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A detailed TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE can be found at the end of the book.
SHAKESPEARE THE BOY
WITH SKETCHES OF
THE HOME AND SCHOOL LIFE
THE GAMES AND SPORTS, THE MANNERS, CUSTOMS
AND FOLK-LORE OF THE TIME
BY
WILLIAM JAMES ROLFE, Litt.D.
WITH FORTY-ONE ILLUSTRATIONS
LONDON
CHATTO & WINDUS
1897
Copyright, 1896, by Harper & Brothers.
All rights reserved.
PREFACE
Two years ago, at the request of the editors of theYouth's Companion, I wrote for that periodical a series offour familiar articles on the boyhood of Shakespeare. Itwas understood at the time that I might afterwards expandthem into a book, and this plan is carried out in thepresent volume. The papers have been carefully revisedand enlarged to thrice their original compass, and a newfifth chapter has been added.
The sources from which I have drawn my material areoften mentioned in the text and the notes. I have beenparticularly indebted to Halliwell-Phillipps's Outlines ofthe Life of Shakespeare, Knight's Biography of Shakspere,Furnivall's Introduction to the "Leopold" edition ofShakespeare, his Babees Book, and his edition of Harrison'sDescription of England, Sidney Lee's Stratford-on-Avon,Strutt's Sports and Pastimes, Brand's Popular Antiquities,and Dyer's Folk-Lore of Shakespeare.
I hope that the book may serve to give the young folksome glimpses of rural life in England when Shakespearewas a boy, and also to help them—and possibly theirelders—to a better understanding of many allusions in hisworks.
W. J. R.
Cambridge, June 10, 1896.