An old play in two parts, which appears to have been written about the year 1590, and which is ascribed by Malone to the pen of Christopher Marlowe, assisted by his friends Poole and Greene, is the foundation of this and the ensuing drama; the prototype of the present being called 'The First Part of the Contention of the two famous Houses of Yorke and Lancaster.' These two parts were published in quarto, the first in 1594, the second in the following year: both were reprinted in 1600, and seem to have been moulded by our author, with many alterations and additions, into the shape in which they at present appear.

Malone has distinguished the amended and absolutely new passages from the original and compara tively meagre text of Marlowe and his coadjutors with much industry and discrimination. All the lines printed in the usual manner,' he observes, are found in the original quarto play 3, or at least with such minute variations as are not worth noticing; and those, I conceive, Shakspeare adopted as he found them. The lines to which a single inverted comma is prefixed, were, if my hypothesis be well-founded, retouched, and greatly improved by him; and those distinguished by double inverted commas, were his

SHAK.

VIII.

I

own original production; the embroidery with which he ornamented the coarse stuff that had been awkwardly made up for the stage by some of his contemporaries. The speeches which he new-modelled, he improved, sometimes by amplification, and sometimes by retrenchment.'

The action of this drama comprises ten years, cominencing with Henry's marriage with Margaret of Anjou, in May, 1445; and terminating with the first battle of Saint Albans, in favor of the house of York, May 22, 1455,

ARGUMENT.

The nuptials of King Henry with Margaret of Anjou are scarcely celebrated, when the new queen resolves to exercise unlimited control over the councils of her imbecile husband, and with the assistance of a number of powerful nobles, to remove the duke of Gloster from his post of protector. Their purpose is at length effected, and the virtuous duke confined on a charge of high treason. His accusers, perceiving the evidence of his guilt insufficient to obtain the least credit, have recourse to assassination. The populace, driven to desperation at the murder of their patron, tumultuously insist on the immediate banishment of Suffolk, his avowed enemy, who, in his passage to France, is captured by pirates, and beheaded. In the mean time, the government of Ireland is entrusted to the duke of York, who previous to his departure induces a needy dependent, named Cade, to commence an insurrection in Kent, laying claim to the crown as a descendant of Edmund Mortimer, in order that he may thereby be enabled to judge of the probability of his own success. Cade and his party are at length dispersed by the king's forces, and the duke of York soon after arrives in England to support his pretensions to the throne by force of arms. The hostile parties come to a gereral engagement near Saint Albans, where the Lancastrians sustain a total defeat, and the victorious duke resolves to commence his march to the capital without delay.

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PERSONS REPRESENTED.

KING HENRY THE SIXTH.

HUMPHREY, duke of Gloster, his uncle.

CARDINAL BEAUFORT, bishop of Winchester, great uncle to the king.

RICHARD PLANTAGENET, duke of York.

EDWARD and RICHARD, his sons.

LORD SCALES, governor of the Tower. LORD SAY.

SIR HUMPHREY STAFFORD, and his brother. SIR JOHN STANLEY. A SEA CAPTAIN, MASTER and MASTER'S MATE, and WALTER

WHITMORE.

Two GENTLEMEN, prisoners with Suffolk.

A HERALD.

VAUX.

HUME and SOUTHWELL, two priests.

BOLINGBROKE, a conjurer. A Spirit raised by him.

THOMAS HORNER, an armourer. PETER, his man.

CLERK OF CHATHAM. MAYOR OF SAINT ALBANS.
SIMPCOX, an impostor. Two MURDERERS.

JACK CADE, a rebel.

GEORGE, JOHN, DICK, SMITH the weaver, MICHAEL, &c. bin

followers.

ALEXANDER IDEN, a Kentish gentleman.

MARGARET, queen to King Henry.

ELEANOR, duchess of Gloster.

MARGERY JOURDAIN, a witch. WIFE TO SIMPCOX.

Lords, Ladies, and Attendants; Petitioners, Aldermen, a Beadle, Sheriff, and Officers; Citizens, Prentices, Falconers, Guards, Soldiers, Messengers, &c.

SCENE, dispersedly in various parts of England.