Page:Julius Caesar (1919) Yale.djvu/114

102 potential and latent.' Emendations seem unnecessary, though many have been proposed and few editors retain the Folio and Quarto punctuation given in the present text.

fourteen. This is Theobald's generally accepted emendation of the Folio and Quarto reading, 'fifteen.' To Brutus (line 40) it is still the night of the fourteenth. If 'fifteen' days were indeed 'wasted' i.e., gone, then the ides too would be gone,—which is just what the Soothsayer points out that they are not (III. i. 2).

Literally interpreted, this statement is incredible, if we stop to reflect that a month has passed since I. ii; Brutus then can mean merely 'I have not slept well.' But as a rule we do not stop to reflect thus mathematically, and so we have the impression that 'Cassius first did whet' Brutus 'against Cæsar' only a night or two before and that Brutus' sleeplessness has not been superhumanly protracted; for seemingly 'Brought you Cæsar home?' (I. iii. 1) means home from the Lupercal (I. ii), and Casca himself in I. iii is returning from his dinner engagement on the night of the Lupercal (I. ii. 294), so that I. iii apparently follows I. ii without any interval; while II. i apparently follows I. iii with almost equal immediacy, for in their last conversation (on stage: I. ii. 308-312) Brutus and Cassius arranged to meet again at Brutus' home 'to-morrow,' and hence (II. i. 70 ff.) we have their first meeting (on stage) since that time. This device, whereby Shakespeare secures an impression of rapid, uninterruptedly continuous action while unobtrusively supplying to reflection all needed data for the determination of the actual historical intervals involved, is known as the phenomenon of 'Double Time,' and is well shown further in Acts IV and V of this play. The Short or Dramatic Time-scheme maintains the tension of the passion,