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we are to recollect that it could not be served on Sunday, recusants, and that they had been so prior to the date of so that apprehension of that kind need not have kept him the former return by the same official persons. away from church on the Sabbath. Neither was it likely that his son, who was at this date profitably employed in London as an actor and author, and who three years before was a sharer in the Blackfriars theatre, would have allowed his father to continue so distressed for money, as not to be able to attend the usual place of divine worship'. Therefore, although John Shakespeare was certainly in great pecuniary difficulties at the time his son William quitted Stratford, we altogether reject the notion that that son had permitted his father to live in comparative want, while he himself possessed more than competence.

"Age, sickness, and impotency of body," may indeed have kept John Shakespeare from church, but upon this point we have no information beyond the fact, that if he were born, as Malone supposes, in 1530, he was at this date only sixty-two.

With regard to his religious opinions, it is certain that after he became alderman of Stratford, on 4th July 1565, he must have taken the usual oath required from all protestants; but, according to the records of the borough, it was not administered to him until the 12th September following his election. This trifling circumstance perhaps hardly deserves notice, as it may have been usual to choose the corporate officers at one court, and to swear them in at the next. So far John Shakespeare may have conformed to the requirements of the law, but it is still possible that he may not have adopted all the new protestant tenets, or that having adopted them, like various other conscientious men, he saw reason afterwards to return to the faith he had abandoned. We have no evidence on this point as regards him; but we have evidence, as regards a person of the name of Thomas Greene, (who, although it seems very unlikely, may have been the same man who was an actor in the company to which Shakespeare belonged, and who was a co-sharer in the Blackfriars Theatre, in 1589) who is described in the certificate of the commissioners as then of a different parish, and who, it is added, had confessed that he had been "reconciled to the Romish religion." The memorandum is in these terms:

"It is here to be remembred that one Thomas Greene, of this parisshe, heretofore presented and indicted for a recusante, hath confessed to Mr. Pobt. Burgoyn, one of the commissioners for this service, that an ould Preest reconciled him to the Romishe religion, while he was prisoner in Worcester goale. This Greene is not everie day to be founde."

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 stress2; 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 here3. 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 doubt*.

We have already stated our distinct and deliberate opin

On the same authority we learn that the wife of Thomas Greene was a most wilful recusant;" and although we are by no means warranted in forming even an opinion on the question, whether Mary Shakespeare adhered to the ancient faith, it is indisputable, if we may rely upon the representation of the commissioners, that some of her family continued Roman Catholics. In the document under considera-ion that "Venus and Adonis " was written before its author tion it is stated, that Mrs. Mary Arden and her servant John Browne had been presented to the commissioners as 1 By an account of rents received by Thomas Rogers, Chamberlain of Stratford, in 1589, it appears that "John Shakespeare" occupied a house in Bridge-street, at an annual rent of twelve shillings, nine shillings of, which had been paid. Perhaps (as Malone thought) this was John Shakespeare, the shoemaker; because the father of the poet, having been bailiff and head-alderman, was usually styled Mr. John Shakespeare, as we have before remarked. However, it is a coincidence to be noted, that the name of John Shakespeare immediately follows that of Henry Fylde or Field, whose goods Mr. John Shakespeare was subsequently employed to value: they were therefore in all probability neighbours.

2Shakspeare 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 halls previous to 1586, on account of his religious opinions.

3 It has the following title :

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left his home in Warwickshire. He kept it by him for some
years, and early in 1593 seems to have put it into the hands
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.

4 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.”

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 pounds to enable him to go through with a purchase which that my Lord Southampton at one time gave him a thousand 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.

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 came from The disposition to make a worthy return for the dedicaField's press in the spring of 1593, preceded by a dedica- tions of "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucrece" would of tion to the Earl of Southhampton. Its popularity was great course be produced in the mind of Lord Southampton by the and instantaneous, for a new edition of it was called for in publication of those poems; and we are to recollect that it 1594, a third in 1596, a fourth in 1600, and a fifth in 16022: was precisely at the same date that the Lord Chamberlain's there may have been, and probably were, intervening im- servants entered upon the project of building the Globe pressions, which have disappeared among the popular and Theatre on the Bankside, not very far to the west of the destroyed literature of the time. We may conclude that Southwark foot of London Bridge. "Venus and Adonis " this admirable and unequalled production first introduced was published in 1593; and it was on the 22nd Dec. in that its author to the notice of Lord Southampton; and it is year that Richard Burbage, the great actor, and the leader evident from the opening of the dedication, that Shake- of the company to which Shakespeare was attached, signed speare had not taken the precaution of ascertaining, in the a bond to a carpenter of the name of Peter Street for the first instance, the wishes of the young nobleman on the sub-construction of the Globe. It is not too much to allow at ject. 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 succeeding year. He then "dedicated his love" to his juvenile patron, having "a warrant of his honourable disposition" 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.

least a year for its completion; and it was during 1594,
while the work on the Bankside was in progress, that "Lu-
""
crece came from the press. Thus we see that the build-
ing of the Globe, at the cost of the sharers in the Black-
friars theatre, was coincident in point of time with the ap-
pearance of the two poems dedicated to the Earl of South-
ampton. 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?

It must have been about this period that the Earl of We do not mean to say that our great dramatist stood in Southampton bestowed a most extraordinary proof of his need of the money, or that he could not have deposited it high-minded munificence upon the author of "Venus and as well as the other sharers in the Blackfriars; but Lord Adonis" and "Lucrece." It was not unusual, at that time Southampton may not have thought it necessary to inquire, and afterwards, for noblemen, and others to whom works whether he did or did not want it, nor to consider precisely were dedicated, to make presents of money to the writers what it had been customary to give ordinary versifiers, who of them; but there is certainly no instance upon record of sought the pay and patronage of the nobility. Although such generous bounty, on an occasion of the kind, as that Shakespeare had not yet reached the climax of his excelof which we are now to speak: nevertheless, we have lence, Lord Southampton knew him to be the greatest every reliance upon the authenticity of the anecdote, taking dramatist this country had yet produced; he knew him also into account the unexampled merit of the poet, the known to be the writer of two poems, dedicated to himself, with liberality of the nobleman, and the evidence upon which which nothing else of the kind could bear comparison; and the story has been handed down. Rowe was the original in the exercise of his bounty he measured the poet by his 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

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

deserts, and "used him after his own honour and dignity," by bestowing upon him a sum worthy of his title and character, and which his wealth probably enabled him without difficulty to afford. We do not believe that there has been any exaggeration in the amount, (although that is more possible, than that the whole statement should have been a fiction) and Lord Southampton may thus have intended also to indicate his hearty good will to the new undertaking of the company, and his determination to support it.

come down to our day it had been entered by him as early as 1596.

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

4 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.

5 After the Globe had been burned down in June, 1613, it was rebuilt very much by the contributions of the king and the nobility Lord Southampton may have intended the 10007., in part, as a contribution to this enterprise, through the hands of an individual whom he had good reason to distinguish from the rest of the company.

CHAPTER X.

The opening of the Globe theatre, on the Bankside, in 1595."
Union of Shakespeare's associates with the Lord Admiral's
players. The theatre at Newington Butts. Projected repair
and enlargement of the Blackfriars theatre: opposition by
the inhabitants of the precinct. Shakespeare's rank in the
company in 1596. Petition from him and seven others to
the Privy Council, and its results. Repair of the Blackfriars
theatre. Shakespeare a resident in Southwark in 1596:
proof that he was so from the papers at Dulwich College.
We have concluded, as we think that we may do very fairly,
that the construction of the new theatre on the Bankside,
subsequently known as the Globe, having been commenced
soon after the signature of the bond of Burbage to Street,
on 22d Dec. 1593, was continued through the year 1594:
we apprehend that it would be finished and ready for the
reception of audiences early in the spring of 1595. It was
a round wooden building, open to the sky, while the stage
was protected from the weather by an overhanging roof of
thatch. The number of persons it would contain we have
no means of ascertaining, but it was certainly of larger di-
mensions than the Rose, the Hope or the Swan, three other
edifices of the same kind and used for the same purpose, in
the immediate vicinity. The Blackfriars was a private
theatre, as it was called, entirely covered in, and of smaller
size; and from thence the company, after the Globe had
been completed, was in the habit of removing in the spring,
perhaps as soon as there was any indication of the setting
in of fine cheerful weather1.

Before the building of the Globe, for the exclusive use
of the theatrical servants of the Lord Chamberlain, there
can be little doubt that they did not act all the year round
at the Blackfriars: they appear to have performed some-
times at the Curtain in Shoreditch, and Richard Burbage,
at the time of his death, still had shares in that playhouse2
Whether they occupied it in common with any other associa-
tion is not so clear; but we learn from Henslowe's Diary, that
in 1594, and perhaps at an earlier date, the company of
which Shakespeare was a member had played at a theatre
in Newington Butts, where the Lord Admiral's servants
also exhibited. At this period of our stage-history the per-
formances usually began at three o'clock in the afternoon;
for the citizens transacted their business and dined early,
and many of them afterwards walked out into the fields
for recreation, often visiting such theatres as were open
purposely for their reception. Henslowe's Diary shows that
the Lord Chamberlain's and the Lord Admiral's servants
had joint possession of the Newington theatre from 3d June
1594, to the 15th November, 1596; and during that period
various pieces were performed, which in their titles resemble
plays which unquestionably came from Shakespeare's pen.
That none of these were productions by our great dramatist,
it is, of course, impossible to affirm; but the strong proba-
bility seems to be, that they were older dramas, of which
he subsequently, more or less, availed himself. Among
these was a "Hamlet," acted on 11th of June, 1594: a
"Taming of a Shrew," acted on 11th June, 1594; an "An-
dronicus," acted on 12th June, 1594; a "Venetian Comedy,"
acted on 12th Aug. 1594; a "Cæsar and Pompey," acted
8th Nov. 1594; a "Second Part of Cæsar," acted 26th
June, 1595; a Henry V.," acted on 28th Nov. 1595; and
a "Troy," acted on the 22d June, 1596. To these we might
add a
"Palamon and Arcite," (acted on 17th Sept. 1594) if
we suppose Shakespeare to have had any hand in writing

"The Two Noble Kinsmen ;" and an "Antony and Vallea,” (acted on the 20th June, 1595) as it is called in the barbarous record, which may possibly have had some connexion with Antony and Cleopatra." We have no reason to think that Shakespeare did not aid in these representations, although he was perhaps, too much engaged with the duties of authorship, at this date, to take a very busy or prominent part as an actor.

The fact that the Lord Chamberlain's players acted at Newington until November, 1596, may appear to militate against our notion that the Globe was finished and ready for performances in the spring of 1595; and it is very possible that the construction occupied more time than we have imagined. Malone was of opinion that the Globe might have been opened even in 1594; but we postpone that event until the following year, because we think the time too short, and because, unless it were entirely completed early in 1594, it would not be required, inasmuch as the company for which it was built seem to have acted at the Blackfriars in the winter. Our notion is, that, even after the Globe was finished, the Lord Chamberlain's servants now and then performed at Newington in the summer, because audiences, having been accustomed to expect them there, assembled for the purpose, and the players did not think it prudent to relinquish the emolument thus to be obtained. The performances at Newington, we presume, did not however interfere with the representations at the Globe. If any members of the company had continued to play at Newington after November 1596, we should, no doubt, have found some trace of it in Henslowe's Diary.

Another reason for thinking that the Globe was opened in the spring of 1595 is, that very soon afterwards the sharers in that enterprise commenced the repair and enlargement of their theatre in the Blackfriars, which had been in constant use for twenty years. Of this proceeding we shall have occasion to say more presently. We may feel assured that the important incident of the opening of a new theatre on the Bankside, larger than any that then stood in that or in other parts of the town, was celebrated by the production of a new play. Considering his station and duties in the company, and his popularity as a dramatist, we may be confident also that the new play was written by Shakespeare. In the imperfect state of our information, it would be vain to speculate which of his dramas was brought out on the occasion; but if the reader will refer to our several Introductions, he will see which of the plays according to such evidence as we are acquainted with, may appear in his view to have the best claim to the distinction. Many years ago we were strongly inclined to think that "Henry V." was the piece: the Globe was round, and the "wooden O" is most pointedly mentioned in that drama; so that at all events we are satisfied that it was acted in that theatre: there is also a nationality about the subject, and a popularity in the treatment of it, which would render it peculiarly appropriate; but on farther reflection and information, we are unwillingly convinced that "Henry V." was not written until some years afterwards. We frankly own, therefore, that we are not in a condition to offer an opinion upon the question, and we are disposed, where we can, to refrain even from conjecture, when we have no ground on which to rest a speculation.

Allowing about fifteen months for the erection and completion of the Globe, we may believe that it was in full operation in the spring, summer, and autumn of 1595. On the approach of cold weather, the company would of course return to their winter quarters in the Blackfriars, which

1 We know that they did so afterwards, and there is every reason to tain, situate and being in Holywell, in the parish of St. Leonard's believe that such was their practice from the beginning. Dr. For- in Shoreditch, in the county of Middlesex; as also my part, estate, and man records, in his Diary in the Ashmolean Museum, that he saw interest, which I have, or ought to have, in and to all that playhouse, "Macbeth" at the Globe, on the 20th April, 1610; "Richard II." on Richard II." on with the appurtenances, called the Globe, in the parish of St. Sathe 30th April, 1611, and "The Winter's Tale" on the 15th May, in viour's, in the county of Surrey."-Chalmers' Supplemental Apology, the same year. See the Introductions to those several plays. p. 165.

2 The same was precisely the case with Pope, the celebrated comedian, who died in Feb. 1604. His will, dated 22d July, 1603, contains the following clause: "Item, I give and bequeath to the said Mary Clark, alias Wood, and to the said Thomas Bromley, as well all my part, right, title, and interest, which I have, or ought to have, in and to all that playhouse, with the appurtenances, called the Cur

Richard Burbage lived and died (in 1619) in Holywell-street, near the Curtain theatre, as if his presence were necessary for the superintendence of the concern, although he had been an actor at the Blackfriars for many years, and at the Globe ever since its erection. 3 Inquiry into the Authenticity, &c. p. 87.

was enclosed, lighted from within, and comparatively warm. proprietor of the freehold, was Richard Burbage, who in This theatre, as we have stated, at this date had been in herited it from his father, and transmitted it to his sons; but constant use for twenty years, and early in 1596 the sharers as a body, the parties addressing the privy council (for the directed their attention to the extensive repair, enlargement, "petition" appears to have been sent thither) might in a and, possibly, entire re-construction of the building. The certain sense call themselves owners of, as well as sharers evidence that they entertained such a design is very deci- in, the Blackfriars theatre. We insert the document in a sive; and we may perhaps infer, that the prosperity of note, observing merely, that like many others of a similar their new experiment at the Globe encouraged them to kind, it is without signatures2. this outlay. On the 9th Jan. 1596 (1595, according to the then mode of calculating the year) Lord Hunsdon, who was Lord Chamberlain at the time, but who died about six months afterwards, wrote to Sir William More, expressing a wish to take a house of him in the Blackfriars, and adding that he had heard that Sir William More had parted with a portion of his own residence "to some that mean to make a playhouse of it1"

The truth, no doubt, was, that in consequence of their increased popularity, owing, we may readily imagine, in a great degree to the success of the plays Shakespeare had produced, the company which had occupied the Blackfriars theatre found that their house was too small for their audiences, and wished to enlarge it; but it appears rather singular that Lord Hunsdon, the Lord Chamberlain, should not be at all aware of the intention of the players acting under the sanction of his name and office, and should only have heard that some persons "meant to make a playhouse" of part of Sir William More's residence. We have not a copy of the whole of Lord Hunsdon's letter-only an abstract of it—which reads as if the Lord Chamberlain did not even know that there was any theatre at all in the Blackfriars. Two documents in the State Paper Office, and a third preserved at Dulwich College, enable us to state distinctly what was the object of the actors at the Blackfriars in 1596. The first of these is a representation from certain inhabitants of the precinct in which the playhouse was situated, not only against the completion of the work of repair and enlargement, then commenced, but against all farther performances in the theatre.

Of this paper it is not necessary for our purpose to say more; but the answer to it, on the part of the association of actors, is a very valuable relic, inasmuch as it gives the names of eight players who were the proprietors of the theatre or its appurtenances, that of Shakespeare being fifth in the list. It will not have been forgotten, that in 1589 no fewer than sixteen sharers were enumerated, and that then Shakespeare's name was the twelfth; but it did not by any means follow, that because there were sixteen sharers in the receipts, they were also proprietors of the building, properties, or wardrobe: in 1596 it is stated that Thomas Pope, (from whose will we have already given an extract) Richard Burbage, John Hemings, (properly spelt Heminge) Augustine Phillips, William Shakespeare, William Kempe, (who withdrew from the company in 1601) William Slye, and Nicholas Tooley, were "owners" of the theatre as well as sharers in the profits arising out of the performances. The fact, however, seems to be that the sole owner of the edifice in which plays were represented, the

1 See "The Loseley Manuscripts," by A. J. Kempe, Esq., 8vo. 1835, p. 496; a very curious and interesting collection of original documents.

2 "To the right honourable the Lords of her Majesties most honourable Privie Councell. "The humble petition of Thomas Pope, Richard Burbage, John Hemings, Augustine Phillips, William Shakespeare, William Kempe, William Slye, Nicholas Tooley, and others, servaunts to the Right Honorable the Lord Chamberlaine to her Majestie.

"Sheweth most humbly, that your Petitioners are owners and players of the private house, or theatre, in the precinct and libertie of the Blackfriers, which hath beene for many yeares used and occupied for the playing of tragedies, commedies, histories, enterludes, and playes. That the same, by reason of its having beene so long built, hath fallen into great decay, and that besides the reparation thereof, it hath beene found necessarie to make the same more convenient for the entertainment of auditories coming thereto. That to this end your Petitioners have all and eche of them put down sommes of money, according to their shares in the said theatre, and which they have justly and honestly gained by the exercise of their qualitie of stage-players; but that certaine persons (some of them of honour) inhabitants of the said precinct and libertie of the Blackfriers have, as your Petitioners are informed, besought your honourable Lordshipps not to permitt the said private house any longer to

The date of the year when this petition of the actors was presented to the privy council is ascertained from that of the remonstrance of the inhabitants which had rendered it necessary, viz. 1596; but by another paper, among the theatrical relics of Alleyn and Henslowe at Dulwich College, we are enabled to show that both the remonstrance and the petition were anterior to May in that year. Henslowe (step-father to Alleyn's wife, and Alleyn's partner) seems always, very prudently, to have kept up a good understanding with the officers of the department of the revels; and on 3rd May, 1596, a person of the name of Veale, servant to Edmond Tylney, master of the revels, wrote to Henslowe, informing him (as of course he must take an interest in the result) that it had been decided by the privy council, that the Lord Chamberlain's servants should be allowed to complete their repairs, but not to enlarge their house in the Blackfriars; the note of Veale to Henslowe is on a small slip of paper, very clearly written; and as it is short, we here insert it :

"Mr. Hinslowe. This is to enfourme you that my Mr., the Maister of the revelles, hath rec. from the Ll. of the counsell order that the L. Chamberlen's servauntes shall not be distourbed at the Blackefryars, according with their petition in that behalfe, but leave shall be given unto theym to make good the decaye of the saide House, butt not to make the same larger then in former tyme hath bene. From thoffice "RICH. VEALE." of the Revelles. this 3 of maie, 1596.

Thus the whole transaction is made clear: the company, soon after the opening of the Globe, contemplated the repair and enlargement of the Blackfriars theatre: the inhabitants of the precincts objected not only to the repair and enlargement, but to any dramatic representations in that part of the town: the company petitioned to be allowed to carry out their design, as regarded the restoration of the edifice, and the increase of its size; but the privy council consented only that the building should be repaired. We are to conclude, therefore, that after the repairs were finished, the theatre would hold no more spectators than formerly; but that the dilapidations of time were substantially remedied, we are sure from the fact, that the house continued long afterwards to be employed for the purpose for which it had been originally constructed3.

What is of most importance in this proceeding, with reference to Shakespeare, is the circumstance upon which we have already remarked; that whereas his name, in 1589, stood twelfth in a list of sixteen sharers, in 1596 it was advanced to the fifth place in an enumeration of eight persons, who termed themselves "owners and players of the private house, or theatre, in the precinct and liberty of the Black

remaine open, but hereafter to be shut up and closed, to the manifest and great injurie of your petitioners, who have no other meanes whereby to maintain their wives and families, but by the exercise of their qualitie as they have heretofore done. Furthermore, that in the summer season your Petitioners are able to playe at their new built house on the Bankside calde the Globe, but that in the winter they are compelled to come to the Blackfriers; and if your honorable Lordshipps give consent unto that which is prayde against your Petitioners, thay will not onely, while the winter endures, loose the meanes whereby they now support them selves and their families, but be unable to practise themselves in anie playes or enterludes, when calde upon to performe for the recreation and solace of her Matie and her honorable Court, as they have beene heretofore accustomed. The humble prayer of your Petitioners therefore is, that your honorable Lordshipps grant permission to finish the reparations and alterations they have begun; and as your Petitioners have hitherto been well ordered in their behaviour, and just in their dealings, that your honorable Lordshipps will not inhibit them from acting at their above namde private house in the precinct and libertie of the Blackfriers, and your Petitioners, as in dutie most bounden, will ever pray for the increasing honor and happinesse of your honorable Lordshipps."

3 The ultimate fate of this playhouse, and of others existing at the same time, will be found stated in a subsequent part of our memoir. C

friars." It is not difficult to suppose that the speculation of what we have considered the second season at the new at the Globe had been remarkably successful in its first season, and that the Lord Chamberlain's servants had thereby been induced to expend money upon the Blackfriars, in order to render it more commodious, as well as more capacious, under the calculation, that the receipts at the one house during the winter would be greater in consequence of their popularity at the other during the summer.

Where Shakespeare had resided from the time when he first came to London, until the period of which we are now speaking, we have no information; but in July, 1596, he was living in Southwark, perhaps to be close to the scene of action, and more effectually to superintend the performances at the Globe, which were continued through at least seven months of the year. We know not whether he removed there shortly before the opening of the Globe, or whether from the first it had been his usual place of abode; but Malone tells us, " From a paper now before me, which formerly belonged to Edward Alleyn, the player, our poet appears to have lived in Southwark, near the Bear-garden, in 15961." He gives us no farther insight into the contents of the paper; but he probably referred to a small slip, borrowed, with other relics of a like kind, from Dulwich College, many of which were returned after his death. Among those returned seems to have been the paper in question, which is valuable only because it proves distinctly, that our great dramatist was an inhabitant of Southwark very soon after the Globe was in operation, although it by no means establishes that he had not been resident there long before. We subjoin it exactly as it stands in the original: the hand-writing is ignorant, the spelling peculiar, and it was evidently merely a hasty and imperfect memorandum."Inhabitantes of Sowtherk as have complaned, this of Jully, 1596. Mr Markis Mr Tuppin

Mr Langorth

Wilsone the pyper

Mr Barett

Mr Shaksper

Phellipes

Tomson

Mother Golden the baude

Nagges

Fillpott and no more, and soe well ended.”

This is the whole of the fragment, for such it appears to be, and without farther explanation, which we have not been able to find in any other document, in the depository where the above is preserved or elsewhere, it is impossible to understand more, than that Shakespeare and other inhabitants of Southwark had made some complaint in July 1596, which, we may guess, was hostile to the wishes of the writer, who congratulated himself that the matter was so well at an end. Some of the parties named, including our great dramatist, continued resident in Southwark long afterwards, as we shall have occasion in its proper place to show. The writer seems to have been desirous of speaking derogatorily of all the persons he enumerates, but still he designates some as " Mr. Markis, Mr. Tuppin, Mr. Langorth, Mr. Barett, and Mr. Shaksper," but "Phellipes, Tomson, Nagges, and Fillpott," he only mentions by their surnames, while he adds the words "the pyper" and "the baude " after "Wilsones" and "Mother Golden," probably to indicate that any complaint from them ought to have but little weight. All that we certainly collect from the memorandum is what Malone gathered from it, that in July 1596, (Malone only gives the year, and adds "near the Bear-garden," which we do not find confirmed by the contents of the paper) in the middle

theatre called the Globe, Shakespeare was an inhabitant of Southwark. That he had removed thither for the sake of convenience, and of being nearer to the spot, is not unlikely, but we have no evidence upon the point: as there is reason to believe that Burbage, the principal actor at the Globe, lived in Holywell Street, Shoreditch, near the Curtain playhouse1, such an arrangement, as regards Shakespeare and the Globe, seems the more probable.

CHAPTER XI.

Chancery suit in 1597 by John Shakespeare and his wife to recover Asbyes: their bill; the answer of John Lambert; and the replication of John and Mary Shakespeare. Probable result of the suit. William Shakespeare's annual visit to Stratford. Death of his son Hamnet in 1596. General scarcity in England, and its effects at Stratford. The quantity of corn in the hands of William Shakespeare and his neighbours in February, 1598. Ben Jonson's "Every Man in his Humour," and probable instrumentality of Shakespeare in the original production of it on the stage. Henslowe's letter respecting the death of Gabriel Spenser,

WE have already mentioned that in 1578 John Shakespeare and his wife, in order to relieve themselves from pecuniary embarrassment, mortgaged the small estate of the latter, called Asbyes, at Wilmecote in the parish of Aston Cantlowe, to Edmund Lambert, for the sum of 407. As it consisted of nearly sixty acres of land, with a dwelling-house, it must have been worth, perhaps, three times the sum advanced, and by the admission of all parties, the mortgagers were again to be put in possession, if they repaid the money borrowed on or before Michaelmas-day, 1580. According to the assertion of John and Mary Shakespeare, they tendered the 407. on the day appointed, but it was refused, unless other moneys, which they owed to the mortgagee, were repaid at the same time. Edmund Lambert (perhaps the father of Edward Lambert, whom the eldest sister of Mary Shakespeare had married) died in 1586, in possession of Asbyes, and from him it descended to his eldest son, John Lambert, who continued to withhold it in 1597 from those who claimed to be its rightful owners.

In order to recover the property, John and Mary Shakespeare filed a bill in chancery, on 24th Nov. 1597, against John Lambert of Barton-on-the-Heath, in which they alleged the fact of the tender and refusal of the 401. by Edmund Lambert, who, wishing to keep the estate, no doubt coupled with the tender a condition not included in the deed. The advance of other moneys, the repayment of which was required by Edmund Lambert, was not denied by John and Mary Shakespeare, but they contended that they had done all the law required, to entitle them to the restoration of their estate of Asbyes: in their bill they also set forth, that John Lambert was "of great wealth and ability, and well friended and allied amongst gentlemen and freeholders of the country, in the county of Warwick," while, on the other hand, they were "of small wealth, and very few friends and alliance in the said county." The answer of John Lambert merely denied that the 407. had been tendered, in consequence of which he alleged that his father became “lawfully and absolutely seised of the premises, in his demesne as of fee." To this answer John and Mary Shakespeare put in a replication, reiterating the assertion of the tender and refusal of the 407. on Michaelmas-day, 1580, and praying Lord Keeper Egerton (afterwards Baron Ellesmere) to decree in their favour accordingly.

1 "Inquiry into the Authenticity," &c. p. 215. He seems to have earliest notice we have of him is prior to the death of Tarlton in reserved particulars for his "Life of Shakespeare," which he did not 1588. live to complete, and which was imperfectly finished by Boswell. 3 It is just possible that by "Wilsone the pyper " the writer meant 2 This may have been Augustine Phillippes, who belonged to the to point out "Jack Wilson," the singer of "Sigh no more, ladies," company of the Lord Chamberlain's servants, and whose name stands in Much ado about Nothing," who, might be, and probably was, a fourth in the royal license of May 1603. He died as nearly as possi-player upon some wind instrument. See also the "Memoirs of Edble two years afterwards, his will being dated on the 4th May, and ward Alleyn," (printed by the Shakespeare Society) p. 153, for a noproved on the 13th May, 1605. Among other bequests to his friends tice of "Mr. Wilson, the singer," when he dined on one occasion and" fellows," he (4 gave a thirty-shillings piece of gold "to William with the founder of Dulwich College. Shakespeare. He was a distinguished comic performer, and the

4 Malone's Shakspeare by Boswell, iii. p. 182.

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