But Gloucester himself is by-and-by to have dealings with the “book of the play.”  In the seventh scene of the third act of “King Richard III.,” a stage direction runs:  “Enter Gloucester in a gallery above, between two bishops.”  Whereupon the Lord Mayor, who has come with divers aldermen and citizens to beseech the duke to accept the crown of England, observes: 

    See where his grace stands ’tween two clergymen!

Says Buckingham: 

    Two props of virtue for a Christian prince,
    To stay him from the fall of vanity;
    And, see, a book of prayer in his hand;
    True ornaments to know a holy man.

The mayor and citizens departing, Gloucester, in Cibber’s acting version of the tragedy, was wont wildly to toss his prayer-book in the air.  Here is an apposite note from John Taylor’s “Records of my Life,” relative to Garrick’s method of accomplishing this piece of stage business:  “My father, who saw him perform King Richard on the first night of his appearance at Goodman’s Fields, told me that the audience were particularly struck with his manner of throwing away the book when the lord mayor and aldermen had retired, as it manifested a spirit totally different from the solemn dignity which characterised the former old school, and which his natural acting wholly overturned.”

A certain antiquary, when Kemble first assumed the part of Richard, took objection to the prayer-book he affected to read in this scene.  “This book,” writes Boaden, “for aught I know the ’Secret History of the Green Room,’ which Kemble took from the property-man before he went on, our exact friend said should have been some illuminated missal.  This was somewhat inconsistent, because one would suppose the heart of the antiquary must have grieved to see the actor skirr away so precious a relic of the dark ages, as if, like Careless, in ’The School for Scandal,’ he would willingly ’knock down the mayor and aldermen.’” It was at this time, probably, that antiquarianism first stirred itself on the subject of scenic decorations.  The solitary banner unfurled by Kemble, as Richard, bore a white rose embroidered upon it.  “What!” cried the antiquaries, “a king of England battling with invaders and yet not displaying his royal banner!” And remark was made upon the frequent mention of armour that occurs in the later scenes of the play.  We have “locked up in steel;” “What! is my beaver easier than it was?” “And all my armour laid into my tent;” “The armourers accomplishing the knights;” “With clink of hammers closing rivets up;” “Your friends up and buckle on their armour.”  Yet, as Boaden relates, it was no less strange than true, that, in Kemble’s time, “excepting the breastplate and thigh-pieces on Richmond, not one of the dramatis personae had the smallest particle of armour upon him in either army.”

There is a stage-book in “King Henry VIII.”  The Duke of Norfolk, in the second act, “opens a folding-door; the king is discovered sitting and reading pensively.”  The book of Prospero is spoken of, but not seen.  In “Hamlet” the stage-book plays an important part.  Says Polonius to Ophelia, when he and Claudius would be “lawful espials” of her meeting with Hamlet: