Threadneedle Street, April 26, 1602.

    To William Shakespeare: 

I acknowledge to have received from you by the hand of Henry Condell L5, and two of your own shares in the stock of the Globe Theatre in further pledge of your bill of L60, as was engaged between us yesterday.  It pains me to make known to you that, owing to the great demands recently made upon the goldsmiths by her sacred Majesty, money hath become very dear; and as it was not my own lent you, I have been obliged to pay above the usance expected a further premium of seventeen in the hundred, which I pray you to presently repay me.  I am told that shares in the Globe can now be bought at L15; and inasmuch as yours were bought at L25, should you acquire other shares at L15, it would serve to equate your havings.

The next letter, from the same broker, is written but a few days later.

    Threadneedle Street, May 12, 1602.

    To William Shakespeare: 

Acting as requested by you, I did one week ago buy for you three shares in the Globe Theatre for L15 each, using in such purchase the L15 given me by you, and L30, not of mine own, but which was furnished me by a goldsmith of repute.  Yesterday I learned that shares were offered at L10 each, perchance from the efforts of forestallers, as also from the preaching of a dissenter, who fulminates that the end of the world is but three weeks away, which hath induced great seriousness among the people.  Unless you can pay me, therefore, as much as L40, on the morrow I shall be constrained to offer such shares to the highest bidder at the meeting of the guild.

The next letter is also from the same Mordecai Shylock, and is dated four days later.

    Threadneedle Street, May 16, 1602.

    To William Shakespeare: 

My earnest epistle to thee of four days since having elicited no response, I did on the following day offer at the meeting of the Brokers’ Guild some of the shares of the stock in the Globe pledged to me, and three shares were bidden at L9 each by my brother, Nehemiah Shylock.  As I offered next all the rest, one Henry Wriothsley, Earl of Southampton, did ask to whom the shares belonged, and when he was enlightened, did straightway take all the shares and pay me the whole balance owing, and called me divers opprobrious names.  I answered not his railing with railing, for sufferance is the badge of all our tribe, but such slander is illy bestowed on one who has been your friend for long, and who was but striving to avert his own destruction.

The next letter in order is from one William Kempe, who would seem to be the business manager of the Globe Theatre, or the person having in charge the unskilled labor connected with the playhouse.

    Globe playhouse, employment Bureau, May 25, 1602.