gue, and in such narrative or lyrical passages as
may occur in his part.

Costume.

The totality of the effect produced by the actor will in some degree
depend upon other aids, among which those of a purely external kind are
unlikely to be lost sight of. But the significance of costume (q.v.) in
the actor, like that of decoration and scenery (see THEATRE) in an
action, is a wholly relative one, and is to a large measure determined
by the claims which custom enables the theatre to make, or forbids its
making, upon the imagination of the spectators. The actor's real
achievement lies in the transformation which the artist himself effects;
nor is there any art more sovereign in the use it can make of its means,
or so happy in the directness of the results it can accomplish by them.

2. INDIAN DRAMA

The origin of the Indian drama may unhesitatingly be described as purely
native. The Mahommedans, when they overran India, brought no drama with
them; the Persians, the Arabs and the Egyptians were without a national
theatre. It would be absurd to suppose the Indian drama to have owed
anything to the Chinese or its offshoots. On the other hand, there is no
real evidence for assuming any influence of Greek examples upon the
Indian drama at any stage of its progress. Finally, it had passed into
its decline before the dramatic literature of modern Europe had sprung
into being.

Origin.

The Hindu writers ascribe the invention of dramatic entertainments to an
inspired sage Bharata, or to the communications made to him by the god
Brahma himself concerning an art gathered from the Vedas. As the word
_Bharata_ signifies an actor, we have clearly here a mere
personification of the invention of the drama. Three kinds of
entertainments, of which the _n[=a]tya_ (defined as a dance combined
with gesticulation and speech) comes nearest to the drama, were said to
have been exhibited before the gods by the spirits and nymphs of Indra's
heaven, and to these the god Siva added two new styles of dancing.

The origin of the Indian drama was thus unmistakably religious. Dramatic
elements first showed themselves in certain of the hymns of the _Rig
Veda_, which took the form of dialogues between divine personages, and
in one of which is to be found the germ of K[=a]lid[=a]sa's famous
_Vikrama and Urv[=a]s[=i]_. These hymns were combined with the dances in
the festivals of the gods, which soon assumed a more or less
conventional for