THE initial letters J. T. are placed before this play, as those belonging to the author of it. What his name was, or what his condition, are alike unknown. It was printed in 12mo. 1662, with two others Thorny Abby or The London Maid, and The Marriage Broker, in a volume entitled Gratia Theatrales, or A Choice Ternary of English Plays. Chetwood says, it was printed in 1599, and Whincop, in the year 1606. I cannot but suspect the fidelity of both these writers in this particular.*

• Nobody who reads this play, can doubt that it is much older than 1662, the date borne by the earliest known edition of it. It has every indication of antiquity, and the title not the least of these. Grim the Collier of Croydon, is a person who plays a prominent character in the humorous portion of Edwards's Damon and Pithias which was printed in 1571, and acted several years earlier. The Grim of the present play is obviously the same person as the Grim of Damon and Pithias, and in both he is said to be "Collier for the king's own Majesty's mouth." Chetwood may therefore be right when he states that it was printed in 1599; but perhaps that was not the first edition, and the play was probably acted before Damon and Pithias had gone quite out of memory. In the officebook of the Master of the Revels under date of 1576, we find a dramatic entertainment entered, called "The Historie of the Colyer," acted by the Earl of Leicester's men, but it was doubtless Ulpian Fulwell's" Like will to like, quod the Devil to the Colier," printed in 1568. The structure, phraseology, versification, and language of "Grim, the Collier of Croydon," are sufficient to shew that it was written before 1600: another instance to prove how much the arrangement of the plays made by Mr. Reed was calculated to mislead. Some slight separate proofs of the age of this piece are pointed out in the new notes, but the general evidence is much more convincing. The versification is interlarded with rhimes like nearly all our earlier plays, and the blank verse is such as was written before Marlow's improvements had generally been adopted. When the play was reprinted in 1662 some parts of it were perhaps a little modernized. The introduction of Malbecco and Paridell into it, from Spenser's Fairy Queen, may be some guide as to the period when the comedy was first produced. C.

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

ST. DUNSTAN, Abbot of Glassenbury.
MORGAN, Earl of London.
LACY, Earl of Kent.

HONOREA, Morgun's daughter.
MARIAN, her Waiting-Maid.

NAN, Marian's-maid.

MUSGRAVE, a young Gentleman.
CAPTAIN CLINTON.

MILES FORREST, a Gentleman.
RALPH HARVY, an Apothecary.

GRIM, the Collier of Croydon.
PARSON SHORT-HOSE.

CLACK, a Miller.

JOAN, a Country Maid.

PLUTO,

MINOS,

EACUS,

Devils.

RHADAMANTHUS,

BELPHAGOR,

AKERCOCK, or Robin Goodfellow,

MALBECCO's Ghost, Officers, Attendants, &c.

The Stage is England.

189

PROLOGUE.

ye,

You're welcome: but our plot I dare not tell
For fear I fright a lady with great belly:
Or should a scold be 'mong you, I dare say
She'd make more work, than the devil, in the play.
Heard you not never how an actor's wife,
Whom he, fond fool, lov'd dearly as his life,
Coming in's way did chance to get a Jape1,
As he was 'tired in his devil's shape;
And how equivocal a generation

Was then begot, and brought forth thereupon ?
Let it not fright you; this I dare to say,
Here is no lecherous devil in our play.

He will not rumple Peg, nor Joan, nor Nan,
But has enough at home to do with Marian;
Whom he so little pleases, she in scorn
Does teach his devilship to wind the horn.
But if your children cry when Robin comes,
You may to still them buy here pears or plums.
Then sit you quiet all, who are come in,

St. Dunstan will soon enter and begin.

1 A Jape.] See Note 91 to Gammer Gurton's Needle, vol. II.