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was the firſt play that brought Beaumont and Fletcher into reputation. That play, as has been already mentioned, was acted about the year 1609. We may therefore preſume that the Maid’s Tragedy did not appear before that year; for we cannot ſuppoſe it to have been one of the unſucceſsful pieces that preceded Philaſter. That the ‘‘Maid’s Tragedy’’ was written before 1611, is aſcertained by a Mſ. play, now extant, entitled The Second Maid’s Tragedy which was licenſed by Sir George Buck, on the 31ſt of Oct. 1611. I believe it never was printed[1].
If, therefore, we fix the date of the original Maid’s Tragedy in 1610, it agrees ſufficiently well with that here aſſigned to Julius Cæſar.
It appears by the papers of the late Mr. George Vertue, that a play called Cæſar’s Tragedy was acted at court before the 10th of April, in the year 1613. This was probably Shakſpeare’s ‘‘Julius Cæſar’’, it being much the faſhion at that time to alter the titles of his plays.
37. A Yorkſhire Tragedy, 1608.
A Yorkſhire Tragedy, (whoever was the author of it) could not have been written before Auguſt 1604, when the murder, on which it was founded, was committed[2]. It was entered at Stationers’ hall May 2, 1608, and printed in that year.
It is obſervable, that, in the title-page of this play, the name of Shakſpeare is ſpelt in the ſame manner as he has himſelf ſubſcribed it to his Will; and the piece is ſaid to have been acted by his majeſtie’s players at the Globe; the theatre in which almoſt all our author’s plays were originally performed.
The very name, however, of the publiſher of this piece, (independent of other circumſtances) is ſufficient to create a doubt concerning its authenticity; for it is printed for Thomas Pavier, who appears, from the Stationers’ books, to
- ↑ This tragedy (as I learn from a Mſ. of Mr. Oldys) was formerly in the poſſeſſion of John Warburton, Eſq. Somerſet Herald. It had no author’s name to it, when it was licenſed, but was afterwards aſcribed to George Chapman, whoſe name is eraſed by another hand, and that of Shakſpeare inſerted.
- ↑ See Dr. Farmer’s Eſſay on the Learning of Shakeſpeare.
