filling at one time the office of High Bailiff, or magistrate of the town. William was the second son of a numerous offspring. In subsequent life the parent was much reduced, and dismissed from the Corporation. This circumstance of his poverty is thought to have induced him to unite his occupation of wool-stapler to the trade of butcher, as an additional means of supporting his progeny. "Such," says Dr. Drake, "are the very few circumstances which reiterated search has hitherto gleaned relative to the father of the Poet. Scanty as they must be pronounced, they lead to the conclusion that he was a moral and industrious man; that when fortune favoured him he was not indolent, but performed the duties of a magistrate with respectability and effect; and that in the hour of adversity he exerted every nerve to support with decency a numerous family."

The house in which THE POET was born was purchased in 1597 from the family of Underhill, and had been called the Great House, probably from its having been at that time the best in the town. In its present reduced state it has been the subject of the graphic art, and some minute particulars have been communicated to the public. The room in which THE BARD is said to have been born, is pencilled over by the names of visitors of all descriptions. Among other names are those of the Prince Regent, and Duke of Cla rence, of Lucien Buonaparte, with the Russian

and Austrian Princes; of the poets, Moore and Scott; of the celebrated actors, Kemble and Kean : and of very many individuals of both Houses of Parliament! To the name of Lucien Buonaparte, in an album at Stratford, are annexed the subsequent lines

The eye of Genius glistens to admire
How memory hails the sound of Shakspeare's lyre ;
One tear I'll shed, to form a crystal shrine
Of all that's grand, immortal, and divine !
Let princes o'er their subject kingdoms rule,
'Tis Shakspeare's province to command the soul !
To add one leaf, oh! Shakspeare, to thy bays,
How vain's the effort, and how mean my lays !
Immortal Shakspeare, o'er thy hallow'd page
Age becomes taught, and Youth is e'en made sage!

The dwelling house has now one part a public house, and the other portion a butcher's shop. In the corner of a chimney stood an old oak chair, which had for a long series of years received nearly as many adorers as the celebrated shrine of the VIRGIN Mary, the Lady of Loretto! This precious relic was, in the year 1790, purchased by a Russian princess, and carried off in a post-chaise to London. And the far-famed mulberry tree, planted by the Poet's own hand, has been altogether annihilated.

In his infancy, SHAKSPEARE narrowly escaped the plague, which raged in his native town with a destructive fury. As to his education, he attended for a short period the free-school at Stratford,

where he acquired the little Latin and less Greek, which Ben Jonson has attributed to him. Literature, though it began then to be cultivated, was not sufficiently rewarded.

Respecting the classical acquirements of our Poet, there has been much controversy. Dr. Farmer, in his Essay on the subject, seems to think that he knew little more than the hig, hag, hog, which he puts in the mouth of Sir Hugh Evans; and derived his knowledge of the Classics from translations.

Mr. CAPEL LOFFT judiciously remarks in his useful little volume entitled Aphorisms from Shakspeare, “If it were asked from what sources SHAKSPEARE drew these abundant streams of WISDOM, carrying with their current the fairest and most unfading flowers of poetry, I should be tempted to say-He had what may be now considered a very reasonable portion of Latin, he was not wholly ignorant of Greek, he had a knowledge of the French so as to read it with ease; and I believe not less so the Italian. He was habitually conversant in the chronicles of his country. He lived with wise and highly cultivated men, with Jonson, Essex, and Southampton, in familiar friendship. He had deeply imbibed THE SCRIPTURES. And his own most acute, profound, active, and original genius, (for there never was a truly great poet, nor an aphoristic writer of excellence without these accompanying qualities) must take the lead in the

solution." These ingenious suggestions speak vo. lumes on this beclouded but most interesting subject.

Mrs. BARBAULD has thus, with her usual elegance and felicity, elucidated the subject; she is speaking of the genius of Richardson the novelist, who, by the exertion of mere natural talent aided by common reading, and ordinary observation, became the author of productions which delighted and astonished the world :

"The youth who is stung with the thirst of knowledge, will steal to the page that gratifies his curiosity, and afterwards brood over the thoughts which have been there kindled, while he is plying the awl, planing the board, or hanging over the loom. To have this desire implanted in the young mind does indeed require some peculiarly favourable circumstances. These can sometimes be traced : oftener not. In regular education the various stimuli that produce this effect are subject to our observation, and distinctly marked; in like manner we know the nature and quality of the seed we sow in gardens and cultured ground, but of those GENIUSES called self-taught, we usually know no more than we do of the wild flowers that spring up in the fields! We know very well they had a seed, but we are ignorant by what accidental circumstances the seed of one has been conveyed by the winds to some favourable spot where it has been safely lodged in the bosom of the ground; nor why

it germinates there, and springs up in health and vigour, while a thousand others perish. Some observation struck the young sense; some verse repeated in his hearing, dropt its sweetness on the unfolding ear; some nursery story told with impressive tones and gestures, has laid hold on the kindling imagination, and thus hath been formed, in solitude and obscurity, the genius of a Burns, or a SHAKSPEARE !"*

Mr. Malone is of opinion that SHAKSPEARE, upon leaving school, was “placed in the office of some country attorney, or the seneschal of some manor court,” merely because there is an appearance of legal "technical skill,” in certain of his plays. Indeed, the business of his education, like other things belonging to this wonderful man, remains in much obscurity.

A greater certainty attends the marriage of Shakspeare, who, in his eighteenth year, espoused Anne Hathaway, (older than himself) the daughter of a substantial yeoman, then residing at the little village of Shottery, distant about a mile from Stratford.

SHAKSPEARE's family was not large, consisting of only one son and two daughters. The son died at

* See a well-written Biographical Account of Samuel Richardson, and Observations on his Writings; by Anna LÆTITIA BARBAULD, prefixed to his Correspondence, in Six Volumes. This introductory Memoir may be pronounced one of the ablest and most fascinating pieces of criticism in the English language.