Complete Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker
Page 188
My matchless frame of nature, creation’s wonder?
Out of my sight!
Fol. I am not in’t; if I were, you’d see but scurvily. You find fault as patrons do with books, to give nothing.
Ray. Yes, bald one, beastly base one, blockish — away!
Vex me not, fool; turn out o’ doors your roarer,
French tailor, and that Spanish gingerbread,
And your Italian skipper; then, sir, yourself.
Fol. Myself! Carbonado me, bastinado me, strappado me, hang me, I’ll not stir; poor Folly, honest Folly, jocundary Folly forsake your lordship! no true gentleman hates me; and how many women are given daily to me, — if I would take ’em, — some not far off know. Tailor gone, Spanish fig gone, all gone, but I —
Enter HUMOUR.
Hum. My waiters quoited off by you! you flay them!
Whence come these thunderbolts? what Furies haunt you?
Ray. You.
Fol. She!
Ray. Yes, and thou.
Fol. Baw-waw!
Ray. I shall grow old, diseas’d, and melancholy;
For you have robb’d me both of Youth and Health,
And that Delight my Spring bestow’d upon me:
But for you two, I should be wondrous good;
By you I have been cozen’d, baffled, torn
From the embracements of the noblest creature —
Hum. Your Spring?
Ray. Yes, she, even she, only the Spring.
One morning spent with her was worth ten nights
With ten of the prime beauties in the world:
She was unhappy never, but in two sons,
March, a rude roaring fool, —
Fol. And April, a whining puppy.
Hum. But May was a fine piece.
Ray. Mirror of faces.
Fol. Indeed, May was a sweet creature; and yet a great raiser of Maypoles.
Hum. When will you sing my praises thus?
Ray. Thy praises,
That art a common creature!
Hum. Common!
Ray. Yes, common:
I cannot pass through any prince’s court,
Through any country, camp, town, city, village,
But up your name is cried, nay curs’d; “a vengeance
On this your debauch’d Humour!”
Fol. A vintner spoke those very words last night to a company of roaring-boys that would not pay their reckoning.
Ray. How many bastards hast thou?
Hum. None.
Ray. ’Tis a lie;
Be judg[‘d] by this your squire else.
Fol. Squire! worshipful Master Folly.
Ray. The courtier has his Humour, has he not,
Folly?
Fol. Yes, marry has he — folly: the courtier’s humour is to be brave, and not pay for’t; to be proud, and no man cares for’t.
Ray. Brave ladies have their humours.
Fol. Who has to do with that but brave lords?
Ray. Your citizens have brave humours.
Fol. O, but their wives have tickling humours.
Hum. Yet done?
Fol. Humour, madam! if all are your bastards that are given to humour you, you have a company of as arrant rascals to your children as ever went to the gallows: a collier being drunk jostled a knight into the kennel, and cried, ’twas his humour; the knight broke his coxcomb, and that was his humour.
Ray. And yet you are not common!
Hum. No matter what I am:
Rail, curse, be frantic; get you to the tomb
Of your rare mistress; dig up your dead Spring,
And lie with her, kiss her: me have you lost
Fol. And I scorn to be found.
Ray. Stay; must I lose all comfort? dearest, stay;
There’s such a deal of magic in those eyes,
I’m charm’d to kiss these only.
Fol. Are you so? kiss on: I’ll be kissed somewhere, I warrant
Ray. I will not leave my Folly for a world.
Fol. Nor I you for ten.
Ray. Nor thee, my love, for worlds pil’d upon worlds.
Hum. If ever for the Spring you do but sigh,
I take my bells.
Fol. And I my hobby-horse: — will you be merry, then, and jocund?
Ray. As merry as the cuckoos of the spring.
Fol. Again!
Ray. How, lady, lies the way?
Hum. I’ll be your convoy,
And bring you to the court of the Sun’s queen,
Summer, a glorious and majestic creature,
Her face outshining the poor Spring’s as far
As a sunbeam does a lamp, the moon a star.
Ray. Such are the spheres I’d move in. — Attend us, Folly. [Exeunt.
SCENE II. Near the SUMMER’S court.
ENTER RAYBRIGHT AND HUMOUR.
Ray. I muse my nimble Folly stays so long.
Hum. He’s quick enough of foot, and counts, I swear,
That minute cast away not spent on you.
Ray. His company is music next to yours
Both of you are a consort, and your tunes
Lull me asleep; and when I most am sad,
My sorrows vanish from me in soft dreams:
But how far must we travel? Is’t our motion
[That] puts us in this heat, or is the air
In love with us, it clings with such embraces,
It keeps us in this warmth?
Hum. This shows her court
Is not far off, you covet so to see;
Her subjects seldom kindle needless fires,
The Sun lends them his flames.
Ray. Has she rare buildings?
Hum. Magnificent and curious: every noon
The horses of the day bait there; whilst he,
Who in a golden chariot makes them gallop
In twelve hours o’er the world, alights awhile
To give a love-kiss to the Summer-queen.
Ray. And shall we have fine sights there?
Hum. O!
Ray. And hear
More ravishing music?
Hum. All the quiristers
That learn’d to sing i’ the temple of the Spring
By her attain such cunning, that when the winds
Roar and are mad, and clouds in antic gambols
Dance o’er our heads, their voices have such charms
They’ll all stand still to listen.
Ray. Excellent.
Enter FOLLY.
Fol. I sweat like a pampered jade of Asia, and drop like a cobnut out of Africa —
Enter a Forester.
Fores. Back! whither go you?
[Fol.] Oyes! this way.
Fores. None must pass:
Here’s kept no open court; our queen this day
Rides forth a-hunting, and the air being hot,
She will not have rude throngs so stifle her.
Back! [Exeunt.
SCENE III. The court of SUMMER.
ENTER SUMMER AND DELIGHT.
Sum. And did break her heart, then?
Del. Yes, with disdain.
Sunt. The heart of my dear mother-nurse, the
Spring!
I’ll break his heart for’t: had she not a face
Too tempting for a Jove?
Del. The Graces sat
On her fair eyelids ever; but his youth,
Lusting for change, so doted on a lady,
Fantastic and yet fair, a piece of wonder, —
They call her Humour, and her parasite Folly, —
He cast the sweet Spring off, and turn’d us from him:
Yet his celestial kinsman, — for young Raybright
Is the SUN’S DARLING, — knowing his journeying hither
To see thy glorious court, sends me before
T’ attend upon you, and spend all my hours
In care for him. [Recorders.
The SUN appears above.
Sun. Obey your charge! — O, thou buil
der [Kneels.
Of me thy handmaid! landlord of my life!
Life of my love! throne where my glories sit!
I ride in triumph on a silver cloud,
Now I but see thee.
Sun. Rise! [She rises.] Is Raybright come yet?
Del. Not yet.
Sun. Be you indulgent over him; —
Enter PLENTY.
And lavish thou thy treasure.
Plen. Our princely cousin
Raybright, your Darling, and the world’s delight,
Is come.
Sun. Who with him?
Plen. A goddess in a woman,
Attended by a prating saucy fellow
Call’d Folly.
Sun. They’ll confound him —
But he shall run [his course]: go and receive him.
[Exit Plenty.
Sum. Your sparkling eyes, and his arrival, draws
Heaps of admirers; earth itself will sweat
To bear our weights. Vouchsafe, bright power, to borrow
Winds not too rough from Æolus, to fan
Our glowing faces.
Sun. I will. — Ho, Æolus!
Unlock the jail, and lend a wind or two
To fan my girl the Summer.
Æol. [within] I will.
Sun. No roarers.
Æol. [within] No.
Sun. Quickly.
Æol. [within] Fly, you slaves!
Summer sweats; cool her.
[Hautboys. The Sun takes his seat above.
Enter RAYBRIGHT, HUMOUR, PLENTY, FOLLY, Country-fellows, and Wenches.
SONG.
Haymakers, rakers, reapers, and mowers,
Wait on your Summer-queen;
Dress up with musk-rose her eglantine bowers,
Daffodils strew the green;
Sing, dance, and play,
’Tis holiday;
The Sun does bravely shine
On our ears of corn.
Rich as a pearl
Comes every girl;
This is mine, this is mine, this is mine;
Let us die, ere away they be borne.
Bow to the Sun, to our queen, and that fair one
Come to behold our sports:
Each bonny lass here is counted a rare one,
As those in princes’ courts.
These and we
With country glee
Will teach the woods to resound,
And the hills with echoes holl
Skipping lambs
Their bleeding dams,
‘Mongst kids shall trip it round;
For joy thus our wenches we follow.
Wind, jolly huntsmen, your neat bugles shrilly;
Hounds make a lusty cry;
Spring up, you falconers, the partridges freely,
Then let your brave hawks fly.
Horses amain,
Over ridge, over plain,
The dogs have the stag in chase:
’Tis a sport to content a king.
So ho ho! through the skies
How the proud bird flies,
And sousing kills with a grace.
Now the deer falls; hark, how they ring! —
[The Sun by degrees is clouded.
Sum. Leave off; the Sun is angry, and has drawn
A cloud before his face.
Del. He’s vex’d to see
That proud star shine [so] near you, at whose rising
The Spring fell sick and died; think what I told you;
His coyness will kill you else.
Sum. It cannot. — Fair prince,
Though your illustrious name has touch’d mine ear,
Till now I never saw you, nor never saw
A man whom I more love, more hate.
Ray. Ha, lady!
Sum. For him I love you from whose glittering rays
You boast your great name; for that name I hate you,
Because you kill’d my mother and my nurse.
Plen. Kill’d he my grandmother? — Plenty will never
Hold you by the hand again.
Sum. You have free leave
To thrust your arm into our treasury
As deep as I myself: Plenty shall wait
Still at your elbow; all my sports are yours,
Attendants yours, my state and glory’s yours:
But these shall be as sunbeams from a glass
Reflected on you, not to give you heat;
To dote on a smooth face my spirit’s too great.
[Flourish. Exit, followed by Plen and Del.
Ray. Divinest!
Hum. Let her go.
Fol. And I’ll go after; for I must and will have a fling at one of her plum-trees.
Ray. I ne’er was scorn’d till now.
Hum. This that Altezza,
That Rhodian wonder gaz’d at by the Sun! —
I fear’d thine eyes should have beheld a face
The moon has not a clearer; this! a dowdy.
Fol. An ouzle; this a queen-apple or a crab she gave you?
Hum. She bids you share her treasure; but who keeps it?
Fol. She points to trees great with child with fruit, but when delivered? grapes hang in ropes, but no drawing, not a drop of wine; whole ears of com lay their ears together for bread, but the devil a bit I can touch.
Hum. Be rul’d by me once more; leave her.
Ray. In scorn,
As [s]he does me.
Fol. Scorn! If I be not deceived, I ha’ seen Summer go up and down with hot codlings; and that little baggage, her daughter Plenty, crying six bunches of radish for a penny.
Hum. Thou shalt have nobler welcome; for I’ll bring thee
To a brave and bounteous housekeeper, free Autumn.
Fol. O, there’s a lad! — let’s go, then.
Re-enter PLENTY.
Plen. Where is this prince? my mother, for the Indies,
Must not have you depart.
Ray. Must not!
Re-enter SUMMER.
Sum. No, must not.
I did but chide thee, like a whistling wind
Playing with leafy dancers: when I told thee
I hated thee, I lied; I dote upon thee.
Unlock my garden of th’ Hesperides
By dragons kept, — the apples being pure gold, —
Take all that fruit; ’tis thine.
Plen. Love but my mother,
I’ll give thee com enough to feed the world.
Ray. I need not golden apples nor your corn;
What land soe’er the world’s surveyor, the Sun,
Can measure in a day, I dare call mine:
All kingdoms I have right to; I am free
Of every country; in the four elements
I have as deep a share as an emperor;
All beasts whom the earth bears are to serve me,
All birds to sing to me; and can you catch me
With a tempting golden apple?
Plen. She’s too good for thee.
When she was born, the Sun for joy did rise
Before his time, only to kiss those eyes,
Which having touch’d, he stole from them such store
Of lights, he shone more bright than e’er before;
At which he vow’d, whenever she did die,
He’d snatch them up, and in his sister’s sphere
Place them, since she had no two stars so clear.
Ray. Let him now snatch them up; away!
Hum. Away,
And leave this gipsy!
Sum. O, I am lost!
Ray. Lost?
Sum. Scorn’d! —
Ray. Of no triumph more, then, love can boast
[Exit with Hum and Fol.
Plen. This strump[et] will confound him; she has me.
Sum. Deluded! [Recorders.
The SUN reappears, with CUPID and FORTUNE.
Sun. Is Raybright gone?
Sum. Yes, and his spiteful eyes
Have shot darts thro
ugh me.
Sun. I thy wounds will cure,
And lengthen-out thy days; his followers gone,
Cupid and Fortune, take you charge of him.
Here thou, my brightest queen, must end thy reign;
Some nine months hence I’ll shine on thee again.
[Exeunt.
ACT IV.
SCENE I. The court of AUTUMN.
ENTER POMONA, RAYBRIGHT, CUPID, and FORTUNE.
Ray. Your entertainments, Autumn’s bounteous queen,
Have feasted me with rarities as delicate
As the full growth of an abundant year
Can ripen to my palate.
Pom. They are but courtings
Of gratitude to our dread lord the Sun,
From whom thou draw’st thy name: the feast of fruits
Our gardens yield are much top coarse for thee;
Could we contract the choice of nature’s plenty
Into one form, and that form to contain
All delicacies which the wanton sense
Would relish, or desire to invent, to please it,
The present were unworthy far to purchase
A sacred league of friendship.
Ray. I have rioted
In surfeits of the ear, with various music
Of warbling birds; I have smelt perfumes of roses,
And every flower with which the fresh-trimm’d earth
Is mantled in: the Spring could mock my senses
With these fine barren lullabies; the Summer
Invited my then-ranging eyes to look on
Large fields of ripen’d com, presenting trifles
Of waterish petty dainties; but my taste
Is only here pleas’d: th’ other objects claim
The style of formal; these are real bounties.
Pom. We can transcend thy wishes; whom the creatures
Of every age and quality post madding
From land to land and sea to sea to meet,
Shall wait upon thy nod, Fortune and Cupid.
Love! yield thy quiver and thine arrows up
To this great prince of time; before him, Fortune!
Pour out thy mint of treasures; crown him sovereign
Of what his thoughts can glory to command:
He shall give payment of a royal prize,
To Fortune judgment, and to Cupid eyes.
For. Be a merchant, I will freight thee
With all store that time is bought for.
Cup. Be a lover, I will wait thee
With success in life most sought for.
For. Be enamour’d on bright honour,
And thy greatness shall shine glorious.
Cup. Chastity, if thou smile on her,
Shall grow servile, thou victorious.
For. Be a warrior, conquest ever
Shall triumphantly renown thee.