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G LOBE QUARTOS
T HE WITCHES OF LANCASHIRE
R ICHARD BROME and THOMAS HEYWOOD
First printed: London, 1634
This edition prepared by Gabriel Egan
G LOBE EDUCATION
and
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N ICK HERN BOOKS
L ONDON
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G LOBE QUARTOS
This edition of The Witches of Lancashire
first published in Great Britain
as a paperback original in 2001
by Nick Hern Books Limited
14 Larden Road, London W3 7ST
in association with
Globe Education
Shakespeare’s Globe, New Globe Walk
London SE1 9DT
Copyright in this edition © 2001
International Shakespeare Globe Centre Ltd
Typeset in Aldine-401 by the editor
Printed by LSL Press, Bedford MK41 0TX
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library
ISBN 1 85459 664 0
P REFACE
Over 400 plays written between 1567 and 1642 have survived in print. Few are now read and even fewer are performed. In 1995 Globe Education initiated a 30-year project to stage readings with professional casts of all the surviving texts so that audiences may once again hear plays by Barnes, Haughton, Shirley, Wilkins et al.
In 1997 Mark Rylance, Artistic Director of Shakespeare’s Globe, included full productions of Beaumont and Fletcher’s The Maid’s Tragedy and Middleton’s A Chaste Maid in Cheapside as part of the Globe Theatre’s opening season. Over 30,000 people came to hear and see the two plays.
The popularity of the readings and the productions prompted Globe Education to approach Nick Hern to publish the texts being revived at the Globe to enable more people to read, study and, ideally, to produce them. Developments in computer typesetting have enabled editions to be published economically and quickly as Globe Quartos.
The first Globe Quartos were edited in 1998 by Nick de Somogyi. In 1999 an Editorial Board, composed of David Scott Kastan, Gordon McMullan and Richard Proudfoot, was established to oversee the series.
Globe Education is indebted to all those who have helped give new life to old plays: production teams, actors, audiences, directors, editors, publishers and readers.
Patrick Spottiswoode
Director, Globe Education
E DITORIAL BOARD’S PREFACE
The aim of the series is to make once more available English plays of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries that have long been out of print in affordable form or have been available to readers only in scholarly editions in academic libraries. The Globe Quartos texts are based on the most reliable surviving forms of these plays (usually the first printed editions). These have been fully edited and modernized so as to make them easily usable by actors and readers today. Editorial correction and emendation are undertaken where required by the state of the original. Extra stage directions added by editors and needed to make the action clear are enclosed in square brackets. Apostrophes in verse speeches indicate elision of syllables and reflect the metrical pattern of the line. Prefatory matter includes notes from the director or co-ordinator of the production or reading of the play at the Globe and a brief factual introduction by the editor. Glossarial notes (keyed to the text by line numbers) explain difficult or obsolete usages and offer brief comment on other points of interest or obscurity. Departures from the wording of the original are recorded in textual notes that identify the source of corrections or editorial emendations. The opening page of the text in the original on which the edition is based is reproduced in reduced facsimile. Extra material relevant to the understanding of the play may occasionally be included in an Appendix.
A CKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The editor wishes to thank his postgraduate students on the Globe Education/King’s College London MA ‘Shakespearean Studies: Text and Playhouse’ for their seminar discussions of this play. The early modern performance expertise of the Globe Education practitioners led by James Wallace brought the play to life in a staged reading that illuminated hitherto murky parts of it. Editing those parts afresh after the performance, I was glad to include a number of Wallace’s suggestions. I am grateful to the British Library for permission to reprint the first text page of one of their two copies of the 1634 quarto. The Globe Quartos general editors, past and present, each helped with one or more of the problems I encountered. Most especially, David Scott Kastan and Gordon McMullan comprehensively mixed their labour with mine not only by advising on points of interpretation and editorial procedure, but also by indicating every occasion upon which I had failed to turn this seventeenth-century play script into proper modern English. What they missed, my student Alexandra London-Thompson caught. Having promised to absorb their lessons, I am grateful to be allowed pass off these people’s improvements as my own.
This edition is dedicated to my wife, Joan Fitzpatrick.
Gabriel Egan
A NOTE ON THE STAGED READING
My first impression of this play was of an excuse for spectacle and amusement and little else. The witches are not particularly diabolical, as they are in Macbeth, nor is witchcraft placed in a social context of small-town poverty with its attendant prejudice and ignorance, as in The Witch of Edmonton. It neither frightened nor enlightened. That the real women involved were, at the time of writing, still suffering in jail for these supposed crimes seemed to add little urgency to the drama. Nathaniel Tomkyns’s ‘review’ of an early performance at the Globe in 1634 appeared accurate enough: ‘there be not in it . . . any poetical genius, or art, or language . . . or tenet of witches’, but with its ‘ribaldry’, ‘fopperies’, and songs and dances, it is still a ‘merry and excellent . . . play’.
The preparation for, and the experience of, rehearsal and performance of a staged reading revealed much more. The prologue’s modest claim that a lack of foreign news was the occasion for a dramatization of domestic issues is disingenuous: Heywood was known for his domestic drama and, like his master Ben Jonson, Brome used realistic characters in contemporary local settings. Conscious art, not default, selected the dramatists’ material. In all likelihood the labour was divided thus: Heywood wrote the spectacles of witch mischief and ancient village ritual, and Brome wrote about the inversion of social order in the Seely household, which is similar to the fun he had in The Antipodes. Brome’s characteristic humour arising from character interplay is evident also in the subtly-executed scenes of the three young gallants. Whetstone is no caricature of a boasting fool but rather is fully developed, and the differing reactions to him from other characters and from the audience repay careful exploration. Master Generous too revealed more depth than expected. An audience is apt first to regard him as a pompous bore, but will become increasingly engaged with his struggle to think and act in accordance with God’s law for the preservation of a Christian soul. The repentance of Mistress Generous is genuinely moving and her subsequent betrayal is all the more shocking for the effect she produced by her plausible act of contrition. The play is full of ideas about belief and disbelief, lies and truth, appearance and reality, and honest speaking and flattery. Over-credulity can spring from vice (the foolish Whetstone) or virtue (the good-hearted Generous).
Not witchcraft but witch-hunting is the play’s serious matter. Doughty moves from scepticism to determination (his name suits both conditions) when frustrated in his lust for Moll Spencer, whose quarto name ‘Mal’ I kept for its connotation of maleficence. The play darkens with this witch-finder’s zeal to see all the witches ‘handsomely hanged’, and we should credit the dramatists’ observation of the psychosexual impulses underlying the witch-hunting craze.
Witchcraft shares with dramatic performance a concern for fortuitous timing, and our staged reading gained knife-edge immediacy by the presence, hot-foot from the Globe stage, of the First Witch from the Globe Theatre’s 2001 season production of Macbeth. This provided an appropriate analogue to the link between the two King’s men’s plays which was clearly in the dramatists’ conception of their work. The long theatrical tradition of bad luck associated with uttering the ‘Scottish play’ appears to have begun with The Witches of Lancashire: merely mentioning ‘the Scottish wayward sisters’ (as the quarto spelling has it) gives Winny Seely impaired vision and a ‘hiccup’ of the heart. Since they are all from Lancashire, the characters should logically all have northern accents, and I instructed the actors accordingly. The dramatists, however, chose to give only Lawrence and Parnell the necessary and nearly incomprehensible accents. Those wishing to reconstruct the early performances are referred for this detail to the 1634 quarto’s difficult but amusing representation of dialect.
In performance it becomes clear that this is not simply an anti-witch play, since their victims suffer little physical harm. Millers were notoriously corrupt and here one is tied naked to his sails (on a very cold night) and another is pinched and scratched; such indignities scarcely exceed the likely fantasies of their customers. For these misdemeanours the witches suffer a variety of excesses from beating and amputation to arrest and threatened execution. In performance the final scene chilled those on stage and in the audience as the historical reality became immediate. Brome and Heywood explicitly name ‘mercy’ in their epilogue and throughout they present witchcraft unseriously while attending to the excessive response of state power. Perhaps this made a difference: unlike their unfortunate predecessors of 1612, there is no evidence that these Pendle witches were executed.
James Wallace
T HE WITCHES OF LANCASHIRE
Cast of the staged reading co-ordinated by James Wallace at the Globe Education Centre on 12 August 2001
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Prologue |
Liza Hayden |
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Arthur, a young gentleman |
Nicholas Rowe |
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Tom Shakestone, a young gentleman |
Tom Cornford |
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Bantam, a young gentleman |
Dan Hawksford |
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Whetstone, nephew to Generous |
Richard Lumsden |
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Generous, a wealthy squire |
David Delve |
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Mistress Generous, Generous’s wife and a witch |
Beverley Klein |
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Robert, Generous’s groom |
Tony Bell |
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Mal Spencer, Robert’s sweetheart and a witch |
Lou Gish |
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Meg Johnson, a witch |
Cherry Morris |
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Mawd Hargreave, a witch |
Olivia MacDonald |
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Gillian Dickinson, a witch |
Caroline Harris |
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Doughty |
Michael Cronin |
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Seely, a wealthy squire whose household is bewitched |
Robert Wilby |
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Gregory Seely, his son |
James Wallace |
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Lawrence, his servant |
Mike Rogers |
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Joan Seely, his wife |
Virginia Denham |
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Winny Seely, his daughter |
Karen Hayley |
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Parnell, his serving-woman |
Sabina Netherclift |
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Soldier |
Karl Stimpson |
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Miller |
James Marsh |
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Boy, the Miller’s son |
Nicholas Kollgaard |
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Epilogue |
Liza Hayden |
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Spirits, Musicians, Country Rustics and Officers played by members of the company |
E DITOR’S INTRODUCTION
On 16 August 1634 Nathaniel Tomkyns wrote a business letter to his acquaintance Sir Robert Phelips, and to lighten the tone at the end Tomkyns turned to some ‘merriment’ which he thought might interest Phelips. In London, he wrote, ‘hath been lately a new comedy at the Globe called The Witches of Lancashire, acted by reason of the great concourse of people three days together’. For a repertory company like the King’s men to perform a play three times in succession indicates enormous popularity, and Tomkyns explained that the subject matter was sensational: ‘the slights and passages done or supposed to be done by these witches sent from thence hither’, and moreover the supposed witches were ‘still visible and in prison here’. Unlike most drama of the period, the play was about contemporary, indeed ongoing, events: the apprehension, conviction, and summoning to London for sentencing of four women from Pendle Forest in Lancashire found guilty of witchcraft at the Lancaster assizes. Tomkyns’s 400-word eyewitness account of the Globe performance is reproduced in Appendix 1.
While the Lancashire women languished in jail in London in the summer of 1634, two seasoned dramatists, Thomas Heywood and Richard Brome, planned a play based on the case. Somehow they obtained transcripts of the witness’s and defendants’ depositions which were intended only for privy council use, and they drew upon these for journalistic details. One of these depositions, as published in 1677, is Appendix 2. When their play was nearly ready, the King’s men successfully petitioned the lord chamberlain to prevent other companies performing witch plays, so preserving their ‘scoop’, and on 11, 12, or 13 August (we cannot be sure which), The Witches of Lancashire opened at the Globe.
In the autumn of 1634 a quarto of the play appeared under the title The Late Lancashire Witches, the word ‘late’ indicating that this was the recent story of Pendle witches, not a similar case originating from the same place in 1612. One of the British Library copies of this 1634 quarto, whose running header ‘The Witches of Lancashire’ confirms the play’s proper title, is the control text for this edition. Brome and Heywood’s play effectively takes the prosecution’s side in the case, showing the women to be guilty of witchcraft and showing those who doubt this or worse, doubt the existence of witchcraft altogether, to be naïve. The most sustained bewitching of which they are guilty is the inversion of social order within the Seely household so that son and daughter (Gregory and Winny) bully their parents but are in turn bullied by their servants (Lawrence and Parnell). Although all the characters are from Lancashire, the dramatists chose to give only Lawrence and Parnell distinctive northern, provincial accents, represented in the quarto by inconsistent use of almost indecipherably non-standard spelling. It seems that a London audience could be expected to delight in regional stereotyping, at least among low class characters.
The Witches of Lancashire is the only surviving collaboration by Brome. Heywood had been writing plays for more than thirty years but Brome’s rise was relatively recent, having had two hits in his first year writing for the stage, 1629: The Lovesick Maid and The Northern Lass, both for the King’s men. To the partnership Heywood brought not only his extensive dramatic experience (he claimed to already have written or contributed to some 220 plays) but also his knowledge of witch-lore. The topsy-turvydom of the Seely household is an exploration of the comedy of inversion which Brome was to develop fully in his The Antipodes.
The play is highly comic but for a modern spectator or reader, knowledge of the serious predicament of the real subjects – most of whom denied the charges – can darken the atmosphere of its reception. Such qualms seem not to have troubled Tomkyns, for whom it was merely ‘full of ribaldry’, ‘fopperies to provoke laughter’, and ‘diverse songs and dances’, making in all a ‘merry and excellent new play’. The historical record of the accused women fades into obscurity; although their accuser confessed to inventing his story, no pardon is recorded and the women were still in jail when they disappear from our view in 1637. Tomkyns’s end is better recorded: on 5 July 1643 he was hanged for counter-parliamentary treason.
Gabriel Egan
T HE
W ITCHES
OF
L ANCASHIRE
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D RAMATIS PERSONAE |
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The Persons in the Play |
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[PROLOGUE] |
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ARTHUR |
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SHAKESTONE |
three young gentlemen, and friends |
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BANTAM |
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GENEROUS |
a wealthy and generous squire |
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MISTRESS GENEROUS |
Generous’s wife, and a witch |
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WHETSTONE |
her dimwitted young nephew |
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ROBERT |
Generous’s groom |
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MOLL Spencer |
Robert’s sweetheart, and a witch |
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GILLIAN Dickinson |
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MAWD Hargreave |
three witches |
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MEG Johnson |
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SEELY |
a wealthy squire whose household is bewitched |
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DOUGHTY |
his friend |
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JOAN |
Seely’s wife |
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GREGORY |
Seely’s son |
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WINNY |
Seely’s daughter |
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LAWRENCE |
Gregory’s servant |
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PARNELL |
Winny’s servant |
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MILLER |
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BOY |
the Miller’s son |
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SOLDIER |
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RABBLE of hoydens |
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Piper, Drummer, Demon-child, Constable, and Officers |
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[Enter] the P ROLOGUE |
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Corrantoes failing, and no foot-post late |
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Possessing us with news of foreign state, |
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No accidents abroad worthy relation |
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Arriving here, we are forc’d from our own nation |
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To ground the scene that’s now in agitation. |
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The project unto many here well known, |
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Those witches the fat jailer brought to town, |
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An argument so thin, persons so low, |
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Can neither yield much matter, nor great show. |
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Expect no more than can from such be rais’d, |
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So may the scene pass pardon’d, though not prais’d . [Exit] |
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A CT 1, SCENE 1 |
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Enter ARTHUR, SHAKESTONE, and |
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- BANTAM, as from hunting
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Arthur |
Was ever sport of expectation |
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Thus cross’d in th’ height? |
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Shakestone |
Tush, these are accidents |
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All game is subject to. |
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Arthur |
So you may call them |
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Chances or crosses or what else you please, |
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But for my part I’ll hold them prodigies, |
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As things transcending Nature. |
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Bantam |
Oh, you speak this |
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Because a hare hath cross’d you. |
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Arthur |
A hare? |
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A witch, or rather a devil, I think! |
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For tell me, gentlemen, was’t possible |
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In such a fair course and no covert near, |
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We in pursuit and she in constant view, |
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Our eyes not wandering but all bent that way, |
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The dogs in chase, she ready to be ceas’d, |
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And at the instant, when I durst have laid |
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My life to gage my dog had pinch’d her, then |
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To vanish into nothing? |
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Shakestone |
Somewhat strange, |
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But not as you enforce it. |
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Arthur |
Make it plain |
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That I am in an error! Sure I am |
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That I about me have no borrow’d eyes; |
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They are mine own and matches. |
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Bantam |
She might find |
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Some muse as then not visible to us |
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And escape that way. |
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Shakestone |
- Perhaps some fox had
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Earth’d there, and though it be not common, |
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For I seldom have known or heard the like, |
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There squat herself, and so her ’scape appear |
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But natural which you proclaim a wonder. |
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Arthur |
Well, well, gentlemen, |
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Be you of your own faith, but what I see |
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And is to me apparent, being in sense, |
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My wits about me, no way toss’d or troubled, |
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To that will I give credit. |
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Bantam |
Come, come, all men |
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Were never of one mind, nor I of yours. |
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Shakestone |
To leave this argument, are you resolv’d |
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Where we shall dine today? |
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Arthur |
Yes, where we purpos’d. |
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Bantam |
That was with Master Generous. |
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Arthur |
True, the same, |
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And where a loving welcome is presum’d, |
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Whose liberal table’s never unprepar’d, |
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Nor he of guests unfurnish’d. Of his means, |
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There’s none can bear it with a braver port |
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And keep his state unshaken. One who sells not |
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Nor covets he to purchase, holds his own |
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Without oppressing others, always press’d |
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To endear to him any known gentleman |
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In whom he finds good parts. |
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Bantam |
A character |
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Not common in this age. |
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Arthur |
I cannot wind him up |
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Unto the least part of his noble worth; |
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’Tis far above my strength. |
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Enter WHETSTONE |
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Shakestone |
See who comes yonder: |
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A fourth to make us a full mess of guests |
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At Master Generous’ table. |
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Arthur |
Tush, let him pass. |
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He is not worth our luring – a mere coxcomb. |
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It is a way to call our wits in question |
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To have him seen amongst us. |
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Bantam |
He hath spied us; |
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There is no way to evade him. |
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Arthur |
That’s my grief. |
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A most notorious liar: out upon him! |
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Shakestone |
Let’s set the best face on’t. |
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Whetstone |
What, gentlemen? All mine old acquaintance? A |
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whole triplicity of friends together? Nay then, ’tis |
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three to one we shall not soon part company. |
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Shakestone |
Sweet Master Whetstone! |
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Bantam |
Dainty Master Whetstone! |
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Arthur |
Delicate Master Whetstone! |
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Whetstone |
You say right! Master Whetstone I have been, |
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Master Whetstone I am, and Master Whetstone I |
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shall be, and those that know me know withal |
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that I have not my name for nothing. I am he |
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whom all the brave blades of the country use to |
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whet their wits upon. Sweet Master Shakestone, |
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dainty Master Bantam, and dainty Master |
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Arthur! And how? And how? What, all lustick? |
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All froligozone? I know you are going to my |
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uncle’s to dinner, and so am I too. What, shall we |
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all make one rendezvous there? You need not |
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doubt of your welcome. |
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Shakestone |
No doubt at all, kind Master Whetstone, but we |
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have not seen you of late – you are grown a great |
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stranger amongst us. I desire sometimes to give |
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you a visit. I pray, where do you lie? |
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Whetstone |
Where do I lie? Why, sometimes in one place and |
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then again in another – I love to shift lodgings but |
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most constantly. Wheresoever I dine or sup, there |
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do I lie! |
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Arthur |
[aside] I never heard that word proceed from him |
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I durst call truth till now. |
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Whetstone |
But wheresoever I lie, ’tis no matter for that – I |
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pray you say, and say truth, are not you three now |
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going to dinner to my uncle’s? |
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Bantam |
I think you are a witch, Master Whetstone. |
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Whetstone |
How! A witch, gentlemen? I hope you do not |
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mean to abuse me, though at this time (if report |
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be true) there are too many of them here in our |
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country. But I am sure I look like no such ugly |
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creature. |
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Shakestone |
It seems, then, you are of opinion that there are |
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witches. For mine own part, I can hardly be |
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induced to think there is any such kind of people. |
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Whetstone |
No such kind of people? I pray you tell me |
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gentlemen, did never any one of you know my |
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mother? |
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Arthur |
Why, was your mother a witch? |
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Whetstone |
I do not say as witches go nowadays, for they for |
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the most part are ugly old beldams, but she was a |
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lusty young lass and, by her own report, by her |
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beauty and fair looks bewitched my father. |
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Bantam |
It seems then your mother was rather a young |
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wanton wench than an old withered witch. |
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Whetstone |
You say right, and know withal I come of two |
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ancient families, for as I am a Whetstone by the |
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mother side, so I am a By-blow by the father’s. |
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Arthur |
It appears then, by your discourse, that you came |
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in at the window. |
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Whetstone |
I would have you think I scorn, like my |
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grandam’s cat, to leap over the hatch. |
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Shakestone |
[To ARTHUR] He hath confess’d himself to be a bastard. |
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Arthur |
[To SHAKESTONE] And I believe’t as a notorious truth. |
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Whetstone |
Howsoever I was begot, here you see I am. And if |
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my parents went to it without fear or wit, what |
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can I help it? |
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Arthur |
[To SHAKESTONE] Very probable, for as he was |
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got without fear, so it is apparent he was born |
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without wit. |
120 |
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Whetstone |
Gentlemen, it seems you have some private |
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business amongst yourselves which I am not |
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willing to interrupt. I know not how the day goes |
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with you, but for mine own part my stomach is |
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now much upon twelve. You know what hour my |
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uncle keeps, and I love ever to be set before the |
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first grace. I am going before. Speak, shall I |
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acquaint him with your coming after? |
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Shakestone |
We mean this day to see what fare he keeps. |
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Whetstone |
And you know it is his custom to fare well, and in |
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that respect I think I may be his kinsman. And so |
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farewell gentlemen. I’ll be your forerunner to give |
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him notice of your visit. |
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Bantam |
And so entire us to you. |
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Shakestone |
Sweet Master Whetstone! |
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Arthur |
Kind Master By-blow! |
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Whetstone |
I see you are perfect both in my name and |
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surname. I have been ever bound unto you, for |
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which I will at this time be your noverint and give |
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him notice that you universi will be with him per |
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præsentes , and that I take to be presently. Exit |
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Arthur |
Farewell As in præsenti. |
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Shakestone |
It seems he’s piece of a scholar. |
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Arthur |
What, because he hath read a little scrivener’s |
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Latin? He never proceeded farther in his |
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Accidence than to Mentiri non est meum and that |
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was such a hard lesson to learn that he stuck at |
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mentiri and could never reach to non est meum. |
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Since, a mere Ignaro and not worth |
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acknowledgement. |
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Bantam |
Are these then the best parts he can boast of? |
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Arthur |
As you see him now, so shall you find him ever – |
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all in one strain. There is one only thing which I |
|
| |
wonder he left out. |
|
|
Shakestone |
And what might that be? |
|
|
Arthur |
Of the same affinity with rest: at every second |
|
| |
word he is commonly boasting either of his aunt |
|
| |
or his uncle. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter GENEROUS |
|
| |
|
|
|
Bantam |
You name him in good time; see where he comes. |
|
|
Generous |
Gentlemen, welcome! ’Tis a word I use; |
160 |
| |
From me expect no further compliment. |
|
| |
Nor do I name it often at one meeting; |
|
| |
Once spoke (to those that understand me best |
|
| |
And know I always purpose as I speak) |
|
| |
Hath ever yet sufficed, so let it you. |
|
| |
Nor do I love that common phrase of guests |
|
| |
As ‘we make bold’, or ‘we are troublesome’, |
|
| |
‘We take you unprovided’, and the like. |
|
| |
I know you understanding gentlemen |
|
| |
And, knowing me, cannot persuade yourselves |
170 |
| |
With me you shall be troublesome or bold, |
|
| |
But still provided for my worthy friends |
|
| |
Amongst whom you are listed. |
|
|
Arthur |
Noble sir, |
|
| |
You generously instruct us and to express |
|
| |
We can be your apt scholars – in a word |
|
| |
We come to dine with you. |
|
|
Generous |
And, gentlemen, |
|
| |
Such plainness doth best please me. I had notice |
|
| |
Of so much by my kinsman, and, to show |
|
| |
How lovingly I took it, instantly |
|
| |
Rose from my chair to meet you at the gate |
180 |
| |
And be myself your usher. Nor shall you find, |
|
| |
Being set to meat, that I’ll excuse your fare |
|
| |
Or say ‘I am sorry it falls out so poor’ |
|
| |
And ‘had I known your coming we’d have had |
|
| |
Such things and such’, nor blame my cook, to say |
|
| |
‘This dish or that had not been sauc’d with care’ – |
|
| |
Words fitting best a common hostess’ mouth |
|
| |
When there’s perhaps some just cause of dislike |
|
| |
But not the table of a gentleman; |
|
| |
Nor is it my wife’s custom. In a word, |
190 |
| |
Take what you find and so. |
|
|
Arthur |
Sir, without flattery |
|
| |
You may be call’d the sole surviving son |
|
| |
Of long since banish’d hospitality. |
|
|
Generous |
In that you please me not. But, gentlemen, |
|
| |
I hope to be beholden unto you all, |
|
| |
Which if I prove I’ll be a grateful debtor. |
|
|
Bantam |
Wherein, good sir? |
|
|
Generous |
I ever studied plainness |
|
| |
And truth withal. |
|
|
Shakestone |
I pray express yourself. |
|
|
Generous |
In few I shall. |
|
| |
I know this youth to whom my wife is aunt |
200 |
| |
Is, as you needs must find him, weak and shallow, |
|
| |
Dull as his name and what for kindred sake |
|
| |
We note not, or at least are loath to see, |
|
| |
Is unto such well-knowing gentlemen |
|
| |
Most grossly visible. If for my sake |
|
| |
You will but seem to wink at these his wants, |
|
| |
At least at table before us his friends. |
|
| |
I shall receive it as a courtesy |
|
| |
Not soon to be forgot. |
|
|
Arthur |
Presume it, sir. |
|
|
Generous |
Now when you please pray enter, gentlemen. |
210 |
|
Arthur |
Would these my friends prepare the way before. |
|
| |
To be resolv’d of one thing before dinner |
|
| |
Would something add unto mine appetite. |
|
| |
[To BANTAM and SHAKESTONE] Shall I |
|
| |
entreat you so much? |
|
|
Bantam |
Oh sir, you may command us. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Exit BANTAM and SHAKESTONE |
| |
|
|
|
Generous |
I’th’ meantime |
|
| |
Prepare your stomachs with a bowl of sack; |
|
| |
My cellar can afford it. Now, Master Arthur, |
|
| |
Pray freely speak your thoughts. |
|
|
Arthur |
I come not, sir |
|
| |
To press a promise from you – take’t not so – |
220 |
| |
Rather to prompt your memory in a motion |
|
| |
Made to you not long since. |
|
|
Generous |
Was’t not about |
|
| |
A manor, the best part of your estate, |
|
| |
Mortgag’d to one slips no advantages |
|
| |
Which you would have redeem’d? |
|
|
Arthur |
True sir, the same. |
|
|
Generous |
And as I think, I promis’d at that time |
|
| |
To become bound with you, or if the usurer |
|
| |
(A base, yet the best, title I can give him) |
|
| |
Perhaps should question that security |
|
| |
To have the money ready. Was’t not so? |
230 |
|
Arthur |
It was to that purpose we discoursed. |
|
|
Generous |
Provided – To have the writings in my custody. |
|
| |
Else how should I secure mine own estate? |
|
|
Arthur |
To deny that I should appear to th’ world |
|
| |
Stupid and of no brain. |
|
|
Generous |
Your money’s ready. |
|
|
Arthur |
And I remain a man oblig’d to you |
|
| |
Beyond all utterance. |
|
|
Generous |
Make then your word good |
|
| |
By speaking it no further, only this: |
|
| |
It seems your uncle you trusted in so far |
|
| |
Hath failed your expectation. |
|
|
Arthur |
Sir, he hath. |
240 |
| |
Not that he is unwilling or unable |
|
| |
But at this time unfit to be solicited; |
|
| |
For, to the country’s wonder and my sorrow, |
|
| |
He is much to be pitied. |
|
|
Generous |
Why, I entreat you? |
|
|
Arthur |
Because he’s late become the sole discourse |
|
| |
Of all the country, for, of a man respected |
|
| |
For his discretion and known gravity, |
|
| |
As master of a govern’d family, |
|
| |
The house – as if the ridge were fix’d below |
|
| |
And groundsills lifted up to make the roof – |
250 |
| |
All now turn’d topsy-turvy. |
|
|
Generous |
Strange! But how? |
|
|
Arthur |
In such a retrograde and preposterous way |
|
| |
As seldom hath been heard of – I think never. |
|
|
Generous |
Can you discourse the manner? |
|
|
Arthur |
The good man |
|
| |
In all obedience kneels unto his son; |
|
| |
He, with an austere brow, commands his father. |
|
| |
The wife presumes not in the daughter’s sight |
|
| |
Without a prepar’d curtsy. The girl she |
|
| |
Expects it as a duty, chides her mother, |
|
| |
Who quakes and trembles at each word she speaks. |
260 |
| |
And, what’s as strange, the maid she domineers |
|
| |
O’er her young mistress who is aw’d by her. |
|
| |
The son to whom the father creeps and bends |
|
| |
Stands in as much fear of the groom his man. |
|
| |
All in such rare disorder that, in some |
|
| |
As it breeds pity and in others wonder, |
|
| |
So in the most part laughter. |
|
|
Generous |
How think you might this come? |
|
|
Arthur |
’Tis thought by witchcraft. |
|
|
Generous |
They that think so dream, |
| |
For my belief is no such thing can be; |
270 |
| |
A madness you may call it. Dinner stays; |
|
| |
That done the best part of the afternoon |
|
| |
We’ll spend about your business. Exeunt |
|
[1.2] |
|
|
| |
Enter SEELY and DOUGHTY |
|
| |
|
|
|
Seely |
Nay, but understand me, neighbour Doughty! |
|
|
Doughty |
Good Master Seely, I do understand you, and over |
|
| |
and over understand you so much that I could |
|
| |
e’en blush at your fondness. And had I a son to |
|
| |
serve me so, I would conjure a devil out of him. |
|
|
Seely |
Alas, he is my child. |
|
|
Doughty |
No, you are his child to live in fear of him. Indeed |
|
| |
- they say old men become children again, but
|
|
| |
- before I would become my child’s child, and make
|
|
| |
- my foot my head, I would stand upon my head
|
10 |
| |
- and kick my heels at the skies.
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter GREGORY |
|
| |
|
|
|
Seely |
You do not know what an only son is. Oh see, he |
|
| |
comes! Now if you can appease his anger toward |
|
| |
me, you shall do an act of timely charity. |
|
|
Doughty |
It is an office that I am but weakly versed in, to |
|
| |
plead to a son in the father’s behalf. [aside] Bless |
|
| |
me what looks the devilish young rascal frights the |
|
| |
poor man withal! |
|
|
Gregory |
I wonder at your confidence and how you dare |
|
| |
appear before me. |
20 |
|
Doughty |
[aside] A brave beginning! |
|
|
Seely |
Oh son, be patient. |
|
|
Gregory |
It is right reverend counsel; I thank you for it. I |
|
| |
shall study patience, shall I, while you practice |
|
| |
ways to beggar me, shall I? |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] Very handsome! |
|
|
Seely |
If ever I transgress in the like again – |
|
|
Gregory |
I have taken your word too often, sir, and neither |
|
| |
can nor will forbear you longer. |
|
|
Doughty |
What, not your father, Master Gregory? |
|
|
Gregory |
What’s that to you, sir? |
30 |
|
Doughty |
Pray tell me then, sir, how many years has he to |
|
| |
serve you? |
|
|
Gregory |
What, do you bring your spokesman now, your |
|
| |
advocate? What fee goes out of my estate now for |
|
| |
his oratory? |
|
|
Doughty |
Come, I must tell you, you forget yourself, |
|
| |
And in this foul unnatural strife wherein |
|
| |
You trample on your father, you are fall’n |
|
| |
Below humanity. You’re so beneath |
|
| |
The title of a son you cannot claim |
40 |
| |
To be a man, and let me tell you, were you mine, |
|
| |
Thou shouldst not eat but on thy knees before me! |
|
|
Seely |
Oh, this is not the way! |
|
| |
This is to raise impatience into fury. |
|
| |
I do not seek his quiet for my ease: |
|
| |
I can bear all his chidings and his threats |
|
| |
And take them well, very exceeding well, |
|
| |
And find they do me good on my own part – |
|
| |
Indeed they do reclaim me from those errors |
|
| |
That might impeach his fortunes – but I fear |
50 |
| |
Th’unquiet strife within him hurts himself |
|
| |
And wastes or weakens nature by the breach |
|
| |
Of moderate sleep and diet; and I can |
|
| |
No less than grieve to find my weaknesses |
|
| |
To be the cause of his affliction |
|
| |
And see the danger of his health and being. |
|
|
Doughty |
Alas poor man! [To GREGORY] Can you stand open-eyed |
| |
Or dry-eyed either at this now in a father? |
|
|
Gregory |
Why, if it grieve you, you may look off on’t. |
|
| |
I have seen more than this twice twenty times, |
60 |
| |
And have as often been deceived by his |
|
| |
Dissimulations. I can see nothing mended. |
|
|
Doughty |
He is a happy sire that has brought up his son to |
|
| |
this! |
|
|
Seely |
All shall be mended. Son, content yourself. |
|
| |
But this time forget but this last fault. |
|
|
Gregory |
Yes, for a new one tomorrow! |
|
|
Doughty |
Pray, Master Gregory, forget it. You see how |
|
| |
submissive your poor penitent is. Forget it, |
|
| |
forget it! Put it out o’ your head; knock it out of |
70 |
| |
your brains. I protest, if my father, nay, if my |
|
| |
father’s dog should have said as much to me, I |
|
| |
should have embraced him. What was the |
|
| |
trespass? It could not be so heinous. |
|
|
Gregory |
Well, sir, you now shall be a judge for all your |
|
| |
jeering. Was it a fatherly part, think you, having a |
|
| |
son, to offer to enter in bonds for his nephew, so |
|
| |
to endanger my estate to redeem his mortgage? |
|
|
Seely |
But I did it not, son! |
|
|
Gregory |
I know it very well, but your dotage had done it if |
80 |
| |
my care had not prevented it. |
|
|
Doughty |
Is that the business? Why if he had done it, had he |
|
| |
not been sufficiently secured in having the |
|
| |
mortgage made over to himself? |
|
|
Gregory |
He does nothing but practice ways to undo |
|
| |
himself and me. A very spendthrift, a prodigal sire, |
|
| |
he was at the ale but t’other day and spent a |
|
| |
fourpenny club. |
|
|
Seely |
’Tis gone and past, son. |
|
|
Gregory |
Can you hold your peace, sir? And not long ago at |
90 |
| |
the wine he spent his tester and two pence to the |
|
| |
piper. That was brave was it not? |
|
|
Seely |
Truly, we were civilly merry, but I have left it. |
|
|
Gregory |
Your civility, have you not? For no longer ago |
|
| |
than last holiday evening he gamed away eight |
|
| |
double-ringed tokens on a rubbers at bowls with |
|
| |
the curate and some of his idle companions. |
|
|
Doughty |
Fie! Master Gregory Seely, is this seemly in a |
|
| |
son? You’ll have a rod for the child your father |
|
| |
shortly, I fear. ‘Alas, did he make it cry?’ ‘Give me |
100 |
| |
a stroke and I’ll beat him!’ Bless me, they make me |
|
| |
almost as mad as themselves. |
|
|
Gregory |
’Twere good you would meddle with your own |
|
| |
matters, sir. |
|
|
Seely |
Son, son. |
|
|
Gregory |
Sir, sir, as I am not beholden to you for house or |
|
| |
land – for it has stood in the name of my ancestry |
|
| |
the Seelys above two hundred years – so will I |
|
| |
look you leave all as you found it. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter LAWRENCE |
|
| |
|
|
|
Lawrence |
What is the matter, can you tell? |
110 |
|
Gregory |
O Lawrence, welcome, thou wilt make all well, I |
|
| |
am sure. |
|
|
Lawrence |
Yea, which way, can you tell? But what the foul |
|
| |
evil do you, here’s such a din? |
|
|
Doughty |
Art thou his man, fellow, ha, that talkest thus to |
|
| |
him? |
|
|
Lawrence |
Yea sir, and what ma’ you o’ that? He maintains |
|
| |
me to rule him ,and I’ll do’t – or ma’ the heart |
|
| |
weary o’ the womb of him. |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] This is quite upside down: the son controls |
120 |
| |
the father and the man overcrows his master’s |
|
| |
coxcomb – sure they are all bewitched. |
|
|
Gregory |
’Twas but so, truly Lawrence. The peevish old |
|
| |
man vexed me, for which I did my duty in telling |
|
| |
- him his own, and Master Doughty here maintains
|
|
| |
him against me. |
|
|
Lawrence |
I forboden you to meddle with the old carl, and let |
|
| |
me alone with him, yet you still be at him. He |
|
| |
served you but well to baste ye for’t, an he were |
|
| |
strong enough, but an I fall foul with ye, and I |
130 |
| |
swaddle ye not savourly, may my guts brast. |
|
|
Seely |
Prithee, good Lawrence, be gentle and do not |
|
| |
fright thy master so. |
|
|
Lawrence |
Yea, at your command anon! |
|
|
Doughty |
Enough, good Lawrence; you have said enough. |
|
|
Lawrence |
How trow you that? A fine world when a man |
|
| |
cannot be quiet at home for busy-brained |
|
| |
neighbours. |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] I know not what to say to anything here; |
|
| |
this cannot be but witchcraft. |
140 |
| |
|
|
| |
Enter JOAN and WINNY |
|
| |
|
|
|
Winny |
I cannot endure it nor I will not endure it! |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] Hey day! The daughter upon the mother, |
|
| |
too! |
|
|
Winny |
One of us two – choose you which – must leave |
|
| |
the house. We are not to live together, I see that, |
|
| |
but I will know, if there be law in Lancashire for’t, |
|
| |
which is fit first to depart the house or the world, |
|
| |
the mother or the daughter. |
|
|
Joan |
Daughter, I say – |
|
|
Winny |
Do you say the ‘daughter’? For that word I say the |
150 |
| |
‘mother’! Unless you can prove me the eldest, as |
|
| |
my discretion almost warrants it, I say the mother |
|
| |
shall out of the house or take such courses in it as |
|
| |
shall sort with such a house and such a daughter. |
|
|
Joan |
Daughter, I say I will take any course so thou wilt |
|
| |
leave thy passion; indeed it hurts thee, child. I’ll |
|
| |
sing and be merry, wear as fine clothes and as |
|
| |
delicate dressings as thou wilt have me, so thou |
|
| |
wilt pacify thyself and be at peace with me. |
|
|
Winny |
Oh, will you so? In so doing I may chance to look |
160 |
| |
upon you! Is this a fit habit for a handsome young |
|
| |
gentlewoman’s mother, as I hope to be a lady? You |
|
| |
look like one o’ the Scottish weird sisters. Oh, |
|
| |
my heart has got the hiccup and all looks green |
|
| |
about me! A merry song now, mother, and thou |
|
| |
shalt be my white girl. |
|
|
Joan |
Ha, ha, ha! She’s overcome with joy at my |
|
| |
conversion. |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] She is most evidently bewitched. |
|
|
Joan |
(sings) There was a deft lad and a lass fell in love, |
170 |
| |
With a fa la la, fa la la, langtidown dilly. |
|
| |
With kissing and toying this maiden did prove, |
|
| |
With a fa la la, fa la la, langtidown dilly, |
|
| |
So wide i’ th’ waist and her belly so high, |
|
| |
That unto her mother the maiden did cry. |
|
| |
Oh langtidown dilly, Oh langtidown dilly, |
|
| |
Fa la la langtidown, langtidown dilly. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter PARNELL |
|
| |
|
|
|
Parnell |
Thus would you do an I were dead. But while I |
|
| |
live you fadge not on it. Is this all the work you |
|
| |
can find? |
180 |
|
Doughty |
[aside] Now comes the maid to set her mistresses |
|
| |
to work! |
|
|
Winny |
Nay, prithee, sweet Parnell, I was but chiding the |
|
| |
old wife for her unhandsomeness, and would have |
|
| |
been at my work presently. She tells me now she |
|
| |
will wear fine things, and I shall dress her head as |
|
| |
I list. |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] Here’s a house well governed! |
|
|
Parnell |
Dress me no dressings, lessen I dress you both and |
|
| |
learn a new lesson with a wanion right now. Ha’ |
190 |
| |
I been a servant here this half dozen o’ years, and |
|
| |
can I see you idler than myself? |
|
|
Joan & Winny |
Nay, prithee, sweet Parnell, content and hark thee – |
|
| |
[JOAN and WINNY talk to Parnell aside] |
|
|
Doughty |
[aside] I have known this, and till very lately, as |
|
| |
well governed a family as the country yields, and |
|
| |
now what a nest of several humours it is grown, |
|
| |
and all devilish ones! Sure, all the witches in the |
|
| |
country have their hands in this homespun |
|
| |
medley, and there be no few, ’tis thought. |
|
|
Parnell |
Yea, yea, ye shall, ye shall, another time but not |
200 |
| |
now, I thank you. You shall as soon piss and |
|
| |
paddle in’t as slap me in the mouth with an old |
|
| |
petticoat or a new pair o’ shoen to be quiet. I |
|
| |
cannot be quiet, nor I will not be quiet to see sicky |
|
| |
doings, I. |
|
|
Lawrence |
Hold thy prattle, Parnell; all’s come about as ween |
|
| |
’a’ had it. Wot’st thou what, Parnell? Wot’st thou |
|
| |
what? Oh dear, wot’st thou what? |
|
|
Parnell |
What’s the fond waxen wild, trow I. |
|
|
Lawrence |
We ha’ been in love these three years, and ever |
210 |
| |
we had not enough. Now is it come about that our |
|
| |
love shall be at an end for ever and a day, for we |
|
| |
mu’ wed, my honey, we mu’ wed. |
|
|
Parnell |
What the devil ails thee, limmer loon? Been thy |
|
| |
brains broke loose, trow I. |
|
|
Lawrence |
Such a wedding was there never i’ Lancashire as |
|
| |
we’ll couple at on Monday next. |
|
|
Parnell |
Aw, aw, say you this sickerly or done you but jam |
|
| |
me? |
|
|
Lawrence |
I jam thee not nor flam thee not; ’tis all as true as |
220 |
| |
book. [Shows a paper] Here’s both our masters |
|
| |
have consented and concluded, and our mistresses |
|
| |
mu’ yield to’t, to put all house and land and all |
|
| |
they have into our hands. |
|
|
Parnell |
Aw, aw! |
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Lawrence |
And we mu’ marry and be master and dame of |
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| |
all! |
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Parnell |
Aw, aw! |
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Lawrence |
And they be our sojourners, because they are |
|
| |
weary of the world, to live in friendliness and see |
230 |
| |
what will come on’t |
|
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Parnell |
Aw, aw, go on! |
|
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Seely & Gregory |
Nay, ’tis true, Parnell; here’s both our hands on’t, |
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| |
and give you joy! |
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Joan & Winny |
And ours too, and ’twill be fine i’fackins. |
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Parnell |
Aw, aw, aw, aw! |
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Doughty |
[aside] Here’s a mad business towards! |
|
|
Seely |
I will bespeak the guests. |
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|
Gregory |
And I the meat. |
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Joan |
I’ll dress the dinner, though I drip my sweat. |
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Lawrence |
My care shall sumptuous ’pparelments provide. |
240 |
|
Winny |
And my best art shall trickly trim the bride. |
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Parnell |
Aw, aw, aw, aw! |
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Gregory |
I’ll get choice music for the merriment. |
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Doughty |
[aside] And I will wait with wonder the event! |
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Parnell |
Aw, aw, aw, aw! Exeunt |
| |
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| |
A CT 2, SCENE 1 |
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| |
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| |
Enter four witches severally |
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| |
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All |
Ho! Well met, well met. |
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Meg |
What new device, what dainty strain, |
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| |
More for our mirth now than our gain, |
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| |
Shall we in practice put? |
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Moll |
Nay, dame, |
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| |
Before we play another game |
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| |
We must a little laugh and thank |
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| |
Our feat familiars for the prank |
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| |
They played us last. |
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Mawd |
Or they will miss |
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| |
Us in our next plot, if for this |
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| |
They find not their reward. |
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Meg |
’Tis right. |
10 |
|
Gillian |
Therefore sing, Mawd, and call each sprite. |
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|
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| |
Enter four spirits |
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| |
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Mawd |
[Sings] Come away, and take thy duggy. |
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Meg |
Come, my Mamilion, like a puggy. |
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Mawd |
And come, my Puckling, take thy teat, |
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| |
Your travails have deserv’d your meat. |
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Meg |
Now, upon the churl’s ground |
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| |
On which we’re met, let’s dance a round, |
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| |
That cockle, darnell, poppia wild |
|
| |
May choke his grain and fill the field. |
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Gillian |
Now spirits fly about the task |
20 |
| |
That we projected in our masque. Exit spirits |
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Meg |
Now let us laugh to think upon |
|
| |
The feat which we have so lately done, |
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| |
In the distraction we have set |
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| |
In Seely’s house, which shall beget |
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| |
Wonder and sorrow ’mongst our foes, |
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| |
Whilst we make laughter of their woes. |
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All |
Ha, ha, ha! |
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Meg |
I can but laugh now to foresee |
|
| |
The fruits of their perplexity. |
30 |
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Gillian |
Of Seely’s family? |
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Meg |
Ay, ay, ay! |
|
| |
The father to the son doth cry, |
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| |
The son rebukes the father old, |
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| |
The daughter at the mother scold, |
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| |
The wife the husband check and chide. |
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| |
But that’s no wonder, through the wide |
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| |
World ’tis common! |
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Gillian |
But to be short, |
|
| |
The wedding must bring on the sport |
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| |
Betwixt the hare-brain’d man and maid, |
|
| |
Master and dame that oversway’d. |
40 |
|
All |
Ha, ha, ha! |
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Meg |
Enough, enough! |
|
| |
Our sides are charm’d or else this stuff |
|
| |
Would laughter-crack them. Let’s away |
|
| |
About the jig: we dance today |
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| |
To spoil the hunters’ sport. |
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Gillian |
Ay, that |
|
| |
Be now the subject of our chat. |
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Meg |
Then list ye well: the hunters are |
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| |
This day by vow to kill a hare, |
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| |
Or else the sport they will foreswear |
50 |
| |
And hang their dogs up. |
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Mawd |
Stay, but where |
|
| |
Must the long-threaten’d hare be found? |
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Gillian |
They’ll search in yonder meadow ground. |
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Meg |
There will I be, and like a wily wat, |
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| |
Until they put me up, I’ll squat. |
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Gillian |
I and my Puckling will a brace |
|
| |
Of greyhounds be, fit for the race, |
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| |
And linger where we may be ta’en |
|
| |
Up for the course in the by-lane. |
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| |
Then will we lead their dogs a-course, |
60 |
| |
And every man and every horse, |
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| |
Until they break their necks, and say – |
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All |
‘The devil on Dun is rid this way!’ |
|
| |
Ha, ha, ha, ha! |
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Meg |
All the doubt can be but this, |
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| |
That if by chance of me they miss |
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| |
And start another hare. |
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Gillian |
Then we’ll not run, |
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| |
But find some way how to be gone. |
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| |
I shall know thee, Peg, by thy grizzled gut. |
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Meg |
And I you, Gillian, by your gaunt thin gut. |
70 |
|
But where will Mawd bestow herself today? |
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Mawd |
O’ th’ steeple-top I’ll sit and see you play. Exeunt |
| |
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|
[2.2] |
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| |
Enter GENEROUS, ARTHUR, BANTAM, |
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| |
SHAKESTONE, and WHETSTONE |
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| |
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Generous |
At meeting and at parting, gentlemen, |
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| |
I only make use of that general word |
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| |
So frequent at all feasts, and that but once: |
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| |
You’re ‘welcome!’ |
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| |
You are so, all of you, and I entreat you |
|
| |
Take notice of that special business |
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| |
Betwixt this gentleman (my friend) and I |
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| |
About the mortgage, to which writings drawn |
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| |
Your hands are witness. |
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Bantam & Shakestone |
We acknowledge it. |
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Whetstone |
My hand is there too, for a man cannot set to his |
10 |
| |
mark but it may be call’d his hand. I am a |
|
| |
gentleman both ways, and it hath been held that it |
|
| |
is the part of a gentleman to write a scurvy hand. |
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|
Bantam |
You write, sir, like yourself. |
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Generous |
Pray take no notice of his ignorance; |
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| |
You know what I foretold you. |
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Arthur |
’Tis confess’d. |
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| |
But for that word by you so seldom spoke, |
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| |
By us so freely on your part perform’d, |
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| |
We hold us much engag’d. |
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Generous |
I pray, no compliment; |
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| |
It is a thing I do not use myself |
20 |
| |
Nor do I love’t in others. |
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Arthur |
For my part, |
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| |
Could I at once dissolve myself to words |
|
| |
And after turn them into matter, such |
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| |
And of that strength as to attract the attention |
|
| |
Of all the curious and most itching ears |
|
| |
Of this our critic age, it could not make |
|
| |
A theme amounting to your noble worth. |
|
| |
You seem to me to supererogate, |
|
| |
Supplying the defects of all your kindred, |
|
| |
To ennoble your own name. I now have done, sir. |
30 |
|
Whetstone |
Hey day! This gentleman speaks like a country |
|
| |
parson that had took his text out of Ovid’s |
|
| |
Metamorphoses . |
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|
Generous |
[To ARTHUR] Sir, you hyperbolize. |
|
| |
And I could chide you for’t, but whilst you connive |
|
| |
At this my kinsman I shall wink at you; |
|
| |
’Twill prove an equal match. |
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|
Arthur |
Your name proclaims |
|
| |
To be such as it speaks you: generous. |
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|
Generous |
Still in that strain! |
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|
Arthur |
Sir, sir, whilst you persevere to be good |
40 |
| |
I must continue grateful. |
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|
Generous |
Gentlemen, |
|
| |
The greatest part of this day you see is spent |
|
| |
In reading deeds, conveyances, and bonds, |
|
| |
With sealing and subscribing – will you now |
|
| |
Take part of a bad supper? |
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|
Arthur |
We are like travellers, |
|
| |
And where such bait they do not use to inn. |
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| |
Our love and service to you. |
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|
Generous |
The first I accept; |
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| |
The last I entertain not. Farewell, gentlemen. |
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|
Arthur |
We’ll try if we can find in our way home, |
50 |
| |
When hares come from their coverts to relieve, |
|
| |
A course or two. |
|
|
Whetstone |
Say you so, gentlemen? Nay then I am for your |
|
| |
company still. ’Tis said hares are like |
|
| |
hermaphrodites – one while male and another |
|
| |
female – and that which begets this year brings |
|
| |
young ones the next, which some think to be the |
|
| |
reason that witches take their shapes so oft. Nay, if |
|
| |
I lie, Pliny lies too – but come, now I have light |
|
| |
upon you, I cannot so lightly leave you. Farewell, |
60 |
| |
uncle. |
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|
Generous |
Cousin, I wish you would consort yourself |
|
| |
With such men ever and make them your precedent |
|
| |
For a more gentle carriage. |
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Arthur |
Good Master Generous – Exeunt all but Generous |
| |
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|
| |
Enter ROBERT |
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| |
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Generous |
Robin! |
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Robert |
Sir? |
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Generous |
Go call your mistress hither. |
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Robert |
My mistress, sir? I do call her ‘mistress’ as I do call |
|
| |
you ‘master’, but if you would have me call my |
|
| |
mistress to my master I may call loud enough |
|
| |
before she can hear me. |
70 |
|
Generous |
Why, she’s not deaf, I hope. I am sure since dinner |
|
| |
she had her hearing perfect. |
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|
Robert |
And so she may have at supper too for ought I |
|
| |
know, but I can assure you she is not now within |
|
| |
my call. |
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|
Generous |
Sirrah, you trifle. Give me the key o’ th’ stable, |
|
| |
I will go see my gelding. I’ th’ meantime |
|
| |
Go seek her out, say she shall find me there. |
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|
Robert |
To tell you true, sir, I shall neither find |
|
| |
My mistress here, nor you your gelding there. |
80 |
|
Generous |
Ha? How comes that to pass? |
|
|
Robert |
Whilst you were busy about your writings, she |
|
| |
came and commanded me to saddle your beast |
|
| |
and said she would ride abroad to take the air. |
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|
Generous |
Which of your fellows did she take along to wait |
|
| |
on her? |
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|
Robert |
None, sir. |
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|
Generous |
None? Hath she us’d it often? |
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|
Robert |
Oftener I am sure than she goes to church, and |
|
| |
leave out Wednesdays and Fridays. |
90 |
|
Generous |
And still alone? |
|
|
Robert |
If you call that alone, when nobody rides in her |
|
| |
company. |
|
|
Generous |
But what times hath she sorted for these journeys? |
|
|
Robert |
Commonly when you are abroad, and sometimes |
|
| |
when you are full of business at home. |
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|
Generous |
To ride out often and alone! What saith she |
|
| |
When she takes horse, and at her back return? |
|
|
Robert |
Only conjures me that I shall keep it from you, |
|
| |
then claps me in the fist with some small piece of |
100 |
| |
silver, and then a fish cannot be more silent that I. |
|
|
Generous |
I know her a good woman and well bred, |
|
| |
Of an unquestion’d carriage, well reputed |
|
| |
Amongst her neighbours, reckon’d with the best |
|
| |
And o’er me most indulgent, though in many |
|
| |
Such things might breed a doubt and jealousy, |
|
| |
Yet I hatch no such frenzy. Yet to prevent |
|
| |
The smallest jar that might betwixt us happen, |
|
| |
Give her no notice that I know thus much. |
|
| |
Besides, I charge thee, when she craves him next |
110 |
| |
He be denied. If she be vex’d or mov’d, |
|
| |
Do not thou feare: I’ll interpose myself |
|
| |
Betwixt thee and her anger. As you tender |
|
| |
Your duty and my service, see this done. |
|
|
Robert |
Now you have expressed your mind I know what |
|
| |
I have to do: first, not to tell her what I have told |
|
| |
you, and next to keep her side-saddle from |
|
| |
coming upon your gelding’s back. But, howsoever, |
|
| |
it is like to hinder me of many a round tester. |
|
|
Generous |
As oft as thou deny’st her, so oft claim |
120 |
| |
That tester from me; ’t shall be roundly paid. |
|
|
Robert |
You say well in that, sir. I dare take your word – |
|
| |
you are an honest gentleman and my master – and |
|
| |
now take mine as I am your true servant: before |
|
| |
she shall back your gelding again in your absence, |
|
| |
while I have the charge of his keeping, she shall |
|
| |
ride me or I’ll ride her! |
|
|
Generous |
So much for that. Sirrah, my butler tells me |
|
| |
My cellar is drunk dry – I mean those bottles |
|
| |
Of sack and claret are all empty grown |
130 |
| |
And I have guests tomorrow, my choice friends. |
|
| |
Take the grey nag i’ th’ stable and those bottles |
|
| |
Fill at Lancaster, there where you use to fetch it. |
|
|
Robert |
[aside] Good news for me! – I shall sir. |
|
|
Generous |
Oh Robin, it comes short of that pure liquor |
|
| |
We drunk last term in London at the Mitre |
|
| |
In Fleet Street – thou rememberest it? Methought |
|
| |
It was the very spirit of the grape, |
|
| |
Mere quintessence of wine! |
|
|
Robert |
Yes, sir, I so remember it that most certain it is I |
140 |
| |
never shall forget it; my mouth waters ever since |
|
| |
when I but think on’t. Whilst you were at supper |
|
| |
above, the drawer had me down into the cellar |
|
| |
below – I know the way in again if I see’t – but at |
|
| |
that time to find the way out again I had the help |
|
| |
of more eyes than mine own. Is the taste of that |
|
| |
Ipsitate still in your palate, sir? |
|
|
Generous |
What then? But vain are wishes. Take those bottles |
|
| |
And see them fill’d where I command you, sir. |
|
|
Robert |
I shall. [aside] Never could I have met with such a |
150 |
| |
fair opportunity, for just in the mid way lies my |
|
| |
sweetheart, as lovely a lass as any is in Lancashire, |
|
| |
and kisses as sweetly. I’ll see her going or coming; |
|
| |
I’ll have one smooch at thy lips and be with thee |
|
| |
to bring, Moll Spencer. Exit |
|
Generous |
Go, hasten your return. What he hath told me |
|
| |
Touching my wife is somewhat strange. No matter. |
|
| |
Be’t as it will, it shall not trouble me. |
|
| |
She hath not lain so long so near my side |
|
| |
That now I should be jealous. |
160 |
| |
|
|
| |
Enter a SOLDIER |
|
| |
|
|
|
Soldier |
You seem, sir, a gentlemen of quality and no |
|
| |
doubt but in your youth have been acquainted |
|
| |
with affairs military. In your very looks there |
|
| |
appears bounty and in your person humanity. |
|
| |
Please you to vouchsafe the tender of some small |
|
| |
courtesy to help to bear a soldier into his country. |
|
|
Generous |
Though I could tax you friend, and justly too, |
|
| |
For begging ’gainst the statute in that name, |
|
| |
Yet I have ever been of that compassion, |
|
| |
Where I see want, rather to pity it |
170 |
| |
Than to use power. Where hast thou served? |
|
|
Soldier |
With the Russian against the Polack, a heavy war |
|
| |
and hath brought me to this hard fate. I was took |
|
| |
prisoner by the Pole and, after some few weeks of |
|
| |
durance, got both my freedom and pass. I have it |
|
| |
about me to show; please you to vouchsafe the |
|
| |
perusal? |
|
|
Generous |
It shall not need. What countryman? |
|
|
Soldier |
Yorkshire, sir. Many a sharp battle by land, and |
|
| |
many a sharp storm at sea, many a long mile, and |
180 |
| |
many a short meal, I have travelled and suffered |
|
| |
ere I could reach thus far. I beseech you, sir, take |
|
| |
my poor and wretched case into your worship’s |
|
| |
noble consideration. |
|
|
Generous |
Perhaps thou lov’st this wandering life, |
|
| |
To be an idle loitering beggar, than |
|
| |
To eat of thine own labour. |
|
|
Soldier |
I, sir? Loitering I defy, sir! I hate laziness as I do |
|
| |
leprosy; it is the next way to breed the scurvy. Put |
|
| |
me to hedge, ditch, plough, thresh, dig, delve, |
190 |
| |
anything: your worship shall find that I love |
|
| |
nothing less than loitering. |
|
|
Generous |
Friend, thou speakest well. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter MILLER, his hands and face scratched and bloody |
|
| |
|
|
|
Miller |
‘Your mill’, quoth he! If ever you take me in your |
|
| |
mill again, I’ll give you leave to cast my flesh to |
|
| |
the dogs and grind my bones to powder betwixt |
|
| |
the millstones. ‘Cats’ do you call them? For their |
|
| |
hugeness they might be cat o’ mountains, and for |
|
| |
their claws I think I have it here in red and white |
|
| |
to show. I pray look here, sir. A murrain take |
200 |
| |
them. I’ll be sworn they have scratched where I |
|
| |
am sure it itched not. |
|
|
Generous |
How camest thou in this pickle? |
|
|
Miller |
You see, sir, and what you see I have felt, and am |
|
| |
come to give you to understand I’ll not endure |
|
| |
such another night if you would give me your mill |
|
| |
for nothing. They say we millers are thieves, but I |
|
| |
could as soon be hanged as steal one piece of a nap |
|
| |
all the night long. Good landlord, provide yourself |
|
| |
of a new tenant. The noise of such caterwauling, |
210 |
| |
and such scratching and clawing, before I would |
|
| |
endure again, I’ll be tied to the sail when the wind |
|
| |
blows sharpest and they fly swiftest till I be torn |
|
| |
torn into as many fitters as I have toes and fingers. |
|
|
Soldier |
I was a miller myself before I was a soldier. What |
|
| |
one of my own trade should be so poorly spirited, |
|
| |
frighted with cats? |
|
| |
Sir, trust me with the mill that he forsakes. |
|
| |
Here is a blade that hangs upon this belt |
|
| |
That spite of all these rats, cats, weasels, witches, |
220 |
| |
Or dogs, or devils, shall so conjure them |
|
| |
I’ll quiet my possession. |
|
|
Generous |
Well spoke, soldier! |
|
| |
I like thy resolution. [To MILLER] Fellow, you then |
| |
Have given the mill quite over? |
|
|
Miller |
Over and over. Here I utterly renounce it, nor |
|
| |
would I stay in it longer if you would give me |
|
| |
your whole estate. Nay, if I say it you may take my |
|
| |
word, landlord. |
|
|
Soldier |
I pray, sir, dare you trust your mill with me? |
|
|
Generous |
I dare, but I am loath, my reasons these: |
230 |
| |
For many months scarce anyone hath lain there |
|
| |
But have been strangely frighted in his sleep, |
|
| |
Or from his warm bed drawn into the floor, |
|
| |
Or claw’d and scratch’d as thou see’st this poor man, |
|
| |
So much that it stood long untenanted, |
|
| |
Till he late undertook it. Now thine eyes |
|
| |
Witness how he hath sped. |
|
|
Soldier |
Give me the keys; I’ll stand it all danger. |
|
|
Generous |
’Tis a match. [To MILLER] Deliver them. |
|
|
Miller |
Marry, with all my heart, and I am glad I am so rid |
240 |
| |
of ’em. Exeunt |
| |
|
|
|
[2.3] |
|
|
| |
Enter BOY with a switch |
|
| |
|
|
|
Boy |
Now I have gathered bullace and filled my belly |
|
| |
pretty well, I’ll go see some sport. There are |
|
| |
gentlemen coursing in the meadow hard by, |
|
| |
and ’tis a game I love better than going to school, |
|
| |
ten to one. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Enter an invisible spirit (John Adson) with a brace |
|
| |
of greyhounds |
|
| |
|
|
| |
What have we here – a brace of greyhounds broke |
|
| |
loose from their masters? It must needs be so, for |
|
| |
they have both their collars and slips about their |
|
| |
necks. Now I look better upon them, methinks I |
|
| |
should know them, and so I do: these are Master |
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Robinson’s dogs, that dwells some two miles off. |
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I’ll take them up and lead them home to their |
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master; it may be something in my way for he is |
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as liberal a gentlemen as any is in our country. [To |
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one of the dogs ] Come, Hector, come. Now if I |
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could but start a hare by the way, kill her and carry |
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her home to my supper, I should think I had made |
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a better afternoon’s work of it than gathering |
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bullace. Come, poor curs, along with me. Exeunt |
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[2.4] |
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Enter ARTHUR, BANTAM, SHAKESTONE, |
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and WHETSTONE |
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Arthur |
My dog as yours. |
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Shakestone |
For what? |
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Arthur |
A piece. |
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Shakestone |
’Tis done. |
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Bantam |
I say the pied dog shall outstrip the brown. |
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Whetstone |
And I’ll take the brown dog’s part against the pied. |
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Bantam |
Yes, when he’s at his lap you’ll take his part. |
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Arthur |
Bantam, forbear him prithee. |
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Bantam |
He talks so like an ass; I have not patience to |
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endure his nonsense! |
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Whetstone |
The brown dog for two pieces. |
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Bantam |
Of what? |
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Whetstone |
Of what you dare! Name them from the last |
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farthings, with the double rings, to the late-coined |
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pieces which they say are all counterfeit. |
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Bantam |
Well, sir, I take on. [Shows him coins] Will you |
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cover these? Give them into the hands of either |
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of those two gentlemen. |
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