As to the general character of the plays, this will best appear by brief analyses of some of them.  The Towneley set being the most ancient, my first specimens will be from that.

The first play of the series includes the creation, the revolt of Lucifer and his adherents, and their expulsion from Heaven.  It opens with a short address from the Deity, who then begins the creation, and, after a song by the cherubim, descends from the throne, and retires; Lucifer usurps it, and asks his fellows how he appears.  The good and bad angels have different opinions about that; but the Deity soon returns, and ends the dispute by casting the rebels with their leader out of Heaven.  Adam and Eve are then created, and Satan winds up the piece with a speech venting his envy of their happiness in Eden.

The second play relates to the killing of Abel, and is opened by Cain’s ploughboy with a sort of prologue in which he warns the spectators to be silent.  Cain then enters with a plough and team, and quarrels with the boy for refusing to drive the team.  Presently Abel comes in, and wishes Cain good-speed, who meets his kind word with an unmentionable request.  The murder then proceeds, and is followed by the cursing of Cain; after which he calls the boy, and gives him a beating.  Cain owns the murder, and the boy counsels flight, lest the bailiffs catch him.  Next we have a course of buffoonery:  Cain makes a mock proclamation in the King’s name, the boy repeats it blunderingly after him, and is then sent off with the team; and the piece closes with a speech by Cain to the spectators, bidding them farewell.

The third of the series is occupied with the Deluge.  After a lamentation by Noah on the sinfulness of the world, God is introduced repenting that he made man, telling Noah how to build the Ark, and blessing him and his.  Noah’s wife is an arrant shrew, and they fall at odds in the outset, both of them swearing by the Virgin Mary.  Noah begins and finishes the Ark on the spot; then tells his spouse what is coming, and invites her on board:  she stoutly refuses to embark, which brings on another flare-up; he persuades her with a whip; she wishes herself a widow, and the same to all the wives in the audience; he exhorts all the husbands to break in their wives betimes:  at length harmony is restored by the intervention of the sons; all go aboard, and pass three hundred and fifty days talking about the weather; a raven is sent out, then a dove, and they debark.

Two plays of the set are taken up with the adoration of the shepherds; and the twelfth is worthy of special notice as being a piece of broad comedy approaching to downright farce, with dashes of rude wit and humour.  The three shepherds, after talking awhile about their shrewish wives, are on the point of striking up a song, when an old acquaintance of theirs named Mak, whose character is none of the best, comes among them.  They suspect him of meditating some sly trick; so,