of Moldavia. The play was suppressed.' The reference may be to V. i. 17 of the play:
La Foole. He [Daw] has his boxe of instruments . . . to draw maps of euery place, and person, where he comes. Clerimont. How, maps of persons! La Foole. Yes, sir, of Nomentack, when he was here, and of the Prince of Moldauia, and of his mistris, mistris Epicoene. Clerimont. Away! he has not found out her latitude, I hope. The Prince of Moldavia visited London in 1607 and is said to have been a suitor for Arabella, but if Jonson's text is really not 'changed from the simplicity of the first copy', it is clear that Arabella misunderstood it, since Epicoene was Daw's mistress.
The Alchemist. 1610
S. R. 1610, Oct. 3 (Buck). 'A Comoedy called The Alchymist made by Ben: Johnson.' Walter Burre (Arber, iii. 445).
1612. The Alchemist. Written by Ben Ionson. Thomas Snodham for Walter Burre, sold by John Stepneth. [Epistles to Lady Wroth, signed 'Ben. Jonson' and to the Reader; Commendatory Verses, signed 'George Lucy'; Argument and Prologue.]
1616. The Alchemist. A Comœdie. Acted in the yeere 1610. By the Kings Maiesties Seruants. The author B. I. W. Stansby. [Part of F_{1}. After text: 'This Comoedie was first acted, in the yeere 1610. By the Kings Maiesties Servants. The principall Comœdians were, Ric. Burbadge, Ioh. Hemings, Ioh. Lowin, Will. Ostler, Hen. Condel, Ioh. Vnderwood, Alex. Cooke, Nic. Tooley, Rob. Armin, Will. Eglestone. With the allowance of the Master of Revells.']
Editions by W. Scott (1811, M. B. D. iii), C. M. Hathaway (1903, Yale Studies, xvii), H. C. Hart (1903, King's Library), F. E. Schelling (1903, B. L.), W. A. Neilson (1911, C. E. D.), G. A. Smithson (1913, R. E. C.).
Jonson's date is confirmed by the references in II. vi. 31 and IV. iv. 29 to the age of Dame Pliant, who is 19 and was born in 1591. In view of the S. R. entry, one would take the production to have fallen in the earlier half of the year, before the plague reached forty deaths, which it did from 12 July to 29 Nov. The action is set in plague-time, but obviously the experience of 1609 and early years might suggest this. Fleay, i. 375, and others following him argue that the action of the play is confined to one day, that this is fixed by V. v. 102 to 'the second day of the fourth week in the eighth month', and that this must be 24 October. They are not deterred by the discrepancy of this with III. ii. 129, which gives only a fifteen-days interval before 'the second day, of the third weeke, in the ninth month', i. e. on their principles 17 November. And they get over the S.R. entry by assuming that Jonson planned to stage the play on 24 October and then, finding early in October that the plague continued, decided to publish it at once. This seems to me extraordinarily thin, in the absence of clearer knowledge as to the system of chronology employed by Ananias of
