Immediately next the wall is the flat stone that marks the grave of Anne Shakespeare, who survived her husband, and died August 6th, 1623, aged sixty-seven. An eight-line Latin verse, probably by her son-in-law, Dr. John Hall, and couched in the most affectionate terms, is inscribed upon a small brass plate; it is thus rendered—
“Milk, life thou gavest. For a boon so great,
Mother, alas! I give thee but a stone;
O! might some angel blest remove its weight,
Thy form should issue like thy Saviour’s own.
But vain my prayers; O Christ, come quickly, come!
And thou, my Mother, shalt from hence arise,
Though closed as yet within this narrow tomb,
To meet thy Saviour in the starry skies.”
Next in order comes the slab covering the grave of Shakespeare himself, and following it that of Thomas Nash, husband of Elizabeth Hall, grand-daughter of the poet. He died in 1647, aged fifty-three, and is honoured in a four-line Latin verse. Fourthly comes the grave of Dr. Hall, who died in 1635, aged sixty, with a six-line Latin verse, and next is that of Susanna, Shakespeare’s elder daughter, wife of Dr. Hall. She died in 1649, aged sixty-six, and has this poetic appreciation for epitaph—
“Witty above her sexe, but that’s not all,
Wise to Salvation was good Mistris Hall,
Something of Shakespeare was in that, but this
Wholy of him with whom she’s now in blisse,
Then, Passenger, ha’st ne’re a teare
To weepe with her that wept with all?
That wept, yet set herselfe to chere
Them up with comforts cordiall.
Her Love shall live, her mercy spread,
When thou hast ne’re a teare to shed.”
This touching tribute was nearly lost in the gross outrage perpetrated in or about 1707, when it was erased for the purpose of providing room for an inscription to one Richard Watts. Happily Dugdale, in his monumental history of Warwickshire, had recorded it, and it was re-cut from that evidence in 1836.
It is gratifying to note that no monuments to self-advertising members of the theatrical profession, or others keen to obtain a reflected glory from association with Shakespeare, have been allowed here, although we have to thank an aroused public opinion, and not the clergy, the natural guardians of the spot, for that. It was proposed, a few years ago, to place a memorial to that entirely blameless actress, well versed in Shakespearean parts, Helen Faucit, Lady Martin, on the wall opposite Shakespeare’s monument, and it was nearly accomplished. The clergy blessed the project, the public were allowed to hear little or nothing about it, and the thing would have been done, except for protests raised at the eleventh hour. The monument eventually found its way to the Shakespeare Memorial, where it may now be found, but those responsible for the proposal were not wholly to be baulked, and the evidence of their persistence is to be seen in the nave, where a very elaborate dark-green marble pulpit, in memory of Helen Faucit, and given by her husband, Sir Theodore Martin, attracts attention.
There has been a good deal of praise and admiration of the modern stained glass in the noble windows of the chancel and the windows of the church in general, including those given by American admirers of Shakespeare, but the truth is that there is no stained glass in Stratford church above the commercial level of the ordinary ecclesiastical furnisher, and the sooner the fact is recognised, the better for all concerned. The guidebooks will tell you nothing of this, but we have to see things for ourselves, and use our own judgment.
The tomb of the rebuilder of the chancel, Thomas Balsall, is little noticed. It is seen under the east window, on the north side, and is a greatly mutilated, but still beautiful, altar-tomb. Above it, on the wall, is the monument with fine portrait-busts of Richard Combe and his intended wife, Judith, who died 1649. The altar-tomb, with effigy, of John Combe, 1614, of the College, and of Welcombe, a friend of Shakespeare, is against the east wall. Combe was a man of wealth, who did not disdain the part of money-lender. He had the reputation of an usurer, although ten per cent. was his moderate rate, and, according to the tradition, hearing it said that Shakespeare had an epitaph waiting for him, begged to hear it. This, then, was what he heard—
“Ten in a hundred lies here engraved,
’Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not saved.
If any man ask, Who lies in this tomb?
Ho! ho! says the Devil, ’tis my John-a-Combe.”
It is an idle story, and the verse is adapted from an epigram in the jest-books of the age.