were less expensive than those lavished on the masks. Certain articles, such as armour, were generally hired. Elaborate properties, which might entail the designing of special 'patterns', had often to be constructed. The fixed 'composition' of £66 6s. 8d. for all the ordinary charges of plays imposed upon the office in 1598 cannot have left much margin for apparel and properties.[1] But probably by this date the companies were themselves better equipped.
When the actual night of performance arrived, all the officers gave personal attendance at Court. Here they had, in Tilney's time, until they were crowded out and driven to hire for themselves, an office and a chamber for the Master, both of which they kept supplied with fuel and rushes.[2] They had also to superintend the conveyance of the 'stuff', either by wagon or by barge and tiltboat, to fit the players with the gloves which seem to have been de rigueur at a Court performance, and to furnish such amenities of the tiring-house as 'an iron cradle to make fire in' and a close-stool.[3] With the officers came a doorkeeper and three servitors, who probably acted as dressers.[4] As the court performances were always at night, beginning about 10 p.m. and ending about 1 a.m., the arrangements for lighting were a constant preoccupation.[5] From the wire-drawers' bills incorporated in the accounts we can gather that use was made of candlesticks of various kinds and sizes, of lanterns, and of branches large and small. Candelabra were formed of as many as twenty-four branches, each bearing four lights, and hung upon wires strained across the hall.[6] But here again the precise provision made for plays cannot be disentangled from that made for masks. There is no special reference to footlights.
Except for the lighting and the maintenance of a 'music-house', the situation of which is unknown, the functions of the Revels do not appear to have extended beyond the
- ↑ Cf. ch. iii, p. 93.
- ↑ Feuillerat, Eliz. 354, 370, 381, 391; cf. ch. iii, p. 89.
- ↑ Ibid. 140, 174, 236, 320, 336, 349 (gloves); 338 (cradle); 205 (close-stool). The Westminster boys in 1565 found their own 'sugar candee', 'comfetts', and 'butterd beere for ye children being horse' (Murray, ii. 168).
- ↑ Feuillerat, Eliz. 337.
- ↑ Tarlton, 10, records a jest, 'Tarlton having plaied before the queen till one a clock at midnight'. De Silva describes entertainments of Elizabeth in private houses early in the reign which ended at 1.30 and 2 a.m. (ch. v, pp. 161, 162). Under James, a play on 7 Jan. 1610, began at 10 p.m. (Arch. xii. 268).
- ↑ Feuillerat, Eliz. 159, 202, 216, 300, 353, 368, &c. We hear of 'high', 'vice', 'stock', 'pricke', 'plate', and 'hand' candlesticks.
in this offyce', and of the others one had 'sondrie' and one 'many' things; cf. Graves, 83.
