Last week Mr. John Masefield's Pompey the Great was revived
by Sir Frank Benson at the St. Martin's Theatre. The play ir an attempt to illustrate an historical character with as much realism as may be, and to reconstruct the events for which be is remembered. The play is in the nature of an, may, for if it i/ to interest at all it must do so by making the audience feel the terrible importance to the world of Pompey's decisions and the fate-ridden tragedy of his trivial overthrow. In this main object the play succeeds. It may lack the.gracea which should belong to a poet's play ; it may be. melodramatic; but we feel the stir of great events. We appreciate Pompey's genius at Dyrrachium, his unwilling folly at Phaxsalia, and the for- tuitousness of his end at Pelusium. We are always concerned for the event, and have the sense of witnessing a contention for mighty issues.
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