himself from the trammels of his predecessors and vaulted at once into a position far above all his contemporaries. He has passed through his apprenticeship, acquired higher ethical and esthetical views of his art, and become conscious of his intellectual resources. The characters are drawn with a firm hand; no weak line nor harsh and distorted touch in his delineations. There is also a festive spirit in these productions, an exuberant energy and even exaltation of mind, which point to this epoch as the happiest of his life. Of the sixteen plays, only four are real tragedies. The severe Melpomene yields the sceptre to Clio, Cupid and Comus. In these pieces we see how Shakespeare is the most genial of comic poets; it is in this sphere that he appears in all his amiability and childlike kindliness of heart. His mirth is like the lark that fills the blue sky with laughing melody. In striking contrast. to this witty and cheerful view of life is Ben Jonson's bitter satire, which, like a bird of prey, mounts into the air with shrill, carnivorous cry, only to pounce upon its victim and tear it in pieces. This happy tolerance was the natural fruit of his many-sided healthy nature. Great genius is essentially conciliatory. It sees good in every thing, without being blind to the evil; it tempers judgment with mercy, and merges the hard law of strict moral justice into the tender humanity of poetic love. This artistic charity pervades all of Shakespeare's maturer creations and contributes very much to their truthfulness. His comedy never degenerates into cynicism, as is often the case with Molière. In Molière, Tartufe is not merely a pious hypocrite, he is hypocrisy itself; Harpagon is not a miser, he is avarice. Thus these figures intended for persons are in fact personifications; the graver bears down so heavily with his burin that the characterization lapses into caricature. We laugh at them as we

laugh at the pictures in "Punch," where Count Bismarck is all brain and

Napoleon III. all nose. This does very well for burlesque, but it is not artistic comedy. Shakespeare, on the other hand, gives us not mere abstractions of good or evil, but mixed characters, as we find them in the real world. Wicked as is Iago, and cruel as is the bastard Edmund, they are still men- not demons; it is possible for them, therefore, to awaken in us the "fear and sympathy" which, according to Aristotle, are the fundamental emotions of tragedy. These feelings can exist only where the character portrayed is of the same human nature with ourselves; from this likeness arises the fear that our fates may be similar, and it is this fear that excites sympathy. Angelo is a heartless hypocrite, but he has some sensitiveness to shame, and craves death from the hands of the Duke rather than

mercy and exposure. And what a creation is Falstaff! A mass of humorous animalism, a cowardly and selfish libertine, with no love of honor, no regard for his reputation-only anxiety for his sensual economy! His material bulk has smothered in him every spiritual faculty. His very wit is a fruit of his physical heaviness; want and necessity sharpen it, and the sole mental gift that he possesses is made wholly subservient to his physical subsistence. His soliloquy concerning honor, which has no worth in his eyes because it can not "set a leg," reveals the utter brutishness of his nature. And yet, what an interest the masterly art of the poet contrives to throw around his fat Jack! Our esthetic delight in him as one "that hath out-villained villainy so far that the rarity redeems him," softens and even bribes over our moral judgment upon his vices. And how admirable is the scene of the old knight's death! His better nature reasserts itself in his last hours, and the memories of childhood return to him in the

dreams of his final sleep; he played

with the flowers and "babbled o' green fields."

To the third period of the Shakespearean drama belong a series of works distinguished for their fine poetry and deep vein of thought: "Measure for Measure," "Othello," "Hamlet," "Macbeth," "King Lear," "Cymbeline," "Troilus and Cressida," "Julius Cæsar," "Antony and Cleopatra," "Coriolanus," "Timon of Athens," แ The Tempest," ," "Winter's Tale," and "Henry VIII." In these productions the tragic predominates, as the comic predominated during the second period. The unnatural disruption of natural ties, oppression, falsehood, treachery and ingratitude toward friends, relatives and benefactors such are the scenes which fill the poet's imagination. This gloomy frame of mind seems to have been due, in part at least, to sorrowful experiencesthe death of his only son Hamnet in 1596, and the unfortunate rebellion of the Earl of Essex in 1601, in which his

friend and benefactor Southampton was fatally involved.

It was by this last and noblest group of his dramas that Shakespeare's poetic supremacy was placed beyond a peradventure. His genius has effected an almost total revolution in the aims and character of dramatic literature throughout the world. Stratford-upon-Avon is not only the goal of pilgrimage for the English-speaking natives, but it has be come the Mecca of the human race. The walls and windows of his house, like the sides of Egyptian pyramids, are inscribed with names which represent nearly all the peoples of the earth. His fame, as Schlegel predicted, will continue to gather strength, like an Alpine avalanche, at every moment of its progress. He is like that bright central star in the constellation of the Harp which ages ago moved half-hid along our horizon, now flames in our zenith, and, as astronomers tell us, is gradually moving on to its predestined place as the pole-star of our universe.

HERE is a Persian tale respecting

THE

a traveler mounted upon an ass and riding along in transport on the high way to Babylon, until by-and-by he saw a troop of beautiful men and women, clad in purple robes, with girdles of gold, approaching on fine camels. Their swift pace made him so envious of their mode of conveyance, that he first wished his ass would grow of a sudden to a camel's hight, and then began beating the poor beast. Dropping far in the rear, and relaxing his bridle, he sank into an unhappy reverie and

fell upon the ground. In a few moments he was awakened by a thousand voices, from a company clad in plain linen and riding beasts of burden like his own. They reproved his discontentment, spoke cheering words, and soon showed him a crowd of happy women and children on foot, bearing burdens, and going the same way. The merry song of these restored his spirits, and proudly remounting his ass he continued his journey. Before reaching the end of his route, to his surprise, he encountered the first travelers in a sorry

situation, extricating themselves and their long purple robes and diamonded girdles from the filthy mud into which their tall camels had thrown them. The humble rider was led to see that pleasure and happiness do not always attend a lofty bearing.

Oriental life is far different from the Occidental. In the one, humility takes the slowest pace, and even rank itself chooses the most ancient and winding pathways. In the other, hurry and speed belong to the most humble. No one is so proud as he who disdains the comfort of the steam-coach, or the parlor luxury of a palace-car flying like the wind. The rattling, rocking Concord coach, with six horses, is deemed a modest, unpretentious servant to the dwellers amid mountains. But the word "enterprise" is so incomprehensible to the Oriental, that to this day he and his kinsmen drive their stumbling camels over the Lebanon Mountains to Damascus, as their fathers did before them forty centuries back, by a crooked stony trail wriggling like a serpent along the terraced slopes-while close beside them lies a smooth graded carriage-way, built by English capitalists, and straight as science could align it, which, from sheer hereditary fogyism, they will never venture to use.

At the time of our story, the Occidentals residing under the shadow of the Sierra Nevada, in California, were in easy communication with their transmontane neighbors in Nevada. Half a dozen years ago, the newly-graded road of a hundred miles in extent was supplied with new coaches, and large stock of Eastern horses distributed along the line for relay. Burly whipsters were assigned the task of making schedule time, by night or day, fair weather or foul, through mud and snow, separate or mixed as the case might be, and with a ton of human freight and half as much mail. By this means trips were made both ways

daily; and if one could but keep a perpendicular posture up hill and down in the land of dreams for one night, the land of gold would not seem far from the land of silver, nor would communication seem difficult from one to the other.

It was after an unusual April storm on the mountains, that the eastward coach left the last town of rose-embowered cottages on the placer gold-belt, one Wednesday, at two in the afternoon, having on board an extra weight of life and luggage. The boots fore and aft were stuffed to excess-indeed, the rear one was inlaid with projecting trunks until it resembled the lean of a lumber pile; and the body-seats supported the avoirdupois of nine grown persons-one of whom possessed more adipose tissue than the law should allow in one berth-beside an infant of two years. Outside, in what De Quincey calls the sky-parlor, there were two; one prone upon the top, swaddled in mail-bags and buttressed by valises; so that the clumsy load made the wheels creak and the thoroughbraces groan like the cordage of a gale-struck ship. Six magnificent horses snatched the monster along at a steady ten-mile gait by the hour-and over rain-gutters and sluice-bridges rocked the huge traveling cradle, and improvised a sort of lullaby for the weary passengers with their iron hoofs on the stony road. The driver, a genuine Jehu, with a roughish surly look and a weather-worn exterior which indicated that his virtues had a correspondence with those of a singed cat, neither knew any thing, said any thing, or did any thing but watch a dozen equine ears, and keep six reins taut in his hands, and coax the off wheelhorse with the belly of his whip-lash every two minutes, invariably accompanying the stroke with a tremendous solitary cluck. For two hours the coach rolled on up the first gentle acclivity of the mountains. The fragrance of roses

and the balmy breath of innumerable varieties of flowers which deck the open California landscape at this season, were soon left behind; the perennial thickets of manzanita and chaparral that dot the aspiring foot-hills with a lustre of green never to be forgotten, by-andby marched around right and left and slowly retired from view. Already they were approaching patches of stately pines, the cooling shade of which the men outside welcomed with uncovered heads; while the coach, as if itself felt a relief from the hot sun, struck into a soft sandy track and became noiseless. Over twenty miles of the route had now been passed, and very soon, on turning an angle of the road, Jehu pulled up his panting steeds beside a spacious barn fronting a park of sweet grass, and having a more businesslike physiognomy than the dwarfish soil-stained hotel in the bottom of the ravine a little further on. It was the second relay station.

A tall young man with a smoothbrimmed felt hat strode down from the doorway of the dwarfish establishment, shuffling a pair of heavy riding-boots, with a spur mounted upon the right heel, and holding in his hand an elegant Mexican bridle. In the space of two minutes-while four hostlers loosened the horses, leaving each unchecked to champ his bit on his way to the barn, and the other six, ready harnessed, circled each into his favorite position with a look of proud intelligence, and were hooked to the coach; and the four passengers that jumped out had time to gap and shrug their shoulders and stretch their arms and jump in again in this time the young man had engaged an outside berth of the driver, mounted to his position on the front seat, and having bestowed his bridle under his feet, was ready for the journey. Before, however, the traces of the wheelers were unknotted, the driver took his position with his foot on the brake, and

gathered the six reins as they were handed him; and sifting them through his fingers to see that they were properly buckled and free of twists, he hoarsely shouted "All aboard!" and then, upon the slamming of the coach door, and the inside answer, "All right!" he grasped the whip out of the socket, bent the point of the stock on the dashboard to make it arrow-straight, and buttoned up his glove; and now, telling the hostlers to hitch away and straighten up the leaders, of a sudden, with a cluck and a spring and a ringing whipcrack, the mettled steeds were bounding up the grade at full gallop. When they had settled down to a good business trot, and the grade for some distance was free of mule teams, and the beautiful shelter of forest on the one side, and yawning ravine and variegated slope on the other, seemed to invite companionship, the young man, who had already ventured several unnoticed expressions of pleasure, turned to the whipster and cleverly asked:

66 Can you tell me what time you left Placerville ?"

"Two o'clock."

"Were there many booked for over the mountains?"

"Don't know."

"Did you get the steamer mail today?"

"Believe so."

"Are you certain you have it on board ?"

"No, I aint. A man aint certain of nothing in this world."

The young man, whom we will call Clayton, thinking that somehow Jehu had been stroked the wrong way, and fearing to make bad humor worse, rode on for half a mile in comparative silence, but finally concluded to take a new tack and tickle the driver's most sensitive rib.

"You've got a splendid pair of leaders on this beat. The near one has a fine limb and some sharp points, I

should say. Don't you think him the better one of the two?" "Yes, he is."

"How fast do you think he would go with a skeleton craft?"

"Like the devil, if he had a chance." "Oh, he is a runaway, is he? I shouldn't judge he had any mustang blood in him. Do you think he has ?" "Yes."

"Did he ever run away with you?" "No."

"I should think it would take pretty sharp work to keep such a team in the track on a dark night."

No reply and he immediately added: "Particularly under the thick forests higher up on the mountains."

Jehu said nothing, and Clayton appended sundry other observations about the road and the weather and the outlook down the valley, just to ease the conversation from too sudden a break; and by-and-by, hearing no response but an ungracious cluck, he first took a good look at the driver from head to heel, and then settled back in his seat and relapsed into reverie.

Mile after mile flew past, and one fresh team after another was exchanged for the sweaty, foaming stagers. The grade now led up a romantic cañon along a river's edge, and wound under gloomy mountain shades in endless coil of ever ascending planes, with the winding river. Banks of red earth and boulders here and there guarded the road on the right and left. About nightfall, as they stopped for relay, and the driver vanished into a bar-room for a few seconds, Clayton turned to his seat-companion and remarked:

"It is unaccountable to me how people can trust their lives in the hands of these surly self-important drivers."

"Well, my friend, I don't think they are over-fed. They can't be proud. Night-work through rain and snow and frost will soon wear a man down to the hard-pan."

"Yes, but this fellow is uncivil." "True, but you don't know him. Tom Jones is trusty. He won't say five words in fifty miles when the mood is on; but, for all that, he is the most careful man on the road. He knows nothing but his business-and he knows that. Yes, sir! every inch of his sixty mile beat. Why, I know ladies who, years ago when he drove wild mustangs on the Silver Mountain road, would ride with him in preference to any other driver. Oh, no! he never had any bad luck; if he did, it always came out right, and the Pioneer Company never knew any thing about it."

Rather quieted in his own mind by this unexpected defense of a man to whom he had taken an unbounded dislike, Clayton began to estimate the probabilities of their reaching Strawbury by supper-time. Knowing the condition of the roads and the depth of the snow on the mountains, he at once reasoned that Jehu's home-beat of ten miles would be a long stretch if he drew the coach to Strawbury. Clayton understood from the passengers that the stage company had given orders to that effect, although for months hitherto they had exchanged wheels for runners at the station where they then were. But the rapidly melting snows had left much of the distance bare, and it was deemed best to get a wheel-track through the remaining drifts to this point. Accordingly, young Clayton made an artful exchange of seats with an inside gentleman, who thought he would enjoy the luxury of an inoffensive cigar on the box, until they reached the next station. This was quickly done, and the coach rattled on. In the few moments of twilight before they drove into the deep shadow of the mountain, he had time to glance at his fellow-travelers, from the front seat in which he was ensconced. He was squeezed between the other fat man and a broad-shouldered man like him