indecency of Bianca's conduct. The plot of "The Fancies, Chaste and Noble," hinges on a circumstance, which Ford himself could only touch on lightly, and which it is utterly impossible to mention here.

The better genius of Ford, however, sometimes presided over his selections; but he had ever a strange propensity to disfigure the works of his own hands. Too high praise can scarcely be bestowed on the skill with which he usually opens his play, and excites the interest of the spectator. But he does not long persevere in a course so nobly entered on. Unnecessary incidents and characters accumulate as the plot advances; its simplicity is destroyed, its progress impeded, and the main design drags heavily to the conclusion; or, being early disposed of, the play is prolonged, that all the extraneous matter may be wrought into a climax also. We except " Perkin Warbeck" from the censure of an involved plot, and redundancy of action, and would gladly have coupled with it the "Broken Heart." But it must not be. Through all the early part of that powerfully written drama, the interest centres in the lovely, injured, and innocent Penthea, who, in the fourth act, dies of a "Broken Heart." Calantha, then taking the lead in interest, is doomed to a similar fate in the last scene of the fifth act; so that the play would with more propriety have been entitled the "Broken Hearts," than the "Broken Heart." In the "Lady's Trial," we have no less than three actions, all independent of each other. The "Masque," in the "Lover's Melancholy," is as gratuitous a piece of folly as ever interrupted the serious business of a tragedy. Not to dwell on the useless banishment, and equally useless recall of Roseilli, in "Love's Sacrifice," for what reason could he have been degraded in the disguise of a slavering idiot, and made to dangle in attendance on his mistress in the garb of folly, senselessly jabbering, "Can speak; de e e e e."? "Duda clap cheek for nowne sake gaffer: hee e e e e?" No single end of the play is answered, or forwarded, by the metamorphosis! Such faint notions had Ford of the necessity of establishing a primary and leading interest, to run through the whole of his play, and of making all other parts dependant on, or subsidiary to

it.

Ford's want of judgment is also conspicuous in the management of the necessary incidents of his dramas. When once determined on bringing a particular point about, he appears absolutely indifferent to the means by which it is effected. In the "Broken

his

Heart," he is desirous that an interview should take place between Orgilus and Penthea, and there is no end to the inconsistencies be is guilty of to accomplish it. When Orgilus was to consummate vengeance on Ithocles, Ford did not think it worth his while to task his invention for any noble or dignified revenge, but adopted the clumsy and grotesque expedient, common to the then meanly furnished stage, namely, "a chair with an engine," as it is proudly

called. By the assistance of a bit of packthread, the two moveable arms of the chair closed over the breast of the person who sat down in it; and thus is Ithocles, like a rat in a trap, caught, and afterwards barbarously put to death.

The perfection Ford so often reached, proves that his failures were not the result of poverty of invention. His mind, in fact, was rich and full, even to abundance; but, unfortunately, he was contented with his first thoughts, and knew not how to reject the faulty suggestions of his fancy. He committed, therefore, many errors; but excellence is ever at hand, which more than atones for his offences, and completely restores him to our favour. The passages are numerous in the "Lover's Melancholy," which bespeak the superiority of the intellect that formed them. Nobler scenes are scarcely to be met with, than the " Broken Heart" displays: the opening scene is an example of judiciousness; and the second scene in the third act, in which Ithocles has an interview with his sister, Penthea, whom he had wantonly and proudly thwarted in her affections, is hardly to be surpassed in truth of feeling, beauty of expression, discriminative delineation of character, and delicacy and chastity of tone. The faults, even of "Love's Sacrifice," are redeemed by the transcendent excellence of many of its scenes: it is, after all, a noble play. Once, and once only, Ford ventured on a historic subject. "Perkin Warbeck" cannot be ranked in the first order of excellence, but would well have justified a repetition of the experiment. There is a beautiful evenness and consistency in the conduct of the play, not common to Ford's productions, and which possesses more charms than those of novelty. Its chief faults, perhaps, are deficiency of action, and superabundance of narration; but the dialogue is very ably written.

Pope thought fit to say of Shakspeare, that if his dramas were printed without prefixing the names of the persons to the dialogue, each separate sentence might with certainty be attributed to the speaker. We would not recommend any one to try the experiment with Ford, who seems not always to have established a clear idea in his own mind of what he intended the characters in his dramas to appear; and when desirous of changing, or modifying them by circumstances, he not only frequently neglected to provide adequate and reasonable motives for the change, but often proceeded with so violent a hand, as to destroy that coherence between the character in its different stages, which is ever perceptible in nature. Bassanes, in the "Broken Heart," is as fine a picture of jealousy, in the early scenes, as ever was exhibited. His passion displays itself in all his words and actions; it absorbs his every thought. His lynx-eye, never tranquil, sees danger in the most trivial incident, and, with insane avidity, his jaundiced imagination perverts every circumstance into a confirmation of its morbid conceptions. Though erroneously, Bassanes does not lightly take up jealousy: his vigorous and active mind is per

fectly imbued with a conviction of the truth of his suspicions. Yet suddenly, nay, upon the instant, he is converted from his folly; and that on no better evidence than his wife's declaration of her own integrity! He then sinks into mere dotage. Bassanes, therefore, is greatly inferior to Jonson's Kitely, who, from first to last, is inimitably and consistently delineated.

We might adduce another instance of inconsistency in "Love's Sacrifice," in which the author exhibits a character glaringly the reverse of that which he intended to portray, and which he evidently thought he had faithfully represented. In the first scene, the Duke addresses Fernando as his but divided self;' and his introduction of him to his wife is,

'Look Bianca,

On this good man; in all respects to him
Be as to me; only the name of husband,
And reverent observance of our bed,
Shall differ us in persons, else in soul
We are all one.'

Bianca is brought forward in a manner that at once challenges admiration. The chosen friend of her husband becomes enamoured of her, and his suit is rejected with becoming dignity and indignation. But in the subsequent acts, she abandons all her virtuous resolves, and her character displays itself in its real deformity; though Ford still remains under the delusion that he is delineating a paragon of purity.

Notwithstanding these and other such inconsistencies, delineation of character is one of the excellences that distinguish Ford. By few dramatists is he surpassed in the variety, strength, beauty, and individuality of the personages whom he embodied. In female perfection, where are we to look, except in Shakspeare, for the equal of Penthea, that lovely personification of patience, meekness, resignation, and broken heartedness? With what intensity are the remorse and repentance of her brother, Ithocles, depicted? Nor must Ford's felicitous portrait of Perkin Warbeck be passed over without the highest praise.

It would be unjust to the author,' remarks Mr. Gifford, to overlook the striking consistency with which he has marked Warbeck's character. Whatever might be his own opinion of this person's pretensions, he has never suffered him to betray his identity with the Duke of York, in a single thought or expression. Perkin has no soliloquies, no side speeches, to compromise his public assertions; and it is pleasing to see, with what ingenuity Ford has preserved him from the contamination of real history, and contrived to sustain his dignity to the last, with all imaginable decorum, and thus rendered him a fit subject for the tragic

muse.'

But Warbeck is even surpassed in excellence by his father-inlaw, Huntley; a character which may, perhaps, be justly fixed upon, as the most perfect of Ford's delineations. Katharine, the

unhappy Katharine, is a worthy child of such a sire. In one instance only, Gifford remarks, did the better genius of Ford desert him, and that was in the last speech which he assigned to her.

By this sweet pledge of both our souls I swear

To die a faithful widow to thy bed;

Not to be forced, or won: oh, never, never!'

This savours somewhat of the "Player Queen," and it so happened that, after Warbeck's death," she married Sir Mathie Cradock, of which marriage is descended William, Earl of Pembroke, by his grandmother, and had some lands by the Cradocks. Lady Katherine Gordon died in Wales, and was buried in a chappell at one of the Earl of Pembroke his dwelling places in that country. The English histories do much commend her for her beauty, comliness, and chastity." Sir Robert Gordon; whom Douglas calls the historian of the family.

It is honourable to Ford, that Meleander, in the "Lover's Melancholy," may be mentioned in conjunction with Lear. Meleander is inferior to Shakspeare's great original; but he brings Lear vividly to the mind, without exciting the invidious reflection, that the effect is produced by imitation. Ford often, indeed, imitated Shakspeare, but never with servility; he looked up to him as an example of exalted excellence, as an authority, as a master; and hence not unfrequent similarity of conception and expression is to be detected in the works of Ford and Shakspeare. But rich himself, Ford borrowed not to conceal the disgrace of his own poverty beneath the wealth of others.

We must conclude, with a few examples of the beauty of Ford's style, the delicacy of his sentiments, and the general impressive ardour of his composition. He was peculiarly happy in expressing the tender emotions of the soul; how beautiful does the following passage describe the felicity of a favoured lover!

Kiss me- -so! thus hung love on Leda's neck,

And sucked divine ambrosia from her lips.

I envy not the mightiest man alive;

But hold myself, in being king of thee,

More great than were I king of all the world.'

'Tis Pity, &c. Act 2, sc. 1.

The next is in a more desponding strain: it is the reflection of a husband, on parting from his bride.

'So leave the winter'd people of the north,
The minutes of their summer, when the sun
Departing, leaves them in cold robes of ice
As I leave Genoa.'

Lady's Trial. Act 1, sc. 1.

The blasting influence of thwarted love has never been more powerfully represented, than by Erclea to Palador, the object of her affections, to whom she is at last united.

'I am so worn away with fears and sorrows,
So winter'd with the tempests of affliction,
That the bright sun of your life-quickening presence,
Hath scarce one beam of force to warm again

That spring of cheerful comfort, which youth once
Apparell'd in fresh looks.'

The Lover's Melancholy. Act 4, sc. 3.

The contrast to this is delightful, in a fond father's notice of his darling child.

Kate, Kate, thou grow'st upon my heart like peace,
Creating every hour a jubilee.'

Perkin Warbeck. Act 1, sc. 2.

From the works of Ford, a series of serious reflections upon man might be collected; but we are necessarily confined to a few instances.

in the turmoils of our lives,

Men are like politic states, or troubled seas,

Toss'd up and down with several storms and tempests,
Change and variety of wrecks and fortunes;

Till labouring to the havens of our homes,

We struggle for the calm that crowns our ends.'

Lover's Melancholy. Act 5, sc. 1.

'Oh, what a thing is man,
To bandy factions of distemper'd passions
Against the sacred providence above him!

In vain we labour in this course of life
To piece our journey out at length, or crave
Respite of breath, our home is in the grave.'

Ibid.

Broken Heart. Act 2, sc. 3.

It is pleasant to remark the beauty and variety of sentiment in Ford. How nobly do the following lines express the sacred obligation of friendship.

Lover's Melancholy. Act 3, sc. 2.

Speaking of the return of a victorious warrior, Prophilus thus describes the independent dignity of the mind of Ithocles.

'He, in this firmament of honour, stands
Like a star fixed, not moved with any thunder
Of popular applause, or sudden lightning
Of self-opinion; he hath serv'd his country,
And he thinks 'twas but his duty.'

Broken Heart. Act 1, sc. 2.