Page:The Elizabethan stage (Volume 2).pdf/267



shall prouide, And alsoe within anie Towne halles, mootehalles, Guyld-*halles, Schoolehowses or other convenient places within the libertye and freedome of anie other Cittie, vniuersitie, Towne or Burroughe whatsoeuer within our Realmes and Domynions, willinge and comaundinge you and everie of you, as you tender our pleasure, not onelie to permitt and suffer them herein without any your lettes, hinderances, molestacions or disturbances during our said pleasure, but alsoe to be ayding and assistinge vnto them, if anie wronge be vnto them offred, And to allowe them such former curtesies as hath byne given to men of their place and qualitie, And alsoe what further fauour you shall shewe them for our sake wee shall take yt kindelie at your handes. Prouided alwayes and our will and pleasure is that all authoritie, power, priveledge, and profitt whatsoever belonginge or properlie apperteyning to the maister of the Revelles in respecte of his office and euerie Article and graunte conteyned within the letters Pattentes or Comission, which haue byne heretofore graunted or directed by the late queene Elizabeth our deere sister or by our selfe to our welbeloued Servantes Edwarde Tylney Maister of the saide Revells, or to Sir George Bucke knighte, or to eyther of them, in possession or reuercon, shall remayne and abide entire and in full force, effecte and vertue, and in as ample sorte as if this our Comission had neuer byne made In witnesse wherof &c. Witnesse our selfe at Westminster the seaven and Twentith daye of Aprill.

per breve de priuato sigillo &c.

The company is first traceable in the country, at Bath during 1610-11 and at Ipswich on 28 May 1611. The names of Moore and Townsend render possible its identification with an unnamed company, which on 29 August 1611 gave duplicate bonds of £500 to Henslowe for the observance of certain articles of agreement of the same date. Unfortunately the articles themselves are not preserved, but it is likely that they contained an arrangement for the housing and financing of the company by Henslowe. The signatories to both bonds include John Townsend, Joseph Taylor, William Ecclestone, Thomas Hunt, John Rice, Robert Hamlen, Joseph Moore, William Carpenter, Thomas Basse, and Alexander Foster. To these one adds Giles Gary and William Barksted and the other Francis Waymus. The names recited in the bodies of the documents agree with the signatures, except that Gary appears in both. Several of these men now come into London theatrical history for the first time, but Gary is probably the Giles Cary who with Barksted played in Epicoene for the Queen's Revels in 1609, Taylor came from the Duke of York's, and Rice from the King's. One Hunt, whose Christian name is unknown, was with the Admiral's