them here; the main object of this work being to render the plays popular. These chronicle plays are a peculiar glory of our own literature, and they may well be the envy of all others but our appreciation of their value has greatly fallen since they have ceased to be acted. We have ample evidence that, at one time, by means of these plays, the English people learned their country's history: it can hardly be maintained that they no longer need such instruction.keywood informs us that in his time "Plays have made e ignorant more apprehensive, taught the unlearned the knowledge of many famous histories, instructed such as cannot read in the discovery of all our English chronicles; and what man have you now of that weak capacity that cannot discourse of any notable thing recorded even from William the Conqueror, nay, from the landing of Brute until this day?" Again, in more recent times such famous men as the first Marlborough, Chatham, and Southey are said to have acknowledged their debt to Shakespeare for the foundations of their knowledge of English history: while Coleridge, having adduced proof. that formerly the people were familiar with these plays, maintained that "it would be a fine national custom to act such a series of dramatic histories in orderly succession." If the work now submitted to the public will contribute to the growth of so wholesome and patriotic a custom, its end will be happily accomplished.