[120] The whole theory of the reason of our delight in Tragic Representations, which has cost so many elaborate chapters of Criticism, is condensed in these four last lines: Aristotle quintessentialised.
The Old Bear Garden
AT BANKSIDE, SOUTHWARK.
Bear Baiting—Masters of the Bears and Dogs—Edward Alleyn—The Falcon Tavern, &c.
The Bull and the Bear baiting, on the Bankside, seem to have preceded, in point of time, the several other ancient theatres of the metropolis. The precise date of their erection is not ascertained, but a Bear-garden on the Bankside is mentioned by one Crowley, a poet, of the reign of Henry VIII., as being at that time in existence. He informs us, that the exhibitions were on a Sunday, that they drew full assemblies, and that the price of admission was then one halfpenny!
“What follie is this to keep with danger,
A great mastive dog, and fowle ouglie bear;
And to this end, to see them two fight,
With terrible tearings, a ful ouglie sight.
And methinkes those men are most fools of al,
Whose store of money is but very smal;
And yet every Sunday they wil surely spend
One penny or two, the bearward’s living to mend.
“At Paris garden each Sunday, a man shal not fail
To find two or three hundred for the bearwards vale,
One halfpenny apiece they use for to give,
When some have no more in their purses, I believe;
Wel, at the last day, their conscience wil declare,
That the poor ought to have al that they may spare.
If you therefore give to see a bear fight,
Be sure God his curse upon you wil light!”
Whether these “rough games,” as a certain author terms them, were then exhibited in the same or similar amphitheatres, to those afterwards engraved in our old plans, or in the open air, the extract does not inform us. Nor does Stowe’s account afford any better idea. He merely tells us, that there were on the west bank “two bear gardens, the old and the new; places, wherein were kept beares, bulls, and other beasts to be bayted; as also mastives in several kenels, nourished to bayt them. These beares and other beasts,” he adds, “are there kept in plots of ground, scaffolded about, for the beholders to stand safe.”
In Aggass’s plan, taken 1574, and the plan of Braun, made about the same time, these plots of ground are engraved, with the addition of two circi, for the accommodation of the spectators, bearing the names of the “Bowll Baytyng, and the Beare Baytinge.” In both plans, the buildings appear to be completely circular, and were evidently intended as humble imitations of the ancient Roman amphitheatre. They stood in two adjoining fields, separated only by a small slip of land; but some differences are observable in the spots on which they are built.