DRAMATISTS Preceding SHAKESPEARE.

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE. 1562-1593. Wrote "Tamburlaine the Great ; "Life and Death of Dr Faustus;" "The

Massacre at Paris; "Edward the Second;" "The Jew of

Malta," etc.

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Robert GREENE. 1560-1592." Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay; " "History of Orlando ; Alphonsus, King of Arragon; "James IV.," "George-a-Greene the Pinner of Wakefield," "The Looking-glass for London and England," etc. and tracts: "A Groat's worth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance," etc.

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GEORGE PEELE. 1553-1598. "The Arraignment of Paris;" 'Edward I.;" "The Old Wives' Tale;"" Tragedy of Absalom;" "The Love of King David and Fair Bethsaba; " "The Battle of Alcazar," etc.

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THOMAS LODGE. 1556—1625. “The Wounds of Civil War; Rosalynde (said to be the prototype of Shakespeare's "As You Like it"), etc.

RICHARD EDWARDS. 1523-1566. "Damon and Pythias ; " "Paradise of Dainty Devices;' Comedy of Palamon and Arcite," etc.

GEORGE GASCOIGNE. 1537-1577. "Princely Pleasures of Kenilworth Castle;" 'Comedy of Supposes;" "Tragedy of Jocasta," etc.

THOMAS NASH. 1558-1600. "Summer's Last Will and Testament;""Tragedy of Dido, Queen of Carthage ;" "Supplication of Pierce Penniless to the Devil;" "Christ's Tears over Jerusalem," etc.

JOHN LYLY. 1553- 1600. The author of "Euphues" wrote nine plays performed at court.

The following were among the earliest predecessors of Shakespeare: NICOLAS UDALL, “Ralph Royster Doyster," dated 1551. THOMAS RICHARDS, “Misogonus," 1560. THOMas Sackville, Earl of Dorset, "Ferrex and Porrex," 1561. JOHN STILL, Bishop of Bath, "Gammer Gurton's Needle," 1565.

IV.

SHAKESPEARE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES.

The Birth-place of Shakespeare - Early life - The Country town of Queen Elizabeth's Day— Shakespeare as an ActorIn London - Ben Jonson.

G

OING through Henley Street in Stratford-on

Avon, to-day, you come upon a curious old house with the peaked roof, timber-and-plaster walls and lattice-work casements which belong to the Sixteenth century. A shabby old house it is, yet one which every stranger enters with curiosity and delight, for here on the twenty-third of April, 1564, William Shakespeare was born.

When Shakespeare was a little boy his father held the position of high-bailiff, or mayor, of the town, and seems to have been well known and universally re

spected. He had married Mary Arden, the daughter of Robert Arden, a gentleman of an ancient and honorable family. Old records in Stratford mention John Shakespeare, the poet's father, as "a gentleman of good figure and fashion ;" and, although some authorities think that he was either a wool-stapler or a butcher, the evidences are very slight. These discussions, however, seem of little consequence; the elder Shakespeare probably had various employments, and that at different times he was in money trouble, if not almost in poverty, we have reason to be very sure.

William was one of ten children. We fancy he must have shown some marks of genius at an early age, since he was sent to a grammar school, studied Greek and Latin, and seemed to have gained a wonderful amount of general information.

Going through the orderly, peaceful English towns to-day, with their air of thrift and matter-of-fact comfort, it is not easy to realize what the provincial life was in Shakspeare's boyhood.

Although we know so few of the details of his life, his plays give constant evidence that the experiences of his early years, the people he saw about him, their manners and ways of thinking, furnished him with a great deal of his material.

We know that the love of pageantry and spectacles

reached even so secluded a spot as Stratford. When the peasantry held a holiday they indulged in some general revel or merry-making, dancing about a may-pole in fantastic costumes, or going through some of those half theatrical performances in which both players and audience delighted. There was a curious mixture of superstition and boldness in the life of the country people. Witches were believed in, ghosts were supposed to haunt every church-yard, and even fairies, goblins and elves had a place in their imagination. The old people in the neighborhood were much thought of, since they could tell strange tales of what had happened in their youth. On winter evenings groups would gather about the firesides in the stonefloored kitchens of the peasantry, or the more spacious servants' hall of some gentleman's dwelling, and here the wildest, most improbable histories were recounted. Every house had its haunted room, and few old crones would admit that they had never seen a ghost.

On All-hallows Eve and similar festivals, curious tricks were played and mysterious ceremonies gone through with, one of which will illustrate the character of the people. It was customary for a group to sit at midnight in some church-yard with eyes fixed intently upon the church door. If any one of the number was destined to die before the year was out, a ghostly figure