hamberlain's Company (who in consequence of that instrument
were afterwards denominated his Majesty's Servants) there is great
probability that the said entry relates to the comedian, and that he had
been carried off by the plague of that year.

Two scenes of two early dramas, which exhibit Kemp _in propria persona_,
must necessarily form a portion of the present essay. _The Retvrne from
Pernassvs: Or The Scourge of Simony. Publiquely acted by the Students in
Saint Johns Colledge in Cambridge_, 1606,[x:1] 4to. furnishes the first
extract:

"Act 4. Scen. 5. [3.]

_[Enter] Burbage [and] Kempe._

"_Bur._ Now, Will Kempe, if we can intertaine these schollers at a
low rate, it wil be well; they haue oftentimes a good conceite in a
part.

"_Kempe._ Its true indeed, honest Dick; but the slaues are somewhat
proud, and, besides, it is a good sport, in a part to see them
neuer speake in their walke but at the end of the stage, iust as
though in walking with a fellow we should neuer speake but at a
stile, a gate, or a ditch, where a man can go no further. I was
once at a Comedie in Cambridge, and there I saw a parasite make
faces and mouths of all sorts on this fashion.

"_Bur._ A little teaching will mend these faults, and it may bee,
besides, they will be able to pen a part.

"_Kemp._ Few of the vniuersity pen plaies well; they smell too
much of that writer Ouid, and that writer Metamorphosis,[xi:1] and
talke too much of Proserpina and Juppiter. Why, heres our fellow
Shakespeare puts them all downe, I,[xi:2] and Ben Jonson too. O
that Ben Jonson is a pestilent fellow! he brought vp Horace giuing
the Poets a pill,[xi:3] but our fellow Shakespeare hath giuen him a
purge that made him beray his credit.

"_Bur._ Its a shrewd fellow indeed. I wonder these schollers stay
so long; they appointed to be here presently that we might try
them: oh, here they come.

[_Enter Philomusus and Studioso._]

"_Stud._ Take heart, these lets[xi:4] our clouded thoughts refine;
The sun shines brightest when it gins decline.

"_Bur._ M[aster] Phil. and M. Stud., God saue you.

"_Kemp._ M. Pil. and M. Otioso, well met.

"_Phil._ The same to you, good M. Burbage. What, M. Kempe, how doth
the Emperour of Germany?

"_Stud._ God saue you, M. Kempe; welcome, M. Kempe, from dan