But were the resources of the tragic writers as great as those of the comedians? We have seen how the first, second, and third actors were added to Greek tragedy. Is there reason to believe that the tragedians of Athens ever followed the comedians in employing a larger number? Until recently a negative reply to this has been accepted without serious question, but in 1908 Professor Rees challenged the tradition. Three years later the old view was defended by Dr. Kaffenberger. Although neither has been able fully to establish his contentions, yet the discussion has helped to clear the air, defined the issues more sharply, and really settled certain important points. For one thing, since 1844 it has generally been taken for granted that three actors were the maximum for Old Comedy as well as for tragedy. But the passages just cited from Aristophanes would seem to be decisive against this view, and all the objections to the presentation of Greek tragedy by only three actors apply with still greater force to Old Comedy. Even Dr. Kaffenberger (_op. cit._, pp. 9 f.) accepts this conclusion, and it is an invaluable result of Professor Rees’s investigations that he has banished this phase of the subject from the field of controversy. Moreover, they are both agreed[274] that a fourth actor seems sometimes to be required also for New Comedy. It must be added, however, that Dr. Graf (_op. cit._, pp. 29 ff.) dissents. But in any case the question has been restricted, so far as the fifth century is concerned, to the practice in tragedy. It can be said at once that if we are willing to grant that the Greeks made use of certain desperate expedients it is physically possible to stage all the extant tragedies with three actors. But these expedients are so offensive to modern feeling as to be tolerable only as a last resort. It will be best to begin at a point where comparative agreement is possible, viz., with Aeschylus’ earlier plays, which nearly everyone would admit were intended for two actors alone. Do they reveal any indication of this limitation?