circumstances that wear the least appearance of novelty or information; the song in p. 62 excepted. 6 "If tradition may be trusted, Shakspeare often baited at the Crown Inn or Tavern in Oxford, in his journey to and from London. The landlady was a woman of great beauty and sprightly wit, and her husband, Mr. John Davenant, (afterwards mayor of that city,) a grave melancholy man; who, as well as his wife, used much to delight in Shakspeare's pleasant company. Their son young Will. Davenant (afterwards Sir William) was then a little school-boy in the town, of about seven or eight. years old, and so fond also of Shakspeare, that whenever he heard of his arrival, he would fly from school to see him. One day an old townsman observing the boy running homeward almost out of breath, asked him whither he was posting in that heat and hurry. He answered, to see his god-father Shakspeare. There's a good boy, said the other, but have a care that you don't take God's name in vain. This story Mr. Pope told me at the Earl of Oxford's table, upon occasion of some discourse which arose about Shakspeare's monument then newly erected in Westminster Abbey;" 6 of about seven or eight years old,] He was born at Oxford in February 1605-6. MALONE. 7 Shakspeare's monument then newly erected in Westminster Abbey ;]"This monument," says Mr. Granger, was erected in 1741, by the direction of the Earl of Burlington, Dr. Mead, Mr. Pope, and Mr. Martyn. Mr. Fleetwood and Mr. Rich gave each of them a benefit towards it, from one of Shakspeare's own plays. It was executed by H. Scheemaker, after a design of Kent. "On the monument is inscribed-amor publicus posuit. Dr. Mead objected to amor publicus, as not occurring in old classical and he quoted Mr. Betterton the player for his authority. I answered, that I thought such a story might have enriched the variety of those choice inscriptions; but Mr. Pope and the other gentlemen concerned insisting that it should stand, Dr. Mead yielded the point, saying, "Omnia vincit amor, nos et cedamus amori.' "This anecdote was communicated by Dr. Lort, late Greek Professor of Cambridge, who had it from Dr. Mead himself.” It was recorded at the time in The Gentleman's Magazine for Feb. 1741, by a writer who objects to every part of the inscription, and says it ought to have been, "G. S. centum viginti et quatuor post obitum annis populus plaudens [aut favens] posuit." The monument was opened Jan. 29, 1741. Scheemaker is said to have got 3001. for his work. The performers at each house, much to their honour, performed gratis; and the Dean and Chapter of Westminster took nothing for the ground. The money received by the performance at Drury Lane, amounted to above 2001. the receipts at Covent Garden to about 1001. These particulars I learn from Oldys's MS. notes on Langbaine. The scroll on the monument, as I learn from a letter to my father, dated June 27, 1741, remained for some time after the monument was set up, without any inscription on it. This was a challenge to the wits of the time; which one of them accepted by writing a copy of verses, the subject of which was a conversation supposed to pass between Dr. Mead and Sir Thomas Hanmer, relative to the filling up of the scroll. I know not whether they are in print, and I do not choose to quote them all. The introductory lines, however, run thus: "To learned Mead thus Hanmer spoke, "Doctor, this empty scroll's a joke. Something it doubtless should contain, "Extremely short, extremely plain; "But wondrous deep, and wondrous pat, "And fit for Shakspeare to point at;" &c. Malone. At Drury Lane was acted Julius Cæsar, 28 April, 1738, when a prologue written by Benjamin Martyn, Esq. was spoken by Mr. Quin, and an epilogue by James Noel, Esq. spoken by Mrs. Porter. Both these are printed in The General Dictionary. At Covent Garden was acted Hamlet, 10th April, 1739, when a prologue written by Mr. Theobald, and printed in The London Magazine of that year, was spoken by Mr. Ryan. In the newspaper of the day it was observed that this last representation was far from being numerously attended. REED. fruits of observation he has presented us in his preface to the edition he had published of our poet's works. He replied-" There might be in the garden of mankind such plants as would seem to pride themselves more in a regular production of their own native fruits, than in having the repute of bearing a richer kind by grafting; and this was the reason he omitted it.”š The same story, without the names of the persons, is printed among the jests of John Taylor the Water-poet, in his works, folio, 1630, p. 184, N° 39: and, with some variations, may be found in one of Hearne's pocket books.9 9 and this was the reason he omitted it.] Mr. Oldys might have added, that he was the person who suggested to Mr. Pope the singular course which he pursued in his edition of Shakspeare." Remember," says Oldys in a MS. note to his copy of Langbaine, Article, Shakspeare, "what I observed to my Lord Oxford for Mr. Pope's use, out of Cowley's preface." The observation here alluded to, I believe, is one made by Cowley in his preface, p. 53, edit. 1710, 8vo: "This has been the case with Shakspeare, Fletcher, Jonson, and many others, part of whose poems I should presume to take the boldness to prune and lop away, if the care of replanting them in print did belong to me; neither would I make any scruple to cut off from some the unnecessary young suckers, and from others the old withered branches; for a great wit is no more tied to live in a vast volume, than in a gigantick body; on the contrary it is commonly more vigorous the less space it animates, and as Statius says of little Tydeus, totos infusa per artus, Major in exiguo regnabat corpore virtus." Pope adopted this very unwarrantable idea; striking out from the text of his author whatever he did not like: and Cowley himself has suffered a sort of poetical punishment for having suggested it, the learned Bishop of Worcester [Dr. Hurd] having pruned and lopped away his beautiful luxuriances, as Pope, on Cowley's suggestion, did those of Shakspeare. MALOne. The same story-may be found in one of Hearne's pocket books.] Antony Wood is the first and original author of the anec "One of Shakspeare's younger brothers,' who dote that Shakspeare, in his journies from Warwickshire to London, used to bait at the Crown-Inn on the west side of the corn market in Oxford. He says, that D'Avenant the poet was born in that house in 1606. "His father (he adds) John Davenant, was a sufficient vintner, kept the tavern now known by the sign of the Crown, and was mayor of the said city in 1621. His mother was a very beautiful woman, of a good wit and conversation, in which she was imitated by none of her children but by this William [the poet]. The father, who was a very grave and discreet citizen, (yet an admirer and lover of plays and play-makers, especially Shakspeare, who frequented his house in his journies between Warwickshire and London,) was of a melancholick disposition, and was seldom or never seen to laugh, in which he was imitated by none of his children but by Robert his eldest son, afterwards fellow of St. John's College, and a venerable Doctor of Divinity." Wood's Ath. Oxon. Vol. II. p. 292, edit. 1692. I will not suppose that Shakspeare could have been the father of a Doctor of Divinity who never laughed; but it was always a constant tradition in Oxford that Shakspeare was the father of Davenant the poet. And I have seen this circumstance expressly mentioned in some of Wood's papers. Wood was well qualified to know these particulars; for he was a townsman of Oxford, where he was born in 1632. Wood says, that Davenant went to school in Oxford. Ubi supr. As to the Crown Inn, it still remains as an inn, and is an old decayed house, but probably was once a principal inn in Oxford. It is directly in the road from Stratford to London. In a large upper room, which seems to have been a sort of Hall for entertaining a large company, or for accommodating (as was the custom) different parties at once, there was a bow-window, with three pieces of excellent painted glass. About eight years ago, I remember visiting this room, and proposing to purchase of the landlord the painted glass, which would have been a curiosity as coming from Shakspeare's inn. But going thither soon after, I found it was removed; the inn-keeper having communicated my intended bargain to the owner of the house, who began to suspect that he was possessed of a curiosity too valuable to be parted with, or to remain in such a place: and I never could hear of it afterwards. If I remember right, the painted glass consisted of three armorial shields beautifully stained. I have said so much on this subject, because I think that Shakspeare's old hostelry at Oxford deserves no less respect than Chaucer's Tabarde in Southwark. T. WARTON. lived to a good old age, even some years as I compute, after the restoration of King Charles II. would in his younger days come to London to visit his brother Will, as he called him, and be a spectator of him as an actor in some of his own plays. This custom, as his brother's fame enlarged, and 1 One of Shakspeare's younger brothers, &c.] Mr. Oldy's seems to have studied the art of "marring a plain tale in the telling of it;" for he has in this story introduced circumstances which tend to diminish, instead of adding to, its credibility. Male dum recitas, incipit esse tuus. From Shakspeare's not taking notice of any of his brothers or sisters in his will, except Joan Hart, I think it highly probable that they were all dead in 1616, except her, at least all those of the whole blood; though in the Register there is no entry of the burial of either his brother Gilbert, or Edmund, antecedent to the death of Shakspeare, or at any subsequent period. The truth is, that this account of our poet's having performed the part of an old man in one of his own comedies, came originally from Mr. Thomas Jones, of Tarbick, in Worcestershire, who has been already mentioned, (see p. 62, n. 1,) and who related it from the information, not of one of Shakspeare's brothers, but of a relation of our poet, who lived to a good old age, and who had seen him act in his youth. Mr. Jones's informer might have been Mr. Richard Quiney, who lived in London, and died at Stratford in 1656, at the age of 69; or Mr. Thomas Quiney, our poet's son-in-law, who lived, I believe, till 1663, and was twenty-seven years old when his father-in-law died; or some one of the family of Hathaway. Mr. Thomas Hathaway, I believe Shakspeare's brother-in-law, died at Stratford in 1654-5, at the age of 85. There was a Thomas Jones, an inhabitant of Stratford, who between the years 1581 and 1590 had four sons, Henry, James, Edmund, and Isaac: some one of these, it is probable, settled at Tarbick, and was the father of Thomas Jones, the relater of this anecdote, who was born about the year 1613. If any of Shakspeare's brothers lived till after the Restoration, and visited the players, why were we not informed to what player he related it, and from what player Mr. Oldys had his account? The fact, I believe, is, he had it not from a player, but from the above-mentioned Mr. Jones, who likewise communicated the stanza of the ballad on Sir Thomas Lucy, which has been printed in a former page. MALONE. |