SCENE V.--_A Room at Old Ford.

_Enter the_ LORD MAYOR, ROSE, EYRE, MARGERY _in a French hood_, SYBIL, _and other_ Servants.

_L. Mayor._ Trust me, you are as welcome to Old Ford As I myself.

_Marg._ Truly, I thank your lordship.

_L. Mayor._ Would our bad cheer were worth the thanks you give.

_Eyre._ Good cheer, my lord mayor, fine cheer! A fine house, fine walls, all fine and neat.

_L. Mayor._ Now, by my troth, I’ll tell thee, Master Eyre, It does me good, and all my brethren, That such a madcap fellow as thyself Is entered into our society.

_Marg._ Ay, but, my lord, he must learn now to put on gravity.

_Eyre._ Peace, Maggy, a fig for gravity! When I go to Guildhall in my scarlet gown, I’ll look as demurely as a saint, and speak as gravely as a justice of peace; but now I am here at Old Ford, at my good lord mayor’s house, let it go by, vanish, Maggy, I’ll be merry; away with flip-flap, these fooleries, these gulleries. What, honey? Prince am I none, yet am I princely born. What says my lord mayor?

_L. Mayor._ Ha, ha, ha! I had rather than a thousand pound, I had an heart but half so light as yours.

_Eyre._ Why, what should I do, my lord? A pound of care pays not a dram of debt. Hum, let’s be merry, whiles we are young; old age, sack and sugar will steal upon us, ere we be aware.[77]

[77] Herrick, who was a goldsmith’s apprentice in London during the time when this play was performed, seems to have appropriated these words of Eyre’s, and turned them into rhyme in these lines:--

“Let’s now take our time, While we’re in our prime, And old, old age is afar off; For the evil, evil days, Will come on apace, Before we can be aware of.”

THE FIRST THREE-MEN’S SONG.[78]

[78] A song or catch for three voices. In the original, the two Three-Men’s Songs are printed separately from the rest of the play, and the place for their insertion is only very uncertainly indicated.

O the month of May, the merry month of May, So frolick, so gay, and so green, so green, so green! O, and then did I unto my true love say: “Sweet Peg, thou shalt be my summer’s queen!

“Now the nightingale, the pretty nightingale, The sweetest singer in all the forest’s choir, Entreats thee, sweet Peggy, to hear thy true love’s tale; Lo, yonder she sitteth, her breast against a brier.

“But O, I spy the cuckoo, the cuckoo, the cuckoo; See where she sitteth: come away, my joy; Come away, I prithee: I do not like the cuckoo Should sing where my Peggy and I kiss and toy.”

O the month of May, the merry month of May, So frolick, so gay, and so green, so green, so green! And then did I unto my true love say: “Sweet Peg, thou shalt be my summer’s queen!”

_L. Mayor._ It’s well done; Mistress Eyre, pray, give good counsel To my daughter.

_Marg._ I hope, Mistress Rose will have the grace to take nothing that’s bad.

_L. Mayor._ Pray God she do; for i’ faith, Mistress Eyre, I would bestow upon that peevish girl A thousand marks more than I mean to give her, Upon condition she’d be ruled by me; The ape still crosseth me. There came of late A proper gentleman of fair revenues, Whom gladly I would call son-in-law: But my fine cockney would have none of him. You’ll prove a coxcomb for it, ere you die: A courtier, or no man must please your eye.

_Eyre._ Be ruled, sweet Rose: th’art ripe for a man. Marry not with a boy that has no more hair on his face than thou hast on thy cheeks. A courtier, wash, go by, stand not upon pishery-pashery: those silken fellows are but painted images, outsides, outsides, Rose; their inner linings are torn. No, my fine mouse, marry me with a gentleman grocer like my lord mayor, your father; a grocer is a sweet trade: plums, plums. Had I a son or daughter should marry out of the generation and blood of the shoemakers, he should pack; what, the gentle trade is a living for a man through Europe, through the world. [_A noise within of a tabor and a pipe._

_L. Mayor._ What noise is this?

_Eyre._ O my lord mayor, a crew of good fellows that for love to your honour are come hither with a morris-dance. Come in, my Mesopotamians, cheerily.

_Enter_ HODGE, HANS, RALPH, FIRK, _and other ~Shoemakers~, in a morris; after a little dancing the_ LORD MAYOR _speaks_.

_L. Mayor._ Master Eyre, are all these shoemakers?

_Eyre._ All cordwainers, my good lord mayor.

_Rose._ (_Aside._) How like my Lacy looks yond’ shoemaker!

_Hans._ (_Aside._) O that I durst but speak unto my love!

_L. Mayor._ Sybil, go fetch some wine to make these drink. You are all welcome.

_All._ We thank your lordship. [ROSE _takes a cup of wine and goes to_ HANS.

_Rose._ For his sake whose fair shape thou represent’st, Good friend, I drink to thee.

_Hans._ _Ic bedancke, good frister._[79]

[79] I thank you, good maid!

_Marg._ I see, Mistress Rose, you do not want judgment; you have drunk to the properest man I keep.

_Firk._ Here be some have done their parts to be as proper as he.

_L. Mayor._ Well, urgent business calls me back to London: Good fellows, first go in and taste our cheer; And to make merry as you homeward go, Spend these two angels[80] in beer at Stratford-Bow.

[80] See note _ante_, p. 39.

_Eyre._ To these two, my mad lads, Sim Eyre adds another; then cheerily, Firk; tickle it, Hans, and all for the honour of shoemakers. [_All go dancing out._

_L. Mayor._ Come, Master Eyre, let’s have your company. [_Exeunt._

_Rose._ Sybil, what shall I do?

_Sybil._ Why, what’s the matter?

_Rose._ That Hans the shoemaker is my love Lacy, Disguised in that attire to find me out. How should I find the means to speak with him?

_Sybil._ What, mistress, never fear; I dare venture my maidenhead to nothing, and that’s great odds, that Hans the Dutchman, when we come to London, shall not only see and speak with you, but in spite of all your father’s policies steal you away and marry you. Will not this please you?

_Rose._ Do this, and ever be assured of my love.

_Sybil._ Away, then, and follow your father to London, lest your absence cause him to suspect something:

To morrow, if my counsel be obeyed, I’ll bind you prentice to the gentle trade. [_Exeunt._

ACT THE FOURTH.