meant[117]. But the whole question is one of such obscurity, and of so little importance from the point of view of my argument, that I shall not attempt to enter further into it. [117] Halpin, _Oberon's Vision_, Shakespeare Society, 1843. In _Endymion_ Lyly shows that his mastership of St Paul's has increased his knowledge of stage-craft. For example, while _Campaspe_ contains at least four imaginary transfers in space in the middle of a scene, _Endymion_ has only one: and it is a transfer which requires a much smaller stretch of imagination than the constant appearance of Diogenes' tub upon the stage whenever and wherever comic relief was considered necessary. There is improvement moreover in characterization. But the interesting thing about this play is Shakespeare's intimate knowledge of it, visible chiefly in the _Midsummer Night's Dream_. The well-known speech of Oberon to Puck, directing him to gather the "little western flower," is to all intents and purposes a beautiful condensation of Lyly's allegory. One would like, indeed, to think that there was something more than fancy in Mr Gollancz's suggestion that Shakespeare when a boy had seen this play of Lyly's acted at Kenilworth, where Leicester entertained Elizabeth; little William going thither with his father from the neighbouring town of Stratford. But however that may be, _Endymion_ certainly had a peculiar fascination for him; we may even detect borrowings from the underplot. Tophas' enumeration of the charms of Dipsas[118] foreshadows Thisbe's speech over the fallen Pyramus[119], while, did we not know Lyly's play to be the earlier, we might suspect the page's song near the sleeping knight to be a clumsy caricature of the graceful songs of the fairies guarding Titania's dreams. Again there are parallels in Shakespeare's earliest comedy _Love's Labour's Lost_. Sir Tophas, who is undoubtedly modelled upon Roister Doister, reappears with his page, as Armado with his attendant Moth. And I have no doubt that many other resemblances might be discovered by careful investigation. We cannot wonder that _Endymion_ attracted Shakespeare, for it is the most "romantic" of all Lyly's plays. Indistinctness of character seems to be in keeping with an allegory of moonshine; and even the mechanical action cannot spoil the poetical atmosphere which pervades the whole. Here if anywhere Lyly reached the poetical plane. He speaks of "thoughts stitched to the starres," of "time that treadeth all things down but truth," of the "ivy which, though it climb up by the elme, can never get hold of the beames of the sunne," and the play is full of many other quaint poetical conceits. [118] _Endymion_, Act III. Sc. II. ll. 30-60. [119] Cp. also Shakespeare, _Sonnet_ CXXX.