"Our unpolished English stage (as he assumes the liberty of calling it) has entertained a nobler taste of dignify'd simplicity, than to deprive dramatic poetry of all that animates its passions; in pursuit of a _cold, starv'd, tame abstinence_, which, from an affectation to shun _figure_, sinks to _flatness_: an _elaborate escape_ from _energy_ into a groveling, wearisome, bald, barren, unalarming _chilness_ of expression, that _emasculates_ the mind, instead of _moving it_." "Athelwold" (1731), a revision of his early "Elfrid," is colorlessly conventional; "The Roman Revenge" (1753) is an alteration of "Julius Cæsar"; "The Insolvent" (1758) is a rewriting of "The Fatal Dowry," making the heroine an innocent object of jealousy. Most Aaronic of all is "Henry V" (1723). Here he gives up French unities and technic, and introduces many characters, shifting scenes, a bit of comedy, and the "genius of England," who sings a song. His greatest addition to Shakespeare is his Harriet, who starts out like one of the evil queens in the heroic tragedies. When abandoned by Henry, she is still jealous and revengeful; next she appears disguised as a page in the French camp, and, Viola-like, relates a story of a love-lorn sister; then recaptured by Henry, she storms and melts; but the Jane Shore mood is transient, and, like a tragedy queen again, she stabs herself. A man who could write a comic duet for Voltaire's "Zaïre" and could supply Prince Hal with a paramour whose grandmothers were Viola and the Indian Queen, ought not to be wholly forgotten.