is an effective piece of work. But both these
are minor characters who therefore receive no development, and if we
look at the more important personages of Lyly's portrait gallery, we
must agree with Mr Bond[131] that Tellus is the best. She is a character
which exhibits considerable development, and she is also Lyly's only
attempt to embody the evil principle in woman--a hint for the
construction of that marvellous portrait of another Scottish queen, the
Lady Macbeth, which Lyly just before his death in 1606 may have seen
upon the stage.

[131] Bond, II. p. 284.

On the whole Lyly is most successful when he is drawing women, which was
only as it should be, if we allow that the feminine element is the very
pivot of true comedy. This he saw, and it is because he was the first to
realise it and to grapple with the difficulties it entailed that the
title of father of English comedy may be given him without the least
reserve or hesitation. Sapho the haughty but amorous queen, Mileta the
mocking but tender Court lady, Gallathea the shy provincial lass, and
Pipenetta the saucy little maid-servant, fill our stage for the first
time in history with their tears and their laughter, their scorn of the
mere male and their "curst yeelding modestie," their bold sallies and
their bashful blushes. Nothing like this had as yet been seen in English
literature. I have already pointed out why it was that woman asserted
her place in art at this juncture. Yet, although the revolution would
have come about in any case, all honour must be paid to the man who saw
it coming, anticipated it, and determined its fortunes by the creation
of such a number of feminine characters from every class in the social
scale. And if it be true that he only gave us "their outward husk of wit
and raillery and flirtation," if it be true that his interpretation of
woman was superficial, that he had no understanding for the soul behind
the social mask, for the emotional and passionate current, now a quiet
stream, now a raging torrent, beneath the layer of etiquette, his work
was none the less important for that.

"Blood and brain and spirit, three
Join for true felicity."

Blood his girls had and brain, but his genius was not divine enough to
bestow upon them the third essential. Yet they were alive, they were
flesh, they had wit, and in this they are undoubtedly the forerunners
not only of Shakespeare's heroines but of Congreve's and of
Meredith's-