ample,
between the acts of "Saint Uliva," which required two days for its
presentation, the "Masque of Hope" was given. The stage directions say:
"You will cause three women, well beseen, to issue, one of them attired
in white, one in red, the other in green, with golden balls in their
hands, and with them a young man robed in white; and let him, after
looking many times first on one and then on another of these damsels, at
last stay still and say the following verses, gazing at her who is clad
in green." The story of Echo and Narcissus was also enacted and the
choir of nymphs which carried off the dead youth had a song beginning
thus:

"Fly forth in bliss to heaven,
Thou happy soul and fair."

On the other hand some few sacred plays showed skill in the treatment of
character. The "Mary Magdalen" is one of these. The Magdalen is
portrayed with power and even passion. But the general purpose of the
sacred play, which was to instruct the populace in the stories of Bible
history, precluded the exercise of high literary imagination. Fancy and
the taste of the time seem to have governed the fashioning of these
plays. Their historic importance thus becomes much larger than their
artistic value. Their close approach to the character of early opera is
beyond question.

CHAPTER III

Birthplace of the Secular Drama

In the midst of more imposing chronicles bearing upon the growth of
Italy the student of her history is likely to lose sight of the little
Marquisate of Mantua. Yet its story is profoundly interesting and in its
relations to the development of the lyric drama filled with
significance. That it should have come to occupy such a high position
among the cultivated centers of the Renaissance seems singularly
appropriate since Virgil, the Italian literary deity of the period, was
born at Pietole, now a suburb of Mantua.

The marquisate owed its elevation to the character of the great lords of
the house of Gonzaga, who ruled it from 1328 to 1708. In the former year
the head of the house ousted from the government the Buonacolsis, who
had been masters since 1247. In 1432 the Gonzagas were invested with the
hereditary title of Marquis and in 1530 Charles V raised the head of the
house to the rank of Duke. When the last duke died without issue in 1708
Austria gained possession of the little realm.

Entangled in the ceaseless turmoil of wars between Milan and the forces
allied against her, Mantua under the