on the
5th of March 1591 the payment for these performances is recorded in the
Acts of the Privy Council to the Lord Admiral's company, while--as Mr.
E.K. Chambers has pointed out--in the Pipe Rolls (542 fol. 156) these
same performances are assigned to Strange's men. It is evident, then,
that late in 1588 (the first performance of this nature being recorded
on the 27th of December) a junction took place between certain members
of Lord Strange's tumblers and the Lord Admiral's men, who had been
connected since 1585 with the Lord Chamberlain's men, and that, at the
same time, the leading members of Lord Leicester's company became
affiliated with them.

In the following Christmas season, 1591-92, Lord Strange's players--now
thoroughly organised into a regular company of players--gave six
performances before the Court, supplanting the formerly powerful and
popular Queen's company, which gave only one performance in that season,
and never afterwards appeared before the Court. There is no further
record of a Court performance by the Lord Admiral's company until the
Christmas season of 1594-95, by which time they had parted from the Lord
Chamberlain's men and reorganised by absorbing members from other
companies--such as the Earl of Sussex and Earl of Pembroke's companies,
which at this time disappear from the records.

Here, then, we find, between the Christmas season of 1588-89 and
1591-92, an amalgamation into one company of a portion of the membership
of four different companies, all of which had, immediately before, been
associated in some measure with the theatrical interests of the
Burbages.

While a chance record remains which reveals official action in the
formation of the Queen's company of players in 1583, and no actual
record of official action has yet been found to account for the sudden
Court favour accorded the new and powerful Lord Strange's company in
1591, _it is very apparent that an equally authoritative purpose existed
in the latter case_.

Between the years 1574 and 1583 the Earl of Leicester's company, under
the auspices of James Burbage, held the position of the leading company
of players in London. During the Christmas and New Year festivities in
every year but one in this decade, Leicester's company played before the
Court, being supplanted by the newly formed Queen's company in 1583-84.

Howes states in his _Additions to Stowe's Chronicles_ that "in 1583
twelve of the best players were chosen