The Plays of William Shakspeare (1778)/Volume 1/Advertisement by Steevens

by George Steevens

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ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE

READER.

THE want of adherence to the old copies which has been complained of, in the text of every modern republication of Shakespeare, is fairly deducible from Mr. Rowe’s inattention to one of the first duties of an editor^[1]. Mr. Rowe did not print from the earliest and most correct, but from the most remote and inaccurate of the four folios. Between the years 1623 and 1685 (the dates of the first and last) the errors in every play, at least, were trebled. Several pages in each of these ancient editions have been examined, that the assertion might come more fully supported. It may be added, that as every fresh editor continued to make the text of his predecessor the ground-work of his own (never collating but where difficulties occurred) some deviations from the originals had been handed down, the number of which are lessened in the impression before us, as it has been constantly compared with the most authentic copies, whether collation was absolutely necessary for the recovery of sense, or not. The person who undertook this task may have failed by inadvertency, as well as those who preceded him; but the reader maybe assured, that he, who thought it his duty to free an author from such modern and unnecessary innovations as had been censured in others, has not ventured to introduce any of his own.

It is not pretended that a complete body of various readings is here collected; or that all the diversities which the copies exhibit, are pointed out; as near two thirds of them are typographical mistakes, or such a change of insignisicant particles, as would crowd the bottom of the page with an ostentation of materials, from which at last nothing usesul could be selected.

The dialogue might indeed sometimes be lengthened by other insertions than have hitherto been made, but without advantage either to its spirit or beauty; as in the following instance:

Lear. No.
Kent. Yes.
Lear. No, I say.
Kent. I say, yea.

Here the quartos add:

Lear. No, no, they would not.
Kent. Yes, they have.

By the admission of this negation and affirmation, has any new idea been gained?

The labours of preceding editors have not left room for a boast, that many valuable readings have been retrieved; though it may be fairly asserted, that the text of Shakespeare is restored to the condition in which the author, or rather his first publishers appear to have left it, such emendations as were absolutely necessary, alone admitted: for where a particle, indispensably necessary to the sense, was wanting, such a supply has been silently adopted from other editions; but where a syllable, or more, had been added for the sake of the metre only, which at first might have been irregular, such interpolations are here constantly retrenched, sometimes with, and sometimes without notice. Those speeches, which in the elder editions are printed as prose, and from their own construction are incapable of being compressed into verse, without the aid of supplemental syllables, are restored to prose again; and the measure is divided afresh in others, where the mass of words had been inharmoniously separated into lines.

The scenery, throughout all the plays, is regulated in conformity to a rule, which the poet, by his general practice seems to have proposed to himself. Several of his pieces are come down to us, divided into scenes as well as acts. These divisions were probably his own, as they are made on settled principles, which would hardly have been the case, had the task been executed by the players. A change of scene, with Shakespeare, most commonly implies a change of place, but always, an entire evacuation of the stage. The custom of distinguishing every entrance or exit by a fresh scene, was adopted, perhaps very idly, from the French theatre.

For the length of many notes, and the accumulation of examples in others, some apology may be likewise expected. An attempt at brevity is often found to be the source of an imperfect explanation. Where a passage has been constantly misunderstood, or where the jest or pleasantry has been suffered to remain long in obscurity, more instances have been brought to clear the one, or elucidate the other, than appear at first sight to have been necessary. For these, it can only be said, that when they prove that phraseology or source of merriment to have been once general, which at present seems particular, they are not quite impertinently intruded; as they may serve to free the author from a suspicion of having employed an affected singularity of expression, or indulged himself in allusions to transient customs, which were not of sufficient notoriety to deserve ridicule or reprehension. When examples in favour of contradictory opinions are assembled, though no attempt is made to decide on either part, such neutral collections should always be regarded as materials for future critics, who may hereafter apply them with success. Authorities, whether in respect of words, or things, are not always producible from the most celebrated writers^[2]; yet such circumstances as fall below the notice of history, can only be sought in the jest-book, the satire, or the play; and the novel, whose sashion did not outlive a week, is sometimes necessary to throw light on those annals which take in the compass of an age. Those, therefore, who would wish to have the peculiarities of Nym familiarized to their ideas, must cxcuse the insertion of such an epigram as best suits the purpose, however tedious in itself; and such as would be acquainted with the propriety of Falstaff’s allusion to stewed prunes, should not be disgusted at a multitude of instances, which, when the point is once known to be established, may be diminished by any future editor. An author, who catches (as Pope expresses it) at the Cynthia of a minute, and does not surnish notes to his own works, is sure to lose half the praise which he might have claimed, had he dealt in allusions less temporary, or cleared up for himself those difficulties which lapse of time must inevitably create.

The author of the additional notes has rather been desirous to support old readings, than to claim the merit of introducing new ones. He desires to be regarded as one, who found the task he undertook more arduous than it seemed, while he was yet feeding his vanity with the hopes of introducing himself to the world as an editor in form. He, who has discovered in himself the power to recttify a few mistakes with ease, is naturally led to imagine, that all difficulties must yield to the efforts of future labour; and perhaps feels a reluctance to be undeceived at last.

Mr. Steevens desires it may be observed, that he has strictly complied with the terms exhibited in his proposals, having appropriated all such assistances, as he received, to the use of the present editor, whose judgment has, in every instance, determined on their respective merits. While he enumerates his obligations to his correspondents, it is necessary that one comprehensive remark should be made on such communications as are omitted in this edition, though they might have proved of great advantage to a more glaring commentator. The majority of these were founded on the supposition, that Shakespeare was originally an author correct in the utmost degree, but maimed and interpolated by the neglect or presumption of the players. In consequence of this belief, alterations have been proposed wherever a verse could be harmonized, an epithet exchanged for one more apposite, or a sentiment rendered less perplexed. Had the general current of advice been followed, the notes would have been filled with attempts at emendation apparently unnecessary, though sometimes elegant, and as frequently with explanations of what none would have thought difficult. A constant peruser of Shakespeare will suppose whatever is easy to his own apprehension, will prove so to that of others, and consequently may pass over some real perplexities in silence. On the contrary, if in consideration of the different abilities of every class of readers, he should offer a comment on all harsh inversions of phrase, or peculiarities of expression, he will at once excite the disgust and displeasure of such as think their own knowledge or sagacity undervalued. It is difficult to fix a medium between doing too little and too much in the task of mere explanation. There are yet many passages unexplained and unintelligible, which may be reformed, at hazard of whatever licence, for exhibitions on the stage, in which the pleasure of the audience is chiefly to be considered; but must remain untouched by the critical editor, whose conjectures are limited by narrow bounds, and who gives only what he at least supposes his author to have written.

If it is not to be expected that each vitiated passage in Shakespeare can be restored, till a greater latitude of experiment shall be allowed; so neither can it be supposed that the force of all his allusions will be pointed out, till such books are thoroughly examined, as cannot easily at present be collected, if at all. Several of the most correct lists of our dramatic pieces exhibit the titles of plays, which are not to be met with in the completest collections. It is almost unnecessary to mention any other than Mr. Garrick’s, which, curious and extensive as it is, derives its greatest value from its accessibility^[3].

To the other evils of our civil war must be added the interruption of polite learning, and the suppression of many dramatic and poetical names, which were plunged in obscurity by tumults and revolutions, and have never since attracted curiosity. The utter neglect of ancient English literature continued so long, that many books may be supposed to be lost; and that curiosity, which has been now for some years increasing among us, wants materials for its operations. Books and pamphlets, printed originally in small numbers, being thus neglected, were soon destroyed; and though the capital authors were preserved, they were preserved to languish without regard. How little Shakespeare himself was once read, may be understood from Tate^[4], who, in his dedication to the altered play of King Lear, speaks of the original as of an obscure piece, recommended to his notice by a friend; and the author of the Tatler, having occasion to quote a few lines out of Macbeth, was content to receive them from D’Avenant’s alteration of that celebrated drama, in which almost every original beauty is either aukwardly disguised, or arbitrarily omitted. So little were the defects or peculiarities of the old writers known, even at the beginning of our century, that though the custom of alteration had prevailed to that degree in the time of Shakespeare, that it became contemptible and ridiculous, yet it is made one of Waller’s praises by a writer of his life, that he first introduced this practice into English versification.

It will be expected that some notice should be taken of the last editor of Shakespeare, and that his merits should be estimated with those of his predecessors. Little, however, can be said of a work, to the completion of which, both a large proportion of the commentary and various readings is as yet wanting. The Second Part of King Henry VI. is the only play from that edition, which has been consulted in the course of this work; for as several passages there are arbitrarily omitted, and as no notice is given when other deviations are made from the old copies, it was of little consequence to examine any further. This circumstance is mentioned, lest such accidental coincidences of opinion, as may be discovered hereafter, should be interpreted into plagiarism.

It may occasionally happen, that some of the remarks long ago produced by others, are offered again as recent discoveries. It is likewise absolutely impossible to pronounce with any degree of certainty, whence all the hints, which surnish matter for a commentary, have been collected, as they lay scattered in many books and papers, which were probably never read but once, or the particulars which they contain received only in the course of common conversation; nay, what is called plagiarism, is often no more than the result of having thought alike with others on the same subject.

The dispute about the learning of Shakespeare being now finally settled, a catalogue is added of those translated authors, whom Mr. Pope has thought proper to call

The classics of an age that heard of none.

The reader may not be displeased to have the Greek and Roman poets, orators, &c. who had been rendered accessible to our author, exposed at one view; especially as the list has received the advantage of being corrected and amplified by the Reverend Dr. Farmer, the substance of whose very decisive pamphlet is interspersed through the notes which are added in this revisal of Dr. Johnson’s Shakespeare.

To those who have advanced the reputation of our Poet, it has been endeavoured, by Dr. Johnson, in the foregoing preface, impartially to allot their dividend of fame; and it is with great regret that we now add to the catalogue, another, the consequence of whose death will perhaps affect not only the works of Shakespeare, but of many other writers. Soon after the first appearance of this edition, a disease, rapid in its progress, deprived the world of Mr. Jacob Tonson; a man, whose zeal for the improvement of English literature, and whose liberality to men of learning, gave him a just title to all the honours which men of learning can bestow. To suppose that a person employed in an extensive trade, lived in a state of indifference to loss and gain, would be to conceive a character incredible and romantic; but it may be justly said of Mr. Tonson, that he had enlarged his mind beyond solicitude about petty losses, and refined it from the desire of unreasonable profit. He was willing to admit those with whom he contracted, to the just advantage of their own labours; and had never learned to consider the author as an under-agent to the bookseller. The wealth which he inherited or acquired, he enjoyed like a man conscious of the dignity of a profession subservient to learning. His domestic life was elegant, and his charity was liberal. His manners were soft, and his conversation delicate: nor is, perhaps, any quality in him more to be censured, than that reserve which confined his acquaintance to a small number, and made his example less useful, as it was less extensive. He was the last commercial name of a family which will be long remembered; and if Horace thought it not improper to convey the Sosii to posterity; if rhetoric suffered no dishonour from Quintilian’s dedication to Trypho; let it not be thought that we disgrace Shakespeare, by appending to his works the name of Tonson.

To this prefatory advertisement I have now subjoined a chapter extracted from the Guls Hornbook, (a satirical pamphlet written by Decker in the year 1609) as it affords the reader a more complete idea of the customs peculiar to our ancient theatres, than any other publication which has hitherto fallen in my way. See this performance, page 27.

“CHAP. VI.

How a Gallant should behave himself in a Play-house.

The theater is your poet’s Royal Exchange, upon which, their muses (that are now turn’d to merchants) meeting, barter away that light commodity of words for a lighter ware than words, plaudities and the breath of the great beast, which (like the threatnings of two cowards) vanish all into aire. Plaiers and their factors, who put away the stuffe and make the best of it they possibly can (as indeed ’tis their parts so to doe) your gallant, your courtier, and your capten, had wont to be the foundest paymasters, and I thinke are still the surest chapmen: and these by meanes that their heades arc well stockt, deale upon this comical freight by the grosse; when your groundling, and gallery commoner buyes his sport by the penny, and, like a hagler is glad to utter it againe by retailing.
Sithence then the place is so free in entertainment, allowing a stoole as well to the farmer’s sonne as to your Templer: that your stinkard has the selfe same libertie to be there in his tobacco-fumes, which your sweet courtier hath: and that your carman and tinker claime as strong a voice in their sussrage, and fit to give judgment on the plaies’ life and death, as well as the proudest Momus among the tribe of critick; it is fit that hee, whom the most tailors bils do make room for, when he comes, should not be basely (like a vyoll) cas’d up in a corner.
Whether therefore the gatherers of the publique or private play-house stand to receive the aftemoone’s rent, let our gallant (having paid it) presently advance himselfe up to the throne of the stage. I meane not into the lords’ roome (which is now but the stage’s suburbs). No, those boxes by the iniquity of custome, conspiracy of waiting-women and gentlemen-ushers, that there sweat together, and the covetous sharers, are contemptibly thrust into the reare, and much new satten is there dambd by being smothered to death in darknesse. But on the very rushes where the commedy is to daunce, yea and under the state of Cambises himselfe must our feather’d estridge, like a piece of ordnance be planted valiantly (because impudently) beating downe the mewes and hisses of the opposed rascality.
For do but cast up a reckoning, what large cummings in are purs’d up by fitting on the stage. First a conspicuous eminence is gotten, by which meanes the best and most essenciall parts of a gallant (good cloathes, a proportionable legge, white hand, the Persian locke, and a tollerable beard,) are perfectly revealed.
By sitting on the stage you have a sign’d pattent to engrosse the whole commodity of censure; may lawfully presume to be a girder; and stand at the helme to steere the paſſage of scænes, yet no man shall once offer to hinder you from obtaining the title of an insolent over-weening coxcombe.
By sitting on the stage, you may (without trauelling for it) at the very next doore, aske whose play it is; and by that quest of inquiry, the law warrants you to avoid much mistaking: if you know not the author, you may raile against him; and peradventure so behave yourselfe, that you may enforce the author to know vou.
By sitting on the stage, if you be a knight, you may happily get you a mistresse: if a meere Fleet-street gentleman, a wife: but assure yourselfe by continuall residence, you are the first and principall man in election to begin the number of We three.
By spreading your body on the stage, and by being a justice in examining of plaies, you shall put yourselfe into such a true scænical authority, that some poet shall not dare to present his muse rudely before your eyes, without having first unmaskt her, rifled her, and discovered all her bare and most mystical parts before you at a taverne, when you most knightly, shal for his paines, pay for both their suppers.
By sitting on the stage, you may (with small cost) purchase the deere acquaintance of the boyes: have a good stoole for sixpence: at any time know what particular part any of the infants present: get your match lighted, examine the play-suits’ lace, and perhaps win wagers upon laying ’tis copper, &c. And to conclude, whether you be a foole or a justice of peace, a cuckold or a capten, a lord maior’s sonne or a dawcocke, a knave or an under shriefe, of what stamp soever you be, currant or counterfet, the stagelike time will bring you to most perfect light, and lay you open: neither are you to be hunted from thence though the scar-crowes in the yard hoot you, hisse at you, spit at you, yea throw dirt even in your teeth: ’tis most gentleman-like patience to endure all this, and to laugh at the silly animals. But if the rabble, with a full throat, crie away with the foole, you were worse than a mad-man to tarry by it: for the gentleman and the foole should never fit on the stage together.
Mary, let this observation go hand in hand with the rest: or rather, like a country-serving man, some five yards before them. Present not your selfe on the stage (especially at a new play) untill the quaking prologue hath (by rubbing) got cullor into his cheekes, and is ready to give the trumpets their cue that hees upon point to enter: for then it is time, as though you were one of the properties, or that you dropt of the hangings to creep from behind the arras, with your tripos or three-legged stoole in one hand, and a teston mounted betweene a fore-finger and a thumbe, in the other: for if you should bestow your person upon the vulgar, when the belly of the house is but halfe full, your apparell is quite eaten up, the sashion lost, and the proportion of your body in more danger to be devoured, then if it were served up in the Counter amongst the Poultry: avoid that as you would the bastome. It shall crowne you with rich commendation to laugh alowd in the middest of the most serious and saddest scene of the terriblest tragedy: and to let that clapper (your tongue) be tost so high that all the house may ring of it: your lords use it; your knights are apes to the lords, and dofo too: your inne-a-court-man is zany to the knights, and (many very scurvily) comes likewise limping after it: bee thou a beagle to them all, and never lin snuffing till you have sented them: for by talking and laughing (like a ploughman in a morris) you heape Pelion upon Ossa, glory upon glory: as first all the eyes in the galleries will leave walking after the players, and onely follow you: the simplest dolt in the house snatches up your name, and when he meetes you in the streetes, or that you fall into his hands in the middle of a watch, his word shall be taken for you: heele cry, Hees such a gallant, and you passe. Secondly you publish your temperance to the world, in that you seeme not to resort thither to taste vaine pleasures with a hungrie appetite; but onely as a gentleman, to spend a soolish houre or two, because you can doe nothing else. Thirdly you mightily disrelish the audience, and disgrace the author: marry, you take up (though it be at the worst hand) a strong opinion of your owne judgement, and inforce the poet to take pity of your weakenesse, and by some dedicated sonnet to bring you into a better paradice, onely to stop your mouth.
If you can (either for love or money) provide yourselfe a lodging by the water side: for above the conveniencie it brings to shun shoulder-clapping, and to ship away your cockatrice betimes in the morning, it addes a kind of state unto you, to be carried from thence to the staires of your play-house: hate a sculler (remember that) worse then to be acquainted with one ath’ scullery. No, your oares are your onely sea-crabs, boord them, and take heed you never go twice together with one paire: often shifting is a great credit to gentlemen: and that dividing of your fare wil make the poore watersnaks be ready to pul you in peeces to enjoy your custome. No matter whether upon landing you have money or no; you may swim in twentie of their boates over the river upon ticket: mary, when silver comes in, remember to pay trebble their fare, and it will make your flounder-catchers to send more thankes after you, when you doe not draw, then when you doe: for they know, it will be their owne another daie.
Before the play begins, fall to cardes; you may win or loose (as fencers doe in a prize) and beate one another by confederacie, yet share the money when you meete at supper: notwithstanding, to gul the ragga-muffins that stand a loofe gaping at you, throw the cards (having first torne foure or five of them) round about the stage, just upon the third sound, as though you had lost: it skils not if the foure knaves ly on their backs, and outface the audience, there’s none such fooles as dare take exceptions at them, because ere the play go off, better knaves than they, will fall into the company.
Now, Sir, if the writer be a fellow that hath either epigram’d you, or hath had a flirt at your mistris, or hath brought either your feather, or your red beard, or your little legs, &c. on the stage, you shall disgrace him worse then by tossing him in a blanket, or giving him the bastinado in a taverne, if in the middle of his play, (bee it pastorall or comedy, morall or tragedic) you rise with a skreud and discontented face from your stoole to be gone: no matter whether the scenes be good or no; the better they are, the worse doe you distast them: and beeing on your feete, sneake not away like a coward, but salute all your gentle acquaintance that are spred either on the rushes or on stooles about you, and draw what troope you can from the stage after you: the mimicks are beholden to you, for allowing them elbow roome: their poet cries perhaps, a pox go with you, but care not you for that; there’s no musick without frets.
Mary, if either the company, or indisposition of the weather binde you to sit it out, my counsell is then that you turne plaine ape: take up a rush and tickle the earnest eares of your fellow gallants, to make other fooles fall a laughing: mewe at the passionate speeches, blare at merrie, finde fault with the musicke, whewe at the children’s action, whistle at the songs; and above all, curse the sharers, that whereas the same day you had bestowed forty shillings on an embroidered felt and feather (Scotch-fashion) for your mistres in the court, or your punck in the clttie, within two houres after, you encounter with the very same block on the stage, when the haberdasher swore to you the impression was extant but that morning.
To conclude, hoord up the finest play-scraps you can get, upon which your leane wit may most favourly feede, for want of other stuffe, when the Arcadian and Euphuis’d gentlewomen have their tongues sharpened to set upon you: that qualitie (next to your shittlecocke) is the only furniture to a courtier that’s but a new beginner, and is but in his ABC of complement. The next places that are fil’d after the play-houses bee emptied, are (or ought to be) tavernes: into a taverne then let us next march, where the braines of one hogshead must be beaten out to make up another.”

I should have attempted on the present occasion to enumerate all other pamphlets, &c. from whence particulars relative to the conduct of our early theatres might be collected, but that Dr. Percy, in his first volume of the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, (third edit. p. 128, &c.) has extracted such passages from them as tend to the illustration of this subject; to which he has added more accurate remarks than my experience in these matters would have enabled me to supply. The GLOBE on the Bancke Side, where Shakespeare acted.

From the long Antwerp View of London in the Pepysian Library,

With the drawing from which this cut was made, I was favoured by the Reverend Mr. Henley, of Harrow on the Hill.

Steevens.

1. “I must not (says Mr. Rowe in his dedication to the duke of Somerset) pretend to have restor’d this work to the exactness of the author’s original manuscripts: those are lost, or, at least, are gone beyond any inquiry I could make; so that there was nothing left, but to compare the several editions, and give the true reading as well as I could from thence. This I have endeavour’d to do pretty carefully, and render’d very many places intelligible, that were not so before. In some of the editions, especially the last, there were many lines (and in Hamlet one whole scene) left out together; these are now all supply’d. I fear your grace will find some faults, but I hope they are mostly litteral, and the errors of the press.” Would not any one, from this declaration, suppose that Mr. Rowe (who does not appear to have consulted a single quarto) had at least compared the folios with each other?
2. Mr. T. Warton in his excellent Remarks on the Fairy Queen of Spenser, offers a similar apology for having introduced illustrations from obsolete literature. “I fear (says he) I shall be censured for quoting too many pieces of this sort. But experience has fatally proved, that the commentator on Spenser, Jonson, and the rest of our elder poets, will in vain give specimens of his classical erudition, unless, at the same time, he brings to his work a mind intimately acquainted with those books, which, though now forgotten, were yet in common use and high repute about the time in which his authors respectively wrote, and which they consequently must have read. While these are unknown, many allusions and many imitations will either remain obscure, or lose half their beauty and propriety: “as the figures vanish when the canvas is decayed.”
   “Pope laughs at Theobald for giving us, in his edition of Shakespeare, a sample of
   ——all such reading as was never read.
   But these strange and ridiculous books which Theobald quoted, were unluckily the very books which Shakespeare himself had studied; the knowledge of which enabled that useful editor to explain so many difficult allusions and obsolete customs in his poet, which otherwise could never have been understood. For want of this sort of literature, Pope tells us that the dreadful Sagittary in Troilus and Cressida, signifies Teucer, so celebrated for his skill in archery. Had he deigned to consult an old history, called the Destruction of Troy, a book which was the delight of Shakepeare and of his age, he would have found that this formidable archer, was no other than an imaginary beast, which the Grecian army brought against Troy. If Shakespeare is worth reading, he is worth explaining; and the researches used for so valuable and elegant a purpose, merit the thanks of genius and candour, not the satire of prejudice and ignorance. That labour, which so essentially contributes to the service of true taste, deserves a more honourable repository than The Temple of Dullness.”
3. There is reason to think that about the time of the Reformation, great numbers of plays were printed, though few of that age are now to be found; for part of queen Elizabeth’s injunctions in 1559, are particularly directed to the suppressing of “Many pamphlets, playes, and ballads: that no manner of person shall enterprize to print any such, &c. but under certain restrictions.” Vid. Sect. V. This observation is taken from Dr. Percy’s Additions to his Essay on the Origin of the English Stage. It appears likewise from a page at the conclusion of the second vol. of the entries belonging to the Stationers’ company, that in the 41st year of queen Elizabeth, many new restraints on booksellers were laid. Among these are the following, “That no plaies be printed excepte they bee allowed by such as have auctoritye.” The records of the Stationers however contain the entries of some which have never yet been met with by the most successsul collectors; nor are their titles to be found in any registers of the stage, whether ancient or modern. It should seem from the same volumes that it was customary for the Stationers to seize the whole impression of any work that had given offence, and burn it publickly at their hall, in obedience to the edicts of the archbishop of Canterbury, and the bishop of London, who sometimes enjoyed these literary executions at their respective palaces. Among other works condemned to the flames by these discerning prelates, were the complete satires of bishop Hall.
   Mr. Theobald, at the conclusion of the preface to his first edition of Shakespeare, asserts, that exclusive of the dramas of Ben Jonson, and B. and Fletcher, he had read “above 800 of old English plays.” He omitted this assertion, however, on the republication of the same work, and, I hope, he did so, through a consciousness of its utter falshood; for if we except the plays of the authors already mentioned, it would be difficult to discover half the number that were written early enough to serve the purpose for which he pretends to have perused this imaginary flock of ancient literature.
   I might add, that the private collection of Mr. Theobald, which, including the plays of Jonson, Fletcher and Shakespeare, did not amount to many more than an hundred, remained entire in the hands of the late Mr. Tonson, till the time of his death. It does not appear that any other collection but the Harleian was at that time formed; nor does Mr. Theobald’s edition contain any intrinsic evidences of so comprehensive an examination of our eldest dramatic writers, as he assumes to himself the merit of having made.
4. In the year 1707 Mr. N. Tate published a tragedy called Injured Love, or the Cruel Husband, and in the title page of it calls himself, “Author of the tragedy called King Lear.”