Enter Captain Pouts, with a letter, and Strange, like a soldier.
Strange. O, these are Lambeth fields.
Capt. Pouts. Strange murder'd on the wedding-day by you,
At his own bride's appointment, for my sake?
Strange. As dead as charity.
Capt. Pouts. This sounds not well.
Strange. 'Zoons! you may say as well I am the man,
As doubt he lives. A plague of your belief!
D'ye know this bloody ruff, which she has sent,
Lest you should be incredulous, and this ring
Which you have seen her wear.
Capt. Pouts. I know the ring,
And I have seen the ruff about his neck.
This comes of enforc'd marriages. Where was't done?
And how escap'd you?
Strange. Sir, receive it briefly.
I am her kinsman, and being newly come
Over, and not intending to stay long,
Took this day to go see my cousin Worldly
(For so my name is), where I found all of them
So deeply drenched in the bridal cup,
That sleep had ta'en possession of their eyes.
Bacchus had given them such an overthrow,
Their bodies lay like slaughtered carcases;
One here, one there, making such antic faces,
As drunkenness had mock'd at drunkenness.
In troth, their postures and their sleep, like death
(For theirs was liker death than sober sleep),
Remember'd me of body-scatter'd fields,
After the bloody battles I have seen.
'Twas such a season, to make short my tale,
As fate had said, "Now murders may be done
And ne'er reveal'd." Approaching further, I
Lighted upon a chamber, where your love
Sat by this merchant, cast drunk on the bed—
She weeping and lamenting her mishap,
Assur'd both, of my daring and my trust,
Fell flat upon the ground, then rais'd herself,
Hung on my neck, then sunk down to my legs,
Told all things pass'd to-day, and never ceas'd,
Till I had ta'en life from that half-dead man
Before, whom straight I strangled with this rope.
Capt. Pouts. You have show'd some kindness to me:
I must love you, sir. What did you with his body?