178 THE WILD-FLOWERS OF SELBORNE 



sonnets were also written, that the poet received from 

 his friend and patron the munificent sum of ;^ICXX), 

 which he is said to have required in order to complete 

 some intended purchase. The sonnets, it is true, were 

 not published as a whole before 1609; but we learn 

 from one Francis Meres that Shakespeare was already 

 known as a sonnet-writer some years earlier. In a 

 book entitled Palladis Tamia, and published in 1598, 

 he speaks of " hony-tongued Shakespeare," and of 

 his Venus and Ado?ns, his Lucrece, and his "sugred 

 sonnets among his private friends." And at that 

 time, as the dedication to Lucrece sufficiently testifies, 

 Southampton was certainly a foremost figure in that 

 privileged circle, and may therefore reasonably be 

 supposed to have been one of the " private friends " 

 for whom the sonnets were intended, and to whom the 

 allusions would be clear which have since puzzled the 

 students of Shakespeare. Now if Mr. Massey be 

 right, and his theory is at least full of interest, the 

 key to the interpretation of those allusions is to 

 be found in the romantic story of the courtship of 

 Southampton and Elizabeth Vernon. 



The story is soon told. The Earl, whose father 

 had died when he was a boy of twelve, had not 

 been long at Court before he fell in love with 

 " faire Mistress Vernon," a beautiful maid-of-honour 

 to Queen Elizabeth. The lady was cousin to the 

 Earl of Essex, and daughter of Sir John Vernon 

 of Hodnet, near Shrewsbury. It is possible that 

 Shakespeare was really thinking of his young friend 

 when in the Shrewsbury camp scene in i Henry IV. 

 he puts the following lines into the mouth of a Sir 

 Richard Vernon : — 



