The imagination is fed with precise words, precise details. Thus, one after another, the would-be heirs come like beasts of prey. The second who arrives is an old miser, Corbaccio, deaf, "impotent," almost dying, who, nevertheless, hopes to survive Volpone. To make more sure of it, he would fain have Mosca give his master a narcotic. He has it about him, this excellent opiate: he has had it prepared under his own eyes, he suggests it. His joy on finding Volpone more ill than himself is bitterly humorous:
"Corbaccio. How does your patron?...
Mosca. His mouth
Is ever gaping, and his eyelids hang.
C. Good.
M. A freezing numbness stiffens all his joints,
And makes the color of his flesh like lead.
C. 'Tis good.
M. His pulse beats slow, and dull.
C. Good symptoms still.
M. And from his brain—
C. I conceive you; good.
M. Flows a cold sweat, with a continual rheum,
Forth the resolved corners of his eyes.
C. Is't possible? Yet I am better, ha!
How does he, with the swimming of his head?
M. O, sir, 'tis past the scotomy; he now
Hath lost his feeling, and hath left to snort:
You hardly can perceive him, that he breathes.
C. Excellent, excellent! sure I shall outlast him:
This makes me young again, a score of years."[548]
If you would be his heir, says Mosca, the moment is favorable, but you must not let yourself be forestalled. Voltore has been here, and presented him with this piece of plate:
"C. See, Mosca, look,
Here, I have brought a bag of bright chequines.
Will quite weigh down his plate....
M. Now, would I counsel you, make home with speed;
There, frame a will; whereto you shall inscribe
My master your sole heir....
C. This plot
Did I think on before....
M. And you so certain to survive him—
C. Ay.
M. Being so lusty a man—
C. 'Tis true."[549]
And the old man hobbles away, not hearing the insults and ridicule thrown at him, he is so deaf.
When he is gone the merchant Corvino arrives, bringing an orient pearl and a splendid diamond:
"Corvino. Am I his heir?
Mosca. Sir, I am sworn, I may not show the will
Till he be dead; but here has been Corbaccio,
Here has been Voltore, here were others too,
I cannot number 'em, they were so many;
All gaping here for legacies: but I,
Taking the vantage of his naming you,
Signior Corvino, Signior Corvino, took
Paper, and pen, and ink, and there I asked him,
Whom he would have his heir? Corvino. Who
Should be executor? Corvino. And,
To any question he was silent to,
I still interpreted the nods he made,
Through weakness, for consent: and sent home th' others,
Nothing bequeath'd them, but to cry and curse.
Cor. O my dear Mosca!... Has he children?
M. Bastards,
Some dozen, or more, that he begot on beggars,
Gypsies, and Jews, and black-moors, when he was drunk....
Speak out:
You may be louder yet....
Faith, I could stifle him rarely with a pillow,
As well as any woman that should keep him.
C. Do as you will; but I'll begone."[550]
Corvino presently departs; for the passions of the time have all the beauty of frankness. And Volpone, casting aside his sick man's garb, cries:
"My divine Mosca!
Thou hast to-day out gone thyself.... Prepare
Me music, dances, banquets, all delights;
The Turk is not more sensual in his pleasures,
Than will Volpone."[551]
On this invitation, Mosca draws a most voluptuous portrait of Corvino's wife, Celia. Smitten with a sudden desire, Volpone dresses himself as a mountebank, and goes singing under her windows with all the sprightliness of a quack; for he is naturally a comedian, like a true Italian, of the same family as Scaramouch, as good an actor in the public square as in his house. Having once seen Celia, he resolves to obtain her at any price: