e city. In
1574, however, the Earl of Leicester, through his influence with Queen
Elizabeth, obtained for his company of players, among whom was
included James Burbadge, the father of the famous Shakespearean actor,
Richard Burbadge, a patent, under the Great Seal, empowering the
actors, "during the queen's pleasure, to use, exercise, and occupy the
art and faculty of playing tragedies, comedies, interludes, and stage
plays, as well for the recreation of the queen's subjects as for her
own solace and pleasure, within the city of London and its liberties,
and within any cities, towns, and boroughs throughout England." This
most important concession to the players was strenuously opposed by
the Lord Mayor and Corporation, who maintained that "the playing of
interludes and the resort to the same" were likely to provoke "the
infection of the plague," were "hurtfull in corruption of youth," were
"great wasting both of the time and thrift of many poor people," and
"great withdrawing of the people from publique prayer and from the
service of God." At last they proposed, as a compromise, that the
players of the queen, or of Lord Leicester--for these titles seem to
have been bestowed upon the actors indifferently--should be permitted
to perform within the city boundaries upon certain special conditions,
to the effect that their names and number should be notified to the
Lord Mayor and the Justices of Middlesex and Surrey, and that they
should not divide themselves into several companies; that they should
be content with playing in private houses, at weddings, &c., without
public assemblies, or "if more be thought good to be tolerated," that
they should not play openly till the whole deaths in London had been
for twenty days under fifty a week; that they should not play on the
Sabbath or on holy days until after evening prayer; and that no
playing should be in the dark, "nor continue any such time but as any
of the auditoire may returne to their dwellings in London before
sonne-set, or at least before it be dark." These severe restrictions
so far defeated the objects of the civic powers, that they led in
truth to the construction of three theatres beyond the Lord Mayor's
jurisdiction, but sufficiently near to its boundaries to occasion him
grave disquietude. About 1576 Burbadge built his theatre in the
Liberty of the Blackfriars--a precinct in which civic authority was at
any rate disputed. Within a year or so The Curtain and The