wyche was gatherd amongs the pepyll ther, vis iiiid; and so was paid by the accomptant, iii viiid." 4

During the reign of Elizabeth, the reward of the City appears to have been payable wholly by the Chamberlain, and so continued until the suppression of the players in 1642; although the custom of actually playing before the Mayor only survived until about 1580, in which year 40s. were paid to the Earl of Oxenforde's lads for playing before the Mayor and his brethren.

In 1565 the sum of 40s. was "given to Mr. Walter Hall and Mr. Ffawsytt, skolemasters, when ther skollers played ther interlude before Mr. Mayor and his brethren, at the Comon Hall," the City Chamberlain also paid 3s. for torches to show light in the chappell when they played." This custom for the Grammar School boys to play before the Mayor survived, however, until the end of the seventeenth century, and perhaps later; and was in no way connected with the Mayor's Play, as performed by professional actors.

The rapid increase in the amount of the gratuity given to the players, is, perhaps, worthy of note. Whereas 68. 8d. was deemed sufficient for the King's players in 1533, 20s. was the usual reward given to the Queen's players, and 13s. 4d. to noblemen's servants in 1557, while these gratuities had risen to 40s. and 20s. respectively by the year 1585.

Having got their licence from the Mayor's Court, the players would repair to the inn at which they were staying and prepare for the performances.

Naturally the first thing to be done would be to proclaim their advent by playing drum and trumpet through

A similar custom appears to have existed at Leicester, as payments to players, occurring in the Borough Accounts from 1555 to 1601, are usually entered as being "over and above that was gathered," or more than was gathered."

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the streets; while, if the performance was to take place in an inn yard, it was usual to post up bills at the entrance announcing the title of the plays and the hours As we have seen, some players of their commencement. performed in St. Andrew's Hall or the Blackfriars' Hall, but for the most part the performances were held in the open yards of certain of the old Norwich inns, such as the Red Lion in St. Stephen's, and the White Horse, The latter house was kept for many near Tombland. years by John Powl, who died on the 4th August, 1620, and to whose memory a monument is erected in the For some reason this church of St. Martin-at-Palace. house was not approved by the Mayor's Court, for in suiturs to have 1601 Lord Hertford's players being leave to play at the signe of the White Horsse in Tombelond...., it is ordered that no players or playes be made. or used in the said house, either now or hereafter" (a marginal note, however, states that leave was afterwards granted), while in 1616 two companies had "leave to play fower days this next week, but not at Powl's, but in the chappell nere the new hall." Powl was probably succeeded by Thomas Marcon as proprietor of the White Horse, and we have preserved to us the contents of a play bill which was found fastened on the gate of the White Horse during Marcon's management, on the 26th April, 1624. The wording of the bill is as follows:

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Here, within this place, at one of the clock, shall be acted an excellent new comedy, called The Spanish Contract, by the Princess's servants. Vivat rex."

The Mayor's licence sometimes provided that the actors should keep "meet and convenient hours": thus in April, 1599, the Earl of Pembroke's players were licensed "to use theire facultie two dayes and two nyghts, and not of the clocke on eyther to use the same after nyne nyghte." And in 1611 "the Quene's players had leave

given them to play for one weeke, so that they play neither on the Saboth day, nor in the night, nor more than one play on a day."

The stage was a mere temporary platform in the inn yard, around three sides of which the bulk of the spectators (or "groundlings," as they were called by the Elizabethan writers) stood beneath the open sky, while the permanent galleries, which usually ran round our old inn yards, and examples of which are still to be seen, formed covered seats or boxes for the richer portion of the audience. It was impossible for a travelling company in those days to be burdened with scenery or stage properties. The appliances were therefore of the roughest sort-a blanket for a curtain, a few flowers to indicate a garden, crowds and armies represented by a dozen ostlers and stable boys, heroes riding on and off on hobby horses, and a board on a post stating whether the scene was at Athens or in London, while all the female parts were taken by boys, and even sometimes. by men, for did not a stage manager on one occasion explain a long delay between the pieces by stating that "the Queen was shaving." As to stage effects, it appears to have been a dangerous thing to introduce anything of that sort, to judge from the fact that Dr. John Dee, the father of our celebrated Norwich doctor, Arthur Dee, was throughout his life regarded as a magician, for having in a Greek comedy at Cambridge, sent a man with a basket of victuals up to the skies, "whereat was great wondering, and many vain reports spread abroad of the means how it was effected."

But, nevertheless, despite the lack of scenery and properties at the play, all the world was there, the galleries crowded with country squires and city aldermen, with their wives and daughters, while apprentices and citizens stood closely packed in the yard below. We

can well believe that the strolling players found Norwich audiences somewhat difficult to please in matters of stage properties and wardrobes for a year or two after Queen Elizabeth's visit, in 1578, when pageants of a highly dramatic character, and mounted with a then unparalleled magnificence, were presented for her amusement on every available occasion. I do not, however, propose to dwell further on these pageants, which anyone can read for himself in the pages of Blomefield.

Having brought my hearers into one of our Norwich inn yards, it seems hard to hurry them off again without affording a glimpse of one of the performances, but I fear we can scarcely hope at the present day to unearth a description of one of these.

Let me, however, here record one or two incidents in connection with visits of strolling companies of players in Norwich and the neighbourhood.

We may gather, I think, that the acting was sometimes of a high order, from the following occurrence at King's Lynn. In the old tragedy of "A Warning to Fair Women," written before 1590, and published in 1599, occur the following lines as an argument in favour of the beneficial results of theatrical representations :

"A woman that had made away her husband,
And sitting to behold a tragedy

At Lynne, a town in Norfolk,

Acted by players travelling that way,

Wherein, a woman that had murdered hers,
Was ever haunted with her husband's ghost;

The passion written by a feeling pen,

And acted by a good tragedian,

She was so moved with the sight thereof,

As she cried out the play was made by her,

And openly confessed her husband's murder."

:

From another source (Heywood's Apology for Actors, published in 1612) we learn that the tragedy in question

was the old "History of Friar Francis," and was being performed by the players of the Earl of Sussex, a company which on several occasions visited Norwich in the reigns of Edward VI. and Elizabeth.

For the next incident I am indebted to a scarce pamphlet, privately printed by the late Mr. Halliwell Phillips, which brings us into very close contact with, and affords us a very interesting glimpse of some of the most famous Elizabethan actors when on a visit to Norwich. The pamphlet is a print of certain contemporary depositions, respecting an affray in the month of June, 1583, in which Queen Elizabeth's company of players was involved. It should be noted that in the preceding March twelve of the principal comedians of the time were, at the earnest request of Sir Francis Walsingham, selected from the various companies then existing under the licence and protection of certain noblemen, and were amalgamated into one company, under the title of "Her Majesties' Servants." The occurrence I am about to record, happened therefore within three months of the formation of the company.

On the afternoon of Saturday, the 15th June, 1583, Queen Elizabeth's Company, amongst whom were Tarleton, Bentley, and Singer, was announced to perform in the yard of the Red Lion Inn, which stood, and still stands in Red Lion Street, and a part of which is now known as the Cricketers' Arms. When the play had just commenced, word was brought to the players that one Wynsdon was trying to get in without paying, and in his struggle with the players' gate-keeper, had caused the latter to drop the money taken at the gate. Thereupon Tarleton, Bentley (who was playing the part of a duke in the play, the title of which is not mentioned), and Singer, in a black doublet, with a players' beard 5 Since the above was written a portion of the house has been modernized.