The three parts of "Henry VI"[15] are certainly only in part Shakespeare's and represent the complex form of collaboration not infrequently found in the drama. It is likely that Marlowe and Greene were concerned in the plays, and that Shakespeare's share was mainly in revision. The three plays were at all events very popular and occupy an important place among the early chronicle histories. The contention between the houses of York and Lancaster becomes an epic theme, uniting the three parts, and affords manifold opportunity for battles, defiances, coronations, usurpations, and patriotism. The structure as well as the material is of the chronicle, without any approach to tragic unity or coherence; but the plays do in some ways invade the field of tragedy. Comedy is practically excluded except in the Cade scenes; and the last two parts, as their titles indicate, present a series of "falls of princes"--"the death of the good Duke Humphrey; And the banishment and death of the Duke of Suffolke, and the tragicall end of the proud cardinall of Winchester" and "The true Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, and the death of good King Henry the Sixt." With themes of bloodshed and battle, material at least full of tragical possibilities, and under the schooling of Marlowe, Shakespeare served his apprenticeship for historical tragedy. In "King John" Shakespeare still followed chronicle history methods without any clear advance toward tragedy. He was engaged in rewriting the old "Troublesome Reign," and he followed its plot with great closeness, scene after scene with entrances and exits being the same in both plays. But here his indebtedness practically stops. He seems to have made out a careful scenario, following the old play with only such alterations and omissions as were necessary for the condensation of its two parts into a single play, and then to have thrown aside the old text and almost forgotten it. His improvements consequently coincide with the developments which we have found common in the tragedies of the period in that they concern characterization and style. Faulconbridge and Constance become incomparably more vital and impressive than in the old play and win our interest away from the battles and arguments of the rapid scenes. The style, almost never reminiscent of the early play, is mainly rhetorical, though always vigorous and usually surpassing the models which it frequently recalls. It often displays the conflict between the ornamental and naturalistic tendencies; as, for example, when Arthur, facing the murderer, quibbles for ten lines over the red-hot iron which is to put out his eyes, and then, as the attendants enter, forgets his rhetoric in words whose sincerity and simplicity have touched every reader.