the highest degree of vain-glory, prodigality, falsehood, and vile and filthy conversation of life, and altogether without faith, conscience, or religion."
Stucley at once became the hero of ballads, chap-books, and plays. The Famous History of the Life and Death of Captain Thomas Stukeley was printed in 1605, and Peele's Battle of Alcazar in 1594, but both plays had been acted before these dates. In the Life and Death Stucley is glorified, as an idol of the military or Essex party to which Shakespeare is known to have belonged, and it has been thought that his hand can be traced in the composition. But if so, he has left in it but little trace of his genius.
In one of the ballads published about Stucley, he is thus spoken of:—
Taverns and ordinaries were his chiefest braveries,
Golden angels there flew up and down;
Riots were his best delights with stately feasting day and night,
In court and city thus he won renown.
