quality of woman. She stands as far apart from and above the other characters in the play as Una does in the first book of the 'Faery Queen.' For the Greek stage she is what Portia and Cordelia are for the English. If less heroic than Antigone or Electra, she is more human; the strength which opposition to harsh laws or thirst for "great revenge" lent to them, to her is supplied by the might of wifely love. Possibly it was this sublime tenderness that kept the memory of Alcestis green through ages in which the manuscripts of Euripidean dramas were lying among the rolls of Byzantine libraries, or the dust and worms of the monasteries of the West. Chaucer, in his 'Court of Love,' calls her the "Quenè's floure;" and in his 'Legende of Good Women' she is "under Venus lady and quene:"—
"And from afer came walking in the Mede
The God of Love, and in his hand a quene,
And she was clad in real[1] habit grene:
A fret of golde she haddè next her heer,
And upon that a white corowne she here
With flourès smale.'
With equally happy art—indeed, after Shakespeare's manner with his female personages—we are not formally told of her goodness; but we know from those around her that the loving wife is also a loving mother, a kind and liberal mistress. Even the sorrow of the Chorus is significant: it is composed not of susceptible women, but of ancient men—past the age in which the affections are active, and when the lengthen-
- ↑ Royal.
