John Heywood (1500?-1580) was a dramatist and epigrammatist. His interludes "prepared the way for English comedy," the characters having some individuality instead of being mere walking virtues and vices. Of these plays The Four P's (printed between 1543 and 1547) is the best known. The characters that give it the name are a Palmer, a Pardoner, a Potecary (apothecary) and a Pedlar. A palmer was a pilgrim to the Holy Land, so called from the palm-branch he brought back in token of having performed the journey. A pardoner was a person licensed to sell papal indulgences, or pardons.
No night is now, etc. The quotation is from A Midsummer-Night's Dream, ii. 1. 102.
Page 191.—Housen. An obsolete plural of house, formed like oxen, etc.
Page 192.—The offices. The rooms in an old English mansion where provisions are kept; that is, the pantry, kitchen, etc.
Waes-hael. Anglo-Saxon for "Be hale (whole, or well)," equivalent to "Here's to your health." Wassail is a corruption of this salutation, which from this meaning was transferred to festive gatherings where it was used, and then to the liquor served on such occasions—generally, spiced ale.
The tenant of Ingon. When Knight wrote this, fifty or more years ago, he supposed that a certain John Shakespeare who in 1570 held a farm known as Ingon or Ington, in the parish of Hampton Lucy near Stratford, was the poet's father; but that he was one of the many other Shakespeares in Warwickshire (see [page 207] below) appears from an entry in the parish register at Hampton Lucy, showing that he was buried on the 25th of September, 1589. The poet's father lived until September, 1601, his funeral being registered as having taken place on the 8th of that month. There was another John Shakespeare, a shoemaker, who was a resident of Stratford from about 1584 to about 1594. In the town records he is generally called the "shumaker," or "corvizer" (an obsolete word of the same meaning), or "cordionarius" (the Latin equivalent); but occasionally he appears simply as "John Shakspere," and some of these entries were formerly supposed to refer to the father of the dramatist.
The Lord of Misrule. The person chosen to direct the Christmas sports and revels. His sovereignty lasted during the twelve days of the holiday season. Stow, in his Survey of London (see on [page 82] above), says: "In the feast of Christmas, there was in the king's house, wheresoever he lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Master of Merry Disports, and the like had ye in the house of every nobleman of honour or good worship, were he spiritual or temporal." Stubbes (see on [page 185] above) inveighed against the practice in his usual bitter way: "First, all the wild heads of the parish, conventing together, choose them a grand captain (of mischief) whom they innoble with the title of my Lord of Misrule, and him they crown with great solemnity, and adopt for their king. This king anointed chooseth forth twenty, forty, three score, or a hundred lusty guts like to himself, to wait upon his lordly majesty, and to guard his noble person. Then every one of these his men he investeth with his liveries, of green, yellow, or some other light wanton color.... And they have their hobby-horses, dragons, and other antics, together with their bawdy pipers and thundering drummers, to strike up the devil's dance withal; ... and in this sort they go to the church (though the minister be at prayer or preaching) dancing and swinging their handkerchiefs over their heads in the church, like devils incarnate, with such a confused noise that no man can hear his own voice.... Then after this, about the church they go again and again, and so forth into the churchyard, where they have commonly their summer halls, their bowers, arbors, and banqueting houses set up, wherein they feast, banquet, and dance all that day, and (peradventure) all that night too. And thus these terrestrial furies spend their Sabbath day." He goes on to tell how the people give money, food, and drink for these festivities, and adds: "but if they knew that, as often as they bring any to the maintenance of these execrable pastimes, they offer sacrifice to the Devil and Sathanas [Satan], they would repent, and withdraw their hands, which God grant they may." The Lords of Misrule in colleges were preached against at Cambridge by the Puritans in the reign of James I. as inconsistent with a place of religious education, and as a relic of Pagan worship. In Scotland, the "Abbot of Unreason" (as the Lord of Misrule was called there), with other festive characters, was suppressed by legislation as early as 1555. Thomas Fuller (1608–1681), in his Good Thoughts in Worse Times (1647), says: "Some sixty years since, in the University of Cambridge, it was solemnly debated betwixt the heads [of the colleges] to debar young scholars of that liberty allowed them in Christmas, as inconsistent with the discipline of students. But some grave governors mentioned the good use thereof, because thereby, in twelve days, they more discover the dispositions of scholars than in twelve months before."
Page 193.—The Clopton who is gone. William Clopton, whose tomb is in the north aisle of Stratford Church. He was the father of the William Clopton of Shakespeare's boyhood, who resided at Clopton House, an ancient mansion less than two miles from Stratford on the brow of the Welcombe Hills. It is still standing, though long ago modernized. It is said to have been originally surrounded with a moat, like the "moated grange" of Measure for Measure (iii. 1. 277).
To burn this night with torches. That is, to prolong the festivities. The quotation is from Antony and Cleopatra, iv. 2. 41.