



Produced by Charlene Taylor and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net






THE HUBBLE-SHUE.


BY

MISS CARSTAIRS.


    Harry, harry, hobillischowe!
    Se quha is cummyn nowe.

    THE CRYING OF ANE PLAYE.


[THIRTY COPIES PRINTED.]

EDINBURGH:
Printed by ANDREW SHORTREDE, Thistle Lane.




INTRODUCTORY NOTICE.


If originality be a test of genius, the authoress of the _Hubble-Shue_
bids fair to rank highest amongst the dramatic writers of the last
century. This rare merit even the most fastidious critic must allow:
but her histrionic essay is, in another respect, equally remarkable. We
are told that obscurity is one of the sources of the sublime; and who
will presume to deny that this drama is not sufficiently obscure?
Perhaps the most remarkable feature in it is that singular, partially
intelligible mystification, which we in vain look for in other writers:
thus, when Gustard enters with his sword drawn, is it possible to
figure any thing more intelligible and natural than that the cat should
run in beneath the bed? But, on the other hand, who was Gustard?--why
was his sword drawn?--what did he want?--how came the cat there? are
questions, the solution of which is not easy. Then we have the
interesting Lady Gundie, who flits across the stage without saying a
word, like one of the phantom kings in Macbeth, leaving the beholder in
a state of the most feverish excitement. In short, so much is left to
the imagination, that the mind gets quite bewildered, and we regard
with most profound veneration a drama capable of producing such
