TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
The oe ligature has been replaced by 'oe' or 'OE'.
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within
the text and consultation of external sources.
More detail can be found at the end of the book.
NOTE.--_Three Hundred copies of this Edition printed on fine
deckle-edge Royal 8vo paper. The fifty Portraits are given in
duplicate, one on Japanese and the other on plate paper, as India
proofs._
_Each of these copies is numbered._
_No._ ..........
"Their Majesties' Servants"
DR. DORAN, F.S.A.
VOLUME THE FIRST
Ballantyne Press
BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO.
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
[Illustration: (Frontispiece, Dr. Doran)]
"_THEIR MAJESTIES' SERVANTS_"
ANNALS
OF
THE ENGLISH STAGE
FROM
THOMAS BETTERTON TO EDMUND KEAN
BY
DR. DORAN, F.S.A.
_EDITED AND REVISED BY ROBERT W. LOWE_
With Fifty Copperplate Portraits and Eighty Wood Engravings
_IN THREE VOLUMES_
VOLUME THE FIRST
LONDON
JOHN C. NIMMO
14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND
MDCCCLXXXVIII
PREFACE.
It is unnecessary to apologise for a new edition of Dr. Doran's
_Annals of the Stage_. The two editions already published have been
for many years out of print, and the first is so rare that copies of
it bring a high price whenever they occur for sale. And this demand
is not a mere bibliographical accident, for the book has held for
many years a recognised position as the standard popular history of
the English stage. The admirable work of Genest, indispensable as
it is to every writer on theatrical history, and to every serious
student of the stage, is in no sense a popular work, and is, indeed,
rather a collection of facts towards a history than a history itself.
In preparing this new edition every effort has been made to
add to its interest by the introduction of portraits and other
illustrations, and to its authority as a book of reference, by
correcting those errors which are scarcely to be avoided by a writer
working among the confused, inaccurate, and contradictory documents
of theatrical history. No one who has not ventured into this maze can
conceive the difficulty of keeping the true path, and I can imagine
nothing better calculated to sap one's self-confidence than the task
of noting the false turnings made by such a writer as Dr. Doran. I
can hardly hope that my own work, light as it is in comparison with
his, will be found free from sins of omission, and even of commission.
My principle has been to pass no error, however trifling; but, at
the same time, I have not thought myself entitled to discuss matters
of opinion, or to criticise, either directly or indirectly, Dr.
Doran's treatment of his subject. Thus it would be easy to supplement
the information regarding the ancient theatres and the theatre of
Shakspeare's time contained in the first and second chapters; but,
as Dr. Doran obviously intended that his real work should begin with
the Restoration Theatres, I have not interfered with his scheme. I
trust that, in this, as in other respects, my work has been done in a
spirit free from captiousness.
The illustrations to this edition have been chosen, not from the book
"illustrator's" point of view, but with a serious desire to increase
its value as a history. In the case of the portraits, those which
Dr. Doran specially mentions, have, wherever it was possible, been
selected, and in every instance I believe the portrait given is an
accurate and trustworthy likeness. The headpieces, intended to form
a supplement to the full-page illustrations, include portraits of
persons whose importance scarcely justified their place among the
larger pictures, drawings of theatres, and of actors in character.
The tailpieces are reproductions of Sayer's beautiful little drawings
of Garrick and his contemporaries in their best characters; and in
their case no chronological arrangement is possible.
For many valuable notes I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. Alban
Doran, who intrusted to me his father's annotated copy of this work.
These notes have in every case been acknowledged and marked "_Doran
MS._"
ROBERT W. LOWE.
LONDON, _September 1887_.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. PAGE
PROLOGUE 1
CHAPTER II.
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE PLAYERS 37
CHAPTER III.
THE "BOY ACTRESSES," AND THE "YOUNG LADIES" 60
CHAPTER IV.
THE GENTLEMEN OF THE KING'S COMPANY 96
CHAPTER V.
THOMAS BETTERTON 109
CHAPTER VI.
"EXEUNT" AND "ENTER" 136
CHAPTER VII.
ELIZABETH BARRY 149
CHAPTER VIII.
"THEIR FIRST APPEARANCE ON THE STAGE" 162
CHAPTER IX.
THE DRAMATIC POETS 183
CHAPTER X.
PROFESSIONAL AUTHORS 213
CHAPTER XI.
THE DRAMATIC AUTHORESSES 237
CHAPTER XII.
THE AUDIENCES OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 246
CHAPTER XIII.
A SEVEN YEARS' RIVALRY 274
CHAPTER XIV.
THE UNITED AND THE DISUNITED COMPANIES 310
CHAPTER XV.
UNION, STRENGTH, PROSPERITY 317
CHAPTER XVI.
COMPETITION, AND WHAT CAME OF IT 337
CHAPTER XVII.
THE PROGRESS OF JAMES QUIN, AND DECLINE OF BARTON BOOTH 356
CHAPTER XVIII.
BARTON BOOTH 391
LIST OF COPPERPLATE PORTRAITS.
VOLUME I.
ENGRAVED BY MESSRS. ANNAN & SWAN, LONDON.
PAGE
I. DR. DORAN _Frontispiece_
II. RICHARD BURBAGE 16
III. NATHANIEL FIELD { From an original picture in Dulwich } 26
{ College }
IV. EDWARD ALLEYN Do. do. 43
V. JOHN LOWEN { From an original picture in the } 49
{ Ashmolean Museum, Oxford }
VI. NELL GWYN From the picture by Gascar 83
VII. MICHAEL MOHUN { From the original in the Dorset } 100
{ Collection }
VIII. JOSEPH HARRIS As Cardinal Wolsey 136
IX. ANTHONY LEIGH { As Dominique in the "Spanish } 144
{ Friar" }
X. ELIZABETH BARRY { From the original of Sir Godfrey } 160
{ Kneller }
XI. THOMAS BETTERTON Do. do. 185
XII. COLLEY CIBBER From the picture by Grisoni 266
XIII. MRS. BRACEGIRDLE 302
XIV. JAMES QUIN From the original by Hudson 334
XV. LAVINIA FENTON 384
XVI. BARTON BOOTH 400
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ON WOOD.
VOLUME I.
ENGRAVED BY DEL ORME & BUTLER, LONDON, AND PRINTED ON JAPANESE PAPER
BY ED. BADOUREAU, LONDON.
PAGE
1. THE BEAR GARDEN--Sixteenth Century 1
2. THE SWAN THEATRE--As it appeared in 1614 37
3. THE GLOBE THEATRE--Sixteenth Century 60
4. THE FORTUNE THEATRE--Sixteenth Century 96
5. THEATRE ROYAL, LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS--1714 109
6. THE DUKE'S THEATRE, DORSET GARDEN--1662 136
7. Do. do. do. --River View 149
8. CONTEST FOR DOGGET'S COAT AND BADGE 162
9. COLLEY CIBBER--From a painting by J. B. Van Loo 183
10. SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT--From a painting by Greenhuth 213
11. MRS. CENTLIVRE 237
12. PRYNNE 246
13. SIR RICHARD STEELE 274
14. THOMAS DOGGET--From a rare contemporary print 310
15. POPE AND DR. GARTH--By Hogarth 317
16. SPILLER'S BENEFIT TICKET--By Hogarth 337
17. THE NEW AND OLD THEATRES ROYAL, HAYMARKET--1720-1821 356
18. BARTON BOOTH 391
LIST OF TAILPIECES ON WOOD.
VOLUME I.
PAGE
1. MR. GARRICK AS SIR JOHN BRUTE IN "THE PROVOKED WIFE" 36
2. MR. GARRICK AS KING LEAR--Act iii. Scene 1 135
3. MRS. BARRY AND MR. GARRICK AS DONNA VIOLANTE AND DON FELIX
IN "THE WONDER" 236
4. MR. GARRICK AS HAMLET--Act i. Scene 4 355
5. MR. FOOTE AS THE DOCTOR IN THE "DEVIL UPON TWO STICKS" 390
6. MR. GARRICK AS ABEL DRUGGER IN THE "ALCHYMIST" 426
[Illustration: THE BEAR GARDEN]
CHAPTER I.
PROLOGUE.
The period of the origin of the drama is an unsettled question, but
it has been fixed at an early date, if we may accept the theory of a
recent writer, who suggests that Moses described the Creation from a
visionary pictorial representation, which occupied seven days from
the commencement to the close of the spectacle!
Among the most remote of the Chinese traditions, the theatre
holds a conspicuous place. In Cochin-China there is at this day a
most primitive character about actors, authors, and audience. The
governor of the district enjoys the least rude seat in the sylvan
theatre; he directs the applause by tapping with his fingers on a
little drum, and as at this signal his secretaries fling strings full
of _cash_ on to the stage, the performance suffers from continual
interruption. For the largesse distributed by the patron of the
drama, and such of the spectators as choose to follow his example,
the actors and actresses furiously scramble, while the poor poet
stands by, sees his best situations sacrificed, and is none the
richer--by way of compensation.
In Greece the profession of actor was accounted honourable. In Rome
it was sometimes a well-requited, but also a despised vocation.
During the decade of years when that aristocratic democrat
Pisistratus held power, the drama first appeared (it is said) at
Athens. It formed a portion of the religion of the State. The theatre
was a temple in which, rudely enough at first, the audience were
taught how the will, not only of men but of gods, must necessarily
submit to the irresistible force of Destiny. This last power,
represented by a combination of the lyric and epic elements, formed
the drama which had its origin in Greece alone. In such a sense the
Semitic races had no drama at all, while in Greece it was almost
exclusively of Attic growth, its religious character being especially
supported on behalf of the audience by the ever-sagacious, morally,
and fervently-pious chorus. Lyric tragedy existed before the age of
Thespis and Pisistratus; but a spoken tragedy dates from that period
alone, above five centuries earlier than the Christian era; and the
new theatre found at once its Prynne and its Collier in that hearty
hater of actors and acting, the legislative Solon.
At the great festivals, when the theatres were opened, the expenses
of the representations were borne partly by the State and partly
by certain wealthy officials. The admission was free, until
over-crowding produced fatal accidents. To diminish the latter an
entrance-fee of two _oboli_, 3-1/4d., was established, but the
receipts were made over to the poor.[1] From morning till dewy eve
these roofless buildings, capable of containing on an average twenty
thousand persons, were filled from the ground to the topmost seat, in
the sweet spring-tide, sole theatrical season of the Greeks.
Disgrace and disfranchisement were the penalties laid upon the
professional Roman actor. He was accounted infamous, and was excluded
from the tribes. Nevertheless, the calling in Italy had something
of a religious quality. Livy tells us of a company of Etruscan
actors, ballet-pantomimists, however, rather than comedians, who were
employed to avert the anger of the gods, which was manifested by a
raging pestilence. These Etruscans were in their way the originators
of the drama in Italy. That drama was at first a dance, then a
dance and song; with them was subsequently interwoven a story. From
the period of Livius Andronicus (B.C. 240) is dated the origin of
an actual Latin theatre, a theatre the glory of which was at its
highest in the days of Attius and Terence, but for which a dramatic
literature became extinct when the mimes took the place of the old
comedy and tragedy.
Even in Rome the skill of the artist sometimes freed him from the
degradation attached to the exercise of his art. Roscius, the popular
comedian, contemporary with Cicero, was elevated by Sulla to the
equestrian dignity, and with Æsopus, the great tragedian, enjoyed
the friendship of Tully and of Tully's friends, the wisest and the
noblest in Rome. Roscius and Æsopus were what would now be called
scholars and gentlemen, as well as unequalled artists, whom no amount
of application could appal when they had to achieve a triumph in
their art. An Austrian emperor once "encored" an entire opera (the
_Matrimonio Segreto_); but, according to Cicero, his friend Æsopus so
delighted his enthusiastic audience, that in one piece they encored
him "millies," a thousand, or perhaps an indefinite number of times.
The Roman tragedian lived well, and bequeathed a vast fortune to his
son. Roscius earned £32 daily, and he too amassed great wealth.
The mimes were satirical burlesques, parts of which were often
improvised, and had some affinity to the pasquinades and
harlequinades of modern Italy. The writers were the intimate friends
of emperors; the actors were infamous. Cæsar induced Decius Laberius,
an author of knightly rank, to appear on the stage in one of these
pieces; and Laberius obeyed, not for the sake of the _honorarium_,
£4000, but from dread of disobeying an order from so powerful a
master. The unwilling actor profited by his degradation to satirise
the policy of Cæsar, who did not resent the liberty, but restored
Laberius to the rank and equestrian privileges which he had forfeited
by appearing on the stage. Laberius, however, never recovered the
respect of his countrymen, not even of those who had applauded him
the most loudly.
The licentious pantomimists were so gross in their performances
that they even disgusted Tiberius, who forbade them from holding
any intercourse, as the professional _histriones_ or actors of the
drama had done, with Romans of equestrian or senatorial dignity.
It was against the stage, exclusively given up to their scandalous
exhibitions, that the Christian fathers levelled their denunciations.
They would have approved a "well-trod stage," as Milton did, and the
object attributed to it by Aristotle,--but they had only anathemas
for that horrible theatre where danced and postured Bathyllus and
Hylas, and Pylades, Latinus and Nero, and even that graceful Paris,
whom Domitian slew in his jealousy, and of whom Martial wrote that
he was the great glory and grief of the Roman theatre, and that all
Venuses and Cupids were buried for ever in the sepulchre of Paris,
the darling of old Rome.
In this our England, minds and hearts had ever been open to dramatic
impressions. The Druidical rites contained the elements of dramatic
spectacle. The Pagan Saxon era had its dialogue-actors, or buffoons;
and when the period of Christianity succeeded, its professors and
teachers took of the evil epoch what best suited their purposes.
In narrative dialogue, or song, they dramatised the incidents
of the lives of the saints, and of One greater than saints; and
they thus rendered intelligible to listeners what would have been
incomprehensible if it had been presented to them as readers.
In Castle-Hall, before farm-house fires, on the bridges, and in
the market-places, the men who best performed the united offices
of missionary and actor, were, at once, the most popular preachers
and players of the day. The greatest of them all, St. Adhelm, when
he found his audience growing weary of too much serious exposition,
would take his small harp from under his robes, and would strike up a
narrative song, that would render his hearers hilarious.
The mixture of the sacred and profane in the early dialogues and
drama prevailed for a lengthened period. The profane sometimes
superabounded, and the higher Church authorities had to look to it.
The monotony of monastic life had caused the wandering glee-men to
be too warmly welcomed within the monastery circles, where there
were men who cheerfully employed their energies in furnishing new
songs and lively "patter" to the strollers. It was, doubtless, all
well meant; but more serious men thought it wise to prohibit the
indulgence of this peculiar literary pursuit. Accordingly, the
Council of Clovershoe, and decrees bearing the king's mark, severally
ordained that actors, and other vagabonds therein named, should
no longer have access to monasteries, and that no priest should
either play the glee-man himself, or encourage the members of that
disreputable profession, by turning ale poets, and writing songs for
them.
It is a singular fact, that one of our earliest theatres had
Geoffrey, a monk, for its manager, and Dunstable--immortalised
by Silvester Daggerwood--for a locality. This early manager, who
flourished about 1119,[2] rented a house in the town just named,
when a drama was represented, which had St. Katherine for a heroine,
and her whole life for a subject. This proto-theatre was, of course,
burnt down; and the managing monk withdrew from the profession, more
happy than most ruined managers, in this, that he had his cell at St.
Albans, to which he could retire, and therein find a home for the
remainder of his days.
Through a course of Mysteries, Miracle-plays--illustrating Scripture,
history, legend, and the sufferings of the martyrs,--Moralities,
in which the vices were in antagonism against the virtues, and
Chronicle-plays, which were history in dialogue, we finally arrive
at legitimate Tragedy and Comedy. Till this last and welcome
consummation, the Church as regularly employed the stage for
religious ends, as the old heathen magistrates did when they made
village festivals the means of maintaining a religious feeling
among the villagers. Professor Browne, in his _History of Greek
Classical Literature_, remarks:--"The believers in a pure faith can
scarcely understand a religious element in dramatic exhibitions. They
who knew that God is a spirit, and that they who worship Him must
worship him in spirit and in truth, feel that His attributes are too
awful to permit any ideas connected with Deity to be brought into
contact with the exhibition of human passions. Religious poetry of
any kind, except that which has been inspired, has seldom been the
work of minds sufficiently heavenly and spiritual, to be perfectly
successful in attaining the end of poetry, namely the elevation of
the thoughts to a level with the subject. It brings God down to man,
instead of raising man to Him. It causes that which is most offensive
to religious feeling, and even good taste, irreverent familiarity
with subjects which cannot be contemplated without awe. But a
religious drama would be, to those who realise to their own minds the
spirituality of God, nothing less than anthropomorphism and idolatry.
Christians of a less advanced age, and believers in a more sensuous
creed, were able to view with pleasure the mystery-plays in which
the gravest truths of the Gospel were dramatically represented; nay,
more, just as the ancient Athenians could look even upon their gross
and licentious comedy as forming part of a religious ceremony, so
could Christians imagine a religious element in profane dramas which
represented in a ludicrous light subjects of the most holy character."
Mysteries kept the stage from the Norman to the Tudor era. The
Moralities began to displace them during the reign of Henry VI., who
was a less beneficial patron of the stage than that Richard III. who
has himself retained a so unpleasant possession of the scene. Actors
and dramatists have been ungrateful to this individual, who was
their first practically useful patron. Never, previous to Richard's
time, had an English prince been known to have a company of players
of his own. When Duke of Gloucester, a troop of such servants was
attached to his household. Richard was unselfish towards these new
retainers; whenever he was too "busy," or "not i' the vein" to
receive instruction or amusement at their hands, he gave them licence
to travel abroad, and forth went the mirthful company, from county to
county, mansion to mansion, from one corporation-hall and from one
inn-yard to another, playing securely under the sanction of his name,
winning favour for themselves, and a great measure of public regard,
probably, for their then generous and princely master.
The fashion thus set by a prince was followed by the nobility, and it
led to a legal recognition of the actor and his craft, in the royal
licence of 1572, whereby the players connected with noble houses were
empowered to play wherever it seemed good to them, if their master
sanctioned their absence, without any let or hindrance from the law.
The patronage of actors by the Duke of Gloucester led to a love of
acting by gentlemen amateurs. Richard had ennobled the profession,
the gentlemen of the Inns of Court took it up, and they soon had
kings and queens leading the applause of approving audiences. To the
same example may be traced the custom of having dramatic performances
in public schools, the pupils being the performers. These boys, or,
in their place, the children of the Chapel Royal, were frequently
summoned to play in presence of the King and Court. Boatsful of them
went down the river to Greenwich, or up to Hampton Court, to enliven
the dulness or stimulate the religious enthusiasm of their royal
auditors there. At the former place, and when there was not yet any
suspicion of the orthodoxy of Henry VIII., the boys of St. Paul's
acted a Latin play before the sovereign and the representatives of
other sovereigns. The object of the play was to exalt the Pope, and
consequently Luther and his wife were the foolish villains of the
piece, exposed to the contempt and derision of the delighted and
right-thinking hearers.
In most cases the playwrights, even when members of the clergy, were
actors as well as authors. This is the more singular, as the players
were generally of a roystering character, and were but ill-regarded
by the Church. Nevertheless, by their united efforts, though they
were not always colleagues, they helped the rude production of the
first regularly constructed English comedy, "Ralph Roister Doister,"
about 1540. The author was a "clerk," named Nicholas Udall, whom
Eton boys, whose master he was, hated because of his harshness. The
rough and reverend gentleman brought forth the above piece, just one
year previous to his losing the mastership, on suspicion of being
concerned in a robbery of the college plate.
Subsequently to this, the Cambridge youths had the courage to play
a tragedy called "Pammachus," which must have been offensive to the
government of Henry VIII. Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, Chancellor
of the University, immediately wrote a characteristic letter to the
Vice-Chancellor, Dr. Matthew Parker. It is dated 27th March 1545. "I
have been informed," he says, "that the youth in Christ's College,
contrary to the mind of the Master and President, hath of late
played a tragedy called 'Pammachus,' a part of which tragedy is so
pestiferous as were intolerable. If it be so, I intend to travail,
as my duty is, for the reformation of it. I know mine office there,
and mind to do in it as much as I may." Parker answers on the 3d
of April, that the play had been performed with the concurrence of
the College authorities, after means had been taken to strike out
"slanderous cavillations and suspicious sentences," and "all such
matter whereby offence might greatly have risen. Hitherto," adds
Parker, "have I not seen any man that was present at it to show
himself grieved; albeit it was thought their time and labour might
be spent in a better-handled matter." Gardiner is not satisfied with
this, and he will have the subject investigated. Accordingly, some
of the audience are ordered to be examined to discover if what they
applauded was what the King's government had reproved. "I have heard
specialities," he writes, "that they" (the actors) "reproved Lent
fastings, all ceremonies, and albeit the words of sacrament and mass
were not named, yet the rest of the matter written in that tragedy,
in the reproof of them was expressed." Gardiner intimates that if
the authorities concurred, after exercising a certain censorship, in
licensing the representation, they were responsible for all that was
uttered, as it must have had the approval of their judgments.
A strict examination followed. Nearly the entire audience passed
under it, but not a man could or would remember that he had heard
anything to which he could make objection. Therewith Parker
transmitted to Gardiner the stage-copy of the tragedy, which the
irate prelate thus reviews:--"Perusing the book of the tragedy which
ye sent me, I find much matter not stricken out, all which, by the
parties' own confession, was uttered very naught, and on the other
part something not well omitted." Flagrant lies are said to be mixed
up with incontrovertible truths; and it is suggested, that if any of
the audience had declared that they had heard nothing at which they
could take offence, it must have been because they had forgotten much
of what they had heard. Ultimately, Parker was left to deal with
the parties as he thought best; and he wisely seems to have thought
it best to do nothing. Plays were the favourite recreation of the
university men; albeit, as Parker writes, "Two or three in Trinity
College think it very unseeming that Christians should play or be
present at any profane comedies or tragedies."
Actors and clergy came into direct collision, when, at the accession
of Edward VI. (1547), the Bishop of Winchester announced "a solemn
dirge _and mass_," in honour of the lately deceased king, Henry VIII.
The indiscreet Southwark actors thereupon gave notice that at the
time announced for the religious service they would act a "solempne
play" to try, as the bishop remarks in a letter to Paget, "who shall
have most resort, they in game or I in earnest." The prelate urgently
requests the interference of the Lord Protector, but with what
effect, the records in the State Paper Office afford no information.
Some of these Southwark actors were the "servants" of Henry Grey,
Marquis of Dorset, whose mansion was on the opposite side of the
river. In 1551 he was promoted to the dukedom of Suffolk, but his
poor players were then prohibited from playing anywhere, save in
their master's presence.[3]
Severity led to fraud. In the autumn of the following year Richard
Ogle forwarded to the Council a forged licence, taken from the
players--a matter which was pronounced to be "worthy of correction."
The young king's patronage of his own "servants" was not marked by a
princely liberality; the salary of one of his players of interludes,
John Brown, was five marks yearly as wages, and one pound three
shillings and fourpence for his livery.
Of the party dramatists of this reign, that reverend prelate,
"Bilious Bale," was the most active and the least pleasant-tempered.
Bale had been a Romanist priest, he was now a Protestant bishop (of
Ossory), with a wife to control the episcopal hospitality. Bale had
"seen the world." He had gone through marvellous adventures, of which
his adversaries did not believe a word; and he had converted the
most abstruse doctrinal subjects into edifying semi-lively comedies.
The bishop did not value his enemies at the worth of a rush in an
old king's chamber. He was altogether a Boanerges; and when his
"John, King of England," was produced, the audience, comprising two
factions in the Church and State, found the policy of Rome towards
this country illustrated with such effect, that while one party hotly
denounced, the other applauded the coarse and vigorous audacity of
the author.
So powerful were the influences of the stage, when thus applied, that
the government of Queen Mary made similar application of them in
support of their own views. A play, styled "Respublica," exhibited
to the people the alleged iniquity of the Reformation, pointed out
the dread excellence of the sovereign herself (personified as Queen
Nemesis), and exemplified her inestimable qualities, by making all
the Virtues follow in her train as Maids of honour.
Such, now, were the orthodox actors; but the heretical players
were to be provided against by stringent measures. A decree of the
sovereign and council, in 1556, prohibited all players and pipers
from strolling through the kingdom; such strollers--the pipers
singularly included--being, as it was said, disseminators of
seditions and heresies.
The eye of the observant government also watched the resident actors
in town. King Edward had ordered the removal of the king's revels and
masques from Warwick Inn, Holborn, "to the late dissolved house of
Blackfriars, London," where considerable outlay was made for scenery
and machinery--adjuncts to stage effect--which are erroneously
supposed to have been first introduced a century later by Davenant.
There still remained acting a company at the Boar's Head, without
Aldgate, on whom the police of Mary were ordered to make levy. The
actors had been playing in that inn-yard a comedy, entitled a "Sack
full of News." The order of the privy council to the mayor informs
his worship, that it is "a lewd play;" bids him send his officers to
the theatre without delay, and not only to apprehend the comedians,
but to "take their play-book from them and send it before the privy
council."
The actors were under arrest for four-and-twenty hours, and were
then set free, but under certain stipulations to be observed by them
"and all other players throughout the city,"--namely: they were to
exercise their vocation of acting "between All Saints and Shrovetide"
only; and they were bound to act no other plays but such as were
approved of by the Ordinary. This was the most stringent censorship
to which the stage has ever been subjected.
Although Edward had commanded the transfer of the company of actors
from Warwick Inn to Blackfriars, that dissolved monastery was not
legally converted into a theatre till the year 1576, when Elizabeth
was on the throne. In that year[4] the Earl of Leicester's servants
were licensed to open their series of seasons in a house, the site of
which is occupied by Apothecaries' Hall and some adjacent buildings.
At the head of the company was James, father of Richard Burbage, the
original representative of Richard III. and of Hamlet, the author of
which tragedies, so named, was, at the time of the opening of the
Blackfriars' theatre, a lad of twelve years of age, surmounting the
elementary difficulties of Latin and Greek in the Free School of
Stratford-on-Avon.
In Elizabeth the drama possessed a generous patroness and a
vindictive censor. Her afternoons at Windsor Castle and Richmond were
made pleasant to her by the exertions of her players. The cost to her
of occasional performances at the above residences during two years
amounted to a fraction over £444. There were incidental expenses
also, proving that the actors were well cared for. In the year 1575,
among the estimates for plays at Hampton Court, the liberal sum of
£8, 14s. is set down "for the boyling of the brawns against Xtmas."
[Illustration: (Richard Burbage.)]
As at Court, so also did the drama flourish at the Universities,
especially at Cambridge. There, in 1566, the coarse dialect
comedy, "Gammer Gurton's Needle"--a marvellous production, when
considered as the work of a bishop, Still, of Bath and
Wells--was represented amid a world of laughter.
There, too, was exercised a sharp censorship over both actors and
audience. In a letter from Vice-Chancellor Hatcher to Burleigh, the
conduct of Punter, a student of St. John's, at stage-plays at Caius
and Trinity, is complained of as unsteady. In 1581 the heads of
houses again make application to Burleigh, objecting to the players
of the Great Chamberlain, the Earl of Oxford, poet and courtier,
exhibiting certain plays already "practised" by them before the
King. The authorities, when scholastic audiences were noisy, or when
players brought no novelty with them to Cambridge, applied to the
great statesman in town, and vexed him with dramatic troubles, as if
he had been general stage-manager of all the companies strolling over
the kingdom.
On one occasion the stage was employed as a vantage ground whereon
to raise a battery against the power of the stage's great patroness,
the Queen. In 1599, the indiscreet followers of Essex "filled the
pit of the theatre, where Rutland and Southampton are daily seen,
and where Shakspeare's company, in the great play of 'Richard II.,'
have, for more than a year, been feeding the public eye with pictures
of the deposition of kings." In June of the following year, "those
scenes of Shakspeare's play disturb Elizabeth's dreams. The play had
had a long and splendid run, not less from its glorious agony of
dramatic passion than from the open countenance lent to it by the
Earl, who, before his voyage, was a constant auditor at the Globe,
and by his constant companions, Rutland and Southampton. The great
parliamentary scene, the deposition of Richard, not in the printed
book, was possibly not in the early play; yet the representation of
a royal murder and a successful usurpation on the public stage is an
event to be applied by the groundlings, in a pernicious and disloyal
sense. Tongues whisper to the Queen that this play is part of a great
plot to teach her subjects how to murder kings. They tell her she is
Richard; Essex, Bolingbroke. These warnings sink into her mind. When
Lambard, Keeper of the Records, waits upon her at the palace, she
exclaims to him, 'I am Richard! Know you not that?'"
The performance of this play was, nevertheless, not prohibited.
When the final attempt of Essex was about to be made, in February
1601--"To fan the courage of their crew," says Mr. Hepworth Dixon,
from whose _Personal History of Lord Bacon_ I borrow these details,
"and prepare the citizens for news of a royal deposition, the
chiefs of the insurrection think good to revive, for a night, their
favourite play. They send for Augustine Phillips, manager of the
Blackfriars Theatre, to Essex House; Monteagle, Percy, and two or
three more--among them Cuffe and Meyrick--gentlemen whose names
and faces he does not recognise, receive him; and Lord Monteagle,
speaking for the rest, tells him that they want to have played the
next day Shakspeare's deposition of Richard II. Phillips objects that
the play is stale, that a new one is running, and that the company
will lose money by a change. Monteagle meets his objections. The
theatre shall not lose; a host of gentlemen from Essex House will
fill the galleries; if there is fear of loss, here are 40s. to make
it up. Phillips takes the money, and King Richard is duly deposed for
them, and put to death."
Meanwhile, the profession of player had been assailed by fierce
opponents. In 1587,[5] when twenty-three summers lightly sat on
Shakspeare's brow, Gosson, the "parson" of St. Botolph's, discharged
the first shot against stage plays which had yet been fired by
any one not in absolute authority. Gosson's book was entitled, _A
School of Abuse_, and it professed to contain "a pleasant invective
against poets, players, jesters, and such like caterpillars of
a Commonwealth." Gosson's pleasantry consists in his illogical
employment of invective. Domitian favoured plays, _argal_, Domitian's
domestic felicity was troubled by a player--Paris. Of Caligula,
Gosson remarks, that he made so much of players and dancers, that
"he suffered them openly to kiss his lips, when the senators
might scarcely have a lick at his feet;" and the good man of St.
Botolph's adds, that the murder of Domitian, by Charea, was "a fit
catastrophe," for it was done as the Emperor was returning from a
play!
As a painter of manners, Gosson thus gaily limns the audiences of
his time. "In our Assemblies at plays in London, you shall see such
heaving and shouting, such pitching and shouldering to sit by
women, such care for their garments that they be not trodden on,
such eyes to their laps that no chips light on them, such pillows
to their backs that they take no hurt, such masking in their ears,
I know not what; such giving them pippins to pass the time; such
playing at foot-saunt without cards; such ticking, such toying, such
smiling, such winking, and such manning them home when the sports
are ended, that it is a right comedy to mark their behaviour." In
this picture Gosson paints a good-humoured and a gallant people. When
he turns from failings to vices, the old rector of St. Botolph's
dwells upon them as Tartuffe does upon the undraped shoulders of
Dorinne. He likes the subject, and makes attractive what he denounces
as pernicious. The playwrights he assails with the virulence of an
author, who, having been unsuccessful himself, has no gladness in
the success, nor any generosity for the shortcomings of others.
Yet he cannot deny that some plays are moral, such as "Cataline's
Conspiracy,"--"because," as he elegantly observes, "it is said to be
a pig of mine own sow." This, and one or two other plays written by
him, he complaisantly designates as "good plays, and sweet plays, and
of all plays the best plays, and most to be liked."
Let us now return to the year of Shakspeare's birth. The great poet
came into the world when the English portion of it was deafened
with the thunder of Archbishop Grindal, who flung his bolts against
the profession which the child in his cradle at Stratford was about
to ennoble for ever. England had been devastated by the plague of
1563. Grindal illogically traced the rise of the pestilence to the
theatres; and to check the evil he counselled Cecil to suppress the
vocation of the idle, infamous, youth-infecting players, as the
prelate called them, for one whole year, and--"if it were for ever,"
adds the primate, "it were not amiss."
Elizabeth's face shone upon the actors, and rehearsals went actively
on before the Master of the Revels. The numbers of the players,
however, so increased and spread over the kingdom, that the
government, when Shakspeare was eight years of age, enacted that
startling statute which is supposed to have branded dramatic art and
artists with infamy. But the celebrated statute of 1572 does _not_
declare players to be "rogues and vagabonds." It simply threatens
to treat as such all acting companies who presume to set up their
stage _without_ the license of "two justices of the peace at least."
This was rather to protect the art than to insult the artist; and a
few years subsequent to the publication of this statute, Elizabeth
granted the first _royal_ patent conceded in England to actors--that
of 1576.[6] By this authority Lord Leicester's servants were
empowered to produce such plays as seemed good to them, "as well,"
says the Queen, "for the recreation of our loving subjects as _for
our solace and pleasure_, when we shall think good to see them."
Sovereign could scarcely pay a more graceful compliment to poet or to
actor.
This royal patent sanctioned the acting of plays within the
liberties of the city; but against this the city magistrates
commenced an active agitation. Their brethren of Middlesex followed
a like course throughout the county. The players were treated as the
devil's missionaries; and such unsavoury terms were flung at them
and at playwrights, by the city aldermen and the county justices,
that thereon was founded that animosity which led dramatic authors to
represent citizens and justices as the most egregious of fools, the
most arrant of knaves, and the most deluded of husbands.
Driven from the city, Burbage and his gay brotherhood were safe in
the shelter of Blackfriars, adjacent to the city walls. Safe, but
neither welcome nor unmolested. The devout and noble ladies who had
long resided near the once sacred building, clamoured at the audacity
of the actors. Divine worship and sermon, so they averred, would be
grievously disturbed by the music and rant of the comedians, and by
the debauched companions resorting to witness those abominable plays
and interludes.
This cry was shrill and incessant, but it was unsuccessful. The
Blackfriars' was patronised by a public whose favours were also
solicited by those "sumptuous houses" the "Theatre" and the "Curtain"
in Shoreditch. Pulpit logicians reasoned, more heedless of connection
between premises and conclusion than Grindal or Gosson. "The cause
of plagues is sin," argues one, "and the cause of sin are plays;
therefore, the cause of plagues are plays." Again: "If these be not
suppressed," exclaims a Paul's Cross preacher, "it will make such a
tragedy that all London may well mourn while it is London."[7] But
for the sympathy of the Earl of Leicester it would have gone ill with
these players. He has been as ill-requited by authors and actors as
their earlier friend, Richard of Gloucester. To this day the stage
exhibits the great earl, according to the legend contrived by his
foes, as the murderer of his wife.
Sanctioned by the court, befriended by the noble, and followed by
the general public, the players stood their ground, but they lacked
the discretion which should have distinguished them. They bearded
authority, played in despite of legal prohibitions, and introduced
forbidden subjects of state and religion upon their stage. Thence
ensued suspensions for indefinite periods, severe supervision when
the suspension was rescinded, and renewed transgression on the part
of the reckless companies, even to the playing on a Sunday, in any
locality where they conjectured there was small likelihood of their
being followed by a warrant.
But the most costly of the theatrical revels of King James took
place at Whitehall, at Greenwich, or at Hampton Court, on Sunday
evenings--an unseemly practice, which embittered the hatred of
the Puritans against the stage, all belonging to it, and all who
patronised it. James was wiser when he licensed Kirkham, Hawkins,
Kendall, and Payne to train the Queen's children of the revels, and
to exercise them in playing within the Blackfriars' or elsewhere
all plays which had the sanction of old Samuel Danyell. His queen,
Anne, was both actress and manager in the masques performed at court,
the expenses of which often exceeded, indeed were ordered not to be
limited to, £1000. "Excellent comedies" were played before Prince
Charles and the Prince Palsgrave[8] at Cambridge; and the members of
St. John's, Clare, and Trinity, acted before the King and court in
1615, when the illustrious guests were scattered among the colleges,
and twenty-six tuns of wine consumed within five days!
The lawyers alone were offended at the visits of the court to the
amateurs at Cambridge, especially when James went thither to see
the comedy of _Ignoramus_, in which law and lawyers are treated
with small measure of respect. When James was prevented from going
to Cambridge, he was accustomed to send for the whole scholastic
company to appear before him, in one of the choicest of their pieces,
at Royston. Roving troops were licensed by this play-loving king to
follow their vocation in stated places in the country, under certain
restrictions for their tarrying and wending--a fortnight's residence
in one town being the time limited, with injunction not to play
"during church hours."
Then there were unlicensed satirical plays in unlicensed houses. Sir
John Yorke, his wife and brothers, were fined and imprisoned, because
of a scandalous play acted in Sir John's house, in favour of Popery.
On another occasion, in 1617, we hear of a play, in some country
mansion, in which the King, represented as a huntsman, observed that
he had rather hear a dog bark than a cannon roar. Two kinsmen, named
Napleton, discussed this matter, whereupon one of them remarked that
it was a pity the King, so well represented, ever came to the crown
of England at all, for he loved his dogs better than his subjects.
Whereupon the listener to this remark went and laid information
before the council against the kinsman who had uttered it!
The players could, in James's reign, boast that their profession
was at least kindly looked upon by the foremost man in the English
Church. "No man," says Hacket, "was more wise or more serious than
Archbishop Bancroft, the Atlas of our clergy, in his time; and he
that writes this hath seen an interlude well presented before him,
at Lambeth, by his own gentlemen, when I was one of the youngest
spectators." The actors thus had the sanction of the Archbishop of
Canterbury in James's reign, as they had that of Williams, Archbishop
of York, in the next. Hacket often alludes to theatrical matters.
"The theatres," he says, in one of his discourses made during the
reign of Charles II., when the preacher was Bishop of Lichfield
and Coventry, "are not large enough nowadays to receive our loose
gallants, male and female, but whole fields and parks are thronged
with their concourse, where they make a muster of their gay clothes."
Meanwhile, in 1616, the pulpit once more issued anathemas against
the stage. The denouncer, on this occasion, was the preacher of
St. Mary Overy's, named Sutton, whose undiscriminating censure was
boldly, if not logically, answered by the actor, Field. There is
a letter from the latter in the State Paper Office, in which he
remonstrates against the sweeping condemnation of all players. The
comedian admits that what he calls his trade has its corruptions,
like other trades; but he adds, that since it is patronised by the
King, there is disloyalty in preaching against it, and he hints
that the theology of the preacher must be a little out of gear,
seeing that he openly denounces a vocation which is not condemned in
Scripture!
[Illustration: (Nathaniel Field.)]
Field, the champion of his craft in the early part of the seventeenth
century, was one of the dozen actors to whom King James, in 1619,
granted a licence to act comedy, tragedy, history, &c., for the
solace and pleasure of his Majesty and his subjects, at the Globe,
and at their private house in the precincts of Blackfriars. This
licence was made out to Hemings, Burbage, Condell, Lowen, Tooley,
Underwood, Field, Benfield, Gough, Eccleston, Robinson, Shancks,
and their associates. Their success rendered them audacious, and,
in 1624, they got into trouble, on a complaint of the Spanish
ambassador. The actors at the Globe had produced Middleton's "Game at
Chess," in which the action is carried on by black and white pieces,
representing the Reformed and Romanist parties. The latter, being
the rogues of the piece, are foiled, and are "put in the bag." The
Spanish envoy's complaint was founded on the fact that living
persons were represented by the actors, such persons being the King
of Spain, Gondomar, and the famous Antonio de Dominis, who, after
being a Romish bishop (of Spalato), professed Protestantism, became
Dean of Windsor, and after all died in his earlier faith, at Rome. On
the ambassador's complaint, the actors and the author were summoned
before the council, but no immediate result followed, for, two
days later, Nethercole writes to Carleton, informing him that "the
comedy in which the whole Spanish business is taken up, is drawing
£100 nightly." At that time, a house with £20 in it was accounted a
"good house," at either the Globe or Blackfriars. Receipts amounting
to five times that sum, for nine afternoons successively, may be
accepted as a proof of the popularity of this play. The Spaniard,
however, would not let the matter rest; the play was suppressed, the
actors forbidden to represent living personages on the stage, and the
author was sent to prison. Middleton was not long detained in durance
vile. James set him free, instigated by a quip in a poor epigram,--
"Use but your royal hand, 'twill set me free!
'Tis but removing of a man--that's me."
A worse joke never secured for its author a greater boon--that of
liberty.
With all this, an incident of the following year proves that the
players disregarded peril, and found profit in excitement. For
Shrovetide, 1625, they announced a play founded on the Dutch horrors
at Amboyna, but the performance was stopped, on the application of
the East India Company, "for fear of disturbances this Shrovetide." A
watch of 800 men was set to keep all quiet on Shrove Tuesday; and the
subject was not again selected for a piece till 1673, when Dryden's
"Amboyna" was produced in Drury Lane, and the cruelties of the
Dutch condemned in a serio-comic fashion, as those of a people--so
the epilogue intimated to the public--"who have no more religion
faith--than you."
In James's days, the greater or less prevalence of the plague
regulated the licences for playing. Thus, permission was given to the
Queen's Servants to act "in their several houses, the Curtain, and
the Boar's Head, Middlesex, as soon as the plague decreases to 30 a
week, in London." So, in the very first year of Charles I., 1625,
the "common players" have leave not only to act where they will, but
"to come to court, now the plague is reduced to six." Accordingly,
there was a merry Christmas season at Hampton Court, the actors
being there; and, writes Rudyard to Nethercole, "the _demoiselles_"
(maids of honour, doubtless), "mean to present a French pastoral,
wherein the Queen is a principal actress." Thus, the example set
by the late Queen Anne and now adopted by Henrietta Maria, led to
the introduction of actresses on the public stage, and it was the
manifestation of a taste for acting exhibited by the French princess,
that led to the appearance in London of actresses of that nation.
With the reign of Charles I. new hopes came to the poor player, but
therewith came new adversaries. Charles I. was a hearty promoter of
all sports and pleasures, provided his people would be merry and
wise according to his prescription only. Wakes and maypoles were
authorised by him, to the infinite disgust of the Puritans, who liked
the authorisation no more than they did the suppression of lectures.
When Charles repaired to church, where the _Book of Sports_ was read,
he was exposed to the chance of hearing the minister, after reading
the decree as he was ordered, calmly go through the Ten Commandments,
and then tell his hearers, that having listened to the commands of
God and those of man, they might now follow which they liked best.
When Bishop Williams, of Lincoln, and subsequently Archbishop of
York, held a living, he pleaded in behalf of the right of his
Northamptonshire parishioners to dance round the maypole. When
ordered to deliver up the Great Seal by the King, he retired to
his episcopal palace at Buckden, where, says Hacket, "he was the
worse thought of by some strict censurers, because he admitted in
his public hall a comedy once or twice to be presented before him,
exhibited by his own servants, for an evening recreation." Being
then in disgrace, this simple matter was exaggerated by his enemies
into a report, that on an Ordination Sunday, this arrogant Welshman
had entertained his newly-ordained clergy with a representation of
Shakspeare's "Midsummer's Night's Dream," the actors in which had
been expressly brought down from London for the purpose!
In the troubled days in which King Charles and Bishop Williams lived,
the stage suffered with the throne and church. After this time the
names of the old houses cease to be familiar. Let us take a parting
glance of these primitive temples of our drama.
The royal theatre, Blackfriars, was the most nobly patronised of all
the houses opened previous to the Restoration. The grown-up actors
were the most skilled of their craft; and the boys, or apprentices,
were the most fair and effeminate that could be procured, and could
profit by instruction. On this stage Shakspeare enacted the Ghost
in "Hamlet," Old Adam, and a similar line of characters, usually
intrusted to the ablest of the performers of the second class.
Blackfriars was a winter house. Some idea of its capability and
pretension may be formed from the fact, that in 1633 its proprietors,
the brothers Burbage,[9] let it to the actors for a yearly rent of
£50. In 1655 it was pulled down,[10] after a successful career of
about three-quarters of a century.
Upon the strip of shore, between Fleet Street and the Thames,
there have been erected three theatres. In the year 1580, the old
monastery of Whitefriars was given up to a company of players; but
the Whitefriars' Theatre did not enjoy a very lengthened career.
In the year 1616, that in which Shakspeare died, it had already
fallen into disrepute and decay, and was never afterwards used for
the representation of dramatic pieces. The other theatres, in Dorset
Gardens, were built subsequently to the Restoration.
In the parish of St. Giles's, Cripplegate, and in the street now
called Playhouse Yard, connecting Whitecross Street with Golding
Lane, stood the old Fortune, erected in 1600, for Henslowe (the
pawnbroker and money-lender to actors) and Alleyn, the most unselfish
of comedians. It was a wooden tenement, which was burned down in
1621, and replaced by a circular brick edifice. In 1649, two years
after the suppression of plays by the Puritan Act, when the house was
closed, a party of soldiers, "the sectaries of those yeasty times,"
broke into the edifice, destroyed its interior fittings, and pulled
down the building.[11] The site and adjacent ground were soon covered
by dwelling-houses.
Meanwhile, the inn yards, or great rooms at the inns, were not yet
quite superseded. The Cross Keys in Gracechurch Street, the Bull in
Bishopsgate Street, near which lived Anthony Bacon, to the extreme
dislike of his grandmother; and the Red Bull, in St. John Street,
Clerkenwell, which last existed as late as the period of the Great
Fire, were open, if not for the acting of plays, at least for
exhibitions of fencing and wrestling.
The Surrey side of the Thames was a favourite locality for plays,
long before the most famous of the regular and royally-sanctioned
theatres. The Globe was on that old joyous Bankside; and the Little
Rose, in 1584, there succeeded to an elder structure of the same
name, whose memory is still preserved in Rose Alley. The Globe, the
summer-house of Shakspeare and his fellows, flourished from 1594 to
1613, when it fell a prey to the flames caused by the wadding of
a gun, which lodged in and set fire to the thatched roof. The new
house, erected by a royal and noble subscription, was of wood, but it
was tiled. Its career, however, was not very extended, for in 1654,
the owner of the freehold, Sir Matthew Brand, pulled the house down;
and the name of Globe Alley is all that is left to point out the
whereabouts of the popular summer-house in Southwark.
On the same bank of the great river stood the Hope, a play-house
four times a week, and a garden for bear-baiting on the alternate
days. In the former was first played Jonson's "Bartholomew Fair."
When plays were suppressed, the zealous and orthodox soldiery
broke into the Hope, horsewhipped the actors, and shot the bears.
This place, however, in its character of Bear Garden, rallied
after the Restoration, and continued prosperous till nearly the
close of the seventeenth century. There remains to be noticed,
Paris Garden, famous for its cruel but well-patronised sports. Its
popular circus was converted by Henslowe and Alleyn into a theatre.
Here, the richest receipts were made on the Sunday, till the law
interfered, and put down these performances, the dear delight of the
Southwarkians and their visitors from the opposite shore, of the
olden time.
The supposed assertion of Taylor, the Water poet, has often been
quoted, namely, that between Windsor Bridge and Gravesend there were
not less than 40,000 watermen, and that more than half of these found
employment in transporting the holiday folks from the Middlesex to
the Southwark shore of the river, where the players were strutting
their little hour at the _Globe_, the _Rose_, and the _Swan_, and
Bruin was being baited in the adjacent gardens. A misprint has
decupled what was about the true number, and even of these, many were
so unskilful that an Act was passed in the very first year of King
James, for the protection of persons afloat, whether on pleasure or
serious business.
In Holywell Lane, near High Street, Shoreditch, is the site of an old
wooden structure which bore the distinctive name of "The Theatre,"
and was accounted a sumptuous house, probably because of the partial
introduction of scenery there. In the early part of Shakspeare's
career, as author and actor, it was closed, in consequence of
proprietary disputes; and with the materials the Globe, at Bankside,
was rebuilt or considerably enlarged. There was a second theatre in
this district called "The Curtain," a name still retained in Curtain
Road. This house remained open and successful, till the accession
of Charles I., subsequent to which time stage plays gave way to
exhibitions of athletic exercises.
This district was especially dramatic; the popular taste was not only
there directed towards the stage, but it was a district wherein many
actors dwelt, and consequently died. The baptismal register of St.
Leonard's contains Christian names which appear to have been chosen
with reference to the heroines of Shakspeare; and the record of
burials bears the name of many an old actor of mark whose remains now
lie within the churchyard.
Not a vestige, of course, exists of any of these theatres; and yet of
a much older house traces may be seen by those who will seek them in
remote Cornwall.
This relic of antiquity is called Piran Round. It consists of a
circular embankment, about ten feet high, sloping backwards, and cut
into steps for seats or standing-places. This embankment encloses
a level area of grassy ground, and stands in the middle of a flat,
wild heath. A couple of thousand spectators could look down from
the seats upon the grassy circus which formed a stage of more than
a hundred feet in diameter. Here, in very early times, sports were
played and combats fought out, and rustic councils assembled. The
ancient Cornish Mysteries here drew tears and laughter from the mixed
audiences of the day. They were popular as late as the period of
Shakspeare. Of one of them, a five act piece, entitled "The Creation
of the World, with Noah's Flood," the learned Davies Gilbert has
given a translation. In this historical piece, played for edification
in Scripture history, the stage directions speak of varied costumes,
variety of scenery, and complicated machinery, all on an open-air
stage, whereon the deluge was to roll its billows and the mimic world
be lost. This cataclysm achieved, the depressed spectators were
rendered merry. The minstrels piped, the audience rose and footed it,
and then, having had their full of amusement, they who had converged,
from so many starting points, upon Piran Round, scattered again on
their several ways homeward from the ancient theatre, and as the sun
went down, thinned away over the heath, the fishermen going seaward,
the miners inland, and the agricultural labourers to the cottages and
farm-houses which dotted, here and there, the otherwise dreary moor.
Such is Piran Round described to have been, and the "old house"
is worthy of tender preservation, for it once saved England from
invasion! About the year 1600, "some strollers," as they are called
in Somer's Tracts, were playing late at night at Piran. At the
same time a party of Spaniards had landed with the intention of
surprising, plundering, and burning the village. As the enemy were
silently on their way to this consummation, the players, who were
representing a battle, "struck up a loud alarum with drum and trumpet
on the stage, which the enemy hearing, thought they were discovered,
made some few idle shots, and so in a hurly-burly fled to their
boats. And thus the townsmen were apprised of their danger, and
delivered from it at the same time."
Thus the players rescued the kingdom! Their sons and successors were
not so happy in rescuing their King; but the powerful enemies of
each suppressed both real and mimic kings. How they dealt with the
monarchs of the stage, our prologue at an end, remains to be told.
[Illustration: Mr. Garrick as Sir John Brute.]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Professor Ward says: "The entrance-money was from the time of
Pericles provided out of the public treasury."
[2] Geoffrey was made Abbot of St. Albans in 1119. The play, of
course, was many years earlier.
[3] It would appear that noblemen's players were prohibited from
acting, even before their masters, without leave from the Privy
Council.
[4] The patent was dated 1574, and does not specify any particular
building or locality.
[5] 1579 (2d edition).
[6] Should be 1574. It is dated 7th May 1574.
[7] These quotations are both from the same sermon.
[8] Or, Prince Palatine.
[9] The owners seem to have been Cuthbert and William Burbage, uncle
and nephew.
[10] The year of its destruction seems uncertain.
[11] It was standing in 1661; in which year it was advertised for
sale, with the ground belonging to it.
[Illustration: THE SWAN THEATRE.]