Enter Claridiana and Rogero bound; with a Friar and Officers.
Rog. My friend, is it the rigour of the law
I should be tied thus hard, I’ll undergo it;
If not, prithee then slacken. Yet I have deserved it;
This murder lies heavy on my conscience.
Cla. Wedlock, ay, here’s my wedlock! O whore, whore, whore! 21
Friar. O, sir, be qualified.
Cla. Sir,[314] I am to die a dog’s death, and will snarl a little at the old signor. You are only a parenthesis, which I will leave out of my execrations; but first to our quondam wives, that makes us cry our vowels in red capital letters, “I[315] and U are cuckolds!” O may bastard-bearing, with the pangs of childbirth, be doubled to ’em![316] May they have ever twins, and be three week in travail between! May they be so rivell’d[317] with painting by that time they are thirty, that it may be held a work of condign merit but to look upon ’em! May they live to ride in triumph in a dung-cart, and be brown’d with all the odious ceremonies belonging to ’t! may the cucking-stool be their recreation, and a dungeon
their dying-chamber! May they have nine lives like a cat, to endure this and more! May they be burnt for witches of a sudden! And lastly, may the opinion of philosophers prove true, that women have no souls! 39
Enter Thais and Abigail.
Tha. What, husband—at your prayers so seriously?
Cla. Yes, a few orisons. Friar, thou that stand’st between the soul of men and the devil, keep these female spirits away, or I will renounce my faith else.
Abi. O husband, I little thought to see you in this taking!