f more
than a thousand closely-printed quarto pages, devoted to the most
searching indictment of the stage and its votaries. The author has
been described as a man of great learning, but little judgment; of
sour and austere principles, but wholly deficient in candour. His book
was judged libellous, for he had unwittingly aspersed the Queen in his
attack upon the masques performed at Court. He was cited in the Star
Chamber, and sentenced to stand in the pillory, to lose both ears, to
pay a heavy fine, and to undergo imprisonment for life. This severe
punishment probably stimulated the Puritans, when opportunity came to
them, to deal mercilessly with the actors by way of avenging Prynne's
wrongs, or of expressing sympathy with his sufferings.

And it is to be noted that early legislation in regard to the players
had been far from lenient. For such actors as had obtained the
countenance of "any Baron of this Realme," or "any other honourable
personage of greater degree," exception was to be made; otherwise, all
common players in interludes, all fencers, bearwards, and minstrels,
were declared by an Act passed in the 14th year of Elizabeth to be
rogues and vagabonds, and, whether male or female, liable on a first
conviction "to be grievously whipped and burned through the gristle of
the right ear with an hot iron of the compass of an inch about,
manifesting his or her roguish kind of life;" a second offence was
adjudged to be felony; a third entailed death without benefit of
clergy or privilege of sanctuary. Meanwhile, the regular companies of
players to whom this harsh Act did not apply, were not left
unmolested. The Court might encourage them, but the City would have
none of them. They had long been accustomed to perform in the yards of
the City inns, but an order of the Common Council, dated December,
1575, expelled the players from the City. Thereupon public playhouses
were erected outside the "liberties" or boundaries of the City. The
first was probably the theatre in Shoreditch; the second, opened in
its immediate neighbourhood, was known as the Curtain; the third,
built by John Burbadge and other of the Earl of Leicester's company of
players, was the famous Blackfriars Theatre. These were all erected
about 1576, and other playhouses were opened soon afterwards. Probably
to avoid the penalties of the Act of Elizabeth, all strolling and
unattached players made haste to join regular companies, or to shelter
themselves