ow
a rear curtain and a projecting stage. The DeWitt drawing was done from
hearsay evidence, is inaccurate in details, and represents a theater
with a movable stage, probably not long regularly used for plays; it
gives little idea of the stage, but does afford a good general notion of
the interior of a public theater. The contract for the Fortune theater,
built on the model of the Globe, except that it was square instead of
octagonal, has been preserved and enables us to complete this view of
the interior in detail.

[Page Heading: Public Theaters]

The public theaters were usually round, or nearly round, wooden
buildings of three stories. These stories were occupied by tiers of
galleries encircling the pit, which was open to the air. The stage
projected halfway into the pit, and was provided with dressing rooms in
the rear, and a protecting roof overhead, supported in some cases by
pillars. At the top was the 'hut', a room used to provide apparatus for
raising and lowering persons or properties from the stage, Light when
needed was provided by torches. Admission to standing room in the pit
was usually only a penny, but seats in the gallery or boxes or on the
stage cost much more, rising as high as half a crown. Performances were
given on every fair day except Sunday, and a flag flying from the hut
indicated that a play was to be performed. Some of the public playhouses
were used for acrobats, fencing, or even bear-baiting as well as for
plays; but the better theaters, as the Globe and Fortune, seem to have
been limited to dramatic performances.

The size and arrangement of the stage doubtless varied somewhat with the
different theaters, and considerable changes seem to have been
introduced by the indoor private theaters. But the Curtain was used from
1577 to 1642, some new theaters were modeled closely on the old, and the
same plays were acted on different stages, so it is apparent that in all
the stage was the same in its main features. For clearness these may be
again enumerated. The stage was a platform projecting into the pit, open
on three sides, and without any front curtain. In the rear were two
doors, and between them, an alcove, or inner stage, separated from the
front stage by curtains. Above the inner stage was a gallery, also
provided with curtains, and over the doors were windows or balconies.
The arrangement of doors, inner stage, gallery, and curtain may have
varied somewhat, but the essential element