Fiorentino, who wrote in 1378; thirty years after the time in which the scene of Boccace's Decameron is laid. (Vid. " Manni Istoria del Decamerone di Giov. Boccac." 4to Fior. 1744.)

That Shakespeare had his plot from the novel itself, is evident from his having some incidents from it, which are not found in the ballad: and I think it will also be found that he borrowed from the ballad some hints that were not suggested by the novel. (See above, Pt. 2, ver. 25, &c. where, instead of that spirited description of the whetted blade," &c. the prose narrative coldly says, "The Jew had prepared a razor," &c. See also some other passages in the same piece.) This however is spoken with diffidence, as I have at present before me only the abridgement of the novel which Mr. Johnson has given us at the end of his commentary on Shakespeare's play. The translation of the Italian story at large is not easy to be met with, having I believe never been published, though it was printed some years ago with this title,-"The Novel, from which the Merchant of Venice written by Shakespeare is taken, translated from the Italian. To which is added a translation of a novel from the Decamerone of Boccaccio. London, printed for M. Cooper, 1755," 8vo.

XII.

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE.

THIS beautiful sonnet is quoted in the "Merry Wives of Windsor," A. iii. sc. i. and hath been usually ascribed (together with the "Reply") to Shakespeare himself by the modern editors of his smaller poems. A copy of this madrigal, containing only four stanzas (the 4th and 6th being wanting), accompanied with the first stanza of the answer, being printed in "The Passionate Pilgrime, and Sonnets to sundry notes of Musicke, by Mr. William Shakespeare, Lond. printed for W. Jaggard, 1599." Thus was this sonnet, &c. published as Shakespeare's in his lifetime.

And yet there is good reason to believe that (not Shakespeare, but) Christopher Marlow wrote the song, and Sir Walter Raleigh the "Nymph's Reply:" For so we are positively assured by Isaac Walton, a writer of some credit, who has inserted them both in his "Compleat Angler,"* under the character of "that smooth song, which was made by Kit. Marlow,

*First printed in the year 1653, but probably written some time before.

now at least fifty years ago; and .... an Answer to it, which was made by Sir Walter Raleigh in his younger days Old-fashioned poetry, but choicely good."-It also passed for Marlow's in the opinion of his contemporaries; for in the old Poetical Miscellany, intitled "England's Helicon," it is printed with the name of Chr. Marlow subjoined to it; and the Reply is subscribed Ignoto, which is known to have been a signature of Sir Walter Raleigh. With the same signature Ignoto, in that collection, is an imitation of Marlow's beginning thus:

"Come live with me, and be my dear,

And we will revel all the year,

In plains and groves," &c.

Upon the whole I am inclined to attribute them to Marlow and Raleigh; notwithstanding the authority of Shakespeare's Book of Sonnets. For it is well known that as he took no care of his own compositions, so was he utterly regardless what spurious things were fathered upon him. "Sir John Oldcastle," "The London Prodigal," and "The Yorkshire Tragedy," were printed with his name at full length in the title-pages, while he was living, which yet were afterwards rejected by his first editors Heminge and Condell, who were his intimate friends (as he mentions both in his will), and therefore no doubt had good authority for setting them aside.*

The following sonnet appears to have been (as it deserved) a great favourite with our earlier poets: for, besides the imitation above-mentioned, another is to be found among Donne's poems, intitled "The Bait," beginning thus:

"Come live with me, and be my love,

And we will some new pleasures prove
Of golden sands," &c.

As for Chr. Marlow, who was in high repute for his dramatic writings, he lost his life by a stab received in a brothel, before the year 1593. See A. Wood, i. 138.

COME live with me, and be my love,
And we wil all the pleasures prove
That hils and vallies, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.

* Since the above was written, Mr. Malone, with his usual discernment, hath rejected the stanzas in question from the other sonnets, &c. of Shakespeare, in his correct edition of "the Passionate Pilgrim," &c. See his Shakesp. Vol. x. p. 340.

There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

There will I make thee beds of roses
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Imbrodered all with leaves of mirtle ;

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Slippers lin'd choicely for the cold;
With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw, and ivie buds,
With coral clasps, and amber studs :
And, if these pleasures may thee move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning :
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

THE NYMPH'S REPLY.

IF that the World and Love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's toung,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee, and be thy love.

But time drives flocks from field to fold,
When rivers rage, and rocks grow cold,
And Philomel becometh dumb,
And all complain of cares to come.

The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yield:
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancies spring, but sorrows fall.

Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies,
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten,
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.

Thy belt of straw, and ivie buds,
Thy coral clasps, and amber studs ;
All these in me no means can move
To come to thee, and be thy love.

But could youth last, and love still breed,
Had joyes no date, nor age no need ;
Then those delights my mind might move
To live with thee, and be thy love.

15

20

XIII.

TITUS ANDRONICUS'S COMPLAINT.

11

THE reader has here an ancient ballad on the same subject as the play of "Titus Andronicus," and it is probable that the one was borrowed from the other: but which of them was the original, it is not easy to decide. And yet, if the argument offered above in page 167, for the priority of the ballad of "the Jew of Venice" may be admitted, somewhat of the same kind may be urged here for this ballad differs from the play in several particulars, which a simple Ballad-writer would be less likely to alter than an inventive Tragedian. Thus in the ballad is no mention of the contest for the empire between the two brothers, the composing of which makes the ungrateful treatment of Titus afterwards the more flagrant: neither is there any notice taken of his sacrificing one of Tamora's sons, which the tragic poet has assigned as the original cause of all her cruelties. In the play Titus loses twenty-one of his sons in war, and kills another for assisting Bassianus to carry off Lavinia: the reader will find it different in the ballad. In the latter she is betrothed to the emperor's son: in the play to his brother. In the tragedy only two of his sons fall into the pit, and the third being banished returns to Rome with a victorious army, to avenge the wrongs of his house in the ballad all three are entrapped and suffer

death. In the scene the Emperor kills Titus, and is in return stabbed by Titus's surviving son. Here Titus kills the Emperor, and afterwards himself.

Let the Reader weigh these circumstances and some others wherein he will find them unlike, and then pronounce for himself. After all, there is reason to conclude that this play was rather improved by Shakespeare with a few fine touches of his pen, than originally written by him; for, not to mention that the style is less figurative than his others generally are, this tragedy is mentioned with discredit in the Induction to Ben Jonson's "Bartholomew Fair", in 1614, as one that had then been exhibited "five and twenty, or thirty years: " which, if we take the lowest number, throws it back to the year 1589, at which time Shakespeare was but 25: an earlier date than can be found for any other of his pieces:* and if it does not clear him entirely of it, shews at least it was a first attempt.t

The following is given from a copy in "The Golden Garland intitled as above; compared with three others, two of them in black letter in the Pepys collection, intitled, "The Lainentable and Tragical History of Titus Andronicus, &c.-To the tune of Fortune. Printed for E. Wright."-Unluckily none of these have any dates.

You noble minds, and famous martiall wights,
That in defence of native country fights,
Give eare to me, that ten yeeres fought for Rome,
Yet reapt disgrace at my returning home.

In Rome I lived in fame fulle threescore yeeres,
My name beloved was of all my peeres;
Full five and twenty valiant sonnes I had,
Whose forwarde vertues made their father glad.

For when Romes foes their warlike forces bent,
Against them stille my sonnes and I were sent ;

5

10

* Mr. Malone thinks 1591 to be the æra when our author commenced a writer for the stage. See in his Shakesp. the ingenious "Attempt to ascertain the order in which the plays of Shakespeare were written."

Since the above was written, Shakespeare's memory has been fully vindicated from the charge of writing the above play by the best criticks. See what has been urged by Stephens and Malone in their excellent editions of Shakespeare, &c.