French ambassador, De Sabran, to De Brienne, “he could not have died with greater propriety or constancy."

Heylyn's "Life of Laud" became, soon after, the book of the season. From September to November, 1668, Pepys was either reading it himself or having it read to him. After a night's reading of it aloud by his friend Gibson, the listener calls it "a shrewd book, but that which I believe will do the bishops in general no great good, but hurt, it pleads so much for Popish." On another occasion the diarist says, "I made my boy to read to me most of the night, to get through the Life of the Archbishop of Canterbury." Finally, at the end of November," after supper," Pepys read for himself, and "made an end of the Life of Archbishop Laud, which is worth reading, as informing a man plainly in the posture of the Church, and how the things of it were managed with the same self-interest and design that every other thing is, and have succeeded accordingly."

There was

Pepys might well write in this strain. then on the episcopal throne of Canterbury, Gilbert Sheldon, who, like his four predecessors in the primacy, Juxon, Laud, Abbot, and Bancroft, had been translated from London. Sheldon had turned Charles II. from granting the promised indulgence to Dissenters; and he very much preferred that a congregation should have no sermon at all rather than one from a Nonconforming clergyman. He was charged by Sedley with

Sheldon in the Plague.

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what was then called gallantry, but he showed his regard for the Sabbath by stopping all boating on the Thames on that day. He was as great a hand at pleasure as at business, and was fond of "drolling," a pastime which would not have suited the dignity of Laud. But, if Laud ennobled his life by dying worthily, let us not forget that Gilbert Sheldon atoned for many shortcomings by his courage and constancy during the outbreak of plague in 1665. In the midst of death he never neglected a duty; and he figures as nobly among the pestilence-stricken as any of his predecessors face to face with their murderers or their executioners.

It is not because these deaths were dramatic that I follow up the narrative with matters connected with the stage; but my work, imperfect as it may be, would have been more so still, if I had not included in it some notice of how the Cassock has agreed or disagreed with the Buskin.

THE PULPIT AND THE "BOARDS."

PRIEST of Zeus would have been proud to sit

A of

down in Athens with such an actor as Hegelochus; but a priest of any temple in Rome would have looked on the great player, Æsopus himself, as excommunicate. At a later period, in Italy, the comedians were as well considered as their ancient predecessors were in Greece. Princes and cardinals attended their performances, and so renowned a saint as St. Charles Borromeo protected-one might almost say managedthem. In 1583 the Governor of Milan invited Adriano Valerini and his company to that city. After they had commenced their season, some religious scruples beset the governor, who forthwith banished the poor players. They appealed, and he referred them to the archbishop, Charles of Borromeo. good prelate invited the comedians to visit him, talked over stage matters with them, and at length arranged the business to their satisfaction. The Italian actors at that time improvised their plays. The plot was sketched out, and they filled up the details with great ability. They were now to bring their plots to the archbishop, who by himself, or by the Provost of

The

Italian Privileges.

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St. Barbara (whom the archbishop appointed as a sort of deputy-licenser), examined the plot, and if there was nothing objectionable in it or likely to arise out of it, the archbishop appended his signature by way of authorizing the representation. Riccoboni, in his youth, knew an old actress named Lavinia who had several of these sketches of plays, which she had found in her father's collection, and which bore the archiepiscopal subscription.

It is certain that the Italian actors who died in France in the sixteenth century were buried with all respect and ceremony. The famous Isabella Andreini, who died at Lyons, was borne to the grave with a pomp that could not have been exceeded if she had been a princess, and this homage was rendered to her by all the authorities of the city. Two French members of the Italian company playing at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, towards the close of the seventeenth century—namely, Dominique, the renowned Harlequin, and Santeuil, the equally celebrated Scaramouch, were interred, with all the honours, in the church of St. Eustache. Harlequin, as an especial grace, was deposited immediately behind the chapel of the Virgin. It is said that these honours were rendered them because on their death-beds they had renounced their calling as actors, whereupon the sacraments were administered. I think that their privileges as members of the Italian company may have had quite as much to do with it.

For only consider how it had been a few years previously with the greatest of French dramatic poets, and one of the ablest of French actors, who was at the head of a company which opposed the Italians. I mean Molière. Death smote him on the stage before he had thought of "renouncing " the profession which the Church condemned. What a coil there was on the following cold February day, 1673! Molière's friends were preparing the funeral honours. "The fellow," said Du Harlay, Archbishop of Paris, "shall not lie in consecrated ground: a mere player!" "A mere player!" exclaimed Molière's wife; "he is the first of French poets!" And the indignant woman hurried down to Versailles to beseech the " grand monarch" to insist that a French poet should not be buried like a dead dog or a French Protestant. The king, who had entertained Molière at his table, coolly remarked that it was the archbishop's affair, and that the poor widow had better apply to that dignitary. Du Harlay was obdurate; great indignation was aroused, and the king expressed a hope that no scandal would spring from it. On this the prelate relented so far as to allow that the great poet, who happened also to be an actor, might lie in the churchyard of St. Joseph-a succursal chapel in the parish of St. Eustache, at the end of the Rue Montmartreprovided all were done privately. On the following night at nine o'clock the body was carried forth from the poet-player's house. Two priests were authorized