ACT THE FOURTH.
SCENE I.—A Room in Matheo’s House.
Enter Matheo brave,[277] and Bellafront.
Mat. How am I suited, Front? am I not gallant, ha?
Bell. Yes, sir, you are suited well.
Mat. Exceeding passing well, and to the time.
Bell. The tailor has played his part with you.
Mat. And I have played a gentleman’s part with my tailor, for I owe him for the making of it.
Bell. And why did you so, sir?
Mat. To keep the fashion; it’s your only fashion now, of your best rank of gallants, to make their tailors wait for their money; neither were it wisdom indeed to pay them upon the first edition of a new suit; for commonly the suit is owing for, when the linings are worn out, and there’s no reason, then, that the tailor should be paid before the mercer.
Bell. Is this the suit the knight bestowed upon you?
Mat. This is the suit, and I need not shame to wear it, for better men than I would be glad to have suits bestowed on them. It’s a generous fellow,—but—pox on him—we whose pericranions are the very limbecks and stillatories of good wit and fly high, must drive liquor out of stale gaping oysters—shallow knight, poor squire Tinacheo: I’ll make a wild Cataian[278] of forty such: hang him, he’s an ass, he’s always sober.
Bell. This is your fault to wound your friends still.
Mat. No, faith, Front, Lodovico is a noble Slavonian: it’s more rare to see him in a woman’s company, than for a Spaniard to go into England, and to challenge the English fencers there.—[Knocking within.] One knocks,—see.—[Exit Bellafront.]—La, fa, fol, la, fa, la, [Sings] rustle in silks and satins! there’s music in this, and a taffeta petticoat, it makes both fly high. Catso.
Re-enter Bellafront with Orlando in his own dress, and four Servants.
Bell. Matheo! ’tis my father.
Mat. Ha! father? It’s no matter, he finds no tattered prodigals here.
Orl. Is not the door good enough to hold your blue coats?[279] away, knaves, Wear not your clothes threadbare at knees for me; beg Heaven’s blessing, not mine.—[Exeunt Servants.]—Oh cry your worship mercy, sir; was somewhat bold to talk to this gentlewoman, your wife here.
Mat. A poor gentlewoman, sir.
Orl. Stand not, sir, bare to me; I ha’ read oft
That serpents who creep low, belch ranker poison
Than wingèd dragons do that fly aloft.
Mat. If it offend you, sir, ’tis for my pleasure.
Orl. Your pleasure be’t, sir. Umh, is this your palace?
Bell. Yes, and our kingdom, for ’tis our content.
Orl. It’s a very poor kingdom then; what, are all your subjects gone a sheep-shearing? not a maid? not a man? not so much as a cat? You keep a good house belike, just like one of your profession, every room with bare walls, and a half-headed bed to vault upon, as all your bawdy-houses are. Pray who are your upholsters? Oh, the spiders, I see, they bestow hangings upon you.
Mat. Bawdy-house? Zounds, sir—
Bell. Oh sweet Matheo, peace. Upon my knees
I do beseech you, sir, not to arraign me
For sins, which Heaven, I hope, long since hath pardoned!
Those flames, like lightning flashes, are so spent,
The heat no more remains, than where ships went,
Or where birds cut the air, the print remains.
Mat. Pox on him, kneel to a dog.
Bell. She that’s a whore,
Lives gallant, fares well, is not, like me, poor.
I ha’ now as small acquaintance with that sin,
As if I had never known’t, t’ had never been.
Orl. No acquaintance with it? what maintains thee then? how dost live then? Has thy husband any lands? any rents coming in, any stock going, any ploughs jogging, any ships sailing? hast thou any wares to turn, so much as to get a single penny by?
Yes thou hast ware to sell,
Knaves are thy chapmen, and thy shop is hell.
Mat. Do you hear, sir?
Orl. So, sir, I do hear, sir, more of you than you dream I do.
Mat. You fly a little too high, sir.
Orl. Why, sir, too high?
Mat. I ha’ suffered your tongue, like a bard cater-tray,[280] to run all this while, and ha’ not stopt it.
Orl. Well, sir, you talk like a gamester.
Mat. If you come to bark at her, because she’s a poor rogue, look you, here’s a fine path, sir, and there, there’s the door.
Bell. Matheo?
Mat. Your blue coats stay for you, sir. I love a good honest roaring boy, and so—
Orl. That’s the devil.
Mat. Sir, sir, I’ll ha’ no Joves in my house to thunder avaunt: she shall live and be maintained when you, like a keg of musty sturgeon, shall stink; where? in your coffin—how? be a musty fellow, and lousy.
Orl. I know she shall be maintained, but how? she like a quean, thou like a knave; she like a whore, thou like a thief.
Mat. Thief? Zounds! Thief?
Bell. Good, dearest Mat!—Father!
Mat. Pox on you both! I’ll not be braved. New satin scorns to be put down with bare bawdy velvet. Thief?
Orl. Ay, thief, th’art a murderer, a cheater, a whoremonger, a pot-hunter, a borrower a beggar—
Bell. Dear father—
Mat. An old ass, a dog, a churl, a chuff, an usurer, a villain, a moth, a mangy mule, with an old velvet foot-cloth on his back, sir.
Bell. Oh me!
Orl. Varlet, for this I’ll hang thee.
Mat. Ha, ha, alas!
Orl. Thou keepest a man of mine here, under my nose—
Mat. Under thy beard.
Orl. As arrant a smell-smock, for an old muttonmonger[281] as thyself.
Mat. No, as yourself.
Orl. As arrant a purse-taker as ever cried, Stand! yet a good fellow I confess, and valiant; but he’ll bring thee to th’ gallows; you both have robbed of late two poor country pedlars.
Mat. How’s this? how’s this? dost thou fly high? rob pedlars?—bear witness, Front—rob pedlars? my man and I a thief?
Bell. Oh, sir, no more.
Orl. Ay, knave, two pedlars; hue and cry is up; warrants are out, and I shall see thee climb a ladder.
Mat. And come down again as well as a bricklayer or a tiler. How the vengeance knows he this? If I be hanged, I’ll tell the people I married old Friscobaldo’s daughter; I’ll frisco you, and your old carcass.
Orl. Tell what you canst; if I stay here longer, I shall be hanged too, for being in thy company; therefore, as I found you, I leave you—
Mat. Kneel, and get money of him.
Orl. A knave and a quean, a thief and a strumpet, a couple of beggars, a brace of baggages.
Mat. Hang upon him—Ay, ay, sir, farewell; we are—follow close—we are beggars—in satin—to him.
Bell. Is this your comfort, when so many years
You ha’ left me frozen to death?
Orl. Freeze still, starve still!
Bell. Yes, so I shall: I must: I must and will.
If as you say I’m poor, relieve me then,
Let me not sell my body to base men.
You call me strumpet, Heaven knows I am none:
Your cruelty may drive me to be one:
Let not that sin be yours; let not the shame
Of common whore live longer than my name.
That cunning bawd, necessity, night and day
Plots to undo me; drive that hag away,
Lest being at lowest ebb, as now I am,
I sink for ever.
Orl. Lowest ebb, what ebb?
Bell. So poor, that, though to tell it be my shame,
I am not worth a dish to hold my meat;
I am yet poorer, I want bread to eat.
Orl. It’s not seen by your cheeks.
Mat. I think she has read an homily to tickle the old rogue. [Aside.
Orl. Want bread! there’s satin: bake that.
Mat. ’Sblood, make pasties of my clothes?
Orl. A fair new cloak, stew that; an excellent gilt rapier.
Mat. Will you eat that, sir?
Orl. I could feast ten good fellows with these hangers.[282]
Mat. The pox, you shall!
Orl. I shall not, till thou begg’st, think thou art poor;
And when thou begg’st I’ll feed thee at my door,
As I feed dogs, with bones; till then beg, borrow,
Pawn, steal, and hang, turn bawd, when th’art whore.—
My heart-strings sure would crack, were they strained more. [Aside, and exit.
Mat. This is your father, your damned—Confusion light upon all the generation of you; he can come bragging hither with four white herrings at’s tail in blue coats, without roes in their bellies, but I may starve ere he give me so much as a cob.[283]
Bell. What tell you me of this? alas!
Mat. Go, trot after your dad, do you capitulate; I’ll pawn not for you; I’ll not steal to be hanged for such an hypocritical, close, common harlot: away, you dog!—Brave i’faith! Udsfoot, give me some meat.
Bell. Yes, sir. [Exit.
Mat. Goodman slave, my man too, is galloped to the devil a’ t’other side: Pacheco, I’ll checo you. Is this your dad’s day? England, they say, is the only hell for horses, and only paradise for women: pray get you to that paradise, because you’re called an honest whore; there they live none but honest whores with a pox. Marry here in our city, all your sex are but foot-cloth nags,[284] the master no sooner lights but the man leaps into the saddle.
Re-enter Bellafront with meat and drink.
Bell. Will you sit down I pray, sir?
Mat. [Sitting down.] I could tear, by th’ Lord, his flesh, and eat his midriff in salt, as I eat this:—must I choke—my father Friscobaldo, I shall make a pitiful hog-louse of you, Orlando, if you fall once into my fingers—Here’s the savourest meat! I ha’ got a stomach with chafing. What rogue should tell him of those two pedlars? A plague choke him, and gnaw him to the bare bones!—Come fill.
Bell. Thou sweatest with very anger, good sweet, vex not, as ’tis no fault of mine.
Mat. Where didst buy this mutton? I never felt better ribs.
Bell. A neighbour sent it me.
Re-enter Orlando disguised as a Serving-man.
Mat. Hah, neighbour? foh, my mouth stinks,—You whore, do you beg victuals for me? Is this satin doublet to be bombasted[285] with broken meat? [Takes up the stool.
Orl. What will you do, sir?
Mat. Beat out the brains of a beggarly—
Orl. Beat out an ass’s head of your own—Away, Mistress [Exit Bellafront.] Zounds, do but touch one hair of her, and I’ll so quilt your cap with old iron, that your coxcomb shall ache like a roasted rabbit, that you must have the head for the brains?
Mat. Ha, ha! go out of my doors, you rogue, away, four marks; trudge.
Orl. Four marks? no, sir, my twenty pound that you ha’ made fly high, and I am gone.
Mat. Must I be fed with chippings? you’re best get a clapdish,[286] and say you’re proctor to some spittle-house.[287] Where hast thou been, Pacheco? Come hither my little turkey-cock.
Orl. I cannot abide, sir, to see a woman wronged, not I.
Mat. Sirrah, here was my father-in-law to day.
Orl. Pish, then you’re full of crowns.
Mat. Hang him! he would ha’ thrust crowns upon me, to have fallen in again, but I scorn cast clothes, or any man’s gold.
Orl. But mine; [Aside.]—How did he brook that, sir?
Mat. Oh, swore like a dozen of drunken tinkers; at last growing foul in words, he and four of his men drew upon me, sir.
Orl. In your house? would I had been by!
Mat. I made no more ado, but fell to my old lock, and so thrashed my blue-coats and old crab-tree-face my father-in-law, and then walked like a lion in my grate.
Orl. O noble master!
Mat. Sirrah, he could tell me of the robbing the two pedlars, and that warrants are out for us both.
Orl. Good sir, I like not those crackers.
Mat. Crackhalter, wou’t set thy foot to mine?
Orl. How, sir? at drinking.
Mat. We’ll pull that old crow my father: rob thy master. I know the house, thou the servants: the purchase[288] is rich, the plot to get it is easy, the dog will not part from a bone.
Orl. Pluck’t out of his throat, then: I’ll snarl for one, if this[289] can bite.
Mat. Say no more, say no more, old coal, meet me anon at the sign of the Shipwreck.
Orl. Yes, sir.
Mat. And dost hear, man?—the Shipwreck. [Exit.
Orl. Th’art at the shipwreck now, and like a swimmer,
Bold, but inexpert, with those waves dost play,
Whose dalliance, whorelike, is to cast thee away.
Enter Hippolito and Bellafront.
And here’s another vessel, better fraught,
But as ill-manned her sinking will be wrought,
If rescue come not: like a man of war
I’ll therefore bravely out; somewhat I’ll do,
And either save them both, or perish too. [Exit.
Hip. ’Tis my fate to be bewitched by those eyes.
Bell. Fate? your folly.
Why should my face thus mad you? ’Las, those colours
Are wound up long ago, which beauty spread;
The flowers that once grew here, are witherèd.
You turned my black soul white, made it look new,
And should I sin, it ne’er should be with you.
Hip. Your hand, I’ll offer you fair play: When first
We met i’th ’lists together, you remember
You were a common rebel; with one parley
I won you to come in.
Bell. You did.
Hip. I’ll try
If now I can beat down this chastity
With the same ordnance; will you yield this fort,
If the power of argument now, as then,
I get of you the conquest: as before
I turned you honest, now to turn you whore,
By force of strong persuasion?
Bell. If you can,
I yield.
Hip. The alarum’s struck up; I’m your man.
Bell. A woman gives defiance.
Hip. Sit. [They seat themselves.
Bell. Begin:
’Tis a brave battle to encounter sin.
Hip. You men that are to fight in the same war
To which I’m prest, and plead at the same bar,
To win a woman, if you’d have me speed,
Send all your wishes!
Bell. No doubt you’re heard; proceed.
Hip. To be a harlot, that you stand upon,
The very name’s a charm to make you one.
Harlotta was a dame of so divine
And ravishing touch, that she was concubine
To an English king;[290] her sweet bewitching eye
Did the king’s heart-strings in such love-knots tie,
That even the coyest was proud when she could hear
Men say, “behold, another harlot there!”
And after her all women that were fair
Were harlots called as to this day some are:
Besides, her dalliance she so well does mix,
That she’s in Latin called the Meretrix.
Thus for the name; for the profession, this,
Who lives in bondage, lives laced; the chief bliss
This world below can yield, is liberty:
And who, than whores, with looser wings dare fly?
As Juno’s proud bird spreads the fairest tail,
So does a strumpet hoist the loftiest sail,
She’s no man’s slave; men are her slaves; her eye
Moves not on wheels screwed up with jealousy.
She, horsed or coached, does merry journeys make,
Free as the sun in his gilt zodiac:
As bravely does she shine, as fast she’s driven,
But stays not long in any house of heaven;
But shifts from sign to sign, her amorous prizes
More rich being when she’s down, than when she rises.
In brief, gentlemen hunt them, soldiers fight for them,
Few men but know them, few or none abhor them:
Thus for sport’s sake speak I, as to a woman,
Whom, as the worst ground, I would turn to common:
But you I would enclose for mine own bed.
Bell. So should a husband be dishonourèd.
Hip. Dishonoured? not a whit: to fall to one
Besides your husband is to fall to none,
For one no number is.
Bell. Faith, should you take
One in your bed, would you that reckoning make?
’Tis time you found retreat.
Hip. Say, have I won,
Is the day ours?
Bell. The battle’s but half done,
None but yourself have yet sounded alarms,
Let us strike too, else you dishonour arms.
Hip. If you can win the day, the glory’s yours.
Bell. To prove a woman should not be a whore,
When she was made, she had one man, no more;
Yet she was tied to laws then, for even than,[291]
’Tis said, she was not made for men, but man.
Anon, t’increase earth’s brood, the law was varied,
Men should take many wives: and though they married
According to that act, yet ’tis not known
But that those wives were only tied to one.
New parliaments were since: for now one woman
Is shared between three hundred, nay she’s common,
Common as spotted leopards, whom for sport
Men hunt to get the flesh, but care not for’t.
So spread they nets of gold, and tune their calls,
To enchant silly women to take falls;
Swearing they’re angels, which that they may win
They’ll hire the devil to come with false dice in.
Oh Sirens’ subtle tunes! yourselves you flatter,
And our weak sex betray: so men love water;
It serves to wash their hands, but being once foul,
The water down is poured, cast out of doors,
And even of such base use do men make whores.
A harlot, like a hen more sweetness reaps,
To pick men one by one up, than in heaps:
Yet all feeds but confounding. Say you should taste me,
I serve but for the time, and when the day
Of war is done, am cashiered out of pay:
If like lame soldiers I could beg, that’s all,
And there’s lust’s rendezvous, an hospital.
Who then would be a man’s slave, a man’s woman?
She’s half starved the first day that feeds in common.
Hip. You should not feed so, but with me alone.
Bell. If I drink poison by stealth, is’t not all one?
Is’t not rank poison still with you alone?
Nay, say you spied a courtesan, whose soft side
To touch you’d sell your birth-right, for one kiss
Be racked; she’s won, you’re sated: what follows this?
Oh, then you curse that bawd that tolled you in;
The night you curse your lust, you loathe the sin,
You loathe her very sight, and ere the day
Arise, you rise glad when you’re stol’n away.
Even then when you are drunk with all her sweets,
There’s no true pleasure in a strumpet’s sheets.
Women whom lust so prostitutes to sale,
Like dancers upon ropes, once seen, are stale.
Hip. If all the threads of harlot’s lives are spun,
So coarse as you would make them, tell me why
You so long loved the trade?
Bell. If all the threads
Of harlot’s lives be fine as you would make them,
Why do not you persuade your wife turn whore,
And all dames else to fall before that sin?
Like an ill husband, though I knew the same
To be my undoing, followed I that game.
Oh, when the work of lust had earned my bread,
To taste it how I trembled, lest each bit,
Ere it went down, should choke me chewing it!
My bed seemed like a cabin hung in hell,
The bawd, hell’s porter, and the liquorish wine
The pander fetched, was like an easy fine,
For which, methought, I leased away my soul,
And oftentimes, even in my quaffing bowl,
Thus said I to myself, I am a whore,
And have drunk down thus much confusion more.
Hip. It is a common rule, and ’tis most true,
Two of one trade ne’er love: no more do you.
Why are you sharp ’gainst that you once professed?
Bell. Why dote you on that, which you did once detest?
I cannot, seeing she’s woven of such bad stuff,
Set colours on a harlot base enough.
Nothing did make me, when I loved them best,
To loathe them more than this: when in the street
A fair young modest damsel I did meet,
She seemed to all a dove, when I passed by,
And I to all a raven: every eye
That followed her went with a bashful glance,
At me each bold and jeering countenance
Darted forth scorn; to her as if she had been
Some tower unvanquished, would they vail,
’Gainst me swoln rumour hoisted every sail.
She, crowned with reverend praises, passed by them,
I, though with face masked, could not ’scape the hem,
For, as if Heaven had set strange marks on whores,
Because they should be pointing stocks to man,
Drest up in civilest shape, a courtesan—
Let her walk saint-like, noteless, and unknown,
Yet she’s betrayed by some trick of her own.
Were harlots therefore wise, they’d be sold dear:
For men account them good but for one year,
And then like almanacs whose dates are gone,
They are thrown by, and no more looked upon.
Who’ll therefore backward fall, who will launch forth
In seas so foul, for ventures no more worth?
Lust’s voyage hath, if not this course, this cross,
Buy ne’er so cheap, your ware comes home with loss.
What, shall I sound retreat? the battle’s done:
Let the world judge which of us two have won.
Hip. I!
Bell. You? nay then as cowards do in fight,
What by blows cannot, shall be saved by flight. [Exit.
Hip. Fly to earth’s fixèd centre: to the caves
Of everlasting horror, I’ll pursue thee,
Though loaden with sins, even to hell’s brazen doors.
Thus wisest men turn fools, doting on whores. [Exit.
SCENE II.—An Apartment in the Duke’s Palace.
Enter the Duke, Lodovico, and Orlando, disguised as a Serving-man; after them Infelice, Carolo, Astolfo, Beraldo, and Fontinell.
Orl. I beseech your grace, though your eye be so piercing as under a poor blue coat to cull out an honest father from an old serving-man, yet, good my lord, discover not the plot to any, but only this gentleman that is now to be an actor in our ensuing comedy.
Duke. Thou hast thy wish, Orlando, pass unknown,
Sforza shall only go along with thee,
To see that warrant served upon thy son.
Lod. To attach him upon felony, for two pedlars: is’t not so?
Orl. Right, my noble knight: those pedlars were two knaves of mine; he fleeced the men before, and now he purposes to flay the master. He will rob me; his teeth water to be nibbling at my gold, but this shall hang him by th’ gills, till I pull him on shore.
Duke. Away: ply you the business.
Orl. Thanks to your grace: but, my good lord, for my daughter—
Duke. You know what I have said.
Orl. And remember what I have sworn. She’s more honest, on my soul, than one of the Turks’ wenches, watched by a hundred eunuchs.
Lod. So she had need, for the Turks make them whores.
Orl. He’s a Turk that makes any woman a whore; he’s no true Christian, I’m sure. I commit your grace.
Duke. Infelice.
Inf. Here, sir.
Lod. Signor Friscobaldo.
Orl. Frisking again? Pacheco.
Lod. Uds so, Pacheco? we’ll have some sport with this warrant: ’tis to apprehend all suspected persons in the house. Besides, there’s one Bots a pander, and one Madam Horseleech a bawd, that have abused my friend; those two conies will we ferret into the purse-net.[292]
Orl. Let me alone for dabbing them o’th’ neck: come, come.
Lod. Do ye hear, gallants? meet me anon at Matheo’s.
Car., Ast., &c. Enough. [Exeunt Lodovico and Orlando.
Duke. Th’ old fellow sings that note thou didst before
Only his tunes are, that she is no whore,
But that she sent his letters and his gifts,
Out of a noble triumph o’er his lust,
To show she trampled his assaults in dust.
Inf. ’Tis a good honest servant, that old man.
Duke. I doubt no less.
Inf. And it may be my husband,
Because when once this woman was unmasked,
He levelled all her thoughts, and made them fit,
Now he’d mar all again, to try his wit.
Duke. It may be so too, for to turn a harlot
Honest, it must be by strong antidotes;
’Tis rare, as to see panthers change their spots.
And when she’s once a star fixed and shines bright,
Though ’twere impiety then to dim her light,
Because we see such tapers seldom burn,
Yet ’tis the pride and glory of some men,
To change her to a blazing star again,
And it may be, Hippolito does no more.
It cannot be but you’re acquainted all
With that same madness of our son-in law,
That dotes so on a courtesan.
All. Yes, my lord.
Car. All the city thinks he’s a whoremonger.
Ast. Yet I warrant he’ll swear no man marks him.
Ber. ’Tis like so, for when a man goes a wenching, it is as if he had a strong stinking breath, every one smells him out, yet he feels it not, though it be ranker than the sweat of sixteen bear warders.
Duke. I doubt then you have all those stinking breaths,
You might be all smelt out.
Car. Troth, my lord, I think we are all as you ha’ been in your youth when you went a-maying, we all love to hear the cuckoo sing upon other men’s trees.
Duke. It’s well; yet you confess. But, girl, thy bed
Shall not be parted with a courtesan.
’Tis strange,
No frown of mine, no frown of the poor lady,
My abused child, his wife, no care of fame,
Of honour, heaven, or hell, no not that name
Of common strumpet, can affright, or woo him
To abandon her; the harlot does undo him;
She has bewitched him, robbed him of his shape,
Turned him into a beast, his reason’s lost;
You see he looks wild, does he not?
Car. I ha’ noted new moons
In’s face, my lord, all full of change.
Duke. He’s no more like unto Hippolito,
Than dead men are to living—never sleeps,
Or if he do, it’s dreams: and in those dreams
His arms work, and then cries, Sweet—what’s her name,
What’s the drab’s name?
Ast. In troth, my lord, I know not,
I know no drabs, not I.
Duke. Oh, Bellafront!—
And, catching her fast, cries, My Bellafront!
Car. A drench that’s able to kill a horse, cannot kill this disease of smock smelling, my lord, if it have once eaten deep.
Duke. I’ll try all physic, and this medicine first:
I have directed warrants strong and peremptory
To purge our city Milan, and to cure
The outward parts, the suburbs, for the attaching
Of all those women, who like gold want weight,
Cities, like ships, should have no idle freight.
Car. No, my lord, and light wenches are no idle freight; but what’s your grace’s reach in this?
Duke. This, Carolo. If she whom my son doats on,
Be in that muster-book enrolled, he’ll shame
Ever t’approach one of such noted name.
Car. But say she be not?
Duke. Yet on harlots’ heads
New laws shall fall so heavy, and such blows shall
Give to those that haunt them, that Hippolito
If not for fear of law, for love to her,
If he love truly, shall her bed forbear.
Car. Attach all the light heels i’th’ city, and clap ’em up? why, my lord, you dive into a well unsearchable: all the whores within the walls, and without the walls? I would not be he should meddle with them for ten such dukedoms; the army that you speak on is able to fill all the prisons within this city, and to leave not a drinking room in any tavern besides.
Duke. Those only shall be caught that are of note;
Harlots in each street flow:
The fish being thus i’th net, ourself will sit,
And with eye most severe dispose of it.
Come, girl. [Exeunt Duke and Infelice.
Car. Arraign the poor whores!
Ast. I’ll not miss that sessions.
Font. Nor I.
Ber. Nor I, though I hold up my hand there myself. [Exeunt.
SCENE III.—A Room in Matheo’s House.
Enter Matheo, Lodovico, and Orlando disguised as a Serving-man.
Mat. Let who will come, my noble chevalier, I can but play the kind host, and bid ’em welcome.
Lod. We’ll trouble your house, Matheo, but as Dutchmen do in taverns, drink, be merry, and be gone.
Orl. Indeed, if you be right Dutchmen, if you fall to drinking, you must be gone.
Mat. The worst is, my wife is not at home; but we’ll fly high, my generous knight, for all that: there’s no music when a woman is in the concert.
Orl. No; for she’s like a pair of virginals,
Always with jacks at her tail.
Enter Astolfo, Carolo, Beraldo and Fontinell.
Lod. See, the covey is sprung.
Ast., Car., &c. Save you, gallants.
Mat. Happily encountered, sweet bloods.
Lod. Gentlemen, you all know Signor Candido, the linen-draper, he that’s more patient than a brown baker, upon the day when he heats his oven, and has forty scolds about him.
Ast., Car., &c. Yes, we know him all, what of him?
Lod. Would it not be a good fit of mirth, to make a piece of English cloth of him, and to stretch him on the tenters, till the threads of his own natural humour crack, by making him drink healths, tobacco,[293] dance, sing bawdy songs, or to run any bias according as we think good to cast him?
Car. ’Twere a morris-dance worth the seeing.
Ast. But the old fox is so crafty, we shall hardly hunt him out of his den.
Mat. To that train I ha’ given fire already; and the hook to draw him hither, is to see certain pieces of lawn, which I told him I have to sell, and indeed have such; fetch them down, Pacheco.
Orl. Yes, sir, I’m your water-spaniel, and will fetch any thing—but I’ll fetch one dish of meat anon shall turn your stomach, and that’s a constable. [Aside and exit.
Enter Bots ushering in Mistress Horseleech.
Ast., Ber., Fon. How now? how now?
Car. What gally-foist[294] is this?
Lod. Peace, two dishes of stewed prunes,[295] a bawd and a pander. My worthy lieutenant Bots; why, now I see thou’rt a man of thy word, welcome.—Welcome Mistress Horseleech: pray, gentlemen, salute this reverend matron.
Mis. H. Thanks to all your worships.
Lod. I bade a drawer send in wine, too: did none come along with thee, grannam, but the lieutenant?
Mis. H. None came along with me but Bots, if it like your worship.
Bots. Who the pox should come along with you but Bots.
Enter two Vintners with wine.
Ast., Car., &c. Oh brave! march fair.
Lod. Are you come? that’s well.
Mat. Here’s ordnance able to sack a city.
Lod. Come, repeat, read this inventory.
1st Vint. Imprimis, a pottle of Greek wine, a pottle of Peter-sameene,[296] a pottle of Charnico,[297] and a pottle of Leatica.[298]
Lod. You’re paid?
2nd Vint. Yes, Sir. [Exeunt Vintners.
Mat. So shall some of us be anon, I fear.
Bots. Here’s a hot day towards: but zounds, this is the life out of which a soldier sucks sweetness! when this artillery goes off roundly, some must drop to the ground: cannon, demi-cannon, saker, and basilisk.[299]
Lod. Give fire, lieutenant.
Bots. So, so: Must I venture first upon the breach? to you all, gallants: Bots sets upon you all. [Drinks.
Ast., Car., &c. It’s hard, Bots, if we pepper not you, as well as you pepper us.
Enter Candido.
Lod. My noble linen-draper!—some wine!—Welcome old lad!
Mat. You’re welcome, signor.
Cand. These lawns, sir?
Mat. Presently; my man is gone for them: we ha’ rigged a fleet, you see here, to sail about the world.
Cand. A dangerous voyage, sailing in such ships.
Bots. There’s no casting over board yet.
Lod. Because you are an old lady, I will have you be acquainted with this grave citizen, pray bestow your lips upon him, and bid him welcome.
Mis. H. Any citizen shall be most welcome to me:—I have used to buy ware at your shop.
Cand. It may be so, good madam.
Mis. H. Your prentices know my dealings well; I trust your good wife be in good case: if it please you, bear her a token from my lips, by word of mouth. [Kisses him.
Cand. I pray no more; forsooth, ’tis very well,
Indeed I love no sweetmeats:—Sh’as a breath
Stinks worse than fifty polecats. [Aside.] Sir, a word,
Is she a lady?
Lod. A woman of a good house, and an ancient, she’s a bawd.
Cand. A bawd? Sir, I’ll steal hence, and see your lawns
Some other time.
Mat. Steal out of such company? Pacheco, my man is but gone for ’em: Lieutenant Bots, drink to this worthy old fellow, and teach him to fly high.
Lod., Ast., &c. Swagger: and make him do’t on his knees.
Cand. How, Bots? now bless me, what do I with Bots?
No wine in sooth, no wine, good Master Bots.
Bots. Gray-beard, goat’s pizzle: ’tis a health, have this in your guts, or this, there [Touching his sword.] I will sing a bawdy song, sir, because your verjuice face is melancholy, to make liquor go down glib. Will you fall on your marrowbones, and pledge this health? ’Tis to my mistress, a whore.
Cand. Here’s ratsbane upon ratsbane, Master Bots;
I pray, sir, pardon me: you are a soldier,
Press me not to this service, I am old,
And shoot not in such pot-guns.[300]
Bots. Cap. I’ll teach you.
Cand. To drink healths, is to drink sickness—gentlemen.
Pray rescue me.
Bots. Zounds, who dare?
Lod., Ast., &c. We shall ha’ stabbing then?
Cand. I ha’ reckonings to cast up, good Master Bots.
Bots. This will make you cast ’em up better.
Lod. Why does your hand shake so?
Cand. The palsy, signor, danceth in my blood.
Bots. Pipe with a pox, sir, then, or I’ll make your blood dance—
Cand. Hold, hold, good Master Bots, I drink. [Kneels.[301]
Ast., Lod., &c. To whom?
Cand. To the old countess there. [Drinks.
Mis. H. To me, old boy? this is he that never drunk wine! Once again to’t.
Cand. With much ado the poison is got down,
Though I can scarce get up; never before
Drank I a whore’s health, nor will never more.
Re-enter Orlando with lawns.
Mat. Hast been at gallows?
Orl. Yes, sir, for I make account to suffer to day.
Mat. Look, signor; here’s the commodity.
Cand. Your price?
Mat. Thus.[302]
Cand. No: too dear: thus.
Mat. No: O fie, you must fly higher: yet take ’em home, trifles shall not make us quarrel, we’ll agree, you shall have them, and a pennyworth; I’ll fetch money at your shop.
Cand. Be it so, good signor, send me going.
Mat. Going? a deep bowl of wine for Signor Candido.
Orl. He would be going.
Cand. I’ll rather stay than go so: stop your bowl.
Enter Constable and Billmen.
Lod. How now?
Bots. Is’t Shrove-Tuesday, that these ghosts walk?[303]
Mat. What’s your business, sir?
Const. From the duke: you are the man we look for, signor. I have warrant here from the duke, to apprehend you upon felony for robbing two pedlars: I charge you i’th’ duke’s name go quickly.
Mat. Is the wind turned? Well: this is that old wolf, my father-in-law:—seek out your mistress, sirrah.
Orl. Yes, Sir,—as shafts by piecing are made strong,
So shall thy life be straightened by this wrong. [Aside and exit.
Lod., Ast., &c. In troth, we are sorry.
Mat. Brave men must be crossed; pish, it’s but fortune’s dice roving against me. Come, sir, pray use me like a gentleman; let me not be carried through the streets like a pageant.
Const. If these gentlemen please, you shall go along with them.
Lod., Ast., &c. Be’t so: come.
Const. What are you, sir?
Bots. I, sir? sometimes a figure, sometimes a cipher, as the State has occasion to cast up her accounts: I’m a soldier.
Const. Your name is Bots, is’t not?
Bots. Bots is my name; Bots is known to this company.
Const. I know you are, sir: what’s she?
Bots. A gentlewoman, my mother.
Const. Take ’em both along.
Bots. Me, sir?
Billmen. Ay, sir!
Const. If he swagger, raise the street.
Bots. Gentlemen, gentlemen, whither will you drag us?
Lod. To the garden house. Bots, are we even with you?
Const. To Bridewell with ’em.
Bots. You will answer this.
Const. Better than a challenge. I’ve warrant for my work, sir.
Lod. We’ll go before.
Const. Pray do.—
[Exeunt Matheo with Lodovico, Astolfo, Carolo, Beraldo, and Fontinell; Bots and Mistress Horseleech, with Billmen.
Who, Signor Candido? a citizen
Of your degree consorted thus, and revelling
In such a house?
Cand. Why, sir? what house, I pray?
Const. Lewd, and defamed.
Cand. Is’t so? thanks, sir: I’m gone.
Const. What have you there?
Cand. Lawns which I bought, sir, of the gentleman that keeps the house.
Const. And I have warrant here,
To search for such stol’n ware: these lawns are stol’n.
Cand. Indeed!
Const. So he’s the thief, you the receiver:
I’m sorry for this chance, I must commit you.
Cand. Me, sir, for what?
Const. These goods are found upon you,
And you must answer’t.
Cand. Must I so?
Const. Most certain.
Cand. I’ll send for bail.
Const. I dare not: yet because
You are a citizen of worth, you shall not
Be made a pointing stock, but without guard,
Pass only with myself.
Cand. To Bridewell too?
Const. No remedy.
Cand. Yes, patience: being not mad,
They had me once to Bedlam, now I’m drawn
To Bridewell, loving no whores.
Const. You will buy lawn! [Exeunt.
