SCENE II.--_A Court of Justice in Nineveh.

_Enter_ ALCON _and_ THRASYBULUS, _with their_ Lawyer.

_Thras._ I need not, sir, discourse unto you the duty of lawyers in tendering the right cause of their clients, nor the conscience you are tied unto by higher command. Therefore suffice, the Usurer hath done me wrong; you know the case; and, good sir, I have strained myself to give you your fees.

_Lawyer._ Sir, if I should any way neglect so manifest a truth, I were to be accused of open perjury, for the case is evident.

_Alc._ And truly, sir, for my case, if you help me not for my matter, why, sir, I and my wife are quite undone; I want my mease[79] of milk when I go to my work, and my boy his bread and butter when he goes to school. Master Lawyer, pity me, for surely, sir, I was fain to lay my wife's best gown to pawn for your fees: when I looked upon it, sir, and saw how handsomely it was daubed with statute-lace,[80] and what a fair mockado[81] cape it had, and then thought how handsomely it became my wife,--truly, sir, my heart is made of butter, it melts at the least persecution,--I fell on weeping; but when I thought on the words the Usurer gave me, "no cow," then, sir, I would have stript her into her smock, but I would make him deliver my cow ere I had done: therefore, good Master Lawyer, stand my friend.

_Lawyer._ Trust me, father, I will do for thee as much as for myself.

_Alc._ Are you married, sir?

_Lawyer._ Ay, marry, am I, father.

_Alc._ Then good's benison light on you and your good wife, and send her that she be never troubled with my wife's disease.

_Lawyer._ Why, what's thy wife's disease.

_Alc._ Truly, sir, she hath two open faults, and one privy fault. Sir, the first is, she is too eloquent for a poor man, and hath the words of art, for she will call me rascal, rogue, runagate, varlet, vagabond, slave, knave: why, alas, sir, and these be but holiday-terms, but if you heard her working-day words, in faith, sir, they be rattlers like thunder, sir; for after the dew follows a storm, for then am I sure either to be well buffeted, my face scratched, or my head broken: and therefore, good Master Lawyer, on my knees I ask it, let me not go home again to my wife with this word "no cow"; for then she will exercise her two faults upon me with all extremity.

_Lawyer._ Fear not, man. But what is thy wife's privy fault?

_Alc._ Truly, sir, that's a thing of nothing; alas, she, indeed, sir-reverence of your mastership, doth use to break wind in her sleep.--O, sir, here comes the Judge, and the old caitiff the Usurer.

_Enter the_ Judge, _attended, and the_ Usurer.

_Usurer._ Sir, here is forty angels for you, and if at any time you want a hundred pound or two, 'tis ready at your command, or the feeding of three or four fat bullocks: whereas these needy slaves can reward with nothing but a cap and a knee; and therefore I pray you, sir, favour my case.

_Judge._ Fear not, sir, I'll do what I can for you.

_Usurer._ What, Master Lawyer, what make you here? mine adversary for these clients?

_Lawyer._ So it chanceth now, sir.

_Usurer._ I know you know the old proverb, "He is not wise that is not wise for himself": I would not be disgraced in this action; therefore here is twenty angels; say nothing in the matter, or what you say, say to no purpose, for the Judge is my friend.

_Lawyer._ Let me alone, I'll fit your purpose.

_Judge._ Come, where are these fellows that are the plaintiffs? what can they say against this honest citizen our neighbour, a man of good report amongst all men?

_Alc._ Truly, Master Judge, he is a man much spoken of; marry, every man's cries are against him, and especially we; and therefore I think we have brought our Lawyer to touch him with as much law as will fetch his lands and my cow with a pestilence.

_Thras._ Sir, I am the other plaintiff, and this is my counsellor: I beseech your honour be favourable to me in equity.

_Judge._ O, Signor Mizaldo, what can you say in this gentleman's behalf?

_Lawyer._ Faith, sir, as yet little good.--Sir, tell you your own case to the Judge, for I have so many matters in my head, that I have almost forgotten it.

_Thras._ Is the wind in that door? Why then, my lord, thus. I took up of this cursed Usurer, for so I may well term him, a commodity of forty pounds, whereof I received ten pound in money, and thirty pound in lute-strings, whereof I could by great friendship make but five pounds: for the assurance of this bad commodity I bound him my land in recognisance: I came at my day, and tendered him his money, and he would not take it: for the redress of my open wrong I crave but justice.

_Judge._ What say you to this, sir?

_Usurer._ That first he had no lute-strings of me; for, look you, sir, I have his own hand to my book for the receipt of forty pound.

_Thras._ That was, sir, but a device of him to colour the statute.

_Judge._ Well, he hath thine own hand, and we can crave no more in law.--But now, sir, he says his money was tendered at the day and hour.

_Usurer._ This is manifest contrary, sir, and on that I will depose; for here is the obligation, "to be paid between three and four in the afternoon," and the clock struck four before he offered it, and the words be "between three and four," therefore to be tendered before four.

_Thras._ Sir, I was there before four, and he held me with brabbling[82] till the clock struck, and then for the breach of a minute he refused my money, and kept the recognisance of my land for so small a trifle.--Good Signor Mizaldo, speak what is law; you have your fee, you have heard what the case is, and therefore do me justice and right: I am a young gentleman, and speak for my patrimony.

_Lawyer._ Faith, sir, the case is altered; you told me it before in another manner: the law goes quite against you, and therefore you must plead to the Judge for favour.

_Thras._ [_Aside_]. O execrable bribery!

_Alc._ Faith, Sir Judge, I pray you let me be the gentleman's counsellor, for I can say thus much in his defence, that the Usurer's clock is the swiftest clock in all the town: 'tis, sir, like a woman's tongue, it goes ever half-an-hour before the time; for when we were gone from him, other clocks in the town struck four.

_Judge._ Hold thy prating, fellow:--and you, young gentleman, this is my ward: look better another time both to your bargains and to the payments; for I must give flat sentence against you, that, for default of tendering the money between the hours, you have forfeited your recognisance, and he to have the land.

_Thras._ [_Aside_]. O inspeakable injustice!

_Alc._ [_Aside_]. O monstrous, miserable, moth-eaten Judge!

_Judge._ Now you, fellow, what have you to say for your matter?

_Alc._ Master Lawyer, I laid my wife's gown to pawn for your fees: I pray you, to this gear.[83]

_Lawyer._ Alas, poor man, thy matter is out of my head, and therefore, I pray thee, tell it thyself.

_Alc._ I hold my cap to a noble,[84] that the Usurer hath given him some gold, and he, chewing it in his mouth, hath got the toothache that he cannot speak.

_Judge._ Well, sirrah, I must be short, and therefore say on.

_Alc._ Master Judge, I borrowed of this man thirty shillings, for which I left him in pawn my good cow; the bargain was, he should have eighteen-pence a week, and the cow's milk for usury: now, sir, as soon as I had gotten the money, I brought it him, and broke but a day, and for that he refused his money, and keeps my cow, sir.

_Judge._ Why, thou hast given sentence against thyself, for in breaking thy day thou hast lost thy cow.

_Alc._ Master Lawyer, now for my ten shillings.

_Lawyer._ Faith, poor man, thy case is so bad, I shall but speak against thee.

_Alc._ 'Twere good, then, I should have my ten shillings again.

_Lawyer._ 'Tis my fee, fellow, for coming: wouldst thou have me come for nothing?

_Alc._ Why, then, am I like to go home, not only with no cow, but no gown: this gear goes hard.

_Judge._ Well, you have heard what favour I can show you: I must do justice.--Come, Master Mizaldo,--and you, sir, go home with me to dinner.

_Alc._ Why, but, Master Judge, no cow!--and, Master Lawyer, no gown! Then must I clean run out of the town. [_Exeunt_ Judge, Lawyer, Usurer, _and_ Attendants. How cheer you, gentleman? you cry "no lands" too; the Judge hath made you a knight for a gentleman, hath dubbed you Sir John Lack-land.

_Thras._ O miserable time, wherein gold is above God!

_Alc._ Fear not, man; I have yet a fetch to get thy lands and my cow again, for I have a son in the court, that is either a king or a king's fellow, and to him will I go and complain on the Judge and the Usurer both.

_Thras._ And I will go with thee, and entreat him for my case.

_Alc._ But how shall I go home to my wife, when I shall have nothing to say unto her but "no cow"? alas, sir, my wife's faults will fall upon me!

_Thras._ Fear not; let's go; I'll quiet her, shalt see. [_Exeunt._

_Oseas._ Fly, judges, fly corruption in your court; The judge of truth hath made your judgment short. Look so to judge that at the latter day Ye be not judg'd with those that wend astray. Who passeth judgment for his private gain, He well may judge he is adjudg'd to pain.