ches, and the comparatively high percentages in
_Love's Labour's Lost_, _Romeo and Juliet_, and _All's Well_ are
probably in part due to these causes.

The phenomena recorded in the last column are peculiar. Previous to the
date of _Macbeth_ it appears that Shakespeare practically avoided ending
a line with light or weak words such as prepositions, conjunctions, and
auxiliary verbs, but that from about 1606 to the end he employed them in
proportions ranging from 3.53 per cent in _Antony and Cleopatra_ to
7.14 per cent in his part of _Henry VIII_.

[Page Heading: Risks of Error]

The figures for plays not wholly written by Shakespeare are naturally
less significant, and have therefore been given separately; yet, on the
whole, they show the same general tendencies in the use of meter.

It will be observed that while the developments suggested by the
different columns are fairly consistent, they do not absolutely agree in
any two cases, and can obviously be used, as has been said, only to
corroborate other evidence in placing a play in a period, not to fix a
precise year. Further, in the calculations involved, there are many
doubtful cases calling for the exercise of individual judgment,
especially as to what constitutes a run-on line, or a light or weak
ending. Thus Professor Bradley differs from Koenig in several cases as to
the figures given in the seventh column, counting the percentage of
speeches ending within the line as 57 for _Hamlet_, 54 for _Othello_, 69
for _King Lear_, and 75 for _Macbeth_. For Acts III, IV, and V of
_Pericles_, the 71 per cent is Bradley's, for which Koenig's 17.1 is
clearly a mistake. Serious as are such discrepancies, and suggestive of
a need for a general re-counting of all the more significant phenomena,
they are not so great as to shake the faith of any scholar who has
seriously studied the matter in the usefulness of metrical tests as an
aid in the settling of the chronology.

TABLE III

==========================================================================
PERIODS | COMEDIES | HISTORIES | TRAGEDIES
---------+-----------------------+-----------------+----------------------
| L. L. L. 1591 | 1 Hy. VI 1590-1 |
| C. of E. 1591 | 2 Hy. VI 1590-2 |
I | T. G. of V. 1591-2 | 3 Hy. VI 1590-2 |
| | R. III 1593 |
| | K. J. 1593 | T. And. 1593