The nobility of spirit and motive which is so distinguishing a mark of Webster’s instinctive genius or natural disposition of mind is proved by his treatment of facts placed on record by contemporary annalists in the tragic story of Vittoria Accoramboni, Duchess of Bracciano.  That story would have been suggestive, if not tempting, to any dramatic poet:  and almost any poet but Shakespeare or Webster would have been content to accept the characters and circumstances as they stood nakedly on record, and adapt them to the contemporary stage of England with such dexterity and intelligence as he might be able to command.  But, as Shakespeare took the savage legend of Hamlet, the brutal story of Othello, and raised them from the respective levels of the Heimskringla and the Newgate Calendar to the very highest “heaven of invention,” so has Webster transmuted the impressive but repulsive record of villanies and atrocities, in which he discovered the motive for a magnificent poem, into the majestic and pathetic masterpiece which is one of the most triumphant and the most memorable achievements of English poetry.  If, in his play, as in the legal or historic account of the affair, the whole family of the heroine had appeared unanimous and eager in complicity with her sins and competition for a share in the profits of her dishonor, the tragedy might still have been as effective as it is now from the theatrical or sensational point of view; it might have thrilled the reader’s nerves as keenly, have excited and stimulated his curiosity, have whetted and satiated his appetite for transient emotion, as thoroughly and triumphantly as now.  But it would have been merely a criminal melodrama, compiled by the labor and vivified by the talent of an able theatrical journeyman.  The one great follower of Shakespeare—­“haud passibus aequis” at all points; “longo sed proximus intervallo”—­has recognized, with Shakespearean accuracy and delicacy and elevation of instinct, the necessity of ennobling and transfiguring his characters if their story was to be made acceptable to the sympathies of any but an idle or an ignoble audience.  And he has done so after the very manner and in the very spirit of Shakespeare.  The noble creatures of his invention give to the story that dignity and variety of interest without which the most powerful romance or drama can be but an example of vigorous vulgarity.  The upright and high-minded mother and brother of the shameless Flamineo and the shame-stricken Vittoria refresh and purify the tragic atmosphere of the poem by the passing presence of their virtues.  The shallow and fiery nature of the fair White Devil herself is a notable example of the difference so accurately distinguished by Charlotte Bronte between an impressionable and an impressible character.  Ambition, self-interest, passion, remorse, and hardihood alternate and contend in her impetuous and wayward spirit.  The one distinct and trustworthy quality which may always be