Page:The Elizabethan stage (Volume 2).pdf/262



Papers (1907); the Bill and Answers in the equity suit of Taylor v. Hemynges (1612) by C. W. Wallace in Globe Theatre Apparel (p.p., 1909).]

A company under the patronage of Prince Charles, then Duke of York, first makes its appearance during 1608, and in the provinces. A visit of 'the younger princes' men to Ipswich is recorded on 20 October. During 1608-9 the company was also at Bath, and it is at least possible that it was 'the Princes players of the White Chapple London' rewarded at Leicester in 1608. The Boar's Head (q.v.) may have been roughly spoken of as in Whitechapel, and although there is no proof that the Duke of York's men occupied it after the Queen's moved to the Red Bull, there is nothing to connect them during the earlier years of their career with any of the better-known London houses. On 30 March 1610 they received, like other London companies, a patent, of which the following are the terms:

Iames by the grace of God &c. To all Iustices, Mayors, Sheriffes, Baylies, Constables, hedboroughes and other our loveing subiectes and officers greetinge. Knowe ye that wee of our especyall grace, certen knowledge, and meere mocion haue lycensed and aucthorized, and by theis presentes doe lycence and authorise Iohn Garland, Willyam Rowley, Thomas Hobbes, Robert Dawes, Ioseph Taylor, Iohn Newton, and Gilbert Reason, alreadye sworne servauntes to our deere sonne the Duke of York and Rothesay, with the rest of their company, to vse and exercise the arte and quality of playing Comedyes, Tragedies, histories, Enterludes, Moralles, Pastoralles, Stagplayes, and such other like as they haue already studdied or hereafter shall studye or vse, aswell for the recreacion of our loveing subiectes, as for our solace and pleasure when wee shall thinke good to see them, and the said Enterludes or other to shewe and execise publiquely to their best aduantage and commoditie, aswell in and about our Cittye of London in such vsuall howses as themselues shall provide, as alsoe within anye Townehalles, Mootehalles, Guildhalles, Schoolehowses, or other convenient places within the lybertye and freedome of any other Cittye, vniversity, Towne, or Boroughe whatsoever within our Realmes and Domynions, willing and comaundinge you and everie of you, as you tender our pleasure, not onlye to permitt and suffer them herein without any your lettes, hindraunces, molestacions or disturbances during our said pleasure, but alsoe to be ayding and assisting vnto them, if any wronge be vnto them offered, and to allowe them such former curtesies as hath byne given to men of their place and quality, And alsoe what further favor you shall shewe them for our sake wee shall take yt kyndlye at your handes. Prouided alwaies and our will and pleasure is that all authority, power, privi-*