Wing S2403; W & M, 1014. A decent copy of this Restoration tragi-comical play which was first published and performed in 1668; Samuel Pepys, who had long looked forward to it, was severely disappointed. The play was then apparently revived for the 1674/5 season, and presumably also revised at this time, and it is this re-issue that we have here.
The original Mulberry-Garden, to which the title refers, was a four acre orchard, planted by James I in 1609, on the site of the present (north-west corner of) Buckingham Palace. King James had been hoping to kickstart English silkworm production, but unfortunately chose the wrong sort of bush. Clement Walker in ‘Anarchia Anglicana’ (1649) refers to “new-erected sodoms and spintries at the Mulberry Garden at S. James’s”; which suggests it may at that date have been a place of debauchery. In 1674, Goring House, which occupied part of the site adjacent to the Mulberry Garden, burnt down, which perhaps explains the play’s revival at that particular date.
4to, 1 f. blank, 1 f. title, 1 f. dedication, 1 f. ‘Dramatis Personnae,’ / Prologue, pp. 75 (1, Epilogue), later boards (spine worn and semi detached, large inksplash on A4, a few small pin-hole burns passim).
£325