I confess I have been an inn for any guest.
CAPTAIN
[Aside.] A pogs ‘a your stable-room.Is you inn a bawdy house now?
DOLL
I confess, for I ha’been taught to hide nothing from my surgeon, and thou art he, I confess that old stinking sturgeon, like thyself, whom I call father, that Hornet, never sweat for me; I’m none of his making.
CAPTAIN
[Aside.] You lie; he makes you a punk Hornet minor.
DOLL
He’s but a cheater, and I the false die he plays withal; I power all my poison out before thee, because hereafter I will be clean.Shun me not, mock me not.Plagues confound thee! I hate thee to the pit of hell!Yet if thou goest thither, I’ll follow thee, run, ride, do what thou canst, I’ll run and ride over the world after thee!
CAPTAIN
[Coming forward.] Cockatrice!You Mistress Salamanders that fear no burning, let my mare and my mare’s horse, and my coach come running home again, and run to an hospital, and your surgeons, and to knaves and panders and to the tevil and his tame too!
DOLL
Fiend, art thou raised to torment me?
BELLAMONT
She loves you, captain, honestly.
CAPTAIN
I’ll have any man, ‘oman, or cild by his ears that says a common drab can love a sentleman honestly.I will sell my coach for a cart to have you to punk’s hall, Bridewell.[To BELLAMONT] I sarge you in Apollo’s name, whom you belong to, see her forthcoming, till I come and tiggle her, by and by.‘Sblood, I was never cozened with a more rascal piece of mutton since I came out a’ the lawer countries![Exit.
BELLAMONT
My doors are open for thee.Be gone, woman!
DOLL
This goats-peezle of thine —
BELLAMONT
Away!I love no such implements in my house.
DOLL
Dost not?Am I but an implement? By all the maidenheads that are lost in London in a year, and that’s a great oath, for this trick other manner of women than myself shall come to this house only to laugh at thee; and if thou wouldst labour thy heart out, thou shalt not do withal.[Exit.
Enter Servant.
BELLAMONT
Is this my poetical fury?How now, sir?
SERVANT
Master Mayberry and his wife, sir, i’th’ next room.
BELLAMONT
What are they doing, sir?
SERVANT
Nothing, sir, that I see, but only would speak with you.
BELLAMONT
Enter ’em.[Exit Servant.] This house will be too hot for me if this wench cast me into these sweats.I must shift myself, for pure necessity haunted with sprites in my old days.
Enter MAYBERRY booted, his Wife with him.
MAYBERRY
A comedy!A Canterbury tale smells not half so sweet as the comedy I have for thee, old poet.Thou shalt write upon’t, poet.
BELLAMONT
Nay, I will write upon’t if’t be a comedy, for I have been at a most villainous female tragedy.Come, the plot, the plot.
MAYBERRY
Let your man give you to boots presently; the plot lies in Ware, my white poet.Wife, thou and I this night will have mad sport in Ware; mark me well, wife, in Ware.
WIFE
At your pleasure, sir.
MAYBERRY
Nay, it shall be at your pleasure, wife.Look you, sir, look you:Featherstone’s boy, like an honest crack-halter, laid open all to one of my prentices, for boys, you know, like women love to be doing.
BELLAMONT
Very good; to the plot.
MAYBERRY
Featherstone, like a crafty mutton-monger, persuades Greenshield to be run through the body.
BELLAMONT
Strange!Through the body?
MAYBERRY
Ay, man, to take physic; he does so; he’s put to this purgation; then, sir, what does me Featherstone but counterfeits a letter from an innkeeper of Doncaster to fetch Greenshield, who is needy, you know, to a keeper’s lodge in Enfield-Chace, a certain uncle where Greenshield should receive money due to him in behalf of his wife.
BELLAMONT
His wife!Is Greenshield married?I have heard him swear he was a bachelor.
WIFE
So have I, a hundred times.
MAYBERRY
The knave has more wives than the Turk; he has a wife almost in every shire in England; this parcel gentlewoman is that innkeeper’s daughter of Doncaster.
BELLAMONT
Hath she the entertainment of her forefathers?Will she keep all comers company?
MAYBERRY
She helps to pass away stale capons, sour wine, and musty provender.But to the purpose, this train was laid by the baggage herself and Featherstone, who it seems makes her husband a unicorn; and to give fire to’t Greenshield like an arrant wittal entreats his friend to ride before his wife and fetch the money, because taking bitter pills he should prove but a loose fellow if he went, and so durst not go.
BELLAMONT
And so the poor stag is to be hunted in Enfield-Chace?
MAYBERRY
No, Sir Master Poet, there you miss the plot.Featherstone and my Lady Greenshield are rid to barter away their light commodities in Ware.Enfield-Chace is too cold for ’em.
BELLAMONT
In Ware!
MAYBERRY
In dirty Ware! I forgot myself, wife, on with your riding suite and cry “Northward Ho” as the boy at Powel’s says.Let my prentice get up before thee, and man thee to Ware; lodge in the inn I told thee, spur cut and away.
WIFE
Well, sir. [Exit.
BELLAMONT
Stay, stay, what’s the bottom of this riddle?Why send you her away?
MAYBERRY
For a thing, my little hoary poet.Look thee, I smelt out my noble stinker Greenshield in his chamber, and as though my heart strings had been crack’d, I wept, and sigh’d, and thump’d, and thump’d, and rav’d, and randed, and rail’d, and told him how my wife was not grown as common as bayberry, and that she had hired her tailor to ride with her to Ware to meet a gentleman of the court.
BELLAMONT
Good, and how took he this drench down?
MAYBERRY
Like eggs and muscadine, at a gulp; he cries out presently, “did I not tell you, old man, that she’d win any game when she came to bearing?”He rails upon her, wills me to take her in the act, to put her to her white sheet, to be divorc’d and for all his guts are not fully scour’d by his pothecary, he’s pulling on his boots and will ride along with us.Let’s muster as many as we can.
BELLAMONT
It will be excellent sport to see him and his own wife meet in Ware, wilt not?I, I will have a whole regiment of horse with us.
MAYBERRY
I stand upon thorns till I shake him bith horns.Come, boots, boy, we must gallop all the way, for the sin, you know, is done with turning up the white of an eye.Will you join your forces?
BELLAMONT
Like a Hollander against a Dunkirk.
MAYBERRY
March then, this curse is on all letchers thrown,
They give horns and at last, horns are their own. [Exeunt.
Act Four, Scene Two
ENTER CAPTAIN JENKINS and ALLUM.
CAPTAIN
See the best of your little diminutive legs before and ride post, I pray.
ALLUM
Is it possible that Mistress Doll should be so bad?
CAPTAIN
Possible!‘Sblood, ’tis more easy for a ‘oman to be naught than for a soldier to beg, and that’s horrible easy, you know.
ALLUM
Ay, but to conycatch us all so grossly!
CAPTAIN
You Norfolk tumblers are but zanies to conycatching punks.
ALLUM
She gelded my purse of fifty pounds in ready money.
CAPTAIN
I will geld all the horses in five hundred shires, but I will ride
over her, and her cheaters, and her Hornets; she made a stark ass of my coach-horse, and there is a putter-box, whom she spread thick upon her white bread and eat him up.I think she has sent the poor fellow to Gelderland, but I will marsh pravely in and out and pack again upon all the low countries in Christendom, as Holland, and Zealand, and Netherland, and Cleveland too; and I will be drunk and cast with master Hans van Belch, but I will smell him out.
ALLUM
Do so and we’ll draw all our arrows of revenge up to the head but we’ll hit her for her villainy.
CAPTAIN
I will traw as petter and as urse weapons as arrews up to the head, lug you; it shall be warrants to give her the whip deedle.
ALLUM
But now she knows she’s discovered, she’ll take her bells and fly out of our reach.
CAPTAIN
Fly with her pells!Ounds! I know a parish that sal tag down all the pells and sell ’em to Captain Jenkins, to do him good, and if pells will fly, we’ll fly too, unless the pell-ropes hang us.Will you amble up and down to Master Justice by my side to have this rascal Hornet in corum, and so to make her hold her whore’s piece?
ALLUM
I’ll amble or trot with you, Captain.You told me she threatened her champions should cut for her; if so, we may have the piece of her.
CAPTAIN
O mon du! Du guin!Follow your leader; Jenkins shall cut and slice as worse as they.Come; I scorne to have any piece of her, or of any ‘oman, but open wars![Exeunt.
Act Four, Scene Three
Enter BELLAMONT, MAYBERRY, GREENSHIELD, PHILIP,
LEVERPOOL, and CHARTLEY;all booted.
BELLAMONT
What, will these young gentlemen help us to catch this fresh salmon, ha?Philip, are they thy friends?
PHILIP
Yes, sir.
BELLAMONT
We are beholding to you gentlemen that you’ll fill our consort.I ha’ seen your faces methinks before, and I cannot inform myself where.
BOTH
Maybe so, sir.
BELLAMONT
Shall’s to horse?Here’s a tickler.Heigh!To horse!
MAYBERRY
Come, switch and spurs!Let’s mount our chevals, merry, quoth a’.
BELLAMONT
Gentlemen, shall I shoot a fool’s bolt out among you all, because we’ll be sure to be merry?
OMNES
What is’t?
BELLAMONT
For mirth on the highway will make us rid ground faster then if thieves were at our tails.What say you to this?Let’s all practise jests one against another, and he that has the best jest thrown upon him, and is most gall’d between our riding forth and coming in, shall bear the charge of the whole journey.
OMNES
Content, i’faith.
BELLAMONT
We shall fit one a’ you with a coxcomb at Ware, I believe.
MAYBERRY
Peace.
GREENSHIELD
Is’t a bargain.
OMNES
And hands clap’t upon it.
BELLAMONT
Stay.Yonder’s the Dolphin without Bishopsgate where our horses are at rack and manger, and we are going past it.Come, cross over.And what place is this?
MAYBERRY
Bedlam, is’t not?
BELLAMONT
Where the madmen are.I never was among them.As you love me, gentlemen, let’s see what Greeks are within.
GREENSHIELD
We shall stay too long.
BELLAMONT
Not a whit.Ware will stay for our coming, I warrant you.Come a spurt and sway.Let’s be mad once in our days.This is the door.
Enter FULL-MOON.
MAYBERRY
Save you, sir, may we see some a’ your mad folks?Do you keep ’em?
FULL-MOON
Yes.
BELLAMONT
Pray, bestow your name upon us, sir.
FULL-MOON
My name is Full-Moon.
BELLAMONT
You well deserve this office, good master Full-Moon.And what madcaps have you in your house?
Enter the Musician.
FULL-MOON
Diverse.
MAYBERRY
God’s so, see, see, what’s he walks yonder?Is he mad?
FULL-MOON
That’s a musician.Yes, he’s besides himself.
BELLAMONT
A musician!How fell he mad, for God’s sake?
FULL-MOON
For love of an Italian dwarf.
BELLAMONT
Has he been to Italy then?
FULL-MOON
Yes, and speaks, they say, all manner of languages.
Enter the Bawd.
OMNES
God’s so, look, look, what’s she?
BELLAMONT
The dancing bear.A pretty well-favoured little woman.
FULL-MOON
They say, but I know not, that she was a bawd, and was frighted out of her wits by fire.
BELLAMONT
May we talk with ’em, Master Full-Moon?
FULL-MOON
Yes, and you will.I must look about for I have unruly tenants.[Exit.
BELLAMONT
What, have you in this paper, honest friend?[Exit Musician.
GREENSHIELD
Is this he has all manner of languages, yet speaks none?
BAWD
How do you, Sir Andrew, will you send for some aqua vitæ for me?I have had no drink never since the last great rain that fell.
BELLAMONT
No, that’s a lie.
BAWD
Nay, by Gad, then you lie, for all y’are Sir Andrew.I was a dapper rogue in Portingale voyage; not an inch broad at the heel, and yet this high, I scorn’d.I can tell you to be drunk with rain water then, Sir.In those golden and silver days I had sweet bits then, Sir Andrew.How do you, good brother Timothy?
BELLAMONT
You have been in much trouble since that voyage.
BAWD
Never in Bridewell, I protest, as I’m a virgin! for I could never abide that Bridewell, I protest.I was once sick and I took my water in a basket, and carried it to a doctor’s.
PHILIP
In a basket?
BAWD
Yes, sir.You arrant fool, there was a urinal in it.
PHILIP
I cry you mercy.
BAWD
The doctor told me I was with child.How many lords, knights, gentlemen, citizens, and others promis’d me to be godfathers to that child?’Twas not God’s will; the prentices made a riot upon my glass windows the Shrove Tuesday following and I miscarried.
OMNES
Oh, do not weep!
BAWD
I ha’ cause to weep.I trust gentlewomen their diet sometimes a fortnight; lend gentlemen Holland shirts, and they sweat ’em out at tennis, and no restitution, and no restitution.But I’ll take a new order.I will have but six stew’d prunes in a dish and some of Mother Wall’s cakes, for my best customers are tailors.
OMNES
Tailors, ha, ha!
BAWD
Ay, tailors.Give me your London prentice; your country gentlemen are grown too politic.
BELLAMONT
But what say you to such young gentlemen as these are?
BAWD
Foh!They as soon as they come to their lands get up to London and like squibs that run upon lines, they keep a spitting of fire and cracking till they ha’ spent all, and when my squib is out, what says his punk?Foh!He stinks!
Enter the Musician.
Methought this other night, I saw a pretty sight,
Which pleased me much.
A comely country maid, not squeamish or afraid
To let gentlemen touch.
I sold her maidenhead once, and I sold her maidenhead twice,
And I sold it last to an alderman of York;
And then I had sold it thrice.
MUSICIAN
You sing scurvily.
BAWD
Marry muff, sing thou better, for I’ll go sleep my old sleeps. [Exit.
BELLAMONT
What are you doing, my friend?
MUSICIAN
Pricking, pricking.
BELLAMONT
What do you mean by pricking?
MUSICIAN
A gentleman-like quality.
BELLAMONT
This fellow is somewhat prouder and sullener than the other.
MAYBERRY
Oh, so be most of your musicians.
MUSICIAN
Are my teeth rotten?
OMNES
No, sir.
MUSICIAN
Then I am no comfit-maker, nor vintner.I do not get wenches in my drink.Are you a musician?
BELLAMONT
Yes.
MUSICIAN
We’ll be sworn brother’s then, look you, sweet rogue.
GREENSHIELD
God’s so, now I think upon’t, a jest is crept into my head.Steal away, if you love me.
[Exeunt GREENSHIELD, MAYBERRY, PHILIP, LEVERPOOL, and CHARTLEY; Musician sings.
MUSICIAN
Was ever any merchant’s band set before I set it?.Walk, I’m a-cold; this white satin is too thin unless it be cut, for then the sun enters.Can you speak Italian too?Sapetè Italiano.
BELLAMONT
Un poco.
MUSICIAN
‘Sblood, if it be in you, I’ll poke it out of you.Un poco; come, March, lie here with me but till the fall of the leaf, and if you have but poco Italiano in you, I’ll fill you full of more poco, March.
BELLAMONT
Come on.[Exeunt.
Enter MAYBERRY, GREENSHIELD, PHILIP, FULL-MOON,
LEVERPOOL, and CHARTLEY.
GREENSHIELD
Good Master Mayberry, Philip, if you be kind gentlemen, uphold the jest; your whole voyage is paid for.
MAYBERRY
Follow it then.
FULL-MOON
The old gentleman say you, why he talk’d even now as well in his wits as I do myself, and look’d at wisely.
GREENSHIELD
No matter how he talks, but his pericranion’s parish’d.
FULL-MOON
Where is he, pray?
PHILIP
Marry, with the musician, and is madder by this time.
CHARTLEY
He’s an excellent musician himself, you must note that.
MAYBERRY
And having met on fit for his own tooth.You see he skips from us.
GREENSHIELD
The troth is, Master Full-Moon, divers trains have been laid to bring him hither, without gaping of people, and never any took effect till now.
FULL-MOON
How fell he mad?
Complete Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker Page 145