In the changing seasons his feeling was but of one description of beauty passing into another, "Hoary-headed frosts Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose; An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds In the works of man, no less than in the works of God, he took deep delight,-the "cloud-capp'd towers," the "gorgeous palaces," the "solemn temples." Of the Fine Arts he was an earnest votary. Music, in particular, was a never-ending delight to him. His eloquent denunciation of those who "are not moved with concord of sweet sounds" is written in a thousand hearts. To his ear music was "the food of love:" he claims for it the distinction of having been "ordained to refresh the mind of man.” In that most exquisite scene at Belmont, in the Fifth Act of the "Merchant of Venice," music intensifies the happiness of the youthful lovers,— "How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! Creep in our ears; soft stillness and the night And Jessica only deepens into tenderness when she breathes into the ear of Lorenzo,— "I am never merry when I hear sweet music." With what truth of feeling the Duke, in "The Twelfth Night," asks for a repetition of the music he has just heard! "That strain again ;-it had a dying fall: O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, And again, "That old and antique song we heard last night: Of these most brisk and giddy-paced times." Such examples could be largely multiplied; but take as the only other the lines put into the lips of Oberon, "My gentle Puck, come hither: thou remember'st Since once I sat upon a promontory, And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, Not contented with thus celebrating the charms of music, Shakespeare gave to be wedded to it some of the most delicious of our English songs. They sparkle through his plays in rich profusion,-many of them light, airy, and fanciful, like his own sprites, others full of a divine melancholy. Painting and sculpture were hardly less prized by him; and he had evidently a learned knowledge of both. Of painting he says, "It tutors nature." Neither Titian, nor Velasquez, nor he, greater than either, who designed the Sybils on the dome of the Sistine Chapel, ever painted a nobler portrait than Hamlet does of the "buried Majesty of Denmark." Raphael, on his most impassioned canvas, never exceeded the beauty of the description of "fair Portia's counterfeit," given by the enamoured Bassanio. Perhaps Shakespeare had before him a work of Julio Romano, for whom he is known to have entertained great admiration, when he makes the Poet say of the picture exhibited by the Painter in the first scene of "Timon of Athens," "Admirable! How this grace Speaks his own standing! what a mental power As regards sculpture, his understanding of the chief excellences of that art is sufficiently attested by the language used when Paulina, in the "Winter's Tale," unvails to Leontes the supposed statue of Hermione ; To see the life as lively mock'd as ever Masterly done: The very life seems warm upon her lip, The fixture of her eye has motion in't; There is an air comes from her; what fine chisel And this was the semi-barbarian whom the French scoffer declared had no spark of taste! Thomas Carlyle spoke truer words when he said, "The noblest thing we men of England have produced has been this Shakespeare." After twelve or fourteen years of persevering industry in London, Shakespeare found himself the possessor of handsome means, which continued steadily to increase till there is every reason to believe he had an income of not less, in modern money, than £1,500 per annum. He and Richard Burbage were the principal proprietors of the Blackfriars Theatre, having four shares each, whilst the whole movable effects belonged exclusively to Shakespeare, who had also a large proprietary interest in the Globe Theatre. The share of profits to which he was entitled from the successful representation of his plays was also a constant source of emolument. De Quincey is of opinion that Shakespeare was the first man of letters in Great Britain who realized a fortune by literature, Pope being the second, and Sir Walter Scott the third. However this may be, it is certain that as soon as Shakespeare had money to invest, his thoughts reverted to Stratford; and, like Sir Walter Scott, he seems to have been ambitious of giving stability to his family by the acquisition of landed rights. In the year 1597 he purchased the best house in Stratford, known by the name of New Place, and in 1602 he bought, at a considerable cost, one hundred and seven acres of land adjoining the house. On Shakespeare's death, New Place went to his daughter, Mrs. Hall, in liferent, and then to her only daughter, Elizabeth, afterwards Lady Barnard, in fee. It was sold in 1675 to Sir Edward Walker, Garter King-at-Arms. From him it passed to his grandson, Sir Hugh Clopton, who, about the year 1740, made extensive alterations on it, and modernized its aspect both internally and externally. Sir Hugh's son-in-law, Henry Talbot, brother to the Lord Chancellor Talbot, sold New Place, about the year 1754, to the Rev. Francis Gastrell, Vicar of Frodsham, in Cheshire. Of this reverend gentleman we fear it must be said that "The motions of his spirit were dull as night, He must have known that he had the honour to own a house which was dear to Stratford and sacred to all England; and yet, in a fit of paltry rage at being forced to pay a poor's-rate on it though he resided a part of the year at Lichfield, he declared, in the year 1759, that New Place should never be assessed again, and forthwith razed the building to the ground, sold off the materials, and took his departure from Stratford amidst the execrations of its inhabitants. Nor was this the only offence of this same Mr. Gastrell: he had committed three years before another act of sacrilege hardly less atrocious. Shakespeare planted with his own hand, in 1609, or thereby, in the garden at New Place, a mulberry tree, which grew |