Blithsome I cried, 'My bonny Meg, come here.
I ferly wherefore ye're so soon asteer?

But I can guess, ye're gaun to gather dew.'
She scoused away, and said, 'What's that to you?'
'Then fare-ye-weel, Meg dorts, and e'en's ye like,'
I careless cried, and lap in o'er the dike.
I trow when that she saw, within a crack,
She came with a right thieveless errand back.
Misca'd me first; then bade me hound my dog,
To wear up three waff ewes strayed on the bog.
I leugh; and sae did she; then with great haste
I clasped my arms about her neck and waist;
About her yielding waist, and took a fouth
Of sweetest kisses frae her glowing mouth,
While hard and fast I held her in my grips,
My very soul came louping to my lips.
Sair, sair she flet wi' me 'tween ilka smack,
But weel I kend she meant nae as she spak.
Den Roger, when your Jo puts on her gloom,
Do you sae too, and never fash your thumb.
Seem to forsake her, soon she'll change her mood;
Gae woo anither, and she'll gang clean wud.

Lecture the Twenty-Seventh.

DRAMATIC LITERATURE.

SIR GEORGE ETHEREGE THOMAS SHADWELL-WILLIAM WYCHERLEY MRS. APHRA BEHN-JOHN CROWNE-THOMAS

OTWAY-NATHANIEL

LEE-THOMAS

SOUTHERNE-NICHOLAS ROWE.

MMEDIATELY after the Restoration, Sir William Davenant, whom we have already noticed as a miscellaneous poet, revived the English drama, and imparted to its representation a degree of splendor that it had not hitherto known. He also introduced upon the stage some very important improvements, among which were female performers, the use of movable scenery, and appropriate decorations. Females had performed on the stage previous to the Restoration, and considerable splendor and variety of scenery had been exhibited in the court masques and revels; but the public had been familiar with neither, and they now, therefore, formed a great attraction. These powerful auxiliaries were not, however, brought in to enhance the effect of the good old dramas of the age of Elizabeth and James the First, and to add grace and splendor to the creations of Shakspeare and Jonson, but were lavished on the flimsy rhyming and heroic plays which had long been fashionable in France, and a taste for which had been brought over to England by Charles the Second, on his return from the continent. They exhibited little truth of coloring or natural passion, but dealt exclusively with personages in high life and of transcendent virtue or ambition; with fierce combats and splendid processions; with superhuman love and beauty; and with extended dialogues formed alternately of metaphysical subtlety and the most extravagant and bombastic expression. The heroic plays were all written in rhyme, and, according to Dryden, 'in the richest and most ornate kind of verse, and the farthest removed from ordinary colloquial diction.'

The comedies of the same period were constructed after the model of the Spanish stage, and adapted to the taste of the king, exhibiting a variety of complicated intrigues, successful disguises, and shifting scenes and adventures. The old native English virtues of sincerity, conjugal fidelity, pru

dence, and propriety, were held up to constant ridicule, as if amusement could be obtained only by obliterating the moral feelings and virtues. Dryden expressly ascribes the licentiousness of the stage to the example of the king; and if this be true, awful was the inheritance of vice which that monarch bequeathed to the English nation. In part, however, we should, perhaps, ascribe it to the ascetic puritanism which prohibited all public amusements during the time of the commonwealth. Had the puritans been satisfied with regulating and purifying the theatres they would have conferred a benefit on the whole nation; but by closing them entirely, and denouncing all public recreations, they provoked a counteraction in the taste and manners of the people, the overwhelming power of which was felt as soon as the restraints were removed.

As we descend toward the close of this period, dramatic literature becomes more polished and artificial, but unfortunately not less licentious. In tragedy, a few writers still possessed the power of stirring the passions, but their language is feeble, compared with that of the great dramatists; and their general style is low and unimpressive. In comedy the national taste is apparent in its faithful and witty delineations of polished life, of which the dramas of Wycherley, Congreve, and their associates, are full. The essays of Steele and Addison, published in the Tatler and the Spectator, tended greatly to improve the taste and moral feelings of the public, and a partial reformation of those nuisances of the drama which the Restoration had introduced, followed. The master of the Revels, by whom all plays, had, at this time, to be licensed, aided also in this work of improvement; but a glance at even those improved plays which were popular during the reigns of William the Third, Queen Anne, and George the First, will satisfy us that ladies visiting the theatre, acted prudently by concealing their faces behind a mask. This picture of the drama is not an agreeable one, and we, therefore, leave it without any additional touches, to examine more minutely the various materials of which it is composed.

The earliest professed dramatists of this period are Etherege, Shadwell, Wycherley, Crowne, and Mrs. Behn.

SIR GEORGE ETHEREGE was descended from an ancient family of Oxfordshire, and was born in Middlesex, near London, in 1636. He spent some time at the University of Cambridge, and afterward travelled in France and Flanders, but apparently without any other purpose than to see the world. On his return to his own country he repaired to London, and entered the Inns of Court as a student of law; but his position in society, and his natural inclinations, soon combined to divert his mind from all serious and laborious pursuits, and, with an ample fortune, he became one of the professed wits of the day. His first comedy was The Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub. This play, written in 1664, was dedicated to the Earl of Dorset, and was remarkably successful. In 1668 he produced his second

comedy, She would if she could, with greater success than the first. His third and last drama, The Man of Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter, appeared eight years after, and was even more successful than either of the former. In this play Sir George gave a more sprightly air to the comic drama than it had before presented; and it also contains the first appearance of that lively humor and witty dialogue which Congreve and Farquhar afterward carried so near to perfection.

Etherege was a gay libertine in his habits, and though frequently honored with public trusts, his morals were not improved by them. While plenipotentiary at Ratisbon, he was one evening taking leave of a festive party to return to his own house, when he accidentally fell down stairs and killed himself. This event occurred, 1694. From this author's 'Comical Revenge' we select the following scene :

[Enter Beaufort and Sir Frederick, and traverse the stage. Enter Bruce and Lovis at another door.]

Bruce. Your friendship, noble youth, 's too prodigal;

For one already lost you venture all:

Your present happiness, your future joy;

You for the hopeless your great hopes destroy.

Lovis. What can I venture for so brave a friend?

I have no hopes but what on you depend.

Should I your friendship and my honour rate
Below the value of a poor estate?

A heap of dirt. Our family has been

To blame, my blood must here atone the sin.

[Enter the five villains with drawn swords.]

First Villain [pulling off his vizard].-Bruce, look on

First Villain. Fall on and sacrifice his blood to my revenge.
Lovis. More hearts than one shall bleed if he must die.

[Enter Beaufort and Sir Frederick.]

[They fight.]

Beau. Heavens! what is this I see? Sir Frederick, draw.
Their blood's too good to grace such villains' swords.
Courage, brave men; now we can match their force!
Lovis. We'll make you slaves repent this treachery.
Beau. So.

[The villains run.]

Bruce. They are not worth pursuit; we'll let them go.
Brave men! this action makes it well appear

"Tis honour, and not envy, brings you here.

Beau. We come to conquer, Bruce, and not to see

Such villains rob us of our victory.

Your lives our fatal swords claim as their due;

We'd wrong'd ourselves had we not righted you

THOMAS SHADWELL, a popular rival and personal enemy of Dryden, was descended from a good family, and was born at Stanton-Hall, Norfolk,