SCENE II.[1275

DOWNRIGHT, DAME KITELY. [_Enter_] MISTRESS BRIDGET, MASTER MATHEW, _and_ BOBADILL; [_followed, at a distance, by_] WELLBRED, E. KNOWELL, STEPHEN, _and_ BRAINWORM.

_Brid._ Servant,[1276] in troth you are too prodigal Of your wit’s treasure, thus to pour it forth Upon so mean a subject as my worth.

_Mat._ You say well, mistress, and I mean as well.

_Dow._ Hoy-day, here is stuff! 5

_Wel._ O, now stand close;[1277] pray Heaven, she can get him to read! He should do it of his own natural impudency.

_Brid._ Servant, what is this same, I pray you?

_Mat._ Marry, an elegy, an elegy, an odd toy——

_Dow._ To mock an ape withal![1278] O, I could (11) sew up his mouth, now.

_Dame K._ Sister, I pray you let’s hear it.

_Dow._ Are you rhyme-given too?

_Mat._ Mistress, I’ll read it, if you please. 15

_Brid._ Pray you do, servant.

_Dow._ O, here’s no foppery! Death! I can endure the stocks better. [_Exit._]

_E. Know._ What ails thy brother? Can he not hold his water at reading of a ballad? 20

_Wel._ O, no; a rhyme to him is worse than cheese, or a bag-pipe; but mark; you lose the protestation.

_Mat._ Faith, I did it in a humour; I know not how it is; but please you come near, sir. This (25) gentleman has judgment, he knows how to censure of a——pray you, sir, you can judge?

_Step._ Not I, sir; upon my reputation, and by the foot of Pharaoh!

_Wel._ O, chide your cousin for swearing. 30

_E. Know._ Not I, so long as he does not forswear himself.

_Bob._ Master Mathew, you abuse the expectation of your dear mistress, and her fair sister. Fie! while you live, avoid this prolixity. 35

_Mat._ I shall, sir, well; _incipere dulce_.[1279]

_E. Know._ How, _insipere dulce_! “a sweet thing to be a fool,” indeed!

_Wel._ What, do you take _incipere_ in that sense? 40

_E. Know._ You do not, you! This was your villainy, to gull him with a mot.

_Wel._ O, the benchers’[1280] phrase: _pauca verba, pauca verba_!

Mat. [_Reads._] _Rare creature, let me speak without offence, 45 Would God my rude words had the influence To rule thy thoughts, as thy fair looks do mine, Then shouldst thou be his prisoner, who is thine._

_E. Know._ This is “Hero and Leander.” 49

_Wel._ O, ay: peace, we shall have more of this.

Mat. _Be not unkind and fair: misshapen stuff Is of behaviour boisterous and rough._

_Wel._ How like you that, sir? MASTER STEPHEN _answers with shaking his head_.

_E. Know._ ’Slight, he shakes his head like a bottle, to feel an there be any brain in it. 55

_Mat._ But observe the catastrophe, now: _And I in duty will exceed all other, As you in beauty do excel Love’s mother._

_E. Know._ Well, I’ll have him free of the wit-brokers, for he utters nothing but stol’n remnants. 61

_Wel._ O, forgive it him.

_E. Know._ A filching[1281] rogue, hang him!—and from the dead! It’s worse than sacrilege. 64 [WELLBRED, E. KNOWELL, _and_ MASTER STEPHEN _come forward_.]

_Wel._ Sister, what ha’ you here? Verses? Pray you, let’s see. Who made these verses? They are excellent good.

_Mat._ O, Master Wellbred, ’tis your disposition to say so, sir. They were good i’ the morning: I made them _ex tempore_ this morning.

_Wel._ How! _ex tempore?_ 71

_Mat._ Ay, would I might be hang’d else; ask Captain Bobadill; he saw me write them, at the——pox on it!—the Star, yonder.

_Brai._ Can he find in his heart to curse the stars so? 76

_E. Know._ Faith, his are even with him; they ha’ curst him enough already.

_Step._ Cousin, how do you like this gentleman’s verses? 80

_E. Know._ O, admirable! the best that ever I heard, coz.

_Step._ Body o’ Caesar, they are admirable! the best that I ever heard, as I am a soldier! 84

[_Re-enter_ DOWNRIGHT.]

_Dow._ I am vext, I can hold ne’er a bone of me still. ’Heart, I think they mean to build and breed here.

_Wel._ Sister, you have a simple servant here, that crowns your beauty with such encomiums (89) and devices; you may see what it is to be the mistress of a wit that can make your perfections so transparent, that every blear eye may look through them, and see him drown’d over head and ears in the deep well of desire. Sister Kitely, I marvel you get you not a servant that can rhyme, and do tricks too. 96

_Dow._ O monster! impudence itself! tricks!

_Dame K._ Tricks, brother! what tricks?

_Brid._ Nay, speak, I pray you, what tricks?

_Dame K._ Ay, never spare any body here; (100) but say, what tricks?

_Brid._ Passion of my heart, do tricks!

_Wel._ ’Slight, here ’s a trick vied and revied![1282] Why, you monkeys, you, what a cater-wauling do you keep! Has he not given you rhymes and verses and tricks? 106

_Dow._ O, the fiend!

_Wel._ Nay, you lamp of virginity, that take it in snuff[1283] so, come, and cherish this tame poetical fury in your servant; you’ll be begg’d (110) else shortly for a concealment:[1284] go to, reward his muse. You cannot give him less than a shilling in conscience, for the book he had it out of cost him a teston[1285] at least. How now, gallants! (114) Master Mathew! Captain! what, all sons of silence? No spirit?

_Dow._ Come, you might practise your ruffian tricks somewhere else, and not here, I wuss;[1286] this is no tavern nor drinking-school, to vent your exploits in. 120

_Wel._ How now; whose cow has calv’d?

_Dow._ Marry, that has mine, sir. Nay, boy, never look askance at me for the matter; I ’ll tell you of it, I, sir; you and your companions mend yourselves when I ha’ done. 125

_Wel._ My companions!

_Dow._ Yes, sir, your companions, so I say; I am not afraid of you, nor them neither; your hangbyes here. You must have your poets and your potlings,[1287] your soldados and foolados to (130) follow you up and down the city; and here they must come to domineer and swagger.—Sirrah, you ballad-singer, and Slops[1288] your fellow there, get you out, get you home; or by this steel, I ’ll cut off your ears, and that presently. 135

_Wel._ ’Slight, stay, let ’s see what he dare do; cut off his ears! cut a whetstone. You are an ass, do you see? Touch any man here, and by this hand I ’ll run my rapier to the hilts in you. 140

_Dow._ Yea, that would I fain see, boy. _They all draw, and they of the house make out to part them._

_Dame K._ O Jesu! murder! Thomas! Gasper!

_Brid._ Help, help! Thomas!

_E. Know._ Gentlemen, forbear, I pray you. 144

_Bob._ Well, sirrah, you Holofernes; by my hand, I will pink your flesh full of holes with my rapier for this; I will, by this good heaven! Nay, let him come, let him come, gentlemen; by the body of St. George, I ’ll not kill him. _Offer to fight again, and are parted._

_Cash._ Hold, hold, good gentlemen. 150

_Dow._ You whoreson, bragging coystril![1289]