GIFT OF T // /V ; ft ^AW^^ / /7 SHAKESPEARE THE PERSONAL PHASE The Stratford Bust The Droeshout Engraving The Presentment of the Two Discrepant (hemispherric) Shakespeares SHAKESPEARE THE PERSONAL PHASE BY WILLIAM HALL CHAPMAN TWENTY ILLUSTRATIONS COPYRIGHTED, 1920 BY THE AUTHOR W. H.. CHAPMAN 4.1C427 um of uf mg PREFATORY NOTE "Shakespeare" "Shake-Speare" "Shak- spere" "Shaksper." The name is spelled sev- eral ways. In this work I find it convenient to write the name Shakspere where I am writ- ing about authenticated matter of fact, in no way connected with Plays or Poems, and "Shakespeare" where I am speaking of the su- preme dramatist and poet of our modern world, whomsoever he was. The spelling of the name involves no as- sumption as to authorship. In quotations I follow the originals. I have employed the descriptive term "Stratfordian" merely to point out to those who hold that William Shakspere of Strat- ford, was the author of the Plays and Poems, without disparagement to any or all of those who hold such belief. I have also given some account of the con- spicuous events connected with the literary history of England, which took place in the Elizabethan age; and likewise considerable prominence to the resourceful and irrepress- XIII XIV PREFATORY NOTE ible personalities of Ben Jonson, Robert Greene and George Chapman, the three Eliz- abethan poets now most conspicuously in the midst of Shakespearean criticism, showing their traits of mind and personal phase. Personality is the only thing about William Shakspere of Stratford, which the researches of inquirers have not exhausted, as is shown by the discovery of new things about him which the inquirers are unearthing, but which his conventional biographers do not care to disclose unless the fresh views of things ac- cord with their bias or prejudice. You have never really known a man until you have seen all sides of him; in fact, the most engaging inquiry for the human race is the particular man. The writer has endeavored to perform his task with freedom from bias, both in the nar- rative and criticism, and does not hesitate to affirm that a detailed statement of the precise circumstances under which the "cursed- blessed" epitaph was chiseled on William Shakspere's tomb is essential in order to pre- sent the man as he is disclosed by the results of the long struggle, from the autumn of 1614 to the winter of 1618, with the corporation of PREFATORY NOTE XV Stratford-on-Avon, over the enclosure of the common fields on the outskirts of the town. Nothing is included in the volume which cannot be readily traced by reference to the Miscellaneous Documents in the Archives of the Stratford Corporation, (Wheler Collec- tion Stratford-on-Avon), "Camden Society Papers." The new documentary information lately discovered among the Belvoir papers and in the Public Record Office, also the standard works on the drama and obvious sources in literature and history of the Eliza- bethan Age. It is possible that through inadvertency I have not marked all passages which are not original or new, by inverted commas. The present writer has endeavored to keep out of the old rutted pathway of conventional biography, based upon Spurious tradition, and has sought to blend interest with instruc- tion. And in giving to his account a fresh and pleasing arrangement. W. H. C. Los Angeles, California CONTENTS PART ONE Page Prefatory Note -------- xiii I. Facts About Shakespeare and Their Significance - 3 PART TWO II. An Account of the True Personality of the Man William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon, as Shown by the Recorded Facts of His Life - - 101 PART THREE III. Shake-speare Shakespeare The Literary Aspect - 179 PART FOUR IV. Shakespeare the Master-Mind with Some Account of Several Elizabethan Authors - 241 Ben Jonson and Shakespeare ------- 941 Who Was Shake-Scene? (the object of Robert Greene's censure) ---------- 281 "That Old Man Eloquent" (George Chapman) "A bet- ter spirit" 372 INDEX 395 XVII LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Page THE STRATFORD BUST THE DROESHOUT ENGRAVING ----- Frontispiece THE HEM1SPHERED PRESENTMENT OF TWO DISCREPANT SHAKESPEARES - Frontispiece AN EXACT REPRODUCTION OF THE ENTRY IN THOMAS GREENE.'S DIARY ON THE 23RD DECEMBER, 1614 ------- 48a PORTRAIT OF THOMAS GREENE - - - - 63 SHAKSPERE EPITAPH ------- 33 THE GROUND BEFORE LONDON WAS BUILT - 76a FIRST PAGE OF ORIGINAL EDITION OF HAM- LET --------- I76a SHAKESPEARE IN UMBRA - * - - - - 1766 AN EMBLEM IN ART, SCIENCE AND LITERA- TURE - - ----- BEN JONSON -------- THE POETS' CORNER SPENSER, MILTON AND BEN JONSON ----- 280a WILLIAM KEMP DANCING THE MORRIS - - 327 A GROUP OF LONDON AUTHORS OF THE XVII 100 CENTURY - 2806 AUTOGRAPH OF QUEEN ELIZABETH - - - 366 CRESCENT ARMS OF CHAPMAN - - - - 372a PORTRAIT OF GEORGE CHAPMAN - - - 386a FACSIMILE RECEIPT FOR 40S. PAID FOR A "PASTORAL ENDING IN A TRAGEDY" FROM CHAPMAN TO PHILIP HENSLOWE 388a CHAPMAN'S TOMB IN ST. GILES CHURCH - - 394 XIX TO THE READER "Pray thee, take care, that tak'st my book in hand, To read it well, that is to understand." Ben Jonson PART I FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" AND THEIR SIGNIFICATION FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" AND THEIR SIGNIFICATION. I. E believe that if "the greatest genius of our world" were now living he would wish to be known as he was, so as to qualify for identification with the person who wrote the immortal "Plays." There is only one cele- brated man in history called Homer, about whom, in connection with his reputed literary work there is so little known, or concerning whom there is so great diversity of opinion among persons eminent in many walks of life. "Paint me as I am," said Oliver Cromwell, shaking Sir Peter Lely, the artist, roughly by the shoulder. "If you leave out the scars and wrinkles I will not pay you a shilling." And there on canvas in the Pitti Gallery it is, a present from the many-sided and wondrous Cromwell to the Grand Duke of Tuscany. The stern, rough face is marked with every scar, wart and seam with nature, civil strife or anxiety, public care or authority, had fea- tured in the king uncrowned. SHAKICSPEAEE, THE PERSONAL PHASE But have we adequate materials which show Shakespeare as he was? We cannot build a biography of the person who wrote the "Plays" without literary material. Hith- erto the antiquarians have failed to unearth facts which contribute to our understanding or appreciation of Shakespeare. The ma- terial in the Public Record Office and Munic- ipal Archives involve no assumption whatever as to authorship, except in so far as the ab- sence of literary facts tend to disprove the claim set up for the Stratford player. They are the primitive and authoritative docu- ments and may be always relied upon as an unbiased record of fact unmixed with the chaff of fiction, legend and spurious tradition. William Shakepere of Stratford is indeed an anomaly for there is no other person asso- ciated with literature whose biography is so completely devoid of authenticated literary facts ; whose activities, so far as known, if not mean are surely not creditable, to a man of letters. Partly from idolatry of the author of the "Plays" facts are omitted or distorted by the conventional biographers of Shake- speare, which in any way reflect on their idol, except where the advantage to the sub- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 5 ject of their memoir seems to outweigh the opprobrium. We have adequate material which shows Ben Jonson, Beaumont, Chapman, Spencer, Drayton and other Elizabethan poet as they were. And the immortal author of the "Plays" had the same opportunity but did not choose to make himself known as he was. Unfortunately for the biographers who had not enough material on which to build a biog- raphy of Shakespeare, the author of "Rich- ard II" was not discovered at the time of the Essex-Southampton Conspiracy. In 1601, on the afternoon of the day preceding the insur- rection, Sir Gilly Merrick, one of the conspir- ators, had procured to be played as an encour- agement to rebellion, the play of the deposing of "Richard the Second." The actor who provided the play was Augustine Phillips, a member of the Globe Theatre, the same per- son who bequeathed by his Will in 1605, "to my fellow William Shakespere a thirty shil- ling piece of gould." He was also one of twenty-three persons who, with William Shakespere of Stratford, was charged with ob- taining "heraldic honours by fradulent rep- resentation." 6 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE It is abundantly evident that the "Age of Shakespeare" was the age of craft, of crime, of grief and judicial cruelties. The Court of High Commission, the Star Chamber and the Privy Council, were names of fear and terror. The simplest expression was liable to be re- garded as seditious and treasonable, subject- ing the writer before conviction, to imprison- ment and torture. In 1599, Sir John Heywood was impris- oned and threatened with torture for the dedi- cation to Essex of a history of the First Part of the Life and Reign of "King Henry IV," which contained an account of the deposition of "Richard II." Ben Jonson and Samuel Daniel were severely censured by authority for supposed expressions of sympathy with Essex, contained in "Sejanus" and "Philatas." Queen Elizabeth denounced the performance of the play "Richard II," as an "act of trea- son." The Queen's fears were well grounded for not long before the Essex rebellion, an edict (1570) was issued by a foreign potentate inciting her subjects to rebellion. When Peter Lombard, the Keeper of the Records in the Tower, was showing Her Majesty his rolls, on coming to the reign of "Richard II," the FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 7 Queen suddenly exclaimed: "I am 'Richard II,' known ye not that?" She told Lombard how the tragedy "was played forty times in open streets and houses" at the time of the Es- sex insurrection. Loyalty was intentionally undermined and the assassination of the Queen was countenaced. If the fiery, pas- sionate daughter o f "the pontiff-king." (Henry VIII) "the untamed heifer" as the Puritans called her, had discovered the author of Richard II she would have laid him by the heels. For as things were in Tudor English days if the rebellion had gathered force, and Eseex lost control of his followers (the London mob), the Queen would in all probability have been deposed and murdered. The players were interrogated and it was proved that the performance of "Richard II" was by request. Nevertheless students of Elizabethan literature, when they take up Shakespearean criticism, find it difficult to un- derstand why the author of the play "Richard II" escaped punishment for committing an of- fense much more serious than any of the au- thor's literary contemporaries, and for which they were imprisoned. Nash declares that for a twelvemonth he 8 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE published nothing for fear of (literary) cen- sure; he had been imprisoned and banished from London, the only place where a profes- sional writer could hope to keep soul and body together. "In 1599, when John Stubbs and the publisher, Page, brought out a pam- phlet against the French marriage they were condemned to have the right hand struck off, according to the barbaric Tudor practice, by a blow from a butcher's knife." No wonder with the dread of authority be- fore him, the author of "Richard II" should have remained in seclusion after his "report what toucheth the deposing of a king." But there is not a grain of fact which tends to prove that the principal person the au- thor, (whatever his name), of "Richard II" suffered for his rashness, or was made known to a distrustful government by the pro- fessional informers, called "State Deciphers" vampires gorged with perjury and sottish with crime. Yet at or before this time (1601), is the supposed date of twenty-three plays and three poems, which now issue under the name "Shakespeare." The list is inclusive of "Richard II" (1593). FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 9 Before or during the year 1603, there was conferred upon the author of the immortal "Plays" (known or unknown), an unusual distinction, when the play "Hamlet" was acetd in the two Universities. We also know that "Volpone" received the same distinction by the grateful acknowledgment of the au- thor, Ben Jonson : "To the most noble and equal Sisters, the two famous Universities, for their love and acceptance shown to his po- em (play) in the presentation." Thus ac- knowledging the authorship of "Volpone" in the dedication of it and himself. Surely this would have been the time of the Stratford Player's life had he written "Hamlet," for the opportunity it gave him to show himself without jeopardy, as he was, and link his name and fame indissolubly as the author of the immortal work, with the two famous Universities. But most unfortunately for the biographers and critics, the author- poet's silence is prima facie evidence of con- cealed authorship. The fact of the matter is the pseudonymous author could not dedicate both "Hamlet" and himself without disclos- ing his identity. However, the manner of man he was cannot be discovered by an en- 10 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE deavor to identify the author with any of his dramatic personages, although to the present writer the name "Shakespeare denotes those ageless and immortal "Plays" and almost nothing else. But we may pursue the examination of the particulars of the life of one William Shaks- pere of Stratford-on-Avon, for the reason that many persons still believe that these par- ticulars of the life of the Stratford Player were identical with the author of "Hamlet" and "King Lear," who in their opinion is still one of the great personalities of the past. Nevertheless there are many distinguished persons who question the claim set up for the Stratford Player to the personal authorship of the "Plays" and poems associated with his name, and who assert that critical acuteness and antiquarian research have ousted him from possession of the works called "Shake- speare." As the Greeks of the olden times failed to establish the identity of the one Homer, au- thor of our "Iliad" and "Odyssy" (according to the traditional view), so the moderns are having no better success in establishing the identity of the one "Shakespeare" as author FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 11 of the "Plays" and whether or not the poems and plays imputed to William Shakespeare were really written by a person of that name. The late Mr. Andrew Lang says, "I can- not believe that the actual author "Shake- speare" lived and died and left no trace of his existence except his share in the "Works" called "Shakespeare". But we know as in the case of "Junius" it did happen, and who Martin Mar, prelate, positively was has nev- er been ascertained. Nor is the mystery likely to be solved as to the authorship of the "Sibyl- line Oracles". However, we reserve what is to be said about pseudonymous authorship for another place, but it may be noted in pas- sing, that if a trace of the actual author of the Plays is ever found it will bear the literary mark or impress like the tracings of all lit- erary men of the time, instead of the litigious trace of the usurer. William Shakspere of Stratford has been traced, and it is this very tracing of him deed by deed now here, now there, his ac- tions and his ways, which prove the utter un- doing of his reputation as the author of the works called "Shakespeare". It is a very easy matter to trace him in his endeavor to sieze 12 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE the common fields ; in his falseness and venal- ity in bribing the officers of Herald College to issue a grant to his father, but do the notices and particulars of the Stratford Player's match-making intermediations, litigious and common-field grabbing proclivity compli- ment the works called "Shakespeare", as the appurtenances of author-craft. By way of contrast, see how in Beaumont, Chapman, Drayton and Ben Jonson, individ- uality and work are linked together; supply- ing the consummation for their history is the complement of poetry and author-craft, while the converse instances in the history of the Stratford actor are the complement of stroll- ing player, money lender, speculator and the like. "To be told that he played a deception on a fellowplayer," the narration of which would sully these pages, or that he died of a drunken carousal, does not, says Hallam, "ex- actly inform us of the man who wrote 'Lear'." Emerson could not marry the Stratford player's life to "Shakespeare's Verse," for the actual facts of the Stratford Player's life add opprobrium to his character the comple- ment of what is called low activities. "Into the dark," says Mr. Lang, "go one FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 13 and all, Shakespeare and the others." The strictest scrutiny, however, fails to disclose the truth of this statement. "Into the dark go one and all" that is taking Spencer, Fletcher, Drayton, Chapman, Beaumont, Ben Jonson and several others; for in the literary particu- lars of their lives they are most manifest. It is not the fewness in the number of notices, which must necessarily be small, that should awaken comment, so long as the notices are native and complemental to the character of literary men. The late Mr. Andrew Lang is a writer who was possessed of much more than miscellane- ous and general erudition, and not so amateur- ish in the matter of Elizabethan literary his- tory as he would have his readers believe. For we find him taking part in the scrimmage go- ing on in the camp of the Stratfordians cudg- eling professionally trained students of liter- ary history, like Sir Sidney Lee and Mr. Churton Collins of his own fellowship, on points concerning "quartos," "The First Fo- lio," and on "Shakespeare's" learning, al- though his thrashing over the old straw in connection with the illustrious "Verulam" seems inconsequential. 14 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE It is fine sport, however, to witness the Stratfordians at odds among themselves, for their divarication is plainly specified in the use made of their knowledge, as professional- ly trained students of Elizabethan literature, in proving that the camp of the Stratfordians divided against itself can stand almost any amount of derisive laughter, on account of the divergences of opinion touching Shake- speare's learning. As as exemplification, Sir Sidney Lee holding the opinion that "Shake- speare" had no claim to rank as a classical scholar, Mr. Andrew Lang and J. M. Rob- ertson concurring. At the same time, that ir- respressible Stratfordian, Mr. Churton Col- lins, points out that the works of Shake- speare evince the ripest scholarship, and Pro- fessor Byness is of the opinion that he (Shake- speare) was a trained classical scholar. "Shakespeare's vocabulary," says Sidney La- nier, "is wonderfully large. It does not seem to have occurred to those who have thought him an unlearned man that whatever words he uses he must have read, for words are whol- ly artificial products and cannot come by in- tuition, no matter how divine may be our gen- ius." The late Dr. Furness says of Shake- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 15 speare, that he must have been an "omnivor- ous reader." The "Shakespeare" Plays, according to Walter Bagehot (1826-1877), "show not only a very powerful but also a very cultivated mind." The upholders of the Stratfordian faith feel the pressure and force of the evidence in striving to off-set the obvious inference of il- literacy in the Stratford Player by harping on the inexact scholarship of the author of the "Plays." However, very many students of literary history assert that Shakespeare was abundantly lettered. We cannot resist a shaking of the sides with laughter in seeing the ardent J. M. Robertson pitted against the members of his own school (Stratfordians), "as cocks in a pit," over the proposition as to the legal knowledge shown in the Plays, and who, like the parson in "Hudibras," strives to "prove his doctrine orthodox by Apostolic (forensic) blows and knocks." Happy thought! Why are the Shake- speare classical scholars so irreconcilably at variance in opinions of Shakespeare's learn- ing if they are to be regarded as professional- 16 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ly trained students of literary history? How delighted we all would be if Shakespeare whomsoever the dramatist might be could have collaborated in "Eastward Hoe" with Chapman and Ben Jonson, and with them committed to a vile prison and been in danger of having his nostrils split, or at least his ears clipped, for this would have disclosed Shakespeare's identity. As one of the im- prisoned poets he would doubtless have writ- ten one or more of the Letters of Chapman and Jonson concerning "Eastward Hoe," seek- ing their release. George Chapman wrote to His Majesty, King James I, also two letters to the Lord Chamberlain. Ben Jonson wrote to the Earl of Pembroke, to the Countess of Rutland and the Earl of Salisbury. The supposed date of "Eastward Hoe" is 1604, but the first quarto version of the play the only one which contains the passage in which the authors poke fun at the Scots ap- peared in 1605, and for which George Chap- man and Ben Jonson were cast into prison. Those years also contained the supposed date of "Othello," "Macbeth" and "Lear." However, there is no ground for belief that the author of the "Plays" (Shakespeare) al- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 17 ways a recluse from public notice would col- laborate, for the conditions of anonymity are irreconcilable with the certified authorship of Chapman, Marston and Ben Jonson in "East- ward Hoe." The author of the immortal "Works" hid his fame in silence, as if conspiring against an illustrious name and wondrous renown. "Shakespeare" is as impersonal and descrip- tive as is Homer, and as misty and mythical as is the name and personality of William Tell. When the claim to authorship is chal- lenged, as in the case of the Stratford Player, the smaller the number of notices non-literary the better for the one taken to be claimant. But instead we find the notices of William Shakspere, the Stratford Player, unconnected with literary work, superabundant; traits and actions not literary, by their excess and pre- dominance tend to prove the literary delusion associated with the Stratford actor's name, for we have practically no authenticated literary facts but are swamped with notices of him not associated with literary work, such as we find recorded by Shakespeare's biographers. Degrading as many of them are, instancing 18 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE the new discoveries unearthed by the anti- quarians, they have placed the reflective Strat- fordians in a quandary. For as late as 1613, after all the immortal plays were written, when the Stratford actor (whom many read- ers still identify with The Great Unknown p 1 a y w r i g h t the pseudonymous "Shake- speare") was supposed to have returned to Stratford, instead a Mr. Shakspeare" is dis- covered at Belvoir Castle with Richard Bur- bage, his yoke-mate and fellow-worker in and about "My Lord's Impreso" or device. In 1905 was discovered the Earl of Rut- land's account book of household expenses in- curred at Belvoir Castle, for the year begin- ning August, 1612, and ending August, 1613. It had lain concealed for more than three cen- turies and contained an entry showing in the year 1613 "Mr. Shakespeare" was engaged with Richard Burbage to work at the Earl of Rutland's new device or emblem, and that each received a sum of forty-four shillings in payment of their services. Mrs. C. C. Stopes is unwilling to believe that the Stratford actor, who in her opinion was the author, was in 1613 engaged in work in no way related to literature, and with Dr. FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 19 C. W. Wallace is struggling to relieve "Shake- speare of the mingling of petty business with the production of the noblest dramas of hu- man life ever written." Contrast "Mr. Shakspeare's" non-literary employment at Belvoir Castle, the seat of the Earl of Rutland, "about my Lord's 'Impreso,' with that of George Peek, poet and drama- tist, at Theobald, the seat of Lord Burleigh. "Peele was employed to compose certain speeches addressed to the Queen, for payment. Also when the Earl of Northumberland pre- sented him with a fee of three pounds for ad- dressing literary tributes." Is it not wonder- ful that the Shakespeare of the Plays, if well known to such men as the Earl of Essex, the Earl of Pembroke, the Earl of Rutland, persons of aristocratic birth, with a position in court circles as some Stratfordians assert (without proof), that he did not mention the name of any one of them, or the name of any poet or author of his time? William Shakspere of Stratford, we know left behind him no literary correspondence, his life history is non-literary; as an humble actor his acts, and all that he did histrionical- ly considered are compressed into scantiest 20 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE record. There were three hundred and thir- ty-two contemporary poets, enumerating those only whose works were published. Of all these but five or six obscure writers refer to "Shakespeare" as a personality, more or less vaguely in the lifetime of the Stratford actor. All other reference is to the "Shakespeare Works," author unknown. While Shakspere of the stage was living, Ben Jonson maintained silence be it remem- bered, not so much as the least commentary upon him until he had lain for years in the grave. But when Ben died in 1637 he left in manuscript the statement that he "loved the man" (Shakspere). Why not say so while both are in the flesh if in the opinion of Ben Will was the author. However, Ben Jonson's panegyrics hyper- bolizing Shakespeare in prose and verse are to a great degree what the Stratfordians rely upon. "Though merely writ at first for fill- ing To raise the volume's price a shill- ing." The plain, unvarnished truth of the matter is the "Shakespeare" Plays were not thought FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 21 wonderful in the time of Queen Elizabeth and King James I, and almost any perso'n in that age could have been set up as claimant and passed unchallenged, so little were dramatic productions regarded. Plays were referred to as "riff-raff" "lewd and lascivious plays." However, the Stratford actor was not seri- ously suspected during his lifetime of any authorship whatever, so far as anyone knows and can prove, but seemed always cherishing the lust of gain. All the conventional writers on the subject of Shakespeare have been put into a quandary or puzzling predicament, by the mean biographical facts and non-literary environment during the entire life of the re- puted author, disclosed by an unbiased view of his whole career. As an instance, when he as marriage-broker or intermediary, gave sup- port to an old wig-maker in bilking his ap- prentice; and when he, a pitiless money- lender and usurer, without any tenderness for his debtors, had the borrower sent to prison for a picayunish sum of money; and when he, with two other common field-land sharks, strove to dispossess the poor people of their rights in the tithe-paying land rights dear to many a poor widow and her fatherless chil- 22 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE dren, struggling in their distress and need against the buffeting of a pitiless world. The reader's discernment perceives the for- midable difficulties in, the way of the "Strat- fordians," who believe the author of the "Plays" to be the young man who came hik- ing up from Stratford, who was thereafter a shareholding actor in a London Playhouse, and returned to Stratford in the very prime of manhood; who never claimed to be the author of the "Plays" or gave any directions for their publication. The Shakespeare Plays owe their per- petuity chiefly to the student reader in the closet and not to the stage, where the Plays were mutilated and still bear the tracings of histrionic savagery, perpetrated before and af- ter the publication of the folio of 1623. For eight and twenty years within the pre- cincts of the Inner and Middle Temple, the name and writings of Shakespeare were un- known. "Whatever the cause," writes H. H. L. Bellot, The Inner and Middle Temple, p. 196, "the fact remains that out of the twenty plays produced in our Hall from the acces- sion of Charles II to the flight of his brother (James II), not one can claim Shakespeare FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 23 as its author. Beaumont and Fletcher are re- sponsible for six." "The Twin" dramatic stars were very distinctly marked in Jacobean times. What have the legal craftsmen of the Inns of Court found wanting in "Shakespeare?" He touches all there is within the scope of hu- man thought. "For his bounty there was no winter in't, an autumn 'twas that grew the more by reaping." Whatever the efficient cause the truth re- mains, that the members of this great legal University, successors to the illustrious Order of the Knights Templar, knew little of the Plays called "Shakespeare." And that little is made manifest by the discovery in 1828, among the Harlian manuscripts at the British Museum, of the diary of a student of the Inn. John Manningham, barrister-at-law and a cultured man, on the 2nd of February, 1602, writes: "At our feast we had a play called Twelve Nights, or What You Will.' This performance formed part of the revels which immediately followed the Christmas revels." There is contained in the diary or note book the sole anecdote of Shakespeare (Shakspere) known to have been recorded in the Stratford 24 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE actor's liftime. But like all other authenti- cated notices of him it is non-literary. "How- ever, the 'Wine and Woman' story contained in the student's note book is very good evi- dence of reputation," writes Sir George G. Greenwood. About the authorship, Man- ningham says nothing, which proves that the Plays were not then conspicuously associated, if at all, with the Stratford actor's name. Among the fellow students of John Man- ningham was John Pym, the celebrated states- man and orator. "He is of a sweet behavior, a good spirit and a pleasing discourse," writes the diarist. Another fellow student, John Ford the playwright, was admitted a fellow of the Middle Temple in 1602; also the famed poet, Dr. John Donne, educated at both Uni- versities and at Lincoln's Inn; Francis Beau- mont, the eminent dramatist, was admitted to the law society on November 3, 1600, and might have been present also when 'Twelfth Night' was produced. Thomas Campion, masque writer, was educated at Gray's Inn; William Camden and William Dugdale, the great and learned antiquaries, were both mem- bers of Gray's Inn; Sir Philip Sidney was a member of Gray's Inn; so were John Hamp- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 25 den, Sir Francis Bacon and Thomas Middle- ton, playwright. Sir Walter Raleigh, who was admitted to membership of the Inn in 1575 ; James Shirley, the poet and play maker, was a member of the Legal Inn. Is it not very extraordinary that in an age of great men and great deeds, and much epis- tolary correspondence, there is no mention of the actual author of the immortal Works, by way of commentation, exposition or observa- tion? While the Plays of Shakespeare were subjects for stage representation in the lifetime of the Stratford actor by illustrious men, no effort was made to illustrate the indi- vidual life by the eminent persons who may well have been present to witness the plays produced in this stately Hall of the honorable societies of the "Inns of Court," and where for many generations they lived and wrought in literature, law and history within the pre- cincts of this historic spot. Is it possible that the great advocate, John Seldon, Thomas Shackvill, Chancellor of Ox- ford, the indomitable Sir Walter Raleigh, Lord Chancellor Hatton, Sir Thomas Over- bury, Sir Francis Drake, Sir Edward Coke, Sir Francis Walsingham, or Henry Wriothes- 26 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ley, third Earl of Southampton, would not if they had witnessed the presentation of Shake- speare's Play as it left the author's hand un- abridged, glorified him and it? However, it is impossible not to recognize the fact that Shakespeare was above the ca- pacity of the playhouse loving, bear-baiting, beer guzzling, rough-and-tumble, fighting public of that day, of whom it was said "they will eat like wolves and fight like devils." All of which is to the meditative student, painful and disgusting. With the play-reader, however, Shake- speare is always at his best, for he gives his readers all the delight which the music of his words contained, and in his unaltered works convey all the poetry of it. Every kind of eloquence, ancient and modern, is present to our mind in the reading. But with the play-goer Shakespeare is at his very worst for there is so much in him which comes not within the sphere of acting but may come under the province of histrion- ical savigism, in the stage representation so pawed over, abbreviated and bemuddled by declamatory actors to please the general audi- tory. FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 27 The fact is they cut him then as they cut him now, by the omission of many of the most striking passages in the plays, but with this difference, that in the olden time they ex- punged the parts more frequently which alone will be treasured to the latest ages. Such as the Roman orations, Clarence's dream, Por- tia's beautiful tribute to the quality of mercy, and the many lines so richly jeweled by the poet's "vision and faculty divine." Proof of which is the omission in all acting editions of the great speech in "Hamlet," Act IV, Scene 4, "the one especial speech," as Swinburne phrased it, "in which the personal genius of Shakespeare soars up to the very highest of its height, and strikes down to the very deepest of its depth." It was written, he says, not for "the stage but for the study." Shakespeare is very beautiful in the read- ing but no dramatist-actor would cast such pearls before the Tudor and Jacobin public playhouse swine. We infer this from the fact that no person in that age did set forth the majesty and loftiness of Shakespeare's thought. In fact, the "Shakespeare" Plays were above the intelligence of the frequenters of the public playhouse. No play was given 28 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE as Shakespeare wrote it, but a good deal ab- breviated for stage production, and an abridged version made for the stage retains all the slang expressions and wanton interpola- tions of the actors, who delight in the non- sensical jargon of the punster. Much of this "sad stuff" was placed under the immortal author's nom de plume, "Shakespeare." Is it not strange that there should be extant the record of but two persons who ever wit- nessed a presentation of a probable Shake- speare Play? An astrologer, one Dr. Simon Forman, noticed three, namely: "The Win- ter's Tale" at the Globe Theatre, May 15th, 1611, "Cymbeline" (time and place not given) and "Macbeth" at the Globe, April 20th, 1610; and "Twelfth Night" noticed by John Manningham, a member of the Middle Tem- ple, February 2nd, 1602. The name "Shake- speare" is not contained in either of their note books in connection with plays or poems. Are we to infer that a well educated bar- rister-at-law, a member of the Inns of Court, would have been indifferent to its authorship had he known that the writer of this mirth- producing play, "Twelfth Night," was the author who speaks from the mouth of An- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 29 tony above the body of Caesar? Are we to understand that if the Roman play, "Julius Caesar" a play which contains those splen- did monuments of genius and eloquence, the speeches of Brutus and Antony had been presented on a stage at that time, or at any time in the Hall of this ancient legal univer- sity, that the benchers, barriers and students of these law societies, would not have given in their note books a more ample commentary? " You all do know this mantel : I re- member The first time ever Caesar put it on 'Twas on a summer's evening, in his tent, That day he overcame the Nervii : Look! In this place ran Cassius' dagger through; See what a rent the envious Casca made; Through this the well-beloved Bru- tus stabbed, And as he plucked his cursed steel away Mark how the blood of Caesar fol- lowed it." When reading these immortal lines Emer- son cast no beam on the "jovial actor and Sharer." He says, "other admirable men have 30 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE led lives in some sort of keeping with their thought, but this man in wide contrast. I can- not marry this fact to his verse." Shakspere the Stratford man is not in har- many with "Shakespeare" the poet. The player's life was never reflected in the poet's works, as he led a life in wide contrast to the poet's thought. Identifying the Stratford player with the author of "Hamlet" is to give the poet a character made up of incongruities manifestly incompatible. It is the work that is immortal, the personality of the author is as mythical as is Homer. II. Our belief in the pseudonymity of the auth- or of the poems and plays called "Shakespear- ean" is strengthened by the absence of verse commemorative of concurrent events, such as the strivings of his boldest countrymen in the great Elizabethan age. There is from his pen neither word of cheer nor sympathy with the daring and suffering warriors and adventur- ers of that time, although his contemporaries versified eulogies to the heroes of those days for their stirring deeds. There is in the poems and plays no elegiac lay in memory of Eliza- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 31 beth "The glorious daughter of the illustri- ous Henry," as Robert Greene called her, "and that great queen of famous memory" is the more exalted praise of Oliver Cromwell. Nor is there one line of mourning verse at the death of Prince Henry, the noblest among the children of the king, by a writer who was al- ways a generous and consistent supporter of prerogative against the apprehension of free- dom. This is another evidence of the secrecy maintained as to the authorship of the poems and plays. We cannot discover a single laud- atory poem or commendatory verse, or a linj of praise, of any publication or writer of his time. All this is in contrast with his contempor- aries whose personalities are identified with their literary work, and so liberal of commen- dation were they that they literally showered commendatory verses on literary works of merit, or those thought to have merit. Of these, thirty-five were bestowed on John Fletcher, a score or more on Beaumont, Chap- man and Ford, while Massinger received nineteen. Ben Jonson's published works contain thir- 32 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ty-seven pieces of commendation. His Ro- man tragedy, "Sejanus, His Fall/' was ac- claimed by ten contemporary poets. In praise of his comedy "Volpone" there are seven poems. The versified compliments bestowed on him by his contemporaries embrace many of the most celebrated names antecedent to his death, which occurred in 1637. Early in 1638 a collection of some thirty elegies were published under the title of "Jonsonus Virbius" or u The Memory of Ben Jonson," in which nearly all the leading poets of the day except Milton, were represented. "How different," wrote Mr. J. A. Symonds, "was the case of Shakespeare." It must appear strange to the votaries of Shakespeare, who make the player one with the playwright, that Ben Jonson should have received so many crowns of mourning verse while for Shakspere of Stratford, the now re- puted author of "Hamlet," "Lear," and "Macbeth," there wailed no dirge. Not a sin- gle elegaic poem written of him in the year of his death, 1616. Already in that fatal year there had been mourning for Francis Beau- mont. Eight and forty days after the death of Francis Beaumont all that was mortal of Wil- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 33 liam Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon was buried in the chancel of his parish church, in which as part owner of the tithes, and conse quently one of the lay rectors, he had the right of interment. Over the spot where his body was laid there was placed a slab with the in- scription in an odd and strange mixture of small and capital letters, imprecating a curse on the man who should disturb his bones: GOOD FREND FOR ksvs JAKE FORBEARE, TO D1CC TIE! DVST ENOLOASED KARE*. BLEST BE f I^IAN i SPARES' THES STONES, AND CVRST BE HE MOVES MY BONES Shakspere's Epitaph. At any rate the words contained in this epi- taph clearly identify Shakspere the player, but manifestly not in the manner of "Shake- speare" the playwright. For we know that had the author of "Hamlet" written his own epitaph it would have been as deathless as the one over the Countess of Pembroke : "Underneath this sable hearse Lies the subject of all verse; Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother, Death ere thou has slain another Learned and fair and good as she, Time shall throw a dart at thee." 34 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE There was not the least danger that the ac- tor's grave would be violated by the Puritans, for Dr. John Hall, Shakspere's son-in-law, was a Puritan. If he had had this warning epitaph cut on the tomb it would have been written in scholarly English. The doggerel lines, rude as they are, satisfied doubtless the widow and daughters as expressing a known wish of their "dear departed." Themselves ignorant they could not read the absurd and ignorant epitaph on his tomb, so their hearts were not saddened as they gazed upon an in- scription of barbaric rudeness. The tradition that William Shakspere of Stratford wrote his own epitaph and com- manded that it be engraved upon his tomb- stone stands undisputed, for the very good rea- son that his son-in-law, Dr. John Hall, a Christian gentleman and scholar, consented to the profanation of a sanctuary in having this mean, ignorant and disgusting epitaph chis- eled in the pavement of "that temple of silence and reconciliation." In the olden time the parochial authorities of Trinity Church had no rights which the wealthy tithe owner and lay rector, William Shakspere, was "bound to respect." FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 35 In reading the four protective lines cut on the tomb, which contain a warning, a bless- ing and a curse, it is impossible to avoid see- ing that the maledictory words point at the ex- humationist of his own generation. Herein the Stratford actor manifests h i s usual shrewdness, for he had offended the good peo- ple of Stratford in an endeavor to rob them of their ancient rights in "the common fields." In striving to snatch bread from the children of the poor doubtless gave William Shakspere an opprobrious name among the towns-people of Stratford and he felt that his bones should have all the protection that a malediction could give. He was shrewd enough to pro- vide, as he imagined, for any contingency, hence he had his blessing for "the man that spares these stones" and a curse for "he who moves my bones." Who wrote Shakspere's epitaph? We don't know positively, but who should wish, or would dare, or be permitted to imprint upon Shakspere's tombstone a curse without his au- thority "Aye There's the Rub?" Mr. Holliwell-Phillipps tells us that these lines "according to an early tradition were se- lected by the poet himself for his epitaph." 36 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE He adds that "there is another early but less probable statement that they were the poet's own composition." If this "mean and vulgar curse" had been traditionally handed down instead of having been cut in stone and laid upon Shakspere's grave it would have been rejected as spurious by the Stratfordolaters. But there the curse- inscribed stone rests and has apparently rested on Shakspere's grave for more than three hun- dred years. Seventy-eight years after Shakspcre's inter- ment, William Hall an Oxford graduate, in 1694 stood beside the grave and after he had read the rude, absurd, and ignorant epitaph, wrote his Commentary contained in a letter to his friend, Edward Thwaites, preserved in the Bodleian Library. The letter has brought to light the significant fact concerning the depth of Shakspere's grave, "they have laid him full seventeen feet deep, deep enough to secure him." The execrative epitaph cut on his tomb is a criminating memorial of his attempt to gain possession of the Stratford Common lands. No wonder Shakspere and family were scared, for the years 1615-16 saw insurrection FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 37 and pitched battles. The townsmen were struggling with the rioters to prevent the en- closure of the Corporation tithing-lands, while the riotous henchmen of the Combe Shakspere land-grabbing Combination were digging ditch-fences around the land they in- tended to enclose, in defiance of the public weal and "the law of the realm." Shakspere knew how extremely bitter had been his fel- low townsmen's state of mind, whom he had oflended during the two years' struggle, he was not "one of them," and of course loved by few. The people of his day were superstitious; the epitaph was to them the voice of the dead. Mr. Holliwell-Phillipps writes, "whatever opinion may be formed respecting the author- ship of the lines upon the stone there can scarcely be a reasonable doubt that they are a record of the poet's (actor's) own wishes." However, there is much that is inexplicable about Shakspere's interment. His name does not appear upon the grave-stone pointed out as his; there is no distinguishing inscription on it nothing in fact but those execrative lines. The Countess de Chambrun writes "person- 38 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ally, I consider these lines (epitaph) almost as much an exemplification of their author s genius as more poetic works." When reading these sentences of the talented lady, I feel con- strained in Socratic phrase to address her thus: "Best of Women, pardon me for asking you to examine the miscellaneous documents extant among the Stratford archives where are disclosed the fact that these dreadful lines are not an exemplification of their author's gen- ius, but of their author's shrewdness in hav- ing his grave guarded by a malediction after having tried to rob his home town of its com- mon field rights. In Stratford's dusty rec- ords we may read about things done, deeds that fit into the known facts of the life of Wil- liam Shakspere of Stratford when and where was Poet's bones." "Spurned from hallowed ground Flung like base carrion to the hound." The Poets' tomb in every age are the object of veneration. How does this jibe with or exemplify, Shakspere's traditional reputation so-called for gentleness of spirit and good-will? With his sympathies and winning disposition? That it should have been found necessary to exert FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 39 a protecting influence in the village where he was born and where he had lived all the time of his youth, where his children were born, where his father, mother and son were buried, and where after life's short eventide they bore him to that quiet resting-place in the chancel of his parish church. That there should have been so little respect shown, much less honor and reverence, to those bones that were Shak- spere's, if the immortalities were really writ- ten by the Stratford actor. Be the cause what it may, not one of the three hundred and thirty-two contemporary English poets sought shelter for his ashes un- der the aegis of malediction. If in pressing his claim the money lender elects to be a tormentor and a common-field vandal (1614-1616), his name will be exe- crated while living and a hateful memory when dead, so the curse-inscribed slab was placed over Shakspere's grave as a shield to protect his ashes from those who would not hesitate to invade the tomb of one whose mem- ory had become hateful to them. One thing is evidenced by the maledictory epitaph, that the one who wrote it was afraid 40 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE the tomb might be vialoted by the removal of the bones. Who were they that would most likely in- vade Shakspere's tomb? Obviously the poor people who regarded the Stratford actor as a grasping usurer, a hard-hearted man who pressed poor debtors with all the rigor of the law, to enforce the payment of petty sums, the man who had shown himself supremely selfish in an attempt to enclose the Stratford common lands, the man who would be made a gentle- man by misrepresentation, fraud and false- hood. However, the awful malediction makes this fact known that the desecration of Shakspere's grave was thought more than probable, for he threatens his fellow-towns- men with a curse should they disturb his bones "you will be blest if you do not, but ac- cursed if you do." It seems an extraordinary anomaly to many persons, who believe that the Stratford actor was the author of the only instance of a poet or author having his grave guarded by a mal- ediction. "Lines which have in them," writes Washington Irving, "something extremely awful." Go visit the sacred spots, "temples of silence FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 41 and reconciliation," where lie or are com- memorated the poets in every land of song. Some there were who mingled too strenuously in the strifes of the day, like Dante and Mil- ton, who might have thought that their ene- mies would not let their bones rest in peace, but nowhere do we find their dreamless dust resting beneath a "stony register" imprecating a curse on the man who should molest his bones. Away with all this nonsense about Puritans, clerks and sextons snatching Shakspere's bones out of his grave in the chancel and flinging them into the bone yard! Why then, was Shakspere haunted with the thought that the exhumationist w r ould disturb his bones? The reason why is disclosed in the "Cor- poration Records," "Green's Diary," "Wheler Collection Stratford-on-Avon." For here may be found in dusty records the facts which the biographers of Shakspere are striving to shun, in order to keep "Shakespeare" as they imagine, from going into the limbo of ex- ploded myths. As a matter of fact, if William Shakspere had died in the early months of the year 1614, before the great excitement and riot at Strat- 42 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ford, respecting an attempted enclosure of the neighboring common fields, the guardian lines would never have been cut on his tomb, for Shakspere could then have had no fear that his tomb would be disturbed. But in the aut- umn of the year Shakspere became implicated and disgracefully involved with Combe and Mainwaring in an attempt to enclose the com- mon fields, which belonged to the Corporation of Stratford. At the time of Shakspere's death the strife was extremely bitter. Thirty-four days before he closed his eyes, a petition was sent up by the Corporation of Stratford to the Lord Chief Justice, Sir Edward Coke, who was on the Warwickshire Assize and a cham- pion of popular rights, standing like a stone wall against the contumacious resistance which William Combe, William Shakspere and Arthur Mainwaring were offering to the authority of the Corporation. And in reply the Chief Justice declared from the bench at Warwick that no enclosure should be made within the parish of Stratford for it was against the law of the realm. This order was confirmed on the same cir- cuit two years afterwards. "By whose Char- ter of Incorporation (Edward VI), the Coun- FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 43 cillors and the Bailiff, Francis Smyth Sr., say the common fields passed to the town for the benefit of the poor, wherein live above seven hundred poor which receive almes, whose cur- ses and clamours will be poured out to God against the enterprise of such a thing." Nevertheless, the three land cormorants, Combe, Shakespere and Mainwaring, were in no complying mood and they proceeded in defiance of their orders, to throw down the banks and to cut up the four hundred acres of corn land into pasture fields. The Stratford common fields, known as Stratford field, Bishopton field and Wilcombe field, contained altogether about 1600 acres; Wilcombe field contained about 400 acres. Against the threatened invasion of the land sharks the Corporation showed a splendid re- sistance. "The town councillors of Stratford were determined to preserve their inheritance, they would not have it said in future times they were the men who gave way to the un- doing of the town all three fires were not so great a loss to the town as the enclosure would be as an injury to the town charities and tithes." On December 23rd the Council drew up 44 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE two letters to be delivered in London, one ad- dressed to Mainwaring, who resided in Lon- don and was represented in Stratford by one Replingham, and who like Combe and Shak- spere knew all about the state of high excite- ment and valiant commotion at Stratford; and the other to Shakspere, who resided in Strat- ford but was now in London part of the time. But instead of assuming a protective attitude toward the people Shakspere gave his fellow- townsmen a stout resistance. It is recorded of him that the latest moments of his life were dedicated to the pursuit of the nefarious scheme known as the enclosure of the Strat- ford common fields in defiance of the public interest. In all that stands for the repression of pop- ular rights William Shakspere of Stratford showed himself to be as perverse as was his confederate, William Combe, the new Squire of Welcombe, who proclaimed his succession to his father's lands and his power as a petty magistrate by arbitrarily sending a person (one Hicox) to Warwick jail, and refused bail merely because he "did not behave him- self with such respect in his presence it seem- eth he looked for." FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 45 The matter contained in the subject of the enclosure at Wilcombe set forth in the details of the hard struggle, is preserved in the Strat- ford Records, where it is represented in its proper color. Notwithstanding the dark ways and vain shuffling by conventional writers of "Shake- speare's" so-called "Lives," the true personal- ity of the Stratford man, Shakspere, is best shown by the recorded facts of his life more especially contained in the subject matter of the attempted enclosures at Wilcombe, 1614- 1618 (Wheler Papers) Corporation Records. The Charter granted by Edward VI to the Corporation of Stratford-on-Avon settled on it the tithes for the support of the refounded school and almshouses. The year 1614 was as direful as any in the history of the old, thatched-roof town. For the third time in twenty years Stratford had been "greatly ruin- ated by fire." There died in July that year (1614), just about the time of the Great Fire July 9th John Combe, the usurious money-lender and notorious litigant, who for thirty years kept the local court of record busy with suits to re- cover small debts, who was Shakspere's espec- 46 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ial friend and to whom he left a legacy of five pounds. The passing of a usurious money-lender in "spacious time" when the law gave a gener- ous advantage to the creditor and its vile pris- on to the breadwinner of the poor man's fam- ily, was very good cause for rejoicing, for then life for the lowly became more nearly worth living, for there was one tormentor the less. Notwithstanding his litigious course John Combe, a confirmed bachelor, was probably the best member of a family of hard creditors. Two brothers, a sister, many nephews, nieces, cousins, uncles and aunts, were all bountifully remembered in his will. However, the peo- ple of Stratford derisively condemned his then un-Christian practice of lending at the rate of ten per cent, and his rigorism in the pursuit of defaulting debtors. "Here lyes ten in the hundred In the ground fast ramn'd, 'Tis a hundred to ten But his soul is damn'd." (Camden's Remains 1614) But it was John Combe's testamentary be- quests which proved so trying to the souls of the good people of Stratford. His nephew, FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 47 Thomas Combe, was his heir and residuary legatee and he succeeded to a large part of his uncle's vast property, and in connection with his rantankerous brother, William Combe, forthwith started enclosures at Welcombe. The fours years' struggle that followed was the bane of Stratford and the opprobrium of Warwickshire, from the autumn of 1614 until squelched by the Court's order in 1618. But before starting these nefarious schemes of en- closures, two months after their uncle's death they had their henchmen inquire who were most likely to be tempted (bribed). Thomas Greene drew up a list of the "An- cient freeholders" in Old Stratford and Wel- combe. Shakspere heads the list and was one of the chief holders of the tithes; his share was worth sixty pounds a year. Shakspere, pre- vious to the attempted enclosures at Wel- combe, had purchased of the elder Combes 127 acres which joined the coveted common fields, and in approving of the scheme of en- closures and giving it a lift, Shakspere was like the farmer who asserted, "I ain't greedy 'bout land, I only just want what j'ines mine." The Corporation, depending on the com- mon lands of Welcombe which were tithe 48 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE producing, for the maintenance of its seven hundred poor who received alms, saw in this scheme (the threatened enclosure), a reduc- tion of tithes from which were endowed their school and almshouses. No wonder the inva- sion of popular rights was fervently resented by the Corporation. It would only be through the tithes that Shakspere might sustain loss as his interest in the tithes may be depreciated. So then, at the outset of the common land grabbing scheme, William Combe, through his "man Friday" one Replingham on Oc- tober 28, 1614, drafted "Articles" guarantee- ing Shakspere from prospective loss, and at Shakspere's suggestion the terms were to in- clude his cousin, Thomas Greene, Town Clerk, although not told at the time but sub- sequently he records in his Diary: 9 Ja (1614) Mr. Replyngham 28 October articled with Mr. Shak- spear I was put in by T Lucas. "The Miscellaneous Documents" and report of the Council meetings at the Town Hall give details of their actions (Wheler Papers at Stratford, 1806). Thomas Greene, Town Clerk, makes an en- try in his Diary on the 23rd December, 1614: ^ FACTS ABOUT "SHAKESPEARE" 49 "A (at the town) Hall Letters wryt- ten one to Mr. Maneryng annother to Mr. Shakspeare with about all the Companys hands to either. I also wryte of myself to my cosen Shak- speare the coppyes of all our oathes made then also a note of the incon- veniences wold grow by the Inclos- ures." See insert page for the exact reproduction of the entry in Thomas Greene's Diary on the 23rd December, 1614. ~h f him contained in his Table Talk, which was recorded and published by his amanuensis, Richard Milward, who lived with him for twenty years? When the Stratford actor, William Shaks- pere died in 1616, John Selden was 32 years of age. The Folio of 1623, the first collected edition of the "Shakspeare" Plays, gave Sel- den a fine opportunity of studying this prodi- gious intellect in his greatness, for when Sel- den died on the 30th of November, 1654, the Folio of 1623 had been in print thirty-one years. He had a very choice library of books, as well in M. S. as printed, but not a single one from Shakespeare, as the eight thousand volume gift to the Bodleian Library attest. He wrote in his books "Above all things Liberty". But this great man who was usually styled the great dictator of learning of the English na- tion, is silent about "Shakespeare" in his cele- brated Table Talk. There are a great variety of subjects discussed, including "Authors," "Books", "Philosophy", and under the head of poetry we read, "Ovid was not only a fine poet but as a man may speak, a great canon 104 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE lawyer, as appears in his 'Fasti', where we have more of the festivals of the old Romans than anywhere else ; Tis pity the rest are lost". To the famous John Selden's legal mind it seems that Ovid was not only a fine poet but a great lawyer. It is to be regretted that the great scholar and jurist had never read in all probability the immortal Plays, and, of course could not deal with Shakespeare's legal attain- ments, if any such there were. The Table Talk of John Selden contains, according to Coleridge, "more weighty bul- lion sense" than he had ever found in the same number of pages of any uninspired writer". Selden not only bearded tyranny but he kept, says Aubry, a plentiful table and was never without learned company, frequently that of Jonson, Drayton, Chapman and Camden. Drayton's first edition of the "Poly-olbion" was enriched by the notes and illustrations of the poet's "learned friend", John Selden. Sel- den was introduced to King James I by Ben Jonson. Selden, with Camden, attended the banquet given by Ben after his and Chapman's release from prison. William Shakspere or Shaksper, the first son and third child of John Shakspere, is sup- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 105 posed to have been born at a place on the chief highway or road leading from London to Ire- land, where the road crosses the river Avon. This crossing was called Street-ford or Strat- ford. This at any rate was the place of his baptism in 1564, as is evidenced by the Parish register, where the name is writen Jonnis Shags per. The name was not made up of Shake and Speare, there is no E in the first syllable and no A in the last, according to the way the Stratford actor spelled his name, when he signs himself "Shakspere" there are no excep- tions in his autographs. Arranged in chrono- logical order, they are, (1) the abbreviated signature Shak'p to the deposition in the Bel- lott-Mountjoy suit, 11 May 1612. (2) Signa- ture to the purchase deed of a house in the Blackfriars, 10 March 1613. (3) Signature to the mortgage deed of same March, 1613, and the three autograph signatures severally written on three sheets of the Will, March 25, 1616. The next proven fact is that of his marriage in 1582, when he was little more than eigh- teen years old. Before this event nothing is known in regard to him. 106 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE John Shakspere, the father, apparently, of William Shakspere, is first discovered and de- scribed as a resident of Henley Street, Strat- ford, where our first glimpse is had of him in April, 1SS2. In that year he was fined the sum of twelve pence for violation of sanitary regu- lations. The number of petty suits for debt in which he was implicated, show a litigious dis- position. Nothing is known in regard to the place of his birth and nurture, nor in regard to his ancestry. John Shakspere seems to have been a chapman, trading in farm produce. In 1557 he married Mary Arden, the sev- enth and youngest daughter of Robert Ar- den, who had left to her fifty-three acres and a house called Asbies at Wilmcote. She also acquired an interest in two messuages at Smit- terfield. This step gave John Shakspere a reputation among his neighbors of having married an heiress, and he was not slow to take advantage of it. His official career com- menced at once by his election, in 1557, as an ale taster, "to see to the quality of bread and ale". He was amerced as a punishment the same year for not keeping his gutters clean. In 1568 he was elected High Bailiff of Stratford. John Shakspere was the only mem- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 107 :r of the Shakspere family that was honored r ith civic preferment and confidence, serving ic corporation for the ninth time in several functions. However, the time of his declina- tion was at hand, for in the autumn of 1577, 'the wife's property at Asbies was mortgaged for forty pounds. The money subsequently tendered in repayment of the loan was refused until other sums due to the same creditor were repaid. John Shakspere was deprived of his alder- manship, September 6th, 1586, because he did not come to the hall when notified. On March 29th, 1577, he produced a writ of habeas cor- pus which shows he had been in prison for debt. Notwithstanding his inability to write, he had more or less capacity for official busi- ness, but so managed his private affairs as to wreck his own and his wife's fortune. At the time of the habeas corpus matter, William Shakspere was thirteen years old. "In all probability", says his biographer, "the lad was removed from school, his father requiring his assistance". There was a grammar school in Stratford which was reconstructed on a pre- Reformation foundation by Edward VI. No Stratford record nor Stratford tradition says 108 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE that Shakspere attended the Stratford gram- mar school. But had the waning fortune of his father made it possible, he might have been a student there from his seventh year the probable age of admission until his improvi- dent marriage when little more than eigh- teen years old. However, a provincial gram- mar school is a convenient place for the lad about whose activities we know nothing, and whose education is made to impinge on con- jecture and fanciful might-have-been. We are told that William Shakspere must have been sent to the grammar school at Strat- ford, as his parents and all the relatives were unlearned persons, and there was no other pub- lic education available ; nevertheless it was the practice of that age to teach the boy no more than his father knew. One thing is certain, that the scholastic awakening in the Shakspere family was of short duration, for it began and ended with William Shokspere, whose youngest daughter Judith, was as illiterate as were her grand- parents. She could not even write her name, although her father, the now putative author, at the time of her school age, had become wealthy. When Judith Shakspere was invited THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 109 in December, 161 1, to be a subscribing witness to two instruments, in both instances her at- testation was executed with marks. Judith had then attained the age of twenty-six years, and his eldest daughter, "the little premature Susanna" as De Quincy calls her, could barely scrawl her name, being unable to identify her husband's (Dr. John Hall's) handwriting, which no one but an illiterate could mistake. Her contention with the army surgeon, Dr. James Cook, respecting her husband's manu- 'scripts, is proof that William Shakspere was true to his antecedents by conferring illiteracy upon his daughters. William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon was not exceptionally liberal and broad- minded in the matter of education in contrast with many of his contemporaries, notably Richard Mulcaster (1531-1611) who says that "the girl should be as well educated as her brother". While the real author of the immortal plays had written, "There is no darkness but ignor- ance". "This house is as dark as ignorance, though ignorance were as dark as hell" (Twelfth Night) "seeing ignorance is the curse of God" (2 Henry VI) "O, thou monster 110 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ignorance, how deformed dost thou look". (Love's Labor Lost). William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon we know, was born to ignorant parents, nur- tured in a bookless home which his unlettered father gave him from necessity, and not from choice. But why should the home of this wealthy son be as illiterate and as bookless as that which he had provided for his own chil- dren? "Dull unfeeling barren ignorance" (Richard II). Wealth had brought no change in the en- vironment of the Shaksperes of Stratford in the matter of education. However, it was not the least of John Shakspere's misfortunes that in November, 1582, his oldest son, William, added to his embarrassment by premature and forced marriage. It is the practice of Shaks- pere's biographers to pass hurriedly over this event in the young man's life, for there is noth- ing commendable in his marital relations. There is expressed in it, irregularity of con- duct and probable desertion on his part. Pres- sure was brought to bear on the young man by his wife's relations, and he was forced to marry the woman whom he had wronged. Who can believe that this marriage was a THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 111 happy one, when the only written words con- tained in his will are not words expressive of connubial endearment such as "Dear wife" or "Sweet wife 1 ' but "My wife". He had for- gotten her, but, by an interlineation, in the final draft of his Will, she received his second best bed with its furniture. This was the sole bequest made to her. Mr. Charles Elton, Q. C., informs us through Sir Sidney Lee (p. 274) that "Shaks- pere barred the dower". We agree with Sir Sidney Lee "that the bar was for practical pur- poses, perpetual, and disposes of Mr. Halli- well-Phillipp's assertion that Shakespeare (Shakspere's) wife was entitled to dower from all his real estate". We are by no means sure of the identity of lis wife in the absence of any entry of the mar- riage. We do not know that she and Shaks- )ere ever went through the. actual ceremony, inless her identity is traceable through Anne Vhately, as a regular license was issued for he marriage of William Shakspere and Anne Vhately of Temple Grafton, November 27th, 582, the day preceding that of William lhagspere and Anna Hathaway, according to he marriage bond of November 28th, 1582. 112 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE Richard Hathaway of Shottery, the reputed father of Shakspere's wife, Anne, in his will dated September 1st, 1581, bequeathed his property to seven children, his daughters be- ing Catherine, Margaret and Agnes. No Anna was mentioned. The first published notice of the name of William Shakspere's (supposed) wife appears in Rowe's Life of Shakspere (1709) wherein it is stated that she "was the daughter of one Hathaway, said to have been a substantial yeoman in the neigh- borhood of Stratford." This was all that Thomas Betterton, the ac- tor, "Rowe's informant, could learn at the time of his visit to Stratford-on-Avon. The exact time of this visit is unknown, but it was prob- ably about the year 1690. This lack of knowl- edge in regard to the Hathaways shows that the locality of Anne Hathaway's residence or that of her parents was not known at Strat- ford. The house at Shottery, now known as Anne Hathaway's cottage, may have been the home of Anne Hathaway (supposed) w r ife of William Shakspere, before her marriage, but of this there is no proof. Shakspere was mar- ried under the name "Willm Shagsper" but the place of marriage is unknown as his place THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 113 of residence is not mentioned in the bond. Al- though Shottery is in the parish of Stratford, no record of Shakspere's marriage to Anne or Agnes, the supposed daughter of Richard Hathaway has been found in the parish regis- ter. However, "in the registry of the bishop of the diocese (Worcester) in the Edgar Cower is contained a deed wherein Sandells id Richardson, husbandmen of Shottery, make themselves responsible in the sum of forty pounds on November 28th, 1582, to free the bishop of all liability should any lawful impediment by reason of any pre-contract or consanguinity be disclosed subsequently. "Provided that Anne obtained the consent of her friends the marriage might proceed with nee asking of the bannes of matrimony be- ween them". The wording of the bond shows that despite the fact that the bridegroom was a ninor by nearly three years", the consent of lis parents was neither called for nor obtained 'though necessary for strictly legalized pro- :edure". The bondsmen, Sandells and Rich- irdson, representing the lady's family, ignored he bridegroom's family completely. In hav- ng received the deed they forced Shakspere 114 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE to marry their friend's daughter in order to save her reputation, "having apparently done his best to desert her before his marriage." Soon afterwards within six months, a daughter was born. Moreover, the whole circumstances of the case render it highly probable that Shakspere had no present thought of marriage, for the waning fortune of his father made him acquainted with the "cares of bread". He was a penniless youth, not yet of age, having neither craftsmanship nor means of livlihood, and was forced by her friends into marrying her, a woman eight years older than himself. But bye and bye, he will have his revenge upon his wife's relations by not remembering any of them in his last will and testament. Even the mother of his children is forgotten "for Shakspere barred the dower". In 1585 she presented him with twins, when he left Stratford for London. We do not know positively, but the advent of the twins is the approximate date. of the young man's flight. He lived apart from his wife many years, ap- parently from the time he left Stratford (date not positively known) until probably 1596, the death year of his son, Hamnet. The breath THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 115 of slander never touched the good name of Anne (or Agnes) the neglected wife of Wil- liam Shakspere. "There is prima facie evi- dence that the player wife fared in his absence no better than his father and mother", who, dying intestate in 1601 and 1608 respectively, were buried somewhere by the Stratford church, but there is no trace of any sepulchral monument or memorial. If anything of the kind had been set up by their wealthy son, William Shakspere, it would certainly have been found by some one. "The only contem- porary mention, writes Sir Sidney Lee, made of the wife of Shakspere between her marriage in 1582 and her husband's death in 1616, was as the borrower, at an unascertained date of forty shillings from Thomas Whittington, who had formerly been her father's shepherd. The money was unpaid when Whittington died in 1601, and his executor was directed to recover the sum from Shakspere and distribute it among the poor of Stratford". As though in mockery of what might have been looked for in the wealthy husband. There is disclosed in this pecuniary transac- tion, coupled with the slight mention of her in the will, and the barring of the dower, 116 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE prima facie evidence of William Shakspere's indifference to and neglect of, if not dislike for his wife. How often in the long years of her loneliness, there came to her in memory, the ill-boding words from the lips of "Suf- olk" (1 Henry VI). "For what is wedlock forced but a hell, An age of discord and continual strife. Whereas that the contrary bringeth bliss And is a pattern of celestial peace." All this is in striking contrast with the con- duct of Sir Thomas Lucy, whom the uphold- ers of the "Stratfordian faith" have attempted to disparage, and whose endearment for his wife is so feelingly expressed in the inscrip- tion on her tomb: "All the time of her lyfe a true and faithful servant of her good God, never detected of any crime or vice, in religion most sound, in love to her husband most faithfull and true. In friendship most constant To what in trust was committed to her most secret in wisdom excelling in gov- erning her house and bringing up THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 117 youth in the fcare of God that did converse with her most rare and singular, a great maintainer of hos- pitality, greatly esteemed of her bet- ters, misliked of none unless the envi- ous. When all is spoken that can be said a woman so furnished and gar- nished with Virtue as not to be bet- tered and hardly to be equalled of any, as she lived most virtuously, so she dyed most godly. Set down by him that best did know what hath been written to be true". THOMAS LUCY. In order to shield Shakspere from the charge of having deserted his family, his biog- raphers find it convenient to set the young man to deer stealing so that he may make his flight to London in order to escape from the grasp of his reputed prosecutor, Sir Thomas Lucy, leaving wife and children a burden upon his poverty-stricken father. The probable source of the fiction is the supposed reference contained in "The Merry Wives of Windsor". The malicious libel was worked after the opening scene, a fictitious narrative of an event that never happened, and first made current about one hundred 118 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE years after the death of William Shakspere of Stratford. The fabricator of the story could not have been a native of Warwickshire for he would have known the arms borne by the Charlicote Lucys were three luces, and could not have been mistaken for the dozen white luces on Justice Shallows' ancient coat. It shows how Sir Thomas Lucy, a very sagacious and good man, may be calumniated by perverse mytho- mania. Still the Lucys of a later day were not anxious to lose the reputation of having spanked Shakspere for poaching on the an- cestral preserves. There is very little likelihood that the young husband, with a wife and three babies to support, would voluntarily place himself in a position where he would have to flee from Sir Thomas Lucy's prosecution, thereby bring- ing disgrace upon himself, his wife and chil- dren, while his parents in straightened circum- stances were struggling to keep the wolf from the door. Moreover, deer were not subject to the crime of larceny at the common law. There were statutes which made it an offense to kill deer in a park impaled. The records show that Sir Thomas Lucy had no park im- [AM SHAKSPERE 111 paled. The poaching yarn, having no histori- cal basis, was not traditionally preserved by the descendants of Sir Thomas Lucy. Unfor- tunately, all the traditions about Shakespeare or however you spell the name, are non-liter- ary and of a degrading character. It was in company with Richard Burbage and William Kempe that William Shakspere is first introduced to our notice as an actor. The treasurer's account shows that "Will Kemp, Will Shakspere, and Rich Burbage" received payment for two comedies played at Court on 26th and 28th December, 1594. They were all share-holding actors. But we do not known that all or either of them ap- peared before the Queen in person at any rate, a matter of no importance, because first, second and third-rate actors often played be- fore the Queen. The last reference made by the Burbages to Shakspere is contained in a memorial address to the Lord Chamberlain of his Majesty's household by Cuthbert Burbage, who gave an account of the building of the Globe Theatre, In this letter reference is made to William Shakspere. "To ourselves", he says, "we joined those deserving men, Shakspere, Hem- 120 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ings, Condall, Philips and others, partners in the profits of that they call the House" and he adds, "that when he and his brother Richard took possession of the Blackfriars Theatre in 1609, they placed in it men players which were Heming, Candall, Shakspere, etc., as successors to the children of the Chapel". This is the way the now reputed author of the immortal plays is described by the Bur- bages, the principal owners of the theatre, to whom the manscripts must have been sub- mitted. They surely must have known all 'about player Shakspere of Stratford-on- Avon for they were in daily intercourse with him, "a man-player, a deserving man". This is all that has come down to us concerning Shakspere's long association with the Bur- bages after twenty-five years of intimacy. This reference was made in 1635, nineteen years after player Shakspere's death (1616) and twelve years after the publication of the first folio edition of 1623. This then is Bur- bage's appraisement of this yoke-fellow, Will Shakspere. The fact is the Burbages hadn't any literary history of their "man-player and deserving man" to record, and were not per- sonally responsible for the literary delusion as- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 121 sociated with his name, although without an intention of mischief. But the tangibility of William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon is very much in evidence along pecuniary lines, especially as money lender, land owner, specu- lator, and litigant. In 1597 he bought New Place in Stratford for sixty pounds. Also mentioned in a letter of Abraham Sturley a purposing to buy the Stratford tithes. The following entry is in Chamberlain's account at Stratford, 1598: "Paid to Mr. Shaxpere for one lode of stone Xd". In the same year, Richard Quiney writes to William Shakspere, a letter for a loan of thirty or forty pounds. This letter is the only >ne addressed to Shakspere which is known to t. In 1599 Shakspere acquires shares in rlobe Theatre. "In May, 1602, Shakspere bought one hundred and seven acres of arable land at Stratford for three hundred two pounds (in his absence the conveyance was given to his brother Gilbert) in the same year he bought a house with barns, orchards and gardens from Hercules Underbill for sixty pounds, also a cottage close to his house at New Place. In 1605 he bought the thirty-two-year lease 122 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE of half Stratford tithes for four hundred and forty pounds. The same year, Augustine Phillips, a brother "player" leaves Shakspere a thirty shilling piece of gold in his will. "In 1613 Shakspere bought a house near Backfriars Theatre, London, for one hundred and forty pounds, and mortgaged it the next day for sixty pounds. In 1612, Shakspere is men- tioned in a law suit, brought before Lord El- lismere about Stratford tithes." There is no evidence to show that Shaks- pere ever visited Stratford from the time he left it (date not positively known, probably in 1 586) to the time he returned to it, the exact date unknown. We are constrained to be- lieve, however, that the father was in Strat- ford at the burial of his only son, Hamnet, claimed early by the covetous grave in his twelfth year, August llth, 1596, in whom for eleven years lay the hopes of primogenitive succession. The father set up no stone to tell where the boy lay. Stratford-on-Avon then contained about fourteen hundred inhabitants. "The most dirty, unseemly, ill-paved, wretched-looking town in all Britain", is David Garrick's un- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 123 sanitary description of Stratford at the time of the Jubilee, 1769. In Shakspere's day, cot- tages in Stratford consisted of rough walls and thatched roofs. Mr. Halliwell-Phillips says "at this period and for many generations aft- erwards, the sanitary conditions of Stratford- on-Avon were simply terrible. The streets were narrow, irregular and without crossways, full of refuse and lively with pigs, poultry and ravenous birds". I "From dirty illiterate Stratford", says Mr. ang, "we can expect nothing more and noth- ing better than we receive." But in Mr. Lang's statement, I find much to support my own opinion of the illiterate condition of Stratford in Shakspere's day. But I cannot share in his opinion in regard to the transmission of inherited traditions. For with notables it is by no means the case. The fact is, William Shakspere of Stratford did not at- tain to much histrionic eminence, and was al- ways a stranger to the avocations of political life. All those who were coetaneous did not regard him as a person of any consequence apart from his wealth. There is not the faint- est shadow of credited evidence to warrant the assumption that Shakspere at the time of his 124 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE retirement to Stratford-on-Avon was received by his fellow townsmen as a poet or man of genius. But instead in the very year of his return (inferentially) to his native place in 1611-1612, the Town Council had carried a resolution that no play should be presented in the Guild Hall. But what became of the family traditions? These surely would have been preserved by immemorial custom were he a person of note or distinction. Family tradition is fossil history. The amber in which the noblest achievements, the tenderest senti- ments have been securely embedded and pre- served. However, as a matter of fact, there were no inherited traditions of a literary kind to pre- serve; not a single particle of authenticated evidence to connect the family of the Stratford Shakspere with the author of the immortal plays and poems. But Mr. Lang is asking us to keep in mem- ory the fact that society in Stratford was not only not literary, but was terribly illiterate. Halliwell-Phillips says, "There were cer- tainly not more than two or three dozen books, if so many in the whole town". Reader, does it not jar you a little when THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 125 made to understand that New Place, the largest house in the town, the home of the wealthy William Shakspere, who in the prime of life was living with his illiterate wife and daughter in a bookless home and they with the now reputed author of Hamlet, Lear and Othello. It seemed to Prince Bismarck incredible that a person "so intimate with all the social courtesies and refinements of thought who had written what was attributed to Shakespeare could of his own free will, whilst still in the prime of life, have retired to such a place as Stratford-on-Avon, and lived there for years, cut off from intellectual society and out of touch with the world". And, we may add, without leaving in Stratford history or society a single trace of his existence as a poet or writer. From the absence of all reference to books in the will of 1616, it may be safely inferred that the Stratford Shakspere was not the owner >f books or manuscripts. But Warwickshire r as not altogether bookless, for we read that >ir Thomas Lucy in a will drawn up in the rear 1600, speaks of "all my French and talian books". In the will of John Florio, 126 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE we find bequeathed his English books and all his other goods to his beloved wife, Rose Florio. We also find that poets who are not inti- mately acquainted with the "cares of bread" were book owners, although not so wealthy as William Shakspere of Stratford; for 1627 is the date of William Drummond of Haw- thornden 1585 1649 munificient gift of about five hundred volumes to the library of Edin- burg University, although particularly rich in the English poets, only one from Shaks- peare's works, "Love's Labor Lost." Robert Burton, a contemporary, was the owner of a large library which he bequeathed to the Bodleian Library. Ben Jonson was also a great book lover, and the possessor of one of the largest private li- braries in England, although often depleted by his necessities, having sold them for bread. But there are still many copies of his books extant, which he presented to his friends. But neither Burton nor Jonson seem to have been the owners of a single volume of Shakspeare. This much we know, that in Tudor and Ja- cobin times, John (father), Mary (mother), Joan (sister), Judith (daughter) of William THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 127 Shakspere of illiterate Stratford-on-Avon, were all illiterate, and not a single fragment of his own letters, books or manuscripts have yet been discovered. Still, the upholders of the Stratford delusion claim for "him who sleeps by Avon" identification with the author of the immortal plays, although there is not a vestige of the literary remains of poet or author, nor has anything ever been discovered amongst the family effects of any of those who bore mari- tal relations. For instance, Shakspere's son-in-law, Dr. John Hall and Thomas Quiney, and there was also Thomas Nash and Sir John Barnard, first and second husband of his grand-daughter, Elizabeth Hall. All these were persons of education and property, and may be trusted to transmit Shakspere's letters, manuscripts, books and family literary traditions. But they have not done so, presumably because there was nothing of a literary character to preserve and transmit. How inexplicable if he was the author of the plays and poems. All through the seventeenth century, Joan Hart, the actor's sister and her descendants in- habited the birthplace, so-called from the time of his death (1616) to the year 1646, and his 128 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE younger daughter lived at Stratford-on-Avon until her death in 1661. Then there were Hathaways, who were memhers (inferentially) of his wife's family, residing in Chapel Street from 1647 to 1696; also his godson, William Walker, who died in the same town in 1680. The whole period covered by Shakspere's life and that of his descendants was 105 years from 1564 to 1669, or to the death of his grand-daughter Eliza- heth Hall. In kinship, she was cognate to her mother's father, William Shakspere, whose reputed authorship of poems and plays was not traditionally handed down by those to whom he gave lineal descent, or by any person or persons coetaneous with him for that matter in the village where he had lived the half of his life time. It may be feared, says Mr. Lang, that Shakspere's daughter, Judith (twin with Hamnet) "brought up in that very illiterate town of Stratford under an illiterate mother, was neglected in her education." Why, may we ask, did this very wealthy husband and father compel his wife and daughter to re- side in that very illiterate town of Stratford, instead of bringing them to London and ab- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 129 seating himself for so many years, thereby shirking all responsibility in the matter of the education of his children, leaving the dis- charge of every parental and social duty to the lonely wife and illiterate mother of his off- spring. Mr. Halliwell-Phillips, the most candid and therefore the most reliable orthodox Stratford relator has shown that "By the spring of 1602 at the latest, he had acquired a secure and definite competence, and yet eight years afterwards in 1610 he (Shakspere) is discovered playing in company with Burbage and Hammings at the Blackfriars Theatre, al- though very much ashamed of the actor's voca- tion, according to the upholders of the Strat- ford-Shakspere delusion. Then why not hike back to Stratford-on-Avon? Why longer re- main a "vagabond under the Act" which be- spoke for him an intense money-hunger, to say the least. "Shakspere's occupation", says Mr. Phil- lips, "debarred him from the possibility of his sustaining even an approach to a continu- ous domestic life" moonshine wherein did Shakspere's occupation differ from those of Alleyn, Hemming, Condall, Burbage and 130 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE other players like himself, share-holding ac- tors, who under precisely the same or very similar conditions sustained family or domes- tic relations in London. The former, Edward Alleyn, famous as an actor, and the founder of Dulwich College, who lived with his wife in London and called her "sweet mouse". The latter, Burbage, in the same place with the wife whom he made his sole executrix. Shakspere's abandonment of his wife and children was from choice, not from necessity. And implies the assumption that he was not an affectionate husband, a kind and loving father; who could not have mourned for his child whom he had not seen since his in- fancy, the son who could have no remem- brance of his father. Are we to believe that the author of the "Winter's Tale" and "Midsummer Nights Dream" actually divorced his own daughters from the socialities and refinements of London life, from the pursuit of knowledge under his immediate direction, from access to that great store house of learning, the immortal plays which contain the treasures of the rarest in- telligence, the children of his own brain THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 131 grace who wrote of Woman "tender as infancy and "Eyes that do mislead the morn". Hermione, Isabella, Juliet, Cordelia, Des- iemona, Perdita, Miranda, Helena, Imogen and Constance weeping for her lost son, Ar- thur, while grief "stuffs out his vacant gar- ments with his form". Glorious sisterhood e fairest, the sweetest bevy of women this orld of sadness, gladness, joy and tears has ver known in them; the true, the beautiful nd the good are born. V. Shakspere is thought to have been penurious :or his litigious striving point in that direc- tion, but this feature of his character was not iisclosed in 1596 and 1599 when he sought to lave his family enrolled among the gentry as lown by his extravagance in bribing the offi- :ers of the Herald College to issue a grant of .rms to his father, "a transaction which in- volved", says Dr. Farmer, "the falsehood and '/eriality of the father, the son and two Kings- it-arms, and did not escape protest, for if ever coat was cut from whole cloth, we may be jure that this coat-of-arms was the one". 132 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE William Shakspere himself was not in a position to apply for a coat-of-arms, "a vaga- bond under the Act" stood far too low in the social scale for the notice of heraldry. Sir William Dethick Garter King-at-arms is charged with unlawfully conceding arms to Shakspere and twenty-three other "base and ignoble persons". We know that the Strat- ford Shaksperes did not belong to the armi- gerous part of the population, and that they stood somewhat lower in the social scale than the Halls, Nashs, Bernards or Quineys who bore marital relations with them. Sir Sidney Lee in commentation on two re- cently discovered manuscript books, written Circa, 1599, he states, "The censors general allegation is that men of low birth and un- dignified employment were corruptly suffered by the heralds to credit themselves with noble or highly aristicratic descent, and to bear in considerations of large money payments coat armour of respectable antiquity." (LEE, A Life of Shakespeare). A long list of the surnames of these pre- tenders are given. The fourth name in the list is that of Shakspere. On June 5th, 1607, Dr. John Hall was mar- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKJSPERE 133 led at Stratfordon-Avon to William Shaks- >ere's eldest daughter, Susanna. He was an linent physician of the French Court school id was opposed to the indiscriminate process of bleeding. He was summoned more than once to attend the Earl and the Countess of Northampton at Ludlow Castle. Dr. John Hall died on November 25th, 1635. With the death of his only daughter, Elizabeth, in the year 1669-70-, terminated the lineal succession. On February 10th, 1616, Shakspere's ounger daughter, Judith, married Thomas Quiney, a liquor dealer of Stratford, four years her junior. They were married without a license, or proclaiming of the banns, an ir- regularity for which they were fined and threatened with excommunication by the ec- clesiastical court at Worcester. Quiney was fined in the year 1631 for "swearing and for encouraging tipplers in his shop" (groggery). In the year 1652, he removed to. London, having deserted his wife after the death of all their children. Judith survived her sister, sons and husband, although forsaken and alone, continued to live to the ripe age of seventy- seven. 134 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE From the Quiney family is a letter, the only letter addressed to Shakspere, which is known to exist, and is one which asks for a loan of thirty pounds. Even his learned kinsman, the Quineys, like the illiterate Shaksperes, saw him only hoarding money instead of writing plays. No wonder such eminent votarist of Shakespeare as Hallam Dyce and Emerson are disappointed and perplexed, for while the record concerning the life of the player, money lender, land owner speculator and liti- gant are ample, they disclose nothing of a lit- erary character, but the pecuniary litigation evidence, growing out of Shakspere's devotion to money getting in London and Stratford does unfold his true life and character, the records do not furnish a single instance of friendship, kindness or generousity, but upon the delinquent borrower of money, he rigidly evoked the law, which gave a generous ad- vantage to the creditor and its vile prison to the debtor. Shakspere with Shylock insistence in 1600 brough action against John Clayton for seven pounds and got judgment in his favor. In THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAK'SPERE 135 .ugust, 1608, Shakspere prosecuted John Ad- inbroke to recover a debt of six pounds. Dr. Charles William Wallace is querying the fact, "Did Shakespeare sell malt?" It was in 1604 that William Sexpere sued Philip Rogers to recover a balance of 35s. lOd. due for malt. But there seems to have been at least six other William Shaksperes living in Stratford and vicinity. Dr. Wallace is anx- ious to relieve William Shakspere, the Strat- ford actor, in whose opinion was the dra- matist, of the stigma on his name from his supposed connection with the brewing busi- ness, a degrading kind of activity. And it is creditable to Dr. Wallace that he strives to disassociate the name and fame of the Author of the Plays, from the liquor traffic. Al- though the most deeply rooted of all the vices of mankind from primeval ages, still among the most advanced communities, it is now in the course of extinction. In the opinion of Dr. Wallace, the docu- ment in the Stratford Court of Record does not apply to Shakspere, but to some un- known petty brewer or malster of Stratford, who was prosecuting Rogers for these pica- yunish debts for malt; because Shakspere 136 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE could not have been in both places, London and Stratford, at once. While Dr. Wallace sees exigency in Shakspere's affairs in the Rogers case, requiring his immediate personal attention, Halliwell-Phillips of the same school, sees nothing which required the pres- ence of the litigeous money lender or malster in Stratford. He says, "It must not be assumed that the great dramatist attended personally to these matters, although, of course, the proceedings were carried on under his instructions." Where we would write Shakspere (player), he uses "Shakespeare" and means the undi- vided personality of Author and Player. However, we are .not asked to believe Shakspere slipping out of London into Strat- ford, selling malt, then travel back to London to join the King's players, then shortly after- wards journey back again to Stratford in or- der to prosecute Rogers for these petty debts for malt. For the Addenbroke suit is actu- ally a presumption against such contention for "The precepts as appears from memoranda in the originals were issued by the poet's (player) cousin, Thomas Green, who was then THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 137 residing under some unknown conditions at New Place." While Shakespeare, the Author of the Plays was according to supposed date, writing "Coriolanus," we know and can prove that William Shakspere, the Stratford player was a professional money-lender at Stratford and London; the same William Shakspere who sued one John Clayton in March, 1600, at London to recover a debt of 7L. But was he the same Shakspere who sued Philip Rogers to recover a balance due for malt? And as to the stigma on his name referred to, is there anything to show in Shakspere's Stratford life or during his whole sojourn with the wigmaker Mountjoy in Silver Street, Lon- don, that he would have regarded the busi- ness of a small brewer or malster as a stigma on his name? For we find his name associated with at least two whiskey soaked traditions (so-called) and that one of the thirty grog- shops in Stratford was run by Shakspere's own son-in-law, Thomas Quiney, "who was fined for swearing, and for keeping a disorderly house." Mr. J. M. Robertson, a stalwart Stratford- ian, chides Mr. Andrew Lang of his own fel- 138 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE lowship, because he pronounced one William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon, a "hard creditor" and to his thinking, "Shakspere's four law suits to recover small debts are very inadequate proof of such a charge." The pres- ent writer is of the opinion that one such law suit of the like kind that William Shakepere u ran with" his neighbor, John Addenbroke adequate proof of such a charge, for is it conceivable that a rascally debtor even would suffer imprisonment in one of those jacobin cess pools called a jail, in order to shun the payment of a paltry sum. But, by the way, there is no proof that Shakspere even found one of his debtors dishonest. Now the pre- sumption is that the poor man was poverty stricken, unable to make both ends meet, for his hard and relentless creditor Shakspere, kept up the pursuit for one year until he left the town. A professional money lender or usurer, he never misses an opportunity to pur- sue an impoverished debtor into prison, di- vesting him of the ability to maintain himself and his family. "The pursuit of an improver- ished man for the sake of imprisoning him and depriving him, both of the power of paying his debts and supporting his family, grate THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERB ipon our feelings," says Richard Grant White, ind adds this eminent orthodox Shakspearian ;cholar, "We hunger and we receive these lusks; we open our mouths for food and we )reak our teeth against these stones." We may be sure that there was left in the mpoverished home of the debtor, little more palatable than husks and stones when the : ather fled to escape from the clutches of his nsistent creditor (Shakspere) while his chil- Iren are clamorous for bread, the wolf of lunger from every crevice glaring. Contrast these scenes in the life of William Shakspere with the restoration of the widow's on by Abraham Lincoln. Poorly clad ind weeping, she said to him, "Mr. President, [ had three sons and a husband in the army. Vly husband has just been killed and I come o ask back my oldest boy." He granted the equest. She took the order, went to the field, )nly to see that oldest son die from his wounds. She went again to the President with the state- nent of the facts by the surgeon. Mr. Lincoln ead the backing on the order, and said, "I enow what you want, you need not ask for it. [ will give you your next son," saying as he vrote, "you have one and I have one, that is 140 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE about right." The poor woman standing by him smoothed his hair with her hands, saying, while her tears fell upon his head, "God bless you, Mr. President, may you live a thousand years and be the head of this great nation." Ever the same in the White House, as he had been in the log cabin, Abraham Lincoln's cal- loused palms never slipped from the poor man's hand. In contrast also, some letters to Edward Al- leyn, which have been preserved, prove that Thomas Dekker, playwright, was several times befriended by that open-handed actor, the "famous Ned Allen." He appears to have had no relations with Shakspere, the Strat- ford player. The paltry suits brought to recover debts do not tend to disclose this Shakspere's "radi- ant Temperament" or fit him to receive the adjective "gentle" except in contumely for his claim to coat-armour. It is not known that Shakspere ever gave hospitality to the neces- sities of the poor of his native shire, for whom it appears there beat no pulse of tenderness. A man of scanty sensibilities he must have been. The poor working people of Stratford, we may be sure, shed no tear at this Shaks- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 141 :re's departure from the world. We do not mvy the man who can regard these harsh pe- :uniary practices in Shakspere as commend- ible traits of his worldly wisdom, for he was hrewd in money matters, and could have in- Bested his money in London and Stratford, so is not to have brought sorrow and distress ipon his poor neighbors. These matters are small in appearance, but hey suggest a good deal for they bear witness sorrow stricken mothers, hungry children ind fathers in loathsome prisons, powerless to )rovide food, warmth and light for the home. >hakspere's loans became a matter of court ecord only when his debtors failed to pay. The diary or note book of Philip Henslowe, he theatrical manager and play broker, shows hat Henslowe was himself a very penurious md grasping man, who taking advantage of tarving play makers' necessities, became very vealthy. William Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon as 1 sharer "in the profits of that they call the ^ouse" became rich also, but his note book las not been preserved, so nothing is known )f his business methods in dealing with the >oor play makers, but the antiquarians by ran- 142 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE sacking corporations records and other public archives have proven that player Shakspere was very much such a man as the old pawn- broker and play broker, Philip Henslowe, of a rival house. The biographers should record these facts, and not strive to shun them for the literary antiquaries have unearthed and brought them forward, and they tell the true story of Shaks- pere's life, though we do not linger lovingly over them, for like Hallam, "We as little feel the power of identifying the young man who came up from Stratford, was afterward an indifferent player in a London theatre, and retired to his native place in middle life with the author of Macbeth and Lear/' For the Stratford records are as barren of literary mat- ter as the lodgings in Silver Street, London. Not a crumb for the literary biographer in either place. One of the results of Dr. Charles W. Wal- lace's research in the Public Record Office is the new Shakspere signature attached to his deposition in an abbreviated form, and shows how the Stratford player spelled the first syllable of his surname, "Willm Shaks" or "Shak'p" is not Shake Shakspere-Shaksper- Shaks THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAK'SPERE 143 lhaks, this is the spelling of his name and there are no exceptions in his autograph. Nevertheless the Stratfordians usually reject the spelling of the owner of the name and adopt the spelling printed on the title page of the plays and poems, "Shakespeare" (a pseudonym), to indicate that the Stratford player, in the opinion of the Stratfornians was the author of the plays. Furthermore, Dr. C. W. Wallace had the good fortune in his research to discover the whereabouts of this certain individual, who in 1612, signs himself "Willm Shaks" or Shak'p and has succeeded in locating his lodgings in 1604 at the house of one Mountjoy, a wigmaker, at the corner of Muggell and Silver Streets, London, as "one Mr. Shakes- peare that lay in the house," and who lodged there from 1598 to 1604. How much longer he continued to sojourn in Silver Street, "the region of money and a good seat for an usurer," as Ben Jonson describes it, is uncer- tain; but he seems to have known the wig- maker's family about thirteen years, exceeding in number the years he had lived with his own family. (See Dr. Charles William Wallace's article, "New Shakespeare Discoveries," 144 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE Harper's Monthly Magazine for March, 1910). However, Dr. Wallace has brought forth from obsurity one "Mr. Shakespeare," who in 1604, succeeded in securing a husband for the daughter of a match-making mamma, but absolutely nothing whatever relating to liter- ary work. From the fact that he (Shakspere) is dis- covered at the corner of Muggell and Silver Streets, bringing about a marriage in 1604, the supposed date of "Othello," it cannot be assumed that he wrote the play here or else- where, as there is not a crumb of evidence in proof. Dr. C. W. Wallace has failed to discover Shakspere, the Stratford player as an author. The witnesses in their deposition speak of him as "one Mr. Shakespeare," never as poet or author. The witnesses were persons of various employments and varied accomplishments, from the scholarly Daniel Nicholas, son of a former Lord Mayor, to the illiterate Joan Johnson, who like the Stratford player's wife and daughter, could not write her name. All of them, near neighbors, saw nothing in one, "Mr. Shakespeare," who had lodgings in the THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 145 wig-maker's house and shop in 1604-1612, which distinguished him from the throng. Prima-facie evidence that he never had any literary celebrity and one of many proofs also of his fictitious reputation. For when the twelve depositions were taken in the case of Bellott vs. Mountjoy, and signed by his neigh- bors of the parish of St. Olave in 1612, all of the "Shakespeare" plays were then written, according to supposed dates. The Stratford player had then protracted his sojourn in London to twenty-six years, dur- ing which time there came into his life, as the ;sult of a quarrel, an incident of the com- lonest kind trifles which reveal the true :haracter of the Stratford player and pro- :laim him as one affiliated to insignificant men ind matters. These non-literary facts were unearthed by 'rofessor Charles William Wallace in the tatter of Shakspere's deposition in the case >f Bellott vs. Mountjoy, and which he dis- :overed in the Public Record Office, but that in no way contributed to a literary biography. The truth is that with all their industry, the Antiquarians have in this regard, not brought to light a single proven fact to sustain the 146 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE claim that this William Shakspere, the Strat- ford actor was the author of either poems or plays. This wee bit of new knowledge gives us a glimpse of one William Shakspere as an eva- sive witness, having a conveniently short memory. The depositions disclose his inter- mediation in the matter of making two hearts happy, but not the faintest glimpse of the au- thor of poems or plays. When the claim of authorship is challenged, new particulars of the life of Shakspere, such as this and others which have been unearthed by antiquarians, whether in the Public Record Office or Cor- poration Archives are alike worthless as far as establishing the Author- Poet, Shakespeare's identity, or any connection between Player and Playwright. There are no family traditions, no books or manuscripts; there are no letters addressed to him known to exist, but the letter in which Richard Quiney asked him for a loan of money, or by him to poet, peer or peasant. The credible evidence supplied by contem- poraneous and antiquarian research, does not identify player and householder of Stratford , t THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 147 ; Hamlet," "Lear" and with the author of "Othello." While on this subject the reader's indul- gence is requested a little longer. Dr. Charles Wallace, in rummaging the Public Rec- archives, searching through musty docu- icnts which belong to the Court of Requests, found one case at court in which Shakspere is involved. "There are twenty-six documents in the case, nine mention Shakespeare by name. In the entire list his name occurs twenty-four times. One is his own deposition signed by his own hand" (in all probability). The body of the signed deposition is not in the hand writing of the deponent, who is described by the clerk as "William Shakes- peare of Stratford upon Avon in the Countye of Warwicke gentleman," who when required to "perfect and subscribe his deposition," does not recognize that form of the name but signs himself "Willm Shak'p." In these depositions, according to Dr. C. W. Wallace, "we have for the first time met Shakespeare (Shakspere) in the flesh and that the acquaintance is good." How so? Would you care to become acquainted with a man, who as intermediary, lured by persuasion a 148 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE poor young man into marriage, and then when summoned to be his star witness played for- getter? Young Bellott swallowed the bait of promised dower "they (wear) made suer by Mr. Shakespeare and agreed to marrye." Furthermore, Dr. Wallace tells us, out of the new evidence on Shakspere now before us, that the family with whom Shakspere lived was named Mountjoy. They were French, doubtless refugee Hugenots. The Mountjoy home was situated at the corner of Silver and Mugwell Streets, London, where Christopher Mountjoy was engaged in the making of head- dresses and wigs, assisted by one Stephen Bel- lott, an apprentice; also by the master's daugh- ter and only child, Mary, who was a dabster in that art. From the records in the present case at court, in which Shakspere is involved, and which Dr. Wallace has unearthed in the Pub- lic Record Office, we read that "Madam Mountjoy told Shakespeare that if he could bring the young man, Stephen Bellott, to make a proposal of marriage, a dower should be settled upon them at marriage." This was the snug sum of fifty pounds in money of that THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 149 r, or approximately four hundred pounds, icarly $2000, in money of today." Shakspere was then living in the Mountjoy lome house and shop under one roof. "So went to Stephen Bellott, then at the end if his sixth year of apprenticeship, and told tim if he would make the offer of marriage lere was good hope that Mary would accept >nd the old folks (shall promise to give) with the" daughter a dowry of fifty pounds on the [ay of marriage." Daniel Nicholas, a near neighbor, testifies: "]VJr. Shakespeare had told him they should have a sum of money for portion from the father. They were made iure of this by Mr. Shakespeare by giving their consent and agreeing to marry, so he (Bellott) and the membefs of the family had several conferences concerning the marriage. Shakspere was present at some of these con- ferences, according to his own testimony. All letails were arranged and the marriage was solemnized November 19th, 1604." But disputes in families are as common as California poppies in April. In 1612, trouble with Mountjoy and his son- in-law took Shakspere as witness into court, 'here we are told by what acts Shakspere got 150 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE into the case. No one would now have dreamed, as we shall see presently, of making such a shifty fellow as William Shakspere wit- ness in the further examination, after his answer to the fourth question in behalf of Bellott's set of interrogatories, when ex- amined in court May 7th, 1612. For the de- positions of the near neighbors as well as his own, prove how elusive and unreliable was his testimony. He cannot remember any of the important details concerning the dower promised, the talk had with Mountjoy, "that the defendant (Mountjoy) promised to give the said complainant (Bellott) a portion in money with Mary, his daughter, but what cer- tain portion, he (Shakspere) remembereth not nor when to be paid." On June 19th the court ordered the further examination. "The question of chief concern to the parties involved and to the court, was what promises of dower did Shakspere, as in- termediary, make. Witnesses were again sum- moned, chief of whom was Shakspere," who was summoned (inferentially) for the sole purpose of retrieving a lost memory. But notwithstanding, the plaintiff, who had Shakspere summoned to answer the first set THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 151 if questions, May 7th, refused through his Lttorney, to have him summoned to answer the xond set of questions which had been pre- >ared for him on June 19th. "For the rec- irds show no summons issued to him and his lame does not appear in the court list of wit- lesses for Bellott on that day. But the plain- tiff (Bellott) was constrained to call in his >wn behalf other witnesses to prove what ihakspere had said to them concerning the lower promised and the talk had with Mount- |oy." "A fearful example of hearsay evi- lence," says Sir George G. Greenwood. Daniel Nicholas is again summoned as a itness to show that Shakspere harbored no :orgetfulness when he talked with him about the promised dower, for he had also in like lanner talked over the question of dower in the presence of Joan Johnson and William laton, as they both testify. In the third and fourth interrogatory the r itness shows unmistakably that Bellott was the victim of connubiality through the inter- lediation of one Mr. Shakespeare. This view :ems to have been entertained by the court. "or "on June 3rd, the court issued an unusual rder referring the whole matter at variance 152 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE to the French Church (Hugenots) of London and making the decision there the final decree of the court." The Church (Hugenots) de- cided in Bellott's favor. Daniel Nicholas, a near neighbor, in his de- position, discloses the fact that Bellott was suspicious of Shakspere, fearful that he may be influenced by the old man's (wigmaker) money bags, for he asked Daniel Nicholas, son of Ambrose Nicholas, former Lor Mayor, "to go to Shakespeare (Shakspere), with his wife and find out what it was tha the defendant (Mountjoy) had promised t give his daughter if she married with th plaintiff (Bellott)". Bellott takes this precaution before he su his father-in-law for the recovery of the su promised at the time of marriage. Daniel Nicholas avers "that he did go to Shaksper and that Shakspere of Stratford, but sojourne with the wigmaker, told him that the defend- ant had promised the plaintiff fifty pounds or thereabouts with his daughter." But whe Shakspere was summoned he had forgotten or pretended to forget the sum which the de- fendant, Mountjoy, promised to give hi daughter. THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 153 The first French Church in London was es- tablished in 1550. Churches were subse- quently founded by successive emigrations. The Edict of Nantes was revoked on the 22nd of October, 1685. It is estimated that nearly eighty thousand French Hugenots established themselves in England during the ten years which preceded and followed the Revocation, and about one-third of them settled in Lon- don. They carried with them the arts by which they had enriched their own country. These refugee people, having a strong feeling of fraternity, were disposed to cling together. They were forbidden to carry their fortunes abroad, but they came to uphold the suprem- acy of conscience and there was ultimately an ilmost absolute fusion, both of race and name. This disposes of the Reverend Richard 'avis' assertion in 1708, ninety- two years after hakspere of Stratford's death, that he "dyed Papist." It is clear that the Stratford player :ould not have been a Catholic, but the ques- tion still remains what was the religious faith f the author of the Plays? Dr. Wallace says, "the fact that Shakspere ind Wilkins are associated as witnesses in this :ase is highly suggestive, and thinks 'Shakes- 154 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE peare' as a pseudonym would be difficult t< explain how he and Wilkins were intereste< in this suit." Dr. Wallace means the undi- vided personality of player and playwright and always uses the word "Shakespeare." In looking the matter through we fin< nothing that is highly suggestive and difficult to explain, save to those only who stand fast in the Stratfordian faith, which identifies the Player with the Playwright. We fail to see why "one Mr. Shakespean tlrat lay in the house" boarded there an< George Wilkins, victualer, should not both be come interested in this suit in behalf of youn< Bellott. One George Wilkins, an inn-keeper, where Bellott and his wife "came to dwell ii one of his chambers," and "one Mr. Shakes- peare, as intermediary in making two hearl happy." Wilkins, in his deposition, gave hii occupation as an Inn-keeper. There is no dif- ficulty about the matter, and nothing to ex- plain, except that here the dispute about th< name involve? a dispute about the man. L there anything presumptuous in our conten- tion that when the author of "Venus an< Adonis" signed the dedication to the Earl o1 Southampton with the name "Shakespeare/ h< adopt THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 155 adopted as a pseudonym the militant form of the name which the Stratford Player never made use of? Stephen Bellott in 1605, after having quar- relled with his father-in-law, who then com- pelled him to go in search of rooms to let, oc- cupied a chamber with one George Wilkins. That Shakspere, in his deposition, did not give his business is a matter of regret. What a pity! On May 7th, 1612, the court issued a peremptory summons to William Shakspere and George Wilkins, in behalf of Bellott, to answer questions prepared for them. The only question of importance before the court was what promise of dower did Shakspere, as intermediary, make. Shakspere failed to satisfy the court in his answer against the fourth question, the essential cause of action, the gist of the issue. The testimony of George Wilkins was not of importance, having ref- erence only to the value of a few household goods, "and to the fact that Bellott and wife, after leaving their father in 1605, came to dwell in one of his chambers." We have known nothing about Wilkins per- sonally before, and know nothing about him 156 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE now, except that he was a victualer and inn- keeper, having a license to sell alcoholic liquors. The conjecture of Delius that 'Shak< peare" (the author's pen name), and Wilkins, a had-i writer for the stage, wrote two plays together is mere guesswork. For this state- ment we have no basis of proof. Granting the collaboration of the play- wrights does not connect the Stratford Player (Shakspere), "one Mr. Shakespeare," with literary works or with acts of dramatic com- position. Neither does it give so much as a basis for presumption, much less proof of identification of the Stratford player with the playwright, or any bearing with the pseudony- mous literature produced under a fictitious name "Shakespeare." Dr. Wallace holds our inquisitive attention when he asserts that these documents in the case of Bellott vs. Mountjoy, confirm him (Shakspere) as being the author of the Plays that bear the name "Shakespeare." The truth is that all the documentary evidence unearthed by Dr. Wallace tends to show that the Strat- ford player was unknown in literary circles. What fact or facts confirm him the Strat- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 157 ford actor, Shakspere, as being the author of [e Plays called "Shakespeare"? However, with the Professor, it would seem hen dealing with Shakespeare, no proposi- tion is too absurd to be believed, for he asserts that Shakespeare "honours his host by raising him in the play (Henry V) to the dignity of a French Herald under his own name of Mountjoy." Whereas, in truth and in fact, the imper- sonal and official name of a French Herald "Mountjoy" is contained in Holinshed, where fe author of Henry V found it. The Chronicles were published in 1577, twenty-one years before "one Mr. Shakespeare that lay in the house" (lived there), with a French wig-maker, one Mountjoy in Silver Ptreet. The embarrassed Stratfordians have long been seeking for some explanation of the chief source of William Shakspere's wealth, and now after more than three hundred years, Dr. Charles W. Wallace discovers William Shakspere of Stratford in Silver Street, Lon- don, "the region of money, a good seat for an userer" as Ben Jonson described it in "The Staple of News." 158 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE 1604, the year of Shakspere's match-mak- ing intermediation, was also the year of the famous actor, Ned Alleyn's last recorded ap- pearance on the stage, he having secured the post of master of the rayol game of bears, bulls and mastiffs, of the bating house at Paris Garden in Southwark. This was doubtless the chief source of Alleyn's great wealth, as interest-mongering in Silver Street, London, one of the centers in which speculative en- terprises were conducted was in all proba- bility the chief source of the Stratford actor's (Shakspere's) wealth. (The usurious Shak- spere practicing usury when the lending at in- terest was accociated with cruelty and was branded as immoral). To link the interest-monger's name and pei sonality with that of the author of the Plays is to debase our conception of the writer of that fadeless and imperishable drama, "The Mer- chant of Venice." After reading all the evidence in the case submitted by Dr. Wallace, we are convinced that Shakspere's statement before the Court of Requests was evasive and shifty, for his own deposition is a strong confirmation of the truth THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 159 of our assertion. "He gave himself so bad a character in it.' tDr. Charles William Wallace, by never-tir- ig industry and indomitable energy, assisted by the gracious Lady, his wife, has examined "some million" of documents in the Public Record Office, London. Although I cannot agree with Dr. Wallace n all his inferences with respect to Shakspere of Stratford, nevertheless I gladly accord him due praise. The foregoing facts, the legal and municipal evidence bound up in dusty records, a bogus coat-of-arms and a rude epitaph, tell the true story of the life of William Shakspere of Strat- ford-on-Avon. There is no record of any pretended living likeness of Shakspere better representing him tan the Stratford bust. This bust is erected the north side of the wall of Holy Trinity 'hurch at Stratford-on-Avon. On the floor )f the chancel, in front of the monument, are te graves of Shakspere and a portion of his lily his father, mother, youngest daughter id son lie in unmarked graves. We have no leans of ascertaining when the monument and >ust were erected. 160 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE The first folio edition of his reputed works was published in 1623. It contained words from Leonard Diggs prefatory lines: "And time dissolves thy Stratford monument," monument being used interchangeably witl tomb, but these words do not prove that th< bust was set up before 1623. It is the bladder-like expression in the physiognomy of the image which drew the ex clamation, "that never wrote this," from great artist standing before it and looking u] at Shakspere's bust, with an open volume o1 Shakespeare's works in hand. His image wa< rudely cut, sensual and clownish in appear- ance. England was called in those days "Th< Toper's Paradise," and tradition (so-called) informs us that Shakspere was one of the Bed- ford topers. However, we should not info from this that William Shakspere, a shewc man of business, was a drunken sot, although from his retirement or withdrawal from the- aterian activity, he may have "drunk too hard." Now we have no basis for proof, only a pre- sumption that this is the reason why Dr. John Hall, Shakspere's son-in-law, made no men- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERB 161 tion of his father-in-law's death in his book of "Cures" in the restrospect as in the case of his wife. In Shakspere's time Stratford contained thirty grog-shops. The diary of Thomas Greene, (Shakspere's cousin) contains nothing on the subject of his kinsman's death, per- haps he also was ashamed of the manner of it. But it may jar the reader when told that the diarist has nothing to say about cousin Shaks- pere's poems and plays. He did not seem to ;gard him as an author or person of much >nsequence. The new information found in the Public .ecord Office by Dr. Wallace, suggests an lendment to the gossipy, commonplace book :ompiled in 1662 by the Rev. John Ward. He ills the story, forty-six years after date, of : the merrie meeting" at the carousing board >f Shakspere, Drayton and Ben Jonson, and it seems "drank too hard for Shakspere died f a fevor then contracted." Evidently the Vicar of Stratford did not ;now enough about the external life of the idividual man, Shakspere, to amend the local jossip for the sake of credibility and the in- lerent likelihood of the alleged facts. It 162 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE could not have been for the convenience and accommodation of Michael Drayton and Ben Jonson who must take a three days' journe] to Stratford, through mud and mire, ovei roads infested with highwaymen, merely ii order to sacrifice at the shrine of Bacchus when they could have had their swill in Lon- don at the public house kept by George Wil- kins, of the parish of St. Sepulchres. The Wilkins travern would have beei chosen doubtless by the bibacious Ben foi convenience and time saving, for he was han at work bringing forth the great folio 161' edition of his works. "We have known noth ing about Wilkins individually" before his deposition in the case of Bellott vs. Mountjo] was found by Dr. Wallace in the Public Rec- ord Office. But his vocation as inn-keeper, hav- ing a license to sell alcoholic liquors, mak< it highly probable that he was a votary oi Bacchus. However, the inventor of the yan could have known but very little of the ex- ternal life of Michael Drayton, always as "sober as a judge," decorous and undefiled, and could hardly have been a member of a Scottish party. There is not a hint from Ben Jonson, in conversation with Drummond THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 163 Hawthornden in 1618-19, of his "having tad a merry meeting in 1616." So soon after the great fire of 1614 when a large part of Stratford lay in ashes. At this time, be it remembered, Silver Street and vicinity, the region Shakspere chose for residence, swarmed with French refu- gees, Hugenots. Some of them, perhaps, met Shakspere, the Stratford player, with his money bags, and found him holding with Shy- lock insistence to the letter of the law, "al- though the taking of interest was at that time regarded as forbidden to a Christian." , There is not a tittle of evidence adduced to show that a knowledge of Shakspere's puta- tive authorship of poems and plays was cur- rent at Stratford, when the first folio edition of his reputed works was published in 1623. The records attest that Shakspere's fame re- putatively as writer, is posterior to this event. How strange it must seem to those who claim for Shakspere an established reputation as poet and dramatist of repute, anterior to the first folio edition in 1623, that Dr. John Hall him- self an author, and most advantaged of all the heirs by Shakspere's death, should fail to 164 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE mention his father-in-law in his "cure book" or "Observations." The earliest dated cure is 1617, the year fol- lowing Shakspere's death, but there are un- dated ones. In "Obs. XIX," Dr. Hall men- tions without date, an illness of his wife, Mrs. Hall, and we find him making a note long afterwards in reference to his only daughter, Elizabeth, who was saved by her father's skill and patience. "Thus was she delivered from death and deadly diseases, and was well for many years." The illness of Michael Drayton is recorded without date in "Obs. XXII" with its wee bit of a literary biography and he is referred to as "Mr. Drayton, an excellent poet." Had Shakspere received a like mention as a poet or writer by one who knew him so intimately, what a delicious morsel it would have been to all those who have followed the literary anti- quarian through the dreary barren waste of Shakespearean research. We have found nothing but husks, and these eulogists of Shakespeare Hallam and Emerson refuse to crounch. For more than three centuries, the Stratford archives have contained all matters concerning THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 165 :spere's life and character, and have given full knowledge of the man. Nothing has Deen lost seemingly but of his alleged literary L ife, there is not a crumb; no family traditions, 10 books, no manuscripts, no letters, no com- nendatory poems, plays, masques or antha- gy- The biographers of William Shakspere of 3tratford-on-Avon have none of the material )ut of which poets and dramatists are made, Dut only those facts which are congruous with noney lenders, land speculators, play brokers, ictors and public land sharks. Also a good assortment of apocryphal stories and gossipy farns, which have become traditional cur- rency. Not having found the slightest trace of Shakespeare in 1592, as writer of plays, or as idapter or elabtorator of other men's work, except conjecturally, his advent into literature nust have been at a later date, if at all. In 159.S " Venus and Adonis" appeared in print with a dedication to Lord Southampton and signed "William Shakespeare." Bear in mind hat the dedicator of a book need not in those days to be its author. In 1594 appeared another poem "Lucrece" 166 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE also with a dedication to Lord Southampton. The poems bore no name of an author on the title page. Here is literary tangibility, but does it establish the identity of their author, or attest the responsibility of the young Strat- ford man for the poems which were published under the name of "Shakespeare?" This was the first mention of the now famous name. Was it a pseudonym or was it the true name of the author of the poems? Every person of fair erudition and common sense has a right to his own opinion, but the present writer can see no strong and valid evidence of any per- sonal connection with the Stratford Shakspere in the works called Shakspearean, which were produced in the main, under a fictitious name, and should be characterized as our greatest anonymous and pseudonymous literature. Furthermore, the enthusiastic reception of the poems awakens a suspicion when we learn that their popularity was due to a belief in their lasciviency, and that the dedicate" was the dissolute self-willed Henry Wriothesley, third Earle of Southampton, and that the name of the dedicator "Shakespeare" was one of a class of nick-names which in 1593 still re- THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 167 ined in some measure that which was deri- r e in them. A student of Merton College, Oxford, :hanged his own name of Hugh Shakspere nto Saunders, because he considered it too expressive and distinctive of rough manners, md significant of degradation and as such was anwilling to aid in its hereditary trasmission, when all that is derisive in the name Shaks- pere vile reputation remained fixed and fos- silized in the old meaning. Primarily the lame has no militant signification. Sir Sidney Lee admits that the Earle of Southampton is the only patron of Shakes- peare that is known to biographical research (p. 126). By what fact or facts, may we ask, is the authenticity of the Earle' friendship or patronage attested? Southampton was the standing patron of all the poets, the stock dedi- catee of those days. It was the fashion of the times to pester him with dedications by poets, grave and gay. They were after a piece of money, five or six pounds which custom con- strained his Lordship to yield for having his name enshrined in poet's lines. Almost all the poets of that age were de- pendents, and there is, with few exceptions, 168 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE the same display of Pharisaic sycopyhan< greediness, and on the part of dedicatee, an in- ordinate desire for adulation. Every student of Elizabethan literature and history should known that the so-called Southampton-Shakes- peare friendship cannot be traced biographi- 'cally. The Earle of Southampton was a volu- minous correspondent, but did not bear wit- ness to his friendship for Shakespeare. A scrutinous inspection of Southampton papers contained in the archives of his family descendants and contemporaries, yields noth- ing in support of the contention that South- ampton's friendship or patronage is known to biographical research! and it is as attestative as that other apocryphal story out of the sup- posable mouth of Sir William D'Avenant and preserved by Nicholas Rowe, that my Lord Southampton at one time gave him (Shaks- pere) "a thousand pounds to enable him to go through with a purchase which he heard he had a mind to." D'Avenant gave out that he was a son of Shakspere. One thousand pounds in 1596 was equal to at least twenty thousand dollars today. The magnitude of the gift discredits the story, nevertheless, the startled Rowe is the first to make it current, THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 169 3ut does not give his readers the ground for lis assurance. Be it what it may, he could lardly satisfy the modern reader that this man (D'Avenant) a son, who insinuatingly defiles :he name and fair fame of his own mother, s a credible witness, for in degrading his nother, "he did but annul the legitimacy of lis own birth." The truth is, the social rules of Tudor and facobin times did not permit peer and peasant o live on terms of mutual good feeling. In :hose times they had a summary way of deal- ng with humble citizens. A nobleman to /indicat; rank, brought an action in the Star Chamber against a person who had orally iddressed him as Goodman. Morley, Chap- nan and Jonson were imprisoned for having lispleased the King by a jest in a play "East- vard Ho," all on account of John Marston's ocularity, who was associated with them, and >f the arbitrary attitude of the crown. The literati of those days found in scholas- ic learning neither potency nor promise to abrogate class distinction by giving a passport o high attainment in literature, science, poetry md high art. Ben Jonson says, "The time was vlicn men were had in price for learning, now 170 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE letters only make men vile. He is unbraid- ingly called a poet, as if it was a contemptible nickname." Edmund Spencer endeavored to propitiate Lord Burleigh, minister of state, by offering an apology for being a poet. Thus we are made acquainted with the socialities of every- day life in that "long gone time" and also how little some persons know who write books to uphold the Stratford delusion, more especially when they assert that such men as the Earl of Essex, the Earl of Southampton and Sir Wal- ter Raleigh were Shakspere's intimate ac- quaintances. But we are on safe ground when we claim for him yoke fellowship with the actors, for Shakspere's will attests the fact that Burbage, Heming and Condell were his yoke mates. "I give and bequeath to my fellows, John Heming, Richard Burbage and Henry Cun- dell, twenty-six shillings, eight pense apiece to buy them rings." Ben Jonson and the poets were not remem- bered in Shakspere's will. Why? But according to the upholders of the Strat- ford Faith, Shakspere in his life time is made to associate with Drayton and Ben Jonson, by THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 171 r hat Mr. Phillips calls "a late but appar- itly genuine tradition," who in the fullness >f their desire to discover Shakspere, the itratford actor in affiliation with poets, make the subject of their memoir die from the ef- fcts of a drunken carousal. Sir Henry Irving in his address at the Uni- versity of Oxford, says, "Richard Burbage was the first great actor that England ever saw, (and adds) unfortunately, we have no record of the intercourse between Shakspere and Bur- bage. But there must have existed a close friendship. We differ with the learned Thespian, for fortunately or unfortunately, we have a wee little record of the intercourse be- tween Shakspere and Burbage. The only story recorded during player Shakspere's life time and is contained in the note book of the Eng- lish Barrister, John Maningham, a student of the Legal Inn. It savors strongly of the tavern, criminating player Shakspere's morals the transcription of which would sully these pages. The barrister had made an entry in his note book. 2 February of the same year 1601, giving a brief abstract of a play which he had witnessed, called "Twelve Night," ind in recording the story six weeks later, fails 172 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE to confirm the players identification with the author of "Twelfth Night." "Love's Labor Lost" was performed at the house of the Earl of Southampton for the amusement of Anna of Denmark in 1604, but Burbage alone is mentioned. No coupling of the names of Southampton and Shakspere as a testimony of their friendship. Sir Walter Cope had spent a whole morning in hunting for "players, jugglers and such kind of crea- tures" as Sir Walter styles them in writing to Lord Cramborne. Sir Sidney Lee tells us that "the state papers and business correspondence of Southampton were enlivened by references to his literary interest and his sympathy with the birth of English drama." (p. 382). However, the Southampton papers and let- ters contain no reference to Shakespeare. There is nothing to show that he was ac- quainted with the author of the plays or the Stratford player, notwithstanding he was pres- ent at the performance of "The Comedy of Er- rors" at Grays Inn in 1594, when the Stratford player Shakspeare was an acting member of the "company of base and common fellows." Southampton zest for the drama is based on the statement contained in the "Sidney THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 173 'apers" 1599. "My Lord Southampton and >rd Rutland come not to the court. The one >th but very seldom they pass away the tyme London merely in going to plays every day." "When a new library for his old college, St. ohns, was in course of construction, South- ampton collected books to the value of three hundred and sixty pounds wherewith to fur- nish it." However, Southampton's literary tastes and sympathy with the drama cannot be drawn from his gift to the library, for it con- sisted largely of legends of the saints and me- diaeval chronicles. Manifestly this is the way the Earl cherished his passion for literature during the closing years of his life. Had the benefaction contained but one Shakespeare play, it would now be more highly prized by the authorities of the University on the river Cam than all this mediaeval lore, which may still be seen on the shelves of the College li- brary. And, furthermore, this would be some proof of the fascination the drama had for Southampton, and serve in some slight meas- ure to rescue the reputed Southampton Shakes- peare friendship and patronage from limbo. When and where did Shakespeare acknowl- 174 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE edge his obligations to the only patron of the dramatist, according to Sir Sidney Lee, who is known to biographical research, not one of the Shakespeare plays was dedicated to Southampton. The name Shakespeare is con- spicuously absent from among the distin- guished writers of his day. Who in panegyrical speech and song ac- claimed Southampton's release from prison in 1603? Sir Sidney Lee says, "Every note in the scale of adulation was sounded in South- ampton's honor in contemporary prose and verse." That is true for every hungry weary Willy (poet) of the Muse is repre- sented in "the scale of adulation." And Sir Sidney Lee has excerpted many lines from the poets in proof of Southampton's literary pre- delictions. But not a single line from Shakes- peare. Why? Because there is nothing cap- able of being extracted. Still we find this earnest Stratfordian en- gaged in an effort to unmask Peer and Poet in (No. CVII) of the enigmatical "Shake- Speare Sonnets." Tom Nash makes a bid for the Earl's patronage in the hope of making money, as he admitted, in those days, literary men died of hunger. However, his note in the THE MAN, WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 175 leak of adulation" is contained in a coarse love poem, dedicated to Southampton. "A lew brain he vociferates, a new soul will I get ne to canonize your name to posterity." In :he same absurd fashion, Nash adulated Sir Philip Sidney, "the least syllable of whose lame sounded in the ears of judgment is able :o give the meanest line he writes a dowry of mmortality." In an adulatory sonnet, Barnabe Barns tells is that Southampton "hand is thrice sacred md his eyes, those heavenly lamps which give he Muses light that holy fire- But Gervase Markham sounded a blasphe- nous note when he asserted that Southamp- on's sweet voice hushed the music of the Spheres" and delighted the ear of Almighty id." The Tragicall Hiftorie of HAMLET Prince of Denmarke. ' & f tiffM tfiiiC i Enter two cntttlt. \ ^-^-, / r ,* < ( 5 1 . O Tand : who is tfeat? 2. OTn.1. 1 . _O you-cotac raofl carefully vpon your watch, The partnersof my watch, bid them make hade, I. 1 will : Sec who goes there. Her. friends to this ground. M*r. And Icegemcn to the Dane, O farewell honcft fouldier, who hath releeued you? 1 . B Amur do hath ray place, giue you good night. M&r* Holla^ Rtmardo. 2. Say, is Heratie there? Hor. Apceccofhim. a. Welcome Hor*tio t welcome good MtrctUiu* M*r. What hath this thing appcar'd agaioc to night. 2. I hauc fcene nothing. M*r. Horttie faycs tis but our fantafic, And wil not let bcliefctakc hold of him, Touching this drea Jed fight twice fccnc by vr, There First page of Original Edition of "Hamlet" IX UMBRA. PART III SHAKE-SPEARE SHAKESPEARE THE LITERARY ASPECT i Let Schollers bee as thriftie as they may. They will be poore ere their last dying daye; Learning and povertie Will ever kisse. Parnassus Trilogy (1597-1601). SHAKE-SPEARE SHAKESPEARE THE LITERARY ASPECT VI. 1RST literary form of Name A Pseudo- nym, nom de plume. The vocabulary of the Author of the Plays show what books he read and the company he kept. By the study of words he became a mine of thoughts and by constant 'reading accumulated his astonishing vocabulary, the storehouse of language which furnishes his characters with apt expressions in which his thoughts enshrine his genius. The sublime conceptions which are displayed in his dramatic writings confirm him to be the greatest writer the world ever saw. That there were two "Shakespeares" "Shake-speare" the Author and Shakespeare the Player, I would disabuse every reader of such an absurdity. My contention is that the immortal Plays were written by a man whose true name was not Shakespeare, however, the name is spelled Shake-speare, (a mask name nom de plume.} 179 180 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE The name, we are told, was spelled soi twenty or thirty different ways, but the Playei himself uinformly w T rote "Shakspere," and tl form "Shakespeare" or "Shake-speare" was never recognized by him. However, I am not concerned about the variants of the Stratford Player's name, inasmuch as my contention is not buttressed by the spelling. Neverthele< as he wrote it "Shakspere" and as some un- known other wrote the Author's (pen-name) as "Shakespeare," must have been pronounced differently, as implied by the spelling, more especially when printed with a hyphen in thii form "Shake-speare," an excellent nom de plume. Possibly suggested to the Author of the Plays by the noted inventor of mask-names and signer of dedications, Edward Kirk, who was the editor and commentator of Spencer's earliest work, and who may have performed a like service for the Author of the Plays and poerns. The true name of the man who pub- lished under the pen-name of Shake-speare or Shakespeare was never revealed. Francis Meres, a student in Divinity, pre- tender to superior knowledge, author of God's Arithmetic, had his Palladis Tamia (Wit's Treasury) registered September 7th, 1598 SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 181 id published shortly after. Meres says: .s the Greek tongue is made famous and elo- tent by Homer, Hesiod, Euripides, Aeschy- is, Sophocles, Pindanus, Phocyledes, and Ar- jtophanes, and the Latin tongue by Virgil, Quid, Horace, Silius, Italicus, Lucanus, Lu- cretius, Ansonius and Claudianus, so the Eng- lish tongue is mightily enriched and gorgeous- ly invested in rare ornaments and resplend- ent abiliments by Sir Philip Sidney, Spenser, Daniel Drayton, Warner, Shakespeare, Mar- low and Chapman." Meres writes of the mel- lifluous and honey tongued Shakespeare of his "Venus and Adonis" his "Lucrece" and his sugared sonnets. Among his private friends, the "book called Shakespeare's Son- nets" was published in 1609, eleven years af- ter the Meres reference in 1598, and in the next year, two of them (138 and 144) were printed in "The Passionate Pilgrim." Mr. Hallam expressed a doubt whether these were fe sonnets mentioned by Meres. However, Meres enumerated twelve plays, seven of which had been published anony- mously; one only "Love's Labour Lost" has been published with Shakespeare's name. Nevertheless, Meres, Carew and Weever, 182 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE hack writers all, write tritely of the hone tongued, the honey sweet and the "sugared" With Francis Meres everything written i mellifluent, but who this "Shakespeare" was he does not claim to know any more than his contemperories knew about the real name and personality of "Martin Mar-Prelate", whose identity was never revealed, and is still a mys- tery as deep as ever "Junius" was. In fact, n< contemporary made the slightest effort to il- lustrate "Shakespeare" the author-poet's indi- vidual life. As a chronicler, Meres is unreliable; all modern commentators reject his list of Shake- sperean plays. Meres asserted that Ben Jon- son was one of our best authors for tragedy, vwhen at that time, 1598, Jonson had not writ- ten a single tragedy, and but one corned] Meres mentions Chapman as one of the best of our poets for both tragedy and comedy, al- though at this period, Chapman had publish- ed but one drama. William Gager is also included in Men list of 1598 of the chief dramatist of the da 1 among writers of comedy, when the fact with the exception of his single comedy "Ri- vals" no longer extant, they were Latin trage- SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 183 dies. Before we transcribe in part "Palladis Tamia" by Francis Meres, we ask the reader's pardon for the abuse of their patience, for Meres merely repeats names of Greek, Latin and modern play makers. "As the tragic poets flourished in Greece, Aeschylus, Euripedes, Sophocles, Alexander, Aetolus, Achaens, Erithriaens, Astydama, Atheninsis, Apollodorus, Torsennis, Nico- machus, Phygius, Therpis, Atticans and Timon, Appolloniates; and then among the Latins, Accim, M. Attilius, Pomponiys, Se- cundus and Seneca. So these are our best for tragedy; the Lord Buckhurst, Doctor Legge of Cambridge, Doctor Edes of Oxford; Maister Edward Ferris the author of the Mirrour for Magistrates; Marlow, Peele, Watson, Kyd, Shakespeare, Drayton, Chap- man, Decker and Benjamin Johnson." The best poets for comedy (Meres pro- ceeds with his enumeration, naming sixteen Creeks and ten Latins, twenty-six in all). "So the best for comedy amongst us be Ed- ard Earle of Oxford, Doctor Gager of Ox- ford, Maister Rowley, once a rare Scholler of learned Pembrook Hall in Cambridge; Mais- :r Edwards, one of her Majesties Chappell 184 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE eloquent and wittie John Lily, Lodge, Gas coyne, Greene, Shakespeare, Thomas Nash, Thomas Heywood, Anthony Munday. Our best ploters are Chapman, Porter, Wilson, Hathway and Henry Chettle." Francis Meres does not seem to have con- sidered it necessary to read before review- ing. Had he done so he would not have placed the name of Lord Buckhurst first in his list, giving primacy to this mediocrist and the author of Romeo and Juliet, whoever he was, ninth in his enumeration of dramatic poets which he considered best among the English for tragedy, nor would he have named for second place on the list, Dr. Legge of Cambridge instead of the author of "The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus" (Mar- low). What has Dr. Edwards of Oxford, whose name stands fourth in the Meres list, written that he should have been mentioned in the same connection with the author of "The White Devil" (Webster) or the author of that English classic, "The Conspiracy and The Tragedy of Charles Duke of Byron" (Chapman). Why this commingling of such insignificant writers as Edward, Earl, Thomas SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 185 r otson and Lord Buckhurst with the giant irotherhood. The fact is so far as attesting the responsibility of anybody or anything, the Meres averments are as worthless as a musty nut. What was said of John Aubury is also true of Francis Meres: "His brain was like a hasty pudding, whose memory and judgment and fancy were all stirred together." Yet this is the writer that many Shakespearean com- mentators confidently appeal to in part, and whose testimony in part they with equal un- animity reject. The fact is the modern Shakespearean commentators have torn the Meres list into tatters. Andronicus is univer- sally rejected. Mr. Lowell denies the total authenticity of Richard III for Shakespeare, he says, "never wrote deliberate nonsense." Mr. Fleay finds in the Romeo and Juliet traces of George Peele and Samuel Daniel, and that there are grave doubts as to Shakes- peare's hand in "The Comedy of Errors." Most modern commentators doubt if the "Two Gentlemen of Verona" could have been writ- ten by Shakespeare. King John mentioned by Meres was doubtless the old play of "The Troublesome Reign of King John," first printed in 1591, and was three times published 186 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE before the first printing of Shakespeare's King John in the folio of 1623, which was worked after the old play. There is no such play as "Love's Labour Won." Not finding Shakespeare in the anthology of his day, the most natural inference would be that all those who wrote under the name "Shakespeare," wrote "incognito " We know that many writers of that day wrote anony- mously for the stage. Many of the anony- mous and pseudonymous writings have been retrieved. Much remains still to be reclaimed from the siftings of what are named "Early Comedy," "Early History" and "Pre-Shakes- pearean Group of Plays." Mr. Spedding had the good fortune to be the first to demonstrate the theory of a divided authorship of "Henry VIII," to reclaim for John Fletcher Wolsley's Farewell to all his greatness. A majority of the best critics now agree with Miss Jane Lee in the assignment of the second and third part of Henry VI to Mar- low, Greene and perhaps Peele. Many writers of that age were communis- tic in the use of the "Shakespeare" as a descriptive title, standing for the collocuted works of not one but several playmakers. In SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 187 the list before me there are twelve plays which were not included in the folio of the collected works of William Shakespeare in 1623. Al- though resting upon title page proprietorship and in the absence of certified authorship, The Yorkshire Tragedy and Hamlet, Prince of Denmark are equally tenable. So thought the printers as we learn by their frequent use of the pseudonymous name of the author of "Ve- nus and Adonis," a sensual poem which had been very popular. The plays referred to which bore the im- printed name of "Shakespeare" were these: Arthur of Eversham, The London Prodigal Loarine, Sir John Oldcastle, Thomas Lord Cromwell, Edward III, The Birth of Mer- lin, Mucedonis, Merry Devil of Edmonton, Yorkshire Tragedy, Arraignment of Paris, Puritan, Widow of Watling Street. The difficulty of identifying Shakespeare the author poet with the young man who came up from Stratford, has induced Shakespearean scholars to question the unity of authorship. Sir Sidney Lee admits that Shakespeare "drew largely" on the Hamlet, referred to by Nash in 1589, which he has ascribed to Kyd (p. 221). 188 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE It is scarcely possible, says Mr. Marshall, "to maintain that the play referred to as well known in 1589 could have been by Shakes- peare (Shakspere) the "Stratforder." Surely not. We see the question of the unity of au- thorship involves the question of his identity, for according to Shakespearean scholarship, the "Works" in part at least are a batch of anonymous plays worked over and labeled "Shakespeare." There is strong presumptive proof that printers and publishers in Elizabethan and Jacobin times were in the habit of selecting names or titles that would best sell their books, and it mattered not to publishers if the name printed on the title page was a personal name or one impersonal. Title pages were not even presumptive proof of authorship in the time of Queen Elizabeth and King James. The printers chose to market their publications un- der the most favorable conditions and some writers and printers chose the incognizable name "Shakespeare" which had been at- tached to the voluptuous poem "Venus and Adonis," 1593, which had a wide popularity resting on its supposed dissoluteness. This was the first appearance of the name SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 189 "Shakespeare" in literature, being the mask- name doubtless of the writer who gave this erotic poem to the world "the first heir of my ivention." r> Certified authorship in that age as to the great body of the works produced is the excep- tion, rather than the rule, for many writers of that age wrote anonymously and pseudony- mously. Edmund Spencer until the begin- ning of 1580 wrote and published under an assume name "Immerito" The authorship of the Shepherd's Calen- dar was not formally acknowledged or certi- fied to until after it had gone through several editions by "the unknown poet" as he is called by the old commentator. After the certifica- tion by the author of the work, after seven years, the critics referred to Spencer as "the late unknown poet or the person who wrote "The Shepherd's Calendar." In 1586 William Webbe published his "Dis- course of English Poetrie." In this the au- thor of "The Shepherd's Calendar" is spoken of by the mask name "Immerito," given by its editor E. K. (Edward Kirk) a friend and fellow student of the author at Pembroke, who r as the editor and commentator of Spencer's 190 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE earliest work, the pseudonymous "Shepherd's Calendar." It was praised by a contemporary poet, George Whitstone, himsef a friend of Spencer, as the reputed work by Sir Philip Sidney. Raleigh, Lodge, Drayton, Nash and Sidney paid homage to Spencer. Spencer wrote nine comedies, but every trace has perished. Not one in fifty of the dramas of this period according to Holli- well-Phillipps having descended to modern times. The plays contained in the first and second folio, (1647-1679) of Beaumont and Fletch- er's comedies and tragedies number fifty- three; but only three were published in Beai mont's lifetime, and that on none of thei does Beaumont's name appear as authoi Fletcher survived his partner nine years. Robert Burton (1576-1649), author of the Anatomy of Melancholy, maintained his in- cognito for a time, he avers, because it gave him greater freedom. John Marston (1575-1634) applied his own mask-name "Kimayder" to his antagonist and purposely ridicules himself. Michael Drayton (1563-1631) also had written at this period under the pseudonym SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 191 of Rowland. At about this time likewise in France, Jean Baptiste (Popuelin), (1622- 73) preferred to be known as Moliere, whose original manuscripts are not to be found, but as one of the great identities of his age, are not essential to illustrate his individual life, He was the particular personal favorite of Louis XIV, who bestowed lavishly his benefits upon Moliere. He had given him a pension of seven thousand livres and a position near the King as groom-of-the-chamber. The great monarch had been delighted to stand god- father to one of his children, to whom the Duchess of Orleans was godmother. In consequence of failing health, his sad- dened friends on the 17th of February, 1673, entreated him not to have any play. "What would you have me do/' he replied, "there are fifty poor workmen who have but their day's pay to live upon. What will they do if we have no play? I should reproach myself with having neglected to give them bread for one single day if I could really help it." How beautifully Moliere's benevolent ac- tions blend with his sweet words. He was ever mindful of the pressure with which the common ills of life fall upon the poor. 192 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE In more recent times, Francois Marie Aronet (1694-1778) won enduring fame as Voltaire. Montesquieu's Esprit des Lois was disguised on its appearance in 1748. The famous work "Eikon Basilike" which appearing soon after the execution of Charles First as his work, was a potent factor in that reaction which culminated in the Restoration of the House of Stuart. Burnet says it had "the greatest run in many impressions of any book of the age." Many years after its first appearance, John Gauden, Bishop of Exeter in 1660, laid claim to its authorship. Sir Walter Scott main- tained his incognito as the great unknown for years like "Junius" whose secret was intrusted to no one, and was never to be revealed. Sir Walter preserved his secret until driven to the brink of financial destruction. We believe that the author of "Hamlet," "Lear" and "Macbeth" chose to sheath his pri- vate life and personality as a man of letters in an impenetrable incognito the nothing- ness of a name. The author (Puttenham) of "The Arts of English Poesie," an anonymous work pub- lished in 1589, says, "I know very many SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 193 notable gentlemen in the court that have writ- ten commendably, and suppressed it agayne, or else suffered it to be publisht without their owner's name to it, as if it were a discredit for a gentleman to seeme learned and to show himself amorous of any good Arte." As these things were so, does it jar you or you to discover a cultured nobleman, the Earl of Derby, writing plays for the common play- ers in the year 1599, the same year in which his Lordship or some unknown other wrote Henry V and Much Ado About Nothing. Mr. James Greenstreet had the good fortune to discover the intercepted dispatch written by a foreign ambassador to his home govern- ment. This piece of information was dis- covered by accident in the place in which the English Public Records are kept. The cour- tier's reason for concealment was to shun the presumption of living by his pen. For the Elizabethan notable gentleman-poet scorned the professional poet and considered publish- ing stage poetry a degradation. It is ridi- culous, says the great Advocate John Selden (1584-1654), "for a lord to print verses; 'tis well enough to make them to please himself, but to make them public is foolish." So we 194 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE see that plain people were not the only on who wrote plays in this great poetic age. But the upper classes great folks, had taken a hand in writing plays "on the sly." Robert Greene in his introductory address to the gentlemen students of both universities, refers to certain devotional poets "which from their calling and gravities being loath to have any profane pamphlets pass under their hand, get some Batillus to set his name to their verses. Thus is the ass made proud by this underhand brokerie. And he that cannot write true English without the help of clerks of parish churches will needes make him selfe the father of interludes." What do we know about the individual life of the author of the plays, who among all the great men of his age was the greatest answer- nothing that can be authenicated. The Stratfordians deny the truth of this statement, and in their attempt at refutation, point to the Shakespeare-Southampton dedication of Venus and Adonis as a memorable poem which they allege is proof of certified author- ship. But are we to accept it (Venus and Adonis) as a memorable poem? Surely not in an age SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 195 when printers wrote dedications. When edi- tors invented and signed the mask name while the author maintained an impenetrable in- cognito as in the case of Edmond Spencer. When the Shepherd's Calendar was printed pseudonymously by the editor E. K., who in- vented and signed Spencer's pen name. No reputed play bore the name "Shakes- >eare" on the title page until 1598. Thomas >dge (1556-1625) in his prose satire "Wits Misery," dated 1596, enumerates the wits of I the time. Shakespeare is not mentioned. Peter Heylin was born in 1599 and died in 1662, thus being seventeen years old when Shakspere, the Stratford player died in 1616. .n reckoning up the famous dramatic poets if England, he omits "Shakespeare." Philip Henslow, the old play broker, also in writing his note book from 1591 to 1609, loes not even mention "Shakespeare," al- though he records the title of no fewer than 270 plays. Henslow was in theatrical part- nership with the famous "Ned Allen" in con- nection with the Rose and Fortune Theatres; Edward Alleyn personated in "Leir the Moore of Venis," "Romeo, Pericles and Henry VIII," "as appears from his inventory 196 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE of his own theatrical wardrobe." Henslowe records in his Diary on June 9th, 1594, that Hamlet was performed by his company (p. 180). Both Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps and Sir Sidney Lee say that Shakespeare began his career as a dramatist by writing plays for the manager, Philip Henslowe at the Rose The- atre. And yet Henslowe makes no mention of Shakespeare, (p. 24-8). According to Henslow's Diary (note book), Henry the Sixth was performed as a new play in March, 1591. This is conjectured to be the play referred to by Nash, acted by "Lord Strange's men" at the Rose in 1592. This was not the company to which Shakspere the Strat- ford player belonged. Milton's poem on Shakespeare (1630) was not published in his works in 1645. This eulogy was prefixed to the folio edition of Shakespeare (1632) but without Milton's $ name. It's pedigree was not at all satisfac- tory. Milton's acquaintance with Shakes- peare's verse must have been very slight, as shown by the lines, "Or sweetest Shakespere fancy's child Warbles his native wood nttes wild," SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 197 r had he read "Venus and Adonis," so clas- sical and formal, he would agree with Walter lavage Landor that no poet was ever less a rarbler of "wood.nttes wild." Now in fact, after the publication of the irst folio edition in 1623, all the later testi- tonies are repetitious, suggestions inspired by ten Jonson's famous ascription to Shakes- ;are, which he wrote for the syndicate of irinters and publishers, with a view to the tie of the work in 1623. The slight mention of Shakespeare by the idicious Webster, as Hazelt calls him, com- prehends no more than that he mistook a pseudonymous author for one of the hack- writers of the day. "Detraction is the sworn friend to ignorance, for mine own part, I have ever truly cherished my good opinion of other mens' worthy labors, especially of that full and heightened style of Master Chapman, the la- bored and understanding works of Master Jonson, the no less worthy composures of the both worthily excellent masters Beaumont and Fletcher, and lastly (without wrong last to be named) the right happy and copious industry of Master Shakespeare, Master Dekker and [aster Heywood." 198 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE These words written by the second greatest English tragic poets are very significant, for Shakespeare's distinctive characteristics are not individualized from those of Dekker and Heywood, while those of Chapman, Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher are. In the last four named is perfect interlace- ment of personality with authorship, but not so in Shakespeare, for industry is the only dis- tinguishing mark which he must share with Dekker and Heywood, hack writers for the stage. Dekker's many plays attest his copious industry, when we remember that this writer spent seven years in prison, and Heywood's in- dustry cannot be doubted for he claimed to have had a hand or main finger in two hundred and twenty plays. Bear in mind when the preface to Webster's tragedy, "The White Devil," which contains this slight mention of Shakespeare was printed in 1612, after all the immortal plays were written and the now re- puted author had returned to Stratford, prob- ably in 1611-1612 in his forty-seventh year, where he lived in idleness for five years before his death from the effect of a drunken carou- sal, according to a so-called late tradition, which some Stratfordians employ, not as an SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 199 jpersion, but merely to show that the Strat- actor lead a jolly life. John Webster possessed a critical faculty id an independent judgment, but the way he lakes mention of Shakespeare shows that he lew nothing about the individual man or the works called "Shakespeare." The generous reference to "the labored and understanding works of Master Jonson," gives a clear idea of the main characteristics of the work of Ben Jonson who, not having reached the fruition of his renown in 1612, but in the after time came into Dryden's view as "The greatest man of the last age, the most learned and judicious writer any theatre ever had." John Webster writes also of the "no less worthy composures of Beaumont and Fletcher." Thus in the morning of life they present an excellent type for purity of vocabu- lary and neatness of expression, and were of "loudest fame; Two of Beaumont and Fletcher's plays were acted to one of Shakes- peare's or Ben Jonson's" in Dryden's time 1631-1700. John Webster's judgment of his fellow dramatist was just. "I have ever truly cher- ished my good opinion of other men's worthy SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE labors." Webster never conceals or misrepre- sents the truth by giving evasive or equivocat- ing evidence. He reveals the judicial trait of his character in placing Chapman first among cognizant poets then living, assuming the name "Shakespeare" was used as an assumed name, masking the true name of the greatest English poet. Sidney Marlowe and Spencer had then descended to the tomb. The play actor, William Shakspere in his life time was not publicly credited with the personal authorship of the plays and poems called "Shakespeare," except possibly by three or four poeticules such as Freeman, Barnfield, Weever and Meres, who follow each other in the iteration and reiteration of the same in- sipid and affected compliments, not one of them implying a personal acquaintance with the author, but who erroneously take one per- son for another, thus identifying the wrong individuality. Some few persons may have believed that the player and playwright were one and the same person and were deceived into so believing. This much we do know that the Stratford actor never openly sanc- tioned the identification, although he may have been accessory to the deception and in this SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 201 mnection, it should be borne in mind also iat no poet was remembered in Shakspere's r ill as were the actors. Of the thirty-six plays assigned by the folio 1623, not one had received the acknowledg- tent of their reputed author (Shakespeare). Not a single line in verse or prose assented to for comparison and identification, and in the absence of credible evidence of (the auth- or's true name) his authorship of certain poems, there can be no authoritative sanction of the assignment. No person writing on the subject of "Shakespeare" can write a literary life of the individual man, for player Shak- spere of Stratford-on-Avon does not offer a single point of correspondence to the activities *f a literary man or scholar. The fantastical critics profess to read the story of the author's life in his works. This is an absurdity, for dramatic art is mainly char- acter creation and cannot be made to disclose a knowledge of his private life. Forty-six years after the death of William Shakspere of Stratford, "The gentle-hum- ored" Thomas Fuller in his "Worthies," pub- lished posthumously in 1662, wrote "Many were the wit combats betwixt him and Ben 202 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE Jonson, which two I behold like a Spanis great galleon and an English man of Master Jonson, like the former, was built fai higher in learning solid, but slow in his pe: formance, Shakespere with the English mi of war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about and take advantage of all winds by the quickness of his wit and invention." Fuller being born in 1608 was only eight years old when player Shakspere of Stratford died and but two years old when he quit Lon- don. If this precocious youngster beheld the "wit combats" of the two, he could only have beheld them as he lay "mewling and puking in his nurse's arms." The facts are when the quaint and witty Fuller was six years old, his father was rector of St. Peter's in Aldwinkle. The boy was sent to school in his native village and con- tinued at that school for four years. It's not likely that the lad was in London during player Shakspere's lifetime. Shakespeare's contemporaries had nothing to say, in fact, and in criticism of either au- thor or works of any consequence during the life time of the Stratford player. All the great SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 203 ien of his time were strangers to him. No ige, no statesman, no orator, no man of lit- irary eminence whatever left any description >f "Shakespeare's" manner as a writer. Is it >ssible that the great men of that age, John n, Sir Walter Raleigh, Inigo Jones, >rayton, Hobbes, Spencer, Daniel, Chapman, (en Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher could lave read the immortal plays and not have (receded Mr. James Spedding in handing lown to posterity something about Shakes- peare. "Close packed expression, the same life ind reality and freshness, the same rapid and ibrupt turnings of thought, so quick that lan- lage can hardly follow fast enough." So transcendent was Shakespeare's genius for ex- >ression. No wonder Dr. Ingleby is led to say that "it is plain that the bard of our admiration was inknown to the men of that age." But Sir Sidney Lee boldly asserts (p. 586), lat at Shakespeare's death "no mark of honor r as denied his name." There is no intimation >f the truth of any such an assertion in the records of integrity. This is only one of the Stratfordian assertions without proof. However, the matter of fact to be accentu- 204 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE ated is that the contemporaries of the writer of the immortal plays did not know positively *hilosophy, all the classic odors from the land >f flowery meads and purple sky, were per- ceived by the great unknown, as all careful 212 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE students will perceive. For the author of the Plays and Poems is saturated with the litera- ture of ancient Greece and Rome, and there is an ostentatious display of erudition in classi- cal lore. In an epistle by Thomas Nash, a gowns- man of the College, to the gentlemen students of both Universities, prefixed to Robert Green's novel "Menaphon," printed in 1589, there is an allusion to the "shifty play wright who from English Seneca, if you entreat him fair in a frostie morning, he will afford you whole Hamlets, I should say handfulls of tragical speeches." We know from the title page of the first quarto of Hamlet (1603) when the play is said to have been acted in the two Universities, we also know that "Vol- phone" received the same distinction by the grateful acknowledgment of the author, Ben Jonson. However, the gownsmen would scarcely recognize their work after its passage from the academic to the professional stage, so pawed over by actors and bemuddled for the "gags" of the clowns. Of this we may be sure, that so long as Hamlet retained an academic environment, its scholar hero was not made SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 213 grotesquely ridiculous as in the pathetic scene over the skull of Yorick, the gruesome relic if his playmate in childhood, or by the inter- polated slang expressions contained in Ham- let's soliloquoy on ending the sorrows of life in death. But we are safe in supposing that Burbage and his "men players" knew what the : requenters of the public play house wanted ind did not hesitate at the employment of slang phrases and sensational tricks, or the in- troduction of anachronisms. Philip Henslowe makes mention of a Ham- let presented June 9th, 1594, which was an >ld play (now lost), doubtless by Thomas Kyd, one of the University bred men who r rote stage plays which served for something lore than as the basis for the "Shakespeare" plays. It seems certain that the "great un- known" found much that he turned to his own account in remodelling Hamlet. The Stratford mythomanic disturbance is due to the fact that the plays were but little read or discussed in the life time of the Strat- ford player (Shakspere) or a considerable time thereafter, as only about half of those contained in the folio of 1623 were in print 214 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE previous to the folio edition, and all of them surreptitiously. When the folio of 1623 was published, the plays attributed to William Shakspere, the Stratford player, had been written many of them for more than thirty years, having in all this time attained no considerable repute or celebrity. The Shakespeare tragedies were very seldom played at court, only one during the long reign of James the First. Twenty plays were not even printed in quarto before the folio of 1623, seven years after player Shakspere's death. The name Shakespeare was placed on the title page by printers and publishers to mark the excess in producing studies of amorous passion, and not because of the popularity of any individual who may have borne the amorously inspired name, which derived nearly all of its commercial value in connection with the erotic poem "Venus and Adonis" of which before the end of 1630, several quarto editions had appeared. If the Shakespeare plays had been as popu- lar as the Poems, twenty of them would not have remained in manuscript, more especially if the author, as is alleged, was a "partner in the profits of what they call the house" for SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 215 he would not have sold them (the plays). "In the strict sense, Ben Jonson managed to retain the control of his dramas," and that too, without property interest in the play house. Why not the play actor from Stratford if the author of the plays called "Shakespeare." The title, so called, which is now assumed, in favor of the Stratford Shakspere was not recognizable then. The play houses were the repository of the plays, the share holding ac- tors the custodians, and the illiterate fre- quenters of the public play house the critics, who never thought it worth while to discuss authorship. As for the literati, they would not soil their hands with such riff-raff as play books. The Poems which were most conspicuously associated with the name Shakespeare are ab- sent from the printed pages of the folio (1623). The syndicate of printers and pub- lishers seems to have known nothing of the personal and literary life of the author of the plays, as the folio of 1623 contains nothing of a biographical history; not the slightest ef- fort made to illustrate the individual life of the Stratfordian fraudulently set up by the two players Hemming and Condell, assuming, of 216 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE course, that they were not so ignorant as to mistake the actor's copy for the original manu- script, and that they did not believe that all the preceding issues, the quarto texts upon which the 1623 folio text "was founded in part were stolen and surreptitious copies maimed and deformed." While they actually reprinted in part these deformed and stolen copies and practised a fraudulent deception when they announced that all the dramas were now pub- lish "according to the original copies." Many writers on the subject of Shakespeare assert that the dramatist of that day did not print and publish their plays because they had sold them to the play houses a mistaken no- tion. The authors could easily have secured permission from the play brokers as there was a new play coming out every eighteen days, according to Henslowe's Diary. Ben Jonson published his plays how we don't know, but the play brokers Henslowe and Burbage would (probably) have been glad to have parted with plays they called old, although of quite recent date, such as Richard II and the like. The reason why the great mass of dramatic literature was produced anony- mously was due, in part, to the prevalence of SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 217 ie common informers, termed "State deci- herers," "a most lewde and detestable profes- ion," and the authors' desire to escape bodily ffliction and not because their works were rretrievable. For the play makers could in all probability ave secured permission to publish. "Many writers before there existed a reading public wore the mask of a fictitious name and were pseudonymous." VII. There is another stumbling block which sends the upholders of the Stratford Shakspere myth sprawling. We have reference to Thomas Heywood's epistle before his "Apo- logy for Actors" which contains his publicly printed protest against the filching of two poems from his Trioa Britannic a t which he found printed in an anthology, entitled "The Passionate Pilgrim," a collection of amourous songs, published by William Jaggard, a pirate publisher. The volume contained twenty pieces in all and but five assigned to the dis- guised author poet, whose mask name (Shakespeare) was on the title page until re- moved as the result of Heyw r ood protest. The 218 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE bulk of the volume was by Marlow, Barnfield, Griffin, Heywood, Raleigh and various un- known authors, not one of whom, Heywood alone excepted, appear to have raised any pro- test, and surely "Shakespeare," the pseudony- mous poet, whose poems in the main they were not, would not and did not raise any. At the time the volume was issued in 1599, the Stratford player (Shakspere) was alive, living in London and could not have been ignorant of the publication, had a "manifest injury" been done him. It's an unwarrantable assumption on the part of Dr. Ingleby and other writers on the subject of Shakespeare to say that Heywood's dedicatory epistle before his "Apology for Actors" is a record of pro- test on Shakespeare's part, a thing taken for granted without proof, Heywood writes : "So the author I know much offended with M. Jaggard that altogether unknown to him pre- sumed to be so bold with his name." And yet the author whom Heywood claimed to have known, suffered three editions of this spurious work for twelve years to issue from the press, and says Sir Sidney Lee, "This is the only instance on record of a protest on Shakes- peare's part against the many injuries which SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 219 suffered at the hands of contemporary pub- jhers." (p. 183). This earnest Stratfordian ;s not perceive the difference between proof id opinion. Shakespeare raised no protest the fraud. Heywood merely says, "the au- ir I know much offended," whomsoever he ty have been. But Heywood did not know even this much, ior the volume is a mere compilement of imourous rhymes which had been drawn from various writers, a book without original re- search, an anthology, and, of course, not au- thored by Shakespeare, or any one of the vari- ous contributors of the material for the com- pilation. Had Heywood examined the Anthology, he could not have been so blunderingly stupid as to mistake compilation for authorism, more especially if the title page bore the pseudony- mous name "Shakespeare," and that notorious plunderer and pickpocket of literary prop- fty, William Jaggard. Heywood in no way connects the play actor, Shakspere of Stratford-on-Avon with Shakes- peare the author poet. He also knew that the name "Shakespeare" on the title page is no proof of authorship. But as the complaining 220 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE witness, Heywood himself has shown by the detection of the fraud, actually a presumption against it; for there are as many as fifteen plays which commentators now admit that Shakespeare the author poet did not write. This is but one of the many abortive at- tempts by the biographers and commentators to establish personal relationship with Shaks- pere or Shakespeare and his literary contem- poraries, disclosing an irrepressible desire to discover player and poet under the same hood. There is therefore no prima facie reason why we should not conceive a concealed author poet, an elder Junius having a large share in the work (Shakespeare). In an age of letter writing, there is nothing in its epistolary cor- respondence in regard to an author poet per- sonal to "Shakespeare;" no trace is found in its literary or social life of the individual man. The Stratfordians much prefer to have a definite name taken to be claimant as the au- thor of the plays and poems by all those who are against the "Stratforder" as the Stratford arsenal contains no weapon for defensive war- fare, and is therefore in a wretched state for defense, which the professionally trained students of literary history are unable to rem- SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 221 ly; for this reason the Stratfordians are so- citious for a definite and famous name; a aimant having a conspicious personality, ore especially a character whom they regard vulnerable most to the darts of the criticas- , and one whose defense must necessitate ie withdrawal of the enemy's fire in some gree from Stratford. But the present writer would prefer the uch lighter task of bringing forward evi- nce tending to prove the pseudonymity of author. The obligation of furnishing evi- nce to prove who that somebody was does t lie upon those whose aim is to prove the eudonymity and anomalousness of the r orks. We know that the works called Shakespeare" and the well-known fables ailed ./Esopus, although, of course, not corn- ed by ^Esop, as every one knows, for their dernity is clearly established, are associated th definite names, the one with that of an glish actor, the other a Greek slave, whose ividuality, however, is not more fabulous d mythical than is the external life of the thor of the works called "Shakespeare." It is a very easy matter to show that people the elder time did not share our admiration 222 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE for the Shakespeare plays, and there should be some abatement of the notion that a false or fictitious name may not baffle the most de- termined inquiries for the Junius letters an proof against any such assumption. For not- withstanding all the discussion and excitemeni caused by the publication, the writer was not discovered, nor do we know positively wh< wrote them. For the authorship of a junius," like the authorship of "Shakespeare" wj never acknowledged either publicly or pri- vately. The evidence for the authorship i< thus wholly circumstantial, and the questioi remains still undecided, and one of the most noted examples of concealed authorship. The first of the celebrated letters of Junii appeared on the 21st of January, 1769, in th< Public Advertiser, one of the leading news- papers of the time and made by far the great- est sensation in the political and literal world. For lucidity and force there is nothinj quite equal to them in our literature. Hii sentences cut and sparkled like diamonds. "King, Lords and commons are but the spoi of his fury; his searching eye penetrate< equally into the retired circles of domesti< SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 223 the cabinets of ministers and the closet of King." (Burke). -iis supreme ambition has been realized in enmities, for he had, indeed, "preserved perishable infamy of their names and made m immortal." Sir Philip Francis has been nted at as the "Man in the Mask" but when letters of Junius were issuing from the ;ss of the Public Advertiser, Edmund rke was thought by many distinguished per- s to be the writer of the letters. Now rybody knows that Burke did not write lius. Die Franciscan theory of Junius, as it is led, is advanced by DeQuincy, Lord Ma- ilay, and others, although Francis was never ntioned in connection with the celebrated ters until 1814, forty-five years after the >t of the far-famed letters of Junius had ap- ired. He (Francis) died in 1818, failing to knowledge the identity of Junius with Fran- , thence forward and forever more insuring rpetual secrecy the immunity of dream- dust. But in this connection, our purpose is not discover the author of the "Letters," but to int out one of the most conspicuous ex- 224 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE amples of concealed authorship of the Eigh- teenth Century. The remarkable volume en- titled "Ecce Homo" is still more recent and one of the most noted of uncertified author- ship. Conditions were much more favorable to the maintenance of secrecy in the literary and political world in Shakespeare's time, when perversion and deception is not only sub- sidiary to Tudor and Jacobin philosophy, but part and parcel of it. There could have been no great mystery about the secrecy or pseu- donymity of authorship of works that were not even recognized by the Republic of Let- ters, nor at Court, as plays of special eminency, much less an epoch making work. There were several motives for concealed authorship dur- ing the struggle for constitutional freedom against prerogative in the turbulent reign of the Stuarts, which is one of the periods in Eng- lish history when the acknowledgment of au- thorship meant danger. In Tudor and Ja- cobin times, works were published under a false name with the distinct intention to in- duce people to believe them the works of those whose names they bore, or of works errone- ously attributed to a wrong person. Sir Thomas Brown complained that his SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 223 name was being used to float books that he never wrote. We cannot agree with the up- holders of the Stratford Shakespere myth madness who say, "That the real authorship could have been kept a secret, would be a greater mystery, more inexplicable, than the Sphinx." Nonsense. The English speaking people are peculiarly liable to delusion or as the great American 'showman and hoaxer, Phineas T. Barnum says, "The people like to be fooled" and some people seem to think gullibility a blessing Whether they love fooling or not, people are fooled by delusion and tabulation, and seem to favor hoaxing and have seldom been dis- appointed for there has been no limit to Brit- ish and American credulity, especially in the elder time when falsehood rather than truth determine the fate of mankind. When delu- sion, tabulation and mythomania, so affluent in the fruition of evil, had gained possession of the confidence of the people, even amongst the most progressive communities. English and American credulity is chiefly responsible for the perpetuity of the great literary hoax, associated with the Stratford player's name, 226 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE giving support to later fabrication and nebul- ous traditions. The reality of witchcraft has been accepted without question. Not to believe in witch- craft in Shakespeare's time was the greatest of heresies. "Scarcely any human belief is supported by so vast a quantity of recorded testimony." Belief in that diabolical super- stition was entertained by the great jurist, Sir Matthew Hale, the famous physician; Sir Thomas Browne, the celebrated Divine; Dr. Bentley, and the great English advocate, John Selden. However, to Reginal Scot, 1538-1599, an English student and John Wier, 1515-1588, the learned Flemish physician, the modern world is indebted for the suppression of witchcraft, for that most malicious and tena- cious of all primeaval superstitions, for they set the joy bells of Christendom ringing. Myths, legends and fables have had an in- calculable effect upon the activities and destiny of mankind, and in some ways, some of them a good effect. For instance, that of the mytho- logical marksman, William Tell, whose stir- ring deeds were celebrated by one of the great- est poets and one of the most popular com- SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 227 posers of modern times, thus giving the legend a world-wide fame. A Swiss writer calls the William Tell story pure fable, but neverthe- less proclaiming his belief in it because the legend is so popular. But it was reserved for Parson Uriel Frendenberge to show in an anonymous pamphlet (1760) that the legend of Tell had a Danish origin; the pamphlet was publicly burned by order of the Govern- ment of Uri. The legend, although localized in Uri is an old Aryan myth. But the beauti- ful story is a lesson of patriotism to the Swiss mountaineer, nerving his soul to avenge the wrongs of his country, the land of his fathers, the shield of his infancy, the inspiration of his children, who are to enshrine and celebrate its hallowed memories in Odes and battle hymns. Mankind seems to have practised, from the beginning, every form of artifice and deceit. This tendency to falsehood and fabulation so characteristic of the age of Shakespeare, but not peculiar to that or any period, for man- kind have been hoaxed and befooled many times before and since the age of Shakespeare. For example, the great collection known as the Collectio Pseudo-Isidoriana or "False De- 22S SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE cretals," published in Spain about (845). These false decretals consist of about one hun- dred spurious documents and contain also the pretended Donation of Constantinc. No suspicion attached to the Pseudo Isidore at the time of its first appearance nor for more than 500 years thereafter. "Not a whisper of doubt, not a murmur of surprise;" on the contrary, it was everywhere accepted without question. "They enjoyed an undisputed au- thority, an unsuspected title from their first appearance about the middle of the Ninth Century to the Fifteenth Century," when Car- dinal Nicholas de Cusa disclosed their ficti- tious character. The present writer's reference to the "Isi- dorian Decretals" is not to show that they be- came potent in their influence on the primitive system of Church polity for the establishment of a pure theoracy, but to call the reader's at- tention to an early and one of the most noted examples of concealed authorship and to the fact that the unknown writer had changed the course of human history, affecting the destinies of nations, imposing upon the credulity of mankind for more than five hundred years. And be it noted that the unknown writer of SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT UJ9 the "Decretals," like the unknown writer of the plays and poems called "Shakespeare," did live and die without leaving in history or so- ciety a single trace of his external life, except his share in the works. Believe or deny what you may in regard to the claim of the Stratford actor's authorship set up by the "Players," the open-minded reader knows full well that it is not on each particular fact or thing done taken separately, but on all the facts taken consecutively that the negative case must be judged. I will now endeavor to summarize the con- clusion of the subject matter which has grown under my hand month after month. In the view of those "spacious times" I have entered thoroughly into the spirit and fiber of the man Shakspere, (whether he was or was not the author in question). "What sort of man was he?"pithily put, is the subject of my in- vestigation. The records do not establish the identity of the Supreme Poet, an assertion put in proof by the silence of his compeers, which is dis- closed by the irrepressible negative pregnants from the ensemble of the facts such as the striking example of the silence of Cuthbert L>30 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHAB Burbage, the brother of Richard, the famous actor. When Cuthbert petitioned the Earl of Pembroke in 1635, then Lord Chamberlain, in the matter about certain theatres, "To our- selves," he says, "we joined those deserving men, Shakespeare, Hemings, Condall, Philips and other partners, in the profits of that they call the House," and he adds, "that when he and his brother took possession of Blackfriars in 1609, they placed in it man players, which were Heming, Condall, Shakspeare, etc." In this address to the Lord Chamberlain came Cuthbert Burbage's opportunity to ad- vantage his associates and himself, as a busi- ness man and proprietor of the play houses. To remind the Earl of the fact if fact it was that "our fellow Shakspere," "a man player," and a "deserving man," had been a man of unsurpassed intelligence, whose works are the highest creations of genius, whose praise Ben Jonson in a panegyrical poem (1623), blew into the trumpet of fame. But in his memorial to Lord Pembroke, the house- holder of the Globe Theatre did not resound Shakspere's praise, but, instead, the reputed author twelve years after the publication of the Great Folio, is described to his Lordship SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 231 as merely a "man player and a deserving man," and nothing more. The affirmative assertions, prefixed to the Folio editions, published in 1623, and signed by the players, "John Heminge" and "Henrie Condall," cannot outweigh the negative evi- dence of Cuthbert Burbage from silence in 1635 ; for in our grasp of the situation if Shaks- pere is "Shakespeare," Cuthbert's silence is perfectly astonishing. The play houses were in need of all the sup- port the mighty genius that glorious name Shakespeare could give. This fact is made manifest for in "The Actor's Remonstrance" (1643), is contained the tarnishing evidence of the admission of the abuse of the players' vocation, and should be read when we are dis- posed to be severe upon our Puritan ancestors for their dislike of the common players. Why speak of the most intellectual of the human race, the wonder of mankind, in the same terms as of the other actors "when their social posi- tion was of the lowest." Would not Cuthbert have been eager to say in his petition to Lord Pembroke: We are called "the basest trade," vagabonds, under the Act, Eliz. xxxlx? Nevertheless, our fellow Shakspere was the 232 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE author of the Plays contained in the Great Fo- lio edition, published in 1623. Is it conceivable that Cuthbert Burbage, if he positively knew the immortal Plays were written by the Strat- ford Player, that he would not have found tongue to say on this occasion, "with cackle and clatter," match him if you can. Why classed simply with a batch of players if Shakspere was "Shakespeare?" Was it not because he (Cuthbert) was aware that the Lord Chamberlain knew very well that none of the men players named in the petition, Hemings, Candall, Philips, Shakspere, etc. had any profession but that of actor? That Shakspere was a professional actor we know, but the inference from Cuth- bert's silence is, that Shakespeare was not a literary gentleman and dramatist. By the owner of the play houses, Shakspeare is placed on the same footing as the other players, and Cuthbert Burbage did not, in telling the his- tory of the play houses, give Lord Pembroke, the survivor of the "incomparable pair of brethren," to whom the Folio was dedicated, the slightest intimation that Shakspeare, a "man player," had ever been a dramatic au- SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 233 thor, when the drama formed so important a part of the literature of England. The silence of Philip Henslowe is also very good proof of anonymity in authorship. The old householder's silence is due to the fact that the Plays were not of certified author- ship bearing no name. Not until the fourth edition did the name "Shakespeare" appear upon the title page of "Romeo and Juliet." It is plain, to say the least, that the anonymous aspect predominates in the dramatic literature of the period, but the reticence of the author of the Works now called "Shakespeare," was in this regard, pe- culiar among his contemporaries. Inasmuch as the same titles or names of so many plays found recorded in Henslowe's Diary are identical with those of the Heminge and Condall list in the Great Folio, they are the strongest testimonials we have that this author began his dramatic career by writing plays for Henslowe as an anonymous writer, and in all probability continued to write un- der his pseudonym "Shakespeare" to the end of his dramatic career. During the twelve years beginning in Feb- ruary, 1591, Henslowe's Diary records the 234 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE titles of no fewer than 270 pieces or plays a new play about every eighteen days. How- ever, it would seem that Henslowe and Al- leyn at the Rose Theatre had knowledge of the "Works," for the Diary or notebook of the old manager, and the wardrobe of the famous actor, Edward Alleyn, attest. But of the au- thor, 'Shakespeare," they knew nothing ab- solutely nothing, about him the Shakespear- ian drama, and no shadow of a real name. Dr. Furness, expressing his disappointment, says: "Where the names of nearly all the dramatic poets of the age are to be frequently found we might certainly count on finding that of Shakespeare, but the shadows in which Shakespeare's early life was spent, envelop him here too, and his name, as Collier says, is not met with in any part of the manuscript." That Shakspere of Stratford had lived a literary life, whether early or late, and was en- veloped by shadows has no foundation in re- corded fact. The negative evidence from the silence of Philip Henslowe, I repeat, does prove that the early plays called "Shakespeare," bearing no name, were of unknown authorship, the works of a reticent writer "The Great Unknown." SHAKESPEARE, THE LITERARY ASPECT 235 Silence in the matter of authorship is the course of "a concealed poet." The silence of Henslowe and Alleyn, house- holders of the Rose Theatre early in Shaks- pere's career, coupled with the silence of the Burbages, householders of the Globe Theatre, does evidence anonymity in authorship. The silence of John Manningham, barris- ter-at-law of the Middle Temple, is still an- other instance of the negative pregnant, who under date of February 2, 1601, records the story in his Diary criminating Shakspere's morals, but who is not personally remembered as a man of letters, a writer of plays, no hint of the undivided personality of player and au- thor. Their never-ceasing silence and the author's never-ceasing reticence is a fatal breach in the claim set up for the player one William Shakspere of Stratford to the personal au- thorship of the Plays called by his name. One comfort is that great men taken up in any way are profitable company. \Ve cannot look, however imperfectly, upon a great man without gaining some- thing by it. He is the living fountain of life, which it is pleasant to be near. On any terms whatsoever you will not grudge to wander in his neighborhood for a while. Heroes and Hero-Worship. PART IV SHAKESPEARE THE MASTER-MIND WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF SEV- ERAL ELIZABETHAN AUTHORS f <-*'. *-Z^J *-. /, 4< HYMN TO CYNTHIA Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, Now the sun is laid to sleep, Seated in thy silver chair, State in wonted manner keep: Hesperus entreats thy light, Goddess, excellently bright. Earth, let not thy envious shade Dare itself to interpose; Cynthia's shining orb was made Heav'n to clear, when day did close: Bless us, then, with wished sight, Goddess, excellency bright. Lay thy bow of pearl apart, And thy crystal shining quiver; Give unto the flying hart Space to breathe, how short soever: Thou that mak'st a day of night, Goddess, excellently bright. Ben Jonson. BEN JONSON AND SHAKESPEARE VIII. "HPHE Mermaid" "the Apollo" the * Club room of "the Devil" is here imaged before us. "Souls of Poets dead and gone, What Elysium have ye known, Happy field or mossy Cavern Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?" The great men were there, Raleigh and Spencer, Drayton and Camden, Chapman and Shirley, Selden and Field, Webster and How- ell, Hobbes and Ford, Fletcher and the lion- in-chief, "Rare Ben." "I lye and dreamed of your full Mermaid Wine," Francis Beaumont writing from the country to Ben Jonson : "What things have we seen Done at the Mermaid: heard words that have been So nimble and so full of subtle flame, As if that every one from whence they came 241 242 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolved to live a fool the rest Of his dull life." In those stirring times rare times they were of indomitable energy. With such men for his contemporaries Ben Jonson was yet a power in their day, and in the age in which we live no mocking vision, but standing forth in sharpest outline after the literary records and personal history of even the greatest have faded. This remarkable man, like his namesake of a later generation, was coarsely framed as his own verse tells us: "His mountain-belly- and his rocky face," seamed with scars of disease; combative and prone to strange imaginations and peculiar manifestations; his vast influence on his own generation; the superiority of rep- utation great as a writer in prose as well as 'in verse; the deference shown the leader of this great literary club. No wonder Ben is exacting that full homage which he believed should be shown him, the acknowledged lit- erary monarch of his day and generation. Nevertheless, Ben Jonson is not one of the SHAKESPEARE THE MASTER-MIND 243 writers of those times whose works are the studies of the aftertime, notwithstanding Ben is more intimately known to posterity than any of the brotherhood of poets contemporaneous with him. Judged by the standard of con- temporaneous work Chapman's "Homer" had won a more enduring fame. In imagination I can see him walking up and down in the club room, his hands thrust into the two lateral pockets of an old coachman's coat, inflamed by strong drink and the recrimination of Dekker and Marston. Ben never would let "sleeping dogs rest." However, Ben Jonson would have been more thoroughly known to posterity had there been a Boswell at his elbow to report the Table-Talk. A similarity of conduct may be traced in Ben and his equally famous name- sake, the Lexicographer, but asking questions was not then all the rage. In fact, the only chronic interviewer in Ben Jonson's day was the Scotch poet, Drummond of Hawthornden, who lived in a handsome home set above the charming valley of Eskdale, far from the Mermaid Tavern. But then there was James Howell who lived in London, an inveterate note taker and letter writer, who was usually 244 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE on the scent for suppers at the Apollo, and could have reported Ben's table talk but un- fortunately did not. In a letter dated from Westminster, April 5, 1636, James Howell describes a solemn supper given by Ben Jon- son, at which he and Thomas Carew were present. This letter to Thomas Hawkins is evidence of the fact that Ben's utterances were veraciously reported by the Scotch poet in his notes, "Conversations of Ben Jonson in 1619," where reference is made to Ben's display of self-worship and vilification of his brother poets, and also of the truth and justice of the criticism as resting on Ben's competency and credibility as a witness. Howell writes: "I was invited yesternight to a solemn supper by B. J. whom you deeply remember. There was good company excel- lent Cheer Choise wines and jovial welcome One thing intervened which almost Spoiled the relish of the rest Ben began to engross all the discourse to Vapour extremely of himself and by vilifying others to magnify his own muse Thomas Carew buzzed me in the ear that Ben had barreled up a great deal of Knowledge yet seeme he had not read the 'Etheques' which among other precepts of SHAKESPEARE THE MASTERMIND 245 morality forbid Self-commendation But for my part I am content to dispense with this Roman infirmity of B's now that time has snowed upon his pericranium." However, we know Ben pretty much as he was known to the men of his own generation. The remarkable record of his sayings, re- ported by William Drummond, the Laird of Hawthornden, in 1619, when honored with a visit from the great literary dictator of the time, "great lover and praiser of himself, contemner and scorner of others." The Drummond notes show Ben Jonson to be a person of rather doubtful veracity, one whose testimony we view with suspicion or re- ject altogether. And this is the witness whom the Stratfordians chiefly depend upon as the attestor for the works which are associated with the Stratford actor's name. The Strat- fordians say or one of them, a sylogizer, has said if Shakspere of Stratford was not the true author of the works of Shakespeare, then Jonson was a liar. Jonson could not have been a liar. Therefore, etc., the critics cannot per- cieve the difference between proof and opin- ion. By the way, the opinion of the most skil- ful critics is, that the great unknown writer 246 SHAKESPEARE, THE PERSONAL PHASE (Junius), who for a hundred and fifty years has been the subject of the closest scrutiny, cannot be identified "Stat nominis umbra!' Edmund Burke was generally supposed to be Junius while the letters were issuing from the press. Dr. Kelly of Finsbury Square, published a tract in order to prove that Burke was the author of Junius. So may we not as glibly syllogize also without any real knowl- edge of the identity of Junius. Thus, if Burke was not the true author of the Junius letters then Dr. Kelly was a liar. Dr. Kelly could not have been a liar. Therefore, etc. However, we now know that Burke did not write the celebrated letters. Junius is noc thick. Sir William, 132. Diuus. Leonard, 160. Donations of Constantlne, 228. Donne, Dr. John, 24, 267. Dowland, John, 323. Drake, Sir Francis. 25. Drayton, Michael, 5, 12, 104, 161, 162, 164, 170, 190, 387. Druminond, \Villhnii of Hawthornden, 126, 162, 243, 245, 246, 248, 390. Dryden, John, 340. Dyce, Dr., 134. E "Eastward Hoe," 16. 17. Elizabeth, Queen, 6, 7, 21, 31, 55, 380. Kl IN! more. Lord, 122. Elton, Charles tl. < ., 111. Emerson, R. W., 12, 29, 134, 164. Epitaph, 33. Essex, Earl of, 5, 6, 19, 170. Farmer, Dr., 131. Field, Nathaniel, 310. INDEX 397 Fleay, Dr.. 96, 185, 318. Fletcher, John, 13, 23, 31, 186, 203, 241. Florio, John, 125. Ford, John, 24, 31, 241. Forman, Dr. Simon, 28. Francis, Sir Philip, 223. Franklin, Ben, 303. Fuller, Thomas, 201, 202. Fume**, Dr., 14, 334. G Greene, Robert His partiality to "The Man with the Hoe," 291, 302. His democratic sympathies, 283, 292, 301. The purity of his writings, 281, 289, 296. He never prostituted his pen to courseness, 297, 298. He appealed to the better class of readers, 303. He was supreme in prose romance, 292. A born story-teller, 300. His versatility and quickness in composition, 303. His literary fame, 288. He was the popular author of the day, 292, 300. His gracious types of womanhood, 295, 298, 299. The salutory effect of his methods of warfare with the criminal classes, 289, 290. With him rank is never the measure of merit, 302. "Not lip-holy," 290. He was given to self-upbraiding, 296, 300. He fell a prey to strong drink, 282, 283. His character as usually framed by the critic, '282, 284, 289, 298, 307. His opprobrious Shake-scene not Shakespeare, 308, 309, 313, 314, 315, 316, 317, 22, 330. He counsels his friends to give up Play Writings as degrading, 318. He was one of the founders of English fiction, 285. The great commercial value of his name, 288. Greene, Thomas Represents the townsmen of Stratford-on- Avon in their struggle with Combe, Manwaring and Shakspere (the "Vandals" of 1614-18) the three par- ties acting in unison in an attempted enclosure of a large part of the adjacent Common fields, 41, 47, 48, 49, 63, 71, 75, 77, 160. Greenwood, Sir George G. His work "Is There a Shake- speare Problem?" cited, 82, 310. Great Unknown, The, 366. Greys Inn, 279. Groats Worth of Wit, 92, 96, 348, 349. Grosart, Dr. A. On Prince Henry's Death, 333, 391. Garrick, David, 122. Gauden, John, Bishop of Exeter, 192. H Hahlngton, William, 393. Hale, Sir Matthew, 226. Hall, Elizabeth, 127, 128, 164. Hall, Dr. John Shakspere's son-in-law, 34, 71, 76, 109, 133, 160, 163, 164. Hall, William an Oxford graduate, 36. Hallam, Henry, 12, 134, 164. Halliwell, Phillipps, 35, 37, 53, 111, 129. 398 INDEX Hammer, Sir Thoir.as, SOS. Hamlet, 9, 315. Hart, Joan, 127. Hat ha way, Allies, 66, 113. Hathaway, Anne, 66, 111, 112, 113, 128. IIn11.avi ay, Richard, 113. Hattoii, Lord Chancellor, 25. Harvey, Gahrlel, 292, 293, 294, 297. HeminxH, .John, 129, 170, 231. Henslowe Blary, 195, 196, 216, 234. Henslovve, Philip, 195, 216, 233, 234, 235. High Commission, The Court of, 6. Henry, Prince, 31, 379, 386, 389, 390, 391. Herald College, 12, 131. Herrlck, Robert, 296. Heylin, Peter, 195. Heywood, ThomaN, 198, 217, 219, 220. Heywood, Sir John, 6. Hobbes, ThomaN, 203, 241. Homer, 3, 10, 30, 73, 88, 387. Howell, James, 241, 243, 244, 280. HiKlihroN, 15. Ingleby, Dr., 203, 218, 338. Inner Temple, 22, 279. Irving, Sir Henry, 171. Irving, Washington, 40. Jagjerard, William, 217. Jinn IM The First Prefers his own writings, 55, 104, 267, 280, 380, 381. George Chapman's letter to, 382, 383. His Demonology, 380. Jefferson, Thomas, 361. Jones, Inigo Great confidence placed in, 268, 278. He was employed in arranging the scenery for the masques of Beaumont, Chapman and Ben Jonson, 386, 387. JohimeiiN Factotum (See Robert Greene "A Groatsworth of Wit.") Johnson, Dr. Samuel lexicographer and critic, 247, 309. Jonsou, Ben He was born to poor condition in London, 249, 309. Educated at Westminister School, 249. He served as a Soldier in Flanders, 250. His appearance, 242, 243, 279. Not sensitive, 280. Quarrels with Marston Deekker and Inigo Jones, 243, 251, 270. A combatant in the "War of the Theatres," 209, 210. Ridiculed for including plays among his "Works," 198. Strong in his friendships and enmitys, 241, 251, 252. Never would let "Sleeping dogs rest," 254. His poverty, 249, 269, 280. Forced to sell library, 255, 268. In the days of his adversity, wrote mendieant epistle for bread, 281. Vilification and commendation of brother poets, 244, 265. Ridicules Drayton and Shakespeare, 266, 267, 271, 272, 275. His literary compliments are to be received with sus- INDEX 399 picion, 247, 274, 275. Spake disparagingly of Beaumont and Shakespeare, 256, 257, 270, 273. His competency and credibility as a witness, 245, 246, 247, 257, 264, 273. Notes of his conversations recorded by Drummond, 248, 265, 266, 267. Who leaves the impress of his individuality, 242, 254. The mass of literary detail respecting him, 254, 278. Compared with the trifles and non-literary matter of no consequence that we know of Shakspere, 242, 245. His allusion to Elizabeth Countess of Rutland, 252, 253, 276, 277. He collected a library rich in scarce and valuable books. In this particular how unlike Shakspere, 254, 255. The superiority of literary reputation, 242, 254. He united in a comedy "Eastward Hoe" with Chapman and Marston and was sent to prison, 252, 253. His allusions to Shakespeare, 251, 258, 259, 261, 272, 273. Junius Letters, 192, 222, 223. Jusseraud, J. J. and Robert Greene, 344. K Keats, John, 378. Keets, Francis, 360. Kemp, William (Will), 119, 205, 208, 311, 313, 314, 322, 327. Kind Hearts Dreams, 347, 348. Kirk, Edward (E. K.), 189, E. K. 195, 180. Kyd, Thomas, 213, 318, 319, 320. Lamb, Charles, 243. Lainer, Sidney, 14. Landor, Walter Savage, 197. Lang, Andrew, 11, 13, 14, 96, 123, 124, 128, 137, 205, 309, 310, 365. Lee, Jane, 186. Lee, Sir Sidney, 13, 14, 91, 111, 167, 203. Lincoln, Abraham, 139, 303. Lincoln Inn, 279. Lodge, Thomas, 190, 195, 354. Lombard, Peter, 6, 7. London, 76. Lowell, James II., 185. Lucy, Sir Thomas, 79, 116, 117, 118, 125. llabie. Hamilton Wright, 309. Macauley, Lord, 223. Middle Temple, 22, 28, 63, 279. 31ainwarin;, Arthur one of the riators confederated with Combe brothers and William Shakspere in an at- tempted enclosure of the Common fields, 42, 53, 55, 85, 87. Malom, Edmond quoted, 91, 309, 369. Manuinghain, Joint diarist records anecdote of Shakspere, 23, 24, 28, 171, 235. Marlowe, Christopher Was on terms of intimate friendship with Chapman, 385. Suffered from repression, 282, 320, 321. His imputed atheism, 359, 360, 361. 400 INDEX His Violent end of life with a foreknowledge of his un- timely death at the stake was his death self-admin- istered? or was he slain by a serving-man one Fran- cis Archer, which? Miller, Joaquin, California poet, 300. Marston, John, 169, 190, 243, 267, 268. Mantson, Prof. David on Shakespeare's reticense, 102. Markham, Edwin American poet, 282. Martin, Marprilate a Mask-name, 292. Manque of the Middle Temple and Lincoln's Inn, 386. Meres, Francis, 180, 181, 182, 184, 185, 288, 298. Mermaid Tavern Ben at. 241. Merton College Oxford, 167. Mlddilton, Thomas, 25, 267. Milton, John, 32, 41, 196, 299, 378. Minto, Prof. William, 373. Montesquieu, 192. Mountjoy, Christopher, Wig-maker Prof. Wallace on, 86, 137! 157. Mollere (Jean Baptiste Poquelin), 191. Mulcaster, Richard, 109. Munday, Anthony, 310. Nash, Thomas Poet on informers, 196, 206, 212, 280, 297, 299, 354, 365. Nash, Thomas marries Elizabeth Hall the grand-daughter of William Shakspere, 127. Nicholas, Cardinal de Cusa, Nine Days Wonder, 327. Norwich Kemp at, 322. Northumberland, Earl of, 356. Outlines, Holltwell-Phillipp's Overhury, Sir Thomas Horribly murdered by poison Lady Essex and James The First being the instigators, 343, 381. Ovid poet and a canon lawyer, 103, 104. Peele, George, 19, 93, 185, 310, 351, 357. Pembrook, Countess of, 33. Pembrook, Earl of, 16, 19, 232, 231, 230. Phillips, Augustine, 122. Poe. Edgar Allen, 282, 298. Pope, Alexander, 308. Privy Council, 6, 74. Public Record Office, 87. Puritans, 41. Pym, John, 24. Quiney, Richard, 121. Quiney, Thomas, 127, 133, 137. Qjuincy, Thomas, 109, 223. INDEX 401 Raleigh, Sir Walter, 25, 170, 190, 381, 391. ItipliiiKltnm Combe's agent, 44, 48. Richard II, 6, 7, 8, 216. Robertson, J. M., 14, 15, 137, 389. Rogers, Philip, 135, 137. Rathwuy, Uiohard, 330. Ro*ve. Nicholas, 68, 79, 83, 112, 168, 308. Rowly, William, 310, 330. Rutland, Countess of, 16, 276. Rutland. Karl of, 14, 276. It utter, Joseph, 274. Salisbury, Earl of, 369. Scot, Reginald, 226, 380. Scott, Sir Walter, 343. Selden John, 25, 102, 103, 104, 226, 241. Shagrsper, Willm, 111, 112. Shake-rage, 95, 322. Shake-scene, 92, 94, 95, 284, 308, 314, 317. Shake-Speare Shakespeare the author of the Plays a psen- donymous Name first assumed in connection with the Poems in 1593 in connection with the Plays in 1598 and in connection with the Sonnets in 1609, 17, 19, 77, 80, 101, 179, 180, 185, 186, 233, 262, 268, 299, 304. Cannot be identified with Shakspere the Stratford Play- er, 187, 188. "The Poet" was anxious to mask his identity under the name "Shakespeare" a pseudonym, why? Was he a man of rank or of high position in society? 189, 200, 201, 203, 219, 234. Not attack by Robert Greene, 91, 92, 93. Shake-scene not allusion to, 92. Ben Jonson's allusion to, 259, 268. Chettle supposed allusion cannot be a reference to, 96. Not a single commendatory verse was addressed to the Poet on the production or publication of any of the Shakespeare Plays, 189, 31, 32. His vocabulary (see the Literary Aspect), 179. A Summary of some of the negative pregnants, 229, 203. Such as the silence of Ben Jonson not so much as the least commentary upon the Author of the Plays until the Stratford Player had lain for years in the grave, 23, 203. Also the silence of the diarest Maningham, 27, 28, 235. The Silence of Sir Thomas Bodley, 102. The Silence of John Selden, 25, 203. The Silence of Inigo Jones, 203. The Silence of Philip Henslowe, 395, 234, 235. The Silence of Edward Alleyn, 234, 235. The Silence of Beaumont and Fletcher, 23, 31, 203. The Silence of Chapman, 202, 203. The Silence of Drayton, 202, 203. Shakspere, William "Him who sleeps by Avon," 4, 5, 10, 11. His parentage, 104. Stratford-on-Avon His Supposed Birthplace, 101. 105 122, 124, 125, 128. His Baptism And Nurture, 105. Was he sent to school in boyhood? his biographers un- able to tell, 107, 108, 109, 110. 402 INDEX Known Facts of his life, 121, 122, 142, 159, 171. His improvident and irregular marriage, 105, 110, 111, He hikes 'to London, 117, 118. An actor, 205, 213, 218, 225, 229, 230, 231, 232, 245, 251, 261, 262. Lived apart from his wife and children, 130. A sojourner for many years in the house shop of a wig- maker, 86, one Mountjoy in Silver Street, London, 143, 149. Was a witness for the plaintiff in the case Bellott vs. Mountjoy. His testimony of little value to the party calling him or to the Court of Requests, 146, 148, 150, 151, 152, 158. Speculation in Real Estate, 121. His harsh treatment of debtors, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141. His litigious striving, 134, 135, 136, 140. Conduct in money affairs, 160, 163, 121, 134, 157. Becomes very wealthy, 108, 110. His arrogant defiance of public interest shown by his persistent invasion of popular rights, 44, 61. Was one of the men who sought the oppression of the townfolks by his attempt to seize the common lands whom the Lord Chief-Justice Sir Edward Coke de- clared from the bench "defied the law of the realm," 41, 42, 43, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 74, 85. TTie execrative epitaph cut on his tomb is a criminating memorial of his attempt to gain possession of the Stratford Common lands, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 75, 76, 77. Was charged with obtaining "heraldic" honours by fraudulent representation, 5, 131, 132. As a player takes unimportant parts in what are now termed the "heavy business," 119, 120, 123, 205. His literary contemporaries had no conception of the actors intellectual supremacy if such he possessed, 103, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 144, 145, 163, 164, 165, 172, 200, 103. Was one of "those deserving men and one of the part- ners in the profits of that they call the House" 119, 120. His readiness to engage with Richard Burbage to work at the Earl of Rutland's, frevolans device ."impreso" in 1613 for the small sum of 44s, three years before his death, 18, 19- The spelling of his name not Spear-Shaking, 105, 142, 143, 188. Never assumed the name of "Shakespeare" or the hy- phenated Shake-Speare, 143. Does not claim the "Shakespeare Plays," 9. And his daughters, illiteracy, 108, 109. The bust in the Stratford Church the most trustworthy physical presentment of, 159, 160. His Will, 63, 63, 66, 170. Death and burial of. Shakspere, John, 106, 126. Shakspere, Judith, 108, 109, 126, 133. Shakspere, Susanna. 109. Sheavyn, Phoebe, 310. Shirley, James, 25, 241. Sidney, Elizabeth, Countess of Rutland, 276. Sidney, Sir Philip, 24, 82, 267. Southampton, Earl of, 26, 165, 167, 168, 170, 172, 173, 174. Speddingr, James, 186, 203. Spencer, Edmund, 5, 170, 189, 241, 267, 294. INDEX 403 Star Chamber, 6, 54, 169. Stevens, George, 83, 84. Stopes, Mrs. C. C., 18, 71, 72. Stevenson, Mr., 72. Stratford Bust (see Frontispiece). Swift, Dean, 291. Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 27. Symouds, J. A., 32. Taft, William Howard, 361. Tarleton, Richard the player, 311, 321. Tell, William, 226, 227. Taylor, John, 267. Thwaites, Sdward, 36. Tyrwhltt, Thomas, 93, 308, 309. U Upstart, Crow, 92, 95. Venus and Adonis, 165, 214. Voltaire (Francis Aronet), 191. W AVallace, Dr. Charles William his Shakspere discoveries, 19, 52, 86, 87, 135, 136, 156, 137, 158, 159, 161, 162. Wheler Collection, the Stratford-on-Avon 1806, 41. White, R. G., 139. Wilkins, eorge, 155. Webster, John, 197, 198, 199, 200, 390. Welcombe, 45, 53, 55. Whateley, Anna, 111. W'riathesley, Henry, Karl of Southampton, 5, 25, 165, 381. Wilson, Woodrow, 279. Wilson, Robert Senior, 310, 311, 313, 314, 330, 371. Wood. Anthony, 376. Worburton, Bishop, 309. 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. This book is due on the last date stamped below, or on the date to which renewed. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. cr 1 3 LD 21A-50m-8,'61 (Cl795slO)476B General Library University of California Berkeley YC 14804 416427 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA UBRARY