These things, to be sure, are all just what we might expect from an author, continuing his own work, with the same characters and the same course of events, and writing under a vivid remembrance of what he had formerly set forth. In this case, and in this alone it was natural that the two plays in question should be thus closely knit together by mutual references, the weak beginnings of things suggesting the thought of distant results, and the harvest putting the reapers in mind how and what they had sown. And so it might be shown that the substance and body of Richard III. is in great part but a development of things presignified in the foregoing play. The continuing of Margaret on the scene, which is all against the truth of history, was to the very end, apparently, that the parties might have a terr ble present remembrancer of their former deeds; even as the manhood of Richard was by many years anticipated for the seemit g purpose of carrying on a livelier recollection of the first beginnings into the final issues of this mul titudinous tragedy.

The unity and continuity of he characterization will be better made appear in our Introduction to the Third Part, when we come to speak of the characters in de ail. For the present, suffice it to say, on this score, that in Richard preeminently, and proportionably in several others, the Second and Third Parts, in their original form, exemplify in large measure Shakespeare's most peculiar method of conceiving and working out character. Strong indeed must be the external evidence, to persuade us that any mind but Shakespeare's could have originated and expressed the conception of that terrible man, so merry-hearted, subtle-witted, and bloodyhanded, whose mental efficacy turns perjury, murder, and what is worse, if aught worse there be, to poetry, as he grows up from youth to manhood in the two plays under consideration, at once the offspring and the avenger of civil butchery.

As to the general style and toning of these plays, their logical and metrical cast and complexion, nothing better, it should seem, need be desired thau the remarks of Dr. Johnson. The three parts of King Henry VI.," says he, " are declared, by Dr. Warburton, to be certainly not Shakespeare's. He gives no reason; but I suppose him to draw his opinion from the general effect and spirit of the composition, which he thinks inferior to the other historical plays. From mere inferiority nothing can be inferred: in the productions of wit there will be inequality. Sometimes judg ment will err, and sometimes the matter itself will defeat the artist. Of every author's works, one will be the best, and one will be the worst. The colours are not equally pleasing, nor the attitudes equally graceful, in all the pictures of Titian or Reynolds. Dissimilitude of style and heterogeneousness of sentiment may sufficiently show that a work does not really belong to the reputed author But in these plays no such marks of spuriousuess are

found. The diction, the versification, and the figures are Shake speare's."

The period of the Second Part extends from the arrival of Queen Margaret in England, May, 1445, till the first battle of St. Albans, May, 1455. Except in one instance, the leading events of the drama come along in their actual order. That exception is the proceedings in the case of Dame Eleanor, which really occurred several years before the opening of the play. Her crime and disgrace, however, are properly represented here, as they had a large share in bringing about the fall of her husband, while his fall had in turn much to do in kindling the fierce domestic wars that form the main subject of this and the following play. Besides, the matter in question furnishes occasion for a most characteristic passage between the duchess and the queen, though in fact they never met; thus giving an early taste of the haughty, vindictive temper, the indomitable energy, and fire-spouting tongue, which mark the whole course of Margaret, fitting her to be, as in truth she was, the constant provoker and stirrer-up of hatreds and strifes. And it seems no slight argument of a common authorship, that the ruin of the duchess is here borrowed from the time of the preceding play, as the death of the Talbots was there borrowed from the period of this, the two events being thus assorted into their respective connections; while, as regards the main action of the play, their effect is the same, whether set forth in their actual order or not.

In all other points the opening of the present play takes up the thread of history precisely where it was left at the close of the former. And the proceedings of the Second Part for the most part grow forth naturally and in course from the principles of the First, the two plays being as closely interwoven as any two acts of either. The criminal passion of Margaret and Suffolk, which was there presented in the bud, here blossoms and goes to seed, setting him near the throne, and thereby at once feeding his pride and chafing the pride of his enemies; while the losses in France, before represented, are ever and anon recurring as matter of continual twittings and jerks, the rust of former miscarriages thus at the same time keeping the old wounds from healing, and causing the new ones to fester and rankle. As the amiable imbecility of the king invites and smooths the way for the arrogance and over weening of the queen and her favourites, this naturally sets the aspiring and far-reaching York upon the policy of hewing away one after another the main supports of the rival house, that so at last he may heave it to the ground, and out of its ruins build up his own. The fall of Gloster is the first practicable breach though, in making York a secret plotter and instigator of the con spracy against him, it may be questionable whether the interest of the drama be not served too much at the expense of history Then, in strict accordance with the suspicions of the time, York is

represented as scheming afar off the insurrection of Cade, as a sort of feeler of the public pulse, and then taking advantage of it to push his designs. That insurrection comes in aptly as the first outbreak of the great social schism, the elements of which had been long working in secret, and growing to a head. The passages of humour, interspersed through the scenes of Cade and his followers, being mostly the same in the original form of the play, yield strong evidence in the question of authorship. It seems hard to believe that any one but Shakespeare could have written them, no instances in that line at all approaching these having been elsewhere given by any other writer of that time. For in poetry merely, Shakespeare, though immeasurably above any or all of his senior contemporaries, differs from them but in degree; but in the article of humour he shows a difference from them in kind. And it is remarkable that the instinct and impulse of humour seem in this case to have put him upon blending together the elements of two widely-separated passages of history: the persons and events being those of the insurrection known as Jack Cade's; while the sentiments and designs are the same, in part, which became matter of history some seventy years before in the rebellion of Wat Tyler and Jack Straw. This curious fact was first pointed out by Mr. Courtenay, who cites the following from Holinshed's account of the earlier insurrection: "They began to show proof of those things which they had before conceived in their minds, beheading all such men of law as they might catch, alleging that the land could never enjoy her true liberty till all those sorts of people were despatched out of the way. This talk liked well the ears of the common people, and they purposed to burn and destroy all records, evidences, court-rolls, and other monuments, that their landlords might not have whereby to challenge any right at their hands. What wickedness was it, to compel teachers of children in grammar schools to swear never to instruct any in this art! For it was dangerous among them to be known for one that was learned; and more dangerous, if any one were found with a penner and ink-horn at his side. At Blackbeath, when the greatest multitude was there got together, John Ball made a sermon, taking this saying for his theme:

When Adam delv'd and Eve span,
Who was then a gentleman?"

After the quelling of Cade's insurrection, which was in July, 1450, the Poet overleaps the events, with one exception, of more than four years, and enters upon the preliminaries of the battle of St. Albans, which was the first ripe fulfilment of the presage and promise given out far back in the scene of the Temple Garden, and the forethought of which is more or less apparent in the whole preceding matter of the dramatic series. As to the rest,

the main events of the play, with the historical passages whereon they are founded, will be set forth in notes from time to time, as they occur.

The Second Part of Henry VI. is manifestly a great advance upon the First, and that in nearly all the particulars of dramatic excellence. The several members are well knit together; the characterization is bold, but, in the main, firm and steady; the action clear, free, and generally carried on in that consecutiveness that every later part seems the natural growth and issue of what had gone before. Much of this superiority, no doubt, was owing to the nature of the materials, which, besides yielding a greater variety of interest, were of themselves more limber and pliant to the shaping of art, and presented less to distract and baffle the powers of dramatic assortment and composition. The losses in France having been despatched in the former play, nothing of them remained for the Poet's use, but the domestic irritations they had engendered; which irritations were as so many eggs of discord in the nest of English life, and Queen Margaret the hotbreasted fury that hatched them into effect. The hatching process is the main subject of this play, and to that end the representation is ordered with considerable skill.

Nor is the superiority of this play any greater in the general effect, than in the force and beauty of particular scenes and passages. Of single speeches, that of Gloster in Act iii. sc. 1, beginning, Ah, gracious lord! these days are dangerous;" that of Warwick in the next scene but one, describing the signs of Gloster's having been murdered; and that of Suffolk in the same scene, telling how he would curse his enemies; also, the longer speech of Lord Say, in Act iv. sc. 7, pleading for his life; and that of young Clifford in Act v. sc. 2, where he finds his father dead; all these may be mentioned as superior to any thing of the kind in the First Part, and such, indeed, as would hardly discredit the Poet's best dramas. And of whole scenes, the second in Act iii., and the seventh in Act iv., may be cited as instances of high and varied excellence. Far above all others, however, is the death-scene of Cardinal Beaufort, which is awfully impressive, running into the very heights of moral sublimity, an apt to remind us of the sleep-walking scene in Macbeth. Schlegel justly remarks concerning it, - - Can any other poet be named, who has drawn aside the curtain of eternity at the close of this life with such overpowering and awful effect? And yet it is not mere horror with which the mind is filled, but solemn emotion. A blessing and a curse stand side by side: the pious king is an image of the heavenly mercy which, even in the sin ner's last moments, labours to enter his soul."

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

KING HENRY THE SIXTH.

HUMPHREY, Duke of Gloster, his Uncle.

HENRY BEAUFORT, Cardinal, and Bishop of Winchester.

RICHARD PLANTAGENET, Duke of York.

EDWARD and RICHARD, his Sons.

EDMUND BEAUFORT, Duke of Somerset,

WILLIAM DE LA POOLE, Duke of Suffolk,

HUMPHREY STAFFORD, Duke of Buckingham,
THOMAS LORD CLIFFORD,

JOHN CLIFFORD, his Son,

RICHARD NEVILLE, Earl of Salisbury, Yorkists.
RICHARD, his Son, Earl of Warwick, S

Lancas

trians

LORD SAY. LORD SCALES, Governor of the Tower.
SIR HUMPHREY STAFFORD, and WILLIAM, his Brother
SIR JOHN STANLEY. WALTER WHITMORE.

A Sea-Captain, Master, and Master's Mate.

VAUX. Two Gentlemen, Prisoners with Suffolk

HUME and SOUTHWELL, Priests.

BOLINGBROKE, a Conjurer. A Spirit raised by him.

THOMAS HORNER, an Armourer.

Clerk of Chatham.

PETER, his Man.

Mayor of St. Albans.

SIMPCOX, an Impostor. Two Murderers.

JACK CADE, a Rebel.

GEORGE, JOHN, DICK, MICHAEL,Followers of Cade.

SMITH the Weaver, and Others,

ALEXANDER IDEN, a Kentish Gentleman.

MARGARET OF ANJOU, Queen to Henry VI.

ELEANOR COBHAM, Duchess of Gloster.

MARGERY JOURDAIN, a Witch.

Wife to Simpcox

Lords, Ladies, and Attendants; a Herald; Petitioners, Al dermen, a Beadle, Sheriff, and Officers; Citizens, Pren ices, Falconers, Guarcs, Soldiers, Messengers, &e.

SCENE, in various parts of England