Note 83 — THE COMMON KNOWLEDGE OF SHAKESPEARE AND BACON

Judge Webb does not refer to Bacon’s remarks on the coloration of flowers which I have thought worth citing, but he quotes the Natural History to the effect that “if you can get a scion to grow upon a stock of another kind” it “may make the fruit greater, though it is like it will make the fruit baser.” But this is not much of a “parallel” with the remark of Polixenes as to marrying “a gentler scion to the wildest stock,” etc.