STRUMBO.
Wild fire and pitch, wild fire and pitch.
THRASIMACHUS.
Villains, I say, tell us the cause hereof?
STRUMBO.
Wild fire and pitch, &c.
THRASIMACHUS.
Tell me, you villains, why you make this noise,
Or with my lance I will prick your bowels out.
ALBA.
Where are your houses, where’s your dwelling place?
STRUMBO.
Place? Ha, ha, ha! laugh a month and a day at him. Place! I cry God mercy: why, do you think that such poor honest men as we be, hold our habitacles in kings’ palaces? Ha, ha, ha! But because you seem to be an abominable chieftain, I will tell you our state.
From the top to the toe,
From the head to the shoe;
From the beginning to the ending,
From the building to the burning.
This honest fellow and I had our mansion cottage in the suburbs of this city, hard by the temple of Mercury. And by the common soldiers of the Shitens, the Scithians— what do you call them?—with all the suburbs were burnt to the ground, and the ashes are left there, for the country wives to wash bucks withall.
And that which grieves me most,
My loving wife,
(O cruel strife!)
The wicked flames did roast.
And therefore, captain crust,
We will continually cry,
Except you seek a remedy
Our houses to reedify
Which now are burnt to dust.
BOTH CRY.
Wild fire and pitch, wild fire and pitch.