self felt with his personages, and therefore
his hearers must do the same.

Goldoni in his Memoirs gives no account of the production of "The
Fan." It was written and first brought out in Paris, and soon became
universally popular, especially in Venice. "The Curious Mishap" was
founded on an episode of real life which happened in Holland, and was
communicated to Goldoni as a good subject for a play. The _denouement_
is the same as in the real story, the details only are slightly altered.
The intrigue is amusing, plausible, and happily conceived. The scene in
which Monsieur Philibert endeavours to overcome the scruples of De la
Cotterie and gives him his purse, is inimitable. Indeed, it is worthy of
Moliere; for if it has not his drollery and peculiar turn of expression,
neither has it his exaggeration. There is no farce, nothing beyond what
the situation of the parties renders natural. "The Beneficent Bear" was
first written in French, and brought out at the time of the _fetes_ in
honour of the marriage of Marie Antoinette and the Dauphin, afterwards
Louis XVI. Played first in the city, and then before the court at
Fontainebleau, it was immensely successful in both cases. For this play
the writer received one hundred and fifty louis d'or. The published
edition also brought him much money.

It was certainly a rare honour for a foreigner to have a play
represented with such success in the fastidious French capital and in
the language of Moliere. He followed it with "L'Avaro Fastoso" ("The
Ostentatious Miser"), also written in French. The fate of this drama was
less happy, owing, however, to a mere accident, for which Goldoni
was in no wise responsible. Nevertheless, he would not allow it to be
represented a second time. He seems to have been discontented with it
as a dramatic work, though it has qualities which bring it nearer to
the modern French _comedie de societe_ than perhaps any other play he
has left behind him. "It was born under an evil constellation," writes
Goldoni, "and every one knows how fatal a sentence that is, especially
in theatrical affairs." "The Father of the Family" is, according to
Goldoni's own opinion, one of his best comedies; but, as he considers
himself obliged to abide by the decision of the public, he can, he says,
only place it in the second rank. It is intended to show the superiority
of a domestic training for girls over a conventual one. "The aunt, to
whom one of the daughters is consign