Chapter IX: Epilogue: Enter VENUS with the Muses

_Venus._ Now, worthy Muses, with unwilling mind
Venus is forc'd to trudge to heaven again,
For Jupiter, that god of peerless power,
Proclaimed hath a solemn festival
In honour of Dame Danaë's luckless death;
Unto the which, in pain of his displeasure,
He hath invited all the immortal gods
And goddesses, so that I must be there,
Unless I will his high displeasure bear.
You see Alphonsus hath, with much ado,
At length obtained fair Iphigena,
Of Amurack her father, for his wife;
Who now are going to the temple wards,
For to perform Dame Juno's sacred rites;
Where we will leave them, till the feast be done,
Which, in the heavens, by this time is begun.
Meantime, dear Muses, wander you not far
Forth of the path of high Parnassus' hill,
That, when I come to finish up his life,[55]
You may be ready for to succour me:
Adieu, dear dames; farewell, Calliope.

_Cal._ Adieu, you sacred goddess of the sky.
[_Exit_ VENUS; _or, if you can conveniently, let a chair come down
from the top of the stage, and draw her up._
Well, loving sisters, since that she is gone,
Come, let us haste unto Parnassus' hill,
As Cytherea did lately will.

_Melpom._ Then make you haste her mind for to fulfil.
[_Exeunt omnes, playing on their instruments._

A LOOKING-GLASS FOR LONDON AND ENGLAND

_A Looking-Glass for London and England_ is first mentioned in Henslowe's _Diary_ as performed by Lord Strange's servants, 8th March 1592. At this time it was not a new play, and it is probable that it had first belonged to the Queen's players, to whom Greene was attached, and that it was by them turned over to Strange's company along with several other plays when the Queen's company went to the provinces in 1591. Henslowe records four performances of the play between 8th March and 7th June 1592. It was printed by Thomas Creede and entered on the _Stationers' Registers_, 5th March 1594, as written by Thomas Lodge and Robert Greene, gent. There is every indication that the play was successful. For two decades after its appearance Jonah and the Whale were popular in puppet-shows, and allusions in Beaumont and Fletcher, Ben Jonson and Cowley indicate the vogue of Nineveh on the puppet-stage. Five early quartos are mentioned by Collins: 1594, in the library of the Duke of Devonshire; 1598, in the Bodleian and the British Museum; 1602, in the British Museum; 1617, in the Bodleian and the British Museum; and apparently an actor's edition with many variants, formerly in Heber's Library, now in that of Mr Godfrey Locker Lampson, of the conjectural date 1598. The assignment of authorship of different portions of the play is difficult and not entirely profitable. Fleay assigns "most and best" of the play to Lodge. From their resemblance to the _Alarum Against Usurers_ Collins assigns the following scenes to Lodge: I. 3; II. 3; V. 2. He also assigns the speeches of Oseas and Jonas, and the scenes displaying marine technology, to Lodge, viz.: III. 2; IV. 1. (_See_ also Gayley, _Representative English Comedies_, p 405, n.) This play was one of the earliest in which Greene had a hand and has been rightly called "a modernised morality."

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

RASNI, King of Nineveh.

KING OF CILICIA.

KING OF CRETE.

KING OF PAPHLAGONIA.

THRASYBULUS, a young gentleman, reduced to poverty.

ALCON, a poor man.

RADAGON, CLESIPHON, his sons.

Usurer.

Judge.

Lawyer.

Smith.

ADAM, his man.

First Ruffian.

Second Ruffian.

Governor of Joppa.

Master of a Ship.

First Searcher.

Second Searcher.

A Man in devil's attire.

Magi, Merchants, Sailors, Lords, Attendants, etc.

REMILIA, sister to RASNI.

ALVIDA, wife to the KING OF PAPHLAGONIA.

SAMIA, wife to ALCON.

Smith's Wife.

Ladies.

An Angel.

An Evil Angel.

OSEAS.

JONAS.

_A LOOKING-GLASS FOR LONDON AND ENGLAND_