The remaining dramas within the compass of this survey may be considered in the following order: first, the older morals and moral interludes, between the years 1400 and 1520; second, various experiments of native and foreign, classical and romantic, origin which distinguish a period of transition extending approximately from 1520 to 1553; and, third, some nine or ten plays of prime importance which succeed these and unite, in one way or another, qualities of structure and aim hitherto distinctive of separate dramatic kinds. The period during which these plays, which I shall venture to call polytypic, were produced, roughly coincides with the years 1545 to 1566, and among these plays are the first English comedies really worthy of the name. We must then notice a group of rudimentary survivals, some of which, falling between 1550 and 1570, illustrate simply an artificial adaptation of the 'moral' species, while other few, appearing between 1553 and 1580, are a persistent flowering of the decadent stock, fruitless in kind but genuine in comic quality. We shall finally pass in brief review the crude romantic plays of morals or intrigue or popular tradition written between 1570 and 1590. And if it were not for lack of space, we should also glance at the satirical comedies which appeared when Shakespeare was beginning and Greene was ceasing; but, so far as possible, I must omit all subjects to which any consideration has elsewhere been accorded in this volume. A sympathetic examination of the older morals--those that were produced before 1520--will reveal, even though the period is comparatively early, a twofold character of composition. We find, on the one hand, plays interpretative of ideals of life, constructive in character, relying upon the fundamentally allegorical, and making principally for a didactic end. We find, on the other hand, plays that deal with the actual have a critical aim, reproduce appearances and manners, and tend toward the amusing and satirical.