less," IV. i.). So far as I have tracked it out this very useful and popular mode of expression is due to Spenser's "thricehappy" expanded (as follows) by Peele, and accepted by Marlowe, Shakespeare and every one else. It is interesting to see how speedily Gabriel Harvey adopted it. Of course there is no literary achievement of note in this compound. It is simply an adaptation from Homeric Greek and other writers of classical times. But as a test of dates and authorship goes, it may prove to be of value. The very suddenness of its appearance in our writers, like an epidemic, is itself a phenomenon.

Spenser had submitted his Faerie Queene, or the beginning of it, to Harvey, for judgment before 1580. We may therefore take that date as a starting-point.

1

Peele has "thrice-reverend" thrice in his Arraignment of Paris, 1584, his earliest dated work, in which The Shepheards Calender is obviously recalled: "And you thrice-reverend powers" (365, a); “And thus, thrice-reverend, have I told my tale" (366, a): "Thrice-reverend gods" (367, b).

From that on Peele used it freely. In Edward I. he has "thrice-valiant" (380, b) and "thrice-renowned" (402, b). In The Battle of Alcazar “thrice-noble," "thrice-happy," "thricevaliant" and "thrice-puissant” (423, a) appear. And later in his signed writings he uses "thrice-honourable," "thrice-haughty,' "thrice-worthy," and "thrice-wretched." The last (The Tale of Troy, 558, a) is, I think, the only use he has, not as an epithet of personal address. Lodge has "thrice-renowned" in Wounds of Civil War.

It is noteworthy that the figure does not appear in Sir Clyomon which must be Peele's, and also must be his earliest effort. But as if to emphasise this bit of evidence he has at the end "twice-welcome to thy knight" (533, b).

Gabriel Harvey plunges into "thrise-sweet" (Grosart, ii. 5); "thrise-affectionate" (ii. 10); "thrise-curteous" (ii. 5); "thriselavish" (ii. 10); "thrise-grace-full" (i. 244); "thrise-happie"; "thrise-learned"; "thrise-secret"; "thrise-profound." But all these are later and date about 1592.

As it is impossible to put some of Peele's usages after 1 Henry VI., we must give him the credit of developing the expression from Spenser's earliest "thrise-happy," acording to the evidence at my disposal.

Henry VI. (Part I.) yields "thrice-victorious" (IV. vii. 67) and "thrice-welcome" (I. ii. 47). Part II. has "thrice-famed" and "thrice-noble." Love's Labour's Lost has "thrice-worthy." The words in Part II. are noted on where they occur in III. i. 266 and III. ii. 157.

Although thrice-happy is not in Shakespeare, it is in the True Tragedie (Q 1 of 3 Henry VI.), at the beginning of I. iv. : "Thrice-happie chance it is for thee and thine," but omitted in four excerpted lines from the finished play. And in the same play at II. ii. 15 "thrise valeaunt son" occurs, which is omitted from 3 Henry VI. also, although in Titus Andronicus. Moreover, from The First Part of Contention, I. i. 188, "thrice valiant" is deliberately omitted; "Warwick my thrice valiant son," reading "Warwick, my son" in the final play.

It is well to mention here how the case stands with a few other prominent plays of this date. Kyd has "thrice happy" in each of the three plays The Spanish Tragedie, Cornelia and Soliman and Perseda, the first of these being the only one that precedes 1 Henry VI. probably. It is one of Kyd's frequent echoes from Spenser. In Soliman and Perseda occurs another: "welcome, thrise renowned Englishman" (1. iii. 12, ed. Boas).

A more interesting state of affairs is found in Edward III., a play of great and acknowledged merit. Using Dent's reprint (edited by G. C. Moore-Smith), I find "thrice-gracious" (p. 23); "thrice-dread" (p. 24); "Thrice-noble" (p. 34); "thricevaliant" (p. 37); and "thrice-loving" (p. 40, and again). These occur, all I think, in the first two acts, the best part of the play, the parts which are attributed to Shakespeare. Or to Shakespeare and Peele as I believe. It is a significant clue. The play was entered in Stationers' Register, 1st Dec., 1595.

With Marlowe's use of these terms in Tamburlaine I will deal in 3 Henry VI. (Introduction). Marlowe had Spenser's "thrice-happy," and Peele's "thrice-reverend" to go upon. But he is found at once developing it as Peele does. Marlowe has "thrice-noble," "thrice-renowned," "thrice-welcome" in Tamburlaine, Part I.; and "thrice-worthy" in Tamburlaine, Part II. Peele went only a little way therefore in front. Later he may be looked on as following Marlowe as he often does.

Following the lead of thrice-happy, the compound seems to be always favourable. Peele has however "thrice-wretched

lady" (558, a); and Lodge has "Romans thrice accursed" in Wounds of Civil War.

V. NOUNS FORMED INTO ADJECTIVES WITH SUFFIXES

-LESS, -FUL, AND -Y OR -ISH.

At the time this play was written our language was in a more than usually pronounced condition of flux and reformation. All capable writers took what licence they pleased with words. Whether their efforts were to be lasting or ephemeral depended partly on the effort itself, but more largely on the fame and impress of the writer, both contingencies being in the lap of posterity. No writer had such a mastery over these manipulations of word-meaning and word-shaping as Shakespeare. No one seized more boldly on a term for a momentary need, whether new or newly applied, whether adopted or rejected when needless, than Shakespeare. Hence every play has its own series of terms not met with elsewhere, often merely "nonce-words," but frequently crystallised into our language. Some of these coinages may be dealt with in groups and lead to interesting generalisations with respect to Shakespeare's earliest work-words whose appearance in literature I have long been taking note of. Roughly speaking, the beginning of the sixteenth century may be taken as a standpoint. Stephen Hawes' work The Pastime of Pleasure, 1509, a very popular allegory with subsequent writers, is a useful guide or landmark, but no great series of changes took place perhaps till the middle of the century. I propose to deal rapidly with a few of these as evidenced in these plays. And first with adjectives formed from nouns by the suffix -less. Schmidt deserts us here and New Eng. Dict. has merely a general paragraph, which informs us that the practice was ancient, but the power seems to have been very slightly used and then laid by. Arthur Golding in his translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses (1565-1567) made free use of these expressions. He gives helpless, heedless, headless, wiveless, knotless, hurtless, luckless, pleasureless, tongueless, lightless, careless. Most of these are new.

Next in order of date who indulged in this direction, is Spenser. His early work yields hurtless, knightless, senseless, dreadless, hapless, heartless and hopeless, breathless, causeless,

favourless, helpless (merciless), heedless, lustless, careless, graceless, hostless, woundless, trustless, rueless (unpitied), quenchless, witless (ante 1590). Spenser has a tendency to group them (Faerie Queene, II. vi. 41, etc.), and so have Kyd, Shakespeare, Peele.

Next in sequence may be taken Peele. Not repeating the common words already mentioned he gives (down to 1593) endless, bloodless, ruthless, successless, quenchless, mirthless, trothless, breathless, soul-less, glory-less, numberless, dateless, waveless, kindless, spotless, sapless, stringless, cloudless.

Peele made obviously an effort in this direction. He strings them together in several places, metrically, and is responsible for some useful words.

Marlowe does his own share at the same time, or a little later (Peele's earliest work precedes Marlowe's). Marlowe stretches the sense of -less into "not able to be" more than the others perhaps. See Ward's Doctor Faustus, who is the only commentator I have found on this subject. Marlowe has timeless, topless, quenchless, expressless, resistless, remediless, removeless, ruthless, attemptless, fleshless, forceless, resistless, lustless.

We now come to Henry VI. and Shakespeare. It may be mentioned that at an immediately later date Sylvester in his Du Bartas carried on the coinage assiduously.

Shakespeare fell into line with his predecessors in his early work in this respect. In fact he kept this string to his bow always ready for use, but the Spenserian influence waned with time. In 1 Henry VI. he gives us (those in italics are peculiar to the play): sapless, pithless, crestless, strengthless, reasonless, timeless, heedless. In 2 Henry VI. crimeless. In 3 Henry VI. luckless, quenchless. In Taming of the Shrew, shapeless and combless. In Two Gentlemen of Verona, conceitless. In Richard II. stringless. In Sonnets, makeless. In Lover's Complaint, phraseless, termless. But one conclusion appears undoubted, that he dropped the trick except at impulsive moments, and discontinued it as a practice after his earliest work, especially 1 Henry VI. He never became enslaved. These forms often occur in groups, as in 3 Henry VI. II. v. It is so with all who adopt them; two, or more at a time. See Lodge, Wounds of Civil War (Hazlitt's Dodsley, v. 116, 141, 196); and Peele, passim. See 1 Henry VI. II. v.

II, 12, 13. See also 3 Henry VI. II. vi. 18, 23, 25. And the first stanzas of Lucrece.

COMPOUNDS WITH PREFIXES EVER, AND NEVER, FROM PARTICIPIAL ADJECTIVES.

A few of these, ever-during, ever-lasting, and ever-living are very early, going back to the first part of the fourteenth century as dealt with in New Eng. Dict. The next in date cited is "ever-increasing," 1570 (T. Norton, translation). Sidney seems then to have given an impetus in Arcadia (ante 1586); he has ever-flourishing in the first few pages.

About the same date Spenser took this mode under his wing. In the first Canto of The Faerie Queene he has everdamned, ever-drouping, and ever-drizling in stanzas 38, 39, and 41. Ever-burning occurs also, twice, in the first book. And ever-dying is found in I. x. 9. While the old ever-living is used in I. x. 50.

This latter occurs in the present play, IV. iii. 51, and is followed immediately by ever-esteemed in Love's Labour's Lost. Later, Spenser has ever-running, ever-preserved, everfixed, ever-fired, ever-during, and ever-burning. Marlowe uses a few of Spenser's, including ever-drizzling. Kyd has everglooming in The Spanish Tragedy.

Spenser's Faerie Queene gave an impetus to this use.

Forms with "never" are not affected much by Shakespeare. None appear in Henry VI. But he has never-conquered and never-ending in Lucrece; never-dying and never-daunted (the latter was common) in Henry IV.; never-quenching in Richard II.; never-resting in Sonnet 5; and in his latest work neversuspected and never-withering occur in Tempest and Cymbeline.

Spenser used never-resting earlier in Mother Hubberd's Tale, but I have not noted these in his earliest work.

Peele and Kyd, or Peele followed by Kyd, have several. The former has never-ceasing and never-dying in Alcazar and the Arraignment. The latter gives never-dying and neverkilling in Spanish Tragedy; ne'er deceiving in Cornelia.

Marlowe adopted these compounds in Tamburlaine. He has ever-howling, ever-green, ever-raging, ever-turning, evershining. He has also never-broken, never-fading, never-stayed, in adjectival use—all in first and second Tamburlaine.