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THE MODERN BRITISH DRAMA.

No. I.

THE FATAL UNCTION.

A Coronation Tragedy-By LAELIUS *******, M.D.

WE have great pleasure in doing our utmost to bring this singularly beautiful production into notice. It has redeemed, in our opinion, the literary character of the age from the imputation of the players, to whom we may now confidently assert a true dramatic genius does exist in English literature. Not only is the subject of this tragedy chosen in an original spirit, and the fable constructed with the greatest skill, but the versification and dialogue are equally entitled to unqualified praise.

The plot is founded on the unhappy coronation of Carlo Aurenzebe, King of Sicily, a prince of the Austrian dynasty, who was put to death during the solemn ceremony of the anointment, by the conspirators substituting a corrosive oil, of the most direful nature, instead of the consecrated ointment; and the medical author, with a rare felicity, has accordingly called his tragedy" The Fatal Unction." As the story is well known, we think it unnecessary to say more respecting it, than that the Doctor, with a judicious fidelity to historical truth, has stuck close to all the leading incidents, as they are narrated in Ugo Foscolo's classic history, in three volumes quarto, a translation of which, with ingenious annotations, may speedily, we understand, be expected from the animated pen of Sir Robert Wilson, the enterprizing member for Southwark.

The play opens with a grand scene in a hilly country, in which Mount Ætna is discovered in the back ground. Butero, who had a chief hand in the plot, enters at midnight, followed by the Archbishop of Palermo, whom he addresses in the following spirited lines, his right hand stretched towards the burning mountain.

"There, spitting fires in heaven's enduring face,

Behold where Etna stands sublime, nor

dreads

The vengeance of the foe he so insults-
For what to him avails the thunderbolt?
It cannot harm his adamantine head,
Nor lavish showers of rain his burning
quench:--

The wonted arms with which the warring
skies

Do wreak their wrath upon the stedfast hills."

After some further conversation of this kind, the archbishop says―

"But why, my good Lord Count, are
you thus shaken ?

The spark of life in Carlo Aurenzebe
Is surely not eterne. He is a man :

The

At any time, my lord, at any time,

posset or the poniard may suffice

To give him his quietus."
and impassioned reply of Count Butero
"Peace, fool, peace," is the abrupt
to the archbishop, and then the fol-
lowing animated colloquy ensues:-

"Archb. I am no fool, you misapply

the term;

I ne'er was such, nor such will ever be.
Oh, if your Lordship would but give me
hearing,

I would a scheme unfold to take him off,
That ne'er conspirator devised before.

Count Butero. Thy hand and pardon.

you,

'Tis my nature's weakness
To be thus petulant; ah, well you know,
My Lord Archbishop, for I oft have told
Told in confession how my too quick ire
Betrays me into sin. But thou didst speak
Of taking off, hinting at Aurenzebe
What was't thou wouldst unfold?

Archb.
Look round.

To-morrow, Count

Count Butero. There's no one near.
Archb. Heard ye not that?

Count Butero. "Twas but the mountain
belching-out upon't.

Rumble his bellyful, nor thus disturb
Pray thee proceed, and let the choleric hill
The wary utterance of thy deep intents.
What would you say?

Archb. To-morrow, my dear Count,
The Carlo Aurenzebe, your sworn foe,
And our fair Sicily's detested tyrant,
Holds in Palermo, with all antique rites,
His royal coronation.

Count Butero. I know that.
Archb. And 'tis your part, an old time-
honour'd right,

To place the diadem upon his brow.
Count Butero. Proceed-go on.
Archb. And 'tis my duteous service
To touch and smear him with the sacred oil.
Count Butero. I am all ear-what then?
Archb. What then, my lord? what
might not you and I
To free the world of one so tyrannous ?"
In that solemnity perform on him,

The traitor archbishop then proceeds to develope the treason which he had

hatched, and proposes, instead of the consecrated oil, to anoint the King with a deadly venom, of which he had provided himself with a phial. Occasional borrowed expressions may be here and there detected in the dialogue; but, in general, they only serve to shew the variety of the Doctor's reading; we fear, however, that the following account of the preparation, which the arch bishop had procured, must be considered as a palpable imitation of the history of Othello's handkerchief at the same time, it certainly possesses much of an original freshness, and of the energy that belongs to a new conception.

“The stuff in this [shewing the bottle]

a gypsey did prepare

From a decoction made of adders' hearts, And the fell hemlock, whose mysterious juice

Doth into mortal curd knead the brisk blood,

Wherein the circling life doth hold its

course

A friar saw her sitting by a well, Tasting the water with her tawny palm, And bought the deadly stuff."

The count and archbishop having agreed to infect with death" their lawful and legitimate monarch, while he is undergoing the fatigues of his inauguration, then go to the palace on purpose to confer with certain others of the rebellious nobles; and the scene changes to a narrow valley, and peasants are seen descending from the hills, singing "God save the King," being then on their way towards Pa

lermo to see the coronation.

Having descended on the stage, and finished their loyal song, one of them, Gaffer Curioso, sees an old gypsey woman, the same who sold the poison to the friar, standing in a disconsolate posture, and going towards her, he gives her a hearty slap on the back, and says, in a jocund humour,—

"What's making you hing your gruntle, lucky, on sic a day as this?

Gyp. Och hon! och hon !

Gaffer Curi. What are ye och-honing

for?

Gyp. Do ye see that bell in the dub there? Gaffer Curi. Weel, what o't? Gyp. It's a' that's left me for an ass and twa creels."

The carlin having thus explained the cause of her grief, namely, the loss of her ass and paniers in the mire, a conversation arises respecting the bad and neglected state of the roads, in which

some political reflections, rather of a radical nature, are made on the Sicilian government and road trustees. In the end, however, as the poor woman is quite bankrupt, by the sinking of her quadruped Argusey, Gaffer Curioso persuades her to go to the city, where she may perhaps gather as much money by begging in the crowd assembled to see the coronation, as will enable her to set up again with another ass and baskets. The whole of this scene is managed with great skill, and the breaks and sparklings of natural pathos, here and there elicited, are exceedingly beautiful. The little incongruity of making the Sicilians converse in our be deemed a blemish; but when it is doric dialect, may, perhaps, by some, considered, that the different high characters in the piece speak in English, the propriety of making those of the lower order talk in Scotch, we are convinced, must, upon serious reflection, appear judicious and beautiful.

When the peasants, with the gypsey, Have quitted the stage, the scene is again shifted, and we are introduced to Carlo Aurenzebe, the King and the beautiful Splendora, his royal consort, in their bed-chamber. His majesty has been up some time, walking about the room, anxious for the coming of his Lord Chamberlain, whose duty it was, according to ancient custom, in such a morning, to dress him ; but the Queen still presses her pillow asleep; in this situation, the King happens to cast his

eye

his own anxious cares about the imtowards the bed, and forgetting pending ceremony of the day, addresstouching verses:— es her in the following tender and

"How like a rose her blooming beauty presses

The smooth plump pillow, and the dent it

makes

Is as a dimple in the guileless cheek
Of some sweet babe, whose chubby inno-

cence

Smiles to provoke caresses. O, my love— But let her sleep too soon, alas! too soon She must be roused, to bear her heavy part In the great business of the coronation."

His majesty then, in the most affectionate manner, steps towards the bed, and stoops

*to taste her cheek, That, like a full-ripe peach, lures the fond lip."

In the attempt he awakens her, and she leaps out of bed, startled and alarmed, exclaiming—

"Arrest that traitor's arm, dash down the bowl

'Tis fraught with death."

And in this striking manner we are apprised that her Majesty has been afflicted with a most awful and ominous dream, of which, when she had somewhat come to herself, she gives the following impressive description:"Methought we sat within an ancient hall, Our nobles there, and all the peeresses Garb'd as befits the feast you hold to day But as I look'd, a change came in my

dream,

And suddenly that old and stately hall, Whose gnarled joists and rafters, richly carved,

Were drap'd and tasselled by the weaving spider,

Melted away, and I beheld myself

In a lone churchyard, sitting on a tree, And a fell band of corse-devouring gowles, Both male and female, gather'd round a grave.

King. What did they there?

Queen. With eager hands they dug, Fiercely as hungry Alpine wolves they dug, Into the hallow'd chamber of the dead, And, like those robbers whom pale science bribes

To bring fit subjects for her college class, With hideous resurrection, from its cell They drew the sheeted body.

King. Queen.

Heavens! They did

And on the churchyard grass I saw it lie,
Ghastly and horrible, beneath the moon,
That paled her light, seeing a thing so grim.
King. Then what ensued?
Queen. I tremble to disclose-

King. I pray you, tell-dearest Splen-
dora, tell.

Queen. It is a tale will harrow up your soul.

They tore the cerements, and laid out to

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damned villain,

Say, wherefore kept you poison in that bottle;

For whom, assassin, didst thou buy the draught?

Friar. Will you not listen?

Sec. No: begone and leave me, I sin in holding converse with thy kind; And in my office do I much offend In suffering such a man to roam at large The cruel'st beast that in the forest dens, The tawny lion, and the grumbling bear, Are far less dangerous than such as thou; They keep no murd'rous phials in their pockets,

Nor secrete steel to do their guilty deeds."

This scene is conceived with great art; for the friar, as the reader sees, is just on the point of telling the secretary of state that he had given the poison to the Archbishop, and if the secretary would only have listened to him, the plot, in all human probability, would have been discovered. But the secretary, by his rashness, prevents himself from hearing the suspicious circumstance of the Archbishop having secretly provided a bottle of poison, and quits the scene, vehement

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Tax'd with the thickness of a felon's blood!"

While the friar is in this resentful mood, Count Butero enters, and a long and highly poetical dialogue takes place, in the course of which the friar is led to suspect that his lordship has some secret understanding with the archbishop, and that between them something of a very dreadful nature has been concerted.

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prelate.

[Exit the Friar; the Count follows him a
few paces with his sword drawn, but
suddenly checks himself, and returning
sheathes it.]

Count. Back to thy home, my bright
and trusty blade;
I'll not commission thee for aught so mean.
Thy prey is royalty-a jibing priest
Would but impair the lustre of the steel.
Yet he suspects, and may to others tell
His shrewd conjectures, and a search detect

"Count. But tell me, monk, where lies Our schemed intent to make the coronation

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Administer to bold ambition's purpose."

The Count then retires, and the scene changes to a hall in the palace, where the Queen, in her robes of state, is addressed by the old gypsey.

"Gyp. Stop, lady fair, with jewell'd
hair,

And something gie, to hear frae me,
That kens what is, and what shall be.
Queen. Alas, poor soul! take that small

change, and go

I have no time to list my fortune's spacing.
This is the coronation-day, and I,
That am the queen of this resplendent land,
Have a great part in that solemnity.

Gyp. Pause and ponder, noble dame,
Swords have points, and lamps have flame;

Bottles cork'd we may defy,
But doctors' drugs are jeopardy.
Queen. This is most mystical-what doth
she mean?

Gyp. I heard a tale, I may not tell,
I saw a sight, I saw it well;
In priestly garb the vision sped,
And then a body without head;
A traitor died, a hangman stood,
He held it up-red stream'd the blood;
The people shouted one and all,
As people should when traitors fall;
But O, thou Queen of high degree,
What 'vails the gladsome shout to thee.
Queen. This is mere rave-I understand
it not-

Away, poor wretch, I'll send for thee again!" The gypsey is accordingly dismissed with the small change" which her majesty had bestowed; for "it is a law of our nature," in such circumstances, to deride admonition, and the author evinces his profound knowledge of man, in thus representing the Queen, reckless alike of her prophetic dream, and the gypsey's prediction, still going undismayed to the coronation.

The next scene represents an apart

ment where the regalia of Sicily is kept. The crown and the other ensigns of royalty are seen on a table, and among them an ivory pigeon, with a golden collar round its neck. The arch Bishop enters with an officer, the keeper of the regalia, and the following brief, but striking conversation, ensues. "Archb. Are all things now prepared? Off. They are, my lord.

Arch. Clean'd and made ready for their solemn use?

Off. They have been all done newly up,

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[Exit the Archbishop; and the Officer is seen wiping up the holy oil as the drop scene falls.]"

The whole of this act is perfect, the action never flags for a moment, but dialogue rich and appropriate, and the proceeds with an awful and appalling rapidity.

The drama is very properly divided into only three acts or parts, the beginning, the middle, and the end, which the author tastefully denominates "the preparation," "the operation," and "the consummation;" and the third and last opens with the peasants and

nation procession, and all talking Scotch in the most natural manner.

Palermitans assembled to see the coro

66 Gaffer Curioso. Hoots, ye stupit muckle stot; what gart you tread on my taes, ye sumph that ye are ?

Cit. Taes! ha'e ye taes? I'm sure a brute like you should ha'e been born baith wi' horns and clutes.

Gaffer Curioso. I'll tell you what it is, gin ye speak in that gait to me, deevil do me gude o' you, but I'll split your harnpan.

1 Fem. Cit. Black and sour, honest folk, for gudesake dinna fight.

2 Fem. Cit. Wheesht, wheesht, it's coming noo!

[The Procession enters with solemn music ;

the crowd increases, and the Friar comes in at one side, and the old Gypsey woman at the other.]

Gyp. Wo. That's the friar who bought the venom frae me at the well-I'll watch him-For what, I wonder, did he buy the

venom ?

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