Richard Jones, as will be seen from the imprint, was the publisher of the work; but the clerk who made the memorandum in the books blundered respecting the name, and, besides terming it "a comedy" as well as "a pleasant and stately moral," he omitted that portion of the title which immediately connects it with "The three Ladies of London." That connection is avowed in the Prologue (usually called a "Preface") which was spoken by "a Lady, very richly attired, representing London;" and it is evident that the author had every reason for making the fact prominent, inasmuch as it was his interest to prove the relationship between his new offspring and a drama that had for some years been established in public approbation. London, speaking in the poet's name, therefore, says—
"My former fruits were lovely Ladies three;
Now of three Lords to talk is London's glee:
Whose deeds I wish may to your liking frame,
For London bids you welcome to the same."
Although, in its plot and general character, "The three Lords and three Ladies of London" is not so far advanced towards genuine comedy, the representation of life and manners, as its first part, "The three Ladies of London," in style and composition it makes a much nearer approach to what soon afterwards became the language of the stage, such as we find it in the works of Shakespeare, and of some of his most gifted contemporaries. Wilson, doubtless, saw the necessity, in 1588, of adopting some of those improvements of versification in which Marlowe had led the way; he therefore laid aside (excepting in a few comic scenes) his heavy, lumbering, and monotonous fourteen-syllable lines (sometimes carried to a greater length for the sake of variety) and not only usually employed ten-syllable lines, but introduced speeches of blank verse. His drama opens with this then uncommon form, and he avails himself of it afterwards, interspersing also prose in such situations as did not seem to require measured speech. This of itself was at that time a bold undertaking; for Marlowe had only just before 1588, when "The three Lords and three Ladies of London" must have been written, commenced weaning audiences at our public theatres from what, in the Prologue to his "Tamburlaine the Great," he ridicules as the "jigging veins of rhiming motherwits."[17] Robert Wilson is, on this account, to be regarded with singular respect, and his works to be read with peculiar interest. It is not easy to settle the question of precedency, but, as far as our knowledge at present extends, he seems entitled to be considered the second writer of blank verse for dramas intended for popular audiences. This is a point of view in which his productions have never yet been contemplated, and it renders the play we have reprinted, illustrating as it does so important and striking a change, especially worthy of notice and republication.
Something has been already said respecting the characters who figure in this representation, and we may add that although Simplicity, who here performs even a more prominent and important part than in "The three Ladies of London," must be reckoned the impersonation of a quality, and the representative of a class, so much individuality is given to him, particularly in his capacity of a ballad-singer, that it is impossible not to take a strong interest in all that he says, and in the incidents in which he is engaged. Richard Tarlton, the famous comedian, died on 3d Sept. 1588, rather more than a month after the entry of "The three Lords and three Ladies of London" at Stationers' Hall; and in this play it will be seen that Simplicity produces his "picture" before the audience, and gives a minute account of his habits, appearance, and employments. It is clear, therefore, as Tarlton is spoken of as dead, that this part of the drama must have been written, and introduced, subsequent to the memorandum in the Stationers' Registers. This of itself is a curious circumstance, and it serves to show with what promptitude our old dramatists availed themselves of any temporary matter that could give attraction and popularity to their plays.
As we have supposed Wilson himself to have acted Simplicity in "The three Ladies of London," we may perhaps conclude that he sustained the same character in "The three Lords and three Ladies of London." The part was an excellent one for the display of comic humour and clownish drollery, and the enumeration of the old ballads he sings and sells needs no illustration here, where, in fact, it would be out of place. The familiar manner in which Simplicity at times addresses the audience, for the sake of raising a laugh, is even more unlicensed in this play than in its predecessor, and we never before saw the words "To the audience" introduced, by way of stage-direction to the performer, that he might appeal to the spectators.[18]
The copy of this play most employed in the ensuing pages is the property of the Editor, but he has had an opportunity of comparing it with another in the library of the Duke of Devonshire.
The connection between the productions of our ancient and more modern stage, such as it existed at the close of the reign of Elizabeth, is even more slightly evidenced by the drama which conies last in our volume, the main features of which bear only a distant resemblance to our drama, while it was still under the trammels of allegorical impersonation. Nevertheless, the likeness is to be traced without difficulty; and when we find such a character as Honesty most prominently engaged from the beginning to the end of the performance (to say nothing of the introduction of the representative of the principle of evil in two passages), the mind is carried back to a period of our theatrical history when such characters were alone employed on our stage. Honesty has no necessary connection with the plot, nor with its development, beyond the exposure by his means of fraud, flattery, and hypocrisy: he bears no relation, however distant, to any of the parties engaged in the performance, and seems to have been designed by the unknown author as a sort of running commentator and bitter satirist upon the vices and follies of mankind. On the other hand, the chief characters among the dramatis personae are real and historical, and King Edgar and Bishop Dunstan, with Ethenwald and Alfrida, may be said to figure prominently throughout. The Knight, the Squire, and the Farmer, who make their appearance further on, are clearly embodiments of the several classes of society to which they appertain. Thus, although the "Knack to know a Knave" makes a nearer approach to comedy than any of the four dramas which precede it, it still by no means entirely discards the use of personages of a description which, many years earlier, engrossed our stage. Characters and scenes of life and manners are blended with others supported only by conventional impersonations, in which the dialogue is not intended to advance the plot, but merely to enforce a lesson of morality, probity, or discretion.
It is not always easy to guess at the full meaning of the author in various scenes he introduces, but some of them were obviously inserted for the purpose of exciting the laughter of the audience, and of giving an opportunity of display to a favourite low comedian. One of the actors is expressly mentioned on the title-page, where "Kemp's applauded merriments of the men of Gotham, in receiving the King into Gotham" are made prominent; but unless much were left to the extemporaneous invention of the performer, or unless much has been omitted in the printed copy, which was inserted by the author in his manuscript, it is difficult at this time of day to discover in what the wit, if not the drollery, consisted. As this portion of the play has come down to us, it seems to be composed of mere ignorant and blundering buffoonery, unworthy of a comedian, who undoubtedly afterwards sustained important humorous characters in the plays of Shakespeare. Who was the Bailiff of Hexham, and why he was brought forward on his deathbed near the opening of the drama, we are unable to explain, unless the author's object were that the spectators, when the Bailiff was ultimately carried away by the devil, should have ocular proof of the condign punishment which followed his principles as explained to his sons, and his practices as avowed by himself.
We can establish, almost to a day, when the "Knack to know a Knave" was first represented, for we find it thus entered in "Henslowe's Diary:" it is in an account relating to the performances of the company acting under the name of Lord Strange, at the Rose Theatre, from 19th Feb. 1591-2 to the 22d June 1592—
R[eceive]d at Jeronimo, the 9 of June 1592 xxviij's.
Rd at a Knack to know a Knave, 1592, 1 day iij'li. xij's.
Rd at Harry the VI, the 12 June 1592 xxxiij's.