But in 1570, as Will was about to start at school, his respectable father was fined for breaking money-lending laws, and the family fortunes began to decline. Two years later, he was accused of "wool bragging": illegally dealing in fleeces. His eldest son was certainly privy to these goings-on - he remembered the details for the rest of his life. Let me see. Every '/even wether tads, every tad yields pound and odd shilling; fifteen hundred shorn, what comes the wool to?
This reference occurs in Shakespeare's play
The Winter's Tale, Act IV, scene iii, lines 32-4.
In modern English:
Every eleven rams yield a tad of 281bs, worth 21 shillings = £143.
