to be a child. There is nonsense in the alteration of Shakspeare's text upon the stage. There are several of the most admired plays of Shakspeare which give much more pleasure to read than to see performed upon the stage. For instance, Othello' and Lear'; both of which abound in beauty of detail, in poetical passages, in highlywrought and consistently preserved characters. But, the pleasure that we take in witnessing a performance upon the stage, depends much upon the sympathy that we feel with the sufferings and enjoyments of the good characters represented, and upon the punishment of the bad. We never can sympathise much with Desdemona or with Lear, because we never can separate them from the estimate that the lady is little less than a wanton, and the old king nothing less than a dotard. Who can sympathise with the love of Desdemona ?-the daughter of a Venetian nobleman, born and educated to a splendid and lofty station in the community. She falls in love and makes a runaway match with a blackamoor, for no better reason than that he has told her a braggart story of his hair-breadth escapes in war. For this, she not only violates her duties to her father, her family, her sex, and her country, but she makes the first advances. She tells Othello she wished Heaven had made her such a man, and informs him how any friend of his may win her by telling her again his story. On that hint, says he, I spoke; and well he might. The blood must circulate briskly in the veins of a young woman, so fascinated, and so coming to the tale of a rude, unbleached African soldier. The great moral lesson of the tragedy of Othello' is, that black and white blood cannot be intermingled in marriage without a gross outrage upon the law of Nature; and that, in such violations, Nature will vindicate her laws. The moral of Othello is not to beware of jealousy, for his jealousy is well founded in the character and conduct of his wife, though not in the fact of her infidelity with Cassio. Desdemona is not false to her husband, but she has been false to the purity and delicacy of her sex and condition when she married him; and the last words spoken by her father on parting from them, after he has forgiven her and acquiesced in the marriage, are Look to her, Moor; have a quick eye to see: And this very idea is that by which the crafty villain Iago works up into madness the jealousy of Othello. Whatever sympathy we feel for the sufferings of Desdemona flows from the consideration that she is innocent of the particular crime imputed to her, and that she is the victim of a treacherous and artful intriguer. But, while compassionating her melancholy fate, we cannot forget the vice of her character. Upon the stage, her fondling with Othello is disgusting. Who, in real life, would have her for his sister, daughter, or wife? She is not guilty of infidelity to her husband, but she forfeits all the affection of her father and all her own filial affection for him. When the duke proposes, on the departure of Othello for the war, that she should return during his absence to her father's house, the father, the daughter and the husband all say 'No!' She prefers following Othello, to be besieged by the Turks in the island of Cyprus. The character of Desdemona is admirably drawn and faithfully preserved throughout the play. It is always deficient in delicacy. Her conversations with Emilia indicate unsettled principles, even with regard to the obligations of the nuptial tie, and she allows Iago, almost unrebuked, to banter with her very coarsely upon women. This character takes from us so much of the sympathetic interest in her sufferings, that when Othello smothers her in bed, the terror and the pity subside immediately into the sentiment that she has her deserts. We feel a similar want of interest in the character and fortunes of Lear, as represented upon the stage. The story of Lear, as those of Othello and Romeo and Juliet, was ready-made to the hand of Shakspeare. They were not of his invention. King Lear and his three daughters form a part of the fabulous history of England. The dotage of an absolute monarch may be a suitable subject of tragedy; and Shakspeare has made a deep tragedy of it. But, as exhibited upon the stage, it is turned into a comedy. Lear, the dotard and the madman, is restored to his throne, and Cordelia finishes with a wedding. What can be more absurd! Dotage and madness, in the person of a king, possessed of the power to give away his kingdom at his pleasure, afford melancholy contemplations of human nature. They are not fit subjects for comedy. Lear is no more fit to be restored to his kingdom than Christopher Sly is to be metamorphosed into a lord. Lear is a dotard and a madman from the first scene in the play, and his insanity commences with such revolting injustice to his only affectionate daughter, that we feel but little compassion for whatever may afterwards befall him. The interesting character of the play is Cordelia; and what a lovely character it is! But the restoration of a dotard from old age to his senses, is as much out of nature as the restoration to his throne is preposterous. Lear, as Shakspeare painted him, is the wreck of a mighty mind and proud spirit, sunk from despotic power into dotage, and maddened by the calamitous consequences of his own imbecility. His madness, with lucid flashes of intellect, is incurable. It is terrible! it is piteous! But it is its effect on the fortunes and fate of Cordelia, that constitutes the chief interest of the spectator; and Lear himself, from his first appearance, loses all title to compassion. The chief import of these objections to the manner in which Shakspeare's plays are represented upon the stage, is to vindicate the great master of the drama' from the liberties taken by stagemanagers with his text. In 'Romeo and Juliet,' the alteration of a single word the substitution of nineteen for fourteenchanges the whole character of the play-makes that, which is a perfect imitation of nature, incongruous absurdity, and takes from one of the loveliest creations of Shakspeare half her charm. Q. SONG OF THE DYING MINSTREL. BY THOMAS POWER. GENTLE lady, sing to me Songs of ancient chivalry; For the minstrel's hand no more Sweeps the sounding harp-strings o'er: Life is ebbing fearfully Gentle lady, sing to me. Ne'er in festal hall again Shall I wake the lofty strain; Silent soon will be the tongue On whose measure crowds have hung: Death has passed his cold decree Gentle lady, sing to me. Sorrow filled my lengthened years, Chilling thoughts and burning tears; Breaks upon the shades of night: Soon the spirit will be free Gentle lady, sing to me. Still the hour, and dark the way Bearing on my closing day: Be the softest music here Whispered on the minstrel's ear: 'Tis my last, sad wish to thee Gentle lady, sing to me. The bamititing comme betor & cu Lea. I where, he was to coud, by I think on his 441 THE POSSESSED OF A DEVIL. READER, I have seen such an one among the victims of intemperance, and it is no creature of my fancy. Charles Granger was a free-hearted, jovial man. He had considerable mental resources, with a lively fancy, and a vein of wit and humor; and his conversational powers gave him an ascendancy over the grave and gay, sacred and profane. He was, in short, at home in every circle, and in every circle he was the listened to of all listeners. He could talk theology with the village parson, with perfect familiarity at one moment, and at the next he could mingle, with no apparent effort in the transition, in the filthy conversation of the drunken and profane. As he passed along, everybody would say, there goes Charles Granger;' and if anything singular or remarkable occurred, everybody would like to hear what Charles Granger would have to say about it. Such is the man that I once saw 'possessed of a devil.' The impression appeared to be as vivid upon his mind as if it were reality, that a devil accompanied him everywhere, exercising over him a most capricious tyranny - at one time sporting with him with boyish familiarity, and at another goading him with a most insufferable terror. This diseased state of mind came on at night, and as his wife was absent on a visit, he left the house before daylight without its being known, with his new companion, and consumed a great part of the day in calling with him upon those who, in his opinion, were the particular friends of his new guest. He found a goodly number of them; and as he passed from house to house, he went as if the devil were really after him. Every now and then he would stop and wipe the big drops of sweat from his brow, (though it was December) and then go on at the same rapid rate as before. It was not long before the story was noised about over the whole village, and much curiosity was manifested in watching to see where he would call, and in listening to what he had to say to different individuals. He called upon many a man and woman who were generally supposed to be the strongest enemies of the devil. In introducing his Satanic friend, he would always mention to him some particular qualities which made the individual a proper object of his regards and attentions, or some acts which he had sometime performed which had been serviceable to the devil's cause. His shrewdness in doing this, caused many a blush of shame and remorse, and many a knee to shake in trepidation. Sins that were effaced long ago from the memory of the community, and some that were almost forgotten by the persons that committed them, were brought out again to the light of day. Joe Hoskins,' 1 said he to a decent-looking old man, that stood with a knot of idlers at the door of a grog shop-here's the devil for whom you stole that sheep, in C***, in the year '96. You remember it, don't you? Why don't you shake hands with him? Well, well; excuse me, if I've mentioned anything disagreeable to you. I knew you served the devil now, though not exactly in that way; but I didn't know that you were so particular about the how and where of such matters.' This act of theft was never known in B*** before, but from this time it was never forgotten, and the boys so annoyed poor Joe Hoskins, that he soon left the place. But Charles lashed wickedness, too, in high places. He recounted to the devil, as he introduced them, the cruel oppressions of Judge A.; the frauds of Mr. B., the merchant; the lies and filching schemes of Mr. C., the lawyer; the intrigues of the respectable Mr. D. with the widow E.; &c. &c. He touched more consciences in that one day than parson Jones had in all his life-time. Though what Charles Granger said on that day supplied material for village tittle-tattle and slander for a long time after, by alteration and exaggeration as it passed from one hand to another, yet it was never found that, in any one case, he stated what was untrue. Some of the superstitious ones believe to this day that he actually was possessed of a devil, and that he was endowed for the time with Satanic powers of discernment; and they look with horror upon those whom Charles specified as being the very particular friends of the devil. Charles Granger was very fond of the ladies, and they were fond of him. His habits had not yet got to be so bad as to make him troublesome, unless now and then just at the conclusion of a ball, or perhaps on the return of a sleighing-party; and then there were so many that were not in a much better condition, that he shared with them the blame of the noise, and the naughty acts which were sometimes perpetrated. To be sure, he went beyond them all, but not so far beyond as to be strikingly distinguished as an offender, in the tattle of the next day. Besides, he had, by long use, acquired a sort of title to the privilege of doing strange and wicked things, and the girls would say, la! it's his way,' and that's dear Charles Granger,' and so on. He, of course, held his standing as yet in society. Even the good old folks, up to deacon Johnson and parson Jones, could converse with him quite familiarly at times, for he had the power to make himself agreeable to everybody. Well-though it was perhaps rather uncourteous so to do he called upon some of his female acquaintances, with his friend, the devil. Among them was Catharine Rawley, who had been the standing village belle for more than ten years. 'Good morning, Mr. Granger,' said she, with her usual smile. Ah, Katy, well, this devil has come to see you' |