Tib. “Her neele, by him that made me!”
Hodge. “How a murrain came this chaunce (say Tib) unto her dame?”
Tib. “My Gammer sat her down on the pes, and bade me reach thy breches,
And by and by, a vengeance on it, or she had take two stitches
To clout upon the knee, by chaunce aside she lears,
And Gib our cat, in the milk pan, she spied over head and ears.
Ah! out, out, theefe, she cried aloud, and swapt the breeches down,
Up went her staffe, and out leapt Gib at doors into the town:
And since that time was never wight cold set their eyes upon it.
God’s malison she have Cocke and I bid twentie times light on it.”
Hodge. “And is not then my breches sewed up, to-morrow that I shuld wear?”
Tib. “No, in faith, Hodge, thy breches lie, for all this never the near.”
Hodge. “Now a vengeance light on al the sort, that better shold have kept it;
The cat, the house, and Tib our maid, that better should have swept it.
Se, where she cometh crawling! Come on, come on thy lagging way;
Ye have made a fair daies worke, have you not? pray you, say.”
———
Act I. Scene 4. Gammer, Hodge, Tib, Cocke.
Gammer. “Alas, alas, I may well curse and ban
This day, that ever I saw it, with Gib and the milke pan.
For these, and ill lucke together, as knoweth Cocke my boy,
Have stacke away my dear neele, and rob’d me of my joy,
My fair long straight neele, that was mine only treasure,
The first day of my sorrow is, and last of my pleasure.”
Hodge. “Might ha kept it when ye had it; but fools will be fools still:
Lose that is fast in your hands? ye need not, but ye will.”