Note 1009 — XI THE ACTOR'S ECONOMICS

This is the only point on which I have anything to add to Dr. Greg's personal information as to Henslowe; it is important as bearing on the history of Lord Strange's men (q.v.). He is described as Groom of the Chamber in an undated document (Henslowe Papers, 42) belonging to a series dealing with the opening of the Rose for Strange's men in a long vacation. This cannot be put later than 1592, as there was plague throughout the long vacation of 1593 and Lord Strange became Earl of Derby in Sept. 1593. On the other hand, Dr. Greg (Henslowe, ii. 9; Henslowe Papers, 36), following Warner, 8, argues that Henslowe must have become Groom of the Chamber later than 7 April 1592, since he is not named in a list of Grooms appended to a warrant of that date and is named in a similar list of 26 Jan. 1599. These warrants are in Addl. MS. 5750, ff. 114, 116. They are original warrants for the 'watching liveries' which were issued annually, but on irregular dates, to the Yeomen of the Guard and to the Groom Porter and fourteen Grooms of the Chamber. A complete series of copies of these warrants is preserved in Lord Chamberlain's Records, v. 90, 91, and shows that Henslowe only received a watching livery during three consecutive years, on 14 Nov. 1597, 26 Jan. 1599, and 27 Oct. 1599. Yet we know that he was a Groom in Aug. 1593 from the address on one of Alleyn's letters (Henslowe Papers, 36), and about 1595-6 from a petition to the first Lord Hunsdon, who died in June 1596 (Henslowe Papers, 44). Therefore the absence of his name from the livery list of 7 April 1592 is no proof that he was not then already a Groom. Probably Henslowe was only an Extraordinary Groom, and only some of the Extraordinary Grooms were needed to supplement the twelve Ordinary ones for watching purposes.