Hamlet's hysterical outburst at the conclusion of the play-scene. In this, some actors use the words peacock, and others pajock, signifying toad. But our critic throws a new light upon the passage which may commend itself to some realistic Hamlet of the future. The word in dispute was, says Leo, really "hiccup," which was intended as a stage direction. Our genial critic argues that Hamlet intended to call the King an ass, and ass certainly rhymes with "was.” The passage, he contends, should read thus: : "For thou dost know, oh Damon dear, Of Jove himself, and now reigns here Hamlet's indignation is apparently too deep for words the very height of tragic emotion finds expression in a hiccup! The unimaginativeness of the critic is in this case absolutely monumental. In Macbeth' we have another instance of the astounding imaginativeness of Shakespeare. The test of the greatness of a work is that it is not only great in itself, but that it is the cause of greatness in others. A very striking instance of this suggestive fecundity of the poet was told me of Mrs. Siddons in her playing the sleep-walking scene. At the words "All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand," the conscience-stricken woman sees with her mind's eye a stain upon her hand, and, raising it to her mouth, desperately sucks the imaginary blood from it, spitting it out as she does so. The daring of this piece of realism, which might strike the common-place as vulgar, was in reality a stroke of imaginative genius, and, I am told, produced an electrical effect upon the audience. In dramatic literature that work is highest which is most suggestive, which gives to the artist as to the spectator most opportunities of weaving round the work of the poet the embroidery of his own imagination. If I may instance a modern play, I should say that this quality is displayed in an eminent degree in Ibsen's latest work, The Master Builder.' We know that this play is condemned by some as a flagrant outrage of conventional form, while others dismiss it as a commonplace presentation of a commonplace theme. I must confess that, judged by Ibsen's plays, Scandinavia, in its sordid Suburbanism, seems to me an undesirable abiding-place. All the more wonderful is it that the magician should have been able to conjure up from this dank soil, which would appear congenial only to mushroom-growths, such wondrous and variegated plants. In witnessing this play we are moved by its power, we are fascinated by its originality. Few fail to feel the thud of its pulse. Each weaves his own version of its message. The master has gained his end; he has stirred the imagination of his audience; he alone remains sphinx-like, unexplained; he is the artist-wise master! In using Shakespeare as an illustration of the highest development of the imaginative artist, and in claiming for his work that impersonality which I hold to be the distinguished mark of his genius, I am far from denying that many of our greatest writers, many of our greatest painters and actors, have been those whose personality is most resonant in their work, but I say that the intrusion of that personality is not the merit of their work, but rather its limitation. No doubt a more easily won popularity is awarded by that large public which demands an exhibition of individuality rather than of characterisation, of personality rather than of impersonation; yet it is better to strive for the higher, even if we miss it, than to clutch at the lower, even if it is within easy reach. The adroit actor should be able at will to adapt his individuality to the character he is pourtraying. By the aid of his imagination, he becomes the man, and behaves unconsciously as the man would or should behave; this he does instinctively rather than from any conscious study, for what does not come spontaneously may as well not come at all. Even the physical man will appear transformed. If he imagines himself a tall man, he will appear so to the audience— how often have we not heard people exclaim that an orator appeared to grow in height as his speech became eloquent ? If the actor imagines himself a fat man, he will appear fat to the spectator. There is a kind of artistic conspiracy between the actor and his audience. It is not the outer covering, which is called the "make up," which causes this impression, it is the inner man-who talks fat, walks fat, and thinks fat. As in the planet, it is only when the internal fire ceases that the body becomes hardened and unpliable. The actor, even though he be peasant born, will be able by the power of his imagination to acquire the rare gift of distinction. He will be able, by the aid of his imagination, to become a king-that is to say, not the accidental king, who in actual life may lack dignity, but the king of our imagination. In this connection it is on record that Napoleon the First once administered a rebuke to Talma, with whom he had a dramatic affinity. The actor, it seems, in playing a Roman emperor, used violent gestures. Napoleon, criticising this exuberance, said, "Why use these unnecessary flourishes ?-When I give an order, I require nothing to enforce it-my word is enough. This is no way to behave as an emperor." The first Napoleon was a great actor-and his dramatic instinct was not the least formidable among those qualities which made him such a power in the world's history. As on the stage, so it is in real life, we are not what we are, we become what we imagine ourselves to be. A man is not always what he appears to his valet. He often finds his truest expression in his work. A great man will often appear uninteresting and commonplace in real life. Who has not felt that disappointment? The real man is to be found in his work. It is this personality which is often obliterated by his biographer-for detraction is the only tribute which mediocrity can pay to the great. This literary autopsy adds a new terror to death. A man might at least be permitted to leave his reputation to his critics, as he would leave his brains to a hospital. But I am forgetting Napoleon-he was able to imagine himself an emperor, and, circumstances conspiring with him, he became one. His enemies thought they were belittling him by calling him an actor, and the Pope, whom he hurled from the Papal throne, could only retort" Comediante"; but the comedian continued to play his part of emperor while the Pope was in exile. The artistic methods of the first Napoleon are brought into strong relief when contrasted with those of his less imaginative nephew. Indeed, the difference between the imaginative and the unimaginative actor is well exemplified in these two. Had Napoleon the Third possessed the true dramatic instinct, he would not have been guilty of the Boulogne fiasco. On that occasion, in order to impress the populace with a supernatural significance of his mission, he had recourse to the stagey device of a tame eagle, which, as the emblem of empire, was at a given cue to alight upon him. But the bird, which had been trained to perch upon his top-hat, disdained his crown. Here we have an illustration of the futility of unimaginative stage-management. The imagination is the mind's eye. To him who has it not, life presents itself as a picture possessing all the merits of a photograph, and none of the blemishes of a work of art. He who does not treasure it, will lose its use. In a burst of scientific fantasy, I once propounded the theory that the soft place on the top of a baby's head was really intended by beneficent Nature to enable us, through this yet open channel, to destroy by electricity, or what not, those tissues of the brain which go to make the vicious portions of our nature. In unfolding my discovery to a scientific friend, I learned, however, that this particular part of our brain was really a primitive eye, and was no doubt used by our prehistoric ancestors for the purpose of seeing objects overhead. The Cyclops was probably a throwback of this species. In certain lower forms of animals, I am told, in lizards, for instance, this eye is infinitely more developed than it is in the higher animals, in whom, from disuse, it has become practically extinct. Even so will the imagination, this third eye of the mind, looking heavenward, lose its function unless it is exercised. The waning of the imagination is, next to the loss of his childish faith, the most tragic thing in a man's life. I can conceive no fate more terrible than that which befalls the artist in watching with still undiminished powers of selfobservation, the slow ebbing of the imaginative faculty, to see it drifting out to sea in the twilight of life. Better be deprived of sight than to feel that the world has lost its beauty-for the blind are happier than the blear-eyed. . . . It would be interesting to know whether the cultivation of the æsthetic faculties would have strengthened or weakened in Darwin those other forces which have made him such a shining figure in the history of science. It may be that what was a loss to the man was a gain to humanity, for to every one is only vouchsafed a limited power of concentration. Nor must it be supposed that Science and Art are separate and opposing forces; they are rather two mighty 128 Mr. H. Beerbohm Tree on the Imaginative Faculty. [May 26, currents springing from one parent source. The greatest victories. which mind has achieved over matter have been due to the soaring flights of the imagination rather than to a mere crawling research along the surface of facts. This hall, where Faraday, Huxley, and Tyndall have spoken, has witnessed displays of the imagination equal to those of the highest poetry. As the diver dives for pearls into the depths of the sea, so does science project itself on the wings of the imagination into the mists which shroud the vast unexplained, snatching in its flight the secrets which solve the mysteries of the universe, and which point out to mankind the invisible steppingstones connecting the known with the unknown. It was in this hall that Professor Dewar summoned the elusive and invisible atmosphere, which since all time has enveloped the earth, and with the wand of science compelled it to appear before you in a palpable and visible form. Even so does the imagination distil from the elemental ether of thought and truth the liquid air of art. I have endeavoured to show that, just as the highest achievement of science is that which we owe to the imagination, so also is the highest achievement of art that which carries us out of the sordid surroundings of every-day life into the realms of idealised truth. Its loftiest mission is to preserve for us, amid the din and clash of life, those illusions which are its better part-to epitomise for us the aspirations of mankind, to stifle its sobs, to nurse its wounds, to requite its unrequited love, to sing its lullaby of death. It is the unwept tear of the criminal, it is the ode of the agnostic to immortality, it is the toy of childhood, the fairyland of the mature, and gilds old age with the afterglow of youth. [H. B. T.] WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, Friday, June 2, 1893. SIR DOUGLAS GALTON, K.C.B. D.C.L. LL.D. F.R.S. Vice-President, in the Chair. PROFESSOR OSBORNE REYNOLDS, M.A. LL.D. F.R.S. Study of Fluid Motion by means of Coloured Bands. In his charming story of The Purloined Letter,' Edgar Allan Poe tells how all the efforts and artifices of the Paris police to obtain possession of a certain letter, known to be in a particular room, were completely baffled for months by the simple plan of leaving the letter in an unsealed envelope in a letter-rack, and so destroying all curiosity as to its contents; and how the letter was at last found there by a young man who was not a professional member of the force. Closely analogous to this is the story I have to set before you tonight-how certain mysteries of fluid motion, which have resisted all attempts to penetrate them are at last explained by the simplest means and in the most obvious manner. This indeed is no new story in science. The method adopted by the minister, D., to secrete his letter appears to be the favourite of Nature in keeping her secrets, and the history of science teems with instances in which keys, after being long sought amongst the grander phenomena, have been found at last not hidden with care, but scattered about, almost openly, in the most commonplace incidents of every-day life which have excited no curiosity. This was the case in physical astronomy-to which I shall return after having reminded you that the motion of matter in the universe naturally divides itself into three classes. 1. The motion of bodies as a whole as a grand illustration of which we have the heavenly bodies, or more humble, but not less effective, the motion of a pendulum, or a falling body. 2. The relative motion of the different parts of the same fluid or elastic body-for the illustration of which we may go to the grand phenomena presented by the tide, the whirlwind, or the transmission of sound, but which is equally well illustrated by the oscillatory motion of the wave, as shown by the motion of its surface, and by the motion of this jelly, which, although the most homely illustration, affords by far the best illustration of the properties of an elastic solid. 3. The inter-motions of a number of bodies amongst each other -to which class belong the motions of the molecules of matter VOL. XIV. (No. 87.) K |