Is it fanciful to say that if he had lived in the eighteenth century, if he had had before his eyes the work of Fielding, Richardson, and Smollett, he would have been a good novelist, less cynical than Fielding, more concise than Richardson, more ideal than Smollett? There are authors like Euripides and Virgil whose very failures by a strange paradox seem part of their greatness; and we may perhaps say that Massinger, by pointing the way somewhat tentatively and blindly to subtle psychological studies, has helped to build up the noble fabric of the English novel. Let us now turn to some miscellaneous points of interest in Massinger; and first, let us note his imitation of Shakspere. It is tempting to suppose that as he was at one time a dependent of a family which was intimate with Shakspere he may have come across the man himself;(226) it is, at any rate, simpler to remember that as he was thirty-two years of age when Shakspere died, he can hardly have failed to meet him in his professional relations. But we have no evidence of the fact. All we can say is that his plays, like those of Fletcher, Webster, Tourneur, and others,(227) show a constant study of Shakspere.(228) First let me give a few examples of the imitation of incidents. In _The Roman Actor_,(229) Paris refers to a tragedy “in which a murder was acted to the life,” which forced a guilty hearer to make discovery of his secret; this recalls the play scene in Hamlet.(230) In _A Very Woman_(231) Almira makes Antonio tell her his history. The hint of this is taken from _Othello_.(232) In _The Fatal Dowry_(233) Beaumelle and her maid arrange to be overheard, like Hero and Ursula in _Much Ado about Nothing_.(234) The device by which Beaupré recovers her husband in _The Parliament of Love_ is imitated from _All’s Well that Ends Well_ and _Measure for Measure_. The banditti in _The Guardian_(235) respect the poor like the outlaws in _The Two Gentlemen of Verona_.(236) The forest scenes in the same play recall _As You Like It_ and _Midsummer-Night’s Dream_.(237) In _The Bashful Lover_(238) the pretty tale of a sister which Ascanio tells is a reminiscence of _Twelfth Night_.(239) The incident in the same play of Hortensio with Ascanio in his arms(240) is modelled on _As You Like It_.(241) Malefort’s behaviour to the tailor(242) is imitated from Petruchio’s in _The Taming of the Shrew_.(243) The gibberish of the pretended Indians in _The City Madam_(244) reminds us of Parolles’ adventure in _All’s Well_.(245) The scene in _The Emperor of the East_(246) where Eudocia professes to have eaten the apple is modelled on _Othello_(247), where Desdemona asserts that the handkerchief is not lost. In _The Bondman_(248) Zanthia overhears Corisca’s confession of love in her sleep, as Iago does Cassio’s.(249) In _A New Way to pay Old Debts_(250) Sir Giles Overreach, is carried off for treatment to a dark room like Malvolio in _Twelfth Night_.(251) Almira in _A Very Woman_(252)