ey
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. These flags were probably displayed only during the hours of
performance; and it should seem from one of the old comedies that they
were taken down in Lent, in which time, during the early part of King
James's reign, plays were not allowed to be represented, though at a
subsequent period this prohibition was dispensed with by paying a fee to
the Master of the Revels.

It was called the Globe from its sign, which was a figure of Hercules, or
Atlas, supporting a globe, under which was written, _Totus mundus agit
histrionem_, (All the world acts a play):--and not as many have
conjectured, that the Globe though hexagonal at the outside, was a rotunda
within, and that it might have derived its name from its circular form.

This theatre was burnt down June 29, 1613, but it was rebuilt with greater
splendour in the following year. The Cut represents the original theatre.
The account of this accident is given by Sir Henry Wotton, in a letter
dated July 2, 1613.[3] "Now to let matters of state sleepe, I will
entertain you at the present with what happened this week at the Banks
side. The King's players had a new play called All is True, representing
some principal pieces of the reign of Henry the Eighth, which set forth
with many extraordinary circumstances of pomp and majesty even to the
matting of the stage; the knights of the order with their Georges and
Garter, the guards with their embroidered coats, and the like: sufficient
in truth within awhile to make greatness very familiar, if not ridiculous.
Now King Henry making a Masque at the Cardinal Wolsey's house, and certain
cannons being shot off at his entry, some of the paper or other stuff,
wherewith one of them was stopped, did light on the thatch, where being
tho