His Life and Genius 133 



still only in the slow making it is a long way from 

 that far-off end. Not observation only of men 

 and things but the ideal use also of his own very 

 mixed experience it was which instructed and 

 qualified Shakspeare to be the wonderful delinea- 

 tor of humanity he was. Even he, all-heeding as 

 he seemed to be, would have been much wanting 

 as an observer of nature had he left out that part 

 of it which he could observe best and with least 

 risk of error — namely, himself. 



Did he, when he left Stratford, drift straight to 

 London ? That has been the usual assumption. 

 Nevertheless some ingenious considerations set 

 forth by Judge Madden in his Diary of William 

 Silence suggest that he may have crossed the 

 borders of the county into Gloucestershire, where 

 some of his relations were then or subsequently 

 settled, and found humble employment there. 

 The author adduces many striking arguments to 

 prove that he gained there the special and 

 accurate knowledge which he shows of falconry, 

 and of the way to tame and train a falcon by 

 starving it of food and sleep, of the virtues and 

 faults of particular hounds, and of their behaviour 

 and that of the hunted stag when at bay. Cer- 

 tainly he never could have known horses, hounds, 

 hawks and hunting so well as he did had he not 

 had to do with them practically by actual attention 

 to, or care of, and work among them.* 



* Besides his well-known exposition in Venus and Adonis 

 of the good qualities which a perfect horse ought to possess, he 



