by Ben Jonson
Is nothing: we will eat such at a meal.
The heads of parrots, tongues of nightingales,
The brains of peacocks, and of estriches
Shall be our food, and, could we get the phoenix,
Though nature lost her kind, she were our dish.
CELIA: Good sir, these things might move a mind affected
With such delights; but I, whose innocence
Is all I can think wealthy, or worth th’ enjoying,
And which, once lost, I have nought to lose beyond it,
210 Cannot be taken with these sensual baits.
If you have conscience –
VOLPONE: ’Tis the beggar’s virtue.
If thou hast wisdom, hear me, Celia.
Thy baths shall be the juice of July-flowers,
Spirit of roses, and of violets,
The milk of unicorns, and panthers’ breath
Gathered in bags and mixed with Cretan wines.
Our drink shall be prepared gold and amber,
Which we will take until my roof whirl round
With the vertigo; and my dwarf shall dance,
220 My eunuch sing, my fool make up the antic.
Whilst we, in changèd shapes, act Ovid’s tales,
Thou like Europa now, and I like Jove,
Then I like Mars, and thou like Erycine;
So of the rest, till we have quite run through,
And wearied all the fables of the gods.
Then will I have thee in more modern forms,
Attirèd like some sprightly dame of France,
Brave Tuscan lady, or proud Spanish beauty;
Sometimes unto the Persian Sophy’s wife,
230 Or the Grand Signior’s mistress; and, for change,
To one of our most artful courtesans,
Or some quick Negro, or cold Russian;
And I will meet thee in as many shapes;
Where we may so transfuse our wand’ ring souls
Out at our lips and score up sums of pleasures,
That the curious shall not know
How to tell them as they flow;
And the envious, when they find
What their number is, be pined.
240 CELIA: If you have ears that will be pierced, or eyes
That can be opened, a heart may be touched,
Or any part that yet sounds man about you;
If you have touch of holy saints, or heaven,
Do me the grace to let me ’scape. If not,
Be bountiful and kill me. you do know
I am a creature hither ill betrayed
By one whose shame I would forget it were.
If you will deign me neither of these graces,
Yet feed your wrath, sir, rather than your lust,
250 (It is a vice comes nearer manliness)
And punish that unhappy crime of nature,
Which you miscall my beauty: flay my face,
Or poison it with ointments for seducing
Your blood to this rebellion. Rub these hands
With what may cause an eating leprosy,
E’en to my bones and marrow; anything
That may disfavour me, save in my honour,
And I will kneel to you, pray for you, pay down
A thousand hourly vows, sir, for your health;
Report, and think you virtuous –
260 VOLPONE: Think me cold,
Frozen, and impotent, and so report me?
That I had Nestor’s hernia thou wouldst think.
I do degenerate and abuse my nation
To play with opportunity thus long;
I should have done the act, and then have parleyed.
Yield, or I’ll force thee.
[He seizes her.]
CELIA O! just God!
VOLPONE: In vain –
BONARIO: Forbear, foul ravisher! libidinous swine!
He leaps out from where MOSCA had placed him.
Free the forced lady, or thou diest, impostor.
But that I am loath to snatch thy punishment
270 Out of the hand of justice, thou shouldst yet
Be made the timely sacrifice of vengeance,
Before this altar, and this dross, thy idol.
Lady, let’s quit the place, it is the den
Of villainy; fear nought, you have a guard;
And he ere long shall meet his just reward.
[Exeunt BONARIO and CELIA.]
VOLPONE: Fall on me, roof, and bury me in ruin!
Become my grave, that wert my shelter! O!
I am unmasked, unspirited, undone,
Betrayed to beggary, to infamy –
III, Viii [Enter MOSCA, wounded and bleeding.]
[MOSCA:] Where shall I run, most wretched shame of men,
To beat out my unlucky brains?
VOLPONE: Here, here.
What! dost thou bleed?
MOSCA: O, that his well-driven sword
Had been so courteous to have cleft me down
Unto the navel, ere I lived to see
My life, my hopes, my spirits, my patron, all
Thus desperately engagèd by my error.
VOLPONE: Woe on thy fortune!
MOSCA: And my follies, sir.
VOLPONE: Th’ hast made me miserable.
MOSCA: And myself, sir.
10 Who would have thought he would have hearkened so?
VOLPONE: What shall we do?
MOSCA: I know not; if my heart
Could expiate the mischance, I’d pluck it out.
Will you be pleased to hang me, or cut my throat?
And I’ll requite you, sir. Let’s the like Romans,
Since we have lived like Grecians.
They knock without.
VOLPONE: Hark! who’s there?
I hear some footing; officers, the Saffi,
Come to apprehend us! I do feel the brand
Hissing already at my forehead; now,
Mine ears are boring.
MOSCA: To your couch, sir; you
20 Make that place good, however. Guilty men
Suspect what they deserve still.
[MOSCA admits CORBACCIO.]
Signior Corbaccio!
III, ix [CORBACCIO:] Why, how now, Mosca?
MOSCA: O, undone, amazed, sir.
Your son, I know not by what accident,
Acquainted with your purpose to my patron,
Touching your will, and making him your heir,
Entered our house with violence, his sword drawn,
Sought for you, called you wretch, unnatural,
Vowed he would kill you.
CORBACCIO: Me?
MOSCA: Yes, and my patron.
CORBACCIO: This act shall disinherit him indeed.
Here is the will.
MOSCA: ’Tis well, sir.
CORBACCIO: Right and well.
Be you as careful now for me.
[Enter VOLTORE, behind.]
10 MOSCA: My life, sir,
Is not more tendered; I am only yours.
CORBACCIO: How does he? Will he the shortly, think’st thou?
MOSCA: I fear
He’ll outlast May.
CORBACCIO: Today?
MOSCA [shouting]: No, last out May, sir.
CORBACCIO: Couldst thou not gi’ him a dram?
MOSCA: O, by no means, sir.
CORBACCIO: Nay, I’ll not bid you.
VOLTORE: This is a knave, I see.
MOSCA [aside]: How! Signior Voltore! Did he hear me?
VOLTORE: Parasite!
MOSCA: Who’s that? O, sir, most timely welcome.
VOLTORE: Scarce
To the discovery of your tricks, I fear.
You are his, only? And mine, also, are you not?
[CORBACCIO stands aside.]
20 MOSCA: Who? I, sir?
VOLTORE: You, sir. what device is this
About a will?
MOSCA: A plot for you, sir.
VOLTOR
E: Come,
Put not your foists upon me; I shall scent ’em.
MOSCA: Did you not hear it?
VOLTORE: Yes, I hear Corbaccio
Hath made your patron there his heir.
MOSCA: ’Tis true,
By my device, drawn to it by my plot,
With hope –
VOLTORE: Your patron should reciprocate?
And you have promised?
MOSCA: For your good I did, sir.
Nay, more, I told his son, brought, hid him here,
Where he might hear his father pass the deed;
30 Being persuaded to it by this thought, sir:
That the unnaturalness, first, of the act,
And then his father’s oft disclaiming in him
(Which I did mean t’ help on) would sure enrage him
To do some violence upon his parent.
On which the law should take sufficient hold,
And you be stated in a double hope.
Truth be my comfort, and my conscience,
My only aim was to dig you a fortune
Out of these two old, rotten sepulchres –
VOLTORE: I cry thee mercy, Mosca.
40 MOSCA: Worth your patience,
And your great merit, sir. And see the change!
VOLTORE: Why? what success?
MOSCA: Most hapless! you must help, sir,
Whilst we expected th’ old raven, in comes
Corvino’s wife, sent hither by her husband –
VOLTORE: What, with a present?
MOSCA: No, sir, on visitation;
(I’ ll tell you how anon) and staying long,
The youth he grows impatient, rushes forth,
Seizeth the lady, wounds me, makes her swear
(Or he would murder her, that was his vow)
50 T’ affirm my patron to have done her rape,
Which how unlike it is, you see! and hence,
With that pretext, he’s gone t’ accuse his father,
Defame my patron, defeat you –
VOLTORE: Where’s her husband?
Let him be sent for straight.
MOSCA: Sir, I’ ll go fetch him.
VOLTORE: Bring him to the Scrutineo.
MOSCA: Sir, I will.
VOLTORE: This must be stopped.
MOSCA: O, you do nobly, sir.
Alas, ’twas laboured all, sir, for your good;
Nor was there want of counsel in the plot.
But Fortune can, at any time, o’erthrow
60 The projects of a hundred learnèd clerks, sir.
CORBACCIO: What’s that?
VOLTORE [to CORBACCIO]: Will’t please you, sir, to go along?
[Exeunt CORBACCIO and VOLTORE.]
MOSCA: Patron, go in and pray for our success.
VOLPONE: Need makes devotion; heaven your labour bless!
[Exeunt]
ACT FOUR
[SCENE ONE]
v,i [A street in Venice.]
[Enter SIR POLITIC and PEREGRINE.]
[SIR POLITIC:] I told you, sir, it was a plot; you see
What observation is! You mentioned me
For some instructions: I will tell you, sir,
Since we are met here in this height of Venice,
Some few particulars I have set down
Only for this meridian, fit to be known
Of your crude traveller; and they are these.
I will not touch, sir, at your phrase, or clothes,
For they are old.
PEREGRINE: Sir, I have better.
SIR POLITIC: Pardon,
10 I meant as they are themes.
PEREGRINE: O, sir, proceed.
I’ll slander you no more of wit, good sir.
SIR POLITIC: First, for your garb, it must be grave and serious,
Very reserved and locked; not tell a secret
On any terms, not to your father; scarce
A fable but with caution; make sure choice
Both of your company and discourse; beware
You never speak a truth –
PEREGRINE: How!
SIR POLITIC: Not to strangers,
For those be they you must converse with most;
Others I would not know, sir, but at distance,
20 So as I still might be a saver in ’em.
You shall have tricks, else, passed upon you hourly.
And then, for your religion, profess none,
But wonder at the diversity of all;
And, for your part, protest were there no other
But simply the laws o’ th’ land, you could content you.
Nick Machiavel and Monsieur Bodin both
Were of this mind. Then must you learn the use
And handling of your silver fork at meals,
The metal of your glass (these are main matters
30 With your Italian), and to know the hour
When you must eat your melons and your figs.
PEREGRINE: Is that a point of state too?
SIR POLITIC: Here it is.
For your Venetian, if he see a man
Preposterous in the least, he has him straight;
He has, he strips him. I’ll acquaint you, sir.
I now have lived here ’tis some fourteen months;
Within the first week of my landing here,
All took me for a citizen of Venice,
I knew the forms so well –
PEREGRINE [aside]: And nothing else.
40 SIR POLITIC: I had read Contarini, took me a house,
Dealt with my Jews to furnish it with movables –
Well, if I could but find one man, one man
To mine own heart, whom I durst trust, I would –
PEREGRINE: What, what, sir?
SIR POLITIC: Make him rich, make him a fortune:
He should not think again. I would command it.
PEREGRINE: As how?
SIR POLITIC: With certain projects that I have,
Which I may not discover.
PEREGRINE [aside]: If I had
But one to wager with, I would lay odds, now,
He tells me instantly.
SIR POLITIC: One is (and that
50 I care not greatly who knows) to serve the state
Of Venice with red herrings for three years,
And at a certain rate, from Rotterdam,
Where I have correspondence. There’s a letter
Sent me from one o’ th’ States, and to that purpose;
He cannot write his name, but mat’s his mark.
PEREGRINE: He is a chandler?
SIR POLITIC: No, a cheesemonger.
There are some other too with whom I treat
About the same negotiation;
And I will undertake it: for ’tis thus
60 I’ll do ’t with ease, I’ve cast it all. Your hoy
Carries but three men in her, and a boy;
And she shall make me three returns a year.
So, if there come but one of three, I save;
If two, I can defalk. But this is now
If my main project fail.
PEREGRINE: Then you have others?
SIR POLITIC: I should be loath to draw the subtle air
Of such a place without my thousand aims.
I’ll not dissemble, sir; where’er I come
I love to be considerative, and ’tis true
70 I have at my free hours thought upon
Some certain goods unto the state of Venice,
Which I do call my cautions; and, sir, which
I mean, in hope of pension, to propound
To the Great Council, then unto the Forty,
So to the Ten. My means are made already –
PEREGRINE: By whom?
SIR POLITIC: Sir, one that though his place be obscure,
Yet he can sway, and they will hear him. He’s
A commnendatore.
PEREGRINE: What, a common sergeant?
SIR POLITIC: Sir, such a
s they are put it in their mouths
80 What they should say, sometimes, as well as greater.
I think I have my notes to show you –
PEREGRINE: Good sir.
SIR POLITIC: But you shall swear unto me, on your gentry,
Not to anticipate –
PEREGRINE: I, sir?
SIR POLITIC: Nor reveal
A circumstance – My paper is not with me.
PEREGRINE: O, but you can remember, sir.
SIR POLITIC: My first is
Concerning tinder-boxes. You must know
No family is here without its box.
Now, sir, it being so portable a thing,
Put case that you or I were ill affected
90 Unto the state; sir, with it in our pockets
Might not I go into the Arsenal?
Or you? Come out again? And none the wiser?
PEREGRINE: Except yourself, sir.
SIR POLITIC: Go to, then. I therefore
Advertise to the state how fit it were
That none but such as were known patriots,
Sound lovers of their country, should be suffered
T’ enjoy them in their houses; and even those
Sealed at some office, and at such a bigness
As might not lurk in pockets.
PEREGRINE: Admirable!
100 SIR POLITIC: My next is, how t’ inquire, and be resolved
By present demonstration, whether a ship
Newly arrivèd from Syria, or from
Any suspected part of all the Levant,
Be guilty of the plague. And where they use
To He out forty, fifty days, sometimes,
About the Lazaretto for their trial,
I’ll save that charge and loss unto the merchant,
And in an hour clear the doubt.
PEREGRINE: Indeed, sir!
SIR POLITIC: Or – I will lose my labour.
PEREGRINE: My faith, that’s much.
110 SIR POLITIC: Nay, sir, conceive me. ’Twill cost me, in onions,
Some thirty livres –
PEREGRINE: Which is one pound sterling.
SIR POLITIC: Beside my waterworks. For this I do, sir:
First, I bring in your ship ’twixt two brick walls –
But those the state shall venture. On the one
I strain me a fair tarpaulin, and in that
I stick my onions, cut in halves; the other
Is full of loopholes, out at which I thrust
The noses of my bellows; and those bellows
I keep, with waterworks, in perpetual motion,
120 Which is the easiest matter of a hundred.
Now, sir, your onion, which doth naturally
Attract th’ infection, and your bellows blowing
The air upon him, will show instantly
By his changed colour if there be contagion,
Or else remain as fair as at the first.
Now ’tis known, ’tis nothing.
PEREGRINE: You are right, sir.