mic produce of his hard and heavy hand, makes happily no attempt to
emulate the really noble touches of poetry and pathos with which Heywood
has thrown out into relief the more serious aspect of the supposed crime
of witchcraft in its influence or refraction upon the honor and
happiness of innocent persons. Og was naturally more in his place and
more in his element as the second "fat jailor" of Lancashire witches
than as the second English dramatic poet of Psyche: he has come closer
than his precursors, closer indeed than could have been thought
possible, to actual presentation of the most bestial and abominable
details of demonolatry recorded by the chroniclers of witchcraft: and in
such scenes as are rather transcribed than adapted from such narratives
he has imitated his professed master and model, Ben Jonson, by appending
to his text, with the most minute and meticulous care, all requisite or
more than requisite references to his original authorities. The allied
poets who had preceded him were content to handle the matter more easily
and lightly, with a quaint apology for having nothing of more interest
to offer than "an argument so thin, persons so low," that they could
only hope their play might "pass pardoned, though not praised." Brome's
original vein of broad humor and farcical fancy is recognizable enough
in the presentation of the bewitched household where the children rule
their parents and are ruled by their servants; a situation which may
have suggested the still more amusing development of the same fantastic
motive in his admirable comedy of "The Antipodes." There is a noticeable
reference to "Macbeth" in the objurgations lavished by the daughter upon
the mother under the influence of a revolutionary spell: "Is this a fit
habit for a handsome young gentlewoman's mother? as I hope to be a lady,
you look like one o' the Scottish wayward sisters." The still more
broadly comic interlude of the bewitched rustic bridegroom and his
loudly reclamatory bride is no less humorously sustained and carried
through. Altogether, for an avowedly hasty and occasional piece of work,
this tragicomedy is very creditably characteristic of both its
associated authors.

How small a fraction of Heywood's actual work is comprised in these
twenty-six plays we cannot even conjecturally compute; we only know that
they amount to less than an eighth part of the plays written wholly or
mainly by his indefatigable hand, and that they are