Folk-lore of Shakespeare - Thomas Firminger Thiselton Dyer (ereader iphone txt) 📗
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Minnow. This little fish, from its insignificant character, is used by “Coriolanus” (iii. 1) as a term of contempt: “Hear you this Triton of the minnows?” and, again, in “Love’s Labour’s Lost” (i. 1), it occurs: “‘that base minnow of thy mirth.’”
Pike. An old name for this fish was luce. In the “Merry Wives of Windsor” (i. 1) we are told that “The luce is the fresh fish.” There can be no doubt, too, that there is in this passage an allusion to the armorial bearings of Shakespeare’s old enemy, Sir Thomas Lucy. Among the various instances of the use of this term we may quote Isaac Walton, who says: “The mighty luce or pike is taken to be the tyrant, as the salmon is the king, of the fresh waters.” Stow, in his “Survey of London,” describes a procession of the Fishmongers’ Company in 1298, as having horses painted like sea-luce: “Then four salmons of silver on foure horses, and after them sixe and fortie armed knightes riding on horses made like luces of the sea.”
Porpoise. According to sailors, the playing of porpoises round a ship is a certain prognostic of a violent gale of wind; hence the allusion in “Pericles” (ii. 1), where one of the fishermen says, speaking of the storm: “Nay, master, said not I as much, when I saw the porpus, how he bounced and tumbled?” Thus, too, in the “Canterbury Guests, or a Bargain Broken,” by Ravenscroft, we read: “My heart begins to leap and play, like a porpice before a storm.” And a further reference occurs in Wilsford’s “Nature’s Secrets:” “Porpoises, or sea-hogs, when observed to sport and chase one another about ships, expect then some stormy weather.”
Sea-monster. The reference in “King Lear” (i. 4), to the “sea-monster”—
More hideous, when thou show’st thee in a child,
Than the sea-monster!”—
is generally supposed to be the hippopotamus, which, according to Upton, was the hieroglyphical symbol of impiety and ingratitude.[935] Sandys[936] gives a picture said to be portrayed in the porch of the temple of Minerva, at Sais, in which is the figure of a river-horse, denoting “murder, impudence, violence, and injustice; for they say that he killeth his sire and ravisheth his own dam.” His account is, no doubt, taken from Plutarch’s “Isis and Osiris;” and Shakespeare may have read it in Holland’s translation (p. 1300), but why he should call the river-horse a “sea-monster” is not very clear. It is more likely, however, that the whale is meant.[937]
[924] See Harting’s “Ornithology of Shakespeare,” 1871, p. 3.
[925] “The Antiquary,” 1881, vol. iv. p. 193.
[926] Ibid.
[927] Nares’s “Glossary,” vol. i. p. 175.
[928] “Handbook Index to the Works of Shakespeare,” 1866, p. 119.
[929] See a note in Dyce’s “Glossary,” p. 112.
[930] Nares’s “Glossary,” vol. ii. p. 518.
[931] See “British Popular Customs,” pp. 494, 495.
[932] See “Book of Days,” vol. ii. pp. 612-614.
[933] Nares’s “Glossary,” vol. ii. p. 565; see Brand’s “Pop. Antiq.,” 1849, vol. iii. pp. 411-414.
[934] “History of Sign-boards,” 1866, p. 226.
[935] Wright’s “Notes to King Lear,” 1877, p. 133.
[936] “Travels,” 1673, p. 105.
[937] Cf. “King Lear,” iv. 2; “Troilus and Cressida,” v. 5; “All’s Well that End’s Well,” iv. 3.
CHAPTER XXII. SUNDRY SUPERSTITIONS.Almanacs. In Shakespeare’s day these were published under this title: “An Almanack and Prognostication made for the year of our Lord God, 1595.” So, in the “Winter’s Tale” (iv. 3), Autolycus says: “the hottest day prognostication proclaims;” that is, the hottest day foretold in the almanac. In Sonnet xiv. the prognostications in almanacs are also noticed:
And yet methinks I have astronomy,
But not to tell of good or evil luck,
Of plagues, of dearths, or season’s quality;
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
Pointing to each his thunder, rain, and wind:
Or say with princes if it shall go well,
By oft predict that I in heaven find.”
In “Antony and Cleopatra” (i. 2) Enobarbus says: “They are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report;” and in “2 Henry IV.” (ii. 4), Prince Henry says: “Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! what says the almanac to that?”
Amulets. A belief in the efficacy of an amulet or charm to ward off diseases and to avert contagion has prevailed from a very early period. The use of amulets was common among the Greeks and Romans, whose amulets were principally formed of gems, crowns of pearls, necklaces of coral, shells, etc. The amulet of modern times has been of the most varied kinds; objects being selected either from the animal, vegetable, or mineral kingdom, pieces of old rags or garments, scraps of writing in legible or illegible characters, in fact, of anything to which any superstitious property has been considered to belong.[938] This form of superstition is noticed in “1 Henry VI.” (v. 3), in the scene laid at Angiers, where La Pucelle exclaims:
Now help, ye charming spells and periapts”
—periapts being charms which were worn as preservatives against diseases or mischief. Thus Cotgrave[939] explains the word as “a medicine hanged about any part of the bodie.”
Ceremonies. These, says Malone, were “omens or signs deduced from sacrifices or other ceremonial rites.” Thus, in “Julius Cæsar” (ii. 1), Cassius says of Cæsar, that—
Quite from the main opinion he held once
Of fantasy, of dreams, and ceremonies.”
And in the next scene Calpurnia adds:
Yet now they fright me.”
Charms. These, as Mr. Pettigrew[940] has pointed out, differ little from amulets, the difference consisting in the manner in which they are used rather than in their nature. Thus, whereas the amulet was to be suspended on the person when employed, the charm was not necessarily subjected to such a method of application. In days gone by, and even at the present day, in country districts, so universal has been the use of this source of supposed magical power that there is scarcely a disease for which a charm has not been given. It is not only to diseases of body and mind that the superstitious practice has been directed; having been in popular request to avert evil, and to counteract supposed malignant influences. As might be expected, Shakespeare has given various allusions to this usage, as, for example, in “Cymbeline” (v. 3), where Posthumus says:
To have sav’d their carcases! took heel to do’t,
And yet died too! I, in mine own woe charm’d,
Could not find death where I did hear him groan,
Nor feel him where he struck”
—this passage referring to the notion of certain charms being powerful enough to keep men unhurt in battle.
Othello (iii. 4), speaking of the handkerchief which he had given to Desdemona, relates:
Did an Egyptian to my mother give;
She was a charmer, and could almost read
The thoughts of people.”
And in the same play (i. 1), Brabantio asks:
By which the property of youth and maidhood
May be abus’d?”
Again, in “Much Ado About Nothing” (iii. 2), Benedick, who is represented as having the toothache, after listening to the banter of his comrades, replies: “Yet is this no charm for the toothache.”
Perfect silence seems to have been regarded as indispensable for the success of any charm; and Pliny informs us that “favete linguis” was the usual exclamation employed on such an occasion. From this circumstance it has been suggested that the well-known phrase “to charm a tongue” may have originated. Thus we have the following dialogue in “Othello” (v. 2):
Thus, on the appearance, amid thunder, of the first apparition to Macbeth, after the witches have performed certain charms (iv. 1), Shakespeare introduces the following dialogue:
Hear his speech, but say thou nought.”
Again, in “The Tempest” (iv. 1), Prospero says:
Or else our spell is marr’d.”
Metrical Charms. There was a superstition long prevalent that life might be taken away by metrical charms.[941] Reginald Scot, in his “Discovery of Witchcraft” (1584), says: “The Irishmen addict themselves, etc.; yea, they will not sticke to affirme that they can rime a man to death.” In “1 Henry VI.” (i. 1), the Duke of Exeter, referring to the lamented death of Henry V., says:
Conjurers and sorcerers, that, afraid of him,
By magic verses have contrived his end?”
These “magic verses,” to which the death of Henry V. is here attributed, were not required to be uttered in his presence; their deadly energy existing solely in the words of the imprecation and the malevolence of the reciter, which were supposed to render them effectual at any distance.
Again, the alphabet was called the Christ-cross-row; either because a cross was prefixed to the alphabet in the old primers, or, more probably, from a superstitious custom of writing the alphabet in the form of a cross by way of a charm. In “Richard III.” (i. 1), Clarence relates how King Edward—
And from the cross-row plucks the letter G.”
Dreams. These, considered as prognostics of good or evil, are frequently introduced by Shakespeare. In “Troilus and Cressida” (v. 3), Andromache exclaims:
While Romeo (“Romeo and Juliet,” v. 1) declares:
It is chiefly as precursors of misfortune that the poet has availed himself of their supposed influence as omens of future fate. Thus, there are few passages in his dramas more terrific than the dreams of Richard III. and Clarence; the latter especially, as Mr. Drake says,[942] “is replete with the most fearful imagery, and makes the blood run chill with horror.”
Dreaming of certain things has generally been supposed to be ominous either of good or ill luck;[943] and at the present day the credulous pay oftentimes no small attention to their dreams, should these happen to have referred to what they consider unlucky things. In the same way Shylock,
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