" One Sunday afternoon, in the year 1582, the scaffold, being
overcharged with spectators, fell down during the performance, and a great
number of persons were killed or maimed by the accident, which the
puritans of the time failed not to attribute to a Divine judgment. These
theatres were patronized by royalty: for we read that Queen Elizabeth, on
the 26th of May, 1599, went by water with the French ambassadors to Paris
Garden, where they saw a baiting of bulls and bears. Indeed, Southwark
seems to have long been of sporting notoriety, for, in the Humorous Lovers,
printed in 1617, one of the characters says, "I'll set up my bills, that
the gamesters of London, Horsly-down, _Southwark_, and Newmarket, may come
in and bait him (the bear,) here before the ladies, &c."[2]
The third Cut includes the GLOBE, ROSE, and BEAR-BAITING THEATRES, as they
appeared about the year 1612. Of the Globe we have been furnished with the
following account by a zealous correspondent, _G.W._:
The Globe Theatre stood on a plot of ground, now occupied by four houses,
contiguous to the present Globe Alley, Maiden Lane, Southwark. This
theatre was of considerable size. It is not certain when it was built.
Hentzner, the German traveller, who gives an amusing description of London
in the time of Queen Elizabeth, alludes to it as existing in 1598, but it
was probably not built long before 1596. It was an hexagonal, wooden
building, partly open to the weather, and partly thatched with reeds, on
which, as well as other theatres, a pole was erected, to which a flag was
affixed.
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