[614] I think Criticus must here be taken to be Jonson's self-portrait. He told Drummond in 1619 that 'by Criticus is understood Done' (Conversations, 6); but the reference there appears to be to the lost 'preface of his Arte of Poesie'. In the folio text of the play Criticus becomes Crites.
[615] The maskers in Wit at Several Weapons, v. i, are 'something like the abstract of a masque'; cf. R. J. i. 4. 3—
The date is out of such prolixity.
We'll have no Cupid hoodwink'd with a scarf,
Bearing a Tartar's painted bow of lath,
Scaring the ladies like a crow-keeper;
Nor no without-book prologue, faintly spoke
After the prompter, for our entrance.
[616] Satiromastix, 2325, 'The watch-word in a maske is the bolde drum'.
[617] I do not wish to exaggerate this detachment. Peele builds upon the customary prayer for the queen or lord at the end of an interlude (cf. chh. x, xviii, xxii), and there are the plays with inductions, such as The Taming of the Shrew and The Knight of the Burning Pestle, in which the personages of the induction mediate between the action and the audience.