merely that he did not belong to the Parish, yet there is something deeply pathetic in the entry in the parish register, "March 20, 1639-40, buried Philip Massinger, a Stranger."

I may as well add here a few more items of information with regard to the Globe Theatre. It is not certain in what year it was built, but Hentzner, a German traveller, who gives an amusing description of London in the time of Queen Elizabeth, alludes to it as existing in 1598, it was probably not built long before 1596: it was burnt down June 29th, 1613. It is curious that the burning down of the Globe coincides with the appearance of the last play sent up to London by Shakspeare from his Warwickshire home. Could it be that when the old spot, the Globe, so identified with his fame, was gone, he cared not to write for the new theatre? He might almost have said with Sir Bevidere,

"But now the whole Round Table is dissolved
Which was an image of the mighty world;
And the days darken round me, and the years,
Among new men, strange faces, other minds."

For the drama had begun its decay almost before Shakspeare's death. However this may be, whether the burning of the Globe, and Shakspeare's silence, were merely one of those strange coincidences that so often occur, or whether the one was the cause of the other, I cannot say; the fact is certain.

An account of this accident is given by Sir Henry Wotton in a letter, dated July 2nd, 1613. "Now to let matters of State sleepe, I will entertain you at the present with what happened this week at the Bankside. The King's players had a new play called "All is True," representing some principal pieces of the reign of Henry VIII., which set

forth with many extraordinary circumstances of pomp and majesty, even to the matting of the stage, the Knights of the Orders with their Georges and Garters, the guards with their embroidered cloaks and the like; sufficient in truth within awhile to make greatness very familiar, if not ridiculous. Now King Henry making a masque at the Cardinal Wolsey's house, and certain cannons being shot off at this entry, some of the paper or other stuff wherewith one of them was stopped, did light on the thatch, where being thought at first but idle smoak, and their eyes more attentive to the show, it kindled inwardly and ran round like a train, consuming, within less than an hour, the whole house to the very ground. This was the fatal period of that virtuous fabric wherein yet nothing did perish but wood and straw, and a few forsaken cloaks; only one man had his breeches set on fire, that would perhaps have broyled him, if he had not by the benefit of a provident wit, put it out with a bottle of ale.”

From a letter of Mr. John Chamberlaine to Sir Ralph Winwood, dated July 8th, 1613, we find that the theatre. had only two doors. "The burning of the Globe or playhouse, on the Bankside on St. Peter's Day, cannot escape you, which fell out by a peal of chambers (that I know not upon what occasion were to be used in the play), the tampin or stopple of one of them lighting in the thatch that covered the house, burn'd it down to the ground, with a dwelling-house adjoining, and it was a great marvaile and a fair grace of God that the people had so little harm, having but two narrow doors to get out."

In 1613 was entered in the Stationers books “A doleful ballad of the general conflagration of the famous theatre called the Globe."

Taylor, the Water Poet, also commemorates the event in the following lines:

"As gold is better that in fire's tried,

So is the Bankside Globe, that late was burn'd
For when before it had a thatched hide,

Now to a stately theatre 'tis turn'd;

Which is an emblem that great things are won;

By those that dare through greater dangers run."

Ben Jonson immortalizes it by some humourous verses called "An execration on Vulcan," in which he enumerates most of the great fires of history, but contrasting these with the loss of the Globe; considers that the heaviest, apparently because in it he lost many of his most valuable MSS. The Theatre was rebuilt with greater splendour in the following year.

We have not yet done with Bankside, for though the subject is not a pleasant one, we must not omit to mention the bear-baitings and bull-baitings, which, like the legitimate drama, had regular places of exhibition there. I am glad to know that these brutal sports were of foreign introduction, and that the first we hear of them in England was in the reign of King John, at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, "where this strange passtyme was introduced by some Italyans for his highness' amusement, wherewith he and his Court were highly delighted." The amusements and the spectators were well matched, for they were on the whole less cruel than John's favourite one of torturing human beings.

One would like to know whether the bear-baiting took place as a supplementary amusement to the "gentle and joyous passage of arms" at Ashby, immortalised in the pages of Ivanhoe. Unfortunately, by-the-bye, that took place before John was King.

It is a fact, however, which we cannot deny that they became favourite pastimes with the English people, the spice of danger in them probably increasing their popu

larity; for when a bull of great strength was roused to fury by the attacks of the dogs, it would sometimes break the cord which fastened it to a ring, and then, woe betide the lookers on.

Stowe, in his survey of London says: "As for the baiting of bulls and of bears, they are to this day much frequented, namely, in bear gardens on the Bankside, wherein be prepared scaffolds for people to stand upon. The spot on which they were held was called Paris gardens, the name Paris being believed to be a corruption of Paradise;" anything but a garden of Eden, one would think.

In No. 540 of "the Mirror" is a wood-cut representing the bull and the bear baiting theatres as they were in 1560. Each theatre looks rather like a miniature stonehenge, open at the top, and having an entrance left on one side. The people seem to have sat or stood all round, and the performance to have taken place in the pit in the middle.

We are told, "Those who go to Paris Gardens, the Bell Savage, or Theatre, to behold bear baitings, interludes or fence play, must not account of any pleasant spectacle unless they first pay one penny at the gate, another at the entry of the scaffold, and a third for quiet standing." As pence were scarce in those days, of course this would of itself imply a comparatively select audience.

One Sunday afternoon in the year 1582 the scaffold, being overcharged with spectators, fell down during the performance, and a great number of persons were killed or maimed by the accident, which the Puritans of the time failed not to attribute to Divine judgement. On the 26th of May, 1599, Queen Elizabeth went by water with the French Ambassadors to Paris Gardens, where they saw a baiting of bulls and bears. Indeed, Southwark seems to have been of sporting notoriety, for, in "the Humorous

Lovers," printed in 1617, one of the characters says: "I'll set up my bills, that the gamesters of London, Horslydown, Southwark, and Newmarket, may come in and bait him (the bear) before the ladies."

CHAPTER XI.

THE REIGN OF JAMES I.

THE GUNPOWDER PLOT.-BISHOP Andrewes.

UR subject in this chapter will not carry us far

from Bankside. Beyond it is Clink Street, full of warehouses and wharfs. Here Winchester Wharf represents the spot where the Bishop of Winchester's Palace once stood, where the principal subject of this chapter, Bishop Andrewes lived, and where he died; let us pass on, going through the narrow arch in the depth of the massive wall, the sole remains of the ancient building, and we shall come out at St. Mary Overie's Dock, where possibly Mary of the Ferry (if ever she existed) plied her oar a thousand years before. Close at hand is the west door of the nave of St. Saviour's, and between it and the Dock is Montague Close.

Stowe, in his survey of London, calls it "St. Mary Overie's close in possession of Lord Montacute." It was on this spot that Lord Montacute and Lord Monteagle

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