OF no other author, perhaps, has more been written than of Shakespeare. Yet whatever other knowledge his commentators professed, few of them appear to have been naturalists, and none, so far as I am aware, have examined his knowledge of Ornithology.
An inquiry upon this subject, undertaken in the first instance for my own amusement, has resulted in the bringing together of so much that is curious and entertaining, that to the long list of books already published about Shakespeare, I have been bold enough to add yet another. In so doing, I venture to hope that the reader may so far appreciate the result of my labour as not to consider it superfluous.
As regards the treatment of the subject, a word or two of explanation seems necessary. In 1866, from the notes I had then collected, I contributed a series of articles on the birds of Shakespeare to The Zoologist. In these articles, I referred only to such birds as have a claim to be considered British, and omitted all notice of domesticated species. I had not then considered any special arrangement or grouping, but noticed each species seriatim in the order adopted by Mr. Yarrell in his excellent “History of British Birds.” Since that date, I have collected so much additional information on the subject, that, instead of eighty pages (the extent of my first publication), three hundred have now passed through the printers’ hands. With this large accession of material, it was found absolutely necessary to re-arrange and re-write the whole. The birds therefore have been now divided into certain natural groups, including the foreign and domesticated species, to each of which groups a chapter has been devoted; and I have thought it desirable to give, by way of introduction, a sketch of Shakespeare’s general knowledge of natural history and acquaintance with field-sports, as bearing more or less directly on his special knowledge of Ornithology, which I propose chiefly to consider.
After I had published the last of the series of articles referred to, I received an intimation for the first time, that, twenty years previously, a notice of the birds of Shakespeare had appeared in the pages of The Zoologist. I lost no time in procuring the particular number which contained the article, and found that, in December, 1846, Mr. T.W. Barlow, of Holmes Chapel, Cheshire, had, to a certain extent, directed attention to Shakespeare’s knowledge as an Ornithologist. His communication, however, did not exceed half a dozen pages, in which space he has mentioned barely one-fourth of the species to which Shakespeare has referred. From the cursory nature of his remarks, moreover, I failed to discover a reference to any point which I had not already investigated. It would be unnecessary for me, therefore, to allude to this article, except for the purpose of acknowledging that Mr. Barlow was the first to enter upon what, as regards Shakespeare, may be termed this new field of research.
The labour of collecting and arranging Shakespeare’s numerous allusions to birds, has been much greater than many would suppose, for not only have I derived little or no benefit from the various editions of his works which I have consulted, but reference to a glossarial index, or concordance, has, in nine cases out of ten, resulted in disappointment. It is due to Mr. Staunton, however, to state that I have found some of the foot-notes to his library edition of the Plays very useful.
Although oft-times difficult, it has been my endeavour, as far as practicable, to connect one with another the various passages quoted or referred to, so as to render the whole as readable and as entertaining as possible. With this view, many allusions have been passed over as being too trivial to deserve separate notice, but a reference to them will be found in the Appendix at the end of the volume,1 where all the words quoted are arranged, for convenience, in the order in which they occur in the plays and poems.
In spelling Shakespeare’s name, I have adopted the orthography of his friends Ben Jonson and the editors of the first folio.2
As regards the illustrations, it seems desirable also to say a few words.
In selecting for my frontispiece a portrait of Shakespeare as a falconer (a character which I am confident could not have been foreign to him), I have experienced considerable difficulty in making choice of a likeness.
Those who have made special inquiries into the authenticity of the various portraits of Shakespeare, are not agreed in the results at which they have arrived. This is to be attributed to the fact that, with the exception of the Droeshout etching, to which I shall presently state my objection, no likeness really exists of which a reliable history can be given without one or more missing links in the chain of evidence.
There are four portraits which have all more or less claim to be considered authentic. These are “the Jansen portrait,” 1610; “the Stratford bust,” prior to 1623; “the Droeshout etching,” 1623; and “the Chandos portrait,” of which the precise date is uncertain, but which must have been painted some years prior to 1616, the year of Shakespeare’s death.
It would be impossible, within the compass of this preface, to review all that has been said for and against these four portraits. Neither will space permit me to give the history of each in detail. I can only briefly allude to the chief facts in connection with each, and state the reasons which have influenced me in selecting the Chandos portrait.
Mr. Boaden, who was the first to examine into the authenticity of reputed Shakespeare portraits,3 has evinced a preference for the so-called “Jansen portrait,” in the collection of the Duke of Somerset, considering it to have been painted by Cornelius Jansen, in 1610, for Lord Southampton, the great patron, at that date, of art and the drama.
The picture, indeed, bears upon the face of it an inscription— Æte 46
1610 —which gives much weight to the views expressed by Mr. Boaden.
It is certain that, in the year mentioned, Jansen was in England, and that he painted several pictures for Lord Southampton; it is equally true, that at that date Shakespeare was in his forty-sixth year. But Mr. Boaden fails to prove that this particular picture was painted by Jansen, and that it was ever in the possession of Lord Southampton, or painted by his order.
As a fine head, and a work of art, it is the one of all others that I should like to think resembled Shakespeare, could its history be more satisfactorily detailed.
Many regard as a genuine portrait, the Bust at Stratford-on-Avon, which is stated to have been executed by Gerard Johnson, and “probably” under the superintendence of Dr. John Hall. The precise date of its erection is not known, but we gather that it was previous to 1623, from the fact that Leonard Digges has referred to it in his Lines to the Memory of Shakespeare, prefixed to the first folio edition of the Plays published in that year. Mr. Wivell relies very strongly on the circumstance of its having been originally coloured to nature.4 Hence tradition informs us that the eyes were hazel, the hair and beard auburn. It must be admitted, however, that a portrait after death can never be so faithful as a picture from the life, while no sculptor who examines this bust can maintain that it was executed from a cast.5
Those who approve of the Droeshout etching, published in 1623, as a frontispiece to the first folio, find a strong argument in favour of its being a likeness in the commendatory lines by Ben Jonson, which accompany it. Jonson knew Shakespeare well, and he says of this picture:—
As a work of art it is by no means skilful, and is confessedly inferior not only to other engravings of that day, but also to other portraits by Martin Droeshout.
That it bore some likeness to Shakespeare as an actor, I do not doubt, but that it resembled him as a private individual when off the stage, I cannot bring myself to believe. The straight hair and shaven chin which are not found in other portraits having good claims to be considered authentic, and the unnaturally high forehead, which would be caused by the actor’s wearing the wig of an old man partially bald, suggest at once that when the original portrait was taken, from which Droeshout engraved, Shakespeare was dressed as if about to sustain a part in which he was thought to excel as an actor.
Boaden has conjectured that this portrait represents Shakespeare in the character of old Knowell, in Ben Jonson’s Every Man in his Humour, a part which he is known to have played in 1598, and this would easily account for Ben Jonson’s commendation.6 This conjecture is so extremely probable, that I have no hesitation in endorsing it.
We come, then, now to “the Chandos portrait.” With the longest pedigree of any, it possesses at least as much collateral evidence of probability, and is, moreover, important as belonging to the nation.7 It has been traced back to the possession of Shakespeare’s godson, William, afterwards Sir William, Davenant, and all that seems to be wanting materially, is the artist’s name. The general opinion is, that it was painted either by Burbage or Taylor, both of whom were fellow-players of Shakespeare. It is styled the Chandos portrait from having come to the trustees of the National Portrait Gallery from the collection of the Duke of Chandos and Buckingham, through the Earl of Ellesmere, by whom it was purchased and presented. The history of the picture, so far as it can be ascertained, is as follows:—
It was originally the property of Taylor, the player (our poet’s Hamlet), by whom, or by Richard Burbage, it was painted.8
Taylor dying about the year 1653, at the advanced age of seventy,9 left this picture by will to Davenant.10 At the death of Davenant, who died intestate in 1663, it was bought, probably at a sale of his effects, by Betterton, the actor.
While in Betterton’s possession, it was engraved by Van der Gucht, for Rowe’s edition of Shakespeare, in 1709. Betterton dying without a will and in needy circumstances, his pictures were sold. Some were bought by Bullfinch, the printseller, who sold them again to a Mr. Sykes. The portrait of Shakespeare was purchased by Mrs. Barry, the actress, who afterwards sold it for forty guineas to Mr. Robert Keck, of the Inner Temple.
While in his possession, an engraving was made from it, in 1719, by Vertue, and it then passed to Mr. Nicholls, of Southgate, Middlesex, who acquired it on marrying the heiress of the Keck family.
The Marquis of Caernarvon, afterwards Duke of Chandos, marrying the daughter of Mr. Nicholls, it then became his Grace’s property. When his pictures were sold at Stowe, in September, 1848, this portrait was purchased for three hundred and fifty-five guineas by the Earl of Ellesmere, who, in March, 1856, presented it to the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery, in whose hands it still remains.
Notwithstanding this pedigree, the picture has been objected to on the ground that the dark hair and foreign complexion could never have belonged to our essentially English Shakespeare. Those who make this objection, seem to forget entirely the age of the portrait, and the fact that it is painted in oil and on canvas, a circumstance which of itself is quite sufficient, after the lapse of two centuries and a half, to account for the dark tone which now pervades it, to say nothing of the numerous touches and retouches to which it has been subjected at the hands of its various owners.
Notwithstanding the missing links of evidence, it seems to me that, having traced the picture back to the possession of Shakespeare’s godson, we have gone far enough to justify us in accepting it as an authentic portrait in preference to many others. For we cannot suppose that Sir William Davenant would retain in his possession until his death a picture of one with whom he was personally acquainted, unless he considered that it was sufficiently faithful as a likeness to remind him of the original.
On the score of pedigree, then, and because I believe that the only well-authenticated portrait (i.e., the Droeshout) represents Shakespeare as an actor, and not as a private individual, I have selected the Chandos portrait for my frontispiece.
By obtaining a reduced photograph of this upon wood, from the best engraving, and “vignetting” it, I have been enabled to place upon the left hand a hooded falcon, drawn by the unrivalled pencil of Mr. Wolf, and thus to entrust to the engraver, Mr. Pearson, a faithful likeness of man and bird.
As regards the other illustrations, my acknowledgments are due to Mr. J.G. Keulemans for the artistic manner in which he has executed my designs, and to Mr. Pearson for the careful way in which he has engraved them.
With these observations, I conclude an undertaking which has occupied my leisure hours for six years, but which indeed has been, in every sense of the word, “a labour of love.”
Should the reader, on closing this volume, consider its design but imperfectly executed, it is hoped that he will still have gleaned from it enough curious information to compensate him for the disappointment.
BEFORE proceeding to examine the ornithology of Shakespeare, it may be well to take a glance at his knowledge of natural history in general.
Pope has expressed the opinion that whatever object of nature or branch of science Shakespeare either speaks of or describes, it is always with competent if not with exclusive knowledge. His descriptions are always exact, his metaphors appropriate, and remarkably drawn from the true nature and inherent qualities of each subject. There can indeed be little doubt that Shakespeare must have derived the greater portion of his knowledge of nature from his own observation, and no one can fail to be delighted with the variety and richness of the images which he has by this means produced.
Whether we accompany him to the woods and fields, midst “daisies pied and violets blue,” or sit with him “under the shade of melancholy boughs,” whether we follow him to “the brook that brawls along the wood,” or to that sea “whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege of watery Neptune,” we are alike instructed by his observations, and charmed with his apt descriptions. How often do the latter strike us as echoes of our own experience, sent forth in fitter tones than we could find.
A sportsman is oft-times more or less a naturalist. His rambles in search of game bring him in contact with creatures of such curious structure and habits, with insects and plants of such rare beauty, that the purpose of his walk is for the time forgotten, and he turns aside from sport, to admire and learn from nature.
That Shakespeare was both a sportsman and a naturalist, there is much evidence to show. During the age in which he lived “hawking” was much in vogue. Throughout the Plays, we find frequent allusions to this sport, and the accurate employment of terms used exclusively in falconry, as well as the beautiful metaphors derived therefrom, prove that our poet had much practical knowledge on the subject. We shall have occasion later to discuss his knowledge of falconry at greater length. It will suffice for the present to observe that there are many passages in the Plays which to one unacquainted with the habits of animals and birds, or ignorant of hawking phraseology, would be wholly unintelligible, but which are otherwise found to contain the most beautiful and forcible metaphors. As instances of this may be cited that passage in Othello (Act iii. Sc. 3), where the Moor compares his suspected wife to a “haggard falcon,” and the hawking scene in Act ii. of the Second Part of King Henry VI.11
Shakespeare, although a contemplative man, appears to have found but little “recreation” in fishing, and the most enthusiastic disciple of Izaak Walton would find it difficult to illustrate a work on angling with quotations from Shakespeare. He might refer us to Twelfth Night (Act ii. Sc. 5), where Maria, on the appearance of Malvolio, exclaims, “Here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling;” and to the song of Caliban in The Tempest (Act ii. Sc. 2), “No more dams I’ll make for fish.” Possibly, by straining a point or two, he might ask with Benedick, in Much Ado about Nothing (Act i. Sc. 1), “Do you play the flouting Jack?”
But our poet seems to have considered—
His forte lay more in hunting and fowling than in fishing,13 and in all that relates to deer-stalking (as practised in his day, when the deer was killed with cross-bow or bow and arrow), to deer-hunting with hounds, and to coursing, we find him fully informed.
In the less noble art of bird-catching14 he was probably no mean adept, while the knowledge which he displays of the habits of our wild animals, as the fox, the badger, the weasel, and the wild cat, could only have been acquired by one accustomed to much observation by flood and field.
On each of these subjects a chapter might be written, but it will suffice for our present purpose to draw attention only to some of the more remarkable passages in support of the assertions above made.
Deer-shooting was a favourite sport of both sexes in Shakespeare’s day, and to enable the ladies to enjoy it in safety, “stands,” or “standings,” were erected in many parks, and concealed with boughs. From these the ladies with bow and arrow, or cross-bow, shot at the deer as they were driven past them by the keepers.
Queen Elizabeth was extremely fond of this sport, and the nobility who entertained her in her different progresses, made large hunting parties, which she usually joined when the weather was favourable. She frequently amused herself in following the hounds. “Her Majesty,” says a courtier, writing to Sir Robert Sidney, “is well and excellently disposed to hunting, for every second day she is on horseback, and continues the sport long.”15 At this time Her Majesty had just entered the seventy-seventh year of her age, and was then at her palace at Oatlands. Often, when she was not disposed to hunt herself, she was entertained with a sight of the sport. At Cowdray Park, Sussex, then the seat of Lord Montagu (1591), Her Majesty one day after dinner saw “sixteen bucks, all having fayre lawe, pulled downe with greyhounds in a laund or lawn.”16
No wonder, then, that the ladies of England, with the royal example before their eyes, found such delight in the chase during the age of which we speak, and not content with being mere spectators, vied with each other in the skilful use of the bow.
To this pastime Shakespeare has made frequent allusion.
In Love’s Labour’s Lost, the first scene of the fourth act is laid in a park, where the Princess asks,—
To which the forester replies,—
And in Henry VI. Part III. Act iii. Sc. 1,—
Again, in Cymbeline (Act iii. Sc. 4), “When thou hast ta’en thy ‘stand,’ the elected deer before thee.” Other passages might be mentioned, but it will be sufficient to refer only to The Merry Wives of Windsor (Act v. Sc. 5), and to the song in As You Like It (Act iv. Sc. 2), commencing “What shall he have that kill’d the deer?”
Deer-stealing in Shakespeare’s day was regarded only as a youthful frolic. Antony Wood (“Athen. Oxon.” i. 371), speaking of Dr. John Thornborough, who was admitted a member of Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1570, at the age of eighteen, and who was successively Bishop of Limerick and Bishop of Bristol and Worcester, informs us, that he and his kinsman, Robert Pinkney, “seldom studied or gave themselves to their books, but spent their time in the fencing schools, and dancing schools, in stealing deer and conies, in hunting the hare and wooing girls.”
Shakespeare himself has been accused of this indiscretion. The story is first told in print by Rowe, in his “Life of Shakespeare”:—“He had, by a misfortune common enough to young fellows, fallen into ill company, and amongst them some that made a frequent practice of deer-stealing engaged him more than once in robbing a park that belonged to Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, near Stratford. For this he was prosecuted by that gentleman, as he thought somewhat too severely; and in order to revenge that ill-usage, he made a ballad upon him. And though this, probably the first essay of his poetry, be lost, yet it is said to have been so very bitter, that it redoubled the prosecution against him to that degree, that he was obliged to leave his business and family in Warwickshire, for some time, and shelter himself in London.”
Mr. Staunton, in his library edition of Shakespeare’s Plays, says: “What degree of authenticity the story possesses will never probably be known. Rowe derived his version of it no doubt through Betterton; but Davies makes no allusion to the source from which he drew his information, and we are left to grope our way, so far as this important incident is concerned, mainly by the light of collateral circumstances. These, it must be admitted, serve in some respects to confirm the tradition. Shakespeare certainly quitted Stratford-upon-Avon when a young man, and it could have been no ordinary impulse which drove him to leave wife, children, friends, and occupation, to take up his abode among strangers in a distant place.
“Then there is the pasquinade, and the unmistakable identification of Sir Thomas Lucy as Justice Shallow, in the Second Part of Henry IV., and in the opening scene of The Merry Wives of Windsor. The genuineness of the former may be doubted; but the ridicule in the Plays betokens a latent hostility to the Lucy family, which is unaccountable, except upon the supposition that the deerstealing foray is founded on facts.”
The more legitimate sport in killing deer was by means of blood-hounds, and in The Midsummer Night’s Dream we are furnished with an accurate description of the dogs in most repute:—
In the Comedy of Errors (Act iv. Sc. 2), Dromio of Syracuse alludes to “a hound that runs counter, and yet draws dry foot well,” and in the Taming of the Shrew we have the following animated dialogue:—
Many more such instances might be adduced, but the reader might perhaps be tempted to exclaim, with Timon of Athens:—
We will therefore only glance at that amusing scene in the Merry Wives of Windsor (Act v. Sc. 5), where Falstaff appears in Windsor Forest, disguised with a buck’s head on. “Divide me,” says he, “like a brib’d-buck, each a haunch: I will keep my sides to myself, my shoulders for the fellow of this walk, and my horns I bequeath your husbands.”
We have here an allusion to the ancient method of “breaking up” a deer.18 “The fellow of this walk” is the forester, to whom it was customary on such occasions to present a shoulder. Dame Juliana Berners, in her “Boke of St. Albans,” 1496, says,—
And in Turbervile’s “Book of Hunting,” 1575, the distribution of the various parts of a deer is minutely described.
The touching description of a wounded stag, in As You Like It, can scarcely escape notice. Alluding to “the melancholy Jaques,” one of the lords says,—
Although the deer, as the nobler animal, has received more attention from our poet than the fox and the hare, yet the two last-named are by no means forgotten:—
who, when he “hath once got in his nose,” will “soon find means to make the body follow” (Henry VI. Part III. Act iv. Sc. 7); and—
receives his share of notice, although it is not always in his praise, and “subtle as the fox” has become a proverb (Cymbeline, Act iii. Sc. 3).
From the “subtle fox” to the “timorous hare,” the transition is easy. What “more a coward than a hare”? (Twelfth Night, Act iii. Sc. 5.)
In Roxburgh and Aberdeen, as we learn from Jamieson’s “Scottish Dictionary,” a hare is termed “a bawd,” and the knowledge of this fact enables us to understand the dialogue in Romeo and Juliet, which would otherwise be unintelligible:—
That coursing was in vogue in Shakespeare’s day, and practised in the same way as at present, we may infer from such expressions as “a good hare-finder” (Much Ado, Act i. Sc. 1), “Holla me like a hare” (Coriolanus, Act i. Sc. 8), and “I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, straining upon the start” (Henry V. Act iii. Sc. 1).
Rabbits were taken, and no doubt poached, in the same way then as now; for we read of the coney19 “that you see dwell where she is kindled” (As You Like It, Act iii. Sc. 2) struggling “in the net.” (Henry VI. Part III. Act i. Sc. 4.)
The Brock20 or Badger (Twelfth Night, Act ii. Sc. 5); the Wild Cat who “sleeps by day” (Merch. of Venice, Act ii. Sc. 5, and Pericles, Act iii. Intro.); “the quarrelous Weasel” (Cymbeline, Act iii. Sc. 4, and Henry IV. Part I. Act ii. Sc. 3); “the Dormouse of little valour” (Twelfth Night, Act iii. Sc. 1); “the joiner Squirrel” (Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 4), whose habit of hoarding appears to have been well known to Shakespeare (Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act iv. Sc. 2); and “the blind Mole,” who “casts copp’d hills towards heaven” (Pericles, Act i. Sc. 1);21—all these are mentioned in their turn, while the Bat “with leathern wing,”22 “the venom Toad,” “the thorny Hedgehog,”23 “the Adder blue,” and the “spotted Snake with double tongue,” are all called in most aptly by way of simile or metaphor.
We cannot forget Titania’s directions to her fairies in regard to Bats:—
nor the comfortable seat which Ariel appears to have found “on the bat’s back” (Tempest, Act v. Sc. 1).
The following striking passage must also be familiar to readers of Shakespeare:—
In a printed broadside of the time of Queen Anne, in the collection of the Society of Antiquaries of London, is the following curious fable relating to the Bat:—
“615. The Birds and Beasts. A Fable.“Once the Birds and Beasts strove for the prerogative: the neuter Batt, seeing the Beasts prevail, goes to them and shows them her large forehead, long ears, and teeth: afterwards, when the Birds prevail’d, the Batt flies with the Birds, and sings chit, chit, chat, and shows them her wings.
“Hence Beakless Bird, hence Winged Beast, they cry’d;Hence plumeless wings; thus scorn her either side.“London. Printed for Edw. Lewis,
Flower-de-Luce Court, Fleet Street. 1710.”
In alluding to the “venom toad” as “mark’d by the destinies to be avoided,” Shakespeare probably only treated it as other writers had done before him, and, without any personal investigation of the matter, ranked it with the viper and other poisonous reptiles, when in fact it is perfectly harmless.
The habit which the snake has, in common with other reptiles, of periodically casting its skin or slough, is frequently alluded to in the Plays, where that covering is sometimes called “the enamell’d skin” (Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act ii. Sc. 1); at other times the “casted slough” (Henry V. Act iv. Sc. 1, and Twelfth Night, Act iii. Sc. 4); and the “shining checker’d slough” (Henry VI. Part II. Act iii. Sc. 1).
It is difficult to say why the Adder is supposed to be deaf, unless because it has no visible ears—but then the term would apply to other reptiles. Shakespeare has several times alluded to this. In the Second Part of King Henry VI. Act iii. Sc. 2, Queen Margaret asks the King,—
And in Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. Sc. 2, Hector says to Paris and Troilus,—
Again, in Sonnet CXII., “the adder’s sense” is referred to in such a way as to leave no doubt of the poet’s impression that adders do not hear.
The “eyeless venom’d worm” referred to in Timon of Athens, Act iv. Sc. 3, is of course the Slow-worm (Anguis fragilis).
The observant naturalist must doubtless have remarked the partiality evinced by snakes and other reptiles for basking in the sun. Shakespeare has noticed that—
And—
In Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 2, allusion is made to the wonderful vitality which snakes possess, and to the popular notion that they are enabled, when cut in two, to reunite the dissevered portions and recover:—
Passing to the insect world, we may well be astonished at the number of species to which Shakespeare has alluded. Although the same attention has not been given to the insects as to the birds, the following have, nevertheless, been noted. Many others, doubtless, have been overlooked.
The Beetle (Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 2; King Lear, Act iv. Sc. 6; Measure for Measure, Act iii. Sc. 1). The Grasshopper (Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 4). The Cricket, (Pericles, Act iii. Introduction; Winter’s Tale, Act ii. Sc. 1; Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 4; Cymbeline, Act ii. Sc. 2). The Glowworm (Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5); and the Caterpillar (Richard II. Act ii. Sc. 4; Henry VI. Part II. Act iii. Sc. 1; Twelfth Night, Act ii. Sc. 1; Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 1). The Butterfly (Troilus and Cressida, Act iii. Sc. 3; Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act iii. Sc. 1); and Moth (Merchant of Venice, Act ii. Sc. 9; King John, Act iv. Sc. 1). The House-fly (Titus Andronicus, Act iii. Sc. 2). The small Gilded-fly (King Lear, Act iv. Sc. 6). The Blow-fly (Love’s Labour’s Lost, Act v. Sc. 2; Tempest, Act iii. Sc. 1); and the Gad-fly, or Brize (Troilus and Cressida, Act i. Sc. 3). The Grey-coated Gnat (Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 4; Comedy of Errors, Act ii. Sc. 2); the Wasp (Taming of the Shrew, Act ii. Sc. 1; Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act i. Sc. 2; Henry VIII. Act iii. Sc. 2); the Drone (Henry V. Act i. Sc. 2); and the Honey-bee (numerous passages).
To three only of these shall we direct further attention: firstly, because a more extended notice of all would be beyond the limits of the present work; and, secondly, because the Entomology of Shakespeare has been already dealt with elsewhere.25
These three are the Bee, the Drone, and the Fly, and we select quotations in reference to these in order to illustrate Shakespeare’s knowledge of the subject on which he wrote; the lessons to be learnt from his allusions; and the sympathy which he has manifested for all living creatures.
What better picture of the interior of a hive can be found than the following? How well are the duties of the inmates described!
“The lazy yawning drone” is frequently alluded to as the type of idleness and inactivity (Pericles, Act ii. Sc. 1; Henry VI. Part II. Act iii. Sc. 2).
And we are counselled—
Who does not remember the scene in which Titus Andronicus reproves his brother Marcus for killing a fly at dinner?—
This is but one of the many lessons taught us by Shakespeare in his allusions to the animal world, and the kindly spirit which characterizes all his dealings with animals is frequently exemplified throughout the Plays; perhaps nowhere so clearly as in Measure for Measure, Act iii. Sc. 1, where we are told—
Probably enough has been said to show the reader that Shakespeare’s knowledge of natural history was by no means slight, and if it be thought to have been only general, it was, at all events, accurate. The use which he has made of this knowledge, throughout his works, in depicting virtue and vice in their true colours, in pointing out lessons of industry, patience, and mercy, and in showing the profit to be derived from a study of natural objects, is everywhere apparent.
The words of the banished Duke, in As You Like It (Act ii. Sc. 1), seem to no one so applicable as to Shakespeare himself. He—
But to come to the Ornithology. The accurate observations on this subject, the apt allusions, and the beautiful metaphors to be met with throughout the Plays, may be said to owe their origin mainly to three causes. Firstly, Shakespeare had a good practical knowledge of Falconry, a pastime which, being much in vogue in his day, brought under his notice, almost of necessity, many wild birds, exclusive of the various species which were hawked at and killed. Secondly, he was a great reader, and, possessing a good memory, was enabled subsequently to express in verse ideas which had been suggested by older authors. Thirdly, and most important of all, he was a genuine naturalist, and gathered a large amount of information from his own practical observations. In all his walks, he evidently did not fail to note even the most trivial facts in natural history, and these were treasured up in his memory, to be called forth as occasion required, to be aptly and eloquently introduced into his works.
Apart from the consideration that a poet may be expected, almost of necessity, to invoke the birds of song, Shakespeare has gone further, and displays a greater knowledge of ornithology, and a greater accuracy in his statements, than is generally the case with poets. How far we shall succeed in proving this assertion, it will be for the reader of the following pages to determine.