PATRONIZE OUR ADVERTISERS. The Teachers' Exchange OF BOSTON, 258 Washington Street, Recommends Teachers, Tutors and Schools. elephone. T. W. WHITE (Tufts '87), Manager. LATERNITY PINS AND NOVELTIES. VERWARE. IT GLASS. RT OBJECTS. SIMONS BRO. & CO., OFFICIAL FRATERNITY JEWELERS, 616 CHESTNUT ST., PHILADELPHIA. DIAMONDS. WATCHES. COLLEGE AND CLASS PINS. RINGS, PRIZES AND TROPHIES. SPECIAL DESIGNS AND ESTIMATES FURNISHED. THE TUFTONIAN. Vol. XXVI. JANUARY, 1901. No. 4 THE KINGS IN HAMLET. In all Shakespeare's plays I doubt if there is a line that has not been given every possible and impossible interpretation. There is not an opportunity for a variation of opinions that has not been made the most of by eminent critics. To compensate for the chagrin at not being able to advance a new theory, one has the consolation of knowing that some worthy man has held the same opinion before now. And it is this thought that gives me the courage to express my views on the subject of the two kings in Hamlet. ance. There are a great many, and prominent men in letters, too, who claim that Claudius, the reigning King in the play, is the exact opposite of his dead brother Hamlet, in personal appearSome actors represent him on the stage as small, physically weak, deformed, like the "mildew'd ear" young Hamlet calls him. They base their interpretation on what Hamlet says in Act 1, Scene 2, when the King and Queen have departed. In this monologue Hamlet likens his father to Hyperion, his uncle to a satyr; and a few lines farther on he says: "My father's brother, but no more like my father Than I to Hercules." Then again in the closet scene where he holds first one, then the other miniature up before his mother. "Look you now, what follows: Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear, Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes? Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed, And batten on this moor?" But do not those who interpret thus, reckon without Shakespeare? The contrast which the great dramatist wishes to make is one of mental worth, not physical perfection. The King Hamlet, we are told, was a noble, dignified king with a corresponding noble appearance. Horatio questions the ghost why he assumes. "that fair and warlike form In which the majesty of buried Denmark To make Claudius the exact opposite of his brother in physical as mental qualities would have been a resort to stage-craft where it was not necessary. A deformed king would gain the suspicion of the audience at once, wherein one of pleasing appearance would win favor and then by foul deeds betray this favor and work the audience into a climax of hatred against him. The subtleness in representing the two with a strong family resemblance and placing all the emphasis on the important difference of mental qualities, is no more than Shakespeare has given us reason to expect of him. Hamlet is the greatest of all great works, written by a tried and master hand and, as it seems, under inspiration. Shakespeare would have recoiled from presenting Claudius as deformed as much as he would shrink from making a pun were he writing today. It would be the crudest of all art that would necessitate making the Queen change her affection from an Hyperion to a Satyr if these names were intended to convey their full literal meaning. Isn't it much better to trust to Shakespeare's greatness and believe that he meant the shallow and weak-minded Queen to have been in love with the physical beauty of her husband and, unable to detect his greater beauty of character, to have changed her affection to his brother, who was like him in general cast of features? Hamlet, who is of a philosophical nature, and thus accustomed to seeking beyond the outward form, loves his father for his noble qualities of mind and keenly feels the difference between his father and his uncle. It is this difference that he is thinking of when he says— "So excellent a king; that was, to this, Even when he says the difference was as great as between himself and Hercules it is still the moral and intellectual qualities of his father and his uncle that he has in mind. When he compares the two miniatures before his mother it is the difference of character as told in their faces that he strives to make her feel, "See, what a grace was seated on this brow: Where every god did seem to set his seal, To give the world assurance of a man. This was your husband. Look you now, what follows: Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear, Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes? And batten on this moor?" In this speech Hamlet makes you feel that Claudius was a man whose countenance was always as smooth and smiling as an English moor, while the brother, the King, was a man whose noble thoughts, mountain-like in their purity and loftiness, could be read in his deep eyes, broad brow, in every line of his face; "A combination and a form indeed, Where every god did seem to set his seal, To give the world assurance of a man." And after all we can only repeat Coleridge' words once more"O heaven! words are wasted on those who feel, and to those who do not feel the exquisite judgment of Shakespeare,-what can be said?" S. M. A., 'oI. THE FENIAN RAID. He was the last customer of the day and "Monsieur" Louis, the village barber, completed the finishing touches to his person with a stubby whisk broom, and pocketed the shilling with an effusiveness which betokened a total indifference to money mat ters. The little town of Pigeon Hill lay taking its afternoon snooze, quietly cuddled between the two arms of the Green Mountain range which divides on reaching the Canadian border. There was no sign of life in the crooked street which had once served as a stage route between the then growing town of Montreal and Boston, save for the vanishing figure of a small boy far up the roadway who was chanting in a nasal key to the accompaniment of a hand-bell, that there was going to be a sheriff's sale at widow Somebody's on the following day. Just why the village was called Pigeon Hill has always been a question in the minds of the villagers, and the answer was probably buried, unspoken, long years ago in the grave of the "Oldest Inhabitant." That it may have the "Original" nest of the Dove of Peace would not in the least surprise any new-comer. The door closed behind the customer, an old gentleman with silver grey hair streaming down to his shoulders, a form that was much shrunken with rheumatism, and large knotty hands which grasped a heavy cane, the resounding thumps of which along the board walk were heard for some time after his footsteps had died away in the distant tinkle of the hand-bell. "Dat be Cap'n. Abercrombie," said Louis, as he dumped a small yellow dog out of the rocker and seated himself preparatory to filling his corn-cob. The dog, who was also taking an afternoon snooze, stretched his stubby legs in a most unconcerned way and curled himself up behind the stove. 'Twant-very-beeg-war-he be Cap'n h'of," continued Louis, intermittently in the lighting of his pipe. "But jus' sam' |