CHAPTER IX. — Mr. Sidney Lee and the Stratford Bust.
One word to the Stratfordians. The "Shakespeare of Stratford-on-Avon" myth has been shattered and destroyed by the mass of inexactitudes collected in the supposititious "Life of Shakespeare" by Mr. Sidney Lee, who has done his best to pulverise what remained of that myth by recently writing as follows:—
"Most of those who have pressed the question [of Bacon being the real Shake-speare] on my notice, are men of acknowledged intelligence and reputation in their own branch of life, both at home and abroad. I therefore desire as respectfully, but also as emphatically and as publicly, as I can, to put on record the fact, as one admitting to my mind of no rational ground for dispute, that there exists every manner of contemporary evidence to prove that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote with his own hand, and exclusively by the light of his only genius (merely to paraphrase the contemporary inscription on his tomb in Stratford-on-Avon Church) those dramatic works which form the supreme achievement in English Literature."
As a matter of fact, not a single scrap of evidence, contemporary or otherwise, exists to show that Shakspere, the householder of Stratford-on-Avon, wrote the plays or anything else; indeed, the writer thinks that he has conclusively proved that this child of illiterate parents and father of an illiterate child was himself so illiterate that he was never able to write so much as his own name. But Mr. Sidney Lee seems prepared to accept anything as "contemporary evidence," for on pages 276-7 (1898 edition) of his "Life of Shakespeare" he writes
"Before 1623 an elaborate monument, by a London sculptor of Dutch birth, Gerard Johnson, was erected to Shakespeare's memory in the chancel of the parish church. It includes a half-length bust, depicting the dramatist on the point of writing. The fingers of the right hand are disposed as if holding a pen, and under the left hand lies a quarto sheet of paper."
As a matter of fact, the present Stratford monument was not put up till about one hundred and twenty years after Shakspeare's death. The original monument, see Plate 3 on Page 8, was a very different monument, and the figure, as I have shewn in Plate 5, instead of holding a pen in its hand, rests its two hands on a wool-sack or cushion. Of course, the false bust in the existing monument was substituted for the old bust for the purpose of fraudulently supporting the Stratford myth.
When Mr. Sidney Lee wrote that the present monument was erected before 1623 he did not do this consciously to deceive the public; still, it is difficult to pardon him for this and the other reckless statements with which his book is filled. But what are we to say of his words (respecting the present monument) which we read on page 286? "It was first engraved—very imperfectly—in Rowe's edition of 1709." An exact full size photo facsimile reproduction of Rowe's engraving is shown in Plate 19, Page 77.
[Illustration: Plate. XIX. The Original Stratford Monument, from Rowe's Life of Shakespeare, 1709]
As a matter of fact, the real Stratford monument of 1623 was first engraved in Dugdale's "Warwickshire" of 1656, where it appears opposite to page 523. We can, however, pardon Mr. Sidney Lee for his ignorance of the existence of that engraving; but how shall we pardon him for citing Rowe as a witness to the early existence of the present bust? To anyone not wilfully blinded by passion and prejudice, Rowe's engraving [see Plate 19, Page 77] clearly shews a figure absolutely different from the Bust in the present monument. Rowe's figure is in the same attitude as the Bust of the original monument engraved by Dugdale, and does not hold a pen in its hand, but its two hands are supported on a wool-sack or cushion, in the same manner as in the Bust from Dugdale which I have shewn in Plate 5, on Page 14.
What are we to say respecting the frontispiece to the 1898 edition of what he is pleased to describe as the "Life of William Shakespeare," which Mr. Sidney Lee tells us is "from the 'Droeshout' painting now in the Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-on-Avon"?
As a matter of fact there is no "Droeshout" painting. The picture falsely so called is a manifest forgery and a palpable fraud, for in it all the revealing marks of the engraving by Martin Droeshout which appeared in the 1623 folio are purposely omitted. A full size photo facsimile of Martin Droeshout's engraving is shewn in Plate 8, pp. 20-21. In the false and fraudulent painting we find no double line to shew the mask, and the coat is really a coat and not a garment cunningly composed of two left arms.
Still it does seem singularly appropriate and peculiarly fitting that Mr. Sidney Lee should have selected as the frontispiece of the romance which he calls the "Life" of Shakespeare, an engraving of the false and fraudulent painting now in the Stratford-on-Avon Gallery for his first edition of 1898; and should also have selected an engraving of the false and fraudulent monument now in Stratford-on-Avon Church as the frontispiece for his first Illustrated Library Edition of 1899.
Mr. Sidney Lee is aware of the fact that Martin Droeshout was only fifteen years old when the Stratford actor died. But it is possible that he may not know that (in addition to the Shakespeare Mask which Droeshout drew for the frontispiece of the 1623 folio edition of the Plays of Shakespeare, in order to reveal, to those who were able to understand, the true facts of the Authorship of those plays), Martin Droeshout also drew frontispieces for other books, which may be similarly correctly characterised as cunningly composed, in order to reveal the true facts of the authorship of such works, unto those who were capable of grasping the hidden meaning of his engravings.
One other point it is worth while referring to. The question is frequently asked, if Bacon wrote under the name of Shakespeare, why so carefully conceal the fact? An answer is readily supplied by a little anecdote related by Ben Jonson, which was printed by the Shakespeare Society in 1842, in their "Notes of Ben Jonson's conversations with William Drummond of Hawthornden".
"He [Ben Jonson] was dilated by Sir James Murray to the King, for writting something against the Scots, in a play Eastward Hoe, and voluntarly imprissonned himself with Chapman and Marston who had written it amongst them. The report was that they should then [have] had their ears cut and noses. After their delivery, he banqueted all his friends; there was Camden, Selden, and others; at the midst of the feast his old Mother dranke to him, and shew him a paper which she had (if the sentence had taken execution) to have mixed in the prisson among his drinke, which was full of lustie strong poison, and that she was no churle, she told, she was minded first to have drunk of it herself."
This was in 1605, and it is a strange and grim illustration of the dangers that beset men in the Highway of Letters.
It was necessary for Bacon to write under pseudonyms to conceal his identity, but he intended that at some time posterity should do him justice and it was for this purpose that, among the numerous clues he supplied to reveal himself he wrote "The Tempest" in its present form, which Emile Montegut writing in the Revue des Deux Mondes in 1865 declared to be the author's literary Testament.
The Island is the Stage. Prospero the prime Duke, the great Magician, represents the Mighty Author who says "my brother ... called Anthonio who next thyself of all the world I lov'd" ... "graves at my command have wak'd their sleepers op'd and let them forth by my so potent Art" ...
"and deeper than ever plummet sound
He drown my booke."
Yet he does not forget finally to add "I do ... require my Dukedome of thee, which perforce I know thou must restore."
The falsely crowned and gilded king of the Island who had stolen the wine (the poetry) "where should they find this grand liquor that hath gilded them" and whose name is Stephanos (Greek for crown) throws off at the close of the play, his false crown while Caliban says "What a thrice double asse was I to take this drunkard for a God."
The mighty Magician Prospero says "knowing I lov'd my bookes, he furnished me from mine own Library, with volumes, that I prize above my Dukedome." Bacon when he was dismissed from his high offices, devoted himself to his books. Not a book of any kind was found at New Place, Stratford. Bacon's brother "whom next himself he loved" was called Anthony. "Gentle" Shakespeare of Stratford died from the effects of a "Drunken" bout!
It does matter whether it is thought that the Immortal works were written by the sordid money-lender of Stratford, the "Swine without a head, without braine, wit, anything indeed, Ramping to Gentilitie"; or were written by him who was himself the "Greatest Birth of Time"; the man pre-eminently distinguished amongst the sons of earth; the man who in order to "do good to all mankind," disguised his personality "in a despised weed," and wrote under the name of William Shakespeare.
It does matter, and England is now declining any longer to dishonour and defame the greatest Genius of all time by continuing to identify him with the mean, drunken, ignorant, and absolutely unlettered, rustic of Stratford who never in his life wrote so much as his own name and in all probability was totally unable to read one single line of print.
The hour has come for revealing the truth. The hour has come when it is no longer necessary or desirable that the world should remain in ignorance that the Great Author of Shakespeare's Plays was himself alive when the Folio was published in 1623. The hour has come when all should know that this the greatest book produced by man was given to the world more carefully edited by its author as to every word in every column, as to every italic in every column, as to every apparent misprint in every column, than any book had ever before been edited, and more exactly printed than there seems any reasonable probability that any book will ever again be printed that may be issued in the future.
The hour has come when it is desirable and necessary to state with the utmost distinctness that
BACON IS SHAKESPEARE.
[Illustration: Plate XX. Reduced Facsimile of Page 136 of the Shakespeare Folio, 1623]
[Illustration: Plate XXI. Portion of Page 136, full size, as in the Shakespeare Folio 1623]