slightest idea of the man.

The bust, however, was

sculptured by Gerard Johnson, one of the best artists of his day, and erected only seven years after Shakspere's death, when his features would still be well remembered; and we must therefore regard it as the only authentic likeness of him we possess. Originally it was coloured, the eyes being a light hazel, and the hair and beard auburn. In 1743 it was repainted, and the old colours were faithfully preserved; but in 1793 Malone caused the whole bust to be whitewashed by some common house-painter, for which he righteously suffered the penalty of the well-known epigram.

*

The old parish register is full of entries of baptisms and deaths in the Shakspere family, the most important, of course, being-"Baptisms, 1564, April 26. Gulielmus filius Johannis Shakspere;" and yet if you ask where is the font where the three-day-born baby was baptized, it cannot be shown. When I lived near Stratford, the old font was in the possession of a private individual. I trust it may be restored to its proper place. For if there is any one of whom Protestantism may be proud,

* Stranger, to whom this monument is shown,
Invoke the poet's curses on Malone:

Whose meddling zeal his barbarous taste displays,
And daubs his tombstone as he marred his plays.

it is Shakspere; and surely the font where he was sealed a member of the Church, and for which, too, in after life he proved himself a faithful soldier, should not be allowed to rot to pieces. Milton has in these days been discovered to be a. Unitarian. But against Shakspere the strictest orthodoxy has never brought a single charge. Yet if ever there was a man who questioned fate, who fought "the cruel battle within," and yet remained faithful, it was Shakspere. Never in any of his plays is there the slightest symptom of that disbelief which ends in despair and mockery. Too large-minded for any one particular creed or system, he ever treats not only religion, but all things, with the purest spirit of reverence; and I do say that he deserves better of his Church than that the font at which he was baptized should be cast aside and forgotten.

There is a monument on the north side of the great east window worth looking at, on account of its connection with Shakspere, and executed by the same sculptor as his own, to the memory of John Combe. He was, as is well known, a money-lender, and the story runs that he asked Shakspere to write his epitaph, the severity of which the miser is said never to have forgiven. But the same thought may be found in different shapes in literature long before Shakspere's time, and there is pro

bably but little truth in the tradition, as we find John Combe leaving by his will five pounds to Shakspere.*

The church itself is very beautiful, especially when seen as I have often seen it by night, the moon lighting up the yellow-gray tower, etching its great black shadow on the churchyard, and breaking in soft silver lights upon the clerestory windows. Very beautiful, too, must that chancel have been where Shakspere lies, when the windows were glazed with the forms of saints and angels, and the old oak roof hung down with its pendant figures and carved statues. But all this sinks into utter insignificance when compared with the one fact that this is the church where Shakspere knelt and prayed, and where he confessed the heavy burden and the mystery of the world. I scarcely ever like to put much faith in tradition, but I think we may trust the tradition of Shakspere's deeply religious cast of thought towards the end of his life. I see no reason for disbelieving it. We may surely better accept this than the other vile stories we unhesitatingly swallow. This much I know, gathered from some little experience, that generally speaking, all bad traditions are false, but

*The common version is that given by Aubrey:Ten in the hundred lies here ingraved:

'Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not saved:

If any man ask who lies in this tomb?

Oh! oh! quoth the Devil, 'tis my John a Combe.

that good traditions ever contain some germ of truth; the reason being that human nature is too prone to invent not good, but evil report. And through all Shakspere's plays, as I before said, there ever shines forth a reverence not only for religion, but for the mysteries of life and the world. We do ourselves no good by disbelieving this account, testified, as I surely think it is, by the evidence of the sonnets. And in conclusion I would intreat the reader to ponder over this, one of the most beautiful of Shakspere's autobiographical poems:

Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth,

Fooled by those rebel powers that thee array,
Why dost thou pine within, and suffer dearth,
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?
Why so large cost, having so short a lease,

Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess,

Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end?
Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss,

And let that pine to aggravate thy store:
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross :

Within be fed, without be rich no more:

So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men,
And death once dead, there's no more dying then.

Sonnet 146.

Nor far from the church stood the College of Stratford, whose tithes Shakspere rented, and where John Combe lived, but which has long since been pulled down. The Grammar School, however, where competent authorities say Shakspere must have been educated, still remains.