DELIA.
And yet his wealth was all as much as yours,
CIVET. My estate, my estate, I thank God, is forty pound a year, in good leases and tenements, besides twenty mark a year at cuckolds-haven, and that comes to us all by inheritance.
DELIA.
That may, indeed, tis very fitly plied.
I know not how it comes, but so it falls out,
That those whose fathers have died wondrous rich,
And took no pleasure but to gather wealth,
Thinking of little that they leave behind
For them, they hope, will be of their like mind,—
But it falls out contrary: forty years sparing
Is scarce three seven years spending,—never caring
What will ensue, when all their coin is gone,
And all too late, then thrift is thought upon:
Oft have I heard, that pride and riot kissed,
And then repentence cries, ‘for had I wist.’
CIVET. You say well, sister Delia, you say well: but I mean to live within my bounds: for look you, I have set down my rest thus far, but to maintain my wife in her French-hood, and her coach, keep a couple of geldings, and a brace of gray hounds, and this is all I’ll do.
DELIA.
And you’ll do this with forty pound a year?
CIVET.
Aye, and a better penny, sister.
FRANCES.
Sister, you forget that at cuckolds-haven.
CIVET.
By my troth, well remembered, Frances;
I’ll give thee that to buy thee pins.
DELIA.
Keep you the rest for points: alas the day.
Fools shall have wealth, tho all the world say nay:
Come, brother, will you in? dinner stays for us.
CIVET.
Aye, good sister, with all my heart.