In the epistle to The Devil's Law Case, Webster says to Sir T. Finch, 'Some of my other works, as The White Devil, The Duchess of Malfi, Guise and others, you have formerly seen', and a Guise is ascribed to him as a comedy in Archer's play-list of 1656 and included without ascription as a tragedy in Kirkman's of 1661 and 1671 (Greg, Masques, lxxii). Rogers and Ley's list of 1656 had given it to Marston (q.v.). Collier forged an entry in Henslowe's diary meant to suggest that this was the Massacre at Paris (cf. s.v. Marlowe). In Sept. 1624 Herbert licensed 'a new Tragedy called A Late Murther of the Sonn upon the Mother: Written by Forde, and Webster' (Herbert, 29).
Doubtful Plays The ascription to Webster on the t.p. of The Thracian Wonder is not generally accepted. His hand has been suggested in Revenger's Tragedy and The Weakest Goeth to the Wall. GEORGE WHETSTONE (1544?-87?). Whetstone was a Londoner by origin. After a riotous youth, he turned to literature interspersed with adventure, possibly acting at Canterbury c. 1571 (cf. ch. xv), serving in the Low Countries in 1572-4, the Newfoundland voyage in 1578-9, and the Low Countries again in 1585-6. His chief literary associates were Thomas Churchyard and George Gascoigne. After writing his one play, Promos and Cassandra, he translated its source, the 5th Novel of the 8th Decade of Giraldi Cinthio's Hecatomithi (1565) in his Heptameron of Civil Discourses (1582). Both Italian and English are in Hazlitt, Shakespeare's Library (1875, iii). Like some other dramatists, Whetstone turned upon the stage, and attacked it in his Touchstone for the Time (1584; cf. App. C, No. xxxvi).
Promos and Cassandra. 1578
S. R. 1578, July 31. 'The famous historie of Promos and Casandra Devided into twoe Comicall Discourses Compiled by George Whetstone gent.' Richard Jones (Arber, ii. 334).
1578. The Right Excellent and famous Historye, of Promos and Cassandra; Deuided into two Commicall Discourses. . . . The worke of George Whetstones Gent. Richard Jones. [Epistles to his 'kinsman' William Fleetwood, dated 29 July 1578, and signed 'George Whetstone', and from the Printer to the Reader, signed 'R.I.'; Argument; Text signed 'G. Whetstone'; Colophon with imprint and date 'August 20, 1578'.]
Editions in Six Old Plays, i. 1 (1779), and by W. C. Hazlitt, Shakespeare's Library, vi. 201 (1875), and J. S. Farmer (1910, T. F. T.). There are two parts, arranged in acts and scenes. Whetstone's epistle is of some critical interest (cf. App. C, No. xix). In the Heptameron he says the play was 'yet never presented upon stage'. The character of the s.ds. suggests, however, that it was written for presentation.
