vary: it may be right to mention this fact, because, as all who have
been in the habit of examining the productions of our early stage are
aware, important alterations and corrections were sometimes introduced
while the sheets were going through the press. Our title-page, including
the wood-cut, may be considered a facsimile. It will be seen that it was
printed in 1590, and it was probably written by Robert Wilson about two
years before, as a sort of second part to his "Three Ladies of London,"
which had met with such decided success. That success was perhaps in
some degree revived by the frequent performance of "The three Lords and
three Ladies of London," and the consequence seems to have been the
publication of the new edition of the former in 1592.

The author called his new effort "The pleasant and stately Moral of the
three Lords and three Ladies of London," and it bears, in all its
essential features, a strong resemblance to the species of drama known
as a Moral or Moral-play. This resemblance is even more close and
striking than that of "The three Ladies of London;" for such important
characters as Gerontus and Mercadore are wanting, and as far as the
_dramatis personae_ are concerned, there is little to take it out of the
class of earlier dramatic representations, but the characters of Nemo
and the Constable, the latter being so unimportant that Wilson did not
include him in the list of "the Actor's names" which immediately follows
the title. Had the piece, however, made a still more remote approach to
comedy, and had it possessed fewer of the mixed features belonging to
its predecessor, we should unhesitatingly have reprinted it as a
necessary sequel.

Towards the conclusion of the drama, as well indeed as in the
introductory stanzas, the allusions to the Armada and to the empty
vaunts of the Spaniards are so distinct and obvious, that we cannot