Chapter XX: Act 1834: , and a purchaser of land no longer need trouble himself to (5)

II. _The Period of Decline._--This may be reckoned from about the 11th to about the 14th century of the Christian era, the beginning roughly coinciding with that of a continuous series of Mahommedan invasions of India. _Han[=u]man-Nataka_, or "the great Nataka" (for this irregular play, the work of several hands, surpasses all other Indian dramas in length, extending over no fewer than fourteen acts), dates from the 10th or 11th century. Its story is taken from the R[=a]ma-cycle, and a prominent character in it is the mythical monkey-chief King Han[=u]man, to whom, indeed, tradition ascribed the original authorship of the play. Krishnamicra's "theosophic mystery," as it has been called,--though it rather resembles some of the moralities,--_Prabodha-Chandrodaya_ (_The Rise of the Moon of Insight_, i.e. the victory of true doctrine over error), is ascribed by one authority to the middle of the 11th century, by another to about the end of the 12th. The famous _Ratnavali_ (_The Necklace_), a court-comedy of love and intrigue, with a half-Terentian plot, seems also to date from the earlier half of the period.

The remaining plays of which it has been possible to conjecture the dates range in the time of their composition from the end of the 11th to the 14th century. Of this period, as compared with the first, the general characteristics seem to be an undue preponderance of narrative and description, and an affected and over-elaborated style. As a striking instance of this class is mentioned a play on the adventures of R[=a]ma, the _Anargha-R[=a]ghava_, which in spite, or by reason, of the commonplace character of its sentiments, the extravagance of its diction, and the obscurity of its mythology, is stated to enjoy a higher reputation with the pundits of the present age than the masterpieces of K[=a]lid[=a]sa and Babhav[=u]ti. To the close of this period, the 14th century, has likewise (but without any pretension to certainty) been ascribed the only Tamil drama of which we possess an English version. _Arichandra_ (_The Martyr of Truth_) exemplifies--with a strange likeness in the contrivance of its plot to the _Book of Job_ and _Faust_--by the trials of a heroically enduring king the force of the maxim "Better die than lie."

Third period (decay).

III. _Period of Decay._--Isolated plays remain from centuries later than the 14th; but these, which chiefly turn on the legends of Krishna (the last incarnation of Vishnu), may be regarded as a mere aftergrowth, and exhibit the Indian drama in its decay. Indeed, the latest of them, _Chitra-Yajna_, which was composed about the beginning of the 19th century, and still serves as a model for Bengali dramatic performances, is imperfect in its dialogue, which (after the fashion of Italian improvised comedy) it is left to the actors to supplement. Besides these there are farces or farcical entertainments, more or less indelicate, of uncertain dates.

The number of plays which have descended to us from so vast an expanse of time is still comparatively small. But though, in 1827, Wilson doubted whether all the plays to be found, and those mentioned by Hindu writers on the drama, amounted to many more than sixty, M. Schuyler's bibliography (1906) enumerates over five hundred Sanskrit plays. To these have to be added the plays in Tamil, stated to be about a hundred in number, and to have been composed by poets who enjoyed the patronage of the Pandian kings of Madura, and some in other vernaculars.

Critical literature.

There certainly is among the Hindus no dearth of dramatic theory. The sage Bharata, the reputed inventor of dramatic entertainments, was likewise revered as the father of dramatic criticism--a combination of functions to which the latter days of the English theatre might perhaps furnish an occasional parallel. The commentators (possibly under the influence of inspiration rather than as a strict matter of memory) constantly cite his _s[=u]tras_, or aphorisms. (From _s[=u]tra_, thread, was named the _s[=u]tra-dh[=a]ra_, thread-holder, carpenter, a term applied to the architect and general manager of sacrificial solemnities, then to the director of theatrical performances.) By the 11th century, when the drama was already approaching its decline, dramatic criticism had reached an advanced point; and the _Dasa-Rupaka_ (of which the text belongs to that age) distinctly defines the ten several kinds of dramatic composition. Other critical works followed at later dates, exhibiting a rage for subdivision unsurpassed by the efforts of Western theorists, ancient or modern; the misfortune is that there should not be examples remaining (if they ever existed) to illustrate all the branches of so elaborate a dramatic system.

Exclusiveness of the Indian drama.

"What," inquires the manager of an actor in the induction to one of the most famous of Indian plays, "are those qualities which the virtuous, the wise, the venerable, the learned and the Brahmans require in a drama?" "Profound exposition of the various passions," is the reply, "pleasing interchange of mutual affection, loftiness of character, delicate expression of desire, a surprising story and elegant language." "Then," says the manager (for the Indian dramatists, though not, like Ben Jonson, wont to "rail" the public "into approbation," are unaffected by _mauvaise honte_), "I recollect one." And he proceeds to state that "Babhav[=u]ti has given us a drama composed by him, replete with all qualities, to which indeed this sentence is applicable: 'How little do they know who speak of us with censure! This entertainment is not for them. Possibly some one exists, or will exist, of similar tastes with myself; for time is boundless, and the world is wide!'" This disregard of popularity, springing from a consciousness of lofty aims, accounts for much that is characteristic of the higher class of Indian plays. It explains both their relative paucity and their extraordinary length, renders intelligible the chief peculiarity in their diction, and furnishes the key to their most striking ethical as well as literary qualities. Connected in their origin with religious worship, they were only performed on solemn occasions, chiefly of a public nature, and more especially at seasons sacred to some divinity. Thus, though they might in some instances be reproduced, they were always written with a view to one particular solemn representation. Again, the greater part of every one of the plays of Northern India is written in Sanskrit, which ceased to be a popular language by 300 B.C., but continued the classical and learned, and at the same time the sacred and court form of speech of the Brahmans. Sanskrit is spoken by the heroes and principal personages of the plays, while the female and inferior characters use varieties, more or less refined, of the Prakrit languages (as a rule not more than three, that which is employed in the songs of the women being the poetic dialect of the most common Prakrit language, the Sauras[=e]n[=i]). Hence, part at least of each play cannot have been understood by the large majority of the audience, except in so far as their general acquaintance with the legends or stories treated enabled them to follow the course of the action. Every audience thus contained an _inner_ audience, which could alone feel the full effect of the drama. It is, then, easy to see why the Hindu critics should make demands upon the art, into which only highly-trained and refined intellects were capable of entering, or called upon to enter. The general public could not be expected to appreciate the sentiments expressed in a drama, and thus (according to the process prescribed by Hindu theory) to receive instruction by means of amusement. These sentiments are termed _r[=a]sas_ (tastes or flavours), and said to spring from the _bh[=a]vas_ (conditions of mind and body). A variety of subdivisions is added; but the _santa r[=a]sa_ is logically enough excluded from dramatic composition, inasmuch as it implies absolute quiescence.

Species of dramas.

The Hindu critics know of no distinction directly corresponding to that between tragedy and comedy, still less of any determined by the nature of the close of a play. For, in accordance with the child-like element of their character, the Hindus dislike an unhappy ending to any story, and a positive rule accordingly prohibits a fatal conclusion in their dramas. The general term for all dramatic compositions is _r[=u]paka_ (from _r[=u]pa_, form), those of an inferior class being distinguished as _upar[=u]pakas_. Of the various subdivisions of the _r[=u]paka_, in a more limited sense, the _n[=a]t[=a]ka_, or play proper, represents the most perfect kind. Its subject should always be celebrated and important--it is virtually either heroism or love, and most frequently the latter--and the hero should be a demigod or divinity (such as _R[=a]ma_ in Babhav[=u]ti's heroic plays) or a king (such as the hero of _S[=a]kuntal[=a]_). But although the earlier dramatists took their plots from the sacred writings or Pur[=a]n[=a]s, they held themselves at liberty to vary the incidents--a licence from which the later poets abstained. Thus, in accordance, perhaps, with the respective developments in the religious life of the two peoples, the Hindu drama in this respect reversed the progressive practice of the Greek. The _prakaranas_ agree in all essentials with the _n[=a]t[=a]kas_ except that they are less elevated; their stories are mere fictions, taken from actual life in a respectable class of society.[1] Among the species of the _upar[=u]paka_ may be mentioned the _trotaka_, in which the personages are partly human, partly divine, and of which a famous example remains.[2] Of the _bhana_, a monologue in one act, one literary example is extant--a curious picture of manners in which the speaker describes the different persons he meets at a spring festival in the streets of Kolahalapur.[3] The satire of the farcical _prahasanas_ is usually directed against the hypocrisy of ascetics and Brahmans, and the sensuality of the wealthy and powerful. These trifles represent the lower extreme of the dramatic scale, to which, of course, the principles that follow only partially apply.

The "unities."

Unity of action is strictly enjoined by Hindu theory, though not invariably observed in practice. Episodical or prolix interruptions are forbidden; but, in order to facilitate the connexion, the story of the play is sometimes carried on by narratives spoken by actors or "interpreters," something after the fashion of the Chorus in _Henry V._, or of Gower in _Pericles_. "Unity of time" is liberally, if rather arbitrarily, understood by the later critical authorities as limiting the duration of the action to a single year; but even this is exceeded in more than one classical play.[4] The single acts are to confine the events occurring in them to "one course of the sun," and usually do so. "Unity of place" is unknown to the Hindu drama, by reason of the absence of scenery; for the plays were performed in the open courts of palaces, perhaps at times in large halls set apart for public entertainments, or in the open air. Hence change of scene is usually indicated in the texts; and we find[5] the characters making long journeys on the stage, under the eyes of spectators not trained to demand "real" mileage.

Proprieties.

With the solemn character of the higher kind of dramatic performances accord the rules and prohibitions defining what may be called the _proprieties_ of the Indian drama. It has been already seen that all plays must have a happy ending. Furthermore, not only should death never be inflicted _coram populo_, but the various operations of biting, scratching, kissing, eating, sleeping, the bath, and the marriage ceremony should never take place on the stage. Yet such rules are made to be occasionally broken. It is true that the mild humour of the _vid[=u]shaka_ is restricted to his "gesticulating eating" instead of perpetrating the obnoxious act.[6] The charming love-scene in the _S[=a]kuntal[=a]_ (at least in the earlier recension of the play) breaks off just as the hero is about to act the part of the bee to the honey of the heroine's lips.[7] But later writers are less squeamish, or less refined. In two dramas[8] the heroine is dragged on the stage by her braid of hair; and this outrage is in both instances the motive of the action. In a third,[9] sleeping and the marriage ceremony occur in the course of the representation.

Construction.

Scenes and situations.

The dramatic construction of the Indian plays presents no very striking peculiarities. They open with a benediction (_n[=a]nd[=i]_), spoken by the manager (supposed to be a highly accomplished person), and followed by "some account" of the author, and an introductory scene between the manager and one of the actors, which is more or less skilfully connected by the introduction of one of the characters with the opening of the play itself. This is divided into acts (_ankas_) and scenes; of the former a _n[=a]t[=a]ka_ should have not fewer than 5, or more than 10; 7 appears a common number; "the great _n[=a]t[=a]ka_" reaches 14. Thus the length of the higher class of Indian plays is considerable--about that of an Aeschylean trilogy; but not more than a single play was ever performed on the same occasion. Comic plays are restricted to two acts (here called _sandhis_). In theory the scheme of an Indian drama corresponds very closely to the general outline of dramatic construction given above; it is a characteristic merit that the business is rarely concluded before the last act. The piece closes, as it began, with a benediction or prayer. Within this framework room is found for situations as ingeniously devised and highly wrought as those in any modern Western play. What could be more pitiful than the scene in _S[=a]kuntal[=a]_, where the true wife appears before her husband, whose remembrance of her is fatally overclouded by a charm; what more terrific than that in _M[=a]lat[=i] and M[=a]dhava_, where the lover rescues his beloved from the horrors of the charnel field? Recognition--especially between parents and children--frequently gives rise to scenes of a pathos which Euripides has not surpassed.[10] The ingenious device of a "play within the play" (so familiar to the English drama) is employed with the utmost success by Babhav[=u]ti.[11] On the other hand, miraculous metamorphosis[12] and, in a later play,[13] vulgar magic lend their aid to the progress of the action. With scenes of strong effectiveness contrast others of the most delicate poetic grace--such as the indescribably lovely little episode of the two damsels of the god of love helping one another to pluck the red and green bud from the mango tree; or of gentle domestic pathos--such as that of the courtesan listening to the prattle of her lover's child, one of the prettiest scenes of a kind rarely kept free from affectation in the modern drama. For the _denouement_ in the narrower sense of the term the Indian dramatists largely resort to the expedient of the _deus ex machina_, often in a sufficiently literal sense.[14]

Characters.

Every species of drama having its appropriate kind of hero or heroine, theory here again amuses itself with an infinitude of subdivisions. Among the heroines, of whom not less than three hundred and eighty-four types are said to be distinguished, are to be noticed the courtesans, whose social position to some extent resembles that of the Greek _hetaerae_, and association with whom does not seem in practice, however it may be in theory, to be regarded as a disgrace even to Brahmans.[15] In general, the Indian drama indicates relations between the sexes subject to peculiar restraints of usage, but freer than those which Mahommedan example seems to have introduced into higher Indian society. The male characters are frequently drawn with skill, and sometimes with genuine force. Prince Samsthanaka[16] is a type of selfishness born in the purple worthy to rank beside figures of the modern drama, of which this has at times naturally been a favourite class of character; elsewhere,[17] the intrigues of ministers are not more fully exposed than their characters and principles of action are judiciously discriminated. Among the lesser personages common in the Indian drama, two are worth noticing, as corresponding, though by no means precisely, to familiar types of other dramatic literatures. These are the _vit[=a]_, the accomplished but dependent companion (both of men and women), and the _vid[=u]shaka_, the humble associate (not servant) of the prince, and the buffoon of the action.[18] Strangely enough, he is always a Brahman, or the pupil of a Brahman--perhaps a survival from a purely popular phase of the drama. His humour is to be ever intent on the pleasures of a quiet life, and on that of eating in particular; his jokes are generally devoid of both harm and point.

Diction.

Scenery and costume.

Thus, clothing itself in a diction always ornate and tropical, in which (as Ruckert has happily expressed it) the prose is the warp and the verse the weft, where (as Goethe says) words become allusions, allusions similes, and similes metaphors, the Indian drama essentially depended upon its literary qualities, and upon the familiar sanctity of its favourite themes for such effects as it was able to produce. Of scenic apparatus it knew but little. The plays were usually performed in the hall of a palace; the simple devices by which exits and entrances were facilitated it is unnecessary to describe, and on the contrivances employed for securing such "properties" as were required (above all, the cars of the gods and of their emissaries),[19] it is useless to speculate. Propriety of costume, on the other hand, seems always to have been observed, agreeably both to the peculiarities of the Indian drama and to the habits of the Indian people.

Actors.

The ministers of an art practised under such conditions could not but be regarded with respect, and spared the contempt or worse, which, except among one other great civilized people, the Greeks, has everywhere, at one period or another, been the actor's lot. Companies of actors seem to have been common in India at an early date, and the inductions show the players to have been regarded as respectable members of society. In later, if not in earlier, times individual actors enjoyed a widespread reputation--"all the world" is acquainted with the talents of Kalaha-Kandala.[20] The managers or directors, as already stated, were usually gifted and highly-cultured Brahmans. Female parts were in general, though not invariably, represented by females. One would like to know whether such was the case in a piece[21] where--after the fashion of more than one Western play--a crafty minister passes off his daughter as a boy, on which assumption she is all but married to a person of her own sex.

Summary.

The Indian drama would, if only for purposes of comparison, be invaluable to the student of this branch of literature. But from the point of view of purely literary excellence it holds its own against all except the very foremost dramas of the world. It is, indeed, a mere phrase to call K[=a]lid[=a]sa the Indian Shakespeare--a title which, moreover, if intended as anything more than a synonym for poetic pre-eminence, might fairly be disputed in favour of Babhav[=u]ti; while it would be absolutely misleading to place a dramatic literature, which, like the Indian, is the mere quintessence of the culture of a caste, by the side of one which represents the fullest development of the artistic consciousness of such a people as the Hellenes. The Indian drama cannot be described as national in the broadest and highest sense of the word; it is, in short, the drama of a literary class, though as such it exhibits many of the noblest and most refined, as well as of the most characteristic, features of Hindu religion and civilization. The ethics of the Indian drama are of a lofty character, but they are those of a scholastic system of religious philosophy, self-conscious of its completeness. To the power of Fate is occasionally ascribed a supremacy, to which gods as well as mortals must bow;[22] but, if man's present life is merely a phase in the cycle of his destinies, the highest of moral efforts at the same time points to the summit of possibilities, and self-sacrifice is the supreme condition both of individual perfection and of the progress of the world. Such conceptions as these seem at once to enfold and to overshadow the moral life of the Indian drama. The affections and passions forming part of self it delineates with a fidelity to nature which no art can afford to neglect; on the other hand, the freedom of the picture is restricted by conditions which to us are unfamiliar and at times seem intolerable, but which it was impossible for the Indian poet's imagination to ignore. The sheer self-absorption of ambition or love appears inconceivable by the minds of any of these poets; and their social philosophy is always based on the system of caste. On the other hand, they are masters of many of the truest forms of pathos, above all of that which blends with resignation. In humour of a delicate kind they are by no means deficient; to its lower forms they are generally strangers, even in productions of a professedly comic intention. Of wit, Indian dramatic literature--though a play on words is as the breath of its nostrils--furnishes hardly any examples intelligible to Western minds.

Poetry of the Indian drama.

The distinctive excellence of the Indian drama is to be sought in the poetic robe which envelops it as flowers overspread the bosom of the earth in the season of spring. In its nobler productions, at least, it is never untrue to its half religious, half rural origin; it weaves the wreaths of idyllic fancies in an unbroken chain, adding to its favourite and familiar blossoms ever fresh beauties from an inexhaustible garden. Nor is it unequal to depicting the grander aspects of nature in her mighty forests and on the shores of the ocean. A close familiarity with its native literature can here alone follow its diction through a ceaseless flow of phrase and figure, listen with understanding to the hum of the bee as it hangs over the lotus, and contemplate with S[=a]kuntal[=a]'s pious sympathy the creeper as it winds round the mango tree. But the poetic beauty of the Indian drama reveals itself in the mysterious charm of its outline, if not in its full glow, even to the untrained; nor should the study of it--for which the materials seem continually on the increase--be left aside by any lover of literature.

3. CHINESE DRAMA

Like the Indian drama, the Chinese arose from the union of the arts of dance and song. To the ballets and pantomimes out of which it developed itself, and which have continued to flourish by the side of its more advanced forms, the Chinese ascribe a primitive antiquity of origin; many of them originally had a symbolical reference to such subjects as the harvest, and war and peace. A very ancient pantomime is said to have symbolized the conquest of China by Wu-Wang; others were of a humbler, and often of a very obscure, character. To their music the Chinese likewise attribute a great antiquity of origin.

There are traditions which carry back the characters of the Chinese drama to the 18th century before the Christian era. Others declare the Emperor Wan-Te (fl. about A.D. 580) to have invented the drama; but this honour is more usually given to the emperor Yuen-Tsung (A.D. 720), who is likewise remembered as a radical musical reformer. Pantomimes henceforth fell into disrepute; and the history of the Chinese drama from this date is divided, with an accuracy we cannot profess to control, into four distinct periods. Each of these periods, we are told, has a style, and each style a name of its own; but these names, such as "Diversions of the Woods in Flower," have little or no meaning for us; and it would therefore be useless to cite them.

The first period is that of the dramas composed under the T'ang dynasty, from A.D. 720 to 907. These pieces, called _Tchhouen-Khi_, were limited to the representation of extraordinary events, and were therefore, in design at least, a species of heroic drama. The ensuing times of civil war interrupted the "pleasures of peace and prosperity" (a Chinese phrase for dramatic performances)--which, however, revived.

Classical age.

The second period is that of the Tsung Dynasty, from 960 to 1119. The plays of this period are called _Hi-Khio_, and presented what became a standing peculiarity of the Chinese drama, viz. that in them figures a principal personage _who sings_.

The third and best-known age of the Chinese drama was under the Kin and Yuen dynasties, from 1125 to 1367. The plays of this period are called _Yuen-Pen_ and _Tsa-Ki_; the latter seem to have resembled the _Hi-Khio_, and to have treated very various subjects. The _Yuen-Pen_ are the plays from which our literary knowledge of the Chinese drama is mainly derived; the short pieces called _Yen-Kia_ were in the same style, but briefer. The list of dramatic authors under the Yuen dynasty, the most important period in Chinese literary annals, which covered the years 1260 to 1368, is tolerably extensive, comprising 85, among whom four are designated as courtesans; the number of plays composed by these and by anonymous authors is reckoned at not less than 564. In 1735 the Jesuit missionary Joseph Henry Premare first revealed to Europe the existence of the tragedy _Tchao-Chi-Cu-Eul_ (_The Little Orphan of the House of Tchao_), which was founded upon an earlier piece treating of the fortunes of an heir to the imperial throne, who was preserved in a mysterious box like another Cypselus or Moses. Voltaire seized the theme of the earlier play for a rhetorical tragedy, _L'Orphelin de la Chine_, in which he coolly professes it was his intention "to paint the manners of the Chinese and the Tartars." The later play, which is something less elevated in the rank of its characters, and very decidedly less refined in treatment, was afterwards retranslated by Stanislas Julien; and to the labours of this scholar, of Sir J. F. Davis (1795-1890) and of Antoine Bazin (1799-1863), we owe a series of translated Chinese dramas, among which there can be no hesitation whatever in designating the master-piece.

Pi-Pa-Ki.

Decline and decay.

The justly famous _Pi-Pa-Ki_ (_The Story of the Lute_) belongs to a period rather later than that of the Yuen plays, having been composed towards the close of the 14th century by Kao-Tong-Kia, and reproduced in 1404, under the Ming dynasty, with the alterations of Mao-Tseu, a commentator of learning and taste. _Pi-Pa-Ki_, which as a domestic drama of sentiment possesses very high merit, long enjoyed a quite exceptional popularity in China; it was repeatedly republished with laudatory prefaces, and so late as the 18th century was regarded as a monument of morality, and as the master-piece of the Chinese theatre. It would seem to have remained without any worthy competitors; for, although it had been originally designed to produce a reaction against the immorality of the drama then in fashion, especially of Wang-Chi-Fou's celebrated _Si-Siang-Ki_ (_The Story of the Western Pavilion_), yet the fourth period of the Chinese drama, under the Ming dynasty, from 1368 to 1644, exhibited no improvement. "What" (says the preface to the 1704 edition of _Pi-Pa-Ki_) "do you find there? Farcical dialogue, a mass of scenes in which one fancies one hears the hubbub of the streets or the ignoble language of the highways, the extravagances of demons and spirits, in addition to love-intrigues repugnant to delicacy of manners." Nor would it appear that the Chinese theatre has ever recovered from its decay.

Theoretical aims.

In theory, no drama could be more consistently elevated in purpose and in tone than the Chinese. Every play, we learn, should have both a moral and a meaning. A virtuous aim is imposed upon Chinese dramatists by an article of the penal code of the empire; and those who write immoral plays are to expect after death a purgatory which will last so long as these plays continue to be performed. In practice, however, the Chinese drama falls far short of its ideal; indeed, according to the native critic already cited, among ten thousand playwrights not one is to be found intent upon perfecting the education of mankind by means of precepts and examples.

Religious drama.

Historical.

Domestic.

The Chinese are, like the Hindus, unacquainted with the distinction between tragedy and comedy; they classify their plays according to subjects in twelve categories. It may be doubted whether what seems the highest of these is actually such; for the religious element in the Chinese drama is often sheer buffoonery. Moreover, Chinese religious life, as reflected in the drama, seems one in which creed elbows creed, and superstitions are welcome whatever their origin. Of all religious traditions and doctrines, however, those of Buddhism (which had reached China long before the known beginnings of its drama) are the most prominent; thus, the theme of absolute self-sacrifice is treated in one play,[23] that of entire absorption in the religious life in another.[24] The historical drama is not unknown to the Chinese; and although a law prohibits the bringing on the stage of "emperors, empresses, and the famous princes, ministers, and generals of former ages," no such restriction is observed in practice. In _Han-Kong-Tseu_ (_The Sorrows of Han_), for instance, which treats a national historic legend strangely recalling in parts the story of Esther and the myth of the daughter of Erechtheus, the emperor Yuen-Ti (the representative, to be sure, of a fallen dynasty) plays a part, and a sufficiently sorry one. By far the greater number, however, of the Chinese plays accessible in translations belong to the domestic species, and to that subspecies which may be called the criminal drama. Their favourite virtue is piety, of a formal[25] or a practical[26] kind to parents or parents-in-law; their favourite interest lies in the discovery of long-hidden guilt, and in the vindication of persecuted innocence.[27] In the choice and elaboration of such subjects they leave little to be desired by the most ardent devotees of the literature of agony. Besides this description of plays, we have at least one love-comedy pure and simple--a piece of a nature not "tolerably mild," but ineffably harmless.[28]

Range of Characters.

Free in its choice of themes, the Chinese drama is likewise remarkably unrestricted in its range of characters. Chinese society, it is well known, is not based, like Indian, upon the principle of caste; rank is in China determined by office, and this again depends on the results of examination. These familiar facts are constantly brought home to the reader of Chinese plays. The _Tchoang-Yuen_, or senior classman on the list of licentiates, is the flower of Chinese society, and the hero of many a drama;[29] and it is a proud boast that for years "one's ancestors have held high posts, which they owed to their literary successes."[30] On the other hand, a person who has failed in his military examination, becomes, as if by a natural transition, a man-eating monster.[31] But of mere class the Chinese drama is no respecter, painting with noteworthy freedom the virtues and the vices of nearly every phase of society. The same liberty is taken with regard to the female sex; it is clear that in earlier times there were few vexatious restrictions in Chinese life upon the social intercourse between men and women. The variety of female characters in the Chinese drama is great, ranging from the heroine who sacrifices herself for the sake of an empire[32] to the well-brought-up young lady who avers that "woman came into the world to be obedient, to unravel skeins of silk, and to work with her needle"[33]--from the chambermaid who contrives the most gently sentimental of _rendezvous_,[34] to the reckless courtesan who, like another Millwood, upbraids the partner of her guilt on his suing for mercy, and bids him die with her in hopes of a reunion after death.[35] In marriage the first or legitimate wife is distinguished from the second, who is at times a _ci-devant_ courtesan, and towards whom the feelings of the former vary between bitter jealousy[36] and sisterly kindness.[37]

Construction and conduct of plots.

The conduct of the plays exhibits much ingenuity, and an aversion from restrictions of time and place; in fact, the nature of the plot constantly covers a long series of years, and spans wide intervals of local distance. The plays are divided into acts and scenes--the former being usually four in number, at times with an induction or narrative prologue spoken by some of the characters (_Sie-Tsen_). Favourite plays were, however, allowed to extend to great length; the _Pi-Pa-Ki_ is divided into 24 sections, and in another recension apparently comprised 42. "I do not wish," says the manager in the prologue, "that this performance should last too long; finish it to-day, but cut out nothing"--whence it appears that the performance of some plays occupied more than a single day. The rule was always observed that a separate act should be given up to the _denouement_; while, according to a theory of which it is not always easy to trace the operation, the perfection of construction was sought in the dualism or contrast of scene and scene, just as the perfection of diction was placed in the parallelism or antithesis of phrase and phrase. Being subject to no restrictions as to what might, or might not, be represented on the stage, the conduct of the plots allowed of the introduction of almost every variety of incidents. Death takes place, in sight of the audience, by starvation,[38] by drowning,[39] by poison,[40] by execution;[41] flogging and torture are inflicted on the stage;[42] wonders are wrought;[43] and magic is brought into play;[44] the ghost of an innocently-executed daughter calls upon her father to revenge her foul murder, and assists in person at the subsequent judicial enquiry.[45] Certain peculiarities in the conduct of the business are due to the usages of society rather than to dramaturgic laws. Marriages are generally managed--at least in the higher spheres of society--by ladies professionally employed as matrimonial agents.[46] The happy resolution of the _nodus_ of the action is usually brought about by the direct interposition of superior official authority[47]--a tribute to the paternal system of government, which is the characteristic Chinese variety of the _deus ex machina_. This naturally tends to the favourite close of a glorification of the emperor,[48] resembling that of Louis XIV. at the end of _Tartufe_, or in spirit, at all events, those of the virgin queen in more than one Elizabethan play. It should be added that the characters save the necessity for a bill of the play by persistently announcing and re-announcing their names and genealogies, and the necessity for a book by frequently recapitulating the previous course of the plot.

The principal personage who sings.

Poetic diction.

One peculiarity of the Chinese drama remains to be noticed. The chief character of a play represents the author as well as the personage; he or she is hero or heroine and chorus in one. This is brought about by the hero's (or heroine's) _singing_ the poetical passages, or those containing maxims of wisdom and morality, or reminiscences and examples drawn from legend or history. Arising out of the dialogue, these passages at the same time diversify it, and give to it such elevation and brilliancy as it can boast. The singing character must be the principal personage in the action, but may be taken from any class of society. If this personage dies in the course of the play, another sings in his place. From the mention of this distinctive feature of the Chinese drama it will be obvious how unfair it would be to judge of any of its productions, without a due appreciation of the lyric passages, which do not appear to be altogether restricted to the singing of the principal personage, for other characters frequently "recite verses." In these lyrical or didactic passages are to be sought those flowers of diction which, as Julien has shown, consist partly in the use of a metaphorical phraseology of infinite nicety in its variations--such as a long series of phrases compounded with the word signifying _jet_ and expressing severally the ideas of rarity, distinction, beauty, &c., or as others derived from the names of colours, birds, beasts, precious metals, elements, constellations, &c., or alluding to favourite legends or anecdotes. These features constitute the literary element _par excellence_ of Chinese dramatic composition. At the same time, though it is impossible for the untrained reader to be alive to the charms of so unfamiliar a phraseology, it may be questioned whether even in its diction the Chinese drama can claim to be regarded as really poetic. It may abound in poetic _ornament_; it is not, like the Indian, bathed in poetry.

Merits of the Chinese drama.

On the other hand, the merits of this dramatic literature are by no means restricted to ingenuity of construction and variety of character--merits, in themselves important, which no candid criticism will deny to it. Its master-piece is not only truly pathetic in the conception and the main situations of its action, but includes scenes of singular grace and delicacy of treatment--such as that where the remarried husband of the deserted heroine in vain essays in the presence of his second wife to sing to his new lute, now that he has cast aside the old.[49] In the last act of a tragedy appealing at once to patriotism and to pity, there is true imaginative power in the picture of the emperor, when aware of the departure, but not of the death, of his beloved, sitting in solitude broken only by the ominous shriek of the wild-fowl.[50] Nor is the Chinese drama devoid of humour. The lively abigail who has to persuade her mistress into confessing herself in love by arguing (almost like Beatrice) that "humanity bids us love men";[51] the corrupt judge (a common type in the Chinese plays) who falls on his knees before the prosecuting parties to a suit as before "the father and mother who give him sustenance,"[52] may serve as examples; and in _Pi-Pa-Ki_ there is a scene of admirable burlesque on the still more characteristic theme of the humours of a competitive examination.[53] If such illustrations could not easily be multiplied, they are at least worth citing in order to deprecate a perfunctory criticism on the qualities of a dramatic literature as to which our materials for judgment are still scanty.

Scenery and costume.

Actors.

While in the north of China houses are temporarily set apart for dramatic performances, in the south these are usually confined to theatres erected in the streets (_Hi-Thai_). Thus scenic decorations of any importance must always have been out of question in the Chinese theatre. The costumes, on the other hand, are described as magnificent; they are traditionally those worn before the 17th century, in accordance with the historical colouring of most of the plays. The actor's profession is not a respectable one in China, the managers being in the habit of buying children of slaves and bringing them up as slaves of their own. Women may not appear on the stage, since the emperor K'ien-Lung admitted an actress among his concubines; female parts are therefore played by lads, occasionally by eunuchs.

4. JAPANESE DRAMA

The Japanese drama, as all evidence seems to agree in showing, still remains what in substance it has always been--an amusement passionately loved by the lower orders, but hardly dignified by literature deserving the name. Apart from its native elements of music, dance and song, and legendary or historical narrative and pantomime, it is clearly to be regarded as a Chinese importation; nor has it in its more advanced forms apparently even attempted to emancipate itself from the reproduction of the conventional Chinese types. As early as the close of the 6th century Hada Kawatsu, a man of Chinese extraction, but born in Japan, is said to have been ordered to arrange entertainments for the benefit of the country, and to have written as many as thirty-three plays. The Japanese, however, ascribe the origin of their drama to the introduction of the dance called _Samb[=a]so_ as a charm against a volcanic depression of the earth which occurred in 805; and this dance appears still to be used as a prelude to theatrical exhibitions. In 1108 lived a woman called Iso no Zenji, who is looked upon as "the mother of the Japanese drama." But her performances seem to have been confined to dancing or posturing in male attire (_otokomai_); and the introduction of the drama proper is universally attributed to Sarnwaka Kanzabur[=o], who in 1624 opened the first theatre (_sibaia_) at Yeddo. Not long afterwards (1651) the playhouses were removed to their present site in the capital; and both here and in the provincial towns, especially of the north, the drama has since continued to flourish. Persons of rank were formerly never seen at these theatres; but actors were occasionally engaged to play in private at the houses of the nobles, who appear themselves to have taken part in performances of a species of opera affected by them, always treating patriotic legends and called _n[=o]_. The mikado has a court theatre.

Subjects of the plays.

The subjects of the serious popular plays are mainly mythological--the acts of the great spirit Day-Sin, the incarnation of Brahma, and similar themes--or historical, treating of the doings of the early dynasties. In these the names of the personages are changed. An example of the latter class is to be found in the _j[=o]ruri_, or musical romance, in which the universally popular tale of _Chiushingura_ (_The Loyal League_) has been amplified and adapted for theatrical representation. This famous narrative of the feudal fidelity of the forty-seven _ronins_, who about the year 1699 revenged their chief's judicial suicide upon the arrogant official to whom it was due, is stirring rather than touching in its incidents, and contains much bloodshed, together with a tea-house scene which suffices as a specimen of the Japanese comedy of manners. One of the books of this dramatic romance consists of a metrical description, mainly in dialogue, of a journey which (after the fashion of Indian plays) has to be carried out on the stage. The performance of one of these quasi-historical dramas sometimes lasts over several days; they are produced with much pomp of costume; but the acting is very realistic, and _hari-kari_ is performed, almost "to the life." Besides these tragic plays (in which, however, comic _intermezzos_ are often inserted) the Japanese have middle-class domestic dramas of a very realistic kind. The language of these, unlike that of Chinese comedy, is often gross and scurrilous, but intrigues against married women are rigidly excluded. Fairy and demon operas and ballets, and farces and _intermezzos_, form an easy transition to the interludes of tumblers and jugglers. As a specimen of nearly every class of play is required to make up a Japanese theatrical entertainment, which lasts from sunrise to sunset, and as the lower houses appropriate and mutilate the plays of the higher, it is clear that the status of the Japanese theatre cannot be regarded as at all high. In respect, however, of its movable scenery and properties, it is in advance of its Chinese prototype. The performers are, except in the ballet, males only; and the comic acting is said to be excellent of its kind. Though the leading actors enjoy great popularity and very respectable salaries, the class is held in contempt, and the companies were formerly recruited from the lowest sources. The disabilities under which they lay have, however, been removed; a Dramatic Reform Association has been organized by a number of noblemen and scholars, and a theatre on European lines built (see JAPAN).

5. PERSIAN AND OTHER ASIATIC, POLYNESIAN AND PERUVIAN DRAMA

Siam.

Java, Sumatra, &c.

Such dramatic examples of the drama as may be discoverable in Siam will probably have to be regarded as belonging to a branch of the Indian drama. The drama of the Malay populations of Java and the neighbouring island of Sumatra also resembles the Indian, to which it may have owed what development it has reached. The Javanese, as we learn, distinguish among the lyrics sung on occasions of popular significance the _panton_, a short simile or fable, and the _tcharita_, a more advanced species, taking the form of dialogue and sung or recited by actors proper. From the _tcharita_ the Javanese drama, which in its higher forms treats the stories of gods and kings, appears to have been derived. As in the Indian drama, the functions of the director or manager are of great importance; as in the Greek, the performers wear masks, here made of wood. The comic drama is often represented in both Java and Sumatra by parties of strollers consisting of two men and a woman--a troop sufficient for a wide variety of plot.

Persian.

Among other more highly civilized Asiatic peoples, the traces of the dramatic art are either few or late. The originally Aryan Persians exhibit no trace of the drama in their ample earlier literature. But in its later national development the two species, widely different from one another, of the religious drama or mystery and of the popular comedy or farce have made their appearance--the former in a growth of singular interest.

The teazies.

Of the Persian _teazies_ (lamentations or complaints) the subjects are invariably derived from religious history, and more or less directly connected with the "martyrdoms" of the house of Ali. The performance of these episodes or scenes takes place during the first ten days of the month of Muharram, when the adherents of the great Shi'ite sect all over Persia and Mahommedan India commemorate the deaths of the Prophet and his daughter Fatima, the mother of Ali, the martyrdoms of Ali himself, shamefully murdered in the sanctuary, and of his unoffending son Hasan, done to death by his miserable guilty Deianira of a wife, and lastly the never-to-be-forgotten sacrifice of Hasan's brother, the heroic Hosain, on the bloody field of Kerbela (A.D. 680). With the establishment in Persia, early in the 16th century, of the Safawid (Sufi) dynasty by the Shi'ites, the cult of the martyrs Hasan and Hosain secured the official sanction which it has since retained. Thus the performance of these _teazies_, and the defraying of the equipment of them, are regarded as religious, and in a theological sense meritorious, acts; and the plays are frequently provided by the court or by other wealthy persons, by way of pleasing the people or securing divine favour. The plays are performed, usually by natives of Isfahan, in courtyards of mosques, palaces, inns, &c., and in the country in temporary structures erected for the purpose.

It would seem that, no farther back than the beginning of the 19th century, the _teazies_ were still only songs or elegies in honour of the martyrs, occasionally chanted by persons actually representing them. Just, however, as Greek tragedy was formed by a gradual detachment of the dialogue from the choric song of which it was originally only a secondary outgrowth, and by its gradually becoming the substance of the drama, so the _Miracle Play of Hasan and Hosain_, as we may call it, has now come to be a continuous succession of dramatic scenes. Of these fifty-two have, thanks to the labours of Alexander Chodzko and Sir Lewis Pelly, been actually taken down in writing, and thirty-seven published in translations; and it is clear that there is no limit to the extension of the treatment, as is shown by such a _teazie_ as the _Marriage of Kassem_, dealing with the unfortunate Hosain's unfortunate son.[54] The performance is usually opened by a prologue delivered by the _rouzekhan_, a personage of semi-priestly character claiming descent from the Prophet, who edifies and excites the audience by a pathetic recitation of legends and vehement admonitions in prose or verse concerning the subject of the action. But the custom seems to have arisen of specially prefacing the drama proper by a kind of induction which illustrates the cause or effect of the sacred story--as for instance that of Amir Timur (Tamerlane), who appears as lamenting and avenging the death of Hosain; or the episode of Joseph's betrayal by his brethren, as prefiguring the cruelty shown to Ali and his sons. At the climax of the action proper Hosain prays to be granted at the day of judgment the key of the treasure of intercession; and the final scene shows the fulfilment of his prayer, which opens paradise to those who have helped the holy martyr, or who have so much as shed a single tear for him. It will thus be seen that not only is this complex and elaborate production unapproached in its length and in its patient development of a long sequence of momentous events by any chronicle history or religious drama, but that it embodies together with the passionately cherished traditions of a great religious community the expression of a long-lived resentment of foreign invasion--and is thus a kind of Oberammergau play and complaint of the Nibelungs in one.

The temachas.

The other kind of Persian drama is the _temacha_ (= spectacle), a kind of comedy or farce, sometimes called _teglid_ (disguising), performed by wandering minstrels or _joculatores_ called _loutys_, who travel about accompanied by their _bayaderes_, and amuse such spectators as they find by their improvised entertainments, which seem to be on much the same level as English "interludes." A favourite and ancient variety of the species is the _karaguez_ or puppet-play, of which the protagonist is called _ketchel pehlevan_ (the bald hero).

The modern Persian drama seems to have admitted Western influences, as in the case of such comedies as _The Pleaders of the Court_, and, avowedly, _Monsieur Jourdan and Musla'li Shah_, of whom the former steals away the wits of young Persia by his pictures of the delights of Paris.

Hebrew literature.

There is no necessity for any reference here to the civilization or to the literature of the Hebrews, or to those of other Semitic peoples, with whom the drama is either entirely wanting, or only appears as a quite occasional and exotic growth. Dramatic elements are apparent in two of the books of the Hebrew scripture--the _Book of Ruth_ and the _Book of Job_, of which latter the author of _Everyman_, and Goethe in his _Faust_, made so impressive a use.

South Seas; Peru.

From Polynesia and aboriginal America we also have isolated traces of drama. Among these are the performances, accompanied by dancing and intermixed with recitation and singing, of the South Sea Islanders, first described by Captain Cook, and reintroduced to the notice of students of comparative mythology by W. Wyatt Gill. Of the so-called Inca drama of the Peruvians, the unique relic, _Apu Ollantay_, said to have been written down in the Quichua tongue from native dictation by Spanish priests shortly after the conquest of Peru, has been partly translated by Sir Clements Markham, and has been rendered into German verse. It appears to be an historic play of the heroic type, combining stirring incidents with a pathos finding expression in at least one lyric of some sweetness--the lament of the lost Collyar. With it may be contrasted the ferocious Aztek dramatic ballet, _Rabinal-Achi_ (translated by Brasseur de Bourbourg), of which the text seems rather a succession of warlike harangues than an attempt at dramatic treatment of character. But these are mere isolated curiosities.

6. DRAMATIC ELEMENTS IN EGYPTIAN CULTURE

The civilization and religious ideas of the Egyptians so vitally influenced the people of whose drama we are about to speak that a reference to them cannot be altogether omitted. The influence of Egyptian upon Greek civilization has probably been overestimated by Herodotus; but while it will never be clearly known how much the Greeks owed to the Egyptians in divers branches of knowledge, it is certain that the former confessed themselves the scholars of Egypt in the cardinal doctrine of its natural theology. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul there found its most solemn expression in mysterious recitations connected with the rites of sepulture, and treating of the migration of the soul from its earthly to its eternal abode. These solemnities, whose transition into the Hellenic mysteries has usually been attributed to the agency of the Thracian worship of Dionysus, undoubtedly contained a dramatic element, upon the extent of which it is, however, useless to speculate. The ideas to which they sought to give utterance centred in that of Osiris, the vivifying power or universal soul of nature, whom Herodotus simply identifies with the Dionysus of the Greeks. The same deity was likewise honoured by processions among the rural Egyptian population, which, according to the same authority, in nearly all respects except the absence of choruses resembled the Greek phallic processions in honour of the wine-god.

That the Egyptians looked upon music as an important science seems fully established; it was diligently studied by their priests, though not, as among the Greeks, forming a part of general education, and in the sacred rites of their gods they as a rule permitted the use of flute and harp, as well as of vocal music. Dancing was as an art confined to professional persons; but though the higher orders abstained from its practice, the lower indulged in it on festive occasions, when a tendency to pantomime naturally asserted itself, and licence and wanton buffoonery prevailed, as in the early rustic festivals of the Greek and Italian peoples. Of a dance of armed men, on the other hand, there seems no satisfactory trace in the representations of the Egyptian monuments.

7. GREEK DRAMA

Religious origin.