composition of these three plays, he produced, in the same year, the comedy entitled The Captain, in which, on the very strong testimony of the prologue,* he * he appears not to have had recourse to the assistance of Beaumont. Indeed the irregularities of the plot are such, that his not recurring to his judicious associate for aid was very unfortunate. The comedy, which was acted by the king's company, May 20, 1613, appears to have been favourably received. In the same year, The History of Cardenio was performed at court; and, on its being entered in the Stationers' Books, September 9, 1653, it was ascribed to Fletcher and Shakspeare conjointly. The play was never printed, but the title-page points out the source to have been the novel of Cardenio in Don Quixote, and, from this circumstance, it has been supposed that it was the same afterwards brought on the stage by "Theobald, and printed in the year 1727, under the title of The Double Falsehood. Theobald attributed the performance to Shakspeare, but, for a long time, it was considered as a play of his own. Dr Farmer, however, was of opinion, that Theobald was not capable of writing it, and 4 Vol. IX. p. 131, 133. that it was the work of Shirley, or, at least, not earlier than his time; while Mr Malone is inclined to attribute the performance to Massinger. The former grounds his opinion on the probability of Shirley's initials having been mistaken for those of Shakspeare, and on the word aspect being accented on the first syllable, and not, according to the practice of Shakspeare and his contemporaries, on the second. Theobald, who, no doubt, tampered with the text, may, however, have modernised the pronunciation of the word; and that Shirley could not have been the author of Cardenio is proved by the play having been performed when he was but nineteen years -of age, and many years before he commenced writing for the stage. The same objection may be raised against Massinger being concerned in any dramatic work at so early a period; and the testimony of the Stationers' Books does not appear questionable with regard to Fletcher, particularly as he had such frequent recourse to the novels of Cervantes for the plots of his plays. That Shakspeare should have had any concern in the performance is more doubtful; but, if we admit that he assisted Fletcher in The Two Noble Kinsmen, the matter will not be altogether improbable. We have no data whatever to determine the year in which the last-mentioned drama was produced. In the title-page of the first edition, which did not appear till 1634, it was ascribed to "the memorable worthies of their time, Mr John Fletcher and Mr William Shakspeare;" but the authenticity of this assertion has been disputed by some critics of eminence, amongst whom Mr Steevens deserves to be mentioned with distinction. Other judges of acknowledged discernment, and particularly Dr Farmer, have not hesitated to declare their belief in the cooperation of Shakspeare with Fletcher, and the reasons which have inclined the editor to assent to the latter opinion will be found at the conclusion of that tragedy." We have already seen that Fletcher, though united in such strict bonds of amity with Beaumont, and though associated with him in his principal dramatic compositions, not only brought several pieces on the stage before the death of Beaumont, without having recourse to his assistance, but that he engaged with other poets of the time in the dramatic partnerships then so common. Mr Malone has printed a curious document from the Henslowe papers preserved in s Vol. XIII. p 151, et seq. Dulwich college, unfortunately without a date, but apparently written, as that commentator conjectures, between the years 1612 and 1615, and, undoubtedly, before the 8th of January, 1615-16, when the death of Henslowe took place, about two months before that of Beaumont. The paper is a curious document of dramatic history, as it proves the poverty of some of the most popular stage-poets; and its insertion in the memoirs of Fletcher is peculiarly necessary, not only as it seems to intimate, that our poet was not in the same indigent circumstances as his associates, but as it proves that he was engaged in poetical partnerships with other authors of the time, even during the lifetime of Beaumont : "To our most loving Friend, Mr Philip Hinchlow, Esquire, These. "MR HINCHLOW, "You understand our unfortunate extremities, and I do not thinke you so void of christianitie but that you would throw so much money into the Thames as wee request now of you, rather then endanger so many innocent lives. You know there is x'. more, at least, to be receaved of you for the play. We desire you to lend us v'. of that, which shall be allowed to you; with out which we cannot be bayled, nor I play any more till this be dispatch'd. It will lose you xx'. ere the end of the next weeke, besides the hinderance of the next new play. Pray, sir, consider our cases with humanity, and now give us cause to acknowledge you our true freind in time of neede. Wee have entreated Mr Davison to deliver this note, as well to witnesse your love as our promises, and alwayes acknowledgment to be ever, "Your most thanckfull and loving friends, • Nathaniel Field was a player and dramatic poet of considerable reputation. He was one of the children of the chapel, and acted a principal part in Ben Jonson's Cynthia's Revels, first performed in the year 1600, and in the Poetaster, brought on the stage in 1601. He was, after the accession of James I., one of the company, called The Children of her Majesty's Revells; in 1607, he performed the part of Bussy D'Ambois, and, in 1609, one of the characters in The Silent Woman. He prefixed a copy of verses to Fletcher's Faithful Shepherdess, acted before 1611; and at the time when he assisted Fletcher, Daborne, and Massinger, in the play above alluded to, he was probably, as Mr Gifford conjectures, about twenty-eight years of age. In 1612, he published his comedy, entitled A Woman is a Weathercock, and, in 1618, another, called Amends for Ladies. In the excellent tragedy of The Fatal Dowry he was associated with Massinger. He died before the year 1641. Mr Reed, in the Biographia Dramatica, and Mr Malone, have doubted whether the player and the dramatic poet were one and the same person; but Mr Chalmers and Mr Gifford have fully proved their identity, chiefly on the testimony of this supplicating letter to Henslowe. |