William Shakespeare as He Lived: An Historical Tale

Let the reader glide over some four or five months from the date of the transactions we have first narrated, and again look upon Stratford-upon-Avon. No trace remains of the dea...

A week has elapsed since Sir Hugh Clopton paid his visit to Charlecote. He has been a few days returned to his own home again, and is filled with pleasurable sensations on accou...

On the skirts of the county of Warwick (saith a modern author), situated on the low meadowy banks of a river, there is a little quiet country town, boasting nothing to attract t...

The rudeness of the keepers and their overbearing style towards the villagers, was by no means an uncommon occurrence. Backed up by their employers to display as much roughness...

The arrival of strangers to take up their abode for any length of time in such a town as Stratford-upon-Avon, always furnished matter of curiosity and speculation amongst the in...

And now a new epoch seems to have arrived, and England (for the time being) may indeed be called "_merrie England_." The good old days of good Queen Bess are now in full force....

Meanwhile, as misfortunes seldom come but in battalions, Sir Hugh Clopton (even before he had heard of the appearance of the disease) had been arrested of high treason, and carr...

In our times the profession of an actor presents a picture of uninterrupted drudgery and discomfort. In Elizabeth's day such was not the case. There was not then that continual...

About three weeks after the departure of Clara de Mowbray, a stout-timbered vessel, built after the peculiar fashion of the time, and yet in something improved in its constructi...

Our readers, we doubt not, have for some time entertained a shrewd suspicion regarding the somewhat indistinct character latterly flitting about amongst the _dramatis personae_...

On the night which followed the action we have described, and which the inhabitants of Stratford long afterwards called the fray of the Checquers, Sir Hugh Clopton held an old a...

After absence from a well-known locality how fresh and verdant seems every spot there. The mind which has dwelt, again and again, upon every nook and corner, unmarked perhaps an...

One week has elapsed since the events narrated in the last chapter. The house of Clopton is shut up, empty, deserted. The good Sir Hugh is again at liberty; but the seas flow be...

Although his own desire for the society of its amiable inmates might reasonably have led the youth to repeat his visit, his better judgment would have hindered him from so soon...

Our scene shifts now from the pleasant fields and sylvan retreats in which we have so long lingered, and changes to the great metropolis of England--London, in the olden time--a...

At the present time, when every street and thoroughfare of a country town has its public-house filled with the noisy refuse of an overwhelming population, and absolutely roaring...

The Lucy family we have already had occasion to notice as descended from an ancient and honourable house. They might indeed say with Christopher Sly--"We came in with Richard Co...

When the curtain rose, it discovered the representation of a private street, very rudely painted upon a sort of hanging screen at the back of the stage, with a couple of wings t...

After young Shakespeare had safely deposited Goodman Doubletongue at his own door, and left him in charge of the good housewife, he turned his steps towards the Falcon, with the...

In a former chapter we have seen the sharp and sententious Lawyer Grasp, in the act of girding up his loins and preparing to set forth upon a somewhat important mission: a matte...

Our situation as recorder of events connected with this history, whilst it enables us to look from an elevated position upon those connected with our story, enables us also to t...

At a time when every rank of men in England buried all party distinctions, and prepared with order, as well as vigour, to resist the violence of the invaders, the Catholics thro...

With lovers, days, weeks, and months pass swiftly by. The fair and witty Rosalind is made to tell us, however, that time trots hard with a young maid, between the contract of he...

In a former chapter we have seen Walter Arderne, after many and various adventures by flood and field, returning to the home and haunts of his childhood. The good and gallant yo...

Stratford-upon-Avon, like most country towns, possessed at this period, amongst other and worthier inhabitants, a certain amount of fragments, who were indeed in themselves noth...

Our story now draws towards conclusion, and we once more return to the point from which we at first started. Clopton Hall, after so many years of gloom, may now be said to have...

On the morning which followed the events narrated in the foregoing chapter, the traveller took leave of the exceedingly poor but kind old man who had so hospitably sheltered him...

There was a feeling amongst the trio, which two of them at least could not understand; so greatly had the youth's manners struck them, so forcible was the interest he had create...

Scotland and its affairs gave Elizabeth continued uneasiness, and every new revolution amongst the wild and turbulent nobles of that rude land caused her fresh anxiety, because...

As those dulcet sounds reached the ears of the poet, he laid down his pen and listened attentively. That voice, no rich in tone, so sweetly modulated, seemed deeply to affect hi...

"Then would we might see it approved in the acting," said Froth; "but 'tis thrown away upon me, as thou know'st. I am not for the personation of aught requiring such rules. If I...

Clopton Hall was situated in a sort of wild chase, or park, in which hundreds of broad, short-stemmed oaks grew at distant intervals; and through this chase a deep trench had be...

When the pair reached the Falcon, they found a goodly assemblage in the "Dolphin" parlour of that hostel. This apartment was appropriated to a certain clique of jolly companions...

Many of our readers, who have searched with curious eye through the various localities and peculiar points of interest at Stratford, will doubtless recollect a small antiquated-...

The confession of the dying priest will doubtless recall to our readers the state of England at this period. Matters indeed were fast hastening towards that great event of Eliza...

The course of events connected with our story has necessarily obliged us to deviate from the locality in which we have heretofore progressed. We must, however, now again, after...

The visitation we have just described caused a sufficiently startling interruption to the cozy comfort of the entire party. Young Shakespeare started back in some surprise, and...

The swift passage of events, and which it has taken some little time to record, has necessarily obliged us to omit mention of several minor characters of our story, but who, nev...

It was about an hour after the performance we have attempted to describe, that a solitary individual stood near the water-gate of the monastery of the Blackfriars. He stood, app...

On the evening of the day on which the accident had happened to Charlotte Clopton, that lady, together with her father, her cousin Walter, and young Shakespeare, were assembled...

The festival held at Kenilworth on occasion of Christmas-tide, was not on such an extended scale as on former occasions had been customary there, when Norman kings feasted and k...

The success of Shakespeare's play of Romeo and Juliet had placed him in a somewhat different situation amongst his companions of the theatre. By the majority he was immediately...

It was one morning, during the reign of Elizabeth, that a youth, clad in a grey cloth doublet and hose (the usual costume of the respectable country tradesman or apprentice in E...

Our story having now (with swift passage) glided o'er some two years, we arrive at a period in which all England was aroused by the alarm of a dreadful invasion.

On the morning of the day on which Sir Thomas paid a visit to the Lucy Arms, William Shakespeare, seated in a small parlour at the back of his house, was employed reading from a...

To describe minutely the magnificent force assembled at Tilbury, and the camp there, would be both a tedious and a twice-told tale. My Lord of Leicester (who had the ordering of...

'Twas a pleasing picture, that old knight taking his evening nap in his oak pannelled room, so quiet and so retired, so undisturbed, except by the cooing of the wood-pigeon, or...

His friend Dismal was the only person who had gained access to him, and that but for a few moments. During the interview, however, Dismal had gathered from Doubletongue, who als...

Leaving his home, the youthful Shakespeare takes his way across the meadows, in which our readers may remember to have first seen him in the opening chapter of this story. His s...

The machinations of Pouncet Grasp had not been without their due effect. His evil disposition was as great as his industry, and his very face and form, twisted and contorted as...

All that Shakespeare had lately seen and gone through made considerable impression upon his mind. In the short period during which the national convulsion we have described was...

Whilst London, and indeed all England, was thus aroused by this sound of deadly preparation, a gay and jovial party sat carousing in one of the apartments of an antique tavern i...

The general aspect of London in the reign of Elizabeth is so singular when contrasted with the same great metropolis of our own day, that we must again refer to it.

It was one bright morning, a few days after the events we have recorded that a gay and gallant-looking party rode into the grounds of Clopton and approached the Hall.

Those of our readers who have visited Stratford-upon-Avon, and looked upon the house in Henley Street, that house which has caused so great an interest in the world, will rememb...

It was but a few days after he had caught a glimpse of the Warwickshire lad, whom he had hunted from his native town, that he found the name of William Shakespeare in the mouths...

As he had never for a moment intended to give ground, he was in no wise daunted at being thus left alone, and as the closing of the door shut out the glare of light, it most pro...

The very name of the New World during the reign of Elizabeth, was suggestive of boundless wealth, and the wildest hopes of gain. The islands already visited by the adventurers o...

So great were the talents possessed by Grasp for smelling out a plot, whether it existed or not, that he seemed peculiarly fitted for the period in which he lived, and in which...

Our readers must now again look upon the town of Stratford, whilst the bright mid-day sun shines upon its roof and chimneys, mid glitters like innumerable diamonds upon its mult...

To Charlotte Clopton the introduction of the stranger youth, the relation her cousin gave of his opportune appearance, and the ready manner in which he had rescued her, seemed l...

Is it that the idea of pestilence and death being rife in that silent town gives its streets so sickly and melancholy a look--a sort of unnatural and unwholesome glare--or is th...

About a couple of hours after the above conversation between the two rangers, the subject of it might have been seen lying along, "like a dropt acorn," book in hand, under cover...