nothing to identify 'the author with the player.'" This is, we shall
see, the eternal argument. Why should Heywood, speaking of W.
Shakespeare, explain what all the world knew? There was no other W.
Shakespeare (with or without the E and A) but one, the actor, in the
world of letters of Elizabeth and James. Who the author was Heywood
himself has told us, elsewhere: the author was--Will!

But why Shakespeare was so indifferent to the use of his name, or,
when he was moved, acted so mildly, it is not for me or anyone to
explain. We do not know the nature of the circumstances in detail;
we do not know that the poet saw hopes of stopping the sale of the
works falsely attributed to him. I do not even feel certain that he
had not a finger in some of them. Knowing so little, a more soaring
wit than mine might fly to the explanation that "Shakespeare" was the
"nom de plume" of Bacon or his unknown equivalent, and that he
preferred to "let sleeping dogs lie," or, as Mr. Greenwood might
quote the Latin tag, said ne moveas Camarinam.



CHAPTER III: THAT IMPOSSIBLE HE--THE SCHOOLING OF SHAKESPEARE



The banner-cry of the Baconians is the word "Impossible!" It is
impossible that the actor from Stratford (as they think of him, a
bookless, untutored lad, speaking in patois) should have possessed
the wide, deep, and accurate scholarship displayed by the author of
the plays and poems. It is impossible that at the little Free School
of Stratford (if he attended it), he should have gained his wide