CHAPTER XXII.

_Stratford—Shakspeare._

Only nine miles to Stratford-upon-Avon! With what a flush of delighted expectation I climbed the coach, and left the Warwick Arms, in the hope of beholding with my eyes, in less than two short hours, the home of Shakspeare, and that world-famous church to which he bequeathed his bones! And yet there was something like a misgiving at the heart. My imagination had been familiar, for years, with a certain ideal of Stratford, that had grown into my whole structure of thought concerning Shakspeare and his times. It had been constructed from here a print, and there a traveller’s tale, and had taken life and beauty from detached anecdotes, and little inklings of historic light, that had come sweetly to me from my boyhood, in some inexplicable manner. In part the product of enthusiastic study, when college oil, that should have been burned in honour of Euclid, and Napier, and Newton, was stealthily sacrificed at the shrine of the great master of the human heart, I had possessed for years, a Stratford of my own; a pet village of my soul, such as Shakspeare should have lived in: and now—in a few hours, all this was to be deposed forever; dull realities were to eclipse the brilliant picture of the fancy, and thenceforth I must know only the Stratford of fact. Would the realization pay me for the downfall of the vision? Alas! what is life but a continual balance between loss and gain; what pleasure do we acquire, without the sacrifice of something almost as sweet? How long the boy looks at his bright penny before he gives it for the toothsome sugar-plum; and how often the bright penny comes back to him, as the substantial wealth, of which the moment’s gratification has deprived him.

As the coach began to draw near Stratford, I found myself greatly excited; and every object began to assume a sort of conscious connection with immortal genius. The very road,—but much more the trees,—and even more, those features of the landscape which might be supposed unchanged by the lapse of centuries, seemed instinct with their past communion with a great creative mind. His spell was on them. He had once been familiar with these scenes. He had gathered many an image, many a thought, and, I doubt not, many a refreshing hope, from intercourse with their spring and summer beauties; and they had been not less instructive to him, perhaps, in the season of the sere-leaf, or in that of the wintry wind. Yonder was Charlecote—beyond the Avon: its park still stretching thro’ the vale, and hiding the old historic hall. But the thought of that juvenile deer-stalking, gave speaking life to even the distant scene. There is some sensitive principle in our nature, to which such associations so powerfully appeal, that nothing is more real, for a time, than the communion we hold with departed greatness, through the medium of objects with which it was once conversant. This reality I never felt so strongly as now. At last we came in sight of that “star-ypointing pyramid”—the spire of Stratford. The gentle tumult of feelings with which it ruffled my inmost nature, for a moment, and the calm enjoyment that succeeded, were enough to pay me for crossing the Atlantic.

I was duly set down at the Red Horse Inn, and ushered into the trim little parlour, and even into the elbow-chair, of which I had read, aforetime, in the pages of Geoffrey Crayon. Mine host readily recognizes an American, and never fails to produce, on such an occasion, the “sceptre” of the said Geoffrey, wherewith he once poked the coals, in the smoking grate of said parlour, and, for a tranquil moment, was “monarch of all he surveyed.” Indeed, if Shakspeare reigns in Stratford, it must be allowed that the Red Horse is, nevertheless, the principality of Crayon, and that it is rapidly rising into a formidable rivalship of New Place, and the Guildhall, on the strength of Crayon’s reputation, to say nothing of the landlord’s ale. In short, no visitor to Stratford has ever left there such a lasting impression of his footsteps, as our own delightful Irving: and it was pleasant, indeed, thus, at the very threshold of my visit, to find, even in the broad glare of Shakspeare’s glory, the star of our countryman revolving steadily in its own peculiar orbit, and shining as no mean satellite of that great central sun of Anglo-Saxon literature.

I should be a bold man, indeed, to attempt to add anything to Irving’s description of Stratford-upon-Avon. I have only the adventures of my day to tell of, and they were few and simple. I followed in the beaten track to the old tumble-down cottage, which is called the birth-place of Shakspeare, and which was doubtless the scene of his infancy. I recognized at once, the original of many a well-thumbed print, and of many a descriptive page. Timber from the forest of Arden; clay from the bed of the Avon; sticks and mud at best compose the nest in which the Mighty Mother brought the immortal Swan to light. It was once a better nest than now. A butcher has degraded it to serve as shambles, and it has yet the appearance of a stall for meat, although it is no longer used, except as a relic, the show-woman being its only tenant. Here, in spite of its transmutations, you cannot but fancy the elder Shakspeare, “with spectacles on nose,” sitting in the spacious chimney, and teaching little Will his alphabet, or telling him, beside the winter’s fire, of the “mysteries” he had seen played, near by, at Coventry, when he was a boy. Through the door, you seem yet to see the marvellous urchin, with his satchel, creeping unwillingly to school: or, back he comes, with shining face, to tell that the Queen’s players have just arrived from London, to play “Troy-town,” at the Guildhall! Here, at all events, day after day went over that mysterious young head, filling it with impressions, not one of which ever seems to have escaped it, and preparing its tenant genius to be the great bridge between old and modern England, by means of which, feeling, as well as fact, runs on continuously, in the line of English History, and gives it a unity and a vitality which the annals of other nations lack. Oh, strange, immortal, universal Will! How supernatural the interest that hangs about thine every step, from the cradle to the grave.

You ascend a few creaking stairs, and you are in the very room where the first of his Seven Ages was, no doubt, duly signalized by himself, “mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.” How many lives have been the mere pendants of the life that here flickered in its first lighting, and which a puff of air might have put out—the world none the sadder for its loss! Yet now, how supreme the dominion of that one soul, these scribbled walls attest; where vulgar enthusiasm is not more legible, than that of the worldly great, of foreign scholars and sovereign princes, and of intellectual autocrats scarce less imperial than Shakspeare himself. How powerful the inspiration of the _genius loci_, is best proved by the fact that among the scribblings one reads the autograph of Walter Scott. Verily, there is no fame like Shakspeare’s! Subduing, as he does, the instincts of all classes alike, and entering as he does, into the sympathies of all nations, he must be regarded less as a man of genius, than as a noble instrument of God, for subordinating human passions and affections to some superior purpose of His own, perhaps not yet conceived. The rise of a Christian literature, and that the purest which the world has ever possessed, is dated from the age of which he was the bright peculiar star; and the whole Anglo-Saxon race must ever recognize in him the original master of many of its forms of thought, a rich contributor to its idiom and language, and the constructor of some of its strongest sentiments of civilization, of morals, and of religion.

The site of the New Place is occupied by a solid mansion, which, devoid of interest in itself, commands a moment’s attention, as occupying the spot on which Shakspeare’s prosperous days were passed, and which was emphatically his home. All that remains of him, in this place, and its immediate neighbourhood, is nevertheless soon seen and dismissed, as nothing but the enthusiasm of an idolator would detect anything specially attractive in a statue set up by Garrick at the Town Hall, and a few other memorials, too minute, or too modern, to deserve much delay in their inspection. I reserved my raptures for the walk to Shottery. Striking into the fields, I pleased myself with the conviction that air and earth are still very much the same in them, as when the boy Shakspeare played truant, and sported among their sweets. The birds and the flowers are still as gay as when he preferred to learn their lessons, rather than the schoolmaster’s; and when I turned into a shady lane, all green and white with hawthorn, or plucked the peas’ blossom in the upland, or the buttercup and daisy in the meadow, I felt sure that his foot had fallen where they grew, and that they had given him pleasure, and taught him morals, which the world has willingly taken at second-hand, and will never “willingly let die.” Yes, the very labouring oxen, and the pasturing cows, seemed to me of a superior breed. Short-horn, or Devonshire, or whatever they may be to the farmer, they were, in my esteem, not less than Shaksperean beef fed on the grass of Stratford, and feeding my imagination with images of the animated nature of the same scenery, as it was three hundred years ago. I came to several pretty farm cottages, with shrubbery in their little door-yards, and at one of these I knocked, thinking it must be Anne Hathaway’s; but the damsel who opened the door seemed not much flattered by the inquiry, for Anne, though she was Shakspeare’s wife, was not an honest woman, by the parish register, and has little honour in her own village. However, the damsel pointed out my way, with milk-maid courtesy, and away I went with traveller-like apologies. Here, then, at last, was the scene of Will’s discreditable courtship; and here, if they deceived me not, descendants of the Hathaways live still. The house is in two parts, like nave and chancel in ecclesiastical architecture; timbered and plastered, like the birth-place aforesaid, and thatched in the picturesque style so dear to Crayon artists and sketchers; its little windows peeping out of the straw, like sharp eyes under the shaggy brows of an old pensioner, sunning himself in front of an ale-house. I am glad to say that roses, and other flowers, were duly set about the cottage, as one which I plucked, and brought away, bears witness. They showed me some old Hathaway furniture, and among others an enormous bedstead of Elizabethan date, on which, they would have me believe, that many of the poet’s dreams had visited him. There was also an ancient oaken chair: and finally, some bed and table linen was taken out of an old chest. It was evidently homespun, and they believed it to be Anne’s work, as well as property. With this view of the matter, however, the initials E. H. did not entirely agree, and although I was inclined to yield this objection at the moment, when credulity was allowable, I do not now flatter myself that I have seen the bedstead or the bed-clothes of Shakspeare. It is something better that I have seen the Church in which he was christened, and where he now lies, under the chancel; and where he was taught to pray; and where he often knelt, one would fain believe, in true contrition; and where he learned, from some lowly parson, unknown to fame, many of those sublime and gospel verities, which have given, even to his poorer themes, their savor of immortality.

The avenue of limes which leads to the church-porch, is rather stiff than otherwise. The “way to Parish Church” was probably unpaved, and perhaps unshaded, when Will tottered over it, to be catechised; or when, in maturer years, he sought the House of God with reverence, among the multitude that kept holy day. The Church itself is of Anglo-Norman date, and was originally such in its architecture, but has frequently been altered and repaired, at various periods. It is cruciform, and would be not unworthy of a visit for its own sake. The churchyard is full of graves, and the Avon flows under its walls. I sat there, for nearly an hour, quite alone, trying to grasp the full idea of the spot. A lubberly scow came paddling along on the turbid river; and the rooks started up, and then lighted upon the old gray tower; and some sheep came nibbling among the graves; and finally, two or three children ran about me, and kept me company, for awhile; but oh! how unconscious seemed all these of the great reality of the place, and how still and solemnly the poet slumbered on, in his sepulchre, unconscious of this prosy nineteenth century, which thus wags on without him. I took out my tablets in a sort of reverie; wrote down the date, and scribbled on at random, as follows: ‘Here, in the churchyard of Stratford, I am sitting on the stone-wall, which defends it from the Avon, and at the foot of which, its fringe of flags grows rank, amid the slime. The sun, through the half-misty atmosphere, is falling tenderly on the limes; birds are singing; a rook cawing; nobody is near, but the breeze whispers, socially, through the elms overhead. How still the old spire points up to heaven! How dearly the grass clings to the tower and belfry, growing there in every “coigne of vantage!” And this quiet old chancel, too! Within these walls was Shakspeare made a member of Christ, and here he waits the Judgment. Oh, Will! how much for thee imports the Scripture, “_by thy words_ thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned!”’

The old legendary sexton of Irving’s visit has passed away, and another reigns in his stead. Availing myself of his keys, I excused him from any further effort of his tongue, and surveyed the solemn interior in peace. Here, too, the hand of restoration has been freshly at work, and has set the holy house in order. The Church which enfolds the tomb of Shakspeare is dedicated to the Holy Trinity—the God who made him, and whom he adored. The meagre god of unbelief would never have filled such a soul as his, or moved him to kneel down; but how often that overwhelming Mystery of Faith must have thrilled him here, as he repeated the creed, or chanted the _Te Deum!_ At last I stood before the famous bust, and looked upon that sublime forehead, and those composed features, and said to it silently those brotherly lines of Milton, which the sight brings naturally to mind. Then I read the inscription, and spelled out, letter by letter, the words of that imprecatory verse, in which Shakspeare’s self is as legible as anything else. “Good friend, for Jesu’s sake,” etc.—_Amen_, was my response. It was a moment to remember, but not to describe.

I next tried to satisfy myself as to the sense of _Mistriss Hall’s_ epitaph, which is ambiguous; and on which the inspection of the original throws little additional light. It tells us _first_, that she was “witty above her sexe,” and _second_, that she was “wise to salvation,” and then adds:

“Something of Shakspeare was in _that_—but _this_ Wholly of him, with whom she’s now in blisse.”

Now, of course, this _him_ must mean her Saviour, with whom she is in Paradise; yet, it may mean, for all that, her father Shakspeare; and the question is, was not the ambiguity a quaint conceit, and intended to be a doublet? If so, as it has often struck me, whatever we may think of its taste, it is an important testimony to the maturer character of the poet; since its secondary meaning would be, to give it in paraphrase—that her wit had something in it of Shakspeare, but that her piety was wholly learned of her father, with whom she now reaps its reward. Now if we exclude this idea, it would almost seem to force us into the sad reverse; for certainly, as it is first read, it seems to imply that she was not indebted to her father for any of her religion, though she was for her wit. Of course, it may be answered, that _wisdom unto salvation_ is so exclusively from Christ, as its meritorious cause, that nothing else is to be taken into account, as its instrument; but is this the sole idea of the verse? Very likely; and yet after all, I wonder that its ambiguous character has never attracted the attention of the many who have raked and scraped the very dust of Stratford for something rich and strange. Certain it is, that, like many readings of Shakspeare himself, it wants but a change of emphasis, from word to word, to give two or three different senses, any one of which is tolerable, although it is an intolerably bad epitaph, after all.

I believe the droppings of this Church of Stratford bedew the works of Shakspeare, from the first sonnet to the last play, and that here he was schooled to that strict law of his dramas, which runs through all, and by which he always “shows virtue her own feature, and scorn her own image,” instead of fitting the mask of propriety upon the front of shame. More than all, it was here that he learned that reverence for the name of Jesus, with which he so often embalms his pages, and which so often makes them melodious to a believer’s ear and heart. How much, too, the first and second lesson out of “the Bishop’s Bible”—how much the Epistle and Gospel, and the Psalter, taught him, not only of sonorous English, but of Christian doctrine and morals! I am sure these influences may be detected in his works; and as I looked at the very spot where his young idea was taught to shoot toward heaven, I felt that this was the sublimest association of the place. Here once (my fancy suggested) he may have heard in the lesson for the day—_suffer chyldren to come unto Me_, and then, a few verses afterwards, he must have been struck with the contrast, when the parson read on—_it is easier for a camell to go thorow a nedle’s eye_, etc. He was now a prosperous man, and had just purchased New-Place, and obtained a grant of Arms. His conscience therefore pricked him with the question—Was he one of the rich men for whom admission into heaven was to be so hard? The parson mounted the pulpit, and quoted much learned stuff out of Sir John Maundeville, to explain the orientalism of the lesson: and among other things, he threw out the idea that the postern gate of an Eastern city was so small, that it was impossible for a beast of burthen to pass through it, and was usually called “the needle’s eye,” and hence the force of the comparison. All this, Shakspeare, who was thinking his own thoughts, heard only incoherently, and he got a somewhat confused idea of the _postern_ and _needle_; but being, just then, at work on his Richard the Second, he goes home, and puts his Sunday reverie into the mouth of his hero, thus:—

“My thoughts of things divine are intermixed With scruples, and do set the word itself Against the word, As thus—_Come little ones_; and then, again, _It is as hard to come, as for a camel_ _To thread the postern of a needle’s eye._”

Such at least is the story, which this passage suggests to me as, very possibly, the way in which it came to him. I often trace to a similar source, that is, to the open Scriptures, and the vernacular services of the Church of England, the innumerable Siloan streams which freshen and even sanctify his verse. The great themes of redemption may be found richly illustrated in many passages; and I think I could select from his works enough of sacred poetry to fill a little volume, and one fit to be kept as a companion to the Prayer-Book and the Christian Year. I cannot credit the scandal that Shakspeare died of a debauch, nor do I believe he was less than an ordinary Christian. While the secrets of his heart are with his God, we may at least, in Christian charity, believe that the friend of publicans and sinners may have seen in him a practical dependence upon that Atonement which, by the mouth of Portia, he has preached so well:—

—“Therefore, Jew, Though justice be thy plea, consider this, That in the course of justice none of us Should see salvation; we do pray for mercy.”

As I departed, I plucked a branch of ivy from the Church wall, near the spot where his dust awaits the resurrection. It was brought home with me to America—the land in which he has more readers than anywhere else in the whole world. How little he foresaw this, when in compliment to James the First, he recorded (if the passage be his own) the prediction that James should “make new nations;” adding—what proves rather true of himself—

“Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine, His honour, and the greatness of his name Shall be!”

A threatening rain prevented my walking to Charlecote, but I went away contented. I was inclined to indulge a little in Jacques’ vein, and the melancholy clouds began to favour us with congenial tears, as—reduced to sober prose—I made my way in the storm, on the top of a stage-coach, through what was once the Forest of Arden.