The entertainment offered to the French Ambassador at the Court of Henry VIII. at Greenwich shows that acting and dressing formed part of a courtly entertainment. They began with tournaments and contests on foot and horse; they went on to an interlude in Latin, the altars being all richly dressed.
“This being ended,” says the author of the Life of Wolsey, “there came a great company of ladies and gentlemen, the chiefest beauties in the realm of England, being as richly attired as cost could make, or art devise, to set forth their gestures, proportions, or beauties, that they seemed to the beholder rather like celestial angels than terrestrial creatures, and in my judgment worthy of admiration, with whom the gentlemen of France danced and masked; every man choosing his lady as his fancy served; that done, and the maskers departed, came in another masque of ladies and gentlewomen, so richly attired as I cannot express; these ladies maskers tooke each of them one of the Frenchmen to dance; and here note, that these noblewomen spoke all of them good French, which delighted them much to hear the ladies speak to them in their own language. Thus triumphantly did they spend the whole night from five of the clock at the night into two or three of the clock in the morning; at which time the gallants drew all to their lodgings to take their rest.”
There was a kind of show called a Prolusion. This appears to have been a representation of some well-known event or legend. Thus in 1587 there was a Prolusion set forth by Hugh Offley, merchant-adventurer and leather-seller, one of the Sheriffs of the year 1588. It represented King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. He chose 300 good archers, personable men; and he dressed them in black satin doublets and black velvet hose; every man carried a bow of yew and a dozen waxed arrows. They marched in goodly array from Merchant Taylors to Mile End Green. Queen Elizabeth in her chariot passed them, and stopped in order to see the show. “In her whole life,” she said, “she had never seen a finer company of archers.” They all fell on their knees and prayed God to prosper and preserve Her Majesty. She thanked them and passed on her way, while the archers proceeded to attack the sham forts which had been set up, after which those who shot best took prizes, and Master Hugh Offley provided a banquet for all.
It is interesting to remember that the Theatre had to contend for the place of honour with the stately and courtly Masque. All that artist could do for decoration, or stage manager could devise for machinery, or that poet could imagine or invent for fable, was pressed into the service of the Masque. The dresses the players wore were most gorgeous; the speeches were fine; the dances and the songs were most beautiful. Real mountains contained real caves; Dryads ran out of the woods; Naiads lay beside running streams; all the Gods and Goddesses of Ovid took part in the action; there were thrones of gold and silver; there were star-spangled skies; sea gods and river gods appeared; Tritons blew their shells; mermaids swam about the sea-shell of mother-of-pearl in which sat Venus herself. And all this time the Theatre itself had no scenery and no stage management and no machinery. The Masque, however, did not assume its full development till the next century. It will be found more fully treated in the chapter on the Theatre and Art in London in the Time of the Stuarts. Even more popular than the theatre were the sports of bear-baiting, bull-baiting, wrestling, quarter-staff and single-stick. The favourite place for these sports was the Paris Garden beyond Bankside.
“Yet everye Sondaye
They will surelye spende
One penye or two
The bearwardes lyvyng to mende.
At Paryse Garden eche Sondaye
A man shall not fayle