BLACKFRIARS THEATRE BUILDING 45 
‘still frequenting their accustomed places, the Blackfriars stage 
was of sufficient proportions and equipment for the Burbage 
‘company,’ the largest in London, to present on its boards the 
great Shakespearean plays with an excellence that is doubtless _ 
hot disproportionately measured by the satisfaction of the audi- 
‘ence and the consequent financial returns exceeding by a thou- 
‘sand pounds in a single winter the amount usually received at 
Whe Globe. 
The preceding comparative view gives a general notion of 
Blackfriars stage more nearly true than the “little’ conception 
current in stage annals. While no published document declares 
‘ the exact dimensions, it is possible from data now at hand to 
translate this general notion into nearer mathematical! definiteness. 
- It was the physical limitations at Blackfriars that determined 
the width of the stage and made it in its relation to galleries and 
audience different from all public theatre stages. 
In the case of the Fortune, modeled after the Globe, the stage 
was 43 feet wide, with a pzssage of 6 feet on each side between 
the stage and that part of the lower gallery where the gentle- 
men’s rooms were,*—the place labeled “orchestra” (in the 
classical sense) in the sketch of the Swan showing a similar 
arrangement. As pointed out later® this condition made it im- 
possible for the custom of sitting on the stage to receive encour- 
agement at the Globe, the Fortune, the Swan, and other public 
theatres, for such spectators would have cut off the view of the 
patrons in the gentlemen’s rooms. 
dren of the Queen’s Revels there 
through the drastic action of James 
See documents from English 
and French archives in my forth- 
coming three-volume work on the 
drama and stage of Shakespeare’s 
time. Also see other extensive doc- 
uments which I have recently dis- 
covered on Shakespeare, Globe, and 
Blackfriars, in forthcoming separate 
publication. 
*Any possible notion that the 
stage or theatre was changed in ar- 
rangement or equipment to accom- 
modate the needs of the Burbage 
company is precluded by documen- 
tary evidence. The former lessee, 
Henry Evans, surrendered his lease 
to Burbage (cf. infra, I, part ii), 
which is later regarded by the Bur- 
bages as a “purchase” of the lease 
(cf. infra, I, part ii). According to 
the newly .discovered documents 
concerning Shakespeare and the the- 
atres just referred to (supra, 44"°), 
the Blackfriars was then leased to 
Shakespeare and fellows for the 
same amount as Evans had been 
paying. They took it over at once 
just as it was when Evans was 
forced by the King to give it up. 
*Cf. supra, 35°. 
°Cf. Fortune contract, u. s., 29°. 
“See the Van Buchell—De Witt 
sketch, u. s., 317. 
5Infra, 136-38. 
159 
