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SCO ;c\J ICO iCM ;03 ICO Do not deface books by marks and writing. iKlanltinb T^e 3d aero Tlays. No. i Supposed date of MS., 1475 Reproduced in Facsimile, 1 907 ^ankinb '¥}< U ■'K Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013324573 %\)t Ctttior jFacgJmtle Ceytg Under the Supervision and Editorship of JOHN S. FARMER 'The Macro Tlays. No. i Issued for Subscribers by T. C. & E. C. JACK, 1 6 HENRIETTA STREET LONDON, W.C. : AND EDINBURGH MCMVII \.r\T\^ '^ JBlankinli The Macro "Plays. No. i The story of the Macro MS. Plays has been told by Dr. Furnivall and Mr. A. W. Pollard in The Early English Text Society's reprint, and it is outside the province of The Tudor Facsimile Texts to go over ground afresh that has been so well and thoroughly traversed by others. It is at Dr. Furnivair s suggestion, and through the kindness and courtesy of the present owner, Mr. J. H. Gurney, of Keswick Hall, near Norwich, that these valuable manuscripts are included in this series. The Macro plays and manuscripts derive their name from a former owner. Cox Macro, an eighteenth-century antiquary, physician, and cleric. Born in 1683, ^f- died in 1767. Full particulars of his life's record will be found in " The Dictionary of National Biography ^^ in The Early English Text Society's reprints of the Macro plays, and later {with contentious matter and suggestions in respect to ''^Mankind" by the present Editor) in "Lost Tudor Plays and Others," issued by The Early English Drama Society as an " extra " volume. Turning specifically to the original manuscript, " Man- kind" formed part of a volume which in the eighteenth century contained other plays and treatises in manuscript — a strange juxtaposition of old moralities, a fuvenal, a treatise on alchemy, &c. When sold at auction, and bought by Mr. Hudson Gurney in 1820, the collection was broken up, and three plays, " Mankind," " Wisdom," and " The Castle of Perseverance," were bound afresh in one volume. The first of these is now presented in facsimile : the others will follow in course. The numeration of the leaves (122-134) is apparently that of the eighteenth century collection. The manuscript is probably not perfect. Mr. A. W. Pollard, in The Early English Text Society's reprint, discusses the questions of the watermarks and the '■'■gatherings" of the thirteen leaves of the manuscript, and has come to the conclusion that the gathering was of twelve leaves (123-134), preceded by a leaf (122) which has nothing to correspond to it. The in- terruption of the dialogue at this point suggests that at least one leaf has been lost. Certainly the lines commencing leaf 123 are very inappropriate in the mouth of Mercy ; and further, this lacuna is made tolerably certain by the small roman figures on the lower margins, the first two extant leaves being numbered i and iii, the numeration then pro- ceeding iv, V, vi, vii, viii (ix is unmarked^ x, and so forth, mostly unmarked. Mr. Pollard thus sums up : " fVe may thus be certain that our gathering of twelve leaves was preceded by two other leaves containing the beginning of the text of the play. But as no scribe would commence work by writing on a half quarto sheet, either two or more leaves belonging to the play are wanting before its present beginning, or else the play must have originally been written in a miscellany book, in which it was preceded by some other piece written on the earlier part of the same gathering. The former hypothesis is not impossible, as the text of the play might have been preceded by the speeches of flag-bearing criers or vexillatores, announcing its approaching performance." The inscription at the end of the play {leaf 134), which is partly erased and cut through, will be found distinctly given in '■'■Wisdom" {Tudor Facsimile Texts, Macro Plays, No. 2). The writing on leaf 1 34 {back) has apparently nothing to do with the play of '■'■Mankind," or '■''Wisdom " which follows it in the original volume. There are three items, all written upside down — eight lines of English between two bits of Latin. JOHN S. FARMER. 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