The proposition was entertained, and a price named -- $50,000, I think; but whatever it was, Barnum paid the money down, without remark, and the papers were drawn up and executed.

He said that it had been his purpose to set up the house in his Museum, keep it in repair, protect it from name-scribblers and other desecrators, and leave it by bequest to the safe and perpetual guardianship of the Smithsonian Institute at Washington.
But as soon as it was found that Shakespeare's house had passed into foreign hands and was going to be carried across the ocean, England was stirred as no appeal from the custodians of the relic had ever stirred England before, and protests came flowing in--and money, too, to stop the outrage.

Offers of repurchase were made--offers of double the money that Mr.Barnum had paid for the house.

He handed the house back, but took only the sum which it had cost him--but on the condition that an endowment sufficient for the future safeguarding and maintenance of the sacred relic should be raised.

This condition was fulfilled.
That was Barnum's account of the episode; and to the end of his days he claimed with pride and satisfaction that not England, but America -- represented by him--saved the birthplace of Shakespeare from destruction.
At 3 P.M., May 6th, the ship slowed down, off the land, and thoughtfully and cautiously picked her way into the snug harbor of Durban, South Africa..