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 printing of Patient Gresell'. This did not prevent the play being entered on the Stationers' Register on 28 March, but does perhaps explain why the earliest known edition is dated 1603. The unfinished plays of 1599-1600 were The Poor Man's Paradise (Haughton), The Orphans' Tragedy (Chettle), an unnamed Italian tragedy by Day, The Arcadian Virgin (Chettle and Haughton), Owen Tudor (Drayton, Hathway, Munday, and Wilson), Truth's Supplication to Candlelight (Dekker), The Spanish Moor's Tragedy (Day, Dekker, and Haughton), The English Fugitives (Haughton), The Devil and his Dame (Haughton), The Wooing of Death (Chettle), Judas (Haughton), 2 Fair Constance of Rome (Hathway), and an unnamed play by Chettle and Day. Except in so far as Fortunatus was an old play, I find no trace of a revival during 1599-1600, but it may be assumed that some of the productions of the last two years still held the boards.

The year 1600 was another turning-point in the history of the company. Probably at some date between 14 August, when the first entry in a fresh account was made, and 28 October, when Pembroke's men were in occupation of the Rose, they crossed the river, and took up their quarters at Alleyn's recently built Fortune, on the north-west boundary of the City. A more important event still was the return of Alleyn himself to the stage, from which he had been absent for three years. It is suggested in the Privy Council letter of 8 April 1600 to the Middlesex justices in favour of the Fortune project, that this step was determined by the personal wish of the Queen to see the great actor at Court with his fellows again. It is not quite clear on what terms he rejoined the*