to have spent fome years before his death at his !native Stratford. His pleasurable wit and goodnature engaged him in the acquaintance, and entitled him to the friendship, of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood. Amongst them, it is a story almost still remembered in that country, that he had a particular intimacy with Mr Combe, an old gentleman noted thereabouts for his wealth and ufury: it happened, that in a pleasant conversation amongst their common friends, Mr Combe told Shakespeare, in a laughing manner, that he fancied he intended to write his epitaph, if he happened to out-live him; and fince he could not know what might be faid of him when he was dead, he defired it might be done immediately: upon which Shakefpeare gave him these four verses:

Ten in the hundred lies here engrand,
'Tis a hundred to ten his foul is not fav'd:
If any man afk, Who lies in this tomb?
Oh! oh! quoth the devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe.*

But

*The Rev. Francis Peck, in his Memoirs of the Life and Poetical Works of Mr John Milton, 4to. 1740, P. 223. has introduced another epitaph imputed (on what authority is unknown) to Shakespeare. It is on Toma-Combe, alias Thin beard, brother to this John, who is mentioned by Mr Rowe :

"Thin in beard, and thick in purse;
"Never man beloved worfe;

"He went to the grave with many a curfe;
"The devil and he had both one nurfe."
STEEVENS.

Ten in the hundred lies bere engrav'd

But the fharpness of the fatire is faid to have ftung the man fo feverely, that he never forgave it.

He

In The more the Merrier, containing Threefcore and odde headleffe Epigrams, shot (like the Fooles bolts) among ft you, light where they will. By H. P. Gent. &c. 1608. I find likewife the following couplet, which is almoft the fame as the two beginning lines of Shakespeare's Epitaph on John a Combe.

Feneratoris Epitaphium.

EPIGRAM 24.

"Ten hundred lies under this stone,

"And a hundred to ten to the Devil he's gone.'

I take the fame opportunity to avow my disbelief that Shakespeare was the author of Mr Combe's Epitaph, or that it was written by any other person at the requeft of that gentleman. If Betterton the player did really visit Warwickshire for the fake of collecting anecdotes relative to our author, perhaps he was too easily fatisfied with fuch as fell in his way, without making any rigid fearch into their authenticity. It appears alfo from a following copy of this infcription, that it was not afcribed to Shakespeare fo early as two years after his death. Mr Reed of Staple-Inn obligingly pointed it out to me in the Remains, &c. of Richard Braithwaite, 1618; and, as his edition of our epitaph varies in fome measure from the later one published by Mr Rowe, I fhall not hesitate to tranfcribe it!

Upon one John Combe of Stratford upon Avon, a notable Ufurer, faftened upon a Tombe that he had caused to be built in his Life Time.

"Ten in the hundred muft lie in his grave,

But a hundred to ten whether God will him have:

"Who

He died in the 53d year of his

age,

and was bu

ried

"Who then must be interr'd in this tombe?
"Oh (quoth the divell) my John a Combe."

Here it may be observed that, strictly speaking, this is no jocular epitaph, but a malevolent prediction; and Braithwaite's copy is furely more to be depended on (being procured in or before the year 1618) than that delivered to Betterton or Rowe, almost a century afterwards. It has been already remarked, that two of the lines, faid to have been produced on this occafion, were printed as an epigram in 1608, by H. P. Gent. and are likewife found in Camben's Remains, 1614. I may add, that a ufurer's folicitude to know what would be reported of him, when he was dead, is not a very probable circumftance; neither was Shakespeare of a dif pofition to compose an invective, at once fo bitter and uncharitable, during a pleasant converfation among the friends of himself and a gentleman with whofe family he lived in fuch friendship, that at his death he beI queathed his fword to Mr Thomas Combe as a legacy. A mifer's monument indeed, conftructed during his lifetime, might be regarded as a challenge to fatire; and we cannot wonder that anonymous lampoons fhould have been affixed to the marble defigned to convey the character of fuch a being to pofterity.-I hope I may be excufed for this attempt to vindicate Shakespeare from the imputation of having poifoned the hour of confidence and festivity by producing the severest of all cenfures on one of his company. I am unwilling, in fhort, to think he could fo wantonly and fo publickly have expreffed his doubts concerning the falvation of one of his fellow-creatures. STEEVENS.

So in Camden's Remains, 1614.

"Here lies ten in the hundred
"In the ground fast ramm'd,

ried on the north-fide of the chancel, in the grea church at Stratford, where a monument, as er

""Tis a hundred to ten

grave

"But his foul is damn'd." MALONE.

Whether the epitaph on Combe was Shakespeare' or not, it is not at prefent poffible to determine; thi however, which follows, is inferted, both because i hath been attributed to him and also because Milton ap pears, from his epitaph on Shakespeare, to have bee no ftranger to it.

Epitaph on the tomb of Sir Thomas Stanley, knt. fe cond fon of Edward Earl of Derby; which was Te maining on the north-fide of the chancel of the church of Tong, in the county of Salop, in 1663, when Si William Dugdale made the last visitation of tha county; and which Sir William, in a marginal not fays, was written by William Shakespeare the lat famous tragedian :

"Afke who lies here, but do not weepe;
"He is not dead, he doth but sleepe:
"This ftony Register is for his Bones,

"His Fame is more perpetuall than thefe Stones;
"And his own goodneffe, with himself being gone,
"Shall live when earthly monument is none.
"Not monumentall ftone preferves our fame,
"Nor fkye afpiring Piramids our name;
"The memory of him for whom this ftands,
"Shall out-live marble and defacers' hands:
"When all to time's confumption fhall be given,
"Stanley, for whom this ftands, fhall stand in Heaven."

From C. 35. fol. zo. in the College of Arms.

F. TOWNSEND

graved in the plate, is placed in the wall *. On his grave-ftone underneath is,

Good friend; for Jesus' fake forbear
To dig the duft inclofed here.

Bleft be the man that spares thefe ftones,
And curft be he that moves my bones †•

He had three daughters, of which two lived to be married; Judith, the elder, to one Mr Thomas Quiney, by whom she had three fons, who all died without children; and Sufanna, who was his favourite, to Dr John Hall, a phyfician of good reputation in that country. She left one child only, a daughter, who was married, first, to Thomas Nath, Efq. and afterwards to Sir John Bernard of Abbington, but died likewife without iffue ‡.

This is what I could learn of any note, either relating to himself or family: the character of the man is best seen in his writings. But fince Ben Jonfon

b

*He died on his birth-day, April 23, 1616, and had exactly completed his fifty-fecond year. MALONE.

"And curft be he that moves my bones."

It is uncertain whether this epitaph was written by Shakespeare himself, or by one of his friends after his death. The imprecation contained in this laft line might have been fuggefted by an apprehenfion that our author's remains might share the fame fate with those of the reft of his countrymen, and be added to the immenfe pile of human bones depofited in the charnelhoufe at Stratford. This, however, is mere conjecture; for fimilar execrations are found in many ancient Latin epitaphs. MALONE.

This, however, is a mistake, as will appear by the pedigree annexed to the lift of baptifms, &c. REED.