of
the Whole Contention,' and the 'True Tragedy of Richard, Duke of York,'
were all three in being before Shakspere began to write for the stage";
and Mr. Hallam says, more cautiously, that "it seems probable that the
old plays of the 'Contention' ... were in great part by Marlowe."

And so, we find Shakspere in London, from six to ten years connected
with its principal theatre, but writing nothing for its stage, not even
as a "hack-writer." We respectfully dissent from this conclusion because
it lacks support either in fact or probability. The man who, from utter
penury, had in 1589 won his way to a lucrative share in the theatre he
made illustrious, and who wrote "Romeo and Juliet," which first
appeared, according to Ulrici's investigation, in 1592, was more capable
of writing, and more likely to have written, the three original pieces
than Greene or Marlowe, to one of whom, or to some other writer, the
authorship is assigned by mere conjecture, from a fancied but confused
and indeterminate likeness of style or metre or classical quotation.

Marlowe was killed in a brawl with one Francis Archer, at Deptford, on
the first day of June, 1593. The only dramas that can be certainly
called his are the "Two Parts of Tamburlaine," "The Massacre of Paris,"
"Faustus," the "Jew of Malta" and "Edward II." His merits and his faults
have been discussed by many scholars; his style is characterized as the
"mighty line"; he is said by many to have invented and introduced blank
verse as the vehicle of the drama, although "Gorboduc," acted before the
Queen in 1561 and published in 1565, Gascogne's "Jocasta," played in
1566, and Whetstone's "Promos and Cassandra," printed in 1578, were
wholly or partly in blank verse. But it is admitted by all editors and
critics that Marlowe's only historical plays are "The Massacre" and "the
almost masterly Edward II.," as Professor Wendell somewhat ambiguously
calls it. The "Massacre" ends with the death of Henry III. of France,
who was assassinated on the 1st of August, 1589; "it cannot, therefore,
have been written earlier than about 1590." Whatever its true date, it
is not claimed to bear any likeness to either part of the "Contention."
On the contrary, "it was a subject in which Marlowe would naturally
revel; for in the progress of the action, blood could be made to flow as
freely as water." The resemblance is sought in his Edward II., which, as
all the facts tend to show, was his latest work, wri