again; Ophelia mad and self-destroyed; the struggle at the grave between Hamlet and Laertes; the queen poisoned; Laertes killed with a poisoned rapier; the king killed by Hamlet; and, last of all, Hamlet's death. No wonder Fortinbras exclaims

"This quarry cries on havoc."

Again, take another early tragedy, of which we may well believe that there was an earlier sketch than that published in 1597-Romeo and Juliet. We may say of the deli

cious poetry, as Romeo says of Juliet's beauty, that it makes the charnel-house " a feasting presence full of light." But imagine a Romeo and Juliet conceived in the immaturity of the young Shakspere's power-a tale of love, but surrounded with horror. There is enough for the excitement of an uninstructed audience: the contest between the houses; Mercutio killed; Tybalt killed; the apparent death of Juliet; Paris killed in the churchyard; Romeo swallowing poison; Juliet stabbing herself. The marvel is, that the surpassing power of the poet should make us forget that Romeo and Juliet can present such an aspect. All the changes which we know Shakspere made in Hamlet, and Romeo and Juliet, were to work out the peculiar theory of his mature judgment—that the terrible should be held, as it were, in solution by the beautiful, so as to produce a tragic consistent with pleasurable emotion. Herein he goes far beyond Webster. His art is a higher art.

THE first edition of Pericles appeared in 1609, under the following title:-The late and much admired play, called Pericles, Prince of Tyre. With the true relation of the whole historie, adventures, and fortunes of the said prince: As also the no lesse strange and worthy accidents, in the birth and life of his daughter Mariana. As it hath been divers and sundry times acted [by] his Maiesties Seruants at the Globe on the Bank-side. By William Shakespeare. Imprinted at London for Henry Gosson, and are to be sold at the sign of the Sunne in Paternoster-row, &c. 1609. In the British Museum there are two copies bearing this date; and we mention this to state that there are minute differences in these copies, such as present themselves to a printer's eye, and show that the types were what is technically called kept standing, to meet a constant demand. Other quarto editions appeared in 1611, in 1619, in 1630, and in 1635. The variations in these from the text of 1609 are very slight. In 1664 Pericles first appeared in the folio collection of Shakspere's works, being introduced into the third edition, whose title-page states-"Unto this impression is added seven plays never before printed in folio." This folio edition varies very slightly indeed from the quarto of 1635; and that varies, as we have said, very slightly from the original quarto. It is probable that the first edition was printed, without authority, from a very imperfect copy. It was produced, as we see upon the title-page, at Shakspere's theatre, and it bore his name; but his fellow-shareholders in that theatre did not re-publish it after his death. Had it been re-published in the folio of 1623, we should, most probably, have had a copy very different from that upon which the text must now be founded. All the copies have been carefully collated for the purposes of our own edition; but we have been able to add little to what Malone's careful editorship effected in 1778. The text manufactured by Steevens is the received text of modern editions. He went upon his ordinary principle of adjusting the versification to a syllabic regularity, and especially the lines spoken by Gower. These he has reduced to octo-syllabic verse, by the most merciless excision of "superfluous" words; and, whilst we lament the perverseness of the man, we cannot but admire the ingenuity with which he has cut his cloth to the exact dimensions, and sewn it together again with surprising neatness. The manipulation of Steevens has been carried so far in this play, that it would have been waste of time to have called attention to it in our foot-notes.

The Illustrations to each act contain very full extracts from Gower's Confessio Amantis,' upon which the author of 'Pericles' founded his legendary drama. The chronology of the play belongs to the question of its authenticity.