Nevertheless, Fuller has described the wit-combats between Shakspeare and Ben Jonson, "which he beheld," meaning with his mind's eye, for he was only eight years of age when Shakspeare died; "a circumstance," says Mr. Charles Knight, "which appears to have been forgotten by some who have written of these matters." But we have a noble record left of the wit-combats in the celebrated epistle of Beaumont to Jonson:-- "Methinks the little wit I had is lost Since I saw you; for wit is like a rest Held up at tennis, which men do the best With the best gamesters: what things have we seen Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have been So nimble, and so full of subtile flame, As if that every one from whence they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolv'd to live a fool the rest Of his dull life; then when there hath been thrown Wit able enough to justify the town For three days past, wit that might warrant be For the whole city to talk foolishly 'Till that were cancell'd: and when that was gone We left an air behind us, which alone Was able to make the two next companies Right witty; though but downright fools, mere wise." THE APOLLO CLUB. The noted tavern, with the sign of St. Dunstan pulling the Devil by the nose, stood between Temple Bar and the Middle Temple gate. It was a house of great resort in the reign of James I., and then kept by Simon Wadloe. In Ben Jonson's _Staple of News_, played in 1625, Pennyboy Canter advises, to "Dine in Apollo, with Pecunia At brave Duke Wadloe's." Pennyboy junior replies-- "Content, i' th' faith; Our meal shall be brought thither; Simon the King Will bid us welcome." At what period Ben Jonson began to frequent this tavern is not certain; but we have his record that he wrote _The Devil is an Asse_, played in 1616, when he and his boys (adopted sons) "drank bad wine at the Devil." The principal room was called "the Oracle of Apollo," a large room evidently built apart from the tavern; and from Prior's and Charles Montagu's _Hind and Panther Transversed_, it is shown to have been an upper apartment, or on the first story:-- "Hence to the Devil-- Thus to the place where Jonson sat, we climb, Leaning on the same rail that guided him." Above the door was the bust of Apollo; and the following verses, "the Welcome," were inscribed in gold letters upon a black board, and "placed over the door at the entrance into the Apollo: