[Enter Hecate, Stadlin, Hoppo, and other Witches.]

Hec. The moon 's a gallant; see how brisk she rides!

Stad. Here's a rich evening, Hecate.

Hec. Ay, is 't not, wenches,

To take a journey of five thousand miles?

Hop. Ours will be more to-night.

Hec. Oh, it will be precious. Heard you the owl yet?

Stad. Briefly in the copse

As we came through now.

Hec. 'Tis high time for us then.

Stad. There was a bat hung at my lips three times

As we came thro' the woods, and drank her fill:

Fire. They are all going a-birding to-night. They talk of fowls i' th' air that fly by day; I'm sure they'll be a company of foul sluts there to-night. If we have not mortality affear'd, I'll be hang'd, for they are able to putrify it to infect a whole region. She spies me now.

Hec. What! Firestone, our sweet son?

Fire. A little sweeter than some of you; or a dunghill were too good for one. Hec. How much hast there?

Fire. Nineteen, and all brave plump ones; besides six lizards, and three serpentine eggs.

Hec. Dear and sweet boy! What herbs hast thou ?

Fire. I have some mar-martin and mandragon.

Hec. Mar-maritin and mandragora thou would'st say.

Fire. Here's pannax too. I thank thee; my pan akes I am sure, with kneeling down to cut 'em.

Hec. And selago.

Hedge Hissop too! How near he goes my cuttings!

Were they all cropt by moonlight?

Fire. Every blade of 'em, or I'm a mooncalf, mother.

Hec.

Hie thee home with 'em.

Look well to th' house to-night; I am for aloft.

Fire. Aloft, quoth you? I would you would break your neck once, that I might have all quickly. [Aside.] Hark, hark, mother! they are above the steeple already, flying over your head with a noise of musicians.

Hec. They are, indeed; help me! help me! I'm too late else.

SONG.

[In the air above.]

Come away, come away,
Hecate, Hecate, come away,

[A Spirit descends in the shape of a cat.]

Above. There's one come down to fetch his dues;

A kiss, a coll, a sip of blood;

And why thou stay'st so long, I muse, I muse,
Since th' air's so sweet and good.

Hec. Oh, art thou come;

What news, what news?

Spirit. All goes still to our delight.
Either come, or else

Refuse, refuse.

Hec. Now I am furnished for the flight.

Fire. Hark, hark! The cat sings a brave treble

In her own language.

Hec. [Ascending with the Spirit.] Now I go, now I fly.
Malkin, my sweet spirit, and I.

Oh, what dainty pleasure 'tis

To ride in the air,

When the moon shines fair,

And sing and dance, and toy and kiss!

Over woods, high rocks, and mountains,

Over seas, our mistress' fountains,

Over steep towers and turrets,

We fly by night, 'mongst troops of spirits.

No ring of bells to our ears sounds;
No howl of wolves, no yelp of hounds;
No, not the noise of waters' breach,

Or cannon's roar our height can reach.
Above. No ring of bells, &c.

JOHN MARSTON was a rough and vigorous satirist, as well as a dramatic writer. He was, for some time, a student in Corpus Christi College, Oxford, but where he was born, or of what family descended, is not known. His principal dramas are The Malcontent, a comedy performed in 1600, Antonio and Mellida, a tragedy, in 1602, The Insatiate Countess, and What You Will. Besides these dramas, Marston wrote, in connection with Jonson and Chapman, the unfortunate comedy of 'Eastward Hoe.' He was the author of a volume of satires also, under the title of The Scourge of the Villainy. His death occurred in 1614, and the last literary labor of the great Shakspeare is represented to have been the editing of his plays.

Hazlitt remarks that 'Marston's forte was not sympathy either with the stronger or softer emotions, but an impatient scorn and bitter indignation

against the vices and follies of men, which vented itself either in comic irony, or lofty invectives.' The following humorous sketch of a scholar and his dog, is worthy of any poet, however exalted his genius or reputation :

I was a scholar; seven useful springs
Did I deflower in quotations

Of cross'd opinions 'bout the soul of man:

The more I learnt, the more I learnt to doubt.
Delight, my spaniel, slept, whilst I baus'd leaves,
Toss'd o'er the dunces, pored on the old print
Of titled words: and still my spaniel slept.
While I wasted lamp-oil, baited my flesh,
Shrunk up my veins and still my spaniel slept.
And still I held converse with Zabarell,
Aquinas, Scotus, the musty saw

Of Antick Donate: still my spaniel slept.
Still on went I; first, an sit anima;

Then, an it were mortal. O hold, hold; at that
They're at brain buffets, fell by the ears amain
Pell-mell together; still my spaniel slept.
Then, whether 'twere corporeal, local, fixt,
Ex traduce, but whether 't had free will
Or no, hot philosophers

Stood banding factions, all so strongly propt;
I stagger'd, knew not which was firmer part,
But thought, quoted, read, observ'd, and pried,
Stufft noting-books: and still my spaniel slept.
At length he wak'd, and yawn'd; and by yon sky,
For ought I know, he knew as much as I.

PHILIP MASSINGER was born at Salisbury, in 1584. His father, as appears from the dedication of one of his plays, was in the service of the Earl of Pembroke; and as he was, on one occasion, intrusted with letters to Queen Elizabeth, his situation must have been a confidential one. In 1601, Massinger entered St. Alban's Hall, Oxford; but during the four years which he passed at the university, he applied his mind exclusively to romances and poetry, and, consequently, at the expiration of that time, left without his degree. On quitting Oxford, he repaired to London, there to improve his poetic fancy by intercourse with the men and manners of the metropolis. He soon after began to write for the stage, but for a number of years he had to struggle with poverty, and its usual attendant, distress. In 1614, he made a joint application with Field and Daborne, two brother dramatists, to the manager, Henslowe, for the loan of five pounds, stating that without it they could not be bailed. The sequel of Massinger's history is only an enumeration of his plays. He wrote a great many dramas, of which eighteen have been preserved, and his death was sudden and unexpected. On the evening of the eighteenth of March, 1639, he retired to rest in his own house at Bankside, Southwark, in his usual health, and the next morning was found. dead in his bed. He was interred at St. Mary Overy's Church, Southwark, in the same grave which had previously received the remains of Fletcher :

and upon the stone that indicated their last resting place, Sir Aston Cock aine incribed the following quaint epitaph:--

In the same grave Fletcher was buried, here
Lies the stage-poet, Philip Massinger.

Plays they did write together, were great friends,
And now one grave includes them at their ends.
So whom on earth nothing did part, beneath

Here in their fames they lie, in spite of death.

Massinger wrote a number of dramas conjointly with Fletcher, Middleton, Rowley, Field, Dekker, and others; and such was his popularity that most of his contemporaries esteemed it an honor to be thus connected with him. Of the dramas exclusively his own, The Virgin Martyr, The Bondman, The Fatal Dowry, The City Madam, and A New Way to Pay Old Debts, are his best known productions. Massinger's comedy resembles, in its eccentric strength and wayward exhibitions of human nature, that of Ben Jonson. The greediness of avarice, the tyranny of unjust laws, and the miseries of poverty, are drawn with a powerful hand. The luxuries and vices of a city life, also, afforded scope for his indignant and forcible invective. The tragedies of Massinger have a calm and dignified seriousness, and a lofty pride, that impresses the imagination very powerfully. His genius was more eloquent and descriptive than impassioned and inventive; yet his pictures of suffering virtue, its struggles and its trials, are calculated to touch the heart, as well as gratify the taste. The versification is so smooth and mellifluous, as to be second only to that of Shakspeare.

Massinger's dramas afford fine scope for extracts, but our space will allow us to introduce only the following:

A MIDNIGHT SCENE.

[Angelo, an Angel, attends Dorothea as a Page.]

Dor. My book and taper.

Ang. Here, most holy mistress.

Dor. Thy voice sends forth such music, that I never

Was ravish'd with a more celestial sound.

Were every servant in the world like thee,

So full of goodness, angels would come down
To dwell with us: thy name is Angelo,
And like that name thou art. Get thee to rest;
Thy youth with too much watching is opprest.
Ang. No, my dear lady. I could weary stars,
And force the wakeful moon to lose her eyes,
By my late watching, but to wait on you.
When at your prayers you kneel before the altar,
Methinks I'm singing with some quire in heaven,
So blest I hold me in your company.

Therefore my most lov'd mistress, do not bid
Your boy, so serviceable, to get hence;

For then you break his heart.

Dor. Be nigh me still, then.

Ꮓ

In golden letters down I'll set that day
Which gave thee to me. Little did I hope
To meet such worlds of comfort in thyself,
This little, pretty body, when I, coming
Forth of the temple, heard my beggar-boy,
My sweet-faced, godly beggar-boy, crave an alms,
Which with glad hand I gave, with lucky hand;
And when I took thee home, my most chaste bosom
Methought, was filled with no hot wanton fire,
But with a holy flame, mounting since higher,
On wings of cherubims, than it did before.

Ang. Proud am I that my lady's modest eye
So likes so poor a servant.

Dor. I have offer'd

Handfuls of gold but to behold thy parents.
I would leave kingdoms, were I queen of some,
To dwell with thy good father; for, the son
Bewitching me so deeply with his presence,
He that begat him must do 't ten times more.
I pray thee, my sweet boy, show me thy parents;
Be not asham'd.

Ang. I am not: I did never

Know who my mother was; but, by yon palace,

Fill'd with bright heav'nly courtiers, I dare assure you,
And pawn these eyes upon it, and this hand,
My father is in heav'n: and, pretty mistress,
If your illustrious hour-glass spend his sand
No worse, than yet it doth, upon my life,
You and I both shall meet my father there,
And he shall bid you welcome.

Dor. A bless'd day.

[Virgin Martyr.]

COMPASSION FOR MISFORTUNE.

Luke. No word, sir,

I hope shall give offence; nor let it relish

Of flattery, though I proclaim aloud,

I glory in the bravery of your mind,

To which your wealth's a servant. Not that riches
Is, or should be, contemn'd, it being a blessing

Deriv'd. from heaven, and by your industry
Pull'd down upon you; but in this, dear sir,
You have many equal: such a man's possessions
Extend as far as yours: a second hath
His bags as full; a third in credit flies
As high in the popular voice: but the distinction
And noble difference by which you are
Divided from them, is, that you are styled
Gentle in your abundance, good in plenty;

And that you feel compassion in your bowels

Of others' miseries (I have found it, sir;

Heaven keep me thankful for 'it!), while they are curs'd
As rigid and inexorable

*

Your affability and mildness, clothed