The general literary peculiarities of the miracle and mystery plays do not differ greatly from those of other compositions in verse of the same time which have been already described. Their great fault is prolixity. In the collection of the _Miracles de la Vierge_, the comparative brevity of the pieces renders them easier to read than the long compositions of the fifteenth century, and the poetical beauty of some of the legends which they tell is sufficient to furnish them with interest. Even in these, however, the absence of point and of dignity in the expression frequently mars the effect; and this is still more the case with the longer mysteries. Of these latter, however, the work of the brothers Greban--for there were two, Arnould and Simon, concerned--contains passages superior to the general run, and in others lines and even scenes of merit occur. [Sidenote: Profane Drama.] [Sidenote: Adam de la Halle.] Although the existence of the drama as an actual fact was for a long time due to the performance and popularity of the mysteries and miracles, specimens of dramatic work with purely profane subjects are to be found at a comparatively early date. Adam de la Halle, so far as our present information goes, has the credit of inventing two separate styles of such composition[126]. In _Li Jus de la Feuillie_ he has left us the earliest comedy in the vulgar tongue known; in the pastoral drama of _Robin et Marion_ the earliest specimen of comic opera. Independently of the improbability that the drama, once in full practice, should be arbitrarily confined to a single class of subject, there were many germs of dramatic composition in mediaeval literature which wanted but a little encouragement to develop themselves. The verse dialogues and _debats_, which both troubadours and trouveres had favoured, were in themselves incompletely dramatic. The _pastourelles_, an extremely favourite and fashionable class of composition, must have suggested to others besides the Hunchback of Arras the idea of dramatising them; and the early and strongly-marked partiality of the middle ages for pageants and shows of all kinds could hardly fail to induce those who planned them to intersperse dialogue.