This edition appears to have been due to Moseley's enterprise. He tells us in a frank address called "The Stationer to the Readers": "'T were vaine to mention the Chargeableneſſe of this VVork; for thoſe who own'd the Manuſcripts, too well knew their value to make a cheap eſtimate of any of theſe Pieces, and though another joyn'd with me in the Purchaſe and Printing, yet the _Care & Pains_ were wholly mine...." Commenting upon the fact stated on the title-page that the plays had not been printed before, he says: "You have here a New Booke; I can ſpeake it clearely; for of all this large Uolume of Comedies and Tragedies, not one, till now, was ever printed before...." "And as here's nothing but what is genuine and Theirs, ſo you will find here are no Omiſſions; you have not onely All I could get, but all that you muſt ever expect. For (beſides thoſe which were formerly printed) there is not any Piece written by theſe Authours, either Joyntly or Severally, but what are now publiſhed to the VVorld in this Volume. One only Play I muſt except (for I meane to deale openly) 'tis a Comedy called the _VVilde-gooſe-Chase_, which hath beene long lost...." Nothing which throws light upon the history of printing at this time is more interesting than the Postscript added at the end of the commendatory verses by Waller, Lovelace, Herrick, Ben Jonson and others, and immediately after a poem by Moseley himself ending, "If this Booke faile, 'tis time to quit the Trade."... "... After the _Comedies_ and _Tragedies_ were wrought off, we were forced (for expedition) to ſend the _Gentlemens_ Verſes to ſeverall Printers, which was the occaſion of their different Character; but the _Worke_ it ſelfe is one continued Letter, which (though very legible) is none of the biggeſt, becauſe (as much as poſſible) we would leſſen the Bulke of the Volume." This matter of size seems to have been the cause of no little solicitude and care. Speaking of adding more plays to the volume, he says: "And indeed it would have rendred the Booke ſo Voluminous, that _Ladies_ and _Gentlewomen_ would have found it ſcarce manageable, who in Workes of this nature muſt firſt be remembred." There are thirty-six plays in the collection: as the stationer tells us in the preface to the reader quoted above, all those previously printed in quarto are included, except the _Wild Goose Chase_, which had been lost. It is added at the end of the volume with a separate title-page dated 1652. The following epigram by Sir Aston Cockain, addressed to the publishers, the two Humphreys, is not without interest in this connection as showing that the difficulties arising from the joint authorship were early sources of perplexity: