rd Chamberlain's players were paid for a
play before the Queen on Twelfth Day."

While two companies of players, meeting accidentally in the provinces,
might at times have combined their forces in an entertainment, we may
assume that in such cases each would give a short interlude from their
own stock of plays, and not that they joined action in the same play. A
performance before the Court, however, was no haphazard thing, but
something that had been carefully rehearsed; hence, when we find--as in
the case of the Lord Admiral's players and the Lord Chamberlain's
players, mentioned above--members of two companies uniting in a play
before the Court and receiving one payment for it, it is apparent that
they must have acted in the same play, and also that such a play had
been previously rehearsed. Burbage's Theatre being the theatrical home
of his company, known, until 1585, as Lord Hunsdon's company, and after
that date, when Lord Hunsdon became Lord Chamberlain, as the Lord
Chamberlain's players, it becomes evident that the rehearsal of plays
for the Court would take place at the Theatre in the summer or the inn
used by Burbage and his company in the winter-time, and that the members
of the Lord Admiral's company, who had acted with him in the Court
performance mentioned, would rehearse at the same places. As we find
Lord Strange's company preparing to act in the winter-time of 1589 at
the Crosskeys, when they were refused permission to do so by the Lord
Mayor, and as we know also that--as the Lord Chamberlain's men--in 1594,
after their separation from Henslowe, they again sought leave to act
there in the winter season, we may infer that Burbage's men used this
same inn for winter performances previous to 1589. Lord Hunsdon's letter
to the Lord Mayor in December 1594, referring to the Crosskeys, reads:
"Where my _now_ company of players have byn accustomed ... to play this
winter time within the City."

While both the Lord Admiral's and Lord Hunsdon's players performed
occasionally in the provinces previous to 1591, the limited number of
their provincial appearances, taken in conjunction with the fact that
they were of sufficient importance to play at intervals before the
Court, during the years that the Queen's company--which had been
specially formed for that purpose--held sway, implies that they were
players of recognised importance.

While it is apparent that Burbage ceased to be an active member of
Leicester's p