Note return to page 1 Merivale's compilation of material from all three parts of HENRY VI, which also adds passages from the writings of Chapman, Webster and others, was written as a star vehicle for the actor Edmund Kean, who played York during its brief, unsuccessful run at Drury Lane in 1817.

Note return to page 2 *In speaking of the compilation of Cibber, which Mr. Hazlitt has not hesitated to condemn as “a miserable medley,” it is nevertheless conceived that some regard is due to the reflection that, such as it is, that very compilation has at all times been attended with a success on the stage far beyond that of any single play of Shakspeare's —a popularity, into the causes of which this is no convenient opportunity for an inquiry. It remains to be seen whether Shakspeare's Richard the Third, the most entire and perfect of all his historical dramas, is capable, by itself, of maintaining that ascendency in the public estimation which it holds with its presents appendages, and whether the restitution to the stage of those strikingly pathetic and beautiful circumstances attending the death of Clarence, and of the highly wrought and magnificent character of Queen Margaret, will make amends for the abandonment of the pillage from the fourth and fifth acts of the last part of Henry the Sixth.

Note return to page 3 *The passages printed in Italics are those borrowed from the works of contemporary authors, or introduced for the sake of necessary connexion. The above is from Chapman's Bussy D' Amboise.

Note return to page 4 *The passages marked with inverted commas are those which, from the length of the performance, it has been found necessary to omit in representation.

Note return to page 5 *Chapman's Byron's Conspiracy.

Note return to page 6 *The few additional passages of humour inserted in the scenes of Jack Cade and his followers are borrowed from a very loyal play founded by Crowne (who was a court poet in the reign of Charles the Second) on Shakspeare's Henry the Sixth, and entitled The Misery of Civil War, 4to. 1680.

Note return to page 7 *Webster's White Devil.

Note return to page 8 *Chapman's Bussy D' Ambois.

Note return to page 9 *The latter lines of this speech from Marston's Antonio and Mellida.

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