the head. The costume is evidently some theatrical display put on for the occasion, and "smacking very much of the stage tailor." There is a doublet, buttoned up to the chin, and a plaited lawn ruff standing out all round in a most uncomfortable and ungraceful position, and stiffened apparently, in the edges and elsewhere, with wire. One feature, the most noticeable of all, is the projection of the forehead. In all the other likenesses, without exception, the forehead, with its noble expanse, recedes gradually and evenly. But in the Droeshout engraving, the forehead is like some beetling cliff, projecting, almost overhanging the brows in a way that is hardly less than monstrous. This misshapen character of the forehead may without difficulty be accepted, not as a part of the likeness of the poet, but as part of the unskillful etching of the engraver. It looks certainly not unlike a huge goitre transferred from the throat to the brow.

6. THE CHANDOS PORTRAIT. Of painted likenesses of Shakespeare, none ranks so high as that known as the Chandos Portrait. This picture is in the National Portrait Gallery, and is the property of the nation, as represented by the trustees of that institution.

At

This picture originally belonged to, and probably was painted by, John Taylor, painter, a brother of Joseph Taylor, a player of Shakespeare's company. It was left by Taylor, by will, at his death, to Sir William Davenant. Davenant dying insolvent, the administration of his effects was granted in 1668 to John Otway, by which means the picture came into his possession. After Otway's death, Betterton, the actor, bought the picture. Betterton's death it was, in like manner, bought by Mrs. Barry, the actress, who afterwards sold it for forty guineas to Robert Keck, of the Temple. From Keck it went by inheritance to a Mr. Nicholls, and thence to Mr. Nicholls's only daughter, who was married to James, Marquis of Caernarvon, afterwards DUKE OF CHANDOS. From the Duke of Chandos the picture went to his daughter, Anna Eliza, Duchess of Buckingham. On the sale of the Duke of Buckingham's pictures, in 1848, this Chandos Shakespeare was bought by the Earl of Ellesmere, and by him presented, in 1856, to the National Portrait Gallery, where it now is.

The picture was engraved, while in Betterton's hands, by Vandergucht; subsequently, in 1719, by Vertue, and in 1747, by Houbraken; after that, and down to the present time, by numerous, or rather almost innumerable engravers. The face of the Chandos portrait is indeed the one altogether best known to the public.

The picture is of life size, in oil, on canvas. In its general character it seems to resemble more nearly the terra cotta bust than any other likeness that I saw. The nose is straight and long, as in the Droeshout engraving, but is thinner and more delicately formed, and, in that respect, conforms more nearly to the Mask, yet it has not the slightly aquiline curve of the latter. There is not the same distance between the eyes, and the same breadth of forehead, that are to be seen in the Mask and in the Droeshout likeness, though the forehead is still ample and strikingly noble. There is more general softness in the picture than in any of the other likenesses that have been named, except perhaps, the terra cotta bust. The picture is decidedly artistic, and the artist has apparently, to some extent, sacrificed literal likeness to artistic effect. The complexion is dark; there is a pinkishness of color about the eye-lids; the lips are inclined to be full and sensuous; the ear that is visible is tricked out with a ring; the hair, a dark auburn, that in the Droeshout is plaited and smoothed down, hangs here in easy, unstudied profusion on the sides and back of the head, while most of the lower part of the face is covered with a soft beard of the same color. No lines of deep thought are in the face, no furrows on the brow. There is an equal show of softness, almost effeminacy, in the costume. The dress, so far as it can be made out, is of black satin, and the collar is of fine plain lawn, folding over easily but simply.

At the first blush, on looking at the Chandos picture and then at the Droeshout, one can hardly believe them to be representations of the same person. Yet, on placing them side by side, and deliberately tracing the lines of each, one after the other, the substantial identity of the two is clearly established.

In the opinion of competent experts, Mr. Page, for instance, the Chandos portrait has internal evidence of having been painted from life. "When I look at that picture,' says Mr. Page," I am sure that the man who painted it looked directly into the eye of

THE STRATFORD PORTRAIT.

Shakespeare." The conjecture is certainly a very plausible one, that John Taylor, whose brother was a dramatic associate of Shakespeare's, did paint from life his brother's friend and companion.

7. THE STRATFORD PORTRAIT.

The only remaining likeness that it seems necessary to notice is that known as the Stratford Portrait. The picture that goes by this name belonged to Mr. W. O. Hunt, Town Clerk of Stratford-upon-Avon, in whose family it had been for over a century. It was supposed to be some old portrait, but whose no one knew. Mr. Simon Collins, of London, a well known restorer of pictures, happening to be in Stratford, in 1860, this picture was submitted to his examination. He discovered that the original picture had been painted over, by a later hand; the face being covered with hair, and with a heavy beard. On the removal of this exterior stratum of paint, the true original, which lay beneath, was brought to light, and was found to be a striking likeness of Shakespeare. The discovery made a sensation in Shakespearean circles. The picture was brought to London and exhibited,

and

caused much discussion. The owner finally very generously gave it to the town of Stratfordupon-Avon, and it is deposited among the other articles of curiosity at the Shakespeare House in that town.

This picture is traced with certainty to William Hunt, grandfather of the late owner. This William Hunt is supposed to have acquired it, with some other old paintings, in the purchase of his house from the Clopton family, in 1758. That however is mere conjecture, though a probable one.

No one who has seen the Stratford bust can look upon this picture without satisfying himselt at the first glance that the two are connected. The connection indeed, is universally conceded. But was the picture made from the bust, or the bust from the picture? The Stratford people strongly insist on the latter, believing firmly that the picture was taken from life, and was the original of the bust. Critics and scholars outside of Stratford take for the most part the opposite view. Mr. Halliwell probably represents the average opinion of the critical world, in believing that the picture was made from the bust, and made fully a century after the bust. It has even been suggested that the picture may have been made about the year of the Garrick Jubilee, in 1769, and in commemoration of that event.

Whatever theory of it be true, the picture is without doubt one of great value. and is worthily placed for perpetual keeping in the same town with the bust, to which it is so closely connected.

The impression which these various likenesses, when thus reviewed, make upon the mind of the observer, especially the impression made by the Mask, is that of majesty and force: what a noble face this man had! how worthy of the noble thoughts to which he gave utterance! and we feel instinctively like applying to him the words which he has himself put into the mouth of Hamlet, when pointing to his father's portrait:

"See, what a grace was seated on this brow; Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself

A WHITE pine floor and a low-ceiled room,
A wheel and a reel and a great-brown loom,
The windows out and the world in bloom-

A pair of 'swifts' in the corner, where
The grandmother sat in her rush-wrought chair,
And pulled at the distaff's tangled hair;

And sang to herself as she spun the tow
While the little wheel' ran as soft and low
As muffled brooks where the grasses grow
And lie one way with the water's flow.

As the Christ's field lilies free from sin,
So she grew like them when she ceased to spin
Counted her knots' and handed them in!

And the slender spokes, like the willow wands That spring so thick in the low, wet lands, Turn dense at the touch of a woman's hands.

As the wheel whirls swift, how rank they grow! But how sparse and thin when the wheel runs slow Forward and backward, and to and fro!

There's a heap of rolls like clouds in curl, And a bright-faced, springy, barefoot girl: She gives a touch and a careless whirl,

She holds a roll in her shapely hand

That the sun has kissed and the wind has fanned, And its mate obeys the wheel's command.

There must be wings on her rosy heel!

And there must be bees in the spindled steel!

A thousand spokes in the dizzy wheel!

Katey closed her eyes.

She was so weak that this little scene exhausted and confused her. So Delphine was here! And she had been ill! Slowly her awakened thoughts traveled back to the point where forgetfulness began. Then she hid her face among the pillows.

Delphine came presently and fed her with broth, and bade her go to sleep like a good child. She could hear the girls whispering outside the door, where Clary had gone; but even this died away upon her ear, and she lost herself again. How long a time passed she did not know. She slept and woke, and slept and woke again. Sometimes it was daylight upon which she opened her eyes, and sometimes a soft glimmer, as from a shaded lamp, filled the room; and all the while she was slowly coming back to herself. How far she must have wandered in the darkness!