ELIZABETHAN DRAMA i 93 



to the enterprise of the Times, under Lord Northcliffe's ownership, in various new directions, 

 and notably in its publication in September 1912, in celebration of its 40,000 number, of a 

 remarkable "Printing" supplement, dealing in a series of expert contributions with the 

 history of journalism, typography, and everything else that goes to the making of a news- 

 paper, and again in December of an equally elaborate "Shipping" supplement. The other 

 important change was Mr. J. L. Garvin's transference to the editorial chair of the Pall Mall 

 Gazette, while still holding that of the (Sunday) Observer, both papers being owned by Mr. 

 Astor. Mr. Garvin (b. 1868), who first became known in London as a leader-writer on the 

 Daily Telegraph, had in recent years come to occupy a unique place among Unionist jour- 

 nalists; a brilliant and inexhaustible writer, one of the inspirers and best exponents of Mr. 

 Chamberlain's Tariff Reform policy, and deep in the councils of the leaders of the party, he 

 had made the Observer the contemporary "Thunderer" of the Press; and in taking the Pall 

 Mali as his week-day organ he gave new vitality to this evening journal, which showed ?igns 

 of enterprise in every direction under his editorship. The amalgamation in May 1912 of the 

 Daily News and Morning Leader, the two Liberal half-penny morning dailies, both owned by 

 Mr. Cadbury, may also be noted. 



Shakespeare, and the Elizabethan Drama. 



During 1909-12 great activity has been shown in ransacking archives, public and 

 private, in pursuit of matter bearing upon dramatic history which might have escaped 

 the scrutiny of earlier investigators, such as Malone, Collier and Halliwell-Phillips. 

 A considerable share in this enterprise has been taken by European and American 

 scholars, more scientifically trained than those of England in the methods of research. 

 One of the most successful contributors has been Prof. A. Feuillerat of Rennes Univer- 

 sity, who has just published in the Shakespeare Jahrbuch for 1912: a set of valuable 

 documents from Loseley Hall, telling the story of a Blackfriars theatre earlier than that 

 built by James Burbage, the existence of which has only been dimly suspected. This 

 theatre was in use from 1577 to 1584 and was managed first by the Masters of the 

 Children of the Chapel Royal, and afterwards by the playwright John Lyly under the 

 patronage of the Earl of Oxford. Much new light has also been thrown upon the 

 history of the Elizabethan and Stuart organisations of actors by Mr. J. T. Murray of 

 Harvard, who in his English Dramatic Companies (1910) has brought together for the 

 first time, in many cases direct from municipal records, a mass of notices bearing upon 

 the tours of the companies in the summer or plague times, and their entertainment in 

 the provincial towns- which they visited. But the most untiring archivist has been 

 Prof. C. W. Wallace of Nebraska University, who has ranged widely in the Record 

 Office, and is now pouring forth an apparently inexhaustible stream of new material, 

 largely derived from the records of the extinct Court of Requests, which had a special 

 mission to compose the differences of players in their capacity as servants of the royal 

 household. Prof. Wallace's researches have centred round the boy companies, and in 

 a quite recent work, The Evolution of the English Drama up to Shakespeare (1912), he 

 has been able to supplement Prof. Feuillerat's Blackfriars discoveries, and also to 

 furnish much fresh information with regard to the Tudor and earlier Elizabethan court 

 drama. He has also earned the gratitude of scholars by publishing in the. Nebraska 

 University Studies for 1909 and 1910 the original documents on which his newspaper 

 and magazine articles making known new facts about Shakespeare and the stage were 

 based. Unfortunately, Prof. Wallace's judgment as an historian is not equal to his 

 flair and perseverance as a researcher, and while the learned world has appreciated his 

 documents, it has too often found it necessary to repudiate the inferences with which 

 they have been garnished. 



English students, however, have not been altogether unmindful of their duties to 

 the archives. A good piece of work has been done by Mr. Ernest Law in Some Supposed 

 Shakespeare Forgeries (1911). Here he reviews the evidence for and against the authen- 

 ticity of the lists of plays presented at court during the winters of 1604 and 1611 as pub- 

 lished by Peter Cunningham in 1842, and comes to the important conclusion that, 

 in spite of the scepticism aroused by Cunningham's shady character, the documents 

 are genuine. His view is accepted by competent palaeographers, and he has been able 

 to maintain it against a vigorous and detailed criticism in the pages of the Athenaeum. 



