Upon this, the playwright made the modest rejoinder that, much as he regretted the circumstances, it was, in point of fact, impossible to play the three pieces in either of those chaste tongues, since he himself had written them in the vulgar English language, which unfortunately was the only tongue with which he could claim an acquaintance, and that a very imperfect one. Such a statement was very shocking to the University. The permission was at once withheld, but in language of great politeness and dignity. “We do not well understand,” it said in effect, “how one who is not even a member of this University or of the sister foundation of Cambridge, who, we are credibly informed, is a mere hackney writer for the theaters, and who, we are further informed, is a little better than one of the illiterate, can prefer such a request.” After this rebuff, the playwright, quite undaunted, applied to the city authorities for permission to use the Town Hall. In the meantime, however, the news had been carried to the bench of aldermen that the University had rebuked this importunate fellow. And if the vulgar English tongue was beneath the dignity of the Gown, how much more was it beneath the dignity of the Town, which had a reputation to maintain and so much less upon which to maintain it. “No, sir,” said the bench of aldermen, “we would have you to know that that which is not deemed worthy for only a part or moiety of this fair city, is deemed still less so for the whole of it.” Thus there was nothing left for the poor playwright to do but to seek permission of honest John Davenant, mine host of the Crown, to set up trestles and boards and rig up a curtain in the middle of his large inn yard. And John Davenant, having less in the way of learning than the Gown and less in the way of dignity than the Town, and being promised, moreover, a full ten percentum of the takings at each performance, was nowise averse from such a proceeding. The play to be given that afternoon was “The Merchant of Venice,” a pleasant comedy that had already been played several times with success in Shoreditch. The author of the piece had not to play in it himself, a contingency for which he expressed himself devoutly thankful. “A bad play is doubly damned,” he said, “if the author himself has to preen and strut in it.” That afternoon, the more congenial and not less onerous rôle was to be his of sitting at the receipt of custom. But his friend, Richard Burbage, had for his sins to play the Jew. And the famous tragedian was fain to declare that the playwright as usual had got the best of the bargain, inasmuch that it was far easier to play the Jew in the box-office than it was upon the boards.