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 plays only one at a time, and it is with some difficulty that I have been prevailed upon to give up this intention. May I then beg of my reader to pardon, in the first place, so great a demand upon his attention by offering at once a volume of plays to his perusal; in the next place, to have the goodness not to read it hastily, but to pause, some days at least, between each play, that they may have in this respect the same advantages which new plays generally have. Let him not smile: this last is a request which I earnestly make, and if it is not complied with, I shall almost be tempted to think myself hardly treated.

I must also mention, that each of the plays contained in this volume has been, at one time or other, offered for representation to one or other of