is comparatively coherent, and beyond his occasional references to the warrant he makes no attempt to play the madman. To turn his literal phrase into metaphor, he is “mad but from the gown outward.”[116:1] Trouble-all himself, when Quarlous’ purpose is accomplished, makes one furious entry, armed “with a dripping pan,”[116:1] but he does no mischief, and soon disappears.
Trouble-all is a noteworthy character, though a small one; yet, for more than one reason, the character is less praiseworthy than Fletcher’s Shattillion. Considerable care is shewn in the sketch, but little or no sympathy; and, if madness is to be utilised in comedy, the comic element should at least, as has been seen, be mingled with some touches of pathos. As it is, any other character than the madman would have served Jonson equally well, provided that it had supplied him with the same dramatic advantages. When Overdo says: “Alas, poor wretch! how it yearns my heart for him!” we believe him about as readily as if Jonson had made the same remark in an “author’s footnote.”
In one respect, and in one respect only, can any claim be made on behalf of Jonson’s character to rank above Fletcher’s “Noble Gentleman.” Fletcher makes us look at madness from the point of view of the madman,
and tries to put us in sympathy with him. We have seen that he is only partially successful. Jonson, on the other hand, treats madness in quite an objective way, uses it frankly for a subsidiary dramatic purpose, and portrays his madman with the utmost conscientiousness and care. It may be just a question—though the writer himself does not think so—whether from the point of view of art Jonson’s production is not the more praiseworthy.
Be that, however, as it may, it is nevertheless absolute Ben Jonson!
FOOTNOTES:
[61:1] From the Alleyn MS.
[62:1] “Spanish Tragedy.”
[63:1] “Spanish Tragedy,” iii., 12a.