Page:A life of William Shakespeare (IA lifeofwilliamsha02lees).pdf/38

chiefly by John Payne Collier more than half a century ago, that I have attached a list of the misleading records to my chapter on 'The Sources of Biographical Information' in the Appendix (Section 1). I believe the list to be fuller than any to be met with elsewhere.

The six illustrations which appear in this volume have been chosen on grounds of practical utility rather than of artistic merit. My reasons for selecting as the frontispiece the newly discovered 'Droeshout' painting of Shakespeare (now in the Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-on-Avon) can be gathered from the history of the painting and of its discovery which I give on pages 288-90. I have to thank Mr. Edgar Flower and the other members of the Council of the Shakespeare Memorial at Stratford for permission to reproduce the picture. The portrait of Southampton in early life is now at Welbeck Abbey, and the Duke of Portland not only permitted the portrait to be engraved for this volume, but lent me the negative from which the plate has been prepared. The Committee of the Garrick Club gave permission to photograph the interesting bust of Shakespeare in their possession,^[1] but, owing to the fact that it is moulded in black terra-cotta, no satisfactory negative could be obtained; the engraving I have used is from a photograph of a white plaster cast of the original bust, now in the