In the progress of the scene, Cymbeline is so powerfully affected by the appearance of the page, that he promises to grant whatever the boy shall ask. Imogen's eye had been caught by the ring on the finger of Iachimo, which she knew to be the one given by her to Posthumus: she demands therefore, that Iachimo shall "render of whom he had it." In Westward for Smelts, the lady under the protection of King Edward demands how a small crucifix of gold, once hers, came into the possession of the man by whom her husband had been deceived.

Bending under the weight of guilt, Iachimo makes full confession of his villany: Posthumus rushes forward, Imogen declares her sex, and mutual explanations and reconciliations ensue.

Belarius now also avows himself, and discovers the two noble youths who had fought with him, and by their valour preserved the British throne, to be the sons of Cymbeline, he having stolen them in their infancy, and reared them as his own in solitude. Guiderius and Arviragus are recognised and acknowledged, and Belarius is pardoned.

The play of Cymbeline, then, is the junction of a modern Italian novel and an ancient British story. Either tale set off with such episodes as adorn the Twelfth Night, and other dramas,

How

would have furnished an interesting play; but the events in Cymbeline, though curiously interwoven, are often " perplexed beyond self-explication," as Imogen says of Pisanio's face. The charms which Shakspeare has thrown over the nakedness of his original stories make the reader regret that his attention is ever distracted. beautiful is the development of Imogen's character; how rich and spirited the dialogue, particularly the scene between Posthumus and Iachimo, after the return of the latter to Rome! The fine poetry which the dramatist has lavished upon Iachimo is an excuse for having left him the same common place villain that he appears in the novel; and where in Boccacio, or in any other writer, is the wretchedness of impure love so beautifully displayed, as in one of the speeches of this hypocrite, during his conversation with Imogen? The ancient British story is adorned with many beauties. Though the king and queen are dull, and prate too much, yet Cloten is interesting. He is a natural fool; yet he often talks with the wit of one of Shakspeare's professed fools. loves Imogen, for she is fair and royal; but he hates her because she despises his person; and Shakspeare makes his hatred predominate, because vanity is the characteristic of a fool. What vigour and vitality are thrown over the

He

monkish chronicle by the fable of the Cambrian gentlemen :-Belarius, full of valuable axioms and sentences, embittered indeed by a world that had disgraced him, and Guiderius and Arviragus, with glorious enthusiasm and lofty hopes, piercing through the meanness of their estate.

278

TIMON OF ATHENS.

1610.

FROM a passage in "Jack Drum's Entertainment," Dr. Farmer conjectured that Timon had made his appearance on the stage previous to 1601. There was in the possession of the late Mr. Strutt, the engraver, a manuscript drama on the subject, and if the date, 1600, usually assigned to it be correct, the supposition of Farmer is confirmed. This play bears no more than a partial resemblance to Shakspeare's. It contains a scene resembling Shakspeare's banquet given by Timon to his flatterers. Instead of warm water, he sets before them stones painted like artichokes, and afterwards beats them out of the He then retires to the woods, attended by his faithful steward, who, like Kent, in King Lear, has disguised himself to continue his services to his master. Timon, in the last act, is

room.

followed by his fickle mistress, &c. after he was reported to have discovered a hidden treasure by digging the earth.

There appears no objection to the belief that thus much Shakspeare was indebted to the old play; but it still remains a question where he acquired that knowledge which enabled him to construct the more material parts of his performance. His well-ascertained familiarity with Painter's Palace of Pleasure naturally suggests the idea that he made use of the twenty-eighth novel of the first volume of that collection; but the neglect of the novelist to account for Timon's hatred of mankind negatives the notion. Timon's story is shortly narrated in Plutarch's Life of Antonius, and there the omission of the novelist is abundantly supplied. "Because of the unthankfulness," says Sir Thomas North, "of those he had done good unto, and whom he tooke to be his friends, he was angry with all men, and would trust no man." It may be contended that from this hint alone Shakspeare developed the origin of Timon's detestation of mankind; and it has been deemed a satisfactory conclusion that he derived none of his materials from Lucian, because no translation of the dialogue of Timon is

* Page 943.