TRANSACTIONS (Q5/| ALBANY INSTITUTE, VOLUME XI, Mo. Bot. Gardan 1909 ALBANY,N. Y¥.: WEED, PARSONS & CO., PRINTERS. 1887. o een CON THNTS, Officers of the Albany Institute, 1887 - - - - _ Shakespearian Criticism, by Irving Browne __ - : ‘ 1 Life in the Arctic, by Harry Macdona “ . - 21 The Albany Institute, by George W. Clinton, LL. D. - - 44 Appendix to Judge Clinton’s paper, by Henry A. Homes, LL. D. - - 58 _ The Open Polar Sea, by George R. Howell - - - 55 London Stone, by Ernest J. Miller - Bon - - =" 61 Bibliomania, by Irving Browne - : Literary Property and International cones by Horace E. Smith, LL. D. 100 Toeutius in Fabrica, by Gilbert M. Tucker j : 117 Fertilization of Flowers, by Charles H. Peck ~—- - - 155 Arendt Van Curler, first Superintendent of Rensselaerwyck, Founder ‘of Schenectady, and of the Dutch Policy of Peace with the — by Wn. Elliot Griffis, D. D. : 1 The Variation of the Needle and the Location of the gon Lines in _ Northern New York, by Verplanck Colvin - 181 ‘Sanitary Value of the Chemical Analysis of Potable Waters, ‘5 Willis a. Tucker, Ph.D. . - The Greek Theory of the State, by Edward North, L. H. D. : - 219 On the Correspondence of Governor D. D. Tompkins, Lately Acquired by the State, with some Notes on his Life, by Henry A. Homes, LL. D. 223 le “Dreamers ” of the Columbia River Valley in oe Territory, by Major J. W. MacMurray, U. 8. A. 241 Expedition of the ‘‘ Alert ” to Hudson's Strait and Bay, ook 1885, 5 by James MacNaughton ‘Gold, Silver and the aes. of the Silver Dollar, by Chauncey P. Wil- liams [om - 249 iv Contents. Minute adopted in Commemoration of the Two Hundredth Anniversary Pais the Publication of Newton’s Principia, by Verplanck Colvin — - - 802 Evidence of the French Discoveries in New York, previous to the Coloni- zation by the Dutch, by George R. Howell = - - - - 309 What made the Institute Possible, by Leonard Kip - 4 ake eee Catalogue of the Members of the Albany Institute - - - 829 Index - - - - - m i “ 4 - 335 OFFICERS OF THE ALBANY INSTITUTE FOR 1887. resident, LEONARD KIP. Treasurer, JOHN TEMPLETON. Recording Secretary, Corresponding Secretary, GEORGE R. HOWELL. ERNEST J. MILLER. First Department — Physical Science and the Arts. President and ex-officio one of the Vice-Presidents of the Institute, VERPLANCK COLVIN. Recording Secretary, Corresponding Seeretary, WILLIAM HAILES, Jr., M. D. SAMUEL B. WARD, M. D. Librarian, GEORGE R. HOWELL. Second Department — Natural History. President and ex-officio one of the Vice-Presidents of the Institute, OSEPH A. LINTNER Vice-President, CHARLES H. PECK. Recording Secretary, Corresponding Secretary, CHARLES E. BEECHER. WILLIAM W. HILL. & Third Department — History and General Literature. President and ex-officio one of the Vice-Presidents id the Institute, WILLIAM L. LEARNED, LL. D Vice-President, THOMAS J. VAN ALSTYNE. Recording Secretary, Corresponding Secretary, EDWARD W. RANKIN. JOHN V. L. PRUYN, Jr. Curators . the Collections in Natural History and the Arts. Maorice E. VIew Horace E. Smiru, LL. D., THEODORE V. Vas Hevses, GRANGE sae Joun W. McNamara, Joun 8S. Perry, CHARLES M. Fauien EUGENE BURLINGAME, Isaac Bart. Publishing Committee, Wiis G. Tucker, M. D., LeonarD Kip, PHILANDER DeEmine. TRANSACTIONS. SHAKESPEARIAN CRITICISM. By Irvine BROWNE. [Read before the Albany Institute, Nov. 23, 1880.] Thave not invited you hither this evening to listen to a learned philological or critical discourse. I have no pretensions for such an office. In asking your attention to the subject of Shakespearian criti- cigsm, my purpose is rather to recreate and amuse you for a few mo ments with some of the humors and absurdities of criticism on Shakespeare and his plays. While we owe much to judicious criti- - eism for the correction of misprints, the emendation .of obscure and incorrect passages, and the unfolding of hidden beauties in these 1m- mortal works, it must be confessed that the poet’s critics have in many _ instances done their best to make him and themselves ridiculous, and not only have disguised his works but have striven to unseat the man himself, In short, criticism on Shakespeare has run mad and_ beaten its own brains out. From this sweeping assertion I must except the celebrated English editor, Mr. Knight, and our own American scholars, Messrs. Verplanck, White, Hudson and Furness. The vari- orum edition, which the latter is now publishing, illustrates both sides of my subject, and should be at the hand of every man who loves and would know Shakespeare. But let us first inquire whether there was any Shakespeare, because if there was not it is of no use to spend our time on : The most audacious of many modern attempts at historical icono- clasm is that which seeks to prove that the plays attributed to Shakes- peare were not written by him, but probably by Lord Bacon. This conjecture would dash down from his throne the acknowledged gover-— 2 : Shakespearian Criticism. eign of literature, and establish in his place the man who of all would have been the most incapable of writing these dramas. The theory, I believe, was originated by a lady of the name of Delia Bacon, but — whether she conjectured herself to be descended from the rival whom she sets up against. Shakespeare, I have no information. The craze of this most mad lady was adopted and advocated in a book of some six hundred infidel pages, by Mr. Nathaniel Holmes, of Missouri, who is said, I blush to relate, to be a lawyer and a judge, although it is evi- dent he is no judge of Shakespeare. The whole contention rests on the assumption that it is impossible that a man of such slender attain- ments, as Shakespeare is known to have beenjcould have written these wise, profound, brilliant, and altogether unparalleled dramas. But just as it requires. more credulity to disbelieve than to believe Christi- anity, so it is much more difficult to disbelieve than to believe Shakes- peare’s authorship. No theory resting in mere skepticism and denial can win its way or carry conviction. It is possible that the assign- ment of the plays to Bacon is intended as a posthumous compensation | for the detriment which his moral character has suffered. But it will not atone fur his moral delinquencies, and his intellectual reputation needs no enhancement. As to the evidence, the arguments adduced to support the theory are of the flimsiest, most baseless, far-fetched and laughably puerjle description — such as a sensible man might use in his dreams, but only such stuff as dreams are made of. To these credulous persons trifles light as air prove confirmation strong as holy writ. For example, Shakespeare’s manuscript contains few alterations or erasures ; conse- quently he must have copied from Bacon’s! So some poet, in return- ing something lent him by Bacon, accompanied it by some compo- | sition of his own, and remarked that while he did not give as good as Bacon sent, yet he sent him “ measure for measure;” consequently, Bacon wrote ‘‘ Measure for Measure”! This would seem better evi- dence that the borrower himself wrote it. These are fair examples of the arguments. On the other hand Bacon never claimed the plays in his life, nor by any of his remains; no contemporary can be shown ever to have suspected him as the author; all contemporaries who speak assign them to Shakespeare; and Bacon is the last man to whom they can be attributed, because they are entirely foreign to his style, as well in their glaring faults asin their magnificent beauties, and because to assign them to him in addition to his acknowledged works, would argue him a more superhuman genius than Shakespeare and vastly greater than any who has ever lived. If Bacon had written = S E % ? Ot an So as Sees plays, would he have borrowed his plots, plagiarized some of his best lines Shakespearian Criticism. 3 and ideas, and committed gross anachronisms? Bacon left his repu- tation to the vindication of posterity. Does any sane man suppose he would uot have left behind him a declaration of his authorship of these immortal works, if it had been his? Granting that he may have been deterred from owning the plays in his life-time on account of the disrepute of the occupation of a play-wright, this reason could not have weighed after his death. Moreover, the ambitious courtier would have been glad to read his plays to Elizabeth as Shakespeare did, despite the unpopularity of the vocation. The humorist of the New York Times says : “« It is as easy to show the falsity of the delusion as to the existence of the Chinese language as it was to . demonstrate the mythical character of the legends upon which the Christian religion was founded.” Upon reasoning similar to that on which Archbishop Whately based his demonstration of the non-exis- tence of Napoleon, James Freeman Clarke has jestingly proved that Shakespeare not only never wrote, but never lived. He says: “ can Shakespeare have been a real person when his very name is spelled in at least two different ways in manuscripts professing to be his own autograph? And when it is found in the manuscripts of the period spelled in every form and with every combination of letters which express its sound or the semblance thereof? One writer of his time calls him Shakescene, showing plainly the mythical character of the name. His wife’s name has also a mythical character, and is probably derived from his song commencing, ‘ Anne hath a way.’ Again, if he were a real person living at London in the midst of writers, poets, actors and other eminent men, is it credible that no allusion should have been made to him by most of them? He was contemporary with Raleigh, Spenser, Bacon, Coke, Burleigh, Hooker, Henry IV of France, Montaigne, Tasso, Cervantes,.Gallileo, Grotius; and not one | of them, although so many of them were voluminous writers, refers to any such person, and no allusion to any of them appears in any of his plays. He is referred to, to be sure, with excessive admiration by the group of play-writers among whom he is supposed to have moved; but as there is not in all his works the least allusion in return to any of them, we may presume that Shakespeare was a sort of nom de plume to which all anonymous plays were referred —a sort of dramatic John Doe. If such a man existed why did not others, out of this circle, say something about his life and circumstances? Milton was eight years old when Shakespeare died, and might have seen him, as he took pains to go and see Gallileo, who was born in the same year with Shakespeare. Oliver Cromwell was seventeen years old when Shakes- peare died; Descartes twenty years old; Rubens, the painter, thirty- t Shakespearian Criticism. nine years old; none of these have heard of him, although Rubens resided in England and painted numerous portraits there. Again, many important events occurred in his supposed life-time, to none of which he has alluded — as the battle of Lepanto, the St. Bartholomew massacre, the defeat of the Spanish Armada, the first circumnaviga- tion of the globe, the gunpowder plot, the deliverance of Holland from Spain, the invention of the telescope and the discovery thereby of Jupiter’s satellites. In an era of strenuous controversy between the Protestant and Roman religions, no one can tell from his works whether he was Catholic or Protestant. Unlike Dante, eee Goethe, he left no trace on the political or even social life of his time.” His works display such an unprecedented universality of knowledge in one man, that he has been conjectured to be pretty much every thing — lawyer, physician, soldier, courtier, tailor. ‘In a time when others collected and published their works, no collected edition of his appeared until long after his death. Nothing that can be pronounced ~ an authentic portrait of him has come down to us, and the effigies which we have are clearly of a formal and traditional type, with their preposterous expanse of forehead.” This is very fine reasoning, but by the same line of reasoning, if we admit that Shakespeare lived, we might prove that Raleigh, Spenser, Bacon, Coke, Burleigh, Hooker, Henry IV, Montaigne, Tasso, Cer- vantes, Gallileo, Grotius, Milton, Cromwell, Descartes and Rubens never lived, because Shakespeare says nothing of them. After all, such omissions are no more singular than that Thucydides has noth- ing to say of Socrates, his great contemporary, nor than that Plutarch, though the contemporary in his youth or in his old age of Persius, — Juvenal, Lucan and Seneca, of Quintillian, Martial, Tacitus, Saeton- ; ius, Pliny the Elder and the Younger, does not cite them, and in return his name is never mentioned by any Roman writer. : The text of Shakespeare’s plays has given rise to some very remark- able conjectural criticism. The variorum edition is almost as good a — jest book as Joe Miller’s. We oe well exclaim, in the words of Madame Roland, slightly altered, “‘Oh, criticism, how many follies — are uttered in thy name!” Once ina great while’ an important and | sensible emendation is effected. Thus, in the description of Fal-— stafi’s death, the words ‘‘table of Greenfields” long stood as the pons asinorum of the commentators. The scholar who suggested ‘*’a babbled o’ green fields,” instead, conferred a boon on mankind. But what a narrow escape from a leap out of the pan into the fire! — Mr. Collier’s folio would read, “on a table of green frieze,” the pas- sage then standing, “‘his nose was as sharp as a pen on a table of © Shakespearian Criticism. 5 green frieze,” which is quite a figure of upholstery. (Here let ps observe that the conclusive argument in favor of the received emenda- tion seems to have escaped the attention of all the commentators until White. A mere reading of the passage suggests it: ‘‘for after I saw him fumble with the sheets and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers’ ends, I knew there was but one way: for his nose was as sharp as a pen, and ’a dabbled of green fields.” What more natural than to talk of green fields after playing with flowers?) It is hard to believe that Pope was serious when he conjectured that the words werea stage direction for a “supe,” by the name of Greenfields, to bring in a table. Perhaps the most disputed passage in Shakespeare is ‘‘ that runa- ways’ eyes may wink,” in Juliet’s soliloquy, where she is longing for the approach of night and her husband, that ‘‘ Romeo may leap to these arms untalked of and unseen.” Who or what is ‘‘ runaway?” Those commentators who preserve the word have different explana- tions, some supposing it to mean Cupid, a runaway from Venus, while others suppose it to mean the sun, Phaeton, the night, watchmen, or Juliet herself. Others think it means vagabonds or tramps. Others would read ‘‘enemies,” ‘‘runagates,” ‘‘ unawares,” ‘‘ renomy’s, ‘*rumor’s,” ‘‘rumorers’,,” ‘‘roamers’,” ‘‘roving,” ‘‘ runabouts’,” _ *Tuna’s,” ‘‘ yonder,” “runaway spies,” “soon day’s,” ‘‘ curious,” *‘ envious,” ‘‘ribald,” ‘* Uranus’,” “ no man’s,” “ Cynthia’s,” “sunny day’s,” ‘‘sun awake’s,” ‘‘sun away,” “sun aweary,” “rude day’s,” while one imaginative person, having the legend of Godiva in mind, would read, “no man’s eyes may peep;” and the climax is capped by one, who reading ‘‘ runaways’,” explains it by referring to boys who at night tie a cat or a dog to a door-knocker, and then run away. Here are thirty-three different explanations, and the conjectures cover twenty-eight large pages in fine type in Mr. Furness’ new edition. A number of these conjectures may be easily set aside. The most in- genious one, Cupid, is disposed ot by the reflection that he is usually represented blind, and therefore his eyes would always wink. In this very context Shakespeare speaks of “blind love;” in Cymbeline he speaks of the images of two “‘ winking Cupids; ” and he makes Mer- cutio speak of “ Venus’ purblind son arid heir,” and the *‘‘ blind bow boy.” If Cupid could see, then, as Mr. White observes, the marriage night would be the very occasion when he would be and would be desired to be wide-awake. No inanimate object will answer, because Romeo’s coming was thus to be ‘‘ untalked cf” as well as “ unseen.” ' ** Enemies’ eyes ” will not serve, because friends’ eyes would be just as objectionable. Juliet would certainly not have wished her own eyes to wink on this occasion. There is some plausibility in calling watch- 6 Shakespearian Criticism. men ‘‘runaways,” judging from the standard of the modern police. “Unawares” would answer, but is inferior in beauty to “rumor’s eyes,” especially when it is remembered that Virgil depicts Rumor with as many eyes and tongues as feathers. Or take the passage in “ Cymbeline,” where Imogen is excusing her husband’s injustice-to her, and says, ‘‘ some jay of Italy, whose mother was her painting, hath betrayed him.” We have had, instead of this, **who smothers her with painting;” ‘‘ whose feather was her paint- ing;” and ‘‘ whose muffler was her painting.” All agree that by *«jay ” is intended a courtesan, and it seems to me that the poet sim- ply meant to say ‘‘ whose mother was just like her.” The scholar who shall suggest a better reading for either of these passages will earn the solid gratitude of all students of literature. Another passage upon which a great deal of gratuitous stupidity has been bestowed is the famous passage in Macbeth, “withered murder * * with his stealthy pace, with Tarquin’s ravishing strides, moves like a ghost.” Nothing can be more felicitous than this descrip- tion of the long, eager, stealthy steps with which the murderer or ravisher steals upon his victim. The word “strides” originally stood “sides,” and the emendation is Pope’s. Rowe, Malone and Knight however preserve “sides.” Knight says it is a verb meaning to match, to balance ; that ‘‘ ravishing” isa noun; and that the meaning is, murder, with his stealthy pace, matches Tarquin’s ravishing. Dr. Johnson says a ravishing stride is an action of violence, incompatible with a stealthy pace, and he would read, ‘‘ with Tarquin ravishing, slides,” etc. A writer in the Gentleman’s Magazine says of this: ** Macbeth was treading on a boarded floor, up one pair of stairs, prob- ably in a passage or lobby, which made a cracking noise, which obliged him, in his alarm, to take long and cautious steps. This granted, we may pretty safely adopt the word s/ides.” Of course it immediately oceurs to the reader that the castle probably had a stone floor, and a few lines further on Macbeth cautions the earth not to hear his steps, “for fear the very stones prate of my whereabouts.” White says, “ Pope’s emendation will seem happy to every cautious person who has stepped through asick chamber, or any apartment in which there were sleepers whom he did not wish to wake, and who remembers how he did it.” tee, __ Again, where Macbeth says the blood on his hand would “the mul- titudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red,” some have related ‘‘ one” to “‘ green,” and made the passage stand, “making the green-one red.” It is to be remarked that the poet has just spoken of “seas” in the plural, and of course he would not speak of them in the - * Shakespearian Criticism, 7 next line in the singular. The idea is plain— making the multitu- dinous green seas one red. Staunton finds it necessary to read, “ mak- ing the green zone red.” — ¥ So where Macbeth defies Banquo’s ghost, he says, “if trembling I inhabit then, protest me the baby of a girl.” ‘‘ Inhabit” has dis- turbed the commentators. Most of those who accept it, read it in the sense of ‘‘stay within doors.” Others suggest ‘‘ inhibit,” ‘in- herit,” ‘‘ exhibit,” ‘‘evitate,” ‘‘evade it,” ‘flinch at it,” ‘I inhabit then,” “‘ Tunknight me then.” But Mr. White has hit the true sense of the word when he cites ‘‘ oh Thou who inhabitest the praises of Israel.” Indeed, the amount of stupid and unnecessary crificism that is in- flicted on our great poet is almost beyond belief. For instance, in re- spect to the passage in Romeo and Juliet where Nurse, calling for Juliet, says, “What lamb! what lady-bird! God forbid! Where’s this girl ?” so sensible an editor as Staunton remarks on the words ‘‘lady-bird,” that they were a term applied to women of light and in- delicate behavior, and that Nurse remembering this, suddenly checks herself, and exclaims, ‘‘God forbid” — that I should apply such a name to my charge! NHereupon, Mr. Dyce deems it necessary to re- mark, ‘‘ Staunton is certainly wrong,” and to explain that the mean- ing is, ‘‘ God forbid” that any thing should have happened to Juliet. One hardly knows which the more to admire, the folly of Staunton or the simplicity of Dyce. If we could be permitted a suggestion, we would say that the reference was unquestionably to the popular Mother Goose melody : ‘*Lady-bird, lady-bird, fly away home, Thy house is on fire, thy children will burn.” Nurse meant ‘‘ God forbid ” that any such bad fortune should come, on Juliet as the incremation of her palace and the contingent young Capulets with which it might be stocked. This now, is something like. Or take Lord Campbell in his conjectural pamphlet on the question whether Shakespeare was a lawyer, in which he comes to the conelu- sion that there is a good deal to be said on both sides, and very little certain on either. Among the arguments in fayor of the affirmative, * his lordship adduces the lines : “But my kisses bring again Seals of love, but sealed in vain.” If this sort of seals were now in vogue among the legal profession, a seal would probably be deemed necessary for every conceivable legal document, and consequently, there would be even more lip-service among lawyers than at present. 8 Shakespearian Criticism. Among the conjectures concerning the occupation of Shakespeare _ before he became a player, none is more entertaining than that of _ Steevens, founded on the passage: 3 ‘* There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, Rough-hew them how we will.” The commentator is alluding to the trade of Shakespeare’s father as a wool dealer or butcher, and conjectures that the poet followed the 4 same business before he came up to London. He first gives the pas- : sage in support of this theory, and then proceeds: “Dr. Farmer in- forms me that these words are merely technical. A woolman, butcher and dealer in skewers ” — and he emphasizes the point by the aid of italics — ‘‘ lately observed to him that his nephew, an idle lad, could only assist in making them — ‘he could rough-hew them, but I was obliged to shape their ends.’ Whoever recollects the profession of Shakespeare’s father, will admit that his son might be no stranger to such a term. I have seen packages of wool pinned up with skewers.” It has always seemed to us a mystery how Shakespeare’s spirit could wait for Steevens to die a natural death after writing that. Perhaps the poet thought that it was one of the decrees of Providence that poets are always to be misunderstood, and that the passage in question might fitly be read thus : “ There’s a divinity that shapes our ends 7 Rough, hew them how we will.” ; These specimens encourage us to look a little further into the mis- i carrying labors of Shakespeare’s editors and commentators. One of q the choicest of these gentlemen is Becket, who might have been _ served as Henry treated his great namesake, without any necessity for repentance. A few samples will suffice. ‘‘ Hamlet. Govern these _ ventages with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your : mouth, and it will discourse most excellent music.’ « Ventages with your fingers and thumb,’ I would read thus: ‘Govern these ventages and the wmbo with your fingers,’ etc. Umbo (Lat.) a knob, a button. The piece of brass at the end of a flute might very well be called a button.” Oh, if one could stop such ventages as this with fingers and thumbs, what a dispensation it would be! But again: Hamlet in the | grave with Laertes says : eae ee ae eb ae ‘“Woo’t weep? woo’t fight? woo’t fast? woo't tear thyself ? : Woo’t drink up Esil? eat a crocodile?” 2 On this Becket is thus delivered : “ This proposition of Hamlet is too extravagant, too ridiculous to remain in the text. By such a reading the Danish prince appears to be a very Dragon of Wantley E for voraciousness. I regulate the passage thus: oe Shakespearian Criticism. 9 ‘ Woo’t weep ? woo’t drink ? woo’t eat? woo't fast ? woo't fight ? Woo't tear thyself ? —Ape, Esil, Crocodile?’ ‘Up’ is misprinted for ‘ Ape,’ ‘ Esel’ in old language is ‘ Ass.’” It may be well to command our faces long enough to remember that Esil was a common term for vinegar, and also might have been a corruption of Issel, one of the affluents of the Rhine. So much for . cket — ‘‘ off with his head.” We next call up Mr. Jackson — and there is no mistake about the latter syllable of his name, however much the reader may be inclined to doubt it after hearing some examples of his powers. Take the speech of the Clown in All’s Well that Ends Well. Clown has been singing an old ballad about the scarcity of good women, and then ob- serves : ‘‘An we might have a good woman born but every blazing star, or at an earthquake, *twould mend the lottery well; a man may pluck his heart out ere he pluck one.” Mr..Jackson says : ‘‘ How can a woman be born?