"Certainly destiny may easier be foreseen than avoided, considering the strange and wonderful signs that were said to be seen before Caesar's death. For, touching the fires in the element, and spirits running up and down in the night and also of the solitary birds to be seen at noondays sitting in the great market-place, are not all these signs perhaps worth the noting, in such a wonderful chance as happened? But Strabo, the philosopher, writeth, that men were seen going up and down in fire; and, furthermore, that there was a slave of the soldiers that did cast a marvelous burning flame out of his hands, insomuch as they that saw it thought he had been burned; but when the fire was out, it was found he had no hurt. Caesar self also doing sacrifice unto the gods, found that one of the beasts which was sacrificed had no heart: which was a strange thing in nature, how a beast could live without a heart. Furthermore there was a certain soothsayer that had given Caesar warning long time before, to take heed of the day of the Ides of March, (which is the fifteenth of the month), for on that day he should be in great danger. That day being come, Caesar going into the Senate-house, and speaking merrily unto the soothsayer, told him 'the Ides of March be come': 'so they be,' softly answered the soothsayer, 'but yet are they not past!' And the very day before, Caesar, supping with Marcus Lepidus, sealed certain letters, as he was wont to do, at the board: so, talk falling out amongst them, reasoning what death was the best, he, preventing their opinions, cried out aloud, 'Death unlooked for!' Then, going to bed the same night, as his manner was, and lying with his wife Calpurnia, all the windows of his chamber flying open, the noise awoke him, and made him afraid when he saw such light; but more, when he heard his wife Calpurnia, being fast asleep, weep and sigh, and put forth many fumbling lamentable speeches; for she dreamed that Caesar was slain, and that she held him in her arms."*

Professor MacCallum, commenting upon this account says: "It is interesting to note how Shakespeare takes this passage to pieces, and assigns those of them for which he has a place to their fitting and effective position. Plutarch's reflections on destiny and Caesar's opinion on death he leaves aside. The first warning of the soothsayer he refers back to the Lupercalia, and the second he shifts forward to its natural place. Calpurnia's outcries in her sleep and her prophetic dream, the apparition of the ghosts mentioned by her among *Life of Caesar, p. 98, Skeat's edition.

the other prodigies, the lack of the heart in the sacrificial beast, are reserved for the scene of her expostulation with Caesar, and are dramatically distributed among the various speakers; Caesar, the servant, Calpurnia herself."*

Pescetti also takes this same passaget and distributes the various sections in a manner similar to Shakespeare's treatment, but dramatically infinitely inferior. He, however, devotes nearly two hundred and fifty lines at the beginning of the third act of "Cesare" to a dialogue between Antony and Caesar, rather tediously moralizing on destiny and Caesar's opinion on death. The only purpose, dramatically, is to continue the feeling of impending disaster created in the previous acts and to give Antony an opportunity of warning Caesar to beware of treachery. The warnings of the soothsayer are entirely disregarded; the only intimation we receive of this very effective scene is the announcement of the messenger in the fifth act that a paper which gave all the details of the conspiracy, and which Caesar had had no opportunity to read, had been found clutched in his dead hand. Nearly half his second act is occupied by a long drawn out dialogue between Calpurnia and the servant regarding the former's fears, and the terrible dream she has had. The Priest, in the third act, together with Calpurnia, recounts the portents to Caesar, and tries to dissuade him from disregarding the manifest tokens of the gods' displeasure. The inspection of the sacrificial beast without a heart is reserved for the expostulation of the Priest. Pescetti, like Shakespeare, thus attempts a distribution of the supernatural which tends to emphasize the impending catastrophe and to invest his play in an atmosphere of portent very similar to that created in "Julius Caesar."

In both dramas ghosts play important parts. Dramatically, it is quite probable that Pescetti was only following the Senecan tradition when he introduced the ghost of Pompey, but, historically, it seems that he was indebted to Lucan for

* Op. cit., p. 194.

† Rather Appian's almost parallel account.

In the "Cornélie" of Garnier (1574) he also warns Caesar.

this hint. The poet in Book IX. of the "Pharsalia" describes how the soul of Caesar's foe, leaving the tomb, soars to the abode of the blessed, and thence, looking down upon the earth, inspires the breasts of Brutus and Cato.* This is the episode which probably furnished Pescetti hints for the employment of the ghost of Pompey as the prime exciting force upon the Brutus of his play.

Now, Plutarch mentions the apparition which appears to Brutus at Philippi, as Brutus' "ill angel" (page 104, J. C., Skeat). Shakespeare calls it "Caesar's ghost," thereby immeasurably enhancing its dramatic significance. That he should be compelled by his keen perception of its dramatic fitness so to handle this episode, seems a very reasonable conclusion; still, in view of his obligations to Pescetti, it would not be stretching probabilities too far to suggest that the Italian's use of the shade of Pompey was not without its influence in the composition of this particular scene. What a fitting example of poetic justice! That Pompey's shade should rouse Brutus to execute vengeance on a Caesar held responsible for his death; that this same ghost-inspired zealot should in turn have his own doom pronounced by the shade of his victim, closes a cycle of nemesis which surely must have appealed to the great poet.

But it is in regard to the disturbances in the elements, and the attendant prodigies, that we get a marked parallel between the two plays. Casca, while the storm is raging, exclaims:

"Are you not moved, when all the sway of earth
Shakes, like a thing unfirm? O Cicero,

I have seen tempests, when the scolding winds
Have rived the knotty oaks, and I have seen
The ambitious ocean swell and rage and foam,
To be exalted with the threat'ning clouds;
But never till to-night, never till now,
Did I go through a tempest dropping fire.
Either there is a civil strife in heaven,

Or else the world, too saucy with the gods,
Incenses them to send destruction.

*Pharsalia, Book IX., lines 1-23.

Cic. Why, saw you anything more wonderful?
Casca-A common slave—you know him well by sight,—

Held up his left hand, which did flame and burn
Like twenty torches joined, and yet his hand
Not sensible of fire, remained unscorched.
Besides, I ha' not since put up my sword,-
Against the Capitol I met a lion,

Who glared upon me, and went surly by
Without annoying me. And there were drawn
Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women,
Transformed with their fear, who swore they saw
Men all in fire walk up and down the streets.
And yesterday the bird of night did sit
Even at noon-day upon the Market-place,
Hooting and shrieking. When these prodigies
Do so conjointly meet, let not men say,
'These are their reasons: they are natural:'
For, I believe, they are portentous things
Unto the climate that they point upon.' ""*

In addition to the supernatural elements recounted in Casca's speech, Calpurnia trying to dissuade Caesar, says:

"... There is one within,

Besides the things that we have heard and seen,
Recounts most horrid sights seen by the watch.

A lioness hath whelped in the street;

And graves have yawned and yielded up their dead;
Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds,

In ranks and squadrons and right form of war,
Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol;

The noise of battle hurtled in the air,

Horses did neigh, and dying men did groan;

And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets."

When beggars die there are no comets seen;

The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes."

The servant reporting the sacrifice says:

* J. C., Act I., Sc. III, L. 1-32.

"Plucking the entrails of an offering forth,

They could not find a heart within the beast."

The Priest in "Cesare" in his soliloquy exclaims:

"Giunon con spaventosi, orribil tuoni,
Con spessi lampi, e fulmini tremendi,
Con infauste comete, con istrane
Pioggie di sangue, e grandini di pietre,
Con sembianze di pugne, con orrendi
Strepiti di tamburi, e suon di trombe,
Con alte grida, pianti, urli, e lamenti,
Uditi nel suo regno hà mostro, quanto
Sia contro noi d'ira, e di sdegno accesa.
Nettun volto hà sossopra tutto il suo
Immenso regno, e sì gonfiato ha l'onde,
Che parea, che de' suoi confin volesse
Uscir, e tutta subissar la terra;

L'antica madre s'è più volte anch' essa
Scossa sì, che parea, che il
grave pondo
Dell 'huom malvagio, che sostien, volesse
Scuoter del tergo suo, et in più luoghi
Per inghiottirlo hà il vasto seno aperto:
Ne pur questi gran corpi, ond'ogni cosa
Si genera, ma molti ancor de' misti

Predetto han gli infortuni, e i danni nostri."-Pp. 74-75

In other portions of the Priest's soliloquy we read:

"Nè questi pur co'lor maligni aspetti,
Ma la Luna ecclissata, anzi di goccie
Sanguigne tutta sparsa, e'l Sol d'oscuro,
E ferrugineo vel coperto il volto.

Da mille tetti udito s'è lo stigio
Gufo versi cantar lugubri, e mesti;
In mille tempi gli ebani, e gli avori
Lagrimar si son visti, e sudar sangue;
Per le piazze, alle case, a i tempi intorno
Notturni cani urlar si sono uditi,
E strider importune, e infauste streghe.
Si son viste grand'ombre, de' sepolcri