nd he was in
love.

In the musicians scene, in Romeo and Juliet, Act IV. Scene V. we find--

_Musician._ Pray you put up your dagger, and put out your wit.

_Peter._ Then have at you with my wit. I will dry beat you with my
iron wit, and put up my iron dagger. Answer me like:

When griping grief the heart doth wound,
And doleful dumps the mind oppress,
Then music with her silver sound--

Why _silver_ sound? Why music with her silver sound? What say you,
Simon Catling?

_First Mins._ Marry, Sir, because silver hath a sweet sound.

_Peter._ Pretty. What say you, Hugh Rebeck?

_Sec. Mins._ I say "silver sound," because musicians sound for
silver.

_Peter._ Pretty, too! What say you, James Soundpost?

_Third Mins._ Faith! I know not what to say.

_Peter._ O! I cry for mercy; you are the singer; I will say for
you. It is music with her silver sound, because musicians have no
gold for sounding.

We may here observe that the puns of Shakespeare are never of the
"atrocious" class; there is always something to back them up, and give
them a shadow of probability. The tournaments of humour which he is fond
of introducing, although good in effect upon the stage, are not
favourable for any keen wit. Such conflicts must be kept up by artifice,
cannot flow from natural suggestion, and degenerate into a mere
splintering of words. One cause of the absence of "salt" in his writings
is that he was not of a censorious or cynical spirit; another was that
his turn of mind was rather sentimental than gay. Shakespeare evidently
knew there might be humour among men of attainments, for he writes,--

"None are so surely caught, when they are catched,
As wit turned fool; folly is wisdom hatched,
Hath wisdom's warrant and the help of school
And wits' own grace to grace a learned fool."

But with him, those who indulge in it are clowns, simpletons, and
profligates. Few of his grand characters are witty. Perhaps he was
conscious of the great difficulty there would be in finding suitable
sayings for them. Indelicacy and hostility would have to be alike
avoided, and thus when the sage Gonzalo is to be amusing, he sketches a
Utopian state of things, which he would introduce were he King of the
island on which they are cast. He would surpass the golden age.
Sebastian and Antonio laugh at him, and cry "God save the King," Alonzo
replies "Prythee,