Page:An Inquiry into the Authenticity of certain Papers and Instruments attributed to Shakspeare.djvu/40

now existing or which once existed, on which it has been constructed.—In the year 1710, Bernard Lintott, the bookseller, published our author’s Poems, from copies (as I have lately discovered) furnished by Mr. Congreve, which, though not the original editions, were then considered as great curiosities; so little at that time were the shops of booksellers, or the libraries of the learned, furnished with the early impressions of the works of the English Poets. In the preface to that publication, he for the first time mentioned that King James the First honoured Shakspeare “with an amicable Letter written with his own hand,” (probably, as Dr. Farmer has conjectured, in consequence of the production of Macbeth,) “and that this Letter remained long in the hands of Sir William D’Avenant, as a credible person then living could testify.” This person, as appears from a MS. note written by Mr. Oldys, who probably derived his information from Lord Oxford, was Sheffield, Duke of Buckinghamshire. Sir William D’Avenant having died intestate and insolvent, and his goods having been seized by his creditors, this Letter was unfortunately lost, and I fear will never be