[10] For the preceding details, and some of those which follow, see the respective articles in the Dictionary of National Biography; Dyce's Works of Beaumont and Fletcher, Vol. I, Biographical Memoir; Grosart, Sir John Beaumont's Poems, and the sources as indicated. See also, below, Appendix, Table C.
[11] See Shaw's Knights of England; Collins, Peerage; and articles in D. N. B. under names.
[12] Dyce says that the Judge was knighted; so Rigg (D. N. B.) and others. The Inner Temple Records speak of him thirty times, but only once, Nov. 5, 1581, as "Sir," though others in memoranda running to 1601 which mention him are given the title. In the codicil to his will he is plain "Mr. Beaumont"; and he is not included in Shaw's Knights of England.
[13] For a Seat in the Groves of Coleorton.
[14] Works of B. and F., XVI.
CHAPTER III
AT THE INNS OF COURT AND CHANCERY; THE POEMS ASSIGNED TO THESE EARLIER YEARS.
The career of the Beaumonts at the University was shortened by the death of their father, some fourteen months after their admission. Henry had been entered of the Inner Temple, November 27, 1597, at his father's request. Some say with John, but I do not find the latter in the Records. Francis may have remained at Oxford until 1600. On November 3 of that year, he, also, was admitted a member of the Inner Temple, his two brothers acting as sponsors for him. We notice from the admission-book that he was matriculated specialiter, gratis, comitive,—because his father had been a Bencher,—was excused from most of the ordinary duties and charges, and was permitted to take his meals and to lodge outside the Inn of Court itself. I gather that, like other young students at the time, he lodged and pursued his studies in one of the lesser Inns, called Inns of Chancery, attached to the Inner Temple and under its supervision: Clifford's Inn across Fleet Street; or, across the Strand, Lyon's Inn,—or, let us hope, by preference, Clement's Inn; where had lain Jack Falstaff in the days when he was "page to Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk," and was seen by lusty Shallow to "break Skogan's head at the court-gate when 'a was a crack not thus high;" where had boozed Shallow himself and his four friends—"not four such swinge-bucklers in all the Inns of Court again"; and where, no doubt, they were talking in Beaumont's day "of mad Shallow yet."