Was Shakespeare A Freemason?*

Ancl touching the same badges , it is curious and extremely interesting to note how apt ancl correspondent is the description often given in Measure for Measure— Lambskins , too , to signify that Craft , Being richer than innocency , stands For the facing . ( To be continued . )

After All .

AFTER ALL .

J 3 T IIMNKY CALVERT APPLEBY , Hon . Librarian of tlie Hull Literary Club , and Author of " A Queer Courtship , " " The Fatal Picture , " eh . Cl-IAHTO VII .

In good name and fame . —King Henry IV . IN our last chapter we left Arthur Huniberton , in a time of passion and disappointment , weakly and vainly giving way to despair ancl rash action . His brilliant hopes had been suddenly ancl cruelly extinguished , ancl his moral courage ancl faith had for the time failed him . Stouter hearts than his have quailed for less . But it was only for a time ; and then he saw the folly of his

actions , though a sickly , deadening- feeling of irretrievable loss still wei ghed heavily upon him ; a dark , depressing cloud seemed as though it could never leave him . He could not easily give up a sort of resigned melancholy that haunted him and made him a kind of machine . His thoughts were often far from his work . He tried to be courageous and manly , in spite of his troubles . His favourite poet told him that

The sweat of industry would dry , and die , But for the end it works to . He had now but a vague , uncertain end in view ; but he determined to " labour on , " so as to be ready to breast the tide that " leads on to fortune , " whenever it reached him . Nor did he forget , with regard to his musical studies , the fact that The labour we delight in , physics pain ,

and he found it a welcome , cheering- relief . Days , weeks , and months wore on in slow incessant routine , ancl " labor ipse voluntas " was still Arthur ' s motto . Fresh joys he found in his work , ancl his depressing melancholy was fast leaving him , though he by no means forgot its cause . His desire was to be always at work amongst fresh matter , finding a wonderful relief in the variety , ancl in the fact that his work always filled his mind , to the exclusion , to a great extent , of his troubles . He worked with

a steady hope , a gradually increasing power , and a belief that he would one day wake ancl find himself famous . This encouraged him , ancl kept him busy . Sketches , songs , sonatas , symphonies , etc ., were poured from his prolific pen , and-his name was becoming- known . All this not only made him much more of a man , but a hopeful one . Of course he had dark moments amid his work '; a strange sensation of isolated impotentiality would come over him at times , ancl cause feelings akin to despair . But this he always conquered as idle and injurious , and once , again with clogged perseverance fought for fame . How many have entered the strife and