Mr. Copeland's Lecture.

Mr. Copeland lectured last night on Shakespeare's English kings before an audience of unusual size for this time of the year, when the examinations keep most men from doing anything which is not either necessary or particularly attractive.

In no other language than our own can there be found such a series of historical dramas as Shakespeare has given us in King John, Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V, Richard III, and Henry VIII. There has been a great deal of dispute as to the real authors of these plays and the times when they were written; but such questions, though perhaps interesting to scholars, are of no great concern to one who reads Shakespeare for pleasure. To such a reader, too, it makes but little difference whether or not the plays are historically accurate.

Shakespeare can not be said to have originated the historical drama; in fact he was hardly an originator in any direction. It was rather his strong point to develope what he found: into the dough which others made he put the yeast which caused it to rise. In this way he took the old Chronicles which existed before his time, and by varying adherence to them and departure from them developed his famous plays. He adhered to the Chronicles in so far as there is a stratum of historical fact in all of the dramas of which we are speaking; he departed from them by the addition of characters and scenes of his own invention, which in some cases almost obscure the facts which underlie them.

It is noticeable that Shakespeare's royal personages are as a rule less happy than his lower characters, and it seems strange that he should have dared to point out all the unhappiness and dishonor and illegality of their reigns. It must be remembered in explanation that his plays were written and acted at a time of England's greatest prosperity, when they gained rather than lost by the dark contrast they presented.

King George the Third always maintained that Shakespeare's writing was but sad stuff, and that it was only tolerated because it was Shakespeare. With this view no one can agree who reads his plays without prejudice. In them we find no trace of preaching or moralizing, but every character is allowed to speak for itself, without preference given or comment made. It is the work of a great artist, to whom life in all its manifold phases strongly appealed, and who was thus able to reproduce it with all the delightful charm of reality.