SOUTHAMPTON THE LORD OF SHAKSPEARE'S LOVE. 49

name.' Whose name did he hallow or honour save that of Southampton? Again in sonnet 102:

Our love was new and then but in the spring,

When I was wont to greet it with my lays.

What love but that betwixt this earl and Shakspeare did the poet ever greet with his lays? And sonnet 105 tells us that up to the time at which it was written, the affection must have been undivided; and the patron of both sonnets and poems must have been one and the same person. For

All alike my songs and praises be,

To one, of one, still such and ever so.

But I shall not only show that the Earl of Southampton was the lord of Shakspeare's love, and the dear friend' of these sonnets, the budding favourite at court, the fatherless youth of nineteen, the patron to whom Shakspeare sent what silent love had writ' before he publicly dedicated his 'love without end; ' those sonnets that were the dumb presagers of his speaking breast, and as such preceded and heralded the spoken thought and feeling of his public inscriptions. I shall also show how Southampton alone could have been spoken of as becoming the 'tenth Muse of sonnet 38, not in the beginning of the sonnets, but after many of them had been begotten, and prove how he only could be a part in what Shakspeare had devoted to him. And lastly, I shall show that whether the sonnets be addressed to the object of them by Shakspeare himself, or spoken dramatically, it is the character of Southampton and that alone, with its love of change, its shifting hues, its passionate impetuosity, its spirit restless as flame, its tossings to and fro, its hurrying here and there to seek in strife abroad the satisfaction denied to him in peace at home, that we shall find reflected all through the larger number of them, and Southampton only who is congratulated in sonnet 107 on having escaped his doom of imprisonment for life, through the death of the Queen.

E

THE name of Southampton was once well known on a past page of our rough island story; his swaling plume was looked to in the battle's front, and recognised as worn by a natural leader of fighting men. He was of the flower of England's chivalry and a close follower of Sir Philip Sidney in heading the onset and breaking hardily on the enemy with a noble few, without pausing to count numbers or weigh odds.

With a most natural aptitude for war, he never had sufficient scope: one of the jewels of Elizabeth's realm did not meet with a fit setting at her hand; a bright particular star of her constellation was dimmed and diminished through a baleful conjunction. But he has a rich reprisal in being the friend of Shakspeare, beloved by him in life, embalmed by him in memory; once a sharer in his own personal affection, and for ever the partaker of his earthly immortality.

Henry Wriothesley was the second of the two sons of Henry, the second earl of the name. His mother was the daughter of Anthony Brown, first Viscount Montague. The founder of the family was Thomas Wriothesley, our earl's grandfather, a favourite servant of Henry VIII.,

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'HONOUR IN HIS PERFECTION.'

51

who granted to him the Promonstratensian abbey of Tichfield, Hants, endowed with about 280l. per year in 1538, creating him Baron Tichfield about the same time, and Earl of Southampton in 1546. He died July 30, 1550. A rare work entitled Honour in his Perfection,' by G. M., 4to, 1624,' contains the following notice of our Southampton's ancestors :-'Next (O Britain!) read unto thy softer nobility the story of the noble house of Southampton; that shall bring new fire to their bloods, and make of the little sparks of honour great flames of excellency. Show them the life of Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, who was both an excellent soldier and an admirable scholar; who not only served the great king, his master, Henry VIII. in his wars, but in his council chamber; 2 not only in the field but on the bench, within his courts of civil justice. This man, for his excellent parts, was made Lord Chancellor of England, where he governed with that integrity of heart, and true mixture of conscience and justice, that he won the hearts of both king and people.

'After this noble prince succeeded his son, Henry, Earl of Southampton, a man of no less virtue, prowess, and wisdom, ever beloved and favoured of his prince, highly reverenced and favoured of all that were in his own rank, and bravely attended and served by the best gentlemen of those countries wherein he lived. His muster-roll never consisted of four lacqueys and a coachman, but of a whole troop of at least a hundred well-mounted gentle

1 'Honour in his Perfection' supposed by Malone to have been written by Gervase Markham. But Gervase was accustomed to write his name Jarvis or larvis. He signs his sonnets dedicatory to his tragedy of Sir Richard Grenville, his dedication to the 'Poem of Poems or Sion's Muse' and his contributions to 'England's Helicon' with the initials J. M. not G. M. I rather think that 'Honour in his Perfection' was written by Griffith or Griffin Markham, the brother of Gervase. He served under the Earl of Southampton in Ireland, as Colonel of Horse, and was an intimate personal friend.

2 As Secretary of State.

admit any man to
This prince could
neither might do

men and yeomen. He was not known in the streets by
guarded liveries but by gold chains; not by painted
butterflies, ever running as if some monster pursued
them, but by tall goodly fellows that kept a constant
pace both to guard his person and to
their lord which had serious business.
not steal or drop into an ignoble place,
anything unworthy of his great calling; for he ever had
a world of testimonies about him.' This earl was attached
to Popery, and a zealous adherent to the cause of Mary,
Queen of Scots; which led to his imprisonment in the
Tower in 1572. He died October 4, 1581, at the early age
of thirty-five, bequeathing his body to be buried in the
chapel of Tichfield Church, where his mother had been
interred, his father having been buried in the choir of
St. Andrew's Church, Holborn; and appointing that 2001.
should be distributed amongst the poor within his several
lordships, to pray for his soul and the souls of his

ancestors.

'When it pleased the divine goodness to take to his mercy this great earl, he left behind to succeed him Henry, Earl of Southampton, his son (now living), being then a child. But here methinks, Cinthius aurem vellet, something pulls me by the elbow and bids me forbear, for flattery is a deadly sin, and will damn reputation. But, shall 1 that ever loved and admired this earl, that lived many years where I daily saw this earl, that knew him before the wars, in the wars, and since the wars-shall I that have seen him endure the worst malice or vengeance that sea, tempests, or thunder could utter, that have seen him undergo all the extremities of war; that have seen him serve in person on the enemy-shall I that have seen him receive the reward of a soldier (before the face of an enemy) for the best act of a soldier (done upon the enemy)—shall I be scared with shadows? No; truth is my mistress, and though I can write nothing which

SOUTHAMPTON'S EARLY YEARS.

53

can equal the least spark of fire within him, yet for her sake will I speak something which may inflame those that are heavy and dull, and of mine own temper. This earl (as I said before) came to his father's dignity in childhood, spending that and his other younger times in the study of good letters (to which the University of Cambridge is a witness), and after confirmed that study with travel and foreign observation.' He was born October 6, 1573. His father and elder brother both died before he had reached the age of twelve years. On December 11, 1585, he was admitted of St. John's College, Cambridge, with the denomination of Henry, Earl of Southampton, as appears by the books of that house; on June 6, 1589, he took his degree of Master of Arts, and after a residence of nearly five years, he finally left the University for London. He is said to have won the high eulogies of his contemporaries for his uncommon proficiency, and to have been admitted about three years later to the same degree, by incorporation, at Oxford.

The Inns of Court, says Aulicus Coquinaria, were always the place of esteem with the Queen, who considered that they fitted youth for the future, and were the best antechambers to her Court. And it was customary for the nobility, as well as the most considerable gentry of England, to spend some time in one of the Inns of Court, on purpose to complete their course of studies. Soon after leaving the University, the young earl entered himself a member of Gray's Inn, and on the authority of a roll preserved in the library of Lord Hardwicke, he is said to have been a member so late as the year 1611. Malone was inclined to believe that he rather was admitted a member of Lincoln's Inn, to the chapel of which society the earl gave one of the admirably painted windows, in which his arms may be yet seen.

One of the earliest notices of the earl in the calendar of