_Humphrey Moseley_ at the _Princes Armes in St Pauls_.


This collection, which is referred to as the First Folio throughout the
present edition, contained all the authors' previously unpublished plays
(34) except _The Wild-Goose Chase_, which, at the date of the Folio, was
supposed to be lost. The dedicatory epistles, commendatory poem, and
Catalogue of Plays, prefixed to the First Folio, are reprinted in the
preliminary pages at the end of this Note (pp. ix--lvii).

The second collected edition appeared in 1679 in folio (14-3/8 ins.
x 8-1/4 ins.); a reprint of the title-page is given on p. lix of the
present volume. This collection, referred to henceforth as the Second
Folio, contained (i) all the plays included in the First Folio, (ii) _The
Wild-Goose Chase_, which had been published in folio in 1652, (iii)
all the other then known plays of the authors which had been published
previously to 1679.

William Marshall's portrait of John Fletcher faces the title-page of both
folios with the following inscription engraved underneath:--

_Felicis ævi ac_ Præsulis _Natus; comes_ Beaumontis; _sic, quippe
Parnassus_, biceps; FLETCHERUS _unam in Pyramida furcas agens. Struxit
chorum plus simplicem Vates Duplex; Plus duplicem solus: nec ullum
transtulit; Nec transferendus: Dramatum æterni sales,_ Anglo _Theatro,
Orbe, Sibi, superstites_.

_FLETCHERE, facies absqz vultu pingitur; Quantus! vel_ umbram _circuit
nemo tuam._