scene ii., which is noteworthy. Hamlet, speaking to Horatio, says:--

"I sat me down Devised a new commission; wrote it fair; I once did hold it, as our statists do, A baseness to write fair, and labour'd much How to forget that learning; but, Sir, now It did me yeomans service."

The nature of this statement is so personal that it could only have been written as the result of experience. Hamlet had been taught, when young, to write a hand so fair that he was capable of producing a fresh commission which would pass muster as the work of a Court copyist. The annotation of these books possessed the same qualification. In the margins of these books are abundant references in handwriting to the whole range of classical authors.

A copy of the "Grammatice Compendium" of Lactus Pomponius, a very rare book printed by De Fortis in Venice in 1484, contains on the margins the boy's scribble and drawings, besides a number of manuscript notes. It bears traces of his reading probably at eight years of age. A large folio volume entitled "T. Livii Palvini Latinae Historiae Principis Decades Tres," published by Frobenius in 1535, is a treasure. It is most copiously annotated and embellished with sketches. The notes are usually in Latin, but interspersed with Greek and sometimes with English. Obviously the writer thought in Latin, and the character of the drawings justifies the assumption that, at the time, his age would be from ten to fourteen years.

The most remarkable reference to these annotations is to be found in the "Rape of Lucrece." The fifteenth stanza is as follows:--

"But she that never cop't with straunger eies, Could picke no meaning from their parling lookes, _Nor read the subtle shining secrecies Writ in the glassie margents of such bookes_, Shee toucht no unknown baits, nor feared no hooks, Nor could shee moralize his wanton sight More than his eies were opend to the light."

It would be difficult to conceive a more inappropriate simile for the lustful looks in Tarquin's eyes than "the subtle shining secrecies, writ in the glassie margents of such books." That this is lugged in for a purpose outside the object of the poem is manifest. How many readers of "Lucrece" would know of such a practice? Nay. If it did exist, was not its use very rare?

But the margin of the verse itself yields a subtle shining secret! The initial letters of the lines are B, C, N, W, Sh, N, M. It is only necessary to supply the vowels--BACoN, W. Sh., NaMe. Sh is on line 103, which is the numerical value of the word Shakespeare. The numerical value of Bacon is 33. In view of this the line 33 is significant:--"Why is Colatine the publisher?" The use of the word _publisher_ here is quite inappropriate. It is introduced for some reason outside the purpose of the text.

The "Rape of Lucrece" commences with Bacon's monogram and, as the late Rev. Walter Begley pointed out, ends with his signature.

The theory now advanced is that when Bacon read a book he made marginal notes in it--the object being mainly to assist his memory, but the critical notes are numerous. It does not follow that all these books constituted his library. He would read a book and it having served his purpose he would dispose of it. Some books no doubt he would retain and these would form his library.

The annotations are chiefly in Latin, but some are in Greek, some in Hebrew, French and Spanish. When these have been examined and translated the meaning of the phrase that he had taken all knowledge to be his province will be better understood. Rawley says: "He read much and that with great judgment and rejection of impertinences incident to many authors."

The writer having examined annotations, many and varied, of books in his library, and having enjoyed the privilege of free access to those collected by Mr. Safford, ventures to assert that much of the ripe learning of the Shakespeare plays can be traced therein to its proper origin. Amongst the former is a copy of Alciat's Emblems, 1577, in the early part profusely annotated. Ben Jonson in his "Discoveries" has incorporated the translation of a portion of one of the Emblems and _has also incorporated a portion of the annotations from this very book_.

FOOTNOTES:

[52] Edwin A. Abbot, in his work, "Francis Bacon," p. 447, writes, "Bacon's style (as a writer) varied almost as much as his handwriting."