SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19227, 6 February 1928, Page 9

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS.

MYSTERY BELIEVED SOLVED. (BY CABLE—PEES 3 ASSOCIATION— COPYRIGHT.) (Australian and n.z. cablz association.) LONDON, February 3. The discovery is announced by the "Daily Telegraph" of the manuscript of a commonplace book, which is likely to solve the age-long mystery of the identity of "Mr W.H.," to, whom Shakespeare's 'sonnets were dedicated. The well-known bibliophile, Mr Edmund Rung, who came into possession of the book, sent it to America for examination by the most erudite authorities of the universities. "The book," says the "Daily Telegraph," "is indubitably that of William Holgate, the seventeen-year-old son of the wealthy inn-keeper of the Rose and Crown at Saffron Walden. It is known that Shakespeare and his travelling company visited the town in 1607, two years before the publication of the sonnets. Those interested will study the sonnets 104 and 135. The boy's interest in Shakespeare was proved by his copying his favourite sonnet, as well as current references to Shakespeare, including a rhyming letter reyealed for the first time from Francis Beaumont to Ben Jonson, in which Shakespeare was proclaimed as a deathless genius."