Folk-lore of Shakespeare Part 77

The tolling of bells at funerals is referred to in "Hamlet" (v. 1), where the priest says of Ophelia:

"she is allow'd her virgin crants, Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home Of bell and burial."

It has been a current opinion for centuries that places of burial are haunted with spectres and apparitions-a notion, indeed, that prevailed as far back as the times of heathenism. Ovid speaks of ghosts coming out of their sepulchres and wandering about: and Vergil, quoting the popular opinion of his time, tells us how Moeris could call the ghosts out of their sepulchres ("Bucol." viii. 98):

"Moerim, saepe animas imis excire sepulchris, Atque satas alio vidi traducere messis."

Indeed, the idea of the ghost remaining near the corpse is of world-wide prevalence; and as Mr. Tylor[748] points out, "through all the changes of religious thought from first to last, in the course of human history, the hovering ghosts of the dead make the midnight burial-ground a place where men's flesh creeps with terror." In "A Midsummer-Night's Dream"

(v. 1), Puck declares:

"Now it is the time of night, That the graves, all gaping wide, Every one lets forth his sprite, In the church-way paths to glide."

[748] "Primitive Culture," vol. ii. p. 30.

In the same play, too (iii. 2), Puck, speaking of "Aurora's harbinger,"

says:

"At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there, Troop home to churchyards: d.a.m.ned spirits all, That in cross-ways and floods have burial, Already to their wormy beds are gone; For fear lest day should look their shames upon."

In this pa.s.sage two curious superst.i.tions are described; the ghosts of self-murderers, who are buried in cross-roads, and of those who have been drowned at sea, being said to wander for a hundred years, owing to the rites of sepulture having never been properly bestowed on their bodies.

We may further compare Hamlet's words (iii. 2):

"'Tis now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and h.e.l.l itself breathes out Contagion to this world."

From the earliest period much importance has been attached to the position of the grave, the popular direction being from east to west, that from north to south being regarded as not only dishonorable, but unlucky. Thus, in "Cymbeline" (iv. 2), Guiderius, when arranging about the apparently dead body of Imogen, disguised in man's apparel, says:

"Nay, Cadwal, we must lay his head to the east; My father had a reason for't."

Indeed, the famous antiquary Hearne had such precise views in this matter that he left orders for his grave to be made straight by a compa.s.s, due east and west. This custom was practised by the ancient Greeks, and thus, as Mr. Tylor points out,[749] it is not to late and isolated fancy, but to the carrying on of ancient and widespread solar ideas, that we trace the well-known legend that the body of Christ was laid with the head towards the west, thus looking eastward, and the Christian usage of digging graves east and west, which prevailed through mediaeval times, and is not yet forgotten. The rule of laying the head to the west, and its meaning that the dead shall rise looking towards the east, are perfectly stated in the following pa.s.sage from an ecclesiastical treatise of the 16th century:[750] "Debet autem quis sic sepeliri ut capite ad occidentem posito, pedes dirigat ad Orientem, in quo quasi ipsa positione orat: et innuit quod promptus est, ut de occasu festinet ad ortum: de mundo ad seculum."[751]

[749] "Primitive Culture," 1873, vol. ii. p. 423.

[750] Durandus, "De Officio Mortuorum," lib. vii. chap. 35-39.

[751] Dr. Johnson thought the words of the clown in "Hamlet"

(v. 1), "make her grave straight," meant, "make her grave from east to west, in a direct line parallel to the church." This interpretation seems improbable, as the word straight in the sense of immediately occurs frequently in Shakespeare's plays.

Within old monuments and receptacles for the dead perpetual lamps were supposed to be lighted up, an allusion to which is made by Pericles (iii. 1), who, deploring the untimely death of Thaisa at sea, and the superst.i.tious demand made by the sailors that her corpse should be thrown overboard, says:

"Nor have I time To give thee hallow'd to thy grave, but straight Must cast thee, scarcely coffin'd, in the ooze; Where, for a monument upon thy bones, And aye-remaining lamps, the belching whale And humming water must o'erwhelm thy corpse, Lying with simple sh.e.l.ls."

Again, in "Troilus and Cressida" (iii. 2), we find a further reference in the words of Troilus:

"O, that I thought it could be in a woman, To feed for aye her lamp and flames of love."

Pope, too, in his "Eloisa to Abelard," has a similar allusion (l. 261, 262):

"Ah, hopeless lasting flames, like those that burn To light the dead, and warm th' unfruitful urn!"

D'Israeli, in his "Curiosities of Literature," thus explains this superst.i.tion: "It has happened frequently that inquisitive men, examining with a flambeau ancient sepulchres which have just been opened, the fat and gross vapors engendered by the corruption of dead bodies kindled as the flambeau approached them, to the great astonishment of the spectators, who frequently cried out 'A miracle!'

This sudden inflammation, although very natural, has given room to believe that these flames proceeded from _perpetual lamps_, which some have thought were placed in the tombs of the ancients, and which, they said, were extinguished at the moment that these tombs opened, and were penetrated by the exterior air." Mr. Dennis, however, in his "Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria" (1878, vol. ii. p. 404), says that the use of sepulchral lamps by the ancients is well known, and gave rise to the above superst.i.tion. Sometimes lamps were kept burning in sepulchres long after the interment, as in the case of the Ephesian widow described by Petronius ("Satyr," c. 13), who replaced the lamp placed in her husband's tomb.

A common expression formerly applied to the dead occurs in the "Winter's Tale" (v. 1), where Dion asks:

"What were more holy, Than to rejoice the former queen is well?"

So in "Antony and Cleopatra" (ii. 5):

"_Messenger._ First, madam, he is well.

_Cleopatra._ Why, there's more gold.

But, sirrah, mark, we use To say, the dead are well."[752]

[752] See Malone's note, Variorum edition, xiv. 400.

Lastly, commentators have differed as to the meaning of the words of Julia in the "Two Gentlemen of Verona" (i. 2):

"I see you have a month's mind to them."

Douce says she refers to the mind or remembrance days of our popish ancestors; persons in their wills having often directed that in a month, or at some other specific time, some solemn office, as a ma.s.s or a dirge, should be performed for the repose of their souls. Thus Ray quotes a proverb: "To have a month's mind to a thing," and mentions the above custom. For a further and not improbable solution of this difficulty, the reader may consult Dyce's "Glossary" (p. 277).

CHAPTER XV.

RINGS AND PRECIOUS STONES.

From a very early period, rings and precious stones have held a prominent place in the traditionary lore, customs, and superst.i.tions of most nations. Thus, rings have been supposed "to protect from evil fascinations of every kind, against the evil eye, the influence of demons, and dangers of every possible character: though it was not simply in the rings themselves that the supposed virtues existed, but in the materials of which they were composed-in some particular precious stones that were set in them as charms or talismans, in some device or inscription on the stone, or some magical letters engraved on the circ.u.mference of the ring."[753] Rings, too, in days gone by, had a symbolical importance. Thus, it was anciently the custom for every monarch to have a ring, the temporary possession of which invested the holder with the same authority as the owner himself could exercise.

Thus, in "Henry VIII." (v. 1), we have the king's ring given to Cranmer, and presented by him (sc. 2), as a security against the machinations of Gardiner and others of the council, who were plotting to destroy him.

Thus the king says:

"If entreaties Will render you no remedy, this ring Deliver them, and your appeal to us There make before them."

[753] Jones's "Finger-Ring Lore," 1877, p. 91.

This custom, too, was not confined to royalty, for in "Richard II." (ii.

2), the Duke of York gives this order to his servant:

"Sirrah, get thee to Plashy, to my sister Gloster; Bid her send me presently a thousand pound:- Hold, take my ring."

There is an interesting relic of the same custom still kept up at Winchester College.[754] When the captain of the school pet.i.tions the head-master for a holiday, and obtains it, he receives from him a ring, in token of the indulgence granted, which he wears during the holiday, and returns to the head-master when it is over. The inscription upon the ring was, formerly, "Potentiam fero, geroque." It is now "Commendat rarior usus" (Juvenal, "Sat." xi. 208).

[754] Wordsworth's "Shakespeare and the Bible," 1880, p. 283.

_Token Rings_ date from very early times. Edward I., in 1297, presented Margaret, his fourth daughter, with a golden pyx, in which he deposited a ring, as a token of his unfailing love.