William Shakespeare: 

In much tribulation do I write thee as to the contention which hath arisen among our stock actors and supes of the Globe.  Nicholas Bottom, whom you brought from the Parish workhouse in Stratford, is in ill humor with thee in especial.  He says when he played with you in Ben Jonson’s comedy, “Every Man in his Humor,” he was by far the better actor and did receive the plaudits of all; despite which he now receives but 6 shillings each week, while you are become a man of great wealth, having gotten, as he verily believes, as much as L100.  Vainly did I oppose to him that the reason you had money when he had none was in verity that you had labored when he was drunken, and that this was to his profit, since, had not you and the other holders of shares in the Globe saved somewhat of money, unthrifty groundlings of his ilk would starve, as there would be none to hire them at wages; but he avers that he is ground in the dust by the greed of capital, and hath so much prated of this that he hath much following, and accounteth himself a martyr.  I said to him that at your especial order he was paid 6 shillings per week, which was double his worth, and that he should go elsewhere if he was not content, as I could daily get a better man for half his wages; but he will not go hence, nor will he perform, and has persuaded others to join with him, his very worthlessness having made him their leader, and they threaten, unless they may receive additional 4 shillings per week, and a groat each night for sack, they will have no plays performed, nor will they allow others to be hired in their stead.  They do further demand that you shall write shorter plays; that you shall write no tragedies requiring them to labor more than three hours in the rendition; that you shall cut out as much as twelve pages each in “Richard III.” and “Othello,” and fifteen pages from “Hamlet,” that they may not labor to weariness, and may have more hours to recreation and improvement at the alehouse.  I know not what to do.  If I yield them their demands, nothing will be left for the owners of shares in the Globe; and if I do not, I fear mobs and riots.  Fain would I receive thy counsel, which shall have good heed.

The next letter is the last in the period under review, and bears date four days later than the one just quoted from William Kempe.

    At the Elephant & magpie inn, London, May 29, 1602.

    To William Shakespeare: 

This is written to thee by John Lely, a clerk, in behalf of Nicholas Bottom, who useth not the pen, and who says to me to tell William Shakespeare, fie upon him that he did order the aforesaid Bottom to be locked out of the Globe Playhouse.  Hath he forgotten the first play he, William Shakespeare, did ever write, to wit, “Pyramus and Thisbe,” when a boy at Stratford, which was played by himself