p. 193 Finsbury Hero, Finsbury Fields, which Pepys thought ‘very pleasant’, had been kept open for the citizens to practise archery. An ordinance of 1478 is extant which orders all obstacles to be removed and Finsbury to be ‘made a plain field for archers to shoot in’. As late as 1737 there were standing twenty-four ‘rovers’ or stone pillars for shooting at distances.
p. 196 Mr. Barnardine. This allusion must almost certainly be to a recent revival of Measure for Measure, which particular play had been amongst those set aside by the regulation of 12 December, 1660, as the special property of Davenant’s theatre. After the amalgamation of the two companies in November, 1682, a large number of the older plays were revived or continued to be played (with a new cast and Betterton in the rôles which had been Hart’s) during the subsequent decade. Downes mentions Othello, The Taming of the Shrew, and several by Beaumont and Fletcher, Ben Jonson, and Brome. On the other hand, it is possible this reference may merely be to The Law Against Lovers (1661, folio, 1673), in which Sir William Davenant has mixed Benedick and Beatrice with Angelo, Claudio, Isabella and the rest. It is a curious conglomeration, and the result is very pitiful and disastrous. Bernardine and the prison scenes are retained. Measure for Measure was again profanely altered by Gildon in 1700, mutilated and helped out by ‘entertainments of music’.
p. 197 Snicker Snee. See note Vol. I, p. 449, Snick-a-Snee, The Dutch Lover, iii, III (p, 278).
p. 198 Spittal Sermon. The celebrated Spital Sermons were originally preached at a pulpit cross in the churchyard (now Spital Square) of the Priory and Hospital of St. Mary Spital, founded 1197. The cross, broken at the Reformation, was rebuilt during Charles I’s reign, but destroyed during the Great Rebellion. The sermons, however, have been continued to the present time and are still preached every Easter Monday and Easter Tuesday before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, at Christ Church, Newgate Street.
P. 201. Alsatia. This cant name had been given to the precinct of Whitefriars before 1623, then and for many years a notorious refuge for persons wishing to avoid bailiffs and creditors. The earliest use of the name is Thomas Towel’s quarto tract, Wheresoever you see meet, Trust unto Yourselfe: or the Mysterie of Lending and Borrowing (1623). The second use in point of time is the Prologue to Settle’s Pastor Fido (1676):—
And when poor Duns, quite weary, will not stay;
The hopeless Squire’s into Alsatia driven.
Otway’s comedy, The Soldiers Fortune (4to, 1681), where Courtine says: ‘I shall be ere long as greasy as an Alsatian bully,’ comes third; and Mrs. Behn’s reference to Alsatia in this play, which is often ignored, claims fourth place. We then have Shadwell’s famous comedy, The Squire of Alsatia (1688), with its well-known vocabulary of Alsatian jargon and slang, its scenes in Whitefriars, the locus classicus, a veritable mine of information. The particular portions of Whitefriars forming Alsatia were Ram-Alley, Mitre Court, and a lane called in the local cant Lombard Street. No. 50 of Tempest’s Cries of London (drawn and published in James II’s reign) is called ‘A Squire of Alsatia’, and represents a fashionable young gallant. Steele, Tatler (No. 66), 10 September, 1709, speaks of Alsatia ‘now in ruins’. It is interesting to note that many authorities, ignoring Settle and Mrs. Behn’s allusions, quote Powel and Otway as the only two places where the word ‘Alsatia’ is found before Shadwell made it so popular.
p. 202 Dornex. Or dornick, a worsted or woollen fabric used for curtains, hangings and the like, so called from Tournai, where chiefly manufactured. cf. Shadwell’s The Miser (1672), Act i, I: ‘a dornock carpet’. Also Wit and Drollery (1681): Penelope to Ulysses:—
The Stools of Dornix which that you may know well
Are certain stuffs Upholsterers use to sell.
p. 202 Henry the Eighth. Henry VIII had been put on by Davenant in December, 1663 with a wealth of pomp and expenditure that became long proverbial in the theatrical world. An extra large number of supers were engaged. Downes dilates at quite unusual length upon the magnificence of the new scenery and costumes. The court scene was especially crowded with ‘the Lords, the Cardinals, the Bishops, the Doctors, Proctors, Lawyers, Tip-staves.’ On New Year’s Day, 1664, Pepys went to the Duke’s house and saw ‘the so much cried up play of Henry VIII; which tho’ I went with resolution to like it, is so simple a thing, made up of a great many patches, that, besides the shows and processions in it, there is nothing in the world good or well done.’ On 30 December, 1668, however, he saw it again, ‘and was mightily pleased, better than ever I expected, with the history and shows of it.’ In The Rehearsal (1671), Act v, I, Bayes says: ‘I’l shew you the greatest scene that ever England saw: I mean not for words, for those I do not value; but for state, shew, and magnificence. In fine I’ll justifie it to be as grand to the eye every whit, I gad, as that great Scene in Harry the Eight.’