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Page 2
Not a single name is given to any of the persons in my _Royal Courtly
Garland_, but the places of action are reversed exactly in the same way as
in Greene's novel of _Pandosto_, where what Shakspeare represents as
passing in Sicily occurs in Bohemia, and _vice versa_; moreover, the error
of representing Bohemia as a maritime country belongs to my ballad, as well
as to the novelist and the dramatist. The King of Bohemia, jealous of an
"outlandish prince," who he suspected had intrigued with his queen, employs
his cup-bearer to poison the prince, who is informed by the cup-bearer of
the design against his life.
"For fear of the king the prince dare not stay:
The wind being fair, he sailed away,
Saying, I will escape from his blood-thirsty hand
By steering away to my native land."
Not long after his departure, the queen, "who had never conceived before"
(which varies both from Greene and Shakspeare), produces a daughter, which
the king resolves to get rid of by turning it adrift at sea in "a little
boat." He so informs the queen, and she in great grief provides the outfit
for the infant voyager:
"A purse of rare jewels she placed next her skin,
And fasten'd it likewise securely within;
A chain round her neck, and a mantle of gold,
Because she her infant no more should behold."
It is revealed to the king in a dream that his wife is innocent, but she
soon dies of a broken-heart. Meanwhile, the prince, on his return to his
own dominions, marries, and has a son. The infant princess is driven on
shore in his kingdom, and is saved by an old shepherd, and brought up by
him and his wife as their own child, they carefully concealing the riches
they had found in the "little boat."
"This child grew up, endued with grace,
A modest behaviour, a sweet comely face;
And being arrived at the age of fifteen,
For beauty and wisdom few like _her_ were seen."
"Her" is misprinted _him_ in the original, and the whole, as may be
expected, is not a first-rate specimen of typography. The son of the prince
sees and falls in love with the supposed shepherd's daughter, and, to avoid
the anger of the prince his father, he secretly sails away with her and the
old shepherd. By a storm they are driven on the coast of Bohemia:
"A violent storm on the sea did arise,
Drove them to Bohemia; they are took for spies;
Their ship was seized, and they to prison sent:
To confine them a while the king's fully bent."
Here we arrive at an incident which is found in Greene, but which
Shakspeare had the judgment to avoid, making the termination of his drama
as wonderful for its art, as delightful for its poetry. Greene and my
ballad represent the king of Bohemia falling in love with his own daughter,
whom he did not recognise. She effectually resisted his entreaties, and he
resolves "to hang or burn" the whole party; but the old shepherd, to save
himself, reveals that she is not his daughter, and produces "the mantle of
gold" in which he had found her:
"He likewise produced the mantle of gold.
The king was amazed the sight to behold;
Though long time the shepherd had used the same,
The king knew it marked with his own name."
This discovery leads directly to the unwinding of the plot: the young
prince makes himself known, and his father being sent for, the lovers are
{3} "married in triumph" in Bohemia, and the old shepherd is made "a lord
of the court."
If any of your readers can inform me of another copy of the above ballad,
especially unmodernised (the versification must have suffered in the
frequent reprints) and in black-letter of an early date, they will do me a
favour. At present I am unable to decide whether it was founded upon
Greene's novel, Shakspeare's play, or upon some independent, possibly
foreign, narrative. I am by no means satisfied that Greene's novel was not
a translation, and we know that he was skilful in Italian, Spanish, and
French.
J. PAYNE COLLIER.
I cannot find the particular Number of NOTES AND QUERIES, but unless I am
greatly mistaken, in one of them, a correspondent gave praise (I am the
last to say it was not deserved) to DR. MAGINN for suggesting that _miching
mallecho_, in _Hamlet_, Act III. Sc. 2., was from the Spanish _mucho
malhecho_. I never heard of DR. MAGINN's opinion until I saw it in your
pages; but if you happen to be able to refer to the Shakspeare I
superintended through the press in 1843, vol. vii. p 271., note 9., you
will see that I propose the Spanish word _malhecho_ as the origin of
"mallecho." I did not think this point worth notice at the time, and I
doubt whether it is worth notice now. If you leave out this postscript, as
you are at perfect liberty to do, I shall conclude that you are of my
opinion.
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