The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 06, No. 35, September, 1860

The curious point, of whose they are, may test the science of decipherers of palimpsest manuscripts; the more weighty one, of what they are worth, remains, as it was from the first, a matter on which every student of Shakspeare may arrive at some conclusion for himself. And, indeed, to this ground of judgment Mr. Collier himself appeals, in his preface to the "Notes and Emendations," in no less emphatic terms than the following:—"As Shakspeare was especially the poet of common life, so he was emphatically the poet of common sense; and to the verdict of common sense I am willing to submit all the more material alterations recommended on the authority before me."

I take "The Tempest," the first play in Mr. Collier's volume of "Notes and Emendations," and, while bestowing my principal attention on the inherent worth of the several new readings, shall point out where they tally exactly with the text of the Oxford edition, because that circumstance has excited little attention in the midst of the other various elements of interest in the controversy, and also because I have it in my power to give from a copy of that edition in my possession some passages corrected by John and Charles Kemble, who brought to the study of the text considerable knowledge of it and no inconsiderable ability for poetical and dramatic criticism.

In the first scene of the first act of "The Tempest" Mr. Collier gives the line,—

"Good Boatswain, have care,"—

adding, "It may be just worth remark, that the colloquial expression is have a care, and a is inserted in the margin of the corrected folio, 1632, to indicate, probably, that the poet so wrote it, or, at all events, that the actor so delivered it."

In the copy of Hanmer in my possession the a is also inserted in the margin, upon the authority of one of the eminent actors above mentioned.

SCENE II

"The sky. it seems, would pour down stinking pitch,
But that the sea, mounting to the welkin's cheek,
Dashes the fire out."

The manuscript corrector of the folio, 1632, has substituted heat for "cheek," which appears to me an alteration of no value whatever. Shakspeare was more likely to have written cheek than heat; for elsewhere he uses the expression, "Heaven's face," "the welkin's face," and, though irregular, the expression is poetical.

At Miranda's exclamation,—

"A brave vessel,
Who had no doubt some noble creature in her,
Dash'd all to pieces,"—

Mr. Collier does Theobald the justice to observe, that he, as well as the corrector of the folio, 1632, adds the necessary letter s to the word "creature," making the plural substantive agree with her other exclamation of, "Poor souls, they perished!"

Where Mr. Collier, upon the authority of his folio, substitutes _pre_vision for "provision" in the lines of Prospero,—

"The direful spectacle of the wreck . . .
I have with such provision in mine art
So safely ordered," etc.,—

I do not agree to the value of the change. It is very true that _pre_vision means the foresight that his art gave him, but _pro_vision implies the exercise of that foresight or _pre_vision; it is therefore better, because more comprehensive.

Mr. Collier's folio gives as an improvement upon Malone and Steevens's reading of the passage,—

"And thy father
Was Duke of Milan; and his only heir
A princess; no worse issued,"—

the following:—

"And thy father
Was Duke of Milan,—thou his only heir
And princess no worse issued."

Supposing the folio to be ingenious rather than authoritative, the passage, as it stands in Hanmer, is decidedly better, because clearer:—

"And thy father
Was Duke of Milan,—thou, his only heir
A princess—no worse issued."

In the next passage, given as emended by the folio, we have what appears to me one bad and one decidedly good alteration from the usual reading, which, in all the editions given hitherto, has left the meaning barely perceptible through the confusion and obscurity of the expression.

"He being thus lorded,
Not only with what my revenue yielded,
But what my power might else exact,—like one
Who having unto truth by telling of it
Made such a sinner of his memory
To credit his own lie,—he did believe
He was indeed the Duke."

The folio says,—

"He being thus loaded."

And to this change I object: the meaning was obvious before; "lorded" stands clearly enough here for made lord of or over, etc.; and though the expression is unusual, it is less prosaic than the proposed word loaded. But in the rest of the passage the critic of the folio does immense service to the text, in reading

"Like one
Who having to untruth by telling of it
Made such a sinner of his memory
To credit his own lie,—he did believe
He was indeed the Duke."

This change carries its own authority in its manifest good sense.

Of the passage,—

"Whereon,
A treacherous army levied, one midnight
Fated to the purpose, did Antonio open
The gates of Milan, and in the dead of darkness
The ministers for the purpose hurried thence
Me and thy crying self,"—

Mr. Collier says that the iteration of the word "purpose," in the fourth line, after its employment in the second, is a blemish, which his folio obviates by substituting the word practice in the first line. I think this a manifest improvement, though not an important one.

Mr. Collier gives Rowe the credit of having altered "butt" to boat, and "have quit it" to had quit it, in the lines,—

"Where they prepar'd
A rotten carcase of a butt not rigg'd,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast,—the very rats
Instinctively have quit it."

Adding, that in both changes he is supported by the corrector of the folio, 1632. Hanmer gives the passage exactly as the latter, and as Rowe does.

We now come to the stage-directions in the folio, to which Mr. Collier gives, I think, a most exaggerated value. He says, that, where Prospero says,—