Chapter 16

A STREET.

ENTER CORBACCIO AND CORVINO.

CORB: They say, the court is set.

CORV: We must maintain Our first tale good, for both our reputations.

CORB: Why, mine's no tale: my son would there have kill'd me.

CORV: That's true, I had forgot:-- [ASIDE.]--mine is, I am sure. But for your Will, sir.

CORB: Ay, I'll come upon him For that hereafter; now his patron's dead.

[ENTER VOLPONE.]

VOLP: Signior Corvino! and Corbaccio! sir, Much joy unto you.

CORV: Of what?

VOLP: The sudden good, Dropt down upon you--

CORB: Where?

VOLP: And, none knows how, From old Volpone, sir.

CORB: Out, arrant knave!

VOLP: Let not your too much wealth, sir, make you furious.

CORB: Away, thou varlet!

VOLP: Why, sir?

CORB: Dost thou mock me?

VOLP: You mock the world, sir; did you not change Wills?

CORB: Out, harlot!

VOLP: O! belike you are the man, Signior Corvino? 'faith, you carry it well; You grow not mad withal: I love your spirit: You are not over-leaven'd with your fortune. You should have some would swell now, like a wine-fat, With such an autumn--Did he give you all, sir?

CORB: Avoid, you rascal!

VOLP: Troth, your wife has shewn Herself a very woman; but you are well, You need not care, you have a good estate, To bear it out sir, better by this chance: Except Corbaccio have a share.

CORV: Hence, varlet.

VOLP: You will not be acknown, sir; why, 'tis wise. Thus do all gamesters, at all games, dissemble: No man will seem to win. [exeunt corvino and corbaccio.] --Here comes my vulture, Heaving his beak up in the air, and snuffing.

[ENTER VOLTORE.]

VOLT: Outstript thus, by a parasite! a slave, Would run on errands, and make legs for crumbs? Well, what I'll do--

VOLP: The court stays for your worship. I e'en rejoice, sir, at your worship's happiness, And that it fell into so learned hands, That understand the fingering--

VOLT: What do you mean?

VOLP: I mean to be a suitor to your worship, For the small tenement, out of reparations, That, to the end of your long row of houses, By the Piscaria: it was, in Volpone's time, Your predecessor, ere he grew diseased, A handsome, pretty, custom'd bawdy-house, As any was in Venice, none dispraised; But fell with him; his body and that house Decay'd, together.

VOLT: Come sir, leave your prating.

VOLP: Why, if your worship give me but your hand, That I may have the refusal, I have done. 'Tis a mere toy to you, sir; candle-rents; As your learn'd worship knows--

VOLT: What do I know?

VOLP: Marry, no end of your wealth, sir, God decrease it!

VOLT: Mistaking knave! what, mockst thou my misfortune?

[EXIT.]

VOLP: His blessing on your heart, sir; would 'twere more!-- Now to my first again, at the next corner.

[EXIT.]