ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER OF

SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS.

The question of the chronological order of the plays is one to which considerable attention has recently been given. Most of the external evidence bearing upon it may be gathered from the foregoing pages, but a good deal of light has been thrown on the subject through the internal evidence afforded by a careful comparison of the different plays from various points of view. The late Charles Bathurst; Professors Dowden and Ingram, of Trinity College, Dublin; Mr. F. J. Furnivall, founder of the "New Shakspere Society," and the Rev. F. G. Fleay, have all given considerable attention to the subject, and their writings should be consulted for a thorough comprehension of this branch of Shakespeare-criticism.1

Briefly it may be stated that this internal evidence consists of the observed variations, partly in the character and moral or æsthetic aspect of the several plays, and partly in the language and metre in which they are presented to us. It is obvious that any writer, however great his original genius, may be expected to show in successive works an increase in power of thought and in facility of expression; and if we are able to estimate this gradual improvement with any accuracy, it will afford valuable evidence as to the order in which the various works were written. Now, in respect to the versification of Shakespeare's plays, this gradual improvement admits of plain demonstration, and the several methods of exhibiting it have been denominated "versetests." For instance, if any two plays which are known to have been written at a wide interval are taken, and the lines which have a pause or stop at the end are com1 See especially Shakspere, his Mind and Art," and the "Shakspere Primer," by Edward Dowden, LL.D. "The Leopold Shakspere," with Introduction by F. J. Furnivall, and "The Shakspere Manual," by Rev. F. G. Fleay.

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pared in number with those in which the sense is carried on to the next line without pause, it will be found that the proportion of run-on lines is much larger in the play which is of later date. The following lines

"Mine ear is open, and my heart prepar❜d:
The worst is worldly loss thou canst unfold.
Say is my kingdom lost? why 'twas my care;
And what loss is it to be rid of care?"

are from Richard II. (III. ii.), a comparatively early play; contrast with them a few from the Tempest (1. ii.), which is one of the latest

"O! I have suffer'd

With those that I saw suffer a brave vessel
Who had no doubt some noble creatures in her
Dash'd all to pieces. O! the cry did knock
Against my very heart "-

and the difference naturally resulting from increased fluency and freedom in the use of verse is plainly perceptible.

This tendency to dissever the grammatical construction from the cadence of the verse is carried even further in some of the late plays. Lines are found which not only terminate in the middle of a sentence, but also end with some unimportant or insignificant word in the sentence. These endings are classified and used as tests. An auxiliary verb, " do," "am," "can," &c., at the end of a line is called a "light ending," whilst a monosyllabic preposition or conjunction, "by," "and," "but," &c., is called a "weak ending." There are twenty-eight instances of weak endings in Antony and Cleopatra, and but one or two in any earlier play. Similarly Macbeth has twentyone light endings, though they are very scarce before that.

Another means of comparison is found in the occurrence of a redundant syllable at the end of a line, which is generally more frequent in the later plays than the earlier ones. Other similar tests have also been appealed to, such as the use of rhymed verse, and the introduction of doggrel, both of which are characteristic of early work;

but the two first mentioned are of the greatest importance, firstly because they depend upon a spontaneous development of the poet's mechanical power, and cannot be supposed to have been caused by any special effort, and secondly because they admit of careful working out, and more trustworthy comparison.

In addition to these formal tests, there is the evidence afforded by obvious growth in taste and poetical expression; besides other indications, easily perceived, but not readily describable, of the change from youth to maturity in the poet's mind. All this evidence, taken in conjunction with such external data as remain, has enabled critics to divide the years of Shakespeare's authorship, extending from about 1588 to about 1612, into four periods, each displaying a different mental stage. In the first six years -the time, as it were, of apprenticeship-we have crude and unrefined work, plays such as Titus Andronicus or 1 Henry VI., which are in fact the work of other hands touched up by Shakespeare. We have specimens of all subjects, comic, tragic, and historical-Love's Labour's Lost, The Comedy of Errors, Midsummer Night's Dream, Two Gentlemen of Verona, Romeo and Juliet, the Second and Third Parts of Henry VI.,Richard II. and Richard III.

-full of youthful fancy or passion, but at the same time with excessive word-play, incomplete characterization, and other defects such as are natural to immature work.

King John and The Merchant of Venice connect this period with the next-the former leading up to the later division of the English historical plays-the trilogy of the two parts of Henry IV. and Henry V. The Falstaff Comedy, which forms so great a part of these, associates with them The Merry Wives of Windsor. With the broad humour of this last we connect that of The Taming of the Shrew; but these were quickly followed by comedy of a much more refined order in Much Ado about Nothing, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night.

At the opening of the new century the joyous vein in which the last plays had been conceived begins to be

overshadowed. All's Well that Ends Well, and Measure for Measure, have a gloomy if not morbid tone, and in the same darkened mental condition the great tragedies, Julius Cæsar, Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth and King Lear were produced. And, in addition to these powerful pictures of mental conflict and crime, we have lust, pride, and misanthropy depicted in Troilus and Cressida, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, and Timon of Athens.

But with the last-named the dark and tragic mood seems to have reached a climax and a sudden end at once for a most remarkable change takes place from scenes of passion and mental desolation to beauty and serenity. The four romantic plays of the last period: Pericles, Cymbeline, The Tempest, and the Winter's Tale, all deal with reunion and reconciliation, and so far as they are an index of their author's mind, form a fitting conclusion to the labours of his life. Henry VIII., the last play usually associated with Shakespeare's name, is only in part his, a larger portion being by Fletcher.

The following list of plays, with the earliest and latest dates assigned to them by recent critics, will show how little room for difference of opinion is now left. To obtain an absolutely conclusive arrangement would be impossible, for in the case of some it is difficult to assign their composition to any one year. For instance, there is little doubt but that Romeo and Juliet was first published in 1597; but it is scarcely less certain that it was composed, if not acted, five or six years sooner. It is possible that Hamlet also existed in an earlier form some time before the date assigned to it.

It need hardly be stated that the order adopted in this, and nearly every other edition, is that of the first

folio of 1623.

E. R.