Angelo Lotti, in love with Fiametta.
Baptista, his friend.
Jacomo Gentili, the noble housekeeper.
Signior Torrenti the riotous lord.
Montinello.
Cargo, Lord Vanni’s man.
Fiametta, the Duke’s daughter.
Dariene, old Lord Vanni’s wife.
Alisandra, her daughter.
Alphonsina, sister to Tibaldo Neri.
Two Courtesans.
A Nurse.
ACT I. SCENE I.
ENTER DUKE OF FLORENCE, PRINCE OF PISA, NICOLETTO VANNI, TREBATIO, MUTIO, PHILIPPO, TORNELLI, TIBALDO NERI, ALPHONSINA, and DARIENE; CARGO attending.
Flor. WE surfeit here on pleasures: seas nor land
Cannot invite us to a feast more glorious,
Than this day we have sat at: my Lord Vanni,
You have an excellent seat here; ’tis a building
May entertain a Cæsar: but you and I
Should rather talk of tombs than palaces,
Let’s leave all to our heirs, for we are old.
Nic. Old? hem! all heart of brass; sound as a bell;
Old? why, I’ll tell your graces; I have gone
But half the bridge o’er yet; there lies before me
As much as I have pass’d, and I’ll go it all.
Flor. Mad Vanni, still
Nic. Old oaks do not easily fall:
December’s cold hand combs my head and beard,
But May swims in my blood; and he that walks
Without his wooden third leg, is never old.
Pisa. What is your age, my lord?
Nic. Age? what call you age?
I have liv’d some half a day, some half an hour.
Flor. A tree of threescore years growth, nothing?
Tib. A mere slip; you have kept good diet, my lord.
Nic. Let whores keep diet;
Tibaldo ne’er; never did rivers run
In wilder, madder streams, than I have done;
I’ll drink as bard yet as an Englishman.
Flor. And they are now best drinkers.
Pisa. They put down the Dutchmen clean.
Nic. I’ll yet upon a wager hit any fencer’s button.
Car. Some of ’em ha’ no buttons to their doublets, sir.
Nic. Then, knave, I’ll hit his flesh, and hit your cockscomb,
If you cross mine once more.
Flor. Nay, be not angry.
Nic. I have my passes, sir, and my passados,
My longes, my stockados, imbrocados,
And all my puntos and puntilios,
Here at my fingers’ end.
Flor. By my faith ’tis well.
Nic. Old? why I ne’er took physic, nor ever will;
I’ll trust none that have art, and leave to kill.
Now for that chopping herb of hell tobacco,
The idle man’s devil, and the drunkard’s whore,
I never meddled with her; my smoke goes
Out at my kitchen-chimney, not my nose.
Flor. And some lords have no chimnies but their noses.
Nic. Tobacco-shops show like prisons in hell;
Hot, smoky, stinking, and I hate the smell.
Pisa. Who’d think that in a coal so ashy white,
Such fire were glowing?
Flor. May not a snuff give light?
Tib. You see it does in him.
Alph. A withered tree doth oft bear branches.
Nic. What think you then of me, sweet lady?
Alph. Troth, my lord, as of a horse, vilely; if he can
Neither wihy, nor wag-tail.
Flor. The Lady Alphonsina Neri has given it to you, my lord.
Nic. The time may come I may give it to her too.
Flor. I doubt, Lord Vanni, she will crack no nuts
With such a tough shell as is yours and mine.
But leaving this, let’s see you pray at court.
Nic. I thank your grace.
Flor. Your wife and your fair daughter,
One of the stars of Florence, with your son,
Heir to your worth and honours, Trebatio Vanni.
Treb. I shall attend your grace.
Flor. The holy knot
Hymen shall, shortly tie, and in fair bands
Unite Florence and Pisa by the hands,
Of Piametta and this Pisan duke
(Our noble son-in-law), and at this day
Pray be not absent.
Nic. We shall your will obey.
Flor. We hear there is a gallant that outvies
Us, and our court for bravery of expence,
For royal feasts, triumphs, and revellings.
Nic. He’s my near kinsman, mine, own brother’s son;
Who desperately a prodigal race doth run;
And for this, riotous humour he has the by-name,
Siguior Torrenti, a, swift head-long stream.
Flor. But there’s another lays on more than he.
Nic. Old Jacomo? open-handed charity
Sits ever at his gates to welcome guests.
He makes no bonfires as my, riotous kinsman,
And yet his chimneys cast out braver smoke.
The bellows which he blows, with are good deeds,
The rich he smiles upon, the poor be feeds.
Flor. These gallants well be feasted by, and feast;
Fame’s praises of ’em shall make us their guest,
Meantime we’ll hence. [Exit Flor. Pisa, &c.
Enter CARGO.
Car. I have new’s to tell your lordship: Signior Angelo (of the Lotti family) is banished.
Dar. How! banish’d? Alas, poor Angelo Lotti.
Treb. Why must he go from Florence?
Car. Because he can stay there no longer.
Nic. To what end is he driven from the city?
Car. To the end he should go into some other, my lord.
Nic. Hoida!
Car. I hope this is news, sir.
Nic. What speak the people of him?
Car. As bells ring; some out, some in, all jangle; they say he has dealt with the Genoese against the state: but whether with the men or the women ’tis to be stood upon.
Nic. Away! sir knave and fool.
Car. Sir knave, a new word: fools, and knaves, sir? — [Exit.
Nic. This muttering long ago flew to mine ear;
The Genoese is but a line thrown out;
But Fiametta’s love’s f the net that chokes him.
Treb. He’s worthy of her equal.
Nic. Peace! foolish boy;
At these state bonfires (whose flames reach so high)
To stand aloof, is safer than too nigh. [Exeunt.
Enter TIBALDO NERI and ALPHONSINA.
Alph. Why, brother, what’s the matter?
Tib. I’m ill, exceeding ill.
Alph. That’s not well.
Tib. Sure I did surfeit at Lord Vanni’s.
Alph. Surfeit? you eat some meat against your stomach.
Tib. No, but I had a stomach to one dish, and the not tasting it makes me sick at heart.
Alph. Was it fish or flesh?
Tib. Flesh sure, if I hit the mark right.
Alph. Is’t not the missing of a mark (which you long to hit)
Makes you draw sighs instead of arrows?
Tib. Would I had been a thousand leagues from thence!
When I sat down at’s table, or been partner
With Angelo Lotti in his banishment;
Oh! sister Alphonsina, there I drank
My bane; the strongest poison that e’er man
Drew from a lady’s eye, now’s swelling in me.
Alph. By casting of thy water then, I guess thou wouldst
Have a med’cine for the green-sickness.
Tib. ’Tis a green wound indeed.
Alph. Tent it, tent it, and keep it from rankling; you are
Over head and ears in love.
Tib. I am, and with such mortal arrows p
ierc’d
I shall fall down
Alph. There’s no hurt in that.
Tib. And die, unless her pity
Send me a quick and sweet recovery.
Alph. And faith what doctress is she must call you patient?
Tib. Fair Dariene, the Lord Vanni’s wife—’
Alph. How! Dariene? can no feather fit you but the broach in an old man’s hat? were there so many dainty dishes to fill your belly, and must you needs long for that dish the master of the house sets up for his own tooth?
Tib. Could love be like a subject, tied to laws,
Then might you speak this language
Alph. Love? a disease as common with young gallants as swaggering and drinking tobacco; there’s not one of ’em all but will to-day lie drawing on for a woman, as if they were puffing and blowing at a straight boot, and to-morrow be ready to knock at death’s door; but I would fain see one of you enter and set in his staff.
Tib. You shall see me then do so.
Alph. I shall look so old first, I shall be taken for thy grandame; come, come, ’tis but a worm between the skin and the flesh; and to be taken out with the point of a waiting-woman’s needle, as well as a great countess.
Tib. If this be all the comfort you will lend me,
Would you might leave me —
Alph. Leave thee in sickness? I had more need give thee a caudle, and thrust thy addlehead into a nightcap; for look you, brother —
Tib. Even what you will must out.
Alph. If what you will might so too, then would you be in tune: I warrant if the sucket stood here before thee, thy stomach would go against it.
Tib. Yes, sure my stomach would go against it:
’Tis only that which breeds in me despair.
Alph. Despair for a woman? they hang about men’s necks in some places thicker than hops upon poles.
Tib. Her walls of chastity cannot be beaten down.
Alph. Walls of chastity? walls of wafer-cakes: I have known a woman carry a feather-bed, and a man in’t, in her mind, when in the street she cast up the white of her eye like a puritan.
Tib. Sister you do but stretch me on the rack,
And with a laughing cheek increase my pain;
Be rather pitiful, and ease my torments,
By teaching me how in this dreadful storm
I may escape shipwreck, and attain that shore
Where I may live, here else I’m sure to die.
Alph. Well, brother, since you will needs sail by such a star as I shall point out; look you here it is: if she were your feather-maker’s, tailor’s or barber’s wife, bait a hook with gold, and with it —
Tib. I do conjure you by that noble blood
Which makes me call you sister, cease to pour
Poison into a wound, so near my heart;
And if to cure love’s pains there be an art,
Woman methinks should know it ‘cause she breeds it
Alph. That cunning woman you take me to be; and because I see you dissemble not, here’s my medicine.
Tib. I shall for ever thank you.
Alph. First send for your barber.
Tib. For heaven’s sake!
Alph. Your barber shall not come to rob you of your beard; I’ll deal in no concealments —
Tib. Oh! fie, fie, fie!
Alph. But let him by rubbing of you quicken your spirits.
Tib. So, so.
Alph. Then whistle your goldfinches (your gallants) to your fist.
Tib. You’re mad! you’re mad!
Alph. Into a tavern; drink stiff, swear stiff, have your music, and your brace; dance, and whiff tobacco, till all smoke again, and split, sir.
Tib. You split my very heart in pieces.
Alph. And do thus but till the moon cuts off her horns; laugh in the day, and sleep in the night: and this wenching fire will be burnt out of you.
Tib. Away! away! cruel you are to kill,
When to give life, you have both power and skill.
[Exit.
Alph. Alas, poor brother, now I pity thee, and wou’d do any thing to help thee to thy longing; but that a gap must be broken; in another man’s hedge to rob his orchard; within there! Luca
Angelo give him music; —
Music has help’d some madmen, let it then
Charm him; love makes fools of the wisest men.
[Exit.
Enter at one Door, ANGELO LOTTI and BAPTISTA; at the other, PIERO and JASPERO.
Pier. Yonder’s that villain; keep off, Jaspero.
This prey I’ll seize. — [All draw.
Jas. Be more advised, sir.
Bap. At whose life shoot you?
Pier. At that slave’s there.
Ang. Slave? I know you for the duke’s son; but I know no cause of quarrel, or this base reproach.
Piero. Thou art a villain.
Ang. Wherein?
Pier. And by witchcraft
Hast stole my sister Fiametta’s heart,
Forcing her leave a prince’s bed for thine.
Ang. If for her love you come to kill me; here
I’ll point you to a door where you may enter
And fetch out a loath’d life.
Pier. Jaspero!
Jas. Oh, my lord!
Ang. Let him come, I owe her all;
And that debt will I pay her gladly.
Jas. Dear sir, hear him.
Ang. But if on any other fire of rage,
You thirst to drink my blood, here I defy
You, and your malice; and return the villain
Into your throat.
Pier. So brave, sir! — [They fight.
Enter NICOLETTO and CARGO.
Nic. I charge you in the duke’s name, keep the peace;
Beat down their weapons! knock ’em down, Cargo!
Car. I have a justice’s warrant to apprehend your weapons;
Therefore I charge you deliver.
Nic. Oh, my lord, make a fray in an open street? ’tis to
Make a bonfire to draw children and fools
Together; Signior Angelo, pray be wise, and be gone.
Ang. I do but guard my life, my lord, from danger.
Bap. (To Piero.) Sir, you do exercise your violence
Upon a man stabb’d to the heart with wounds;
You see him sinking, and you set your foot
Upon his bead, to kill him with two deaths;
Trample not thus on a poor banish’d man.
Nic. If he be banish’d why dwells he i’ th’ house, whose tiles are pull’d down over his head?
Ang.) You must hunt no more in this park of
Florence; why then do you lie sneaking here to steal venison?
Ang. My lords, I take my last leave of you all;
Of love and fortunes.
Bap. Lower thou canst not fall.
[Ang and Bap.
Jas. Trust me, my lord, this Lotti is a man,
(Setting aside his rivalship in love,
For which you hate him), so abundant rich
In ail the virtues of a gentleman,
That had you read their file, as I have done,
You would not only fall in love with him,
And hold him worthy of a princess’s bed,
But grieve, that for a woman, such a man
Should so much suffer, in being so put down,
Never to rise again.
Nic. A terrible case, I’d not be in’t for all Florence.
Pier. Troth, dear friend,
The praises which have crown’d him with thy judgment,
Make me to cast on him an open eye,
Which was before shut, and I pity him.
Jas. I never heard ‘mongst all your Roman spirits,
That any held so bravely up his head,
In such a sea of troubles (that Come rolling
One on another’s neck), as Lotti doth;
He puts the spite of fortune to disgrace, And makes her, when she frowns worst, turn her fa
ce.
Pier. No more: I love him, and for all the dukedom —
Would not have cut so noble a spreading vine,
To draw from it one drop of blood: Lord Vanni,
I thank you that you cur’d our wounded peace;
So fare you well. — [Exit.
Nic. A good health to you both.
Jag. You play the constable wisely.
Car. And I his beadle, I hope as wisely.
Nic. The constable wisely; Cargo he calls me fool by craft, but let’m pass.
Car. As gentlemen do by creditors (muffled).
Nic. I have another case to handle: thou know’st the Donna Alphonsina, of the Neri family.
Car. The little paraquito that was here when the duke was feasted? she had quicksilver in her mouth, for her tongue, like a bride the first night, never lay still.
Nic. The same aspen-leaf! the same! Is’t not a galley for
The great Turk to be row’d in?
Car. I think, my lord, in calm weather, she may sit upon
A galley as big as your lordship.
Nic. Commend me to this Angelica.
Car. Angelica water is good for a cold stomach.
Nic. I am all fire.
Car. She’s a cooler.
Nic. Would ‘twere come to that.
Car. A small thing does it, my lord; in the time a Flemming drinks a flap-dragon.
Nic. Give her this paper, and this; in the one she may know my mind, in the other, feel me: this a letter; this a jewel: tell her I kiss the little white nail of her little white finger, of her more little white hand, of her most little white body.
Car. Her tell-tale, for all this will I be.
Nic. Thou hast been my weaver’s shuttle, to run betwixt me and my stuffs of Procreandi causa.
Car. A suit of stand-farther-off, had been better sometimes.
Nic. No, Cargo, I have still the Lapis mirabilis; be thou close
Car. As my lady’s chamber-maid.
Nic. Away then! nay quick, knave, thou rack’st me. — [Exit.
Car. I go to stretch you to your full length.
[Exit.
Enter JACOMO GENTILT, dressed in a Suit of with Velvet Gown, Cap, and Chain: attended by his Steward and other Servants; and accompanied by MUTIO, PHILLIPPO, TORNELLI, and MONTINELLI.
Gen. Happy be your arrival, noble friends;
You are the first that, like to doves, repair
To my new building; you are my first-born guests,
My eldest sons of hospitality;
Here’s to my hearty welcomes.
Mut. Worthy lord,
In one word, and in the word of one, for all,
Our thanks are as your welcomes, infinite.
Phil. Rome, in her ancient pride, never rais’d up
A work of greater wonder than this building.
Complete Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker Page 88