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In Four Volumes
Edited by
1882-1889.
Preface
Sir Gyles Goosecappe
The Wisdome of Dr. Dodypoll
The Distracted Emperor
The Tryall of Chevalry
Footnotes
I have not been able to give in the present volume the unpublished playof Heywood's to which I referred in the Preface to Vol. I. When I cameto transcribe the play, I found myself baffled by the villanous scrawl.But I hope that, with the assistance of some expert in old handwriting,I may succeed in procuring an accurate transcript of the piece for thefourth volume.
One of the plays here presented to the reader is printed for the firsttime, and the others have not been reprinted. I desire to thank ALFREDHENRY HUTH, Esq., for the loan of books from his magnificent collection.It is pleasant to acknowledge an obligation when the favour has beenbestowed courteously and ungrudgingly. To my friend F.G. FLEAY, Esq., Icannnot adequately express my gratitude for the great trouble that hehas taken in reading all the proof-sheets, and for his many valuablesuggestions. Portions of the former volume were not seen by him in theproof, and to this cause must be attributed the presence of some slightbut annoying misprints. One serious fault, not a misprint, occurs in thefirst scene of the first Act of Barnavelt's Tragedy (p. 213). In themargin of the corrected proof, opposite the lines,
"And you shall find that the desire of glory
Was the last frailty wise men ere putt of,"
I wrote
"That last infirmity of noble minds,"
a [mis]quotation from Lycidas. The words were written in pencil andenclosed in brackets. I was merely drawing Mr. FLEAY'S attention to thesimilarity of expression between Milton's words and the playwright's;but by some unlucky chance my marginal pencilling was imported into thetext. I now implore the reader to expunge the line. On p. 116, l. 12 (inthe same volume), for with read witt; p. 125 l. 2, for He readIle; p. 128, l. 18, for pardue read perdue; p. 232, for Is readIn; p. 272, l. 3, for baste read haste; p. 336, l. 6, the speakershould evidently be not Do. (the reading of the MS.) but Sis., andnoble Sir Richard should be noble Sir Francis; p. 422, l. 12, del.comma between Gaston and Paris. Some literal errors may, perhaps,still have escaped me, but such words as anottomye for anatomy, ordietie for deity must not be classed as misprints. They arerecognised though erroneous forms, and instances of their occurrencewill be given in the Index to Vol. IV.
5, WILLOW ROAD, HAMPSTEAD, N.W.January 24, 1884.
This clever, though somewhat tedious, comedy was published anonymouslyin 1606. There is no known dramatic writer of that date to whom it couldbe assigned with any great degree of probability. The comic portionshows clearly the influence of Ben Jonson, and there is much to remindone of Lyly's court-comedies. In the serious scenes the philosophisingand moralising, at one