SCENE III.--Lady DUNCE'S _Chamber_.

Lady DUNCE _and_ BEAUGARD _discovered_.

_L. Dunce._ What think you now of a cold wet march over the mountains, your men tired, your baggage not come up, but at night a dirty watery plain to encamp upon, and nothing to shelter you, but an old leaguer cloak as tattered as your colours? Is not this much better, now, than lying wet, and getting the sciatica?

_Beau._ The hopes of this made all fatigue easy to me; the thoughts of Clarinda have a thousand times refreshed me in my solitude. Whene'er I marched, I fancied still it was to my Clarinda; when I fought, I imagined it was for my Clarinda; but when I came home, and found Clarinda lost!--How could you think of wasting but a night in the rank, surfeiting arms of this foul-feeding monster, this rotten trunk of a man, that lays claim to you?

_L. Dunce._ The persuasion of friends, and the authority of parents.

_Beau._ And had you no more grace than to be ruled by a father and mother?

_L. Dunce._ When you were gone, that should have given me better counsel, how could I help myself?

_Beau._ Methinks, then, you might have found out some cleanlier shift to have thrown away yourself upon than nauseous old age, and unwholesome deformity.

_L. Dunce._ What, upon some over-grown, full-fed country fool, with a horse-face, a great ugly head, and a great fine estate; one that should have been drained and squeezed, and jolted up and down the town in hackneys with cheats and hectors, and so sent home at three o'clock every morning, like a lolling booby, stinking, with a belly-full of stummed wine,[52] and nothing in's pockets?

_Beau._ You might have made a tractable beast of such a one; he would have been young enough for training.

_L. Dunce._ Is youth then so gentle, if age be stubborn? Young men, like springs wrought by a subtle workman, easily ply to what their wishes press them; but the desire once gone that kept them down, they soon start straight again, and no sign's left which way they bent before.

_Sir Jol._ [_At the door peeping._] So, so, who says I see anything now? I see nothing, not I; I don't see, I don't see, I don't look, not so much as look, not I. [_He enters._

_Enter_ Sir DAVY DUNCE.

_Sir Dav._ I will have my wife, carry me to my wife, let me go to my wife, I'll live and die with my wife, let the devil do his worst; ah, my wife, my wife, my wife!

_L. Dunce._ [_To_ BEAUGARD.] Alas! alas! we are ruined! shift for yourself; counterfeit the dead corpse once more, or anything.

_Sir Dav._ Ha! whosoe'er thou art thou canst not eat me! speak to me, who has done this? Thou canst not say I did it.

_Sir Jol._ Did it? did what? Here's nobody says you did anything that I know, neighbour; what's the matter with you? what ails you? whither do you go? whither do you run? I tell you here's nobody says a word to you.

_Sir Dav._ Did you not see the ghost just now?

_Sir Jol._ Ghost! pr'ythee now, here's no ghost; whither would you go? I tell you, you shall not stir one foot farther, man; the devil take me if you do. Ghost! pr'ythee, here's no ghost at all; a little flesh and blood, indeed, there is, some old, some young, some alive, some dead, and so forth; but ghost! pish, here's no ghost.

_Sir Dav._ But, sir, if I say I did see a ghost, I did see a ghost, an you go to that; why, sure I know a ghost when I see one. Ah, my dear, if thou hadst but seen the devil half so often as I have seen him!

_L. Dunce._ Alas, Sir Davy! if you ever loved me, come not, oh, come not near me; I have resolved to waste the short remainder of my life in penitence, and taste of joys no more.

_Sir Dav._ Alas, my poor child! But do you think there was no ghost indeed?

_Sir Jol._ Ghost! Alas-a-day, what should a ghost do here?

_Sir Dav._ And is the man dead?

_Sir Jol._ Dead! ay, ay, stark dead, he's stiff by this time.

_L. Dunce._ Here you may see the horrid ghastly spectacle, the sad effects of my too rigid virtue, and your too fierce resentment--

_Sir Jol._ Do you see there?

_Sir Dav._ Ay, ay, I do see; would I had never seen him; would he had lain with my wife in every house between Charing Cross and Aldgate, so this had never happened!

_Sir Jol._ In truth, and would he had! but we are all mortal, neighbour, all mortal; to-day we are here, to-morrow gone; like the shadow that vanisheth, like the grass that withereth, or like the flower that fadeth; or indeed like anything, or rather like nothing: but we are all mortal.

_Sir Dav._ Heigh!

_L. Dunce._ Down, down that trap-door, it goes into a bathing-room; for the rest, leave it to my conduct.

[BEAUGARD _descends_.

_Sir Jol._ 'Tis very unfortunate that you should run yourself into this _premunire_,[53] Sir Davy.

_Sir Dav._ Indeed, and so it is.

_Sir Jol._ For a gentleman, a man in authority, a person in years, one that used to go to church with his neighbours.

_Sir Dav._ Every Sunday truly, Sir Jolly.

_Sir Jol._ Pay scot and lot to the parish.

_Sir Dav._ Six pounds a year to the very poor, without abatement or deduction: 'tis very hard if so good a commonwealth's-man should be brought to ride in a cart at last, and be hanged in a sunshiny morning to make butchers and suburb apprentices a holiday; I'll e'en run away.

_Sir Jol._ Run away! why then your estate will be forfeited; you'll lose your estate, man.

_Sir Dav._ Truly you say right, friend; and a man had better be half-hanged than lose his estate, you know.

_Sir Jol._ Hanged! no, no, I think there's no great fear of hanging neither: what, the fellow was but a sort of an unaccountable fellow, as I heard you say.

_Sir Dav._ Ay, ay, pox on him, he was a soldierly sort of a vagabond; he had little or nothing but his sins to live upon: if I could have had but patience, he would have been hanged within these two months, and all this mischief saved.

[BEAUGARD _rises up like a ghost at the_ _trap-door, just before_ Sir DAVY.

O Lord! the devil, the devil, the devil! [_Falls upon his face._

_Sir Jol._ Why, Sir Davy, Sir Davy, what ails you? what's the matter with you?

_Sir Dav._ Let me alone, let me lie still; I will not look up to see an angel; oh-h-h!

_L. Dunce._ My dear, why do you do these cruel things to affright me? Pray rise and speak to me.

_Sir Dav._ I dare not stir; I saw the ghost again just now.

_L. Dunce._ Ghost again! what ghost? where?

_Sir Dav._ Why, there! there!

_Sir Jol._ Here has been no ghost.

_Sir Dav._ Why, did you see nothing then?

_L. Dunce._ See nothing! no, nothing but one another.

_Sir Dav._ Then I am enchanted, or my end is near at hand, neighbour; for Heaven's sake, neighbour, advise me what I shall do to be at rest.

_Sir Jol._ Do! why, what think you if the body were removed?

_Sir Dav._ Removed! I'd give a hundred pound the body were out of my house; may be then the devil would not be so impudent.

_Sir Jol._ I have discovered a door-place in the wall betwixt my lady's chamber and one that belongs to me; if you think fit we'll beat it down, and remove this troublesome lump of earth to my house.

_Sir Dav._ But will you be so kind?

_Sir Jol._ If you think it may by any means be serviceable to you.

_Sir Dav._ Truly, if the body were removed, and disposed of privately, that no more might be heard of the matter--I hope he'll be as good as his word. [_Aside._

_Sir Jol._ Fear nothing, I'll warrant you; but in troth I had utterly forgot one thing, utterly forgot it.

_Sir Dav._ What's that?

_Sir Jol._ Why, it will be absolutely necessary that your lady stayed with me at my house for one day, till things were better settled.

_Sir Dav._ Ah, Sir Jolly! whatever you think fit; anything of mine that you have a mind to; pray take her, pray take her, you shall be very welcome. Hear you, my dearest, there is but one way for us to get rid of this untoward business, and Sir Jolly has found it out; therefore by all means go along with him, and be ruled by him; and whatever Sir Jolly would have thee do, e'en do it: so Heaven prosper ye, good-bye, good-bye, till I see you again. [_Exit._

_Sir Jol._ This is certainly the civilest cuckold in city, town, or country.

_Beau._ Is he gone? [_Steps out._

_L. Dunce._ Yes, and has left poor me here.

_Beau._ In troth, madam, 'tis barbarously done of him, to commit a horrid murder on the body of an innocent poor fellow, and then leave you to stem the danger of it.

_Sir Jol._ Odd, an I were as thee, sweetheart, I'd be revenged on him for it, so I would. Go, get ye together, steal out of the house as softly as you can, I'll meet ye in the Piazza presently; go, be sure ye steal out of the house, and don't let Sir Davy see you. [_Exeunt._