THE HOME OF SHAKSPERE.

LL that is known with any degree of certainty concerning Shakspere is that he was born at Stratford-upon-Avon--married and had children there went to London, where he commenced actor, and wrote poems and plays - returned to Stratford, made his will, died, and was buried. Such is the concise biography of our greatest poet, as given by Steevens; and although volumes have been written, more or less conjectural, on his life and times, they scarcely add a single fact to the meagre list of ordinary events he has enumerated. Slight, however, as these notices are, they invest the humble town of Stratford-on-Avon with an interest which it would not otherwise possess. It was peculiarly the home of Shakspere: here he was born; here he passed his early youth; here he courted and won Anne Hathaway; here he sought that retirement which the avocations of his London career would occasionally allow him to indulge in; and here, when in riper age he had won honours and fortune in the great capital, he chose to return, and pass the latter days of a life where he had first seen the light at Stratford he died and was buried. "From the birthplace of Shakspere," says Washington Irving, a few paces brought me to his grave." All that connects itself with the personal history of " the world's poet" at Stratford is thus almost as closely con

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densed as are the few words quoted above, which form his biography. A day at Stratford affords ample time to visit all these places; they lie so close, that a few minutes' walk only separates them. In these days of change, when the birthplace of the Poet is scarcely safe, and Stratford is threatened with the spoliation of what little remains to it, it must be a work of interest to record and picture the few relics connected with the Bard of Avon, the more particularly as alterations are continually taking place there; which, if they do not destroy, do at least change the aspect of much that is interesting to all lovers of the poet, and "their name is legion." We will therefore conduct the reader over Stratford and its neighbourhood, minutely describing all that at present exists, and enumerating what has passed away, commencing our journey at

SHAKSPERE'S BIRTHPLACE.

The house in Henley Street, as it at present exists, is but a fragment of the original building as purchased by John Shakspere, the Poet's father, in 1574, ten years exactly after the birth of his son William, the entry of whose baptism is dated in the parish register, April 26, 1564. John Shakspere had purchased in 1555 a copyhold house in Henley Street, but this was not the house now shewn as the Poet's birthplace; he had also another copyhold residence in Greenhill Street, and some property at Ingon, a mile and a quarter from Stratford, on the road to Warwick. From these circumstances a modern doubt has been cast on the truthfulness of the tradition which assigns the house in Henley Street to be the Poet's birthplace. Mr. Knight says: "William Shakspere, then, might have been born at either of his father's copyhold houses in Greenhill Street or in Henley Street; he might have been born at Ingon, or his father might have occupied one of the two freehold houses in Henley Street at the

time of the birth of his eldest son. Tradition says that William Shakspere was born in one of these houses; tradition points out the very room in which he was born. Let us not disturb the belief." A wise conclusion! Antiquarian credulity has given place to an extreme degree of scepticism; and from believing too much, we are now too much given to believe too little: add to this the anxiety which many evince to write about Shakspere, although little else but conjecture in its vaguest form be the result; and the value of the modern conjecture as opposed to the ancient tradition may very readily be estimated. Let Stratford ever sacredly preserve the venerable structure with which she is entrusted; pilgrims from all climes have felt a glow of enthusiasm beneath the humble roof in Henley Street. Let no rude pen destroy such heart - homage, or seek to deprive us of the little we possess connected with our immortal countryman!

When John Shakspere purchased this house from Edmund Hall for forty pounds, it was described in the legal documents as two messuages, two gardens, and two orchards, with their appurtenances. It passed at his death to his son William, and from him to his sister Joan Hart, who was residing there in 1639, and probably until her death in 1646. Throughout the Poet's life the house is thus intimately connected with him. Its original features may be seen in our first view, which was taken in 1769. It was a large building, the timbers of substantial oak, the walls filled in with plaster. The dormer windows and gable, the deep porch, the projecting parlour, and bay window, all contribute to render it exceedingly picturesque. The division of the house into two tenements is here very visible. The changes it has undergone since this view was taken, and which has reduced the original building to a mere fragment, will be best understood by a glance at our next two views. In 1792, when Ireland visited the house, it exhibited the appearance given in the upper portion

of our third plate. The dormer windows and gable had been removed; the bay window beneath the gable had given place to an ordinary flat lattice-window of four lights; the porch in front of that portion of the building in which Shakspere was born was removed, and a butcher's shop-front constructed. At this time there lived here a descendant of Joan Hart, sister to the Poet, who pursued the humble occupation of a butcher. The other half of the house was at this time converted into an inn, and ultimately sunk into a low public-house. It had been known as the Maidenhead Inn in 1642; and when, in 1806, the house was disposed of to Mr. Thomas Court, who became "mine host" thereof, he combined that name with the one it then held of the Swan. About 1820, excited by a desire for " 'improvement," he destroyed the original appearance of this portion of the building by constructing a new red-brick front, exactly of the approved fashion in which rows of houses are built in small towns, and which consists generally of an alternate door and window, repeated at regular intervals below, while a monotonous range of windows above effectually repulses attention. This brings us to its present aspect, delineated in the lower cut of Plate 3. The house is now divided into three tenements; the central one is the portion set apart for exhibition, in the back rooms of which live the proprietors; the shop, the room above, and the kitchen, are sacred to visitors. When the lower part of the central tenement was made to serve for a butcher's shop, its window was removed, and has not been replaced; and when the butcher's trade ceased, a few years since, no attempt at restoration was made, and the shop still retains the signs of its late occupation. The old window in the upper story, originally a lattice of three lights, had been altered into one of four; and modern squares of glass usurped the place of the old leaded diamond-panes. A board for flower-pots was erected in front of the window; but more recently a large, obtrusive, rudely-painted sign-board pro

jects from the front

to tell us "the immortal Shakspeare was born in this house." Such is its present external aspect : "it is a small, mean-looking edifice," says Irving; it was not so in Shakspere's time.

Ascending the step, we pass into the shop. The door is divided into a hatch, and we look back into the street above the lower half, and through the open window of the shop, with its projecting stall for meat, and its wooden roof above. The walls of this room are of plaster, and the solid oak beams rest on the stone foundation. On entering, the visitor looks towards the kitchen, through the open door communicating with the shop. On the right is a roomy fireplace, the sides built of brick, and having the chimney-piece above cut with a lowpointed arch out of a massive beam of oak. To the left of the door is a projection in the wall, which forms a recess or "bacon cupboard," the door of which opens in the side of the kitchen chimney of the adjoining room. The floor is covered with flag-stones, broken into fifty varied shapes; the