lately set foorth on stage with more commendation, then I can looke for: (being there much better set forth then I haue or can dooe) yet the same matter penned as it is, may serue to lyke good effect, if the readers do brynge with them lyke good myndes, to consider it,* which hath the more incouraged me to publishe it, suche as it is. Ar. Br."

The poem rhymes in couplets, but the lines originally were divided throughout; otherwise the measure forms alternate lines of twelve and fourteen syllables. A short specimen, to shew the manner of first printing it, will suffice.

"There is beyonde the Alps,

a towne of auncient fame,

Whose bright renoune yet shineth cleare,
Verona men it name.

Bylt in an happy time,

bylt on a fertile soyle:

Maynteined by the heauenly fates,

and by the townish toyle." &c. Fo. 1.

* Steevens, in a note prefixed to the play, rather prophetically observes, "we are not yet at the end of our discoveries relative to the originals of our author's dramatick pieces:" true: a play founded on the story of Romeo and Juliet, appearing on the stage "with commendation," anterior to the time of Shakspeare, is a new discovery for the commentators. HASLEWOOD,

AMID the desert rockes the mountaine beare
Bringes forth vnformd, vnlyke herselfe, her yong,
Nought els but lumpes of fleshe, withouten heare;
In tract of time, her often lycking tong

Geues them such shape, as doth, ere long, delight
The lookers on; or, when one dogge doth shake
With moosled mouth the ioyntes too weake to fight,
Or, when vpright he standeth by his stake,
(A noble creast!) or wylde in sauage wood
A dosyn dogges one holdeth at a baye,

With gaping mouth and stayned iawes with blood;
Or els, when from the farthest heauens, they
The lode-starres are, the wery pilates marke,

In stormes to gyde to hauen the tossed barke ;

Right so my muse

Hath (now, at length,) with trauell long, brought forth
Her tender whelpes, her diuers kindes of style,
Such as they are, or nought, or little woorth,
Which carefull trauell and a longer whyle
May better shape. The eldest of them loe
I offer to the stake; my youthfull woorke,
Which one reprochefull mouth might overthrowe:
The rest, (vnlickt as yet,) a whyle shall lurke,

Tyll Tyme geue strength, to meete and match in fight,
With Slaunder's whelpes. Then shall they tell of stryfe,
Of noble trymphes, and deedes of martial might;
And shall geue rules of chast and honest lyfe.
The whyle, I pray, that ye with fauour blame,
Or rather not reprove the laughing game

Of this my muse.

THE ARGUMENT.

LOUE hath inflamed twayne by sodayn sight,
And both do graunt the thing that both desyre;
They wed in shrift, by counsell of a frier;
Yong Romeus clymes fayre Juliets bower by night.
Three monthes he doth enioy his cheefe delight:
By Tybalt's rage prouoked vnto yre,

He payeth death to Tybalt for his hyre.

A banisht man, he scapes by secret flight:

New marriage is offred to his wyfe:

She drinkes a drinke that seemes to reue her breath;
They bury her, that sleping yet hath lyfe.

Her husband heares the tydinges of her death;

He drinkes his bane; and she, with Romeus' knyfe,
When she awakes, her selfe, (alas!) she sleath.

ROMEUS AND JULIET.*

THERE is beyonde the Alps a towne of auncient fame, Whose bright renoune yet shineth cleare, Verona men it name; Bylt in an happy time, bylt on a fertyle soyle,

Maynteined by the heauenly fates, and by the townish toyle.

* In a preliminary note on Romeo and Juliet I observed that it was founded on The Tragicall Hystory of Romeus and Juliet, printed in 1562. That piece being almost as rare as a manuscript, I reprinted it a few years ago, and shall give it a place here as a proper supplement to the commentaries on this tragedy. From the following lines in An Epitaph on the Death of Maister Arthur Brooke drownde in passing to New-Haven, by George Tuberville, [Epitaphes, Epigrammes, &c. 1567,] we learn that the former was the author of this poem:

Apollo lent him lute, for solace sake,

"To sound his verse by touch of stately string,
"And of the never-fading baye did make
"A lawrell crowne, about his browes to cling.

"In proufe that he for myter did excell,

"As may be judge by Julyet and her mate;
"For there he shewde his cunning passing well,
"When he the tale to English did translate.
"But what? as he to forraigne realm was bound,
"With others moe his soveraigne queene to serve,
"Amid the seas unluckie youth was drownd,

"More speedie death than such one did deserve."

The original relater of this story was Luigi da Porto, a gentleman of Vicenza, who died in 1529. His novel did not appear till some years after his death; being first printed at Venice, in octavo, in 1535, under the title of La Giulietta. In an epistle prefixed to this work, which is addressed Alla bellissima e leggiadra Madonna Lucina Savorgnana, the author gives the following account (probably a fictitious one) of the manner in which he became acquainted with this story:

1 was

"As you yourself have seen, when heaven had not as yet levelled against me its whole wrath, in the fair spring of my youth I devoted myself to the profession of arms, and, following therein many brave and valiant men, for some years I served in your delightful country, Frioli, through every part of which, in the course of my private service, it was my duty to roam. ever accustomed, when upon any expedition on horseback, to bring with ine an archer of mine, whose name was Peregrino, a man about fifty years old, well practised in the military art, a pleasant companion, and, like almost all his countrymen of Verona, a great talker. This man was not only a brave and experienced soldier, but of a gay and lively disposition, and, more perhaps than became his age, was for ever in love; a quality which gave a double value to his valour. Hence it was that he delighted in relating the most amusing novels, especially such as treated of love, and this he did with more

The fruitfull hilles aboue, the pleasant vales belowe,

The siluer streame with chanell depe, that through the town

doth flow;

The store of springes that serue for vse, and eke for ease,
And other moe commodities, which profite may and please;
Eke many certaine signes of thinges betyde of olde,
To fyll the houngry eyes of those that curiously beholde;
Doe make this towne to be preferde aboue the rest

Of Lumbard townes, or at the least, compared with the best,
In which while Escalus as prince alone dyd raigne,

To reache rewarde vnto the good, to paye the lewde with payne, Alas! (I rewe to thinke,) an heauy happe befell,

Which Boccace skant, (not my rude tonge,) were able forth to tell.

Within my trembling hande my penne doth shake for feare,
And, on my colde amased head, vpright doth stand my heare.
But sith shee doth commaunde, whose hest I must obaye,
In moorning verse a woful chaunce to tell I will assaye.
Helpe, learned Pallas, helpe, ye Muses with your arte,
Helpe, all ye damned feendes, to tell of ioyes retournd to smart:
Helpe eke, ye sisters three, my skillesse penne tindyte,
For you it causd, which I alas! vnable am to wryte.

grace and with better arrangement than any I have ever heard. It therefore chanced that, departing from Gradisca, where I was quartered, and, with this archer and two other of my servants, travelling, perhaps impelled by love, towards Udino, which route was then extremely solitary, and entirely ruined and burned up by the war,-wholly absorbed in thought, and riding at a distance from the others, this Peregrino drawing near me, as one who guessed my thoughts, thus addressed me: Will you then for ever live this melancholy life, because a cruel and disdainful fair one does not love you? though I now speak against myself, yet, since advice is easier to give than to follow, I must tell you, master of mine, that, besides its being disgraceful in a man of your profession to remain long in the chains of love, almost all the ends to which he conducts us are so replete with misery, that it is dangerous to follow him. And in testimony of what I say, if it so please you, I could relate a transaction that happened in my native city, the recounting of which will render the way less solitary and less disagreeable to us; and in this relation you would perceive how two noble lovers were conducted to a miserable and piteous death.'-And now, upon my making him a sign of my willingness to listen, he thus began."

The phrase, in the beginning of this passage, when heaven had not as yet levelled against me its whole wrath, will be best explained by some account of the author, extracted from Crescimbeni, Istoria della Volgar Poesia, T. V. p. 91: "Luigi da Porto, a Vicentine, was, in his youth, on account of his valour, made a leader in the Venetian army; but, fighting against the Germans in Friuli, was so wounded, that he remained for a time wholly disabled, and afterwards lame and weak during his life; on which account, quitting the profession of arms, he betook himself to letters," &c. MALONE.

There were two auncient stockes, which Fortune high dyd place Aboue the rest, indewd with welth, and nobler of their race; Loved of the common sort, loved of the prince alike,

And like vnhappy were they both, when Fortune list to strike; Whose prayse with equall blast Fame in her trumpet blew; The one was cliped Capelet, and thother Montagew.

A wonted vse it is, that men of likely sorte,

(I wot not by what furye forsd) enuye eche others porte. So these, whose egall state bred enuye pale of hew,

And then of grudging enuyes roote blacke hate and rancor grewe; As of a little sparke oft ryseth mighty fyre,

So, of a kyndled sparke of grudge, in flames flashe oute theyr

yre:

And then theyr deadly foode, first hatchd of trifling stryfe,
Did bathe in bloud of smarting woundes,-it reued breth and lyfe,
No legend lye I tell; scarce yet theyr eyes be drye,

That did behold the grisly sight with wet and weping eye.
But when the prudent prince who there the scepter helde,
So great a new disorder in his commonweale behelde,
By ientyl meane he sought their choler to asswage,
And by perswasion to appease their blameful furious rage;
But both his woords and tyme the prince hath spent in
vayne,
So rooted was the inward hate, he lost his buysy payne.
When frendly sage aduise ne ientyll woords auayle,
By thondring threats and princely powre their courage gan he
quayle;

In hope that when he had the wasting flame supprest,

In time he should quyte quench the sparks that boornd within their brest.

Now whilst these kyndreds do remayne in this estate,

And eche with outward frendly shew dooth hyde his inward hate,
One Romeus, who was of race a Montague,

Upon whose tender chyn as yet no manlyke beard there grewe,
Whose beauty and whose shape so farre the rest did stayne,
That from the cheef of Veron youth he greatest fame dyd gayne,
Hath found a mayde so fayre (he founde so foul his happe)
Whose beauty, shape, and comely grace, did so his heart entrappe,
That from his owne affayres his thought she did remove;
Onely he sought to honor her, to serue her and to loue.
To her he writeth oft, oft messengers are sent,

At length, (in hope of better spede,) himselfe the louer went;
Present to pleade for grace, which absent was not founde,
And to discouer to her eye his new receaued wounde.
But she that from her youth was fostred euermore

With vertues foode, and taught in schole of wisdomes skilfull

lore,