PERSONS REPRESENTED. ORSINO, duke of Illyria. SEBASTIAN, a young gentleman, brother to Viola. VALENTINE, CURIO, gentlemen, attending on the duke. Sir TOBY BELCH, uncle of Olivia. MALVOLIO, steward to Olivia. Lords, Priests, Sailors, Officers, Musicians, and other Attendants. SCENE-a City, in Illyria; and the Sea-coast near it. TWELFTH-NIGHT. ACT I. SCENE I.—An Apartment in the Duke's Palace. Enter Duke, CURIO, Lords; Musicians attending. Duke. IF music be the food of love, play on, O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou! [1] Amongst the beauties of this charming similitude, its exact propriety is not the least. For, as a south wind, while blowing over a violet bank, wafts away the odour of the flowers, it at the same time communicates its own sweetness to it; so the soft affecting music, here described, though it takes away the natural sweet tranquillity of the mind, yet, at the same time, it communicates a new pleasure to it. Or, it may allude to another property of music, where the same strains have a power to excite pain or pleasure, as the state is, in which it finds the hearer. Hence Milton makes the self-same strains of Orpheus proper to excite both the affections of mirth and melancholy, just as the mind is then disposed. If to mirth, he calls for such music, "That Orpheus' self may heave his head From golden slumbers on a bed Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear Of Pluto, to have quite set free His half-regain'd Eurydice." L'Allegro. If to melancholy, "Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing Such notes as warbled to the string, Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek, And made hell grant what love did seek." Il Penseroso. WARB. [2] Milton, in his Paradise Lost, B. IV. has very successfully introduced the same image: -now gentle gales, Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there, But falls into abatement and low price, Cur. Will you go hunt, my lord? Cur. The hart. Duke. Why, so I do, the noblest that I have: O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, Methought, she purg'd the air of pestilence; That instant was I turn'd into a hart;3 And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, E'er since pursue me.-How now? what news from her? Enter VALENTINE. Val. So please my lord, I might not be admitted, The element itself, till seven years heat, Duke. O, she, that hath a heart of that fine frame, SCENE II. [Exeunt. The Sea-coast. Enter VIOLA, Captain, and Sailors, Vio. What country, friends, is this? Cap. Illyria, lady. Vio. And what should I do in Illyria ? [3] This image evidently alludes to the story of Acteon. by which Shakespeare seems to think men cautioned against too great familiarity with for bidden beauty. Acteon, who saw Diana naked and was torn to pieces by his hounds, represents a man, who indulging his eyes, or his imagination. with the view of a woman that be cannot gain, has his heart torn with incessart longing. An interpretation far more elegant and natural than that of Sir Francis My brother he is in Elysium. Perchance, he is not drown'd:-What think you, sailors? Cap. It is perchance, that you yourself were saved. Vio. O my poor brother! and so, perchance, may he be. Cap. True, madam: and, to comfort you with chance, Assure yourself, after our ship did split, When poor number saved with you, and that you, Hung on our driving boat, I saw your brother, Most provident in peril, bind himself (Courage and hope both teaching him the practice) I saw him hold acquaintance with the waves, Vio. For saying so, there's gold : Mine own escape unfoldeth to my hope, Whereto thy speech serves for authority, The like of him. Know'st thou this country? Cap. Ay, madam, well; for I was bred and born, Not three hours' travel from this very place. Vio. Who governs here? Cap. A noble duke, in nature, As in his name. Vio. What is his name? Cap. Orsino. Vio. Orsino! I have heard my father name him: He was a bachelor then. Cap. And so is now, Or was so very late for but a month Ago I went from hence; and then 'twas fresh In murmur (as, you know, what great ones do, The less will prattle of,) that he did seek Vio. What's she? Cap. A virtuous maid, the daughter of a count That dy'd some twelve-month since; then leaving her In the protection of his son, her brother, Who shortly also died for whose dear love, They say, she hath abjur'd the company Vio. O, that I served that lady : Bacon, who, in his Wisdom of the Ancients, supposes this story to inquiring into the secrets of princes by shewing that those who kno reasons of state is to be concealed, will be detected and destroy servants. JOHNSON. " And might not be delivered to the world, Till I had made mine own occasion mellow, Cup. That were hard to compass; No, not the duke's. Vio. There is a fair behaviour in thee, captain; I will believe, thou hast a mind that suits Cap. Be you his eunuch, and your mute I'll be: SCENE III. [Exeunt A Room in OLIVIA's House. Enter Sir TOBY BELCH, and MARIA. Sir To. What a plague means my niece, to take the death of her brother thus? I am sure, care's an enemy to life. Mar. By my troth, sir Toby, you must come in earlier o'nights; your cousin, my lady, takes great exceptions to your ill hours. Sir To. Why, let her except before excepted. Mar. Ay, but you must confine yourself within the modest limits of order. Sir To. Confine? I'll confine myself no finer than I am these clothes are good enough to drink in, and so be these boots too, an they be not, let them hang themselves in their own straps. Mar. That quaffing and drinking will undo you: I heard my lady talk of it yesterday; and of a foolish knight, that you brought in one night here, to be her wooer. |