whom few men, perhaps none, ever knew better how to judge and how to write on such a theme,—­indicate how he struck the scholarship of the age.  And from the scattered notices of his contemporaries we get, withal, a very complete and very exalted idea of his personal character as a man; although, to be sure, they yield us few facts in regard to his personal history or his actual course of life.  How dearly he was held by those who knew him best, is well shown by a passage of Ben Jonson, written long after the Poet’s death, and not published till 1640.  Honest Ben had been charged with malevolence towards him, and he repelled the charge thus:  “I lov’d the man, and do honour his memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any.  He was indeed honest, and of an open and free nature; had an excellent phantasy, brave notions, and gentle expressions.”

I cannot dwell much on the particulars of the Poet’s latter years; a few, however, must be added touching his family.

On the 5th of June, 1607, his eldest daughter, Susanna, then in her twenty-fifth year, was married to Mr. John Hall, of Stratford, styled “gentleman” in the parish register, and afterwards a practising physician of good standing.  The February following, Shakespeare became a grandfather; Elizabeth, the first and only child of John and Susanna Hall being baptized the 17th of that month.  It is supposed, and apparently with good reason, that Dr. Hall and his wife lived in the same house with the Poet; she was evidently deep in her father’s heart; she is said to have had something of his mind and temper; the house was large enough for them all; nor are there wanting signs of entire affection between Mrs. Hall and her mother.  Add to all this the Poet’s manifest fondness for children, and his gentle and affable disposition, and we have the elements of a happy family and a cheerful home, such as might well render a good-natured man impatient of the stage.  Of the moral and religious tenour of domestic life at New Place we are not permitted to know:  at a later period the Shakespeares seem to have been not a little distinguished for works of piety and charity.

On the 10th of February, 1616, the Poet saw his youngest daughter, Judith, married to Thomas Quiney, of Stratford, vintner and wine-merchant, whose father had been High-Bailiff of the town.  From the way Shakespeare mentions this daughter’s marriage portion in his will, which was made the 25th of March following, it is evident that he gave his sanction to the match.  Which may be cited as argument that he had not himself experienced any such evils, as some have alleged, from the woman being older than the man; for his daughter had four years the start of her husband; she being at the time of her marriage thirty-one, and he twenty-seven.