But whence have we the plot of Timon, except from the Greek of Lucian?-The editors and criticks have been never at a greater lofs than in their enquiries of this fort; and the fource of a tale hath been often in vain fought abroad, which might eafily have been found at home: my good friend, the very ingenious editor of the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, hath fhewn our author to have been fometimes contented with a legendary ballad. The story of the mifanthrope is told in almost every collection of the time; and particularly in two books, with which Shakspeare was intimately acquainted; the Palace of Pleasure, and the English Plutarch. Indeed from a paffage in an old play, called Jack Drum's Entertainment, I conjecture that he had before made his appearance on the stage. Were this a proper place for fuch a difquifition, I could give you many cafes of this kind. We are fent for instance to Cinthio for the plot of Measure for Meafure, and Shakspeare's judgement hath been attacked for fome deviations from him in the conduct of it: when probably all he knew of the matter was from madam Isabella in the Heptameron of Whetstone. Ariofto is continually quoted for the fable of Much ado about nothing; but I fufpect our poet to have been fatisfied with the Geneura of Turberville. As you like it was certainly borrowed, if we believe Dr. Grey, and Mr. Upton, from the 4 Lond. 4to. 1582. She reports in the fourth dayes exercise, the rare Hiftorie of Promos and Caffandra. A marginal note informs us, that Whetstone was the author of the Commedie on that fubject; which likewife might have fallen into the hands of Shakspeare. 5" The tale is a pretie comicall matter, and hath bin written in English verfe fome few years paft, learnedly and with good grace, by M. George Turberuil." Harrington's Ariefte, fol. 1591, Coke's Tale of Gamelyn; which by the way was not printed till a century afterward: when in truth the old bard, who was no hunter of MSS. contented himself folely with Lodge's Rofalynd, or Euphues' Golden Legacye, quarto, 1590. The ftory of All's well that ends well, or, as I fuppofe it to have been fometimes called, Love's Labour Wonne, is originally indeed the property of Boccace, but it came immediately to Shakspeare from Painter's Giletta of Narbon. Mr. Langbaine could not conceive, whence the ftory of Pericles could be taken, "not meeting in history with any fuch Prince of Tyre;" yet his legend may be found at large in old Gower, under the name of Appolynus." Pericles is one of the plays omitted in the latter editions, as well as the early folios, and not improperly; though it was published many years before the death of Shakspeare, with his name in the title-page. Aulus Gellius informs us, that fome plays are afcribed abfolutely to Plautus, which he 6 See Meres's Wits Treafury, 1598, p. 282. 7 Our ancient poets are under greater obligations to Boccace, than is generally imagined. Who would fufpect, that Chaucer hath borrowed from an Italian the facetious tale of the Miller of Trumpington ? Mr. Dryden obferves on the epick performance, Palamon and Arcite, a poem little inferior in his opinion to the Iliad or the Eneid, that the name of its author is wholly loft, and Chaucer is now become the original. But he is mistaken: this too was the work of Boccace, and printed at Ferrara in folio, con il commento di Andrea Baff, 1475. I have feen a copy of it, and a tranflation into modern Greek, in the noble library of the very learned and communicative Dr. Afkew. It is likewife to be met with in old French, under the title of La Thefeide de Jean Boccace, contenant les belles & chaftes amours de deux jeunes Chevaliers Thebains Arcite & Palemon. In the first Vol. of the Palace of Pleasure, 4to. 1566. 9 Confeffio Amantis, printed by T. Berthelet, fol. 1532, p. 175,&c. only re-touched and polished; and this is undoubtedly the cafe with our author likewife. The revival of this performance, which Ben Jonfon calls ftale and mouldy, was probably his earliest attempt in the drama. I know, that another of these discarded pieces, The Yorkshire Tragedy, hath been frequently called fo; but most certainly it was not written by our poet at all: nor indeed was it printed in his life-time. The fact on which it is built, was perpetrated no fooner than 1604 : much too late for fo mean a performance from the hand of Shakfpeare. Sometimes a very little matter detects a forgery. You may remember a play called The Double Falfhood, which Mr. Theobald was defirous of palming upon the world for a pofthumous one of Shakspeare: and I fee it is claffed as fuch in the laft edition of the Bodleian catalogue. Mr. Pope himself, after all the ftrictures of Scriblerus, in a letter to Aaron Hill, fuppofes it of that age; but a mistaken accent determines it to have been written fince the middle of the last century: 66 This late example "Of bafe Henriquez, bleeding in me now, 2 William Caluerley, of Caluerley in Yorkshire, Efquire, murdered two of his owne children in his owne house, then stabde his wife into the body with full intent to haue killed her, and then inftantlie with like fury went from his house, to haue flaine his yongeft childe at nurse, but was preuented. Hee was preft to death in Yorke the 5 of August, 1604." Edm. Howes' Continuation of John Stowe's Summarie, 8vo. 1607, P. 574: The ftory appeared before in a 4to. pamphlet, 1605. It is omitted in the folio chronicle, 1631. 3 Thefe, however, he affures Mr. Hill, were the property of Dr. Arbuthnot. And in another place, "You have an áspect, fir, of wondrous wisdom." The word afpect, you perceive, is here accented on the first fyllable, which, I am confident, in any fenfe of it, was never the cafe in the time of Shakspeare; though it may fometimes appear to be fo, when we do not obferve a preceding elifion.+ Some of the profeffed imitators of our old poets have not attended to this and many other minutiæ: I could point out to you feveral performances in the refpective ftyles of Chaucer, Spenfer, and Shakspeare, which the imitated bard could not poffibly have either read or construed. This very accent hath troubled the annotators on Milton. Dr. Bentley obferves it to be "a tone different from the prefent ufe." Mr. Manwaring, in his Treatife of Harmony and Numbers, very folemnly informs us, that "this verfe is defective both in accent and quantity, B. III. v. 266: His words here ended, but his meek aspéct Here (fays he) a fyllable is acuted and long, whereas it fhould be fort and graved!" And a still more extraordinary gentleman, one Green, who published a fpecimen of a new version of the Paradife Loft, into BLANK verfe, " by which that amazing work is brought fomewhat nearer the Thus a line in Hamlet's defcription of the Player, should be printed as in the old folios: "Tears in his eyes, distraction in's afpéct." agreeably to the accent in a hundred other places. fummit of perfection," begins with correcting a blunder in the fourth book, v. 540: The fetting fun "Slowly defcended, and with right affect Not fo in the new version: "Meanwhile the fetting fun defcending flow- Enough of fuch commentators.-The celebrated Dr. Dee had a Spirit, who would fometimes condefcend to correct him, when peccant in quantity: and it had been kind of him to have a little affifted the wights abovementioned.-Milton affected the antique; but it may feem more extraordinary, that the old accent fhould be adopted in Hudibras. After all, The Double Falfhood is fuperior to Theobald. One paffage, and one only in the whole play, he pretended to have written: Strike up, my mafters; "But touch the ftrings with a religious foftnefs: "Teach found to languish through the night's dull ear, These lines were particularly admired; and his vanity could not refift the opportunity of claiming them: but his claim had been more eafily allowed to any other part of the performance. To whom then fhall we afcribe it?-Somebody hath told us, who fhould feem to be a noftrummonger by his argument, that, let accents be how they will, it is called an original play of William Shakspeare in the King's Patent prefixed to Mr. Theobald's edition, 1728, and confequently there could be no fraud in the matter. Whilft, on the |