vision of it? Was Robert Greene the original producer, and whence did he filch it? The general opinion is that Greene was the part-author of the older play, and that it was the work, or one of the works, he referred to in his attack on Shakespeare, when he accused him of bedecking himself with the plumage of others. 104 Much of the old play, however, is too vigorous, too manly, and too straightforward to have been the composition of Greene, so that if he had anything to do with the work it must have been as a partner with a better man, but who that man was is too speculative a subject to hazard a suggestion about. That the greatly revised and much improved version of King John by Shakespeare contained some of Marlowe's work no one thoroughly acquainted with his mannerisms can doubt, but the suggestion that he wrote the whole of it is preposterous. No character of the Shakespearian drama shows the imprint of its creator more decidedly, although in his youthful style, than does the Bastard. 'Sir Richard Plantagenet' is typically Shakespearian in every muscle of him. Another drama, or rather a dramatic trilogy, which bears still more marked impression of Marlowe's work is that now known as Henry the Sixth. As with King John, this dramatic series is founded upon the productions of some anonymous predecessor or predecessors, and some writers contend that this play is also one of those which Greene referred to in con nection with stolen plumes, and which a certain unidentified R. B. Gent.' alluded to in a pamphlet entitled Greene's Funeralls: 'Nay more, the men that so eclipst his fame, Purloynde his Plumes, can they deny the same?' Greene's invective appears to be unmistakably directed at Shakespeare, when he sneers, in his Groatsworth, at 'an upstart crow beautified with our feathers, that, with his Tygres heart wrapt in a players hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you; and, beeing an absolute Johannes-fac-totum, is in his owne conceyt the onely Shake-scene in a countrey.' These allusions, quite in Greene's usual malicious style of innuendo, are too transparent to be mistaken. The quotation is but slightly parodied from a line in the True Tragedie of Richard, Duke of York, the play on which the second and third parts of the drama now known as Henry the Sixth are founded the 'Shake-scene' is self-evident, and the fac-totum refers to Shakespeare's general theatrical utility. Henslowe, in his famous, ill-spelt Diary, refers to a play entitled Henry the Sixth, as being first acted at his theatre on the 3rd March 1592, and this is the piece Thomas Nashe thus refers to in his Pierce Pennilesse of that year: 'How would it have joy'd brave Talbot (the terror of the French) to thinke that after he had lyne two hundred yeare in his tombe, he should triumphe againe on the stage, and have his bones new embalmed with the teares of ten thousand spectators at least, (at severall times), who, in the tragedian that represents his person, imagine they behold him fresh bleeding.' 105 This First Part of King Henry the Sixth, whenever it may have originally appeared, and by whomsoever written, is very unequal, and furnishes but slight evidence of containing much of the handiwork of the two men, Marlowe and Shakespeare, who are now believed to have jointly remodelled it. The workers warmed, apparently, as they progressed, and towards its conclusion display more mastery over their materials. The three parts into which Henry the Sixth is divided are replete with passages taken from, or reminiscent of, Marlowe's earlier dramas, and it is the theory of those who will not forgo their belief in Shakespeare's sole authorship of these plays, that from his having acted in Marlowe's dramas, and having studied them sympathetically, he unconsciously, although continually, made repeated references to and quotations from them! Is it possible that Shakespeare, knowing Marlowe's writings so intimately as he did, could embody whole lines of them unconsciously? Shakespeare either knowingly plagiarised, or Marlowe himself set them in the places where they are now found. The latter proposition is not only more agreeable to believe, but it is in every respect more probable. The statement that Marlowe never repeated himself is incorrect: like many great writers he frequently revised the wording of his ideas, as innumerable instances might be cited from his works to prove several of them have already been referred to in these pages. Students of Marlowe's style cannot fail to detect plenteous evidence of its presence in Henry the Sixth. It is impossible to ignore his massive rhythm and his mighty line in that drama. His masterly method of alliterating sound, unparalleled for three centuries, reveals the author. His dexterous introduction of similar sounding syllables in any part of a word, rolling successively through a verse, like wave following wave upon the rising beach; the dragging in of classical allusions irrespective of their appropriateness; as, also, other signs of his less artistic mannerisms, are equally apparent. Beyond all cavil or dispute, Marlowe's handiwork is as clearly discernible in Henry the Sixth, as is Shakespeare's ; and this drama, or trilogy of dramas, should bear their names jointly on the title-page. What a feeling of wondering admiration is aroused at the thought of these two mighty minds working at the same drama! And perhaps together! One conjuring up visions of unrealisable aspirations, and the other realising and immortalising characters of fiction as well as of fact. Never in the history of the world's literature could so noble a pair have partnered, and in such glorious work. The very thought of it is a poem! The creators of Faustus and of Hamlet sitting face to face as they wrought out their conceptions! Exhausting worlds and then creating new! The poet of Hero and Leander exchanging divinest thoughts with the creator of Romeo and Juliet! The wit-combats at The Mermaid' fade into insignificance compared with this! From time to time in Henry the Sixth the two poets seem to be seen, face to face, speaking through their dramatis persona. Shakespeare appears as Winchester, the haughty conservative prelate, whilst Marlowe assumes the role of Gloucester, the people's beloved Lord Protector. Cannot the voices of the two poets be heard in this dialogue ?— 'WIN. Com'st thou with deep premeditated lines, With written pamphlets studiously devised? As I with sudden and extemporal speech GLO. Presumptuous priest! This place commands my patience, And for thy treachery, what's more manifest,- |