when it was the church that fell, many years before at Beverley, found little echo in the mind of the Elizabethan Puritan.[1] A further letter from the Lord Mayor to the Privy Council on 3 July 1583 states that by then the Paris Garden scaffolds were 'new builded'.[2]
I find it very difficult to say which of the numerous bear gardens mentioned by Taylor and Stowe was in use at any given time. Mr. Rendle thought that Taylor's first two, that at Mason Stairs and that at the corner of the Pike Garden, were the two shown as 'The bolle bayting' and 'The Bearebayting' by Agas.[3] If so, they are quite out of scale. This is likely, since they are drawn large enough to show the animals. They are shown east and west of each other. Rendle puts the Pike Garden due south of Mason Stairs, but it clearly extended more to the east in 1587. In any case both these earlier sites were farther to the west of the Clink than the Hope. Where then was the place on William Payne's ground? Mr. Rendle, after a careful comparison of Rocque's map of 1746 and other later maps, puts it at 'the north courtelage in the lane known as the Bear Garden' and the Hope at the south courtelage in the same lane.[4] I take him to mean that the Bear Garden on Payne's ground was that in use until 1613, and that the Hope was built a little to the south of it. The terms of the contract with Katherens, however, suggest that the same or practically the same site was used. Mr. Rendle adds that 'William Payne's place next the Thames can be traced back into the possession of John Allen, until it came down to Edward Alleyn, and was sold by him at a large profit to Henslowe; the same for which Morgan Pope in 1586 paid to the Vestry of St. Saviour's "6s. 8d. by the year for tithes".'[5] This I cannot quite follow. There seem to have been two properties standing respectively next and next but one on the west to the 'little Rose'. Next the Rose stood messuages called The Barge, Bell and Cock.
- ↑ More, Works (ed. 1557), 208, 'This is much like as at Beuerlay late, whan much of the people beyng at a bere baytyng, the church fell sodeinly down at euensonge tyme, and ouer whelmed some that than were in it: a good felow, that after herde the tale tolde, "lo", quod he, "now maie you see what it is to be at euensong whan ye should be at the bere baytynge". How be it, the hurt was not ther in beinge at euensonge, but in that the churche was falsely wrought'.
- ↑ App. D, No. lxx.
- ↑ Rendle, Antiquarian, viii. 57.
- ↑ Rendle, Antiquarian, viii. 57; Bankside, xxx, with map.
- ↑ The tithes were for 'the bear garden and for the ground adjoining to the same where the dogs are' (Rendle, Bankside, v). It was for Morgan Pope that Bowes's patent as Master of the Game was exemplified in 1585; cf. p. 450.
