Page:The Elizabethan stage (Volume 2).pdf/180

 thirty-five weeks in all for the year 1597-8. The company only took two weeks' vacation in the summer and are not likely to have travelled, although on 27 September, after the new season had begun, Borne is found riding to the Lord Admiral at Croydon at the time of the Queen's visit there. They played for thirty-one weeks from about 22 July to 24 February 1599, with performances at Court on 27 December, 6 January and 18 February, and stopped for three weeks in Lent. The summer season lasted for eleven weeks from about 19 March to 3 June, making forty-four weeks playing for 1598-9. On Easter Eve Towne and Richard Alleyn went to Court for some unspecified purpose. About the same time Anthony Jeffes was making purchases against St. George's Day. The interval of this summer was seventeen weeks, but I have no evidence of any travelling. The next season was one of nineteen weeks from about 29 September 1599 to 10 February 1600, with Court performances on 27 December and 1 January, and was followed by a Lenten interval of about four weeks. At the beginning of February they bought a drum and trumpets 'when to go into the contry'. Whether these were for use during the short break in Lent or not until the following summer must remain uncertain; at any rate the purchase confirms the view that there had been no provincial tour since 1596. Finally they played for nineteen weeks from about 2 March to 13 July, thus completing thirty-six weeks for 1599-1600. Apparently the summer season was diversified by a visit to Windsor for the Garter installation of Henri IV of France on 27 April. In all they seem to have played for about 115 weeks or something under 690 days in 1597-1600, as compared with 728 days in 1594-7.

The entries of sums paid for plays usually give the names of the authors as well as those of the plays, and therefore furnish a good deal of material for reconstituting the literary side of the company's activity. Henslowe's terminology is neither precise nor uniform, but it is clear that, while the payments were always entered as loans to the company, they were often made direct by him to the playwrights, on the 'appointment' of one or more of its members. Sometimes they are