A RANDOM ANNOUNCEMENT &

TO THE PUBLIC UNIVERSALLY.

It is my anxious expectation and vehement desire that this newly published address, which may be estimated by some as being "flimsy," and merely having about it "an infinite deal of nothing," will be noticed either favourably or unfavourably, in which manner it matters little to me, by one or more of our judicious critics, who are "nothing if not critical," being brimful "of wise saws and modern instances," and will at least be thoroughly perused by many who have a more comprehensive mind, containing a larger store of profound knowledge, and have a more prolific taste, and a better appreciative acquaintance of Shakespearean literature, than unfortunately I am possessed of. I further trust that those whose extensive "book learned skill," excellency of wit and singularity of gifts, can give them assurance in the composition of prose and verse, and no less learned for study and reading, and no less honourable for faithful and profitable services to their country and common weal, will be prompted with an incentive sensibility for the useful, the true, and the good; and with a beneficent and an instructive tendency towards elevating mankind, intellectually, socially, and morally, that they will contribute other information of greater import regarding unknown lines in the momentous life of our inimitable author, hitherto left in obscurity by the illustrious prophets of the past and present, and by the great dead writers, the living pettish praters, the selfish scribes, and the magnanimous biographers and commentators. When this needful goal is successfully attained, very probably it will afford me unspeakable happiness, the remembrance of which, whilst vitality exists with me, and I "hold death at arms end," will undoubtedly live in my memory like a bright and never-dimming light: "tis a consummation devoutly to be wished" by an enthusiastic admirer of the bard's unlimited genius and an humble exponent of his mighty works.

Huddersfield,

October 10th, 1884.

SHAKESPEARE HIRST.

ADDRESS.

MR. CHAIRMAN, VICE-CHAIRMAN, AND FRIENDS,

The wheels of Phoebus' cart have again revolved, and we are once more happily assembled to pay our humble tribute to departed worth, and never-dying genius. I may be pardoned for saying that this is the sweetest day of any in April, or in all the year, because it is the day on which was born the greatest intellectual luminary the world ere saw, the great, the glorious man! the matchless! the wonderful! the God-like WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. In his line of literature there is none like him, and there never was, his like we shall never look upon again; he was a sun among the stars, the other star-authors of his time could not twinkle in his presence. Neither Emperors, Kings, Poets, Painters, Orators, Actors, Musicians, Divines, Members of Congresses, Philosophers, Professors, nor Lawyers are a match for him, for this reason, his soul was that of an intellectual giant, before the exuberance of whose powerful "muse of fire" which ascends "the brightest heaven of invention!" all are awed, and are lost in marvellous admiration at his astonishing powers of imagination, and accurate

delineation of characters. I may say that to myself, and to all present at this annual celebration, and also to millions of the human race in every part of this habitable globe, there should not be a day in the year which we ought to look forward to with greater pleasure, or with more reverential observance, than this Three hundred and twenty years have rolled away since the great Genius made his debut upon the stage of life, and still his good name and his fame shine forth with brighter lustre than ever, and his pleasing, instructive, matchless, and inexhaustible works are more widely read and performed, and are far better appreciated now than ever they were in the good days of yore. We who admire the drawer of the many changes of coloured life, have the pleasing thought, pride, and honour of saying, without the slightest fear of refutation, that in this country, in a beautiful secluded town known by the name of Stratford-on-Avon, in the County of Warwick, one of the pleasantest of old English towns, situated in the bosom of poetry, was born 1564, the man of all men, who is, as Ben Jonson wrote, “not for an age but for all time." He was the greatest Genius that ever was known, or perhaps ever will be known in Dramatic Poetry. A candid Author, whose productions are suitable to all nations and all periods. This information heads of families should impress upon their children's minds, and "be he ne'er so vile, this day shall gentle his condition," who fearlessly upholds that "the Sweet Swan of Avon" shall always, on a similar occasion, "be in our flowing cups freshly remembered."

Just imagine for a moment in your mind's eye, our Immortal Poet when a child, "mewling and puking" in his

loving mother's arms, whose heart was capable of love, of love, pure, devoted, unchangeable, springing from being beloved. The fond mother, Mary Shakespeare, having her child in her lap, would show an humble pleasure for the felicity she enjoyed in having so lovely an infant. When he was the heaven-born child, the first of a family of ten children, oh joy! oh rapture! oh! with what delightful pleasure must the doting parents have looked upon their boy. As he grew up, and prattled on their knees, and smiled in their faces, would they not alternately kiss him, and glory in his smile? But how little would they imagine. that their amiable pet. their joy, their boast, their pride, was destined to exhaust the world in literature, and then create other pleasing worlds out of his own intellectual fancy.

His "illumined page

Has never yet been laid aside,

Chief Prompter on Creation's stage,

Our endless joy—our matchless pride."

When he was "the whining school-boy, with his satchel

And shining morning face, creeping like a snail
Unwillingly to school,"

A free grammar school in his native town. His Schoolmaster and his preceptors would, most probably, protest that he would some day be a prodigy, for he would soon have distinguished himself as a book-worm, and would, with his superior talents, invariably continue to remain at the head of his class. Early he must have known the moods and tenses of a Greek or Latin sentence, and must quickly have made himself a master of his own language, as he soon quitted school and became

"The lover sighing like furnace with a woeful ballad,

Made to his mistress' eye-brow."

Then "trimmed like a younker prancing to his love."

3

He thought proper to marry while he was yet very young,

a fair being, made up of gentleness and love if ever woman was. His wife, a woman eminently beautiful, by whom he had three children, a son and two daughters, was the daughter of one Hathaway, a substantial yeoman in a small village called Shottery, in the neighbourhood of Stratford. In his matrimonial settlement he continued for some time, but not very long, for how could it be expected that such a genius would be cramped, "cabin'd, cribb'd, confined, bound, into saucy doubts and fears," and remain almost entirely shut out from the world.

Through receiving a bounteous gift of a thousand pounds from his admirer, friend and patron, the Right Honourable Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, and Baron of Tichfield, to whom he dedicated his first poetic effusion, "Venus and Adonis," he was he was enabled to commence his peregrinations as "an actor or a wit's pedlar, retailing his wares at wakes, and wassals, meetings, markets, fairs.” He had the honour to meet with many great and uncommon marks of favour and friendship from the noble Earl, and we, in duty bound, ought to cherish with loving remembrance, and with grateful and lasting reverence, the memory of this bounteous nobleman, he having been instrumental in extricating from obscurity, and in bringing forth to the public, the mightiest intellectual monarch whose name ever graced the pages of the world's history.

Our Poet very probably commenced his career as a Thespian, or in other words, as a Tragedian of the city, about the year 1585; he would then be about 21 years of age, and at such an early period in life was the father of a young family. He was a