Part ii

, based on the collections of 1779 and 1841–53, adds the dramatic sources, Warner’s _Menaechmi_, _True Tragedie of Richard III_, Legge’s _Richardus Tertius_, _Troublesome Raigne of John_, _Famous Victories of Henry the Fifth_, _1 Contention of York and Lancaster_, _True Tragedy of Richard Duke of York_, Shakespeare’s _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (Q_{1}), Whetstone’s _Promos and Cassandra_, _King Leire_, _Timon_, _Taming of A Shrew_.]

1878. R. Simpson, _The School of Shakspere_. 2 vols. [_Captain Thomas Stukeley_, _Nobody and Somebody_, _Histriomastix_, _Jack Drum’s Entertainment_, _Warning for Fair Women_, _Fair Em_, with _A Larum for London_ (1872) separately printed.]

1882–5. A. H. Bullen, _A Collection of Old English Plays_. 4 vols. [Cited as Bullen, _O. E. P. Maid’s Metamorphosis_, _Noble Soldier_, _Sir Giles Goosecap_, _Wisdom of Doctor Dodipoll_, _Charlemagne or The Distracted Emperor_, _Trial of Chivalry_, Yarington’s _Two Lamentable Tragedies_, _Costly Whore_, _Every Woman in her Humour_, with later plays.]

[1885]-91. _43 Shakspere Quarto Facsimiles._ Issued under the superintendence of F. J. Furnivall. [Photographic facsimiles by W. Griggs and C. Praetorius, with introductions by various editors, including, besides accepted Shakespearian plays, _Pericles_ (Q_{1}, Q_{2}), _1 Contention_ (Q_{1}), _True Tragedy of Richard Duke of York_ (Q_{1}), _Whole Contention_ (Q_{3}), _Famous Victories of Henry V_ (Q_{1}), _Troublesome Raigne of John_ (Q_{1}), _Taming of A Shrew_ (Q_{1}).]

1888. _Nero and other Plays_ (Mermaid Series). [_Nero_ (1624), Porter’s _Two Angry Women of Abingdon_, Day’s _Parliament of Bees_ and _Humour Out of Breath_, Field’s _Woman is a Weathercock_ and _Amends for Ladies_, by various editors.]

1896–1905. _The Temple Dramatists._ [Cited as _T. D._ Single plays by various editors, including, besides plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, Dekker, Heywood, Jonson, Kyd, Marlowe, Peele, Udall, Webster (q.v.), _Arden of Feversham_, _Edward III_, _Merry Devil of Edmonton_, _Selimus_, _T. N. K._, _Return from Parnassus_.]

1897. J. M. Manly, _Specimens of the Pre-Shakspearean Drama_. 2 vols. issued. [Udall’s _Roister Doister_, _Gammer Gurton’s Needle_, Preston’s _Cambyses_, Norton and Sackville’s _Gorboduc_, Lyly’s _Campaspe_, Greene’s _James IV_, Peele’s _David and Bethsabe_, Kyd’s _Spanish Tragedy_ in vol. ii; earlier plays in vol. i.]

1897. H. A. Evans, _English Masques_ (Warwick Library). [Ten masks by Jonson (q.v.), Daniel’s _Twelve Goddesses_, Campion’s _Lords’ Mask_, Beaumont’s _Inner Temple Mask_, _Mask of Flowers_, and later masks.]

1897–1912. _Jahrbuch der deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft_, vols. xxxiii-xlviii. [Wilson’s _Cobbler’s Prophecy_ (1897), _1 Richard II_ (1899), Wager’s _The Longer Thou Livest, the More Fool Thou Art_ (1900), _The Wars of Cyrus_ (1901), Jonson’s _E. M. I._ (1902), Lupton’s _All for Money_ (1904), Wapull’s _The Tide Tarrieth No Man_ (1907), Lumley’s translation of _Iphigenia_ (1910), _Caesar and Pompey_, or _Caesar’s Revenge_ (1911, 1912), by various editors.]

1898. A. Brandl, _Quellen des weltlichen Dramas in England vor Shakespeare_. Ein Ergänzungsband zu Dodsley’s Old English Plays. (_Quellen und Forschungen_, lxxx.) [_King Darius_, _Misogonus_, _Horestes_, Wilmot’s _Gismond of Salern_, _Common Conditions_, and earlier plays.]

1902–8. _The Belles Lettres Series._ Section iii. _The English Drama._ General Editor, G. P. Baker. [Cited as _B. L._ Plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, Chapman, Dekker, Gascoigne, Jonson, Webster (q.v.), in separate volumes by various editors.]

1902–14. _Materialien zur Kunde des älteren englischen Dramas_ ... begründet und herausgegeben von W. Bang. 44 vols. issued. (A. Uystpruyst, Louvain.) [Includes, with other ‘material’, text facsimile reprints of plays, &c., of Barnes, Brewer, Daniel, Chettle and Day, Dekker, Heywood, Jonson, Mason, Sharpham (q.v.), with _How a Man may Choose a Good Wife from a Bad_, _Sir Giles Goosecap_, the Latin _Victoria_ of A. Fraunce and _Pedantius_, and translations from Seneca.]

1903, 1913, 1914. C. M. Gayley, _Representative English Comedies_. 3 vols. [Plays of Udall, Lyly, Peele, Greene, Porter, Jonson, and Dekker, with _Gammer Gurton’s Needle_, _Eastward Ho!_, _Merry Devil of Edmonton_, and later plays, by various editors.]

1905–8. J. S. Farmer, _Publications of the Early English Drama Society_. [Modernized texts, mainly of little value, but including a volume of _Recently Recovered Plays_, from the quartos in the Irish sale of 1906.]

1907–20. _Malone Society Reprints._ 46 vols. issued. [In progress; text-facsimile reprints of separate plays, by various editors, under general editorship of W. W. Greg; cited as _M. S. R._]

1907–14. J. S. Farmer, _The Tudor Facsimile Texts_, with a Hand List (1914). [Photographic facsimiles, mostly by R. B. Fleming; cited as _T. F. T._ The Hand List states that 184 vols. are included in the collection, but I believe that some were not actually issued before the editor’s death. Some or all of these, with reissues of others, appear in _Old English Plays, Student’s Facsimile Edition_; cited as _S. F. T._]

1908–14. _The Shakespeare Classics._ General Editor, I. Gollancz. (_The Shakespeare Library_). [Includes Warner’s _Menaechmi_ and _Leire_, _Taming of A Shrew_, and _Troublesome Reign of King John_.]

1911. W. A. Neilson, _The Chief Elizabethan Dramatists excluding Shakespeare_. [Plays by Lyly, Peele, Greene, Marlowe, Kyd, Chapman, Jonson, Dekker, Marston, Heywood, Beaumont, Fletcher, Webster, Middleton, and later writers; cited as _C. E. D._]

1911. R. W. Bond, _Early Plays from the Italian_. [Gascoigne’s _Supposes_, _Bugbears_, _Misogonus_.]

1912. J. W. Cunliffe, _Early English Classical Tragedies_. [Norton and Sackville’s _Gorboduc_, Gascoigne and Kinwelmersh’s _Jocasta_, Wilmot’s _Gismond of Salerne_, Hughes’s _Misfortunes of Arthur_.]

1912. _Masterpieces of the English Drama._ General Editor, F. E. Schelling, [Cited as _M. E. D._ Plays of Marlowe, Beaumont and Fletcher, Webster and Tourneur (q.v.), with Massinger and Congreve, in separate volumes by various editors.]

1915. C. B. Wheeler, _Six Plays by Contemporaries of Shakespeare_ (_World’s Classics_). [Dekker’s _Shoemaker’s Holiday_, Beaumont and Fletcher’s _K. B. P._ and _Philaster_, Webster’s _White Devil_ and _Duchess of Malfi_, Massinger’s _New Way to Pay Old Debts_.]

* * * * *

[In this chapter I give under the head of each playwright (_a_) a brief sketch of his life in relation to the stage, (_b_) a list of contemporary and later collections of his dramatic works, (_c_) a list of dissertations (books, pamphlets, articles in journals) bearing generally upon his life and works. Then I take each play, mask, &c., up to 1616 and give (_a_) the MSS. if any; (_b_) the essential parts of the entry, if any, on the Stationers’ Register, including in brackets the name of any licenser other than an official of the Company, and occasionally adding a note of any transfer of copyright which seems of exceptional interest; (_c_) the essential parts of the title-page of the first known print; (_d_) a note of its prologues, epilogues, epistles, and other introductory matter; (_e_) the dates and imprints of later prints before the end of the seventeenth century with any new matter from their t.ps. bearing on stage history; (_f_) lists of all important 18th-20th century editions and dissertations, not of the collective or general type already dealt with; (_g_) such notes as may seem desirable on authorship, date, stage history and the like. Some of these notes are little more than compilations; others contain the results of such work as I have myself been able to do on the plays concerned. Similarly, I have in some cases recorded, on the authority of others, editions and dissertations which I have not personally examined. The section devoted to each playwright concludes with lists of work not extant and of work of which his authorship has, often foolishly, been conjectured. I ought to make it clear that many of my title-pages are borrowed from Dr. Greg, and that, while I have tried to give what is useful for the history of the stage, I have no competence in matters of minute bibliographical accuracy.]

WILLIAM ALABASTER (1567–1640)

Alabaster, or Alablaster, was born at Hadleigh, Suffolk, in 1567 and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, from Westminster in 1583. His Latin poem _Eliseis_ is mentioned by Spenser in _Colin Clout’s Come Home Again_ (1591). He was incorporated M.A. of Oxford in 1592, and went as chaplain to Essex in the Cadiz expedition of 1596. On 22 Sept. 1597 Richard Percival wrote to Sir Robert Cecil (_Hatfield MSS._ vii. 394), ‘Alabaster has made a tragedy against the Church of England’. Perhaps this is not to be taken literally, but only refers to his conversion to Catholicism. Chamberlain, 7, 64, records that he was ‘clapt up for poperie’, had escaped from the Clink by 4 May 1598, but was recaptured at Rochelle. This was about the beginning of Aug. 1599 (_Hatfield MSS._ ix. 282). Later he was reconverted and at his death in 1640 held the living of Therfield, Herts. He wrote on mystical theology, and a manuscript collection of 43 sonnets, mostly unprinted, is described by B. Dobell in _Athenaeum_ (1903), ii. 856.

_Roxana. c. 1592_

[_MSS._] _T. C. C. MS._ (‘Authore Domino Alabaster’); _Camb. Univ. MS._ Ff. ii. 9; _Lambeth MS._ 838 (‘finis Roxanae Alabastricae’).

_S. R._ 1632, May 9 (Herbert). ‘A Tragedy in Latyn called Roxana &c.’ _Andrew Crooke_ (Arber, iv. 277).

1632. Roxana Tragædia olim Cantabrigiae, Acta in Col. Trin. Nunc primum in lucem edita, summaque cum diligentia ad castigatissimum exemplar comparata. _R. Badger for Andrew Crook._ [At end is Herbert’s imprimatur, dated ‘1 March, 1632’.]

1632. Roxana Tragædia a plagiarii unguibus vindicata, aucta, & agnita ab Authore Gulielmo Alabastro. _William Jones._ [Epistle by Gulielmus Alabaster to Sir Ralph Freeman; commendatory verses by Hugo Hollandius and Tho. Farnabius; engraved title-page, with representation of a stage (cf. ch. xviii, _Bibl. Note_).]

The Epistle has ‘Ante quadraginta plus minus annos, morticinum hoc edidi duarum hebdomadarum abortum, et unius noctis spectaculo destinatum, non aevi integri’. The play is a Latin version of Luigi Groto’s _La Dalida_ (1567).

SIR WILLIAM ALEXANDER, EARL OF STIRLING (_c._ 1568–1640).

William Alexander of Menstrie, after an education at Glasgow and Leyden and travel in France, Spain, and Italy, was tutor to Prince Henry before the accession of James, and afterwards Gentleman extraordinary of the Privy Chamber both to Henry and to Charles. He was knighted about 1609, appointed a Master of Requests in 1614 and Secretary for Scotland in 1626. He was created Earl of Stirling in 1633. He formed literary friendships with Michael Drayton and William Drummond of Hawthornden, but Jonson complained (Laing, 11) that ‘Sir W. Alexander was not half kinde unto him, and neglected him, because a friend to Drayton’. His four tragedies read like closet plays, and his only connexion with the stage appears to be in some verses to Alleyn after the foundation of Dulwich in 1619 (Collier, _Memoirs of Alleyn_, 178).

_Collections_

_S. R._ 1604, April 30 (by order of Court). ‘A booke Called The Woorkes of William Alexander of Menstrie Conteyninge The Monarchicke Tragedies, Paranethis to the Prince and Aurora.’ _Edward Blunt_ (Arber, iii. 260).

1604. The Monarchicke Tragedies. By William Alexander of Menstrie. _V. S. for Edward Blount._ [_Croesus_ and _Darius_ (with a separate t.p.).]

1607. The Monarchick Tragedies; Croesus, Darius, The Alexandraean, Iulius Caesar, Newly enlarged. By William Alexander, Gentleman of the Princes priuie Chamber. _Valentine Simmes for Ed. Blount._ [New issue, with additions. _Julius Caesar_ has separate t.p. Commendatory verses, signed ‘Robert Ayton’.]

1616. The Monarchicke Tragedies. The third Edition. By S^r. W. Alexander Knight. _William Stansby._ [_Croesus_, _Darius_, _The Alexandraean Tragedy_, _Julius Caesar_, in revised texts, the last three with separate t.ps.]

1637. Recreations with the Muses. By William Earle of Sterline. _Tho. Harper._ [_Croesus_, _Darius_, _The Alexandraean Tragedy_, _Julius Caesar_.]

1870–2. _Poetical Works._ 3 vols.

1921. L. E. Kastner and H. B. Charlton, _The Poetical Works of Sir William Alexander, Earl of Stirling_. Vol. i. The Dramatic Works.--_Dissertations_: C. Rogers, _Memorials of the Earl of S. and the House of A._ (1877); H. Beumelburg, _Sir W. A. Graf von S., als dramatischer Dichter_ (1880, Halle _diss._).

_Darius > 1603_

1603. _The Tragedie of Darius._ By William Alexander of Menstrie. _Robert Waldegrave. Edinburgh._ [Verses to James VI; Epistle to Reader; Commendatory verses by ‘Io Murray’ and ‘W. Quin’.]

1604. _G. Elde for Edward Blount._ [Part of _Coll._ 1604, with separate t.p.; also in later _Colls._ Two sets of verses to King at end.]

_Croesus > 1604_

1604. [Part of _Coll._ 1604; also in later _Colls._ Argument; Verses to King at end.]

_The Alexandraean Tragedy > 1607_

1605? [Hazlitt, _Manual_, 7, and others cite a print of this date, which is not confirmed by Greg, _Plays_, 1.]

1607. (_Running Title_). The Alexandraean Tragedie. [Part of _Coll._ 1607; also in later _Colls._ Argument.]

_Julius Caesar > 1607_

1607. The Tragedie of Iulius Caesar. By William Alexander, Gentleman of the Princes priuie Chamber. _Valentine Simmes for Ed. Blount._ [Part of _Coll._ 1607, with separate t.p.; also in later _Colls._ Argument.]

_Edition_ in H. H. Furness, _Julius Caesar_ (1913, _New Variorum Shakespeare_, xvii).

WILLIAM ALLEY (_c._ 1510–70).

Alley’s Πτωχὸμυσεῖον. _The Poore Mans Librarie_ (1565) contains three and a half pages of dialogue between Larymos and Phronimos, described as from ‘a certaine interlude or plaie intituled _Aegio_. In the which playe ij persons interlocutorie do dispute, the one alledging for the defence of destenie and fatall necessitie, and the other confuting the same’. P. Simpson (_9 N. Q._ iii. 205) suggests that Alley was probably himself the author. The book consists of _praelectiones_ delivered in 1561 at St. Paul’s, of which Alley had been a Prebendary. He became Bishop of Exeter in 1560. On his attitude to the public stage, cf. App. C. No. viii. It is therefore odd to find the Lord Bishop’s players at Barnstaple and Plymouth in 1560–1 (Murray, ii. 78).

ROBERT AMERIE (_c._ 1610).

The deviser of the show of _Chester’s Triumph_ (1610). See ch. xxiv (C).

ROBERT ARMIN (> 1588–1610 <). For biography see Actors (ch. xv).

_The Two Maids of Moreclacke. 1607–8_ (?)

1609. The History of the two Maids of Moreclacke, With the life and simple maner of Iohn in the Hospitall. Played by the Children of the Kings Maiesties Reuels. Written by Robert Armin, seruant to the Kings most excellent Maiestie. _N. O. for Thomas Archer._ [Epistle to Reader, signed ‘Robert Armin’.]

_Editions_ in A. B. Grosart, _Works of R. A. Actor_ (1880, _Choice Rarities of Ancient English Poetry_, ii), 63, and J. S. Farmer (1913, _S. F. T._). The epistle says that the play was ‘acted by the boyes of the Reuels, which perchaunce in part was sometime acted more naturally in the Citty, if not in the hole’, that the writer ‘would haue againe inacted Iohn my selfe but ... I cannot do as I would’, and that he had been ‘requested both of Court and Citty, to show him in priuate’. John is figured in a woodcut on the title-page, which is perhaps meant for a portrait of Armin. As a King’s man, and no boy, he can hardly have played with the King’s Revels; perhaps we should infer that the play was not originally written for them. All their productions seem to date from 1607–8.

_Doubtful Play_

Armin has been guessed at as the R. A. of _The Valiant Welshman_.

THOMAS ASHTON (_ob._ 1578).

Ashton took his B.A. in 1559–60, and became Fellow of Trinity, Cambridge. He was appointed Head Master of Shrewsbury School from 24 June 1561 (G. W. Fisher, _Annals of Shrewsbury School_, 4). To the same year a local record, Robert Owen’s _Arms of the Bailiffs_ (17th c.), assigns ‘M^r Astons first playe upon the Passion of Christ’, and this is confirmed by an entry in the town accounts (Owen and Blakeway, _Hist. of Shrewsbury_, i. 353) of 20s. ‘spent upon M^r Aston and a other gentellmane of Cambridge over pareadijs’ on 25 May 1561. Whitsuntide plays had long been traditional at Shrewsbury (_Mediaeval Stage_, ii. 250, 394, where the dates require correction). A local chronicle (_Shropshire Arch. Soc. Trans._ xxxvii. 54) has ‘Elizabeth 1565 [i. e. 1566; cf. App. A], The Queen came to Coventry intending for Salop to see M^r Astons Play, but it was ended. The Play was performed in the Quarry, and lasted the Whitson [June 2] hollydays’. This play is given in _Mediaeval Stage_, from local historians, as _Julian the Apostate_, but the same chronicle assigns that to 1556. Another chronicle (_Taylor MS._ of 16th-17th c.) records for 1568–9 (_Shropshire Arch. Soc. Trans._ iii. 268), ‘This yeare at Whytsoontyde [29 May] was a notable stage playe playeed in Shrosberie in a place there callyd the quarrell which lastid all the hollydayes unto the which cam greate number of people of noblemen and others the which was praysed greatlye and the chyff aucter therof was one Master Astoon beinge the head scoolemaster of the freescole there a godly and lernyd man who tooke marvelous greate paynes therin’. Robert Owen, who calls this Aston’s ‘great playe’ of the _Passion of Christ_, assigns it to 1568, but it is clear from the town accounts that 1569 is right (Fisher, 18). This is presumably the play referred to by Thomas Churchyard (q.v.) in _The Worthiness of Wales_ (1587, ed. Spenser Soc. 85), where after describing ‘behind the walles ... a ground, newe made Theator wise’, able to seat 10,000, and used for plays, baiting, cockfights, and wrestling, he adds:

At Astons Play, who had beheld this then, Might well have seene there twentie thousand men.

In the margin he comments, ‘Maister Aston was a good and godly Preacher’. A ‘ludus in quarell’ is noted in 1495, and this was ‘where the plases [? playes] have bine accustomyd to be usyd’ in 1570 (_Mediaeval Stage_, ii. 251, 255). Ashton resigned his Mastership about 1571 and was in the service of the Earl of Essex at Chartley in 1573. But he continued to work on the Statutes of the school, which as settled in 1578, the year of his death, provide that ‘Everie Thursdaie the Schollers of the first forme before they goo to plaie shall for exercise declame and plaie one acte of a comedie’ (Fisher, 17, 23; E. Calvert, _Shrewsbury School Register_). It is interesting to note that among Ashton’s pupils were Sir Philip Sidney and Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, who entered the school together on 16 Nov. 1564.

JAMES ASKE (_c._ 1588).

Author of _Elizabetha Triumphans_ (1588), an account of Elizabeth’s visit to Tilbury. See ch. xxiv (C).

THOMAS ATCHELOW (_c._ 1589).

The reference to him in Nashe’s _Menaphon_ epistle (App. C, No. xlii) rather suggests that he may have written plays.

FRANCIS BACON (1561–1626).

Bacon was son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper, by Anne, daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke. He was at Trinity, Cambridge, from April 1573 to March 1575, and entered Gray’s Inn in June 1576. He sat in the Parliaments of 1584 and 1586, and about 1591 attached himself to the rising fortunes of the Earl of Essex, who in 1595 gave him an estate at Twickenham. His public employment began as a Queen’s Counsel about 1596. He was knighted on 23 July 1603, became Solicitor-General on 25 June 1607, Attorney-General on 27 Oct. 1613, Lord Keeper on 7 March 1617, and Lord Chancellor on 7 Jan. 1618. He was created Lord Verulam on 12 July 1618, and Viscount St. Albans on 27 Jan. 1621. Later in the same year he was disgraced for bribery. The edition of his _Works_ (with his _Letters and Life_) by J. Spedding, R. L. Ellis, and D. D. Heath (1857–74) is exhaustive. Many papers of his brother Anthony are at Lambeth, and are drawn on by T. Birch, _Memoirs of the Reign of Elizabeth_ (1754). F. J. Burgoyne, _Facsimile of a Manuscript at Alnwick_ (1904), reproduces the _Northumberland MS._ which contains some of his writings, with others that may be his, and seems once to have contained more. Apart from philosophy, his chief literary work was _The Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall_, of which 10 appeared in 1597, and were increased to 38 in 1612 and 58 in 1625. Essay xxxvii, added in 1625, is _Of Masks and Triumphs_, and, although Bacon was not a writer for the public stage, he had a hand, as deviser or patron, in several courtly shows.

(i) He helped to devise dumb-shows for Thomas Hughes’s _Misfortunes of Arthur_ (q.v.) given by Gray’s Inn at Greenwich on 28 Feb. 1588.

(ii) The list of contents of the _Northumberland MS._ (Burgoyne, xii) includes an item, now missing from the MS., ‘Orations at Graies Inne Revells’, and Spedding, viii. 342, conjectures that Bacon wrote the speeches of the six councillors delivered on 3 Jan. 1595 as part of the _Gesta Grayorum_ (q.v.).

(iii) Rowland Whyte (_Sydney Papers_, i. 362) describes a device on the Queen’s day (17 Nov.), 1595, in which the speeches turned on the Earl of Essex’s love for Elizabeth, who said that, ‘if she had thought there had been so much said of her, she would not have been there that night’. A draft list of tilters, of whom the challengers were led by the Earl of Cumberland and the defendants by the Earl of Essex, is in _Various MSS._ iv. 163, and a final one, with descriptions of their appearance, in the _Anglorum Feriae_ of Peele (q.v.). They were Cumberland, Knight of the Crown, Essex, Sussex, Southampton, as Sir Bevis, Bedford, Compton, Carew, the three brothers Knollys, Dudley, William Howard, Drury, Nowell, John Needham, Skydmore, Ratcliffe, Reynolds, Charles Blount, Carey. The device took place partly in the tiltyard, partly after supper. Before the entry of the tilters a page made a speech and secured the Queen’s glove. A dialogue followed between a Squire on one hand, and a Hermit, a Secretary, and a Soldier, who on the entry of Essex tried to beguile him from love. A postboy brought letters, which the Secretary gave to Essex. After supper, the argument between the Squire and the three tempters was resumed. Whyte adds, ‘The old man [the Hermit] was he that in Cambridg played Giraldy; Morley played the Secretary; and he that plaid Pedantiq was the soldior; and Toby Matthew acted the Squires part. The world makes many untrue constructions of these speaches, comparing the Hermitt and the Secretary to two of the Lords [Burghley and Robert Cecil?]; and the soldier to Sir Roger Williams.’ The Cambridge reference is apparently to _Laelia_ (q.v.) and the performers of the Hermit and Soldier were therefore George Meriton and George Mountaine, of Queen’s. Morley might perhaps be Thomas Morley, the musician, a Gentleman of the Chapel.

Several speeches, apparently belonging to this device, are preserved. Peele speaks of the balancing of Essex between war and statecraft as indicated in the tiltyard by ‘His mute approach and action of his mutes’, but they may have presented a written speech.

(_a_) _Lambeth MS._ v. 118 (copied by Birch in _Sloane MS._ 4457, f. 32) has, in Bacon’s hand, a speech by the Squire in the tiltyard, and four speeches by the Hermit, Soldier, Secretary, and Squire ‘in the Presence’. These are printed by Birch (1763), Nichols, _Eliz._ iii. 372, and Spedding, viii. 378.

(_b_) _Lambeth MS._ viii. 274 (copied by Birch in _Addl. MS._ 4164, f. 167) has, in Bacon’s hand, the beginning of a speech by the Secretary to the Squire, which mentions Philautia and Erophilus, and a letter from Philautia to the Queen. These are printed in Spedding, viii. 376.

(_c_) The _Northumberland MS._ ff. 47–53 (Burgoyne, 55) has ‘Speeches for my Lord of Essex at the tylt’. These deal with the attempts of Philautia to beguile Erophilus. Four of them are identical with the four speeches ‘in the Presence’ of (_a_); the fifth is a speech by the Hermit in the tiltyard. They were printed by Spedding, separately, in 1870, as _A Conference of Pleasure composed for some festive occasion about the year 1592 by Francis Bacon_; but 1592 is merely a guess which Whyte’s letter corrects.

(_d_) _S. P. D. Eliz._ ccliv. 67, 68, docketed ‘A Device made by the Earl of Essex for the Entertainment of her Majesty’, has a speech by the Squire, distinct from any in the other MSS., a speech by the Attendant on an Indian Prince, which mentions Philautia, and a draft by Edward Reynolds, servant to Essex, of a French speech by Philautia. The two first of these are printed by Spedding, viii. 388, and Devereux, _Lives of the Earls of Essex_, ii. 501. The references to Philautia are rather against Spedding’s view that these belong to some occasion other than that of 1595.

Sir Henry Wotton says of Essex (_Reliquiae Wottonianae_, 21), ‘For his Writings, they are beyond example, especially in his ... things of delight at Court ... as may be yet seen in his Impresses and Inventions of entertainment; and above all in his darling piece of love, and self love’. This, for what it is worth--and Wotton was secretary to Essex in 1595, suggests that the Earl himself, rather than Bacon, was the author of the speeches, which in fact none of the MSS. directly ascribe to Bacon. But it is hard to distinguish the literary productions of a public man from those of his staff.

(iv) The _Northumberland MS._ (Burgoyne, 65) has a speech of apology for absence, headed ‘ffor the Earle of Sussex at y^e tilt an: 96’, which might be Bacon’s, especially as he wrote from Gray’s Inn to the Earl of Shrewsbury on 15 Oct. 1596, ‘to borrow a horse and armour for some public show’ (Lodge, _App._ 79).

(v) Beaumont (q.v.) acknowledges his encouragement of the Inner Temple and Gray’s Inn mask on 20 Feb. 1613, for the Princess Elizabeth’s wedding.

(vi) He bore the expenses of the Gray’s Inn _Mask of Flowers_ (q.v.) on 6 Jan. 1614 for the Earl of Somerset’s wedding. To this occasion probably belongs an undated letter signed ‘Fr. Bacon’, and addressed to an unknown lord (_M. S. C._ i. 214 from _Lansdowne MS._ 107, f. 13; Spedding, ii. 370; iv. 394), in which he expresses regret that ‘the joynt maske from the fowr Innes of Cowrt faileth’, and offers a mask for ‘this occasion’ by a dozen gentlemen of Gray’s Inn, ‘owt of the honor which they bear to your lordship, and my lord Chamberlayne, to whome at theyr last maske they were so much bownde’. The last mask would be (v) above, and the then Lord Chamberlain was Suffolk, prospective father-in-law of Somerset, to whom the letter may be supposed to be addressed. But it is odd that the letter is endorsed ‘M^r’ Fr. Bacon, and bound up with papers of Burghley, and it is just possible, although not, I think, likely, that the reference may be to some forgotten Elizabethan mask.

(vii) A recent attempt has been made to assign to Bacon the academic _Pedantius_ (cf. App. K).

JOHN BADGER (_c._ 1575).

A contributor to the Kenilworth entertainment (cf. ch. xxiv, C). Gascoigne calls him ‘Master Badger of Oxenforde, Maister of Arte, and Bedle in the same Universitie’. A John Badger of Ch. Ch. took his M.A. in 1555, and a superior bedel of divinity of the same name made his will on 15 July 1577 (Foster, _Alumni Oxonienses_, i. 54).

WILLIAM BARKSTED.

For biography, cf. ch. xv (Actors), and for his share in _The Insatiate Countess_, s.v. Marston.

There is no reason to regard him as the ‘William Buckstead, Comedian’, whose name is at the end of a _Prologue to a playe to the cuntry people_ in _Bodl. Ashm. MS._ 38 (198).

BARNABE BARNES (_c._ 1569–1609).

Barnes was born in Yorkshire, the son of Richard Barnes, bishop of Durham. He entered Brasenose College, Oxford, in 1586, but took no degree, accompanied Essex to France in 1591, and dedicated his poems _Parthenophil and Parthenophe_ (1593) to William Percy (q.v.). He was a friend of Gabriel Harvey and abused by Nashe and Campion. In 1598 he was charged with an attempt at poison, but escaped from prison (_Athenaeum_, 1904, ii. 240). His _Poems_ were edited by A. B. Grosart in _Occasional Issues_ (1875). Hazlitt, _Manual_, 23, states that a manuscript of a play by him with the title _The Battle of Hexham_ was sold with Isaac Reed’s books in 1807, but this, which some writers call _The Battle of Evesham_, has not been traced. As Barnes was buried at Durham in Dec. 1609, it is probable that _The Madcap_ ‘written by Barnes’, which Herbert licensed for Prince Charles’s men on 3 May 1624, was by another of the name.

_The Devil’s Charter. 2 Feb. 1607_

_S. R._ 1607, Oct. 16 (Buck). ‘The Tragedie of Pope Alexander the Sixt as it was played before his Maiestie.’ _John Wright_ (Arber, iii. 361).

1607. The Divils Charter: A Tragedie Conteining the Life and Death of Pope Alexander the sixt. As it was plaide before the Kings Maiestie, vpon Candlemasse night last: by his Maiesties Seruants. But more exactly reuewed, corrected and augmented since by the Author, for the more pleasure and profit of the Reader. _G. E. for John Wright._ [Dedication by Barnabe Barnes to Sir William Herbert and Sir William Pope; Prologue with dumb-show and Epilogue.]

_Extracts_ by A. B. Grosart in Barnes’s _Poems_ (1875), and editions by _R. B. McKerrow_ (1904, _Materialien_, vi) and J. S. Farmer (1913, _S. F. T._)--_Dissertation_: A. E. H. Swaen, G. C. Moore Smith, and R. B. McKerrow, _Notes on the D. C. by B. B._ (1906, _M. L. R._ i. 122).

DAVID, LORD BARRY (1585–1610).

David Barry was the eldest son of the ninth Viscount Buttevant, and the ‘Lo:’ on his title-page represents a courtesy title of ‘Lord’, or ‘Lording’ as it is given in the lawsuit of _Androwes v. Slater_, which arose out of the interest acquired by him in 1608 in the Whitefriars theatre (q.v.). Kirkman’s play-lists (Greg, _Masques_, ci) and Wood, _Athenae Oxon._ ii. 655, have him as ‘Lord’ Barrey, which did not prevent Langbaine (1691) and others from turning him into ‘Lodowick’.--_Dissertations_: J. Q. Adams, _Lordinge (alias Lodowick) Barry_ (1912, _M. P._ ix. 567); W. J. Lawrence, _The Mystery of Lodowick Barry_ (1917, _University of North Carolina Studies in Philology_, xiv. 52).

_Ram Alley. 1607–8_

_S. R._ 1610, Nov. 9 (Buck). ‘A booke called, Ramme Alley, or merry trickes. _Robert Wilson_ (Arber, iii. 448).

1611. Ram-Alley: Or Merrie-Trickes. A Comedy Diuers times heretofore acted. By the Children of the Kings Reuels. Written by Lo: Barrey. _G. Eld for Robert Wilson._ [Prologue and Epilogue.]

1636; 1639.

_Editions_ in Dodsley^4 (1875, x) and by W. Scott (1810, _A. B. D._ ii) and J. S. Farmer (1913, _S. F. T._).

Fleay, i. 31, attempts to place the play at the Christmas of 1609, but it is improbable that the King’s Revels ever played outside 1607–8. Archer’s play-list of 1656 gives it to Massinger. There are references (ed. Dodsley, pp. 280, 348, 369) to the baboons, which apparently amused London about 1603–5 (cf. s.v. _Sir Giles Goosecap_), and to the Jacobean knightings (p. 272).

FRANCIS BEAUMONT (_c._ 1584–1616).

Beaumont was third son of Francis Beaumont, Justice of Common Pleas, sprung from a gentle Leicestershire family, settled at Grace Dieu priory in Charnwood Forest. He was born in 1584 or 1585 and had a brother, Sir John, also known as a poet. He entered Broadgates Hall, Oxford, in 1597, but took no degree, and the Inner Temple in 1600. In 1614 or 1615 he had a daughter by his marriage, probably recent, to Ursula Isley of Sundridge Hall, Kent, and another daughter was born after his death on 6 March 1616. He was buried in Westminster Abbey.

Beaumont contributed a humorous grammar lecture (preserved in _Sloane MS._ 1709, f. 13; cf. E. J. L. Scott in _Athenaeum_ for 27 Jan. 1894) to some Inner Temple Christmas revels of uncertain date. This has allusions to ‘the most plodderly plotted shew of Lady Amity’ given ‘in this ill-instructed hall the last Christmas’, and to seeing a play at the Bankside for sixpence. His poetical career probably begins with the anonymous _Salmacis and Hermaphroditus_ of 1602. His non-dramatic poems, of which the most important is an epistle to Elizabeth Countess of Rutland in 1612, appeared after his death in volumes of 1618, 1640, and 1653, which certainly ascribe to him much that is not his. His connexion with the stage seems to have begun about 1606, possibly through Michael Drayton, a family friend, in whose _Eglogs_ of that year he appears as ‘sweet Palmeo’. But his first play, _The Woman Hater_, written independently for Paul’s, shows him under the influence of Ben Jonson, who wrote him an affectionate epigram (lv), told Drummond in 1619 that ‘Francis Beaumont loved too much himself and his own verses’ (Laing, 10), and according to Dryden (_Essay on Dramatick Poesie_) ‘submitted all his writings to his censure, and, ’tis thought, used his judgment in correcting, if not contriving, all his plots’. To Jonson’s _Volpone_ (1607) commendatory verses were contributed both by Beaumont, whose own _Knight of the Burning Pestle_ was produced in the same year, and by John Fletcher, whose names are thus first combined. Jonson and Beaumont, in their turn, wrote verses for Fletcher’s _The Faithful Shepherdess_, probably written in 1608 or 1609 and published in 1609 or 1610. About 1608 or 1609 it may also be supposed that the famous literary collaboration began. This, although it can only be proved to have covered some half-dozen plays, left the two names so closely associated that when, in 1647 and 1679, the actors and publishers issued collections of fifty-three pieces, in all or most of which Fletcher had had, or was supposed to have had, a hand, they described them all as ‘by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher’, and thus left to modern scholarship a task with which it is still grappling. A contemporary protest by Sir Aston Cockaine pointed out the small share of Beaumont and the large share of Massinger in the 1647 volume; and the process of metrical analysis initiated by Fleay and Boyle may be regarded as fairly successful in fixing the characteristics of the very marked style of Fletcher, although it certainly raises more questions than it solves as to the possible shares not only of Massinger, but of Jonson, Field, Tourneur, Daborne, Middleton, Rowley, and Shirley, as collaborators or revisers, in the plays as they have come down to us. Since Fletcher wrote up to his death in 1625, much of this investigation lies outside my limits, and it is fortunate that the task of selecting the plays which may, certainly or possibly, fall before Beaumont’s death in 1616 is one in which a fair number of definite data are available to eke out the slippery metrical evidence. It would seem that the collaboration began about 1608 and lasted in full swing for about four or five years, that in it Beaumont was the ruling spirit, and that it covered plays, not only for the Queen’s Revels, for whom both poets had already written independently, and for their successors the Lady Elizabeth’s, but also, and concurrently, for the King’s. According to Dryden, two or three plays were written ‘very unsuccessfully’ before the triumph of _Philaster_, but these may include the independent plays, of which we know that the _Knight of the Burning Pestle_ and the _Faithful Shepherdess_ failed. The Folios contain a copy of verses written by Beaumont to Jonson (ed. Waller, x. 199) ‘before he and M^r. Fletcher came to _London_, with two of the precedent Comedies then not finish’d, which deferr’d their merry meetings at the _Mermaid_’, but this probably relates to a temporary _villeggiatura_ and cannot be precisely dated. It is no doubt to this period of 1608–13 that we may refer the gossip of Aubrey, i. 96, who learnt from Sir James Hales and others that Beaumont and Fletcher ‘lived together on the Banke-Side, not far from the Play-house, both batchelors; lay together; had one wench in the house between them, which they did so admire; the same cloathes and cloake, &c., betweene them’. Obviously these conditions ended when Beaumont married an heiress about 1613, and it seems probable that from this date onwards he ceased to be an active playwright, although he contributed a mask to the Princess Elizabeth’s wedding at Shrovetide of that year, and his hand can be traced, perhaps later still, in _The Scornful Lady_. At any rate, about 1613 Fletcher was not merely writing independent plays--a practice which, unlike Beaumont, he may never have wholly dropped--but also looking about for other contributors. There is some converging evidence of his collaboration about this date with Shakespeare; and Henslowe’s correspondence (_Henslowe Papers_, 66) shows him quite clearly as engaged on a play, possibly _The Honest Man’s Fortune_, with no less than three others, Daborne, Field, and Massinger. It is not probable that, from 1616 onwards, Fletcher wrote for any company but the King’s men. Of the fifty-two plays included in the Ff., forty-four can be shown from title-pages, actor-lists, licences by the Master of the Revels, and a Lord Chamberlain’s order of 1641 (_M. S. C._ i. 364) to have belonged to the King’s, six by title-pages and another Lord Chamberlain’s order (_Variorum_, iii. 159) to have belonged to the Cockpit theatre, and two, _Wit at Several Weapons_ and _Four Plays in One_, together with _The Faithful Friends_, which does not appear in the Ff., cannot be assigned to any company. But some of the King’s men’s plays and some or all of the Cockpit plays had originally belonged to Paul’s, the Queen’s Revels, or the Lady Elizabeth’s, and it is probable that all these formed part of the Lady Elizabeth’s repertory in 1616, and that upon the reorganization of the company which then took place they were divided into two groups, of which one passed with Field to the King’s, while the other remained with his late fellows and was ultimately left with Christopher Beeston when their occupation of the Cockpit ended in 1625.

I classify the plays dealt with in these notes as follows: (_a_) Plays wholly or substantially by Beaumont--_The Woman Hater_, _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_; (_b_) Plays of the Beaumont-Fletcher collaboration--_Philaster_, _A Maid’s Tragedy_, _A King and No King_, _Four Plays in One_, _Cupid’s Revenge_, _The Coxcomb_, _The Scornful Lady_; (_c_) Plays wholly or substantially by Fletcher--_The Woman’s Prize_, _The Faithful Shepherdess_, _Monsieur Thomas_, _Valentinian_, _Bonduca_, _Wit Without Money_; (_d_) Plays of doubtful authorship and, in some cases, period--_The Captain_, _The Honest Man’s Fortune_, _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, _The Faithful Friends_, _Thierry and Theodoret_, _Wit at Several Weapons_, _Love’s Cure_, _The Night Walker_. Full treatment of _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, as of _Henry VIII_, in which Fletcher certainly had a hand, is only possible in relation to Shakespeare. I have not thought it necessary to include every play which, or a hypothetical version of which, an unsupported conjecture, generally from Mr. Oliphant, puts earlier than 1616. _The Queen of Corinth_, _The Noble Gentleman_, _The Little French Lawyer_, _The Laws of Candy_, _The Knight of Malta_, _The Fair Maid of the Inn_, _The Chances_, _Beggar’s Bush_, _The Bloody Brother_, _Love’s Pilgrimage_, _Nice Valour_, and _Rule a Wife and Have a Wife_ are omitted on this principle, and I believe I might safely have extended the same treatment to some of those in my class (_d_).

_Collections_

_S. R._ 1646, Sept. 4 (Langley). ‘These severall Tragedies & Comedies hereunder mencioned (viz^t.) ... [thirty plays named] ... by M^r. Beamont and M^r. Flesher.’ _H. Robinson and H. Moseley_ (Eyre, i. 244).

1660, June 29. ‘The severall Plays following, vizt.... [names] ... all six copies written by Fra: Beamont & John Fletcher.’ _H. Robinson and H. Moseley_ (Eyre, ii. 268).

F_{1}, 1647. Comedies and Tragedies Written by Francis Beaumont and Iohn Fletcher Gentlemen. Never printed before, And now published by the Authours Originall Copies. _For H. Robinson and H. Moseley._ [Twenty-nine plays of the 1646 entry, excluding _The Wildgoose Chase_, and the five plays and one mask of the 1660 entry, none but the mask previously printed; Portrait of Fletcher by W. Marshall; Epistle to Philip Earl of Pembroke and Montgomery, signed ‘John Lowin, Richard Robinson, Eylaerd Swanston, Hugh Clearke, Stephen Hammerton, Joseph Taylor, Robert Benfield, Thomas Pollard, William Allen, Theophilus Bird’; Epistle to the Reader, signed ‘Ja. Shirley’; The Stationer to the Readers, signed ‘Humphrey Moseley’ and dated ‘Feb. 14^{th} 1646’; Thirty-seven sets of Commendatory verses, variously signed; Postscript; cf. W. W. Greg in _4 Library_, ii. 109.]

F_{2}, 1679. Fifty Comedies and Tragedies. Written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, Gentlemen. All in one Volume. Published by the Authors Original Copies, the Songs to each Play being added. _J. Macock, for John Martyn, Henry Herringman, Richard Marriot._ [The thirty-four plays and one mask of F_{1}, with eighteen other plays, all previously printed; Epistle by the Stationers to the Reader; Actor Lists prefixed to many of the plays.]

1711. The Works of B. and F. 7 vols. _Jacob Tonson._

_Editions_ by Theobald, Seward and Sympson (1750, 10 vols.), G. Colman (1778, 10 vols.; 1811, 3 vols.), H. Weber (1812, 14 vols., adding _The Faithful Friends_), G. Darley (1839, 2 vols.; 1862–6, 2 vols.), A. Dyce (1843–6, 11 vols.; 1852, 2 vols.).

1905–12. A. Glover and A. R. Waller. _The Works of F. B. and J. F._ 10 vols. (_C. E. C._). [Text of F_{2}, with collations of F_{1} and Q_{q}.]

1904–12 (in progress). A. H. Bullen, _The Works of F. B. and J. F. Variorum Edition._ 4 vols. issued. [Text based on Dyce; editions of separate plays by P. A. Daniel, R. W. Bond, W. W. Greg, R. B. McKerrow, J. Masefield, M. Luce, C. Brett, R. G. Martin, E. K. Chambers.]

_Selections_

1887. J. S. L. Strachey, _The Best Plays of B. and F._ 2 vols. (Mermaid Series). [_Maid’s Tragedy_, _Philaster_, _Thierry and Theodoret_, _K. B. P._, _King and No King_, _Bonduca_, _Faithful Shepherdess_, _Valentinian_, and later plays.]

1912. F. E. Schelling, _Beaumont and Fletcher_ (_M. E. D._). [_Philaster_, _Maid’s Tragedy_, _Faithful Shepherdess_, _Bonduca_.]

_Dissertations_: A. C. Swinburne, _B. and F._ (1875–94, _Studies in Prose and Poetry_), _The Earlier Plays of B. and F._ (1910, _English Review_); F. G. Fleay, _On Metrical Tests as applied to Dramatic Poetry: