"My mother had a maid call'd Barbara," says Desdemona, standing unwittingly upon the threshold of death,
"She had a song of 'willow';
An old thing 'twas, but it expressed the future,
And she died singing it. That song, to-night,
Will not go from my head."
The most apparently casual and irrelevant ditties of Shakespeare's dramas, in like manner, "express the future" of the story.
"Come unto these yellow sands,
And there take hands"…
So, eventually, Ferdinand and Miranda avow their mutual love beside the lapping of the long blue waves.
"Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me," —
might be the very leit-motiv of As You Like It.
"Sigh no more, ladies, – ladies, sigh no more,
Men were deceivers ever:
One foot on sea, and one on shore,
To one thing constant never," —
– here you have the treachery of Don John, and the vacillating mistrust of Claudio, succinctly summed up.
"Journeys end in lovers' meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know," —
thus the Clown in Twelfth Night becomes mouthpiece of the dénouement which was never long in doubt.
To every man his métier: and that of William Shakespeare was not to be the mouthpiece of those "spacious times," tingling with sensation, with excitement, with huge enterprise. Exhibiting, throughout, the curious patient persistence of the essential Midlander, he had worked his way right up from the bottom rung of the ladder. The ill-mated young man of twenty-three, who had left Stratford with a travelling company of players in 1587, – who had (whether conscious or unconscious of his genius) plodded industriously onward as a literary hack of drama – tinkering, adapting, re-shaping and re-writing the stale old stock plays, until they suffered a change "into something rich and strange," – whose colossal greatness his contemporaries were not great enough to appreciate; – that same man was now arriving – like so many other Midlanders – at a point where criticism could not touch him. He had gained no giddy pinnacle of sudden success, but a safe and solid summit of assured position. That he should attain it in his own way, and after his own methods, – that, after all, was his business. There were plenty of other poets to utter Arma virumque cano. William Shakespeare preferred to link himself with thoughts of Italy, and fairy-folk, and "the sea-coast of Bohemia," – with youth and palaces and forests, and fortunate or frustrate love. His range and scope were enormous, if he cared: his output astonishing, if he chose… Meanwhile, it was mid-summer and there were roses…
"Ferdinand and Miranda avow their mutual love, beside the lapping of the long blue waves."
Ferdinand. Here's my hand.
Miranda. And mine, with my heart in't.
(The Tempest).
Moving meditatively along Holborn, he presently encountered his old friend Gerard the botanist, whose Herball had been published two years before, – who stood at the head of his profession for knowledge and achievement. He lived in Holborn, where he had not only a fine garden-ground, but a fruit-ground in Fetter Lane, which he superintended for the surgical society of which he was a member.
"Well met, Will!" said the grave and reverend herbalist, "no other man in London would I more gladly welcome: for that thou hast a most worthy apprehension of the seemliness of plants and herbs. Country blood, country blood, good sir! Come, now, into my poor enclosure and let me regale thee with new and marvellous things… What! it is but eight o' the clock! The paltry playhouse shall not claim thee yet awhile. What are all Euripides his dramas, in comparison with that wherewith I shall rejoice thine eyes?"
And, seizing the poet's hand, Gerard drew him through a side-door into his beloved garden. "Behold!" he exclaimed, "the Apple of Love, Pomum Aureum!" – and, with ineffable pride, he pointed out some slowly-ripening tomatoes. "These grow in Spain, Italy and such hot countries, from whence myself have received seeds for my garden, where, as thou seest, they do grow and prosper… Howbeit there be other golden apples, which the poets do fable growing in the gardens of the daughters of Hesperus. These," – he added regretfully, "I have not."
"Master Gerard, there shall no golden apples ever come to England worthy to compare with yours," remarked the dramatist, luxuriously inhaling the warm June scents shut closely within sun-baked walls, and gazing down the coloured vistas and aisles of bloom. "Here's flowers for you!" he murmured to himself,
"Here's a plenty of sweet herbs!
Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram,
The marigold that goes to bed with the sun,
And with him rises weeping: these are flowers
Of middle summer. And I think they are given
To men of middle age."
"Sithee here again," continued Gerard, well launched upon his favourite topic, "this plant, which is called of some Skyrrits of Peru, is generally called of us, Potatus or Potatoes," – and he waved his hand towards a bed of sweet potatoes. "Of these roots may be made conserves, toothsome, wholesome and dainty, and many comfortable and restorative sweetmeats. Other potatoes there be, which some do use with salt, – but of these I have no present apprehension."
Shakespeare was not paying attention to the potatoes. On his knees beside a strawberry bed, he looked up with a laughing face. "Methinks I would rather fresh fruit than conserves," said he, filling his mouth with much satisfaction.
"Then, of the Indian pot-herb, tobacco," the botanist proceeded, "give me joy that I have had good fortune in three kinds thereof, – the Henbane of Peru, the Trinidada Tobacco, and the pigmy or dwarfish sort. But, indeed, this same tobacco is by no means to be commended as a fume or smoking-medicine. The juice, boiled with sugar into a syrup, is a sovereign cure for many maladies. I pray you, good Master Shakespeare," said he, earnestly seizing the other's arm and punctuating his words with a gentle see-saw movement, "believe me, that any other herb of hot temperature will suffice for pipe-smoking – rosemary, thyme, winter savory, sweet marjoram and such-like."
"Faith, I am no great smoker," replied Shakespeare, as with a dexterous jerk he eluded his friend and dived down an alley of damask roses. "Here," said he, "I shall play the robber, – " He gathered a rose and set it behind his ear in the most approved Court fashion. "I would fain linger all day among these manifold sweetnesses," he added, "but alack! I have need to hasten now. I pray you, therefore, give me leave to depart." The herbalist, talking volubly, accompanied him to the door.
The playwright turned down towards Blackfriars: on his way he entered an apothecary's shop, and, heedless of Master Gerard's warnings, purchased a "rich smoke" at sixpence a pipeful – (equivalent to, perhaps, four shillings of our money). This was no cheap and adulterated mixture, such as the "groundlings" used, but the very best procurable: and, to emphasise its recherché quality, it was kept in a lily-pot, minced on a maple-block, served out with silver tongs, and lighted from a little fire of juniper shavings. Shakespeare, having thus filled his long clay pipe, proceeded to the Blackfriars shore, where he took a ferry-boat across to Bankside in Southwark and entered the Globe Theatre, of which he was part proprietor. It may here be explained that, every theatre having recently been banished from the City as the very quintessence of disreputability and root of all evil, the exiled players had taken refuge south of the river, in Bankside: which, being a quarter singularly ill-famed, was considered by all reputable citizens a most appropriate situation for them. The Globe, like other public playhouses of the period, was roofless: three stories high, with boxes all round in tiers, the ground tier paled with oaken boards and fenced with strong iron pikes. The stage, which had a "shadow" or cover over it, was some 40 ft. wide and extended to the middle of the yard or pit. At the back of the stage was a balcony, over the entrance from the "tiring-house" or dressing-rooms. It was lighted, if necessary, by branched candlesticks, while "cressets" (tarred ropes' ends in cages) were set in front of the boxes.