A Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 4

Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Tapio Riikonen and PG Distributed
Proofreaders
In Four Volumes
Edited by
1882-89.
Preface Two Tragedies in One. By Robert Yarington The Captives, or the Lost Recovered. By Thomas Heywood The Costlie Whore. Everie Woman in her Humor. Appendix Index Footnotes
The fourth and final volume of this Collection of Old Plays ought to have been issued many months ago. I dare not attempt to offer any excuses for the wholly unwarrantable delay.
In the preface to the third volume I stated that I hoped to be able to procure a transcript of an unpublished play (preserved in Eg. MS. 1,994) of Thomas Heywood. It affords me no slight pleasure to include this play in the present volume. Mr. JEAVES, of the Manuscript Department of the British Museum, undertook the labour of transcription and persevered to the end. As I have elsewhere stated, the play is written in a detestable hand; and few can appreciate the immense trouble that it cost Mr. JEAVES to make his transcript. Where Mr. JEAVES' labours ended mine began; I spent many days in minutely comparing the transcript with the original. There are still left passages that neither of us could decipher, but they are not numerous.
In the original announcement of this Collection I promised a reprint of Arden of Feversham from the quarto of 1592; I also proposed to include plays by Davenport, William Rowley, and Nabbes. After I had transcribed Arden of Feversham I determined not to include it in the present series. It occurred to me that I should enhance the value of these volumes by excluding such plays as were already accessible in modern editions. Accordingly I rejected Arden of Feversham, Sir John Oldcastle, Patient Grissel , and The Yorkshire Tragedy . The plays of Davenport, William Rowley, and Nabbes were excluded on other grounds. Several correspondents suggested to me that I should issue separately the complete works of each of these three dramatists; and, not without some misgivings, I adopted this suggestion.