Again, it was observed by those conversant with the earlier editions, especially with the little read or valued Oxford edition, that a vast number of the passages given as emendations in Mr. Collier’s folio were precisely the same in Hanmer’s text.  Indeed, it seems not a little remarkable that neither Mr. Collier nor his opponents have thought it worth their while to state that nearly half, and that undoubtedly the better half, of the so-called new readings are to be found in the finely printed, but little esteemed, text of the Oxford Shakspeare.  If, indeed, these corrections now come to us with the authority of a critic but little removed from Shakspeare’s own time, it is remarkable that Sir Thomas Hanmer’s, or rather Mr. Theobald’s, ingenuity should have forestalled the fiat of Mr. Collier’s folio in so many instances.  On the other hand, it may have been judged by others besides a learned editor of Shakspeare from whom I once heard the remark, that the fact of the so-called new readings being many of them in Rowe and Hanmer, and therefore well known to the subsequent editors of Shakspeare, who nevertheless did not adopt them, proved that in their opinion they were of little value and less authority.  But, says Mr. Collier, inasmuch as they are in the folio of 1632, which I now give to the world, they are of authority paramount to any other suggestion or correction that has hitherto been made on the text of Shakspeare.

Thus stood the question in 1853.  How stands it in 1860?  After a slow, but gradual process of growth and extension of doubt and questionings, more or less calculated to throw discredit on the authority of the marginal notes in the folio,—­the volume being subjected to the careful and competent examination of certain officers of the library of the British Museum,—­the result seems to threaten a considerable reduction in the supposed value of the authority which the public was called upon to esteem so highly.

The ink in which the annotations are made has been subjected to chemical analysis, and betrays, under the characters traced in it, others made in pencil, which are pronounced by some persons of a more modern date than the letters which have been traced over them.

Here at present the matter rests.  Much angry debate has ensued between the various gentlemen interested in the controversy,—­Mr. Collier not hesitating to suggest that pencil-marks in imitation of his handwriting had been inserted in the volume, and a fly-leaf abstracted from it, while in the custody of Messrs. Hamilton and Madden of the British Museum; while the replies of these gentlemen would go towards establishing that the corrections are forgeries, and insinuating that they are forgeries for which Mr. Collier is himself responsible.

While the question of the antiquity and authority of these marginal notes remains thus undecided, it may not be amiss to apply to them the mere test of common sense in order to determine upon their intrinsic value, to the adequate estimate of which all thoughtful readers of Shakspeare must be to a certain degree competent.