Title page King RICHARD the Third, A TRAGEDY, by SHAKESPEARE. AS PERFORMED AT THE THEATRE-ROYAL, DRURY-LANE. Regulated from the PROMPT-BOOK, With PERMISSION of the MANAGERS, By Mr. HOPKINS. Prompter. An INTRODUCTION, and NOTES CRITICAL and ILLUSTRATIVE, ARE ADDED BY THE AUTHORS of the DRAMATIC CENSOR. LONDON: Printed for JOHN BELL, near Exeter-Exchange, in the Strand, and C. Etherington, at York. MDCCLXXIII.

INTRODUCTION. There is no passage or personage in English History, better chosen for the drama, than what we find in the following piece; whatever doubts may arise as to the real character and figure of our Third Richard, Shakespeare was most undoubtedly right to make him a confirmed, uniform villain: nothing in the medium way would have been half so striking on the stage, and it was equally prudent to present him deformed in figure, as well as in mind; though the unities are grossly, yet they are almost imperceptibly, broken, in this play; the events appear so admirably connected with, and consequential to, each other: nature speaks in all the characters with plain, intelligible dignity; no bombast swells upon the ear, no improbability intrudes on belief; upon the whole it must always read well, but act better.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

Gentlemen, Ladies, Guards, and Attendants.

[Servant], [Lord Stanley], [Guard], [Soldier], [Ghost of King Henry], [Ghost of Queen Anne], [Ghost of Prince Edward]

Drury-Lane.	Covent-Garden.
King Henry,	Mr. Reddish.	Mr. Kniveton.
P. of Wales,	Miss Rogers.	Master Harris.
D. of York,	Miss P. Hopkins.	Master Jones.
D. of Glo'ster [Richard],	Mr. Garrick.	Mr. Smith.
Buckingham [Duke of Buckingham],	Mr. Jefferson.	Mr. Hull.
Richmond,	Mr. Aickin.	Mr. Wroughton.
Norfolk [Duke of Norfolk],	Mr. Hurst.
Ratcliff [Sir Richard Ratcliff],	Mr. Wright.	Mr. Lewes.
Catesby [Sir William Catesby],	Mr. Packer.	Mr. Davis.
Tressel,	Mr. Cautherley.	Mr. Dyer.
Oxford [Earl of Oxford],	Mr. Wheeler.
Lieut. of the Tower [Sir Robert Brakenbury],	Mr. Fawcett.
Blunt [Sir James Blount],	Mr. Griffith.
Lord Mayor,	Mr. Baddeley.
Tirrel [Sir James Tyrrel],	Mr. Wrighten.
Forest,	Mr. Lings.
Dighton.
Queen [Elizabeth],	Mrs. Hopkins.	Miss Miller.
Lady Anne,	Miss Younge.	Mrs. Lessingham.
Dutchess of York [Dutches of York].	Mrs. Johnston.

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