y dramatists he is a distinguished playwright. His
characters do not live, but he could invent effective scenes, though in
some cases the poet's taste may be questioned.

For many years _Tamerlane_ was acted at Drury Lane on the anniversary of
King William's landing in England, and under the names of Tamerlane and
Bajazet the king is belauded at the expense of Louis XIV. _The Fair
Penitent_, a piece even more successful upon the stage, will still
please the reader, though he may question the high eulogium of Johnson,
that "scarcely any work of any poet is at once so interesting by the
fable, and so delightful by the language." Rowe has not the tragic power
which can express passion without rant, and pathos without extravagance.
In _The Fair Penitent_ Calista gives utterance to her feelings by piling
up expletives. Thus, when her husband attacks the lover who has ruined
her, she exclaims, 'Destruction! fury! sorrow! shame! and death!' and,
on another occasion, she cries out, 'Madness! confusion!' words which
give a sense of the ludicrous rather than of the tragic; and so also
does Calista's last utterance when, addressing Altamont, she says:

'Had I but early known
Thy wondrous worth, thou excellent young man
We had been happier both--now 'tis too late!'

Rowe may be regarded as the principal representative of tragedy in the
'age of Pope,' but his respectable work shows a fatal degeneration from
the 'gorgeous tragedy' of the Elizabethans.

[Sidenote: Aaron Hill (1684-1749).]

Aaron Hill, unlike Rowe, was not distinguished as a dramatist, and
succeeded only in two or three adaptations from the French. His claims
as a poet are also insignificant. He was born in London in 1684, with
expectations that were not destined to be realized, but Fortune was not
unkind to him. His uncle, Lord Paget, Ambassador at Constantinople, gave
the youth a warm welcome, supplied him with a tutor, and sent him to
travel in the East. On Lord Paget's return to England, Hill accompanied
him, and together they are said to have visited a great part of Europe.
Some time later Hill went abroad again, and was absent two or three
years. For awhile--it could not have been long--he was secretary to the
Earl of Peterborough, and at the age of twenty-six, his good star being
still in the ascendant, he married a young lady 'of great merit and
beauty, with whom he had a very handsome fortune.' Hill was then
appointed manager o