This must
evidently be taken to refer to some recent occasion on which the policy
of Lord Burghley (possibly in the matter of the Anjou marriage) had been
rebuked in private by the Maiden Queen, "his mistress," as meddling,
laughable, and fruitless.
This discovery seemed to produce a great impression till the Chairman
reminded the Society that the play in question was now generally ascribed
to George Peele, {278} who was notoriously the solicitor of Lord
Burghley's patronage and the recipient of his bounty. That this poet was
the author of _Romeo and Juliet_ could no longer be a matter of doubt, as
he was confident they would all agree with him on hearing that a living
poet of note had positively assured him of the fact; adding that he had
always thought so when at school. The plaudits excited by this
announcement had scarcely subsided, when the Chairman clenched the matter
by observing that he rather thought the same opinion had ultimately been
entertained by his own grandmother.
Mr. D. then read a paper on the authorship and the hidden meaning of two
contemporary plays which, he must regretfully remark, were too obviously
calculated to cast a most unfavourable and even sinister light on the
moral character of the new Shakespeare; whose possibly suspicious
readiness to attack the vices of others with a view to diverting
attention from his own was signally exemplified in the well-known fact
that, even while putting on a feint of respect and tenderness for his
memory, he had exposed the profligate haunts and habits of Christopher
Marlowe under the transparent pseudonym of Christopher Sly.
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