But Isabella Andreini has left us no such memorial. Of all the very numerous contemporaries who speak in rapture of her performances, not one has recorded a single hint as to the characters in which she enchanted them. The omission seems a most singular one, and can be accounted for on no other supposition, than that the written words which the actress was to speak were considered a comparatively insignificant part of her performance: and the nature of the praises lavished on her acting seem to point to the same conclusion. We hear much of voice, action, grace, and charm of elocution, but nothing of those higher matters of histrionic art which raise it to the level of an intellectual profession. Nothing is said of the effect produced on the minds of the audience, nothing of conception and interpretation of character, nothing of empire over the sources of smiles and tears. And these facts seem to furnish an explanation of the difficulty of accounting for a great dramatic reputation, at a time when dramatic literature was such as has been described. [Sidenote: TASSO'S AMINTA.] There was indeed one form of dramatic composition, not properly to be classed with either tragedy or comedy, that has not been mentioned. These were the pastoral pieces, "favole boschereccie," poems rather than dramas, of which Tasso's "Aminta" is the great example, and to which Isabella's own "Mirtilla" also belonged. From the circumstance of her having herself written in that style, and more still from the high place which the "Aminta" occupied in the public favour, it may be deemed almost certain that the leading actress of the day must have appeared in the part of Silvia. The superiority of this charming little gem of Tasso's to the generality of the contemporary dramatic writings is very marked. But its charms, its idyllic elegance, its Theophrastic echoes, its melodious verse, are not dramatic charms. And though we may fancy a beautiful woman, mistress of graceful elocution, and skilled in drawing all its music from polished Italian verse, uttering Silvia's disclaimer, "Pianto d'amor non già, ma di pietade," with infinite charm of expression, still, any pleasure to be derived from the stage presentation of such a poem as the "Aminta," and any histrionic excellences to be manifested by the exponents of it, must be deemed to be of a very inferior rank indeed, to aught that modern times have learned to expect from those whom the world now considers great actors. And on the whole, this record of a great Italian actress contemporary with Shakspeare, must be considered to indicate that even if the great master's works be left out of the question as exceptional, drama stood higher, and was more appreciated in the great sixteenth century among the "toto divisos orbe Britannos," than in Italy, the metropolis of literary culture. BIANCA CAPPELLO. (1548–1587.) CHAPTER I.