20 pounds a
year. Eight or nine of these plays were published during the period, but
the publishers operated independently of the author, taking all the risks
and, at the same time, all the receipts. The publication of
Shakespeare's plays in no way affected his monetary resources, although
his friendly relations with the printer Field doubtless secured him,
despite the absence of any copyright law, some part of the profits in the
large and continuous sale of his poems.

But it was as an actor that at an early date he acquired a genuinely
substantial and secure income. There is abundance of contemporary
evidence to show that the stage was for an efficient actor an assured
avenue to comparative wealth. In 1590 Robert Greene describes in his
tract entitled 'Never too Late' a meeting with a player whom he took by
his 'outward habit' to be 'a gentleman of great living' and a
'substantial man.' The player informed Greene that he had at the
beginning of his career travelled on foot, bearing his theatrical
properties on his back, but he prospered so rapidly that at the time of
speaking 'his very share in playing apparel would not be sold for 200
pounds.' Among his neighbours 'where he dwelt' he was reputed able 'at
his proper cost to build a windmill.' In the university play, 'The
Return from Parnassus' (1601?), a poor student enviously complains of the
wealth and position which a successful actor derived from his calling.

England affords those glorious vagabonds,
That carried erst their fardles on their backs,
Coursers to ride on through the gazing streets,
Sweeping it in their glaring satin suits,
And pages to attend their masterships;
With mouthing words that better wits had framed,
They purchase lands and now esquires are made. {199a}

The travelling actors, from whom the highwayman Gamaliel Ratsey extorted
a free performance in 1604, were represented as men with the certainty of
a rich competency in prospect. {199b} An efficient actor received in
1635 as large a regular salary as 180 pounds. The lowest known valuation
set an actor's wages at 3s. a day, or about 45 pounds a year.
Shakespeare's emoluments as an actor before 1599 are not likely to have
fallen below 100 pounds; while the remuneration due to performances at
Court or in noblemen's houses, if the accounts of 1594 be accepted as the
basis of reckoning, added some 15 pounds.

Thus over 130 pounds (equal to 1,040 pounds of