The title page attributes the play to Shirley, and states that it was acted by "her Majesty's servants" at the Phoenix playhouse which was the Cockpit Theatre.
Schelling considered it an anomaly with no larger impact,[3] while Nason thought that it represented Shirley's "complete acceptance of romanticism.
"[4] King Basilius of Arcadia, accompanied by his queen Gynecia and their daughters Philoclea and Pamela, retire to a forest lodge in an attempt to evade the prediction of an oracle.
To escape this tangle, Pyrocles arranges to meet both the king and queen in a cave — but he leaves them to run into each other, while he pursues his own suit to Philoclea.
The queen gives her husband the wine she brought for Pyrocles, believing it carries a love potion; instead it is poison, and Basilius "dies" after drinking it.