ABSTRACT
One of the many problems connected with the N-Town plays, as the discussion of the opening of the Visitation play has suggested, is the extent to which the main scribe was involved in revising the material which he copied. It might be hoped that some light could be thrown on this by the one play in the manuscript, play 40 The Assumption of the Virgin and in which, the main scribe's alterations can be easily distinguished. The play 40 scribe uses finals with either a bold horizontal top stroke, or a backward-curling flourish. Despite W. W. Greg concern, the elucidation of the metrical scheme is of no substantial value except to a copyist anxious to check the stanzas, or to someone deeply interested in the mechanics of metre. There is nothing to support the idea of the main scribe as an inspired adapter of his material the positive evidence shows merely a metre organizer.
