lowing March,81 her father made his will "in perfect health and memory;" but his existence was drawing to a close; for he died on the 23rd of the ensuing April, the anniversary of his birth, having exactly completed his fifty-second year. Concerning the nature of the disease which removed this mighty spirit from the earth, no record exists; even tradition is silent. His sonin-law,82 Dr. Hall, who most probably attended him during his illness, left a note-book contain "These following verses were made by William Shakespeare, the late famous tragedian: Written upon the east end of this tombe. "Aske who lyes here, but do not weepe; His fame is more perpetual than these stones: Written upon the west end thereof. "Not monumental stone preserves our fame, When all to time's consumption shall be given, Stanley, for whom this stands, shall stand in heaven." This epitaph (as Malone observes) must have been composed after 1600, as Venetia Stanley, afterwards wife of Sir Kenelm Digby, was born in that year. 81 It appears to have been drawn up on the 25th of [January,] though not executed till the 25th of March. See note on the Will, Appendix ii. 82 See p. xlvi. He was married to Susanna Shakespeare, 5th June, 1607. ing cases of various patients; but it unfortunately affords no information on the interesting subject of Shakespeare's death, none of the memoranda being dated earlier than 1617. His body was interred on the 25th of April, on the north side of the chancel of the great church, at Stratford. On his grave-stone is this inscription: "Good Frend for Iesus SAKE forbeare To diGG T-E Dust EncloAsed HERE A monument was subsequently erected there to his memory, at what time is not known, but certainly before 1623, as it is mentioned in the verses by Leonard Digges, prefixed to the folio of Shakespeare's Dramatic Works published in that year. It represents him 83 seated under an arch, with a cushion spread before him, his right hand holding a pen, his left resting on a scroll of paper. Immediately below the cushion is the following distich: "Judicio Pylivm, genio 84 Socratem, arte Maronem, Terra tegit, popvlvs mæret, Olympvs habet." 88 The bust is as large as life, and was originally painted over in imitation of nature: the eyes were light hazel; the hair and beard auburn; the doublet, or coat, scarlet; the loose gown, or tabard, without sleeves, black; the upper part of the cushion green, the under half crimson; and the tassels gilt. Its colours were renewed in 1748; but Malone caused it to be covered over with one or more coats of white paint in 1793. 84 As the first syllable in "Socratem" is here made short, On a tablet underneath the cushion are these lines: "Stay, passenger, why goest thov so fast, Read, if thov canst, whom envious death hath plast Obiit Ano Doi 1616. Etatis 53. Die 23 Ap." The will of Shakespeare is given in an Appendix to this Memoir. His estate was valued by Gildon at £300 a year, which was equal to at least £1000 in the present time: but Malone doubts if all his property was worth more than £200 per annum, which yet was a considerable sum in those days. A legacy of his "second-best bed,85 with the furniture," expressed by an interlineation in his (doubtless from the writer's slight knowledge of quantity) Steevens would read "Sophoclem." reader the late Mr. Bos"The total omission of 85 I shall not withhold from the well's observations on this bequest. his wife's name by Shakespeare in the first draft of his will, and the very moderate legacy he afterwards inserted, has created a suspicion that his affections were estranged from her either through jealousy or some other cause. But if we may suppose that some provision had been made for her during his life time, the bequest of his second-best bed was probably considered in those days neither as uncommon nor reproachful. Sir Thomas Lucy, the younger, by his will in 1600, of which I find an account among Mr. Malone's Adversaria, leaves to his second son, Richard, his second-best horse, but no land, because his father-in-law had promised E will, was all that Shakespeare left to his wife!* Having survived her illustrious husband several years, she died on the 6th of August, 1623. The death of his only son Hamnet, (buried 11th of August, 1596,) has been before noticed. To his eldest daughter, Susanna, and her husband, Dr. Hall, the poet bequeathed the bulk of his property. Mrs. Hall expired on the 11th of July, 1649, distinguished for her mental endowments and Christian benevolence.86 She left only to provide for him. Shakespeare's not recollecting at first to mention her name at all, will be no great subject of surprise, when we recollect the remarkable instances of forgetful. ness which perpetually occur in documents of this nature. He had forgotten also at first, his fellows, Heminge, Burbage, and Condell, upon whom he certainly did not intend to fix a stigma. If he had taken offence at any part of his wife's conduct, I cannot believe that he would have taken this petty mode of expressing it." Shak. ii. 609. *[This gross mistake was first corrected by Mr. Knight. "Shakspere knew the law of England better than his legal commentators. His estates, with the exception of a copyhold tenement expressly mentioned in his will, were freehold. His wife was entitled to dower. She was provided for amply by the clear and undeniable operation of the English law. Postscript to Twelfth Night. Pictorial Shakspere. 86 The inscription on her tomb, preserved by Dugdale, was this: 66 Witty above her sexe, but that's not all, Something of Shakespeare was in that, but this Then, passenger, hast ne're a teare, To weep with her that wept with all: one child, Elizabeth, who married first, Thomas Nash, a country gentleman, and afterwards Sir John Barnard, knight, of Abington, near Northampton, and deceased without offspring. Judith, his youngest daughter, bore three sons to her husband Thomas Quyney, namely, Shakespeare, who was cut off in infancy, and Richard and Thomas, who died, the former, in his 21st, the latter in his 19th year, both unmarried; their mother was buried on the 9th of February, 1662. Charles Hart, who at an early age fought in the battle of Edge-Hill, as lieutenant, in Prince Rupert's regiment, and afterwards became a very celebrated tragic actor, is believed to have been the grandson of Shakespeare's sister Joan, the wife of William Hart, a hatter in Stratford. An old woman, who within the last few years obtained a subsistence by showing to strangers the house in which Shakespeare is said to have been born, 87 That wept, yet set her selfe to chere 87 Mary Hornby, whose maiden name was Hart. In 1820, after favouring me with some remarks on Shakespeare's dramas, she said, "I writes plays, sir:" she then told me, that she had published by subscription, a tragedy called The Battle of Waterloo, and showed me the MS. of another which she had composed, The Broken Vow, founded on a circumstance that happened to one of her relations. |