Damon too is led back by an evil conscience, and Pilumnus likewise appears.  Claius, in his anxiety to make Amarillis reveal her assassin, betrays his own identity, to the joy of his old enemy Pilumnus.  Alexis now returns with Laurinda, and upon hearing the letter which Amarillis had written, Damon confesses his crime and declares that henceforth his love is for none but her.  His life, however, is forfeit through his having shed blood in the holy vale, and he is led off in company with Claius to die at the altar of Ceres.  In the fifth act we find all prepared for the double sacrifice, when Amyntas enters, and bidding Pilumnus stay his hand, claims to expound the oracle.  Claius’ blood, he argues, has been already shed in Amarillis, and has quenched the fire of Damon’s love for Laurinda, rekindling it again to Amarillis’ self.  Moreover, had not the oracle warned them that the recognized guardians of wisdom would fail to interpret truly, and that such a scorned wit as that of the ‘mad Amyntas’ would discover the meaning?  Furthermore, he argues that since Amarillis was the victim the goddess aimed at, her blood might without sin be shed even in the holy vale, while Damon is of the priestly stock to which that office justly pertained.  Thus Claius and Damon are alike spoken free, and Sicily is relieved of the goddess’ curse.  While the general rejoicing is at its height, Urania is brought in to take her vestal vows at the altar.  In spite of her lover’s remonstrance she kneels before the shrine and addresses her prayer to the goddess.  At length the appeased deity deigns to answer, and in a gracious echo reveals the solution of the enigma of the dowry—­a husband.

This plot is a mingling of comedy in the scenes of Laurinda’s ’wavering’[277] and the ‘humours’ of Amyntas’ madness, and of tragi-comedy in the catastrophe.  But besides this there is what may best be described as an antiplot of pure farce, in which the main character is the roguish page Dorylas, who in the guise of Oberon robs Jocastus’ orchard, tricks Thestylis into marrying the foolish augur, and gulls everybody all round.  The humour of this portion of the piece may be occasionally a trifle broad and at the same time childish, but there is nevertheless no denying the genuineness of the quality, while the verse is as a rule sparkling, and the dialogue both racy and pointed, occasionally displaying qualities hardly to be described as other than brilliant.

This comic subplot obviously owes nothing to Guarini, but is introduced in accordance with the usage of the English popular drama, and is grafted somewhat boldly on to the conventional stock.  Dorylas is one of the most inimitable and successful of the descendants of Lyly’s pages; while the characters of Mopsus and Jocastus, although the former no doubt owes his conception to a hint in the Aminta, belong essentially to the English romantic farce.  The scenes in which the page appears as Oberon surrounded by his