have assembled in the forest to rehearse a play in honour of the duke and his bride. Puck, a fairy sprite, plays pranks upon them, finally crowning Bottom, the weaver, with an ass's head, and leading him to Titania for her liege lord, she being also under the spell of the love-juice.

Act IV brings a happy clearing up of tangled webs, and a reconciliation between the four lovers and the duke's party.

Act V celebrates a triple wedding at the ducal palace, where the artisans present the burlesque play, and ends with a fairy dance and blessing.

SOURCES

The plot of this play, so far as is known, originated with Shakespeare, though critics are of opinion that he is indebted to Chaucer's Knightes Tale' for several elements, notably the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. The story of the crossed lovers differs from the story of the two friends Palamon and Arcite and their love for Emily in the Tale,' yet bears resemblances to it at more than one point. The gods of Olympus, who have so active a hand in the destiny of Chaucer's lovers, are here represented by the fairy sprites. The anachronism of May-day observances in Athens at the time of Theseus may also be laid at Chaucer's door.

The fairies in their dealings with mortals are a product of the poet's fancy, but their names and general traits belong to popular literature and tradition. Obe

ron is found in Greene's James IV,' and still earlier in a Charlemagne romance, Huon of Bordeaux.' He is probably identical with Alberich, the dwarf of

theNibelungenlied.'

Titania is taken from Ovid, who bestows the title on Diana to indicate her descent from the Titans. Her popular name was Queen Mab.' The exact prototype of Puck is not to be found, but his general characteristics are well known to popular tradition. He is the counterpart of Robin Goodfellow, found in several writers. Puck or pouki was an old word for devil, softened in Cornish to pixey. Oberon's vision is believed to contain a compliment to Queen Elizabeth, under the veil of allegory.

Chaucer's influence may perhaps be seen again in the suggestion for the play of Pyramus and Thisbe,' in his Merchant's Tale.' However this may be, the comic interlude itself sufficiently recalls the story related by Chaucer in The Legend of Good Women,' or the version in Ovid's Metamorphoses,' to show

the poet's indebtedness.

As to the tradesmen actors, it was customary at that time for the rude mechanical' to try his hand at acting and probably with as dire results.

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DURATION OF THE ACTION

Theseus states in the opening scene that four days are to pass before the marriage; but it will be seen that the action occupies only three. Upon the night following the opening of the play, Hermia and Lysander flee from Athens, and on the same night the clowns hold their forest rehearsal and the fairies play their pranks. The next morning Theseus discovers the lovers, and the same evening witnesses the joint nuptials. The eventful night in the forest occupies the greater part of the play Acts II, III, and IV, scene i. The time of the action is as legendary as the plot.

DATE OF COMPOSITION

The mention of this play by Meres in • Palladis Tamia,' in 1598, makes it certain that the play was then known to the public. A piece of internal evidence not so certain is the name of Theseus, which may have been inspired by the Life of Theseus,' reissued in North's Plutarch in 1595. But an earlier edition of this book was published, and this date of 1595 affords no definite base.

Perhaps the most valuable internal evidence is given by the lines in Act V, scene i, 59-60: The thrice three Muses, mourning for the death of learning, late deceast in beggerie.' The opening phrase has been taken by Warton, in 1773, to allude to Spenser's Teares of the Muses,' published in 1591. And the entire allusion was believed by Knight, in 1840, to refer to Robert Greene, a contemporary writer who died in poverty in 1592.

A further indication of the date may be given by Titania's description of the weather (Act II, scene i, ll. 86-120), if it applied to the actual state of the weather in England at the time when the play was performed. This year of bad weather is believed by several authorities to be 1594.

The supposition that the play was written to be performed at the marriage of a friend has proved unconclusive, since the two noblemen, Southampton and Essex, for whom it might have been intended, were not married until 1598 and 1590, respectively – dates when the play was already known.

Nor do the literary qualities of the play lead to any definite evidence of the date. Rhymed lines and blank verse cannot be balanced against each other, since the

play is intentionally lyrical. Yet the comparatively regular structure of the lines, the relatively undeveloped dramatic portrayal of character as judged by the poet's later work, and the general similarity in tone to the group of early comedies Loves Labour's Lost,' • Comedie of Errors,' and Two Gentlemen of Verona '— all tend to place this play with them in point of time.

The summing up of this evidence, unconclusive as it may be, piecemeal, assigns the play to a position somewhere between 1590 and 1597, 1595 being the date generally preferred.

EARLY EDITIONS

A Midsommer Nights Dreame' was first published in 1600 in two different Quarto editions, at sixpence each. The First Quarto title-page ran as follows:

'A Midsommer nights dreame. As it hath beene sundry times publickely acted, by the Right honourable, the Lord Chamberlaine his servants. Written by William Shakespeare. ¶ Imprinted at London, for Thomas Fisher, and are to be soulde at his shoppe, at the Signe of the White Hart, in Fleetestreete. 1600.'

The Second Quarto bore the same title and division of lines, but instead of Fisher's name appears Printed by James Roberts, 1600.'

Which is the earlier there is no means of being sure. Roberts's Quarto was unregistered. Fisher's appears in the Stationers' Register,' 1600, 8 Octobris. Thomas ffyssher. Entred for his copie under the handes of master Bodes and the Wardens a booke called A mydsommer nightes Dreame . . . vjd.'

In the First Folio of 1623 the play appears amid the comedies, from page 145 to page 162, It is divided

into acts, but omits the scenes and Dramatis Personæ. The First Folio gives ninety-seven stage directions, not counting the division into acts, whereas the Second Quarto gives seventy-four stage directions and the First Quarto but fifty-six. Both Quartos omit the acts. Such evidences as these and that of V. i. 134 (where the name of one of the players appears in the direction) bring the Folio closer than the Quartos to Shakespeare's stage.

The Second Quarto corrects some of the errors of the First Quarto, is superior in stage directions, and is better printed; but otherwise the text and punctuation are not so good.

The First Folio was printed from a copy of the Second Quarto which had been used as a prompter's stage copy. It shows some errors and a few slight variations from its original.