THE Retrospective Review. NEW SERIES. VOL. II.-Part I. A pleasant Comedie, called Summer's last Will and Testament; written by Thomas Nash. Imprinted at London, by Simon Stafford, for Walter Burre. 1600. The Countrie Girle. A Comedie, as it hath beene often acted with much Applause. Never printed before. By T. B. London, printed for A. R. 1647. OUR articles on the early English Drama, contained in a former part of this work, though making more than one allusion to Thomas Nash, do not contain any account of the only dramatic production which that celebrated wit wrote without assistance, nor of that which he wrote in conjunction with Marlowe. The reason of this omission was their excessive rarity, which, at the time, precluded our getting access to them. That industrious labourer in the fields of dramatic literature, Langbaine, although living so much nearer the time of their publication, could never procure a sight of either of them. The omission, however, we are now enabled to supply, and shall, therefore, proceed to give an account of" Summer's last Will and Testament," written by Nash alone; and we shall also slightly touch on the other play, "Dido, Queen of Carthage," which has lately been reprinted from one of the two old copies which are alone known to exist. Nash was born in the town of Leostoff, or Lowestoft, a small sea-port on the coast of Suffolk, about the year 1564, and became a student of St. John's College, Cambridge, where he remained seven years. He was chiefly distinguished for the active part he took in the literary warfare between the Puritans VOL. II.-PART I. B and the Episcopalians. Nash took the side of the establishment, and attacked Martin Mar-prelate (the name by which the Puritans were designated), with such power of ridicule and invective, that he was chiefly instrumental in silencing him. He also engaged in a bitter conflict with Gabriel Harvey, which was carried to such a pitch of violence, that the Archbishop of Canterbury issued an order, "that all Nash's books and Harvey's books be taken wheresoever they may be found, and that none of the said books be ever printed hereafter." Nash was, like most of the wits of his time, poor: he gives a very miserable account of himself on this head, in a passage in his" Pierce Pennilesse, his Supplication to the Devil," quoted in one of the articles before referred to; and in the same work he sues for a patron, in a strain which appears to be wrung from him by the hard gripe of poverty. The passage is so curious and characteristic, and part of it is penned with such beauty of expression, that we are tempted to quote it. "Gentles," says he, addressing the Public," it is not your lay Chronigraphers, that write of nothing but Mayors and Sheriffs, and the dear year, and the great frost, that can endow your names with never-dated glory; for they want the wings of choice words to fly to heaven, which we have: they cannot sweeten a discourse, or wrest admiration from men reading, as we can, reporting the meanest accident. Poetry is the honey of all flowers, the quintessence of all sciences, the marrow of all wits, and the very phrase of angels: how much better is it, then, to have an elegant lawyer to plead one's cause, than a strutting townsman that looseth himself in his tale, and doth nothing but make legs. So much it is better for a nobleman or gentleman to have his honour's story related, and his deeds emblazon'd by a poet, than a citizen."-" For my part, I do challenge no praise of learning to myself; yet have I worn a gown in the university: but this I dare presume, that if any Mecænas bind me to him by his bounty, or extend some sound liberality to me worth the speaking of, I will do him as much honour as any poet of my beardless years shall in England. Not that I am so confident what I can do, but that I attribute so much to my thankful mind above others, which, I am persuaded, would enable me to work miracles. On the contrary side, if I be evil intreated, or sent away with a flea in my ear, let him look that I will rail on him soundly: not for an hour or a day, while the injury is fresh in my memory, but in some elaborate polished poem, which I will leave to the world when I am dead, to be a living image to all ages, of his beggarly parsimony and ignoble illiberality: and let him not (whatsoever he be) measure the weight of my words by this book, where I write quicquid in buccam veneret, as fast as my hand can trot; but I have terms (if I be vext) laid in steep in aquafortis and gun powder, that shall rattle through the skies, and make an earthquake in a peasant's ears." Nash enjoyed great reputation amongst the poets of the time, and is much commended by them. His various literary labours, however, brought him neither wealth nor contentment. "I am grown," he says, "at length to see into the vanity of the world more than ever I did, and now I condemn myself for nothing so much as playing the dolt in print." He died in the year 1600 or 1601. "Summer's last Will and Testament," of which we propose to give an account in this article, is a singular production. It is between a pageant and a play, has not sufficient of spectacle for the former, nor of dialogue for the latter, and is spoiled for both. Written by an accomplished scholar, it is remarkably destitute of art, or contrivance, or design: it is the offspring of whim, the bantling of a mad wit, with a patrimony of most prodigal tongue. To adopt his own apology for it-"Wit hath his dregs as well as wine; words their waste; ink his blots." Nash occasionally wrote in a figurative, nay, poetical vein in his prose, but seldom in his verse. In the production before us, we meet not with poetical descriptions of the seasons, as might have been expected, with the beauties of summer, or the terrors of winter: Flora scatters not her flowers, nor Pomona her fruits. The author's almost irrepressible tendency is to satire; if he commences with any thing of the beautiful, ten to one that it winds up with satire, or ends in vituperation. Never man possessed a greater fecundity of abuse: he was the very knight-errant of satirical invective; he possessed an armoury of bitter words, which seems inexhaustible; all of them sharpened, not polished for the fight. The war of words is his felicity, he enjoys it with rapture; and at the same time that he is the bitterest, he is one of the pleasantest of satirists. But to proceed with the "Pleasant Comedy of Summer's last Will and Testament."-The prologue is curious and characteristic of the author; it is spoken by the clown: "At a solemn feast of the Triumviri in Rome, it was seen and observed, that the birds ceased to sing, and sat solitary on the housetops, by reason of a sight of a painted serpent set openly to view. So fares it with us novices, that here betray our imperfections: we, afraid to look on the imaginary serpent of envy, painted in men's affections, have ceased to tune any music of mirth to your ears this twelvemonth, thinking, that as it is the nature of the serpent to hiss, so childhood and ignorance would play the goslings, contemning and condemming what they understood not. Their censures we weigh not, whose senses are not yet unswaddled. The little minutes will be continually striking, though no man regard them. Whelps will bark before they can see, and strive to bite before they have teeth. Politicians speak of a beast, who, while he is cut on the table, drinketh, and represents the motions and voices of a living creature. Such like foolish beasts are we, who whilst we are cut, mocked, and flouted at, in every man's common talk, will notwithstanding proceed to shame ourselves, to make sport. No man pleaseth all; we seek to please one. Didymus wrote four thousand books, or as some say, six thousand, of the art of grammar. Our author hopes, it may be as lawful for him to write a thousand lines of as light a subject. Socrates (whom the Oracle pronounced the wisest man of Greece) sometimes danced; Scipio and Lelius by the seaside played at pebble-stones. Semel infatuimus.omnes. Every man cannot, with Archimedes, make a heaven of brass, or dig gold out of the iron mines of the law. Such odd trifles, as mathematicians' experiments be, artificial flies to hang in the air by themselves, dancing balls, an egg-shell that shall climb up to the top of a speard, fiery breathing gores, Poeta noster professeth not to make. Placeat sibi quisque licebit: what's a fool but his bable? Deep reaching wits! here is no deep stream for you to angle in. Moralizers! you that wrest a never meant meaning out of every thing, applying all things to the present time, keep your attention for the common stage: for here are no quips in characters for you to read. Vain glozers, gather what you will. Spite, spell backwards, what thou canst. As the Parthians fight flying away; so will we prate and talk, but stand to nothing what we say." Summer, "Harvest and Age having whitened his green head," determines to make his last will and testament; but, in order to know what he has to bequeath, it is first necessary to summon his officers, to give an account of the wealth they were intrusted with. One of the chief interlocutors is a clown, or fool, who criticises the characters, and makes remarks on what is passing. Ver, the spring, is first summoned into court, and enters with his train, overlaid with suits of green moss, representing short grass, singing 66 Spring, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant king, Cuckow, jugge, jugge, pu we, to witta woo. The palm and may make country houses gay. Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day ; Cuckow, jugge, jugge, pu we, to witta woo. Ver being ordered to give an account of his stewardship, goes out and returns with "the hobby-horse and morris dancers, who dance about." Ver proves an unthrift, and justifies himself in the following manner : |