Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: XXXI. The Reign Of King Henry VII. With the exception of ' King John,' the historical dramas of Shake-speare extend consecutively from the reign of Richard II. to that of Henry VIII., a period of 181 years. One break, and one only, occurs in the series, viz., that of Henry VII., which is omitted. Bacon wrote one historical work, that on the reign of Henry VII. He began it abruptly with the victory of Bosworth Field, making but slight reference to the causes and events that led up to it. Shakespeare leaves us at this exact point in the drama preceding ' Richard III.' This ends with the crowning of Henry on the battle-field by Lord Stanley who plucks the crown for the occasion from Richard's "dead temples." Bacon's history begins with the crowning of Henry on the battle-field by Lord Stanley, who finds the crown "among the spoils." The two accounts seem to be tongued and grooved together, as though from one hand. XXXII. Henry The Eighth. 'Henry VIII.' was also one of those dramas of Shakespeare, sixteen in number, that were printed for the first time in the folio of 1623. Possibly it was in existence in an earlier draft in 1613, for at the bu.ning of the Globe Theatre on the afternoon of June 29 of that year, a play, described by a contemporary as "representing some principal pieces in the reign of Henry VIII." was in course of performance there, under the title of 'All is True.' Whether this be so or not, the drama, as we now have it, seems in some important particulars to have been suggested by the condition of things under King James in 1621. It treats of fallen greatness, of Queen Catharine, the divorced wife of Henry, and of Lord Chancellor Wolsey, who was degraded from his high office, stripped of the seals, and ordered to be imprisoned in the Tower. The arg...