be visible in the judicious regularity of the plot, and in the almost total absence of serious scenes, which Fletcher, in the comedies he furnished for the stage after the demise of Beaumont, introduces very liberally. The versification, however, on the principles which will be mentioned in the sequel of this introduction, intimates that the execution was principally Fletcher's. From the testimony of several poets who have eulogised our authors, it appears, that, in many instances, one of them furnished the plot, while the other raised the fabric on his superstructure, and this may have been the case in the last-mentioned comedy, as well as in King and No King and The Custom of the Country.:

The dramas which we have hitherto attributed to both poets, on such evidence as we must necessarily rest contented with, not being in possession of better, are chiefly comedies. Among the tragedies and tragi-comedies, there are three which may be ascribed to Beaumont and Fletcher conjointly with considerable probability,— Bonduca, The Knight of Malta, and The Laws of Candy. The two former were undoubtedly represented previous to March 1618-9, as the celebrated tragedian Burbage, who performed in both, died at that period; and internal evi

dence proves that all the three were composed by more than one author."

The strict intimacy in which our poets had lived for so many years was interrupted by the sudden death of Beaumont, which took place early in March 1615-6, before. he had fully attained his thirtieth year. He was buried on the ninth of that month, without any inscription, in Westminster cathedral, at the entrance of St Benedict's chapel, near the Earl of Middlesex's monument. He exhibited one of the most brilliant, and, at the same time, the most solid instances of early genius. Besides his juvenile poem, he had, in about eight years, from the first appearance of Philaster, which is the first play in which he is known with certainty to have had any concern, to his death, furnished in the whole, or in part, about twenty dramatic performances for the theatres, in which he had displayed talents of a very superior quality, and of great variety. But the consideration of his merit as a dramatic writer will be more in place when we come to a general criticism on the works of our united authors, from which it will appear, though Fletcher, perhaps, exceeded his

See the introductions to those plays, vol. VI. p. 3, vol. VIII. p. 257, and vol. III. p. 3,

associate in the richness of fancy, and the delineation of some peculiar descriptions of character, that Beaumont joined great eloquence of language, power of description, and sublimity of diction, to a strong and manly humour, and a powerful and indignant personification of the vices and follies of the time.

The connection between our poets seems to have been of the most amiable nature; indeed, as the writer of their article in the Historical Dictionary has already observed, nothing can be imagined more delightful than this union of genius, and this entire renunciation of individual fame. The gradual structure of the plots, perhaps first suggested in familiar conversation, and matured in subsequent meetings, the distribution of the different parts to be executed by each, and the open and ingenuous submission of their several scenes to the criticism and scrutiny of each other, indicate a degree of literary intimacy, which has, probably, never before, or since, endured for so long a period. We are informed by Aubrey, that "they lived together on the Bankside, not far from the play-house, both bachelors had one bench in the house between them, which they did so admire; the same clothes, cloak, &c. between them."

Beaumont, however, did not die a bachelor: He married, in what year has not been ascertained, Ursula, daughter and coheir of Henry Isley of Sundridge, in Kent, by whom he left two daughters. One of these, Frances, reached a very advanced age, as she was living in 1700, at which time she enjoyed a pension of one hundred pounds a year from the Duke of Ormond, having lived in his family as a domestic for some years. She is said to have been in possession of several poems of her father's, which were lost during her voyage from Ireland to England,

Beaumont appears to have enjoyed the friendship of Ben Jonson in a very distinguished degree. Indeed his genius was, in some measure,

The superlative merits of Ben Jonson, in the peculiar walk of comedy, to which he principally confined himself, and the occasional flashes of a higher poetical genius which are to be met with in his works, must be readily acknowledged by every reader who has the faculty of distinguishing the various excellencies of dramatic composition. His humour is harsh and severe, but it is supereminently excellent, and no poet has ever exceeded him in delineating the absurd affectations of folly, or the artful stratagems of impostors, profiting by the credulity of weak minds. This acknowledgment of old Ben's excellencies becomes requisite from every one who ventures to retain a belief in the failings of that great poet, the existence of which Mr Octavius Gilchrist, with a laudable anxiety for his fame, has laboured to disprove. It seems that all who place any degree

assimilated to that of Jonson, and particularly his humour. The Mermaid tavern, in Cornhill, seems to have been the resort of some of the principal wits of the time, chiefly those of the Jonsonian school; and Beaumont gives us the following fascinating account of their meetings, in his poetical epistle to Ben Jonson :

"What things have we seen

Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have been
So nimble and so full of subtle flame,

As if that every one from whom they came
Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest,

And had resolved to live a fool the rest

Of his dull life; then when there hath been thrown

Wit able enough to justify the town

For three days past; wit that might warrant be

For the whole city to talk foolishly

Till that were cancelled; and when that was gone
We left an air behind us, which alone

of faith in the testimony of Drummond and Howel, respecting Jonson's self-sufficiency and harsh censure of his contemporaries, and who are not satisfied with the manner in which that gentleman has explained away every passage in old literature, which seems to indicate an enmity, or even coolness, between him and Shakspeare at one part of their lives, (and particularly that very strong passage in The Return from Parnassus,) are set down as despisers of his genius, who find nothing to admire in his works. If we were to regulate our poetical taste according to this standard, and to condemn every production whose author may be charged with some defect, or failing, in the moral constitution of his mind, how many works of genius would be removed from our admiration!