1 and he quoted Mr. Betterton the player' for 'his authority. I anfwered, that I thought fuch a fory might have enriched the variety of those choice ' 1 infcriptions; but Mr. Pope and the other gentlemen concerned infifting that it thould ftand, Dr. Mead yielded the point, faying, "Omnia vincit amor, nos et cedamus amori." "This anecdote was communicated by Dr. Lort, late Greek Profeffor of Cambridge, who had it from Dr; Mead himself." *$36 It was recorded at the time in The Gentleman's Magazine for Feb. 1741, by a writer who objects to every part of the infcrip tion, and fays it ought to have been, G. S. centum viginti et quatuor poft obitum annis populus plaudens [aut favens] pofuit." 60 The monument was opened Jan. 29, 1741, Scheemaker is said to have got 3001. for his work. The performers at each house, much to their honour, performed gratis; and the Dean and Chapter of Westminster took nothing for the ground. The money received by the performance at Drury Lane, amounted to above 2001, the receipts at Covent Garden to about 1001. These particulars I learn from Oldys's MS, notes on Langbaine. * 3 The fcroll on the monument, as I learn from a letter to thy father, dated June 27, 1741, remained for fome time after the monument was fet up, without any infcription on it. This was a challenge to the wits of the time; which one of them accepted by writing a copy of verfes, the fubject of which was a converfation fuppofed to pafs between Dr. Mead and Sir Thomas Hanmer, relative to the filling up of the feroll. I know not whether they are in print, and I do not choose to quote them all. The introductory lines, however, run thus: "To learned Mead thus Hanmer fpoke, 1 "And fit for Shakspeare to point at;" &c. MALONE. At Drury Lane was acted Julius Cæfar, 28 April, 1738, when a prologue written by Benjamin Martyn, Efq. was spoken by Mr. Quin, and an epilogue by James Noel, Efq. fpoken by Mrs. Porter. Both thefe are printed in The General Dictionary. At Covent Garden was acted Hamlet, 10th April, 1739, when a prologue written by Mr. Theobald, and printed in The London Magazine of that year, was fpoken by Mr. Ryan. In the newfpaper of the day it was obferved that this lait reprefentation was far from being numéroully attended. REED." fruits of obfervation he has prefented us in his preface to the edition he had published of our poet's works. He replied-" There might be in the garden of mankind fuch plants as would feem to pride themselves more in a regular production of their own native fruits, than in having the repute of bearing a richer kind by grafting; and this was the reafon he omitted it."8" · The fame ftory, without the names of the perfons, is printed among the jefts of John Taylor the Water-poet, in his works, folio, 1630, p. 184, N° 39: and, with fome variations, may be found in one of Hearne's pocket books.9 and this was the reafon he omitted it.] Mr. Oldys might have added, that he was the perfon who fuggefted to Mr. Pope the fingular course which he purfued in his edition of Shakspeare. "Remember," fays Oldys in a MS. note to his copy of Langbaine, Article, Shakspeare, "what I obferved to my Lord Oxford for Mr. Pope's ufe, out of Cowley's preface." The observation here alluded to, I believe, is one made by Cowley in his preface, p. 53, edit. 1710, 8vo: "This has been the cafe with Shakspeare, Fletcher, Jonfon, and many others, part of whofe poems I should prefume to take the boldness to prune and lop away, if the care of replanting them in print did belong to me; neither would I make any scruple to cut off from fome the unneceffary young fuckers, and from others the old withered branches; for a great wit is no more tied to live in a vast volume, than in a gigantick body; on the contrary it is commonly more vigorous the lefs space it animates, and as Statius fays of little Tydeus, totos infufa per artus, "Major in exiguo regnabat corpore virtus." Pope adopted this very unwarrantable idea; ftriking out from the text of his author whatever he did not like: and Cowley himself has fuffered a fort of poetical punishment for having fuggefted it, the learned Bishop of Worcester [Dr. Hurd] having pruned and lopped away his beautiful luxuriances, as Pope, on Cowley's fuggeftion, did thofe of Shakspeare. MALONE. 9 The fame Story-may be found in one of Hearne's pocket books.] Antony Wood is the first and original author of the anec "One of Shakspeare's younger brothers,' who dote that Shakspeare, in his journies from Warwickshire to London, used to bait at the Crown-Inn on the weft fide of the corn market in Oxford. He fays, that D'Avenant the poet was born in that house in 1606. "His father (he adds) John Davenant, was a fufficient vintner, kept the tavern now known by the fign of the Crown, and was mayor of the faid city in 1621. His mother was a very beautiful woman, of a good wit and converfation, in which the was imitated by none of her children but by this William [the poet]. The father, who was a very grave and discreet citizen, (yet an admirer and lover of plays and play-makers, especially Shakspeare, who frequented his houfe in his journies between Warwickshire and London,) was of a melancholick difpofition, and was feldom or never feen to laugh, in which he was imitated by none of his children but by Robert his eldest fon, afterwards fellow of St. John's College, and a venerable Doctor of Divinity." Wood's Ath. Oxon. Vol. II. p. 292, edit. 1692. I will not fuppofe that Shakspeare could have been the father of a Doctor of Divinity who never laughed; but it was always a conftant tradition in Oxford that Shakspeare was the father of Davenant the poet. And I have seen this circumftance exprefsly mentioned in fome of Wood's papers. Wood was well qualified to know these particulars; for he was a townsman of Oxford, where he was born in 1632. Wood fays, that Davenant went to school in Oxford. Ubi jupr. As to the Crown Inn, it ftill remains as an inn, and is an old decayed house, but probably was once a principal inn in Oxford. It is directly in the road from Stratford to London. In a large upper room, which feems to have been a fort of Hall for entertaining a large company, or for accommodating (as was the cuftom) different parties at once, there was a bow-window, with three pieces of excellent painted glafs. About eight years ago, I remember vifiting this room, and propofing to purchase of the landlord the painted glafs, which would have been a curiofity as coming from Shakspeare's inn. But going thither foon after, I found it was removed; the inn-keeper having communicatedmy intended bargain to the owner of the house, who began to suspect that he was poffeffed of a curiofity too valuable to be parted with, or to remain in fuch a place and I never could hear of it afterwards. If I remember right, the painted glass confifted of three armorial shields beautifully ftained. I have faid fo much on this fubject, because I think that Shakspeare's old hoftelry at Oxford deferves no less refpect than Chaucer's Tabarde in Southwark. T. WARTON. 2 lived to a good old age, even fome years as I compute, after the restoration of King Charles II. -would in his younger days come to London to vifit his brother Will, as he called him, and be a fpectator of him as an actor in fome of his own plays. This cuftom, as his brother's fame enlarged, and " * One of Shakspeare's younger brothers,' &c.] Mr. Oldys feems to have ftudied the art of "marring a plain tale in the telling of it; for he has in 'this story introduced circumstances which tend to diminish, instead of adding to, its credibility. 'Male dum recitas, incipit effe tuus. From Shakspeare's not taking notice of any y of his brothers or fifters in his will, except Joan Hart, I think it highly probable that they were all dead in 1616, except her, at least all those of the whole blood; though in the Regifter there is no entry of the burial of either his brother Gilbert, or Edmund, antecedent to the death of Shakspeare, or at any fubfequent period. J. The truth is, that this account of our poet's having performed the part of an old man in one of his own comedies, came originally from Mr. Thomas Jones, of Tarbick, in Worcestershire, who has been already mentioned, (fee p. 62, n. 1,) and who related it from the information, not of one of Shakspeare's bro ́thers, but of a relation of our poet, who lived to a good old age, and who had feen him act in his youth. Mr. Jones's informer might have been Mr. Richard Quiney, who lived in London, and died at Stratford in 1656, at the age of 69; or Mr. Thomas Quiney, our poet's fon-in-law, who lived, I believe, till 1663, and was twenty-feven years old when his father-in-law died; or fome one of the family of Hathaway. Mr. Thomas Hathaway, I believe Shakspeare's brother-in-law, died at Stratford in 1654-5, at the age of 85. There was a Thomas Jones, an inhabitant of Stratford, who between the years 1581 and 1590 had four fons, Henry, James, Edmund, and Ifaac: fome one of thefe, it is probable, fettled at Tarbick, and was the father of Thomas Jones, the relater of this anecdote, who was born about the year 1613. If any of Shakspeare's brothers lived till after the Restoration, and vifited the players, why were we not informed to what player he related it, and from what player Mr. Oldys bad his account? The fact, I believe, is, he had it not from a player, but from the above-mentioned Mr. Jones, who likewife communicated the ftanza of the ballad on Sir Thomas Lucy, which has been printed in a former page. MALONE. his dramatick entertainments grew the greatest fupport of our principal, if not of all our theatres, he continued it feems fo long after his brother's death, as even to the latter end of his own life. The curiofity at this time of the most noted actors [exciting them] to learn fomething from him of his brother, &c. they juftly held him in the highest veneration. And it may be well believed, as there was befides a kinfman and defcendant of the family, who was then a celebrated actor among them, [Charles Hart. See Shakspeare's Will.] this opportunity made them greedily inquifitive into every little circumftance, more especially in his dramatick character, which his brother could relate of him. But he, it seems, was fo ftricken in years, and poffibly his memory fo weakened with infirmities, (which might make him the easier pafs for a man of weak intellects,) that he could give them but little light into their enquiries; and all that could be recollected from him of his brother Will. in that ftation was, the faint, general, and almost loft ideas he had of having once feen him act a part in one of his own comedies, wherein being to perfonate a decrepit old man, he wore a long beard, and appeared fo weak and drooping and unable to walk, that he was forced to be fupported and carried by another person to a table, at which Charles Hart.] Mr. Charles Hart the player was born, I believe, about the year 1630, and died in or about 1682. If he was a grandfon of Shakspeare's fifter, he was probably the fon of Michael Hart, her youngest fon, of whofe marriage or death there is no account in the parish Register of Stratford, and therefore I fufpect he fettled in London. MALONE. 2 Charles Hart died in Auguft, 1683, and was buried at Stanmore the 20th of that month. Lyfon's Environs of London, Vol. III. p. 400. REED. VOL. I. K |