[649] This title was given by Reed; Baker's original work of 1762 was called A Dictionary of the Stage.
[650] The arguments against Still's authorship of Gammer Gurton, and in favour of that of Bridges, are stated at length in an article by Mr. C. H. Ross in the nineteenth volume of Anglia (1896), to which we are indebted for several useful references.
[651] Of course it is not meant that these persons corresponded exactly to the type represented by Diccon—the ex-patient of Bethlehem Hospital, discharged as being supposed to be cured or rendered harmless, and wearing a badge indicating the possession of a licence to beg.
[652] In Pikeryng's Horestes (1567), which is some years earlier than the first known publication of Gammer Gurton, the country characters (one of whom is named Hodge) speak a strongly marked southwestern dialect.
A Ryght
Pithy, Pleasaunt and merie
Comedie: Intytuled
Gammer gurtons
Nedle: Played on
Stage, not longe
ago in Christes
Colledge in Cambridge
Made by Mr. S. Mr. of Art.