,
and the headstrong insolence and tyranny thence proceeding, are purged
away; so that while the latter has neither intellect nor generosity to
redeem his character, jealousy being the least of his faults, the
other has a liberal stock of both. And in Bellaria the Poet had little
more than a bare framework of incident wherein to set the noble, lofty
womanhood of Hermione,--a conception far, far above the reach of such
a mind as Greene's. In the matter of the painted statue, Shakespeare,
so far as is known, was altogether without a model, as he is without
an imitator; the boldness of the plan being indeed such as nothing but
entire success could justify, and wherein it is hardly possible to
conceive of anybody but Shakespeare's having succeeded. And yet here
it is that we are to look for the idea and formal cause of Hermione's
character, while her character, again, is the shaping and informing
power of the whole drama. For this idea is really the living centre
and organic law in and around which all the parts of the work are
vitally knit together. But, indeed, the Poet's own most original and
inimitable mode of conceiving and working out character is everywhere
dominant.

* * * * *

So much has been said about the anachronisms of this play, that it
seems needful to add a word concerning them. We have already seen that
the making of seaports and landing of ships in Bohemia were taken from
Greene. Mr. Verplanck conjectures that by Bohemia Shakespeare meant
simply the land of the Boii, an ancient people several tribes of whom
settled in the maritime parts of France: but I hardly think he would
have used the name with so much license at a time when the boundaries
of that country were so well fixed and so widely known. For the events
of the Reformation had made Bohemia an object of special interest to
the people of England, and there was much intercourse between the
English and Bohemian Courts. I have no notion indeed that this breach
of geography was a blunder: it was meant, no doubt, for the
convenience of thought; and such is its effect, until one goes to
viewing the parts of the work with reference to ends not contemplated
in the use here made of them. And the same is to be said touching
several points of chronological confusion; such as the making Whitsun
pastorals, Christian burial, Julio Romano, the Emperor of Russia, and
Puritans singing psalms to hornpipes, all contemporary with the O