It will easily be understood that his chief model was Shakespeare. He himself did not live to see the great success of his only masterpiece; he died broken-spirited in 1830 at Kecskemét, in the thirty-eighth year of his luckless life. The first remarkable Hungarian dramatist after Katona is Edward Szigligeti (his real name was Joseph Szatmáry), 1814-1878. From an early date he was in constant contact with the theatre and with actors, and so acquired great practical knowledge of stage-lore. He had deeply studied the art of stage effect, and all his very numerous dramatic works testify to an extraordinary stage-craft. It would, however, be unfair to compare him to writers like Kotzebue in Germany, or Labiche in France. His routine, no doubt, was pre-eminent in many of his pieces; yet, beside and beyond the mere cleverness of the playwright, he had real _vis comica_ and a profound knowledge of Hungarian society. During his life-time that society was slowly but steadily emerging from the semi-civilized state of the former patriarchalism to the forms and usages of modern life. In such periods of transition there is ample material for anyone gifted with a keen sense of humour. The aping of western manners (ridiculed in “_Marna_,” 1857; “Female Rule” [“_Nőuralom_” 1862], etc.); the humour of the altered family-life (“Three Matrimonial Commands” [“_Házassági három parancs_,”] 1850; “Stephen Dalos” [_Dalos Pista_], 1855; etc.); odd remnants of the former social state, such as tramping actors, the still-life of small towns; all this Szigligeti knew how to dramatize with great effect. Like Charles Kisfaludy he drew with great felicity on the stores of drastic humour pervading a conservative society composed of many a discrepant element and moving onwards on entirely new lines of development. He tried his skilful hand at tragedies too, and “The Shadows of Light” (“_A fény árnyai_,” 1865,) and “The Pretender” (“_A trónkereső_”, 1868,) are said to be meritorious. His rare stage-craft and witty dialogue alone, however, could not have raised his name to the height on which it rests, and where in all probability it will continue to rest. Szigligeti’s name is justly famous for being the real founder of what, for lack of a better name in English, must be called the Hungarian folk-drama. In England there is no such thing, and no such word. Already in our remarks on Arany (see page 195), we essayed to show that the continental peasantry is generically different from any class of small farmers in England. That peasantry is, in reality, a world of its own. It is as much a world of its own, as is the well-known world of the “upper ten.” He who has never been in what the knowing call “_le monde_,” will easily confound the sentiments and thoughts of his own world with those of the “_monde_.” Yet the two worlds are two worlds indeed. Their whole tone and rhythm of life is different. They are written not only in different scales but also for different instruments.