For her feet have touched the meadows
And have left the daisies rosy:
a student may, with the fine sense acquired by patient loving study, read signs into known facts as clearly as that of Tennyson, that the morning daisies and buds when trodden on, lay their crimson under petals to the side, and the path is really made rosy. Our poet’s path may be traced in printer’s ink.
I believe that Shakespeare went to London in 1587 hoping to earn his fortune there, but that his plans were somewhat guided by business concerning this desired arrangement with John Lambert. There is little doubt he would first go to take counsel with Richard Field, the apprentice, who was about to become the son-in-law and successor of Thomas Vautrollier the great French printer. But the following morning, when he started on his mission, I venture to put forward a suggestion that his footsteps took a very different direction from what has usually been accepted; indeed, that Shakespeare began by seeking his fortune not at the play-house, but at the Court!
I find that a John Lambert, possibly the poet’s cousin, was a Yeoman of the Chamber at the time, and young Shakespeare might have hoped to persuade him to agree to the payment of that extra £20, or make up for it in Court influence. Why not? John Arden of Park Hall had been Esquire of the Body to Henry VII, his younger brother Robert, Yeoman of the Chamber to Henry VII and Henry VIII, his nephew or relative William held the same office to Queen Elizabeth down to 1584, and his son Robert was associated with him; John Scarlet, so friendly with the Ardens of Wilmcote, had been also Yeoman of the Chamber; Roger Shakespeare had held the same office in the reign of Mary, and Thomas Shakespeare was the Royal Messenger, at least down to 1575, possibly later. William Shakespeare was a man of good appearance and of manly courage, the two essentials for the post; he may have had many introductions, and evidently had high hopes. But he failed. We may realize his feelings during his first months in London by his works. It was not Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, who had learned by personal experience:
Who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
... the law’s delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns,
That patient merit of the unworthy takes.