ections_, I, 265.]

In 1608 the Boar's Head seems to have been occupied by the newly
organized Prince Charles's Company. In William Kelly's extracts from
the payments of the city of Leicester we find the entry: "Itm. Given
to the Prince's Players, of Whitechapel, London, xx _s._"

In 1664, as Flecknoe tells us, the Cross Keys and the Bull still gave
evidence of their former use as playhouses; perhaps even then they
were occasionally let for fencing and other contests. In 1666 the
great fire completely destroyed the Bell, the Cross Keys, and the Bell
Savage; the Bull, however, escaped, and enjoyed a prosperous career
for many years after. Samuel Pepys was numbered among its patrons, and
writers of the Restoration make frequent reference to it. What became
of the Boar's Head without Aldgate I am unable to learn; its memory,
however, is perpetuated to-day in Boar's Head Yard, between Middlesex
Street and Goulston Street, Whitechapel.

CHAPTER II

THE HOSTILITY OF THE CITY

As the actors rapidly increased in number and importance, and as
Londoners flocked in ever larger crowds to witness plays, the
animosity of two forces was aroused, Puritanism and Civic
Government,--forces which opposed the drama for different reasons, but
with almost equal fervor. And when in the course of time the Governors
of the city themselves became Puritans, the combined animosity thus
produced was sufficient to drive the players out of London into the
suburbs.

The Puritans attacked the drama as contrary to Holy Writ, as
destructive of religion, and as a menace to public morality. Against
plays, players, and playgoers they waged in pulpit and pamphlet a
warfare characterized by the most intense fanaticism. The charges they
made--of ungodliness, idolatrousness, lewdness, profanity, evil
practices, enormities, and "abuses" of all kinds--are far too numerous
to be noted here; they are interesting chiefly for their
unreasonableness and for the violence with which they were urged.

And, after all, however much the Puritans might rage, they were
helpless; authority to restrain acting was vested in the Lord Mayor,
his brethren the Aldermen, and the Common Council. The attitude of
these city officials towards the drama was unmistakable: they had no
more love for the actors than had the Puritans. They found that "plays
and players" gave them more trouble than anything else in the entire
administration of municipal affairs. The dedication o