then my will is, and so I devise and bequeath both their legacies of ten pounds apiece to Susanna Collens, wife of the said Francis, and to the eldest son of the said Francis equally betwixt them. Item, I give and bequeath to the said Susanna Collens six pounds thirteen shillings four pence of lawful English money, and to Mr. Henry Walker twenty shillings. Item, I give and bequeath unto my servants Richard Mason and Audrian Holder, if they be my servants at the time of my decease, all my wearing apparel not before given, except that apparel that was my uncle William Combes; and if they be not my servants, then to such persons as my executors shall appoint. Item, I give and bequeath to my cousin Thomas Reynoldes the elder, and Margaret his wife, my team of oxen which I shall have at my decease, and if I then shall have no team, then I give and bequeath forty marks of lawful English money; and also I give unto them, the said Thomas and Margaret, my waynes, tumbrells, ploughs, and other things belonging to a team. Item, I give and bequeath unto Sir Francis Smith, knight, five pounds to buy him a hawk, and to the Lady Anne his wife fourty pounds of lawful English money to buy her a bason and ewer; and unto Mrs. Palmer, the wife of John Palmer esquire, 40.8. to buy her a ring. Item, I give and bequeath to every one of my godchildren before not named five shillings apiece. Item, I give will bequeath and devise to my cousin Thomas Combe, his heirs and assigns for ever, all my meadow ground with the appurtenances in Shottery meadow, to the uses intents and purposes hereafter herein mentioned, that is to say that he the said Thomas Combe, his heirs and assigns, shall yearly and every year for ever pay to a learned preacher twenty shillings to make a sermon twice a year at Stretford church aforesaid, and also shall and do yearly and every year for ever, one week before the feast of the Nativity of our Lord God, give and deliver to such ten poor people within the borough of Stretford aforesaid as shall be yearly appointed and elected by the bailiff and chief alderman for the time being of the said borough, and two of the ancientest aldermen there, ten black gowns, every one of them worth thirteen shillings and four pence apiece and if my said nephew Thomas Combe, his heirs or assigns, shall or do not pay the said twenty shillings yearly to a preacher, and give and deliver the said gowns, then my will is, and so I will and devise that it shall be lawful to and for the bailiff and burgesses of the borough of Stretford aforesaid and their successors for the time being, from time to time and at all times hereafter, so often as the said twenty shillings shall not be yearly paid to a preacher, or the said gowns or any of them delivered and given as aforesaid, according to my will and meaning herein mentioned, to enter into the said meadow ground and every part and parcel thereof, and the issues and profits thereof, to pay give and satisfy the yearly sum of twenty shillings so behind unpaid and the arrearages thereof, if any be, together with the said gowns as shall be behind undelivered, according to this my will, and after, the said meadow ground to be to the said Thomas Combe his heirs and assigns, charged as aforesaid. Item, I give and bequeath to every one of my good and just debtors for every twenty pounds that any man oweth me, twenty shillings, and so after this rate, for a greater or lesser debt, to be delivered back to them by my executors when they pay in their debts. All the rest of my goods, chattels, leases, credits,

:

and rights whatsoever, after my debts and legacies paid, and my funerals discharged according to my degree, and my will performed, which I will and charge my executors to do within one year and an half after my decease, upon pain of forfeiture of such legacies of as well of lands as money or goods I leave or do herein give and bequeath unto my said nephew Thomas Combe. And I do make and ordain the said Thomas Combe, Sir Richard Verney, knight, and Bartholomew Hales, esquire, executors of this my last will and testament. And I do give and bequeath to the said Sir Richard Varney and Bartholomew Hales twenty pounds apiece of lawful English money, and also I do nominate and appoint Sir Edward Blunt, knight, Sir Henry Rainsford, knight, Sir Francis Smith, knight, and John Palmer of Compton, esquire, to be overseers of this my will, unto whom I give five pounds apiece, or unto every one of them a silver salt worth five pounds. Item, I give to Mrs. Barnes fourty shillings to buy her a ring, and to the Lady Rainsford fourty shillings to buy her a ring; And my will is and so I do devise that if any person whatsoever before named shall dislike of such legacies as I have herein devised or bequeathed unto them, and not hold themselves therewith contented, shall lose the same and all other benefit that they can any way claim by this my will. And I do hereby revoke all former wills by me heretofore made; and do declare and publish this to be my last will and testament, and have unto every sheet hereof written my name.

Interior of the Hall of Stratford College, 1785.

Posterity has reason to deplore the haste of the three officers in their tour of 1634, for their want of time to

"sack up" the verses on Combe, has deprived us of the benefit of receiving what Shakespeare really wrote on his friend. These, perhaps, will never be recovered, but it is worthy of remark that a different version of the anecdote is related in MS. Ashmole 38, p. 180,* written not many years after the death of Shakespeare,

On John Combe, a coveteous rich man, Mr. Wm. Shak-spear wright this att his request while hee was yett liveing for his epitaphe,

Who lies in this tombe ?

Hough, quoth the devill, tis my sone John a Combe.

Finis.

But being dead and making the poore his heiers, hee after wrightes this for

Peck, in his New Memoirs of Milton, 1740, has preserved another tale, in which it is stated that Shakespeare wrote another satirical epitaph on the brother of John Combe. It is equally authentic with the former. Every body," he says, "knows Shakespeare's epitaph for John a Combe, and I am told he afterwards wrote another for Tom a Combe, alias Thin-beard, brother of the said John, and that it was never yet printed." This second composition is in the following strain,

Thin in beard, and thick in purse,

Never man beloved worse;

He went to th' grave with many a curse:

The devil and he had both one nurse.

*This curious extract was first published by me in 1841, in "An Introduction to Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream," 8vo.

It will be observed that the composers of this and other similar stanzas attributed to the bard, among which may be included the vulgar lines over his grave, are never satisfied without introducing his Satanic majesty on the scene, or, at the least, his ordinary legacy, a curse. We must not so readily deprive our poet of his contemporary epithet, the gentle Shakespeare; for none of these can safely be assigned to his pen. It is however, worth adding, that in the last century there was a traditionary tale current at Stratford, which included the verses on John and Thomas Combe, and in which they are introduced somewhat differently from the narratives just given.

Mr. Combe and the bard of Stratford were intimately acquainted; the former one day in a tavern, said to be the sign of the Bear, in the Bridge street, in Stratford, said to the other, "I suppose you will write my epitaph when I am dead; you may as well do it now, that I may know what you will say of me when I am gone." Immediately he replied, "It shall be this, "Ten in the hundred, &c.'" The company instantly burst into a loud laugh, perhaps from the justness of the idea, and the hatred all men have to the character of a miser and usurer: the violence of the mirth somewhat subsiding, they desired to hear what he had to say of Mr. Thomas Combe, brother of the former gentleman, when he instantly said, "But thin in beard, &c." This brother was remarkable for the thinness of his beard, and no doubt also for his covetous disposition; therefore the poignancy of the sarcasm afforded no small diversion amongst the convivial meeting; but it is said the severity of this satire made so deep an impression upon the two brothers, that they never forgave the author of their epitaphs.

Another traditionary anecdote has likewise been stated to refer to Combe, but the best version of it introduces a blacksmith as the chief actor, and Combe's name does not appear. A blacksmith accosted Shakespeare, as he was leaning over a mercer's door, with

Now, Mr. Shakespeare, tell me, if you can,

The difference between a youth and a young man.

To which the poet immediately replied,—

Thou son of fire, with thy face like a maple,

The same difference as between a scalded and a coddled apple.

According to Malone, in 1790, "this anecdote was related near fifty years ago to a gentleman at Stratford, by a person then above eighty years of age, whose father might have been contemporary with Shakespeare." I have, however, seen an unpublished letter, written by Malone in 1788, in which the following account of this tradition is given.

Mr. Macklin tells but a blind story of Sir Hugh Clopton's having sent for a very old woman, near ninety, who repeated to him a couplet that she remembered to have heard in her youth, and which was said to have been made by Shakspeare on old John Combe, in which he compared his face to a maple. I gave no great credit to this at first, but having yesterday found the same satirical comparison in a book of Queen Elizabeth's age, I begin to be less incredulous. Perhaps Mr. Taylor may remember this old woman. It is certain much tradition might have been handed down about our great poet, for the mother of the very old woman I speak of might have been a servant to his daughter Mrs. Queeny, and have heard many particulars from her so late as the Restoration, but unfortunately the last age was not an age of curiosity or inquiry.

The old work to which Malone referred in confirmation of this anecdote was, 'Tarltons Jests drawne into these three parts, his court-witty jests, his sound city jests, his countrey-pretty jests, full of delight, wit, and honest mirth,' 4to. 1638, first published in 1600, and also containing an anecdote (sig. B 2) in which a person's face is compared to a maple.

A jest of an apple hitting Tarlton on the face.

Tarlton having flouted the fellow for his pippin which hee threw, hee thought to bee meet with Tarlton at length, so in the play Tarltons part was to travell, who kneeling down to aske his father blessing, the fellow threw an apple at him, which hit him on the check. Tarlton, taking up the apple, made this jest: