ted to the sons of a carpenter and a butcher for the greatest
pleasure and philosophy that has ever been enunciated on the globe!

The years 1611, 1612 and 1613 found William at the pinnacle of his dramatic
glory, and like a ripe philosopher he finished his most thoughtful plays,
"Timon of Athens," "A Winter's Tale," "Antony and Cleopatra," "Pericles,"
"Cymbeline," "Henry the Eighth," and his cap sheaf in the grain field of
thought, "The Tempest."

The constant intellectual labor of Shakspere began to tell on his body, but
his mind like a slumbering volcano, emitted flashes of heat and light,
irradiating the midnight of literary mediocrity and gilding his declining
days with golden flashes of fame and fortune.

He sold his interest in the Blackfriars and Globe theatres, and purchased
property in London and Stratford, making every preparation as a wise and
thrifty man for himself and his children and family. William ever kept an
eye on the glint and glory of gold, and while his bohemian theatrical
companions were squandering their shillings at midnight taverns with
"belles and beaux" he "put money in his purse," and kept it there.

_Gold is power everywhere;
Best of friends in toil and care;
And it surely will outwear
Royal purple here or there!_

King James, in searching for an alliance to strengthen his throne by a
marriage with his beautiful and brainy daughter, Elizabeth, finally hit
upon the Elector Frederick, Count Palatine of Germany, and in the spring of
1613 all the loyal nobility of England were delighted that a matrimonial
alliance had been made with a Protestant prince.

While King James lent his official power to the Protestant religion and
aided the Reformation in its rapid encroachments upon the papal power of
Rome, he socially and clandestinely gave ear to the priests, bishops and
cardinals of the Catholic church.

The ceremonials incident to the marriage of Frederick and Elizabeth were
splendid in the songs, dances, masques, parades, fireworks, and dramatic
entertainments at Whitehall.

[Illustration]

A dozen of the most appropriate plays of Shakspere were enacted before
the nobility of the realm; and the diplomatic corps from foreign lands were
greatly charmed by the magnificence of the theatrical displays.

The King spent one hundred thousand dollars in the palace and London
festivities of the marriage of his beautiful daughter, and he secretly
pawned his word and jewels to