“The first folio edition of Shakspeare was probably sold for the same price. This was not in the library, nor any ancient edition but that of 1685, which was bound in three volumes. His name was not in it. Waller died in 1687. Is it possible that he did not possess a copy of Shakspeare’s Plays till two years before his death? His Ovid by Sandys contained nothing; but in Sandys’ version of the Psalms he has written Ex dono Authoris.
“I was surprised to find that a very thick volume of quarto tracts, which contained a great number of detached speeches made in Parliament in 1642 and 1643 and printed on single sheets, did not contain Wallers own speech in his defence when his plot was discovered.”
An application made to Kemble for some theatrical information, and the acknowledgment of the actor for some literary attentions from the critic, produced a characteristic letter from the former while absent from London on one of his summer campaigns:—
Mr dear Sir,—Your letter found me confined to bed by a pleurisy, and utterly incapable of moving. This is the eleventh day of my illness; but, thank God, I am on the mending hand, and hope to be on horseback to-morrow. I wrote to Mr. Westley, the treasurer of Drury Lane Theatre, by this post, and shall mention your desire very particularly. I have inclosed a line to him here; he lives in Charlotte Street, Bedford Square just behind me; I don’t know the number of it, but his name is on the door; and nine in the morning or four in the afternoon is the likeliest time to find him within.
I am very much obliged to you for having thought
