eyes of the Huguenots. For
a time the very mysteries of the Brethren of the Passion had been
prohibited; while the moralities and farces had sunk to an almost
contemptible level. Yet to this reign belong the contributions to
farce-literature of three writers so distinguished as Rabelais
(non-extant), Clement Marot and Queen Margaret of Navarre. Meanwhile
isolated translations of Italian[81] as well as classical dramas had in
literature begun the movement which Jodelle now transferred to the stage
itself. His tragedy _Cleopatre captive_ was produced there on the same
day as his comedy _L'Eugene_, in 1552, his _Didon se sacrifiant_
following in 1558. Thus at a time when a national theatre was perhaps
impossible in a country distracted by civil and religious conflicts,
whose monarchy had not yet welded together a number of provinces
attached each to its own traditions, and whose population, especially in
the capital, was enervated by frivolity or enslaved by fanaticism, was
born that long-lived artificial growth, the so-called classical tragedy
of France. For French comedy, though subjected to the same influences as
tragedy, had a national basis upon which to proceed, and its history is
partly that of a modification of old popular forms.

French tragedy in the 16th century.

The history of French tragedy begins with the _Cleopatre captive_, in
the representation of which the author, together with other members of
the "Pleiad," took part. It is a tragedy in the manner of Seneca, devoid
of action and provided with a ghost and a chorus. Though mainly written
in the five-foot Iambic couplet, it already contains passages in the
Alexandrine metre, which soon afterwards J. de La Peruse by his _Medee_
(pr. 1556) established in French tragedy, and which Jodelle employed in
his _Didon_. Numerous tragedies followed in the same style by various
authors, among whom Gabriel Bounyn produced the first French regular
tragedy on a subject neither Greek nor Roman,[82] and the brothers de la
Taille,[83] and J. Grevin,[84] distinguished themselves by their style.
In the reign of Charles IX. a vain attempt was made by Nicolas Filleul
to introduce the pastoral style of the Italians into French tragedy;[85]
and the Brotherhood of the Passion was intermingling with pastoral plays
its still continued reproductions of the old entertainments, and the
religious drama making its expiring efforts, among which T. Le Coq's
interesting mystery of _Ca