From all this it is a simple deduction that where legend (historic or otherwise) associates a particular character with a particular scene that is by any means presentable on the stage, that scene becomes obligatory in a drama of which he is the leading figure.  The fact that Shakespeare could write a play about King John, and say nothing about Runnymede and Magna Charta, shows that that incident in constitutional history had not yet passed into popular legend.  When Sir Herbert Tree revived the play, he repaired the poet’s omission by means of an inserted tableau.  Even Shakespeare had not the hardihood to let Caesar fall without saying, “The Ides of March are come” and “Et tu, Brute!” Nero is bound to fiddle while Rome burns, or the audience will know the reason why.[4] Historic criticism will not hear of the “Thou hast conquered, Galilean!” which legend attributes to Julian the Apostate; yet Ibsen not only makes him say it, but may almost be said to find in the phrase the keynote of his world-historic drama.  Tristram and Iseult must drink a love-philtre or they are not Tristram and Iseult.  It would be the extreme of paradox to write a Paolo-and-Francesca play and omit the scene of “Quel giorno piu non vi leggemmo avante.”

The cases are not very frequent, however, in which an individual incident is thus imposed by history or legend.  The practical point to be noted is rather that, when an author introduces a strongly-marked historical character, he must be prepared to give him at least one good opportunity of acting up to the character which legend—­the best of evidence in the theatre—­assigns to him.  When such a personage is presented to us, it ought to be at his highest potency.  We do not want to see—­

  “From Marlborough’s eyes the tears of dotage flow,
  And Swift expire, a driveller and a show.”

If you deal with Napoleon, for instance, it is perfectly clear that he must dominate the stage.  As soon as you bring in the name, the idea, of Napoleon Bonaparte, men have eyes and ears for nothing else; and they demand to see him, in a general way, acting up to their general conception of him.  That was what Messrs. Lloyd Osbourne and Austin Strong forgot in their otherwise clever play, The Exile.  It is useless to prove, historically, that at a given moment he was passive, supine, unconscious, while people around him were eagerly plotting his escape and restoration.  That may have been so; but it is not what an audience wants to see.  It wants to see Napoleon Napoleonizing.  For anomalies and uncharacteristic episodes in Napoleon’s career we must go to books; the playhouse is not the place for them.  It is true that a dramatist like Mr. Bernard Shaw may, at his own risk and peril, set forth to give us a new reading of Caesar or of Napoleon, which may or may not be dramatically acceptable.[5] But this is not what Messrs. Osbourne and Strong tried to do.  Their Napoleon was the Napoleon of tradition—­only he failed to act “in a concatenation according.”