Volpone and Other Plays

by Ben Jonson

FILCHER: Twopence apiece, sir, the best motion in the Fair!

  WASP: I believe you lie. If you do, I’ ll have my money again and beat you.

  WINWIFE: Numps is come!

  WASP: Did you see a master of mine come in here, a tall young squire

  80 of Harrow o’ the Hill, Master Barthol’ mew Cokes?

  FILCHER: I think there be such a one within.

  WASP: Look he be, you were best; but it is very likely. I wonder I found him not at all the rest. I ha’ been at the eagle, and the black wolf, and the bull with the five legs and two pizzles (he was a calf at Uxbridge Fair, two years agone), and at the dogs that dance the morris, and the hare o’ the tabor, and missed him at all these! Sure this must needs be some fine sight that holds him so, if it have him.

  COKES: Come, come, are you ready now?

  90 LEATHERHBAD: Presently, sir.

  WASP: Hoyday, he’s at work in his doublet and hose. Do you hear, sir? are you employed, that you are bare-headed and so busy?

  COKES: Hold your peace, Numps; you ha’ been i’ the stocks, I hear.

  WASP: Does he know that? Nay, then the date of my authority is out; I must think no longer to reign, my government is at an end. He that will correct another must want fault in himself.

  WINWIFE: Sententious Numps! I never heard so much from him

  100 before.

  LEATHERHEAD: Sure, Master Littlewit will not come. Please you take your place, sir, we’ ll begin.

  COKES: I pray thee do; mine ears long to be at it, and my eyes

  too. O Numps, i’ the stocks, Numps? Where’s your sword, Numps?

  WASP: I pray you intend your game, sir; let me alone.

  COKES: Well then, we are quit for all. Come, sit down, Numps; I’ ll interpret to thee. Did you see Mistress Grace? It’s no matter, neither, now I think on’t, tell me anon.

  110 WINWIFE: A great deal of love and care he expresses.

  GRACE: Alas! would you have him to express more than he has? That were tyranny.

  [The curtains of the puppet-theatre are drawn.]

  COKES: Peace, ho; now, now.

  LEATHERHEAD: Gentles, that no longer your expectations may wander,

  Behold our chief actor, amorous Leander,

  With a great deal of cloth lapped about him like a scarf,

  For he yet serves his father, a dyer at Puddle Wharf,

  Which place we’ ll make bold with, to call it our Abydos,

  As the Bankside is our Sestos, and let it not be denied us.

  120 Now, as he is beating, to make the dye take the fuller,

  Who chances to come by but fair Hero in a sculler?

  And seeing Leander’s naked leg and goodly calf,

  Cast at him, from the boat, a sheep’s eye and a half.

  Now she is landed, and the sculler come back;

  By and by you shall see what Leander doth lack.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Cole, Cole, old Cole.

  LEATHERHEAD: That is the sculler’s name without control.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Cole, Cole, I say, Cole.

  LEATHERHEAD: We do hear you.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Old Cole.

  LEATHERHEAD: Old Cole? Is the dyer turned collier? How do you sell?

  PUPPET LEANDER: A pox o’ your manners, kiss my hole here and smell.

  130 LEATHBRHBAD: Kiss your hole and smell? There’s manners indeed.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Why, Cole, I say, Cole.

  LEATHERHEAD: It’s the sculler you need!

  PUPPET LEANDER: Ay, and be hanged.

  LEATHERHEAD: Be hanged! Look you yonder,

  Old Cole, you must go hang with Master Leander.

  PUPPET COLE: Where is he?

  PUPPET LEANDER: Here, Cole. What fairest of fairs Was that fare that thou landedst but now a’ Trig Stairs?

  COKES: What was that, fellow? Pray thee tell me; I scarce understand ’ em.

  LEATHERHEAD: Leander does ask, sir: What fairest of fairs Was the fare that he landed but now at Trig Stairs?

  140 PUPPET COLE: It is lovely Hero.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Nero?

  PUPPET COLE: No, Hero.

  LEATHERHEAD: It is Hero

  Of the Bankside, he saith, to tell you truth without erring,

  Is come over into Fish Street to eat some fresh herring.

  Leander says no more, but as fast as he can,

  Gets on all his best clothes, and will after to the Swan.

  COKES: Most admirable good, is’t not?

  LEATHERHEAD: Stay, sculler.

  PUPPET COLB: What say you?

  LEATHERHEAD: You must stay for Leander,

  150 And carry him to the wench.

  PUPPET COLE: You rogue, I am no pander.

  COKES: He says he is no pander. ’Tis a fine language; I understand it now.

  LEATHERHEAD: Are you no pander, Goodman Cole? Here’s no man says you are.

  You’ ll grow a hot Cole, it seems; pray you stay for your fare.

  PUPPET COLE: Will he come away?

  LEATHERHEAD: What do you say?

  PUPPET COLE: I’ d ha’ him come away.

  LEATHERHEAD: Would you ha’ Leander come away? Why pray, sir, stay.

  You are angry, Goodman Cole; I believe the fair maid Came over w’ you o’ trust. Tell us, sculler, you are paid?

  PUPPET COLE: Yes, Goodman Hogrubber o’ Pickt-hatch.

  LEATHERHEAD: How, Hogrubber o’ Pickt-hatch?

  160PUPPET COLE:

  Pickt-hatch

  Take you that

  Ay, Hogrubber o’

  LEATHERHEAD: O, my head!

  The PUPPET strikes him over the pate.

  PUPPET COLE: Harm watch, harm catch.

  COKES: Harm watch, harm catch, he says. Very good i’ faith; the sculler had like to ha’ knocked you, sirrah.

  LEATHERHEAD: Yes, but that his fare called him away.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Row apace, row apace, row, row, row, row, row.

  LEATHERHEAD: You are knavishly ’ oaden, sculler, take heed where you go.

  PUPPET COLE: Knave i’ your face, Goodman Rogue.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Row, row, row, row, row, row.

  COKES: He said knave i’ your face, friend.

  LEATHERHEAD: Aye, sir, I heard him. But there’s no talking to

  170 these watermen; they will ha’ the last word.

  COKES: God’s my life! I am not allied to the sculler yet; he shall be Dauphin my boy. But my fiddle-stick does fiddle in and out too much; I pray you speak to him on’t; tell him, I would have him tarry in my sight more.

  LEATHERHEAD: I pray you be content; you’ ll have enough on him, sir.

  Now gentles, I take it, here is none of you so stupid,

  But that you have heard of a little god of love, called Cupid;

  Who out of kindness to Leander, hearing he but saw her

  This present day and hour, doth turn himself to a drawer.

  180 And because he would have their first meeting to be merry,

  He strikes Hero in love to him with a pint of sherry.

  Which he tells her from amorous Leander is sent her,

  PUPPET LEANDER goes into Mistress Hero’s room.

  Who after him into the room of Hero doth venter

  PUPPET JONAS: A pint of sack, score a pint of sack i’ the Coney.

  COKES: Sack? You said but e’ en now it should be sherry.

  PUPPET JONAS: Why so it is: sherry, sherry, sherry.

  COKES: Sherry, sherry, sherry. By my troth he makes me merry.

  I must have a name for Cupid too. Let me see, thou mightst

  190 help me now, an’ thou wouldst, Numps, at a dead lift, but thou art dreaming o’ the stocks still! Do not think on’t, I have forgot it. ’Tis but a nine days’ wonder, man; let it not trouble thee.

  WASP: I would the stocks were about your neck, sir; condition I hung by the heels in them till the wonder were off from you, with all my heart.

  COKES: Well said, resolute Numps. But hark you, friend, where is the friends
hip, all this while, between my drum, Damon, and my pipe, Pythias?

  LEATHERHEAD: You shall see by and by, sir.

  200 COKES: You think my hobby-horse is forgotten, too. No, I’ ll see ’ em all enact before I go; I shall not know which to love best, else.

  KNOCKEM: This gallant has interrupting vapours, troublesome vapours, Whit; puff with him.

  WHIT: No, I pre dee, Captain, let him alone. He is a child i’ faith, la.

  LEATHERHEAD: Now, gentles, to the friends, who in number are two,

  And lodged in that ale-house in which fair Hero does do:

  Damon (for some kindness done him the last week)

  210 Is come fair Hero in Fish Street this morning to seek.

  Pythias does śmell the knavery of the meeting,

  And now you shall see their true friendly greeting.

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: You whoremasterly slave, you.

  COKES: Whoremasterly slave you? Very friendly and familiar, that!

  PUPPET DAMON: Whoremaster i’ thy face,

  Thou hast lien with her thyself, I’ ll prove ’t i’ this place.

  COKES: Damon says Pythias has lien with her himself; he’ ll prove’t in this place.

  LEATHERHEAD: They are whoremasters both, sir, that’s a plain case. 220

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: You lie like a rogue.

  LEATHERHEAD: Do I lie like a rogue?

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: A pimp and a scab.

  LEATHERHEAD: A pimp and a scab?

  I say between you, you have both but one drab.

  PUPPET DAMON: You lie again.

  LEATHERHEAD: Do I lie again?

  PUPPET DAMON: Like a rogue again.

  LEATHERHEAD: Like a rogue again?

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: And you are a pimp again.

  COKES: And you are a pimp again, he says.

  230 PUPPET DAMON: And a scab again.

  COKES: And a scab again, he says.

  LEATHERHEAD: And I say again you are both whoremasters again,

  And you have both but one drab again. They fight.

  PUPPETS DAMON and PYTHIAS: Dost thou, dost thou, dost thou?

  LEATHERHEAD: What, both at once?

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: Down with him, Damon.

  PUPPET DAMON: Pink his guts, Pythias.

  LEATHERHEAD: What, so malicious?

  Will ye murder me, masters both, i’ mine own house?

  240 COKES: Ho! well acted, my drum, well acted, my pipe, well acted still.

  WASP: Well acted, with all my heart.

  LEATHERHEAD: Hold, hold your hands.

  COKES: Ay, both your hands, for my sake! for you ha’ both done well.

  PUPPET DAMON: Gramercy, pure Pythias.

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: Gramercy, dear Damon.

  COKES: Gramercy to you both, my pipe and my drum.

  PUPPETS DAMON and PYTHIAS: Come now we’ ll together to breakfast to Hero.

  250 LEATHERHEAD: ’Tis well, you can now go to breakfast to Hero, You have given me my breakfast, with a hone and honero.

  COKES: How is’t, friend, ha’ they hurt thee?

  LEATHERHEAD: O no!

  Between you and I, sir, we do but make show.

  Thus, gentles, you perceive, without any denial,

  ’Twixt Damon and Pythias here, friendship’s true trial.

  Though hourly they quarrel thus and roar each with other,

  They fight you no more than does brother with brother.

  But friendly together, at the next man they meet,

  They let fly their anger, as here you might see’t.

  260 COKES: Well, we have seen’t, and thou hast felt it, whatsoever thou sayest. What’s next? What’s next?

  LEATHERHEAD: This while young Leander with fair Hero is drinking,

  And Hero grown drunk, to any man’s thinking!

  Yet was it not three pints of sherry could flaw her,

  Till Cupid, distinguished like Jonas the drawer,

  From under his apron, where his lechery lurks,

  Put love in her sack. Now mark how it works.

  PUPPET HERO: O Leander, Leander, my dear, my dear Leander, I’ ll forever be thy goose, so thou’ lt be my gander.

  270 COKES: Excellently well said, fiddle! She’ ll ever be his goose, so he’ ll be her gander: was’t not so?

  LEATHERHEAD: Yes, sir, but mark his answer, now.

  PUPPET LEANDER: And sweetest of geese, before I go to bed, I’ ll swim o’ er the Thames, my goose, thee to tread.

  COKES: Brave! he will swim o’ er the Thames and tread his goose tonight, he says.

  LEATHERHEAD: Ay, peace, sir, they’ ll be angry if they hear you eavesdropping, now they are setting their match.

  PUPPET LEANDER: But lest the Thames should be dark, my goose, my dear friend.

  280 Let thy window be provided of a candle’s end.

  PUPPET HERO: Fear not, my gander, I protest I should handle

  My matters very ill, if I had not a whole candle.

  PUPPET LEANDER: Well then, look to ’t, and kiss me to boot.

  LEATHERHEAD: Now here come the friends again, pythias and damon And under their cloaks they have of bacon a gammon

  DAMON and PYTHIAS enter

  PUPPET PYTHIAS Drawer, fill some wine here.

  LEATHERHEAD: How, some wine there?

  There’s company already, sir, pray forbear!

  PUPPET DAMON: ’Tis Hero.

  LEATHERHEAD: Yes, but she will not be taken,

  After sack and fresh herring, with your Dunmow-bacon.

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: You lie, it’s westfabian.

  LEATHERHEAD: Westphalian, you should. 290

  290 say

  DAMON: If you hold not your peace, you are a coxcomb, I would say

  LEANDER and HERO are kissing.

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: What’s here? What’s here? Kiss, kiss upon kiss.

  LEATHERHEAD: Ay, wherefore should they not? What harm is in this?

  ’Tis Mistress Hero.

  PUPPET DAMON: Mistress Hero’s a whore.

  LEATHERHEAD: Is she a whore? Keep you quiet, or Sir knave out of door.

  PUPPET DAMON: Knave out of door?

  PUPPET HERO: Yes knave, out of door

  PUPPBT DAMON: Whore out of door

  Here the PUPPETS quarrel and fall together by the ears.

  PUPPET HERO: I say knave out of door.

  PUPPET DAMON: I say whore out of door.

  PUPPET PYTHIAS: Yea, so say I too.

  PUPPET HERO: Kiss the whore o’ the arse.

  LEATHERHEAD: Now you ha’ something to do:

  300 You must kiss her o’ the arse, she says.

  PUPPETS DAMON and PYTHIAS: So we will, so we will

  [They kick her.]

  PUPPET HERO: O my haunches, o my haunches, hold, hold!

  LEATHERHEAD: Stand’st thou still?

  Leander, where art thou? Stand’st thou still like a sot,

  And not offer’st to break both their heads with a pot?

  See who’s at thine elbow there! Puppet Jonas and Cupid.

  PUPPET JONAS: Upon’ em, Leander, be not so stupid.

  They fight.

  PUPPET LEANDER: You goat-bearded slave!

  PUPPET DAMON: You whoremaster knave!

  PUPPET LEANDER: Thou art a whoremaster.

  PUPPET JONAS: Whoremasters all.

  LEATHERHEAD: See, Cupid with a word has ta’ en up the brawl.

  KNOCEEM: These be fine vapours!

  310 COKES: By this good day they fight bravely, do they not, Numps?

  WASP: Yes, they lacked but you to be their second, all this while.

  LEATHERHEAD: This tragical encounter, falling out thus to busy us,

  It raises up the ghost of their friend Dionysius,

  Not like a monarch, but the master of a school,

  In a scrivener’s furred gown, which shows he is no fool.

  For therein he hath wit enough to keep himself warm.

  ‘O Damon, ’ he cries, ‘and Pythias, what harm

  Hat
h poor Dionysius done you in his grave,

  That after his death you should fall out thus, and rave,

  320 And call amorous Leander whoremaster knave?’

  PUPPET DIONYSIUS: I cannot, I will not, I promise you, endure it.

  V, V [Enter BUSY.]

  BUSY: Down with Dagon, down with Dagon! ’Tis I will no longer endure your profanations.

  LEATHERHEAD: What mean you, sir?

  BUSY: I will remove Dagon there, I say, that idol, mat heathenish idol, that remains, as I may say, a beam, a very beam, not a beam of the sun, nor a beam of the moon, nor a beam of a balance, neither a house-beam nor a weaver’s beam, but a beam in the eye, in the eye of the Brethren; a very great beam, an exceeding great beam; such as are your stage-players, rhymers,

  10 and morris-dancers, who have walked hand in hand in contempt of the Brethren and the Cause, and been borne out by instruments of no mean countenance.

  LEATHERHEAD: Sir, I present nothing but what is licensed by authority.

  BUSY: Thou art all license, even licentiousness itself, Shimei!

  LEATHERHEAD: I have the Master of the Revels’ hand for it, sir.

  BUSY: The master of rebels’ hand thou hast ̵ Satan’s! Hold thy peace; thy scurrility shut up thy mouth. Thy profession is damnable, and in pleading for it thou dost plead for Baal. I have

  20 long opened my mouth wide and gaped, I have gaped as the oyster for the tide, after thy destruction; but cannot compass it by suit or dispute; so that I look for a bickering ere long, and then a battle.

  KNOCKEM: Good Banbury-vapours.

  COKES: Friend, you’ d have an ill match on’t if you bicker with him here; though he be no man o’ the fist, he has friends that will go to cuffs for him. Numps, will not you take our side?

  EDGWORTH: Sir, it shall not need; in my mind, he offers him a fairer course, to end it by disputation! Hast thou nothing to say

  30 for thyself, in defence of thy quality?

  LEATHERHEAD: Faith, sir, I am not well studied in these controversies between the hypocrites and us. But here’s one of my motion, Puppet Dionysius, shall undertake him, and I’ ll venture the cause on’t.

  COKES: Who? My hobby-horse? Will he dispute with him?

  LEATHERHEAD: Yes, sir, and make a hobby-ass of him, I hope.

  COKES: That’s excellent! Indeed he looks like the best scholar of ‘em all. Come, sir, you must be as good as your word, now.

  BUSY: I will not fear to make my spirit and gifts known! Assist

  40 me, zeal; fill me, fill me, that is, make me full!

  WINWIFE: What a desperate, profane wretch is this! Is there any ignorance or impudence like his? To call his zeal to fill him against a puppet?