meat and drink o' the table: my clothes were never worn out, but next morning a tailor brought me a new suit: and without question it will be so ever. Use makes perfectness: if all should fail, it is but a little straining myself extraordinary and laugh myself to death." Looking at the comic aspect of Beaumont's work, the first thing that occurs to us is the phrase which Dryden used of Fletcher, "a limb of Shakspere." But if the name has aptness in connection with some elements of Beaumont, it is hardly appropriate to Fletcher at all. With Jonson, though in an entirely different way, Fletcher stands more apart from Shakespeare than does any other of the great dramatists. His constant exaggeration in plot, in character, in thought, his redundancy of expression, his avoidance of prose even in the lowest comedy all these qualities are un-Shakespearean. And there is a still deeper difference, which Dryden perfectly expressed in one of the most searching touches of his searching criticism: "The scholar had the softer soul, but the master had the kinder." Fletcher was brilliant, spirited, vigorous always. He was quick to feel and to perceive and over-ready to express. But he rarely went below the surface. He had little power of thought, little depth of emotion. To this essential superficiality we may trace all of his very marked and undeniable defects. In plot-making he was unwilling to go to the bottom of a subject and work it out seriously. He preferred to rush off a hasty sketch and get his effects by heightened situations and sparkling dialogues, turning tragedy into melodrama and comedy into farce. In his earlier days Beaumont corrected this tendency, and Massinger in later. But it is curious to note that in a number of plays written with Massinger, Fletcher leaves to his younger associate the responsibility of opening the action and again of closing it; as if Massinger worked out the plot and began the development, then Fletcher became interested, caught the thread, hurried it along be yond the climax, then lost his enthusiasm and left the conclusion to be elaborated by the original designer. Again, Fletcher's lack of depth shows in the material and physical aspect under which he views everything. All critics since Coleridge have insisted on this peculiarity of Fletcher's heroines, in particular; their virtue is a mechanical property, not a spiritual grace. And the same thing is true when we go back of the heroines to Fletcher himself. It is the outside of goodness, its conventional value, its utilitarian advantage, that especially appeal to him. His sympathy with the inner loveliness of noble character is vague and insufficient. This accounts not only for his general grossness of language, but for the almost insufferable æsthetic as well as moral impropriety which makes him defile the fairest people and things by impure association. His play of The Faithful Shepherdess is perhaps the most striking example of this. In it he seeks to present an ideal example of pure and devoted love, and to that end he employs all the most varied and exquisite means of poetical expression; but he fails because he has not sufficient depth of nature to justify the beauty of virtue by itself and therefore tries to enhance it by contrast with the foulest and most deformed shapes of ugliness. Milton's Comus, which owes so much to Fletcher's play, excels it far more in purity and dignity of moral conception than in mere poetry. One trifling yet significant mark of the physical element in Fletcher is his singular fondness for the undignified practice of kicking. I do not think Shakespeare's gentlemen ever resort to this, certainly not often. They refrain from it, not so much from regard to others as from respect to themselves. Fletcher's heroes are always kicking their antagonists and dependents about the stage. Nay, even the finer temper of Beaumont becomes infected, and in The Maid's Tragedy the delicate Aspatia, disguised as a boy, wishing to provoke her lover to fight with her that she may die by his hand - kicks him. Shades of Imogen and Viola! But Fletcher's lack of profound grasp of human life shows most in his treatmentor ill-treatment of character. Here again, as in his plots, he makes up for sober, profound study, by exaggerated emphasis and an extravagance often approaching caricature. This is much less marked, at any rate less offensive, in comic than in serious personages; yet even in comedy Fletcher cannot get the rich, delicate humor of Beaumont and Shakespeare. A curious instance of this is Bessus, who was doubtless created by Beaumont and through the earlier portion of the play speaks prose and is a thoroughly Beaumontesque and Shakespearean figure. Then Fletcher takes him, puts dancing verses into his mouth, and he becomes a member of a different conic family altogether. With tragic characters this fault of exaggeration grows almost unendurable. Fletcher's heroes all brag; not so much as Dryden's, to be sure, but too much for heroism. The noble Caratach, the generous Accius, not only show their generosity and nobility, but repeatedly call our attention to them. With the women it is the same. They all lack dignity. The sweetest of them, like Ordella and Juliana, tend to become abject in their submission. Those of an opposite type are so very opposite! The Brunhalts are not only monsters, but vulgar monsters, and talk like fishwives. Worse still, spirits of the noblest strain, like Edith and Bonduca, suddenly break out into the same fishwifery, and rail with an excess of epithet that is as repulsive as it is picturesque. We have noted the change in Bessus, as he passes from Beaumont's hands to those of his partner. The same thing takes place even more strikingly with Evadne in The Maid's Tragedy. During the first part of the action, Beaumont depicts her with real tragic restraint. But as soon as Fletcher takes a hand, she tends at once to deteriorate, to become fiendish in her revenge and groveling in her repentance, in short, to show the true Fletcherian lack of dignity. Yet we must not let these defects of characterization lead us to Darley's and Oliphant's conclusion that Fletcher's creations are without power and without charm. After all, he was an Elizabethan. which means that he thronged his scenes with human faces, often ugly, often caricatured, but alive, studied, and reproduced for the pure love of them; and so his work is infinitely more interesting than, for instance, the drama of Calderon, with its perpetual repetition of the same primitive types, its fantastic cavaliers, veiled ladies, and silly graciosos. In the Spanish, even in the French drama, the logical necessity of the dramatic movement makes the characters seem to live not for themselves, but for the action. In Shakespeare and in all the Elizabethans, high and low, the characters live for their own pleasure and walk in and out of the story with a lovely indifference, letting it adapt itself to their individuality, as best it can. If we want to get on with Fletcher, we must let him have his way. His most characteristic work is that in which a grain of exaggeration is permissible: romance, which oversteps the boundaries of humdrum reality, or rollicking farce crammed full of lyrical grace and charm. The very titles of his romantic plays carry their atmosphere with them, as do Calderon's: The Pilgrim, The Island Princess, The Sea Voyage, The Beggar's Bush, Love's Pilgrimage, The Maid in the Mill. The Pilgrim, especially, perhaps comes nearest to the outdoor plays of Shakespeare, with its woodland scenes, its gay and sprightly heroine and her waiting-maid, its quick interchange of tenderness and laughter. Even better are the comedies, Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, Monsieur Thomas, The Wild Goose Chase, The Chances. "A whiffling vagary" Darley called the latter, with all the scorn of a serious-minded person. But one should love "whiffling vagaries," that is to say, trifles of human passion beaten up into light foam by the wind of fancy. Such are the delicious comedies of Meilhac and Halévy, between which and Fletcher's there is a good deal of kinship. Only the great attraction of La Petite Marquise and Fanny Fear is best indicated in the remark of Frondeville to Fanny herself: "The charm of your conversation lies not only in what you say, but still more and above all in what you don't say." Now there is nothing that Fletcher does not say. In these merry Fletcherian farces everything is gay, sparkling, full of life, movement, and theatrical effectiveness. "A pipe and a comedy of Fletcher's the last thing of a night is the best recipe for light dreams and to scatter away Nightmares," says Lamb. And Coleridge: "I could read The Beggar's Bush from morning to night. How sylvan and sunshiny it is!" The characters flash and sputter about like so many fireworks set off all at once. Everywhere there is the light tinkle of fresh young voices, the careless glee of fresh young faces. I have said hard things of Fletcher's women and they deserve it; yet his comedies abound with jolly girls whose piquancy more than outweighs their occasional disregard of the lesser proprieties. The greater they rarely fail to respect. Mr. Saintsbury says of them very justly, "For portraits of pleasant English girls, not too squeamish, not at all afraid of lovemaking, quite convinced of the hackneyed assertion of the mythologists that jests and jokes go in the train of Venus, but true-hearted, affectionate, and of a sound, if not a very nice morality, commend me to Fletcher's Dorotheas and Marys and Celias." Of Fletcher's young men much the same is to be said, mutatis mutandis, as of his young women. Dr. Johnson had "heard that Steele practised the lighter vices." So do the young gentlemen of Fletcher, and with such zeal that it is sometimes difficult to distinguish their practices from the heavier sins. Yet one would fain believe that they are all somewhat after the model of Hylas in Monsieur Thomas, of a monstrous dissipation in words, but with deeds not quite in "a concatenation accordingly." At any rate, if one disregards their loveaffairs, there is much to be said for them. They are keen of wit, ready of sword, quick in sense of honor, loyal in friendship, apt to remember a kindness, generous, and not incapable of sacrifice. A very little acquaintance with the skeptical, cynical, selfish gallants of Dryden, Congreve, and Wycherley makes one ready to find Fletcher's Don Johns, and Pineros and Rutilios a harmless and even a lovable generation. Many critics have found fault with Dryden for his remark that Beaumont and Fletcher “understood and imitated the conversation of gentlemen much better" than did Shakespeare. But there is some truth in it. Shakespeare's young men are proud of their wit and too often seem to be thinking about their own smartness. Fletcher's heroes think about pretty girls, about their tailors' bills, the last run of the dice, or the newest fashion in doublets; and when they discuss these things they are smart. Even in the essentials of gentlemanliness perhaps Shakespeare is not so much superior as is sometimes thought, and the ugly passages of Fletcher are well paralleled by Lysander and Demetrius, by Claudio in Much Ado About Nothing and Claudio in Measure for Measure and Bertram in All's Well That Ends Well. Indeed, high authorities have attributed to Fletcher a peculiar perception and appreciation of the gentlemanly character. Professor Ward says, "I have been much struck by the passages in his works where he recurs to a conception which undoubtedly had a very vital significance for him that of a gentleman. See, above all, the fine passage in The Nice Valor:— I cannot make you gentlemen; that's a work Raised from your own deservings: merit, man -- ners, And in-born virtue does it; let your own good ness Make you so great, my power shall make you greater. Lysander in The Lover's Progress is a really fine gentleman every inch of him." And our own Emerson, who surely knew, tells us that "in the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher there is a constant recognition of gentility." Fletcher's style is absolutely characteristic of the man and has all his defects and excellences. It fails in tragedy, and generally in passages of serious reflection; it is too jaunty, too flippant, too highlycolored. Wolsey's farewell speech in King Henry VIII represents probably the best that Fletcher could do in this kind, and effective as it is, it is far enough from the enormous grandeur of Macbeth or Lear. Fletcher uses two words where Shakespeare would use one, he lavishes adjectives and particles, his old men and young women and clowns and heroes are all garrulous alike. He has tricks of style, too, pet tricks that he indulges in on all occasions. For instance, he loves a ringing repetition of words: She is fair and young and wealthy, They are cozening mad, they are brawling mad, they are proud mad; They are all, all mad. I come from a world of mad women, Mad as March hares: get 'em in chains, then deal with 'em. There's one that's mad; she seems well, but she is dog-mad. Is she dead, dost think? And certainly no English or other poet ever had a greater fancy for alliteration or got more cunning or more preposterous effects from it. See how it haunts the noble reply of Ordella to Thierry when he the terror of her fate and declares urges it to be full of fearful shadows: So is sleep, sir, Or anything that's merely ours and mortal; We were begotten gods else. But those fears, Feeling but once the fires of nobler thoughts, Fly, like the shapes of clouds we form, to nothing. But all these whims and dainty devices, unworthy of the serious dignity of high tragedy, are immensely effective in comedy; and of easy, vivid, brilliant comic dialogue Fletcher is certainly a master. In this, as in everything, his work is peculiarly adapted to immediate presentation before an audience. Critics have sought out many explanations of the fact that Fletcher's plays were so much more frequently acted during the seventeenth century than Shakespeare's. But this is the most obvious reason: that Fletcher always expresses himself with limpid clearness and intelligibility. His language, in the French phrase, gets over the footlights, instantly explains and emphasizes itself. It is difficult to imagine any average audience in any age following with pleasure the elaborate thought and compact expression of Shakespeare's Ulysses. But a child can catch, without effort, the easy, flowing rhetoric which Fletcher gives to wise men and fools alike. It is rare that our author is even so subtle as in the beautiful line which Coleridge called one of the finest in the language:- You are old and dim, sir, And the shadow of the earth eclipsed your judgment. Usually his figures, his descriptions, his narrative, his dialogues of passion and of reflection, all run on with the golden, sparkling clearness of a sunlit brook. One charming passage from the Elder Brother may serve to illustrate most of the points which we have been considering: I have forgot to eat and sleep with reading, And all my faculties turn into study: 'Tis meat and sleep. What need I outward garments, When I can clothe myself with understanding? The stars and glorious planets have no tailors, Yet ever new they are and shine like courtiers. The seasons of the year find no fond parents, Yet some are armed in silver ice that glisters, And some in gaudy green come in like masquers; The silk-worm spins her own suit and her lodging And has no aid nor partner in her labours. Why should we care for anything but knowledge Or look upon the world but to contemn it? Our study of Fletcher's style would not be complete without some comment on his verse, which is even more thoroughly characteristic than his diction. In verse, as in diction, Fletcher has a manner. An author has a style when he rules his expression and has it thoroughly under control. He has a manner when his expression rules him, and forces his thought into a fixed mould, no matter what its subject. Carlyle and Browning have a manner. Shakespeare is the most glorious example of the absolute possession of a style. Now Fletcher found out a few inventions in rhythm in his younger days and they pleased him so greatly that he clung to them till his death, in season and out of season, for every subject and every character. Without insisting on technicalities too much, it is sufficient to say that the chief of these inventions was that of ending two thirds of the lines with an extra, unaccented syllable. In the above-quoted passage every line thus ends. This practice is common enough in the Continental languages, but Shakespeare and Milton use it very soberly. In serious writing it is apt to tend to monotony, as, for instance, in the sing-song blank verse of Schiller. And in Fletcher's tragedies it is simply one more added to his long list of defects, as will be seen by comparing the Wolsey speech with any Shakespearean passage in the same play. But, here again, when we come to Fletcher's comedies, the result is altogether different. In writing easy, natural dialogue, he combines the above-mentioned peculiarity with others which go far to relieve its monotony, shakes out the folds of his lines, as it were, adds extra syllables internally, throws the pauses in unexpected places, above all adapts rhythm to sense and emphasis in the most wonderfully varied and telling manner. Just how far Fletcher was original in seeking these effects and how much he owed to Plautus and Aristophanes it would be difficult to say. Coleridge clearly recognized the Plautian affinity. Critics since his day have surprisingly neglected it. But it is certain that no dramatist of modern times has come anywhere near producing the comic effects of the Roman poet as Fletcher produces them. Shakespeare, when he wrote comic dialogue, turned to prose. So did most of his contemporaries. And the stiff Alexandrines of Molière are about as un-Plautian as can well be imagined. It was a verse-quality like Fletcher's that Goethe referred to when he said, in connection with Byron's Don Juan, that English poetry has developed a comic medium which we Germans are entirely without." And, though Byron probably knew nothing of Fletcher and got his octave entirely from the Italians, the swift flight of the Byronic stanza has something very Fletcherian about it. As for the bass, the beast could only bellow. But the free movement of comic blank verse gives an opening for such things which no stanza could possibly afford, and Fletcher used that opening to the full. His verse dances, sparkles, quivers. It leaps like a serpent and lashes like a whip. Of course, his careless temper pushes everything to excess, and to crowd seventeen syllables into one ten-syllabled line is an excess undoubtedly. Do they think/to car/ry it away/with a great band/made of bird-/pots ? Yet even this monstrosity, read as I have marked it, rather enhances than trammels the contemptuous bearing of the thought; and it is just here that Fletcher's cunning and his greatness lie, in his extraordinary faculty of emphasizing sense by sound. His lines speak themselves, they fling themselves right |