Lord Penzance,as all lawyers know,and as the late Mr.Inderwick,K.C.has testified,was one of the first legal authorities of his day,famous for his "remarkable grasp of legal principles,"and "endowed by nature with a remarkable facility for marshalling facts,and for a clear expression of his views."Lord Penzance speaks of Shakespeare's "perfect familiarity with not only the principles,axioms,and maxims,but the technicalities of English law,a knowledge so perfect and intimate that he was never incorrect and never at fault .The mode in which this knowledge was pressed into service on all occasions to express his meaning and illustrate his thoughts,was quite unexampled.He seems to have had a special pleasure in his complete and ready mastership of it in all its branches.As manifested in the plays,this legal knowledge and learning had therefore a special character which places it on a wholly different footing from the rest of the multifarious knowledge which is exhibited in page after page of the plays.At every turn and point at which the author required a metaphor,simile,or illustration,his mind ever turned FIRST to the law.He seems almost to have THOUGHT in legal phrases,the commonest of legal expressions were ever at the end of his pen in deion or illustration.That he should have descanted in lawyer language when he had a forensic subject in hand,such as Shylock's bond,was to be expected,but the knowledge of law in 'Shakespeare'was exhibited in a far different manner:it protruded itself on all occasions,appropriate or inappropriate,and mingled itself with strains of thought widely divergent from forensic subjects."Again:"To acquire a perfect familiarity with legal principles,and an accurate and ready use of the technical terms and phrases not only of the conveyancer's office but of the pleader's chambers and the Courts at Westminster,nothing short of employment in some career involving constant contact with legal questions and general legal work would be requisite.But a continuous employment involves the element of time,and time was just what the manager of two theatres had not at his disposal.In what portion of Shakespeare's (i.e.Shakspere's)career would it be possible to point out that time could be found for the interposition of a legal employment in the chambers or offices of practising lawyers?"Stratfordians,as is well known,casting about for some possible explanation of Shakespeare's extraordinary knowledge of law,have made the suggestion that Shakespeare might,conceivably,have been a clerk in an attorney's office before he came to London.Mr.
Collier wrote to Lord Campbell to ask his opinion as to the probability of this being true.His answer was as follows:"You require us to believe implicitly a fact,of which,if true,positive and irrefragable evidence in his own handwriting might have been forthcoming to establish it.Not having been actually enrolled as an attorney,neither the records of the local court at Stratford nor of the superior Courts at Westminster would present his name as being concerned in any suit as an attorney,but it might reasonably have been expected that there would be deeds or wills witnessed by him still extant,and after a very diligent search none such can be discovered."Upon this Lord Penzance comments:"It cannot be doubted that Lord Campbell was right in this.No young man could have been at work in an attorney's office without being called upon continually to act as a witness,and in many other ways leaving traces of his work and name."There is not a single fact or incident in all that is known of Shakespeare,even by rumor or tradition,which supports this notion of a clerkship.And after much argument and surmise which has been indulged in on this subject,we may,I think,safely put the notion on one side,for no less an authority than Mr.Grant White says finally that the idea of his having been clerk to an attorney has been "blown to pieces."It is altogether characteristic of Mr.Churton Collins that he,nevertheless,adopts this exploded myth."That Shakespeare was in early life employed as a clerk in an attorney's office,may be correct.At Stratford there was by royal charter a Court of Record sitting every fortnight,with six attorneys,beside the town clerk,belonging to it,and it is certainly not straining probability to suppose that the young Shakespeare may have had employment in one of them.There is,it is true,no tradition to this effect,but such traditions as we have about Shakespeare's occupation between the time of leaving school and going to London are so loose and baseless that no confidence can be placed in them.It is,to say the least,more probable that he was in an attorney's office than that he was a butcher killing calves 'in a high style,'and making speeches over them."This is a charming specimen of Stratfordian argument.There is,as we have seen,a very old tradition that Shakespeare was a butcher's apprentice.John Dowdall,who made a tour in Warwickshire in 1693,testifies to it as coming from the old clerk who showed him over the church,and it is unhesitatingly accepted as true by Mr.Halliwell-Phillipps.(Vol I,p.11,and see Vol.II,p.71,72.)
