Cup. Be a courtier, beauty never
Shall but with her duty crown thee.
For. Fortune’s wheel is thine, depose me;
I’m thy slave, thy power hath bound me.
Cup. Cupid’s shafts are thine, dispose me;
Love loves love; thy graces wound me.
Both. Live, reign! pity is fame’s jewel;
We obey; O, be not cruel!
Ray. You ravish me with infinites, and lay
A bounty of more sovereignty and amazement
Than th’ Atlas of mortality can support.
Enter behind HUMOUR and FOLLY.
Hum. What’s here?
Fol. Nay, pray observe.
[Ray. Be my heart’s empress, build your kingdom there.
Hum. With what an earnestness he compliments!
Fol. Upon my life, he means to turn costermonger, and is projecting how to forestall the market; I shall cry pippins rarely.
Ray. Till now my longings were ne’er satisfied,
And the desires my sensual appetite
Were only fed with, barren expectations
To what I now am fill’d with.
Fol. Yes, we are filled and must be emptied; these wind-fruits have distended my guts into a lenten pudding, there’s no fat in them; my belly swells, but my sides fall away: a month of such diet would make me a living anatomy.
Pom. These are too little; more are due to him
That is the pattern of his father’s glory:
Dwell but amongst us, industry shall strive
To make another artificial nature,
And change all other seasons into ours.
Hum. Shall my heart break? I can contain no longer. [Comes forward with Fol.
Ray. How fares my lov’d Humour?
Hum. A little stirr’d; — no matter, I’ll be merry;
Call for some music — do not; — I’ll be melancholy.
Fol. A sullen humour; and common in a dicer that has lost all his money.
Pom. Lady, I hope ’tis no neglect of courtesy
In us that so disturbs you: if it rise
From any discontent, reveal the cause;
It shall be soon removèd.
Hum. O, my heart! —
Help to unlace my gown.
Fol. And unlace your petticoat
Hum. [to Pay.] Saucy, how now!— ’tis well you have some sweetheart,
Some new fresh sweetheart — I’m a goodly fool
To be thus play’d on, stal’d and foil’d.
Pom. Why, madam?
We can be courteous without stain of honour:
’Tis not the raging of a lustful blood
That we desire to tame with satisfaction,
Nor have his masculine graces in our breast
Kindled a wanton fire: our bounty gives him
A welcome free, but chaste and honourable.
Hum. Nay, ’tis all one; I have a tender heart:
Come, come, let’s drink.
Pol. A humour in fashion with gallants, and brought out of the Low Countries.
Hum. Fie! there’s no music in thee; — let us sing.
Fol. Here’s humour in the right trim! a few more such toys would make the little world of man run mad as the puritan that sold his conscience for a maypole —
[A flourish. Shouts within.
Ray. The meaning of this mirth?
Pom. My lord is coming.
Ray. Let us attend to humble our best thanks
For these high favours.
Enter AUTUMN and BACCHANALIAN.
Pom. My dearest lord, according to th’ injunction
Of your command, I have, with all observance,
Given entertainment to this noble stranger.
Aut. The Sun-born Raybright, minion of my love!
Let us be twins in heart; thy grandsire’s beams
Shine graciously upon our fruits and vines.
I am his vassal, servant, tributary;
And for his sake the kingdoms I possess
I will divide with thee; thou shalt command
The Lydian Tmolus and Campanian mounts
To nod their grape-crown’d heads into thy bowls,
Expressing their rich juice; a hundred grains
Both from the Beltic and Sicilian fields
Shall be congested for thy sacrifice
In Ceres’ fane; Tiber shall pay thee apples,
And Sicyon olives; all the choicest fruits
Thy father’s heat doth ripen.
Ray. Make me but treasurer
Of your respected favours, and that honour
Shall equal my ambition.
Aut. My Pomona,
Speed to prepare a banquet of [all] novelties.
This is a day of rest; and we the whiles
Will sport before our friends, and shorten time
With length of wonted revels.
Pom. I obey. —
Will’t please you, madam, a retirement
From these extremes in men, more tolerable,
Will better fit our modesties.
Hum. I’ll drink,
And be a bacchanalian — no, I will not.
Enter, I’ll follow; — stay, I’ll go before.
Pom. Even what Humour pleaseth.
[Exeunt Hum and Pom.
Aut. Raybright, a health to Phœbus!
[A flourish. Drinks.
These are the paeans which we sing to him,
And yet we wear no bays; our cups are only
Crown’d with Lyæus’ blood: to him a health!
A flourish. Drinks.
Ray. I must pledge that too.
Aut. Now, one other health
To our grand patron, call’d Good-fellowship,
Whose livery all our people hereabout
Are clad in. [Flourish. Drinks.
Ray. I am for that too.
Aut. ’Tis well;
Let it go round; and, as our custom is
Of recreations of this nature, join
Your voices, as you drink, in lively notes;
Sing Ios unto Bacchus.
Fol. Hey-hoes! a god of winds: there’s at least four-and-twenty of them imprisoned in my belly: if I sigh not forth some of them, the rest will break out at the back-door; and how sweet the music of their roaring will be, let an Irishman judge.
Ray. He is a songster too.
Fol. A very foolish one; my music’s natural, and came by inheritance: my father was a French nightingale, and my mother an English wagtail; I was born a cuckoo in the spring, and lost my voice in summer with laying my eggs in a sparrow’s nest; but I’ll venture for one: — fill my dish — every one take his own, and when I hold up my finger, off with it.
Aut. Begin.
FOLLY sings.
Cast away care; he that loues sorrow
Lengthens not a day, nor can buy to-morrow:
Money is trash; and he that will spend it,
Let him drink merrily, Fortune will send it.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, O, ho!
Play it off stiffly, we may not part so.
Chor. Merrily, &c..
[Here, and at the conclusion of every stanza, they drink.
Wine is a charm, it heats the blood too;
Cowards it will arm, if the wine be good too;
Quickens the wit, and makes the back able;
Scorns to submit to the watch or constable.
Chor. Merrily, &c.
Pots fly about, give us more liquor,
Brothers of a rout, our brains will flow quicker;
Empty the cask; score up y we care not;
Fill all the pots again; drink on, and spare not.
Chor. Merrily, &c.
Now have I more air than ten musicians; besides, there is a whirlwind in my brains; I could both caper and turn round.
Aut. O, a dance, by all means!
Now cease your healths, and in an active motion
Bestir ye nimbly to beguile the hours.
&nb
sp; Fol. I am for you in that too; ‘twill jog down the lees of these rouses into a freer passage; but take heed of sure footing, ’tis a slippery season: many men fall by rising, and many women are raised by falling.
A DANCE.
Aut. How likes our friend this pastime?
Ray. Above utterance.
O, how have I, in ignorance and dulness,
Run through the progress of so many minutes,
Accusing him who was my life’s first author
Of slackness and neglect, whilst I have dreamt
The folly of my days in vain expense
Of useless taste and pleasure! Pray, my lord,
Let one health pass about, whilst I bethink me
What course I am to take for being denizen
In your unlimited courtesies.
Aut. Devise a round;
You have your liberty.
Ray. A health to Autumn’s self!
And here let Time hold still his restless glass,
That not another golden sand may fall
To measure how it passeth. [They drink.
Aut. Continue here with me, and by thy presence
Create me favourite to thy fair progenitor,
And be mine heir.
Ray. I want words to express
My thankfulness.
Aut. Whate’er the wanton Spring,
When she doth diaper the ground with beauties,
Toils for, comes home to Autumn; Summer sweats,
Either in pasturing her furlongs, reaping
The crop of bread, ripening the fruits for food,
[While] Autumn’s garners house them, Autumn’s jollities
Feed on them; I alone in every land
Traffic my useful merchandise; gold and jewels,
Lordly possessions, are for my commodities
Mortgag’d and lost: I sit chief moderator
Between the cheek-parch’d Summer and th’ extremes
Of Winter’s tedious frost; nay, in myself
I do contain another teeming Spring.
Surety of health, prosperity of life
Belongs to Autumn; if thou, then, canst hope
T’ inherit immortality in frailty,
Live here till time be spent, yet be not old.
Ray. Under the Sun, you are the year’s great emperor.
Aut. On now to new variety of feasts;
Princely contents are fit for princely guests.
Ray. My lord, I’ll follow. [Flourish. Exit Aut.]
Sure, I am not well.
Fol. Surely I am half drunk, or monstrously mistaken: you mean to stay here belike?
Ray. Whither should I go else?
Fol. Nay, if you will kill yourself in your own defence, I’ll not be of your jury.
Re-enter HUMOUR.
Hum. You have had precious pleasures, choice of drunkenness;
Will you be gone?
Ray. I feel a war within me,
And every doubt that resolution kills
Springs up a greater. In the year’s revolution
There cannot be a season more delicious,
When Plenty, Summer’s daughter, empties daily
Her cornucopia fill’d with choicest viands; —
Fol. Plenty’s horn is always full in the city.
Ray. When temperate heat offends not with extremes,
When day and night have their distinguishment
With a more equal measure; —
Hum. Ha! in contemplation?
Fol. Troubling himself with this windy-guts, this belly-aching Autumn, this Apple John Kent and warden of Fruiterers’ hall.
Ray. When the bright Sun with kindly-distant beams
Gilds ripen’d fruit; —
Hum. Arid what fine meditation
Transports you thus? You study some encomium
Upon the beauty of the garden’s queen;
You’d make the paleness to supply the vacancy
Of Cynthia’s dark defect
Fol. Madam, let but a green-sickness chambermaid be throughly steeled, if she get not a better colour in one month, I’ll be forfeited to Autumn for ever, and fruit-eat my flesh into a consumption.
Hum. Come, Raybright; whatsoe’er suggestions
Have won on thy apt weakness, leave these empty
And hollow-sounding pleasures, that include
Only a windy substance of delight,
Which every motion alters into air:
I’ll stay no longer here.
Ray. I must.
Hum. You shall not;
These are adulterate mixtures of vain follies:
I’ll bring thee
Into the court of Winter: there thy food
Shall not be sickly fruits, but healthful broths,
Strong meat and dainty.
Fol. Pork, beef, mutton, very sweet mutton, veal, venison, capon, fine fat capon, partridge, snite, plover, larks, teal, admirable teal, my lord.
Hum. Mistery there, like to another nature,
Confects the substance of the choicest fruits
In a rich candy, with such imitation
Of form and colour, ‘twill deceive the eye
Until the taste be ravish’d.
Fol. Comfits and caraways, marchpanes and marmalades, sugar-plums and pippin-pies, gingerbread and walnuts.
Hum. Nor is his bounty limited; he’ll not spare
T’ exhaust the treasure of a thousand Indies.
Fol. Two-hundred-pound suppers, and neither fiddlers nor broken glasses reckoned; besides, a hundred pound a throw ten times together, if you can hold out so long.
Fay. You tell me wonders!
Be my conductress: I’ll fly this place in secret:
Three quarters of my time are almost spent,
The last remains to crown my full content.
Now if I fail, let man’s experience read me;
Twas Humour, join’d with Folly, did mislead me.
Hum. Leave this naked season,
Wherein the very trees shake-off their locks,
It is so poor and barren.
Fol. And when the hair falls off, I have heard a poet say ’tis no good sign of a sound body.
Ray. Come, let’s go taste old Winter’s fresh delights,
And swell with pleasures our big appetites.
The Summer, Autumn, [Winter,] and the Spring,
As ‘twere conjoin’d in one conjugal ring, —
An emblem of four provinces we sway, —
Shall all attend our pastimes night and day;
Shall both be subject to our glorious state,
While we enjoy the blessings of our fate;
And since we’ve notice that some barbarous spirits
Mean to oppose our entrance, if by words
They’ll not desist, we’ll force our way with swords.
[Exeunt.
ACT V.
SCENE I. The court of WINTER.
ENTER SEVERAL CLOWNS.
First Clown. Hear you the news, neighbour?
Second Clown. Yes, to my grief, neighbour; they say our prince Raybright is coming hither with whole troops and trains of courtiers: we’re like to have a fine time on’t, neighbours.
Third Clown. Our wives and daughters are, for they are sure to get by the bargain; though our barn be emptied, they will be sure to be with barn for’t. O, these courtiers, neighbours, are pestilent knaves; but ere I’ll suffer it, I’ll pluck a crow with some of ’em.
First Clown. ‘Faith, neighbour, let’s lay our heads together, and resolve to die like men, rather than live like beasts.
Second Clown. Ay, like horn-beasts, neighbour: they may talk, and call us rebels, but a fig for that, ’tis not a fart matter: let’s be true amongst ourselves, and with our swords in hand resist his entrance. —
Enter WINTER.
Win. What sullen murmurings does your gall bring forth?
Will you prove’t true, “No good comes from the north”?
Bold, saucy mortals, da
re you, then, aspire
With snow and ice to quench the sphere of fire?
Are your hearts frozen like your clime, from thence
All temperate heat’s fled of obedience?
How durst you else with force think to withstand.
Your prince’s entry into this his land?
A prince who is so excellently good,
His virtue is his honour more than blood;
In whose clear nature, as two suns, do rise
The attributes of merciful and wise;
Whose laws are so impartial, they must
Be counted heavenly, ‘cause they’re truly just:
Who does with princely moderation give
His subjects an example how to live;
Teaching their erring natures to direct
Their wills to what it ought most to affect;
That, as the sun, does unto all dispense
Heat, light, nay, life, from his full influence:
Yet you, wild fools, possess’d with giant rage,
Dare, in your lawless fury, think to wage
War against heaven, and from his shining throne
Pull Jove himself, for you to tread upon;
Were your heads circled with his own green oak,
Yet are they subject to his thunder-stroke,
And he can sink such wretches as rebel
From heaven’s sublime height to the depth of hell.
First Clown, The devil he can as soon! we fear no colours; let him do his worst; there’s many a tall fellow besides us will die rather than see his living taken from them, nay, even eat up: all things are grown so dear, there’s no enduring more mouths than our own, neighbour.
Second Clown, Thou’rt a wise fellow, neighbour; prate is but prate. They say this prince, too, would bring new laws upon us, new rites into the temples of our gods; and that’s abominable; we’ll all be hanged first.
Win. A most fair pretence
To found rebellion upon conscience!
Dull, stubborn fools! whose perverse judgments still
Are govern’d by the malice of your will,
Not by indifferent reason, which to you
Comes, as in droughts the elemental dew
Does on the parch’d earth; ‘t wets, but does not give
Moisture enough to make the plants to live.
Things void of soul! can you conceive that he,
Whose every thought’s an act of piety,
Who’s all religious, furnish’d with all good
That ever was compris’d in flesh and blood,
Cannot direct you in the fittest way
To serve those powers to which himself does pay
True zealous worship, nay, ‘s so near allied
To them, himself must needs be deified?
Complete Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker Page 189