157 
THE QUEEN’S PURPOSES 
entiation from the Blackfriars was quickly picked up by poets 
and patrons and was felt by the public theatres to have a touch 
of stigma in it. Shakespeare but represents the feeling of his 
fellows when he expresses his disrelish of the new distinction of 
_ “common stages,’”’ both officially and popularly applied.* 
: The attitude of the Queen towards public theatres and her pat- 
_ ronage of Blackfriars cannot but have had large influence in ac- 
~ complishing what her orders in the hands of the City authorities 
failed to accomplish. It at least was the means of depriving the 
public theatres of their best patronage and materially reducing 
their income, as their representatives charge. They could not as 
a result be a very friendly element. 
It was with a full knowledge of these conditions that the Essex 
conspirators sought to enlist Shakespeare’s company in their 
_ cause* early in 1601. And doubtless these conditions, more than 
_ the bribe of 40s., wrought persuasively with those actors of the 
Globe who were besought to present “the deposyng and kyllyng 
_ of Kyng Rychard the Second” on the following day, Saturday, 
_ February 7, 1601. Although wholly unaware of the Essex con- 
_ Spiracy, they were fully aware of Elizabeth’s special antipathy to 
_ the theme involved,* and no amount of palliation can cover their 
culpability to that extent. 
Although no legal proceedings were instituted against the Globe 
players, and within three weeks, on Shrove Tuesday, Feb. 24, 
_ they played, by previous arrangement, before the Queen, yet never 
after did good feeling exist on either side. 
The items of the two following paragraphs in the chronology 
of events are of only incidental concern. 
The Queen had the Paul’s Boys at Court January 1, 1601, and 
the Children of the Chapel on February 6, and again on Shrove 
Sunday, February 22. Her orders of March 11 following, for 
added documents on the famous fa- 
wee further, infra, 176", 165°. 
*For documents in this affair see, 
at the Public Record Office, State 
Papers, Domestic Series, Elizabeth, 
CCLXXVIII, Nos. 78, 85; Calendar 
of the same (1598-1601) 575-78; 
J. O. Halliwell-Phillips, op. cit., II, 
359-62. Mr. Halliwell-Phillip’s dis- 
cussion of the case (I, 191-99) with 
tal insurrection of the following 
car Sunday, Feb. 8, 1601, is very 
u 
aes J. O. Halliwell-Phillips, op. 
T9359! 
Ee complete work, vol. II, 
Plays at Court. Also cf. supra, 
as Ose 8 hace 
271 
