y agreeable to the manners of a polite and civilised
people; but as there are no exceptions to this rule on the French
stage, it leads them into absurdities almost as ridiculous as that
which falls under our present censure. I remember in the famous play
of Corneille, written upon the subject of the Horatii and Curiatii,
the fierce young hero, who had overcome the Curiatii one after another
(instead of being congratulated by his sister for his victory, being
upbraided by her for having slain her lover), in the height of his
passion and resentment kills her. If anything could extenuate so
brutal an action, it would be the doing of it on a sudden, before the
sentiments of nature, reason, or manhood could take place in him.
However, to avoid public bloodshed, as soon as his passion is wrought
to its height, he follows his sister the whole length of the stage,
and forbears killing her till they are both withdrawn behind the
scenes. I must confess, had he murdered her before the audience, the
indecency might have been greater; but as it is, it appears very
unnatural, and looks like killing in cold blood. To give my opinion
upon this case, the fact ought not to have been represented, but to
have been told if there was any occasion for it.

It may not be unacceptable to the reader to see how Sophocles has
conducted a tragedy under the like delicate circumstance. Orestes was
in the same condition with Hamlet in Shakespeare, his mother having
murdered his father and taken possession of his kingdom in conspiracy
with her adulterer. That young prince, therefore, being determined to
revenge his father's death upon those who filled his throne, conveys
himself by a beautiful stratagem into his mother's apartment, with a
resolution to kill her. But because such a spectacle would have been
too shocking to the audience, this dreadful resolution is executed
behind the scenes. The mother is heard calling to her son for mercy,
and the son answering her that she showed no mercy to his father;
after which she shrieks out that she is wounded, and by what follows
we find that she is slain. I do not remember that in any of our plays
there are speeches made behind the scenes, though there are other
instances of this nature to be met with in those of the ancients:
and I believe my reader will agree with me that there is something
infinitely more affecting in this dreadful dialogue between the
mother and her son behind the scenes than could have b