Printed for J. Johnson, R. Baldwin, H. L. Gardner, W. J. and J. Richardson,
J. Nichols and Son, F. and C. Rivington, T. Payne, R. Faulder, G. and
J. Robinson, W. Lowndes, G. Wilkie, J. Scatcherd, T. Egerton,
J. Walker, W. Clarke and Son, J. Barker and Son, D. Ogilvy and Son,
Cuthell and Martin, R. Lea, P. Macqueen, J. Nunn, Lackington, Allen
and Co. T. Kay, J. Deighton, J. White, W. Miller, Vernor and Hood,
D. Walker, B. Crosby and Co. Longman and Rees, Cadell and Davies,
T. Hurst, J. Harding, R. H. Evans, S. Bagster, J. Mawman, Blacks and
Parry, R. Bent, J. Badcock, J. Asperne, and T. Ostell.

[J. PLYMSELL, Printer, Leather Lane, Holborn, London.]

* HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK.] The original story on which this play is built, may be found in Saxo Grammaticus the Danish hiftorian. From thence Belleforest adopted it in his collection of novels, in feven volumes, which he began in 1564, and continued to publish through fucceeding years. From this work, The Hystorie of Hamblett, quarto, bl. 1. was translated. I have hitherto met with no earlier edition of the play than one in the year 1604, though it must have been performed before that time, as I have feen a copy of Speght's edition of Chaucer, which formerly belonged to Dr. Gabriel Harvey, (the antagonist of Nash) who, in his own hand-writing, has fet down Hamlet, as a performance with which he was well acquainted, in the year 1598. His words are thefe: "The younger fort take much delight in Shakspeare's Venus and Adonis; but his Lucrece, and his tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke, have it in them to please the wifer fort, 1598."

In the books of the Stationers' Company, this play was entered by James Roberts, July 26, 1602, under the title of " A booke called The Revenge of Hamlett, Prince of Denmarke, as it was lately acted by the Lord Chamberlain his fervantes."

In Eastward Hoe, by George Chapman, Ben Jonson, and John Marston, 1605, is a fling at the hero of this tragedy. A footman named Hamlet enters, and a tankard-bearer afks him"'Sfoote, Hamlet, are you mad ?"

The frequent allufions of contemporary authors to this play fufficiently fhow its popularity. Thus, in Decker's Bel-man's Nightwalkes, 4to. 1612, we have-" But if any mad Hamlet, hearing this, fmell villainic, and rufh in by violence to see what the tawny diuels [gypfies] are dooing, then they excuse the fact" &c. Again, in an old collection of Satirical Poems, called The Night-Raven, is this couplet :

I will not cry Hamlet, Revenge my greeves,
"But I will call Hangman, Revenge on thieves."

STEEVENS.

Surely no fatire was intended in Eastward Hoe, which was acted at Shakspeare's own playhouse, (Blackfriers,) by the children of the revels, in 1605. MALONE.

The following particulars relative to the date of this piece, are borrowed from Dr. Farmer's Effay on the Learning of ShakSpeare, p. 85, 86, fecond edition:

"Greene, in the Epiftle prefixed to his Arcadia, hath a lafh at fome vaine glorious tragedians,' and very plainly at ShakSpeare in particular. I leave all thefe to the mercy of their mother-tongue, that feed on nought but the crums that fall from the tranflators trencher.-That could scarcely latinize their neck