ACT IV. SCENES 6, 7, ACT V. SCENES 1, 2 265

as the cause of his misfortunes; but whether it be that or no, failure lies before him. Defeat or victory will alike be fatal to the man who has raised his arm against his country.

66 When, Caius, Rome is thine,

Thou art poor'st of all; then shortly art thou mine."

Act v. Scene 1 shows a further development of the plot. All Rome cannot move Coriolanus to mercy. Cominius has been repelled. The tribunes dare not go for very shame; Menenius will not make the attempt. But while Shakespeare lays stress upon the degradation which the tribunes have brought on their city by thinking the supplying of "cheap coals" to be the only duty of a statesman, he does not fail to call attention to the want of balance of Coriolanus, even in his revenge. It was the part of divine mercy to spare a city for the sake of five righteous inhabitants. Yet Coriolanus will not spare the city, even for the sake of wife, mother, and child.

A journey of Menenius to the Volscian camp is the only suggestion that the tribunes can offer. Surely the subtle tongue which so often has turned the rabble can do the same with Coriolanus. If he will not do it for their sake, will he not do it for Rome? This appeal to his patriotism sets Menenius afoot. He will go; and haply, former failures have been due to a want of address in speech, and to an inopportuneness in the time of entreaty. He himself will do better. But he fails (Act v. Scene 2). Coriolanus, with a certain

nobility of perverseness, repels his entreaties, and setting his sense of honour to his allies against the claims of ancient friendship, vows that "another word he will not hear him speak." Even the Volscians are amazed at the tenacity of his resolution (Act v. Scene 3). But the strain is terrible. Coriolanus himself feels that another such scene must undo him. Henceforth he will receive no embassies. But ere he can give effect to this resolution, another train of suppliants are at his knees. His wife comes foremost; then his mother, leading his only child. To steel himself for the trial Coriolanus makes a supreme effort. Nature herself has risen up against him, but he will

66 never

Be such a gosling to obey instinct; but stand

As if a man were author of himself,

And knew no other kin."

But can he? That is the question Shakespeare sets himself to answer. And he answers-No. Coriolanus, like Lear, is a man who "hath ever but slenderly known himself," and he is as wrong now as ever. From the moment when Coriolanus so far forgets himself as to impress a kiss upon his wife's lips, it is plain that his capitulation to nature is only a question of time, and from that moment Coriolanus's better man seems to recover itself. He showed himself more noble than before, when he was driven into exile. He was at his worst when he allowed his passion to drive him to

allows

treachery. He is at his greatest when he nature and patriotism to resume their sway. greater in his yielding than he was in his tenacity.

He is

But even here his judgment failed him. Between the two camps there was no half-way house. His position was one in which compromise was for once impossible. He must either be wholly Roman or wholly Volsce.

To lead the Volscians to the very brink of success and then to call them off their prey might be possible for a countryman; for a political exile it was out of the question. Even though submitted to for a moment, a charge of treachery must inevitably follow upon such tergiversation. Nor does Shakespeare omit (in Act v. Scenes 4 and 5) to bring this out. In a rapture of gratitude, the Romans have wholly forgotten their resentment. Even the tribunes own their folly, and for once place a true estimate on their own value. All that is wanted is the presence of Coriolanus, to make him the most popular and the most powerful man in the State.

But he is not there. /He has turned his back upon the city of his birth, which now longed for him, and was returning with the disappointed Volsces, who must inevitably come to hate him. The truth of the situation is perfectly obvious to the cunning Aufidius. Envy, disappointment, revenge-all spur him on. He will strike at his rival ere the real value of the peace which Coriolanus brings with him can have time to weigh with the people. And Aufidius carries his plot

X

to a successful conclusion. Coriolanus, angered as against the tribunes, loses his control over himself. The populace of Antium, as fickle as those of Rome, turn against him. He has, in truth, placed himself in the lists to fight single against nature, and he perishes. Yet even in his death he is grander than he who takes his life. No one who reads the last scene would take Aufidius's place. Nor would one take those of the tribunes, Brutus and Sicinius. Coriolanus may have made mistakes; in joining the Volscians he may even have been guilty of a grievous sin against Rome. Yet there is an element of grandeur about him which is wanting in his opponents, and one which Shakespeare was well aware that no military nation could afford to despise. After all, it was to such men as Coriolanus, and not to unpatriotic demagogues like the tribunes, that Rome owed her greatness and her fame.

THE TEMPEST

PART I

IT is hardly necessary to say that, to an English audience of the time of James I., the title of the play which we are about to study was likely to be very attractive. It was an age of maritime discovery and adventure, when the wonders of new-found lands and the hairbreadth escapes of explorers were in every mouth. At such a time the prospect of seeing the representation of a tempest would be certain to draw a crowded audience. Nor were those who came disappointed, for the opening scene of the play gave as realistic a description of the terror and confusion of a tempest as can anywhere be found in literature.

But amidst the hurly-burly of the storm what is the thought brought home to us in the first scene? Is it not the powerlessness of man in deadly struggle with the overmastering violence of the elements? The coolness of the master, the noisy efficiency of the boatswain, the handiness of the crew, the readiness of resource with which they meet the changing dangers of