Not content with making war on his own account almost, Beaumarchais also undertook the immense task of publishing a complete edition of Voltaire.  He also prepared a sequel to the ‘Barber,’ in which Figaro should be even more important, and should serve as a mouthpiece for declamatory criticism of the social order.  But his ‘Marriage of Figaro’ was so full of the revolutionary ferment that its performance was forbidden.  Following the example of Moliere under the similar interdiction of ‘Tartuffe,’ Beaumarchais was untiring in arousing interest in his unacted play, reading it himself in the houses of the great.  Finally it was authorized, and when the first performance took place at the Theatre Francais in 1784, the crush to see it was so great that three persons were stifled to death.  The new comedy was as amusing and as adroit as its predecessor, and the hits at the times were sharper and swifter and more frequent.  How demoralized society was then may be gauged by the fact that this disintegrating satire was soon acted by the amateurs of the court, a chief character being impersonated by Marie Antoinette herself.

The career of Beaumarchais reached its climax with the production of the second of the Figaro plays.  Afterward he wrote the libretto for an opera, ‘Tarare,’ produced with Salieri’s music in 1787; the year before he had married for the third time.  In a heavy play called ’The Guilty Mother,’ acted with slight success in 1790, he brought in Figaro yet once more.  During the Terror he emigrated to Holland, returning to Paris in 1796 to find his sumptuous mansion despoiled.  May 18th, 1799, he died, leaving a fortune of $200,000, besides numerous claims against the French nation and the United States.

An interesting parallel could be drawn between ‘The Rivals’ and the ‘School for Scandal’ on the one side, and on the other ’The Barber of Seville’ and ‘The Marriage of Figaro’; and there are also piquant points of likeness between Sheridan and Beaumarchais.  But Sheridan, with all his failings, was of sterner stuff than Beaumarchais.  He had a loftier political morality, and he served the State more loyally.  Yet the two comedies of Beaumarchais are like the two comedies of Sheridan in their incessant wit, in their dramaturgic effectiveness, and in the histrionic opportunities they afford.  Indeed, the French comedies have had a wider audience than the English, thanks to an Italian and a German,—­to Rossini who set ‘The Barber of Seville’ to music, and to Mozart who did a like service for ‘The Marriage of Figaro.’

[Illustration:  Signature:  Brander Matthews]

FROM ‘THE BARBER OF SEVILLE’

OUTWITTING A GUARDIAN

[Rosina’s lover, Count Almaviva, attempts to meet and converse with her by hoodwinking Dr. Bartolo, her zealous guardian.  He comes in disguise to Bartolo’s dwelling, in a room of which the scene is laid.]