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Or, again,
Honour's the soul which nought but guilt can wound,
Fame is the trumpet which the people sound.]
The above dates are enough to disprove the common belief that the
heroic drama, rhymed couplet and all, was imported from France.
_Albovine_, as we have seen, has every mark of the heroic drama, except
the couplet; and _Albovine_ was written seven years before the first
masterpiece of Corneille, one year before his first attempt at tragedy.
A superficial likeness to the drama of Corneille and, subsequently,
of Racine may doubtless have given wings to the popularity of the new
style both with Davenant and his admirers. But the heroic drama is,
in truth, a native growth: for good or for evil, to England alone must
be given the credit of its birth. Dryden, no doubt, more than once
claims French descent for the literary form with which his fame was
then bound up. [Footnote: He is, however, as explicit as could be
wished in tracing the descent _through_ Davenant. "For Heroick Plays
... the first light we had of them on the English theatre was from the
late Sir W.


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