ning of the seventeenth century. The following sonnet does not contain such beautiful poetry as some others by Drummond; but it has the rare property of a perfect exemption from mean associations. It refers to the death of his mistress: DRUMMOND TO HIS LUTE. My lute, be as thou wert when thou did grow Since that dear voice which did thy sounds approve, Thy pleasing notes be pleasing notes no more, But orphan wailings to the fainting ear, Each stroke a sigh, each sound draws forth a tear, Or if that any hand to 'touch thee deign, SIR ROBERT AYTON (1570-1638), was another Scottish poet of this era, whose versification displays an elegant fancy. Of the same order may be classed William Alexander Earl of Stirling, Alexander Hume, and Robert Kerr Earl of Ancrum. Latin poetry, however, was at this time more extensively cultivated in Scotland than either English or Scotch. When James I. visited his native kingdom in 1617, he was addressed, wherever he went, in excellent Latin verse, sometimes the composition of persons in the middle ranks of society. In 1637, a collection of the best Latin poetical compositions of Scotsmen in that and the preceding age, appeared at Amsterdam ;† and it is allowed by Dr. Samuel Johnson to reflect great credit on the country. DRAMATISTS. Notwithstanding the greatness of the name of Spenser, it is not in general versification that the poetical strength of the age of Elizabeth is found to be chiefly manifested. The dramatic form of composition rose at this period with a sudden and wonderful brilliancy, and * Boughs. + Entitled Delitia Poetarum Scotorum, 2 vols. attracting all the best existing wits, left comparatively little genius to be expended upon the ordinary kinds of poetry. It would appear that at the dawn of modern civilization, most countries of Christian Europe possessed a rude kind of theatrical entertainment, consisting, not in those exhibitions of natural character and incident which constituted the plays of ancient Greece and Rome, but in representations of the principal supernatural events of the Old and New Testaments, and of the history of the saints; whence they were denominated Miracles, or Miracle Plays. Originally they appear to have been acted by, and under the immediate management of the clergy, who are understood to have deemed them favourable to the diffusion of religious feeling, though, from traces of them which remain, they seem to have been profane and indecorous in the highest degree. A Miracle Play, upon the story of St. Katharine, and in the French language, was acted at Dunstable in 1119, and how long such entertainments may have previously existed in England is not known. From the year 1268 to 1577, they were performed almost every year in Chester; and there were few large cities which were not then regaled in a similar manner; even in Scotland they were not unknown. The most sacred persons, not excluding the Deity, were introduced into them. About the reign of Henry VI., persons representing sentiments and abstract ideas, such as Mercy, Justice, Truth, began to be introduced into the miracle plays, and led to the composition of an improved kind of drama, entirely or chiefly composed of such characters, and termed Moral Plays. These were certainly a great advance upon the Miracles, in as far as they endeavoured to convey sound moral lessons, and at the same time gave occasion to some poetical and dramatic ingenuity, in imaging forth the characters, and putting appropriate speeches into their mouths. The only scriptural character retained in them was the devil, who, being represented in grotesque habiliments, and perpetually beaten by an attendant character called the Vice, served to enliven what must have been at the best a sober, though well-meant entertainment. The Cradle of security, Hit the Nail on the Head, Impatient Poverty, and The Marriage of Wisdom and Wit, are the names of moral plays which enjoyed popularity in the reign of Henry VIII. It was about that time that acting first became a distinct profession both miracles and moral plays had previously been represented by clergymen, schoolboys, or the members of trading incorporations, and were only brought forward occasionally, as part of some public or private festivity. As the introduction of allegorical characters had been an improvement upon those plays which consisted of scriptural persons only, so was the introduction of historical and actual characters an improvement upon those which employed only a set of impersonated ideas. It was soon found that a real human being, with a human name, was better calculated to awaken the sympathies, and keep alive the attention of an audience, and not less so to impress them with moral truths, than a being who only represented a notion of the mind. The substitution of these for the symbolical characters, gradually took place during the earlier part of the sixteenth century, and thus, with some aid from Greek dramatic literature, which now began to be studied, and from the improved theatres of Italy and Spain, the genuine English drama took its rise. As specimens of something between the moral plays and the modern drama, the Interludes of JOHN HEYwood may be mentioned. Heywood was supported at the court of Henry VIII. partly as a musician, partly as a professed wit, and partly as a writer of plays. His dramatic compositions, some of which were produced before 1521, generally represented some ludicrous familiar incident, in a style of the broadest and coarsest farce, but yet with no small skill and talent. One, called The Four P.'s, turns upon a dispute between a Palmer, a Pardoner, a Poticary, and a Pedlar, (who are the only characters,) as to which shall tell the grossest falsehood: an accidental assertion of the Palmer, that he never saw a woman out of patience in his life, takes the rest off their guard, all of whom declare it to be the greatest lie they ever heard, and the settlement of the question is thus brought about amidst much drollery. One of Heywood's chief objects seems to have been to satirize the manners of the clergy, and aid in the cause of the Reformers. There were some less distinguished writers of interludes, and Sir David Lyndsay's Satire of the Three Estates, acted in Scotland in 1539, was a play of this kind. The regular drama, from its very commencement, was divided into comedy and tragedy, the elements of both being found quite distinct in the rude entertainments above described, not to speak of the precedents afforded by Greece and Rome. Of comedy, which was an improvement upon the interludes, and may be more remotely traced in the ludicrous parts of the moral plays, the earliest specimen that can now be found bears the uncouth title of Ralph Royster Doyster, and was the production of NICOLAS UDALL, Master of WestSchool. It is supposed to have been written in the reign of Henry VIII., but certainly not later than 1551. The scene is in London, and the characters, thirteen in number, exhibit the manners of the middle orders of the people of that day. It is divided into five acts, and the plot is amusing and well constructed. The next in point of time is Gammer Gurton's Needle, supposed to have been written about 1566 by JOHN STILL, Master of Arts, and afterwards Bishop of Bath and Wells. This is a piece of low rustic humour, the whole jest turning upon the loss and recovery of the needle with which Gammer Gurton was mending a piece of attire belonging to her man, Hodge. But it is cleverly hit off, and contains a few well-sketched characters. The language of Ralph Royster Doyster, and of Gammer Gurton's Needle, is in long and irregularly measured rhyme, of which a specimen may be given from a speech of Dame Custance in the former play, respecting the difficulty of preserving a good reputation : -How necessary it is now a-days, That each body live uprightly in all manner ways; And be sure of this, the worst will be spoken! Tragedy, of later origin than comedy, came directly from the more elevated portions of the moral plays, and from the pure models of Greece and Rome. The ear liest known specimen of this kind of composition, is the Tragedy of Ferrex and Porrer, already alluded to, composed by Thomas Sackville, afterwards Earl of Dorset, and by Thomas Norton, and played before Queen Elizabeth, at Whitehall, by the members of the Inner Temple, in January, 1561. It is founded on a fabulous incident in early British history, and is full of bloody murders and civil broils. It is written, however, in regular blank verse, consists of five acts, and observes some of the more useful rules of the classic drama of antiquity, to which it bears resemblance in the introduction of a chorus-that is, a group of persons whose sole business it is to intersperse the play with moral observations and inferences, expressed in lyrical stanzas. It may occasion some surprise that the first English tragedy should contain lines like the following :— Acastus. Your grace should now in these grave years of yours, Of nothing sure save only of the death, To whom both man and all the world doth owe Than as the naked hand whose stroke assays The armed breast where force doth light in vain. Gorboduc. Many can yield right sage and grave advice And can in speech both rule and conquer kind,* Not long after the appearance of Ferrex and Porrex, both tragedies and comedies had become not uncommon. Damon and Pythias, the first English tragedy upon a classical subject, was acted before the queen at Oxford, in 1566; it was the composition of Richard Edwards, a learned member of the University, but was inferior to Ferrex and Porrex, in as far as it carried an admixture of vulgar comedy, and was written in rhyme. In the same year, two plays respectively styled the Supposes and Jocasta, the one a comedy adapted from Ariosto, the other a tragedy from Euripides, were acted in Gray's Inn. A tragedy called Tancred and Gismun *The ties of blood. |