The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery: Volume 1 The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery, Volume I [Reprint 2013 ed.] 9780674733909, 9780674730205

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T H E D R A M A T I C WORKS OF ROGER BOYLE VOLUME

I

LONDON : H U M P H R E Y MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY

PRESS

T H E D R A M A T I C W O R K S OF

ROGER BOYLE EARL OF ORRERY E D I T E D BY

WILLIAM SMITH CLARK, II

VOLUME I

CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS

HARVARD U N I V E R S I T Y PRESS 1937

COPYRIGHT,

I937

BY T H E P R E S I D E N T AND F E L L O W S OF HARVARD COLLEGE

P U B L I S H E D WITH T H E AID OF T H E CHARLES PHELPS T A F T FUND U N I V E R S I T Y OF CINCINNATI

PRINTED AT T H E HARVARD U N I V E R S I T Y CAMBRIDGE, MASS., U . S . A .

PRESS

To CHESTER NOYES G R E E N O U G H T H E BELOVED P A T R O N OF Y O U T H F U L SCHOLARS

CONTENTS VOLUME

I

FOREWORD

XI

HISTORICAL PREFACE

Ι

CRITICAL PREFACE

61

T H E GENERALL

ΙΟΊ

H E N R Y THE FIFTH

165

MUSTAPHA

225

T H E B L A C K PRINCE

305

TRYPHON

373

GUZMAN

437

VOLUME

II

M R . ANTHONY

515

HEROD THE GREAT

585

T H E TRAGEDY OF ZOROASTRES

643

T H E TRAGEDY OF K I N G SAUL

701

EXPLANATORY NOTES

765

T E X T U A L NOTES

825

APPENDICES

947

A.

NOTES

ON ROGER

B O Y L E , FIRST

EARL

OF ORRERY,

BY

JOHN B O Y L E , FIFTH EARL OF ORRERY

949

B.

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF ORRERY'S DRAMATIC WORKS

.

.

.

954

C.

MANUSCRIPTS OF ORRERY'S DRAMATIC WORKS

.

.

.

963

ILLUSTRATIONS VOLUME

I

"SOLYMAN'S T E N T "

Frontispiece

A design by John Webb of a "scene in relief" for the projected performance of Mustapha at the Whitehall Theatre in 1665. Reproduced from the original at Chatsworth by permission of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire. FACSIMILE T I T L E - P A G E TO H E N R Y THE FIFTH (1668) FACSIMILE T I T L E - P A G E TO MUSTAPHA " T H E TURKISH C A M P . . .

.

164

(1668)

224

IN B A T T A L I A "

244

A design by Webb of another "scene in relief " for the projected Whitehall performance of Mustapha in 1665. Reproduced from the original at Chatsworth by permission of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire. "THE

TURKISH C A M P "

246

An alternative drawing by Webb of the central portion (i.e., the back flat of the "scene in relief") of the previous design. Reproduced from a pencil sketch by Francis Thompson, Esq., the Chatsworth librarian. "THE

Q U E E N OF HUNGARIA'S T E N T "

268

A design by Webb of a "flat scene" for the projected Whitehall performance of Mustapha in 1665. Reproduced from the original at Chatsworth by permission of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire. " B U D A BELEAGUED.

T H E COMMON"

280

A design by Webb of another " flat scene " for the projected Whitehall performance of Mustapha in 1665. Reproduced from the original at Chatsworth by permission of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire. FACSIMILE T I T L E - P A G E TO THE B L A C K PRINCE ( 1 6 6 9 )

.

.

304

FACSIMILE T I T L E - P A G E TO TRYPHON ( 1 6 6 9 )

372

FACSIMILE T I T L E - P A G E TO GUZMAN ( 1 6 9 3 )

436

X

ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME

II

ROGER BOYLE, EARL o r ORRERY

Frontispiece

A reproduction of the frontispiece portrait to the first volume of The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery (1739). FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE TO M R . ANTHONY ( 1 6 9 0 ) FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE TO HEROD THE GREAT ( 1 6 9 3 )

514 .

.

.

TITLE-PAGE TO THE TRAGEDY OF ZOROASTRES

584 642

A type facsimile of the title-page to Sloane Ms. 1828. FACSIMILE TITLE-PAGE TO THE TRAGEDY OF K I N G SAUL ( 1 7 0 3 )

700

FOREWORD LITERARY scholarship, like literature itself, ebbs and flows in the currents of fashion. Periods and personalities are ever subject to the whims of scholarly regard. Since the World War literary students have been turning to a fresh exploration of the authors who flourished from the accession of Charles I I to the death of William. A host of studies and editions concerned with Restoration writers has proceeded from this particular trend in learned research on both sides of the Atlantic. The period of Dryden has been yielding literary personages of a newly recognized value, either artistic or historical. Y e t the movement of re-discovery has paid but little attention to one of the central figures in the dramatic experimentations of the Restoration era. "Between the years sixty and seventy, the taste of England was for Rhyming Heroick Fustian," stated the wellknown critic, John Dennis, in the preface to Remarks On a Book entitled, Prince Arthur (1696). The playwright who shared with Dryden applause (and, later, opprobrium) for introducing this " R h y m i n g Heroick Fustian" to the London and Dublin stages was a well-known Irish nobleman, Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery. As a result of the speedy demise of heroic, riming plays in general, Orrery's dramatic writings suffered an early oblivion from which they have never recovered. They were not even honored with a collected edition, though a partial collection, consisting of six plays, appeared in 1739. T w o centuries have since ensued without an editorial glance at Orrery. Today the large group who are seeking to become acquainted with the significant developments in Restoration literature are kept from becoming familiar with Orrery's dramatic work through the lack of any satisfactory edition whatsoever. The time therefore seems ripe for a properly complete collection of his plays, which shall rescue the Earl from a neglect quite unjustifiable when many of his no more worthy contemporaries are enjoying a new lease on fame. The present edition of Orrery's dramatic writings includes one play, The Tragedy of Zoroastres, never before printed. Another, The Generali, previously published only in a private volume of miscellaneous literary pieces with an edition of eighty copies, is now printed from the different and sounder text of an hitherto unexamined manuscript. Still another piece, The Tragedy of King Saul,

χπ

FOREWORD

has not heretofore been placed in the Orrery canon. Of the remaining seven plays, Henry the Fifth, Mustapha, and Tryphon have been thoroughly re-edited after a study of all the extant manuscripts. Numerous important errors in the Restoration folios have thus been uncovered and rectified. The texts of the four plays, The Black Prince, Guzman, Mr. Anthony, and Herod the Great, of which there exist no manuscripts, have been based upon a careful collation of all the editions. A considerable number of inaccuracies in the original editions have come to light and undergone correction. The desire of the editor is not merely to print the first complete collection of Orrery's plays but to present an accepted definitive text. During textual examination and comparison a half-dozen unrecorded bibliographical items were discovered. The handlist of Orrery editions in Nicoll's A History of Restoration Drama, the best list up to the moment, has turned out to be decidedly incomplete. The new compilation, given in an appendix to the present work, contains hitherto unnoted editions and issues, and shows the Orrery bibliography to be considerably more complicated than has ever been suspected. Throughout the preparation and notation of the ten plays the editor has considered his material not only as dramatic literature, but as compositions actually staged for the most part, or intended for production. Hence, under the explanatory notes for each play, he has devoted a separate section to discussion of interesting or significant matters of staging, and in this manner has attempted, through these representative specimens of early Restoration theatre, to interpret many important features of its stage theory and practice. In fact, Orrery as a man of the theatre becomes at times really more interesting than as a dramatist. Not a few of his devices and effects are very unusual, occasionally almost unique. In line with such close attention to theatrical matters the editor has taken much pains to draw from various authorities all available biographical information of the men and women who took roles in Orrery's productions. Consequently, the accounts of the individual actors and actresses are believed to be more nearly exact and complete than those now contained in any one volume of Restoration drama. While the notes on theatre personages may not contain freshly discovered material, the Historical Preface does include much new information about Orrery's life, and about the history and influence of his playwriting. No extensive biographical account of the Earl of Orrery has ever been published, though several brief studies of his life written in the encyclopaedic vein have been printed during the two and a half centuries since his death. The chronology of his plays

FOREWORD

xiii

has also never been fully established. The scholar, therefore, who seeks a clear portrait of personality and a careful chronicle of dramatic activity must piece together his own record out of widely dispersed source material. Such has been the attempt of the present editor. Few documents directly connected with the first Earl of Orrery were preserved in the family archives, because almost all Orrery's correspondence and papers were burnt when soldiers from the Duke of Berwick's army set fire in 1690 to Charleville, his chief residence in Ireland. Such of these private manuscripts as did escape destruction were finally purchased from the Orrery relatives some years ago by the Harvard College Library. The extensive files of letters among the state papers at the Public Record Office, London, include many to and from the Earl of Orrery, but they are largely on public business. More interesting and important are the accumulations of correspondence.which formerly belonged to the Duke of Ormonde, and to the Earl of Essex, and which were later scattered in various directions, the major portions going either into the Carte manuscripts at the Bodleian Library or reaching finally the manuscript collection at the British Museum. In these accumulations Orrery appears frequently. Unfortunately, however, the bulk of the letters are purely political in content. A real mine of information lay in the copious selections printed from private library manuscripts by the Historical Manuscripts Commission. Many of these volumes have cast a ray of light upon Orrery's career. And thus the search has been carried on in memoirs, journals, and diaries, as well as in manuscripts both published and unpublished. From these diverse sources the editor has essayed to form the tale of Orrery's life so far as it can now be reconstructed: its little bits of colorful incident, its revelation of a changing personality, its rather meagre glimpses of dramatic composition carried on as a pleasurable avocation in the midst of a busy life. The tale is not intended to form an exhaustive biography. The narration of political and military affairs has been greatly curtailed in order that the activity and prestige of Orrery as man of letters might stand out the more clearly. The highlights of the tale no doubt lie in the history of Orrery's beginnings as a dramatist; in the identification of his maiden play, The Generali; and in the unique career and influence of this piece, now ascertained to be the pioneer "heroic" drama on the Restoration stage. And if the tale be pursued to its close, then Orrery perhaps may emerge as a figure of larger consequence in English authorship of the early Restoration days than has been commonly imagined by learned students of that period.

XIV

FOREWORD

In so extensive an undertaking as this collection of Orrery's dramatic works together with biographical, critical, and bibliographical apparatus, I have incurred an indebtedness almost too multifarious for complete acknowledgement. As a stranger within the gates, so to speak, I have received both a friendly welcome and incalculable assistance from the staffs of the Bodleian, Worcester College, and Christ Church College libraries at Oxford; of the University of London Library; of the Victoria and Albert Museum; and of the British Museum. On this side of the Atlantic similar aid has been most freely and courteously given by the authorities of the Harvard College, Yale University, Columbia University, University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas, Amherst College, Henry E. Huntington, and New York Public libraries. The Harvard College Library, at my instigation and request, some years ago made generous purchases of Orrery material, which greatly facilitated the editorial task. No student at work in the field of Restoration drama and theatre could help being grateful to the guidance and contents of such reference books as Allardyce Nicoll's A History of Restoration Drama, J. L. Hotson's Commonwealth and Restoration Stage, and Montague Summers' The Restoration Theatre. Specific notes of indebtedness have been inserted wherever there has occurred conscious borrowing of definitely original material from these and kindred works. Indebtedness extends even further, however, to the cordial helpfulness of my scholarly friends, Professors Allardyce Nicoli, J. L . Hotson, Hazelton Spencer, and, in particular, Dr. W. J. Lawrence, who first interested me in the subject of the stage's relation to dramatic literature and thereafter, on many occasions, has communicated to me out of the richness of his own learning much invaluable information. Others have assisted in manifold ways. Through the kindness of Francis Thompson, Esq., the Chatsworth librarian, I was able to secure photographs of the Webb drawings for Mustapha. T o His Grace the Duke of Devonshire is owed a large debt of thanks for permission to reproduce these drawings out of his priceless collection. Dr. Robert Shafer not only has generously supplied a reproduction of the Orrery portrait from his own copy of the 1739 octavo, but by other means also has done much to effect publication. T o the same end the constant influence and warm support of Dr. Frank W. Chandler have proven so indispensable that no expression of obligation can be wholly adequate. And to Professor C. N . Greenough must go an equal debt of gratitude for inspiration and advice during the eight years that this project has been in the making. He has read the whole manuscript as a labor of love, and offered highly

FOREWORD

XV

pertinent suggestions looking to the improvement of the text. For the editorial travail so unselfishly undertaken words of appreciation fail. Last, but not least, must be thanked Gladys L. Hathaway Clark, who patiently and tirelessly has spent countless hours upon the proper preparation of the manuscript. Hers has been a devotion without which this work would not have come to its present completion. Yet, despite the widespread and unstinted cooperation of numerous individuals, the research connected with this editorial project and the publication of the finished product could never have been accomplished without financial subvention from interested bodies. Toward the necessary research the faculty research fund of Amherst College gave an annual subsidy for the years 1927-31. The American Council of Learned Societies made a generous grant for the same purpose in 1929. And, finally, in 1934, the Charles Phelps Taft Memorial Fund, University of Cincinnati, granted an amount in aid sufficient to assure printing. These volumes, therefore, represent in their preparation and publication an example of the benevolent enterprises which today are working together for the advancement of scholarship in the field of the humanities. For such organized benevolence the younger generation of scholars in particular are indebted, and, to an inestimable degree, this editor. W. S. C. UNIVERSITY o r

CINCINNATI

June, 1936

HISTORICAL PREFACE

HISTORICAL

PREFACE

THE life and accomplishments of Roger Boyle, the first Earl of Orrery, form the subject of a surprisingly instructive excursion into the byways of English politics and literature. Personal favorite of both Oliver Cromwell and Charles II — a unique distinction — he cut a considerable figure "in the Camp, the Court, and the Republic of Letters" during the Commonwealth and after the Restoration. His fame, however, as a result of an unfortunate combination of circumstances, suffered an early eclipse. For more than two centuries now, undeserved neglect has obscured the peculiar significance of his role in literary as well as public affairs. The Boyle family, from whom the first Earl of Orrery was descended, attained national eminence when his father, Richard, second son of Roger Boyle, Esq., of Feversham, Kent, was created by James I Lord Boyle, Baron of Youghall, in 1616; and then, in 1620, Earl of Cork. As a youthful soldier of fortune, Richard Boyle had crossed to Ireland in the year of the Armada. There, his exceptional services to the English cause finally raised his family to the ranks of the nobility, and before his death in 1643 earned him, in addition, the popular title, "the Great Earl of Cork." From the reign of Queen Elizabeth to that of Dr. Johnson the Boyle family by their various private and public activities maintained an unbroken prominence. The youngest son of "the Great Earl" was the renowned scientist, Robert Boyle (1627-91), whose theorem in regard to the volume of gases under varying pressures is known to students of physics under the name of Boyle's Law. Charles Boyle (16761731), the fourth Earl of Orrery, grandson of the first Earl, Roger, gained great notoriety by his controversy with Dr. Richard Bentley over the Epistles of Phalaris, a controversy which Swift vividly memorialized for posterity in The Battle of the Books. Charles became an enthusiastic patron of astronomy, and caused the name of the family earldom to be perpetuated in the terminology of that science. He was one of the original subscribers for a planetarium perfected by John Rowley, a London mechanician, who at the end of 1712 advertised for sale by subscription an instrument to illustrate the movement of the solar bodies in the form of balls rotated by means of wheel-work.1 Therefore, Rowley called "his machine the Orrery, in Gratitude to the Nobleman of that Title." 2 This name 1 2

The Spectator, no. 552. The Englishman, no. 11 (Dec. 15, 1713).

4

DRAMATIC

WORKS

OF

ROGER

BOYLE

survives, though the apparatus is today only a curious toy. The eldest son of Charles Boyle was John, the fifth Earl of Orrery (170762), who became a close friend and patron of both Dean Swift and Dr. Johnson. He also attained some note as a literary man through his authorship of Remarks on Swift and of a translation of the Letters of Pliny the Younger. With the death of John, the illustrious Boyle family passed completely from the position of public eminence which it had held continuously for a century and a half. Roger Boyle, the first Earl of Orrery, was the fifth son born to Richard, Earl of Cork, and his second wife, Catherine, the only daughter of Sir Jeffrey Fenton, Principal Secretary of State for Ireland. Roger's birth took place on April 25, 1621, at Lismore Castle, his father's chief seat, in the county of Waterford, Ireland. In his sixth year, he received from Charles I the title of Lord Boyle, Baron of Broghill in the kingdom of Ireland, by royal patent issued at Westminster on November 30, 1627, and at Dublin on February 28, 1628.3 This first title and his subsequent one, Orrery, were both derived from the names of lands in the county of Cork. Broghill is a town land in the parish of Ballyhea belonging to the barony of Orrery. Orrery, a barony or hundred in the northern part of Cork County, takes its name from an Irish tribe which originally dwelt in that section, the Orbhraighe (pronounced Orvery>Orrery), i.e. the posterity of Orbh, an ancient Celtic chieftain.4 In March, 1628, the Earl of Cork took Roger and his next older brother, Lewis, to Dublin that they might be invested with their newly created titles by the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Henry Cary, Viscount Falkland. The Lord Deputy knighted the two boys on April 1 5 and later may have entertained them at his private residence in Thomas Court on the outskirts of Dublin.6 If so, Roger then had his first glimpse of the house which he himself probably occupied for a season after the Restoration. Within two years of this visit to the capital the Earl of Cork moved the whole family to Dublin. Broghill, in company with his brother Lewis, now Viscount Kynelmeaky, entered Trinity College, Dublin, on May 9, 1630, though he was but nine years old.7 Because of his extreme youth it is unlikely that he ever undertook studies of the university grade during the four or five years he continued as a student at that institution. 8 4 5 6 7

Lodge, Peerage of Ireland. Lismore Papers (ist series), ed. by Alex. B. Grosart, in, 250. Ibid., HI. See Cal. State Papers Ireland (1625-33), 4^6. Lismore Papers, πι, 32.

HISTORICAL

PREFACE

5

Early in 1635 the Earl of Cork began to make plans for Broghill's "grand tour" on the Continent. Through the assistance of his good friend, Sir Henry Wotton, Provost of Eton, he finally secured as tutor and guide a Genevan, Monsieur Isaac Marcombes, who arrived in Dublin January 14, 1635/6.8 Exactly a month later, Broghill, Kynelmeaky, and the tutor departed for London,9 where the two young noblemen kissed the hands of King Charles and Queen Henrietta Maria in dutiful farewell. On March 16 they were provided with a royal license " t o travel into parts beyond the seas, with their servants and £50 in money, there to remain for three years." 10 The next day 11 they set out for Geneva via Dieppe and Paris, and lingered so little by the way that they reached their Swiss destination on April 25.12 At Geneva Broghill and his brother took up residence in the house of Giovanni Diodati, outstanding scholar and preacher of the Swiss Reformed Church, and Professor of Theology at the University of Geneva.13 In 1607 Diodati had published an Italian translation of the Bible, which is still generally used among Italian Protestants. His home, because of its cultural atmosphere, was sought out by young noblemen of Protestant antecedents from various parts of Europe.14 The Earl of Cork's two sons, sent thither, doubtless, by the advice of Sir Henry Wotton, were received as resident guests through the latter's influence with Dr. Diodati. Wotton's personal intimacy with the Genevan professor began during his ambassadorship at Venice, when Diodati came thither to sow the seeds of Protestantism and found in the English diplomat a willing partner to his religious schemes.16 The Italian scholar was a popular and forceful figure in the university community of Geneva. His broad learning, his ability to instruct, and his vigorous, elevated spirit won an admiring response from students.16 In contact with such a personality for a year and a half, Broghill, despite his youthfulness, should have experienced notable intellectual stimulation. Two other young men, now famous in English literary history, visited Diodati within a few years of Broghill's stay. In June, 1639, John Milton sojourned at Geneva, and afterwards he took pride in the fact that, while there, he had been "daily in the society of John Ibid., IV, 149. • Ibid., 157. Cal. S. P. Dom. (1635-36), 298. a Lismore Papers, iv, 177. » Ibid., 157. 13 Thos. Morrice, Memoirs of Roger, Earl of Orrery, in Orrery's State Letters (London, 1742). 314 David Masson, Life of John Milton, 1, 832. 15 E. de Budé, Vie de Jean Diodati (Lausanne, 18Ö9), 241 ff. 16 Ibid., 294-295. 8

10

6

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WORKS

OF

ROGER

BOYLE

Diodati, the most learned Professor of Theology." 17 The professor was, indeed, uncle of Charles Diodati, Milton's dearest college friend. Family associations, therefore, as well as kindred scholarly interests drew Milton to the Diodati domicile. Here, John Evelyn also took pains to establish an acquaintance in May, 1646. His diary tells of the call which he made the day after his arrival at Geneva: "The next morning having a letter for Signr John Diodati, the famous Italian minister and translator of the Holy Bible into that language, I went to his house, and had a greate deal of discourse w th that learned person." 18 The Diodati house was quite evidently within Geneva proper. Its location is not to be confused with that of the Villa Diodati which Lord Byron leased in June, 1816, for a summer's sojourn. This villa, situated at Cologny, a suburb several miles to the northeast of the city, was built in the early eighteenth century by a distant relative of John Diodati, Noble Gabriel Diodati (1668-1751), who bought the Cologny property in 1710. Hence the villa has no connections with the illustrious Genevan scholar who died in 1649. Nevertheless, there began to develop toward the middle of the nineteenth century a myth that Milton as well as Byron had lodged at the Villa Diodati. The myth is now well established and has led to the erection at this Cologny estate of a tablet which sets forth that it was the abode of both Milton and Byron. 19 The stay of Broghill and his brother at Geneva came to an end on September 30, 1637, when they departed for Zurich under the guidance of Monsieur Marcombes, with the intention of proceeding to Italy.20 Since entrance to Italy from Switzerland was found impossible, however, on account of the plague, they decided to go to France and thence into Italy. 21 Their route took them to Lyons, Orange, Avignon, Marseilles, Nice, and finally to Genoa, where they arrived the first of December.22 Then Broghill fell sick with a fever on Christmas Eve and thus delayed again the long postponed Italian tour.23 The subsequent travels through Italy and France are succinctly described in an extant letter from Broghill to the Earl of Cork. This letter was written on May 28, 1638, at Saumur, France, where the two Boyles and their tutor had recently arrived to spend some months in study. Defensio Secunda, as quoted in Masson, op. cit., 1, 833. Diary of John Evelyn, edit, by H. B. Wheatley (London, 1879), 287-288. 19 For a full discussion of the legend about John Diodati and the villa, see my article, "Milton and the Villa Diodati," in The Review of English Studies, vol. xi, no. 41. ,0 Letter of Marcombes to Cork, B.M. Add. Ms. 19832, f. 41-43. 21 Ibid. B Ibid. 23 Ibid. 17

18

HISTORICAL

PREFACE

7

M y most honored L o : & Father I have written to yo r Lor: from Venice that after y t pleased God to restore us to our former health, what way wee tooke to goe from Genoua thither, passing b y Lucka, Bolognia, Ferrara, Padua, & to Venice, and how curteously my lord Embassadour did use us; From Venice we went to Florence by Padua, Bolognia, & Ferrara, where the heat surprising us, my brother not fynding himselfe well b y the way, and the Phisitians assuring us of the contrariety of the ayre with my brothers nature, was the cause that we did not see Rome nor Naples, but wee were resolved to goe into France by Turin, wee were diswaded by many, because of the quantity of soldiers of the Emperor, the French king, and the king of Spaine. This consideration made us to goe to Lygorne, where wee tooke a Galley, & went to Genoua: my brother as soone as he arived shore, fell sick where the Phisitians againe did councell us to get him into France with all speed, from thence wee went to Nise b y sea, from Nise to Marsellis by land, from Marsellis to Montpelier in Languedock: Wee crossed from thence the [ ?], and embarqued ourselves upon the River of Alir w o h fais into Loyre, wee were at Orleans, Bloyce, Toure, Samure, where wee are all in good health thanks be to G o d ; . . . . Y o r lop: hath been extreame happy in choyce of Mr. Marcombes, for he hath had an extreame great care of us both in our sickness, & in our travells, and is wholly devoted to yo r Lop. service. . . .24

On the same date, Roger's brother, Lewis, wrote to his father concerning their lodgings in Saumur: "Wee are lodged in the house of one Mr. Duncan a Scotchman, being professor in Philosophy, & doctor of Phisick, and have the conveniency both of his, & famous M r du Plessis his lybrary; . . . . " 25 The sojourn of the Boyle party at Saumur probably came about through the advice of Dr. Diodati, who had lived and preached there from 1611 to 1614. His intimate friend and patron had been the famous Protestant nobleman and "gouverneur de Saumur," Phillipe Duplessis-Mornay (1549-1623),26 whose library Lewis Boyle mentions as at their disposal. Broghill and his brother spent the summer and fall of 1638 at Saumur in rather constant study under Monsieur Marcombes. The two youths apparently did not confine their reading to philosophy, science, and the classics, but sought more than occasional relaxation in romances and plays. Thus early did Broghill begin to secure the background for his later playwriting. The Earl of Cork seems to have been informed by the conscientious tutor of these literary diversions and to have written strict injunctions against his sons' further indulgence in such corrupting entertainment, for Lewis Boyle, in a letter dated at Paris December 27, 1638, makes brief but amusing apology to his father: " A s concerning my reading of Romancyes & playbooks, I never (thanks be to God) have been much « Ibid., f. 45·

« Ibid., f. 46.

» de Budé, op. cit., 258 fi.

8

DRAMATIC WORKS

OF ROGER

BOYLE

inclined unto them before your Lordships commands to y® contrary." 27 The pursuit of learning at Saumur was brought to an end on November 10, when the Boyles and their tutor set out for Paris.28 They reached the French capital on the 19th 29 and proceeded to pass the winter in a life of greater gaiety and sociability than any which they had enjoyed previously. It was not long before the sons of the Earl of Cork were introduced at court and thereafter became somewhat familiar with members of the royal family. Various of the English aristocracy who were residing in Paris took pains to entertain the young noblemen, so that the latter did not lack for acquaintances of high rank to afford them diversion. Lewis, in writing to his father on January 4, 1638/9, describes with boyish brevity some of their Parisian doings: " W e have waited twice upon y e Princes, by whom we were curteously & familarly received. We goe one Sunday to y e Lord Leicesters, & y e other to Lord Scudamors.... The Lord of Lecester invited us particularly to a play Acted in English in his Lordships howse on Newyears day, by some English Inhabitants heere." 30 For the first time, Broghill found himself in a society fond of the theatre and interested deeply in dramatic matters. He presumably supplemented such private theatricals as this occasion at Lord Leicester's by attendance at public, professional productions in the Hôtel de Bourgogne or the Théâtre'du Marais. The controversy over Corneille's Le Cid was still in the air, and his "heroic" drama was establishing itself as the fashionable mode of the French stage. Broghill's probable acquaintance with this new form of play through actual performance on the Parisian boards may have sown the seeds of the French influence which later so strongly affected the Englishman's dramatic compositions. Broghill reached London once again on March 4, 1639, and shortly thereafter proceeded to Stalbridge, the Dorset manor where the Earl of Cork was then residing.31 In May Broghill rode off with his two brothers, Dungarvan and Kynelmeaky, to fight against the Scots, but the campaign was so brief that the latter part of June saw him back in Stalbridge.32 With the coming of autumn the Earl of Cork settled his family in a London residence, Savoy House, the Strand, which he had leased from Sir Thomas Stafford, gentleman usher to the Queen.33 Thenceforth Broghill led a gay life among the young " Lismore Papers (2d ser.), ret, 278. " Ibid., 277. « Ibid. 81 Lismore Papers (ist ser.), iv, 192; ν, 78, 8o. 32 Ibid., ν, 89, g6. 83 Ibid., i n .

80

Ibid., iv, 6-7.

HISTORICAL

PREFACE

9

aristocrats and courtiers. Within a few months two of his brothers, Lewis and Francis, had married ladies-in-waiting to the Queen.34 Francis' wife was Elizabeth Killigrew, the favorite sister of Thomas Killigrew who after the Restoration produced a number of Broghill's plays. These weddings took place in Whitehall Palace and were followed by elaborate banquets given at royal expense. Such brilliant social events were not the only fashionable pastimes, of course, in which Broghill indulged. Like the young ladies of his family,35 he no doubt spent much time "in seeing and reading plays and romances." Not long after he had joined the young smart set who haunted Whitehall, Broghill was involved in a love affair at court. He became infatuated with Miss Frances Harrison, maid of honor to the Queen. She apparently was considered a satisfactory match in the eyes of the Boyle family, for marital negotiations started toward the end of 1639. Some frank gossip concerning this match has been preserved in a series of letters addressed to one of Miss Harrison's admirers, Thomas Windebank, son of Sir Francis Windebank, the Secretary of State. These letters, written by Thomas' cousin, Robert Read, reveal that, at this time, Broghill, like most Caroline young noblemen, had a distinctly unsavory side to his private life. On January 2, 1639/40, Read writes in part: The Lord of Kinalmeaky, who was married last week to Lady Eliz. Fielding, has not kept his wedding night yet, b y reason he is still under medical treatment. This has put Mrs. Harrison a little out of countenance, for fear the like may be her case with the other brother, yet I believe that business is so far advanced, though she will not acknowledge it, that she must adventure herself with him. It is said they [i.e. Kynelmeaky and Broghill] are both very debauched, & though perhaps the latter [i.e. Broghill] may use more discretion in fixing the wedding day, yet it is feared they will be equally ill husbands. 36

A week following he reports: "Mistress Harrison continues yet a virgin; some say that the match is broken off, but I believe it was too far advanced to be altered." 37 On January 13 he gives the added information that "Mrs. Harrison is yet a virgin (at least goes for one), and I hear will not consent to be married before Easter." 38 Then three days later he writes: " W e hear nothing of Mrs. Harrison and her Brawner, as you call him. I am confident if Lady Fielding could have given her a good account of her boat, the other would quickly have followed." 39 Meanwhile Broghill was becoming exIbid., 112, 119. Autobiography of Mary Boyle, Countess of Warwick (Percy Soc. Repts., xxii), 4. * Cal. S. P. Dom. (1639-40), 297. 37 Ibid., 317. 38 Ibid., 332. 39 Ibid., 341. 34

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tremely jealous of his mistress' company. Thomas Howard, second son of Thomas Howard, Earl of Berkshire, for some time had been showing considerable devotion to Miss Harrison. Finally, Broghill could no longer endure Howard's attentions in silence, and proceeded to express his disapproval in forcible terms. The upshot of the matter was that Howard challenged Broghill to a duel. The challenge was delivered by Charles Rich, son of the Earl of Warwick, while Broghill was at dinner with his father on January 20, 1639/40.40 Without a word, Broghill rose from the table, left the house, secured one of his cronies, Jack Barry, as his second, and drove by coach into the fields beyond the city, where the rival lovers faced each other with drawn rapiers. In the encounter Broghill took away the fringe of Howard's glove by a thrust between the body and the arm, and thus scored a technical victory. The two antagonists were then separated by their seconds and drove back to Broghill's house to sup together in peace and amity! Despite its tame ending the affair was for a time quite the talk of the town. On January 23 Read wrote his cousin of the incident as follows: M y Lord of Broghill is grown so settled in his love now that he will suffer nobody to be in company of his mistress but himself, which Mr. Thomas Howard found the other day, and was glad to give him an accompt in the field why he left not walking with Mrs. Harrison as soon as his lordship entered the room; but I think it was but in jest, for there was no harm done.41

This rivalry in love brought Broghill into close acquaintance with the whole Howard family, and he shortly profited by these friendly relations. For one reason or another, Miss Harrison, not long after the duel, transferred her affections and married Howard.42 When his late adversary had thus outmatched him by winning the fair maid of honor's hand, Broghill harbored no hard feelings against the Howards, but at once began paying suit to Thomas' cousin, Margaret, third daughter of Theophilus Howard, second Earl of Suffolk. She was an eminently beautiful young lady, popular at court, and therefore played an important role in the last Caroline masque at Whitehall, D'Avenant's Salmacida Spolia, which was performed on Tuesday evening, January 21, 1639/40. Sir John Suckling pays tribute to her notable beauty by remarking in one of his letters: " . . . as I have showed you how to get out of love, so you, according to our bargain, should teach me how to get into it. I know you have Lismore Papers, v, 121. Mary Boyle {op. cit., 5) gives January 17 as the date. " Cal. S. P. Dom. (1639-40), 365. 42 Autobiog. of Mary Boyle, 5. 40

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but one way and will prescribe me now to look upon Mistress Howard." 43 In his second attempt at courting, Broghill proved successful and the following year became a relative of his former rival. This family bond with the Howards may, after the Restoration, have helped the forming of a significant literary contact between the Earl of Orrery and John Dryden. The summer of 1640 Broghill spent at Stalbridge,44 and then in September rode to York to join the forces of Charles I in another campaign against the Scots,45 but like the expedition of the previous year this second one did not continue long, and allowed him to return to London for a busy season of social activity which culminated in his marriage to Lady Margaret Howard on January 27, 1640/1.46 The wedding took place at the home of the bride's grandfather, the Earl of Dunbar, in Queen's Street, Covent Garden, and was a brilliant affair with all the notables of court and town in attendance, since both parties were among the most prominent of the younger nobility. The occasion has been most delightfully, though fancifully, described in Suckling's Ballad upon a Wedding ( " I tell thee, Dick, where I have been"). Suckling was a warm friend of the engaging and witty young Broghill, and celebrated the latter's marriage not only by his famous Ballad but by a poem in dialogue between Jack Bond and himself, entitled Upon My Lord BroghilVs Wedding, and also by The Bride, an encomium in verse to the fair lady of the occasion. Another leading literary light of the court with whom Broghill was intimate was Sir William D'Avenant, the poet laureate and the chief playwright of the day. Twenty years later Broghill speaks of the latter as " m y old friend, Will D'Avenant." 47 In all likelihood these two famous wits and poets of the Caroline court were his chief mentors in matters dramatic and literary. Their work for the theatre served to some extent as a model for his first effort in playwriting. In the court circles where Broghill moved, the cult of Platonic love, introduced from Parisian salons at the instigation of Queen Henrietta Maria, was all the rage. Platonic affectations colored conversation and literary expression, and induced a highly artificial attitude of mind together with a set formula for social intercourse between the sexes. The cult is aptly described in a letter from Westminster under date of June 3, 1634: 43

Poetical

Works (ed. by W. C. Hazlitt, London, 1892), n, 182.

Lismore Papers, v, 150. « Ibid., 159. 44

47

46

Ibid., 168.

Orrery's State Letters (London, 1742), 38.

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There is a Love call'd Platonick Love which much sways there of late. It is a Love abstracted from all corporeal, gross impressions and sensual appetite, but consists in contemplations, and ideas of the mind, not in any carnal fruition. This Love sets the Wits of the Town on work. . . ,48

Broghill found this Platonic pose on every side of him and did not fail to perceive its absurd affectation. Memories of its heyday at the court of Charles I lingered with him and prompted the following cynical remarks in his first play, which was written after the Restoration when the Platonic vogue still had a few followers, notably Mrs. Katharine Phillips (the famous "Orinda") and her coterie with the highly romantic pseudonyms: — Think'st thou a Platonic is a fool? Know 'tis the subtlest sect in Cupid's school. She who does once resign me up her soul, All fears to miss her body does control; And by it many a well-meaning maid Has, as I know, her body oft betray'd. 'Tis but a veil suspicious men to blind; None fear to be a cuckold of the mind.49

Nevertheless, traces of the cult's mock idealism are plainly evident in Broghill's plays of the Restoration period, wherein he sought to fashion dramatic entertainment for a court which included many from the old regime of Charles I. Broghill's residence in London from 1639 to 1641, therefore, was of great significance to his subsequent life and work. The personal associations he formed, the social atmosphere he breathed, permanently determined his mental outlook and cultural tastes. Royalist sympathies, and the literary predilections which went with that political alignment, became ingrained in him for all time. In the fall of 1641 Lord and Lady Broghill followed the Earl of Cork and family back to Ireland, and reached Lismore Castle on October 19.50 Four days later the revolt of the Irish Catholics broke out in Tyrone, and the whole country took up arms. The Earl of Cork immediately began to raise forces to protect Munster against the Catholic rebels, and ordered the English tenantry impressed for cavalry service. Broghill was placed in command of a cavalry regiment 61 and for the next year was engaged in the defense of Munster under the leadership of Lord Inchiquin, self-appointed governor of the province. In November, 1642, Broghill took his wife for reasons 48 49 50 61

Dramatic Works of Sir W. D'Avenant (Maidment & Logan ed.), π , 3The Generali, Act II, 11. 206-213. Lismore Papers, v, 195, 198. Ibid., ν, ig8.

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13 82

of health out of the turmoil and passed the winter in England. On their return to Lismore in July, 1643,63 he joined again the Inchiquin forces. Hostilities ceased, however, in September with the conclusion of a truce between the Catholic rebels and the Duke of Ormonde, the Protestant commander-in-chief. After almost a year of comparative inactivity the Munster Protestants, led by Inchiquin and Broghill, declared for a break of the truce and appealed in July, 1644, to Parliament for official support against the Papists.54 During the following December and January Broghill was in London to confer with the Parliamentary committee on Irish affairs.55 The committee commissioned Inchiquin as Lord President of Munster and recommended that he appoint Broghill General of the Horse.56 The spring of 1645 saw a fierce offensive in Munster by the Catholics. One of the few bright spots in the Protestant campaign was the valiant defense of Youghall in April by Broghill, who was governor there.57 He undertook two months later 58 another trip to London for consultation with Parliamentary leaders and procured some greatly needed supplies before his return to Cork by September.59 Exactly a year thereafter Broghill arrived once more in London to attempt to secure from Parliament more vigorous aid.60 He presented a plea for the organization of a regular army of 5000 foot and ισοο horse to protect Munster against the ever-active Catholic forces which had brought that province into a desperate plight.61 In recognition of Broghill's apparent devotion to the cause, the Parliamentary committee made him commander of a brigade of four foot regiments which were to serve directly under the new lord lieutenant, Lord Lisle.62 Thus was planted the seed of future trouble between Broghill and Inchiquin, for the former found this increasing influence in Irish affairs much to his taste and the latter grew fearful at Broghill's rising power. When Broghill came back to Munster in December, 1646, he had been largely successful in his mission to arouse Parliament's more earnest interest in the Irish situation.63 During the succeeding winter a Parliamentary council board for 52

Ibid., 216. M Ibid., 230. Cal. S. P. Dom. (1644), 40ά. τ Ibid. (1644-45). 7 ° et seq. M Ibid., 251. 67 Β. M. Add. Ms. 25287, f. 12 et seq. 68 Egmont Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1905), 1, 257. 5 » Portland Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1891), l, 267. 60 Cal. S. P. Ireland (1633-47), 506. 81 Portland Mss., 1, 390-391. 68 Cal. S. P. Ireland (1633-47), 5*4® Egmont Mss., I, 301. 64 65

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Ireland made an investigation at first hand. Their coming brought into the open the squabble for power which had been secretly developing among the Irish Protestant leaders. Since Lord Lisle was to go back to England at the expiration of his term of office in April, 1647, the Parliamentary board decided to place the command of the Irish army in the hands of a committee of four experienced officers, two of whom were to be Lord Inchiquin and Lord Broghill. Inchiquin, however, claimed the chief command rested solely in him, since he held the presidency of Munster. Of course Broghill and the other two officers vigorously opposed his claim. Nevertheless the Parliamentary board departed for England again without settling this vexing question.64 Thus the situation remained in a state of uncertainty and ill feeling. Broghill was anxious for a place of greater leadership in Irish affairs, and was naturally filled with jealous indignation at the arrogant preemption of military authority by Inchiquin. Disgusted finally with the continued impasse in regard to the army command, he relinquished his responsibilities in Munster and travelled to England in May. 65 At once he began a campaign against Inchiquin in Parliamentary circles at London and during June filed formal charges of disloyalty, which later were published in a pamphlet entitled Articles of Attack on Inchiquin's Loyalty as Commander of the Parliamentary Forces.*6 Broghill's attack did not produce any immediate results, because Inchiquin was enjoying great success in Munster against the Papist cause. Broghill therefore could do nothing but sulk in jealous discontent. He had his wife come over to England in August 67 and perhaps retired with her to his Somersetshire manor of Marston Bigod,68 a wedding gift from the Earl of Cork. The following April Inchiquin, now the master of southern Ireland, declared himself for the King. Parliament at once revoked all his commissions and evidently appointed Broghill Lord President of Munster some time thereafter.69 The latter, however, never took any important steps to assert his new office in Ireland, possibly because he was always at heart a royalist and sympathized secretly with Inchiquin's move to support the cause of the king. Following the execution of Charles I at the end of January, 1648/9, Charles II was at once proclaimed king at Edinburgh by the Scottish supporters of the monarchy. These events gave new impetus to the royalist movement which during the previous year had been 64 66 68

Portland. Mss., 1, 419. Β. M. Tract E 402 (19). Morrice, op. cit., 9. Cal. S. P. Ireland (1633-47), 761.

66 67

Egmonl Mss., 1, 397. Egmont Mss., 1, 437.

HISTORICAL

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15

launched in Ireland under Ormonde's leadership. Broghill finally determined to lend this movement active aid. Before he should go to Ireland, however, he decided, apparently for the purposes of selfadvertisement and political prestige, to procure in person from the exiled Charles II a direct commission for raising forces in Ireland on the King's behalf. Some time in the early spring of 1649 he arrived in London to make arrangements for an ostensible journey to Spa on account of his health, but actually he was planning to visit Charles at Breda.70 On April xo Charles wrote to Ormonde in Ireland that Orrery "intends shortly to wait upon us in his way to Ireland." 71 Cromwell as a member of the committee of state got wind of Broghill's scheme through certain of the latter's confidential letters which had come into the possession of the committee. He therefore called on Broghill and informed him that his treasonable designs were known.72 Upon Broghill's denial of any such designs Cromwell produced copies of the letters and thus had the would-be royalist at his mercy. Since Cromwell had been appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in March, 1649, and was planning a campaign of pacification, he offered Broghill the choice of two alternatives: an officer's command in the Commonwealth forces which were to take the field against the anti-Parliamentary groups in Ireland, or confinement in the Tower. Broghill had little reason to hesitate over a decision, for, as an aide to Cromwell, he might well hope to advance himself in the new regime. Therefore he agreed to serve with the Cromwellian army in Ireland and crossed over thither in October, 1649.73 A letter, dated November 14, from Cromwell reports concerning Broghill as follows: "The Lord Broghill is now in Munster; where he, I hope, will do very good offices: all his suit is for £200 to bring his wife over. . . . He hath a great interest in the men that come from Inchiquin." 74 Broghill's financial stringency, implied in this letter, was finally relieved by a Parliamentary vote on January 8, 1649/50, to grant him out of the estates of Lord Muskerry, the arch Irish Papist rebel, a yearly salary of £iooo. 75 Hence February saw him in England for the purpose of transporting his family across the Irish Sea now that he had promise of funds.76 B y April he had returned to Munster and opened a new campaign, in which he speedily Morrice, op. cit., 10. Pepys Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt.), 297. n The story of this interview is told in Morrice, op. cit., 10-11. 73 Portland Mss., 11, 67. 74 The Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell (ed. by S. C. Lomas, London, 1904), 76 Cal. S. P. Dom. (1649-50), 463. I, 499. 76 Egmont Mss., 1, 493. 70

71

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attained a considerable victory over the rebellious Inchiquin party and " b e a t up the quarters of three Inchiquin regiments." 77 Under Ireton's administration of Irish affairs after Cromwell's departure in M a y , 1650, Broghill grew restive and complained that he was being neglected. The truth of the matter seems to be that he was greatly disappointed not to find himself on a speedy rise to high office. In order to appease him, Ireton recommended that he be given the rank of a general officer. During the early spring of 1651 the Parliament consequently appointed Broghill Lieutenant General of the Ordnance in Ireland, a high-sounding title which actually carried little added power. 78 The following summer witnessed an extensive series of triumphs by the now satisfied Broghill over the troops of Lord Muskerry. The politic victor saw to it that the Parliament and the English public should be fully informed of these military successes by publishing at London during the fall of 1651 a pamphlet, entitled A Letter from Lord Broghill,79 which related in detail the victories of the Parliamentary forces under his command. Thus Broghill deliberately advertised himself and his services with a view to securing a position of power and prestige in the Commonwealth government. His publicity efforts finally bore the desired fruit, though he had to continue campaigning in the south of Ireland for over two years before promotion came. After Cromwell had assumed the office of Lord Protector at the end of 1653, he proceeded to form a cabinet council, and in due time he requested Broghill to become a member of that body. 80 This appointment brought to a close Broghill's military service in Ireland and placed him in the midst of English political affairs for an extended period. During his four years in Ireland Broghill seems to have found time to write a romance after the style of the French heroic narratives which were becoming quite the fashion among English readers. Broghill's novel apparently was widely heralded before its publication. The advance interest arose in large measure from the fact that it was the first work of the kind by an English author. Dorothy Osborne in a letter to her fiancé, Sir William Temple, some time during 1653, remarks: " M y Lord Broghill, sure, will give us something worth the reading." 81 This English heroic romance was entitled Parthenissa, and was entered by Henry Herringman, later the pub77

Bulstrode Whitelock, Memorials

of the English Affairs

(Oxford, 1853), ill, 168-

169. The Memoirs of Edmund Ludlow (ed. by C. H. Firth, Oxford, 1894), 1, 263. » B. M. Tract E 640 (10). 80 Morrice, op. cit., 20. 81 Letters from D. Osborne to Sir W. Temple (ed. by E. A. Parry, London, 1888), 162. 78

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17

lisher of Broghill's plays, in the Stationer's Register on October 12, 1653. Its publication was advertised in Mercurius Politicus for January 19, 1653/4. Dorothy Osborne speedily procured a copy and started to read it, but because of the involved and tedious plot she was much disappointed in the book.82 Parthenissa never became popular, but as the English pioneer in this form of romantic fiction it did win for itself and its author a fairly widespread reputation. Broghill came to London in June, 1654.83 The following month he was elected a member of Parliament from Munster.84 With the assembling of the first Cromwellian parliament in September he became active in state affairs, and apparently impressed those high in authority with his abilities and judgment. As early as April, 1655, he was being talked about for the presidency of a Scottish state council.85 In August he was formally appointed to this office at a salary of £2000, but he accepted on the express condition that his tenure should be one year only.86 On the eve of his departure for Scotland August 20, he wrote to Thurloe concerning various matters then under consideration and in the course of his letter remarked that "your commands concerning fisheryes, and sending highlanders to America shall be in an especial manner observed." 87 This proposal to ship the then poverty-stricken Highland Scots to the New World must have been one of the earliest governmental schemes for forced emigration. Further study of the project after his arrival in Scotland led Broghill to decide that it was a doubtful expedient.88 During his single administration at Edinburgh he evidently won the regard of the Scots by his conduct in office. Robert Baillie on September ι, 1656, testified that "the President Broghill is reported by all to be a man exceeding wise and moderate. . . . He has gained more on the affections of the people than all the English that ever were among us." 89 At the expiration of his presidential term in August, 1656, Broghill hastened to England on account of his health and went at once to Bath in hopes to cure the severe gout which had attacked him.90 Still suffering from that malady he travelled to Marston in November for a brief sojourn with his family.91 By January, 1656/7,92 he 84 Ibid., Ibid., 236 fi. » Egmoní Mss., ι, 542. 548. Clarke Papers (Royal Hist. Soc.), ra, 32. 86 Ludlow, Memoirs, 1, 395. 87 John Thurloe, A Collection of the State Papers (ed. by Thos. Birch, London, 1742), 88 Ibid., IV, 41. in, 727. 89 Letters and Journals (ed. Robert Aiken, Edinburgh, 1775), n, 408. 90 Thurloe, op. cit., ν, 326. 91 Ibid., 665. 92 Clarke Papers, ra, 88. 82 85

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had returned to London and resumed his influential position as an intimate adviser to the Lord Protector. During the early months of 1657 Cromwell was being urged from many directions to assume the power of king. Yet even though so pressing an affair of state occupied his mind most earnestly at this time, he often took occasion in the presence of his closest counsellors to banish temporarily the cares of government, and then surprised them by his display of gaiety and wit. In such lighter moments the Protector must have found Broghill an especially congenial and entertaining companion. The only glimpse of these unsuspected interludes of witty joviality amid the sessions of the Commonwealth cabinet is to be found in a little noted passage by Whitelock, a member of the group: The protector often advised about this [i.e. the kingship] and other great businesses with the lord Broghil, Pierepoint, myself, Sir Charles Wolseley, and Thurloe, and would be shut up three or four hours together in private discourse . . . he would sometimes be very cheerful with us, and, laying aside his greatness, he would be exceeding familiar with us, and by way of diversion would make verses with us, and everyone must try his fancy. . . ,93

On Saturday, April 11, a committee of Parliament visited Cromwell and pressed him to take the royal title. Broghill as one of the leading spokesmen presented a strong argument, succinctly described by Ludlow : Amongst others the Lord Broghil much pressed that passage brought by the apostle in the dispute concerning the abolition of the Jewish worship by the new and living way revealed in Jesus Christ, illustrated by the wife that was put away, who might yet be retaken by her former husband, if she was not married to another; applying this similitude to the present occasion as if there was no other way to keep out Charles Stewart but by filling his place with another King.94

Ludlow, of course, could not be expected to set forth sympathetically the confirmed monarchist views of the former royalist! After Cromwell's final refusal of the kingship, Broghill seems to have attempted another piece of political scheming for the reestablishment of a royal dynasty. 95 He undertook, apparently on his own initiative, to set Cromwell's mind in motion on the matter of the marriage of the latter's daughter to the exiled Charles II. Upon meeting Broghill a certain day, Cromwell asked him what was the news in the city. In answer, Broghill reported that Cromwell was 94 Op. cit., ir, 23. Op. cit., IV, 289-290. Gilbert Burnet, History of My Own Time (ed. by Osmund Airy, Oxford, 1897), I, 124. Burnet claims Broghill (Orrery) as the source of his account. Cf. the more extreme and vague, hence far less probable, version of the intrigue in Morrice, op. cit., 21. 93 96

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said to be negotiating for the restoration of Charles and his marriage to Frances Cromwell. Then Broghill went on to develop the most favorable arguments for the project, to all of which Cromwell remarked, " T h e king can never forgive his father's blood." Still Broghill insisted on the desirability of the scheme, until Cromwell expressed his feelings about Charles in forceful language — " H e is so damnably debauched, he would undo us all." With that categoric statement he dismissed the whole question from further discussion, and no doubt put an end thereby to whatever hopes Broghill may have entertained for his own consummation of a political reconciliation. Thus came to nought the second of BroghilPs efforts to achieve a master stroke of political strategy. In August, 1657, Broghill crossed to Ireland for a visit which was somewhat prolonged by a recurrence of his former gouty attacks.96 B y the new year he was once more in London 97 to take his place among the sixty peers in the upper house of Cromwell's handpicked parliament, which opened in January, 1657/8.98 Not only did Cromwell hold Broghill in high esteem, but perhaps he came also to feel toward him a deep sense of personal gratitude, if the story be true that Broghill's watchful eye and quick action saved Cromwell from a would-be assassin on a certain coach ride from Westminster to Whitehall.99 Once the former royalist had sworn allegiance to the great Puritan leader, he served him faithfully and well until the Protector's death. A genuine regard for Cromwell and a selfish ambition for power and position combined to dictate a constant loyalty in view of the gratifying patronage he received from high Puritan circles in general. After Cromwell's decease Broghill again made a trip to Munster,100 but returned for the assembling of the new parliament in January, 1658/9. Richard Cromwell reappointed him to his position in the cabinet council, and sought his advice constantly in the troubled days which followed the convening of Parliament.101 Broghill continued to support the new Protector against the Commonwealth and Army parties until these latter forced Cromwell to abdicate his office early in May, 1659. Then Broghill, shorn of all political power by this change, returned the same month into Munster 102 to watch from there the direction of the political currents and make his next move accordingly. 98 98 100 102

Thurloe, op. cit., vi, 468, 661. Whitelock, op. cit., iv, 314. Egmont Mss., 1, 600. Egmont Mss., 1, 604.

97 99 101

Ibid., 710. Morrice, op. cit., 26. Ludlow, Memoirs, 11, 61.

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For a while after his return to Ireland Broghill abstained from any notable political activity, but he was only biding his time. B y the fall of 1659 he had decided apparently to establish tentative relations with the army group in Scotland under General George Monk, who were then aiming to overthrow the Rump and establish a free parliament. Broghill, always at heart a royalist, presumably perceived that the Monk party was tending toward conciliatory measures and would eventually determine to bring back Charles. In any case, he made what was evidently an initial overture by means of a friendly letter to General Monk in early November. The politic move is revealed by Monk's reply, hitherto unrecorded, dated Dalkeith [Scotland], November 23, 1659:103 M y Lord, I recd yo r Lo : p p e s Letter Dated the 19 th instant, wherein yo r Lo : p p e is pleased to give mee thanks for that which I doe not deserve, and truly my Lord I Honour you much, and am sorry to heare of yo r Resolution to Leave off publique imployment, which if such Men as you should doe before thinges be setled itt would bee a meanes to Leave thinges soe unsetled that itt might putt us together by the Eares: Therfore I must desire you if there bee a parliament that you will please to bee a member therof, and nott to have any thoughte of Leaving off action till thinges bee better setled, and I shall bee glad when I see that day to bee yo r Neighbour and live a Country Life with you, I humbly thanke you for the care you have of my Kinsman, I shall intreate you to present my Service to my Lord Lieutenant. . . . I prayse God, All thinges heere are quiett & well, for the forces here trouble themselves neither with petitioning businesse nor States businesse, butt how to make our Monie hold out till wee gett more: w ch is all att present from Yo r Lo: p p e s very affectionate humble servant George Monck.

Whether influenced by this letter or not, Broghill did not give up "public employment" but on the contrary became a more zealous adherent of the Monk party in Ireland. In conjunction with similar movements in Connaught under Sir Charles Coote, in Ulster under Colonel Georges, and in Dublin under Sir Hardress Waller, Broghill secured Munster for the Monk party during December, 1659.104 Then he went to Dublin to confer with the other leaders and signed his name to a manifesto of January 11, 1659/60, which expressed allegiance and service to the cause of General George Monk and a free parliament.105 103 104 105

Harvard College Library Ms. Eng. 218.22 F — a holograph. Clarke Papers, iv, 203. Ibid., 243.

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On his return to Munster the end of the month 106 he undertook on his own responsibility a political move from which he unquestionably expected to gain fame and credit. He drew up a letter which on behalf of the officers of the army in Munster extended an invitation to Charles II to come thither and promised him their loyal support in such action as he might take for his restoration to the throne. This letter he himself signed first and foremost, and then procured a dozen or so other prominent signatures. By the last of February he saw it despatched to Charles at Breda in the care of his younger brother, Francis Boyle, later Viscount Shannon.107 A t the same time he was playing the game of cooperation with his colleagues in the north. On February 18 his name was prominently affixed to a public declaration by the army in Munster for a free parliament.108 Meanwhile Broghill's clever piece of epistolary advertising was on its way to the exiled king, but on its arrival at Breda the invitation which it contained was not, of course, considered seriously by Charles, since the negotiations with General Monk were so far advanced as to indicate his early restoration by Parliamentary procedure.109 These negotiations were indeed speedily concluded, and resulted in Charles' restoration by Parliament on May 8, and his triumphal entry into London on his thirtieth birthday, May 29, 1660. This swift turn of affairs was probably in one way a grievous disappointment to Broghill, for his political ambitions had been again thwarted. B y his recent machinations in Ireland he quite evidently had had some hope of putting himself at the head of an organized movement, supported by the presence and participation of Charles, to reestablish the Stuart monarchy. Thus for the third time his dreams of leadership in the achievement of royal restoration came to nought. Thanks to his own careful and calculated efforts, however, Broghill's various services to the royal cause always had been brought to the notice of the new monarch during the past years of royal hardship. Therefore His Majesty after his accession was strongly disposed to show Broghill such marks of favor as the readjustment of political conditions would make possible. Under happy auspices, therefore, Broghill went to England during the summer of 1660 to greet and congratulate the sovereign on behalf of the Irish convention, which in May had elected him one of the three commissioners for affairs in Ireland.110 After his arrival in London honor and 10» 107 109

Harvard Coll. Lib. Ms. Eng. 218.22 F. Monice, op. cit., 31-32. Morrice, op. cit., 31-32.

108 110

Thurloe, op. cit., vn, 817. Egmont Mss., 1, 611.

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office were quickly bestowed upon him. On September 5 the King created him Earl of Orrery, and on October xo, Lord President of Munster Province. A t the same time he was called into the privy councils of both England and Ireland. Finally, by royal patent of December 3 1 , he was constituted one of the three lord justices for Ireland, who were to rule that country temporarily as its supreme administrative officers. B y these numerous appointments Orrery was assured of Charles' warm appreciation; but such rewards did not really altogether assuage his disappointment at the earlier shifts of political fortune. These had prevented him from rendering services so unusual as to give him a permanent place among the select circle of court statesmen. During the fall and early winter of 1660 Orrery's associations with Charles I I and his courtiers grew very close, partly because he seems to have gained to a marked degree the personal liking of the King, and partly because he figured largely in the many consultations at Whitehall over official matters relating to Ireland. Orrery soon made his way into those informal gatherings about the " M e r r y Monarch" when only a small group of intimates were in attendance. On such occasions Charles I I delighted in the companionship of witty and sparkling gallants like Lord Buckhurst, the Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Rochester, the Earl of Bristol, and Sir Charles Sedley. 111 Another of the favorites was a groom of His Majesty's bed-chamber, Thomas Killigrew, " a merry droll," 112 who, it may be recalled, through his sister's marriage had family connections with Orrery. Because a dilettante interest in the pursuit of the Muses was an important stock in trade with these royal companions, the conversation of a friendly party assembled in the King's chamber naturally turned often to the topic of the drama. The London playhouses were once again offering regular performances. Killigrew had been busy all summer and fall in organizing a company of actors who should bear the King's name. Talk of the stage was indeed much in the air the last months of 1660. Since Charles and many of his boon friends among the nobility had been enjoying the entertainments of the French theatre for over a decade and had developed in that space sympathetic tastes for its modes and practices, the relative merits of the French and the English drama became an important topic for discussion. One point in particular provoked attention and argument. The serious French plays were composed in Alexandrine, or iambic hexameter, verse, with couplet rime, whereas the English 111 m

Cf. Pepys' Diary, July 27, 1661. Ibid., May 24, 1660.

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plays of a similar kind had not customarily used rimed verse to any considerable extent. The King and at least some of his intimates had been much pleased by the sound of the end rime in French dialogue and consequently began to question whether English plays could not regularly employ rimed lines with an equally pleasing effect. Over this point a lively argument was held by a group of courtiers who waited on Charles II one day toward the close of 1660.113 Orrery evidently took a prominent part in urging that the innovation was possible and desirable. The King finally suggested to Orrery that he make the experiment and compose a play in rimed verse. The circumstances of this debate, which was responsible for the subsequent dramatic activity of Orrery, are described as follows by Thomas Morrice, his chaplain: King Charles was the first, who put my lord upon writing plays, which his majesty did upon occasion of a dispute, that arose in his royal presence about writing plays in rhyme: some affirmed it was not to be done; others said it would spoil the fancy to be so confined, but Lord Orrery was of another opinion; and his majesty being willing a trial should be made, commanded his lordship to employ some of his leisure that way, which my lord readily did.114

A little over a year following this memorable incident Orrery briefly alludes to it in these words: When I had the Honnor, & unhappyness the Last Time to Kiss his majts hande, he Commanded me, to write a Play for Him; . . . And therfore . . . I Presumed to lay at his majts Feet, a Trage-Comedi, All in Ten Feet verse, & Ryme. I writt it, in that manner . . . because I found his maj t y Relish'd rather, the French Fassion of Playes, then the English. . . ,115

With the royal injunction in mind, Orrery left London for Ireland on December 14.116 He landed at Cork the end of the month 117 and was sworn in as a lord justice of Ireland at Dublin on January 17, 1660/1.118 In the following months he suffered a severe attack of the gout, from which he did not recover until May. 119 During this extended period of enforced quiet he seems to have employed himself in the composition of a play in rime. Henceforth it was at times when an attack of the gout confined him that he did the greatest part 113 In view of the opening sentence of Orrery's letter of January, 1661/2, hereafter quoted, the date of this argument could not have been long before Orrery's departure for Ireland in December, 1660. 114 Op. cit., 39. 115 Β. M . Add. Ms. 37206, f. 54. 116 Carte Ms. 31, f. 216. 117 Β. M . Add. Ms. 37206, f. 14. 118 J. Warburton, A Hist, of City of Dublin, 1, 33. 119 Β. M . Add. Ms. 37206, f. 20.

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of his playwriting. This fact became common knowledge in London literary circles. Dryden as early as 1664 alludes to it in glowing terms: The Muses have seldom employed your thoughts, but when some violent fit of the gout has snatched you from affairs of state; and, like the priestess of Apollo, you never come to deliver his oracles, but unwillingly and in torment. So that we are obliged to your lordship's misery for our delight. . . . Other men endure their diseases; your lordship only can enjoy them.120

John Crowne, a fellow playwright, also makes particular comment about Orrery's habits of dramatic composition: And what a fit of the gout snatches from the use and benefit, your lordship takes care to employ to the delight and pleasure of the world; and if your lordship can do all this upon the rack of pain and with some glances of your thoughts, whil'st the rest like scattered rays of light, are dispersed on various objects; what would you do with all the freedom and ease of other men, and with all the united force of your soul? 121

During these periods of indisposition he was accustomed, if family tradition be correct, to dictate much of his composing to his eldest daughter, Elizabeth, who acted more or less in the capacity of a secretary.122 In the spring of 1661, then, Orrery probably finished his pioneer attempt at playwriting and sent off the experimental composition in rimed verse to Charles for his perusal and judgment. The King so much approved that he put it into the hands of Thomas Killigrew, the manager of his company of players, with the intention that the latter should act it at some future date. When Sir William D'Avenant, however, heard that the rival troupe had secured this dramatic novelty written by a prominent personage, he realized that they possessed a possible theatrical " h i t " with which he ought to be able to compete by a similar play at his own house. Therefore he quickly got in touch with his old friend, Orrery, and requested that the latter supply him with a piece of the same sort. Orrery could not fail to be pleased and flattered by this evident eagerness to obtain for production the maiden products of his pen, and hence undertook to satisfy D'Avenant by starting a second play at the opening of 1662. Thus stood matters when Orrery wrote 123 concerning his dramatic The dedicatory preface to The Rival Ladies. The dedicatory preface to Juliana (1671). See notes by John Boyle, fifth Earl of Orrery, in Appendix A. 123 Β. M. Add. Ms. 37206, f. 54 — the holograph letter. This letter is printed with textual errors and revised spelling in A Collection of the State Letters of the Right Honourable Roger Boyle, etc. (London, 1742), 38-39. 120 m

m

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activities to the Duke of Ormonde, the recently appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who was still residing at London : May it Please your Grace, When I had the Honnor, & unhappyness the Last Time to Kiss his majts hande, he Commanded me, to write a Play for Him; I did not scruple therin to evidence my great weakness; since therby I did evidence, the Greater Obedience. And therfore som months [M'C] I Presumed to lay at his majts Feete, a TrageComedi, All in Ten Feet verse, & Ryme. I writt it, in that manner upon two accounts; First, because I thought it was not fit, a Command soe Extraordinary, should have bin obeyd in a way that was Common; Secondly, because I found his majty Relish'd rather, the French Fassion of Playes, then the English. I had just grounds to beleeve, at least Feare, that my Play would have bin thought fitter for the Fire, then the Theater; but his majts mercy having condemn'd it only to the Latter; & then giveinge it to be Acted, by Mr. Killegrews Company; my old Frend Will: D'Avenant, apperd soe Displeasd his Company mist it; That noethinge could Reconcile me to him; but to write another purposely for him; Therfore ye last, & this weeke, haveinge gotten som few houres to my selfe from my Publik Dutye; I Dedicated thos, to Please my Particular Frend, And writt this unpolished Draft of two Actes; I Know noe man can better Discover Faults, or will sooner forgive them, then yo r G: & therfore upon both these scores, I humbly Present you, with what I have writt, & as cheerfully & Rationally choose you for my Judge. The Plot is such, that I wish you could but as much like ye rest of ye Play, as I flatter my self you will like That, when by the Finisshing of what is begun, you will know it; And that yo r G: may have som gess at it; I will tell you heere, that Acorces, is Romira in Disguise. In the speeches & Discourse, of Duell honor [sic], Jellosy, Revenge, Love, & Envy, I have Carefully Declyn'd sayinge any thinge, I had ever heard, or Read on any of thos subiects; that if ye conceptions of them should not please you, the newness of them might. The Humour of Hilas, of wh: yo r Gr will see som Touches, in the beginninge of ye Second Acte, shall be enterwoven, if yo r G : dislike it not, in every of the Three remayninge; Tho I dispaire to make my Hilas, as Famous on the Theater, as the Marquis of Urfé, has made his, in the Romance; for besides his Genius'es beinge exceedingly above myne, his Hilas, was not limitted, to numbers, & Ryme, as mine is. But tho I showe my weaknesses to yo r G: yet I humbly beg, they may be seene, by none, but you; who I hope will beleeve, I will conceale noethings from you, since those are by choyce exposd now to yo r sight by May it Please yo r G: Dublin ye 23 of Jan: 61

Yo r G: s most humble most faithfull & most afft Devoted servt Orrery

Orrery did not wait however to learn of Ormonde's opinion on the initial portion of his second play, but proceeded to complete the piece early in the next month. Then he at once dispatched the concluding three acts to London. He remarks to Ormonde in a letter of February 26: " I have presented about a fortnight since to yo r Grace

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ye whole Play. . . ." 124 Thus by February, 1661/2, Orrery had written and sent to London two serious plays which aimed particularly to demonstrate the advantages of rime in English dramatic verse. They were the pioneer examples which speedily initiated for the London stage the fashion of rimed dialogue in imitation of French practice. Further news of these two plays is contained in correspondence of the following year. On February 26, 1662/3, Charles II wrote what was apparently his first personal letter to Orrery since his restoration, a letter 125 which he concludes thus: I will now tell you, that I have read your first play, which I like very well, and doe intend to bring it upon the Stage, as Soone as m y Company have their new Stage in order, that the Seanes m a y bee worthy the words they are to sett forth. For the last I have onely seene in m y Lord Leuit: hand, but will reade it, a s soone as I have leasure.

I h a v e noe more to say to you at present, but to

assure you I am Your very affectionat Frend Charles R

Highly gratified of course at his sovereign's missive, Orrery made the following reply: 126 T h a t m y first play has the Great honor to be liked b y your M a t y is the highest and onely end I could Ambition in writeing of it.

T h e second play which m y

Lord L* has Acquainted your M a t y with, I flatter m y selfe will be less unworthy of your M a t i e B pardon, then the former. T h e plott, humors, and discourses in it, being more proportionate to the Genius of those who frequent the Theater, then the other; A n d because your M a t y is pleased so far to descend as to let me know you will honor it with your perusall, A n d that what I sent M y Lord L ' is loose sheetes as I writt it, I will presume to send it in one Booke to Mr. Progers

127

to

b e layd b y him at your M a t y e s Feete. . . .

Orrery had written this second play ostensibly for D'Avenant. Y e t he had placed it first in the hands of Ormonde, and, a year later, presumably sent a copy to the King, while there is no evidence to show that he ever presented a manuscript of the play directly to D'Avenant. Apparently he changed his mind about its disposition and decided to write a third play to satisfy the request of D'Avenant. The references to the content of the second play, which are contained in Orrery's letter to Ormonde of January 23, 1661/2, prove clearly that this composition was never produced by D'Avenant and that it is not one of the still existing dramatic works of the Earl of Orrery. m m 126 127

Ibid., f. 74. Ibid., f. 108 — a transcript. Ibid., f. 109 — a transcript without date or salutation. Edward Progers, a groom of His Majesty's bed-chamber.

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Like the first play, the second was also a tragi-comedy in rimed verse with the same sentiments of "duel, honor, jealousy, revenge, love, and envy." One of the devices in the plot was the disguise of a woman, Romira, as a man, Acorces. There was also a leading character named Hilas, who was somewhat fashioned after the figure of the Don Juan-like, lustful, inconstant lover with the same name in Honoré D'Urfé's famous romance, L'A sir êe. This lost Orrery play, his second in order of composition, has never been recorded by dramatic historians of the Restoration period. Though the second play has mysteriously disappeared, the first did not suffer the same fate. Yet its identity among the existing Orrery pieces has long remained an unsolved question. According to the correspondence already cited, Orrery's first play was slated for production by the King's company some time after they should have "their stage in order," i.e. the stage of the Theatre Royal in Bridges Street, which first opened its doors to the public on May 7, 1663. Orrery's first play was therefore to appear sooner or later at the new "King's House." Now the initial Orrery production at that house was The Generali in September, 1664.128 The Generali had been licensed for performance by the Master of the Revels some time previous to November 3, 1663,129 so that it was very evidently in Killigrew's hands at least by the fall of 1663. In the spring of that year Killigrew had in his possession Orrery's first play, not yet licensed for acting. This piece and The Generali seem therefore beyond reasonable doubt to be one and the selfsame play. Additional support for this identification is offered by the title of The Generali, which reads "The Generali: a Tragi-Comedy" both in the existing manuscript and in the modernized reprint by Halliwell-Phillips of another manuscript now unlocated. It will be remembered that Orrery in his letter to Ormonde, dated January 23, 1661/2, called his first play specifically " a tragi-comedy, all in ten feet verse and rime." In the light of this statement the presence of the term "tragi-comedy" as part of the titling of The Generali points significantly toward the latter as Orrery's first play. The evidence, however, afforded by the text of The Generali appears decisive. Its language is strikingly plain and its rimed verse extremely crude in comparison with the polish and the smoothness of the lines in Orrery's Henry the Fifth and subsequent plays. The action demands only the simplest sort of staging and aims in no way to produce the striking scenic effects which Orrery introduced into 128 129

See the stage history of The Generali for details. The Dramatic Records of Sir Henry Herbert (ed. by J. Q. Adams), 138.

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his other pieces — for example, the coronation scene in Henry the Fifth, the execution scene in Mustapha, the court masque in The Black Prince. Finally, the stage directions show for a certainty that The Generali was written before Orrery was acquainted with the new Restoration method of staging which employed scene flats and proscenium curtain.130 This technique he learned after the Smock Alley Theatre opened at Dublin in October, 1662. All the textual indications, therefore, are that The Generali was an earlier composition than Orrery's other plays, and that it was written before the fall of 1662. In view of the foregoing evidence, external and internal, The Generali would seem conclusively identified as Orrery's maiden dramatic effort and hence written in the early part of 1661.131 Consequently, to The Generali should go the important historical honor of being the earliest composition among the acted plays of Restoration authorship. Although Orrery wrote The Generali with the particular purpose of pleasing the King by the novel dialogue in heroic couplets, he was of course none the less careful that the play as a whole should be of the kind to tickle the fancy of Charles II and his court. That court he found by his sojourn in London during the latter half of 1660 to be a fairly close imitation, in its atmosphere and interests, of the more brilliant court in which for a brief space he had played the gallant so successfully some twenty years before. While the once imported cult of Platonic love and précieuse sentiment no longer flourished as a popular court fashion, still that Caroline fad had left its impress upon the Whitehall coterie, many of whom had been also present in its heyday. Conversation and fancy continued to dally with the topic of love, though preciosity was now much less intriguing and carnality more openly ascendent. A vivid description of court tastes and interests is contained in the letter of a French hanger-on, Denis De Repas, whose keen and witty comments ought to be lifted from their present complete obscurity. He writes as follows: For news from Court I shall tell you that one cannot possibly know a woman from a man, unless one hath the eyes of a linx who can see through a wall, for by See explanatory notes to The Generali for detailed evidence. m without regard to the facts of Orrery's life up to 1642, or of his earliest playwriting, Professor Allardyce Nicoli in his History of Restoration Drama (ed. 1928, p. 379) makes the statement, backed by no added evidence whatsoever, that " there is undoubtedly a possibility" that The Generali may be the Dublin play of the same title, for which James Shirley wrote the prologue included in his 1646 volume of poems, and that if such is the case The Generali "must have seen its première not in 1662, but before 1642." 130

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the face and garbe they are like men. T h e y do not weare any hood, but only men's perwick hatts and coats. There is no othere plague here but the infection of love; no other discourse but of ballets, dance, and fine clouse; no other emulation but who shall look the handsomere, and whose vermillion and spanish white is the best; none other fight then for " I am yours." In a word there is nothing here but mirth, and there is a talk that there shall be a proclamacon made that any melancholy man or woman coming into this towne shall be turned out and put to the pillory, and there to be whep till he hath learned the way to be mary a la mode. . . . 1 3 2

With this picture coincides the striking summary of Whitehall life and speech from the pen of one of the grooms of the royal bedchamber, Herbert Price, who remarks in an unprinted letter: "There is noethinge soe constant in Court as love: it was, is, and will be." 133 Of the court absorption in the theme of love Orrery was fully aware, and obviously sought to cater to it by the manner in which he patterned the dramatic toy presented to Charles II in 1661. His courtly public were more or less continually engaged in a fleshly game of love with its veneer of sentimental refinements. Therefore, to attract their admiring attention, he designed The Generali to be, above all else, the representation of a love duel conducted along the most scrupulously pure lines, and he concentrated especially upon the depiction of the discipline administered to the minds and emotions of the principal actors by their faithful allegiance to love, which is conceived as a metaphysical passion that finds its deepest happiness in the intangible rewards of spiritual merit. Orrery might well have looked upon his own creation and said what one of his contemporaries confessed at a later date to his audience : Y e t 'tis such Love as you've scarce met before, Such L o v e I'm sure as English ground ne'er bore.134

So large does the ritual of this love bulk in the material of The Generali, and so far-reaching is its effect upon the form in which the dramatic conflict is presented, that Orrery's pioneer composition marks the appearance of a new species of serious drama. The leading figures in love's service, which involves continual obedience to the dictates of virtue or its synonym, honor, are a hero and a heroine, both extraordinarily distinguished for their ethical and physical attainments. Their relations with each other, and with the lesser characters who are drawn into love's orbit, are impres132 133 134

Portland. Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1894), m, 293. Bodl. Bibl. Carte Ms. 32, f. 107. Epilogue to Elkanah Settle's Ibrahim (1675).

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sively marked by numerous disputes over the respective obligations of love and honor. Not only these disputes but the whole dialogue is composed in a verse of heroic couplets. Thus the theme, the characterization, the form of dialogue, and the style of language in Orrery's maiden piece constitute the basic elements of that new dramatic type born in the Restoration era and soon denoted by the name of "heroic play." In vièw of its composition during the early months of 1661, The Generali may therefore be termed the first fullfledged "heroic play." 135 As such it deserves much wider recognition than it has received from students of Restoration drama, who, if they have been directly acquainted with the play, have simply thought it a piece of little artistic merit. Probably during the summer of 1661 The Generali made its appearance in manuscript at Whitehall. After the King had read the play, the court " w i t s " undoubtedly had a chance to peruse it. Then a wider circulation may have come about through the customary making of copies by interested persons. The King's liking for Orrery's unique creation instigated the introduction of the heroic couplet and of disputative scenes concerned with love vs. honor, as new fashions in dramatic expression. Sir William D'Avenant, who had already "begun to shadow," according to Dryden, certain qualities of the " heroic play" in his "opera," The Siege of Rhodes, made a slight but obvious attempt to follow Orrery's lead in his first legitimate drama. Into a revised version of his Caroline play, Love and Honour, he inserted a disputative passage of almost fifty lines in rimed couplets and presented his revision on the Duke's stage in October of 1661.136 The interpolated speeches occur during the second scene of the fifth act,137 and constitute a portion of dialogue strikingly different from the surrounding text, in tone as well as in 135 D'Avenant's The Siege of Rhodes, as it was produced in June, 1661, is often mistakenly called the first "heroic play," because of Dryden's remarks in his essay Of Heroic Plays. Dryden, however, is careful not to term it an "heroic p l a y , " but " t h e first light " of the species. Professor Dent's supposition (Foundations of English Optra, 77 n.) that this " o p e r a " was given after the Restoration in ordinary dramatic form is easily controverted by the diaries of Pepys and Evelyn, which evidence time and again that the piece was distinctly a musical entertainment. D'Avenant's Playhouse to be Let (1663) also emphasizes the "stilo recitativo" of The Siege of Rhodes. Professor Allardyce Nicoli in his History of Restoration Drama has called attention to an obscure piece of closet drama, a tragedy in heroic rime, The Heroic Lover, or, The Infanta of Spain, by an unknown George Cartwright of Fulham. Though this play was published at London some time in 1661, the author states in a preface that it was penned " m a n y years ago," i.e. presumably a decade. I t contains several close resemblances in form and material to the Restoration "heroic plays," but obviously it is a sporadic and academic effort, significant only as an early forerunner of shifting dramatic trends. 136 137

Pepys' Diary, October 21, 1661. 1673 ed.

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form. The suitors, Alvaro, Lionell, and Prospero, carry on an argument with the objects of their love, Evandra and Melora. That argument in its sentiment and its epigrammatic style of language is strongly reminiscent of certain debates in The Generali. The next to imitate Orrery's innovations were Charles' witty intimates, Lord Buckhurst, Sir Charles Sedley, Sir Edward Fillmore, and Edmund Waller, who undertook in company a translation of Corneille's Pompey and finished the work before the end of 1662.138 This translation is wholly in couplets and is filled with disputative scenes. Late in 1662 also,139 another hanger-on at court, Sir Samuel Tuke, hoping to attract to himself the King's favor and esteem, completed the adaptation of a Spanish tragi-comedy entitled The Adventures of Five Hours, parts of which were written in rime. The most prominent passage is to be found toward the close of the second act where the hero, Octavio, tries to persuade his friend, Antonio, not to accompany him to Porcia's house. The argument takes the form of a verbal duel interspersed with high sentiment and couched in some twenty lines of heroic verse.140 Tuke was striving to imitate on a small scale the mode of dialogue Orrery had brought into considerable favor at court. Thus during 1661 and 1662 there are recorded these three significant intimations that the new dramatic style to be noted in The Generali was winning increasing attention and support in Whitehall circles. Until the Duke of Ormonde finally reached Dublin in July, 1662, to assume the powers of lord lieutenant, Orrery as a lord justice continued at the head of affairs in Ireland. When Ormonde arrived at Dublin, however, Orrery could not welcome him in person, because a severe attack of gout compelled him to remain quietly at Newtown in Munster,141 from where he was superintending the construction not far away of a new family estate. In December, 1661, he had written to Ormonde: " I am now buildinge a house for my self in Munster of wh: I am ye Architect." 142 As a result of his inopportune illness, Orrery in absentia had to give up the sword of office to Ormonde on July 28, and consequently sent an appropriate speech to be read on this occasion.143 By the middle of August, however, he had come up to Dublin,144 and thereafter played a leading part in the 138 139 140 141 14ΐ 143 114

Letters of Orinda to Poliarchus (172g), 108. See Evelyn's Diary, December 23, 1662. 1663 ed., 23. State Papers (Ireland), vol. 310, f. 167. Β. M. Add. Ms. 37206, f. 42. Sloane Ms. 1008, f. 185, preserves the text of this speech. See Letters of Orinda to Poliarchus (1729), 60.

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political and social doings of the capital until the following spring. He seems to have made his residence in Thomas Court, a " l i b e r t y " located in St. Catharine's parish on the southwestern outskirts of the city. 145 Thomas Court comprised the buildings and site of the once famous Abbey of St. Thomas the Martyr, which during the reign of Henry V I I I was confiscated and given to the Brabazon family, later the Earls of Meath, for secular purposes.145 Speed's iconographie map of Dublin in 1610 depicts, not far from St. Catharine's Church, " S . Thomas Court," a large, somewhat rectangular area, bounded on three sides by rows of buildings and by a wall on the fourth, and entered by two gateways at diagonally opposite corners.146 It may be remembered that Viscount Falkland, the lord deputy of Ireland who knighted Orrery as Lord Broghill in 1628, lived in Thomas Court. 147 Quite evidently at least one commodious residence fit for a nobleman existed among the old abbey precincts. Orrery may have occupied what had once been the Falkland home. Perhaps it was in the frater, or great hall, of the former abbey that on October 18,1662, he gave a large reception for the new lord lieutenant, to which were invited all the notable personages of the town. It was a gala affair with an elaborate banquet followed by the performance of a play from the pen of the host. The playwright had become producer under his own roof! This brilliant social event was thus reported by Mercurius Politicus, the London newsbook, in the following week: Dublin, Oct. 21. On the 18. at evening the Lord Lieutenant and most of the persons of Honor in these parts were entertained by the Earle of Orery at Thomas Court where his Lordship treated them with a noble Banquet and a Play of his own making. 148

The play with which Orrery entertained his distinguished guests that Saturday evening in October, 1662, seems to have been none other than the piece he had presented a year before to the King as an experiment in rimed verse, namely, The Generali. However, on the occasion of this private production, its first stage appearance, the title was given as Alternera.149 The presentation of The Generali, or Alternera, in Thomas Court 146 Cal. Ancient Records of Dublin (Dublin, 1889), 1, 199; J. Warburton, Bist. City of Dublin (1818), I, 319. 146 See The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine . . . Ireland and the Isles adjoining, London, 1611-12. 117 Lismore Papers (ist series), πι, i. 148 Β. Μ. E 195, no. 140. This important item was discovered and communicated to me by Dr. J. Leslie Hotson. 148 See notes on The Generall's stage history, prefaced to its text, for detailed evidence and discussion.

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on October 18, 1662, under the auspices of the author, was an event of considerable historical significance. It was not only the first production in Ireland of a Restoration drama, but it marked also the maiden performance of an "heroic play," preceding by more than a year the original London production, that of The Indian Queen in January, 1663/4, at the Theatre Royal. Thus, in its staging as well as in its composition, The Generali, or Alternera, is revealed as the pioneer example of that popular dramatic species. Finally, Dublin rather than London must be accorded the honor of being both the literary and the stage birthplace of the "heroic play." After this opening venture in private theatricals Orrery continued his activity as a producer. He took the lead in staging Pompey, Corneille's play translated into English couplets by Katharine Phillips. The latter had become acquainted with Orrery soon after her arrival at Dublin in July, 1662, and had shown him one scene of rimed translation.150 A t his enthusiastic urging she then finished the play. Orrery made very elaborate arrangements for its production at the new Smock Alley Theatre. From various Dublin friends he procured songs to accompany several of the scenes : from his nephew, the Earl of Roscommon, a prologue; and from Sir Edward Dering, an epilogue. Then, in order to provide fine costumes for the actors, he "advanced a 100 Pounds towards the Expense of buying Roman and Egyptian Habits." 151 Pompey was finally given its première on the Smock Alley stage with great éclat early in February, 1662/3, a n d received much applause.152 Although Orrery thus proved himself a highly successful theatrical promoter, he evidently felt content to retire with the laurels now won. There is no record of any subsequent effort on his part in connection with the Irish theatre. Meanwhile Orrery had not forgotten his friendly commission to write a play in rime for D'Avenant, and had been engaged on a piece to fulfill that obligation. This, his third composition, is undoubtedly Henry the Fifth. Prior to November 3, 1663,163 the Master of the Revels had granted D'Avenant a license for the production of Henry the Fifth, so that D'Avenant must have received the play from Orrery by the fall of 1663 at the latest. In fact, there is good reason to believe that Orrery finished the writing of Henry the Fifth and forwarded the manuscript to his friend toward the end of 1662. In the Preface to Orrery's Dramatic Works (1739) is preserved an excerpt from an undated letter, which seems to refer to Henry the 150 161 163

tetters of Orinda to Poliarchus (1729), 60. 162 Ibid. Ibid., 115. The Dramatic Records of Sir Henry Herbert (Adams), 138.

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Fifth and to offer indications regarding the date of its completion. Orrery writes as follows to a friend at court whose name is not recorded : I have now finished a P l a y in the French Manner; because I heard the K i n g declare himself more in favour of their W a y of Writing than ours: M y poor A t t e m p t cannot please his M a j e s t y , but m y Example m a y incite others who can: Sir William D a v e n a n t will have it acted about Easter.

A n d as it is wrote in a

new W a y , he m a y possibly take Confidence to invite the K i n g to see it; which if his M a j e s t y should condescend to, and if you at the same time should wait on him thither, I intreat you, do not let him know who is the Author of the Play, unless you have double Assurance, that he does not dislike it. 154

It appears clear that Orrery must have written these words when the fashion of rimed couplets for dramatic dialogue — the French manner as he calls it — still needed explanation for its being, and when plays thus written were yet dramatic novelties to those about Charles II's court. Hence the remarks were presumably penned before the end of January, 1664, by which time Dryden and Howard's The Indian Queen had been staged and had thoroughly advertised the new mode to the London beau monde. Moreover, Orrery's letter, since it specifically mentions D'Avenant as the producer, points to Henry the Fifth as the sole play to fit all the conditions of time and theatrical connection. Now the tenor of Orrery's remarks suggests, on the one hand, that his letter was dispatched after sufficient time had elapsed for D'Avenant to receive the new play and to report back on his probable plans for production; and, on the other hand, that the expected performance "about Easter" was not a far distant date, say a couple of months at most. Thus, if the foregoing inferences are correct, somewhere about the close of 1662 may be set as the approximate time that Orrery completed his literary labor for D'Avenant and sent Henry the Fifth to London to be acted at the Duke's Theatre. Evidently D'Avenant had promised a speedy production which failed to materialize. He even seems to have delayed a long while before securing a license for the play's performance, and then he forced the author to wait another year for its appearance on the boards. After Orrery had actively pursued his dramatic interests, both in composition and in stage production, at Dublin during the fall and winter season of 1662-63, he again retired by May, 1663,165 to the quiet of Newtown in Munster, whence he watched over the final stages in the construction of his family castle, Charleville. This child 154 166

Vol. I, p. v. State Papers (Ireland), vol. 313, f. 341.

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of his own architectural ingenuity he describes as follows; " This is an Castle, with a Court walled about it, wh is a Four square figgure, but very Irregular. Three sides of it has little old fashioned Flankers, such as most noblemen and gentlemens Houses have to this day, over all Ireland; the 4th side . . . is ye longest. . . ." 1 5 6 Elsewhere he speaks proudly of its imposing size and value: " I have also Built on my Estate in Ireland y e best howse in Ireland wch has cost me wthin little of Ten Thousand pounds though all y e Tymber . . . Stone and other chief Materialls were my owne." 157 Thus Charleville represented a huge investment in house building for those days. Such an outlay affords some indication of Orrery's great wealth after the Restoration. In December, 1663, Orrery occupied the new estate and informed Ormonde of the fact in a letter postscript of unusual interest: This 1 1 t h of Decem br from Charleville, wh is ye name som Godfathers have given ye new house I am now in, for ye foundation of it was L a y d ye 29 of M a y '61 [i.e. Charles II's birthday]. I hope by yo r Gs favor to get it made a Burrogh; & have ye Burrough beare y t name; it beinge now Called by ye heathenish name of Rathgoggane: I admitt, neither Presbiter, Papists, Independent, nor (as our Proclamation sayse) any other sorte of Phanatticks to Plow ther; but all good, old Protestants; and am settinge up manefacture of Linnen, & wollen clothes, & all other good trades.158

In these few sentences Orrery drew unwittingly a portrait of himself notable for the clarity with which it depicts the curious mixture of the conservative and progressive in his nature. On the one hand, he displays, unlike most of the Anglo-Irish landlords at that time, a genuine concern for the economic upbuilding of the Irish community within his jurisdiction. In this connection he reveals an ability to organize practical methods for the actual attainment of improved conditions. Such qualities explain the intelligent statesmanship which he evidenced during the years of so-called reconstruction in Ireland after the Restoration. Frequently single-handed, he exerted a continual pressure upon persons of high authority in the national government to secure political and economic measures for the betterment of those people whom so many of his peers looked upon as almost aliens. On the other hand, Orrery shows himself by his remarks a keen partisan in the face of the religious divisions which hindered greatly the stability and prosperity of Ireland. He is obvi186 157 168

Stowe Ms. 200, f. 255. C. J. Phillips, A Hist, of the Sackville Family, 1, 431. B. M. Add. Ms. 37206, f. 124.

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ously a zealous extremist in his devotion to the cause of the Established Church, no doubt partly for political reasons, and partly by temperament and heritage. His attitude of pious conformity, at least in sight of his fellows, is excellently illustrated by the following sentence from a letter to Secretary Bennett under date of January, 1663/4: "However, tis a Cleere & indispensable Duty to Rest in ye Will of God & of ye Kinge wh is a Doctryne I inculcate into all, & shall still Practice." 159 As time went on, it will be noted that Orrery's care for the cause of Protestant orthodoxy in Ireland became so enthusiastic as to render him a fanatic in the eyes of his political acquaintances. Thus did his makeup contain conventionality and independence in striking juxtaposition. B y the spring of 1664 Orrery had determined to visit England on several accounts. For one thing, he was anxious to get his eldest son and namesake married. Indeed he had pretty well concluded negotiations on young Roger's behalf for the hand of Lord Falkland's granddaughter,160 but the match never came off. The Boyle heir finally married Mary Sackville, daughter of the Earl of Dorset, on February 6,1664/5. More important, however, than family business was political ambition. There was always lurking within Orrery a sense of jealousy at Ormonde's power, which at the moment quite eclipsed his own. He would like to turn the scales, but in order to shift the prevailing balance he would have to be in a position to carry on personal consultations with the monarch and his ministers over an extended period. Chicanery on the spot might accomplish what correspondence from a distance never could. The time now was ripe for a secret campaign to break the prestige of the lord lieutenant, for many Irish problems were pressing for settlement at London. Therefore Orrery informed Ormonde and others that numerous urgent requests from friends for his advice in person on various Irish matters had caused him to decide upon a sojourn in London.161 He went up to Dublin in April for conferences with Ormonde,162 and there gout seized him so violently that he was unable to reach England till late in June. 163 Meanwhile Ormonde, who had come to suspect Orrery's designs, departed for London in advance of his secretly scheming rival. Once established in town, Orrery was quick to renew acquaintance with Charles II. Some two weeks after his arrival he wrote to Vis159 180 181 lfa 183

State Papers (Ireland), vol. 316, f. 2. Egmont Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1909), n, 9. State Papers (Ireland), vol. 316, f. 141. Ibid,., f. 194. Ibid., f. 201.

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count Conway: " I had since my Cominge to Towne ye honour of a long Discourse alone with his Majty, & by his owne apointment." 164 The same friendly intimacy which in 1660 had existed between the two was easily reestablished. The ensuing months found Orrery a continual adviser to the King in matters of state and also his constant playfellow. An amusing glimpse of the close personal associations Orrery must have enjoyed with his royal master during that stay in London is interpolated, obviously for effect, in a letter to Ormonde on May 16, 1665: " T h e Kinge ye Spanish Ambassadour & yo r servant, had a battel at ombre yesterday in which I was victorious over both." 165 Orrery's presence in London stirred both D'Avenant and Killigrew to take speedy steps for the production, now long overdue, of the Orrery play each held in script. In August D'Avenant put Henry the Fifth on the boards, and the middle of September Killigrew countered with The Generali. The success of these two plays at once placed Orrery in the popular estimation at the forefront of contemporary dramatic poets. His pioneering in rimed verse was being talked about on all sides. The time therefore was most opportune for the young and ambitious John Dryden to dedicate to Orrery his recently acted tragi-comedy, The Rival Ladies, and perhaps thus influence the newest star on the literary horizon to shine upon him, the still struggling man of letters. Furthermore, since Dryden had used rimed verse in both The Indian Queen and The Rival Ladies, and evidently had met with criticism thereby, he was eager for a proper opportunity to defend himself in print. The publication of The Rival Ladies the same year gave him precisely the chance he desired. He well realized that the much acclaimed stage creations by Orrery, aided as they were by the author's personal prestige and by royal patronage, constituted in the eyes of the public the strongest arguments for the newly introduced usage of heroic couplets. Hence Dryden took the excellent occasion offered him to turn his dedication of The Rival Ladies into a critique upon the merits of rime in plays, and to gain added point and emphasis for his critique by addressing it to Orrery, whose example and achievement largely had paved the way for his own attempts in the new form of dialogue. Flattery, for once at least, led Dryden, toward the conclusion of this preface, to speak what was the probable truth on the whole matter: . . it is your lordship . . . who have much better commended this way by your writing in it, than I can do by writing for it. Where my reason 164 186

Ibid., vol. 317, part 1, f. 4. B. M. Add. Ms. 37206, f. 168.

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cannot prevail, I am sure your lordship's example must. Your rhetoric has gained my cause. . . ." 166 There can be little doubt that Dryden had read at least The Generali in manuscript before he began the composition of The Indian Queen or The Rival Ladies. His patron and intimate, Sir Robert Howard, with whom he was living in 1663,167 was a chief shareholder of the King's company and in a position to secure from Killigrew the script of any new play that came into the company's repertoire. The novel form of The Generali and the name of its author would naturally cause Howard to take pains to get hold of the manuscript after it reached Killigrew's hands. B y way of Howard then, if in no other manner, Dryden surely must have had opportunity to peruse the text of The Generali. In Act IV, Scene 1, of The Rival Ladies, Dryden introduces an extended debate in rimed couplets between the heroine, Julia, and Gonsalvo, one of her two lovers.168 Julia argues with Gonsalvo that to make her happiness in love possible he must retire voluntarily in favor of his rival, Roderigo, to whom Julia wishes to be betrothed. The situation is almost an exact counterpart of that closing scene in The Generali where Alternera insists she cannot be properly matched with Lucidor unless Clorimun willingly gives her to his rival. Clorimun finally yields all his claims to the hand of the fair heroine after her lofty appeals to honor and virtue have moved him to act with heroic grace. After the same fashion does Gonsalvo behave in The Rival Ladies. Moreover the lines and sentiments in the Julia-Gonsalvo argument fully echo the words and ethical ideas expressed in the Altemera-Clorimun debate of Act V and in their earlier discussion at the opening of Act III. Indeed the resemblance of Dryden's scene in its various details to Orrery's earlier efforts is so very close as to suggest that Dryden imitated quite directly some of the most effective passages in The Generali. In the dedicatory preface to The Rival Ladies there are seeming hints of a direct literary contact between Dryden and Orrery before Dryden's coming to London in the summer of 1664. But the servile exaggeration and extravagant flattery which permeate the dedication quite possibly distorted the truth concerning his previous connections with Orrery. Whatever the case, he took pains to interpolate into his essay the following remarks : . . . I have an argument, which is too advantageous for me not to publish it to the world. It is the kindness your lordship has continually shown to all my 166 Works (Scott and Saintsbury ed.), Ii, 139. 167 See my article in Mod. Lang. Notes, XLII, 16 ff. íes Works (Scott and Saintsbury ed.), 11, 188-191.

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writings. You have been pleased, my lord, they should sometimes cross the Irish seas, to kiss your hands. . . . Your favour has shone upon me at a remote distance, without the least knowledge of my person; and . . . you have done good, without knowing to whom you did it. It is this virtue in your lordship, which emboldens me to this attempt; for did I not consider you as my patron, I have little reason to desire you for my judge.169

These statements, on first thought, would almost appear to imply that Dryden had been in the habit of submitting various effusions to Orrery in Ireland for his examination and approval. Of course it is possible that such an avenue of patronage was actually opened to Dryden through Howard's good offices. Howard, as has been pointed out, was a cousin to Orrery. That some degree of intimacy existed between them is evidenced by Orrery's casual reference on one occasion to " m y old Frend Robin Howard." 170 Perhaps Howard by letter introduced his protégé to his famous Irish kinsman and asked the latter's consideration for the rising poet. As a result, some correspondence may have been exchanged between Dryden and Orrery during the years 1661-63. On the other hand, the particular remarks in question, like much of the remaining preface to The Rival Ladies, are more probably composed for purposes of self-advertisement. If this be so, they may be interpreted to indicate no more than that Dryden knew his published occasional poems to have met a favorable reception at Orrery's hands in Ireland. That fact alone would have afforded Dryden sufficient grounds to embroider the further assertions regarding the favor and kindness Orrery had shown towards his writings. When Dryden's preface is viewed as a whole, its consistently hyperbolic tone causes the impartial reader to discount considerably the author's remarks and to look upon his claim of definite patronage from Orrery as more likely the specious invention of his own self-seeking. The acclaim with which his heroic rimed plays, Henry the Fifth and The Generali, were received upon the London stage in the summer and fall of 1664 spurred Orrery to the composition of a fourth play of the same nature during his residence in the city the ensuing winter. This piece, which he entitled Mustapha, was placed with D'Avenant for production. The latter lost no time in bringing about its performance at the Duke's Theatre during the first week of April, 1665.171 Thus the author was able to enjoy in person the applause of town and court for his latest creation before an incursion of the 169 170 1,1

Ibid., 131. Β. M . Add. Ms. 37207, f. 202. Letter of Orrery to Ormonde, January 25, 1665/6. For details of stage history, see notes to Mustapha.

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plague put an end to theatrical activities at the beginning of June. That disruption spoiled his chance to view Mustapha acted in the new Whitehall playhouse with the more elaborate staging of a court performance which was then in preparation. In the spring of 1665 also, it has been suggested, yet another new play by Orrery, now supposed lost, appeared on the London stage.172 The sole basis for such a conjecture lies in a contemporary letter from Henry Savile to his brother, Sir George Savile, later Marquess of Halifax. Under heading of "London, May y e 4 th , 1665 " he writes as follows : I am come newly from my Lord of Orrery's new play called T h e Widow, whose character you will receive from better hands.

I will only say that one

part of it is the humour of a man that has great need to go to the dose stool, where there are such indecent postures as would never be suffered upon any stage but ours, which has quite turn'd the stomach of so squeamish a man as I am, that am used to see nothing upon a theatre that might not appear in the ruelle of a fine lady. 173

Now a number of forceful considerations militate against the correctness of this statement concerning a new Orrery play called The Widow. To begin with, there is absolutely no record of any sort that Orrery was ever concerned with a dramatic composition of the title or content noted. For an acted play by so important a public personage to pass into complete oblivion except for this casual epistolary reference is extremely improbable. Furthermore, the date of the observed performance of The Widow follows within a month the première of Mustapha. It is most unlikely that Orrery in the midst of his constant political and social activity at London during the winter of 1664-65 would have pressed himself to the writing of two plays in rapid succession. And the possibility of his completion of a play in the winter of 1663-64 before he left Ireland is quite remote, for he was settling into his newly finished castle, Charleville, during that period. Finally, Savile's description of the supposed Orrery creation reveals a kind of drama which it may be said with almost absolute certainty Orrery would never compose. None of his work shows the slightest vulgarity of speech or action. Lewdness or obscenity are scarcely conceivable in connection with his literary efforts. The scrupulous nicety of his two extant comedies in comparison with the accepted Restoration or Elizabethan specimen is altogether notable. On the other hand, Savile's remarks about The Widow correspond in 17s

See article by W. J. Lawrence in T. L. S., October 18, 1928, p. 755. Savile Correspondence (Camden Soc. Ser., 1858), 4.

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closely in their general tenor to John Evelyn's comment on a play of the same title from the pen of Thomas Middleton and others. On January 16, 1661/2, Evelyn notes in his diary: "This night was acted before his Maty 'The Widow,' a lewd play." Middleton's comedy was one of the old plays in the regular repertoire of the King's company. Pepys saw a revival of The Widow on January 8, 1660/1. The vulgar behavior detailed by Savile does not agree precisely, to be sure, with any to be noted in the Elizabethan piece, but some of the action in Act IV, Scene 2, might well give rise in the mind of an inattentive spectator to memories like those of Savile. The scene is a room of the Cross Inn, where a quack, Latrocinio, conducts examinations of certain of his victims possessed with diverse ailments. The antics of Silvio, in particular, who suffers supposedly from hernia in scrotum, might be interpreted as the indecent postures which so impressed Savile, though other patients at the Cross Inn also perform acts of a questionable nicety. Probably, then, what Savile saw was a revival of Middleton's vulgar comedy. He is to be presumed but a casual theatregoer, for there is no other reference to dramatic productions in his extant correspondence. Quite conceivably he went to the theatre on that May afternoon expecting to see performed Lord Orrery's very recent success, Mustapha, of which he had heard much talk about town, and he was too ignorant of current dramatic matters to realize that the piece actually staged on that day was not the Orrery drama. Even Pepys, the well-informed theatregoer, shows himself confused on occasion about the authorship of a play attended. At any rate the arguments against the accuracy of Savile's attribution are so preponderant that the possibility of a lost Orrery play entitled The Widow and acted in the spring of 1665 must be dismissed as not worthy of credence. Early in June, the full force of the plague struck London and obliged the court to move from town. At the same time Orrery made preparations to return to Ireland. For a year, as a member of the Council on Irish Affairs, he had taken a leading part in arranging satisfactorily the final details of an act for Ireland. Since the provisions of this act had now been agreed upon, his official task in London was completed. Orrery had established himself in the royal confidence more firmly than ever. His reputation as dramatic poet and as political adviser to the throne was at its height, and he could retire to the isolation of Charleville with the assurance that he would still be considered an important figure in the fields of politics and of letters. On July 26 he paid his farewell visit to the King at Hampton

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Court. The next day he wrote with pride to Secretary Arlington: " I t was a quarter Past nine last night ere I kist ye Kings hand, he did me ye unspeakable honour to Discourse with me alone neere an hour and gave me soe many evidences and apperances of his Royall favor, yt never man was soe satisfyed as I . " 174 August u saw Orrery safely arrived at Charleville via Chester and Dublin.175 In October he went to Dublin for the opening of the Irish Parliament,176 and was present again in December when the Act of Settlement, on which he had labored so arduously, was at last ratified.177 Thereafter he took up his residence in Charleville again.178 During the fall and early winter of 1665, Orrery " b y ye Kings command " began another play. The critical relations between England and France, which were steadily growing more warlike, no doubt suggested to him as the germ of his plot the noble character and story of Edward the Black Prince, who had performed such glorious exploits against the French three centuries before. Some time in early winter Orrery seems to have sent off to Charles a first portion of the new composition. Morrice, Orrery's chaplain, relates this and subsequent developments as follows : Soon after the earl's fall, 179 his lordship returned into Ireland, where he still kept up the presidency court; and there received a kind letter from his M a j e s t y , written with his own hand, which I have seen ; . . . and in the conclusion his majesty lets him know, he was very well pleased with that part of the Black Prince he had sent him, and conjured his lordship to go on and complete it, which if he could not do, until he had a fit of gout, he wished him a fit presently, that he might the sooner finish it. 180

The aforementioned letter from the King was quite possibly the one spoken of by Orrery when on January 23, 1665/6, he wrote to the Duke of Ormonde: " I had ye happyness this Post, to receive ye unspeakable honour of a letter from ye Kinge my master all written with his own hand, & full of expressions of his kindness and Royall favor to yo r servt." 181 After Charles had taken such pains to express his approbation, no doubt Orrery proceeded speedily to finish the play. The final touches may be imagined to have been given by the early spring of 1666. The Prologue to The Black Prince, penned in all likelihood State Papers (Ireland), vol. 319, f. 219. 176 Ibid., f. 339. 177 Ibid., f. 477. Ibid., ff. 222-229. 178 Ibid., vol. 320, f. 19. 179 I.e. the fall of the Earl of Clarendon, which Morrice erroneously states happened in 1665 while Orrery was still in England. See op. cit., 36. 180 Op. cit., 39. 181 Β. M. Add. Ms. 37206, f. 198. 174 175

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after the play itself, not only contains evident allusion to the hostilities against France, initiated by England's declaration of war on February 20, but also clearly displays that fresh flush of patriotic feeling which a war of very recent birth usually inspires. In the prologue the "Genius of England" speaks thus: Can you in arms conspiring nations see, And think on anything but Fame and me, While the loud cannon, with prophetic sound, Foretells our King must be in Paris crown'd; And with such heat once more invade the French, As all the waves between us cannot quench; To the just fury of whose fatal blows Fleets, walls, and armies they in vain oppose? Their frighted lilies shall confess their loss, Wearing the crimson liv'ry of your Cross; And all the world shall learn by their defeat, Our Charles, not theirs, deserves the name of Great.

Further news of The Black Prince in the summer of 1666 comes out of a letter dated July 17, from Orrery to Edward, Viscount Conway, an old acquaintance and a colleague on the Council of Irish Affairs at London in 1664-65:182 M y Deare Lord, I cannot express my Trouble for haveinge bin for six months Deprived of ye honour of yo r letters. . . . If all is quiet against winter, I hope to spend part of it in London. . . . If we meet at London you will see a Play Acted, wh I writt by ye Kings Command; I call it, Edward ye Black Prince; And if ever I writt anythinge fit for ye Theatre this Play is it. . . .183

Though Orrery makes no reference here as to which company would act his new play, the inference of course is that, since The Black Prince was written with the express cognizance of the King, the script ultimately would be placed in the hands of the manager of the King's company. Orrery's expectation that the latter would stage it by the winter of 1666-67 w a s never realized. Maybe his failure to visit London that winter moved Killigrew to postpone production, or perhaps presentation was delayed chiefly by the numerous troubles which beset the King's house from its reopening in November, 1666, after the great London fire. Whatever the cause of delay, The Black Prince did not see the boards until October, 1667, when its author had not even yet crossed over from Ireland again.184 182 183 184

Hastings Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1930), 11, 366. State Papers (Ireland), vol. 321, f. 175. For details of stage history, see notes to The Black Prince.

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During 1666 and 1667 Orrery was active in protecting the coast towns of southern Ireland from depredations at the hands of French or Dutch privateers in league with Catholic anti-English residents of the district. Rebellious uprisings were a constant threat in the eyes of the staunch Anglo-Protestant president of Munster, who at least pretended in his letters to be deeply anxious over what he described as dangerous unrest in his province. In this supposedly trying period he still remained on good terms with the lord lieutenant and frequently visited him at Kilkenny or Dublin. Ormonde remarks in a letter to Arlington under date of October 2, 1666: " M y Ld of Orrery and his Lady are now here. I have no reason but to be highly satisfyed with the friendship and civility of the whole family to mee." 185 In the first week of September, 1666, occurred the great fire of London. This catastrophe prompted on September 2 1 a letter from Orrery to Ormonde, which is more than commonly revealing of the pious and sanctimonious attitude the former could assume on occasion. The unctuous style is quite typical of the politic Earl and so much a habit with him as to be no longer conscious hypocrisy. The following excerpt is the passage of most interest: T h e Miserable and unperraleld Calamity wh has befallen London, & y e Fatali Consequences of it, ought not only to fill every human heart with sorrow, but all with Repentance, for as yo r Gr has truly observed, it com from y e A l mighties longe Provoked Justice Immediatly; & I hope y t which must be visible to All, will be operative upon many; for who has not b y his owne sins contributed to fill up ye measure of thos iniquities, after wh Judgment was inevitably to follow. T h a t C i t y only of all his M a j t y s Dominions, scaped ye Como 11 losses; nay grew rich b y them; & now God has doubly visited them; ye First yeere, b y Plague he swept away ye Cittizens; and ye next yeere b y Fyre, y e C i t t y . But yet tis worthy our Prayses and last observations y t God himself does Punish us, and lets not our Ennemys doe it. H e chooses for us, wher D a v i d chose for himself.186

The studied fulsomeness of these expressions of an admirable humility causes one to suspect that the author's primary desire is to reflect credit upon himself for the perfect propriety of his religious pretensions. After the Earl of Clarendon had been forced from office in August, 1667, and the infamous cabal of ministers led by Buckingham and Shaftesbury had come into power, Orrery apparently renewed with considerable intensity his secret campaign to undermine Ormonde, who soon grew aware of the former's duplicity. In a letter of Febru185 186

Carte Ms. 48, f. 426. B. M. Add. Ms. 37207, f. 122.

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ary 8,1667/8, he speaks of Orrery's desire to meet with him and then continues in a vein of irony: " H e will conclude with deepe protestations of sincerity & freindshippe . . . where in my confidence is somewhat abated." 187 Naturally Ormonde's anger and jealousy at Orrery's behavior vented themselves at times in most uncomplimentary language, but he spoke the truth when he wrote about his rival on January 21, 1667/8: "His vanity, ostentation & itch to popularity are infirmityes so notoriously knowne to be dominant in his nature." 188 The "itch to popularity" was the fundamental weakness which betrayed itself more and more clearly in the Earl of Orrery's public life, and eventually, by the methods of intrigue it induced, brought him into disrepute with his former friends. Affairs became so critical for Ormonde that he left Ireland during the spring of 1668 to undertake his own defense at the centre of power. Growing opposition in London, fostered in no small measure by Orrery's colored reports, threatened his continuance as lord lieutenant. The ambitious Earl was not slow to follow, and reached England in June, 1668,189 where he set about his machinations to put himself forward at Ormonde's expense. He took up his London residence at the house of Viscount Conway in Queen's Street, which shortly became an important seat of political activity because of his presence. The King's favor shone more brightly than ever upon him. The heyday of his influence was at hand. A glimpse of it comes down to us from a letter of Conway to Sir George Rawdon under date of September 29: "Upon Sunday last the King adjourned the Privy Council to meet here in my Lord Orrery's chamber. . . . The Council sat about 3 hours, and the King staid an hour and a half after that in cheerful discourse and kind entertainment of Lord Orrery." 190 Some time after he had finished The Black Prince for the King and his company of actors, Orrery turned his energies to the composition of another heroic play, his sixth, for the Duke's players. Whether he brought the manuscript to England with him in the summer of 1668, or had completed it the previous year and sent it over, only to have production delayed, it is impossible to conjecture. No information about the new play, which was entitled Tryphon, is on record until we learn from Pepys of its première at the Duke's Theatre in the first week of December, 1668.191 Doubtless the author was present at one 187 189 180 191

188 Ibid., f. 236. Carte Ms. 49, f. 248. Cal. State Papers {Ireland), 1666-6Ç, 617. Rawdon Papers (London, 1819), 232-234. For details of stage history, see notes to Tryphon.

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or several early performances and noted that his latest play did not arouse the applause which had greeted its predecessors. The continuing sameness of his creations had begun to pall on the London audiences. Pepys describes the reaction of the general run of spectators in a diary note of December 8 : The play, though admirable, yet no pleasure almost in it because just the very same design, and words, and sense, and plot, as every one of his plays have, anyone of which alone would be held admirable, whereas as many of the same design and fancy do but dull one another; and this, I perceive, is the sense of everybody else, as well as myself, who therefore showed but little pleasure in it.

Such a cool reception must have been a bitter pill for the vain Orrery to swallow. With the production of Tryphon, the most important period in Orrery's playwriting career came to a close. Tryphon was not only the last of his heroic plays to be acted, but also the last to be printed during his lifetime. Whatever fame he enjoyed in later years rested entirely upon the measure of his success with the five heroic plays produced between 1664 and 1669. That, by 1670, The Generali, Henry the Fifth, Mustapha, The Black Prince, and Tryphon had established him in the forefront of contemporary dramatic poets is strongly implied by the glowing references to his work in the prefaces of two plays published the following year. Edward Howard, a younger brother of Sir Robert Howard, in the Preface to The Women's Conquest, which he devotes to arguing against rime in plays, alludes directly to Orrery's preeminence thus : And I presume that my Lord of Orrery (whose ingenuity in verse brought it more in fashion; in those ornaments he bestowed on the stage in Mustapha, and other of his heroic compositions) would not judge it a debasing of their worth, if they were distinguished b y the name of poems, instead of plays, for reasons that he is better able to give himself, than any which I have here presumed to offer.

John Crowne, later one of the best known dramatists of the age, dedicated his first play, Juliana, to Orrery as an outstanding man of letters whose patronage was eminently desirable. The dedicatory preface is one long encomium, the most pertinent passages of which are as follows: Not to say anything, my Lord, of the soldier and statesman in you, which have rendered you both known and famous to all the valiant and politic part of mankind, that of your poetry is a large theme. . . . If there be any part of the world so obscure as not to have heard your Lordship's fame in that, as well as other respects, I shall refer them . . . to the incomparable issues of your own thoughts, wherein they will see not only a character of your Lordship, but of the present improv'd genius of England, which by the assistance of your Lordship

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. . . begins to be as famous in arts as formerly it was in arms. . . . It is from your Lordship's pen that Solyman may be truly stiled Magnificent, and you have made him succeed to the civility and gallantry of the Greeks, as well as to their Empire, nor was Mustapha ever so much the hopes of his barbarous nation, as in his image and the generous character you have given him, he is the delight of England, who weep the fate, not of Mustapha, but of murder'd Virtue. . . . It is your Lordship's pen that hath assisted Henry the Fifth in a second conquest of France, and in the noblest characters of valour, love, and friendship hath made English wit and language as triumphant as their arms: nor could a story acted with so much glory, and success, be attempted by any pen beneath your Lordship's. In fine it is your Lordship that hath charmed up the ghost of many noble heroes, who otherwise would have lain unlamented in their tombs; and they have walked on the stage in brighter shapes than ever they lived, and have been conducted to their fates, with more sorrow of the spectators than perhaps they had when they died.

These contemporary eulogies, even after the blatant flattery is discounted, suggest Orrery's leading position at the opening of the second decade after the Restoration. The gallantry and nobility of his heroes like Mustapha or Delaware, loftily inspired as they were by the nicest motives of valor, honor, love, and friendship, captivated the Restoration taste during the brief epoch when extravagant civility and polish were the sine qua non in the characters of both society and literature. In consequence of the public's lack of enthusiasm for Tryphon, Orrery rightly came to feel, so Thomas Shadwell told Pepys, that "his heroic plays could do no more wonders." 192 Nevertheless he was not willing to allow his fame as dramatist to rest at this point. Nothing daunted, he determined to try his hand at the other especially popular mode in drama of the day, farcical comedy. Thus he might be able to keep his name before the theatregoing public. During the winter of 1668-69 he earnestly set himself to the task and by spring he had his farce, Guzman, ready for acting. As a supposed compensation perhaps for the comparative failure of Tryphon he gave the new experiment also to the Duke's company to produce. It was speedily prepared for performance, and appeared on the stage for the first time April 16, 1669. But Orrery's effort in the new dramatic vein was decidedly not a success according to Pepys, who on the day of its première writes as follows: After the play done, I into the pit and . . . here I did meet with Shadwell, the poet, who, to my great wonder, do tell me that my Lord of Orrery did write this play, trying what he could do in comedy, since his heroique plays could do no more wonders. This do trouble me; for it is a mean thing, and so he says, as 152

Pepys' Diary, April 16, 1669.

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hath been upon the stage a great while, and Harris, who hath no part in it did come to me, and told me in discourse that he was glad of it, it being a play that will not take.

Meanwhile the persistent plotting against Ormonde on the part of the cabal, the Earl of Orrery, and lesser political lights finally had effected his downfall the middle of February. 193 Without question Orrery held high hopes to succeed as lord lieutenant of Ireland. Indeed most of his ill-designs towards Ormonde appear to have been prompted not so much by genuine dislike or disrespect as by jealous ambition. Royal caprice, however, blasted Orrery's hopes and appointed to the coveted office Lord Roberts, Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal. With his eye on the future the wily Earl buried his disappointment, continued his machinations with the Buckingham party, and paid suit to the new lord lieutenant, if the following statement of Ormonde on June 8 can be believed: " M y Ld of Orrery, as they say, will begin his journey on Munday next if the duke of Bucks can spare him, he makes servile applications to my Ld Roberts." 194 This intended journey by Orrery to Ireland was prevented by a sudden and severe attack of the gout that continued more or less steadily through the ensuing winter and kept him in London until the summer of 1670. As an aftermath to the Ormonde deposition in which Orrery had been deeply involved, the latter was himself set upon, before he could leave England, by certain factions which he had alienated during his intrigues of the year past. Their hostile campaign culminated on Thursday, November 25, 1669, in the passage of an order in the House of Commons for Orrery to attend in person and answer charges of treason.195 The following Wednesday he hobbled into the hall of the Commons.196 Though forced to remain seated throughout the day's session on account of his gout, he still was able to testify so forcefully in his own defense that further prosecution was dropped. Nevertheless he won the decision that day by the narrowest of margins, since the motion to prosecute the charges further was only defeated by a vote of 121 to 118. Thus he thwarted what was a political trick to discredit him publicly, part of a larger scheme, no doubt, to undermine the cabal. This whole affair evidently did not affect in the slightest Orrery's favor with the King. When he returned to Ireland in July, 1670,197 Orrery went armed 183 195 198 197

194 Carte Ms. 49, f. 331. Ibid.., f. 352. Preface to Orrery's State Letters (London, 1742), vm. Ibid., ix. Cal. S. P. {Ireland), 1669-70, 266.

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with larger authority and discretion than ever before. Indeed he made out to his friends that his actual power was to be almost equal to that of the new lord lieutenant, Lord Berkeley, who had succeeded Lord Roberts, and that he was likely to supersede Lord Berkeley before long. Of these matters Orrery's old friend, Viscount Conway, writes most confidentially to his brother-in-law on July 14, 1670: " M r . Ayres [i.e. Orrery] by Mr. Church's [i.e. the King's] letters hath equal authority with Mr. Johnson [i.e. Lord Berkeley], I do not mean public authority, but only whatever he thinks fit to be done should be done. . . . Mr. Ayres expects to succeed Mr. Johnson very suddenly." 198 In the case of this last expectation the wish was doubtless father to the thought! Before his return to Ireland in July Orrery may have completed another play for the Duke's company. He must have been undaunted by the slight approbation accorded his first farce, Guzman, at their theatre, for the new piece was also a farcical comedy, entitled Mr. Anthony. Since, however, its stage production almost certainly occurred during the first half of 1672,199 there is the alternative possibility that Mr. Anthony was written during Orrery's next sojourn in England the winter of 1670-71. It was not many months after his return to Ireland in the summer of 1670 before the scheming Earl, still hopeful of the King's present of office, was planning to cross again to London, where he could more effectively curry favor with the sovereign. Gout, his continual enemy, temporarily put a stop to his plans, as he tells in a letter of October 17: " I had, the beginning of this month, a most gracious letter from his Majesty, all writt with his owne hand, which had brought me to London this sitting of the Parliament, had not the gout, the night before I was to have tooke ship, ceised me in both feet." 200 He did finally depart for England in early December,201 and remained there until May, 1671,202 when he came back to Charleville. The winter sojourn in London apparently developed no particular prospect of political advancement. By the beginning of 1672 Orrery had written a new drama of the species he originally had done so much to make popular. With a hope perhaps of equalling his early theatrical success, he had returned to his old love, the rimed play of heroic theme, and woven a plot out of the well-known story of Herod and Mariamne. Concern198 199 200 201 202

Hastings Mss., II, 378. For evidence see notes to Mr. Anthony. Bath Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1907), n , 152. Cal. S. P. (Ireland), 1660-70, 322. Cal. S. P. (Dom.), 1671, 322.

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ing his new creation, intended for production by the King's company, the one and only source of information extant is a recently discovered letter,203 addressed to Orrery by an unsigned friend, of which the following passage is of present significance: Dublin 17th Febre: 71 I hope y e accident of burning y e Kings Theatre y r Gr. concealing Mariamne from y r servannts.

204

will not be an occasion of

It would be unjust in y r Gr.

and to her M e m o r y to add to our misfortunes, and make them feel a punishment who have bin guilty of no offence; but whatever y r Gr. intentions are as to y e publishing that work I presume y r Gr. will not deny me y e favour of seeing it; If y r Gr. will be pleased to send it to me b y y e post I will engadge not to give a coppy of it unto any, and that I will returne it againe unto y r Gr. whensoever you shall comand it.

No more is known about this play except its publication, which was long delayed. It was eventually printed in 1694 under the title of Herod the Great, with prologue and epilogue attached to the text. This fact would indicate the script of the play had been in final state for performance, and, taken in connection with the contents of the above letter, would lead one to believe that Killigrew, copy in hand, was contemplating its production when his playhouse burned. T o be sure, the remarks of Orrery's correspondent may imply only that, at the date of his letter, Herod the Great was known by him to have been destined for the King's troupe, and to have been already in finished form. Hence the correspondent inferred the Theatre Royal fire would interfere with the intended stage career of Orrery's latest effort. Even if Herod the Great, at one time or another, reached Killigrew's hands, it was never acted. The King's company shortly after the burning of their theatre transferred activities to the old Duke's house in Lincoln's Inn Fields, but in the next year or two they possessed neither the equipment nor the financial resources for the elaborate staging required by Orrery's new heroic play. Meanwhile a London hack writer, Samuel Pordage, who possibly had heard of Orrery's piece through one channel or another, took it into his head to pen a rimed play on the same general theme. Through the influence of Elkanah Settle, a new and popular dramatist, the rival Duke's company were persuaded to take and stage Pordage's Herod and Mariamne in October, 1673. So similar in style and subject was it to Herod the Great that it must have forced Killigrew to give up plans for production of the latter, if indeed he had made any. Thus did a 203 201

Harvard Coll. Lib. Ms. Eng. 218.22 F — a holograph. I.e. on January 25.

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most unfortunate set of circumstances prevent Orrery's Herod the Great from receiving the performance which was presumably in store at the start of 1672. In the spring of 1672, Orrery, hoping to benefit his increasingly gouty condition, removed from Charleville to the milder climate of a castle nearer the southern coast, Castlemartyr — or Ballymartyr, to give it the full Gaelic name which Orrery often used. Here he made his permanent Irish residence henceforth.205 In a letter of August 16, 1672, to the Earl of Essex, the new lord lieutenant of Ireland, he describes the place briefly : While I was L d Preseci1 of Munster, I used Sometimes to Pass 2 or 3 months at this Castell, it beinge scituated in a Pleasant Country for all Recreation, & because there is noe Towne or Villadge about it, I bought six Iron Guns, wh: I mounted in ye Flankers of it, for ye better Security of ye Place dureinge my Residence in it.206

It will be noticed that Orrery uses the past tense in mentioning his Munster presidency. Less than a month before, he had lost his office of lord president by a royal order which suppressed the presidential powers in the Irish provinces.207 This loss was the first outward sign of importance that his influence and prestige were beginning to wane. The Earl of Essex was determined to brook no rivalry in his administration of Ireland, and wisely decided that the abolition of provincial presidents would remove certain opportunities to question his authority. What is more, Essex had the necessary favor with Charles I I to bring about his wish against any opposition from Orrery and his colleagues. Essex' next step in the assertion of his power was to order dismantled the fortifications which Orrery had built both at Charleville and Castlemartyr. Despite Orrery's plea for retention, this order received royal confirmation on September 7.208 Orrery had at last met his match! Nevertheless the King had by no means forgotten his old favorite, for he still took pen in hand to write personally to the Earl. For example, the latter takes pains to report to Conway on January 3 1 , 1672/3, that there has just arrived a letter in his royal master's own hand, wherein, according to Orrery, the sovereign says: " I will say no more to you now, but only desire you, to come over against the sitting of Parliament, not only to serve me, but also to receive from myself full satisfaction that I am your affectionate friend." 209 Such 205 206 207 209

Stowe Ms. 210, f. 211. Essex Papers (Camden Soc. Ser., 1890), 12. 208 Ibid., 12 η. Ibid., 25. Cal. S. P. (Dom.) 1672-73, 499.

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a missive made him once more itch to be back in the thick of the intrigue and chicanery at court and to reoccupy his place of prominence in the royal council chamber. The urge for greatness could only be quieted by the severe discomfort of gout, which was now always likely to incapacitate him without warning. Before he could leave Castlemartyr he was laid low again, and endured a long siege that lasted into September. Even in the midst of sickness, however, he was still the clever writer of smooth words to persons in authority whose favor he would enjoy. In a letter of July n , he tells the Earl of Essex that many friends in London are urging him to come over for consultation on the nation's business, but the following excerpts show him pretending a great reluctance to accede: Ye Ague & the last fitt of ye Goute have made my knees & Ancles soe weeke yt I am not yet able to goe in or out of my Couch, much less up or downe any Stares but as I am lifted by a Couple of Servants, wh: is a condition wh: makes me both unwilling & unable to goe from home. . . . I must confess to Yo r Ex M yt not only y e ill Habbit of body I am fallen under, but also my minde, Invites me to a Retired Life, for haveinge bin Tost about three & Thirty Yeers in the world, & beinge tired therewith, tis Time to thinke seriously how to gett to that Haven wher only True Rest can be Injoy'd. And I believe a Cell is fitter for thos thoughts then a Court. Besides, I have found soe much uncertainty in the thinges of this world that, being now Fairly out of ye Tyde of it, I would not seeke to gett into ye Streame again. . . . But since we are not borne for ourselves, If I be put to the sad choice of either breakinge with my Frends or breakinge off yt quiet course of Life I now am in, God is my witness, if I must embrace the Former, twil be merely an Act of my obedience, not my choice.210

This is the high-toned manner of the practiced politician. Under the guise of piety and unselfishness he harbored feelings of a very contrary import. Such duplicity he thought necessary that he might keep his especial rival in the dark as to his real motives and schemes. If Essex was not aware of Orrery's double-faced attitude previously, he learned of it soon after the Earl's arrival during November in London, where he had taken up his residence at Warwick House, the home of his sister, Lady Mary Rich.211 Viscount Conway, who apparently had decided to desert to Essex' cause as the more worth while, lost no time in writing on November 22 to the lord lieutenant this frank statement: "Orrery is in towne, somewhat unsatisfied with Essex." 212 From other sources also came reports to Ireland of Orrery engaged at his old game of discrediting the Irish lord lieutenant in order to secure the place for himself. William 210 212

Essex Papers, 99-100. Ibid., i. 194.

211

Stowe Ms. 203, f. 198.

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Habord writes to Essex on January 24,1673/4: "Orrery is much dissatisfyed & disappointed. . . . And in truthe Orrery aims mightely to succeede Essex in his poore Imployment." 213 The Earl's personal relations with the King seem to have remained warmly intimate, even if he did not cut the figure at court which he had done formerly. He makes a point on February 21 of informing Essex, with whom he still corresponded constantly in a vein of extreme friendliness, that " I had the honour to be alone with his Maj ty neere an houre." 214 Although more or less confined by the gout from the middle of March till the end of May, 216 he did not give over his scheming against Essex but tried to initiate the revival of lord justices for Ireland in place of a lord lieutenant.216 Under such an arrangement, Orrery would have had an almost certain chance of office. Yet it is clear that his influence in Whitehall circles was definitely on the decline. Despite their biased nature the reports of Conway to Essex do picture the general trend of affairs concerning Orrery. On May 19 he writes: "Tis true that Orrery doth Essex all the ill offices he can, but he hath lost himself beyond imagination, and hath no credit, and Treas. [i.e. Lord Danby] tells me all his [i.e. Orrery's] complaints." 217 June 2 finds him telling Essex: " M y Lord Orrery tallas of going away in a fortnight, and living privately the rest of his days in Munster. I am confident he will never have more invitations to come againe into England." 218 The truth seems to be that through querulous complaining of every new superior his growing self-seeking had now become patent to friends as well as foes and had defeated its own ends. To the close of his sojourn in England, however, he continued to plot means of advancement for himself. He undertook to move for a resurrection of the military powers formerly granted to the President of Munster and for the establishment of a Munster militia to protect the Protestants against the Catholics.219 Henceforward to the end of his life this cry of protection for the direly threatened Protestants was to be Orrery's chief slogan in his political campaigning. He had decided apparently that the best move for his future was, to use the apt words of Essex, to become " y e great Patrone of ye Protestant Interest." 220 B y the middle of July Orrery was starting his journey back to Ireland. On July 15 he rejoiced in a delightful farewell visit at Wind213 216 217 219

Essex Papers, 165. Stowe Ms. 205, f. 173. Ibid., 228. Essex papers, 245.

214 216 218 220

Ibid., 178. Essex Papers, 225. Stowe Ms. 205, f. 179. Ibid.

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sor with Charles II, which he describes as follows: "On Wednesday in ye eveninge, I had ye honour of neer one hours Discourse alone, with his majty; who to attend me, came to my lady Suffolks Lodgings; He was very gracious to me." 221 Evidently the King was still fond of the courtier who these fifteen years had done him homage by his poetry and his state service. Over a month elapsed from the time of this visit before Orrery settled down once more at Castlemartyr on August 24.222 There he stayed quietly the ensuing winter, but in March, 1675, he was looking toward London.223 Once again he brings out his old excuse for crossing over thither, namely a letter from the King which invites him to be present for the new sitting of Parliament.224 The never-dying hopes for a material token of royal esteem were revived and prompted him to quit the quiet of his Irish castle in spite of illhealth. He did not get away, however, until late spring, so that it was June when he reached London.225 That summer he had an operation performed on his toe by a Dr. Wiseman with the hope that it might relieve somewhat his increased inability to use his feet, but, according to Morrice, Orrery was never able to walk unaided after this operation.226 Yet this physical incapacity did not deter him from his usual playing of politics. He persevered in his attempts to undermine Essex and obtain authority for himself by renewed propaganda in favor of Irish lord justices to supersede the lord lieutenant.227 Yet it all came to nought because the veteran Irish statesman could no longer command the influence of years gone by. His continual scheming and self-interest were now known on every hand and deprived him almost entirely of worthy supporters in high places. Without any reward, therefore, for his pains he made ready for what he realized would be his last departure from London. A round of final farewells to his friends ended on July 6 228 with his start toward Ireland. He arrived August 4 at Castlemartyr,229 which he was nevermore to leave. After a lapse of four years in his playwriting Orrery evidently resumed his dramatic endeavors a little subsequent to his return from London. In the British Museum exists the manuscript 230 of a rimed tragedy, on the first leaf of which is written in three different hands the following four lines: 221 223 225 227 228 230

222 Stowe Ms. 205, f. 344. Ibid., f. 411. 221 Ibid., 207, f. 253. Ibid. 226 Ibid., 208, f. 55. Op. cit., 45. Letterbooks of Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex (Camden Soc., 3d ser., vol. 24), 49. 229 Stowe Ms. 210, f. 49. Ibid., f. 116. Sloane Ms. 1828, ff. 46-79.

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T h e T r a g e d y of Zoroastres M s 1677 W r i t t e n b y the right honourable the l a t e E a r l of O r r e r y .

The second line of this title-leaf has been cancelled by criss-cross strokes. The first line, and the greater part of the text proper, are quite clearly in the hand of Orrery himself, whose corrections can be noted occasionally through the first four acts. Under the dramatis personae still another hand has penned the statement, "Written in 1676." 231 There appears to be little doubt, therefore, that Orrery during the winter of 1676-77 undertook a further composition in his favorite dramatic form of rimed verse, and built an extravagant play around the character of the famous magician-philosopher of central Asia. For some reason Orrery only carried his creation into the fifth act. An unknown successor crudely completed the play in poor blank verse. Perhaps at the point where Orrery left off he was overcome by gout for the moment, and never thereafter felt inspired to finish a play which he realized had no chance of production when neither his name nor heroic verse was any longer a drawingcard for London theatregoers. Faced during the last year or two of his life with the premonition of a fast-approaching earthly end, Orrery gave more attention to moral and religious meditation. This change of mood and interest naturally affected his themes for literary effort, as he confesses in the Preface to Poems on Most of the Festivals of the Church, which were published after his death but begun, according to Morrice,232 in 1678: "God of His abundant Mercy, having convinced me, how much Precious Time I had cast away on Airy Verses; I Resolv'd to take a Final leave of that Sort of Poetry; and in some Degree to Repair the Unhappiness and Fault, of what was past, to Dedicate my Muse in the Future, entirely to Sacred Subjects." While in this frame of mind Orrery may well have chosen to dramatize with pious fidelity the Biblical story of Saul, Jonathan, and David. At his death the play was left in manuscript among his papers. In February, 1703, a play in rimed verse was published with the title The Tragedy of King Saul, and was advertised on the title-page as by " a Deceas'd Person of Honour." The Epistle Dedicatory is addressed to the "Right Honourable the Countess of Burlington, 231 For described Essays in 232 Op.

more details of this ms., see notes to Zoroastres. Montague Summers first the ms. with numerous inaccuracies in Mod. Lang. Rev., x n , 24 fi., and in Petto, 135 fi. cit., 46.

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etc.," who at that moment was Lady Juliana (Noel) Boyle, wife of Charles, second Earl of Burlington and third Earl of Cork. The latter's grandfather was Richard Boyle, first Earl of Burlington, and elder brother to Roger, Earl of Orrery. Now the publisher in his dedication remarks that the Countess of Burlington has a "right to protect" the play, "as you are said to be related to the Noble Person, who is suppos'd to be the Author of it." In the preface he states that "the Great Person that wrote this Excellent Tragedy, stands in need of no other Pen than his own to defend Him or His Inimitable Composure." Further on in the preface he refers to the "Noble Author" and adds that "every one that knows a Deceas'd Man of Qualitie's way of writing, must guess at the Gentleman that Obliges the World with this." All these statements and comments would seem to imply quite plainly that the author of The Tragedy of King Saul was thought to be none other than Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery. Possibly his authorship was not acknowledged in the published composition because "The Persons that have the Government of the Stage have rejected this Heroick Poem, as being freighted with too much Vertue, and Morality to gain 'em a full audience." Hence the publisher interpolated several "Poetical Interludes of Ghosts, Furies, etc.," with musical accompaniments, in order to "adapt it in some Measure to the Air of the Times," and put it forth "to be Acted in Schools, and Universities, as a proper Entertainment . . . on Solemn Occasions." Under such circumstances it would not perhaps be considered fitting for Orrery's illustrious name to be connected openly with the printed play.233 The internal evidence in The Tragedy of King Saul also indicates Orrery's authorship. His favorite form of emotional conflict finds ample play in the character of Jonathan, in whom friendship constantly struggles with duty. The scene where Jonathan embraces David and the two exchange the pledge of friendship 234 reminds one of that in which Zanger and Mustapha embrace and swear their vows of friendly loyalty.235 Throughout the drama the expressions of sentiment are couched in typical Orreryan style, and often echo his previous wordings of similar sentiments. To cite only one instance, Adriel, jealously fearing that David will receive as a reward for valor Saul's daughter Merab, whom he too loves, consoles himself by saying: 233 F. W. Payne in an unprinted University of London M . A . thesis (1923), The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery, pt. 2, p. 98 ff., argues against Orrery's authorship on stylistic grounds of slight weight. 234 Act I, Sc. 4. as5 Mustapha, Act I, Sc. 3.

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Let him the Merit of his Conquest boast, I will deserve her best by loving most.236

These lines at once recall Mustapha's remark to Zanger concerning the Queen of Hungary, whom they both love: But she must be by Merit's Claim possess'd, And he who loves her most, deserves her best.237

The earliest recorded attribution of authorship for The Tragedy of King Saul was made in 1758 by Horace Walpole, who suggested the Earl of Orrery. In the postscript of a letter to Rev. Henry Zauch on October 21, 1758, he writes: " I must ask you one question, but to be answered entirely at your leisure, I have a play in rhyme, called Saul, said to be written by a peer, I guess Lord Orrery. If you ever happen to find out, be so good to tell me." 238 Half a century later the Biographia Dramatica made the astonishing statement concerning The Tragedy of King Saul that "this play in the n m o . edition (1739) is ascribed to Dr. Trapp." 239 As a matter of fact the 1739 edition makes absolutely no reference to Dr. Trapp, and furthermore bears on its title-page, as did the 1703 edition, "Written by a Deceas'd Person of Honour." The ascription of authorship to Dr. Trapp is indeed ridiculous, for Dr. Joseph Trapp was not a "person of honour" and he was very much alive both in 1703 and in 1739Î He took his M.A. at Wadham College, Oxford, in 1702, became a fellow of the college the following year, and did not die until 1747. Subsequent authorities have followed either one or the other of these early attributions without further investigation for evidence.240 The composition of The Tragedy of King Saul, if it really occurred between 1677 and Orrery's death in 1679, marked the end of his efforts at dramatic writing, which in these last years he had come presumably to look upon as a mere closet pastime. Meanwhile, he was still trying earnestly to have a hand in the affairs of Ireland and to be a figure of political consequence. In 1677 Orrery's former superior, the Duke of Ormonde, again assumed the office of lord lieutenant. A t once Orrery began to play toward Ormonde his old game of, on the one hand, currying favor through constant direct corre236

Act I, Sc. 3,11. 352-353· Mustapha, Act III, Sc. 1,11. 121-122. 238 Letters (Cunningham ed., London, 1857-58), πι, 187. 239 1812 ed., πι, 241. 237

240

A. W. Ward, in A Hist, of Eng. Dram. Lit., m , 345, mentions The Tragedy of King

Saul under Orrery's works simply on Walpole's suggestion. On the other hand, Allardyce Nicoli in A Hist, of XVIII Cent. Drama, 1700-50 (Cambridge, England, 1924), 361, lists the play as by Dr. Trapp.

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spondence, and, on the other, secretly attacking his superior by criticism expressed to others. Thus Orrery made out that Ormonde was not sufficiently careful of Protestant interests in Ireland, and in Munster especially; that a combination of Papist traitors and their French allies threatened constantly to rise up and overthrow the Protestant power; that he, Orrery, was alone fully aware of the dangers and best prepared to offer plans for the proper course of protection. B y this time he may have come to partly believe his assertions, but much must have been pure hocus-pocus for political ends. The Earl of Ossory was not far wrong when in a letter to Ormonde on October 23, 1678, he called Orrery "The Charlatan of Munster." 241 According to Ossory's further letter of November 26, Orrery's tricks were now so fully recognized and despised by his royal master that the latter had declared he knew Orrery " t o be a rogue, and that he [i.e. Orrery] would ever continue so."242 In the same month of 1678 Ormonde paints the following vivid but fair picture of Orrery's chicanery regarding Irish affairs : You know the disproportion betwixt Papists and Protestants in England as to number is vastly different from that in Ireland: there perhaps the hundredth man is not a Papist, and here it may be the eighth or tenth man is not a Protestant, yet it cannot hence be inferred that we are at their mercy; on the contrary, I think they are more at ours. . . . But my Lord Orrery's ends visibly enough are to manifest his extraordinary vigilance and forecast, which is a safe figure to assume. If no mischief happens, providence and circumspection never want applause; if any shall happen and have no success, he knows as well how to attribute that to the neglect of his advices. Another end of his is to asperse the government and render it suspected to the Protestants, as not acting vigorously enough for their preservation because they do not put in execution those things that he — being a man of sense enough — knows to be impracticable or really more likely to bring danger than safety upon them, such as are the imprisonment of gentlemen and purging, as he calls it, of garrison towns.243

Although the pose advanced him not a whit, Orrery, now in his dotage, maintained to the end the fiction of his large importance to Irish affairs. In April, 1679, he writes proudly that he has a license to go to London and a ship provided by royal warrant for his transport across the Irish Sea, but that he has decided not to travel thither, since " I think the poor Protestants would think it somewhat worse should I leave the country at this nick of time." 244 The blind vanity of the Earl, so persistent though former friends and 211 242 213 244

Ormonde Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt.), iv (new ser.), 220. Ibid., 243. Leyborne-Popham Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt. 1899), 242-243. Portland Mss. (Hist. Mss. Comm. Rpt., 1893), n, 155·

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allies were sneering at him behind his back, takes on a certain element of pathos in these last days. Never a note of self-pity or loneliness or disappointment is mingled with the egotistic tone of even his final correspondence. The "Charlatan of Munster" steadfastly preserved the habit of mind which his "itch to popularity" long ago had ingrained in him. Such was his mental and spiritual state when he was visited in September, 1679, with " a violent fit of gout" and " a great cold," 245 from which union of ailments he never recovered. Thereafter his condition grew steadily worse and was reported of October 3 as follows: " T i s not the gout, but a sudden violent decay in nature. Nothing they give him continues in his stomach, and he is hugely lethargic." 246 The end of these physical infirmities occurred at Castlemartyr on October 16 while he was still only in his fifty-ninth year. Two days later the Earl of Orrery was buried in the Youghall parish church after a funeral sermon by Thomas Morrice, M.A., his lordship's domestic chaplain.247 That faithful cleric described his patron in language of such extravagant flattery that the portrait is of a man wholly without fault or weakness. Quite the opposite picture of Orrery has been left by the famous Bishop Burnet, who had a personal acquaintance with the Irish earl and was an intimate friend of Orrery's brother, Robert Boyle. Among Burnet's miscellaneous notes, not intended for publication, is found this biting character sketch: "Orrery pretended to knowledge, but was very ignorant, and to wit, but it was very luscious; to eloquence, but had the worst style in the world; and to religion, but was thought a very fickle and false man, and was vain to the pitch of the Earl of Shaftesbury." 248 The harsh lines of Burnet's "character" are a far cry from the saccharine eulogy of the chaplain, but despite their undue severity they give truthful evidence of Orrery's intense vanity. This salient flaw in his personality slowly exasperated his contemporaries, as the passing of the years showed the egotism and the pretence becoming constantly more blatant. Before death came, these critical failings tended to overshadow, in the eyes of the world, Orrery's undoubted virtues. They dimmed to a perceptible extent the lustre of his many and worthy achievements. Even the heroic efforts of the Rev. Thomas Morrice could not remove the tarnish which his patron had brought upon his own name. Ormonde Mss., ν (new ser.), 206. Ibid., 218. 247 Β. M . 1419.6.20: A Sermon Preached at the Funeral of the Right Honourable Roger, Earl of Orrery . . . London, . . . 1681. 248 A Supplement to Burnet's History (ed. b y H. C. Foxcroft, Oxford, 1902), 63. 246

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Thus closed the career of the most important nobleman connected with the Restoration theatre and drama. His activity during the first years of Charles II's reign in writing heroic plays was largely responsible for setting in motion this dramatic fashion, and his subsequent creations helped much to popularize it. The sanction of an aristocratic pen counted heavily with the Restoration literary world. Therein the Earl of Orrery stood for a time as a notable figure among the numerous dilettantes from the nobility who were prompted to write chiefly for the sake of self-advertisement, but still with some slight love of the Muses. His prestige as a playwright waned when his sparse stock in trade was exhausted and its meagreness was finally realized by an amazingly uncritical audience. Strangely enough, the waning of his influence in the world of letters coincided closely with his decline as a statesman. In the field of government he had looked after the Protestant interests of the southern half of Ireland with great diligence over a long period of vicissitude and reorganization. For thirty years he had labored with increasing credit and reputation amid the tangle of Anglo-Irish relations, until about 1670 vain and selfish desires at last overcame his political vision and perverted his administrative capacities. The final decade of Orrery's life saw his name gradually eclipsed by a new generation of dramatists and statesmen. Y e t in his heyday he must have been a man of some genius and charm; otherwise he could never have played the pioneer in English heroic fiction and drama, and served as confidant to Cromwell and Charles II. His was indeed a far from inconspicuous role in the arena of Commonwealth and Restoration affairs, an arena mostly filled with little men and petty achievements. Judged by the standards of those times, Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery, rendered such contributions to the national life and culture of his age as proved him "eminently serviceable in the world." 249 Mg

Morrice, A Sermon, etc., 23.

CRITICAL

PREFACE

CRITICAL PREFACE "AFTER the Restoration of King Charles, Rhyme and Romance bore universal sway; Sense was made subservient to Gingie, and Truth fell a sacrifice to Knights in Armour. The Verses were to tinkle at any Rate, and the Nymph was to be brought on her milk-white Palfry, tho' the Hero was forced to fetch her out of the Clouds." 1 This airy statement by an eighteenth-century editor of Orrery's plays pictures vividly the early Restoration mood of extravagant, "heroic" romanticism, out of which sprang the drama of the Irish earl. "Heroic" sentiment, born of a mixed parentage, had thoroughly permeated English taste and thought by 1660. The roots of this sentiment extend back into the reign of Charles I when the précieuse and Platonic conventions of Henrietta Maria's court began to breed absurdly exaggerated notions of love and honor. Such affected notions, inspired originally by the salons of France, coincided in their development with an outburst of enthusiasm for the French heroic romances, and for the heroic poems, not only of Homer and Virgil, but also more especially of Ariosto, Tasso, and their contemporary French imitators, whose names were legion. From these social and literary currents, which one and all tended to exalt "heroic virtue," grew a highly artificial fashion for heroism. Prominent men, both living and dead, came to be apostrophized in ridiculous adulation, for the age chose to pretend that "there is in Princes, and men of conspicuous power (anciently called Heroes) a lustre and influence upon the rest of men, resembling that of the Heavens. . . . " 2 Dryden, therefore, exemplified perfectly the contemporary attitude and manner of speaking when in 1658 he wrote of the dead Cromwell the following grandiloquent words : His grandeur he derived from Heaven alone; F o r he was great ere Fortune made him so.

Such patently make-believe admiration quickly crystallized into a penetrating and predominant affectation. And because the opinion was commonly held that "the delight of an Epique Poem consisteth not in mirth, but admiration," 3 the Restoration era was only too ready to welcome, as a means of satisfying its assumed urge for ad1

Orrery, Dramatic Works (1739), 1, iv. The Answer of Mr. Hobbes to Sir William Davenant's Preface before Gondibert 3 (1673 ed.), 21. Ibid., 26. 2

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miration, any form of literature with the epic or heroic emphasis, whether it were poetry, prose fiction, or drama. This welcome, according to Bonamy Dobrée,4 was prompted in large measure by a hunger for the heroism lacking in real life, and a consequent impulse to see imaginative depictions of men as they should be. The lack of actual heroism and the contrasting prevalence of "Heroic Persons" in the talk and writing of that day was indeed originally observed by the keen Samuel Butler, who wrote in his notebook that, though no age "ever abounded more with those Images (as they call them) of Moral and Heroicall Virtues, there was never any so opposite to them all in the mode and Custome of Life." 5 The cause, however, of this craze for the heroic at the opening of the Restoration period appears to be explained more truthfully as a desire for aesthetic gratification pure and simple, without spiritual or moral implications of any sort. The literary modes of the preceding decades had agreed in emphasizing the display of "nature beautified, as in the picture of a fair woman, which we all admire." 6 Such love for idealized nature, however, did not derive its raison d'etre from any inward dissatisfaction with contemporary humanity, but rather from a growing sense of pleasure in the depiction of human nature wholly perfected as to its manners. B y the beginning of Charles II's reign the alluring brilliance of imaginary male and female heroes, who were glorious embodiments of a conventionalized virtue, had quite captivated the fancy of the fashionable world in England. The state of English taste at that moment may be likened to the condition of a moth attracted and blinded by the sheer brightness of shining light. The heroic movement in England should be said, therefore, to have developed as a pleasurable, artistic pose that at last became a deep infection. Writers of every degree seized upon heroic virtue as a glorious concept with which to toy. The puppet products of their wit caused delight because of the sheer splendor of the heroic concoction in its boundless gallantry. Mary Evelyn, wife of the famous diarist, in a letter to her Oxford friend, Mr. Bohun, lays bare the artistic hypocrisy and the aesthetic appeal of this heroic infection when she remarks on Dryden's Conquest of Granada: "Love is made so pure, and valour so nice, that one would imagine it designed for an Utopia rather than our stage. I do not quarrel with the poet, but admire one born in the decline of morality should be able to feign 4 5 6

Restoration Tragedy, 16-17. Characters, etc. (ed. by A. R. Waller, Cambridge, England, 1908), 278. Dryden in his preface to Annus Mirabilis (1666).

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65

7

such exact virtue." It is plain that the more remarkable the feigning of this heroic virtue, the more delighted and gratified was the Restoration audience, who desired only to be dazzled. The heroic fad, of course, had a most significant and far-reaching effect upon the form and content of serious drama. Tragedy's kinship to the epic came to be emphasized in no uncertain terms. As early as 1650, Thomas Hobbes expressed what was soon the accepted view: "For the Heroique Poem narrative . . . is called an Epique Poem. The Heroique Poem Dramatique, is tragedy. . . . The Figure therefore of an Epique Poem, and of a Tragedy, ought to be the same." 8 B y the time of the Restoration the newly asserted importance of the heroic element in tragic drama had produced a widespread opinion that "the present world is so enlightened that the old dramatic must bear no sway." 9 Serious drama must now be patterned to elicit for the poet praise such as the following: In mere compassion to this wretched age You bring heroique Vertue on the stage. 10

Hence the catering playwrights of the new era tacitly conformed to the dictum that "the great Characters and Subjects of serious Plays are representations of the past glories of the World." 11 They were not long in offering "the Heroick Stories of past Ages to their Hands, who are the Ornaments of the present," 12 namely the royal and aristocratic personages who held the fortunes of the reopened theatres in their power. The influence of these contemporary heroic trends is not quite as apparent in the Earl of Orrery's pioneer play, The Generali, as in his subsequent pieces. This, the first full-fledged heroic play, is based upon the necessary theme of heroic valor and virtue. The heroic idea, however, had not yet bent dramatic design and content entirely into the new shape ultimately developed by Orrery for the complete expression of the heroic. In his maiden essay at playwriting Orrery had his eye somewhat upon English dramatic practice of the preceding era and did not break away altogether from the Caroline tradition in tragi-comedy. The plot of The Generali is not taken from a famous heroic story of a past age in the world's history, but is a pseudo-historical action with a martial background of 7 8 9 10 u 12

Diary of John Evelyn (Bray ed.), iv, 25-26 Op. cit., 21. Letter of Mary Evelyn in Evelyn's Diary (Bray ed.), iv, 26. Congratulatory verses prefixed to The Adventures of Five Hours (1663 ed.). Preface to Cambyses (1671). Ibid.

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Mediterranean locale, like the plots of Beaumont and Fletcher, D'Avenant, Carliell, and Suckling, whose plays Orrery had seen on the stage and knew intimately when he was a sparkling gallant in London before the Civil War. Though there are evident reminiscences of the work of these playwrights in situation, incident, and even lines of dialogue, still The Generali departs from the pattern of the Caroline tragi-comedies in its uniformly serious and gallant tone. There are no scenes in which servants or persons of common station engage in witticism or horse-play. Not only is the humorous element entirely excluded, as in French tragi-comedy, but, like the latter also, Orrery's play lacks roles of lower rank with the exception of Candaces, the confidante to the heroine. The considerable intrigue and action, so characteristic of the earlier English romantic drama, are to be found in The Generali, but are definitely subordinated to the depiction of heroic virtue through the foremost figures in the plot. The usurping king of Sicily, his leading general, Clorimun, and the leader of certain rebel forces, Lucidor, engage in a complicated rivalry for the love of Alternera, a peerless princess, who, previous to the opening of the play, has promised herself to Lucidor. The emphasis, however, falls not so much upon the portrayal of surprising or exciting events brought about by the attempts of the various males to further their individual amatory interests as upon the exposition of the ethical ritual by which they govern their behavior. Throughout the play the suitors are moved to act in accordance with an extravagant and rigid code of honor in the service of love. This code smacks strongly of the hyperbolic idealism of the Platonic love cult so popular at the Whitehall of Charles I, and hence thoroughly appreciated by Orrery at first hand. Indeed, most of the sentimental tenets in The Generali are to be discovered in one or another of the Caroline court plays. Nevertheless, the ramified Platonic principles in the preceding court drama can hardly have been the only source of literary influence upon Orrery. The same extravagant idealization of the love passion permeated the content of the French heroic romances, in which Orrery had steeped himself so deeply that he had been able to publish a fairly satisfactory English imitation in 1654. And furthermore, the contemporary French serious plays of the two Corneilles and of Quinault, which beyond question were thoroughly familiar to Orrery, had woven into their fabric an essentially similar code of love, honor, duty, and virtue, with the attendant sentimental conflicts. These several streams of literary influence must have commingled in Orrery's mind. They impelled him toward a more elab-

CRITICAL

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67 orate refining and glorification of the love and honor code than had ever before been presented in English drama, when at Dublin in 1661 he undertook to write of heroic virtue as the dramatic theme best calculated to please the Restoration court taste. The extreme emphasis which Orrery placed upon the ritual of love in his new dramatic pattern necessitated a heightening in characterization. He exalted the roles of the hero and the heroine beyond any conceptions of virtue entertained by his English predecessors in the drama. The underlying motif of The Generali is the sentiment of admiration for the paragons of virtuous love, Clorimun and Alternera. After the prevailing French fashion Orrery aimed to effect with these leading personages, male and female, an impression of moral grandeur and nobility almost superhuman, and he sought to keep attention focused on the glorified figures. As the action in The Generali progresses, the suitors come more and more under the stern direction of the heroine, Alternera. She it is who recalls to their minds the proper rules of love's cause when they grow faint or recalcitrant in their obedience. Steadily she spurs them on to nobler service by appeals to the unassailable motives of virtue or honor. Her conception of the behavior required of each lover at a given moment never fails of eventual triumph, while her determination to follow personally those regulations of conduct which the gods have laid down for all under love's dominion, and of which she claims to be sole arbiter, never swerves, even when her life is threatened by the wrathful King. It ne'er shall be of Alternera said, Virtue to save she went to sin for aid.13

Nowhere is the forceful nature of her part in Orrery's drama more noticeably depicted than in the last scene, where she insists to Clorimun Though to your Rival all my Love is bent, Yet to be his I must have your consent14

and threatens But yet if I of your consent should miss I ne'er must be another's, since not his. None to a higher action can pretend Than choose to die, rather than wrong a friend.15 13 14

16

Act V, 11. 192-193. Ibid., 11. 311-312.

Ibid., 11. 313-314, 325-326.

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In the face of her impassioned persistence Clorimun finally has to rise to the height of magnanimity and give his blessing to the success of his rival, Lucidor. Thus Alternera emerges as the governing figure in The Generali. So illustrious and persuasive is her example of love perfectly controlled by virtue or honor, that the whole group of male characters are impelled to imitation and subservience. Though her personality as a woman appears as flat, wooden, and unreal as are the female portraits which Suckling and D'Avenant drew, the extremely positive and powerful influence which Alternera exerts places her role of the heroine in a distinctly new category. In a slightly different manner Orrery intensified the part of the hero. Clorimun, the general, distinguishes himself both in deeds and in sentiment far more than do the heroes of the Caroline playwrights. Though an unsuccessful suitor, he nevertheless transcends all his rivals in the strength and nobility of his character. He is valorous and successful in military exploits, the perfect embodiment of an eminent martial leader. He constantly moves in the path of a strict virtue which requires him to subordinate the passion of his love to the dictates of honor as formulated by Alternera, his beloved. Even when faced by the certain failure of his suit and by possible dismissal from the King's service because, to please Alternera, he saved Lucidor's life contrary to royal order, he still can proclaim proudly to Alternera: Honour and love my actions still shall guide. What's duty to obey, 'tis sin to hide. I'll make it to the world and you appear, To serve you is my glory, not my fear.16

He well deserves Altemera's encomium — Oh noble virtue! great enough alone The whole world to supply, if it had none —17

when at the close of the play he resigns at her request all hopes of her hand, and makes friends with his successful rival, Lucidor. At the same time Clorimun displays on occasion a touch of fiery spirit and haughtiness. In the third act the King, angered at Clorimun for preserving Lucidor's life in defiance of his command, upbraids him with the following words: I doubt it will too evidently prove That is your treachery you call your Love.18 16

Act III, U. 201-204.

17

Ibid., 11. 228-229.

18

LI. 339-340.

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Clorimun replies with lofty vehemence : M y treachery! durst any but my King Such an aspersion on my honour fling, Though Armies to secure him had Combin'd, Yet through them all this sword a way should find, — This Sword on which Success did still attend, And to enthrone you was your powerfullest friend. Reproach for this is a Reward unfit.19

Orrery's creation of one outstanding male with a strikingly vigorous and virtuous character is a significant development. The Caroline playwrights did not take pains to single out and exalt one of their youthful lovers as a remarkable pattern of heroic virtue. To be sure, their important characters are possessed of pure and honorable sentiments, of an ardent affection toward a female paragon, but they are relatively colorless and flabby individuals. For example, D'Avenant's Love and Honour, which The Generali in many respects resembles, presents as lovers of the heroine, Evandra, three highsouled youths, Prospero, Alvaro, and Lionell, who are only vaguely differentiated and do little more than talk occasionally in exalted terms of fame and love, for which no sacrifice is too great, but for which they actually are never required to sacrifice. D'Avenant's indifferent treatment of his leading male roles in this play is thoroughly representative of the general practice among the court dramatists of the period. None of them conceived of such heroic individualization as Orrery initiated in his depiction of Clorimun. Throughout the dialogue of The Generali, and especially in those portions which take place between Alternera and her suitors, Orrery has developed another new point of dramatic emphasis. Extensive arguments over the issues of love's service are frequently occurring. Perhaps the two most striking instances, each of which occupies practically a hundred lines of speech, are found in the second scene of Act I I I where Alternera pleads with Clorimun to save Lucidor's life, and in the latter part of Act V where Alternera, though by accident wounded severely during a duel between Lucidor and Clorimun, argues forcefully with them to bring about a reconciliation. In fact, for the greater part of the play, the note of disputation so dominates that all the critical decisions concerned with the various courtships of Alternera are preceded by considerable debate. The bent for sophistical argument displayed by Orrery's characters is quite remi19

LI. 341-344. 347-349·

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niscent of the exponents of the Platonic love cult, who were notorious for their oral casuistry. Upon this trait Suckling comments in Aglaura (1637) through the mouth of an anti-Platonic, Philan: The Platonic is ever so; they are as tedious, Before they come to the point, as an old man Fall'n into the stories of his youth.20

In imitation of this Platonic mode the Caroline court dramatists employed in a rather tentative fashion some controversial dialogue over the claims of love. Probably the most elaborate example is contained in Aglaura at the end of Act IV when Semanthe rejects the suit of Iolas in an argument conducted with much formality and finesse. Though the controversies of this nature in Caroline plays are almost never lengthy and are only occasional, in The Generali disputation is constant and results in a series of formal debates quite unprecedented. While the tendency of the English drama of the preceding age to interpolate from time to time argumentation over the delicate problems of honor and love undoubtedly influenced Orrery, he was perhaps affected as much, if not more, by the usage of French serious drama, where sophistry and argument were prominently employed in the dialogue. Indeed the conflict between love and duty, which formed at that period the chief theme of the French tragedies and tragicomedies, was expressed for the most part through intense discussion alone. With the sentiments and the conflicts in The Generali so closely similar to the French material, it would be strange if their form of oral presentation was not strongly suggested by French practice. Once again a significant feature of the new dramatic pattern in Orrery's play would appear to arise from a commingling of literary influences — native and foreign. Yet was not the most decisive factor in connection with the extensive introduction of disputative dialogue the probable realization by Orrery that the form of regular heroic couplets, which he was introducing to the Restoration theatre, was eminently suited to the battledore and shuttlecock method of discourse between arguing lovers? The crisp and terse expression induced by the rimed couplet coincided nicely with that method, and easily produced an epigrammatic style extremely pleasing to the Restoration taste for wit in argument. The impression of smartness in dialogue, so desirable to that age, is admirably conveyed by this excerpt from the important debate between Alternera and Clorimun over the fate of Lucidor: 20

Act II, Sc. ι.

CRITICAL ALTEMERA. CLORIMUN. ALTEMERA. CLORIMUN.

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Who but b y virtue does to love pretend, Forsakes the way, and yet pursues the end. And you would have me, b y what now you say, Forsake the end, and yet pursue the way. He who his mistress' favor cannot get Ought to be pleased that he does merit it. T o miss the purchase and yet pay the price, Makes virtue more unfortunate than vice. 21

The particular excellence of rimed verse in argumentative scenes was early stressed by John Dryden. In his preface to The Rival Ladies (1664) he writes: Then, in the quickness of repartees (which in discoursive scenes fall very often), it has so particular a grace, and is so aptly suited to them, that the sudden smartness of the answer, and the sweetness of the rhyme, set oS the beauty of each other. . . . The scenes, which, in my opinion, most commend it, are those of argumentation and discourse, on the result of which the doing or not doing of some considerable action should depend.

Dryden, before he wrote these remarks, had had the opportunity to reflect upon Orrery's pioneer work in the technique of rimed dialogue and to test it out further in his own creations, while Orrery in his maiden composition appears to have been fully aware of the socalled delightful effects in sound and sense which disputations in rime afforded. The Generali was indeed a marked departure from previous English forms, and exemplified the fundamental outline of the new Restoration species of serious drama, the heroic play, with its motif of admiration unbroken by comic distractions; its overwhelming emphasis on heroic virtue and love in the shapes of a valorous warrior and a lovely, high-minded princess; its careful delineation of an involved, sentimental conflict through long-winded argument in riming couplets. These basic points of structure Orrery followed in his second extant composition, probably written at Dublin in the latter half of 1662. Yet he changed considerably other features of his design. At last he succumbed wholly to the influence of the contemporary heroic interest by choosing as the subject of his play an heroic figure and situation from English history, namely, Henry V and his triumphal campaign in France. This play, entitled Henry the Fifth, inaugurates the model of heroic play which came to be considered typical of Orrery. No other Restoration playwright undertook to imitate his particular mould. Edward Phillips in his Theatrum Poetarum (1674) aptly described Henry the Fifth and its genre as 21

Act I I I , 11. 49-56.

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"dramatic histories" filled with "the continual Riming, and love and honour way of the French>" 22 Though the sentimental fabric of love and honor in conflict resembles closely that of The Generali, the fabric is woven around actual figures and events of history, rather than around such fictitious personages as Clorimun and Alternera. True history, however, has been wonderfully garbled and adulterated with the glorious intrigue of love which Orrery invented for the hero of Agincourt. Henry the Fifth is primarily the dramatized picture of an heroic courtship illustrious and admirable. The extreme sway of French conventions in Orrery's new model was the cause for the lack of any imitation by the theatrical writers of the period. Orrery carefully avoided any precise reference to time or place in his text, and, like Corneille, made these two elements of almost no account. No stage direction concerning place occurs anywhere in the play. During an act English characters leave the stage, and a group of French personages enter, without any indication of a change of setting. In the same manner, all allusions as to the lapse of time are withheld in order to conceal the improbability which would arise from crowding the Agincourt victory and the subsequent political and romantic intrigues into any sort of compact period of time. Sophistry and argument after the prevailing French fashion are even more abounding than in The Generali. Incident and action appear prominently in Orrery's first play, but his second replaces much of such material by mere dialectics. Physical movement is so reduced that the only moment of violence occurs when King Henry swiftly disarms the Dauphin in the third act. Although England and France are at war during the greater part of the play, the war is kept simply a distant shadowy background. In fact, martial atmosphere through the introduction of alarums, shouts, and other sounds, which frequently are employed in The Generali, is carefully avoided in Henry the Fifth. A number of important military and political events closely connected with the King's suit for Princess Katherine and France are not presented on the stage, but are subsequently narrated by an eye-witness or a messenger. Thus the scenes of Henry the Fifth take on that chill and inactivity which were then associated with French dramatic practice. The unduly Gallicized mode of Henry the Fifth must have rendered it the chiefest offender among the Restoration stage pieces early criticized for their undramatic exposition by Orrery's relative and fellow playwright, Sir Robert Howard. Howard's strictures on this * Pp. 165-166.

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point are contained in his Preface to Four New Plays, written early in 1665, and run as follows: The serious plays were anciently compos'd of speeches and choruses, where all things are related, but no matter of Fact presented on the Stage: This pattern the French do at this time nearly follow, only leaving out the Chorus, making up their Plays with almost entire and discoursive scenes, presenting the business in relations: This way has very much affected some of our Nation, who possibly believe well of it more upon the account that what the French do ought to be a Fashion, than upon the Reason of the thing.

The date of these remarks makes it practically certain that they are especially directed at the Frenchified pattern of Orrery's Henry the Fifth, first acted in August, 1664. Henry the Fifth retains the design of The Generall's, main plot, namely the rivalry of male lovers for a female paragon, though it narrows the field to two rivals instead of four. Once more this rivalry produces intense sentimental conflict. The desires of love's passion are again depicted as warring continually against the dictates of love's virtue. Yet the emotional battles of the mind take a new turn. This new turn may well have been suggested to Orrery by social trends at Dublin contemporaneous to the writing of Henry the Fifth. "The matchless Orinda" came to the Irish capital in July, 1662, and quickly attracted the attention and patronage of Orrery as well as other notables. It was not long before she had introduced her pet interest, the Society of Friendship, into Dublin high society. Lady Anne Boyle, Orrery's cousin, became Orinda's "adored Valeria," and Orrery's witty young nephew, the Earl of Roscommon, also swore eternal friendship with the charming Mrs. Philips. A mutual friend, Sir Edward Dering, was soon denoted "the noble Silvander." The Society of Friendship thus engendered at Orrery's very door, so to speak, an atmosphere of Platonic sensibility, in which the sentiments of love and friendship figured above all else. In consequence, love and friendship would probably be uppermost in Orrery's mind as he was casting about for the sentimental basis of his new play. Therefore he might well have developed his dramatic conflict accordingly. King Henry and Owen Tudor are bosom friends, but each possesses a lofty passion for the lovely Princess Katherine of France. Friendship soon clashes with love. The clash becomes more intense, of course, in the soul of Tudor, who must obey his sovereign and woo Katherine on behalf of Henry. A t last, Tudor, like Clorimun, nobly resigns his love to the superior claims of his rival, but it is the specific obligation of friendly loyalty which forces him to this unselfish

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course, rather than the more general motive of honor, which solely prompted Clorimun. The same theme of friendship versus love Orrery continued to utilize with slight variations in his succeeding heroic plays, until the public became bored by the repetition. The rivalry in love between the King and Tudor is supposed to reach its climax in Act V, Scene 4, where the two lovers appear together before Princess Katherine, plead each for the other's cause in obedience to friendship's code, and await the verdict of their mistress. The scene is distinctly disappointing, really an anti-climax which even Pepys noted after his first view of Henry the Fifth on the stage. The King does not plead Tudor's cause with much earnestness, nor does Tudor press his own suit when he has been given leave. His ultra-unselfishness, though in perfect accord with friendship's code, somewhat irritates the Princess, who would have him display a more impetuous love for her. She therefore acts rather harshly and coldly toward this truly virtuous lover, who is now unhappily caught between two fires. Then it transpires that she cannot seriously consider his suit anyway, for no princess may stoop so low as to marry a mere subject. "So much I owe my fame, that to my birth I would resign my flame" — such was the decision she had already reached. Thus Tudor's cause is always hopeless, and King Henry wins the day without the expected struggle. The utter inability of Orrery to create a tense, emotional scene is here exposed once and for all. The fire of feeling, either genuine or forced, does not make its appearance among the characters even at the crisis. This glaring defect in Orrery's dramatic art can be noted throughout his later work, where the same stiff, passionless men and women move in a still blatantly artificial world of sophistical discussion. Orrery more or less reproduces in Henry the Fifth the heroic conception he created in The Generali, but he really portrays both King Henry and Owen Tudor as characters of nearly equal grandeur. They walk in the footsteps of Clorimun, and make glory their way, love their end. The glory, however, which surrounds their persons is reflected almost entirely from the remarks of others about them and about their actions off-stage. Clorimun was allowed by Orrery to prove more directly his martial prowess and his valor. Nevertheless the opening scene of Henry the Fifth does offer some direct glimpse of King Henry's character by the words he speaks to his supporters before the battle of Agincourt. To Tudor he says, "Reflect on dangers, which most glory win!" 23 and when the former mentions grief, the monarch quickly counters: M Act 1,1. 47·

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Speak not of grief, but think on that applause, Which Heav'n doth still allow the juster cause.24

Thus they go forth to battle, where the King behaves in so mighty a manner that Blamount reports of him to the French Queen in a paean of praise : But fame can want no theme, when she does sing Of English swords led by an English king: Nor was he only in the battle known By his bright armour, which like lightning shone: But did with nobler marks his valour grace, Still being seen where foremost danger was.26

Despite the pictures, presented through narration, of these two heroes at Agincourt, the heroic characterization in Henry the Fifth for the most part lacks something of the vigor and force exhibited quite consistently by Clorimun. Gallic flaccidness and restraint have undermined Orrery's earlier and more English conception of the heroic ideal on the stage. The rimed verse of Henry the Fifth possesses far more grace and beauty than that of The Generali. Indeed Orrery never attained by any subsequent composition greater smoothness in his heroic couplets. At times, the easy flow of the lines is quite admirable and no doubt captivated at first the inexperienced ear of the Restoration audience. The dialogue of Henry the Fifth also reveals the more frequent intrusion of pleasing poetic figure. The marked improvement which took place in Orrery's language can be most effectively demonstrated by quotation. The most inspired passage in The Generali (if that adjective may be allowed for such verse) is Altemera's soliloquy as she anticipates Lucidor's pitiable execution at the hands of the King: Death which mankind in such high awe does keep Can only hold us in eternal sleep, And if a life after this life remains, Sure to our loves belongs those happy plains. There in blest fields I'll pass the endless hours, And him I crown with love, I'll crown with flowers, A crown which more true joy than laurel brings, Or that bright earth which circles heads of kings. Either my fancy does delude my eyes, Or I behold my friend ascend the skies. His spirit now from clogs of flesh set free Invites me to his immortality.26 24

Ibid.,

Π. 6 I - 6 2 .

26

Ibid., 11. 192-197.

28

Act III, 11. 145-156.

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In comparison to this flight of fancy note the greater dignity and polish of the poetry in one of Tudor's speeches during his wooing of Princess Katherine for King Henry, a speech quite representative of the language in Henry the Fifth: 'Tis far above the labored art of man To draw a mistress as a lover can: Your picture took his sight; but you will find My words alone did captivate his mind. Though you may think the pencil's power is great, It aims to paint a fire, but not a heat; Much less a heat which does from love arise, And which is kindled by his mistress' eyes. The pencil to my words resigned the place; Those drew your soul, that painted but your face. Madam, 'twas I who told him how your mind With greater lustre than your beauty shined; That from the charms of your discourse and shape Men could not more than from your eyes escape.27

Thus Orrery clearly grew in versifying skill and in maturity of poetic diction during his early years of playwriting. The greater experience in composition brought about a more finished and severe style of dialogue, even though it did not increase his dramatic powers. Between Henry the Fifth and Orrery's next creation, Mustapha, an interval of some two years elapsed, so that it is not surprising to find Orrery changing slightly his dramatic pattern after the interval. The formal French tone and structure, which he had rather fully adopted in Henry the Fifth, he now imitated somewhat more freely. Mustapha is noticeably less restrained in treatment, though no whit more possessed of resemblance to life. Once more Orrery chose historical figures well known to his time as personages of heroic proportions in situations capable of lofty romance. With the usual shadowy background of war, he again depicted verbal battles revolving about friendship and love. The famous Turkish sultan, Solyman, is besieging with his army the capital of Hungary, Buda. Mustapha and Zanger, sons of Solyman by different wives, are boon friends who both become infatuated with the widowed Queen of Hungary during her initial visit to the Turkish camp. In Act I I Zanger reveals to Mustapha his love for the Queen by the same involved procedure Tudor uses in the fourth act of Henry the Fifth when he reveals to King Henry his love for Princess Katherine. During the following act the two Turkish princes plead, each for the other's suit, before the Hungarian Queen in a fashion similar to " Act II, 11. 2 9 9 - 3 1 2 .

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K i n g Henry and Tudor before the French Princess in Henry the Fifth, Act V. So far, then, the material in Mustapha is strongly reminiscent of its immediate predecessor, but now Orrery did not stop with the portrayal of a rivalry in courtship such as largely formed the plot of his Henry the Fifth. He introduced further matter to produce greater complexity of plot with an outcome that is intended to be tragic, in contrast to Henry the Fifth's happy ending. Roxolana, mother of Zanger, in order to preserve the throne for her son alone, contrives secretly to reach Solyman's ears with false reports of Mustapha's disloyalty. Solyman finally has Mustapha executed, but later learns the outrageous injustice of his terrible act and punishes Roxolana by divorce and banishment. Meantime Zanger, who has sworn that he will not live longer than his brother, dutifully commits suicide close to Mustapha's corpse, while the Queen of Hungary in sorrow departs for a nunnery. With the greater number of interrelations possible in this plot, Orrery has paid more attention to the development of stage situations. Consequently there are in Mustapha some good, theatrical scenes such as the execution of Mustapha, the suicide of Zanger, and Roxolana's forced composition of her own divorce decree. For the most part, however, the action in these scenes smacks of melodrama. Mustapha, who has been hitherto a rather colorless youth of virtuous meekness, suddenly resists with great vigor and resulting bloodshed his arrest by the mutes whom his father has ordered to seize and execute him. Such a scene of violence as Orrery here interpolates gives the effect simply of absurd spectacle, because it is in no way prepared for by the dramatist. Samuel Chappuzeau, the French critic, saw Mustapha performed in London about 1668 and justly derided what must have been the ludicrous impression of this scene when acted on the stage. Estant à Londres il y a six ans . . . je fus à deux representations, à la mort de Montezume R o y de Mexique, et à celle de Mustapha, qui se défendoit vigoureusement sur le Theatre contre les muets qui le vouloient étrangler; ce qui faisait rire, et ce que les François n'auraient representé que dans un récit.28

Despite occasional interpolations of violent action Orrery still maintains to a great extent the atmosphere of Gallic correctitude initiated in Henry the Fifth. Scenes of endless discourse and argument predominate to give Mustapha the doubtful honor of being the longest of Orrery's heroic plays. The characters anticipate every 28

Le Théâtre François (Paris, 1674), 55.

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move of consequence with extended debate, and thereby only accentuate their hopeless unnaturalness. Like their predecessors by the same author, they exist as abstract beings in an artificial world of arbitrary sentiments. Yet, despite their universal habit for dialectical exercise, they frequently make their final decisions or change their previous attitudes with a startling suddenness that can make no claim to plausible motivation. At no point is Orrery's lack of finesse as a dramatist more glaring than at the end of a series of argumentative tirades when the moment of resolution is approached. Then the hand of the puppet master is clumsily revealed to the audience through his own incompetence at the critical moments. Consider the striking instance of Roxolana's agreement to the murder of the infant King of Hungary. After she and Rustan, the vizier, have delivered counter-opinions on the barbarity of the act until the patience of the most well-disposed auditor is exhausted, their argument suddenly concludes in the following manner: ROXOLANA. RUSTAN.

ROXOLANA.

I have pity of his innocence. His early dying may his soul prefer To th' other world, and may secure us here. Those, Madam, may rejoice, who upward go, And ought to pity us who stay below. Ah, Rustan, you by soaring virtue reach Those heights of which our priests can only preach; My pity you correct, and then destroy, In pleading what the dead by death enjoy; And now, to show I prize what you esteem, Call in my mutes and bid them strangle him.29

Yet the characterization in Mustapha, lifeless and stilted though it may be, is in part somewhat superior to that which Orrery ordinarily attained. Mustapha and Zanger, to be sure, are merely the conventional, wooden figures of gallant warrior and lover. Orrery has not depicted them, however, in such hyperbolic terms as his previous heroes. Indeed the two youths are so inhibited by their absurd ideas of heroic virtue and love that their characters leave no distinct impression. On the other hand, Solyman and Roxolana, especially the latter, are drawn with a fair degree of spirit. Feeling and vigor run through the dialogue between the Sultan and his favorite wife at the end of Act I, where Roxolana finally persuades him not to kill the infant Hungarian monarch, who had been sent to her for protection. The scene of greatest emotional vitality, however, is the closing one of the play, in which Solyman inflicts pun28

Act I, 11. 336-345·

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ishment upon his misguided wife. Therein Orrery's language takes on an unusual directness and simplicity of expression with a consequent decrease in the formality of the verse. Thus a reader of sufficiently high sensibility may perhaps be stirred faintly in the drama's last moments. Certainly they were decidedly touching to the romantic mind of the Restoration theatregoer. These final speeches of Solyman and Roxolana were clearly designed to effect a definite climax of feeling: SOLYMAN.

ROXOLANA. SOLYMAN. ROXOLANA. SOLYMAN.

Take with your life perpetual banishment. Long may you live, that you may much repent; But from my sight be still so far remov'd, As I may quite forget I ever lov'd. Ah, Sultan! do but hear what I can say. Oh, cruelty! you kill me if you stay. I'll but forgiveness beg for love and grief, Since both offend you, when they seek relief. Oh, Heav'n! still will you speak?

ROXOLANA.

SOLYMAN.

Sir, I ' l l d e p a r t ,

And at your feet leave a forsaken heart. Farewell forever! and to Love farewell! I'll lock m y bosom up, where Love did dwell; I will to Beauty ever shut my eyes, And be no more a captive by surprise: But oh! how little I esteem a throne, When Love, the ornament of Pow'r, is gone! (.Exeunt

{Exit.

omnes.30

In no other heroic play does Orrery work out his drama to so moving a finale, if the degree of pathos aroused, however artificial its causes, be the measure — and such was the usual measure his contemporaries applied to so-called "tragedies" like Mustapha. Yet Dryden at a later date decried the ending because it obliterated the supposed main theme of the play, the love of Mustapha and Zanger for the Hungarian queen. In a neo-classic mood he complains as follows: " T h u s in Mustapha, the play should naturally have ended with the death of Zanger, and not have given us the grace-cup after dinner, of Solyman's divorce from Roxolana." 31 From a technical standpoint his criticism is just. The structure of Mustapha is far inferior to that of Henry the Fifth. On account of the prolix plot material at his disposal Orrery apparently did not atttempt to preserve unity of action and theme until the close of the drama. Nevertheless Dryden's complaint smacks of the study rather than the theatre, where the sad spectacle of Roxolana's divorce marked, with»· Act V, 11. 779-79531 Preface to Troilus and Cressîda (1679).

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out a doubt, an emotional climax of real intensity for the vast majority of the audience. In consequence, Mustapha was commonly regarded during the Restoration period as Orrery's masterpiece and held the stage far longer than the rest of his compositions. In 1693 Nahum Tate, the new poet laureate, singled Mustapha out of all Orrery's dramatic creations for particular praise as " a just Model of Tragedy, as long as the Stage shall last." 32 The year after the appearance of Mustapha saw Orrery complete in Ireland another heroic play, The Black Prince. The title-page of the play, when published in 1669, calls it a "tragedy," but the Term Catalogue describes it more accurately as "The History of the Black Prince. A Tragi-Comedy." 33 The new piece was an obvious imitation in theme and design of Henry the Fifth. With his usual heroic decoration Orrery had dramatized another English royal courtship. Except for the mention, in the opening scene, of Edward's great victory over the French at Poictiers, The Black Prince is devoid of the political and martial background which was noticeably present in Henry the Fifth. Love rivalry among friends brings about the peculiarly Orreryan conflict between friendship and love. The development of the rivalry is, however, a great deal more complicated than in Henry the Fifth, for in The Black Prince there are three women and four men involved in the love tangle. Not long after the beginning of the drama, King Edward abandons his attachment to Alizia Pierce, and King John his devotion to Valeria. Both sovereigns have become infatuated by the charm of the widowed paragon, Plantagenet, whom Prince Edward and Lord Delaware already adore. Eventually, the two kings, rebuffed in their new allegiance and upbraided by their former mistresses, grow properly remorseful and return to their first loves. Lord Delaware, meanwhile, like Owen Tudor in Henry the Fifth, struggles between the desire of love and the demand of friendship, only to yield at last his own cause in favor of his royal master's. Thus the noble friend is content in the end to see his princely hero capture the hand of Plantagenet. Honor wins the day in every heart, so that Orrery again may glorify heroic virtue among the great of English history. The characters in The Black Prince are no more clearly differentiated nor more vitalized than in the Irish earl's previous efforts. They reach decisions by means of the usual, astonishing, psychological changes. The implausibility of these emotional revolutions is excellently illustrated by the dispute between Alizia and Plan32 93

Dedicatory preface to Guzman (1693). Arber ed., ι, 20.

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tagenet. Alizia has upbraided the latter for alienating the affections of King Edward, and, even in the face of Plantagenet's assertions of innocence, Alizia has bitterly condemned her as a traitor to friendship. Finally, Plantagenet in desperation says : Though your not crediting what I have spoke M y just resentment does too much provoke, Y e t that you may my friendship clearly see E v ' n while you show that you have none for me,

I swear the King nor any e're to me Mention'd that love which makes your jealousy; And should he e're for me a passion have, Rather than wed the King I'll wed m y Grave: These vows your Friendship should to me restore.34

At once Alizia's attitude is completely transformed, and she replies thus: Ah, madam, now my trouble is more high Than it was lately b y m y jealousy; You could impose no penance so sublime, A s thus to show me and forgive m y crime.

Y e t who can wonder that I jealous grew Of so much beauty and such virtue too; T h e perfectness of both you now have shown, T h e last has pardon'd what the first has done.38

Thereafter the two ladies embrace each other in friendly felicity. The most ridiculous piece of sentimental artificiality, however, occurs in the scene where Alizia is about to die from a broken heart, because she thinks King Edward no longer loves her. The King then comes to visit her as she lies sick in bed, and, asking forgiveness for his temporary inconstancy, swears he loves her now with utmost devotion. In spite of his earnest plea that she should live and make him happy with her love, she continues determined to die. Y e t during the following conversation, a swift change of heart is born in Alizia: KING.

And I of life should too unworthy be, If I could Jive after you died for me. Your love for me b y living must be shown, For you, to save my life, must keep your own;

34 86

A c t I I I , 11. 241-244, 247-251. Ibid., 11. 255-258, 263-266.

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And if my words you give no credit to, What I have vow'd, my grief will make me do. Ah, then all thoughts of dying I'll decline, Since you have vow'd your life depends on mine. . .

Thus harmony and love are speedily restored, while an immediate return of bodily vigor is promised by the no longer pining lady. The Black Prince contains even greater inaction and more discourse than Henry the Fifth. The use of narration and report to develop the plot is largely prevalent. Indeed the method is carried to an absurd extreme in Act V, where Orrery arranged for Lord Delaware to read aloud a long letter written by the Earl of Kent before his death some time since. This tedious proceeding aroused the indignation of the audience on the first night and was afterwards abandoned. The only important departure from a thoroughly Frenchified pattern comes about through the introduction of King John's mistress, Valeria, in disguise as a young man. A t the end of the fourth act, King Edward, who has been visiting Plantagenet in her chamber, suddenly notices Valeria, in masculine costume, emerging from behind the bed, whither she had gone upon his unexpected entrance into the chamber. The King, scenting scandal, seizes the supposed culprit and shouts for the guards. This scene is an obviously English touch thrust in by Orrery to create a slight excitement and break the monotony of the lengthy discourses in palace chambers. Several features of The Black Prince show minor innovations in Orrery's dramatic practice. For the first time he added a prologue and epilogue, both of which are flattering tributes to Charles II. With this play also he began to pay real attention to the scene division and to indicate carefully the setting of the particular scenes, whereas he had previously cited the locale, if at all, by vague references in the dialogue. At the opening of Act II he introduced a stage attraction never used by him in any other play, namely, a masque. King Edward and all his court are assembled in the great hall of the royal palace. There descend to the stage two scenes of clouds, in the hollows of which are hidden richly apparelled women and men, who are singing in dialogue. The chorus finally steps upon the stage and dances. After the dance is finished, they disappear again in the clouds, which "insensibly ascend" amid more singing. This elaborate spectacle impressed Pepys by the "very fine dance for variety of figures," but even so he found it " a little too long." 37 36 87

Act V, 11. 239-246. Diary, October 19, 1667.

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The interpolation of the masque may have resulted from Orrery's observations on the success of similar stage performances in The Indian Queen38 and The Indian Emperor,39 both of which he had seen, no doubt, during his sojourn at London, 1664-65. For some unaccountable reason he did not repeat this use of dance and song in the scene of any subsequent serious play. The form and matter of The Black Prince are filled with such clear echoes of Orrery's earlier compositions that they were even heard in the theatre, where production so often covers up minor repetitions. Pepys, not too keen an observer as a rule, remarked pertinently after the first performance: "But, as to the contrivance, and all that was witty . . . was almost the same that had been in his two former plays of Henry the 5th and Mustapha, and the same points and turns of wit in both, and in this very same play often repeated. . . ." 4 0 Orrery may not have realized that his public would become bored by a continued succession of plays without noticeable variance. A t least he had not yet shown a disposition to make any important shift from the dramatic model which had won him much applause at the outset of his playwriting career. Not more than a year after the first acting of The Black Prince Orrery finished another heroic history, entitled Tryphon, in honor of the notorious Syrian tyrant, about whom the plot centres. As was Orrery's wont, the historic situations and characters are most freely altered with an eye to the proper glorification of heroic virtue. Except for the bit of bloody action caused by the suicide of the tyrant, Tryphon contains nothing but lofty argument in various palace chambers, and is in consequence more completely after the French mode than any other drama by the same author. Though its outcome is a thoroughly pleasurable one, the play was nevertheless printed as a "tragedy," obviously on account of Tryphon's death. Tragi-comedy of the Orreryan type, however, was frequently given the misnomer of tragedy by contemporary critics for the reason that its tone was serious and dignified throughout. In Tryphon Orrery introduces again his favorite theme of friendship versus love, and as always he portrays honor, in the form of friendship, triumphant. With two fair sisters, Cleopatra and Stratonice, pursued by the changeable affections of four men, the complications in the love rivalry are developed to a high point of intricacy and then are unravelled by Tryphon's suicide and the expected victory of virtue over passion in the minds of the male characters 38 40

Act III, Sc. 2. Diary, October 19, 1667.

« Act II, Sc. ι.

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whom love's code requires to be unsuccessful. Tryphon is at first in love with Cleopatra, who steadily loves Aretus, but later Tryphon turns his affections to Stratonice. The latter is beloved by the friend of Aretus, Demetrius, whose love she reciprocates. Demetrius is also sworn friend to Tryphon and agrees to court on his behalf whatever lady the tyrant desires. Tryphon's change of affections, however, places Demetrius in the position of a rival. Thus the part of Tudor in Henry the Fifth and of Delaware in The Black Prince is repeated once more in the role of Demetrius. Tryphon threatens Stratonice with the murder of her father, Nicanor, and secures to aid him in this project Seleucus, rival of Aretus for the favor of Cleopatra. Seleucus, however, repents of his evil intent and plans with Demetrius and Aretus to kill the wicked usurper, who finally stabs himself to avoid their plot. Aretus and Demetrius win the hands of Cleopatra and Stratonice at the close, while Seleucus magnanimously resigns his love for Cleopatra and contents himself with that sense of heroic virtue which is the highest of all rewards. Thus Seleucus follows in the train of those Orreryan heroes, Clorimun, Tudor, Zanger, and Delaware, whose noble surrender of their loves he imitates. The warp and woof of Tryphon is clearly identical with that which Orrery had utilized in his previous heroic plays. His lack of inventive genius was exposed completely when the new play appeared on the boards. The London theatregoers were at last disgusted with the continued repetitions of the selfsame dramatic formula, as Pepys' comment during the play's initial run shows: . . . the play, though admirable, y e t no pleasure almost in it, because just the very same design, and words, and sense and plot, as every one of his plays have, a n y one of which alone would be held admirable, whereas so m a n y of the same design and fancy do but dull one another; and this, I perceive, is the sense of every body else, as well as myself, who therfore showed but little pleasure in it. 41

Pepys never wrote down a more unexceptionable piece of dramatic criticism. Henry the Fifth, Mustapha, The Black Prince, and Tryphon are all concerned with the glorification of friendship, which comes into conflict with love, but transcends and conquers the latter sentiment. In each of these plays are presented situations where friends become rival lovers, and where disputations constantly occur over the same set of ethical considerations. In The Generali and in these four compositions also, one lover sacrifices himself in the cause of his rival and does his best to make the latter's suit successful. The 41

Diary, December 8, 1668.

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emotional struggle in the mind of the unfortunate, unselfish lover is identical in every play, where his attainment of a lofty resignation always forms a prominent part of the finale. Such identities in plot and sentiment quite overshadow the varying historical backgrounds. The differences in setting are at best superficial, for the same tone of interminable discussion and virtuous gallantry invades palace chambers, whether they be in England, Hungary, or Syria. The repetitions of sense and phrasing in Orrery's successive heroic plays are also stressed in the foregoing comment by Pepys. His criticism may be fully substantiated by two series of illustrative citations. The first is concerned with the theme of Friendship's supremacy over other human ties: The Generali — Memnor to Clatus: Know friendship is a greater tie than blood.42 Henry the Fifth — King Henry to Tudor: Friendship above all ties does bind the heart.43 Mustapha — Mustapha to Zanger: Friendship's a stronger tie than that of blood.44 The Black Prince —• Prince Edward to King John: [Friendship] is its own security, you know, And does more strongly bind than any vow.45 Tryphon — Stratonice to Cleopatra: That sacred friendship, which so firm has stood, And joins us more than Nature does by blood.46

The second series of repetitious statements treats of the rewarding sense of pride felt by the unsuccessful, but virtuous, lover : The Generali — Clorimun: I'll save my rival, and make her confess 'Tis I deserve what he does but possess.47 Henry the Fifth — Tudor: If I her right above my love prefer, In that, by losing, I shall merit her.48 Mustapha — Mustapha: Only those lovers should be counted true, Who noble would, when by their fortune cross'd, Have others get what to them is lost.49 « Act Act « Act 48 Act 44

1,1. 293. 1,1. 227. 1,11. 251-252. II, 11. 157-158.

Act « Act 47 Act 49 Act 43

IV, III, III, III,

1. 288. 11. 219-220. 11. 143-144. 11. 401, 403-404.

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The Black Prince — Alizia: She has the happier, I the nobler part, She may possess, but I'll deserve his heart.50 Tryphon — Demetrius: To lose her, yet deserve her, is more fit, Than to possess her, and not merit it.51

Of course, these recurrences in sentiment and wording eventually destroyed what on first hearing had been witty novelty. The Earl of Orrery was made to feel, in one way or another, the force of the adverse criticism which the latest exhibition of his talent had occasioned. He came to realize that he had indeed exhausted the possibilities of his peculiar dramatic model, and he never again followed it. For the time being he forsook the heroic play entirely and turned to comedy. His first effort, under the name of Guzman, made its appearance on the stage in the spring of 1669, but it was not printed for another quarter of a century. After attending a performance, Pepys rightly calls this play " a mean thing." 52 It is a labored piece of farce, spun out to an utterly boring extreme by overmuch talk and monotonous situations. The clumsy handling of the material betrays Orrery's inaptitude and inexperience with the comic form. The superficial trappings of Guzman are Spanish, but much of the action smacks of the commedia dell'arte tradition. There run throughout its five acts two strains of comic appeal, i.e. buffoonery, both verbal and physical, and romantic intrigue of the Spanish variety. The buffoonery is principally supplied by the absurd antics of Guzman, a wealthy, foppish braggadocio with pretensions to poetry, and by the gulling tactics of his tricky servant, Francisco, who assumes at the proper moments the guise of an astrologer. It is Francisco also who carries on the intrigue to marry various fair ladies to suitable husbands. In the end, unknown identities are revealed; misfortunes caused by deceit are rectified; and the mating of the ladies and gentlemen is accomplished to the satisfaction, as well as to the surprise, of all concerned. Francisco's two brothers, Guivarro and Alvares, marry two genteel sisters, Antonia and Pastrana, while Francisco secures their mother, Leonora. Two gallants, Oviedo and Piracco, patrons of Guivarro and Alvares, win Maria and Lucia, who are sisters of the last-named pair of males. Salazar and Fernando, the uncles of Francisco, discover that they have contracted a supposedly legal marriage with the maid-servants of Antonia and Pastrana, Tireletta and Tirelesa, but they are finally " A c t 1,11. 484-485.

61

A c t I I I , II. 523-524.

62

Diary, A p r i l 16, 1669.

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freed from their bondage by Francisco's revelation that they have undergone only a mock ceremony. So intricate are the involutions of the plot that the matrimonial intrigues frequently give rise to perplexity rather than amusement. Guzman in performance might have possessed certain comic effects through the outlandish behavior of Guzman with his continual rodomontade or his horrible versifying. The spectacular element of the scenes in the astrological study, and the absurd fright of Guzman at the magic phenomena, might appear more entertaining if actually observed. In the reading, however, such buffoonery grows forced and tiresome after constant reiteration for five long acts. Guzman is given to pedantic verbiage and ridiculous oaths. The following is a typical specimen of his manner of speaking: By Cupid, when I would not make sonnets, my fancy will coin nothing else; and now that I would make but one, and when my mistress for that one does look, I'm duller than a lover, that's forsook. Why, here's witchcraft again: rhyme and verses when I need it not. But when I most desire in both to speak, I then find, to my grief, I am to seek! Look! by Pegasus, a third effect of magic. I am Ovid when I speak to thee, but De Tristibus when I am to speak to her.63

Not only the speeches of Guzman, but the dialogue throughout the play contains this same sort of awkward, heavy humor rather than the sparkle and polish of true wit. Certainly Orrery's first essay at comedy demonstrates no temperamental bent nor literary gift for that type of dramatic composition. Despite his obvious lack of skill and success in the lighter vein of theatrical entertainment he did not hesitate to bring forth another attempt within a year or two after Guzman. The second comedy, entitled Mr. Anthony, bears much resemblance to its predecessor in its devices for humor, but the externals are greatly altered. The Spanish decorations are wholly removed. So far as the play suggests any locale, it is London of the Commonwealth period. Hence some slight satire at Puritan manners can be descried, largely in the last act. The fabric of the farce is the same mixture of matrimonial intrigue and buffoonish antics which appears in Guzman. Though the intrigue of the later piece is less complex and extensive, it does provide the backbone of the plot and allows the usual happy solution of all budding alliances. Philadelphia and Isabella, wards of Sir Timothy, become betrothed to Art and Plot; Cudden and Anthony 68

Act 1,11. 231-240.

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to Nan and Betty, nieces of Sir Timothy's wife; Goody Winifred to Pedagog. The proper mating is brought about, however, by a type of deceit foreign to Guzman. Sir Timothy, the old knight, who is father of Anthony, is inveigled into an assignation with Betty in her chamber. Then, when he is discovered by his whole family in this compromising situation, and is in fear of punishment, he has to agree to the marital wishes of his son, nieces, and wards. The greater portion of Mr. Anthony is taken up with buffoonery reminiscent of Guzman. Cudden and Anthony are two huffing, foppish fellows, inclined usually to fustian speech. Their grotesquely affected behavior leads them into frequent fracases with each other, and in the third act to the arrangement of a duel. This duel scene evidently was the bright spot of the play for the Restoration theatregoers, who took delight, no doubt, in the excellent clownish acting of Nokes and Angel. With their martial equipage of cudgels, bows, and arrows, they must have presented a highly ridiculous appearance on the stage. Such horseplay, less outlandish perhaps than this socalled duel, occurs throughout Mr. Anthony and extends on occasion to other characters than the two mentioned. The jawbreaking, bombastic phraseology, recurrent regularly in the speeches of Cudden and Anthony, crops out also in the dialogue of Pedagog, Art, and Plot. So continual and extravagant is the rodomontade that, as in Guzman, it soon tires the reader and loses all comic force. In no respect, therefore, does Mr. Anthony evidence progress by Orrery in comic writing. On the contrary, it is clearly a less interesting and less finished effort than Guzman. Thus the same lack of invention and of variety in treatment is made apparent in Orrery's comedy as was previously revealed in his serious drama. The capacity of his creative imagination was even more swiftly exhausted in the service of the new muse than of the old! The fruits of his labors for the new mistress added, moreover, very little to his reputation and not at all to the more permanent repertoire of the London theatres. When, after this brief and unsuccessful excursion into the field of comedy, Orrery returned to his first love, the heroic play, he realized that he must depart radically from his former design. The new pattern, which he consequently formulated about 1671, bears little resemblance to his previous work, but it may have been suggested by a fresh species of heroic play, at that time in its first flush of popularity. Elkanah Settle, a youthful playwright, was just beginning to win the attention of fashionable London. His Cambyses had proved a great success at the Duke's Theatre about the opening of

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1671, and had enjoyed a most lucrative run on account of the spectacular novelties in its contents. It is quite probable that Orrerysaw the play during his sojourn at London in the winter of 1670-71. He may well have considered it the successful model which he needed to guide him in his attempt to recover prestige as an heroic playwright. In Settle's piece wicked characters and evil motives predominate with a cruel, bloodthirsty king and an unprincipled, ambitious courtier as central figures. Bloody incidents and devices for horrible effects are especially stressed. Ghosts and evil spirits rise and fall. The whole coloring is definitely of gloom and black fatality. Such indeed are the features which also figure prominently in Herod the Great, the first product of Orrery's pen in his second period of serious drama. Nicoli calls this play "thoroughly heroic in subject matter and in treatment," 54 but he fails to make clear in what respect it is heroic. Certainly the play is not heroic in the previously established Orreryan manner. Its only points of close affinity are the verse in rimed couplets and the plot of pseudo-history. Herod the Great does not present the theme of love in conflict with honor and friendship, the favorite subject of its author in the past, nor does it depict heroic virtue as the pervading rule of conduct. To be sure, the element of heroic virtue is not entirely absent. Queen Mariamne is portrayed as the epitome of wifely loyalty and high-principled womanhood. Though she believes Herod dead and loves her stepson, Antipater, yet she refuses to give her hand to him and replies to his plea as follows: Prince, I for you dare die, but dare not sin. But incest is forbid, by Heaven's great law. Ah, do not ask what Heaven bids me deny.55

When, after his unexpected and undesired reappearance, Herod's life is threatened by Abner, Mariamne interposes her own person before the dagger of Abner and exclaims : I'll now forget, since he assaults his life, All wrongs, and but remember I'm his wife. You through my heart your way to his must force.56

Her extraordinary nobility does not prevent her headstrong, cruel husband from murdering her in a fit of stupid jealousy. The sad 64

65 68

A Hist, of Restoration Drama, 143.

Act 1,11. 416, 418, 423. Act IV, 11. 150-152.

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