Shakespeare's family
margin, as if it were a later insertion, "towards the charge of
prosecuting the Bill in Parliament for the better repair of Highways." A
Parliament was then expected to meet, but it was not summoned till long
afterwards. In 1612 Lane, Green, and Shakespeare filed a new bill of
complaint concerning the tithes before Lord Ellesmere.
In March, 1613, he made a curious purchase of a tenement and yard, one
or two hundred yards to the east of the Blackfriars Theatre. The lower
part had long been in use as a haberdasher's shop. The vendor was Henry
Walker, a musician, who had paid L100 for it in 1604, and who asked then
the price of L140. Shakespeare, however, at this raised price secured
it, leaving L60 of it on mortgage. The date of the conveyance deed is
March 10, 1613,[168] probably signed on the 11th, on which day it was
enrolled in the Court of Chancery. Besides the witnesses to this
document, there was present Henry Lawrence, the scrivener who had drawn
it up, who unfortunately lent his seal to the poet, which still exists,
bearing the initials "H. L."
Shakespeare is believed to have written two plays a year while he was a
shareholder. On June 29, 1613, the Globe Theatre was destroyed by fire
while the history of Henry VIII. was being enacted. Burbage, Hemings,
Condell, and the Fool were so long in leaving the theatre that the
spectators feared for their safety. It is not known whether this fire
would prove a loss to him. In June of that year a malicious piece of
gossip was circulating in Stratford against the good name of
Shakespeare's daughter, Susanna Hall. The rumour was traced to a man
called Lane, who was summoned to appear before the Ecclesiastical Court
at Worcester on July 15, 1613. He did not venture to appear, and he was
duly excommunicated for perjury.
It was the custom for the Corporation then to make complimentary
offerings of wine to those whom they wished to honour, and thus they
honoured an itinerant preacher, quartered at New Place, in the spring of
1614, with a quart of sack and another of claret, and this has been
supposed to prove that the poet had turned Puritan. John Combe, one of
the chief men of the neighbourhood, died in July, 1614, leaving
Shakespeare L5. Shakespeare would probably never receive it. The will,
dated January 28, 1612-13, was not proved till November, 1616. It is
clear, however, that these men were friendly at that time, and that the
mock elegy, attributed to Shakespeare, could not then have been written,
or, if written, was only laughed at. The Globe Theatre was rebuilt at
great cost that year. Chamberlain, writing to a lady in Venice, said: "I
hear much speech of this new playhouse, which is sayde to be the fayrest
that ever was in England" (June 30, 1614).
In the same year, William Combe, the new Squire of Welcombe, attempted
enclosure of some of the common fields, a design resisted by the
Corporation. This scheme materially affected Shakespeare through his
tithes, and much discussion has been waged over the true meaning of
the entries of his cousin, Thomas Green, the Town Clerk of
Stratford-on-Avon, and his attorney. Unfortunately, these are badly
written, and the composition is dubious; but to my mind it seems clear
that Green meant to say that Mr. Shakespeare could not bear the
enclosing of Welcombe.[169]
In the opening of 1615-16 Shakespeare found himself "in perfect healthe
and memorie--God be praised"; and yet, for some reason, he wished to
make a new will, "revoking all other wills," and his solicitor, Francis
Collins of Warwick, drew up a draft. Halliwell-Phillipps thinks this was
done in January, and that it was intended to have been signed on the
25th of that month. I own that the date, erased to be replaced by
"March," looks to me more like "February." An important difference it
would be, because in January he might not have known that his daughter,
Judith Shakespeare, aged 32, had made up her mind to marry Thomas
Quiney, aged 28. By February 25 she had already done it. On February 10,
1616, Thomas Quiney was married, at Stratford-on-Avon, to Judith
Shakespeare without a license, an irregularity for which both the
parties were summoned to appear[170] before the Ecclesiastical Courts
some weeks afterwards, and threatened with excommunication, but probably
the fact of Shakespeare's illness and death would act as an excuse in
high quarters.
Though it seems to me that the will must have been drawn up before
Judith's marriage, the possibility of such a change of state is clearly
considered. There is no sign of indignation at the later date of the
signing of the will, and L300 was a large portion; and there are no
alterations in his bequests to her, except a curious one. The first
bequest was originally intended to have been in favour of "_my sonne
and_ daughter Judith," but the "sonne" was erased. Of course, this
possibly arose from the scrivener intending to start with the Halls. But
the less important bequests came first. One hundred and fifty pounds was
to be paid to Judith within a year, in two instalments, the L100 in
discharge of her marriage portion, and the L50 on her surrendering her
share in the copyhold tenement in Stratford-on-Avon (once Getley's) to
her sister, Susanna Hall. Another L150[171] was to be paid Judith, or
any of her heirs alive at the date of three years after the testator's
death. If she had died without issue at that date, L100 thereof was to
go to Elizabeth Hall, and L50 to his sister Joan and her children. If
Judith were alive, the stock was to be invested by the executors, and
only the interest paid her as long as she was married, unless her
husband had "assured her in lands answerable to her portion."
Sister Joan was to have L20, the testator's wearing apparel, and a
life-rent in the Henley Street house, under the yearly payment of one
shilling. Five pounds a piece were left to her sons. Elizabeth Hall was
to have all the plate, except his broad silver-gilt bowl, which he left
to Judith. Ten pounds he left to the poor, his sword to Mr. Thomas
Combe, L5 to Thomas Russell, L13 6s. 8d. to Francis Collins. Rings of
the value of 26s. 8d. each were left to Hamnet Sadler, William Reynolds,
gent., Antony Marsh, gent., Mr. John Marsh; and in interpolation "to my
fellows, John Heming, Richard Burbage, and Henry Condell," and to
William Walker, his godson, 20s. in gold.
To enable his daughter Susanna to perform all this, she received "the
Capital Messuage called New Place, wherein I now dwell, two messuages in
Henley Street, and all my Barns, Stables, Orchards, Gardens, Lands,
Tenements and hereditaments whatsoever lying in Stratford-upon-Avon, Old
Stratford, Bishopton, and Welcombe, in the County of Warwick"; and "that
Messuage in Blackfriars in London near the Wardrobe wherein one John
Robinson now dwelleth."
The descent was to be to her sons if she had any, failing whom to the
sons of his grand-daughter Elizabeth, failing whom to the sons of his
daughter Judith, failing whom "to the right heires of me William
Shakespeare for ever."
Item interpolated: "I give unto my wife my second-best bed, with the
furniture."
Everything else to his "sonne-in-law John Hall, gent., and to his
daughter Susanna, his wife," whom he made executors.
Thomas Russell, Esq., and Francis Collins, gent., were to be overseers.
There were several witnesses. It was proved June 22, 1616, by John Hall,
at Westminster, but the inventory is unfortunately lost.
Much discussion has taken place over Shakespeare's legacy to his wife.
It may very simply and naturally have arisen from some conversation in
which a reference had been made to giving her "the best bed." But that
was the visitor's couch. "The second-best" would have been her own, that
which she had used through the years, and he wished her to feel that
that was not included in the "residue." That was to be her very own. As
to any provision for her, it must have taken the form of a settlement, a
jointure, or a dower. There is no trace of the first or second. But the
English law then assured a widow in a third of her husband's property
for life and the use of the capital messuage, if another was not
provided her. The absence of all special provision for Mrs. Shakespeare
seems to have arisen from her husband's knowledge of this and his trust
in the honour of Mr. John Hall, and the love of his daughters for their
mother. It also supports my opinion of her extreme delicacy of
constitution. She was not to be overweighted by mournful
responsibilities.
The indefiniteness of the residuary inheritance leaves room for surmise.
A curious reference, not, it seems to me, hitherto sufficiently noted,
occurs in the Burbage Case of 1635. Cuthbert, Winifred, the widow of
Richard, and William his son, recite facts concerning their father
James, who was the first builder of playhouses. "And to ourselves we
joined those deserving men, _Shakspere_, Hemings, Condell, Phillips, and
others, _partners[172] in the profittes of that they call the House_;
but _makeing the leases for twenty-one yeares hath been the destruction
of ourselves and others_, for _they dying at the expiration of three or
four yeares of their lease, the subsequent yeeres became dissolved to
strangers, as by marrying with their widdowes and the like by their
children_."
If Shakespeare's "lease" had not then expired, which seems to me
implied, it would have been "dissolved to a stranger" in the person of
Dr. Hall.
Some ready money would be required for the carrying out of the will.
Three hundred pounds left to Judith, and L73 13s. 4d. in smaller
bequests, would certainly run up to L400 by the payment of debts and
funeral expenses. The eagerness to leave all land to his own children is
another proof of Shakespeare's earnest desire to found a family.
Shakespeare did not immediately die after the signing of his will.
Probably the devoted care of his wife and daughters and the skill of his
son-in-law soothed his dying moments. But one cannot but have a lurking
suspicion of maltreatment through the crude medical notions of the time:
of bleeding when there should have been feeding; of vile medicines when
Nature should have been supported and not undermined by art. At all
events, Dr. John Hall had not the happiness and honour to record the
name of his illustrious father-in-law in his book of "Cures."[173] This
was the one great failure of his life.
The April 23 on which Shakespeare closed his eyes completed his cycle of
fifty-two years, according to ordinary reckoning. But strangely enough
there is entered on his tombstone "AEtatis 53," and this suggests that he
had been born on April 22. No records of his funeral have come down to
us, but it must have made a stir in his native place. He was a native of
the town, known to all in his youth, and loved by many. Yet, on the
other hand, he had offended all the traditions of the borough. He had
descended from the safe levels of trade to the vagabond life of a
"common player," especially detested in Stratford-on-Avon (see notes);
he had made money somehow in the city, and had returned to spend it in
his native town, but he had never taken office, and had never been "one
of them." And at the end he was to be buried in the Chancel, the select
spot for nobles and prelates and "great men." Verily the tongues of the
gossips of Stratford would wag on April 25, 1616. The authorship of the
doggerel lines on his tomb has been attributed to various people.
Probably they were a part of the stock-in-trade of the stone-cutter,
that satisfied Shakespeare's widow as expressing a known wish of her
"dear departed." Rude as they are, they have fulfilled their end:
"Good Frend, for Jesus' sake forbeare