and smoking tobacco, playing at cards, eating and drinking, were generally prevalent among them. The hours of performance were also earlier the play commencing at one o'clock. During the representation a flag was unfurled at the top of the theatre; and the stage, according to the universal practice of the age, was strewn with rushes; but, in all other respects, the theatres of Elizabeth and James's days seem to have borne a perfect resemblance to our own. They had their pit, where the inferior class of spectators, the groundlings, vented their clamorous censure or approbation; they had their boxes-rooms as they were called-to which the right of exclusive admission was engaged by the night, for the more affluent portion of the audience; and there were again the galleries, or scaffoldings above the boxes, for those who were content to purchase less commodious situations at a cheaper rate. On the stage, in the same manner, the appointments appear to have been nearly of the same description as at present. The curtain divided the audience from the actors, which, at the third sounding, not indeed of the bell, but of the trumpet, was drawn for the commencement of the performance. Malone, in his account of the ancient theatre, supposes that there were no moveable scenes; that a permanent elevation of about nine feet was raised at the back of the stage, from which, in many of the old pays, part of the dialogue was spoken; and that there was a private box on each side this platform. Such an arrangement would have destroyed all theatrical illusion; and it seems extraordinary that any spectators should desire to fix themselves in a station where they could have seen nothing but the backs and trains of the performers; but, as Malone himself acknowledges the spot to have been inconvenient, and that" it is not very easy to ascertain the precise situation where these boxes really were, ," it may very reasonably be presumed, that they were not placed in the position that the historian of the English stage has supposed. As to the permanent floor, or upper stage, of which he speaks, he may or may not be correct in his statement. All that his quotations upon the subject really establish is, that in the old, as in the modern theatre, when the actor was to speak from a window, or balcony, or the walls of a fortress, the requisite ingenuity was not wanting to contrive a representation of the place. But with regard to the use of painted moveable scenery, it is not possible, from the very circumstances of * Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 83, note 3. the case, to believe him correct in his theory. Such a contrivance could not have escaped our ancestors. All the ma. terials were ready to their hands. They had not to invent for themselves, but merely to adapt an old invention to that peculiar purpose; and at a time when every better-furnished apartment was adorned with tapestry; when even the rooms of the commonest taverns were In this hung with painted cloths; while all the materials were constantly before their eyes, we can hardly believe our forefathers to have been so deficient in ingenuity, as to have missed the simple contrivance of converting the common ornaments of their walls into the decorations of their theatres. But, in fact, the use of scenery was almost co-existent with the introduction of dramatic representations in this country. In the Chester Mysteries (1268), the most ancient and complete collection of the kind which we possess, is found the following stage direction: "Then Noe shall go into the arke with all his familye, his wife excepte. The arke must be boarded round about; and upon the boardes all the beastes and fowles, hereafter rehearsed, must be painted, that their wordes may agree with their pictures." † passage we have a clear reference to a painted scene. It is not likely that, in the lapse of three centuries, while all other arts were in a state of rapid improvement, and the art of dramatic writing, perhaps, more rapidly and successfully improved than any other, the art of theatrical decoration should have alone stood still. It is not improbable that their scenes were few; and that they were varied, as occasion might require, by the introduction of different pieces of stage furniture. Mr. Gifford, who adheres to the opinions of Malone, says,"A table with a pen and ink thrust in, signified that the stage was a countinghouse; if these were withdrawn and two stools put in their place, it was then a tavern." And this might be perfectly satisfactory as long as the business of the play was supposed to be passing within doors; but when it was removed to the open air, such meagre devices would no longer be sufficient to guide the imagi nation of the audience, and some new method must have been adopted to indicate the place of action. After giving the subject very considerable attention, I cannot help thinking that Steevens was right in rejecting Malone's theory, and concluding that the spectators were, as at + Itid, vol. iii. p 15. * Gifford's Massinger, vol. 1, p. 103. the present day, assisted in following the In one respect only do I perceive any material difference between the mode of representation at the time of Massinger and at present in his day, the female parts were performed by boys. This custom, which must in many cases have materially injured the illusion of the scene, was in others of considerable advantage; it furnished the stage with a succession of youths, regularly educated for the art, to fill, in every department of the drama, the characters suited to their age. When the lad had become too tall for Juliet, he had acquired the skill, and was most admirably fitted, both in age and appearance, for performing the part which Garrick considered the most difficult on the stage, because it needed "" an old head upon young shoulders," the ardent and arduous character of Romeo. When the voice had "the mannish crack," that rendered the youth unfit to appear as the representative of the gentle Imogen, the stage possessed in him the very person that was wanting to do justice to the princely sentiments of Arviragus or Guiderius.* Such was the state of the stage when Massinger arrived in the metropolis, and dedicated his talents to its service. He joined a splendid fraternity, for Shakspeare, Jonson, Beaumont, Fletcher, Shirley, were then flourishing at the height of their reputation, and the full vigour of their genius. Massinger came among them no unworthy competitor for such honours and emoluments as the theatre could afford. Of the honours, indeed, he seems to have reaped a very fair and equitable portion; of the emoluments, the harvest was less abundant. In those days very little pecuniary reward was to be gained by the dramatic poet, unless, as indeed was most frequently the case, he added the profession of the actor to that of the author, and recited the verses which But on he wrote. The distinguished performers of that time, Alleyn, Burbage, Heminge, Condell, Shakspeare, all appear to have died in independent, if not affluent circumstances; but the remuneration obtained by the poet was most miserably curtailed. The price given at the theatre for a new play fluctuated between ten and twenty pounds; the copyright, if the piece was printed, might produce from six to ten pounds more; in addition to these sums, the dedication-fee may be reckoned, the usual amount of which was forty shillings. Fam. Lib. Dramatic Series. this subject there is one passage which appears to me quite conclusive. Must not all the humour of the mock play in The Midsummer Night's Dream have been entirely lost, unless the audience before whom it was performed were actomed to all the embellishments requisite to give effect to a dramatic representation, and could consequently estimate the absurdity of those shallow contrivances and mean substitutes for scenery devised by the ignorance of the clowns* ? This question ought to be set at rest, methinks, by the following extract from the Book of Revels, the oldest that exists, in the office of the auditors of the imprest: "Mrs. Dane, the lynnen dealer, for canvass to paynte for houses for the players, and other properties, as monsters,great hollow trees, and such other, twenty dozen ells, 12l."-See Boswell's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 364, et seq. The first woman who appeared in a regular drama, on a public stage, played Desde mona, about the year 1660. Her name is unknown. THE TWO UNCLES.-A SKETCH. (For the Olio.) the Lions. He cautiously avoided public dinners and considered them as luxuries, like doctors, and unnecessary. He was "If they were living, I would try them yet." constant to church, to his disposition to THOUGH Uncle Edward and uncle Henry were brothers, brought up under the same roof, educated at the same school and had all things in common together, yet they differed in person, taste, habit, occupation and dress. Edward was fair complexioned, under the middle size, and nimble; his profile was archwise, and indicated close observation, and a close fist to keep what he could get. His heart was bent more on gain than love; more on personal safety from want, than the generous exercise of liberal opinions, feelings and principles. That he at an early age left home, and soon wore the yoke for himself, and acquired the appellation of being a niggard, he cared little for, since it obtained his independence, though mean it were in others' consideration, and gave him an importance with his country relations, who were waiting anxiously in the prospect of being benefited by his demise at a future day. Edward, however, lived long enough to disappoint even the youngest of his expectant heirs, and he would have been the last of his race, but for an accident which befel him and brought him to his death-bed unexpectedly, when he determined his property to those who had the least relative claims on his bequests. In all his vicissitudes, which were many, he never felt the power of the tender passion, but treated females with no other regard than politeness to be agreeable in their society. His notions of the marriage state were peculiar, and he expected to find such qualities in a woman as are rarely, if ever, concentrated. "She must have been rich, beautiful, young, affectionate, refined, forbearing, forgiving, healthy, notable, industrious, bland, very temperate, sweet-tempered, with many other indescribable properties." Thus uncle Edward, the old bachelor, lived without a wife and died, like King William, without issue. When living, he wore a three-cornered hat, used a gold-headed cane, buttons of an unvaried pattern for his coat and waistcoat, cuffs, flaps and collars; and buckles of the same pattern, for his wristbands, knees and shoes. His watch was regulated by the time-beaters at St. Dunstan's clock, and his pocket-book annually" Baldwin's Journal." He never went more than once to Mary-le-bonne Gardens, once to Ranelagh, and once to the Dibdinian Melangè ;--then he was treated by his cousin, to whom he shewed getting money, to early rising and early rest. He read little from books, but much from countenances. He studied men and escaped their follies. He loved pleasure to a cheap and gratuitous degree, but husbanded it sparingly, shrinking from excess as from a viper. If he took a liking to a person, he was sincere in his friendship and gave advice with precepts, setting himself by example in advantageous light. He lived a life of eccentricity and departed in the same spirit. My uncle Henry was thin, tall and well formed. As soon as he gained liberty, he made nature his study and, like Bloomfield's Farmer's Boy, the field his books.' He excelled in walking, riding, running, swimming, skaiting, jumping. He was a Walton-like angler, and none of his day could cast a net like him. A good shot, and he might have vied with Osbaldistone, for few could equal him in bringing a hare, wild duck, or snipe into his bag. He could use his voice at a Rent Feast in the "High Mettled Racer." He knew the secret movements of fish, flesh and fowl. He could raise the "Tallyho!" in a foxchase, or command his course in a stag hunt. He always, on sporting occasions, mounted Merriman, his Bull, in company with the Squire and the Parson, and he ventured through bog and over ditches where none dared follow, wisely pursuing the scrambling method in preference to that of leaping gates, an art in which Mr. Merriman was not practised. He could tell a long narrative and smoke a long pipe; keep a party in laughter, by suiting the action to the word, and mimic the known eccentric characters of his time. He was the best promoter of St. Valentine, by getting up meetings with persons for cross purposes, which his merry eclaircissements only could make straight. He was the most spirited contriver of the Maypole, and the most ardent continuer of it, affording means and his active substance for jocundity. Yet he was diligent in business, and the farm prospered with his regulation. He was shapened out of the rock of manly substance for agricultural pursuits, and improved many of their implements. His time of toil and pleasure accorded with the seasons. He could pitch a load of hay quicker and better than his neighbours. He could put his hand to the plough, into the seedlip and grasp the sickle. He evinced a practical willingness to lend a horse and AMID the varieties with which the Suffolk Street Galleries abound, the names of many of the exhibitors may be thus resolved : Primogenitors, there are three Adams. Titles.-Two Kings, a Duke, an Earl, an Abbott, three Knights, one Marshall, a Serjeant, a Burgess, a Noble, and a Purser. Colours-Bright, White, Brown, two Corbeaux, and four Greens. Animals.-One Fox, two Bullocks, a Kidd, a Hart, and a Cudlip.* Names, of Derby, Essex, Hastings, Bromley, Bosworth, Richmond, Preston, Leeds, Romney, Holland, Sutherland, Leigh, &c. Craftsmen.-An Archer, a Parker, two Farriers, a Faulkner, Fowler, Fisher, Capper, Puller, two Wrights, Hurlstone, an Arrowsmith, five Smiths, and a Smith seers, Meadows, a Marsh, Beau-mont, Lovegrove, two Woods, Woodward, Stump, Hens-haw, Beech-ey, Stan-field, Lonsdale, and two Du-jardins. Kindred,-Sons, Olderson, Wildman, Boys, Childe, two of Dearman! a Cheeseman, an Inman, a Prentis, Johnsons, Davisons, Richardsons, Robertsons, and Wilsons.. Public Characters.-Bonner, Vincent, Howard, Creswick, Alexander, Duncan, Percy, Irving, three Allens, and a Middleton. Poets-Watts, Collins, Shenston, Waller, Shiels, and two Scotts. Pleaders.-One Denman, and a Phil lips. Liquids.-Perry, Cape, and a Poole. Edibles.-Bacon, Fry, three Bones, and a Crabb. Birds. Two Martins, and one Dawe. Measures.-A Gill and a Gallon. Christian Names.-George, Jaques, Giles, and Barney. House Affinities.-La Porte, seven Wards, Chambers, a Garrett, a Hall. Artisans.-A Barber, a Glover, a Turner, a Cooke, and a Barker. Stature.-Long. Implements. A Mace and a Lance. A Wind-up.-Physic, Graves, a Redgrave, and a Churchyard. For the Fair Sex.-A Shepherd, a Call, a Clack, a Price, a Carter, a Boxall, a Sharp, a Timbrell. Read.-A Walker, two Moore, and a ONCE upon a time there lived in Hamah a certain Turk called Mustapha, who, having accumulated some wealth by carrying on a trade in goats' hair, determined to make a pilgrimage to Mecca. His family consisted of his wife and two slaves; and as the lady insisted on not being left behind, the good man resolved to sell off his stock of goats' hair, to take all his household with him, and to shut up his house till his return. The only difficulty that presented itself was what to do with his money. He did not like to run the risk of being robbed of it in his journey through the desart, he did not like to leave it in an empty house, and there was not any of his friends to whom he wished to trust the secret of his wealth. After much deliberation he placed it in separate parcels at the bottom of five large earthen jars, which he then filled up with butter, and on his departure sent them to the house of one of his neighbours, a Jew named Mousa, to keep till his return, telling him it was a stock which he had laid in for winter consumption. The Jew, however, from the weight of the jars and other circumstances, suspected that they contained something more valuable; and as soon as Mustapha was fairly on his way to Damascus to join the caravan, he ventured to open them; when finding his expectations realized, he took out the gold and filled them up again with butter, so carefully, that nobody could tell that they had been disturbed. The poor Turk, on his return from the pilgrimage, soon found out the trick that his neighbour had practised upon him; but as the jars were exactly in the same apparent state as when he left them, and as there was no evidence as to their contents, it was plain that no legal process could give him any redress. He therefore set about to devise some other way of punishing the Jew, and of recovering if possible his property; and in the meantime he did not communicate his loss to any person but his wife, and enjoined on her the strictest secrecy. After long consideration, a plan suggested itself. In one of his visits to the neighbouring town of Homs, where he was in the habit of going to sell his goats' hair to the manufacturers of the mashlakhs, for which that place is famous, he fell in with a troop of gypsies, who had with them an ape of extraordinary sagacity. He prevailed on them to sell him this animal; and conveying it privately to his house at Hamah, shut it up in a room to which no one but himself had access. He then went to the bazaar, and bought one of the dark scanty robes and the small caps or kalpaks, with a speckled handkerchief tied closely round it, which is the prescribed costume of the Jews throughout the Turkish empire. This dress he took care invariably to put on whenever he went to visit his ape; and as he always carried him his meals, and indeed never allowed any other person to see him, the animal in the course of a few weeks became extremely attached to him, jumping on his neck and hugging and caressing him as soon as he entered the room. About this time, as he was walking along the streets one day he met a lad, the son of the Jew Mousa, and having enticed him into his house by the promise of some figs, he shut him up a close prisoner in a detached apartment in his garden, at such a distance from the street and from the other houses in the town, that the boy could not discover to any one the place of his confinement. The Jew, after several days search, not being able to obtain any tidings of him, concluded that he had either been drowned, or had strayed out of the town and fallen into the hands of some of the wandering Bedouins; and as he was his only child, fell into a state of the greatest despair: till at length he heard by accident, that just about the time that the boy was missing, he had been seen walking in company with Hadgi Mustapha. The truth instantly flashed on his mind, and he recognised in the loss of his son some stratagem which the Turk had planned in revenge for the affair of the butter-jars. He immediately summoned him before the Cadi, accused him of having the boy in his possession, and insisted on his immediately restoring him. Mustapha at first strenuously denied the fact; but when one of the witnesses positively declared that he saw the boy go into his house, and when the cadi was about to pronounce his decree, that he should bring him into court dead or alive, Yah illah! el Allah!' he exclaimed, there is no God but Allah, and his power is infinite, he can work miracles when it seemeth good in his sight. It is true, effendi,* continued he, addressing himself to the cadi,' that I saw the Jew Mousa's son passing by my house; and for the sake of the old friendship subsisting between his father and myself, I invited him to come in and to eat some figs which I had just been gathering. The boy, however, repaid my hospitality with rudeness and abuse: nay, he even blasphemed the name of our holy prophet; but scarcely had the words passed his lips, when, to my surprise and horror, he was suddenly changed into a monkey. In that form I will produce him: and as a proof that what I tell you is true, you will see that he will immediately recognise his father.' At this instant a servant who was waiting on the outside let loose the ape into the divan, who seeing that the Jew was the only person present in the dress to which he was accustomed, mistook him for his master, jumped upon him, and clung round his neck with all the expressions of fondness which the child might have been supposed to exhibit on being restored to his parent. Nothing more was wanting to convince the audience of the truth of Mustapha's story; A miracle, a real miracle !' they cried out, great is Allah, and Mahomet is his prophet:' and the Jew was ordered. to take the monkey and retire from the court. A compromise was now his only resource; and accordingly, as soon as it. was dark, and he could go unobserved, he repaired to Mustapha's house, and offered |