by no means warranted in forming even an opinion on the question, whether Mary Shakespeare adhered to the ancie. faith, it is indisputable, if we may rely upon the represen tation of the commissioners, that some of her family continued Roman Catholics. In the document under consideration it is stated, that Mrs. Mary Arden and her servant John Browne had been presented to the commissioners as recusants, and that they had been so prior to the date of the former return by the same official persons.

In considering the subject of the faith of our poet's father, we ought to put entirely out of view the paper upon which Dr. Drake lays some stress'; we mean the sort of religious will, or confession of faith, supposed to have been found, about the year 1770, concealed in the tiling of the house John Shakespeare is conjectured to have inhabited. It was printed by Malone in 1790, but it obviously merits no attention, and there are many reasons for believing it to be spurious. Malone once looked upon it as authentic, but he corrected his judgment respecting it afterwards.

Upon the new matter we have here been able to produce, we shall leave the reader to draw his own conclusion, and to decide for himself whether John Shakespeare forbore church in 1592, because he was in fear of arrest, because he was" aged, sick, and impotent of body," or because he did not accord in the doctrines of the protestant faith.

We ought not, however, to omit to add, that if John Shakespeare were infirm in 1592, or if he were harassed and threatened by creditors, neither the one circumstance nor the other prevented him from being employed in August 1592 (in what particular capacity, or for what precise purpose is not stated) to assist Thomas Trussell, gentleman," and "Richard Sponer and others," in taking an inventory of the goods and chattels of Henry Feelde of Stratford, tanner, after his decease. A contemporary copy of the original document has recently been placed in the hands of the Shakespeare Society for publication, but the fact, and not the details, is all that seems of importance here.

1 Shakspeare and his Times," vol. i. p. 8. Dr. Drake seems to be of the opinion that John Shakespeare may have refrained from attending the corporation alls previous to 1536, on account of his religious opinions.

2 It has the following title :

"A true and perfect Inventory of the Goodes and Cattells, which were the Goodes and Cattells of Henry Feelde, late of Stretford-upponAvon in the County of Warwyke, tanner, now decessed, beynge in Stretford aforesayd, the 21st daye of Auguste, Anno Domini 1592. By Thomas Trussell, Gentleman, Mr. John Shaksper, Richard Sponer and

others."

The items of the inventory consist of nothing but an enumeration of old bedsteads, painted cloths, andirons, &c. of no curiosity and of

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

cxiii

In the heading of the paper our poet's father is called "Mr. John Shakespeare," and at the end we find his name as "John Shakespeare senior :" this appears to be the only instance in which the addition of " senior was made, and the object of it might be to distinguish him more effectually from John Shakespeare, the shoemaker in Stratford, with whom, of old perhaps, as in modern times, he was now and then confounded. The fact itself may be material in deciding whether John Shakespeare, at the age of sixty-two, was, or was not so "aged, sick, or impotent of body" as to be unable to attend protestant divine worship. It certainly does not seem likely that he would have been selected for the performance of such a duty, however trifling, if he had been so apprehensive of arrest as not to be able to leave his dwelling, or if he had been very infirm from sickness or old age.

Whether he were, or were not a member of the protestant reformed Church, it is not to be disputed that his children, all of whom were born between 1558 and 1580, were baptized at the ordinary and established place of worship in the parish. That his son William was educated, lived, and died a protestant we have no doubt1.

We have already stated our distinct and deliberate opinion that "Venus and Adonis " was written before its author left his home in Warwickshire. He kept it by him for some

little value. It is to be observed that Thomas Trussel was an attorney of Stratford, and it seems likely that the valuation was made in relation to Field's will. The whole sum at which the goods were estimated was £14. 14s. Od., and the total, with the names of the persons making the appraisement, is thus stated at the end of the ac

count.

"Some totall-£14. 14s. Od.

John Shaksper senior
By me Richard Sponer
Per me Thomas Trussel
Script. present."

Of course, unless, as does not appear in this coeval copy, John Shakespeare made his mark, the document must have been subscribed by some person on his behalf.

1 Nearly all the passages in his works, of a religious or doctrinal character, have been brought into one view by Sir Frederick B. Watson, K. C. H., in a very elegant volume, printed in 1843, for the benefit of the theatrical funds of our two great theatres. The object of the very zealous and amiable compiler was to counteract a notion, formerly prevailing, that William Shakespeare was a Roman Catholic, and he has done so very effectually, although we do not find among his extracts one which seems to us of great value upon this question: it forms part of the prophecy of Cranmer, at the christening of Queen Elizabeth in Henry VIII." act v. sc. 4. It consists of but five expressive words, which we think clearly refer to the completion of the Reformation under our maiden queen.

"In her days #

God shall be truly known."

J*

years, and early in 1593 seems to have put it into the hands of a printer, named Richard Field, who, it has been said, was of Stratford, and might be the son of the Henry Feelde, or Field, whose goods John Shakespeare was employed to value in 1592. It is to be recollected that at the time "Venus and Adonis" was sent to the press, while it was printing, and when it was published, the plague prevailed in London to such an excess, that it was deemed expedient by the privy council to put a stop to all theatrical performances'. Shakespeare seems to have availed himself of this interval, in order to bring before the world a production of a different character to those which had been ordinarily seen from his pen. Until " Venus and Adonis" came out, the public at large could only have known him by the dramas he had written, or by those which, at an earlier date, he had altered, amended, and revived. The poem caine from Field's press in the spring of 1593, preceded by a dedication to the Earl of Southampton. Its popularity was great and instantaneous, for a new edition of it was called for in 1594, a third in 1596, a fourth in 1600, and a fifth in 16022: there may have been, and probably were, intervening impressions, which have disappeared among the popular and destroyed literature of the time. We may conclude that this admirable and unequalled production first introduced its author to the notice of Lord Southampton; and it is evident from the opening of the dedication, that Shakespeare had not taken the precaution of ascertaining, in the first instance, the wishes of the young nobleman on the subject. Lord Southampton was more than nine years younger than Shakespeare, having been born on 6th Oct. 1573.

We may be sure that the dedication of "Venus and Adonis" was, on every account, acceptable, and Shakespeare followed it up by inscribing to the same peer, but in a much more assured and confident strain, his "Lucrece" in the

1 By the following order, derived from the registers :"That for avoyding of great concourse of people, which causeth increase of the infection, it were convenient that all Playes, Bearbaytings, Cockpitts. common Bowling-alleyes, and such like unnecessarie assemblies, should be suppressed during the time of infection, for that infected people, after their long keeping in. and before they be cleared of their disease and infection, being desirous of recreation, use to resort to such assemblies, where, through heate and thronge, they infect many sound personnes."

In consequence of the virulence and extent of the disorder, Michaelmas term, 1593, was kept at St. Alban's. It was about this period that Nash's "Summer's Last Will and Testament" was acted as a private entertainment at Croydon.

2 Malone knew nothing of any copy of 1594. The impression of 1602 was printed for W. Leake; only a single copy of the edition has come down to our day it had been entered by him as early as 1596.

:

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

CXV

succeeding year. He then "dedicated his love" to his juvenile patron, having "a warrant of his honourable dispo sition" towards his "pamphlet" and himself. "Lucrece was not calculated, from its subject and the treatment of it, to be so popular as "Venus and Adonis," and the first edition having appeared from Field's press in 1594, a reprint of it does not seem to have been called for until after the lapse of four years, and the third edition bears the date of 1600.

It must have been about this period that the Earl of Southampton bestowed a most extraordinary proof of his high-minded munificence upon the author of "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucrece." It was not unusual, at that time and afterwards. for noblemen, and others to whom works were dedicated, to make presents of money to the writers of them; but there is certainly no instance upon record of such generous bounty, on an occasion of the kind, as that of which we are now to speak': nevertheless, we have every reliance upon the authenticity of the anecdote, taking into account the unexampled merit of the poet, the known liberality of the nobleman, and the evidence upon which the story has been handed down. Rowe was the original narrator of it in print, and he doubtless had it, with other information, from Betterton, who probably received it directly from Sir William Davenant, and communicated it to Rowe. If it cannot be asserted that Davenant was strictly contemporary with Shakespeare, he was contemporary with Shakespeare's contemporaries, and from them he must have obtained the original information. Rowe gives the statement in these words :

"There is one instance so singular in the munificence of this patron of Shakespeare's that, if I had not been assured that the story was handed down by Sir William Davenant, who was probably very well acquainted with his [Shakespeare's] affairs, I should not have ventured to have inserted; that my Lord Southampton at one time gave him a thousand pounds to enable him to go through with a purchase which he heard he had a mind to."

No biographer of Shakespeare seems to have adverted to the period when it was likely that the gift was made, in combination with the nature of the purchase Lord Southampton had heard our great dramatist wished to complete, or, it seems to us, they would not have thought the tradition by any means so improbable as some have held it.

1 The author of the present Life of Shakespeare is bound to make one exception, which has come particularly within his own knowl edge, but of which he does not feel at liberty to say more.

1

The disposition to make a worthy return for the dedications of "Venus and Adonis" and Lucrece" would of course be produced in the mind of Lord Southampton by the publication of those poems; and we are to recollect that it was precisely at the same date that the Lord Chamberlain's servants entered upon the project of building the Globe Theatre on the Bankside, not very far to the west of the Southwark foot of London Bridge. "Venus and Adonis" was published in 1593; and it was on the 22nd Dec. in that year that Richard Burbage, the great actor, and the leader of the company to which Shakespeare was attached, signed a bond to a carpenter of the name of Peter Street for the construction of the Globe. It is not too much to allow at least a year for its completion; and it was during 1594, while the work on the Bankside was in progress, that "Lucrece came from the press. Thus we see that the building of the Globe, at the cost of the sharers in the Blackfriars theatre, was coincident in point of time with the appearance of the two poems dedicated to the Earl of Southampton. Is it, then, too much to believe that the young and bountiful nobleman, having heard of this enterprise from the peculiar interest he is known to have taken in all matters relating to the stage, and having been incited by. warm admiration of "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucrece," in the fore-front of which he rejoiced to see his own name, presented Shakespeare with 10007., to enable him to make good the money he was to produce, as his proportion, for the completion of the Globe?

We do not mean to say that our great dramatist stood in need of the money, or that he could not have deposited it as well as the other sharers in the Blackfriars'; but Lord Southampton may not have thought it necessary to inquire, whether he did or did not want it, nor to consider precisely what it had been customary to give ordinary versifiers, who sought the pay and patronage of the nobility. Although Shakespeare had not yet reached the climax of his excellence, Lord Southampton knew him to be the greatest dramatist this country had yet produced; he knew him also to be the writer of two poems, dedicated to himself, with which nothing else of the kind could bear comparison; and in the exercise of his bounty he measured the poet by his deserts, and "used him after his own honour and diguity," by bestowing upon him a sum worthy of his title and char

Neither are we to imagine that Shakespeare would have to contribute the whole sum of 1000. as his contribution to the cost of the Globe: probably much less; but this was a consideration which, we may feel assured, never entered the mind of a man like Lord Southampton.