HOSPITALITY.
Lady Conscience, pleaseth it you to walk home to dinner with me?[179]
CONSCIENCE.
I give you thanks,[180] my good friend Hospitality;
But I pray, sir, have you invited to dinner any stranger?
HOSPITALITY.
No, sure; none but Lady Love, and three or four honest neighbours.
SIMPLICITY.
Mass, my lady is gotten to dinner already:
I believe she rose at ten o'clock, she is so hungry.
What, and I should come to dinner, hast thou any good cheer.
HOSPITALITY.
I have bread and beer, one joint of meat, and welcome, thy best fare.
SIMPLICITY.
Why, art thou call'd Hospitality, and hast no better cheer than that?
I'll tell thee, if thou hast no more meat for so many, they'll
ne'er be fat.
What, if my cousin—nay, I myself alone—to dinner should come,
Where should my lady and the rest dine, for I could eat up every crumb?
Thou art an old miser: dost thou keep no better fare in thy house?
Hast thou no great bag-pudding, nor hog's-face that is called souse?
HOSPITALITY.
My friend, hospitality doth not consist in great fare and banqueting,
But in doing good unto the poor, and to yield them some refreshing;
Therefore, thou and Sincerity will come and take part:
Such as I have I'll give you with a free and willing heart.
[Exeunt HOSPITALITY and CONSCIENCE.
SIMPLICITY.
He speaks well, cousin; let's go to dinner with him.
The old man shall not think but we will pleasure him.
Faith, he might have richer fellows than we to take his part,
But he shall never have better eating fellows, if he would
swelt his heart.
Here be them that will eat with the proudest of them;
I am sure my mother said I could eat so much as five men.
Nay, I have a gift for eating, I tell ye,
For our maids would never believe I put all the meat in my belly.
But I have spied a knave, my Lady Lucre's cogging man.
Give me your letters, cousin; I'll prefer ye, if I can.
Enter DISSIMULATION.