"higher authority than that of Cibber's Lives of "the Poets, Vol. I. p. 130. Sir William Da"venant told it to Mr. Betterton, who commu"nicated it to Mr. Rowe, who, according to Dr. "Johnson, related it to Mr. Pope." Mr. Malone concurs in opinion that this story stands on a very slender foundation, while he differs from Mr. Steevens as to the fact of gentlemen going to the theatre on horseback.. With respect likewise to Shakspeare's father being "engaged in a "lucrative business," we may remark, that this could not have been the case at the time our author came to London, if the preceding dates be correct. He is said to have arrived in London in 1586, the year in which his father resigned the office of alderman, unless, indeed, we are permitted to conjecture that his resignation was not the consequence of his necessities.

But in whatever situation he was first employed at the theatre, he appears to have soon discovered those talents which afterwards made him

"Th' applause! delight! the wonder of our stage!"

Some distinction he probably first acquired as an actor, although Mr. Rowe has not been able to discover any character in which he appeared to more advantage than that of the ghost in Hamlet. The instructions given to the player in that tra

gedy, and other passages of his works, show an intimate acquaintance with the skill of acting, and such as is scarcely surpassed in our own days. He appears to have studied nature in acting as much as in writing. But all this might have been mere theory. Mr. Malone is of opinion he was no great actor. The distinction however, which he might obtain as an actor could only be in his own plays, in which he would be assisted by the novel appearance of author and actor combined. Before his time, it does not appear that any actor could avail himself of the wretched pieces represented on the stage.

Mr. Rowe regrets that he cannot inform us which was the first play he wrote. More skilful research has since found that Romeo and Juliet, and Richard II. and III. were printed in 1597, when he was thirty-three years old; there is also some reason to think that he commenced a dramatic writer in 1592, and Mr. Malone even places his first play "First part of Henry VI." in 1589. His plays, however, must have been not only popular, but approved by persons of the higher order, as we are certain that he enjoyed the gracious favour of Queen Elizabeth who was very fond of the stage: and the particular and affec

* See the Lists of Mr. Malone and Mr. George Chalmers at the end of this Life.

tionate patronage of the Earl of Southampton, to whom he dedicated his poems of " Venus and Adonis," and his “ Rape of Lucrece." On Sir William Davenant's authority, it has been asserted that this nobleman at one time gave him a thousand pounds to enable him to compleat a purchase. At the conclusion of the advertisement prefixed to Lintot's edition of Shakspeare's poems, it is said, "That most learned prince and great "patron of learning, King James the First, was

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pleased with his own hand to write an amicable "letter to Mr. Shakspeare; which letter, though "now lost, remained long in the hands of Sir "William D'Avenant, as a credible person now

living can testify." Dr. Farmer with great probability supposes, that this letter was written by King James in return for the compliment paid to him in Macbeth. The relator of this anecdote was Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham.* These brief notices, meagre as they are, may show that our author enjoyed high favour in his day. Whatever we may think of King James as a "learned "prince," his patronage, as well as that of his predecessor, was sufficient to give celebrity to the founder of a new stage. It may be added that his uncommon merit, his candour, and good

*Note by Mr. Malone to "Additional Anecdotes of William Shakspeare."

nature are supposed to have procured him the admiration and acquaintance of every person distinguished for such qualities. It is not difficult indeed, to suppose that Shakspeare was a man of humour and a social companion, and probably excelled in that species of minor wit not ill adapted to conversation, of which it could have been wished he had been more sparing in his writings.

How long he acted has not been discovered, but he continued to write till the year 1614. During his dramatic career he acquired a property in the theatre,* which he must have disposed of when he retired, as no mention of it occurs in his will. His connexion with Ben Jonson has been variously related. It is said that when Jonson was unknown to the world, he offered a play to the theatre, which was rejected after a very careless perusal, but that Shakspeare having accidentally cast his eye on it, conceived a favourable opinion of it, and afterwards recommended Jonson and his writings to the publick. For this candour he was repaid by Jonson, when the latter became a poet of note, with an envious disrespect. Jonson acquired reputation by the variety of his pieces, and endeavoured to arrogate the su

* In 1603 he and several others obtained a licence from King James to exhibit comedies, tragedies, histories, &c. at the Globe Theatre and elsewhere.

premacy in dramatic genius. Like a French critick, he insinuated Shakspeare's incorrectness, his careless manner of writing, and his want of judgment, and, as he was a remarkable slow writer himself, he could not endure the praise frequently bestowed on Shakspeare of seldom altering or blotting out what he had written. Mr. Malone says, that "not long after the year 1600, a coolness arose between Shakspeare and

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him, which, however he may talk of his almost "idolatrous affection, produced on his part, from that time to the death of our author, and for

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many years afterwards, much clumsy sarcasm "and many malevolent reflections." But from these, which are the commonly received opinions on this subject, Dr. Farmer is inclined to depart, and to think Jonson's hostility to Shakspeare absolutely groundless; so uncertain is every circumstance we attempt to recover of our great poet's life. Jonson had only one advantage over Shakspeare, that of superior learning, which might in certain situations give him a superior rank, but could never promote his rivalship with a man who attained the highest excellence without it. Nor will Shakspeare suffer by its being known that all the dramatic poets before he appeared were scholars. Greene, Lodge, Peele, Marlowe, Nashe, Lily, and Kyd had all, says Mr. Malone, a regu