had risen. And indeed some such thing may be needful, in order to excuse the Poet, on the score of art, for not carrying out the truth of history from seed-time to harvest, or at least indicating the consummation of that whereof he so faithfully unfolds the beginnings. For, that the play is historically true so far as it goes, strengthens the reason for that completeness which enters into the proper idea of historical truth. Nevertheless, the moral effect of the play is very impressive and very just. And the lesson evolved, so far as it can be gathered into generalities, may be said to stand in showing how sorrow makes sacred the wearer, and how, to our human feelings, suffering, if borne with true dignity and strength of soul, covers a multitude of sins; or, to carry out this point with more special reference to Katharine, the lesson is stated by Mrs. Jameson, with her usual felicity, to consist in illustrating how, by the union of perfect truth with entire benevolence of character, a queen and heroine of tragedy, though "stripped of all the pomp of place and circumstance," and without any of "the usual sources of poetical interest, as youth, beauty, grace, fancy, commanding intellect, could depend on the moral principle alone, to touch the very springs of feeling in our bosoms, and melt and elevate our hearts through the purest and holiest impulses." COMMENTS By SHAKESPEAREAN SCHOLARS KATHARINE Dr. Johnson observed that the genius of Shakspere comes in and goes out with Queen Katharine. What then chiefly interested the dramatist in this designed and partly accomplished Henry VIII? The presence of a noble sufferer,—one who was grievously wronged, and who by a plain loyalty to what is faithful and true, by a disinterestedness of soul, and enduring magnanimity, passes out of all passion and personal resentment into the reality of things, in which much indeed of pain remains, but no ignoble wrath or shallow bitterness of heart. Her earnest endeavor for the welfare of her English subjects is made with fearless and calm persistence in the face of Wolsey's opposition. It is integrity and freedom from self-regard set over against guile, and power, and pride. In her trialscene the indignation of Katharine flashes forth against the Cardinal, but is an indignation which unswervingly progresses towards and penetrates into the truth.-DowDEN, Shakspere-His Mind and Art. With all his desire to please his royal mistress, Shakspeare has yet never once depreciated the virtues of the good Queen Katharine, or drawn a veil over her injuries. He has made her the most prominent, as well as the most amiable, sufferer in his drama; and, in thus closely adhering to the truth of history, he pays a silent tribute to the liberality of Elizabeth, more worth than all his warmest eulogiums.—INCHBALD, King Henry VIII in The British Theatre. KATHARINE AND ANNE BULLEN The two female characters between whom Henry is placed betray the same masterly manner of dramatic delineation, although one is a mere sketch. Katharine is a touching model of womanly virtue and gentleness, of conjugal devotion and love, and of Christian patience in defenseless suffering. She is surrounded by the most virtuous company; her enemy is compelled to praise in her a "disposition gentle" and a "wisdom o'ertopping woman's power." She has never done evil which must seek concealment; she was incapable of calumny and injury. Only when a natural instinct provokes her against an artful intriguer, to whom, while led away by his ambition, virtue is a folly, and when she has to take poor subjects under her protection against oppression, then only does her virtue impart to her a sting, which, however, never transgresses the limits of womanly refinement. She loves her husband "with that excellence that angels love good men with"; almost bigoted in her love, she dreams of no joy beyond his pleasure; he himself testifies to her that she was never opposed to his wishes, that she was of wife-like government, commanding in obeying; all his caprices she bore with the most saint-like patience. To see herself divorced from him after twenty years of happiness is a load of sorrow which only the noblest of women can bear with dignity and resignation; to descend from the high position of queen is moreover painful to the royal Spaniard. But she is ready to lead a life of seclusion in homely simplicity, and to bless her faithless, cruel husband even to the hour of her death. Her soul had remained beautiful upon the throne, in her outward degradation it was more beautiful still; she goes to the grave reconciled with her true enemy and destroyer. Johnson has ranked her death scene as above any scene in any other poet; so much was he impressed with its profound effect, unaided by romantic contrivance, and apart from all unnatural bursts of poetic lamentation and the ebullitions of stormy sorrow. One womanly weakness the poet (in obedience to history) has imputed to her even to the brink of the grave: even in the hour of death, and after she has indeed seen heaven open, she clings to the royal honor which belongs to her. The poet indicates in Anne Bullen the counterpart to this weakness. He has portrayed this "fresh-fish," the rising queen, only from a distance, he has rather declared than exhibited her beauty, her loveliness, and chastity, her completeness in mind and feature; he does not attempt to enlist us excessively in her favor, when he exhibits her so merry in the society of a Sands; moreover, all place greater stress upon the blessing which is to descend from her than upon herself. The introductory scene makes us believe that she is as free from ambitious views as she asserts; her conversation indeed with the court lady convinces us as little as the former that she could not reconcile herself to splendid honors when they were laid upon her. We see her not as queen, but we see her self-love flattered so far that we can well divine that, raised out of her lowly position, she would play the part of queen as well as Katharine did that of a domestic woman.-GERVINUS, Shakespeare Commentaries. ANNE What was the real position of Anne now in the midst of all these stirring events? Shakespeare's portrait of her in the two scenes (aside from the coronation) in which she is introduced has all the delicacy of a rare water-color, daintily washed in. Before the subject of Katharine's divorce is touched upon, the poet with his dramatic instinct presents Anne to his audience at one of the fashionable masques of the time, in Wolsey's house, where she meets the king by poetic license for the first time. The meaning is to convey, subtly and without offense to Henry's memory, the well-known fact that the king had long known and paid his royal attention to Anne. Perhaps there was here a delicate reference to the often-referred-to fact, that although Anne accepted favors from the royal hand in the shape of titles and estates, she bestowed none in return until as a lawful wife she could with honor. Such an interference could not fail to be gratefully received by Anne's daughter, and Shakespeare among his other talents possessed those of an accomplished courtier. -WARNER, English History in Shakespeare's Plays. The scene in which Anna Bullen is introduced as expressing her grief and sympathy for her royal mistress is exquisitely graceful. Here's the pang that pinches: His highness having liv'd so long with her, and she How completely, in the few passages appropriated to Anna Bullen, is her character portrayed! with what a delicate and yet luxuriant grace is she sketched off, with her gaiety and her beauty, her levity, her extreme mobility, her sweetness of disposition, her tenderness of heart, and, in short, all her femalities! How nobly has Shakspeare done justice to the two women, and heightened our interest in both, by placing the praises of Katherine in the mouth of Anna Bullen! and how characteristic of the latter, that she should first express unbounded pity for her mistress, insisting chiefly on her fall from her regal state and worldly pomp, thus betraying her own disposition For she that had all the fair parts of woman, Affected eminence, wealth, and sovereignty. That she should call the loss of temporal pomp, once enjoyed, "a sufferance equal to soul and body's severing"; that she should immediately protest that she would not herself be a queen-"No, good troth! not for all the riches under heaven!"-and not long afterwards ascend without reluctance that throne and bed from which her royal mistress had been so cruelly divorced!-how natural! The portrait is not less true and masterly than that of Katherine; but the character is overborne by the superior moral |