temporary topicks might have fuggefted, in a course of years, fome additions and alterations in fome other of his pieces. But with respect to the entire fcenes that are wanting in fome of the early editions, (particularly thofe of King Henry V. King Richard II. and The Second Part of King Henry IV.) I fuppofe the omiffions to have arifen from the imperfection of the copies; and inftead of faying that " the first scene of King Henry V. was added by the author after the publication of the quarto in 1600," all that we can pronounce with certainty is, that this fcene is not found in the quarto of

1600.

19. MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, 1600.

Much Ado about Nothing was written, we may prefume, early in the year 1600; for it was entered at Stationers' hall, Auguft 23, 1600, and printed in that year.

It is not mentioned by Meres in his lift of our author's plays, publifhed in the latter end of the year 1598.

20. AS YOU LIKE IT, 1600.

This comedy was not printed till 1623, and the caveat or memorandum in the fecond volume of the books of the Stationers' company, relative to the three plays of As you like it, Henry V. and Much Ado about Nothing, has no date except Aug. 4. But immediately above that caveat there is an entry, dated May 27, 1600, and the entry imme

4 See Mr. Steeven's extracts from the books of the

Stationers' company, ante, p. 5.

diately following it, is dated Jan 23, 1603. We may therefore presume that this caveat was entered between those two periods: more efpecially, as the dates fcattered over the pages where this entry is found, are, except in one inftance, in a regular feries from 1596 to 1615. This will appear more clearly by exhibiting the entry exactly as it ftands in the book:

To Thomas Thorpe, and William Afpley. S

This to be their

to be

ftaied.

copy, &c. It is extremely probable that this 4th of Auguft was of the year 1600; which standing a little higher on the paper, the clerk of the Stationers' company might have thought unneceffary to be repeated. All the plays which were entered with As you like it, and are here faid to be faied, were printed in the year 1600 or 1601. The flay or injunction against the printing appears to have been very speedily taken off; for in ten days afterwards, on the 14th of August, 1600, King Henry V. was entered, and published in the fame year. Much Ado about Nothing was entered Auguft 23,

So,

1600, and printed alfo in that year: and Every Man in his Humour was published in 1601.

Shakspeare, it is faid, played the part of Adam in As you like it. As he was not eminent on the ftage, it is probable that he ceafed to act fome years before he retired to the country. His appearance, however, in this comedy, is not inconfiftent with the date here affigned; for we know that he performed a part in Jonfon's Sejanus in 1603.

A paffage in this comedy furnishes an additional proof of its not having been written before the year 1596, nor after the year 1603. "I will weep for nothing," fays Rofalind, "like Diana in the fountain." Stowe in his Survey of London, 1598, infórms us, that in the year 1596, at the east fide of the Cross in Cheapfide was fet up "a curious wrought tabernacle of gray marble, and in the fame an alabaster image of Diana, and water conveyed from the Thames, prilling from her naked breaft." To this the paffage above cited certainly alludes. In his fecond edition of the fame work, printed in 1603, he informs the reader, that the water flowed in this manner for a time, but that the ftatue was then decayed. It was, we fee, in order in 1598, and continued fo without doubt for two years afterwards, that is, till 1600, when As you like it appears to have been written.

In this comedy a line of Marlowe's Hero and Leander is quoted. That poem was published in 1598, and probably before.

21. MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, 1601.

The following line in the earliest edition of this comedy,

'fhews that it was written after Sir Walter Raleigh's return from Guiana in 1596.

The first sketch of The Merry Wives of Windfor was printed in 1602. It was entered in the books. of the Stationers' company, on the 18th of January 1601-2, and was therefore probably written in 1601, after the two parts of King Henry IV., being, it is. faid, compofed at the defire of Queen Elizabeth, in order to exhibit Falstaff in love, when all the pleafantry which he could afford in any other fituation was exhaufted. But it may not be thought fo clear, that it was written after King Henry V. Nym and Bardolph are both hanged in King Henry V. yet appear in The Merry Wives of Windfor. Falftaff is difgraced in The Second Part of K. Henry IV. and dies in King Henry V.; but in The Merry Wives of Windfor he talks as if he were yet in favour at court; If it jhould come to the ear of the court how I have been transformed," &c. and Mr. Page difcountenances Fenton's addreffes to his daughter, because he kept company with the wild prince and with Pointz. Thefe circumflances feem to favour the fuppofition that this play was written between the Firft and Second Parts of King Henry IV. But that it was not written then, may be collected from the tradition above mentioned. The truth, I believe, is, that though it ought to be read (as Dr. Johnfon has obferved) between The Second Part of King Henry IV. and King Henry V., it was written after King Henry V. and after Shakspeare had killed Falstaff. In obedience to the royal commands, having revived him, he found it neceffary at the

fame time to revive all thofe perfons with whom he was wont to be exhibited; Nym, Pistol, Bardolph, and the Page: and difpofed of them as he found it convenient, without a ftrict regard to their fituations, or catastrophes in former plays.

There is reafon to believe that The Merry Wives of Windfor was revised and enlarged by the author, after its firft production. The old edition in 1602, like that of Romeo and Juliet, is apparently a rough draught, and not a mutilated or imperfect copy. The precife time when the alterations and additions were made, has not been afcertained: however, fome paffages in the enlarged copy may affift us in our conjectures on the fubject.

Falstaff's addrefs to Juftice Shallow in the first fcene fhews that the alterations were made after King James came to the throne: "Now, Mafter Shallow, you'll complain of me to the king." the first copy the words are, "to the council."

In

When Mrs. Page obferves to Mrs. Ford, that "these knights will hack," which words are not in the original copy, Shakspeare, it has been thought, meant to convey a covert fneer at King James's prodigality in bestowing knighthood in the begin, ning of his reign. Between the king's arrival at Berwick and the 2d of May, 1603, he made 237 knights; and in the following July near four

hundred.

"The best courtier of them all," fays Mrs. Quickly, "when the court lay at Windfor, could never have brought her to fuch a canary. Yet there have been knights, and lords, and gentlemen, with their coaches, I warrant you, coach after coach," &c.