Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 8.djvu/266

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. VIL APRIL 5, 1913.

a personal group, in reproaches his friend

THE MB. W. H. OF SHAKESPEAKE'S SONNETS.

(Concluded' from p. 243.)

SONNET 67 begins which Shakespeare with some fault : Why should false painting imitate his cheek,

And steal dead seeing of his living hew ? Why should poor beauty indirectly seek

Roses of shadow, since his Rose is true ? L. 5.

"Rose" has a capital in the original text. Three words noted elsewhere as allusive are found in close proximity.

S. 78 : This Sonnet begins an important group relating to the Rival Poet :

So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse And found such fair assistance in my verse

As every alien pen hath got my use And under thee their poesy disperse. L. 1.

A fairly good pun on use and Hews. Note the emphasis on "thee" in fourth line.

O, how I faint when 1 of you do write, Knowing a better spirit doth use your name.

S. 80, 1. 1.

This looks like a verbal allusion to the name.

Your name from hence immortal life shall have.

S. 81, 1. 5.

Significant in that the group of Sonnets 78 to 82 may contain several verbal allusions to the name Hews.

The dedicated words which writers use.

S. 82, 1. 3. Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hew. L. 5.

And their gross painting might be better used Where cheeks need blood, in thee it is abused.

L. 13.

S. 84 : Another sonnet on the theme " you are you," like S. 13.

In my tongue Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell.

S. 89, 1. 9.

The name, whatever it Was, haunted Shake- speare.

How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame

Which, like a canker in the fragrant Rose, Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name !

Naming thy name blesses an ill report. L. 8.

Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege ; The hardest knife ill used doth lose his edge.

L. 13.

"Rose" has a capital in the original text. See note on S. 1 on the rose as the emblem, and possible pet-name, of the friend. The last line seems rather an

awkward one unless it is introduced in order to bring in a verbal allusion to the friend's name.

Different flowers in odour and in hew.

O QQ -I n

Nor did I wonder at the Lily's white, Nor praise the deep vermilion in the Rose;

They were but sweet, but figures of delight, Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.

Yet seemed it winter still, and. you away,

As with your shadow, I with these did play.

L. 9.

The fact that several Words already noted

as allusive are found in close proximity

may be significant.

S. 99, 1. 8 : " Roses," not significant.

Sonnets 100 to 126 are probably con- siderably later in date than the others addressed to the friend. They contain few possible allusions to his name.

Your sweet hew. S. 104, 1. 11.

S. 108 : This Sonnet contains distinct allusions to the fact that the friend's beauty had begun to fade : So that eternal love in love's fresh case

Weighs not the dust and injury of age, Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place,

But makes antiquity for aye its page ; Finding the first conceit of love there bred, When time and outward form would show it dead.

L.9. " Outward form " is equivalent to " hew."

S. 109 was, perhaps, written in a fit of remorse for the preceding one : For nothing this wide Universe I call Save thou, my Rose, in it thou art my all. L. 13. See note on S. 1 on the rose as the emblem, and possible pet -name, of the friend! " Rose " has a capital in the Quarto.

S. 113: This Sonnet contains no verbal allusions, but in meaning is simply a varia- tion on the old text,

A man in hew, all Hews in his controlling. Every figure which Shakespeare's imagi- nation can conjure up turns itself to the image of the friend.

The Sonnets mainly concerned with, or addressed to, the Dark Woman begin from No. 127. They are probably rather early in date. As Wyndham remarks, Sonnets 133 to 144, dealing with the friend's intrigue with the mistress, form a counterpart to the group S. 33 to 42, evidently written on the same theme and at the same time.

S. 130, 1. 5 : " Roses," not significant.

S. 133, 1. 12 * " use," not significant, except that this is the first Sonnet of this series in which the figure of the friend comes on the scene.