Chapter XIII: Introduction: The Boy Companies (11)

‘Warrant from the Queenes Majestie of her Players. Anna Regina.
Anne by the grace of God Queene of England, Scottland, Fraunce,
and Ireland. To all Justices of the Peace, Maiors, Sheriffs,
Bayliffes, and all other his Majestes Officers and loving
subiectes to whom yt shall or may appertaine greetinge, Know
yee that of our speciall grace and favour, Wee are well pleased
to authorize under our hand and signett the bearers hereof our
sworne servauntes Robert Lee, Martin Statier and Roger Barfield
with theyr fellowes and associates being our Commedians vppon
theyr humble Suite unto us for theyr better mainetenaunce, Yf
att annie time they should have occasion to travell into anie
parte of his Majestes Dominions to playe Tragedyes, historyes,
commedies and pastoralls as well in anie about the Cittye of
London, and in all other cittyes vniversities and townes at all
time anie times (the time of divine seruice onlye excepted)
Theise are therefore to will and requier you uppon the sight
hereofe quiettlye and favourably with your best favours, to
permitt and suffer them, to use theyr sayd qualitye within your
Jurisdiccions without anie of your molestacions or troubles, and
also to affourd them your Townehalls and all other such places
as att anie time have been used by men of theyr qualitye, That
they maye be in the better readiness for our seruise when they
shalbe thereunto commaunded, Nott doubtinge butt that our sayd
servauntes shall find the more favour for our sake in your best
assistaunce, Wherein you shall doe unto us acceptable pleasure.
Given att the Court of Whitehall, the seaventh daye of Marche
1605.’

Of these three men, Lee, and Lee alone, appears in the London lists of 1603, 1604, and 1609. Of Barfield’s career nothing more is known. Martin Slater, whose name can be divined under that of Statier, had left the Admiral’s in 1597. He was probably in Scotland during 1599, and if so his patronage by Anne may be analogous to the patronage by James, which brought Laurence Fletcher’s name into the King’s men’s patent. In 1603 he was payee for Hertford’s men. Presumably the enterprise of 1606 did not last long, for in the spring of 1608 Slater became manager for the King’s Revels. His place in the provinces may have been taken by Thomas Swinnerton, who was leading a company of Queen’s men at Coventry in 1608–9, and whose departure from the London company is perhaps indicated by the fact that at about the same time he sold a share, which he had held in the house of the Red Bull. Swinnerton was travelling again in 1614–16 and using an exemplification of the patent of 1609. In 1616 he was accompanied by Robert Lee, who for two years before had been acting as payee for the London company. Lee came again with the exemplification to Norwich on 31 May 1617, and it was then noted to have been taken out on 7 January 1612. A few days later, on 4 June 1617, a copy was entered in the Norwich court books of a warrant by the Lord Chamberlain of 16 July 1616, condemning the use of such exemplifications, and specifying amongst others two taken out by Thomas Swinnerton and Martin Slater, ‘beinge two of the Queens Maiesties company of Playors hauing separated themselves from their said Company’.[665] Slater had, therefore, returned to the provincial field, and there were now two travelling companies of Queen’s men. I take it that in 1617 the Lord Chamberlain succeeded in suppressing them, and that the Queen’s men who continued to appear in the provinces up to Anne’s death on 2 March 1619 were the London company.[666] Lee joined the Queen’s Revels as reorganized under a licence of 31 October 1617. Slater, about the same time, joined the Children of Bristol, for whom, with John Edmonds and Nathaniel Clay, he got letters of assistance in April 1618. In these all three are described as her Majesty’s servants. Swinnerton apparently succeeded in keeping on foot a company of his own, which visited Leicester in 1619.[667] The Bristol company was in fact under Anne’s patronage, but Lee and Swinnerton, no less than Slater and Edmonds, remained technically the Queen’s servants, and are included with the London men in a list of the players who received mourning at her funeral on 13 May 1619.[668] These were Robert Lee, Richard Perkins, Christopher Beeston, Robert Pallant, Thomas Heywood, James Holt, Thomas Swinnerton, Martin Slater, Ellis Wroth, John Comber, Thomas Basse, John Blaney, William Robinson, John Edmonds, Thomas Drewe, Gregory Sanderson, and John Garret.

The list of seventeen names includes seven of the ten patentees of 1609. I do not know what had become of John Duke and Robert Beeston. Thomas Greene had died in August 1612, having made on 25 July a will, amongst the witnesses to which were Christopher Beeston, Heywood, and Perkins. The disposal of his property led many years afterwards to a lawsuit, which gives valuable information as to both the _personnel_ and the organization of the London company. After providing for his family and making some small legacies, including one to John Cumber, and 40_s._ to ‘my fellowes of the house of the Redd Bull, to buy gloves for them’, he left the residue to his widow and executrix, Susanna Greene, formerly wife of one Browne.[669] In June 1613 she took a third husband, James Baskervile. The following is her account in 1623 of certain transactions with the company. Shortly before Greene’s death had died George Pulham, a ‘half sharer’ in the company, which is described as being in 1612 ‘the companie of the actors or players of the late queenes majestie Queene Anne, then vsuallie frequentinge and playinge att the signe of the Redd Bull in St. Johns Street, in Clerkenwell parishe, in the county of Middlesex’. His representatives received £40 from the company in respect of his half-share. This was under an agreement formerly made amongst the company ‘concerninge the part and share of euerie one of the sharers and half sharers of the said companie according to the rate and proporcion of their shares or half shares in that behalfe’. Under the same agreement Susanna Greene, whose husband was ‘one of the principall and cheif persons of the said companie, and a full adventurer, storer and sharer of in and amongst them’, claimed £80, together with £37 laid out by him before his death in ‘diuers necessarie prouisions’ for the company. In order to get satisfaction she had to appeal to Viscount Lisle, Chamberlain of the Queen’s Household, ‘who hadd a kind of gouernment and suruey ouer the said players’. It was arranged that Mrs. Greene should receive a half-share in the profits until the debt was paid. By the time, however, of her marriage with Baskervile, she had only received £6. In June 1615 negotiations took place between the Baskerviles and the company, who then included Worth, Perkins, and Christopher Hutchinson, _alias_ Beeston, by which the Baskerviles agreed to invest £57 10_s._ in the enterprise and to accept in discharge of their claims a pension for their joint lives of 1_s._ 8_d._ a day ‘for euerye of sixe daies in the weeke wherin they should play’. The company defaulted, and in June 1616 a second settlement was made, whereby the Baskerviles invested another £38, a further pension of 2_s._ a day was established, and the life of Susan’s son, Francis Browne (or Baskervile), was substituted for her husband’s. The players were Christopher Beeston, Thomas Heywood, Ellis Worth, John Cumber, John Blaney, Francis Walpole, Robert Reynolds, William Robins, Thomas Drewe, and Emanuel Read.[670] Again they defaulted, and moreover fell into arrear for the wages of another of Susan Baskervile’s sons, William Browne, who played with them as a hired man. A third settlement, reassuring the pensions, and substituting William Browne for Francis, who was now dead, was made on 3 June 1617, when the company were ‘now comme, or shortlie to comme from the said Playhowse called the Redd Bull to the Playhowse in Drurie Lane called the Cockpitt’; and to this the parties, so far as the company were concerned, were Beeston, Heywood, Worth, Cumber, Walpole, Blaney, Robins, and Drewe. Apparently Reynolds and Read, and also Perkins and Thomas Basse, although their names were recited in the deed, refused to seal. Some further light is thrown on this by allegations of Worth, Cumber, and Blaney, in opposition to those of Mrs. Baskervile in 1623. The company of 1617 contained some members ‘new come into’ it, ‘which were of other companyes at the tyme of graunting the first annuity’. The terms of the agreement were carefully looked into, and were found to bind the company to procure the subscription of any future new members to its terms. This was inconsistent with a proviso of 1616 that the pensions should only last so long as four of those then signing should play together; and therefore, while some of the company signed and gave bonds by way of security on an oral promise by Mrs. Baskervile that this proviso should in fact hold good, others refused to do so. These were the wiser, for in 1623, when Worth, Cumber, and Blaney were the only three of the 1617 signatories who still held together, Mrs. Baskervile sued them on their bonds, and although they applied to Chancery for equitable enforcement of the alleged oral promise, Chancery held that the agreement, being made between players, was ‘vnfitt to be releeued or countenaunced in a courte of equitie’. In some other respects the players’ account of the transactions differs from Mrs. Baskervile’s, and in particular they alleged that the Baskerviles had secured their interest by bribing Beeston, to whom ‘your oratours and the rest of thier fellowes at that tyme and long before and since did put the managing of thier whole businesses and affaires belonging vnto them ioyntly as they were players in trust’, so that she knew well that whatever he promised the rest ‘would allowe of the same’. This Mrs. Baskervile repudiates as regards the bribe, and does not wholly accept as regards Beeston’s position in the company, although she admits that both before and after her husband’s death they ‘did putt much affiance in the said Huttchinson alias Beeston, concerninge the managing of their affaires’.

I am afraid that Beeston’s character does not come altogether unstained out of another suit brought by one John Smith in the Court of Requests during 1619 for a sum of £46 5_s._ 8_d._ in respect of ‘tinsell stuffes and other stuffe’ delivered on Beeston’s order to Worth, Perkins, Cumber, and others at the Red Bull between 27 June 1612 and 23 February 1617, since when they had ‘fallen at variance and strife amongst themselves and separated and devided themselves into other companies.’ He accuses these four men of conspiring to keep him out of payment. Worth, Perkins, and Cumber asserted that the liability was Beeston’s. The company had ‘required divers officers and that every of the said actors should take vpon them some place & charge’. Beeston was charged with the provision of furniture and apparel, which needed ‘a thriueing man & one that was of abilitie & meanes’. He was to ‘defaulke outt of the colleccions and gatheringes which were made continually when-soeuer any playe was acted a certen some of money as a comon stock.’ to pay for purchases out of this, and to account to the company for the balance. No one else was privy to his transactions. The arrangement lasted for seven or eight years, and they believe that he ‘much enritched himself and rendered a false account for expenditure of £400. He is now conspiring with Smith and hoping for a chance to ‘exclayme on’ them. If he incurred debt, he had certainly taken funds to meet it. From the beginning he had ‘a greater care for his owne privatt gaine’. Now he has ‘of late given over his coate & condicion & separated and devided himself’ from the company, carrying away all the furniture and apparel. Beeston says that he has long been ill. On Queen Anne’s death he left the company and joined Prince Charles’s men. The Queen’s had ten sharers, and sometimes one, sometimes another, provided the clothes. He denies liability. Several witnesses, including William Freshwater, merchant tailor and ‘a workman to the said company’, spoke to Beeston’s liability.[671] One John King says that the company allowed Beeston ‘one half of the profitt that came of the gallyryes’, and that they began to break up about three years ago. At a hearing on 16 June 1620 Beeston got the case deferred on the ground that Emanuel Read, a material witness, was in Ireland until Michaelmas. Elizabeth, the wife of Richard Perkins, said that Read had been there for two or three years, was over at Easter, and was not expected again. Smith got in a blow at Beeston’s credit with an affidavit that he had said ‘it was nothing for him to put in a false answere into the Court of Requestes, for that it was not punishable’. The result of the suit is unknown.

We may perhaps reach the following conclusions as to the composition of the London company after the deaths in 1612 of Pulham, presumably a recent comer since 1609, and Greene. Their nucleus consisted of two of the patented men, Christopher Beeston and Heywood, who probably remained with them throughout. Of the other patentees, Swinnerton kept to the provinces. Lee had rejoined them from the provinces by 1613 or 1614, and went back to the provinces about May 1616. Perkins was apparently not of their number in June 1616, but was in June 1617. Holt is not traceable; perhaps he also went to the provinces. Pallant joined the Lady Elizabeth’s in 1614 and had passed to Prince Charles’s by 1616. All these five men, however, appear with Beeston and Heywood as Anne’s servants at her funeral. Here too are Slater and Edmonds, then of the Bristol, and apparently never of the London company; also Worth, Cumber, Blaney, Drewe, and Robinson, presumably identical with Robins, all of whom had joined the London company by June 1616, Basse, formerly of the Lady Elizabeth’s, who joined it between June 1616 and June 1617, and Gregory Sanderson and John Garret, who, if they belonged to the London company at all, must have joined it after June 1617.[672] The list does not contain the names of two men who belonged to the company in 1616 and 1617. One was Emanuel Read, who joined it from the Lady Elizabeth’s in 1613 or later; the other, Robert Reynolds, whose attachment to the company must have been rather loose, as he was travelling in Germany in July 1616 and again in 1618. Evidently, as the lawsuits suggest, the organization of the Queen’s men during its later years was rather unstable. Into its attempts to hold together after Anne’s death and the after-careers of its members, it is not necessary to go.

In June 1617 the Queen’s were come, or shortly to come, from the Red Bull to the Cockpit. In fact they were at the Cockpit, then a new house, on 4 March 1617, when it was sacked by prentices in a Shrovetide riot.[673] But they may have returned to the Red Bull for a time, while the Cockpit was being repaired, as they did again after they lost it on the separation from Christopher Beeston, who seems to have been its owner, in 1619.

xxii. THE DUKE OF LENNOX’S MEN

Ludovic Stuart, s. of Esmé, 1st Duke of Lennox; cousin and
until 1594 heir presumptive of James; _nat._ 29 Sept. 1574;
succ. as 2nd Duke, 26 May 1583; Gentleman of Bedchamber, 1603;
Earl of Richmond, 6 Oct. 1613; Lord Steward, Nov. 1615; Duke of
Richmond, 17 Aug. 1623; o.s.p. 16 Feb. 1624.

The first notice of Lennox’s men is on 13 October 1604, when he gave an open warrant of assistance in their behalf addressed to mayors, justices, and other local officers, some of whom had apparently refused the company permission to play (App. D, no. cxxxvii). On 16 March 1605 Francis Henslowe gave his uncle Philip a bond of £60 to observe articles of an agreement he had entered into with John Garland and Abraham Savere ‘his ffellowes, servantes to the most noble Prince the duke of Lennox’; and on 1 March 1605 Savere had given Francis Henslowe a power of attorney to recover £40 on a forfeited bond from John Garland of ‘the ould forde’, securing delivery of a warrant made to Savere by Lennox (_Henslowe Papers_, 62). Some other traces point to a connexion between Savere and Francis Henslowe, which was ended by the latter’s death in the middle of 1606 (Henslowe, ii. 277), and an undated loan of £7 by Philip Henslowe to his nephew ‘to goyne with owld Garlland and Symcockes and Saverey when they played in the duckes nam at ther laste goinge owt’ (Henslowe, i. 160) makes it possible to add one more to the list of the company. It does not seem to have played in London, but is traceable at Canterbury in 1603–4, Barnstaple, Coventry, and Norwich in 1604–5, and Coventry again in 1607–8. Both Garland and Henslowe had been Queen Elizabeth’s men, and it is possible that, when these men were left stranded by her death in 1603, they found a new patron in Lennox. John Garland had joined the Duke of York’s men by 1610, and it has been suggested that this company may have been a continuation of Lennox’s.

xxiii. THE DUKE OF YORK’S (PRINCE CHARLES’S) MEN

_The Duke of York’s Men (1608–12); The Prince’s Men (1612–16)_

Charles, 2nd s. of James I; _nat._ 19 Nov. 1600; Duke of Albany,
23 Dec. 1600; Duke of York, 16 Jan. 1605; Prince of Wales, 3
Nov. 1616; afterwards (27 Mar. 1625) Charles I.

[_Bibliographical Note._--The documents bearing on the relations
of the Duke of York’s men with Alleyn are printed by W. W. Greg
in _Henslowe Papers_ (1907); the Bill and Answers in the equity
suit of _Taylor v. Hemynges_ (1612) by C. W. Wallace in _Globe
Theatre Apparel_ (p.p., 1909).]

A company under the patronage of Prince Charles, then Duke of York, first makes its appearance during 1608, and in the provinces. A visit of ‘the younger princes’ men to Ipswich is recorded on 20 October. During 1608–9 the company was also at Bath, and it is at least possible that it was ‘the Princes players of the White Chapple London’ rewarded at Leicester in 1608. The Boar’s Head (q.v.) may have been roughly spoken of as in Whitechapel, and although there is no proof that the Duke of York’s men occupied it after the Queen’s moved to the Red Bull, there is nothing to connect them during the earlier years of their career with any of the better-known London houses. On 30 March 1610 they received, like other London companies, a patent, of which the following are the terms:[674]

[Sidenote: De licentia agendi Tragedias &c. pro Johanne Garland & aliis.]

Iames by the grace of God &c. To all Iustices, Mayors,
Sheriffes, Baylies, Constables, hedboroughes and other our
loveing subiectes and officers greetinge. Knowe ye that wee of
our especyall grace, certen knowledge, and meere mocion haue
lycensed and aucthorized, and by theis presentes doe lycence
and authorise Iohn Garland, Willyam Rowley, Thomas Hobbes,
Robert Dawes, Ioseph Taylor, Iohn Newton, and Gilbert Reason,
alreadye sworne servauntes to our deere sonne the Duke of
York and Rothesay, with the rest of their company, to vse and
exercise the arte and quality of playing Comedyes, Tragedies,
histories, Enterludes, Moralles, Pastoralles, Stagplayes, and
such other like as they haue already studdied or hereafter
shall studye or vse, aswell for the recreacion of our loveing
subiectes, as for our solace and pleasure when wee shall thinke
good to see them, and the said Enterludes or other to shewe
and execise publiquely to their best aduantage and commoditie,
aswell in and about our Cittye of London in such vsuall howses
as themselues shall provide, as alsoe within anye Townehalles,
Mootehalles, Guildhalles, Schoolehowses, or other convenient
places within the lybertye and freedome of any other Cittye,
vniversity, Towne, or Boroughe whatsoever within our Realmes and
Domynions, willing and comaundinge you and everie of you, as
you tender our pleasure, not onlye to permitt and suffer them
herein without any your lettes, hindraunces, molestacions or
disturbances during our said pleasure, but alsoe to be ayding
and assisting vnto them, if any wronge be vnto them offered, and
to allowe them such former curtesies as hath byne given to men
of their place and quality, And alsoe what further favor you
shall shewe them for our sake wee shall take yt kyndlye at your
handes. Prouided alwaies and our will and pleasure is that all
authority, power, priviledg, and proffitt whatsoever belonging
and properly apperteyninge to the Master of our Revelles in
respect of his Office and everie article and graunt contayned
within the lettres patentes or Commission, which haue byne
heretofore graunted or directed by the late Queene Elizabeth our
deere sister or by our selfe to our welbeloved servantes Edmond
Tillney Master of the said Office of the said Revelles, or to
Sir George Bucke knight, or to eyther of them, in possession or
Revercion, shall remayne and abyde entire and in full force,
estate and vertue and in as ample sort as if this our commission
had never bene made. Witnes our selfe att Westminster the
thirtith daye March.
per breve de priuato sigillo &c.

The only member of the Duke of York’s men, of whose previous history anything is known, is John Garland. He was of the Duke of Lennox’s men in 1605. Perhaps the whole company was taken over from the Duke of Lennox. Mr. Fleay says that the Duke of York’s men arose ‘immediately after the disappearance of the King’s Revels Children’,[675] and appears to suggest a continuity between the two companies; but he must have overlooked the fact that the Duke of York’s were already performing in the provinces, while the King’s Revels were in all probability still at Whitefriars.[676]

Some reconstruction doubtless took place about the date of the issue of the patent, for the pleadings in the equity suit of _Taylor v. Hemynges_ in 1612 recites an agreement of 15 March 1610, which provided for the continuance of fellowship during three years and the forfeiture of the interest in a common stock of ‘apparrell goodes money and other thinges’ of any member, who left without the consent of the rest. It was made between Garland on the one side and Taylor, Rowley, Dawes, and Hobbes on the other, and these four gave Garland a bond of £200 as security. On 8 May the five bought some ‘olde clothes or apparrell which formerly weare players clothes or apparrell’ from John Heminges of the King’s men for £11, and gave a bond of £20 for payment. Apparently payment had not been made by Easter 1611, when Taylor ‘by the licence and leave of his said Master the Duke vpon some speciall reason ... did give over and leave to play in the company’. Under the agreement the apparel passed to his fellows, and according to Taylor they paid Heminges the £11 or otherwise satisfied him, and then ‘havinge conceaued some vndeserued displeasure’ against Taylor for leaving them, conspired with Heminges to defraud him of £20 on the bond. According to Heminges no payment was made, and he sued Taylor as ‘the best able to paye and discharge the same’. Taylor was arrested and in February 1612 brought his suit in equity to stay the common law proceedings. The result is unknown.

The company frequently played at Court, but, as it would seem, only before the younger members of the royal family. Their first appearance was before Charles and Elizabeth on 9 February 1610. In 1610–11 they were at Saffron Walden. They came before Charles and Elizabeth on 12 and 20 December 1610 and 15 January 1611, and before Henry, Charles, and Elizabeth on 12 and 28 January and 13 and 24 February 1612. On this last occasion they played William Rowley’s _Hymen’s Holiday, or Cupid’s Vagaries_. After Henry’s death, on 7 November 1612, they became entitled to the designation of the Prince’s players. In 1612–13 they were at Barnstaple and Ipswich. On 2 and 10 March 1613 they gave the two parts of _The Knaves_, perhaps by Rowley, before Charles, Elizabeth, and the Palsgrave. In 1613–14 they were at Barnstaple, Dover, Saffron Walden, and Coventry. They were not at Court for the winter of 1613–14. In November 1614 they were at Oxford, Leicester, and Nottingham. At the Christmas of 1614–15 they gave six plays before Charles, and on 11 February they were at Youghal in Ireland. Ten days later R. A.’s _The Valiant Welshman_ was entered and in the course of the year published as theirs. Their leader seems to have been Rowley. He both wrote plays for them and acted as payee for all their court rewards from 1610 to 1614. In 1611 they lost Taylor and in 1614 Dawes to the Lady Elizabeth’s men; and these transferences seem to have led to a temporary amalgamation of the two companies, which Mr. Fleay and Dr. Greg place in 1614, but for which their distinct appearances at Court in the following winter suggest 1615 as the more likely date.[677] On 29 March 1615 William Rowley and John Newton were called with representatives of other companies before the Privy Council to answer for playing in Lent. No separate representation of the Lady Elizabeth’s is indicated by the list. In 1614–15 the Prince’s were at Norwich, Coventry, Winchester, and Barnstaple. In the winter of 1615–16 they gave four plays before Prince Charles, and the payee was not Rowley, but Alexander Foster, formerly of the Lady Elizabeth’s. Rosseter’s patent of 3 June 1615 for a second Blackfriars theatre contemplates its use by the Prince’s men and the Lady Elizabeth’s, as well as by the Queen’s Revels, and Field’s _Amends for Ladies_ was actually played in the Blackfriars, probably in this house before it was suppressed, by the two first-named companies. After Henslowe’s death on 6 January 1616, the combination, whatever its nature, was probably broken up, and separate companies of Prince’s men and Lady Elizabeth’s men were again formed. But both of the original companies continued to be represented in one which remained at the Hope. This is shown by an agreement entered into with Alleyn and Meade on 20 March 1616, and signed in the presence of Robert Daborne and others by William Rowley, Robert Pallant, Joseph Taylor, Robert Hamlen, John Newton, William Barksted, Thomas Hobbes, Antony Smith, William Penn, and Hugh Attwell.[678] This recites that the signatories and others had given bonds to Henslowe and Meade for the repayment of sums lent them by Henslowe, for a stock of apparel worth £400, and for the fulfilment of certain Articles of Agreement; and that at their entreaty Alleyn had agreed to accept £200 in discharge of their full liabilities. They covenant to pay the £200 by making over to Alleyn one-fourth of the daily takings of the whole galleries at the Hope or any house in which they may play, and to carry out the Articles with Alleyn and Meade by so playing. Alleyn and Meade agree to cancel the bonds when the £200 is paid, except any which may relate to private debts of any of the men to Henslowe, and also to make over to them any apparel which they had received from Henslowe, Alleyn, or Meade. The rights of Alleyn and Meade against any bondsmen not taking part in the new agreement are to remain unaffected. That the signatories to this document used the name of Prince Charles’s men seems pretty clear from the reappearance of several of their names in two later lists of the Prince’s men, one in Rowley and Middleton’s _Mask of Heroes_ (1619), the other in the records of King James’s funeral on 20 May 1625.[679] This last contains also the name of Gilbert Reason, who is not one of the signatories of 1616, but was in that year travelling the provinces with an irregularly obtained exemplification of the 1610 patent.[680] An undated letter from Pallant, Rowley, Taylor, Newton, Hamlen, Attwell, and Smith to Alleyn, which may belong to some time in 1616 or 1617, shows that, in spite of the easy terms which the company seem to have received by the agreement, the subsequent relations were not altogether smooth. They write to excuse their removal from the Bankside, where they had stood the intemperate weather, until ‘more intemperate Mr. Meade thrust vs over, taking the day from vs w^{ch} by course was ours’. They ask Alleyn to find them a house and in the meantime to lend them £40, on the security that ‘we haue to receiue from the court (w^{ch} after Shrouetide wee meane to pursue w^{th} best speede) a great summe of monie’, amounting to more than twice the loan desired.[681] It is to be presumed that the ‘course’ to which they refer was some distribution of days between playing and bear-baiting. In 1619 the company was joined by Christopher Beeston, formerly of the Queen’s, and his house of the Cockpit became available for their use.

xxiv. THE LADY ELIZABETH’S MEN

Elizabeth, e. d. of James I; _nat. c._ 19 Aug. 1596; m.
Frederick V, Elector Palatine (Palsgrave), 14 Feb. 1613; Queen
of Bohemia, 7 Nov. 1619; known as Queen of Hearts; _ob._ 13 Feb.
1662.

[_Bibliographical Note._--Nearly all the material is to be found
among the extracts from the Dulwich MSS. printed by W. W. Greg
in _Henslowe Papers_ (1907) and summarized in Henslowe, ii. 137.]

This company seems to have come into existence in 1611 under the following patent of 27 March:[682]

[Sidenote: De licencia speciali pro Iohanne Townsend & Iosepho Moore & aliis.]

Iames by the grace of god &c. To all Iustices, Maiors,
Sheriffes, Bailiffes, Constables hedborroughes, and other our
lovinge Subiectes and officers greetinge. Knowe ye that wee of
our especiall grace, certayne knowledge, and meere mocon have
licenced and authorised, and by these presente do licence and
authorize Iohn Townsend and Joseph Moore, sworne servantes to
our deere daughter the ladie Elizabeth, with the rest of theire
Companie, to vse and exercise the Arte and qualitie of playinge
Comedies, histories, Enterludes, Morralls, pastoralls, stage
playes, and such other like as they haue alreadie studied or
hereafter shall studie or vse, aswell for the recreacion of
our lovinge Subiectes, as for our solace and pleasure when wee
shall thinke good to see them, And the said enterludes or other
to shewe and exercise publiquelie to their best commoditie
in and about our Cittie of London in such vsuall howses as
themselues shall prouide, And alsoe within anie Towne halles,
mootehalles, Guyld-halles, Schoolehowses or other convenient
places within the libertye and freedome of anie other Cittie,
vniuersitie, Towne or Burroughe whatsoeuer within our Realmes
and Domynions, willinge and comaundinge you and everie of you,
as you tender our pleasure, not onelie to permitt and suffer
them herein without any your lettes, hinderances, molestacions
or disturbances during our said pleasure, but alsoe to be
ayding and assistinge vnto them, if anie wronge be vnto them
offred, And to allowe them such former curtesies as hath byne
given to men of their place and qualitie, And alsoe what
further fauour you shall shewe them for our sake wee shall
take yt kindelie at your handes. Prouided alwayes and our will
and pleasure is that all authoritie, power, priveledge, and
profitt whatsoever belonginge or properlie apperteyning to the
maister of the Revelles in respecte of his office and euerie
Article and graunte conteyned within the letters Pattentes or
Comission, which haue byne heretofore graunted or directed by
the late queene Elizabeth our deere sister or by our selfe to
our welbeloued Servantes Edwarde Tylney Maister of the saide
Revells, or to Sir George Bucke knighte, or to eyther of them,
in possession or reuercon, shall remayne and abide entire and
in full force, effecte and vertue, and in as ample sorte as if
this our Comission had neuer byne made In witnesse wherof &c.
Witnesse our selfe at Westminster the seaven and Twentith daye
of Aprill.
per breve de priuato sigillo &c.

The company is first traceable in the country, at Bath during 1610–11 and at Ipswich on 28 May 1611. The names of Moore and Townsend render possible its identification with an unnamed company, which on 29 August 1611 gave duplicate bonds of £500 to Henslowe for the observance of certain articles of agreement of the same date. Unfortunately the articles themselves are not preserved, but it is likely that they contained an arrangement for the housing and financing of the company by Henslowe.[683] The signatories to both bonds include John Townsend, Joseph Taylor, William Ecclestone, Thomas Hunt, John Rice, Robert Hamlen, Joseph Moore, William Carpenter, Thomas Basse, and Alexander Foster. To these one adds Giles Gary and William Barksted and the other Francis Waymus. The names recited in the bodies of the documents agree with the signatures, except that Gary appears in both. Several of these men now come into London theatrical history for the first time, but Gary is probably the Giles Cary who with Barksted played in _Epicoene_ for the Queen’s Revels in 1609, Taylor came from the Duke of York’s, and Rice from the King’s. One Hunt, whose Christian name is unknown, was with the Admiral’s in 1601. Alexander Foster received payment on behalf of the Lady Elizabeth’s men for three plays given at Court during the Christmas of 1611–12. The first was on 19 January 1612 before Elizabeth and Henry; the second was _The Proud Maid’s Tragedy_, on 25 February before James; and the third was on 11 March, again before Elizabeth and Henry. In 1611–12 the company were at Dover and Coventry, and on 30 July 1612 at Leicester. On 20 October they played before Elizabeth and the Palsgrave, shortly after the latter’s arrival in England, in the Cockpit. This was perhaps the play paid for out of the private funds of Elizabeth, as the result of a wager with Mr. Edward Sackville.[684] During Christmas they played twice before Charles, Elizabeth, and the Palsgrave, showing Marston’s _The Dutch Courtesan_ on 25 February and _Raymond Duke of Lyons_ on 1 March. For 1612–13 Joseph Taylor was payee.

The names of Taylor and Ecclestone are found in another document in the Dulwich collection, which pretty clearly belongs to the Lady Elizabeth’s men, and which shows that about the spring of 1613 their business relations with Henslowe entered upon a somewhat troubled phase. This is shown by internal evidence to have been written in the course of 1615. It is here reproduced:[685]

Articles of [ ]uaunce against
M[ ] Hinchlowe

Imprimis in March 1612 vppon M^r. Hynchlowes Joyninge Companes
with M^r. Rosseter the Companie borrowed 80^[ll] of one M^r.
Griffin and the same was put into M^r. Hinchlowes debt which
made itt sixteene score poundes; whoe [a]fter the receipt of the
same or most parte thereof in March 1613 hee broke the saide
Comp[any a]gaine and Ceazed all the stocke, vnder Culler to
satisfie what remayned due to [him]; yet perswaded M^r. Griffyne
afterwardes to arest the Companie for his 80^{ll}, whoe are
still in daunger for the same; Soe nowe there was in equitie due
to the Companie 80^{ll}:

Item M^r. Hinchlowe having lent one Taylor 30^{ll} and 20^{ll}
to one Baxter fellowes of the Companie Cunninglie put theire
said privat debts into the generall accompt by which meanes hee
is in Conscience to allowe them 50^{ll}:

Item havinge the stock of Apparell in his handes to secure his
debt he sould tenn poundes worth of ould apparrell out of the
same without accomptinge or abatinge for the same; heare growes
due to the Companie 10^{ll}:

Also vppon the departure of one Eglestone a ffellowe of the
Companie hee recovered of him 14^{ll} towardes his debt which is
in Conscience likewise to bee allowed to the Companie 14^{ll}:

In March 1613 hee makes vpp a Companie and buies apparrell of
one Rosseter to the value of 63^{ll}, and valued the ould stocke
that remayned in his handes at 63^{ll}, likewise they vppon his
word acceptinge the same at that rate, which being prized by
M^r. Daborne iustlie, betweene his partner Meade and him, Came
but to 40^{ll}: soe heare growes due to the Companie 23^{ll}:

Item hee agrees with the said Companie that they should enter
bond to plaie with him for three yeares att such house and
houses as hee shall appointe and to allowe him halfe galleries
for the said house and houses, and the other halfe galleries
towardes his debt of 126^{ll}, and other such moneys as hee
should laie out for playe apparrell duringe the space of the
said 3 yeares, agreeinge with them in Consideration theareof to
seale each of them a bond of 200^{ll} to find them a Convenient
house and houses, and to laie out such moneies as fower of the
sharers should think fitt for theire vse in apparrell, which att
the 3 yeares, being paid for, to be deliuered to the sharers;
whoe accordinglie entered the said bondes; but M^r. Henchlowe
and M^r. Mead deferred the same, an[d] in Conclusion vtterly
denied to seale att all.

Item M^r. Hinchlowe havinge promised in Consideracion of the
Companies lying still one daie in forteene for his baytinge to
give them 50^s, hee havinge denied to bee bound as aforesaid
gave them onlie 40^s, and for that M^r. Feild would not Consent
therevnto hee gave him soe much as his share out of 50^{ll}
would have Come vnto; by which meanes hee is dulie indebted to
the Companie x^{ll}:

In June followinge the said agreement, hee brought in M^r.
Pallant and short[l]ie after M^r. Dawes into the said Companie,
promisinge one 12^s a weeke out of his part of the galleries,
and the other 6^s a weeke out of his parte of the galleries;
and because M^r. Feild was thought not to bee drawne therevnto,
hee promissed him six shillinges weekelie alsoe; which in
one moneth after vnwilling to beare soe greate a Charge, he
Called the Companie together, and told them that this 24^s was
to bee Charged vppon them, threatninge those which would not
Consent therevnto to breake the Companie and make vpp a newe
without the[m]. Whearevppon knowinge hee was not bound, the
three-quarters sharers advauncinge them selves to whole shares
Consented therevnto, by which meanes they are out of purse
30^{ll}, and his parte of the galleries bettred twise as much
30^{ll}:

Item havinge 9 gatherers more then his due itt Comes to this
yeare from the Companie 10^{ll}:

Item the Companie paid for [Arra]s and other properties 40^{ll},
which Mr. Henchlow deteyneth 40^{ll}:

In Februarie last 1614 perceav[ing]e the Companie drewe out of
his debt and Called vppon him for his accompts hee brooke the
Companie againe, by withdrawinge the hired men from them, and
selles theire stocke (in his hands) for 400^{ll}, givinge vnder
his owne hand that hee had receaved towardes his debt 300^{ll}:

Which with the iuste and Conscionable allowances before named
made to the Companie, which Comes to ... 267^{ll}, makes
567^{ll}:

Articles of oppression against
M^r. Hinchlowe.

Hee Chargeth the stocke with ... 600^{ll}: and odd, towardes
which hee hath receaved as aforesaid ... 567^{ll} of vs; yet
selles the stocke to strangers for fower hundred poundes, and
makes vs no satisfacion.

Hee hath taken all boundes of our hired men in his owne name,
whose wages though wee have truly paid yet att his pleasure hee
hath taken them a waye, and turned them over to others to the
breaking of our Companie.

For lendinge of vj^{ll} to p[ay] them theire wages, hee made vs
enter bond to give him the profitt of a warraunt of tenn poundes
due to vs att Court.

Alsoe hee hath taken right gould and silver lace of divers
garmentes to his owne vse without accompt to vs or abatement.

Vppon everie breach of the Companie hee takes newe bondes for
his stocke and our securitie for playinge with him; Soe that
hee hath in his handes bondes of ours to the value of 5000^{ll}
and his stocke to; which hee denies to deliuer and threatens to
oppresse us with.

Alsoe havinge apointed a man to the seeinge of his accomptes in
byinge of Clothes (hee beinge to have vi^s a weeke) hee takes
the meanes away and turnes the man out.

The reason of his often breakinge with vs hee gave in these
wordes ‘Should these fellowes Come out of my debt, I should have
noe rule with them’.

Alsoe wee have paid him for plaie bookes 200^{ll} or
thereaboutes and yet hee denies to give vs the Coppies of any
one of them.

Also within 3 yeares hee hath broken and dissmembred five
Companies.

It is not quite possible to trace all the five breakings of companies referred to in the closing sentence; but the statement is sufficient to give a fairly clear outline of the history of the Lady Elizabeth’s men during the years which it covers, and, as it happens, there is a good deal of other evidence from which to supplement it. It appears that in March 1613 Henslowe joined companies with Rosseter; that is to say, that an amalgamation took place between the Lady Elizabeth’s men and the Children of the Queen’s Revels, who had been acting at the Whitefriars under the patent to Rosseter and others of 4 January 1610. One of these children was Robert Baxter, if he is the Baxter named in the Articles of Grievance as a fellow of the company with Taylor between March 1613 and March 1614.[686] During the same period it appears that William Ecclestone left the company. He afterwards joined the King’s men. But, before he went, he took a part in _The Honest Man’s Fortune_, which is stated in the _Dyce MS._ to have been played in 1613, while its ‘principal actors’ are named in the 1679 folio of Beaumont and Fletcher as ‘Nathan Field, Robert Benfield, Emanuel Read, Joseph Taylor, Will. Eglestone and Thomas Basse’. This particular combination seems to point clearly to the Lady Elizabeth’s men as the original producers of the play. A very similar cast is assigned in the same folio to _The Coxcomb_, namely, ‘Nathan Field, Joseph Taylor, Giles Gary, Emanuel Read, Richard Allen, Hugh Atawell, Robert Benfeild, and William Barcksted’; and I think that this also must belong to a performance by the Lady Elizabeth’s men about 1613. _The Coxcomb_ had certainly been played at Court by the Queen’s Revels in 1612, but it seems impossible that Taylor can then have been a member of that company.[687] The new blood brought in from Rosseter’s company will, then, have included Field, Attwell, Richard Allen, Benfield, Reade, and perhaps Robert Baxter, of whom the first three had played in Jonson’s _Epicoene_ for the Revels in 1609. When it is remembered that Cary and Barksted had been in the same cast, it will be realized that the Lady Elizabeth’s men, as constituted in 1613, were very much the Queen’s Revels over again.

I think there can be no doubt that the Lady Elizabeth’s men was the company principally referred to in the long series of letters from Robert Daborne to Henslowe, which runs from 17 April 1613 to 31 July 1614.[688] Daborne had been one of the patentees for the Queen’s Revels in 1609, and some letters apparently belonging to the same series show Field as interested, either as writer or actor, in some of the plays which Henslowe was purchasing from Daborne, with a view to reselling them to this company. Further confirmation is to be obtained for this view from the signature of Hugh Attwell as witness to one of Henslowe’s advances to Daborne,[689] and from the mention of Benfield,[690] of Pallant who, as will be seen, joined the company in 1614,[691] and of _Eastward Ho!_ which their repertory had inherited from that of the Queen’s Revels.[692] That ‘Mr. Allin’ was hearing Daborne’s plays with Henslowe in May 1613 need cause no difficulty.[693] It is true that Edward Alleyn is not known to have had any relations with the Lady Elizabeth’s men, but John Alleyn, a nephew of Edward, is amongst Henslowe’s witnesses about this time,[694] and Richard Allen, who may not have belonged to the same family, was himself one of the Lady Elizabeth’s men, and perhaps served as their literary adviser. The correspondence makes it possible to recover the names of a series of plays on which Daborne was engaged, either alone or in collaboration with others, during the period over which it extends, and all of which seem to have been primarily meant for the Lady Elizabeth’s men, although he occasionally professes, as an aid to his chaffering, to have an alternative market with the King’s men.[695] From April to June 1613 he was writing a tragedy of _Machiavel and the Devil_, and this is probably the ‘new play’, of which he suggests the performance on Wednesday in August, to follow one of _Eastward Ho!_ on the Monday.[696] For this Henslowe covenanted to pay him £20. In June he was also completing _The Arraignment of London_, of which he had given an act to Cyril Tourneur to write; and to this _The Bellman of London_, for which he and a colleague, perhaps again Tourneur, asked no more than £12 and ‘the overplus of the second day’ in August, was probably a sequel.[697] This may be the play which he had delivered to Henslowe about the beginning of December. About July he seems also to have been occupied upon a play in collaboration with Field, Fletcher, and Massinger. This is not named, and Mr. Fleay’s identification of it with _The Honest Man’s Fortune_ is rather hazardous.[698] In December he began _The Owl_, for which his price fell to £10; and on 11 March 1614 he had finished this, and was beginning _The She Saint_ and asking ‘but 12^l a play till they be playd.’ The correspondence has a gap between the middle of August and the middle of October 1613. Probably the company were on tour; they are found at Coventry, Shrewsbury, and Marlborough in 1612–13, Canterbury on 4 July 1613, Dover between 12 July and 7 August, and Leicester on 13 October. In the spring they had been at Bristol and Norwich. On 12 December they repeated one of their plays of the preceding winter, Marston’s _The Dutch Courtesan_, before Charles, and on 25 January 1614 gave _Eastward Ho!_ which they had been playing in public during the summer, before James. Taylor was again their payee for this Christmas.

The statement of grievances indicates another reconstruction of the company in March 1614. In this transaction, which apparently involved the buying out of Rosseter’s interest, Meade was in partnership with Henslowe, and Field was presumably in some position of authority on behalf of the players, as it is alleged that Henslowe bribed him, in order to obtain his assent to the modification of a covenant under which he was to make an allowance for a withdrawal of the theatre once a fortnight for baiting. The terms recited agree with those of an undated and mutilated agreement between Henslowe and Jacob Meade on one side and Field on behalf of an unnamed company of players on the other. The text of this follows:[699]

Articles of agreement made, concluded, and agreed vppon,
and which are on the parte and behalfe of Phillipp Henslowe
Esquier and Jacob Meade Waterman to be perfourmed, touchinge
& concerninge the Company of players which they haue lately
raised, viz^t.

Imprimis the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob Meade doe for
them, their executours and administratours, Covenante, promise,
and graunt by theis presentes to and with Nathan Feilde gent.,
That they the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob Meade or one
of them shall and will duringe the space of Three yeares at
all tymes (when noe restraynte of playinge shalbe) at their
or some of their owne proper costes and charges fynde and
provide a sufficient howse or howses for the saide Company
to play in, And also shall and will at all tymes duringe the
saide tearme disburse and lay out all suche somme & sommes of
monny, as ffower or ffive Shareres of the saide Company chosen
by the saide Phillipp and Jacob shall thinck fittinge, for
the furnishinge of the said Company with playinge apparrell
towardes the settinge out of their newe playes, And further
that the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob Meade shall and will
at all tymes duringe the saide tearme, when the saide Company
shall play in or neare the Cittie of London, furnish the saide
Company of players, aswell with suche stock of apparrell & other
properties as the said Phillipp Henslowe hath already bought, As
also with suche other stock of apparrell as the saide Phillipp
Henslowe and Jacob Meade shall hereafter provide and buy for
the said Company duringe the saide tearme, And further shall
and will at suche tyme and tymes duringe the saide tearme, as
the saide Company of Players shall by meanes of any restraynte
or sicknes goe into the Contrey, deliuer and furnish the saide
Company with fitting apparrell out of both the saide stockes of
apparrell. And further the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob
Meade doe for them, their executours and administratours,
convenante and graunt to and with the saide Nathan Feilde by
theis presentes in manner and fourme followinge, that is to say,
That they the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob Meade or one of
them shall and will from tyme to tyme duringe the saide tearme
disburse and lay out suche somme or sommes of monny as shalbe
thought fittinge by ffower or ffive of the Shareres of the saide
Company, to be chosen by the saide Phillipp & Jacob or one of
them, to be paide for any play which they shall buy or condicion
or agree for; Soe alwaies as the saide Company doe and shall
truly repaye vnto the saide Phillipp and Jacob, their executores
or assignes, all suche somme & sommes of monny, as they shall
disburse for any play, vppon the second or third daie wheron the
same play shalbe plaide by the saide Company, without fraude
or longer delay; And further that the saide Phillipp Henslowe
and Jacob Meade shall and will at all tymes, vppon request made
by the Maior parte of the Sharers of the saide Company v[nder
their] handes, remove and putt out of the saide Company any of
the saide Company of playeres, if the saide Phillipp Henslowe
and Jacob Meade shall fynde [the s]aide request to be iust and
that ther be noe hope of conformety in the partie complayned
of; And further that they the saide Phillipp Henslowe and Jacob
Mea[de shall] and [will] at all tymes, vppon request made by
the saide Company or the maior parte therof, pay vnto them all
suche somes of monny as shall comme vnto their handes v[ppon [
extra spaces ]of]any forfectures for rehearsalles or suche like
paymentes; And also shall and will, vppon the request of the
said Company or the maior parte of the[m], sue [ extra spaces ]
ar[ extra spaces ] persons by whom any forfecture shalbe made
as aforesaid, and after or vppon the recovery and receipte
th[ero]f (their charges disbursed about the recovery [[ extra
spaces ]b]einge first deducted and allowed) shall and will make
satisfaccion of the remaynder therof vnto the said Company
without fraude or guile.

Mr. Fleay and Dr. Greg think that at the time of this reconstruction the company was further strengthened by the incorporation of the Duke of York’s, now the Prince’s, men.[700] This I doubt, as the Prince’s men continued to play at Court, as a company quite distinct from the Lady Elizabeth’s, during the winter of 1614–15. It is true that Robert Dawes, who had been one of the Duke of York’s in 1610, joined the Lady Elizabeth’s, but it was precisely one of the grievances that this man and Robert Pallant were introduced by Henslowe, by means of a financial adjustment unfavourable to the sharers, in June 1614. Pallant had passed through several companies, and is traceable with Queen Anne’s men in 1609. He was still technically a servant of the Queen at her death in 1619.[701] A letter from Daborne on 28 March 1614 shows that he was then expecting an answer to some proposal made to Henslowe, which the latter had neglected.[702] Articles between Robert Dawes and Henslowe and Meade are on record, and bear the date 7 April 1614.[703] The following is the text:

Articles of Agreement,] made, concluded, and agreed uppon, and
which are to be kept & performed by Robert Dawes of London,
Gent. unto and with Phillipp Henslowe Esq^{re} and Jacob [Meade
Waterman] in manner and forme followinge, that is to say