property Shakespeare had put together became dispersed shortly
after his family became extinct, and New Place came back to the heirs of
the Cloptons, from whom it was purchased. I had hoped we might find
something from the will of Edward Bagley, but he died intestate,[207]
and the administration mentions nothing of interest to Shakespeare.

It is therefore quite clear that the whole period covered by
Shakespeare's life and that of his descendants was 105 years, _i.e._,
from 1564 to 1669, and that _no lineal descendants can survive_. Yet, as
if in illustration of the methods of fabrication of tradition, when it
is desired, I have heard of many of the name who boast a _lineal descent
from the poet_; and of one even who boasts of having inherited not only
_the Shakespeare's_ dinner-service, but his _teapot_! Yet that the
presence of the name is a certain bar to the descent, as above shown, no
such claimants seem to have taken the trouble to find out, as they
easily might do. I am told that in Verona, by the tomb of Romeo and
Juliet, a modern visitor has described himself as "Shakespeare,
_descendant_ of the poet who wrote the play." William Shakespeare's
poems alone are his posterity.

Even under another name they are not to be accepted.[208] In the
_Cambridge Chronicle_ obituary, January 1, 1842, appears: "Died on the
28th ult. at Exning, Suffolk, aged 87, Mrs. Hammond, mother of Mr. Wm.
Hammond, of No. 8, Scots Yard, Cannon Street, London, Indigo Merchant.
The deceased was one of the few remaining descendants of Shakespeare."
So lately as June, 1857, there was recorded the death of William
Hammond, Esq., of London, "one of the last lineal descendants of
Shakespeare."

Dr. Bigsby says that Colonel Gardner, descendant of the Barnards, had
some Shakespeare letters, and claimed descent from Lady Elizabeth
Barnard.[209]

A correspondent remembered to have seen when a boy the Shakespear Inn,
Lower Northgate Street, Gloucester, kept by an old gentleman named
Smith. Outside the passage to the inn was a signboard, "The Shakespear
Inn, by William Smith, descendant from and next of kin to that immortal
bard."[210]

* * * * *

JOHN SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY.

Richard Shakespeare, = wife uncertain,
farmer, of Snitterfield, held land from |
Robert Arden, Mary Arden's father. |
|
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