So Mrs. Charlotte Stopes argues, who brought into association these facts and dates.  She brings out also, another curious incident or two concerning what we may take to be the earliest performances of “The Comedie of Errors.”  One is that the mother of the Earl of Southampton,—­the young nobleman who was Shakespeare’s patron and to whom the Poet dedicated “Venus and Adonis” and “Lucrece,”—­was then acting officially for her late husband.  Thus it fell to her care to make up his accounts as Treasurer of the Chamber, and she it was who wrote this particular notice of the acting of Shakespeare before Queen Elizabeth.  Others acting as Treasurer did not find it worth their while to include the Actors’ names in their accounts.  This notice of hers is the first and last to mention names in this way.  Her son, being a Gray’s Inn man, would have been in a position to suggest the substitution of Shakespeare’s Play and as a friend of Shakespeare’s would desire to do so.

The other incident of biographical interest is that the Gray’s Inn students were much mortified by the uproar which caused the failure of the program of their chief of Revels called “The Prince of Purpoole,” and made it necessary for them to call in common players.  The result of their desire “to recover their lost honor with some graver conceipt” was to give Jan. 3d, a learned Dialogue called “Divers Plots and Devices.”  Bacon aided largely in this stately affair.  In its course six Councillors one after the other deliver speeches on enrollment of Knights and Chivalry, the glory of War, the study of Philosophy, etc.  The scorn felt for Shakespeare’s “Comedie” and the contrast with this rival specimen of academic dramatics is significant.

Out of the comparatively simple plot of Plautus, Shakespeare developed an amusing complexity of situations.  These appear upon studying the progress of the story, Act by Act, as follows: 

ACT I

THE ARRIVAL OF CERTAIN STRANGERS IN EPHESUS

What has the arrest of the “Marchant” Egean to do with the rest of the Story?  How soon does any connection appear?

The reference in scene ii, to the occurrence taking place in scene i, suggests a somewhat odd chance coincidence in the arrival from Syracuse on the same day of both of these strangers.  By this casual reference the seemingly unrelated scenes are so innocently linked together that it rather blinds than opens the eyes of the audience to the deeper links of connection.  It also acts at once as a warning to Antipholus, and explains why he also is not arrested under the same law from which Egean suffered.

The merchant who gives Antipholus this warning does not appear to be at all an intimate friend.  Yet he seems to have met the stranger upon his arrival.  Is this accounted for?  What office does the scene show that he bears toward him?  How recent an institution is the Bank and Letter of Credit for travellers?  Was the lack of such facilities long filled in the way here exemplified?