Chapter X: Act II: , Scene 1

_Enter_ SELDOM _[and] his wife_ GRACE, _working as in their shop_.

GRACE. Husband, these gloves are not fit for my wearing; I'll put 'em into the shop, and sell 'em: you shall give me a plain pair for them.

SEL. This is wonderful, wonderful! this is thy sweet care and judgment in all things: this goodness is not usual in our wives. Well, Grace Seldom, that thou art fair is nothing, that thou art well-spoken is nothing, that thou art witty is nothing, that thou art a citizen's wife is nothing; but, Grace, that thou art fair, that thou art well-spoken, that thou art witty, that thou art a citizen's wife, and that thou art honest, I say--and let any man deny it that can, it is something, it is something; I say, it is Seldom's something, and for all the sunshine of my joy, mine eyes must rain upon thee.

_Enter_ MOLL CUT-PURSE, _with a letter_.

MOLL. By your leave, Master Seldom, have you done the hangers I bespake for the knight?

SEL. Yes, marry have I, Mistress _hic_ and _hæc;_[87] I'll fetch 'em to you. [_Exit._

MOLL. Zounds! does not your husband know my name? if it had been somebody else, I would have called him cuckoldy slave.

GRACE. If it had been somebody else, perhaps you might.

MOLL. Well, I may be even with him; all's clear. Pretty rogue, I have longed to know thee this twelve months, and had no other means but this to speak with thee. There's a letter to thee from the party.

GRACE. What party?

MOLL. The knight, Sir John Love-all.

GRACE. Hence, lewd impudent!
I know not what to term thee, man or woman,
For, Nature, shaming to acknowledge thee
For either, hath produc'd thee to the world
Without a sex: some say thou art a woman,
Others a man: and many, thou art both
Woman and man, but I think rather neither,
Or man and horse, as the old centaurs were feign'd.

MOLL. Why, how now, Mistress What-lack-ye? are you so fine, with a pox? I have seen a woman look as modestly as you, and speak as sincerely, and follow the friars as zealously,[88] and she has been as sound a jumbler as e'er paid for't: 'tis true, Mistress Fi'penny, I have sworn to leave this letter.

GRACE. D'ye hear, you Sword-and-target (to speak in your own key), Mary Ambree, Long Meg.[89]

Thou that in thyself, methinks, alone
Look'st like a rogue and whore under a hedge;
Bawd, take your letter with you, and begone,
When next you come, my husband's constable,
And Bridewell is hard by: you've a good wit,
And can conceive----

_Enter_ SELDOM, _with hangers_.

SEL. Look you, here are the hangers.

MOLL. Let's see them.
Fie, fie! you have mistook me quite,
They are not for my turn. B'w'ye, Mistress Seldom. [_Exit._

_Enter_ LORD PROUDLY.

GRACE. Here's my Lord Proudly.

PROUDLY. My horse, lackey! is my sister Honour above?

SEL. I think her ladyship, my lord, is not well, and keeps her
chamber.

PROUDLY. All's one, I must see her: have the other ladies dined?

GRACE. I think not, my lord.

PROUDLY. Then I'll take a pipe of tobacco here in your shop, if it be not offensive. I would be loth to be thought to come just at dinner-time. [_To his servant_] Garçon! fill, sirrah.

_Enter_ PAGE, _with a pipe of tobacco_.

What said the goldsmith for the money?

[SELDOM, _having fetched a candle, walks off at the other
end of the shop_. LORD PROUDLY _sits by his wife_.

PAGE. He said, my lord, he would lend no man money that he durst not arrest.

PROUDLY. How got that wit into Cheapside, trow? He is a cuckold. Saw
you my lady to-day? hat says she? [_Takes tobacco._

PAGE. Marry, my lord, she said her old husband had a great payment to make this morning, and had not left her so much as a jewel.

PROUDLY. A pox of her old cat's chaps! The teeth she had
Have made a transmigration into hair:
She hath a bigger beard than I, by this light.
[LORD _whispers to_ GRACE.

SEL. This custom in us citizens is good:
Thus walking off, when men talk with our wives;
It shows us courteous and mannerly.
Some count it baseness; he's a fool that does so.
It is the highest point of policy,
Especially when we have virtuous wives.

GRACE. Fie, fie! you talk uncivilly, my lord.

PROUDLY. Uncivilly, mew! Can a lord talk uncivilly? I think you, a finical taffata pipkin, may be proud I'll sit so near it. Uncivilly, mew!

GRACE. Your mother's cat has kittened in your mouth, sure.

PROUDLY. Prythee, but note yon fellow. Does he not walk and look as if he did desire to be a cuckold?

GRACE. But you do not look as if you could make him one. Now they have dined, my lord.

_Enter_ LORD FEESIMPLE _and_ WELLTRIED.

FEE. God save your lordship.

PROUDLY. How dost thou, coz? Hast thou got any more wit yet?

FEE. No, by my troth, I have
But little money with that little wit I have,
And the more wit ever the less money;
Yet as little as I have of either,
I would give something that I durst but quarrel:
I would not be abus'd thus daily as I am.

WELL. Save you, my lord.

PROUDLY. Good Master Welltried, you can inform me: pray, how ended the quarrel betwixt young Bold and the other gentleman?

WELL. Why, very fairly, my lord; on honourable terms. Young Bold was injured and did challenge him, fought in the field, and the other gave him satisfaction under his hand. I was Bold's second, and can show it here.

PROUDLY. 'Tis strange there was no hurt done, yet I hold
The other gentleman far the better man.

WELL. So do not I.

PROUDLY. Besides, they say the satisfaction that walks in the ordinaries is counterfeit.

WELL. He lies that say so, and I'll make it good.
And for I know my friend is out of town,
What man soever wrongs him is my foe.
I say he had full satisfaction,
Nay, that which we may call submission;
That the other sought peace first; and who denies this,
Lord, knight or gentleman: English, French or Scot,
I'll fight and prove it on him with my sword.

FEE. No, sweet Master Welltried, let's have no fighting, till (as you have promised) you have rid me from this foolish fear, and taught me to endure to look upon a naked sword.

WELL. Well, and I'll be as good as my word.

FEE. But do you hear, cousin Proudly? They say my old father must marry your sister Honour, and that he will disinherit me, and entail all his lordships on her and the heir he shall beget on her body. Is't true or not?

PROUDLY. There is such a report.

FEE. Why, then I pray God he may die an old cuckoldy slave.
O world, what art thou? where is parent's love?
Can he deny me for his natural child?
Yet see (O fornicator!) old and stiff,
Not where he should be, that's my comfort yet.
As for you, my lord, I will send to you as soon as
I dare fight, and look upon steel; which, Master
Welltried (I pray) let be with all possible speed.

PROUDLY. What d'ye this afternoon?

FEE. Faith, I have a great mind to see Long Meg and the Ship at the Fortune.[90]

PROUDLY. Nay, i' faith, let's up and have a rest at primero.

WELL. Agreed, my lord; and toward the evening I'll carry you to the company.

FEE. Well, no more words.
[_Exeunt_ LORD PROUDLY, LORD FEESIMPLE, _and_ WELLTRIED.[91]

GRACE. I wonder, sir, you will walk so, and let anybody sit prating to your wife. Were I a man, I'd thrust 'em out o' th' shop by the head and shoulders.

SEL. There were no policy in that, wife; so should I lose my custom. Let them talk themselves weary, and give thee love-tokens--still I lose not by it.

Thy chastity's impregnable, I know it.
Had I a dame, whose eyes did swallow youth,
Whose unchaste gulf together did take in
Masters and men, the footboys and their lords,
Making a gallimaufry in her blood,
I would not walk thus then: but, virtuous wife,
He that in chaste ears pours his ribald talk
Begets hate to himself, and not consent;
And even as dirt, thrown hard against a wall,
Rebounds and sparkles in the thrower's eyes,
So ill words, utter'd to a virtuous dame,
Turn and defile the speaker with red shame. [_Exeunt._

SCENE II.

_Enter_ HUSBAND _and_ WIFE.

HUS. Zounds! you're a whore; though I entreat him fair
Before his face, in compliment or so,
I not esteem him truly as this rush.
There's no such thing as friendship in the world,
And he that cannot swear, dissemble, lie,
Wants knowledge how to live, and let him die.

WIFE. Sir, I did think you had esteem'd of him,
As you made show; therefore I us'd him well,
And yet not so, but that the strictest eye
I durst have made a witness of my carriage.

HUS. Plague o' your carriage! why, he kiss'd your hand,
Look'd babies in your eyes, and wink'd and pink'd.
You thought I had esteem'd him! 'Sblood. you whore!
Do not I know that you do know you lie?
When didst thou hear me say and mean one thing?
O, I could kick you now, and tear your face,
And eat thy breasts like udders.

WIFE. Sir, you may,
But if I know what hath deserv'd all this,
I am no woman: 'cause he kiss'd my hand
Unwillingly?

HUS. A little louder, pray.

WIFE. You are a base fellow, an unworthy man,
As e'er poor gentlewoman match'd withal.
Why should you make such show of love to any
Without the truth? thy beastly mind is like
Some decay'd tradesman, that doth make his wife
Entertain those for gain he not endures.
Pish! swell and burst: I had rather with thy sword
Be hew'd to pieces, than lead such a life.
Out with it, valiant sir: I hold you for
A drawer upon women, not on men.
I will no more conceal your hollow heart,
But e'en report you as you are in truth.

HUS. This is call'd marriage. Stop your mouth, you whore.

WIFE. Thy mother was a whore, if I be one.

HUS. You know there's company in the house.

_Enter_ SUBTLE.

Sweet friend, what, have you writ your letter?

SUB. Tis done, dear friend: I have made you stay too long;
I fear you'll be benighted.

HUS. Fie! no, no.
Madam and sweetest wife, farewell; God bless us.
Make much of Master Subtle here, my friend, [_Kisses her._
Till my return, which may be ev'n as't happens,
According as my business hath success. [_Exit._

SUB. How will you pass the time now, fairest mistress?

WIFE. In troth, I know not: wives without their husbands,
Methinks, are low'ring days.

SUB. Indeed, some wives
Are like dead bodies in their husbands' absence.

WIFE. If any wife be, I must needs be so,
That have a husband far above all men;
Untainted with the humours others have,
A perfect man, and one that loves you truly:
You see the charge he left of your good usage.

SUB. Pish! he's an ass, I know him; a stark ass,
Of a most barbarous condition,
False-hearted to his friend, rough unto you;
A most dissembling and perfidious fellow.
I care not if he heard me: this I know,
And will make good upon him with my sword,
Or any for him--for he will not fight.

WIFE. Fie, servant! you show small civility
And less humanity: d'ye requite
My husband's love thus ill? for what d'ye think
Of me, that you will utter to my face
Such harsh, unfriendly, slanderous injuries
Even of my husband? Sir, forbear, I pray,
My ears or your own tongue: I am no house-wife
To hear my husband's merit thus deprav'd.

SUB. His merit is a halter, by this light.
You think he's out of town now; no such matter:
But gone aside, and hath importun'd me
To try your chastity.

WIFE. It cannot be.
Alas! he is as free from jealousy,
And ever was, as confidence itself.
I know he loves me too-too heartily
To be suspicious, or to prove my truth.

SUB. If I do feign in ought, ne'er may I purchase
The grace I hope for! and, fair mistress,
If you have any spirit, or wit, or sense,
You will be even with such a wretched slave.
Heaven knows I love you as the air I draw!
Think but how finely you may cuckold him,
And safely, too, with me, who will report
To him, that you are most invincible,
Your chastity not to be subdu'd by man.

WIFE. When you know I'm a whore?

SUB. A whore? fie! no;
That you have been kind, or so: your whore doth live
In Pickt-hatch,[92] Turnbull Street.

WIFE. Your whore lives there! [_Aside._]
Well, servant, leave me to myself awhile:
Return anon; but bear this hope away,
'T shall be with you, if I at all do stray. [_Exit_ SUBTLE.
Why, here's right wordly[93] friendship! ye're well-met.
O men! what are you? why is our poor sex
Still made the disgrac'd subjects in these plays
For vices, folly, and inconstancy:
When, were men look'd into with such critical eyes
Of observation, many would be found
So full of gross and base corruption,
That none (unless the devil himself turn'd writer)
Could feign so badly to express them truly?
Some wives that had a husband now, like mine,
Would yield their honours up to any man:
Far be it from my thoughts! O, let me stand,
Thou God of marriage and chastity,
An honour to my sex! no injury
Compel the virtue of my breast to yield!
It's not revenge for any wife to stain
The nuptial bed, although she be yok'd ill.
Who falls, because her husband so hath done,
Cures not his wound, but in herself makes one. [_Exit_ WIFE.

SCENE III.

_Enter_ INGEN, _reading a letter; sits down in a chair, and stamps with his foot; to him a_ SERVANT.

INGEN. Who brought this letter?

SER. A little Irish footboy, sir:
He stays without for an answer.

INGEN. Bid him come in. Lord!
What deep dissemblers are these females all.
How far unlike a friend this lady us'd me,
And here how like one mad in love she writes.

_Enter_ MAID, _like an Irish footboy, with a dart,[94] gloves in her pocket, and a handkerchief_.

So bless me, heaven, but thou art the prettiest boy
That e'er ran by a horse! hast thou dwelt long
With thy fair mistress?

MAID. I came but this morning, sir.

INGEN. How fares thy lady, boy?

MAID. Like to a turtle that hath lost her mate,
Drooping she sits; her grief, sir, cannot speak.
Had it a voice articulate, we should know
How and for what cause she suffers; and perhaps--
But 'tis unlikely--give her comfort, sir.
Weeping she sits, and all the sound comes from her
Is like the murmur of a silver brook,
Which her tears truly would make there about her,
Sat she in any hollow continent.

INGEN. Believe me, boy, thou hast a passionate tongue,
Lively expression, or thy memory
Hath carried thy lesson well away.
But wherefore mourns thy lady?

MAID. Sir, you know,
And would to God I did not know myself!

INGEN. Alas! it cannot be for love to me.
When last I saw her, she revil'd me, boy,
With bitterest words, and wish'd me never more
To approach her sight; and for my marriage now
I do sustain it as a penance due
To the desert that made her banish me.

MAID. Sir, I dare swear, she did presume no words,
Nor dangers had been powerful to restrain
Your coming to her, when she gave the charge--
But are you married truly?

INGEN. Why, my boy,
Dost think I mock myself? I sent her gloves.

MAID. The gloves she has return'd you, sir, by me,
And prays you give them to some other lady,
That you'll deceive next, and be perjured to.
Sure, you have wrong'd her: sir, she bad me tell you,
She ne'er thought goodness dwelt in many men,
But what there was of goodness in the world,
She thought you had it all; but now she sees
The jewel she esteem'd is counterfeit;
That you are but a common man yourself--
A traitor to her and her virtuous love;
That all men are betrayers, and their breasts
As full of dangerous gulfs as is the sea,
Where any woman, thinking to find harbour,
She and her honour are precipitated,
And never to be brought with safety off.
Alas, my hapless lady desolate!
Distress'd, forsaken virgin!

INGEN. Sure, this boy
Is of an excellent nature who, so newly
Ta'en to her service, feels his mistress' grief,
As he and they were old familiar friends.
Why weep'st thou, gentle lad?

MAID. Who hath one tear,
And would not save't from all occasions,
From brothers' slaughters and from mothers' deaths,
To spend it here for my distressed lady?
But, sir, my lady did command me beg
To see your wife, that I may bear to her
The sad report. What creature could make you
Untie the hand fast pledged unto her?

INGEN. Wife, wife, come forth! now, gentle boy, be judge,

_Enter_ INGEN'S BROTHER, _like a woman, masked_. INGEN _kisses her_.

If such a face as this, being paid with scorn
By her I did adore, had not full power
To make me marry.

MAID. By the God of love,
She's a fair creature, but faith, should be fairer.
My lady, gentle mistress, one that thought
She had some interest in this gentleman,
(Who now is only yours) commanded me
To kiss your white hand, and to sigh and weep,
And wish you that content she should have had
In the fruition of her love you hold.
She bad me say, God give you joy, to both;
Yet this withal (if ye were married):
No one her footsteps ever more should meet,
Nor see her face but in a winding-sheet.

BRO. Alas, poor lady! faith, I pity her,
And, but to be i' th' same state, could forego
Anything I possess to ease her woe.

MAID. Love's blessing light upon thy gentle soul!
Men rail at women, mistress, but 'tis we
Are false and cruel, ten times more unkind;
You are smoother far and of a softer mind.
Sir, I have one request more.

INGEN. Gentle lad,
It must be one of a strange quality
That I deny thee: both thy form and mind
Inform me that thy nurture hath been better,
Than to betray thee to this present life.

MAID. 'Tis, that you would vouchsafe to entertain me.
My feet do tremble under me to bear
My body back unto my uncouth lady,
To assure her grief. What heart so hard would owe
A tongue to tell so sad a tale to her?
Alas! I dare not look upon her eyes,
Where wronged love sits like the basilisk.
And, sure, would kill me for my dire report:
Or rather should not I appear like death,
[_Holding up his dart._
When every word I spake shot through her heart
More mortally than his unsparing dart.

BRO. Let me speak for the boy.

INGEN. To what end, love?
No, I will sue to him to follow me.
In troth, I love thy sweet condition,
And may live to inform thy lady of thee.
Come in; dry, dry thine eyes, respite thy woe;
The effects of causes[95] crown or overthrow.

SCENE IV.

_Enter_ LORD PROUDLY, LORD FEESIMPLE, WELLTRIED, SELDOM, WIDOW, BOLD _pinning in a ruff_, WIFE.

PROUDLY. 'Slight, what should be become of her? you swear
She pass'd not forth of doors, and i' th' house she is not?

WID. Did you not see her, Princox?

PROUDLY. This same bawd
Has brought her letters from some younger brother,
And she is stolen away.

BOLD. Bawd! I defy you.
Indeed, your lordship thinks you may make bawds
Of whom you please. I'll take my oath upon a book,
Since I met her in the necessary house i' th' morning,
I ne'er set eye on her.

GRACE. She went not out of doors.

PROUDLY. Sure, she has an invisible ring.

FEE. Marry, she's the honester woman, for some of their rings are visible enough, the more shame for them, still say I. Let the pond at Islington be searched: go to, there's more have drowned themselves for love this year than you are aware of.

PROUDLY. Pish! you are a fool.

WELL. 'Sheart! call him fool again.

FEE. By this light, and I will, as soon as ever you have showed me the Swaggerers.[96]

WIFE. Her clothes are all yonder, my lord.

GRACE. And even those same she had on to-day.

PROUDLY. Madam, where is your husband?

WIFE. Rid into the country.

FEE. O' my conscience, rid into France with your sister.

OMNES. Away, away; for shame!

FEE. Why, I hope she is not the first lady that has ran away with other women's husbands.

WELL. It may be she's stolen out to see a play.

PROUDLY. Who should go with her, man?

WID. Upon my life, you'll hear of her at Master Ingen's house: some love pass'd betwixt them, and we heard that he was married to-day to another.

PROUDLY. 'Sheart! I'll go see. [_Exit_ LORD PROUDLY.

WELL. Come to the Swaggerers.

FEE. Mercy upon me! a man or a--Lord now?

[_Exeunt_ LORD FEESIMPLE, WELLTRIED.

OMNES. Here's a coil with a lord and his sister.

WID. Princox, hast not thou pinned in that ruff yet? ha! how thou fumblest!

BOLD. Troth, madam, I was ne'er brought up to it; 'tis chambermaid's work, and I have ever lived gentlewoman, and been used accordingly.

[_Exeunt._

FOOTNOTES:

[87] In reference to her female sex and male attire.

[88] These words contain an allusion to Blackfriars as a common
residence of the Puritans. The Widow subsequently refers to the same
circumstance, when in act iii. she asks Bold: "Precise and learned
Princox, dost thou not go to Blackfriars." That Blackfriars, although
the play-house was there, was crowded with Puritans may be proved by
many authorities.

[89] Two celebrated English heroines. The achievements of Mary Ambree
at the siege of Ghent, in 1584, are celebrated in a ballad which goes
by her name in Percy's "Reliques," ii. 239, edit. 1812. She is
mentioned by Fletcher, Ben Jonson, and many other dramatists; some of
whom were her contemporaries. Dr Percy conjectured that the "English
Mall" of Butler was the same female soldier, but he probably alluded
to Mall or Moll Cut-purse who forms a character in this play. Long Meg
is Long Meg of Westminster, also a masculine lady of great notoriety,
and after whom a cannon in Dover Castle, and a large flagstone in the
cloisters of Westminster Abbey are still called. Her life and "merry
pranks" were detailed in a pamphlet dated in [1582], and reprinted
[from a later edition] in 1816. It is conjectured that she was dead in
1594, but she is often spoken of in our old writers. It will be seen
by a subsequent note that Long Meg was the heroine of a play which has
not survived.

[90] It is tolerably evident that two plays (one called "Long Meg,"
and the other "The Ship"), and not one with a double title, are here
intended to be spoken of. This may seem to disprove Malone's assertion
("Shakespeare" by Boswell, iii. 304), that only one piece was
represented on one day. By Henslowe's Diary it appears that "Longe
Mege of Westminster" was performed at Newington in February 1594, and,
according to Field, it must have continued for some time popular.
Nothing is known of a dramatic piece of that date called "The Ship."
It may have been only a jig, often given at the conclusion of plays.
[Compare p. 136.]

[91] The second edition misprints this stage direction, _Enter Lord_.

[92] A noted and often-mentioned purlieu, the resort and residence of
prostitutes, &c. See "Merry Wives of Windsor," act i. sc. 2, where
enough, and more than enough, is said upon the subject. Turnbull
Street has been already mentioned.

[93] [_i.e._, Worldly.]

[94] It seems to have been the custom to employ the Irish as lackeys
or footmen at this period. R. Brathwaite, in his "Time's Curtaine
Drawne," 1621, speaking of the attendants of a courtier, mentions "two
_Irish_ lacquies" as among them. The _dart_ which, according to this
play, and Middleton and Rowley's "Faire Quarrel" (edit. 1622), they
carried, was perhaps intended as an indication of the country from
which they came, as being part of the accoutrements of the native
Irish: thus, in the description of the dumb show preceding act ii. of
"The Misfortunes of Arthur," we find the following passage: "After
which there came a man bareheaded with long black shagged hair down to
his shoulders, apparaled with an Irish jacket and shirt, having an
Irish dagger by his side and a _dart_ in his hand" [iv. 279]. The
_shirt_ in our day seldom forms part of the dress of the resident
Irish. [George Richardson] wrote a tract called "The Irish Footman ['s
Poetry," 1641, in defence of Taylor the Water-poet.]

[95] The second 4º has it _the effects of pauses_, which, if not
nonsense, is very like it.

[96] [_i.e._, The roaring boys, who are introduced a little later in
the play.]