R,CHARD MONCKTON MILNES was born in the year - OUDL Home

150 Sir Arthur PineroVaudeville curtain, denouncing the "organized opposition"which had damned Jacks and Jills—though if everthere was a foredoomed play, that was it.' I rememberthe melancholy incident. That rash act of Albery's closedhis career as a writer of original plays. Thenceforward,soured and sullen, and apprehensive perhaps of theattitude of an outraged public, he felt himself driven torestrict himself to adaptations. Some of those adaptationswere excellent—improvements on the originals; buteven in his hackwork he was frequently behindhand andundependable. In happier days, half in jest, he composedan epitaph on himself, which showed that he was notblind to his shortcomings. This is it:He revelled 'neath the Moon,He slept beneath the Sun,He lived a life of going to do,And died with nothing done.Alas, poor Albcry!The name of William Gorman Wills is next on my listof notable playwrights of the 'seventies. Wills, who wasborn in Kilkenny County in 1828, studied at TrinityCollege, Dublin, and was a pupil in the art school of theRoyal Irish Academy. He painted many portraits andsubject pictures, but as an artist was a man of mediocreability. What led him to the theatre I don't know. Aplay of his called The Man o' Airlie was produced in 1866and won him some consideration, but it was not until theproduction of his Charles I that he became really prominent.This was the first of a scries of dramas whichincluded Eugene Aram, Jane Shore, Olivia—founded onThe Vicar of Wakefield—Nell Gwynne, Sedgemoor, andClaudian—all of great merit. Wills was a charming, ifnot very profound writer, but was deficient in dramaticinvention. Given a strong situation to handle, he couldtreat it with skill, but he needed guiding. He could hang