REFERENCES DESCRIPTIVE OF THE PLATES. PERICLES, PRINCE OF TYRE. THE very great doubt of the authenticity of this play as one of Shakspeare's, and the universal sentence of its inferiority in interest and execution to his undoubted productions, might seem to warrant its omission in a work of such extent as this series of illustrations has unavoidably become; but it so generally forms a part in the numerous editions of our great poet, that these illustrations, purporting to be suited to almost all editions, without it would be incomplete. The illustration of the first part of the story, alluding to Antiochus, has not been attempted, on account of the impossibility of drawing either a riddle or its explication, and its general character being so decidedly objectionable, as well as unnecessary to the main plot of the play. |