markable seasons than any of the prosaic records of the time. In 1594, Dr. J. King thus preaches at York: "Remember that the spring (that year when the plague broke out) was very unkind, by means of the abundance of rains that fell. Our July hath been like to a February, our June even as an April, so that the air must needs be infected." He then adds, speaking of three successive years of scarcity, "Our years are turned upside down. Our summers are no summers; our harvests are no harvests ; our seed-times are no seed-times." There are passages in Stow's 'Annals,' and in a manuscript by Dr. Simon Forman in the Ashmolean Museum, which show that in the June and July of 1594 there were excessive rains. But Stow adds, of 1594,"notwithstanding in the month of August there followed a fair harvest." This does not agree with

"The ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted, ere his youth attain'd a beard.”

It is not necessary to fix Shakspere's description of the ungenial season upon 1594 in particular. There was a succession of unpropitious years, when

"The spring, the summer,

The childing autumn, angry winter, change

Their wonted liveries."

"Our summers are no summers; our harvests are no harvests; our seed-times are no seed-times." Churchyard, in his preface to a poem entitled 'Charity,'t says, "A great nobleman told me this last wet summer the weather was too cold for poets." The poetry of Shakspere was as much subjective as objective, to use one of the favourite distinctions which we have derived from the Germans. The most exact description of the coldness of the "wet summer" becomes in his hands the finest poetry, even taken apart from its dramatic propriety; but in association with the quarrels of Oberon and Titania, it becomes something much higher than descriptive poetry. It is an integral part of those wondrous efforts of the imagination which we can call by no other name than that of creation. It is in A Midsummer Night's Dream, as it appears to us, that Shakspere first felt the entire strength of his creative power. That noble poem is something so essentially different from anything which the stage had previously possessed, that we must regard it as a great effort of the highest originality; conceived perhaps with very little reference to its capacity of pleasing a mixed audience; probably composed with the express intention of being presented to "an audience fit though few," who were familiar with the allusions of classical story, ol "masque and antique pageantry," but who had never yet been enabled to form an adequate notion of

"Such sights as youthful poets dream

On summer eves by haunted stream."

* See our Illustrations of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act II., Sc. II.

+ Quoted by Mr. Halliwell, in his 'Introduction to A Midsummer Night's Dream.'

The exquisite delicacy of the compliment to "the imperial votaress" fully warrants the belief that in the season of calamity, when her own servants "may not disport her Highness with their wonted and ordinary pastimes," one of them was employed in a labour for her service, which would make all other pastimes of that epoch appear flat and trivial.

It is easy to believe that if any external impulse were wanting to stimulate the poetical ambition of Shakspere-to make him aspire to some higher character than that of the most popular of dramatists-such might be found in 1593 in the clear field which was left for the exercise of his peculiar powers. Robert Greene had died on the 3rd of September, 1592, leaving behind him a sneer at the actor who aspired "to bombast out a blank verse." Had his genius not been destroyed by the wear and tear, and the corrupting influences, of a profligate life, he never could have competed with the mature Shakspere. But as we know that "the only Shake-scene in a country," at whom the unhappy man presumed to scoff, felt the insult somewhat deeply, so we may presume he took the most effectual means to prove to the world that he was not, according to the malignant insinuation of his envious compeer, an upstart crow beautified with our feathers." We believe that in the gentleness of his nature, when he introduced into A Midsummer Night's Dream

"The thrice three Muses mourning for the death

Of learning late deceas'd in beggary,"

he dropped a tear upon the grave of him whose demerits were to be forgiven in his misery. On the 1st of June, 1593, Christopher Marlowe perished in a wretched brawl, "slain by Francis Archer," as the Register of Burials of the parish of St. Nicholas, Deptford, informs us. Who was left of the dramatists that could enter into competition with William Shakspere, such as he then was? He was almost alone. The great disciples of his school had not arisen. Jonson had not appeared to found a school of a different character. It was for him, thenceforth, to sway the popular mind after his own fashion; to disregard the obligation which the rivalry of high talent might have imposed upon him of listening to other suggestions than those of his own lofty art; to make the multitude bow before that art, rather than that it should accommodate itself to their habits and prejudices. But at a period when the exercise of the poetical power in connection with the stage was scarcely held amongst the learned and the polite in itself to be poetry, Shakspere vindicated his reputation by the publication of the Venus and Adonis. It was, he says, "the first heir of my invention." There may be a doubt whether Shakspere meant to say literally that this was the first poetical work that he had produced; or whether he held, in deference to some critical opinions, that his dramatic productions could not be classed amongst the heirs of "invention." We think that he meant to use the words literally; and that he used them at a period when he might assume, without vanity, that he had taken his rank amongst the poets of his time. He dedicates to the Earl of Southampton something that had not before been given to the world. He calls his verses "unpolished lines;" he vows to take advan

tage of all idle hours till he had honoured the young patron of the Muses with 'some graver labour." But invention was received then, as it was afterwards. as the highest quality of the poet. Dryden says,-"A poet is a maker, as the word signifies; and he who cannot make, that is invent, hath his name for nothing." We consider, therefore, that "my invention" is not the language of cne unknown to fame. He was exhibiting the powers which he possessed upon a different instrument than that to which the world was accustomed; but the world knew that the power existed. We employ the word genius always with reference to the inventive or creative faculty. Substitute the word genius for invention, and the expression used by Shakspere sounds like arrogance. But the substitution may indicate that the actual expression could not have been used by one who came forward for the first time to claim the honours of the poet. It has been argued from this expression that Shakspere had produced nothing original before the Venus and Adonis-that up to the period of its publication, in 1593, he was only a repairer of the works of other men. We hold that the expression implies the direct contrary.

The dreary summer of 1593 has passed away;

"And on old Hyems' chin, and icy crown,

An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set."

From the 1st of August in that year to the following Christmas the Queen was at Windsor. The plague still raged in London, and the historian gravely records, amongst the evils of the time, that Bartholomew Fair was not held. Essex was at Windsor during this time, and probably the young Southampton, was there also. It was a long period for the Court to remain in one place. Elizabeth was afraid of the plague in the metropolis; and upon a page dying within the castle on the 21st of November, she was about to rush away from the pure air which blew around the "proud keep." But "the lords and ladies who were accommodated so well to their likings had persuaded the Queen to suspend her removal from thence till she should see some other effect."* Living in the dread of "infection," we may believe that the Queen would require amusement; and that the Lord Chamberlain's players, who had so long forborne to resort to the metropolis, might be gathered around her without any danger from their presence. If so, was the Midsummer Night's Dream one of the novelties which her players had to produce? But there was another novelty which tradition tells us was written at the especial desire of the Queen herself -a comedy which John Dennis altered in 1702, and then published with the following statement:-"That this comedy was not despicable, I guessed for several reasons: first, I knew very well that it had pleased one of the greatest queens that ever was in the world-great not only for her wisdom in the arts of government, but for her knowledge of polite learning, and her nice taste of the drama; for such a taste we may be sure she had, by the relish which she had of the ancients. This comedy was written at her command, and by her direction,

Letter from Mr. Standen to Mr. Bacon, in Birch's Memoirs of Queen Elizabeth.'

and she was so eager to see it acted, that she commanded it to be finished in fourteen days; and was afterwards, as tradition tells us, very well pleasea at the representation." The plain statement of Dennis, "this comedy was written at her command," was amplified by Rowe into the circumstantial relation that Elizabeth was so well pleased with the character of Falstaff in Henry IV. "that she commanded him to continue it for one play more, and to show him in love. Hence all the attempts, which have only resulted in confusion worse confounded, to connect The Merry Wives of Windsor with Henry IV. We have stated this question fully, and, we hope, impartially, in the Introductory Notice to The Merry Wives of Windsor. Let us give one corroboration of the belief there expressed, that the comedy was written in 1593, or very near to that time; the circumstance itself being somewhat of a proof that Shakspere was at Windsor precisely at that period, and ready to obey the Queen's command that a comedy suggested by herself should be finished in fourteen days."

"Ben Jonson and he [Shakspere] did gather humours of men daily wherever they came." So writes honest Aubrey. "The humour of the constable,” which Shakspere, according to the same authority, "happened to take at Grendon in Bucks, which is on the road from London to Stratford," may find a paralle. in mine host of the Garter of The Merry Wives of Windsor. We have little doubt that the character was a portrait of a man well known to the courtiers, and whose good-natured bustling importance was drawn out by the poet as he passed many a cheerful evening of the winter of 1593 around his sea-coal fire. We have shown that in all likelihood the "perplexity" of the host when he lost his horses was a real event. Let us quote the cause of this perplexity from the original sketch of The Merry Wives, as published in 1602. The unfortunate host, who when he is told "Here be three gentlemen come from the Duke, the stranger, sir, would have your horse," exclaims with wondrous glee "They shall have my horses, Bardolph, they must come off, I'll sauce them," is now "cozened." Sir Hugh, who has a spite against mine host, thus tells him the ill news: "Where is mine Host of the Garter? Now, my Host, I would desire you, look you now, to have a care of your entertainments, for there is three sorts of cosen garmombles is cosen all the Host of Maidenhead and Readings." Dr. Caius has previously told him "Dere be a Garman Duke come to de Court has cosened all de host of Branford and Reading." We have pointed out that in 1592 a German Duke did visit Windsor; and that he had a kind of passport from Lord Howard addressed to all justices of peace, mayors, and bailiffs, expressing that it was her Majesty's pleasure "to see him furnished with post-horses in his travel to the sea-side, and there to seek up such shipping, he paying nothing for the same." We asked, was there any dispute about the ultimate payment for the Duke's horses for which he was to pay nothing? We have no doubt whatever that the author of The Merry Wives of Windsor literally rendered the tale of mine host's perplexity for the amusement of the Court. For who was the German Duke who visited Windsor in the autumn of 1592?" His Serene Highness the Right Honourable Prince and Lord Frederick Duke of Würtemburg and Teck, Count of Mümpelgart." The pass

port of Lord Howard describes him as Count Mombeliard. And who are those who have rid away with the horses? "Three sorts of cosen garmombles." One device of the poets of that day for masking a real name under a fictitious was to invert the order of the syllables; thus, in the Shepherd's Calendar' Algrind stands for Archbishop Grindal, and Morel for Elmor, Bishop of London. In Lodge's Fig for Momus,' we also find Donroy for Matthew Roydon, and Ringde for Dering. Precisely according to this method Garmomble is MomblegarMumpelgart.* We think this is decisive as to the allusion; and that the allusion is decisive as to the date of the play. What would be a good joke when the Court was at Windsor in 1593, with the visit of the Duke fresh in the memory of the courtiers, would lose its point at a later period. Let us fix then the performance of The Merry Wives of Windsor at that period when Elizabeth remained five months in her castle, repressing her usual desire to progress from

We are indebted for this suggestion to a correspondent to whom we offer our best tharks.