The most celebrated of these are those in general, both of these whom I have met of the Russian mountains, where two peo- with are of the lowest description. The ple descend with surprising velocity from former excel in sheer impudence, the latter a theatre; and ascending a few feet almost by tricks, that, one would think, scarcely perpendicularly, are hooked and drawn could impose on a child. Here, also, are upwards by horses and machinery in the numbers of ballad singers, music grinders, lower part of the building. On the top punch performers, hired criers, hawking and side passages of ascent, are hundreds ped ars, twopenny shows, old print sellers, of people delighted with the view, or eager beer and lemon-water carriers, the last reto engage in the aerial flight, while a band markable for the towers instead of wheeled of music softens, with its harmony, the carriages, which they carry on their backs thunder of the chariots. The deep grooves with pipes led round their middle, so that in which they roll, are well calculated to the liquor would seem to flow from the prevent accidents by overturning ; but there | waistcoat pockets. These towers have has lately been a misfortune, wherein two often a metal image on the tops, holding in people lost their lives, from the only chance their hands various devices, as a flag with of casualty that could possibly occur. The peace. Fame with a trumpet, &c. The wheel having slipped from its axis, the drinking cups are in the shape of bells, and chariot, abruptly checked in the rapid re-kept always shining. Of the music, Rule volution of its descent, violently precipitated the unfortunate sufferers on the bar that was locked in front to secure their safety, and by the shock bereft them of an existence in which they had exultingly leaped to experience the excited feelings of danger over the ground of hitherto undisputed security. Can it be out of place, then, to call it a Folie beaujon? Underneath this scaffolding, or temporary erection of brick-work, which shakes as the sound proclaims the velocity of the carriages, are large apartments elegantly fitted up, where coffee, refreshments, and ices, are variously served, as the vanity or appetite demands, or the purses of the individuals permit. A coloured engraving is annexed, il lustrative of this hazardous amusement. The gardens, next in reputation to the Thuilleries, are those called Tivoli. On particular days the company here are extremely select, and the fire works on Sundays particularly brilliant. In dif ferent parts they have recitations, music and legerdemain. There is an apartment where profiles are taken from the reflected shadow of the face, and these gardens differ materially froin ours, in the spectators becoming themselves the performers mounting in cars, tumbling in swings, or joining in the gladsome circles of the waltz. There are, besides, a number of other gardens ou something of a similar plan, open to the public for a trifling gratuity, in different parts of the town, suited to the convenience of the neighbouring inhabitants. To these also may be added the Boulevards, where, in the vicinity of the better sort of coffee houses, there are seats to be let out; these, on both sides, are liued with crowds witnessing the antics of a buf: foon, or the sleight of haud of a juggler Britannia, aud God save the King, were very commou tunes, a circumstance that spoke for itself, the number of English who are every where to be found. The ballad singers are chiefly women and young girls, who accompany the tambourine, and are often handsome, with almost always an excellent voice. They gain an audience from the concourse of people in the evening, which, including those who are seated, is often so great, as to interrupt the passage, and render the boulevards nearly as hot as the air of the theatres. Several engravings, neatly executed, and coloured agreeably to the costume of the countries traversed by our author, enhance the value of this unpreteuding but really curious and amusing volume. Shakspeare and his Times; including the Biography of the Poet; Criticisms on his Genus and Writing, &c. &c. By Nathan Drake, M. D. 4to. 2 vols. £5. 5s. Cadell & Davies, London, 1817. [Concluded from p. 743. Vol. VII.] THE second volume of Dr. Drake's elaborate work commences with a biographical sketch of Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, Shakspeare's great friend and patron, to whom he dedicated the two first productions of his muse, "Venus and Adonis," and his "Rape of Lucrece." To this succeeds a critique on the poems, and particularly the sonnets of Shakspeare; Dr. Drake has shewn, we think most satisfactorily, that the person so frequently and affectionately addressed in the last mentioned pieces, is no other of their eccentricities in this way; and than the Earl of Southampton. This Dr. Drake has introduced several argument is prosecuted at very conside- pleasing illustrations of his allusions. rable length, but would be imperfectly We are tempted to transcribe a passage exhibited by any extracts that we can from this part of his volume, for the adduce. The passages, quoted from gratification of such of our fair readers Shakspeare's Miscellaneous Poetry, are as may be disposed to institute a comabundantly sufficient to evince a value parison between antient and modern far beyond what has been attributed to female fashions, it in modern times. Previously to entering on the dramatic career of our poet, Dr. Drake presents us with an amusing sketch of the dress and modes of living, manners, customs, and diversions of the inhabitants of the metropolis. In no period of our annals, perhaps, was a passion for dress cherished, and carried to a greater extreme, than during the reigns of Elizabeth and James. The Queen, who possessed an unbounded share of vanity and coquetry, set an example of profusion, which was followed through every rank of society. So great indeed was her attachment to dress, that she could not bear the idea being rivalled, much less surpassed, in any exhibition of this kind; neither could she endure, from whatever quarter it came, any censure, whether direct or indirect, on her love of personal decoration. The Bishop of London, on one occasion, having urged the vanity of dressing the body too closely, incurred her Majesty's indignation, who told her ladies that if the Bishope held more discourse on suche matters, she wolle fitte him for heaven, but he shoulde walke thither without a staffe, and leave his mantle behind him!' Perchance, says the lively contemporary writer who records this anecdote, the Bishope bathe never soughte her Highnesse wardrobe, or he woulde have chosen another texte.' It appears from another contemporay writer, that the Queen's wardrobe consisted of more than two thousand gowns, with all other things in proportion; and, on her decease, she was found to have left upwards of three thousand dresses behind her !!! With such a model before them, it may easily be credited, that our country women vied with each other in the luxury, variety, and splendour of their dresses. Shakspeare has noticed most Benedict, describing the woman of his choice, says, her hair shall be of what colour it please God;" an oblique stroke at a very prevalent fashion in Shakspeare's time of colouring or dying the hair, and which, from its general adoption, not only excited the shaft of the satirist, but the reprobation of the pulpit. Nor were the ladies content with disfiguring their own hair, but so universally dismissed it for that of others, that it was a common practice with them, as Stubbes asserts in his Anatomie of Abuses, to allure children who had beautiful hair to private places, in order to deprive them of their envied locks. gay;" and he repeats the charge in his Merchant of Venice, "So are those crisped suaky golden locks, Which make such wanton gambols with the wind, Upon supposed fairness, often known The hair, when thus obtained, was often dyed of a sandy colour, in compliment to the Queen, whose locks were of that tint; and these false ornaments or "thatches," as Timon terms them, were called periwigs; thus Julia, in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, contemplating the picture of her rival, observes, "Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow: If that be all the difference in his love, I'll get me such a colour'd periwig." Periwigs, which were first introduced into England about 1572, were to be had of all colours; for an old artist, speaking of his countrywomen, says, "It is a woonder more than ordinary to beholde theyr perewigs of sundry collours." A distinction, however, in wearing the hair, as well To some of the various coverings for the hair our poet refers in the Merry Wives of Windsor, when Falstaff, complimenting Mrs. Ford, exclaims, " thou hast the right arched bent of the brow, that becomes the ship-tire, the tire-valiant, or any tire of Venetian admittance." The ship-tire appears to have been an open flaunting head-dress, with scarfs or ribands floating in the air like streamers, or as Fenton himself, in the fifth act of this play, describes it, "With ribbons pendant flaring 'bout her head." The tire-valiant, if the text be correct, must mean a dress still more shewy and ostentatious; and we know that feathers, jewels, and gold and silver ornaments, were common decorations in these days of gorgeous finery. Nash, in 1594, speaks of " lawn caps" with " snow-resembled silver curlings;" and a sarcastic poet in 1595 describes "flaming heads with staring haire, 'With' wyers turnde like horns of ramTo peacockes I compare them right, That glorieth in their feathers bright." Venice and Paris were the sources of fashion, and both occasionally furnished a more chaste and elegant costume for the female head than the objects of Falstaff's encomium. The "French hood," a favourite of the times, consisted simply of gauze or muslin, reaching from the back of the head down over the forehead, and leaving the hair exposed on each side. Cauls, or nets of gold thread, were thrown with much taste over their glossy tresses, and attracted the notice of the satirist just quoted: These glittering caules of golden plate Wherewith their heads are richlie dect, Makes them to seeme an angels mate In judgment of the simple sect." Another happy mode of embellishment consisted of placing gracefully on the hair artificial peascods, which were represented open, with rows of pearls for peas. The lady's morning cap was usually a mob; and the citizens' wives wore either a'splendid velvet cap, or what was called the Minever cap,' with peaks three inches high, white, and three-cornered. Paint was openly used for the face: use; "These painted faces which they weare, Can any tell from whence they came;" and masks and mufflers were in general the former, according to Stubbes, were made of velvet, "wherewith when they ride abroad they cover all their faces, having holes made in them against their eyes, whereout they looke. So that if a man knew not their guise before, should chaunce to meet one of them, he would think he met a monster or a Devil, for face he can shew none, but two broad holes against their eyes, with glasses in them;" the latter covered the lower part of the face only, as far as the nose, and had the appearance of a linen bandage. So common were these female masks in Shakspeare's days, that the author of Quippes for newfangled Gentlewemen, after remarking that they were the offspring not of modesty but of pride, informs us that 66 "on each wight now are they seene, The tallow-pale, the browning bay, The swarthy blacke, the grassie-greene, The pudding-red, the dapple-graie." The ruff, already partly described under the dress of Elizabeth, was common to both sexes; but under the fostering care of the ladies, attained, in stiffness, fineness, and dimensions, the most extravagant pitch of absurdity. It reached behind to the very top of the head, and the tenuity of the lawn or cambrick of which it was made was such, that Stowe prophecies, they would shortly wear ruffes of a spider's web." In order to support so slender a fabrick, a great quantity of starch become necessary, the skilful use of which was introduced by a Mrs. Dingen Van Plesse in 1564, who taught her art for a premium of five guineas. Starching was subsequently improved by the introduction of various colours, one of which, the yellow die, being the invention of a Mrs. Turner, who was afterwards concerned in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, was dismissed with abhorrence from the fashionable world, in consequence of this abandoned woman being executed at Tyburn in a ruff of her favourite tint. The extreme indignation with which Stubbes speaks of the use of starch is highly amusing:-" One arch or piller," says he, " wherewith the devil's kingdome of great ruffes is underpropped, is a certain kind of liquid matter which they call startch, wherein the devill bath learned them to wash and die their ruffes, which, being drie, will stand stiff and inflexible about their neckes. And this starch they make of divers substances-of all collours and hues, as white, redde, blewe, purple, and the like." The waist was beyond all proportion | as that of the man of fashion. But of long, and the gowns were made of the all the effeminate fashions of this age most costly materials, and richly orna- the most effeminate, perhaps, was the mented. Silk stockings (first intro- custom of wearing jewels and roses in duced by the Queeu in 1560) formed the ears, or about the neck, and of cheone of the most expensive articles of rishing a long lock of hair under the female dress. Their shoes were fur- left ear, called a love-lock. The first nished with heels of enormous height; and least expensive of these decorations, and it appears that the ladies were as the use of jewels and rings in the ear, profound adepts in the art of flirting was general through the upper and midwith their richly decorated ostrich fea- dle ranks, nor was it very uncommon to ther fans, as some of our modern belles see gems worn, appended to a riband are. Perfumed bracelets, necklaces, round the neck. Roses (sometimes and gloves, were favourite articles; to real flowers, but mostly of riband) were which we may add, that a small looking the general appendage of the love-lock; glass pendent from the girdle, (what which at length became so notorious as belle thus bedizened could resist the to invoke the indignant satire of the temptation of contemplating her sweet celebrated William Prynne, who wrote person,) a pocket handkerchief richly an express treatise against it, which he wrought with gold and silver, and a quaintly intitled "The Unloveliness of love lock hanging wantonly over the Love-locks and Long Womanish Hair." shoulder, were customarily exhibited by the fashionable female. The modes of living, household furniture, eating, drinking, and domestic economy of our town ancestors, during the close of the sixteenth and the commencement of the seventeenth century, furnish materials for an amusing seetion; these we reluctantly pass, together with Dr. Drake's delineation of Queen Elizabeth's personal character, which, as well as that of James I. had a considerable influence on the manners of their Like Elizabeth, respective subjects. the English, during the age of Shakspeare, were brave, magnanimous, and prudent; and sometimes, like James, they were credulous, curious, and dissipated. Nor was the male-dress of that time less extravagant. The love of finery, for which James I. was so conspicuous, seems to have been imbibed not only by his courtiers, but also by his youthful subjects. Their apparel was of the most costly materials; their hair was worn long and flowing, and the beard, which bikewise had its fashionable cut, was dyed of various colours, and moulded into various forms, according to the profession, age, or fancy, of the wearer. Red was one of the most fashionable tints; a beard of formal cut distinguished the Justice and the Judge; a rough bushy beard marked the Clown; Gaming with cards, dice, &c. danand a spade-beard, or a stiletto or dag-cing, bear and bull baiting, archery, ger-shaped beard graced the soldier. lounging at fashionable promenades, Ruffs of very large dimensions were masques and pageants the most extraworn round the neck the doublet and vagant, were among the principal and But the stage, hose were of an enormous size, the favourite diversions. shoes were curiously ornamented with which was in a state of comparative inrows of riband, and the boots were still fancy at the birth of Shakspeare, fosmore costly, resembling in some degree tered by the public patronage of Elizathe theatre Buskin of the modern stage. beth, and James I. and their ministers, Rapiers or small swords, which by a gradually advanced in public favour; sumptuary proclamation of Queen Eli-and the private patronage of the nobility zabeth, were limited to three feet, were the indispensable accompaniment of every one who aspired to the character of a gentleman. Though less elegant, the dress of the citizen was equally shewy, and sometimes fully as expensive : and gentry, during the latter half of the sixteenth century, supported not fewer than fourteen distinct companies of performers. The Globe, on Bankside, was the scene of Shakspear's ear liest dramatic performance; and in 1603, this order, are interwoven with his critical remarks on each of Shakspeare's Dramas, which occupy several following chapters. Of these remarks it is sufficient to say, that our Author has analysed the productions of the bard with the same acumen and taste, of which his Literary hours present so many pleasing specimens. We have been particularly pleased with his disquisitions on the Fairy Mythology elucidating the Midsummer Night's Dream, on the popular superstitious notions concerning the agency of spirits and apparitions illus the company to which he belonged, was formally licensed by James I. This theatre, and another in Blackfriars, which belonged to the same company, were the two principal places of public attraction; and here all his dramas were performed. Dr. Drake has, with much research, detailed at considerable length, the economy of the stage during the time of Shakspeare; but want of room compels us to withhold any extracts from this part of his work, as well as from his accurate, though brief view, of dramatic poetry, from the birth of Shakspeare to the pe-trative of the Tragedy of Hamlet, as riod of his commencement as a writer for the stage. Much and diversified research is here compressed into a comparatively short compass. From various internal evidences, Dr. D. is of opinion, that Shakspear's career, as a dramatic poet, commenced about the year 1590: the following is the chronological order in which our author is of opinion that his genuine productions successively appeared. 1590 1591 1591 1592 1592 1593 1595 1596 well as on the popular belief in Witchcraft during the age of Shakspeare, and on his management of this superstition in the Tragedy of Macbeth. We are tempted to transcribe the account of the supposed compact made by witches with satan, and Dr. Drake's application of this superstition to the elucidation of Macbeth. It remains to notice the nature of the compact or bargain, which witches were believed to enter into with their seducer, and the species of homage which they were compelled to pay him; and here again we must have recourse to Scot, not only as the most compressed, but as the most authentic detailer of this strange credulity of his 1593 times. "The order of their bargaine or 1594 profession" says he, "is double; the one 1595 solemne and publike; the other secret and private. That which is called solemue or publike, is where witches come together at certaine assemblies, at the times prefixed, and doo not onlie see the divell in visible forme; but confer and talke familiarlie with him. In which couference the divell exhorteth them to observe their fidelitie 1599 unto him, promising them long life and 1599 prosperitic. Then the witches assembled, 1600 commend a new disciple (whom they call a 1601 novice) unto him: and if the divell find 1601 that yoong witch apt and forward in re1602 punciation of christain faith, in despising 1602 anie of the seven sacraments, in treading upon crosses, in spetting at the time of the elevation, in breaking their fast on fasting daies, and fasting on suudaies: then the divell giveth foorth his hand, and the novice joining hand in hand with him, pro1609 miseth to observe and keepe all the divels 1610 commandments. 1597 1598 1598 1603 1604 1605 1606 1607 108 1611 1612 1613 The reasons, stated by Dr. Drake for "This doone, the divell beginneth to be more bold with hir, telling her plaiulie, that all this will not serve his turne; and therefore requireth homage at hir hands: |