are exulting in the success of their plot, he springs up uninjured, and delivers them over to Mephistopheles, and "other devils," to be tormented. He afterwards sells a bundle of straw to a horse-dealer, to whom it appears to be a horse, but on riding his bargain into a stream it disappears, and there is nothing left but a bundle of straw, floating away. He does various other tricks, but it must be confessed these scenes, as well as those between the subordinate characters, are totally destitute of interest or humour. At a feast which he gives to two or three scholars, he, at their request, raises the form of Helen, in all her beauty, of whom he becomes enamoured. In the second part of the Faust of Goethe, he makes him raise the shades of Helen and Paris, in presence of the court and in the same manner he becomes struck with her loveliness. But, to return to Marlowe's play; after Helen has disappeared and the scholars taken their leave, an old man enters, who begs Faustus, while there is yet time, to repent, but Mephistopheles threatens him with instant destruction if he does, and his remorse disappearing, he requires the fiend to procure him the possession of Helen. His wish is instantly complied with, and Helen appears between two Cupids. Faust breaks out into the following impassioned address :

"Was this the face that launch'd a thousand ships,
And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?

Sweet Helen! make me immortal with a kiss!
Her lips suck forth my soul! see where it flies;
Come! Helen! come, give me my soul again.
Here will I dwell, for heaven is in those lips,
And all is dross that is not Helena."

The two first lines of this last passage breathe an intense appreciation of the beautiful, and a rare power of expression-none but a true poet could have written them. They resemble, and indeed contain, the main idea of Byron's celebrated lines,

"She walks in beauty like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

but Marlowe has clothed it in language more soft and exquisite in its harmony and expression than the modern bard. This is the last pleasure Faust derives from his art; the term has almost expired, and as it draws to a close, his remorse and terrors increase to a fearful degree. He tells the scholars who come to visit him what he has done :

"Lucifer and Mephistopheles! Oh,

Gentlemen! I gave them my soul for my cunning!
All. God forbid !

Faust. God forbade it, but Faustus hath done it."

They depart to offer up their prayers for him, and leave him to wrestle with his agony alone. The Good and Bad Angels visit him, one reminding him of what he has lost, and the other showing him what is to come. The description of the infernal tortures, given by the Bad Angel, reads like a passage from Dante. As they vanish, the clock strikes eleven, and Faust's concluding soliloquy is only interrupted by the striking of the bell, which speaks the lapse of the short remainder of the term with horrible distinctness, while he prays for an hour-a moment's respite-and calls upon the mountains to cover him. As the clock strikes twelve, he is torn in pieces. The two scholars return in the morning, and gather up his mangled limbs, the play concluding with a few lines, spoken by a Chorus :

"Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight, And burned is Apollo's laurel-bough,

That sometime grew within this learned man.
Faustus is gone; regard his hellish fall,
Whose fiendful torture may exhort the wise,
Only to wonder at unlawful things:

Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits,
To practise more than heavenly power permits."

The first two lines of this passage are used by Mr. Horne, in the conclusion of his fine dramatic sketch, the "Death of Marlowe." This old play of "Faustus" has been translated into German.

THE END.