in the edition of 1614, and the editor appends to the last one the following remark:
"These three [or four?] ditties were taken out of Maister John Dowland"s Book of Tableture for the Lute. The authors" names not there set down, and therefore left to their owners."
But it happens that the four ditties are all credited to "Ignoto" in the Table of Contents, prepared by the _other editor_, so that in the edition of 1614 "Ignoto" has twenty pieces, besides the one a.s.signed to Marlowe.
With all this confusion what are we to believe in regard to "Ignoto"?
Was he sometimes Raleigh, sometimes Barnfield, sometimes Dyer, sometimes Greville,
and sometimes Shakspere, or some one else? Or was he a single person who "loved better to be a poet than to be counted so" and who affected to hoodwink the above-named Greville by writing to him in 1596: "For poets I can commend none, being resolved to be ever a stranger to them"?
And here let us note a bit of internal evidence that Bacon wrote the little poem in praise of the "Faery Queen" signed "Ignoto." One couplet of it is as follows:
"For when men know the goodness of the wine, "Tis needless for the host to have a sign."
No. 517 of Bacon"s "Promus of Formularies and Elegancies" is this:
"Good wine needs no bush."
The word "bush" as applied to wine is thus defined by Webster:
"branch of ivy (as sacred to Bacchus) hung out at vintners" doors, or as a tavern sign; hence a tavern sign, or the tavern itself."
""If it be true that good wine needs no bush, "tis true that a good play needs no epilogue."" Shak.[As You Like It.]
We leave the reader to put this and that together argument or comment is superfluous.
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AS THE CONCEALED POET IGNOTO
And now what shall we say in regard to Marlowe"s ostensible authorship of a popular song, which was attributed to Shakspere in 1599? Is it not presumable that "Ignoto," who wrote the "Nymph"s Reply," and followed it with "Another of the same nature made since" in imitation of the song subscribed "Chr. Marlowe"-is it not probable that "Ignoto" ascribed his own original song to Marlowe?
Marlowe was buried June 1, 1593. In the same year Shakspere"s name first appeared in print as an author. And now among the startling revelations. .h.i.therto hidden in the Folio of 1623, but made known through Bacon"s cipher discovered by the Hon. Ignatius Donnelly, is this sentence:
"Ever since Marlowe was killed Shakspere has been my mask."
Another Poem by Bacon in 1590.
The 33d anniversary of Elizabeth"s coronation was celebrated November 17, 1590. Sir Henry Lea, the Queen"s champion and master of the armory, who had conducted the exercises from the beginning, appeared for the last time, and, after the customary performances, resigned his office to the Earl of c.u.mberland, whereupon the celebrated vocalist, Mr. Hales, a servant of her Majesty, p.r.o.nounced and sung the following verses, personating the aged man-at-arms:
"My golden locks hath time to silver turned, (O Time too swift, and swiftness never ceasing!) My youth "gainst age, and age at youth hath spurned, But spurned in vain; youth waneth, by increasing.
Beauty and strength, and youth flowers fading been, Duty, faith, love, are roots and ever green.
"My helmet now shall make a hive for bees, And lovers" songs shall turn to holy psalms; A man-at-arms must now stand on his knees, And feed on prayers that are old age"s alms.
And so from court to cottage I depart; My saint is sure of my unspotted heart.
"And when I sadly sit in lonely cell, I"ll teach my swains this carol for a song: "Blest be the hearts that wish my Sovereign well, Curst be the souls that think to do her wrong."
G.o.ddess! vouchsafe this aged man his right, To be your beadsman now that Was your knight."
Parallels are found in Bacon and Shakspere with almost every sentiment and expression in these lines. (See Mrs. Pott"s "Promus," p. 528.)
The verses were published anonymously in Dowland"s "First Book of Songs," 1600, and again in 1844; both times with the p.r.o.nouns changed from the first to the third person-e. g., "His golden locks," etc. In the "Works of George Peele," 1828, they are credited to that poet, but the only evidence adduced of his authorship is the fact that he, as an eye-witness, wrote a poetic description of the celebration in 1590. Mrs.
Pott is doubtless right in claiming for Bacon the authorship, and is only mistaken in supposing that the person to whom the verses were intended to apply was Lord Burleigh, who about that time, on account of the loss of his wife, had temporarily withdrawn from court.
BACON AND SHAKSPERE A CHRONOGRAPH
1. If the Parliament met November 23, 1584, as Mr. Spedding distinctly says, then Bacon was not yet twenty-four.
An ideal tableau of the youthful statesman is gaily depicted by Wm.
Hepworth Dixon, in his "Personal History of Lord Bacon:"
"How he appears in outward guise and aspect among these courtly and martial contemporaries the miniature of Hilyard helps us to conceive.
Slight in build, rosy and round in fleshy dight in a sumptuous suit, the head well-set, erect, and framed in a thick starched fence of frill; a bloom of study and travel on the fat, girlish face, which looks far younger than his years; the hat and feather tossed aside from the white brow, over which, crisps and curls a mane of dark, soft hair; an English nose, firm, open, straight; a mouth delicate and small-a lady"s or jester"s mouth-a thousand pranks and humors, quibbles, whims and laughters lurking in its twinkling, tremulous lines;-such is Francis Bacon at the age of twenty-four."
Bearing in mind that Bacon is three years and three months older than Shakspere, we will now parallel their lives by successive years.
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A CHRONOGRAPHIC PARALLEL
A. D. 1585.
Bacon at 24, in a letter to the Queen"s princ.i.p.al secretary, Sir Francis Walsingham, urges his some time pending suit, which is to determine his "course of practice"-supposed to mean a shortening of the five years"
probation required to become a pleader.
He writes an essay ent.i.tled "Greatest Birth of Time," foreshadowing his scientific works.
His mother in her zeal for the Nonconformists urges their cause in person before Lord Treasurer Burleigh, and follows it by a letter to the same in which she says:
"I confess as one that hath found mercy, that I have profited more in the inward feeling knowledge of G.o.d his holy will, though but in small measure, by an ordinary preaching within these seven or eight years, than I did by hearing odd sermons at Paul"s well nigh twenty years together."