THE Author of this Play is unknown. Philips and Winstanley ascribe it to John Heywood, author of the Four P's, and other pieces which bear not the least resemblance to the present performance. The story on which it is grounded seems to have its foundation in the particular traditions of the Town of Wakefield: that part which relates to Robin Hood is contained in one of the popular Ballads concerning that celebrated Outlaw, printed in the first volume of Evan's Collection of old Ballads, p. 99, and more accurately in Ritson's Robin Hood, II. 16. This Ballad is mentioned by Drayton, in his Poly-olbion, Song the Twentietheighth:

eye,

"It chanc'd she in her course on Kirkbey cast her "Where merry Robin Hood, that honest thief, doth

lie;

"Beholding fitly too before how Wakefield stood, "She doth not only think of lusty Robin Hood, "But of his merry man, the Pindar of the town "Of Wakefield, George a Green, whose fames so far are blown

"For their so valiant fight, that every free man's song "Can tell you of the same, quoth she be talk'd on long,

*A copy of this play was in Mr. Rhodes's collection with the following notes upon the title page, in a hand writing of about the time when it was printed (1599).

"Written by.

.... a minister who acted the piner's pt in it him selfe. Teste. W. Shakespeare.

Ed. Juby saith it was made by Ro. Greene."

If Robert Greene were the author of it, the incident on p. 11, of making Sir N. Mannering eat the seals of the Earl of Kendall's commission, was taken from an event in his own life (vide note 4). Juby was an actor in the company of Prince Henry, in 1604, and had joined with Rowley in writing a play called Sampson in 1602.

4

"For ye were merry lads, and those were merry days; &c."

And Richard Braithwaite, in the Strappado for the Devil, 1615, 8vo. p. 203, says:

"At least such places labour to make known, "As former times have honour'd with renown, "So by thy true relation 't may appear "They are no others now, than as they were "Ever esteem'd by auntient times records, "Which shall he shadow'd breefly in few words. "The first whereof that I intend to show, "Is merry Wakefield and her Pindar too: "Which Fame hath blaz'd with all that did belong, "Unto that Towne in many gladsome song: "The Pindars valour, and how firm he stood, "In th' Townes defence 'gainst th' rebel Robin Hood, "How stoutly he behav'd himselfe, and would, "In spite of Robin bring his horse to th' fold; "His many Maygames which were to be seene, Yeerely presented upon Wakefield greene, "Where lovely Jugge and lustie Tib would go, "To see Tom lively turne upon the toe;

"Hob, Lob, and Crowde the fidler would be there, "And many more I will not speake of here: "Good god! how glad hath been this hart of mine "To see that Towne, which hath in former time "So flourish'd and so gloried in her name, "Famous by the Pindar who first rais'd the same; "Yea, I have paced ore that greene and ore, "And th' more I saw't I tooke delight the more, "For where we take contentment in a place, "A whole daies walke seemes as a cinquepace. "Unto thy taske, my muse, and now made knowne "The jolly shoo-maker of Bradford towne, "His gentle craft so rais'd in former time, "By princely Journey-men his discipline, "Where he was wont with passengers to quaffe, "But suffer none to carry up their staffe