theatres kneeled down on the stage, and prayed for theirpatrons; and those belonging to the public theatres, for theking and queen : this prayer sometimes made part of theepilogue—hence probably the addition of Vivant Rex et Reginato the modern play-bills.

The prices paid in our old theatres in the commencementof the seventeenth century, were extremely low, the pit andgallery being only one penny : some of the gay gallants usedto sit upon the stage on stools, and paid a shilling for theirsuperior accommodation, which was also the price of a pri-vate box, then called a room. On the first day of exhibitinga new play, the prices of admission were sometimes raised,and this seems to have been occasionally practised on thebenefit nights of authors.

It is uncertain at what time the usage of giving authors abenefit on the third day of the exhibition of their piece com-menced ; it however seems to have been an established cus-tom in 1612 ; forDecker in the prologue to one of his comedies,printed in that year, speaks of the poet’s third day. Southernwas the first dramatic writer who obtained the emolumentsarising from two representations ; and Farquhar, or, accordingto others, Rowe, first received the advantages of a thirdrepresentation.

The custom of passing a kind of censure on plays on theirfirst exhibition, is as ancient as the time of Shakespeare ; forno less than three plays of his rival, Ben Johnson, appear tohave been damned.

Persons were hired to applaud both by the Greeks andRomans; and hissing and clapping of hands are of equalantiquity.

The most ancient play-houses were the Curtain , in Shore­ ditch , and the Theatre , in Blackfriars. In the time of Shake­ speare , there were no less than ten theatres open, viz.: theTheatre , the Cock-pit or Phoenix, in Drury-lane 3 the Globe,the Swan, the Rose, and the Hope, on the Bank-side, the