SHAKESPEARE'S LIBRARY:

A COLLECTION OF THE

ROMANCES, NOVELS,

POEMS, AND HISTORIES,

USED BY

SHAKESPEARE

AS THE FOUNDATION OF HIS DRAMAS.

NOW FIRST COLLECTED, AND ACCURATELY REPRINTED FROM THE ORIGINAL

EDITIONS.

WITH INTRODUCTORY NOTICES,

By J. PAYNE COLLIER, Esq. F.S.A.

VOL. I.

LONDON:

THOMAS RODD,

9, GREAT NEWPORT STREET.

LONDON:

COMPTON AND RITCHIE, PRINTERS, MIDDLE STREET, CLOTH FAIR.

PREFACE.

THE following work supplies an important deficiency in our literature as regards Shakespeare: it brings into one view all that has been recovered of the sources he employed, in various degrees, in the composition of such of his dramas as are not derived from Grecian, Roman, or English History, or were not formed upon some earlier play. The romances, novels, and poems, to which he resorted are scattered over many volumes, some of them of the rarest occurrence, existing only in our public libraries: these are included in the ensuing pages. We have ventured to call the work "Shakespeare's Library," since our great dramatist, in all probability, must have possessed the books to which he was indebted, and some of which he applied so directly and minutely to his own purposes. Until now the ordinary reader