PREFACE.

HE farce or droll of Simpleton the
Smith was, certainly, one of the

most popular of any of the short interludes which occupied the chief attention of the English actors between the period of the suppression of the theatres in 1643, and their revival after the restoration of Charles the Second. It was so familiar to the public, that the author excuses himself from annexing an argument,-" argument needless, it being a thorow farce, and very well known.” The author was one Robert Cox, who was not only the writer, but an actor in this piece, concerning which Kirkman relates the follow

ing curious anecdotes. Cox, in acting Young Simpleton, "being to appear with a large piece of bread and butter, I have frequently known several of the female spectators and auditors to long for some of it; and once, that well-known natural, Jack Adams of Clarkenwell, seeing him with bread and butter on the stage, and knowing him, cryed out,-Cuz, cuz, give me some, give me some; to the great pleasure of the audience; and so naturally did he act the Smith's part, that, being at a fair in a countrey town, and that farce being presented, the only master-smith of the town came to him saying,-Well, although your father speaks so ill of you, yet, when the fair is done, if you will come and work with me, I will give you twelve-pence a week more than I give any other journeyThus was he taken for a smith bred, "That

man,
that was indeed as much of

trade." any

Robert Cox was also the author, appears from the following statement by the same writer, "I have seen the Red Bull Playhouse, which was a large one, so full, that as many went back for want of room as had entred; and as meanly as you may now think of these drols, they were then acted by the best comedians then and now in being: and I may say, by some that then exceeded all now living, by name the incomparable Robert Cox, who was not only the principal actor, but also the contriver and author of most of these farces. How have I heard him cryed up for his John Swabber, and Simpleton the Smith?" It happened that once upon a time he played at Oxford, when the butler of one of the colleges, noticing that these drolls were deficient in prologues, composed the following one, which Cox recited for merriment in the midst of a farce,

Courteous spectators,

We are your relators,

Neither tylers nor slaters,

Nor your vexators,

But such who will strive to please,

While you sit at your ease,—

And speak such words as may be spoken,
And not by any be mistoken.

The writer of these primitive lines evidently had the old miracle-plays in his recollection, and had probably witnessed a late performance of some of them. As for the drolls they were intended to introduce, they were then acted under serious disadvantages. "Thus," observes Kirkman, "were these compositions liked and approved by all, and they were the fittest for the actors to represent, there being little cost in cloaths, which often were in great danger to be seiz'd by the then souldiers; who, as the poet sayes, Enter the Red Coat, exit Hat and Cloak,'

was very true, not only in the audience, but the actors too, were commonly not only strip'd, but many times imprisoned, till they paid such ransom as the souldiers would impose upon them ; so that it was hazardous to act anything that required any good cloaths, instead of which painted cloath many times served the turn to represent rich habits."

The droll of Simpleton the Smith continued to be known, and probably acted at Bartholomew Fair, and such places, for many years. It is thus alluded to in Dryden's Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco, 1674,-" some people mistake this play, and think it a tragedy. I take it to be the merryest rhiming farce that I ever saw, much beyond Mock Pompey, old Simpleton the Smith, or any of that kind."

B