the deeds, and LAWRENCE's seal, bearing his initials 'H. L.,' was stamped in each case on the parchmenttag, across the head of which Shakespeare wrote his name. In all three documents-the two indentures and the mortgage-deed-Shakespeare is described as 'of Stratford-on-Avon, in the Countie of Warwick, Gentleman.' There is no reason to suppose that he acquired the house for his own residence. He at once leased the property to John Robinson, already a resident in the neighbourhood.

With puritans and puritanism Shakespeare was not in sympathy,' and he could hardly have viewed with unvarying composure the steady progress that puritanism was making among his fellow-townsmen. Nevertheless a preacher, doubtless of puritan proclivities, was entertained at Shakespeare's residence, New Place, after delivering a sermon in the spring of 1614. The incident might serve to illustrate Shakespeare's characteristic placability, but his son-in-law Hall, who avowed sympathy with puritanism, was pro

'Shakespeare's references to puritans in the plays of his middle and late life are so uniformly discourteous that they must be judged to reflect his personal feeling. The discussion between Maria and Sir Andrew Aguecheek regarding Malvolio's character in Twelfth Night (11. iii. 153 et seq.) runs :

MARIA. Marry, sir, sometimes he is a kind of puritan.

SIR ANDREW. O! if I thought that, I'd beat him like a dog.

SIR TOBY. What, for being a puritan? thy exquisite reason, dear knight. SIR ANDREW. I have no exquisite reason for 't, but I have reason good enough. In Winter's Tale (IV. iii. 46) the Clown, after making contemptuous references to the character of the shearers, remarks that there is but one puritan amongst them, and he sings psalms to hornpipes.' Cf. the allusions to 'grace' and 'election' in Cymbeline, p. 250, note 1.

bably in the main responsible for the civility. In July John Combe, a rich inhabitant of Stratford, died and left 51. to Shakespeare. The legend that Shakespeare alienated him by composing some doggerel on his practice of lending money at ten or twelve per cent. seems apocryphal, although it is quoted by Aubrey and accepted by Rowe.2 Combe's death involved Shakespeare more conspicuously than before in civic affairs. Combe's heir William no sooner succeeded to his father's lands than he, with a neighbouring owner, Arthur Mannering, steward of Lord-chancellor Ellesmere (who was ex-officio lord of the manor), attempted

The town council of Stratford-on-Avon, whose meeting-chamber almost overlooked Shakespeare's residence of New Place, gave curious proof of their puritanic suspicion of the drama on February 7, 1612, when they passed a resolution that plays were unlawful and the sufferance of them against the orders heretofore made and against the example of other well-governed cities and boroughs,' and the council was therefore 'content,' the resolution ran, that the penalty of xs. imposed [on players heretofore] be xli. henceforward.' Ten years later the King's players were bribed by the council to leave the city without playing. (See the present writer's Stratford-on-Avon, p. 270.)

* The lines as quoted by Aubrey (Lives, ed. Clark, ii. 226) run :

Ten-in-the-hundred the Devil allows,

But Combe will have twelve he sweares and he vowes;

If any man ask, who lies in this tomb?

Oh! ho! quoth the Devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe.

Rowe's version opens somewhat differently :

Ten-in-the-hundred lies here ingrav'd.

'Tis a hundred to ten, his soul is not sav'd.

The lines, in one form or another, seem to have been widely familiar in Shakespeare's lifetime, but were not ascribed to him. The first two in Rowe's version were printed in the epigrams by H[enry] P[arrot], 1608, and again in Camden's Remaines, 1614. The whole first appeared in Richard Brathwaite's Remains in 1618 under the heading: Upon one John Combe of Stratford upon Aven, a notable Usurer, fastened upon a Tombe that he had Caused to be built in his Life Time.'

Attempt to

Stratford

common fields.

to enclose the common fields, which belonged to the corporation of Stratford, about his estate at enclose the Welcombe. The corporation resolved to offer the scheme a stout resistance. Shakespeare had a twofold interest in the matter by virtue of his owning the freehold of 106 acres at Welcombe and Old Stratford, and as joint owner-now with Thomas Greene, the town clerk-of the tithes of Old Stratford, Welcombe, and Bishopton. His interest in his freeholds could not have been prejudicially affected, but his interest in the tithes might be depreciated by the proposed enclosure. Shakespeare consequently joined with his fellow-owner Greene in obtaining from Combe's agent Replingham in October 1614 a deed indemnifying both against any injury they might suffer from the enclosure. But having thus secured himself against all possible loss, Shakespeare threw his influence into Combe's scale. In November 1614 he was on a last visit to London, and Greene, whose official position as town clerk compelled him to support the corporation in defiance of his private interests, visited him there to discuss the position of affairs. On December 23, 1614, the corporation in formal meeting drew up a letter to Shakespeare imploring him to aid them. Greene himself sent to the dramatista note of inconveniences [to the corporation that] would happen by the enclosure.' But although an ambiguous entry of a later date (Septem ber 1615) in the few extant pages of Greene's ungrammatical diary has been unjustifiably tortured into an expression of disgust on Shakespeare's part