the public."

Some attempts have been made to impugn this account, but the result of
them all has been rather to confirm it. How nobly the Poet's gentle
and judicious act of kindness was remembered, is shown by Jonson's
superb verses, some of which I have quoted, prefixed to the folio of
1623; enough of themselves to confer an immortality both on the writer
and on the subject of them.

In 1599, we find a coat of arms granted to John Shakespeare, by the
Herald's College, in London. The grant was made, no doubt, at the
instance of his son William. The matter is involved in a good deal of
perplexity; the claims of the son being confounded with those of the
father, in order, apparently, that out of the two together might be
made a good, or at least a plausible, case. Our Poet, the son of a
glover, or a yeoman, had evidently set his heart on being heralded
into a gentleman; and, as his profession of actor stood in the way,
the application was made in his father's name. The thing was started
as early as 1596, but so much question was had, so many difficulties
raised, concerning it, that the Poet was three years in working it
through. To be sure, such heraldic gentry was of little worth in
itself, and the Poet knew this well enough; but then it assured a
certain very desirable social standing, and therefore, as an aspiring
member of society, he was right in seeking it.

In the year 1600, five more of his plays were published in as many
quarto pamphlets. These were, _A Midsummer-Night's Dream, The Merchant
of Venice, Much Ado about Nothing_, the Second Part of _King Henry the
Fourth_, and _King Henry the Fifth_. It appears, also, that _As You
Like It_ was then written; for it was entered at the Stationers' for