Chapter 5

_Enter_ ALDO _and_ GEOFFERY.

_Aldo._ Despatch, Geoffery, despatch: The outlying punks will be upon us, ere I am in a readiness to give audience. Is the office well provided?

_Geoff._ The stores are very low, sir: Some dolly petticoats, and manteaus we have; and half a dozen pair of laced shoes, bought from court at second hand.

_Aldo._ Before George, there is not enough to rig out a mournival of whores: They'll think me grown a mere curmudgeon. Mercy on me, how will this glorious trade be carried on, with such a miserable stock!

_Geoff._ I hear a coach already stopping at the door.

_Aldo._ Well, somewhat in ornament for the body, somewhat in counsel for the mind; one thing must help out another, in this bad world: Whoring must go on.

_Enter Mrs_ OVERDON, _and her Daughter_ PRUE.

_Mrs Over._ Ask blessing, Prue: He is the best father you ever had.

_Aldo._ Bless thee, and make thee a substantial, thriving whore. Have your mother in your eye, Prue; it is good to follow good example. How old are you, Prue? Hold up your head, child.

_Pru._ Going o'my sixteen, father Aldo.

_Aldo._ And you have been initiated but these two years: Loss of time, loss of precious time! Mrs Overdon, how much have you made of Prue, since she has been man's meat?

_Mrs Over._ A very small matter, by my troth; considering the charges I have been at in her education: Poor Prue was born under an unlucky planet; I despair of a coach for her. Her first maiden-head brought me in but little, the weather-beaten old knight, that bought her of me, beat down the price so low. I held her at an hundred guineas, and he bid ten; and higher than thirty would not rise.

_Aldo._ A pox of his unlucky handsel! He can but fumble, and will not pay neither.

_Pru._ Hang him; I could never endure him, father: He is the filthiest old goat; and then he comes every day to our house, and eats out his thirty guineas; and at three months end, he threw me off.

_Mrs Over._ And since then, the poor child has dwindled, and dwindled away. Her next maiden-head brought me but ten; and from ten she fell to five; and at last to a single guinea: She has no luck to keeping; they all leave her, the more my sorrow.

_Aldo._ We must get her a husband then in the city; they bite rarely at a stale whore at this end of the town, new furbished up in a tawdry manteau.

_Mrs Over._ No: Pray let her try her fortune a little longer in the world first: By my troth, I should be loth to be at all this cost, in her French, and her singing, to have her thrown away upon a husband.

_Aldo._ Before George, there can come no good of your swearing, Mrs Overdon: Say your prayers, Prue, and go duly to church o'Sundays, you'll thrive the better all the week. Come, have a good heart, child; I will keep thee myself: Thou shalt do my little business; and I'll find thee an able young fellow to do thine.

_Enter Mrs_ PAD.

Daughter Pad, you are welcome: What, you have performed the last Christian office to your keeper; I saw you follow him up the heavy hill to Tyburn. Have you had never a business since his death?

_Mrs Pad._ No indeed, father; never since execution-day. The night before, we lay together most lovingly in Newgate; and the next morning he lift up his eyes, and prepared his soul with a prayer, while one might tell twenty; and then mounted the cart as merrily, as if he had been going for a purse.

_Aldo._ You are a sorrowful widow, daughter Pad; but I'll take care of you.--Geoffery, see her rigged out immediately for a new voyage: Look in figure 9, in the upper drawer, and give her out the flowered justacorps, with the petticoat belonging to it.

_Mrs Pad._ Could you not help to prefer me, father?

_Aldo._ Let me see--let me see:--Before George, I have it, and it comes as pat too! Go me to the very judge that sate upon him; it is an amorous, impotent old magistrate, and keeps admirably. I saw him leer upon you from the bench: He will tell you what is sweeter than strawberries and cream, before you part.

_Enter Mrs_ TERMAGANT.

_Mrs Term._ O father, I think I shall go mad.

_Aldo._ You are of the violentest temper, daughter Termagant! When had you a business last?

_Mrs Term._ The last I had was with young Caster, that son-of-a-whore gamester: he brought me to taverns, to draw in young cullies, while he bubbled them at play; and, when he had picked up a considerable sum, and should divide, the cheating dog would sink my share, and swear,--Damn him, he won nothing.

_Aldo._ Unconscionable villain, to cozen you in your own calling!

_Mrs Term._ When he loses upon the square, he comes home zoundsing and blooding; first beats me unmercifully, and then squeezes me to the last penny. He has used me so, that, Gad forgive me, I could almost forswear my trade. The rogue starves me too: He made me keep Lent last year till Whitsuntide, and out-faced me with oaths it was but Easter. And what mads me most, I carry a bastard of the rogue's in my belly; and now he turns me off, and will not own it.

_Mrs Over._ Lord, how it quops! you are half a year gone, madam.-- [_Laying her hand on her belly._

_Mrs Term._ I feel the young rascal kicking already, like his father.--Oh, there is an elbow thrusting out: I think, in my conscience, he is palming and topping in my belly; and practising for a livelihood, before he comes into the world.

_Aldo._ Geoffery, set her down in the register, that I may provide her a mid-wife, and a dry and wet nurse: When you are up again, as heaven send you a good hour, we will pay him off at law, i'faith. You have him under black and white, I hope?

_Mrs Term._ Yes, I have a note under his hand for two hundred pounds.

_Aldo._ A note under his hand! that is a chip in porridge; it is just nothing.--Look, Geoffery, to the figure 12, for old half-shirts for childbed linen.

_Enter Mrs_ HACKNEY.

_Hack._ O, madam Termagant, are you here? Justice, father Aldo, justice!

_Aldo._ Why, what is the matter, daughter Hackney?

_Hack._ She has violated the law of nations; for yesterday she inveigled my own natural cully from me, a married lord, and made him false to my bed, father.

_Term._ Come, you are an illiterate whore. He is my lord now; and, though you call him fool, it is well known he is a critic, gentlewoman. You never read a play in all your life; and I gained him by my wit, and so I'll keep him.

_Hack._ My comfort is, I have had the best of him; he can take up no more, till his father dies: And so, much good may do you with my cully, and my clap into the bargain.

_Aldo._ Then there is a father for your child, my lord's son and heir by Mr Caster. But henceforward, to preserve peace betwixt you, I ordain, that you shall ply no more in my daughter Hackney's quarters: You shall have the city, from White-Chapel to Temple-Bar, and she shall have to Covent-Garden downwards: At the play-houses, she shall ply the boxes, because she has the better face; and you shall have the pit, because you can prattle best out of a vizor mask.

_Mrs Pad._ Then all friends, and confederates. Now let us have father Aldo's delight, and so adjourn the house.

_Aldo._ Well said, daughter.--Lift up your voices, and sing like nightingales, you tory rory jades. Courage, I say; as long as the merry pence hold out, you shall none of you die in Shoreditch.

_Enter_ WOODALL.

A hey, boys, a hey! here he comes, that will swinge you all! down, you little jades, and worship him; it is the genius of whoring.

_Wood._ And down went chairs and table, and out went every candle. Ho, brave old patriarch in the middle of the church militant! whores of all sorts; forkers and ruin-tailed: Now come I gingling in with my bells, and fly at the whole covey.

_Aldo._ A hey, a hey, boys! the town's thy own; burn, ravish, and destroy!

_Wood._ We will have a night of it, like Alexander, when he burnt Persepolis: _tuez, tuez, tuez! point de quartier._ [_He runs in amongst them, and they scuttle about the room._

_Enter_ SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, JUDITH, _with Broom-sticks._

_Saint._ What, in the midst of Sodom! O thou lewd young man! my indignation boils over against these harlots; and thus I sweep them from out my family.

_Pleas._ Down with the Suburbians, down with them.

_Aldo._ O spare my daughters, Mrs Saintly! Sweet Mrs Pleasance, spare my flesh and blood!

_Wood._ Keep the door open, and help to secure the retreat, father: There is no pity to be expected. [_The Whores run out, followed by_ SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, _and_ JUDITH.

_Aldo._ Welladay, welladay! one of my daughters is big with bastard, and she laid at her gascoins most unmercifully! every stripe she had, I felt it: The first fruit of whoredom is irrecoverably lost!

_Wood._ Make haste, and comfort her.

_Aldo._ I will, I will; and yet I have a vexatious business, which calls me first another way. The rogue, my son, is certainly come over; he has been seen in town four days ago.

_Wood._ It is impossible: I'll not believe it.

_Aldo._ A friend of mine met his old man, Giles, this very morning, in quest of me; and Giles assured him, his master is lodged in this very street.

_Wood._ In this very street! how knows he that?

_Aldo._ He dogged him to the corner of it; and then my son turned back, and threatened him. But I'll find out Giles, and then I'll make such an example of my reprobate! [_Exit._

_Wood._ If Giles be discovered, I am undone!--Why, Gervase, where are you, sirrah! Hey, hey!

_Enter_ GERVASE.

Run quickly to that betraying rascal Giles, a rogue, who would take Judas's bargain out of his hands, and undersell him. Command him strictly to mew himself up in his lodgings, till farther orders: and in case he be refractory, let him know, I have not forgot to kick and cudgel. That _memento_ would do well for you too, sirrah.

_Gerv._ Thank your worship; you have always been liberal of your hands to me.

_Wood._ And you have richly deserved it.

_Gerv._ I will not say, who has better deserved it of my old master.

_Wood._ Away, old Epictetus, about your business, and leave your musty morals, or I shall--

_Gerv._ Nay, I won't forfeit my own wisdom so far as to suffer for it. Rest you merry: I'll do my best, and heaven mend all. [_Exit._

_Enter_ SAINTLY.

_Saint._ Verily, I have waited till you were alone, and am come to rebuke you, out of the zeal of my spirit.

_Wood._ It is the spirit of persecution. Dioclesian, and Julian the apostate, were but types of thee. Get thee hence, thou old Geneva testament: thou art a part of the ceremonial law, and hast been abolished these twenty years.

_Saint._ All this is nothing, sir. I am privy to your plots: I'll discover them to Mr Limberham, and make the house too hot for you.

_Wood._ What, you can talk in the language of the world, I see!

_Saint._ I can, I can, sir; and in the language of the flesh and devil too, if you provoke me to despair: You must, and shall be mine, this night.

_Wood._ The very ghost of queen Dido in the ballad.[10]

_Saint._ Delay no longer, or--

_Wood._ Or! you will not swear, I hope?

_Saint._ Uds-niggers but I will; and that so loud, that Mr Limberham shall hear me.

_Wood._ Uds-niggers, I confess, is a very dreadful oath. You could lie naturally before, as you are a fanatic; if you can swear such rappers too, there is hope of you; you may be a woman of the world in time. Well, you shall be satisfied, to the utmost farthing, to-night, and in your own chamber.

_Saint._ Or, expect to-morrow--

_Wood._ All shall be atoned ere then. Go, provide the bottle of clary, the Westphalia ham, and other fortifications of nature; we shall see what may be done. What! an old woman must not be cast away. [_Chucks her._

_Saint._ Then, verily, I am appeased.

_Wood._ Nay, no relapsing into verily; that is in our bargain. Look how she weeps for joy! It is a good old soul, I warrant her.

_Saint._ You will not fail?

_Wood._ Dost thou think I have no compassion for thy gray hairs? Away, away; our love may be discovered: We must avoid scandal; it is thy own maxim. [_Exit_ SAINTLY. They are all now at ombre; and Brainsick's maid has promised to send her mistress up.

_Enter_ PLEASANCE.

That fury here again!

_Pleas._ [_Aside._] I'll conquer my proud spirit, I am resolved on it, and speak kindly to him.--What, alone, sir! If my company be not troublesome; or a tender young creature, as I am, may safely trust herself with a man of such prowess, in love affairs--It wonnot be.

_Wood._ So! there is one broadside already: I must sheer off. [_Aside._

_Pleas._ What, you have been pricking up and down here upon a cold scent[11]; but, at last, you have hit it off, it seems! Now for a fair view at the wife or mistress: up the wind, and away with it: Hey, Jowler!--I think I am bewitched, I cannot hold.

_Wood._ Your servant, your servant, madam: I am in a little haste at present. [_Going._

_Pleas._ Pray resolve me first, for which of them you lie in ambush; for, methinks, you have the mien of a spider in her den. Come, I know the web is spread, and whoever comes, Sir Cranion stands ready to dart out, hale her in, and shed his venom.

_Wood._ [_Aside._] But such a terrible wasp, as she, will spoil the snare, if I durst tell her so.

_Pleas._ It is unconscionably done of me, to debar you the freedom and civilities of the house. Alas, poor gentleman! to take a lodging at so dear a rate, and not to have the benefit of his bargain!--Mischief on me, what needed I have said that? [_Aside._

_Wood._ The dialogue will go no farther. Farewell, gentle, quiet lady.

_Pleas._ Pray stay a little; I'll not leave you thus.

_Wood._ I know it; and therefore mean to leave you first.

_Pleas._ O, I find it now! you are going to set up your bills, like a love-mountebank, for the speedy cure of distressed widows, old ladies, and languishing maids in the green-sickness: a sovereign remedy.

_Wood._ That last, for maids, would be thrown away: Few of your age are qualified for the medicine. What the devil would you be at, madam?

_Pleas._ I am in the humour of giving you good counsel. The wife can afford you but the leavings of a fop; and to a witty man, as you think yourself, that is nauseous: The mistress has fed upon a fool so long, she is carrion too, and common into the bargain. Would you beat a ground for game in the afternoon, when my lord mayor's pack had been before you in the morning?

_Wood._ I had rather sit five hours at one of his greasy feasts, then hear you talk.

_Pleas._ Your two mistresses keep both shop and warehouse; and what they cannot put off in gross, to the keeper and the husband, they sell by retail to the next chance-customer. Come, are you edified?

_Wood._ I am considering how to thank you for your homily; and, to make a sober application of it, you may have some laudable design yourself in this advice.

_Pleas._ Meaning, some secret inclination to that amiable person of yours?

_Wood._ I confess, I am vain enough to hope it; for why should you remove the two dishes, but to make me fall more hungrily on the third?

_Pleas._ Perhaps, indeed, in the way of honour--

_Wood._ Paw, paw! that word honour has almost turned my stomach: it carries a villainous interpretation of matrimony along with it. But, in a civil way, I could be content to deal with you, as the church does with the heads of your fanatics, offer you a lusty benefice to stop your mouth; if fifty guineas, and a courtesy more worth, will win you.

_Pleas._ Out upon thee! fifty guineas! Dost thou think I'll sell myself? And at a playhouse price too? Whenever I go, I go all together: No cutting from the whole piece; he who has me shall have the fag-end with the rest, I warrant him. Be satisfied, thy sheers shall never enter into my cloth. But, look to thyself, thou impudent belswagger: I will he revenged; I will. [_Exit._

_Wood._ The maid will give warning, that is my comfort; for she is bribed on my side. I have another kind of love to this girl, than to either of the other two; but a fanatic's daughter, and the noose of matrimony, are such intolerable terms! O, here she comes, who will sell me better cheap.

SCENE _opens to_ BRAINSICK'S _Apartment._

_Enter Mrs_ BRAINSICK.

_Mrs Brain._ How now, sir? what impudence is this of yours, to approach my lodgings?

_Wood._ You lately honoured mine; and it is the part of a well-bred man, to return your visit.

_Mrs Brain._ If I could have imagined how base a fellow you had been, you should not then have been troubled with my company.

_Wood._ How could I guess, that you intended me the favour, without first acquainting me?

_Mrs Brain._ Could I do it, ungrateful as you are, with more obligation to you, or more hazard to myself, than by putting my note into your glove?

_Wood._ Was it yours, then? I believed it came from Mrs Tricksy.

_Mrs Brain._ You wished it so; which made you so easily believe it. I heard the pleasant dialogue betwixt you.

_Wood._ I am glad you did; for you could not but observe, with how much care I avoided all occasions of railing at you; to which she urged me, like a malicious woman, as she was.

_Mrs Brain._ By the same token, you vowed and swore never to look on Mrs Brainsick!

_Wood._ But I had my mental reservations in a readiness. I had vowed fidelity to you before; and there went my second oath, i'faith: it vanished in a twinkling, and never gnawed my conscience in the least.

_Mrs Brain._ Well, I shall never heartily forgive you.

_Jud._ [_Within._] Mr Brainsick, Mr Brainsick, what do you mean, to make my lady lose her game thus? Pray, come back, and take up her cards again.

_Mrs Brain._ My husband, as I live! Well, for all my quarrel to you, step immediately into that little dark closet: it is for my private occasions; there is no lock, but he will not stay.

_Wood._ Thus am I ever tantalized! [_Goes in._

_Enter_ BRAINSICK.

_Brain._ What, am I become your drudge? your slave? the property of all your pleasures? Shall I, the lord and master of your life, become subservient; and the noble name of husband be dishonoured? No, though all the cards were kings and queens, and Indies to be gained by every deal--

_Mrs Brain._ My dear, I am coming to do my duty. I did but go up a little, (I whispered you for what) and am returning immediately.

_Brain._ Your sex is but one universal ordure, a nuisance, and incumbrance of that majestic creature, man: yet I myself am mortal too. Nature's necessities have called me up; produce your utensil of urine.

_Mrs Brain._ It is not in the way, child: You may go down into the garden.

_Brain._ The voyage is too far: though the way were paved with pearls and diamonds, every step of mine is precious, as the march of monarchs.

_Mrs Brain._ Then my steps, which are not so precious, shall be employed for you: I will call up Judith.

_Brain._ I will not dance attendance. At the present, your closet shall be honoured.

_Mrs Brain._ O lord, dear, it is not worthy to receive such a man as you are.

_Brain._ Nature presses; I am in haste.

_Mrs Brain._ He must be discovered, and I unavoidably undone! [_Aside._ [BRAINSICK _goes to the door, and_ WOODALL _meets him: She shrieks out._

_Brain._ Monsieur Woodall!

_Wood._ Sir, begone, and make no noise, or you will spoil all.

_Brain._ Spoil all, quotha! what does he mean, in the name of wonder?

_Wood._ [_Taking him aside._] Hark you, Mr Brainsick, is the devil in you, that you and your wife come hither, to disturb my intrigue, which you yourself engaged me in, with Mrs Tricksy, to revenge you on Limberham? Why, I had made an appointment with her here; but, hearing somebody come up, I retired into the closet, till I was satisfied it was not the keeper.

_Brain._ But why this intrigue in my wife's chamber?

_Wood._ Why, you turn my brains, with talking to me of your wife's chamber! do you lie in common? the wife and husband, the keeper and the mistress?

_Mrs Brain._ I am afraid they are quarrelling; pray heaven I get off.

_Brain._ Once again, I am the sultan of this place: Mr Limberham is the mogul of the next mansion.

_Wood._ Though I am a stranger in the house, it is impossible I should be so much mistaken: I say, this is Limberham's lodging.

_Brain._ You would not venture a wager of ten pounds, that you are not mistaken?

_Wood._ It is done: I will lay you.

_Brain._ Who shall be judge?

_Wood._ Who better than your wife? She cannot be partial, because she knows not on which side you have laid.

_Brain._ Content.--Come hither, lady mine: Whose lodgings are these? who is lord, and grand seignior of them?

_Mrs Brain._ [_Aside._] Oh, goes it there?--Why should you ask me such a question, when every body in the house can tell they are 'nown dear's?

_Brain._ Now are you satisfied? Children and fools, you know the proverb--

_Wood._ Pox on me! nothing but such a positive coxcomb as I am, would have laid his money upon such odds; as if you did not know your own lodgings better than I, at half a day's warning! And that which vexes me more than the loss of my money, is the loss of my adventure! [_Exit._

_Brain._ It shall be spent: We will have a treat with it. This is a fool of the first magnitude.

_Mrs Brain._ Let my own dear alone, to find a fool out.

_Enter_ LIMBERHAM.

_Limb._ Bully Brainsick, Pug has sent me to you on an embassy, to bring you down to cards again; she is in her mulligrubs already; she will never forgive you the last _vol_ you won. It is but losing a little to her, out of complaisance, as they say, to a fair lady; and whatever she wins, I will make up to you again in private.

_Brain._ I would not be that slave you are, to enjoy the treasures of the east. The possession of Peru, and of Potosi, should not buy me to the bargain.

_Limb._ Will you leave your perboles, and come then?

_Brain._ No; for I have won a wager, to be spent luxuriously at Long's; with Pleasance of the party, and Termagant Tricksy; and I will pass, in person, to the preparation: Come, matrimony. [_Exeunt_ BRAINSICK, _Mrs_ BRAIN.

_Enter_ SAINTLY, _and_ PLEASANCE.

_Pleas._ To him: I'll second you: now for mischief!

_Saint._ Arise, Mr Limberham, arise; for conspiracies are hatched against you, and a new Faux is preparing to blow up your happiness.

_Limb._ What is the matter, landlady? Pr'ythee, speak good honest English, and leave thy canting.

_Saint._ Verily, thy beloved is led astray, by the young man Woodall, that vessel of uncleanness: I beheld them communing together; she feigned herself sick, and retired to her tent in the garden-house; and I watched her out-going, and behold he followed her.

_Pleas._ Do you stand unmoved, and hear all this?

_Limb._ Before George, I am thunder-struck!

_Saint._ Take to thee thy resolution, and avenge thyself.

_Limb._ But give me leave to consider first: A man must do nothing rashly.

_Pleas._ I could tear out the villain's eyes, for dishonouring you, while you stand considering, as you call it. Are you a man, and suffer this?

_Limb._ Yes, I am a man; but a man's but a man, you know: I am recollecting myself, how these things can be.

_Saint._ How they can be! I have heard them; I have seen them.

_Limb._ Heard them, and seen them! It may be so; but yet I cannot enter into this same business: I am amazed, I must confess; but the best is, I do not believe one word of it.

_Saint._ Make haste, and thine own eyes shall testify against her.

_Limb._ Nay, if my own eyes testify, it may be so:--but it is impossible, however; for I am making a settlement upon her, this very day.

_Pleas._ Look, and satisfy yourself, ere you make that settlement on so false a creature.

_Limb._ But yet, if I should look, and not find her false, then I must cast in another hundred, to make her satisfaction.

_Pleas._ Was there ever such a meek, hen-hearted creature!

_Saint._ Verily, thou has not the spirit of a cock-chicken.

_Limb._ Before George, but I have the spirit of a lion, and I will tear her limb from limb--if I could believe it.

_Pleas._ Love, jealousy, and disdain, how they torture me at once! and this insensible creature--were I but in his place--[_To him._] Think, that this very instant she is yours no more: Now, now she is giving up herself, with so much violence of love, that if thunder roared, she could not hear it.

_Limb._ I have been whetting all this while: They shall be so taken in the manner, that Mars and Venus shall be nothing to them.

_Pleas._ Make haste; go on then.

_Limb._ Yes, I will go on;--and yet my mind misgives me plaguily.

_Saint._ Again backsliding!

_Pleas._ Have you no sense of honour in you?

_Limb._ Well, honour is honour, and I must go: But I shall never get me such another Pug again! O, my heart! my poor tender heart! it is just breaking with Pug's unkindness! [_They drag him out._