INTRODUCTION.

A material fact, in reference to the date of the first production of “The Tempest,” has only been recently ascertained: we allude to the notice of the performance of it, before King James, on Nov. 1st, 1611^{1 note}, which is contained in the “Extracts from the Accounts of the Revels at Court,” edited by Mr. P. Cunningham for the Shakespeare Society, p. 211: the memorandum is in the following form:—

“Hallomas nyght was presented att Whithall before the Kinges Majestie a play called the Tempest.”

In the margin is inserted the additional circumstance, that the performance was “by the King's Players;” and there can be no reasonable doubt that it was Shakespeare's drama, which had been written for that company. When it had been so written, is still a point of difficulty; but the probability, we think, is that it was selected by the Master of the Revels, for representation at Court in 1611, on account of its novelty and popularity on the public stage. Eleven other dramas, as appears by the same document, were exhibited between Oct. 31, 1611, and the same day in the next year; and it is remarkable that ten of these (as far as we possess any information respecting them) were comparatively new plays, and with regard to the eleventh, it was not more than three years old^{2 note}. We may, perhaps, be warranted in inferring, therefore, that “The Tempest” was also not then an old play.

It seems to us, likewise, that the internal evidence, derived from style and language, clearly indicates that it was a late production, and that it belongs to about the same period of our great dramatist's literary history as his “Winter's Tale,” which was also chosen for a Court-play, and represented at Whitehall only four days after “The Tempest” had been exhibited. In point of construction, it must be admitted at once that there is the most obvious dissimilarity, inasmuch as “The Winter's Tale” is a piece in which the unities are

utterly disregarded, while in “The Tempest” they are strictly observed. It is only in the involved and parenthetical character of some of the speeches, and in psychological resemblances, that we would institute a comparison between “The Tempest” and “The Winter's Tale,” and would infer from thence that they belong to about the same period.

Without here adverting to the real or supposed origin of the story, or to temporary incidents which may have suggested any part of the plot, we may remark that there is one piece of external evidence which strongly tends to confirm the opinion that “The Tempest” was composed not very long before Ben Jonson wrote one of his comedies: we allude to his “Bartholomew Fair,” and to a passage in “the Induction,” frequently mentioned, and which we concur in thinking was intended as a hit not only at “The Tempest,” but at “The Winter's Tale.” Ben Jonson's “Bartholomew Fair,” was acted in 1614, and written perhaps in the preceding year^{3 note}, during the popularity of Shakespeare's two plays; and there we find the following words, which we reprint, for the first time, exactly as they stand in the original edition, where Italic type seems to have been used to make the allusions more distinct and obvious:—“If there bee never a Servant-monster i' the Fayre, who can helpe it, he sayes; nor a nest of Antiques? Hee is loth to make Nature afraid in his Playes, like those that beget Tales, Tempests, and such like Drolleries.” The words “servant-monster,” “antiques,” “Tales,” “Tempests,” and “drolleries,” which last Shakespeare himself employs in “The Tempest,” (Act iii. sc. 3.) seem so applicable, that they can hardly relate to any thing else.

It may be urged, however, that what was represented at Court in 1611 was only a revival of an older play, acted before 1596, and such may have been the case: we do not, however, think it probable, for several reasons. One of these is an apparently trifling circumstance, pointed out by Farmer; viz. that in “The Merchant of Venice,” written before 1598, the name of Stephano is invariably to be pronounced with the accent on the second syllable, while in “The Tempest,” the proper pronunciation is as constantly required by the verse. It seems certain, therefore, that Shakespeare found his error in the interval, and he may have learnt it from Ben Jonson's “Every Man in his Humour,” in which Shakespeare performed, and in the original list of characters to which, in the edition of 1601, the names not only of Stephano, but of Prospero occur.

Another circumstance shows, we think almost decisively, that “The Tempest” was not written until after 1603, when the translation of Montaigne's Essays, by Florio, made its first appearance in print. In Act ii. sc. 1, is a passage so closely copied from Florio's version, as to leave no doubt of identity^{4 note}. If it be said that these lines may have been an insertion subsequent to the original production of the play, we answer, that the passage is not such as could have been introduced, like some others, to answer a temporary or complimentary purpose, and that it is given as a necessary and continuous portion of the dialogue.

The Reverend Mr. Hunter, in his very ingenious and elaborate “Disquisition on The Tempest,” has referred to this and to other points, with a view of proving that every body has hitherto been mistaken, and that this play, instead of being one of his latest, was one of Shakespeare's earliest works. With regard to the point derived from Montaigne's Essays by Florio, 1603, he has contended, that if the particular essay were not separately printed before, (of which we have not the slightest hint) Shakespeare may have seen the translation in manuscript; but unless he so saw it in print or manuscript as early as 1595, nothing is established in favour of Mr Hunter's argument; and surely when other circumstances show that “The Tempest” was not written until 1610^{5 note}, we need not hesitate long in deciding that our great dramatist went to no manuscript authority, but took the passage almost verbatim as he found it in the complete edition. In the same way Mr. Hunter has argued, that “The Tempest” was not omitted by Meres in his list in 1598, but that it is found there under its second title, of “Love's Labours Won;” but this is little better than a gratuitous assumption, even supposing we were to admit that “All's well that ends Well” is not the play intended by Meres^{6 note}. Our

notion is (see Vol. iii. p. 204.) that “All's well that ends Well” was originally called “Love's Labours Won,” and that it was revived, with some other changes, under a new name in 1605 or 1606.

Neither can we agree with Mr. Hunter in thinking that he has established, that nothing was suggested to Shakespeare by the storm, in July 1609, which dispersed the fleet under Sir George Somers and Sir Thomas Gates, of which an account was published by a person of the name of Jourdan in the following year. This point was, to our mind, satisfactorily made out by Malone, and the mention of “the still-vex'd Bermoothes” by Shakespeare seems directly to connect the drama with Jourdan's “Discovery of the Bermudas, otherwise called the Isle of Devils,” printed in 1610. We are told at the end of the play, in the folio of 1623, that the scene is laid “in an uninhabited island,” and Mr. Hunter has contended that this island was Lampedusa, which unquestionably lies in the track which the ships in “The Tempest” would take. Our objection to this theory is two-fold: first, we cannot persuade ourselves, that Shakespeare had any particular island in his mind; and secondly, if he had meant to lay his scene in Lampedusa, he could hardly have failed to introduce its name in some part of his performance: in consequence of the deficiency of scenery, &c. it was the constant custom with our early dramatists to mention distinctly, and often more than once, where the action was supposed to take place. As a minor point, we may add, that we know of no extant English authority to which he could have gone for information, and we do not suppose that he consulted the Turco Græciæ of Crusius, the only older authority quoted by Mr. Hunter.

No novel, in prose or verse, to which Shakespeare resorted for the incidents of “The Tempest” has yet been discovered; and although Collins, late in his brief career, mentioned to T. Warton that he had seen such a tale, it has never come to light, and we apprehend that he must have been mistaken. We have turned over the pages of, we believe, every Italian novelist, anterior to the age of Shakespeare, in hopes of finding some story containing traces of the incidents of “The Tempest,” but without success. The ballad entitled “The Inchanted Island,” printed in “Farther Particulars regarding Shakespeare and his Works,” is a more modern production than the play, from which it varies in the names, as well as in some points of the story, as if for the purpose of concealing its connection with a production which was popular on the stage. Our opinion decidedly is, that it was founded upon “The Tempest,” and not upon any ancient narrative to which Shakespeare also might have been indebted. It may be remarked, that here also no locality is given to the island: on the contrary, we are told, if it ever had

any existence but in the imagination of the poet, that it had disappeared:—

Mr. Thoms has pointed out some resemblances in the incidents of an early German play, entitled Die Schöne Sidea, and “The Tempest:” his theory is, that a drama upon a similar story was at an early date performed in Germany, and that if it were not taken from Shakespeare's play, it was perhaps derived from the same unknown source. Mr. Thoms is preparing a translation of it for the Shakespeare Society, and we shall then be better able to form an opinion, as to the real or supposed connection between the two.

When Coleridge tells us (Lit. Rem. ii. p. 94.) that “‘The Tempest’ is a specimen of the purely romantic Drama,” he of course refers to the nature of the plot and personages: in one sense of the words, it is not a “romantic drama,” inasmuch as there are few plays, ancient or modern, in which the unities are more exactly observed: the whole of the events occupy only a few hours. At the same time it is perfectly true, as the same enlightened and fanciful commentator adds, “It is a species of drama, which owes no allegiance to time or space, and in which, therefore, errors of chronology and geography—no mortal sins in any species—are venial faults, and count for nothing: it addresses itself entirely to the imaginative faculty.” This opinion was delivered in 1818; and three years earlier Coleridge had spoken of “The Tempest,” as certainly one of Shakespeare's latest works, judging from the language only: Schlegel was of the same opinion, without, however, assigning any distinct reason, and instituted a comparison between “The Tempest” and “Midsummer Night's Dream,” adding, “The preponderance of thought in ‘The Tempest,’ exhibited in its profound and original characterisation, strikes us at once; but we must also admire the deep sense of the art (tiefsinnige Kunst) which is apparent in the structure of the whole, in the wise economy of its means, and in the skill with which the scaffolding is raised to sustain the marvellous aerial structure.” Ueber Dram. Kunst und Litt. Vol. iii. p. 123. edit. 1817.

1 ^note.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ ALONSO, King of Naples. SEBASTIAN, his Brother. PROSPERO, the right Duke of Milan. ANTONIO, his Brother, the usurping Duke of Milan. FERDINAND, Son to the King of Naples. GONZALO, an honest old Counsellor. ADRIAN, a Lord. FRANCISCO, a Lord. CALIBAN, a savage and deformed Slave. TRINCULO, a Jester. STEPHANO, a drunken Butler. Master of a Ship, Boatswain, Mariners. MIRANDA, Daughter to Prospero. ARIEL, an airy Spirit. IRIS, a Spirit. CERES, a Spirit. JUNO, a Spirit. Nymphs, Spirits. Reapers, Spirits. Other Spirits attending on Prospero. SCENE, the Sea, with a Ship; afterwards an uninhabited Island.

THE TEMPEST.

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