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are the ſubject of his play, happened at Verona in 1591, at the very moment that a dramatick repreſentation of them was exhibiting in London: (for if Romeo and Juliet was written in 1591, it probably was then alſo repreſented.) The paſſage quoted ſtrikes me, as only diſplaying one of thoſe characteriſtical traits, which diſtinguiſh old people of the lower claſs; who delight in enumerating a multitude of minute circumſtances that have no relation to the buſineſs immediately under their conſideration[1], and are particularly fond of computing time from extraordinary events, ſuch as battles, comets, plagues, and earthquakes. This feature of their character our author has in various places, ſtrongly marked. Thus (to mention one of many inſtances) the Grave-digger in Hamlet ſays, that he came to his employment, “ of all the days i'th'year, that day that the laſt king o’ercame Fortinbras—that very day that young Hamlet was born.”—Shakſpeare probably remembered the earth-quake in 1580, and thought he might introduce one, for the nonce, at Mantua. Why he has placed this earthquake at the diſtance of eleven years, it is not very eaſy to determine. However, it may be obſerved, that having ſuppoſed it to have happened on the day on which Juliet was weaned, he could not well have made it more diſtant than thirteen years; which, indeed, from the context, ſhould ſeem to be the true reading. Suppoſing the author to have uſed figures, the miſtake might eaſily have happened.—At preſent there is a manifeſt contradiction in the Nurſe’s account; for ſhe expreſsly ſays that Juliet was within a fortnight and odd days of completing fourteenth year; and yet, according to the computation here made, ſhe could not well be much more than twelve years old. Perhaps Shakſpeare was more careful to mark the garrulity, than the preciſion, of the old woman—or perhaps, he meant this very incorrectneſs as a trait of her character:—or, without having recourſe to either of theſe ſuppoſitions, ſhall we ſay, that our author was here, as in ſome other places, haſty and inattentive? It is certain
- ↑ Thus Mrs. Quickly in K. Henry IV. reminds Falſtaff, that he “ ſwore on a parcel-gilt goblet, to marry her, fitting in her Dolphin chamber, at a round table, by a ſea-coal fire, on Wedneſday in Whitſun-week, when the prince broke his head for likening his father to a ſinging man of Windſor.”
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