"The canker galls the infants of the Spring
Too oft before their buttons be disclos'd."
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3.
In "Macbeth," desiring to pay the highest compliment to Macduff's judgment and knowledge, he makes Lennox say,—
"He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows
The fits of the season."—Act iv. Sc. 2.
Not the last fall or last spring style, be it observed, but that of the season, which it is most necessary for the fashionable tailor to know. In writing the first scene of the "Second Part of Henry IV.," his mind was evidently crossed by the shade of some over-particular dandy, whose fastidious nicety as to the set of his garments he had failed to satisfy; for he makes Northumberland compare himself to a man who,
"Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire Out of his keeper's arms."
And yet we must not rely too much even upon evidence so strong and so cumulative as this. For it would seem as if Shakespeare must have been a publisher, and have known the anxiety attendant upon the delay of an author not in high health to complete a work the first part of which has been put into the printer's hands. Else, how are we to account for his feeling use of this beautiful metaphor in "Twelfth Night"?
"Lady, you are the cruell'st she alive,
If you will lead these graces to the grave,
And leave the world no copy."
Act i. Sc. 5.
But this part of our subject expands before us, and we must stay our hand. We merely offer these hints as our modest contribution to the attempts to decide from phrases used in Shakespeare's works what were his avocations before he became a playwright, and return to Lord Campbell and Mr. Rushton.