feeling prompting him to hazard it; but the whole scene is a forced transposition of that already alluded to in Marston's Malcontent. Even the form of the stage directions is the same:

"Enter Mendozo supporting the Duchess; Guerrino; the Ladies that are on the stage rise. Ferrardo ushers in the Duchess; then takes a Lady to tread a measure.

Aurelia. We will dance: music: we will dance.

Prepasso. The Duke? is the Duke returned?

Aurelia. Music.

Enter Celso.

The Duke is quite invisible, or else is not.

Aurelia. We are not pleased with your intrusion upon our private retirement; we are not pleased: you have forgot yourselves.

Enter a Page.

Celso. Boy, thy master? where's the Duke?

Page. Alas, I left him burying the earth with his spread joyless limbs; he told me he was heavy, would sleep: bid me walk off, for the strength of fantasy oft made him talk in his dreams: I straight obeyed, nor ever saw him since; but wheresoe'er he is, he's sad. Aurelia. Music, sound high, as is our heart, sound high.

Enter Malevole and her Husband, disguised like a Hermit.
Malevole. The Duke, peace! the Duke is dead.
Aurelia. Music !"*

The passage in Ford appears to me an ill-judged copy from this. That a woman should call for music, and dance on in spite of the death of her husband whom she hates, without regard to common decency, is but too possible that she should dance on with the same heroic

* [Marston's Works, 1856, ii. 260-1 (Act iv. sc. 2 and 3).]

perseverance in spite of the death of her husband, of her father, and of every one else whom she loves, from regard to common courtesy or appearance, is not surely natural. The passions may silence the voice of humanity, but it is, I think, equally against probability and decorum to make both the passions and the voice of humanity give way (as in the example of Calantha) to a mere form of outward behaviour. Such a suppression of the strongest and most uncontrollable feelings can only be justified from necessity, for some great purpose, which is not the case in Ford's play; or it must be done for the effect and éclat of the thing, which is not fortitude, but affectation. Mr. Lamb in his impressive eulogy on this passage in the Broken Heart has failed (as far as I can judge) in establishing the parallel between this uncalled-for exhibition of stoicism, and the story of the Spartan Boy.

It may be proper to remark here, that most of the great men of the period I have treated of (except the greatest of all, and one other) were men of classical education. They were learned men in an unlettered age; not self-taught men in a literary and critical age. This circumstance should be taken into the account in a theory of the dramatic genius of that age. Except Shakspeare, nearly all of them, indeed, came up from Oxford or Cambridge, and immediately began to write for the stage. No wonder. The first coming up to London in those days must have had a singular effect upon a young man of genius, almost like visiting Babylon or Susa, or a journey to the other world. The stage (even as it then was), after the recluseness and austerity of a college life, must have appeared like Armida's enchanted palace, and its gay votaries like

"Fairy elves beyond the Indian mount,
Whose midnight revels, by a forest-side
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,

Or dreams he sees; while overhead the moon

Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth

Wheels her pale course: they on their mirth and dance
Intent, with jocund music charm his ear:

At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds."

So our young novices must have felt when they first saw the magic of the scene, and heard its siren sounds with rustic wonder, and the scholar's pride: and the joy that streamed from their eyes at that fantastic vision, at that gaudy shadow of life, of all its business and all its pleasures, and kindled their enthusiasm to join the mimic throng, still has left a long lingering glory behind it; and though now "deaf the praised ear, and mute the tuneful tongue," lives in their eloquent page, "informed with music, sentiment, and thought, never to die !"

LECTURE V.

"THE

ON SINGLE PLAYS, POEMS, ETC.; THE FOUR P's;" RETURN FROM PARNASSUS;" GAMMER GURTON'S NEEDLE;'

AND OTHER WORKS.

66

"

I SHALL, in this Lecture, turn back to give some account of single plays, poems, &c.; the authors of which are either not known or not very eminent, and the productions themselves, in general, more remarkable for their singularity, or as specimens of the style and manners of the age, than for their intrinsic merit or poetical excellence. There are many more works of this kind, however, remaining, than I can pretend to give an account of; and what I shall chiefly aim at will be to excite the curiosity of the reader, rather than to satisfy it.

The Four P's is an interlude, or comic dialogue, in verse, between a Palmer, a Pardoner, an Apothecary, and a Pedlar, in which each exposes the tricks of his own and his neighbours' profession, with much humour and shrewdness. It was written by John Heywood the Epigrammatist, who flourished chiefly in the reign of Henry VIII., was the intimate friend of Sir Thomas More, with whom he seems to have had a congenial spirit, and died abroad, in consequence of his devotion to the Roman Catholic cause, about the year 1580.* His zeal, however, on this head, does not seem to have

* The author incorrectly, but according to the general opinion current fifty years ago, wrote "1565;" but it is now known that Heywood was living, at all events, in 1576. See Mr. Collier's Biblio graphical Catalogue, 1865, i. 370-1.—ED.

blinded his judgment, or to have prevented him from
using the utmost freedom and severity in lashing the
abuses of Popery, at which he seems to have looked
"with the malice of a friend." The Four P's bears the
date of 1547.* It is very curious, as an evidence both
of the wit, the manners, and opinions of the time. Each
of the parties in the dialogue gives an account of the
boasted advantages of his own particular calling, that is,
of the frauds which he practises on credulity and igno-
rance, and is laughed at by the others in turn.
In fact,
they all of them strive to outbrave each other, till the
contest becomes a jest, and it ends in a wager who shall
tell the greatest lie; when the prize is adjudged to him
who says, that he had found a patient woman.† The
common superstitions (here recorded) in civil and re-
ligious matters, are almost incredible; and the chopped
logic, which was the fashion of the time, and which
comes in aid of the author's shrewd and pleasant sallies
to expose them, is highly entertaining. Thus the
Pardoner, scorning the Palmer's long pilgrimages and
circuitous road to heaven, flouts him to his face, and
vaunts his own superior pretensions :

"Pard. By the first part of this last tale.
It seemeth ye came of late from the ale:
For reason on your side so far doth fail,
That you leave reasoning, and begin to rail.
Wherein you forget your own part clearly,
For you be as untrue as I:

But in one point ye are beyond me,

For you may lie by authority,

And all that have wandered so far,

That no man can be their controller.

And where you esteem your labour so much,

* The first edition bears no date at all, nor does the second; but the former is supposed to have appeared about the period named in the text. There is one old impression dated 1569.-ED.

† Or never known one otherwise than patient.

L