A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III

A Collection of Old English Plays,
Vol. III

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Title: A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III
Author: Various
Release Date: January 17, 2004 [EBook #10734]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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A COLLECTION OF OLD ENGLISH PLAYS; VOL. III
In Four Volumes
Edited by
A.H. BULLEN
1882-1889.

CONTENTS:
Preface Sir Gyles Goosecappe The Wisdome of Dr. Dodypoll The

Distracted Emperor The Tryall of Chevalry Footnotes

PREFACE.
I have not been able to give in the present volume the unpublished play
of Heywood's to which I referred in the Preface to Vol. I. When I came
to 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 the
fourth volume.
One of the plays here presented to the reader is printed for the first time,
and the others have not been reprinted. I desire to thank ALFRED
HENRY HUTH, Esq., for the loan of books from his magnificent
collection. It is pleasant to acknowledge an obligation when the favour
has been bestowed courteously and ungrudgingly. To my friend F.G.
FLEAY, Esq., I cannnot adequately express my gratitude for the great
trouble that he has taken in reading all the proof-sheets, and for his
many valuable suggestions. Portions of the former volume were not
seen by him in the proof, and to this cause must be attributed the
presence of some slight but annoying misprints. One serious fault, not a
misprint, occurs in the first scene of the first Act of _Barnavelt's
Tragedy_ (p. 213). In the margin 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 and
enclosed in brackets. I was merely drawing Mr. FLEAY'S attention to
the similarity of expression between Milton's words and the
playwright's; but by some unlucky chance my marginal pencilling was
imported into the text. I now implore the reader to expunge the line. On
p. 116, l. 12 (in the same volume), for with read _witt_; p. 125 l. 2, for
He read _Ile_; p. 128, l. 18, for pardue read _perdue_; p. 232, for Is
read _In_; p. 272, l. 3, for baste read _haste_; p. 336, l. 6, the speaker
should evidently be not Do. (the reading of the MS.) but Sis., and noble
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_, or dietie for
deity must not be classed as misprints. They are recognised though
erroneous forms, and instances of their occurrence will be given in the
Index to Vol. IV.
5, WILLOW ROAD, HAMPSTEAD, N.W. January 24, 1884.

INTRODUCTION TO SIR GYLES GOOSECAPPE.
This clever, though somewhat tedious, comedy was published
anonymously in 1606. There is no known dramatic writer of that date
to whom it could be assigned with any great degree of probability. The
comic portion shows clearly the influence of Ben Jonson, and there is
much to remind one of Lyly's court-comedies. In the serious scenes the
philosophising and moralising, at one time expressed in language of
inarticulate obscurity and at another attaining clear and dignified
utterance, suggest a study of Chapman. The unknown writer might
have taken as his motto a passage in the dedication of Ovid's _Banquet
of Sense_:-- "Obscurity in affection of words and indigested conceits is
pedantical and childish; but where it shroudeth itself in the heart of his
subject, uttered with fitness of figure and expressive epithets, with that
darkness will I still labour to be shrouded." Chapman's Gentleman
Usher was published in the same year as _Sir Gyles Goosecappe_; and
I venture to think that in a passage of Act III., Scene II., our author had
in his mind the exquisite scene between the wounded Strozza and his
wife Cynanche. In Strozza's discourse on the joys of marriage occur
these lines:--
"If he lament she melts herselfe in teares; If he be glad she triumphs; if
he stirre She moon's his way: in all