[Footnote 531: Printed in The Malone Society's Collections, I, 271.]

[Footnote 532: See Keysar v. Burbage et al., printed by Mr. Wallace, in his Shakespeare and his London Associates, pp. 80 ff.]

The troupe well deserved the patronage of the Queen. Keysar described the Blackfriars Children whom he had reorganized as "a company of the most expert and skillful actors within the realm of England, to the number of eighteen or twenty persons, all or most of them, trained up in that service in the reign of the late Queen Elizabeth for ten years together."[533] And to these, as I have pointed out, it seems likely that the best members of the bankrupt Children of His Majesty's Revels had been added. The chief actor of the new organization was Nathaniel Field, whose histrionic ability placed him beside Edward Alleyn and Richard Burbage. One of the first plays he was called upon to act in his new theatre was Jonson's brilliant comedy, Epicoene, in which he took the leading role.

[Footnote 533: Ibid., p. 90.]



The idea then occurred to Rosseter to secure a monopoly on child-acting and on private playhouses. The Children of His Majesty's Revels had ceased to exist. The Blackfriars Playhouse had been closed by royal command, and its lease had been surrendered to its owner, Richard Burbage. The only rival to the Children at Whitefriars was the troupe of Paul's Boys acting in their singing-school behind the Cathedral. How Rosseter attempted to buy them off is thus recorded by Richard Burbage and John Heminges:

There being, as these defendants verily think, but only three private playhouses in the city of London, the one of which being in the Blackfriars and in the hands of these defendants or of their assigns, one other being in the Whitefriars in the hands or occupation of the said complainant himself [Keysar], his partners [Rosseter, et al.], or assigns, and the third near St. Paul's Church, then being in the hands of one Mr. Pierce, but then unused for a playhouse. One Mr. Rosseter, a partner of the said complainant [Keysar] dealt for and compounded with the said Mr. Pierce [Master of the Paul's Boys] to the only benefit of him, the said Rosseter, the now complainant [Keysar], the rest of their partners and company, and without the privity, knowledge, or consent of these defendants [the King's Company], or any of them, and that thereby they, the said complainant [Keysar] and the said Rosseter and their partners and company might advance their gains and profit to be had and made in their said house in Whitefriars, that there might be a cessation of playing and plays to be acted in the said house near St. Paul's Church aforesaid, for which the said Rosseter compounded with the said Pierce to give him, the said Pierce, twenty pounds per annum.[534]

[Footnote 534: Wallace, Shakespeare and his London Associates, p. 95.]

By this means Rosseter disposed of the competition of the Paul's Boys. But, although he secured a monopoly on child-acting, he failed to secure a monopoly on private playhouses, for shortly after he had sealed this bargain with Pierce, the powerful King's Men opened up at Blackfriars. Rosseter promptly requested them to pay half the "dead rent" to Pierce, which they good-naturedly agreed to do.

In 1613 Whitefriars was rented by certain London apprentices for the performance "at night" of Robert Taylor's The Hog Hath Lost His Pearl. The episode is narrated by Sir Henry Wotton in a letter to Sir Edmund Bacon:

On Sunday last, at night, and no longer, some sixteen apprentices (of what sort you shall guess by the rest of the story) having secretly learnt a new play without book,[535] entitled The Hog Hath Lost His Pearl, took up the Whitefriars for their theatre, and having invited thither (as it should seem) rather their mistresses than their masters, who were all to enter per buletini for a note of distinction from ordinary comedians. Towards the end of the play the sheriffs (who by chance had heard of it) came in (as they say) and carried some six or seven of them to perform the last act at Bridewell. The rest are fled. Now it is strange to hear how sharp-witted the city is, for they will needs have Sir John Swinerton, the Lord Mayor, be meant by the Hog, and the late Lord Treasurer by the Pearl.[536]

[Footnote 535: Miss Gildersleeve, in her valuable Government Regulation of the Elizabethan Drama, p. 112, says: "Just what is the meaning of 'a new Play without Book' no one seems to have conjectured." And she develops the theory that "it refers to the absence of a licensed play-book," etc. The phrase "to learn without book" meant simply "to memorize."]

[Footnote 536: Reliquiae Wottonianae (ed. 1672), p. 402. The letter is dated merely 1612-13. In connection with the play one should study The Hector of Germany, 1615.]

Apparently the Children of the Queen's Revels continued successfully at Whitefriars until March, 1613. On that date Rosseter agreed with Henslowe to join the Revels with the Lady Elizabeth's Men then acting at the Swan. The new organization, following the example of the King's Men, used Whitefriars as a winter, and the Swan as a summer, house. Thus for a time at least Whitefriars came under the management of Henslowe.

Rosseter's lease of the building was to expire in the following year. He seems to have made plans—possibly with the assistance of Henslowe—to erect in Whitefriars a more suitable playhouse for the newly organized company; at least that is a plausible interpretation of the following curious entry in Sir George Buc's Office Book: "July 13, 1613, for a license to erect a new playhouse in Whitefriars, &c. L20."[537] But the new playhouse thus projected never was built, doubtless because of strong local opposition. Instead, Henslowe erected for the company a public playhouse on the Bankside, known as "The Hope."

[Footnote 537: Malone, Variorum, III, 52.]

In March, 1614, at the expiration of one year, Rosseter withdrew from his partnership with Henslowe. On December 25, 1614, his lease of the Whitefriars expired, and he was apparently unable to renew it. Thereupon he attempted to fit up a private playhouse in the district of Blackfriars, and on June 3, 1615, he actually secured a royal license to do so. But in this effort, too, he was foiled.[538]

[Footnote 538: See the chapter on "Rosseter's Blackfriars." The documents concerned in this venture are printed in The Malone Society's Collections, I, 277.]

After this we hear little or nothing of the Whitefriars Playhouse. Yet the building may occasionally have been used for dramatic purposes. Cunningham says: "The case of Trevill v. Woodford, in the Court of Requests, informs us that plays were performed at the Whitefriars Theatre as late as 1621; Sir Anthony Ashley, the then landlord of the house, entering the theatre in that year, and turning the players out of doors, on pretense that half a year's rent was yet unpaid to him."[539] I have not been able to examine this document. Neither Fleay nor Murray has found any trace of a company at Whitefriars after Rosseter's departure; hence for all practical purposes we may regard the Whitefriars Playhouse as having come to the end of its career in 1614.

[Footnote 539: The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 90. The document printed by Collier in New Facts Regarding the Life of Shakespeare (1835), p. 44, as from a manuscript in his possession, is, I think, an obvious forgery.]



CHAPTER XVI

THE HOPE

On August 29, 1611, Henslowe became manager of the Lady Elizabeth's Men. Having agreed among other things to furnish them with a playhouse,[540] and no longer being in possession of the Rose, he rented the old Swan and maintained them there throughout the year 1612.

[Footnote 540: The agreement has been lost, but for a probably similar agreement, made with the actor Nathaniel Field, see Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 23.]

In March of the following year, 1613, he entered into a partnership with Philip Rosseter (the manager of the private playhouse of Whitefriars), and "joined" the Lady Elizabeth's Men with Rosseter's excellent troupe of the Queen's Revels. Apparently the intention of Henslowe and Rosseter was to form a company strong enough to compete on equal terms with the King's Men. In imitation of the King's Men, who used the Globe as a summer and the Blackfriars as a winter home, the newly amalgamated company was to use the Swan and the Whitefriars.[541] And the chief actor of the troupe, corresponding to Richard Burbage of the King's Men, was to be Nathaniel Field, then at the height of his powers:

Cokes. Which is your Burbage now?

Leatherhead. What mean you by that, sir?

Cokes. Your best actor, your Field.

Littlewit. Good, i' faith! you are even with me, sir.[542]

[Footnote 541: Daborne writes to Henslowe on June 5, 1613: "The company told me you were expected there yesterday to conclude about their coming over ... my own play which shall be ready before they come over." This, I suspect, refers to the moving of the company to the Swan for the summer. (See Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 72.) That Henslowe was manager of a "private" house in 1613 is revealed by another letter from Daborne, dated December 9, 1613. (See Greg, ibid., p. 79.)]

[Footnote 542: Bartholomew Fair, V, iii. The part of Littlewit was presumably taken by Field himself.]

Among their playwrights were Ben Jonson, Philip Massinger, John Fletcher, and Robert Daborne, not to mention Field, who in addition to acting wrote excellent plays.

If it was the purpose of Henslowe and Rosseter to compete with the Globe Company in a winter as well as in a summer house, that purpose was endangered by the fact that Rosseter's lease of his private theatre expired within a year and a half, and could not be renewed. Rosseter and Henslowe, as pointed out in the preceding chapter, seem to have attempted to erect in Whitefriars a winter home for their troupe; so, at least, I have interpreted the curious entry in Sir George Buc's Office Book: "July 13, 1613, for a license to erect a new playhouse in the Whitefriars, &c. L20."[543] The attempt, however, was foiled, probably by the strong opposition of the inhabitants of the district.

[Footnote 543: Malone, Variorum, III, 52.]

Shortly after this, Henslowe made plans to provide the company with a new and better public playhouse on the Bankside, more conveniently situated than the Swan. The old Bear Garden was beginning to show signs of decay, and, doubtless, would soon have to be rebuilt. This suggested to Henslowe the idea of tearing down that ancient structure and erecting in its place a larger and handsomer building to serve both for the performance of plays and for the baiting of animals. To this plan Jacob Meade, Henslowe's partner in the ownership of the Bear Garden, agreed.



Accordingly, on August 29, 1613, Henslowe and Meade signed a contract with a carpenter named Katherens to pull down the Bear Garden and erect in its place a new structure. The original contract, preserved among the Henslowe Papers, is one of the most valuable documents we have relating to the early theatres. It is too long and verbose for insertion here, but I give below a summary of its contents.[544] Katherens agreed:

1. To "pull down" the Bear Garden and "the stable wherein the bulls and horses" had been kept; and "near or upon the said place where the said game-place did heretofore stand," to "newly erect, build, and set up" a "playhouse, fit and convenient in all things both for players to play in, and for the game of bears and bulls to be baited in."

2. "To build the same of such large compass, form, wideness, and height as the playhouse called the Swan."

3. To provide for the building "a good sure, and sufficient foundation of bricks ... thirteen inches at the least above the ground."

4. To make three galleries: "the inner principal posts of the first story to be twelve feet in height, and ten inches square; in the middle story ... eight inches square; in the upper story ... seven inches square."[545]

5. To "make two boxes in the lowermost story, fit and decent for gentlemen to sit in," and in the rest of the galleries "partitions between the rooms as they are in the said playhouse called the Swan."

6. To construct "a stage, to be carried and taken away, and to stand upon tressels, good, substantial, and sufficient for the carrying and bearing of such a stage."

7. To "build the heavens all over the said stage, to be borne or carried without any posts or supporters to be fixed or set upon the said stage."

8. To equip the stage with "a fit and convenient tyre-house."

9. To "build two staircases without and adjoining to the said playhouse ... of such largeness and height as the staircases of the said playhouse called the Swan."

10. "To new build, erect, and set up the said bull-house and stable ... of that largeness and fitness as shall be sufficient to keep and hold six bulls and three horses."

11. "To new tyle with English tyles all the upper roof of the said playhouse ... and stable."

12. To have the playhouse finished "upon or before the last day of November," 1613.

[Footnote 544: The contract is printed in full in Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 19.]

[Footnote 545: The height is given for the first story only. We may assume that the middle and uppermost stories were of diminishing heights, as in the case of the Fortune Playhouse, in which the galleries were respectively twelve, eleven, and nine feet in height.]

For all this Katherens was to receive the sum of L360; but since Henslowe and Meade supplied a large share of the lumber and other materials, the total cost of the building may be estimated as not less than L600.

When completed, the new playhouse was appropriately christened "The Hope."

It has been generally assumed that a picture of the Hope is given in Visscher's View of London, published in 1616; but this, I think, is exceedingly doubtful. In drawing the Bankside, Visscher rather slavishly copied the Agas map of 1560, inserting a few new buildings,—notably the playhouses,—and it is virtually certain that he represented the "Bear Garden" (so he distinctly calls it) and the Globe as they were before their reconstruction.[546] The first representation of the Hope is to be found in Hollar's splendid View of London published in 1647 (see page 326). At this time the building, which had for many years been devoted wholly to the royal sports of bull- and bear-baiting, was still standing. It is hard to believe that an artist who so carefully represented the famous edifices of the city should have greatly erred in drawing the "Bear Baiting House,"—a structure more curious than they, and quite as famous.

[Footnote 546: The Merian View of London, published in 1638 at Frankfort-am-Main, is merely a copy of the Visscher view with the addition of certain details from another and earlier view not yet identified. It has no independent value. The View of London printed in Howell's Londinopolis (1657), is merely a slavish copy of the Merian view. Visscher's representation of the Bear Garden does not differ in any essential way from the representation in Hondius's View of 1610. For a fuller discussion see pages 126, 146, 248.]

Hollar represents the Hope as circular. According to the contract Katherens was "to build the same of such large compass, form, wideness, and height as the playhouse called the Swan." Whether the word "form" was intended to apply to the exterior of the building we do not know. The Swan was decahedral; Visscher represents the "Bear Garden" as octagonal (which is correct for the Bear Garden that preceded the Hope). But since the exterior was of lime and plaster, and a decahedral form had no advantage, Katherens may well have constructed a circular building as Hollar indicates. Perhaps it is significant in this connection that John Taylor, the Water-Poet, in his Bull, Bear, and Horse, refers to the Hope as a "sweet, rotuntious college." Significant also, perhaps, is the clause in the contract by which Katherens was required to "build the heavens all over the stage," for this exactly describes the heavens as drawn by Hollar. I see no reason to doubt that in the View of 1647 we have a reasonably faithful representation of the Hope.



The Hope was probably opened shortly after November 30, 1613, the date at which Katherens had bound himself to have the building "fully finished," and it was occupied, of course, by the Henslowe and Rosseter troupe of actors. The arrangement of the movable stage enabled Henslowe and Meade to use the building also for animal-baiting. According to the contract with the actors, the latter were to "lie still one day in fourteen" for the baiting.[547] This may not have been a serious interruption for the players; but the presence of the stable, the bear dens, and the kennels for the dogs must have rendered the playhouse far from pleasant to the audiences. Ben Jonson, in the Induction to his Bartholomew Fair, acted at the Hope in October, 1614, remarks: "And though the Fair be not kept in the same region that some here perhaps would have it, yet think that therein the author hath observed a special decorum, the place being as dirty as Smithfield, and as stinking every whit."[548]

[Footnote 547: Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 88; cf. p. 125, where animal-baiting is said to be used "one day of every four days"—a possible error for "fourteen days." In the manuscript notes to the Phillipps copy of Stow's Survey (1631), we are told that baiting was used at the Hope on Tuesdays and Thursdays; but the anonymous commentator is very inaccurate.]

[Footnote 548: The Rose Playhouse was likewise affected. Dekker, in Satiromastix, III, iv, says: "Th'ast a breath as sweet as the Rose that grows by the Bear Garden."]

In March, 1614,—that is, at the completion of one full year under the joint management of Henslowe and Rosseter,—the amalgamated company was "broken," and Rosseter withdrew, selling his interest in the company's apparel to Henslowe and Meade for L63. The latter at once reorganized the actors under the patent of the Lady Elizabeth's Men, and continued them at the Hope.[549] The general excellence of the troupe thus formed is referred to by John Taylor, the Water-Poet, in the lines:

And such a company (I'll boldly say) That better (nor the like) e'er play'd a play.[550]

[Footnote 549: Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 87. The articles of agreement between Henslowe and Meade and the company, are printed by Greg on page 23.]

[Footnote 550: Works, Folio of 1630; The Spenser Society's reprint, p. 307.]

But this encomium may have been in large measure due to gratitude, for the company had just saved the Water-Poet from a very embarrassing situation. The amusing episode which gave occasion to this deserves to be chronicled in some detail.

With "a thousand bills posted over the city" Taylor had advertised to the public that at the Hope Playhouse on October 7, 1614, he would engage in a contest of wit with one William Fennor, who proudly styled himself "The King's Majesty's Riming Poet."[551] On the appointed day the house was "fill'd with a great audience" that had paid extra money to hear the contest between two such well-known extemporal wits. But Fennor did not appear. The result may best be told by Taylor himself:

I then stept out, their angers to appease; But they all raging, like tempestuous seas, Cry'd out, their expectations were defeated, And how they all were cony-catch'd and cheated. Some laught, some swore, some star'd and stamp'd and curst, And in confused humors all out burst. I (as I could) did stand the desp'rate shock, And bid the brunt of many dang'rous knock. For now the stinkards, in their ireful wraths, Bepelted me with lome, with stones, with laths. One madly sits like bottle-ale and hisses; Another throws a stone, and 'cause he misses, He yawnes and bawles, ... Some run to th' door to get again their coin ... One valiantly stepped upon the stage, And would tear down the hangings in his rage ... What I endur'd upon that earthly hell My tongue or pen cannot describe it well.[552]

[Footnote 551: Fennor is not to be confused (as is commonly done) with Vennar (see p. 177). Such wit-contests were popular; Fennor had recently challenged Kendall, on the Fortune Stage.]

[Footnote 552: John Taylor's Works, Folio of 1630, p. 142; The Spenser Society's reprint, p. 304.]

At this point the actors came to his rescue and presented a play that mollified the audience. Taylor had to content himself with a printed justification. The bitter invective of Taylor against Fennor, Fennor's reply, and Taylor's several answers are to be found in the folio edition of the Water-Poet's works. The episode doubtless furnished much amusement to the city.

Some three weeks after this event, on October 31, 1614, the Lady Elizabeth's Men produced with great success Jonson's Bartholomew Fair; and on November 1 they were called upon to give the play at Court. But the career of the company was in the main unhappy. Henslowe managed their affairs on the theory that "should these fellows come out of my debt, I should have no rule with them."[553] Accordingly in three years he "broke" and again reorganized them no fewer than five times.

[Footnote 553: Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 89.]

At last, in February, 1615, he not only "broke" the company, but severed his connection with them for ever. He turned the hired men over to other troupes, and sold the stock of apparel "to strangers" for L400. The indignant actors, in June, 1615, drew up "Articles of Grievance" in which they charged Henslowe with having extorted from the company by unjust means the sum of L567; and also "Articles of Oppression" in which they accused him of various dishonorable practices in his dealings with them.[554]

[Footnote 554: Ibid., pp. 86, 89.]

Shortly after severing his connection with the Lady Elizabeth's Men, Henslowe, in March, 1615, seems to have taken over Prince Charles's Men, who, it appears, had been acting at the Swan. To this new company—the "strangers" referred to, I think—he had already transferred some of the hirelings, and had sold the Hope stock of apparel for L400.

Henslowe died early in January of the following year, 1616, and his interest in the theatre passed to Edward Alleyn. On March 20, 1616, Alleyn and Meade engaged Prince Charles's Men to continue at the Hope "according to the former articles of agreement had and made with the said Philip [Henslowe] and Jacob [Meade]."[555] The actors acknowledged themselves indebted to Henslowe "for a stock of apparel used for playing apparel, to the value of L400, heretofore delivered unto them by the said Philip,"[556]—the stock formerly used by the Lady Elizabeth's Men; and Alleyn and Meade agreed to accept L200 in full discharge of that debt.[557]

[Footnote 555: Collier, Memoirs of Edward Alleyn, p. 127; Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 91.]

[Footnote 556: Collier, Memoirs of Edward Alleyn, p. 127.]

[Footnote 557: My interpretation of the relation of Henslowe to Prince Charles's Men differs from the interpretation given by Fleay and adopted by Greg and others. For the evidence bearing on the case see Fleay, Stage, pp. 188, 262; Greg, Henslowe's Diary, II, 138; Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 90, note; Chambers, Modern Language Review, IV, 165; Cunningham, Revels, p. xliv; Wallace, Englische Studien, XLIII, 390; Murray, English Dramatic Companies.]

In the winter of 1616-17, Prince Charles's Men quarreled with Meade, who had appropriated an extra day for his bear-baiting. Rosseter had just completed a new private theatre in Porter's Hall, Blackfriars, and that stood invitingly open. So about February they abandoned the Hope, and wrote a letter of explanation to Edward Alleyn: "I hope you mistake not our removal from the Bankside. We stood the intemperate weather, 'till more intemperate Mr. Meade thrust us over, taking the day from us which by course was ours."[558]

[Footnote 558: Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 93. Cf. also the chapter on "Rosseter's Blackfriars."]

After the company quarreled with Meade and deserted the Hope, there is no evidence that the building was again used for plays. It became associated almost entirely with animal-baiting, fencing, feats of activity, and such-like performances; and gradually the very name "Hope," which was identified with acting, gave way to the earlier designation "Bear Garden." In 1632 the author of Holland's Leaguer remarks that "wild beasts and gladiators did most possess it"; and such must have been the chief use of the building down to 1642, when animal-baiting was prohibited by Parliament.[559]

[Footnote 559: Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), III, 102; Ordish, Early London Theatres, p. 237.]

On January 14, 1647, at the disposition of the Church lands, the Hope was sold for L1783 15s.[560]

[Footnote 560: Arthur Tiler, St. Saviour's, p. 51; Reed's Dodsley, IX, 175.]

In certain manuscript notes entered in the Phillipps copy of Stow's Annals (1631), we read:

The Hope, on the Bankside, in Southwarke, commonly called the Bear Garden, a playhouse for stage-plays on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, and for the baiting of Bears on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the stage being made to take up and down when they please. It was built in the year 1610, and now pulled down to make tenements, by Thomas Walker, a petticoat-maker in Cannon Street, on Tuesday, the 25 day of March, 1656. Seven of Mr. Godfrey's bears, by the command of Thomas Pride, then high sheriff of Surrey, were then shot to death on Saturday the 9 day of February, 1655 [i.e. 1656], by a company of soldiers.[561]

[Footnote 561: Printed in The Academy, October 28, 1882, p. 314. As to "Mr. Godfrey" see Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), III, 102.]

The mistakes in the earlier part of this note are obvious, yet the latter part is so circumstantial that we cannot well doubt its general accuracy. The building, however, was not pulled down "to the ground," though its interior may have been converted into tenements.

At the Restoration, when the royal sport of bear-baiting was revived, the Hope was again fitted up as an amphitheatre and opened to the public. The Earl of Manchester, on September 29, 1664, wrote to the city authorities, requesting that the butchers be required, as of old, to provide food for the dogs and bears:

He had been informed by the Master of His Majesty's Game of Bears and Bulls, and others, that the Butchers' Company had formerly caused all their offal in Eastcheap and Newgate Market to be conveyed by the beadle of that Company unto two barrow houses, conveniently placed on the river side, for the provision and feeding of the King's Game of Bears, which custom had been interrupted in the late troubles when the bears were killed. His Majesty's game being now removed to the usual place on the Bankside, by Order of the Council, he recommended the Court of Aldermen to direct the Master and Wardens of the Butchers' Company to have their offal conveyed as formerly for the feeding of the bears, &c.[562]

[Footnote 562: The Remembrancia, p. 478. Quoted by Ordish, Early London Theatres, p. 241.]

For some years the Bear Garden flourished as it had in the days of Elizabeth and James. It was frequently visited by Samuel Pepys, who has left vivid accounts of several performances there. In his Diary, August 14, 1666, he writes:

After dinner with my wife and Mercer to the Bear-garden; where I have not been, I think, of many years, and saw some good sport of the bull's tossing of the dogs: one into the very boxes. But it is a very rude and nasty pleasure. We had a great many hectors in the same box with us (and one, very fine, went into the pit, and played his dog for a wager, which was a strange sport for a gentleman), where they drank wine, and drank Mercer's health first; which I pledged with my hat off.

John Evelyn, likewise, in his Diary, June 16, 1670, records a visit to the Bear Garden:

I went with some friends to the Bear Garden, where was cock-fighting, dog-fighting, bear- and bull-baiting, it being a famous day for all these butcherly sports, or rather barbarous cruelties. The bulls did exceeding well; but the Irish wolf-dog exceeded, which was a tall greyhound, a stately creature indeed, who beat a cruel mastiff. One of the bulls tossed a dog full into a lady's lap as she sat in one of the boxes at a considerable height from the arena. Two poor dogs were killed; and so all ended with the ape on horseback, and I most heartily weary of the rude and dirty pastime, which I had not seen, I think, in twenty years before.

On January 7, 1676, the Spanish Ambassador was entertained at the Bear Garden, as we learn from a warrant, dated March 28, 1676, for the payment of L10 "to James Davies, Esq., Master of His Majesty's Bears, Bulls, and Dogs, for making ready the rooms at the Bear Garden, and baiting of the bears before the Spanish Ambassador, the 7 January last, 1675 {6}."[563]

[Footnote 563: British Museum Additional MSS. 5750; quoted by Cunningham, Handbook of London (1849), I, 67.]

Rendle[564] quotes from The Loyal Protestant an advertisement of an entertainment to be given so late as 1682 "at the Hope on the Bankside, being His Majesty's Bear Garden." And Malcolm writes the following account of the baiting of a horse there in April of the same year:

Notice was given in the papers that on the twelfth of April a horse, of uncommon strength, and between 18 and 19 hands high, would be baited to death at his Majesty's Bear-Garden at the Hope on the Bankside, for the amusement of the Morocco ambassador, many of the nobility who knew the horse, and any others who would pay the price of admission. It seems this animal originally belonged to the Earl of Rochester, and being of a ferocious disposition, had killed several of his brethren; for which misdeed he was sold to the Earl of Dorchester; in whose service, committing several similar offenses, he was transferred to the worse than savages who kept the Bear-Garden. On the day appointed several dogs were set upon the vindictive steed, which he destroyed or drove from the arena; at this instant his owners determined to preserve him for a future day's sport, and directed a person to lead him away; but before the horse had reached London Bridge the spectators demanded the fulfilment of the promise of baiting him to death, and began to destroy the building: to conclude, the poor beast was brought back, and other dogs set upon him, without effect, when he was stabbed to death with a sword.[565]

[Footnote 564: The Antiquarian Magazine and Bibliographer, VIII, 59.]

[Footnote 565: James Peller Malcolm, Anecdotes of the Manners and Customs of London from the Roman Invasion to the Year 1700 (London, 1811), p. 425.]

This is the last reference to the Hope that I have been able to discover. Soon after this date the "royal sport of bulls, bears, and dogs" was moved to Hockley-in-the-hole, Clerkenwell, where, as the advertisements inform us, at "His Majesty's Bear Garden" the baiting of animals was to be frequently seen.[566] Strype, in his Survey of London, thus describes Bear Garden Alley on the Bankside:

Bear Alley runs into Maiden Lane. Here is a Glass House; and about the middle is a new-built Court, well inhabited, called Bear Garden Square, so called as built in the place where the Bear Garden formerly stood, until removed to the other side of the water: which is more convenient for the butchers, and such like who are taken with such rustic sports as the baiting of bears and bulls.[567]

[Footnote 566: The earliest advertisement of the Bear Garden at Hockley-in-the-hole that I have come upon is dated 1700. For a discussion of the sports there see J.P. Malcolm, Anecdotes of the Manners and Customs of London during the Eighteenth Century (1808), p. 321; Cunningham, Handbook of London, under "Hockley"; W.B. Boulton, Amusements of Old London, vol. I, chap. I.]

[Footnote 567: Ordish (Early London Theatres, p. 242) is mistaken in thinking that the old building was converted into a glass house. He says: "The last reference to the Hope shows that it had declined to the point of extinction," and he quotes an advertisement from the Gazette, June 18, 1681, as follows: "There is now made at the Bear Garden glass-house, on the Bankside, crown window-glass, much exceeding French glass in all its qualifications, which may be squared into all sizes of sashes for windows, and other uses, and may be had at most glaziers in London." From Strype's Survey it is evident that the glass house was in Bear Garden Alley, but not on the site of the old Bear Garden.]

In the map which he gives of this region (reproduced on page 245) the position of the Hope is clearly marked by the square near the middle of Bear Alley.



CHAPTER XVII

ROSSETER'S BLACKFRIARS, OR PORTER'S HALL

Philip Rosseter, the poet and musician, first appears as a theatrical manager in 1610, when he secured a royal patent for the Children of the Queen's Revels to act at Whitefriars. This company performed there successfully under his management until March, 1613, when, for some unknown reason, he formed a partnership with Philip Henslowe, who was managing the Lady Elizabeth's Men at the Swan. The two companies were combined, and the new organization, under the name of "The Lady Elizabeth's Men," made use of both playhouses, the Swan as a summer and the Whitefriars as a winter home.

As already explained in the preceding chapters, Rosseter's lease on the Whitefriars Playhouse was to expire in 1614, and apparently he was unable to renew the lease.[568] Naturally he and his partner Henslowe were anxious to secure a private playhouse in the city to serve as a winter home for their troupe, especially since the Swan was poorly situated for winter patronage. This may explain the following entry in Sir George Buc's Office-Book: "July 13, 1613, for a license to erect a new playhouse in Whitefriars &c. L20."[569] The new playhouse, however, was not built. Probably the opposition of the inhabitants of the district led to its prohibition.

[Footnote 568: Nathaniel Field, the leading actor at Whitefriars, published A Woman is a Weathercock in 1612, with the statement to the reader: "If thou hast anything to say to me, thou know'st where to hear of me for a year or two, and no more, I assure thee." Possibly this reflects the failure of the managers to renew the lease; after 1614 Field did not know where he would be acting. But editors have generally regarded it as meaning that Field intended to withdraw from acting.]

[Footnote 569: Malone, Variorum, III, 52.]

At the expiration of one year, in March, 1614, Rosseter withdrew from his partnership with Henslowe, and on the old patent of the Children of the Queen's Revels (which he had retained) organized a new company to travel in the country.

In the following year, 1615, he and certain others, Philip Kingman, Robert Jones, and Ralph Reeve, secured a lease of "diverse buildings, cellars, sollars, chambers, and yards for the building of a playhouse thereupon for the better practising and exercise of the said Children of the Revels; all which premises are situate and being within the precinct of the Blackfriars, near Puddlewharf, in the suburbs of London, called by the name of the Lady Saunders's House, or otherwise Porter's Hall."[570] It was their purpose to convert this hall into a playhouse to rival the near-by Blackfriars; and in accordance with this purpose, on June 3, 1615, Rosseter secured a royal license under the Great Seal of England "to erect, build, and set up in and upon the said premises before mentioned one convenient playhouse for the said Children of the Revels, the same playhouse to be used by the Children of the Revels for the time being of the Queene's Majesty, and for the Prince's Players, and for the Lady Elizabeth's Players."[571]

[Footnote 570: The Malone Society's Collections, I, 277. For the location of Puddlewharf see the map of the Blackfriars precinct on page 94.]

[Footnote 571: The Malone Society's Collections, I, 277.]

The work of converting Porter's Hall into a playhouse seems to have begun at once. On September 26, 1615, the Privy Council records "that one Rosseter, and others, having obtained license under the Great Seal of England for the building of a playhouse, have pulled down [i.e., stripped the interior of] a great messuage in Puddlewharf, which was sometimes the house of the Lady Saunders, within the precinct of the Blackfriars, and are now erecting a new playhouse in that place."[572]

[Footnote 572: Ibid., p. 373.]

The city authorities, always hostile to the actors and jealous of any new theatres, made so vigorous a complaint to the Privy Council that the Lords of the Council "thought fit to send for Rosseter." He came, bringing his royal license. This document was carefully "perused by the Lord Chief Justice of England," who succeeded in discovering in the wording of one of its clauses a trivial flaw that would enable the Privy Council, on a technicality, to prohibit the building: "The Lord Chief Justice did deliver to their Lordships that the license granted to the said Rosseter did extend to the building of a playhouse without the liberties of London, and not within the city."[573] Now, in 1608 the liberty of Blackfriars had by a special royal grant been placed within the jurisdiction of the city. Rosseter's license unluckily had described the Lady Saunders's house as being "in the suburbs," though, of course, the description was otherwise specific enough: "all which premises are situate and being within the precinct of the Blackfriars, near Puddlewharf, in the suburbs of London, called by the name of the Lady Saunders's House, or otherwise Porter's Hall."

[Footnote 573: The Malone Society's Collections, I, 373.]

Since "the inconveniences urged by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen were many," the Lords of the Privy Council decided to take advantage of the flaw discovered by the Lord Chief Justice, and prohibit the erection of the playhouse. Their order, issued September 26, 1615, reads as follows:

It was this day ordered by their Lordships that there shall be no playhouse erected in that place, and that the Lord Mayor of London shall straightly prohibit the said Rosseter and the rest of the patentees, and their workmen to proceed in the making and converting the said building into a playhouse. And if any of the patentees or their workmen shall proceed in their intended building contrary to this their Lordships' inhibition, that then the Lord Mayor shall commit him or them so offending unto prison and certify their Lordships of their contempt in that behalf.[574]

[Footnote 574: Ibid.]

This order, for the time being, halted work on the new playhouse. The Children of the Revels were forced to spend the next year traveling in the provinces; and the Lady Elizabeth's Men and Prince Charles's Men had to remain on the Bankside and endure the oppressions of Henslowe and later of Meade. Possibly their sufferings at the hands of Meade led them to urge Rosseter to complete at once the much desired house in the city. At any rate, in the winter of 1616, Rosseter, believing himself strongly enough entrenched behind his royal patent, resumed work on converting Porter's Hall into a theatre. The city authorities issued "diverse commandments and prohibitions," but he paid no attention to these, and pushed the work to completion. The building seems to have been ready for the actors about the first of January, 1617. Thereupon the company which had been occupying the Hope deserted that playhouse and "came over" to Rosseter's Blackfriars.[575] In the new playhouse they presented Nathaniel Field's comedy, Amends for Ladies, which was printed the following year "as it was acted at the Blackfriars both by the Prince's Servants and the Lady Elizabeth's."

[Footnote 575: See the chapter on "The Hope."]

The actors, however, were not allowed to enjoy their new home very long. On January 27, 1617, the Privy Council dispatched the following letter to the Lord Mayor:

Whereas His Majesty is informed that notwithstanding diverse commandments and prohibitions to the contrary, there be certain persons that go about to set up a playhouse in the Blackfriars near unto His Majesty's Wardrobe, and for that purpose have lately erected and made fit a building, which is almost if not fully finished. You shall understand that His Majesty hath this day expressly signified his pleasure that the same shall be pulled down, so as it be made unfit for any such use; whereof we require your Lordship to take notice and to cause it to be performed accordingly, with all speed, and thereupon to certify us of your proceeding.

There can be no doubt that an order so peremptory, carrying the authority both of the Privy Council and of the King, and requiring an immediate report, was performed "with all speed." After this we hear nothing more of the playhouse in Puddlewharf.[576]

[Footnote 576: I can find no further reference to the Puddlewharf Theatre either in the Records of the Privy Council or in the Remembrancia of the City. Collier, however, in his History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), I, 384, says: "The city authorities proceeded immediately to the work, and before three days had elapsed, the Privy Council was duly and formally made acquainted with the fact that Rosseter's theatre had been 'made unfit for any such use' as that for which it had been constructed." Collier fails to cite his authority for the statement; the passage he quotes may be found in the order of the Privy Council printed above.]



CHAPTER XVIII

THE PHOENIX, OR COCKPIT IN DRURY LANE

The private playhouse opened in Drury Lane[577] in 1617 seems to have been officially named "The Phoenix"; but to the players and the public alike it was more commonly known as "The Cockpit." This implies some earlier connection of the site or of the building with cock-fighting, from time out of mind a favorite sport in England. Stowe writes in his Survey: "Cocks of the game are yet cherished by diverse men for their pleasures, much money being laid on their heads, when they fight in pits, whereof some be costly made for that purpose." These pits, it seems, were circular in shape, and if large enough might well be used for dramatic purposes. Shakespeare, in Henry V (1599), likens his playhouse to a cockpit:

Can this cockpit hold The vasty fields of France? or may we cram Within this wooden O the very casques That did affright the air at Agincourt?

[Footnote 577: Its exact position in Drury Lane is indicated by an order of the Privy Council, June 8, 1623, concerning the paving of a street at the rear of the theatre: "Whereas the highway leading along the backside of the Cockpit Playhouse near Lincolns Inn Fields, and the street called Queens Street adjoining to the same, are become very foul," etc. (See The Malone Society Collections, I, 383. Queens Street may be readily found in Faithorne's Map of London.) Malone (Variorum, III, 53) states that "it was situated opposite the Castle Tavern." The site is said to be marked by Pit Court.]

It is possible, then, that the building was an old cockpit made into a playhouse. Howes,[578] in enumerating the London theatres, says: "Five inns or common hostelries turned into playhouses, one cockpit, St. Paul's singing-school," etc. And Thomas Randolph, in verses prefixed to James Shirley's Grateful Servant (printed in 1630 as it was acted "in the private house in Drury Lane"), suggests the same metamorphosis:

When thy intelligence on the Cockpit stage Gives it a soul from her immortal rage, I hear the Muse's birds with full delight Sing where the birds of Mars were wont to fight.

[Footnote 578: Stow's Annals (1631), p. 1004.]

But in this fantastic conceit Randolph may have been thinking simply of the name of the theatre; possibly he knew nothing of its early history. On the whole it seems more likely that the playhouse was newly erected in 1617 upon the site of an old cockpit. The name "Phoenix" suggests that possibly the old cockpit had been destroyed by fire, and that from its ashes had arisen a new building.[579] Howes describes the Phoenix as being in 1617 "a new playhouse,"[580] and Camden, who is usually accurate in such matters, refers to it in the same year as "nuper erectum."[581]

[Footnote 579: Some scholars have supposed that the playhouse, when attacked by the apprentices in 1617, was burned, and that the name "Phoenix" was given to the building after its reconstruction. But the building was not burned; it was merely wrecked on the inside by apprentices.]

[Footnote 580: Continuation of Stow's Annals (1631), p. 1026.]

[Footnote 581: William Camden, Annals, under the date of March 4, 1617. Yet Sir Sidney Lee (A Life of William Shakespeare, p. 60) says, "built about 1610."]

Of its size and shape all our information comes from James Wright, who in his Historia Histrionica[582] tells us that the Cockpit differed in no essential feature from Blackfriars and Salisbury Court, "for they were all three built almost exactly alike for form and bigness." Since we know that Blackfriars and Salisbury Court were small rectangular theatres, the former constructed in a hall forty-six feet broad and sixty-six feet long, the latter erected on a plot of ground forty-two feet broad and one hundred and forty feet long, we are not left entirely ignorant of the shape and the approximate size of the Cockpit.[583] And from Middleton's Inner Temple Masque (1618) we learn that it was constructed of brick. Its sign, presumably, was that of a phoenix rising out of flames.

[Footnote 582: Hazlitt's Dodsley, XV, 408.]

[Footnote 583: Fleay and Lawrence are wrong in supposing that the Cockpit was circular.]



The playhouse was erected and managed by Christopher Beeston,[584] one of the most important actors and theatrical managers of the Elizabethan period. We first hear of him as a member of Shakespeare's troupe. In 1602 he joined Worcester's Company. In 1612 he became the manager of Queen Anne's Company at the Red Bull. He is described at that time as "a thriving man, and one that was of ability and means."[585] He continued as manager of the Queen Anne's Men at the Red Bull until 1617, when he transferred them to his new playhouse in Drury Lane.

[Footnote 584: Alias Christopher Hutchinson. Several actors of the day employed aliases: Nicholas Wilkinson, alias Tooley; Theophilus Bourne, alias Bird; James Dunstan, alias Tunstall, etc. Whether Beeston admitted other persons to a share in the building I cannot learn. In a passage quoted by Malone (Variorum, III, 121) from the Herbert Manuscript, dated February 20, 1635, there is a reference to "housekeepers," indicating that Beeston had then admitted "sharers" in the proprietorship of the building. And in an order of the Privy Council, May 12, 1637 (The Malone Society's Collections, I, 392), we read: "Command the keepers of the playhouse called the Cockpit in Drury Lane, who either live in it or have relation to it, not to permit plays to be acted there till further order."]

[Footnote 585: Wallace, Three London Theatres, p. 35.]

The playhouse seems to have been ready to receive the players about the end of February, 1617. We know that they were still performing at the Red Bull as late as February 23;[586] but by March 4 they had certainly moved to the Cockpit.

[Footnote 586: Wallace, ibid., pp. 32, 46. John Smith was delivering silk and other clothes to the Queen Anne's Men at the Red Bull from 1612 until February 23, 1617.]

On the latter date, during the performance of a play, the Cockpit was entered by a mob of disorderly persons, who proceeded to demolish the interior. The occasion for the wrecking of the new playhouse was the Shrove Tuesday saturnalia of the London apprentices, who from time immemorial had employed this holiday to pull down houses of ill-fame in the suburbs. That the Cockpit was situated in the neighborhood of such houses cannot be doubted. We may suppose that the mob, fresh from sacking buildings, had crowded into the playhouse in the afternoon, and before the play was over had wrecked that building too.

The event created a great stir at the time. William Camden, in his Annals, wrote under the date of March 4, 1617:

Theatrum ludiorum, nuper erectum in Drury Lane, a furente multitudine diruitur, et apparatus dilaceratur.

Howes, in his continuation of Stow's Annals, writes:

Shrove-Tuesday, the fourth of March, many disordered persons of sundry kinds, amongst whom were very many young boys and lads, that assembled themselves in Lincolnes Inn Field, Finsbury Field, in Ratcliffe, and Stepney Field, where in riotous manner they did beat down the walls and windows of many victualing houses and of all other houses which they suspected to be bawdy houses. And that afternoon they spoiled a new playhouse, and did likewise more hurt in diverse other places.[587]

[Footnote 587: Annals (1631), p. 1026.]

That several persons were killed, and many injured, is disclosed by a letter from the Privy Council to the Lord Mayor, dated March 5, 1617:

It is not unknown unto you what tumultuous outrages were yesterday committed near unto the city of London in diverse places by a rowt of lewd and loose persons, apprentices and others, especially in Lincolns Inn Fields and Drury Lane, where in attempting to pull down a playhouse belonging to the Queen's Majesty's Servants, there were diverse persons slain, and others hurt and wounded, the multitude there assembled being to the number of many thousands, as we are credibly informed.[588]

[Footnote 588: The Malone Society's Collections, I, 374. Collier, in The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), I, 386, prints a long ballad on the event; but he does not give its source, and its genuineness has been questioned. The following year threats to pull down the Fortune, the Red Bull, and the Cockpit led to the setting of special watches. See The Malone Society's Collections, I, 377.]

The Queen's Men returned to the Red Bull and acted there until their ruined playhouse could be repaired. Three months later, on June 3, they again occupied the Cockpit,[589] and continued there until the death of Queen Anne on March 2, 1619.[590]

[Footnote 589: Greenstreet, Documents, The New Shakspere Society's Transactions (1880-86), p. 504.]

[Footnote 590: Mr. Wallace (Three London Theatres, p. 29) says that the documents he prints make it "as certain as circumstances unsupported by contemporary declaration can make it, that Queen Anne's company occupied the Red Bull continuously from the time of its erection ... till their dissolution, 1619." His documents make it certain only that Queen Anne's Men occupied the Red Bull until February 23, 1617. Other documents prove that they occupied the Cockpit from 1617 until 1619. (Note the letter of the Privy Council quoted above.) The documents printed by Greenstreet show that Queen Anne's Men moved to the Cockpit on June 3, 1617, and continued there.]

This event led to the dissolution of the company. For a year or more its members had been "falling at variance and strife amongst themselves," and when the death of the Queen deprived them of a "service," they "separated and divided themselves into other companies."[591] As a result of the quarrels certain members of the company made charges against their former manager, Beeston: "The said Beeston having from the beginning a greater care for his own private gain, and not respecting the good of these defendants and the rest of his fellows and companions, hath in the place and trust aforesaid much enriched himself, and hath of late given over his coat and condition,[592] and separated and divided himself from these defendants, carrying away not only all the furniture and apparel," etc.[593] The charges against Beeston's honesty may be dismissed; but it seems clear that he had withdrawn from his former companions, and was preparing to entertain a new troupe of actors at his playhouse. And Beeston himself tells us, on November 23, 1619, that "after Her Majesty's decease, he entered into the service of the most noble Prince Charles."[594] Thus Prince Charles's Men, after their unfortunate experiences at the Hope and at Rosseter's Blackfriars, came to Beeston's playhouse, where they remained until 1622. In the spring of that year, however, they moved to the Curtain, and the Princess Elizabeth's Men occupied the Cockpit.[595] Under their tenancy, the playhouse seems to have attained an enviable reputation. Heminges and Condell, in the epistle to the readers, prefixed to the Folio of Shakespeare (1623), bear testimony to this in the following terms: "And though you be a Magistrate of Wit, and sit on the stage at Blackfriars, or the Cockpit, to arraign plays daily." A further indication of their prosperity is to be found in the records of St. Giles's Church; for when in 1623 the parish undertook the erection of a new church building, "the players of the Cockpit," we are informed, contributed the large sum of L20, and the proprietors, represented by Christopher Beeston, gave L19 1s. 5d.[596]

[Footnote 591: Wallace, Three London Theatres, p. 33.]

[Footnote 592: He had joined Prince Charles's Men.]

[Footnote 593: Wallace, Three London Theatres, p. 38.]

[Footnote 594: Ibid., p. 40. Fleay, Murray, and others have contended that the Princess Elizabeth's Men came to the Cockpit in 1619, and have denied the accuracy of the title-page of The Witch of Edmonton (1658), which declares that play to have been "acted by the Prince's Servants at the Cockpit often." (See Fleay, A Chronicle History of the London Stage, p. 299.)]

[Footnote 595: Malone, Variorum, III, 59.]

[Footnote 596: John Parton, Some Account of the Hospital and Parish of St. Giles in the Fields, p. 235. From a parish entry in 1660 we learn that the players had to contribute 2d. to the parish poor for each day that there was acting at the Cockpit. (See ibid., p. 236.)]

The Princess Elizabeth's Men continued to act at the Cockpit until May, 1625, when all theatres were closed on account of the plague. Beeston made this the occasion to organize a new company called "Queen Henrietta's Men"; and when the theatres were allowed to reopen, about December, 1625,[597] this new company was in possession of the Cockpit. But the reputation of the playhouse seems not to have been enhanced by the performances of this troupe. In 1629, Lenton, in The Young Gallant's Whirligig, writes sneeringly:

The Cockpit heretofore would serve his wit, But now upon the Friars' Stage he'll sit.

[Footnote 597: In the Middlesex County Records, III, 6, we find that on December 6, 1625, because "the drawing of people together to places was a great means of spreading and continuing the infection ... this Court doth prohibit the players of the house at the Cockpit, being next to His Majesty's Court at Whitehall, commanding them to surcease all such their proceedings until His Majesty's pleasure be further signified." Apparently the playhouses in general had been allowed to resume performances; and since by December 24 there had been no deaths from the plague for a week, the special inhibition of the Cockpit Playhouse was soon lifted.]

And in the following year, 1630, Thomas Carew in verses prefixed to Davenport's Just Italian, attacks the Red Bull and the Cockpit as "adulterate" stages where "noise prevails," and "not a tongue of th' untun'd kennel can a line repeat of serious sense." Queen Henrietta's Men probably continued to occupy the building until May 12, 1636, when the theatres were again closed on account of a serious outbreak of the plague. The plague continued for nearly a year and a half, and during this time the company was dissolved.[598]

[Footnote 598: "When Her Majesty's Servants were at the Cockpit, being all at liberty, they dispersed themselves to several companies." (Heton's Patent, 1639, The Shakespeare Society Papers, IV, 96.)]

Before the plague had ceased, early in 1637, "Mr. Beeston was commanded to make a company of boys."[599] In the Office-Book of the Lord Chamberlain we find, under the date of February 21, 1637: "Warrant to swear Mr. Christopher Beeston His Majesty's Servant in the place of Governor of the new company of The King's and Queen's Boys."[600] The first recorded performance by this new company was at Court on February 7, 1637.[601] On February 23, the number of deaths from the plague having diminished, acting was again permitted; but at the expiration of one week, on March 2, the number of deaths having increased, all playhouses were again closed. During this single week the King's and Queen's Boys, we may suppose, acted at the Cockpit.[602]

[Footnote 599: Herbert Manuscript, Malone, Variorum, III, 240.]

[Footnote 600: Stopes, "Shakespeare's Fellows and Followers," Shakespeare Jahrbuch, XLVI, 99. In 1639 Heton applied for a patent as "Governor" of the company at Salisbury Court.]

[Footnote 601: On May 10 Beeston was paid for "two plays acted by the New Company." See Stopes, "Shakespeare's Fellows and Followers," in the Shakespeare Jahrbuch, XLVI, 99.]

[Footnote 602: Herbert Manuscript, Malone, Variorum, III, 240.]

On May 12, Beeston was arrested and brought before the Privy Council for having allowed his Boys to act a play at the Cockpit during the inhibition.[603] In his apology he explains this as follows: "Petitioner being commanded to erect and prepare a company of young actors for Their Majesties's service, and being desirous to know how they profited by his instructions, invited some noblemen and gentlemen to see them act at his house, the Cockpit. For which, since he perceives it is imputed as a fault, he is very sorry, and craves pardon."[604]

[Footnote 603: The Malone Society's Collections, I, 392.]

[Footnote 604: The Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1636-1637, p. 254.]

On September 17, 1637, "Christopher Beeston, His Majesty's servant, by petition to the Board, showed that he hath many young actors lying unpractised by reason of the restraint occasioned by infection of the plague, whereby they are much disabled to perform their service, and besought that they might have leave to practise. It was ordered that Beeston should be at liberty to practise his actors at Michaelmas next [September 29], if there be no considerable increase of the sickness, nor that there die more than died last week."[605]

[Footnote 605: Ibid., 1637, p. 420.]

On October 2, 1637, the plague having abated, all playhouses were opened, and the King's and Queen's Boys, Herbert tells us, began to play at the Cockpit "the same day."[606] Here, under the popular name of "Beeston's Boys," they enjoyed a long and successful career, which ended only with the prohibition of acting in 1642.

[Footnote 606: Malone, Variorum, III, 240.]

In 1639 Christopher Beeston died, and the position of Governor of the Boys was conferred upon his son, William Beeston, who had long been associated in the management of the company,[607] and who, if we may believe Francis Kirkman, was admirably qualified for the position. In dedicating to him The Loves and Adventures of Clerico and Lozia, Kirkman says:

Divers times in my hearing, to the admiration of the whole company, you have most judiciously discoursed of Poesie: which is the cause I presume to choose you for my patron and protector, who are the happiest interpreter and judge of our English stage-plays this nation ever produced; which the poets and actors of these times cannot (without ingratitude) deny; for I have heard the chief and most ingenious acknowledge their fames and profits essentially sprung from your instruction, judgment, and fancy.

[Footnote 607: He is referred to as their Governor on August 10, 1639; see Malone, Variorum, III, 159.]

But in spite of all this, William Beeston's career as Governor was of short duration. About the first of May, 1640, he allowed the Boys to act without license a play that gave great offense to the King. Herbert, the Master of the Revels, writes of this play that it "had relation to the passages of the King's journey into the north, and was complained of by His Majesty to me, with command to punish the offenders."[608] In the Office-Book of the Lord Chamberlain, under the date of May 3, 1640, we read:

Whereas William Beeston and the company of the players of the Cockpit, in Drury Lane, have lately acted a new play without any license from the Master of His Majesty's Revels, and being commanded to forbear playing or acting of the same play by the said Master of the Revels, and commanded likewise to forbear all manner of playing, have notwithstanding, in contempt of the authority of the said Master of the Revels, and the power granted unto him under the Great Seal of England, acted the said play, and others, to the prejudice of His Majesty's service, and in contempt of the Office of the Revels, [whereby] he and they and all other companies ever have been and ought to be governed and regulated: These are therefore in His Majesty's name, and signification of his royal pleasure, to command the said William Beeston and the rest of that company of the Cockpit players from henceforth and upon sight hereof, to forbear to act any plays whatsoever until they shall be restored by the said Master of the Revels unto their former liberty. Whereof all parties concernable are to take notice, and conform accordingly, as they and every one of them will answer it at their peril.[609]

[Footnote 608: Malone, Variorum, III, 241.]

[Footnote 609: Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), II, 32; Stopes, op. cit., p. 102.]

Herbert records in his Office-Book:

On Monday the 4 May, 1640, William Beeston was taken by a messenger and committed to the Marshalsea by my Lord Chamberlain's warrant, for playing a play without license. The same day the company at the Cockpit was commanded by my Lord Chamberlain's warrant to forbear playing, for playing when they were forbidden by me, and for other disobedience, and lay still Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. On Thursday, at my Lord Chamberlain's entreaty, I gave them their liberty, and upon their petition of submission subscribed by the players, I restored them to their liberty on Thursday.[610]

[Footnote 610: Malone, Variorum, III, 241. Herbert did not forget Beeston's insubordination, and in 1660, in issuing to Beeston a license to use the Salisbury Court Playhouse, he inserted clauses to prevent further difficulty of this kind (see Variorum, III, 243).]

To this period of Beeston's imprisonment I should refer the puzzling Epilogue of Brome's The Court Beggar:

There's wit in that now. But this small Poet vents none but his own, and his by whose care and directions this Stage is govern'd, who has for many years, both in his father's days, and since, directed Poets to write and Players to speak, till he trained up these youths here to what they are now. Aye, some of 'em from before they were able to say a grace of two lines long to have more parts in their pates than would fill so many Dry-vats. And to be serious with you, if after all this, by the venomous practice of some, who study nothing more than his destruction, he should fail us, both Poets and Players would be at loss in reputation.

His "destruction" was wrought, nevertheless, for as a result of his indiscretion he was deposed from his position as Governor of the King's and Queen's Company, and William Davenant was appointed in his place. In the Office-Book of the Lord Chamberlain under the date of June 27, 1640,[611] appears the following entry with the heading, "Mr. Davenant Governor of the Cockpit Players":

Whereas in the playhouse or theatre commonly called the Cockpit, in Drury Lane, there are a company of players authorized by me (as Lord Chamberlain to His Majesty) to play or act under the title of The King's and Queen's Servants, and that by reason of some disorders lately amongst them committed they are disabled in their service and quality: These are therefore to signify that by the same authority I do authorize and appoint William Davenant, Gent., one of Her Majesty's servants, for me and in my name to take into his government and care the said company of players, to govern, order, and dispose of them for action and presentments, and all their affairs in the said house, as in his discretion shall seem best to conduce to His Majesty's service in that quality. And I do hereby enjoin and command them, all and every of them, that are so authorized to play in the said house under the privilege of His or Her Majesty's Servants, and every one belonging as prentices or servants to those actors to play under the same privilege, that they obey the said Mr. Davenant and follow his orders and directions, as they will answer the contrary; which power and privilege he is to continue and enjoy during that lease which Mrs. Elizabeth Beeston, alias Hucheson, hath or doth hold in the said playhouse, provided he be still accountable to me for his care and well ordering the said company.[612]

[Footnote 611: Stopes (op. cit.) dates this June 5, but Collier, Malone, and Chalmers all give June 27, and Mrs. Stopes is not always quite accurate in such matters.]

[Footnote 612: Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), II, 32, note 1.]

Under the direction of Davenant the company acted at the Cockpit until the closing of the theatres two years later.

The history of the playhouse during the troubled years that followed is varied. In the churchwarden's account of St. Giles's Parish is found the entry: "1646. Paid and given to the teacher at the Cockpit of the children, 6d."[613] Apparently the old playhouse was then being temporarily used as a school.

[Footnote 613: John Parton, Some Account of the Hospital and Parish of St. Giles in the Fields, p. 235.]

Wright, in his Historia Histrionica, tells us that at the outbreak of the civil war most of the actors had joined the royal army and served His Majesty, "though in a different, yet more honorable capacity." Some were killed, many won distinction; and "when the wars were over, and the royalists totally subdued, most of 'em who were left alive gathered to London, and for a subsistence endeavored to revive their old trade privately. They made up one company out of all the scattered members of several, and in the winter before the King's murder, 1648, they ventured to act some plays, with as much caution and privacy as could be, at the Cockpit." John Evelyn records in his Diary, under the date of February 5, 1648: "Saw a tragicomedy acted in the Cockpit after there had been none of these diversions for many years during the war." Trouble, however, was brewing for these daring actors. As Wright records: "They continued undisturbed for three or four days, but at last, as they were presenting the tragedy of The Bloody Brother (in which Lowin acted Aubery; Taylor, Rollo; Pollard, the Cook; Burt, Latorch; and, I think, Hart, Otto), a party of foot-soldiers beset the house, surprised 'em about the middle of the play, and carried 'em away in their habits, not admitting them to shift, to Hatton House, then a prison, where, having detained them some time, they plundered them of their clothes, and let 'em loose again."[614]

[Footnote 614: Hazlitt's Dodsley, XV, 409.]

In 1649 the interior of the building was sacked, if we may trust the manuscript note entered in the Phillipps copy of Stow's Annals (1631): "The playhouse in Salisbury Court, in Fleet Street, was pulled down by a company of soldiers set on by the sectaries of these sad times, on Saturday the 24 day of March, 1649. The Phoenix, in Drury Lane, was pulled down also this day, being Saturday the 24 day of March, 1649, by the same soldiers."[615] In the passage quoted, "pulled-down" merely means that the stage and its equipment, and possibly a part of the galleries and the seats, were wrecked, not that the walls of the building itself were thrown down.

[Footnote 615: See The Academy, October 28, 1882, p. 314. The soldiers here mentioned also "pulled down on the inside" the Fortune playhouse.]

In 1656 Sir William Davenant undertook to create a form of dramatic entertainment which would be tolerated by the authorities. The Lord Protector was known to be a lover of music. Sir William, therefore, applied for permission to give operatic entertainments, "after the manner of the antients," the "story sung in recitative music," and the representation made "by the art of perspective in scenes." To such entertainments, he thought, no one could object. He was wise enough to give his first performances at Rutland House; but in 1658 he moved to the Cockpit, where, says Aubrey, "were acted very well, stylo recitativo, Sir Francis Drake and The Siege of Rhodes (1st and 2d parts). It did affect the eye and ear extremely. This first brought scenes in fashion in England; before at plays was only a hanging." Thus the Cockpit had the distinction of being the first English playhouse in which scenery was employed, and, one should add, the first English home of the opera.[616]

[Footnote 616: For a discussion of Davenant's attempts to introduce the opera into England, see W.J. Lawrence, The Elizabethan Playhouse (Second Series), pp. 129 ff.]

Later in the same year, 1658, Davenant exhibited at the Cockpit The Cruelty of the Spaniards in Peru; but this performance excited the suspicion of the authorities, who on December 23 sent for "the poet and the actors" to explain "by what authority the same is exposed to public view."[617]

[Footnote 617: Malone, Variorum, III, 93; Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), II, 48.]

"In the year 1659," writes John Downes in his Roscius Anglicanus, "General Monk marching then his army out of Scotland to London, Mr. Rhodes, a bookseller, being wardrobe-keeper formerly (as I am informed) to King Charles the First's company of commedians in Blackfriars, getting a license from the then governing state,[618] fitted up a house then for acting, called the Cockpit, in Drury Lane, and in a short time completed his company." If this statement is correct, the time must have been early in the year 1659-60, and the company must have attempted at first to play without a proper license. From the Middlesex County Records (III, 282), we learn that one of their important actors, Thomas Lilleston, was held under bond for having performed "a public stage-play this present 4th of February [1659-60] in the Cockpit in Drury Lane in the parish of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, contrary to the law in that case made"; and in the Parish Book[619] of St. Giles we find the entry: "1659. Received of Isack Smith, which he received at the Cockpit playhouse of several offenders, by order of the justices, L3 8s. 6d." Shortly after this, it is to be presumed, the company under Rhodes's management secured the "license of the then governing state" mentioned by Downes, and continued thereafter without interruption. The star of this company was Betterton, whose splendid acting at once captivated London. Pepys went often to the theatre, and has left us some interesting notes of his experiences there. On August 18, 1660, he writes:

Captain Ferrers, my Lord's Cornet, comes to us, who after dinner took me and Creed to the Cockpit play, the first that I have had time to see since my coming from sea, The Loyall Subject, where one Kinaston, a boy, acted the Duke's sister, but made the loveliest lady that ever I saw in my life, only her voice not very good.

[Footnote 618: For his troubles with the Master of the Revels see Halliwell-Phillipps, A Collection of Ancient Documents, p. 26.]

[Footnote 619: Parton, op. cit., p. 236.]

Again on October 11, 1660, he writes:

Here in the Park we met with Mr. Salisbury, who took Mr. Creed and me to the Cockpit to see The Moor of Venice, which was well done. Burt acted the Moor, by the same token a very pretty lady that sat by me called out to see Desdemona smothered.

The subsequent history of the Cockpit falls outside the scope of the present treatise. The reader who desires to trace the part the building played in the Restoration would do well to consult the numerous documents printed by Malone from the Herbert Manuscript.[620]

[Footnote 620: Malone, Variorum, III, 244 ff.]



CHAPTER XIX

SALISBURY COURT

The Salisbury Court Playhouse[621] was projected and built by two men whose very names are unfamiliar to most students of the drama—Richard Gunnell and William Blagrove. Yet Gunnell was a distinguished actor, and was associated with the ownership and management of at least two theatres. Even so early as 1613 his reputation as a player was sufficient to warrant his inclusion as a full sharer in the Palsgrave's Company, then acting at the Fortune. When the Fortune was rebuilt after its destruction by fire in 1621, he purchased one of the twelve shares in the new building, and rose to be manager of the company.[622] In addition to managing the company he also, as we learn from the Herbert Manuscript, supplied the actors with plays. In 1623 he composed The Hungarian Lion, obviously a comedy, and in the following year The Way to Content all Women, or How a Man May Please his Wife.[623] Of William Blagrove I can learn little more than that he was Deputy to the Master of the Revels. In this capacity he signed the license for Glapthorne's Lady Mother, October 15, 1635; and his name appears several times in the Herbert Manuscript in connection with the payments of various companies.[624] Possibly he was related to Thomas Blagrove who during the reign of Elizabeth was an important member of the Revels Office, and who for a time served as Master of the Revels.

[Footnote 621: The playhouse discussed in this chapter was officially known as "The Salisbury Court Playhouse," and it should always be referred to by that name. Unfortunately, owing to its situation near the district of Whitefriars, it was sometimes loosely, though incorrectly, called "Whitefriars." Since it had no relation whatever to the theatre formerly in the Manor-House of Whitefriars, a perpetuation of this false nomenclature is highly undesirable.]

[Footnote 622: Malone, Variorum, III, 66.]

[Footnote 623: Chalmers's Supplemental Apology, pp. 216-17. He may also have been the author of a play called The Masque, which Herbert in 1624 licensed: "For the Palsgrave's Company, a new play called The Masque." In the list of manuscript plays collected by Warburton we find the title A Mask, and the authorship ascribed to R. Govell. Since "R. Govell" is not otherwise heard of, we may reasonably suppose that this was Warburton's reading of "R. Gunell." Gunnell also prefixed a poem to the Works of Captain John Smith, 1626.]

[Footnote 624: Malone, Variorum, III, 66, 122, 176, 177.]

What threw these two men together in a theatrical partnership we do not know. But in the summer of 1629 they decided to build a private playhouse to compete with the successful Blackfriars and Cockpit; and for this purpose they leased from the Earl of Dorset a plot of ground situated to the east of the precinct of Whitefriars. The ground thus leased opened on Salisbury Court; hence the name, "The Salisbury Court Playhouse." In the words of the legal document, the Earl of Dorset "in consideration that Richard Gunnell and William Blagrove should at their costs and charges erect a playhouse and other buildings at the lower end of Salisbury Court, in the parish of St. Bridges, in the ward of Farringdon Without, did demise to the said Gunnell and Blagrove a piece of ground at the same lower end of Salisbury Court, containing one hundred and forty foot in length and forty-two in breadth ... for forty-one years and a half." The lease was signed on July 6, 1629. Nine days later, on July 15, the Earl of Dorset, "in consideration of nine hundred and fifty pounds paid to the said late Earl by John Herne, of Lincoln's Inn, Esquire, did demise to hire the said piece of ground and [the] building [i.e., the playhouse] thereupon to be erected, and the rent reserved upon the said lease made to Gunnell and Blagrove." Herne's lease was for a term of sixty-one years. The effect of this second lease was merely to make Herne, instead of the Earl of Dorset, the landlord of the players.



The plot of ground selected for the playhouse is described with exactness in the lease printed below. The letters inserted in brackets refer to the accompanying diagram (see page 371):

All that soil and ground whereupon the Barn {A}, at the lower end of the great back court, or yard of Salisbury Court, now stands; and so much of the soil whereupon the whole south end of the great stable in the said court or yard stands, or contains, from that end of that stable towards the north end thereof sixteen foot of assize, and the whole breadth of the said stable {B}; and all the ground and soil on the east and west side of that stable lying directly against the said sixteen foot of ground at the south end thereof between the wall of the great garden belonging to the mansion called Dorset House and the wall that severs the said Court from the lane called Water Lane {C and D}; and all the ground and soil being between the said walls on the east and west part thereof, and the said barn, stable, and ground on both side the same on the south and north parts thereof {E}. Which said several parcells of soil and ground ... contain, in the whole length ... one hundred and forty foot of assize, and in breadth ... forty and two foot of assize, and lies together at the lower end of the said Court.

This plot, one hundred and forty feet in length by forty-two in breadth, was small for its purpose, and the playhouse must have covered all the breadth and most of the length of the leased ground;[625] there was no actual need of leaving any part of the plot vacant, for the theatre adjoined the Court, and "free ingress, egress, and regress" to the building were stipulated in the lease "by, through, and on any part of the Court called Salisbury Court."

[Footnote 625: The Blackfriars auditorium was sixty-six feet in length and forty-six feet in breadth.]

At once Gunnell and Blagrove set about the erection of their playhouse. They may have utilized in some way the "great barn" which occupied most of their property; one of the legal documents printed by Cunningham contains the phrase: "and the great barn, which was afterwards the playhouse."[626] If this be true—I think it very doubtful—the reconstruction must have been thorough, for Howes, in his continuation of Stow's Annals (1631), speaks of Salisbury Court as "a new, fair playhouse";[627] and in all respects it seems to have ranked with the best.

[Footnote 626: Cunningham, The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 104. In his Handbook for London Cunningham says that the Salisbury Court Playhouse "was originally the 'barn.'"]

[Footnote 627: Annals (1631), p. 1004. In 1633 Prynne (Histriomastix) refers to it as a "new theatre erected."]

We know very little of the building. But Wright, in his Historia Histrionica, informs us that it was "almost exactly like" the two other private houses, the Blackfriars and the Cockpit:

True. The Blackfriars, Cockpit, and Salisbury Court were called private houses, and were very small to what we see now. The Cockpit was standing since the Restoration, and Rhodes' company acted there for some time.

Love. I have seen that.

True. Then you have seen the other two in effect, for they were all three built almost exactly alike for form and bigness.[628]

[Footnote 628: Collier, The History of English Dramatic Literature (1879), III, 106, thought that Salisbury Court was a round playhouse, basing his opinion on a line in Sharpe's Noble Stranger acted at "the private house in Salisbury Court": "Thy Stranger to the Globe-like theatre."]

In spite of what Wright says, however, there is some reason for believing that Salisbury Court was smaller than the other two private houses. The Epilogue to Totenham Court refers to it as "my little house"; and the Epistle affixed to the second edition of Sir Giles Goosecappe is said to convey the same impression of smallness.[629]

[Footnote 629: I have not been able to examine this. In the only copy of the second edition accessible to me the Epistle is missing.]

According to Malone, Sir Henry Herbert, the Master of the Revels, was "one of the proprietors" of the house, and held a "ninth share" in the profits.[630] This, however, is not strictly accurate. Sir Henry, by virtue of his power to license playhouses, demanded from each organization of players an annual fee. The King's Men gave him two benefit performances a year; Christopher Beeston, on behalf of the Cockpit in Drury Lane, paid him L60 a year; as for the rest, Herbert tells us that he had "a share paid by the Fortune Players, and a share by the Bull Players, and a share by the Salisbury Court Players."[631] It seems, therefore, that the Salisbury Court organization was divided into eight shares, and that of the profits an extra, or ninth, share was set aside as a fee for the Master of the Revels.

[Footnote 630: Malone, Variorum, III, 178.]

[Footnote 631: Halliwell-Phillipps, A Collection of Ancient Documents, p. 27.]

The playhouse was ready for use in all probability in the autumn of 1629; and to occupy it a new company of actors was organized, known as "The King's Revels." The chief members of this company were George Stutville, John Young, William Cartwright, William Wilbraham, and Christopher Goad; Gunnell and Blagrove probably acted as managers. In the books of the Lord Chamberlain we find a warrant for the payment of L30 to William Blagrove "and the rest of his company" for three plays acted by the Children of the Revels, at Whitehall, 1631.[632] The Children continued at Salisbury Court until about December, 1631, when they abandoned the playhouse in favor of the much larger Fortune, surrendered by the Palsgrave's Men.

[Footnote 632: See Mrs. Stopes's extracts from the Lord Chamberlain's books, in the Shakespeare Jahrbuch (1910), XLVI, 97. This entry probably led Cunningham to say (The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 92) that Blagrove was "Master of the Children of the Revels in the reign of Charles I."]

The Palsgrave's Men, who for many years had occupied the Fortune, seem to have fallen on bad times and to have disbanded. They were reorganized, however, possibly by their old manager, Richard Gunnell, and established in Salisbury Court. The Earl of Dorset, who took a special interest in Salisbury Court, obtained for the troupe a patent to play under the name of the infant Prince Charles, then little more than a year old.[633] The patent bears the date of December 7, 1631; and "The Servants of the High and Mighty Prince Charles" opened at Salisbury Court very soon after[634] with a play by Marmion entitled Holland's Leaguer. The Prologue refers to the going of the King's Revels to the Fortune, and the coming of the new troupe to Salisbury Court:

Gentle spectators, that with graceful eye Come to behold the Muses' colony New planted in this soil, forsook of late By the inhabitants, since made Fortunate.

[Footnote 633: For Dorset's interest in the matter see Cunningham, The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 96.]

[Footnote 634: In December, 1631; see Malone, Variorum, III, 178.]

The Prologue closes thus:

That on our branches now new poets sing; And when with joy he shall see this resort Phoebus shall not disdain to styl't his Court.

But the audiences at Salisbury Court were not large. For six performances of the play, says Malone, Sir Henry Herbert received "but one pound nineteen shillings, in virtue of the ninth share which he possessed as one of the proprietors of the house."[635]

[Footnote 635: Malone, Variorum, III, 178.]

Of the "new poets" referred to by the Prologue, one, of course, was Marmion himself. Another, I venture to say, was James Shirley, who, as I think, had been engaged to write the company's second play. This was The Changes, brought out at Salisbury Court on January 10. The Prologue is full of allusions to the company, its recent misfortunes, and its present attempt to establish itself in its new quarters:

That Muse, whose song within another sphere[636] Hath pleased some, and of the best, whose ear Is able to distinguish strains that are Clear and Phoebean from the popular And sinful dregs of the adulterate brain, By me salutes your candour once again; And begs this noble favour, that this place, And weak performances, may not disgrace His fresh Thalia.[637] 'Las, our poet knows We have no name; a torrent overflows Our little island;[638] miserable we Do every day play our own Tragedy. But 't is more noble to create than kill, He says; and if but with his flame, your will Would join, we may obtain some warmth, and prove Next them that now do surfeit with your love. Encourage our beginning. Nothing grew Famous at first. And, gentlemen, if you Smile on this barren mountain, soon it will Become both fruitful and the Muses hill.

[Footnote 636: The Cockpit, for which Shirley had been writing.]

[Footnote 637: Cf. "new poets" of Marmion's Prologue.]

[Footnote 638: An allusion to the smallness of the Salisbury Court Playhouse?]

The similarity of this to the Prologue of Holland's Leaguer is striking; and the Epilogue is written in the same vein:

Opinion Comes hither but on crutches yet; the sun Hath lent no beam to warm us. If this play Proceed more fortunate, we shall bless the day And love that brought you hither. 'T is in you To make a little sprig of laurel grow, And spread into a grove.

All scholars who have written on the subject—Collier, Fleay, Greg, Murray, etc.—have contended that the King's Revels Company did not leave Salisbury Court until after January 10, 1632, because Herbert licensed Shirley's The Changes on that date,[639] and the title-page of the only edition of The Changes states that it was acted at Salisbury Court by His Majesty's Revels. But Herbert records payments for six representations of Marmion's Leaguer by Prince Charles's Men at Salisbury Court "in December, 1631."[640] This latter date must be correct, for on January 26 Holland's Leaguer was entered on the Stationers' Register "as it hath been lately and often acted with great applause ... at the private house in Salisbury Court." According to the generally accepted theory, however, the King's Men were still at Salisbury Court, and actually bringing out a new play there so late as January 10. This error has led to much confusion, and to no little difficulty for historians of the stage; for example, Mr. Murray is forced to suppose that two royal patents were granted to Prince Charles's Company.[641] It seems to me likely that the title-page of The Changes is incorrect in stating that the play was acted by the King's Revels. The play must have been acted by the new and as yet unpopular Prince Charles's Men, who had occupied Salisbury Court as early as December, and, as Herbert tells us, with poor success. The various dates cited clearly indicate this; and the Prologue and the Epilogue are both wholly unsuited for utterance by the successful Revels Company which had just been "made Fortunate," but are quite in keeping with the condition of the newly organized and struggling Prince Charles's Men, who might naturally ask the public to "encourage our beginning."

[Footnote 639: Malone, Variorum, III, 232. But Malone was a careless transcriber, and Herbert himself sometimes made errors. Possibly the correct date is January 10, 1631.]

[Footnote 640: Ibid., III, 178.]

[Footnote 641: English Dramatic Companies, I, 221.]

Whether Prince Charles's Men ultimately succeeded in winning the favor of the public we do not know. Presumably they did, for at some date before 1635 they moved to the large Red Bull Playhouse. Richard Heton wrote: "And whereas my Lord of Dorset had gotten for a former company at Salisbury Court the Prince's service, they, being left at liberty, took their opportunity of another house, and left the house in Salisbury Court destitute both of a service and company."[642]

[Footnote 642: Richard Heton, "Instructions for my Pattent," The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 96.]

This person, Richard Heton, who describes himself as "one of the Sewers of Her Majesty's Chamber Extraordinary," had now obtained control of Salisbury Court, and had become manager of its affairs.[643] He apparently induced the Company of His Majesty's Revels to leave the Fortune and return to Salisbury Court, for in 1635 they acted there Richard Brome's The Sparagus Garden. But their career at Salisbury Court was short; on May 12 of the following year all playhouses were closed by the plague, and acting was not allowed again for nearly a year and a half. During this long period of inactivity, the Company of His Majesty's Revels was largely dispersed.

[Footnote 643: We find a payment to Richard Heton, "for himself and the rest of the company of the players at Salisbury Court," for performing a play before his Majesty at Court, October, 1635. (Chalmers's Apology, p. 509.) Exactly when he took charge of Salisbury Court I am unable to learn.]

When at last, on October 2, 1637, the playhouses were allowed to open, Heton found himself with a crippled troupe of actors. Again the Earl of Dorset interested himself in the theatre. Queen Henrietta's Company, which had been at the Cockpit since 1625, having "disperst themselves," Dorset took "care to make up a new company for the Queen";[644] and he placed this new company under Heton at Salisbury Court. Heton writes: "How much I have done for the upbuilding of this Company, I gave you some particulars of in a petition to my Lord of Dorset." This reorganization of the Queen's Men explains, perhaps, the puzzling entry in Herbert's Office-Book, October 2, 1637: "I disposed of Perkins, Sumner, Sherlock, and Turner, to Salisbury Court, and joyned them with the best of that company."[645] Doubtless Herbert, like Dorset, was anxious for the Queen to have a good troupe of players. This new organization of the Queen's Men continued at Salisbury Court without interruption, it seems, until the closing of the playhouses in 1642.[646]

[Footnote 644: Cunningham, The Shakespeare Society's Papers, IV, 96.]

[Footnote 645: Malone, Variorum, III, 240.]

[Footnote 646: For certain troubles at Salisbury Court in 1644 and 1648, see Collier, The History of English Dramatic Poetry (1879), II, 37, 40, 47.]

In 1649 John Herne, son of the John Herne who in 1629 had secured a lease on the property for sixty-one years, made out a deed of sale of the playhouse to William Beeston,[647] for the sum of L600. But the document was not signed. The reason for this is probably revealed in the following passage: "The playhouse in Salisbury Court, in Fleet Street, was pulled down[648] by a company of soldiers set on by the sectaries of these sad times, on Saturday, the 24 day of March, 1649."[649]