XVIII.
TENNYSON'S COMEDY OF THE FORESTERS.
"Besides, the King's name is a tower of strength." Thousands of people all over the world honour, and ought to honour, every word that falls from the pen of Alfred Tennyson. He is a very great man. No poet since the best time of Byron has written the English language so well—that is to say, with such affluent splendour of imagination; such passionate vigour; such nobility of thought; such tenderness of pathos; such pervasive grace, and so much of that distinctive variety, flexibility, and copious and felicitous amplitude which are the characteristics of an original style. No poet of the last fifty years has done so much to stimulate endurance in the human soul and to clarify spiritual vision in the human mind. It does not signify that now, at more than fourscore, his hand sometimes trembles a little on the harp-strings, and his touch falters, and his music dies away. It is still the same harp and the same hand. This fanciful, kindly, visionary, drifting, and altogether romantic comedy of Robin Hood is not to be tried by the standard that is author reared when he wrote Ulysses and Tithonus and The Passing of Arthur—that imperial, unapproachable standard that no other poet has satisfied.
"Cold upon the dead volcano sleeps the gleam of dying day."
But though the passion be subdued and the splendour faded, the deep current of feeling flows on and the strong and tender voice can still touch the heart and charm the ear. That tide of emotion and that tone of melody blend in this play and make it beautiful. The passion is no longer that of Enone and Lucretius and Guinevere and Locksley Hall and Maud and The Vision of Sin. The thought is no longer that of In Memoriam, with its solemn majesty and infinite pathos. The music is no longer that of The May Queen and the Talking Oak and Idle Tears. But why should these be expected? He who struck those notes strikes now another; and as we listen our wonder grows, and cannot help but grow, that a bard of fourscore and upward should write in such absolute sympathy with youth, love, hope, happiness, and all that is free and wandering and martial and active in the vicissitudes of adventure, the exploits of chivalry, and the vagabondish spirit of gypsy frolic. The fact that he does write in that mood points to the one illuminative truth now essential to be remembered. The voice to which we are privileged to listen, perhaps for the last time, is the voice of a great poet—by which is meant a poet who is able, not through the medium of intellect but through the medium of emotion, to make the total experience of mankind his own experience, and to express it not only in the form of art but with the fire of nature. The element of power, in all the expressions of such a mind, will fluctuate; but every one of its expressions will be sincere and in a greater or less degree will be vital with a universal and permanent significance. That virtue is in Alfred Tennyson's comedy of Robin Hood, and that virtue will insure for it an abiding endurance in affectionate public esteem.
The realm into which this play allures its auditor is the realm of Ivanhoe—the far-off, romantic region of Sherwood forest, in the ancient days of stout king Richard the First. The poet has gone to the old legends of Robin Hood and to the ballads that have been made upon them, and out of those materials—using them freely, according to his fancy—he has chosen his scene and his characters and has made his story. It is not the England of the mine and the workshop that he represents, and neither is it the England of the trim villa and the formal landscape; it is the England of the feudal times—of gray castle towers, and armoured knights, and fat priests, and wandering minstrels, and crusades and tournaments; England in rush-strewn bowers and under green boughs; the England in which Wamba jested and Blondel sung. To enter into that realm is to leave the barren world of prose; to feel again the cool, sweet winds of summer upon the brow of youth; to catch, in fitful glimpses, the shimmer of the Lincoln green in the sunlit, golden glades of the forest, and to hear the merry note of the huntsman commingled, far away, with "horns of Elfland faintly blowing." The appeal is made to the primitive, elemental, poetical instinct of mankind; and no detail of realism is obtruded, no question of probability considered, no agony of the sin-tortured spirit subjected to analysis, no controversy promoted and no moral lesson enforced. For once the public is favoured with a serious poetical play, which aims simply to diffuse happiness by arousing sympathy with pleasurable scenes and picturesque persons, with virtue that is piquant and humour that is refined, with the cheerful fortitude that takes adversity with a smile, and with that final fortunate triumph of good over evil which is neither ensanguined with gore nor saddened with tears, nor made acrid with bitterness. The play is pastoral comedy, written partly in blank verse and partly in prose, and cast almost wholly out of doors—in the open air and under the greenwood tree—and, in order to stamp its character beyond doubt or question, one scene of it is frankly devoted to a convocation of fairies around Titania, their queen.
The impulse that underlies this piece is the old, incessant, undying aspiration, that men and women of the best order feel, for some avenue of escape, some relief, some refuge, from the sickening tyranny of convention and the commonplace, and from the overwhelming mystery with which all human life is haunted and oppressed. A man who walks about in a forest is not necessarily free. He may be as great a slave as anybody. But the exalted imagination dwells upon his way of life as emancipated, breezy, natural, and right. That way, to the tired thinker, lie peace and joy. There, if anywhere—as he fancies—he might escape from all the wrongs of the world, all the problems of society, all the dull business of recording, and analysing, and ticketing mankind, all the clash of selfish systems that people call history, and all the babble that they call literature. In that retreat he would feel the rain upon his face, and smell the grass and the flowers, and hear the sighing and whispering of the wind in the green boughs; and there would be no need to trouble himself any more, whether about the past or the future. Every great intellect of the world has felt that wild longing, and has recorded it—the impulse to revert to the vast heart of Nature, that knows no doubt, and harbours no fear, and keeps no regret, and feels no sorrow, and troubles itself not at all. Matthew Arnold dreamily and perhaps austerely expressed it in The Scholar Gypsy. Byron more humanly uttered it in four well-remembered lines, of Childe Harold:
"Oh, that the desert were my dwelling-place,
With one fair spirit for my minister,
That I might all forget the human race,
And, hating nothing, love but only her."
Robin Hood, as technical drama, is frail. Its movement, indeed, is not more indolent than that of its lovely prototypes in Shakespeare, As You Like It and A Midsummer Night's Dream. With all the pastorals Time ambles. But, on the other hand, Tennyson's piece is not a match for either of those Shakespearean works, in massiveness of dramatic signification or in the element of opportunity for the art of acting. Character, poetry, philosophy, humour, and suggestion it contains; but it contains no single scene in which its persons can amply put forth their full histrionic powers with essentially positive dramatic effect. Its charm resides more in being than in doing, and therefore it is more a poem than a play, and perhaps more a picture than a poem. It is not one of those works that arouse, agitate, and impel. It aims only to create and sustain a pleased condition; and that aim it has accomplished. No spectator will be deeply moved by it, but no spectator will look at it without delight. While, however, Robin Hood as a drama is frail, it is not destitute of the dramatic element. It depicts a central character in action, and it tells a representative love story—a story in which the oppressive persecutor of impoverished age is foiled and discomfited, in which faithful affection survives the test of trial, and in which days of danger end at last in days of blissful peace. Traces of the influence of Shakespeare—exerted by his pastoral comedies and by the Merry Wives of Windsor—are obvious in it. There is no imitation; there is only kinship. The sources that Scott explored for some of the material used in Ivanhoe also announce themselves. Many stories could be derived from the old Robin Hood ballads. The poet has only chosen and rearranged such of their incidents as would suit his purpose—using those old ballads with perfect freedom, but also using them with faultless taste.
Robin Hood was born at Locksley, in the county of Nottingham, about 1160, when Henry the Second was king. His true name was Robert Fitzooth—a name that popular mispronunciation converted into Robin Hood—and he was of noble lineage. Old records declare him to have been the Earl of Huntingdon. He was extravagant and adventurous, and for reasons that are unknown he preferred to live in the woods. His haunts were chiefly Sherwood Forest, in Nottinghamshire, and Barnsdale, in Yorkshire. Among his associates were William Scadlock, commonly called Scarlet; Much, a miller's son; Friar Tuck, a vagabond monk; and Little John, whose name was Nailor. Robin Hood and his band were kind to the poor; but they robbed the rich and they were specially hard on the clergy. There is a tradition that a woman named Maid Marian went with Robin into the forest, but nothing is known about her. Robin lived till the age of eighty-seven, and he might have lived longer but that a treacherous relative, the prioress of Kirkley—to whose care he had entrusted himself in order that he might be bled—allowed him to bleed to death. At the time indicated in Tennyson's comedy—the year 1194, which was the year of King Richard's return from captivity in Germany—he was thirty-four years old. It is the year of Ivanhoe, and in the play as in the novel, the evil agent is the usurper Prince John.
Fifteen characters take part in this comedy. Act first is called "The Bond and the Outlawry." The action begins in a garden before Sir Richard Lea's castle—or rather the dialogue begins there, by which the basis of the action is revealed. Maid Marian is Marian Lea, the daughter of Sir Richard. Walter Lea, the son of Sir Richard, has been captured by the Moors, and in order to pay the boy's ransom Sir Richard has borrowed a large sum of money from the Abbot of York. That debt must presently be paid; but Sir Richard does not see his way clear to its payment, and if he does not pay it he must forfeit his land. The Sheriff of Nottingham, a wealthy suitor for the hand of Marian, is willing to pay that debt, in case the girl will favour his suit. But Marian loves the Earl of Huntingdon and is by him beloved; and all would go well with those lovers, and with Sir Richard, but that the Earl of Huntingdon is poor. Poor though he be, however, he makes a feast, to celebrate his birthday, and to that festival Sir Richard and his daughter are bidden. Act first displays the joyous proceedings of that good meeting and the posture of those characters toward each other. The Sheriff of Nottingham intrudes himself upon the scene, accompanied by Prince John, who is disguised as a friar. The Prince has cast a covetous eye upon Marian, and, although he outwardly favours the wish of the Sheriff, he is secretly determined to seize her for himself. The revellers at Huntingdon's feast, unaware of the Prince's presence, execrate his name, and at length he retires, in a silent fury. Robin gives to Marian a remarkable ring that he has inherited from his mother. Later a herald enters and reads a proclamation from Prince John, declaring the Earl of Huntingdon to be a felon, and commanding his banishment. Robin cannot forcibly oppose that mandate, and he therefore determines to cast in his lot with Scarlet and Friar Tuck and other "minions of the moon," and thenceforward to live a free and merry life under the green boughs of Sherwood Forest. A year is supposed to pass. Act second, called "The Flight of Marian," begins with a song of the Foresters, in the deep wood—"There is no land like England." That is a scene of much gentle beauty, enhanced by Robin Hood's delivery of some of the finest poetry in the play, and also by the delicious music of Sir Arthur Sullivan. Robin descants upon freedom, and upon the advantage of dwelling beneath the sky rather than beneath a groined roof that shuts out all the meaning of heaven. There is a colloquy between Little John, who is one of Robin's men, and Kate, who is Marian's maid. Those two are lovers who quarrel and make it up again, as lovers will. Kate has come to the forest, bringing word of the flight of her mistress. Prince John has tried to seize Marian, and that brave girl has repulsed and struck him; and she and her father have fled—intending to make for France, in which land the old knight expects to find a friend who will pay his debt and save his estate. While Robin is considering these things he perceives the approach of Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham, and, thereupon, he takes refuge in the hut of an old witch and disguises himself in some of her garments. Prince John and the Sheriff, who are in pursuit of Sir Richard and Marian, find Robin in this disguise, and for a time they are deceived by him; but soon they penetrate his masquerade and assail him—whereupon some of his people come to his assistance, and he is reinforced by Sir Richard Lea. Prince John and his party are beaten and driven away. Sir Richard is exhausted, and Robin commits him to the care of the Foresters. Marian, arrayed as a boy, and pretending to be her brother Walter, has been present at this combat, as a spectator, and a sparkling scene of equivoke, mischief, and sentiment ensues between Marian and Robin. That scene Tennyson wrote and inserted for Ada Rehan, to whose vivacious temperament it is fitted, and whose action in it expressed with equal felicity the teasing temper of the coquette and the propitious fondness of the lover. Robin discovers Marian's identity by means of the ring that he gave her, and, after due explanation, it is agreed that she and her father will remain under his protection. Act third is called "The Crowning of Marian," and is devoted to pictures, colloquies, and incidents, now serious and now comical, showing the life of the Foresters and the humorous yet discriminative justice of their gypsy chief. Sir Richard Lea is ill and he cannot be moved. The outlaws crown Marian, with an oaken chaplet, and declare her to be their queen. Robin Hood vindicates his vocation, and in a noble speech on freedom—deriving his similes from the giant oak tree, as Tennyson has ever loved to do—declares himself the friend of the poor and the servant of the king; the absent Richard of the Lion Heart, for whose return all good men are eager. Various beggars, friars, and other travellers are halted on the road, in practical illustration of Robin's doctrine; comic incidents from the old ballads are reproduced; and so the episode ends merrily of these frolics in the wood. At that point a delicious fairy pageant is introduced, presenting Queen Titania and her elves and illustrating at once the grievance of the fairies against the men whose heavy feet have crushed their toads and bats and flowers and mystic rings, and Marian's dream of love. Sir Arthur Sullivan's music is here again used, and again it is felt to be characteristic, melodious, and uncommonly sweet and tender. Act fourth begins in a forest bower at sunrise. Marian and Robin meet there and talk of Sir Richard and of his bond to the Abbot of York—soon to fall due and seemingly to remain unpaid. Robin has summoned the Abbot and his justiciary to come into the forest and to bring the bond. King Richard, unrecognised, now arrives, and in submission to certain laws of the woodland he engages in an encounter of buffets, and prevails over all his adversaries. At the approach of the Abbot, however, fearing premature recognition, the monarch will flit away; but his gypsy friends compel him to accept a bugle, upon which he is to blow a blast when in danger. The Abbot and his followers arrive, and Robin Hood offers the money to redeem Sir Richard's bond; but, upon a legal quibble, the Abbot declines to receive it—preferring to seize the forfeited land. Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham appear, and Robin and his Foresters form an ambuscade. Sir Richard Lea has been brought in, upon his litter, and Marian stays beside him. Prince John attempts to seize her, but this time he is frustrated by the sudden advent of King Richard—from whose presence he slinks away. The myrmidons of John, however, attack the King, who would oppose them single-handed; but Friar Tuck snatches the King's bugle and blows a blast of summons—whereupon the Foresters swarm into the field and possess it. John's faction is dispersed, Marian is saved, the absent Walter Lea reappears, Sir Richard is assured of his estate, the Abbot and the Sheriff are punished, and Robin Hood and Maid Marian may wed—for now the good King Richard has come again to his own.
The lyrics in the piece possess the charm of fluent and unaffected sweetness, and of original, inventive, and felicitous fancy, and some of them are tenderly freighted with that indescribable but deeply affecting undertone of pathetic sentiment which is a characteristic attribute of Tennyson's poetry.
The characters in the comedy were creatures of flesh and blood to the author, and they come out boldly, therefore, on the stage. Marian Lea is a woman of the Rosalind order—handsome, noble, magnanimous, unconventional, passionate in nature, but sufficient unto herself, humorous, playful, and radiant with animal spirits. Ada Rehan embodied her according to that ideal. The chief exaction of the part is simplicity—which yet must not be allowed to degenerate into tameness. The sweet affection of a daughter for her father, the coyness yet the allurement of a girl for her lover, the refinement of high birth, the blithe bearing and free demeanour of a child of the woods, and the predominant dignity of purity and honour—those are the salient attributes of the part. Ada Rehan struck the true note at the outset—the note of buoyant health, rosy frolic, and sprightly adventure—and she sustained it evenly and firmly to the last. Every eye was pleased with the frank, careless, cheerful beauty of her presence, and every ear was soothed and charmed with her fluent and expressive delivery of the verse. In this, as in all of the important representations that Ada Rehan has given, the delightful woman-quality was conspicuously present. She can readily impersonate a boy. No actress since Adelaide Neilson has done that so well. But the crowning excellence of her art was its expression of essential womanhood. Her acting was never trivial and it never obtruded the tedious element of dry intellect. It refreshed—and the spectator was happier for having seen her. Many pleasant thoughts were scattered in many minds by her performance of Maid Marian, and no one who saw it will ever part with the remembrance of it.