sification; and the impressive story of the penniless fugi tive, who afterwards became a leading inhabitant of Stratford and the owner of New Place, was one likely to be handed down with passable fidelity to the grandchildren of his contemporaries. It is, moreover, one which exactly harmonizes with circumstances that materially add to its probability, with the satirical allusions to the Lucys in their immediate relation to a poaching adventure, and with the certainty that there must have been some very grave reason to induce him to leave his wife and children to seek his unaided fortunes in a distant part of the country, rendering himself at the same time liable to imprisonment (5 Eliz. c. 4, s. 47) for violating the conditions of his apprenticeship. If there had been no such grave reason, how should there have been the provincial belief in 1693 that he had run from his master to London, and was there received into the play-house as a servitor'? What but a strong and compulsory motive could have driven him so far away from a locality to which, as we gather from subsequent events, he was sensitively attached? The only theory, indeed, that would sanction the unconditional rejection of the traditions is that which assumes that they were designed in explanation of the allusions in the Merry Wives of Windsor;' but surely if that had been the case there would have been a more explicit reference to the accusations of Master Shallow, — charges that are in the aggregate of a more formidable description than those which have been transmitted by hearsay: 'You have hurt my keeper, kill'd my dogs, stol'n my deer' (edition 1602). You have beaten my men, kill'd my deer, and broke open my lodge' (edition of 1623). It is also exceedingly improbable that there should have been any one at Stratford-onAvon at the time of Betterton's visit who would have cared to elucidate the justice's implications; and it would appear, from the incorrect quotations which are given by Davies, that even the archdeacon was somewhat better acquainted with the history of Sir Thomas Lucy than he was with the comedy." (H.-P. i. 67–71.) Of that "first essay of his poetry" no copy exists, but the following fabrications have often been published: "A parliament member, a justice of peace, At home a poor scarecrow, at London an asse; . He thinks himself greate, Yet an asse in his state, We allowe by his ears but with asses to mate : "Sir Thomas was too covetous, To covet so much deer, When horns enough upon his head Most plainly did appear. Had not his worship one deer left? What then? He had a wife, Took pains enough to find him horns "Sir Thomas Lucy used a seal with the plain design of three luces interlaced." A luce is a full grown pike. Slender alludes to a "dozen white luces." The general tradition amongst the rustics of the neighborhood was that the poet was wild in his younger days. Sir Philip Sidney's "May-Lady" terms deer-stealing a "pretty service." The students of Oxford had been for many generations the most notorious poachers in all England. one "Dr. Forman relates how two students in 1573,of them John Thornborough, then aged twenty-one, afterwards Dean of York and Bishop of Worcester, 'never studied nor gave themselves to their books, but to go to schools of defence, to the dancing-schools, to steal deer and conies, and to hunt the hare, and to wooing of wenches."" (H.-P. i. 73.) ... "It was natural that Sir Thomas Lucy should do his best to protect his covers from spoliation, and it is easy to believe that there may have been a display of arbitrary and undue severity in the process. . . But the county records of the time not being extant, it is now impossible to ascertain the course of any proceedings that may have been taken in the matter." (H.-P. i. 74.) "That the magistrates in the vicinity of Stratford-onAvon were accustomed to exercise a despotic sway over the poorer inhabitants may be gathered from the fact that at a somewhat later period William Combe, the squire of Welcombe, sent a person of the name of Hiccox to Warwick gaol, and refused bail, merely because he 'did not behave himself with such respect in his presence it seemeth he looked for.' What would he not have done if he had first caught his disrespectful visitor marching off with his rabbits and deer, and then, with unprecedented temerity, electrifying the neighborhood by the circulation of a poetical lampoon reflecting upon the intelligence and judgment of His Worship! Now, Shakespeare, in his poaching days, the penniless son of an impecunious father, and without friends of appreciable. influence, would assuredly have fared no better on such occasions than poor Hiccox, unless he had been, as he obviously was not, high in the favour of Davy, the servingman; and the most rational mode of accounting for and excusing his long-sustained resentment is to recognize a substantial groundwork of facts in the early traditions. They are in unison with possibilities that furnish an intelligible explanation of the known circumstances; and all becomes clear if it be assumed that a persistive, harsh, and injudicial treatment elicited the obnoxious ballad. Its author could have been severely punished under the common law for its exhibition; and there can be little doubt that it was a contemplated movement in reference to the libel, in addition perhaps to some other indictment, that occasioned his flight to the metropolis." (H.-P. i. 75–76.) Dr. Johnson, in 1765, reports the tradition of his day, and says that Shakespeare "came to London a needy adventurer, and lived for a time by very mean employments." A tract called "Ratseis Ghost," entered at the Stationers' Hall, May 31, 1605, contains a passage reasonably believed to refer to the great dramatist. Ratsey says to a strolling player: "Get thee to London, for if one man were dead, they will have much neede of such a one as thou art. There would be none in my opinion fitter than thyselfe to play his parts. My conceipt is such of thee that I durst venture all the mony in my purse on thy head to play Hamlet with him for a wager. There thou shalt learne to be frugall (for players were never so thriftie as they are now about London) and to feed upon all men, and to let none feede upon thee; to make thy hand a stranger to thy pocket, thy hart slow to performe thy tongue's promise. And when thou feelest thy purse well lined, buy thee some place or lordship in the country, that, growing weary of playing, thy mony may there bring thee to dignitie and reputation; then thou needest care for no man, nor not for them that before made thee prowd with speaking their words upon the stage.' 'Sir, I thanke you,' quoth the player, 'for this good counsell; I promise you I will make use of it, for I have heard, indeede, of some that have gone to London very meanly, and have come in time to be exceeding wealthy.' 'And in this presage and propheticall humor of mine,' sayes Ratsey, 'kneele downe: Rise up, Sir Simon Two Shares and a Halfe! thou art now one of my knights, and the first knight that ever was player in England.'” "In the time of Elizabeth, coaches being yet uncommon and hired coaches not at all in use, those who were too proud, too tender, or too idle to walk went on horseback to any distant business or diversion. Many came on horseback to the play; and when Shakespeare fled to London from the terror of a criminal prosecution, his first expedient was to wait at the door of the play-house, and hold the horses of those that had no servants, that they might be ready again after the performance. In this office he became so conspicuous for his care and readiness, that in a short time every man as he alighted called for Will Shakespeare, and scarcely any other waiter was trusted with a horse while Will Shakespeare could be had. This was the first dawn of better fortune; Shakespeare, finding more horses put into his hand than he could hold, hired boys to wait under his inspection, who, when Will Shakespeare was summoned, were immediately to present themselves, 'I am Shakespeare's boy, sir!' In time Shakespeare found higher employment; but as long as the practice of riding to the play-house continued, the waiters that held the horses retained the appellation of 'Shakespeare's boys.'" Mr. Phillipps says that "Dr. Johnson received. this anecdote from Pope, to whom it had been communicated by Rowe; and it appears to have |