Shakespeare's Son-in-Law John Hall by Arthur Gray (1939)

SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW JOHN HALL

By ARTHU.R GRAY, M.A. Master of Jesus College, Cambridge

CAMBRIDGE

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First Published in 193 9

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Shakespeare s Son-in-Law

ON June 5, 1607, John Hall, gentleman, was married at Stratford church, to Susanna Shakespeare.

Susanna, his elder daughter, was evidently Shakespeare's favourite. The ample provision which he made in his will for her and her husband and issue is in marked contrast with the hesitating bequests which he makes to her sister, Judith, and her husband, Thomas Quiney, who in his later life proved so unsatisfactory. John and Susanna were executors of Shakespeare's will, and to them he devised his freehold properties in London and at Stratford. Their only child, Elizabeth, was born in February, 1 6o8.

"Something there was of Shakespeare," perhaps, in John, as well as in Susanna. We should like to know the man who, in h1s medical capacity, cared for the poet in his retirement, and must have taken daily part in conversation with him, and conceivably, imparted something of his experience and character to the production of the plays. Just possibly, some likeness of him may be intended in Cerimon, the benevolent physician of Pericles (I 6o8), but the portrait has no individual features. If little positive evidence be forthcoming of the relation between the two men during the years when both were living at Stratford, it might be expected that from documents some evidence might be forthcoming to satisfy some obvious questions about Hall. What of his family and birthplace, his

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SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

education, when did he settle at Stratford, and what induced him to start a medical practice there?

In the amplitude of its records concerning the lives and conditions of even its least distinguished citizens, Stratford has perhaps as much to tell as any town in England in the period I 590- I 6 3 5. And Hall was by no means among the least distinguished. In the town and neighbourhood his reputation stood almost as high as Shakespeare's. And what does Stratford tell of the one man more than the other?

Extracted from a bewildering heap of pure guesswork the following facts are all that Sir E. K. Chambers could unearth when he wrote his biography of William Shakespeare in I 930. John Hall was somehow connected with Acton, Middlesex, where he owned a house, which he bequeathed to his daughter, Elizabeth. He was elected in his absence and without his consent to the Town Council of Stratford, and was displaced for non-attendance. His age at death (I 6 3 s), as stated on his monument, was "6o," and he himself notes that in August, 1632, he was about 57· He was described as M.A. (in Artibus Magister). As Stratfordian biographers naturally postulated that a West Country man would go to the nearer University, it was assumed that he was a certain John Haule who graduated M.A. at Oxford in I 598 and was of Worcestershire. But the arms of the Worcestershire family were not those displayed on the Hall monument at Stratford Church. Sir E. K. Chambers prudently remarks "the name is too common to make any conclusion more than tentative." In the register of John Hall's burial he is described as medicus peritissimus,

SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW 3

"a physician greatly skilled." So far as is known he had no licence to practise medicine at Stratford or elsewhere.

But there exists a notebook, written in Hall's hand and now in the British Museum, of cases attended by him in his later years, which proves that he had a wide practice and many distinguished patients. After Hall's death this book fell into the hands of a provincial physician, J ames Cooke, who edited it, with additions of his own, as Observations of English Bodies, I 6 3 7. One of his notes is that Hall had travelled and "was acquainted with the French tongue." The significance of the remark is illustrated by the discoveries made by Mr. I. E. Gray and published by him in the Genealogical Magazine of September, I 936. The evidence collected by Mr. Gray is attested by contemporary documents, collected from many sources, and leaves no question that the subject of his enquiry was indeed the John Hall who married Shakespeare's daughter.

The key that opened the enquiry came from an altogether neglected quarter. In the invaluable Alumni Cantabrigienses of the late Dr. John Venn, a register of admissions and degrees from the earliest times, occur the following notes :

HALL, DivE. Matric. pens. from QuEENs', Mich. I 589. Of Bedfordshire.

HALL, JoHN. Matric. pens. from QuEENs', Mich. I 589. Of Bedfordshire. B.A. I 593-4, M.A. I 597, as Hale.

In college admission books the county stated is invariably that of birth. The fact that both brothers were pensioners indicates that they were of some social

+ SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

standing. Of Dive, more will presently be said. The remarkable thing in his admission is his Christian name. It is the surname of a well-known family living at Bromham in Bedfordshire. Dive may have been related-possibly a god-son of either Sir Lewis Dive (d. 1592) or of Sir John Dive (d. 16o7).

The clue offered by John Hall's ownership of the house at Acton of course had to be followed up. But the parish register of that place contains no entries of Halls who could reasonably be connected with the Bedfordshire family. A flood of light on their origin, occupations and interests comes from the will of a certain William Hall "of Acton in the Countye of M1dd.," dated December I 2, I 607. The testator was buried at Acton on the following December 2 I.

WILL OF WILLIAM HALL OF ACTON, MIDDLESEX, GENT.

DATED I 2 DEcEMBER I 6o7 (P.C.C.)

In dei nomine Amen, I William Hall of Acton in the Countye of Midd. ~entleman, sicke in bodye but of a perfect memorye and understandmg I thanke god Do ordayne, constitute and make this my last will and testament in manner and forme folowing. First I bequeathe my bodye to be buryed in the churche of Acton if I dye there or in the churche elswhere. My soule I bequeathe unto the Almightie god whoe hathe created me and gave his sonne to redeeme me and _therfore he is wholly myne by whose deathe passion and resurrectiOn I only truste to be saved, and by noe meritte of myne owne, for he hathe given me of his spiritt sufficiently to call me to repentaunce for all my former synnes, and hathe given me grace steedfastly to beleve in hym and unto suche he hathe promised no condempation but life everlasting saying: Whosoever repenteth and beleeveth in me I will give hym life everlasting, thoroughe which


promise my faithe ys fortified and confirmed. For the whiche I give hym humble thankes and so I take the whole Cupp of Salvation of hym with thankes gyving for ever and ever Amen. Concerning my earthlie goodes I ordayne as foloweth. As concerning my eldest son ne Dive forasmuche as he requyred his portion longe agoe the whiche ye receyved and bound hym selfe in a bond to demaunde any more as appeareth by his bond obligatorye in this house, as allso the many unkyndnes which he showed unto me heretofore and especially synce the deathe of his mother; Notwithstanding in regard that he is my sonne I bequeathe unto hym as a legacey fortie shillings. Item I give unto the poore of Acton fortye shillings to be distributed by the churchwardens and cunstables of the parishe of Acton equally where most neede ys. Item I give and bequeathe to my daughter Elizabeth Sutton tenne poundes conditionallye that she give the sayed tenne poundes with her sonne William Sutton to bynde hym an apprentise; Because they have kept hym home at his owne will and would not suffer hym to profitt while he mighte, and nowe of necessitie is constreyned to be put an apprentise because he will not give hym selfe to any other profession. Furthermore I give and bequeathe unto my sayed Daughter Sutton twelve poundes conditionally that she shall distribute yt equally betwene her children called Randall, Mary and Elizabeth at the ages of eightene yeres ould or at the dayes of theire marriage, whiche of bothe shall first come. And yf it please god to take any of theise before the sayed time theire portion so dying shall remayne to the rest lyvinge equally distributed. And in defaulte of them all before the forsayed tyme: Then that yt should all remayne whollie to William Sutton her eldest sonne. And in his defaulte to remayne whollie to my daughter Welles children successively. Item I give and bequeathe to my daughter Sara Sheppard fiftie poundes to be receyved and had from my executors within the space of one halfe yere after the deathe of her husband that now ys to witte William Shepparde Doctor of phisicke. Item I give and bequeathe to my daughter Martha Barlowe nowe wife of Benjamyn Barlowe, one hundred and twentie poundes, to be receyved from the executor or executors within the space of one quarter of a yere after the deathe of her said husbande Benjamyne Bar!owe. Item I give and bequeathe to my sister Cicely Carter twentie nobles to be payed unto her within one quarter of a yere after my deceasse. Item I give and bequeathe to my sister Knighte her sonne, twentye nobles, to be payed unto hym within one quarter of a yere after my deceasse. Furthermore I give and bequeathe unto my man Mathewe Morris all my bookes of Astronomye and

6 SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

Astrologie whatsoever conditionally that yf my sonne John do intende and purpose to laboure studdye and endevor in the sayed Arte, that the sayd Mathewe should instruct hym in consideracon of his Mr. his benevolence and free guift. Further I give and bequeathe unto the sayed Mathewe Morris fower poundes of good and lawfull money to be payed unto the sayed Mathewe within three moneths after my deceasse and the foresayed bookes presently after my Deceasse. Furthermore I give and bequeathe to my mayde Anne Gouldstone that nowe ys thirtie shillings to be payed unto her within one moneth after my deceasse. All the rest of my goodes, debts as well by bonde due as otherwise and all houses, landes, leasses, tenements or whatsoever myne or due unto me, I give and bequeathe unto my sonne John Hall whome I make my sole executor of this my last will and testament condicionally that the sayed John shall dischardge paye or cause to be · executed, discharged and payed the abovenamed legaceys according to the true intent will and meaning of me the Testator, as allso to dischardge my funerall expenses and debts. In witnesse whereof I have putt to my hande uppon the twelveth daye of December in the f}'veth yere of the Raign of James by the grace of god kinge of England, France and Ireland and of Scotlande the one and fortithe and in the yere of our Lord god 1 6o7. Provided further that yf my sayed sonne John do refuse to be executor and to paye the legaceys abovewritten That then my sonne Dive should take uppon hym the foresayed execution of my testament; my will ys paying unto my sayed sonne John fiftie poundes togither with all my bookes of phisicke, to be payed unto the sayd John within one or twoe moneths after my deceasse. Further I give and bequeathe all my bookes of Alchimye unto my foresaid servaunt Mathewe Morris, to be payed and given presently after my deceasse unto hym. Allso I ordeyne and constitute that my executor whosoever shall paye or cause to be payed all my debts whatsoever and execute and contente all Demaundes whatsoever. Moreover yf neither of may sayed sonnes will be executor: then my will ys that my sonne Michaell Welles should be executor paying to my son John and the Rest the aforesaid Legaceys before rehersed together with my Debt and funerall expenses. Allso my will ys that yf neither of my Sonnes be executor, that then my sonne Sutton and my sonne W elles should be Overseers. And yf my sonne W elles be executor that then my sonne John Hall and my sonne Sutton should be overseers. In witnesse whereof (That this is my true and laste will and testament) I have putt to my hande and seale the Daye and yere abovewritten per me Guilielmum Hall.

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I SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW 7

John Hall was clearly not present when the will was drawn; otherwise the doubt as to his acceptance of the executorship would not have arisen. He had been married to Susanna Shakespeare in the previous June and, no doubt, professional duties kept him at Stratford, just as, at a later time, they prevented his attendance at meetings of the Town Council. He proved the will on December 24, I 607, but declined to act as executor, and in accordance with the will, his brother, Dive, acted in his room. Dive died at Acton, apparently in his brother's house, in I 626, and by his nuncupatory will left all he had to his relation, Michael W elles. In I 6 2 9 there was Chancery litigation between John Hall, of Stratford, gent., and Michael W elles, of Glatton, Hunts. Hall states that he renounced the executorship of his father's will "in regard it would be a hindrance in his profession of being a physician."

From the particular mention in his will of "books of physic" it would appear that William Hall was a practitioner in medicine at Acton, then a suburban village within the jurisdiction of the Royal College of Physicians. Whether he had a medical degree or was licensed by that body is unknown. The value which he attached to his books of Astrology, Astronomy and Alchymy proves that he had been trained in a school of medicine which was old-fashioned in I 6o7 but had been highly popular forty years earlier, when the great physician, J erome Cardan, associated those sciences with his medical teaching. We gather from his will that he was a convinced Protestant.

Dive and John were apparently his only sons


surviving in 1607. He had several married daughters who, with their husbands and families, are mentioiJed in the will. His most notable son-in-law was William Sheppard, "doctor of physick," a Buckinghamshire man, who was an Eton Scholar of King's College, Cambridge, in I S82, B.A. I S86-7, M.D. c. I S98, Fellow of King's, I ss S-I S99· His family had property at Maulden, Beds. Of the rest, Michael W elles was a Bedfordshire man, related to the Halls, and mentioned in the will of John Hall's daughter, Elizabeth, Lady Bernard.

The most interesting name in William's will is that f " " " " M tth M . t o my man or my servant, a ew orrts, o

whom he leaves his books of Astronomy and Alchymy with the hesitating condition that if his son, John, intends to study "that art," Morris is to give him instruction. Morris, it would seem, is employed in William's profession as dispenser or secretary. Whether he was at Acton in December, I 6o7, is not clear. What is evident is that shortly afterwards he was at Stratford with John. There, in I 6 I 3, he married Elizabeth Rogers, and had children Susanna, John, Elizabeth, and Matthew. The first three names suggest intimacy with the family of Shakespeare's son-in-law. Furthermore, he is brought into direct connection with Shakespeare in an indenture of I 6 I 8, relating to the transference of Shakespeare's house in Blackfriars to the use of Susanna Hall, to which Matthew IVlorrys "of Stratford on Avon" is a party.

Mr. Irvine Gray's investigation of Bedforshire parish registers has brought to light complete evidence


of the relationship of the Hall and W elles families. His attention has been concentrated on the two small villages of Carlton and Chellington, near Harrold in Bedfordshire. At a remote period the two benefices were united, but the registers are distinct. From I S77 to his death in I 642 the rector was Thomas W elles, whose tombstone in Carlton church records that he died "Aged about a Hundred." His son, Michael, born in IS 7 8, married a daughter of William Hall, in whose will he is proposed as executor in case Dive and John decline to act. Michael W elles had a son, Thomas, and in her will (1 669) Elizabeth Hall, Lady Bernard, bequeaths £so to "my cousin, Thomas Welles of Carlton, Beds., gent." The registers of either parish contain many entries of the W elles family, and two inscriptions of the Carlton branch of it occur at so distant a place as Elm, Cambs., in I 694 and I7I3. '

The Carlton register witnesses that William Hall was resident there from I S69 to I S90. During those years it contains the baptisms of five daughters and one son, and burials of two daughters and two sons; also the marriage of Elizabeth Hall to Edmund Sutton, in August, I 590. After that date there are no Halls in the register, and it must seem that William Hall quitted the place. But a Carlton terrier of I 607 has various references to "the land of Mr. Hall," which may imply that he still owned property in the parish. The baptisms of Dive and John are not in the Carlton register: possibly they may be found at some neighbouring village. William Hall appears in a Lay Subsidy for Carlton in I 593, and again in I S97, but


with a note in the latter year that he has departed. In the early years of Edward VI, William Hall, generosus, appears in the neighbouring parish of Turvey.

\Vhen, where, and how did Hall and Shakespeare become first acquainted? At the Acton house, in London, or at the New Place where Shakespeare set up house for himself and daughters in I 597?

Unlike his brother-in-law, William Sheppard, John took no medical degree at Cambridge. He took the usual course in Arts, ending with M.A. in I 597, when he was 22. In the sixteenth century continuous residence for nine terms (three years) was required for proceeding from B.A. to M.A., and for so long Hall must have been at Cambridge. After that he studied medicine, apparently at a French University, and could scarcely be engaged in professional work much before I 6oo.

He had no qualification for practice in Acton or London. By the Charter of the Royal College of Physicians it was prescribed that no person should practise physic in London, or within seven miles of it, unless with sanction of the President and Fellows. Graduates in medicine of Oxford and Cambridge might practise if they had license from the University Chancellor. Graduates in medicine of foreign universities had no authority to practise in England unless they had licence from the bishop of the diocese. Until Post-Reformation times episcopal registers rarely contain any mention of licences granted, and it is fairly evident that medical men seldom applied for them. There is no mention of such a grant to Hall at Worcester, and we may fairly assume that he had

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none. Why, of all places, did he choose Stratford for a start in his career?

A possible answer to this question is supplied by the unexpected appearance on the scene of two familiar Stratford men-Abraham Sturley and Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote.

Abraham Sturley matriculated at Cambridge at Queens' College-the College of Dive and John Hall -in the Easter term, I 569. Richard Sturley, who matriculated from the same College in I 564, was perhaps hts brother. The facts are derived from the V niversity Grace Books, and as admissions at Queens' College do not begin until some years later, we have no knowledge of the county of their birth. The surname--otherwise spelt Strelly-should imply that the family was derived from Strelly, Notts. In or before I 57 5, Mr. Fripp tells us that Abraham was in the service of Sir Thomas Lucy in a legal capacity and variously described as the knight's "servant" or "retainer." His name is familiar to Shakespeare students for his correspondence with Richard Quiney on matters of busmess concerning Shakespeare. There is no reason to suppose that he had family associations with Bedfordshire, but Mr. Fripp is authority for the fact that he visited Cambridge and Bedford early in I 598 in behalf of sufferers from fires at Stratford. A vtsit to Cambridge would be natural if among scholars there he retained friends of student days: but why Bedford?

The Lucy family-including Sir Thomas of legendary fame-possessed ample estates in Bedfordshire, and it is likely that Sturley acted as estate agent and


rent-collector and holder of a manor court. The connection of Charlecote with Bedfordshire was of old standing and lasted far into the seventeenth century. Several mentions of Lucy names occur in Beds. parish registers: one is of Constance, daughter of Richard Lucy of Charlecote, who married Sir John Burgoyne, Bart., of Sutton, Beds. It is highly suggestive that some of the family estates lay in Carlton parish. Here there were two manors, one called Pabenhams, the other Carlton and Chellington. Pabenhams passed by marriage of a de Pabenham heiress into the possession of the Lucy family. It was alienated by Sir Thomas (of the legend) in I 569, in which year William Hall was clearly living at Carlton. An Inquisitio Post Mortem in I 602 states that at that date Lord Mordaunt was seised of the 1.\tlanor of Carlton and Chellington together with appurtenances and of a close called "long close" lying in Carlton, which he purchased from William Hall. The Court Rolls of Carlton Manor state that Sir Thomas Lucy held his court at Carlton in 8 Henry VI and again in the following year. In a terrier of Carlton (I 6o7) there are several references to land of William Hall. But in his will William makes no mention of property there and it may be assumed that he parted with it when he went to live at Acton.

The facts so far ascertained in the early life of John Hall reveal far more than the Stratford Legend does of the youth of Shakespeare. The Orthodox interpretation of the conflicting stories told a century or more after the events has only fostered the Heretical Schools which ascribe the authorship of the poems and plays


to anyone rather than the Stratford man. The only evidence of his existence is in the church register of the baptism of his children, and it is a gratuitous assumption that he was then resident at Stratford or present at the ceremony. No mention of him in municipal records or in letters of contempor~ry Stratfordians serves to identify him with the dramatist. In the documents cited in the "Lives" there is only one which so identifies him, and the witness is Shakespeare in his will. The "Centurie of his Prayse," beginning with Meres in I 598, is continuous thmughout his literary life. From first to last Stratford was seemingly unconscious of the splendour of its Star of Poets. In a letter of Abraham Sturley (I 5 9li ), addressed to his neighbour, Richard Quiney, he mentions Shakespeare as a man of substance who may advance money in the concerns of the town, and he passes to the topics of markets and "beeves," exactly as Shallow talks of fairs and "bullocks" in connection with the Psalmist's text on the certainty of death. The Puritan antipathy of the Corporation to stage performances was so pronounced when Shakespeare was at the zenith of his fame that they refused to admit players to the town, and even paid them to stop away. When Shakespeare died the local folk put on the flagstone of his grave some doggerel rimes which might have served for any tradesman in the town. The monument and bust were the work of a London mason, and probably were provided by more scholarly friends at a later time. When Shakespeare occupied the New Place in I 597 he found homely neighbours in such people as Sturley

'4 SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

and Quiney, and they found in him no more than was in themselves.

In a society so provincial and unimaginative, John Hall, from his advent at Stratford, could not fail to interest Shakespeare. He was young and brought talk of recent day.; at Cambridge and in Francealmost certainly of Montpellier and its great medical Professor, Rabelais. Probably when he started in his profession he lodged with some Dame Quickly, and was a constant visitor at the New Place. Perhaps he attended Shakespeare professionally. We know that he accompanied him on a visit to London in I6I4.

The names of Stratford patients included in Hall's case book are interesting, but unfortunately it contains few dates, and none earlier than I 6 I 7. It does not include Shakespeare or any of the Lucy family of Charlecote, but mentions "generosa" Hall, uxor mea, and their daughter Elizabeth. Among others the following occur:

"Eques Rainsforde," "Domina Rainsforde," and "Mr. Drayton, poeta laureatus." These were Sir Henry of Clifford Chambers and his wife Lady Ann, daughter of Sir Henry Goodere of Polesworth, Warwicks, at whose house Drayton for many years used to pass some months in summer; she was the Idea celebrated in Drayton's sonnets.

"Katherine" Sturley, perhaps a daughter of Abraham.

"Generosus Nash, aet. 62," perhaps a relation of Thomas, husband of Elizabeth Hall.

"Anna Greene, 'generosa,' jiliola primogenita Causidici Greene," i.e. daughter of Thomas, a barrister of i

t

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the Middle Temple, in whose diary he calls Shakespeare his "Cosen."

"Mr. Quiney," perhaps Thomas, husband of J udith Shakespeare.

Neither in the case book nor from any Stratford sources do we get any clue as to the date when Hall began his residence at Stratford. Is it just possible that in the plays there is incidental evidence to determine it? Hall was continuously resident at Cambridge, where he did not study medicine, until I 597· After that year a medical course in France could scarcely have occupied less than two or three years. It is unlikely that he started in practise at Stratford before I 599-I 6oo. What plays did Shakespeare produce about that time?

From external evidence Sir E. K. Chambers in his William Shakespeare (Vol. I, pp. 248-9) gives the following dates: Henry 17, I 599; As You Like It, I 6oo; Twelfth Night, I 6o2; Merry Wives, I 602.

But the first staging and composition of some of them may be earlier; none of them are in the list of Palladis Tamia (I598). In their theme they form a natural group belonging to the period of Shakespeare's shrewd and mirthful comedy. In them, and in no earlier plays, there are some odd features of a casual kind which suggest that Hall's fleeting talk of Cambridge and France has crept into them.

Of the practice of English universities Shakespeare seems to have had more knowledge than might be expected of one who was not, as Hall was, a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge. At Cambridge a graduate was said to "proceed," when he advanced from a lower

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to a higher degree, and the cerem h. admitted to the latter wa~ called theo~t at w tch he was Remark how the three t ommencement." Timon's speech to A erms ar(e,.,..~roug?t together in

pemantus .J. tmon IV 3). ' ' . Hadst thou like fi h The sweet degreuu~a~o~ t tl'· ~st swath procudd

~:rh natudre dhid comme!lce sin r;~1f:~~~.a!:;~s • · • ma e t ee hard m 't.

There is evidence that Camb 'd . mind when he made K' Lrt ge was~~ Shakespeare's

mg ear complam to Regan 'Tis not in thee-to scant my . SIZes.

"Size" is a Cambrid e d ~ . food or drink priv!tel word or a certam quantity of The word · · Y ?r ered from the buttery.

~~ qmte pecuhar to Cambrid . daughter umversities of D bl' y ge and Its Minsheu in his Gut'd • ,.,.. u m, ale and Harvard.

. e .o .1.ongues(I6I7) "I · portiOn of bread and dri k. . . say~: t IS a Cambridge scholars h n , It ts a farthmg which with the letter S a . ave at the ?uttery; it is noted halfe a farthing , ' ~~n Oxford wt~h the letter Q, for was "battels." . "Ab e corre.~pond~ng word at Oxford

. atement of stzes w C 11 pumshment alternative to " atin " a~ a o ege an apparent allu · . L ~ g, to whtch there is

ston In ear s next wo d " the bolt against my corn· . , r s, to oppose

I tng m. n Merry Wives the French docto . Il .

Shakespeare is reckles . . . r ts ea ed CaiUs. s In gtvmg nam h'

acters and regardless f d. ffi . . .es to ts char-was the name ori i o Il I e:mg conditiOns. Oldcastle Falstaff, and Sir ]!h n~ Y gtven to the character of of Sir John Fastolfen s ;a~ was suggested by that course we . . n aster Doctor Caius of

must recogmse the distinguished h . . p ystctan,


John Caius, the founder of Caius College at Cambridge, who died in I 573· In John Hall's student days stories lingered in Cambridge of the violent quarrels of the doctor with the University officialsparticularly of his vehement dislike of Sir Hugh Evans' countrymen, whom he expressly excluded from the benefit of his foundation. He was physician to Edward VI, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, just as his namesake in the play was the court physician at Windsor. Otherwise there is no resemblance between the two. John Caius was not a French doctor. As an ardent Catholic he studied medicine at the Italian University of Padua, but John Hall at a Protestant French University. Both John Caius and John Hall graduated in Arts at Cambridge before they studied medicine abroad.

When and how did Shakespeare acquire his know-ledge of French speech such as is employed in Henry V and Merry Wives and in no play of earlier date? His scene in earlier plays is often in France, but the courtiers of Navarre and the royalties of King John speak English. For French dialogue the talk between the French King and Helen, daughter of the physician, Gerard de Narbon, might have given an opportunity of which Shakespeare did not avail himself. Translations of French books were common in Tudor days, and it is just possible that he was acquainted with an otherwise unknown English translation of Belleforest's Histoires Tragikes, itself a translation of an Italian original; otherwise Shakespeare drew his comedy plots exclusively from Italian literature. The scenes in Henry r and Merry Wives, in which French dialogue


occurs, are partly in English, partly in French. It is noticeable that in Henry F, Act m, Scene 7, the Dauphin quotes a text from the French Protestant translation of the New Testament, a version no doubt current at Montpellier, but not very likely to be known to Shakespeare. One scene in Henry V.-that between the Princess Katherine and her maid-is written entirely in French of a fairly idiomatic kind. It must have been "caviare to the general" of the Globe Theatre. It is irrelevant in its place in the play, for the Princess has no reason to learn English when the French court was confident of victory and the English King and people were regarded with contempt. It is unfitting to the majestic theme of the play and an ill introduction of the future Queen of England. Its sole motive is to introduce an obscene jest which is uncharacteristic of Shakespeare at his worst. If not actually written by Hall it was introduced by some one who was a better French linguist than dramatic artist.

So far as we can learn from the Plays there was only one French author in whom Shakespeare was interested -Rabelais. No English translation of Pantagruel is known to have existed in his day, and there is small likelihood that he had French enough to unravel the Rabelaisian jargon which discomfited U rquhart and even French editors. His acquaintance with Rabelais' book is casual and general and his notes of names and incidents seem to be drawn from conversation rather than the written page. Something of Gargantua was already known to Shakespeare before the date of his first introduction to Hall. In Book I, chapter 4, Rabelais introduces a great Sophister-Doctor, Tubal


Holofernes, who taught the infant Gargantua his A.B.C. The odd combination of names suggested the names of characters in Loves' Labours Lost and the Merchant of Fenice, both written before I598. In the plays written in I 599 or after I 6o2 we meet with more conscious association with Rabelais. In As You Like It, Rosalind wishes that she had Gargantua's mouth. In Twelfth Night Feste delights Sir Andrew with the Rabelaisian nonsense about Pigromitus and the Vapians passing the equinoctial of Queubus. Rabelais makes Queubus a personal name, translated Lord Kiss breech by U rquhart. In the last scene of Henry F the French King's jest about "maiden walh" is an unpleasant reminder of ribald talk of Panurge. In King Lear (?I 6o 5) Edgar, in his assumed madness, says, "Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness," which looks like a confused recollection of what Epistemon says of his vision of the occupations in after life of historical celebrities, "Trajan was a fisher of frogs, Nero a base blind fiddler."

All these four plays were written about the years when John Hall made acquaintance with Shakespeare at the New Place. He was young and brought fresh reminiscences of Montpellier and of the tutelary genius of its University, Rabelais, student and doctor of medicine there, whose red gown was used to invest students there on taking a degree; his first two books, printed in I 54 7, would be in the hands of the scholars, and it is likely that Hall brought the volume to Stratford, and gave Shakespeare the benefit of his translation.

Of course the connection of John Hall with the

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:!0 SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

Plays is matter of surmise, but surmise based on ascertained and dated facts. The Stratford School does not approve of surmise unless it is based on the gossip of the nameless and ignorant gobes-mouches of Stratford whose grandfathers had buried the poet in their church. Once again, and not too often, it must be said that no Stratford document can prove that Shakespeare was continuously resident in the town before his retirement in I 597, when half his literary life was done. If he was, as on good evidence we are told, "a schoolmaster in the country," it is likely that he was not present at the baptisms of his children.

Population in Elizabethan days was much more mobile than is conceived by Stratford enthusiasts. In a book, A Chapter in the Early Life of Shakespeare, printed in I926, I developed a theory that Shakespeare was brought up at Polesworth, in North Warwicks. In that neighbourhood he mentions many towns and villages in the plays, one actually in Polesworth parish, which in some verses of I 6 53 is identified with the scene of Christopher Sly's tippling, but he never mentions Stratford or any place near it. Sir E. K. Chambers in his William Shakespeare dismisses my theory as "most improbable," since Polesworth is too far from Stratford. Since I wrote that book I have discovered a remarkable entry in the P;lesworth register of the baptism on July 5, I632, of Susanna, daughter of "Mr" Quiny. The Quiny family were all resident at Stratford, and there is no other mention of the name at Polesworth. What brought him to a place so distant? Apparently he is Thomas, the unthrifty husband of Judith Shakespeare. In I632


he was in financial straits and, as there was a likelihood that he would part with his house in Stratford, John Hall and Thomas Nash, husband of Shakespeare's grand-daughter, Elizabeth, in the interest of Judith took over the lease of the house. Was Susanna Quiny Shakespeare's grand-daughter? Nothing further is known of her. If-which is doubtfulMr. Quiny journeyed from Stratford to Polesworth for the christening of his daughter is it altogether improbable that for the baptism of his children Shakespeare travelled from Polesworth, or some other Warwickshire place, to Stratford? Thrice in their correspondence of I 598 Sturley and Quiny speak of Shakespeare as their "countryman," inasmuch as they associated him with the "county" of Warwick rather than with Stratford. This tallies with William Beeston's statement that in his younger days Shakespeare had been a schoolmaster in the" country." There were many good schools in Warwickshire, but I have grave doubts that the apprentice who, according to the Legend, left Stratford School at the age of thirteen, had poor qualifications as a teacher-or even as a writer ot plays.

In his William Shakespeare Sir E. K. Chambers devotes a long section to what he calls the Shakespeare Mythos, in which he includes the gossip of Stratford of a time when "the inquisitiveness of tourists was beginning to meet with the natural response of local guides." Sir E. K. Chambers objects that my theory had "no support from records or probability." Of the improbability of the Legendary stories my book gave, I think, ample evidence. Of record there is

:Z2 SHAKESPEARE'S SON-IN-LAW

none at Stratford. Of course, Polesworth has no municipal records, and its church register only begins in r 6 3 r. Stratford in its corporation documents has minute evidence of the lives and conditions of its inhabitants, and its church register covers the whole period of Shakespeare's life. Neither source affords a particle of information about the man who was a dramatist and also the richest man in the town.

Admitting his doubt of the credibility of most of the articles of the geocentric Stratford faith, Sir E. K. Chambers yet believes that authority must be attached to the testimony of certain writers of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century that traditions, e.g. of the deer-stealing business, survived in their days at Stratford, and he does not welcome the suggestion that the whole of the authoritarian belief is unbelievable. When I am confronted with the caricature portrait of young Shakespeare, drawn by Stratford artists, I must express my concurrence with the justice of the verdict of Mrs. Betsy Prig about a similar figment-"! don't believe there was no sich a person."

Shakespeare's Son-in-Law John Hall by Arthur Gray (1939)

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Transcript of Shakespeare's Son-in-Law John Hall by Arthur Gray (1939)