Chapter VII: Theatrical Allusions

ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL

PARTS.

Ours be your patience then, and yours our parts.
_Epilogue, line 5._

This word bears quite a respectable age of antiquity in its theatrical sense, being so used in the year 1495 in a note to the Coventry Mysteries. “Payd for copying of the 11 Knights partes and demons.” The meaning refers to the character assigned or sustained by an actor in a dramatic performance; also the words assigned to or spoken by an actor in such a character. It also refers to a printed copy of these words:

PLAY.

The King’s a beggar, now the play is done.
_Epilogue, line 1._

TRAGEDIANS.

What say you to his expertness in war?
Faith, sir, had led the drum before the
English tragedians.
IV, 3, 299.

Although the sentence is self explanatory, its meaning puzzled me. The contemporary drama has no reference to this somewhat primitive method of advertising. I wrote the following paragraph to _Notes and Queries_, and received the two replies which are here printed.

FROM _Notes and Queries_.

Shakespereana. All’s Well that Ends Well.

In the “Arden Shakespeare,” which is the only separate edition of this play that has a full commentary, the important passage, “Has led the drum before the English tragedians,” is left unnoticed. I am prepared to wager that not one in a hundred readers of Shakespeare would be able to interpret it. I am not quite certain of its interpretation, and therefore I ask your readers to interpret it. I believe it has reference to the actors who marched through the City accompanied by a drum to call attention to the play they were about to act.

(Sgnd.) MAURICE JONAS.

REPLIES.

Shakespereana. All’s Well that Ends Well. 10 S. XI. 30.

In reply to the query as to the meaning of the passage, “Has led the drum before the English tragedians,” I offer the following quotation from the _European Magazine_ for June, 1788. It refers to the early history of the drama in Birmingham. In about 1740 a theatre was erected in Moor Street, which rather gave a spring to the amusement. In the daytime the comedian beat up for volunteers for the night, delivered his bills of fare and roared out an encomium on the excellence of the entertainment. “In 1751 a company arrived which announced themselves ‘His Majesty’s Servants from the Theatres Royal in London,’ and hoped the public would excuse the ceremony of the drum as beneath the dignity of a London company.” The novelty had a surprising effect, the performers had merit, and the house was continually crowded. It is evident, therefore, that the custom was prevalent long after Shakespeare’s death. I may add that there is a well-known portrait of Tarlton, the actor, which represents him with a big or small drum.

(Sgnd.) HOWARD S. PEARSON.

ANOTHER REPLY.

Parolle’s ridicule of Capt. Dumain’s soldiership by saying that “He led the drum before the English tragedians,” IV, III, 298, may be compared to Iago’s “That never set a squadron in the field” (Oth. I 1). And in both of those plays, in the scenes just referred to, the “bookish theoric” of war is satirized. Parolle’s comparison of Dumain, with the drummer that preceded a company of strolling players, was probably due to his knowledge of the importance of the soldier that carried the drum with his smatter of languages, and what appeared a ridiculous imitation of the military costume.

The military disliked the players marching to the beats of a drum, and sometimes, when the players entered a town where soldiers were quartered, a fight ensued, often ending in a riot. This explanation may support the point to Parolle’s remark. In III, 41, Parolle’s vexation at the loss of his drum is not clear from the text, so it is necessary to add that the colours were attached to the instrument in those times.

(Sgnd.) TOM JONES.

Does Tom Jones, in his reply, convey the idea that an English soldier marched in front of the actors? This is quite a conjectural assumption, not a scrap of evidence existing that such was the custom. Since writing my note I came across an allusion bearing on the subject. This appears in a letter written by Lord Hunsdon to the Lord Mayor in 1594, stating that “where my now company of players have been accustomed for the better exercise of their quality and for the service of her Majesty if need so require, to play this winter time within the City at the Cross Keys, in Gracious Street, those are to require and pray your Lordship to permit and suffer them so to do, the which I pray you the rather to do for that they have undertaken for me that where heretofore they began not their plays till towards four o’clock, they will now begin at two and have done between four and five, and will not use any drums or trumpets at all for the calling of the people together, and shall be contributors to the poor of the parish where they play according their habilities. Halliwell’s Illustrations, p. 31, of Remembrancia, p. 353, as quoted in Greg’s edition of _Henslowe’s Diary_.”

In this interesting and important extract nothing is said respecting the actors marching through the City with a drummer at their head. It is a well-known fact that three blasts of a trumpet announced that the play was about to commence. I feel sure something more is known about this practice, although it does not appear in the usual channels of information in reference to this period. At a much later date this custom seems to have prevailed when the actors visited the provinces, but whether it was customary or only occasional cannot be stated with any degree of certainty. Unfortunately, so many questions of Shakesperean interest must be unanswered in a similarly unsatisfactory manner.

Another question of interest arises from this extract. How comes it that the company formerly commenced their plays between four and five even in winter time? The players either acted at a regular theatre or in an inn-yard, and at both places acting took place in the open air. The only solution possible is that the actors rented a large room of one of the inns or taverns and there acted by candlelight, otherwise beginning at such a late hour cannot be accounted for.

AS YOU LIKE IT

STAGE, PLAYERS, EXITS, ENTRANCES, PLAYS, PARTS, ACTS, SCENE.

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.

Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history.
II, 7, 139.

ENTRANCES.

Entrances is not used as a stage direction. It is employed here in a special sense of an actor making his appearance on the stage. Exit denotes the departure of an actor from the stage, and is freely used in all the printed editions of Shakespeare’s works and in all other dramatic literature. The plural exeunt is also used in the same sense. Although exit is written and spoken in its Latin form, the word is thoroughly naturalised, whilst exeunt is marked in the dictionary as a foreigner. Man and Manet are also stage directions often to be met with in the old quarto editions; they signify that the actor or actors whose name or names follow this direction remain on the stage after the others have left; later dramatists did not use these terms, and now they have become obsolete. As the old quartos were not divided into scenes or acts, these directions generally indicated that the scene or act was concluded. At the end of a few plays the words “exeunt omnes” are to be found.

ACTOR.

“Bring us to this sight, and you shall say
I’ll prove a busy actor in their play.”
III, V, 62.

PLAY.

And so he plays his part.
II, 7, 157.

I charge you, O women, for the love you bear to men, to like as much of this play as please you.

_Epilogue._

I charge you, O men, for the love you bear to women, that between you and the women the play may please.

_Epilogue._

PROLOGUE.

Shall we clap into ’t roundly, without hawking or spitting or saying we are hoarse, which are the only prologues to a bad voice.

PLAY.

Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part.
II, 7, 157.

CLOWN.

The roughish clown, at whom so oft your grace was wont to laugh at.
II, 1, 8.

Hollow you clown! Peace, fool;
It’s meat and drink for me to see a clown.
V, 1, 12.