acted the parts of Comus and Sabrina, but the part of the Attendant Spirit was taken by Henry Lawes, “gentleman of the Chapel Royal, and one of His Majesty’s private musicians.” The Earl’s children were his pupils, and the mask was naturally produced under his direction. Milton’s friendship with Lawes is shown by the sonnet which the poet addressed to the musician:

Harry, whose tuneful and well measur’d song

First taught our English music how to span

Words with just note and accent, not to scan

With Midas’ ears, committing short and long;

Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the throng,

With praise enough for Envy to look wan;

To after age thou shalt be writ the man,

That with smooth air could’st humour best our tongue.

Thou honour’st Verse, and Verse must lend her wing

To honour thee, the priest of Phoebus’ quire,

That tun’st their happiest lines in hymn, or story.

Dante shall give Fame leave to set thee higher

Than his Casella, who he woo’d to sing,

Met in the milder shades of Purgatory.

We must remember also that it was to Lawes that Milton’s Comus owed its first publication, and, as we see from the dedication prefixed to the text, that he was justly proud of his share in its first representation.

Such were the persons who appeared in Milton’s mask; they are few in number, and the plan of the piece is correspondingly simple. There are three scenes which may be briefly characterised thus:

In the first scene, after a kind of prologue (lines 1-92), the interest rises as we are introduced first to 

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