Herc. An act against the plurality of mistresses.
Cup. Read. 220
Herc. Whereas some over amorous and unconscionable covetous young gallants, without all grace of Venus, or the fear of Cupid in their minds, have at one time engrossed
the care or cures of divers mistresses, with the charge of ladies, into their own tenure or occupation,[285] whereby their mistresses must of necessity be very ill and insufficiently served, and likewise many able portly gallants live unfurnished of competent entertainment, to the merit of their bodies; and whereas likewise some other greedy strangers have taken in the purlieus, outset land, and the ancient commons of our sovereign liege Don Cupid, taking in his very highways, and enclosing them, and annexing them to their own lordships, to the much impoverishing and putting of divers of Cupid’s true hearts and loyal subjects to base and abhominable[286] shifts: Be it therefore enacted, by the sovereign authority and erected ensign of Don Cupid, with the assent of some of the lords, most of the ladies, and all the commons, that what person or persons soever shall, in the trade of honour, presume to wear at one time two ladies’ favours, or at one time shall earnestly court two women in the way of marriage, or if any under the degree of a duke shall keep above twenty women of pleasure, a duke’s brother fifteen, a lord ten, a knight or a pensioner or both four, a gentleman two, shall ipso facto be arrested by folly’s mace, and instantly committed to the ship of fools, without either bail or main prize, Millesimo centesimo quingentesimo quadragesimo nono Cupidinis semper unius.—Nymphadoro, to the bar! 248
Nym. Shame o’ folly, will Fawn now turn an informer? Does he laugh at me?
Herc. Domina Garbetza, did he not ever protest you were his most only elected mistress?
Gar. He did.
Herc. Domina Donetta, did he not ever protest, you were his most only elected mistress?
Don. He did.
Herc. Domina Poveia, did he not ever protest, that you were his most only elected mistress?