THE

AUTHENTICITY OF THE FIRST FOLIO.

N

O more authentic volume was published in the first quarter of the 17th century than the First Folio edition of the Plays of Shakespeare, which bears the following title:

"Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. Published according to the True Originall Copies. London Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed. Blount. 1623."

The colophon reads: "Printed at the Charges of W. Jaggard, Ed. Blount, I. Smithweeke, and W. Aspley, 1623."

On the title page, on a rectangular ground, measuring 7.5 x 6.3 inches, is a portrait of the Poet, under which, on the left-hand side, is the inscription, "Martin Droeshout sculpsit London." Droeshout was a Dutch artist, resident, at the time, in London. He engraved portraits of George Chapman (for his translation of Homer), John Fox, the martyrologist, John Howson, Bishop of Oxford, afterward Bishop of Durham, Richard Elton, Lord Montjoy Blount, William Fairfax, who fell at the siege of Frankendale, in 1621, and other distinguished persons of the time. (See 3d Var. ed. of Shakespeare, 1821, vol. 2, p. 514.)

Droeshout may never have seen Shakespeare, and may have had to work after some poor sketch or painting, in the possession of Shakespeare's family, or, which is more likely (as the costume is evidently theatrical, even to the hair, which has the appearance of a peruke), after some daub which had been hanging in the tiring-room of the theatre, representing Shakespeare in one of his impersonations, possibly, as has been suggested, Old Knowell, in

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Be that as it may,

Ben Jonson's "Every Man in his Humour." the portrait must have been a passably good likeness, or Ben Jonson, his most intimate friend, would hardly have allowed his lines "To the Reader" respecting it, to face the title-page, especially, too, as there must have been hundreds of people in London, at the time, to whom Shakespeare's face had been familiar. But all which concerns our present purpose is, that the portrait is not a “sell," but, unquestionably, an authentic, a bona-fide portrait, done by an engraver of whose work numerous other specimens exist, and testified to by a life-long friend, and that friend one of the most prominent of the poets and dramatists of the time, and exceedingly jealous of his own reputation.

Ben Jonson's lines 'To the Reader' are familiar to everybody who reads:

"This Figure, that thou here seest put,

It was for gentle Shakespeare cut;
Wherein the Grauer had a strife

with Nature, to out-doo the life:

O, could he but haue drawne his wit

As well in brasse, as he hath hit

His face; the Print would then surpasse

All, that was euer writ in brasse.
But, since he cannot, Reader, looke

Not on his Picture, but his Booke."

B. I.

A large allowance must of course be made for conventional extravagance of phrase, in such cases. Similar compliments to engravers were not uncommon at the time. See notes to the Lines, in "Shakespeare's Centurie of Prayse; . . . By C. M. Ingleby, LL.D. Second edition, . . . by Lucy Toulmin Smith," PP. 141, 142. But the important thing is the high tribute involved in the Lines, to the Poet's "wit."

Though it is outside of our present purpose, one thing must be said in defence of Droeshout, as an engraver, namely, that, judging from other portraits which exist, engraved by him, especially those of Fairfax and Bishop Howson, this of Shakespeare, as we

have it in the First Folio, does not do him (the engraver) justice, evidence existing that the plate on which the portrait was engraved, was tampered with before it was used for printing the portrait as it appears in the First Folio. That evidence is afforded by a proof-impression now among the Shakespearian rarities, drawings, and engravings, possessed by James Orchard HalliwellPhillipps,* Esq., F.R.S., at Hollingbury Copse, near Brighton, England, "that quaint wigwam on the Sussex Downs which has the honour of sheltering more record and artistic evidences connected with the personal history of the Great Dramatist than are to be found in any other of the World's libraries." Mr. HalliwellPhillipps privately printed a Calendar of these rarities, "For Special Circulation and for Presents only." I have had the privilege of examining the above-mentioned proof-impression, and can testify to the superior delicacy and softness of the work to that exhibited by the portrait as it appears in all existing copies of the First Folio. The late F. W. Fairholt, F. S. A., in his description, given in the Calendar, of this proof-impression, minutely contrasts it with the Folio engraving, and explains how by cross-hatching and coarse dotting, the artistic merit of the plate was seriously impaired; and the late Mr. William Smith, Director of the National Portrait Gallery, the highest authority on early engraving, after a careful examination of the proof-impression, gives it as his opinion, that "on what is technically termed proving the plate, it was thought that much of the work was so delicate as not to allow of a sufficient number of impressions being printed. Droeshout might probably have refused to spoil his work, and it was retouched by an inferior and coarser engraver."

Sed hæc hactenus. My theme is the authenticity of the First Folio.

Following the title-leaf, is the Dedication, "To the most noble and incomparable paire of brethren. William Earle of Pembroke, &c. Lord Chamberlaine to the Kings most Excellent Maiesty.

* Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps died on the 3d of January, 1829.

and Philip Earle of Montgomery, &c. Gentleman of his Maiesties Bed-Chamber. Both Knights of the most Noble Order of the Garter, and our singular good Lords."

It may be assumed, as a matter of course, that the privilege of dedicating the Work to two noblemen of such exalted rank and station as were the Earl of Pembroke and the Earl of Montgomery, had first to be solicited and secured by the dedicators, John Heminge and Henry Condell. It would have been a piece of unexampled audacity, in those days, for two actors to dedicate the Work to them without express permission. And it is evident from the Dedication itself, that the privilege was granted by them, not so much on account of the honor (although they no doubt esteemed it such), which the Dedication would do them, as by reason of their personal interest in Shakespeare, and of their admiration of his Plays.

From what we know of one of the dedicatees, the Earl of Pembroke, as a liberal patron of literature and the drama, and of their representatives, it may be presumed, that he generously aided in the enterprise, which must have been attended with large expense. The publication of such a magnificent volume, in those days, when there was no general reading public, and no book trade, in its present meaning, was a great undertaking, and could have been possible only with noble patronage.

The knowledge we have of these two noblemen, is abundant and entirely authentic. Anthony á Wood says of them, in his "Athenæ Oxonienses. An exact history of all the Writers and Bishops who have had their Education in the most Antient and Famous University of Oxford, from 15 Hen. VII. A.D. 1500, to the Author's death in Nov. 1695,' "William Herbert, son and heir of Hen. Earl of Pembroke, was born at Wilton in Wilts, 8 Apr. 1580, became a nobleman of New Coll. in Lent Term 1592, aged 13, continued there about two years, succeeded his father in his honours 1601, made Knight of the Garter 1 Jac. I. and Governour of Portsmouth six years after. In 1626 he was unanimously elected Chancellor of this University [Oxford], being a great

patron of learning, and about that time was made Lord Steward of the Kings Household. He was not only a great favourer of learned and ingenious men, but was himself learned, and endowed to admiration with a poetical geny, as by those amorous and not inelegant aires and poems of his composition doth evidently appear; some of which had musical-notes set to them by Hen. Lawes and Nich. Laneare. All that he hath extant, were published with this title: Poems written by William Earl of Pembroke, etc., many of which are answered by way of repartee, by Sir Benj. Rudyard, with other poems written by them occasionally and apart. Lond. 1660. Oct. He died suddenly in his house called Baynard's Castle in London, on the tenth of Apr. in sixteen hundred and thirty . . . whereupon his body was buried in the Cath. Ch. at Salisbury near to that of his Father. See more of him in the "Fasti," among the Creations, an. 1605. He had a younger brother named Philip, who was also a nobleman of New Coll. at the same time with his brother, was afterwards created Earl of Montgomery, and upon the death of his brother William, succeeded in the title of Pembroke. ... He also turned rebel† when the Civil Wars began in 1642, was one of the Council of State by Oliver's appointment after K. Ch. I. was beheaded,"

...

He too was Chancellor of the University of Oxford, in 1648. Pembroke College was named after William, Earl of Pembroke. He presented to the Bodleian Library 242 Greek manuscripts which he had bought in Italy.

In the "Fasti Oxonienses" appended to the "Athenæ Oxonienses," the Earl of Pembroke is represented as "the very picture and viva effigies of Nobility, a person truly generous, a singular lover of learning and the professors thereof, and therefore by the Academians elected their Chancellor some years after this.

* The leading musical composer of the time. He composed the music for Milton's Comus, and performed the combined characters of the Spirit and the shepherd Thyrsis in that drama; was one of the court-musicians to K. Charles the First. † Wood was a hot Royalist.