Gentles, do not reprehend: Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue, So, good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, [Exit. 9 And, as I'm AN HONEST PUCK,] "Fuck," or Pouke, meant the devil; and, as Tyrwhitt remarks, it is used in that sense in "Pierce Ploughman's Vision," and elsewhere. It was therefore necessary for Shakespeare's fairy messenger to assert his honesty, and to clear himself from any connexion with the "helle Pouke." "The excellent History of the Merchant of Venice. With the extreme cruelty of Shylocke the Iew towards the saide Merchant, in cutting a iust pound of his flesh. And the obtaining of Portia, by the choyse of three caskets. Written by W. Shakespeare. by J. Roberts, 1600." 4to, 40 leaves. Printed With "The most excellent Historie of the Merchant of Venice. the extreame crueltie of Shylocke the lewe towards the sayd Merchant, in cutting a iust pound of his flesh and the obtayning of Portia by the choyse of three chests. As it hath beene diuers times acted by the Lord Chamberlaine his Seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. At London, Printed by I. R., for Thomas Heyes, and are to be sold in Paules Church-yard, at the signe of the Greene Dragon, 1600." 4to, 38 leaves. It is also printed in the folio, 1623, where it occupies 22 pages, viz., from p. 163 to p. 184, inclusive, in the division of "Comedies." Besides its appearance in the later folios, the Merchant of Venice was republished in 4to, in 1637 and 1652. INTRODUCTION. THE two plots of "The Merchant of Venice are found as distinct novels in various ancient foreign authorities, but no English original of either of them of the age of Shakespeare has been discovered. That there were such originals is highly probable, but if so they have perished with many other relics of our popular literature. Whether the separate incidents, relating to the bond and to the caskets, were ever combined in the same novel, at all as Shakespeare combined them in his drama, cannot of course be determined. Steevens asserts broadly, that "a play comprehending the distinct plots of Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice had been exhibited long before he commenced a writer;" and the evidence he adduces is a passage from Gosson's "School of Abuse," 1579, where he especially praises two plays "showne at the Bull," one called "The Jew," and the other "Ptolome:" of the former Gosson states, that it "represented the greedinesse of worldly chusers, and bloody minds of usurers." (Shakespeare Society's Reprint, p. 30.) The terms, "worldly chusers," may certainly have reference to the choice of the caskets; and the conduct of Shylock may very well be intended by the words, "bloody minds of usurers." It is possible, therefore, that a theatrical performance should have existed, anterior to the time of Shakespeare, in which the separate plots were united; and it is not unlikely that some novel had been published which gave the same incidents in a narrative form. "On the whole," says the learned and judicious Tyrwhitt, "I am inclined to suspect that Shakespeare followed some hitherto unknown novelist, who had saved him the trouble of working up the two stories into one." Both stories are found separately in the Latin Gesta Romanorum, with considerable variations: that of the bond is chap. xlviii. of MS. Harl. 2270, as referred to by Tyrwhitt; and that of the caskets is chap. xcix. of the same collection. The Pecorone of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino also contains a novel very similar to that of "The Merchant of Venice," with respect to the bond, the disguise and agency of Portia, and the gift of the ring. This narrative (Giorn. iv. nov. 1) was written as early as the year 1378, but not printed in Italy until 1554; and it is remarkable that the scene of certain romantic adventures, in which the hero was engaged, is there laid in the dwelling of a lady at Belmont. These adventures seemt afterwards to have been changed, in some English version, for the incidents of the caskets. In Boccaccio's Decameron (Giorn. x., nov. 1) a choice of caskets is introduced, but it does not in other respects resemble the choice as we find it in Shakespeare; while the latter, even to the inscriptions, is extremely like the history in the Gesta Romanorum. The earliest notice in English, with a date, of any circumstances connected with the bond and its forfeiture, is contained in "The Orator: handling a Hundred several Discourses," a translation from the French of Alexander Silvayn, by Anthony Munday, who published it under the name of Lazarus Piot, in 1596, 4to. There, with the head of "Declamation 95," we find one "Of a Jew, who would for his debt have a pound of flesh of a Christian ;" and it is followed by "The Christian's Answer," but nothing is said of the incidents, out of which these "declamations" arose. Of the old ballad of "The Crueltie of Gernutus, a Jewe," in "Percy's Reliques," I. 228 (edit. 1812) no dated edition is known; but most readers will be inclined to agree with Warton ("Observations on the Faerie Queene," I. 128,) that it was not founded upon Shakespeare's play, and was anterior to it: it might owe its origin to the ancient drama of "The Jew," mentioned by Gosson. "Henslowe's Diary," under date of 25th Aug. 1594, contains an entry relating to the performance of "The Venetian Comedy," which Malone conjectured might mean "The Merchant of Venice ;" and it is a circumstance not to be passed over, that in 1594 the company of actors to which Shakespeare was attached was playing at the theatre in Newington Butts, in conjunction, as far as we can now learn, with the company of which Henslowe was chief manager. Meres has "The Merchant of Venice" in his list, which was published in 1598, and we have no means of knowing how long prior to that date it was written. If it were "The Venetian Comedy " of Henslowe, it was in a course of performance in August, 1594. The earliest entry regarding "The Merchant of Venice" in the Stationers' Register is curious, from its particularity : "22 July, 1598, James Robertes.] A booke of the Marchaunt of Venyce, or otherwise called the Jewe of Venyse. Provided that yt bee not prynted by the said James Robertes, or anye other whatsoever, without lycence first had from the right honourable the Lord Chamberlen." Shakespeare was one of the players of the Lord Chamberlain, and the object seems to have been to prevent the publication of the play without the consent of the company, to be signified through the noble |
