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all, since the internal evidence fully bears out the tradition, we think the genuineness of it can scarcely be questioned. If Shakspeare did not assist Fletcher, who then did? None of the plays which Fletcher alone wrote are composed in the same style, or exhibit the same lofty imagination, and if there were any other dramatist save Shakspeare, who could attain to such a height of excellence, he has certainly handed down none of his compositions to posterity. If Shakspeare did not write part of it, all we can say is, that his imitators went very near to rival himself. Our readers will excuse us for extracting the following simile:

Emilia.

Methinks a rose is best.

Servant.

Emilia.

Of all flowers

Why, gentle madam?

It is the very emblem of a maid:

For when the west wind courts her gently,

How modestly she blows, and paints the sun

With her chaste blushes! when the north comes near her,
Rude and impatient, then, like chastity,

She locks her beauties in her bud again,

And leaves him to base briars.

In conclusion, we can only say, that he who has not perused Beaumont and Fletcher, can have no complete idea of the riches of English poetry; and that they are the only English dramatists whose distance from Shakspeare, in his more peculiar excellencies, is not so immense as to make the descent painful.

Their works were printed in 10 vols. 8vo. in 1751, with the notes of Seward and others; in 10 vols. 8vo. 1778, edited by Colman; in 10 vols. 8vo. London, 1780, edited by Theobald; and at Edinburgh, in 12 vols. 8vo. in 1812, edited by Weber.

The following plays were undoubtedly the joint composition of Beaumont and Fletcher. Philaster, The Maid's Tragedy, The King and No King, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, Cupid's Revenge, The Coxcomb, The Captain, The Honest Man's Fortune, and The Scornful Lady.

Shakspeare.

BORN A. D. 1564.—died A. D. 1616.

WE are informed by the most recent biographer of our mighty dramatist, that a family variously named Shaxper, Shakespeare, Shakspere, and Shakspeare, was spread over the woodland part of Warwickshire in the 16th century. They were chiefly devoted to trade and agriculture, and had little or no connexion with the upper ranks of society. The immediate ancestor of him whose name has filled the earth far beyond that of any titled or untitled contemporary, was John Shakspeare, originally a glover, subsequently a butcher, and finally a

It is worthy of notice, that Langbaine says decidedly that Shakspeare was one of the authors. The inquiry is a very interesting one, but our limits prevent us from pursuing it at length.

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all, since the internal evidence fully bears out the tradition, we think the genuineness of it can scarcely be questioned.' If Shakspeare did not assist Fletcher, who then did? None of the plays which Fletcher alone wrote are composed in the same style, or exhibit the same lofty imagination, and if there were any other dramatist save Shakspeare, who could attain to such a height of excellence, he has certainly handed down none of his compositions to posterity. If Shakspeare did not write part of it, all we can say is, that his imitators went very near to rival himself. Our readers will excuse us for extracting the following simile :

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Emilia. It is the very emblem of a maid :

For when the west wind courts her gently,

How modestly she blows, and paints the sun

With her chaste blushes! when the north comes near her,

Rude and impatient, then, like chastity,

She locks her beauties in her bud again,

And leaves him to base briars.

In conclusion, we can only say, that he who has not perused Beaumont and Fletcher, can have no complete idea of the riches of English poetry; and that they are the only English dramatists whose distance from Shakspeare, in his more peculiar excellencies, is not so immense as to make the descent painful.

Their works were printed in 10 vols. 8vo. in 1751, with the notes of Seward and others; in 10 vols. 8vo. 1778, edited by Colman; in 10 vols. 8vo. London, 1780, edited by Theobald; and at Edinburgh, in 12 vols. 8vo. in 1812, edited by Weber.

The following plays were undoubtedly the joint composition of Beaumont and Fletcher. Philaster, The Maid's Tragedy, The King and No King, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, Cupid's Revenge, The Coxcomb, The Captain, The Honest Man's Fortune, and The Scornful Lady.

Shakspeare.

BORN A. D. 1564.-DIED A. D. 1616.

WE are informed by the most recent biographer of our mighty dramatist, that a family variously named Shaxper, Shakespeare, Shakspere, and Shakspeare, was spread over the woodland part of Warwickshire in the 16th century. They were chiefly devoted to trade and agriculture, and had little or no connexion with the upper ranks of society. The immediate ancestor of him whose name has filled the earth far beyond that of any titled or untitled contemporary, was John Shakspeare, originally a glover, subsequently a butcher, and finally a

It is worthy of notice, that Langbaine says decidedly that Shakspeare was one of the authors. The inquiry is a very interesting one, but our limits prevent us from pursuing it at length.

dealer in wool in the town of Stratford,' where he attained the supreme honours of the borough by being elected to the office of high-bailiff in 1568. It would appear, however, that whatever respectability the corporation of Stratford possessed in their own eyes and that of their fellow-burgesses, their claims to erudition were very humble: for out of nineteen members of that body whose signatures are attached to a document bearing date 1564, only seven could write their names, and among the twelve who affixed their mark only, was John Shakspeare.? The original position of the bard of Avon was little favourable certainly to the developement of mental powers. In 1574 his father's affairs began to fall into decay, and in 1585-6 a distress having been issued against his goods, it was returned unexecuted with this notification, "Joh'es Shackspere nihil habet unde distr. potest levari." The ex-bailiff of Stratford died in 1601. He had married Mary, the youngest daughter of Robert Arden of Wilmecote in Warwickshire, by whom he had eight children: Jone, Margaret, William, Gilbert, Jone, Ann, Richard, and Edmund. Of this family some died in infancy; Edmund embraced the calling of an actor, and died in 1607; Jone, the second daughter of that name, married William Hart, a hatter in Stratford, whose descendants still exist in that town.

William Shakspeare was born at Stratford-upon-Avon, on the 23d of April, 1564," a fact," says Skottowe, "which comprises the whole of the poet's history till he is found, for some time,' at the free grammar-school of his native town, where he doubtless acquired the Latin, 'the small Latin,' that his friend Ben Jonson assures us he was master of." Gildon, Sewell, Upton, and others, have strenuously contended for young Shakspeare's scholarship and erudition; there is little evidence, however, that he ever enjoyed much of school-discipline; what learning he possessed was won for himself by his own strong and active understanding. The narrowness of his father's circumstances sufficiently account for his neglected education; but, after all, what occasion is there afforded us, while perusing his immortal pages, to regret his scantiness of school-learning? At the youthful age of eighteen, our poet entered into the connubial state. The wife he selected for himself was some eight years older than her husband; and the attachment -if any such ever existed-appears to have had little influence either on his mind or his fortunes. Shortly after the birth of his youngest child, Shakspeare quitted Stratford, and came up to the metropolis: his motive for taking this step is involved in obscurity. Rowe says that it was in consequence of his having got into a poaching scrape, and incurred the bitter resentment of Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, by his ungracious behaviour during the legal proceedings which were instituted against him; but Malone throws discredit on the whole story, and contends that Shakspeare was induced to visit London by some actors who persuaded him to engage in the profession of a player. He was at this time about twenty-two years of age, and the first office which he filled on the stage was one of the lowest class. He soon rose, however, to a more elevated station among his Thespian brethren, although he does not appear ever to have sustained a leading part on the stage. The ghost in his own Hamlet was one of his best efforts; and

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