With Fleay, in 1874, began the scientific analysis of the problem, based upon metrical tests as derived from the investigation of the individual verse of Fletcher, Massinger, and Beaumont. His method has been elaborated, corrected, and supplemented by additional rhetorical and literary tests, on the part of various critics, some of whom are mentioned below.[147] The more detailed studies in metre and style are by R. Boyle, G. C. Macaulay, and E. H. Oliphant; and the best brief comparative view of their conclusions as regards Beaumont's contribution is to be found in R. M. Alden's edition of _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_ and _A King and No King_. To the chronology of the plays serviceable introductions are afforded by Macaulay in the list appended to his chapter in the sixth volume of the _Cambridge History of English Literature_, and by A. H. Thorndike in his _Influence of Beaumont and Fletcher upon Shakespeare_.
Concerning the authorship of the successive scenes in a few of the plays undoubtedly written in partnership by Beaumont and Fletcher a consensus of opinion has practically been reached. Concerning others, especially those in which a third or fourth hand may be traced, the difference of opinion is still bewildering. This divergence is due, perhaps, to the proneness of the critic to emphasize one or more tests out of relation to the rest, or to forget that though individual scenes were undertaken now by one, now by the other of the colleagues, the play as a whole would be usually planned by both, but any individual scene or passage revised by either. The tests of external evidence have of course been applied by all critics, but as to events and dates there is still variety of opinion. Of the internal criteria, those based upon the peculiarities of each partner in respect of versification have been so carefully studied and applied that to repeat the operation seems like threshing very ancient straw; but to accept the winnowings of others, however careful, is unsatisfactory. Tests of rhetorical habit and tectonic preference have also been, in general, attempted; but not, I think, exhaustively. And, though much has been established, and availed of, in analysis, there remains yet something to desire in the application of the more subtle differentiae yielded by such preliminary methods of investigation,--what these differentiae teach us concerning the temperamental idiosyncrasies of each of the partners in scope and method of observation, in poetic imagery, in moral and emotional insight and elevation, intellectual outlook, philosophical and religious conviction.
FOOTNOTES:
[141] See G. C. Macaulay (_Camb. Hist. Eng. Lit._, VI), and other authorities as in footnote toward end of this chapter.
[142] See authorities as in footnote, below.
[143] Included "thirty years" after, among the commendatory poems in the folio of 1647; but published earlier with _Beaumont's Poems_, 1640.
[144] Miss O. L. Hatcher, _John Fletcher_, Chicago, 1905.
[145] As by Langbaine, _An Account of the English Dramatick Poets_ (1691), who acknowledges Cockayne as the only conclusive authority upon the subject.
[146] _R. E. C._, Vol. III.
[147] F. G. Fleay, in _New Shakespeare Society Transactions_, 1874; _Shakespeare Manual_, 1876; _Englische Studien_, IX (1866); _Chronicle of the English Drama_, 1891. R. Boyle, in _Engl. Stud._, V, VII, VIII, IX, X, XVII, XVIII, XXVI, XXXI (1881-1902), and in _N. Shaksp. Soc.
Trans._, 1886. G. C. Macaulay, _Francis Beaumont_, 1883; and in _Cambridge History of English Literature_, VI (1910). A. H. Bullen, article _John Fletcher_ in _Dictionary of National Biography_, XIX (1889). E. H. Oliphant, in _Engl. Stud._, XIV, XV, XVI (1890-92). A.
H. Thorndike, _The Influence of Beaumont and Fletcher on Shakespeare_, 1901; Beaumont and Fletcher's _Maid's Tragedy_, etc. (Belles Lettres Series), 1910. R. M. Alden, Beaumont's _Knight of the Burning Pestle_, etc. (Belles Lettres Series), 1910. The introductions in the _Variorum Edition_, 1904, 1905. For a general treatment of the subject see, also, A. W. Ward's _History of English Dramatic Literature_, II, 155-248 (1875), II, 642-764 (1809), and F. E. Schelling's _Elizabethan Drama_, II, 184-204, and for bibliography, 526. For general bibliography, Thorndike and Alden in Belles Lettres Series, as above; and _Camb. Hist. Eng. Lit._, VI, 488-496.
CHAPTER XVII
THE DELIMITATION OF THE FIELD
The plays contained in the first folio of Beaumont and Fletcher's _Comedies and Tragedies_, 1647, are _The Mad Lover_, _The Spanish Curate_, _The Little French Lawyer_, _The Custome of the Countrey_, _The Noble Gentleman_, _The Captaine_, _The Beggers Bush_, _The Coxcombe_, _The False One_, _The Chances_, _The Loyall Subject_, _The Lawes of Candy_, _The Lovers Progresse_, _The Island Princesse_, _The Humorous Lieutenant_, _The Nice Valour_, _The Maide in the Mill_, _The Prophetesse_, _The Tragedy of Bonduca_, _The Sea Voyage_, _The Double Marriage_, _The Pilgrim_, _The Knight of Malta_, _The Womans Prize_ or _The Tamer Tamed_, _Loves Cure_, _The Honest Mans Fortune_, _The Queene of Corinth_, _Women Pleas'd_, _A Wife for a Moneth_, _Wit at Severall Weapons_, _The Tragedy of Valentinian_, _The Faire Maide of the Inne_, _Loves Pilgrimage_, _The Maske of the Gentlemen of Grayes Inne, and the Inner Temple, at the Marriage of the Prince and Princesse Palatine of Rhene_ written by Francis Beaumont, Gentleman, _Foure Playes_ (or _Moralle Representations_) _in One_.
Of these thirty-five, which purport to be printed from "the authours originall copies," only one, as I have already said, _The Maske_, had been published before.
The second folio, entitled _Fifty Comedies and Tragedies_, 1679, contains, beside those above mentioned, eighteen others, one of which, _The Wild-Goose Chase_, had been published separately and in folio, 1652. The remaining seventeen said to be "published from the Authors'
Original Copies," are printed from the quartos. They are _The Maides Tragedy_, _Philaster_, _A King and No King_, _The Scornful Ladie_, _The Elder Brother_, _Wit Without Money_, _The Faithfull Shepheardesse_, _Rule a Wife and Have a Wife_, _Monsieur Thomas_, _Rollo_, _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_, _The Night-Walker_, _The Coronation_, _Cupids Revenge_, _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, _Thierry and Theodoret_, and _The Woman-Hater_.
In addition to these fifty-three plays, one, _The Faithful Friends_, entered on the Stationers' Registers in 1660, as by Beaumont and Fletcher, was held in manuscript until 1812, when it was purchased by Weber from "Mr. John Smith of Furnival's Inn into whose possession it came from Mr. Theobald, nephew to the editor of Shakespeare," and published.
According to the broadest possible sweep of modern opinion, the presence of Beaumont cannot by any _tour de force_ be conjectured in more than twenty-three of the fifty-four productions listed above. The twenty-three are (exclusive of _The Maske_) _The Woman-Hater_, _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_, _Cupids Revenge_, _The Scornful Ladie_, _The Maides Tragedy_, _A King and No King_, _Philaster_, _Foure Playes in One_, _Loves Cure_, _The Coxcombe_, _The Captaine_, _Thierry and Theodoret_, _The Faithful Friends_, _Wit at Severall Weapons_, _Beggers Bush_, _Loves Pilgrimage_, _The Knight of Malta_, _The Lawes of Candy_, _The Nice Valour_, _The Noble Gentleman_, _The Faire Maide of the Inne_, _Bonduca_, and _The Honest Mans Fortune_. With regard to the last twelve of these plays beginning with _Thierry and Theodoret_ there is no convincing proof that more than the first four were written before February 1613, when after preparing the _Maske_ for the Lady Elizabeth's marriage to the Elector Palatine, Beaumont seems (except for his share of _The Scornful Ladie_ which I date about 1614) to have withdrawn from dramatic activity,--perhaps because of his own marriage about that time and withdrawal to the country, or because of failing health; and there is no generally accepted historical or textual evidence that Beaumont had any hand even in these four. Of the eight remaining at the end of the list, four may be dated before Beaumont's death in 1616: _The Honest Mans Fortune_, which is said on manuscript evidence to have been played in the year 1613, but probably later than August 5;[148] _Bonduca_, which Oliphant asserts is an alteration by Fletcher of an old drama of Beaumont's, but which other authorities assign to Fletcher alone; and, on slighter evidence, _Loves Pilgrimage_, and _The Nice Valour_. The balance of proof with regard to the other four, _The Knight of Malta_, _The Lawes of Candy_, _The Noble Gentleman_, and _The Faire Maide of the Inne_, is altogether in favour of their composition after Beaumont's death.
In each of these twelve plays, however, beginning with _Thierry_ and ending with _The Honest Mans Fortune_, an occasional expert thinks that he finds a speech or a scene in Beaumont's style, and concludes that the play in its present form is a revision of some early effort in which that dramatist had a hand. But where one critic surmises Beaumont, another detects Beaumont's imitators; and where one conjectures Fletcher and Beaumont conjoined, half a dozen assert Fletcher, assisted, or revised by anywhere from one to four contemporaries,--Field or Daborne or Massinger, Middleton or Rowley, or First and Second Unknown. I have examined these plays and the evidence, as carefully as I have those which have more claim to consideration among the Beaumont possibilities, and have applied to them all the tests which I shall presently describe; and have come to the conclusion that Beaumont had nothing to do with any of the twelve.
There remain, then, of the twenty-three plays enumerated above as Beaumont-Fletcher possibilities, only eleven of which I can, on the basis of external or internal evidence, or both, safely say that they were composed before Beaumont ceased writing for the stage, and that he had, or may have had, a hand in writing some of them. These are, in the order of their first appearance in print: _The Woman-Hater_, published without name of author in 1607; _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_, also anonymous, published in 1613; _Cupids Revenge_, published as Fletcher's in 1615; _The Scornful Ladie_, published in 1616, as Beaumont and Fletcher's, just after the death of the former; _The Maides Tragedy_, published, without names of authors, in 1619; _A King and No King_, published as Beaumont and Fletcher's in 1619; _Philaster_, published as Beaumont and Fletcher's in 1620; and _Foure Playes in One_, _Loves Cure_, _The Coxcombe_, and _The Captaine_, first published in the 1647 folio, without ascription of authorship on the title-page, but as of the "Comedies and Tragedies written by Beaumont and Fletcher," in general.
In the case of _Loves Cure_ the Epilogue mentions "our Author"; the Prologue, spoken "at the reviving of this play," attributes it to Beaumont and Fletcher. As for _The Coxcombe_, the Prologue for a revival speaks of "the makers that confest it for their own."
It is worthy of notice that three only of these eleven possible "Beaumont-Fletcher" plays were printed during Beaumont's lifetime,--_The Woman-Hater_, _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_ and _Cupids Revenge_, and that on none of them does Beaumont's name appear as author. The last indeed was ascribed, wrongly, as I shall later show, to Fletcher alone.
It should also be noted that four other of the plays, beginning with _The Scornful Ladie_ and ending with _Philaster_, were published before the death of Fletcher in 1625; and that while three of them have title-page ascriptions to both authors, one, _The Maides Tragedy_, is anonymous.
To these eleven plays as a residuum I have given the preference in the application of tests deemed most likely to reveal the relative contribution and genius of the authors in partnership. Beside the seven published as stated above during Fletcher's life, two others appeared which I do not include in this residuum,--_The Faithfull Shepheardesse_ and _Thierry and Theodoret_. The former, printed between December 22, 1608 and July 20, 1609, is of Fletcher's sole authorship, and will be employed as one of the clues to his early characteristics. The latter, attributed by some critics to both authors was published without ascription of authorship in a quarto of 1621. It does not appear in the folio of 1647, but was printed in second quarto as "by John Fletcher" in 1648, and again as "by F. Beaumont and J. Fletcher" in 1649; and was finally gathered up with the _Comedies and Tragedies_ which compose the folio of 1679. Oliphant and Thorndike are of opinion that the play is a revision by Massinger of an original by Beaumont and Fletcher, but I cannot discover in the text evidence sufficient to warrant its inclusion in the list of plays worthy to be investigated as the possible product of the partnership.
The eleven Beaumont-Fletcher plays to which the criteria of internal evidence may be applied with some assurance of success, comprise in their number, fortunately for us, three of which we are informed by external evidence,--the contemporary testimony of John Earle, dated 1616-1617,--that Beaumont was concerned in their composition. These three, _Philaster_, _The Maides Tragedy_, and _A King and No King_, are a positive residuum to which as a model of the joint-work of our authors we may first, in the effort to discriminate their respective functions when working in partnership, apply the tests of style derived from a study of the plays and poems which each wrote alone.
With this delimitation of the field of inquiry, we are now ready for the consideration of the criteria by which the presence of either author may be detected. The criteria are primarily of versification; then, successively and cumulatively, of diction and mental habit. Ultimately, and by induction, they are of dramatic technique and creative genius.
FOOTNOTES:
[148] See Fleay, _Chron. Eng. Dram._, I, 195; and W. W. Greg, _Henslowe Papers_, 90.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE VERSIFICATION OF FLETCHER AND OF BEAUMONT
I. In Plays Individually Composed.
The studies of the most experienced critics into the peculiarities of Fletcher's blank verse as displayed in productions of the popular dramatic kind, indubitably written by him alone,[149] such as _Monsieur Thomas_ of the earlier period, ending 1613, _The Chances_, _The Loyall Subject_, and _The Humorous Lieutenant_ of the middle period, ending 1619, and _Rule a Wife and Have a Wife_ of his latest period, indicate that he indulges in an excessive use of double endings, sometimes as many as seventy in every hundred lines, even in triple and quadruple endings; in an abundance of trisyllabic feet; and in a peculiar retention of the old end-stopped line, or final pause,--occasionally in as many as ninety out of a hundred lines. Attention has been directed also to the emphasis which he deliberately places upon the extra syllable of the blank verse, making it a substantive rather than a negligible factor: as in the "brains" and "too" of the following:
Or wander after that they know not where To find? or, if found how to enjoy? Are men's brains Made nowadays of malt, that their affections Are never sober, but, like drunken people Founder at every new fame? I do believe, too, That men in love are ever drunk, as drunken men Are ever loving,--[150]
and to his fondness for appending words such as "first," "then,"
"there," "still," "sir," and even "lady" and "gentlemen" to lines which already possess their five feet. It has also been remarked that he makes but infrequent employment of rhyme.
Of this metrical style examples will be found on pages in Chapter XIX, Section 2, below; or on any page of Fletcher's _Rule a Wife and Have a Wife_, as for instance the following from Act III, Scene 1, 14-23:
_Altea._ My life , an in nocent !
_Marg._ That's it I aim at, That's it I hope too; then I am sure I rule him; 15 For in nocents are like obe dient chil dren Brought up under a hard [+!] moth er-in-law , a cru el, Who be ing not us'd to break fasts and colla tions, [+!] When they have coarse bread of fer'd 'em are thank full, And take it for a fa vour too . Are the rooms 20 Made read y to en tertain my friends ? I long to dance now, [+!] And to be wan ton. Let me have a song.
Is the great couch up the Duke of Medi na sent?
[Illustration: JOHN EARLE, BISHOP OF WORCESTER AND SALISBURY From the portrait in the National Portrait Gallery]
Here the first half of v. 14 is also the last of the preceding line; seven out of ten verses have double endings; one has a triple ending.
One, v. 21, has a quadruple ending; unless we rearrange by adding "made ready" to v. 20, so as to scan:
And take 't for a fa vour too . Are the rooms made read y To en tertain my friends ? I long to dance now.--
Trisyllabic feet occur in nine; final pauses in nine; stress-syllable openings and compensating anapaests in two; the feminine caesura (phrasal pause within the foot) in two. The pause in v. 15, after two strong monosyllables of which the first is stressed, produces a jolt, typically Fletcherian.
Now, these peculiarities of versification are not a habit acquired by Fletcher after Beaumont ceased to write with him. They are rife not only in the plays of his middle and later periods, but in those of the earlier period while Beaumont was still at his side. As for instance in _Monsieur Thomas_, entirely Fletcher's of 1607, or at the latest 1611.
The reader may be interested to verify for himself by scanning the following passage from Act IV, 2 at which I open at random: Launcelot is speaking:
But to the silent streets we turn'd our furies: A sleeping watchman here we stole the shooes from, There made a noise, at which he wakes, and follows: The streets are durty, takes a Queen-hithe cold, Hard cheese, and that choaks him o' Munday next: Windows and signs we sent to Erebus; A crew of bawling curs we entertain'd last, When having let the pigs loose in out parishes, O, the brave cry we made as high as Algate!
Down comes a Constable, and the Sow his Sister Most traiterously tramples upon Authority: There a whole stand of rug gowns rowted mainly, And the King's peace put to flight, a purblind pig here Runs me his head into the Admirable Lanthorn,-- Out goes the light and all turns to confusion.