Page:The Library, volume 5, series 3.djvu/309

 MIRACLE CYCLES. 297 metre as the rest of the cycle of which it forms an integral part, was derived either from the Brome play itself, or at least from one of a closely related type. This view has now been questioned. The most recent and much the ablest investigation of the subject that has appeared is one by an American lady, a student of Radcliffe College. 1 From this, although the exact relation of the texts is not in all details established, certain points emerge with tolerable clearness. In the first place, the Chester play cannot be derived from that of the Brome manuscript or from any version of a similar type ; in the second, the Chester is of a more primi- tive type than the Brome play ; lastly, it is not impossible that the Brome play may be derived from that of Chester, perhaps under the influence of other types, though it may equally be derived from a common original. Like a good deal else in recent criticism, this result tends to establish the fundamental unity and originality of the bulk of the Chester cycle. I will now return to the play which just now we reserved for more detailed consideration, that of the disputation of c Christ and the Doctors ' in the Temple. It is the only play .. of which we have texts derived from four different cycles, those namely of York, Wakefield, Coventry, and Chester. 2 For convenience I shall use the letters 1 See Miss C. A. Harper's article in 'Studies in English and Comparative Literature presented to Agnes Irwin,' Radcliffe College Monographs,' no. 15, 1910, p. 51. 2 By the Coventry Cycle I mean, of course, the true Coventry guild plays, not the so-called 'Ludus Coventriae.' The texts