great sensibility (says he), or none at all, seems to produce the same effect. In the latter case, the audience supply what is wanting; and with the former they sympathise."

In reference to "the sweet Ophelia," Hazlitt eloquently exclaims:-"Ophelia is a character almost too exquisitely touching to be dwelt upon. 'Oh, rose of May!' oh, flower too soon faded! Her love, her madness, her death are described with the truest touches of tenderness and pathos. It is a character which nobody but Shakspere could have drawn in the way he has done; and to the conception of which there is not the smallest approach, except in some of the old romantic ballads."

Mrs. Jameson also, in her "CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN," has a beautiful passage on the same pathetic theme:"Once at Marano, I saw a dove caught in a tempest: perhaps it was young, and either lacked strength of wing to reach its home, or the instinct which teaches to shun the brooding storm: but so it was-and I watched it, pitying as it flitted, poor bird! hither and thither, with its silver pinions shining against the black thunder-cloud, till after a few giddy whirls it fell blinded, affrighted, and bewildered, into the turbid wave beneath, and was swallowed up for ever. It reminded me of the fate of Ophelia; and now, when I think of her, I see again that poor dove, beating with weary wing, bewildered amid the storm."

"How should I your true love know

From another one?

By his cockle-hat and staff,

And his sandal-shoon."-Act IV., Scene 5.

The habiliments mentioned in the last two lines were appropriated to pilgrims. Warburton remarks, "that while this kind of devotion was in favour, love intrigues were carried on under that mask. Hence the old ballads and novels made pilgrimages the subjects of their plots. The cockleshell was an emblem of an intention to go beyond sea."

"They say, the owl was a baker's daughter."
Act IV., Scene 5.

This transformation is said to be a common tradition in Gloucestershire. It is thus related by Mr. Douce :-"Our Saviour went into a baker's shop where they were baking, and asked for some bread to eat: the mistress of the shop immediately put a piece of dough in the oven to bake for him; but was reprimanded by her daughter, who insisting that the piece of dough was too large, reduced it to a very small size: the dough, however, immediately began to swell, and presently became of a most enormous size, whereupon the baker's daughter cried out, 'Heugh, heugh, heugh,' which owl-like noise probably induced our Saviour to transform her into that bird, for her wickedness." The story is related to deter children from illiberal behaviour to the poor.

"There's such divinity doth hedge a king,

That treason can but peep to what it would."
Act IV., Scene 5.

For "hedge" the first quarto reads "wall."-As a genuine instance of royal confidence, an anecdote of Queen Elizabeth is quoted from Chettle's "ENGLAND'S MOURNING GARMENT: ""While her Majesty was on the Thames, near Greenwich, a shot was fired by accident, which struck the royal barge, and hurt a waterman near her. The French ambassador being amazed, and all crying 'Treason, treason!" yet she, with an undaunted spirit, came to the open

"It was that very day that young Hamlet was born." Act V., Scene 1.

This is possibly a slip of memory in the poet. It appears, from what the Gravedigger subsequently says, that Hamlet must have been at this period thirty years old; and yet, in the early part of the play, we are told of his intention to return to school at Wittenberg. In the first quarto, Yorick's skull is said to have lain in the earth twelve years, instead of three-and-twenty, as at present:-"Look you, here's a skull hath been here this dozen year; let me see, ay, ever since our last King Hamlet slew Fortinbrasse in combat:--young Hamlet's father: he that's mad."

It is probable that, in the reconstruction of the play, Shakspere perceived that the general depth of Hamlet's philosophy indicated a mind too mature for the possession of a very young man.-In reference to Hamlet's demeanour in this transcendant scene, Boswell the younger says (in his edition of Malone), "The scene with the Gravedigger shews, in a striking point of view, his good-natured affability. The reflections which follow afford new proofs of his amiable character. The place where he stands, the frame of his own thoughts, and the objects which surround him, suggest the vanity of all human pursuits; but there is nothing harsh or caustic in his satire; his observations are dictated rather by feelings of sorrow than of anger; and the sprightliness of his wit, which misfortune has repressed, but cannot altogether extinguish, has thrown over the whole a truly pathetic cast of humorous sadness. Those gleams of sunshine, which serve only to shew us the scattered fragments of a brilliant imagination, crushed and broken by calamity, are much more affecting than a long uninterrupted train of monotonous woe."

"Let four captains

Bear Hamlet, like a soldier to the stage,
For he was likely, had he been put on,

To have proved most royally."-Act V., Scene 2.

Many efforts have been made to render the character of Hamlet perfectly consonant with that idea of moral perfection which we are anxious to attach to him; but none, it appears to us, with perfect success; nor are such attempts necessary, except for those who are anxious to worship an idol, rather than to discuss the merits of a human being. As regards the main incident of his life, his merits and deficiencies are delineated with great delicacy and discrimination by the hand of Goethe:-"It is clear to me that Shakspere's intention was to exhibit the effects of a great action, imposed as a duty, upon a mind too feeble for its accomplishment. In this sense, I find the character consistent throughout. Here is an oak planted in a china vase, proper to receive only the most delicate flowers: the roots strike out, and the vessel flies to pieces. A pure, noble, highly moral disposition, but without that energy of soul which constitutes the hero, sinks under a load which it can neither support nor resolve to abandon altogether. All his obligations are sacred to him; but this alone is above his powers. An impossibility is required at his hands; not an impossibility in itself, but that which is so to him. Observe how he shifts, turns, hesitates, advances and recedes; how he is continually reminded and reminding himself of his great commission, which he, nevertheless, in the end, seems almost entirely to lose sight of; and this without ever recovering his former tranquillity."

In reference to the disputed question of Hamlet's sanity, Boswell makes some judicious remarks, in which he maintains that the prince's great intellect is essentially sound, though weakened and disturbed :

"The sentiments which fall from Hamlet in his soliloquies, or in confidential communication with Horatio, evince not only a sound, but an acute and vigorous understanding. His misfortunes, indeed, and a sense of shame, from the hasty and incestuous marriage of his mother, have sunk him into a state of weakness and melancholy; but though his mind is enfeebled, it is by no means deranged. It would have been little in the manner of Shakspere to introduce two persons in the same play whose intellects were disordered; but he has rather, in this instance, as in 'KING LEAR,' a second time effected what, as far as I can recollect, no other writer has ever ventured to attempt-the exhibition on the same scene of real and fictitious madness in contrast with each other.-In carrying his design into execution, Hamlet feels no difficulty in imposing upon the King, whom he detests; or upon Polonius, and his school-fellows, whom he despises but the case is very different indeed in his interviews with Ophelia: aware of the submissive mildness of her character, which leads her to be subject to the influence of her father and her brother, he cannot venture to entrust her with his secret. In her presence, therefore, he has not only to assume a disguise, but to restrain himself from those expressions of affection which a lover must find it most difficult to repress in the presence of his mistress. In this tumult of conflicting feelings, he is led to overact his part, from a fear of falling below it; and thus gives an appearance of rudeness and harshness to that which is, in fact, a painful struggle to conceal his tenderness."

Dr. Johnson's appreciation of Shakspere is, unfortunately, not in general such as to tempt us to transcribe his summary

remarks on each play; but as the opening paragraph of his estimate of "HAMLET" is more lauditory than usual, we willingly give it currency:

"If the dramas of Shakspere were to be characterised, each by the particular excellence which distinguishes it from the rest, we must allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are so numerous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The scenes are interchangeably diversified with merriment and solemnity: with merriment that includes judicious and instructive observations; and solemnity not strained by poetical violence above the natural sentiments of man. New characters appear from time to time in continual succession, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of conversation. The pretended madness of Hamlet causes much mirth, the mournful distraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every personage produces the effect intended, from the Apparition that in the first Act chills the blood with horror, to the Fop in the last, that exposes affectation to just contempt."

As a specimen of the great difference between the first edition of "HAMLET" and the finished play, we subjoin a scene from the former, in which the prince's return is announced to his mother. It should be premised that, in the earlier edition, the Queen's innocence of the murder is distinctly asserted by herself; as it is also in the black-letter "HISTORIE OF HAMBLETT :”—

Enter HORATIO and the QUEEN.

Hor. Madam, your son is safe arrived in Denmarke,
This letter I even now received of him,
Whereas he writes how he escaped the danger
And subtle treason that the King had plotted,
Being crossed by the contention of the winds,
He found the packet sent to the King of England,
Wherein he saw himself betrayed to death,

As at his next conversion with your grace
He will relate the circumstance at full.

Queen. Then I perceive there's treason in his looks,
That seemed to sugar o'er his villanies:
But I will sooth and please him for a time,
For murderous minds are always jealous;
But know not you, Horatio, where he is?

Hor. Yes, madam, and he hath appointed me
To meet him on the east side of the city
To-morrow morning.

Queen. O fail not, good Horatio, and withal commend me
A mother's care to him, bid him awhile
Be wary of his presence, lest that he
Fail in that he goes about.

Hor. Madam, never make doubt of that;

I think by this the news be come to court
He is arrived: observe the King, and you shall
Quickly find, Hamlet being here,

Things fell not to his mind.

Queen. But what became of Gilderstone and Rossencraft? Hor. He being set ashore, they went for England, And in the packet there writ down that doom To be performed on them 'pointed for him: And by great chance he had his father's seal, So all was done without discovery.

Queen. Thanks be to heaven for blessing of the prince. Horatio, once again I take my leave,

With thousand mother's blessings to my son.

Hor. Madam, adieu!