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ACT I It is Ascension Day in a village of the West. In the lowpanelled hall-sittingroom of the BURLACOMBE'S farmhouse on thevillage green, MICHAEL STRANGWAY, a clerical collar round histhroat and a dark Norfolk jacket on his back, is playing theflute before a very large framed photograph of a woman, which isthe only picture on the walls. His age is about thirty-five hisfigure thin and very upright... more...

PREFACE. The main rules which we proposed to ourselves in undertaking this Edition are as follows: 1. To base the text on a thorough collation of the four Folios and of all the Quarto editions of the separate plays, and of subsequent editions and commentaries. 2. To give all the results of this collation in notes at the foot of the page, and to add to these conjectural emendations collected and... more...

ACT I SCENE I Front room on ground floor at 126 Redcliffe Gardens. An apartment furnished richly but in an old-fashioned way. Fine pictures. Large furniture. Sofa near centre. General air of neglect and dustiness. Carpet half-laid. Trunks and bags lying about in corners, some opened. Men's wearing apparel exposed. Mantelpiece, R., in disorder. At back double doors (ajar) leading to another room.... more...

INTRODUCTION THE greatest of English dramatists except Shakespeare, the first literary dictator and poet-laureate, a writer of verse, prose, satire, and criticism who most potently of all the men of his time affected the subsequent course of English letters: such was Ben Jonson, and as such his strong personality assumes an interest to us almost unparalleled, at least in his age. Ben Jonson came of the... more...

HALL-MARKED The scene is the sitting-room and verandah of HER bungalow. The room is pleasant, and along the back, where the verandahruns, it seems all window, both French and casement. There is adoor right and a door left. The day is bright; the timemorning. [HERSELF, dripping wet, comes running along the verandah,through the French window, with a wet Scotch terrier in herarms. She vanishes through the... more...

TO THERIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES MONTAGUE,ONE OF THE LORDS OF THE TREASURY. Sir,—I heartily wish this play were as perfect as I intended it, that it might be more worthy your acceptance, and that my dedication of it to you might be more becoming that honour and esteem which I, with everybody who is so fortunate as to know you, have for you.  It had your countenance when yet unknown; and now it is made... more...

FIRST ACT SCENE The octagon room at Sir Robert Chiltern’s house in Grosvenor Square. [The room is brilliantly lighted and full of guests.  At the top of the staircase stands lady chiltern, a woman of grave Greek beauty, about twenty-seven years of age.  She receives the guests as they come up.  Over the well of the staircase hangs a great chandelier with wax lights, which illumine a large... more...

ACT  IV SCENE  I.  London.  Before the Tower [Enter, on one side, QUEEN ELIZABETH, DUCHESS of YORK, and MARQUIS of DORSET; on the other, ANNE DUCHESS of GLOSTER, leading LADY MARGARET PLANTAGENET, CLARENCE's young daughter.]DUCHESSWho meets us here?—my niece Plantagenet,Led in the hand of her kind aunt of Gloster?Now, for my life, she's wandering to the Tower,On pure heart's love,... more...

PREFACE A preface to a play seems generally to be considered as a kind of closet-prologue, in which—if his piece has been successful—the author solicits that indulgence from the reader which he had before experienced from the audience: but as the scope and immediate object of a play is to please a mixed assembly in representation (whose judgment in the theatre at least is decisive,) its degree of... more...

THE GAY LORD QUEX THE FIRST ACT The scene represents a manicure establishment in New Bond Street. It is a front room upon the first floor, with three french-windows affording a view of certain buildings on the east side of the street. On the left, furthest from the spectator, is a wide, arched opening, apparently leading to another apartment, in which is the door giving entrance to the rooms from the... more...