Mat. If it offend you, sir, ’tis for my pleasure.
Orl. Your pleasure be’t, sir. Umh, is this your palace?
Bell. Yes, and our kingdom, for ’tis our content.
Orl. It’s a very poor kingdom then; what, are all your subjects gone a sheep-shearing? not a maid? not a man? not so much as a cat? You keep a good house belike, just like one of your profession, every room with bare walls, and a half-headed bed to vault upon, as all your bawdy-houses are. Pray who are your upholsters? Oh, the spiders, I see, they bestow hangings upon you.
Mat. Bawdy-house? Zounds, sir—
Bell. Oh sweet Matheo, peace. Upon my knees
I do beseech you, sir, not to arraign me
For sins, which Heaven, I hope, long since hath pardoned!
Those flames, like lightning flashes, are so spent,
The heat no more remains, than where ships went,
Or where birds cut the air, the print remains.
Mat. Pox on him, kneel to a dog.
Bell. She that’s a whore,
Lives gallant, fares well, is not, like me, poor.
I ha’ now as small acquaintance with that sin,
As if I had never known’t, t’ had never been.
Orl. No acquaintance with it? what maintains thee then? how dost live then? Has thy husband any lands? any rents coming in, any stock going, any ploughs jogging, any ships sailing? hast thou any wares to turn, so much as to get a single penny by?
Yes thou hast ware to sell,
Knaves are thy chapmen, and thy shop is hell.