Facts and fancies for the curious from the harvest-fields of literature

by Unknown

PROTOTYPES

Shylock

The Ninety-fifth Declamation of “The Orator,” of Alexander Silvayn, treats “Of a Jew who would for his debt have a pound of the flesh of a Christian.” This is classed by J. Payne Collier among the romances, novels, poems, and histories used by Shakespeare as the foundation of his dramas. It first appeared in 1596. According to Gregorio Leti, the biographer of Pope Sixtus V, the question of Shylock’s Judaism had been anticipated by others. In the eleventh book of his history of the Pope, Leti tells the following story:

“In the year of 1587, ten years before the probable date of the production of Shakespeare’s play, a Roman merchant named Paul Maria Secchi, a good Catholic Christian, learned that Sir Francis Drake had conquered San Domingo. He imparts his news to a Jewish trader, Simson Ceneda, who either disbelieved it or had an interest in making it appear so. He obstinately contested the truth of the statement, and to emphasize his contradiction added that he would stake a pound weight of his flesh on the contrary. The Christian took him at his word, staking one thousand scudi against the pound of flesh, and the bet was attested by two witnesses. On the truth of Drake’s conquest being confirmed, the Christian demanded the fulfilment of the wager. In vain the Jew offered money instead of the stake he had agreed to. The Jew appealed to the governor, and the governor to the Pope, who sentenced them both to the galleys—a punishment they were allowed to make up for by a payment of two thousand scudi each to the Hospital of the Sixtine Bridge.” A more interesting fact connected with the “pound of flesh” is that the conception is found in different shapes in Hindoo mythology.

Figaro

The music of the opera of “Le Barbier de Seville” (Il Barbiere di Siviglia) is by Rossini, and the words are by Sterbini. The music of “Le Mariage di Figaro” (Le Nozze di Figaro) is by Mozart, and the libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte. But both operas are based on Beaumarchais’s satirical comedies, which had acquired popularity all over Europe.

The Malaprops

Theodore Hook’s series of “Ramsbottom Papers” were the precursors of all the Mrs. Malaprops, Tabitha Brambles, and Mrs. Partingtons of a later generation. Let Dorothea Julia Ramsbottom speak for herself, in a few sentences from her “Notes on England and France:”

“Having often heard travellers lamenting not having put down what they call the memorybilious of their journey, I was determined, while I was on my tower, to keep a dairy (so called from containing the cream of one’s information), and record everything which occurred to me.

“Resolving to take time by the firelock, we left Montague Place at 7 o’clock by Mr. Fulmer’s pocket thermometer, and proceeded over Westminster Bridge to explode the European continent. I never pass Whitehall without dropping a tear to the memory of Charles II., who was decimated after the rebellion of 1745, opposite the Horse Guards.

“We saw the inn where Alexander, the Autograph of all the Russias, lived when he was here; and, as we were going along, we met twenty or thirty dragons mounted on horses. The ensign who commanded them was a friend of Mr. Fulmer’s: he looked at Lavinia as if pleased with her tooting assembly. I heard Mr. Fulmer say he was a son of Marr’s. He spoke as if everybody knew his father: so I suppose he must be the son of the poor gentleman who was so barbarously murdered a few years ago near Ratcliffe Highway: if so he is uncommon genteel.

“Travellers like us, who are mere birds of prey, have no time to waste: so we went to-day to the great church which is called Naughty Dam, where we saw a priest doing something at an altar. Mr. Fulmer begged me to observe the knave of the church; but I thought it too hard to call the man names in his own country.”

The Pen and the Sword

Dr. Draper, in his “Intellectual Development of Europe,” says,—

“Within twenty-five years after the death of Mohammed, under Ali, the fourth Khalif, the patronage of learning had become a settled principle of the Mohammedan system. Some of the maxims current show how much literature was esteemed.”

“The ink of the doctor is equally valuable with the blood of the martyr.

“Paradise is as much for him who has rightly used the pen, as for him who has fallen by the sword.”

The Best Service

When General R. B. Hayes was nominated by the Republican party for the Presidency, he made use, in his letter of acceptance, of the expression, “He serves his party best who serves his country best.” A clue to this phrase, which was frequently repeated afterwards, will be found in Pope’s translation of the tenth book of Homer’s Iliad, where Nestor goes through the camp to wake up the captains, and arousing Diomed says,—

“Each single Greek, in his conclusive strife,

Stands on the sharpest edge of death or life.

Yet if my years thy kind regard engage,

Employ thy youth as I employ my age;

Succeed to these my cares, and rouse the rest;

He serves me most who serves his country best.”

The similarity of the last line to the celebrated expression used by President Hayes is striking. It is probable he was at some period of his life a close reader of the Iliad, and that this expression found a lodgement in his mind, to crop out in a slightly modified form after many years.

Mark Twain Accused of Plagiary

Mark Twain having dedicated a recent book of his “to Mr. Smith wherever he is found,” will, doubtless, be interested to learn that the gentleman in question is to be discovered in the current London Post Office Directory alone to the very considerable extent of sixteen and a half columns. But will Mr. Twain be surprised to hear that the notion of this Smith dedication of his is not a new one? Surely he must be aware that an earlier American humorist, Artemus Ward, prefaced one of his volumes with a similar inscription, and gave it additional point, too, by adding a sincere hope that every one of his “dedicatees” would purchase a copy of the book. So that, apparently, and not by any means for the first time, a stolen idea has been spoiled in the stealing.

The Bill of Fare

A German gastronomical publication gives the following account of the origin of the menu: At the meeting of Electors in Regensburg in the year 1489, Elector Henry of Braunschweig attracted general notice at a state dinner. He had a long paper before him to which he referred every time before he ordered a dish. The Earl of Montfort, who sat near him, asked him what he was reading. The Elector silently handed the paper to his interrogator. It contained a list of the viands prepared for the occasion, which the Elector had ordered the cook to write out for him. The idea of having such a list so pleased the illustrious assembly that they introduced it each in his own household, and since that time the fashion of having a menu has spread all over the civilized world.

Ancestry

On one occasion Mr. John Bright said, in the course of a speech, “The noble lord comes of a race distinguished, I am told, as having come over with the Conqueror. I never heard that any of them have since been distinguished for anything else.” This sentiment, though probably Mr. Bright knew it not, found epigrammatic expression in France more than a century ago, in a distich composed when A. Courtenay, in compliment to his birth, was elected a member of the Academy:

“Le Prince de Courtenay est de l’Académie,

Quel ouvrage a-t-il fait? Sa généalogie.”

The phrase, “I am my own ancestor,” is traced to Andoche Junot. When Junot, a soldier who had risen from the ranks, was created Duke of Abrantes, a French nobleman of the old régime sneeringly asked him what was his ancestry. Junot replied, “Ah, ma foi, je n’en sais rien; moi je suis mon ancêtre.” (Faith, I know nothing about it; I am my own ancestor.) The Emperor Tiberius, however, thus described Curtius Rufus: “He seems to be a man sprung from himself.” A similar reply is attributed to Napoleon, as he is said to have told his prospective father-in-law, the emperor of Austria, when the latter tried to trace the Bonaparte lineage to some petty prince: “Sire, I am my own Rudolph of Hapsburg.” (Rudolph was the founder of the Hapsburg family.)

Cinderella

The story of Cinderella is not the invention of some imaginative genius, but is founded on fact. According to Strabo, the story is as follows: One day a lady named Rhodopis was bathing in the Nile, and the wind carried one of her sandals and laid it at the feet of the king of Egypt, who was holding a court of justice in the open air not far away. His curiosity was excited by the singularity of the event and the elegance of the sandal, and he offered a reward for the discovery of the owner. Rhodopis claimed it, and it was found to fit her exactly. She was very beautiful, and the king married her. She lived two thousand years before the Christian era, and is remembered in history as the “Rosy-cheeked Queen” of Egypt.

Crossing the Bar

Did Tennyson find the suggestion for one of his latest poems, “Crossing the Bar,” in the letter written by the Rev. Donald Cargill in 1680 to a friend who was under sentence of death? Thus it runs: “Farewell, dearest friend, never to see one another any more, till at the right hand of Christ. Fear not, and the God of mercies grant a full gale and a fair entry into His kingdom, that may carry you sweetly and swiftly over the bar, that you find not the rub of death.”

Fourth Estate

Carlyle, in the fifth lecture on “Heroes and Hero Worship,” said, “Burke said there were three estates in Parliament, but in the reporters’ gallery yonder there sat a fourth estate more important far than they all.” This was in 1839 or 1840.

Ne Sutor Ultra Crepidam

John Randolph had had a discussion with a man named Sheffey, who was one of his colleagues, and who had been a shoemaker in early life. Sheffey had made a speech which excited Randolph’s jealousy, and Randolph, in replying to him, said that Sheffey was out of his sphere, and by way of illustration had told the story of the sculptor Phidias. “This sculptor,” said Randolph, “had made a noted figure, and having placed it on the sidewalk, he secured a hiding-place near by, where, unobserved, he might hear the criticisms of those who passed upon his statue. Among those who examined the marble was a shoemaker, and this man criticised the sandals and muttered over to himself as to where they were wrong. After he had gone away, Phidias came forth and examined the points that the shoemaker had objected to, and found that his criticism was correct. He removed the statue to his studio and remedied the defects. The next day Phidias again placed it upon the street and the shoemaker again stopped before it. He saw at once that the defects he had noticed had been remedied, and he now began to criticise very foolishly other points about the statue. Phidias listened to him for a time, and then came forth with a Latin phrase which means ‘Let the shoemaker stick to his last.’ And so,” concluded Randolph, “I say in regard to my colleague.”

Chestnut

The slang term “chestnut,” as applied to ancient jokes or moss-grown anecdotes, though credited to a Philadelphia actor, may be traced to a remote period. Ovid, in his “Art of Love,” says, “Let your boy take to your mistress grapes, or what Amaryllis so delighted in; but at the present time she is fond of chestnuts no longer.” This is plainly a reference to a line in the Second Eclogue, in which Virgil tells how chestnuts pleased Amaryllis. The idea obviously was that for weariness and satiety the chestnut had lost its allurement.

Milton’s Indebtedness

A reverend gentleman named Edmunson is endeavoring to rob the author of “Paradise Lost” of all the honor which belongs to originality of conception. He has published a work to prove that Milton was largely indebted in the composition of his great poem to various poems of a Dutch rhymester of the same period, one Joost Van den Vondel, and that Samson Agonistes was inspired by a drama by Vondel on the same subject.

An Expressive Phrase

Mr. Lincoln has often been credited with the expressive phrase, “Of the people, by the people, for the people.” It was not original with him, however; Theodore Parker first used it, and often used it during the last decade of his life. A lady who was long a member of Mr. Parker’s household, and who assisted him in his intellectual work, says that the idea did not spring at once to his mind in its perfect conciseness; he had expressed it again and again with gradually lessening diffuseness before he gave the address to the Anti-Slavery Society, May 13, 1854, where it appears thus: “Of all the people, by all the people, and for all the people,” as published in Additional Speeches, Vol. II., page 25. “But that,” she adds, “was not quite pointed enough for the weapon he needed to use so often in criticising the national action, to pierce and penetrate the mind of hearer and reader with the just idea of democracy, securing it there by much iteration; and I can distinctly recall his joyful look when he afterwards read it to me in his library, condensed into this gem: ‘Of the people, by the people, for the people.’”

Overstrained Politeness

Maunsell B. Field, in his “Memories,” relates that General Winfield Scott told him that during the last war with Great Britain (1812–14), before an action began between the two armies, it was customary for the respective commanders to ride forward, accompanied by their staffs, and formally salute each other. Each then returned to his own lines, and the battle opened.

This serves as a reminder of the old story of Fournier (L’Esprit dans l’histoire): “Lord Hay at the battle of Fontenoy, 1745, called out, ‘Gentlemen of the French Guard, fire first.’ To which the Comte d’Auteroches replied, ‘Sir, we never fire first; please to fire yourselves.’”

The Next to Godliness

The proverb “Cleanliness is next to godliness” first made its appearance in “Beraitha” as the last Mishna of Sota, chapter ix. Mishna (instruction) is a word applied by the Jews to the oral law, which is divided into six parts. The Jewish Talmud is a commentary on the Mishna. The references to that are: Talmud Jerus, Skakalim, chapter iii., page 6; Talmud babl. Ab. Sarah, page 20 b; Jalket, sh. Isaiah No. 263; and Alfassi ab; Sarah, ibid. loc. Here it reads as follows: “Phinehas ben Yair says, The doctrines of religion are resolved into (or are next to) carefulness; carefulness into vigorousness; vigorousness into guiltlessness; guiltlessness into abstemiousness; abstemiousness into cleanliness; cleanliness into godliness (equal to holiness),” etc., etc. No translation can render it exactly; it is literally “cleanliness next to (or akin to) godliness;” and this saying is older than the gospels.

Punchinello

The Punch and Judy idea is over two thousand years old. The Celestial Emperor Kao Tsu (206 B.C.) was shut up in the City of Peh-têng by an army of barbarous Huns. “With his Majesty was a statesman, Ch’ ên P’ing, who, happening to know that the wife of the besieging chieftain was a very jealous woman, devised a scheme. He caused the portrait of a very beautiful girl to be forwarded to her, with a message that if her husband would permit the emperor to go forth unharmed, the young lady should become his property. The chieftain’s wife never mentioned the portrait to her husband, but at once began to persuade him to raise the siege, which, in fact, he would have done forthwith had he not been privately informed of the picture and warned at the same time that the whole affair was simply a ruse. Thereupon he sent to say that it would be necessary for him first of all to have a glimpse of this beauty in the flesh; and later on he repaired by agreement to the foot of the city wall, where he beheld the young lady moving about and surrounded by a number of attendants. His suspicions being thus allayed, he gave orders to open a passage through his lines to the Emperor Kao Tsu and suite, who promptly made the best of their way out. At the same time the Hun chieftain entered the city and proceeded to the spot on the wall where the young lady was awaiting him, still surrounded by her handmaids; but on arriving there he found that the beauty and her attendants were simply a set of wooden puppets which had been dressed up for the occasion and were worked by a concealed arrangement of springs.

Workmen’s Strikes

Mrs. Oliphant, in “The Makers of Florence,” relates that in the course of the construction of the massive dome of the Duomo, of the many difficulties with which Brunelleschi had to contend, “the greatest was a strike of his workmen, of whom, however, there being no trades’ unions in those days, the imperious maestro made short work.”

The Standing Egg

The well-known trick of Columbus in making an egg stand on end during a dispute after his return from his first voyage was anticipated by Brunelleschi, the architect of the magnificent dome of the Duomo in Florence. During the heated controversy which preceded his selection over his competitors, “he proposed,” according to Vasari’s amusing account, “to all the masters, foreigners, and compatriots, that he who could make an egg stand upright on a piece of smooth marble should be appointed to build the cupola, since in doing that his genius would be made manifest. They took an egg accordingly, and all those masters did their best to make it stand upright, but none discovered the method of doing so. Wherefore Filipo (Brunelleschi), being told that he might make it stand himself, took it daintily into his hand, gave the end of it a blow on the plane of the marble, and made it stand upright. Beholding this the artists loudly protested, exclaiming that they could all have done the same, but Filipo replied, laughingly, that they might also know how to construct the cupola if they had seen the model and design.”

This was in the year 1420, fifteen years before Columbus was born.

Setting up to Knock Down

The great English statesman, John Bright, once playfully suggested that the appointment of a certain gentleman to the Chief Secretaryship of Ireland was intended as a punishment to that country for some of its offences. What was thus said half in jest a sacred writer states here in all seriousness: “That such a prince as Zedekiah was raised to the throne was itself a token of divine displeasure, for his character was such as to hasten the final catastrophe,”—that which came to pass was “through the anger of the Lord.”

The Guilds of London

With regard to the origin of the London guilds there are two opposing parties, one of which holds that these organizations had their origin in certain mutual benefit associations of the Roman Empire, while the other insists on their spontaneous generation from the needs of Teutonic society in the Middle Ages. One thing is certain, without the culture of the Roman Empire there would have been no Teutonic nor Celtic nor Iberian civilization in modern Europe, and chivalry, knighthood, and the guild system, as well as every other step toward modern refinement, owe their existence in a near or remote degree to what preceded them, to the civic life that descended in unbroken continuity from Babylon to Treves. It would have been a remarkable thing if mediæval Europe had not retained a reminiscence more or less distinct of the well-drilled, well-mounted, well-armed, imperturbable Romans, the men “under authority,” scattered in villages and outposts, or collected in garrisons, and had not tried to create defenders of the same kind. Equally strange would it be if such organizations as the Collegia Opificum pervaded the urban life of the imperial dominions without leaving an impression on the people. The similarity of the guilds to their Roman prototypes is very remarkable. The objects of both were common worship, social intercourse, and mutual protection. It is confessed that modern historians have exaggerated the breach in continuity between the Roman and the barbarian world; it is even acknowledged that in one or two Gallic towns certain artisan corporations may have existed without interruption from the fifth to the twelfth century; and that Roman regulations may have served as models for the organization of serfs, skilled laborers on the lands of monks and nobles. But it must be pointed out on the other hand that until the twelfth century the demand for skilled labor in Europe was comparatively meagre and that the stream of ancient tradition was really growing weaker with every decade. What can be insisted on is simply a certain economy of intellectual effort, for the sake of a human animal, the mediæval Celt, Saxon, Norseman, Hun, etc., with whom intellect does not seem to have been a strong point. His invention may not have been put to the test in the matter of guilds. What he needed had happily survived his own clumsy race as well as the indifference of Romans and Provincials. Even in England one can ascend much beyond the twelfth century by the discovery of a rare notice now and then of a Knights’ Guild or a Frith Guild in Saxon London.

Rip Van Winkle

The classical scholar will regard Rip Van Winkle as a resuscitation of Epimenides, who lived in the Island of Crete six centuries before the Christian era. The story is, that going by his father’s order in search of a sheep, he laid himself down in a cave, where he fell asleep, and slept for fifty years. He then reappeared among the people, with long hair and a flowing beard. But while poor Rip, after his twenty years’ slumber, awoke to find himself the butt of his village, Epimenides had absorbed a wonderful degree of knowledge.

The German legend on which Washington Irving’s story is founded is given by Otmar in his “Volks-Sagen,” entitled “Der Ziegenhirt.” Peter Klaus, a goatherd of Sittendorf, is the hero of the tale, the scene of which is laid on the Kyffhäuser.

Menteith

Benedict Arnold, the traitor whose betrayal of trust and attempt to sacrifice his country will, through all time, be regarded as the highest height and the lowest depth of infamy, had a fitting prototype in Sir John Menteith, who betrayed the great defender of Scotch liberty, Sir William Wallace, into the hands of the English invaders, and, with the deliverance of his person, the surrender of the liberty of his country, leaving a name and memory loaded with disgrace. Sir Walter Scott, in his “Tales of a Grandfather,” says,—

“The King of England, Edward I., possessed so many means of raising soldiers, that he sent army after army into the poor, oppressed country of Scotland, and obliged all its nobles and great men, one after another, to submit themselves to his yoke. Sir William Wallace alone, or with a very small band of followers, refused either to acknowledge the usurper Edward, or to lay down his arms. He continued to maintain himself among the woods and mountains of his native country for no less than seven years after his defeat at Falkirk, and for more than one year after all the other defenders of Scottish liberty had laid down their arms. Many proclamations were sent out against him by the English, and a great reward was set upon his head; for Edward did not think he could have any secure possession of his usurped kingdom of Scotland while Wallace lived. At length he was taken prisoner, and shame it is to say, a Scotsman, called Sir John Menteith, was the person by whom he was seized and delivered to the English. It is generally said that he was made prisoner at Robroyston, near Glasgow, and the tradition of the country is that the signal for rushing upon him and taking him unawares, was that one of his pretended friends, who was to betray him, should turn a loaf which was placed on the table, with its bottom or flat side uppermost. And in after times it was reckoned ill-breeding to turn a loaf in that manner if there was a person named Menteith in company; since it was as much as to remind him that his namesake had betrayed Sir William Wallace, the champion of Scotland.

The Christmas-Tree

The Christmas-tree came in with the movements of the transition from the mediæval to the modern period. Previous to that epoch, the fir or spruce-tree, with its pendant decorations, its toys and baubles, its stars and crosses, its spangles and tinselry, its glittering emblems, and the wax candles lighting its branches were unknown. For a long time it found its highest expression in the tannenbaum of Germany, and German antiquaries claim that it was a relic of the Saturnalia, and was implanted in Teutonic soil by the conquering Legions of Drusus, about the commencement of the Christian era. The myth which connects it with St. Winfred goes forward to the eighth century. While the famous missionary was hewing down the sacred oak that had been the object of idolatrous worship, a tornado blasted it. But just behind it, unharmed by the whirlwind, stood a young fir tree pointing a green spire to the stars. Winfred turned to his followers, and said,—

“This little tree, a young child of the forest, shall be your holy-tree to-night. It is the wood of peace, for your houses are built of it. It is the sign of an endless life, for its leaves are always green. See how it points upward to heaven. Let this be called the tree of the Christ-child; gather about it, not in the wild woods, but in your own homes; there it will shelter no deeds of blood, but loving gifts and acts of kindness.”

It is noteworthy that the first description of a Christmas-tree in German literature is to be found in “The Nut-Cracker” of Hoffman, whose strange stories remind us of our own Edgar Poe. But whatsoever the German pedigree, the tree had a Roman prototype, as we learn from the Georgics of Virgil. It was customary to suspend from the branches of trees in the vineyards oscilla or sigilla, which were little figures, or faces, or heads of Bacchus, made of earthenware or marble (some of which are preserved in the British Museum), to be turned in every direction by the wind. Whichsoever way they looked when blown by the air currents, they were supposed to make the vines in that quarter fruitful. The oscilla were frequently given as toys to children. Virgil says of the Roman youth—to use Dryden’s translation,—

“In jolly hymns they praise the god of wine,

Whose earthen images adorn the pine,

And there are hung on high, in honor of the vine,” etc.

Antiquarians who are not satisfied to let the origin rest with this feature of the sixth and seventh days of the Saturnalia have undertaken to trace the tree to the ancient Egyptians, and also to the Buddhists.

Shallows and Deeps

“The shallows murmur while the deeps are dumb” seems to be an adaptation from Quintus Curtius Rufus: “Altissima quæque flumina minimo sono labuntur.” The line is to be found in “The Silent Lover,” usually attributed to Sir Walter Raleigh, sometimes entitled “Sir Walter Raleigh to Queen Elizabeth”:

“Passions are likened best to flouds and streames;

The shallow murmur, but the deepe are dumbe:

Soe, when affections yield discourse, it seemes

The bottome is but shallowe whence they come.

They that are riche in wordes, in wordes discover

That they are poore in that which makes a lover.”

The lines—

“Remember, aye the ocean deeps are mute,

The shallows roar.

Worth is the Ocean—Fame is but the bruit

Along the shore”—

are to be found in “Fame,” translated from Schiller, one of the Hymns of the Ages.

Platform

In Carlyle’s “Letters of Oliver Cromwell,” vol. iii, p. 89, is a passage in which Cromwell uses the word platform in the modern American sense of a creed, or theory, or declaration of principles. He charges Governor Dundas (Edinburgh Castle) and the Presbyterian ministers with “darkening and not beholding the glory of God’s wonderful dispensations in this series of His providences in England, Scotland, and Ireland, both now and formerly, through envy at instruments, and because the things did not work forth your platform, and the great God did not come down to your minds and thoughts.”