Читать книгу Shakespeare the Boy - W. J. Rolfe - Страница 17

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The Guild was dissolved by Henry VIII. in 1547, and its possessions remained as crown property until 1553. For seven years the town had been without any responsible government. Meanwhile the leading citizens—the old officers of the Guild—had petitioned Edward VI. to restore that society as a municipal corporation. He granted their prayer, and by a charter dated June 7, 1553, put the government of the town in the hands of its inhabitants. The estates, revenues, and chattels of the Guild were made over to the corporation, which, as the heir and successor of the venerable fraternity, adopted the main features of its organization. The names and functions of its chief officers were but slightly changed. The warden became the bailiff, and the proctors were called chamberlains, but aldermen, clerk, and beadle resumed their old titles. The common council continued to meet monthly in the Guildhall; but it now included, besides the bailiff and ten aldermen, the ten chief burgesses, and its authority covered the whole town. The fraternal sentiment of the ancient society survived; it being ordered "that none of the aldermen nor none of the capital burgesses, neither in the council chamber nor elsewhere, do revile one another, but brother-like live together, and that after they be entered into the council chamber, that they nor none of them depart not forth but in brotherly love, under the pains of every offender to forfeit and pay for every default, vjs. viijd." When any councillor or his wife died, all were to attend the funeral "in their honest apparel, and bring the corpse to the church, there to continue and abide devoutly until the corpse be buried."

The Grammar School and the chapel and almshouses of the Guild became public institutions. The bailiff became a magistrate who presided at a monthly court for the recovery of small debts, and at the higher semi-annual leets, or court-leets, to which all the inhabitants were summoned to revise and enforce the police regulations. Shakespeare alludes to these leets in The Taming of the Shrew (ind. 2. 89) where the servant tells Kit Sly that he has been talking in his sleep:—

"Yet would you say ye were beaten out of door,

And rail upon the mistress of the house,

And say you would present her at the leet

Because she brought stone jugs and no seal'd quarts."

And Iago (Othello, iii. 3. 140) refers to "leets and law-days." Prices of bread and beer were fixed by the council, and ale-tasters were annually appointed to see that the orders concerning the quality and price of malt liquors and bread were enforced. Shakespeare's father was an ale-taster in 1557, and about the same time was received into the corporation as a burgess. In 1561 he was elected as one of the two chamberlains; in 1565 he became an alderman; and in 1568 he was chosen bailiff, the highest official position in the town.

The rule of the council was of a very paternal character. "If a man lived immorally he was summoned to the Guildhall, and rigorously examined as to the truth of the rumors that had reached the bailiff's ear. If his guilt was proved, and he refused to make adequate reparation, he was invited to leave the town. Rude endeavors were made to sweeten the tempers of scolding wives. A substantial 'ducking-stool,' with iron staples, lock, and hinges, was kept in good repair. The shrew was attached to it, and by means of ropes, planks, and wheels was plunged two or three times into the Avon whenever the municipal council believed her to stand in need of correction. Three days and three nights were invariably spent in the open stocks by any inhabitant who spoke disrespectfully to any town officer, or who disobeyed any minor municipal decree. No one might receive a stranger into his house without the bailiff's permission. No journeyman, apprentice, or servant might 'be forth of their or his master's house' after nine o'clock at night. Bowling-alleys and butts were provided by the council, but were only to be used at stated times. An alderman was fined on one occasion for going to bowls after a morning meeting of the council, and Henry Sydnall was fined twenty pence for keeping unlawful or unlicensed bowling in a back shed. Alehouse-keepers, of whom there were thirty in Shakespeare's time, were kept strictly under the council's control. They were not allowed to brew their own ale, or to encourage tippling, or to serve poor artificers except at stated hours of the day, on pain of fine and imprisonment. Dogs were not to go about the streets unmuzzled. Every inhabitant had to go to church at least once a month, and absences were liable to penalties of twenty pounds, which in the late years of Elizabeth's reign commissioners came from London to see that the local authorities enforced. Early in the 17th century swearing was rigorously prohibited. Laws as to dress were regularly enforced. In 1577 there were many fines exacted for failure to wear the plain statute woollen caps on Sundays, to which Rosaline makes allusion in Love's Labour's Lost (v. 2. 281); and the regulation affected all inhabitants above six years of age. In 1604 'the greatest part' of the inhabitants were presented at a great leet, or law-day, 'for wearing their apparel contrary to the statute.' Nor would it be difficult to quote many other like proofs of the persistent strictness with which the new town council of Stratford, by the enforcement of its own order and the statutes of the realm, regulated the inhabitants' whole conduct of life."

Plan of Stratford On Avon