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I have a motion much imports your good;
Whereto if you'll a willing ear incline,
What's mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.
So, bring us to our palace; where we'll show

What's yet behind, that's meet you all should know.

[Exeunt.

INTRODUCTION

ΤΟ

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

THE earliest notice that has reached us of MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING is an entry in the books of the Stationers' Company, bearing date August 4, 1600, and running thus:

"As You Like It, a book.

66 Henry the Fifth, a book.

"Every Man in his Humour, a book. "Much Ado about Nothing, a book.

To be stayed."

Why these plays were thus entered and the publication stayed, cannot be certainly determined: probably it was to protect the authorized publishers and the public against those "stolen and surreptitious copies" which the editors of the folio allege to have been put forth. In the same Register, under the date of August 23, 1600, the following entry was made by Andrew Wise and William Aspley: "Two books, the one called Much Ado about Nothing, and the other The Second Part of the History of King Henry the IV., with the Humours of Sir John Falstaff: Written by Mr. Shakespeare." This entry was for publication; which may infer that the stay of August 4 had been revoked by the 23d of the same month. In the course of the same year a quarto pamphlet of thirty-six leaves was published, with a title-page reading as follows: "Much Ado ab ut Nothing: As it hath been sundry times publicly acted by the right honourable the Lord Chamberlain his servants. Written by William Shakespeare. - London : Printed by V. S. for Andrew Wise and William Aspley. 1600." The frequent use of the play on the public stage, and the need of a stay to prevent a stolen issue, may doubtless be taken as evidence of a pretty good run. There is one more contemporary reference to this play, which should not be omitted. Mr. Steevens ascertained from one of Vertue's manuscripts that Much Ado about Nothing once passed under the title of Benedick and Beatrice;

and that Heminge the player received on the 20th of May, 1613. the sum of 40 pounds, and 20 pounds more as his Majesty's gra tuity, for exhibiting six plays at Hampton Court, among which was this comedy.

166

Except the quarto of 1600, there was no other edition of Much Ado about Nothing, that we know of, till the folio of 1623, where it stands the sixth in the division of Comedies. In the first edition neither the scenes nor the acts, in the second only the latter, are marked. Some question has been made whether the folio were a reprint of the quarto, or from another manuscript. Considerable might be urged on either side of the question: but the arguments would hardly pay for the stating; the differences between the two copies being so few and slight as to make it of little consequence whether they were printed from several manuscripts, or the one from the other. And the superior authority of the quarto is suf ficiently established in that it came out during the author's life, and when he was at hand to correct the proof: besides, in nearly every case of difference the reading of the quarto seems better in itself. There is one point, however, bearing rather in favor of several manuscripts, which ought perhaps to be stated. In Act ii. sc. 3, one of the stage directions in the folio is, Enter Prince, Leo nato, Claudio, and Jack Wilson," thus substituting the name of the actor for that of the character; which looks very much as if the whole came fresh from the prompter's book. Wilson was a celebrated stage singer of that time; and we thus learn that he performed the part of Balthazar. Again, in Act iv. sc. 2, both quarto and folio set the names of Kemp and Cowley before the speeches of Dogberry and Verges; thus showing what actors originally played the parts of those immortal magistrates. So far as the question of several manuscripts is concerned, perhaps the agreement of the two editions in this latter case may be fairly regarded as offsetting their difference in the former, as Kemp had been dead so.ne years when the folio appeared. It may be worth the while to add, that the folio omits some passages that are found in the quarto, two of which, besides being quite at home where they stand, are too good to be lost. One is the following part of Dor Pedro's speech in Act iii. sc. 2: "Or in the shape of two countries at once; as a German from the waist downward, all slops, and a Spaniard from the hip upward, no doublet:" which Mr. Collier thinks may have been left out in consequence of some change of fashion between 1600 and 1623. The other passage includes a part of Dogberry's speech in Act iv. sc. 2: Write down that they hope they serve God:- and write God first; for God defend but God should go before such villains:" which, as Blackstone suggests, may have been thrown out in 1623, on account of a law made in the third year of James I. against the irreverent use of the sacred Name.

What with the copies of 1600 and 1623, the text of Much Ado

about Nothing, except in one instance, is every where so clear and well-settled as almost to foreclose controversy. That exception is the last verse of the Song in Act v. sc. 3; where the best result we can come to will be found in a note.

This play, as may be seen in our Introduction to The Two Gentlemen of Verona, is not in the list given by Francis Meres in 1598. As Meres' purpose was to set forth the Poet's excellence in comedy, it is hardly to be supposed that he would have taken The Two Gentlemen of Verona and left Much Ado about Nothing, if the latter had then been known. This circumstance, tnerefore, together with the publishing of the play in the latter part of 1600, sufficiently ascertains the probable date of the composition. Allowing time enough for a successful run upon the boards, and for such a growth of popularity as to invite a fraudulent publication, the play could scarce have been written after 1599, when the Poet was in his thirty-fifth year.

As in many other of our Author's plays, a part of the plot and story of Much Ado about Nothing was borrowed. But the same matter had been borrowed so many times before, and run into so many variations, that we cannot affirm with certainty to what source Shakespeare was immediately indebted. Mrs. Lenox, indeed, characteristically instructs us, that the Poet here" borrowed just enough to show his poverty of invention, and added enough to prove his want of judgment:" and this choice dropping of criticism, like many others vouchsafed by her learned ladyship, is too wise, if not too womanly, to need any comment from us, save that the Poet can better afford to have such things said, than the sayer can to have them repeated.

Pope says, -"The story is taken from Ariosto." And so much of it as relates to Hero, Claudio, and John, certainly bears a strong resemblance to the tale of Ariodante and Genevra, which occupies the whole of the fifth and part of the sixth books of Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. A translation of this part of the poem by Peter Beverly was licensed for the press in 1565; and Warton tells us it was reprinted in 1600; which is of some consequence, as suggesting that Shakespeare's play may have had something to do with the republication. An English version of Ariosto's whole poem, by Sir John Harrington, came out in 1591; but Much Ado about Nothing yields no traces of the Author's having been with Sir John. And indeed the fixing of any obligations in this quarter is the more difficult, forasmuch as the same matter appears to have been borrowed by Ariosto himself. For the story of a laly betrayed to peril and disgrace by the personation of her waiting-woman was an old European tradition: it has been traced to Spain; and Ariosto interwove it with the adventures of Rinaldo, as yielding an apt occasion for his chivalrous heroism. An outline of the story as told by Ariosto is thus given by Mr. Knight:

"The Lady Genevra, so falsely accused, was doomed to die

unless a true knight came within a month to do battle for her hon our. Her lover, Ariodante, had fled, and was reported to have perished. The wicked duke, Polinesso, who had betrayed Genevra, appears secure in his treachery. But the misguided woman, Dalinda, who had been the instrument of his crime, flying from her paramour, meets with Rinaldo, and declares the truth. Then comes the combat, in which the guilty duke is slain by the champion of innocence, and the lover reappears to be made happy with his spotless princess."

From which it will be seen at once that the Polinesso of the poem answers to the John of the play. But there is this important difference, that the motive of the former in vilifying the lady is to drive away her lover, that he may have her himself; whereas the latter acts from a self-generated malignity of spirit that takes pleasure in blasting the happiness of others without any hope of supplanting them.

Spenser, whose genius sucked in whatsoever was rich and rare in all the resources that learning could accumulate, seems to have followed Ariosto in working the same tale into the variegated structure of his great poem: but the Englishman so used it as to set forth a high moral lesson; the Italian, to minister opportunity for a romantic adventure. The story of Phedon, relating the treachery of his false friend Philemon, is in Book ii. Canto 4 of the Faery Queene.

The same story also forms the groundwork of one of Bandello's novels; and Mr. Skottowe's brief analysis of that tale will indicate the most probable source of Shakespeare's borrowings:

"Fenicia, the daughter of Lionato, a gentleman of Messina, is betrothed to Timbreo de Cardona. Girondo, a disappointed lover of the young lady, resolves, if possible, to prevent the marriage. He insinuates to Timbreo that his mistress is disloyal, and oilers to show him a stranger scaling her chamber window. Timbreo accepts the invitation, and witnesses the hired servant of Girondo, in the dress of a gentleman, ascending a ladder and entering the nouse of Lionato. Stung with rage and jealousy, Timbreo the next morning accuses his innocent mistress to her father, and re. jects the alliance. Fenicia sinks in a swoon; a dangerous illness succeeds; and to stifle all reports injurious to her fame, Lionato proclaims that she is dead. Her funeral rites are performed in Messina, while in truth she lies concealed in the obscurity of a country residence.

"The thought of having occasioned the death of an innocert and lovely female strikes Girondo with horror; in the agony of remorse he confesses his villany to Timbreo, and they both throw themselves on the mercy, and ask forgiveness, of the insulted family of Fenicia. On Timbreo is imposed only the penance of espousing a lady whose face he should not see previous to his marriage instead of a new bride, whom he expected, he is pre

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