Memoir of John Aubrey, F.R.S.; embracing his autobiographical sketches, a brief review of his personal and literary merits, and an account of his works, with extracts from his correspondence, anecdotes of some of his contemporaries, and of the times in which he lived / By John Britton ... Published by the Wiltshire Topographical Society [with its 5th Annual Report, 1845].
- John Britton
- Date:
- 1845
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Memoir of John Aubrey, F.R.S.; embracing his autobiographical sketches, a brief review of his personal and literary merits, and an account of his works, with extracts from his correspondence, anecdotes of some of his contemporaries, and of the times in which he lived / By John Britton ... Published by the Wiltshire Topographical Society [with its 5th Annual Report, 1845]. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![Oxonienses, were, like the copious and accurate account of Milton, transcribed lite- rally from Aubrey’s papers. What has been there suggested [that D’Avenant was Shakspere’s son] is confirmed by a subsequent passage in the MS., which has been imperfectly obliterated, and which Wood did not print; though, in one of his own unpublished manuscripts, now in the Bodleian Library, he has himself told the same story. The line which is imperfectly obliterated, in a different ink, and therefore probably by another hand than that of Aubrey, tells us (as Mr. Warton, who has been able to trace the words through the obliteration, informs me) that D’Avenant was Shakspeare’s son.” Malone, a few pages onward, prints what he calls “an exact transcript of the whole article [by Aubrey] relating to Shakspeare, from the original;” and this, which is given more accurately than it had previously been by Warton and Farmer, is accompanied by nine pages of critical commentary upon Aubrey’s anecdotes. Indeed, it is evident that this editor of Shakspere fairly and fully appreciated Aubrey’s industry and his accuracy of record. In page 269, Malone makes the following additional remarks respecting D’Avenant :—“ I have mentioned in a preceding page,” he says, “ that the account given of him by Wood was taken from Mr. Aubrey’s MS. Since that sheet was printed Mr. Warton has obligingly furnished me with an exact transcript of the article relating to D’Avenant,* which, as it contains some particulars not noticed by Wood, I shall, here subjoin.” Yet it is remarkable that in the transcript which follows, the “imperfectly obliterated” passages, so ingeniously observed by Warton, are not given. Soon after the appearance of Malone’s edition of Shakspere the literary world was agitated by the famous discussion respecting the Ireland forgeries ;} and this led to * There is no doubt that the “exact transcript” of the memoir of Shakspere, previously given by Malone, was also supplied by his friend Warton. Mr. Charles Knight, in his recent Biography of Shakspere, notices the traditionary account of him by Aubrey, and endeavours to reconcile some of its statements with the few facts which have been satisfactorily ascertained. + The original documents prepared by William Henry Ireland, junior, and promulgated with so much temporary success, together with his own manuscript “Confession” of the whole course of his deceptions, are in the possession of Lewis Pocock, Esquire, F.S.A. London.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33522169_0124.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
