It was at this time that the regular drama was first introduced into Europe. "Calandra," the earliest modern comedy, was presented at Venice in 1508, and about the same time the Spanish tragi-comedy of "Calisto and Melibœa" was printed. The pastoral romance, also, made its appearance in Portugal; and the "Arcadia," 1502, by the Italian Sannazaro, a work of this class, did much to restore the correctness and elegance of Italian prose. Peter Bembo's "Asolani," 1505, a dialogue on love, has also been thought to mark an epoch in Italian literature. At the same time, William Dunbar, with his "Thistle and Rose," 1503, and his allegorical "Golden Targe," was leading the van of British poetry. The records of voyages of discovery begin to take a prominent place. The old travels of Marco Polo, as well as those of Sir John Mandeville, and the "Cosmography" of Ptolemy, had been printed in the previous century; but the stupendous discoveries of the close of that age now fell to be told. The voyages of Cadamosto, a Venetian, in Western Africa, appeared in 1507; and those of Amerigo Vespucci, entitled "Mondo Nuovo," in the same year. An epistle of Columbus himself had been printed in Germany about 1493. Leo X., who became pope in 1513, placed men of letters in the most honourable stations of his court, and was the munificent patron of poets, scholars, and printers. Rucellai's "Rosmunda," a tragedy played before Leo in 1515, was the earliest known trial of blank verse. The "Sophonisba" of Trissino, published in 1524, a play written strictly on the Greek model, had been acted some years before. Two comedies by Ariosto were presented about 1512. Meanwhile, the printing press became very active in Paris, Basle, and Germany, chiefly in preparing works for the use of students in universities. But in respect of learning, we have the testimony of Erasmus that neither France, nor Germany, stood so high as England. In Scotland, boys were being taught Latin in school; and the translation of the Æneid by Gawin Douglas, completed about 1513, shows, by its spirit and fidelity, the degree of scholarship in the north. The only work of real genius which England can claim in this age is the "Utopia" of Sir Thomas More, first printed in 1516. Erasmus diffuses a lustre over his age, which no other name among the learned supplies. About 1517, he published an enlarged edition of his "Adages," which displays a surprising intimacy with Greek and Roman literature. The most remarkable of them, in every sense, are those which reflect with excessive bitterness on kings and priests. Erasmus knew that the regular clergy were not to be conciliated, and resolved to throw away the scabbard; and his invectives against kings proceeded from a just sense of the oppression of Europe in that age by ambitious and selfish rulers.