Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 1).djvu/413



E here present our readers with fac-similes of the manuscripts of several of the most popular of living playwrights, chosen from some of the best-known of their plays. Most of them tell their own story; but we may call particular attention to the specimen by Mr. Irving, who is not generally known to be a playwright. Yet the manner in which he treats a drama like "Louis XI." (a page of which we give), by cutting, adding, and writing in soliloquies, manifestly makes him a joint-author in the play.