unknown.[1] The applause was often invited in the closing speech or in a formal epilogue, on the same lines as the prologue, which it seems to have replaced in favour about the end of the sixteenth century.[2] This might also lead up to or perhaps represent the prayer for the sovereign, of which there are traces up to a late date, and which was analogous to the modern use of 'God Save the King'.[3] The accompanying prayer for the 'lord' of the players, on the other hand, cannot be shown to have been adopted into the public theatres.[4] Finally, the epilogue might indicate a coming dance.[5] Of this a little more needs to be said. The players have amongst other elements in their ancestry the mediaeval mimes, and they inherit the familiar mimic tradition of multifarious entertainment. The 'legitimate' drama was not as yet on its pedestal. The companies of the 'eighties and even the early 'nineties were composed of men ready at need to eke out their plays by musical performances and even the 'activities' of acrobats. This is perhaps most obvious in the continental companies, which had to face the obstacles to a complete intelligence between stage and audience introduced at the tower of Babel. Such a cosmopolitan mingling of drama and 'activities' as we may suppose The Labours of Hercules to have been was a valuable resource.[6] But at home also we find Strange's and the Admiral's men showing their 'activities' at court, and Symons
- [Footnote: Devil an Ass, III. v. 41:
If I could but see a piece. . . .
Come but to one act, and I did not care—
But to be seene to rise, and goe away,
To vex the Players, and to punish their Poet—
Keepe him in awe!
]
- ↑ Isle of Gulls, ind., 'a prepared company of gallants to aplaud his iests and grace out his play'; Histriomastix, ii. 137, 'Belch. 'What's an Ingle? Posthaste. One whose hands are hard as battle doors with clapping at baldness'. For the special use of 'ingle' (= 'intimate') in the sense of a patron of players, cf. Poetaster, I. ii. 18, 'What! shall I have my sonne a stager now? an enghle for players? a gull? a rooke? a shot-*clogge? to make suppers, and bee laught at?'
- ↑ Cf. p. 547, n. 1.
- ↑ K. to K. a Knave (1594), ad fin.; Looking-Glass, 2282; Locrine, 2276; 2 Hen. IV, epil. 35, 'And so kneele down before you; but indeed, to pray for the Queene'; Two Wise Men and All the Rest Fools (1619), epil., 'It resteth that we render you very humble and hearty thanks, and that all our hearts pray for the king and his family's enduring happiness, and our country's perpetual welfare. Si placet, plaudite'; cf. ch. xxii.
- ↑ Cf. ch. x.
- ↑ M. N. D. v. i. 360, 'Will it please you to see the epilogue, or to hear a Bergomask dance between two of our company?'; Much Ado, v. i. 130, 'Strike vp, pipers. Dance'; A. Y. L. V. iv. 182.
- ↑ Cf. ch. xiii (Leicester's).
