5 ([return])
[ best of poets: "Marlo." Marg. note in old ed.]
6 ([return])
[ best of actors: "Allin." Marg. note in old. ed.—Any account of the celebrated actor, Edward Alleyn, the founder of Dulwich College, would be superfluous here.]
7 ([return])
[ In HERO AND LEANDER, &c.: The meaning is—The one (Marlowe) gained a lasting memory by being the author of HERO AND LEANDER; while the other (Alleyn) wan the attribute of peerless by playing the parts of Tamburlaine, the Jew of Malta, &c.—The passage happens to be mispointed in the old ed. thus,
"In Hero and Leander, one did gaine
A lasting memorie: in Tamberlaine,
This Jew, with others many: th' other wan," &c.
and hence Mr. Collier, in his HIST. OF ENG. DRAM. POET. iii. 114, understood the words,
"in Tamburlaine,
This Jew, with others many,"
as applying to Marlowe: he afterwards, however, in his MEMOIRS OF ALLEYN, p. 9, suspected that the punctuation of the old ed. might be wrong,—which it doubtless is.]