A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Ix Part 94

CLOWN. I have heard of many black-jacks, sir, but never of a blue-bottle.

ILF. Well, sir, are you of the house?

CLOWN. No, sir, I am twenty yards without, and the house stands without me.

BAR. Prythee, tell's who owes[333] this building?

CLOWN. He that dwells in it, sir.

ILF. Who dwells in it, then?

CLOWN. He that owes it.

ILF. What's his name?

CLOWN. I was none of his G.o.d-father.

ILF. Does Master Scarborow lie here?

CLOWN. I'll give you a rhyme for that, sir-- Sick men may lie, and dead men in their graves.

Few else do lie abed at noon, but drunkards, punks, and knaves.

ILF. What am I the better for thy answer?

CLOWN. What am I the better for thy question?

ILF. Why, nothing.

CLOWN. Why, then, of nothing comes nothing.

_Enter_ SCARBOROW.

WEN. 'Sblood, this is a philosophical fool.

CLOWN. Then I, that am a fool by art, am better than you, that are fools by nature. [_Exit_.

SCAR. Gentlemen, welcome to Yorks.h.i.+re.

ILF. And well-encountered, my little villain of fifteen hundred a year.

'Sfoot, what makest thou here in this barren soil of the North, when thy honest friends miss thee at London?

SCAR. Faith, gallants, 'tis the country where my father lived, where first I saw the light, and where I am loved.

ILF. Loved! ay, as courtiers love usurers, and that is just as long as they lend them money. Now, dare I lay--

WEN. None of your land, good knight, for that is laid to mortgage already.

ILF. I dare lay with any man, that will take me up.

WEN. _Who list to have a lubberly load_. [_Sings this_.[334]

ILF. Sirrah wag, this rogue was son and heir to Antony Now-now[335] and Blind Moon. And he must needs be a scurvy musician, that hath two fiddlers to his fathers: but tell me, in faith, art thou not--nay, I know thou art, called down into the country here by some h.o.a.ry knight or other who, knowing thee a young gentleman of good parts and a great living, hath desired thee to see some pitiful piece of his workmans.h.i.+p --a daughter, I mean. Is't not so?

SCAR. About some such preferment I came down.

ILF. Preferment's a good word. And when do you commence into the cuckold's order--the preferment you speak of? when shall we have gloves;[336] when, when?

SCAR. Faith, gallants, I have been guest here but since last night.

ILF. Why, and that is time enough to make up a dozen marriages, as marriages are made up nowadays. For look you, sir; the father, according to the fas.h.i.+on, being sure you have a good living, and without enc.u.mbrance, comes to you thus:--takes you by the hand thus:--wipes his long beard thus:--or turns up his moustachio thus:--walks some turn or two thus:--to show his comely gravity thus:--and having washed his foul mouth thus: at last breaks out thus.----

WEN. O G.o.d! let us hear no more of this?

ILF.----Master Scarborow, you are a young gentleman; I knew your father well, he was my wors.h.i.+pful good neighbour, for our demesnes lay near together. Then, sir, you and I must be of more near acquaintance, at which you must make an eruption thus:--O G.o.d (sweet sir)--

BAR. 'Sfoot, the knight would have made an excellent Zany in an Italian comedy.

ILF. When he goes forward thus: Sir, myself am lord of some thousand a year, a widower (Master Scarborow). I have a couple of young gentlewomen to my daughters: a thousand a year will do well divided among them; ha, will't not, Master Scarborow? At which you out of your education must reply thus: The portion will deserve them worthy husbands: on which tinder he soon takes fire, and swears you are the man his hopes shot at, and one of them shall be yours.

WEN. If I did not like her, should he swear himself[337] to the devil, I would make him foresworn.

ILF. Then putting you and the young pug[338] too in a close room together----

WEN. If he should lie with her there, is not the father partly the bawd?

ILF.----Where the young puppet, having the lesson before from the old fox, gives the son half a dozen warm kisses which, after her father's oaths, takes such impression in thee, thou straight call'st, By Jesu, mistress, I love you!--when she has the wit to ask, But, sir, will you marry me? and thou, in thy c.o.c.k-sparrow humour, repliest, Ay, before G.o.d, as I am a gentleman, will I; which the father overhearing, leaps in, takes you at your word, swears he is glad to see this; nay, he will have you contracted straight, and for a need makes the priest of himself.

Thus in one hour, from a quiet life, Thou art sworn in debt, and troubled with a wife.

BAR. But can they love one another so soon?

ILF. O, it is no matter nowadays for love; 'tis well, and they can but make s.h.i.+ft to lie together.

WEN. But will your father do this too, if he know the gallant breathes himself at some two or three bawdy-houses in a morning?

ILF. O, the sooner; for that and the land together tell the old lad, he will know the better how to deal with his daughter.

The wise and ancient fathers know this rule, Should both wed maids, the child would be a fool.

Come, wag, if thou hast gone no further than into the ordinary fas.h.i.+on-- meet, see, and kiss--give over; marry not a wife, to have a hundred plagues for one pleasure: let's to London, there's variety: and change of pasture makes fat calves.

SCAR. But change of women bald knaves, sir knight.

ILF. Wag, and thou beest a lover but three days, thou wilt be heartless, sleepless, witless, mad, wretched, miserable, and indeed a stark fool; and by that thou hast been married but three weeks, though thou shouldst wed a _Cynthia rara avis_, thou wouldst be a man monstrous--a cuckold, a cuckold.

BAR. And why is a cuckold monstrous, knight?

ILF. Why, because a man is made a beast by being married. Take but example thyself from the moon: as soon as she is delivered of her great belly, doth she not point at the world with a pair of horns, as who would say: Married men, ye are cuckolds.

SCAR. I construe more divinely of their s.e.x: Being maids, methinks they are angels; and being wives, They are sovereign cordials that preserve our lives,[339]

They are like our hands that feed us; this is clear, They renew man, as spring renews the year.