storation_, a badly
arranged, but valuable work. It obtained for him the post of librarian
to the duke of Devonshire, and, subsequently, access to the chief
collections of early English literature throughout the kingdom,
especially to the treasures of Bridgwater House. These opportunities
were unhappily misused to effect a series of literary fabrications,
which may be charitably, and perhaps not unjustly, attributed to
literary monomania, but of which it is difficult to speak with patience,
so completely did they for a long time bewilder the chronology of
Shakespeare's writings, and such suspicion have they thrown upon MS.
evidence in general. After _New Facts_, _New Particulars_ and _Further
Particulars_ respecting Shakespeare had appeared and passed muster,
Collier produced (1852) the famous _Perkins Folio_, a copy of the second
folio (1632), so called from a name written on the title-page. On this
book were numerous MS. emendations of Shakespeare said by Collier to be
from the hand of "an old corrector." He published these corrections as
_Notes and Emendations to the Text of Shakespeare_ (1852), and boldly
incorporated them in his edition (1853) of Shakespeare. Their
authenticity was disputed by S. W. Singer in _The Text of Shakespeare
Vindicated_ (1853) and by E. A. Brae in _Literary Cookery_ (1855) on
internal evidence; and when in 1859 the folio was submitted by its
owner, the duke of Devonshire, to experts at the British Museum, the
emendations were incontestably proved to be forgeries of modern date.
Collier was exposed by Mr Nicholas Hamilton in his _Inquiry_ (1860). The
point whether he was deceiver or deceived was left undecided, but the
falsifications of which he was unquestionably guilty among the MSS. at
Dulwich College have left little doubt respecting it. He had produced
the _Memoirs of Edward Alleyn_ for the Shakespeare Society in 1841. He
followed up this volume with the _Alleyn Papers_ (1843) and the _Diary
of P. Henslowe_ (1845). He forged the name of Shakespeare in a genuine
letter at Dulwich, and the spurious entries in Alleyn's _Diary_ were
proved to be by Collier's hand when the sale of his library in 1884 gave
access to a transcript he had made of the _Diary_ with interlineations
corresponding with the Dulwich forgeries. No statement of his can be
accepted without verification, and no manuscript he has handled without
careful examination, but he did much useful work. He compiled a valuable
_Bibli