ALTHOUGH John Shakespeare could not write his name, it has been stated, and believed, that while he filled the office of bailiff he obtained a grant of arms from Clarencieux Cooke, who was in office from 1566 to 1592. We doubt this fact, for though Cooke's original book, in which he entered the arms he granted, has been preserved in the Heralds' College, we find in it no note of any grant to John Shakespeare: it is true that this book might not contain memoranda of all the arms he had granted. A confirmation of these arms was made in 1596, but we cannot but think, that this was obtained at the personal instance of the Poet, who had then purchased, or was on the eve of purchasing New Place, or "the great house," in Stratford. The confirmation states, that the heralds had been "by credible report informed," that "the parents and late antecessors" of John Shakespeare "were for their valiant and faithful services advanced and rewarded of the most prudent prince, Henry the Seventh;" but, in the rolls of that reign, we discover no trace of advancement or reward to any Shakespeare. It is true that the Ardens were 80 "advanced and rewarded;" and these, though not strictly the "parents," were the "antecessors" of William Shakespeare. In 1599, an exemplification of arms was procured, and in this it is asserted that the "great grandfather" of John Shakespeare had been "advanced and rewarded with lands and tenements" by Henry VII. Our Poet's "great grandfather," by the mother's side, was so "advanced and rewarded;"

and we know that he did "faithful and approved service" to that "most prudent prince."

It is also stated, at the foot of the confirmation of 1596, that John Shakespeare "showeth" a patent "under Clarence Cooke's hand:" the word seems originally to have been sent, over which " showeth" was written: if the original patent, had been sent to the Heralds' College in 1596, there could have been little question about it; but "showeth" is more indefinite, and may mean only, that the party applying for the confirmation alleged that Cooke had granted such a coat of arms. That William Shakespeare could not have procured a grant of arms for himself in 1596 is highly probable, from the fact that he was an actor, (a profession then much looked down upon,) and not of a rank in life to entitle him to it: he, therefore, may have put forward his father's name and claims, as having been bailiff of Stratford, and a "justice of peace," and coupled that fact with the deserts and rewards of the Ardens under Henry VII., one of whom was his maternal "great grandfather," and all of whom, by reason of the marriage of his father with an Arden, were his "antecessors."

We only doubt whether John Shakespeare obtained any grant of arms, in 1568-9; the documents relating to this grant, in the Heralds' College, are full of corrections and interlineations, particularly as regards the ancestors of John Shakespeare, and we are persuaded that when William Shakespeare applied to the office in 1596, the heralds made a confusion between the " great grand

father" and the "antecessors" of John, and of William Shakespeare. What is stated, as to parentage and descent, is true as regards William Shakespeare, but erroneous as regards his father.'

Arms of John Shakespeare.

It appears that Sir William Dethick, garter-king-atarms in 1596 and 1599, was subsequently called to account for having granted coats to persons whose station in society and circumstances gave them no right to the distinction. The case of John Shakespeare was one of those complained of in this respect; and had Clarencieux Cooke really put his name in 1568-9 to any such patent as, it was asserted, had been exhibited to Dethick, a copy of it, or some record of it, would probably have remained in the office; and the production of that, proving that he had acted on the precedent of Clarencieux Cooke would have aided to justify

1 The confirmation and the exemplification differ slightly as to the mode in which the arms are set out: in the former it is thus: "I have therefore assigned, graunted, and by these have confirm. ed, this shield or cote of arms, viz. gould, on a bend sable and a speare of the first, the point steeled, proper; and for his crest or cognizance a faulcon, his wings displayed, argent, standing on a wrethe of his coullors, supporting a speare gould steele as aforesaid, sett uppon a helmett with mantelles and tasselles as hath been accustomed." In the exemplification the arms are stated as follows: "In a field of gould upon a bend sables a speare of the first, the poynt upward, hedded argent; and for his crest or cognisance a falcon with his wyngs displayed, standing on a wrethe of his coullors, supporting a speare armed hedded or steeled sylver, fyxed upon a helmet, with mantelles and tasselles." In the confirmation, as well as in the exemplification, it is stated that the arms are "depicted in the margin;" and in the latter a reference is made to another escutcheon, in which the arms of Shakespeare are impaled with "the auncyent arms of Arden of Wellingcote, signifying thereby that it maye and shall be lawfull for the said John Shakespeare, gent, to beare and use the same shield of arms, single, or impaled as aforesaid, during his naturall lyffe." The motto, as given at the head of the confirmation, is—

NON SANZ DROICT.

For "Arden of Wellingcote" the heralds should have said, Arden of Wilnecote

Dethick. No copy, nor record, was produced, but merely the memorandum, that an original grant had been sent or shown, which may have been added when Dethick's conduct was called in question; and some other statements are made at the bottom of the same document, which would be material to Garter's vindication, but which are not borne out by facts. One of these statements is, that John Shakespeare, in 1596, was worth 500l., an error certainly as regarded him, but a truth probably as regarded his son.

It is of little moment whether John Shakespeare did or did not obtain a grant of arms while he was bailiff of Stratford; but we think that he did not, and that the assertion that he did, and that he was worth 500l. in 1596, originated with Sir W. Dethick, when he subsequently wanted to make out his own vindication from the charge of having conceded arms to various persons without due caution and inquiry.

In 1570, when William Shakespeare was in his seventh year, his father was in possession of a field called Ingon, or Ington, meadow, within two miles of Stratford, which he held under William Clopton. The instrument proving his tenancy is dated 11th June, 1581, and only states the fact, that on 11th December, 1570, it was in his occupation. The annual payment for it was 87., a considerable sum, certainly, for that time; but there is no evidence of "a good dwelling-house and orchard" upon the field, as Malone conjectured, and it is not likely that John Shakespeare employed it for agricultural purposes. That he lived in Stratford at the time we infer from the fact, that on the 28th September, 1571, a second daughter, named Anne, was baptized at the parish church. He had thus four children living, William, Gilbert, Joan, and Anne, but the last died at an early age, having been buried on 4th April, 1579, On the baptism of his daughter Anne, he was, for the first time, called "Magister Shakespeare" in the Latin entry in the Register-a distinction he seems to have acquired by having served the office of bailiff two years before; another child, Richard, was baptized 11th March, 1573-4, as the son of " Mr. John Shakespeare."

The increase of his family seems, for some time, to have been accompanied by an increase of his means, and in 1574 he gave Edmund and Emma Hall 407. for two freehold houses, with gardens and orchards, in Henley-street; and he was already the owner of a copyhold tenement in the same street, which he had bought in 1556, before his marriage. To one of the two lastpurchased dwellings John Shakespeare is supposed to have removed his family; but, for aught we know, he had lived from the time of his marriage, and continued to live in 1574, in the house in Henley-street, bought in 1556. It does not appear that he had ever parted with that house, so that in 1574 he was the owner of three houses in Henley-street. Forty pounds, even allowing for great difference in value of money, seems a small sum for two freehold houses, with gardens and orchards.

It is indisputable that soon after the tide of John Shakespeare's affairs began to turn, and that he experienced disappointments and losses which seriously affected his pecuniary circumstances. This appears from several facts. At a borough hall on the 29th January, 1578, it was ordered that every alderman in Stratford should pay 6s. 8d., and every burgess 38. 4d. towards "the furniture of three pikemen, two billmen, and one

archer." Now, though John Shakespeare was not only an alderman, but had been chosen "head alderman" in 1571, he was allowed to contribute only 3s. 4d., as if he had been merely a burgess: Plymley, another alderinan, paid 58., while others contributed 2s. 6d. and 2s. each. In November, 1578, when it was required that every alderman should "pay weekly to the relief of the poor 4d.," John Shakespeare and Robert Bratt were excepted: they were "not to be taxed to pay any thing," while two others were rated at 3d. a week. In March, 1578-9, when another call was made upon the town for the purpose of purchasing corslets, calivers, etc., the name of John Shakespeare is found, at the end of the account, in a list of persons whose "sums were unpaid and unaccounted for." Another fact indicates that in 1578 John Shakespeare was distressed for money: he owed a baker of the name of Roger Sadler 5l., for which Edmund Lambert, and one Cornishe, had become security: Sadler, in his will, dated 14th November, 1578, included the following among the debts due to him:"Item of Edmund Lambert and Cornishe, for the debt of Mr. John Shacksper, 51."

To Edmund Lambert, John Shakespeare, in 1578, mortgaged his wife's estate in Aston Cantlowe, called Asbyes, for 407.; and so severe the pressure of his necessities about this date seems to have been, that in 1579 he parted with his wife's interest in two tenements in Snitterfield, for the small sum of 41. The original deed, with the bond, (both bearing date 15th Oct. 1579,) subscribed with the distinct marks of John and Mary Shakespeare, and sealed with their respective seals, is in the hands of the Shakespeare Society. His houses in Stratford descended to his son, but they may have been mortgaged at this period, and it is indisputable that John Shakespeare divested himself, in 1578 and 1579, of the landed property his wife had brought him.'

1 The property is thus described in the deed of sale. For and in consideration of the sum of 41. in hand paid, they "give,

It has been supposed that he might not at this time reside in Stratford-upon-Avon, and that for this reason he contributed so little, in 1578. This is refuted by the fact, that in the deed for the sale of his wife's property in Snitterfield to Webbe, in 1579, he is called "John Shackspere of Stratford-upon-Avon," and in the bond for the performance of covenants, "Johannem Shackspere de Stratford-upon-Avon, in comitat. Warwici." In both these documents, John Shakespeare is termed yeoman," and not glover: perhaps in 1579, although he continued to occupy a house in Stratford, he had relinquished his original trade, and having embarked in agricultural pursuits, to which he had not been educated, had been unsuccessful. This may account for some of his difficulties. In the midst of them, in the spring of 1580, another son, named Edmund, was born, and christened at the parish church, as the son of "Mr. John Shakspere."

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graunte, bargayne, and sell unto the said Robert Webbe, his heires and assignes for ever, all that theire moitye, parte, and partes, be it more or lesse, of and in two messuages or tenementes, with thappurtennances, sette, lyinge and beynge in Snitterfield aforesaid, in the said county of Warwicke." The deed terminates thus:

"In witnesse whereof the parties above said to these present indentures interchangeablie have put their handes and seales, the day and yeare fyrst above wrytten

"The marke+of John Shackspere. The marke M of Marye Shackspere.

"Sealed and delivered in the presens of

Nycholas Knoolles, Vicar of Anston,
Wyllyam Maydes, and Anthony Os-
baston, with other moe."

The seal affixed by John Shakespeare has his initials I. S. upon it, while that appended to the mark of his wife represents a rudely-engraved horse. The mark of Mary Shakespeare seems to have been intended for an uncouth imitation of the letter M. With reference to the word "moiety," used throughout the indenture, it is to be remembered that at its date the term did not, as now, imply half, but any part or share. Shakespeare repeatedly so uses it.

Ar this period, William Shakespeare was in his sixteenth year, and in what way he had been educated is mere matter of conjecture. It is highly probable that he was at the free-school of Stratford, founded in the reign of Edward IV., and chartered by Edward VI.; but we are destitute of all evidence beyond Rowe's assertion. Between 1570 and 1578, Walter Roche, Thomas Hunt, and Thomas Jenkins, were successively masters, and from them he must have derived the rudiments of his learning. That his father and mother could give him no instruction of the kind is quite certain from the proof that neither of them could write; but this deficiency might render them more desirous that their eldest son, at least, should receive the best education circumstances would allow. The free grammarschool of Stratford afforded an opportunity of which, it is not unlikely, the parents of William Shakespeare availed themselves.

As we are ignorant of the time when he went to school, we are also in the dark as to when he left it. Rowe, indeed, has told us that the poverty of John Shakespeare, and the necessity of employing his son profitably at home, induced him, at an early age, to withdraw him from the place of instruction. Such may have been the case; but we must not leave out of view that the education of the son of a member of the corpotion would cost nothing: so that, if the boy were removed from school at the period of his father's embarrassments, the expense of continuing his studies there could not have entered into the calculation: he

must have been taken away, as Rowe states, in order to aid his father in the maintenance of the family.

Aubrey has asserted positively, in his manuscripts, that, "in his younger years, Shakespeare had been a schoolmaster in the country;" and the truth may be, that being rapid in the acquisition of knowledge, he had been employed by the master of the school to aid him in the instruction of the junior boys. Such a course is certainly not unusual, and it may account for this part of Aubrey's narrative,

We decidedly concur with Malone in thinking that after Shakespeare quitted the free-school, he was employed in the office of an attorney. Proofs of some thing like a legal education are to be found in many of his plays; and we doubt if, in the whole works of Marlowe, Greene, Peele, Jonson, Heywood, Chapman, Marston, Decker, and Webster, so many law terms and allusions are to be found, as in some six or eight plays by Shakespeare: moreover, they are applied with much technical exactness and propriety. Malone has accumulated some of these, and it would be easy to multiply them.1 We may presume that, if so employ

1 A passage from the epistle of Thomas Nash before Greene's "Menaphon," has been held by some to apply to Shakespeare, to his HAMLET, and to his early occupation in an attorney's office. The terms Nash employs are these; and it is to be observed, that by noverint he means an attorney or attorney's clerk, employed to draw up bonds, etc., commencing Noverint universi, etc. "It is a common practice now-a-dayes, amongst a sort of shifting companions, that run through every art and thrive by none, to leave the trade of noverint, whereto they were borne,

ed, he was paid something for his services; for, if he were to earn nothing, his father could have had no motive for taking him from school. Supposing him to have ceased to receive instruction from Jenkins in 1579, when John Shakespeare's distresses were apparently most severe, we may easily imagine that he was, for the next year or two, in the office of one of the seven attorneys in Stratford, whose names Malone preserves. That he wrote a good hand we are sure, not only from the extant specimens of his signature, when we may suppose him to have been in health, but from the ridicule which, in HAMLET, he throws upon such as affected to write illegibly:

"I once did hold it, as our statists do,

A baseness to write fair."

In truth, many of his dramatic contemporaries wrote excellently: Ben Jonson's penmanship was beautiful: and Peele, Chapman, Decker, and Marston, (to say nothing of some inferior authors,) must have given printers and copyists little trouble.'

and busie themselves with the indevours of art, that could scarcely Latinize their neck verse, if they should have neede: yet English Seneca, read by candle-light, yields many good sentences, as Bloud is a begger, and so forth; and if you intreate him faire in a frostie morning, he will affoord you whole Hamlets, I should say handfuls of tragical speeches."

1 It is certain also that Shakespeare wrote with great facility, and that his compositions required little correction. This fact we have upon the indubitable assertion of Ben Jonson, who thus speaks in his "Discoveries," written in old age, when, as he tells us, his memory began to fail, and printed with the date of 1641:"I remember the players have often mentioned it as an honour to Shakespeare, that in his writing (whatsoever he penned) he never blotted out line. My answer hath been, Would he had blotted a thousand! which they thought a malevolent speech. I

Excepting by tradition, we hear not a syllable regarding William Shakespeare from the time of his birth until he had considerably passed his eighteenth year, and then we suddenly come to his marriage with Anne Hathaway, which could not have taken place before the 28th November, 1582, because on that day two persons, named Fulk Sandells and John Richardson, entered into a preliminary bond,' in the penalty of 401., if it were had not told posterity this, but for their ignorance, who chuse that circumstance to commend their friend by, wherein he most faulted; and to justify mine own candour, for I loved the man, and do honour his memory (on this side idolatry) as much as any. He was indeed honest, and of an open and free nature; had an excellent fancy, brave notions, and gentle expressions, wherein he flowed with that faciilty, that sometimes it was necessary he should be stopped. Sufflaminandus erat, as Augustus said of Haterius. His wit was in his own power; would the use of it had been so too!"

Ben Jonson then adds in conclusion:-"But he redeemed his vices with his virtues: there was ever more in him to be praised, than to be pardoned." Consistently with what Ben Jonson telle us above the players had "often mentioned," we find the following in the address of Heminge and Condell, "To the great variety of Readers," before the folio of 1623:-"His mind and hand went together, and what he thought he uttered with that easiness, that we have scarce received from him a blot in his papers."

1 The instrument, divested of useless formal contractions, runs thus:

"Noverint universi per presentes, nos Fulconem Sandells de Stratford in comitatu Warwici, agricolam, et Johannem Richardson ibidem agricolam, teneri et firmiter obligari Ricardo Cosin, generoso, et Roberto Warmstry, notario publico, in quadraginta libris bonæ et legalis monetæ, Angliæ solvendis eisdem Ricardo et Roberto, heredibus, executoribus, vel assignatis suis, ad quam quidem solutionem bene et fideliter faciendam obligamus nos, et utrumque nostrum, per se pro toto et in solido, heredes, executores, et administratores nostros firmiter per presentes, sigillis nostris sigillatos. Datum 28 die Novembris, anno Regni Dominæ nostræ

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