Two other arguments. In the Prologue of the play, written and recited when it was acted, there are two passages expressing great fears as to the result,--one that Chaucer might rise to condemn the dramatist for spoiling his story,--another that the play might be damned, and destroy the fortunes of the Theatre[115:1]. Is this the way in which a play partly written by Shakspere--then near the close of his successful stage career--would be spoken of on its production? Another argument is, if Shakspere, using Chaucer's poem as a model, spoiled it in dramatising it[115:2], then as a poet he was inferior to Chaucer--which is absurd. Following high authorities, anybody may adopt any opinion on this play and find backers--the extremes being the German Tieck, who entirely rejects the idea of Shakspere's authorship, and Mr Hickson, who throws on him the responsibility for the whole framework of a play and the groundwork of every character. I should incline to the middle opinion[116:1], that Shakspere selected the subject, began the play, wrote many passages; had no underplot, and generally left it in a skeleton state; that Fletcher took it up, patched it here and there, and added an underplot;--that Fletcher, not Shakspere, is answerable for all the departures from Chaucer, for all the underplot, and for the revised play as it stands. There is nothing improbable in this. After Shakspere retired to Stratford, Fletcher may have found the play amongst the MSS. of the Theatre, and then produced it after due changes made--not giving the author's name. At that time it was the custom that a play remained the property of the company of actors who produced it. That the Blackfriars Company did _not_ regard the play as Shakspere's is pretty plain--for in the edition of 1623, published by Heminge and Condell of that company, Shakspere's own fellow-players, the play is not included. Nor does the part authorship account for the omission, as plays with less of Shakspere's undoubted authorship are there included. But the omission is intelligible if the play had been so Fletcherised that it was, when acted, generally regarded as Fletcher's. Fletcher was alive in 1623 to claim all as his property; but in 1634 he was dead. Then the publisher, knowing or hearing that Shakspere had a share, printed _his_ name, after _Fletcher's_, as part dramatist. Thus I return to the older verdict of Coleridge and Lamb, that Shakspere wrote passages of this play, perhaps also the outlines, but that Fletcher filled up, added an underplot, and finally revised. FOOTNOTES: [115:1] Does not this as much imply that Fletcher knew he had spoiled what Shakspere would have done well?--H. L.