Now we begin at last to understand what we are told by Rowe, in his "Life of Shakespeare," published in 1709, that is, 93 years after Shakespeare's death in 1616, when all traces of the actual man had been of set purpose obliterated, because the time for revealing the real authorship of the plays had not yet come. Rowe, page x., tells us: "There is one Instance so singular in the Magnificence of this Patron of Shakespeare's, that if I had not been assur'd that the Story was handed down by Sir William D'Avenant, who was probably very well acquainted with his Affairs, I should not have ventured to have inserted, that my Lord Southampton, at one time, gave him a thousand Pounds, to enable him to go through with a Purchase which he heard he had a mind to."
This story has been hopelessly misunderstood, because people did not know that a large sum had to be paid to Shakespeare to obtain his consent to allow his name to be put to the plays, and that New Place had to be purchased for him, 1597 (the title deeds were not given to him for five or six years later), and that he had also to be sent away from London before "W Shakespeare's" name was attached to any play, the first play bearing that name being, as we have already pointed out, page 89, "Loues Labor's lost," with its very numerous revelations of authorship. Then, almost immediately, the world is informed that eleven other plays had been written by the same author, the list including the play of "Richard II."
The story of the production of the play of "Richard II." is very curious and extremely instructive. It was originally acted with the Parliament scene, where Richard II. is made to surrender, commencing in the Folio of 1623 with the words—
"Fetch hither Richard, that in common view he may surrender,"
continuing with a description of his deposition extending over 167 lines to the words—
"That rise thus nimbly by a true king's fall."
This account of the deposition of a king reached Queen Elizabeth's ears; she was furiously angry and she exclaimed: "Seest thou not that I am Richard II."
A copy of the play without any author's name was printed in 1597, omitting the story of the deposition of Richard II.; this was followed by a second and probably a third reprint in 1597, with no important alterations, but still without any author's name. Then, after the actor had been sent away to Stratford, Shakespeare's name was put upon a fourth reprint, dated 1598.
The story of Richard II.'s deposition was not printed in the play till 1608, five years after the death of Queen Elizabeth.[10]
This history of the trouble arising out of the production of the play of "Richard II." explains why a name had to be found to be attached to the plays. Who would take the risk? An actor was never "hanged," he was often whipped, occasionally one lost his ears, but an actor of repute would probably have refused even a large bribe. There was, however, a grasping money-lending man, of little or no repute, that bore a name called Shaxpur, which might be twisted into Bacon's pen-name Shake-Speare, and that man was secured, but as long as he lived he was continually asking for more and more money. The grant of a coat of arms was probably part of the original bargain. At one time it seems to have been thought easier to grant arms to his father. This, however, was found impossible. But when in 1597 Bacon's friend Essex was Earl Marshal and chief of the Heralds' College, and Bacon's servant Camden (whom Bacon had assisted to prepare the "Annales"—see Spedding's "Bacon's Works," Vol. 6, p. 351, and Letters, Vol. 4, p. 211), was installed as Clarenceux, King-of-Arms, the grant of arms to Shakespeare was recognised, 1599. Shakespeare must have been provisionally secured soon after 1593, when the "Venus and Adonis" was signed with his name, because in the next year, 1594, "The Taming of a Shrew" was printed, in which the opening scene shews a drunken "Warwickshire" rustic [Shakspeare was a drunken Warwickshire rustic], who is dressed up as "My lord," for whom the play had been prepared. (In the writer's possession there is a very curious and absolutely unique masonic painting revealing "on the square" that the drunken tinker is Shakspeare and the Hostess, Bacon.)