Whatever may have been the case with the domestic fool of history, it is not improbable that the tradition of the stage rightly interprets the intention of Shakespeare. The actual texts are not very decisive. The point that is most clear is that the fool wears a ‘motley’ or ‘patched’ coat[1404]. The fool in _Lear_ has a ‘coxcomb[1405]’; Monsieur Lavache in _All’s Well_ a ‘bauble,’ not of course necessarily a _marotte_[1406]; Touchstone, in _As You Like It_, is a courtier and has a sword[1407]. The sword may perhaps be inherited from the ‘vice’ of the later moralities[1408]; and, in other respects, it is possible that Shakespeare took his conception of the fool less from contemporary custom, for indeed we hear of no fool at Elizabeth’s court, than from the abundant fool-literature, continental and English, above described. The earliest of his fools, Feste in _Twelfth Night_, quotes Rabelais, in whose work, as we have just seen, the fool Triboulet figures[1409]. It is noticeable that the appearance of fools as important _dramatis personae_ in the plays apparently coincides with the substitution for William Kempe as ‘comic lead’ in the Lord Chamberlain’s company of Robert Armin[1410], whose own _Nest of Ninnies_ abounds in reminiscences of the fool-literature[1411]. But whatever outward appearance Shakespeare intended his fools to bear, there can be no doubt that in their dramatic use as vehicles of general social satire they very closely recall the manner of the _sotties_. Touchstone is the type: ‘He uses his folly like a stalking-horse, and under the presentation of that he shoots his wit[1412].’ CHAPTER XVII MASKS AND MISRULE [_Bibliographical Note._--On the history of the English Masque A. Soergel, _Die englischen Maskenspiele_ (1882); H. A. Evans, _English Masques_ (1897); J. A. Symonds, _Shakespeare’s Predecessors_, ch. ix; A. W. Ward, _English Dramatic Literature_, passim; W. W. Greg, _A List of Masques, Pageants, &c._ (1902), may be consulted. Much of the material used by these writers is in Collier, _H. E. D. P._ vol. i, and P. Cunningham, _Extracts from the Accounts of the Revels at Court_ (Shakespeare Soc. 1842). For the early Tudor period E. Hall’s _History of the Union of Lancaster and York_ (1548) and the Revels Accounts in J. S. Brewer and J. Gairdner, _Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII_, vols. ii, iii, are detailed and valuable. R. Brotanek’s very full _Die englischen Maskenspiele_ (1902) only reached me when this chapter was in type.]