Illustrations of Shakspeare, and of Ancient Manners: / with Dissertations on the Clowns and Fools of Shakspeare; on a Collection of Popular Tales Entitled Gesta Romanorum; and on the English Morris dance.

by Francis Douce

ACT III.

Scene 1. Page 561.

York. Uncle, my brother mocks both you and me;
Because that I am little, like an ape,
He thinks that you should bear me on your shoulders.

Mr. M. Mason contends that this is simply an allusion to Richard's deformity, and is not inclined to admit the propriety of Dr. Johnson's supposition that York means to call his uncle a bear. From a quotation given by the former gentleman, it is clear that Shakspeare, when alluding to Richard's deformity, mentions his back; and it is therefore probable that he would have used the same term in the present instance, had he adverted to the duke's shape. For this reason Dr. Johnson's opinion seems preferable; yet something more might have been intended. The practice of keeping apes or domestic monkeys was formerly much more common than at present. Many old prints and paintings corroborate this observation,[17] and in some the monkey appears chained to a large globe or roller of wood, which, whilst it permitted the animal to shift his situation, prevented him from making his escape. It is almost unnecessary to add that the monkey, as the intimate companion of the domestic fool, would often get upon his shoulders. There is a fine picture, by Holbein, of Henry the Eighth and some of his family, which by favour of his majesty now decorates the meeting room of the Society of Antiquaries. In it is an admirable portrait of Will Somers, the king's fool, with a monkey clinging to his neck, and apparently occupied in rendering his friend William a very essential piece of service, wherein this animal is remarkably dexterous, the fool reclining his head in a manner that indicates his sense of the obligation. York may therefore mean to call his uncle a fool, and this, after all, may be the scorn that Buckingham afterwards refers to.

Every one is acquainted with the propensity of the monkey to climbing upon other animals. Gervase Markham in his Cavalerice, a treatise on horsemanship, already referred to, devotes a chapter to inform his readers "how a horse may be taught to doe any tricke done by Bankes his curtall," in which he says, "I will shew you by the example of two or three trickes, how you shall make your horse to doe any other action as well as any dog or ape whatsoever, except it be leaping upon your shoulders." The curious reader may find more illustration of the subject in the specimen of Dr. Boucher's Supplement to Johnson's dictionary, article ape; but the learned and ingenious author was certainly mistaken in supposing that fools carried the representations of apes on their shoulders, and probably in what he says concerning the origin of the phrase of putting an ape in a man's hood.