ayhouse as "at present so ruinous that part
thereof is already fallen down, and the rest will suddenly follow."
Accordingly, they inserted in the _Mercurius Politicus_ of February
14-21, 1661, the following advertisement: "The Fortune Playhouse,
situate between Whitecross Street and Golding Lane, in the parish of
St. Giles, Cripplegate, with the ground thereto belonging, is to be
let to be built upon."[481]

[Footnote 481: Discovered by Stevens, and printed in Malone,
_Variorum_, III, 55, note 5. Mr. W.J. Lawrence, _Archiv fuer das
Studium der Neueren Sprachen und Literaturen_ (1914), p. 314, says
that the date of this advertisement is 1660. But the same
advertisement is reprinted by H.R. Plomer in _Notes and Queries_
(series X), VI, 107, from _The Kingdom's Intelligencer_ of March 18,
1661.]

No one seems to have cared to lease the property; so on March 16,
following, the materials of the building were sold to one William
Beaven for the sum of L75;[482] and in the records of the College,
March 4, 1662, we read that "the said playhouse ... is since totally
demolished."[483]

[Footnote 482: Young, _The History of Dulwich College_, II, 265.]

[Footnote 483: Collier, _The Alleyn Papers_, p. 101. I am aware of the
fact that there are references to later incidents at the Fortune (for
example, the statement that it was visited by officers in November,
1682, in an attempt to suppress secret conventicles that had long been
held there), but in view of the unimpeachable documentary evidence
cited above (in 1662 the College authorities again refer to it as "the
late ruinous and now demolished Fortune playhouse"), we must regard
these later references either as inaccurate, or as referring to
another building later erected in the same neighborhood. The so-called
picture of the Fortune, printed in Wilkinson's _Londina Illustrata_,
and often reproduced by modern scholars, cannot possibly be that of
the playhouse erected by Alleyn. For an interesting surmise as to the
history of this later building see W.J. Lawrence, _Restoration Stage
Nurseries_, in _Archiv fuer das Studium der Neueren Sprachen und
Literaturen_ (1914), p. 301.]

CHAPTER XIV

THE RED BULL

The builder of the Red Bull Playhouse[484] was "one Aaron Holland,
yeoman," of whom we know little more than that he "was utterly
unlearned and illiterate, not being able to read."[485] He had leased
"for many years" from Anne Beddingfield, "wife and administratrix