MR. DONNELLY’S CRYPTOGRAM.
I have waited until I had Mr. Donnelly’s book before me. The marvellous
industry, research and intelligence displayed is simply astounding. I
dare not express an opinion on the subject. But why or wherefore should
Bacon take such an interest in and spend so much ingenuity on Anne
Hathaway and her marriage? It is a strange tale. I have myself been
Commissary for Bishops and held Courts for them; have been for years a
Surrogate for Bishops and Archbishops, and have had now and then to
refuse a license; but I never had or heard of such a case as this, and
should certainly have refused to grant a license to allow “_once_”
publishing the banns to stand for “_thrice_” and to slur over “consent of
parents.” It most probably happened that the banns were published the
first time more or less surreptitiously, and taking the parents by
surprise were not objected to; but if it proceeded to a second “asking,”
they would be forbidden; it is clear there was an objection known to be
hanging up. Turn the bull’s-eye light of common sense unto what was too
common in parishes of old. Who, why, and wherefore did Farmers Sandells
and Rychardson appear upon the scene? They, it may be, held office in
the parish, and had caught hold of a lad who, to save the parish a burden
or one of themselves a scandal, would for a consideration make an “honest
woman of Ann Hathaway.” I myself recollect having a similar case to deal
with on all-fours—a farming lad of 19 or 20 and a woman of 29 or 30 near
her confinement, when I felt so strongly on the subject, that before the
marriage ceremony, I asked the intended bridegroom to come into the
vestry to question him as to his being in his sober senses, and if he
understood what was the position he was about to make for himself.
One error Mr. Donnelly has fallen into when he uses strong language
against William Shakespere for allowing “one quart of sack” (p. 51) to be
sent to his guest. It was a common compliment to send such gifts, and
the omission would have been thought an insult. In Ambrose Barnes’
Memoirs (p. 244) published by the Surtees Society, Appendix, 1592:—“The
Corporation of Newcastle-on-Tyne paid for 20 lb. of sugar in two loaves
at 18_d._ a lb., 6 bottles of sack, 10 pottles of white wine, 9 pottles
of claret wine, sent as a present to my Lord of Durham as he came
travelling to this town.” Again (p. 427), 1684:—“6_d._ for one pint of
sack when Mr. Shakespeare preached!” Also in Longstaff’s Darlington (p.
239), Churchwardens’ accounts, 1643:—“One quart off wine when Mr. Doughty
preached, 10_d._; one quart wine and one pinte sack when another
gentleman preached, which lay att George Stevenson’s, 1_s._ 8_d._;” 1650,
“six quarts of sacke to the minister that preached when we had not a
minister, 9_s._;” 1666, “one quart of sack bestowed on Mr. Jellett when
he preached, 2_s._ 4_d._; more bestowed on him at Ralph Collings’, when
Mr. Bell was there, 1_s._ 8_d._”
I know that my friends the public have a strong idea that this subject
has been thoroughly threshed out, and are apt to say and think—
Shakespere and Bacon are vexation,
Donnelly is as bad,
His Cryptogram it puzzles me,
His Cipher drives me mad.
Nevertheless, I have an opinion that I have been able to fling a few
novel hints upon the question, and so cast it upon the waters to sink or
swim.
SCOTT SURTEES.
DINSDALE-ON-TEES,
_May_ 14, 1888.
APPENDIX.
Banns.
Cripp’s Laws of the Church, p. 634.—“Before the time of Pope Innocent
III. there was no solemnization of marriage in the Church: but the man
came to the woman’s house and led her home to his own house, which was
all the ceremony then used. By the customs of the Anglo-Saxons the
marriage ceremony was commonly performed at the house of the bridegroom,
to which the bride had been previously taken.” (p. 638) “It was formerly
the law of this country that marriages celebrated by licence, when either
of the parties was under the age of twenty-one years (not being a widow
or widower), without the consent of the father, or if he were not living,
of the mother or guardians, should be absolutely void.” They must
proceed either by publication of banns or by license. The word banns is
of Saxon origin, and signifies publication or proclamation (Rogers, E. L.
509). This publication for three several Sundays or holidays, unless a
license or faculty had been obtained, was enjoined by Canon Law and by
the rubric “in the time of divine service” (p. 650). . . . For the
avoiding of all fraud and collusion, before such license shall be granted
it shall appear to the judge by the oaths of two sufficient witnesses . .
. that the express consent of the parents or parent is thereunto had and
obtained (Canon 103).” It is singular we find in Francis Bacon’s life,
that he tried to break off the match with Sir John Villiers and Lady
Hatton’s only daughter and heiress, because the mother opposed it, “he
strongly advises that the match be not proceeded in without the consent
of both parents required by religion and the law of God” (Campbell’s Life
of Lord Bacon, p. 138).
“Spurrings” they are still called in the North of England, where old
customs and our fore-elders’ language linger long. I myself in a parish
in Wensleydale, where they until recently “raced for the garter,” heard
the Clerk, to my astonishment, after I had finished the “spurring” for
the last time of asking, stand up and in broad accent and loud voice sing
out, “God speed them well!” and all the people answered, Amen! It was
not any way ludicrous, but really sounded solemn and a beautiful
benediction from their fellow-parishioners.—(See Atkinson’s Glossary of
Cleveland Dialect, “Spurrings, sb. The publication of banns of marriage:
the being ‘asked’ at Church, an immediate derivative from speer, speir,
even if not directly from Old Norse spyria.”)
The name of Shakespeare, Laborer, in the neighbourhood of Stratford is
spelt as above in George I.
“Walter Shakespeare, of Tachbrooke, in the county of Warwicke, laborer,
aged forty yeares or thereabouts, being sworne and examined, deposeth as
follows:
“To the fourth interrogatory this deponent saith that the cure of the
parish has been neglected by the complainant, and in particular this
deponent’s wife was put by being churched, there being no Divine Service
at Tachbrooke one Sunday since the complainant’s institucion and
induction; and this deponent further says that notice was given that his
wife was to be churched that Sunday, and that this deponent was then and
now is an inhabitant of the parish of Tachbrooke.”—Record Office, 41st
Report, p. 555, 7 George I. Warwick and Stafford Exchequer.
SUPPLEMENT.
See p. 22.—Ante “Anthony Sherley and no other was he who wrote these
plays.”
Since I wrote the first portion of this pamphlet so much matter has
turned up, showing beyond reasonable doubt that I am right in my
conjecture as to Anthony Sherley, that I am encouraged to bring it also
before the public. “Magna est veritas,” and in due time the leaven will
work its way.
I had called attention (p. 20) to the Sonnets 135, 136, 105.
SONNET CV.
Let not my love be called idolatry,
Nor my beloved as an idle show,
Since all alike my songs and praises be
To _one_, of _one_, still such and ever so.
Kind is my love to-day, to-morrow kind,
Still constant in a wondrous excellence;
Therefore my verse to constancy confin’d,
_One_ thing expressing, leaves out difference.
Fair, kind, and true, varying to other words;
And in this change is my invention spent,
Three themes in _one_, which wondrous scope affords.
Fair, kind, and true, have often liv’d alone
Which three, till now, never kept seat in _one_.
CXXXV.
Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy _will_,
And _will_ to boot, and _will_ in over-plus;
More than enough am I that vex thee still,
To thy sweet _will_ making addition thus.
Wilt thou, whose _will_ is large and spacious,
Not once vouchsafe to hide my _will_ in thine?
Shall _will_ in others seem right gracious,
And in my _will_ no fair acceptance shine?
The sea, all water, yet receives rain still,
And in abundance addeth to his store;
So thou, being rich in _will_, add to thy _will_
One _will_ of mine, to make thy large _will_ more!
Let no unkind, no fair beseechers kill.
Think all but _one_, and me in that _one Will_.
and the enigmatical allusions in them to Sherley’s motto “only one.” He
could not write “only one,” as it would have betrayed the author of the
plays, but he shaves as near the wind as he dare, and as he says, Sonnet
lxxvi., which I mentioned (p. 19):
Why write I still all one, ever the same,
And keep invention in a noted weed,
That every word doth almost tell my name,
Showing their birth and where they did proceed?
And so it does, when we look behind the scenes. They were written in the
hope that some one like myself would arise, a light in a dark place, to
give honour to whom honour was due, and pluck the jay’s false feathers
from off the crow. The instant you begin to look for it, you will
observe how strangely any-how and oft, in all times and places, in season
and out of season, this word “_one_” is wrought into the text of the
plays, sometimes in connection with “_all’s one_”; (he would not write
“only one” straight off, else it would have led, as I said before, to
detection, and so he uses the plural “all” instead of singular “only,”
see Sonnet lxxvi.), and in a much more important position boldly puts it
forward (in Quarto 1608, with the name of Shakespeare) “_All’s one_ or
_one_ of the four plaies in _one_,” called “A Yorkshire Tragedy.” Now
this play with Anthony Sherley’s motto is nothing more nor less than the
story of the ruin of his house; it is hardly disguised under the flimsy
title of “A Yorkshire Tragedy.” It is important to note that of all the
plays this has no _stage names_ to it, simply “Husband and wife.”
Strange! passing strange! Why should Shakespeare care to represent on
the stage the history of the Sherley family and ruin? This same company,
mark, had played it under the name openly of “The Three English
Brothers,” prologue, “Clothing our truth within an argument, fitting the
stage and your attention, yet not so hid but that she may appear to be
herself, even Truth.” This would also fit the “Yorkshire Tragedy.” What
is the substance of the play? It tells the story in blank verse, which
we have almost word for word in prose in “The Sherley Brothers,” viz.
that of Sir Thomas Sherley the elder gambling away his extensive
property. “Elizabeth had seized and sold everything belonging to him
except (Wiston), his wife’s dowry.” “_Wife_: If you suspect a plot in me
to keep my dowry . . . you are a gentleman of many bloods; think on the
state of these _three_ lovely boys (the leash of brothers old Fuller
calls them) . . . Your lands mortgaged, yourself wound into
debts.”—“_Wife_: I see how ruin with a palsy hand begins to shake this
ancient seat to dust . . . beggary of the soul and of the body, as if
some vexed spirit had got his form upon him.” His wife had interest
enough to get him the offer of a place at Court, etc.
But the writer of Shakespeare’s plays was not content with this, an exact
account, even to _minute_ particulars, of the history of the three
Sherley brothers; just compare that history and this “Yorkshire Tragedy”
play, and then read the same story (Richard II. Act 2, scene 3).
KING RICHARD II. ACT 2, SCENE 3.
“O, then, my father,
Will you permit that I shall stand condemn’d,
A wand’ring vagabond; my rights and royalties
Pluck’d from my arms perforce, and given away
To upstart unthrifts? Wherefore was I born?
* * * * *
I am deny’d to sue my livery here,
And yet my letters-patent give me leave:
My father’s goods are _all distrained_ and sold;
And these, and _all_, are _all_ amiss employ’d.
What would you have me do? I am a subject
And challenge law: Attornies are deny’d me,
And therefore personally I lay my claim
To my inheritance of free descent.
ACT 3, SCENE 1.
_Boling_. “Myself, a prince by fortune of my birth;
Near to the king in blood; and near in love,
Till you did make him misinterpret me,
Have stoop’d my neck under your injuries,
And sigh’d my English breath in foreign clouds,
Eating the bitter bread of banishment:
Whilst you have fed upon my signories,
Dis_park’d_ my parks, and fell’d my forest woods;
From my own windows torn my household coat,
Raz’d out my _impress_, {32} leaving me no sign,
Save men’s opinions and my living blood,
To shew the world I am a gentleman.
This, and much more, much more than twice all this,
Condemns you to the death. See them deliver’d over
To execution and the hand of death.”
ACT 1, SCENE 3.
_Boling_. Your will be done: this must my comfort be,
That sun, that warms you here, shall shine on me;
And those his golden beams, to you here lent,
Shall point on me, and gild my banishment.
_North_. A dearer merit, not so deep a maim
As to be cast forth in the common air,
Have I deserved at your highness’ hand.
The language I have learn’d these forty years,
My native English, now I must forego, etc., etc.
What is my sentence then, but speechless death,
Which robs my native tongue from breathing native breath?
Does not every thoughtful reader pause over it and say to himself, why
does he bring forward Busby and Green and rate them and sentence them to
death? What for? treason? rebellion? murder? sedition? some rash crime?
No; but for having “disparked” his parks and pulled down “his impress”
(_only one_!), and his “household coat,” and tells us what he would like
to have done to his enemies at Court if he had had the chance, as they
had done when they cut off his patron and his kinsman Essex’s head. Now
to return to the reason why he should have written a play to unfold the
reasons of his family decay. To Cecil from Anthony Sherley, “The worst
sort of the world have taken advantage to lay upon _me_ all sorts of
defamation” (p. 37), and again, and therefore to clear himself, he shows
how it came to pass, and that his father was not in his right senses who
incurred “this great debt” (p. 37, Sherley Brothers). Elizabeth had
actually “_distrained_” upon his father’s goods, had carried off even his
blankets and sheets, chairs and arras hangings, feather beds, and silver
spoons, and left his mother scanty and beggarly supply for her dowry
house, not sufficient for the necessities of everyday life. She had
seized and sold the vast lands and possessions of his ancestors.
(Stemmata Shirleana, Roxburgh Club, p. 251.) “A description of the
Manors sold, all save Wiston dowry.” “In 1578 Sir T. Sherley served the
office of Sheriff for the counties of Surrey and Sussex. He afterwards
became Treasurer at War in the Low Countries, and having fallen under the
displeasure of Queen Elizabeth, and become indebted to the Crown, his
estates and personal effects, with the exception of the Manor of Wiston,
settled on his wife, were seized.” See Lansdowne MSS. Goods seized at
Wiston by Sheriff, 1588. Here again I earnestly request comparison with
the story in the “Yorkshire Tragedy.” Rowland Whyte, “he owed the Queen
more than he was worth; his own doings have undone him.”
SCENE IV.—HUSBAND—YORKSHIRE TRAGEDY.
“What is there in three dice to make a man draw thrice three thousand
acres into the compass of a little round table, and with the
gentleman’s palsy in the hand shake out his posterity thieves or
beggars? ’Tis done; I have don ’t i’ faith; terrible, horrible
misery!—How well was I left! Very well, very well. My lands show’d
like a full moon about me; but now the moon’s in the quarter—waning,
waning; and I am mad to think that moon was mine; mine and my
father’s, and my fore-fathers’; generations, generations.—Down goes
the house of us; down, down it sinks. Now is the name a beggar’s;
begs in me. That name, which hundreds of years has made this shire
famous in me and my posterity, runs out.”
To the Rt. Hon. Sir R. Cecil, Knight, from Anthony Sherley:
“Arkangell, 1600, June 10.
“Either the unfairness of the ways or messengers have kept my letters
from you. You have not vouchsafed me _one only_ answer . . . your
honour knoweth the fortunes of my house, and from how great
expectations our sins or disasters brought it both in estate and in
disgrace . . . my purpose was to satisfy the world in myself that I
was too worthy to have the decay of myself laid on me.”—The Sherley
Brothers, p. 28. S. P. O. From Sir R. Cecil, 1600. “Her Majesty
has increased her former displeasure towards him so far in respect of
this presumption as by no means she will suffer him to come into the
kingdome; but wholly rejected any such offer” (p. 31).
The truth is, Elizabeth had been stung in her sorest point. Sherley the
elder was paymaster to the forces in the Low Countries, and his accounts
were deficient. That was never to be passed over. She, who exercised
her ingenuity and talents in cheese-paring, who, whilst waiting for the
coming of the Armada, spent her time in trying whether, if she gave her
sailors fish and oil instead of salt beef, it would not save her a penny
or two a day from each separate mess; who never would victual her ships
or refit them, or give them shot or powder more than enough for the day.
It was owing to the pluck of the half-starved, half-victualled British
sailor in non-repaired ships, and in spite of every disadvantage, that
the victory was won; not with her help, not with her providence, but in
spite of it. Well was it expressed, “Her maddened grasp of passionate
avarice.” Give the devil his due, as we say in the proverb, but don’t
give one iota of credit to that stingiest, and vainest of womenkind.
Ray’s Glossary of words—“Stingy, pinching, sordid, narrow spirited.”
Read all these quotations from Shakespeare’s plays, and compare them line
with line and the lives of Sherley’s brothers, and conviction must
follow. I might just notice that Anthony Sherley’s knowledge of the
localities and people where most scenes of the plays are fixed was
unequalled. He told that which he had seen; he spoke of what he knew.
Whateley on Shakespeare, “The characters which he has drawn are masterly
copies from nature.”
Now to return to Sonnet 105, which has always been a stumbling block to
commentators, as it clearly was intended to explain some mystery or
enigma connected with the author of the plays. I have never yet noticed
any reasonably satisfactory explanation of this Sonnet. Why even the
person who wrote on the religion of Shakespeare claims it as a sort of
William Shakespeare’s Athanasian creed, and meant to express a belief in
the Trinity, “three in one!” “_All’s one_” I noticed may be met with
often; but as for “_one_,” it crops up everywhere. In a single scene in
a single page you may count in places six “_ones_” (“Henry V.” passim),
in many cases “lugged” in where the sense and context show it would be
far better otherwise, and commentators take trouble to emend it. This is
the key to his broad hint (Sonnet lxxvi.), “Why write I still all
‘_one_,’ ever the same . . . that every word doth almost tell my name.”
But, conjoined with his impress “_one_,” there is also a play upon his
“armories,” the Sherley Trinity of virtues. I find in Lansdowne MSS.,
No. 49, leaf 28, which I have verified, “That armories were antiently
introduced to distinguish noble and illustrious families. The house of
Shirley of great estimation, ‘Noble light,’ ‘Gold,’ it cannot be
corrupted, or the value diminished by earth, water, air, or fire. Gold
and sunbeams signifies in virtues, alluding to the Shirley family in
particular, ‘Field of gold,’ faith, charitie, wisdom, and fidelitie, and
many others, all of which their arms are the true emblems.” There are
several pages of this sort in MSS. of British Museum relating to the
Shirley family. May not this be the Trinity of virtues mentioned in that
puzzling Sonnet 105, “Three themes in _one_”? {36}
If Anthony Sherley did not write the plays and sonnets, why does the
writer chronicle his every movement? (_passim._) Why does he give an
exact account of his family history (Yorkshire Tragedy), their ruin and
his own banishment? Why again in Richard II. Act ii. sc. 3, transforming
it to himself in a figure, give an account of their harsh treatment by
Elizabeth? Why does that same company act the Brothers Sherley on the
stage as well as the Yorkshire Tragedy (quarto W. Shakespeare)? Why in
all other plays but that alone are there _stage_ names, but in this play
when acted (as he wishes it not so to be), a Sherley had interest enough
to get his way? Why are all the scenes of the plays laid at places where
Anthony Sherley tarries?
Why does Kemp (with “good new plaies”), one of this _same_ company, go to
meet him at places where he is then known to be, “over the Alpes,”
“Venice,” “Emperor of Germany” (Nine Daies’ Wonder).
Why is it that Shakesperians have been so sure that their claimant must
have had a classical education, that they have searched the records of
Oxford and find no entry? Why do I find “Aula Cervina” Antonius Sherlye,
1579—_equitis aurati_ fil. 14 ann. Hart Hall is thus described by a
contemporary, 1st Elizabeth: “By the advantage of the most famous and
learnedest of tutors he acquired a knowledge not common of the Greek and
Latin tongues, of philosophy, of history, of politicks and other liberal
sciences.”—Would not Shakesperians have been delighted if they could have
this said of the tutors W. Shakespere studied under!!
Why, as Clement’s Inn is mentioned, are they sure he must have had a
legal training, but can find no mention? Why, when I go to the Library
of the Inner Temple, do I find at once the name and record I want,
covering just the very date I need for my theory? “1583, November,
admitted Inner Temple Sir Anthony Shirley, Wiston, Sussex, the second of
the celebrated brothers, died 1630.” Extract from “Members admitted to
the Inner Temple 1547–1660.” Why is it the writer is so familiar with
the ins and outs, and changes, and intricate governments, and of Italian
states and cities, and their laws and ways? Why does he mention what
puzzles so many commentators, viz. that Bohemia had a sea-board? {38}
Why in everyday talk does he bring in Venetian proverbs and ways of
speech. “Fico,” Heylin, p. 124, “When they intend to scoff a man, are
wont to put their thumb between two of their fingers, saying, ‘Ecco le
Fico.’” This would answer to our “taking a sight.” Must not the
familiar use of this and similar proverbs point to residence? “Basta,”
what a useful word one finds in it when dwelling in Italy. “A Bergomask
dance” (Midsummer Night’s Dream). Who could know, unless resident, that
the Venetians looked down on them as coarse and vulgar? Notice also all
sorts of trifling incidents which prove the writer was a dweller at
Venice, and moved about among the Italian States. Why is he always
harping upon ancient families being ruined, and the hardship of
banishment? Why are all his provincialisms Sussex and south country?
“The many musits through which he goes” (Venus and Adonis). “A hare wee
found musing on her meaze” (Return from Pernassus). Surrey
Provincialisms, G. Leveson Gower, “Meuse, a hole in the hedge made by a
fox, hare, or rabbit, alias a run.” Musit occurs in Two Noble Kinsmen,
III. i. 97. Halliwell has muse and muset. “Maund, a basket” (Ray’s
South Country Glossary). Why does he so accurately, in smallest details,
describe the horrors of a battle-field, the sacking of a town, the
horrible scenes and impossibility of keeping in hand the soldiers? How,
if he had not been present, could he have imagined the meeting in
conclave and settling over night the lines of to-morrow’s battle? What
did either Shakespere or Bacon know of that phase of camp life, of battle
in retreat and advance, the field before and after, prisoners and their
ransom, all true to the letter, of one who had been with Philip Sidney
and knighted on the very field of battle in Brittany by the King of
France, and sent to the Fleet by Elizabeth’s jealousy because he was so
knighted?
“Have I not heard in my time lions roar?
Have I not heard the sea puffed up with winds
Rage like an angry boar, chafed with sweat?
Have I not heard great ordnance in the field,
And heavens artillery thunder in the skies?
Have I not in a pitched battle heard
Loud ’larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets clang?”
(Taming of the Shrew.)
All this had Anthony Sherley heard and seen. Had Bacon? Had John Bull’s
Stratford pet? Then, as for field sports, hunting in every form or
fashion, he describes as none but he and Jorrocks could. (R. S. Surtees,
of Hamsterley, I know, drew all his pictures from originals, and that is
why they hold their own.) The dying hare, “Venus and Adonis,” was there
ever anything more touching? The same repeated, “As You Like It,” Act
II. i. the dying deer, and Jacques weeping over it.
Unless at home he had had an early introduction to stable and kennel
management, that sort of learning could not be acquired in after-life;
his love for his “crop-eared roan,” the descriptions in so many places of
his devotion to horses and hounds, he knows them all by name. “Taming of
the Shrew,” scene 1, “Huntsman, tender well my hounds;” see also Henry
VI. scene 2. His description of deer and deer hunts shows that he had
watched their habits, couchant and in chase. What a fund of similar
knowledge is there in the Return from Pernassus, _not_ Parnassus,
distinguishing between the names at different seasons of their life, and
also the same of “Roa-bucke,” “rode on a roan gelding,” “the buck broke
gallantly,” and then comes a similar touching description to that of the
death of the hare in the Sonnets, “the hounds seized upon him, he
groaned, and wept, and dyed, in good faith it made me weep too.” The
truth is, when you compare the words and sentiments and expressions with
those in Shakespeare’s plays, {40} you feel that one and the same writer
was author of them both. Recollect that the modern Pernassus was in the
neighbourhood of Bergamo, from whence Kemp had just returned from his
visit to Anthony Sherley (see An Almond for a Parrot), and, as Heylyn
tells us, “Crema,” the inhabitants of, on the destruction “of Parnassus,
a town of Lombardy, where before they lived, were permitted to build
here.” Then it is evident that whoever wrote these plays was a Romanist,
he sneers at Churchmen and Puritans alike, whilst with regard to Friars
and Romanists, he mostly speaks of them with respect. Well, in S. P. O.
there is a letter from one Phillipp employed by Cecil “to intercept
letters and spy out secrets,” dated Rome, 1601: “He (Anthony Sherley)
denyeth himself to have been a Protestant ever since his first being at
Venice, and here also he hath used to frequent confession every seven or
eight days, and upon Easter Eve he did communicate here; upon Easter Day
he dined here in the English Colledge.”
This will account for the attack on Sir John Oldcastle, egged on by his
Jesuit friends, and his dropping the subject when he found that the wave
of public opinion ran high against him. Last, but not least, we have a
few landmarks of localities. “Burton” and “Wincot” stand out in
eminence. Far and near have they been sought after by Shakesperians, but
from Dan to Beersheba it is all barren; they locate poor Christopher Sly
here, there, and everywhere, or else declare there must be mis-spelling;
as follows is what one of the best and shrewdest of the commentators is
driven to: Steevens: “I suspect we should read Barton Heath. Barton and
Woodmancot, or as it is vulgarly pronounced, Woncot, are both of them in
Gloucestershire, near the residence of Shakespeare’s old enemy Justice
Shallow. Very probably also this fat ale wife might be a real
character.” Dr. Samuel Ireland, 1795: “From the similarity of the name
and the consideration that no such place as Barton Heath has been by any
inquiry of mine discovered in the neighbourhood, I am led to conceive
that Barton Heath, which lies in this county about 18 miles from
Stratford, must have been the spot to which Shakespeare refers. It is
worth hazarding a conjecture to have even a chance of tracing him in any
one of his haunts.” Well, I need not such subterfuges, but go down to
Stanford’s and buy an Ordnance Map of Sussex, and find _both_ places
within an easy reach of Wiston. Names thereabouts seem to be strangely
contracted, Wystoneston=Wiston, St. Botulph’s Bridge=Bootle Bridge, so
also Woodmancote and Edburton; but if that will not please for
Christopher Sly’s residence (when at home?), there is _another Burton
proper_, within a few miles of Wiston; Woodmancote and Edburton are next
parish to Wiston, aye, and joining on “Nightingale” Hill, how fond he was
of them, he gives us even their notes; his father’s woods were as full of
them as his park of deer. There is no question, it appears to me, I
cannot answer, no puzzled point I cannot explain, no stumbling-block to
commentators I cannot take out of their way. Why then not believe me?
“All the world against nothing,” Romeo, III. 5. Although I have run a
dark horse, he has run straight and true, and distanced Bacon, whilst
Shakespere has alike dropped out of both betting and running. {42}
Shakesperians have left their Dagon on the ground and hardly lift the
feather of a quill to raise him up. Their last resource in argument is
(fact) inspiration! in opposition ridicule! As to their other candidate,
that weakly youth never could have been physically equal to have taken
his share in youthful sports. Campbell’s Life of Bacon: “Francis was
sickly and unable to join in the rough sports suited for boys of robust
constitution,” if so he could not have described them so vividly and
true; his poetry, such specimens as we have, is hardly-third rate, his
prose on stilts, his history discredited. Preface to Bacon’s Essays,
1814: “His History of Henry VII. is in these days only consulted by a
few.” Can this be said of his contemporary’s Historical plays? Whilst I
have known those who have taken Bacon up and laid him down, I have hardly
ever known one who after he had put Shakepeare down with reluctance, but
longed for the time to take him up again,—the one interested and
enchanted, the other bored. Never both the product of the same brain, or
writings of the same man. I have told my tale and run my (paper) chase,
and now leave it to my umpires, the British and American readers, to
decide whether, as Stratford has been pulled up and Bacon distanced, I
may not claim from every unprejudiced mind that Sherley has been well
ridden and won in a canter. “De l’audace, de l’audace et encore de
l’audace!”
THE AUTHOR,
DINSDALE-ON-TEES,
DARLINGTON.
_August_ 13_th_, 1888.
* * * * *
* * * * *
STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS, PRINTERS, HERTFORD.
Footnotes
{20} See Sonnets, 135, 136, 105.
{32} Motto, “_only one_.”
{36} There is some meaning unknown in the play everywhere on the word
“_Will_,” also on frequent mention of _Sun_, _Sunbeams_, etc. See
Malone, vol. i. p. 271. In an Eclogue made long since on the death of
Sir Philip Sidney (Davidson’s Poetical Rhapsody, 1602), we find that
celebrated writer lamented in almost every stanza by the name of Willy!
“Willy is dead,” “of Willie’s pipe,” etc., etc., A. Sherley’s friend and
fellow in command at Zutphen = Suid-fen = South fen, or it may be his
brother-in-law, Lord Southampton, to whom he dedicated his early works.
{38} Freeman’s Geography of Europe—“Ottokar King of Bohemia, the power
of that King for a moment reached the Baltic as well as the
Adriatic.”—Vol. i. p. 319. See also Peter Heylin, 1682, Italy, p. 103.
{40} Love’s Labour Lost, scene 2, names of deer given same as in
Pernassus—death of the deer.
{42} See W. Howitt’s Visit to Remarkable Places, 1840, p. 84.