Note return to page 1 *See Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, p. 271.

Note return to page 2 †Ibid. p. 268.

Note return to page 3 *I will take this opportunity of restoring to him an emendation which is his property. In The Taming of the Shrew, see vol. v. p. 441, Biondello, as the speech is given in the folio, exclaims, on entering, “Master, master! news, and such news as you never heard of.” Mr. Rowe, perceiving that the answer of Baptista, “Is it new and old too?” was thus unintelligible, read “Master, master! old news.” Mr. Capell thought the passage would be more spirited, if we read, “news, old news;” and so it has since been printed in the text, but without any mention of his name. I will subjoin his note as an unusually favourable instance of his mode of expressing himself. “‘Master, master! &c.’ As this speaker's reply could not have run in such terms as we see it does, unless ‘old’ had stood somewhere, moderns all consent in inserting it; but the place chosen by them, is after ‘Master.’ This editor has looked on old and news too, as words omitted by accident; judging, that Biondello should first come out with ‘news!’ and branch it afterwards, such branching being more in the order of nature's working, and the period is made fuller and rounder by it.” Moderns is the only term which Mr. Capell applies to former editors, whom he never mentions by name; but styles Rowe, Pope, Theobald, &c. first, second, or third modern. Sir Thomas Hanmer is, indeed, sometimes described as “he of Oxford:” and Johnson is thus corrected: “cunning is wrong interpreted by he who brings up the rear of them.”

Note return to page 4 *See Mr. Richardson's Proposals, p. 291. It will scarcely be necessary to inform the reader, that these Proposals were written by Mr. Steevens.

Note return to page 5 *Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, p. 253.

Note return to page 6 *Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, p. 253.

Note return to page 7 †Mr. Richardson's Proposals, p. 290.

Note return to page 8 *Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, p. 255.

Note return to page 9 †Ibid. p. 82.

Note return to page 10 *See his Advertisement, p. 275.

Note return to page 11 *Cursory Criticisms on Malone's edition, p. ix.

Note return to page 12 *Gifford's Jonson, vol. viii. p. 453.

Note return to page 13 †The same, vol. i. p. ccliii.

Note return to page 14 *See vol. xix. p. 500.

Note return to page 15 *See Mr. Tyrwhitt's note, vol. xix. p. 306.

Note return to page 16 *Gifford's Jonson, vol. ix. p. 4.

Note return to page 17 It was not my intention to have given, on the present occasion, any sketch of Mr. Malone's life; but to have reserved myself for a future opportunity, when I could have done more justice to the subject. In compliance, however, with the recommendation of several of my friends, who were of opinion that something of that nature would be expected, I have ventured to reprint a slight tribute to his memory, which I drew up in the year 1814.

Note return to page 18 *This is not the place to enlarge upon Mr. Malone's family; but a detailed account of it is to be found in the 7th volume of Archdall's Peerage of Ireland, which, it is believed, was drawn up by Mr. Malone himself, and which contains a full and interesting delineation of his grandfather and uncle.

Note return to page 19 *These particulars are collected from the correspondence which passed between them, which Mr. Malone preserved.

Note return to page 20 *The passage to which I have alluded is in &grE;&grP;&grE;&grA; &grP;&grT;&grE;&grR;&grO;&grE;&grN;&grT;&grA;, vol. ii. p. 319; and will show into what absurdity a man of real talent may be drawn, when he is carried away by an hypothesis, or (which I rather believe to be the case in this instance), writes under the influence of spleen. “In the Winter's Tale, Act I. Sc. I. p. 273, we have, ‘Come (Sir Page) Looke on me with your Welkin eye.’ On which passage S. Johnson says, hardily as usual, ‘Welkin eye: blue eye; an eye of the same colour with the welkin, or sky.’ And this is accepted and repeated by Malone. I can only say that this Note is worthy of them both; and they of each other. Welkin is the present participle Willi&yogh;end, or Wealcynd, i. e. volvens quod volvit of the Anglo-Saxon verb Willi&yogh;an Wealcan, volvere revolvere, which is equally applicable to an eye of any colour, to what revolves or rolls over our heads, and to the waves of the sea, þealcynde ea þealcende sæ.” Had Mr. Tooke produced an instance from any one author, who wrote in English, of welkin having been used in the sense of rolling, or in any other than that of the sky, or been able to persuade us that Shakspeare was an Anglo-Saxon, there might have been some ground for his criticism, though no excuse for his petulance. Ingenious etymology is always amusing, and, where we are in the dark with regard to the meaning of a word, may sometimes furnish us with a clue to discover it; but to adhere to the primitive and obsolete signification of a term, when, in the course of those changes which every language undergoes, it has assumed another sense, which is known and established, is surely little better than idle pedantry. As well might we maintain that hostis, in the age of Augustus, meant only a stranger, because Cicero informs us that it was so used in the earlier ages of the Republick; or, to take our examples from our own language, with as much propriety might we say that a man is a knave in proportion as he is poor (Vide &grE;&grP;&grE;&grA; &grP;&grT;&grE;&grR;. vol. ii. p. 425), or describe a beautiful young lady as being uncouth, because we have not the honour of her acquaintance, and she is therefore unknown to us.

Note return to page 21 *Addison, in the 273d Spectator, has delivered a similar opinion respecting Homer: “There is scarce a speech or action in the Iliad, which the reader may not ascribe to the person who speaks or acts, without seeing his name at the head of it.” Steevens.

Note return to page 22 *These, as the reader will find in the notes on that play, Shakspeare drew from Sir Thomas North's translation, 1579. Malone.

Note return to page 23 †They were written by Thomas Heywood. See vol. xx. p. 395. Malone.

Note return to page 24 5Enter three Witches solus.] This blunder appears to be of Mr. Pope's own invention. It is not to be found in any one of the four folio copies of Macbeth, and there is no quarto edition of it extant. Steevens.

Note return to page 25 *Much Ado About Nothing, Act II.: “Enter Prince Leonato, Claudio, and Jack Wilson,” instead of Balthasar. And in Act IV. Cowley and Kemp constantly through a whole scene. Edit. fol. of 1623, and 1632. Pope.

Note return to page 26 †Such as “My queen is murder'd! Ring the little bell.” “&lblank; His nose grew as sharp as a pen, and a table of green fields;” which last words are not in the quarto. Pope. There is no such line in any play of Shakspeare, as that quoted above by Mr. Pope. Malone.

Note return to page 27 *Mr. Pope probably recollected the following lines in The Taming of the Shrew, spoken by a Lord, who is giving directions to his servant concerning some players: “Go, sirrah, take them to the buttery, “And give them friendly welcome, every one.” But he seems not to have observed that the players here introduced were strollers; and there is no reason to suppose that our author, Heminge, Burbage, Lowin, &c. who were licensed by King James, were treated in this manner. Malone.

Note return to page 28 †The Double Falshood, or The Distressed Lovers, a play, acted at Drury Lane, 8vo. 1727. This piece was produced by Mr. Theobald as a performance of Shakspeare's. See Dr. Farmer's Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare. Reed.

Note return to page 29 *His name was affixed only to four of them. Malone.

Note return to page 30 *The following passage by Mr. Pope stands as a preface to the various readings at the end of the 8th volume of his edition of Shakspeare, 1728. For the notice of it I am indebted to Mr. Chalmers's Supplemental Apology, p. 261. Reed. “Since the publication of our first edition, there having been some attempts upon Shakspeare published by Lewis Theobald, (which he would not communicate during the time wherein that edition was preparing for the press, when we, by publick advertisements, did request the assistance of all lovers of this author,) we have inserted, in this impression, as many of 'em as are judg'd of any the least advantage to the poet; the whole amounting to about twenty-five words. “But to the end every reader may judge for himself, we have annexed a compleat list of the rest; which if he shall think trivial, or erroneous, either in part, or in whole; at worst it can spoil but a half sheet of paper, that chances to be left vacant here. And we purpose for the future, to do the same with respect to any other persons, who either thro' candor or vanity, shall communicate or publish, the least things tending to the illustration of our author. We have here omitted nothing but pointings and mere errors of the press, which I hope the corrector of it has rectify'd; if not, I cou'd wish as accurate an one as Mr. Th. [if he] had been at that trouble, which I desired Mr. Tonson to solicit him to undertake. A. P.”

Note return to page 31 *This is Mr. Theobald's preface to his second edition in 1740, and was much curtailed by himself after it had been prefixed to the impression in 1733. Steevens.

Note return to page 32 *See the extracts from the register-book of the parish of Stratford, in vol. ii. Steevens.

Note return to page 33 *By Mr. Combe's Will, which is now in the Prerogative-office in London, Shakspeare had a legacy of five pounds bequeathed to him. The Will is without any date. Reed.

Note return to page 34 *See an answer to Mr. Pope's Preface to Shakspeare, by a Strolling Player, 8vo. 1729, p. 45. Reed.

Note return to page 35 *It has been allowed, &c.] On this subject an eminent writer has given his opinion which should not be suppressed. “You will ask me, perhaps, now I am on this subject, how it happened that Shakspeare's language is every where so much his own as to secure his imitations, if they were such, from discovery; when I pronounce with such assurance of those of our other poets. The answer is given for me in the preface to Mr. Theobald's Shakspeare; though the observation I think, is too good to come from that critick. It is, that though his words, agreeably to the state of the English tongue at that time, be generally Latin, his phraseology is perfectly English; an advantage he owed to his slender acquaintance with the Latin idiom. Whereas the other writers of his age, and such others of an older date as were likely to fall into his hands, had not only the most familiar acquaintance with the Latin idiom, but affected on all occasions to make use of it. Hence it comes to pass, that though he might draw sometimes from the Latin (Ben Jonson you know tells us He had less Greek,) and the learned English writers, he takes nothing but the sentiments; the expression comes of itself and is purely English.” Bishop Hurd's Letter to Mr. Mason, on the Marks of Imitation, 8vo. 1758. Reed.

Note return to page 36 *David Mallet. See his poem Of Verbal Criticism, vol. i. of his works, 12mo. 1759. Reed.

Note return to page 37 *It appears from a letter which has been printed by Mr. Nicholls, in his Literary Illustrations, vol. ii. p. 77, that a considerable part of this preface was written by Warburton, as he himself informs Dr. Birch, Nov. 24, 1737. I had formerly suspected that this was the case, from internal evidence; and I was confirmed in my opinion by finding that the comparison between Jonson and Shakspeare, in p. 30, is to be found almost verbatim in a note on Love's Labour's Lost, with Warburton's name affixed to it. See vol. iv. p. 288, n. 4. The contemptuous mention of Mallet I have no doubt proceeded from the same pen, which may have come to the other's knowledge. This may partly account for the virulence with which that despicable hireling of Bolingbroke assailed Warburton for his defence of Pope on the subject of The Patriot King. Boswell.

Note return to page 38 *Mr. Pope's preface. Reed.

Note return to page 39 *Published in 1745, by Dr. Johnson. Reed.

Note return to page 40 *The Spectator. Reed.

Note return to page 41 *See his Letters to me.

Note return to page 42 *&lblank; our great Selden, when he thought he might reflect credit on his country, did not disdain to comment a very ordinary poet, one Michael Drayton.] This compliment to himself for condescending to write notes on Shakspeare, Warburton copied from Pope, who sacrificed Drayton to gratify the vanity of this flattering editor: “I have a particular reason (says Pope in a letter to Warburton) to make you interest yourself in me and my writings. It will cause both them and me to make a better figure to posterity. A very mediocre poet, one Drayton, is yet taken notice of because Selden writ a few notes on one of his poems.” Pope's Works, vol. ix. p. 350, 8vo. 1751. Holt White.

Note return to page 43 *This alludes to Dr. Grey's edition of Hudibras published in 1744. Reed.

Note return to page 44 †Sir Isaac Newton. See Whiston's Historical Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Clarke, 1748, 8vo. p. 113. Reed.

Note return to page 45 *First printed in 1765.

Note return to page 46 *Est vetus atque probus, centum qui perficit annos. Hor. Steevens.

Note return to page 47 *Quærit quod nusquam est gentium, reperit tamen, Facit illud verisimile quod mendacium est. Plauti. Pseudolus, Act I. Sc. IV. Steevens.

Note return to page 48 *From this remark it appears, that Dr. Johnson was unacquainted with the Cyclops of Euripides. It may, however, be observed, that Dr. Johnson, perhaps, was misled by the following passage in Dryden's Essay on Dramatick Poesy: “Tragedies and Comedies were not writ then as they are now, promiscuously, by the same person; but he who found his genius bending to the one, never attempted the other way. This is so plain, that I need not instance to you that Aristophanes, Plautus, Terence, never any of them writ a tragedy; Æschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, and Seneca, never meddled with comedy: the sock and buskin were not worn by the same poet.” And yet, to show the uncertain state of Dryden's memory, in his Dedication to his Juvenal he has expended at least a page in describing the Cyclops of Euripides. So intimately connected with this subject are the following remarks of Mr. Twining in his excellent commentary on the Poetick of Aristotle, that they ought not to be withheld from our readers. “The prejudiced admirers of the ancients are very angry at the least insinuation that they had any idea of our barbarous tragi-comedy. But, after all, it cannot be dissembled, that, if they had not the name, they had the thing, or something very nearly approaching to it. If that be tragi-comedy, which is partly serious and partly comical, I do not know why we should scruple to say, that the Alcestis of Euripides is, to all intents and purposes, a tragi-comedy. I have not the least doubt, that it had upon an Athenian audience the proper effect of tragi-comedy; that is, that in some places it made them cry, and in others, laugh. And the best thing we have to hope, for the credit of Euripides, is, that he intended to produce this effect. For though he may be an unskilful poet, who purposes to write a tragi-comedy, he surely is a more unskilful poet, who writes one without knowing it. “The learned reader will understand me to allude particularly to the scene, in which the domestick describes the behaviour of Hercules; and to the speech of Hercules himself, which follows. Nothing can well be of a more comick cast than the servant's complaint. He describes the hero as the most greedy and ill-mannered guest he had ever attended, under his master's hospitable roof; calling about him, eating, drinking, and singing, in a room by himself, while the master and all the family were in the height of funeral lamentation. He was not contented with such refreshments as had been set before him: &lblank; &gro;&grus;&grt;&gri; &grs;&grw;&grf;&grr;&gro;&grn;&grw;&grst; &gres;&grd;&gre;&grc;&gra;&grt;&gro; &grT;&gra; &grp;&grr;&gro;&grs;&grt;&gru;&grx;&gro;&grn;&grt;&gra; &grc;&gre;&grn;&gri;&gra; &lblank; &grA;&grl;&grl;&grap; &gres;&gri; &grt;&gri; &grm;&grh; &grf;&gre;&grr;&gro;&gri;&grm;&gre;&grn;, &grW;&grT;&grR;&grU;&grN;&grE;&grN; &grf;&gre;&grr;&gre;&gri;&grn;. Then he drinks— &GREr;&grw;&grst; &gres;&grq;&gre;&grr;&grm;&grh;&grn;&grap; &gras;&gru;&grt;&gro;&grn; &gras;&grm;&grf;&gri;&grb;&gra;&grs;&gra; &grf;&grl;&gro;&grc; &grO;&gri;&grn;&gro;&grud; &lblank; —crowns himself with myrtle, and sings, &grA;&grM;&grO;&grU;&grS;&grap; &grU;&grL;&grA;&grK;&grT;&grW;&grN; —and all this, alone. “Cette description,’ says Fontenelle, ‘est si burlesque, qu'on diroit d'un crocheteur qui est de confrairie.’ A censure somewhat justified by Euripides himself, who makes the servant take Hercules for a thief: &lblank; &grp;&gra;&grn;&gro;&gru;&grr;&grg;&gro;&grn; &grK;&grL;&grW;&grP;&grA; &grk;&gra;&gri; &grL;&grH;&grI;&grS;&grT;&grH;&grN; &grt;&gri;&grn;&gra;. “The speech of Hercules, &grf;&gri;&grl;&gro;&grs;&gro;&grf;&gro;&gru;&grn;&grt;&gro;&grst; &gres;&grn; &grm;&gre;&grq;&grh;, as the scholiast observes (v. 776,) ‘philosophizing in his cups,’ is still more curious. It is, indeed, full of the &grf;&grl;&gro;&grc; &gros;&gri;&grn;&gro;&gru;, and completely justifies the attendant's description. Nothing can be more jolly. It is in the true spirit of a modern drinking song; recommending it to the servant to uncloud his brow, enjoy the present hour, think nothing of the morrow, and drown his cares in love and wine: &GROr;&grU;&grT;&grO;&grS;—&grt;&gri; &grs;&gre;&grm;&grn;&gro;&grn; &grk;&gra;&gri; &grp;&gre;&grf;&grr;&gro;&grn;&grt;&gri;&grk;&gro;&grst; &grb;&grl;&gre;&grp;&gre;&gri;&grst;&gr?; &grO;&gru; &grx;&grr;&grh; &grs;&grk;&gru;&grq;&grr;&grw;&grp;&gro;&grn;, &grk;. &grt;. &gra;&grl;. ————— &grD;&grE;&grU;&grR;&grap; &GREs;&grL;&grQ;&grap;, &gror;&grp;&grw;&grst; &gras;&grn; &grk;&gra;&gri; &grs;&gro;&grf;&grw;&grt;&gre;&grr;&gro;&grst; &grg;&gre;&grn;&grh;. &grT;&gra; &grq;&grn;&grh;&grt;&gra; &grp;&grr;&gra;&grg;&grm;&gra;&grt;&grap; &gros;&gri;&grd;&gra;&grst; &grhr;&grn; &gres;&grx;&gre;&gri; &grf;&gru;&grs;&gri;&grn;&gr?; &grO;&grI;&grM;&grA;&grI; &grm;&gre;&grn; )&gro;&grU;&grcolon; &grP;&grO;&grQ;&grE;&grN; &grG;&grA;&grR;&gr?;—&gras;&grl;&grl;&grap; &gras;&grk;&gro;&gru;&gre; &grm;&gro;&gru;. &grB;&grr;&gro;&grt;&gro;&gri;&grst; &gras;&grp;&gra;&grs;&gri; &grk;&gra;&grt;&grq;&gra;&grn;&gre;&gri;&grn; &gros;&grf;&gre;&gri;&grl;&gre;&grt;&gra;&gri;, &grK; &gro;&gru;&grk; &gres;&grs;&grt;&gri; &grq;&grn;&grh;&grt;&grw;&grn; &gror;&grs;&grt;&gri;&grst; &grer;&grc;&gre;&grp;&gri;&grc;&gra;&grt;&gra;&gri; &grT;&grh;&grn; &gras;&gru;&grr;&gri;&gro;&grn; &grm;&gre;&grl;&grl;&gro;&gru;&grs;&gra;&grn; &gres;&gri; &grb;&gri;&grw;&grs;&gre;&grt;&gra;&gri;. ————— ————— &grE;&gru;&grf;&grr;&gra;&gri;&grn;&gre; &grs;&gra;&gru;&grt;&gro;&grn;&grcolon; &grP;&grI;&grN;&grE;&grdot;—&grt;&gro;&grn; &grk;&gra;&grq; &grhr;&grm;&gre;&grr;&gra;&grn; &grB;&gri;&gro;&grn; &grl;&gro;&grg;&gri;&grz;&gro;&gru; &grs;&gro;&grn;, &grt;&gra; &grd;&grap; &gras;&grl;&grl;&gra;, &grt;&grh;&grst; &grt;&gru;&grx;&grh;&grst;. &grT;&gri;&grm;&gra; &grd;&gre; &grk;&gra;&gri; &grt;&grh;&grn; &grp;&grl;&gre;&gri;&grs;&grt;&gro;&grn; &grhr;&grd;&gri;&grs;&grt;&grh;&grn; &grq;&gre;&grw;&grn; &grK;&grU;&grP;&grR;&grI;&grN; &grb;&grr;&gro;&grt;&gro;&gri;&grs;&gri;&grn;— &grk;. &grt;. &grl;. V. 783—128. “If any man can read this, without supposing it to have set the audience in a roar, I certainly cannot demonstrate that he is mistaken. I can only say, that I think he must be a very grave man himself, and must forget that the Athenians were not a very grave people. The zeal of Pere Brumoy in defending this tragedy, betrays him into a little indiscretion. He says, ‘tout cela à fait penser à quelques critiques modernes que cette piece etoit une tragi-comedie; chimere inconnu aux anciens. Cette piece est du gout des autres tragedies antiques.’ Indeed they, who call this play a tragi-comedy, give it rather a favourable name; for, in the scenes alluded to, it is, in fact, of a lower species than our tragi-comedy: it is rather burlesque tragedy; what Demetrius calls &grt;&grr;&gra;&grg;&grw;&grd;&gri;&gra; &grp;&gra;&gri;&grz;&gro;&gru;&grs;&gra;. Much of the comick cast prevails in other scenes; though mixed with those genuine strokes of simple and universal nature, which abound in this poet, and which I should be sorry to exchange for that monotonous and unaffecting level of tragick dignity, which never falls, and never rises. “I will only mention one more instance of this tragi-comick mixture, and that from Sophocles. The dialogue between Minerva and Ulysses, in the first scene of the Ajax, from v. 74 to 88, is perfectly ludicrous. The cowardice of Ulysses is almost as comick as the cowardice of Falstaff. In spite of the presence of Minerva, and her previous assurance that she would effectually guard him from all danger by rendering him invisible, when she calls Ajax out, Ulysses, in the utmost trepidation, exclaims— &grT;&gri; &grd;&grr;&gra;&grst;, &grA;&grq;&gra;&grn;&gra;&gr?; &grm;&grh;&grd;&gra;&grm;&grw;&grst; &grs;&grf;&grap; &gre;&grc;&grw; &grk;&gra;&grl;&gre;&gri;. “‘What are you about, Minerva?—by no means call him out.’ Minerva answers— &grO;&gru; &grs;&gri;&grg;) &gras;&grn;&gre;&grc;&grh;, &grm;&grh;&grd;&gre; &grd;&gre;&gri;&grl;&gri;&gra;&grn; &gra;&grr;&gre;&gri;&grst;&gr?; “‘Will you not be silent, and lay aside your fears?’ But Ulysses cannot conquer his fears:— &grM;&grH;, &grP;&grR;&grO;&grST; &grQ;&grE;&grW;&grN;—&gras;&grl;&grl;&grap; &gres;&grn;&grd;&gro;&grn; &gras;&grr;&grk;&gre;&gri;&grt;&grw; &grm;&gre;&grn;&grw;&grn;. “‘Don't call him out, for heaven's sake:—let him stay within.’ And in this tone the conversation continues; till, upon Minerva's repeating her promise that Ajax should not see him, he consents to stay; but in a line of most comical reluctance, and with an aside, that is in the true spirit of Sancho Pança:— &grM;&gre;&grn;&gro;&gri;&grm;) &gras;&grn;&grcolon; &grH;&grQ;&grE;&grL;&grO;&grN; &grD;&grap;&grA;&grN; &grE;&grK;&grT;&grO;&grST; &grW;&grN; &grT;&grU;&grX;&grE;&grI;&grN;. “‘I'll stay—(aside) but I wish I was not here.’ ‘J'avoue,’ says Brumoy, ‘que ce trait n'est pas à la louange d'Ulysse, ni de Sophocle.’ “No unprejudiced person, I think, can read this scene without being convinced, not only, that it must actually have produced, but that it must have been intended to produce, the effect of comedy. “It appears indeed to me, that we may plainly trace in the Greek tragedy, with all its improvements, and all its beauties, pretty strong marks of its popular and tragi-comick origin. For &grT;&grr;&gra;&grg;&grw;&grd;&gri;&gra;, we are told, was, originally, the only dramatick appellation; and when, afterwards, the ludicrous was separated from the serious, and distinguished by its appropriated name of Comedy, the separation seems to have been imperfectly made, and Tragedy, distinctively so called, still seems to have retained a tincture of its original merriment. Nor will this appear strange, if we consider the popular nature of the Greek spectacles. The people, it is probable, would still require, even in the midst of their tragick emotion, a little dash of their old satyrick fun, and poets were obliged to comply, in some degree, with their taste.” Twining's Notes, pp. 202, 203, 204, 205, 206. Steevens.

Note return to page 49 *Thus, says Downes the Prompter, p. 22: “The tragedy of Romeo and Juliet was made some time after [1662] into a tragi-comedy, by Mr. James Howard, he preserving Romeo and Juliet alive; so that when the tragedy was revived again, 'twas play'd alternately, tragical one day, and tragi-comical another, for several days together.” Steevens.

Note return to page 50 *In the rank and order of geniuses it must, I think, be allowed, that the writer of good tragedy is superior. And therefore, I think the opinion, which I am sorry to perceive gains ground, that Shakspeare's chief and predominant talent lay in comedy, tends to lessen the unrivalled excellence of our divine bard. J. Warton.

Note return to page 51 *As a further extenuation of Shakspeare's error, it may be urged that he found the Gothick mythology of Fairies already incorporated with Greek and Roman story, by our early translators. Phaer and Golding, who first gave us Virgil and Ovid in an English dress, introduce Fairies almost as often as Nymphs are mentioned in these classick authors. Thus, Homer, in his 24th Iliad: '&gre;&grn; &grS;&gri;&grp;&grua;&grl;&grw;, &grora;&grq;&gri; &grf;&gra;&grs;&grig; &grq;&gre;&graa;&grw;&grn; &grera;&grm;&grm;&gre;&grn;&gra;&gri; &gre;&grus;&grn;&grag;&grst; &grN;&grU;&grM;&grF;&grA;&grW;&grN;, &gra;&grira;&grt;&grap; &gras;&grm;&grf;&grap; &grA;&grx;&gre;&grl;&grwa;&grid;&gro;&grn; &gres;&grr;&grr;&grw;&grs;&gra;&grn;&grt;&gro;. But Chapman translates— “In Sypilus—in that place where 'tis said “The goddesse Fairies use to dance about the funeral bed “Of Achelous: &lblank;.” Neither are our ancient versifiers less culpable on the score of anachronisms. Under their hands the balista becomes a cannon, and other modern instruments are perpetually substituted for such as were the produce of the remotest ages. It may be added, that in Arthur Hall's version of the fourth Iliad, Juno says to Jupiter: “&lblank; the time will come that Totnam French shal turn.” And in the tenth book we hear of “The Bastile,” “Lemster wool,” and “The Byble.” Steevens.

Note return to page 52 *&lblank; unities of time and place &lblank;] Mr. Twining, among his judicious remarks on the poetick of Aristotle, observes, that “with respect to the strict unities of time and place, no such rules were imposed on the Greek poets by the criticks, or by themselves; nor are imposed on any poet, either by the nature, or the end, of the dramatick imitation itself.” Aristotle does not express a single precept concerning unity of place. This supposed restraint originated from the hypercriticism of his French commentators. Steevens.

Note return to page 53 *So in the Epistle Dedicatory to Dryden's Love Triumphant: “They who will not allow this liberty to a poet, make it a very ridiculous thing, for an audience to suppose themselves sometimes to be in a field, sometimes in a garden, and at other times in a chamber. There are not, indeed, so many absurdities in their supposition, as in ours: but, 'tis an original absurdity for the audience to suppose themselves to be in any other place, than in the very theatre in which they sit; which is neither a chamber, nor garden, nor yet a publick place of any business but that of the representation.” Steevens.

Note return to page 54 *See Mr. Twining's commentary on Aristotle, note 51. Steevens.

Note return to page 55 *Thus, also, Dryden, in the Epistle Dedicatory to his Rival Ladies: “Shakspeare (who with some errors not to be avoided in that age, had, undoubtedly, a larger soul of poesie than ever any of our nation) was the first, who, to shun the pains of continual rhyming, invented that kind of writing which we call blank verse, but the French more properly, prose mesurée; into which the English tongue so naturally slides, that in writing prose 'tis hardly to be avoided.” Steevens.

Note return to page 56 †It appears from the Induction of Ben Jonson's Bartholomew Fair, to have been acted before the year 1590. See also vol. xv. p. 198, n. 3. Steevens.

Note return to page 57 *What Montaigne has said of his own works may almost be applied to those of Shakspeare, who “n'avoit point d'autre sergent de bande à ranger ses pieces, que la fortune.” Steevens.

Note return to page 58 *Much deserved censure has been thrown out on the carelessness of our ancient printers, as well as on the wretched transcripts they obtained from contemporary theatres. Yet I cannot help observing that, even at this instant, should any one undertake to publish a play of Shakspeare from pages of no greater fidelity than such as are issued out for the use of performers, the press would teem with as interpolated and inextricable nonsense as it produced above a century ago. Mr. Colman (who cannot be suspected of ignorance or misrepresentation) in his preface to the last edition of Beaumont and Fletcher, very forcibly styles the prompter's books “the most inaccurate and barbarous of all manuscripts.” And well may they deserve that character; for verse (as I am informed) still continues to be transcribed as prose by a set of mercenaries, who in general have neither the advantage of literature or understanding. “Foliis tantum ne carmina manda, ne turbata volent ludibria,” was the request of Virgil's Hero to the Sybil, and should also be the supplication of every dramatick poet to the agents of a prompter. Steevens.

Note return to page 59 *The following compliment from Broome (says Dr. Joseph Warton) Pope could not take much pleasure in reading; for he could not value himself on his edition of Shakspeare: “If aught on earth, when once this breath is fled, “With human transport touch the mighty dead, “Shakspeare, rejoice! his hand thy page refines; “Now ev'ry scene with native brightness shines; “Just to thy fame, he gives thy genuine thought; “So Tully publish'd what Lucretius wrote; “Prun'd by his care, thy laurels loftier grow, “And bloom afresh on thy immortal brow.” Broome's Verses to Mr. Pope. Steevens.

Note return to page 60 *See Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson, vol. i. p. 227, 3d edit. Reed.

Note return to page 61 †It is extraordinary that this gentleman should attempt so voluminous a work, as the Revisal of Shakspeare's text, when he tells us in his preface, “he was not so fortunate as to be furnished with either of the folio editions, much less any of the ancient quartos: and even Sir Thomas Hanmer's performance was known to him only by Dr. Warburton's representation.” Farmer.

Note return to page 62 *Republished by him in 1748, after Dr. Warburton's edition, with alterations, &c. Steevens.

Note return to page 63 *&lblank; the Bishop of Aleria &lblank;] John Andreas. He was secretary to the Vatican Library during the papacies of Paul II. and Sixtus IV. By the former he was employed to superintend such works as were to be multiplied by the new art of printing, at that time brought into Rome. He published Herodotus, Strabo, Livy, Aulus Gellius, &c. His school-fellow, Cardinal de Cusa, procured him the bishoprick of Accia, a province in Corsica; and Paul II. afterwards appointed him to that of Aleria in the same island, where he died in 1493. See Fabric. Bibl. Lat. vol. iii. 894. Steevens.

Note return to page 64 *This paragraph relates to the edition published in 1773, by George Steevens, Esq. Malone.

Note return to page 65 †All prefatory matters being in the present edition printed according to the order of time in which they originally appeared, the Advertisement Dr. Johnson refers to, will be found immediately after Mr. Capell's Introduction. Steevens. Dr Johnson's Preface first appeared in 1765. Boswell.

Note return to page 66 [Prefixed to Mr. Steevens's Edition of Twenty of the old Quarto Copies of Shakspeare, &c. in 4 Vols. 8vo. 1766.]

Note return to page 67 *It may be proper on this occasion to observe, that the actors printed several of the plays in their folio edition from the very quarto copies which they are here striving to depreciate; and additional corruption is the utmost that these copies gained by passing through their hands.

Note return to page 68 *&lblank; and their caution against profaneness is, in my opinion, the only thing for which we are indebted to the editors of the folio.] I doubt whether we are so much indebted to the judgment of the editors of the folio edition, for their caution against profaneness, as to the statute 3 Jac. I. c. 21, which prohibits under severe penalties the use of the sacred name in any plays or interludes. This occasioned the playhouse copies to be altered, and they printed from the playhouse copies. Blackstone.

Note return to page 69 *This collection is now, in pursuance of Mr. Garrick's Will, placed in the British Museum. Reed.

Note return to page 70 *It will be obvious to every one acquainted with the ancient English language, that in almost all the titles of plays in this catalogue of Mr. William Rufus Chetwood, the spelling is constantly overcharged with such a superfluity of letters as is not to be found in the writings of Shakspeare or his contemporaries. A more bungling attempt at a forgery was never obtruded on the publick. See the British Theatre, 1750; reprinted by Dodsley in 1756, under the title of “Theatrical Records, or an Account of English Dramatick Authors, and their Works,” where all that is said concerning an Advertisement at the end of Romeo and Juliet, 1597, is equally false, no copy of that play having been ever published by Andrew Wise.

Note return to page 71 *Locrine, 1595. Sir John Oldcastle, 1600. London Prodigal, 1605. Pericles, Prince of Tyre, 1609. Puritan, 1600. Thomas Lord Cromwell, 1613. Yorkshire Tragedy, 1608.

Note return to page 72 *Volumes xiii. xiv. xv. and xvi. in large 8vo. Nine more have since been added. Reed.

Note return to page 73 *As the foregoing Advertisement appeared when its author was young and uninformed, he cannot now abide by many sentiments expressed in it: nor would it have been here reprinted, but in compliance with Dr. Johnson's injunction, that all the relative Prefaces should continue to attend his edition of our author's plays. Steevens.

Note return to page 74 *Dr. Johnson's opinion of this performance may be known from the following passage in Mr. Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson, second edit. vol. iii. p. 251: “If the man would have come to me, I would have endeavoured to endow his purpose with words, for as it is, he doth gabble monstrously.” Steevens.

Note return to page 75 *This is meant of the first quarto edition of The Taming of the Shrew; for the second was printed from the folio. But the play in this first edition appears certainly to have been a spurious one, from Mr. Pope's account of it, who seems to have been the only editor whom it was ever seen by: great pains has been taken to trace who he had it of, (for it was not in his collection) but without success. [Mr. Capell afterwards procured a sight of this desideratum, a circumstance which he has quaintly recorded in a note annexed to the MS. catalogue of his Shaksperiana: “&lblank; lent by Mr. Malone, an Irish gentleman, living in Queen Ann Street East.” Steevens.]

Note return to page 76 *There is yet extant in the books of the Stationer's Company, an entry bearing date—Feb. 12, 1624, to Messrs. Jaggard and Blount, the proprietors of this first folio, which is thus worded: “Mr. Wm. Shakespear's Comedy's History's & Tragedy's so many of the said Copy's as bee not enter'd to other men:” and this entry is follow'd by the titles of all those sixteen plays that were first printed in the folio: The other twenty plays (Othello, and King John, excepted; which the person who furnished this transcript, thinks he may have overlook'd,) are enter'd too in these books, under their respective years; but to whom the transcript says not.

Note return to page 77 †The plays, mark'd with asterisks, are spoken of by name, in a book, call'd—Wit's Treasury, being the Second Part of Wit's Commonwealth, written by Francis Meres, at p. 282: who, in the same paragraph, mentions another play as being Shakspeare's, under the title of Loves Labours Wonne; a title that seems well adapted to All's Well that Ends Well, and under which it might be first acted. In the paragraph immediately preceding, he speaks of his Venus and Adonis, his Lucrece, and his Sonnets: this book was printed in 1598, by P. Short, for Cuthbert Burbie; octavo, small. The same author, at p. 283, mentions too a Richard the Third, written by Doctor Leg, author of another play, called The Destruction of Jerusalem. And there is in the Musæum, a manuscript Latin play upon the same subject, written by one Henry Lacy in 1586: which Latin play is but a weak performance; and yet seemeth to be the play spoken of by Sir John Harrington, (for the author was a Cambridge man, and of St. John's,) in this passage of his Apologie of Poetrie, prefix'd to his translation of Ariosto's Orlando, edit. 1591, fol.: “&lblank; and for tragedies, to omit other famous tragedies; that, that was played at S. Johns in Cambridge of Richard the 3. would move (I thinke) Phalaris the tyraunt, and terrifie all tyr&abar;nous minded men, fr&obar; following their foolish ambitious humors, seeing how his ambition made him kill his brother, his nephews, his wife, beside infinit others; and last of all after a short and troublesome raigne, to end his miserable life, and to have his body harried after his death.”

Note return to page 78 *Vide, this Introduction, p. 121.

Note return to page 79 *But see a note at p. 123, which seems to infer that they were fairly come by: which is, in truth, the editor's opinion, at least of some of them; though, in way of argument, and for the sake of clearness, he has here admitted the charge in that full extent in which they bring it.

Note return to page 80 †Some of these alterations are in the quarto's themselves; (another proof this, of their being authentick,) as in Richard II.: where a large scene, that of the king's deposing, appears first in the copy of 1608, the third quarto impression, being wanting in the two former: and in one copy of 2 Henry IV. there is a scene too that is not in the other, though of the same year; it is the first of Act the third. And Hamlet has some still more considerable; for the copy of 1605 has these words:—“Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according to the true and perfect Coppie:” now though no prior copy has yet been produc'd, it is certain there was such by the testimony of this title-page: and that the play was in being at least nine years before, is prov'd by a book of Doctor Lodge's printed in 1596; which play was perhaps an imperfect one; and not unlike that we have now of Romeo and Juliet, printed the year after; a fourth instance too of what the note advances.

Note return to page 81 *Locrine; The London Prodigal; Pericles, Prince of Tyre; The Puritan, or, the Widow of Watling Street; Sir John Oldcastle; Thomas Lord Cromwell; and The Yorkshire Tragedy: And the imputed ones, mention'd a little above, are these;—The Arraignment of Paris; Birth of Merlin; Fair Em; Edward III.; Merry Devil of Edmonton; Mucedorus; and The Two Noble Kinsmen: but in The Merry Devil of Edmonton, Rowley is call'd his partner in the title-page; and Fletcher, in The Two Noble Kinsmen. What external proofs there are of their coming from Shakspeare, are gather'd all together, and put down in the Table; and further it not concerns us to engage: but let those who are inclin'd to dispute it, carry this along with them:—that London, in Shakspeare's time, had a multitude of playhouses; erected some in inn-yards, and such like places, and frequented by the lowest of the people; such audiences might have been seen some years ago in Southwark and Bartholomew, and may be seen at this day in the country; to which it was also a custom for players to make excursion, at wake times and festivals: and for such places, and such occasions, might these pieces be compos'd in the author's early time; the worst of them suiting well enough to the parties they might be made for:—and this, or something nearly of this sort, may have been the case too of some plays in his great collection, which shall be spoken of in their place.

Note return to page 82 *It will perhaps be thought strange, that nothing should be said in this place of another edition that came out about a twelve-month ago, in eight volumes, octavo; but the reasons for it are these:—There is no use made of it, nor could be; for the present was finish'd, within a play or two, and printed too in great part, before that appear'd: the first sheet of this work (being the first of vol. ii.) went to the press in September 1760: and this volume was follow'd by volumes viii. iv. ix. i. vi. and vii.; the last of which was printed off in August 1765: In the next place, the merits and demerits of it are unknown to the present editor even at this hour: this only he has perceiv'd in it, having look'd it but slightly over, that the text it follows is that of its nearest predecessor, and from that copy it was printed.

Note return to page 83 *But of one of these six, (a 1. Henry IV. edition 1604) the editor thinks he is possessed of a very large fragment, imperfect only in the first and last sheet; which has been collated, as far as it goes, along with others: And of the twelve quarto editions, which he has had the good fortune to add to those that were known before, some of them are of great value; as may be seen by looking into the Table. [As this table relates chiefly to Mr. Capell's desiderata, &c. (and had been anticipated by another table equally comprehensive, which the reader will find in the next volume,) it is here omitted. Steevens.]

Note return to page 84 *In the manuscripts from which all these plays are printed, the emendations are given to their proper owners by initials and other marks that are in the margin of those manuscripts; but they are suppressed in the print for two reasons: First, their number, in some pages, makes them a little unsightly: and the editor professes himself weak enough to like a well-printed book: In the next place, he does declare—that his only object has been, to do service to his great author; which provided it be done, he thinks it of small importance by what hand the service was administer'd: If the partizans of former editors shall chance to think them injur'd by this suppression, he must upon this occasion violate the rules of modesty, by declaring—that he himself is the most injur'd by it; whose emendations are equal, at least in number, to all theirs if put together; to say nothing of his recover'd readings, which are more considerable still.

Note return to page 85 *The divisions that are in the folio are religiously adher'd to, except in two or three instances which will be spoken of in their place; so that, as is said before, a perusal of those old-divided plays will put every one in a capacity of judging whether the present editor has proceeded rightly or no: the current editions are divided in such a manner, that nothing like a rule can be collected from any of them.

Note return to page 86 *If the use of these new pointings, and also of certain marks that he will meet with in this edition, do not occur immediately to the reader, (as we think it will) he may find it explain'd to him at large in the preface to a little octavo volume intitl'd— “Prolusions, or, Select Pieces of Ancient Poetry;” publish'd in 1760 by this editor, and printed for Mr. Tonson.

Note return to page 87 *Though our expressions, as we think, are sufficiently guarded in this place, yet, being fearful of misconstruction, we desire to be heard further as to this affair of his learning. It is our firm belief then,—that Shakspeare was very well grounded, at least in Latin, at school: It appears from the clearest evidence possible, that his father was a man of no little substance, and very well able to give him such education; which, perhaps, he might be inclin'd to carry further, by sending him to a university; but was prevented in this design (if he had it) by his son's early marriage, which, from monuments, and other like evidence, it appears with no less certainty, must have happen'd before he was seventeen, or very soon after: the displeasure of his father, which was the consequence of this marriage, or else some excesses which he is said to have been guilty of, it is probable, drove him up to town; where he engag'd early in some of the theatres, and was honour'd with the patronage of the Earl of Southampton: his Venus and Adonis is address'd to the Earl in a very pretty and modest dedication, in which he calls it—“the first heire of his invention;” and ushers it to the world with this singular motto,— Vilia miretur vulgus, mihi flavus Apollo   Pocula Castalia plena ministret aqua; and the whole poem, as well as his Lucrece, which follow'd it soon after, together with his choice of those subjects, are plain marks of his acquaintance with some of the Latin classicks, at least at that time: The dissipation of youth, and, when that was over, the busy scene in which he instantly plung'd himself, may very well be suppos'd to have hinder'd his making any great progress in them; but that such a mind as his should quite lose the tincture of any knowledge it had once been imbu'd with, can not be imagin'd: accordingly we see, that this school-learning (for it was no more) stuck with him to the last; and it was the recordations, as we may call it, of that learning which produc'd the Latin that is in many of his plays, and most plentifully in those that are most early: every several piece of it is aptly introduc'd, given to a proper character, and utter'd upon some proper occasion; and so well cemented, as it were, and join'd to the passage it stands in, as to deal conviction to the judicious— that the whole was wrought up together, and fetch'd from his own little store, upon the sudden and without study. The other languages, which he has sometimes made use of, that is—the Italian and French, are not of such difficult conquest that we should think them beyond his reach: an acquaintance with the first of them was a sort of fashion in his time; Surrey and the sonnet-writers set it on foot, and it was continu'd by Sidney and Spenser: all our poetry issu'd from that school; and it would be wonderful, indeed, if he, whom we saw a little before putting himself with so much zeal under the banner of the muses, should not have been tempted to taste at least of that fountain to which of all his other brethren there was such continual resort: let us conclude then, that he did taste of it; but, happily for himself, and more happy for the world that enjoys him now, he did not find it to his relish, and threw away the cup: metaphor apart, it is evident—that he had some little knowledge of the Italian: perhaps, just as much as enabl'd him to read a novel or a poem; and to put some few fragments of it, with which his memory furnish'd him, into the mouth of a pedant, or fine gentleman. How or when he acquir'd it we must be content to be ignorant, but of the French language he was somewhat a greater master than of the two that have gone before; yet, unless we except their novelists, he does not appear to have had much acquaintance with any of their writers; what he has given us of it is merely colloquial, flows with great ease from him, and is reasonably pure: Should it be said—he had travel'd for't, we know not who can confute us: in his days indeed, and with people of his station, the custom of doing so was rather rarer than in ours; yet we have met with an example, and in his own band of players, in the person of the very famous Mr. Kempe; of whose travels there is mention in a silly old play, call'd—The Return from Parnassus, printed in 1606, but written much earlier in the time of Queen Elizabeth: add to this—the exceeding great liveliness and justness that is seen in many descriptions of the sea and of promontories, which, if examin'd, shew another sort of knowledge of them than is to be gotten in books or relations; and if these be lay'd together, this conjecture of his travelling may not be thought void of probability. One opinion, we are sure, which is advanc'd somewhere or other, is utterly so;—that this Latin, and this Italian, and the language that was last mention'd, are insertions and the work of some other hand: there has been started now and then in philological matters a proposition so strange as to carry its own condemnation in it, and this is of the number; it has been honour'd already with more notice than it is any ways intitl'd to, where the poet's Latin is spoke of a little while before; to which answer it must be left, and we shall pass on—to profess our entire belief of the genuineness of every several part of this work, and that he only was the author of it: he might write beneath himself at particular times and certainly does in some places; but he is not always without excuse; and it frequently happens that a weak scene serves to very good purpose, as will be made appear at one time or other. It may be thought that there is one argument still unanswer'd, which has been brought against his acquaintance with the Latin and other languages; and that is, —that, had he been so acquainted, it could not have happen'd but that some imitations would have crept into his writings, of which certainly there are none: but this argument has been answer'd in effect; when it was said—that his knowledge in these languages was but slender, and his conversation with the writers in them slender too of course: but had it been otherwise, and he as deeply read in them as some people have thought him, his works (it is probable) had been as little deform'd with imitations as we now see them: Shakspeare was far above such a practice; he had the stores in himself, and wanted not the assistance of a foreign hand to dress him up in things of their lending.

Note return to page 88 *The authenticity of this play stands further confirm'd by the testimony of Sir Aston Cockayn; a writer who came near to Shakspeare's time, and does expressly ascribe it to him in an epigram address'd to Mr. Clement Fisher of Wincot; but it is (perhaps) superfluous, and of but little weight neither, as it will be said—that Sir Aston proceeds only upon the evidence of it's being in print in his name: we do therefore lay no great stress upon it, nor shall insert the epigram; it will be found in The School of Shakspeare, which is the proper place for things of that sort.

Note return to page 89 *No evidence has occur'd to prove exactly the time these plays were written, except that passage of Jonson's which relates to Jeronimo; but the editions we have read them in, are as follows: Tamburlaine in 1593; Selimus, and The Wars of Cyrus, in 1594; and Soliman and Perseda, in 1599; the other without a date, but as early as the earliest: they are also without a name of author; nor has any book been met with to instruct us in that particular, except only for Jeronimo; which we are told by Heywood, in his Apology for Actors, was written by Thomas Kyd; author, or translator rather, (for it is taken from the French of Robert Garnier,) of another play, intitl'd—Cornelia, printed likewise in 1594. Which of these extravagant plays had the honour to lead the way, we can't tell, but Jeronimo seems to have the best pretensions to it; as Selimus has above all his other brethren, to bearing away the palm for blood and murther: this curious piece has these lines for a conclusion:— “If this first part Gentles, do like you well, “The second part, shall greater murthers tell.” But whether the audience had enough of it, or how it has happen'd we can't tell, but no such second part is to be found. All these plays were the constant butt of the poets who came immediately after them, and of Shakspeare amongst the rest; and by their ridicule the town at last was made sensible of their ill judgment, and the theatre was purg'd of these monsters.

Note return to page 90 *The particulars that could not well be pointed out below, according to the general method, or otherwise than by a note, are of three sorts;—omissions, any thing large; transpositions; and such differences of punctuation as produce great changes in the sense of a passage: instances of the first occur in Love's Labour's Lost, p. 54, and in Troilus and Cressida, p. 109 and 117; of the second, in The Comedy of Errors, p. 62, and in Richard III. p. 92, and 102; and The Tempest, p. 69, and King Lear, p. 53, afford instances of the last; as may be seen by looking into any modern edition, where all those passages stand nearly as in the old ones. [All these references are to Mr. Capell's own edition of our author.]

Note return to page 91 *First printed in 1773. Malone.

Note return to page 92 †“I must not (says Mr. Rowe in his dedication to the Duke of Somerset) pretend to have restor'd this work to the exactness of the author's original manuscripts: those, are lost, or, at least, are gone beyond any enquiry I could make; so that there was nothing left, but to compare the several editions, and give the true reading as well as I could from thence. This I have endeavour'd to do pretty carefully, and render'd very many places intelligible, that were not so before. In some of the editions, especially the last, there were many lines (and in Hamlet one whole scene) left out together; these are now all supply'd. I fear your grace will find some faults, but I hope they are mostly literal, and the errors of the press.” Would not any one, from this declaration, suppose that Mr. Rowe (who does not appear to have consulted a single quarto) had at least compared the folios with each other? Steevens.

Note return to page 93 *I retract this supposition, which was too hastily formed. See note on The Tempest, vol. xv. p. 84, n. 2. Steevens.

Note return to page 94 *Mr. T. Warton in his excellent Remarks on the Fairy Queen of Spenser, offers a similar apology for having introduced illustrations from obsolete literature. “I fear (says he) I shall be censured for quoting too many pieces of this sort. But experience has fatally proved, that the commentator on Spenser, Jonson, and the rest of our elder poets, will in vain give specimens of his classical erudition, unless, at the same time, he brings to his work a mind intimately acquainted with those books, which, though now forgotten, were yet in common use and high repute about the time in which his authors respectively wrote, and which they consequently must have read. While these are unknown, many allusions and many imitations will either remain obscure, or lose half their beauty and propriety: ‘as the figures vanish when the canvas is decayed.’ “Pope laughs at Theobald for giving us, in his edition of Shakspeare, a sample of “&lblank; all such reading as was never read.” But these strange and ridiculous books which Theobald quoted, were unluckily the very books which Shakspeare himself had studied: the knowledge of which enabled that useful editor to explain so many different allusions and obsolete customs in his poet, which otherwise could never have been understood. For want of this sort of literature, Pope tells us that the dreadful Sagittary in Troilus and Cressida, signifies Teucer, so celebrated for his skill in archery. Had he deigned to consult an old history, called The Destruction of Troy, a book which was the delight of Shakspeare and of his age, he would have found that this formidable archer, was no other than an imaginary beast, which the Grecian army brought against Troy. If Shakspeare is worth reading, he is worth explaining; and the researches used for so valuable and elegant a purpose, merit the thanks of genius and candour, not the satire of prejudice and ignorance. That labour, which so essentially contributes to the service of true taste, deserves a more honourable repository than The Temple of Dulness.” Steevens.

Note return to page 95 *There is reason to think that about the time of the Reformation, great numbers of plays were printed, though few of that age are now to be found; for part of Queen Elizabeth's injunctions in 1559, are particularly directed to the suppressing of “Many pamphlets, playes, and ballads: that no manner of person shall enterprize to print any such, &c. but under certain restrictions.” Vid. Sect. V. This observation is taken from Dr. Percy's additions to his Essay on the Origin of the English Stage. It appears likewise from a page at the conclusion of the second volume of the entries belonging to the Stationers Company, that in the 41st year of Queen Elizabeth, many new restraints on booksellers were laid. Among these are the following: “That no playes be printed excepte they bee allowed by such as have auctoritye.” The records of the Stationers, however, contain the entries of some which have never yet been met with by the most successful collectors; nor are their titles to be found in any registers of the stage, whether ancient or modern. It should seem from the same volumes that it was customary for the Stationers to seize the whole impression of any work that had given offence, and burn it publickly at their hall, in obedience to the edicts of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Bishop of London, who sometimes enjoyed these literary executions at their respective palaces. Among other works condemned to the flames by these discerning prelates, were the complete Satires of Bishop Hall.* [Subnote: *Law, Physick, and Divinity, bl. l. may be found on every stall. Plays, poetry, and novels, were destroyed publickly by the Bishops, and privately by the Puritans. Hence the infinite number of them entirely lost, for which licenses were procured, &c. Farmer.] Mr. Theobald, at the conclusion of the preface to his first edition of Shakspeare, asserts, that exclusive of the dramas of Ben Jonson, and Beaumont and Fletcher, he had read “above 800 of old English plays.” He omitted this assertion, however, on the republication of the same work, and, I hope, he did so, through a consciousness of its utter falsehood; for if we except the plays of the authors already mentioned, it would be difficult to discover half the number that were written early enough to serve the purpose for which he pretends to have perused the imaginary stock of ancient literature. I might add, that the private collection of Mr. Theobald, which, including the plays of Jonson, Fletcher, and Shakspeare, did not amount to many more than an hundred, remained entire in the hands of the late Mr. Tonson, till the time of his death. It does not appear that any other collection but the Harleian was at that time formed; nor does Mr. Theobald's edition contain any intrinsick evidences of so comprehensive an examination of our eldest dramatick writers, as he assumes to himself the merit of having made. Steevens. Whatever Mr. Theobald might venture to assert, there is sufficient evidence existing that at the time of his death he was not possessed of more than 295 quarto plays in the whole, and some of these, it is probable, were different editions of the same play. He died shortly after the 6th of September, 1744. On the 20th of October his library was advertized to be sold by auction, by Charles Corbett, and on the third day was the following lot: “295 Old English Plays in quarto, some of them so scarce as not to be had at any price: to many of which are MSS. notes and remarks by Mr. Theobald, all done up neatly in boards in single plays. They will all be sold in one lot.” Reed. There were about five hundred and fifty plays printed before the Restoration, exclusive of those written by Shakspeare, Jonson, and Fletcher. Malone.

Note return to page 96 *In the year 1707 Mr. N. Tate published a tragedy called Injured Love, or the Cruel Husband, and in the title-page calls himself “Author of the tragedy called King Lear.” In a book called The Actor, or a Treatise on the Art of Playing, 12mo. published in 1750, and imputed to Dr. Hill, is the following pretended extract from Romeo and Juliet, with the author's remark on it: “The saints that heard our vows and know our love, “Seeing thy faith and thy unspotted truth, “Will sure take care, and let no wrongs annoy thee. “Upon my knees I'll ask them every day “How my kind Juliet does; and every night, “In the severe distresses of my fate, “As I perhaps shall wander through the desert, “And want a place to rest my weary head on, “I'll count the stars, and bless 'em as they shine, “And court them all for my dear Juliet's safety.” “The reader will pardon us on this and some other occasions, that where we quote passages from plays, we give them as the author gives them, not as the butcherly hand of a blockhead prompter may have lopped them, or as the unequal genius of some bungling critic may have attempted to mend them. Whoever remembers the merit of the player's speaking the things we celebrate them for, we are pretty confident will wish he spoke them absolutely as we give them, that is, as the author gives them.” Perhaps it is unnecessary to inform the reader that not one of the lines above quoted, is to be found in the Rome and Juliet of Shakspeare. They are copied from the Caius Marius of Otway. Steevens.

Note return to page 97 *A list of them is appended to Dr. Farmer's essay. Boswell.

Note return to page 98 *This addition to Mr. Steevens's Advertisement was made in 1778. Malone.

Note return to page 99 *The following pretty picture of the stage is given in Gayton's Notes on Don Quixote, 1654, p. 271: “Men came not to study at a play-house, but love such expressions and passages, which with ease insinuate themselves into their capacities. Linqua, that learned comedy of the contention betwixt the five senses for superiority, is not to be prostituted to the common stage, but is only proper for an Academy; to them bring Jack Drum's Entertainment, Green's Tu Quoque, the Devil of Edmonton, and the like; or if it be on holy dayes, when saylers, water-men, shoo-makers, butchers, and apprentices, are at leisure, then it is good policy to amaze those violent spirits with some tearing Tragedy full of fights and skirmishes: as the Guelphs and Guiblins, Greeks and Trojans, or the three London Apprentices; which commonly ends in six acts, the spectators frequently mounting the stage, and making a more bloody catastrophe amongst themselves, than the players did. I have known upon one of these festivals, but especially at Shrove-tide, where the players have been appointed, notwithstanding their bils to the contrary, to act what the major part of the company had a mind to; sometimes Tamerlane, sometimes Jugurth, sometimes The Jew of Malta; and sometimes parts of all these, and at last none of the three taking, they were forc'd to undresse and put off their tragick habits, and conclude the day with the Merry Milk-maides. And unlesse this were done, and the popular humour satisfied, as sometimes it so fortun'd, that the players were refractory; the benches, the tiles, the laths, the stones, oranges, apples, nuts, flew about most liberally; and, as there were mechanicks of all professions, who fell every one to his owne trade, and dissolved a house in an instant, and made a ruine of a stately fabrick. It was not then the most mimicall nor fighting man, Fowler, nor Andrew Cane, could pacifie: Prologues nor Epilogues would prevaile; the devill and the fool were quite out of favour. Nothing but noise and tumult fils the house, untill a cogg take 'um, and then the bawdy houses and reforme them; and instantly to the Banks's Side, where the poor bears must conclude the riot, and fight twenty dgs dogs at a time beside the butchers, which sometimes fell into the service; this perform'd, and the horse and jack-an-apes for a jigge, they had sport enough that day for nothing.” Todd.

Note return to page 100 *Edit. 1778.

Note return to page 101 †As I was never vain enough to suppose the edit. 1778 was entitled to this encomium, I can find no difficulty in allowing that it has been properly recalled by the gentleman who bestowed it. See his Preface; and his Letter to the Reverend Dr. Farmer, p. 7 and 8. Steevens.

Note return to page 102 *Mr. Mason alludes to a supplement published by Mr. Malone in 1780, to Mr. Steevens's edition of 1778. These plays were not given as the genuine productions of Shakspeare, but as having been ascribed to him, and therefore worthy of republication, as a curiosity. Boswell.

Note return to page 103 *This is a mistake. The second folio merely adopted the misprint of the first. Bowell.

Note return to page 104 *Here again both folios adopt the error of their predecessors, but do not insert the word the. Boswell.

Note return to page 105 *In that copy anoint being corruptly printed instead of aroint, “Anoint thee, witch, the rump-fed ronyon cries.” the error was implicitly adopted by D'Avenant.

Note return to page 106 †Except only in the instance of Romeo and Juliet, where the first copy, printed in 1597, appears to be an imperfect sketch, and therefore cannot be entirely relied on. Yet even this furnishes many valuable corrections of the more perfect copy of that tragedy in its present state, printed in 1599.

Note return to page 107 *“To walk unbraced, and suck up the humours “Of the dank morning.” First Folio. “Of the dark morning.” Second Folio. “We are blest that Rome is rid of him.” First Folio. “We are glad that Rome is rid of him.” Second Folio. “The noise of battle hurtled in the air.” First Folio. “The noise of battle hurried in the air.” Second Folio.

Note return to page 108 *That this editor never examined any of the quarto copies is proved by the following instances: In Troilus and Cressida, we find in the first folio: “&lblank; the remainder viands “We do not throw in unrespective same, “Because we now are full.” Finding this nonsense, he printed “in unrespective place.” In the quarto he would have found the true word—sieve. Again, in the same play, the following lines are thus corruptly exhibited: “That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax; “Since things in motion begin to catch the eye, “Than what not stirs. the words—“begin to,” being inadvertently repeated in the second line, by the compositor's eye glancing on the line above. The editor of the second folio, instead of examining the quarto, where he would have found the true reading: “Since things in motion sooner catch the eye.” thought only of amending the metre, and printed the line thus: “Since things in motion 'gin to catch the eye &lblank;” leaving the passage nonsense, as he found it. So, in Titus Andronicus: “And let no comfort delight mine ear &lblank;” being erroneously printed in the first folio, instead of “And let no comforter,” &c. the editor of the second folio corrected the error according to his fancy, by reading— “And let no comfort else delight mine ear.” So, in Love's Labour's Lost: “Old Mantuan, who understands thee not, loves thee not.” The words in the Italick character being inadvertently omitted in the first folio, the editor of the second folio, instead of applying to the quarto to cure the defect, printed the passage just as he found it: and in like manner in the same play implicitly followed the error of the first folio, which has been already mentioned,— “O, that your face were so full of O's &lblank;” though the omission of the word not, which is found in the quarto, made the passage nonsense. So, in Much Ado about Nothing: “And I will break with her. Was't not to this end,” &c. being printed instead of— “And I will break with her and with her father, “And thou shalt have her. Was't not to this end,” &c. the error, which arose from the compositor's eye glancing from one line to the other, was implicitly adopted in the second folio. Again, in A Midsummer-Night's Dream: “Ah me, for aught that I could ever read, “Could ever hear,” &c. the words Ah me being accidentally omitted in the first folio, instead of applying to the quarto for the true reading, he supplied the defect, according to his own fancy, thus: “Hermia, for aught that I could ever read,” &c. Again, in The Merchant of Venice, he arbitrarily gives us— “The ewe bleat for the lamb when you behold,” instead of— “Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb.” Innumerable other instances of the same kind might be produced.

Note return to page 109 *See vol. xiii. p. 228, n. 2.

Note return to page 110 *In Measure for Measure we find these lines: “&lblank; Merciful heaven! “Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt, “Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak, “Than the soft myrtle;—But man, proud man,” &c. There can be no doubt that a word was omitted in the last line; perhaps some epithet to myrtle. But the editor of the second folio, resorting to his usual expedient, absurdly reads: “Than the soft myrtle. O but man, proud man &lblank;.” So, in Titus Adronicus, Act III. Sc. II. complaynet being corruptly printed instead of complainer, “Speechless complaynet, I will learn thy thoughts &lblank;” this editor, with equal absurdity, reads: “Speechless complaint, O, I will learn thy thoughts.” I have again and again had occasion to mention in the notes on these plays, that omission is of all the errors of the press that which most frequently happens. On collating the fourth edition of King Richard III. printed in 1612, with the second printed in 1598, I found no less than twenty-six words omitted.

Note return to page 111 *At the time the tragedy of King Richard III. was in the press, I was obliged to make use of the second edition printed in 1598; but have since been furnished with the edition of 1597, which I have collated verbatim, and the most material variations are noticed in the appendix.

Note return to page 112 *If the explication of any word or phrase should appear unsatisfactory, the reader, by turning to the Glossarial Index, may know at once whether any additional information has been obtained on the subject. Thus, in Macbeth, vol. iv. p. 392, Dr. Warburton's erroneous interpretation of the word blood-bolter'd is inserted; but the true explication of that provincial term may be found in the Appendix. So of the phrase, “Will you take eggs for money” in The Winter's Tale; and some others.

Note return to page 113 †Lest this assertion should be supposed to be made without evidence, I subjoin a list of the restorations made from the original copy, and supported by contemporary usage, in two plays only: The Winter's Tale and King John. The lines in the former instance are exhibited as they appear in the edition of 1778, (as being much more correctly printed than that of 1785,) those which follow as they appear in the present edition (i. e. Mr. Malone's, in ten volumes 1790.) THE WINTER'S TALE. 1. “&lblank; I'll give you my commission, “To let him there a month.” P. 293. “&lblank; I'll give him my commission, “To let him there a month.” P. 125. 2. “&lblank; we know not “The doctrine of ill-doing, no, nor dream'd &lblank;” P. 295. “&lblank; we know not “The doctrine of ill-doing; nor dream'd &lblank;.” P. 126. 3. “As o'er-dyed blacks, as winds, as waters;—” P. 300. “As o'er-dy'd blacks, as wind, as waters;—” P. 130. 4. “As ornament oft does.” P. 302. “As ornaments oft do.” P. 130. The original copy, with a disregard of grammar, reads—“As ornaments oft does.” This inaccuracy has been constantly corrected by every editor, wherever it occurs; but the correction should always be made in the verb, and not in the noun. 5. “Have you not—thought (for cogitation “Resides not in the man that does not think it) “My wife is slippery?” P. 408. “Have you not—thought (for cogitation “Resides not in the man that does not think) “My wife is slippery?” P. 138. 6. “&lblank; wishing clocks more swift? “Hours, minutes, the noon midnight? and all eyes,—” P. 408. “&lblank; wishing clocks more swift? “Hours minutes? noon midnight? and all eyes,—” P. 139. 7. “&lblank; Ay, and thou,—who may'st see “How I am gall'd—thou might'st be-spice a cup,—” P. 309. “&lblank; Ay, and thou,—who may'st see “How I am galled,—might'st be-spice a cup,—” P. 140. 8. “&lblank; I'll keep my stable where “I lodge my wife;—” P. 325. “&lblank; I'll keep my stables where “I lodge my wife;—” P. 153. 9. “Relish as truth like us.” P. 317. “Relish a truth like us.” P. 156. 10. “And I beseech you, hear me, who profess &lblank;” P. 333. “And I beseech you, hear me, who professes &lblank;” P. 162. 11. “This session to our great grief,—” P. 343. “This sessions to our great grief,—” P. 170. 12. “The bug which you will fright me with, I seek.” P. 347. “The bug which you would fright me with, I seek.” P. 175. 13. “You here shall swear upon the sword of justice,—” P. 349. “You here shall swear upon this sword of justice,—” P. 177. 14. “The session shall proceed.” P. 349. “The sessions shall proceed.” P. 178. 15. “Which you knew great; and to the certain hazard “Of all incertainties &lblank;” P. 350. “Which you knew great, and to the hazard “Of all incertainties &lblank;” P. 179. Some word was undoubtedly omitted at the press; (probably fearful or doubtful;) but I thought it better to exhibit the line in an imperfect state, than to adopt the interpolation made by the editor of the secoud folio, who has introduced perhaps as unfit a word as could have been chosen. 16. “Through my dark rust! and how his piety &lblank;” P. 360. “Thorough my rust! and how his piety &lblank;” P. 179. The first word of the line is in the old copy by the mistake of the compositor printed Through. 17. “O but dear sir,—” P. 375. “O but, sir,—” P. 200. 18. “Your discontenting father I'll strive to qualify,—” P. 401. “Your discontenting father strive to qualify,—” P. 224. 19. “If I thought it were not a piece of honesty to acquaint the king withal, I would do it.” P. 407. “If I thought it were a piece of honesty to acquaint the king withal, I'd not do it.” P. 229. 20. “Dost thou think, for that I insinuate or toze &lblank;” P. 402. “Dost thou think, for that I insinuate and toze &lblank;” P. 231. 21. “You might have spoke a thousand things—” P. 414. “You might have spoken a thousand things,—” P. 235. 22. “Where we offend her now, appear &lblank;” P. 417. “Where we offenders now appear &lblank;” P. 237. 23. “Once more to look on. “Sir, by his command,—” P. 420. “Once more to look on him. “By his command,—” P. 240. 24. “&lblank; like a weather beaten conduit.” P. 425. “&lblank; like a weather-bitten conduit.” P. 246. 25. “&lblank; This your son-in-law, “And son unto the king, who, heaven's directing, “Is troth-plight to your daughter.” P. 437. “&lblank; This your son-in-law, “And son unto the king, (whom heavens directing,) “Is troth-plight to your daughter.” P. 257. KING JOHN. 1. “Which fault lies on the hazard of all husbands. P. 10. “Which fault lies on the hazards of all husbands.” P. 451. 2. “'Tis too respective, and too sociable. “For your conversing.” P. 14. “'Tis too respective, and too sociable, “For your conversion.” P. 456. 3. “Thus leaning on my elbow,—” P. 16. “Thus leaning on mine elbow,—” P. 457. 4. “With them a bastard of the king deceas'd.” P. 25. “With them a bastard of the king's deceas'd.” P. 464. 5. “That thou hast under-wrought its lawful king.” P. 26. “That thou hast under-wrought his lawful king.” P. 465. 6. “Say, shall the current of our right run on?” P. 37. “Say, shall the current of our right roam on?” P. 476. 7. “And now he feasts, mouthing the flesh of men,—” P. 38. “And now he feasts, mousing the flesh of men,—” P. 477. 8. “A greater power than ye &lblank;” P. 39. “A greater power than we &lblank;” P. 478. 9. “For grief is proud, and makes his owner stoop.” P. 52. “For grief is proud, and makes his owner stout.” P. 492. 10. “O, that a man would speak these words to me!” P. 52. “O, that a man should speak these words to me!“ P. 497. 11. “Is't not amiss, when it is truly done?” P. 64. “Is not amiss, when it is truly done.” P. 504. 12. “Then, in despight of broad-ey'd watchful day,—” P. 72. “Then, in despight of brooded watchful day,—” P. 512. 13. “A whole armado of collected sail.” P. 74. “A whole armado of convicted sail.” P. 514. 14. “And bitter shame hath spoil'd the sweet world's taste.” P. 79. “And bitter shame hath spoil'd the sweet word's taste.” P. 519. 15. “Strong reasons make strong actions.” P. 81. “Strong reasons make strange actions.” P. 522. 16. “Must make a stand at what your highness will.” P. 89. “Doth make a stand at what your highness will.” P. 530. 17. “Had none, my lord! why, did not you provoke me?” P. 96. “Had none, my lord! why, did you not provoke me?” P. 536. 18. “Mad'st it no conscience to destroy a king.” P. 97. “Made it no conscience to destroy a king.” P. 537. 19. “Sir, sir, impatience has its privilege.” P. 102. “Sir, sir, impatience has his privilege.” P. 541. 20. “Or, when he doom'd this beauty to the grave,—” P. 102. “Or, when he doom'd this beauty to a grave,—” P. 541. 21. “To the yet-unbegotten sins of time.” P. 102. “To the yet-unbegotten sin of times.” P. 541. 22. “And breathing to this breathless excellence,—” P. 102. “And breathing to his breathless excellence,—” P. 542. 23. “And your supplies, which you have wish'd so long,—” P. 121. “And your supply, which you have wish'd so long,—” P. 561. 24. “What's that to thee? Why may I not demand &lblank;” P. 122. “What's that to thee? Why may not I demand &lblank;” P. 562. 25. “O, my sweet sir, news fitted to the night.” P. 123. “O, my sweet sir, news fitting to the night.” P. 563. 26. “Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts, “Leaves them; invisible his siege is now “Against the mind,—” P. 124. “Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts, “Leaves them invisible; and his siege is now “Against the mind,—” P. 565. 27. “The salt of them is hot.” P. 125. “The salt in them is hot.” P. 568. Two other restorations in this play I have not set down: “Before we will lay down our just-borne arms &lblank;” Act II. Sc. II. and— “Be these sad signs confirmers of thy word.” Act III. Sc. I. because I pointed them out on a former occasion. It may perhaps be urged that some of the variations in these lists, are of no great consequence; but to preserve our poet's genuine text is certainly important; for otherwise, as Dr. Johnson has justly observed, “the history of our language will be lost;” and as our poet's words are changed, we are constantly in danger of losing his meaning also. Every reader must wish to peruse what Shakspeare wrote, supported at once by the authority of the authentick copies, and the usage of his contemporaries, rather than what the editor of the second folio, or Pope, or Hanmer, or Warburton, have arbitrarily substituted in its place. Let me not, however, be misunderstood. All these variations have not been discovered by the present collation, some of them having been pointed out by preceding editors; but such as had been already noticed were merely pointed out: the original readings are now established and supported by the usage of our poet himself and that of his contemporaries, and restored to the text, instead of being degraded to the bottom of the page.

Note return to page 114 ‡That I may be accurately understood, I subjoin a few of these unnoticed corrections: In King Henry VI. P. I. Act I. Sc. VI: “Thy promises are like Adonis' gardens, “That one day bloom'd and fruitful were the next.” The old copy reads—garden. In King John, Act IV. Sc. II: “&lblank; that close aspect of his “Does shew the mood of a much-troubled breast.” The old copy reads—Do. Ibidem, Act I. Sc. I: “'Tis too respective, and too sociable,” &c. The old copy,—'Tis two respective,” &c. Again, in the same play, we find in the original copy: “Against the inuoluerable clouds of heaven.” In King Henry V. Act V. Sc. II: “Corrupting in its own fertility.” The old copy reads—it. In Timon of Athens, Act I. Sc. I: “Come, shall we in?” The old copy has—Comes. Ibidem: “Even on their knees, and hands &lblank;.” The old copy has—hand. In Cymbeline, Act III. Sc. IV: “The handmaids of all women, or, more truly, “Woman its pretty self.” The old copy has—it. It cannot be expected that the page should be encumbered with the notice of such obvious mistakes of the press as are here enumerated. With the exception of errors such as these, whenever any emendation has been adopted, it is mentioned in a note, and ascribed to its author.

Note return to page 115 *Newton's Preface to his edition of Milton.

Note return to page 116 *If ever the account-book of Mr. Heminge shall be discovered, we shall probably find in it—“Paid to William Shakspeare for mending Titus Andronicus.” See vol. iii.

Note return to page 117 *Vol. iii. p. 329.

Note return to page 118 *See the Essay on the Chronological Order of Shakspeare's Plays. vol. ii. Boswell.

Note return to page 119 †He afterwards procured the first edition, from which that poem is now printed. Boswell.

Note return to page 120 *King Henry IV. Part II.

Note return to page 121 †See particularly The Merchant of Venice, vol. v. p. 68. “&lblank; That many may be meant “By the fool multitude.” with the note there. We undoubtedly should not now write— “But, lest myself be guilty to self-wrong,—” yet we find this phrase in The Comedy of Errors, vol. iv. p. 214, n. 4. See also The Winter's Tale, vol. xiv. p. 428, n. 5. “&lblank; This your son-in-law, “And son unto the king, (whom heavens directing,) “Is troth-plight to your daughter.” Measure for Measure, vol. ix. p. 156, n. 1; “&lblank; to be so bared,—.” Coriolanus, vol. xiv. p. 133, n. 2: “Which often, thus, correcting thy stout heart,” &c. Hamlet, vol. vii. p. 203, n. 2: “That he might not beteem the winds of heaven,” &c. As You Like It, vol. vi. p. 396, n. 7: “My voice is ragged,—.” Cymbeline, vol. xiii. p. 228, n. 2: “Whom heavens, in justice, (both on her and hers,) “Have laid most heavy hand.”

Note return to page 122 *Act II. Sc. I: “&lblank; throw the quean in the channel.” In that passage, as in many others, I have silently restored the original reading, without any observation; but the word in this sense, being now obsolete, should have been illustrated by a note. This defect, however, will be found remedied in K. Henry VI. P. II. Act II. Sc. II: “As if a channel should be call'd a sea.”

Note return to page 123 †Hurd's Hor. 4th edit. vol. i. p. 55.

Note return to page 124 *The Right Honourable Edmund Burke.

Note return to page 125 *“The tongue in general is so much refined since Shakspeare's time, that many of his words, and more of his phrases, are scarce intelligible.” Preface to Dryden's Troilus and Cressida. The various changes made by Dryden in particular passages in that play, and by him and D'Avenant in The Tempest, prove decisively that they frequently did not understand our poet's language. In his defence of the Epilogue to The Conquest of Granada, Dryden arraigns Ben Jonson for using the personal, instead of the neutral, pronoun, and unfeard for unafraid: “Though heaven should speak with all his wrath at once, “We should stand upright, and unfear'd.” “His (says he) is ill syntax with heaven, and by unfear'd he means unafraid; words of a quite contrary signification.—He perpetually uses ports for gates, which is an affected error in him, to introduce Latin by the loss of the English idiom.” Now his for its, however ill the syntax may be, was the common language of the time; and to fear, in the sense of to terrify, is found not only in all the poets, but in every dictionary of that age. With respect to ports, Shakspeare, who will not be suspected of affecting Latinisms, frequently employs that word in the same sense as Jonson has done, and as probably the whole kingdom did; for the word is still so used in Scotland. D'Avenant's alteration of Macbeth, and Measure for Measure, furnish many proofs of the same kind. In The Law against Lovers, which he formed on Much Ado about Nothing, and Measure for Measure, are these lines: “&lblank; nor do I think, “The prince has true discretion who affects it.” The passage imitated is in Measure for Measure: “Nor do I think the man of safe discretion, “That does affect it.” If our poet's language had been well understood, the epithet safe would not have been rejected. So Othello: “My blood begins my safer guides to rule; “And passion, having my best judgment collied,” &c. So also, Edgar, in King Lear: “The safer sense will ne'er accommodate “His master thus.”

Note return to page 126 *The price of books at different periods may serve in some measure to ascertain the taste and particular study of the age. At the sale of Dr. Francis Bernard's library in 1698, the following books were sold at the annexed prices: FOLIO. Gower de Confessione Amantis Now sold for two guineas. 0 2 6 Caxton's Recueyll of the Histories of Troy, 1502 0 3 0 —Chronicle of England 0 4 0 Hall's Chronicle 0 6 4 Grafton's Chronicle 0 6 10 Holinshed's Chronicle, 1587 1 10 6 This book is now frequently sold for ten guineas. QUARTO. Turberville on hawking and hunting 0 0 6 Copley's Wits, Fits, and Fancies 0 0 4 Puttenham's Art of English Poesie 0 0 4 This book is now usually sold for a guinea. Powell's History of Wales 0 1 5 Painter's second tome of the Palace of Pleasure 0 0 4 The two volumes of Painter's Palace of Pleasure are now usually sold for three guineas. OCTAVO. Metamorphosis of Ajax, by Sir John Harrington 0 0 4 [The prices of books have altered even since this note was written by Mr. Malone so much, that collectors would think themselves fortunate in procuring some of the works enumerated in the above list at three times the sum which is there considered as comparatively extravagant. Boswell.]

Note return to page 127 *Notwithstanding our high admiration of Shakspeare, we are yet without a splendid edition of his works, with the illustrations which the united efforts of various commentators have contributed; while in other countries the most brilliant decorations have been lavished on their distinguished poets. The editions of Pope and Hanmer, may, with almost as much propriety, be called their works, as those of Shakspeare; and therefore can have no claim to be admitted into any elegant library. Nor will the promised edition, with engravings, undertaken by Mr. Alderman Boydell, remedy this defect, for it is not to be accompanied with notes. At some future, and no very distant, time, I mean to furnish the publick with an elegant edition in quarto, (without engravings,) in which the text of the present edition shall be followed, with the illustrations subjoined in the same page.

Note return to page 128 †In the year 1642, whether from some capricious vicissitude in the publick taste, or from a general inattention to the drama, we find Shirley complaining that few came to see our author's performances: “&lblank; You see “What audience we have: what company “To Shakspeare comes? whose mirth did once beguile “Dull hours, and buskin'd made even sorrow smile; “So lovely were the wounds, that men would say “They could endure the bleeding a whole day; “He has but few friends lately.” Prologue to The Sisters. “Shakspeare to thee was dull, whose best jest lies “I'th lady's questions, and the fool's replies; “Old fashion'd wit, which walk'd from town to town, “In trunk-hose, which our fathers call'd the clown; “Whose wit our nicer times would obsceneness call, “And which made bawdry pass for comical. “Nature was all his art; thy vein was free “As his, but without his scurrility.” Verses on Fletcher, by William Cartwright, 1647. After the Restoration, on the revival of the theatres, the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher were esteemed so much superior to those of our author, that we are told by Dryden, “two of their pieces were acted through the year, for one of Shakspeare's.” If his testimony needed any corroboration, the following verses would afford it: “In our old plays, the humour, love, and passion, “Like doublet, hose, and cloak, are out of fashion; “That which the world call'd wit in Shakspeare's age, “Is laugh'd at, as improper for our stage.” Prologue to Shirley's Love Tricks, 1667. “At every shop, while Shakspeare's lofty stile “Neglected lies, to mice and worms a spoil, “Gilt on the back, just smoking from the press, “The apprentice shews you D'Urfey's Hudibras, “Crown's Mask, bound up with Settle's choicest labours, “And promises some new essay of Babor's.” Satire, published in 1680. “&lblank; against old as well as new to rage, “Is the peculiar frenzy of this age. “Shakspeare must down, and you must praise no more, “Soft Desdemona, nor the jealous Moor: “Shakspeare, whose frightful genius, happy wit, “Was fram'd and finish'd at a lucky hit, “The pride of nature, and the shame of schools, “Born to create, and not to learn from, rules, “Must please no more: his bastards now deride “Their father's nakedness they ought to hide.” Prologue by Sir Charles Sedley, to the Wary Widow, 1693. To the honour of Margaret Duchess of Newcastle be it remembered, that however fantastick in other respects, she had taste enough to be fully sensible of our poet's merit, and was one of the first who after the Restoration published a very high eulogy on him. See her Sociable Letters, folio, 1664, p. 244.

Note return to page 129 *Conjectures on Original Composition, by Dr. Edward Young.

Note return to page 130 *Camden.

Note return to page 131 *Such, we think were the remarks, that occurred to us several years ago, when this portrait was accessible. We wished indeed to have confirmed them by a second view of it; but a late accident in the noble family to which it belongs, has precluded us from that satisfaction.

Note return to page 132 †Vertue's portraits have been over-praised on account of their fidelity; for we have now before us six different heads of Shakspeare engraved by him, and do not scrupple to assert that they have individually a different cast of countenance. Cucullus non facit monachum. The shape of our author's ear-ring and falling-band may correspond in them all, but where shall we find an equal conformity in his features? Few objects indeed are occassionally more difficult to seize, than the slender traits that mark the character of a face; and the eye will often detect the want of them, when the most exact mechanical process cannot decide on the places in which they are omitted.—Vertue, in short, though a laborious, was a very indifferent draughtsman, and his best copies too often exhibit a general instead of a particular resemblance.

Note return to page 133 *Nor does the same piece of ancient scandal derive much weight from Aubrey's adoption of it. The reader who is acquainted with the writings of this absurd gossip, will scarcely pay more attention to him on the present occasion, than when he gravely assures us that “Anno 1670, not far from Cirencester was an apparition; being demanded whether a good spirit or a bad? returned no answer, but disappeared with a curious perfume and most melodious twang. Mr. W. Lilly believes it was a fairy,” See Aubrey's Miscellanies, edit. 1784, p. 114.—Aubrey, in short, was a dupe to every wag who chose to practise on his credulity; and would most certainly have believed the person who should have told him that Shakspeare himself was a natural son of Queen Elizabeth. An additional and no less pleasant proof of Aubrey's cullibility, may be found at the conclusion of one of his own Letters to Mr. Ray; where, after the enumeration of several wonderful methods employed by old women and Irishmen to cure the gout, agues, and the bloody flux, he adds: “Sir Christopher Wren told me once [eating of strawberries] that if one that has a wound in the head eats them, 'tis mortal.” See Philosophical Letters between the late learned Mr. Ray, &c. Published by William Derham, Chaplain to his Royal Highness George Prince of Wales, and F. R. S. 8vo. 1718, p. 251. In the foregoing instance our letter-writer seems to have been perfectly unconscious of the jocularity of Sir Christopher, who would have meant nothing more by his remark, than to secure his strawberries, at the expence of an allusion to the crack in poor Aubrey's head. Thus when Falstaff “did desire to eat some prawns,” Mrs. Quickly told him “they were ill for a green wound.” Mr. T. Warton has pleasantly observed that he “cannot suppose Shakspeare to have been the father of a Doctor of Divinity who never laughed;” and—to waste no more words on Sir William D'Avenant,—let but our readers survey his heavy, vulgar, unmeaning face, and, if we mistake not, they will as readily conclude that Shakspeare “never holp to make it.” So despicable, indeed, is his countenance as represented by Faithorne, that it appears to have sunk that celebrated engraver beneath many a common artist in the same line.

Note return to page 134 *Much respect is due to the authority of portraits that descend in families from heir to heir; but little reliance can be placed on them when they are produced for sale (as in the present instance) by alien hands, almost a century after the death of the person supposed to be represented; and then, (as Edmund says in King Lear) “come pat, like the catastrophe of the old comedy.” Shakspeare was buried in 1616; and in 1708 the first notice of this picture occurs. Where there is such a chasm in evidence, the validity of it may be not unfairly questioned, and especially by those who remember a species of fraudulence recorded in Mr. Foote's Taste: “Clap Lord Dupe's arms on that half-length of Erasmus; I have sold it him as his great grandfather's third brother, for fifty guineas.”

Note return to page 135 *A kindred trick had actually been passed off by Chatterton on the late Mr. Barrett of Bristol, in whose back parlour was a pretended head of Canynge, most contemptibly scratched with a pen on a small square piece of yellow parchment, and framed and glazed as an authentick icon by the “curyous poyntill” of Rowley. But this same drawing very soon ceased to be stationary, was alternately exhibited and concealed, as the wavering faith of its possessor shifted about, and was prudently withheld at last from the publick eye. Why it was not inserted in the late History of Bristol, as well as Rowley's plan and elevation of its ancient castle, (which all the rules of all the ages of architecture pronounce to be spurious) let the Rowleian advocates inform us. We are happy at least to have recollected a single imposition that was too gross for even these gentlemen to swallow.—Mr. Barrett, however, in the year 1776, assured Mr. Tyrwhitt and Mr. Steevens, that he received the aforesaid scrawl of Canynge from Chatterton, who described it as having been found in the prolifick chest, secured by six, or six-and-twenty keys, no matter which.

Note return to page 136 *They who wish for decorations adapted to this edition of Shakspeare, will find them in Silvester Harding's Portraits and Views, &c. &c. (appropriated to the whole suite of our author's Historical Dramas, &c.) published in thirty numbers. See Gent. Mag. June 1759, p. 257.

Note return to page 137 *List of the different engravings from the Chandosan Shakspeare: By Vandergucht, to Rowe's edit. 1709 Vertue, half sheet, Set of Poets 1719 Do. small oval, Jacob's Lives 1719 Do. to Warburton's 8vo. 1747 Duchange, 8vo. to Theobald's 1733 Gravelot, half sheet, Hanmer's edit 1744 Houbraken, half sheet, Birch's Heads 1747 Millar, small oval, Capell's Shakspeare 1766 Hall, 8vo. Reed's edit 1785 Cook, 8vo. Bell's edit 1788 Knight, 8vo. Mr. Malone's edit 1790 Harding, 8vo. Set of Prints to Shakspeare 1793 No two of these Portraits are alike; nor does any one of them bear the slightest resemblance to its wretched original. G. S.

Note return to page 138 †His Sonnets, though printed without date, were entered in the year 1581, on the books of the Stationers' Company, under the title of “Watson's Passions, manifesting the true Frenzy of Love.” Shakspeare appears to have been among the number of his readers, having in the following passage of Venus and Adonis,— “Leading him prisoner in a red-rose chain,” borrowed an idea from his 83d Sonnet: “The Muses not long since intrapping love “In chaines of roses, Watson, however, declares on this occasion that he imitated Ronsard; and it must be confessed, with equal truth, that in the present instance Ronsard had been a borrower from Anacreon.

Note return to page 139 *&lblank; nec instabili famâ superabere Delo. Stat. Achill. I. 388.

Note return to page 140 *He died September 8th, 1797.

Note return to page 141 †It will perhaps be urged, that to this first folio we are indebted for the only copies of sixteen or seventeen of our author's plays: True: but may not our want of yet earlier and less corrupted editions of these very dramas be solely attributed to the monopolizing vigilance of its editors, Messieurs Hemings and Condell? Finding they had been deprived of some tragedies and comedies which, when opportunity offered, they designed to publish for their own emolument, they redoubled their solicitude to withhold the rest, and were but too successful in their precaution. “Thank fortune (says the original putterforth of Troilus and Cressida) for the scape it hath made amongst you; since by the grand possessors' wills, I believe, you should have pray'd for it, rather than beene pray'd.”—Had quartos of Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, All's Well that Ends Well, &c. been sent into the world, from how many corruptions might the text of all these dramas have been secured!

Note return to page 142 *See first folio, &c. for the list of actors in our author's plays.

Note return to page 143 *Sufficient instances of measures thus rendered defective, and in the present edition unamended, may be found in the three last Acts of Hamlet, and in Othello.The length of this prefatory advertisement has precluded their exemplification, which was here meant to have been given.—We wish, however, to impress the foregoing circumstance on the memory of the judicious reader.

Note return to page 144 *Tempest.

Note return to page 145 *See also Addison's Spectator, No. 470.

Note return to page 146 †See Mr. Holt White's note on Romeo and Juliet, vol. vi. p. 90, n. 4.

Note return to page 147 *i. e. as acted before Queen Elizabeth in 1568. See Warton, Hist. of Poet. vol. iii. p. 376, n. g.

Note return to page 148 *Abraham Fleming supervised, corrected, and enlarged the second edition of Holinshed's Chronicle, in 1585.

Note return to page 149 *Thus (as one instance out of several that might be produced) when Mr. Malone, in The Merry Wives of Windsor, very judiciously restores the uncommon word—ging, and supports it by instances from The New Inn and The Alchemist, he forbears to mention that such also is the reading of the second, though not of the first folio. See vol. viii. p. 153, n. 5.

Note return to page 150 †Amounting to (as we are informed by a very accurate compositor who undertook to count them) 186. Instances wherein Mr. Malone has admitted the Corrections of the Second Folio. Tempest 4 Two Gentlemen of Verona 10 Merry Wives of Windsor 5 Measure for Measure 15 Comedy of Errors 11 Much Ado about Nothing 0 Love's Labour's Lost 13 Midsummer-Night's Dream 4 Merchant of Venice 2 As You Like It 15 Taming of the Shrew 16 All's Well that Ends Well 6 Twelfth-Night 3 Winter's Tale 8 Macbeth 6 King John 3 King Richard II 1 King Henry IV. Part I. 1 —II. 1 King Henry V 7 King Henry VI. Part I. 6 —II. 6 —III. 2 King Richard III. 0 King Henry VIII 6 Coriolanus 0 Julius Cæsar 2 Antony and Cleopatra 7 Timon of Athens 6 Troilus and Cressida 0 Cymbeline 10 King Lear 3 Romeo and Juliet 4 Hamlet 3 Othello 0 Total 186 Plymsell.

Note return to page 151 *This doctrine, however, appears to have made few proselytes: at least, some late catalogues of our good friends the booksellers, have expressed their dissent from it in terms of uncommon force. I must add, that on the 34th day of the auction of the late Dr. Farmer's library, this proscribed volume was sold for three guineas; and that in the sale of Mr. Allen's library, April 15th, 1799, at Leigh and Sotheby's, York Street, Covent Garden, the four folio editions of our author's plays were disposed of at the following prices: [Table: 1Kb] Sale No. l. s. d. 1460 1st folio 40 19 0 61 2d do. 5 10 0 62 3d do. 5 15 6 63 4th do. 3 13 6

Note return to page 152 *See Mr. Malone's Preface.

Note return to page 153 *“&lblank; the hospitable door “Expos'd a matron, to avoid worse rape.” Paradise Lost, b. i. v. 504.

Note return to page 154 *Number of letters, &c. in a page of Shakspeare, 1793. TEXT. The average number in each line (including letters, points, spaces, &c.) is 47; the number of lines in a page—37. 47 37 — 329 141 — 1739 in a page. NOTES. The average number in each line (including letters, points, spaces, &c.) is 67; the number of lines in a page—47. 67 47 — 469 268 — 3149 in a page. From this calculation it is clear, that a common page, admitting it to consist of 1–3d text, and 2–3ds notes, contains about 2680 distinct pieces of metal; which multiplied by 16, the number of pages in a sheet, will amount to 42,880—the misplacing of any one of which would inevitably cause a blunder. Plymsell.

Note return to page 155 *It would not be easy to produce a stronger instance of a writer acting in the character of a partisan than this passage furnishes. When Mr. Reed was enumerating the criticks on Shakspeare, who were of “high estimation,” was Mr. Malone forgotten? or was he meant to be classed with “others of inferior name?” Boswell.

Note return to page 156 *Of one to whom the readers of Shakspeare are so much obliged, a slight memorial will not here be considered as misplaced. George Steevens was born at Poplar, in the county of Middlesex, in the year 1736. His father, a man of great respectability, was engaged in a business connected with the East India Company, by which he acquired an handsome fortune. Fortunately for his son, and for the publick, the clergyman of the place was Dr. Gloucester Ridley, a man of great literary accomplishment, who is styled by Dr. Lowth poeta natus. With this gentleman an intimacy took place that united the two families closely together, and probably gave the younger branches of each that taste for literature which both afterwards ardently cultivated. The first part of Mr. Steevens's education he received under Mr. Wooddeson, at Kingston-upon-Thames, where he had for his school-fellows George Keate the poet, and Edward Gibbon the historian. From this seminary he removed in 1753 to King's College, Cambridge, and entered there under the tuition of the Reverend Dr. Barford. After staying a few years at the University, he left it without taking a degree, and accepted a commission in the Essex militia, in which service he continued a few years longer. In 1763 he lost his father, from whom he inherited an ample property, which if he did not lessen he certainly did not increase. From this period he seems to have determined on the course of his future life, and devoted himself to literary pursuits, which he followed with unabated vigour, but without any lucrative views, as he never required, or accepted, the slightest pecuniary recompence for his labours. His first residence was in the Temple, afterwards at Hampton, and lastly at Hampstead, where he continued near thirty years. In this retreat his life passed in one unbroken tenor, with scarce any variation, except an occasional visit to Cambridge, walking to London in the morning, six days out of seven, for the sake of health and conversation, and returning home in the afternoon of the same day. By temperance and exercise he continued healthy and active until the last two years of his life, and to the conclusion of it did not relax his attention to the illustration of Shakspeare, which was the first object of his regard. He died the 22d of January, 1800, and was buried in Poplar chapel. To the eulogium contained in the following epitaph by Mr. Hayley, which differs in some respect from that inscribed on the monument in Poplar chapel, those who really knew Mr. Steevens will readily subscribe: “Peace to these ashes! once the bright attire “Of Steevens, sparkling with æthereal fire! “Whose talents, varying as the diamond's ray, “Could fascinate alike the grave or gay!   “How oft has pleasure in the social hour “Smil'd at his wit's exhilarating power! “And truth attested, with delight intense, “The serious charms of his colloquial sense! “His genius, that to wild luxuriance swell'd, “His large, yet latent, charity excell'd: “Want with such true beneficence he chear'd, “All that his bounty gave his zeal endear'd.   “Learning, as vast as mental power could seize, “In sport displaying and with grateful ease, “Lightly the stage of chequer'd life he trod, “Careless of chance, confiding in his God!   “This tomb may perish, but not so his name “Who shed new lustre upon Shakspeare's fame!”

Note return to page 157 *See Mr. Richardson's Proposals.

Note return to page 158 †“Martin Droeshout. One of the indifferent engravers of the last century. He resided in England, and was employed by the booksellers. His portraits, which are the best part of his works, have nothing but their scarcity to recommend them. He engraved the head of Shakspeare, John Fox, the martyrologist, John Howson, Bishop of Durham,” &c. Strutt's Dictionary of Engravers, vol. i. p. 264. “William Marshall. He was one of those laborious artists whose engravings were chiefly confined to the ornamenting of books. And indeed his patience and assiduity is all we can admire when we turn over his prints, which are prodigiously numerous. He worked with the graver only, but in a dry tasteless style; and from the similarity which appears in the design of all his portraits, it is supposed that he worked from his own drawings after the life, though he did not add the words ad vivum, as was common upon such occasions. But if we grant this to be the case, the artist will acquire very little additional honour upon that account; for there is full as great a want of taste manifest in the design, as in the execution of his works on copper,” &c. Ibid. vol. ii. p. 125.

Note return to page 159 *Of some volunteer infidelities, however, Droeshout may be convicted. It is evident from the picture that Shakspeare was partly bald, and consequently that his forehead appeared unusually high. To remedy, therefore, what seemed a defect to the engraver, he has amplified the brow on the right side. For the sake of a more picturesque effect, he has also incurvated the line in the fore part of the ruff, though in the original it is mathematically straight. It may be observed, however, to those who examine trifles with rigour, that our early-engraved portraits were produced in the age when few had skill or opportunity to ascertain their faithfulness or infidelity. The confident artist therefore assumed the liberty of altering where he thought he could improve. The rapid workman was in too much haste to give his outline with correctness; and the mere drudge in his profession contented himself by placing a caput mortuum of his original before the publick. In short, the inducements to be licentious or inaccurate, were numerous; and the rewards of exactness were seldom attainable, most of our ancient heads of authors being done, at stated prices, for booksellers, who were careless about the veri-similitude of engravings which fashion not unfrequently obliged them to insert in the title-pages of works that deserved no such expensive decorations.

Note return to page 160 *A living artist, who was apprentice to Roubiliac, declares that when that elegant statuary undertook to execute the figure of Shakspeare for Mr. Garrick, the Chandos picture was borrowed; but that it was, even then, regarded as a performance of suspicious aspect; though for want of a more authentick archetype, some few hints were received, or pretended to be received, from it. Roubiliac, towards the close of his life, amused himself by painting in oil, though with little success. Mr. Felton has his poor copy of the Chandos picture, in which our author exhibits the complexion of a Jew, or rather that of a chimney-sweeper in the jaundice. It is singular that neither Garrick, or his friends, should have desired Roubiliac at least to look at the two earliest prints of Shakspeare; and yet even Scheemaker is known to have had no other model for our author's head, than the mezzotinto by Zoust.

Note return to page 161 *A broker now in the Minories declares, that it is his usual practice to cut down such portraits as are painted on wood, to the size of such spare frames as he happens to have in his possession.

Note return to page 162 †It is observable, that this hand-writing is of the age of Elizabeth, and that the name of Shakspeare is set down as he himself has spelt it.

Note return to page 163 ‡The age of the person represented agrees with the date on the back of the picture. In 1597 our author was in his 33d year, and in the meridian of his reputation, a period at which his resemblance was most likely to have been secured.

Note return to page 164 §It has hitherto been supposed that Marshall's production was borrowed from that of his predecessor. But it is now manifest that he has given the very singular ruff of Shakspeare as it stands in the original picture, and not as it appears in the plate from it by Martin Droeshout.

Note return to page 165 *The Player alluded to was Richard Burbage. A Gentleman who, for several years past, has collected as many pictures of Shakspeare as he could hear of, (in the hope that he might at last procure a genuine one,) declares that the Eastcheap legend has accompanied the majority of them, from whatever quarter they were transmitted. It is therefore high time that picture-dealers should avail themselves of another story, this being completely worn out, and no longer fit for service.

Note return to page 166 †Much confidence, perhaps, ought not to be placed in this remark, as a succession of limners now unknown might have pursued their art in England from the time of Hans Holbein to that of Queen Elizabeth.

Note return to page 167 *Philip Jones of Barnard's Inn, the auctioneer who sold off Mr. Sloman's effects, has been sought for; but he died a few years ago. Otherwise, as the knights of the hammer are said to preserve the catalogue of every auction, it might have been known whether pictures constituted any part of the Boar's Head furniture; for Mr. Sloman himself could not affirm that there were no small or obscure paintings above stairs in apartments which he had seldom or ever occasion to visit. Mrs. Brinn, the widow of Mr. Sloman's predecessor, after her husband's decease quitted Eastcheap, took up the trade of a wire-worker, and lived in Crooked Lane. She died about ten years ago. One, who had been her apprentice (no youth,) declares she was a very particular woman, was circumstantial in her narratives, and so often repeated them, that he could not possibly forget any article she had communicated relative to the plate, furniture, &c. of the Bear's Head:—that she often spoke of the painting that represented the robbery at Gadshill, but never so much as hinted at any other pictures in the house; and had there been any, he is sure she would not have failed to describe them in her accounts of her former business and place of abode, which supplied her with materials for conversation to the very end of a long life.

Note return to page 168 *The four last publicans who kept this tavern are said to have filled the whole period, from the time of Vertue's inquiries, to the year 1788, when the Boar's Head, having been untenanted for five years, was converted into two dwellings for shopkeepers.

Note return to page 169 †The tradition that Burbage painted a likeness of Shakspeare, has been current in the world ever since the appearance of Mr. Granger's Biographical History.

Note return to page 170 *It is not improbable that Ben Jonson furnished the Dedication and Introduction to the first folio, as well as the Commendatory Verses prefixed to it.

Note return to page 171 †&lblank; as he hath hit His face;] It should seem from these words, that the plate prefixed to the folio 1623 exhibited such a likeness of Shakspeare as satisfied the eye of his contemporary, Ben Jonson, who, on an occasion like this, would hardly have ventured to assert what it was in the power of many of his readers to contradict. When will evidence half so conclusive be produced in favour of the Davenantico-Bettertonian-Barryan-Keckian-Nicolsian-Chandosan canvas, which bears not the slightest resemblance to the original of Droeshout's and Marshall's engraving?

Note return to page 172 *“W. S. R. B.”

Note return to page 173 †&lblank;are all good, As long as all these goods are no worse us'd;] So, in our author's Othello: “Where virtue is, these are most virtuous.”

Note return to page 174 *There is reason to believe that Shakspeare's is the earliest known portrait of Droeshout's engraving. No wonder then that his performances twenty years after, are found to be executed with a somewhat superior degree of skill and accuracy. Yet still he was a poor engraver, and his productions are sought for more on account of their scarcity than their beauty. He seems indeed to have pleased so little in this country, that there are not above six or seven heads of his workmanship to be found.

Note return to page 175 *It is common for an artist who engraves from a painting that has been already engraved, to place the work of his predecessor before him, that he may either catch some hints from it, or learn to avoid its errors. Marshall most certainly did so in the present instance: but while he corrected Droeshout's ruff, he has been led by him to desert his original in an unauthorised expansion of our author's forehead.

Note return to page 176 *This mistake originated from a passage in Lord Orford's Anecdotes, &c. 8vo. vol. v. p. 258, where it is said, and truly, that Vertue's Set of Poets appeared in 1730. The particular plate of Shakspeare, however, as is proved by a date at the bottom of it, was engraved in 1719.

Note return to page 177 *One of these portraits is on canvas, and therefore the genuineness of it is controverted, if not denied.

Note return to page 178 *In the numerous List of Gentlemen who thoroughly examined this original Picture, were convinced of its authenticity, and immediately became Subscribers to W. Richardson, are the names of—Dr. Farmer, Mr. Cracherode, Mr. Bindley, Sir Joseph Banks, Sir George Shuckburgh, Mr. Chalmers, Mr. Reed, Mr. Ritson, Mr. Douce, Mr. Markham, Mr. Weston, Mr. Lysons, Mr. James, Col. Stanley, Mr. Coombe, Mr. Lodge, Mess. Smith, sen. and jun. Mr. Nicol, Mr. Boaden, Mr. Pearce, Mr. Whitefoord, Mr. Thane, Mess. Boydell, Mr. G. Romney, Mr. Lawrence, (Portrait-painter to his Majesty,) Mr. Bowyer, (Miniature-painter to his Majesty,) Mr. Barry, R. A. (Professor of Painting,) &c. &c. &c.

Note return to page 179 †Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, prefixed to edition 1793, which, being now printed in its chronological order, will be found in a former part of this volume. Boswell.

Note return to page 180 *Mr. Seward, in his Preface to Beaumont and Fletcher, 10 vols. 8vo. 1750.

Note return to page 181 *This passage of Ben Jonson, so often quoted, is given us in the admirable preface to the late edition, with a various reading, “small Latin and no Greek,” which hath been held up to the publick for a modern sophistication: yet whether an error or not, it was adopted above a century ago by W. Towers, in a panegyric on Cartwright. His eulogy, with more than fifty others, on this now forgotten poet, was prefixed to the edit. 1651.

Note return to page 182 *“Though thou hadst small Latin,” &c.

Note return to page 183 †In his Elegie on Poets and Poesie, p. 206. Folio, 1627.

Note return to page 184 ‡From his Poem upon Master William Shakspeare, intended to have been prefixed, with the other of his composition, to the folio of 1623: and afterward printed in a several miscellaneous collections: particularly the spurious edition of Shakspeare's Poems, 1640. Some account of him may be met with in Wood's Athenæ.

Note return to page 185 *Hence perhaps the ill-starr'd rage between this critick and his elder brother, John Dennis, so pathetically lamented in the Dunciad. Whilst the former was persuaded, that “the man who doubts of the learning of Shakspeare, hath none of his own:” the latter, above regarding the attack in his private capacity, declares with great patriotick vehemence, that “he who allows Shakspeare had learning, and a learning with the ancients, ought to be looked upon as a detractor from the glory of Great Britain.” Dennis was expelled his college for attempting to stab a man in the dark: Pope would have been glad of this anecdote† [Subnote: †See this fact established against the doubts and objections of Dr. Kippis in the Biographia Britannica, in Dr. Farmer's Letter to me, printed in the European Magazine, June 1794, p. 412. Reed.] .

Note return to page 186 *It is extraordinary, that this gentleman should attempt so voluminous a work, as the Revisal of Shakspeare's Text, when, he tells us in his Preface, “he was not so fortunate as to be furnished with either of the folio editions, much less any of the ancient quartos:” and even Sir Thomas Hanmer's performance was known to him only by Mr. Warburton's representation.

Note return to page 187 †I find the character of this work pretty early delineated: “'Twas Greek at first, that Greek was Latin made, “That Latin, French; that French to English straid: “Thus 'twixt one Plutarch there's more difference, “Than i'th' same Englishman return'd from France.”

Note return to page 188 *See Theobald's Preface to King Richard II. 8vo. 1720.

Note return to page 189 *By Henry Stephens and Alias Andreas, Par. 1554, 4to. ten years before the birth of Shakspeare. The former version hath been ascribed without reason to John Dorat. Many other translators appeared before the end of the century: and particularly the Ode in question was made popular by Buchanan, whose pieces were soon to be met with in almost every modern language.

Note return to page 190 *It was originally drawn into Englishe by Caxton under the name of The Recuyel of the Historyes of Troy, from the French of the ryght venerable Person and worshipfull man Raoul le Feure, and fynyshed in the holy citye of Colen, the 19 day of Septembre, the yere of our Lord God, a thousand foure hundred sixty and enleuen. Wynkyn de Worde printed an edit. fol. 1503, and there have been several subsequent ones.

Note return to page 191 *“Who list thistory of Patroclus to reade,” &c. Ship of Fooles, 1570, p. 21.

Note return to page 192 †“Nepenthe is a drinck of soueragne grace,   “Deuized by the gods, for to asswage “Harts grief, and bitter gall away to chace—   “Instead thereof sweet peace and quietage “It doth establish in the troubled mynd,” &c. Faerie Queene, 1596, book iv. c. iii. st. 43.

Note return to page 193 ‡It is very remarkable, that the bishop is called by his countryman, Sir David Lindsey, in his Complaint of our Souerane Lordis Papingo, “In our Inglische rethorick the rose.” And Dunbar hath a similar expression in his beautiful poem of The Goldin Terge.

Note return to page 194 *Aristophanis Comœdiæ undecim. Gr. & Lat. Amst. 1710, Fol. p. 596.

Note return to page 195 †Dr. Warburton corrects orphan to ouphen; and not without plausibility, as the word ouphes occurs both before and afterward. But I fancy, in acquiescence to the vulgar doctrine, the address in this line is to a part of the troop, as mortals by birth, but adopted by the fairies: orphans with respect to their real parents, and now only dependant on Destiny herself. A few lines from Spenser, will sufficiently illustrate the passage: “The man whom heauens have ordayn'd to bee   “The spouse of Britomart, is Arthegall: “He wonneth in the land of fayeree,   “Yet is no fary borne, ne sib at all “To elfes, but sprong of seed terrestriall,   “And whilome by false faries stolen away, “Whyles yet in infant cradle he did crall,” &c. Edit. 1590, Book III. c. iii. st. 26.

Note return to page 196 *Revisal, p. 75, 323, and 561.

Note return to page 197 †History of his Life and Times, p. 102, preserved by his dupe, Mr. Ashmole.

Note return to page 198 *Lond. 4to. 1582. She reports in the fourth dayes exercise, the rare Historie of Promos and Cassandra. A marginal note informs us, that Whetstone was the author of the Commedie on that subject; which likewise might have fallen into the hands of Shakspeare.

Note return to page 199 †“The tale is a pretie comicall matter, and hath bin written in English verse some few years past, learnedly and with good grace by M. George Turberuil.” Harrington's Ariosto, fol. 1591, p. 39.

Note return to page 200 ‡See Meres's Wits Treasury, 1598, p. 282.

Note return to page 201 §Our ancient poets are under greater obligations to Boccace, than is generally imagined. Who would suspect, that Chaucer hath borrowed from an Italian the facetious tale of the Miller of Trumpington? Mr. Dryden observes on the epick performance, Palamon and Arcite, a poem little inferior in his opinion to the Iliad or the Æneid, that the name of its author is wholly lost, and Chaucer is now become the original. But he is mistaken; this too was the work of Boccace, and printed at Ferrara in folio, con il commento di Andrea Bassi, 1475. I have seen a copy of it, and a translation into modern Greek, in the noble library of the very learned and communicative Dr. Askew. It is likewise to be met with in old French, under the title of La Theseide de Jean Boccace, contenant les belles & chastes amours de deux jeunes Chevaliers Thebains Arcite & Palemon.

Note return to page 202 &sign;In the first Vol. of the Palace of Pleasure, 4to. 1566.

Note return to page 203 *Confessio Amantis, printed by T. Berthelet, folio, 1532, p. 175, &c.

Note return to page 204 †“William Caluerly, of Caluerly in Yorkshire, Esquire, murdered two of his owne children in his owne house, then stabde his wife into the body with full intent to haue killed her, and then instantlie with like fury went from his house, to haue slaine his yongest childe at nurse, but was preuented. Hee was prest to death in Yorke the 5 of August, 1604.” Edm. Howes' Continuation of John Stowe's Summarie, 8vo. 1607, p. 574. The story appeared before in a 4to pamphlet, 1605. It is omitted in the folio chronicle, 1631.

Note return to page 205 ‡These, however, he assures Mr. Hill, were the property of Dr. Arbuthnot.

Note return to page 206 *Thus a line in Hamlet's description of the Player, should be printed as in the old folios: “Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspéct.” agreeably to the accent in a hundred other places.

Note return to page 207 *See also a wrong accentuation of the word aspect in Mr. Ireland's unmetrical, ungrammatical, harum-scarum Vortigern, which was damned at Drury Lane theatre, April—1796—the performance of a madman without a lucid interval.

Note return to page 208 *Middleton, in an obscure play called A Game at Chesse, hath some very pleasing lines on a similar occasion: “Upon those lips, the sweete fresh buds of youth, “The holy dewe of prayer lies like pearle, “Dropt from the opening eye-lids of the morne “Upon the bashfull rose.—”

Note return to page 209 *Had our zealous puritan been acquainted with the real crime of De Mehun, he would not have joined in the clamour against him. Poor Jehan, it seems, had raised the expectations of a monastery in France, by the legacy of a great chest, and the weighty contents of it; but it proved to be filled with nothing better than vetches. The friars enraged at the ridicule and disappointment, would not suffer him to have christian burial. See the Hon. Mr. Barrington's very learned and curious Observations on the Statutes, 4to. 1766, p. 24. From the Annales d' Aquitaine. Par. 1537. Our author had his full share in distressing the spirit of this restless man. “Some Play-books are grown from Quarto into Folio; which yet bear so good a price and sale, that I cannot but with griefe relate it.—Shackspeer's Plaies are printed in the best Crowne-paper, far better than most Bibles!”

Note return to page 210 †Others would give up this passage for the vera incessu patuit dea; but I am not able to see any improvement in the matter: even supposing the poet had been speaking of Juno, and no previous translation were extant.

Note return to page 211 *This passage recalls to my memory a very extraordinary fact. A few years ago, at a great court on the continent, a countryman of ours of high rank and character, [Sir C. H. W.] exhibited with many other candidates his complimental epigram on the birth day, and carried the prize in triumph: “O Regina orbis prima et pulcherrima: ridens “Es Venus, incedens Juno, Minerva loquens.” Literally stolen from Angerianus: “Tres quondam nudas vidit Priameius heros   “Luce deas; video tres quoque luce deas. “Hoc majus; tres uno in corpore: Cœlia ridens   “Est Venus, incedens Juno, Minerva loquens.” Delitiæ Ital. Poet. by Gruter, under the anagrammatic name of Ranutius Gherus, 1608, vol. i. p. 189. Perhaps the latter part of the epigram was met with in a whimsical book, which had its day of fame, Robert Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, fol. 1652, 6th edit. p. 520.

Note return to page 212 *Cap. 1. 4to. 1556.

Note return to page 213 †Amongst “the things, which Mayster More wrote in his youth for his pastime,” prefixed to his Workes, 1557, Fol.

Note return to page 214 *Printed amongst the works of Chaucer, but really written by Robert Henderson, or Henryson, according to other authorities.

Note return to page 215 †It is observable that Hyperion is used by Spenser with the same error in quantity.

Note return to page 216 *The Troy Boke was somewhat modernized, and reduced into regular stanzas, about the beginning of the last century, under the name of “The Life and Death of Hector—who fought a hundred mayne Battailes in open Field against the Grecians; wherein there were slaine on both Sides Fourteene Hundred and Sixe Thousand Fourscore and Sixe Men.” Fol. no date. This work, Dr. Fuller and several other criticks, have erroneously quoted as the original; and observe in consequence, that “if Chaucer's coin were of greater weight for deeper learning, Lydgate's were of a more refined standard for purer language: so that one might mistake him for a modern writer!” Let me here make an observation for the benefit of the next editor of Chaucer. Mr. Urry, probably misled by his predecessor, Speght, was determined, Procrustes-like, to force every line in The Canterbury Tales to the same standard: but a precise number of syllables was not the object of our old poets. Lydgate, after the example of his master, very fairly acknowledges, “Well wot I moche thing is wronge, “Falsely metryd both of short and longe.” and Chaucer himself was persuaded, that the rime might possibly be “&lblank; Somewhat agreáble, “Though some verse faile in a sylláble.” In short, the attention was directed to the cæsural pause, as the grammarians call it; which is carefully marked in every line of Lydgate: and Gascoigne in his Certayne Notes of Instruction concerning the making of Verse, observes very truly of Chaucer, “Whosoeuer do peruse and well consider his workes, he shall find, that although his lines are not always of one selfe same number of syllables, yet beyng redde by one that hath understanding, the longest verse and that which hath most syllables in it, will fall to the eare correspondent unto that which hath fewest syllables in it: and likewise that whiche hathe in it fewest syllables shall be found yet to consist of wordes that hath suche naturall sounde, as may seeme equall in length to a verse which hath many moe syllables of lighter accents.” 4to. 1575.

Note return to page 217 *[“&lblank; Aliæ panduntur inanes “Suspensæ ad ventos: aliis sub gurgite vasto “Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni.”

Note return to page 218 †At the ende of the festyuall drawen oute of Legenda aurea, 4to. 1508. It was printed by Caxton, 1483, “in helpe of such clerkes who exeuse theym for defaute of bokes, and also by symplenes of connynge.”

Note return to page 219 ‡On all soules daye, p. 152.

Note return to page 220 §Mr. afterwards Dr. Lort.

Note return to page 221 &sign;Islandiæ Descript. Ludg. Bat. 1607, p. 46.

Note return to page 222 *In some remarks on The Tempest, published under the quaint title of “An Attempt to rescue that aunciente English Poet and Play-write, Maister Williaume Shakespeare, from the many Errours, faulsely charged upon him by certaine new-fangled Wittes. Lond. 8vo. 1749, p. 81.

Note return to page 223 †His work is dedicated to the Earl of Leicester in a long epistle in verse, from Berwick, April 20, 1567.

Note return to page 224 *M. Bayle hath delineated the singular character of our fantastical author. His work was originally translated by one Zacharie Jones. My edit. is in 4to. 1605, with an anonymous Dedication to the King: the Devonshire story was therefore well known in the time of Shakspeare.—The passage from Scaliger is likewise to be met with in “The Optick Glasse of Humours,” written, I believe, by T. Wombwell* [Subnote: *“So I imagined from a note of Mr. Baker's, but I have since seen a copy in the library of Canterbury Cathedral, printed 1607, and ascribed to T. Walkington, of St. John's, Cambridge.” Dr. Farmer's MSS. Reed.] ; and in several other places.

Note return to page 225 *His poems are printed with the title of “Pithy, Pleasaunt, and Profitable Workes of Maister Skelton Poet Laureate.”— “But,” says Mr. Cibber, after several other writers, “how or by what interest he was made Laureat, or whether it was by a title he assumed to himself, cannot be determined.” This is an error pretty generally received, and it may be worth our while to remove it. A facetious author says somewhere, that a poet laureat, in the modern idea, is a gentleman, who hath an annual stipend for reminding us of the New Year, and the Birth-day: but formerly a Poet Laureat was a real university graduate. “Skelton wore the laurell wreath,   “And past in schoels ye knoe.” says Churchyarde in a poem prefixed to his works. And Master Caxton in his Preface to The Boke of Eneydos, 1490, hath a passage, which well deserves to be quoted without abridgment: “I praye mayster John Skelton, late created poete laureate in the universite of Oxenforde, to oversee and correcte thys sayd booke, and taddresse and expowne whereas shall be founde faulte, to theym that shall requyre it; for hym I knowe for suffycyent to expowne and Englysshe every dyfficulte that is therein; for he hath late translated the epystles of Tulle, and the book of Dyodorus Syculus, and diverse other workes out of Latyn into Englyshe, not in rude and old language, but in polyshed and ornate termes, craftely, as he that hath redde Vyrgyle, Ouyde, Tullye, and all the other noble poets and oratours, to me unknowen: and also he hath redde the ix muses, and understands their musical scyences, and to whom of them eche scyence is appropred; I suppose he hath dronken of Elycons well!” I find, from Mr. Baker's MSS. that our laureat was admitted ad eundem at Cambridge, “An Dom. 1493, & Hen. 7. nono. Conceditur Johi&iab; Skelton Poete in partibus transmarinis atque Oxon. Laureâ ornato, ut apud nos eâdem decoraretur.” And afterward, “An. 1504–5 Conceditur Johi&iab; Shelton, Poetæ Laureat. quod possit stare eodem gradu hic, quo stetit Oxoniis, & quod possit uti habitu sibi concesso à Principe.” See likewise Dr. Knight's Life of Colet, p. 122. And Recherches sur les Poetes couronnez, par M. l'Abbé du Resnel, in the Memoires de Litterature, vol. x. Paris, 4to. 1736.

Note return to page 226 *Mr. Johnson's edit. vol. viii. p. 171.

Note return to page 227 *I have met with a writer who tells us, that a translation of the Offices was printed by Caxton, in the year 1481: but such a book never existed. It is a mistake for Tullius of old Age, printed with The Boke of Frendshipe, by John Tiptoft, Earl of Worccster. I believe the former was translated by William Wyrcestre, alias Botoner.

Note return to page 228 *“Falsitatis enim (Hamlethus) alienus haberi cupidus, ita astutiam veriloquio permiscebat, ut nec dictis veracitas deesset, nec acuminis modus verorum judicio proderetur.” This is quoted, as it had been before, in Mr. Guthrie's Essay on Tragedy, with a small variation from the Original. See edit. fol. 1644, p. 50.

Note return to page 229 *This observation of Mr. Colman is quoted by his very ingenious colleague, Mr. Thornton, in his translation of this play: who further remarks, in another part of it, that a passage in Romeo and Juliet, where Shakspeare speaks of the contradiction in the nature of love, is very much in the manner of his author: “Amor—mores hominum moros et morosos efficit. “Minus placet quod suadetur, quod disuadetur placet. “Quom inopia'st, cupias, quando ejus copia'st, tum non velis,” &c. Which he translates with ease and elegance, “&lblank; Love makes a man a fool, “Hard to be pleas'd.—What you'd persuade him to, “He likes not, and embraces that, from which “You would dissuade him.—What there is a lack of, “That will he covet; when 'tis in his power, “He'll none on't.—” Act III. Sc. III. Let us now turn to the passage in Shakspeare: “&lblank; O brawling love! O loving hate!— “O heavy lightness! serious vanity! “Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms! “Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! “Still-waking sleep! that is not what it is!” Shakspeare, I am sure, in the opinion of Mr. Thornton, did not want a Plautus to teach him the workings of nature; nor are his parallelisms produced with any such implication: but, I suppose, a peculiarity appears here in the manner of expression, which however was extremely the humour of the age. Every sonnetteer characterises love by contrarieties. Watson begins one of his canzonets, “Love is a sowre delight, a sugred griefe, “A living death, an euer-dying life,” &c. Turberville makes Reason harangue against it in the same manner: “A fierie frost, a flame that frozen is with ise! “A heavie burden light to beare! a vertue fraught with vice!” &c. Immediately from The Romaunt of the Rose: “Loue it is an hatefull pees “A free acquitaunce without reles— “An heavie burthen light to beare “A wicked wawe awaie to weare: “And health full of maladie “And charitie full of envie— “A laughter that is weping aie “Rest that trauaileth night and daie,” &c. This kind of antithesis was very much the taste of the Provençal and Italian poets; perhaps it might be hinted by the Ode of Sappho, preserved by Longinus: Petrarch is full of it: Pace non trovo, et non hò da far guerra, Et temo, et spero, et ardo, et son un ghiaccio, Et volo sopra'l cielo, et giaccio in terra, Et nulla stringo, et tuttol mondo abbraccio, &c. Sonetto 105. Sir Thomas Wyat gives a translation of this Sonnet, without any notice of the original, under the title of “Description of the contrarious Passions in a Louer,” amongst the Songes and Sonettes, by the Earle of Surrey, and others, 1574.

Note return to page 230 *It was published in 4to. 1595. The printer of Langbaine, p. 524, hath accidentally given the date, 1515, which hath been copied implicitly by Gildon, Theobald, Cooke, and several others. Warner is now almost forgotten, yet the old criticks esteemed him one of “our chiefe heroical makers.”—Meres informs us, that he had “heard him termed of the best wits of both our Universities, our English Homer.”

Note return to page 231 †His works were first collected under the singular title of “A hundredth sundrie Flowres bounde up in one small Poesie. Gathered partly (by translation) in the fyne outlandish gardins of Euripides, Ouid, Petrarke, Ariosto, and others: and partly by inuention, out of our own fruitefull orchardes in Englande: yelding sundrie sweet sauors of tragical, comical, and morall discourses, bothe pleasaunt and profitable to the well smellyng noses of learned readers.” Black letter, 4to. no date.

Note return to page 232 *W. Kenrick's Review of Dr. Johnson's edit. of Shakspeare, 1765, 8vo. p. 105.

Note return to page 233 *I know indeed, there is extant a very old poem, in black letter, to which it might have been supposed Sir John Harrington alluded, had he not spoken of the discovery as a new one, and recommended it as worthy the notice of his countrymen: I am persuaded the method in the old bard will not be thought either. At the end of the sixth volume of Leland's Itinerary, we are favoured by Mr. Hearne with a Macaronick poem on a battle at Oxford between the scholars and the townsmen: on a line of which, Invadunt aulas bycheson cum forth geminantes, our commentator very wisely and gravely remarks: “Bycheson, id est, son of a byche, ut è codice Rawlinsoniano edidi. Eo nempe modo quo et olim whorson dixerunt pro son of a whore. Exempla habemus cum alibi tum in libello quodam lepido et antiquo (inter codices Seldenianos in Bibl. Bodl.) qui inscribitur: The wife lapped in Morel's Skin: or the Taming of a Shrew. Ubi pag. 36, sic legimus: “They wrestled togyther thus they two   “So long that the clothes asunder went. “And to the ground he threwe her tho,   “That cleane from the backe her smock he rent. “In every hand a rod he gate,   “And layd upon her a right good pace: “Asking of her what game was that,   “And she cried out, Horeson, alas, alas.” Et pag. 42: “Come downe now in this seller so deepe,   “And morels skin there shall you see: “With many a rod that hath made me to weepe,   “When the blood ranne downe fast by my knee. “The mother this beheld, and cryed out, alas:   “And ran out of the seller as she had been wood. “She came to the table where the company was,   “And say'd out, horeson, I will see thy harte blood.”

Note return to page 234 *It may seem little matter of wonder, that the name of Shakspeare should be borrowed for the benefit of the bookseller; and by the way, as probably for a play as a poem: but modern criticks may be surprised perhaps at the complaint of John Hall, that “certayne chapters of the Proverbes, translated by him into English metre, 1550, had before been untruely entituled to be the doyngs of Mayster Thomas Sternhold.

Note return to page 235 *I must, however, correct a remark in the Life of Spenser, which is impotently levelled at the first criticks of the age. It is observed from the correspondence of Spenser and Gabriel Harvey, that the plan of The Fairy Queen, was laid, and part of it executed in 1580, three years before the Gierusalemme Liberata was printed: “hence appears the impertinence of all the apologies for his choice of Ariosto's manner in preference of Tasso's” But the fact is not true with respect to Tasso. Manso and Niceron inform us, that his poem was published, though imperfectly, in 1574; and I myself can assure the biographer, that I have met with at least six other editions, preceding his date for its first publication. I suspect, that Baillet is accountable for this mistake: who, in the Jugemens des Scavans, tom. iii. p. 399, mentions no edition previous to the quarto, Venice, 1583. It is a question of long standing, whether a part of The Fairy Queen hath been lost, or whether the work was left unfinished: which may effectually be answered by a single quotation. William Browne published some Poems in fol. 1616, under the name of Britannia's Pastorals, “esteemed then,” says Wood, “to be written in a sublime strain, and for subject amorous and very pleasing.”—In one of which, book ii. song I, he thus speaks of Spenser: “He sung th' heroicke knights of faiery land “In lines so elegant, of such command, “That had the Thracian plaid but halfe so well, “He had not left Eurydice in hell. “But e're he ended his melodious song, “An host of angels flew the clouds among, “And rapt this swan from his attentive mates, “To make him one of their associates “In heauens faire quire: where now he sings the praise “Of him that is the first and last of daies.” It appears, that Browne was intimate with Drayton, Jonson, and Selden, by their poems prefixed to his book: he had therefore good opportunities of being acquainted with the fact above-mentioned. Many of his poems remain in MS. We have in our library at Emmanuel, a masque of his, presented at the Inner Temple, Jan. 13, 1614. The subject is the story of Ulysses and Circe.

Note return to page 236 *Fasti, 2d edit. vol. i. 208.—It will be seen on turning to the former edition, that the latter part of the paragraph belongs to another Stafford.—I have since observed, that Wood is not the first who hath given us the true author of the pamphlet.

Note return to page 237 *It was observed in the former edition, that this place is not met with in Spelman's Villare, or in Adams's Index; nor, it might have been added, in the first and the last performance of this sort, Speed's Tables, and Whatley's Gazetteer: perhaps, however, it may be meant under the name of Crandon;—but the inquiry is of no importance.—It should, I think, be written Credendon; though better antiquaries than Aubrey have acquiesced in the vulgar corruption.

Note return to page 238 †To this observation of Dr. Farmer it may be added, that the play of Hamlet was better known by this scene, than by any other. In Decker's Satiromastix, 1602, the following passage occurs: “Asinius. “Would I were hang'd if I can call you any names but captain, and Tucca.” “Tucca. “No, fye; my name's Hamlet Revenge: thou hast been at Paris-Garden, hast thou not?” Again, in Westward Hoe, by Decker and Webster, 1607: “Let these husbands play mad Hamlet, and cry, revenge!” Steevens. Dr. Farmer's observation may be further confirmed by the following passage in an anonymous play, called A Warning for faire Women, 1599. We also learn from it the usual dress of the stage ghosts of that time: “&lblank; A filthie whining ghost, “Lapt in some foule sheet, or a leather pilch, “Comes screaming like a pigge half stickt, “And cries vindicta—revenge, revenge.” The leathern pitch. I suppose, was a theatrical substitute for armour. Malone.

Note return to page 239 *These people, who were the Curls of the last age, ascribe likewise to our author, those miserable performances, Mucidorus, and The Merry Devil of Edmonton.

Note return to page 240 †Mr. Pope asserts, “The troublesome Raigne of King John,” in two parts, 1611, to have been written by Shakspeare and Rowley:—which edition is a mere copy of another in black letter, 1591. But I find his assertion is somewhat to be doubted: for the old edition hath no name of author at all; and that of 1611, the initials only, W. Sh. in the title-page‡ [Subnote: See the Essay on the Order of Shakspeare's Plays, Article, King John. Malone.] .

Note return to page 241 *Peele seems to have been taken into the patronage of the Earl of Northumberland about 1593, to whom he dedicates in that year, “The Honour of the Garter, a poem gratulatorie— the firstling consecrated to his noble name.”—“He was esteemed,” says Anthony Wood, “a most noted poet, 1579; but when or where he died, I cannot tell, for so it is, and always hath been, that most Poets die poor, and consequently obscurely, and a hard matter it is to trace them to their graves. Claruit 1599.” Ath. Oxon. vol. i. p. 300. We had lately in a periodical pamphlet, called, The Theatrical Review, a very curious letter under the name of George Peele, to one Master Henrie Marle; relative to a dispute between Shakspeare and Alleyn, which was compromised by Ben Jonson.—“I never longed for thy companye more than last night; we were all verie merrie at the Globe, when Net Alleyn did not scruple to affyrme pleasauntly to thy friende Will, that he had stolen hys speeche about the excellencie of acting in Hamlet hys tragedye, from conversaytions manifold, whych had passed between them, and opinions gyven by Alleyn touching that subject. Shakspeare did not take this talk in good sorte; but Jonson did put an end to the stryfe wyth wittielie saying, thys affaire needeth no contentione: you stole it from Ned no doubte: do not marvel: haue you not seene hym acte tymes out of number?”—This is pretended to be printed from the original MS. dated 1600; which agrees well enough with Wood's Claruit: but unluckily, Peele was dead at least two years before. “As Anacreon died by the pot, says Meres, so George Peele by the pox.” Wit's Treasury, 1598, p. 286.

Note return to page 242 *By one Anthony Copley, 4to. black letter, it seems to have had many editions: perhaps the last was in 1614.—The first piece of this sort, that I have met with, was printed by T. Berthelet, though not mentioned by Ames, called, “Tales, and quicke answeres very mery and pleasant to rede.” 4to. no date.

Note return to page 243 *It is remarked, that “Paris, though in one place called earl, is most commonly styled the countie in this play. Shakspeare seems to have preferred, for some reason or other, the Italian conte to our count:—perhaps he took it from the old English novel, from which he is said to have taken his plot.”—He certainly did so: Paris is there first styled a young earle, and afterward, counte, countee, and countie; according to the unsettled orthography of the time. The word, however, is frequently met with in other writers; particularly in Fairfax: “As when a captaine doth besiege some hold, “Set in a marish or high on a hill, “And trieth waies and wiles a thousand fold,   “To bring the piece subjected to his will: “So far'd the countie with the pagan bold.” &c. Godfrey of Bulloigne, book vii. st. 90. “Fairfax,” says Mr. Hume, “hath translated Tasso with an elegance and ease, and at the same time with an exactness, which for that age are surprising. Each line in the original is faithfully rendered by a correspondent line in the translation.” The former part of this character is extremely true; but the latter not quite so. In the book above quoted Tasso and Fairfax do not even agree in the number of stanzas.

Note return to page 244 *Every writer on Shakspeare hath expressed his astonishment, that his author was not solicitous to secure his fame by a correct edition of his performances. This matter is not understood. When a poet was connected with a particular playhouse, he constantly sold his works to the Company, and it was their interest to keep them from a number of rivals. A favourite piece, as Heywood informs us, only got into print, when it was copied by the ear, “for a double sale would bring on a suspicion of honestie.” Shakspeare therefore himself published nothing in the drama: when he left the stage, his copies remained with his fellow-managers, Heminge and Condell; who at their own retirement, about seven years after the death of their author, gave the world the edition now known by the name of the first folio; and call the previous publications “stolne and surreptitious, maimed and deformed by the frauds and stealths of injurious impostors.” But this was printed from the playhouse copies; which in a series of years had been frequently altered, through convenience, caprice, or ignorance. We have a sufficient instance of the liberties taken by the actors, in an old pamphlet by Nash, called Lenten Stuff, with the Prayse of the red Herring, 4to. 1599, where he assures us, that in a play of his, called The Isle of Dogs, “foure acts, without his consent, or the leaste guesse of his drift or scope, were supplied by the players.” This, however, was not his first quarrel with them. In the Epistle prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, which I have quoted before, Tom hath a lash at some “vaine glorious tragedians,” and very plainly at Shakspeare in particular; which will serve for an answer to an observation of Mr. Pope, that had almost been forgotten: “It was thought a praise to Shakspeare, that he scarce ever blotted a line:—I believe the common opinion of his want of learning proceeded from no better ground. This too might be thought a praise by some.”—But hear Nash, who was far from praising: “I leaue all these to the mercy of their mother-tongue, that feed on nought but the crums that fall from the translator's trencher.—That could scarcely Latinize their neck verse if they should haue neede, yet English Seneca read by candle-light yeelds many good sentences—hee will affoord you whole Hamlets, I should say, handfuls of tragicall speeches.” —I cannot determine exactly when this Epistle was first published; but, I fancy, it will carry the original Hamlet somewhat further back than we have hitherto done: and it may be observed, that the oldest copy now extant is said to be “enlarged to almost as much againe as it was.” Gabriel Harvey printed at the end of the year 1592, Foure Letters and certaine Sonnetts, especially touching Robert Greene: in one of which his Arcadia is mentioned. Now Nash's Epistle must have been previous to these, as Gabriel is quoted in it with applause; and the Foure Letters were the beginning of a quarrel. Nash replied, in Strange Newes of the intercepting certaine Letters, and a Convoy of Verses, as they were going privilie to victual the Low Countries, 1593. Harvey rejoined the same year in Pierce's Supererogation, or a new Praise of the old Asse. And Nash again, in Have with you to Saffron Walden, or Gabriell Harvey's Hunt is up; containing a full Answer to the eldest Sonne of the Halter-maker, 1596. Dr. Lodge calls Nash our true English Aretine: and John Taylor in his Kicksey-Winsey, or a Lerry Come-twang, even makes an oath “by sweet satyricke Nashe his urne.”—He died before 1606, as appears from an old comedy, called The Return from Parnassus.

Note return to page 245 *Lond. 1592, 8vo.

Note return to page 246 †Lond. 1593, 4to. Eliot is almost the only witty grammarian that I have had the fortune to meet with. In his Epistle prefatory to The Gentle Doctors of Gaule, he cries out for persecution, very like Jack in that most poignant of all Satires, the Tale of a Tub, “I pray you be readie quicklie to cauill at my booke, I beseech you heartily calumniate my doings with speede, I request you humbly controll my method as soone as you may, I earnestly entreat you hisse at my inventions,” &c.

Note return to page 247 *It is indeed of no importance, but I suspect the former to be right, as I find it corrupted afterward to Lanam and Lanum.

Note return to page 248 †This author by a pleasant mistake in some sensible Conjectures on Shakspeare lately printed at Oxford, is quoted by the name of Maister. Perhaps the title-page was imperfect; it runs thus: “Palladis Tamia. Wits Treasury. Being the second part of Wits Commonwealth, By Francis Meres Maister of Artes of both Universities.” I am glad out of gratitude to this man, who hath been of frequent service to me, that I am enabled to perfect Wood's account of him; from the assistance of our Master's very accurate list of graduates, (which it would do honour to the university to print at the publick expense) and the kind information of a friend from the register of his parish:—He was originally of Pembroke-Hall, B. A. in 1587, and M. A. 1591. About 1602 he became rector of Wing in Rutland; and died there, 1646, in the 81st year of his age.

Note return to page 249 ‡I have quoted many pieces of John Taylor, but it was impossible to give their original dates. He may be traced as an author for more than half a century. His works were collected in folio, 1630, but many were printed afterward; I will mention one for the humour of the title: “Drinke and welcome, or the famous History of the most part of Drinkes in use in Greate Britaine and Ireland; with an especial Declaration of the Potency, Vertue, and Operation of our English Ale: with a description of all sorts of Waters, from the Ocean Sea to the Tears of a Woman, 4to. 1633.” In Wits Merriment, or Lusty Drollery, 1656, we have an “Epitaph on John Taylor, who was born in the city of Glocester, and dyed in Phœnix Alley, in the 75 yeare of his age; you may find him, if the worms have not devoured him, in Covent Garden churchyard,” p. 130. —He died about two years before.

Note return to page 250 *Some inquiry hath been made for the first performers of the capital characters in Shakspeare. We learn, that Burbage, the alter Roscius of Camden, was the original Richard, from a passage in the poems of Bishop Corbet; who introduces his host at Bosworth describing the battle: “But when he would have said King Richard died, “And call'd a horse, a horse, he Burbage cried.” The play on this subject mentioned by Sir John Harrington in his Apologie for Poetrie, 1591, and sometimes mistaken for Shakspeare's, was a Latin one, and written by Dr. Legge; and acted at St. John's in our university, some years before 1588, the date of the copy in the Museum. This appears from a better MS. in our library at Emmanuel, with the names of the original performers. It is evident from a passage in Camden's Annals, that there was an old play likewise on the subject of Richard the Second; but I know not in what language. Sir Gelley Merrick, who was concerned in the harebrained business of the Earl of Essex, and was hanged for it with the ingenious Cuffe, in 1601, is accused amongst other things, “quod exoletam Tragœdiam de tragicâ abdicatione Regis Ricardi Secundi in publico theatro coram conjuratis datâ pecuniâ agi curasset.”

Note return to page 251 *I cannot take my leave of Holinshed without clearing up a difficulty, which hath puzzled his biographers. Nicholson and other writers have supposed him a clergyman. Tanner goes further, and tells us, that he was educated at Cambridge, and actually took the degree of M. A. in 1544. Yet it appears by his will, printed by Hearne, that at the end of life he was only a steward or a servant in some capacity or other, to Thomas Burdett, Esq. of Bromcote, in Warwickshire.—These things Dr. Campbell could not reconcile. The truth is, we have no claim to the education of the Chronicler: the M. A. in 1544, was not Raphael, but one Ottiwell Holingshed, who was afterward named by the founder one of the first Fellows of Trinity College.

Note return to page 252 *Ascham in the Epistle prefixed to his Toxophilus, 1571, observes of them, that “Manye Englishe writers, usinge straunge wordes, as Lattine, Frenche, and Italian, do make all thinges darke and harde. Ones,” says he, “I communed with a man which reasoned the Englishe tongue to be enriched and encreased thereby, sayinge: Who will not prayse that feast, where a man shall drincke at a dinner both wyne, ale, and beere? Truly (quoth I) they be al good, eury one taken by himself alone, but if you put Malmesye and sacke, redde wyne and white, ale and beere, and al in one pot, you shall make a drinke neither easye to be knowen, nor yet holsome for the bodye.”

Note return to page 253 †This alludes to an intended publication of the Antiquities of the Town of Leicester. The work was just begun at the press, when the writer was called to the principal tuition of a large college, and was obliged to decline the undertaking. The plates, however, and some of the materials, have been long ago put into the hands of a gentleman, who is every way qualified to make a proper use of them.

Note return to page 254 By a mistake, for which I must offer an apology to the reader, in giving out the copy to the printer, the following note by Mr. Steevens, and Dr. Farmer's two prefaces, were omitted in their former places, before his essay. They are here subjoined. Boswell.

Note return to page 255 Though our commentaries on the following Plays have been enriched by numerous extracts from this celebrated Essay, the whole of it is here reprinted. I shall hazard no contradiction relative to the value of its contents, when I add— &lblank; prosunt singula, juncta juvant. Steevens.

Note return to page 256 *&stellam;*I may just remark, lest they be mistaken for Errata, that the word Catherine in the 329th page is written, according to the old Orthography for Catharine; and that the passage in the 332d page is copied from Upton, who improperly calls Horatio and Marcellus in Hamlet, “the Centinels.”

Note return to page 257 *“Colman, in a note on his Translation of Terence, talking of Shakspeare's Learning, asks, ‘What says Farmer to this? What says Johnson?’ Upon this he observed, ‘Sir, let Farmer answer for himself: I never engaged in this controversy. I always said Shakspeare had Latin enough to grammaticise his English.” Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson, vol. iii. 264.

Note return to page 258 *Mr. Farmer closes the general testimonies of Shakspeare's having been only indebted to nature, by saying, “He came out of her hand, as some one else expresses it, like Pallas out of Jove's head, at full growth and mature.” It is whimsical enough, that this some one else, whose expression is here quoted to countenance the general notion of Shakspeare's want of literature, should be no other than myself. Mr. Farmer does not choose to mention where he met with the expression of some one else; and some one else does not choose to mention where he dropt it‡ [Subnote: ‡It will appear still more whimsical that this some one else whose expression is here quoted, may have his claim to it superseded by that of the late Dr. Young, who in his “Conjectures on Original Composition,” (p. 100, vol. v. edit. 1773,) has the following sentence: “An adult genius comes out of nature's hands, as Pallas out of Jove's head, at full growth and mature. Shakspeare's genius was of this kind.” Where some one else the first may have intermediately dropped the contested expression I cannot ascertain; but some one else the second transcribed it from the author already mentioned. Anon.] .

Note return to page 259 †In defence of the various reading of this passage, given in the Preface to the last edition of Shakspeare, “small Latin and no Greek,” Mr. Farmer tells us, that “it was adopted above a century ago by W. Towers, in a panegyrick on Cartwright.” Surely Towers having said that Cartwright had no Greek, is no proof that Ben Jonson said so of Shakspeare.

Note return to page 260 *This List was drawn up by Mr. Steevens. I have made a few inconsiderable additions to it, which are distinguished by this mark ‡ being prefixed. Malone.

Note return to page 261 †In the first vol. of the books of entries belonging to the Stationers' Company, is the following: “Henry Bynneman.] Nov. 1580, lycenced unto him under the wardens' handes ten bookes of the Iliades of Homer.” Again, “Samuel Macham.] Nov. 14, 1608. Seven bookes of Homer's Iliades translated into English by George Chapman.— [By assignment from Mr. Windett.]” Again, “Nathaniel Butter.] April 8, 1611, A booke called Homer's Iliades in Englishe, containing 24 Bookes.” Again, “Nov. 2, 1614, Homer's Odisses 24 bookes, translated by George Chapman.”

Note return to page 262 §Meres, in his Second Part of Wits Commonwealth, says that Chapman is “of good note for his inchoate Homer.” Thomas Drant, (the translater of two books of Horace's Satires, 1566,) in a miscellany of Latin poetry, entitled Sylva, informs us, that he had begun to translate the Iliad, but had gone no further than the fourth book.

Note return to page 263 *In the first volume of the Entries of the Stationers' Company is the following: “T. Purfoote.] The Battel of the Frogges and Myce, and certain orations of Isocrates.” Jan. 4, 1579.

Note return to page 264 *In the first volume of the Entries of the Stationers' Company is the following: “T. Purfoote.] The Battel of the Frogges and Myce, and certain orations of Isocrates.” Jan. 4, 1579.

Note return to page 265 *This translation, or at least Marlowe's part in it, must have been published before 1599, being twice mentioned in Nash's Lenten Stuff, &c. which bears that date. “Leander and Hero, of whom divine Musæus sung, and a diviner muse than him, Kit Marlow.” Again, “She sprung after him, and so resigned up her priesthood, and left worke for Musæus and Kit Marlow.” Among the entries at Stationers' Hall I find the following made by John Wolfe in 1593, Sept. 8th. “A booke entitled Hero and Leander, being an amorous poem devised by Christopher Marlow.” At the same time, “Lucan's first book of the famous Cyvill Warr betwixt Pompey and Cæsar. Englished by Christopher Marlow.” Again, in 1597, “A booke in English called Hero and Leander.” Again, April 1598, “The seconde Parte of Hero and Leander by Henry Petowe.” Andrew Harris entered it. Again, in 1600, “Hero and Leander by Marlowe.” In 1614 an entire translation of Lucan was published by Sir Arthur Gorges, and entered as such on the same books.

Note return to page 266 *This book was entered in May, 1592, at Stationers' Hall.

Note return to page 267 †Among the entries in the books at Stationers' Hall this appears to be one: “John Denham.] The famous Historye of Herodotus in Englyshe, June 13, 1581.”

Note return to page 268 *On the Stationers' books in 1607 either this or some other translation is entered, called “The History of Thucidides the Athenian, translated into English.”

Note return to page 269 †Caxton tells us, that “Skelton had translated Diodorus Siculus, the Epistles of Tulle, and diverse other Workes:” but I know not that they were ever printed.

Note return to page 270 ‡In the first Volume of the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company, Feb. 5, 1577, is the following: “Henry Binneman.] Appianus Alexandrinus of the Romaine Civill Warres.”

Note return to page 271 *Oct. 1591, Herodian in English was entered at Stationers' Hall by—Adams.

Note return to page 272 †Thus entered in the books of the Stationers' Company: “April 1579—Vautrouller—Wright, a booke in Englishe called Plutarch's Lyves.”

Note return to page 273 §On the Stationers' books in the year 1600 is the following entry: “A booke to be translated out of French into Englishe, and so printed, called the Morall Woorkes of Plutarque.” Again, in 1602. Again, in the same year, “The moral worke of Plutarque, being translated out of French into English.”

Note return to page 274 &sign;Of the Ethicks of Aristotle some more early translation must have appeared; as Sir Tho. Elyot, in his Boke named the Governour, 1537, says, “they are to be learned in Greke; for the translations that we have, be but a rude and grosse shadowe of the eloquence and wysdome of Aristotle.”

Note return to page 275 **This translation is entered in the books at Stationers' Hall. “Adam Islip.] Aristotle's Politiques with expositions; to be translated into Englishe by the French copie, 1598.”

Note return to page 276 *In the books of the Stationers' Company, Feb. 12, 1581, Tho. Easte entered Enchiridon in English.

Note return to page 277 †Thus entered in the books of the Stationers' Company. “Richard Jones.] The Lives of divers excellent Orators and Philosophers written in Greeke by Enapius of the city of Sardis in Lydia, and translated into Englishe by &lblank;.”

Note return to page 278 §This book was entered in the same year by Thomas Creede, on the books of the Stationers' Company.

Note return to page 279 *This book is only introduced, that an opportunity may be obtained of excluding it from any future catalogue of translated classicks. It was a fraud of Guevara's, but not undetected; for Chapman, in his Gentleman Usher, 1602, speaks of the book as Guevara's own. “If there be not more choice words in that letter, than in any three of Guevara's Golden Epistles, I am a very ass.” See his article in Bayle. Our countryman Elyott did somewhat of the same kind. He pretended to translate the Actes and Sentences notable, of the Emperor Alexander Severus (from the Greek of Encolpius). See Fabricius' and Tanner's Bibliothec. &c.

Note return to page 280 †A translation of the same book is likewise entered at Stationers' Hall, 1602, and again twice in 1604, for different printers.

Note return to page 281 *This is a translation of the second and fourth books into blank verse, and is perhaps the oldest specimen of that metre in the English language.

Note return to page 282 †The following “Epytaphe of Maister Thomas Phayre,” is found in a very scarce book entitled “Eglogs, Epytaphes, and Sonettes. Newly written by Barnabe Googe, 1563, 15 Marche. Imprynted at London by Thomas Colwell, for Raffe Newbery, dwelyng in Fletestrete a little aboue the Conduit in the late shop of Thomas Bartelet.” “The hawtye verse yt Maro wrote   “made Rome to wonder muche, “And meruayle none, for why the style   “And weightynes was suche, “That all men iudged Parnassus mownt   “had clefte her selfe in twayne, “And brought forth one that seemd to drop   “from out Mineruaies brayne. “But wonder more maye Bryttane great   “wher Phayre did florysh late, “And barreyne tong with swete accord   “reduced to such estate: “That Virgils verse hath greater grace   “in forrayne foote obtaynde, “Than in his own, who whilst he lyued   “eche other poets staynde. “The noble H. Hawarde once,   “that raught eternall fame, “With mighty style did bryng a pece   “of Virgils worke in frame. “And Grimaold gaue the lyke attempt,   “and Douglas wan the ball, “Whose famouse wyt in Scottysh ryme   “had made an ende of all. “But all these same dyd Phayre excell   “I dare presume to wryte, “As muche as doth Apolloes beames   “the dymmest starre in lyght “The enuyous fates (O pytie great)   “had great disdayne to se “That us amongst there shuld remayn   “so fyne a wyt as he: “And in the midst of all his toyle   “dyd force him hence to wende, “And leaue a worke unperfyt so   “that never man shall ende.”

Note return to page 283 *Among the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company, is the following. “Tho. Creede] Virgil's Æneidos in Englishe verse, 1595.” Again, in 1600. Again, his Bucolics and Georgics in the same year.

Note return to page 284 †The copy which I have seen, was in 4to. printed at Leiden, and was entered as such on the books of the Stationers' on the 24th of January, 1582.

Note return to page 285 §They are translated into English hexameters. Boswell.

Note return to page 286 &sign;It is also found in his Lawiers Logike, 1588. Boswell.

Note return to page 287 *There is an entry at Stationers' Hall of the Epistles of Horace in 1591.

Note return to page 288 †Among the Stationers' entries I find in 1594, “A booke entitled Oenone and Paris, wherein is described the extremity of love,” &c. This may be a translation from Ovid.

Note return to page 289 §This book was entered at Stationers' Hall by Tho. Easte, July 1, 1577, and by Thomas Orwin in 1591.

Note return to page 290 *Among the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company is the following: “Henry Bynneman.] July 1, 1577, Ovid's Invective against Ibis. Bought of Thomas Easte.”

Note return to page 291 †In the forty-first of Queen Elizabeth these translations from Ovid were commanded by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, to be burnt at Stationers' Hall.

Note return to page 292 §On the books of the Stationers' Company, Dec. 23, 1599, is entered, Ovidius Naso his Remedy of Love. Again, in the same year, Ovydes Epistles in Englishe, and Ovydes Metamorphosis in Englyshe.

Note return to page 293 &sign;This piece was entered at Stationers' Hall, June 10th, 1594. In 1520, viz. the 11th year of Henry VIII. it appears from Holinshed that a comedy of Plautus was played before the King.

Note return to page 294 **Entered at Stationers' Hall, Feb. 1576.

Note return to page 295 *As the following metrical introduction to this play, relates chiefly to the improvements at that time supposed to have been made in the English language, I could not prevail on myself to suppress it: THE POET. “The famous renown through the worlde is sprong “Of poetys ornate that usyd to indyte “Of dyvers matters in theyr moder tong “Some toke upon them translacions to wryte “Some to compile bokys for theyr delyte “But in our English tong for to speke playn “I rede but of few have take any gret payn. “Except master Gowre which furst began “And of moralite wrote ryght craftely “Than master Chaucer that excellent man “Which wrote as compendious as elygantly “As in any other tong ever dyd any “Ludgate also which adournyd our tong “Whose noble famys through the world be sprong. “By these men our tong is amplyfyed so, “That we therin now translate as well as may “As in eny other tongis other can do. “Yet the Greke tong and Laten dyvers men say “Have many wordys can not be Englyshid this day “So lyke wyse in Englysh many wordys do habound “That no Greke nor Laten for them can be found. “And the cause that our tong is so plenteouse now “For we kepe our Englysh contynually “And of other tongis many wordis we borow “Which now for Englysh we use and occupy “These thingis have given corage gretly “To dyvers and specyally now of late “To them that this comedy have translate. “When all discrete men now do besech “And specyally lernyd men to take no dysdayn “Though this be compylyd in our vulgare spech “Yet lernyng thereby some men may attayn “For they that in this comedy have take payn “Pray you to correct where faut shall be found “And of our matter so here is the ground.” In the metrical peroration to this piece, is the following stanza: “Wherfore the translatours now require you this “Yf ought be amys ye wold consyder “The Englysh almost as short as the Latten is “And styll to kepe ryme a dyffycult matter “To make the sentence opynly to appere “Which if it had a long expocysion “Then were it a comment and no translacyon.”

Note return to page 296 *At Stationers' Hall in 1597, “the second comedy of Terence, called Eunuchus,” was entered by W. Leake; and the first and second comedie in 1600.

Note return to page 297 †In the first volume of the entries of the Stationers' Company, Aug. 1579, Rich. Jones and John Charlewood entered the 4th tragedie of Seneca. And again all the ten in 1581. “It is remarkable” says Mr. Warton, (History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 393,) “that Shakspeare has borrowed nothing from the English Seneca. Perhaps a copy might not fall in his way. Shakspeare was only a reader by accident. Holinshed and translated Italian novels supplied most of his plots or stories. His storehouse of learned history was North's Plutarch. The only poetical fable of antiquity, which he has worked into a play, is Troilus. But this he borrowed from the romance of Troy: Modern fiction and English history were his principal resources. These perhaps were more suitable to his taste: at least he found that they produced the most popular subjects. Shakspeare was above the bondage of the classicks.”

Note return to page 298 *In the first volume of the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company is the following: “March 26, 1579, Seneca de Beneficiis in Englyshe.”

Note return to page 299 †Perhaps we may add to this list a translation of Valerius Flaccus, by Nycholas Whyte, 1565. See Mr. Steevens's note on the Merchant of Venice, vol. v. p. 92. n. 2. Boswell.

Note return to page 300 ‡In the first volume of the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company, anno 1597, is the following note: “Memorandum that Mr. Alexander Nevill, Gent. is appointed to translate Titus Livius into the Englyshe tongue: expressed, the same is not to be printed, by anie man, but only such as shall have his translacion.” Again, in 1598, The Historie of Titus Livius was entered by Adam Islip.

Note return to page 301 *A translation of Sallust was entered at Stationers' Hall in 1588. Again in 1607, The Historie of Sallust in Englishe.

Note return to page 302 †This translation was entered at Stationers' Hall in 1604.

Note return to page 303 ‡In the entries made in the books of the Stationers' Company is the following: “John Charlewood] Sept. 1581, Abstracte of the Historie of Cæsar and Pompeius.”

Note return to page 304 *In the Stationers' books this or some other translation of the same author was entered by Richard Tottell, Feb. 1582, and again by Tho. Creede, &c. 1599.

Note return to page 305 †Mattaire says [Ann. Typog. B. 290] “in florulentâ tituli margunculâ (vulgo vignette) superiore, inscribitur 1534.” This was a wooden block used by the printer Tottel, for many books in small 8vo. and by no means determines their date. There may, however, have been some earlier translation than any here enumerated, as in Sir Thomas Elyot's Boke named the Governour, 1537, is mentioned “the worke of Cicero, called in Latine De Officiis, whereunto yet is no propre English worde,” &c.

Note return to page 306 *An Epytaphe of the death of Nicholas Grimaold. [Among Barnaby Googe's Poems already mentioned.] “Behold this fletyng world how al things fade   “Howe eury thyng doth passe and weare awaye, “Eche state of lyfe by comon course and trade   “Abydes no tyme, but hath a passyng daye. “For looke as lyfe that pleasaunt dame hath brought   “The pleasaunt yeares and dayes of lustynes, “So death our foe consumeth all to nought,   “Enuying these with darte doth us oppresse. “And that whiche is the greatest gryfe of all,   “The gredye grype doth no estate respect, “But where he comes he makes them down to fall,   “Ne stayes he at the hie sharpe wytted sect. “For yf that wyt or worthy eloquens   “Or learnyng deape could moue hym to forbeare, “O Grimaold then thou hadste not yet gon hence,   “But heare hadst sene full many an aged yeare. “Ne had the muses loste so fyne a floure,   “Nor had Minerva wept to leave the so: “If wysdome myght haue fled the fatall howre   “Thou hadste not yet ben suffred for to go. “A thousande doltysh geese we myght have sparde,   “A thousande wytles heads death might have found, “And taken them for whom no man had carde,   “And layde them lowe in deepe obliuious grounde.     “But fortune fauours fooles as old men saye,     “And lets them lyve, and takes the wyse awaye.”

Note return to page 307 †In the books belonging to Stationers' Hall, Tullies Offices in Latin and English is entered Feb. 1582, for R. Tottell. Again, by Tho. Orwin, 1591.

Note return to page 308 ‡In the Itinerarium of W. de Worcestre, p. 368, is the following notice of this book: “1473, die 10 Augusti presentavi W. episcepo Wyntoniensi apud Asher librum Tullii de Senectute per me translatum in Anglicis, sed nullum regardum recepi de Episcopo.”

Note return to page 309 *These are perhaps the same as the two foregoing translations.

Note return to page 310 *These are perhaps the same as the two foregoing translations.

Note return to page 311 †In the Stationers' books, Jan. 13th, 1608, Matthew Lownes entered “Anitius Manlius Torquatus Severinus Boethius, a Christian Consul of Rome, newly translated out of Latin, together with original Notes explaining the obscurest Places.” Printed 8vo. 1609.

Note return to page 312 *There is an entry of this translation in the books at Stationers' Hall in 1595. Valentine Simes is the name of the printer who entered it. It is again entered by Clement Knight in 1600.

Note return to page 313 †On the books of the Stationers' Company is this entry: “Adam Islip, 1600.] The xxxvii. bookes of C. Plinius Secundus his Historie of the Worlde. To be translated out of Latin into Englyshe and so printed.”

Note return to page 314 *Probably this was never printed.

Note return to page 315 †There is an entry of Caton at Stationers' Hall in 1591 by— Adams, in Eng. and Lat. Again, in the year 1591 by Thomas Orwin. Again, in 1605, “Four Bookes of morall Sentences, entitled Cato, translated out of Latin into English by J. M. Master of Arts.”

Note return to page 316 §“Æsop's Fables in Englyshe” were entered May 7th, 1590, on the books of the Stationers' Company. Again, Oct. 1591. Again, Esop's Fables in Meter, Nov. 1598. Some few of them had been paraphrased by Lydgate, and I believe, are still unpublished. See the Brit. Mus. Harl. 2251. It is much to be lamented that Andrew Maunsell, a bookseller in Lothbury, who published two parts of a catalogue of English printed books, fol. 1595, did not proceed to his third collection. This, according to his own account of it, would have consisted of “Grammar, Logick, and Rhetoricke, Lawe, Historie, Poetrie, Policie,” &c. which, as he tells us, “for the most part concerne matters of delight and pleasure.”

Note return to page 317 *These illiberal and splenetick effusions were preceded by one of the same cast and complexion, entitled, “The Essence of Malone, or the Beauties of that fascinating Writer; extracted from his immortal Work in Five Hundred and Sixty-nine Pages, just published (and with his accustomed felicity) entitled, “Some Account of the Life and Writings of John Dryden!!” 8vo. 1800. All the three pieces are said to be the acknowledged productions of George Hardinge, Esq. Reed.

Note return to page 318 *The words within crotchets here and below were interpolated by Mr. Macklin, not being found in the original.

Note return to page 319 †In the original, this signature is in Greek characters, &grO; &grf;&gri;&grl;&gro;&grst;; a language with which Mr. Macklin is unacquainted. In this instance therefore he must have had the assistance of some more learned friend.

Note return to page 320 *See p. 402.

Note return to page 321 *Of all the ancient poems which Chatterton pretended to have found in the famous Bristol chest, he wisely produced, I think, but four, that he ventured to call originals.

Note return to page 322 *For this information I am indebted to the Reverend Mr. Palk, Vicar of Ilsington.

Note return to page 323 *According to the best accounts. The precise year however of this poet's birth has not been ascertained. Fuller tells us, that “with all his industry he could not find him in his cradle, but that he could fetch him from his long coats;—when a little child, he lived in Hartshorne-lane near Charing-Cross.” I in vain examined the Register of St. Margaret's, Westminster, and St. Martin's in the Fields, for the time of his baptism. There is a lacuna in the latter register from February to Dec. 1574. Ben Jonson therefore was probably born in that year, and he has himself told us that he was born on the 11th of June. This agrees with the account given by Anthony Wood, who says, that before his death in August 1637, he had completed his sixty-third year. I found in the Register of St. Martin's, that a Mrs. Margaret Jonson was married in November 1575 to Mr. Thomas Fowler. He was perhaps the poet's step-father, who is said to have been a bricklayer. The greater part of the history of this poet's life is involved in much confusion. Most of the facts which have been transmitted concerning him, were originally told by Anthony Wood; and there is scarcely any part of his narrative in which some error may not be traced. Thus we are told, that soon after his father's death his mother married a bricklayer; that she took her son from Westminster-school, and made him work at his step-father's trade. He helped, says Fuller, at the building of the new structure in Lincoln's-Inn, where having a trowel in his hand, he had a book in his pocket: and this book Mr. Gildon has found out to be Horace. In this situation, according to Wood, being pitied by his old master, Camden, he was recommended to Sir Walter Raleigh as a tutor to his son; and after attending him on his adventures, they parted, on his return, not, as I think, says Wood, in cold blood. He then, we are told, was admitted into St. John's College in Cambridge, and after a short stay there, went to London, and became an actor in the Curtain playhouse: and soon afterwards, “having improved his fancy by keeping scholastick company, he betook himself to writing plays.” Lastly, we are told by the same writer, on the death of Daniel [in October 1619] “he succeeded him as poet-laureat, as Daniel succeeded Spenser.” If Jonson ever worked with his step-father at his trade in Lincoln's-Inn, it must have been either in 1588, or 1593, in each of which years, as I learn from Dugdale's Origines Juridiciales, some new buildings were erected by that society. He could not have been taken from thence to accompany young Raleigh on his travels, who was not born till 1594, nor even went abroad except with his father in 1617 to Guiana, where he lost his life. The poet might indeed about the year 1610 or 1611 have been private tutor to him; and it is probable that their connexion was about that time, as Jonson mentions that he furnished Sir Walter Raleigh with a portion of his History of the World, on which Sir Walter must have been then employed; but if the tutor and the pupil then parted in ill humour, it was rather too late for Jonson to enter into St. John's College, at the age of thirty-four or thirty-five years. That at some period he was tutor to young Raleigh, is ascertained by the following anecdote, preserved in one of Oldys's Manuscripts: “Mr. Camden recommended him to Sir Walter Raleigh, who trusted him with the care and education of his eldest son Walter, a gay spark, who could not brook Ben's rigorous treatment, but perceiving one foible in his disposition, made use of that to throw off the yoke of his government: and this was an unlucky habit Ben had contracted, through his love of jovial company, of being overtaken with liquor, which Sir Walter did of all vices most abominate, and hath most exclaimed against. One day, when Ben had taken a plentiful dose, and was fallen into a sound sleep, young Raleigh got a great basket, and a couple of men, who lay'd Ben in it, and then with a pole carried him between their shoulders to Sir Walter, telling him, their young master had sent home his tutor.”—“This, (adds Mr. Oldys,) I have from a MS. memorandum-book written in the time of the civil wars by Mr. Oldisworth, who was secretary, I think, to Philip earl of Pembroke.” The truth probably is, that he was admitted into St. John's college as a sizar in 1588, at which time he was fourteen years old, (the usual time then of going to the University,) and after staying there a few weeks was obliged from poverty to return to his father's trade; with whom he might have been employed on the buildings in Lincoln's Inn in 1593, when he was nineteen. Not being able to endure his situation, he went, as he himself told, Mr. Drummond of Hawthornden, to the Low countries, where he served a campaign, and distinguished himself in the field. On his return, perhaps in 1594, being now used to a life of adventure, he probably began his theatrical career, as a strolling player, and after having “rambled for some time by a play-waggon in the country,” repaired to London, and endeavoured at the Curtain to obtain a livelihood as an actor, till, as Decker informs us, “not being able to set a good face upon't, he could not get a service among the mimicks.” Between that year and 1598, when Every Man in his Humour was acted, he probably produced those unsuccessful pieces which Wood mentions. It is remarkable that Meres in that year enumerates Jonson among the writers of tragedy, though no tragedy of his writing, of so early a date, is now extant: a fact which none of his biographers have noticed. Some particulars relative to this poet, which I have lately learned, will serve to disprove another of the facts mentioned by Wood; namely, that “he succeeded Daniel as poet-laureat, [in October, 1619,] as Daniel did Spenser.” I do not believe that any such office as poet-laureat existed in the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently Spenser never could have possessed it; nor has any proof whatsoever been produced of Daniel's having ever enjoyed that office. Spenser, we are told by Camden, died in great poverty in 1598, and such has been the prevailing opinion ever since; but a fact which I have lately discovered, and which has not been noticed by any writer of that great poet's life, renders Camden's assertion very disputable. Spenser, I find, in February, 1590–1, obtained from Queen Elizabeth an annuity or pension of fifty pounds a year, during his life; which, the value of money and the modes of life being jointly considered, may be estimated as equal to two hundred pounds a year at this day. We see, therefore, that the incense lavished on his parsimonious mistress in the Faery Queen, which was published in the preceding year,* [Subnote: *The Faery Queen was entered on the Stationers' books by W. Ponsonby, in December, 1589.] did not pass unrewarded, as all our biographical writers have supposed. The first notice I obtained of this grant, was from a short abstract of it in the Signet-office, and with a view to ascertain whether he was described as poet-laureat. I afterwards examined the patent itself, (Patent Roll, 33 Eliz. P. 3.) but no office or official duty is there mentioned. After the usual and formal preamble, pro diversis causis et considerationibus, &c. the words are, “damus et concedimus dilecto subdito nostro, Edmundo Spenser, &c. King James by letters patent dated February 3, 1615–16, granted to Ben Jonson an annuity or yearly pension of one hundred marks during his life, “in consideration of the good and acceptable service heretofore done, and hereafter to be done, by the said B. J.” Then, therefore, and not in 1619, undoubtedly it was that he was made poet-laureat, if ever he was so constituted; but not one word is there in the grant, which I examined in the chapel of the Rolls, touching that office: unless it may be supposed to be comprehended in the words which I have just quoted. On the 23d of April, 1630, King Charles by letters patent, reciting the former grant, and that it had been surrendered, was pleased, “in consideration (says the patent) of the good and acceptable service done unto us and our said father by the said B. J. and especially to encourage him to proceed in those services of his wit and pen, which we have enjoined unto him, and which we expect from him, to augment his annuity of one hundred marks, to one hundred pounds per ann. during his life, payable from Christmas, 1629, and the first payment to commence at Lady-day, 1630.” Charles at the same time granted, him a tierce of Canary Spanish wine yearly during his life, out of his Majesty's cellars at Whitehall: of which there is no mention in the former grant. From hence, and from the present of one hundred pounds sent to Jonson by the King in 1629, we may see how extremely improbable the story is, which has been recorded on I know not what authority, and which Dr. Smollet was idle enough to insert in his History; that Ben in that year being reduced to great distress, and living in an obscure alley, petitioned his Majesty to assist him in his poverty and sickness; and on receiving ten guineas, said to the messenger who brought him the donation, “his majesty has sent me ten guineas, because I am poor and live in an alley; go and tell him that his soul lives in an alley.” None of his biographers appear to have known, that Ben Jonson obtained from King James a reversionary grant of the office of Master of the Revels. His Majesty by letters patent dated October 5, in the nineteenth year of his reign, (1621,) granted him, by the name and addition of “our beloved servant Benjamin Jonson, gentleman,” the said office, to be held and enjoyed by him and his assigns, during his life, from and after the death of Sir George Buck and Sir John Astley, or as soon as the office should become vacant by resignation, forfeiture, or surrender: but Jonson never derived any advantage from this grant, because Sir John Astley survived him. It should seem from a passage in the Satiromastix of his antagonist Decker, printed in 1602, that Ben had made some attempt to obtain a reversionary grant of this place before the death of Queen Elizabeth: for Sir Vaughan in that piece says to Horace [i. e. Jonson,] “I have some cossens-german at court shall beget you the reversion of the Master of the King's Revels, or else to be his Lord of Misrule nowe at Christmas.” It has been commonly understood, that on Ben Jonson's death in August, 1637, Sir William D'Avenant [then Mr. D'Avenant] was appointed poet-laureate in his room: but he at that time received no favour from the crown. Sixteen months afterwards, Dec. 13, 1638, in the 14th year of Charles the First, letters patent passed the great seal, granting, “in consideration of service heretofore done and hereafter to be done by William Davenant, gentleman,” an annuity of one hundred pounds per ann. to the said W. D. during his Majesty's pleasure. By this patent, no Canary wine was granted; and no mention is made of the office of poet-laureate. It is at present conferred, not by letters patent, but by a warrant signed and sealed by the Lord Chamberlain, nominating A. B. to the office, with the accustomed fees thereunto belonging.

Note return to page 324 *Which Ben claimed the merit of having first taught his contemporaries. See his Verses to his old servant Richard Brome, prefixed to The Northern Lass, which was first acted in July, 1629: “Now you are got into a nearer room “Of fellowship, professing my old arts, “And you do do them well, with good applause;   “Which you have justly gained from the stage, “By observation of those comick laws   “Which I, your master, first did teach the age.”

Note return to page 325 *See Jonson's Works, folio, 1616: Epig. XLIX. To Playwright. “Playwright me reades, and still my verses damnes; “He sayes, I want the tongue of epigrammes; “I have no salt; no bawdrie he doth meane, “For wittie, in his language, is obscene. “Playwright, I loath to have thy manners knowne “In my chaste booke: professe them in thine owne.” Epig. LXVIII. On Playwright. “Playwright, convict of public wrongs to men, “Takes private beatings, and begins againe. “Two kindes of valour he does shew at ones, “Active in his braine and passive in his bones.” The person aimed at, under the name of Playwright, was probably Decker.

Note return to page 326 *“I here offer to your lordship the ripest of my studies, my epigrammes, which, though they carry danger in the sound, do not therefore seek your shelter. For when I made them, I had nothing in my conscience to expressing of which I did need a cypher. But if I be falne into those times, wherein, for the likeness of vice,” &c.

Note return to page 327 *One of the leaves of Sir Henry Herbert's Manuscript, which was missing, having been recovered since the remark in the text was made, I find that the Ladies Trial was performed for the first time at the Cockpit theatre in May, 1638, on the 3d of which month it was licensed by the Master of the Revels.

Note return to page 328 †In Sir Henry Herbert's Office-book is the following entry: “For a play of Fletcher's, corrected by Shirley, called The Night Walkers, the 11th of May, 1633,—£.2 0 0.

Note return to page 329 ‡“Received of Blagrove from the King's Company, for the renewing of Love's Pilgrimage, the 16th of September, 1635, —£.1 0 0.” Ibidem. The addition of a new scene, and sometimes an entire act, to an old play, appears from the following entries in the same book to have been common: “For the adding of a scene to The Virgin Martyr, this 7th July, 1624,—£.0 10 0.” “For allowing of a new act in an ould play, this 13th May, 1629,—£.0 10 0.” “For allowing of an ould play, new written or forbisht by Mr. Biston, the 12th of January, 1631,—£.1 0 0.” “An ould play, with some new scenes, Doctor Lambe and the Witches, to Salisbury Courte, the 16th August, 1634,— £.1 0 0. “Received of ould Cartwright for allowing the [Fortune] company to add scenes to an ould play, and to give it out for a new one, this 12th of May, 1636,—£.1 0 0.” This practice prevailed in Shakspeare's time. “The players,” says Lupton, in his London and the Country carbonadoed and quartered, 8vo. 1602, “are as crafty with an old play as bauds with old faces: the one puts on a new fresh colour, the other a new face and name.” If the Office-books of Edmund Tilney, Esq. and Sir George Buck, who were Masters of the Revels during the greater part of the reign of King James the First shall ever be discovered, I have no doubt that the Vision, Masque, and Prophecy, in the fifth Act of Cymbeline, will be found to have been interpolated by the Players after our poet's death.

Note return to page 330 *Randolph's attachment to Ben Jonson was also noticed in the letter printed in the preceding month, in The General Advertiser, (the Theatrical Gazette of that time,) by way of prelude to Mr. Ryan's benefit. “He was, (says the writer,) a man of pregnant wit, gay humour, and of excellent learning; which gained him the esteem of the town, and particularly recommended him to Ben Jonson, who adopted him one of his sons, and held him in equal esteem with the ingenious Mr. Cartwright, another of the laureat's sons.”

Note return to page 331 *That plunderer Ben ne'er made so rich a theft.] This thought appears to have been adopted from the words in which Virgil is said to have replied to one who charged him with borrowing from Homer: “Cur non illi quoque eadem furta tentarunt?” Could the illiterate Macklin, therefore, be suspected as author of the verses imputed to him by Mr. Malone? Steevens.

Note return to page 332 *Account of the Dramatick Poets, 8vo, 1691, pp. 145, 148, 149.

Note return to page 333 †Mr. Macklin tells us, that the pamphlet from which he pretends to quote, mentions, that among other depreciating language Jonson had said of Shakspeare, that “the man had imagination and wit none could deny, but that they were ever guided by true judgment in the rules and conduct of a piece, none could with justice assert, both being ever servile to raise the laughter of fools and the wonder of the ignorant.” “Being guided by judgment in the conduct of a piece,” is perfectly intelligible; but what are we to understand by being guided by judgment in the rules of a piece? However, every part of this sentence also may be traced to its source. Mr. Pope has said in his preface, that “not only the common audience had no notion of the rules of writing, but few of the better sort piqued themselves upon any great degree of knowledge or nicety that way, till Ben Jonson getting possession of the stage, brought critical learning into vogue:” and Jonson himself, in his Discoveries, speaking of Shakspeare, says, “his wit was in his power, would the rule of it had been so.” In Mr. Pope's Preface we are told, that “in tragedy nothing was so sure to surprise, and create admiration, as the most strange, improbable, and consequently most unnatural, incidents and events.—In comedy, nothing was so sure to please, as mean buffoonery, vile ribaldry, and unmannerly jests of fools and clowns.” Prefixed to Randolph's Works is a panegyrick written by Mr. Richard West, from whose poem two lines are quoted by Langbaine, which were also inserted in The General Advertiser of the 5th of March, 1748, in the encomium on Randolph's plays. In Mr. West's Verses, speaking of ordinary dramatick poets, he says,— “For humours to lie lieger, they are seen “Oft in a tavern or a bowling-green. “They do observe each place and company, “As strictly as a traveller or spy:— “And sit with patience an hour by the heels, “To learn the nonsense of the constables; “Such jig-like flim-flams being got, to make “The rabble laugh, and nut-cracking forsake.” Randolph is then described, and among other high praises, we are told,— “There's none need fear to surfeit with his phrase; “He has no giant raptures, to amaze “And torture weak capacities with wonder.” We have already seen that Mr. Macklin had been just perusing Ben Jonson's Epigrams. In his second Epigram, which is addressed to his book, are these lines: “&lblank; by thy wiser temper let men know, “Thou art not covetous of least self-fame, “Made from the hazard of another's shame: “Much less, with lewd, prophane, and beastly phrase, “To catch the world's loose laughter, or vaine gaze.”

Note return to page 334 *Addison's Cato.

Note return to page 335 †See the Gentleman's and European Magazine for March and April, 1790.

Note return to page 336 *Such undoubtedly was the character of Endymion Porter, who was a Gentleman of his Majesty's Bedchamber.

Note return to page 337 †The late Honourable Topham Beauclerk.

Note return to page 338 ‡I know not from what cause it has arisen, but I think I have observed a more than common degree of inaccuracy in facts and dates relative to the stage, as often as they become objects for the memory to exercise itself upon. No conclusive arguments, I am sure, can be drawn from the falsehoods or mistakes in the piece under consideration, to prove the non-existence of it. Immediately on the death of Mr. Quin in 1766, a pamphlet was published professing to be an account of his Life, in which the fact of his having killed a brother actor was related; but so related, that no one circumstance belonging to it could be depended on, except that a man was killed. Neither the time when the accident happened, the place where, the cause of the quarrel, the progress of it, or even the name or identity of the person, were stated agreeable to truth; and all these fables were imposed on the publick at a time when many people were living, who could have contradicted them from their own personal knowledge. To apply this to the present case: suppose at the distance of more than a century, one single copy only of this Life (no improbable supposition) should remain, and after being quoted should be lost; the facts which it contains might be demonstrated to be untrue, but the non-existence of the work referred to, surely would not thereby be established. Reed.

Note return to page 339 *It is rather whimsical that Mr. Steevens should have been of opinion that Mr. Malone had bestowed disproportionate labour on so slight a subject, and should yet refuse his assent to the arguments which he has produced. Mr. Reed's argument is not less extraordinary. Such it seems is the inaccuracy which, for some reason or another, is inseparable from every thing which relates to the history of the stage, which he contents himself with proving by one instance, that no mistakes or falsehoods in a narrative of that nature can be sufficient for its detection. It follows, that forgery, in all such cases, must have an unlimited privilege. Mr. Malone has been censured upon another ground; for the mild terms in which he has spoken of this fabrication. It is true that strict justice might have admitted, and perhaps demanded, a stronger sentence: but I cannot regret that my benevolent friend, while he has very intelligibly pointed out, in the close of his Essay, how far he was aware of the folly and criminality of falsehood, should have suffered himself to spare the grey hairs of the venerable Macklin. Boswell.

Note return to page 340 *His father, who was a considerable dealer in wool,] It appears that he had been an officer and bailiff of Stratford-upon-Avon; and that he enjoyed some hereditary lands and tenements, the reward of his grandfather's faithful and approved services to King Henry VII. See the extract from the Herald's Office. Theobald.

Note return to page 341 †He had bred him, it is true, for some time at a free-school,] The free-school, I presume, founded at Stratford. Theobald.

Note return to page 342 *&lblank; he thought fit to marry while he was yet very young.] It is certain he did so; for by the monument in Stratford church, erected to the memory of his daughter, Susanna, the wife of John Hall, gentleman, it appears, that she died on the 2d of July, 1649, aged 66; so that she was born in 1583, when her father could not be full 19 years old. Theobald. Susanna, who was our poet's eldest child, was baptized, May 26, 1583. Shakspeare therefore, having been born in April 1564, was nineteen the month preceding her birth. Mr. Theobald was mistaken in supposing that a monument was erected to her in the church of Stratford. There is no memorial there in honour of either our poet's wife or daughter, except flat tombstones, by which, however, the time of their respective deaths is ascertained.—His daughter, Susanna, died, not on the second, but the eleventh of July, 1649. Theobald was led into this error by Dugdale. Malone.

Note return to page 343 †His wife was the daughter of one Hathaway,] She was eight years older than her husband, and died in 1623, at the age of 67 years. Theobald.

Note return to page 344 *&lblank; to have learned from certain authority, which was the first play he wrote;] The highest date of any I can yet find, is Romeo and Juliet in 1597, when the author was 33 years old; and Richard the Second, and Third, in the next year, viz. the 34th of his age. Pope. Richard II. and III. were both printed in 1597.—On the order of time in which Shakspeare's plays were written, see the Essay in the next volume. Malone.

Note return to page 345 †&lblank; for aught I know, the performances of his youth—were the best.] See this notion controverted in the above-mentioned Essay. Malone.

Note return to page 346 †&lblank; this part of Falstaff is said to have been written originally under the name of Oldcastle;] See the Epilogue to Henry the Fourth. Pope. See in this edition, vol. xvi. p. 410. Boswell.

Note return to page 347 *&lblank; to recommend Mr. Jonson and his writings to the publick.] In Mr. Rowe's first edition, after these words was inserted the following passage: “After this, they were professed friends: though I do not know whether the other ever made him an equal return of gentleness and sincerity. Ben was naturally proud and insolent, and in the days of his reputation did so far take upon him the supremacy in wit, that he could not but look with an evil eye upon any one that seemed to stand in competition with him. And if at times he has affected to commend him, it has always been with some reserve; insinuating his uncorrectness, a careless manner of writing, and want of judgment. The praise of seldom altering or blotting out what he writ, which was given him by the players, who were the first publishers of his works after his death, was what Jonson could not bear: he thought it impossible, perhaps, for another man to strike out the greatest thoughts in the finest expression, and to reach those excellencies of poetry with the ease of a first imagination, which himself with infinite labour and study could but hardly attain to.” I have preserved this passage because I believe it strictly true, except that in the last line, instead of but hardly I would read—never. Dryden, we are told by Pope, concurred with Mr. Rowe in thinking Jonson's posthumous verses on our author sparing and invidious. Before Shakspeare's death Ben's envious disposition is mentioned by one of his own friends; it must therefore have been even then notorious, though the writer denies the truth of the charge: “To my well accomplished friend, Mr. Ben Jonson.   “Thou art sound in body; but some say, thy soule   “Envy doth ulcer; yet corrupted hearts   “Such censurers must have.” Scourge of Folly, by J. Davies, printed about 1611. The following lines by one of Jonson's admirers will sufficiently support Mr. Rowe in what he has said relative to the slowness of that writer in his compositions: “Scorn then their censures who gave out, thy wit “As long upon a comedy did sit “As elephants bring forth, and that thy blots “And mendings took more time than Fortune-Plots; “That such thy drought was, and so great thy thirst, “That all thy plays were drawn at the Mermaid first; “That the king's yearly butt wrote, and his wine “Hath more right than thou to thy Catiline.” The writer does not deny the charge, but vindicates his friend by saying that, however slow,— “He that writes well, writes quick &lblank;.” Verses on B. Jonson, by Jasper Mayne. So also, another of his Panegyrists: “Admit his muse was slow, 'tis judgment's fate “To move like greatest princes, still in state.” In The Return from Parnassus, 1606, Jonson is said to be “so slow an enditer, that he were better betake himself to his old trade of bricklaying.” The same piece furnishes us with the earliest intimation of the quarrel between him and Shakspeare: “Why here's our fellow Shakspeare put them [the university poets] all down, ay, and Ben Jonson too. O, that Ben Jonson is a pestilent fellow; he brought up Horace giving the poets a pill, but our fellow Shakspeare hath given him a purge that made him bewray his credit.” Fuller, who was a diligent enquirer, and lived near enough the time to be well informed, confirms this account, asserting in his Worthies, 1662, that “many were the wit-combats” between Jonson and our poet. It is a singular circumstance that old Ben should for near two centuries have stalked on the stilts of an artificial reputation; and that even at this day, of the very few who read his works, scarcely one in ten yet ventures to confess how little entertainment they afford. Such was the impression made on the publick by the extravagant praises of those who knew more of books than of the drama, that Dryden in his Essay on Dramatick Poesie, written about 1667, does not venture to go further in his elogium on Shakspeare, than by saying, “he was at least Jonson's equal, if not his superior;” and in the preface to his Mock Astrologer, 1671, he hardly dares to assert, what, in my opinion, cannot be denied, that “all Jonson's pieces, except three or four, are but crambe bis cocta; the same humours a little varied, and written worse.” Ben, however, did not trust to the praise of others. One of his admirers candidly confesses,— “&lblank; he “Of whom I write this, has prevented me, “And boldly said so much in his own praise, “No other pen need any trophy raise.” In vain, however, did he endeavour to bully the town into approbation by telling his auditors, “By G&wblank; 'tis good, and if you like't, you may;” and by pouring out against those who preferred our poet to him, a torrent of illiberal abuse; which, as Mr. Walpole justly observes, some of his contemporaries were willing to think wit, because they were afraid of it; for, notwithstanding all his arrogant boasts, notwithstanding all the clamour of his partizans both in his own life time and for sixty years after his death, the truth is, that his pieces, when first performed, were so far from being applauded by the people, that they were scarcely endured; and many of them were actually damned. “&lblank; The fine plush and velvets of the age “Did oft for sixpence damn thee from the stage,”— says one of his eulogists in Jonsonius Virbius, 4to. 1638. Jonson himself owns that Sejanus was damned. “It is a poem,” says he, in his Dedication to Lord Aubigny, “that, if I well remember, in your Lordship's sight suffered no less violence from our people here, than the subject of it did from the rage of the people of Rome.” His friend E. B. (probably Edmund Bolton) speaking of the same performance, says,— “But when I view'd the people's beastly rage,   “Bent to confound thy grave and learned toil,   “That cost thee so much sweat and so much oil, “My indignation I could hardly assuage.” Again, in his Dedication of Catiline to the Earl of Pembroke, the author says, “Posterity may pay your benefit the honour and thanks, when it shall know that you dare in these jig-given times to countenance a legitimate poem. I must call it so, against all noise of opinion, from whose crude and ayrie reports I appeal to that great and singular facultie of judgment in your lordship.” See also the Epilogue to Every Man in his Humour, by Lord Buckhurst, quoted below in The Account of our old English Theatres, ad finem. To his testimony and that of Mr. Drummond of Hawthornden, (there also mentioned,) may be added that of Leonard Digges in his Verses on Shakspeare, and of Sir Robert Howard, who says in the preface to his Plays, folio, 1665, (not thirty years after Ben's death,) “When I consider how severe the former age has been to some of the best of Mr. Jonson's never-to-be-equalled comedies, I cannot but wonder, why any poet should speak of former times.” The truth is, that however extravagant the elogiums were that a few scholars gave him in their closets, he was not only not admired in his own time by the generality, but not even understood. His friend Beaumont assures him in a copy of verses, that “his sense is so deep that he will not be understood for three ages to come.” Malone.

Note return to page 348 *Mr. Hales, who had sat still for some time, told them,] In Mr. Rowe's first edition this passage runs thus: “Mr. Hales, who had sat still for some time, hearing Ben frequently reproach him with the want of learning and ignorance of the antients, told him at last, That if Mr. Shakspeare,” &c. By the alteration, the subsequent part of the sentence—“if he would produce,” &c. is rendered ungrammatical. Malone.

Note return to page 349 †&lblank; He would undertake to show something upon the same subject at least as well written by Shakspeare.] I had long endeavoured in vain to find out on what authority this relation was founded; and have very lately discovered that Mr. Rowe probably derived his information from Dryden: for in Gildon's Letters and Essays, published in 1694, fifteen years before this Life appeared, the same story is told; and Dryden, to whom an Essay in vindication of Shakspeare is addressed, is appealed to by the writer as his authority. As Gildon tells the story with some slight variations from the account given by Mr. Rowe, and the book in which it is found is now extremely scarce, I shall subjoin the passage in his own words: “But to give the world some satisfaction that Shakspeare has had as great veneration paid his excellence by men of unquestioned parts, as this I now express for him, I shall give some account of what I have heard from your mouth, sir, about the noble triumph he gained over all the ancients, by the judgment of the ablest criticks of that time. “The matter of fact, if my memory fail me not, was this. Mr. Hales of Eton affirmed, that he would show all the poets of antiquity out-done by Shakspeare, in all the topicks and common-places made use of in poetry. The enemies of Shakspeare would by no means yield him so much excellence; so that it came to a resolution of a trial of skill upon that subject. The place agreed on for the dispute was Mr. Hales's chamber at Eton. A great many books were sent down by the enemies of this poet; and on the appointed day my Lord Falkland, Sir John Suckling, and all the persons of quality that had wit and learning, and interested themselves in the quarrel, met there; and upon a thorough disquisition of the point, the judges chosen by agreement out of this learned and ingenious assembly, unanimously gave the preference to Shakspeare, and the Greek and Roman Poets were adjudged to vail at least their glory in that to the English Hero.” This elogium on our author is likewise recorded at an earlier period by Tate, probably from the same authority, in the preface to The Loyal General, quarto, 1680: “Our learned Hales was wont to assert, that, since the time of Orpheus, and the oldest poets, no common-place has been touched upon, where our author has not performed as well.” Dryden himself also certainly alludes to this story, which he appears to have related both to Gildon and Rowe, in the following passage of his Essay of Dramatick Poesy, 1667; and he as well as Gildon goes somewhat further than Rowe, in his panegyrick. After giving that fine character of our poet which Dr. Johnson has quoted in his preface, he adds, “The consideration of this made Mr. Hales of Eton say, that there was no subject of which any poet ever writ, but he would produce it much better done by Shakspeare; and however others are now generally preferred before him, yet the age wherein he lived, which had contemporaries with him, Fletcher and Jonson, never equalled them to him in their esteem: And in the last king's court [that of Charles I.] when Ben's reputation was at highest, Sir John Suckling, and with him the greater part of the courtiers, set our Shakspeare far above him.” Let ever-memorable Hales, if all his other merits be forgotten, be ever mentioned with honour, for his good taste and admiration of our poet. “He was,” says Lord Clarendon, “one of the least men in the kingdom; and one of the greatest scholars in Europe.” See a long character of him in Clarendon's Life, vol. i. p. 52. Malone.

Note return to page 350 *&lblank; that he had a particular intimacy with Mr. Combe,] This Mr. John Combe I take to be the same, who, by Dugdale, in his Antiquities of Warwickshire, is said to have died in the year 1614, and for whom at the upper end of the quire of the guild of the holy cross at Stratford, a fair monument is erected, having a statue thereon cut in alabaster, and in a gown, with this epitaph: “Here lyeth interred the body of John Combe, Esq. who departing this life the 10th day of July, 1614, bequeathed by his last will and testament these sums ensuing, annually to be paid for ever; viz. xx. s. for two sermons to be preach'd in this church, and vi. l. xiii. s. iv. d. to buy ten gownes for ten poore people within the borough of Stratford; and 100l. to be lent to fifteen poore tradesmen of the same borough, from three years to three years, changing the parties every third year, at the rate of fifty shillings per annum, the which increase he appointed to be distributed towards the relief of the almes-poor there.” The donation has all the air of a rich and sagacious usurer. Theobald.

Note return to page 351 †&lblank; where a monument is placed in the wall.] He is represented under an arch, in a sitting posture, a cushion spread before him, with a pen in his right hand, and his left rested on a scroll of paper. The following Latin distich is engraved under the cushion: Judicio Pylium, genio Socratem, arte Maronem,   Terra tegit, populus mæret, Olympus habet. Theobald. The first syllable in Socratem is here made short, which cannot be allowed. Perhaps we should read Sophoclem. Shakspeare is then appositely compared with a dramatick author among the ancients: but still it should be remembered that the elogium is lessened while the metre is reformed; and it is well known that some of our early writers of Latin poetry were uncommonly negligent in their prosody, especially in proper names. The thought of this distich, as Mr. Tollet observes, might have been taken from The Faëry Queene of Spenser, B. II. c. ix. st. 48, and c. x. st. 3. To this Latin inscription on Shakspeare should be added the lines which are found underneath it on his monument: “Stay, passenger, why dost thou go so fast? “Read, if thou canst, whom envious death hath plac'd “Within this monument; Shakspeare, with whom “Quick nature dy'd; whose name doth deck the tomb “Far more than cost; since all that he hath writ “Leaves living art but page to serve his wit. “Obiit Ano. Dni. 1616. æt. 53, die 23 Apri.” Steevens.

Note return to page 352 *&lblank; nor did I ever meet with it in any edition that I have seen, as quoted by Mr. Jonson.] See Mr. Tyrwhitt's note on Julius Cæsar, Act III. Sc. I. vol. xii. p. 75, n. 8. Malone.

Note return to page 353 †&lblank; in a late collection of poems.] In the fourth volume of State Poems, printed in 1707. Mr. Rowe did not go beyond A Late Collection of Poems, and does not seem to have known that Shakspeare also wrote 154 Sonnets, and a poem entitled A Lover's Complaint. Malone.

Note return to page 354 *&lblank; are really tragedies, with a run or mixture of comedy amongst them.] Heywood, our author's contemporary, has stated the best defence that can be made for his intermixing lighter with the more serious scenes of his dramas: “It may likewise be objected, why amongst sad and grave histories I have here and there inserted fabulous jests and tales savouring of lightness. I answer, I have therein imitated our historical, and comical poets, that write to the stage, who, lest the auditory should be dulled with serious courses, which are merely weighty and material, in every act present some Zany, with his mimick action to breed in the less capable mirth and laughter; for they that write to all, must strive to please all. And as such fashion themselves to a multitude diversely addicted, so I to an universality of readers diversely disposed.” Pref. to History of Women, 1624. Malone. The criticks who renounce tragi-comedy as barbarous, I fear, speak more from notions which they have formed in their closets, than any well-built theory deduced from experience of what pleases or displeases, which ought to be the foundation of all rules. Even supposing there is no affectation in this refinement, and that those criticks have really tried and purified their minds till there is no dross remaining, still this can never be the case of a popular audience, to which a dramatick representation is referred. Dryden in one of his prefaces condemns his own conduct in The Spanish Friar; but, says he, I did not write it to please myself, it was given to the publick. Here is an involuntary confession that tragi-comedy is more pleasing to the audience; I would ask then, upon what ground it is condemned? This ideal excellence of uniformity rests upon a supposition that we are either more refined, or a higher order of beings than we really are: there is no provision made for what may be called the animal part of our minds. Though we should acknowledge this passion for variety and contrarieties to be the vice of our nature, it is still a propensity which we all feel, and which he who undertakes to divert us must find provision for. We are obliged, it is true, in our pursuit after science, or excellence in any art, to keep our minds steadily fixed for a long continuance; it is a task we impose upon ourselves: but I do not wish to task myself in my amusements. If the great object of the theatre is amusement, a dramatick work must possess every means to produce that effect; if it gives instruction by the by, so much its merit is the greater; but that is not its principal object. The ground on which it stands, and which gives it a claim to the protection and encouragement of civilised society, is not because it enforces moral precepts, or gives instruction of any kind; but from the general advantage that it produces, by habituating the mind to find its amusement in intellectual pleasures; weaning it from sensuality, and by degrees filing off, smoothing, and polishing, its rugged corners. Sir J. Reynolds.

Note return to page 355 *&lblank; the same coat of arms which Dugdale, in his Antiquities of that county, describes for a family there,] There are two coats, I observe, in Dugdale, where three silver fishes are borne in the name of Lucy; and another coat to the monument of Thomas Lucy, son of Sir William Lucy, in which are quartered in four several divisions, twelve little fishes, three in each division, probably luces. This very coat, indeed, seems alluded to in Shallow's giving the dozen white luces; and in Slender's saying he may quarter. Theobald.

Note return to page 356 *&lblank; but though we have seen that play received and acted as a comedy,] In 1701 Lord Lansdown produced his alteration of The Merchant of Venice, at the theatre in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields, under the title of The Jew of Venice, and expressly calls it a comedy. Shylock was performed by Mr. Doggett. Reed. And such was the bad taste of our ancestors that this piece continued to be a stock-play from 1701 to Feb. 14, 1741, when The Merchant of Venice was exhibited for the first time at the theatre in Drury-Lane, and Mr. Macklin made his first appearance in the character of Shylock. Malone. In justice to Lord Lansdown it should be mentioned, that the alterations which he made in the part of Shylock were very inconsiderable; and that therefore the misconception of this character must be imputed to the performers. Mr. Reed's censure upon him for calling it a comedy, is altogether unfounded. It is included among the comedies in the first folio, and in the early quartos it is termed The Comical Historie of The Merchant of Venice. Boswell.

Note return to page 357 *&lblank; which, I have been informed, three very great men concurred in making &lblank;] Lord Falkland, Lord C. J. Vaughan, and Mr. Selden. Rowe. Dryden was of the same opinion. “His person (says he, speaking of Caliban,) is monstrous, as he is the product of unnatural lust, and his language is as hobgoblin as his person: in all things he is distinguished from other mortals.” Preface to Troilus and Cressida. Malone. See this notion controverted by Dr. Johnson in a note on The Tempest, vol. xv. p. 52, n. 2. Boswell.

Note return to page 358 *&lblank; are both concerned in the murder of their husbands,] It does not appear that Hamlet's mother was concerned in the death of her husband. Malone.

Note return to page 359 *&lblank; of a name for which he had so great a veneration.] Mr. Betterton was born in 1635, and had many opportunities of collecting information relative to Shakspeare, but unfortunately the age in which he lived was not an age of curiosity. Had either he or Dryden or Sir William D'Avenant taken the trouble to visit our poet's youngest daughter, who lived till 1662, or his grand-daughter, who did not die till 1670, many particulars might have been preserved which are now irrecoverably lost. Shakspeare's sister, Joan Hart, who was only five years younger than him, died at Stratford in Nov. 1646, at the age of seventy-six; and from her undoubtedly his two daughters, and his granddaughter Lady Barnard, had learned several circumstances of his early history antecedent to the year 1600. Malone. This Account of the Life of Shakspeare is printed from Mr. Rowe's second edition, in which it had been abridged and altered by himself after its appearance in 1709. Steevens.

Note return to page 360 *Many came on horseback to the play,] Plays were at this time performed in the afternoon. “The pollicie of plaies is very necessary, howsoever some shallow-brained censurers (not the deepest searchers into the secrets of government) mightily oppugne them. For whereas the afternoon being the idlest time of the day wherein men that are their own masters (as gentlemen of the court, the innes of the court, and a number of captains and soldiers about London) do wholly bestow themselves upon pleasure, and that pleasure they divide (how vertuously it skills not) either in gaming, following of harlots, drinking, or seeing a play, is it not better (since of four extreames all the world cannot keepe them but they will choose one) that they should betake them to the least, which is plaies?” Nash's Pierce Pennilesse his Supplication to the Devil, 1592. Steevens.

Note return to page 361 †&lblank; the waiters that held the horses retained the appellation of, Shakspeare's boys.] I cannot dismiss this anecdote without observing that it seems to want every mark of probability. Though Shakspeare quitted Stratford on account of a juvenile irregularity, we have no reason to suppose that he had forfeited the protection of his father who was engaged in a lucrative business, or the love of his wife who had already brought him two children, and was herself the daughter of a substantial yeoman. It is unlikely therefore, when he was beyond the reach of his prosecutor, that he should conceal his plan of life, or place of residence, from those who, if he found himself distressed, could not fail to afford him such supplies as would have set him above the necessity of holding horses for subsistence. Mr. Malone has remarked in his Attempt to ascertain the Order in which the Plays of Shakspeare were written, that he might have found an easy introduction to the stage; for Thomas Green, a celebrated comedian of that period, was his townsman, and perhaps his relation. The genius of our author prompted him to write poetry; his connection with a player might have given his productions a dramatick turn: or his own sagacity might have taught him that fame was not incompatible with profit, and that the theatre was an avenue to both. That it was once the general custom to ride on horse-back to the play, I am likewise yet to learn. The most popular of the theatres were on the Bankside; and we are told by the satirical pamphletteers of that time, that the usual mode of conveyance to these places of amusement, was by water, but not a single writer so much as hints at the custom of riding to them, or at the practice of having horses held during the hours of exhibition. Some allusion to this usage, (if it had existed) must, I think, have been discovered in the course of our researches after contemporary fashions. Let it be remembered too, that we receive this tale on no higher authority than that of Cibber's Lives of the Poets, vol. i. p. 130. “Sir William Davenant told it to Mr. Betterton, who communicated it to Mr. Rowe,” who (according to Dr. Johnson) related it to Mr. Pope. Mr. Rowe (if this intelligence be authentick) seems to have concurred with me in opinion, as he forbore to introduce a circumstance so incredible into his Life of Shakspeare. As to the book which furnishes the anecdote, not the smallest part of it was the composition of Mr. Cibber, being entirely written by a Mr. Shiells, amanuensis to Dr. Johnson, when his Dictionary was preparing for the press. T. Cibber was in the King's Bench, and accepted of ten guineas from the booksellers for leave to prefix his name to the work; and it was purposely so prefixed as to leave the reader in doubt whether himself or his father was the person designed. The foregoing anecdote relative to Cibber's Lives, &c. I received from Dr. Johnson. See, however, The Monthly Review, for December, 1781, p. 409. Steevens.

Note return to page 362 *&lblank; it is said, that one Bowman—was unwilling to allow that his associate and contemporary Betterton had ever undertaken such a journey.] This assertion of Mr. Oldys is altogether unworthy of credit. Why any doubt should be entertained concerning Mr. Betterton's having visited Stratford, after Rowe's positive assertion that he did so, it is not easy to conceive. Mr. Rowe did not go there himself; and how could he have collected the few circumstances relative to Shakspeare and his family, which he has told, if he had not obtained information from some friend who examined the Register of the parish of Stratford, and made personal inquiries on the subject? “Bowman,” we are told, “was unwilling to believe,” &c. But the fact disputed did not require any exercise of his belief. Mr. Bowman was married to the daughter of Sir Francis Watson, Bart, the gentleman with whom Betterton joined in an adventure to the East Indies, whose name the writer of Betterton's Life in Biographia Britannica has so studiously concealed. By that unfortunate scheme Betterton lost above 2000l. Dr. Ratcliffe 6000l. and Sir Francis Watson his whole fortune. On his death soon after the year 1692, Betterton generously took his daughter under his protection, and educated her in his house. Here Bowman married her; from which period he continued to live in the most friendly correspondence with Mr. Betterton, and must have known whether he went to Stratford or not. Malone.

Note return to page 363 *&lblank; of about seven or eight years old,] He was born at Oxford in February 1605–6. Malone.

Note return to page 364 †&lblank; and this was the reason he omitted it.] Mr. Oldys might have added, that he was the person who suggested to Mr. Pope the singular course which he pursued in his edition of Shakspeare. “Remember,” says Oldys in a MS. note to his copy of Langbaine, Article, Shakspeare, “what I observed to my Lord Oxford for Mr. Pope's use, out of Cowley's preface.” The observation here alluded to, I believe, is one made by Cowley in his preface, p. 53, edit. 1710, 8vo: “This has been the case with Shakspeare, Fletcher, Jonson, and many others, part of whose poems I should presume to take the boldness to prune and lop away, if the care of replanting them in print did belong to me; neither would I make any scruple to cut off from some the unnecessary young suckers, and from others the old withered branches; for a great wit is no more tied to live in a vast volume, than in a gigantick body; on the contrary it is commonly more vigorous the less space it animates, and as Statius says of little Tydeus,— &lblank; totos infusa per artus, Major in exiguo regnabat corpore virtus. Pope adopted this very unwarrantable idea; striking out from the text of his author whatever he did not like: and Cowley himself has suffered a sort of poetical punishment for having suggested it, the learned Bishop of Worcester [Dr. Hurd] having pruned and lopped away his beautiful luxuriances, as Pope, on Cowley's suggestion, did those of Shakspeare. Malone.

Note return to page 365 *The same story—may be found in one of Herne's pocketbooks.] Antony Wood is the first and original author of the anecdote that Shakspeare, in his journeys from Warwickshire to London, used to bait at the Crown-Inn on the west side of the corn market in Oxford. He says that D'Avenant the poet was born in that house in 1606. “His father (he adds) John Davenant, was a sufficient vintner, kept the tavern now known by the sign of the Crown, and was mayor of the said city in 1621. His mother was a very beautiful woman, of a good wit and conversation, in which she was imitated by none of her children but by this William [the poet]. The father, who was a very grave and discreet citizen, (yet an admirer and lover of plays and play-makers, especially Shakspeare, who frequented his house in his journeys between Warwickshire and London,) was of a melancholick disposition, and was seldom or never seen to laugh, in which he was imitated by none of his children but by Robert his eldest son, afterwards fellow of St. John's College, and a venerable Doctor of Divinity.” Wood's Ath. Oxon. vol. ii. p. 292, edit. 1692. I will not suppose that Shakspeare could have been the father of a Doctor of Divinity who never laughed; but it was always a constant tradition in Oxford that Shakspeare was the father of Davenant the poet. And I have seen this circumstance expressly mentioned in some of Wood's papers. Wood was well qualified to know these particulars; for he was a townsman of Oxford, where he was born in 1632. Wood says, that Davenant went to school in Oxford. Ubi supra. As to the Crown Inn, it still remains as an inn, and is an old decayed house, but probably was once a principal inn in Oxford. It is directly in the road from Stratford to London. In a large upper room, which seems to have been a sort of Hall for entertaining a large company, or for accommodating (as was the custom) different parties at once, there was a bow-window, with three pieces of excellent painted glass. About eight years ago, I remember visiting this room, and proposing to purchase of the landlord the painted glass, which would have been a curiosity as coming from Shakspeare's inn. But going thither soon after, I found it was removed; the inn-keeper having communicated my intended bargain to the owner of the house, who began to suspect that he was possessed of a curiosity too valuable to be parted with, or to remain in such a place: and I never could hear of it afterwards. If I remember right, the painted glass consisted of three armorial shields beautifully stained. I have said so much on this subject, because I think that Shakspeare's old hostelry at Oxford deserves no less respect than Chaucer's Tabarde in Southwark. T. Warton.

Note return to page 366 *&lblank; whibh letter, though now lost, remained long in the hands of Sir William D'Avenant,] Dr. Farmer with great probability supposes that this letter was written by King James in return for the compliment paid to him in Macbeth. The relater of this anecdote was Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham. Malone.

Note return to page 367 1In a collection of manuscript poems which was in the possession of the late Gustavus Brander, Esq. these verses are entitled —“Basse his Elegie one [on] poett Shakespeare, who died in April 1616.” The MS. appears to have been written soon after the year 1621. In the edition of our author's poems in 1640, they are subscribed with the initials W. B. only. They were erroneously attributed to Dr. Donne, in a quarto edition of his poems printed in 1633; but his son Dr. John Donne, a Civilian, published a more correct edition of his father's poems in 1635, and rejected the verses on Shakspeare, knowing, without doubt, that they were written by another. William Basse, according to Wood, [Athen. Oxon. vol. ii. p. 812,] “was of Moreton, near Thame in Oxfordshire, and was sometime a retainer to the Lord Wenman of Thame Park.” There are some verses by him in Annalia Dubrensia, 4to. 1636; and in Bathurst's Life and Remains, by the Reverend Thomas Warton, 8vo. 1761, there is a poem by Dr. Bathurst “to Mr. William Basse, upon the intended publication of his Poems, Jan. 13, 1651.” The volume never, I believe, appeared; but there is in the collection of Richard Slater, Esq. a volume of MS. poems by Basse, entitled Polyhymnia, containing six copies of verses on various subjects. From the words “who died in April, 1616,” it may be inferred that these lines were written recently after Shakspeare's death, when the month and year in which he died were well known. At a more distant period the month would probably have been forgotten; and that was not an age of such curiosity as would have induced a poet to search the register at Stratford on such a subject. From the address to Chaucer and Spenser it should seem, that when these verses were composed the writer thought it probable that a cenotaph would be erected to Shakspeare in Westminster Abbey. There is a copy of these lines in a manuscript volume of poems written by W. Herrick and others, among Rawlinson's Collections in the Bodleian library at Oxford; and another among the Sloanian MSS. in the Museum, No. 1702. In the Oxford copy they are entitled “Shakspeare's Epitaph;” but the author is not mentioned. There are some slight variations in the different copies, which I shall set down. Line 2. “To rare Beaumond, and learned Beaumond lie,” &c. Edit. 1633. Line 5. “To lodge in one bed all four make a shift.” MS. Brander. “To lodge all four in one bed,” &c. MS. R. and S. “To lie all four,” &c. Edit. 1633. Line 7. So B. S. and R. “&lblank; by fates be slain.” Edit. 1633. Line 8. So B. and S. “&lblank; will be drawn again.” R. “&lblank; need be drawn again.” 1633. Line 9. “But if precedency of death,” &c. Edit. 1633. “If your precedency in death,” &c. B. R. S. Line 10. So B. R. and edit. 1633. “A fourth to have place in your sepulcher.” S. Line 11. So B. and R. “&lblank; under this curled marble of thine own.” Edit. 1633. “&lblank; under this sable,” &c. S. Line 12. So, B. S. and edit. 1633. “Sleep, rare comedian,” &c. R. Line 13. So, B. and R. “Thine unmolested peace, unshared cave.”— S. “Thy unmolested peace in an unshared cave.”— Edit. 1633. Line 14. So, B. “Possess as lord not tenant of the grave.” S. “&lblank; to thy grave.” R. This couplet is not in edit. 1633. Line 15. So, edit. 1633. “That unto us, or others,” &c. B. R. and S. Malone.

Note return to page 368 2&lblank; a thought &lblank;] i. e. a little, a small space; the phraseology of the time. See note on Much Ado about Nothing, Act III. Sc. IV. Reed.

Note return to page 369 3Fifth was formerly corruptly written and pronounced fift. I have adhered to the old spelling on account of the rhyme. This corrupt pronunciation yet prevails in Scotland, and in many parts of England. Malone.

Note return to page 370 4&lblank; to make thee a room:] See the preceding verses by Basse. Malone.

Note return to page 371 5&lblank; our Lyly outshine,] Lyly wrote nine plays during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, viz. Alexander and Campaspe, T. C.; Endymion, C.; Galatea, C.; Loves Metamorphosis, Dram. Past.; Maids Metamorphosis, C.; Mother Bombie, C.; Mydas, C.; Sapho and Phao, C.; and Woman in the Moon, C. To the pedantry of this author perhaps we are indebted for the first attempt to polish and reform our language. See his Euphues and his England. Steevens.

Note return to page 372 6&lblank; or sporting Kyd,] It appears from Heywood's Actor's Vindication that Thomas Kyd was the author of the Spanish Tragedy. The late Mr. Hawkins was of opinion that Soliman and Perseda was by the same hand. The only piece, however, which has descended to us, even with the initial letters of his name affixed to it, is Pompey the Great his fair Cornelia's Tragedy, which was first published in 1594, and, with some alteration in the title-page, again in 1595. This is no more than a translation from Robert Garnier, a French poet, who distinguished himself during the reigns of Charles IX. Henry III. and Henry IV. and died at Mons in 1602, in the 56th year of his age. Steevens.

Note return to page 373 7&lblank; or Marlowe's mighty line.] Marlowe was a performer as well as an author. His contemporary Heywood, calls him the best of our poets. He wrote six tragedies, viz. Dr. Faustus's Tragical History; King Edward II.; Jew of Malta; Lust's Dominion; Massacre of Paris; and Tamburlaine the Great, in two parts. He likewise joined with Nash in writing Dido Queen of Carthage, and had begun a translation of Musæus's Hero and Leander, which was finished by Chapman, and published in 1606. Steevens. Christopher Marlowe was born probably about the year 1566, as he took the degree of Bachelor of Arts at Cambridge, in 1583. I do not believe that he ever was an actor, nor can I find any authority for it higher than the Theatrum Poetarum of Phillips, in 1674, which is inaccurate in many circumstances. Beard, who four years after Marlowe's death gave a particular account of him, does not speak of him as an actor. “He was,” says that writer, “by profession a scholler, brought up from his youth in the universitie of Cambridge, but by practice a playmaker and a poet of scurrilitie.” Neither Drayton, nor Decker, nor Nashe, nor the author of The Return from Parnassus, 1606, nor Heywood in his prologue to The Jew of Malta, give the slightest intimation of Marlowe's having trod the stage. He was stabbed in the street, and died of the wound, in 1593. His Hero and Leander was published in quarto, in 1598, by Edward Blount as an imperfect work. The fragment ended with this line: “Dang'd down to hell her loathsome carriage.” Chapman completed the poem, and published it as it now appears, in 1600. Malone.

Note return to page 374 8&lblank; thy art, My gentle Shakspeare, must enjoy a part:] Yet this writer, in his conversation with Mr. Drummond of Hawthornden in 1619, said, that Shakspeare “wanted art, and sometimes sense.” Malone.

Note return to page 375 9&lblank; true-filed lines;] The same praise is given to Shakspeare by a preceding writer. “As Epius Stolo said that the Muses would speak with Plautus his tongue, if they would speak Latin, so I say that the Muses would speak with Shakspeare's fine filed phrase, if they would speak English.” Wit's Treasury, by Francis Meres, 1598. It is somewhat singular that at a subsequent period Shakspeare was censured for the want of that elegance which is here justly attributed to him. “Though all the laws of Heroick Poem,” says the author of Theatrum Poetarum, 1674, “all the laws of tragedy, were exactly observed, yet still this tour entrejanté, this poetick energie, if I may so call it, would be required to give life to all the rest; which shines through the roughest, most unpolished and antiquated language, and may haply be wanting in the most polite and reformed. Let us observe Spenser, with all his rustick obsolete words, with all his rough-hewn clouterly phrases, yet take him throughout, and we shall find in him a graceful and poetick majestie: in like manner Shakspeare, in spite of all his unfiled expressions, his rambling and indigested fancies, the laughter of the critical, yet must be confessed a poet above many that go beyond him in literature some degrees.” Malone. “In his well-torned and true-filed lines;”] Jonson is here translating the classick phrases tornati et limati versus. Does not the poet in the next line, by the expression shake a lance, intend to play on the name of Shakspeare? So, in Two Bookes of Epigrammes and Epitaphs, by Thomas Bancroft, Lond. 1639, 4to. “To Shakspeare. “Thou hast so used thy pen, (or shooke thy speare,) “That poets startle, nor thy wit come near.” Dryden, in his Dedication to his Translation of Juvenal, terms these verses by Jonson an insolent, sparing, and invidious panegyrick. Holt White.

Note return to page 376 1See Wood's Athenæ Oxon. edit. 1721, vol. i. p. 583. Steevens.

Note return to page 377 2See Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses, vol. i. p. 599 and 600. edit. 1721. His translation of Claudian's Rape of Proserpine was entered on the Stationers' books, Oct. 4, 1617. Steevens. It was printed in the same year. Malone.

Note return to page 378 3Perhaps John Marston. Steevens.

Note return to page 379 4The verses first appeared in the folio, 1632. There is no name ascribed to them. Malone.

Note return to page 380 5To outrun hasty time,] “And panting time toil'd after him in vain.” Dr. Johnson's Prologue. Steevens.

Note return to page 381 7&lblank; speaking silence &lblank;] “Silence that spoke, and eloquence of eyes.” Pope's Hom. Steevens.

Note return to page 382 8Probably, Jasper Mayne, Student. He was born in the year 1604, and became a member of Christ Church, in Oxford, in 1623, where he was soon afterwards elected a Student. In 1628 he took a bachelor's degree, and in June, 1631, that of a Master of Arts. These verses first appeared in the folio, 1632. Malone.

Note return to page 383 9This poem is one of those prefixed to the folio edition of our author's plays, 1632, and therefore is the first of Milton's pieces that was published. It appeared, however, without even the initials of his name. Steevens.

Note return to page 384 1&lblank; of itself bereaving,] So the copy in Milton's Poems, printed by Mosely in 1645. That in the second folio, 1632, has —of herself bereaving. Malone.

Note return to page 385 2These verses were written by Milton in the year 1630. Notwithstanding this just eulogium, and though the writer of it appears to have been a very diligent reader of the works of our poet, from whose rich garden he has plucked many a flower, in the true spirit of sour puritanical sanctity he censured King Charles I. for having made this “great heir of fame” the closet companion of his solitudes. See his Eiconoclastes. Malone.

Note return to page 386 3The Fortune company, I find from Sir Henry Herbert's Manuscript, removed to the Red Bull, and the Prince's company to the Fortune, in the year 1640; these verses therefore could not have been written so early as 1623. Malone.

Note return to page 387 4This, I believe, alludes to some of the company of The Fortune playhouse, who removed to the Red Bull. See a Prologue on the removing of the late Fortune players to The Bull. Tatham's Fancies Theatre, 1640. Malone.

Note return to page 388 5These verses are prefixed to a spurious edition of Shakspeare's poems, in small octavo, printed in 1640. Malone.

Note return to page 389 6These anonymous verses are prefixed likewise to Shakspeare's Poems, 1640. Malone.

Note return to page 390 7This author published a small volume of Epigrams in 1651, among which this poem in memory of Shakspeare is found. Malone.

Note return to page 391 8These verses are taken from Two Bookes of Epigrammes and Epitaphs, by Thomas Bancroft, Lond. 1639, 4to. Holt White.

Note return to page 392 9From Wits Recreations, &c. 12mo. 1640. Steevens.

Note return to page 393 1Milton.

Note return to page 394 2The Œdipus of Sophocles.

Note return to page 395 3Julius II. the immediate predecessor of Leo X.

Note return to page 396 4Their characters are thus distinguished by Mr. Dryden.

Note return to page 397 5There cannot be a stronger proof that, even up to a late period, the powers of Shakspeare were imperfectly understood, than that such a man as Collins should have delivered this opinion. No poet has ever surpassed, perhaps no one has equalled, the various, and even nicely discriminative excellence with which Shakspeare has delineated the female character. Nothing more is necessary to show this, than a short list of names, to which many might be added: Lady Macbeth, Volumnia, and Cleopatra; Lady Constance, and Queen Catharine; Ophelia, Desdemona, Juliet, and Imogen; Beatrice, and Rosalind. Boswell.

Note return to page 398 6About the time of Shakspeare, the poet Hardy was in great repute in France. He wrote, according to Fontenelle, six hundred plays. The French poets after him applied themselves in general to the correct improvement of the stage, which was almost totally disregarded by those of our own country, Jonson excepted.

Note return to page 399 7The favourite author of the elder Corneille.

Note return to page 400 8Turno tempus erit, magno cùm optaverit emptum Intactum Pallanta, &c.

Note return to page 401 9See the tragedy of Julius Cæsar.

Note return to page 402 1Coriolanus. See Mr. Spence's dialogue on the Odyssey.

Note return to page 403 2An ingenious person, who sent Mr. Gray his remarks anonymously on this and the following Ode soon after they were published, gives this stanza and the following a very just and well-expressed eulogy: “A poet is perhaps never more conciliating than when he praises favorite predecessors in his art. Milton is not more the pride than Shakspeare the love of their country: It is therefore equally judicious to diffuse a tenderness and a grace through the praise of Shakspeare, as to extol in a strain more elevated and sonorous the boundless soarings of Milton's imagination.” The critick has here well noted the beauty of contrast which results from the two descriptions; yet it is further to be observed, to the honour of our poet's judgment, that the tenderness and grace in the former, does not prevent it from strongly characterising the three capital perfections of Shakspeare's genious; and when he describes his power of exciting terror (a species of the sublime) he ceases to be diffuse, and becomes as he ought to be, concise and energetical. Mason.

Note return to page 404 3Thus Pope, in his Temple of Fame, speaking of Aristotle: “His piercing eyes erect appear to view “Superior worlds, and look all Nature through.” Steevens.

Note return to page 405 4The Transfiguration, that well known picture of Raphael, was carried before his body to the grave, doing more real honour to his memory than either his epitaph in the Pantheon, the famous distich of Cardinal Bembo, or all the other adulatory verses written on the same occasion. Keate.

Note return to page 406 *His imitation of Flatman, in “A Dying Christian to his Soul,” has been often pointed out; but the passage in Settle, which, I conjecture, he had in view, may not be so generally known. In the Empress of Morroco, which he is likely to have read from curiosity, as the object of Dryden's hostility, the empress accuses Muly Hamet of an attempt to ravish her— “Then, Muly Hamet, then thy cruel breast— “Muly Hamet. Speak! “Empress. Let my tears and blushes speak the rest.” I need not remind the reader of the corresponding line in Eloisa, nor how Pope, by one admirable epithet burning blushes, has made it his own.

Note return to page 407 Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, p. 276.

Note return to page 408 *It is generally asserted that English verse depends not upon quantity, but accent alone. Surely this is too broadly stated. When Pope submitted his Pastorals to the corection of “knowing Walsh.” he inquired whether, in the second line of the first Pastoral, which originally stood— “Nor blush to sport on Windsor's peaceful plains;” it would be better to alter peaceful to happy, in order to avoid the alliteration. Walsh objected to the substitution of happy for peaceful, from its not being the same quantity, as the first syllable in happy was short. Pope assented to this criticism, and adopted blissful plains.

Note return to page 409 *The harp of Sir Walter has been too long unstrung. Yet there are not wanting those who suspect that he has all this while been doing us good by stealth, and that he has spoken of the publick in the language of an old play, “She shall not know me: she shall drink of my wealth, as beggars do of the running water, freely, yet never know from what fountain-head it flows.” Decker's Honest Whore, 2d Part, Act I. Sc. I. To the anonymous writer, whoever he may be, by whom we have been so much delighted, we may apply the words of another old dramatist: “I heard, sir, of an antiquary, who, if he be as good at wine as at history, he is sure an excellent companion.” The Antiquary, by Marmion.

Note return to page 410 *What our ancestors meant by rhyme doggrel, may be learnt from Freeman's Runne and a Great Cast, 1614: Epigram 36: quis cladem. “More did not Dulake, nor Godfry of Bullen, “Bevis of Hampton, nor Guy Erle of Warwicke, “The Knight of the Sun, the three Kings of Cullen, “Nor all the world twixt Dover and Barwicke, “Nor any man if his cap made of woollen, “At land at see without Castle or Carricke: “Feeders on mans flesh, blood-suckers brave Jack “Hath thumb'd many thousands, and kil'd with a knacke.” Epigram 37. “Whoop, whoop, me thinkes I heare my Reader cry, “Here is rime doggrell; I confesse it I,” &c.

Note return to page 411 *For a multitude of particles similarly misapplied in the writings of the age of Queen Anne, see Lowth's Grammar, p. 166. Edit. 1775.

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