The modern tendency in the matter seems to be to choose the reprehensible--such, for instance, as Mlle. Mars, Madame de Pompadour, Madame du Barri, and La Montansier, women in the career of whom no doubt there were many dramas, similar, however, to the dramas in the lives of other women of their class less famous and infamous. When, however, they are put upon the stage they cease to be remarkable, and the characters introduced to support them have the same fate; for instance, the Louis XV. at the Savoy does not give the faintest idea of the ineffably vile monarch, whilst no glimpse is shown of the quality which enabled a Du Barri to obtain her tremendous power. It is always a case of mountain and mouse in these plays; take as an example the Sardou _Dante_ play produced with prodigious drum-beating a while ago at Drury Lane. Who, if names had been altered, would have guessed that the hero of the piece was the author of the immortal poems? There has been hardly a historical play in modern times in which the identity of the famous personages could be guessed except from the names, the make-up, the costumes, and the specific facts; at the best the pieces are _tableaux vivants_. Perhaps there is nothing illegitimate in the ambition of the player to pose as one of the mighty dead, and it is rather humility in the author which urges him to seek adventitious interest than vanity that causes him to believe himself really able to give a true idea of a Napoleon. Into such delicate questions it is needless to inquire. The point is that the lives of the great are not more dramatic than the lives of the small. Napoleon at St Helena was not more unhappy than were millions of people of his day. There is a drama as poignant in the history of César Birotteau as in that of Marie Antoinette, as big a tragedy in the career of Whitaker Wright as in that of Napoleon III. There was a reason, which exists no longer, why the authors of the Middle Ages chose characters of great social status for their principal parts, and even this reason was not altogether well founded. It would be wrong to assert that historical plays ought not to be written, for, whilst not recommending the use of the stage instead of history classes, one can see that a historical play may illustrate ideas that could hardly be presented otherwise.