This strange and powerful conception is worked out in a manner as strong as it is subtle; and, indeed, almost every character in the play seems to suggest some new psychological problem.  The mere handling of the verse is essentially characteristic of our modern introspective method, as it presents to us, not thought in its perfected form, but the involutions of thought seeking for expression.  We seem to witness the very workings of the mind, and to watch the passion struggling for utterance.  In plays of this kind (plays that are meant to be read, not to be acted) it must be admitted that we often miss that narrative and descriptive element which in the epic is so great a charm, and, indeed, may be said to be almost essential to the perfect literary presentation of any story.  This element the Greek managed to retain by the introduction of chorus and messenger; but we seem to have been unable to invent any substitute for it.  That there is here a distinct loss cannot, I think, be denied.  There is something harsh, abrupt, and inartistic in such a stage-direction as ‘Canute strangles Edric, flings his body into the stream, and gazes out.’  It strikes no dramatic note, it conveys no picture, it is meagre and inadequate.  If acted it might be fine; but as read, it is unimpressive.  However, there is no form of art that has not got its limitations, and though it is sad to see the action of a play relegated to a formal footnote, still there is undoubtedly a certain gain in psychological analysis and psychological concentration.

It is a far cry from the Knutlinga Saga to Rossetti’s note-book, but Michael Field passes from one to the other without any loss of power.  Indeed, most readers will probably prefer The Cup of Water, which is the second play in this volume, to the earlier historical drama.  It is more purely poetical; and if it has less power, it has certainly more beauty.  Rossetti conceived the idea of a story in which a young king falls passionately in love with a little peasant girl who gives him a cup of water, and is by her beloved in turn, but being betrothed to a noble lady, he yields her in marriage to his friend, on condition that once a year—­on the anniversary of their meeting—­she brings him a cup of water.  The girl dies in childbirth, leaving a daughter who grows into her mother’s perfect likeness, and comes to meet the king when he is hunting.  Just, however, as he is about to take the cup from her hand, a second figure, in her exact likeness, but dressed in peasant’s clothes, steps to her side, looks in the king’s face, and kisses him on the mouth.  He falls forward on his horse’s neck, and is lifted up dead.  Michael Field has struck out the supernatural element so characteristic of Rossetti’s genius, and in some other respects modified for dramatic purposes material Rossetti left unused.  The result is a poem of exquisite and pathetic grace.  Cara, the peasant girl, is a creation as delicate as it is delightful, and it deserves to rank beside the Faun of Callirhoe.  As for the young king who loses all the happiness of his life through one noble moment of unselfishness, and who recognised as he stands over Cara’s dead body that