Their play had sundry wise factors, A perfect diocess of actors Upon the stage, for I am sure that There was both bishop, pastor, curate, Nor was their labour light and small, The charge of some was pastoral.[71] Footnote 71: Nichols’s Progress of James I., vol. iii., p. 70. Several of the younger men who figured on the stage of Clare Hall were associated in their subsequent career with some of the most important events of the period in which they lived. At the last hour, a boy of thirteen was called upon to act the part of Surda, in which it was necessary to assume female attire. This youth was, even at that early age, an undergraduate; and he was thus summoned hastily to learn a new part in addition to that of Venica, which had been allotted to him, from the scruples of his tutor, the Rev. Mr. Fairclough, who had been selected to undertake the character of Surda on account of his low stature; but Mr. Fairclough was a Puritan, and, deeming it a species of deception to wear women’s clothes, abjured the degrading task. The boy who now supplied his place was Spencer Compton, afterwards Lord Compton, an early favourite and attendant of Charles I., whom he accompanied into Spain. His loyal exertions in the cause of his unfortunate master shed, in after life, honour upon his name. Mr. Fairclough was not the only person who objected to lower the dignity of man’s estate by the assumption of a woman’s gown. The Head of Emmanuel College, then esteemed a Puritanical house, objected also to one of its undergraduates accepting the part of a girl; but these scruples were overruled by the guardian of the youth.[72] Footnote 72: Sir Walter Mildmay, the founder of Emmanuel College, being at the Court of Queen Elizabeth, she said to him:—“Sir Walter, I hear you have erected a Puritan Foundation.” “No, madam,” he replied; “far be it from me to countenance anything contrary to your established laws; but I have set an acorn, and when it becomes an oak, God alone knows what will be the fruit thereof.”—Fuller’s History of Cambridge, p. 147. In the “Grave Poem” of Bishop Corbet, Emmanuel College is thus satirised:— But th’ poor house of Emmanuel Would not be like proud Jesabel, Nor shew herself before the King, An hypocrite, or painted thing; [And images she would have none, For fear of superstition, or] But that the ways might seem more fair, Conceived a tedious mile of prayer.[73] Footnote 73: Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 67.