DRAMATIC REPRESENTATIONS. 329 Elizabeth respecting the conduct of the theatre; some of which are remarkable. During the early part of her reign; Sunday being still regarded principally in the light of a holiday; her majesty not only selected that day, more frequently than any other, for the representation of plays at court for her own amusement, but by her license granted to Burbage in 1574 authorized the performance of them at the public theatre, on Sundays only out of the hours of prayer. Five years after, however, Gosson in his School of Abuse complains, that the players, "because they are allowed to play every Sunday, make four or five Sundays at least every week." To limit this abuse, an order was issued by the privy-council in July 1591, purporting that no plays should be publicly exhibited on Thursdays; because on that day bear-baiting and similar pastimes had usually been practised; and in an injunction to the lord mayor four days after, the representation of plays on Sunday (or the Sabbath as it now began to be called among the stricter sort of people) was utterly condemned; and it was further complained that on "all other days of the week in divers places the players do use to recite their plays, to the great hurt and destruction of the game of bear-baiting and like pastimes; which are maintained for her majesty's pleasure." " In the year 1589 her majesty thought proper to appoint commissioners to inspect all performances of writers for the stage, with full powers to reject and obliterate whatever they might esteem unmannerly, licentious, or irreverent:-a regulation which might seem to claim the applause of every friend 830 ANECDOTE OF THE QUEEN AND TARLETON. to public decency, were not the state in which the dramas of this age have come down to posterity sufficient evidence, that to render these impressive appeals to the passions of assembled multitudes politically and not morally inoffensive, was the genuine or principal motive of this act of power. In illustration of this remark the following passage may be quoted: "At supper" the queen "would divert herself with her friends and attendants; and if they made her no answer, she would put them upon mirth and pleasant discourse with great civility. She would then admit Tarleton, a famous comedian and pleasant talker, and other such men, to divert her with stories of the town and the common jests and accidents. Tarleton, who was then the best comedian in England, had made a pleasant play; and when it was acting before the queen, he pointed at Raleigh, and said "See the knave commands the queen!" for which he was corrected by a frown from the queen: yet he had the confidence to add, that he was of too much and too intolerable a power; and going on with the same liberty, he reflected on the too great power of the earl of Leicester; which was so universally applauded by all present, that she thought fit to bear these reflections with a seeming unconcernedness. But yet she was so offended that she forbad Tarleton and all jesters from coming near her table".". a See Bohun's Character of Queen Elizabeth. Among the various sources whence the preceding dramatic notices have been derived, it is proper to point out Dr. Drake's Memoirs of Shakespeare and his Age, and Warton's History of English Poetry. 331 CHAPTER XXIV. FROM 1593 TO 1597. A parliament.-Haughty language of the queen.-Committal of Wentworth and other members—of Morice.-His letter to lord Burleigh.—Act to retain subjects in their due obedience.-Debates on the subsidy.-Free speeches of Francis Bacon and sir E. Hobby.-Queen's speech.-Notice of Francis Bacon-of Anthony Bacon.-Connexion of the two Bacons with Essex.-Francis disappointed of preferment.-Conduct of Burleigh towards him.-Of Fulk Greville.-Reflections.—Conversion of Henry IV.—Behaviour of Elizabeth.-War in Bretagne.-Anecdote of the queen and sir C. Blount.-Affair of Dr. Lopez.-Squire's attempt on the life of the queen.Notice of Ferdinando earl of Derby.-Letter of the queen to lord Willoughby.— Particulars of sir Walter Raleigh.-His expedition to Guiana.-Unfortunate enterprise of Drake and Hawkins. -Death of Hawkins.-Death and character of Drake.Letters of Rowland Whyte.-Case of the earl of Hertford. -Anecdote of Essex.-Queen at the lord keeper's.-Anecdote of the queen and bishop Rudd.-Case of sir T. Arundel. NOTWIT OTWITHSTANDING all the frugal arts of Elizabeth, the state of her finances compelled her in the spring of 1593 to summon a parliament. It was four entire years since this assembly had last met: but her majesty took care to let the commons know, that the causes of offence which had then occurred were still fresh in her memory; and that her resolution to preserve her own prerogative in 332 A PARLIAMENT QUEEN'S ́ INJUNCTIONS. its rigor and the ecclesiastical commission in all its terrors, was still inflexible. It even appeared, that an apprehension lest her present necessities might embolden the parliament to treat her despotic mandates with a deference less profound than formerly, irritated her temper and prompted her to assume a more haughty and menacing style than her habitual study of popularity had hitherto permitted her to employ. In answer to the three customary requests made by the speaker, for liberty of speech, freedom from arrests and access to her person; she replied by her lord keeper: that such liberty of speech as the commons were justly entitled to;-liberty, namely, of aye and no;-she was willing to grant; but by no means a liberty for every one to speak what he listed. And if any idle heads should be found careless enough of their own safety to attempt innovations in the state, or reforms in the church, she laid her injunctions on the speaker to refuse the bills offered for such purposes till they should have been examined by those who were better qualified to judge of these matters. She promised that she would not impeach the liberty of their persons, provided they did not permit themselves to imagine that any neglect of duty would be allowed to pass unpunished under shelter of this privilege; and she engaged not to deny them access to her person on weighty affairs and at convenient seasons; when she should have leisure from other important business of state. But threats alone were not found sufficient to restrain all attempts on the part of the commons to COMMITTAL OF WENTWORTH AND OTHERS. 333 exercise their known rights and fulfil their duty to the country. Peter Wentworth, a member whose courageous and independent spirit had already drawn upon him repeated manifestations of royal displeasure, presented to the lord keeper a petition, praying that the upper house would join with the lower in a supplication to the queen for fixing the succession. Elizabeth, enraged at the bare mention of a subject so offensive to her, instantly.committed to the Fleet prison Wentworth, sir Thomas Bromley who had seconded him, and two other members to whom he had imparted the business; and when the house was preparing to petition her for their release, some privy-councillors dissuade d the step, as one which could only prove injurious to these gentlemen by giving additional offence to her majesty. Soon after, James Morice, an eminent lawyer, who was attorney of the court of Wards and chancellor of the Duchy, made a motion for redress of the abuses in the bishops' courts; and especially of the monstrous ones committed under the High Commission. Several members supported the motion: but the queen, sending in wrath for the speaker, required him to deliver up to her the bill; reminded him of her strict injunctions at the opening of the sessions and testified her extreme indignation and surprise at the boldness of the commons in intermeddling with subjects which she had expressly forbidden them to discuss. She informed him, that it lay in her power to summon parliaments and to dismiss them; and to sanction or to reject any determination of theirs; that she had at present |