The last of the dramatic lords of this century was that Lord Lansdowne whom Pope called "Granville the polite," and absurdly compared with Surrey, by awkwardly calling the latter the "Granville of a former age." Granville was a statesman, a Tory, a stiff-backed gentleman in a stiff-backed period, and a sufferer for his opinions. Driven into leisure, he addressed himself to literature, in connection with which he committed a crime against the majesty of Shakspeare, which was unpardonable. He reconstructed the "Merchant of Venice," called it the "Jew of Venice," and assigned Shylock to Dogget. Lord Lansdowne's "She Gallants" is a vile comedy for its "morals," but a vivacious one for its manner. Old Downes, the prompter, sneers at the offence taken at it by some ladies, who, he thinks, affected rather than possessed virtue themselves. But ladies, in 1696, _were_ offended at such outrages on decency as this play contains. They were not the first who had made similar protest. Even in this lord's tragedy of "Heroic Love," Achilles and Briseis are only a little more decent than Ravenscroft's loose rakes and facile nymphs. The only consolation one has in reading the "Jew of Venice" (produced in 1701) is, that there are some passages the marrer could not spoil. As for Shylock, Rowe expressed the opinion of the public when, in spite of the success of the comic edition of the character, he said, modestly enough, "I cannot but think the character was _tragically designed_ by the author." Dryden, Pope, and Johnson have in their turn eulogised Granville; but, as a dramatic poet, he reflects no honour either on the century in which he was born, or on that in which he died. Indeed, of the dramatist peers of the seventeenth century, there is not a play that has survived to our times. And now, coming to a dozen of baronets, knights, and honourables, let us point to two,--Sir Samuel Tuke and Sir William Killigrew, who may claim precedence for their comparative purity, if not for decided dramatic talent. To the former, an old colonel of the cavalier times, Charles II. recommended a comedy of Calderon's, which Sir Samuel produced at the Lincoln's Inn Fields theatre, in 1663, under the title of the "Adventures of Five Hours." The public generally, and Pepys especially, were unusually delighted with this well-constructed comedy. When it was played at Whitehall, Mrs. Pepys saw it from Lady Fox's "_pew_;" and, making an odd comparison, the diarist thought "Othello" a "mean thing," when weighed against the "Adventures;" but his chief praise is, that it is "without one word of ribaldry;" and Echard has added thereto his special commendation as a critic. Sir Robert Stapylton says of William Killigrew what could not be said of his brother Tom (whose plays were written before the Restoration), that in him were found-- "---- plots well laid, The language pure and ev'ry sentence weighed."