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The Devils exportabunt eos, and the four Evangelists conclude the whole of this series of pageants, by impressing upon the audience the truth of their gospels.

In the Ludus Coventria, the forty-second pageant is Coventry appropriated to 'Doomsday,' and it commences Plays. by a summons from the archangels, Michael and Gabriel, to all ranks,

'Both pope, prynce, and prysste with crowne,
'Kynge and Caysere and Knyghts kene;'

and according to the stage direction' omnes resur-
gentes subtus terram clamant ha a a, ha a a, ha a a!'
Ha a a! cleve a sundyr, ye clowdys of clay,
'Asundyr ye breke, and lete us pas.

'Now may oure song be wele away,

That evyr we synned in dedly trespas.'

After they have exclaimed

Harrow and out,' the

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Saviour sees the good waiting patiently for admission, and orders St. Peter to let in his blyssyd childeryn.' The wicked beg for mercy, and Primus Diabolus tells them to expect none. The Saviour then shows how they had neglected all offices of charity, and the devils read the sins of the damned, as they are marked in black upon their foreheads: it is made an offence of the deepest dye, that they had attended neither mass nor matins. This piece is imperfect at the end, and the last words of it are a repetition by the wicked of their exclamation for mercy.

In concluding this analysis, I ought to apologize for its many unavoidable imperfections, as the first experiment to bring into the compass of a few sheets, subjects that occupy three large volumes. I have collated all the extracts with the utmost care.

Subsequent to the printing of the preceding examination of the Widkirk, Chester, and Coventry Miracle-plays, I was informed of the existence of a fourth Manuscript of the Chester series, only very recently discovered, and unknown to all our literary antiquaries. It came into the hands of J. B. Nichols, Esq., F.S.A., from a gentleman of Cheshire, but of its earlier history he knew nothing: he, however, immediately favoured me with the use of it, which was the more desirable, as it differs from both the MSS. in the British Museum, and is considerably older than either. It was transcribed (from what original does not appear) by a person of the name of Edward Gregorie, who subscribing the conclusion, calls himself a scholar of Bunbury,' and adds the date of the year when he finished his undertaking, viz., 1591: the most ancient copy hitherto known bears date in 1600. At one period Mr. Nichols' MS. seems to have been in the possession of some member of the Egerton family, the name of Joh. Egerton, Esq.' being written at the conclusion of one of the plays.

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It more nearly follows Harl. MS. No. 2013, than Harl. MS. No. 2124; but, nevertheless, preserves not

a few of the peculiarities of the latter, and is, in my opinion, a more valuable relic than either, notwithstanding the unfortunate deficiency of the first play and the Banes.' As one proof of the variations it contains, and at the same time of their value, I may refer to the eighth play, where the boy and pig' are introduced in the stage direction of the Harleian MSS., which I suspected meant that the boy was furnished with a pig's bladder at the end of a stick, with which he repeatedly struck Herod, in order to increase his rage and to excite the laughter of the spectators. In the MS. of 1591, Herod complains of the manner in which the boy troubled him :

'This boye doth me so greatly anoye

'That I wax dull and pure dry:'

whereas, in both the Harleian MSS, this point is lost by the misreading of the transcribers:

This bost doth me so greate nye *, &c.

The quantity of French is the same in all three MSS., and I may here notice, what I omitted before to remark, that Pilate opens the eighteenth play with a stanza, still preserved in what I take to be the original language of at least part of the performances: as, like the others, it is a mass of ignorant and almost unintelligible corruption, it is useless to quote it. Upon this subject I may, however, cite from this new

* In the MS. of Mr. Nichols, in the play of Antichrist, the important word' lollards' occurs, as in the Judicium of the Towneley MS. Both the Harleian copies read merely losells.

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authority, the following lines in the fourteenth Pageant, a prayer that the King of France may not be exposed to treachery :—

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The realm and barony' could be no other than the kingdom of France, from whence the piece was imported, and in rendering which into English, the translator omitted to adapt it to the change of country. The stage directions in the MS. of 1591, are often more full and explanatory than in either of the Harleian MSS. In the twenty-first Play we are told

Christ must speake in heaven,' and above what he says is written' Lyttle god;' as if there were two representatives of the Deity, one larger than the other, one for the Father and a smaller for the Son. Most of the local and temporary allusions are preserved in Mr. Nichols' manuscript, particularly the singular speech of the female tavern-keeper at the close of the seventeenth Play in Harl. MS. 2013, when she is left in hell, after Christ has freed Adam, Eve, and the Prophets, because she had cheated her customers by selling them bad wine and in small measures.

THE

DIGBY MIRACLE-PLAYS.

THE three Miracle-plays or Pageants, devoted to the Conversion of St. Paul, (preserved among the Digby MSS. in the Bodleian Library,) as far as regards that event, are conducted very scripturally, and in this respect present nothing requiring particular remark. The performances are opened and terminated by Poeta, in his own character, who delivers a kind of prologue and epilogue, in the latter of which he beseeches

yow all of hye and low degree,

Our sympylnes to hold excusyd, and lycens.'

St. Paul is first introduced on horseback, and after his conversion he enters in a dyscypuls wede.'-Two devils are employed, called Belyal and Mercury, and the first seems to have been indulged with the unusual luxury of a chair: the stage direction is, Here to ' enter a Dyvel with thunder and fyre, and to avaunce 'hym sylfe, saying as folowyth; and his spech spokyn 'to syt downe in a chayre.'

'Belyall. Ho! ho! beholde me, the myghte prince of the parts infernall,

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'Next unto Lucyfer I am in magestye;

By name I am nominate the god Belyall,

'Non of more myghte, nor of more excellencye.

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