nd to Bussy as being mistaken for "a knight of the
new edition," must have been written after the accession of James I
(_Chronicle of the English Drama_, 1, 59). But Mr Fleay's further
statement that the words, "Tis leape yeere" (1, 2, 85), "must apply to
the date of production," and "fix the time of representation to 1604,"
is only an ingenious conjecture. If the words "Ile be your ghost to
haunt you," etc (1, 2, 243-244), refer to _Macbeth_, as I have suggested
in the note on the passage, they point to a revision of the play not
earlier than the latter part of 1606.

[xxxvii-1] "Hence a deadly feud arose between the kin of Bussy and
Montsurry. The task of carrying this into action was undertaken by Jean
Montluc Baligny, who had married the murdered man's sister, a
high-spirited woman who fanned the flame of her husband's wrath. With
difficulty, after a period of nine years, was an arrangement come to
between him and Montsurry on specified terms by the order of the King."

[xxxvii-2] "Renee, his sister, a high-souled woman, and of aspirations
loftier than those of her sex, brooked it very ill that this injury, of
which his brother and nearest kin took no heed, should remain unavenged.
When, therefore, Baligny profferred himself as an avenger, she agreed to
marry him, in defiance of the admonitions of her family."

THE TEXT

_Bussy D'Ambois_ was first printed in quarto in 1607 by W. Aspley, and
was reissued in 1608. In 1641, seven years after Chapman's death, Robert
Lunne published another edition in quarto of the play, which, according
to the title-page, was "much corrected and amended by the Author before
his death." This quarto differs essentially from its predecessors. It
omits and adds numerous passages, and makes constant minor changes in
the text. The revised version is not appreciably superior to the
original draft, but, on the evidence of the title-page, it must be
accepted as authoritative. It was reissued by Lunne, with a different
imprint, in 1646, and by J. Kirton, with a new title-page, in 1657.
Copies of the 1641 quarto differ in unimportant details such as
_articular_, _articulat_, for evidently some errors were corrected as
the edition passed through the press. Some copies of the 1646 quarto
duplicate the uncorrected copies of the 1641 quarto.

In a reprint of Chapman's Tragedies and Comedies, published by J.
Pearson in 1873, the anonymous editor purported to "follow mainly" the
text of 164