Good night to me and all the world for ever. _Dies._
_King._ So impious!
_Duch._ ’T is most true; Alvarez’ blood
Is now reveng’d; I find my brain return,
And every straggling sense repairing home. 200
_Car._ I have deserv’d you should turn from me, sir.
My life hath been prodigiously wicked;
My blood is now the kingdom’s balm. Oh, sir,
I have abus’d your ear, your trust, your people,
And my own sacred office: my conscience 205
Feels now the sting. Oh, show your charity,
And with your pardon, like a cool soft gale,
Fan my poor sweating soul, that wanders through
Unhabitable climes, and parched deserts.
But I am lost, if the great world forgive me, 210
Unless I find your mercy for a crime
You know not, madam, yet, against your life,
I must confess, more than my black intents
Upon your honour; you’re already poison’d.
_King._ By whom? 215
_Car._ By me,
In the revenge I ow’d Columbo’s loss;
With your last meat was mixt a poison, that
By subtle, and by sure degrees, must let
In death.
_King._ Look to the duchess, our physicians!
_Car._ Stay; 221
I will deserve her mercy, though I cannot
Call back the deed. In proof of my repentance,
If the last breath of a now dying man
May gain your charity and belief, receive 225
This ivory box; in it an antidote,
’Bove that they boast the great magistral medicine:
That powder, mixt with wine, by a most rare
And quick access to the heart, will fortify it
Against the rage of the most nimble poison, 230
I am not worthy to present her with it.
Oh, take it, and preserve her innocent life.
_1 Lord._ Strange, he should have a good thing
in such readiness.
_Car._ ’T is that, which in my jealousy and state,
Trusting to false predictions of my birth, 235
That I should die by poison, I preserv’d
For my own safety; wonder not, I made
That my companion was to be my refuge.
_Enter_ Servant _with a bowl of wine_.
_1 Lord._ Here’s some touch of grace.
_Car._ In greater proof of my pure thoughts, I take 240
This first, and with my dying breath confirm
My penitence; it may benefit her life,
But not my wounds. [_He drinks._] Oh, hasten to preserve her;
And though I merit not her pardon, let not
Her fair soul be divorc’d. 245
[_The_ DUCHESS _takes the bowl and drinks_.]
_King._ This is some charity; may it prosper, madam!
_Val._ How does your grace?
_Duch._ And must I owe my life to him, whose death
Was my ambition? Take this free acknowledgment;
I had intent, this night, with my own hand 250
To be Alvarez’ justicer.
_King._ You were mad,
And thought past apprehension of revenge.
_Duch._ That shape I did usurp, great sir, to give
My heart more freedom and defence; but when
Hernando came to visit me, I thought 255
I might defer my execution;
Which his own rage suppli’d without my guilt,
And when his lust grew high, met with his blood.
_1 Lord._ The Cardinal smiles.
_Car._ Now my revenge has met
With you, nimble duchess! I have took 260
A shape[4406] to give my act more freedom too,
And now I am sure she’s poison’d with that dose
I gave her last.
_King._ Thou’rt not so horrid?
_Duch._ Ha! some cordial.
_Car._ Alas, no preservative
Hath wings to overtake it; were her heart 265
Lock’d in a quarry, it would search and kill
Before the aids can reach it. I am sure
You sha’ not now laugh at me.
_King._ How come you by that poison?
_Car._ I prepar’d it,
Resolving, when I had enjoy’d her, which 270
The colonel prevented, by some art
To make her take it, and by death conclude
My last revenge. You have the fatal story.
_King._ This is so great a wickedness, it will
Exceed belief.
_Car._ I knew I could not live. 275
_Surg._ Your wounds, sir, were not desperate.
_Car._ Not mortal? Ha! were they not mortal?
_Surg._ If I have skill in surgery.
_Car._ Then I have caught myself in my own engine.
_2 Lord._ It was your fate, you said, to die by poison. 280
_Car._ That was my own prediction, to abuse
Your faith; no human art can now resist it:
I feel it knocking at the seat of life;
It must come in; I have wrackt all my own
To try your charities: now it would be rare, 285
If you but waft me with a little prayer;
My wings that flag may catch the wind; but ’tis
In vain, the mist is risen, and there’s none
To steer my wand’ring bark. _Dies._
_1 Lord._ He’s dead.
_King._ With him
Die all deceived trust.
_2 Lord._ This was a strange 290
Impiety.
_King._ When men
Of gifts and sacred function once decline
From virtue, their ill deeds transcend example.
_Duch._ The minute’s come that I must take my leave, too.
Your hand, great sir; and though you be a king, 295
We may exchange forgiveness. Heaven forgive,
And all the world! I come, I come, Alvarez. _Dies._
_King._ Dispose their bodies for becoming funeral.
How much are kings abus’d by those they take
To royal grace, whom, when they cherish most
By nice indulgence, they do often arm 301
Against themselves! from whence this maxim springs:
None have more need of perspectives[4407] than kings. _Exeunt._
EPILOGUE
_Within._ Master Pollard! Where’s Master Pollard, for the epilogue?
_He is thrust upon the stage, and falls._
_Epi._ [_rising._] I am coming to you, gentlemen; the poet
Has help’d me thus far on my way, but I’ll
Be even with him. the play is a tragedy,
The first that ever he compos’d for us, 5
Wherein he thinks he has done prettily.
_Enter_ Servant.
And I am sensible.—I prithee look,
Is nothing out of joint? Has he broke nothing?
_Serv._ No, sir, I hope.
_Epi._ Yes, he has broke his epilogue all to pieces. 10
Canst thou put it together again?
_Serv._ Not I, sir.
_Epi._ Nor I; prithee be gone. [_Exit_ Serv.]—Hum!—Master poet,
I have a teeming mind to be reveng’d.—
You may assist, and not be seen in’t now, 15
If you please, gentlemen, for I do know
He listens to the issue of his cause;
But blister not your hands in his applause;
Your private smile, your nod, or hem! to tell
My fellows that you like the business well; 20
And when, without a clap, you go away,
I’ll drink a small-beer health to his second day;
And break his heart, or make him swear and rage
He’ll write no more for the unhappy stage.
But that’s too much; so we should lose; faith, shew it, 25
And if you like his play, ’t ’s as well he knew it.
ADDITIONAL NOTES ON THE PLAYS
ENDYMION
_Endymion_ was published in 1591, and the title-page states that it
had been played “before the Queenes Maiestie at Greenwich on Candlemas
day at night, by the Chyldren of Paules.” It is fairly certain that
this performance took place on Feb. 2, 1586. The present text is based
on Bond’s reprint of the quarto of 1591, with slight additions from
the version included by Blount in his _Sixe Court Comedies_, 1632.
Like most of Lyly’s plays, _Endymion_ is an allegory of the court,
with a mythological basis. Very little, however, is here borrowed
from the myth of the Moon-goddess and her lover, and the plot is
evidently invented with a view to carrying contemporary allusions.
Beginning with Halpin’s paper in 1843, many attempts have been made
to read the riddle, the latest and most ingenious being that of M.
Feuillerat, who identities Cynthia with Elizabeth, Tellus with Mary
of Scots, and Endymion with her son, James VI. The credit of having
disproved the Endymion-Leicester identification is shared with M.
Feuillerat by Dr. P. W. Long, who seeks to read the play as mainly an
allegory of Heavenly Beauty (Cynthia) and Earthly Beauty (Tellus), an
interpretation perhaps not wholly incompatible with the more personal
solution.
THE OLD WIVES TALE
_The Old Wife’s Tale_, as the title should appear in modern spelling
(the reference being, of course, to Madge), was first published in
1595, and on this quarto, as reprinted by Gummere, the present text
is based. The precise date of production has not been definitely
ascertained, but it was probably not far from 1590. Source, in the
usual sense of the term, the play can hardly be said to have; it is a
medley of a dozen themes from current English folk-tales. Realistic in
diction, romantic in subject-matter, the play was a notable innovation
in its day; and through the peculiar irony of the satire on romance,
Peele introduced a new and subtler form of humor into English comedy.
Both in its main theme, and in its use of the induction, this drama is
an interesting forerunner of _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_.
FRIAR BACON AND FRIAR BUNGAY
This play was first printed in quarto in 1594, and that edition (Q₁),
as printed by Collins and Gayley, forms the basis of the present text.
The existence of a second quarto, said to have been issued in 1599, has
been rendered highly doubtful by Gayley. Later editions appeared in
1630 (Q₃) and 1655 (Q₄). The date of production was probably 1589-90.
That part of the plot dealing with the marvelous exploits of Friar
Bacon is drawn from _The Famous Historic of Friar Bacon_, a late
sixteenth-century account of the legends that had gathered round the
name of the Oxford Franciscan, Roger Bacon (born 1214). The love story
is Greene’s own. It seems probable that this comedy was conceived as
a foil to Marlowe’s tragedy of _Doctor Faustus_, some of the scenes
approaching an actual parody, and stress being laid on the superiority
of the English to the German necromancer.
TAMBURLAINE
Both parts of _Tamburlaine_ were entered in the Stationers’ Register on
Aug. 14, 1590, and they appeared together in octavo in 1590, and again
in 1592. The alleged existence of editions of 1593, 1597, and 1600 is
unsupported by evidence; and the third edition seems to be that of
1605 (part i.) and 1606 (part ii.) printed from the first. The issue
of 1590 is the basis of the present text. The first part of the play
was probably produced three years before, in 1587, and the second part
in the following year. All the early editions are anonymous, nor does
there survive any pre-Restoration statement as to the authorship; yet
so convincing is the internal evidence that the ascription to Marlowe
may be regarded as indubitable.
The main source of part i. is Fortescue’s _Foreste_, 1571, a
translation of Pedro Mexia’s _Silva de varia lecion_, 1543. Additional
details were derived from _The Notable History of the Saracens_ by
Thomas Newton, 1575, and from Petrus Perondinus, 1553. The title-role
was first acted by the gigantic Edward Alleyn.
DOCTOR FAUSTUS
Allusions to contemporary events in the Low Countries fix the limits
for the date of _Doctor Faustus_ as 1585 and 1590; and the evidence
of style places it after _Tamburlaine_. A ballad which seems to be
inspired by the play was licensed in February, 1589, so that it is
generally agreed that the first production of the play fell in the
winter of 1588-89. “A booke calld _the plaie of Doctor Faustus_” was
entered in the Stationers’ Register on Jan. 7, 1601, but if an edition
was published in that year, no copy has survived. The earliest extant
edition is that of 1604 (Q₁), on which the present text is based.
This version was reprinted in 1609 and 1611; and in 1616 appeared an
enlarged form, followed in the later quartos of 1619, 1620, 1624, and
1631. An edition issued in 1663 has many additions and excisions, but
none with any claim to authority. The question of the authorship of
the amplifications in the quarto of 1616 is still under discussion,
but recent opinion tends to the view that, except for a few scattered
lines, the additions may well be the work of William Birde and Samuel
Rowley, engaged by Henslowe in 1602 for this purpose. Marlowe’s
knowledge of the Faust legend is derived from the German _Faustbuch_,
published at Frankfurt by Johann Spies in 1587, which he probably knew
through an English translation.
THE JEW OF MALTA
The earliest mention of this play occurs in Henslowe’s _Diary_, where
a performance is noted as taking place on February 26, 1592, and it
is implied that the tragedy was not then new. Its composition is
conjecturally placed about 1590. On May 17, 1594, it was entered on the
Stationers’ Register, but no edition had come down to us earlier than a
corrupt quarto of 1633, which is thus our sole authority for the text.
As to the source from which Marlowe drew his material, nothing definite
is known. Kellner (_Englishe Studien_, X. 80) has elaborated a parallel
between the career of Marlowe’s hero and that of a sixteenth-century
Portuguese Jew, Michesius, who is mentioned by a number of historians;
but such accounts as have been found could have furnished only
suggestions.
This play was one of the most popular on the Elizabethan stage,
Henslowe recording thirty-six performances before June 21, 1596.
EDWARD II
When _The troublesom Reign and Lamentable Death of Edward the Second_
was entered in the Stationers’ Register on July 6, 1593, the play had
been already on the stage for some time; and it is probable that it was
first produced in 1591 or 1592. No copy issued in 1593 is extant, and
the earliest surviving quarto belongs to 1594. On this, the best of
the early prints, the present text is based. Other editions followed
in 1598, 1612, and 1622. Marlowe’s main source for the historical
basis of the play was Holinshed, Fabyan’s and Stowe’s _Chronicles_
having also supplied some minor details. Chronological accuracy is
often disregarded, yet in its main lines the action in substantially
faithful to history. The play is Marlowe’s ripest production, and we
are fortunate in having the text preserved in a purer state than that
of any of his other plays.
In the four plays by Marlowe, Tucker Brooke’s reprints of the early
editions haye been used.
THE SPANISH TRAGEDY
The most definite indication of the date of this, one of the most
popular of all Elizabethan plays, is found in an allusion in the
Induction to Ben Jonson’s _Bartholomew Fair_ (1614), where it seems
to be implied that _The Spanish Tragedy_ was then twenty-five or
thirty years old. This gives us the years 1584-89 as limits, and the
absence of any reference to the Armada, in a play laid in Spain, has
led critics to place it before 1588. The year 1586 may, perhaps, be
fairly conjectured as coming within a year of the date of composition.
In 1592 it was being successfully performed; and on October 6 of that
year it was entered for publication. The first edition has disappeared
entirely; and the earliest extant is an undated quarto in the British
Museum. Other quartos appeared in 1594 and 1599; and in the edition of
1602 are first found the additions made to the play by Ben Jonson, and
included in the later quartos of 1610, 1615, 1618, 1623, and 1633. The
present text is based on the B. M. quarto for Kyd’s part of the play,
and on that of 1602 for the additions, which are pointed out in the
foot-notes; and I have availed myself of the collations of both Manly
and Boas. All the early editions are anonymous; and the ascription of
the play to Kyd is made on the authority of a passage in Heywood’s
_Apology for Actors_, 1612.
BUSSY D’AMBOIS
The first quarto of _Bussy D’Ambois_ appeared in 1607, and a second
in 1608. In 1641 a third quarto appeared, which claimed to be “much
corrected and amended by the author before his death,” and this was
reissued in 1646 and 1657. The present text is based on Boas’s reprint
of the quarto of 1641. The date of the production of the play is
uncertain. Certain entries in Henslowe’s _Diary_ point to 1598, but if
the play was on the stage as early as this, it must have been revised
before its publication in 1607. _Bussy D’Ambois_ belongs to the group
of Chapman’s plays dealing with almost contemporary French politics.
D’Ambois himself was born in 1549, and was murdered by Monsoreau’s
retainers in 1579. The earliest extant accounts of his career are
later in date than the play, and the precise sources of Chapman’s
information have not yet been found. But from the later descriptions it
is clear that the action of the play, and the view given of the hero’s
character, are substantially historical.
EVERY MAN IN HIS HUMOUR
This play, the first example of the “comedy of humours,” was performed
in 1598 with great success. It was published in quarto in 1601, and in
this version the characters bear Italian names, and the scene is laid
in Italy. It was revised about 1606, and this second version, with the
names and scene made English and with many other changes, was published
in the folio of 1616. The present text is based directly on the folio.
The plot, which seems to have been entirely of Jonson’s invention, is
constructed with a view to those classical standards of comedy, which
Jonson sought to uphold against the prevailing romantic license.
SEJANUS, HIS FALL
_Sejanus_ was first performed in 1603, but, as Jonson admits, failed to
please the audience. It was published in 1605, and again in the folio
of 1616. On this latter the present text is based. It is not necessary
to discuss the sources of this impressive tragedy, since Jonson has
supplied us in his ample foot-notes with documentary evidence for
nearly every fact in the play. These notes have been reproduced in the
present edition, through the first scene, which is probably as far as
the modern reader will care to study them. The delineation of Tiberius
is one of the most successful attempts in our literature to recreate a
highly complex historical character.
VOLPONE, OR THE FOX
_Volpone_ was performed in 1605 or 1606 at the Globe theatre and at
both Oxford and Cambridge, and in 1607 was printed in quarto. It was
included in the folio of 1616, on which the present text is based. The
main plot is founded on an episode in the _Satiricon_ of Petronius
Arbiter; but the parts of Celia and of Sir Politic and Lady Would-be
are of Jonson’s own invention. The song, “Drink to me only with thine
eyes,” is practically a translation from Philostratus, and “Come, my
Celia” is imitated from Catullus. The comedy is a terrible satire
on some of the most sordid aspects of human nature, and the superb
skill with which it is constructed barely suffices to counteract the
depressing effect of the types of character it displays.
THE ALCHEMIST
_The Alchemist_, which may, perhaps, be regarded as Jonson’s supreme
masterpiece in comedy, was performed in 1610, and published in
quarto in 1612. The present text is based on that of the folio of
1616. It has been frequently stated that for the plot of this play
Jonson was indebted to Plautus, but the borrowing is very slight. In
the _Mostellaria_ there is a scene which might have suggested the
opening dialogue of _The Alchemist_, and another which bears a slight
resemblance to Face’s attempt to hoodwink his master in V. i. In the
_Poenulus_, a man speaks Punic, and is misunderstood somewhat as
Surly’s Spanish is misunderstood in IV. iii. But the plot as a whole
is Jonson’s own, and the alchemical and astrological matter is drawn
from a wide acquaintance with current treatises on these subjects.
Attempts have been made to identify Subtle and Face with the famous
Dee and Kelley, but identification is much too strong a word. Hathaway
has pointed out a more striking correspondence with the activities of
Simon Forman, a notorious quack of Jonson’s day. _The Alchemist_ has
been credited with a considerable effectiveness in clearing London of
the type of impostors which it ridicules and exposes so trenchantly and
amusingly.
THE SHOEMAKERS’ HOLIDAY
This, the first of Dekker’s comedies, was acted in 1599, and printed in
the following year. On the text of this quarto, as reprinted by Warnke
and Proescholdt, the present text is based. The story of the partly
historical Simon Eyre was found by Dekker in one of the tales in Thomas
Deloney’s _Gentle Craft_, 1597; but the main interest of the play lies
in its picture of London tradespeople in the author’s own day, and for
this Dekker needed no literary source.
THE HONEST WHORE
From a passage in Henslowe’s _Diary_ it appears that Middleton had some
share in the first part of _The Honest Whore_, but it is not supposed
that he wrote any considerable portion of it. The second part is wholly
Dekker’s, and is generally regarded as superior to the first. The first
edition of part i. appeared in 1604, of part ii. in 1630. Pearson’s
reprint, on which the present text is based, follows the 1605 quarto
of part i. and the 1630 of part ii. A copy of the 1635 quarto of the
double play has been used to check Pearson’s text. No source of the
plot has been discovered. The play is a highly characteristic product
of the time, both in its picture of the vices of the city, and in its
sound and straightforward, if somewhat coarse, handling of the moral
issues involved. The character of Friscobaldo, in part ii., afforded
Hazlitt the theme for what he himself justly regarded as one of his
finest pieces of critical interpretation.
THE MALCONTENT
_The Malcontent_ was first issued in 1604; and in the same year a
second quarto appeared with the title-page, “The Malcontent. Augmented
by Marston. With the Additions played by the Kings Maiesties servants.
Written by Ihon Webster. 1604. At London Printed by V. S. for William
Aspley, and are to be sold at his shop in Paules Church-yard.” The
title-page of the first edition gives John Marston as author; the
date and publisher are the same. The second edition, on which the
present text is directly based, contains, as new matter, the Induction
and a number of additions, marked in the present text by brackets
and specified in the foot-notes. Its title-page has proved highly
misleading; the facts seem to be that Webster supplied the Induction
when the play was revived by the King’s men; and that the other
additions are restorations of passages from Marston’s original play
which had been cut for acting purposes. Stoll, who has made this
clear, places the composition of the play in 1600, and has given the
tragi-comedy a new importance, in addition to its intrinsic vigor
and effectiveness, by arguing forcibly for it as an influence on the
characters of Shakespeare’s Jaques and Hamlet. The source of the plot
has so far not been discovered.
A WOMAN KILLED WITH KINDNESS
This tragedy, one of the earliest and most pathetic examples of
domestic drama, was first published in 1607; and the present text is
based on Pearson’s reprint of this quarto. The play was acted in 1603,
as appears from an entry in Henslowe’s _Diary_. The title, like those
of several other plays by Heywood, was a proverbial phrase. Creizenach
(IV. 264) states that Heywood borrowed the two plots of this drama from
Margaret of Navarre and from Bandello. The thirty-second tale in the
_Heptameron_ does indeed tell of a husband who refrained from killing a
wife taken in adultery, but the resemblance is far from close.
THE KNIGHT OF THE BURNING PESTLE
_The Knight of the Burning Pestle_ was printed in quarto in 1613, and
on Murch’s reproduction of this edition the present text is based.
A second and a third quarto were issued in 1635, and the play was
included in the second folio edition of Beaumont and Fletcher in 1679.
The date of composition is uncertain, but recent opinion tends to
place it about 1610. It cannot be said that there is as yet a general
agreement as to the respective snares of the two authors in this
comedy, but according to the most careful examination of the question
so far made, that of Dr. Murch, most of the play should be ascribed to
Beaumont, Fletcher having probably written only the three love scenes,
I. i. 1-60; III. i.; and IV. iv. 18-93. In spite of the similarity
between the satirical purpose of this play and of _Don Quixote_, it
has not been shown that the authors had any knowledge of the work
of Cervantes, or that they could read Spanish. (The first English
translation of _Don Quixote_ appeared in 1612.) In the mock-heroic part
of the play, the object of the satire was the type of play founded upon
medieval romance and popular at that time among the tradespeople of
London; and of this type, Heywood’s _Four Prentices of London_ seems to
have been especially in view. Koeppel has pointed out the resemblance
between the coffin scene in Act IV. and an episode in Marston’s
_Antonio and Mellida_ (1602). The love-plot is too commonplace to have
a definitely assignable source, and the scenes between Merrythought and
his wife, like those of the Induction, are, one may be sure, due to
direct observation of contemporary life and manners.
PHILASTER
The first quarto of _Philaster_, issued in 1620, seems to have been
unauthorized, and to have been made up in part from a report taken down
at a performance. At the beginning and end it is quite different from
the other quartos. The second quarto, 1622, as reprinted by Thorndike,
is the basis for the present text, with occasional readings from the
later quartos and the folio of 1679. The play was probably written
about 1608-10. The respective shares of the two authors are difficult
to assign. Oliphant and Thorndike give to Fletcher I. i. 99-360; II.
ii.; II. iv. 69-203; passages in III. ii.; V. iii.; and V. iv.; the
rest to Beaumont; the prose scenes with less assurance. Macaulay gives
little beyond V. iii., iv. to Fletcher. This distribution is made
mainly on the grounds of the characteristics of the metre; it does
not exclude the probability of intimate collaboration in plot and
characterization. The story of the play seems to have been original,
though several of the motives are common enough. There is marked
indebtedness to _Hamlet_, and much resemblance to _Cymbeline_, though
Thorndike has argued plausibly for the view that in the latter case
Shakespeare was the borrower.
THE MAID’S TRAGEDY
As in the case of _Philaster_, the first quarto of the _The Maid’s
Tragedy_ (1619) is corrupt and unauthorized. The second quarto (1622),
with Thorndike’s collations of the first and third (1630), is the
basis for the present text. The date of composition is probably about
1609-11. There is more agreement here than in the case of _Philaster_
as to the respective shares of the joint authors. Most critics give
Fletcher II. ii; IV. i; V. i. 1-111; V. ii; the rest to Beaumont, with
the exception of I. ii, which is uncertain. Macaulay gives II. ii. also
to Beaumont. The source of the plot has not been found, though minor
resemblances have been noted, such as that of the duel between Aspatia
and Amintor, to the fight between Parthenia and Amphialus in Sidney’s
_Arcadia_, book iii, and that of the quarrel between Melantius and
Amintor to that between Brutus and Cassius in _Julius Caesar_.
THE FAITHFUL SHEPHERDESS
The first quarto of _The Faithful Shepherdess_ is undated, but it was
certainly issued before May, 1610, and the play had been unsuccessfully
produced not long before, perhaps in 1608 or 1609. The present text is
based on the first edition, and is dependent on the collations in the
Glover and Waller edition of Beaumont and Fletcher. Fletcher’s chief
model in this pastoral seems to have been Guarini’s _Pastor Fido_, and
some few details are borrowed from Spenser; but the plot itself seems
to be original. The play, as Fletcher confesses in his address _To the
Reader_, was unsuccessful on the stage, but the beauty of its lyric and
descriptive poetry has given it, in spite of its weak dramatic quality,
a distinguished place in literature. It is notable also as having in
part suggested Milton’s _Comus_.
THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE
_The Wild-Goose Chase_, we are told by the publisher of the first
folio edition of Beaumont and Fletcher, was lost when that volume was
compiled; it reappeared later, and was issued separately, in folio, in
1652. A second edition appeared in the folio of 1679. The present text
is based on the reprint of Waller, following, however, the edition of
1652 in preference to that of 1679. The comedy is known to have been
acted as early as 1621. No source for the plot seems as yet to have
been found. Farquhar based on it his comedy of _The Inconstant_, a
fact which points to the obvious relationship between the Fletcherian
comedy, of which this is a typical example, and the drama of the
Restoration.
THE DUCHESS OF MALFI
The first edition of _The Duchess of Malfi_ appeared in quarto in 1623,
and was followed by others in 1640, 1678, and 1708. The present text
follows chiefly the Harvard copy of the first quarto, with occasional
readings supplied by Sampson’s collation of the other editions. The
date of first performance cannot be later than 1614, since the actor
who created the part of Antonio died in that year. The main plot is
taken from Painter’s _Palace of Pleasure_, vol. II, Nov. 23 (1567).
Painter translated his story from Belle-Forest’s paraphrase (1565) of
the twenty-sixth novella of Bandello (1554). The story appears in many
places, and had been dramatized by Lope de Vega. Crawford (_Notes and
Queries_, Sept. 17-Nov. 12, 1904) has shown many incidental and even
literal borrowings from Sidney’s _Arcadia_. Among the elements in the
play not found in Painter are the underplot of Julia and the Cardinal,
the scenes of torture, and the most of the fifth act. Some of these
are derived from the tradition of the tragedy of revenge, especially
as represented by Shakespeare, Marston, and Tourneur; but, in spite of
frequent echoes, this impressive tragedy, almost the last of its kind,
derives its vitality mainly from the powerful and sombre imagination of
Webster.
A TRICK TO CATCH THE OLD ONE
This comedy was licensed October 7, 1607, and published in quarto in
1608. A second edition appeared in 1616. The present text is based
directly on the copy of the first quarto in the Boston Public Library,
with the aid of the readings from the second quarto given by Bullen.
The plot is supposed to have given Massinger a suggestion for _A
New Way to Pay Old Debts_, but where Middleton found it, if he did
not originate it, is not known. This play is an excellent example
of Middleton’s comedies of intrigue and manners, full of bustle and
fun, more careful of theatrical effect than of moral or aesthetic
consistency.
THE CHANGELING
_The Changeling_ was performed as early as 1623, but did not appear
in print till 1653. On a copy of this quarto in the Harvard Library
the present text is based. The source of the tragic plot is the fourth
history in book i. of John Reynolds’s _Triumph of God’s Revenge against
Murder_ (1621), but the prose narrative is not followed closely. The
under-plot, which gives its title to the play, may be original. Miss
Wiggin assigns to Rowley the whole under-plot, and the opening and
closing scenes of the main plot. Symons finds the greatness of the play
as a whole due to the collaboration of the two authors, and beyond the
powers of either alone (Cf. Camb. Hist. of Eng. Lit., vi. 76-7).
A NEW WAY TO PAY OLD DEBTS
This play, Massinger’s masterpiece in comedy, appeared in quarto in
1633, and on the Harvard Library copy of this edition the present text
is based. The play was acted before 1626, and Fleay places it as early
as 1622. Few plays of this whole period have held the English stage so
continuously or so long as this. The central idea of the plot seems to
have been taken from Middleton’s _A Trick to Catch the Old One_; but
there is almost as great a difference in the dramatic method between
the two plays as there is in moral tone. Massinger’s didacticism here
finds eloquent expression, without destroying theatrical effectiveness.
Prototypes of Sir Giles Overreach and Greedy have been found in the
notorious monopolist, Sir Giles Mompesson and his tool, Michael.
THE BROKEN HEART
The only early edition of _The Broken Heart_ was published in 1633,
and the present text is based on a copy of this quarto in the Boston
Public Library. There is no evidence as to the date of composition
except the hitherto unnoted fact that _The Garland of Good Will_,
mentioned in IV. ii. 15, was published in 1631. The prologue seems
to imply that the plot of the play is founded on fact, and Sherman
has argued plausibly that the reference is to the story of Penelope
Devereux, Sidney’s “Stella,” whose second husband Ford had eulogised
in his first publication, _Fame’s Memorial_ (1606). It is certain
that Ford was interested in both Sidney and Stella, and there are
many correspondences between their situation and that of Orgilus and
Penthea. The catastrophe is, of course, entirely changed; but in the
spiritual situation there is much to recall the sonnets of Astrophel to
Stella. There are traces of the influence of the _Arcadia_ also in the
play, such as the laying of the plot in Sparta; and in the delineation
of the jealousy of Bassanes Ford draws upon Burton’s _Anatomy of
Melancholy_.
THE LADY OF PLEASURE
_The Lady of Pleasure_ was published in quarto in 1637, and the present
text is based on a copy of this edition in the Harvard Library. The
play, a good example of Shirley’s comedy of manners, was produced in
1635. No source has been discovered for the plot. Like Fletcher’s
_Wild-Goose Chase_, this type of Shirley’s comedies is important in
measuring the approach made toward the Restoration comedy before the
Puritan Revolution.
THE CARDINAL
This tragedy, regarded by Shirley as his greatest play, and in fact
no unworthy piece to close a volume representing the drama of that
age, appeared in a volume of _Six New Plays_ in 1653, the date on the
title-page of _The Cardinal_ being 1652. On a copy of this octavo in
the Harvard Library the present text is based. The play was acted in
1641, and thus belongs to the last few months before the theatres were
closed by the Long Parliament. It is probable that Webster’s _Duchess
of Malfi_ afforded more than a suggestion for the plot, but otherwise
no source has been found. The play was popular both on its first
appearance and when it was revived after the Restoration.
BIBLIOGRAPHIES
GENERAL WORKS ON THE ELIZABETHAN DRAMA
REGISTER OF THE STATIONERS’ COMPANY, 1554-1640. Transcript by E. Arber.
5 vols. 1875-94.
HENSLOWE’S DIARY. Ed. W. W. Greg. 2 vols. 1904.
COLLIER (J. P.), History of English Dramatic Poetry. New ed. 3 vols.
1879.
FLEAY (F. G.), Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, 1559-1642.
2 vols. 1891.
FLEAY (F. G.), A Chronicle History of the London Stage, 1890.
WARD (A. W.), History of English Dramatic Literature to the Death of
Queen Anne. 2d ed. 3 vols. 1899.
GREG (W. W.), A List of English Plays written before 1643 and printed
before 1700. Bibliographical Society. 1900.
CREIZENACH (W.), Geschichte des neueren Dramas. Vols. I-IV. Halle,
1893-1909.
THORNDIKE (A. H.), Tragedy. Boston, 1908.
SCHELLING (F. E.), Elizabethan Drama. Boston, 1908.
HAZLITT (W.), Lectures on the Dramatic Poets of the Age of Elizabeth,
in Works, ed. Waller and Glover, vol. VI., 1903.
LAMB (C.), Specimens of English Dramatic Poets. Ed. Gollancz (I.), 2
vols. 1908.
COLERIDGE (S. T.), Literary Remains, vol. II., 1836.
SYMONDS (J. A.), Shakespere’s Predecessors in the English Drama. 1881.
LOWELL (J. R.), The Old English Dramatists, 1892.
SWINBURNE (A. C.), The Age of Shakespeare, 1908.
The Cambridge History of English Literature, vols. V. and VI.
Cambridge, 1910.
The Dictionary of National Biography (for lives of the dramatists).
JOHN LYLY
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Campaspe, 1584. Sapho and Phao, 1584. Endymion, 1591. Gallathea, 1592.
Midas, 1592. Mother Bombie, 1594. The Woman in the Moon, 1597. Love’s
Metamorphosis, 1601.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Blount (E.), Six Court Comedies, 1632.—Fairholt (F. W.), 2 vols.,
1858.—Bond (R. W.), 3 vols., Oxford, 1902.
ENDYMION
Ed. Baker (G. P.), New York, 1894.
CRITICISM, etc.[4408]
Child (C. G.), John Lyly and Euphuism, in Münchener Beiträge, VII.,
Erlangen and Leipzig, 1894.—Halpin (N. J.), Oberon’s Vision in M.
N. Dream, illustrated by comparison with Lyly’s Endymion, [Old]
Shakespeare Soc. Pub. 1843.—Long (P. W.), The Purport of Lyly’s
Endymion, Pub. Mod. Lang. Ass. Amer., XXIV., 1909.—Feuillerat (A.),
John Lyly, Cambridge, 1910.—Brooke (C. F. T.), The Allegory in Lyly’s
Endymion, Mod. Lang. Notes, Jan. 1911.
GEORGE PEELE
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Arraignment of Paris, 1584. Edward I, 1593. Battle of Alcazar, 1594.
Old Wives Tale, 1596. David and Bethsabe, 1599.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Dyce (A.), 3 vols. 1828-39; 1861, 1879.—Bullen (A. H), 2 vols. 1888.
OLD WIVES TALE
Ed. Gummere (F. B.), in Gayley’s Representative English Comedies,
1903.—Greg (W. W.), In Malone Society Reprints, 1907.
CRITICISM, etc.
Lämmerhirt (R.), George Peele, Untersuchungen über sein Leben und seine
Werke. Rostock, 1882.—Bayley (A. R.), Peele as a Dramatic Artist.
The Oxford Point of View, 15 Feb. 1903.—Odell (G. C.), Peele as a
Dramatist. The Bibliographer, vol. II., 1903.
ROBERT GREENE
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Orlando Furioso, 1594; 1599. Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, 1594; 1599;
1630; 1655. James the Fourth, 1598. Alphonsus of Aragon, 1599. A
Looking Glass for London and England (with Lodge), 1594.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Dyce (A.), 2 vols. 1831; 1861,1879.—Grosart (A. B.), 15 vols.
1881-6.—Collins (J. C), 2 vols. Oxford, 1905.—Dickinson (T. A.), six
plays in Mermaid Series, 1909.
FRIAR BACON AND FRIAR BUNGAY
Ed. Manly (J. M.), in Specimens of Pre-Shakespearean Drama, Boston,
1897-8.—Ward (A. W.), in Old English Drama, Oxford, 1878; New ed.
1901.—Gayley (C. M.), in Representative English Comedies, 1903.
CRITICISM, etc.
Conrad (H.), Robert Greene als Dramatiker, in Shak. Jahrbuch, XXIX.,
1894.—Ehrke (K.) Robert Greene’s Dramen, 1904.—Woodberry (G.),
Greene’s Place in Comedy, in Gayley’s Representative English Comedies,
1903.—Ritter (O.), De Rob. Greeni Fabula, Fr. Bacon et Fr. Bungay,
Thorn, 1886.
CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Tamburlaine the Great (parts i and ii), 1590; 1592; part i, 1605; part
ii, 1606. Dr. Faustus, 1604; 1609; 1616; 1619; 1620; 1624; 1631; 1663.
The Jew of Malta, 1633. Edward II, 1594; 1598; 1612; 1622. The Massacre
at Paris, n. d. Dido, Queen of Carthage (with Nashe), 1594.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Robinson (G.), 3 vols. 1826.—Dyce (A.), 3 vols., 1850, 1858; 1
vol., 1865, 1876.—Cunningham (F), 1871. —Bullen (A. H.), 3 vols.,
1884-5.—Breymann (H.), and Wagner (A.), 1885-9.—Ellis (H.), five
plays in Mermaid Series, 1887.—Brooke (C. F. T.), 1 vol., Oxford, 1910.
TAMBURLAINE
Ed. Vollmöller (K.), Heilbronn, 1885.
DR. FAUSTUS
Ed. Wagner (W.), 1877—-Ward (A. W.), in Old English Drama, Oxford, new
ed. 1891.—Gollancz, (I.), in Temple Dramatists, 1897.
THE JEW OF MALTA
Ed. Thayer (W. R.), in Best Elizabethan Plays, Boston, 1890.
EDWARD II
Ed. Wagner (W.), Hamburg. 1871.—Fleay (F. G.), 1873, 1877.—Tancock
(O. W.), Oxford, 1879, 1899.—Verity (A. W.), in Temple Dramatists,
1896.—McLaughlin (E. T.), New York, 1894.
CRITICISM, etc.
Ingram (J. H.), Christopher Marlowe and his Associates, 1904, _q. v._
for further bibliography.—Tzschaschel (C.), Marlowe’s Edward II und
seine Quelle, Halle, 1902.
THOMAS KYD
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Cornelia, 1594, 1595. The Spanish Tragedy, 1592(?), 2d ed. n. d., 1594,
1599; with additions, 1602, 1610, 1615, 1618, 1623, 1633. The First
Part of Jeronimo, 1605. Soliman and Perseda, 1599.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Boas (F. S.), Oxford, 1901.
THE SPANISH TRAGEDY
Ed. Manly (J. M.), in Specimens, vol. II., 1897-8.—Schick (J.), in
Temple Dramatists, 1898.—Markscheffel (K.), in Litterarhist. Forsch.,
Berlin, 1901.
CRITICISM, etc.
Sarrazin (G.), Thomas Kyd und sein Kreis, Berlin, 1892. (Cf. Schick in
Herrig’s Archiv, XC.; Koeppel in Englische Studien, XVIII. 125.)—Bang
(W.), Engl. Stud. XXVIII. 229.—Brereton (J. LeG.), Notes on the text
of Kyd, Engl. Stud., XXXVII.—Crawford (C.), Concordance to the Works
of T. Kyd, in Bang’s Materialien, Louvain, 1909.
GEORGE CHAPMAN
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The Blind Beggar of Alexandria, 1598. A Humorous Day’s Mirth, 1599.
All Fools, 1605. Monsieur D’Olive, 1606. The Gentleman Usher, 1606.
Bussy D’Ambois, 1607, 1608, 1641, 1646, 1657. The Conspiracy and Tragedy
of Charles, Duke of Byron, 1608. May-Day, 1611. The Widow’s Tears,
1612. The Revenge of Bussy D’Ambois, 1613. Pompey and Cæsar, 1631,
1653. Alphonsus of Germany(?), 1654. Revenge for Honour, 1654. Chabot,
Admiral of France (with Shirley), 1639.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Pearson (J.), 1873.—Shepherd (R. H.), 3 vols., 1874; 1889. Phelps (W.
L.), five plays in Mermaid Series, 1895.
BUSSY D’AMBOIS
Ed. Boas (F. S.), in Belles Lettres Series, Boston, 1906.
CRITICISM, etc.
Coleridge (S. T.), Literary Remains, I. 259, 1836.—Koeppel (E.),
Quellenstudien zu Dramen George Chapman’s, etc., in Quellen und
Forschungen, LXXXII., Strassburg. 1897—Parrott (T. M.), Notes on the
Text of Chapman’s Plays, Anglia, XXX., 1907.—Stoll (E. E.), On the
Dates of Some of Chapman’s Plays, Mod. Lang. Notes, XX., 1905.
BEN JONSON
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Every Man Out of his Humour, 1600. Every Man in his Humour, 1601 (S.
R. 1600). Cynthia’s Revels, 1601. The Poetaster, 1602 (S. R. 1601).
Sejanus, 1605 (S. R. 1604). Volpone, 1607. The Case is Altered, 1606.
Catiline, 1611. The Alchemist, 1612 (S. R. 1610). Epicoene, or The
Silent Woman, 1609(?), 1612(?), (Acted 1609; S. R. 1610), Fol. 1616.
The New Inn, 1631 (Acted 1629). Bartholomew Fair, 1631 (Acted 1614).
The Devil is an Ass, 1631 (Acted 1616). The Staple of News, 1631 (Acted
1625). The Magnetic Lady, 1640 (S. R. 1632). A Tale of a Tub, 1640 (S.
R. 1633). The Sad Shepherd, 1640. Mortimer, his Fall, 1640.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
First Folio, 1616.—Second Folio, 1640.—Whalley (P.), 7 vols.,
1756.—Gifford (W.), 9 vols., 1816.—Cunningham (F.), rep. of Gifford,
1871, 1875.—Morley (H.), Plays and Poems of Ben Jonson, 1885.—Herford
(C. H.), and Nicholson (B.), 3 vols. in Mermaid Series, 1893-4.—Bang
(W.), Reprints from Folios and Quartos in his Materialien; in
process.—Eight of the plays have appeared in Yale Studies in English,
1903-8. A new edition by Herford (C. H.) and Simpson (P.) is announced,
Oxford.
EVERY MAN IN HIS HUMOUR
Rep. from Q. of 1601 by Graban (C.), Shakespeare Jahrbuch, XXXVIII.,
1903; and by Bang (W.) and Greg (W. W.), in Bang’s Materialien, XI.,
1905.—Wheatley (H. B.), 1877.—Dixon (W. M.), in Temple Dramatists,
1905.
VOLPONE
Ed. Wilkins (H. B.), New York, 1905, in Yale Studies in English.
THE ALCHEMIST
Ed. Thayer (W. R.), Boston, 1890, in Best Elizabethan Plays.—Hathaway
(C. H.), New York, 1903, in Yale Studies in English.—Hart (H. C.),
1903, in The King’s Library.—Schelling (F. E.), Boston, 1903, in
Belles Lettres Series.
CRITICISM, etc.
Castelain (M.), Ben Jonson: l’Homme et l’Œuvre. Paris, 1907.—Koeppel
(E.), Quellenstudien zu den Dramen Ben Jonson’s, etc., in Münchener
Beiträge. XI., Erlangen and Leipzig, 1895.—Swinburne (A. C.), A Study
of Ben Jonson, 1889.—Symonds (J. A.), Ben Jonson, 1886.—Woodbridge
(E.), Studies in Jonson’s Comedy, Boston, 1898.
THOMAS DEKKER
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The Shoemakers’ Holiday, 1600, 1610, 1618, 1631, 1657. Old Fortunatus,
1600. Satiro-mastix, 1602. The Honest Whore, part i, 1604, 1605, 1615,
1616, 1635. The Whore of Babylon, 1607. If it be not Good, the Devil
is in it, 1612. The Honest Whore, part ii, 1630. Match me in London,
1631. A Wonder of a Kingdom, 1636. Patient Grisel (with Chettle and
Haughton), 1603. Westward Ho! (with Webster), 1607. Northward Ho!
(with Webster), 1607. Sir Thomas Wyatt (with Webster), 1607. The Witch
of Edmonton (with W. Rowley and Ford), 1658. The Roaring Girl (with
Middleton), 1611. The Virgin Martyr (with Massinger), 1622.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Pearson (J.), 4 vols., 1873.—Rhys (E.), five plays in Mermaid Series,
1895.
THE SHOEMAKERS’ HOLIDAY
Ed. Fritsche (H.), Thorn, 1862.—Warnke (K.) and Proescholdt (L.),
Halle, 1886.
CRITICISM, etc.
Swinburne (A. C.), Thomas Dekker, The Nineteenth Century, Jan.
1887.—Stoll (E. E.), The Influence of Jonson on Dekker, Mod. Lang.
Notes, XXI.
JOHN MARSTON
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Antonio and Mellida, 1602. Antonio’s Revenge, 1602. The Dutch
Courtesan, 1605. Parasitaster, or The Fawn, 1606. The Wonder of Women,
or Sophonisba, 1606. What you Will, 1607. The Insatiate Countess, 1613.
The Malcontent (with Webster), 1604. Eastward Hoe! (with Chapman and
Jonson), 1605.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Plays. 1633.—Halliwell [-Phillipps] (J. O), 3 vols., 1856.—Bullen (A.
H.), 3 vols., 1887.
CRITICISM, etc.
Koeppel (E.), Quellenstudien zu den Dramen Ben Jonson’s, John
Marston’s, etc. Münchener Beiträge, XI., Erlangen and Leipzig,
1895—Swinburne (A. C.) in Nineteenth Century, XXIV., 1888.—Wurzbach
(W. von), in Shak. Jahrbuch, XXXIII., 1897.—Stoll (E. E.), John
Webster, chap, ii, sect, ii, Boston, 1905—Stoll (E. E.), Shakspere,
Marston and the Malcontent Type, in Modern Philology, III.,
1906.—Aronstein (P.), Marston als Dramatiker, Eng. Studien, XX.
THOMAS HEYWOOD
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Edward the Fourth, parts i and ii, 1600. If You Know Not Me, You Know
Nobody, part i, 1605; part ii, 1606. A Woman Killed with Kindness,
1607, 1617. The Rape of Lucrece, 1608. The Four Prentices of London,
1616. rev 1632. The Fair Maid of the West, part i, 1631; part ii, 1631.
The Golden Age, 1610. The Silver Age, 1613. The Brazen Age, 1613. The
Iron Age, part i, 1632; part ii, 1632. The English Traveller, 1633. A
Maidenhead Well Lost, 1634. A Challenge for Beauty, 1636. The Royal
King and the Loyal Subject, 1637. The Wise Woman of Hogsdon, 1638.
Love’s Mistress, 1636. The Late Lancashire Witches (with Brome), 1634.
Fortune by Land and Sea (with W. Rowley), 1655.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Pearson’s Reprint, 6 vols., 1874.—Verity (A. W.), five plays in
Mermaid Series, 1888.
A WOMAN KILLED WITH KINDNESS
Ed. Collier (J. P.), in Shak. Soc. Pub., 1850.—Ward (A. W.), in Temple
Dramatists, 1897.—Cox (F. J.), 1907.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER
ORIGINAL EDITIONS OF SINGLE PLAYS BY BOTH AUTHORS
The Woman Hater (probably by Beaumont alone), 1607, 1648, 1649. The
Knight of the Burning Pestle, 1613, 1635. Cupid’s Revenge, 1616, 1630,
1635. The Scornful Lady, 1616, 1625, 1630, 1635, 1639, 1651, 1677,
1691, 1695. A King and No King, 1619, 1625, 1631, 1639, 1655, 1661,
1676, 1693. The Maid’s Tragedy, 1619, 1622, 1630, 1638, 1641, 1650,
1661, 1686. Philaster, 1620, 1622, 1630, 1634, 1639, 1651, 1652 (2
edd.), 1660(?), 1687. Thierry and Theodoret, 1621, 1648, 1649.
ORIGINAL EDITIONS OF SINGLE PLAYS BY FLETCHER ALONE
The Faithful Shepherdess, n. d. (prob. 1609), 1629, 1634, 1656, 1665.
Henry VIII (with Shakespeare), in Shakespeare Folio of 1623. The Two
Noble Kinsmen (with Shakespeare), 1634. The Elder Brother, 1637, 1651,
1661, 1678. Wit Without Money, 1639, 1661. Monsieur Thomas, 1639. The
Bloody Brother, 1639, 1640. Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, 1696, 1697.
The Night-Walker, 1640, 1661. The Wild-Goose Chase, 1652. The Humorous
Lieutenant, 1830 (from a MS. dated 1625).
FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER’S PLAYS (1647)
The Mad Lover. The Spanish Curate. The Little French Lawyer. The Custom
of the Country. The Noble Gentleman. The Captain.* The Beggar’s Bush.
The Coxcomb.* The False One. The Chauces. The Loyal Subject. The Laws
of Candy. The Lover’s Progress. The Island Princess. The Humorous
Lieutenant. The Nice Valour, or The Passionate Mailman. The Maid in the
Mill. The Prophetess. Bonduca. The Sea Voyage. The Double Marriage. The
Pilgrim. The Knight of Malta. The Woman’s Prize, or The Tamer Tamed.
Love’s Cure, or The Martial Maid.* The Honest Man’s Fortune. The Queen
of Corinth. Women Pleased. A Wife for a Month. Wit at Several Weapons.*
Valentinian. The Fair Maid of the Inn. Love’s Pilgrimage. The Masque
at the Marriage of the Prince and Princess Palatine of the Rhine. Four
Plays in One.*
(Plays followed by an asterisk are believed to be in part by Beaumont:
the rest by Fletcher.)
COLLECTED EDITIONS
First Folio, 1647. Fifty Comedies and Tragedies (Second Folio),
1679.—Works of B. and F. (pub. Tonson), 7 vols., 1711.—Theobald,
Seward, and Sympson, 10 vols., 1750.—Colman (G.), 10 vols.,
1778.—Colman (G.), (with Jonson’s Works), 4 vols., 1811; (without
Jonson) 3 Vols., 1811.—Weber (H.), 14 vols. Edin. 1812.—Darley (G.),
2 vols., 1839 (text of Weber).—Dyce (A.), 11 vols., 1843-6; 2 vols.,
Boston, 1852.—Strachey (J. St. L.), in Mermaid Series, ten plays in
2 vols., 1887.—Builen (A. H.), General editor of Variorum edition by
various editors, 12 vols., 1904, (in process).—Glover (A.) and Waller
(A. R.), in Cambridge English Classics, 10 vols., 1905. (In process,
Text of folio of 1679 with collations of other edd.)
THE KNIGHT OF THE BURNING PESTLE
Ed. Morley (H.), in Burlesque Plays and Poems, Universal Library,
1885.—Moorman (F. W.), in Temple Dramatists, 1898.—Murch (H. S.),
in Yale Studies in English, New York, 1908.—Alden (R. M.), in Belles
Lettres Series, Boston, 1910.
PRILASTER
Ed. Thayer (W. R.), in Best Elizabethan Plays, Boston, 1890.—Boas (F.
S.), in Temple Dramatists, 1898.—Thorndike (A. H.), in Belles Lettres
Series, Boston, 1906.
THE MAID’S TRAGEDY
Ed. Thorndike (A. H.), in Belles Lettres Series, Boston, 1906.—Cox (F.
J.), 1908.
THE FAITHFUL SHEPHERDESS
Ed. Moorman (F. W.), in Temple Dramatists, 1897.—Fletcher (J. B.), in
Belles Lettres Series, announced.
CRITICISM, etc.
Koeppel (E.), Quellenstudien zu den Dramen...Beaumont’s and Fletcher’s,
in Münchener Beiträge, XI. 1895.—Leonhardt (B.), Ucber B. and F.’s
Knight of the Burning Pestle, Annaberg, 1885. Cf. also Anglia, VIII.
424; XIX. 34; XIX. 509; XXIII. 14; in Engl. Studien, XII. 307;
1885-1903.—Macaulay (G. C.), Francis Beaumont, a critical study,
1883.—Hatcher (O. L.), John Fletcher, a study in dramatic method,
Chicago, 1905.—Swinburne (A. C), Beaumont and Fletcher, in Studies in
Prose and Poetry, 1894.—Thorndike (A. H.), Influence of B. and F. on
Shakespeare, Worcester, Mass., 1901.—Greg (W. W.), Pastoral Poetry and
Pastoral Drama, London, 1906.
JOHN WEBSTER
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The White Devil, 1612. The Duchess of Malfi, 1623, 1640, 1678. The
Devil’s Law-case, 1623. Appins and Virginia, 1654. A Cure for a Cuckold
(with W. Rowley), 1661. The Thracian Wonder (with W. Rowley), 1661.
Induction to The Malcontent, 1604.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Dyce (A.), 4 vols., 1830, 1867.—Hazlitt (W.), 4 vols., 1857.-Symonds
(J. A.), two plays in Mermaid Series, 1888.
THE DUCHESS OF MALFI
Ed. Thayer (W. R.), In Best Elizabethan Plays, Boston. 1890.—Vaughan
(C. E.), in Temple Dramatists, 1896.—Sampson (M. W.), in Belles
Lettres Series, Boston, 1904.
CRITICISM, etc.
Gosse (E.), in Seventeenth Century Studies, 1883.—Stoll (E. E.), John
Webster, the Periods of his work, Boston, 1905.—Pierce (F. E.), The
Collaboration of Webster and Dekker, in Yale Studies in English, New
York, 1909.—Kiesow (K.), Die Verschichenen Bearbeitungen der Novelle
von der Herzogin v. Amalfi, Anglia, XVII. 198.
THOMAS MIDDLETON
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
Blurt, Master-Constable, 1602. The Phoenix, 1607, 1630. Michaelmas
Term, 1607. A Trick to Catch the Old One, 1608, 1616. The Family of
Love, 1608. A Mad World, my Masters, 1608. Your Five Gallants, n. d.
(lic. 1608). A Game at Chess, 1625. A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, 1630.
Women Beware Women, 1657. More Dissemblers Besides Women, 1657. No Wit,
No Help like a Woman’s, 1657. The Mayor of Quinborough, 1661. Anything
for a Quiet Life, 1662. The Witch, 1778. A Fair Quarrel (with W.
Rowley), 1617. The Changeling (with W. Rowley), 1653. The Spanish Gipsy
(with W. Rowley), 1653. The Old Law (with Massinger and W. Rowley),
1656. The Roaring Girl (with Dekker), 1611. The Widow (with Jonson and
Fletcher), 1652.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Dyce (A.), 5 vols., 1840.—Bullen (A. H.), 8 vols., 1885-6.—Swinburne
(A. C), and Ellis (H.), ten plays, in Mermaid Series, 1890.
CRITICISM, etc.
Wiggin (P. G.), An Enquiry into the authorship of the Middleton-Rowley
Plays, in Radcliffe College Monographs, Boston, 1897.—Christ (K.),
Quellenstudien zu den Dramen Thomas Middleton’s, 1905.
WILLIAM ROWLEY
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
A Search for Money, 1609. A New Wonder, a Woman Never Vext, 1632.
A Match at Midnight, 1633. All’s Lost by Lust, 1633. A Shoemaker a
Gentleman, 1638. The Changeling (with Middleton), 1653. And many other
collaborated plays.
CRITICISM, etc.
Stork (C. W.), Rowley’s Place in the Drama, in his ed. of All’s Lost by
Lust, etc., Philadelphia, 1910.—Wiggin (P. G.), An Enquiry into the
authorship of the Middleton-Rowley Plays, Boston, 1897.
PHILIP MASSINGER
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The Virgin Martyr (with Dekker), 1622. The Duke of Milan, 1623. The
Bondman, 1624. The Roman Actor, 1629. The Renegado, 1630. The Picture,
1630. The Maid of Honour, 1632. The Emperor of the East, 1632. The
Fatal Dowry (with N. Field), 1632. A New Way to Pay Old Debts, 1633.
The Great Duke of Florence, 1636. The Unnatural Combat, 1639. The
Guardian. 1655. A Very Woman, 1655. The Bashful Lover, 1655. The City
Madam, 1658. The Parliament of Love (lic. 1624), 1805. Believe as you
List (S. R. 1653), 1849.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Coxeter (T.), 4 Vols., 1759, 1761.—Mason (T. M.), 4 vols.,
1779.—Gifford (W.), 4 vols., 1805, 1813, 1845, 1850; ed. Cunningham
(F.), 1870.—Coleridge (H.), with Ford, 1 vol., 1840.—Symons (A.), in
Mermaid Series, ten plays in two vols., 1887-89.
A NEW WAY TO PAY OLD DEBTS
Ed. Stronach (G.), in Temple Dramatists, 1904.
CRITICISM, etc.
Stephen (Sir L.), in Cornhill Magazine, Oct., 1877 (also in Hours in
a Library, III., 1879).—Swinburne (A. C), in Fortnightly Review,
July, 1889.—Tréverret (A. de). Étude sur Massinger, Revue de
l’enseignement des langues vivantes, Dec. 1886, Jan. 1887.—Wurzbach
(W. von), in Shakespeare Jahrbuch, XXXV. 214, XXXVI. 128.—Koeppel
(E.), Quellenstudien, in Quellen und Forschungen, LXXXII., Strassburg,
1897.—Gardiner (S. R.), The Political Element in Massinger,
Contemporary Review, XXVIII., 1876 (also New Shak. Soc. Trans.,
1876).—Phelan (J.), Anglia, II., 1879.
JOHN FORD
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The Lover’s Melancholy, 1629. The Broken Heart, 1633. Love’s Sacrifice,
1633. ’T is Pity She’s a Whore, 1633. Perkin Warbeck, 1634. The
Fancies, Chaste and Noble, 1638. The Lady’s Trial, 1639. The Witch of
Edmonton (with Dekker and W. Rowley). 1658.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Weber (H.), 2 vols., 1811.—Gifford (W.), 2 vols., 1827; w. additions
by Dyce (A.), 3 vols., 1869, 1895.—Coleridge (H.), (with Massinger’s
Works), 1840.—Ellis (H.), five plays in Mermaid Series, 1888.—Bang
(W.), Louvain, 1908 (in process).
THE BROKEN HEART
Ed. Scollard (C.), New York, 1905.—Smeaton (O.), in Temple Dramatists,
1906.
CRITICISM, etc.
Koeppel (E.), Quellenstudien zu den Dramen ... John Ford’s, in Quellen
und Forschungen, LXXXII., Strassburg, 1897.—Swinburne (A. C.), in
Essays and Studies, 1888.—Wolff (M.), John Ford, ein Nachahmer
Shakespeare’s, Heidelberg, 1880.—Sherman (S. P.), Stella and The
Broken Heart, in Publ. Mod. Lang. Ass. Amer. XXIV., 274, 1909; see
also his Introduction to Bang’s Ford, and his MS. dissertation in the
archives of Harvard University Library.—Pierce (F. E.), The Sequence
of Ford’s Plays, The Nation, N. Y., Jan. 5, 1911.
JAMES SHIRLEY
ORIGINAL EDITIONS
The Wedding, 1629. The Grateful Servant, 1630. The School of
Compliment, 1631, as Love Tricks, 1637, 1667. Changes, or Love in a
Maze, 1632. The Witty Fair One, 1633. The Bird in a Cage, 1633. The
Traitor, 1635. Hyde Park, 1637. The Gamester, 1637. The Young Admiral,
1637. The Example, 1637. The Lady of Pleasure, 1637. The Duke’s
Mistress, 1638. The Royal Master, 1638. The Maid’s Revenge, 1639.
Love’s Cruelty, 1640. The Opportunity, 1640. The Coronation (lic.
1635), 1640. The Constant Maid, 1640, as Love Will Find Out a Way,
1667. St Patrick for Ireland, 1640. The Humorous Courtier, 1640. The
Arcadia, 1640. Six New Plays, viz., The Brothers, The Doubtful Heir,
The Imposture, The Cardinal, The Sisters, The Court Secret, 1652-3.
The Politician, 1655. The Gentleman of Venice, 1655. Honoria and
Mammon, 1659. The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses, 1659. The Ball (with
Chapman), 1639. Chabot, Admiral of France (with Chapman), 1639.
COLLECTED EDITIONS
Gifford (W.) and Dyce (A.), 6 vols., 1833.—Gosse (E.), six plays, in
Mermaid Series, 1888.
CRITICISM, etc.
Swinburne (A. C.), in Fortnightly Review, April, 1890.—Stiefel (A.
L.), Die Nachahmung spanischer Komödien in England, in Romanische
Forschungen. V. 193, 1890.—Nissen (P.), James Shirley, Hamburg,
1901.—Gärtner (O.), Shirley, sein Leben und Werken, Halle, 1904.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES
JOHN LYLY
John Lyly was born in Kent about 1554. His father was Peter Lyly,
Registrar of Canterbury, and his grandfather the well-known grammarian,
William Lyly, the friend of Colet and More. He entered Magdalen
College, Oxford, in 1569, whence he graduated B. A. in 1573, and M. A.
in 1575. Here he was more distinguished for wit than for scholarship.
Going up to London, and living at first under the protection of
Burleigh, be produced in 1578 his _Euphues: the Anatomy of Wit_, which
was followed in 1580 by _Euphues and his England_, both of which gained
a great and immediate popularity. He was now attached to the Earl of
Oxford. _Campaspe_, his first play, was performed in 1581, and most of
his dramatic work was done in that decade. _The Woman in the Moon_,
however, may have been produced as late as 1594-5. In 1583, Lyly
married Beatrice Browne, a well-connected lady, who bore him eight
children. From 1588 he seems to have held an honorary position as
Esquire of the Body to the Queen, and he lived for years in the vain
hope of succeeding to the office of Master of the Revels. Between 1589
and 1601 he sat in four parliaments, and in his _Pappe with an Hatchet_
(1589) he took part with the Bishops in the Marprelate controversy. In
spite of the distinction which Lyly won by his literary work, be failed
to obtain from the Queen the substantial preferment which he craved,
and he died in 1606, a disappointed place-seeker. Lyly’s reputation has
depended largely on the extraordinary vogue of his _Euphues_, and the
immense influence of the style of that work on the prose of the time;
but he holds also a highly important position in the development of
polite comedy in England.
GEORGE PEELE
The date of Peele’s birth is unknown, but is conjecturally placed about
1558. In 1565 he was a free scholar at Christ’s Hospital, of which
his father was clerk, and in 1571 he went to Oxford. He was a student
first at Broadgates Hall (now Pembroke College), and later at Christ
Church, whence he graduated B. A. in 1577, and M. A. in 1579. From the
University, where he had already achieved some reputation as a poet, he
went to London, and apparently plunged at once into the irregularities
that wrecked his career, for in the same year the governors of Christ’s
Hospital forced his father to turn him out of the precincts of the
hospital. His wife, whom he had married by 1583, brought him some
property, which he soon dissipated; and he became a member of that
group of authors who wrote plays, pageants, and all sorts of occasional
productions, in the uncertain hope of earning a living. The famous
_Jests_, fathered on Peele, are probably quite unauthentic; but there
is an unfortunate appropriateness in many of them to his known mode of
life. He seems to have been an actor as well as a playwright. Meres
mentions him in _Palladis Tamia_ (1598) as dead.
Peele’s claims to distinction rest upon his treatment of metre, and on
his humor. He did much to refine and supple the diction of the drama,
and before Marlowe placed his stamp upon blank verse, Peele was writing
it with great sweetness and a charming musical quality. In the present
play, the realistic element in the dialogue is more notable than the
decorative, and this realism is employed in the service of a new type
of humor. “He was the first,” says Gummere, “to blend romantic drama
with a realism which turns romance back upon itself, and produces the
comedy of subconscious humor.”
ROBERT GREENE
Greene was much given to the mingling of autobiography with his
fiction, and this has resulted in a much larger body of possibly
true biographical details than we possess concerning most of his
contemporaries. He was born in Norwich of a respectable family,
probably about 1560; entered St. John’s College, Cambridge, in 1575;
graduated B. A. in 1578; travelled in Spain and Italy, and, by his
own account, lived up to the proverbial reputation of the Italianate
Englishman; returned to Cambridge and took his M. A. in 1581; and
during the rest of his short life busied himself in the production
of the very considerable mass of romances, tracts, songs, and plays
which to-day give him his place in literature. About 1585 he married
a Lincolnshire woman, who bore him a son, and whom he deserted after
spending her portion. The annals of literature hardly bear the record
of a more sordid career than that of this university-bred man of
letters; and his death was only too fitting a close to it. He died in
1592 in the house of a poor shoemaker, to whom he gave a bond for ten
pounds, leaving the following letter to his deserted wife: “Doll, I
charge thee by the love of our youth and by my soul’s rest that thou
wilt see this man paid, for if he and his wife had not succoured me I
had died in the streets. Robert Greene.” Following his own wish, the
shoemaker’s wife crowned his head with a garland of bay.
In spite of the self-confessed wickedness of his ways, Greene was not
a hardened criminal, and no themes are more frequent in his tracts
than moral exhortation and repentance. It is further notable that his
work is freer from grossness than that of most of his contemporary
playwrights, and he is distinguished for the freshness and purity
of his female creations. He seems also, to judge from his plays, to
have retained a love for the country, where he often chose to lay his
scenes; and he ranks high among the lyrists of the time. The vivacity
and variety of his humor are well exemplified in the play here printed.
CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
Christopher Marlowe was the eldest son of a substantial burgess of
Canterbury, and he was born in that city on February 6, 1564. He
entered the King’s School in January, 1579, and two years later became
a scholar of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, whence he graduated
B. A. in 1584, and M. A. in 1587. As _Tamburlaine_ was acted in
that year, it appears that Marlowe’s academic and his literary life
overlapped. Little is certainly known of his later life, apart from the
production of his plays and poems. He belonged to a circle of which
Sir Walter Raleigh was the centre, and which contained men like the
Earl of Oxford, and Harriot, the mathematician. These men seem to have
engaged in scientific and theological speculation, and were suspected
of atheism by the narrower spirits of the time. This connection was
probably the basis for certain extreme charges made against Marlowe
after his death; but there is little evidence worthy of consideration.
Even the documents connected with Kyd, in which that author seeks
to save his own reputation for orthodoxy at Marlowe’s expense, are
under suspicion in point of genuineness. Marlowe died by the hand of
a certain Francis Archer, at Deptford, in 1593, but the circumstances
are obscure. The later reports, such as that according to which he was
stabbed by a serving man in a brawl over a mistress, are inconsistent
with one another, and are little worthy of credit. The prevailing
impression of the dissoluteness of Marlowe’s life is not based on
substantial evidence such as we have, for example, in the case of
Greene.
No such uncertainty as surrounds his character and career attaches to
the quality of his work. Born in the same year as Shakespeare, he left
behind him at twenty-nine work which far surpasses anything his great
contemporary had written by that time. In the vastness and intensity of
his imagination, the splendid dignity of his verse, and the dazzling
brilliance of his poetry at its best, Marlowe exhibited the greatest
genius that had so far appeared in the English drama.
THOMAS KYD
The date of Kyd’s birth may with practical certainty be placed in
1558. His father was a London scrivener, and the son was educated at
Merchant Taylors’ School, which he entered in 1565. Mulcaster was then
headmaster, and Edmund Spenser was among his schoolfellows. He does not
seem to have attended a university. A habit of anonymity has thrown a
cloud over the extent of Kyd’s literary activity, and the list of his
plays and translations has been compiled with difficulty and much less
than complete certainty. His fame depends upon _The Spanish Tragedy_,
and upon the importance of his contribution to the Senecan tragedy
of revenge in this play and probably in the lost pre-Shakespearean
_Hamlet_, which is now usually ascribed to him.
The later years of his life seem to have been unfortunate, and he was
arrested on charges of sedition and atheism in 1593. From the latter
he sought, if the letter to Puckering (Boas. p. cviii.) is genuine, to
clear himself by ascribing the ownership of the incriminating documents
to the dead Marlowe, and he endeavored to minimise the closeness of his
intimacy with his great contemporary. These charges, it appears, lost
him his patron, and perhaps in some degree his theatrical popularity.
He died in 1594.
Kyd seems to have been a man of gloomy temperament, and the vividness
and intensity with which he presents in his work the darker sides of
human nature and experience are probably in some degree the outcome
of his own disposition. In spite of tendencies to melodrama that, to
the modern taste, border on the ludicrous, Kyd rises at times to the
utterance of genuine passion, and even his sensationalism is frequently
impressive. But his historical importance in the development of the
type of tragedy of which _Hamlet_ is the climax must be granted to be
greater than his intrinsic value.
GEORGE CHAPMAN
George Chapman was born in Hitchin, Hertfordshire, in 1557 or 1559, and
was educated at Oxford, and perhaps also at Cambridge. His earliest
extant work is _The Shadow of Night_ (1594), which was followed
in 1595 by _Ovid’s Banquet of Sense_, _The Amorous Zodiac_, and
other poems, works curiously obscure and contorted in style, though
containing distinguished passages. In 1598, he finished Marlowe’s
incomplete _Hero and Leander_, and when Meres published his _Palladis
Tamia_ in that year, Chapman was already well-known as a playwright.
His reputation, however, is most firmly based on his translations
from Homer, issued in detachments in 1598, 1609, 1611, and 1614, and
complete in folio in 1616. In this work be was encouraged by Prince
Henry, to whom he was “sewer in ordinary.” He was imprisoned in 1605
along with Jonson and Marston on account of the passages against the
Scots in _Eastward Ho!_ and in 1608 he again had difficulties with
the authorities on account of a scene in _Charles, Duke of Byron_. He
continued his work in translation and in the drama till his death in
1634.
Though one can hardly feel that Chapman’s natural gifts were those
of a dramatist, the evidences of intellectual power, and the almost
Shakespearean splendor of the poetry in occasional passages throughout
his work, entitle him to an honorable place among the writers of the
time.
BEN JONSON
Ben Jonson came of an Annandale family, and was born at Westminster
in 1573. He followed his stepfather’s trade of bricklaying for a
short time, and later served as a soldier in Flanders. He probably
began play-writing about 1595, and two years later we find him in the
Admiral’s Company of actors. In 1598 he is mentioned by Meres as a
writer of tragedy, and in the same year he killed a fellow-actor in a
duel. In prison he became a Roman Catholic, but returned to the Church
of England twelve years later. He scored a success with _Every Man
in his Humour_ in 1598, Shakespeare acting a part in the play. After
several years of work on satirical drama, Jonson turned to tragedy;
and on the accession of James I. he began his long series of masques
and court entertainments. In 1605 he was again in prison, this time
for his share in _Eastward Ho!_ From this date till about 1617 Jonson
was at the height of his fame, and was the leading literary figure in
London. He visited France in 1613 as tutor to Raleigh’s son; and in
1616 issued a folio edition of his works. In 1618, he visited Scotland,
and held his famous conversations with Drummond of Hawthornden; and, on
his return, Oxford made him an M. A. After the death of James I, Jonson
was less fortunate in court favor, suffered from ill health, and was
unsuccessful at the theatre. In 1628, however, he succeeded Middleton
as chronologer to the city of London, and the King sent him £100 in
his sickness, later raising his salary. But fortune turned against
him again; he lost his city office, made further attempts to regain
theatrical favor, and died August 6, 1637. Besides plays, he left an
interesting prose work, _Timber, or Discoveries_, and a considerable
amount of non-dramatic verse. A second folio edition of his _Works_
appeared in 1640.
Jonson’s artistic ideals were classical rather than romantic, and he
stands, in significant respects, in opposition to some of the main
literary currents of his time. The plays in the present volume include
an example of the “comedy of humours” introduced by him, a typical
example of his tragedy, and two of his satirical masterpieces. In these
alone one can find abundant evidence that, despite a lack of charm and
geniality, one is dealing with the work of a deep student of human
nature, a vigorous and independent thinker, and a master of eloquent
and virile expression.
THOMAS DEKKER
Dekker’s career is an extreme instance of the hazardous life led by
the professional author in the time of Shakespeare. Born in London
about 1570, Dekker first appears certainly as a dramatist about
1597, when we find him working on plays in collaboration with other
dramatists in the pay of Henslowe. He wrote, in partnership or alone,
many dramas; and when the market for these was dull, he turned to the
writing of entertainments, occasional verses, and prose pamphlets on
a great variety of subjects. No writer of the time gives us a more
vivid picture of Elizabethan London. But all his activity seems to
have failed to supply a decent livelihood, for he was often in prison
for debt, at one time for a period of three years; and most of the
biographical details about him which have come down to us are connected
with borrowing money, or getting into jail or out of it. He disappears
from view in the thirties of the seventeenth century.
In spite of the impression of gloom left by such a record, Dekker’s
plays abound in high spirits, and their general tendency in plot and
characterization is sane and wholesome. Evidences of hasty and careless
workmanship are easily found, yet he was far from an uninspired hack,
and passages of a noble and delicate poetry are frequent throughout his
work.
JOHN MARSTON
John Marston came of an old Shropshire family, and was born, probably
at Coventry, about 1575. His father, who bore the same name, was
lecturer of the Middle Temple, and there is evidence that the son was
trained for the law. He entered Brasenose College, Oxford, in 1592,
and, according to Bullen, graduated B. A. in 1594. His first work
in poetry was his _Metamorphosis of Pigmalion’s Image and Certain
Satires_, 1598; and later in the same year appeared his _Scourge of
Villany_. In the following year both books were burned on account of
their licentiousness by the order of the Archbishop of Canterbury,
though Marston had professed a reformatory purpose in both. In 1599
he turned to play-writing; but the turgid style of his _Antonio and
Mellida_ and _Antonio’s Revenge_ brought down on him the ridicule
of Jonson in _The Poetaster_. _The Malcontent_ was written during a
period of reconciliation with Jonson, and in 1605 Marston collaborated
with him and Chapman in _Eastward Ho_, a comedy containing a passage
reflecting on the Scots, which landed all three dramatists in prison.
Marston gave up play-writing in 1607, and later became a clergyman.
From 1616 to 1631 he held the living of Christ Church, Hampshire, and
in 1634 died in London, and was buried in the Temple Church.
The extreme tendency to fustian which Jonson had attacked in Marston’s
early work no longer appears to any great extent in _The Malcontent_,
and the play exhibits favorably Marston’s capacity for the creation of
well marked character and effective stage situations. An attempt has
recently been made to show that he exerted a considerable influence on
Shakespeare, especially in _Hamlet_.
THOMAS HEYWOOD
The early records of this, the most prolific of the dramatic
writers of the time, are extremely scanty. The date of his birth is
conjecturally placed about 1575, and he refers to himself as a native
of Lincolnshire, and at one time resident at Cambridge. He begins to
figure in Henslowe’s accounts in 1596, and he appears as a member of
the Lord Admiral’s Company in 1598. He began writing plays with _The
Four Prentices of London_, and in the _Address to the Reader_ prefixed
to his _English Traveller_ (1633) he claims to have written or had a
“main finger” in two hundred and twenty plays. Outside of the drama, he
tried his hand at almost all sorts of literature, and the quality of
his work is extremely uneven. He was still alive in 1648, but probably
died soon thereafter.
Heywood’s characteristic power of elicting powerful emotions by a
sympathetic treatment of everyday conditions and events, is well
illustrated by the play here printed. While much is perfunctory in his
work, one constantly finds evidences of a genuine and pious spirit
moved by a keen appreciation of the pathos of human life.
FRANCIS BEAUMONT
Francis Beaumont was born 1584, the son of Sir Francis Beaumont of
Grace-Dieu, Leicestershire, a judge of the common pleas. He was
educated at Broadgates Hall (now Pembroke College), Oxford, which
he entered in 1597. On the death of his father in 1598, he left the
university without a degree, and in 1600 became a member of the Inner
Temple. The law, however, if he ever really studied it, was soon
abandoned for poetry; and Beaumont became an intimate of Jonson and his
circle at the Mermaid. His collaboration with Fletcher began early,
and seems to have been brought about by personal preference, not, like
most collaboration at that time, by the exigencies of the theatrical
manager. Aubrey has preserved the tradition of their domestic intimacy
and similarity of tastes. Their joint-production seems to have begun
about 1605, and there is no evidence that Beaumont wrote any plays
after 1612. About 1613 he married, and three years later died and
was buried in Westminster Abbey. He had achieved a high contemporary
reputation for his non-dramatic poetry, but he survives as a dramatist.
JOHN FLETCHER
John Fletcher came of a family which has given many distinguished names
to English literature. His father was Richard Fletcher, Bishop of
London. Giles Fletcher the elder was his uncle, and Giles and Phineas
Fletcher his cousins. The dramatist was born at Rye, Sussex, in 1579,
and entered Benet College (now Corpus Christi), Cambridge, in 1591;
but of the details of his life from this time till his appearance as
a dramatist little is known. He collaborated with Beaumont from about
1605 till 1612; and, after Beaumont’s withdrawal, with Shakespeare,
Jonson, Massinger, and others. He died of the plague in 1625.
The men who laid the foundations of the Elizabethan drama were
generally of somewhat obscure origin; and though some of them had been
educated at the universities, they were all poor. Beaumont and Fletcher
were the first recruits to the profession of play-writing who came of
distinguished families and habitually moved in wealthy circles; and
this social environment was early suggested as an explanation of their
power of representing naturally the conversation of high-born ladies
and gentlemen. The general style of their plays has been thus admirably
characterized by Thorndike: “Their plots, largely invented, are
ingenious and complicated. They deal with royal or noble persons, with
heroic actions, and are placed in foreign localities. The conquests,
usurpations, and passions that ruin kingdoms are their themes, there
are no battles or pageants, and the action is usually confined to the
rooms of the palace or its immediate neighborhood. Usually contrasting
a story of gross sensual passion with one of idyllic love, they
introduce a great variety of incidents, and aim at constant but varied
excitement.... The plays depend for interest not on their observation
or revelation of human nature, or the development of character, but
on the variety of situations, the clever construction that holds the
interest through one suspense to another up to the unravelling at the
very end, and on the naturalness, felicity, and vigor of the poetry.”
JOHN WEBSTER
The dates 1580-1625 are usually given as conjectures for Webster’s
birth and death, exact information being entirely lacking. His father
was a member of the Merchant Taylors’ Company, of which the son was
likewise a freeman; but this does not imply that he was actually a
tailor. In 1602, we find him collaborating with seven others in the
production of four plays for Henslowe, and the rest of his biography
consists in the discussion of the dates of his works.
Webster’s tragedies come towards the close of the great series of
tragedies of blood and revenge in which _The Spanish Tragedy_ and
_Hamlet_ are landmarks, but before decadence can fairly be said to have
set in. Webster, indeed, loads his scene with horrors almost past the
point which modern taste can bear; but the intensity of his dramatic
situations, and his superb power of flashing in a single line a light
into the recesses of the human heart at the crises of supreme emotion,
redeem him from mere sensationalism, and place his best plays in the
first rank of dramatic writing.
THOMAS MIDDLETON
The date of Middleton’s birth is unknown, but is conjecturally placed
about 1570. He came of good family, and his writings indicate that he
received a good education. We know, however, nothing about his early
training before his entering Gray’s Inn, probably in 1593. His plays
abound in allusions to law and pictures of lawyers.
The earliest evidence of his writing for the stage is in the date of
_The Old Law_, which was probably composed by Middleton about 1599, and
later revised by Massinger and W. Rowley. He was much employed in the
writing of pageants and masques, especially by the city, and in 1621 he
obtained the post of city chronologer. In 1624 he gave expression to
the popular hatred of Spain in his allegorical play, _A Game at Chess_,
which scored a great success, but which was ultimately suppressed at
the instigation of the Spanish ambassador, and led to a warrant for
Middleton’s arrest. He died in 1627.
In his comedies Middleton shows himself a keen observer of contemporary
life and manners, and few writers of the time have left a more
vivacious picture of the London of James I. “His later plays,” says
Herford, “show more concentrated as well as more versatile power. His
habitual occupation with depraved types becomes an artistic method;
he creates characters which fascinate without making the smallest
appeal to sympathy, tragedy which harrows without rousing either
pity or terror, and language which disdains charm, but penetrates by
remorseless veracity and by touches of strange and sudden power.”
WILLIAM ROWLEY
William Rowley was born about 1585. He was an actor as well as a
dramatist, and is sometimes confused with two other actors, Ralph and
Samuel Rowley. In his earlier years he wrote some non-dramatic verse,
mostly of a conventional kind. His most important work was done in
collaboration with Middleton, with whom he worked from 1614, but he
had many other literary partners. His verse is apt to be rough and
irregular, his humor broad and rollicking rather than fine, his serious
scenes tending to extravagance and bombast. But his constant employment
to coöperate with greater men, or revise their work, points to a
general serviceableness and a capacity for theatrical effectiveness.
His death is conjecturally placed about 1642.
PHILIP MASSINGER
Philip Massinger was born at Salisbury, in November, 1583. His
father was in the service of the Earls of Pembroke, and it has been
conjectured that the future dramatist was named after the Countess’s
brother, Sir Philip Sidney. He entered St. Alban Hall, Oxford, in
1602, and left four years later without a degree, having, according to
Wood, “applied his mind more to poetry and romances than to logic and
philosophy.” On coming to London he seems to have turned at once to
writing for the stage; and, after Beaumont retired from play-writing,
Massinger became Fletcher’s chief partner and warm friend. All
Massinger’s relations with his fellow-authors of which we have record
seem to have been pleasant; and the impression of his personality which
one derives from his work is that of a dignified, hard-working, and
conscientious man. He seems to have been much interested in public
affairs, and he at times came into collision with the authorities on
account of the introduction into his plays of more or less veiled
allusions to political personages and events. He died in 1640, and was
buried in St. Saviour’s, Southwark, in the same grave, it is said by
Cokayne, as his friend Fletcher.
Massinger’s great merit lies in his masterly conduct of plot. His
characters are usually of a somewhat conventional type, his pictures
of passion tend to sheer extravagance, and his ethical quality has in
it something mechanical. His verse is often eloquent, but the dialogue
is often preposterously remote from life. Yet so skillful was he in
the manipulation of the action that he usually holds the attention
without difficulty; and in the present play this power is combined with
a singularly forceful presentation of the main character and a fairly
obvious didacticism that together kept the drama on the stage almost
down to modern times.
JOHN FORD
John Ford was born at Ilsington in Devonshire in April, 1586, of good
family. A man of his name entered Exeter College, Oxford, in 1601;
but if this was our Ford, his stay was short, for he became a member
of the Middle Temple in November, 1602. Of the rest of his career we
know almost nothing, except the names of people to whom he dedicated
his plays and verses. He disappears after the publication of his last
play in 1639. He seems to have been a man of a somewhat melancholy
temperament, independent in his attitude towards the public taste, and
capable of espousing unpopular causes.
Ford’s dramas show a tendency to deal with illicit and even incestuous
love in a peculiar mood, the dramatist frequently creating strong
sympathy for the tempted and the sinner, and leaving the question of
guilt open. This, along with his fondness for the theatrical and the
sensational, has led to his being frequently chosen as an example of
the decadence of the drama. The charge is not to be denied; but in
spite of these defects, he shows a power of insight into suffering and
perplexity, and writes at times poetry of such beauty and tenderness,
that he remains a figure of much intrinsic interest as well as
historical importance.
JAMES SHIRLEY
James Shirley, often called “the last of the Elizabethans,” was born
in London in September, 1596, and was educated at Merchant Taylors’
School and St. John’s College, Oxford. Later he went to Catherine Hall,
Cambridge, whence he graduated. About 1619 he took orders, and obtained
a living at St. Albans, Hertfordshire; but resigned to enter the
church of Rome, and became master of the St. Albans grammar school in
1623. His first play was licensed in 1625, and from this time till the
closing of the theatres he devoted himself to the writing of plays and
masques, gaining both popular success and the patronage of the court.
With the outbreak of the Civil War, Shirley followed his patron, the
Earl of Newcastle, to the field; but after Marston Moor he returned to
London, published some of his earlier writings, and resumed teaching.
Some of his plays were revived at the Restoration, but he wrote no
more. He and his second wife were driven from their home by the fire of
London in 1666, and both died from shock on the same day.
Shirley wrote many non-dramatic poems, graceful enough but
conventional; few of them are read to-day. Out of nearly forty dramas,
seven are tragedies, the rest chiefly romantic comedies and comedies
of manners. He was a careful student of the work of his predecessors,
and he reproduced many of their dramatic effects with skill. He had a
distinct comic gift, and his power in tragedy may be judged by _The
Cardinal_. With Shirley, more than with any of his fellow-playwrights,
one feels the disadvantage of coming so late in the development of
this phase of the drama that originality of conception seems almost
impossible. That he is still able to amuse and to thrill with the
old instruments is proof of his capacity as a literary workman; and
he should not be denied the possession of passages where he displays
touches of imagination all his own.
INDEX OF CHARACTERS
Abbess, 96.
Abbot, 122.
Abigail, 96.
Acton, Sir Francis, 485.
Aeolus, 568.
Afer, 247.
Agrippina, 247.
Agydas, 57.
Alexander the Great, 80.
Alexandro, 153.
Alexis, 598.
Alibius, 715.
Allworth, Tom, 741.
Allworth, Lady, 741.
Alphonso, 830.
Alsemero, 715.
Altofronto, Giovanni, 456.
Alvarez, Count d’, 830.
Amarillis, 598.
Amble, 741.
Amelus, 770.
Amintor, 568.
Amoret, 598.
Amyclas, 770.
Ananias, 325.
Andrea, Ghost of, 153.
Androgyno, 285.
Anippe, 57.
Annabelle, 185.
Anselmo, 393.
Antic, 24.
Antiphila, 568.
Antonelli, 830.
Antonio, 715, 830.
Antonio Bologna, 656.
Antonio Georgio, 425.
Aplotes, 770.
Apprentices, 367, 393, 425.
Archbishop of Canterbury, 122.
Arethusa, 539.
Aretina, 800.
Armostes, 770.
Arruntius, 247.
Arthur, 690.
Arundel, 122.
Askew, 367.
Aspatia, 568.
Astolfo, 425.
Audrey, 690.
Aurelia, 456.
Avocatori, 285.
Bagoa, 1.
Bajazeth, 57.
Baldock, 122.
Balthazar, 153.
Barabas, 96.
Barber, 509.
Barnardine, 96.
Barrisor, 185.
Bashaw, 153.
Bassanes, 770.
Bassoes, 57, 96.
Bazardo, 153.
Beatrice-Joanna, 715.
Beaumont, 122.
Beaupre, 185.
Behemoth, 185.
Bel-Imperia, 153.
Bellafront, 393, 425.
Bellamira, 96.
Bellario, 539.
Belleur, 625.
Belzebub, 80.
Benedict, Doctor, 393.
Beraldo, 425.
Berkeley, 122.
Bianca, 456.
Bilioso, 456.
Bishop of Coventry, 122.
Bishop of Winchester, 122.
Bobadill, Captain, 214.
Bonario, 285.
Bornwell, Lady, 800.
Bornwell, Sir Thomas, 800.
Bosola, Daniel De, 656.
Bots, 425.
Bountinall, Catharina, 425.
Brainworm, 214.
Brickbat, Roger, 485.
Bridewell, Masters of, 425.
Bridget, Mistress, 214.
Brisac, 185.
Bryan, 425.
Burden, Doctor, 35.
Bussy D’Ambois, 185.
Calantha, 770.
Calypha, 24.
Calianax, 568.
Caligula, 247.
Candido, 393, 425.
Candido’s Bride, 425.
Capolin, 57.
Captain, 539.
Cardinal, 656, 830.
Cardinal of Lorrain, 80.
Cariola, 656.
Carolo, 425.
Carpenters, 96.
Cartophylax, 185.
Cash, Thomas, 214.
Castile, Cyprian, Duke of, 153.
Castile, King of, 35.
Castrone, 285.
Castruccio, 656.
Castruchio, 393.
Catharina Bountinall, 425.
Celanta, 24.
Celestina, 800.
Celia, 285.
Celinda, 830.
Celso, 456.
Ceneus, 57.
Chambermaid, 741.
Champion, 122.
Charlotte, 185.
Christophil, 153.
Christalla, 770.
Churchwarden, 24.
Cicely, 485.
Citizen, 509.
Citizen’s Wife, 509.
Clement, Doctor, 35.
Clement, Justice, 214.
Cleon, 568.
Cleremont, 539.
Cloe, 598.
Clorin, 598.
Clowns, 35, 80.
Clunch, 24.
Cob, Oliver, 214.
Columbo, 830.
Colonels, 830.
Commandadori, 285.
Constables, 1, 35, 425.
Corbaccio, 285.
Cordus, 247.
Corebus, 24.
Cornelius, 80.
Cornwall, Earl of, 367.
Corsites, 1.
Corvino, 285.
Cosroe, 57.
Cotta, 247.
Country Fellow, 539.
Courtesan, 690.
Crambo, 393.
Cranwell, 485.
Creditors, 690, 741.
Crotolon, 770.
Cynthia, 1, 568.
Cyprian, Duke of Castile, 153.
D’Alvarez, Count, 830.
Dame Kitely, 214.
Dame Pliant, 325.
Dampit, Harry, 690.
Daniel De Bosola, 656.
Daphnis, 598.
Dapper, 325.
Dares, 1.
Decoy, 800.
De Flores, 715.
De Gard, 625.
Delia, 24.
Delio, 656.
Deputy, 153.
Devils, 35, 80.
Diagoras, 569.
Diaphanta, 715.
Dion, 539.
Diphilus, 568.
Dipsas, 1.
Doctor, 656.
Dodger, 367.
Dol Common, 325.
Don Bazulto, 153.
Don Lodowick, 96.
Don Mathias, 96.
Don Pedro, 153.
Dorothea Target, 425.
Downright, George, 214.
Dragon, 35.
Drugger, 325.
Drusus Junior, 247.
Drusus Senior, 247.
Duchess of Vanholt, 80.
Duchess Rosaura, 830.
Duke of Guise, 185.
Duke of Vanholt, 80.
Dula, 568.
Dumb Show, 1, 153.
Dutch Skipper, 367.
Earl of Kent, 122.
Ebea, 57.
Edward Knowell, 214.
Edward, Prince, 122.
Edward, Prince of Wales, 35.
Edward the Second, 122.
Elenor, Duchess of Guise, 185.
Elinor of Castile, 35.
Emilia, 456.
Emperor of Germany, 35, 80.
Endymion, 1.
Epiton, 1.
Equato, 456.
Erastus, Knight of Rhodes, 153.
Erestus, 24.
Ermsby, 35.
Eudemus, 247.
Eumenides, 1, 24.
Euphranea, 770.
Euphrasia, 539.
Evadne, 568.
Evil Angel, 80.
Face, 325.
Fairies, 1.
Falconers, 485.
Fantastic, 24.
Faustus, 80.
Favilla, 1.
Ferdinand, 656.
Ferneze, 96, 456.
Ferrardo, 456.
Fingerlock, Mistress, 393.
Firk, 367.
First Brother, 24.
Flamen, 247.
Floscula, 1.
Fluello, 393.
Fontinell, 425.
Foot-Boy, 625.
Formal, Roger, 214.
Foxtone, 690.
Franciscus, 715.
Frankford, John, 485.
Frankford, Mistress Anne, 485.
Frederick, Master, 800.
Freedom, Sam, 690.
Friars, 24, 80.
Friar Bacon, 35.
Friar Bungay, 35.
Friar Comolet, 185.
Friscobaldo, Orlando, 425.
Frolic, 24.
Froth, 741.
Furies, 24.
Furnace, 741.
Fustigo, 393.
Galatea, 539.
Gallus, 247.
Gasparo Trebazzi, 393, 425.
Gaveston, 122.
Gentleman-usher, 830.
Georgio, Antonio, 425.
George, 393, 509, 690.
Geron, 1.
Ghost of Andrea, 153.
Ghost of Friar, 185.
Ghost of Jack, 24.
Giovanni, Altofronto, 456.
God of the River, 598.
Good Angel, 80.
Governor of Damascus, 57.
Grausis, 770.
Greedy, 741.
Greengoose, George, 509.
Grege or Mob, 285.
Grisolan, 656.
Groneas, 770.
Guerrino, 456.
Guise, Duchess of, 185.
Guise, Duke of, 185.
Gulf, 690.
Gurney, 122.
Gyptes, 1.
Haircut, 800.
Hammerton, William, 509.
Hammon, 367.
Hangman, 153.
Hans, 367.
Harvest-men, 24, 367.
Haterius, 247.
Helen of Troy, 80.
Hemophil, 770.
Henry III of England, 35.
Henry III of France, 185.
Herald, 122.
Hercules, 35.
Hernando, 830.
Hieronimo, 153.
Hippolito, 393, 425.
Hoard, Onesiphorus, 690.
Hoard, Walkadine, 690.
Hodge, 367.
Horatio, 153.
Horse-Courser, 80.
Horseleech, Mistress, 425.
Host, 509, 690.
Hostess, 24.
Hostess of the Bell, 35.
Huanebango, 24.
Humphrey, 509.
Hunters, 367.
Huntsmen, 485.
Hymen, 153.
Infelice, 393, 425.
Isabella, 153, 715, 800.
Ithamore, 96.
Ithocles, 770.
Jack, 24.
Jack Slime, 485.
Jacomo, 96.
Jacques, 153.
James, 122.
Jane, 367.
Jaques, 830.
Jaques Vandermast, 35.
Jasper, 509.
Jasperino, 715.
Jenkin, 485.
Jews, 96.
Joan, 35.
Joyce, 690.
Julia, 656.
Justice Clement, 214.
Kastrill, 325.
Katherine, 96.
Keeper of Fressingfield, 35.
Keeper of Prison, 485.
Kickshaw, Alexander, 800.
King, 367, 568.
King Henry III, 35.
King of Arabia, 57.
King of Argiers (Algiers), 57.
King of Castile, 35.
King of Fez, 57.
King of Morocco, 57.
King of Navarre, 830.
King of Sicily, 539.
King of Spain, 153.
Kitely, 214.
Kitely, Dame, 214.
Kix, 690.
Knight, 80.
Knights, 96.
Knowell, 214.
Laco, 247.
Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, 35.
Lacy, Rowland, 367.
Lacy, Sir Hugh, 367.
La Castre, 625.
L’Anou, 185.
Lambert, 35.
Lamprey, 690.
Lampriscus, 24.
Lancaster, 122.
Latiaris, 247.
Launcelot, 690.
Leicester, 122.
Lepidus, 247.
Levune, 122.
Lictores, 247.
Lightborn, 122.
Lillia Bianca, 625.
Limber, 690.
Lincoln, Earl of, 35.
Littleworth, John, 800.
Livia, 247.
Lodovico Sforza, 425.
Lollio, 715.
Lord ——, 800.
Lorenzo, 153.
Lovell, 367.
Lovell, Lord, 741.
Lovewit, 325.
Luce, 509.
Lucifer, 80.
Lucre, Mistress, 690.
Lucre, Pecunius, 690.
Lugier, 625.
Lysippus, 568.
Machiavel, 96.
Macro, 247.
Madge, 24.
Madmen, 393, 656, 715.
Maffe, 185.
Magnetes, 57.
Maid, Isabella’s, 153.
Malatesti, Count, 656.
Malby, 485.
Malevole, 456.
Malfi, Duchess of, 656.
Mammon, Sir Epicure, 325.
Maquerelle, 456.
Margaret, 741.
Margaret of Fressingfield, 35.
Margery, 367.
Maria, 456.
Mariana, 625, 800.
Marrall, 741.
Martin Del Bosco, 96.
Mason, Doctor, 35.
Masquers, 568.
Matheo, 393, 425.
Mathew, 214.
Matrevis, 122.
Meander, 57.
Megra, 539.
Melantius, 568.
Melynell, 185.
Menaphon, 57.
Mendoza, 456.
Mephistophilis, 80.
Mercatori, 285.
Merchants, 96.
Merrythought, 509.
Merrythought, Mistress, 509.
Michael, 509.
Miles, 35.
Ministri, 247.
Minutius, 247.
Mirabel, 625.
Mistress Fingerlock, 393.
Moneylove, 690.
Monks, 122.
Monsieur, 185.
Montsurry, 185.
Moors, 57.
Mortimer, the elder, 122.
Mortimer, the younger, 122.
Mosca, 285.
Mountford, Old, 485.
Mountford, Susan, 485.
Mountford, Sir Charles, 485.
Mower, 122.
Murderers, 185.
Mycetes, 57.
Nano, 285.
Nantolet, 625.
Natta, 247.
Navarre, King of, 830.
Nearchus, 770.
Neptune, 568.
Nero, 247.
Nicholas, 483.
Niece to Edward II, 122.
Night, 568.
Notario, 285.
Nuntius, 185, 247.
Oately, Sir Roger, 367.
Old Man, 1, 80.
Old Shepherd, 598.
Olympias, 568.
Opsius, 247.
Order, 741.
Orgilus, 770.
Oriana, 625.
Orlando Friscobaldo, 425.
Ortygius, 57.
Overreach, Sir Giles, 741.
Page, Lorenzo’s, 153.
Panelion, 1.
Paramour of Alexander the Great, 80.
Passarello, 456.
Pedringano, 153.
Pedro, 153, 715, 830.
Pembroke, 122.
Penelope Whorehound, 425.
Penthea, 770.
Peregrine, 285.
Perigot, 598.
Pero, 185.
Perseda, 153.
Pescara, Marquis of, 656.
Petella, 625.
Pharamond, 539.
Philaster, 539.
Philema, 770.
Philemus, 57.
Phulas, 770.
Pietro Jacomo, Duke of Genoa, 456.
Pilia-Borsa, 96.
Pinac, 625.
Pioratto, 393.
Piracquo, Alonzo De, 715.
Piracquo, Tomaso De, 715.
Placentia, 830.
Poli, 393.
Pompiona, 509.
Pomponius, 247.
Poor Man, 122.
Pope, 80.
Porter, 393.
Portuguese Ambassador, 153.
Portuguese, Two, 153.
Posthumus, 247.
Praecones, 247.
Prepasso, 456.
Priest, 625.
Priest of Pan, 598.
Prince Edward, 122.
Prologue, 509.
Prophilus, 770.
Pyra, 185.
Pyrrhot, 185.
Pythagoras, 1.
Queen Isabella, 122.
Ralph, 80, 367,509.
Ralph Simnell, 35.
Reader, 96.
Regulus, 247.
Revenge, 153.
Rice ap Howel, 122.
Richard, 35.
Robin, 80.
Roder, 485.
Roger, 367, 393.
Roger Brickbat, 485.
Roderigo, 656.
Rosalura, 625.
Rosaura, Duchess, 830.
Rose, 367.
Rufus, 247.
Sabinus, 247.
Sacrapant, 24.
Samias, 1.
Sandy, 485.
Sanquinius, 247.
Satrius, 247.
Satyr, 598.
Scentlove, Sir William, 800.
Scholars, 35, 80.
Scintilla, 1.
Scott, 367.
Scrivener, 690.
Sea Gods, 568.
Second Brother, 24.
Secretary to Lord ——, 800.
Sejanus, 247.
Selim Calymath, 96.
Semele, 1.
Serberine, 153.
Serlsby, 35.
Servitore, 285.
Servus, 247.
Seven Deadly Sins, 80.
Sexton, 24.
Sforza, Lodovico, 425.
Shafton, 485.
Shepherds, 598.
Shepherdesses, 598.
Sheriff, 485.
Shoemakers, 367.
Silius, 247.
Silvio, 656.
Simon Eyre, 367.
Sinezi, 393.
Singing Boy, 625.
Sir Epicure Mammon, 325.
Sir John of Hainault, 122.
Sir Politic Would-Be, 285.
Sir Tophas, 1.
Slaves, 96.
Slime, Jack, 485.
Soldan of Egypt, 57.
Soliman, 153.
Sosia, 247.
Spanish General, 153.
Spenser, the elder, 122.
Spenser, the younger, 122.
Spichcock, 600.
Spigot, 485.
Spirit of Hercules, 35.
Stephen, 214.
Steward to Lady Aretina, 800.
Steward to Lady Celestina, 800.
Stato, 508.
Subtle, 325.
Sullen Shepherd, 598.
Surgeon, 830.
Surly, Pertinax, 325.
Susan Mountford, 485.
Sussex, Earl of, 35.
Sybil, 367.
Tamburlaine, 57.
Tamyra, Countess of Montsurry, 185.
Tapster, 509.
Tapwell, 741.
Target, Dorothea, 425.
Techelles, 57.
Tecnicus, 770.
Tellus, 1.
Terentius, 247.
Thelea, 24.
Thenot, 598.
Theridamas, 57.
Thomas, 35.
Thrasiline, 539.
Thrasus, 770.
Tib, 214.
Tiberius, 247.
Tibicines, 247.
Tidy, 485.
Tim, 509.
Tophas, Sir, 1.
Trebazzi, Gasparo, 393.
Tribune, 247.
Trio, 247.
Tribulation Wholesome, 325.
Trussel, 122.
Tubicines, 247.
Two Nuns, 96.
Umbra of Friar, 185.
Usumcasane, 57.
Valdes, 80.
Valeria, 830.
Vandermast, Jaques, 35.
Varro, 247.
Venelia, 24.
Venturewell, 509.
Vermandero, 715.
Viceroy of Portugal, 153.
Villuppo, 153.
Vintner, 80.
Viola, 393.
Virgins of Damascus, 57.
Volpone, 285.
Voltore, 285.
Wagner, 80.
Waiting Woman, 741.
Warner, 367.
Warren, Earl of Sussex, 35.
Warwick, 122.
Watchall, 741.
Watchmen, 1, 153.
Wellborn, Frank, 741.
Wellbred, 214.
Wendoll, 485.
Wholesome, Tribulation, 325.
Whorehound, Penelope, 425.
Wiggen, 24.
Willdo, 741.
Winds, 568.
Witgood, Theodorus, 690.
Woodmen, 539.
Would-Be, Madame, 285.
Would-Be, Sir Politic, 285.
Zabina, 57.
Zantippa, 24.
Zenocrate, 57.
Zontes, 1.
INDEX OF SONGS
Alack, alack, 386.
All ye that lovely lovers be, 26.
All ye woods, and trees, and bowers, 624.
And some they whistled, and some they sung, 537.
And where is your true love? Oh, where is yours, 536.
Arms and honours deck thy story, 674.
As you came from Walsingham, 522.
Begone, begone, my juggy, my puggy, 528.
Better music ne’er was known, 538.
But yet, or ere you part (oh, cruel!), 516.
Can you paint a thought, or number, 782.
Cold’s the wind, and wet’s the rain, 389.
Come, my Celia, let us prove, 306.
Come, my Daphne, come away, 853.
Come no more there, boys, 536.
Come, shepherds, come, 603.
Come, you whose loves are dead, 532.
Comforts lasting, loves increasing, 786.
Cynthia, to thy power and thee, 572.
Der was een bore van Gelderland, 371.
Do not fear to put thy feet, 612.
Down, down they fall, 522.
Fools, they are the only nation, 288.
For Jillian of Berry, she dwells on a hill, 533.
From the honour’d dead I bring, 654.
Give him flowers enow, palmer, 522.
Glories, pleasures, pomps, delights, and ease, 798.
Go from my window, love, go, 528.
Had old Hippocrates, or Galen, 296.
_Hans’s Song_, 371.
Hark, now everything is still, 680.
_Harvest-men’s Song_, 29.
He set her on a milk-white steed, 522.
He that doth his youth expose, 690.
Heigh-ho, farewell, Nan!, 516.
Ho, ho, nobody at home!, 533.
Hold back thy hours, dark Night, 572.
I come not hither for thee to teach, 529.
I could never have the power, 574.
I’d set mine old debts against my new driblets, 370.
I would not be a serving-man, 533.
If such danger be in playing, 537.
If you will sing, and dance, and laugh, 528.
It was a lady’s daughter, 537.
Lay a garland on my hearse, 574.
Lo, here we come a-reaping, 29.
Maids of England, sore may you mourn, 133.
My Savoy lord, why dost thou frown on me? 644.
Nose, nose, jolly red nose, 615.
O, let us howl some heavy note, 678.
O, no more, no more, too late, 793.
O, the month of May, the merry month of May, 379.
Oh, the Mimon round, 536.
She cares not for her daddy, nor, 522.
Sing his praises that doth keep, 600.
Sing we, and chant it, 536.
Sweet love, pity me, 725.
Tell me, dearest, what is love? 523.
The courtier’s flattering jewels, 410.
The Dutchman for a drunkard, 478.
_The First Three-men’s Song_, 379.
_The Second Three-men’s Song_, 389.
Thou art welcome from Stygian lake so soon, 536.
’T is mirth that fills the veins with blood, 521.
To bed, to bed! Come, Hymen, lead the bride, 572.
Troul the black bowl to me, 521.
Was never man, for lady’s sake, 522.
Well met, pug, the pearl of beauty, 401.
When earth and seas from me are reft, 516.
When it was grown to dark midnight, 521.
When as the rye reach to the chin, 25.
Who can sing a merrier note, 533.
Who would fear that may destroy, 481.
Why, an if she be, what care I, 522.
Why, farewell he! 536.
With hey, trixy, terlery-whiskin, 537.
With that came out his paramour, 537.
You are no love for me Margaret, 529.
You that would last long, list to my song, 297.
INDEX OF AUTHORS
Beaumont, Francis, 509, 539, 568, 872.
Chapman, George, 185, 870.
Dekker, Thomas, 367, 393, 425, 871.
Fletcher, John, 509, 539, 568, 598, 625, 872.
Ford, John, 770, 874.
Greene, Robert, 35, 869.
Heywood, Thomas, 485, 872.
Jonson, Ben, 214, 247, 285, 325, 871.
Kyd, Thomas, 153, 870.
Lyly, John, 1, 869.
Marlowe, Christopher, 57, 80, 96, 122, 870.
Marston, John, 456, 871.
Massinger, Philip, 741, 873.
Middleton, Thomas, 690, 715, 873.
Peele, George, 24, 869.
Rowley, William, 715, 873.
Shirley, James, 800, 830, 874.
Webster, John, 456, 656, 873.
INDEX OF PLAYS
A New Way to Pay Old Debts, 741, 859.
A Trick to Catch the Old One, 690, 859.
A Woman Killed with Kindness, 485, 858.
Bussy D’Ambois, 185, 856.
Doctor Faustus, 80, 855.
Edward the Second, 122, 856.
Endymion, the Man in the Moon, 1, 855.
Every Man in His Humour, 214, 856.
Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, 35, 855.
Philaster, or Love Lies a-bleeding, 539, 858.
Sejanus, His Fall, 247, 857.
Tamburlaine, Part I, 57, 855.
The Alchemist, 325, 857.
The Broken Heart, 770, 859.
The Cardinal, 830, 860.
The Changeling, 715, 859.
The Duchess of Malfi, 656, 859.
The Faithful Shepherdess, 598, 858.
The Honest Whore, Part I, 393, 857.
The Honest Whore, Part II, 425, 857.
The Jew of Malta, 96, 856.
The Knight of the Burning Pestle, 509, 858.
The Lady of Pleasure, 800, 860.
The Maid’s Tragedy, 568, 858.
The Malcontent, 456, 857.
The Old Wives Tale, 24, 855.
The Shoemakers’ Holiday, 367, 857.
The Spanish Tragedy, 153, 856.
The Wild-Goose Chase, 625, 859.
Volpone, or The Fox, 285, 857.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Interpret the play as referring to political or other events.
[2] In the Gardens of Cynthia’s Palace.
[3] So Bond. Old edd. _love_.
[4] Infatuated with.
[5] Foolish.
[6] Swaddling-clothes.
[7] The same.
[8] Plot.
[9] Caught with poisoned dough-balls.
[10] The same.
[11] Blunt arrows.
[12] Wool of Seres, Chinese silk. Old edd. read _Ceres_. Bond _Seres_.
[13] Old edd. _confound_.
[14] Drake.
[15] The same.
[16] Plot.
[17] Abated.
[18] Overcome.
[19] The same.
[20] “The fish _Scolopidus_ in the flood _Araris_.”—_Anat. of Wit_, p.
89, Arber. (Baker.)
[21] The same.
[22] A thief.
[23] Dolls.
[24] Loose shoes.
[25] Show his style.
[26] The trout which Epiton is carrying.
[27] Uncombed.
[28] Paltry.
[29] Reproached.
[30] In a Grove.
[31] Moonwort. “I have heard of an herb called Lunary that being bound
to the pulses of the sick cause nothing but dreams of weddings and
dances.” Act III, Sc. 3, _Sapho and Phao_. (Baker.)
[32] _Dumb show._ Omitted in first edition. Given by Blount in 1632.
[33] Blount reads _readeth_.
[34] In the Gardens of the Palace.
[35] Wranglings.
[36] A crooked tree.
[37] Matters.
[38] Before a castle.
[39] In the Gardens of the Palace.
[40] Here, and below, the allusions are to W. Lilly’s Latin Grammar.
[41] Disclose.
[42] Cicero, _De Officiis_, i. 22, 76.
[43] Adapted from Ovid, _Heroides_, xvii. 254.
[44] Ovid, _Her._ iv. 10.
[45] These lines seem to be Lyly’s own.
[46] Ovid, _Amores_, i. 9. 1.
[47] Ovid, _Ars Amatoria_, ii. 123.
[48] Ovid, _Tristia_, iv. 10, 26.
[49] Simpleton.
[50] Take off.
[51] The Song appears first in Blount’s edition.
[52] Grow fat.
[53] To untie the laces.
[54] So Baker. Old edd. _Travice_.
[55] Terence, _Andria_, 1. i. 144.
[56] A desert place, with a fountain.
[57] Foolish.
[58] Foolish.
[59] Before Corsites’ Castle.
[60] Bond emends to _customary_.
[61] That.
[62] In the Gardens of the Palace.
[63] Irritable humour.
[64] Move.
[65] Black Sanctus, a hymn to Saint Satan.
[66] So Baker. Old edd. read _No_.
[67] Quoted by Cicero in _Paradoxa Stoicorum_, i. 1, as from Bias
(Baker).
[68] So Baker. Old edd. read _Now_.
[69] Lucan, vii. 819.
[70] Fellows.
[71] Rumbles.
[72] Let me understand.
[73] This song appears first in Blount’s edition.
[74] Fool.
[75] Swagger.
[76] In the Grove, till v. 54.
[77] Languor.
[78] Appears first in Blount’s edition.
[79] A country dance.
[80] Now the Gardens.
[81] Again in the Grove.
[82] Overcome.
[83] In the Grove.
[84] Or _here_. Old edd. read _heere_.
[85] Appearance.
[86] In the Gardens of the Palace.
[87] So Baker. Old edd. read _love lappe_.
[88] Grove.
[89] An unfledged bird.
[90] Virgil, _Æneid_, iv. 23.
[91] A sucking rabbit.
[92] Old edd. _be_.
[93] Adapted from Ovid, _Ars Amat._ i. 244.
[94] Terence, _Adelphi_, v. 9. 9.
[95] Girls.
[96] Ovid, _Ars Amat._, ii. 535.
[97] Pale blue.
[98] The same.
[99] Wickeder.
[100] Unheard of.
[101] Bond transposes _scar_ and _wound_; and _seen_ and _felt_.
[102] Mean, base.
[103] Worms. A comic execration.
[104] Q _Franticke_.
[105] Dejected.
[106] A gay fellow.
[107] With a pun on _wood_, mad.
[108] Long wide trousers.
[109] The scene is now at the cottage.
[110] Madge is called _old woman_ in the speech-tags throughout in Q.
[111] A drink made of ale and the pulp of roasted crab-apples.
[112] A common card game.
[113] Handsome.
[114] [The young man] lives.
[115] Erestus is called _old man_ in the speech-tags throughout in Q.
[116] Later, _Corebus_.
[117] The clown appears to be priding himself on his finery—his plume
and long stockings.
[118] Care.
[119] Abundance.
[120] However hard the times may be.
[121] Sings.
[122] Called.
[123] Previously, _Booby, the clown_.
[124] Q. _Simon_.
[125] That’s flat.
[126] In Q. _Wiggen ... pike-staff_ appears as part of Sexton’s speech.
[127] Open the argument from my side. (Bullen).
[128] On.
[129] Where the ale-house often stood.
[130] Vile.
[131] Well done.
[132] Diggers.
[133] Ugly.
[134] Plague take you!
[135] With a vengeance. The origin of the phrase is uncertain.
[136] Used as a love charm.
[137] Apparently a parody of Stanyhurst’s hexameters.
[138] Pig’s eye, darling.
[139] A quotation from Harvey’s _Encomium Lauri_.
[140] Chaucer’s phrase for alliteration.
[141] Quoth he.
[142] “Lob’s pound” meant “the thralldom of a henpecked married man.”
(Bullen.)
[143] This stage direction occurs in Q after _tree_.
[144] Well done!
[145] Qy. Read _life’s_ for _life his_?
[146] This and the next three lines are found, with slight variations,
in Greene’s _Orlando Furioso._ (Dyce.)
[147] Separate.
[148] Framlingham.
[149] Of late.
[150] Outstripped.
[151] Dogs that roused the game.
[152] A woollen cloth.
[153] Dejected.
[154] Pearls.
[155] Rare appearance.
[156] Tint.
[157] Would have made that woman blush whom art, etc.
[158] Placket, slit in a woman’s skirt.
[159] Because.
[160] July 25.
[161] Outstrip.
[162] Overmaster.
[163] Friar Bacon’s cell at Brazenose.
[164] Be assured.
[165] Pentagram, the five-rayed star supposed to have magical
properties.
[166] Aims, tries to shoot with.
[167] Pick-a-back, on your shoulders.
[168] Care not for.
[169] Impulse.
[170] Cast down.
[171] Be abashed.
[172] Harleston Fair.
[173] Bargain.
[174] In the face of it.
[175] Fastidious.
[176] Qq. give these words to Mar.
[177] A term of contempt.
[178] _I. e._ shepherd’s garb.
[179] Hampton Court.
[180] Definitions, statements of scientific principles.
[181] Till.
[182] Q₁ _fit_; Q₂ _sit_. Qy. _flit_?
[183] Oxford: a street.
[184] At hand, at any instant.
[185] Trick.
[186] Swaggering.
[187] A student who received free board and tuition, and, formerly,
performed menial services.
[188] Tied by love.
[189] Entreat.
[190] Leathern wine jugs.
[191] Friar Bacon’s Cell.
[192] This stage-direction shows that the change of scene took place
only in the minds of the audience.
[193] Qq. _bright-sunne_. Gayley suggests _sunne-bright_.
[194] The Prince does not hear the following dialogue.
[195] Excuse.
[196] So Gayley. Qq. _cape_. Other edd. _rape_.
[197] Check, overmaster.
[198] Nearer (to your purpose).
[199] Prematurely.
[200] Because.
[201] Portable breviary.
[202] Gayley _scale_, as Q.
[203] From.
[204] The Regent-house at Oxford.
[205] Visit.
[206] Worthless fellow.
[207] Trim(?) (Cent. Dict.)
[208] Darling.
[209] From the soles of the slippers.
[210] Qq. _Bartlets_, perhaps rightly, as Greene may have intended
Miles to corrupt the name of the author of _The Ship of Fools_.
[211] The old north gate of Oxford, used as a prison.
[212] Fressingfield.
[213] Love.
[214] Sharer.
[215] Shittim.
[216] Get rid of.
[217] Overturned.
[218] Oxford.
[219] Fattening.
[220] Compared.
[221] _I.e._ Paris. Qq. _Lutrech_.
[222] Love-kindling looks.
[223] See note on I. 5.
[224] A servant who sets the table.
[225] Chopped meat in broth(?) (N. E. D.)
[226] Wonder.
[227] Qq. _with such_.
[228] Spices.
[229] A variety of plums.
[230] Confectionery.
[231] Lamprey(?) (Ward).
[232] Fressingfield.
[233] Pitchers.
[234] Jointure, or jointress.
[235] Estate (Gayley).
[236] Degree.
[237] Till.
[238] Qq. _Lempster_ (phonetic).
[239] Strutting, swelling.
[240] Hang loosely (N. E. D.).
[241] Qq. _forward_.
[242] Ephemera.
[243] Premature.
[244] Friar Bacon’s cell.
[245] Halbert.
[246] Till.
[247] With a pun on _coursed_ and _fares_, goes.
[248] At Court.
[249] Excessively.
[250] Friar Bacon’s cell.
[251] Venture.
[252] Bout.
[253] Britons(?) bloods(?)
[254] Doomed.
[255] Freesingfield.
[256] A lewd woman.
[257] Foolishly.
[258] Friar Bacon’s cell.
[259] Trimmings or facings.
[260] Pack.
[261] Of froth.
[262] The Court.
[263] This prophecy refers, as usual, to Elizabeth.
[264] Lower.
[265] So Dyce. Qq. _first_.
[266] Uncivilized.
[267] Forthwith.
[268] Viceroy.
[269] Confounded.
[270] Care.
[271] Rule.
[272] Dissolve.
[273] Persons of state.
[274] May Jove.
[275] Investiture.
[276] Early edd. read _of Medea_.
[277] The curtle-axe (Fr. _coutelasse_) was not an axe, but a short
curved sword, the modern cutlass.
[278] Invaluable.
[279] Valuable.
[280] Fine.
[281] Trunks.
[282] Merchantmen.
[283] Lower their flags.
[284] Partner.
[285] Early edd. _noble_.
[286] Originally the height to which a falcon soared; hence for height
in general. Here it means the shoulders.
[287] So Dyce. Early edd. read _snowy_.
[288] Gate.
[289] Scurvy.
[290] Spies.
[291] Surpass. Early edd. read _stop_.
[292] Nemesis, who had a temple at Rhamnus in Attica. (Bullen.)
[293] The white mark in the target at which the archers aimed.
[294] The peg in the centre which fastened the clout.
[295] Ed. of 1605, _apeece_.
[296] Booty.
[297] Requite.
[298] Dyce emends to _fate_.
[299] Artery.
[300] Rule.
[301] Preys.
[302] Algiers.
[303] Pashas.
[304] Christians who have abjured their faith.
[305] The Mediterranean.
[306] The Black Sea.
[307] Subjection.
[308] Deeds.
[309] Astonished.
[310] Sticks. Ital. _bastone_.
[311] Seraglio.
[312] Huge.
[313] Dash to pieces.
[314] Floating.
[315] Qq. _our_.
[316] Perhaps in the sense of “decoy.” Ellis suggests “light” from Fr.
_lueur_. Dyce conj. _air_.
[317] Contemptuously used of a woman.
[318] Early edd. add _and slay_.
[319] Defeat. Early edd. read _soile_.
[320] Plundering.
[321] Zante. (Bullen.)
[322] Gibraltar.
[323] Biscay.
[324] Pieces of ordnance, so called from their fancied resemblance to
the fabulous serpent of that name. (Cunningham.)
[325] Trisyllabic here.
[326] Demogorgon.
[327] Vain-glorious, boastful.
[328] Early edd. read _stature_.
[329] Dyce conj.
[330] Slices for broiling.
[331] Hinder.
[332] Until.
[333] Band.
[334] Holding out his sword.
[335] Expecting.
[336] Free.
[337] Shore: Fr. _plage_. Early edd. read _place_.
[338] First two edd. read _hower_.
[339] Early edd. _value_.
[340] Pity.
[341] Prayers.
[342] Moderate.
[343] Frightened.
[344] Later edd. emend to _Reflexed ... their_.
[345] Early edd. read _submissions_.
[346] Court.
[347] An antidote distilled from poisons. (Bullen.)
[348] Sorrow.
[349] Dissolved.
[350] Idea of defeat.
[351] Distil.
[352] Emend. Dyce. Early edd. read _stopt the tempest_.
[353] Conj. Collier. Early edd. read _lonely_.
[354] Early edd. _martch_.
[355] Emend. Dyce. Early edd. read _weeds_.
[356] Emend. Dyce. Early edd. _aie_. Qy. _die_?
[357] Bent back.
[358] Vomit.
[359] _I. e._ eyes.
[360] Slave.
[361] Dissolve.
[362] Early edd. read _our celebrated_.
[363] Confound. But Hannibal was victorious at Lake Trasumennus, B.C.
217.
[364] For applause.
[365] Roda, in the Duchy of Saxe-Altenburg, near Jena.
[366] The garden of scholarship being adorned by him.
[367] Knowledge.
[368] An allusion to the myth of Icarus, who flew too near the sun.
[369] Teach publicly.
[370] Aim.
[371] Logic.
[372] This is Mr. Bullen’s emendation of Q₁ _Oncaymaeon_, a corruption
of the Aristotelian phrase for “being and not being.”
[373] “Where the philosopher leaves off, there the physician begins.”
[374] This and the previous quotation are from Aristotle.
[375] Medical maxims.
[376] Announcements.
[377] “If one and the same thing is bequeathed to two persons, one gets
the thing and the other the value of the thing.”
[378] “A father cannot disinherit the son except,” etc.
[379] Of Justinian, under whom the Roman law was codified.
[380] Q₁, _Church_.
[381] Its.
[382] The Vulgate.
[383] Excels.
[384] Q₃, _tire my_.
[385] Idea.
[386] Emend. Dyce. Qq. _skill_.
[387] The Netherlands, over which Parma re-established the Spanish
dominion.
[388] A ship filled with explosives used to blow up a bridge built by
Parma in 1583 at the siege of Antwerp.
[389] The famous Cornelius Agrippa. German Valdes is not known.
[390] Cf. Virgil, _Aeneid_, vi. 667.
[391] American Indians.
[392] Q₄, _spirits_.
[393] Troopers. Germ. _Reiters_.
[394] Versed.
[395] Roger Bacon.
[396] Perhaps Pietro d’Abano, a medieval alchemist; perhaps a misprint
for Albertus (Magnus), the great schoolman.
[397] Fine point.
[398] Before Faustus’s House.
[399] “Thus I prove”—a common formula in scholastic discussions.
[400] “‘_Corpus naturale seu mobile_’ is the current scholastic
expression for the subject-matter of Physics.” (Ward.)
[401] Puritan.
[402] A Grove.
[403] Every star belonging to.
[404] Planets.
[405] “Be propitious to me, gods of Acheron! May the triple deity of
Jehovah prevail! Spirits of fire, air, water, hail! Belzebub, Prince
of the East, monarch of burning hell, and Demogorgon, we propitiate
ye, that Mephistophilis may appear and rise. Why dost thou delay? By
Jehovah, Gehenna, and the holy water which now I sprinkle, and the sign
of the cross which now I make, and by our prayer, may Mephistophilis
now summoned by us arise!”
[406] “For indeed thou hast power in the image of thy brother
Mephistophilis.”
[407] Twist in anagrams.
[408] Heaven and hell are indifferent to him.
[409] Sorrowful.
[410] Inform.
[411] Study.
[412] A street.
[413] Beards cut to a sharp point (Fr. _pic-à-devant_).
[414] Dyce points out that these are the first words of W. Lily’s “_Ad
discipulos carmen de moribus_.”
[415] A kind of larkspur, used for destroying lice.
[416] A mean street in London.
[417] Short wide breeches.
[418] For _diametrically_.
[419] “As if to tread in my tracks.”
[420] Emden, near the mouth of the river Ems, was an important
commercial town in Elizabethan times.
[421] “Misery loves company.”
[422] “It is finished.”
[423] “Man, fly!”
[424] Foolish.
[425] The Queen of Sheba.
[426] Repeating.
[427] The same.
[428] “In direction and in time?”
[429] “On account of their unequal motion in relation to the whole.”
[430] Pair.
[431] Refreshments between meals.
[432] Martlemas or Martinmas was “the customary time for hanging up
provisions to dry which had been salted for the winter.” (Nares.)
[433] Later edd. give this speech to Chorus.
[434] The Pope’s Privy-chamber.
[435] Treves.
[436] Virgil, who was reputed a magician in the Middle Ages, was buried
at Naples.
[437] Engaged.
[438] “A particular set of notes on the trumpet or cornet, different
from a flourish.” (Nares.)
[439] If.
[440] “May the Lord curse him.”
[441] “And all the saints.”
[442] An Inn-yard.
[443] Wine mixed with sugar and spices.
[444] An Inn.
[445] Gain.
[446] The abuse was left to the actor’s inventiveness.
[447] “In the name of the Lord.”
[448] “Sin of sins.”
[449] “Mercy on us.”
[450] The Court of the Emperor.
[451] Proportionate.
[452] Its.
[453] Mention.
[454] A Green; afterwards, the house of Faustus.
[455] Dr. Lopez, physician to Queen Elizabeth, hanged in 1594 on the
charge of conspiring to poison the Queen.
[456] A juggler’s term, like “presto, fly!” Hence applied to the
juggler himself. (Bullen.)
[457] Inn.
[458] The Court of the Duke of Vanholt.
[459] A room in the house of Faustus.
[460] Old Man.
[461] Unsurpassed in height.
[462] Qq₁₋₃ read _suckes_.
[463] The same.
[464] “Run softly, softly, horses of the night.”—Ovid’s _Amores_, i.
13.
[465] Without ceasing.
[466] The Duc de Guise, who had organised the Massacre of St.
Bartholomew in 1572, was assassinated in 1588.
[467] Q. _Empire_.
[468] Q. _Samintes_. Recent edd. _Sabans_.
[469] Count.
[470] Seldom seen.
[471] A stuffed halcyon, or kingfisher, was used as a weather vane.
[472] Enter them at the custom-house.
[473] Q. _servants_
[474] Scrambled.
[475] Expenses.
[476] Some edd. suppose the scene to be shifted here to a street.
[477] Foolish
[478] Against.
[479] Misquoted from Terence’s _Andria_, iv. 1. 12. The words should be
“Proximus sum egomet mihi.” (Ellis.)
[480] Inside the council-house.
[481] Bashaws or Pashas.
[482] Haply.
[483] Await.
[484] Reckoned.
[485] Refuses.
[486] Convert.
[487] Foolish.
[488] For I have toiled only to inherit the months, etc., which have
been, etc.
[489] Violent emotion.
[490] Plan.
[491] The scene seems to change here from the Council-house to the
neighbourhood of Scene I.
[492] Redress.
[493] Foolish.
[494] Portuguese gold coins.
[495] Sex.
[496] Secretive.
[497] So Q. “cloisters,” “gardens,” and “quarters,” have been
conjectured as emendations.
[498] The scene is before Barabas’s house, now a nunnery.
[499] Bullen emends to _youth_.
[500] Dyce emends to _wake_.
[501] Span. “My herd was not good for all”; _i. e._, different people
judged me differently.
[502] Span. “Beautiful pleasure of money.”
[503] The Council-house.
[504] Freight.
[505] Lowered our flags.
[506] Q. Spanish.
[507] So Dyce. Q. _left and tooke_.
[508] Established.
[509] The market-place.
[510] Gold or silver leaf placed under a gem to increase its brilliance.
[511] Defiled, punning on _foil_.
[512] Make insinuations.
[513] Pieces of silver coin.
[514] Break off our conversation.
[515] Barabas was represented on the stage with a large false nose. In
Rowley’s _Search for Money_ (1609) allusion is made to the “artificiall
Jewe of Maltaes nose.” (Ellis.)
[516] Practice.
[517] In good earnest.
[518] Affianced.
[519] Q. _unsoyl’d_. But cf. II. iii. 58.
[520] A piece of money with a cross marked on it.
[521] Satisfied.
[522] Betrothed thee.
[523] Outside of Bellamira’s house.
[524] A street.
[525] Q. places _reading_ after _Enter Lodowick_.
[526] Brave.
[527] A room in Barabas’s house.
[528] Object.
[529] Q. _sinne_.
[530] Q. _Pryor. Sire_, Tucker Brooke.
[531] Q. _Sonne_.
[532] Reveal.
[533] The same.
[534] Unnatural.
[535] Meaneth.
[536] Q. _life_.
[537] Q. _least_.
[538] Feed.
[539] In abundance.
[540] In short.
[541] A poison not certainly identified
[542] The council-house.
[543] Cannon.
[544] The interior of a convent.
[545] Hated.
[546] Plot.
[547] Secret.
[548] A street.
[549] Equal to.
[550] A petty oath. (Italian).
[551] Dyce emend. Q. omits.
[552] Lofts.
[553] So Tucker Brooke. Q. _goe_.
[554] Ithamore.
[555] Convent.
[556] A room in the house of Barabas.
[557] Q. _save_.
[558] It would appear from the following scene that the body was stood
up outside of the house.
[559] Outside Barabas’s house.
[560] Succeed.
[561] Delayed.
[562] A verandah of Bellamira’s house.
[563] Brave.
[564] At.
[565] Service.
[566] Mustachios.
[567] Hasty.
[568] The early form of _realm_ had no “l.”
[569] A musical term.
[570] The street.
[571] Tattered.
[572] Knavery.
[573] Playing sham husband to a courtesan.
[574] Sum, number.
[575] A verandah of Bellamira’s house.
[576] A familar Bacchanalian exclamation.
[577] Probably corrupt. “Snickle” is a noose.
[578] Dainty, sweet.
[579] Referring to the tradition that Judas Iscariot hanged himself on
an elder-tree.
[580] Q. masty.
[581] The council-house.
[582] Q. _Mater_.
[583] Outside the city walls.
[584] Conj. Collier. Q. _truce_.
[585] At once.
[586] An open place in the city.
[587] Lower.
[588] Q. _kept_.
[589] The scene is here supposed to shift to the governor’s residence
inside the citadel.
[590] _’T is_, Cunningham emend. Q. _within_.
[591] Outside the city walls.
[592] Cannons’.
[593] A street in Malta.
[594] A hall in the citadel, with a gallery at the end.
[595] Concealed.
[596] Dyce, _ascend_.
[597] Cunningham emend. Q. _fate_.
[598] Intended.
[599] Q _meditate_.
[600] A street in London.
[601] Dyce emends to _lie_. _Die_ may be used in the sense of “swoon.”
[602] “So much for them.”
[603] A rural dance.
[604] Mowbray, but the Q. spelling indicates the pronunciation.
[605] This line and the next are ironical.
[606] Flattering.
[607] Contend.
[608] Rule.
[609] Fear’st for.
[610] Gutter.
[611] I. e., You have used the true word “Convey” (= steal).