poses, after 1608. We know, indeed, the contrary to be true: for the chorus to the fifth act must have been written in 1599. The fair inference to be drawn from the imperfect and mutilated copies of this play, published in 1600, 1602, and 1608, is, not that the

Jonson (says that writer), was a great lover and praiser of himself; a contemner and scorner of others, given rather to lose a friend than a jest; jealous of every word and action of those about him, especially after drink, which is one of the elements in which he lived; a dissembler of the parts which reign in him; a bragger of some good that he wanted he thinketh nothing well done, but what either himself or some of his friends have said or done; he is passionately kind and angry; careless either to gain or keep; vindictive, but, if he be well answered [angry], at himself; interprets the best sayings and deeds often to the worst*. He was for any religion, as being versed in both; oppressed with fancy, which over-mastered his reason, a general disease in many poets. His inventions are smooth and easy; but above all, he excelleth in translation. Drummond's Works, fol. 1711, p. 226.

In the year 1619 Jonson went to Scotland, to visit Mr. Drummond, who has left a curious account of a conversa tion that passed between them, relative to the principal poets of those times.

*His misquoting a line of Julius Cæsar, so as to render it nonsense, at a time when the play was in print, is a strong illustration of this part of his character. The plea of an unfaithful memory cannot be urged in his defence, for he tells us in his Discoveries, that till he was past forty, he could repeat every thing that he had written.

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whole

whole play, as we now have it, did not then exist, but that those copies were surreptitious (probably taken down in short-hand, during the representation); and that the editor in 1600, not being able to publish the whole, published what he could.

I have not, indeed, met with any evidence (except in three plays) that the several scenes, which are found in the folio of 1623, and are not in the preceding quartos, were added by the second labour of the author. The last chorus of King Henry V. already mentioned, affords a striking proof that this was not always the case. The two copies of The Second Part of King Henry IV. printed in the same year (1600) furnish another. In one of these, the whole first scene of A&t III. is wanting; not because it was then unwritten (for it is found in the other copy published in that year), but because the editor was not possessed of it. That what have been called additions by the author, were not really such, may be also collected from another circumstance; that in some of the quartos, where these supposed additions are wanting, references and replies are found to the passages

omitted *.

* Of this see a remarkable instance in King Henry IV. P. II. A&t I. Sc. i. where Morton, in a long speech, having informed Northumberland that the archbishop of York had joined the rebel party, the earl replies" I knew of this before."-The quarto contains the reply, but not a single line of the narrative to which it relates.

I do not, however, mean to say, that Shakspere never made any alterations in his plays. We have reason to believe that Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and The Merry Wives of Windsor, were entirely new written ; and a second revisal, or temporary topicks, might have suggested, in a course of years, some additions and alterations in all his pieces. But with respect to the entire scenes that are wanting in some of the early editions (particularly those of King Henry V. King Richard II. and The Second Part of King Henry IV.) X suppose the omissions to have arisen from the imperfection of the copies; and instead of saying that “ the first scene of King Henry V. was added by the author after the publication of the quarto in 1600," all that we can pronounce with certainty is, that this scene is not found in the quarto of 1600.

20. MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 1600.

Much Ado about Nothing was written, we may presume, early in the year 1600; for it was entered at Stationers-Hall, August 23, 1600, and printed in that year.

It is not mentioned by Meres in his list of our author's plays, published in the latter-end of the year 1598.

21. AS YOU LIKE IT, 1600.

This comedy was not printed till 1623, and the caveat or memorandum * in the second volume of the books of the Stationers-Company, relative to the three plays of As You Like It, Henry V. and Much Ado about Nothing, has no date except Aug. 4. But immediately above that caveat there is an entry, dated May 27, 1600-and the entry immediately following it, is dated Jan. 23, 1603. We may therefore presume that this caveat was entered between those two periods: more especially, as the dates, scattered over the pages where this entry is found, are, except in one instance, in a regular series from 1596 to 1615. This will appear more clearly by exhibiting the entry exactly as it stands in the book:

27 May, 1600.

To Mr. Roberts.] Allarum to London.

As You Like It, a book,

Henry the Fift, a book,

4 Aug.

Every Man in his Humour, a book,

Comedy of Much Ado about Nothing,

23 Jan. 1603.

to be staied.

To Thomas Thorpe, and William Aspley.] This to be their copy, &c.

* See Mr. Steevens's extracts from the books of the Sta tioners-Company, ante, p, 270.

It is extremely probable that this 4th of August was of the year 1600; which standing a little higher on the paper, the clerk of the Stationers-Company might have thought unnecessary to be repeated. All the plays which were entered with As You Like It, and are here said to be staied, were printed in the year 1600 or 1601. The stay or injunction against the printing appears to have been very speedily taken off; for in ten days afterwards, on the 14th of August, 1600, King Henry V. was entered, and published in the same year. So, Much Ado about Nothing was entered August 23, 1600, and printed also in that year: and Every Man in his Humour was published in 1601.

Shakspere, it is said, played the part of Adam in As You Like It. As he was not eminent on the stage, it is probable that he ceased to act some years before he retired to the country. His appearance, however, in this comedy, is not inconsistent with the date here assigned; for we know that he performed a part in Jonson's Sejanus in 1603.

22. MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, 1601..

The first sketch of this comedy was printed in 1602. It was entered in the books of the Stationers-Company, on the 18th of January 1601-2, and was, therefore, probably, written in 1601, after the Two Parts of King Henry IV. being, it is said, composed at the desire of queen Elizabeth, in order to exhibit Falstaff in love, when all the pleasantry which he could afford in any other situation was exhausted. But it may not be thought

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