the plays owned by the company. Though
Shakespeare's grammar school days ended in Stratford he took his
collegiate course in Burbage's Theatre. During the leisure hours of the
years of his servitorship he studied the arts as he found them in MS.
plays. _I shall show, later, that Robert Greene, through the pen of his
coadjutor, Thomas Nashe, in an earlier attack than that of 1592, refers
to Shakespeare's servitorship and to the acquisitions of knowledge he
made during his idle hours._ That he made good use of his time and his
materials, however, is demonstrated by the fact that in the four years
intervening between the end of 1590 and the end of 1594, he composed, at
least, seven original plays, two long poems, and over sixty sonnets;
much of this work being since and still regarded--three hundred years
after its production--as a portion of the world's greatest literature.

While it is apparent, even to those critics and biographers who admit
the likelihood that Shakespeare's earliest connection with theatrical
affairs was with the Burbage interests, that Lord Strange's company--of
which they, erroneously, suppose that he still continued to be a
member--ceased to perform under James Burbage in, or before, February
1592, when they began to play under Alleyn and Henslowe's management at
the Rose Theatre, no previous attempt has been made to explain the
reasons for Lord Strange's company's connection with Henslowe, or to
account for the fact that no plays written by Shakespeare were presented
by this company while they performed at the Rose Theatre, though it is
very evident, and admitted by all critics, that he composed several
original plays during this interval.

As it is probable that James Burbage, through his son Richard, retained
some interest in Lord Strange's company during the period that it acted
under Henslowe's and Alleyn's management, the question naturally arises,
Why should Lord Strange's company, which was composed largely of members
of Leicester's and Hunsdon's company, both of which, affiliated with the
Admiral's men, had been previously associated with the Burbage
interests--why should this company, having Richard Burbage in its
membership, enter into business relations with Henslowe and perform for
two years at the Rose Theatre instead of playing under James Burbage at
the Theatre in Shoreditch in summer, and at the Crosskeys in winter,
where they formerly played?

A consideration of the business aff