Field is the author of two comedies, "A Woman is a Weathercock" and "Amends for Ladies," and he assisted Massinger in the "Fatal Dowry.

I would credit Massinger with the admirably conducted trial-scene in the fourth act; but the concluding scene of the play, where Barnavelt is led to execution, I would ascribe, without hesitation, to Fletcher.

In like manner, he excuses Massinger for the grossness of one of his plots (that of the Unnatural Combat) by saying that it was supposed to take place before the Christian era; by this shallow common-place persuading himself, or fancying he could persuade others, that the crime in question (which yet on the very face of the story is made the ground of a tragic catastrophe) was first made statutory by the Christian religion.

The language is very mild, but receives a peculiar shade of meaning when read in connexion with the following passage by Massinger from the Virgin Martyr, I. 1, 236: