Through the door The King has hurled the dagger, holds His son against his breast, and pain Contorts him, like a smitten oak; Then sets the child upon the floor, And rises, and undoes the clasp Of his great mantle (like a stain Of blood it lies about his feet). Next from his head he takes the crown, Holds it arm's-length, and drops it down Suddenly, from his loosened grasp, And for the third time goes he forth, Bare-footed as a penitent, Humble, and excommunicate, To stand all day in falling snow Outside Canossa's guarded gate, Till Hildebrand shall mercy show. The dramatic sense is clearly operative there. Here is an instinct which perceives the kinetic values of things; which seizes unerringly upon the stuff of drama, and, contemplating a character, an event or a situation, feels it start into life under the touch and sees it move forward and rush to a crisis before the eyes. In the lyrics this quality is often merely latent; but in the plays it has come to full power and has found expression through its own proper medium. It is, of course, the originating impulse of drama as well as the force that shapes it; and if we would take some measure of this creative energy in our poet, we have only to observe that all of his five plays were published in five years, one play to each year. The first, _Joan of Arc_, appeared in 1909; the last, _Belisarius_, came out in 1913; the other three, _Mary Queen of Scots_, _Manin_, and _Marcus Aurelius_, belong respectively to the three intervening years. And there is another ready, representing 1914! Moreover, they are all fully developed and of rather elaborate structure. Being poetic and historical drama, perhaps it is natural that they should follow the Shakespearean model, though their dependence on tradition is a curious fact at this time of day. _Joan of Arc_ and _Mary Queen of Scots_ are both of five-act length, and the rest are of four acts. Numerous characters are introduced and a great deal of material is handled: incident is plentiful, situations vary and scenes change with some frequency; while underplot and crossaction bring in interests which are additional to, though subserving, the main theme.