however, for the space of six years--years that were the weariest and saddest in Lessing's life, and mark the only time when his healthful optimism, his sanguine cheerfulness broke into complaint and yielded to depression of mind. Physical causes were at work as well as mental. Wolfenbüttel was an old deserted capital, devoid of society, and Lessing, who loved to mingle with his fellow-creatures, saw himself banished from any intelligent human intercourse, unless he undertook the somewhat expensive journey to Brunswick. At Hamburg he had lived in an active and intellectual circle; here he found himself thrown back upon himself and books. His heart and thoughts were with Madame Koenig, her business affairs went badly; their rare meetings only further strengthened his desire to claim as his own this the only woman who understood him and felt with him. The promised leave of absence, too, for Italy, was constantly deferred under futile pretexts, and thus depressed, dispirited, Lessing could not feel within himself the capability of original production. At the same time he did not feel it right or wise to neglect the resources placed within his reach by the excellent library of which he was custodian; he ransacked its manuscript treasures, and published some of them. He also in a brief period of renewed happiness and mental vigour, that followed a visit to Hamburg and a meeting with Madame Koenig, wrote his famous tragedy 'Emilia Galotti.' This drama is an illustration of the principles enunciated by Lessing in his 'Dramaturgy;' its condensation is a protest against the verbosity of the French, its form an approach to Shakespeare; while its tendency is a stricture on the abuses practised at petty Courts. The latter was a bold innovation, considering that at the time Lessing wrote and produced this play he was himself the servant of a Court, enlightened and liberal it is true, but libertine and despotic; and that parallels could not fail to be drawn by the malevolent between Brunswick and Guastalla. The story is a modernised version of that of Virginia, but the catastrophe is not equally harmonious, because not so absolutely necessitated by the conditions of modern society as by those of the ancient world. Still the play is in many respects inimitable; the manner in which the story is developed and unravelled renders it a model to young dramatists; nothing superfluous, nothing obscure, no needless retrogressions, no violent transitions. Lessing's contemporaries were not slow to recognise that he had presented them with a master-piece. He himself after its completion had sunk back into his former mood of irritated depression, and he would not even be present at the first representation. This mood was in great part physical, but was also the result of circumstances. He was anxious and uneasy. The hereditary prince had held out hopes to him, but their fulfilment was too long deferred; Madame Koenig's affairs grew more and