With its love of the false heroic, of rhetorical bombast, of sumptuous dress, magnificent scenes, and gorgeous accessories in the way of “supers” and processions, the Roman tragic drama of this period must have borne a striking resemblance to the corresponding English pieces of the Restoration or age of Dryden.  Perhaps the most popular part of the performance was the music and dancing, whether by individual actors or as ballets, accompanied by the flageolet, the lyre, or the cymbals.

In comedy there was apparently no originality.  As in the oldest days of their drama the Romans had copied the Greeks, so they copied them still.  We may believe that the acting was often excellent; especially in respect of intonation and gesture, but little can be said for the play, whether from the point of view of literature or of morals.  Since verbal description must necessarily be of little force, it will serve better to present here a few specimens of comic masks and a scene from comedy: 

[Illustration:  FIG. 82.—­COMIC MASKS.]

[Illustration:  FIG. 83.—­SCENE FROM COMEDY.]

Much more in demand were theatrical performances of a lower kind.  These were farces, interludes, character-pieces, and dumb-shows known as “pantomimes.”  The farce was a loosely constructed form of fooling comedy, containing much of the ready Italian improvisation or “gag,” and regularly introducing the four stock characters which have lasted with little disguise for so many centuries There was an old “grandfather,” the forerunner of the modern pantaloon; a cunning sharper; a garrulous glutton with a fat face (known as “Chops"); and an amorous Simple Simon.  Sometimes types of foreigners or provincials were introduced, with caricatures of their dress and language, after the manner, and probably with the veracity, of the stage Scotchman, Irishman, or Frenchman.  All these parts were played in masks.

The interlude again was a slight piece with very little plot, and composed in a large measure of buffoonery, practical jokes, hitting and slapping, and dancing.  Topical allusions and contemporary caricatures were freely introduced, and the whole performance, however coarsely amusing, was both vulgar and indecent.  In these pieces no masks were worn and also no shoes, and the women’s parts—­taken in the other instances by men and boys—­were actually played by females, whose posture-dances were no credit to their sex.

The dumb-shows or “pantomimes” were performances in which expressive and elaborate gestures and movements were left to tell the whole tale.  For this kind of piece the actors naturally required not only uncommon cleverness but also great suppleness of body.  As usual, these qualities, together with the qualities of voice, the magnificent dress, and the carefully cultivated long hair, won for the actor demoralising influence over too large a number of the more impressionable and untrammelled Roman dames.