SCENE VI.[1263

[_Enter_] KITELY, COB.

_Kit._ Ha! how many are there, sayest thou?

_Cob._ Marry, sir, your brother, master Wellbred——

_Kit._ Tut, beside him: what strangers are there, man?

_Cob._ Strangers? let me see, one, two; mass, I know not well, there are so many. 5

_Kit._ How! so many?

_Cob._ Ay, there’s some five or six of them at the most.

_Kit._ [_Aside._] A swarm, a swarm! Spite of the devil, how they sting my head With forked stings, thus wide and large!—But, Cob, 10 How long hast thou been coming hither, Cob?

_Cob._ A little while, sir.

_Kit._ Didst thou come running?

_Cob._ No, sir.

_Kit._ [_Aside._] Nay, then I am familiar with thy haste. 15 Bane to my fortunes! what meant I to marry? I, that before was rankt in such content, My mind at rest too, in so soft a peace, Being free master of mine own free thoughts, 19 And now become a slave? What! never sigh, Be of good cheer, man; for thou art a cuckold: ’Tis done, ’tis done! Nay, when such flowing-store, Plenty itself, falls in [to] my wife’s lap, The cornucopiae will be mine, I know.— But, Cob, 25 What entertainment had they? I am sure My sister and my wife would bid them welcome: ha?

_Cob._ Like enough, sir; yet I heard not a word of it.

_Kit._ No;— [_Aside._] Their lips were seal’d with kisses, and the voice, 30 Drown’d in a flood of joy at their arrival, Had lost her motion, state, and faculty.— Cob, which of them was’t that first kist my wife, My sister, I should say? My wife, alas! I fear not her; ha! who was it say’st thou?

_Cob._ By my troth, sir, will you have the truth of it?

_Kit._ Oh, ay, good Cob, I pray thee heartily.

_Cob._ Then I am a vagabond, and fitter for Bridewell than your worship’s company, if I saw any body to be kist, unless they would (40) have kist the post[1264] in the middle of the ware-house; for there I left them all at their tobacco, with a pox!

_Kit._ How! were they not gone in then ere thou cam’st!

_Cob._ O no, sir. 45

_Kit._ Spite of the devil! what do I stay here then? Cob, follow me. [_Exit._]

_Cob._ Nay, soft and fair; I have eggs on the spit;[1265] I cannot go yet, sir. Now am I, for some five and fifty reasons, hammering, hammering (50) revenge: oh for three or four gallons of vinegar, to sharpen my wits! Revenge, vinegar revenge, vinegar and mustard revenge! Nay, an he had not lien in my house, ’twould never have griev’d me; but being my guest, one that, (55) I’ll be sworn, my wife has lent him her smock off her back, while his own shirt has been at washing; pawn’d her neckerchers for clean bands for him; sold almost all my platters, to buy him tobacco; and he to turn monster of (60) ingratitude, and strike his lawful host! Well, I hope to raise up an host of fury for’t: here comes justice Clement.