Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: [Mrs Knipp] tells me how Smith, of the Duke's house, hath killed a man upon a quarrel in play; which makes every body sorry, he being a good actor, and, they say, a good man, however this happens. The ladies of the Court do much bemoan him, she says

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: [Mrs Knepp] tells me Harris is well again, having been very ill

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Mrs Pierce tells me the two Marshalls at the King's house are Stephen Marshall's, the great Presbyterian's daughters [an erroneous rumor]; and that Nelly Gwin? and Beck Marshall, falling out the other day, the latter called the other my Lord Buckhurst's whore, Nell answered them, "I was but one man's whore, though I was brought up in a bawdy-house to fill strong waters to the guests; and you are a whore to three or four, though a Presbyter's praying daughter!" which was very pretty

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary, 6 June 1660: My letters tell me...that the two Dukes do haunt the Park much, and that they were at a play, Madam Epicene, the other day

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: So that I could not do as I had intended, that is to...go the the Red Bull Playhouse, but I took coach and went to see whether it was done so or no, and I found it done

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: So we returned and landed at the Bear at the Bridge foot, where we saw Southwark Fair (I having not all seen Bartholomew Fair)

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Mr Moore coming to me, my wife staid at home, and he and I went out together...and so home with him to the cockpit, where, understanding that "Wit without money" was acted, I would not stay

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: in the afternoon, to ease my mind, I went to the cockpit all alone, and there saw a very fine play called The Tamer tamed, very well acted

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: And then out to the red bull (where I had not been since plays come up again)...where I was led by a seaman that knew me, but is here as a servant, up to the tireing-room, where strange the confusion and disorder that there is among them in fitting themselves, especially here, where the clothes are very poor, and the actors but common fellows. At last into the pitt, where I think there was not above ten more than myself, and not one hundred in the whole house. And the play, which is called All's lost by Lust, poorly done; and with so much disorder, among others, that in the musique-room the boy that was to sing a song, not singing it right, his master fell about his ears and beat him so, that it put the whole house in an uprore. Nicoll (Restoration Drama, p. 309) argues that George Jolly probably occupied the red bull in St John's Street, Clerkenwell. When Richard Walden saw the red bull players at Oxford in July 1661, Anne Gibbs acted Dionysia in All's Lost by Lust. It is possible that she played that role on this day. See Walden's Io Ruminans, 1662

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Captain Ferrers and I to the Opera, and saw The Witts, again, which I like exceedingly. The Queen of Bohemia was here, brought by my Lord Craven

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Then my wife and I to Drury Lane to the French comedy, which was so ill done, and the scenes and company and everything else so nasty and out of order and poor, that I was sick all the while in my mind to be there. See also Boswell (Restoration Court Stage, p. 280). W. J. Lawrence (Early French Players in England, The Elizabethan Playhouse and Other Studies (1912), pp. 139-40) argues that the play was Chapoton's Le Mariage d'Orphee et d'Eurydice. See also The Description of the Great Machines of the Descent of Orpheus into Hell. Presented by the French Comedians at the cockpit in Drury Lane. The Argument Taken out of the Tenth and Eleventh Books of Ovid's Metamorphosis (1661). Rugg's Diurnal the French players (BM Add. Mss. 10116, f243v)

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: At noon comes Luellin to me, and he and I to the tavern and after that to Bartholomew fair, and there upon his motion to a pitiful alehouse, where we had a dirty slut or two come up that were whores, but my very heart went against them, so that I took no pleasure but a great deal of trouble in being there and getting from thence in fear of being seen. From hence he and I walked towards Ludgate and parted. I back to the fair all alone , and there met with the ladies Jemimah and Paulina, with Mr Pickering and Madamoiselle, at seeing the monkeys dance, which was much to see, when they could be brought to do so, but it troubled me to sit among such nasty company

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: My wife and I to the fair, and I showed her the Italians dancing the ropes, and the women that do strange tumbling tricks

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Captain Ferrers and I to the Theatre, and there came too late, so we staid and saw a bit of Victoria, which pleased me worse than it did the other day. So we staid not to see it out

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary So back to the Opera, and there I saw again Love and Honour, and a very good play it is

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: My wife and I to the Opera, and there saw again Love and Honour, a play so good that it has been acted but three times and I have seen them all, and all in this week; which is too much, and more than I will do again a good while

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: I went to see if any play was acted, and I found none upon the post, it being Passion week

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Thence to see an Italian puppet play, that is within the rayles there [Covent Garden], which is very pretty, the best that ever I saw, and great resort of gallants

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: After it [Wit in a Constable] was done, my wife and I went to the puppet play in Covent Garden, which I saw the other day, and indeed it is very pleasant

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: And taking my wife up, carried her to Charing Cross, and there showed her the Italian motion, much after the nature of what I showed her a while since in Covent Garden. Their puppets here are somewhat better, but their motions not all

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Having sent for Mr Creed, had thought to have shown my wife a play before the King, but it is so late that we could not

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: I hearing what play it was that is to be acted before the King tonight, I would not stay

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: I took Creed by coach and to the Duke's playhouse, where we did see The Five Hours entertainment again, which indeed is a very fine play, though, through my being out of order, it did not seem so good as at first; but I could discern it was not any fault in the play

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Thence to Lincoln's Inn Fields; and it being too soon to go to dinner, I walked up and down, and looked upon the outside of the new theatre, now a-building in Covent Garden, which will be very fine

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: And there took up my wife and Ashwell to the Theatre Royall, being the second day of its being opened. The house is made with extraordinary good contrivance, and yet hath some faults, as the narrowness of the passages in and out of the pitt, and the distance from the stage to the boxes, which I am confident cannot hear; but for all other things it is well, only, above all, the musique being below, and most of it sounding under the very stage, there is no hearing of the bases at all, nor very well of the trebles, which sure must be mended. The play was The Humerous Lieutenant, a play that hath little good in it, nor much in the very part which, by the King's command, Lacy now acts instead of Clun. In the dance, the tall devil's actions was very pretty....I am resolved to deny myself the liberty of two plays at court, which are in arreare to me for the months of March and April, which will more than countervail this excess, so that this month of May is the first that I must claim a liberty of going to a Court play according to my oath