and the worldliness of the great princes of the Church finds only too ready corroboration in the annals of the time.     

       Webster's tragedies come toward the close of the great series of tragedies of blood and revenge, in which "The Spanish Tragedy" and "Hamlet" are landmarks, but before decadence can fairly be said to have set in. He, indeed, loads his scene with horrors almost past the point which modern taste can bear; but the intensity of his dramatic situations, and his superb power of flashing in a single line a light into the recesses of the human heart at the crises of supreme emotion, redeems him from mere sensationalism, and places his best things in the first rank of dramatic writing.     

   

    

       THE DUCHESS OF MALFI     

       Dramatis Personae:     

       FERDINAND [Duke of Calabria]. CARDINAL [his brother]. ANTONIO       [BOLOGNA, Steward of the Household to the Duchess]. DELIO [his friend]. DANIEL DE BOSOLA [Gentleman of the Horse to the Duchess].       [CASTRUCCIO, an old Lord]. MARQUIS OF PESCARA. [COUNT]       MALATESTI. RODERIGO, ] SILVIO, ] [Lords]. GRISOLAN, ]       DOCTOR. The Several Madmen. 

       DUCHESS [OF MALFI]. CARIOLA [her woman]. [JULIA, Castruccio's wife, and] the Cardinal's mistress. [Old Lady]. 

       Ladies, Three Young Children, Two Pilgrims, Executioners, Court Officers, and Attendants. 

   

   

        ACT I 

        SCENE I[1]         [Enter] ANTONIO and DELIO DELIO. You are welcome to your country, dear Antonio; You have been long in France, and you return A very formal Frenchman in your habit:   How do you like the French court? ANTONIO. I admire it:   In seeking to reduce both state and people To a fix'd order, their judicious king Begins at home; quits first his royal palace Of flattering sycophants, of dissolute And infamous persons,—which he sweetly terms His master's 

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