[74] These initials were almost unquestionably intended for Christopher Hatton, afterwards knighted and created Lord Chancellor of England. In the fourth year of Queen Elizabeth, 1562, about six years before this play is supposed to have been written, we learn from Dugdale's "Origines Juridiciales," p. 150, a magnificent Christmas was kept in the Inner Temple, at which her majesty was present, and Mr Hatton was appointed Master of the Game. Historians say he owed his rise, not so much to his mental abilities, as to the graces of his person and his excellence in dancing, which captivated the Queen to such a degree, that he arose gradually from one of her Gentlemen Pensioners to the highest employment in the law, which he, however, filled without censure, supplying his own defects by the assistance of the ablest men in the profession. _The grave Lord Keeper_, after his promotion, still retained his fondness for that accomplishment to which he was indebted for his rise, _and led the Brawls_ almost until his death. In 1589, on the marriage of his heir with Judge Gawdy's daughter, "the Lord Chancellor danced the measures at the solemnity, and left his gown on the chair, saying _Lie there, Chancellor_." His death, which happened two years after, was hastened by an unexpected demand of money from the Queen, urged in so severe a manner, that all the kindness she afterwards showed to him was insufficient to remove the impression it had made on him. See Birch's "Memoirs of Queen Elizabeth." vol. i. pp. 8, 56, [and Nicolas's "Life of Hatton," p. 478.] [75] Dryden's translation of Boccaccio's "Description of the Cave" is as follows:-- "Next the proud palace of Salerno stood A Mount of rough ascent, and thick with wood. Through this a cave was dug with vast expence: The work it seem'd of some suspicious prince, Who, when abusing power with lawless might, From public justice would secure his flight. The passage made by many a winding way, Reach'd even the room in which the tyrant lay. Fit for his purpose on a lower floor, He lodged, whose issue was an iron door; From whence by stairs descending to the ground. In the blind grot a safe retreat he found. Its outlet ended in a brake o'ergrown With brambles, choak'd by time, and now unknown. A rift there was, which from the mountain's height Convey'd a glimm'ring and malignant light, A breathing place to draw the damps away, A twilight of an intercepted day." --"Sigismonda and Guiscardo." Dryden's Works, vol. iii. p. 251. [76] See Milton's "Paradise Lost," Bk. i. l. 60. [77] _Fetters_ or _chains_. So in Beaumont and Fletcher's "Beggar's Bush," act iii. sc. 4-- "_Gyves_ I must wear, and cold must be my comfort." Marston's "What You Will," act ii. sc. 1-- "Think'st thou a libertine, _an ungiv'd_ beast, Scornes not the shackles of thy envious clogs?" Milton's "Samson Agonistes," l. 1092--