st assured that he exercised a considerable influence
upon later writers, we cannot actually trace this influence at work; we
cannot in fact point to Lyly as the first of a _definite_ series. The
novel like its style coloured, but did not deflect, the stream of
English literature. And indeed we may say this not only of _Euphues_
but of Elizabethan fiction as a whole. The public to which a 16th
century novel would appeal was a small one. Few people in those days
could read, and of these the majority preferred to read poetry; and
though, as we have seen, _Euphues_ passed through, for the age, a
considerable number of editions, the circle of those who appreciated
Lyly, Sidney, and Nash must have been for the most part confined to the
Court. And this accounts for the brevity of their popularity and for its
intensity while it lasted; a phenomenon which is not seen in the drama,
and which is due to the susceptibility of Court life to sudden changes
of fashion. Drama was the natural form of literature in an age when most
people were illiterate and yet when all were eager for literary
entertainment. Drama was therefore the main current of artistic
production, the prose novel being quite a minor, almost an
insignificant, tributary. Realising then the inevitable limitations
which surrounded our English fiction at its birth we can understand its
infantile imperfections and the subsequent arrest of its development.

[95] It was Sidney and Nash who set the fashion for the 17th century.

"The novel held in Elizabeth's time very much the same place as was held
by the drama at the Restoration; it was an essentially aristocratic
entertainment, and the same pitfall waylaid both, the pitfall of
artificiality. Dryden's audiences and the readers of _Euphues_ both
sought for better bread than is made of wheat; both were supplied with
what satisfied them in an elaborate confection of husks[96]."

[96] Raleigh, p. 57. He writes _Arcadia_ for _Euphues_ but the
substitution is legitimate.

CHAPTER III.

LYLY THE DRAMATIST.

So far we have been dealing with those of Lyly's writings, which, though
they are his most famous, form quite a small section of his work, and
exerted an influence upon later writers which may have been considerable
but was certainly indirect. His plays on the other hand, in the
production of which he spent the better part of his life, greatly
outweigh his novel both in aesthetic and historical importance.