ACT THE FOURTH.
SCENE I.—Edmonton. The Street.
Enter Old Banks and several Countrymen.
Old Banks. My horse this morning runs most piteously of the glanders, whose nose yesternight was as clean as any man’s here now coming from the barber’s; and this, I’ll take my death upon’t, is long of this jadish witch Mother Sawyer.
1st Coun. I took my wife and a serving-man in our town of Edmonton thrashing in my barn together such corn as country wenches carry to market; and examining my polecat why she did so, she swore in her conscience she was bewitched: and what witch have we about us but Mother Sawyer?
2nd Coun. Rid the town of her, else all our wives will do nothing else but dance about other country maypoles.
3rd Coun. Our cattle fall, our wives fall, our daughters fall, and maid-servants fall; and we ourselves shall not be able to stand, if this beast be suffered to graze amongst us.
Enter Hamluc with thatch and a lighted link.
Ham. Burn the witch, the witch, the witch, the witch!
Countrymen. What hast got there?
Ham. A handful of thatch plucked off a hovel of hers; and they say, when ’tis burning, if she be a witch, she’ll come running in.
O. Banks. Fire it, fire it! I’ll stand between thee and home for any danger. [Ham. sets fire to the thatch.
Enter Mother Sawyer running.
M. Saw. Diseases, plagues, the curse of an old woman
Follow and fall upon you!
Countrymen. Are you come, you old trot?
O. Banks. You hot whore, must we fetch you with fire in your tail?
1st Coun. This thatch is as good as a jury to prove she is a witch.
Countrymen. Out, witch! beat her, kick her, set fire on her!
M. Saw. Shall I be murdered by a bed of serpents? Help, help!
Enter Sir Arthur Clarington and a Justice.
Countrymen. Hang her, beat her, kill her!
Just. How now! forbear this violence.
M. Saw. A crew of villains, a knot of bloody hangmen,
Set to torment me, I know not why.
Just. Alas, neighbour Banks, are you a ringleader in mischief? fie! to abuse an aged woman.
O. Banks. Woman? a she hell-cat, a witch! To prove her one, we no sooner set fire on the thatch of her house, but in she came running as if the devil had sent her in a barrel of gunpowder; which trick as surely proves her a witch as the pox in a snuffling nose is a sign a man is a whore-master.
Just. Come, come: firing her thatch? ridiculous!
Take heed, sirs, what you do; unless your proofs
Come better armed, instead of turning her
Into a witch, you’ll prove yourselves stark fools.
Countrymen. Fools?
Just. Arrant fools.
O. Banks. Pray, Master Justice What-do-you-call-’em, hear me but in one thing: this grumbling devil owes me I know no good-will ever since I fell out with her.
M. Saw. And break’dst my back with beating me.
O. Banks. I’ll break it worse.
M. Saw. Wilt thou?
Just. You must not threaten her; ’tis against law: Go on.
O. Banks. So, sir, ever since, having a dun cow tied up in my back-side,[446] let me go thither, or but cast mine eye at her, and if I should be hanged I cannot choose, though it be ten times in an hour, but run to the cow, and taking up her tail, kiss—saving your worship’s reverence—my cow behind, that the whole town of Edmonton has been ready to bepiss themselves with laughing me to scorn.
Just. And this is long of her?
O. Banks. Who the devil else? for is any man such an ass to be such a baby, if he were not bewitched?
Sir Arth. Nay, if she be a witch, and the harms she does end in such sports, she may scape burning.
Just. Go, go: pray, vex her not; she is a subject,
And you must not be judges of the law
To strike her as you please.
Countrymen. No, no, we’ll find cudgel enough to strike her.
O. Banks. Ay; no lips to kiss but my cow’s—!
M. Saw. Rots and foul maladies eat up thee and thine! [Exeunt Old Banks and Countrymen.
Just. Here’s none now, Mother Sawyer, but this gentleman,
Myself, and you: let us to some mild questions;
Have you mild answers; tell us honestly
And with a free confession—we’ll do our best
To wean you from it—are you a witch, or no?
M. Saw. I am none.
Just. Be not so furious.
M. Saw. I am none.
None but base curs so bark at me; I’m none:
Or would I were! if every poor old woman
Be trod on thus by slaves, reviled, kicked, beaten,
As I am daily, she to be revenged
Had need turn witch.
Sir Arth. And you to be revenged
Have sold your soul to th’ devil.
M. Saw. Keep thine own from him.
Just. You are too saucy and too bitter.
M. Saw. Saucy?
By what commission can he send my soul
On the devil’s errand more than I can his?
Is he a landlord of my soul, to thrust it,
When he list, out of door?
Just. Know whom you speak to.
M. Saw. A man; perhaps no man. Men in gay clothes,
Whose backs are laden with titles and with honours,
Are within far more crookèd than I am,
And, if I be a witch, more witch-like.
Sir Arth. You’re a base hell-hound.—
And now, sir, let me tell you, far and near
She’s bruited for a woman that maintains
A spirit that sucks her.
M. Saw. I defy thee.
Sir Arth. Go, go:
I can, if need be, bring an hundred voices,
E’en here in Edmonton, that shall loud proclaim
Thee for a secret and pernicious witch.
M. Saw. Ha, ha!
Just. Do you laugh? why laugh you?
M. Saw. At my name,
The brave name this knight gives me—witch.
Just. Is the name of witch so pleasing to thine ear?
Sir Arth. Pray, sir, give way, and let her tongue gallop on.
M. Saw. A witch! who is not?
Hold not that universal name in scorn, then.
What are your painted things in princes’ courts,
Upon whose eyelids lust sits, blowing fires
To burn men’s souls in sensual hot desires,
Upon whose naked paps a lecher’s thought
Acts sin in fouler shapes than can be wrought?
Just. But those work not as you do.
M. Saw. No, but far worse
These by enchantments can whole lordships change
To trunks of rich attire, turn ploughs and teams
To Flanders mares and coaches, and huge trains
Of servitors to a French butterfly.
Have you not city-witches who can turn
Their husbands’ wares, whole standing shops of wares,
To sumptuous tables, gardens of stolen sin;
In one year wasting what scarce twenty win?
Are not these witches?
Just. Yes, yes; but the law
Casts not an eye on these.
M. Saw. Why, then, on me,
Or any lean old beldam? Reverence once
Had wont to wait on age; now an old woman,
Ill-favoured grown with years, if she be poor,
Must be called bawd or witch. Such so abused
Are the coarse witches; t’other are the fine,
Spun for the devil’s own wearing.
Sir Arth. And so is thine.
M. Saw. She on whose tongue a whirlwind sits to blow
A man out of himself, from his soft pillow
To lean his head on rocks and fighting waves,
Is not that scold a witch? The man of law
Whose honeyed hopes the credulous client draw—
As bees by tinkling basins—to swarm to him
From his own hive to work the wax in his;
He is no witch, not he!
Sir Arth. But these men-witches
Are not in trading with hell’s merchandise,
Like such as you are, that for a word, a look,
Denial of a coal of fire, kill men,
Children, and cattle.
M. Saw. Tell them, sir, that do so:
Am I accused for such an one?
Sir Arth. Yes; ’twill be sworn.
M. Saw. Dare any swear I ever tempted maiden
With golden hooks flung at her chastity
To come and lose her honour; and being lost,
To pay not a denier[447] for’t? Some slaves have done it.
Men-witches can, without the fangs of law
Drawing once one drop of blood, put counterfeit pieces
Away for true gold.
Sir Arth. By one thing she speaks
I know now she’s a witch, and dare no longer
Hold conference with the fury.
Just. Let’s, then, away.—
Old woman, mend thy life; get home and pray. [Exeunt Sir Arthur and Justice.
M. Saw. For his confusion.
Enter the Dog.
My dear Tom-boy, welcome!
I’m torn in pieces by a pack of curs
Clapt all upon me, and for want of thee:
Comfort me; thou shall have the teat anon.
Dog. Bow, wow! I’ll have it now.
M. Saw. I am dried up
With cursing and with madness, and have yet
No blood to moisten these sweet lips of thine.
Stand on thy hind-legs up—kiss me, my Tommy,
And rub away some wrinkles on my brow
By making my old ribs to shrug for joy
Of thy fine tricks. What hast thou done? let’s tickle.
Hast thou struck the horse lame as I bid thee?
Dog. Yes;
And nipped the sucking child.
M. Saw. Ho, ho, my dainty,
My little pearl! no lady loves her hound,
Monkey, or paroquet, as I do thee.
Dog. The maid has been churning butter nine hours; but it shall not come.
M. Saw. Let ’em eat cheese and choke.
Dog. I had rare sport
Among the clowns i’ th’ morris.
M. Saw. I could dance
Out of my skin to hear thee. But, my curl-pate,
That jade, that foul-tongued whore, Nan Ratcliffe,
Who, for a little soap licked by my sow,
Struck and almost had lamed it;—did not I charge thee
To pinch that queen to th’ heart?
Dog. Bow, wow, wow! look here else.
Enter Ann Ratcliffe mad.
Ann. See, see, see! the man i’ th’ moon has built a new windmill; and what running there’s from all quarters of the city to learn the art of grinding!
M. Saw. Ho, ho, ho! I thank thee, my sweet mongrel.
Ann. Hoyda! a pox of the devil’s false hopper! all the golden meal runs into the rich knaves’ purses, and the poor have nothing but bran. Hey derry down! are not you Mother Sawyer?
M. Saw. No, I am a lawyer.
Ann. Art thou? I prithee let me scratch thy face; for thy pen has flayed-off a great many men’s skins. You’ll have brave doings in the vacation; for knaves and fools are at variance in every village. I’ll sue Mother Sawyer, and her own sow shall give in evidence against her.
M. Saw. Touch her. [To the Dog, who rubs against her.
Ann. O, my ribs are made of a paned hose, and they break![448] There’s a Lancashire hornpipe in my throat; hark, how it tickles it, with doodle, doodle, doodle, doodle! Welcome, sergeants! welcome, devil!—hands, hands! hold hands, and dance around, around, around. [Dancing.
Re-enter Old Banks, with Cuddy, Ratcliffe, and Countrymen.
Rat. She’s here; alas, my poor wife is here!
O. Banks. Catch her fast, and have her into some close chamber, do; for she’s, as many wives are, stark mad.
Cud. The witch! Mother Sawyer, the witch, the devil!
Rat. O, my dear wife! help, sirs! [Ann is carried off by Ratcliffe and Countrymen.
O. Banks. You see your work, Mother Bumby.[449]
M. Saw. My work? should she and all you here run mad,
Is the work mine?
Cud. No, on my conscience, she would not hurt a devil of two years old.
Re-enter Ratcliffe and Countrymen.
How now! what’s become of her?
Rat. Nothing; she’s become nothing but the miserable trunk of a wretched woman. We were in her hands as reeds in a mighty tempest: spite of our strengths away she brake; and nothing in her mouth being heard but “the devil, the witch, the witch, the devil!” she beat out her own brains, and so died.
Cud. It’s any man’s case, be he never so wise, to die when his brains go a wool-gathering.
O. Banks. Masters, be ruled by me; let’s all to a justice.—Hag, thou hast done this, and thou shalt answer it.
M. Saw. Banks, I defy thee.
O. Banks. Get a warrant first to examine her, then ship her to Newgate; here’s enough, if all her other villanies were pardoned, to burn her for a witch.—You have a spirit, they say, comes to you in the likeness of a dog; we shall see your cur at one time or other: if we do, unless it be the devil himself, he shall go howling to the gaol in one chain, and thou in another.
M. Saw. Be hanged thou in a third, and do thy worst!
Cud. How, father! you send the poor dumb thing howling to the gaol? he that makes him howl makes me roar.
O. Banks. Why, foolish boy, dost thou know him?
Cud. No matter if I do or not: he’s bailable, I am sure, by law;—but if the dog’s word will not be taken, mine shall.
O. Banks. Thou bail for a dog!
Cud. Yes, or a bitch either, being my friend. I’ll lie by the heels myself before puppison shall; his dog days are not come yet, I hope.
O. Banks. What manner of dog is it? didst ever see him?
Cud. See him? yes, and given him a bone to gnaw twenty times. The dog is no court-foisting hound that fills his belly full by base wagging his tail; neither is it a citizen’s water-spaniel,[450] enticing his master to go a-ducking twice or thrice a week, whilst his wife makes ducks and drakes at home: this is no Paris-garden bandog[451] neither, that keeps a bow-wow-wowing to have butchers bring their curs thither; and when all comes to all, they run away like sheep: neither is this the Black Dog of Newgate.[452]
O. Banks. No, Goodman Son-fool, but the dog of hell-gate.
Cud. I say, Goodman Father-fool, it’s a lie.
All. He’s bewitched.
Cud. A gross lie, as big as myself. The devil in St. Dunstan’s will as soon drink with this poor cur as with any Temple-bar laundress that washes and wrings lawyers.
Dog. Bow, wow, wow, wow!
All. O, the dog’s here, the dog’s here.
O. Banks. It was the voice of a dog.
Cud. The voice of a dog? if that voice were a dog’s, what voice had my mother? so am I a dog: bow, wow, wow! It was I that barked so, father, to make coxcombs of these clowns.
O. Banks. However, we’ll be coxcombed no longer: away, therefore, to the justice for a warrant; and then, Gammer Gurton, have at your needle of witchcraft!
M. Saw. And prick thine own eyes out. Go, peevish fools! [Exeunt Old Banks, Ratcliffe, and Countrymen.
Cud. Ningle, you had liked to have spoiled all with your bow-ings. I was glad to have put ’em off with one of my dog-tricks on a sudden; I am bewitched, little Cost me-nought, to love thee—a pox,—that morris makes me spit in thy mouth.—I dare not stay; farewell, ningle; you whoreson dog’s nose!—Farewell, witch! [Exit.
Dog. Bow, wow, wow, wow.
M. Saw. Mind him not, he is not worth thy worrying;
Run at a fairer game: that foul-mouthed knight,
Scurvy Sir Arthur, fly at him, my Tommy,
And pluck out’s throat.
Dog. No, there’s a dog already biting,—’s conscience.
M. Saw. That’s a sure bloodhound. Come, let’s home and play;
Our black work ended, we’ll make holiday. [Exeunt.
SCENE II. A Bedroom in Carter’s House. A bed thrust forth, with Frank in a slumber.
Enter Katherine.
Kath. Brother, brother! so sound asleep? that’s well.
Frank. [Waking.] No, not I, sister; he that’s wounded here
As I am—all my other hurts are bitings
Of a poor flea;—but he that here once bleeds
Is maimed incurably.
Kath. My good sweet brother,—
For now my sister must grow up in you,—
Though her loss strikes you through, and that I feel
The blow as deep, I pray thee be not cruel
To kill me too, by seeing you cast away
In your own helpless sorrow. Good love, sit up;
And if you can give physic to yourself,
I shall be well.
Frank. I’ll do my best.
Kath. I thank you;
What do you look about for?
Frank. Nothing, nothing;
But I was thinking, sister,—
Kath. Dear heart, what?
Frank. Who but a fool would thus be bound to a bed,
Having this room to walk in?
Kath. Why do you talk so?
Would you were fast asleep!
Frank. No, no; I’m not idle.[453]
But here’s my meaning; being robbed as I am,
Why should my soul, which married was to hers,
Live in divorce, and not fly after her?
Why should I not walk hand in hand with Death,
To find my love out?
Kath. That were well indeed,
Your time being come; when Death is sent to call you,
No doubt you shall meet her.
Frank. Why should not I
Go without calling?
Kath. Yes, brother, so you might,
Were there no place to go when you’re gone
But only this.
Frank. ’Troth, sister, thou say’st true;
For when a man has been an hundred years
Hard travelling o’er the tottering bridge of age,
He’s not the thousand part upon his way:
All life is but a wandering to find home;
When we’re gone, we’re there. Happy were man,
Could here his voyage end; he should not, then,
Answer how well or ill he steered his soul
By Heaven’s or by Hell’s compass; how he put in—
Losing blessed goodness’ shore—at such a sin;
Nor how life’s dear provision he has spent,
Nor how far he in’s navigation went
Beyond commission: this were a fine reign,
To do ill and not hear of it again;
Yet then were man more wretched than a beast;
For, sister, our dead pay is sure the best.
Kath. ’Tis so, the best or worst; and I wish Heaven
To pay—and so I know it will—that traitor,
That devil Somerton—who stood in mine eye
Once as an angel—home to his deservings:
What villain but himself, once loving me,
With Warbeck’s soul would pawn his own to hell
To be revenged on my poor sister!
Frank. Slaves!
A pair of merciless slaves! speak no more of them.
Kath. I think this talking hurts you.
Frank. Does me no good, I’m sure;
I pay for’t everywhere.
Kath. I have done, then.
Eat, if you cannot sleep; you have these two days
Not tasted any food.—Jane, is it ready?
Frank. What’s ready? what’s ready?
Kath. I have made ready a roasted chicken for you:
Enter Maid with chicken.
Sweet, wilt thou eat?
Frank. A pretty stomach on a sudden; yes.—
There’s one in the house can play upon a lute;
Good girl, let’s hear him too.
Kath. You shall, dear brother. [Exit Maid.
Would I were a musician, you should hear
How I would feast your ear! [Lute plays within]—stay mend your pillow,
And raise you higher.
Frank. I am up too high,
Am I not, sister now?
Kath. No, no; ’tis well.
Fall-to, fall-to.—A knife! here’s never a knife.
Brother, I’ll look out yours. [Takes up his vest.
Enter the Dog, shrugging as it were for joy, and dances.
Frank. Sister, O, sister,
I’m ill upon a sudden, and can eat nothing.
Kath. In very deed you shall: the want of food
Makes you so faint, Ha! [Sees the bloody knife]—here’s none in your pocket;
I’ll go fetch a knife. [Exit hastily.
Frank. Will you?—’tis well, all’s well.
Frank searches first one pocket, then the other, finds the knife, and then lies down.—The Dog runs off.—The spirit of Susan comes to the bed’s side; Frank stares at it, and then turns to the other side, but the spirit is there too. Meanwhile enter Winnifred as a page, and stands sadly at the bed’s foot.—Frank affrighted sits up. The spirit vanishes.
Frank. What art thou?
Win. A lost creature.
Frank. So am I too.—Win?
Ah, my she-page!
Win. For your sake I put on
A shape that’s false; yet do I wear a heart
True to you as your own.
Frank. Would mine and thine
Were fellows in one house!—Kneel by me here.
On this side now! how dar’st thou come to mock me
On both sides of my bed?
Win. When?
Frank. But just now:
Outface me, stare upon me with strange postures,
Turn my soul wild by a face in which were drawn
A thousand ghosts leapt newly from their graves
To pluck me into a winding-sheet!
Win. Believe it,
I came no nearer to you than yon place
At your bed’s feet; and of the house had leave,
Calling myself your horse-boy, in to come,
And visit my sick master.
Frank. Then ’twas my fancy;
Some windmill in my brains for want of sleep.
Win. Would I might never sleep, so you could rest!
But you have plucked a thunder on your head,
Whose noise cannot cease suddenly: why should you
Dance at the wedding of a second wife,
When scarce the music which you heard at mine
Had ta’en a farewell of you? O, this was ill!
And they who thus can give both hands away
In th’ end shall want their best limbs.
Frank. Winnifred,—
The chamber-door’s fast?
Win. Yes.
Frank. Sit thee, then, down;
And when thou’st heard me speak, melt into tears:
Yet I, to save those eyes of thine from weeping,
Being to write a story of us two.
Instead of ink dipped my sad pen in blood.
When of thee I took leave, I went abroad
Only for pillage, as a freebooter,
What gold soe’er I got to make it thine.
To please a father I have Heaven displeased;
Striving to cast two wedding-rings in one,
Through my bad workmanship I now have none;
I have lost her and thee.
Win. I know she’s dead;
But you have me still.
Frank. Nay, her this hand
Murdered; and so I lose thee too.
Win. O me!
Frank. Be quiet; for thou my evidence art,
Jury, and judge: sit quiet, and I’ll tell all.
While they are conversing in a low tone, enter at one door Carter and Katherine, at the other the Dog, pawing softly at Frank.
Kath. I have run madding up and down to find you,
Being laden with the heaviest news that ever
Poor daughter carried.
Car. Why? is the boy dead?
Kath. Dead, sir!
O, father, we are cozened: you are told
The murderer sings in prison, and he laughs here.
This villain killed my sister see else, see,
[Takes up his vest, and shows the knife to her father, who secures it.
A bloody knife in’s pocket!
Car. Bless me, patience!
Frank. [Seeing them.] The knife, the knife, the knife!
Kath. What knife? [Exit the Dog.
Frank. To cut my chicken up, my chicken;
Be you my carver, father.
Car. That I will.
Kath. How the devil steels our brows after doing ill!
Frank. My stomach and my sight are taken from me;
All is not well within me.
Car. I believe thee, boy; I that have seen so many moons clap their horns on other men’s foreheads to strike them sick, yet mine to scape and be well; I that never cast away a fee upon urinals, but am as sound as an honest man’s conscience when he’s dying; I should cry out as thou dost, “All is not well within me,” felt I but the bag of thy imposthumes. Ah, poor villain! ah, my wounded rascal! all my grief is, I have now small hope of thee.
Frank. Do the surgeons say my wounds are dangerous, then?
Car. Yes, yes, and there’s no way with thee but one.
Frank. Would he were here to open them!
Car. I’ll go to fetch him; I’ll make an holiday to see thee as I wish.
Frank. A wondrous kind old man!
Win. [Aside to Frank.] Your sin’s the blacker
So to abuse his goodness.—[Aloud] Master, how do you?
Frank. Pretty well now, boy; I have such odd qualms
Come cross my stomach.—I’ll fall-to; boy, cut me—
Win. [Aside.] You have cut me, I’m sure;—A leg or wing, sir?
Frank. No, no, no; a wing—
[Aside.] Would I had wings but to soar up yon tower!
But here’s a clog that hinders me.
Re-enter Carter, with Servants bearing the body of Susan in a coffin.
What’s that?
Car. That! what? O, now I see her; ’tis a young wench, my daughter, sirrah, sick to the death; and hearing thee to be an excellent rascal for letting blood, she looks out at a casement, and cries, “Help, help! stay that man! him I must have or none.”
Frank. For pity’s sake, remove her: see, she stares
With one broad open eye still in my face!
Car. Thou putted’st both hers out, like a villain as thou art; yet, see! she is willing to lend thee one again to find out the murderer, and that’s thyself.
Frank. Old man, thou liest!
Car. So shalt thou—in the gaol.—
Run for officers.
Kath. O, thou merciless slave!
She was—though yet above ground—in her grave
To me; but thou hast torn it up again—
Mine eyes, too much drowned, now must feel more rain.
Car. Fetch officers.
[Exit Katherine and Servants with the body of Susan.
Frank. For whom?
Car. For thee, sirrah, sirrah! Some knives have foolish posies upon them, but thine has a villainous one; look! [Showing the bloody knife.] O, it is enamelled with the heart-blood of thy hated wife, my belovèd daughter! What sayest thou to this evidence? is’t not sharp? does’t not strike home? Thou canst not answer honestly and without a trembling heart to this one point, this terrible bloody point.
Win. I beseech you, sir,
Strike him no more; you see he’s dead already.
Car. O, sir, you held his horses; you are as arrant a rogue as he: up go you too.
Frank. As you’re a man, throw not upon that woman
Your loads of tyranny, for she is innocent.
Car. How! how! a woman! Is’t grown to a fashion for women in all countries to wear the breeches?
Win. I’m not as my disguise speaks me, sir, his page,
But his first, only wife, his lawful wife.
Car. How! how! more fire i’ th’ bed-straw![454]
Win. The wrongs which singly fell upon your daughter
On me are multiplied; she lost a life,
But I an husband, and myself must lose
If you call him to a bar for what he has done.
Car. He has done it, then?
Win. Yes, ’tis confessed to me.
Frank. Dost thou betray me?
Win. O, pardon me, dear heart! I’m mad to lose thee,
And know not what I speak; but if thou didst,
I must arraign this father for two sins,
Adultery and murder.
Re-enter Katherine.
Kath. Sir, they are come.
Car. Arraign me for what thou wilt, all Middlesex knows me better for an honest man than the middle of a market-place knows thee for an honest woman.—Rise, sirrah, and don your tacklings; rig yourself for the gallows, or I’ll carry thee thither on my back: your trull shall to the gaol go with you: there be as fine Newgate birds as she that can draw him in: pox on’s wounds!
Frank. I have served thee, and my wages now are paid;
Yet my worse punishment shall, I hope, be stayed. [Exeunt.
