Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 54151-h.htm or 54151-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/54151/54151-h/54151-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/54151/54151-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/shakespeareboy00rolf Transcriber's note: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=). A carat character is used to denote superscription. A single character following the carat is superscripted (example: y^e).nsultation of external sources. A detailed transcriber's note can be found at the end of the book. [Illustration: SHAKESPEARE THE BOY] SHAKESPEARE THE BOY With Sketches of The Home and School Life The Games and Sports, the Manners, Customs and Folk-Lore of the Time by WILLIAM JAMES ROLFE, LITT.D. [Illustration: (Publisher's colophon)] With Forty-one Illustrations London Chatto & Windus 1897 Copyright, 1896, by Harper & Brothers. All rights reserved. PREFACE Two years ago, at the request of the editors of the _Youth's Companion_, I wrote for that periodical a series of four familiar articles on the boyhood of Shakespeare. It was understood at the time that I might afterwards expand them into a book, and this plan is carried out in the present volume. The papers have been carefully revised and enlarged to thrice their original compass, and a new fifth chapter has been added. The sources from which I have drawn my material are often mentioned in the text and the notes. I have been particularly indebted to Halliwell-Phillipps's _Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare_, Knight's _Biography of Shakspere_, Furnivall's Introduction to the "Leopold" edition of Shakespeare, his _Babees Book_, and his edition of Harrison's _Description of England_, Sidney Lee's _Stratford-on-Avon_, Strutt's _Sports and Pastimes_, Brand's _Popular Antiquities_, and Dyer's _Folk-Lore of Shakespeare_. I hope that the book may serve to give the young folk some glimpses of rural life in England when Shakespeare was a boy, and also to help them--and possibly their elders--to a better understanding of many allusions in his works. W. J. R. CAMBRIDGE, _June 10, 1896_. CONTENTS PAGE PART I.--HIS NATIVE TOWN AND NEIGHBORHOOD 1 WARWICKSHIRE 3 WARWICK CASTLE AND SAINT MARY'S CHURCH 4 WARWICK IN HISTORY 8 GUY OF WARWICK 9 KENILWORTH CASTLE 12 COVENTRY 14 CHARLECOTE HALL 19