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„May I be as a Slave, depos’'d and serve, On else forlorn in some wild Desart starve Till Pm as wretched as my IIIs deserve.“

Berenice has no confidence in his words, blames him for his hard-heartedness and cruelty and promises to take revenge on him. She then parts. Afflicted at so implacable a resentment and led astray by the excess of sorrows, Titus forgets his resolution and is going to beg her pardon; at the suggestion, however, given by Paulinus, that the tribunes and the senate im- patiently wait for him, he sends her a letter of farewell. Soon after, Berenice comes and asks Antiochus to forgive her. So he does with all his heart, expecting that, after her breach with Titus, he would at least have a share in her love. But it is impossible, as she says. Titus then re-enters and hearing that Berenice is resolved to part this very day, he exclaims:

„No Journey must you take. Would you poor Titus in his Griefs forsake? No! Stay!“ But such is her exasperation, that she accuses him to be a„false Man“,„ingrateful“,„perjur'd“, since, a little while before, he had pledged his word and now had ordered her to be banished, as the tablet shows which he has sent. She will, by no means, trust his love and fancies to be scorned, till he offers to stab himself for her sake. But now Berenice is convinced of his faithful love, and, confessing to have been wrong, she resolves for ever to quit love and „with one funeral Act crown all the rest“: „Far from your Sight and Rome for ever go.“ When Titus then tries to persuade her to remain, she answers: „I have resolv'd on't, and it shall be so.“ She encourages Antiochus who wishes to die, and, saying the last adieu, she exclaims: „Let us all three a rare Example prove, Of a most tender tho' unhappy Love.“

This short analysis of the play of Otway may suffice for a comparison between this play and the source from which it is taken. Before entering into the comparison, a few remarks about the French original may be permitted here. Bérénice is dated from the year 1670, and the com- posing of it was, as it were, caused by a literary duel between Racine and Corneille, in which the former gained the victory. All his plays, by the unanimous voices of the centuries, have been acknowledged to be the best and most sublime of what has been produced in the French classical period, so that even Voltaire, being asked to write a commentary to them, answered:„II est tout fait; il n'y a qu'à écrire en bas de chaque page: Beau, Pathetique, Harmonieux, Sublime.“ The play is the dramatic picture of tender and deep love, but yielding voluntarily to duty, perhaps not without an allusion to the separation of Lewis XIV. from lady de la Vallière, his first mistress, or, as others say, to the hopeless love which Henriette d'Orleans, who is said to have ordered the play to be written, felt for Lewis XIV.

The principle character in the tragedy of Racine is the character of Berenice. She is the queen of Palestine, and has become acquainted and fallen in love with PDitus, who intends soon to make her his wife. She loves him with all the burning passion of a woman's heart, without regard to his dignity