Page:The Library, volume 5, series 3.djvu/382

 368 PROBLEMS OF THE ENGLISH account of the cycle that has so far appeared; but even this is not wholly satisfactory, since, as Chambers himself observes, it is obvious that con- siderable portions of the cycle were not intended for division at all. For the internal history of the plays we have three main sources of information : the make-up of the manuscript, the indications of division afforded by the scribe, and the comparison of the plays as we have them with the descriptions given us in the Prologue. Of course, beyond this there are general guides afforded by internal connexions between individual plays, resemblances and differ- ences of style, and the evidence afforded by the different metres used. Broadly, the first two sources may be said to be bibliographical and the rest literary, and it is only by using both kinds to the utmost that we can hope to disentangle the history of this very complex cycle. In what follows I shall say enough to make plain the bearing of the bibliographical evidence, but I wish to state at once that the more minute biblio- graphical analysis applies chiefly to matters the importance of which is only apparent when we come to criticise the construction of the cycle in far greater detail than is possible in a lecture such as this. As regards the subsidiary sources of information, I shall repeatedly have occasion to refer to corre- spondencies or contradictions between different plays, and shall attach a good deal of weight to the evidence they afford. On the other hand, I shall say very little about style, all judgments thereon