We saw that the earliest religious drama known to have been performed in this country was one on St. Catherine. William Fitzstephen, in his "Life of St. Thomas a Becket," written in 1182, brings into contrast with the pagan shows of old Rome the "holier plays" of London, which he terms "representations of the miracles wrought by the holy confessors or of the sufferings whereby the constancy of the martyrs became gloriously manifest." Thus we perceive how the term "miracle" attached itself to this species of theatrical exhibitions. Probably, towards the commencement of the twelfth century, French playwrights fastened on the miracles of the saints as their special themes, and, by force of habit, the English public in ensuing generations retained the description, though subjects had come to be chosen other than the marvels of the martyrology. Dr. Ward would limit the term "miracle play" to those dramas based on the legends of the saints, and would describe those drawn from the Old and New Testaments as "mysteries" in conformity with Continental usage. The distinction is logical, but its acceptance would practically involve the sacrifice of the former term, since the Dunstable play of St. Catherine, the plays founded on the lives of St. Fabyan, St. Sebastian, and St. Botolph, which were performed in London, and those on St. George, acted at Windsor and Bassingbourn--no others are recorded--have all perished. According to the "Banes," or Proclamation, of the Chester Plays, at the end of the sixteenth century, the cycle of plays acted in that city dates from the mayoralty of John Arneway (1268-76), and the author was Randall Higgenet, a monk of Chester Abbey. These statements are, for various reasons, open to impeachment. For one thing, Arneway's term is incorrectly assigned to the years 1327-8--a far more probable date for the plays, though there is no sort of certainty on the subject, and, in the nature of things, a cycle of plays is more likely to have grown up than to have been the work of a single hand. The later date is more probable, because the re-institution of the Corpus Christi festival by the Council of Vienne in 1311 has an important bearing on the annexation of the miracle play by the trade-gilds, and it was only on their assumption of responsibility that performances on the scale of a cycle of plays could have been contemplated, or possible.