Like Patience, gazing on king's graves and smiling
Extremity out of act:"[279:A]
a picture which is rendered yet more touching by a subsequent trait; for Lysimachus informs us
"———————— she would never tell
Her parentage; being demanded that,
She would sit still and weep."[279:B]
To this delightful sketch of female tenderness and subdued suffering, nearly all the interest of the last two acts is to be ascribed, and we feel, therefore, highly gratified that sorrows so unmerited, and so well borne, should, at length, terminate not only in repose, but in positive happiness. The poet, indeed, has allotted strict retributory justice to all his characters; the bad are severely punished, while in Pericles and his daughter, we behold
"Virtue preserv'd from fell destruction's blast,
Led on by heaven, and crown'd with joy at last."[279:C]
To whom, may it now be asked, if not to Shakspeare, can this play with any probability be given? Has not the above slight analysis of its two principal characters, with the quotations necessarily adduced, fully convinced us, that in style, sentiment, and imagery, and in the outline and conception of its chief female personage, the hand of our great master is undeniably displayed?