SCENE III.--_A Chamber in_ BELLAFRONT’S _House_.

BELLAFRONT _discovered sitting with a lute; pen, ink, and paper on a table before her_.

_Bell._ [_Sings._] The courtier’s flattering jewels, Temptations only fuels, The lawyer’s ill-got moneys, That suck up poor bees’ honeys: The citizen’s sons riot, The gallant’s costly diet: Silks and velvets, pearls and ambers, Shall not draw me to their chambers. Silks and velvets, &c. [_She writes._

Oh, ’tis in vain to write! it will not please; Ink on this paper would ha’ but presented The foul black spots that stick upon my soul, And rather made me loathsomer, than wrought My love’s impression in Hippolito’s thought: No, I must turn the chaste leaves of my breast, And pick out some sweet means to breed my rest. Hippolito, believe me I will be As true unto thy heart, as thy heart to thee, And hate all men, their gifts and company!

_Enter_ MATHEO, CASTRUCHIO, FLUELLO, _and_ PIORATTO.

_Mat._ You, goody punk, _subaudi_ cockatrice, oh you’re a sweet whore of your promise, are you not, think you? how well you came to supper to us last night; mew, a whore, and break her word! nay, you may blush, and hold down your head at it well enough. ’Sfoot, ask these gallants if we stayed not till we were as hungry as sergeants.

_Flu._ Ay, and their yeomen too.

_Cas._ Nay, faith, acquaintance, let me tell you, you forgat yourself too much: we had excellent cheer, rare vintage, and were drunk after supper.

_Pio._ And when we were in, our woodcocks,[192] sweet rogue, a brace of gulls, dwelling here in the city, came in, and paid all the shot.

[192] Simpletons.

_Mat._ Pox on her! let her alone.

_Bell._ Oh, I pray do, if you be gentlemen: I pray, depart the house: beshrew the door For being so easily entreated! faith, I lent but little ear unto your talk; My mind was busied otherwise, in troth, And so your words did unregarded pass: Let this suffice,--I am not as I was.

_Flu._ I am not what I was? no, I’ll be sworn thou art not: for thou wert honest at five, and now thou’rt a punk at fifteen: thou wert yesterday a simple whore, and now thou’rt a cunning, cony-catching baggage to day.

_Bell._ I’ll say I’m worse; I pray, forsake me then: I do desire you leave me, gentlemen. And leave yourselves: O be not what you are, Spendthrifts of soul and body! Let me persuade you to forsake all harlots, Worse than the deadliest poisons, they are worse: For o’er their souls hangs an eternal curse. In being slaves to slaves, their labours perish; They’re seldom blest with fruit; for ere it blossoms, Many a worm confounds it. They have no issue but foul ugly ones, That run along with them, e’en to their graves: For, ’stead of children, they breed rank diseases, And all you gallants can bestow on them, Is that French infant, which ne’er acts, but speaks: What shallow son and heir, then, foolish gallants, Would waste all his inheritance, to purchase A filthy, loathed disease? and pawn his body To a dry evil: that usury’s worst of all, When th’ interest will eat out the principal.

_Mat._ ’Sfoot, she gulls ’em the best! this is always her fashion, when she would be rid of any company that she cares not for, to enjoy mine alone. [_Aside._

_Flu._ What’s here? instructions, admonitions, and caveats? Come out, you scabbard of vengeance.

_Mat._ Fluello, spurn your hounds when they fist, you shall not spurn my punk, I can tell you: my blood is vexed.

_Flu._ Pox a’ your blood: make it a quarrel.

_Mat._ You’re a slave! will that serve turn?

_Pio._ ’Sblood, hold, hold!

_Cas._ Matheo, Fluello, for shame, put up!

_Mat._ Spurn my sweet varlet?

_Bell._ O how many thus Moved with a little folly, have let out Their souls in brothel-houses! fell down and died Just at their harlot’s foot, as ’twere in pride.

_Flu._ Matheo, we shall meet.

_Mat._ Ay, ay; any where, saving at church: Pray take heed we meet not there.

_Flu._ Adieu, damnation!

_Cas._ Cockatrice, farewell!

_Pio._ There’s more deceit in women, than in hell. [_Exeunt_ CASTRUCHIO, FLUELLO _and_ PIORATTO.

_Mat._ Ha, ha, thou dost gull ’em so rarely, so naturally! If I did not think thou hadst been in earnest: thou art a sweet rogue for’t i’faith.

_Bell._ Why are not you gone too, Signor Matheo? I pray depart my house: you may believe me, In troth, I have no part of harlot in me.

_Mat._ How’s this?

_Bell._ Indeed, I love you not: but hate you worse Than any man, because you were the first Gave money for my soul: you brake the ice, Which after turned a puddle; I was led By your temptation to be miserable: I pray, seek out some other that will fall, Or rather, I pray seek out none at all.

_Mat._ Is’t possible to be impossible! an honest whore! I have heard many honest wenches turn strumpets with a wet finger,[193] but for a harlot to turn honest is one of Hercules’ labours. It was more easy for him in one night to make fifty queans, than to make one of them honest again in fifty years. Come, I hope thou dost but jest.

[193] Easily, readily.

_Bell._ ’Tis time to leave off jesting, I had almost Jested away salvation: I shall love you, If you will soon forsake me.

_Mat._ God be with thee!

_Bell._ O tempt no more women! shun their weighty curse; Women, at best, are bad, make them not worse. You gladly seek our sex’s overthrow: But not to raise our states. For all your wrongs, Will you vouchsafe me but due recompense, To marry with me?

_Mat._ How! marry with a punk, a cockatrice, a harlot? maarr, faugh, I’ll be burnt through the nose first.

_Bell._ Why, la, these are your oaths! you love to undo us, To put Heaven from us, whilst our best hours waste; You love to make us lewd, but never chaste.

_Mat._ I’ll hear no more of this, this ground upon, Thou’rt damned for altering thy religion. [_Exit._

_Bell._ Thy lust and sin speak so much: go thou, my ruin, The first fall my soul took! By my example I hope few maidens now will put their heads Under men’s girdles; who least trusts is most wise: Men’s oaths do cast a mist before our eyes. My best of wit, be ready! Now I go, By some device to greet Hippolito.

ACT THE FOURTH.