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SHAKESPERE :
HIS BIRTHPLACE, HOME, AND GRAVE.
:N THF PARISH CHURCH, 51 RM FORD-ON A<
SHAKESPERE:
HIS BIRTHPLACE, HOME, AND GRAVE.
pilgrimage t0 Stratf0r!tr-0tr-
IN THE AUTUMN OF 1863.
BY THE
REV. J. M. JEPHSON, B.A., F.S.A.
WITH
PHOTOGRAPHIC ILLUSTRATIONS BY ERNEST ED WARDS, B.A.
A Contribution to the Tercentenary Commemoration of
the Poet's Birth.
LONDON:
LOVELL REEVE & CO., 5, HENRIETTA STREET,
COVENT GARDEN.
1864.
PRINTED BY
JOHN EDWARD TAYLOR, LITTLE QUEEN STREET,
LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS.
PREFACE.
o
FOUR years ago I was induced to give a very plain,
matter-of-fact account of a tour which I took in
Brittany. To my great furprife and pleafure it was
moil indulgently received by my literary friends, the
critics. I accomplifhed, not only my primary object
of paffing my fummer holiday with pleafure and profit,
but alfo the fecondary one of obtaining much unex-
pected praife. I have been ever fince projecting
another expedition, but fomething always prevented
me, till laft autumn, when my friend, Mr. Lovell
Reeve, fuggefted a vilit to Stratford-upon-Avon, and
a little book a propos of the Tercentenary Feftival in
honour of Shakefpere's birth. A love for the drama,
and an efpecial veneration for the Father of it in Eng-
land, are, I may fay, hereditary in my family. In the
laft century my grand-uncle, Robert Jephfon, was one
of thofe who endeavoured to revive the romantic
drama of the Elizabethan era, and wrote feveral tra-
gedies, amongft which was " The Count of Nar-
M188570
vi Preface.
bonne/' founded on Walpole's " Caftle of Otranto,"
and " Julia, or the Italian Lovers," which long held
pofleffion of the ftage. From my childhood, then, I
have heard Shakefpere difcuffed, extolled, acted, and
quoted ; and I was glad of an opportunity of vifiting
the place which is eipecially confecrated to his memory,
and of adding my tiny grain to the volume of incenfe
which will rife in his honour on his three hundredth
birthday. The few facts of his life already known
have been published over and over again ; but I thought
that they might be fo connected with the fcene of his
youth and the chofen retreat of his mature age, as to
make a whole which might be fuggeftive of thought
to thofe who mall viiit Stratford next ipring. I am
the more bold to offer this little fketch to lovers of
England's greateft poet, becaufe, if, like Mofes, my
fpeech be weak and flammering, I am affifled by a
coadjutor whofe camera is almoft as great a worker of
wonders as was Aaron's rod.
CONTENTS.
o
CHAPTER I.
Pilgrimages, ancient and modern Reafons for riding on horfeback The
companions of my journey Hints for the road Hertford Its
ftaple manufacture Panfhanger The River Lea Luton Dun-
flable Early Englifh church Winflow Buckingham Banbury
Edgehill Page i
CHAPTER II.
Arrival at Stratford Firft impreffions Appearance of Stratford in
Shakefpere's time Ancient bridge built by Sir Hugh Clopton
The Shakefpere Inn The Town Hall Chapel of Holy Crofs
Grammar School Parifh church Old houfes in Chapel Street
Street fronts Priefts' college 16
CHAPTER III.
Shakefpere's parentage His father's flation and employments His
mother The houfe in which he was born Reftorations Portrait
prefented by Mr. W. O. Hunt Projea of planting the garden
with flowers mentioned by Shakefpere Viciffitudes of the houfe
Its final prefervation as a national relic 26
viii Contents.
CHAPTER IV.
The fchool where he was brought up His fchoolmafters Prototype of
Sir Hugh Evans, and perhaps of Holofernes 44
CHAPTER V.
Shottery Anne Hathaway's home His marriage and married life 51
CHAPTER VI.
His brothers and lifters His father's embarraflments Tradition of his
poaching adventure External evidence Internal evidence Juftice
Shallow His love of hunting His punimment and revenge
Vifit to Charlecote Harveft home Shooting a buck Charlecote
Hall Lord Macaulay on Englifh domeftic architecture Charlecote
Church and monuments 58
CHAPTER VII.
The early drama Myfteries, miracles, moralities The Elizabethan
Drama Shakefpere's Introduction to the flage Tradition that he
held gentlemen's horfes His firft employments in the theatre
Greene's envious allufion to his fuccefs Chettle's teftimony to his
uprightnefs and courtefy Meeres' account of his plays His induf-
try The profits of actors in his time 78
CHAPTER VIII.
Elizabethan theatres Shakefpere's ikill as an actor His friendmip with
Southampton He is noticed by King James His plays popular at
court Venus and Adonis Rape of Lucrece His obligations to
Chaucer The fonnets Dedication Mr. F. Victor Hugo's theory
his knowledge of good fociety 98
CHAPTER IX.
His annual vifit to Stratford His careleflhefs of fame Grant of arms to
his father Purchafe of New Place Remains of New Place Fate
of his mulberry tree 1 24
Contents.
CHAPTER X.
Social effects of railroads Shakefpere's town and country life Sources
from whence he obtained the plots of his plays Wrote for immediate
fuccefs and profit His friends and focial life in London Ben Jonfon
His converfation and Ion-mots Life in the country Friends at
Stratford Amufements His death His religion His defcendants
Firil edition of his works Dedication 136
CHAPTER XI.
Remaining relics at Stratford-on-Avon His parifh church His grave
His monument Monuments of his family Font in which he was
probably baptifed My return home 183
CHAPTER XII.
Ideal of the man His influence on the national character Structure
of his plays The Tercentenary Feftival Propofed Shakefperian
Theatre 196
LIST OF PHOTOGRAPHIC ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
Monument of Shakefpere in the Parifli Church, Stratford-on-
Avon . . . . . * Frontifpiece.
Ancient Houfe at Stratford-on-Avon . ' . . . ." . 24
Shakefpere's Houfe, Stratford-on-Avon -, from Henley Street . 30
Shakefpere's Houfe, Ihowing the Window of the Room in which
he was born . . . . . . . -35
Living Room in Shakefpere's Houfe . . . . . 37
Interior of the Room in which Shakefpere was born . . .38
Shakefpere's Houfe, from the Garden. The Garden Seat, a carved
Hone removed from New Place . . . . . . . 40
Grammar School and Tower of the Guild Chapel, Stratford-on-
Avon . . . ... .^ 44
Ann Hathaway's Cottage, Shottery . . ."" . .- ; 52
Charlecote Hall, near Stratford-on-Avon : the Seat of Sir Thomas
Lucy (Juflice Shallow) . . . . . .76
Ruins of New Place, Stratford-on-Avon : the Houfe in which
Shakefpere died . . . . . . . . . 134
Porch of Parifh Church, Stratford-on-Avon . .' . .. . 184
Weft end of the Parim Church, Stratford-on-Avon . . . 186
Ancient Font in the Parim Church of Stratford-on-Avon, in which
it is believed Shakefpere was baptifed . . . . . . 192
Monument of Shakefpere, in Poets' Corner, Weftminfter Abbey . ip^
SHAKESPERE.
******#*#*******#*^
CHAPTER I.
MANY are the changes which have pafled over Eng-
land fince Edward the Third was king ; and amongft
them not the leaft characteriftic is that which may be
obferved in the objects, the manner, and the feafons of
our pilgrimages. The men of the fourteenth century
fought forgetfulnefs of the evils under which they
groaned by adoring at the fhrine of the bold prieft
who, by paffive refiftance, withftood the will of the
fierce Norman Conqueror ; we try to elevate our minds
above the common drudgery of life by feeking Nature
where fhe may be worshipped in her grandeft forms,
or by treading the ground which has been confecrated
by Genius. They rode from every {hire's end of
England to kneel at the fhrine of Beckett, " the holy,
blifsful martyr," and to kifs his blood-ftained veflments ;
we take the exprefs train to Warwick, and thence
Shakefpere.
proceed by omnibus to Stratford-upon-Avon, that we
may gaze on the cottage where Shakefpere was born
and the grave where his bones moulder in peace.
Their minds were prepared to adore in the gorgeous
temple where the relics of the faint were enfhrined in
gold and precious ftones, by the perufal of legends
written in defiance of Nature and Tafte ; our intereft
in the homely fcenes we vifit is infpired by poems in
which Nature is prefented to our minds with the
fidelity of the moft confummate art, and every fenti-
ment and word dictated by the moft exquifite tafte.
Not lefs fignificant is the change in the feafon at which
we feek our annual recreation. In days when men
were content with few luxuries and had leifure to
choofe their time for work and play, the verdure, the
flowers, the finging of the birds, and the genial breezes
of April, reminded them that a ride in pleafant com-
pany through the pretty fields and woods of Kent
would be beneficial to their fouls ; then " longen folk
to gon on pilgrimages ;" now we can only fave from
labour and corroding cares a few weeks at the fag
end of fummer, when we are releafed for a feafon from
the confuming toils of our bury life.
On the whole, I think our nineteenth-century pil-
grimages, whether their objects be the Matterhorn
or the little town of Stratford-upon-Avon, have the
The Prologue.
advantage of their predeceflbrs in the fourteenth cen-
tury. But in one reipecl: mine was fadly inferior to that
which ftarted from the tabard in the Borough fome-
where about the year 1383. I had no "perfight gentil
knight," no clerk of Oxenford, no jolly friar, no gentle
manciple, no gallant fquire, no precife priorefs, no boif-
terous hoft, to bear me company ; nor, I fear, if I had,
mould I have anfwered to the defcription of the " pore
perfoun of a toun " in any quality except that implied
in the firft epithet. " I rode all unarmed and I rode all
alone." I rode becaufe I preferred fpending my " par-
fon's week" loitering among the green lanes, taking
the rough and fmooth, the funfhine and mower, the
bitter and fweet, as it pleafed God to fend them, to being
whifked from one point of my journey to the other
in a railway carriage. In the latter plan the journey
itfelf is quite uninterefting, and is, therefore, hurried
over as quickly as poffible ; in the former it forms part
of the pleafure of the trip. " The prize is in the pur-
fuit." Some of my neighbours, indeed, to whom I im-
parted my defign,faid very plainly, by their looks at leaft,
that they thought me a trifle infane for fpending three
days in travelling a diftance which might be accom-
plifhed by train in as many hours ; but the imputation
of infanity is one which muft be fubmitted to by any
one who refolves to follow his own inclinations in thefe
Shakefpere.
days when all thought and action are civilifed down
to a dead level of infipid conventionalifm.
A friend kindly lent me a Norwegian pony of fmall
fize but immenfe power, for the journey. Thefe ftrong,
compact little animals get through far more work than
a large horfe. I chriftened my temporary fervant
" Stornoway," for I thought that had a fine Scandina-
vian found. And fo, having packed the feweft poffible
number of neceflaries in the old knapfack which had
accompanied me round Brittany fome fix years ago, and
ftrapped it on little Stornoway's crupper, I mounted for
my journey.
At that moment, my black retriever, whom his
former mafter had called "Smoker," came bounding
up, wriggling from fide to fide, holding up " his honeft
bawfoned fonfie face," laying back his ears, and wag-
ging his tail, as much as to fay, " What a pleafant ride
we are going to have together." I did not like to
difappoint him, and it ftruck me that he might make
an agreeable addition to the ttte-a-rtte between me and
Stornoway. So Smoker was permitted to join the
expedition.
By the way, I never could make out the propriety
of calling a dog " Smoker." Johnfon explains the
word, " One who dries or perfumes by fmoke." And
with all his good qualities, Smoker is as guiltlefs as
The Prologue.
Crab was of having anything in common with per-
fume. Smoker is not a romantic or an elegant name ;
but my Smoker is as good-natured, fagacious, faithful,
engaging, and, I may fay, with Launce, " gentleman-
like " a dog, as if he had taken his name from gods
or heroes. Still, I muft fay, he had fome of Crab's
qualities, for he never med a tear at leaving his friends,
the beagle puppies.
The evening was delightful. It was the 31 ft of
Auguft : every field was filled with labourers gathering
in the heavy fheaves, and at every turn I met the laden
waggons, drawn by their fturdy teams, and entering
the homefteads.
But, at the very outfet, I met with fome troubles
for which I had not bargained. Stornoway was a very
wife little fellow, and evidently thought that though
it might be very good fun for me to ride along the
pleafant lanes of England on a harveft evening on his
legs, he had much rather be in his comfortable ftable,
and that poffibly a little well-timed firmnefs on his part
might intimidate the new rider whom he found upon
his back. Accordingly, as foon as he came to the
well-known gate of his home he objected ftrongly to
go any farther. The fmalleft intimation of mine with
hand or knee that I wifhed him to go on, was met
with a defiant tofs of the head. When I became im-
Shakefpere.
portunate he iidled towards the gate. But he imme-
diately refented an application of the whip or fpur by
{landing up ftraight on his hind-legs. If I had not
been very quick in leaning well forward and loofening
the reins, he muft have tumbled back on the hard road.
The next time he tried it, however, I was prepared, and
leaning over his fhoulder with a rein in each hand, I
pulled him down, and then applied the fpurs vigoroufly.
After fome fighting and lofs of time and temper on both
fides, we agreed upon a truce. The fame fcene was
repeated, however, with gradually diminifhed intenfity
at every farm-yard we came to, and I thought to my-
felf, " Mafter Stornoway, either you muft give in, or we
mall not reach Stratford this month." Stornoway did
give in, for this was the laft time he fhowed any ferious
difpofition to difpute my wifhes.
Hertford was my deftination on the firft night of
my pilgrimage, and my road lay through the pretty
village of Blackmore, and to the left of Foreft Hall,
whence many a gallant fox has broken covert, and
led the EfTex hounds for miles acrofs the celebrated
Roding, or Roden, country, on the outskirts of which
it is fituated. Both the country and the peer take
their titles from the little ftream called the Roden
which runs through it. About four miles on this fide
of Epping I turned to the right for Harlow Bum, and
The Prologue.
as the fhades of evening were defcending, paffed the
fine park of the Rev. Jofeph Arkwright, a brother-in-
law of the Bifhop of Rochefter, and Mafter of the EiTex
Fox-hounds ; and what is more, though now over
fixty, one of the fineft riders in England. From Har-
low Bufh my way lay through Natfhall Crofs, Burnt
Mills, Eaflwich, and Stanftead all charming, pic-
turefque villages of thatched and tiled cottages, fur-
rounded by trees. The moon had rifen, the ftars were
mining, and the clocks were going nine as I faw the
lights of Hertford below me in the valley. I put up
at the Dimfdale Arms, and having feen Stornoway fed,
retired to what is called the coffee-room, having ac-
complifhed twenty-fix miles on this the firft day of
my pilgrimage.
Perhaps it may be ufeful to obferve that horfes on a
journey derive wonderful benefit from being fed in the
prefence of their mafters. Why it is I never could
make out ; it may be that they enjoy their corn the
more for company. The coachman of a friend of
mine always makes it a point to comb his horfes' tails
while they are eating their oats at an inn, and he fays
that they do their work as well again in confequence
of this practice. The oftlers do not like it.
Having feen my pony fed, the next thing was to
look after my own creature comforts. And here I was
8 Shakefpere.
foon made unpleafantly aware that I was travelling in
a country where people live at home. I might have
faid, it is true,
" The chambres and the ftables were wyde,
And wel we weren efud atte befte,"
as far as houfe-room went ; but in refped: of all that
minifters to real material comfort and cheerfulnefs, an
Englifh inn is far behind a Continental one. In a
French town fuch as Hertford, there would have been
a falle-a-manger filled with guefls, and the chef would
have fent in a refreshing potage, with fome delicate
cutlets, or other appetiflant dim, followed by a poire
cuite, and wafhed down with a bottle of Bordeaux.
Here I was fhown into a room, carpeted and curtained
it is true, with well-fluffed chairs to fit on or to go to
fleep in, but with an air as if it was never occupied.
And then when I afked for fupper I was told I might
have cold beef, or they would fend out for a chop a
thing with a quantity of fat and griftle on it, from
which one has to pare the eatable part with the
greateft care, and even that is imbued with the flavour
of the tallow which one has to banifh to the farther
corner of one's plate. And this is to be wafhed down
with heavy brewer's ale or brandied fherry. We
Englifh are indeed highly favoured in our meat, but
who fent us our cooks ?
'The Prologue.
While waiting for my animals to be fed next morn-
ing, I ft rolled about the town. The ftaple manufac-
ture here is fchoolboys. There are the Blue Coat
School, the Green Coat School, and ever fo many other
fchools, public and private, and upon thefe the trades-
people live. The town is furrounded by fine woods,
and prettily fituated on the river Lea, where the quaint
old haberdafher, Izaak Walton, ufed to catch chubs
with toafted cheefe, and liften to the milk-maids fing-
ing " Come live with me and be my love."
At about nine I ftarted, intending to pafs through
Welwyn, feven miles diftant ; Wheathampftead, five
miles from Welwyn, both in Hertfordshire; Luton,
eight miles from Wheathampftead, in Bedfordfhire ;
Dunftable, five miles from Luton ; Leighton Buzzard,
nine miles from Dunftable ; and perhaps Winflow in
Bucks, twelve miles from Leighton : thus making
forty-fix miles in the day. This would have been too
long a journey for a continuance ; but I thought that it
would be beft to get well forward towards my deftina-
tion at firft, and then to take my time afterwards ; and
little Stornoway did not feem to mind my weight in
the leaft.
On leaving Hertford, I took the wrong turning for
Welwyn, but it proved a fortunate miftake ; for the
road led me round Panfhanger, the beautiful demefne
i o Shakefpere.
of Lord Cowper. Happily it is furrounded by park-
palings, not a wall, and I had an advantageous view of
the green glades, dotted here and there with noble
oaks and elms, and lofing themfelves in coppices of
beech. Smoker put up feveral coveys of birds which
lay funning themfelves and bathing in the duft by the
road-fide ; and by eleven o'clock I heard the guns
going in all directions, and faw the {hooting parties
" going a-birding," and tramping through the Swedes.
It was a fplendid firft of September, if not for the par-
tridges, at leaft for the fportfmen.
After paffing Panfhanger, I defcended into the valley
of the Lea, along which the road runs for feveral miles.
It is a fluggim river, and is laid out at this part of its
courfe in extenfive beds of water-crefles, which men
were employed in gathering. Unfortunately it had no
" fhingly bars," nor did it "chatter" as it went, but
only " loitered " continually " round its crefles." To
do it juftice, however, it did "ftir its fweet Forget-me-
nots that grow for happy lovers," and indeed abounded
with the richeft vegetation.
At Welwyn, a fplendid viaduft, of nearly a quarter
of a mile long, fpans this valley, and carries the Great
Northern Railway acrofs it. From this to Luton,
which is fituated on the boundary between Herts and
Beds, the road lies along the fluggifh flream, and paiTes
'The Prologue. \ i
to Luton Hoo, formerly belonging to the Marquis of
Bute. A few years ago it was burnt down, and the
ruins and eftate were purchafed by a Liverpool attor-
ney, who had made a fortune by the fale of land at
Birkenhead. Luton Hoo is furrounded by a great,
high, ugly, brick wall, and threatening placards de-
nounce the fevereft penalties of the law againft thofe
who dare to tread its hallowed precincts ; fo the attor-
ney has his fine place all to himfelf. How different
from the ftately Panihanger, with its pidlurefque park-
pales, the fence of Engliih demefnes and warrens from
time immemorial.
Luton is the head-quarters of the ftraw bonnet ma-
nufacture, and has all the unpleafing look of a manu-
facturing town.
After leaving Luton, I found that the country loft
its rich park-like character. The foil appears to be
chalk, and the landfcape ftretches away in fine breezy
downs and rolling hills, and corn-fields of fifty acres
in extent.
The entrance to Dunftable the place where the
ftraw bonnets were firft manufactured, and from
whence they take their name, and where you now
fee women walking about platting, as they knit on
the Continent is very ftriking. The church, an ex-
quifite example of Early Englifh architecture, appear-
1 2 Skakefpere.
ing all the more beautiful from the uglinefs of the
furrounding buildings, ftands to the left. The deep
arcading and bold mouldings of the weft end are per-
fectly charming.
It is the fafhion, I believe, to fay that Gothic archi-
tecture culminated in the Decorated period, but to
me, judging merely by the light of nature without
any pretenfion to deep learning on the fubjecl:, there
feems a poetry, a feeling in the Early En glim which
the ftyle of no other period approaches.
Here I was ftruck by a name which appeared over
the door of a wretched public-houfe. It was Norman
Snoxell. What on earth could have brought Norman
Snoxell to Dunftable to retail beer and tobacco ? Bal-
zac ufed to perambulate the ftreets of Paris for days
looking over the doors of the (hops for appropriate
names for his characters. Here would have been
quite a godfend for any novelift who wanted to name
his Norfe fmuggler or pirate. But, indeed, the names
of the Englifh peafantry are fometimes very curious.
I remember, in Norfolk, a fervant-maid named Phebe
Blanchflower. You would never expect fuch a name
out of a novel ; but it was a real name neverthelefs ;
for her father, old Blanchflower, drove the Ipfwich
mail for many years.
I reached Leighton Buzzard, on the borders of
The Prologue. 1 3
Bucks, at about fix ; but I was determined, if poffible,
to fleep at Winflow where I heard there was a very
comfortable country inn, and fo pufhed on ; but both
Stornoway and I were tired, and the laft five miles
feemed interminable. However, at Winflow we ar-
rived at about ten o'clock, and put up at the " Bell,"
having accomplifhed a journey of forty-fix miles fince
breakfaft.
Next morning, being the 2nd of September, I
ftarted from Winflow at a little after nine, purpofing,
if poffible, to reach Edgehill the fame night. Edgehill
is within twelve miles of Stratford, and I thought that
by fleeping there, I might ride into Stratford next
morning at my leifure, and thus have the advantage of
feeing the end and object of my pilgrimage by day-
light.
The firft town I reached was Buckingham, feven
miles from Winflow. It is a nice, pretty country
town, in the valley of the Stour. Between this and
Brackley I paffed one of the lodges of Stowe, and
then the fcenery changed. I am no great geologift,
but the ftone appeared to me to be a reddifh green
limeftone. It lies in regular ftrata, and comes out
of the earth in nice rectangular pieces, well adapted
for building. Accordingly the houfes and fences are
all built of ftone, the latter having no mortar; but
1 4 Shakefpere.
great art is apparently employed in making the ftones
fit nicely into each other, and fome of the walls have
quite a Cyclopean or Etrufcan character. I was par-
ticularly ftruck with the village of Middleton- Cheney.
Here the houfes feem very old, and the brown and
greenim ftone of which they are built has become
covered with lichens, which add much to the beauty
of the colouring. Their mingled roofs, of high pitch,
are very picturefque. Yet here, where Nature and the
practice of former generations would feem to have
plainly indicated the right forms and materials, the
people are actually building fome new almfhoufes of
flaming red brick and blue flate. Red brick may be
made a very beautiful material, and is proper for Lon-
don or Eflex, where there is no ftone ; but to import
it into a place where there is already a beautiful ma-
terial provided by Nature, (hows a wonderful amount
of bad tafte in the builders.
Banbury is a handfome town, and the principal inn
extremely comfortable. I could not defcry the Crofs^
to which, when I was a baby, I was invited to " ride
a cock-horfe ; " but I ate a Banbury cake out of curi-
ofity. It is a villainous invention, being a " roll-up,"
to ufe Mifs Evans* expreffion, of rich paftry, envelop-
ing currants.
From Banbury I ftarted at a little after fix, and,
'The Prologue. 15
after paffing fbme gentlemen's places- Colonel North's
amongft the reft got upon fome high table-land, with
wild country, as far as I could fee in the rapidly clof-
ing-in evening, on either fide. Smoker as well as I
feemed to feel the lonelinefs of the road, for inftead of
foraging about as ufual, and enjoying the pleafure of
finding out what everything he pafled fmelt of, he kept
clofe to Stornoway's heels. At laft I faw a twinkling
light, which I afterwards found proceeded from the
houfe of a Mr. Fitzgerald, and defcried two keepers
under the trees. This was quite a relief. Prefently I
came to an almoft ruinous toll-bar, and in a few mi-
nutes more reached the lonely road-fide inn. This
was Edgehill, where the firft blood was drawn in the
Civil War. I knocked at the door with my whip, and
was anfwered by a feared maid, who, however, foon
made me comfortable ; and I went to bed in a great,
wild chamber, and dreamt of battles between Cavaliers
and Roundheads, the latter being worfted by a well-
dire&ed fire of Enfield rifles, in which I took part.
16
CHAPTER II.
NEXT morning I found that the inn at which I had
flept was called the " Sun Rifing." It bears on its
walls the old proverb, " Good wine needs no bufh,"
yet betrays its unbelief in the adage by difplaying over
the door a huge bunch of grapes.
It is built on the very edge of a fteep hill, hence
probably called Edgehill, and commands a fine view of
at leaft thirty miles in extent, bounded by the Malvern
Hills. To the right is the village of Kyneton, or
Kington, where the Parliamentary army was pofted on
the eve of the battle of Edgehill ; and clofe under the
hill is Battle Farm, where the firft battle was fought in
the quarrel between the Sovereign and the Parliament,
" When hard words, jealoufies, and fears
Set folks together by the ears."
But what was more to my prefent purpofe, mine hoft
pointed out to me a little riling ground in the middle
of the vaft plain which was fpread out before me,
Fir ft Imprejfiom of Stratford. 17
behind which, he faid, lay Stratford-upon-Avon. Here,
then, I was beginning to tread the ground which was
familiar to him whofe words are houfehold words to
all Englim-fpeaking people, and which fuggefted to
him thofe fweet, and withal accurate and life-like pic-
tures of country manners with which his great poems
abound.
At about ten o'clock I ftarted on my final ride to
Stratford, and after defcending the almoft precipitous
hill upon which the inn is perched, I found myfelf on
a level road, bounded on either fide by cornfields, from
which the harveft was, in many cafes, not yet gathered
in. The only villages of note I pafled were Pillerton
Priors and Eatington, the feat, ever fince the Con qu eft,
of the ancient family of Shirley.
At a little after twelve I came in fight of the
beautiful old bridge built over the Avon at the en-
trance to Stratford, by Sir Hugh Clopton, in the
reign of Henry VII. It confifts of fourteen flightly-
pointed arches, and is nearly, if not quite, level. In
fad:, one does not fee how modern architects excel the
older ones, even in this thoroughly utilitarian branch
of the art at leaft fo far as the old materials of lime
and ftone are employed. The feudal trinoda necejfltas
laid upon the vaflal the obligation of defending the
country, building bridges, and keeping the highways
1 8 Shakefpere.
in order, and the vaflal appears to have performed the
obligation tolerably well in mediaeval England.
And now I was all expectation. I had at laft reached
the ipot where Shakefpere was born, where he imbibed
his earlieft impreffions from outward things, and where
he chofe to fpend his life, in preference to many other
places which would feem to have had greater claims
upon his regard. The queftion I afked myfelf was,
Is it poffible, by fixing my mind upon the fcene which
infcribed its impreffions upon the white paper of the
poet's mind, and comparing it with his writings and
with the few facts known of his life, to arrive at any-
thing like a juft conception of the man himfelf ? I
have often obferved that by perfeveringly fixing the
attention upon a difficult paffage in a foreign language,
the meaning after a time feems to flafh like lightning
upon the mind. Can I, by any procefs like this, read
the myfterious book of Shakeipere's nature ?
My firft impreffions were certainly not encouraging.
The bridge was fine, and to the right was a pretty old
houfe, approached by an avenue of trees, and kept with
that beautiful neatnefs and elegance of greenfward and
flower-beds which is feen nowhere but in England.
The Avon, too, was flowing majeftically on, as it did
when Shakefpere played upon its banks, or flew his
hawk at the wild-fowl which harboured in its fedges;
Firfl Impreffions of Stratford. 1 9
and a pair of fwans, accompanied by their cygnets,
were thrufting their long necks to the bottom, where
they probably found an abundant repaft of worms and
grubs, warned down from fome new cuts and embank-
ments a little higher up the ftream. Thefe were all
pleafing objects, upon which the fancy of a poet might
delight to dwell ; but as I rode up the High Street, I
was obliged to acknowledge that Stratford is about as
uninterefting to the outward fenfes as any country town
I had ever feen in England. There is no appearance
of anything like antiquity, except perhaps a couple of
carriers' inns, and they are modernifed. There is no
appearance even of wealth, nor any of that neatnels
and elegance which are its fruits. Stratford is a col-
lection, generally fpeaking, of mean houfes, and the
High Street is not its befl feature. At the upper
extremity is the ugly market- houfe, where the old
market-crofs ufed to ftand, but this difappeared in the
laft or the beginning of this century.
Having called at the " Red Horfe," a good inn on
the right of the High Street, in hopes of finding that
Mr. Edwards, the photographer, had arrived a hope
in which I was difappointed I turned to the left,
down Chapel Street, .to the " Shakefpere," where I
took up my quarters.
The " Shakefpere " is an old-fafhioned, comfortable
2O Shakefpere.
inn, and the hoft {hows a laudable intereft in the Poet
who gives a name to his hoftelry and brings him moft
of his cuftomers. Each room is called after one of
the plays, the title of which is placed over the door.
Thus the commercial room is fuperfcribed " The
Tempeft" not very appropriately, however, at leaft
during my ftay, for the houfe was remarkably quiet.
The coffee-room was " As You Like It " I confefs I
did not much like it, for it was as lonely as the Foreft
of Arden itfelf. My bed-chamber was named " A
Midfummer Night's Dream ;" another on the fame
landing, "Much Ado about Nothing;" another,
" Love's Labour Loft," and fo on. Bufts of the Poet
are placed on every lobby, and the walls are hung
with portraits of himfelf and illuftrations of his works.
A curious old clock, faid to have been taken from
New Place, and various articles of ancient furniture
with which his name is connected, are to be feen in
different parts of the houfe. Indeed, as a general rule,
I believe Stratford-upon-Avon may be faid to live
upon the memory of its great Poet, as Rome does
upon the relics of the Apoftles.
What a capital plan it would be, by the way, to fet
up a Shakefperian high-prieft at Stratford, whofe func-
tion it mould be to regulate the devotions of the pil-
grims and employ himfelf in the culte des ruines, and
Firft Imprefjlons of Stratford. 2 1
whofhould be infpired to pronounce an infallible judg-
ment upon Shakefperian criticifm. He fhould decide
whether " The Two Noble Kinfmen," " Titus Andro-
nicus," " Pericles," and the firft and fecond parts of
"Henry VI." were canonical or apocryphal; what
fhould be the received text the folio of 1623 or that
of 1632 and what the authority of the quartos; he
would pronounce upon the validity of the claims of
various readings, and winnow the whole crop of com-
mentators, from Malone, Farmer, Theobald, Steevens,
and Johnfon, down to Collier, Dyce, and the Cambridge
editors. And fo at length the republic of letters might
repofe upon infallible authority, and not be, as it now
is, a prey to unhappy divifions, and diftra&ed by the
uncertain found emitted by its contending teachers.
But to return from my digreffion.
Having feen poor little Stornaway made comfortable
in a loofe box, to reft after his long journey, and left
Smoker to keep him company, I walked out to take a
general furvey of the town. The High Street I have
already defcribed. Henley Street, which branches off
from it at the market-place, is built of mean houfes,
and has nothing remarkable about it but Shakefpere's
birthplace, of which I mall fpeak prefently. Chapel
Street, where New Place once ftood, has much more
character. But everybody feems to have confpired to
22 Shakefpere.
deface this town. The Town Hall is an ugly modern
building, and the Guild Chapel of the Holy Crofs is in
the debafed ftyle of the reign of Henry VIL, when Sir
Hugh Clopton built it on the ruins of an older edifice,
the chancel of which ftill bears evidence to its fuperior
beauty. The clumfy tower is feen to the left in the
photograph of the Grammar School. In the chapel
is the tomb of Sir Hugh, on which is the following
infcription : " He built y e ftone bridge over Avon, with
y e caufey at y e Weft End; further manifefting his
piety to God and love to this place of his nativity (as
y e centurion in y e Gofpel did to y e Jewim Nation and
Religion by building them a fynagogue), for at his fole
charge this beautiful chappell of y e Holy Trinity was
rebuilt, temp. H. VIL, and y e crofs ifle of y e Pari/h
Church." Inftead of, perhaps, a beautiful Early Eng-
lifh or Decorated building, we have one of clumfy
proportions and debafed ornamentation. Such as it is,
however, it has-been further debafed by the church-
wardens or common -councillors of the eighteenth
century. ProfefTor Willis has well obferved, that when-
ever a church wanted rebuilding or decoration in the
middle ages, fome Saint, or Saint's relics, were fure
providentially to turn up in the neighbourhood. The
clergy immediately enfhrined them, the people flocked
to pay their devotions, and the church was renovated
Fir/1 Impreffiom of Stratford. 23
by means of their pious offerings. Surely the votaries
of Shakefpere ought to offer for the reftoration of a
fhrine whofe fhadow fell upon his houfe, upon which
he muft have looked from his windows, and where he
probably ufed often to kneel. Little befides the clearing
away of a quantity of ugly cumbrous church furniture
would be enough to reftore it to nearly the fame
appearance as it bore when Shakefpere knew it. It
would now be impoffible, even if fuch a proceeding
were fandtioned by public opinion, to reftore the beau-
tiful frefcoes difcovered in 1804, when the chapel was
repaired. The chief fubjecl: was the " Invention of
the Holy Crofs," to which the chapel was dedicated ;
but that which probably brought the fwdfteft ruin
upon the whole was the " Martyrdom of Thomas-a-
Beckett," to whofe memory Henry VIII. bore fpecial
enmity, becaufe the ground of the " blifsful martyr's "
canonization was his refiftance to the power of the
crown. His name is carefully erafed from all mifTals
and other fervice-books ufed in Henry's reign. The
frefcoes were therefore probably defaced by the Refor-
mers even before they were finally deftroyed in 1804.
They were, however, copied, and have been published.
Faffing on from the Guild Chapel, we have the
whole range of buildings containing the Grammar
School and Guildhall, and, near the parifh church, a
24 Shakefpere.
nice-looking old houfe, built on the fite of the old
college for priefts, which was pulled down in 1799.
The parifh church is a very fine fpecimen of Perpen-
dicular, built on the banks of the Avon, and furrounded
by trees. I fhall fpeak of it more at length in connection
with Shakefpere's grave and monument. The bridge,
the chapel, the church, the Poet's birthplace in Henley
Street, and the old houfe in Chapel Street, of which
Mr. Edwards has taken an excellent photograph, are
the only vifible remains of the period when Shakefpere
lived here. They may ferve to give us fome idea of
how Stratford looked in his time.
In the firft place, then, the ftreets were not, as now,
compofed of rows of uninterefting brick cottages.
The dwelling-houfes were probably detached, and fur-
rounded by yards and gardens, like John Shakefpere's,
in Henley Street. Of the ftyle of the fhop-fronts, the
mop of Mr. Williams, breeches-maker, glover, &c.
(fee photograph), will give us an idea ; and a ftreet of
fuch fronts, with the fhape, and height, and ornamen-
tation of each varied indefinitely, muft have been very
beautiful. There, on the top of the hill upon which
the town ftands, was the old market crofs, a pidiurefque
Gothic ftrufture, round which the chapmen aflembled,
and mowed their merchandife, and perhaps fome Au-
tolycus fung :
I
Firjl Imprejfions of Stratford. 25
" Will you buy any tape,
Or lace for your cape,
My dainty duck, my dear-a j
Any lilk, any thread,
Any toys for your head,
Of the new'ft and fin'ft, fin'fl wear-a ;
Come to the pedlar,
Money's a meddler
That doth alter all men's wear-a."
Here, near the church, was the old college for priefts,
appropriated by Mafter John a Combe as a dwelling-
houfe on the diflblution of the religious houfes, but
ftill retaining its {lately ecclefiaftical character. The
church and chapel were fhorn, indeed, of their former
glories, and a coat of whitewash had perhaps been laid
on the walls to deface any traces of colour or painting ;
but the carved benches or chairs, the rood-fcreen, and
the ftained glafs probably yet remained, and the galleries
and pews were as yet in the womb of time. Chapel
Street was adorned and dignified by New Place, a fine
old manfion built by the magnificent Sir Hugh Clop-
ton. In fuch a town, built on a rifing ground on the
banks of the Avon, clofe to the parks of Fulbrooke
and Charlecote and the Foreft of Arden, the Poet of
Nature might well have been proud to have been born,
and glad to dwell amongft his own people.
26 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER III.
I HAD now got fo far as this in my investigation :
The place of Shakefpere's birth where he fpent his
youth, and to which he retired the moment he had
acquired a competence was in his time, notwithftand-
ing its prefent dreary appearance, a town embellifhed
by many ftately and beautiful buildings, the refidence
of wealthy burghers and of a large body of clergy,
at that time the moft learned and cultivated clafs of
fociety. It was moreover built on the banks of a
lovely river, furrounded by rural villages, parks, and
foreft tracts fuch a country, in fhort, as would feize
upon the fancy of a poet, and mark his imagination
with the imprels of its own character. For though
the poet's fancy be, in one fenfe, independent of out-
ward things, and
" Doth glance from heaven to earth, and earth to heaven,
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to fhapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name,"
His Parentage. 27
yet if, as Locke afferts, the mind be a fheet of white
paper till written upon by the fenfes, the original fimple
ideas from which the complex images of poetry are
formed muft have had their origin in outward things,
however independent of them they may afterwards
become. And that Shakefpere's young imagination
fed upon the fcenes in which his youth was Ipent is
plain, both from the facT; that he never loft light of
the grand objecl: of returning to live in his native town,
and from the whole character of his writings. None
of his contemporaries has drawn fb direftly and Ib
largely from Englim rural life as he, and the ftyle of
fcenery upon which he delights to dwell, as defcribed,
for inftance, in the words of Titania
" And never, fince the middle fummer's fpring,
Met we on hill, in dale, foreft, or mead,
By paved fountain, or by rufhy brook"
is juft that of the neighbourhood of Stratford. Greene
and Peele have fome pretty country fcenes, but they
want the touches of nature, the elegance, the lightnefs
of the mafter. In thefe relpects no one approaches
him but Chaucer, whole merits are unhappily buried
for the generality in his obfolete language, and whofe
occalional gro Uriels condemns his poems to clofe prifon.
To quote inftances of Shakefpere's power of depicting
Englilh country fcenes and people would be to tranfcribe
28 Shakefpere.
a great part of his plays. But to take an inftance : " As
You Like It" is faid to be more generally read than
any other of his works ; and this is owing, I think, to
the hold which the idea of life in the Foreft of Arden
has on the reader, who finds in the fhepherds and
fhepherdeffes, not the Arcadian article, but the real
Englifli one. And where did Shakefpere get his Foreft
of Arden ? Not, we may be fure, in Flanders, but in
the foreft tract of Warwickfhire. Of Englifh middle
clals fociety in a country town, where (hall we find a
more life-like or genial picture than in " The Merry
Wives of Windfor?" Page, Ford, and their wives,
Sir Hugh Evans, and the hoft of the " Garter " were
doubtlefs drawn from the fubftantial glovers and wool-
ftaplers, innkeepers and parfons, of Stratford and the
neighbourhood. Of the home of a wealthy juftice
of the peace in a remote county Shallow's houfe and
furroundings is the trueft and moft humorous concep-
tion that ever was penned.
But to gather from the place all the infight which
it can yield, we muft take into account eipecially the
pofition which the Poet held there in his youth. The
imprefiion made upon the mind, of the young eipecially,
by outward objects, depends much upon the ftanding-
point from which it views them. A peer and a
coftermonger fhall both inhabit London, but yet their
His Parentage. 29
feveral conceptions of the place fhall differ as widely
as if one lived in Timbuctoo and the other in Siberia.
The family of Shakeipere, which had been long
fettled in Warwickshire, appears never to have rifen
above the rank of the yeomanry. The Poet's father,
John Shakefpere, was the fon of Richard Shakefpere,
a farmer of Snitterfield, not far from Stratford, and
refided in the houfe in Henley Street which tradition
afligns as the place of the Poet's birth. In an entry
in the regifter of the Bailiff's Court of that town,
dated 1556, ftating that he was fued by Thomas Siche
of Arfcotte in Wiltshire for 8, he is defcribed as
"Johannes Shakefpere de Stretford in Comitatu Warici,
Glover" It appears that he alfo farmed land, or at
leaft fold corn and timber, for in the fame year he
fued Henry Fyld for eighteen quarters of barley, which
the latter unjuftly detained. In 1564 the corporation
of Stratford paid him 4^. for a piece of timber. In
the fame year the year of his celebrated fon's birth
he contributed towards the relief of the poor when
the plague was raging in the town. He occupied a
farm of fourteen acres at Ington Meadow, or Ingon
Ing means " meadow," as in Ingateftone, called in
Latin, Pratum apud petram and in 1575 he purchafed
two freehold houfes in Henley Street. One of thefe he
had before occupied as tenant that, namely, in which
30 Shakefpere.
William Shakefpere was in all probability born. In a
deed dated 1579 he is defcribed as a yeoman, and his
name is found in a roll of the gentlemen and freeholders
of Barlim hundred, in which Stratford is Situated, bear-
ing date 1580. In a deed dated 1596 he is again
defcribed as a yeoman. In 1586 the copyhold of a
houfe in Henley Street was affigned to him.
We have feen that in one document he is ftyled
"glover," and that from others it appears that he
farmed land. Aubrey fays he was a butcher, and
Rowe, that he was a confiderable dealer in wool. But
all thefe are callings which might very poffibly be exer-
cifed by one and the fame perfon. Even at the prefent
day, when the principle of the divifion of labour is
much more rigidly carried out than formerly, we often
fee farmers combining with their principal callings thofe
of butchers, general dealers, timber-merchants, charcoal-
burners, horfe-dealers, corn-factors, auctioneers, valuers,
or fuch like country trades. In thofe times it was ftill
more likely that a man of active mind and of fome
claim to gentility mould be impatient of the fmall
profits of farming, and mould try fome fhort cut to
wealth by Speculating in any bufinefs with which cir-
cumftances might have made him acquainted.
At any rate he mult have been a man of fome
Standing and influence in his native town, for in 1557
His Parentage. 31
he was appointed an ale-tafter and a burgefs; in 1558
and 1559 he ferved as conftable an office generally
held by refpeftable farmers or tradefmen; in 1561 he
was appointed afferor an officer defined by Cowel,
" Such as are appointed in court-leets, &c., upon oath,
to mul<fl fuch as have committed faults arbitrarily
punifhable, and have no exprefs penalty fet down by
ftatute." He was elected one of the chamberlains in
1561 ; an alderman in 1565 ; high bailiff in 1568 ; and
on September 5, 1571, he was again elefted alderman
for the enfuing yean From fome of the documents
from which thefe fats are recorded, it has been argued
that John Shakefpere could not write his name, for he
has made his mark at the foot of feveral of them. At
that time the inability to write was not confidered fo
difgraceful as it would now be. But that John Shake-
Ipere figned his mark and not his name is by no
means decifive of the fad: that he could not write. I
think it is Dr. Maitland who obferves, in his book
on the middle ages, that it was then confidered a
mark of dignity to have your name written by a clerk,
and merely to acknowledge the a6t by making a crofs
or other mark oppofite it.
It has often been obferved that men of genius favour
to ufe a provincial, but, I think, alfo a Shakefperian
word their mother, rather than their father ; a prin-
32 Shakefpere.
ciple afted upon by the Arabs, who are faid to count
the pedigrees of their horfes through the dams, and
not the fires. It may be fo in the cafe of men, but the
fact, if it be one, may alfo be due to the early educa-
tion imparted by mothers to their children. Educa-
tion begins, in fact, at the mother's knee ; and the
bent given to the youthful mind from infancy to eight
or nine years old, during the long hours fpent at home
while the father is at his work, is probably difcernible
for ever after. Was it fo in the cafe of Shakefpere ?
We cannot tell, indeed, for certain ; but ftill the mind,
in dealing with the myfterious problem of his genius,
clings to anything in the fhape of even a probability.
When we read " Hamlet," " The Moor of Venice,"
"The Merchant of Venice," "As You Like It," "Much-
Ado About Nothing," "Lear," " Cymbeline," or " Ro-
meo and Juliet," we are amazed at the variety of cha-
racter difplayed in Ophelia, Defdemona, Portia, Rofalind,
Celia, Hermione, Beatrice, Cordelia, Imogen, and Juliet ;
but in each we recognife fundamental truth to the
higheft type of woman's nature. How did he obtain
the moral infight and elevation neceffary as a founda-
tion on which to raife thefe various fuperftructures ?
Where did he, a wild young man, {pending his youth
among the young farmers and tradefmen of Stratford,
and his manhood about the London theatres, acquire
His Mother. 33
that reverence for women which enabled him to com-
bine in his female characters the wildeft paflion with
the moft exquiiite purity ? Clever fons have often had
foolifh mothers ; but if any man has a tender refpect for
women and a deep appreciation of female excellence,
I think it will be found that he has acquired thefe
qualities from the early leflbns of maternal love. I
am willing, therefore, to fancy that Shakefpere ob-
tained his faculty of forming his high ideal of female
character from the early impreffions left upon his
mind by his mother.
Her very name, Mary Arden, is fuggeftive. The
painters have taken care that the firft bearer of the
name of Mary mall prefent to our minds all that is
pureft, nobleft, moft graceful, and womanly in maid,
wife, and mother. The fimple country folk give her
name to the moft wholefome, the fweeteft, and the
prettieft herbs and flowers that grow in their gardens
and hedges the rofemary, the marygold, the lady's
flipper, the maiden-hair, the lady's fingers, and other
fuch like. Arden means a foreft, and is applied, by way
of excellence, to the foreft country in Warwickfhire,
and that on the borders of France and Flanders, the
fcene of " As You Like It " and " Quentin Durward."
Of Mary Arden, indeed, no perfonal record remains,
but we know this at leaft, that me was of an old and
34 Shakefpere,
wealthy Warwickshire family, fome members of which
had done good fervice to Henry VII. Her father was
Robert Arden, a gentleman of Wilmecote, in the pa-
riflies of Stratford-upon-Avon and Afton, from whom
me inherited the eftate of Afhbies, confifting of about
fifty-four acres, two tenements in Snitterfield, a mare
in other lands at Wilmecote, befides a fmall fum of
money. The family derived its name from the foreft
diftrict of Arden, whence the Poet, no doubt, took his
ideal of the Arden whofe trees Orlando " marred with
writing love-fongs in their barks." That the heirefs
of Wilmecote inherited fome gentle qualities from her
gentle anceflry is poffible ; and its probability will not
be gainfayed by thofe who know what a difference the
fact of a pointer being fhot over or left untrained,
makes in the fteadinefs of its offspring. The fagacity
acquired by affociation with man's fuperior intelligence
is tranfmitted from generation to generation in the
lower animals ; and that in man the qualities of mind
foftered by the habitual felf-refpect, intellectual activity,
and purfuit of noble aims, which, as a general rule,
are found only amongft thofe who are exempt from
a dependence upon bodily toil, mould alfo defcend with
the blood, is not improbable ; but that her father's
eafy circumftances fecured to Mary Arden the un-
queftionable benefits of a good education, there can
SHOWING THE WINDOW OF THL ROOM IN WHICH H t WAS BORN
His Birthplace.
be no reafonable doubt. And fo Shakefpere, perhaps,
might add one more inftance to confirm. the fuppofed
rule that the genius of great men defcends to them
from their mothers' qualities or training. He was
born, in fad:, upon the outfkirts of gentility, and was
excluded from the tempting inner circle by poverty
rather than by birth.
I had now to vifit the aftual houfe nay, the very
room in which he probably firft faw the light.
In this houfe refided his father, John Shakefpere,
probably as a tenant, in 1552. In 1556 he purchafed
the freehold, and was refident there in 1590. The
baptifm of his third child, William, is regiftered in the
parifh church, under the date of April 26, 1564 ; and
therefore it feems almoft certain that the Poet was
born in this houfe, his parents' ufual refidence, in
accordance with the uninterrupted tradition of the
place.
Mr. Edwards, with camera more potent than the
perfpective glafs of Friar Bacon, or the wand with
which Profpero commanded the fervices of his
" trickfy Ariel" has compelled the bleffed Sun him-
felf to paint us four pictures of this interefting relic.
It is built of timber, with the interftices filled in with
what is called " wattle and dab," and probably refem-
bled mod other houfes of its clafs in the old town of
36 Shakefpere.
Stratford ; but I was not prepared to fee it look fo
fmug and new. Many of the old timbers remain,
and the houfe is, indeed, fubftantially the fame houfe
as it was ; but new timbers have been inferted where
the old were decayed, everything has been fcraped and
polimed up, and the place looks as if it had been
" reftored," a word to ftrike terror to the heart of
an antiquary, not to fpeak of a man of tafte. The
propenfity to ftain, and polifh, and varnifh, and fub-
ftitute new work for old unneceffarily, is much to be
deprecated. Perhaps the committee, who hold the
property in truft for the nation, could not avoid giving
to Shakefpere's birthplace its prefent holiday appear-
ance ; but how often is the artiftic eye offended by
feeing a fine old building vulgarifed by refhorers! There
is an ancient log-church at Grinftead, near Chipping
Ongar, in this county, which is enough to make one
tear one's hair. The trunks of the trees of which it
is built, and which were all riven and white with age,
have been fcraped, and ftained, and varnimed ; old
ftone-work has been replaced by the moft neatly-
pointed brick ; windows filled with the weather-ftained
green glafs of centuries ago, have been re-glazed in
the neweft fafhion ; an enormous and very conceited-
looking eagle ftands in the middle of the nave, and
the whole place is encumbered with berlin-wool im-
His Birthplace. 37
pertinences. The worft of it is, that the perpetrators
of fuch enormities are generally fuch worthy, well-
meaning people, that one is afraid to fuggeft a doubt
as to their difcretion, for fear of damping their zeal.
Perhaps a few years' expofure to the weather may
tone down the " neat " look of the houfe in Henley
Street.
The firft room I entered was in that part of the
building which had been a butcher's mop, and which,
I believe, was the refidence of John Shakefpere. It
feemed to be a fort of hall, or outer kitchen, paved
with unfhapely flags. The great old fire-place is fup-
ported by immenfe ftone jambs, and the ceiling by
a ponderous beam. Opening out of this is a better
room, probably the keeping-room, or, as it is called
in Yorkshire, the " houfe-place." This, too, is paved
with flags, and fupported by beams. The fire-place
is maflive, and under its projecting jambs are cofy
chimney-corners, where, doubtlefs, young Shakefpere,
feated on a fettle, many a time conned his leflbns of a
winter's evening, or read in Holinfhed, or roafted
crabs for the lambs'-wool, or, perhaps, dried himfelf
after one of his raids upon a neighbouring park or
warren. Beyond this are two fmaller rooms, which
were probably bed-chambers ; and beyond them, again,
fome more rooms, which, there feems every reafon to
38 Shakefpere.
believe, formed part of the other adjoining houfe, and
which are not (hown. Upftairs is the bed-chamber in
which tradition afferts the great Poet to have been
born ; and tradition is probably right, for it is the beft
chamber in the houfe, and therefore probably appro-
priated to the miftrefs on fuch an occafion, The large
window in the firft photograph belongs to it, and the
fecond places the interior before the reader's eyes as it
exifts ; and if he cannot actually be prefent at Stratford
on the 23rd of April next, he can fee all that the veri-
table pilgrims will fee without ftirring out of his arm-
chair. Every fquare inch of the walls is covered with
the names of vifitors, attefting the univerfal homage
paid to the mighty genius who reflects his fame upon
the unconfcious ftone and mafonry. The jambs of the
chimney have been appropriated by the modern actors
and actrefles, and amongft their names may ftill be read
that of Edmund Kean. Sir Walter Scott has in'fcribed
his in indelible characters with a diamond on a pane of
glafs in the large window.
In another room on the fame floor is mown a
portrait, much refembling the buft in the church, and
faid to have been preferved for many years in the
family of Mr. William Oakes Hunt, town-clerk of
Stratford, by whom it has been prefented to the public.
It is very like the monument in the church.
His Birthplace. 39
After looking at thefe things for a while, and linger-
ing over them with a fort of vague feeling that they
ought to tell fomething of him to whom they were
once familiar the feeling, I fuppofe which made men
brave every danger to vifit Jerufalem, and which ftill
impek them to traverfe the defert that they may tread
the ftreets of Mecca I patted out by a back-door
into the garden, which is nicely laid out with gravel-
walks, and in the middle of which may be feen fome
carved ftones taken from the ruins of New Place.
This fupplied Mr. Edwards with another view of the
houfe.
There was a fcheme, I think, fuggefted of planting
this garden exclulively with plants mentioned in Shake-
fpere's works, but it was abandoned. Perhaps it would
be impoffible to carry the idea out thoroughly ; but
I would certainly plead for a place for poor Ophelia s
" rofemary, that's for remembrance," and " panfies,
that's for thought ;" her fennel and her columbines,
and " herb-o'grace o' Sundays." I would have here
" Dailies pied, and violets blue,
And lady's fmocks all filver white,
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue ;"
and Titanic? s " mulk-rofes " mould be there too
not forgetting the "little weftern flower," which
40 Shakefpere.
maidens call " Love in Idlenefs ;" and fweet Perditas
" Daffodils,
That come before the fwallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty 5 violets, dim,
But fweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,
Or Cytherea's breath j pale primrofes,
That die unmarried, ere they can behold
Bright Phcebus in his flrength : a malady
Moft incident to maids ; bold oxlips, and
The crown-imperial ; lilies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one."
Thefe gardens are intended for the delegation of
the public, and it would certainly contribute to the
intereft and amufement of vifitors if, as they walked,
they could read on labels the many charming paffages
in which the great Poet, like One ftill greater, mowed
his love of nature by taking fimilitudes and pointing
morals from " the lilies of the field."
In this houfe, then, which is that of a refpe&able
yeoman, was William Shakeipere born, fome few days
before the 26th of April, 1564, the date of his bap-
tifm. The period allowed to elapfe between his birth
and baptifm was, probably, not more than eight days ;
becaufe the analogy between the Jewiih rite and the
Chriftian facrament was then maintained ; and a fuper-
ftition prevailed, that if the time were deferred longer,
the infant might be carried off by the fairies, and an
ouf fubftituted in its place. Here, at any rate, his
(THE GARDEN SEAT A CARVED STONE REMOVED FROM NEW PLACE)
.,
His Birthplace. 41
boyhood and youth were fpent, and he pafled through
the ages defcribed by himfelf :
" At firft the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurfe's arms j
Then the whining fchoolboy, with his fatchel,
With fhining morning face, creeping like mail,
Unwillingly to fchool ; and then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad
Made to his miftrefs' eyebrow."
Before difmiffing the fubjecT: of the houfe in Henley
Street, it may be well to record the viciffitudes through
which it has pafled. John Shakefpere, the Poet's
father, appears to have lived in a freehold houfe in
Henley Street, as tenant, in the year 1552. In 1574,
he purchafed from Edmund Hall, and Emma his wife,
for forty pounds, the houfes, defcribed as " two mef-
fuages, two gardens, and two orchards, with their ap-
purtenances ;" and one of thefe was, probably, that
which he already occupied as tenant. On the death
of John Shakefpere, thefe houfes defcended to his eldeft
fon, William ; and here, probably, the Poet's wife and
family lived while he was working for them in
London. The houfes continued to belong to him after
he had purchafed New Place, and he bequeathed " the
two mefluages, or tenements, with the appurtenance,
fituate, &c., in Henley Street, within the borough of
Stratford," to his daughter, Sufanna Hall, from whom
42 Shake fpere.
they defcended to her daughter, Elizabeth, married, firft,
to Thomas Na(b, and, fecondly, to Sir William Barnard.
Lady Barnard bequeathed the property, defcribed in
her will as " the inn, called the ' Maidenhead,' and
the adjoining houfe and barn," to Thomas and George
Hart, the grandchildren of Shakefpere's fifter Joan, in
the pofleflion of whofe defcendants they remained till
the beginning of this century. The name of the inn
was, however, changed from the " Maidenhead," to
the " White Lion/' and the adjoining houfe was ufed
as a butcher's mop. In this ftate they continued, the
property of private perfons ; and, at one time, there
was a rumour that fome American Barnum, perhaps
was about to buy them, and traniport them bodily,
like the Holy Houfe of Loretto, to Bofton. This
aft of facrilege was prevented by the appointment
of a committee of gentlemen, amongft the reft, Lord
Carlifle, who collected fubfcriptions, and bought them
for the nation. Rightly deeming that the prefervation
of the houfe was the firft object, they pulled down the
adjoining tenements to prevent the danger of fire,
repaired the houfe where it was decayed, and laid out
the wafte ground in gardens. In 1854, Mr. John
Shakefpere, of Afhby-de-la-Zouche, left by will a fum
of 2,000, to be employed in reftoring the houfe, efta-
blifhing a mufeum of Shakefperian relics, and paying
His Birthplace. 43
a curator ; but the bequeft was held by the Court of
Chancery to be bad for its indefmitenefs, and con-
trary to the provifions of the Statute of Mortmain.
Sufficient funds were, however, obtained, by fublcrip-
tion, to put the premifes into their prefent very credit-
able ftate of repair ; and the Shakeiperian pilgrims
who vifit the place next fpring will, no doubt, make
up any deficiency.
44 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER IV.
THE next object of intereft was the Grammar School,
founded in the reign of Edward VI., by Thomas
Jolepe. The prefent buildings, which comprife the
guildhall and the fchoolroom, are in Chapel Street,
and form part of a long row, the upper ftory of which
projects over the lower, after the manner of ancient
dwellings. The reader may fee it in Mr. Edwards's
photograph, with the tower of the Guild Chapel in
the background. It was during the play-hour that I
vifited it, and the head-mafter very kindly mowed me
over the place. You afcend a flight of ftairs to reach
the fchoolroom, which has much the fame appearance
as other rooms devoted to a like purpofe. The ceiling
has lately been removed and the oak roof revealed,
which, with the aid of the latticed windows, gives the
room an ancient and venerable appearance, fuch as it
bore when Shakefpere learned his accidence here.
Much ftrefs has been laid upon a fuppoiition that
I : ^~
- .
\
J-"1
I!
Iff.
ST RATFORD-ON -AVON
'The School where he was brought up. 45
Shakefpere was taught in " a fchool i' the church ; "
and indeed there is evidence that at one time the fchool
was held in the Guild Chapel. But the mode of edu-
cation was the fame whether it were given in the
church or in a feparate building. A chantry prieft, or
the parim prieft himfelf, was often the fchoolmafter,
and held the fchool in the foler over the church porch,
and the foundation of the education he gave was gram-
mar the grammar of the Latin language as being the
moft fcientific and accurate. At that time fchoolmaf-
ters were not fo foolim as to teach Latin grammar and
Englifh grammar feparately, as if they were two diftincl:
branches of knowledge. Latin was the medium for
teaching grammar in general, and, therefore, we may
be fure that through it Shakefpere learned the elements
of the fcience of language, in which he proved fo great
a mafter.
In the fixteenth century Greek was only beginning
to be generally ftudied. Erafmus, Rabelais, Sir Thomas
More, and Dean Collet had up-hill work in recom-
mending the ftudy, and were vehemently oppofed by the
confervatives in the old feats of learning. In fome of the
great grammar fchools it was introduced in the reign of
Edward VI., as, for inftance, at Chrift's Hofpital, where
the moft advanced ftudents are ftill called Grecians.
Chapman, who was fenior to Shakefpere, tranflated
46 Shakefpere.
Homer, though his fcholarfhip was certainly not great,
as may be feen by his notes ; and Marlowe, Greene, and
Peele, the " Univeriity pens," as they were called, knew
enough of it perhaps to fwear by. But even this fmall
amount of Greek, Shakefpere had no means of acquir-
ing. He could not have remained at the Stratford
grammar fchool long enough to become anything like
a fcholar ; but without becoming fo familiar even with
Latin as to read it for pleafure, or acquiring a critical
knowledge of Latin authors, he certainly learned the
fcience of language to fuch good purpofe that his
power of wielding words is unrivalled. And this is,
after all, the beft fruit of fcholarfhip.
It is related fomewhere that Wilkie, feeing a gro-
tefque face, and not having the materials of his art by
him, drew it on his thumb-nail, and introduced it in
one of his pictures ; and Shakefpere, no doubt, like a
true artift, loft no opportunity of obferving any old
character he came acrofs and embodying it in his plays.
Now amongft the names of the fchoolmafters who
wielded the ferule at Stratford, I think we may find
the probable prototype of a very amufing perfonage in
the "Merry Wives of Windfor." In 1570, when
Shakefpere was fix years old, the fchoolmafter was
Walter Roche. In 1572, when he was eight years
old, Thomas Hunt, curate of Shottery, came into
'The School where he was brought up. 47
power; and in 1580 Thomas Jenkins was inftalled.
Shakefpere was then fixteen, an age at which boys are
very keen to detect the weaknefles of their mafters.
In the "Merry Wives of Windfor" he pays off Sir
Thomas Lucy ; may he not alfo have drawn his quon-
dam pedagogue in the admirable fcene where Sir
Hugh Evans puts William Page through his parts of
fpeech ? Thomas Jenkins is obvioufly the name of a
Welfhman, for which the Poet probably fubftituted
the equally Welfh combination of names, Hugh Evans.
At fixteen, Shakefpere had either left, or was about
to leave, fchool, and therefore we can hardly fuppofe
"William" to have been himfelf; but he may have
remained for a time after he had finimed his own
ftudies to affift Jenkins and this, by the way, would
account for the tradition that he was at one time a
fchoolmafter when he would have had abundant
opportunities of obferving fuch fcenes as the follow-
ing. We might, therefore, perhaps, read "Thomas
Jenkins " for " Hugh Evans " in this paflage :
Mrs. Page. How now, Sir Hugh? no fchool to-day?
Evans. No j Mailer Slender is let the boys leave to play.
Quickly. Bleflings of his heart !
Mrs. Page. Sir Hugh, my hulband fays my fon profits nothing in the
world at his book ; I pray you, alk him fome queftions in his accidence.
Evans. Come hither, William ; hold up your head, come.
Mrs. Page. Come on, firrah : hold up your head ; anfwer your matter,
be not afraid.
48 Shakefpere.
Evcuis. William, how many numbers is in nouns ?
William. Two.
Quickly. Truly, I thought there had been one number more ; becaufe
they fay od's nouns.
Evans. Peace your tattlings. What is fair, William?
William. Pulcher.
Quickly. Polecats ! there are fairer things than polecats, fure.
Evans. You are a very fimplicity 'oman j I pray you, peace. What is
lapis, William ?
William. A flone.
Evans. And what is a (tone, William ?
William. A pebble.
Evans. No, it is lapis ; I pray you remember in your prain.
William. Lapis.
Evans. That is a good William. What is he, William, that doth lend
articles ?
William. Articles are borrowed of the pronoun ; and be thus declined,
Singulariter, nominativo, hie, hcec, hoc.
Evans. Nominativo, hig, hag, hog; I pray you mark: genitivo, hujus.
Well, what is your accusative case?
William. Accusativo, hunc.
Evans. I pray you, have your remembrance, child} Accusativo, hung,
hang, hog.
Quickly. Hang hog is Latin for bacon, I warrant you.
Evans. Leave your prabbles, 'oman. What is the focative case,
William ?
William. vocativo O.
Evans. Remember, William, focative is, caret r
Quickly. And that's a good roqt.
If poor William Shakefpere learned his accidence in
this ftyle, it is no wonder that he had "fmall Latin;"
and Farmer has clearly mown that the tradition of
his lack of fcholarmip, embodied even in the enco-
miums of his contemporaries, is probably true. But
His Schoolmafters. 49
perhaps Thomas Hunt, the curate of Shottery, was a
better fcholar than Thomas Jenkins.
The grammar fchool is alfo probably the parent of
the comical fcene in " Love's Labour Loft/' where Sir
Nathaniel called " Sir " becaufe a Mafter of Arts and
Holofernes, the fchoolmafter or pedant, mow off their
learning before Goodman Dull ; but whether Ho/of "ernes
were intended to reprefent either William Roche or
Thomas Hunt we have no means even to form a
conjecture.
Nathaniel. Very reverend fport, truly ; and done in the teftimony of a
good conference.
Holof ernes. The deer was, as you know, fanguls, in blood; ripe as a
pomewater, who how hangeth like a jewel in the ear of coelo the iky,
the welkin, the heaven ; and anon falleth like a crab, on the face of
terra the foil, the land, the earth.
Nathaniel. Truly, Mafter Holofernes, the epithets are fweetly varied,
like a fcholar at the leaft ; but, fir, I aflhre you, it was a buck of the firlt
head.
Holofernes. Sir Nathaniel, haud credo.
Dull. 'Twas not a haud credo; 'twas a pricket.
Holofernes. Moft barbarous intimation! yet a kind of inlinuation as it
were, in via, in way, of explication ; facere, as it were, replication j or,
rather, oftentare, to ihow, as it were, his inclination, after his undrefled,
unpolifhed, uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or rather unlettered, or,
rathereft, unconformed fafhion to infert again my haud credo for a deer.
Dull. I faid the deer was not a haud credo ; 'twas a pricket.
Holofernes. Twice fod fimplicity, bis coc~tus ! O thou monfter igno-
rance, how deformed doft thou look !
Nathaniel. Sir, he hath never fed of the dainties that are bred in a
book : he doth not eat paper, as it were ; he hath not drunk ink : his
50 Shakefpere.
intelle6t is not replenished 5 he is only an animal, only fenfible in the
duller parts.
It is not unlikely that Shakefpere, in this excellent
caricature of a fcholar, may have intended to retaliate
upon Ben Jonfon and his other more learned friends
for their reflections upon his "fmall Latin." The
whole fcene is an example of the euphuifm brought
into fafhion by Lilly the far-fetched and fantaftic
ftyle which has defcended to the fecond-rate writers in
newfpapers. A man who, like Shakefpere, has fed
upon the banquet that Nature provided for him, is apt
to be a little impatient of thofe who have, " as it were,
eaten paper and drunk ink," juft as Lord Bacon told
his friend, Sir Thomas Bodley, that he was going to
write a treatife againft great libraries.
Shottery.
CHAPTER V.
FROM the grammar fchool in Chapel Street I returned to
Henley Street, and from thence, by a footpath acrofs the
fields and over ftiles, to the little village of Shottery.
Many a time had Shakefpere trodden this very path
when he had attained the lover ftage of life, " fighing
like a furnace, with a woful ballad made to his
miftrefs' eyebrow." Here, perhaps, when the fighs
became too deep, he may have cheered himfelf with
" Jog on, jog on, the footpath way,
And merrily hent the ftile-a ;
Your merry heart goes all the day,
Your fad one tires in a mile-a."
The village is a ftraggling one, and the cottages are
pi&urefque though poor. At the bottom of the village
to the left of a pretty country lane, ftands the cottage
to which tradition points as having been the refidence
of Anne Hathaway, who afterwards became the Poet's
5 2 Shakefpere.
wife. The reader will at once fee its character from
Mr. Edwards's charming little photograph.
It was once obvioufly a fubftantial farm-houfe, much
fuperior to that of John Shakefpere in Henley Street,
though, like it, built of wooden frames rilled in with
wattle and dab on foundations of ftone. In modern
times brick has been in fome places fubftituted where
the ftone has become decayed. The roof is thatched,
I think with reed. It is now divided into two cottages,
and Mrs. Baker, a pleafing refpedtable-looking woman,
who believes herfelf to be related to the Hathaways,
lives in a portion of it. She is proud of her connection
with the Poet an honour which me appreciates the
more, perhaps, as it brings her in many a milling from
the pilgrims who flock to fee the houfe. She willingly
mows the infide of her dwelling, and feveral pieces of
old furniture which, as me avers, have defcended to her
from her anceftors. If fo, and there is no reafon to
doubt the fadl, they may very poffibly have been ufed
by young Shakefpere when he was courting his future
wife.
A flight of fteps leads into a large keeping room or
hall, where under the great old chimney may have fat
Shakefpere and his love, in the days of his extreme
youth when Love is ftone blind. In a family Bible
Mrs. Baker mows the following pedigree, in which me
13*
Anne Hathaway" s Home. 53
traces her defcent from the Hathaways, who have
continued to relide in the houfe ever fince the iixteenth
century.
Sufan Hathaway. _ William Taylor.
I
John Hathaway Taylor. Mary Harrifs.
William Taylor. Elizabeth Dobbin.
Mary Taylor. Baker.
The prefent tenant.
Upftairs is a bed-chamber, where Mrs. Baker fhows
an old oak bed and a pair of very beautifully worked
meets and pillow-cafes. She fays (he inherited them
from her father, and that they have been in the family
from time immemorial, and ufed on ftate occafions,
fuch as marriages, births, and deaths. They are marked
" Elizabeth Hathaway/' but whether the character of
the work be ancient or modern I am not fuch an adept
in needlework as to determine. About the houfe are
feveral old oak chefts, chairs, and fettles, but none, I
fhould imagine, older than the feventeenth century.
Much has been written refpefting Shakefpere's mar-
riage, and perhaps a good deal of it raflily. The circum-
ftances are not, affuredly, very fatisfa&ory. In the firft
place he was under nineteen when he married, and
54 Shakefpere.
Anne Hathaway was fix and twenty. And though he
was not a man to make literary capital out of his
domeftic relations, or to whine in public over his re-
grets and forrows, like the fnivelling hypocrite Greene,
yet I cannot perfuade myfelf that his own cafe was not
prefent to his mind when he wrote the well-known
lines in " Twelfth Night : "-
" Let the woman take
An elder than herielf ; fo wears fhe to him ;
So fways Ihe level in her hufband's heart ;
For, boy, however we do praife ourfelves,
Our fancies are more giddy and infirm,
More longing, wavering, fooner loft and worn
Than women's are.
Then let thy love be younger than thyfelf,
Or thy affection cannot hold the bent."
<
Anne Hathaway was the daughter of one Richard
Hathaway, a fmall farmer. The marriage bond and
licenfe were difcovered in the Confiftorial Court at
Worcefter in the year 1836, by Sir Robert Phillipps.
They are dated November 28, 1582, and are marked
with crofles. One of the feals has the initials " R. H.,"
fuppofed to be thofe of the bride's father, Richard
Hathaway. There is no record of the marriage in
Stratford church ; it therefore muft have been folem-
nifed in the church of fome neighbouring village, where
the regifters have not been preferved, or perhaps in a
His Marriage. 55
private houfe. The regifter of Stratford bears witnefs,
however, to the birth of the firft-born of William
Shakefpere and Anne Hathaway, in May, 1583.
From thefe ugly fafts, Mr. de Quincy, in his article
on Shakefpere, in the " Encyclopaedia Britannica," has
perhaps drawn unwarrantable conclufions. The agree-
ment to live as man and wife is held, I believe, by
the canon law to conftitute marriage. Manzoni's " I
Promeffi Spoil " is founded upon this principle, which
ftill prevails even in Proteftant Scotland, while the law of
the country follows that of Rome in many of its prin-
ciples and forms. The religious ceremony was held to
be merely a folemn ratification of a contract already
complete, and to be in no wife eflential to its perfection .
Hence, the marriage of heathens has always been held
good, and not to be repeated on the parties becoming
Chriftians. Every nation has, of courfe, a right to re-
quire certain forms to be gone through in order to
prevent clandeftine marriages, and to make the crime
of bigamy more difficult to commit ; and thofe who
choofe to dilpenfe with fuch legal forms in their own
cafe, thereby (how, or may be prefumed to mow, that
they have not really confented to be bound by the laws
of marriage. But the queftion is, Was the cuftom of
holding troth-plight to be equivalent to marriage preva-
lent in England in Shakefpere's time? There may, of
56 Shakefpere.
courfe, have been great laxity in this refpecT: among the
lower orders, as there is now ; but Shakefpere's family
was rather above the lower- orders. The Englifh have
always been particularly impatient of any attempt to
introduce the canon law of marriage, and the famous
" Nolumus leges Anglias mutari " was uttered in oppo-
fition to the attempt of the Pope to make the law of
England conformable to the principle of the canon law,
that a fubfequent marriage renders children born be-
fore wedlock legitimate. This was never admitted by
Englifh lawyers. But Shakeipere himfelf has recorded
his own judgment, and therein the judgment of his
day, upon fuch an ante-dating of the public ceremony
of matrimony. In " The Tempeft," Profpero charges
Ferdinand and Miranda
" Then, as my gift, and thine own acquisition
Worthily purchaf'd, take my daughter : But
If thou doft break her virgin knot before
All fanctimonious ceremonies may
With full and holy rite be minifter'd,
No fweet afperlion mall the heavens let fall
To make this contract grow ; but barren hate,
Sour-ey'd difdain, and difcord, mall beftrew
The union of your bed with weeds fo loathly,
That you {ball hate it both : therefore, take heed,
As Hymen's lamps mall light you."
Whether Shakefpere's married life were a happy one
or not, we have no means of knowing; but certainly
His Marriage. 57
the circumflances under which it commenced were
not promiiing.
It has been fuppofed that his bequeathing to his wife
only his fecond-beft bed is indicative of no very ftrong
affection for her ; but it has been well obferved by Mr.
Knight, that this circumftance does not prove much
with refpecl: to the terms on which they lived, becaufe
a considerable part of the property of which he died
pofTeffed was freehold, and out of this me was entitled
to her dower and thirds at common law. Still, I can-
not help thinking, that had his love for his wife been
very ardent or very tender, he would have mentioned
her in his will in more endearing terms, and left her
fome more fignificant token of affection than his fecond*
beft bed.
Anne Hathaway died in 1623, furviving herhufband
feven years, and is buried clofe to him in the chancel
of the parifh church at Stratford. On her graveftone
is this infcription, " Here lyeth interred the body of
Anne, wife of William Shakefpeare, who departed this
life the 6th day of Auguft, 1623, being of the age of
67 years."
58 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER VI.
MARY ARDEN had borne to John Shakefpere two
daughters Joan, born in 1558, the year of Queen
Elizabeth's acceffion ; fhe probably died young, as a
fubfequent daughter was chriftened by the fame name.
Margaret, the fecond child, we know, from the regifter,
to have died foon after her birth. William, therefore,
was the eldeft furviving child. He was fucceeded by
Gilbert, born in 1566; Joan, in 1569; Anne, in 1571 ;
and Edmund, in 1580.
But before the birth of Edmund, John Shakefpere
was beginning to experience the ufual lot of thofe who
have many irons in the fire. In 1578, Afhbies, his
wife's patrimony, was mortgaged. In the next year,
the intereft and reverfion to the eftate at Snitterfield
was fold. When his brother aldermen were required
to contribute fix and eight pence for the equipping of
three pikemen, two billmen, and one archer, John
Shakefpere was indulgently let off for one half, and
His Father s Embarraffments. 59
was altogether excufed from contributing fourpence a
week, which the others paid, for the relief of the poor,
then firft becoming chargeable upon the general public
in confequence of the diflblution of the monafteries.
When, in 1578-9, a rate was levied on the inhabitants
for the purchafe of armour, he was unable to pay; and
becaufe he had no goods to diftrain upon, a capias
iffued againft him on the igth of January. And then,
of courfe, his embarraffments came thicker and thicker
upon him, till, at a court held on the 6th September,
1586, a more profperous citizen was chofen to fill his
place as alderman.
At this time the Poet was twenty- two years of age,
and the gall of this indignity probably entered into his
foul, and dictated thofe bitter taunting reflections of
Jaques, when he faw the ftricken deer deferted by the
herd:
" ' 'Tis right,' quoth he, * thus mifery doth part
The flux of company.' Anon a carelefs herd,
Full of the pafture, jumps along by him,
And never flays to greet him : ' Ay/ quoth Jaques,
* Sweep on, you fat and greafy citizens ;
'Tis juft the fafhion 5 wherefore do you look
Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there ? ' '
The oftenfible reafon of John Shakefpere's degra-
dation from the poft of alderman was, that he " dothe
not come to the halles when they be warned, nor
60 S ha kef per e.
hathe not done of longe time." But, probably, his
abfence was caufed by his being in prifon, or in
hiding for fear of arreft ; for, in the next year, he fued
out a writ of habeas corpus in the Stratford Court of
Record.
From thefe pecuniary embarraffments, and the legal
proceedings which fprang out of them, William Shake-
ipere probably derived that knowledge of legal terms
and practice which, appearing in his plays, led Malone
to believe that he was bound apprentice to an attorney ;
and it is but too likely that he then learnt to count
the time by the duration of a law-fuit. " I will devife
matter enough," fays Falftajf, "out of this Shallow
to keep Prince Harry in continual laughter the wear-
ing out of fix fafhions (which is four terms, or two
aftions), and he mall laugh without inter vallums"
In thefe misfortunes it is to be feared that William
Shakefpere was not a comfort or afliftance to his father.
Both from the external evidence of tradition, and the
internal teftimony of his plays, there is good reafon to
fuppofe that his youth was, as the French fay, ftormy.
In the archives of Corpus Chrifti College, Oxford, is
a collection of antiquarian papers compiled by the Rev.
William Fulman, who died in 1688, and who may
therefore have been born fome time before Shake-
fpere's death. Thefe papers were bequeathed by Mr.
His Poaching Adventure. 61
Fulman to his friend, the Rev. Richard Davies, who
died in 1708, and who has added the following remark
on Shakefpere, derived, probably, from information
fupplied to him by his friend. Under the head
" Shakefpere" we read, " Much given to all unlucki-
nefle in ftealing venifon and rabbits, particularly from
Sir Lucy, who had him oft whipt, and fome-
times imprifoned, and at laft made him fly his native
country, to his great advancement ; but his reveng was
fo great, that he is his Jujlice Clodpate (i.e. foolifh
juftice), and calls him a great man ; and that, in allu-
lion to his name, bore three lowfes rampant for his
arms." The fame ftory is told by Oldys, Norroy king-
at-arms, and the compiler of the " Biographia Bri-
tannica." There was a very aged gentleman living
in the neighbourhood of Stratford (where he died fifty
years fince), who had not only heard from feveral old
people in that town of Shakefpere's tranfgreffion, but
could remember the firft ftanza of that bitter ballad,
which, repeating to one of his acquaintance, he pre-
ferved it in writing, and here it is, neither better nor
worfe, but faithfully tranfcribed from the copy which
his relation very courteoufly communicated to me :
" A parlemente member, a juftice of peace,
At home a poor fcare-crowe, at London an affe j
If lowfie is Lucy, as ibme volk mifcalle it,
Then Lucy is lowfie, whatever befall it.
6a Shakefpere.
He thinks himfelf greate,
Yet an afle in his flate
We allowe by his ears but with afles to mate.
If Lucy is lowfie, as fome volk mifcalle it,
Sing lowfie Lucy whatever befall it."
Rowe, who wrote the firft life of Shakefpere, and
derived his information from Betterton, the adtor,
gives the following account of the tranfadion : " An
extravagance that he was guilty of forced him both
out of the country, and that way of living which he
had taken up ; and though it feemed at firft to be a
blemifh upon his good manners, and a misfortune to
him, yet it afterwards happily proved the occafion of
exerting one of the greateft geniufes that ever was
known in dramatic poetry. He had, by a misfortune
common enough to young fellows, fallen into ill com-
pany, and amongft them fome, that made a frequent
practice of deer-ftealing, engaged him more than once
in robbing a park that belonged to Sir Thomas Lucy,
of Charlecote, near Stratford. For this he was pro-
fecuted by that gentleman, as he thought, fomewhat
too feverely, and, in order to revenge that ill-ufage,
he made a ballad upon him. And though this, pro-
bably the firft effay of his poetry, be loft, yet it is faid
to have been fo very bitter, that it redoubled the pro-
fecutions againft him to that degree, that he was
obliged to leave his bufmefs and family in Warwick-
His Poaching Adventure. 63
fhire, and {belter himfelf in London." A Mr. Thomas
Jones, who lived at Tarbich, a village in Worcefter-
fbire about eight miles from Stratford, and died in
1703, aged ninety, had often heard the fame ftory
from old people at Stratford. So far the external
evidence is as ftrong as any which is ufually relied
upon under fuch circumftances.
The play of " The Merry Wives of Windfor" fup-
plies internal evidence, not only of a quarrel with Sir
Thomas Lucy, but that the quarrel had its origin in
a poaching affray. The play opens before Page's
houfe, at Windfor, where enter Juftice Shallow, Slen-
der, and Sir Hugh Evans :
Shallow. Sir Hugh, perfuade me not; I will make a Star Chamber matter
of it : if he were twenty Sir John FalftafFs, he fhall not abufe Robert
Shallow, efquire,
Slender. In the county of Glo'fter, juftice of peace and coram.
Shallow. Ay, coufin Slender, and Cuft-alorum.
Slender. Ay, and ratolorum too j and a gentleman born, matter parfon ;
who writes himfelf armigero ! in any bill, warrant, quittance, or obliga-
tion, armigero.
Shallow. Ay, that I do ; and have done any time thefe three hundred
years.
Slender. All his fucceflbrs gone before him have done 't ; and all his an-
ceftors that come after him may : they may give the dozen white luces
in their coat.
Shallow. It is an old coat.
Evans. The dozen white loufes do become an old coat well j it agrees
well, paflant j it is a familiar beaft to man, and fignifies love.
Shallow. The luce is a frefh fiflij the fait fim is an old coat.
64 Shakefpere.
Though the name of the foolifh juftice be Shallow,
the allufion here to the name and arms of Lucy arms
which the family at Charlecote now bear is unmif-
takable ; and, moreover, the very fame ludicrous play
upon the words is ufed as in the ftanza of the ballad,
which has been preferved. Now for the corpus delicti
the matter of the fault.
Falftaff comes in with Bardolpb, Nym, and Piftol 9
and thus addreffes the juftice :
Falftaff. Now, mafter Shallow, you'll complain of me to the king ?
Shallow. Knight, you have beaten my men, killed my deer, and broke
open my lodge.
Falftaff. But not kifl 'd your keeper's daughter.
Shallow. Tut, a pin ! This mail be anfwer'd.
Malone, and others, feem unwilling to admit this
ftory of Shakefpere's youth, and feem to think that it
was beneath Shakefpere to be a " deer-ftealer." The
word certainly founds bad, but I cannot conceive how
anyone could fuppofe that, for a youth to ferret rabbits
and kill the fquire's game could imprint a lafting
ftigma upon his character. Probably many noblemen
who now fit in the Houfe of Lords and pafs game-
laws, have robbed hen-roofts and orchards, and fnared
hares, when they were at Harrow or Winchefter, and
nobody thinks the worfe of them for it. In the reigns
of Elizabeth and James, to break into a park, kill the
His Poaching Adventure. 65
deer, beat the keeper, and kifs his pretty daughter,
would have been confidered only in the light of a
youthful frolic, and nothing more. Falftaff, who, in
his boyhood, was page to Thomas Mowbray, Duke
of Norfolk, and, at the period of " The Merry Wives
of Windfor" at leaft was received at Court, is not the
leaft afhamed of his exploit.
The truth is, that the guilt of any crime is not mea-
fured by the crime itfelf, but by the motive and inten-
tion of him who commits it. Malice prepenfe is an
effential element of the crime of murder ; the animus
furandi of that of larceny. A political affaffination is
a great crime ; but the political afTaffin may be a high-
minded, though miftaken man; whereas the fervant
who cuts his mafter's throat that he may rob the till, or
the garrotter who ftrangles a man for his watch, is a
bafe flave, for whom the moft ignominious death that
can be devifed is too good. A peafant who fteals
poultry and kills deer and other game to fell, that he
may live in idlenefs and luxury, is a thief, and defer ves
fome infamous punifhment; but a fchoolboy or youth
who, for the fake of the excitement and adventure,
robs a hen-rooft, or breaks into a deer-park and
carries off a buck, is not really a thief. The animus
furandi, the intention of ftealing, is not really prefent in
his mind. It is rather the love of fport and the excite-
66 Shakefpere.
ment of incurring danger that impels him to do the
unlawful ad:.
We may even go further than this, and affert that
the fame ad: varies in guilt according to the general
eftimate of its lawfulnefs or unlawfulnefs at different
times ; for this reafon, that a man who committed an
ad: univerfally held to be infamous, would be outraging
his own confcience, and deftroying his felf-refped. In
Shakefpere's time and long after, the diftindion be-
tween the foldier who robbed by wholefale and the
poor gentleman who took purfes by retail upon the
road, was fcarcely acknowledged; ftill lefs would any
note of infamy be attached to a young fellow who
fhould turn Robin Hood for the nonce, and infringe
the odious foreft-laws.
But, indeed, there is an antecedent probability that
young Shakefpere, circumftanced as he was, would be
" much given to all unluckinefs ; " apt to do wild and
daring things which would get him into fcrapes, and
live in enmity with the more ftaid and orderly portion
of the community. Lord Clive was juft fuch a youth.
Lord Byron had the fame aptitude. I do not, of
courfe, mean to fay that every man of genius muft
neceffarily have been a fcamp when he was young;
but it is undoubtedly true, that the fame adive imagi-
nation and force of will which, when direded to
His Love of Hunting. 67
worthy ends, make a man great, will in his hot youth,
if he be not reftrained by fome wholefome external
influences, hurry him into acts which his mature rea-
fon will condemn. It is when thefe youthful indif-
cretions are not counterbalanced by nobler counter-
acting qualities, and therefore form habits which are
only ftrengthened by the lapfe of years and become
part of the character, that they degrade and corrupt
the man. I cannot believe that young Shakefpere
can have found an adequate fcope for his energies and
afpirations in the farming, butchering, wool-dealing, or
gloving, in the profecution of which his father managed
to become a bankrupt.
And what more likely form could his wildnefs have
aflumed than that of unlawful fporting ? All Englifh-
men are fond of manly out-of-door fports, and no
Engliih poet, Chaucer perhaps excepted, has mown in
his works a greater appreciation of the pleafures of the
chafe than Shakefpere. It is worth while to cite a
few of the many paflages which atteft his practical
knowledge and enjoyment of field fports. Here is a
defcription of the fhifts of the hare, from one of his
earlieft poems, the " Venus and Adonis : "
"And when thou haft on foot the purblind hare,
Mark the poor wretch, to overlhoot his troubles,
How he outruns the wind, and with what care
He cranks and crofles with a thoufand doubles :
68 Shakefpere.
The many mufits through the which he goes
Are like a labyrinth to amaze his foes.
Sometimes he runs among a flock of flieep,
To make the cunning hounds miflake their fmell ;
And fometimes where earth-delving conies keep,
To flop the loud purfuers in their yell ;
And fometimes forteth with a herd of deer :
Danger devifeth fhifts ; wit waits on fear j
For there his fmell with others being mingled,
The hot fcent-muffing hounds are driven to doubt,
Ceafing their clamorous cry till they have tingled
With much ado the cold fault clearly out ;
Then do they fpend their mouths : Echo replies,
As if another chafe were in the ikies.
By this, Poor Wat, far off upon an hill
Stands on his hinder legs with liftening ear,
To hearken if his foes purfue him flill :
Anon their loud alarums he doth hear :
And now his grief may be compared well
To one fore lick that hears the paffing-bell.
Then fhalt thou fee the dew-bedabbled wretch
Turn and return, indenting with the way j
Each envious briar his weary legs doth fcratch,
Each fhadow makes him flop, each murmur flay ;
For mifery is trodden on by many,
And being low, never relieved by any."
There is a familiarity fhown, too, with the names
of hounds and the terms of hunting in the paffage
where Profpero and Ariel fet the fpirits on to hunt
Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo, in " The Tempeft,"
His Love of Hunting. 69
Profpero. Hey, Mountain, hey !
Ariel. Silver, there it goes, Silver !
Profpero. Fury, Fury ! there, Tyrant, there ! hark ! hark !
Again, in the introduction to "The Taming of a
Shrew," the nobleman who comes in from hunting
fays
Huntfman, I charge thee, tender well my hounds :
Leach Merriman, the poor cur is embofled ;
And couple Clowder with the deep-mouthed brach.
Saw'ft thou not, boy, how Silver made it good
At the hedge-corner, in the coldeft fault ?
I would not lofe the dog for twenty pound.
Firfl Huntfman. Why, Belman is as good as he, my lord !
He cried upon it at the mereft lofs,
And twice to-day picked out the coldeft fcent :
Truft me, I take him for the better dog.
Lord. Thou art a fool : if Echo were as fleet,
I would efleem him worth a dozen fuch.
Here in two diftincT: pafTages we have " Silver "
ufed as the name of a hound ; probably a favourite
one of Shakefpere's.
In " A Midfummer Night's Dream " is a charming
dialogue on hunting between Thefeus and Hippolyta :
Ttiefeus. Go, one of you, find out the forefler ;
For now our obfervation is performed ;
And fince we have the vaward of the day,
My love mall hear the mufic of my hounds,
Uncouple in the weftern valley j let them go :
Defpatch, I fay, and find the forefter.
We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top,
And mark the mufical confufjon
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.
70 Shakefpere.
Hippolyla. I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bayed the bear
With hounds of Sparta : never did I hear
Such gallant chiding; for, belides the groves,
The ikies, the fountains, every region near,
Seemed all one mutual cry : I never heard
So mufical a difcord, fuch fweet thunder.
< T/iefeus 9 who poffibly does not like to hear Hippolyta
fpeak of the pleafant hours fhe fpent with Hercules
and Cadmus, and extol their hounds, immediately fays
that his hounds, too, are of Sparta, and ftands up for
their excellence :
" My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flewed, fo fanded ; and their heads are hung
With ears that fweep away the morning dew.
Crook-kneed and dew-lapped like Theilalian bulls ;
Slow in purfuit, but matched in mouth like bells,
Each under each. Aery more tuneable
Was never holla'd to, nor cheered with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in ThefTaly :
Judge, when you hear."
It is true, thefe crooked-kneed, dew-lapped, long-
eared, " tow-rowing " hounds, fo flow in purfuit,
would not fuit the ideas of modern fportfmen, who
like to come home and talk of, " by Jove, fir, the fafteft
thing of fifty minutes you ever faw !" but there is
in this paflage an appreciation of the qualities then
prized in hounds, which (hows that Shakefpere was
a fportfman himfelf, and drew from the life.
His Revenge on Sir T. Lucy. 71
For thefe reafons I conclude that Oldys's affertion,
that Shakefpere was " much given to all unluckineis
in dealing venifon and rabbits," is in itfelf probable ;
and if he did poach upon his neighbours' manors, thofe
who know anything of Englifh country gentlemen will
not be difpofed to doubt that he was an object of efpe-
cial diflike to the largeft preferver of game in the
neighbourhood that Sir Thomas Lucy who actually
brought a bill into Parliament to increafe the ftrin-
gency of the game-laws. When it is recollefted how
young Shakefpere was when he married, and that his
unlawful fporting adventures had probably begun when
he was ftill at fchool, or foon after, it is not unlikely
that Sir Thomas Lucy had had him " whipt ;" the
imprifonment came afterwards, no doubt.
His mode of revenge was characteristic, and one
which was not unfamiliar to his mind ; for he makes
Faljiaff threaten the Prince and Pointz in " Henry IV."
" An I have not ballads made on you all and fung to
filthy tunes, let this cup of fack be my poifon."
Though the ftanza which has been handed down as
the inftrument of his revenge be not of the choice!!,
it was enough to anfwer his purpofe. It is founded
upon the fame play of words that occurs in " The Merry
Wives of Windfor," as already quoted, and is of that
rough-and-ready fort that would tickle the ears of an
Shakefpere.
audience of Warwickshire clowns, for whom it was
intended. It was alfo likely to be very mortifying to
Sir Thomas Lucy. A county magistrate like him
would feel infinitely indignant at the bare idea of a
youth like Shakefpere having fo little refpect for him
as to hold up his perfon and name to ridicule ; for if
there be one thing more than another which angers
a man to the foul, it is to play upon his name. To
have his " luces," too, of which he was fo proud,
turned into that "beaft" which, however familiar to
man, is " abhorred alike by faint and finner ! " It was
more than any county magiftrate could bear. Sir
Thomas Lucy might whip or imprifon young Shake-
fpere, but young Shakefpere could make Sir Thomas
Lucy a nay-word through the whole country's fide,
fo that wherever his name was mentioned, at fair or
market, men would think of " loufy Lucy ;" fuch is
the power of what Falftaff calls the " damnable itera-
tion" of the initial letter. But it is curious to fee the
caprice of Fame. A worthy Warwickshire juftice pro-
fecutes a young farmer for poaching and libelling him
in the grofleft manner. The young farmer incon-
tinently goes to London, and becomes the greateft
poet of one of the greateft nations in the world, and
the worthy country gentleman is handed down to all
pofterity as the perfonification of all that is moft
Charlecote.
73
ridiculous and contemptible in magifterial folly and
pretenfion.
There is fome difpute as to the real fcene of Shake-
fpere's exploits, but it is probable that he was not
particular as to where he fhot his deer or fnared his
rabbits. Mr. Bracebridge maintains, in a pamphlet on
the fubjeft, that Fulbrooke, and not Charlecote, was
the fcene of the affray which led to Shakelpere's dif-
grace ; but Charlecote was probably only one demefne
among many that were laid under contributions. At
any rate, it was the feat of Sir Thomas Lucy, Mafter
Robert Shallow, Efquire, of the play, and I therefore
refolved to pay it a vifit.
The road lies over the fine old bridge, built by Sir
Hugh Clopton, and along the margin of the Avon,
to the left as you leave the town. As I was walking
through a pretty village, I overtook a waggon, and fee-
ing that the waggoner looked very much pleafed about
fomething, and was evidently anxious to enter into
converfation, I determined to indulge him, and " gave
him the time of day," as they fay in Effex. Then it all
came out. There had been a grand harveft-home the
day before ; and firft, he told me, the Vicar " prached a
farmon for the good of our fowls ;" and there was a great
tent pitched, and all the people fat at long tables, and
there was plenty of beef and plum-pudding ; and " Sir
74 Shakefpere.
. Robert H was runnin' about till he" (how {hall I
tranflate the vigorous but not elegant Anglo-Saxon of
my churl ?) " perfpired again, afkin' us all, 'Well, have
you got anything to ate ? J I fuppofe he have been in
many a fcrimmage, for he have got a lot o' medals.
Then there was all forts of amufement, a band o'
mufic and dancin', and throwin' the wheat-fheaf."
He added, " Sir Robert is a big man, and a Parlia-
ment member." Here we have the very phrafe in
the fong. This honeft waggoner and his harveft-
home put me in mind of the meep-fhearing in the
" Winter's Tale," when the Clown comes in, counting
what he has to buy for the feaft :
" Let me fee, what am I to bay for our fheep-lhearing feaft ? Three
pound of fugarj five pound of currants; rice what will this fifter of
mine do with rice ? But my father hath made her miftrefs of the feaft,
and me lays it on. She hath made me four-and-twenty nofegays for the
ihearers ; three-man-fong men all, and very good ones ; but they are
moft of them means and bafes, but one Puritan amongft them, and he
fings pfalms to hornpipes. I muft have faftron, to colour the warden
pies $ mace, dates none j that's out of my note ; nutmegs, feven - } a race
or two of ginger ; but that I may beg j four pounds of prunes, and as
many of raifins o' the fun."
But ftill more appofite was the churl's defcription
of Sir Robert H J s exertions to pleafe the ruftic
guefts to the Shepherds reminifcences of his wife's
hofpitable cares :
Harveft-Home.
" When my old wife lived, upon
This day me was both pantler, butler, cook j
Both dame and fervant ; welcomed all ; ferved all ;
Would fing her fong, and dance her turn ; now here
At upper end o' the table, now i' the middle ;
On his Ihoulder, and on his ; her face o' fire
With labour, and the thing fhe took to quench it."
The ruftic feafts, with decorations of flowers and
corn, which the gentry are now introducing, are,
indeed, only revivals of the old cuftoms ; and Shake-
fpere, had he revifited Stratford in September laft,
would have found himfelf at home among thofe
country merry-makings.
After walking for about three miles, with the Avon
on my left, I turned into Charlecote Park, by a clap-
gate in the maffive park pales faftened with trenails
with which it is enclofed. It is a noble park, inter-
fperfed with fine oaks and elms, and interfected by the
broad, clear Avon, which flows quietly, but not flug-
gifhly along. Prefcntly I heard the fmart crack of a
rifle, and then a herd of deer made a rufh paft me,
followed by the boy on an old pony who was driving
them to their fate. The keeper was mooting a buck.
How different was the mode in which the Poet per-
formed the fame feat ! It was a cloth-yard fhaft that
brought his quarry to the ground.
Among the glades of this fine old park, under the
Shakefpere.
fhade of oaks which were acorns, perhaps, when young
Shakefpere was a boy, I felt more fenfibly the prefent
divinity than in any other of the fcenes confecrated
to his memory. Here Nature's High Prieft was in
her temple among the objects of his worfhip, and I
was treading the very path which he trod ; admiring
the very views which he had admired, and looking
at the fine old manfion which elicited from him, in
the perfon of Falftaff, the exclamation, partly of admi-
ration and partly of envy, " 'Fore God, you have a
goodly dwelling, and a rich ! "
And, indeed, Charlecote is a noble example of the
dwelling of an Englifh country gentleman in the fix-
teenth and feventeenth centuries. It was built by Sir
Thomas Lucy, in 1558, the year of Queen Elizabeth's
acceffion. My reader can judge of it from Mr. Ed-
wards's fun-picture, which mows the front entrance
and the pleached garden, where Mafter Robert Shallow,
Efquire, and his man Davy entertained Fa/ftaffznd his
men of war, under the fhrewd convidlion that "a friend
at court is better than a penny in purfe."
In looking at this fine old manfion fo light, fo
cheerful, fo fuited to the rich Englifh fcenery in which
it is planted I could not help wondering what Lord
Macaulay could have meant when he faid that the
country gentleman of the feventeenth century " troubled
1 1
Houfe of Englijh Gentry. 77
himfelf little about decorating his abode, and, if he
attempted decoration, feldom produced anything but
deformity." This is the hiftorian's eftimate of fuch
houfes as Charlecote, and Helmingham in Suffolk, and
Blickling in Norfolk, and their clafs, the deformity of
which he contrails with the elegance of thofe cold,
melancholy, barrack-like ftructures, with a Grecian
portico ftuck on to them, which, till within the laft
few years, was confidered the right fort of abode for an
Englifh gentleman when he went to spend the dull
feafon in the country. But then it muft be remembered
that the Englifh country gentleman of the fixteenth
and feventeenth century was a Tory.
The church is, unfortunately, quite new, having
been rebuilt a few years ago by the mother of the
prefent pofleffor of the eftate. It contains, however,
the old monuments, amongft which is that creeled to
commemorate Sir Thomas Lucy, who died in 1595.
His recumbent figure in armour, befide his wife, gives
one the idea that he was a fine-looking man, and not
the ftarveling defcribed by Shakefpere but marble is
deceptive. The " three white Luces " appear every-
where.
A walk acrofs the park and fields by the margin of
Avon brought me to my inn at about fix o'clock, and
fo ended one of the pleafanteft days of my pilgrimage.
78 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER VII.
AND now, in order the better to underftand the procefs
by which Shakefpere, having left his beloved Stratford
under a cloud, returned to it in a few years, gilded
with the funfhine of profperity, we muft accompany
him in his expedition to feek his fortunes in London.
In 1583, a few months after his marriage, his eldeft
child, Sufanna, was born, and was followed in the fuc-
ceeding year by the twins, Judith and Hamnet. A
family increafing at this rate, combined with his father's
embarraflments, was enough to warn him that he muft
beftir himfelf if he would not fink into utter poverty.
But perhaps thefe ftrong inducements were quickened
by the fear of a profecution by the game-preferving
fquire of Charlecote. However this may be, we find
him in London in the year 1586 at lateft.
Good fortune, or his inclination, led him, on his
arrival, to the theatre. It feems to me extremely
probable that he had dabbled in theatrical affairs
The early Drama. 79
even before his departure from Stratford. Stage-plays
were, before the general diffufion of knowledge, a
favourite amufement with the common people, and
formed a part of every great feftivity, juft as, before the
multiplication of books, ftory-telling was a favourite
mode of fpending a winter's evening or a fultry fum-
mer's afternoon. He was probably only depi&ing the
immemorial ufage when, in "A Midfummer Night's
Dream," he reprefented the "bafe mechanicals" of
Athens as welcoming Thefeus and Hippolyta with a
play. In "Love's Labour's Loft," too, a ftage-play
is the obvious mode which prefents itfelf to the
pedant and the parfon of entertaining the court and
(howing their own wit and learning; and when Falftaff
wants to be extremly merry, he propofes to the Prince
to extemporife a play. I, for one, cannot believe that
the Englifh people awoke fuddenly, about the middle
of the fixteenth century, to a knowledge and a love of
the drama. In one form or other, the people had
always had ftage-plays, or ftories in action, at their
feftivities ; and there can be little doubt that a young
fellow like Shakefpere, with the natural proclivity to
the drama, which every one muft acknowledge he had,
took a part in fuch entertainments of the kind as were
performed in his native village. The fame love of
amufement which led him into all unluckinefs in
80 Shake fpere.
ftealing venifon and rabbits, would alfo lead him to
make one in any project: for private theatricals that
might be on foot.
The tafte for the ftage had been for centuries
foftered among all claffes of the Englifh people by the
religious plays, which formed part of the celebration
of the great feafts of the Church. At Chriftmas,
Eafter, and Whitfuntide worldly bufinefs was laid afide
for feveral days, and even weeks. The fovereign and
principal nobility kept their courts with great magni-
ficence at fome favourite palace, and fometimes at a rich
monaftery of which they had been the benefactors;
and mafques, plays, and interludes were performed in
their halls by players and muficians, whom they fpecially
retained, and who were therefore called their "fer-
vants." For the general public the Church provided
its Myfteries, Miracles, and Moralities, and thefe were
played in the fpacious naves of cathedrals and minfters,
in inn yards, where the audience might fee them from
the galleries and the chambers, or upon fcaffolds in
market-places.
Antiquaries, of courfe, need not be told what is
meant by Myfteries, Miracles, and Moralities ; but as
this little book is intended for the general reader, I
think I had better fay that Myfteries were dramatic
verfions of the great events upon which the Chriftian
Early Rnglifh Drama. 8 I
religion is founded, fuch as the Nativity, the Paffion,
the Refurredion, Afcenfion, and Defcent of the Holy
Ghoft at Whitfuntide. Thefe were reduced to the
form of a dialogue carried on by the feveral characters,
almoft in the very words of Scripture. They are ftill
performed in the Tyrol, and laft year feveral letters
from tourifts, defcribing them, appeared in the papers.
The Miracles were dramatic reprefentations of fome
miraculous exertion of Divine power through the inter-
vention of a faint ; and the Moralities were allegorical
dramas, reprefenting the adtion of certain virtues and
vices perfonified. Several of thefe ancient dramatic
works have been collected and publifhed by the Shake-
fpere Society. Many of them poffefs confiderable
humour and dramatic power, and are, indeed, plays to
all intents and purpofes, though they are not 'divided
into ats and fcenes. They bear quite as much refem-
blance to a modern drama as the dialogues recited by
the peafants and fhepherds, and faid by Horace to have
been invented by Thefpis, did to the Prometheus, the
CEdipus, the Medea, and the Nephelas. Chaucer
alludes to the Myfteries when, defcribing Abfolon, in
the " Milleres Tale," he fays :
" Some time, to fhew his lightnefs and maiftrye,
He playeth Herod on a fcafFold high."
Herod, of courfe, was a character of great prominence
M
82 Shakefpere.
in the Myftery of the Paffion, and fitted to (how off
Abfolons powers. Hamlet, too, refers to the fame
character in the Myftery when he fays to the players,
" O, it offends me to the foul, to hear a robuftious
perriwig-pated fellow tear a paffion to tatters, to very
rags, to iplit the ears of the groundlings ; who, for the
moft part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable
dumb fhow, and noife : I would have fuch a fellow
whipped for o'erdoing Termagant " one of the fup-
pofed falfe gods of Mahometanifm ; "it out-herods
Herod," that is, it overdoes even the overdone character
of the perfecuting king of Jews.
When the cuftom of entertaining great people during
their vifits to the Univerfities, with an interlude or
play, began, I cannot fay, but it probably dates far back
beyond the time of Shakefpere. In France, at any
rate, not only Myfteries and Miracles were known,
but paftoral comedies, fo early as the eleventh century.
M. Francifque Michel has publifhed feveral in that
moft curious book, his " Theatre Frangais du Moyen
Age;" and it can hardly be fuppofed that, at a time
when the dukes of Normandy, Touraine, Anjou, and
Maine were alfo kings of England, and the nobility
and high clergy, of both fides of the Channel, were of
the fame race and fpoke the fame language, dramatic
amufements mould be fa(hionab!e in one country and
Elizabethan Drama. 83
unknown in the other. When people, therefore,
fpeak as if they thought that Engli(hmen had never
heard a tragedy till Sackville and Norton wrote " Gor-
boduc," or a comedy till Udall wrote " Ralph Roifter
Doifter," or Still "Gammer Gurton's Needle," they
feem to me to be talking at random. Thefe may be
the firft inftances of dramatic works reduced to the
form of a modern play, but dramas had been known
and loved by the people from time immemorial.
Indeed, fome of the plays of the eleventh century pub-
liflhed by M. Francifque Michel are in the original
manufcripts fet to mufic, and anfwer to what we call
operas.
The circumstances which produced what may be
called the Elizabethan drama are obvious enough. In
the middle ages, it need hardly be obferved, learning
was left almoft entirely to the clergy. Every one who
followed learning thought it incumbent on him to
take orders, becaufe that profeffion, which included, be
it remembered, the practice of the law, alone afforded
leifure, opportunity, and remuneration for ftudy. The
confequence was, that almoft all literature was tinctured
with the ecclefiaftical ipirit, even though it was in
many cafes directed againft the doctrines of the Church
and the privileges of the clergy. The drama was not
exempt from this general law. It was the monk or the
84 Shake fp ere.
friar who alone had the leifure or fkill to cater for
the dramatic taftes of the people, and he dramatifed the
Bible, juft as Mr. Terry might dramatife " Rob Roy,"
or Mr. Dion Boucicault " The Collegians." At the
revival, or rather, the diffufion of learning, and elpe-
cially in the countries where the Reformation was
eftablifhed, the clergy ceafed to be an excluiively
learned clafs. The diffolution of the monafteries and
chauntries deprived the Church of the means of pro-
viding unambitious graduates of the Univerfities with
a comfortable maintenance immediately on their en-
trance upon the world, for the parochial cures were
then even lefs appropriately termed " livings " than
now ; and the confequence was, that young men
brought the learning they had acquired in the fchools
into general fociety. They did not, as theretofore,
take orders : there was the fame complaint as now,
that young men of promife preferred the chance of
material wealth in worldly profeffions to the ghoftly
riches of the priefthood ; and thofe who did affume
the facred office were fo low in the focial fcale that it
was found neceflary to forbid them by a canon to eke
out their living by becoming tapfters. Univerfity
men, like Udall, Still, Greene, Chapman, Peele, and
Marlow, who adopted literature as a profeffion, brought
with them reminifcences of Plautus and Terence, and
His Introduction to the Stage. 85
perhaps even of Sophocles, Euripides, and Ariftophanes,
and no longer derived the perfons of their dramas from
fupernatural or faintly beings, Scriptural characters, or
abftract virtue and vice, but from profane hiftory and
common life. In mort, the drama did not fpring up
all at once in the Englifh nation, but merely, like every
other art, received a new development from the great
intellectual and focial revolution of the fixteenth
century.
With the ftage, therefore, Shakefpere was probably
familiar from his youth. We know, indeed, that in
1569, when his father was bailiff, plays were performed
in the Town Hall, and it is highly probable that a
wild young man of his taftes would feek aflbciates
among " thofe harlotry players/' as Quickly calls them
the fervants of the earls of Worcefter, Leicefter, or
Warwick, for whom the Town Hall was turned into a
temporary theatre. And when he found himfelf in
London, flenderly provided as we may prefume, he
would naturally feek for friends among his old aflb-
ciates, who were making money lightly at the Globe,
Blackfriars, or the Swan, and Spending it as lightly in
the " Mermaid/' the " Blue Boar," and the " Falcon."
In what capacity he firft obtained employment is
uncertain, but it cannot have been a very exalted one.
The parifh clerk of Stratford told Dowdall, in 1693,
86 Shakefpere.
that he was received into the playhoufe as a ferviture,
which I fuppofe means a fervitor, or, in plain Englifh,
a fervant. This is not inconfiftent with the ftory told
by Sir William Davenant to Betterton, by Betterton to
Rowe, by Rowe to Pope, by Pope to Newton, the
editor of Milton, and by Newton to Johnfon, who
incorporated it in the prolegomena to his edition of
Shakefpere's plays : " In the time of Elizabeth, coaches
being yet uncommon, and hired coaches not at all in
ufe, thofe who were too proud, too tender, or too idle
to walk, went on horfeback to any diftant bufinefs or
diverfion. Many came on horfeback to the play ; and
when Shakefpere fled to London from the terror of a
criminal profecution, his firft expedient was to wait at
the door of the playhoufe and hold the horfes of thofe
that had no fervants, that they might be ready again
after the performance. In this office he became fo
conspicuous for his care and readinefs, that in a fhort
time every man as he alighted called for ' Will Shake-
fpere/ and fcarcely any other waiter was trufted with a
horfe to hold while Will Shakefpere could be had.
This was the firft dawn of better fortune. Shakefpere
finding more horfes put into his hand than he could
hold, hired boys to wait under his infpeftion, who,
when Will Shakefpere was fummoned, were imme-
diately to prefent themfelves ' / am Will Shakefpere's
His Introduction to the Stage. 87
boy, Jir* In time Shakefpere found higher employ-
ment; but. as long as the practice of riding to the
playhoufe continued, the waiters that held the horfes
retained the appellation of Shakefpere' s boys"
Whether this ftory be true or not, it certainly is not
improbable. To take the firft employment that offered
any remuneration, and to diftinguifh himfelf even in
the humble office of holding horfes, is eminently charac-
teriftic of the practical good fenfe of the man who,
while competing works requiring the exercife of the
higheft and moft cultivated imagination and tafte, was
bringing actions for his rents, buying up impropriate
tithes, and making money of his wheat, fheep, and
beeves. Money was his preffing need at the time, not
only for himfelf, but for the wife and young family
whom he had left at Stratford ; money was to be got
honeftly by holding gentlemen's horles and he held
them.
A man "whofe blood and judgment were" not "fb
well commingled," would have been deprefled by the
meannefs of his employment; but Shakelpere knew
that in order to climb to the top of the ladder you
muft begin at the bottom, and went on mounting
fteadily and furely till he had arrived at the height to
which he intended to attain. With that tafte which,
in one of his education is even more wonderful than his
88 Shakefpere.
creative genius, he perceived the deficiencies of the
plays which then held the ftage. His predeceffors
were Udall, Heywood, Still, Redford, Ingelend, Mun-
day, the two Wagers, Lyly, the euphuift ; but Peele,
Greene, Lodge, Nafh, Marlowe, Kyd, Daniel, Belchier,
Clarke, and Wilfon were alfo his contemporaries, and
though many of their plays mow conliderable merit,
befide the great Mafter him who held the horfes of
the gallants who came to hear their plays they muft
pale their ineffectual fires. Greene's " Looking Glafs
for London and England " is more admirable in its
comic than its tragic parts ; but it is a fine play, full of
fierce invective, which was his forte. " Friar Bacon
and Friar Bungay" has fome pretty and fome effective
fcenes ; but one feels painfully throughout that, after
one has been led up with great care and preparation to
a point, the point is feebly made, or not at all. Peele's
" David and Bethfabe " is perhaps better than " Titus
Andronicus ;" but " Edward I." is not to be compared
with the worfl of Shakefpere's hiftorical plays. The
" Old Wives' Tale " is really a pretty piece of faerie, and
there is fomething myfterious and grand in the unin-
telligible incantations at the well ; but how infinitely is
it left behind by Qberon, Puck, and Titania, by the weird
fitters in " Macbeth," and by Ariel and Caliban ! " The
Devil and Dr. Fauftus," by Marlowe, is much admired,
Hisjlrji Employment in the Theatre. 89
but it always feems to me as if the Doffior was too
palpably cheated. He really gets nothing in exchange
for his foul. Goethe's Fauft does enjoy himfelf for
the time, but Marlowe's Dr. Faujlus wearies the
reader by his continual anticipation of the day of
reckoning. The whole intereft and tragic effect of
the play is produced by his repentance of the bargain
he has made from the very moment when it has been
ratified.
Shakelpere's firft employment in the higher buiinefs
of the theatre is fuppofed to have been the correcting
and adapting for the ftage the imperfect plays of his
contemporaries. In 1592 Robert Greene ended his
wretched life in mifery, and, as his laft act, bequeathed
his " Groat's worth of Wit bought with a Million of
Repentance " a malignant libel under the hypocritical
mafk of a charitable warning to his fellows in talent
and profligacy, Marlowe, Lodge, and Peele. This
ftrange effuiion of which I fcarcely know whether
to admire the power of the language, or wonder at the
ghaflly fpectacle it prefents of a profligate pouring curfes
with his failing breath upon the companions of his vices
contains the following addrefs to Peele, in which there
is an obvious allufion to Shakefpere, as the publifher
afterwards acknowledged : " And thou, no lefs deferv-
ing than the other two (Marlowe and Lodge), in fome
go Shakefpere.
things rarer, in nothing inferior, driven, as myfelf, to
extraordinary {hilts, a little have I to fay to thee ; and
were it not an idolatrous oath, I would fwear by fweet
St. George thou art unworthy better hap, fith thou
dependeft on fo mean a ftay. Bare-minded men all
three of you, if by my mifery ye be not warned ; for
unto none of you like me fought thofe burs to cleaVe ;
thofe puppets I mean that fpeak from our mouths,
thofe an ticks garnifhed in our colours. Is it not
ftrange that I, to whom they all have been beholding ;
is it not like that you, to whom they all have been
beholding, (hall, were you in that cafe that I am now,
be both of you at once forfaken ? Yes, truft them not,
for there is an upftart now beautified with our feathers,
that, with his tiger's heart wrapt in a player's hide,
fuppofes he is as well able to bombaft out a blank verfe
as the beft of you ; and being an abfolute Johannes Fac-
totum, is, in his own conceit, the only Shake-fcene in a
country."
The expreffion, " Tiger's heart wrapt in a player's
hide," is a parody of a line in the third part of " King
Henry the Sixth," Aft I., Sc. 4
" Oh, tiger's heart wrapp'd in a woman'sjiide S"
And there is no poffibility of doubting that Shake-fcene
is an allufion to the name of Shakefpere. From this it
C kettle's Teftimony to his Uprightnefs. 91
may be concluded that in fix years after coming to
London, Shakefpere had eftablifhed fuch a reputation
as an adlor that he had become the objeft of Greene's
impotent jealoufy ; that he had made himfelf fo ufeful
to the theatre as to be confidered a Johannes Factotum:
an author as well as an aftor, able to make the houfe,
and to rival " Marlowe's mighty line." But whether
the exprefiion, " a crow beautified with our feathers,"
means only that he obtained profit and applaufe by
a&ing the plays which they had written, or that he
retouched them, or borrowed from them, is doubtful.
Certain it is that he was an object of diilike to the
profligate fet of whom Greene was one partly, no
doubt, becaufe he exhibited a felf-refpe6t and fore-
thought which were a tacit reproach to their debauchery
and improvidence.
This malignant outburft of envy on the part of
Greene was the means of eliciting the teftimony of
Chettle, the publifher, to the high character that
Shakefpere bore amongft his contemporaries ; and this ,
is the more valuable as Marlowe is excepted from the
like praife. Chettle appears to have really meant what
he faid of Shakefpere. The two aggrieved authors,
as it feems, remonftrated with Chettle for publishing
this attack upon them, and this is his reply: "With
neither of them that take offence (Shakefpere and
92 Shakefpere.
Marlowe) was I acquainted, and with one of them I
care not if I never be : the other, whom at that time I
did not fo much fpare as fmce I wifh I had for that,
as I have moderated the heat of living writers, and
might have ufed my own difcretion, efpecially in fuch
a cafe, the author being dead that I did not I am as
forry as if the original fault had been my fault, becaufe
myfelf have feen his demeanour no lefs civil than
he excellent in the quality he profeffes. Befides
divers of worfhip have reported his uprightnefs of
dealing, which argues his honefty, and his facetious
grace in writing, which approves his art." As to
Shakelpere's excellence in his art we need not Chettle's
teftimony, but it is plealant to find that the moral
qualities for which he was refpefted by his contempo-
raries were uprightnefs and courtefy ; nor is it fmall
praife to fay that he knew how to pleafe men of ftation
and good breeding.
It luckily happens that in a pedantic and euphuiftic
treatife on the poets of England, called " Palladis
Tamia, Wit's Treafury, being the Second Part of Wit's
Commonwealth," written by Francis Meeres, and pub-
lifhed in 1598, we find an authentic record of the
plays and poems which had been produced by Shake-
fpere up to that period. Here is the pafiage : " As the
foule of Euphorbus was thought to live in Pythagoras,
His Indujiry. 93
fo the fweete wittie foule of Ovid lives in melli-
fluous and hony-tongued Shakefpeare ; witnefs his
' Venus and Adonis/ his * Lucrece/ his fugred Sonnets
among his private friends As Plautus and Seneca
are accounted the beft for comedy and tragedy among
the Latines, fo Shakefpeare among the Englifh is the
moft excellent in both kinds for the flage ; for comedy,
his ' Gentlemen of Verona/ his ' Errors' [" Comedy of
Errors"], his * Love Labors Loft/ his 'Love Labors
Won' [ All's Well that Ends Well"], his Midfummer
Night Dreame/ and his ' Merchant of Venice ;' for
tragedy, his ' Richard the Second/ * Richard the Third/
' Henry the Fourth/ < King John/ ' Titus Andronicus/
and his ' Romeo and Juliet.' ' To thefe original, or
nearly original, plays, may be added his re-cafts of
" Pericles," " Henry the Sixth," firft part ; " Henry the
Sixth," fecond part; "Henry the Sixth," third part.
The three parts of "Henry the Sixth" were all originally
written by the unfortunate Kit Marlowe, whofe pretty
fong, " Come live with me and be my love," is fung by
Sir Hugh Evans in " The Merry Wives of Windfor,"
to keep up his courage when he is going to fight with
Dr. Caius, and by the Milkmaid in Ifaac Walton's
" Complete Angler." They were merely touched up
and adapted for the ftage by the " Johannes Fadtotum "
at the theatre at Blackfriars.
94 Shakefpere.
From this, then, we learn that Shakefpere, at the
age of thirty-four, had written "Venus and Adonis,"
"The Rape of Lucrece," his Sonnets, amounting to
one hundred and fifty-four, befides twelve original plays,
and that he had altered and adapted four or five more.
All this time he was alfo gaining money by acting.
In thofe times the profits of literary labour were not
fo great as now. We all remember the price for which
Milton fold the copyright of the " Paradife Loft " in
the next century. But the reign of Queen Elizabeth
was the tranfition period between a liftening and a
reading age ; the theatre was ftill the great vehicle
through which the poet reached the public ear, and
play-writing was probably the beft paid of any literary
labour. Of this a curious example is to be found in
a novel called " Never too Late," written by Greene,
the dramatift, and believed by Mr. Dyce to be the
hiftory of his wretched life. The hero, Roberto, is
reduced to great fhifts, and is bewailing his wretched
fate behind a hedge :
" On the other fide of the hedge fat one that heard
his forrow, who, getting over, came towards him and
brake off his paffion. When he approached, he faluted
Roberto in this fort, ' Gentleman/ quoth he, ' for fo
you feem, I have by chance heard you difcourfe fome
part of your grief, which appeareth to me more than
The Profits of Aft or s. 95
you will difcover or I can conceit. But if you vouch-
fafe fuch fimple comfort as my ability will yield, affure
yourfelf that I will endeavour to do the beft that either
may procure your profit or bring you pleafure; the
rather for that I fuppofe you are a fcholar, and pity
it is men of learning fhould live in lack.' Roberto,
wondering to hear fuch good words, for that this
iron age affords few that efteem of virtue, returned
him thankful gratulations, and, urged by neceffity,
uttered his prefent grief, befeeching his advice how
he might be employed. ( Why, eafily,' quoth he, ' and
greatly to your benefit ; for men of my profeffion get
by fcholars their whole living/ 'What is your pro-
feffion ? ' faid Roberto. ' Truly, fir/ faid he, * I jam a
player.' * A player! ' quoth Roberto ; ' I took you rather
for a gentleman of great living ; for if by outward
habit men fhould be cenfured [judged], I tell you, you
would be taken for a fubftantial man.' * So am I,
where I dwell,' quoth the player, * reputed able at
my proper coft to build a windmill. What though
the world once went hard with me, when I was fain
to carry my playing fardel afoot-back ? [to carry my
properties on my back as I walked.] Tempora mutantur:
I know you know the meaning of it better than I but
I thus confter it, It is other wife now ; for my very fhare
in playing apparel will not be fold for two hundred
96 Shake f per e.
pounds/ ' Truly/ faid Roberto, ' it is ftrange that you
fhould fo profper in that vain practice, for that it feems
to me your voice is nothing gracious/ ' Nay then/
faid the player, 'I miflike your judgment ; why, I am
as famous for Delphrygus and the King of Fairies as
ever was any of my time ; " The Twelve Labours of
Hercules" have I terribly thundered on the ftage, and
played three fcenes of "The Devil on the Highway
to Heaven." ' Have you fo?' faid Roberto, 'then I
pray you pardon me/ < Nay, more/ quoth the player,
'I can ferve to make a pretty fpeech, for I was a.
country author, paffing at a Moral [a Morality] ; for
it was I that penned "The Moral of Man's Wit,"
" The Dialogue of Doves," and for feven years' fpace
was abfolute interpreter of the puppets. But now my
almanack is out of date
" The people make no eftimation
Of Morals, teaching education."
Was not this pretty for a plain rhyme extempore ? If
ye will, you mall have more/ 'Nay, it is enough/
faid Roberto; < but how mean you to ufe me?' ' Why,
fir, in making plays/ faid the other; 'for which you
{hall be well paid, if you will take the pains/ Roberto,
perceiving no remedy, thought it beft to refpedl [have
regard to] his prefent neceffity, and, to try his wit, went
with him willingly ; who lodged him at the town's
His Profpenty. 97
end, &c. &c. ... But Roberto, now famoufed for an
arch play-making poet, his purfe, like the fea, fometimes
fwelled anon, like the fame fea, fell to a low ebb ; yet
feldom he wanted, his labours were fo well efteemed."
If Greene, with vaftly inferior powers and induftry,
were able, by writing plays only, to fet want at defiance,
notwithftanding his extravagant and thriftlefs mode of
life, it is no wonder that Shakefpere, with his extraor-
dinary induftry, his prudence, and the combined profits
of writing for the ftage and acting, mould have foon
raifed himfelf to a good pofition, fo that he was
reputed where he dwelt, and indeed was, " able at his
proper coft to build a windmill," or to buy the beft
houfe in his native town.
98 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER VIII.
WE have followed Shakefpere from Stratford to the
playhoule, where he is enjoying not only the light
froth of popular applaufe, but the folid pudding of
fubftantial profit. We have feen him begin by hold-
ing the horfes of gentlemen who rode to the play, and
rifmg gradually from amending and adapting the works
of others to be himfelf a great dramatic writer and
adlor, and, in facl, the founder of the modern drama.
We naturally inquire what fort of playhoufes were thofe
in which his mafterpieces firft appeared ? With what
fcenery and other means and appliances were thofe
dramas, which now require all the art of the machinift,
the fcene painter, and the upholfterer, to make them
tolerable to our faftidious age, firft prefented to the wits
and courtiers of the days of Elizabeth and James ?
The playhoufes in which the pageantry of " Henry
the Eighth " and " Macbeth," and the fairy fcenes
of "The Tempeft" and "A Midfummer Night's
Elizabethan theatres. 99
Dream," were firft reprefented, were little better than
wooden fheds. I do not believe that they were def-
titute of a certain architectural beauty of their own,
for in that time the old art-traditions of the middle
ages had not yet been utterly loft; and they were
probably much better adapted to their purpofe than
our great, fuffocating, uncomfortable theatres, where,
what with the lize of the houfe and the mumbling and
ranting of the actors, it is impoffible to hear one word
in ten ; but they were totally deftitute of fcenery.
Curtains, or, as they were called, " traverfes," fupplied
the place of fcenes ; the ftage was ftrewed with rufhes ;
at the back of the ftage was a balcony, raifed eight
or nine feet from the ground, which ferved as an upper
chamber or window, from whence, as in " Romeo and
Juliet," a part of the dialogue might be ipoken ; and
the ceiling, called the " heavens," was painted blue, as
in the churches of the time. The ftage was hung with
black when a tragedy was performed. A bed placed
upon it indicated that the fcene was a bed-chamber ; a
table with pen and ink denoted a counting-houfe. Trap-
doors and pulleys were fometimes ufed, but were not
effential. The place of action was written on a board
for the information of the audience. Inftead of the
prompter's bell, a flourifh of trumpets announced that
the curtain which feparated the ftage from the audience
i oo Shakefpere.
was about to be drawn, and at the third founding the
play began.
The audience were not perhaps fo well accommo-
dated as at prefent. In the public theatres the area,
called the " yard," was open to the fky, and no part of
the houfe was roofed but the ftage and boxes ; in the
private houfes the whole was covered in. The ftage
was feparated from the pit or yard by pales, within
which young men of famion ufed to fit on ftools, and
criticife the performance. The orcheftra was fituated
in the place now occupied by the ftage-boxes. The
remainder of the audience was accommodated, as with
us, in private boxes and galleries, or fcafTblds.
In Shakefpere's time there were no lefs than eleven
theatres in London. There was The Theatre, fo called
by way of diftin&ion, Paris Garden, the Globe, the
Rofe, the Hope, the Swan, in Southwark, the Black-
friars, the Whitefriars, the Fortune, in Golden Lane,
and the Red Bull.
The drefles of the players were fome times very rich.
We have feen that the player's wardrobe, in Greene's
" Never too Late," was worth two hundred pounds.
Women never acted till after the Reftoration, and
female parts were played by boys, generally the
chorifters from the church or royal chapel, as they are
now at the Weftminfter plays. This muft have been
Play-houfe Cufloms. 101
the moft ferious defect in the Elizabethan acted drama.
And yet, when one obferves the continual effort of all
but the beft actreffes to attract perfonal admiration, one
cannot but acknowledge that both plans have their
difadvantages.
Ham let's directions to the players, the play within
the play, and fome of Jonfon's comedies, afford the beft
idea of the cuftoms of the players and audience. From
Hamlet's directions to the players we learn that the
clowns fometimes, as indeed they do now, extemporifed
a joke to bring down a laugh
"Arid let thofe that play your clown fpeak no more than is fet down for
them j for there be of them that will themfelves laugh, to fet on fome
quantity of barren fpe6tators to laughter ; though, in the meantime, fome
neceffary queftion of the play be then to be confidered "
and that the principal actors wore periwigs
" O, it offends me to the foul to hear a robuftious periwig-pated fellow
tear a pallion to tatters."
From the play, we mould conclude that young men of
famion criticifed the performance aloud in a very rude
and unceremonious manner, as where Hamlet fays to
the actor on the ftage
" Begin, murderer leave thy damnable faces, and begin ! "
From Jonfon's comedies we learn that the audience
took tobacco, that is, fmoked without remorfe; that,
IO2 Shakefpere.
indeed, did not fignify fo much when the pit
Jove frigtdo.
The prices of admiffion to the boxes were a fhilling,
and to the yard or pit and galleries, fixpence, fourpence,
twopence, and even a penny. The play began after
dinner, or at " undern of the day," or " under meles,"
that is, about three o'clock ; and people, therefore, got
home, or to the tavern, as the cafe might be, at about
feven to fupper.
Thefe arrangements would be confidered rather rude
and uncomfortable by modern play-goers ; but then it
muft be remembered that plays were continually acted
at Court, to which everybody of note at that time re-
forted, and in the houfes of the high nobility ; and, in
the independence in which the drama flood of fcenical
decorations, the great dining-hall or prefence chamber
could be converted into a theatre in a very fhort time,
by merely hanging a few pieces of tapeftry acrofs the
apartment.
And now the further queftion arifes, was juftice done
to Shakefpere's plays in fuch theatres, and with fuch
lack of fcenery ? I mould anfwer, without hefitation,
yes. For myfelf, I am of Charles Lamb's opinion,
that Shakefpere's plays are more enjoyed in the reading
than in the beholding. I have often feen " Hamlet "
and " King Richard the Third," and to my mind Hamlet
Stage Decorations. 103
and Richard have become identified with Mr. Charles
Kean. Thank goodnefs ! I have never feen " Lear." I
fhould be forry indeed to have my ideal of the hale,
impulfive, fomewhat boifterous and paffionate old king,
firft driven mad, then foftened and refined by his great
ibrrow and tender love, deftroyed by fome periwig-pated
fellow. But if afted at all, let the words of the Poet,
and not the drefs and fcenery, be relied upon to produce
their effect. As between tawdry, vulgar, inappropriate
fcenery and drefles, and the correct and tafteful decora-
tions of the Princefs's during Mr. Kean's management,
there can be no comparifon. But, in my opinion, fimple
traverfes, or curtains, and the quiet, rich, unpedantic
drefles of the Elizabethan drama, would be better than
either. If managers would fpend lefs money upon
fcenery, and more upon fecuring the higheft dramatic
attainment in the performers ; and if acftors would think
more of ftudying their parts and declaiming them
corredlly, and lefs of their flafhed doublets and flefh-
coloured tights, Shakeipere would be more worthily
reprefented on the ftage.
Homer makes his model orator mean in his appear-
ance, awkward in his geftures, and totally deftitute of
action, fo that people thought he was a fool until he
opened his mouth ; and then every eye was turned
upon him, and every mind was bowed by the perfuafion
1 04 Shakefpere.
of his voice. I have always thought this a high ftroke
of criticifm an ideal which would never have occurred
to any but a mailer. If the orator cannot make an
impreffion by his words and the intonation of his voice,
he will never do it by "fawing the air." Juft fo,
what one deiiderates on the ftage is to have Shake-
fpere's fpeeches fpoken as they are fet down, with all
the advantages of emphafis and intonation which the
natural aptitude, the ftudy, and the practice of the actor
can give them ; but who cares, or ought to care, what
drefs the player wears, or whether the painted caftle on
the fcene have the appropriate dog-toothed moulding of
the reign of King John or not ? I think, therefore, that
Queen Elizabeth and King James and their courtiers, and
the audiences which crowded the playhoufe at Black-
friars and the Globe, probably faw Shakefpere's plays
to as great advantage as we are ever likely to do, and
perhaps to greater. At any rate, they did not fee Shake-
fpere infulted by Gibber's and Garrick's interpolations.
They were never treated to " Off with his head ! So
much for Buck-ing-ham ! "
Shakefpere had got him " a fellowfhip in a cry of
players," known as " the Lord Chamberlain's fervants."
They poffeffed two theatres, one at Blackfriars, oppo-
fite the place where Apothecaries' Hall now ftands ;
here they played in winter, becaufe it was effectually
His Skill as an A 51 or. 105
protected from the weather. At the Globe, on the
Bankfide, they played in fummer. A petition, ftill
extant, dated 1596, and addreffed by the proprietors to
the Privy Council, praying to be allowed to repair the
houfe and continue their entertainments at the theatre
in Blackfriars, proves that Shakefpere was a fhareholder
in the concern, in conjunction with Thomas Pope,
Richard Burbage, John Hemings, Auguftine Phillips,
Wm. Kempe,Wm. Slye, and Nicholas Tooley. As to his
attainments as an actor, the traditions are various and
conflicting. Chettle fays, as we have feen, that he was
" excellent in the quality he proferTeth ;" Aubrey, that
he " did act exceedingly well ;" Wright, that " he was a
much better poet than player." There can be little doubt
of that, unlefs he was the greateft player that ever trod
the ftage. He adds, however, and this is obvioufly an
error, " I could never meet with any further account
of him this way than that the top of his performance
was the Ghoft, in his own ' Hamlet.' ' Oldys fays that
a younger brother of the Poet's, who lived at Stratford
to a good old age, ufed to tell how he faw Shakefpere
play the part of " an old man, who was carried by
another perfon to a table, at which he was feated
among fome company who were eating, and that one
of them fang a fong." This obvioufly points to Adam,
in " As You Like It."
106 Shake f per e.
There is a tradition that King James, flattered by
the lines fo complimentary to himfelf in " Henry the
Eighth "
" Nor ihall this peace ileep with her ; bat as when
The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix,
Her afhes new create another heir,
As great in admiration as herfelf,
So mall me leave her blefTednefs to one
(When heaven (hall call her from this cloud of darknefs)
Who, from the facred alhes of her honour
Shall, ftar-like, rife as great in fame as me was,
And fo Hand fixed : peace, plenty, love, truth, terror,
That were the fervants to this chofen infant,
Shall then be his, and like a vine grow to him.
Wherever the bright fun of heaven mail mine,
His honour and the greatnefs of his name
Shall be, and make new nations: he fhall flourifh,
And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches
To all the plains about him. Our children's children
Shall fee this, and blefs heaven"
" was pleafed with his own hand to write an amicable
letter to Mr. Shakefpere ;" which letter, though now
loft, remained long in the hands of Sir William Dave-
nant, " as a creditable perfon, now living, can teftify."
This is Lintot's ftatement, and Oldys, in a note on
Fuller's Worthies, fays that Lintot's authority for this
was Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, who faw the letter
in Davenant's poffeffion. This is certain, from the
" Accounts of the Revels at St. James's," in the reign
of James, that Shakefpere's plays were frequently
performed at Court.
His Friendfhip with Southampton. 107
Amongft the nobility of that time the theatre was a
very popular amufement. Of this we have a curious
proof in the Sydney Papers. Rowland Whyte, in a
letter to Sir Robert Sydney, fays : " My Lord South-
ampton and Lord Rutland came not to the Court ; the
one doth but very feldom ; they pafs away the time in
London merely in going to plays every day."
Southampton's reafon for not going to Court was
that his friend Effex was then in prifon and difgrace ;
but the way in which he folaced himfelf indicates his
tafte. This is the Southampton to whom Shakefpere
dedicated his earlier! poems, " Venus and Adonis " and
" The Rape of Lucrece ; " and the dedications are fo
charadteriftic, that I think they will help much in
forming an eftimate of Shakefpere. The Dedication
of the " Venus and Adonis " is addrefled to the Right
Honourable Henry Wriothefly, Earl of Southampton
and Baron of Tichfield, and is as follows:
" Right Honourable, I know not how I mall offend in dedicating my
unpoliihed lines to your lordfhip, nor how the world will cenfure me for
choofing fo ftrong a prop to fupport fo weak a burden ; only, if your
honour feem but pleafed, I account myfelf highly praifed, and vow to
take advantage of all idle hours till I have honoured you with fome
graver labours. But if the firft heir of my invention prove deformed,
I mall be forry it had fo noble a godfather, and never after ear [plough]
fo barren a land, for fear it yield me Hill fo bad a harveft. I leave it to
your honourable furvey, and your honour to your heart's content, which
I wiili may always anfwer your own willi and the world's hopeful expec-
tation. Your honour's in all duty, " WILLIAM SHAKESPERE."
io8 S /lake/per e.
The dedication of " The Rape of Lucrece " is ad-
drefled to the fame accomplifhed nobleman :
"The love I dedicate to your lordihip is without end ; whereof this
pamphlet, without beginning, is but a fuperfluous moiety. The warrant
I have of your honourable difpofition, not the worth of my untutored
lines, makes it affured of acceptance. What I have done is yours 5 what
I have to do is yours ; being part in all I have, devoted yours. Were
my worth greater, my duty would mow greater ; meantime, as it is, it is
bound to your lordfhip, to whom I wim long life, flill lengthened with
all happinefs."
There appears to me to be in thefe complimentary
addrefies a more manly and independent fpirit, lefs
deformed by extravagant conceits, than is to be found
in moft dedications of the period. In the firft, Shake-
fpere does not hefitate to fay, that he hopes to honour
his patron by fome graver work. This hope was not
fulfilled, perhaps, as he intended it ; but the memory
of Southampton is certainly moft honoured in the
record 'of his friendfhip for the Poet.
The fecond feems to indicate a growing intimacy
and affection. This affeclion is faid to have been fo
great on Southampton's fide, that he once prefented
Shakefpere with a thoufand pounds to carry through a
purchafe in which he was then engaged, poflibly a
mare in the Blackfriars or the Globe. Now a thou-
fand pounds in the time of Queen Elizabeth was worth
fully as much as five thoufand now. This would have
been a very large gift to one in Shakefpere's circum-
Venus and Adonis. 109
fiances ; but that the tradition exifted in the time of
Sir William Davenant is fufficient ground for believing
that Southampton did make Shakefpere a handfome
prefent, though we may allow fomething for exaggera-
tion as to the amount.
The fubjefts of both thefe poems are fuch, that an
edition of Shakefpere which contains them cannot be
left upon a drawing-room table. I think my readers
will therefore be obliged to me if I extract a few of
the moft ftriking paflages from both. They are
Shakefpere's earlieft productions : the " Venus and
Adonis " he calls the "firft heir of my invention."
The defcription of Adonis's hounds returning after
having loft their mafter and brought the boar to bay
is extremely graphic, and further illuftrates the Poet's
intimate knowledge of hunting :
" By this me hears the hounds are at a bay,
Whereat ihe ftarts, like one that fpies an adder,
Wreathed up in fatal folds juil in his way,
The fear whereof doth make him {hake and fhudder ;
Even fo the timorous yelping of the hounds
Appals her fenfes, and her fpirit confounds.
" For now flie knows it is no gentle chafe,
But the blunt boar, rough bear, or lion proud,
Becaufe the cry remaineth in one place,
Where fearfully the dogs exclaim aloud :
Finding their enemy to be fo curft,
They all ftrain courtefy who mall cope him firll.
1 1 o Shakefpere.
" Here kennelled in a brake me finds a hound,
And aiks the weary caitiff for his matter ;
And then another licking of his wound,
'Gainft venomed fores the only fovereign plafter ;
And here me meets another fadly fcowling,
To whom ihe fpeaks, and he replies with howling.
" When he hath ceafed his ill-refounding noife,
Another flap-mouthed mourner, black and grim,
Againft the welkin vollies out his voice ;
Another and another anfwer him,
Clapping their proud tails to the ground below,
Shaking their fcratched ears, bleeding as they go-."
No one who had not clofely obferved hounds could
have written this. The conclufion almoft rifes to fub-
limity in the picture it draws of the dire evils which
attend upon earthly paffion :
" Since thou art dead, lo, here I prophefy,
Sorrow on love hereafter mall attend :
It mall be waited on with jealoufy,
Find fweet beginning, but unfavoury end ;
Ne'er fettled equally, but high or low,
That all love's pleafure mall not match his woe.
" It mail be fickle, falfe, and full of fraud ;
Bud and be blafted in a breathing while;
The bottom poifon, and the top o'erftrewed
With fweets that fhall the trueft fight beguile j
The ftrongeft body mall it make moft weak,
Strike the wife dumb, and teach the fool to fpeak.
" It mall be fparing and too full of riot,
Teaching decrepit age to tread the meafures ;
His Obligations to Chaucer. i 1 1
The flaring ruffian fhall it keep in quiet,
Pluck down the rich, enrich the poor with treafures -,
It mall be raging mad and lilly mild,
Make the young old, the old become a child.
" It mail fufpect where is no caufe of fear ;
It mall not fear where it mould mofl miflrufl ;
It mall be merciful, and too fevere,
And mofl deceiving when it feems moil jufl ;
Perverfe it fhall be where it mows mofl toward,
Put fear to valour, courage to the coward."
This is quite in the manner of the old Engliih poets,
and reminds one of the moral to the beautifully told
but licentious ftory of "January and May," in Chaucer's
" Canterbury Tales." Pluto threatens to make known
the guilt of May, when Proferpine thus addreffes him,
and, in her fpeech, points the moral of the tale :
" ' Ye mall,' quoth Proferpine, ' and will ye fo ?
Now, by my mother Ceres' foul I fwear
That I fhall give her fuffiiant anfwer,
And alle women after, for her fake ;
That though they be in any guilt itake,
With face bold they fhall themfelves excufe,
And bear them down that woulden them accufe ;
For lack of anfwer none of them mall dien.
All had you feen a thing with both your eyen,
Yet fhall we women vifage it hardily,
And weep, and fwear, and chide fubtilly,
That ye mall be as lewed [foolifh] as be geefe.' "
Both the fentiments, the idea of indicating the
moral of the tale, and the vigour of the language, are
alike in both. But there is a ftill more ftriking refem-
1 1 2 Shakefpere.
blance, perhaps, in one of the expreffions in the paflage
quoted, to a bitter ftanza in another of Chaucer's poems,
" The Court of Love :"
" For it peradventure may fo befall
That they [women] be bound by nature to deceive,
And fpin and weep, and Jitgar Jlrew on gall,
The heart of man to ravilh and to reave."
Compare with this :
" The bottom poifon, and the top o'erftrewed
With fweets that ihall the truell fight beguile."
" The Rape of Lucrece " is a far nobler and more
varied poem. There can be little doubt that Shake-
fpere was indebted to the Legenda Lucrecle Rome,
Martyris 9 in Chaucer's " Legende of Code Women,"
for its general idea, and for many of the thoughts. It
abounds with fine paffages ; but I will choofe the
defcription of the picture in the houfe of Collatinus,
becaufe it mows that even thus early in his career the
Poet loved and appreciated the kindred art of painting :
" At laft fhe calls to mind where hangs a piece
Of ikilful painting m,ade for Priam's Troy.
* * * *
A thoufand lamentable objects there,
In fcorn of Nature, art gave lifelefs life ;
Many a dry drop feemed a weeping tear,
Shed for the flaughtered hufband by the wife 5
The red blood reeked to mow the painter's ftrife ;
And dying eyes gleamed forth their afhy lights,
Like dying coals burnt out in tedious nights.
Rape of Lucrece. 1 1 3
"There might you lee the labouring pioneer
Begrimed with fweat and fmeared all with duft j
And from the towers of Troy there would appear
The very eyes of men through loopholes thruft,
Gazing upon the Greeks with little luft :
Such fweet obfervance in this work was had,
That one might fee thofe far-off eyes look fad.
" In great commanders grace and majefty
You might behold triumphing in their faces j
In youth quick bearing and dexterity j
And here and there the painter interlaces
Pale cowards, marching on with trembling paces;
Which heartlefs peafants did fo well relemble,
That one would fwear he law them quake and tremble.
" In Ajax and Ulyffes, oh ! what art
Of phynognomy might one behold !
The face of either ciphered cither's heart ;
Their face their manners molt expreflly told :
In Ajax' eyes blunt rage and rigour rolled ;
But the mild glance, that fly Ulyfles lent
Showed deep regard and fmiling government."
How admirable is the contraft between the mere
foldier and the ftatefman ! How expreffive the phrafe,
" blunt rage ! " and how exactly does it defcribe the
character of Ajax, as drawn by Homer! The "mild
glance " of " fly Ulyffes " reminds one of the " Mitis
fapientia Laeli ;" but the "deep regard and fmiling
government " are Shakefpere's own, and fhow that he
had feen and marked the deportment of thofe great
ftatefmen who fleered the bark of the commonwealth
1 1 4 Shakefpere.
through the troubled feas of the beginning of the
queen's reign. No words could better exprefs the
habitual though tfulnefs, and quiet and dignified cour-
tefy acquired by thofe who are converfant with great
affairs and fubtle policy. It is fomewhat remarkable
that both thefe poems depift unrequited love, the one
on the part of the woman, the other on that of the
man. If one were dilpofed to find autobiographical
hints in Shakeipere's poems, one might argue from
hence that he had not found woman's love a folace
and a comfort.
The fonnets have always prefented a puzzle to thofe
who have endeavoured to draw from them hints with
refped: to the Poet's life and fentiments. Some of
them, perhaps, may contain allufions to his own cir-
cumftances. The following, for inftance, may refer to
his profeffion of an ad:or, then fcarcely freed from the
infamy attached to it by the Roman law :
" Oh ! for my fake do you with fortune chide,
The guilty goddefs of my harmful deeds,
That did not better for my life provide
Than public means, which public manners breeds.
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
And almoft thence my nature is fubdued
To what it works in, like the dyer's hand :
Pity me, then, and wifh I were renewed,
Whilft, like a willing patient I will drink
Potions of eyiell 'gainft my ftrong infection ;
The Sonnets. \ 1 5
No bitternefs that I will bitter think,
Nor double penance to correct corre6tion.
Pity me, then, dear friends, and I allure ye
Even that your pity is enough to cure me."
One of the moft beautiful of thefe exquilite little
poems is that in which the Poet laments his friend's
abfence, or alienation :
" Full many a glorious morning have I feeii
Flatter the mountain-tops with fovereign eye,
Killing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale ftreams with heavenly alchemy,
Anon permit the bafeft clouds to ride
With ugly rack on his celeflial face,
And from the forlorn world his vifage hide,
Stealing unfeen to weft with this difgrace :
Even fo my fun one early morn did fhiiie,
With all triumphant fplendour on my brow,
But, out alack ! he was but one hour mine,
The region cloud hath maiked him from me now.
Yet him for this my love no whit difdaineth ;
Suns of the world may ftain when heaven's fun ftaineth."
" Stain," in the laft line, is a neuter verb. " Heavenly
alchemy" heaven's own art of tranfmuting bafer things
to gold is one of thofe happy metaphors which denote
a true poet.
The dedication prefixed to thefe fonnets has long
been a puzzle to Shakefperian biographers. In the
original edition it is not pointed, but in modern
editions it has always been printed thus :
Shake fpere.
DEDICATION.
TO THE ONLY BEGETTER
OF THESE ENSUING SONNETS,
MR. W. H.,
ALL HAPPINESS
AND THAT ETERNITY PROMISED
BY OUR EVERLASTING POET,
WISHETH THE
WELL-WISHING ADVENTURER
IN SETTING FORTH,
T. T.
" Mr. W. H.," then, was fuppofed to be " the only
begetter" of the fonnets, and no one could make out
who "Mr. W. H.," to ,whom fo high an honour is
attributed, was. Another reading has been fuggefted
lately. A full flop is placed at "wifheth," to which
verb " Mr. W. H." then becomes the nominative cafe,
and " T. T.," Thomas Thorpe, the bookfeller, is made
merely to defcribe himfelf as " the well-wifhing adven-
turer in fetting forth." Point it as we will, however,
the dedication, like the fonnets themfelves, remains an
enigma which no CEdipus has yet been found to folve.
The lateft attempt which I have feen to trace in
the fonnets the Poet's autobiography, is that of Mr.
Francis Victor Hugo. By reading them over fre-
quently, he thinks he has diicovered the real fequence
in which they mould be placed, and arranges them
accordingly, introducing fome pieces from " The Paf-
fionate Pilgrim ;" and in an " Introduction " explains
'The Sonnets. 1 1 7
the purport of the ftory which he thus makes them
tell. In the firft three fonnets, according to his ar-
rangement, Shakefpere appears in love, and addrefles
his miftrefs in the ufual language of lovers ; but me
favours another, and in the eighth fonnet the Poet
changes his tone and threatens to go mad and {peak ill
of her. In the fucceeding fonnets, he accordingly
tells her that he has overrated her beauty, and over-
whelms her with farcafm. She retaliates by re-
minding him that he is married, and therefore, in
loving her, perjured. He retorts, in the twenty-firft
fonnet, that me is as much to blame as he ; and me at
length yields, and the twenty-fifth fonnet is his fong of
triumph. But me revenges herfelf, not only by being
unfaithful, but by making his bofom friend, who is
none other than Southampton, his rival. The friend
confeffes his fault, and the Poet " generoufly," as
Mr. Hugo fays, forgives him. The warmth of the
language of the fucceeding fonnets, addrefled to this
faithlefs friend, is explained thus : " Deceived in love
Shakefpere throws himfelf unrefervedly into friendship.
From friendship he afks that impoffible happinefs
which he has fought elfewhere in vain. From thence-
forth he renounces material affection which is change-
able like the inftin&s of animals ; what he feeks
is a love which fhall be immovable, inexhauftible,
1 1 8 Shakefpere.
ideal. By one of thofe fudden reactions fo frequent
in impetuous natures, he paffes at once from one
extreme to the other, and from having been enfnared
by a courtezan, he attaches himfelf to a foul ; in de-
fpair at having been feduced by earthly paffion, he
determines now to love by the intellect alone."
But in reply to this theory it may be afked, Why,
then, were the fonnets difplaced from their natural
order and thereby rendered unintelligible ? They were
published in 1609, during the writer's life, and not,
like the plays, after his death ; he could, therefore,
have placed them in their proper order.
The myftery is thus explained. Queen Elizabeth,
like Ferdinand in " Love's Labour's Loft," had not
only determined herfelf to lead a iingle life, but had
forbidden all her courtiers to marry, and Southampton
among the reft. He, however, yielding to the charms
of "la belle Miftrefs Varnon," and to the eloquent
pleadings of his friend, married, and the confequence
was that he was fent, not for his fuppofed participation
in the attempt of Effex, but for his difobedience to the
Queen's command, to "contemplate the honeymoon
in the Tower of London." The publifhers were, of
courfe, afraid to publifh the fonnets which had been
the caufe of fuch dire evils, during the Queen's life-
time ; and when at laft they were given to the world
The Sonnets. 119
in the reign of her fucceffor, it was thought convenient
to difguife the name of Southampton under the
initials " W. H.," and the true purport of the fonnets
by deftroying their natural fequence.
The ingenuity of this theory is undeniable, and
Mr. Francis Victor Hugo's little book is well worth
reading ; but it muft, of courfe, remain a theory only ;
and the latter part, at leaft, relating to Elizabeth and
her decree againft marriage, is fanciful and utterly
without foundation.
Amongft Shakefpere's early productions may be
claffed the fhort poems called "A Lover's Com-
plaint," and " The Paffionate Pilgrim." They con-
tain many pretty paffages, and, in common with his
other poems, are only not fo much thought of and
read becaufe of the overwhelming fplendour of his
dramatic works.
Thefe feveral poems were but the firft eflays of
Shakefpere's genius, yet upon them his fame refted
amongft his contemporaries long after fome of his
beft plays had been acted. In the firft ten years
the "Venus and Adonis" parTed through thirteen
editions, while " Romeo and Juliet" was only once
printed.
The fonnet had been introduced from Italy, by Lord
Surrey and Sir Thomas Wyatt, in the reign of Henry
] 2O Shakefpere.
the Eighth. In Italy, Petrarch had invented, or, at
leaft, brought it to the higheft perfection of which it
is capable ; but, like caviar and olives, it is rather a
fort of intellectual relifli for thofe whofe palates require
a ftimulant, than food fuch as ordinary minds can con-
fume in any quantity. Sonnets muft be read and
mufed upon one at a time. A fonnet is founded upon
one thought which permeates the complicated metre,
and is turned inlide out by the metaphyiical ingenuity
of the poet. So artificial a flructure can hardly exprefs
ftrong paffion, nor does it convey pleafure to any but
thofe who can regard it as a work of art, and follow
and appreciate the poet's ingenuity. Its condenfed
form always makes it difficult to underftand, and it
is only educated minds which take pleafure in the
intellectual effort neceffary for the tafk. The age of
Elizabeth was a metaphyfical age. The old philo-
fophy and theology ftill influenced men's minds, and
prepared them to look for metaphyfics even in poetry.
And the concluiion that moft people come to after
reading Shakefpere's fonnets is, that they are poetical
and intellectual exercifes, not intended to exprefs the
Poet's real fentiments, but merely to mow his fkill
in finding poetical thoughts, and dreffing them up
in poetical language. They entitle him to a place
among the metaphyfical poets, Surrey, Wyatt, Ben
The Sonnets a Preparation for the Plays. 121
Jonfon, Donne, and Cowley, and, I think, they place
him at the head of them.
A better preparation for the great dramatic works
which were ftill lying unhewn in Shakefpere's brain
could hardly have been found than thefe hundred and
fifty-four fonnets. In maftering fo thoroughly the
difficulties of the metre and of the condenfation of
thought and language neceffary in the fonnet, he muft
have acquired a facility of writing and power over
words which would make them ever afterwards his
flaves, and not, as is the cafe with inferior writers and
thinkers, his mafters. And this explains the fa<ft, other-
wife not the leaft wonderful of the many wonders of
his genius, that he never blotted out a word or a line ;
that the " Hamlet/' the " Macbeth/' the " Lear/'
which have exercifed the wits of critics any time this
hundred years to fathom the depths of their meaning,
flowed fpontaneoufly from his pen, without effort and
without hefitation.
A paffage from Mr. Francis Victor Hugo's book,
which I have feen fince writing the above, exactly
expreffes my idea: " Englifli, that obftinate jargon
[no more a 'jargon ' than French, Mr. Hugo !], fo
unamenable to rhyme, fo briftling with confonants,
Shakefpere undertakes to throw into the crucible of
the fonnet, and to draw from thence a language
i 2 2 Shakefpere.
warm, fparkling, harmonious, all chifeled with anti-
thefes and conceits, which mall be the language of
Romeo and Juliet, of Othello and Defdemona"
But the popularity of his early poems was of in-
finite advantage to him, in giving him opportunities of
obferving a phafe of manners with which he could
otherwife fcarcely have become acquainted. It is fome-
thing little fhort of miraculous how Shakefpere, the fon
of a Warwickfhire yeoman, who had never even been at
the Univerlity, fhould have known how to portray men
and women of rank, not only in their graver hours, but
in the eafe and abandonment of focial intercourfe. The
former he might have learnt from books, or from being
prefent at great ftate folemnities, but the latter he could
have known only from taking part in it. The dialogues
between Prince Henry and Poyns and Faljlaff, between
Romeo, Mercutio, and Benvolio, between Rofalind, Celia,
and Orlando, and between Beatrice and Benedict, are
of the very beft ftyle of wellbred converfation. It is
fufficiently wonderful how, under any circumftances,
he could have fo accurately caught the tone of good
fociety. We fee daily how very indifferently even
clever novelifts, who have lived amongft fafhionable
people all their lives, depict their manners. Shake-
fpere, of courfe, could not have attained this excellence
by fimple intuition. He muft have fomewhere feen the
His Knowledge of Good Society. 123
original from which he drew. I think it is probable,
therefore, that his early poems were the means of
introducing him to the fociety of people of refinement
and high breeding, whofe manners his extraordinary
powers of perception enabled him fo accurately to
obferve and reproduce. And thus, I think, the poems,
and the fame they brought him, may have combined
to prepare Shakefpere for the great dramatic career
which his father's misfortunes and his own were the
means of opening to him in London.
1 24 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER IX.
SHAKESPERE was one of thofe men who have got a
great deal into a fhort life. Before he had attained
the age of thirty he had fown fome very wild oats
at Stratford, and got into confiderable trouble ; he
had managed his love-making and matrimonial affairs
in fuch a way as not by any means to fmooth his way
out of his difficulties ; he had gone to London a ruined
man, with a very flender education, and had adopted
the firft menial office which promifed him bread; but
by the time that he was thirty, he found himfelf
eftablifhed amongft the foremoft poets of a poetic
age, gaining a handfome competence as author, adtor,
and fhareholder in the Globe and Blackfriars theatres,
the envy of his profligate and unhappy fellow-dra-
matifts, like Green, and the friend of men of rank and
refinement, like Southampton.
But while all thefe honours and emoluments were
flowing in upon him in London, he ftill confidered
His annual Vifit to Stratford. 125
the little village in Warwickshire where he was born
as his real home. Aubrey fays that he " was wont to
goe to his native countreye once a yeare ; " and there is
a tradition that on thefe occafions he ufed to take up
his quarters at the Crown inn, near Carfax, at Oxford.
The houfe is now divided into fhops, but retains much
of its ancient character. It was kept by one Davenant,
father of Sir William Davenant, the dramatift, in con-
nection with whom a fcandalous ftory was in circula-
tion, after the Reftoration, refpedting the Poet ; but as
it is grounded upon no tangible evidence I do not care
to record it. At Stratford it is probable he left his
wife and family during his early ftruggles, and we may
fancy how refreshing it muft have been to the country-
loving Poet to revifit every year the fcenes of his early
adventures, and to fee his young family growing up,
while he felt that he was every year increaling his
means of providing for them. A family merrymaking,
at which the Combes, Hathaways, Halls, Ardens, would
meet over a bowl of lambfwool, was in his eyes better
than the wit-combats at the " Mermaid." With what
delight muft he have feen the Avon flowing majefti-
cally at the foot of the town by the fine old church !
How pleafant muft have appeared to him the glades
and groves of Charlecote and Fulbrooke after the
" melancholy of Houndfditch ! " And how fweet muft
26 Shakefpere.
have founded to him the cry of the hounds in the
woodlands of Arden. Probably quite as fweet as the
plaudits of the theatre.
Indeed, one of the moft curious traits of his cha-
racter was his love for an unambitious country life in
his native town. Like another of the world's great
poets, he really might fay
" Flumina amem fylvafque inglorius."
He feems to have looked upon his literary fame only
as a means to enable him to retire honourably to Strat-
ford; and he was content that to be the author of
" Hamlet/' " Lear," " The Tempeft," As You Like
It," and the reft of thofe great works which will laft
out the Englifh language, mould bring him no higher
reward than might have been gained by a career of
fuccefsful farming or trade.
This is a very Englifh feeling. Horace Walpole
was rather amamed of being a literary man ; Walter
Scott was much prouder of being the Laird of Abbots-
ford than the author of " Waverley ;" and I fancy that
Mr. Anthony Trollope, when got up in his " pink "
and " tops," and {landing by a covert in the Rodings
waiting for a fox to be found, would conlider it very
bad tafte for any one to allude to " The Small Houfe
at Allington." A foreigner cannot understand this
His Carelejjnefs of Fame. \ 27
feeling. If, by writing a clever feullleton in a paper he
has obtained the crofs of the Legion of Honour, he
will wear the ribbon in the button-hole of his fhooting-
jacket; indeed it is not clear to me that he does not
wear it in his night-fhirt. We, on the contrary, think
literature a fort of occupation which rather unfits a man
for the bufinefs of the world, and look upon a literary
man with fome degree of fufpicion and diftruft ; and
moft Englifhmen would rather derive an hereditary
fortune from a county magiftrate, who had juft brains
enough to adjudicate on a poaching cafe with the
affiftance of a clerk, than from having written " Wa-
verley," or " Pickwick."
In his careleffnefs of literary fame, Shakefpere was
true to the national character. He reminds one of thofe
people in Chaucer's " Houfe of Fame," who cared not
for renown :
With that, about I clewed mine head,
And faw anon the fifth rout,
That to this lady [Fame] gan to lout,
And down on knees anon to fall;
And to her then befoughten all
To hiden their good workes eke,
And faid they would not give a leek
For no fame, nor for fuch renown.
* * * * ..
' What ?' quoth me, ' and be ye wood ? [mad]
And ween ye for to doen good,
ia8 Shakefpere.
And for to have of that no fame I
Have ye defpite to have my name ?
Nay, ye (hall lyen every one 1
Blow up thy trump, and that anon/
Quoth Hie, ' thou Eolus yhote,
[Thou who art called Eolus]
And ring thefe folkes works by note.
That all the world may of it hear.' "
We fhould have expected that Shakefpere would
have fettled in London, to be near his great friends, to
mix with the wits, and take his accuftomed chair in
the evening at fome club of chofen ipirits, like Dryden,
Addifon, and Johnfon, and pronounce, ex cathedra,
upon the merits of the lateft play. But inftead of
this, the firftfruits of his prosperity are feen in his
endeavour to eftablim himfelf in a good pofition in his
native town. In 1597 his parents, John and Mary
Shakefpere, filed a bill in Chancery for the recovery of
the eftate of Afhbies, which they had mortgaged, and
of which the mortgage was alleged to have been fore-
clofed. Now, a Chancery fuit is not a cheap luxury,
and it is not likely that John Shakefpere, the poor
bankrupt of a few years back, mould fo foon have
retrieved his affairs as to be able to indulge in it.
There was then no Commiflioner of Bankrupts to
wipe out an unlucky tradefman's liabilities, and enable
him to ftart afrefh and make a fortune as if nothing
had happened. The renowned cafe of " Bardwell
Grant of Arms to his Father. 129
againft Pickwick" had not yet been publiflied to the
world, and debtors, once in prifon, were there till death
releafed them. To Shakefpere himfelf, then, we muft
attribute this attempt to refcue his mother's patrimony
from the mortgageor. It was the proceeds of the fale
of the poems, and fuch plays as he had then written,
and the profits of the Globe and Blackfriars, that went
to fee the Chancery lawyers for their unfuccefsful
attempt to keep Ambies in the family.
To the fame defire to affume a pofition among the
gentlemen of his county may be affigned his father's
application to the Heralds' Office about the fame time
for a grant of arms ; this, however, was not iffued till
1599. It recites that John Shakefpere's "parent,
great-grandfather, and late anteceflbr, for his faithful
and approved fervice to the late moft prudent prince,
King Henry the Seventh, of famous memorie, was
advaunced and rewarded with lands and tenements,
given to him in thofe parts of Warwickshire where
they have continewed by fome defcents in good repu-
tation and credit ; and for that the faid John Shak-
ipeare having marryed the daughter and one of the
heyrs of Robert Arden, of Wellingcote, in the faid
countie, and alfo produced this his auncient cote-of-
arms, heretobefore affigned to him whileft he was her
Majeftie's officer and baylefe of that towne : in con-
130 Shakefpere.
lideration of the premifles and for the encouragement
of his pofteritie, unto whome fuch blazon of arms and
achievements of inheritance from theyre faid mother
by the auncyent cuftom and laws of arms maye law-
fully defend : we the faid Garter and Clarencieulx have
afligned, graunted, and by thefe prefents exemplefied
unto the faid John Shakfpeare, and to his pofteritie,
that fhield and cote-of-arms, viz., In a field of gould
upon a bend, fables, a fpeare of the firft, the poynt
upward, hedded argent ; and for his creft or cognizance,
A falcon with his wings defplayed, ftanding on a wrethe
of his coullers, fupporting a fpeare armed, hedded, or
fteeled, filver, fixed upon a helmet with mantell and
taffels, &c."
In the original draft of the grant by De thick, and
in feveral other documents, I find the name fpelt
" Shakefpere," which fpelling I follow for the following
reafons the College of Arms is the beft authority
in the matter of names ; the name is an old one in
Warwickfhire, and the correct fpelling of the two
words of which it is compofed is "make" and "fpere."
In the reign of Elizabeth an " a " was introduced into
fuch words as were originally fpelt with an " e " alone
as fpear, head, ftead, mead, fear; for fpere, hede,
ftede, mede, fere to the great detriment of the lan-
guage ; and in the name Shakefpere I fee no reafon to
Pur chafe of New Place. 131
adopt it. The name is fpelt in numerous different
ways even by Shakefpere himfelf, and I adopt that
which was the mode of fpelling it when it was firft
adopted by his anceftors.
In 1597 tne wifhed-for opportunity of fecuring a
place of retirement in his native town occurred. New
Place, the beft houfe in Stratford, was for fale, and
Shakefpere bought it for the fum of fixty pounds. It
had been built in the reign of Henry the Seventh by
the magnificent Sir Hugh Clopton, the builder of the
bridge and reflorer of the chapel, dire&ly oppofite to
which it flood. It is thus defcribed by Dugdale :
" On the north fide of this chapel was a fair houfe,
built of brick and timber by the faid Sir Hugh,
wherein he lived in his latter days and died." Sir
Hugh bequeathed it to William Clopton, of Clopton,
from whom it pafTed to William Bott. Its next pof-
feffor was William Underbill, of Eatington and Idli-
cote, from whom- Shakefpere bought it in Eafter
term, 1597. In the conveyance it is defcribed in the
comical dog-Latin of the law, to confift " de uno
mefuagio, duobus horreis, duobus gardinis cum per-
tinentiis " (of one meffuage, two barns, and two gar-
dens, with their appurtenances). There is no draw-
ing of it extant, for the pretended one publifhed by
Malone is a palpable forgery. That it was a com-
132 Shakefpere.
fortable, and even ftately refidence, may be inferred
from the faft that it was built by Sir Hugh Clopton,
that it was the beft houfe in the town, and that when
Queen Henrietta Maria afterwards fojourned for a
while at Stratford, me took up her abode there. On
Shakefpere's death, in default of heirs male of his
daughters, Sufanna and Judith, it defcended to his
right heirs, that is to fay, to the daughter of Sufanna
Hall, married to Thomas Nam, and afterwards to
Sir John Barnard. She died without iflue, and New
Place was fold to Sir Hugh Clopton, a defcendant of
the original builder, who almoft entirely pulled it down
and rebuilt it. After Sir Hugh's death his houfe was
fold to the Rev. Francis Gaftrell. This gentleman,
who was married to a friend and correfpondent of
Dr. Johnfon, confidering that it was rated too highly
to the relief of the poor, pulled down the houfe in 1 757,
having firft cut down a fine mulberry-tree which was
faid to have been planted by Shakefpere's own hands
in the gardens. The caufe alleged for this felfim act
was, that the reverend gentleman, who appears to have
been an epicure, and fond of his eafe, was annoyed by
the flux of company who came to vifit the interefting
relic. Upon the old foundations was built a modern
houfe, which, having been purchafed for the public
within the laft few years, was pulled down, in the
Remains of New Place. 133
hope that fome remains of that in which Shakefpere
lived might be difcovered.
When I vifited it, it prefented a moft forlorn and
miferable appearance. Nothing was to be feen but a
newly-made garden, and the rubbifh and foundations
of a houfe. The only parts remaining of the original
building in which Shakefpere lived are the ftone foun-
dations of the main wall, abutting on Chapel Lane,
a portion of the porch wall, and a well, from which
were taken a candleflick, knife, tobacco-pipes, tiles,
glafs, and fome pieces of iron. The further fide of the
plot of ground is bounded by a fhed, which is digni-
fied by the name of " The Theatre." Had the old
houfe, where Shakefpere ipent the laft years of his life
in eafe and opulence, furrounded by his family, and
where fome of his greateft works were written, re-
mained, it would really have been a relic of intereft ;
but the place has been thoroughly and effectually
denuded of everything upon which it is poffible to fix
any affociation with Shakefpere. The little piece of
ftone wall which formed the foundation of the houfe
tells no intelligible tale of the illuftrious inhabitant.
Still there at leaft is the ground upon which he walked,
and the garden which he probably took pleafure in
cultivating, and it is well to keep up our veneration
for genius by refpect for the place confecrated by being
134 Shakefpere.
the fcene offome of its happieft creations. " Far from
me and from my friends," fays Dr. Johnfon, " be fuch
frigid philofophy as may conducl: us indifFerent and
unmoved over any ground which has been dignified
by wifdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to
be envied whofe patriotifm would not gain force upon
the plain of Marathon, or whofe piety would not
grow warmer among the ruins of lona;" or, we may
add, whofe veneration for genius would not grow
deeper among the remains of Shakefpere's home.
Mr. Edwards' photograph gives the little bit of the
foundation of the porch and the boundary wall,
with the theatre in the background. The reader
will fee that it is a fcene of moft admired dif-
order, and what fhape it will ultimately aflume I
know not.
The mulberry- tree, cut down by Mr. Gaftrell and
his wife, was fold for fire-wood, and bought by a
Mr. Thomas Sharp, a watch-maker in the town, who
cut it up and made it into various little knick-knacks,
which were greedily purchafed by admirers .of the
Poet. Mifs Burdett Coutts pofferTes a chair made of
it, with a medallion in the back, carved by Hogarth ;
and the cup from which Garrick drank when he fang
the foolifh fong compofed for the Shakefpere jubilee,
was alfo made of it. Mr. W. O. Hunt, the donor of
/V07V
(THE HOUSE IN WHICH SHAKESPERL DIED.)
Fate of his Mulberry-tree. 135
the portrait now to be feen in the houfe in Henley
Street, has a table made of the fame wood.
The veneration paid to thefe trifling remains (hows
how naturally we afibciate the work of art with the
artift. The plays would have the fame excellence by
whomfoever they might have been written. There is
no intrinfic connection between them and the man
William Shakefpere. He has been long dead, and
they remain a poffeffion for ever. But the mind
refufes to view things from this abftract and cold point
of view. It infifts upon tracing the work to the
workman, and connefts by fome wayward and irra-
tional, but ftill natural procefs, " Lear," " Hamlet/'
and the reft of thofe wondrous poems, with a cup or
a fnuff-box made of a piece of mulberry-tree !
136 Shakefpere.
CHAPTER X.
COCKNEYISM is one of the old inftitutions of the
country which railroads have done much to modify.
There was a time when barrifters and attorneys ufed
to live all the year round, to eat, drink, fleep, and keep
their carriages, in the gloomy ftreets near the Old
Bailey and Weftminfter Hall. Indeed, perfons now
alive can recollect an eminent civilian who had a hand-
fome houfe and eftablifhment in Doctors' Commons,
and never thought of leaving it. Publifhers not only
had their warehoufes, but lived in Paternofter Row ;
tradefmen in Cheapfide, winter and fummer. Grub
Street was the chofen abode of authors. Johnfon lived
in Bolt Court, and thought the view down Fleet Street
the fineft profpect in England. The country was con-
fidered a fort of wildernefs, and a chance vifit to fome
remote county was fufficient occafion for writing a
book about fhepherds and mepherdefles. London was
the centre of intelligence, and he who was not up to
Social Effeffis of Railroads. i 37
all its ways who did not know the fafhionable taverns,
and could not call the waiters at them by their Chrif-
tian names was called a gull and a ninny.
Railroads have changed all this. Lawyers, bankers,
tradefmen, and innkeepers, and even publifhers and au-
thors, now live ten, twenty, or thirty miles from town,
in a country houfe with a demefne arid farm attached
to it, where they fpend, upon growing grapes and pines,
turnips and mangold wurtzel, prize beef and mutton,
pheafants and partridges, the money which has been
fpun from their brains, or abftracted from their clients'
or cuftomers' pockets in a gloomy den in the City. A
friend and neighbour of mine, an eminent lawyer, who
is no lefs remarkable for his legal acumen than for his
fkill as a fportfman, and who in the very whirlwind
of his practice has always given two days a-week to
(hooting or fiihing, was complaining one day to the
farmer who fupplied him with corn for his pheafants,
of the quantity of barley which appeared againft him
in his bill. " Ah ! " fays Hodge, " you don't mind a
quarter or two o' barley more or lefs in a half-year !
Tou'll make it all right when you git a robbin' on 'em
up in Lonon ! " And Hodge was right. You pafs an
exquiiitely kept place which puts the old fquire's quite
to the blufh, and you are told that it belongs to the
grocer in Piccadilly where you got a jar of ginger the
138 Shakefpere.
day before. You fee a man perfectly got up in pink and
leathers and tops, fplendidly mounted and followed by
a groom on his fecond horfe, and what is more, riding
well to hounds ; all this is derived from the calico ware-
houfe in Cheapiide, or from the magazine of " leading
articles " in Printing Houfe Square. A pack of harriers
dafh acrofs the road followed by a gentleman in green ;
this gallant iportfman is the eminent publifher who
thus learns whether to accept or refufe the MS. of
Mr. St. Hubert's fporting novel. And to go a ftep
lower in the focial fcale whofe is this neat little villa
with its fmall coach-houfe and ftable, and little paddock
in which grazes a pretty Alderney cow? That is
Mr. Whiff's, the tobacconift, in the Strand. All this
is the falutary effect of railroads, which enable men of
bufmefs to fleep in the pure air of the country, and be
at their mops or offices by bufinefs hours in the morn-
ing ; which gives them healthful and civilifing amufe-
ments for their leifure hours, and infures health and
vigour to their children. I don't mean to fay that this
double life wholly eradicates the inftincts, language,
and manners, which ufed to mark the dwellers within
the found of Bow-bells, or that the profufe magnifi-
cence of a Londoner's eftablifhment in the country is
as pleaiing as the fimpler ftyle of the old fquire's
that would be too much to expecT: ; but ftill the more
His Town and Country Life. 139
falient angles of Cockneyifm have been rubbed off;
and what is more, thofe whofe taftes and habits lead
them to prefer a country life can now, by means of the
railroad, participate in fome degree in the pecuniary
advantages of the great market, where a purchafer may
be found for any article, whether manufactured by the
hands or created by the brain.
Shakefpere lived before Watt had invented the fteam-
engine, or Stephenfon had applied it to locomotion ;
but he anticipated in fome degree the dual life which
it enables us now to lead. London was never his real
home Stratford was the home of his mind. In the
very hey-day of his fame and profperity the little vil-
lage on the Avon, with its fimple fociety of country
fquires and yeomen, its farming and field fports, was
the object towards which his life pointed ; and to this,
I think, we owe the healthy tone of his great dramatic
poems and their variety of intereft. Compare them
with the plays of Jonfon, Greene, Peek, and Marlowe,
Beaumont and Fletcher, Dryden, Wycherley, and Con-
greve, and one of the marks by which they are diftin-
guifhed, and their chiefeft charm, will be found to be
the fuperior reality of the pictures of country life and
character which they prefent. The town fupplies
but few phafes of chara&er ; but Shakefpere had the
whole range at his command. While mixing in all
1 40 Shakefpere.
the humours of the court and city, his yearly vifits to
his native village kept his mind frem and fweet, and
enabled it to work amidft the reek of the theatres and
taverns of the city without being tainted or enfeebled.
As a pilgrim to Stratford, I ought, perhaps, to con-
fine myfelf entirely to his doings in his country home ;
but, I think, we can hardly judge what manner of man
he was without a glance at the other life he led in
London.
In the firft place it was a life of labour. We have
feen that before 1598 he had written his poems, and
either retouched or written fifteen or fixteen plays,
amongft which are fome of his beft, fuch as " The
Merchant of Venice," "A Midfummer Night's Dream,"
" Romeo and Juliet," and " Henry the Fourth,"
Part I. It is impoffible, after this, to determine
exadtly the year in which each play was produced,
but from internal and external evidence, Malone, Mr.
Halliwell, Mr. Dyce, and others, have arrived at an
approximation to it. They all agree generally to attri-
bute to the year 1599, "Much Ado about Nothing"
and "Henry the Fifth ;" to 1600, "As You Like It "
and "The Moor of Venice;" to 1601, "The Merry
Wives of Windfor " and " King Henry the Eighth ;"
to 1602, " Twelfth Night " and " Hamlet ;" to 1603,
" Meafure for Meafure " and "Julius Casfar ;" to 1605,
Sources from which he obtained his Plots. 141
"Lear" and "Macbeth;" to 1607 and 1608, "An-
thony and Cleopatra " and " Troilus and Creffida ;"
to 1609, " Cymbeline ;" to 1 6 1 o, " Coriolanus " and
"Timon of Athens ;" to 1611, " A Winter's Tale "
and " The Tempeft," the moft perfect as a work of art
of all his dramatic poems. Like Profpero, he is fup-
pofed, with this crowning exercife of his magic power, to
have laid by his conjuring robe and wand. Within the
fpace of nineteen years, therefore, he muft have written
thirty-one plays at leaft, befides retouching others, fuch
as " Pericles," " Titus Andronicus," and the three parts
of " Henry the Sixth," and taking part in the general
theatrical bufinefs of the Globe and the theatre at the
Blackfriars.
It is curious to obferve what a deep abyfs of igno-
rance lies beneath the knowledge which is now-a-days
ipread over fo large a furface. It reminds one of thofe
beautifully green Ipots of herbage which appear to
offer fafe footing on the banks of a fluggifh ftream, but
as foon as your horfe treads upon them the upper cruft
of verdure gives way, and you find yourfelf plunging
helpleffly up to the girths in black mud. Of the many
people who talk of Shakefpere, how many have read
all his plays ? Of the feleft few who have read his
plays, how many have tried to form a conception of
the mode of their conftrudlion ? And yet what a lazy,
142 Shake f per e.
incurious mind inuft that be which can go on contem-
plating a phenomenon which is almoft miraculous,
and never feeking to penetrate the myftery ! It is as
if a man were daily to fee the bones and tufks of the
maftodon and the ichthyofaurus, the ftems of giant
ferns, and the fhells of unknown mollufcs, thrown up
by the pick of the quarryman, and mould never inquire
how the earth was made. I muft confefs, with fhame,
that long after I had learned to read Shakefpere with
fome degree of difcrimination, and to, appreciate his
fuperiority to any other dramatic poet I had read, I
was content to accept the fad: that the plays had been
written by an uneducated man in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, without further inquiry. As far as I thought
about the matter, I believed that he had produced the
whole thing, plots and all, by a fort of plenary inipira-
tion, or by the help of a meflenger from above, like
Numa's Egeria, or Mahomet's pigeon. And I fuppofe
a great many of thofe who really more or lefs enjoy
fuch plays as " The Temper!,' ' and " A Midfummer
Night's Dream," and "As You Like It," are in the
fame ftate of happy ignorance. Shakefpere's genius
can hardly be overrated, but yet it was not equal to fuch
a ftupendous effort as this.
There is fcarcely one of the plays of which the plot
may not be traced to fome previous writer. But is
Sources from 'which he obtained his Plots. -143
Shakefpere to be accufed of plagiarifm or want of
invention for this? Certainly not. The objeft of
a play is not to tell a ftory, but to fhow men and
women adKng under the influence of ftrong paffion.
And, therefore, Horace, in the Epiftle to the Pifos,
de arte poetica, properly advifes authors to choofe
fome fable well known to the audience, fo that
he may take them with him at once into the very
midft of the adlion. It detracts nothing from the
merits of the hiftorical plays that the incidents are
taken bodily from North's " Plutarch," Holinfhed,
or Geoffrey of Monmouth; becaufe it is not the
proper buiinefs of the dramatift to invent plots, but
rather to reprefent character in action. Geoffrey may
tell us that Lear went mad, but who but Shakefpere
could have imagined the fcene in the hut where the
old king arraigns Goneril and Regan, while the Fool
heightens the reality and the pathos of the circum-
ftance by his comments, and Edgar enhances the difmal
horror of it by his fnatches of " Tom o' Bedlam "
fongs? Holinfhed may tell how Harry, Prince of
Wales, forgot his ftation for a time to haunt taverns
with loofe companions ; but it was referved for Shake-
fpere to imagine the wit and fun which tempted him
to leave his fphere. Nor even in the romantic plays
was the dramatift bound to invent his own plots, when
1 44 Shakefpere.
he could find them ready made in Boccaccio's " Deca-
meron." The Italian novelift relates the incidents fo
terfely that they have almoft the air of being the
arguments of a poem. They are the very fkeletons
which Shakefpere, and before him Chaucer, clothed
with flefh and blood. Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton's
" Eugene Aram " is not the lefs an original novel for
being founded on fact, nor is Mr. Dickens's " Oliver
Twift," becaufe he had probably learned many of the
incidents at the police courts.
Such has been the induftry of Shakefperian critics
that the plots of almoft all the plays have been traced
to their fources. To take them in the approximate
order of their compofition rather than in that in which
they were printed in the firft complete edition, which
is the folio of 1623, and which is followed in modern
editions the three parts of " Henry the Sixth " can
fcarcely be called Shakefpere's. They are, in fact, Mar-
lowe's plays, retouched by him. The " Comedy of
Errors " was probably taken from a play founded on the
"Menaschmi" of Plautus, afted before Queen Eliza-
beth, at Hampton Court, on New Year's Day, at night,
" by the children of Pawles," that is, the choir boys.
The ftory of " Love's Labour 's Loft " has been traced
by Mr. Dyce to an incident related in Monftrelet's
" Chronicle." The incident of the cafkets in " The
Sources from which he obtained his Plots. 145
Merchant of Venice " is found in Gower's " Confeffio
Amantis," and that relating to the Jew in the " Gefta
Romanorum," as alfo in a ballad publifhed by Percy.
For the incidents of " Richard the Second," Shakefpere
was indebted to an older play or to the Chronicles.
The " Two Gentlemen of Verona " is founded on an
older play called " The Hiftory of Felix and Philif-
mena," played before Queen Elizabeth in 1584. "A
Midfummer Night's Dream " appears to be one of the
moft original of the plays. The plot is found in no
previous work as yet difcovered, but the materials for
the feparate parts may have been derived by Shake-
fpere from North's " Plutarch" and Ovid's " Metamor-
phofes." Oberon, Titania, Puck, and the other ouphes,
are the genuine growth of the popular Englim ima-
gination, and Shakefpere probably drew his conception
of them from the tales he had heard by the firefide
on winter evenings in the farmhoufes of Warwick-
mire. " The Taming of a Shrew " is a recaft of a
play " at fundry times aled by the Right Honorable
the Earle of Pembrook his fervants." " Romeo and
Juliet " is " The Tragicall Hiftorye of Romeus and
Juliet, written firft in Italian by Bandell, and now in
Englifh by ArthurBrooke" ( J562),dramatifed. "Henry
the Fourth," Parts I and II., and " Henry the Fifth,"
are founded upon older plays. Sir Jo/in Falftaff, in
1 46 Shake fpere.
Shakefpere's firft draught called Sir John Oldcaftle, is,
of courfe, the undivided property of the great mafter.
He was no doubt as great a favourite of Shakefpere's
as Sir Roger de Coverley was of Addifon's. Shakefpere
cannot part with him. He takes him through the
two parts of " Henry the Fourth," " Henry the Fifth,"
and "The Merry Wives of Windfor," and is careful
to make his death as unexpedledy tragical as the nature
of the cafe would admit. He knew that the foil
which could throw up fuch a luxuriant crop of wit
muft have been deep and rich by nature. The tattle
of Quickly and the Page, as they tell the ghaftly ftory
of his deathbed, gives us a glimpfe of the ftruggle
between Falftaff's better nature and early recollections,
and his long habits of debauchery. This was a touch
of nature which none but the mafter could throw in.
" Richard the Third " is founded upon hiftory alone,
though there was a former play on the fame fubjecl:.
"All's Well that Ends Well" is from the "Deca-
meron " of Boccaccio, and is, indeed, thoroughly Italian
in its plot. " King John " is founded upon an earlier
anonymous play. " Much Ado about Nothing " is
founded remotely on a ftory in Bandello. The general
plot of "As You Like It" is to be found in " The Cokes
Tale of Gamelyn," generally included in Chaucer's
Canterbury Tales, but not, I think, written by Chaucer.
Sources from which he obtained his Plots. \ 47
" The Moor of Venice " is from a ftory in Cinthio's
" Heccatommithi." The ftories of " Hamlet," " Lear/'
and " Macbeth," were popular in chronicles and hif-
tories in Shakefpere's time. "Julius Casfar," "An-
thony and Cleopatra," and " Coriolanus," are taken
from North's " Plutarch." The original of " Timon
of Athens " is in Lucian, but the ftory of the Mifan-
thrope was current in the iixteenth century. Shake-
fpere might have got all the incidents of " Troilus and
Creffida" from Chaucer's exquifite love-ftory, itfelf a
recaft of Boccaccio's " Filoftrato," but he has given a
totally different reading of the characters. I fuppofe I
mall be accufed of rank herefy, but I muft acknow-
ledge that I prefer Chaucer's poem to Shakefpere's
play. The play is to me the only unpleafing one of
Shakefpere's ; the poem is one of the moft elaborately
beautiful in the Englifh, or indeed in any, language,
and far fuperior to Boccaccio's. The remote original
of " Cymbeline " is a very ancient romance, publifhed
by M. Francifque Michel in his " Theatre FranQais du
Moyen-Age," from which is taken the "Roman de
Violette ;" but whether Shakefpere borrowed his plot
from either of thefe, or from fome Englifh tranflation,
I cannot tell. The ftory was extant, at any rate, long
before his time. " A Winter's Tale " is dramatifed
from Greene's novel, called " Pandofto ;" but as yet no
148 Shakefpere.
original has been found for Shakefpere's moft perfect
and fmifhed work, " The Tempeft." Defert iflands,
magicians, fpirits of air and water, damfejs who had
never feen a man, abound in the literature of romance ;
but I am glad to believe that Shakefpere is indebted
to no one for the exquilite combination of all thefe
incidents which forms " The Tempeft."
From this furvey it would appear that Shakefpere fet
himfelf, in a buiinefs-like way, to provide plays for the
theatre in which he had a mare, without much regard
to anything but pleafing the public for the moment.
For this purpofe he ranfacked the works of his prede-
ceffors and contemporaries, he read the old chronicles
and romances, he feized upon every Englifh verfion of
an Italian novel as it came out, and for claffical ftories
had recourfe to North's " Plutarch," a tranflation of a
French tranflation. In " The Tempeft " is a whole
paffage taken from Florio's then recently publifhed tranf-
lation of " Montaigne's Eflays." A copy, with Shake-
fpere's autograph, or alleged autograph in it, is now
preferved in the Britifh Mufeum. That he was greedy
of all knowledge there can be no doubt. His mind
muft have been ftored with philofophy, divinity, law,
art; and this varied knowledge, which was quite a
different thing from claffical fcholarfhip, flowed into
his dialogue, and gives it that richnefs which we
His Plays written to be Affied. 149
!
fcarcely find in any other writer. This was the effed
of his genius ; but everything concurs to (how that
his immediate objed was gained when his plays filled
the houfe. He never blotted or erafed his manufcript.
He took no care to colled: his works and publim them
during his life-time, and they were not in fad: collected
till nearly ten years after his death.
Now it appears to me, though the propofition
feem paradoxical, that this writing for an immediate
and tangible objed was one caufe of Shakefpere's ex-
cellence. He knew that he had the fecret of pleafing
the public, and he had no crotchets about writing for
posterity to mar the fimplicity of his aim. He was not
oppreffed by the greatnefs of his tafk, and his thoughts,
therefore, flowed the more freely and effedively. I
think it will be found that works of art produced to
anfwer fome obvious end paintings painted expreffly
to decorate fome particular building, like thofe of
Giotto ; hiftories, compiled to ferve fome political or
religious purpofe, like Gibbon's Decline and Fall and
Macaulay's England; pamphlets to overwhelm fome
perfonal enemy, like the Letters of Junius or Drapier,
or the poem of " Hudibras " -facit indignatio verfus
and plays written with the fole purpofe of filling the
houfe, like Shakefpere's, are the very works that pof-
terity will not fuffer to perifh. The great fault of the
150 Shakefpere.
later poets, thofe of the lakes in particular, was that they
had forne dream of perfection in their head which was
too high for common men of their own generation
fome ideal of beauty which ordinary men could not
tafle, and they have fo far endangered their permanent
fame. Shakefpere, apparently, cared only to pleafe the
audience at the Globe and Blackfriars, and he has
" built himfelf an everlafting name."
Of his focial life where he lived, and with whom,
when he was in London little is known, except that
he was, as we have feen, noted for the Straightforward
honefty of his dealings and his pleafing manners, and
that he was deemed worthy of the fpecial regard of
Queen Elizabeth and King James, and of the friend-
fhip of Southampton.
His humbler friends were the other poets of his
time, among whom Ben Jonfon Stands pre-eminent for
his affedtionate and judicious praife. The foundation
of their friendship was laid in an act of kindnefs on
Shakefpere's part which a literary man would be likely
never to forget. Jonfon, though the fon of a me-
chanic, had been brought up at the renowned college
of St. Peter's, Weftminfter ; for, indeed, the ancient
foundations of our great public fchools were intended
for the education of poor fcholars. After this he be-
came a bricklayer, following the trade of his Stepfather,
His Companions in London. 151
and Fuller fays that he "helped in the ftru&ure of
Lincoln's Inn, when, having a trowel in his hand, he
had a book in his pocket." Scorning fo mechanical
an employment, he went as a foldier to the wars in the
Low Countries, and, returned from thence, took to
literature as a means of living, and while yet quite
unknown, offered his celebrated " Every Man in his
Humour" to the company at the Blackfriars. The
manager failed to tafte the humour of Bofradi/zndBram-
worm, and was about to return the play with one of
thofe difagreeable anfwers with which fome managers
and publishers are faid to damp the hopes of unknown
authors, when Shakefpere afked to fee it, and was fo
pleafed with it as to procure its acceptance. The ac-
quaintance thus begun was ripened into friendfhip by
frequent focial meetings at the " Mermaid Tavern," in
Bread Street, where Sir Walter Raleigh had founded a
club, the earlieft probably known in England. It is
alluded to by Jonfon in his lines "Inviting a Friend
to Supper "
" To-night, grave fir, both my poor houfe and I
Do equally defire your company -,
Not that we think us worthy fuch a gueft,
But that your worth will dignify our feaft
With thofe that come j whole grace may make that feem
Something, which elfe could hope for no efleem.
It is the fair acceptance, fir, creates
The entertainment perfect, not the cates.
1 5 2 Shakefpere.
Yet fhall you have, to re6tify your palate,
An olive, capers, or fome bitter sallat,
inhering the mutton, with a fliort-legged hen,
If we caught her full of eggs, and then
Lemons and wine for fauce j to thefe a coney,
Is not to be defpaired of for our money ;
And though fowl now be fcarce, yet there are clerks,
The fky not falling, think we may have larks.
I'll tell of more, and lie, fo you will come,
Of partridge, pheafant, woodcock, of which fome
May yet be there, and godwit, if we can,
Knot, rail, and ruff, too. Howfoe'er, my man
Shall read a piece of Virgil, Tacitus,
Livy, or of fome better book to us,
Of which we'll fpeak our minds amidft our meat,
And I'll profefs no verfes to repeat.
To this, if aught appear which I not know of,
That will the paftry, not my paper fhow of j
Digeflive cheefe and fruit there fure will be.
But that which moft doth take my mule and me,
Is a pure cup of rich Canary wine,
Which is the Mermaid's now, but fhall be mine;
Of which had Horace or Anacreon tafted,
Their lives, as do their lines, till now had lafted."
Allufion is again made to this celebrated tavern in
The Voyage :"
" It was the day, what time the powerful moon
Makes the poor Bankfide creature wet its moon
In its own hall ; when thefe (in worthy fcorn
Of thofe that put out monies on return
From Venice, Paris, or fome inland paflage
Of fix times to and fro, without embaflage,
Or him that backwards went to Berwick, or which
Did dance the famous Morris into Norwich)
At Bread Street's Mermaid having dined, and merry,
Propofed to go to Holborn in a wherry."
Meetings at the "Mermaid" 153
I have quoted the former of thefe paflages becaufe it
gives a curious infight into the focial cuftoms of Shake-
fpere's time. From it we learn that it was not unufual
for one to read out fome entertaining book during
dinner, as they read out paflages from Scripture, or the
"Lives of the Saints," in monafteries. It alfo gives
one forne idea of the luxury in which literary men
lived, befides fome curious gaftronomical fads, fuch as
that olives were eaten before, not after dinner.
At the " Mermaid," then, ufed to meet the wits of
the town Shakefpere, Jonfon, Beaumont, Fletcher,
Selden, Donne. And here, as quaint old Fuller in his
" Worthies " relates, " Many were the wit combats
between him [Shakefpere] and Ben Jonfon, which two
I behold like a Spaniih great galleon and an Engliih
man-of-war : Mafter Jonfon, like the former, was
built higher in learning, folid but flow in his perform-
ances ; Shakefpere, with the Englifh man-of-war, lefler
in bulk, but lighter in failing, could turn with all tides,
tack about and take advantage of all winds, by the
quicknefs of his wit and invention."
Of this wit the fpecimens which have been preferved
do not give a very exalted notion ; but it is a curious
fact that converfation which has delighted the hearers
by its wit, when repeated, often feems infipid. A joke
which the reports of the debates in Parliament declare
154 Shake f per e.
to have been received with roars of " laughter," often
feems fo poor and trivial that we think our legiflators
rnuft be wonderfully eafily amufed. Yet they are the
moft faftidious audience in the world. The joke was not
a bad joke in reality, but wit read is not like wit fpoken.
The time, place, and manner have much to do with it.
So Falftajf, a great authority furely on this fubject, fays,
" Oh, it is much that a jeft with a grave face and a
flight oath will do with a fellow that hath never had
the ache in his moulders!" Beiides, wit is of fo flight
and evanefcent a character that it is not the beft jokes
that are remembered, but rather the heavieft and dulleft.
Barrow defines wit thus : " Sometimes it lieth in a pat
allufion to a known ftory, or in a feafonable application
of a trivial faying, or in forging an appofite tale ; fome-
times it playeth in words and phrafes, taking advantage
from the ambiguity of their fenfe, or the affinity of
their found; fometimes it is wrapped in a drefs of
humorous expreffion ; fometimes it lurketh under an
odd fimilitude ; fometimes it is lodged in a fly queftion,
in a fmart anfwer, in a quirkiih reafon, in a fhrewd
intimation, in cunningly averting or cleverly retorting
an objection ; fometimes it is couched in a bold fcheme
of fpeech, in a tart irony, in a lufty hyperbole, in a
ftartling metaphor, in a plaufible reconciling of contra-
dictions, or in acute nonfenfe; fometimes a fcenical
Barrow's Definition of Wit. 155
reprefentation of perfons or things, a counterfeit fpeech,
a mimical look or gefture, paffeth for it ; fometimes an
affe&ed fimplicity, fometimes a prefumptuous blunt-
nefs giveth it being ; fometimes it rifeth only from a
lucky hitting upon what is ftrange ; fometimes from a
crafty wrefting obvious matter to the purpofe ; often it
confifteth in one knows not what, and fpringeth up one
can hardly tell how. Its ways are unaccountable and
inexplicable, being anfwerable to the numberlefs rovings
of fancy and windings of language. It is, in fhort, a
manner of fpeaking out of the fimple and plain way
(fuch as reafon teacheth and proveth things by), which
by a pretty furprifing uncouthnefs in conceit or expref-
fion, doth affect and amufe the fancy, ftirring in it fome
wonder, and breeding fome delight thereto."
It would not be difficult, and it would be an amufing
paftime, to cull paffages from Shakefpere's plays which
would anfwer to each of the various forms of wit here
enumerated. F^^z^wouldfupply moft of them. That
he who fo nimbly followed the turnings of this Proteus
in his writings, was equally aftive in his converfation,
Fuller, no mean judge, affures us ; and we mufl blame
the reporters, or the nature of wit itfelf, if the jokes
which have actually come down to us be difappoint-
ing. I do not, however, feel at liberty to omit them.
From a collection of " Merry Paffages and Jefts,"
156 Shakefpere.
collected by Sir Nicholas 1'Eftrange, we learn that on
one occafion " Shakefpere was god-father to one of Ben
Jonfon's children, and after the chriftening, being in a
deep ftudy, Jonfon came to cheer him up, and afked
him why he was fo melancholy. 'No, faith, Ben/
fays he, * not I ; but I have been confidering a great
while what mould be the fitteft gift for me to beftow
upon my god-child, and I have refolved at laft.' < I
prithee what?' fays he. *F faith, Ben, I'll e'en give
him a dozen latten (Latin) fpoons, and thou malt tranf-
late them.' "
Now we muft recoiled that Jonfon was a learned
man, and probably was in the habit of poking fun at
Shakefpere for his lack of Latin. Shakefpere retaliates
by faying he will give the child fome latten, or brafs,
fpoons, a ufual prefent from a fponfor, and that
Jonfon fhall tranflate them, playing upon the am-
biguity of the word latten, and hinting that Jonfon
could do little but tranflate from the ancients. The
joke is a good joke if we confider the circumftances,
which, I think, muft have been pretty much what
I have fuppofed. It is what Aulus Gellius calls a
/comma, and probably turned the laugh againft honeft
Ben.
The next is not fo fuccefsful. We read in an Afh-
molean MS. that " Mr. Ben Jonfon and Mr. William
His Friend/hip with Jonfon. 157
Shakefpere being merry at a tavern, Mr. Jonfon having
begun this for his epitaph
' Here lies Ben Jonfon,
That was once one,'
he gives it to Mr. Shakefpere to make up, who pre-
fently writes
'Who, while he lived, was a flow thing,
And now, being dead, is no-thing.' "
No doubt Shakefpere was a little out of patience
with Jonfon's " flownefs in his performance ; " his end-
ing is certainly more pointed than Jonfon's beginning.
The two men feem to have been formed by nature,
both from their refemblance and the difference of their
feveral characters, to be foils one to the other ; they went
about together obferving odd humours, and the fact that
they were always engaging in wit combats is one of
the greateft proofs of the fincerity of their friendfhip.
It is only a very fincere affedlion that will bear the
wear and tear of mutual jefts, and none but men of a
high order of intellect and fine tafte can joke or take a
joke without giving or taking offence.
Jonfon in his " Difcoveries," in the ninth volume of
Gifford's edition, fays " I remember the players have
often mentioned it as an honour to Shakefpere, that in
his writing, whatfoever he penned he never blotted out
158 Shake f per e.
a line. My anfwer hath been, ' Would he had blotted
a thoufand ! ' which they thought a malevolent fpeech.
I had not told pofterity this but for their ignorance,
who chofe that circumftance to commend their friend
by wherein he moft faulted, and to juftify mine own
candour; for I loved the man and do honour his
memory, on this fide idolatry, as much as any. He
was, indeed, honeft, and of an open and free nature ;
had an excellent phantafy, brave notions, and gentle
expreffions ; wherein he flowed with that facility that
fometimes it was neceiTary he mould be flopped :
Sujflaminandus erat, as Auguftus faid of Haterius. His
wit was in his own power ; would the rule of it had
been fo too ! Many times he fell into thofe things
could not efcape laughter : as when he faid in the
perfon of Ccefar, one fpeaking to him, * Casfar, thou
doft me wrong,' he replied, * Caefar did never wrong
but with jufl caufe, 5 and fuch like, which were ridicu-
lous. But he redeemed his vices with his virtues.
There was ever more in him to be praifed than
pardoned."
This is a piece of criticifm characteriftic of a correct
fcholar like Jonfon. That Shakefpere, writing with
running pen, fhould have made fuch miftakes, was
natural. It was as natural that Jonfon fhould be fcan-
dalifed by them ; but I, for one, am glad that Shake-
Jonfons Lines to his Memory. 159
fpere did not blot a line. We can well forgive fuch an
Irifh bull as Casfar's reply, or fuch a blunder as repre-
fenting a feaport in Bohemia if it be a blunder, which
is doubtful, for I have feen it ftated in fome periodical
that ieveral feaports on the Mediterranean formed part
of Bohemia in the lixteenth century in confideration
of poffeffing the fpontaneous flow of Shakefpere's fine
genius. Sheridan ufed to fay that your eafy writing
was d d hard reading, and this is generally true ;
but Shakefpere is really an entirely exceptional cafe.
Spontaneity is one of the peculiarities of his genius.
But it is abfurd to accufe Jonfon honeft Ben of
malignity for having his own view of his friend's
excellencies and defects. If we wanted a contradiction
to any fuch accufation it is to be found in his addrefs
to his departed friend. Jonfon's poems are fo little
known to ordinary readers, and there is fuch a charm
in his fine nervous Englifh, that I make no excufe
for giving the paffage at length. How delightful is
ftrength ! There is no unpardonable fin in art but
weaknefs, and for this there is no place of repentance.
" To draw no envy, Shakefpere, on thy name,
Rile I thus ample to thy book and fame;
While I confefs thy writings to be fuch
As neither man nor mufe can praife too much.
"Tis true, and all men's fuffrage. But thefe ways
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praife.
1 60 Shake/pert.
For fillieft ignorance on thefe may light,
Which, when it founds at beft, but echoes right ;
Or blind arFe6tion, which doth ne'er advance
The truth, but gropes and urgeth all by chance j
Or crafty malice might pretend this praife,
And think to ruin where it feemed to raife.
# * * * * *
But thou art proof againft them, and, indeed,
Above the ill-fortune of them or their need.
I, therefore, will begin : Soul of the age !
The applaufe, delight, and wonder of the ftage !
My Shakefpere, rife ! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer or Spenfer, or bid Beaumont lie
A little farther off to make thee room :
Thou art a monument without a tomb,
And art alive ftill, while thy book doth live,
And we have wits to read, and praife to give.
* * * * * *
Yet muft I not give Nature all : thy art,
My gentle Shakefpere, mufl enjoy a part ;
For though the poet's matter Nature be,
His art doth give the fafliion ; and that he
Who cafts to write a living line muft fvveat,
Such as thine are, and ftrike the fecond heat
Upon the Mufe's anvil ; turn the fame
And himfelf with it, that he thinks to frame ;
Or for the laurel he may gain a fcorn,
For a good poet 's made as well as born,
And fuch wert thou ! ' Look how the father's face
Lives in his iflue ; even fo the race
Of Shakefpere's mind and manners brightly {nines
In his well-turned and true-filed lines j
In each of which he feems to make a lance,
As brandimed at the eyes of ignorance.
Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a fight it were
To fee thee in our water yet appear,
His Friends in London. - 161
And make thofe flights upon the banks of Thames
Which fo did take Eliza and our James !
But flay, I fee thee in the hemifphere
Advanced, and made a conftellation there !
Shine forth, thou ilar of poets! and with rage
Or influence chide or cheer the drooping ftage,
Which fince thy flight from hence hath mourned like night,
Arid defpairs day, but for thy volume's light."
The other tribute to the memory of his friend was
fubfcribed by Jonfon to Droefhout's engraving of
Shakefpere, prefixed to the firft folio edition of his
works published in 1623, and attefts both Jonfon's
affection and the fidelity of the likenefs :
" This figure that thou here feefl put,
It was for gentle Shakefpere cut,
Wherein the graver had a flrife
With Nature, to outdo the life.
O, could he but have fhown his wit
As well in brafs as he has hit
His face, the print would then furpafs
All that was ever writ in brafs !
But fince he cannot, reader, look
Not on his picture, but his book."
There is a paffage in Spenfer's "Teares of the
Mufes " lamenting the death of " Willy." This has
been referred to Shakefpere ; but Mr. Dyce thinks it
is inapplicable to Shakefpere, and that it was intended
rather for Sir Philip Sidney, for Willy is a common
name for all fhepherds, or, in paftoral language, poets ;
but there can be no doubt, from the allufion to the
1 62 Shakefpere.
name in the laft lines of the following quotation from
" Colin Clout's come home again," that by JEtion is
meant Shakefpere. Why he is called ^Etion (
"one who afks ") it is difficult to underftand:
" And there, though laft not leaft, is
A gentler Ihepherd may nowhere be found j
Whofe Mufe, full of high thoughts' invention,
Doth, like himfelf, heroically found."
Heaps of commendatory verfes from other meaner
poets might be quoted, but they would be rather dull
reading, and, after Ben Jonfon's fine and difcriminating
lines, would feem very tame. The fad: that Shake-
fpere was commended and patronifed by Elizabeth and
James implies, of courfe, that he was noticed and
carefled by the courtiers.
Among such friends and companions was pafled
Shakefpere's town life ; but running parallel with it, as
it were, was another totally different life in the coun-
try. In London he was the favourite of princes
and great noblemen, the friend of the poets and men
of letters, and, as he laments in his fonnet air dy
quoted, dependent on the popular applaufe in a pro-
feffion to which prejudice ftill attached a note of
infamy. In his native Stratford we find him taking
his place among the gentry and fubftantial burgeiTes, a
farmer and a keen man of bufinefs, a man able to lend
His Life in the Country. 163
a good round fum of money to a friend, one whofe
influence was worth canvaffing for. His occupations
in the country probably weaned him gradually from
London, and about 1612 or 1613 he finally took up
his abode at New Place with his family. Ward, the
Vicar of Stratford, fays that " in his elder days he lived
at Stratford, and fupplied the ftage with two plays
every year, and for it had an allowance fo large that he
fpent at the rate of one thoufand pounds a year," a
fum equal to five times the amount at the prefent time.
From old deeds and records, hunted out with in-
credible zeal and labour by Shakefperian critics, and
printed by Mr. Halliwell in his comprehenfive bio-
graphy of the Poet, it appears that in 1 6 1 2 he bought
one hundred and feven acres of arable land at Stratford,
of William Combe ; alfo a cottage in Walker Street ;
in 1604 he brings an action againft Philip Rogers for
i i$s. iod., owing to him for malt fupplied at
different times ; in 1605 he purchales a moiety of the
leafe of the tithes of Stratford and fome neighbouring
parishes ; in 1 6 1 2 he fues the other leflees of the tithes ;
in 1613 he defends his right to certain common lands;
and all this time he is producing two plays a year.
In the meantime various changes take place in his
family. In 1601 his father dies; in 1607 his eldeft
daughter, Sufanna, marries Dr. Hall, a phyfician at
164 Shakefpere.
Stratford; in 1607 his firft grandchild, Elizabeth
Hall, is born, and in the fame year his mother, Mary
Arden, dies; in 1615 his fecond daughter, Judith,
whofe twin brother, Hamnet, had died fome confider-
able time before, marries Thomas Quiney, vintner.
Rowe, his earlieft biographer, fays that his agreeable
manners and pleafant difpofition procured him the
friendfhip of the neighbouring gentry, and amongft the
reft, of a Mr. John Combe, who lived at the old
college from which the priefts had been expelled at the
Reformation. It feems to have been a favourite
amufement in thofe times for friends to write imaginary
epitaphs on each other over their wine. We have
feen already that Shakefpere and Ben Jonfon thus
diverted themfelves. A iimilar ftory is told of Charles
the Second and Buckingham, when the latter made
the celebrated epitaph on the " mutton-eating king."
Even Garrick, Reynolds, Burke, and Goldfmith played
at this fomewhat ghaftly game. A ftory then was
current that Mr. Combe, who was noted for his
ufurious practices, afked Shakefpere, when they were
making merry together, to write his epitaph, and that
Shakefpere produced the following :
"Ten in the hundred lies here engraved -,
'Tis a hundred to ten his foul is not faved ;
If any man alks who lies in this tomb,
Oh, oh ! quoth the devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe."
His Life in the Country. 165
Mr. Halliwell fays that this was a common joke in
the j eft-books of the period, but perhaps Shakefpere
thought it good enough for the occafion. Others hold
that the ftory is difproved, becaufe the two men were
friends, Combe leaving Shakefpere five pounds in his
will, and Shakefpere in his bequeathing his fword to
Combe's nephew, William. But, indeed, that friend-
fhip muft be a frail commodity which could be broken
by a joke like this. Mr. Combe was probably a faving
man, and was certainly a rich one; and I have re-
marked that rich and thrifty men are the laft people to
be offended by a joke upon their clevernefs in amaffing
money. As to prognoftications on the company they
are likely to keep in the next world, that is too unprac-
tical a queftion to trouble them much. The joke was a
poor one enough, and perhaps a ftale one too ; but the
ftory illuftrates the difficulty of catching that Proteus,
wit, and binding him in the fetters of writing.
Another ftory, related to Malone by a native of
Stratford, fays that Shakefpere being invited to a
party by the topers of Bidford, a neighbouring village,
made the following epigram on them and their neigh-
bours :
" Piping Pebworth, dancing Marfton,
Haunted Hillborough, and hungry Grafton,
With dodging Exhall, papilt Wixford,
Beggarly Broom, and drunken Bidford."
1 66 Shakefpere.
Such tales as this are the only famples which tradi-
tion could feize upon to give pofterity an idea of the
focial powers of the wittieft writer perhaps that ever
exifted, and one whofe converfation is ftated by Fuller
to have been remarkable for its verfatility and humour.
As I rode and walked about Stratford and the fur-
rounding green lanes, and by the banks of the Avon, I
could not help wondering whether the country people
whom I met were aware that they were treading the
ground which Shakefpere had trod while he was medi-
tating " Cymbeline," " Coriolanus," the " Winter's
Tale," and " The Tempeft." The thought of courfe
was abfurd ; the country people knew nothing about
him, except that they fometimes got a fhilling from
people who came to viiit his tomb ; but my mind
being wholly occupied with the memory of the mighty
dead, it feemed to me as if they too muft be thinking
of him. But very likely even his contemporaries, the
burgeffes and country gentlemen with whom he af-
fociated, admitted him to their fociety, not becaufe he
was a great poet, but becaufe he was a wealthy man
and a pleafant companion, who could tell them ftories
of the great world in London. His plays were not
published collectively till feven years after his death,
and very likely few of the feparate editions made their
way down to Stratford. The burgefles, Shakefpere's
His Life in the Country. 1 67
fellow-citizens, had actually forbidden the reprefentation
of ftage plays in the town, and we may, therefore, con-
clude that they would regard the arch-playwright as
"little better than one of the wicked." Sir Walter
Scott complained that fome vifitors at Abbotsford were
too poetical for him; and I fancy that Shakefpere
would have had the fame fort of feeling with regard
to his art, and that any unobfervant perfon feeing
him at home would have fcarcely believed that he
was the author of the plays. There would have
been very little of what we mould call " the mop "
about him.
His farms, his malting afforded him active occupa-
tion; but for exercifing his great intellectual powers in
works which kept his name alive amongft the great
ones of the earth, he found time ; and it is not a little
remarkable that fome of the fineft of his plays were
written after his retirement to the country, as if his
genius were there moft free and vigorous. His
amufements were probably thofe fo quaintly defcribed
by his contemporary, Burton : " The ordinary iports
which are ufed abroad [out of doors] are hawking,
hunting : hilares venandi labores, one calls them, becaufe
they recreate body and mind ; another the beft exercife
that is, by which alone many have been freed from all
feral difeafes. Hegefippus (lib. i., cap. 37) relates of
1 68 Shakefpere.
Herod that he was eafed of a grievous melancholy by
that means. Plato (7 de leg.} highly magnifies it,
dividing it into three parts by land, water, air.
Xenophon (in Cyropted.) graces it with a great name,
Deorum munus, the gift of the gods, a princely fport,
which they have ever ufed, faith Langius (Epift. 59,
lib. ii.), fole almoft and ordinary fport of our noblemen
in Europe, and elfewhere all over the world. Bohemus
(De Mor. Gent., lib. iii., cap. 12) ftiles it therefore
ftudium nobilium ; 'tis all their ftudy, their exercife,
ordinary bufinefs, all their talk ; and indeed fome
dote too much after it; they can do nothing elfe,
difcourfe of naught elfe. Paulus Jovius (Defer. Brit.}
doth in fome fort tax our Englim nobility for it, for
living in the country fo much, and too frequent ufe of
it, as if they had no other means but hawking and
hunting to approve themfelves gentlemen with.
" Hawking comes near to hunting, the one in the
air as the other on the earth, a fport as much affected
as the other, by fome preferred. It was never heard of
amongft the Romans, invented fome 1,200 years fince,
and firft mentioned by Firmicus (lib. v., cap. 8). The
Greek emperors began it, and now nothing fo frequent;
he is nobody that in the feafon hath not a hawk on his
fift : a great art, and many books written on it. * * *
The Mufcovian emperors reclaim eagles to fly at hinds,
His Amufements in the Country. 169
foxes, &c., and fuch a one was fent for a prefent to
Queen Elizabeth : fome reclaim ravens, caftrels, pies,
&c., and train them for their pleafures.
" Fowling is more troublefome, but all out as delight-
fome to fome forts of men, be it with guns, lime, nets,
glades, ginnes, firings, baits, pitfalls, pipes, calls,
ftalking-horfes, fetting-dogs, coy-ducks, or otherwife.
Some much delight to take larks with day nets, fmall
birds with draff-nets, plovers, partrich, herons, fnite,
&c. * * * Tycho Brahe, that great aftronomer, in
the chorography of his Ifle of Huena and Caflle of
Uraneburge, puts down his nets and manner of catching
fmall birds as an ornament and a recreation, wherein
he himfelf was fometimes employed." * * *
After enumerating fifhing, which he terms " a kind
of hunting by water," ringing, bowling, mooting,
" keelpins, tronks, coits, pitching bars, hurling,
wreftling, leaping, running, fencing, muftring, fwim-
ming, wallers, foils, foot-balls, balowns, quintans, &c.,
and many fuch, which are the common recreations of
the country folks ; riding of great horfes, running at
rings, tilts and turnaments, horfe races, wild-goofe
chafes, which are the difports of greater men, and good
in themfelves, though many gentlemen by that means
gallop quite out of their fortunes ;" he comes to " deam-
bulatio per amcena /oca, to make a petty progress, a
1 70 Shakefpere.
merry journey now and then with fome good com-
pany, to vifit a friend, fee cities, caftles, towns,
' Vifere faepe amnes nitidos, peramoenaque Tempe,
Et placidas fummis fectari in montibus auras '
(To fee the pleafant fields, the cryilal fountains,
And take the gentle air among the mountains) ;
to walk amongft orchards, gardens, bowers, mounts,
and arbours, artificial wilderneffes, green thickets,
arches, groves, lawns, and fuch like pleafant places,
like that Antiochian Daphne, brooks, pools, fifh-ponds,
betwixt wood and water, in a fair meadow, by a river
fide, ubi varice avium cantationes, florum co/ores, pra-
torum frutices, &c., to difport in fome pleafant plain,
park, run up a fteep hill fometimes, or fit in a fhady
feat, muft needs be a deleclable recreation."
His enumeration of games for winter evenings is ftill
fuller and more various. u The ordinary recreations
which we have in winter, and in moft folitary times
bufy our minds with, are cards, tables, and dice,
{hovel-board, chefs play, the philofopher's game, fmall
trunks, fhut tie-cock, billiards, mufic, mafks, finging,
dancing, ulegames, frolicks, jefts, riddles, catches,
purpofes, queftions and commands, merry tales of
errant knights, queens, lovers, lords, ladies, giants,
dwarfs, thieves, cheaters, witches, fairies, goblins, friars,
&c., such as the old women told Pfyche in Apuleius,
His Amufements in the Country. 171
Boccace novels, and the reft, quorum audit lone pueri
dele&antur, fenes narratione, which forne delight to
hear, fome to tell."
Such were probably the amufements and employ-
ments in which Shakefpere palled his latter days ; for
he, no doubt, lived and amufed himfelf like his neigh-
bours in Stratford and its vicinity. He did not quit
the Court and the fociety of London that he might
fpend his time in poring over books in the country.
But, as Cowley, another poet, who fought for quiet
in rural retirement, and healthful employment in
the cultivation of a farm, complains : " God laughs
at man who fays to his foul, Take thy eafe : I met
prefently not only with many little incumbrances and
impediments, but with fo much ficknefs (a new mif-
fortune to me) as would have fpoiled the happinefs of
an emperor as well as mine : yet I do neither repent
nor alter my courfe. Non ego perfidum Dixi facr amen-
tum ; nothing shall feparate me from a miftrefs [retire-
ment] which I have loved fo long and have now at
laft married, though me neither has brought me a rich
portion, nor lived yet fo quietly with me as I hoped
from her.
' Nee vos dulciflima mundi
Nomina, vos Mufae, liber tas, otia, libri,
Hortique, fylvaeque anima remanente relinquam.'
172 Shakefpere.
(Nor by me e'er lliall you,
You of all names the tweeted and the heft,
You, mules, books, and liberty, and reft,
You, gardens, fields, and woods, forfaken be,
As long as life itfelf forfakes not me.)"
And fo difeafe and death overtook Shakefpere as
they did Cowley, in that retreat where they both had
hoped to find the reft which fate had hitherto denied
them.
New Place had probably been a fcene of much
feftivity on February 10, 1615. Judith, Shakelpere's
younger daughter, had been married to Thomas
Quiney, his fellow townfman, and no doubt there was
a gathering of all the family, and the wedding party
walked up to the beautiful church, and paffed in
through the porch and under the folar, of which
Mr. Erneft Edwards has given us fuch a charming
little picture, and there was a banquet, and the " brod
filver and gilt bole " was filled with " canaris fack," and
there was a dance, and probably a play or interlude was
acted in the hall. And this was, perhaps, the occafion
of Jonfon's and Drayton's vifit to their old friend,
when, according to Ward, these three " had a merrie
meeting, and it feems drank too hard, for Shakefpere
died of a fever there contracted." Whatever may have
been the caufe of his death, it is certain that he died
on the 23rd of April, 1616, a little more than two
His Death. 173
months after his daughter's marriage, and that the
fignatures in his will mow that his hand was unfteady
when he figned it. It was executed on the 5th of
March, 1616.
Whether Ward's teftimony be worth much, feeing
that it dates fifty years at leaft after the event, is a
queflion. Indeed it seems to have been thought the
corred: thing to reprefent a poet, and efpecially a
dramatic poet, to have died of hard living, as Anacreon
is faid to have been choked by a grape- ftone. Puri-
tanifm, which was then coming into vogue, and which
always fuppofes itfelf to be in the fecrets of Providence,
thought perhaps to mow by this means that Heaven
was bound to punifh, not only in the next world, but
even in this, the heinous fin of having written good
poetry. Shakeipere was proiperous ; their theory there-
fore would not hold if it appeared that he who had
held up the godly to ridicule by reprefenting a Puritan
as " finging pfalms to hornpipes " had died like other
men. Shakefpere very likely rejoiced to fhow his
country holpitality and warm houfekeeping to Jonfon
and Drayton, his countryman, and he may have
fickened with fever foon after. It was eafy to fay poft
hoc, ergo, propter hoc, though it was probably not hock
but merry that they drank. And that there were
plenty of perfons at Stratford who would be glad to tell
1 74 Shakefpere.
Ward, the vicar, a ftory to the difadvantage of the
wild youth who had broken Sir Thomas Lucy's park,
and afterwards become richer than they by writing and
acting plays, human nature and the nature of Puritanifm
forbid us to doubt. With Puritans Stratford mult have
abounded, inafmuch as we find that ftage-plays, as was
before obferved, had been forbidden there by the
municipal authorities. We need not, therefore, believe
that gentle Shakelpere met his death in this untoward
fafhion. The tradition . may have originated in a pious
defire to blacken the name of a writer of plays.
Perhaps to the fame caufe may be traced the report
of Davies, that " he dyed a Papift." His father was
included in a lift of perfons who abfented themfelves
from the reformed fervice at church, and of whom
cognizance was taken for that offence by the penal
laws of the time ; but it is ftated that the reafon was
not recufancy, but the fear of arreft. I am not aware
of the date of the law which allows the debtor immu-
nity from arreft on Sunday, but an eminent lawyer
has informed me that it is part of that common law
which derives its authority from the fact of its having
been a cuftom " whereof the memory of man run-
neth not to the contrary/' that is to fay, traceable
to the reign of Richard the Second. The allega-
tion may, therefore, have been an excufe. The tefti-
His Religion. 175
mony of Davies and of the corporation archives at
Stratford is, however, confirmed in fome degree by
a document faid to have been difcovered in the houfe
in Henley Street in 1770. Thomas Hart, a defcendant
of John Shakefpere, employed a mafon named Mofeley
to-repair the roof of one of the houfes there. Mofeley
alleged that in the courfe of his work he found a manu-
fcript hidden beneath the tiling, and this manufcript
purported to be written by John Shakefpere, and to be
a profeffion of his faith as a Roman Catholic. It has
been published, and is indeed thoroughly anti-proteftant.
It was accepted at firft as genuine by Malone, but he
afterwards rejected it. Chalmers maintains its genuine-
nefs. Againft this it is argued that John Shakefpere
muft have taken the oath of allegiance on becoming
a bailiff and alderman; but on the other hand he
was depofed from thefe offices ; and it by no means
follows that becaufe he once conformed, he may not
afterwards have changed his mind. It is an hiftorical
fad: that a great many perfons who, in the beginning
of the queen's reign, attended the reformed worihip,
withdrew themfelves when the bull of Pope Pius V.,
iffued in 1563, drew an impaflable line of demarcation
between Roman Catholics and Anglicans.
But it by no means follows that becaufe John Shake-
fpere was a recufant, his fon was one too. There are
176 Shake f per e.
fome paffages in the plays which fhow no good-will to
the caufe of the Pope ; as in " King John "
" King John. What earthly name to interrogatories
Can talk the free breath of a facred king ?
Thou canft not, cardinal, devife a name
So flight, unworthy, and ridiculous,
To charge me to an anfwer, as the pope.
Tell him this tale ; and from the mouth of England,
Add this much more, that no Italian priefl
Shall tithe or toll in our dominions ;
But as we under heaven are fupreme head,
So, under him, that great fupremacy,
Where we do reign, we will alone uphold
Without the afliftance of a mortal hand.
So tell the pope j all reverence fet apart,
To him, and his ufurped authority."
But, on the other hand, there is nothing anti-papal in
" Henry the Eighth," where we might have expedled
to find it ; and even in the paflage above quoted the
proteft of King John is political, not dodrinal, and
fuch as a Gallican might have ufed in the reign of
Louis the Fourteenth.
It would be endlefs to quote paffages to fhow how
deeply imbued Shakeipere was with the old theology.
In "Hamlet" the ghoft of the king declares that he
has been releafed for a term from purgatory, and com-
plains that he did not receive the Viaticum and the
facrament of Extreme Unclion :
His Religion. 177
" Thus was I, fleeping, by a brother's hand
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once defpatch'd :
Cut off even in the bloflbms of my fin,
Unhoufel'd, difappointed, unanel'd.'
I think, too, we may trace an allufion to the religious
changes, backwards and forwards, which diftra&ed the
nation in the reigns of Henry the Eighth, Edward the
Sixth, Mary and Elizabeth, in the faying in " Lear,"
" It is and it is not, is no good divinity ; " or perhaps
the paffage may allude to the ambiguity of the Angli-
can formularies, which were framed to include both
Catholics and Proteftants. But certainly monks and
friars are generally treated with refpeft in the plays,
while the parochial clergy, who were generally
favourers of the new dodrine, are held up to ridicule
in fuch characters as Sir Hugh Evans and Sir Nathaniel.
A very curious entry in the Chamberlain's accounts
at Stratford under the year 1614, is ftill extant:
" Item, for on quart of fack, and on quart of clarrett
winne, given to a preacher at the New Place, XXd."
Now, whether this preacher were fent to try and
convert Shakefpere, or whether he came by the Poet's
wifh is uncertain ; but if the latter, the corporation
would not have paid for his reverence's liberal pota-
tions. Indeed it was quite in the fpirit of the age to
fend a preacher to a man's houfe for the exprefs pur-
pofe of refuting his religious belief.
A A
178 Shakefpere.
From his writings I fhould rather imagine that
Shakefpere, as far as religion was concerned, refembled
the great ftatefmen of Henry and Elizabeth politically
they were Proteftants, doclrinally Catholics, and were
willing to fubmit outwardly to the powers in being,
while they held themfelves free to have their own
private opinions, which were not thofe of the vulgar,
and far from fanatical.
The Poet's illnefs muft have lafted a confiderable
time, for his will is dated the 5th of March, and the
iignatures to it, by their tremulous lines, {how that he
muft have been very weak when he wrote them. The
houfe of rejoicing had foon been turned into the
houfe of mourning ; in February New Place rang
with the merriment of a bridal ; in April the matter
lay dead in one of its chambers. Shakeipere's laft
teftament fhows the fame kindly difpofition as was
diiplayed in his whole life. After, in the ufual form,
commending his foul to God, he leaves the bulk of
his perfonal property to his elder daughter, Mrs. Hall ;
and to his fecond daughter, Mrs. Quiney, and his
nephews and nieces, fons of Mrs. Joan Hart, his lifter,
certain fums of money; to Mrs. Hall all his plate ?
except his " brod filver-gilt bole ; " to the poor of the
parifh ten pounds ; to Mr. Thomas Combe his fword ;
to Thomas Ruflell and Francis Collins fmall fums ; and
His Defcendants. 179
to Hamlet Sadleir, William Raynolds, William Walker,
his godfon, Anthonye Nafhe, and to " my fellows, John
Hemynges, Richard Burbage, and Henry Cundell,"
fmall fums of money "to buy themfelves rings." His
fecond beft bed he leaves to his wife ; but at any
rate, as has been already obferved, me had her dower
and thirds at common law out of all his freehold
property, and was therefore amply provided for. The
moft noticeable point, however, is his kind remem-
brances of his fellow a&ors and partners in the
theatre.
In the next century Shakefpere's family became
extinct. His daughter Sufanna, married to John
Hall, died in 1649, leaving ne daughter, married firft
to Thomas Nam, and fecondly to John (afterwards
Sir John) Barnard of Abington in Northamptonfhire,
but me died without iffue, and was buried at Abington
in 1669.
Judith, married to Thomas Quiney, had three
children: Shakefpere, baptifed November 23, 1616,
and buried May 8, 1617; Richard, baptifed February
9, 1617-18, and buried February 26, 1638-9; and
Thomas, baptifed January 23, 1619-20, and buried
January 28, 1638-9. She herfelf was buried in
Stratford Church on February 9, 1661-2.
A Mrs. Hornby, a defcendant of the Poet's lifter,
180 Shake f per e.
Joan Hart, was living till lately at Stratford, and ufed
to gain her livelihood by fhowing the houfe in Henley
Street to ftrangers. She was quite illiterate, and was
much vexed when the houfe was purchafed to be
reftored.
, Like Milton and Sir Walter Scott, Shakefpere has left
no lineal defcendant to inherit his name or his genius.
By the Poet's untimely death, when he was only
fifty-two, and therefore ftill in the zenith of his powers,
pofterity loft the chance of obtaining a full and correct
collection of his works. Whether he ever would have
collected and edited them is, however, doubtful. Even
his fonnets, which were published in his lifetime, appear
to have been given to the public without his con-
currence. He feems, indeed, to have been like the
oftrich in the Pfalms, which the Lord is faid to have
deprived of underftanding, fo that me leaves her eggs
in the fand to be hatched by the heat of the fun, or to
be trodden down by the foot of the wayfarer, as chance
may order it. Yet for the fake of the money at leaft,
which might have purchafed another farm or two at
Stratford, it may be fuppofed that he would have
entered into a fpeculation which might have proved
profitable. Then we ihould have had no emendators ;
no Bentleys, no Irelands, no Colliers, and one great
branch of literary induftry would never have exifted.
Firjl Edition of his Works. 1 8 1
Neverthelefs, the certainty that we were reading what
Shakeipere really did mean to fay might have confoled
us even for this lofs.
The tafk of collecting his plays, was referved for
his " fellows/' John Heminge and Henry Condell,
whom he had named in his will ; and under their
fuperintendence was publiftied, feven years after his
death, the firft folio edition of his dramatic works.
It is dedicated to William, Earl of Pembroke, the
Lord Chamberlain, and to Philip, Earl of Mont-
gomery.
The addrefs, " To the great variety of readers," pre-
fixed to this edition is interefting :
" From the moft able to him that can but fpell : there you are
numbered. We had rather you were weighed : efpecially when the fate
of all books depends upon your capacities ; and not of your heads alone
but of your purfes. Well, it is now public, arid you will ftand for your
privileges we know, to read and cenfure. Do fo, but buy it firflj that
doth beft commend a book, the ftationer fays. Then how odd foever
your brains be or your wifdoms, make your licenfe the fame and fpare
not. Judge your fix penn'orth, your milling's worth, or your five Ihillings'
worth at a time, or higher, fo you rife to the proof rates, and welcome.
But, whatever you do, buy. Cenfure will not drive a trade or make the
Jack go. And though you be a magiftrate of wit, and fit on the flage at
Blackfriars or the Cock-pit, to arraign plays daily, know thefe plays have
had their trial already, and flood out all appeals, and do now come forth
quitted rather by a decree of court than any purchafed letters of
commendation.
" It had been a thing, we confefs, worthy to be wifhed, that the author
himfelf had lived to have fet forth and overfeen his own writings. But
1 82 Shakefpere.
lince it hath been ordained otherwife, and he by death departed from
that right, we pray you do not envy his friends the office of their care
and pain, to have collected and publifhed them ; and fo to have publifhed
them, as where (before) you were abufed with divers ftolen and iurrep-
titious copies, maimed and deformed by the frauds and ftealths of injurious
impoftors, that expofed them, even thofe are now offered to your view
cured and perfect of their limbs, and all the reft abfolute in their numbers
as he conceived them; who, as he was a happy imitator of nature, was a
moft gentle expreffer of it : his mind and hands went together ; and
what he thought he uttered with that eafinefs that we have fcarce
received from him a blot on his paper. But it is not our province, who
only gather his works and give them you, to praife him. It is yours that
read him; and then we hope, to your divers capacities, you will find
enough both to draw and hold you, for his wit can no more lie hid than
it can be loft. Read him therefore; and again and again ; and if then
you do not like him, furely you hunger not to underftand him. And fo
we leave you to other of his friends, whom, if you need, can be your
guides : if you need them not, you can lead yourfelves and others. And
fuch readers we wiih him.
"JoHN HEMINGE.
" HENRY CONDELL."
It is needlefs perhaps to fay that in this edition the
plays are very far indeed from being " cured and perfect
of their limbs, and all the reft abfolute of their
numbers. 5 ' If fo we fhould not have our attention
drawn off from fome neceffary action of the play
by having to look at a note to explain an unintel-
ligible paffage. But this firft folio, as it is called,
has been generally taken as the foundation of fubfe-
quent texts, and has been adopted as fuch by the
editors of the fcholarlike Cambridge edition, now in
courfe of publication.
Memorials of the Poet at Stratford. 183
CHAPTER XL
IT now remains to notice the few memorials of the
Poet which are preferved in different places throughout
the town. Firft there is Mr. James's mufeum of
Shakefperian relics, confiding of various pieces of
furniture faid to have been taken from New Place.
Then there is the Town Hall, where may be feen a
picture of the Poet by Wilfon, idealifed from the buft ;
but I confefs the original is more interefting to me.
How could Wilfon tell that Shakefpere looked more
poetical than the buft reprefents him to have looked ?
Then there is an affected picture of Garrick leaning on
Shakefpere's buft, and looking as if he actually believed
the nonfenfe which people talked, about his rivalling
the genius of the Poet himfelf. Fancy Davy patron-
ifing Shakefpere, and thinking that he knew better than
the author of " The Tempeft " what was fuited to the
ftage ! Though Burke and the other members of the
club combined to flatter him, fturdy old Samuel Johnfon
was much nearer a true eftimation of his merits. The
184 Shakefpere.
very fact that he prefumed to alter and adapt Shake-
fpere's plays, is, to my mind, proof pofitive that, what-
ever his powers of declamation, he muft have been a
very little man indeed. Romney's portrait of the Duke
of Dorfet is alfo to be feen here, and is well worth look-
ing at. On a fcreen may be obferved ridiculous pictures
of the mummery which was acted in the ftreets of
Stratford under Garrick's aufpices at the Jubilee in the
laft century. It is devoutly to be hoped that the Poet's
memory may not be defecrated by a repetition of fuch
folly next Spring. The worft of it is, that on all fuch
occafions that refpectable body called, in the language
of the gods, " licenfed victuallers," and in that of men,
"publicans," has generally as influential a voice as it
has in the election of members for Marylebone and
the Tower Hamlets. Any vulgar mow, therefore,
which will fill the public-houfes, will be fure to have
many advocates at Stratford.
But the moft interefting relic of all, which, as it
comes laft in the order of the Poet's life, I kept for the
laft ftation of my pilgrimage, is the church where his
bones repofe. It is, in itfelf, a noble ftructure, fur-
rounded by fine trees, and built on the bank of the
beautiful Avon, which on one fide bounds the church-
yard. As I approached it under an avenue of lime
trees I thought how often the Poet had trodden the
His Parijh Church. 185
fame path. Here he had probably learned his firft
leflbns in divinity, upon which his works fhow that he
had thought deeply and accurately. Hither he had
accompanied the chriftening party, when his children,
Sufanna, Hamnet, and Judith had been baptifed.
Here he had joined the crowd of his fellow-citizens in
after days when they were "knolled to parim church,"
and endured the profing of fome worthy preacher, who
endeavoured to foothe the fidgettinels of his congregation
with, " Have patience, good people ; have patience ; "
or fat amufed upon his bench while "coughing
drowned the parfon's faw." Here he followed the
bier of his only fon with forrow to the grave, and
hither he himfelf was borne at laft, when all too foon
he left the world of which he was the benefadtor, and
will be till the crack of doom ; for divines may preach
and philofophers may theorife, but what philofopher
or divine will ever convey fuch leflbns of practical
wifdom, or fpeak fo inwardly to the confcience as the
writer of " Hamlet," " Lear," and " Othello ?"
But I was recalled from thefe thoughts by a woman
with a broom in her hand, who, like the vulture of the
defert, feemed to nofe from afar the prey which had
come within her reach. However, I felt a fort of dif-
inclination to enter too fuddenly upon the intima
penetralia of the temple, and made my approaches
B B
1 86 Shakefpere.
with deliberation ; juft as one fometimes anxioufly fcans
the poftmark on the outfide of a letter and the hand-
writing of the direction, when by fimply breaking the
feal all myftery might at once be diffipated.
I therefore began by walking round the church, and
found that it was built of grey ftone, in the form of a
crofs, with large chancel and tower at its junction with
the nave; tranfepts, aifles, and north porch. There
are fome Romanefque remains and early Englifh work in
the ftrufture; but the chief part is perpendicular, of the
fourteenth century. The guide-book informed me
that the fouth aifle was rebuilt by John de Stratford,
Archbimop of Canterbury, in the reign of Edward the
Third. The chancel appears to be the lateft part of
the building, and was probably rebuilt or largely altered
in the fifteenth century. The college for priefts,
where John-a-Combe once refided, and which muft
have been one of the greateft ornaments of the town,
was actually pulled down in 1799 by its then owner, a
Mr. Edward Butteribee.
On entering by the beautiful porch, furmounted by
its folar, where a prieft probably once kept fchool, the
view is very impofing ; you can fee from the weft to
the eaft window, and can appreciate fully the extra-
ordinary inclination of the chancel towards the fouth,
for there are no high pews to intercept the viiion.
STRATFORD-ON-AVON
His Grave.- 187
The church has been, what is called, " reftored," and
the people fit on low benches. This procefs has not
been done in the beft of tafte indeed, and the aides are
ftill encumbered with galleries; but I do not think the
ftrucliure of the church itfelf has been materially in-
jured. As I advanced up towards the eaft end, I
obferved a chapel in the north aifle filled with fine
monuments of the Clopton family, amongft which the
alabafter figures of George Carew, Earl of Totnefs and
Baron Clopton, with his countefs, coloured to refemble
life, are the moft curious.
And now I approached the very fpot in which re-
pofes all that was mortal of Shakefpere. The chancel
is, on the whole, a worthy mrine for fuch a relic. The
old mifereres or feats for the choir remain, and are
curious examples of the grotefque tafte of the latter
part of the middle ages ; for each feat, on being turned
up, difclofes fome quaint and hideous figures, which
are not certainly conducive to religious ideas, nor
indeed quite decent. But of courfe, the objecl: of all
objects is the grave itfelf of Shakefpere. It is beneath
the dais on which ftands tjie altar, and is covered by a
flag-ftone, which bears the infcription
" Good frend, for Jefvs fake forbeare
To digg the dvfl encloofed heare j
Bleile be y e man y* fpares thes ftones,
And cvrfl be he y* moves my bones."
88 Shakefpere.
This piece of foolifh doggrel, which is common
enough on tomb-ftones, has been, I believe, by fome,
fuppofed to have been written by the Poet himfelf. I
cannot believe that he could have been fo fuperftitious
and egotiftical he who cared fo little what became of
the creations of his mind would furely be ftill lefs
felicitous about the duft which formed his body. He
who had fo meditated on life and death as to write the
fcene at Ophelias grave, could not have cared much
what became of his bones :
" Hamlet. To what bafe ufes may we return, Horatio I Why may not
imagination trace the noble duft of Alexander till he find it flopping a
bung-hole ?
Horatio. 'Twere to confider too curioufly to confider fo.
Hamlet. No, faith, not a jot ; but to follow him thither with modefly
enough, and likelihood to lead it : as thus ; Alexander died ; Alexander
was buried ; Alexander returned unto duft j the duft is earth ; of earth
we make loam j and why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might
they not flop a beer-barrel?"
It is not to be fuppofed that Shakefpere could
vehemently deiire for his remains an immunity from
the chances which might befall thofe of Alexander.
Within a few yards of the grave, againft the north
wall of the chancel, is the celebrated monument.
Mr. Edwards gives the reader a photographic fac-
fimile of it. It is in itfelf not in bad tafte, except
for the naked little boys at the top, and the effigy is
probably the beft likenefs of the Poet extant. Digges,
His Monument.
in his verfes prefixed to the firft folio edition of the
plays, published in 1623, mentions it, and therefore it
muft have been eredted foon after the poet's death.
The tradition is that it was done by Gerard Johnfon
from a caft taken after death; and curioufly enough
fuch a caft was lately in the pofleffion of a German
phyfician, and is now, I believe, in Profeflbr Owen's
hands. It was originally coloured to reprefent life, for
the artifts of thofe days had no idea but to " hold the
mirror up to nature;" nor did they fee any propriety
in reprefenting the human form of a dead white colour.
Shakefpere, fpeaking of the fuppofed ftatue of Her-
mione, calls it " a piece many years in doing, and now
newly performed by that rare Italian mafter, Julio
Romano." Now this muft have been fuppofed to have
been painted to refemble life, becaufe when Perdita is
about to kifs its hand, Paulina fays.
" O, patience !
The ilatue is but newly fixed, the colours
Not dry."
And again, when Leontes is going to kifs the lips
Paulina interrupts him :
" Good, my lord, forbear j
The ruddinefs upon her lip is wet j
You'll mar it if you kifs it ; flain your own
With oily painting."
It {hewed, therefore, great ignorance in Malone to
190 Shakefpere.
have the buft painted ftone colour, as if that were more
claffical, when in reality we know that the Greeks and
Romans painted the pureft Parian marble ; but Malone,
in this, was only following the falfe tafte of his age,
and therefore I think he is rather harfhly treated in
the following epigram, infcribed by a vifitor in the
book appropriated to fignatures and obfervations :
" Stranger, to whom this monument is mown,
Invoke the Poet's curfe upon Malone 5
Whofe meddling zeal his barbarous tafte betrays,
And daubs his tombftone as he mars his plays.' 1
Malone's annotations and fuggeftions certainly did not
mar the poet's plays, though it is true that the ftone-
coloured paint betrayed a barbarous tafte in art.
A few years ago the ftone-coloured paint was re-
moved, and the old colours renewed. The hair, mouf-
tachios, and beard are now reprefented as chefnut, the
eyes, I think, brown, and the complexion ruddy. The
Poet is reprefented drefled in " his habit as he lived."
It will be feen that he appears in the aft of compofition,
and from the expreffion of his face it is to be prefumed
that the work upon which he is engaged is a comedy ;
there is indeed a certain fmirk upon the features, but
this is owing in great meafure to the curl of the mouf-
tachios and the fhadow they caft upon the mouth.
But the whole face expreffes high intelligence and
Monuments of his Family. 191
genial good humour, and in this is much fuperior to
the other portraits of him, and efpecially to the
Chandos, and the engraving in the folio edition of his
works, publifhed in 1623.
On the flab beneath the buft is the following infcrip-
tion, which I will give for the benefit of my more
elderly readers ; the younger, with the help of a mag-
nifying glafs, may decipher it themfelves, from Mr.
Edwards's photograph :
JUDICIO PYLIVM, GENIO SOCRATEM, ARTE MARONEM
TERRA TEG1T, POPVLVS MGERET, OLYMPVS HABET.
" STAY, PASSENGER, WHY GOEST THOV BY so FAST,
READ, IF THOV CANST, WHOM ENVIOVS DEATH HATH PLAST
WITHIN THIS MONVMENT, SHAKESPERE, WITH WHOME
QVICK NATVRE DIDE j WHOSE NAME DOTH DECK YB TOMBE
FAR MORE THAN COST, SITH ALL Y* HE HATH WRITT
LEAVES LIVING ART BVT PAGE TO SERVE HIS WITT."
" Obiit Ano Doi 1616, Starts 53, die 23 Ap."
Befide Shakefpere's grave, to the fouth, is that of
Anne Hathaway, his wife (see ante, p. 57). On the
fouth fide lies Mrs. Sufanna Hall, his eldeft daughter,
who died in 1649. On her tombftone the original
verfes have been renewed, for they had been obliterated,
and run as follows :
" Witty above her fexe, but that 's not all,
Wise to falvation was good Miftrefs Hall :
Something of Shakefpere was in that, but this
Wholly of Him of whom Ihe's now in blifle.
192 Shakefpere.
Then paflenger, haft ne'ere a teare
To weep with her that wept with all ?
That wept, yet fet herfelf to chere
Them up with comfort's cordiall,
Her love mail live, her mercy fpread,
When thou haft ne'er a tear to fhed."
Some have thought that the fourth line is a reflec-
tion upon her father, as if fhe inherited none of her
good difpofitions from him ; but in reality it only
mows that the writer not only liked to make an epi-
grammatic antithefis, but was an orthodox anti-
pelagian, and held the utter corruption of human
nature. On the fame line, below the altar, are the
tombs of Mrs. Judith Quiney, Shakelpere's younger
daughter, and Elizabeth, his grand-daughter, married
firft to Thomas Nam, and afterwards to Sir John
Barnard, and befide them, that of Dr. Hall. To the
north of the altar, againft the eaft wall, is a handfome
tomb erefted to the memory of John-a-Combe, the
Poet's friend.
Thofe who defire to fee the very entries themfelves
of the births, deaths, and marriages in the Shakefpere
family, will find them in the regifter. Malone has
printed them in his edition of the Poet's works.
All that now remains to be noticed is the broken
font in the veftry, in which Shakefpere himfelf and his
children were probably baptifed. It is placed on the
" Knotted to Parijh Church:' 193
parifti cheft, and has been photographed by Mr.
Erneft Edwards.
The old buildings and other remains of the England
of Shakefpere's day are faft paffing away. The true
" Herne's Oak," was felled, I believe, in the laft century,
and a very old tree in Windfor Park, which local tradi-
tion had fubftituted for it, was blown down fhortly
before I undertook my pilgrimage. The " Boar's
Head " in Eaftcheap has long fince difappeared with its
" fly-bitten tapeftries," and the inn at Rochefter, of
which the carrier declared that " this be the moft
villainous houfe in all London Road for fleas," has juft
been pulled down to make way for a railroad. Of
the ftatue which graces " Poets' Corner " in Weft-
minfter Abbey, and was eredted in the lail century,
Mr. Edwards gives us a photograph. The attitude and
drapery are graceful, but neither the face nor figure
bear the fmalleft refemblance to thofe of the Poet as
he is feen in the Stratford monument, from which we
learn that his outward as well as his inward man
reprefented the honeft, manly, unfentimental Engliih-
man the typical John Bull.
Next day, being Sunday, I joined the groups who
hurried along the, till then, deferted ftreets of Stratford
to morning prayers, and found that the fervice was
conducted in a manner worthy of the fine church
c c
1 94 Shakefpere.
and its great aflbciations. Almoft the whole was
fung by a well-trained choir, and very fine and im-
preflive it was. But when the clergyman mounted the
pulpit to preach, I foon found that the fermon was
fadly out of tune with the time, the place, and the reft
of the proceedings. It was, in fact, a fcolding to the
parishioners for not coming to the Sacrament. Now I
hate all fcolding, and do not believe in it ; and, more-
over, this particular fcolding did not apply to me ; while
it lafted, therefore, I had leifure to let my mind roam
over the paft and revel in the aflbciations of the place.
And when the final blefling was given I could hardly
prevail on myfelf to leave the laft fcene the conclud-
ing ftation of my pilgrimage.
With my vifit to the church on Sunday, and long
lingering look at the marble beneath which repofe the
bones of Shakefpere, my pilgrimage to Stratford came
to an end. Thinking that I mould fpend the Sunday
afternoon quite as well in riding along the pretty roads
of Warwickshire as in falling afleep in my inn over
fuch volume of old fermons as I might borrow from
my landlady, I mounted little Stornoway, and, accom-
panied by Smoker, turned my face towards home.
On my road the horfe-boys feemed much furprifed to
fee me returning fo foon, for they had foretold that I
Should never reach my deftination ; but they did not
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
Return Home.
'95
know Stornoway's capabilities. I, who do know
them, am happy to fay that he has now taken up his
permanent abode in my ftable. Some few weeks after
my return I happened to pay the friend who had lent
him to me a vifit, and as we walked through the fields
attached to the houfe, Stornoway came trotting up and
thruft his pretty nofe into the breaft of my coat, thus
mowing his remembrance of my care of him during
our joint pilgrimage. The refult was, that he tranf-
ferred his allegiance to me next morning, and now
carries me about to vifit in my parim, where he is the
admiration and pet of everybody.
Smoker's travels have not, I think, improved him.
He has grown too much a citizen of the world. His
frequent vifits to inns have given him a tafte for fuch
haunts ; and now, when I take him to Chelmsford, he
makes himfelf fo comfortable among the horfes and
horfe-boys, that he fcarcely cares to return home.
But his friendfhip for Stornoway is unabated, and they
occupy the fame bed at night.
I myfelf am more than ever convinced of the
benefit conferred on mind and body by fuch a trip as I
have defcribed; but the next time I ride abroad, it
mall be with a companion, especially if England be the
fcene of my pilgrimage.
196 . Shakefpere.
CHAPTER XII.
MY experiment has now been made, and as far as I
am concerned, it has proved fuccefsful. My pilgrim-
age to Shakefpere's birth-place, home, and grave,
combined with the few facts and traditions refpedting
him which have come down to us, and with the
iplendid legacy which in his works he has bequeathed
to mankind, have enabled me to form a certain ideal of
the man. Whether that ideal be true or fantaftical ;
whether it will recommend itfelf to others or not, I
cannot tell ; but, at any rate, I am fatisfied with it.
In the firft place, then, Shakelpere was a manly man,
fond of the fports which make Englishmen quick of
eye, fertile in expedients, ftrong of hand, active of foot,
and fearlefs in execution. His fturdy, well-built figure,
ruddy complexion, and frank open countenance, as
feen upon his tomb, are at once an evidence and an
effect of this trait, which is further attefted by tradition
and his writings. He was fond of fociety, anxious to
have a ftately, well-appointed houfe and eflablifhment,
Ideal of his Character. 1 97
a little proud of his gentle blood, and ready with the
firft joke that came uppermoft to tickle Southampton,
retaliate upon Ben Jonfon, or make John-a-Combe
chuckle.
Next, he was totally free from the pedantry of an
author. He looks neither mad, nor fentimental, nor
melancholy, nor infpired. While fmaller men are apt
to magnify the value of works which have coft them
immenfe labour and effort to produce, he cared fo little
for the fpontaneous produ&ions of his genius that he
took no care about them once they had anfwered their
immediate purpofe. The ordinary companions of his
later days were the honeft fquires and burghers of War-
wickfhire, nor do the few jokes recorded of him at all
fmell of the lamp, but rather refer to the purfuits of
ordinary men. All his aims were pra&ical. His objed:
in life was to fecure to himfelf an independence, and to
enjoy the amufements and the occupations to which
his fimple taftes impelled him. For this purpofe he
was not too proud to turn his hand to any honeft em-
ployment, to hold gentlemen's horfes, adt, adapt other
men's works to the ftage, write the fineft plays that
ever were conceived by mortal man, buy and fell malt,
and farm impropriate tithes.
As might have been expe&ed from a man of this
mould, he was free from the petty jealoufies of litera-
198 Shakefpere.
ture. The irritable race of his fellow poets ufe refpedt-
ing him fome turn of phrafe or epithet which denotes
perfonal affedtion, fuch as " gentle." Spenfer, Drayton,
Chettle, all have a kind word for him. And this is
the more fignificant, inafmuch that they muft have felt
that he had beaten them. The only exception to this
rule is Greene, who feems to me to have been the very
type of all that is moft bafe and degraded in literary
men. The irritable, overbearing, and impulfive Jonfon
declares that he loved him almoft to idolatry.
Behind thefe moral qualities rifes the ftupendous
edifice of his genius ; but indeed they add much to its
beauty and effedt. His manly, generous, unarFedted,
and nature-loving mind is apparent in every ftone of
the ftrudture a proof, if any were wanting, that every
work of the artift is the produdt of his whole nature,
by which the height, depth, length, breadth, and
colour of his foul and ipirit are meafured and gauged.
And happy it was for England that our greateft Poet
was of this temperament. Who can fay what efFedt
the widely-fpread ftudy of his works may have on the
national character ? His tranfcendent genius, had it
been combined with fome morbid fentimentalifm or
effeminate affedlation, muft have more or lefs injured
the moral fenfe of the thoufands of his countrymen
to whom his writings are as familiar as houfehold
His Influence on the National Character. 199
words. Lord Byron, with very inferior powers, was
able actually to make it fashionable for a time to ape
the maudlin egotifm and weak mifanthropy of a worn-
out voluptuary. But there was no perverfe quality
in Shakefpere's mind to throw a jaundiced tinge over
his pi&ures of God's fair creation. He has Shown
that robuft good fenfe is an element of the higheft
poetry, and that to be a great poet it is not neceffary
to be either mad or bad. Again, with refpect to lan-
guage, had he been a bookifh man and a fcholar, as
fcholarmip was in thofe days, he would probably have
fallen in with the affectations of Sir Philip Sydney,
and written in the half French, half Latin jargon of
the Euphuifls, or tied himfelf to the tail of Terence
and Seneca, like Jonfon. Or, rebelling againft the
pfeudo-claffical mania, he might have affected archa-
ifms, like Spenfer. But inftead of this, he wrote in
the ftrong homely language of the Englifh people of
his own time ; and his writings, combined perhaps with
the Englifh tranflation of the Bible, have fixed our
language for ever. There is in them always a model,
ready to our hand and familiar to everybody, of the
very beft colloquial Englim.
He has conferred another great boon upon Englifh
literature. He has created a fchool of dramatic criticifm
founded upon nature and the national character, and not
2oo Shakefpere.
upon arbitrary laws of precedents. Ariftotle laid down,
and the dramatifts of Greece and Rome followed, cer-
tain canons called the Unities, which required that the
action of a play fhould not occupy more than one day
at moft; that the fcene mould not change to any place
fo diftant that the actors might not have reached it in
the time occupied by the events reprefented ; and that in
4*agedy, none but tragic and dignified perfonages mould
be introduced. In one of his plays, " The Tempeft,"
Shakefpere has actually, whether intentionally or by
accident, obferved the firft two of the Unities. The
whole bufinefs of the play is tranfacted in Profperos little
ifland within the fpace of a few hours. It is impoffible
to deny that the refult upon a reader's mind at leaft
upon a critical reader's mind is a certain feeling of
artiftic completenefs. But this advantage is not enough
in general to compenfate for the bondage under which
the poet who writes under thefe conditions labours. In
none of Shakefpere's plays is the third Unity obferved.
Whether the Greek mind, in which thefe rules origi-
nated, were fo fenfitive as not to admit the mixture of
tragic and comic emotions, or whether the religious
character of the Greek feftivals excluded it, or what-
ever may have been the origin of the canon, it certainly
deprives the artift of one great inftrument of artiftic
effect contraft. The grave fcene in " Hamlet," the
'The Tercentenary FeftivaL 201
fcenes on the heath in Lear," and at the caflle-gate
in " Macbeth," would fuffer confiderably if any claffical
enthufiaft were to omit the parts of the gravedigger,
the fool, and the porter. At any rate, tragedy, comedy,
and farce, are ftrangely blended in real life, to which
Shakefpere held the mirror, and our fluggifti northern
imaginations require the ftimulus of the contraft.
The builders of our cathedrals muft carve a fow play-
ing on the bagpipes, or a friar putting a goofe into his
fleeve, on the moulding of a ftrudlure which awes the
lighteft imagination by its folemn and myfterious
beauty. If Shakefpere had been .a fcholar, we mould
probably . have known no tragedy but fuch as the
ftilted productions of Corneille and Racine, or dramatic
criticifm but fuch as Voltaire's.
And now one word upon the Tercentenary Feftival.
As long as human nature remains what it is, the mind
will attach a certain fentimental importance to anni-
verfaries and other epochs which recall the memory of
great events, of which the birth of Shakefpere is moft
afluredly one of the greateft. It is a principle inter-
woven in our religion, our laws, and our cuftoms.
The delire to mow refpect to the memory of a great
man by creeling a monument to his honour is. alfo a
natural feeling which we inherit from our Celtic,
Teutonic, or Scandinavian anceftors, whofe cairns and
D D
2O2 Shake/fere.
barrows fupply food for the {peculations of our anti-
quarian focieties. But in all our attempts as a nation to
keep anniverfaries or erect monuments, we are iingu-
larly unhappy. We fet about fuch matters moult
trlftement. Something of courfe will be done at the
coming Tercentenary Feftival, and the beft way not to
be difappointed is not to expert much. A ftatue or an
obelifk more or lefs will make little difference in the
beauty or uglinefs of our public places. Fortunately he
whom we delight to honour may fay, Exegi monumen-
tum cere perennius. His plays, unlike the victories of
warriors, are his real monument, and it feems to me
that through them we can beft evince our gratitude to
their author. To found a theatre in which the Shake-
iperian drama could be acted and a fchool of acting
maintained, would be a work really worthy of the
occalion. The difficulties in the way, though great,
are not infurmountable. There is the Academy of
Mufic in Paris endowed by the State; and in every
principal town in Italy, till lately, fome fuch home was
provided for the lyric drama. Why, then, mould not
perfons co-operate to found a fchool of national dra-
matic poetry in this country ? There can be no doubt
that a public which can be drawn together to hear
ftupid lectures and orations about things in general by
popular preachers, would flock to hear Shakeipere's
A Shakefperian ^Theatre. 203
plays declaimed exacflly as they were written, and that
without any of the factitious attractions of elaborate
fcenery and drefles. People do not from choice feed
upon garbage when they can get wholefome food.
To hope that fuch an idea will be actually carried out
amidft the jarring elements of the literary and artiftic
world may perhaps be Utopian ; but I cannot help
thinking that to provide for the adequate reprefentation
of Shakefpere's plays, and to enlarge the circle of thofe
who receive from them benefit and delight, would be
the moft rational and noblefl homage we could pay to
his greatnefs.
FINIS.
J. E. TAYLOR, PRINTER, IO, LITTLE QUEEN STREET,
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