comedy; it is rather to be regarded as a Christmas piece, an imitation of the Yule-tide mummeries acted by disguised villagers or townsfolk at the houses of such wealthier persons as would afford them hospitality.

The following list of Oxford plays—compiled, with additions, from W. L. Courtney's article in Notes and Queries for December 11th, 1886, and W. Carew Hazlitt's Manual of English Plays—may be of interest, as showing the frequency of dramatic entertainments at the various colleges between 1547 and the Restoration. The dates appended are in most cases those of presentation; but when these are either unknown, or impossible to distinguish from dates of entry at Stationers' Hall, I have substituted the latter.

This catalogue does not, of course, pretend to be exhaustive. An examination of the various college archives would doubtless afford further material. There exists, for instance, the record of performances at Merton; cf. G. C. Brodrick's Memorials of Merton College (Oxford Hist. Soc., 1885), p. 67: "In January and February, 1566-7, two dramatic performances were given in the Warden's lodgings by members of the foundation ... the one being an English comedy, and the other Terence's Eunuchus.... Again, in 1568, a play of Plautus was acted in the hall."

It will be seen that of the above-mentioned plays six, besides Narcissus, were performed at the College of S. John the Baptist, the first recorded being the Christmas Prince in 1607, the succeeding ones taking place after an interval of twenty-six years; and to these we should very probably add Pharamus, the writer of which, Thomas Snelling, "became Scholar of S. John's in 1633, aged 19, and afterwards fellow ... and was esteemed an excellent Latin poet." (Wood, Ath. Ox., vol. iii., p. 275.)

A passage from Wake's Rex Platonicus (ed. 1, p. 18) is also worthy of note in this connection: "Quorum primos jam ordines dum principes contemplantur, primisque congratulantium acclamationibus delectantur, Collegium Diui Iohannis, nobile literarum domicilium (quod Dominus Thomas Whitus Prætor olim Londinensis, opimis reditibus locupletârat) faciles eorum oculos speciosæ structuræ adblanditione invitat; moxque et oculos & aures detinet