were--neither the whole nor a part--written by Shakspere, the lampoon containing no indications of genius; it is a libel on the memory of the poet to assert that they were the offspring of his mind--to say nothing of the “poorspite” they would have manifested,--a feeling totally away from so great a soul. The story of Shakspere’s early transgression and its consequences is thus related by Rowe: “An extravagance that he was guilty of first forced him out of his country, and that way of living which he had taken up; and though it seemed at first to be a blemish upon his good manners, and a misfortune to him, yet it afterwards happily proved the occasion of exerting one of the greatest geniuses that ever was known in dramatic poetry. He had, by a misfortune common enough to young fellows, fallen into ill company, and, amongst them, some that made a frequent practice of deer-stealing, engaged him more than once in robbing a park that belonged to Sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, near Stratford; for this he was prosecuted by that gentleman, as he thought somewhat too severely; and, in order to revenge that ill-usage, he made a ballad upon him.” That Shakspere engaged in a frolic similar to the one related of him, is by no means improbable; freaks of the kind are common enough to “young fellows;” and although it is impossible to imagine that the poet took part in this, from any motive other than that love of risk and adventure inseparable from great minds in the bud, we may readily believe tradition to be in the main correct. That Sir Thomas Lucy was not a man of even poor understanding is sufficiently proved by the epitaph to the memory of his wife. [62] Mr. Wheeler, a most intelligent gentleman of Stratford, who has given much time and thought to all subjects connected with Shakspere’s history,--and by whom we had the advantage of being accompanied to the church--directed our attention to the fact, that formerly a charnel-house adjoined the chancel, from which there was a communicating door. Here the bones of the neglected or forgotten were gathered: “The vault To whose foul mouth no healthsome air comes in, * * * * * * an ancient receptacle, Where for these many hundred years, the bones Of all my buried ancestors are packed.” And it is by no means unlikely that the frequent contemplation of a scene so humiliating, and of objects so revolting, may have induced the anathema, “Cvrst be he yt moves my bones.”