speare was not furnished with moveable painted scenes, but merely decorated with curtains, and

prove that scenes were employed on the stage in Shakspeare's time, for The Staple of News was not exhibited till March, 1625-6.

"It must be acknowledged," says Mr. Steevens, "that little more is advanced on the occasion, than is fairly supported by the testimony of contemporary writers.

"Were we, however, to reason on such a part of the subject as is now before us, some suspicions might arise, that where machinery was discovered, the less complicated adjunct of scenes was scarcely wanting. When the column is found standing, no one will suppose but that it was once accompanied by its usual entablature. If this inference be natural, little impropriety can be complained of in one of the stage-directions above-mentioned. Where the bed is introduced, the scene of a bed-chamber (a thing too common to deserve description) would of course be at hand. Neither should any great stress be laid on the words of Sir Philip Sidney. Are we not still obliged to receive the stage alternately as a garden, as an ocean, as a range of rocks, or as a cavern? With all our modern advantages, so much of vraisemblance is wanting in a theatre, that the apologies which Shakspeare offers for scenical deficiency, are still in some degree needful; and be it always remembered, that Sir Philip Sidney has not positively declared that no painted scenes were in use. Who that mentions the present stage, would think it necessary to dwell on the article of scenery, unless it were peculiarly striking and magnificent? Sir Philip has not spoken of stage-habits, and are we therefore to suppose that none were worn? Besides, between the time when Sir Philip wrote his Defence of Poesy, and the period at which the plays of Shakspeare were presented, the stage in all probability had received much additional embellishment. Let me repeat, that if in 1529 (the date of Acolastus) machinery* is known to have existed, in 592 (when Shak speare commenced a play-wright) a greater number of ornaments might naturally be expected, as it is usual for one improvement to be soon followed by another. That the plays of

What happy deceptions could be produced by the aid of framework and painted canvas, we may learn from Holinshed, and yet more ancient historians. The pageants and tournaments at the beginning of Henry VIIIth's reign very frequently required that the castles of imaginary beings should be exhibited. Of such contrivances some descriptions remain. These extempore buildings afforded a natural introduction to scenery on the stage.

arras or tapestry hangings, which, when decayed,

Shakspeare were exhibited with the aid of machinery, the following stage-directions, copied from the folio 1623, will abundantly prove. In The Tempest, Ariel is said to enter like a harpey, claps his wings on the table, and with a quaint device the banquet vanishes.' In a subsequent scene of the same play, Juno descends' and in Cymbeline, Jupiter descends likewise, in thunder and lightning, sitting upon an eagle.' In Macbeth, the cauldron sinks, and the apparitions rise. It may be added, that the dialogue of Shakspeare has such perpetual reference to objects supposed visible to the audience, that the want of scenery could not have failed to render many of the descriptions uttered by his speakers absurd and laughable.-Macduff examines the outside of Inverness castle with such minuteness, that he distinguishes even the nests which the martins had built under the projecting parts of its roof.Romeo, standing in a garden, points to the tops of fruit-trees gilded by the moon.-The prologue-speaker to The Second Part of King Henry IV. expressly shows the spectators this wormeaten hold of ragged stone,' in which Northumberland was lodged. Jachimo takes the most exact inventory of every article in Imogen's bedchamber, from the silk and silver of which her tapestry was wrought, down to the Cupids that support her andirons. Had not the inside of this apartment, with its proper furniture, been represented, how ridiculous must the action of Jachimo have appeared! He must have stood looking out of the room for the particulars supposed to be visible within it. In one of the parts of King Henry VI. a cannon is discharged against a tower; and conversations are held in almost every scene from different walls, turrets, and battlements. Nor is my belief in ancient scenery entirely founded on conjecture. In the folio edition of Shakspeare's plays, 1623, the following traces of it are preserved. În King John: Enter, before Angiers, Philip king of France,' &c.- Enter a citizen upon the walls. Enter the herald of France with trumpets to the gates.'. Enter Arthur on the walls.'-In King Henry V. Enter the king, &c. with scaling ladders at Harfleur.'-Enter the king with ail his train before the gates.' In King Henry VI. Enter to the protector at the Tower gates,' &c.- Enter Salisbury and Talbot on the walls.'- - The French leap over the walls in their shirts.'

- Enter Pucelle on the top of the tower, thrusting out a torch burning.'- Enter lord Scales upon the tower, walking. Then enter two or three citizens below.' Enter King and Queen and Somerset on the terrace.'- Enter three watchmen to guard

appear to have been sometimes ornamented with

the King's tent.' In Coriolanus: Marcius follows them to the gates, and is shut in.' In Timon: Enter Timon in the woods.'* Enter Timon from his cave.' In Julius Cæsar: Enter Brutus in his orchard,' &c. &c.-In short, without characteristick discriminations of place, the historical dramas of Shakspeare in particular, would have been wrapped in tenfold confusion and obscurity; nor could the spectator have felt the poet's power, or accompanied his rapid transitions from one situation to another, without such guides as painted canvas only could supply. The audience would with difficulty have received the catastrophe of Romeo and Juliet as natural and affecting, unless the deception was confirmed to them by the appearance of a tomb. The managers who could raise ghosts, bid the cauldron sink into the earth, and then exhibit a train of royal phantoms in Macbeth, could with less difficulty supply the flat paintings of a cavern or a grove. The artists who can put the dragons of Medea in motion, can more easily represent the clouds through which they are to pass. But for these, or such assistances, the spectator, like Hamlet's mother, must have bent his gaze on mortifying vacancy; and with the guest invited by the Barmecide, in the Arabian tale, must have furnished from his own imagination the entertainment of which his eyes were solicited to partake.

"It should likewise be remembered, that the intervention of civil war would easily occasion many customs of our early theatres to be silently forgotten. The times when Wright and Downes produced their respective narratives, were by no means times of exactness or curiosity. What they heard might have been heard imperfectly; it might have been unskilfully related; or their own memories might have deceived them:

Ad nos vix tenuis famæ perlabitur aura.'

"One assertion made by the latter of these writers, is chronologically disproved. We may remark, likewise, that in private theatres, a part of the audience was admitted on the stage,

lines:

Apemantus must have pointed to the scenes as he spoke the following

A piece of old tapestry must have been regarded as a poor substitute for these towering shades.

pictures; and some passages in our old dramas

but that this licence was refused in the publick playhouses. To what circumstance shall we impute this difference between the customs of the one and the other? Perhaps the private theatres had no scenes, the publick had; and a crouded stage would prevent them from being commodiously beheld, or conveniently shifted. The fresh pictures mentioned by Ben Jonson in the Induction to his Cynthia's Revels, might be properly introduced to cover old tapestry; for to hang pictures over faded arras, was then and is still sufficiently common in antiquated mansions, such as those in which the scenes of dramatick writers are often laid. That Shakspeare himself was no stranger to the magick of theatrical ornaments, may be inferred from a passage in which he alludes to the scenery of pageants, the fashionable shows of his time:

"Sometimes we see a cloud that's dragonish,

"A vapour sometimes like a lion, a bear,
"A towred citadel, a pendent rock,

"A forked mountain, or blue promontory
"With trees upon't, that nod unto the world,

"And mock our eyes with air;-these thou hast seen,
They are black Vesper's pageants.Ӡ

Antony and Cleopatra. "To conclude, the richest and most expensive scenes had been introduced to dress up those spurious children of the Muse called Masques; nor have we sufficient reason for believing that Tragedy, her legitimate offspring, continued to be exposed in rags, while appendages more suitable to her dignity were known to be within the reach of our ancient managers. Shakspeare, Bur

To shift a scene is at least a phrase employed by Shakspeare himself in King Henry V:

"Unto Southampton do we shift our scene."

and by Ben Jonson, yet more appositely, in The Staple of News: "Lic. Have you no news o'the stage?

"Tho. O yes;

1

"There is a legacy left to the king's players,

"Both for their various shifting of the scenes,

"And dextrous change of their persons to all shapes

"And all disguises," &c.

† After a pageant had passed through the streets, the characters that composed it were assembled in some hall or other spacious apartment, where they delivered their respective speeches, and were finally set out to view with the advantages of proper scenery and decoration.

incline me to think, that when tragedies were performed, the stage was hung with black.

In the early part, at least, of our author's acquaintance with the theatre, the want of scenery seems to have been supplied by the simple expedient of writing the names of the different places where the scene was laid in the progress of the play, which were disposed in such a manner as to be visible to the audience.9

bage, and Condell must have had frequent opportunities of being acquainted with the mode in which both masques, tragedies, and comedies, were represented in the inns of court, the halls of noblemen, and in the palace itself."

7" Sir Crack, I am none of your fresh pictures, that use to beautify the decayed old arras, in a publick theatre." Induction to Cynthia's Revels, by Ben Jonson, 1601.

In the Induction to an old tragedy called A Warning for fair Women, 1599, three personages are introduced, under the names of Tragedy, Comedy, and History. After some contest for superiority, Tragedy prevails; and History and Comedy retire with these words:

"Hist. Look, Comedie, I mark'd it not till now,
"The stage is hung with blacke, and I perceive
"The auditors prepar'd for tragedie.

"Com. Nay then, I see she shall be entertain'd.
"These ornaments beseem not thee and me;
"Then Tragedie, kill them to-day with sorrow,

"We'll make them laugh with mirthful jests to-morrow."

So, in Marston's Insatiate Countess, 1613;

"The stage of heaven is hung with solemn black,
"A time best fitting to act tragedies."

Again, in Daniel's Civil Warres, Book V. 1602:
"Let her be made the sable stage, whereon
"Shall first be acted bloody tragedies."

Again, in King Henry VI. Part I:

"Hung be the heavens with black," &c.

Again, more appositely, in The Rape of Lucrece, 1594: "Black stage for tragedies, and murthers fell."

"What child is there, that coming to a play and seeing Thebes written upon an old door, doth believe that it is Thebes?" Defence of Poesie, by Sir Philip Sidney. Signat. G. 1595.