Duet
MILESTONE.
All my troubles disappear,
When the dinner-bell I hear,
Over woodland, dale, and fell,
Swinging slow with solemn swell, —
The dinner-bell! the dinner-bell!
HIPPY.
What can bid my heart-ache fly?
What can bid my head-ache die?
What can all the ills dispel,
In my morbid frame that dwell?
The dinner-bell! the dinner-bell!
BOTH.
Hark! — along the tangled ground,
Loudly floats the pleasing sound!
Sportive Fauns to Dryads tell,
’Tis the cheerful dinner-bell!
The dinner-bell! the dinner-bell! [Exeunt.]
[Enter O’FIR.]
O’FIR.
Now, my sweet mountain-tulip! — Ah! she’s off by herself. Here’s a disaster. Och! as I came along I heard the dinner-bell going: and I dare say there she is, among all the ragamuffinly doctors. I’ll just walk in, and stir up a quarrel, and carry her off in a hubbub: and if old Hippy proves obstreperous, I shall be apt to serve him as I did the Tipperary tailor.
Song
O’FIR.
A tailor called on me, and, scraping his legs,
As one morning I sate o’er my muffin and eggs,
Says he: “Here I’ve brought you a little account,
And I’ll be mighty glad to receive the amount.”
Says I: “My sweet soul,” and I shrugged up my brow,
“I don’t find it convenient to pay it just now.”
“You had better,” says he, “for your own little sake,
Or perhaps you won’t relish the measure I’ll take.
“I must have the money, so make no appeals;
Or I’ll lay you, my honey, next week, by the heels.”
Says I: “For my heels I can’t answer, I trow,
But I’ll just give you now a soft taste of my toe.”
So I kicked him down stairs, in the midst of his threats;
Which you see is a new way of paying old debts:
“Now,” says I, “you’ve just learned, without any demur,
The footing you stand on with Phelim O’Fir.”
[Enter BARBET]
BARBET.
Insufferable insolence! intolerable outrage!
O’FIR.
Who are you, my little parboiled potatoe?
BARBET.
My name is Barbet.
O’FIR.
Ah! the dog-doctor. Something’s the matter. You’ve swallowed a distemper pill.
BARBET.
No, sir. I have been insulted, grossly insulted, by an upstart physician. Swore he would not dine in my company. Said I should go to the steward’s table. — [Aside.] Here’s a man that will shoot him, if I can touch his feelings. — He has been making love to Miss Caroline.
O’FIR.
Then I’ll clap an extinguisher on the farthing rushlight of his life. I’ll put an end to his being, a period to his existence, and a termination to his days. I’ll revenge your quarrel, on one condition.
BARBET.
Name it.
O’FIR.
Let all the dogs out of the kennel, and turn them into the dining-room.
BARBET.
I will.
O’FIR.
Immediately.
BARBET.
This instant.
O’FIR.
About it, my hero! Oh! I’ll worry ’em finely [Exeunt severally.]
SCENE II. — The Dining-room.
[HIPPY, CAROLINE, MILESTONE, NARCOTIC, and WINDGALL discovered at table. CAROLINE between MILESTONE and NARCOTIC: both paying her great attention.
SHENKIN and other servants waiting. Welch harp without.]
[Enter O’FIR.]
O’FIR [advancing to the table, and filling a glass of wine.]
My best respects to all this amiable company.
HIPPY.
Give me leave to tell you, sir, this is a very unwelcome intrusion.
O’FIR.
Be quiet, half a minute. I’ve two objects in coming here: to take away my wife and pay my respects to the doctor. Doctor Narcotic, I am your most obliged and obedient humble servant. [ Pulls off NARCOTIC’s wig, and puts it in his pocket.].
NARCOTIC.
Sulphur and iron! what do you mean, you monster? [Jumping up with the table-cloth under his chin, oversets the dinner service.]
HIPPY.
Phew! here’s all hell let loose.
BARBET [without].
Cæsar! Jowler! Neptune! Pompey!
O’FIR.
Come along, my jewel!
[Takes CAROLINE’s hand. Exeunt OÍFIR and CAROLINE. Dogs run on the stage and put to flight the rest of the party]
MILESTONE.
Oh, that infernal Irishman and his pack of hell-hounds! My portfolio torn to pieces! My plan for Lord Littlebrain’s park rent into a million of atoms!
[Enter NARCOTIC.]
NARCOTIC.
Where the devil’s my wig?
[Enter BARBET.]
BARBET.
Ha! ha! ha! see what you get by sending me to the steward’s table.
NARCOTIC.
Oh, you dwarf-laurel bolus!
[Enter HIPPY.]
HIPPY.
Where’s my daughter? Where’s Dr. Narcotic? Doctor! Doctor! feel my pulse! I’m in the last stage of a galloping consumption!
[Enter WINDGALL with one skirt to his coat.]
WINDGALL.
Ruined! ruined! pocket and pocketbook carried off by a mastiff!
BARBET.
I’ll help you to that. [Gives WINDGALL the pocket-book.]
[Enter SHENKIN and LUCY.]
SHENKIN.
Please your honour, look you, Mrs. Lucy and myself have a creat inclinations to pe married.
LUCY.
Yes, your honour.
HIPPY.
Go to the devil together.
[Enter O’FIR and CAROLINE.]
O’FIR.
Give me leave, Mr. Hippy, to introduce to you Mrs. O’Fir.
HIPPY.
Oh, you disobedient vixen!
O’FIR.
Hark ye, Mr. Humphry Hippy! You gave me your daughter when I was richer than you, and when the tables turned, you wanted to take her away. I have just obtained possession of what is fairly my own, and want none of your dirty estate.
CAROLINE.
Father! won’t you forgive me?
HIPPY.
Caroline! Caroline! I can’t part with you, you jade, though you’ve disappointed my hopes of seeing you Mrs. Milestone. But I begin to suspect, I have been more in the wrong than you; so let us take hands and be friends.
O’FIR.
Now you’re old Hippy again.
MILESTONE.
Very pretty treatment this for Marmaduke Milestone, Esquire!
O’FIR.
My dear sir, I’ll give you satisfaction immediately.
MILESTONE.
Sir, I am much obliged to you: I am satisfied.
O’FIR.
And when I’ve given old Pestle his wig, I hope he’ll be satisfied.
NARCOTIC.
No, sir, I shall not be satisfied, till I have first asked our friends here, if they will give a retaining fee to the Three Doctors.
Finale
HIPPY.
Quick the dinner bring again:
O’FIR.
And uncork the old champagne.
CAROLINE & LUCY.
All dlsasters now are past:
Here we meet in peace at last.
WINDGALL & BARNET.
Let us hope, for fees, to you,
Not in vain the Doctors sue.
NARCOTIC.
All they ask, to crown their cause,
Is one dose of your applause.
CHORUS.
All they ask, to crown their cause,
&
nbsp; Is one dose of your applause.
THE END
Gl’Ingannati, or The Deceived
A COMEDY
Performed at Siena in 1531.
[Published in 1862.]
CONTENTS
PREFACE BY T. L. PEACOCK.
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.
ACT I.
ACT II.
ACT III.
ACT IV.
ACT V.
PREFACE BY T. L. PEACOCK.
MR. COLLIER, IN his Annals of the Stage, published in 1831, gives an account of a Diary, in which he found recorded a performance of Shakspeare’s Twelfth Night. “This Diary,” he says, “I was fortunate enough to meet with among the Harleian MSS. in the Museum. It was kept by an individual, whose name is nowhere given, but who seems to have been a barrister, and consequently a member of one of the Inns of Court. The dates, which are inserted with much particularity, extend from January, 1600-1, to April, 1603; and when I state, that it includes original and unpublished anecdotes of Shakspeare, Spenser, Tarleton, Ben Jonson, Marston, Sir John Davis, Sir Walter Raleigh, and others, it will not be disputed that it is a very valuable and remarkable source of information....
“The period when Shakspeare wrote his Twelfth Night, or, What You Will, has been much disputed among the commentators. Tyr- whitt was inclined to fix it in 1614, and Malone was for some years of the same opinion: but he afterwards changed the date he had adopted to 1607. Chalmers thought he found circumstances in the play to justify him in naming 1613; but what I am about to state affords a striking, and, at the same time, a rarely occurring and convincing proof, how little these conjectures merit confidence. That comedy was unquestionably written before 1602, for in February of that year it was an established play, and so much liked, that it was chosen for performance at the Reader’s Feast, on Candlemas Day, at the Inn of Court, to which the author of this Diary belonged — most likely the Middle Temple, which, at that date, was famous for its costly entertainments. After reading the following quotation, it is utterly impossible, although the name of the poet be not mentioned, to feel a moment’s doubt as to the identity of the play there described and the production of Shakspeare: —
“‘Feb. 2, 1601-2.
“‘At our feast we had a play called Twelve Night, or, What You Will, much like the Comedy of Errors, or Menechmi in Plautus, but most like and neere to that in Italian called Inganni. A good practice in it, to make the steward believe his lady widdowe was in love with him, by counterfayting a letter, as from his lady, in general termes, telling him what she liked best in him, and prescribing his gestures, inscribing his apparaile, &c., and then, when he came to practise, making him believe they took him to be mad.’
“Should the Italian comedy, called Inganni, turn up, we shall probably find in it the actual original of Twelfth Night, which it has been hitherto supposed was founded upon the story of Apollonius and Silla, in Barnabe Riche’s Farewell to Military Profession, twice printed, viz.: in 1583 and 1606.”
Riche’s Farewell was reprinted by the Shakspeare Society in 1846. The editor, after alluding to Bandello’s tale of?sicuola and Lattantio, and Belleforest’s French version of that tale, says: “It seems more likely that Riche resorted to Bandello; but it is possible that this novel was one of those which had been dramatized before Riche wrote, and if this were the case, it would establish the new and important fact, that a play on the same story as Twelfth Night, had been produced before 1581.
“Two Italian comedies, upon very similar incidents, one called Inganni, and the other Ingannati, were certainly then in existence, and may have formed the groundwork of a drama, anterior to Shakspeare, in our own language. The names given by Riche to the various personages are not those which occur in Bandello, Belleforest, or the Italian comedies: neither are they the same as any used by Shakspeare. Riche perhaps obtained them from the old English drama.”
If a play on the same subject as Twelfth Night had been produced before 1581, it could scarcely have escaped the notice of the writer of the Diary. As to the two comedies, Gl’ Inganni and Gl’ Ingannati, the latter was first in time, and claims to be strictly original.
The Ingannati was performed in Siena in 1531; the Inganni at Milan in 1547. The first has most resemblance to Twelfth Night, and was probably in the mind of the author of the Diary, though he called it Inganni. That he could make a slight mistake as to what was before him, is evident from his calling Olivia a widow.
I first became acquainted with the Inganni in the French version of Pierre de Larivey, under the title of Les Tromperies, 1611. This French comedy had become very scarce; but it has been republished in the Ancien Théâtre Français of the Bibliothèque Elzévirienne. I have since read the original in the British Museum.
The scene of the Inganni was laid in Italy. Larivey transferred it to France. I give the Italian argument.
Anselmo, a merchant of Genoa, who traded with the Levant, went on a voyage to Syria, taking with him his wife and his twin children, Fortunato and Ginevra, aged four years, whom, for the convenience of the sea passage, he dressed precisely alike, so that the girl passed for a boy. On the voyage they were captured by Corsairs. Anselmo was taken into Natolia, where he remained in slavery fourteen years. Fortunato was several times sold, but ultimately in Naples, where the scene is laid, and where he is serving Dorotea, a lady no better than she should be. The mother and Ginevra, after various adventures, were purchased, also in Naples, by Messer Massimo Caracci- oli. The mother had deemed it prudent to continue the male apparel of her daughter, and through her the brother and sister had been made known to each other. The mother had died six years previously to the opening of the comedy. Ginevra had taken the name of Roberto. Massimo has a son named Gostanzo, and a daughter named Portia. Portia is in love with the supposed Roberto, and Gostanzo with Dorotea, who returns his attachment, but her mother, Gilletta, a rapacious and tyrannical woman, forbids him the house, after she has extorted from him all the money he could dispose of. Ginevra, persecuted by the love of Portia, smuggles her brother Fortunato into the house, and, when occasion serves, substitutes him for herself. At the opening of the play, Portia is on the point of increasing the population of Naples. Ginevra is in double grief, fearing the anger of Massimo, and suffering under her own love for Gostanzo, seeing his love for Dorotea. In despair, she discovers herself to Gostanzo, who transfers his love to her, and Anselmo arrives, abundantly rich, in time to appease the wrath of Massimo, and unite Gostanzo to Ginevra, and Fortunato to Portia.
In all this, what little there is of resemblance to Twelfth Night, is taken, as will be presently seen, and not changed for the better, from the Ingannati.
Much of this comedy is borrowed, in parts closely translated, from the Asinaria of Plautus. Cleaereta, the mother; Philenium, the daughter; Argyrippus, the lover; are reproduced in Gilletta, Dorotea, and Gostanzo. So are the old physician and his wife reproductions of the old man Demaenetus, and his wife Artemona. The scenes of the Asinaria, between Cleaereta and Argyrippus, act i., scene 3; Cleaereta and Philenium, act iii., scene 1; the portion of act iii., scene 3, which is between Argyrippus and Philenium; the concluding scene, in which Artemona carries off Demaenetus from the house of Cleaereta, act v., scene 2; are copied in the Inganm, in the scenes between Gostanzo and Gilletta, act i., scene 1; between Gilletta and Dorotea, act ii., scene 2; between Gostanzo and Dorotea, act ii., scene 5; and in the concluding scene, in which the physician’s wife carries off her husband from the house of Gilletta, act v., scene 10.
There is also a captain of the Bobadil order, who is imposed on and fleeced by Gilletta and Dorotea, and afterwards, finding the house barred against him, besieges it, as Terence’s Thraso does the house of Thais, and is as easily repulsed. There are other gatherings from the Latin drama. The comedy, in short, though very entertaining, has no originality.
It seems strange that the Inganni should have remained undiscovered by Shaksperian critics: but the cause which concealed the Ingannati from thei
r researches, is somewhat curious. It appears with the title Comedia del Sacrificio degli Intronati. The Sacrifieio is a series of songs to music, in which various characters, who have suffered from “the pangs of despised love,” renounce love, and each in succession sacrifices on an altar some gift or memorial of his unkind or faithless mistress. This prelude, which has no relation whatever to the comedy, being concluded, the comedy follows, with its own proper title, Gl’ Ingannati.
There are many editions of this comedy. The earliest of which I have yet found a record, is of 1537. It is not probable that this was the fust. There were others of 1538, 1550, 1554, 1562, 1563, 1569, 1585. Four of these are in the British Museum; and one, In Venetia, without date. And it was included in collections; one, containing all the comedies of the Intronati, 1611; another, with four other comedies and notes by Ruscelli, which I find mentioned without the date. The title of an edition in my possession, is, Comedia del Saeri- Jicio de gli Intronati, Celebrato ne i giuochi d’ un Caimovale in Siena, l’Anno MDXXXI. Sotto il Sodo, dignissimo Archintronato. Di nuovo corretta e ristampata. In Venetia, appresso Francesco Ram- pazetto, MDLXII.
Gl’ Intronati, the Thunder-stricken, was an Academy in Siena, which distinguished itself at that period by dramatic productions. The Italian academies gave themselves fantastical names, I Caliginosi, I Dubbiosi, I Chimerici: The Dark, the Doubtful, the Chimerical, and so forth. Their members assumed conformable appellations. V Amor Costante, a comedy performed at Siena, before the Emperor Charles V., in 1536, is given in the title as by Signor Stordito, Intronato: Master Stunned of the Thunder-stricken. This comedy is introduced by a dialogue, between the Prologue and a Spaniard, in the course of which the Spaniard inquires —
Who is the author of the comedy? Is it the most divine Pietro Aretino?
Prologue. The author is a member of an academy, which has been in Siena many years.
Spaniard. What is the name of this academy?
Prologue. The academy of the Intronati.
Spaniard. The Intronati? The fame of this academy has spread through all parts of Spain; and its name has gone so far, that it has reached the ears of the emperor. How rejoiced should I be if I could belong to this academy! And if you would have me bound to you for the whole time of my life, place me among you.
Complete Works of Thomas Love Peacock Page 114