into partes and pagiantes")
     instead of in Latin, and played on Monday, Tuesday, and
     Wednesday in Whitsun week. The companies began at the abbey
     gates, and when the first pageant was concluded, the
     moveable stage ("a high scaffolde with two rowmes; a higher
     and a lower, upon four wheeles") was wheeled to the High
     Cross before the Mayor, and then onward to every street, so
     that each street had its pageant. "The Harrowing of Hell" is
     one of the most ancient Miracle Plays in our language. It is
     as old as the reign of Edward the Third, if not older. The
     Prologue and Epilogue were delivered in his own person by
     the actor who had the part of the Saviour. In 1378, the
     Scholars of St. Paul's presented a petition to Richard the
     Second, praying him to prohibit some "inexpert people" from
     representing the History of the Old Testament, to the
     serious prejudice of their clergy, who had been at great
     expense in order to represent it at Christmas. On the 18th
     July, 1390, the Parish Clerks of London played Religious
     Interludes at the Skinners' Well, in Clerkenwell, which
     lasted three days. In 1409, they performed The Creation of
     the World, which continued eight days. On one side of the
     lowest platform of these primitive stages was a dark pitchy
     cavern, whence issued fire and flames, and the howlings of
     souls tormented by demons. The latter occasionally showed
     their grinning faces through the mouth of the cavern, to the
     terrible delight of the spectators! The Passion of Our
     Saviour was the first dramatic spectacle acted in Sweden, in
     the reign of King John the Second. The actor's name was
     Lengis who was to pierce the side of the person on the
     cross. Heated by the enthusiasm of the scene, he plunged his
     lance into that person's body, and killed him. The King,
     shocked at the brutality of Lengis, slew him with his
     scimetar; when the audience, enraged at the death of their
     favourite actor, wound up this true tragedy by cutting off
     his Majesty's head!

They had pitched upon an ill-looking surly butcher for King Herod, upon whose chuckle-head a gilt pasteboard crown glittered gloriously by the candlelight; and, as soon as he had seated himself in a rickety old wicker chair, radiant with faded finery, that served him for a throne, the orchestra (three fifes and a fiddle) struck up a merry tune, and a young damsel began so to shake, her heels, that with the help of a little imagination, our noble comedian might have fancied himself in his old quarters at St. Bartholomew, or Sturbridge Fair. *