and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE MIRROR
OF
LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.
| VOL. 12, NO. 371.] | SATURDAY, MAY 23, 1829. | [PRICE 2d. |
The Fortune Playhouse
The Engraving represents one of the playhouses of Shakspeare'stime, as the premises appeared a few years since. This theatre wasin Golden Lane, Barbican, and was built by that celebrated andbenevolent actor Edward Alleyn, the pious founder of DulwichCollege, in 1599. It was burnt in 1624, but rebuilt in 1629. Astory is told of a large treasure being found in digging for thefoundation, and it is probable that the whole sum fell to Alleyn.Upon equal probability, is the derivation of the name "TheFortune." The theatre was a spacious brick building, and exhibitedthe royal arms in plaster on its front. These are retained in theEngraving; where the disposal of the lower part on the buildinginto shops, &c. is a sorry picture of the "base purposes" towhich a temple of the Drama has been converted.
According to the testimony of Ben Jonson and others, Alleyn wasthe first actor of his time, and of course played leadingcharacters in the plays of Shakspeare and Jonson. He was probablythe Kemble of his day, for his biographers tell us such was hiscelebrity, that he drew crowds of spectators after him wherever heperformed; so that possessing some private patrimony, with acareful and provident disposition, he soon became master of anestablishment of his own—and this was the Fortune.Although Alleyn left behind him a large sum, it is hardly probablethat he made it here; for in his diary, which, we believe isextant, he records that he once had so slender an audience, thatthe whole receipts of the house amounted to no more than threepounds and a few odd shillings—a sum which would not pay theexpenses; for it appears by the MS. of Lord Stanhope, treasurer toJames I. that the customary sum paid for the performance of a playat court, was 20 nobles, or 6l. 12s. 4d.1 Alleyn was likewise proprietor of the Blackfriars' Theatre, near what is still called Playhouse Yard. However he might have gathered laurels on the stage, he must have gained his fortune by other means. He was keeper of the King's Bear Garden and Menagerie, which were frequented by thousands, and produced Alleyn, the then great sum of [pg 338] 500l. per annum. He was also thrice married, and received portions with his two first wives; and we need not insist upon the turn which matrimony gives to a man's fortune.
Among the theatrico-antiquarian gossip of The Fortune is,that it was once the nursery for Henry VIII.'s children—but"no scandal about the"—we hope.
FINE ARTS
EXHIBITION OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY.
All men are critics, in a greater or less degree. They cangeneralize upon the merits and defects of a picture, although theycannot point out the d