In such circumstances which are certainly in accordance with human nature, I suppose the actor to have been noticed by the young, handsome, popular Earl of Southampton; who found him interesting, and interested himself in the poet.  There followed the dedication to the Earl of Venus and Adonis; a poem likely to please any young amorist (1693).

Mr. Greenwood cries out at the audacity of a player dedicating to an Earl, without even saying that he has asked leave to dedicate.  The mere fact that the dedication was accepted, and followed by that of Lucrece, proves that the Earl did not share the surprise of Mr. Greenwood.  He, conceivably, will argue that the Earl knew the real concealed author, and the secret of the pseudonym.  But of the hypothesis of such a choice of a pseudonym, enough has been said.  Whatever happened, whatever the Earl knew, if it were discreditable to be dedicated to by an actor, Southampton was discredited; for we are to prove that all in the world of letters and theatre who have left any notice of Shakespeare identified the actor with the poet.

This appears to me to be the natural way of looking at the affair.  But, says Mr. Greenwood, of this intimacy or “patronage” of Southampton “not a scrap of evidence exists.” {109a} Where would Mr. Greenwood expect to find a scrap of evidence?  In literary anecdote?  Of contemporary literary anecdote about Shakespeare, as about Beaumont, Dekker, Chapman, Heywood, and Fletcher, there is none, or next to none.  There is the tradition that Southampton gave the poet 1000 pounds towards a purchase to which he had a mind. (Rowe seems to have got this from Davenant,—­through Betterton.) In what documents would the critic expect to find a scrap of evidence?  Perhaps in Southampton’s book of his expenditure, and that does not exist.  It is in the accounts of Prince Charlie that I find him, poor as he was, giving money to Jean Jacques Rousseau.

As to the chances of an actor’s knowing “smart people,” Heywood, who knew all that world, tells us {109b} that “Tarleton, in his time, was gracious with the Queen, his sovereign,” Queen Elizabeth.  “Will Kempe was in the favour of his sovereign.”

They had advantages, they were not literary men, but low comedians.  I am not pretending that, though his

“flights upon the banks of Thames So did take Eliza and our James,”

Will Shakspere “was gracious with the Queen.”

We may compare the dedication of the Folio of 1623; here two players address the Earls of Pembroke and Montgomery.  They have the audacity to say nothing about having asked and received permission to dedicate.  They say that the Earls “have prosecuted both the plays and their authour living” (while in life) “with much favour.”  They “have collected and published the works of ‘the dead’ . . . only to keep alive the memory of so worthy a Friend, and Fellow” (associate) “as was our Shakespeare, ‘your servant Shakespeare.’”