that they are lauding a
condition of things against which Shakespeare himself, in the spirit of a
true artist, always strongly protested.

_HENRY THE FOURTH_ AT OXFORD
(_Dramatic Review_, May 23, 1885.)

I have been told that the ambition of every Dramatic Club is to act
_Henry IV_. I am not surprised. The spirit of comedy is as fervent in
this play as is the spirit of chivalry; it is an heroic pageant as well
as an heroic poem, and like most of Shakespeare's historical dramas it
contains an extraordinary number of thoroughly good acting parts, each of
which is absolutely individual in character, and each of which
contributes to the evolution of the plot.

To Oxford belongs the honour of having been the first to present on the
stage this noble play, and the production which I saw last week was in
every way worthy of that lovely town, that mother of sweetness and of
light. For, in spite of the roaring of the young lions at the Union, and
the screaming of the rabbits in the home of the vivisector, in spite of
Keble College, and the tramways, and the sporting prints, Oxford still
remains the most beautiful thing in England, and nowhere else are life
and art so exquisitely blended, so perfectly made one. Indeed, in most
other towns art has often to present herself in the form of a reaction
against the sordid ugliness of ignoble lives, but at Oxford she comes to
us as an exquisite flower born of the beauty of life and expressive of
life's joy. She finds her home by the Isis as once she did by the
Ilissus; the Magdalen walks and the Magdalen cloisters are as dear to her
as were ever the silver olives of Colonus and the golden gateway of the
house of Pallas: she covers with fanlike tracery the vaulted entrance to
Christ Church Hall, and looks out from the windows of Merton; her feet
have stirred the Cumnor cowslips, and she gathers fritillaries in the
river-fields. To her the clamour of the schools and the dullness of the
lecture-room are a weariness and a vexation of spirit; she seeks not to
define virtue, and cares little for the categories; she smiles on the
swift athlete whose plastic grace has pleased her, and rejoices in the
young Barbarians at their games; she watches the rowers from the reedy
bank and gives myrtle to her lovers, and laurels to her poets, and rue to
those who talk wisely in the street; she makes the earth lovely to all
who dream with Keats; she opens high heaven to all who soar with She