A MADRIGAL. YE who complain Of Life, and are sad, Come sit in the lane That Summer hath clad In green coats of moss, with flow'rs begem'd, Come, come, and I wis Turn gloomy to glad, For beauty breeds love, and joy in love lies; Then lie on the grass With thy love in the lane A swain needs a lass, And a lass needs a swain. All live things and pretty in forest or field GUY ROSLYN. ON THE COMIC WRITERS OF ENGLAND. BY CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE, III.-BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER. NE of the chief inducements with me in making choice of my present subject of our comic writers, was the knowledge of the fund of humour and wit that abounds in the early ones; but which, from its surrounding mass of indelicacy, and even grossness, is almost as much beyond the reach of many as if it had never been written. It was with this feeling, that I might sift and bring forth, in a presentable shape, some specimens of the unclouded gems, apart from their coarse setting, and which, so far as many are concerned, would otherwise lie hidden in "unsummed heaps;" it was in the hope of enjoying a few hours' harmless, and even profitable, entertainment, from the intellectual wit-encounters of our elder dramatists; retaining the brightness of their weapons, while I expunged the venom from their points; it was with the belief that I might bring up rich ore from the mines of intellectual wealth, polished and refined from alloying dross, and in a form of "winnowed purity," befitting even the youngest readers, to admire and add to their store of mental wealth. They will thus have an opportunity of enjoying, without a misgiving, or altered cheek, the quint-essential wit and humour, carefully culled for them from authors, the manners of whose time permitted a latitude of expression which would, under other circumstances, have excluded their writings from the literary circle of their acquaintance. It is somewhat remarkable respecting the Siamese Twins in literature (Beaumont and Fletcher) that although they were both descended from honourable families, and had both received a liberal and collegiate education, the record of their lives does not extend beyond a few unimportant, and mayhap even these not authentic, anecdotes, with a catalogue of their literary compositions. Fletcher's father was Bishop of Bristol, and when Dean of Peterborough attended the execution of the ill-starred Mary Queen of Scots, whom he distressed in her last moments with his intemperate zeal to turn her from the faith of her forefathers. He was rewarded for his assiduous promulgation of the reformed doctrines in being translated to the several sees of Bristol, Worcester, and London. Beaumont was descended from a very ancient, as well as honourable, family of the Beaumonts of Grace-dieu, in Leicestershire. His father was one of the judges of the Common Pleas, and his mother was a Pierpoint. The literary partnership that existed between the two poets was by no means a singular one in their age; for it was not unusual for three, and even four, writers to be associated upon one play. But a peculiar and delightful union existed between Beaumont and Fletcher: they lived together; they wrote together; and Aubrey says: "They even wore each other's clothes, cloak, &c." The simple fact of this frank and amiable consociation is, of itself, sufficient warrant for the fine nature of the two men: their total renunciation of any individual or exclusive fame. We may fancy the gradual structure of their plots, suggested, perhaps, in familiar conversation, and matured in the development; the allotting of the characters to be filled up by each, their candid submission of their several scenes to the sincere eye and judgment of each, all indicate a literary fraternity that most likely has never existed, either before or since, for so long a period. Beaumont was the man of solid judgment; Fletcher of rich and exquisite fancy. Beaumont possessed a remarkable opulence of language, great power and vividness of description, and, at times, even a sublimity of diction: moreover, he had a thoroughly masculine humour, and an indignant mode of satirizing and personifying the vices and follies of his time. So well ordered and so finely balanced was his judgment, that the severe old practitioner, Ben Jonson, would submit his compositions to him, in their progress, for his opinion and advice; and Beaumont, in the early part of their acquaintance, was only nineteen years old; and he died before he reached thirty. Each had a high esteem for the other. Beaumont, to a certain extent, adopted Jonson's humour for his model; but it was of a more natural and open-air character; it was the humour of a man of town-society; Jonson's, of the scholiast. Beaumont never failed to testify his admiration of the veteran when an occasion presented itself. Every reader should know his famous and witty record of the renowned meetings at the Mermaid, in his poetical epistle to Ben Jonson : "What things have we seen Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have been So nimble and so full of subtle flame, As if that every one from whom they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, Of his dull life; then, when there hath been thrown Wit able enough to justify the town For three days past; wit that might warrant be For the whole city to talk foolishly Till that were cancell'd; and when that was gone, We left an air behind us, which alone Was able to make the two next companies Right witty; though but downright fools, mere wise." The nervous and manly character of this little extract, with the fine structure of the versification, at once indicate the order of Beaumont's genius. Seward, one of his editors, in quoting it, rises into an enthusiasm of eloquence upon the occasion. He says: "Now, reader, when thou art fired with rage, or melted into pity, by their tragic scenes, charmed with the genteel elegance, or bursting into laughter at their comic humour, canst thou not drop the intervening ages, steal into Jonson, Beaumont, and Fletcher's club-room at the Mermaid, on a night when Shakespeare, Donne, and others visited them, and there join in society with as great wits as ever this, or perhaps ever Greece or Rome, could at one time boast? where, animated each by the other's presence, they even excelled themselves." Dr. Earle, the Bishop of Salisbury, who was acquainted with both poets, informed Aubrey that Beaumont mainly occupied himself in pruning and cutting back the rampant luxuriances of Fletcher's wit and imagination. That this was his usual charge, the plays which Fletcher produced singly after the death of his friend in some instances exhibit internal evidence; for they frequently run into extravagance and carelessness. But, with all this wantonness and negligence, Fletcher's tongue was divinely touched with the live coal from the Delphic altar. Not only was his imagination abundant and untiring, but his language was rich, fluent, and felicitous in expression. However select Fletcher may be proved in the more polished scenes of his serious verses, he is scarcely surpassed by any one in the aptitude of his terms and epithets; the true poetic test. His skill in tracing all the ramifications of a humorous thought is extraordinary. He seems to run a joke out of breath. There is quite as much of the true poet, of the divine afflation, in these his wild lunes of mad waggery, as in those graceful soarings of his genius amid the lovely creations of the old-world classics; and his feeling for and critical appreciation of the Theocritan class of composition was perfectly refined, and even exquisite. Moreover, Fletcher possessed much tenderness of sentiment, and a high and chivalrous sense of the most alluring features in the female character. His versification is, I think, more studied and artistical than that of Shakespeare, and it is indeed "musical as is Apollo's lute." But the result produced by this very art is, that it has not the ease and spontaneous effect of the greater genius. One of the most imaginative and luxuriant of his productions, as poetry, is unquestionably "The Faithful Shepherdess," a pastoral drama, and which must always be cited when the question turns upon that class of dramatic poetry. It was written in imitation of the celebrated Italian models, the "Amyntas" and "Pastor fido" of Tasso and Guarini; and as a legitimate drama, which it can scarcely claim to be—that is, a drama of natural life-it is not to be entertained for one moment. But accept it as a courtly poem, transfusing the gentilities of artificial society into the primitive habits of Arcadian rusticity; in short, inquire not curiously into the truth and nature of its machinery, but receive all with child-like faith; and great will be the reader's reward. Suffice to say in a few words, that for luxuriance and tender voluptuousness of sentiment, with verve, and sportiveness of imagination and fancy, the whole composition approaches more nearly the genius of Spenser and Shakespeare than any production of equal magnitude in the language. One cannot indeed patronise the love-making of the wanton shepherdess Cloe, which is "fierce as a siege ;" and still less the "dark keeping" in the character of the sullen shepherd-which serves only for a coarse and staring contrast to the more amiable persons in the scene-or, lastly, and least of all, the affectation of Thenot, who professes love for Clorin, the holy shepherdess, because she was faithful to her dead husband; and yet he entreats her not to yield to his suit, lest it should quench his own flame! This is flat nonsense. Nature does not play at fast-andloose in that style. If Thenot were sincere, such sophistication would never enter his brain; and if he were not sincere, he was a coxcomb, which Fletcher never intended to represent him. These, however, are mere nebulæ in the disc of this lustrous work of the imagination. I do not say it for the sake of the paradox, but really the most natural character in the whole drama is the supernatural— the unhuman one of the satyr-and that is indeed portrayed with exquisite beauty and feeling. What fancy and what poetry in his opening speech upon beholding Clorin, the holy shepherdess! [Enter a Satyr, with a basket of fruit.] "Thorough yon same bending plain |