\ UM Ge 
180 CHILDREN OF THE CHAPEL AT BLACKFRIARS 
himself by leaving with the audience the satisfied sense of dis- 
covering the meaning themselves, he turns aside and proceeds 
to blame the poets who write for the Children for making them 
utter jibes against the public theatres, to which they must ulti- 
mately succeed. For upon the general knowledge that the 
primary function of singing is the basic consideration of their im- 
pressment and maintenance while their acting is simply a conse- 
quence that must be conterminal with the cause, it is warrantably 
assumed that these Chapel Boys will be continued at the theatre 
as actors only so long as they can sing.* If then they keep on act- 
ing until their voices at puberty begin to break and unfit them 
for choir-singing and taking part in the varied sort of .entertain- 
ment they now furnish at Blackfriars, they will at the time of 
voice-change be deprived of their present superior position; and 
not being gentlemen’s sons but lads who have no better means 
than their own resources for support,” it is like-most that they 
themselves, despite their present raillery, will then have to seek 
employment as a means of livelihood among these same “com- 
mon players” their poets now make them cry down.’ 
But the contest has not been one-sided. With a glance at the 
more general conditions in which there has been “much to-do on 
both sides,” Shakespeare having made Hamlet apparently talk — 
away from the question raised as to maintenance and appareling 
of the lads, now purposely causes Rosencranz to avoid directly 
answering it, but nevertheless reenforces the answer in the minds 
of the audience by shifting, after all, the blame from the poets to 
the “nation” for allowing and encouraging the present state of 
affairs. For a while the controversy was so hot that plays were 
purchased by neither side unless* the poet took the part of the 
*See supra, 115. 
*Shakespeare by his “as is like 
most if their meanes are no better” 
(1623 folio) understands that these 
are not gentlemen’s children. Clif- 
ton’s boy, who never acted, was 
probably the only one of rank taken 
up. See also supra, 80°, 82*. 
*’Shakespeare prophesied soundly 
here. This is exactly what did hap- 
pen later, as the history from 1610 
to the Restoration, taken up in suc- 
ceeding chapters, shows. The 
grown-up children of Blackfriars 
and Whitefriars are found among 
the leaders in every men’s company 
but one, and practically dominate 
the stage during that later period. 
‘“There was for a while no 
money bid for argument unless” &c. 
This is as clear a declaration as 
one need make that the personal 
was subordinate to the theatrical 
quarrel and came before the public 
solely through demands of the lat- 
ter. Cf. supra, 158*, 169-72. 
294 
