nos et utrumque nostrum per se pro toto et in solid. hæred. executor. et administrator. nostros firmiter per præsentes sigillis nostris sigillat. Dat. 28 die Novem. anno regni dominæ nostræ Eliz. Dei gratia Angliæ, Franc. et Hiberniæ reginæ, fidei defensor. &c. 25°. The condicion of this obligacion ys suche, that if herafter there shall not appere any lawfull lett or impediment, by reason of any precontract, consangui[ni]tie, affinitie, or by any other lawful meanes whatsoever, but that William Shagspere one thone partie, and Anne Hathwey of Stratford in the dioces of Worcester, maiden, may lawfully solennize matrimony together, and in the same afterwardes remaine and continew like man and wiffe, according unto the lawes in that behalf provided: and moreover, if there be not at this present time any action, sute, quarrell, or demaund, moved or depending before any judge ecclesiasticall or temporall, for and concerning any suche lawfull lett or impediment: and moreover, if the said William Shagspere do not proceed to solemnizacion of mariadg with the said Anne Hathwey without the consent of hir frindes: and also, if the said William do, upon his owne proper costes and expenses, defend and save harmles the right reverend Father in God, Lord John Bushop of Worcester, and his offycers, for licencing them the said William and Anne to be maried together with once asking of the bannes of matrimony betwene them, and for all other causes which may ensue by reason or occasion therof; that then the said obligacion to be voyd and of none effect, or els to stand and abide in full force and vertue." The marks and seals of Sandells and Richardson (one of the seals having the initials R. H.42). Though not mentioned among his other children in his will, it seems indisputable that Anne Hathaway was the daughter of Richard Hathaway, a "husbandman,"48 or "substantial yeoman,' "44 of Shottery in the parish of Stratford,45 who had been dead 46 upwards of a twelvemonth when the above bond was executed, and who appears to have been on terms of intimacy with John Shakespeare.47-The Hathaways were resident in Shottery 48 before the middle of the sixteenth century. To free our poet from the imputation which is sug 42 The seal had probably belonged to the deceased Richard Hathaway. The two bondsmen, Sandells and Richardson, are mentioned in his will: he appoints the former to be one of its supervisors; and the latter is among the witnesses to it. They were his neighbours at Shottery. 1863. The Rev. Mr. Bellew, in a work entitled Shakespere's Home, &c., after giving the above preliminary bond, observes; "Here follow the signatures, or marks, of the witnesses; the first resembling the attempt that an aged person would make to draw a triangle; the second being a clumsy letter C. Two seals are added: the one is defaced, the other bears the impression 'R. H.'" p. 31. "When it was stated, at p. 31, that there are two seals to Shakespere's marriage-bond, one bearing the impression 'R. H.,' it would have been more correct to say there were,' because the seals have entirely vanished, and there is scarcely a trace of them on the parchment." p. 132. 43 So he styles himself in his will. Rowe's Life of Shakespeare. 45 Hence in the preliminary bond Anne Hathaway and the two bondsmen are described as "of Stratford."-Shottery is a hamlet about a mile from the town of Stratford. 66 46 He was buried at Stratford, Sept. 7th, 1581.-Yet Mr. Collier (Life of Shakespeare, p. 64, sec. ed.) speaks of Richard Hathaway concurring in the alliance" of Shakespeare and his daughter. 47 Two precepts found among the papers of the Court of Record at Stratford seem to show that in 1566 John Shakespeare became security for Richard Hathaway. 45 The house occupied by the Hathaways in Shakespeare's time (but now divided into three cottages) is still pointed out. gested by a comparison of the date of the preliminary bond (Nov. 28th, 1582) with that of his first child's baptism (May 26th, 1583), some recent biographers have anxiously informed us that in those days betrothment was often regarded as a sufficient warrant for cohabitation before actual marriage. Such may have been the case it by no means follows, however, that Shakespeare saw any excuse for his weakness in the conventional morality of the time. 50 "49 All things considered, Mr. Hunter perhaps is justified in terming this "a marriage of evil auspices." But it is unfair to conclude, as Malone and others have done, from certain passages in our author's plays,5 each of which passages more or less grows out of the incidents of the play, that he had cause to complain of domestic unhappiness: indeed, without taking into account the tradition of his regular visits to Stratford, we have strong presumptive evidence to the contrary in the fact, that the wife of his youth was the companion of his latest years, when he had raised himself to opulence and to the position of a gentleman. Nor assuredly is he to be charged with any want of affection as a husband, because he bequeaths to her only his "second best bed with the furniture;" for (as Mr. Knight first observed,—and it is strange that he should not have been anticipated in the remark) Shakespeare's estates, with the exception of a copyhold tenement expressly mentioned in his will, were freehold; and his widow was, of course, entitled to what the law terms dower. Still, on the other hand, we must allow that the disparity in age between himself and his wife, the circumstances attending their marriage, and the want of proof that she ever resided with him in London, are enough to excite suspicions "that Shakespeare was not a very happy married man." Susanna, the first child of William and Anne Shakespeare, was baptized at Stratford, May 26th, 1583. Hamnet and Judith,2 twins, baptized Feb. 2d, 1584-5, were the only other issue of their marriage. The circumstance next to be noticed in our author's history is one of great importance, inasmuch as, if not the sole cause of his quitting Stratford and putting forth the efforts of his genius, it may at least have contributed to such a result. Having fallen, we are told, into the company of some wild and disorderly young men, he was induced to assist them, on more than one occasion, in stealing deer from the park of Sir Thomas Collier's Life of Shakespeare, p. 66, sec. ed. 2 They were doubtless christened after Hamnet Sadler and Judith his wife. Hamnet (or Hamlet) Sadler, a baker at Stratford, was to the last intimate with Shakespeare, who bequeathed him 36s. and 8d. to buy a ring. Lucy of Charlecote, in the neighbourhood of Stratford. For this offence (which certainly, in those days, used to be regarded as a venial frolic) he was treated, he thought, too harshly; and he repaid the severity by ridiculing Sir Thomas in a ballad. So bitter was its satire, that the prosecution against the writer was redoubled; and forsaking his family and occupation, he took shelter in the metropolis from his powerful enemy. Such is the story3 which tradition has handed down; 3 First put in print by Rowe, Life of Shakespeare, 1709. But in the archives of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, are the Ms. collections of a learned antiquary, the Rev. William Fulman, who died in 1688, with additions by the friend to whom he bequeathed them, the Rev. Richard Davies, rector of Sapperton and archdeacon of Litchfield, who died in 1708. Among these papers, under the article Shakespeare, the following additions by Davies are found; "Much given to all unluckinesse in stealing venison and rabbits; particularly from Sr Lucy, who had him oft whipt and sometimes imprisoned, and at last made him fly his native country, to his great advancement: but his reveng was so great, that he is his Justice Clodpate [i.e. his foolish Justice-Justice Shallow]; and calls him a great man, and that, in allusion to his name, bore three lowses rampant for his arms." Rowe speaks of the ballad on Sir Thomas Lucy as "lost."-According to Oldys; "There was a very aged gentleman living in the neighbourhood of Stratford (where he died fifty years since) who had not only heard from several old people in that town of Shakespeare's transgression, but could remember the first stanza of that bitter ballad, which, repeating to one of his acquaintance, he preserved it in writing, and here it is, neither better nor worse, but faithfully transcribed from the copy which his relation very courteously communicated to me: 'A parliemente member, a justice of peace, At home a poor scare-crowe, at London an asse ; Yet an asse in his state We allowe by his ears but with asses to mate. Ms. Notes,-first printed by Steevens. One stanza of it [the ballad]," says Capell, "which has the appearance |