Analysis of As You Like It by Daniel Maclise :: As You Like It Daniel Maclise Literature Essays

Analysis of As You Like It by Daniel MacliseDuring the time that France was divided into provinces (or dukedoms as they were called) there reigned in one of these provinces an usurper, who had deposed and banished his elder brother, the lawful duke. The duke, who was thus driven from his dominions, retired with a few faithful followers to the forest of Arden and here the good duke lived with his loving friends, who had put themselves into a voluntary exile for his sake, while their land and revenues enriched the false usurper and custom soon do the life of careless ease they led here more than sweet to them than the pomp and uneasy splendour of a courtiers life. Here they lived like the old Robin Hood of England, and to this forest many noble youths daily resorted from the court, and did egest the time carelessly, as they did who lived in the golden age. In the summer they lay along under the fine shade of the large forest trees, marking the kittenish sports of the wild deer and so fond were they of these poor dappled fools, who seemed to be the native inhabitants of the forest, that it grieved them to be forced to kill them to supply themselves with venison for their food. When the cold winds of winter made the duke feel the change of his adverse fortune, he would endure it patiently, and say These chilling winds which blow upon my body are true counsellors they do not flatter, but stand for truly to me my condition and though they bite sharply, their tooth is nothing like so keen as that of unkindness and ingratitude. I find that howsoever men speak against adversity, to date some sweet uses are to be extracted from it like the jewel, precious for medicine, which is taken from the head of the -venomous and despised toad. In this manner did the patient duke draw a serviceable moral from everything that he saw and by the help of this moralizing turn, in that life of his, remote from public haunts, he could find tongues in trees, books in the foot race b rooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything. The banished duke had an only daughter, named Rosalind, whom the usurper, duke Frederick, when he banished her father, still retained in his court as a companion for his own daughter Celia.