that there is nothing in which he is lefs accurate, than the computation of time. Of his negligence in this respect, As you Like It, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Measure for Meafure, and Othello, furnish remarkable inftances..

12. COMEDY OF ERRORS, 1596.

In a tract, written by Thomas Decker, entitled Newes from Hell brought by the Devil's Carrier, 1606, there feems to be an allufion to this comedy:

"his ignorance (arifing from his blindnefs) is the only caufe of this Comedie of Errors."

This play was neither entered on the Stationers' books, nor printed, till 1623, but is mentioned by Meres in 1598; and exhibits internal proofs of having been an early production. It could not, however, have been written before 1496; for the tranflation of the Menæchmi of Plautus, from which the plot was taken, was not publifhed till 1595.

13. HAMLET, 1596.

The tragedy of Hamlet was not registered in the books of the Stationers' company till the 26th of July 1602, nor printed till 1604. This circumftance, and indeed the general air of the play itfelf, which has not, it must be owned, the appearance of an early compofition, might induce us to clafs it five or fix years later than 1596, were we not overpowered by the proof adduced by Dr. Farmer, and by other circumftances, from which it appears to have been acted in, or before, that year. The piece, however, which was then exhibited, was probably but a rude sketch of that which we now poflefs; for from the title page of the first edition, in 1604, we learn, that (like Romeo and Juliet, and the

NOTES.

1 See Merry Wives of Windfor, A&t II. Sc. laft.-Meaf. for Meaf. Act I. Sc. iii. and iv.-As you Like It, A&t IV. Sc. i. and iii.Othello, Act III. Sc. iii. "I flept the next night well," &c.

* "Dr. Lodge publifhed, in the year 1596, a pamphlet called Wit's Miferic, or the World's Madness, difcovering the incarnate Devils of the age, quarto. One of thele devils is Hate-virtue, or forrory for another man's fucceffe, who, fays the doctor, is a foule lubber, and looks as pale as the vizard of the ghost, who cried fo miferably at the theatre, Hamlet revenge." Farmer's Efay on the Learning of Shakespeare.

Merry

Merry Wives of Windfor) it had been enlarged to almost twice its original fize.

The Cafe is altered, a comedy, attributed to Ben Jonson, and written before the end of the year 1599', contains a paffage, which fecms to me to have a reference to this play: Angels. "But first I'll play the ghost; I'll call him out"

In the fecond act of Hamlet, a contest between the children of the queen's chapel ", and the actors of the eftabifhed theatres, is alluded to. At what time that conteft began, is uncertain. But, fhould it appear not to have commenced till fome years after the date here affigned, it would not, I apprehend, be a fufficient reafon for afcribing this play to a later period; for, as we are certain that confiderable additions were made to it after its firft production, and have some authority for attributing the firft fketch of it to 1596, till that authority is faken, we may prefume, that any paffage which is inconfiftent with that date, was not in the play originally, but a fubfequent infertion.

With refpect to the allufion in queftion, it probably was an addition; for it is not found in the quarto of 1604, (which has not the appearance of a mutilated or imperfect copy,) nor did it appear in print till the publication of the folio in 1623.

The fame obfervation may be made on the paffage produced by Mr. Holt, to prove that this play was not written till after 1597: "Their inhibition comes by means of the late innovation." This, indeed, does appear in the quarto of 1604, but, we may prefume, was added in the interval be

NOTES.

This comedy was not printed till 1609, but it had appeared many years before. The time when it was written, is afcertained with great precision by the following circumstances. It contains an allution to Meres's Wit's Treafury, firft printed in the latter end of the year 1599, (Ante p. 276.) and is itfelf mentioned by Nathe in his Lenten Stuff, 4to. 1599.-" It is right of the merry cob ler's ftuff, in that witty play of the Cafe is Altered."

Jonton's works, vol. VII. p. 362. Whalley's edit.

Between the years 1595 and 160, fome of Lilly's comedies were performed by thefe children. Many of the plays of Jonfon were reprefented by them between 1600 and 1609.—From a paffage in Jack Drum's Entertainment, or the Comedy of Pafquil and Catherine, which was printed in 1601, we learn that they were much followed at that time.

tween 1597, (when the ftatute alluded to,-39 Eliz. ch. 4-was enacted) and that year.

Hamlet Sadler was one of the witneffes to Shakspeare's Will. He was probably born foon after the first exhibition of this play; and, according to this date, was twenty years old at the time of his atteftation.

If this tragedy had not appeared till fome years after the date here affigned, he would not have been at the time of Shakspeare's death above fixteen or feventeen years old; at which age he fcarcely would have been chofen as a witness to fo folemn an act.

The following paffage, in An Epifle to the Gentlemen Students of the Two Universities by Thomas Nafhe, prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, (which has no date) has been thought to allude to this play." I will turn back to my first text of ftudies of delight, and talk a little in friendship with a few of our trivial tranflators. It is a common practice now adays, among a fort of fhifting companions, that runne through every art, and thrive by none, to leave the trade of Noverint, whereto they were born, and bufie themselves with the endevors of art, that could fcarcely latinize their neckverfe if they fhould have neede; yet English Seneca, read by candle light, yeelds many good fentences, as Bloud is a beggar, and fo forth and if you intreat him faire in a frosty morning he will affoord you whole hamlets, I should fay, handfuls of tragical fpeeches. But O grief! Tempus edax rerum-what is that will last always? The fea exhaled by drops will in continuance be drie; and Seneca, let bloud líne by line and page by page, at length must needes die to our stage."

This paffage does not, in my apprehenfion, decifively prove that our author's Hamlet was written fo early as 1591; (in which year? Dr. Farmer, on good grounds, conjectures

NOTES.

that

• It has been observed to me, that there are other instances of this being used as a chriftian name; it is certainly very uncom mon; and may be fairly fuppofed, in this cafe, to have taken its rife from the play.-After all, however, it is not quite clear that this was his name. The name fubfcribed to Shakspeare's original Will (which I have seen) feems to be Hamnet: but in the body of the Will, he is called Hamlet Sadler.

P Mr. Oldys, in his Mf. Additions to Langbaine's Lives of the Dramatick Poets, fays, on I know not what authority, that Greene's Arcadia

that Greene's Arcadia was published:) for fuppofing this to have been a fneer at Shakspeare, it might have been inferted in fome new edition of this tract after 1596; it being a frequent practice of Nafhe and Greene, to make additions to their pamphlets at every re-impreffion.

But it is by no means clear, that Shakspeare was the perfon whom Nashe had here in contemplation. He feems to point at fome dramatick writer of that time, who had been originally a fcrivener or attorney:

"A clerk foredoom'd his father's foul to cross,

Who pen'd a flanza when he should engros

who, instead of tranfcribing deeds and pleadings, chofe to imitate Seneca's plays, of which a translation had been published not many years before." The trade of Noverint" is the trade of an attorney or notary 9. Shakspeare was not bred to the law, at least we have no fuch tradition; nor, however freely he may have borrowed from North's Plutarch and Holinfhed's Chronicle, does he appear to be at all indebted to the tranflation of Seneca.

Of all the writers of the age of queen Elizabeth, Nafhe is the most licentious in his language; perpetually distorting words from their primitive fignification, in a manner often puerile and ridiculous, but more frequently incom prehenfible and abfurd. His profe works, if they were collected together, would perhaps exhibit a greater farrago of unintelligible jargon, than is to be found in the productions of any author ancient or modern. An argument that rests on a term used by fuch a writer, has but a weak foundation. The phrafe whole hamlets of tragical speeches"—is certainly intelligible, without fuppofing an allufion to the play; and might have only meant a large quantity.-We meet a fimilar expreffion in our author's Cymbeline.

"I'd let a parish of fuch Clotens blood."

NOTES.

Arcadia was printed in 1589. If he is right, it is ftill lefs probable that this paffage fhould have related to our author's Hamlet. 4 "The Country Lawyers too jog down apace,

Each with his noverint univerfi face."

Ravenscroft's Prologue prefixed to Titus Andronicus. Our ancient deeds were written in Latin, and frequently began with the words, Noverint Univerfi. The form is still retained, Know all men, &c.

It should also be obferved, that "hamlets," in the foregoing paffage, is not printed in Italicks, though the word Seneca, in the fame fentence, is; and all the quotations, authors' names, and books mentioned in this cpiftle, are diftinguished by that character.

14. KING JOHN, 1596.

This is the only one of the uncontefted plays of Shakfpeare, that is not entered in the books of the Stationers' company. It was not printed till 1623, but is mentioned by Meres in 1598, unlefs he mistook the old play in two parts, printed in 1591, for the compofition of Shakspeare'.

In the first act of King John, an ancient tragedy, entitled Solyman and Perfeda, is alluded to. The earliest edition of that play, now extant, is that of 1599, but it was written, and probably acted, many years before; for it was entered on the Stationers' books, by Edward Whyte, Nov. 20, 1592. Mariton's Infatiate Countefs, printed in 1603, contains a paffage, which, if it fhould be confidered as an imitation of a fimilar one in King John, will ascertain this hiftorical drama to have been written at least before that year:

"Then how much more in me, whofe youthful veins, "Like a proud river, overflow their bounds.”

So in King John:

Why holds thine eye that lamentable rheum, "Like a proud river peering o'er his bounds."

15. RICHARD II. 1597.

King Richard II. was entered on the Stationers' books, Auguft, 29, 1597, and printed in that

year.

Dr. Farmer fuppofes that there was a former play on this fubject, because when Sir Gilly Merricke, one of the fol

NOTE.

It is obfervable, that on the republication of this old play in 1611, the two parts are fet forth-" as they were (fundry times) lately acted by the Queene's Majefties fervants"-a defcription, which, probably, was copied literally from the former edition in 1591. If this had been really Shakspeare's performance, it would have been defcribed, on its re-impreflion, as acted by his Majefty's fervants; for fo runs the title of most of his genuine pieces, that were either originally printed or re-publifhed after the year 1603. The bookfeller, the better to impofe on the publick, prefixed the letters W. Sh. to the new edition of this play in 1611, which do not appear in the former impreffion in 1591.

lowers