The Antipodes The Antipodes / Richard Brome / ED. Richard Cave: a TEI edition for EMOTHE Antipodes The EMOTHE0472

Source text for this digital edition:
Brome, Richard. The Antipodes [online] Edited by Richard Cave. Egham: Royal Holloway, University of London, 2010. Richard Brome Online. https://www.dhi.ac.uk/brome/viewTranscripts.jsp?play=AN&type=MOD&act=1

Digital text editor for EMOTHE:

Note on this digital edition

Reproduced by kind permission of Professor Richard Cave. ©Royal Holloway, University of London

The Persons in the Play

Blaze, A Herald Painter

Joyless, An Old Country Gentleman

Hughball, a doctor of physic

Barbara, wife to Blaze

Martha, wife to Peregrine

Letoy, a fantastic lord

Quailpipe, his curate

Peregrine, son to Joyless

Diana, wife to Joyless

Byplay, A conceited servant to Letoy

Truelock, a close friend to Letoy

who are actors in the byplay

[Prologue]

[Enter the PROLOGUE.]

PROLOGUE

Opinion, which our author cannot court,

(For the dear daintiness of it) has of late

From the old way of plays possessed a sort

Only to run to those that carry state

In scene magnificent and language high,

And clothes worth all the rest, except the action.

And such are only good, those leaders cry;

And into that belief draw on a faction

That must despise all sportive, merry wit,

Because some such great play had none in it.

But it is known (peace to their memories!)

The poets late sublimèd from our age,

Who best could understand, and best devise

Works that must ever live upon the stage,

Did well approve, and lead this humble way,

Which we are bound to travel in tonight;

And, though it be not traced so well as they

Discovered it by true Phoebean light,

Pardon our just ambition yet that strive

To keep the weakest branch o’ th’ stage alive.

I mean the weakest in their great esteem,

That count all slight that’s under us or nigh;

And only those for worthy subjects deem,

Fetched or reached at (at least) from far or high,

When low and home-bred subjects have their use,

As well as those fetched from on high or far;

And ’tis as hard a labour for the muse

To move the earth as to dislodge a star.

See yet those glorious plays; and let their sight

Your admiration move; these, your delight.

[The PROLOGUE exits.]

ACT ONE

1.1

[Enter] BLAZE [and] JOYLESS.

BLAZE

To me, and to the City, sir, you are welcome,

And so are all about you: we have long

Suffered in want of such fair company.

But now that time’s calamity has given way,

Thanks to high providence, to your kinder visits,

We are (like half-pined wretches, that have lain

Long on the planks of sorrow, strictly tied

To a forced abstinence, from the sight of friends)

The sweetlier filled with Joyless.

JOYLESS

Alas, I bring

Sorrow too much with me to fill one house,

In the sad number of my family.

BLAZE

Be comforted, good sir. My house, which now

You may be pleased to call your own, is large

Enough to hold you all; and for your sorrows,

You came to lose ’em; and I hope the means

Is readily at hand: the doctor’s coming,

Who, as by letters I advertised you,

Is the most promising man to cure your son

The kingdom yields; it will astonish you

To hear the marvels he hath done in cures

Of such distracted ones, as is your son,

And not so much by bodily physic (no!

He sends few recipes to th’ apothecaries)

As medicine of the mind, which he infuses

So skilfully, yet by familiar ways,

That it begets both wonder and delight

In his observers, while the stupid patient

Finds health at unawares.

JOYLESS

You speak well of him:

Yet I may fear, my son’s long-grown disease

Is such he hath not met with.

BLAZE

Then I’ll tell you, sir,

He cured a country gentleman that fell mad

For spending of his land before he sold it

(That is: ’twas sold to pay his debts). All went

That way, for a dead horse, as one would say!

He had not money left to buy his dinner

Upon that whole-sale day. This was a cause

Might make a gentleman mad, you’ll say; and him

It did, as mad as landless squire could be;

This doctor by his art removed his madness,

And mingled so much wit among his brains

That, by the over-flowing of it merely,

He gets and spends five-hundred pound a year now,

As merrily as any gentleman

In Derbyshire; I name no man. But this

Was pretty well, you’ll say.

JOYLESS

My son’s disease

Grows not that way.

BLAZE

There was a lady mad

(I name no lady) but stark mad she was,

As any in the country, city, or almost

In court could be.

JOYLESS

How fell she mad?

BLAZE

With study,

Tedious and painful study. And for what

Now, can you think?

JOYLESS

For painting, or new fashions.

I cannot think for the philosopher’s stone.

BLAZE

No, ’twas to find a way to love her husband,

Because she did not, and her friends rebuked her.

JOYLESS

Was that so hard to find, if she desired it?

BLAZE

She was seven years in search of it and could not,

Though she consumed his whole estate by it.

JOYLESS

’Twas he was mad then.

BLAZE

No: he was not born

With wit enough to lose. But mad was she

Until this doctor took her into cure,

And now she lies as lovingly on a flockbed

With her own knight, as she had done on down

With many others (but I name no parties).

Yet this was well, you’ll say.

JOYLESS

Would all were well!

BLAZE

Then, sir, of officers and men of place,

Whose senses were so numbed, they understood not

Bribes from due fees, and fell on praemunires,

He has cured divers that can now distinguish,

And know both when and how to take of both,

And grow most safely rich by’t. T’other day

He set the brains of an attorney right,

That were quite topsy-turvy overturned

In a pitch o’er the bar, so that (poor man)

For many moons he knew not whether he

Went on his heels or’s head, till he was brought

To this rare doctor; now he walk’st again,

As upright in his calling, as the boldest

Amongst ’em. This was well, you’ll say.

JOYLESS

’Tis much.

BLAZE

And then for horn-mad citizens, my neighbours,

He cures them by the dozens, and we live

As gently with our wives as rams with ewes.

JOYLESS

"We", do you say? Were you one of his patients?

BLAZE

[Aside]

’Slid, he has almost catched me!

[To JOYLESS]

No sir, no.

I name no parties, I! But wish you merry;

I strain to make you so, and could tell forty

Notable cures of his to pass the time

Until he comes.

JOYLESS

But pray, has he the art

To cure a husband’s jealousy?

BLAZE

[Aside]

’Sfoot! I am catched again. Mine, sir, he did.

JOYLESS

But still you name no party! Pray, how long,

Good Master Blaze, has this so famous doctor,

Whom you so well set out, been a professor?

BLAZE

Never in public, nor endures the name

Of doctor, though I call him so, but lives

With an odd lord in town, that looks like no lord.

My doctor goes more like a lord than he.

(Enter DOCTOR [Hughball].)

O welcome sir! I sent mine own wife for you:

Ha’ you brought her home again?

DOCTOR

She’s in your house,

With gentlewomen, who seem to lodge here.

BLAZE

Yes, sir: this gentleman's wife, and his son’s wife:

They all ail something, but his son (’tis thought)

Is falling into madness, and is brought

Up by his careful father to the town here

To be your patient. Speak with him about it.

DOCTOR

How do you find him, sir? Does his disease

Take him by fits, or is it constantly

And at all times the same?

JOYLESS

For the most part

It is only inclining still to worse,

As he grows more in days. By all the best

Conjectures we have met with in the country,

’Tis found a most deep melancholy.

DOCTOR

Of what years is he?

JOYLESS

Of five and twenty, sir.

DOCTOR

Was it born with him? Is it natural,

Or accidental? Have you or his mother

Been so at any time affected?

JOYLESS

Never.

Not she unto her grave; nor I, till then,

Knew what a sadness meant, though since I have

In my son’s sad condition, and some crosses

In my late marriage, which at further time

I may acquaint you with.

BLAZE

[Aside]

The old man’s jealous

Of his young wife! I find him by the question

He put me to erewhile.

DOCTOR

Is your son married?

JOYLESS

Divers years since; for we had hope a wife

Might have restrained his travelling thoughts, and so

Have been a means to cure him; but it failed us.

DOCTOR

What has he in his younger years been most

Addicted to? What study or what practice?

JOYLESS

You have now, sir, found the question, which I think

Will lead you to the ground of his distemper.

DOCTOR

That’s the next way to the cure. Come. Quickly, quickly.

JOYLESS

In tender years he always loved to read

Reports of travels and of voyages;

And when young boys like him would tire themselves

With sports and pastimes and restore their spirits

Again by meat and sleep, he would whole days

And nights (sometimes by stealth) be on such books

As might convey his fancy round the world.

DOCTOR

Very good. On.

JOYLESS

When he grew up towards twenty,

His mind was all on fire to be abroad;

Nothing but travel still was all his aim;

There was no voyage or foreign expedition

Be said to be in hand, but he made suit

To be made one in it. His mother and

Myself opposed him still in all, and strongly

Against his will, still held him in; and won

Him into marriage, hoping that would call

In his extravagant thoughts, but all prevailed not,

Nor stayed him (though at home) from travelling

So far beyond himself that now, too late,

I wish he had gone abroad to meet his fate.

DOCTOR

Well, sir, upon good terms I’ll undertake

Your son: let’s see him.

JOYLESS

Yet there’s more: his wife, sir.

DOCTOR

I’ll undertake her too. Is she mad too?

BLAZE

They’ll ha’ mad children then!

DOCTOR

Hold you your peace.

JOYLESS

Alas, the danger is they will have none:

He takes no joy in her; and she no comfort

In him: for though they have been three years wed,

They are yet ignorant of the marriage-bed.

DOCTOR

I shall find her the madder of the two then.

JOYLESS

Indeed, she’s full of passion, which she utters

By the effects, as diversely as several

Objects reflect upon her wand’ring fancy,

Sometimes in extreme weepings, and anon

In vehement laughter; now in sullen silence,

And presently in loudest exclamations.

DOCTOR

Come, let me see ’em, sir. I’ll undertake

Her too. Ha’ you any more? How does your wife?

JOYLESS

Some other time for her.

DOCTOR

I’ll undertake

Her too; and you yourself, sir, by your favour

And some few yellow spots which I perceive

About your temples, may require some counsel.

Enter BARBARA.

BLAZE

[Aside]

So, he has found him.

JOYLESS

But my son, my son, sir?

BLAZE

Now, Bab, what news?

BARBARA

There’s news too much within,

For any home-bred Christian understanding.

JOYLESS

How does my son?

BARBARA

He is in travail, sir.

JOYLESS

His fit’s upon him?

BARBARA

Yes. Pray, Doctor Hughball,

Play the man-midwife, and deliver him

Of his huge tympany of news: of monsters,

Pygmies, and giants, apes, and elephants,

Gryphons and crocodiles, men upon women

And women upon men, the strangest doings!

As far beyond all Christendom as ’tis to’t.

DOCTOR

How, how?

BARBARA

Beyond the moon and stars, I think,

Or Mount in Cornwall either.

BLAZE

[Aside]

How prettily like a fool she talks?

And she were not mine own wife, I could be

So taken with her.

DOCTOR

’Tis most wondrous strange.

BARBARA

He talks much of the kingdom of Cathaya,

Of one Great Khan, and goodman Prester John,

(Whate’er they be) and says that Khan’s a clown

Unto the John he speaks of. And that John

Dwells up almost at Paradise. But sure his mind

Is in a wilderness, for there he says

Are geese that have two heads apiece, and hens

That bear more wool upon their backs than sheep.

DOCTOR

O Mandeville! Let's to him. Lead the way, sir.

BARBARA

And men with heads like hounds.

DOCTOR

Enough, enough.

BARBARA

You’ll find enough within, I warrant ye.

[DOCTOR, BLAZE and JOYLESS exit.]

[Aside to audience]

And here comes the poor mad gentleman’s wife,

Ent[er] MAR[THA].

Almost as mad as he: she haunts me all

About the house to impart something to me.

Poor heart, I guess her grief and pity her.

To keep a maidenhead three years after marriage

Under wed-lock and key! Insufferable! Monstrous!

It turns into a wolf within the flesh,

Not to be fed with chickens and tame pigeons.

I could wish maids be warned by’t not to marry

Before they have wit to lose their maiden-heads

For fear they match with men whose wits are past it.

What a sad look, and what a sigh was there!)

[To MARTHA]

Sweet Mistress Joyless, how is’t with you now?

MARTHA

When I shall know, I’ll tell. Pray tell me first,

How long have you been married?

BARBARA

[Aside]

Now she is on it.

[To MARTHA]

Three years, forsooth.

MARTHA

And truly so have I;

We shall agree I see.

BARBARA

If you’ll be merry.

MARTHA

No woman merrier, now I have met with one

Of my condition. Three years married, say you? Ha, ha, ha!

BARBARA

[Aside]

What ails she, trow?

MARTHA

Three years married. Ha, ha, ha.

BARBARA

Is that a laughing matter?

MARTHA

’Tis just my story.

And you have had no child; that’s still my story. Ha, ha, ha!

BARBARA

Nay, I have had two children.

MARTHA

Are you sure on’t?

Or does your husband only tell you so?

Take heed o’that, for husbands are deceitful.

BARBARA

But I am o’the surer side: I am sure

I groaned for mine and bore ’em, when at best

He but believes he got ’em.

MARTHA

Yet both he

And you may be deceived, for now I’ll tell you,

My husband told me, fac’d me down and stood on’t,

We had three sons, and all great travellers,

That one had shook the Great Turk by the beard.

I never saw ’em, nor am I such a fool

To think that children can be got and born,

Trained up to men, and then sent out to travel,

And the poor mother never know nor feel

Any such matter. There’s a dream indeed!

BARBARA

Now you speak reason, and ’tis nothing but

Your husband’s madness that would put that dream

Into you.

MARTHA

He may put dreams into me, but

He ne’er put child, nor any thing towards it yet,

To me to making.

([She] weep[s].)

Something, sure, belongs

To such a work; for I am past a child

Myself to think they are found in parsley beds,

Strawberry banks or rosemary bushes, though

I must confess I have sought and searched such places,

Because I would fain have had one.

BARBARA

[Aside]

’Las, poor fool!

MARTHA

Pray tell me, for I think nobody hears us,

How came you by your babes? I cannot think

Your husband got them you.

BARBARA

[Aside]

Fool, did I say?

She is a witch, I think.

[To MARTHA]

Why not my husband?

Pray can you charge me with another man?

MARTHA

Nor with him neither. Be not angry, pray now.

For were I now to die, I cannot guess

What a man does in child-getting. I remember

A wanton maid once lay with me, and kissed

And clipped, and clapped me strangely, and then wished

That I had been a man to have got her with child.

What must I then ha’ done, or (good now, tell me)

What has your husband done to you?

BARBARA

[Aside]

Was ever

Such a poor piece of innocence! Three years married?

[To MARTHA]

Does not your husband use to lie with you?

MARTHA

Yes, he does use to lie with me, but he does not

Lie with me to use me as he should, I fear,

Nor do I know to teach him. Will you tell me?

I’ll lie with you and practise, if you please.

Pray take me for a night or two: or take

My husband and instruct him. But one night.

Our country folks will say, you London wives

Do not lie every night with your own husbands.

BARBARA

Your country folks should have done well to ha’ sent

Some news by you; but I trust none told you there

We use to leave our fools to lie with madmen.

MARTHA

Nay, now again you’re angry.

BARBARA

No, not I,

But rather pity your simplicity.

Come, I’ll take charge and care of you.

MARTHA

I thank you.

BARBARA

And wage my skill, against my doctor’s art,

Sooner to ease you of these dangerous fits,

Than he shall rectify your husband’s wits.

[BARBARA exits, followed by MARTHA, who speaks as she leaves.]

MARTHA

Indeed, indeed, I thank you.

1.2

[Enter] LETOY [and] BLAZE.

LETOY

Why brought’st thou not mine arms and pedigree

Home with thee, Blaze, mine honest herald’s painter?

BLAZE

100

I have not yet, my lord, but all’s in readiness,

According to the herald’s full directions.

LETOY

101

But has he gone to the root? Has he derived me

Ex origine, ab antiquo? Has he fetched me

Far enough, Blaze?

BLAZE

102

Full four descents beyond

The conquest, my good lord, and finds that one

Of your French ancestry came in with the Conqueror.

LETOY

103

Jeffrey Letoy, ’twas he from whom the English

Letoys have our descent; and here have took

Such footing, that we’ll never out while France

Is France, and England England,

And the sea passable to transport a fashion.

My ancestors and I have been beginners

Of all new fashions in the court of England

From before Primo Ricardi Secundi

Until this day.

BLAZE

104

I cannot think, my lord,

They’ll follow you in this though.

LETOY

105

Mark the end,

I am without a precedent for my humour.

But is it spread and talked of in the town?

BLAZE

106

It is, my lord, and laughed at by a many.

LETOY

107

I am more beholding to them than all the rest:

Their laughter makes me merry; others’ mirth,

And not mine own it is that feeds me, that

Battens me as poor men’s cost does usurers.

But tell me, Blaze, what say they of me, ha?

BLAZE

108

They say, my lord, you look more like a pedlar

Than like a lord, and live more like an emperor.

LETOY

109

Why there they ha’ me right. Let others shine

Abroad in cloth o’bodkin; my broadcloth

Pleases mine eye as well, my body better.

Besides, I’m sure ’tis paid for (to their envy).

I buy with ready money; and at home here

With as good meat, as much magnificence,

As costly pleasures, and as rare delights,

Can satisfy my appetite and senses,

As they with all their public shows and braveries.

They run at ring, and tilt ’gainst one another;

I and my men can play a match at football,

Wrestle a handsome fall, and pitch the bar

And crack the cudgels, and a pate sometimes.

’Twould do you good to see’t.

BLAZE

110

More than to feel’t.

LETOY

111

They hunt the deer, the hare, the fox, the otter,

Polecats or harlots, what they please, whilst I

And my mad grigs, my men, can run at base,

And breathe our selves at barley-break and dancing.

BLAZE

112

Yes, my lord, i’the country when you are there.

LETOY

113

And now I am here i’th’ city, sir, I hope

I please myself with more choice home delights,

Than most men of my rank.

BLAZE

114

I know, my lord,

Your house in substance is an amphitheatre

Of exercise and pleasure.

LETOY

115

Sir, I have

For exercises, fencing, dancing, vaulting,

And for delight, music of all best kinds;

Stage plays and masques are nightly my pastimes.

And all within myself: my own men are

My music, and my actors; I keep not

A man or boy but is of quality;

The worst can sing or play his part o’th’ viols,

And act his part too in a comedy,

For which I lay my bravery on their backs;

And where another lord undoes his followers,

I maintain mine like lords. And there’s my bravery.

Hautboys. A service, as for dinner, passes over the stage, borne by many servitors, richly apparelled, doing honour to LETOY as they pass.

[All exit]

Now tell me, Blaze, look these like pedlar’s men?

BLAZE

116

Rather an emperor’s, my lord.

LETOY

117

I tell thee,

These lads can act the emperors’ lives all over,

And Shakespeare’s chronicled historiesto boot,

And were that Caesar, or that English Earl

That loved a Play and Player so well, now living,

I would not be outvied in my delights.

BLAZE

118

My lord, ’tis well.

LETOY

119

I love the quality

Of playing, I; I love a play with all

My heart, a good one: and a player that’s

A good one too, withal. As for the Poets,

No men love them, I think, and therefore

I write all my plays myself, and make no doubt

Some of the court will follow

Me in that too. Let my fine lords

Talk o’ their horse-tricks and their jockeys, that

Can out-talk them. Let the gallants boast

Their May-games, play-games, and their mistresses;

I love a play in my plain clothes, I,

And laugh upon the actors in their brave ones.

(Ent[er] QUAILP[IPE].)

QUALPIPE

120

My lord, your dinner stays prepared.

LETOY

121

Well, well,

Be you as ready with your grace as I

Am for my meat, and all is well.

(QUAIL[PIPE exits].)

Blaze, we have rambled

From the main point this while: it seems by his letter,

My doctor's busy at thy house. I know who’s there,

Beside. Give him this ring. Tell him it wants

A finger. Farewell, good Blaze.

[LETOY exits.]

BLAZE

122

Tell him it wants a finger! My small wit

Already finds what finger it must fit.

[BLAZE exits.]

1.3

Enter DOCTOR, PEREGRINE, [with] a book in his hand, JOYLESS [and] DIANA.

DOCTOR

123

Sir, I applaud your noble disposition,

And even adore the spirit of travel in you,

And purpose to wait on it through the world,

In which I shall but tread again the steps

I heretofore have gone.

PEREGRINE

124

All the world o’er

Ha’ you been already?

DOCTOR

125

Over and under too.

PEREGRINE

126

In the Antipodes?

DOCTOR

127

Yes, through and through:

No isle nor angle in that nether world,

But I have made discovery of. Pray, sir, sit.

[Aside to JOYLESS]

And, sir, be you attentive: I will warrant

His speedy cure without the help of Gallen,

Hippocrates, Avicen, or Dioscorides.

DIANA

128

A rare man! Husband, truly I like his person

As well as his rare skill.

JOYLESS

129

Into your chamber!

I do not like your liking of men’s persons.

DOCTOR

130

Nay, lady, you may stay. Hear and admire,

If you so please, but make no interruptions.

JOYLESS

131

[Aside to DIANA]

And let no looser words, or wandering look

Bewray an intimation of the slight

Regard you bear your husband, lest I send you

Upon a further pilgrimage than he

Feigns to convey my son.

DIANA

132

Oh, jealousy!

DOCTOR

133

Do you think, sir, to th’ Antipodes such a journey?

PEREGRINE

134

I think there’s none beyond it; and that Mandeville,

Whose excellent work this is, was th’ only man

That e’er came near it.

DOCTOR

135

Mandeville went far.

PEREGRINE

136

Beyond all English legs that I can read of.

DOCTOR

137

What think you, sir, of Drake, our famous countryman?

PEREGRINE

138

Drake was a didapper to Mandeville.

Candish, and Hawkins, Frobisher, all our voyagers

Went short of Mandeville. But had he reached

To this place here—yes, here—this wilderness,

And seen the trees of the Sun and Moon, that speak,

And told King Alexander of his death, he then

Had left a passage ope for travellers,

That now is kept and guarded by wild beasts,

Dragons and serpents, elephants, white and blue,

Unicorns, and lions of many colours,

And monsters more as numberless as nameless.

DOCTOR

139

Stay there.

PEREGRINE

140

Read here else. Can you read?

Is it not true?

DOCTOR

141

No truer than I ha’ seen’t.

DIANA

142

Ha’ you been there, sir? Ha’ you seen those trees?

DOCTOR

143

And talked with ’em, and tasted of their fruit.

PEREGRINE

144

Read here again then: it is written here,

That you may live four or five hundred year.

DIANA

145

Brought you none of that fruit home with you, sir?

JOYLESS

146

You would have some of’t would you, to have hope

T’outlive your husband by’t.

DIANA

147

I’d ha’t for you,

In hope you might out-live your jealousy.

DOCTOR

148

Your patience both, I pray: I know the grief

You both do labour with, and how to cure it.

JOYLESS

149

Would I had given you half my land ’twere done.

DIANA

150

Would I had given him half my love to settle

The t’other half free from encumbrances

Upon my husband.

DOCTOR

151

Do not think it strange, sir:

I’ll make your eyes witnesses of more

Than I relate, if you’ll but travel with me.

You hear me not deny that all is true

That Mandeville delivers of his travels,

Yet I myself may be as well believed.

PEREGRINE

152

Since you speak reverently of him, say on.

DOCTOR

153

Of Europe I’ll not speak, ’tis too near home:

Who’s not familiar with the Spanish garb,

Th’ Italian shrug, French cringe,and German hug?

Nor will I trouble you with my observations

Fetched from Arabia, Paphlagonia,

Mesopotamia, Mauritania,

Syria, Thessalia, Persia, India,

All still is too near home, though I have touched

The clouds upon the Pyrenean mountains,

And been on Paphos isle, where I have kissed

The image of bright Venus. All is still

Too near home to be boasted.

DIANA

154

[Aside]

That I like

Well in him too, he will not boast of kissing

A woman too near home.

DOCTOR

155

These things in me

Are poor: they sound in a far traveller’s ear

Like the reports of those that beggingly

Have put out , on returns from Edinburgh,

Paris, or Venice, or perhaps Madrid,

Whither a milliner may with half a nose

Smell out his way; and is not near so difficult,

As for some man in debt, and unprotected,

To walk from Charing Cross to th’ old Exchange.

No, I will pitch no nearer than th’ Antipodes,

That which is farthest distant, foot to foot

Against our region.

DIANA

156

What with their heels upwards?

Bless us! How ’scape they breaking o’ their necks?

DOCTOR

157

They walk upon firm earth, as we do here,

And have the firmament over their heads,

As we have here.

DIANA

158

And yet just under us!

Where is hell then? If they whose feet are towards us

At the lower part of the world have heaven too

Beyond their heads, where’s hell?

JOYLESS

159

You may find that

Without inquiry. Cease your idle questions.

DIANA

160

Sure hell’s above ground then in jealous husbands.

PEREGRINE

161

What people, sir, (I pray proceed) what people

Are they of the Antipodes? Are they not such

As Mandeville writes of, without heads or necks,

Having their eyes placed on their shoulders, and

Their mouths amidst their breasts?

DIANA

162

Ay, so indeed;

Though heels go upwards an their feet should slip,

They have no necks to break.

DOCTOR

163

Silence, sweet Lady.

Pray give the gentleman leave to understand me.

The people through the whole world of Antipodes,

In outward feature, language, and religion,

Resemble those to whom they are supposite:

They under Spain appear like Spaniards,

Under France, French men, under England, English,

To the exterior show: but in their manners,

Their carriage and condition of life,

Extremely contrary. To come close to you:

What part o’ th’ world’s Antipodes shall I now

Decipher to you, or would you travel to?

PEREGRINE

164

The furthest off.

DOCTOR

165

That is the Antipodes of England.

The people there are contrary to us.

As thus: here (heaven be praised!) the magistrates

Govern the people; there the people rule

The magistrates.

DIANA

166

There’s precious bribing then.

JOYLESS

167

You’ll hold your peace.

DOCTOR

168

Nay, lady, ’tis by nature,

Here generally men govern the women.

JOYLESS

169

I would they could else!

DIANA

170

You will hold your peace.

DOCTOR

171

But there the women over-rule the men.

If some men fail here in their power, some women

Slip their holds there. As parents here and masters

Command, there they obey the child and servant.

DIANA

172

But pray, sir, is’t by nature or by art

That wives o’ersway their husbands there?

DOCTOR

173

By nature.

DIANA

174

Then art’s above nature, as they are under us.

DOCTOR

175

In brief, sir, all

Degrees of people, both in sex and quality,

Deport themselves in life and conversation

Quite contrary to us.

DIANA

176

Why then the women

Do get the men with child, and put the poor fools

To grievous pain, I warrant you, in bearing.

JOYLESS

177

Into your chamber! Get you in, I charge you.

DOCTOR

178

By no means, as you tender your son’s good.

No, lady, no: that were to make men women,

And women men. But there the maids do woo

The bachelors and, ’tis most probable,

The wives lie uppermost.

DIANA

179

That is a trim

Upside-down Antipodian trick indeed.

DOCTOR

180

And then at christenings and gossips’ feasts,

A woman is not seen, the men do all

The tittle-tattle duties, while the women

Hunt, hawk and take their pleasure.

PEREGRINE

181

Ha’ they good game, I pray, sir?

DOCTOR

182

Excellent;

But by the contraries to ours, for where

We hawk at pheasant, partridge, mallard, heron,

With goshawk, tercel, falcon, laneret,

Our hawks become their game, our game their hawks,

And so the like in hunting. There the deer

Pursue the hounds, and (which you may think strange)

I ha’ seen one sheep worry a dozen foxes.

By moonshine, in a morning before day,

They hunt train-scents with oxen, and plough with dogs.

PEREGRINE

183

[Laughs]

Hugh, hugh, hugh!

DIANA

184

Are not their swans all black and ravens white?

DOCTOR

185

Yes, indeed are they; and their parrots teach

Their mistresses to talk.

DIANA

186

That’s very strange.

DOCTOR

187

They keep their cats in cages

From mice that would devour them else; and birds

Teach ’em to whistle and cry "Beware the rats, Puss".

But these are frivolous nothings. I have known

Great ladies ride great horses, run at tilt,

At ring, races, and hunting matches, while

Their lords at home have painted, pawned their plate

And jewels to feast their honourable servants,

And there the merchants’ wives do deal abroad

Beyond seas, while their husbands cuckold them

At home.

DIANA

188

Then there are cuckolds too, it seems,

As well as here.

JOYLESS

189

Then you conclude here are.

DIANA

190

By hearsay, sir, I am not wise enough

To speak it on my knowledge yet.

JOYLESS

191

Not yet!

DOCTOR

192

Patience, good sir.

PEREGRINE

193

[Laughs]

Hugh, hugh, hugh!

DOCTOR

194

What, do you laugh that there is cuckold-making

In the Antipodes? I tell you, sir,

It is not so abhorred here as ’tis held

In reputation there: all your old men

Do marry girls, and old women boys,

As generation were to be maintained

Only by cuckold-making.

JOYLESS

195

Monstrous!

DOCTOR

196

Pray, your patience.

There’s no such honest men there in their world,

As are their lawyers: they give away

Their practice, and t’enable ’em to do so,

Being all handicrafts, or labouring men,

They work (poor hearts, full hard) in the vacations

To give their law for nothing in the term times.

No fees are taken, which makes their divines,

Being generally covetous, the greatest wranglers

In lawsuits of a kingdom. You have not there

A gentleman in debt, though citizens

Haunt them with cap in hand to take their wares

On credit.

DIANA

197

What fine sport would that be here now!

DOCTOR

198

All wit and mirth and good society

Is there among the hirelings, clowns and tradesmen,

And all their poets are puritans.

DIANA

199

Ha' they poets?

DOCTOR

200

And players too. But they are all the soberest

Precisest people picked out of a nation.

DIANA

201

I never saw a play.

DOCTOR

202

Lady, you shall.

JOYLESS

203

She shall not.

DOCTOR

204

She must, if you can hope for any cure.

Be governed, sir: your jealousy will grow

A worse disease than your son’s madness else.

You are content I take the course I told you of

To cure the gentleman?

JOYLESS

205

I must be, sir.

DOCTOR

206

Say, Master Peregrine, will you travel now

With me to the Antipodes, or has not

The journey wearied you in the description?

PEREGRINE

207

No, I could hear you a whole fortnight, but

Let’s lose no time. Pray talk on as we pass.

(A bowl on the table.)

DOCTOR

208

First, sir, a health to auspicate our travels,

And we’ll away.

[Doctor offers bowl of wine to PEREGRINE]

PEREGRINE

209

Gi’ me’t.

(Ent[er] BLA[ZE])

What’s he? One sent

I fear, from my dead mother to make stop

Of our intended voyage.

DOCTOR

210

No sir: drink.

BLAZE

211

[Aside to DOCTOR]

My lord, sir, understands the course you’re in,

By your letters, he tells me; and bad me gi’ you

This ring, which wants a finger here, he says.

PEREGRINE

212

We’ll not be stayed?

DOCTOR

213

No, sir, he brings me word

The mariner calls away; the wind and tide

Are fair, and they are ready to weigh anchor,

Hoist sails, and only stay for us. Pray drink, sir.

PEREGRINE

214

A health then to the willing winds and seas

And all that steer towards th’ Antipodes.

[He drinks the wine]

JOYLESS

215

He has not drunk so deep a draught this twelvemonth.

DOCTOR

216

’Tis a deep draught indeed; and now ’tis down,

And carries him down to the Antipodes?

I mean but in a dream.

JOYLESS

217

Alas, I fear!

See, he begins to sink.

DOCTOR

218

Trust to my skill.

Pray take an arm, and see him in his cabin.

Good lady, save my ring that’s fallen there.

DIANA

219

In sooth, a marvellous neat and costly one!

BLAZE

220

[Aside]

So, so, the ring has found a finger.

DOCTOR

221

Come sir, aboard, aboard, aboard, aboard.

[DOCTOR and JOYLESS exit with PEREGRINE, while DIANA follows at a distance.]

BLAZE

222

To bed, to bed, to bed! I know your voyage,

And my dear lord’s dear plot I understand,

Whose ring hath past here by your sleight of hand.

[BLAZE exits.]

ACT TWO

2.1

[Enter] LETOY [and] DOCTOR.

[LETOY]

223

Tonight, sayest thou, my Hughball?

DOCTOR

224

By all means;

And if your play takes to my expectation,

As I not doubt my potion works to yours,

Your fancy and my cure shall be cried up

Miraculous. Oh, you’re the lord of fancy.

LETOY

225

I’m not ambitious of that title, sir.

No, the Letoys are of antiquity,

Ages before the fancies were begot,

And shall beget still new to the world’s ends.

But are you confident o’your potion, doctor?

Sleeps the young man?

DOCTOR

226

Yes, and has slept these twelve hours

After a thousand mile an hour outright

By sea and land; and shall awake anon

In the Antipodes.

LETOY

227

Well, sir, my actors

Are all in readiness; and, I think, all perfect

But one that never will be perfect in a thing

He studies; yet he makes such shifts extempore,

(Knowing the purpose what he is to speak to)

That he moves mirth in me ’bove all the rest.

For I am none of those poetic furies,

That threats the actor’s life in a whole play,

That adds a syllable or takes away.

If he can fribble through, and move delight

In others, I am pleased.

DOCTOR

228

It is that mimic fellow, which your lordship

But lately entertained.

LETOY

229

The same.

DOCTOR

230

He will be wondrous apt in my affair:

For I must take occasion to interchange

Discourse with him sometimes amidst their scenes,

T’inform my patient, my mad young traveller,

In diverse matters.

LETOY

231

Do. Put him to’t: I use’t myself sometimes.

DOCTOR

232

I know it is your way.

LETOY

233

Well, to the business.

Hast wrought the jealous gentleman, old Joyless,

To suffer his wife to see our comedy?

DOCTOR

234

She brings your ring, my lord, upon her finger,

And he brings her in’s hand. I have instructed her

To spur his jealousy off o’ the legs.

LETOY

235

And I will help her in’t.

DOCTOR

236

The young distracted

Gentle waiting woman too that’s sick of her virginity,

Yet knows not what it is; and Blaze and’s wife

Shall all be your guests tonight, and not alone

Spectators, but (as we will carry it) actors

To fill your comic scenes with double mirth.

LETOY

237

Go fetch ’em then, while I prepare my actors.

(DOC[TOR] ex[its].)

Within there ho!

238

[within]

This is my beard and hair.

239

[within]

My lord appointed it for my part.

240

[within]

No:

This is for you; and this is yours, this grey one.

241

[within]

Where be the foils and targets for the women?

242

[within]

Here, can’t you see?

LETOY

243

What a rude coil is there!

But yet it pleases me.

244

[within]

You must not wear

That cloak and hat.

245

[within]

Who told you so? I must

In my first scene, and you must wear that robe.

LETOY

246

What a noise make those knaves? Come in one of you.

(Enter QUAILPIPE, [three] actors and BYPLAY.)

Are you the first that answers to that name?

QUALPIPE

247

My lord.

LETOY

248

Why are not you ready yet?

QUALPIPE

249

I am not to put on my shape before

I have spoke the prologue. And for that my lord

I yet want something.

LETOY

250

What, I pray, with your grave formality?

QUALPIPE

251

I want my beaver shoes and leather cap

To speak the prologue in; which were appointed

By your lordship's own direction.

LETOY

252

Well, sir, well:

[He fetches them.]

There they be for you; I must look to all.

QUALPIPE

253

Certes, my lord, it is a most apt conceit:

The comedy being the world turned upside-down

That the presenter wear the capital beaver

Upon his feet, and on his head shoe leather.

LETOY

254

Trouble not you your head with my conceit,

But mind your part. Let me not see you act now

In your scholastic way you brought to town wi’ye,

With seesaw sack-a-down, like a sawyer;

Nor in a comic scene play Hercules Furens,

Tearing your throat to split the audients’ ears.

And you, sir, you had got a trick of late,

Of holding out your bum in a set speech,

Your fingers fibulating on your breast,

As if your buttons or your band-strings were

Helps to your memory. Let me see you in’t

No more I charge you. No, nor you, sir, in

That over-action of the legs I told you of:

Your singles and your doubles, look you, thus――

Like one o'th' dancing masters o’the Bear-garden;

And when you have spoke, at end of every speech,

Not minding the reply, you turn you round

As tumblers do; when betwixt every feat

They gather wind by firking up their breeches.

I’ll none of these absurdities in my house,

But words and action married so together,

That shall strike harmony in the ears and eyes

Of the severest, if judicious, critics.

QUALPIPE

255

My lord, we are corrected.

LETOY

256

Go, be ready.

[QUAILPIPE and the three actors exit, leaving BYPLAY.]

But you, sir, are incorrigible and

Take licence to yourself to add unto

Your parts your own free fancy; and sometimes

To alter or diminish what the writer

With care and skill composed: and when you are

To speak to your co-actors in the scene,

You hold interlocutions with the audients.

BYPLAY

257

That is a way, my lord, has been allowed

On elder stages to move mirth and laughter.

LETOY

258

Yes in the days of Tarlton and Kemp

Before the stage was purged from barbarism

And brought to the perfection it now shines with.

Then fools and jesters spent their wits because

The poets were wise enough to save their own

For profitabler uses. Let that pass.

Tonight I’ll give thee leave to try thy wit

In answering my doctor and his patient

He brings along with him to our Antipodes.

BYPLAY

259

I heard of him, my lord. Blaze gave me light

Of the mad patient, and that he never saw

A play in’s life. It will be possible

For him to think he is in the Antipodes

Indeed, when he is on the stage among us,

When’t has been thought by some that have their wits

That all the players i’ th’ town were sunk past rising.

LETOY

260

Leave that, sir, to th’ event. See all be ready:

Your music, properties, and――

BYPLAY

261

All, my lord.

Only we want a person for a mute.

LETOY

262

Blaze, when he comes, shall serve. Go in.

(BYP[LAY] ex[its].)

My guests, I hear, are coming.

Enter BLAZE, JOYLESS, DIANA, MARTHA, BARB[ARA].

BLAZE

263

My lord, I am become your honour’s usher

To these your guests. The worthy Master Joyless

With his fair wife and daughter-in-law.

LETOY

264

They’re welcome,

And you in the first place, sweet Mistress Joyless.

You wear my ring, I see; you grace me in it.

JOYLESS

265

[Aside]

His ring! What ring? How came she by’t?

BLAZE

266

[Aside]

’Twill work.

LETOY

267

I sent it as a pledge of my affection to you,

For I before have seen you and do languish

Until I shall enjoy your love.

JOYLESS

268

[Aside]

He courts her.

LETOY

269

Next, lady―you―I have a toy for you too.

MARTHA

270

My child shall thank you for it, when I have one.

I take no joy in toys since I was married.

LETOY

271

Prettily answered! I make you no stranger,

Kind Mistress Blaze.

BARBARA

272

[Aside to LETOY]

Time was your honour used

Me strangely too, as you’ll do these, I doubt not.

LETOY

273

Honest Blaze,

Prithee go in; there is an actor wanting.

BLAZE

274

Is there a part for me? How shall I study't?

LETOY

275

Thou shalt say nothing.

BLAZE

276

Then if I do not act

Nothing as well as the best of ’em, let me be hissed.

[BLAZE] exit[s] .

JOYLESS

277

[Aside to DIANA]

I say restore the ring, and back with me.

DIANA

278

[Aside to JOYLESS]

To whom shall I restore it?

JOYLESS

279

[Aside to DIANA]

To the lord that sent it.

DIANA

280

[Aside to JOYLESS]

Is he a lord? I always thought and heard

I’th’ country, lords were gallant creatures. He

Looks like a thing not worth it. ’Tis not his.

The doctor gave it me, and I will keep it.

LETOY

281

I use small verbal courtesy Master Joyless,

You see, but what I can in deed, I’ll do.

You know the purpose of your coming, and

I can but give you welcome. If your son

Shall receive ease in’t, be the comfort yours,

The credit of’t my doctor’s. You are sad.

JOYLESS

282

My lord, I would entreat we may return;

I fear my wife’s not well.

LETOY

283

Return! Pray slight not so my courtesy.

DIANA

284

Besides, sir, I am well; and have a mind

(A thankful one) to taste my lord’s free bounty.

I never saw a play, and would be loath

To lose my longing now.

JOYLESS

285

[Aside]

The air of London

Hath tainted her obedience already;

And should the play but touch the vices of it,

She’d learn and practise ’em.

[Aloud]

Let me beseech

Your lordship’s reacceptance of the un-

Merited favour that she wears here, and

Your leave for our departure.

LETOY

286

I will not

Be so dishonoured; nor become so ill

A master of my house to let a lady

Leave it against her will, and from her longing.

I will be plain wi’ye therefore: if your haste

Must needs post you away, you may depart;

She shall not, not till the morning, for mine honour.

JOYLESS

287

Indeed ’tis a high point of honour in

A lord to keep a private gentleman’s wife

From him.

DIANA

288

[Aside]

I love this plain lord better than

All the brave gallant ones that e’er I dreamt on.

LETOY

289

’Tis time we take our seats. So: if you’ll stay,

Come sit with us; if not, you know your way.

JOYLESS

290

[Aside]

Here are we fallen through the doctor’s fingers

Into the lord’s hands. Fate deliver us.

[All exit.]

2.2

Enter in sea-gowns and caps, DOCTOR and PEREGRINE [who is] brought in a chair by two sailors; cloaks and hats brought in.

DOCTOR

291

Now the last minute of his sleeping fit

Determines. Raise him on his feet. So, so.

Rest him upon mine arm. Remove that chair.

Welcome ashore, sir, in th’ Antipodes.

PEREGRINE

292

Are we arrived so far?

DOCTOR

293

And on firm land.

Sailors, you may return now to your ship.Sail[ors] ex[it].

PEREGRINE

294

What worlds of lands and seas have I passed over,

Neglecting to set down my observations!

A thousand thousand things remarkable

Have slipped my memory, as if all had been

Mere shadowy phantasms or fantastic dreams.

DOCTOR

295

We’ll write as we return, sir; and ’tis true,

You slept most part o’ th’ journey hitherward,

The air was so somniferous; and ’twas well

You ’scaped the calenture by’t.

PEREGRINE

296

But how long do

You think I slept?

DOCTOR

297

Eight months and some odd days,

Which was but as so many hours and minutes

Of one’s own natural country sleep.

PEREGRINE

298

Eight months――――

DOCTOR

299

’Twas nothing for so young a brain.

How think you one of the seven Christian champions,

David by name, slept seven years in a leek-bed.

PEREGRINE

300

I think I have read it in their famous history.

DOCTOR

301

But what chief thing of note now in our travels

Can you call presently to mind? Speak like a traveller.

PEREGRINE

302

I do remember, as we past the verge

O’ th’ upper world, coming down, down-hill,

The setting sun then bidding them good night,

Came gliding easily down by us and struck

New day before us, lighting us our way;

But with such heat that, till he was got far

Before us, we even melted.

DOCTOR

303

[Aside]

Well-wrought potion!

[Aloud]

Very well observed, sir.

But now we are come into a temperate clime,

Of equal composition of elements

With that of London, and as well agreeable

Unto our nature, as you have found that air.

PEREGRINE

304

I never was at London.

DOCTOR

305

Cry you mercy.

This, sir, is Anti-London. That’s th’ Antipodes

To the grand city of our nation,

Just the same people, language, and religion,

But contrary in manners, as I ha’ told you.

PEREGRINE

306

I do remember that relation,

As if you had but given it me this morning.

DOCTOR

307

Now cast your sea weeds off, and don fresh garments.

Hark, sir, their music.

Shift

Hautboys. Enter LETOY, JOYLESS, DIANA, MARTHA, [and] BARBARA in masks; they sit at the other end of the stage.

LETOY

308

Here we may sit, and he not see us.

DOCTOR

309

Now see one of the natives of this country.

Note his attire, his language and behaviour.

Enter QUAILPIPE [as] PROLOGUE.

QUALPIPE

310

Our far-fetched title over lands and seas,

Offers unto your view th’ Antipodes.

But what Antipodes now shall you see?

Even those that foot to foot ’gainst London be,

Because no traveller that knows that state

Shall say we personate or imitate

Them in our actions; for nothing can

Almost be spoke, but some or other man

Takes it unto himself and says the stuff,

If it be vicious or absurd enough,

Was woven upon his back. Far, far be all

That bring such prejudice mixed with their gall.

This play shall no satiric timist be

To tax or touch at either him or thee

That art notorious. ’Tis so far below

Things in our orb that do among us flow,

That no degree from kaiser to the clown,

Shall say this vice or folly was mine own.

LETOY

311

This had been well now, if you had not dreamt

Too long upon your syllables.

Prol[ogue] ex[its].

DIANA

312

The prologue call you this, my lord?

BARBARA

313

’Tis my lord’s reader and as good a lad,

Out of his function, as I would desire

To mix withal in civil conversation.

LETOY

314

Yes, lady, this was prologue to the play,

As this is to our sweet ensuing pleasures.

Kiss[es her].

JOYLESS

315

[Aside]

Kissing indeed is prologue to a play

Composed by th’ devil and acted by the Children

Of his black Revels. May hell take ye for’t!

MARTHA

316

Indeed I am weary and would fain go home.

BARBARA

317

Indeed, but you must stay and see the play.

MARTHA

318

The play? What play? It is no children's play,

Nor no child-getting play, pray is it?

BARBARA

319

You’ll see anon. Oh, now the actors enter.

Flourish.

Enter two SERGEANTS, with swords drawn, running before a GENTLEMAN.

GENTLEMAN

320

Why do you not your office, courteous friends?

Let me entreat you stay and take me with you.

Lay but your hands on me. I shall not rest

Until I be arrested. A sore shoulder-ache

Pains and torments me till your vertuous hands

Do clap or stroke it.

1 SERGEANT

321

You shall pardon us.

2 SERGEANT

322

And, I beseech you, pardon our intent,

Which was indeed to have arrested you.

But sooner shall the charter of the city

Be forfeited than varlets like ourselves

Shall wrong a gentleman’s peace. So, fare you well, sir.

[They] ex[it].

GENTLEMAN

323

Oh, you’re unkind.

PEREGRINE

324

Pray, what are those?

DOCTOR

325

Two catchpoles

Run from a gentleman, it seems, that would

Have been arrested.

Enter OLD LADY and BYPLAY, like a servingman.

OLD LADY

326

Yonder’s your master.

Go, take him you in hand, while I fetch breath.

BYPLAY

327

[To GENTLEMAN]

Oh, are you here? My lady and myself

Have sought you sweetly.

LETOY

328

You and your lady, you

Should ha’ said, puppy.

BYPLAY

329

For we heard you were

To be arrested. Pray sir, who has bailed you?

I wonder who of all your bold acquaintance

That knows my lady durst bail off her husband.

GENTLEMAN

330

Indeed, I was not touched.

BYPLAY

331

Have you not made

An end by composition, and disbursed

Some of my lady’s money for a peace

That shall beget an open war upon you?

Confess it, if you have, for ’twill come out.

She’ll ha’ you up, you know. I speak it for your good.

GENTLEMAN

332

I know’t, and I’ll entreat my lady wife

To mend thy wages t’other forty shillings

A year for thy true care of me.

OLD LADY

333

’Tis well, sir.

But now, if thou hast impudence so much

As face to face to speak unto a lady

That is thy wife and supreme head, tell me

At whose suit was it? Or upon what action?

Debts, I presume, you have none, for who dares trust

A lady’s husband who is but a squire

And under covert-barne? It is some trespass――

Answer me not till I find out the truth.

GENTLEMAN

334

The truth is――――

OLD LADY

335

Peace. How dar’st thou speak the truth

Before thy wife? I’ll find it out myself.

DIANA

336

In truth, she handles him handsomely.

JOYLESS

337

Do you like it?

DIANA

338

Yes, and such wives are worthy to be liked

For giving good example.

LETOY

339

[Aside to DIANA]

Good! Hold up

That humour by all means.

OLD LADY

340

I think I ha’ found it.

There was a certain mercer sent you silks

And cloth of gold to get his wife with child;

You slighted her and answered not his hopes,

And now he lays to arrest you. Is’t not so?

GENTLEMAN

341

Indeed, my lady wife, ’tis so.

OLD LADY

342

For shame!

Be not ingrateful to that honest man,

To take his wares and scorn to lie with his wife.

Do’t I command you. What did I marry you for?

The portion that you brought me was not so

Abundant, though it were five thousand pounds

(Considering too the jointure that I made you)

That you should disobey me.

DIANA

343

It seems the husbands

In the Antipodes bring portions, and

The wives make jointures.

JOYLESS

344

Very well observed.

DIANA

345

And wives, when they are old and past child-bearing,

Allow their youthful husbands other women.

LETOY

346

Right. And old men give their young wives like licence.

DIANA

347

That I like well. Why should not our old men

Love their young wives as well?

JOYLESS

348

Would you have it so?

LETOY

349

Peace, Master Joyless, you are too loud. Good still.

BYPLAY

350

Do as my Lady bids, you got her waiting woman

With child at half these words.

GENTLEMAN

351

Oh, but another’s

Wife is another thing. Far be it from

A gentleman’s thought to do so, having a wife

And handmaid of his own, that he loves better.

BYPLAY

352

There said you well. But take heed, I advise you,

How you love your own wench or your own wife

Better than other men’s.

DIANA

353

Good Antipodean counsel.

OLD LADY

354

Go to that waiting woman; if she prove with child,

I’ll take it as mine own.

GENTLEMAN

355

Her husband would

Do so. But from my house I may not stray.

MARTHA

356

If it be me your wife commends you to,

You shall not need to stray from your own house.

[She stands]

I’ll go home with you.

BARBARA

357

Precious! What do you mean?

Pray keep your seat: you’ll put the players out.

JOYLESS

358

Here’s goodly stuff! She’s in the Antipodes too.

PEREGRINE

359

[Gesturing towards LETOY and his guests]

And what are those?

DOCTOR

360

All Antipodeans.

Attend, good sir.

OLD LADY

361

You know your charge, obey it.

Enter WAITING WOMAN, great-bellied.

WAITING WOMAN

362

What is his charge? Or whom must he obey,

Good madam, with your wild authority?

You are his wife, ’tis true, and therein may

According to our law, rule and control him.

But you must know withal, I am your servant

And bound by the same law to govern you

And be a stay to you in declining age,

To curb and qualify your head-strong will,

Which otherwise would ruin you. Moreover,

Though you're his wife, I am a breeding mother

Of a dear child of his; and therein claim

More honour from him than you ought to challenge.

OLD LADY

363

In sooth, she speaks but reason.

GENTLEMAN

364

Pray let’s home then.

WAITING WOMAN

365

You have something there to look to, one would think,

If you had any care. How well you saw

Your father at school today, and knowing how apt

He is to play the truant!

GENTLEMAN

366

But is he not

Yet gone to school?

WAITING WOMAN

367

Stand by, and you shall see.

Enter three OLD MEN with satchels, etc.

ALL THREE

368

Domine, domine duster.

Three knaves in a cluster, etc.

GENTLEMAN

369

Oh, this is gallant pastime! Nay, come on,

Is this your school? Was that your lesson, ha?

1 OLD MAN

370

Pray now, good son, indeed, indeed.

GENTLEMAN

371

Indeed,

You shall to school.

[To Byplay]

Away with him; and take

Their wagships with him, the whole cluster of ’em.

2 OLD MAN

372

You shan’t send us now, so you shan’t.

3 OLD MAN

373

We be none of your father, so we bain’t.

GENTLEMAN

374

Away with ’em, I say; and tell their school-mistress

What truants they are, and bid her pay ’em soundly.

ALL THREE

375

Oh! Oh! Oh!

BYPLAY

376

Come, come, ye gallows-clappers.

DIANA

377

Alas, will nobody beg pardon for

The poor old boys?

DOCTOR

378

[He gestures to Byplay]

Sir, gentle sir, a word with you.

BYPLAY

379

To strangers, sir, I can be gentle.

LETOY

380

Good.

Now mark that fellow: he speaks extempore.

DIANA

381

Extempore call you him? He’s a dogged fellow

To the three poor old things there. Fie upon him!

PEREGRINE

382

Do men of such fair years here go to school?

BYPLAY

383

They would die dunces else.

PEREGRINE

384

Have you no young men scholars, sir, I pray,

When we have beardless doctors?

DOCTOR

385

He has wiped

My lips. You question very wisely, sir.

BYPLAY

386

So, sir, have we; and many reverend teachers,

Grave counsellors at law, perfect statesmen,

That never knew use of razor, which may live

For want of wit to lose their offices.

These were great scholars in their youth. But when

Age grows upon men here, their learning wastes

And so decays that if they live until

Threescore, their sons send them to school again.

They’d die as speechless else as new-born children.

PEREGRINE

387

’Tis a wise nation; and the piety

Of the young men most rare and commendable.

Yet give me, as a stranger, leave to beg

Their liberty this day; and what they lose by’t,

My father, when he goes to school, shall answer.

JOYLESS

388

I am abused on that side too.

BYPLAY

389

’Tis granted.

Hold up your heads and thank the gentleman

Like scholars; with your heels now.

ALL THREE

390

Gratias, gratias, gratias.

The Old Men exit

DIANA

391

Well done, son Peregrine. He’s in’s wits, I hope.

JOYLESS

392

If you lose yours the while, where’s my advantage?

DIANA

393

And trust me, ’twas well done too of Extempore

To let the poor old children loose. And now

I look well on him, he’s a proper man.

JOYLESS

394

[Aside]

She’ll fall in love with the actor, and undo me.

DIANA

395

Does not his lady love him, sweet my lord?

LETOY

396

Love? Yes, and lie with him, as her husband does

With’s maid. It is their law in the Antipodes.

DIANA

397

But we have no such laws with us.

JOYLESS

398

Do you

Approve of such a law?

DIANA

399

No; not so much

In this case, where the man and wife do lie

With their inferior servants; but in the other,

Where the old citizen would arrest the gallant

That took his wares and would not lie with’s wife,

There it seemes reasonable, very reasonable.

JOYLESS

400

Does it?

DIANA

401

Mak’t your own case: you are an old man;

I love a gentleman; you give him rich presents

To get me a child, because you cannot. Must not

We look to have our bargain?

JOYLESS

402

Give me leave

Now to be gone, my lord, though I leave her

Behind me. She is mad and not my wife,

And I may leave her.

LETOY

403

Come; you are moved, I see.

I’ll settle all. But first, prevail with you

To taste my wine and sweetmeats. The comedians

Shall pause the while. This you must not deny me.

[LETOY, DIANA, MARTHA and BARBARA] ex[it].

JOYLESS

404

I must not live here always, that’s my comfort.

[JOYLESS] exit[s]

PEREGRINE

405

I thank you, sir, for the poor men’s release.

It was the first request that I have made

Since I came in these confines.

BYPLAY

406

’Tis our custom

To deny strangers nothing; yea, to offer

Of any thing we have that may be useful

In courtesy to strangers. Will you therefore

Be pleased to enter, sir, this habitation

And take such viands, beverage and repose

As may refresh you after tedious travels?

DOCTOR

407

Thou tak’st him right: for I am sure he’s hungry.

PEREGRINE

408

All I have seen since my arrival are

Wonders. But your humanity excels.

BYPLAY

409

Virtue in the Antipodes only dwells.

[PEREGRINE, DOCTOR and BYPLAY exit.]

ACT THREE

3.1

[Enter] LETOY, JOYLESS, DIANA, MARTHA, [and] BARBARA.

LETOY

410

Yet, Master Joyless, are you pleased? You see,

Here's nothing but fair play, and all above-board.

JOYLESS

411

But it is late, and these long intermissions

By banqueting and courtship ’twixt the acts

Will keep back the catastrophe of your play

Until the morning light.

LETOY

412

All shall be short.

JOYLESS

413

And then in midst of scenes

You interrupt your actors; and tie them

To lengthen time in silence, while you hold

Discourse by the by.

LETOY

414

Pox on thy jealousy.

Because I give thy wife a look or word

Sometimes! What if I kiss (thus)?

[He kisses her.]

I'll not eat her!

JOYLESS

415

So, so, his banquet works with him.

LETOY

416

And for my actors, they shall speak, or not speak

As much, or more, or less, and when I please.

It is my way of pleasure, and I'll use it.

(Flourish.)

So sit: they enter.

Enter LAWYER and POET.

LAWYER

417

Your case is clear, I understand it fully

And need no more instructions. This shall serve

To firk your adversary from court to court.

If he stand out upon rebellious legs,

But till Octavus Michaelis next.

I'll bring him on submissive knees.

DIANA

418

What's he?

LETOY

419

A lawyer, and his client there, a poet.

DIANA

420

Goes law so torn, and poetry so brave?

JOYLESS

421

Will you but give the actors leave to speak,

They may have done the sooner?

LAWYER

422

Let me see:

This is your bill of parcels?

POET

423

Yes, of all

My several wares, according to the rates

Delivered unto my debtor.

DIANA

424

Wares, does he say?

LETOY

425

Yes, poetry is good ware

In the Antipodes, though there be some ill payers,

As well as here; but law there rights the poets.

LAWYER

426

(Reads)

“Delivered to and for the use of the right worshipful Master Alderman Humblebee, as followeth: ―Imprimis―― ”

Umh, I cannot read your hand: your character

Is bad, and your orthography much worse.

Read it yourself, pray.

DIANA

427

Do aldermen

Love poetry in Antipodean London?

LETOY

428

Better than ours do custards; but the worst

Paymasters living there, worse than our gallants,

Partly for want of money, partly wit.

DIANA

429

Can aldermen want wit and money too?

That's wonderful.

POET

430

[Reads]

“Imprimis, sir, here is

For three religious madrigals to be sung

By th’ holy vestals in Bridewell, for the

Conversion of our city wives and daughters:

Ten groats a-piece—” It was his own agreement.

LAWYER

431

’Tis very reasonable.

POET

432

[Reads]

“Item: twelve hymns

For the twelve sessions during his shrievalty,

Sung by the choir of Newgate, in the praise

Of city clemency:” (for in that year

No guiltless person suffered by their judgement)

“Ten groats a piece also.”

LAWYER

433

So, now it rises.

DIANA

434

Why speaks your poet so demurely?

LETOY

435

Oh―――

’Tis a precise tone he has got among

The sober sisterhood.

DIANA

436

Oh, I remember:

The doctor said poets were all puritans

In the Antipodes. But where's the doctor?

And where’s your son, my Joyless?

LETOY

437

Do not mind him.

POET

438

[Reads]

“Item: A distich, graven in his thumb-ring,

Of all the wise speeches and sayings of all

His alder predecessors and his brethren

In two kings’ reigns.”

LAWYER

439

There was a curious piece.

POET

440

Two pieces he promised to me for it.

[Reads]

“Item: insciptions in his hall and parlour,

His gallery and garden, round the walls,

Of his own public acts, between the time

He was a common–councilman and shrieve:

One thousand lines put into wholesome verse.”

LAWYER

441

Here's a sum towards indeed! A thousand verses?

POET

442

They come to, at the known rate of the City

(That is to say at forty pence the score),

Eight pounds, six shillings, eight pence.

LAWYER

443

Well sir, on.

POET

444

[Reads]

“Item: an elegy for Mistress Alderwoman

Upon the death of one of her coach-mares

She prized above her daughter, being crooked―――

DIANA

445

The more beast she.

MARTHA

446

Ha, ha, ha.

BARBARA

447

Enough, enough, sweetheart.

MARTHA

448

’Tis true, for I should weep for that poor daughter:

’Tis like she’ll have no children. Pray now, look:

Am not I crooked too?

BARBARA

449

No, no, sit down.

POET

450

[Reads]

“Item: a love epistle for the aldermanikin, his son,

And a book of the godly life and death

Of Mistress Katherine Stubbs” (which I have turned

Into sweet metre, for the virtuous youth,

To woo an ancient lady widow with).

LAWYER

451

Here’s a large sum in all, for which I’ll try

His strength in law till he peccavicry,

When I shall sing, for all his present bigness,

Iamque opus exegi quod nec Iovis ira, nec ignis.

DIANA

452

The lawyer speaks the poet’s part.

LETOY

453

He thinks

The more; the poets in th’Antipodes

Are slow of tongue, but nimble with the pen.

POET

454

The counsel and the comfort you have given me

Requires a double fee.

Offers money.

LAWYER

455

Will you abuse me therefore?

I take no fees, double nor single, I.

Retain your money, you retain not me else.

Away, away. You’ll hinder other clients.

POET

456

Pray, give me leave to send then to your wife.

LAWYER

457

Not so much as a posy for her thimble,

For fear I spoil your cause.

POET

458

You’ve warned me, sir.

Exit[s].

DIANA

459

What a poor, honest lawyer’s this?

LETOY

460

They are all so in th’Antipodes.

Enter a spruce, young CAPTAIN.

LAWYER

461

Y’are welcome, captain.

In your two causes I have done my best.

CAPTAIN

462

And what’s the issue, pray, sir?

LAWYER

463

Truly sir,

Our best course is not to proceed to trial.

CAPTAIN

464

Your reason? I shall then recover nothing.

LAWYER

465

Yes, more by composition, than the court

Can lawfully adjudge you, as I have laboured.

And, sir, my course is, where I can compound

A difference, I’ll not toss nor bandy it

Into the hazard of a judgement.

DIANA

466

Still

An honest Lawyer, and though poor, no marvel.

LETOY

467

A kiss for thy conceit.

JOYLESS

468

A sweet occasion!

CAPTAIN

469

How! Have you done, sir?

LAWYER

470

First, you understand

Your several actions, and your adversaries:

The first a battery against a coachman,

That beat you sorely.

DIANA

471

What hard-hearted fellow

Could beat so spruce a gentleman, and a captain?

CAPTAIN

472

By this fair hilt, he did, sir, and so bruised

My arms, so crushed my ribs and stitched my sides,

That I have had no heart to draw my sword since.

And shall I put it up, and not his purse

Be made to pay for’t?

LAWYER

473

It is up already, sir,

If you can be advised. Observe, I pray,

Your other actions ’gainst your feathermaker,

And that of trespass for th’incessant trouble

He puts you to by importunate requests,

To pay him no money, but take longer day.

CAPTAIN

474

Against all human reason, for although

I have bought feathers off him these four years,

And never paid him a penny, yet he duns me

So desperately to keep my money still,

As if I owed him nothing. He haunts and breaks my sleeps.

I swear sir, by the motion of this I wear now,

(Shakes [head and hat with feather decoration])

I have had twenty better feathers of him,

And as ill paid for. Yet still he duns me

To forbear my payment and take longer day

More than at first. I ha’ not said my prayers

In mine own lodging, sir, this twelvemonth’s day

For sight or thought of him. And how can you

Compound this action, or the other of

That ruffian coachman that durst lift a hand

’Gainst a commander?

LAWYER

475

Very easily, thus:

The coachman's poor and scarce his twelvemonths’ wages,

Though’t be five marks a year, will satisfy.

CAPTAIN

476

Pray name no sum in marks, I have had too many

Of’s marks already.

LAWYER

477

So you owe the other

A debt of twenty pound; the coachman now

Shall for your satisfaction beat you out

Of debt.

CAPTAIN

478

Beat me again?

LAWYER

479

No sir: he shall beat

For you your featherman, till he take his money.

CAPTAIN

480

So I’ll be satisfied, and help him to

More customers of my rank.

LAWYER

481

Leave it to me then:

It shall be by posterity repeaten

That soldiers ought not to be dunned or beaten.

Away and keep your money.

CAPTAIN

482

Thank you, sir.

Exit[s].

DIANA

483

An honest lawyer still! How he considers

The weak estate of a young gentleman

At arms―

(Enter BUFF WOMAN.)

But who comes here? A woman?

LETOY

484

Yes; that has taken up the newest fashion

Of the town militasters.

DIANA

485

Is it buff,

Or calfskin, trow? She looks as she could beat

Out a whole tavern garrison before her

Of— mill-tasters, call you ’em? If her husband

Be an old jealous man now, and can please her

Lawyer reads on [his] papers.

No better than most ancient husbands can,

I warrant she makes herself good upon him.

JOYLESS

486

’Tis very good; the play begins to please me.

BUFF WOMAN

487

I wait to speak w’ye, sir, but must I stand

Your constr’ing and piercing of your scribblings.

LAWYER

488

Cry mercy, lady.

DIANA

489

“Lady” does he call her?

LAWYER

490

Thus far I have proceeded in your cause

I’th’ marshal’s court.

BUFF WOMAN

491

But shall I have the combat?

LAWYER

492

Pray observe

The passages of my proceedings, and

The pro’s and contra’s in the windings, workings

And carriage of the cause.

BUFF WOMAN

493

Fah on your passages,

Your windy workings, and your fizzlings at

The Bar. Come ye to th’ point: is it decreed,

A combat?

LAWYER

494

Well, it is; and here’s your order.

BUFF WOMAN

495

Now thou hast spoken like a lawyer,

And here’s thy fee.

LAWYER

496

By no means, gentle lady.

BUFF WOMAN

497

Take it, or I will beat thy carcass thinner

Than thou hast worn thy gown here.

LAWYER

498

Pardon me.

BUFF WOMAN

499

Must I then take you in hand?

LAWYER

500

Hold, hold. I take it.

DIANA

501

Alas poor man, he will take money yet

Rather than blows; and so far he agrees

With our rich lawyers that sometimes give blows,

And shrewd ones, for their money.

BUFF WOMAN

502

Now victory

Afford me, Fate, or bravely let me die.

Exit[s].

LETOY

503

Very well acted, that.

DIANA

504

Goes she to fight now?

LETOY

505

You shall see that anon――――

Enter a BEGGAR and a GALLANT

DIANA

506

What's here, what's here?

A courtier or some gallant practising

The beggar’s trade, who teaches him, I think.

LETOY

507

You’re something near the subject.

BEGGAR

508

Sir, excuse me. I have

From time to time supplied you without hope

Or purpose to receive least retribution

From you; no, not so much as thanks, or bare

Acknowledgement of the free benefits

I have conferred upon you.

GALLANT

509

Yet good uncle—

BEGGAR

510

Yet do you now, when that my present store

Responds not my occasions, seek to oppress me

With vain petitionary breath, for what I may not

Give without fear of dangerous detriment?

DIANA

511

In what a phrase the ragged orator

Displays himself!

LETOY

512

The Beggars are the most

Absolute courtiers in th’Antipodes.

GALLANT

513

If not a piece, yet spare me half a piece

For goodness sake, good sir. Did you but know

My instant want, and to what virtuous use

I would distribute it, I know you would not

Hold back your charity.

DIANA

514

And how feelingly

He begs! Then, as the beggars are the best

Courtiers, it seems the courtiers are best beggars

In the Antipodes. How contrary in all

Are they to us!

BEGGAR

515

Pray, to what virtuous uses

Would you put money to now, if you had it?

GALLANT

516

I would bestow a crown in ballads,

Love-pamphlets, and such poetical rarities,

To send down to my lady grandmother.

She’s very old, you know, and given much

To contemplation; I know she’ll send me for ’em,

In puddings, bacon, souse and pot-butter

Enough to keep my chamber all this winter.

So shall I save my father’s whole allowance

To lay upon my back, and not be forced

To shift out from my study for my victuals.

DIANA

517

Belike he is some student.

BEGGAR

518

There’s a crown.

GALLANT

519

I would bestow another crown in

Hobby-horses and rattles for my grandfather,

Whose legs and hearing fail him very much;

Then, to preserve his sight, a Jack-a-Lent,

In a green sarcenet suit, he’ll make my father

To send me one of scarlet, or he’ll cry

His eyes out for’t.

DIANA

520

Oh, politic young student!

BEGGAR

521

I have but just a fee left for my lawyer;

If he exact not that, I’ll give it thee.

DIANA

522

He’ll take no fee (that’s sure enough, young man)

Of beggars, I know that.

LETOY

523

You are deceived.

DIANA

524

I’ll speak to him myself else to remit it.

JOYLESS

525

You will not, sure. Will you turn actor too?

Pray do, be put in for a share amongst ’em!

DIANA

526

How must I be put in?

JOYLESS

527

The players will quickly

Show you, if you perform your part; perhaps

They may want one to act the whore amongst ’em.

LETOY

528

Fie, Master Joyless, you’re too foul.

JOYLESS

529

My lord,

She is too fair, it seems in your opinion,

For me. Therefore if you can find it lawful,

Keep her; I will be gone.

LETOY

530

Now I protest!

Sit and sit civilly till the play be done,

I’ll lock thee up else, as I am true Letoy.

JOYLESS

531

Nay, I ha’ done

Whistles "Fortune my foe".

LAWYER

532

Give me my fee, I cannot hear you else.

BEGGAR

533

Sir, I am poor, and all I get is at

The hands of charitable givers; pray sir—

LAWYER

534

You understand me, sir. Your cause is to be

Pleaded today, or you are quite o’erthrown in’t.

The judge by this time is about to sit.

Keep fast your money, and forgo your wit.

[LAWYER] exit[s].

BEGGAR

535

Then I must follow, and entreat him to it:

Poor men in law must not disdain to do it.

[BEGGAR] exit[s].

GALLANT

536

Do it then. I’ll follow you and hear the cause.

[GALLANT] exit[s].

DIANA

537

True Antipodeans still, for, as with us

The gallants follow lawyers, and the beggars them,

The lawyer here is followed by the beggar,

While the gentleman follows him.

LETOY

538

The moral is, the lawyers here prove beggars,

And beggars only thrive by going to law.

DIANA

539

How takes the lawyers, then, the beggars’ money

And none else by their wills?

LETOY

540

They send it all

Up to our lawyers, to stop their mouths

That curse poor clients that are put upon ’em

In forma pauperis.

DIANA

541

In truth most charitable;

But sure that money’s lost by th’ way sometimes.

Yet, sweet my lord, whom do these beggars beg of,

That they can get aforehand so for law?

Who are their benefactors?

LETOY

542

Usurers, usurers.

DIANA

543

Then they have usurers in th’Antipodes too?

LETOY

544

Yes, usury goes round the world, and will do,

Till the general conversion of the Jews.

DIANA

545

But ours are not so charitable, I fear.

Who be their usurers?

LETOY

546

Soldiers and courtiers chiefly;

And some that pass for grave and pious churchmen.

DIANA

547

How finely contrary they’re still to ours.

Enter BYPLAY.

LETOY

548

Why do you not enter? What, are you asleep?――

BYPLAY

549

My lord, the mad young gentleman―――

JOYLESS

550

What of him?

BYPLAY

551

He has got into our tiring house amongst us,

And ta’en a strict survey of all our properties,

Our statues and our images of gods, our planets and our constellations,

Our giants, monsters, furies, beasts, and bugbears,

Our helmets, shields and vizors, hairs and beards,

Our pasteboard marchpanes and our wooden pies.

LETOY

552

Sirrah, be brief. Be not you now as long in

Telling what he saw, as he surveying.

BYPLAY

553

Whether he thought ’twas some enchanted castle,

Or temple, hung and piled with monuments

Of uncouth and of various aspects,

I dive not to his thoughts. Wonder he did

A while it seemed, but yet undaunted stood:

When on the sudden, with thrice knightly force,

And thrice, thrice puissant arm he snatcheth down

The sword and shield that I played Bevis with,

Rusheth amongst the foresaid properties,

Kills monster after monster, takes the puppets

Prisoners, knocks down the Cyclops, tumbles all

Our jiggumbobs and trinkets to the wall.

Spying at last the crown and royal robes

I’th’ upper wardrobe, next to which by chance

The devil’s vizors hung and their flame-painted

Skin coats, those he removed with greater fury,

And (having cut the infernal ugly faces,

All into mammocks) with a reverend hand,

He takes the imperial diadem and crowns

Himself King of the Antipodes, and believes

He has justly gained the kingdom by his conquest.

LETOY

554

Let him enjoy his fancy.

BYPLAY

555

Doctor Hughball

Hath soothed him in’t, so that nothing can

Be said against it. He begins to govern

With purpose to reduce the manners

Of this country to his own; h’as constituted

The doctor his chief officer, whose secretary

I am to be. You’ll see a court well ordered.

LETOY

556

I see th’event already, by the aim

The doctor takes. Proceed you with your play,

And let him see it in what state he pleases.

LETOY whispers with BARBARA

BYPLAY

557

I go, my lord.

Exit[s].

DIANA

558

Trust me, this same Extempore,

(I know not’s tother name) pleases me better

For absolute action than all the rest.

JOYLESS

559

You were best beg him of his lord.

DIANA

560

Say you so?

He’s busy or I’d move him.

LETOY

561

Prithee do so,

Good Mistress Blaze.

(To MARTH[A].)

Go with her gentle lady.

Do as she bids you, you shall get a child by’t.

MARTHA

562

I’ll do as anybody bids me for a child.

JOYLESS

563

Diana, yet be wise: bear not the name

Of sober chastity to play the beast in.

DIANA

564

Think not yourself, nor make yourself a beast

Before you are one; and when you appear so,

Then thank yourself; your jealousy durst not trust me

Behind you in the country, and since I’m here,

I’ll see and know, and follow th’fashion; if

It be to cuckold you, I cannot help it.

JOYLESS

565

I now could wish my son had been as far

In the Antipodes as he thinks himself,

Ere I had run this hazard.

LETOY

566

You’re instructed.

BARBARA

567

And I’ll perform’t, I warrant you, my lord.

BA[RBARA and] MAR[THA] ex[it].

DIANA

568

Why should you wish so? Had you rather lose

Your son than please your wife? You show your love both ways.

LETOY

569

Now what’s the matter?

JOYLESS

570

Nothing, nothing―――

LETOY

571

Sit: the actors enter.

Flourish.

Enter BYPLAY [as] the Governor, MACE-BEARER, SWORD-BEARER, [and] OFFICER[.] The Mace and Sword [are] laid on the table[.] The Governor sits.

DIANA

572

What’s he, a king?

LETOY

573

No, ’tis the city governor,

And the chief judge within their corporation.

JOYLESS

574

Here's a city like to be well governed then――

Enter PEREGRINE and DOCTOR.

LETOY

575

Yonder’s a king. Do you know him?

DIANA

576

’Tis your son,

My Joyless, now you’re pleased.

JOYLESS

577

Would you were pleased

To cease your huswif’ry in spinning out

The play at length thus.

DOCTOR

578

Here, sir, you shall see

A point of justice handled.

BYPLAY

579

Officer.

OFFICER

580

My lord.

BYPLAY

581

Call the defendant and the plaintiff in.

SWORD-BEARER

582

Their counsel and their witnesses.

BYPLAY

583

How now!

How long ha’ you been free o’th’ pointmakers,

Good Master hilt-and-scabbard carrier

(Which is in my hands now)? Do you give order

For counsel and for witnesses in a cause

Fit for my hearing, or for me to judge, haw?

I must be ruled and circumscribed by lawyers, must I,

And witnesses, haw? No, you shall know

I can give judgement, be it right or wrong,

Without their needless proving and defending!

So bid the lawyers go and shake their ears,

If they have any, and the witnesses

Preserve their breath to prophesy of dry summers.

Bring me the plaintiff and defendant only,

But the defendant first. I will not hear

Any complaint before I understand

What the defendant can say for himself.

[OFFICER exits]

PEREGRINE

584

I have not known such downright equity:

If he proceeds as he begins, I’ll grace him.—

Enter GENTLEMAN and OFFICER.

BYPLAY

585

Now, sir, are you the plaintiff or defendant, haw?

GENTLEMAN

586

Both as the case requires, my lord.

BYPLAY

587

I cannot

Hear two at once; speak first as you’re defendant.

GENTLEMAN

588

Mine adversary doth complain—

BYPLAY

589

I will hear no

Complaint. I say speak your defence.

GENTLEMAN

590

For silks and

Stuffs received by me—

BYPLAY

591

A mercer is he, haw?

GENTLEMAN

592

Yes, my good lord, he doth not now complain—

BYPLAY

593

That I like well.

GENTLEMAN

594

For money nor for wares

Again: but he complains—

BYPLAY

595

Complains again?

Do you double with me, haw?

GENTLEMAN

596

In his wife’s cause.

BYPLAY

597

Of his wife, does he, haw? That I must confess

Is many a good man’s case; you may proceed.

GENTLEMAN

598

In money I tender him double satisfaction,

With his own wares again unblemished, undishonoured.

BYPLAY

599

That is unworn, unpawned.

DIANA

600

What an odd

Jeering judge is this?

GENTLEMAN

601

But unto me

They were delivered upon this condition:

That I should satisfy his wife.

BYPLAY

602

He’ll have

Your body for her then, unless I empt

My breast of mercy to appease her for you.

Call in the plaintiff.

(OFFICER exit[s.])

Sir, stand you aside.

DIANA

603

Oh, ’tis the flinching gentleman that broke

With the kind citizen’s wife. I hope the judge

Will make him an example.

Enter CITIZEN and OFFICER.

BYPLAY

604

Come you forwards.

[CITIZEN takes a step forward.]

Yet nearer man.

[CITIZEN comes closer.]

I know my face is terrible,

And that a citizen had rather lose

His debt than that a judge should truly know

His dealings with a gentleman. Yet speak,

Repeat without thy shopbook now, and without

Fear it may rise in judgement here against thee.

What is thy full demand? What satisfaction

Requirest thou of this gentleman?

CITIZEN

605

And please you sir――――

SWORD-BEARER

606

Sir! You forget yourself.

BYPLAY

607

’Twas well said, Sword-bearer.

Thou know’st thy place, which is to show correction.

CITIZEN

608

My lord, an’t please you, if it like your honour—

BYPLAY

609

La! An intelligent citizen, and may grow

In time himself to sit in place of worship.

CITIZEN

610

I ask no satisfaction of the gentleman

But to content my wife; what her demand is,

’Tis best known to herself; please her, please me,

An’t please you, sir―― my lord, an’t like your honour.

But before he has given her satisfaction

I may not fall my suit, nor draw my action.

BYPLAY

611

You may not?

CITIZEN

612

No, alack-a-day! I may not,

Nor find content nor peace at home, an’t please you

(My lord, an’t like your honour, I would say).

An’t please you, what’s a tradesman that

Has a fair wife without his wife, an’t please you?

And she without content is no wife. Considering

We tradesmen live by gentlemen, an’t please you,

And our wives drive a half trade with us, if the gentlemen

Break with our wives, our wives are no wives to us,

And we but broken tradesmen, an’t please you.

And’t like your honour, my good lord, and’t please you.

BYPLAY

613

You argue honestly.

CITIZEN

614

Yet gentlemen,

Alack-a-day! and please you, and like your honour,

Will not consider our necessities,

And our desire in general through the city,

To have our sons all gentlemen like them.

BYPLAY

615

Nor though a gentleman consume

His whole estate among ye, yet his son

May live t’inherit it?

CITIZEN

616

Right, right, and’t please you,

Your honour, my good lord, an’t please you.

BYPLAY

617

Well,

This has so little to be said against it,

That you say nothing. Gentlemen, it seems

You’re obstinate, and will stand out――

GENTLEMAN

618

My lord,

Rather than not to stand out with all men’s wives,

Except mine own, I’ll yield me into prison.

CITIZEN

619

Alack-a-day!

DIANA

620

If our young gentlemen

Were like those of th’Antipodes, what decay

Of trade would here be, and how full the prisons!

GENTLEMAN

621

I offer him any other satisfaction:

His wares again, or money twice the value.

BYPLAY

622

That’s from the point.

CITIZEN

623

Ay! Ay! Alack-a-day!

Nor do I sue to have him up in prison;

Alack-a-day, what good (good gentleman)

Can I get by his body?

BYPLAY

624

Peace! I should

Now give my sentence, and for your contempt,

(Which is a great one, such as if let pass

Unpunished, may spread forth a dangerous

Example to the breach of city custom,

By gentlemen’s neglect of tradesmen’s wives)

I should say for this contempt commit you

Prisoner from sight of any other woman,

Until you give this man’s wife satisfaction,

And she release you; justice so would have it.

But as I am a citizen by nature,

(For education made it so) I’ll use

Urbanity in your behalf towards you;

And as I am a gentleman by calling,

(For so my place must have it) I’ll perform

For you the office of a gentleman

Towards his wife. I therefore order thus:

That you bring me the wares here into court,

(I have a chest shall hold ’em, as mine own)

And you send me your wife, I’ll satisfy her

Myself. I’ll do’t, and set all straight and right:

Justice is blind, but judges have their sight.

DIANA

625

And feeling too in the Antipodes.

Ha’n’t they, my lord?

JOYLESS

626

What’s that to you, my lady?

WITHIN

627

Dismiss the court.

LETOY

628

Dismiss the court. Cannot you hear the prompter?

Ha’ you lost your ears, judge?

BYPLAY

629

[Aside to LETOY]

No.

[Aloud to Officer]

Dismiss the court.

[To GENTLEMEN and CITIZEN]

Embrace you friends, and to shun further strife,

See you send me your stuff, and you your wife.

[GENTLEMAN, CITIZEN, OFFICER, MACE-BEARER and SWORD-BEARER exit.]

PEREGRINE

630

Most admirable justice.

[BYPLAY removes his judicial robes.]

DIANA

631

Protest Extempore played the judge; and I

Knew him not all this while.

JOYLESS

632

What over-sight

Was there?

DIANA

633

He is a properer man, methinks

Now, than he was before: sure I shall love him.

JOYLESS

634

Sure, sure you shall not, shall you?

DIANA

635

And I warrant,

By his judgement speech e’en now, he loves a woman well:

For he said, if you noted him, that he

Would satisfy the citizen’s wife himself.

Methinks a gentlewoman might please him better.

JOYLESS

636

How dare you talk so?

BYPLAY kneels and kisses PEREGRINE’S hand.

DIANA

637

What’s he a-doing now, trow?

PEREGRINE

638

Kneel down again. Give me a sword somebody.

LETOY

639

The King’s about to knight him.

BYPLAY

640

Let me pray

Your majesty be pleased yet to withhold

That undeservèd honour till you first

Vouchsafe to grace the city with your presence,

Accept one of our hall feasts, and a freedom,

And freely use our purse for what great sums

Your majesty will please.

DIANA

641

What subjects there are

In the Antipodes!

LETOY

642

None in the world so loving.

PEREGRINE

643

Give me a sword, I say. Must I call thrice?

LETOY

644

No, no, take mine, my liege.

PEREGRINE

645

Yours! What are you?

DOCTOR

646

A loyal lord, one of your subjects too.

PEREGRINE

647

He may be loyal; he’s a wondrous plain one.

JOYLESS

648

Prithee, Diana, yet let’s slip away

Now while he’s busy.

DIANA

649

But where’s your daughter-in-law?

JOYLESS

650

Gone home, I warrant you, with Mistress Blaze.

Let them be our example.

DIANA

651

You are cozened.

JOYLESS

652

You’re an impudent whore.

DIANA

653

I know not what I may be

Made by your jealousy.

PEREGRINE

654

[Throwing down LETOY's sword]

I’ll none o’ this.

Give me that princely weapon.

[Pointing to sword of state]

LETOY

655

Give it him.

SWORD-BEARER

656

It is a property, you know, my lord,

No blade, but a rich scabbard with a lath in’t.

LETOY

657

So is the sword of justice, for aught he knows.

PEREGRINE

658

It is enchanted.

BYPLAY

659

Yet on me let it fall,

Since ’tis your highness’ will, scabbard and all.

PEREGRINE

660

Rise up, our trusty well-belovèd knight.

BYPLAY

661

Let me find favour in your gracious sight

To taste a banquet now, which is prepared,

And shall be by your followers quickly shared.

PEREGRINE

662

My followers? Where are they?

LETOY

663

[Calls offstage]

Come, sirs, quickly.

Ent[er] 5 or 6 COURTIERS.

PEREGRINE

664

’Tis well. Lead on the way.

[PEREGRINE, DOCTOR, BYPLAY and COURTIERS exit.]

DIANA

665

And must not we

Go to the banquet too?

LETOY

666

He must not see

You yet; I have provided otherwise

For both you in my chamber; and from thence

We’ll at a window see the rest o’th’ play

Or if you needs, sir, will stay here, you may.

JOYLESS

667

Was ever man betrayed thus into torment?

[DIANA, LETOY and JOYLESS] ex[it].

ACT FOUR

4.1

Enter DOCTOR and PEREGRINE.

DOCTOR

668

Now, sir, be pleased to cloud your princely raiment

With this disguise. Great kings have done the like

([PEREGRINE] puts on a cloak and hat.)

To make discovery of passages

Among the people: thus you shall perceive

What to approve, and what correct among ’em.

PEREGRINE

669

And so I’ll cherish or severely punish.

Enter an OLD WOMAN, reading [a handbill]. To her, a young MAID [carrying a book].

DOCTOR

670

Stand close sir, and observe.

OLD WOMAN

671 [Reads] “Royal pastime ... in a great match between the tanners and the butchers, six dogs of a side, to play single at the game bear for fifty pound and a ten-pound supper, for their dogs and themselves. Also you shall see two ten-dog courses at the great bear.”

MAID

672

Fie, granny, fie! Can no persuasions,

Threat’nings, nor blows prevail, but you’ll persist

In these profane and diabolical courses?

To follow bear-baitings, when you can scarce

Spell out their bills with spectacles?

OLD WOMAN

673

What though

My sight be gone beyond the reach of spectacles,

In any print but this, and though I cannot

(No, no, I cannot) read your meditations,

(strikes down her book)

Yet I can see the royal game played over and over,

And tell which dog does best, without my spectacles.

And though I could not, yet I love the noise;

The noise revives me, and the bear-garden scent

Refresheth much my smelling.

MAID

674

Let me entreat you

Forbear such beastly pastimes; they’re satanical.

OLD WOMAN

675

Take heed, child, what you say: ’tis the king’s game.

PEREGRINE

676

What is my game?

DOCTOR

677

Bear-baiting, sir, she means.

OLD WOMAN

678

A bear’s a princely beast, and “one side venison”,

Writ a good author once. You yet want years,

And are with baubles pleased; I’ll see the bears.

Exit[s].

MAID

679

And I must bear with it. She’s full of wine,

And for the present wilful, but in due

Season I’ll humble her. But we are all

Too subject to infirmity.

Enter a [second] young GENTLEMAN and an old SERVINGMAN.

GENTLEMAN

680

Boy—. Boy—.

SERVINGMAN

681

Sir.

GENTLEMAN

682

Here take my cloak.

PEREGRINE

683

Boy, did he say?

DOCTOR

684

Yes sir, old servants are

But boys to masters, be they ne’er so young.

GENTLEMAN

685

’Tis heavy, and I sweat.

SERVINGMAN

686

Take mine, and keep

You warm then. I’ll wear yours.

[They exchange cloaks.]

GENTLEMAN

687

Out, you varlet!

Dost thou obscure it, as thou meant’st to pawn it?

Is this a cloak unworthy of the light?

Publish it, sirrah. ――Oh, presumptuous slave!

Display it on one arm. ――Oh, ignorance!

SERVINGMAN

688

Pray load your ass yourself, as you would have it.

GENTLEMAN

689

Nay, prithee, be not angry.

[Rearranging the cloak on the SERVINGMAN's arm]

Thus. And now

Be sure you bear’t at no such distance but

As’t may be known appendix to this book.

PEREGRINE

690

This custom I have seen with us.

DOCTOR

691

Yes, but

It was derived from the Antipodes.

MAID

692

It is a dainty creature, and my blood

Rebels against the spirit: I must speak to him.

SERVINGMAN

693

Sir, here’s a Gentlewoman makes towards you.

GENTLEMAN

694

Me? She’s deceived. I am not for her mowing.

MAID

695

Fair sir, may you vouchsafe my company?

GENTLEMAN

696

No truly, I am none of those you look for.

The way is broad enough.

[She seizes his arm.]

Unhand me, pray you.

MAID

697

Pray, sir, be kinder to a lass that loves you.

GENTLEMAN

698

Some such there are, but I am none of those.

MAID

699

Come, this is but a copy of your countenance.

I ha’ known you better than you think I do.

GENTLEMAN

700

What ha’ you known me for?

MAID

701

I knew you once

For half a piece, I take it.

GENTLEMAN

702

You are deceived

The whole breadth of your nose. I scorn it.

MAID

703

Come be not coy, but send away your servant,

And let me gi’ you a pint of wine.

GENTLEMAN

704

Pray keep

Your courtesy, I can bestow the wine

Upon myself, if I were so disposed

To drink in taverns. Fah!

MAID

705

Let me bestow’t

Upon you at your lodging then; and there

Be civilly merry.

GENTLEMAN

706

Which if you do,

My wife shall thank you for it; but your better

Course is to seek one fitter for your turn;

You'll lose your aim in me, and I befriend you

To tell you so.

MAID

707

Gip gaffer shotten. Fagh!

Take that for your coy counsel.

Kicks [GENTLEMAN].

GENTLEMAN

708

Help! Oh, help!

SERVINGMAN

709

What mean you, gentlewoman?

MAID

710

That to you sir.

Kicks [SERVINGMAN too].

GENTLEMAN

711

Oh murder! Murder!

SERVINGMAN

712

Peace, good master,

And come away. Some cowardly jade, I warrant,

That durst not strike a woman.

Enter CONSTABLE and WATCH.

CONSTABLE

713

What's the matter?

SERVINGMAN

714

[To Maid]

But an we were your match—

WATCH

715

What would you do?

Come, come afore the Constable. Now, if

You were her match, what would you do, sir?

MAID

716

Do?

They have done too much already sir: a virgin

[She] weeps.

Shall not pass shortly for these street-walkers,

If some judicious order be not taken.

GENTLEMAN

717

Hear me the truth.

CONSTABLE

718

Sir, speak to your companions:

I have a wife and daughters and am bound

By hourly precepts to hear women first,

Be’t truth, or no truth. Therefore, virgin, speak,

And fear no bugbears, I will do thee justice.

MAID

719

Sir, they assailed me, and with violent hands,

When words could not prevail, they would have drawn me

Aside unto their lust, till I cried murder.

GENTLEMAN

720

Protest, sir, as I am a gentleman

And as my man's a man, she beat us both

Till I cried murder.

SERVINGMAN

721

That’s the woeful truth on’t.

CONSTABLE

722

You are a party and no witness, sir.

Besides you’re two, and one is easier

To be believed. Moreover, as you have the odds

In number, what were justice, if it should not support

The weaker side? Away with them to the Counter.

PEREGRINE

723

Call you this justice?

DOCTOR

724

In th’Antipodes.

PEREGRINE

725

Here’s much to be reformed. Young man, thy virtue

Hath won my favour. Go: thou art at large.

DOCTOR

726

Be gone.

GENTLEMAN

727

He puts me out. My part is now

To bribe the constable.

DOCTOR

728

No matter. Go.

GENTLEMAN and [SERVINGMAN] ex[it].

PEREGRINE

729

And you sir, take that sober seeming wanton

And clap her up till I hear better of her.

I’ll strip you of your office and your ears else.

DOCTOR

730

At first show mercy.

PEREGRINE

731

They are an ignorant nation

And have my pity mingled with correction:

And therefore, damsel (for you are the first

Offender I have noted here and this

Your first offence, for ought I know)

MAID

732

Yes, truly.

DOCTOR

733

That was well said.

PEREGRINE

734

Go, and transgress no more.

And, as you find my mercy sweet, see that

You be not cruel to your grandmother

When she returns from bear-baiting.

DOCTOR

735

So all be gone.

[MAID] ex[its]

Enter BUFF WOMAN, her head and face bleeding, and many women, as from a prize.

PEREGRINE

736

And what are these?

DOCTOR

737

A woman fencer, that has played a prize,

It seems, with loss of blood.

PEREGRINE

738

It doth amaze me.

(They pass over [the stage and exit].)

What can her husband be, when she’s a fencer?

DOCTOR

739

He keeps a school and teacheth needlework,

Or some such arts, which we call womanish.

PEREGRINE

740

’Tis most miraculous and wonderful.

MAN-SCOLD

741

(within)

Rogues! Varlets! Harlots! Ha’ you done your worst,

Or would you drown me? Would you take my life?

WOMEN

742

(within)

Duck him again. Duck him again.

PEREGRINE

743

What noise is this?

DOCTOR

744

Some man it seems, that’s ducked for scolding.

PEREGRINE

745

A man for scolding?

DOCTOR

746

You shall see.

Enter WOMEN and MAN-SCOLD.

WOMEN

747

So, so.

Enough, enough. He will be quiet now.

MAN-SCOLD

748

How know you that, you devil-ridden witch, you?

How, quiet? Why quiet? Has not the law passed on me,

Over and over me, and must I be quiet?

1 WOMAN

749

Will you incur the law the second time?

MAN-SCOLD

750

The law’s the river, is’t? Yes, ’tis a river

Through which great men, and cunning, wade or swim;

But mean and ignorant must drown in’t. No

You hags and hellhounds, witches, bitches, all

That were the law, the judge and executioners,

To my vexation, I hope to see

More flames about your ears, than all the water

You cast me in can quench.

3 WOMAN

751

In with him again:

He calls us names.

MAN-SCOLD

752

No, no; I charge ye, no!

Was ever harmless creature so abused?

To be drenched under water, to learn dumbness

Amongst the fishes, as I were forbidden

To use the natural members I was born with,

And of them all, the chief that man takes pleasure in:

The tongue! Oh me, accursed wretch!

[He] weeps.

PEREGRINE

753

Is this a man?

I ask not by his beard, but by his tears.

1 WOMAN

754

This shower will spend the fury of his tongue,

And so the tempest’s over.

2 WOMAN

755

I am sorry for’t

I would have had him ducked once more.

But somebody will shortly raise the storm

In him again, I hope, for us to make

More holiday-sport of him.

[MAN-SCOLD and WOMEN] exit.

PEREGRINE

756

Sure these are dreams,

Nothing but dreams.

DOCTOR

757

No, doubtless we are awake, sir.

PEREGRINE

758

Can men and women be so contrary

In all that we hold proper to each sex?

DOCTOR

759

I’m glad he takes a taste of sense in that yet.

PEREGRINE

760

’Twill ask long time and study to reduce

Their manners to our government.

DOCTOR

761

These are

Low things and easy to be qualified―――

But see, sir, here come courtiers; note their manners.

Enter a COURTIER [counting his money.]

1 COURTIER

762

This was three shillings yesterday, how now!

All gone but this? Six pence, for leather soles

To my new green silk stockings, and a groat

My ordinary in pompions baked with onions.

PEREGRINE

763

Do such eat pompions?

DOCTOR

764

Yes; and clowns musk-melons.

1 COURTIER

765

Three pence I lost at ninepins; but I got

Six tokens towards that at pigeon-holes――――

’S nails!

[Enter 2 COURTIER, unseen by 1 Courtier.]

Where’s the rest? Is my poke bottom broke?

2 COURTIER

766

What, Jack! A pox o’ertake thee not? How dost?

Kicks [him].

1 COURTIER

767

What with a vengeance ail’st? Dost think my breech

Is made of bell-metal? Take that!

Box[es him] o’th’ ear.

2 COURTIER

768

In earnest?

1 COURTIER

769

Yes, till more comes.

[Grabs him by the hair.]

2 COURTIER

770

Pox rot your hold! Let go my lock. D’ye think

You’re currying of your father’s horse again?

1 COURTIER

771

I’ll teach you to abuse a man behind

Was troubled too much afore.

They buffet.

Ent[er] 3rd COURT[IER, just as 2nd COURTIER knocks down 1st COURTIER.]

3 COURTIER

772

Hey! There boys, there.

Good boys are good boys still. There, Will! There, Jack!

Not a blow, now he’s down.

2 COURTIER

773

’Twere base, I scorn’t.

1 COURTIER

774

There’s as proud fall as stand in court or city.

3 COURTIER

775

That’s well said, Will. Troth, I commend you both.

How fell you out? I hope in no great anger.

2 COURTIER

776

For mine own part I vow I was in jest.

1 COURTIER

777

But I have told you twice and once, Will, jest not

With me behind. I never could endure

(Not of a boy) to put up things behind;

And that my tutor knew: I had been a scholar else.

Besides you know my sword was nocked i’th’ fashion,

Just here behind, for my back-guard and all;

And yet you would do’t.

I had as lief you would take a knife――

3 COURTIER

778

Come, come,

You’re friends. Shake hands I’ll give you half a dozen

At the next ale-house to set all right and straight.

And a new song; a dainty one; here ’tis.

[Showing them] a ballad[-sheet].

1 COURTIER

779

Oh, thou art happy that canst read――

I would buy ballads too, had I thy learning.

3 COURTIER

780

Come, we burn daylight, and the ale may sour.

[They] ex[it].

PEREGRINE

781

Call you these Courtiers? They are rude silken clowns,

As coarse within as watermen or car-men.

DOCTOR

782

Then look on these: here are of those conditions.

Ent[er] CAR-MAN [and] WATERMAN.

WATERMAN

783

Sir, I am your servant.

CAR-MAN

784

I am much obliged,

Sir, by the plenteous favours your humanity

And noble virtue have conferred upon me,

To answer with my service your deservings.

WATERMAN

785

You speak what I should say. Be therefore pleased

T’unload, and lay the weight of your commands

Upon my care to serve you.

CAR-MAN

786

Still your courtesies,

Like waves of a spring-tide, o’er-flow the banks

Of your abundant store; and from your channel

Or stream of fair affections you cast forth

Those sweet refreshings on me (that were else

But sterile earth) which cause a gratitude

To grow upon me, humble, yet ambitious

In my devoir to do you best of service.

WATERMAN

787

I shall no more extend my utmost labour

With oar and sail to gain the livelihood

Of wife and children than to set ashore

You and your faithful honourers at the haven

Of your best wishes.

CAR-MAN

788

Sir, I am no less

Ambitious to be made the happy means,

With whip and whistle, to draw up or drive

All your detractors to the gallows.

Enter SEDANMAN.

WATERMAN

789

See,

Our noble friend.

SEDANMAN

790

Right happily encountered――

I am the just admirer of your virtues.

[BOTH]

791

We are, in all, your servants.

SEDANMAN

792

I was in quest

Of such elect society to spend

A dinner-time withal.

BOTH

793

Sir, we are for you.

SEDANMAN

794

Three are the golden number in a tavern:

And at the next of best, with the best meat

And wine the house affords (if you so please)

We will be competently merry. I

Have received, lately, letters from beyond seas,

Importing much of the occurrences,

And passages of foreign states. The knowledge

Of all, I shall impart to you.

WATERMAN

795

And I

Have all the new advertisements from both

Our universities of what has passed

The most remarkably of late.

CAR-MAN

796

And from

The court I have the news at full,

Of all that was observable this progress.

PEREGRINE

797

From court?

DOCTOR

798

Yes, sir. They know not there they have

A new king here at home.

SEDANMAN

799

’Tis excellent!

We want but now the news-collecting gallant

To fetch his dinner and materials

For his this week’s dispatches.

WATERMAN

800

I dare think

The meat and news being hot upon the table,

He’ll smell his way to’t.

SEDANMAN

801

Please you to know yours, sir?

CAR-MAN

802

Sir, after you.

SEDANMAN

803

Excuse me.

WATERMAN

804

By no means, sir.

CAR-MAN

805

Sweet sir, lead on.

SEDANMAN

806

It shall be as your servant

Then to prepare your dinner.

WATERMAN

807

Pardon me.

CAR-MAN

808

In sooth I’ll follow you.

WATERMAN

809

Yet ’tis my obedience.

[CAR-MAN, WATERMAN and SEDANMAN] Ex[it].

PEREGRINE

810

Are these but labouring men and t’other courtiers?

DOCTOR

811

Tis common here, sir, for your watermen

To write most learnedly, when your courtier

Has scarce ability to read.

PEREGRINE

812

Before I reign

A month among them, they shall change their notes,

Or I’ll ordain a course to change their coats

I shall have much to do in reformation.

DOCTOR

813

Patience and counsel will go through it, sir.

PEREGRINE

814

What if I craved a counsel from New England?

The old will spare me none.

DOCTOR

815

Is this man mad?

My cure goes fairly on. Do you marvel that

Poor men outshine the courtiers? Look you, sir,

(These persons pass over the stage in couples, according as he describes them.)

A sick man giving counsel to a physician;

And there’s a puritan tradesman teaching a

Great traveller to lie; that ballad-woman

Gives light to the most learned antiquary

In all the kingdom.

BALLAD-SINGER

816

Buy new ballads, come.

DOCTOR

817

A natural fool, there, giving grave instructions

T’a lord ambassador; that’s a schismatic,

Teaching a scrivener to keep his ears;

A parish clerk, there, gives the rudiments

Of military discipline to a general:

And there’s a basket-maker confuting Bellarmine.

PEREGRINE

818

Will you make me mad?

Ent[er during the following speech] BYPLAY like a statesman [and] three or four PROJECTORS with bundles of papers.

DOCTOR

819

We are sailed, I hope,

Beyond the line of madness. Now sir, see

A statesman, studious for the commonwealth,

Solicited by projectors of the country.

BYPLAY

820

Your projects are all good; I like them well,

Especially these two: this for th’increase of wool,

And this for the destroying of mice. They’re good

And grounded on great reason. As for yours

For putting down the infinite use of jacks

(Whereby the education of young children

In turning spits is greatly hindered)

It may be looked into. And yours against

The multiplicity of pocket watches,

(Whereby much neighbourly familiarity,

By asking, “what d’ye guess it is o’clock?”

Is lost) when every puny clerk can carry

The time o’th’ day in’s breeches: this, and these,

Hereafter may be looked into. For present:

This for the increase of wool (that is to say,

By flaying of live horses and new covering them

With sheepskins), I do like exceedingly.

And this for keeping of tame owls in cities

To kill up rats and mice, whereby all cats

May be destroyed, as an especial means

To prevent witchcraft and contagion.

PEREGRINE

821

Here’s a wise business!

PROJECTOR

822

Will your honour now,

Be pleased to take into consideration

The poor men’s suits for briefs to get relief,

By common charity throughout the kingdom,

Towards recovery of their lost estates?

BYPLAY

823

What are they? Let me hear.

PROJECTOR

824

First, here’s a gamester that sold house and land

To the known value of five thousand pounds,

And by misfortune of the dice lost all,

To his extreme undoing, having neither

A wife or child to succour him.

BYPLAY

825

A bachelor?

PROJECTOR

826

Yes, my good lord.

BYPLAY

827

And young and healthful?

PROJECTOR

828

Yes.

BYPLAY

829

Alas, ’tis lamentable! He deserves much pity.

PEREGRINE

830

How’s this?

DOCTOR

831

Observe him further, pray sir.

PROJECTOR

832

Then, here’s a bawd of sixty-odd years’ standing.

BYPLAY

833

How old was she when she set up?

PROJECTOR

834

But four

And twenty, my good lord. She was both ware

And merchant; flesh and butcher (as they say)

For the first twelve years of her housekeeping.

She’s now upon fourscore and has made markets

Of twice four thousand choice virginities;

And twice their number of indifferent gear.

(No riff-raff was she ever known to cope for)

Her life is certified here by the justices,

Adjacent to her dwelling―――

BYPLAY

835

She is decayed.

PROJECTOR

836

Quite trade-fallen, my good lord, now in her dotage;

And desperately undone by riot.

BYPLAY

837

’Las, good woman.

PROJECTOR

838

She has consumed in prodigal feasts and fiddlers

And lavish lendings to debauched comrades

That sucked her purse, in jewels, plate and money,

To the full value of six thousand pounds.

BYPLAY

839

She shall have a collection, and deserves it.

PEREGRINE

840

’Tis monstrous, this.

PROJECTOR

841

Then here are divers more,

Of pandars, cheaters, house and highway robbers,

That have got great estates in youth and strength

And wasted all as fast in wine and harlots,

Till age o’ertook ’em, and disabled them

For getting more.

BYPLAY

842

For such the law provides

Relief within those counties where they practised.

PEREGRINE

843

Ha! What, for thieves?

DOCTOR

844

Yes, their law punisheth

The robbed and not the thief, for surer warning

And the more safe prevention. I have seen

Folks whipped for losing of their goods and money

And the pickpockets cherished.

BYPLAY

845

The weal public,

As it severely punisheth their neglect

(Undone by fire-ruins, shipwreck and the like)

With whips, with brands, and loss of careless ears,

Imprisonment, banishment, and sometimes death;

And carefully maintaineth houses of correction

For decayed scholars and maimed soldiers,

So doth it find relief and almshouses,

For such as lived by rapine and by cozenage.

PEREGRINE

846

Still worse and worse! Abominable! Horrid!

PROJECTOR

847

Yet here is one, my lord, ’bove all the rest,

Whose services have generally been known,

Though now he be a spectacle of pity.

BYPLAY

848

Who’s that?

PROJECTOR

849

The captain of the cutpurses, my lord;

That was the best at’s art that ever was,

Is fallen to great decay by the dead palsy

In both his hands, and craves a large collection.

BYPLAY

850

I’ll get it him.

PEREGRINE

851

You shall not get it him.

Do you provide whips, brands and ordain death

For men that suffer under fire or shipwreck

The loss of all their honest gotten wealth,

And find relief for cheaters, bawds, and thieves?

I’ll hang ye all.

BYPLAY

852

Mercy, great king.

BYPLAY

854

Let not our ignorance suffer in your wrath,

Before we understand your highness’ laws.

We went by custom and the warrant, which

We had in your late predecessor’s reign.

But let us know your pleasure, you shall find

The state and commonwealth in all obedient

To alter custom, law, religion, all,

To be conformable to your commands.

PEREGRINE

855

’Tis a fair protestation; and my mercy

Meets your submission. See you merit it

In your conformity.

[During the following] LETOY, DIANA [and] JOYLESS, appear above.

BYPLAY

856

Great sir, we shall.

In sign whereof we lacerate these papers

And lay our necks beneath your kingly feet.

PEREGRINE

857

Stand up, you have our favour.

DIANA

858

And mine too.

Never was such an actor as Extempore!

JOYLESS

859

You were best to fly out of the window to him.

DIANA

860

Methinks I am even light enough to do it.

JOYLESS

861

I could find in my heart to quoit thee at him.

DIANA

862

So he would catch me in his arms, I cared not.

LETOY

863

Peace both of you, or you’ll spoil all.

BYPLAY

864

Your grace

Abounds― abounds― your grace― I say, abounds.

LETOY

865

Pox o’ your mumbling chops. Is your brain dry?

Do you pump?

DIANA

866

He has done much, my lord, and may

Hold out a little.

LETOY

867

Would you could hold your peace

So long.

DIANA

868

Do you sneap me too, my lord?

JOYLESS

869

Ha, ha, ha!

LETOY

870

Blockhead!

JOYLESS

871

I hope his hotter zeal to’s actors

Will drive out my wife’s love-heat.

DIANA

872

I had

No need to come hither to be sneaped.

LETOY

873

Hoyday!

The rest will all be lost, we now give over

The play, and do all by extempore,

For your son’s good, to sooth him into’s wits.

If you’ll mar all, you may. Come nearer, coxcomb,

Ha’ you forgotten (puppy) my instructions

Touching his subjects and his marriage?

BYPLAY

874

I have all now, my lord.

PEREGRINE

875

What voice was that?

BYPLAY

876

A voice out of the clouds that doth applaud

Your highness’ welcome to your subjects’ loves.

LETOY

877

So, now he’s in. Sit still, I must go down

And set out things in order.

Ex[its].

BYPLAY

878

A voice that doth inform me of the tidings,

Spread through your kingdom, of your great arrival;

And of the general joy your people bring

To celebrate the welcome of their king.

[Shouts within.]

Hark how the country shouts with joyful votes,

Rending the air with music of their throats.

(Drum & trumpets.)

Hark how the soldier with his martial noise

Threatens your foes, to fill your crown with joys.

(Hautboys.)

Hark how the city with loud harmony

Chants a free welcome to your majesty.

(Soft music.)

Hark how the court prepares your grace to meet

With solemn music, state and beauty sweet.

The soft music playing, ent[er] by two and two, divers COURTIERS, MARTHA after them, like a queen, between two boys in robes, her train borne up by BARBARA. All the LORDS kneel and kiss PEREGRINE’S hand. MARTHA approaching, he starts back, but is drawn on by BYPLAY and the DOCTOR. LETOY enters and mingles with the rest, and seems to instruct them all.

DIANA

879

Oh, here’s a stately show! Look, Master Joyless:

Your daughter-in-law presented like a queen

Unto your son. I warrant now he’ll love her.

JOYLESS

880

A queen?

DIANA

881

Yes, yes, and Mistress Blaze is made

The mother of her maids, if she have any:

Perhaps the Antipodean court has none.

See, see, with what a majesty he receives ’em.

(Song)

Health, wealth, and joy our wishes bring,

All in a welcome to our king:

May no delight be found,

Wherewith he be not crowned

Apollo with the Muses,

Who arts divine infuses,

With their choice garlands deck his head;

Love and the Graces make his bed:

And to crown all, let Hymen to his side

Plant a delicious, chaste and fruitful bride.

BYPLAY

882

Now, sir, be happy in a marriage choice,

That shall secure your title of a king.

See, sir, your state presents to you the daughter,

The only child and heir apparent of

Our late deposed and deceased sovereign,

Who with his dying breath bequeathed her to you.

PEREGRINE

883

A crown secures not an unlawful marriage.

I have a wife already.

DOCTOR

884

No: you had, sir,

But she’s deceased.

PEREGRINE

885

How know you that?

DOCTOR

886

By sure advertisement; and that her fleeting spirit

Is flown into, and animates this princess.

PEREGRINE

887

Indeed she’s wondrous like her.

DOCTOR

888

Be not slack

T’embrace and kiss her, sir.

He kisses her and retires.

MARTHA

889

He kisses sweetly;

And that is more than e’er my husband did.

But more belongs than kissing to child-getting;

And he’s so like my husband, if you note him,

That I shall but lose time and wishes by him.

No, no, I’ll none of him.

BARBARA

890

I’ll warrant you he shall fulfil your wishes.

MARTHA

891

Oh, but try him you first and then tell me.

BARBARA

892

There’s a new way indeed to choose a husband!

Yet ’twere a good one to bar fool-getting.

DOCTOR

893

Why do you stand aloof, sir?

PEREGRINE

894

Mandeville writes

Of people near the Antipodes, called Gadlibriens,

Where on the wedding-night the husband hires

Another man to couple with his bride,

To clear the dangerous passage of a maidenhead.

DOCTOR

895

’Slid, he falls back again to Mandeville madness.

PEREGRINE

896

She may be of that serpentine generation

That stings oft-times to death (as Mandeville writes).

DOCTOR

897

She’s no Gadlibrien, sir, upon my knowledge.

You may as safely lodge with her, as with

A maid of our own nation. Besides,

You shall have ample counsel: for the present,

Receive her and entreat her to your chapel.

BYPLAY

898

For safety of your kingdom, you must do it.

Hautboys[. PEREGRINE, MARTHA, BARBARA, the DOCTOR and the procession] exit in state, as LETOY directs. LETOY stays.

LETOY

899

So, so, so, so. This yet may prove a cure.

DIANA

900

See my lord now is acting by himself.

LETOY

901

And Letoy’s wit cried up triumphant. Ho!

Come, Master Joyless and your wife, come down

Quickly, your parts are next. I had almost

Forgot to send my chaplain after them.

You, Domine, where are you?

Enter QUAILPIPE in a fantastical shape.

QUALPIPE

902

Here, my lord.

LETOY

903

What in that shape?

[QUALPIPE]

904

’Tis for my part, my lord,

Which is not all performed.

LETOY

905

It is, sir, and the play for this time. We

Have other work in hand.

QUALPIPE

906

Then have you lost

Action (I dare be bold to speak it) that

Most of my coat could hardly imitate.

LETOY

907

Go shift your coat, sir, or for expedition

Cover it with your own, due to your function.

Follies as well as vices may be hid so;

Your virtue is the same. Dispatch, and do

As Doctor Hughball shall direct you. Go.

(QUA[ILPIPE] exit[s, as] JOYLESS [and] DIANA enter..)

Now Master Joyless, do you note the progress

And the fair issue likely to ensue

In your son’s cure? Observe the doctor’s art.

First, he has shifted your son’s known disease

Of madness into folly; and has wrought him

As far short of a competent reason as

He was of late beyond it. As a man

Infected by some foul disease is drawn

By physic into an anatomy,

Before flesh fit for health can grow to rear him,

So is a madman made a fool before

Art can take hold of him to wind him up

Into his proper centre, or the medium

From which he flew beyond himself. The doctor

Assures me now, by what he has collected

As well from learned authors as his practice,

That his much troubled and confused brain

Will by the real knowledge of a woman,

Now opportunely ta’en, be by degrees

Settled and rectified with the helps beside

Of rest and diet, which he’ll administer.

DIANA

908

But ’tis the real knowledge of the woman,

Carnal, I think you mean, that carries it?

LETOY

909

Right, right.

DIANA

910

Nay, right or wrong, I could even wish,

If he were not my husband’s son, the doctor

Had made myself his recipe, to be

The means of such a cure.

JOYLESS

911

How, how?

DIANA

912

Perhaps that course might cure your madness too

Of jealousy, and set all right on all sides.

Sure, if I could but make him such a fool,

He would forgo his madness, and be brought

To Christian sense again.

JOYLESS

913

Heaven grant me patience

And send us to my country home again.

DIANA

914

Besides, the young man’s wife’s as mad as he.

What wise work will they make!

LETOY

915

The better, fear’t not.

Bab Blaze shall give her counsel; and the youth

Will give her royal satisfaction

Now in this kingly humour. I have a way

To cure your husband’s jealousy myself.

DIANA

916

Then I am friends again. Even now I was not,

When you sneaped me, my lord.

LETOY

917

That you must pardon.

Come Master Joyless. The new married pair

Are towards bed by this time; we’ll not trouble them

But keep a house-side to our selves. Your lodging

Is decently appointed.

JOYLESS

918

Sure your lordship

Means not to make your house our prison?

LETOY

919

My Lordship but I will, for this one night.

See sir, the keys are in my hand. You’re up,

As I am true Letoy. Consider, sir,

The strict necessity that ties you to’t,

As you expect a cure upon your son―――

Come, lady, see your chamber.

DIANA

920

I do wait

Upon your lordship.

JOYLESS

921

I both wait and watch.

Never was man so mastered by his match.

ACT FIVE

5.1

[Enter] JOYLESS with a light in his hand.

JOYLESS

922

Diana! Ho! Where are you? She is lost.

Here is no further passage. All’s made fast.

This was the bawdy way, by which she ’scaped

My narrow watching. Have you privy posterns

Behind the hangings in your strangers’ chambers?

She’s lost from me for ever. Why then seek I?

Oh, my dull eyes! To let her slip so from ye,

To let her have her lustful will upon me!

Is this the hospitality of lords?

Why, rather, if he did intend my shame

And her dishonour, did he not betray me

From her out of his house, to travail in

The bare suspicion of their filthiness?

But hold me a nose-witness to its rankness?

No! This is sure the lordlier way; and makes

The act more glorious in my sufferings. O

[Kneels]

May my hot curses on their melting pleasures,

Cement them so together in their lust

That they may never part, but grow one monster.

Enter BARBARA.

BARBARA

923

[Aside]

Good gentleman! He is at his prayers now,

For his mad son’s good night-work with his bride.

Well fare your heart, sir: you have prayed to purpose;

But not all night I hope. Yet sure he has,

He looks so wild for lack of sleep.

[Aloud]

You’re happy, sir.

Your prayers are heard, no doubt, for I’m persuaded

You have a child got you tonight.

JOYLESS

924

Is’t gone

So far, do you think?

BARBARA

925

I cannot say how far.

Not fathom-deep, I think, but to the scantling

Of a child-getting, I dare well imagine.

For which, as you have prayed, forget not, sir,

To thank the lord o’th’ house.

JOYLESS

926

For getting me

A child? Why, I am none of his great lordship’s tenants

Nor of his followers, to keep his bastards.

Pray stay a little.

BARBARA

927

I should go tell my lord

The news: he longs to know how things do pass.

JOYLESS

928

Tell him I take it well, and thank him.

I did before despair of children, I.

But I’ll go wi’ye and thank him.

BARBARA

929

[Aside]

Sure his joy

Has madded him. Here’s more work for the doctor.

JOYLESS

930 [Withdrawing his dagger] But tell me first: were you their bawd that speak this?

BARBARA

931

What mean you with that dagger?

JOYLESS

932

Nothing, I

But play with’t. Did you see the passages

Of things? I ask: were you their bawd?

BARBARA

933

Their bawd?

I trust she is no bawd that sees and helps,

If need require, an ignorant lawful pair

To do their best.

JOYLESS

934

Lord’s actions all are lawful.

And how? And how?

BARBARA

935

[Aside]

These old folks love to hear.

[Aloud]

I’ll tell you, sir―and yet I will not neither.

JOYLESS

936

Nay, pray thee out with’t.

BARBARA

937

Sir, they went to bed.

JOYLESS

938

To bed! Well, on.

BARBARA

939

On? They were off, sir, yet;

And yet a good while after. They were both

So simple, that they knew not what, nor how.

For she’s, sir, a pure maid.

JOYLESS

940

Who dost thou speak of?

BARBARA

941

I’ll speak no more, ’less you can look more tamely.

JOYLESS

942

Go bring me to ’em then. Bawd, will you go?

[He threatens her again with his dagger.]

BARBARA

943

Ah―――

Enter BYPLAY, [who] holds JOYLESS.

BYPLAY

944

What ail you, sir? Why bawd? Whose bawd is she?

JOYLESS

945

Your lord’s bawd and my wife’s.

BYPLAY

946

You are jealous mad.

Suppose your wife be missing at your chamber,

And my lord too at his: they may be honest.

If not, what’s that to her, or you, I pray,

Here in my lord’s own house?

JOYLESS

947

Brave, brave, and monstrous!

BYPLAY

948

She has not seen them. I heard all your talk.

The child she intimated is your grandchild

In posse sir, and of your son’s begetting.

BARBARA