Page:Life of Edmond Malone.djvu/303

CHAPTER XIII.

1805–1810.

Venus and Adonis (ed. 1593)—Life of Shakspeare—Bishop Percy—Notices of Malone, by Rev. J. Jephson—Letter to his Sister—Pamphlet on the origin of The Tempest—Parliamentary Logic and Right Hon. W. G. Hamilton—Thomas Moore and Kilkenny Theatricals—Right Hon. W. Windham.

The allusion in the last chapter by the Bishop to Venus and Adonis, applied to a new Shakspearian acquisition made by his editor. In the little volume itself, now in the Bodleian (325), we find the following memorandum:—

“Bought of Mr. William Ford, bookseller, in Manchester, in August, 1805, at the enormous price of twenty-five pounds.

“Many years ago, I said that I had no doubt an edition of Shakspeare’s Venus and Adonis was published in 1593;^[1] but no copy of that edition was discovered in the long period that has elapsed since my first notice of it, nor is any other copy of 1593 but the present known to exist.

”E. Malone."

In December, he writes to the Rev. Mr. Davenport, of Stratford, of the new edition, “in twenty-three volumes, royal octavo,” flitting before his san-

1. In the edition of Shakspeare (1790) he fancied the first edition was 1594, though entered at Stationers’ Hall 1593.