Visitors from the Shades.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIII, Issue III, 15 July 1899, Page 67

Visitors from the Shades.

By

H. D. TRAILL,

in the London “ Daily Telegraph.”

It was with an unwonted feeling of awe that 1 set about my preparations for an interview with the Shade ot Shakespeare. Even to possess the power of summoning so mighty a spirit oppressed my imagination; to exercise it seemed almost, impiety. Moreover, to conjure him up by the force of magic was one thing, and to interrogate him quite another. I remembered the impressive line with which a poet of our day begins a sonnet to the Poet of all Time. “Others abide our question; thou art free.” How could 1 venture to question him, and about what? I trembled at the very thought, and could only reassure myself by the reflection that perhaps he would condescend to unbosom himself without being much interrogated. By all contemporary accounts he was a man of sweet and gracious temper; and, anyhow, he was too interesting a man for me to miss an opportunity of a talk with him on this his birthday. So I determined to risk it. But, as I uttered the final words of incantation, having previously thrown my door wide open—for I could never put upon so illustrious a guest the indignity of knocking—l confess I could not help closing my eyes. There was, moreover, another reason than awe-stricken reverence for this greatest of the sons of men that kept my eyes fast shut for a full minute after I heard him enter the room. 1 had summoned my illustrious visitor, not under the nam r of William Shakespeare, but—with, of course, a special object in view—under that of the author of what are known as the Shakespearian plays. Whom, I asked myself—oh Heaven! whom should I see on opening my eyes ? In fear and trouble I opened them and a sigh of profound relief escaped my lips. “Thank God!” I muttered. “You are not Bacon!” Nor was he; there could be no doubt of that. No one could have mistaken the countenance before me for that keen, triangular, full-beard-

ed face which looks out at us in the well-known portrait from under •‘broad browed Venetian's” broadbrimmed hat. It was the face—the unromantic face —of the Stratford bust, with its thinly thatched cranium. its scanty chin-tuft, and the plump, not to say puffy, cheeks that bespeak the ease of the retired country gentleman rather than the soulwrestlings of the divine poet.

He had evidently noted my agitation, and looked at me with a look of mild, half-humorous inquiry in the hazel eyes. Full of fear lest he should have overheard my muttered utterance, and should press for explanations which would have been unspeakably painful, I hastened to address him.

“Poet of All Time!” I said in a low voice, raising his hand reverently to my lips, “accept the salutations which I offer you in the name of your country and of mankind on this your natal day.” “Ah!” said Shakespeare, with a sly smile, “you know that?” “Well, sir,” said I, a little taken aback by the question. “It is either the 22nd or the 2.’ird, and we generally prefer to keep it on the 23rd.” “Your exquisite reason?” said the Bard, still smiling. “Your biographers give two reasons, Mr Shakespeare.” replied I, boldly, “each as exquisite as the other. One is that you died, if you remember, on April 23; and the other is that that day is sacred to our patron Saint. St. George. But perhaps,” I

added, eagerly, “you will now clear up this doubtful point.” Again I noticed a humorous twinkle in the Poet’s eye. “I would willingly do so if I eould,” said he. “But the point has been discussed before me so learnedly and ingeniously by the Shades of commentators that my own mind is now in a state of per-

petual doubt. Indeed. T am in the same case with regard to many of the events of my life, and from the same cause. I eould not now tell you for certain whether 1 ever stole deer at Charlecote, or held horses in Loudon, or slaughtered ealves at Stratford, ‘in a high style,' and ‘making a speech.’ Nay, were you to ask me why I left my wife nothing by my will but my second best bed, beshrew me if I could tell you.” "But what of your works. Sir?” I asked—“things of infinitely more interest to us than your deeds. What of them? Is the First Folio to be regarded as—” But 1 stopped, aghast, for a look of almost horror had passed over the I»oet‘s face. “Speak not of it,” he cried, “nor of the Second Folio either; nor yet of the Third Folio; nor of any of the Quartos. Ask me not what I have written, or what I meant by it. The commentators have so belaboured me with exposition that 1 often doubt whether I ever meant anything. Ere long 1 shall begin to doubt whether I have ever written anything.” My heart was in my mouth! Had he heard of the Baconian theory? What would happen if it were sprung upon him while he was in one of these doubting moods? Happily, most of the Baconians are still living, and perhaps those who are dead are isolated in Elysium on pathological grounds. “Dear sir,” I resumed, after a pause, breathing again, “it is a thousand pities that you did not issue an authoritative edition of your own plays in your life-time.” “And prithee, why?” asked the illustrious Shade, in perfect good faith. “The actors hail their copies and wanted no other, and I. too. had what I wanted —my leisure.” “Ah, sir, but why did you not think jf future ages and of their longing to know your very words, as authenticated by your very hand? That whicn was written not for an age. but for all time, should surely have been perpetuated by a single and indisputable record. Your successors, sir. provide more carefully for their immortality.” My immortal guest looked up at me with a quick glance of inquiry. “Successors?” he said. “Do yon speak of Fletcher and Ben?” “No, sir.” I answered, “but of much later playmakers than they. I speak

of the Fletchers and liens of our own time. They, I say, have no notion of giving any chances to oblivion. Look here, and here, and here.” And, one after another, I placed a number of neatly-bound little books in Shakesjteare’s hand. He opened them wonderingly, ran his eye over a page or two, and then turned to me for an explanation. “They are a set of First Folios, so to speak,” replied 1, triumphantly. “They are the plays of the great Mr A., and the famous Mr 8.. and the distinguished Mr C., revised and corrected, each of them, down to the minutest stage direction, by the author's own eminent hand. So that the sacred text is now settled for ever.” “They are in prose, I see,” said the Shade, after a pause, and with, apparently, a touch of disappointment in his tone. “Are they read?” “They certainly have a better chance of it,” I said, “than if they were in verse. But, as to that, I cannot say. I rather think they are intended for the use of future generations. And. ah. sir,” I continued, “forgive my boldness, but what a rebuke is it of your own negligence. Consider the contrast two centuries hence. Commentators will still be wrangling over the text of your plays, while over those of the great Mr A., the famous Mr 8.. and the distinguished Mr C. you will not hear one word of dispute?’ “I had not these good gentlemen’s phophetic soul.” said the Poet. “Had I foreknown that my plays would be read and acted now I night have been more careful in the handing of them down. But how stood matters? I had filled my purse and bought my land, and was back again in the fields of Warwickshire. The theatre was thriving, and my plays would keep me warm to my life’s end. Why vex myself for what should befall them after?” “Successful plays keep playwrights much warmer in these days than they did in your time, Mr Shakespeare," said I, “and yet they are not contented. Nothing will satisfy them but literary fame in the present and dramatic immortality in prospect.” My visitor made no comment on this. He was immersed in the study of a “problem-play,” and kept silence for several minutes. “Tell me,” he said at last, looking up at me with an air of bewilderment, “is his a comedy?” “It is, sir,” I replied, “ a very lamentat’.e comedy, and one from which you ir ay such much agreeable melancholy.” “And do the groundlings enjoy it?” asked he. “They do—bitterly,” replied I. “It makes them—or it used to make them —most luxuriously miserable.” “And is this the fare that all the three London theatres set before ” “All the three London theatres, sir!” exclaimed I, hard put to it to restrain my laughter. “All the thirty-three you mean.” The Shade sank back in his chair, with high-raised eyebrows, and but for the irreverence of the thought I should have imagined that his pursed lips were on the point of giving vent to a whistle. “No, not all,” I continued; “indeed, not many of them just at present, because, as it happens, the comedy of agony is for the moment ‘off.’ But there is always a considerable ntimoer of theatres which deal in comic opera, diversified by ‘high-kicking,’ and plenty of others that go in for three-act farce of the risky type.” T felt in vain to attempt to translate these theatrical technicalities into Elizabethian language, so I flung them out unexplained for my guest to make what he could of them.

He could make nothing of them. He had not yet got over the shock of the thirty-three London theatres, and this avalanche of neologisms overwhelmed him. He gazed on me with a look cf pathetic helplessness. “Forgive me, sir.” said I. cheerfully. “ l'o you. 1 know, these terms must he all Greek, of which Ben Jonson savs 1 remember, that you had even less than ton had Latin. You must manage to come some night to a theatre with me, and that will explain more to vou than an hour’s talk about it. I might take you to see a play of your own. There doesn’t hap|>en to be one on the bills just now, but no doubt there soon will be.”

The 1 oet s thoughts, however, were elsewhere.

“If there are thirty-three theatres iu London," said he, after a pause, “how many playwriters are there to supply them —two hundred? There must have been six times as many playwriters as playhouses in my own day.” “There are, as I have tild you, sir, the great Mr A., and the famous Mr 8., and the distinguished Mr C„ besides,” I added, after a brief interval of reflection, “the deserving Mr E., the industrious Mr F., and the rising Mr G. And, after all,” I concluded, with a profound obeisance, “we ean always fail back, as we do. on the immortal Mr S.” The countenance of the Shade relaxed into a benevolent smile. “I have written more plays,” he said, “than you have built theatres in London. You might act one of my tragedies or comedies or histories at each, and still have two or three to spare.” “We might, we might!” said T, with an ardour which was partly simulated, for I would not for the world have had him suspect that barely a dozen of his deathless dramas still keep the English stage. And for the same reason I began to think that it would be prudent to evade further questions bybringing the interview to a close. “Yes, sir,” I said, rising, as a polite hint to my illustrious visitor to withdraw. “I must take you some night to a performance of ‘Hamlet,’ say, or ‘Much Ado About Nothing.’ I cannot promise you that you will hear all your admirable but somewhat too copious dialogrue delivered by the actors and actresses, but y-ou will find your plays “mounted’ on a scale of magnificence of which you can have no conception. The worthy production of a Shakesperian drama is estimated in these days to entail an expenditure of thousands of pounds.” And before he could recover from the blank astonishment — not as I fancied wholly pleasurable — with which this information evidently filled him, I was bowing him to the door. “One moment, Mr Shakespeare,” said I. as a sudden thought struck me, “You would settle a much-vexed question if you would kindly tell me how you spell your name. An expert calculator has computed that by ringing all the possible changes on ‘ks,’ ‘kes.’ ‘pear,’ ‘pere,’ ‘peare,’ and so on. it can be spelt in no fewer than 4000 way ■. In the council-book of Stratford it occurs six times, and with sixteen different spellings. Which of them is right?” There was an awkward pause. “How did 1 spell it myself?” said the Swan of Avon, in some confusion. “Alas, sir! not uniformly.” I replied: “We possess only five of your hallowed autographs, and their spelling is as multiform as your genius. In your will itself you spell your name in two different ways. A deed of yours which is still extant, you signed ‘William Shakspere,’ while throughout the whole body of the instrument you seem to have actually- adopted it yourself in the dedicatory epistles prefaced to two of your poems. Should we spell your name ‘Shakspere’ or ‘Shakespeare’ or ‘Shakspeare’—not to trouble you for the present with the rest of the four thousand variants?” “That,” said the Bard, shaking his god-like head sadly, “is another of the questions to which I cannot reply. If I ever knew- the answer, I know it no longer. You must consult the commentators.” And with these words he faded from the room.