READINGS IN SHAKSPEARE, NO. I.
"In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,
The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets;
As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood,
Disasters in the sun; and the moist star,
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands,
Was pale almost to dooms-day with eclipse."
Hamlet, Act I. Sc. 1.
Such is the present state of the text; and notwithstanding its evident corruption, it has been judiciously preferred by modern editors to the various emendations and additions which, even to the manufacture of a complete line alleged to be deficient, had been unscrupulously made in it.
But the slight change I now wish to propose, in the substance of one word, and in the received sense of another, carries such entire conviction to my own mind of accordance with the genuine intention of Shakspeare, that I may perhaps be pardoned if I speak of it with less hesitation than generally ought to accompany such suggestions, particularly as I do not arrogate to myself its sole merit, but freely relinquish to Malone so much of it as is his due.
With Malone however the suggestion, such as it was, appears to have been but a random guess, abandoned as soon as formed, and avowedly prompted by very different considerations from those that have actuated me. That he should have been on the very brink, as it were, of the true reading, and yet fail to discover it, is only to be accounted for by his subjection to that besetting sin of the day which denied to Shakspeare all philological knowledge except what he might derive through his own language.
In order to give Malone strict justice, I shall transcribe his suggestion, together with the comment by which Steevens appears to have stifled it in the birth:—
"The disagreeable recurrence of the word stars in the second line induces me to believe that As stars, in that which precedes, is a corruption. Perhaps Shakspeare wrote:—
Astres with trains of fire—
——and dews of blood
Disasterous dimm'd the sun.
The word astre is used in an old collection of poems entitled Diana, addressed to the Earl of Oxenforde, a book of which I know not the date, but believe it was printed about 1580. In Othello we have antres, a word of exactly a similar formation."—Malone.
"The word astre (which is nowhere else to be found) was affectedly taken from the French by John Southern, author of the poems cited by Mr. Malone. This wretched plagiarist stands indebted both for his verbiage and his imagery to Ronsard."—Steevens.
Hence, according to Malone's own account, the consideration by which he was led to the suggestion of "astres" was "the disagreeable recurrence of stars in the second line."
He did not perceive the analogy between aster and disaster, which renders a verbal antithesis of these two words so extremely probable with Shakspeare!—he did not apparently think of "asters" at all, although that word is so close to the text that it may be almost said to be identical with it; and, notwithstanding that "aster" had been so long familiarised in every English garden as to be literally under his nose, he must search out "astre" in obscure and contemptible ballads, in order that Shakspeare might be sanctioned in the use of it.
But it is absolutely incredible that any person to whom astre suggested itself should not also be reminded of aster. The conclusion therefore is almost unavoidable, that Malone and Steevens considered the latter word as too learned for poor Shakspeare's small acquirements. They would not trust him, even for a synonyme to star, unless under the patronage of John Southern!
At least such was the spirit in which too many of the commentators of that day presumed to treat Shakspeare,—him to whom, if to any mortal, his own beautiful language is applicable—
"How noble in reason! how infinite in faculty!
In apprehension how like a god!"
Let us be thankful we have fallen to better times.
It is only by the occurrence of such difficulties as the present, which, after remaining so long obscure, are at last only resolvable by presupposing in Shakspeare a depth of knowledge far exceeding that of his triflers, that his wonderful and almost mysterious attainments are beginning to be appreciated.
In the present case he must not only have known that the fundamental meaning of aster is a spot of light,[1] but he must also have taken into consideration the power of dis in producing an absolute reversal in the meaning of the word to which it may be prefixed. Thus, service is a benefit, disservice is an injury, while unservice (did such a word exist) would be a negative mean between the two extremes. Similarly, if aster signify a spot of light, a name singularly appropriate to a comet, disaster[2] must, by reversal, be a spot of darkness, and "disasters in the sun" no other than what we should call spots or maculæ upon his disk.
[1] Ἀστὴρ, ab ἄω, luceo.
[2] Ἀνάστερος, obscurus.
Can there remain a doubt, therefore, that Shakspeare intended the passage to read as follows, which, requiring neither addition nor alteration of the text as transmitted to us—saving one slight change of "as stars" into "asters,"—must be perfectly intelligible to every reader, especially if accompanied by the simple note of explanation which I subjoin to it:—
"In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,
The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets
Asters with trains of fire and dews of blood,
Disasters in the sun,[3] and the moist star
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands,
Was sick almost to dooms-day with eclipse."
[3] Spots or blotches.
A. E. B.
Leeds.