of London," in style and composition it makes a much nearer approach to
what soon afterwards became the language of the stage, such as we find
it in the works of Shakespeare, and of some of his most gifted
contemporaries. Wilson, doubtless, saw the necessity, in 1588, of
adopting some of those improvements of versification in which Marlowe
had led the way; he therefore laid aside (excepting in a few comic
scenes) his heavy, lumbering, and monotonous fourteen-syllable lines
(sometimes carried to a greater length for the sake of variety) and not
only usually employed ten-syllable lines, but introduced speeches of
blank verse. His drama opens with this then uncommon form, and he avails
himself of it afterwards, interspersing also prose in such situations as
did not seem to require measured speech. This of itself was at that time
a bold undertaking; for Marlowe had only just before 1588, when "The
three Lords and three Ladies of London" must have been written,
commenced weaning audiences at our public theatres from what, in the
Prologue to his "Tamburlaine the Great," he ridicules as the "jigging
veins of rhiming motherwits."[17] Robert Wilson is, on this account, to
be regarded with singular respect, and his works to be read with
peculiar interest. It is not easy to settle the question of precedency,
but, as far as our knowledge at present extends, he seems entitled to be
considered the second writer of blank verse for dramas intended for
popular audiences. This is a point of view in which his productions have
never yet been contemplated, and it renders the play we have reprinted,
illustrating as it does so important and striking a change, especially
worthy of notice and republication.

Something has been already said respecting the characters who figure in
this representation, and we may add that although Simplicity, who here
performs even a more prominent and important part than in "The three
Ladies of London," must be reckoned the impersonation of a quality, and