[Footnote 17: The ancient game of shovel-board was played by sliding pieces of money along a smooth table, something on the principle of billiards. The allusion seems to be the same as if a modern poet had said, that a feeble player at billiards runs no risk of pocketing his own ball. The reader will find a variety of passages concerning this pastime in the notes of the various commentators upon a passage in the "Merry Wives of Windsor," where Slender enumerates among the contents of his pocket, when picked by Pistol, "two Edward shovel-boards," that is, two broad shillings of Edward VI. used for playing at this game. In some old halls the shovel-board table is still preserved, and sometimes used.] [Footnote 18: Cardinal Ottoboni, a Venetian by birth, succeeded to the tiara on the death of Innocent XI., and assumed the name of Alexander VIII. He was, like his predecessor, an enemy to France, and maintained the privileges of the Holy See, both in the point of the regale, and in refusing to grant bulls to those French bishops who had signed the formulary of 1682, by which the Pope was declared fallible, and subject to the decrees of a general council. His death took place during the congress of 1690. It was therefore a recent event when this play was first represented, and the disposition of his successor, towards the French or Imperial Courts, was matter of anxious speculation to the politicians of the day.] DRAMATIS PERSONÆ. _King_ ARTHUR. OSWALD, _King of_ KENT, _a Saxon, and a Heathen_. CONON, _Duke of_ CORNWALL, _Tributary to King_ ARTHUR. MERLIN, _a famous Enchanter_. OSMOND, _a Saxon Magician, and a Heathen_. AURELIUS, _Friend to_ ARTHUR. ALBANACT, _Captain of_ ARTHUR'S _Guards_. GUILLIMAR, _Friend to_ OSWALD. EMMELINE, _Daughter of_ CONON. MATILDA, _her Attendant_. PHILIDEL, _an Airy Spirit_. GRIMBALD, _an Earthy Spirit_. _Officers and Soldiers, Singers and Dancers._ _SCENE--Kent._ KING ARTHUR, OR, THE BRITISH WORTHY. ACT I--SCENE I. _Enter_ CONON, AURELIUS, ALBANACT. _Con._ Then this is the deciding day, to fix Great Britain's sceptre in great Arthur's hand. _Aur._ Or put it in the bold invader's gripe. Arthur and Oswald, and their different fates, Are weighing now within the scales of Heaven. _Con._ In ten set battles have we driven back These heathen Saxons, and regained our earth. As earth recovers from an ebbing tide Her half-drowned face, and lifts it o'er the waves, From Severn's bank, even to this barren down, Our foremost men have pressed their fainty rear, And not one Saxon face has been beheld; But all their backs and shoulders have been stuck With foul dishonest wounds; now here, indeed, Because they have no farther ground, they stand. _Aur._ Well have we chose a happy day for fight; For every man, in course of time, has found Some days are lucky, some unfortunate.