Chapter VIII: Part 8

In particular, we learn from the prologue to the _Phormio_, that he was fond of bringing on the stage frantic youths, committing all those excesses of folly and distraction which are supposed to be produced by violent love. Donatus has afforded us an account of the plot of his _Phasma_, which was taken from Menander. A lady, who, before marriage, had a daughter, the fruit of a secret amour with a person now living in a house adjacent to her husband’s, made an opening in the wall of her own dwelling, in order to communicate with that in which her former paramour and daughter resided. That this entrance might appear a consecrated spot to her husband’s family, she decked it with garlands, and shaded it with branches of trees. To this passage she daily repaired as if to pay her devotions, but in fact, to procure interviews with her illegitimate daughter. Her husband also had, by a former wife, a son, who dwelt in his father’s house, and who, having one day accidentally peeped through the aperture, beheld the girl; and, as she was possessed of almost supernatural beauty, he was struck with awe, as at the sight of a Spirit or divinity, whence the play received the name of _Phasma_. The young man, discovering at length that she is a mortal, conceives for her a violent passion, and is finally united to her, with the consent of his father, and to the great satisfaction of the mother. There is another play of Menander, which has also been closely imitated by Luscius Lavinius. Plautus, we have seen, borrowed his _Trinummus_ from the _Thesaurus_ of Philemon. But Menander also wrote a _Thesaurus_, which has been copied by Lavinius. An old man, by his last will, had commanded, that, ten years after his death, his son should carry libations to the monument under which he was to be interred. The youth, having squandered his fortune, sold the ground on which this monument stood to an old miser. At the end of ten years, the prodigal sent a servant to the tomb with due offerings, according to the injunctions of his deceased father. The servant applied to the new proprietor to assist him in opening the monument, in which they discovered a hoard of gold. The miserly owner of the soil seized the treasure, and retained it on pretence of having deposited it there for safety during a period of public commotion. It is claimed, however, by the young man, who goes to law with him; and the plot of the comedy chiefly consists in the progress of the suit(295)—the dramatic management of which has been ridiculed by Terence, in the prologue to the _Eunuchus_, since, contrary to the custom and rules of all courts of justice, the author had introduced the defendant pleading his title to the treasure before the plaintiff had explained his pretensions, and entered on the grounds of his demand. Part of the old Scotch ballad, The Heir of Linne, has a curious resemblance to the plot of this play of Luscius Lavinius.

Turpilius, Trabea, and Attilius, were the names of comic writers who lived towards the end of the sixth and beginning of the seventh century, from the building of Rome. Of these, and other contemporary dramatists, it would now be difficult to say more than that their works have perished, and to repeat a few scattered incidental criticisms delivered by Varro or Cicero. To them probably may be attributed the _Baccharia_, _Cæcus_, _Cornicularia_, _Parasitus_, and innumerable other comedies, of which the names have been preserved by grammarians. Of such works, once the favourites of the Roman stage, few memorials survive, and these only to be found separate and imperfect in the quotations of scholiasts. Sometimes from a single play numerous passages have been preserved; but they are so detached, that they neither give us any insight into the fable to which they appertain, nor enable us to pronounce on the excellence of the dramatic characters. In general, they comprise so small a portion of uninterrupted dialogue, that we can scarcely form a judgment even of the style and manner of the poet, or of the beauty of his versification. All that is now valuable in these fragments is a few brief moral maxims, and some examples of that _vis comica_, which consists in an ingenious and forcible turn of expression in the original language.

It is not difficult to account for the vast number of dramatic productions which we thus see were brought forward at Rome in the early ages of the Republic. There are two ways in which literature may be supported,—By the patronage of distinguished individuals, as it was in the time of Mæcenas and the age of Lorenzo de Medici; or, By the encouragement of a great literary public, as it is now rewarded in modern Europe. But, in Rome, literature as yet had not obtained the protection of an emperor or a favourite minister; and previous to the invention of printing, which alone could give extensive circulation to his productions, a poet could hardly gain a livelihood by any means, except by supplying popular entertainments for the stage. These were always liberally paid for by the Ædiles, or other directors of the public amusements. To this species of composition, accordingly, the poet directed his almost undivided attention; and a prodigious facility was afforded to his exertions by the inexhaustible dramatic stores which he found prepared for him in Greece.

TRABEA.

The plays of Quintus Trabea, supposed to belong chiefly to the class called _Togatæ_, are frequently cited by the grammarians, and are mentioned with approbation by Cicero. He in particular commends the lines where this poet so agreeably describes the credulity and overweening satisfaction of a lover—

“Tantâ lætitiâ auctus sum ut mihi non constem:
Nunc demum mihi animus ardet.
Lena, delinita argento, nutum observabit meum—
Quid velim quid studeam: adveniens digito impellam januam:
Fores patebunt—de improviso Chrysis, ubi me aspexit,
Alacris obviam mihi veniet, complexum exoptans meum;
Mihi se dedet.—Fortunam ipsam anteibo fortunis meis(296).”

The name of Trabea was made use of in a well known deception practised on Joseph Scaliger by Muretus. Scaliger piqued himself on his faculty of distinguishing the characteristic styles of ancient writers. In order to entrap him, Muretus showed him some verses, pretending that he had received them from Germany, where they had been transcribed from an ancient MS. attributed to Q. Trabea—

“Here, si querelis, ejulatu, fletibus,
Medicina fieret miseriis mortalium,
Auro parandæ lachrymæ contra forent:
Nunc hæc ad minuenda mala non magis valent
Quam Nænia præficæ ad excitandos mortuos:
Res turbidæ consilium, non fletum, expetunt(297).”

Scaliger was so completely deceived, that he afterwards cited these verses, as lines from the play of _Harpace_, by Q. Trabea, in the first edition of his Commentary on Varro’s Dialogues _De Re Rustica_, in order to illustrate some obscure expression of his author—“Quis enim,” says he, “tam aversus a Musis, tamque humanitatis expers, qui horum publicatione offendatur.” Muretus, not content with this malicious trick, afterwards sent him some other verses, to which he affixed the name of Attius, expressing, but more diffusely, the same idea. Scaliger, in his next edition of Varro, published them, along with the former lines, as fragments from the _Œnomaus_, a tragedy by Attius, and a plagiarism from Trabea—observing, at the end of his note, “Fortasse de hoc nimis.” Muretus said nothing for two years; but, at the end of that period, he published a volume of his own Latin poems, and, along with them, under the title _Afficta Trabeæ_, both sets of verses which he had thus palmed on Scaliger for undoubted remnants of antiquity. The whole history of the imposture was fully disclosed in a note: Both poems, it was acknowledged, were versions of a fragment, attributed by some to Menander, and by others to Philemon, beginning,—Ει τα δακρυα ἡμιν, κ.τ.λ. They have been also translated into Latin by Naugerius(298).

The progress of time, the ravages of war, and the intervention of a period of barbarism, which have deprived us of so many dramatic works of the Romans, have fortunately spared six plays of

TERENCE,

which are perhaps the most valuable remains that have descended to us among the works of antiquity. This celebrated dramatist, the delight and ornament of the Roman stage, was born at Carthage, about the 560th year of Rome. In what manner he came or was brought thither is uncertain. He was, in early youth, the freedman of one Terentius Lucanus in that city, whose name has been perpetuated only by the glory of his slave. After he had obtained his freedom, he became the friend of Lælius, and of the younger Scipio Africanus(299). His _Andria_ was not acted till the year 587—two years, according to the Eusebian Chronicle, after the death of Cæcilius; which unfortunately throws some doubt on the agreeable anecdote recorded by Donatus, of his introduction, in a wretched garb, into the house of Cæcilius, in order to read his comedy to that poet, by whom, as a mean person, he was seated on a low stool, till he astonished him with the matchless grace and elegance of the _Andria_, when he was placed on the couch, and invited to partake the supper of the veteran dramatist. Several writers have conjectured, it might be to another than to Cæcilius that Terence read his comedy(300); or, as the _Andria_ is not indisputably his first comedy, that it might be one of the others which he read to Cæcilius(301). Supposing the Eusebian Chronicle to be accurate in the date which it fixes for the death of Cæcilius, it is just possible, that Terence may have written and read to him his _Andria_ two years previous to its representation. After he had given six comedies to the stage, Terence left Rome for Greece, whence he never returned. The manner of his death, however, is altogether uncertain. According to one report, he perished at sea, while on his voyage from Greece to Italy, bringing with him an hundred and eight comedies, which he had translated from Menander: according to other accounts, he died in Arcadia for grief at the loss of those comedies, which he had sent before him by sea to Rome. In whatever way it was occasioned, his death happened when he was at the early age of thirty-four, and in the year 594 from the building of the city.

_Andria_,—acted in 587, is the first in point of time, and is usually accounted the first in merit, of the productions of Terence. Like most of his other comedies, it has a double plot. It is compounded of the _Andrian_ and _Perinthian_ of Menander; but it does not appear, that Terence took his principal plot from one of those Greek plays, and the under-plot from the other. He employed both to form his chief fable; and added the characters, on which the under plot is founded, from his own invention, or from some third play now unknown to us.

At the commencement of the play, Simo, the father of Pamphilus, informs Sosia of his son’s love for Glycerium. In consequence of a report of this attachment spreading abroad, Chremes refuses his daughter, who had previously been promised to Pamphilus in marriage: Simo, however, still pretends to make preparations for the nuptials, in order more accurately to ascertain the state of his son’s affections. Charinus, the lover of Chremes’ daughter, is in despair at the prospect of this union; but he is comforted by the assurances of Pamphilus, that he would do every thing in his power to retard it. By this time, Davus, the slave of Pamphilus, discovers, that it is not intended his master’s marriage should in reality proceed; and, perceiving it is a pretext, he advises Pamphilus to declare that he is ready to obey his father’s commands. Glycerium, meanwhile, gives birth to a child; but Simo believes, that her reported delivery was a stratagem of Davus, to deter Chremes from acceding to his daughter’s marriage with Pamphilus. Simo, however, at length prevails on him to give his consent. Pamphilus is thus placed in a most perplexing dilemma with all parties. His mistress, Glycerium, and her attendants, believe him to be false; while Charinus thinks that he had deceived him; and, as he had given his consent to the marriage, he can form no excuse to his father or Chremes for not concluding it. Hence his rage against Davus, and new stratagems on the part of the slave to prevent the nuptials. He contrives that Chremes should overhear a conversation between him and Mysis, Glycerium’s attendant, concerning the child which her mistress bore to Pamphilus, and Chremes in consequence instantly breaks off from his engagement. In this situation, Crito arrives to claim heirship to Chrysis, the reputed sister of Glycerium. He discloses, that Glycerium having been shipwrecked in infancy, had been preserved by his kinsman, the father of Chrysis; and, from his detail, it is discovered, that she is the daughter of Chremes. There is thus no farther obstacle to her marriage with Pamphilus; and the other daughter of Chremes is of course united to Charinus.

The long narrative with which the _Andria_, like several other plays of Terence, commences, and which is a component part of the drama itself, is beautiful in point of style, and does not fail to excite our interest concerning the characters. We perceive the compassion and even admiration of Simo for Glycerium, and we feel that, if convinced of her respectable birth and character, he would have preferred her to all others, even to the daughter of Chremes. Glycerium, indeed, does not appear on the stage; but her actual appearance could scarcely have added to the interest which her hapless situation inspires. Simo is the model of an excellent father. He is not so easily duped by his slaves as most of the old men in Plautus; and his temper does not degenerate, like that of many other characters in the plays of Terence, either into excessive harshness, or criminal indulgence. His observations are strikingly just, and are the natural language of age and experience. Chremes, the other old man, does not divide our interest with Simo; yet we see just enough of his good disposition, to make us sympathize with his happiness in the discovery of a daughter. Pamphilus is rendered interesting by his tenderness for Glycerium, and respect for his father. Davus supports the character of a shrewd, cunning, penetrating slave; he is wholly devoted to the interests of Pamphilus, but is often comically deterred from executing his stratagems by dread of the lash of his old master. The part of Crito, too, is happily imagined: His apprehension lest he be suspected of seeking an inheritance to which he has no just title, and his awkward feelings on coming to claim the wealth of a kinswoman of suspicious character, are artfully unfolded. Even the gossip and absurd flattery of the midwife, Lesbia, is excellent. The poet has also shewn considerable address in portraying the character of Chrysis, who was supposed to be the sister of Glycerium, but had died previous to the commencement of the action. In the first scene, he represents her as having for a long while virtuously struggled with adverse fortune, and having finally been precipitated into vice rather by pressure of poverty than depravity of will; and afterwards, in the pathetic account which Pamphilus gives of his last conference with her, we insensibly receive a pleasing impression of her character, and forget her errors for the sake of her amiable qualities. All this was necessary, in order to prevent our forming a disadvantageous idea of Glycerium, who had resided with Chrysis, but was afterwards to become the wife of Pamphilus, and to be acknowledged as the daughter of Chremes.

This play has been imitated in the _Andrienne_ of Baron, the celebrated French actor. The Latin names are preserved in the _dramatis personæ_, and the first, second, and fifth acts, have been nearly translated from Terence. In the fourth, however, instead of the marriage being interrupted by Davus’s stratagem, Glycerium, hearing a report of the falsehood of her lover, rushes on the stage, throws herself at the feet of Chremes, and prevails on him to break off the intended match between his daughter and Pamphilus. But, though the incidents are nearly the same, the dialogue is ill written, and is very remote from the graceful ease and simplicity of Terence.

Steele’s _Conscious Lovers_ is the best imitation of the _Andria_. The English play, it will be remembered, commences in a similar manner with the Latin comedy, by Sir John Bevil relating to an old servant, that he had discovered the love of his son for Indiana, an unknown and stranger girl, by his behaviour at a masquerade. The report of this attachment nearly breaks off an intended marriage between young Bevil and Lucinda, Sealand’s daughter. Young Bevil relieves the mind of Myrtle, the lover of Lucinda, by assuring him that he is utterly averse to the match. Still, however, he pretends to his father, that he is ready to comply with his wishes; and, meanwhile, writes to Lucinda, requesting that she would refuse the offer of his hand. Myrtle, hearing of this correspondence having taken place, without knowing its import, is so fired with jealousy that he sends Bevil a challenge. Sealand, being still pressed by Sir John to bestow his daughter in marriage, waits on Indiana, in order to discover the precise nature of her relations with Bevil. She details to him her story; and, on his alluding to the probability of the projected nuptials being soon concluded, she tears off, in a transport of passion, a bracelet, by which Sealand discovers, that she is a daughter whom he had lost, and who, while proceeding to join him in the East Indies, had been carried into a French harbour, where she first met with young Bevil.

An English translator of Terence remarks, “That Steele has unfolded his plot with more art than his predecessor, but is greatly his inferior in delineation of character. Simo is the most finished character in the Latin piece, but Sir John Bevil, who corresponds to him, is quite insignificant. Young Bevil is the most laboured character in the _Conscious Lovers_, but he is inferior to Pamphilus. His deceit is better managed by Terence than Steele. Bevil’s supposed consent to marry is followed by no consequence; and his honest dissimulation, as he calls it, is less reconcilable to the philosophic turn of his character, than to the natural sensibility of Pamphilus. Besides, the conduct of the latter is palliated, by being driven to it by the artful instigations of Davus, who executes the lower part of the stratagems, whereas Bevil is left entirely to his own resources.” Bevil, indeed, in spite of his refinement and formality, his admiration of the moral writers, and, “the charming vision of Mirza consulted in a morning,” is a good deal of a _Plato-Scapin_. Indiana, who corresponds to Glycerium, is introduced with more effect than the ladies in the French plays imitated from Terence. Her tearing off her ornaments, however, in a fit of despair, at the conclusion, is too violent. It is inconsistent with the rest of her character; and we feel that she would not have done so, had not the author found that the bracelet was necessary for her recognition as the daughter of Sealand. The under plot is perhaps better managed in the English than in the Latin play. Myrtle sustains a part more essential to the principal fable than Charinus; and his character is better discriminated from that of Bevil than those of the two lovers in the _Andria_. The part of Cimberton, the other lover of Lucinda, favoured by Mrs Sealand, is of Steele’s own contrivance; and of course, also, the stratagem devised by Bevil, in which Myrtle and Tom pretend to be lawyers, and Myrtle afterwards personates Sir Geoffry Cimberton, the uncle of his rival.

The _Andria_ has also suggested those scenes of Moore’s _Foundling_, which relate to the love of young Belmont, and the recognition of Fidelia as the daughter of Sir Charles Raymond.

_Eunuchus_.—Though, in modern times, the _Andria_ has been the most admired play of Terence, in Rome the _Eunuchus_ was by much the most popular of all his performances, and he received for it 8000 sesterces, the greatest reward which poet had ever yet obtained(302). In the _Andria_, indeed, there is much grace and delicacy, and some tenderness; but the _Eunuchus_ is so full of vivacity and fire, as almost to redeem its author from the well-known censure of Cæsar, that there was no _vis comica_ in his dramas.

The chief part of the _Eunuchus_ is taken from a play of the same title by Menander; but the characters of the parasite and captain have been transferred into it from another play of Menander, called _Kolax_. There was an old play, too, by Nævius, founded on the _Kolax_; but Terence, in his prologue, denies having been indebted to this performance.

The scenes of the _Eunuchus_ are so arranged, that the main plot is introduced by that which is secondary, and which at first has the appearance of being the principal one. Phædria is brought on the stage venting his indignation at being excluded from the house of the courtezan Thais, for the sake of Thraso, who is the sole braggart captain exhibited in the plays of our author. Thais, however, succeeds in persuading Phædria that she would admit Thraso only for two days, in order to obtain from him the gift of a damsel who had originally belonged to the mother of Thais, but after her death had been sold to the captain. Phædria, vying in gifts with Thraso, presents his mistress with an Ethiopian eunuch. The younger brother of Phædria, who is called Chærea, having accidentally seen the maid presented to Thais by Thraso, falls in love with her, and, by a stratagem of his father’s slave Parmeno, he is introduced as the eunuch to the house of Thais, where he does not in all respects consistently support the character he had assumed. After Chærea had gone off, his adventure was discovered; and Pythias, the waiting maid of Thais, in revenge for Parmeno’s fraud, tells him that Chærea, having been detected, was about to be made precisely what he had pretended to be. Parmeno, believing this report, informs the father of Chærea, who instantly rushes into the house of Thais, (to which, by this time, his son had ventured to return,) and being there relieved from his sudden apprehension, he consents the more readily to the marriage of Chærea with the girl whom he had deluded, and who is now discovered to be an Athenian citizen, and the sister of Chremes. In this paroxysm of good humour, he also agrees that Phædria should retain Thais as his mistress. Thraso and his parasite, Gnatho, having been foiled in an attack on the house of Thais, enter into terms, and, at the persuasion of Gnatho, Thraso is admitted into the society of Phædria, and is allowed to share with him the favours of Thais.

There are thus, strictly speaking, three plots in the _Eunu__chus_, but they are blended with inimitable art. The quarrel and reconciliation of Thais and Phædria promote the marriage of Chærea with Pamphila, the girl presented by Thraso to Thais. This gift again produces the dispute between Phædria and Thais, and gives room for the imposture of Chærea. It is unfortunate that the regard in which the ancient dramatists held the unity of place, interposed between the spectators and the representation of what would have been highly comical—the father discovering his son in the eunuch’s habit in the house of Thais, the account of which has been thrown into narrative. At the conclusion Thraso is permitted, with consent of Phædria, to share the good graces of Thais; but, as has been remarked by La Harpe(303) and Colman(304), and as indeed must be felt by every one who reads the play, this termination is scarcely consistent with the manners of gentlemen, and it implies the utmost meanness in Phædria to admit him into his society, or to allow him a share in the favours of his mistress, merely that he may defray part of the expense of her establishment.

The drama, however, is full of vivacity and intrigue. Through the whole piece the author amuses us with his pleasantries, and in no scene discovers that his fund of entertainment is exhausted. Most of the characters, too, are happily sketched. Under Thais, Menander is supposed to have given a representation of his own mistress Glycerium. On the general nature of the parts of the parasite and braggart captain, something has been said while treating of the dramas of Plautus; but Terence has greatly refined and improved on these favourite characters of his predecessor. Gnatho is master of a much more delicate and artful mode of adulation than former flatterers, and supports his consequence with his patron, at the same time that he laughs at him and lives on him. He boasts, in the second scene of the second act, that he is the founder of a new class of parasites, who ingratiated themselves with men of fortune and shallow understandings, solely by humouring their fancies and admiring what they said, instead of earning a livelihood by submitting to blows, the ridicule of the company, and all manner of indignities, like the antiquated race of parasites whom Plautus describes as beaten, kicked, and abused at pleasure:—

“Et hîc quidem, hercle, nisi qui colaphos perpeti
Potis parasitus, frangique aulas in caput,
Vel ire extra portam trigeminam ad saccum libet.”

The new parasite, of whom Gnatho may be considered as the representative, had been delineated in the characters of Theophrastus, and has more resemblance to Shakspeare’s Osrick, or to the class of parasites described by Juvenal as infesting the families of the Great in the latter ages of Rome(305). Thraso, the braggart captain, in the _Eunuchus_, is ridiculous enough to supply the audience with mirth, without indulging in the extravagant bluster of Pyrgopolinices. A scene in the fourth act gives the most lively representation of the conceit and ridiculous vanity of this soldier, who, calling together a few slaves, pretends to marshal and draw them up as if they formed a numerous army, and assumes all the airs of a general. This part is so contrived, that nothing could have more happily tended to make him appear ridiculous though he says nothing extravagant, or beyond what might naturally be expected from the mouth of a coxcomb. One new feature in Thraso’s character is his fondness for repeating his jests, and passion for being admired as a wit no less than a warrior. There is, perhaps, nowhere to be found a truer picture of the fond and froward passion of love, than that which is given us in the character of Phædria. Horace and Persius, when they purposely set themselves to expose and exaggerate its follies, could imagine nothing beyond it. The former, indeed, in the third satire of his second book, where he has given a picture of the irresolution of lovers, has copied part of the dialogue introduced near the commencement of the _Eunuchus_.

The love, however, both of Phædria and Chærea is more that of temperament than sentiment: Of consequence, the _Eunuchus_ is inferior to the _Andria_ in delicacy and tenderness; but there are not wanting passages which excel in these higher qualities. Addison has remarked(306), that Phædria’s request to his mistress, on leaving her for a few days, is inimitably beautiful and natural—

“Egone quid velim?
Cum Milite isto præsens, absens ut sies;
Dies noctesque me ames: me desideres:
Me somnies: me expectes: de me cogites:
Me speres: me te oblectes: mecum tota sis:
Meus fac sis postremo animus, quando ego sum tuus.”

This demand was rather exorbitant, and Thais had some reason to reply—_Me miseram!_

There is an Italian imitation of the _Eunuchus_ in _La Talanta_, a comedy by Aretine, in which the courtezan who gives the name to the play corresponds with Thais, and her lover Orfinio to Phædria,—the characteristic dispositions of both the originals being closely followed in the copy. A youth, from his disguise supposed to be a girl, is presented to La Talanta by Tinca, the Thraso of the piece, who, being exasperated at the treatment he had received from the courtezan, meditates, like Thraso, a military attack on her dwelling-house; and, though easily repulsed, he is permitted at the conclusion, in respect of his wealth and bounty, to continue to share with Orfinio the favours of La Talanta.

There is more _lubricity_ in the _Eunuchus_ of Terence, than in any of his other performances; and hence, perhaps, it has been selected by Fontaine as the most suitable drama for his imitation. His _Eunuque_, as he very justly remarks in his advertisement prefixed, “n’est qu’une mediocre copie d’un excellent original.” Fontaine, instead of adapting the incidents to Parisian manners, like Moliere and Regnard, in their delightful imitations of Plautus, has retained the ancient names, and scene of action. The earlier part is a mere translation from the Latin, except that the character of Thais is softened down from a courtezan to a coquette. The next deviation from the original is the omission of the recital by Chærea, of the success of his audacious enterprize—instead of which, Fontaine has introduced his Chærea professing honourable and respectful love to Pamphile. In the unravelling of the dramatic plot, the French author has departed widely from Terence. There is nothing of the alarm concerning Chærea given by Thais’ maid to Parmeno, and by him communicated to the father: The old man merely solicits Parmeno to prevail on his sons to marry:—

“Il se veut desormais tenir clos et couvert,
Caresser, les pieds chauds, quelque Bru qui lui plaise,
Conter son jeune temps, et banqueter a son aise.”

This wish is doubly accomplished, by the discovery that Pamphile is of reputable birth, and by Phædria’s reconciliation with Thais. While making such changes on the conclusion, and accommodating it in some measure to the feelings of the age, I am surprised that the French author retained that part of the compact with Thraso, by which he is to remain in the society of Phædria merely to be fleeced and ridiculed.

The _Eunuchus_ is also the origin of _Le Muet_ by Bruyes and Palaprat, who laboured in conjunction, like our Beaumont and Fletcher, and who have made such alterations on the Latin drama as they thought advisable in their age and country. In this play, which was first acted in 1691, a young man, who feigns to be dumb, is introduced as a page in a house where his mistress resided. But although an Ethiopian eunuch, which was an article of state among the ancients, may have attracted the fancy of Thais, it is not probable that the French countess should have been so desirous to receive a present of a dumb page. Those scenes in which the credulous father is made to believe that his son had lost the power of speech, from the effects of love and sorcery, and is persuaded, by a valet disguised as a doctor, that the only remedy for his dumbness is an immediate union with the object of his passion, are improbable and overcharged. The character of the parasite is omitted, and instead of Thraso we have a rough blunt sea captain, who had protected Zayde when lost by her parents.

The only English imitation of the _Eunuchus_ is _Bellamira, or the Mistress_, an unsuccessful comedy by Sir Charles Sedley, first printed in 1687. In this play the scene lies in London, but there is otherwise hardly any variation in the incidents; and there is no novelty introduced, except Bellamira and Merryman’s plot of robbing Dangerfield, the braggart captain of the piece, an incident evidently borrowed from Shakspeare’s Henry IV.

_Heautontimorumenos_. The chief plot of this play, which I think on the whole the least happy effort of Terence’s imitation, and which, of all his plays, is the most foreign from our manners, is taken, like the last-mentioned drama, from Menander. It derives its Greek appellation from the voluntary punishment inflicted on himself by a father, who, having driven his son into banishment by excess of severity, avenges him, by retiring to the country, where he partakes only of the hardest fare, and labours the ground with his own hands. The deep parental distress, however, of Menedemus, with which the play opens, forms but an inconsiderable part of it, as the son, Clinia, returns in the second act, and other incidents of a comic cast are then interwoven with the drama. The plan of Clitopho’s mistress being brought to the house both of Menedemus and his neighbour Chremes, in the character of Clinia’s mistress, has given rise to some amusing situations: but the devices adopted by the slave Syrus, to deceive and cheat the two old men, are too intricate, and much less ingenious than those of a similar description in most other Latin plays. One of his artifices, however, in order to melt the heart of Chremes, by persuading him that Clitopho thinks he is not his son, has been much applauded; particularly the preparation for this stratagem, where, wisely concluding that one would best contribute to the imposition who was himself deceived, he, in the first place, makes Clitopho believe that he is not the son of his reputed father.

Terence himself, in his prologue, has called this play _double_, probably in allusion to the two plots which it contains. Julius Scaliger absurdly supposes that it was so termed because one half of the play was represented in the evening, and the other half on the following morning(307). It has been more plausibly conjectured, that the original plot of the Greek play was simple, consisting merely of the character of the Self-tormentor Menedemus, the love of his son Clinia for Antiphila, and the discovery of the real condition of his mistress; but that Terence had added to this single fable, either from his own invention, or from some other Greek play, the passion of Clitopho for Bacchis, and the devices of the slave in order to extract money from old Chremes(308). These two fables are connected by the poet with much art, and form a double intrigue, instead of the simple argument of the Greek original.

Diderot has objected strongly to the principal subject which gives name to this play, and to the character of the self-tormenting father. Tragedy, he says, represents individual characters, like those of Regulus, Orestes, and Cato; but the chief characters in comedy should represent a class or species, and if they only resemble individuals, the comic drama would revert to what it was in its infancy.—“Mais on peut dire,” continues he, “que ce pere là n’est pas dans la nature. Une grande ville fourniroit a peine dans un siecle l’example d’une affliction aussi bizarre.” It is observed in the _Spectator_(309), on the other hand, that though there is not in the whole drama one passage that could raise a laugh, it is from beginning to end the most perfect picture of human life that ever was exhibited.

There has been a great contest, particularly among the French critics, whether the unities of time and place be preserved in _Heautontimorumenos_. In the year 1640, Menage had a conversational dispute, on this subject, with the Abbé D’Aubignac, with whom he at that period lived on terms of the most intimate friendship. The latter, who contended for the strictest interpretation of the unities, first put his arguments in writing, but without his name, in his “Discours sur la troisieme comedie de Terence; contre ceux qui pensent qu’elle n’est pas dans les regles anciennes du poeme dramatique.” Menage answered him in his “Reponse au discours,” &c.; and, in 1650, he published both in his _Miscellanea_, without leave of the author of the _Discours_. This, and some disrespectful expressions employed in the _Reponse_, gave mortal offence to the Abbé, who, in 1655, wrote a reply to the answer, entitled “Terence Justifié, &c. contre les Erreurs de Maistre Gilles Menage, Avocat en Parlement.” This designation of _Maistre_, proved intolerable to the feelings of Menage. Hearing that the tract was full of injurious expressions, he declared publicly and solemnly, that he never would read it; but being afterwards urged to peruse it by some good-natured friends, he consulted the casuists of the Sorbonne, and the College of Jesuits, on the point of conscience; and having at last read it with their approval, he wrote a full reply, which was not published till after the death of his opponent.

In these various tracts, it was maintained by the Abbé, that unity of time was most strictly preserved in the _Heautontimorumenos_, as a less period than twelve hours was supposed to pass during the representation, the longest space to which, by the rules of the drama, it could be legitimately prolonged. Of course he adduces arguments and citations, tending to restrict, as far as possible, the period of the dramatic action. In the third scene of the second act, it is said _vesperascit_, and in the first scene of the third act, _Luciscit hoc jam_. Now the Abbé, giving to the term _vesperascit_ the signification, “It is already night,” was of opinion, that the action commenced as late as seven or eight in the evening, when Menedemus returned to Athens from his farm; that the scene of the drama is supposed to pass during the Pithœgia, or festivals of Bacchus, held in April, at which season not more than nine hours intervened between twilight and dawn; that the festival continued the whole night, and that none of the characters went to bed, so that the continuity of action was no more broken than the unity of time. Menage, on the other hand, contended that at least fifteen hours must be granted to the dramatic action, but that this extension implied no violation of the dramatic unities, which, according to the precepts of Aristotle, would not have been broken, even if twenty-four hours had been allotted. He successfully shews, however, that fifteen hours, at least, must be allowed. According to him, the play opens early in the evening, while Menedemus is yet labouring in his field. The festivals were in February; and he proves, from a minute examination, that the incidents which follow after it is declared that _luciscit_, must have occupied fully three hours. Some of the characters, he thinks, retired to rest, but no void was thereby left in the action, as the two lovers, Bacchis, and the slaves, sat up arranging their amorous stratagems. Madame Dacier adopted the opinion of Aubignac, which she fortified by reference to a wood engraving in a very ancient MS. in the Royal Library, which represents Menedemus as having quitted his work in the fields, and as bearing away his implements of husbandry.

The poet being perhaps aware that the action of this comedy was exceptionable, and that the dramatic unities were not preserved in the most rigid sense of the term, has apparently exerted himself to compensate for these deficiencies by the introduction of many beautiful moral maxims: and by that purity of style, which distinguishes all his productions, but which shines, perhaps, most brightly in the _Heautontimorumenos_.

That part of the plot of this comedy, where Clitopho’s mistress is introduced as Clinia’s mistress, into the house of both the old men, has given rise to Chapman’s comedy, _All Fooles_, which was first printed in 1605, 4to., and was a favourite production in its day. In this play, by the contrivance of Rynaldo, the younger son of Marc Antonio, a lady called Gratiana, privately married to his elder brother Fortunio, is introduced, and allowed to remain for some time at the house of their father, by persuading him that she is the wife of Valerio, the son of one of his neighbours, who had married her against his parent’s inclination, and that it would be an act of kindness to give her shelter, till a reconciliation could be effected. By this means Fortunio enjoys the society of his bride, and Valerio, her pretended husband, has, at the same time, an admirable opportunity of continuing his courtship of Bellonora, the daughter of Marc Antonio.

_Adelphi_.—The principal subject of this drama is usually supposed to have been taken from Menander’s _Adelphoi_; but it appears that Alexis, the uncle of Menander, also wrote a comedy, entitled _Adelphoi_; so that perhaps the elegant Latin copy may have been as much indebted to the uncle’s as to the nephew’s performance, for the delicacy of its characters and the charms of its dialogue. We are informed, however, in the prologue, that the part of the drama in which the music girl is carried off from the pander, has been taken from the _Synapothnescontes_ of Diphilus. That comedy, though the version is now lost, had been translated by Plautus, under the title of _Commorientes_. He had left out the incidents, however, concerning the music girl, and Terence availed himself of this omission to interweave them with the principal plot of his delightful drama—“Minus existimans laudis proprias scribere quam Græcas transferre.”

The title, which is supposed to be imperfect, is derived from two brothers, on whose contrasted characters the chief subject and amusement of the piece depend. Demea, the elder, who lived in the country, had past his days in thrift and labour, and was remarkable for his severe penurious disposition. Micio, the younger brother, was, on the contrary, distinguished by his indulgent and generous temper. Being a bachelor, he had adopted Æschinus, his brother’s eldest son, whom he brought up without laying much restraint on his conduct. Ctesipho, the other son of Demea, was educated with great strictness by his father, who boasted of the regular and moral behaviour of this child, which, as he thought, was so strongly contrasted with the excesses of him who had been reared under the charge of his brother. Æschinus at length carries off a music girl from the slave-merchant, in whose possession she was. Hence fresh indignation on the part of Demea, and new self-congratulation on the system of education he had pursued with Ctesipho: Hence, too, the deepest distress on the part of an unfortunate girl, to whom Æschinus had promised marriage; and also of her relations, at this proof of his alienated affections. At last, however, it is discovered that Æschinus had run off with the music girl, for the sake, and at the instigation, of his brother Ctesipho. The play accordingly concludes with the union of Æschinus and the girl to whom he was betrothed, and the total change of disposition on the part of Demea, who now becomes so complete a convert to the system of Micio, that he allows his son to retain the music girl as his mistress.

The plot of the _Adelphi_ may thus be perhaps considered as double; but the interest which Æschinus takes in Ctesipho’s amour, combines their loves so naturally, that they can hardly be considered as distinct or separate; and the details by which the plot is carried on, are managed with such infinite skill, that the intrigue of at least four acts of the _Adelphi_ is more artfully conducted than that of any other piece of Terence. At the commencement of the play, Micio summons his servant Storax, whom he had sent to find out Æschinus; but as the servant does not appear, Micio concludes that the youth had not yet returned from the place where he had supped on the preceding evening, and is in consequence overwhelmed with all the tender anxiety of a father concerning an absent son. This alarm gives us some insight into the character of the young man, and explains the interest Micio takes in his welfare, without shewing too plainly the art and design of the author. His uneasiness, by naturally leading him to reflect on the situation of the family, and the doubtful part he had himself acted, brings in less awkwardly than usual one of those long soliloquies, in which the domestic affairs of the speaker are explained by him for the sake of the audience. Demea is then introduced, having just learned, on his arrival in the city, that Æschinus had carried off the music girl. His character and predominant feelings are finely marked in the account which he gives of this outrage, dwelling on every minute particular, and exaggerating the offences of Æschinus. This passage, too, acquires additional zest and relish, on a second perusal of the play, when it is known that the son so much commended is chiefly in fault. The grief of the mother of the girl, who was betrothed to Æschinus, and the honest indignation of her faithful old servant Geta, are highly interesting. The interview of Micio with his adopted son, after he had discovered the circumstances of this connection, is eminently beautiful. His delicate reproof for the young man’s want of confidence, in not communicating to him the state of his heart—the touches of good humour, mildness, and affection, which may be traced in every line of Micio’s part of the dialogue, as well as the natural bursts of passion, and ingenuous shame, in Æschinus, are perhaps more characteristic of the tender and elegant genius of Terence, than any other scene in his dramas. But the triumph of comic art, is the gradation of Demea’s anger and distresses—his perfect conviction of the sobriety of his son, who, he is persuaded by Syrus, had shewn the utmost indignation at the conduct of Æschinus, and had gone to the country in disgust, when in fact he was at that moment seated at a feast—then his perplexity on not finding him at the farm, and his learning that Æschinus, having violated a free citizen, was about to be married to her, though she had no portion. Even his meeting Syrus intoxicated augments his rage, at the general libertinism and extravagance of the family. At length the climax of events is finally completed, by discovering that the music girl had been carried off for the sake of his favourite son, and by finding him at a carousal with his brother’s dissolute family.

With this incident the fable naturally concludes, and it is perhaps to be regretted that Terence had not also ended the drama with the third scene of the fifth act, where Demea breaks in upon the entertainment. The conversion of Demea, indeed, with which the remaining scenes are occupied, grows out of the preceding events. He had met, during the course of the play, with many mortifications—his anger, complaints, and advice, had been all neglected and slighted—he had seen his brother loved and followed, and found himself shunned; but such a change in long-confirmed habits could hardly have been effected in so short a period, or by a single lesson, however striking and important. His complaisance, too, is awkward, and his generosity is evidently about to run into profusion.

But if all this be an impropriety, what shall we say of the gross absurdity of Micio, a bachelor of sixty-five, marrying an old woman, the mother of Æschinus’ bride, (and whom he had never seen but once,) merely out of complaisance to his friends, who seemed to have no motive in making the request, except that she was quite solitary, had nobody to care for her, and was long past child-bearing—

—— “Parere jam diu hæc per annos non potest:
Nec, qui eam respiciat, quisquam est; sola est.”

Micio had all along been represented as possessed of so much judgment, good sense, and knowledge of the world, that this last piece of extravagance destroys the interest we had previously felt in the character. Donatus, who has given us some curious information in his excellent commentary on Terence, with regard to the manner in which he had altered his comedies from the original Greek, says, that in the play of Menander, the old Bachelor has no reluctance at entering into a state of matrimony.—“Apud Menandrum, Senex de nuptiis non gravatur.” The English translator of Terence thinks, that the Latin poet, by making Micio at first express a repugnance to the proposed match, has improved on his model; but it appears to me, that this only makes his unbounded complaisance more improbable and ridiculous. Indeed the incongruity and inconsistence of the concluding scenes of the _Adelphi_, have been considered so great, that a late German translator of Terence has supposed that they did not form a component part of the regular comedy, but were in fact the _Exodium_, a sort of afterpiece, in which the characters of the preceding play were usually represented in grotesque situations, and with overcharged colours(310).

So much for the plot of the _Adelphi_, and the incidents by which the conclusion is brought about. With regard to the characters of the piece, Æschinus is an excellent delineation of the elegant ease and indifference of a fine gentleman. In one scene, however, he is represented as a lover, full of tenderness, and keenly alive to all the anxieties, fears, and emotions of the passion by which he is affected. In the parts of Demea and Micio, the author has violated the precept of Horace with regard to a dramatic character:

—— “Servetur ad imum
Qualis ab incepto processerit, et sibi constet.”

During four acts, however, the churlishness of Demea is well contrasted with the mildness of Micio, whose fondness and partiality for his adopted son are extremely pleasing. “One great theatrical resource,” says Gibbon, “is the opposition and contrast of characters which thus display each other. The severity of Demea, and easiness of Micio, throw mutual light; and we could not be so well acquainted with the misanthropy of Alceste, were it not for the fashionable complaisant character of Philinte(311).” Accordingly, in the modern drama, we often find, that if one of the lovers be a gay companion, the other is grave and serious; like Frankly and Bellamy, in the _Suspicious Husband_, or Absolute and Faulkland in the _Rivals_. Yet in the _Adelphi_, the contrast, perhaps, is too direct, and too constantly obtruded on the attention of the audience. It has the appearance of what is called antithesis in writing, and, in the conduct of the drama, has the same effect as that figure in composition. Diderot, in his _Essay on Dramatic Poetry_, also objects to these two contrasted characters, that, being drawn with equal force, the moral intention of the drama is rendered equivocal; and that we have something of the same feeling which every one has experienced while reading the _Misanthrope_ of Moliere, in which we can never tell whether Alceste or Philinte is most in the right, or, more properly speaking, farthest in the wrong.—“On diroit,” continues he, “au commencement du cinquieme acte des _Adelphes_, que l’auteur, embarassé du contraste qu’il avoit etabli, a été contraint d’abandonner son but et de renverser l’interet de sa piece. Mais qu’est il arrivé: c’est qu’on ne scait plus a qui s’interesser; et qu’apres avoit eté pour Micion contre Demea, on finit sans savoir pour qui l’on est. On desireroit presque un troisieme pere qui tint le milieu entre ces deux personnages, et qui en fit connoitre le vice.”

It is not unlikely, however, that this sort of uncertainty was just the intention of Terence, or rather of Menander. It was probably their design to show the disadvantages resulting from each mode of education pursued, and hence, by an easy inference, to point out the golden mean which ought to be preserved by fathers; for, if Demea be unreasonably severe, the indulgence of Micio is excessive, and his connivance at the disorders of Ctesipho, which he even assisted him to support, is as reprehensible, as the extraordinary sentiment which he utters at the commencement of the comedy:—

“Non est flagitium, mihi crede, adolescentulum
Scortari, neque potare; non est: neque fores effringere.”

This, though the breaking doors was an ordinary piece of gallantry, is, it must be confessed, rather loose morality. But some of the sentiments in the drama are equally remarkable for their propriety, and the knowledge they discover of the feelings and circumstances of mankind; as,

“Omnes, quibus res sunt minus secundæ, magis sunt, nescio quomodo,
Suspiciosi: ad contumeliam omnia accipiunt magis;
Propter suam impotentiam se semper credunt negligi.”

And afterwards,—

“Ita vita ’st hominum, quasi, quum ludas tesseris;
Si illud, quod maxime opus est jactu, non cadit,
Illud, quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas.
* * * * *
Nunquam ita quisquam bene subducta ratione ad vitam fuit,
Quin res, ætas, usus, semper aliquid adportet novi,
Aliquid moneat, ut illa, quæ te scire credas, nescias;
Et quæ tibi putâris prima, in experiundo repudies.”

A play possessing so many excellencies as the _Adelphi_, could scarcely fail to be frequently imitated by modern dramatists. It has generally been said, that Moliere borrowed from the _Adelphi_ his comedy _L’Ecole des Maris_, where the brothers Sganarelle and Ariste, persons of very opposite dispositions, bring up two young ladies intrusted to their care on different systems; the one allowing a proper liberty—the other, who wished to marry his ward, employing a constant restraint, which, however, did not prevent her from contriving to elope with a favoured lover. The chief resemblance consists in the characters of the two guardians—in some of the discussions, which they hold together on their opposite systems of management—and some observations in soliloquy on each other’s folly. Thus, for example, Demea, the severe brother in Terence, exclaims: