passage. And being well accompanied with divers
resolute and forward gentlemen, her majesty then lying at the Right
Honorable the Lord of Warwick's house, in Essex, he came to take his
leave; and kissing her highness' hands, with gracious countenance and
comfortable words departed toward his charge.

BUILDING OF THE FIRST THEATRE IN ENGLAND

A.D. 1576

KARL MANTZIUS

_A History of the Theatre_, the scholarly work of Mantzius, has had
no time to become a classic--published 1904--but certainly the
author has delved into his subject with a minuteness and presented
it with a lively interest which fully justify the selection of his
work for presentation here.

The theatre has become so prominent an institution among us that its
origin must be of interest to all; and the building of the first
theatre is inextricably interwoven with the larger and vaguer story
of the rise of the modern drama itself. The dramatic arts of Greece
and Rome had never been wholly forgotten. Their traditions survived
in Italy in the crude pantomime performances of the common people.
Practically, however, the Middle Ages invented a new dramatic art of
their own, developed from the gorgeous religious pantomime of the
church services. The theatre was born of the cathedral; the stage,
of the altar.

The plays, at first purely religious, rapidly developed a comic
side, which by degrees became their central theme. The moral purpose
of the performance was forgotten; and the Church disowned its evil
changeling. To none of these early plays can the term "drama" be
accurately applied; for each and all of them lack plot. They are
merely a series of disconnected scenes, pictures having small
connection and less development. The idea of pursuing a single,
slowly developing story to its climax and conclusion dawns upon the
modern stage only with the English Elizabethan drama.

Despite our imperfect knowledge of the plays and players of that
time, one feels almost justified in saying that the modern drama was
created about 1580 by Christopher Marlowe and was raised to the
highest point of its development about 1600 by William Shakespeare.

At the date of Shakespeare's birth, 1564, no permanent theatre as yet
existed in England. But there had long existed a class of