ught at first but idle smoak, and their eyes more attentive to the show,
it kindled inwardly, and ran round like a train, consuming within less
than an hour the whole house to the very ground. This was the fatal period
of that virtuous fabrick, wherein yet nothing did perish but _wood_ and
_straw_, and a few forsaken cloaks; only one man had his breeches set on
fire, that would perhaps have broyled him, if he had not by the benefit of
a provident wit, put it out with a bottle of ale."

From a letter of Mr. John Chamberlaine to Sir Ralph Winwood, dated July 8,
1613, in which this accident is likewise mentioned, we learn that the
theatre had only two doors.[4] "The burning of the Globe or playhouse on
the Bankside on St. Peter's day cannot escape you; which fell out by a
peal of chambers, (that I know not upon what occasion were to be used in
the play,) the tampin or stopple of one of them lighting in the thatch
that covered the house, burn'd it down to the ground in less than two
hours, with a dwelling-house adjoyning; and it was a great marvaile and a
fair grace of God that the people had so little harm, having but _two
narrow doors_ to get out."

In 1613, was entered in the Stationers' books, "A doleful ballad of the
General Conflagration of the famous Theatre called the Globe."

Taylor, the water poet, commemorates the event in the following lines:

"As gold is better that in fire's tried,
So is the Bankside Globe, that late was burn'd;
For where before it had a thatched hide,
Now to a stately theatre 'tis turn'd;
Which is an emblem that great things are won;
By those that dare through greatest dangers run."

It is also alluded to in some verses by Ben Jonson, entitled, "An
Execration upon Vulcan," from which it appears that Ben Jonson was in the
theatre when it was burnt.

This theatre was open in summer and the performances took place by
daylight; the King's company usually began to play in the month of May.
The exhibitions appear to have been calculated for the lower class of
people, and to have been more frequent than those at the Blackfriars, till
1604 or 5, when it became less fashionable and frequented. Being
contiguous to the Bear Garden, it is probable that those who resorted
there went to the theatre, when the bear-baiting sports were over, and
such persons were not likely to form a very refined audience.

We have no description of the interior of the Globe, but that it was
somewhat