Respect my sex; who shall attend me else,
And yield me the last service ?-sure it never
Can be my sister's pleasure, that in me

My sex should be insulted; that these men,
With their rude hands, should touch my royal person.

BURLEIGH.

"'Tis order'd that no woman shall ascend

The scaffold steps with you; their tears and moans—

MARY.

"She shall not weep, my lord, she shall not moan;

I answer for my Anna's resolution;

Be merciful; divide me not so soon

From my true foster-mother, from my friend.
She bore me on her arms into this life,

Let her then gently lead me to my death.

Have nothing in this world to wish for more.
[She takes the crucifix, and kisses it.

My God! my Comforter! my blest Redeemer!
As once thy arms were stretch'd upon the cross.
Let them be now extended to receive me!

[She turns round to go, at the same moment her eyes fall upon
LEICESTER, who, on her going, starts involuntary and turns
his eyes towards her: at this sight MARY trembles, her knees
fail her, she is about to fall, when LEICESTER catches at her,
and receives her in his arms; she regards him for some time
earnestly, and in silence; he cannot support her looks; at
length she speaks.

You keep your word, my Lord of Leicester: for
You promised me your arm to lead me forth
From prison, and you lend it to me now.
At length the wish'd for day is come, and what
Was oft the object of my fondest dreams
Is now accomplish'd: and the Earl of Leicester,
The long-expected, the long-wish'd for friend
Appears at length in Fotheringay Castle.

I see him standing in my prison; all
Is ready for the journey; all the gates
Stand open, and at length I cross the threshold,
Conducted by his hand; and now I leave
These dismal walls behind me, and forever.

All is fulfill'd, and you have saved your honor.

[He stands as if annihilated; she continues, with a gentle voice Yes, Leicester; not for liberty alone

1 wish'd to be indebted to your hands.

You should have made me bless that liberty.

Led by your hand, and happy in your love,

I hoped once more to taste the joys of life.
Yes; now that I'm prepared from all the world
To part, and to become a happy spirit,
Whom earthly inclinations tempt no more,
Now, Leicester, I may venture to confess
Without a blush, the frailty I have conquer'd—
Farewell, my lord; and, if you can, be happy!
To woo two queens has been your daring aim ;
You have disdain'd a tender, loving heart;
Betray'd it, in the hope to win a proud one :
Kneel at the feet of Queen Elizabeth!

May your reward not prove your punishment.
Farewell! I now have nothing more on earth."

Leicester remains alone after the departure of Mary, the feeling of despair and shame that overwhelms him can hardly be expressed; he listens, he hears all that is passing in the hall of execution, and, when the business is ended, he falls senseless on the ground. We are afterwards told that he is gone to France, and the grief of Elizabeth at the loss of her lover is the beginning of her punishment.

I shall make some observations on this imperfect analysis of a piece, in which the charm of the verse adds greatly to its other merits. I hardly know if they would permit, in France, an entire act on one decisive situation; but that repose of grief, which springs from the very privation of hope, produces the truest and the most profound emotions. This solemn repose permits the spectator, as well as the victim, to descend into himself, and feel all that misery reveals to him.

The scene of the confession, and above all, that of the com munion, would be condemned altogether, and with reason

but it is certainly not for want of effect that it would be censured: the pathetic never touches the heart more nearly than when founded on the national religion. The most Catholic country in Europe, Spain, and its most religious poet, Calderon, who had himself entered into the ecclesiastical order, have admitted as subjects for the stage, the ceremonies of Christianity.

It seems to me that, without being at all wanting in the revence which we owe to the Christian religion, we may suffer it to enter into poetry and the fine arts, into all that elevates the soul, and embellishes life. To exclude it from these, is to imitate children who think they can do nothing but what is sad and solemn in their father's house. There is a religion in every thing that occasions a disinterested emotion of the mind; poetry, love, nature, and the Divinity itself, are connected together in the heart, whatever efforts we may make to separate them; and, if genius is prohibited from sounding all these strings at once, the full harmony of the soul will never be heard.

This very Mary whom France beheld so brilliant, and England so unhappy, has been the subject of a thousand different poems, celebrating her charms and her misfortunes. History has painted her as sufficiently light; Schiller has thrown more of the serious into her character, and the period at which he brings her forward may well account for the change. Twenty years of imprisonment, even twenty years of existence, in whatever manner they have been spent, are generally a severe lesson.

The adieu of Mary to the Earl of Leicester appears to me to be one of the finest situations to be met with on the stage. There is some sweetness for her in that trying moment. She has a compassion for Leicester, all guilty as he is; she feels what a remembrance she bequeathes to him, and this vengeance of the heart is not prohibited. In short, at the moment o death, of a death, the consequence of his refusal to save her, she again says to him that she loves him; and if any thing can console the mind under the terrible separation to which we are doomed by death, it is the solemnity which it gives to our parting words: no end, no hope, can mingle with them, and the purest truth is exhaled from our bosoms with life.

CHAPTER XIX.

JOAN OF ARC' AND THE BRIDE OF MESSINA.

SCHILLER, in a copy of verses full of grace, reproaches the French with ingratitude towards Joan of Arc. One of the noblest epochs of history, that in which France, and her king, Charles the Seventh, were rescued from the yoke of foreigners, has never yet been celebrated by any writer worthy of effacing the remembrance of Voltaire's poem; and it is a stranger that has attempted to re-establish the glory of a French heroine, of a heroine whose unhappy fate might interest us in her favor, even though her exploits did not excite our just enthusiasm. Shakspeare could not judge of Joan of Arc but with the partiality of an Englishman; yet even he represents her, in his historical play of Henry the Sixth, as having been at first inspired by heaven, and subsequently corrupted by the demon of ambition. Thus, the French only have suffered her memory to be dishonored. It is a great fault of our nation, to be incapable of resisting the ridiculous, when presented to us under a striking form. Yet, is there so much room in the world for the serious and the gay together, that we might impose it upon ourselves as a law, never to trifle with what is worthy of our veneration, and yet lose nothing, by doing so, of the freedom of pleasantry.

The subject of Joan of Arc partaking at once of the historical and the marvellous, Schiller has intermingled in his play, pieces of lyrical poetry, and the mixture produces a fine effect, even in representation. We have hardly any thing in the French language, except the Monologue of Polyeucte, and the Choruses of Athalie and Esther, that can give us any idea

The play of Schiller is entitled the Maid of Orleans.-Ed.

of it. Dramatic poetry is inseparable from the situation which it is required to paint; it is recitation in action, the conflict of man with fate. Lyrical poetry is almost always suited to religious subjects; it raises the soul towards heaven; it expresses I know not what of sublime resignation, which often seizes on us in the midst of the most tumultuous passions, and delivers us from our personal disquietudes, to give us for an instant the taste of divine peace.

No doubt we must take care that the progressive advance of the interest shall not suffer by it; but the end of dramatic art is not simply to inform us whether the hero is killed, or whether he marries: the principal object of the events represented, is to serve to develop sentiments and characters. The poet is in the right, therefore, sometimes to suspend the action of the theatre, to make us listen to the heavenly music of the soul. We may abstract ourselves in art, as in life, and soar for a moment above all that passes within us and around us.

The historical epoch at which Joan of Arc existed, is peculiarly proper to display the French character in all its beauty, when an unalterable faith, an unbounded reverence for women, an almost imprudent generosity in war, signalized this nation throughout Europe.

We must picture to ourselves a young girl of sixteen, of a majestic form, but with still infantine features, a delicate exterior, and without any strength but that which comes to her from on high; inspired by religion, poetical in her actions, poetical also in her speech, when animated by the divine spirit; showing in her discourses, sometimes an admirable genius, at others an absolute ignorance of all that heaven has not revealed to her. It is thus that Schiller has conceived the part of Joan of Arc. He first shows her at Vaucouleurs, in the rustic habitation of her father, where she hears of the misfortunes of France, and is inflamed by the recital. Her aged father blames her sadness, her thoughtfulness, her enthusiasm. Unaccustomed to penetrate the secret of what is extraordinary, he ninks that there is evil in all that is not habitual to him. A countryman brings in a helmet, which a gipsey had put into