of Shakespeare, which once stood like a presiding genius in a London theatre, and is now preserved in the Garrick club. In the place of reliques which existed in Heine's time, it is now only possible in many cases to identify the sites, but it is agreeable to find how frequently we are led to these by the perpetuation of the old place-names. The survival of the alleys and their names on Bankside affords an indubitable connection between the present and the time when Shakespeare's plays were originally produced in the Globe theatre there. The making of Queen Victoria Street caused many alterations in a region rich in Shakespearean associations. But it is interesting to discover that Puddle Dock still exists, which was one of the landmarks cited in the deeds of conveyance of Shakespeare's house in Blackfriars, in the definition of its locality. In Walcott's History of St Margaret's, Westminster, it appears that among the earliest entries in the Parish Register is the following: 1539, April 30. Willhelmus Shakspere buried. This curious instance of the prevalence of the name suggested that the conclusion drawn from the record as to the poet's residence at St Helen's, Bishopsgate (see p. 218 et seq., infra) might need a 66 cautionary note. But in the Athenæum for March 26 of this year appeared a communication from Prof. J. W. Hales, on The London Residences of Shake speare," which seems to establish what was already stated in these pages, viz., that Shakespeare resided at one time at St Helens, and at another in the liberty of the Clink on Bankside. An Itinerary is a barren thing without some historical imagination. It needs not to be a Heine or a Douglas Jerrold, a Besant or a Rosebery to find an interest in following up the clues to history which London affords, but if the study is to be fruitful there must be some exercise of imaginative vision. There are few better lessons in English history. When the half holidays fall on rainy days there are the museums available and accessible. But on fine spring days young scholars might be encouraged to learn something of the history which may be read in the stones of London and localised in the names of sites and places. The association of Shakespeare with London leads towards that ennobling perception which Heine described, and that spiritual aspect of the vast city to which Lord Rosebery has pointed. |