You wot well who they bee.
The sum doth arise to three companies:
One, two, three, foure, make we.
Besides we that travel, with pumps full of gravell,
Made all of such running leather,
That once in a week, new masters we seeke,
And never can hold together.
The actual performance, perhaps owing to a Marstonian interpolation, consists of a fragment of The Prodigal Child, together with a fragment of a piece on Troilus and Cressida. At the end Posthaste extemporizes on a 'theame' and the company are rewarded with 3s. 4d. In Act III a Marstonian passage introduces them to a new poet Chrisoganus, who asks ten pounds a play. But 'our companie's hard of hearing of that side', and they will be content with their goose-quillian Posthast'. Chrisoganus rates their pride and the 'windy froth of bottle-ale' which passes muster for poetry on the stage. The 'proud statute rogues' also refuse an offer from Mavortius of 13s. 4d. or even £1 6s. 8d. for another performance, and in view of their 'expense in sumptuous clothes' they must have 'ten pound a play, or no point comedy'. Their insolence is condemned:
How soone can they remember to forget
Their undeserved fortunes and esteeme.