[83] "When the publique Theatres were shut up, and the actors forbidden to present us with any of their tragedies, because we had enough of that in earnest: and comedies, because the vices of the age were too lively and smartly represented; then all that we could divert ourselves with, were these humours and pieces of plays which, passing under the name of a merry conceited fellow, called "Bottom the Weaver," "Simpleton the Smith," "John Swabber," or some such title, were only allowed us, and that but by stealth too, and under pretence of rope-dancing or the like; and these being all that was permitted us, great was the confluence of the auditors; and these small things were as profitable and as great get-pennies to the actors as any of our late famed plays. 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 entered; 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."--Kirkman's Preface to "The Wits, or Sport upon Sport," 1672. [84] [Concerning Field the actor and dramatist, see introduction to his "Woman is a Weathercock," &c., xi. 3-6, 89-91, and Collier's "Memoirs of Actors," p. 206, _et seq._] Nathaniel Field, on the authority of Roberts the player (see his answer to Mr Pope's preface to Shakespeare), has been considered as the author of two plays: "A Woman is a Weathercocke," 1612, and "Amends for Ladies," 1618. He is also supposed to be the same person who assisted Massinger in "The Fatal Dowry." I suspect that Roberts was mistaken in these assertions, as I do not find any contemporary writer speak of Field as an author; nor is it mentioned by Langbaine, who would have noticed it, had he known the fact. It seems more probable that the writer of these plays was Nathaniel Field, M.A., Fellow of New College, Oxford, who wrote some Latin verses, printed in "Oxoniensis Academiæ Parentalia, 1625," and who, being of the same university with Massinger, might join with him, while there, in the composition of the play ascribed to them. Nathaniel Field above mentioned was celebrated in the part of "Bussy D'Ambois," first printed in 1607. On the republication of that play in 1641, he is thus spoken of in the Prologue:--