in view of the almost immediate suspicion of a connexion with the Plot that fell upon him. Castelain, 907, considers, and rightly rejects,
another suggestion by Fleay that Sejanus and not Eastward Ho! was the cause of the imprisonment of Jonson and Chapman in 1605. Fleay supposed that Chapman was the collaborator of whom Jonson wrote in the Q epistle, 'I would informe you, that this Booke, in all numbers, is not the same with that which was acted on the publike Stage, wherein a second pen had good share; in place of which I have rather chosen, to put weaker (and no doubt lesse pleasing) of mine own, then to defraud so happy a Genius of his right, by my lothed usurpation'. Shakespeare also has been guessed at. If Jonson's language was seriously meant, there were not, of course, many contemporaries of whom he would have so spoken. Probably the problem is insoluble, as the subject-matter of it has disappeared. It is difficult to believe that the collaborator was Samuel Sheppard, who in his The Times Displayed in Six Sestyads (1646) claims to have 'dictated to' Ben Jonson 'when as Sejanus' fall he writ'. Perhaps he means 'been amanuensis to'.
Eastward Ho (1605) With Chapman (q.v.) and Marston.
Volpone or The Fox. 1606
[MS.] J. S. Farmer (Introd. to Believe As You List in T. F. T.) states that a holograph MS. is extant. He may have heard of a modern text by L. H. Holt, used by J. D. Rea. If so, App. N is in error.
S. R. 1610, Oct. 3. Transfer from Thomas Thorpe to Walter Burre of '2 bookes the one called, Seianus his fall, the other, Vulpone or the ffoxe' (Arber, iii. 445).
1607. Ben: Ionson his Volpone Or The Foxe. For Thomas Thorpe. [Dedicatory epistle by 'Ben. Ionson' to the two Universities, dated 'From my House in the Black-Friars, the 11^{th} day of February, 1607'; Commendatory Verses, signed 'I. D[onne]', 'E. Bolton', 'F[rancis] B[eaumont]', 'T. R.', 'D. D.', 'I. C.', 'G. C.', 'E. S.', 'I. F.'; Argument; Prologue and Epilogue.]
1616. Volpone, or The Foxe. A Comœdie. Acted in the yeere 1605. By the K. Maiesties Servants. The Author B. I. William Stansby. [Part of F_{1}. After text: 'This Comoedie was first acted, in the yeere 1605. By the Kings Maiesties Servants. The principall Comœdians were, Ric. Burbadge, Ioh. Hemings, Hen. Condel, Ioh. Lowin, Will. Sly, Alex. Cooke. With the allowance of the Master of Revells.']
Editions by W. Scott (1811, M. B. D. iii) in O. E. D. (1830, i) and by H. B. Wilkins (1906), W. A. Neilson (1911, C. E. D.), J. D. Rea (1919, Yale Studies).—Dissertations: F. Holthausen, Die Quelle von B. J.'s V. (1889, Anglia, xii. 519); J. Q. Adams, The Sources of B. J.'s V. (1904, M. P. ii. 289); L. H. Holt, Notes on J.'s V. (1905, M. L. N. xx. 63).
Jonson dates the production 1605, and the uncertainty as to the style he used leaves it possible that this may cover the earlier part of 1606. Fleay, i. 373, attempts to get nearer with the help of the news
