A second objection is founded on the title-page of the first edition of _Pericles_, published in 1609, where this drama is termed "the _late_ and much admired play."[285:D] It is obvious that from a word so indefinite in its signification as _late_, whether taken adverbially or adjectively, nothing decisive can result. To a play written eighteen years before, the lexicographic definitions of the term in question, namely, _in times past_, _not long ago_, _not far from the present_, may, without doubt, justly apply; but we must also add, that it is uncertain whether the word is meant to refer to the period of the composition of the play, or to the date of its last representation; _lately performed_ being most probably the sense in which the editor intended to be understood. Lastly, Mr. Douce is of opinion that three of the devices of the knights in act the second, scene the second, of _Pericles_, are copied from a translation of the _Heroicall Devises of Paradin and Symeon_, printed in 1591, which, if correct, would necessarily bring forward the date of the play either to this or the subsequent year; but from this difficulty we are relieved even by Mr. Douce himself, who owns that two out of the three are to be found in _Whitney's Emblems_, published in 1586, a confession which leads us to infer that the third may have an equally early origin.[286:A] From the extensive survey which has now been taken of the merits and supposed era of this early drama, the reader, it is probable, will gather sufficient _data_ for concluding that by far _the greater part of it issued from the pen of Shakspeare_, that _it was his first dramatic production_, that _it appeared towards the close of the year 1590_, and that _it deserves to be removed from the Appendix to the editions of Shakspeare, where it has hitherto appeared, and incorporated in the body of his works_. 2. COMEDY OF ERRORS, 1591. That this play should be ascribed to the year 1591, and not to 1593, or 1596, has, we think, been fully established by Mr. Chalmers[286:B], to whom, therefore, the reader is referred, with this additional observation, that, from an account published in the _British Bibliographer_, of an interlude, named _Jacke Jugeler_, which was entered in the Stationers' books in 1562-3, it appears that the _Menæchmi_ of Plautus, on which this comedy is founded, "was, in part at least, known at a very early period upon the English stage[286:C]," a further proof that versions or imitations of it had been in existence long prior to Warner's translation in 1595.