Wherein the graver had a strife
With Nature, to out-doo the life.
O, could he but have drawne his wit
As well in brasse as he hath hit
His face, the print would then surpasse
All that was ever writ in brasse;
But since he cannot, reader, looke
Not on his picture, but his booke.’
These lines would indicate that the portrait of the face was represented with some degree of truth. It may be observed here that until within the last few years artists were less exact and minute in the delineation of the head than the face; and the head appears unusually high for its breadth, and impresses you with the semblance of a form more like Scott than Byron, of Canova than Chantrey.
“The features of Droeshout’s engraving bear a closer resemblance to the plaster cast than to the Stratford bust. The nose has the same flowing outline, well defined, prominent, yet finely chiselled, and the nostrils rather large. There is the same long upper lip, and a general correspondence with the mouth of the cast. The eye is large and round, and in life would be mild and lustrous. The hair is thin and not curled, and the head is high but comparatively narrow. There would be moderate secretiveness, less destructiveness, small constructiveness, and little acquisitiveness. There is an ample endowment of the higher sentiments. The imaginative and imitative faculties are represented as very large. Ideality, wonder, wit, imitation, benevolence, and veneration, comparison and causality, are all very large. The perceptive region is scarcely sufficiently indicated for the powers of mind possessed by Shakespeare, in his vast and ready command of view over the range of natural objects so evident in his works. This may be the fault of the engraver. It is the opposite in this respect to the cast from the face. There is one feature in the portrait which harmonises with Milton’s praise and Jonson’s worship and Spenser’s admiration,—his large benevolence, veneration and ideality, and his small destructiveness and acquisitiveness, leading to the control over his feelings and generous sympathy with others, manifested by his quiet manner and gentle nature. Men of strong passions like Jonson and Byron have very different heads to this portrait, which presents a great contrast both to the bust and the Chandos portrait” (said to be painted by Burbage, a player contemporary with Shakespeare). “The physical proportions of the Droeshout figure harmonise better with a fine temperament and an intellectual head than the Stratford bust with Shakespeare’s mental activity.”