tention, and the difficulty he has found in fathoming the precise meaning of metaphysical treatises, dive as deeply as he might into 'the depths of his consciousness.'

German actors and stage-managers have long felt a want unknown in English-speaking lands. There are probably not three theatres in Germany that use the same translation or adaptation of Shakespeare. To meet this want of uniformity, a selection of the dramas was issued by EDUARD and OTTO DEVRIENT, a name that will ensure everywhere a respectful attention to all suggestions thus endorsed, suggestions, be it understood, never the crude conceits of the moment, but practically tested during many years of highly-famed practice on the stage. In their rendition of Hamlet by the Messrs DEVRIENT, it is a noteworthy fact that for scenic representation the First Quarto has been proved by them to be more effective than the Second Quarto or Folio, which is the basis of the ordinary acting copies. Over thirty years ago HUNTER in England and RAPP in Germany maintained the higher dramatic power of the First Quarto over the Second Quarto in the order of the scenes and in its general effectiveness. But it was reserved for the Messrs DEVRIENT to put these theories to the test with the best possible result, as they say, and as their fame warrants the belief.

The claim for Hamlet's youth, urged by the Messrs DEVRIENT, deserves attention. Hamlet as a youth of nineteen or twenty certainly possesses a charm which can hardly belong to the maturer age of thirty; besides, this idea of him reconciles many discrepancies which have set commentators at variance. It accords with his wish to return to Wittenberg; with the election of his uncle over him as king by the nobles; and it also lessens the age of the Queen and our disgust at the mutiny in a matron's bones. A discussion of this question will be found in the notes on V, i, 153. This puzzle about Hamlet's age arises, to a large extent, it is submitted, from our losing sight of SHAKESPEARE'S method of dealing with the dramatic element of time, -a method whereby in the most artful manner he conveys two opposite ideas of its flight: swiftness and slowness; by one series of allusions we receive the impression that the action of the drama is driving ahead in storm, while by

1

another series we are insensibly beguiled into the belief that it extends over days and months. Attention was called to this wondrous art of SHAKESPEARE'S by both HALPIN and CHRISTOPHER NORTH, at about the same time; the former admirably analyzed, with reference to it, the Merchant of Venice, and the latter revealed its working in the case of Macbeth and Othello. If we turn to this present play of Hamlet, we see how throughout, wherever time comes in as an element, we are subject to SHAKESPEARE'S glamour and gramarye. Horatio is introduced to us as one familiar with all the every-day occurrences in Denmark, the gossip of the court, the cause of the post haste and rummage in the land; in the next scene, on the very same day, Hamlet greets him with such surprise that we get the impression that he is fresh from Wittenberg; if we stop to think, we remember that he came to see the old king's funeral, and that took place nearly two months before, and in that time he might well have learned all the political news; but then he must have been about the court, and it is a little strange that Hamlet had not met him. As spectators of the play, we do not stop to think this out, but accept without question each impression that the poet intends to make on us. Again, Polonius, who assuredly knew the latest item of court gossip, seems as much surprised at Ophelia's account of Hamlet's strange behaviour as Ophelia herself; it was evidently a new thing to him, and yet when he goes directly to the King, the latter has been so long cognisant of Hamlet's 'transformation' that he had sent for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to help him find out its cause; and Polonius, too, speaks of Hamlet's 'lunacy' as a fact well known and of long standing; and the very next day after this Hamlet has a second interview with Ophelia, when she asks him how he does 'this many a day,' and tells him that she has remembrances of his which she has longed long to re-deliver. Again, Hamlet tells Rosencrantz and Guildenstern that he has 'of late foregone all custom of exercises.' In the last scene Hamlet tells Horatio that he has been in 'continual practice of 'late.' These are not inconsistencies. They are not oversights on the part of SHAKESPEARE. They belong to the two series of

times, the one suggestive and illusory, and the other visible and explicitly indicated. HALPIN calls them the protractive series and the accelerating series. CHRISTOPHER NORTH calls them SHAKESPEARE'S 'two clocks.' As another instance of the way in which the long time is adroitly insinuated in this Play, note the passage, where Claudius describes to the Queen the events that have followed the death of Polonius: 'the people are muddied, thick, 'and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers,' which of course was the work not of an hour nor of a day, but perhaps of weeks; it must have taken some time for this knowledge to have reached the king's ears; then Laertes has returned in secret 'from France, feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds.' This, too, consumes time, and the very time which we feel, without stopping to compute it, is necessary for Laertes to gather the populace to his side and mature his plans for rebellion. From what we here learn, Laertes may have returned from France weeks before, and yet when he bursts into the King's presence and demands his father, the short time which is essential for keeping up the tension of the passion comes into play, and we get the impression that Laertes has just landed and has rushed in hot haste to the King's palace. And so vivid is this impression that Laertes is always held up by critics and commentators as an example to Hamlet in the speed with which he sweeps to avenge his father's death; whereas, as we see from this speech of Claudius, Laertes may have been almost as dilatory as Hamlet, and may have allowed 'buzzers' day after day 'to infect his ears,' or kept himself 'in clouds' for weeks. The short time is again thrust upon us by showing us Laertes ignorant of Ophelia's insanity. Apparently, Laertes has not even taken the time to go to his own home after landing from France. And these instances may be multiplied, doubtless, by any attentive reader of the tragedy. Indeed, is not the whole theory of Hamlet's procrastination to a large extent due to this 'legerdemain' of SHAKESPEARE'S in the matter of time? There are not wanting critics who, counting off the days on only one of 'SHAKESPEARE'S clocks, conclude

....

If

We

the whole action within a week or ten days, -scant room for procrastination, where the killing of a king is the aim. AS CHRISTOPHER NORTH says: 'Shakespeare, in his calmer constructions, 'shows in a score of ways, weeks, months; that is therefore the 'true time, or call it the historical time. Hurried himself, and 'hurrying you, on the torrent of passion, he forgets time; and a 'false show of time, to the utmost contracted, arises. 'any wiseacre should ask, "How do we manage to stand the "known together-proceeding of two times?" the wiseacre is an'swered, "We don't stand it, for we know nothing about it. "We are held in a confusion and a delusion about the time." 'We have effect of both, distinct knowledge of neither. 'have suggestions to our Understanding of extended time, we 'have movements of our Will by precipitated time. If you 'ask me, which judiciously you may, what or how much did 'the Swan of Avon intend and know of all this astonishing leger'demain, when he sang thus astonishingly? Was he, the juggler, 'juggled by aërial spirits, -as Puck and Ariel? I put my finger to 'my lip, and nod to him to do the same. A good-natured 'Juggler has cheated your eyes. You ask him to show you how 'he did it. He does the trick slowly, and you see. "Now, "good Conjurer, do it slowly and cheat us." "I can't. I "cheat you by doing it quickly. To be cheated, you must not "see what I do; but you must think that you see." When we 'inspect the Play in our closets, the Juggler does his trick slow'ly. We sit at the Play, and he does it quick.' Just as SHAKESPEARE has dealt with the time of the whole tragedy he has dealt with the age of Hamlet; in the earlier scenes he is in the very hey-day of primy nature, but the effect of the fearful experience which he undergoes is to quicken and stimulate mightily his powers of thought, -to ripen his intellect prematurely. Therefore at the close, as though to smoothe away any discrepancy between his mind and his years, or between the execution of his task and his years, a chance allusion by the Grave-digger is thrown out, which, if we are quick enough to catch, we can apply to Hamlet's age, and we have before us Hamlet in his full maturity.

B

....

In the selection of French Criticisms which follow the German, it may be thought strange that no reference is to be found to Ducis's version of Hamlet, that unlucky butt for English and German ridicule. No extracts would do it justice, and to insert the whole was impossible. But would it not be well, between our fits of laughter over it, to recall the year in which it first appeared? In 1769 the first German translation of Hamlet was only three years old, and LESSING almost single-handed was in the thick of his battle-royal with the French school of art, then supreme in Germany, and of which DUCIS's Hamlet is no unfair representative in the main features; seven years later, BROCKMANN, the idol of the German stage, played Hamlet at first in HEUFELD'S version, in which Laertes is omitted and Hamlet is the prosperous successor of Claudius (afterwards, it is true, BROCKMANN acted SCHROEDER'S version, which is nearer the original, although Hamlet survives the King's attempt to poison him, and the fencingscene is omitted). And at that time, on the English stage, GARRICK and his 'showmen' were 'drawing about' Lear with NAHUM TATE'S 'hook in the nostrils of the Leviathan.' It is to be apprehended that no German nor English tongue dare wag in rude noise at DUCIS, who, after all, did not assume to translate SHAKESPEARE, but merely adapt him. From the French point of view (and is it not unreasonable to demand that a Frenchman should have any other?) it is not difficult to regard Ducis's version as a powerful drama; and we know that in the hands of TALMA its effect was signal.

There now remains the agreeable duty to record the names of those from whom I have received aid.

At the very outset, however, it is with sorrow that I am reminded that Professor ALLEN, upon whom in years past I leaned so heavily, and to whom it was a pleasure to be indebted, has joined the group of

• Precious friends, hid in death's dateless night.'

Had he lived, many an error now lurking in these volumes would