INTRODUCTION

IN this edition of the play of King Lear my first object has been to give a text as good as possible. At the foot of each page I have endeavoured to show how the early editions of the play, on which a text must be formed, differ from each other, and when the old text has to be changed, to record such change, with the name of the editor who first introduced it, and the suggester of it (if any). Though the work of collating the early editions has been already admirably done,-in 1866 by Mr. W. G. Clark and Mr. W. Aldis-Wright in the Cambridge Shakespeare, and afterwards by Mr. H. H. Furness in his edition of King Lear, the fifth volume of his Variorum Shakespeare (1880),

-I thought it best to carefully collate the first edition of the play, Quarto I (the Pide Bull edition), 1608, with the second edition, Quarto 2 (the N. Butter edition), 1608, and again to collate each of these editions of the play independently, with its text in the first edition of the works of Shakespeare (the first Folio, 1623), where it was for the third time printed.1 I have also recorded all but the minutest differences in the texts of some differing copies of Quarto I, and a few readings in the Quarto of 1 It stands between Hamlet and Othello: the last page of Hamlet is 282 (misprinted 280); the first page of Othello is 310, and is printed on the back of the last page of Lear. The page-numbers run from 283 to 309 (308 is misprinted 38).

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1655, and of the text of the play in the three later Folios; but for this part of my work I wish here to acknowledge my obligations to the Cambridge Shakespeare, to which great work and to Mr. Furness I am indebted for much information which is to be found given in my notes, though I have always endeavoured to verify it. I must also express my obligations to Malone's Variorum edition, Boswell, 1821.

In my notes Q standing alone indicates the two Quartos of 1608 in agreement, QI the first published edition of 1608 (the Pide Bull edition), Q 2 the second published edition of that year (the N. Butter edition). By F is indicated the first collected edition of Shakespeare's plays (the first Folio edition of 1623).

F 2, F 3, and F 4 refer to editions of our poet published in 1632, 1664, and 1685 (the second, third, and fourth Folios).

I have almost ignored Jane Bell's 1655 reprint of Quarto 2, as it is almost, if not quite, worthless, but when it is quoted it is indicated as Q 3.

I have very seldom ventured to introduce new readings. At IV. vi. 202 I have inserted the word "for," which seems to me to have dropped out of the text. At IV. i. 60 I adopt the form "Hoberdidance" as that is the form found in Harsnett's Declaration; "Hobbididence" has only the support of the Quartos, as the passage in which it occurs is not in the Folio. At III. vi. 33, however, I think it is best to retain "Hoppedance" of the Quartos.

I have placed hyphens between the words "stubborn " and "ancient" at II. ii. 130; and between the words "clamour" and "moistened" at IV. iii. 32—in both cases

following suggestions made by W. Sidney Walker in his Critical Remarks on Shakespeare's Versification (1854). At Iv. iv. 6 I print " sentry"; Johnson adopted ❝ sentry," which was not followed; I have shown that the Folio word "centery" is probably only another form of" sentry." At IV. ii. 68 I practically adopt the pointing of my Oxford Shakespeare, 1891, which shews that "mew" of the Quartos is an interjection. At IV. iii. 35 I believe I have been the first editor who has ventured to print "mate and make," the reading of Quarto 1, instead of "mate and mate" of Quarto 2, and at III. iv. 78 "Pellicock's hill" of the Quartos, instead of "Pillicock-hill" of the Folio and Rowe. At I. ii. 146 I print "Fut" of the Quartos instead of "Tut," introduced by Jennens in 1770. At I. ii. 21 I, with some hesitation, retain the word "to" ("shall to the legitimate "), the reading of both Quarto and Folio, instead of adopting, as most editors do, "top," the suggestion of Edwards in his Canons of Criticism, 1758, first printed in Capell's edition, 1768. As I think a certain sense can be obtained I am unwilling to change the text. At v. iii. 270 I follow Quarto I and read "murderous traitors." Johnson and Jennens follow Quarto 2, and read "murdrous traitors." I prefer the form I print to "murderers, traitors," the reading of the Folio.

I venture to make a few suggestions in notes to I. ii. 166 (“dissipation of cohorts"); IV. ii. 8 ("When I informed him, then "); IV. iii. 19, 20 (“ her smiles and tears were like a better way "); IV. vii. 35 (“quick, cross lightning"); II. i. 55 ("gasted by the noise I made ").

In the year 1608 there appeared two editions of King Lear, which in the present edition I have described

as Quarto I and Quarto 2; the first of these editions bore the following title:-" M. William Shakspeare, HIS True Chronicle Historie of the life and death of King Lear and his three Daughters. With the unfortunate life of Edgar, sonne and heire to the Earle of Gloster, and his sullen and assumed humor of TOм of Bedlam: As it was played before the Kings Maiestie at Whitehall vpon S. Stephans night in Christmas Hollidayes. By his Maiesties seruants playing vsually at the Gloabe on the Bancke-side. LONDON, printed for Nathaniel Butter, and are to be sold at his shop in Paul's Church-yard at the signe of the Pide Bull neere St. Austins Gate, 1608."

The title of the second edition runs as follows:-" M. William Shake-speare, HIS True Chronicle History of the life and death of King Lear, and his three Daughters. With the vnfortunate life of EDGAR, sonne and heire to the Earle of Glocester, and his sullen and assumed humour of TOM of Bedlam. As it was plaid before the Kings Maiesty at White-Hall, vppon St. Stephen's night, in Christmas Hollidaies. By his Maiesties seruants, playing vsually at the Globe on the Banck-side. Printed for

Nathaniel Butter, 1608."

That these two Quarto editions of King Lear, and these only, appeared in 1608 was first definitely determined by the Cambridge editors, Mr. W. G. Clarke and Mr. W. Aldis-Wright in the first edition of their great work, the Cambridge Shakespeare, 1866. Before that date it was vaguely supposed that three or more editions of the play were published in 1608, the great differences in the several copies of the Pide Bull edition having induced that belief.

The elaborate collation by the Cambridge editors of