While Shakespeare was thus living in London, charming the public, enraging his rivals, and astonishing all, his family remained quietly at Stratford, in the old home with his parents.

His marriage does not seem to have been a happy one. Mistress Anne probably had-a-way that was neither soothing nor agreeable to the poet, who used to run away from his gay and busy life for a few days each summer to pet his favorite child Susanna, and have a romp with the twins, Hamnet and Judith. His son died at the age of twelve, and in the next year, 1597, he purchased the finest house and grounds in the town, called New Place, and fitted them up handsomely, that he might have a comfortable home to which he could retire when weary of the excitements of a city. It was in this garden he planted the mulberry-tree of which Garrick has sung so enthusiastically:

"Behold this fair goblet! 'Twas carved from the tree,

Which, O my sweet Shakespeare, was planted by thee!
As a relic I kiss it, and bow at thy shrine,

What comes from thy hand must be ever divine.

All shall yield to the mulberry-tree;

Bend to thee

Blest mulberry!
Matchless was he

Who planted thee,

And thou like him, immortal shalt be.

"The oak is held royal, is Britain's great boast,

Preserved once our king, and will always our coast;
But of fir we make ships, we have thousands that fi ht,
While one, only one, like our Shakespeare can write.

"Then each take a relic of this hallowed tree;

From folly and fashion a charm let it be;
Fill, fill to the planter the cup to the brim-
To honor the country, do honor to him."

Irving tells us, in his own delightful style, of the

various relics he found at the birthplace of Shakespeare; "There was the shattered stock of the very matchlock with which Shakespeare shot the deer, on his poaching exploits. There, too, was his tobacco-box; which proves that he was a rival smoker of Sir Walter Raleigh; the sword also with which he played Hamlet; and the identical lantern with which Friar Lawrence discovered Romeo and Juliet at the tomb! There was an ample supply also of Shakespeare's mulberry-tree, which seems to have as extraordinary powers of self-multiplication as the wood of the true cross; of which there is enough extant to build a ship-of-the-line.

"The most favorite object of curiosity, however, is Shakespeare's chair. It stands in the chimney-nook of a small gloomy chamber, just behind what was his father's shop. Here he may many a time have sat when a boy, watching the slowly-revolving spit with all the longing of an urchin; or of an evening, listening to the cronies and gossips of Stratford, dealing forth churchyard tales and legendary anecdotes of the troublesome times of England. In this chair it is the custom of every one that visits the house to sit; whether this be done with the hope of imbibing any of the inspirations of the bard, I am at a loss to say, I merely mention the fact; and mine hostess privately assured me, that though built of solid oak, such was the fervent zeal of devotees, that the chair had to be new-bottomed at least once in three years. It is worthy of notice also, in the history of this extraordinary chair, that it partakes something of the volatile nature of the Santa Casa of Loretto, or the flying chair of the Arabian enchanter; for, although sold some few years since to a northern princess, yet, strange to tell, it has found its way back again to the old chimney corner."

An old minister, who afterward lived at "New Place," actually cut down that "blest mulberry!" be

cause it attracted so many visitors. I wonder if Garrick's ghost did not haunt him after that act of vandalism!

The year 1612 is given as the date of Shakespeare's return to his Stratford home. Perhaps failing health led him to seek repose, for he lived only a few years after the change, having died on the 23d of April, 1616, his fiftysecond birthday. He was buried in Stratford church, and his grave was at first marked by a plain stone, with an inscription, said to be written by himself. Here is a facsimile of the inscription:

"GOOD FREND FOR IESVS SAKE FORBEARE,

TO DIGG THE DVST ENCLOASED HARE:

BLESE BE MANY SPARES THES STONES,

AND CVRST BE HE MOVES MY BONES."

This singular epitaph has prevented his remains from being placed in Westminster Abbey, and reveals, it is thought, his belief in the resurrection of the body.

Some unknown artist executed a statue of the poet, sitting beneath an arch, with a desk before him, and a pen in his hand. This was colored to the life, eyes light hazel, hair and beard of an auburn tinge, with a scarlet doublet and black gown. All the busts of Shakespeare are said to be taken from this.

In his will, written a short time before his death, we find a careful, loving remembrance of many of his old comrades, to each of whom he gave some token of his regard, generally a ring. But to his wife there was nothing left but the "second best bed, with the hangings"! Poor Anne! termagant and virago though she may have been, one cannot help pitying a woman handed down to immortality in that fashion. She would certainly have been "more honored in the breach than the observance."

You notice that one of the pictures illustrating this sketch represents the great dramatist reading one of his

plays to Elizabeth. This is not an historic fact, but one of those traditions that have been created by later writers to embellish his life. Yet he was undoubtedly popular with Elizabeth and James, who attended the theatre where his plays were acted. Some writer says, that Queen Elizabeth was so well pleased with the admirable character of Falstaff in the two parts of "Henry IV." that she commanded him to continue it for one play more, and to show him in love. This is said to be the occasion of his writing the "Merry Wives of Windsor," but there is no proof of this.

We are certain, however, that Queen Bess, true to her sex, was not averse to receiving a graceful compliment, and, among her wily, flatterering train of courtiers, there was not one who could compete successfully in this respect with the once obscure playwright, who, by the might of his unaided genius, eclipsed them all. As a proof of this, read Cranmer's prophecy at the christening of the infant Elizabeth, in "King Henry VIII.:"

"Let me speak, sir,

For Heaven now bids me; and the words I utter
Let none think flattery, for they'll find them truth.
This royal infant (Heaven still move about her!)
Though in her cradle, yet now promises
Upon this land a thousand thousand blessings,
Which time shall bring to ripeness. She shall be
(But few now living can behold that goodness)
A pattern to all princes living with her,
And all that shall succeed: Sheba was never
More covetous of wisdom, and fair virtue,
Than this pure soul shall be; all princely graces
That mould up such a mighty piece as this is,

With all the virtues that attend the good,

Shall still be doubled on her; truth shall nurse her;

Holy and heavenly thoughts still counsel her:

She shall be loved and feared; Her own shall bless her;
Her foes shake like a field of beaten corn,

And hang their heads with sorrow; good grows with her;
In her days, every man shall eat in safety
Under his own vine, what he plants; and sing
The merry songs of peace to all his neighbors;
God shall be truly known; and those about her
From her shall read the perfect ways of honor,
And by those claim their greatness, not by blood.

She shall be, to the happiness of England,
An aged princess; many days shall see her,
And yet no day without a deed to crown it.
Would I had known no more! but she must die;
She must; the saints must have her-yet a virgin;
A most unspotted lily shall she pass

To the ground, and all the world shall mourn her."

Richard Grant White, the most thorough Shakesperian scholar and critic in this country, tells us that he has found but ONE passage in praise of woman, in the whole of Shakespeare's writings, and this he calls "cold and conceitish." You will find the passage in "Love's Labor's Lost:

"From women's eyes this doctrine I derive,

They sparkle still, the right Promethean fire;
They are the books, the arts, the academies
That show, contain, and nourish all the world."

Praises of particular women are numerous, but not of the sex; and, on the other hand, there is no lack of sharp censure. Yet Shakespeare's women are at once the noblest, loveliest, and truest to nature, that have ever been described. This incongruity is owing partly to the influence which his unhappy marriage had upon his mind, and partly to the state of society at the time. He never indulged in the impossible, and judged of women as they were judged by the world in his day.

Henry Giles says: "Shakespeare's women are no fictions, no coinage of a heated brain, drunk with the fumes of reverie, when the. realities of society are lost in the