"Bycheson, id est, son of a byche, ut e codice Rawlinsoniano edidi. Eo nempe modo quo et olim whorson dixerunt pro son of a whore. Exempla habemus cum alibi tum in libello quodam lepido & antiquo (inter codices Seldenianos in Bibl. Bodl.) qui inscribitur: The Wife lapped in Morel's Skin: or the Taming of a Shrew" (Farmer). Farmer then gives Hearne's quotation of two verses from it, pp. 36 and 42.

202. Pope's list. At the end of vol. vi. of his edition.

Ravenscroft, Edward, in his Titus Andronicus, or the Rape of Lavinia, 1687, "To the Reader'; see Ingleby's Centurie of Prayse, p. 404.

203. The Epistles, says one, of Paris and Helen. Pope's Shakespeare, vol. vii., 1725, p. 10.

Sewell, Preface to

it may be concluded, says another. Whalley, Enquiry, p. 79.

Jaggard. "It may seem little matter of wonder that the name of Shakespeare should be borrowed for the benefit of the bookseller; and by the way, as probably for a play as a poem : but modern criticks may be surprised perhaps at the complaint of John Hall, that "certayne chapters of the Proverbes, translated by him into English metre, 1550, had before been untruely entituled to be the doyngs of Mayster Thomas Sternhold" (Farmer).

204. Biographica Britannica, 1763, vol. vi. Farmer has a note at this passage correcting a remark in the life of Spenser and showing by a quotation from Browne's Britannia's Pastorals, that the Faerie Queene was left unfinished,—not that part of it had been lost.

205. Anthony Wood. "Fasti, 2d Edit., v. 1. 208.-It will be seen on turning to the former edition, that the latter part of the paragraph belongs to another Stafford. I have since observed that Wood is not the first who hath given us the true author of the pamphlet " (Farmer). Fasti, ed. Bliss, i. 378. But Stafford's authorship of this pamphlet has now been disproved: see the English Historical Review, vi. 284-305.

Warton, Thomas. Life of Ralph Bathurst, 2 vols., 1761.

Aubrey. See Brief Lives, ed. Andrew Clark, 1898, vol. ii., pp. 225-227. For Beeston, see vol. i., pp. 96-7.

Grendon. "It was observed in the former edition that this place is not met with in Spelman's Villare, or in Adams's Index; nor, it might have been added, in the first and the last performance of this sort, Speed's Tables and Whatley's Gazetteer: perhaps, however, it may be meant under the name of Crandon; but the inquiry is of no importance. It should, I think, be written Credendon; tho' better antiquaries than Aubrey have acquiesced in the vulgar corruption" (Farmer). But Crendon is only a misprint for Grendon.

206. Rowe tells us.

Hamlet revenge.

See p. 4.

Steevens and Malone "confirm" Farmer's observation by references to Dekker's Satiromastix, 1602, and an anonymous

play called A Warning for Faire Women, 1599. Farmer is again out in his chronology.

Holt. See above, p. 190. Johnson's edition of Shakespeare, vol. viii., Appendix, note on viii. 194.

Kirkman, Francis, bookseller, published his Exact Catalogue of all the English Stage Plays in 1671.

Winstanley, William (1628-1698), compiler of Lives of the most famous English Poets, 1687. "These people, who were the Curls of the last age, ascribe likewise to our author those miserable performances Mucidorous and the Merry Devil of Edmonton" (Farmer).

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seven years afterward. "Mr. Pope asserts 'The troublesome Raigne of King John,' in two parts, 1611, to have been written by Shakespeare and Rowley which edition is a mere copy of another in black letter, 1591. But I find his assertion is somewhat to be doubted: for the old edition hath no name of author at all; and that of 1611, the initials only, W. Sh., in the title-page" (Farmer).

Nash. This reference was added in the second edition. See Arber's reprint of Greene's Menaphon, p. 17, or Gregory Smith, Elizabethan Critical Essays, i. 307, etc.

"Peele seems to have been taken into the patronage of the Earl of Northumberland about 1593, to whom he dedicates in that year, The Honour of the Garter, a poem gratulatorie-the firstling consecrated to his noble name.'-'He was esteemed,' says Anthony Wood, a most noted poet, 1579; but when or where he died, I cannot tell, for so it is, and always hath been, that most Poets die poor, and consequently obscurely, and a hard matter it is to trace them to their graves. Claruit, 1599.' Ath. Oxon., vol. i., p. 300.-We had lately in a periodical pamphlet, called The Theatrical Review, a very curious letter, under the name of George Peele, to one Master Henrie Marle, relative to a dispute between Shakespeare and Alleyn, which was compromised by Ben. Jonson. I never longed for thy companye more than last night; we were all verie merrie at the Globe, when Ned Alleyn did not scruple to affyrme pleasauntly to thy friende Will, that he had stolen hys speeche about the excellencie of acting in Hamlet hys tragedye, from conversaytions manifold, whych had passed between them, and opinions gyven by Alleyn touchyng that subjecte. Shakespeare did not take this talk in good sorte; but Jonson did put an end to the stryfe wyth wittielie saying, thys affaire needeth no contentione; you stole it from Ned no doubte: do not marvel: haue you not seene hym acte tymes out of number?'-This is pretended to be printed from the original MS. dated 1600; which agrees well enough with Wood's Claruit but unluckily Peele was dead at least two years before. As Anacreon died by the pot,' says Meres, 'so George Peele by the pox,' Wit's Treasury, 1598, p. 286" (Farmer).

Constable in Midsummer Night's Dream. Apparently a mistake for Much Ado.

207. two children. Susannah, Judith, and Hamnet were all born at Stratford. Judith and Hamnet were twins. Cf. p. 21 and note. "cheers up himself with ends of verse." Butler, Hudibras, i. 3. 1011. Wits, Fits, and Fancies. "By one Anthony Copley, 4to, black letter; it seems to have had many editions: perhaps the last was in 1614.-The first piece of this sort that I have met with was printed by T. Berthelet, tho' not mentioned by Ames, called Tales, and quicke answeres very mery and pleasant to rede.' 4to, no date." (Farmer).

208. Master Page, sit. 2 Henry IV., v. 3. 30.

Heywood. In the To the Reader' prefixed to his Sixt Hundred of Epigrammes (Spenser Society reprint, 1867, p. 198).

Dekker. Vol. iii., p. 281 (ed. 1873).

Water-poet. See the Spenser Society reprint of the folio of 1630, P. 545.

Rivo, says the Drunkard. 1 Henry IV., ii. 4. 124.

209. What you will. Act ii., Sc. I (vol. i., p. 224, ed. 1856). Love's Labour Lost, iv. 1. 100. This paragraph was added in the

second edition.

Taming of the Shrew, ii. 1. 73.

Heath. Revisal of Shakespear's Text, p. 159. This quotation was added in the second edition.

Heywood. Epigrammes upon prouerbes, 194 (Spenser Soc. reprint, p. 158).

210. Howell, James (1594-1666), Historiographer, author of the Epistolae Ho-Elianae. Proverbs or old sayed Saws and Adages in English or the Saxon Tongue formed an appendix to his Lexicon Tetraglotton (1659-60). The allusion to Howell was added in the second edition.

Philpot, John (1589-1645). See Camden's Remains concerning Britain, 1674, "Much amended, with many rare Antiquities never before Imprinted, by the industry and care of John Philipot, Somerset Herald, and W. D. Gent": 1870 reprint, p. 319.

Grey. Notes on Shakespeare, ii., p. 249.

Romeo. "It is remarked that 'Paris, tho' in one place called Earl, is most commonly stiled the Countie in this play. Shakespeare seems to have preferred, for some reason or other, the Italian Conte to our Count :-perhaps he took it from the old English novel, from which he is said to have taken his plot.'-He certainly did so : Paris is there first stiled a young Earle, and afterward Counte, Counter, and County, according to the unsettled orthography of the time. The word, however, is frequently met with in other writers, particularly in Fairfax," etc. (Farmer).

Painter, vol. ii. 1567, 25th novel. Arthur Broke's verse rendering, founded on Boaistuau's (or Boisteau's) French version of Bandello,

appeared in 1562; and it was to Broke, rather than to Painter, that Shakespeare was indebted. See P. A. Daniel's Originals and Analogues, Part I. (New Shakspere Society, 1875).

Taming of the Shrew. Induction, i. 5.

Hieronymo, iii. 14, 117, 118 (ed. Boas, p. 78); cf. p. 193.

Whalley. Enquiry, p. 48.

Philips,-Edward Phillips (1630-1696), Milton's nephew. See his Theatrum Poetarum, or a Compleat Collection of the Poets, 1675, ii. p. 195. Cf. also Winstanley's English Poets, p. 218.

Heywood, in the Apology for Actors, 1612, alluded to above; see Hawkins's Origin of the English Drama, 1773, ii., p. 3, and Boas's Works of Kyd, 1901, pp. xiii, civ, and 411. Mr. Boas gives Hawkins the credit of discovering the authorship of The Spanish Tragedy "some time before 1773," but the credit is Farmer's. Hawkins was undoubtedly indebted to Farmer's Essay.

211. Henry the fifth, Act iii., Sc. 4.

not published by the author. "Every writer on Shakespeare hath expressed his astonishment that his author was not solicitous to secure his fame by a correct edition of his performances. This matter is not understood. When a poet was connected with a particular playhouse, he constantly sold his works to the Company, and it was their interest to keep them from a number of rivals. A favourite piece, as Heywood informs us, only got into print when it was copied by the ear, 'for a double sale would bring on a suspicion of honestie.' Shakespeare therefore himself published nothing in the drama: when he left the stage, his copies remained with his fellow-managers, Heminge and Condell; who at their own retirement, about seven years after the death of their author, gave the world the edition now known by the name of the first Folio, and call the previous publications 'stolne and surreptitious, maimed and deformed by the frauds and stealths of injurious impostors.' But this was printed from the playhouse copies; which in a series of years had been frequently altered, thro' convenience, caprice, or ignorance. We have a sufficient instance of the liberties taken by the actors, in an old pamphlet by Nash, called Lenten Stuff, with the Prayse of the red Herring, 4to, 1599, where he assures us that in a play of his, called the Isle of Dogs, foure acts, without his consent, or the least guesse of his drift or scope, were supplied by the players.'-This, however, was not his first quarrel with them. In the Epistle prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, which I have quoted before, Tom hath a lash at some 'vaine glorious tragedians,' and very plainly at Shakespeare in particular; which will serve for an answer to an observation of Mr. Pope, that had almost been forgotten: 'It was thought a praise to Shakespeare that he scarce ever blotted a line. I believe the common opinion of his want of learning proceeded from no better ground. This, too, might be thought a praise by some.' But hear

Nash, who was far from praising: I leaue all these to the mercy of their mother-tongue, that feed on nought but the crums that fall from the translator's trencher, that could scarcely Latinize their neck verse if they should haue neede; yet English Seneca, read by candle-light, yeelds many good sentences-hee will affoord you whole Hamlets, I should say, handfuls of tragicall speeches.' I cannot determine exactly when this Epistle was first published; but, I fancy, it will carry the original Hamlet somewhat further back than we have hitherto done; and it may be observed that the oldest copy now extant is said to be enlarged to almost as much againe as it was.' Gabriel Harvey printed at the end of the year 1592 Foure Letters and certaine Sonnetts, especially touching Robert Greene in one of which his Arcadia is mentioned. Now Nash's Epistle must have been previous to these, as Gabriel is quoted in it with applause; and the Foure Letters were the beginning of a quarrel. Nash replied in Strange Newes of the intercepting certaine Letters, and a Convoy of Verses, as they were going privilie to victual the Low Countries, 1593. Harvey rejoined the same year in Pierce's Supererogation, or a new Praise of the old Asse; and Nash again, in Have with you to Saffron Walden, or Gabriel Harvey's Hunt is up; containing a full Answer to the eldest Sonne of the Halter-maker, 1596.-Dr. Lodge calls Nash our true English Aretine: and John Taylor, in his Kicksey-Winsey, or a Lerry Come-twang, even makes an oath by sweet satyricke Nash his urne.'-He died before 1606, as appears from an old comedy called The Return from Parnassus” (Farmer). See Gregory Smith, Elizabethan Critical Essays, especially i 424-5.

211. Hawkins. Johnson's Shakespeare, vol. viii., Appendix, note on iv., P. 454. The quotation from Johnson, and the references to Eliot and Du Bartas, were added in the second edition.

Est-il impossible. Henry V., iv. 4. 17.

French Alphabet of De la Mothe. "Lond., 1592, 8vo " (Farmer). Orthoepia of John Eliot. "Lond., 1593, 4to. Eliot is almost the only witty grammarian that I have had the fortune to meet with. In his Epistle prefatory to the Gentle Doctors of Gaule, he cries out for persecution, very like Jack in that most poignant of all Satires, the Tale of a Tub, 'I pray you be readie quicklie to cauill at my booke, I beseech you heartily calumniate my doings with speede, I request you humbly controll my method as soone as you may, I earnestly entreat you hisse at my inventions," etc. (Farmer).

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Sejanus. See Jonson's 'To the Readers' "Lastly, I would inform you that this book, in all numbers, is not the same with that which was acted on the public stage; wherein a second pen had good share in place of which, I have rather chosen to put weaker, and, no doubt, less pleasing, of mine own, than to defraud so happy a genius of his right by my loathed usurpation." Jonson is supposed to refer here to Shakespeare.

But what if... Capell's Prolusions, added in the second edition.