priests, executioners, playing their parts with equal effect and only
distinguished by the splendour or meanness of their apparel; he was a
witness to Satan's overthrow, to Abel's death, and was a spectator at
the flogging and crucifixion of Jesus. It is easy for those acquainted
with the later drama (of Greene especially) to see the direct line of
descent from these Miracles to the Shakespearian stage.

One interesting feature of these plays is the frequent appearance of
Angels and Devils on the stage. This accustomed the audience to the
entrance of the supernatural, in solid form, into the realm of the
natural; and paved the way for those most substantial ghosts which
showed themselves so much at home on the Elizabethan stage. We should be
not far wrong, perhaps, in describing the later introduction of the
Senecan Ghost into English drama as an innovation only in name: the
supernatural had been a familiar factor in heightening dramatic interest
long before _The Misfortunes of Arthur_ or _The Spanish Tragedy_ were
written.--Of the Devils even more may be said. Their picturesque
attire,[19] their endless pranks (not set down in the text), their
reappearance and disappearance at the most unexpected times, their howls
and familiar 'Harrow and owt! owt and alas!' were a constant delight,
and preserved their popularity unexhausted for two hundred years,
securing for them a place in the later forms of drama when the Miracles
were supplanted by Moralities and Interludes. The Devil's near cousin,
Herod, attained to a similar reputation and longevity. Has even modern
melodrama quite lost that immortal type of the ranting, bombastic tyrant
and villain?

The women in the play deserve notice. With the exception of Noah's wife,
who was commonly treated in a broadly humorous vein, the principal
female characters possess that sweet naturalness, depth and constancy