In the same scene occurs an instance of a different kind of beauty, less commonly found in Dryden. The tender description given by Felicia of her attachment to her child, in infancy, is exquisitely beautiful.
The introduction of magic, and of the astral spirits, who have little to do with the catastrophe, was perhaps contrived for the sake of music and scenery. The supernatural has, however, been fashionable at all periods; and we learn, from a passage in the dedication to "Prince Arthur," that the Duchess of Monmouth, whom Dryden calls his first and best patroness, was pleased with the parts of airy and earthy spirits, and with that fairy kind of writing, which depends upon the force of imagination. It is probable, therefore, that, in a play inscribed to her husband, that style of composition was judiciously intermingled, to which our poet knew the duchess was partial. There is much fine description in the first account of the wizard; but the lyrical dialogue of the spirits is rather puerile, and is ridiculed, with great severity, in the "Rehearsal."
Mr Malone has fixed the first acting of this play to the end of 1668, or beginning of 1669. It was printed in 1670, and a revised edition came forth in 1672.
TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS PRINCE,
JAMES,
DUKE OF MONMOUTH AND BUCCLEUGH,
ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S MOST HONOURABLE PRIVY-COUNCIL;
AND KNIGHT OF THE MOST NOBLE ORDER OF THE GARTER, &c.[K]