It has, however, always been a favourite topic of the Prynne’s, the Jeremy Collier’s and the Dr. Style’s, and such like opponents of the theatre, to contrast the English stage with the purity of the Grecian and Roman Theatres.  Now, without stopping to enquire whether this has any particular connection with the subject of their dissertations, or whether it is not in fact quite irrelevant to the question, it is impossible not to remark the crass ignorance which these assertions display of the manners and customs of the theatres of either the Greeks or the Romans.  Without wearying the reader by entering into a long discussion upon the subject, it will be sufficient to recall certain passages in Aristophanes, Xenophon, Plautus, and Terence to induce them to hesitate in assenting to such vague assertions of the purity of either the Grecian or Roman dramatic writers.  William Prynne, the English Puritan writer, in his violent attack on the stage in the “Histrio-Mastix” or “Players Scourge”—­which book, by the way, for some unfavourable comments therein on the Queen of Charles I., and the ladies of her Court, for attending theatrical representations, was debarred his rooms (he was a barrister), by the Court of Star Chamber, sentenced to be imprisoned for life, fined L5,000, committed to the Tower, placed in the pillory, both ears cut off, and his book burnt by the common hangman; yet after undergoing all these pains and penalties, he published a recantation of all that he had previously written in his “Histrio-Mastix”—­says “It seems that the Grecian actors did now and then to refresh the spectators, bring a kind of cisterne on the stage, wherein naked women did swim and bathe themselves between the acts and scenes; which wicked, impudent, and execrable practice the holy father Chrysostom doth sharpely and excellently declaime against.”

Xenophon mentions the tale of “Bacchus and Ariadne,” Pantomimically played, and Martial tells us he saw the whole story of “Pasiphae,” minutely represented on the stage of the Mimis, and Plautus, in his epilogue to “Casina,” has—­

    “Nunc vos aequim est, manibus meritis,
    Meritam mercedem dare. 
    Qui faxit, clam uxorem, ducat scortum
    Semper quod volet. 
    Verum qui non manibus clare, quantum
    Potent, plauserit,
    Ei, pro scorto, supponetur hircus unctus nantea.”

On the Roman stage female parts were represented in tragedy by men, is ascertained (says Malone) by one of Cicero’s letters to Atticus, and by a passage in Horace.  Horace mentions, however, a female performer called Arbuscula, but as we find from his own authority men personated women on the Roman stage, she was probably an Emboliariae.  Servius calls her a Mima, or one who danced in the Pantomimic dances, and which seems more probable, as she is mentioned by Cicero, who says the part of Andromache was played by a male performer on the very day Arbuscula also performed.