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dDpra Cnraml
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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PShste sf ^ j ? r » as 5 ed g ^/ ni to b ? a ' great pullet , ' and glorify him ac cordfngly ; ottiers remain true to their allegiance ; Ae debate growns warm ; some of the disputants Sve each otter the lie ( bat very calmly ) ; * t length , the scene is closed , by Lucifer ' s condemnation to Hell which , as the directions provide , shall gape when 7 t is named . ' The faithful angels are then told to have swords and staves ready for Lucifer , ' who . we are informed , ' voideth and goeth down to Hell apparelled foul , with fire about him , turning to Hell , with every degree of devils and lost spirits on cords running into the plain . ' With this stirring scene the act ends .
" The second act comprises the creation and fall of man . Here , again , we will consult the stage directions , as giving the best narrative of the incidents and scenes . We find that Adam and Eve are to be apparelled in white leather in a place appointed by the conveyor' ( probably the person we term stagemanager now ); and are not to be seen until they be called ; and then each rises . ' After this , we read : — ? Let Paradise be finely made , with fair trees in it , and apples upon a tree , and other fruit on the others . A fountain , too , in Paradise , and fine flowers painted . Put Adam into Paradise—let flowers appear in Paradise—let Adam lie down and sleep where Eve is , and ¦ he bv the conveyor , must be taken from Adams
side jet fishes of all sorts , birds and beasts , as oxen , kyiie , sheep , and such like , appear . ' " Then , we have the preparations for the temptation ordered thus : —• A fine serpent to be made with a virgin ' s face , and yellow hair on her head . Let the serpent appear , and also geese and hens . ' Lucifer enters immediately afterwards , and goes into the serpent , which is then directed to be ? seen singing in a tree' ( the actor who personated Lucifer must have had some evmnastie difficulties to contend with in
his part !)—* Eve looketh strange on the serpent ;* then , * talketh familiarly and cometh near him ;' then , * doubteth and looitein angrily ; ' and then eats part of the apple , shows it to Adam , and insists on his eating part of it too , in the following lines , in which the connubial style of argument is certainly represented by the old dramatist to the life : — "' Sir , in a few words , Taste thou part of the apple , Or my love thou shale lose ! See , take this fair apple , Or surely between thee and thy wife The love shall utterly fail . If thou wilt not eat of it !'
" The stage direction now proceeds : — ' Adam receiveth the apple and tasteth it , and so repenteth and casteth it away . Eve looketh on Adam very strangely , and speaketh not anything . ' During this pause , the conveyor' is told to get the fig-leaves ready . ' Then Lucifer is ordered to ' come out of the serpent and creep on his belly to hell ; ' Adam and Eve receive the curse , and depart out of Paradise , « shewing a spindle and distaff , ' no badly conceived emblem of the labour to which they are henceforth doomed . And thus , the second act terminates . " The third act treats of Cain and Abel ; and is properly opened by an impersonation of Death . After which , Cain and Abel appear to sacrifice .
* ' Cain makes his offering of the first substance that comes to hand— ' dry cow-dung' (!) ; and tells Abel that he is * dolthead' and a frothy fool' for using anything better . Then , ' Abel is stricken with a jawbone and dieth—Cain casteth him into a ditch . ' The effect of the first murder on the minds of our first parents is delineated in some speeches exhibiting a certain antique simplicity of thought , which sometimes almost rises to the poetical by its homely adherence to nature , and its perfect innocence of effort , artifice , or display . The banishment of Cain , still glorying in his crime , follows the lamentations of Adam and Eve for tho death of Abel ; and the act is closed by Adam's announcement of the birth of Seth .
" The fourth act relates the deaths of Cain and Adam , and contains some of the most eccentric , and also , tome of tho most elevated writing in the play . Lamech opens the scene , candidly and methodically exposing hia own character in these lines : — " ' Sure I am tho first That ever yet hud two wives ! And maidens in sufficient plenty They are to me . I am not dainty , I can find them where I will ; ¦ Nor do I spare of them " In anywise one that ia handsome . But I am wondrous troubled , Source do I Bee one glimpse What the devil ahull be done !'
" In this vagabond frame of mind Lamech goes out hunting , with bow and arrow , and shoots Cain , accidentally , in a bush . WKen Cain falla , Lamech appeals to his servant , to know what it is that ho has Bhotj—the servant declares that it is ' hairy , rough , ugly , and a buck-goat of the night . ' Cain , howovor , discolors himself before ho dieB . There is yomcthiiig rudely dreary and graphic about his dea *
cription of his loneliness , bare as any recommendation of metaphors or epithets : — " * Deformed I am very much , And overgrown "with hair ; I do live continually in heat or cold frost , Surely night and day ; Nor do I desire to see the son of man , With my will , at any time ; ¦ But accompany most time with all the beasts . " Lamech , discovering the fatal error that he has committed , killshis servant in his anger ; and the scene ends with the devils carrying them away with great noise to hell . ' . _ ' ...
" The second scene is between Adam and his son Seth ; and here , the old dramatist often rises to an elevation of poetical feeling , which , judging from the preceding portions of the play , we should not have imagined he could reach . Barbarous as his execution may be , the simple beauty of his conception often shines through it faintly , but yet palpably , in this part of the drama . . " Adam is weary of life and weary of the world ; he sends Seth to the gates of Paradise to ^ ask merev and release for him , telling his son that he will find the way thither by his father ' s footprints , burnt into the surface of the earth that was cursed for Adam s transgression . Seth finds and follows the supernatural marks , is welcomed by the angel at the gate
of Paradise , and is permitted to look in . He beholds there an Apocalypse of the redemption of the world . On the tree of life sit the Virgin and Child ; on the tree from which Eve plucked the apple , « the woman ' is seen , having power over the serpent . The vision changes , and Cain is shown in hell , ' sorrowing and weeping . * Then the angel plucks three kernels from the tree of life , and gives them to Seth for his father ' s use , saying that they shall grow to another tree of life , when more than five thousand years are ended ; and that Adam shall be redeemed from his pains , when that period is fulfilled . After this Seth is dismissed by the angel , arid returns to communicate to his father the message of consolation which he has received .
•• Adam hears the result of his son s mission with thankfulness ; blesses Seth ; and speaks these last words , while he is confronted by Death : — 14 Old and weak , I am gone ! To live longer is not for me : Death is come , Nor will here leave me , To live one breath ! I see him now with his spear , _ Beady to pierce me on every side , There is no escaping from him ! The time 18 welcome with me—I have served long the world !' So , the patriarch dies , trusting in the promise conveyed through his son ; and is buried by Seth ' in a fair tomb , with some Church sonnet . '
" After this impressive close to the fourth actimpressive in its intention , however clumsy the appliances by which that intention was worked out—it would be doing the old author no kindness to examine his fifth act in detail . Here he sinks , again , in many places , to puerility of conception and coarseness of dialogue . Suffice it to Bay , that the history of the Flood closes the drama , and that the spectators are dismissed with an epilogue , directing them to come to-morrow , betimes , and see very great matters 'the minstrels being charged , at the conclusion , to 4 pipe / so that all may dance together , as the proper manner of ending the day ' s amusements .
" And now , let us close the book , look forth over this lonesome country and lonesome amphitheatre , and imagine what a scene both must have presented , when a play was to be acted on a fine summer ' s morning in the year 1611 . " Fancy , at the outset , the arrival of the audience —people dressed in the picturesque holiday costume of the time , which varied with every varying rank , hurrying to their daylight play from miles off ; all visible in every direction on the surface of the open moor , and all converging from every point of the compass to the one common centre of Piran Round . Then , figure to yourself the assembling in the amphitheatre ; the bustle , the bawling , the laughter ; the running round the outer circle of the embankment to get at tho entrances ; the tumbling and rushing up
the steps inside ; the racing of hotheaded youngsters to get to the top places ; the sly deliberation of the elders in selecting the lower and safer positions ; tho quarrelling when a tall man chanced to stand before a short one ; the giggling and blushing of buxom peasant wenches when the gallant young bachelors of tho district happened to be placed behind them ; the universal speculations on tho weather ; the universal shouting for pots of ale—and then , as the time ot the performance drew near , and the minstrels appeared with their pipes , the gradual hush and stillness among the multitude ; the combined stare of the whole circular mass of spectators on tho one point in the plain of the amphitheatre , where everybody knew that tho actors lay hidden in a pit , properly covered in from observation—the mysterious ' green-room' of the strolling players of old Cornwall ! " And tho play !— -to see the play must havo been a eight indeed J Imagine tho ooinjnencerocnt of Hi
y was open awfuliy ^~ r ^ ever Heaven was named ; the mock clouds coon up by the ' property man' on an open air « jT 8 et where the genuine clouds appeared above the ge ' expose the counterfeit ; the hard fighting of v ° angels with swords and staves ; the descent of «! losj spirits along cords running into "¦ the plain . Ji ! thump with which they must have coine d the rolling off , of the whole troop over the enw 1 ' the infernal regions , amid shouts of appia « L I ' — the audience as they rolled ! Then the apueaiwi , m Adam and Eve , packed in white leather , S modern dolls—the serpent with the virgin ' s face ° J the yellow hair , climbing into a tree , and sineim ? the branches—Cain falling out of the bush -when ^ was struck by the arrow of Lamech , and his hi a appearing , according to the stage directions , whPn v &&L - * 5 « l' * *^* ? « lta ? * wubT ^ ^ ** ^* ^ ^
, stock , the scenery of the Deluge , in the fifth acti —what a combination of theatrical prodi gies th whole performance must have presented ! Ho the actors must have ranted to make themselves heard in the open air—how often the machines must have gone wrong , and the rude scenerv toppled and tumbled down ? Could we revive at will , for mere amusement , any of the bygone performances of the theatre , since the first days of barbaric acting in a cart , assuredly the performances at Piran Round would be those which , without hesitation , we should select from all others to call back to life .
" The end of the play , too—how picturesque , how striking all the circumstances attending it must have been ! Gh that we could hear again the merry ' old English tune piped by the minstrels , and see the merry old English dancing of the audience to the music ! Then , think of the separation and the return home of the populace , at sunset—the fishing people strolling off towards the sea shore ; the miners walk , ing away farther inland ; the agricultural labourers spread ing in all directions , wherever cottages andfarmhouses were visible tn the far distance over the
moorthe darkness coming on , and the moon rising over the amphitheatre , so silent and empty , save at one corner where the poor worn-out actors are bivouacking , gipsy-like in their tents , cooking supper over the fire that flames up red in the moonlight , and talking languidly over the fatigues _ and the triumphs of the play . What a moral and what a beauty in the quiet night view of the old amphitheatre , after the sight that it must have presented during the noise , the bustle , and the magnificence of the day !*'
There , is not that more instructive and amusing than if I had amiably lacerated tbe feelings of various vespectable fathers of families , who think themselves actors , and ought to be grocers ? Vivian .
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dDpra Cnraml
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CITIZEN SOLDIERS . 10 , Groat Winohoatcr-Btreet , City , January 18 , 1 »«> 8 m , ~ I have read with great interest the « JN on War , " by a soldier , in tho Leader , and agreo ^ the main with what is advanced by him ; »*» doubt whether tho " musket and bayonet is tue « ft clumsy , awkward tool , that ever was P »» T
ltman ' s hands , and every soldier knows it- ti ery nessed a passage of arms at the Finsbury «* " ^ grounds , Borne time ago , in which a Pr 0 J ^ B 0 * , ftinBt ft broadsword , a large , tall man , wns pitched "g 8 " 1 ^ . sergeant , a smnll man with musket ana d » j ^ The bayonet had a decided advantage in "" % , ( .. counter . It is true a pike would have been •»' tiye , probably much more so , in this instance . * ft tried the experiment myself , and find tnou p 0 piko seven feet long the swordsman has u « chance . jv () If anything is to bo don © toward * p itting our »»«
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[ IN THIS DBPAHTMKNT , AS AV . X . OPINIONS , HOWBVEB BXTB AHB AXLOWHD AN BXPSBSBION , TUB BDITOB HBO *"""" HOLDS IIIMHBLF BBSPONSIBLB FOB NONE . ]
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There ia no learned man but will confess he hath . rai profited by reading controversies , hia senses awai « " ^ and his judgment sharpened . If , then , it be P ° rXie for him to read , why should it not , at least , be tolerable his adversary to write . —M ilton .
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 7, 1852, page 138, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1921/page/22/
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