'--All unavailing without a strict observance of the unities, sir,'
returned Mr Curdle. 'The unities of the drama, before everything.'

'Might I ask you,' said Nicholas, hesitating between the respect he
ought to assume, and his love of the whimsical, 'might I ask you what
the unities are?'

Mr Curdle coughed and considered. 'The unities, sir,' he said, 'are a
completeness--a kind of universal dovetailedness with regard to place
and time--a sort of a general oneness, if I may be allowed to use so
strong an expression. I take those to be the dramatic unities, so far as
I have been enabled to bestow attention upon them, and I have read
much upon the subject, and thought much. I find, running through the
performances of this child,' said Mr Curdle, turning to the phenomenon,
'a unity of feeling, a breadth, a light and shade, a warmth of
colouring, a tone, a harmony, a glow, an artistical development
of original conceptions, which I look for, in vain, among older
performers--I don't know whether I make myself understood?'

'Perfectly,' replied Nicholas.

'Just so,' said Mr Curdle, pulling up his neckcloth. 'That is my
definition of the unities of the drama.'

Mrs Curdle had sat listening to this lucid explanation with great
complacency. It being finished, she inquired what Mr Curdle thought,
about putting down their names.

'I don't know, my dear; upon my word I don't know,' said Mr Curdle. 'If