sat still for some time, told him that if Mr. Shakspeare had not read the ancients, he likewise had not stolen any thing from them; and that if he would produce any one topick finely treated by any one of them, he would undertake to shew something upon the same subject, at least, as well written by Shakspeare."

It is beautifully observed of Shakspeare, by Dr. Young, in his Conjectures on Original Composition, that, " perhaps he was as learned as his dramatick province required; for whatever other learning he wanted, he was master of two books unknown to many of the profoundly read, though books which the last conflagration alone can destroy, the book of nature, and the book of man."

The close of Shakspeare's life was such as it were to be wished, every man of genius's should be, in ease, retirement, and in the circle of his friends and domestic relations. He resided at his native town of Stratford, where his wit and good nature, says Rowe, procured him the friendship of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood. Immediately after this, the same writer relates a tale which, if true, would be no proof either of the wit or good-nature of Shakspeare.

"It is a story almost still remembered in that county, (says he) that he had a particular intimacy with Mr. Combe, an old gentleman noted thereabouts for his wealth and usury. It happen

ed, that in a pleasant conversation amongst their common friends, Mr. Combe told Shakspeare in a laughing manner, that he fancied he intended to write his epitaph, if he happened to outlive him; and since he could not know what might be said of him when he was dead, he desired it might be done immediately, upon which Shakspeare gave him these four verses:

"Ten in the hundred lies here ingrav'd,
"Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not sav'd;

If any man ask, who lies in this tomb ?

Oh! ho! quoth the devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe,"

But the sharpness of the satire is said to have stung the man so severely, that he never forgave it. The commentators have taken laudable pains to disprove this miserable story, and to clear Shakpeare's reputation from the charge of malignant wit. They have accordingly found a similar inscription, in a piece entituled, "The More the Merrier, by H. P. &c. 1608."

"FENERATORIS EPITAPHIUM.

Ten in the hundred lies under this stone,
And a hundred to ten to the devil he's gone,"

And in the Remains, &c. of Richard Brath; waite, printed in 1618, is the following:

"Upon one John Combe of Stratford-uponAvon a notable usurer, fastened upon a tomb

that

that he had caused to be built in his life

time:

"Ten in the hundred lies in this grave,

But a hundred to ten whether God will him have,
Who then must be interred in this tombe,

Oh! (quoth the devill), my John-a-Combe."

Mr. Steevens took the trouble to examine Combe's will, by which it appears that so far from erecting a tomb in his life time, he directed that one should be raised within one year after his decease, which happened in 1614, two years before the death of Shakspeare. And instead of any thing like animosity between him and Shakspeare, Mr. Combe bequeathed to him five pounds; and Shakspeare left to Combe's nephew his sword, as a legacy.

It were to be wished that Shakspeare could be as successfully cleared from the charge of being the author of the vile and unchristian doggrel which disgraces his own grave stone.

"Good friend, for Jesus' sake forbear
To dig the dust inclosed here,

Blest be the man that spares these stones
And curst be he that moves my bones."

Mr. Malone thinks that the last line was suggested by an apprehension that our author's remains might share the same fate with those of the

rest of his countrymen, and be added to an immense pile of human bones deposited in the charnel house at Stratford. But though this may account for the oddness of the injunction, it is no apology for the harshness of the sentiment or the meanness of the verse.

101

EDWARD and GEORGE HERBERT.

THE

history of the human mind can hardly exhibit a more eccentric and unaccountable character than the celebrated lord Herbert, of Cherbury, who served as ambassador in France, with great reputation, under James the First, and was created a knight of the Bath, and made a peer; but in the rebellion he sided with the parliament. He died in 1648, aged 69. He was at the same time a deist and an enthusiast; a man of high courage and a knight errant; he professed the most refined principles, while he acted by the falsest maxims of morality.

When he was in France, and was on a visit at the duke of Montmorency's, it happened one evening, that a daughter of the duchess de Ventadour, of about ten or eleven years of age, went to walk in the meadows with his lordship, and several other ladies and gentlemen. The young lady wore a knot of ribband on her head, which a French chevalier snatched away, and fastened to his hatband. He was desired to return it, but refused. The lady then requested lord Herbert to recover it for her. A race ensued; and the chevalier finding himself likely to be overtaken, made a sudden turn, and was about to deliver his H 3

prize