terly reckless of consequences. His exclamation, when he gets a new suit of velvet, or a lucky run on the dice, "Do we not fly high," is an answer to all arguments. Punishment or advice has no more effect upon him, than upon the moth that flies into the candle. He is only to be left to his fate. Orlando saves him from it, as we do the moth, by snatching it out of the flame, throwing it out of the window, and shutting down the casement upon it!

Webster would, I think, be a greater dramatic genius than Deckar, if he had the same originality; and perhaps is so, even without it. His White Devil and Duchess of Malfy, upon the whole perhaps, come the nearest to Shakespear of any thing we have upon record; the only drawback to them, the only shade of imputation that can be thrown upon them, "by which they lose some colour," is, that they are too like Shakespear, and often direct imitations of him, both in general conception and individual expression. So far, there is nobody else whom it would be either so difficult or so desirable to imitate; but it would have been still better, if all his characters had been entirely his own, had stood out as much from others, resting only on their own naked merits, as that of the honest Hidalgo, on whose praises I have dwelt so much above, Deckar has, I think, more truth

of character, more instinctive depth of sentiment, more of the unconscious simplicity of nature; but he does not, out of his own stores, clothe his subject with the same richness of imagination, or the same glowing colours of language. Deckar excels in giving expression to certain habitual, deeply-rooted feelings, which remain pretty much the same in all circumstances, the simple uncompounded elements of nature and passion:Webster gives more scope to their various combinations and changeable aspects, brings them into dramatic play by contrast and comparison, flings them into a state of fusion by a kindled fancy, makes them describe a wider arc of oscillation from the impulse of unbridled passion, and carries both terror and pity to a more painful and sometimes unwarrantable excess. Deckar is contented with the historic picture of suffering; Webster goes on to suggest horrible imaginings. The pathos of the one tells home and for itself; the other adorns his sentiments with some image of tender or awful beauty. In a word, Deckar is more like Chaucer or Boccaccio; as Webster's mind appears to have been cast more in the mould of Shakespear's, as well naturally as from studious emulation. The Bellafront and Vittoria Corombona of these two excellent writers, shew their different powers and turn of mind. The one is all softness; the other" all

fire and air." The faithful wife of Matheo sits at home drooping, "like the female dove, the whilst her golden couplets are disclosed;" while the insulted and persecuted Vittoria darts killing scorn and pernicious beauty at her enemies. This White Devil (as she is called) is made fair as the leprosy, dazzling as the lightning. She is dressed like a bride in her wrongs and her revenge. In the trial-scene in particular, her sudden indignant answers to the questions that are asked her, startle the hearers. Nothing can be imagined finer than the whole conduct and conception of this scene, than her scorn of her accusers and of herself. The sincerity of her sense of guilt triumphs over the hypocrisy of their affected and official contempt for it. In answer to the charge of having received letters from the Duke of Brachiano, she

"Grant I was tempted:

says,

Condemn you me, for that the Duke did love me?
So may you blame some fair and chrystal river,
For that some melancholic distracted man

Hath drown'd himself in't."

And again, when charged with being accessary to her husband's death, and shewing no concern for it

"She comes not like a widow; she comes arm'd

With scorn and impudence. Is this a mourning habit?"

she coolly replies,

"Had I foreknown his death as you suggest, I would have bespoke my mourning."

In the closing scene with her cold-blooded assassins, Lodovico and Gasparo, she speaks daggers, and might almost be supposed to exorcise the murdering fiend out of these true devils. Every word probes to the quick. The whole scene is the sublime of contempt and indiffe

rence.

"Vittoria. If Florence be i' th' Court, he would not kill me. Gasparo. Fool! princes give rewards with their own hands, But death or punishment by the hands of others.

Lodovico (To Flamineo). Sirrah, you once did strike me; I'll strike you

Unto the centre.

Flam. Thou'lt do it like a hangman, a base hangman, Not like a noble fellow; for thou see'st

I cannot strike again.

Lod. Dost laugh?

Flam. Would'st have me die, as I was born, in whining? Gasp. Recommend yourself to Heaven.

Flam. No, I will carry mine own commendations thither. Lod. O! could I kill you forty times a-day, And use 't four year together, 'twere too little: Nought grieves, but that you are too few to feed

Flam. Nothing; of nothing: leave thy idle questions

The famine of our vengeance. What do'st think

I am i'th' way to study a long silence.

To prate were idle: I remember nothing;

There's nothing of so infinite vexation

As man's own thoughts.

Lod. O thou glorious strumpet!

Could I divide thy breath from this pure air
When 't leaves thy body, I would suck it up,
And breathe 't upon some dunghill.

Vit. Cor. You my death's-man!

Methinks thou dost not look horrid enough;
Thou hast too good a face to be a hangman:
If thou be, do thy office in right form;

Fall down upon thy knees, and ask forgiveness.

Lod. O! thou hast been a most prodigious comet ;

But I'll cut off your train: kill the Moor first.

Vit. Cor. You shall not kill her first ; behold my breast; I will be waited on in death: my servant

Lod. Thou dost not tremble!

Methinks, fear should dissolve thee into air.

Vit. Cor. O, thou art deceiv'd, I am too true a woman! Conceit can never kill me. I'll tell thee what,

I will not in my death shed one base tear;

Or if look pale, for want of blood, not fear.

Gasp. (To Zanche). Thou art my task, black fury.
Zanche. I have blood

As red as either of theirs! Wilt drink some?

"Tis good for the falling-sickness: I am proud Death cannot alter my complexion,

For I shall ne'er look pale.

Lod. Strike, strike,

With a joint motion.