entially the beauty of fiery and perfect youth,
answering as much to the Greek, or Roman, or Elizabethan knight as to
the mediaeval one; whereas the definite interest in armor and dress is
opposed by Shakespere in the French (meaning to depreciate them), to the
English rude soldierliness:

"_Con._ Tut, I have the best armor in the world. Would it were day!
_Orl._ You have an excellent armor, but let my horse have his due."

And again:

"My lord constable, the armor that I saw in your tent to-night, are
those stars, or suns, upon it?"

while Henry, half proud of his poorness of array, speaks of armorial
splendor scornfully; the main idea being still of its being a gilded
show and vanity--

"Our gayness and our _gilt_ are all besmirched."

This is essentially Elizabethan. The quarterings on a knight's shield,
or the inlaying of his armor, would never have been thought of by him as
mere "gayness or gilt" in earlier days.[112] In like manner, throughout
every scale of rank or feeling, from that of the French knights down to
Falstaff's "I looked he should have sent me two-and-twenty yards of
satin, as I am true knight, and he sends me security!" care for dress is
always considered by Shakespere as contemptible; and Mrs. Quickly
distinguishes herself from a true fairy by her solicitude to scour the
_chairs of order_--and "each fair instalment, coat, and several crest;"
and the association in her mind of the flowers in the fairy rings with
the

"Sapphire, pearl, and rich embroidery,
Buckled below fair knighthood's bending knee;"

while the true fairies, in field simplicity, are only anxious to "sweep
the dust behind the door;" and

"With this field dew consecrate,
Every several chamber bless
Through this palace with sweet peace."

Note the expression "Field dew consecrate." Shakespere loved courts and
camps; but he felt that sacredness and peace were in the dew of the
Fields only.

Sec. 31. There is another respect in which he was wholly incapable of
entering into the spirit of the middle ages. He had no great art of any
kind around him in his own country, and was, consequently, just as
powerless to conceive the general influence of former art, as a man of
the most inferior calibre. Therefore it was, that I did not care to
quote his authority respecting the power of imitation, in the second
chapter of the preceding volume. If it had been needful to add his
testimony to that of Dante (gi