Mr. Kynafton even after women had affumed their proper rank on the ftage, was not only endured, but admired, if we may believe a contemporary writer; who affures us, "that being then very young, he made a complete stage beauty, performing his parts fo well, (particularly Arthiope and Aglaura) that it has fince been difputable among the judicious, whether any woman that fucceeded him, touched the audience fo fenfibly as he." + In D'Avenant's company, the firft actress that appeared was probably Mrs. Saunderson, who performed Ianthe in The Siege of Rhodes, on the opening of his new theatre in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields, in April 1662. It does not appear from Downes's account, that while D'Avenant's company performed at the Cockpit in Drury-lane during the years 1659, 1660 and 1661, they had any female performer among them: or that Othello was acted by them at that period. In the infancy of the English ftage it was cuftomary in every piece to introduce a Clown, " by "If this be pardon'd, we shall henceforth bring A Royal Arbour, &c. p. 12. The author of Hiftoria Hiftrionica fays, that Major Mohun played Bellamente in Shirley's Love Cruelty, after the Restoration; and Cibber mentions, that Kynafton told him he had played the part of Evadne in The Maid's Tragedy, at the fame period, with fuccefs. The apology made to King Charles the Second for a play not beginning in due time, (" that the queen was not shaved,") is well known. The queen is faid (but on no good authority) to have been Kynafton. 4 Rofcius Anglicanus, p. 19. In the following year fhe married Mr. Betterton, and not in 1670, as is erroneously afferted in the Biographia Britannica. She acted by the name of Mrs. Betterton in The Slighted Maid, in 1663. his mimick geftures to breed in the lefs capable mirth and laughter." The privileges of the Clown were very extenfive; for, between the acts, and fometimes between the fcenes, he claimed a right to enter on the stage, and to excite merriment by any fpecies of buffoonery that ftruck him. Like the Harlequin of the Italian comedy, his wit was often extemporal, and he fometimes entered into a conteft of raillery and farcafm with fome of the audience. He generally threw his thoughts into hobbling doggrel verses, which he made horter or longer as he found convenient; but, however irregular his metre might be, or whatever the length of his verses, he always took care to tag them with 6 Heywood's Hiftory of Women, 1624. 7 In Brome's Antipodes, which was performed at the theatre in Salisbury-court, in 1638, a by-play, as he calls it, is represented in his comedy; a word, for the application of which we are indebted to this writer, there being no other term in our language that I know of, which fo properly expreffes that species of interlude which we find in our poet's Hamlet and fome other pieces. The actors in this by-play being called together by Lord Letoy, he gives them fome inftructions concerning their mode of acting, which prove that the clowns in Shakspeare's time frequently held a dialogue with the audience: "But you, fir, are incorrigible, and "Take licence to yourfelf to add unto "Your parts your own free fancy; and sometimes "With care and fkill compos'd, and when you are You hold interlocution with the audients. 66 Bip. That is a way, my lord, hath been allow'd "Let. Yes, in the days of Tarleton and Kempe, "He fagotted his notions as they fell, "And if they rhym'd and rattled, all was well." Thomas Wilfon and Richard Tarleton, both fworn fervants to Queen Elizabeth, were the most popular performers of that time in this department of the drama, and are highly praised by the Continuator of Stowe's Annals, for "their wondrous plentiful, pleafant, and extemporal wit." Tarleton, whofe comick powers were fo great, that, according to Sir Richard Baker, "he delighted the fpectators before he had spoken a word," is thus defcribed in a very rare old pamphlet:" "The next, by his fute of ruffet, his buttoned cap, his taber, his standing on the toe, and other tricks, I knew to be either the body or resemblance of Tarlton, who living, for his pleafant conceits was of all men liked, and, dying, for mirth left not his like." In 1611 was published a book entitled his feafts, in which fome fpecimens are given of the extempore wit which our ancestors thought fo excellent. As he was performing fome part "at the Bull in Bishops-gate-ftreet, where the Queenes players oftentimes played," while he was "kneeling down to afke his fathers bleffing," a fellow in the gallery threw an apple at him, which hit him on the "Who 8 Howes's edition of Stowe's Chronicle, 1631, p. 698. See alfo Gabriel Harvey's Four Letters, 4to. 1592, p. 9: in London hath not heard of-his fond difguifinge of a Master of Artes with ruffianly haire, unfeemely apparell, and more unfeemely company; his vaineglorious and Thrafonicall bravery; his piperly extemporifing and Tarletonizing?" &c. 9 Kinde-Hartes Dreame, by Henry Chettle, 4to. no date, but published in Dec. 1592. cheek. He immediately took up the apple, and advancing to the audience, addreffed them in these lines: "Gentlemen, this fellow, with his face of mapple,* "But as for an apple he hath cast a crab, "So instead of an honeft woman God hath fent him a drab." The people," fays the relater," laughed heartily; for the fellow had a quean to his wife." Another of thefe ftories, which I fhall give in the author's own words, establishes what I have already mentioned, that it was cuftomary for the Clown to talk to the audience or the actors ad libitum. "At the Bull at Bifhops-gate, was a play of Henry the V. [the performance which preceded Shakspeare's,] wherein the judge was to take a box on the eare; and becaufe he was abfent that fhould take the blow, Tarlton himselfe ever forward to please, tooke upon him to play the fame 2 This appears to have been formerly a common farcafm. There is a tradition yet preferved in Stratford, of Shakspeare's comparing the carbuncled face of a drunken blacksmith to a maple. The blacksmith accofted him, as he was leaning over a mercer's door, with "Now, MR. SHAKSPEARE, tell me, if you can, to which our poet immediately replied, "Thou fon of fire, with thy face like a maple, "The fame difference as between a scalded and a coddled apple." This anecdote was related near fifty years ago to a gentleman at Stratford by a perfon then above eighty years of age, whofe father might have been contemporary with Shak fpeare. It is obfervable that a fimilar imagery may be traced in The Comedy of Errors: "Though now this grained face of mine be hid," &c. The bark of the maple is uncommonly rough, and the grain of one of the forts of this tree (according to Evelyn) is " undulated and crifped into variety of curls." judge, befides his own part of the clowne; and Knel, then playing Henry the Fifth, hit Tarleton a found box indeed, which made the people laugh the more, because it was he: but anon the judge goes in, and immediately Tarleton in his clownes cloathes comes out, and afks the actors, What news? O, faith one, had'ft thou been here, thou fhouldest have feen Prince Henry hit the judge a terrible box on the eare. What, man, faid Tarlton, ftrike a judge! It is true, i'faith, faid the other. No other like, faid Tarlton, and it could not be but terrible to the judge, when the report fo terrifies me, that methinks the blowe remaines ftill on my cheeke, that it burnes againe. The people laught at this mightily, and to this day I have heard it commended for rare; but no marvell, for he had many of thefe. But I would fee our clownes in thefe days do the like. No, I warrant ye; and yet they thinke well of themselves too." The last words fhew that this practice was not difcontinued in the time of Shakspeare, and we here fee that he had abundant reafon for his precept in Hamlet; "Let thofe that play your clowns, Speak no more than is fet down for them; for there be of them, that will of themfelves laugh, to fet on fome quantity of barren fpectators to laugh too; though in the mean time fome neceffary question of the play be then to be confider'd." This practice was undoubtedly coeval with the English ftage; for we are told that Sir Thomas More, while he lived as a page with Archbishop Moreton, (about the year 1490,) as the Chriftmas plays were going on in the palace, would fometimes fuddenly ftep upon the stage, "" without studying for the matter," and exhibit a part of his |