SCENE III.

_Room in_ SECURITY'S _house_.

_Enter_ QUICKSILVER _in his prentice's coat and cap, his gallant breeches and stockings, gartering himself_, SECURITY _following_.

_Qu._ Come, old Security, thou father of destruction! th' indented sheepskin is burned wherein I was wrapt; and I am now loose, to get more children of perdition into thy usurous bonds. Thou feed'st my lechery, and I thy covetousness; thou art pander to me for my wench, and I to thee for thy cozenages. Ka me, ka thee,[39] runs through court and country.

_Sec._ Well said, my subtle Quicksilver! These ka's ope the doors to all this world's felicity: the dullest forehead sees it. Let not master courtier think he carries all the knavery on his shoulders: I have known poor Hob, in the country, that has worn hob-nails on's hoes, have as much villainy in's head as he that wears gold buttons in's cap. 14

_Qu._ Why, man, 'tis the London highway to thrift; if virtue be used, 'tis but as a scape to the net of villainy. They that use it simply, thrive simply, I warrant. Weight and fashion makes goldsmiths cuckolds.

_Enter_ SINDEFY, _with_ QUICKSILVER'S _doublet, cloak, rapier, and dagger_.

_Si._ Here, sir, put off the other half of your prenticeship.

_Qu._ Well said, sweet Sin! Bring forth my bravery. Now let my trunks shoot[40] forth their silks conceal'd. 22 I now am free, and now will justify My trunks and punks. Avaunt, dull flatcap, then! _Via_ the curtain that shadow'd Borgia![41] There lie, thou husk of my envassail'd state, I, Sampson, now have burst the Philistines' bands, And in thy lap, my lovely Dalila, I'll lie, and snore out my enfranchised state.

_When_[42] _Sampson was a tall young man, 30 His power and strength increased than; He sold no more nor cup nor can; But did them all despise. Old Touchstone, now write to thy friends For one to sell thy base gold-ends; Quicksilver now no more attends Thee, Touchstone._

But, dad, hast thou seen my running gelding dressed to-day?

_Sec._ That I have, Frank. The ostler a'th' Cock dressed him for a breakfast. 41

_Qu._ What! did he eat him?

_Sec._ No, but he eat his breakfast for dressing him; and so dressed him for breakfast.

_Qu._ O witty age! where age is young in wit, And all youths' words have gray-beards full of it!

_Sec._ But alas, Frank! how will all this be maintained now? Your place maintained it before. 48

_Qu._ Why, and I maintained my place. I'll to the court: another manner of place for maintenance, I hope, than the silly City! I heard my father say, I heard my mother sing an old song and a true: _Thou_ _art a she-fool, and know'st not what belongs to our male wisdom._ I shall be a merchant, forsooth! trust my estate in a wooden trough as he does! What are these ships but tennis-balls for the winds to play withal? tossed from one wave to another; now under line, now over the house; sometimes brick-walled against a rock, so that the guts fly out again; sometimes strook under the wide hazard, and farewell, master merchant! 60

_Si._ Well, Frank, well: the seas you say, are uncertain: but he that sails in your Court seas shall find 'hem ten times fuller of hazard; wherein to see what is to be seen is torment more than a free spirit can endure; but when you come to suffer, how many injuries swallow you! What care and devotion must you use to humour an imperious lord, proportion your looks to his looks, smiles to his smiles; fit your sails to the winds of his breath!

_Qu._ Tush! he's no journeyman in his craft that cannot do that. 71

_Si._ But he's worse than a prentice that does it; not only humouring the lord, but every trencher-bearer, every groom, that by indulgence and intelligence crept into his favour, and by panderism into his chamber; he rules the roast; and when my honourable lord says it shall be thus, my worshipful rascal, the groom of his close stool, says it shall not be thus, claps the door after him, and who dares enter? A prentice, quoth you? 'Tis but to learn to live; and does that disgrace a man? He that rises hardly stands firmly; but he that rises with ease, alas! falls as easily. 82

_Qu._ A pox on you! who taught you this morality?

_Sec._ 'Tis 'long of this witty age, Master Francis. But, indeed, Mistress Sindefy, all trades complain of inconvenience, and therefore 'tis best to have none. The merchant, he complains and says, traffic is subject to much uncertainty and loss; let 'hem keep their goods on dry land, with a vengeance, and not expose other men's substances to the mercy of the winds, under protection of a wooden wall (as Master Francis says); and all for greedy desire to enrich themselves with unconscionable gain, two for one, or so; where I, and such other honest men as live by lending money, are content with moderate profit; thirty or forty i' th' hundred, so we may have it with quietness, and out of peril of wind and weather, rather than run those dangerous courses of trading, as they do. 98

[_Exit_[43] SINDEFY.

_Qu._ Ay, dad, thou may'st well be called Security, for thou takest the safest course.

_Sec._ 'Faith, the quieter, and the more contented, and, out of doubt, the more godly; for merchants, in their courses, are never pleased, but ever repining against heaven: one prays for a westerly wind, to carry his ship forth; another for an easterly, to bring his ship home, and at every shaking of a leaf[44] he falls into an agony, to think what danger his ship is in on such a coast, and so forth. The farmer, he is ever at odds with the weather: sometimes the clouds have been too barren; sometimes the heavens forget themselves; their harvests answer not their hopes; sometimes the season falls out too fruitful, corn will bear no price, and so forth. The artificer, he's all for a stirring world: if his trade be too full, and fall short of his expectation, then falls he out of joint. Where we that trade nothing but money are free from all this; we are pleased with all weathers, let it rain or hold up, be calm or windy; let the season be whatsoever, let trade go how it will, we take all in good part, e'en what please the heavens to send us, so the sun stand not still, and the moon keep her usual returns, and make up days, months, and years. 121

_Qu._ And you have good security?

_Sec._ Ay, marry, Frank, that's the special point.

_Qu._ And yet, forsooth, we must have trades to live withal; for we cannot stand without legs, nor fly without wings, and a number of such scurvy phrases. No, I say still, he that has wit, let him live by his wit; he that has none, let him be a tradesman.

_Sec._ Witty Master Francis! 'tis pity any trade should dull that quick brain of yours. Do but bring Knight Petronel into my parchment toils once, and you shall never need to toil in any trade, o' my credit. You know his wife's land? 133

_Qu._ Even to a foot, sir; I have been often there; a pretty fine seat, good land, all entire within itself.

_Sec._ Well wooded?

_Qu._ Two hundred pounds' worth of wood ready to fell, and a fine sweet house, that stands just in the midst on't, like a prick in the midst of a circle; would I were your farmer, for a hundred pound a year!

_Sec._ Excellent Master Francis! how I do long to do thee good! How I do hunger and thirst to have the honour to enrich thee! ay, even to die, that thou mightest inherit my living! even hunger and thirst! for o' my religion, Master Francis, and so tell Knight Petronel, I do it to do him a pleasure. 146

_Qu._ Marry, dad! his horses are now coming up to bear down his lady; wilt thou lend him thy stable to set 'hem in?

_Sec._ 'Faith, Master Francis, I would be loth to lend my stable out of doors; in a greater matter I will pleasure him, but not in this.

_Qu._ A pox of your hunger and thirst! Well, dad, let him have money; all he could any way get is bestowed on a ship now bound for Virginia; the frame of which voyage is so closely conveyed that his new lady nor any of her friends know it. Notwithstanding, as soon as his lady's hand is gotten to the sale of her inheritance, and you have furnished him with money, he will instantly hoist sail and away. 160

_Sec._ Now, a frank gale of wind go with him, Master Frank! we have too few such knight adventurers; who would not sell away competent certainties to purchase, with any danger, excellent uncertainties? your true knight venturer ever does. Let his wife seal to-day; he shall have his money to-day.

_Qu._ To-morrow she shall, dad, before she goes into the country; to work her to which action with the more engines, I purpose presently to prefer my sweet Sin here to the place of her gentlewoman; whom you (for the more credit) shall present as your friend's daughter, a gentlewoman of the country, new come up with a will for awhile to learn fashions forsooth, and be toward some lady; and she shall buzz pretty devices into her lady's ear; feeding her humours so serviceably (as the manner of such as she is, you know). 176

_Sec._ True, good Master Francis.

_Re-enter_ SINDEFY.

_Qu._ That she shall keep her port open to anything she commends to her.

_Sec._ O' my religion, a most fashionable project; as good she spoil the lady, as the lady spoil her; for 'tis three to one of one side. Sweet Mistress Sin, how are you bound to Master Francis! I do not doubt to see you shortly wed one of the head-men[45] of our city.

_Si._ But, sweet Frank, when shall my father Security present me? 186

_Qu._ With all festination; I have broken the ice to it already; and will presently to the knight's house, whither, my good old dad, let me pray thee, with all formality to man her.

_Sec._ Command me, Master Francis, I do hunger and thirst to do thee service. Come, sweet Mistress Sin, take leave of my Winifred, and we will instantly meet Frank, Master Francis, at your lady's.

_Enter_ WINIFRED _above_.

_Wi._ Where is my Cu there? Cu?

_Sec._ Ay, Winnie. 196

_Wi._ Wilt thou come in, sweet Cu?

_Sec._ Ay, Winnie, presently.

[_Exeunt_ SECURITY _and_ SINDEFY.

_Qu._ Ay, Winnie, quod he, that's all he can do, poor man, he may well cut off her name at Winnie. O, 'tis an egregious pander! What will not an usurous knave be, so he may be rich? O, 'tis a notable Jew's trump! I hope to live to see dogs' meat made of the old usurer's flesh, dice of his bones, and indentures of his skin; and yet his skin is too thick to make parchment, 'twould make good boots for a peter-man[46] to catch salmon in. Your only smooth skin to make fine vellum is your Puritan's skin; they be the smoothest and slickest knaves in a country. 209

_Enter_ Sir PETRONEL _in boots, with a riding-wand_.[47]

_Pe._ I'll out of this wicked town as fast as my horse can trot! Here's now no good action for a man to spend his time in. Taverns grow dead; ordinaries are blown up; plays are at a stand; houses of hospitality at a fall; not a feather waving, nor a spur jingling anywhere. I'll away instantly.

_Qu._ Y'ad best take some crowns in your purse, knight, or else your Eastward Castle will smoke but miserably.

_Pe._ O, Frank! my castle? Alas! all the castles I have are built with air, thou know'st. 219

_Qu._ I know it, knight, and therefore wonder whither your lady is going.

_Pe._ 'Faith, to seek her fortune, I think. I said I had a castle and land eastward, and eastward she will, without contradiction; her coach and the coach of the sun must meet full butt. And the sun being outshined with her ladyship's glory, she fears he goes westward to hang himself.

_Qu._ And I fear, when her enchanted castle becomes invisible, her ladyship will return and follow his example.

_Pe._ Oh, that she would have the grace! for I shall never be able to pacify her, when she sees herself deceived so. 232

_Qu._ As easily as can be. Tell her she mistook your directions, and that shortly yourself will down with her to approve it; and then clothe but her crouper in a new gown, and you may drive her any way you list. For these women, sir, are like Essex calves, you must wriggle 'hem on by the tail still, or they will never drive orderly.

_Pe._ But, alas! sweet Frank, thou knowest my ability will not furnish her blood with those costly humours.

_Qu._ Cast that cost on me, sir. I have spoken to my old pander, Security, for money or commodity; and commodity (if you will) I know he will procure you. 243

_Pe._ Commodity! Alas! what commodity?

_Qu._ Why, sir! what say you to figs and raisins?

_Pe._ A plague of figs and raisins, and all such frail[48] commodities! We shall make nothing of 'hem.

_Qu._ Why then, sir, what say you to forty pound in roasted beef?[49]

_Pe._ Out upon't, I have less stomach to that than to the figs and raisins; I'll out of town, though I sojourn with a friend of mine, for stay here I must not; my creditors have laid to arrest me, and I have no friend under heaven but my sword to bail me. 254

_Qu._ God's me, knight, put 'hem in sufficient sureties, rather than let your sword bail you! Let 'hem take their choice, either the King's Bench or the Fleet, or which of the two Counters they like best, for, by the Lord, I like none of 'hem.

_Pe._ Well, Frank, there is no jesting with my earnest necessity; thou know'st if I make not present money to further my voyage begun, all's lost, and all I have laid out about it. 263

_Qu._ Why, then, sir, in earnest, if you can get your wise lady to set her hand to the sale of her inheritance, the bloodhound, Security, will smell out ready money for you instantly.

_Pe._ There spake an angel: to bring her to which conformity, I must feign myself extremely amorous; and alleging urgent excuses for my stay behind, part with her as passionately as she would from her foisting hound.[50] 272

_Qu._ You have the sow by the right ear, sir. I warrant there was never child longed more to ride a cock-horse or wear his new coat, than she longs to ride in her new coach. She would long for everything when she was a maid, and now she will run mad for 'hem. I lay my life, she will have every year four children; and what charge and change of humour you must endure while she is with child, and how she will tie you to your tackling till she be with child, a dog would not endure. Nay, there is no turnspit dog bound to his wheel[51] more servilely than you shall be to her wheel; for, as that dog can never climb the top of his wheel but when the top comes under him, so shall you never climb the top of her contentment but when she is under you. 286

_Pe._ 'Slight, how thou terrifiest me!

_Qu._ Nay, hark you, sir; what nurses, what midwives, what fools, what physicians, what cunning women must be sought for (fearing sometimes she is bewitched, sometimes in a consumption), to tell her tales, to talk bawdy to her, to make her laugh, to give her glisters, to let her blood under the tongue and betwixt the toes; how she will revile and kiss you, spit in your face, and lick it off again; how she will vaunt you are her creature; she made you of nothing; how she could have had thousand mark jointures; she could have been made a lady by a Scotch knight, and never ha' married him; she could have had ponados[52] in her bed every morning; how she set you up, and how she will pull you down: you'll never be able to stand of your legs to endure it. 301

_Pe._ Out of my fortune, what a death is my life bound face to face to! The best is, a large time-fitted conscience is bound to nothing: marriage is but a form in the school of policy, to which scholars sit fastened only with painted chains. Old Security's young wife is ne'er the further off with me.

_Qu._ Thereby lies a tale, sir. The old usurer will be here instantly, with my punk Sindefy, whom you know your lady has promised me to entertain for her gentlewoman; and he (with a purpose to feed on you) invites you most solemnly by me to supper. 312

_Pe._ It falls out excellently fitly: I see desire of gain makes jealousy venturous.

_Enter_ GERTRUDE.

See, Frank, here comes my lady. Lord! how she views thee! she knows thee not, I think, in this bravery.

_Ge._ How now? who be you, I pray?

_Qu._ One Master Francis Quicksilver, an't please your ladyship.

_Ge._ God's my dignity! as I am a lady, if he did not make me blush so that mine eyes stood a-water. Would I were unmarried again! 322

_Enter_ SECURITY _and_ SINDEFY.

Where's my woman, I pray?

_Qu._ See, madam, she now comes to attend you.

_Sec._ God save my honourable knight and his worshipful lady.

_Ge._ Y'are very welcome; you must not put on your hat yet.

_Sec._ No, madam; till I know your ladyship's further pleasure, I will not presume.

_Ge._ And is this a gentleman's daughter new come out of the country? 332

_Sec._ She is, madam; and one that her father hath a special care to bestow in some honourable lady's service, to put her out of her honest humours, forsooth; for she had a great desire to be a nun, an't please you.

_Ge._ A nun? what nun? a nun substantive? or a nun adjective?

_Sec._ A nun substantive, madam, I hope, if a nun be a noun. But I mean, lady, a vowed maid of that order.

_Ge._ I'll teach her to be a maid of the order, I warrant you. And can you do any work belongs to a lady's chamber? 343

_Si._ What I cannot do, madam, I would be glad to learn.

_Ge._ Well said; hold up, then; hold up your head, I say; come hither a little.

_Si._ I thank your ladyship.

_Ge._ And hark you, good man, you may put on your hat now; I do not look on you. I must have you of my faction now; not of my knight's, maid. 351

_Si._ No, forsooth, madam, of yours.

_Ge._ And draw all my servants in my bow, and keep my counsel, and tell me tales, and put me riddles, and read on a book sometimes when I am busy, and laugh at country gentlewomen, and command anything in the house for my retainers; and care not what you spend, for it is all mine; and in any case be still a maid, whatsoever you do, or whatsoever any man can do unto you.

_Sec._ I warrant your ladyship for that. 360

_Ge._ Very well; you shall ride in my coach with me into the country, to-morrow morning. Come, knight, pray thee let's make a short supper, and to bed presently.

_Sec._ Nay, good madam, this night I have a short supper at home waits on his worship's acceptation.

_Ge._ By my faith, but he shall not go, sir; I shall swoon and he sup from me.

_Pe._ Pray thee, forbear; shall he lose his provision?

_Ge._ Ay, by-lady, sir, rather than I lose my longing. Come in, I say; as I am a lady, you shall not go. 370

_Qu._ I told him what a burr he had gotten.

_Sec._ If you will not sup from your knight, madam, let me entreat your ladyship to sup at my house with him.

_Ge._ No, by my faith, sir; then we cannot be abed soon enough after supper.

_Pe._ What a medicine is this! Well, Master Security, you are new married as well as I; I hope you are bound as well. We must honour our young wives, you know.

_Qu._ In policy, dad, till to-morrow she has sealed.

_Sec._ I hope in the morning yet your knighthood will breakfast with me? 381

_Pe._ As early as you will, sir.

_Sec._ I thank your good worship; I do hunger and thirst to do you good, sir.

_Ge._ Come, sweet knight, come; I do hunger and thirst to be abed with thee.

[_Exeunt._

[39] "Ka me, ka thee"--one good turn deserves another. See Nares' _Glossary_.

[40] _Trunk_ was a term for a pea-shooter.

[41] "This alludes to a scene in the tragedy of _Mulleasses the Turke_, 1610, by Mason, where Borgias appears as a ghost, and is addressed by Mulleasses in these words:-- 'Illusive ayre, false shape of Borgias, Could thy vaine shadow worke a feare in him That like an Atlas under went the earth, When with a prim and constant eye he saw Hell's fifty-headed porter; thus I'd prove Thy apparition idle. [_Runnes at Borgias._

_Borg._ Treason! I live.'"--_Reed._

[42] A parody of an old ballad. See Evans' _Old Ballads_, i. 283 (1810); Chappell's _Popular Music of the Olden Time_, i. 241.

[43] Not marked in old ed.--She leaves the stage while Security and Quicksilver are conversing; and presently (p. 37) returns. [Transcriber's note: after line 177, above scene.]

[44] Cf. _Merchant of Venice_, i. 1:-- "My wind, cooling my broth, Would blow me to an ague, when I thought What harm a wind too great at sea might do."

[45] A jocular term for _cuckolds_.

[46] Nickname for a fisherman (one who followed the occupation of the apostle Peter).

[47] "A hollie wand or _riding wand_. Houssine."--_Cotgrave._

[48] Used with a quibble. _Frail_ was a basket for figs, raisins, &c.

[49] In _Lanthorn and Candlelight_ (1609) Dekker mentions this extraordinary commodity:--"After a revelling, when younger brothers have spent all, or in gaming have lost all, they sit plotting in their chambers with necessity how to be furnished presently with a new supply of money. They would take up any commodity whatsoever, but their names stand in too many texted letters in mercers' and scriveners' books. Upon _a hundred pounds' worth of roasted beef_ they could find in their hearts to venture, for that would away in turning of a hand; but where shall they find a butcher or a cook that will let any man run so much upon the score for flesh only?" (_Works_, ed. Grosart, iii. 231.)

[50] "Foisting hound" = a dog with an evil smell.

[51] "There is comprehended under the curs of the coarsest kind a certain dog in kitchen service excellent. For when any meat is to be roasted _they go into a wheel_, which they turning round about with the weight of their bodies so diligently look to their business that no drudger nor scullion can do the feat more cunningly: whom the popular sort hereupon call turnspits."--Topsel's _History of Four-footed Beasts_, ed. 1658 (p. 139).

[52] The old ed. gives "poynados" (= poniards), which modern editors strangely retain. _Ponado_ (_panado_) was a caudle made of bread, currants, sack, eggs, &c.