The building that forms the southeast corner of High street and Bridge street in Stratford was once occupied by Thomas Quiney, a wine-dealer, who married the poet's youngest daughter, Judith, and an inscription appears upon it, stating that Judith lived in it for thirty-six years. Richard Savage, that competent, patient, diligent student of the church registers and other documentary treasures of Warwickshire, furnished the proof of this fact, from investigation of the town records—which is but one of many services that he has rendered to the old home of Shakespeare. The Quiney premises are now occupied by Edward Fox, a journalist, a printer, and a dealer in souvenirs of Shakespeare and of Stratford. That house, in old times, was officially styled The Cage, because it had been used as a prison. Standing in the cellar of it you perceive that its walls are four feet thick. There likewise are seen traces of the grooves down which the wine-casks were rolled, in the days of Shakespeare's son-in-law, Thomas Quiney. The business now carried on by Edward Fox has been established in Stratford more than a hundred years, and, as this tenant has a long lease of the building and is of[152] an energetic spirit in his pursuits, it bids fair to last as much longer. An indication of Mr. Fox's sagacity was revealed to me in the cellar, where was heaped a quantity of old oak, taken, in 1887, from the belfry of Trinity church, in which Shakespeare is buried. This oak, which was there when Shakespeare lived, and which had to be removed because a stronger structure was required for sustaining an augmented chime of heavy bells, will be converted into various carved relics, such as must find favour with Shakespeare worshippers,—of whom more than sixteen thousand visited Stratford in 1887, at least one-fourth of that number [4482] being Americans. A cross made of the belfry wood is a pleasing souvenir of the hallowed Shakespeare church. When the poet saw that church the tower was surmounted, not as now with a graceful stone spire, but with a spire of timber, covered with lead. This was removed, and was replaced by the stone spire, in 1763. The oak frame to support the bells, however, had been in the tower more than three hundred years.
The Shakespeare Memorial Theatre.
The two sculptured groups, emblematic of Comedy and Tragedy, which have been placed upon the front of the Shakespeare Memorial theatre, are the gain of a benefit performance, given in that building on August 29, 1885, by Miss Mary Anderson,[30] who then, for the first time in her life, impersonated Shakespeare's Rosalind. That actress, after her first visit to Stratford,—a private visit made in 1883,—manifested a deep interest in the town, and because of her services to the Shakespeare Memorial she is now one of its life-governors. Those services completed the exterior decorations of the building. The emblem of History had already been put in its place,—the scene in King John in which Prince Arthur melts the cruel purpose of Hubert to burn out his eyes. Tragedy is represented by Hamlet and the Gravedigger, in their colloquy over Yorick's skull. In the emblem of Comedy the figure of Rosalind is that of Miss Mary Anderson, in a boy's dress,—a figure that may be deemed inadequate to the original, but one that certainly is expressive of the ingenuous demeanour and artless grace of that gentle lady. The grounds south of the Memorial are diversified and adorned with lawns, trees, flowers, and commodious pathways, and that lovely, park-like enclosure,—thus beautified through the liberality of Charles Edward Flower [obiit, May 3, 1892], the original promoter of the Memorial,—is now free to the people, "to walk abroad and recreate themselves" beside the Avon. The picture gallery of the Memorial lacks many things that are needed. The library continues to grow, but the American department of it needs accessions. Every American edition of Shakespeare ought to be there, and every book of American origin, on a Shakespeare subject. It was at one time purposed to set up a special case, surmounted with the American ensign, for the reception of contributions from Americans. The library contained, in March, 1890, five thousand seven hundred and ninety volumes, in various languages. [Now, in 1896, it comprises about eight thousand volumes.] Of English editions of the complete works of Shakespeare it contains two hundred and nine. A Russian translation of Shakespeare, in nine volumes, appears in the collection, together with three complete editions in Dutch. An elaborate and beautiful catalogue of those treasures, made by Mr. Frederic Hawley, records them in an imperishable form. Mr. Hawley, long the librarian of the Memorial, died at Stratford on March 13, 1889, aged sixty-two, and was buried at Kensal Green, in London, his wish being that his ashes should rest in that place. Mr. Hawley had been an actor, under the name of Haywell, and he was the author of more than one tragedy, in blank verse. Mr. A. H. Wall, who succeeded him as librarian,[31] is a learned antiquary and an admired writer. To him the readers of the Stratford-upon-Avon Herald are indebted for instructive articles,—notably for those giving an account of the original Shakespeare quartos acquired for the Memorial library at the sale of the literary property of J. O. Halliwell-Phillipps. Those quartos are the Merchant of Venice, the Merry Wives of Windsor, and a first edition of Pericles. A copy of Roger of Faversham was also bought, together with two of the plays of Aphra Behn. Charles Edward Flower purchased, at that sale, a copy of the first folio of Shakespeare, and the four Shakespeare Folios, 1623, 1632, 1663, 1685, stand side by side in his private library at Avonbank. Mr. Flower intimated the intention of giving them to the Memorial library. [His death did not defeat that purpose. Those precious books are now in the Memorial collection.]
A large collection of old writings was found in a room of the Grammar School, adjacent to the Guild chapel, in 1887. About five thousand separate papers were discovered, the old commingled with the new; many of them indentures of apprenticeship; many of them receipts for money; no one of them especially important, as bearing on the Shakespeare story. Several of them are in Latin. The earliest date is 1560,—four years before the poet was born. One document is a memorandum "presenting" a couple of the wives of Stratford for slander of certain other women, and quoting their bad language with startling fidelity. Another is a letter from a citizen of London, named Smart, establishing and endowing a free school in Stratford for teaching English,—the writer quaintly remarking that schools for the teaching of Latin are numerous, while no school for teaching English exists, that he can discover. Those papers have been classified and arranged by Richard Savage, but nothing directly pertinent to Shakespeare has been found in them. I saw a deed that bore the "mark" of Joan, sister of Mary Arden, Shakespeare's mother, but this may not be a recent discovery. All those papers are written in that "cramped penmanship" which baffled Tony Lumpkin, and which baffles wiser people than he was. Richard Savage, however, is skilful in reading this crooked and queer calligraphy; and the materials and the duty of exploring them are in the right hands. When the researches and conclusions of that scholar are published they will augment the mass of evidence already extant,—much of it well presented by J. O. Halliwell-Phillipps,—that the writer of Shakespeare's plays was a man familiar with the neighbourhood, the names, and the everyday life of Stratford-upon-Avon; a fact which is not without its admonitory suggestiveness to those credulous persons who incline to heed the ignorant and idle theories and conjectures of Mr. Ignatius Donnelly. That mistaken and somewhat mischievous writer visited Shakespeare's town in the summer of 1888, and surveyed the scenes that are usually viewed. "He did not address himself to me," said Miss Chattaway, who was then at the Birthplace, as its custodian; "had he done so I should have informed him that, in Stratford, Bacon is all gammon." She was right. So it is. And not alone in Stratford, but wherever men and women have eyes to see and brains to understand.
An Old Stratford Character: George Robbins. Died September 17, 1889, aged 78.
The spot on which Shakespeare died ought surely to be deemed as sacred as the spot on which he was born: yet New Place is not as much visited as the Birthplace,—perhaps because so little of it remains. Only five hundred and thirty-seven visitors went there during the year ending April 13, 1888.[32] In repairing the custodian's house at New Place the crossed timbers in the one remaining fragment of the north wall of the original structure were found, beneath plaster. Those have been left uncovered and their dark lines add to the picturesque effect of the place. The aspect of the old house prior to 1742 is known but vaguely, if at all. Shakespeare bought it in 1597, when he was thirty-three years old, and he kept it till his death, nineteen years later. The street, Chapel lane, that separates it from the Guild chapel was narrower than it is now, and the house stood in a grassy enclosure, encompassed by a wall, the entrance to the garden being at some distance eastward in the lane, toward the river. The chief rooms in New Place were lined with square, sunken panels of oak, which covered the walls from floor to roof and probably formed the ceilings. Some of those panels,—obtained when the Rev. Francis Gastrell tore down that house in 1759,—may be seen in a parlour of the Falcon hotel, at the corner of Scholar's lane and Chapel street. There is nothing left of New Place but the old well in the cellar, the fragments of the foundation, the lintel, the armorial stone, and the fragment of wall that forms part of the custodian's house. That custodian, Mr. Bower Bulmer, a pleasant, appreciative, and genial man, died on January 17, 1888, and his widow succeeded him in office.[33] Another conspicuous and interesting Stratford figure, well known and for a long time, was John Marshall, the antiquary, who died on June 26, 1887. Mr. Marshall occupied the building next but one to the original New Place, on the north side,—the house once tenanted by Julius Shaw, one of the five witnesses to Shakespeare's will. Mr. Marshall sold Shakespeare souvenirs and quaint furniture. He had remarkable skill in carving, and his mind was full of knowledge of Shakespeare antiquities and the traditional lore of Stratford. His kindness, his eccentric ways, his elaborate forms of speech, and his love and faculty for art commended him to the respect and sympathy of all who knew him. He was a character,—and in such a place as Stratford such quaint beings are appropriate and uncommonly delightful. He will long be kindly remembered, long missed from his accustomed round. He rests now, in an unmarked grave, in Trinity churchyard, close to the bank of the Avon,—just east of the stone that marks the sepulchre of Mary Pickering; by which token the future pilgrim may know the spot. Marshall was well known to me, and we had many a talk about the antiquities of the town. Among my relics there was for some time [until at last I gave it to Edwin Booth], a precious piece of wood, bearing this inscription, written by him: "Old Oak from Shakespeare's Birth-place, taken out of the building when it was Restored in 1858 by Mr. William Holtom, the contractor for the restoration, who supplied it to John Marshall, carver, Stratford-on-Avon, and presented by him to W. Winter, August 27th, 1885, J. M." Another valued souvenir of this quaint person, given by his widow to Richard Savage, of the Birthplace,—a fine carved goblet, made from the wood of the renowned mulberry-tree planted by the poet in the garden of New Place, and cut down by the Rev. Francis Gastrell in 1756,—came into my possession, as a birthday gift from Mr. Savage, on July 15, 1891.
At the Shakespeare Birthplace you will no longer meet with those gentle ladies,—so quaint, so characteristic, so harmonious with the place,—Miss Maria Chattaway and Miss Caroline Chattaway. The former was the official custodian of the cottage, and the latter assisted her in the work of its exposition. They retired from office in June, 1889, after seventeen years of service, the former aged seventy-six, the latter seventy-eight; and now,—being infirm, and incapable of the active, incessant labour that was required of them by the multitude of visitors,—they dwell in a little house in the Warwick Road, where their friends are welcomed, and where venerable and honoured age may haunt the chimney-corner, and "keep the flame from wasting, by repose."[34] The new guardian of the Shakespeare cottage is Joseph Skipsey,[35] of Newcastle, the miner poet: for Mr. Skipsey was trained in the mines of Northumberland, was long a labourer in them, and his muse sings in the simple accents of nature. He is the author of an essay on Burns, and of various other essays and miscellaneous writings. An edition of his poems, under the title of Carols, Songs, and Ballads has been published in London, by Walter Scott, and that book will be found interesting by those who enjoy the study of original character and of a rhythmical expression that does not savour of any poetical school. Mr. Skipsey is an elderly man, with grizzled hair, a benevolent countenance, and a simple, cordial manner. He spoke to me, with much animation, about American poets, and especially about Richard Henry Stoddard, in whose rare and fine genius he manifested a deep, thoughtful, and gratifying interest. The visitor no longer hears that earnest, formal, characteristic recital, descriptive of the house, that was given daily and repeatedly, for so many years, by Miss Caroline Chattaway,—that delightful allusion to "the mighty dome" that was the "fit place for the mighty brain." The Birthplace acquires new treasures from year to year,—mainly in its library, which is kept in perfect order by Richard Savage, that ideal antiquarian, who even collects and retains the bits of the stone floor of the Shakespeare room that become detached by age. In that library is preserved the original manuscript of Wheler's History of Stratford, together with his annotated and interleaved copy of the printed book, which is thus enriched with much new material relative to the antiquities of the storied town.