I have quoted the former of these paffages because it gives a curious infight into the focial customs of Shakefpere's time. From it we learn that it was not unusual for one to read out fome entertaining book during dinner, as they read out paffages from Scripture, or the "Lives of the Saints," in monafteries. It also gives one fome idea of the luxury in which literary men lived, befides fome curious gaftronomical facts, fuch as that olives were eaten before, not after dinner.

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At the "Mermaid," then, ufed to meet the wits of the town-Shakespere, Jonson, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Donne. And here, as quaint old Fuller in his Worthies" relates, "Many were the wit combats between him [Shakefpere] and Ben Jonfon, which two I behold like a Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war: Mafter Jonfon, like the former, was built higher in learning, solid but flow in his performances; Shakespere, with the English man-of-war, leffer in bulk, but lighter in failing, could turn with all tides, tack about and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention."

Of this wit the specimens which have been preserved do not give a very exalted notion; but it is a curious fact that conversation which has delighted the hearers by its wit, when repeated, often seems infipid. A joke which the reports of the debates in Parliament declare

to have been received with roars of "laughter," often feems fo poor and trivial that we think our legiflators must be wonderfully easily amused. Yet they are the moft faftidious audience in the world. The joke was not a bad joke in reality, but wit read is not like wit spoken. The time, place, and manner have much to do with it. So Falstaff, a great authority surely on this subject, fays, "Oh, it is much that a jeft with a grave face and a flight oath will do with a fellow that hath never had the ache in his fhoulders!" Befides, wit is of fo flight and evanefcent a character that it is not the best jokes that are remembered, but rather the heaviest and dulleft. Barrow defines wit thus: "Sometimes it lieth in a pat allufion to a known story, or in a seasonable application of a trivial faying, or in forging an appofite tale; fometimes it playeth in words and phrases, taking advantage from the ambiguity of their fenfe, or the affinity of their found; fometimes it is wrapped in a drefs of humorous expreffion; fometimes it lurketh under an odd fimilitude; fometimes it is lodged in a fly question, in a smart answer, in a quirkish reafon, in a fhrewd intimation, in cunningly averting or cleverly retorting an objection; sometimes it is couched in a bold scheme of speech, in a tart irony, in a lufty hyperbole, in a ftartling metaphor, in a plausible reconciling of contradictions, or in acute nonfenfe; fometimes a fcenical

representation of perfons or things, a counterfeit speech, a mimical look or gefture, paffeth for it; fometimes an affected fimplicity, fometimes a prefumptuous bluntness giveth it being; fometimes it rifeth only from a lucky hitting upon what is ftrange; fometimes from a crafty wresting obvious matter to the purpose; often it confifteth in one knows not what, and fpringeth up one can hardly tell how. Its ways are unaccountable and inexplicable, being anfwerable to the numberless rovings of fancy and windings of language. It is, in fhort, a manner of speaking out of the fimple and plain way (such as reason teacheth and proveth things by), which by a pretty surprising uncouthness in conceit or expreffion, doth affect and amufe the fancy, stirring in it fome wonder, and breeding fome delight thereto."

It would not be difficult, and it would be an amufing paftime, to cull paffages from Shakespere's plays which would answer to each of the various forms of wit here enumerated. Falstaff would supply most of them. That he who so nimbly followed the turnings of this Proteus in his writings, was equally active in his conversation, Fuller, no mean judge, affures us; and we must blame the reporters, or the nature of wit itself, if the jokes which have actually come down to us be disappointing. I do not, however, feel at liberty to omit them.

From a collection of "Merry Paffages and Jefts,"

collected by Sir Nicholas l'Eftrange, we learn that on one occafion "Shakespere was god-father to one of Ben Jonfon's children, and after the christening, being in a deep ftudy, Jonfon came to cheer him up, and asked him why he was fo melancholy. No, faith, Ben,' fays he, not I; but I have been confidering a great while what should be the fittest gift for me to bestow upon my god-child, and I have refolved at laft.' 'I prithee what?' fays he. 'I' faith, Ben, I'll e'en give him a dozen latten (Latin) spoons, and thou shalt tranflate them.'

Now we must recollect that Jonfon was a learned man, and probably was in the habit of poking fun at Shakefpere for his lack of Latin. Shakefpere retaliates by faying he will give the child some latten, or brass, fpoons, a ufual prefent from a sponsor, and that Jonfon fhall tranflate them, playing upon the ambiguity of the word latten, and hinting that Jonfon could do little but tranflate from the ancients. The joke is a good joke if we confider the circumftances, which, I think, must have been pretty much what I have fuppofed. It is what Aulus Gellius calls a Scomma, and probably turned the laugh against honest

Ben.

The next is not fo fuccefsful. We read in an Ashmolean MS. that "Mr. Ben Jonfon and Mr. William

Shakefpere being merry at a tavern, Mr. Jonfon having begun this for his epitaph—

'Here lies Ben Jonson,

That was once one,'

he gives it to Mr. Shakespere to make up, who fently writes

'Who, while he lived, was a flow thing,

And now, being dead, is no-thing.""

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No doubt Shakefpere was a little out of patience with Jonson's "flowness in his performance;" his ending is certainly more pointed than Jonfon's beginning.

The two men seem to have been formed by nature, both from their resemblance and the difference of their several characters, to be foils one to the other; they went about together obferving odd humours, and the fact that they were always engaging in wit combats is one of the greatest proofs of the fincerity of their friendship. It is only a very fincere affection that will bear the wear and tear of mutual jests, and none but men of a high order of intellect and fine taste can joke or take a joke without giving or taking offence.

Jonfon in his " Discoveries," in the ninth volume of Gifford's edition, fays—“I remember the players have often mentioned it as an honour to Shakefpere, that in his writing, whatsoever he penned he never blotted out