'
This fits in with Shakspere's 'small Latin and less Greek'--a
circumstance of which Jonson himself, in his poem in memory of
Shakspere (1623), thought he should remind the coming generations.
It is, no doubt, a little revenge for the 'dark chamber' in which
Malvolio [25] is imprisoned, that, after Horace has concluded his
speech in which the study of Latin and Greek is recommended to
Crispinus as something very necessary for him, Virgil should add the
further advice:--
And for a week or two see him locked up
In some dark place, removed from company;
He will talk idly else after his physic.
The full name given by Jonson to Crispinus is--RUFUS LABERIUS CRISPINUS.
John Marston already, in 1598, designates Shakspere with the nickname
'_Rufus_.' Everyone can convince himself of this by first reading
Shakspere's 'Venus and Adonis,' and immediately afterwards John
Marston's 'Metamorphosis of Pigmalion's Image.' [26] We do not know
whether it has struck anyone as yet that this poem of Marston is a
most evident satire, written even in the same metre as Shakspere's
first, and at that time most popular, poem. [27] In his sixth satire
of 'The Scourge of Villanie,' Marston explains why he had composed
his 'Pigmalion's Image:'--
Yet deem'st that in sad seriousnesse I write
such nasty stuff as in Pigmalion?
Such maggot-tainted, lewd corruption! .
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