so much; Accius (Plautus), the genius of all the comedies; and "him of Cordova" (Seneca), the type of the tragedies. Such cryptogrammatic evidence does not, however, atone for the open misleading of the public. And it would be idle to suppose that he was himself mislead. Whatever William Shakespeare may have pretended to be, Jonson knew him intimately and could not have been deceived.

But if Ben Jonson were salving his conscience with mental reservation when he wrote his address to" the memory of my beloved master," there was nothing in it, as Miss Delia Bacon has pointed out, except the words "Mr. William Shakespeare," that would not have applied to Francis Bacon. He also might be called the "Sweet swan of Avon," for the Avon flows by Cheltenham, where his great estate was, as well as by Stratford. And if William Shakespeare were literally dead in 1623, he also was dead to the world, having been disgraced and driven into retirement in 1621. Then the "small Latin and less Greek" might, to Jonson's vanity, appear enough for the great philosopher, though it would evidently be too much for William Shakespeare, whom all his contemporaries certify to have

been entirely without art, i.e. without education. And lastly, he uses the same expressions to describe the works of Bacon and Shakespeare. Thus he said, of Bacon, in his 'Discoveries,' that

He hath filled up all numbers and performed that in our tongue which may be compared or preferred to insolent Greece or haughty Rome; so that he may be named or stand as the mark and åkμý of our language.

while in this address we have

Or, when thy socks were on,
Leave thee alone for thy comparison

Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome
Sent forth or since did from their ashes come.

CHAPTER XIV.

AUTHORSHIP OF THE PLAYS, CONTINUED.

Shakespeare's Personal Character-Aubrey MSS.-Manningham's Diary-Ward's MSS.-The Bidford Sippers -'Groatsworth of Wit'-Return from Parnassus No. 3- Pierce Penniless'-' Ratsie's Ghost'' Use of Richard II.' by Lord Essex-Lord Southampton's gift to Shakespeare-Signature of Shakespeare.

HAVING shown that the contemporaries of William Shakespeare previous to 1623 had no very exalted opinion of his genius, we will now inquire what historical evidence says of his personal character.

Of his early life very little is actually known. Rowe, his first biographer, writing from the information of Betterton, the player, who had gone to Stratford for the purpose of collecting evidence, tells us that he was the son of a leading burgess of that town. But all Betterton had found in the Stratford register was a statement that a certain John Shakespeare had a

But

son, christened William, born in 1564. Shakespeare was then and still is a common patronymic of the neighbourhood, so that a score of different children may have had the same name. The only scrap of real evidence is traditional, being contained in the Aubrey MSS., 1680 (C. of P., p. 383) which were not written till sixty-four years after his death. Aubrey says:

Mr. William Shakespeare was born at Stratford-uponAvon, in the county of Warwick. His father was a butcher; and I have been told heretofore by some of his neighbours that, when he was a boy, he exercised his father's trade. But, when he killed a calf, he would do it in a high style and make a speech. This William, being

inclined to poetry and acting, came to London, I guess about eighteen (1582?) and was an actor at one of the play-houses and did act exceedingly well. Now Ben Jonson was never a good actor, but an excellent instructor. He began early to make essays in dramatic poetry, which at that time was very low; and his plays took well. He was a handsome, well-shaped man, very good company and of a very ready and pleasant, smooth wit. The humour of the constable in a 'Midsummer Night's Dream' (?) he happened to take at Grendon in Bucks, which is the road from London to Stratford; and there was living that constable about 1642, when I first came to Oxon. Mr. Jos. Howe is of that parish, and knew him. Ben Jonson and he did gather humours of men daily, wherever they came. One time, as he was at the tavern at Stratford-upon-Avon, one Coombes an old rich usurer was to be buried. He makes there this extemporary epitaph:

Ten in the hundred the devil allows,

(*)

But Coombe will have twelve he swears and he vows. If any one asks," Who lies in this tomb?" "Hoh!" quoth the devil, "'tis Jack o' Coombe." He was wont to go to his country once a year. I think I have been told he left 200 or 300 li. per annum, there and thereabout, to his sister. I have heard Sir William Davenant and Mr. Thomas Shadwell, who is counted the best comedian we have now, say, that he had a most prodigious wit and did admire his natural parts beyond all other dramatical writers. He was wont to say that he never blotted out a line. Said Ben Jonson "I wish he had blotted out a thousand." His comedies will remain wit as long as the English tongue is understood; for that he handles mores hominum. (Now our present writers reflect so much upon particular persons and coxcombites that twenty years hence they will not be understood.) Though, as Ben Jonson says, he had but little Latin andless Greek he understood Latin pretty well; for he had been, in his

*This impromptu was evidently a matter of common notoriety in Stratford, when Betterton visited the town, for Rowe gives it in his memoir of Shakespeare. He, however, alters it as follows—

Ten in the hundred lies here ingraved,

'Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not saved;
If any man ask, "Who lies in this tomb?

"Oh! oh!" quoth the devil, " 'tis my John o' Coombe."

He thus not only improves the poetry, he relieves Shakespeare of the odium of having likened the Queen, his good patroness, to the enemy of souls. And it is undeniable that she had raised the legal rate of interest to ten per cent.; for, though it were effected by Act of Parliament, no act was passed in her reign without her real assent. We also learn from Halliwell-Phillips' outlines, that Shakespeare himself was not above receiving it, though his church called it usury.