"Arcades" were exhibited, probably in 1634. Milton's melodious verses
were only one feature in a more ample entertainment. That they pleased
we may be sure, for we find him shortly afterwards engaged on a similar
undertaking of much greater importance, commissioned by the Bridgewater
family. In those days Milton had no more of the Puritanic aversion to
the theatre--

"Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Jonson's learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild,"

than to the pomps and solemnities of cathedral ritual:--

"But let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious cloisters pale,
And love the high-embowed roof,
With antique pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light:
There let the pealing organ blow,
To the full-voic'd quire below,
In service high and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness through mine ear
Dissolve me into ecstacies,
And bring all heaven before mine eyes."

He therefore readily fell in with Lawes's proposal to write a masque to
celebrate Lord Bridgewater's assumption of the Lord Presidency of the
Welsh Marches. The Earl had entered upon the office in October, 1633,