Then he vj crownes of gold out of his pocket drew, And gave them her; a slight reward (quod he) and so adiew. Her crooked knees, as now they bowe. She takes her leave, and home she hyes with spedy pace; Of all this towne, and there is none hath halfe so good a grace: And still with many prayses more she heaved him to the skies. But of our mariage say at once, what aunswer have you brought? Nothing was done or said that she hath left untolde, Here was a gratuity for any dramatist. And, once in the English play, the scenes would never have been dropped out by a Dutch translator or remodeler; for if there is one thing in broad comedy which causes the Dutch the greatest merriment, even to this day, it is the garrulity of a housemaid. Assumed priority on the part of the English play would likewise explain why its author made such extensive use of Boaistuau instead of turning to the much more elaborate account in Brooke. From the Frenchman he apparently got the proper names and great blocks of dialogue. Whereas a comparison of D with the poem reveals but the two points of contact which have just been commented upon. Of course, it is fair at this point to put the question: Why did Brooke, except in two instances, entirely ignore the play? The answer is not far to seek. The play, judging by D, added to the growth of this fable, it is true, a good deal of figurative language and many suggestions for the arrangement of scenes; but, on the 1 Op. cit., pp. 102-5. other hand, introduced but one important new incident-the death of Mercutio. And this latter is brought in so by the way that its purpose might easily have escaped detection. A narrative poet, therefore, like Brooke, would have found little to glean from the play; for him the more kindred novella-writer, Boaistuau, would have been a sufficient guide. Further, Brooke probably had the text of Boaistuau directly at hand, whereas he undoubtedly had to trust to his memory for the play.' Hence it seems safe to conclude that the English source of D antedated the poem. With this much determined, the date of composition of the play falls within very narrow limits-between 1562 and 1559, the years in which the English poem and the French novella, respectively, first appeared. IV The mere knowledge that an English play on this subject existed as early perhaps as 1560, and that Shakspere used it extensively, does not, however, entirely satisfy one's curiosity. One wonders about the nature of this tragedy. Did it share with its contemporaries, Gorboduc, Cambyses, Appius and Virginia, and Tancred and Gismunda, in all the Senecan characteristics which were clogging the drama at that time? Or did it depend for its tragedy solely on the tremendous situation inherent in the plot? These are questions which one can answer only by referring to D. Fortunately, the play seems not to have been greatly changed at the hands of the Dutch redactor. In only one instance, indeed, is there positive evidence of interpolation. This is where the nurse, apropos of Romeo's visit to Juliette's chamber, grossly compares feminine temperaments, Italian and Dutch. In other instances the author probably adhered pretty closely to his original. Two things, at least, make this seem likely. For, in the first place, as I pointed out before, considerable portions of D are nothing more than slavish paraphrases of Boaistuau, indicating that its author's method was certainly no more original than that of his English predecessor. And, in the second place, many lines in D, as we have amply seen, still have a close similarity to their coun1 For reminding me of the cumulative value as testimony of this literary condition I must thank Professor Neilson, of Columbia University terparts in S. The force of this testimony will at once become apparent if one but reflect what Shakspere's method of adaptation habitually was. He seldom paraphrased, he transformed. Take the following for example: Brooke: Art thou quoth he [the friar to Romeo] a man? thy shape Thy crying and thy weeping eyes denote a woman's hart. So that I stood in doute this howre (at the least) If thou a man, or woman wert, or else a brutish beast. Shakspere (III, iii, 109–11): Fr. L. Art thou a man? thy form cries out thou art; The unreasonable fury of a beast. Here one, surely, observes a tightening up of clauses and a deepening of the imagination sufficient to transform Brooke's lines from doggerel to poetry of venerable poise, quite suited to the sternest mood of the genial friar. Now, if the Dutch author, too, had remodeled to any great extent his English source, it is to be seriously doubted whether the parallelisms already cited in D and S would still be so numerous and comparatively close. Let the unconvinced but place side by side the Romeo and Juliet of Shakspere and Lope de Vega's dramatization of this fable. The absolute dissimilarity of the two plays is proof of what results when playwrights of imagination attack the same story. On these grounds, therefore, it seems highly probable that Struijs did not bother to make many changes. V If this inference be just, a description of D will serve well enough to characterize the English original. Perhaps, first of all, since D is so generally inaccessible, a brief analysis should be given of each scene. Preceding the play there is, as in Shakspere, a prologue outlining the action that is to follow. In the opening scene of the play, Romeo, besought by Phebidas-who corresponds to Mercutio-to reveal the cause of his depression and solitary wanderings, at length owns to being involved in a love affair the hopelessness of which makes him mad. Phebidas, however, is most encouraging; he informs Romeo in a lyric stanza of six lines that the mind of woman changes like the wind; he must therefore persist and not despair. Whereupon Romeo is induced to recount the circumstances of his first meeting with Juliette, which occurred at a banquet at Capellets' house, to which Romeo went from a sheer love of danger. After he had taken off his masque, as he tells Phebidas, the Capellets, though surprised at this evident effrontery, still concealed their anger. Juliette, he continues, every portion of whose fair body he proceeds in a lyric stanza to eulogize, sat next to him once during the evening, and pressed his hand with amorous sighs. Romeo, though admitting perforce the impossibility of intermarriage between the two families, is yet quite beside himself with passion. He has been passing by Juliette's house, he says, in the day time, exchanging glances with her; but, realizing the danger to which this exposed her, he now approaches her house only by night, hoping sometime to get a chance to address her. Phebidas, alarmed at this state of affairs, yet seeing that any attempt at dissuasion would be futile, wishes his friend all success, and exit. In scene i Romeo is discovered beneath Juliette's window, invoking the shroud of night to shelter him. While he stands rapturously singing her praises, he sees a light suddenly flash in her window. Then Juliette appears, and though startled at first by this intrusion, soon perceives by means of the moonlight that it is Romeo. At once she fears for his safety, but is reassured, and at length responds to his ardent love-making, being first convinced that marriage is his intention. It is arranged that he shall disclose their affair to Friar Lourens and shall urge him to appoint a time for the marriage. As the dawn is beginning to appear, Romeo sadly takes his leave, resolving to visit the friar as soon as possible. At the beginning of scene iii Friar Lourens is discovered in soliloquy, which reaches the extent of some twenty lines before Romeo appears and sets forth his desperate case. The friar's objections are only overruled when he hears that Romeo, rather than forego this union with Juliette, will take his life. Finally a plan for the marriage is devised: Romeo is to be concealed in the cell the following day and to wait for Juliette to come to confession. Scene iv finds Capellets, Thibout, and Paris in conversation concerning the fierce feud between the two families. Thibout, insisting that his self-restraint at the feast which Romeo had the impudence to visit made him swallow much gall, fiercely denounces Romeo and swears revenge, being, however, rebuked in turn by Paris and Capellets. Juliette enters for a moment to obtain permission from her father to attend confession. After her withdrawal Paris pays her a high compliment, whereupon old Capellets defends the proposition that parents are apt to be happier in the possession of a daughter than of a son, enumerating the scrapes which a son is likely to get into. Thibout, at once piqued by this, takes of course the other side. Then Paris steps in as peacemaker, agreeing in general with each, but in particular with Capellets, since, as he says, "You have a paragon, pleasing to both God and man; I do not believe that the earth can boast of her equal." Further self-felicitations by Capellets follow, in which the author has mingled dramatic irony almost too plenteously. Exeunt all three. The audience then sees Romeo and Juliette in the act of being married; this, however, is effected by pantomime. Act II. The first scene of this act is devoted to a long monologue in which Paris professes love for Juliette and displays some fear that she may not accept him. From a scrap of dialogue between Romeo and Pedro at the outset of scene ii we learn that the ladder has been procured, and that Juliette awaits her lover, it now being toward midnight. Before he enters her window, Romeo, half-delirious, rejoices at the smiles with which Fortune is at present regarding him. Then he goes within, leaving the nurse in an outer room to soliloquize at some length, and with great indecency, on a subject which in Shakspere is found beautifully refined in Juliet's monologue (III, ii, 1 ff.) beginning, "Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds." Scene iii is occupied with a discussion by several members of Capellets' faction, arising from some information imparted by Thi |