WRITTEN BY THE MEMORABLE WORTHIES OF THEIR TIME, MR. JOHN FLETCHER AND GENT. MR. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Edited, with Notes, BY WILLIAM J. ROLFE, LITT. D., FORMERLY HEAD MASTER OF THE HIGH SCHOOL, CAMBRIDGE, MASS. WITH ENGRAVINGS. ΕΧΟΝΤΕΣ ΔΙΑΔΩΣΟΥ NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE. 1890. +34-82.54.3 Harvard University, Edgar Mc. Wel's. (H, U. 1897) ENGLISH CLASSICS. EDITED BY WM. J. ROLFE, A.M. Illustrated. 16m0, Cloth, 56 cents per volume; Paper, 40 cents per volume. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part HARVARD LIBRAR Copyright, 1883, by HARPER & BROTHERS. PREFACE. I HAVE included The Two Noble Kinsmen in this edition of Shakespeare's works because, as some critics believe (see p. 10), he appears to have had some share in the composition of the play. I have nothing to add here to the discussion of that question except a few paragraphs from Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps' Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare (2d ed. 1882), which would have been included in the Introduction if I had seen them in time. He states concisely "the main external testimonies on each side of the question ;" and among the "reasons for believing that the great dramatist had no share whatever in the composition" are the following: "1. When John Waterson, in October, 1646, transferred to Humphrey Moseley his copyright interests in three plays—The Elder Brother, Monsieur Thomas, and The Two Noble Kinsmen-the undivided authorship of all of them is distinctly assigned to Fletcher in the register, the third appearing there under the title of The Noble Kinsman. The Fletcherian authorship of the two other dramas is undisputed; and if Waterson really believed that Shakespeare had written part of the last, there seems no reason why the name of the great dramatist should not have been given in the entry of the assignment. . . . 2. In a list of books printed for Moseley, which is inserted at the end of some copies of Shirley's Six New Playes, 1653, occurs the Two Noble Kinsmen, a comedy written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, gent., in 4°. The same entry is met with the following year in a similar list of the works of the same publisher, these announcements singularly contrasting with his trading anxiety to use the name of Shakespeare improperly in other instances, It should be carefully recollected that Moseley was specially connected with the works of Beaumont and Fletcher, so that his evidence, valueless in a question of Shakespearian authorship, is most likely important in regard to the works of the former dramatists. . . . 5. The absence of con: temporary evidence that Shakespeare and Fletcher were acquainted with each other.... 7. The direct evidence of Leonard Digges, about the year 1623, of Shakespeare's aversion to any kind of literary partnership, so that he even carefully avoided the then common practice of availing himself of scenes written for him by other dramatists.-8. The parallel |