document was lent to him by Moseley, fabricated a will and returned his fabrication to Moseley instead of the original document, is to suppose what is absurd. The original document was already known to Moseley and Payton, and was subsequently again in their possession, and transmitted by them as genuine through Davenport to Malone. They must therefore have perceived at once any discrepancy between Jordan's copy and the original, and it is simply incredible that had such existed, neither Moseley, Payton, Davenport, nor Malone should ever have exposed Jordan's forgery, nor entered a word of protest against its circulation.

Further, we may ask, what motive was there for such a forgery? There was no controversy then as to John Shakespeare's religion, nor did the Ireland forgeries, prompted according to Malone by this very will, appear till eleven years later. The history of the forged will of William Shakespeare offers an instructive contrast indeed to that of the will of John Shakespeare. Ireland produced a will professedly made by William Shakespeare, having found it, he said, in the house of a gentleman whose name he could not give. The contents of this document are of a colourless, stilted character, and Ireland's son Samuel Henry admitted, within twelve months of the publication, that he had himself fabricated the document, though without his father's knowledge. The will of John Shakespeare was found in Mr. Hart's house by Moseley, a man of unimpeachable

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integrity, and his statement as to its discovery is confirmed by independent testimony. The genuineness of the will is guaranteed by a chain of witnesses during some thirty or forty years, and its contents are in complete agreement, as has been shown, with the spiritual testaments drawn up by Catholics at that period. Against the evidence, internal and external, in favour of the will, the unsupported assumption of its forgery is not, we think, tenable. The will has therefore a right in our judgment to be regarded as genuine till further evidence to the contrary be adduced, and thus we leave it as forming the last witness to John Shakespeare's religious belief.

There is good reason, then, for believing that the poet's parents were Catholics. But it is objected the fact remains that the poet himself, whatever was the religion of his parents, was baptized, married, and buried in the Protestant Church.

First, then, as regards the baptism. Catholic parents knew that if the matter and form were duly applied, that sacrament was valid, by whomsoever administered, lay or cleric, heretic or Catholic. The law enforced the baptism of all children by the minister in the Parish Church, and we shall see in the Recusancy-return how carefully evidence was taken on this head. There was a great difficulty in finding a priest, and Catholics, even the parents of the child, were subjected to severe penalties for conferring that sacrament. Lord Montague, for baptizing

his own son, was visited by a pursuivant, forced to dismiss all his servants, and incurred much persecution. So, too, as regards marriage; the non-performance of the ceremony at the Parish Church always aroused suspicions that the services of a priest had been secretly employed. Thus Arden, we find, was examined concerning his daughter's marriage to Somerville. "Where was he married? in what church? and by what minister? Did not Hall the priest marry Somerville and your daughter at a Mass, at which you were present?" Shakespeare, then, like his connection Somerville, may have been secretly married by some priest, and when the persecution waxed hot in 1581-82, obtained a licence from the Bishop of Worcester, both to screen his secret espousals and to obtain a legal certificate of his union. His burial in the Protestant Church proves nothing as to his religion, for it was the only official place of interment, for priests as well as laity, when there were no Catholic cemeteries. F. Thurston mentions three priests, besides Dr. Petre, Vicar of the Western District in the last century, all of whom were buried in Protestant Churches.2

The performance of these three rites according to the new creed prove, then, nothing conclusively as to the poet's religion. We believe, however, that surer evidence as to his religion is to be found by considering the creed and politics of his friends,

1 Dom. Eliz., vol. clxvii. No. 59.

2 Month, May 1882, 12.

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associates, and patrons. The Protestant and Catholic parties in Warwickshire, as well as in every part of the kingdom, were in a position of bitter antagonism, and in this strife the poet soon became involved. The leader of the Protestant party in Shakespeare's county was the new upstart favourite Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Absolutely devoid of principle, religious or other, and at times indeed favourable to Catholics, as for instance in his relations with Campion, he found it to his interests in Warwickshire to play the part of a zealous Puritan; and he thus secured the support of the Grenvilles, Lucys, the Combes, the Porters and others, all zealous adherents of the new religion. Leicester's iniquities, his criminal relations with the Lady Sheffield and Lady Essex, his murder of both their husbands and of his own wife at Cumnor, were condoned or ignored by his partisans, in return for his Puritan zeal.1 Not so, however, with the Catholics, and conspicuous among them in his sturdy independence was Edward Arden, the Squire of Parkhall, and the cousin of Shakespeare's mother. He refused to wear the Earl's livery, and openly expressed his disgust at his infamies. Arden was supported in his contest by the prayers and good wishes of all that was respectable in the county, but the Earl had the machinery of Cecil's statecraft at his command, and knew how to use it. In 1583, Somerville, Arden's son-in-law, a youth of naturally weak mind, which had become still further 1 Parsons, "Leicester's Commonwealth."

unbalanced by his brooding over the wrongs of Catholics, went up to London with the avowed purpose of shooting the Queen. This was Leicester's opportunity. Somerville was arrested, as were also the Ardens and Hall, their chaplain. They were indicted for treason at Warwick, but fearing Arden's popularity there, Leicester got the venue changed to London. They were all condemned. Somerville was found strangled in Newgate, Arden suffered a traitor's death at Smithfield, his wife, his daughter, Mrs. Somerville, and Hall the chaplain endured a long imprisonment at the Tower. One of Leicester's henchmen, meanwhile, was in possession of Arden's and Somerville's estates, till he was finally ejected by Arden's son.

But what has this to do with Shakespeare? Mr. Simpson hazarded the supposition that he had served Arden in the capacity first of a page, and then in that of a legal secretary or agent, under the assumed name of William Thacker. The Edinburgh Reviewer has, however, since shown that William Thacker was a real personage. But, even though Shakespeare had not been a member of the Arden household, the poet's blood connection with the Ardens could have scarcely suffered him to remain indifferent to the bitter persecutions they endured. He was, at this time, an ardent youth of nineteen; was there any one on whom he could in any way avenge the wrong done to his own kith and kin? Within a few miles of Stratford lay the property of Sir Thomas Lucy, the