In the ancient religious plays the Devil was very frequently introduced. He was ufually reprefented with horns, a very wide mouth, (by means of a mask) staring eyes, a large nofe, a red beard, cloven feet, and a tail. His conftant attendant was the Vice, (the buffoon of the piece,) whofe principal employment it was to belabour the Devil with his wooden dagger, and to make him roar, for the entertainment of the populace 7. As the Myfteries or Miracle-plays "frequently required the introduction of allegorical characters, fuch as Charity, Sin, Death, Hope, Faith, or the like, and as the common poetry of the times, especially among the French, began to deal much in allegory, at length plays were formed entirely confifting of fuch perfonifications. These were called MORALITIES. The Miracle-plays or MYSTERIES were totally deftitute of invention and plan: they tamely reprefented ftories, according to the letter of the fcripture, or the refpective legend. But the MORALITIES indicate dawnings of the dramatick art: they contain fome rudiments of a plot, and even attempt to delineate characters, and to paint manners. From hence the gradual tranfition to real historical perfonages was natural and obvious"." Dr. Percy in his account of the English Stage has given an Analysis of two ancient Moralities, entitled Every Man, and Lufty Juventus, from which a perfect notion of this kind of drama may be obtained. Every Man was written in the reign of king Henry the Eighth, and Lufty Juventus in that of king Edward the Sixth. As Dr. Percy's curious and valuable collection of ancient English Poetry is in the hands of every fcholar, I fhall content myself with merely teferring to it. Many other Moralities are yet extant, of fome of which I 7" It was a pretty part in the old church-playes," fays Bishop Harfenet, "when the nimble Vice would fkip up nimbly like a Jacke-anapes into the Devil's necke, and ride the devil a course, and belabour him with his wooden dagger, till he made him roar, whereat the people would laugh to fee the Devil fo Vice-haunted." Harfenet's Declaration of Popish Impostures, &c. 4to. 1603. 8 Warton's HIST. OF E. P. I. p. 242. Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, Vol. I. p. 128. fhall T e fhall give the titles below. Of one, which is not now "UPON A STAGE-PLAY WHICH I SAW WHEN "In the city of Gloucefter the manner is, (as I think it is in other like corporations,) that when players of enterludes come to towne, they firft attend the Mayor, to enforme him what noble-mans fervants they are, and fo to get licence for their publike playing; and if the Mayor like the actors, or would fhew refpect to their lord and mafter, he appoints them to play their first play before himself and the Aldermen and CommonCounfell of the city; and that is called the Mayors play: where every one that will, comes in without money, the Mayor giving the players a reward as hee thinks fit to fhew refpect unto them. At fuch a play, my father tooke me with him, and made me ftand between his leggs, as he fate upon one of the benches, where we faw and heard very well. The play was called The Cradle of Security, wherein was perfonated a king or fome great prince, with his courtiers of feveral kinds, among which three ladies were in fpecial grace with him; and they keeping him in delights and pleasures, drew him from his graver counfellors, hearing of fermons, and 9 Magnificence, written by John Skelton; Impatient Poverty, 1560; The Life and Repentance of Marie Magdalene, 1567; The Trial of Treasure, 1567; The Nice Wanton, 1568; The Difobedient Child, no date; The Marriage of Wit and Science, 1570; The Interlude of Youth, no date; The longer thou liveft, the more Fool thou art, no date; The Interlude of Wealth and Health, no date; All for Money, 1578; The Conflict of Confcience, 1581; The three Ladies of London, 1584; The three Lords of London, 1590; Tom Tyler and bis Wife, &c. The Cradle of Securitie is mentioned with feveral other Moralities, in a play which has not been printed, entitled Sir Thomas More, Miï. Harl. 3768. C 3 listening liftening to good councell and admonitions, that in the end they got him to lye down in a cradle upon the ftage, where thefe three ladies, joyning in a fweet fong, rocked him afleepe, that he fnorted againe; and in the meane time closely conveyed under the cloaths wherewithall he was covered, a vizard, like a fwines fnout, upon his face, with three wire chains fastened thereunto, the other end whereof being holden feverally by those three ladies; who fall to finging againe, and then discovered his face, that the fpectators might see how they had transformed him, going on with their finging. Whilft all this was acting, there came forth of another doore at the fartheft end of the stage, two old men; the one in blew, with a ferjeant at armes his mace on his shoulder; the other in red, with a drawn sword in his hand, and leaning with the other hand upon the others fhoulder; and fo they two went along with a foft pace round about by the skirt of the ftage, till at last they came to the cradle, when all the court was in the greatest jollity; and then the foremoft old man with his mace ftroke a fearfull blow upon the cradle; wherewith all the courtiers, with the three ladies, and the vizard, all vanished; and the defolate prince starting up bare-faced, and finding himself thus fent for to judgement, made a lamentable complaint of his miferable cafe, and fo was carried away by wicked fpirits. This prince did perfonate in the Morall, the wicked of the world; the three ladies, Pride, Covetoufnefs, and Luxury; the two old men, the end of the world, and the laft judgement. This fight took fuch impreffion in me, that when I came towards mans eftate, it was as fresh in my memory, as if I had seen it newly acted"." The writer of this book appears to have been born in the fame year with our great poet (1564). Suppofing him to have been feven or eight years old when he faw this interlude, the exhibition must have been in 1571 or 1572. 2 Mount Tabor, &c. 8vo. 1639, pp. 110, et feq. With this curious extract I was favoured, feveral years ago, by the Rev. Mr. Bowle of Idmifton near Salisbury. I am unable to ascertain when the first Morality appeared, but incline to think not fooner than the reign of king Edward the Fourth (1460). The publick pageants of the reign of king Henry the Sixth were uncommonly fplendid; and being then firft enlivened by the introduction of fpeaking allegorical perfonages properly and characteristically habited, they naturally led the way to those perfonifications by which Moralities were diftinguished from the fimpler religious dramas called Myfteries. We must not however suppose, that, after Moralities were introduced, Myfteries ceafed to be exhibited. We have already feen that a Myftery was reprefented before king Henry the Seventh at Winchester in 1487. Sixteen years afterwards, on the first Sunday after the marriage of his daughter with king James of Scotland, a Morality was performed. In the early part of the reign of king Henry the 3 See Warton's HIST. OF E. P. Vol. II. p. 199. 4 Sir James Ware in his Annales, folio, 1664, after having given an account of the Statute, 33 Henry VIII. c. 1. by which Henry was declared king of Ireland, and Ireland made a kingdom, informs us, that the new law was proclaimed in St. Patrick's church, in the prefence of the Lord Deputy St. Leger, and a great number of peers, who at tended in their parliament robes. "It is needlefs," {he adds,)" to mention the feafts, comedies, and sports, which followed." "Epulas, comedias, et certamina ludicra, quæ fequebantur, quid attinet dicere ?" The mention of comedies might lead us to fuppofe that our fifter kingdom had gone before us in the cultivation of the drama; but I find from a MI. in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, that what are here called comedies, were nothing more than pageants. "In the parliament of 1541," (fays the author of the memoir,)" wherein Henry VIII. was declared king of Ireland, there were prefent the earls of Ormond and Defmond, the lord Barry, M'Gilla Phædrig, chieftaine of Offory, the fon of O'Bryan, M'Carthy More, with many Irish lords; and on Corpus Chrifti day they rode about the freets in their parliament-robes, and the NINE WORTHIES WAS played, and the Mayor bore the mace before the deputy on horfeback." Two of Bale's Mysteries, God's Promifes, and St. John Baptift, we have been lately told, were acted by young men at the market-crofs in Kilkenny, on a funday, in the year 1552. See Walker's Essay on the Irif Stage, 4to. 1789, and Collect. de Rebus Hiber. Vol. II. p. 388: but there is a flight error in the date. Bale has himself informed us, that he was confecrated Bishop of Offory, February 2, 1552-3, (not on the 25th of March, as the writer of Bale's Life in Biograpbia Britannica afferts,) and that he foon afterwards went to his palace in Kil C 4 kenny. the Eighth they were perhaps performed indifcriminately; but Myfteries were probably feldom reprefented after the ftatute 34 and 35 Henry VIII. c. 1. which was made, as the preamble informs us, with a view that the kingdom fhould be purged and cleanfed of all religious plays, interludes, rhymes, ballads, and fongs, which are kenny. Thefe Mysteries were exhibited there on the 20th of Auguft, 1553, the day on which Queen Mary was proclaimed, as appears from his own account: "On the xx daye of August was the ladye Marye with us at Kilkennye proclaimed Quene of England, &c.-The yonge men in the forenone played a tragedye of Gods Promifes in the old lawe, at the market-crofle, with organe-plainges and fonges, very aptely. In the afternone agayne they played a comedie of San Joban Baptiftes preachinges, of Chriftes baptifynge, and of his temptacion in the wilderneffe; to the fmall contentacion of the preftes and other papiftes there." The Vocacyon of Joban Bale, &c. 16mo. no date, fign. C 8. The only theatre in Dublin in the reign of queen Elizabeth was a booth (if it may be called a theatre) erected in Hoggin Green, now College Green, where Myfteries and Moralities were occafionally performed. It is ftrange, that fo lately as in the year 1600, at a time when many of Shakipeare's plays had been exhibited in England, and lord Montjoy, the intimate friend of his patrons, lord Eflex and lord Southampton, was Deputy of Ireland, the old play of Gorboduck, written in the infancy of the ftage, (for this piece had been originally prefented in 1562, under the name of Ferrex and Perrex,) fhould have been performed at the Caftle of Dublin: but fuch is the fact, if we may believe Chetwood the prompter, who mentions that old Mr. Ashbury had feen a bill dated the 7th of September 1601, (queen Elizabeth's birth-day,)" for wax tapers for the play of Gorboduck done at the Caffle, one and twenty fhillings and two groats." Whether any plays were reprefented in Dublin in the reign of James the First, I am unable to afcertain. Barnaby Riche, who has given a curious account of Dublin in the year 1610, makes no mention of any theatrical exhibition. In 1635, when lord Strafford was Lord Lieutenant, a theatre, probably under his patronage, was built in Werburgh-ftreet; which, under the conduct of the well known John Ogilby, Mafter of the Revels in Ireland, continued open till October 1641, when it was shut up by order of the Lords Juftices. At this theatre Shirley's Royal Mafter was originally reprefented in 1639, and Burnel's Landgartha in 1641. In 1662 Ogilby was reftored to his office, and a new theatre was erected in Orange-street, (fince called Smock-Alley) part of which fell down in the year 1671. Agrippa, King of Alba, a tragedy tranflated from the French of Quinault, was acted there before the duke of Ormond, in 1675; and it continued open, I believe, till the death of king Charles the Second. The difturbances which followed in Ireland put an end for a time to all theatrical entertainments. equally |