ties of his day, famous for his "remarkable grasp of legal
principles," and "endowed by nature with a remarkable facility for
marshalling facts, and for a clear expression of his views."

Lord Penzance speaks of Shakespeare's "perfect familiarity with not only
the principles, axioms, and maxims, but the technicalities of English
law, a knowledge so perfect and intimate that he was never incorrect and
never at fault . . . The mode in which this knowledge was pressed into
service on all occasions to express his meaning and illustrate his
thoughts, was quite unexampled. He seems to have had a special pleasure
in his complete and ready mastership of it in all its branches. As
manifested in the plays, this legal knowledge and learning had therefore
a special character which places it on a wholly different footing from
the rest of the multifarious knowledge which is exhibited in page after
page of the plays. At every turn and point at which the author required
a metaphor, simile, or illustration, his mind ever turned _first_ to the
law. He seems almost to have _thought_ in legal phrases, the commonest
of legal expressions were ever at the end of his pen in description or
illustration. That he should have descanted in lawyer language when he
had a forensic subject in hand, such as Shylock's bond, was to be
expected, but the knowledge of law in 'Shakespeare' was exhibited in a
far different manner: it protruded itself on all occasions, appropriate
or inappropriate, and mingled itself with strains of thought widely
divergent from forensic subjects." Again: "To acquire a perfect
familiarity with legal principles, and an accurate and ready use of the
technical terms and phrases not only of the conveyancer's office but of
the pleader's chambers and the Courts at Westminster, nothing short of
employment in some career involving constant contact with legal questions
and general legal work would be requisite. But a continuous employment
involves the element of time, and time was just what the manager of two
theatres had not at his disposal. In what portion of Shakespeare's
(_i.e._ Shakspere's) career would it be possible to point out that time
could be found for the interposition of a legal employment in the
chambers or offices of practising lawyers?"

Stratfordians, as is well known, casting about for some possible
explanation of Shakespeare's extraordinary knowledge of law, have made
the suggestion that Shakespeare might, co