into acts and scenes. The story is one of common, every-day life; and none of the characters are such as people had been accustomed to find in ordinary dramatic entertainments. The piece takes its name from its hero, a young town-gallant, who is mightily enamoured of himself, and who is encouraged in the good opinion he entertains of his own person and accomplishments by Matthew Merrygreek, a poor relation, who attends him in the double capacity of companion and servant. Ralph Roister Doister is in love with a lady of property, called Custance, betrothed to Gawin Goodluck, a merchant, who is at sea when the comedy begins, but who returns before it concludes. The main incidents relate to the mode in which the hero, with the treacherous help of his associate, endeavours to gain the affections of Custance. He writes her a letter, which Merrygreek reads without a due observance of the punctuation, so that it entirely perverts the meaning of the writer: he visits her while she is surrounded by her female domestics, but he is unceremoniously rejected: he resolves to carry her by force of arms, and makes an assault upon her habitation; but with the assistance of her maids, armed with mops and brooms, she drives him from the attack. Then, her betrothed lover returns, who has been misinformed on the subject of her fidelity, but he is soon reconciled on an explanation of the facts; and Ralph Roister Doister, finding that he has no chance of success, and that he has only been cajoled and laughed at, makes up his mind to be merry at the wedding of Goodluck and Custance.

In all this we have no trace of anything like a moral play, with the exception, perhaps, of the character of Matthew Merrygreek, which, in some of its features, its love of mischief and its drollery, bears a resemblance to the Vice of the older drama. Were the dialogue

2 By "the older drama," we mean moral plays, into which the Vice was introduced for the amusement of the spectators: no character so called, or with

modernised, the comedy might be performed, even in our own day, to the satisfaction of many of the usual attendants at our theatres.

The

In considering the merits of this piece, we are to recollect that Bishop Still's "Gammer Gurton's Needle," which, until of late, was held to be our earliest comedy, was written some twenty years after "Ralph Roister Doister:" it was not acted at Cambridge until 1566, nine years subsequent to the death of Udall; and it is in every point of view an inferior production. plot is a mere piece of absurdity, the language is provincial (well fitted, indeed, to the country where the scene is laid, and to the clownish persons engaged in it) and the manners depicted are chiefly those of illiterate rustics. The story, such as it is, relates to the loss of a needle with which Gammer Gurton had mended Hodge's breeches, and which is afterwards found by the hero, when he is about to sit down. The humour, generally speaking, is as coarse as the dialogue; and though it is impossible to deny that the author was a man of talents, they were hardly such as could have produced "Ralph Roister Doister."

The drama which we have been accustomed to regard as our oldest tragedy, and which probably has a just claim to the distinction, was acted on 18th January, 1562, and printed in 1565. It was originally called similar propensities, is to be traced in miracle-plays. He was, in fact, the buffoon of our drama in, what may be termed, its second stage; after audiences began to grow weary of plays founded upon Scripture-history, and when even moral plays, in order to be relished, required the insertion of a character of broad humour, and vicious inclinations, who was sometimes to be the companion, and at others the castigator, of the devil, who represented the principle of evil among mankind. The Vice of moral plays subsequently became the fool and jester of comedy, tragedy, and history, and forms another, and an important, link of connexion between them.

3 In the Hist. of Engl. Dram. Poetry and the Stage, ii. 482, it is said that the earliest edition of "Gorboduc" has no date. This is a mistake, as is shown by the copy in the collection of Lord Francis Egerton, which has "anno 1565, Septemb. 22" at the bottom of the title-page. Mr. Hallam, in his admirable "Introduction to the Literature of Europe," &c. (Second Edit. vol. ii. p. 167), expresses his dissent from the position, that the three first acts were by Norton, and the two last by Sackville. The old title-page states, that "three acts were

"Gorboduc;" but it was reprinted in 1571 under the title of "Forrex and Porrex," and a third time in 1590 as "Gorboduc." The first three acts were written by Thomas Norton, and the last two by Thomas Sackville, afterwards Earl of Dorset, and it was performed "by the gentlemen of the Inner Temple." Although the form of the Greek drama is observed in “Gorboduc,” and each act concluded by a chorus, yet Sir Philip Sidney, who admitted (in his "Apology of Poetry") that it was "full of stately speeches and well-sounding phrases," could not avoid complaining that the unities of time and place had been disregarded. Thus, in the very outset and origin of our stage, as regards what may be termed the regular drama, the liberty, which allowed full exercise to the imagination of the audience, and which was afterwards happily carried to a greater excess, was distinctly asserted and maintained. It is also to be remarked, that "Gorboduc" is the earliest known play in our language in which blankverse was employed'; but of the introduction of blankverse upon our public stage, we shall have occasion to speak hereafter. It was an important change, which requires to be separately considered.

We have now entered upon the reign of Elizabeth; and although, as already observed, moral plays and even miracle-plays were still acted, we shall soon see what a variety of subjects, taken from ancient history, from mythology, fable, and romance, were employed for the purposes of the drama. Stephen

written by Thomas Norton, and the two last by Thomas Sackville." Unless the printer, William Griffith, were misinformed, this seems decisive. Norton's abilities have not had justice done to them.

Richard Edwards, a very distinguished dramatic poet, who died in 1566, and who wrote the lost play of " Palamon and Arcite," which was acted before the Queen in September of that year, did not follow the example of Sackville and Norton his "Damon and Pithias" (the only piece by him that has survived) is in rhyme. See Dodsley's Old Plays, last edition, vol. i. p. 177. Thomas Twine, an actor in “Palamon and Arcite," wrote an epitaph upon its author. “Gammer Gurton's Needle," and "Gorboduc," (the last printed from the second edition) are also inserted in vols. i. and ii. of Dodsley's Old Plays.

Gosson, one of the earliest enemies of theatrical performances, writing his "Plays confuted in Five Actions" a little after the period of which we are now speaking, but adverting to the drama as it had existed some years before, tells us, that "the Palace of Pleasure, the Golden Ass, the Æthiopian History, Amadis of France, and the Round Table," as well as "comedies in Latin, French, Italian, and Spanish, have been thoroughly ransacked to furnish the play-houses in London." Hence, unquestionably, many of the materials of what is termed our romantic drama were obtained. The accounts of the Master of the Revels between 1570 and 1580 contain the names of various plays represented at court; and it is to be noted, that it was certainly the practice at a later date, and it was probably the practice at the time to which we are now adverting, to select for performance before the Queen such pieces as were most in favour with public audiences: consequently, the mention of a few of the titles of productions represented before Elizabeth at Greenwich, Whitehall, Richmond, or Nonesuch, will show the character of the popular performances of the day. We derive the following names from Mr. P. Cunningham's "Extracts from the Revels' Accounts," printed for the Shakespeare Society:

These are only a few out of many dramas, establish

ing the multiplicity of sources to which the poets of the time resorted". Nevertheless, we find on the same indisputable authority, that moral plays were not yet altogether discarded in the court entertainments; for we read, in the original records, of productions the titles of which prove that they were pieces of that allegorical description: among these are "Truth, Faithfulness, and Mercy," and "The Marriage of Mind and Measure," which is expressly called "a moral."

Our main object in referring to these pieces has been to show the great diversity of subjects which had been dramatised before 1580. In 1581 Barnabe Rich published his "Farewell to Military Profession "," consisting of a collection of eight novels; and at the close of the work he inserts this strange address "to the reader:"-" Now thou hast perused these histories to the end, I doubt not but thou wilt deem of them as they worthily deserve, and think such vanities more fitter to be presented on a stage (as some of them have been) than to be published in print." The fact is, that three dramas are extant which more or less closely resemble three of Rich's novels: one of them "Twelfth Night;" another, "The Weakest goeth to the Wall;" and the third the old play of "Philotus "."

5 "The Play of Fortune," in the above list, is doubtless the piece which has reached us in a printed shape, as "The Rare Triumphs of Love and Fortune :" it was acted at court as early as 1573, and again in 1582; but it did not come from the press until 1589, and the only copy of it is in the library of Lord Francis Egerton. The purpose of the anonymous writer was to compose an entertainment which should possess the great requisite of variety, with as much show as could at that early date be accomplished; and we are to recollect that the court theatres possessed some unusual facilities for the purpose. The "Induction" is in blank-verse, but the body of the drama is in rhyme. "The History of the Collier," also mentioned, was perhaps the comedy subsequently known and printed as "Grim, the Collier of Croydon ;" and it has been reasonably supposed, (see vol. ii. p. 109) that "The History of Error" was an old play on the same subject as Shakespeare's "Comedy of Errors."

6 Until recently no edition of an earlier date than that of 1606 was known; but there is an impression of 1581 at Oxford, which is about to be reprinted by the Shakespeare Society. Malone had heard of a copy in 1583, but it is certainly a mistake.

7 It was reprinted for the Bannatyne Club in 1835, by J. W. Mackenzie, Esq.