by Edith Nesbit
The king came in just as he was saying this, and said —
“No, if we are marked to die, we are enough for our country to lose. If we are to live, the fewer there are of us the greater share of honour. I do not covet gold or feasting, or fine garments, but honour I do covet. Wish not another man from England. I would not lose the honour of this fight by sharing it with more men than are here, and if any among our soldiers has no desire to fight, let him go. He shall have a passport and money to take him away. I should be ashamed to die in such a man’s company. We need not wish for men from England. It is the men in England who will envy us when they hear of the great crown of honour and glory that we have won this day. This is Saint Crispin’s day. Every man who fights on this day will remember it and be honoured to the last hour of his life. Crispin’s day shall ne’er go by from this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered,
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers,
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother, be he ne’er so vile.
And gentlemen in England now abed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhood cheap while any speaks
That fought with us upon St. Crispin’s day.”
Lord Salisbury came in as the king was saying this. “The French are in battle order,” he said, “and ready to charge upon our men.”
“All things are ready,” said the king quietly, “if our minds are ready.”
“Perish the man whose mind is backward now,” said Westmoreland.
“You wish no more for men from England then,” said the king smiling.
And Westmoreland, inspired with courage and confidence by the king’s brave speech, answered—”I would to God, my king, that you and I alone without more help might fight this battle out to-day.”
“Why, now you have unwished five thousand men,” said the king laughing, “and that pleases me more than to wish us one more. God be with you all.”
a.d. 1415.
So they went into battle tired as they were. The brave English let loose such a shower of arrows that, as at Creçy, the white feathers of the arrows filled the air like snow, and the French fled before them.
The Earl of Suffolk was wounded, and as he lay dying, the Duke of York, his great friend, wounded to death, dragged himself to Suffolk’s side and took him by the beard and kissed his wounds, and cried aloud —
“Tarry, dear Cousin Suffolk,
My soul shall keep thine company to heaven.
Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast,
As in this glorious and well-foughten field
We kept together in our chivalry.”
Then he turned to the king’s uncle, the Duke of Exeter, and took his hand and said: “Dear my lord, commend my service to my sovereign.”
Then he put his two arms round Suffolk’s neck, and the two friends died together. But the battle was won.
Peace was made with France, and to seal the peace Henry married the French princess, Katherine. A little son was born to them at Windsor, and was called Henry of Windsor, Prince of Wales; he was afterwards Henry the Sixth. When Henry the Fifth knew he was going to die, he called his brothers together and gave them good advice about ruling England and France, and begged them to take great care of his little son. Henry the Sixth was not a year old when his father died, and he was crowned at once.
One of the finest English poems we have, was written about the Battle of Agincourt.
I.
Fair stood the wind for France
When we our sails advance,
Nor now to prove our chance
Longer will tarry;
But putting to the main
At Caux, the mouth of Seine,
With all his martial train,
Landed King Harry.
II.
And turning to his men,
Quoth our brave Harry then,
Though they be one to ten,
Be not amazed.
Yet have we well begun;
Battles so bravely won
Have ever to the sun
By fame been raised.
III.
And for myself (quoth he)
This my full rest shall be,
England ne’er mourn for me,
Nor more esteem me.
Victor I will remain,
Or on this earth lie slain,
Never shall she sustain
Loss to redeem me.
IV.
Poitiers and Cressy tell
When most their pride did swell,
Under our swords they fell;
No less our skill is
Then when our grandsire great,
Claiming the regal seat,
By many a warlike feat
Lopped the French lilies.
V.
They now to fight are gone,
Armour on armour shone,
Drum now to drum did groan,
To hear was wonder;
That with the cries they make,
The very earth did shake,
Trumpet to trumpet spake,
Thunder to thunder.
VI.
With Spanish yew so strong,
Arrows a cloth-yard long
That like to serpents stung,
Piercing the weather;
None from his fellow starts,
But playing manly parts,
And like true English hearts,
Stuck close together.
VII.
When down their bows they threw
And forth their bilbos drew,
And on the French they flew,
Not one was tardy;
Arms were from shoulders sent,
Scalps to the teeth were rent,
Down the French peasants went —
Our men were hardy.
VIII.
This while our noble king,
His broadsword brandishing,
Down the French host did ding,
As to o’erwhelm it.
And many a deep wound lent
His arms with blood besprent.
And many a cruel dent
Bruised his helmet.
IX.
Upon Saint Crispin’ day
Fought was this noble fray.
Which fame did not delay
To England to carry.
O when shall Englishmen
With such acts fill a pen,
Or England breed again
Such a King Harry?
THE CHILDREN’S SHAKESPEARE
The Children’s Shakespeare first appeared in 1897, published by Raphael Tuck and Sons. Publishers subsequently reprinted the book under a few different titles and with different illustrators.
On November 25, 1911, Publisher’s Weekly reviewed the collection in this paragraph:
E. Nesbit brings before the minds of children in a most attractive manner many of the great dramatic poet’s works, acquainting them with the character and plots of the plays in a style that will impress them on their memories and make them long for the time when they shall read the whole for themselves. The introduction, “When Shakespeare Was a Boy,” is simply and interestingly written by Dr. F. J. Furnivall. Illustrated with eight beautiful colored plates by John H. Bacon and Howard Davie, and many black and white drawings by Harold Copping.
CONTENTS
A BRIEF LIFE OF SHAKESPEARE.
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
THE TEMPEST
THE WINTER’S TALE
KING LEAR
TWELFTH NIGHT
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
ROMEO AND JULIET
PERICLES
HAMLET
CYMBELINE
MACBETH
THE COMEDY OF ERRORS
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE
TIMON OF ATHENS
OTHELLO
THE TAMING OF THE SHREW
&nbs
p; MEASURE FOR MEASURE
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL
QUOTATIONS FROM SHAKESPEARE
“It may be said of Shakespeare, that from his works may be collected a system of civil and economical prudence. He has been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may be doubted whether from all his successors more maxims of theoretical knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence can be collected than he alone has given to his country.” — Dr. SAMUEL JOHNSON.
PREFACE
The writings of Shakespeare have been justly termed “the richest, the purest, the fairest, that genius uninspired ever penned.”
Shakespeare instructed by delighting. His plays alone (leaving mere science out of the question), contain more actual wisdom than the whole body of English learning. He is the teacher of all good — pity, generosity, true courage, love. His bright wit is cut out “into little stars.” His solid masses of knowledge are meted out in morsels and proverbs, and thus distributed, there is scarcely a corner of the English-speaking world to-day which he does not illuminate, or a cottage which he does not enrich. His bounty is like the sea, which, though often unacknowledged, is everywhere felt. As his friend, Ben Jonson, wrote of him, “He was not of an age but for all time.” He ever kept the highroad of human life whereon all travel. He did not pick out by-paths of feeling and sentiment. In his creations we have no moral highwaymen, sentimental thieves, interesting villains, and amiable, elegant adventuresses — no delicate entanglements of situation, in which the grossest images are presented to the mind disguised under the superficial attraction of style and sentiment. He flattered no bad passion, disguised no vice in the garb of virtue, trifled with no just and generous principle. While causing us to laugh at folly, and shudder at crime, he still preserves our love for our fellow-beings, and our reverence for ourselves.
Shakespeare was familiar with all beautiful forms and images, with all that is sweet or majestic in the simple aspects of nature, of that indestructible love of flowers and fragrance, and dews, and clear waters — and soft airs and sounds, and bright skies and woodland solitudes, and moon-light bowers, which are the material elements of poetry, — and with that fine sense of their indefinable relation to mental emotion, which is its essence and vivifying soul — and which, in the midst of his most busy and tragical scenes, falls like gleams of sunshine on rocks and ruins — contrasting with all that is rugged or repulsive, and reminding us of the existence of purer and brighter elements.
These things considered, what wonder is it that the works of Shakespeare, next to the Bible, are the most highly esteemed of all the classics of English literature. “So extensively have the characters of Shakespeare been drawn upon by artists, poets, and writers of fiction,” says an American author,—”So interwoven are these characters in the great body of English literature, that to be ignorant of the plot of these dramas is often a cause of embarrassment.”
But Shakespeare wrote for grown-up people, for men and women, and in words that little folks cannot understand.
Hence this volume. To reproduce the entertaining stories contained in the plays of Shakespeare, in a form so simple that children can understand and enjoy them, was the object had in view by the author of these Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare.
And that the youngest readers may not stumble in pronouncing any unfamiliar names to be met with in the stories, the editor has prepared and included in the volume a Pronouncing Vocabulary of Difficult Names. To which is added a collection of Shakespearean Quotations, classified in alphabetical order, illustrative of the wisdom and genius of the world’s greatest dramatist.
E. T. R.
A BRIEF LIFE OF SHAKESPEARE.
In the register of baptisms of the parish church of Stratford-upon-Avon, a market town in Warwickshire, England, appears, under date of April 26, 1564, the entry of the baptism of William, the son of John Shakspeare. The entry is in Latin—”Gulielmus filius Johannis Shakspeare.”
The date of William Shakespeare’s birth has usually been taken as three days before his baptism, but there is certainly no evidence of this fact.
The family name was variously spelled, the dramatist himself not always spelling it in the same way. While in the baptismal record the name is spelled “Shakspeare,” in several authentic autographs of the dramatist it reads “Shakspere,” and in the first edition of his works it is printed “Shakespeare.”
Halliwell tells us, that there are not less than thirty-four ways in which the various members of the Shakespeare family wrote the name, and in the council-book of the corporation of Stratford, where it is introduced one hundred and sixty-six times during the period that the dramatist’s father was a member of the municipal body, there are fourteen different spellings. The modern “Shakespeare” is not among them.
Shakespeare’s father, while an alderman at Stratford, appears to have been unable to write his name, but as at that time nine men out of ten were content to make their mark for a signature, the fact is not specially to his discredit.
The traditions and other sources of information about the occupation of Shakespeare’s father differ. He is described as a butcher, a woolstapler, and a glover, and it is not impossible that he may have been all of these simultaneously or at different times, or that if he could not properly be called any one of them, the nature of his occupation was such as to make it easy to understand how the various traditions sprang up. He was a landed proprietor and cultivator of his own land even before his marriage, and he received with his wife, who was Mary Arden, daughter of a country gentleman, the estate of Asbies, 56 acres in extent. William was the third child. The two older than he were daughters, and both probably died in infancy. After him was born three sons and a daughter. For ten or twelve years at least, after Shakespeare’s birth his father continued to be in easy circumstances. In the year 1568 he was the high bailiff or chief magistrate of Stratford, and for many years afterwards he held the position of alderman as he had done for three years before. To the completion of his tenth year, therefore, it is natural to suppose that William Shakespeare would get the best education that Stratford could afford. The free school of the town was open to all boys and like all the grammar-schools of that time, was under the direction of men who, as graduates of the universities, were qualified to diffuse that sound scholarship which was once the boast of England. There is no record of Shakespeare’s having been at this school, but there can be no rational doubt that he was educated there. His father could not have procured for him a better education anywhere. To those who have studied Shakespeare’s works without being influenced by the old traditional theory that he had received a very narrow education, they abound with evidences that he must have been solidly grounded in the learning, properly so called, was taught in the grammar schools.
There are local associations connected with Stratford which could not be without their influence in the formation of young Shakespeare’s mind. Within the range of such a boy’s curiosity were the fine old historic towns of Warwick and Coventry, the sumptuous palace of Kenilworth, the grand monastic remains of Evesham. His own Avon abounded with spots of singular beauty, quiet hamlets, solitary woods. Nor was Stratford shut out from the general world, as many country towns are. It was a great highway, and dealers with every variety of merchandise resorted to its markets. The eyes of the poet dramatist must always have been open for observation. But nothing is known positively of Shakespeare from his birth to his marriage to Anne Hathaway in 1582, and from that date nothing but the birth of three children until we find him an actor in London about 1589.
How long acting continued to be Shakespeare’s sole profession we have no means of knowing, but it is in the highest degree probable that very soon after arriving in London he began that work of adaptation by which he is known to have begun his literary career. To improve and alter older plays not up to the standard that was required at the time was a common practice even among the best dramatists of the day, and Shakespea
re’s abilities would speedily mark him out as eminently fitted for this kind of work. When the alterations in plays originally composed by other writers became very extensive, the work of adaptation would become in reality a work of creation. And this is exactly what we have examples of in a few of Shakespeare’s early works, which are known to have been founded on older plays.
It is unnecessary here to extol the published works of the world’s greatest dramatist. Criticism has been exhausted upon them, and the finest minds of England, Germany, and America have devoted their powers to an elucidation of their worth.
Shakespeare died at Stratford on the 23rd of April, 1616. His father had died before him, in 1602, and his mother in 1608. His wife survived him till August, 1623. His so Hamnet died in 1596 at the age of eleven years. His two daughters survived him, the eldest of whom, Susanna, had, in 1607, married a physician of Stratford, Dr. Hall. The only issue of this marriage, a daughter named Elizabeth, born in 1608, married first Thomas Nasbe, and afterwards Sir John Barnard, but left no children by either marriage. Shakespeare’s younger daughter, Judith, on the 10th of February, 1616, married a Stratford gentleman named Thomas Quincy, by whom she had three sons, all of whom died, however, without issue. There are thus no direct descendants of Shakespeare.
Shakespeare’s fellow-actors, fellow-dramatists, and those who knew him in other ways, agree in expressing not only admiration of his genius, but their respect and love for the man. Ben Jonson said, “I love the man, and do honor his memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any. He was indeed honest, and of an open and free nature.” He was buried on the second day after his death, on the north side of the chancel of Stratford church. Over his grave there is a flat stone with this inscription, said to have been written by himself:
Good friend for Jesus sake forbeare
To digg the dust encloased heare:
Blest be ye man yt spares these stones,
And curst be he yt moves my bones.
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
Hermia and Lysander were lovers; but Hermia’s father wished her to marry another man, named Demetrius.
Now, in Athens, where they lived, there was a wicked law, by which any girl who refused to marry according to her father’s wishes, might be put to death. Hermia’s father was so angry with her for refusing to do as he wished, that he actually brought her before the Duke of Athens to ask that she might be killed, if she still refused to obey him. The Duke gave her four days to think about it, and, at the end of that time, if she still refused to marry Demetrius, she would have to die.
