is to say, because he had acquired the name of Fawkes as an alias.

"If he will not otherwise confess," the King had ended by saying, "the gentler tortures are to be first used unto him, et sic per gradus ad ima tenditur." To us, living in the nineteenth century, these words are simply horrible. As a Scotchman, however, James had long been familiar with the use of torture as an ordinary means of legal investigation, while even in England, though unknown to the law, that is to say, to the practice of the ordinary courts of justice, it had for some generations been used not infrequently by order of the council to extract evidence from a recalcitrant witness, though, according to Bacon, not for the purpose of driving him to incriminate himself. Surely, if the use of torture was admissible at all, this was a case for its employment. The prisoner had informed the government that he had been at the bottom of a plot of the most sanguinary kind, and had acknowledged by implication that there were fellow-conspirators whom he refused to name.

If, indeed, Father Gerard's view of the case, that the government, or at least Salisbury, had for some time known all about the conspiracy, nothing—not even the Gunpowder Plot itself—could be more atrocious than the infliction of torments on a fellow-creature to make him reveal a secret already in their possession. If, however, the evidence I have adduced be worth anything, this was by no means the case. What it shows is that on the afternoon of the 6th all that the members of the government were aware of was that an unknown number of conspirators were at large—they knew not where—and might at that very moment be appealing—they knew not with what effect—to Catholic land-owners and their tenants, who were, without doubt, exasperated by the recent enforcement of the penal laws. We may, if we please, condemn the conduct of the government which had brought the danger of a general Catholic rising within sight. We cannot deny that, at that particular moment, they had real cause of alarm. At all events, no immediate steps were taken to put this part of the King's orders in execution.

Some little information, indeed, was coming in from other witnesses. In his first examination, on November 5th, Fawkes had stated that in his absence he locked up the powder, and "one Gibbons' wife who dwells thereby had the charge of the residue of the house." An examination of her husband on the 5th, however, only elicited that he, being a porter, had with two others carried three thousand billets into the vault. On the 6th, Ellen, the wife of Andrew Bright, stated that Percy's servant had, about the beginning of March, asked her to let the vault to his master, and that she had consented to abandon her tenancy of it if Mrs. Whynniard, from whom she held it, would consent. Mrs. Whynniard's consent having been obtained, Mrs. Bright, or rather Mrs. Skinner—she being a widow remarried subsequently to Andrew Bright—received two pounds for giving up the premises.

The important point in this evidence is that the date of March, 1605, given as that on which Percy entered into possession of the cellar, showed that Fawkes' statement that he had brought powder into the cellar at Christmas, 1604, could not possibly be true. On the 7th Mrs. Whynniard confirmed Mrs. Bright's statement, and also stated that, a year earlier, in March, 1604, "Mr. Percy began to labor very earnestly with this examinate and her husband to have the lodging by the Parliament House, which one Mr. Henry Ferris, of Warwickshire, had long held before, and, having obtained the said Mr. Ferris' good-will to part from it after long suit by himself and great entreaty of Mr. Carleton, Mr. Epsley, and other gentleman belonging to the Earl of Northumberland, affirming him to be a very honest gentleman, and that they could not have a better tenant, her husband and she were contented to let him have the said lodging at the same rent Mr. Ferris paid for it."

Mrs. Whynniard had plainly never heard of the mine; and that the Government was in equal ignorance is shown by the indorsement on the agreement of Ferris—or rather Ferrers—to make over his tenancy to Percy—"The bargain between Ferris and Percy for the bloody cellar, found in Winter's lodging." Winter's name had been under consideration for some little time, and doubtless the discovery of this paper was made on, or more probably before, the 7th. The Government, having as yet nothing but Fawkes' evidence to go upon, connected the hiring of the house with the hiring of the cellar, and at least showed no signs of suspecting anything more.

On the same day, the 7th, something was definitely heard of the proceedings of the other plotters, who had either gathered at Dunchurch for the hunting-match, or had fled from London to join them, and a proclamation was issued for the arrest of Percy, Catesby, Rokewood, Thomas Winter, Edward[10] Grant, John and Christopher Wright, and Catesby's servant, Robert Ashfield. They were charged with assembling in troops in the counties of Warwick and Worcester, breaking into stables and seizing horses. Fawkes, too, was on that day subjected to a fourth examination. Not very much that was new was extracted from him. He acknowledged that his real name was Guy Fawkes, that—which he had denied before—he had received the sacrament not to discover any of the conspirators, and also that there had been at first five persons privy to the plot, and afterward five or six more "were generally acquainted that an action was to be performed for the Catholic cause, and saith that he doth not know that they were acquainted with the whole conspiracy." Being asked whether Catesby, the two Wrights, Winter, or Tresham, were privy, he refused to accuse any one.

That Fawkes had already been threatened with torture is known, and it may easily be imagined that the threats had been redoubled after this last unsatisfactory acknowledgment. On the morning of the 8th, however, Waad, who was employed to worm out his secrets, reported that little was to be expected. "I find this fellow," he wrote, "who this day is in a most stubborn and perverse humour, as dogged as if he were possessed. Yester-night I had persuaded him to set down a clear narration of all his wicked plots from the first entering to the same, to the end they pretended, with the discourses and projects that were thought upon amongst them, which he undertook [to do] and craved time this night to bethink him the better; but this morning he hath changed his mind and is [so] sullen and obstinate as there is no dealing with him."

The sight of the examiners, together with the sight of the rack,[11] changed Fawkes' mind to some extent. He was resolved that nothing but actual torture should wring from him the names of his fellow-plotters, who so far as was known in London were still at large.[12] He prepared himself, however, to reveal the secrets of the plot so far as was consistent with the concealment of the names of those concerned in it. His fifth examination, on the 8th, the last before the one taken under torture on the 9th, gives to the inquirer into the reality of the plot all that he wants to know.

"He confesseth," so the tale begins, "that a practice was first broken unto him against his majesty for the Catholic cause, and not invented or propounded by himself, and this was first propounded unto him about Easter last was twelvemonth, beyond the seas in the Low Countries, by an English layman,[13] and that Englishman came over with him in his company into England, and they two and three more[14] were the first five mentioned in the former examination. And they five resolving to do somewhat for the Catholic cause (a vow being first taken by all of them for secrecy), one of the other three[15] propounded to perform it with powder, and resolved that the place should be (where this action should be performed and justice done) in or near the place of the sitting of the Parliament, wherein Religion had been unjustly suppressed. This being resolved, the manner of it was as followeth:

"First they hired the house at Westminster, of one Ferres, and having his house they sought then to make a mine under the Upper House of Parliament, and they began to make the mine in or about the 11 of December, and they five first entered into the works, and soone after took an other[16] to them, having first sworn him and taken the sacrament for secrecy; and when they came to the wall (that was about three yards thick) and found it a matter of great difficulty, they took to them an other in like manner, with oath and sacrament as aforesaid;[17] all which seven were gentlemen of name and blood, and not any was employed in or about this action (no, not so much as in digging and mining) that was not a gentleman.

"And having wrought to the wall before Christmas, they ceased until after the holidays, and the day before Christmas (having a mass of earth that came out of the mine) they carried it into the garden of the said house, and after Christmas they wrought the wall till Candlemas, and wrought the wall half through; and saith that all the time while the other wrought, he stood as sentinel, to decry any man that came near; and when any man came near to the place, upon warning given by him they ceased until they had notice to proceed from him; and sayeth that they seven all lay in the house, and had shot and powder, and they all resolved to die in that place, before they yielded or were taken.

"And, as they were working, they heard a rushing in the cellar, which grew by one Bright's selling of his coals,[18] whereupon this examinant, fearing they had been discovered, went into the cellar and viewed the cellar, and perceiving the commodity thereof for their purpose, and understanding how it would be letten, his master, Mr. Percy, hired the cellar for a year for £4 rent; and confesseth that after Christmas twenty barrels of powder were brought by themselves to a house, which they had on the bank side in hampers, and from that house removed the powder to the said house near the Upper House of Parliament; and, presently, upon hiring the cellar they themselves removed the powder into the cellar, and covered the same with fagots which they had before laid into the cellar.

"After, about Easter, he went into the Low Countries (as he before hath declared in his former examination) and that the true purpose of his going over was, lest, being a dangerous man, he should be known and suspected, and in the mean time he left the key of the cellar with Mr. Percy, who in his absence caused more billets to be laid into the cellar, as in his former examination he confessed, and returned about the end of August, or the beginning of September, and went again to the said house, near to the said cellar, and received the key of the cellar again of one of the five,[19] and then they brought in five or six barrels of powder more into the cellar, which also they covered with billets, saving four little barrels covered with fagots, and then this examinant went into the country about the end of September.

"It appeareth the powder was in the cellar placed as it was found the 5 of November, when the Lords came to prorogue the Parliament, and sayeth that he returned again to the said house near the cellar on Wednesday the 30 of October.

"He confesseth he was at the Earl of Montgomery's marriage, but, as he sayeth, with no intention of evil, having a sword about him, and was very near to his Majesty and the Lords there present.[20]

"Forasmuch as they knew not well how they should come by the person of the Duke Charles, being near London, where they had no forces (if he had not been also blown up), he confesseth that it was resolved among them that the same day that this detestable act should have been performed, the same day should other of their confederacy have surprised the person of the Lady Elizabeth, and presently have proclaimed her Queen, to which purpose a proclamation was drawn, as well to avow and justify the action, as to have protested against the Union, and in no sort to have meddled with religion therein, and would have protested also against all strangers, and this proclamation should have been made in the name of the Lady Elizabeth.

"Being demanded why they did not surprise the King's person, and draw him to the effecting of their purpose, sayeth that so many must have been acquainted with such an action as it would not have been kept secret.

"He confesseth that if their purpose had taken effect, until they had had power enough, they would not have avowed the deed to be theirs; but if their power (for their defence and safety) had been sufficient, they themselves would then have taken it upon them. They meant also to have sent for the prisoners in the Tower to have come to them, of whom particularly they had some consultation.

"He confesseth that the place of rendezvous was in Warwickshire, and that armour was sent thither, but the particular thereof he knows not.

"He confesseth that they had consultation for the taking of the Lady Mary into their possession, but knew not how to come by her.

"And confesseth that provision was made by some of the conspiracy of some armour of proof this last summer for this action.

"He confesseth that the powder was bought by the common purse of the confederates.

"L. Admiral [Earl of Nottingham] Earl of Salisbury

L. Chamberlain [Earl of Suffolk] Earl of Mar

Earl of Devonshire Lord Chief Justice [Popham][21]

Earl of Northampton

"Attended by Mr. Attorney-General [Coke]."

The 9th, the day on which Fawkes was put to the torture, brought news to the government that the fear of insurrection need no longer be entertained. It had been known before this that Fawkes' confederates had met on the 5th at Dunchurch on the pretext of a hunting-match,[22] and had been breaking open houses in Warwickshire and Worcestershire in order to collect arms. Yet so indefinite was the knowledge of the council that, on the 8th, they offered a reward for the apprehension of Percy alone, without including any of the other conspirators.[23] On the evening of the 9th[24] they received a letter from Sir Richard Walsh, the Sheriff of Worcestershire.

"We think fit," he wrote, "with all speed to certify your Lordships of the happy success it hath pleased God to give us against the rebellious assembly in these parts. After such time as they had taken the horses from Warwick upon Tuesday night last,[25] they came to Mr. Robert Winter's house to Huddington upon Wednesday night,[26] where—having entered—[they] armed themselves at all points in open rebellion. They passed from thence upon Thursday morning unto Hewell—the Lord Windsor's house—which they entered and took from thence by force great store of armour, artillery of the said Lord Windsor's, and passed that night into the county of Staffordshire unto the house of one Stephen Littleton, Gentleman, called Holbeche, about two miles distant from Stourbridge, whither we pursued, with the assistance of Sir John Foliot, Knight, Francis Ketelsby, Esquire, Humphrey Salway, Gentleman, Edmund Walsh, and Francis Conyers, Gentlemen, with few other gentlemen and the power and face of the country.

"We made against them upon Thursday morning,[27] and freshly pursued them until the next day,[28] at which time, about twelve or one of the clock in the afternoon, we overtook them at the said Holbeche House—the greatest part of their retinue and some of the better sort being dispersed and fled before our coming, whereupon and after summons and warning first given and proclamation in his Highness's name to yield and submit themselves—who refusing the same, we fired some part of the house and assaulted some part of the rebellious persons left in the said house, in which assault one Mr. Robert Catesby is slain, and three others verily thought wounded to death whose names—as far as we can learn—are Thomas Percy, Gentleman, John Wright, and Christopher Wright, Gentlemen; and these are apprehended and taken: Thomas Winter Gentleman, John Grant Gentleman, Henry Morgan Gentleman, Ambrose Rokewood Gentleman, Thomas Ockley carpenter, Edmund Townsend servant to the said John Grant, Nicholas Pelborrow, servant unto the said Ambrose Rokewood, Edward Ockley carpenter, Richard Townsend servant to the said Robert Winter, Richard Day servant to the said Stephen Littleton, which said prisoners are in safe custody here, and so shall remain until your Honours good pleasures be further known. The rest of that rebellious assembly is dispersed, we have caused to be followed with fresh suite and hope of their speedy apprehension. We have also thought fit to send unto your Honours—according unto our duties—such letters as we have found about the parties apprehended; and so resting in all duty at your Honours' further command, we take leave, from Stourbridge this Saturday morning, being the ixth of this instant November 1605.

"Your Honours' most humble to be commanded,

"RICH. WALSH."

CERVANTES' "DON QUIXOTE" REFORMS LITERATURE

A.D. 1605

HENRY EDWARD WATTS

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra is the most celebrated of Spanish authors; but his fame rests upon a far more solid basis than merely that of having written the most readable and tender of humorous romances. He reformed literature. He tilted at windmills as truly as ever his hero did, and overthrew the false taste for wordy pomp and emptiness which was characteristic of his times. It was not only Spanish literature that felt the impulse of his warm, frank honesty and insight into life. All Europe was his debtor.

Cervantes was an impoverished nobleman, that too common product of Spain in those days when her American gold fleets had begun to fail her. In his early manhood he was an author and then a soldier of fortune in Italy. He fought as a common soldier on one of the Genoese galleys in the great sea-fight of Lepanto, distinguished himself there by his heroism, and was three times wounded, crippled in one arm for life. Later he was captured by Algerian pirates, and was for five years a slave, ever planning and attempting escapes, a daring, dashing hero, the life and admiration of his fellow-captives.

After his ransom and return to Spain, Cervantes once more took up literature, the amusement of his youth. He became a playwright and romancer. The government gave him a small position as a tax-collector, but with such good-natured carelessness did he handle this uncongenial employ that he had repeatedly to make good from his own pocket the losses he entailed upon the government. Even this unsatisfactory labor failed the impractical author about the period of the death of King Philip II (1598). He was imprisoned for debt, and sank into such abject poverty that he depended on his friends for bread. How much the gloomy Philip II is satirized in Cervantes' masterpiece has always been a disputed question.

The accession of the new King, which had been hailed as "the light after darkness," had little effect on Cervantes' fortunes. Philip III, though he had some taste for letters, and was not without sprouts of kindliness in his heart, had been by education and by an over-strict regimen in youth debased, so that he was even more completely a slave to the priestly influence than his father had been, without any of his father's ability or force of character. The Duke of Lerma was "the Atlas who bore the burden of the monarchy."[1] He was a man, according to Quevedo, "alluring and dexterous rather than intelligent; ruled by the interested cunning of his own creatures but imperious with all others; magnificent, ostentatious; choosing his men only by considerations of his own special policy or from personal friendship." Under such a man, who ruled the King at his will, it was not likely that any portion of the royal benevolence should light on Miguel de Cervantes. Moreover, the crowd of suppliants at court was very great, their appetite stimulated doubtless by the flattering reports of the new King's liberal disposition.