graphy generally. All these branches of Shakesperean study should of course be undertaken only in the senior classes, with pupils of the age of 17 or 18, and they should not be regarded as objects of study for their own sake exclusively, but rather as adding to our conception of the artistic qualities and greatness of the plays. Finally, the study of Shakespeare should also be comparative: our pupils should compare particular plays or groups of plays, and trace the growth of his mind and art.

Nor should the dramatic study of our pupils be confined to Shakespeare. The numerous grammatical and linguistic difficulties that are found in his plays tend to distract the minds of young pupils from the essential sense of dramatic effect; and it may be held therefore that the study of drama may more conveniently begin with a play of later date, the language of which would not present so many difficulties. At a later stage, too, after the study of one or more of Shakespeare's plays, there should certainly be included in the course the study, in a good English translation, of one or more of the great Greek tragedies. No other dramas are so well fitted to impress the reader or hearer with a right sense of dramatic effect. The Greek tragic writers were restricted in their themes to certain current legends, but their subjects were characteristically tragic. And again, many of the artistic laws which Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides observed are not arbitrary and of limited application, but essential to the nature of true drama generally. Greek tragedy is marked by simplicity of plot, severity of structure, and adaptation of story and character: in it

the unity of impression which drama should convey is not blurred by the presentation of subsidiary details, and we are enabled the more easily to perceive the dramatic point of the story. As a means whereby our pupils may appreciate better the qualities of Shakesperean drama, no more effective plan could be devised than the successive reading of a Greek and of a Shakesperean tragedy. Euripides's Electra and Shakespeare's Hamlet suggest themselves as suitable plays for this purpose. The two plays resemble one another in subject, but differ widely in treatment. In the Electra the unities of time and place are observed, and there is also unity of impression; in Hamlet the unities of time and place are broken, but the essential unity of impression is preserved amid all the diversity of the plot and tone and characterization. A wider reading and comparison of Greek and Shakesperean drama should help our pupils to realize more vividly the imperial scope of Shakespeare's genius: his sympathy with and zest for life in all its aspects, grave and gay, and his infinitely varied power of dramatic presentment.

CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.