Into the entrails of yon labouring cloud; The Watch strikes. Why wert thou not a creature wanting soul? Oh, Pythagoras! metempsychosis, were that true, All beasts are happy, for when they die, The Clock strikes Twelve. It strikes, it strikes; now, body, turn to air, Thunder, and enter the Devils. Oh mercy, heaven, look not so fierce on me. William Shakespeare. Born 1564. Died 1616. SHAKESPEARE was born on 23d April 1564, in Henley Street, Stratfordupon-Avon, and though looked on, even in his day, as the greatest poet England had ever produced, the materials of his biography are of the most scanty kind. His father was a wool-dealer and butcher, and though in humble, was never in straitened circumstances. Shakespeare received only a plain education, having at school made no progress beyond the rudiments of Latin. While only eighteen he married Anne Hathaway, the daughter of a small farmer at Shottery, near Stratford. She was con siderably older than himself. Nothing is known of his occupation at this period, excepting that he was making a figure in the justice of peacecourt for deer-stealing. After one of these visits to the justice-court he appears to have written a satirical ballad on the justice, which he affixed to his park gate. The ballad has been lost, but it is said to have been so bitter that Shakespeare had at last to flee to London, where he began his career at the theatres by holding horses for gentlemen who came to the play. He afterwards was admitted inside the theatres to act the humbler parts of the drama. From this moment he rose rapidly, and although all details are awanting, it is known that in his twenty-fifth year he was a sharer in the profits of the representations. In 1593 appeared his first poem, "Venus and Adonis," and in 1594 "Lucrece." About the same time he appears to have become part proprietor of the Globe Theatre, and on the fair way to fortune. His plays were now issued in rapid succession, though the dates when written are not known. The latter years of Shakespeare's life were spent in ease and retirement; he had accumulated a fortune and retired to his native village, where he passed the remainder of his life. He had three children by Anne Hathaway, two girls and a boy; the daughters only survived their parent. Shakespeare died in his fifty-second year, on his birthday, April 23, 1616. He was buried in the parish church of Stratford, where his monument may still be seen. MURDER OF KING DUNCAN. MACBETH and a Servant. Macbeth. Go, bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready, She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed. Is this a dagger which I see before me, [Exit Servant. The handle towards my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. As this which now I draw. Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going; Mine eyes are made th' fools o' th' other senses, Pale Hecate's offerings; and withered Murder, Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace, I go, and it is done; the bell invites me : LOVE SCENE. [A bell rings. [Exit. Romeo. He jests at scars that never felt a woundBut, soft! what light through yonder window breaks; It is the east, and Juliet is the sun! [Juliet appears above at a window. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief, That thou her maid are far more fair than she; Her vestal livery is but sick and green, What of that? O that she knew she were! OTHELLO RELATES HIS COURTSHIP TO THE MOST potent, grave, and reverend signiors, Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech, For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith, And little of this great world can I speak, More than pertains to feats of broil and battle; In speaking for myself. Yet by your gracious patience Of my whole course of love: what drugs, what charms, For such proceeding I am charged withal— I won his daughter with. Her father loved me, oft invited me; Still questioned me the story of my life, From year to year; the battles, sieges, fortunes, I ran it through, ev'n from my boyish days, Of moving accidents by flood and field; Of hairbreadth 'scapes i' th' imminent deadly breach ; And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence, Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle, Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven, It was my lot to speak, such was the process; And of the cannibals that each other eat, The anthropophagi, and men whose heads Do grow beneath their shoulders. These things to hear Would Desdemona seriously incline; But still the house affairs would draw her thence; Which ever as she could with haste despatch, When I did speak of some distressful stroke She swore-in faith, 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange, 'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful She wished she had not heard it, yet she wished That Heaven had made her such a man:-she thanked me, And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her, I should but teach him how to tell my story; And that would woo her. On this hint I spake ; END OF EARTHLY GLORIES. OUR revels now are ended: these our actors, LIFE AND DEATH. The Tempest. To be, or not to be, that is the question- |