sunshine of his favour beam out again, but that will not cure the difgrace; tears and penitence are fitter (XXXIV.); and for fake of such tears Will fhall be forgiven (xxxv.); but henceforth their lives must run apart (XXXVI.); Shakspere, separated from Will, can look on and rejoice in his friend's happiness and honour (XXXVII.), finging his praise in verfe (XXXVIII.), which he could not do if they were fo united that to praise his friend were felf-praise (XXXIX.); separated they must be, and even their loves be no longer one; Shakspere can now give his love, even her he loved, to the gentle thief; wronged though he is, he will still hold Will dear (XL.); what is he but a boy whom a woman has beguiled (XLI.)? and for both, for friend and mistress, in the midst of his pain, he will try to feign excufes (XLII.). Here there feems to be

a gap of time. The Sonnets begin again in

absence, and some students have called this, perhaps rightly, the Second Abfence (XLIII., Sqq.). His friend continues as dear as ever, but confidence is fhaken, and a deep diftruft begins

to grow (XLVIII.). What right indeed has a poor player to claim conftancy and love (XLIX.)? He is on a journey which removes him from Will (L. LI.). His friend perhaps profeffes unfhaken loyalty, for Shakspere now takes heart, and praises Will's truth (LIII. LIV.)-takes heart, and believes that his own verfe will for ever keep that truth in mind. He will endure the pain of abfence, and have no jealous thoughts (LVII. LVIII.); ftriving to honour his friend in fong better than ever man was honoured before (LIX.); in fong which fhall outlaft the revolutions of time (LX.). Still he cannot quite get rid of jealous fears (LXI.); and yet, what right has one fo worn by years and care to claim all

a young man's love (LXII.)?

Will, too, in his

turn must fade, but his beauty will survive in verse (LXIII.). Alas! to think that death will take away the beloved one (LXIV.); nothing but Verse can defeat time and decay (LXV.). For his own part Shakfpere would willingly die, were it not that, dying, he would leave his friend alone in an evil world (LXVI.). Why

Shak

fhould one fo beautiful live to grace this ill world (LXVII.) except as a survival of the genuine beauty of the good old times (LXVIII.); yet beautiful as he is, he is blamed for careless living (LIX.), but furely this must be flander (LXX.). Shakspere here returns to the thought of his own death; when I leave this vile world, he fays, let me be forgotten (LXXI. LXXII.); and my death is not very far off (LXXIII.); but when I die my spirit ftill lives in my verse (LXXIV.). A new group feems to begin with LXXV. fpere loves his friend as a miser loves his gold, fearing it may be ftolen (fearing a rival poet?). His verfe is monotonous and old-fashioned (not like the rival's verfe?) (LXXVI.); fo he fends Will his manuscript book unfilled, which Will may fill, if he please, with verfe of his own; Shakspere chooses to sing no more of Beauty and of Time; Will's glass and dial may inform him henceforth on these topics (LXXVII.) The rival poet has now won the first place in Will's esteem. (LXXVIII.-LXXXVI.). Shakspere muft bid his friend farewell (LXXXVII.). If Will should scorn

him, Shakspere will fide against himself (LXXXVIII. LXXXIX.). But if his friend is ever to hate him, let it be at once, that the bitterness of death may foon be paft (xc.). He has dared to say farewell, yet his friend's love is all the world to Shakspere, and the fear of lofing him is misery (XCI.); but he cannot really lose his friend, for death would come quickly to fave him from such grief; and yet Will may be false and Shakspere never know it (XCII.); fo his friend, fair in seeming, false within, would be like Eve's apple (XCII.); it is to fuch felf-contained, paffionless persons that nature entrusts her rarest gifts of grace and beauty; yet vicious felf-indulgence will spoil the fairest human soul (XCIV.). Will beware of his youthful vices, already whispered by the lips of men (xcv.); true, he makes graces out of faults, yet this should be kept within bounds (xcvI.). Here again, perhaps, is a gap of time.1 Sonnets XCVII.-XCIX.

So let

1 The last two lines of xcvI.-not very appropriate I think in that fonnet-are identical with the last two lines of XXXVI. It occurs to me as a poffibility that the мs. in Thorpe's hands may here have been imperfect, and that

are written in absence, which fome students, perhaps rightly, call Third Abfence. These three fonnets are full of tender affection, but at the close of XCIX. allufion is made to Will's vices, the canker in the rofe. After this followed a period of filence. In c. love begins to renew itself, and fong awakes. Shakfpere excufes his filence (CI.); his love has grown while he was filent (CII.); his friend's loveliness is better than all fong (cm.); three years have paffed fince first acquaintance; Will looks as young as ever, yet time muft infenfibly be altering his beauty (CIV.). Shakfpere fings with a monotony of love (cv.). All former fingers praising knights and ladies only prophefied concerning Will (CVI.); grief and fear are past; the two friends are reconciled again; and both live for ever united in Shakspere's verse (CVII.). Love has conquered time and age, which deftroy mere beauty of face (cvIII.). Shakfpere confeffes his errors, but now he has returned to his home

he filled it up fo far as to complete xcvi. with a couplet from an earlier fonnet.