University of Virginia Library

4. IV.
AT THE TOMB OF SHAKSPEARE.

Mr. Punch, My dear Sir,—I've been
lingerin by the Tomb of the lamentid
Shakspeare.

It is a success.

I do not hes'tate to pronounce it as such.

You may make any use of this opinion
that you see fit. If you think its publication
will subswerve the cause of litteratoor, you
may publicate it.

I told my wife Betsy when I left home
that I should go to the birthplace of the
orthur of Otheller and other Plays. She
said that as long as I kept out of Newgate
she didn't care where I went. “But,” I said,
“don't you know he was the greatest Poit
that ever lived? Not one of these common
poits, like that young idyit who writes verses

to our daughter, about the Roses as growses,
and the Breezes as blowses—but a
Boss Poit—also a philosopher, also a man
who knew a great deal about everything.”

She was packing my things at the time,
and the only answer she made was to ask
me if I was goin to carry both of my red
flannel night caps.

Yes. I've been to Stratford onto the
Avon, the Birthplace of Shakspeare. Mr.
S. is now no more. He's been dead over
three hundred (300) years. The peple of
his native town are justly proud of him.
They cherish his mem'ry, and them as sell
picturs of his birthplace, &c., make it prof'tible
cherisin it. Almost everybody buys
a pictur to put into their Albiom.

As I stood gazing on the spot where
Shakspeare is s'posed to have fell down
on the ice and hurt hisself when a boy,
(this spot cannot be bought—the town
authorities say it shall never be taken from
Stratford) I wondered if three hundred
years hence picturs of my birthplace will
be in demand? Will the peple of my native
town be proud of me in three hundred

years? I guess they won't short of that time
because they say the fat man weighing
1000 pounds which I exhibited there was
stuffed out with pillers and cushions, which
he said one very hot day in July, “Oh
bother, I can't stand this,” and commenced
pullin the pillers out from under his weskit,
and heavin 'em at the audience. I never
saw a man lose flesh so fast in my life. The
audience said I was a pretty man to come
chiselin my own townsmen in that way.
I said, “Do not be angry, feller-citizens.
I exhibited him simply as a work of art. I
simply wished to show you that a man
could grow fat without the aid of cod-liver
oil.” But they wouldn't listen to me.
They are a low and grovelin set of peple,
who excite a feelin of loathin in every brest
where lorfty emotions and original idees
have a bidin place.

I stopped at Leamington a few minits on
my way to Stratford onto the Avon, and a
very beautiful town it is. I went into a
shoe shop to make a purchis, and as I entered
I saw over the door those dear familiar
words, “By Appintment: H. R. H.;” and

I said to the man, “Squire, excuse me, but
this is too much. I have seen in London
four hundred boot and shoe shops by Appintment:
H. R. H.; and now you're at it.
It is simply onpossible that the Prince can
wear 400 pairs of boots. Don't tell me,”
I said, in a voice choked with emotion—
“Oh, do not tell me that you also make
boots for him. Say slippers—say that you
mend a boot now and then for him; but
do not tell me that you make 'em reg'lar
for him.”

The man smilt, and said I didn't understand
these things. He said I perhaps
had not noticed in London that dealers in
all sorts of articles was By Appintment.
I said, “Oh, hadn't I? Then a sudden
thought flasht over me. “I have it!” I said.
“When the Prince walks through a street,
he no doubt looks at the shop windows.”

The man said, “No doubt.”

“And the enterprisin tradesman,” I continnerd,
“the moment the Prince gets out
of sight, rushes frantically and has a tin
sign painted, By Appintment, H. R. H.!
It is a beautiful, a great idee!”

I then bought a pair of shoe strings, and
wringin the shopman's honest hand, I
started for the Tomb of Shakspeare in a
hired fly. It look't however more like a
spider.

“And this,” I said, as I stood in the old
church-yard at Stratford, beside a Tombstone,
“this marks the spot where lies
William W. Shakspeare. Alars! and this
is the spot where—”

“You've got the wrong grave,” said a
man—a worthy villager: Shakspeare is
buried inside the church.”

“Oh,” I said, “a boy told me this was
it.” The boy larfed and put the shillin
I'd given him into his left eye in a inglorious
manner, and commenced moving backwards
towards the street.

I pursood and captered him, and after
talking to him a spell in a skarcastic stile,
I let him went.

The old church was damp and chill. It
was rainin. The only persons there when
I entered was a fine bluff old gentleman who
was talking in a excited manner to a fashnibly
dressed young man. “No, Ernest

Montresser,” the old gentleman said, “it is
idle to pursoo this subjeck no further. You
can never marry my daughter. You were
seen last Monday in Piccadilly without a
umbreller! I said then, as I say now, any
young man as venturs out in a uncertain
climit like this without a umbreller, lacks
foresight, caution, strength of mind and
stability; and he is not a proper person to
intrust a daughter's happiness to.”

I slapt the old gentleman on the shoulder,
and I said, “You're right! You're
one of those kind of men, you are—”

He wheeled suddenly round, and in a
indignant voice, said, “Go way—go way!
This is a privit intervoo.”

I didn't stop to enrich the old gentleman's
mind with my conversation. I sort
of inferred that he wasn't inclined to listen
to me, and so I went on. But he was right
about the umbreller. I'm really delighted
with this grand old country, Mr. Punch,
but you must admit that it does rain rayther
numerously here. Whether this is owing to
a monerkal form of gov'ment or not, I leave
all candid and onprejudiced persons to say.

William Shakspeare was born in Stratford
in 1564. All the commentaters, Shaksperian
scholars, etsetry, are agreed on this,
which is about the only thing they are
agreed on in regard to him, except that his
mantle hasn't fallen onto any poet or dramatist
hard enough to hurt said poet or
dramatist much. And there is no doubt if
these commentaters and persons continner
investigatin Shakspeare's career, we shall
not, in doo time, know anything about it at
all. When a mere lad little William attended
the Grammer School, because, as he
said, the Grammer School wouldn't attend
him. This remarkable remark, comin from
one so young and inexperunced, set peple
to thinkin there might be somethin in this
lad. He subsequently wrote Hamlet and
George Barnwell. When his kind teacher
went to London to accept a position in the
offices of the Metropolitan Railway, little
William was chosen by his fellow pupils to
deliver a farewell address. “Go on, Sir,”
he said, “in a glorus career. Be like a
eagle, and soar, and the soarer you get the
more we shall all be gratified! That's so.”

My young readers, who wish to know
about Shakspeare, better get these vallyable
remarks framed.

I returned to the hotel. Meetin a young
married couple, they asked me if I could
direct them to the hotel which Washington
Irving used to keep?

“I've understood that he was onsuccessful
as a lan'lord,” said the lady.

“We've understood,” said the young
man, “that he busted up.”

I told'em I was a stranger, and hurried
away. They were from my country, and
ondoubtedly represented a thrifty Ile well
somewhere in Pennsylvany. It's a common
thing, by the way, for a old farmer in
Pennsylvany to wake up some mornin and
find ile squirtin all around his back yard.
He sells out for `normous price, and his
children put on gorgeous harness and start
on a tower to astonish peple. They succeed
in doin it. Meantime the Ile itsquirts
and squirts, and Time rolls on. Let it
roll.

A very nice old town is Stratford, and a
capital inn is the Red Horse. Every admirer

of the great S. must go there once
certinly; and to say one isn't a admirer of
him, is equv'lent to sayin one has jest about
brains enough to become a efficient tinker.

Some kind person has sent me Chawcer's
poems. Mr. C. had talent, but he
couldn't spel. No man has a right to be a
lit'rary man onless he knows how to spel.
It is a pity that Chawcer, who had geneyus,
was so unedicated. He's the wuss speller
I know of.

I guess I'm through, and so I lay down
the pen, which is more mightier than the
sword, but which I'm fraid would stand a
rayther slim chance beside the needle gun.