(2) Underneath this sable hearse Lies the subject of all verse, Sidney’s sister, Pembroke’s mother: Death, ere thou hast slain another, Learned, and fair, and good as she, Time shall throw a dart at thee! _Epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke_[99] In the estimation of his own age Jonson stood second to none; to a later generation he is overshadowed by the towering bulk of Shakespeare. But even the enormous prestige of Shakespeare cannot or ought not to belittle the merits of Jonson. Of Jonson we can justly say that he had all good literary gifts except one, and that the highest and most baffling of all--true genius. He had learning--perhaps too much of it; industry and constancy well beyond the ordinary; versatility; a crabbed and not unamiable humor, diversified with sweetness, grace, and nimbleness of wit; and a style quite adequate to his needs. But the summit of it all--the magical phrase that catches the breath, the immortal spirit that creates out of words and buckram “forms more real than living man”--these were lacking; and without these he cannot join the circle of the very great. =2. Francis Beaumont (1584–1616)= and =John Fletcher (1575–1625)= combined to produce a great number of plays, said to be fifty-two in all. How much of the joint work is to be assigned to the respective hands is not accurately known. The elder, Fletcher, was a cousin of Giles and Phineas Fletcher (see (p. 101), and was born at Rye, Sussex. He was educated at Cambridge, and lived the life of a London literary man. He died of the plague in 1625. His colleague Beaumont, who was probably the abler of the two, was the son of a judge, Sir Francis Beaumont, was educated at Oxford, and entered the Inner Temple (1600), but was captivated by the attractions of a literary life. He died almost within a month of Shakespeare, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. They excelled in comedy, especially in the comedy of London life. Theirs is not the heavy “humorous” comedy of Jonson, but is lighter and more romantic. Their characters are slighter, but more pleasing and human; their humor is free and genial, and their representation of contemporary life is happy and attractive. Their plots are ingenious and workmanlike, and their incidents numerous and striking. Their style shows a distinct decline from the high standard of Shakespeare. They have a greater fondness for prose, their blank verse is looser and weaker, but they are capable of poetical lines and phrases. Typical comedies are _A King and No King_ (1611), esteemed by Dryden the best of them all, _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_ (1611), a very agreeable farce, and _The Scornful Lady_ (1616). Their tragedies, such as _The Maid’s Tragedy_ (1619), _Philaster_ (1620), suggesting _Twelfth Night_, and _The Faithful Shepherdess_ (by Fletcher alone), are not too tragical, and they are diversified by attractive incidents and descriptions.