Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: Alone to the Kings' house, to a play, The Traytor, where, unfortunately, I met with Sir W. Pen, so that I must be forced to confess it to my wife, which troubles me. Thence walked home, being ill-satisfied with the present actings of the House, and prefer the other House before this infinitely

Event Comment: The Duke's Company, presumably. Evelyn, Diary: This night was acted my Lord Brahals Tragedy cal'd Mustapha before their Majesties &c: at Court: at which I was present, very seldom at any time, going to the publique Theaters, for Women now (& never 'til now) permitted to appeare & act, which inflaming severall young noble-men & gallants, became their whores, & to some their Wives, wittnesse the Earle of Oxford, Sir R. Howard, Pr. Rupert, the E. of Dorset, & another greater person than any of these, who fell into their snares, to the reproch of their noble families, & ruine both of body & Soule: I was invited to see this Tragedie, exceedingly well writ, by my Lord Chamberlain, though in my mind, I did not approve of any such passe time, in a season of such Judgements & Calamitie. Pepys, Diary: Here my Lord Bruncker proffered to carry me and my wife into a play at court to-night, and to lend me his coach home, which tempted me much; but I shall not do it

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Then out and walked alone on foot to the Temple, it being a fine frost, thinking to have seen a play all alone; but there, missing of any bills, concluded there was none, and so back home

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the Duke's house, and saw Macbeth, which, though I saw it lately, aet appears a most excellent play in all respects, but especially in divertisement, though it be a deep tragedy; which is a strange perfection in a tragedy, it being most proper here, and suitable. So home, it being the last play now I am to see till a fortnight hence, I being from the last night entered into my vowes for the year coming on

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary I home to dinner, where Mr Pierce dined with us, who tells us what troubles me, that my Lord Buckhurst hath got Nell Gwin? away from the King's house, lies with her, and gives her #100 a year, so as she hath sent her parts to the house, and will act no more. And yesterday Sir Thomas Crew told me that Lacy lies a-dying of the pox

Event Comment: The King's Company. The date of the first performance is not known; Pepys does not suggest that this day was the premiere. Pepys, Diary: Sir W. Pen...and I by coach to the King's playhouse, and there saw The Mad Couple, which I do not remember that I have seen; it is a pretty pleasant play. Thence home, and my wife and I to walk in the garden, she having been at the same play with Jane, in the 18d. seat, to shew Jane the play

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the King's playhouse, my eyes being so bad since last night's straining of them, that I am hardly able to see, besides the pain which I have in them. The play was a new play; and infinitely full: the King and all the Court almost there. It is The Storme, a play of Fletcher's; which is but so-so, methinks; only there is a most admirable dance at the end, of the ladies, in a military manner, which indeed did please me mightily....And there comes my wife home from the Duke of York's playhouse. Two songs, printed somewhat later in Choice Songs and Ayres, The First Book, 1673, may have been prepared for this revival: Hark the storm grows, set by Robert Smith; and Cheer up my mates, set by Pelham Humphrey

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the Duke of York's House, and there went in for nothing into the pit, at the last act, to see Sir Martin Marr-all, and met my wife, who was there, and my brother, and W. Hewer and Willett, and carried them home, still being pleased with the humour of the play, almost above all that ever I saw

Event Comment: [The Duke's Company. For Harris' role, see Pepys, 11 May 1668. For Angel as Stephano, see An Elegy Upon...Mr Edward Angell, reprinted in A Little Ark, pp. 38-39: @Who shall play Stephano now? your Tempest's gone@To raise new Storms i' th' hearts of every one.@ For Underhill as Trincalo, note his nickname of Prince Trincalo. (For Mary Davis as Ariel and Mrs Long as Hypolito, see J. H. Wilson, All the King's Ladies, pp. 140, 166.) Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 33): The Tempest...Acted in Lincolns-Inn-Fields...alter'd by Sir William Davenant and Mr Dryden before 'twas made into an Opera. Pepys, Diary: At noon resolved with Sir W. Pen to go see The Tempest, an old play of Shakespeare's, acted, I hear, the first day; and so my wife, and girl, and W. Hewer by themselves, and Sir W. Pen and I afterwards by ourselves; and forced to sit in the side balcone over against the musique-room at the Duke's house, close by my Lady Dorset and a great many great ones. The house mighty full; the King and Court there: and the most innocent play that ever I saw; and a curious piece of musique in an echo of half sentences, the echo repeating the former half, while the man goes on the latter, which is mighty pretty. The play [has] no great wit, but yet good, above ordinary plays. Thence home with Sir W. Pen, and there all mightily pleased with the play

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: I and my wife and Willett to the Duke of York's house, and there saw the Tempest again, which is very pleasant, and full of so good variety that I cannot be more pleased almost in a comedy, only the seaman's part a little too tedious. Thence home, and there to my chamber, and do begin anew to bind myself to keep my old vows, and among the rest not to see a play till Christmas but once in every other week, and have laid aside #10, which is to be lost to the poor, if I do

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: Away to my wife at the Duke of York's house, in the pit, and so left her; and to Mrs Pierce, and took her and her cozen Corbet, Knepp and little James, and brought them to the Duke's house; and, the house being full, was forced to carry them to a box, which did cost me 20s., besides oranges, which troubled me, though their company did please me. Thence, after the play, stayed till Harris was undressed, there being acted The Tempest, and so he withall, all by coach, home

Event Comment: The King's Company. This is a Friday in Lent, when frequently the playhouses did not act. Pepys, Diary: To the King's playhouse, and there saw a piece of Love in a Maze, a dull, silly play, I think: and after the play, home with W. Pen and his son Lowther, whom we met there

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: By and by comes my wife and Deb. home, have been at the King's playhouse to-day, thinking to spy me there; and saw the new play, Evening Love, of Dryden's, which, though the world commends, she likes not. Evelyn, Diary: To a new play, with severeall of my Relations, the Evening Lover, a foolish plot, & very Prophane, so as it afflicted me to see how the stage was. degenerated & poluted by the licentious times

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: With my wife and Deb. to the Duke of York's playhouse, and there saw The Slighted Maid, but a mean play; and thence home, there being little pleasure now in a play, the company being but little. Here we saw Gosnell, who is become very homely, and sings meanly, I think

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: My wife and I to the Duke of York's playhouse; and there saw, the first time acted, The Queene of Arragon, an old Blackfriars' play, but an admirable one, so good that I am astonished at it, and wonder where it hath lain asleep all this while, that I have never heard of it before. Here met W. Batelier and Mrs Hunt, Deb's aunt; and saw her home--a very witty woman, and one that knows this play, and understands a play mighty well

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the King's playhouse, and there, the pit being full, sat in a box above, and saw Catiline's Conspiracy, yesterday being the first day: a play of much good sense and words to read, but that do appear the worst upon the stage, I mean, the least diverting, that ever I saw any, though most fine in clothes; and a fine scene of the Senate, and of a fight, that ever I saw in my life. But the play is only to be read, and therefore home, with no pleasure at all, but only in sitting next to Betty Hall, that did belong to this house, and was Sir Philip Howard's mistress, a mighty pretty wench. Evelyn, Diary: I went to see the old play Cataline acted, having ben now forgotten 40 years almost

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. This performance is on the L. C. list at Harvard. See VanLennep, "Plays on the English Stage," p. 14. Pepys, Diary: My wife and I to White Hall; and there, by means of Mr Cooling, did get into the play, the only one we have seen this winter: it was The Five Hours' Adventure: but I sat so far I could not hear well, nor was there any pretty woman that I did see, but my wife, who sat in my Lady Fox's pew with her. The house very full; and late before done, so that it was past eleven before we got home

Event Comment: The King's Company. For the identification of this play and details of its performance, see W. J. Lawrence, "Foreign Singers and Musicians at the Court of Charles II," Musical Quarterly, IX (1923), 217-25, and James G. McManaway, "Entertainment for the Grand Duke of Tuscany," Theatre Notebook, XVI (1961), 20-21. The Travels of Cosmo the Third [Monday 3 June 1669 NS; Monday 24 May 1669 OS]: In the afternoon his highness left home earlier than usual to make his visits, that he might be at the King's Theatre in time for the comedy, and a ballet set on foot and got up in honor of his highness by my Lord Stafford, uncle of the Duke of Norfolk. On arriving at the theatre, which was sufficiently lighted on the stage and on the walls to enable the spectators to see the scenes and the performances, his highness seated himself in a front box, where, besides enjoying the pleasure of the spectacle, he passed the evening in conversation with the Venetian ambassador, the Duke of Norfolk, Lord Stafford, and other noblemen. To the story of Psyche, the daughter of Apollo, which abounded with beautiful incidents, all of them adapted to the performers and calculated to express the force of love, was joined a well-arranged ballet, regulated by the sound of various instruments, with new and fanciful dances after the English manner, in which different actions were counterfeited, the performers passing gracefully from one to another, so as to render intelligible, by their movements, the acts they were representing. This spectacle was highly agreeable to his highness from its novelty and ingenuity; and all parts of it were likewise equally praised by the ladies and gentlemen, who crouded in great numbers to the theatre, to fill the boxes, with which it is entirely surrounded, and the pit, and to enjoy the performance, which was protracted to a late hour of the night (pp. 347-48). In BM Add. Mss. 10117, folio 230, Rugge's Diurnall states that towards the end of May 1669 Cosmo, Prince of Tuscany had several plays acted for him

Event Comment: Evelyn, Diary: I went home, steping in at the Theater, to see the new Machines for the intended scenes, which were indeede very costly, & magnificient

Event Comment: On this date, James Vernon, writing to Sir Joseph Williamson, reported: Senior Scaramouchio and his band have begged his Majesty's leave to returne, theire affaires requiring their presence att home (Letters to Sir Joseph Williamson at Cologne, Camden Society, I, 179)

Event Comment: The King's Company. CSPD, Charles II, 1682, p. 24: 12 Jan. 1681@2: On Friday the second part of the Siege of Jerusalem is acted by his [Russian ambassador's] particular command and on Monday he goes home

Event Comment: Samuel Pepys to Robert Southwell, 10 Oct. 1685: To night wee have had a mighty Musique--Entertainment at court for the welcoming home the King and Queen. Wherein the fraequent Returnes of the Words, Arms, Beauty, Triumph, Love, Progeny Peace, Dominion, Glory, &c. had apparently cost our Poet-Prophet more paine to finde Rhimes then Reasons (R. G. Howard, Letters and the Second Diary of Samuel Pepys [London, 1932], p. 171. [The entertainment for this occasion seems not to have survived.

Event Comment: The United Company, Lord Ashburnham's Diary: I went to visit Ld Sussex, and Mr Campion, neither of them at home, I went into the Play (the Wanton Wife) [Ashburnham MS 932; see 14 Dec. 1686]

Event Comment: The United Company. Lord Ashburnham's Diary: I went to the Play (a King and no King) and came home in good time a very rayny night (Ashburnham MS 932; see 14 Dec. 1686)

Event Comment: The United Company. Lord Ashburnham's Diary: I came home at 8 of ye Clock after having look'd in at the Play, the Spanish Curate (Ashburnham MS 932; see 14 Dec. 1686)