Chapter X: Act III: Scene II

PROS. Beshrew me, but it was an absolute good jest, and
exceedingly well carried.

LOR. JU. Ay, and our ignorance maintain'd it as well,
did it not?

PROS. Yes, faith, but was't possible thou should'st not
know him?

LOR. JU. 'Fore God, not I, an I might have been join'd
patten with one of the nine worthies for knowing him.
'Sblood, man, he had so writhen himself into the habit of
one of your poor Disparview's here, your decayed, ruinous,
worm-eaten gentlemen of the round: such as have vowed to
sit on the skirts of the city, let your Provost and his
half dozen of halberdiers do what they can; and have
translated begging out of the old hackney pace, to a fine
easy amble, and made it run as smooth off the tongue as a
shove-groat shilling, into the likeness of one of these
lean Pirgo's, had he moulded himself so perfectly, observing
every trick of their action, as varying the accent: swearing
with an emphasis. Indeed, all with so special and exquisite
a grace, that (hadst thou seen him) thou would'st have sworn
he might have been the Tamberlane, or the Agamemnon on the
rout.

PROS. Why, Musco, who would have thought thou hadst been
such a gallant?

LOR. JU. I cannot tell, but (unless a man had juggled
begging all his life time, and been a weaver of phrases
from his infancy, for the apparelling of it) I think
the world cannot produce his rival.

PROS. Where got'st thou this coat, I marle?

MUS. Faith, sir, I had it of one of the devil's near
kinsmen, a broker.

PROS. That cannot be, if the proverb hold, a crafty
knave needs no broker.

MUS. True, sir, but I need a broker, ergo, no crafty
knave.

PROS. Well put off, well put off.

LOR. JU. Tut, he has more of these shifts.

MUS. And yet where I have one, the broker has ten, sir.

[ENTER PIS.]

PIS. Francisco, Martino, ne'er a one to be found now:
what a spite's this?

PROS. How now, Piso? is my brother within?

PIS. No, sir, my master went forth e'en now, but Signior
Giuliano is within. Cob, what, Cob! Is he gone too?

PROS. Whither went thy master? Piso, canst thou tell?

PIS. I know not, to Doctor Clement's, I think, sir. Cob.

[EXIT PIS.]

LOR. JU. Doctor Clement, what's he? I have heard much
speech of him.

PROS. Why, dost thou not know him? he is the Gonfaloniere
of the state here, an excellent rare civilian, and a great
scholar, but the only mad merry old fellow in Europe: I
shewed him you the other day.

LOR. JU. Oh, I remember him now; Good faith, and he hath
a very strange presence, methinks, it shews as if he stood
out of the rank from other men. I have heard many of his
jests in Padua; they say he will commit a man for taking
the wall of his horse.

PROS. Ay, or wearing his cloak on one shoulder, or any
thing indeed, if it come in the way of his humour.

PIS. Gaspar, Martino, Cob: 'Sheart, where should they be,
trow?

[ENTER PISO.]

BOB. Signior Thorello's man, I pray thee vouchsafe
us the lighting of this match.

PIS. A pox on your match, no time but now to vouchsafe?
Francisco, Cob.

[EXIT.]

BOB. Body of me: here's the remainder of seven pound,
since yesterday was sevennight. It's your right Trinidado:
did you never take any, signior?

STEP. No, truly, sir; but I'll learn to take it now, since
you commend it so.

BOB. Signior, believe me (upon my relation) for what I
tell you, the world shall not improve. I have been in the
Indies, (where this herb grows) where neither myself nor a
dozen gentlemen more (of my knowledge) have received the
taste of any other nutriment in the world, for the space
of one and twenty weeks, but tobacco only. Therefore it
cannot be but 'tis most divine. Further, take it in the
nature, in the true kind, so, it makes an antidote, that had
you taken the most deadly poisonous simple in all Florence it
should expel it, and clarify you with as much ease as I speak.
And for your green wound, your Balsamum, and your -- are all
mere gulleries, and trash to it, especially your Trinidado:
your Nicotian is good too: I could say what I know of the
virtue of it, for the exposing of rheums, raw humours,
crudities, obstructions, with a thousand of this kind; but I
profess myself no quack-salver. Only thus much; by Hercules,
I do hold it, and will affirm it (before any Prince in
Europe) to be the most sovereign and precious herb that ever
the earth tendered to the use of man.

LOR. JU. Oh, this speech would have done rare in an
apothecary's mouth.

[ENTER PISO AND COB.]

PIS. Ay; close by Saint Anthony's: Doctor Clement's.

COB. Oh, oh.

BOB. Where's the match I gave thee?

PIS. 'Sblood, would his match, and he, and pipe, and
all, were at Sancto Domingo.

[EXIT.]

COB. By God's deins, I marle what pleasure or felicity
they have in taking this roguish tobacco; it's good for
nothing but to choke a man, and fill him full of smoke
and embers: there were four died out of one house last
week with taking of it, and two more the bell went for
yesternight, one of them (they say) will ne'er escape it,
he voided a bushel of soot yesterday, upward and downward.
By the stocks, an there were no wiser men than I, I'd
have it present death, man or woman, that should but deal
with a tobacco pipe; why, it will stifle them all in the
end as many as use it; it's little better than rat's-bane.

[EXIT PISO.]

ALL. Oh, good Signior; hold, hold.

BOB. You base cullion, you.

PIS. Sir, here's your match; come, thou must needs be
talking too.

COB. Nay, he will not meddle with his match, I warrant
you; well, it shall be a dear beating, an I live.

BOB. Do you prate?

LOR. JU. Nay, good Signior, will you regard the humour
of a fool? Away, knave.

PROS. Piso, get him away.

[EXIT PISO AND COB.]

BOB. A whoreson filthy slave, a turd, an excrement.
Body of Caesar, but that I scorn to let forth so mean a
spirit, I'd have stabb'd him to the earth.

PROS. Marry, God forbid, sir.

BOB. By this fair heaven, I would have done it.

STEP. Oh, he swears admirably; (by this fair heaven!)
Body of Caesar: I shall never do it, sure (upon my salvation).
No, I have not the right grace.

MAT. Signior, will you any? By this air, the most divine
tobacco as ever I drunk.

LOR. JU. I thank you, sir.

STEP. Oh, this gentleman doth it rarely too, but nothing
like the other. By this air, as I am a gentleman: By Phoebus.

[EXIT BOB. AND MAT.]

MUS. Master, glance, glance: Signior Prospero.

STEP. As I have a soul to be saved, I do protest --

PROS. That you are a fool.

LOR. JU. Cousin, will you any tobacco?

STEP. Ay, sir: upon my salvation.

LOR. JU. How now, cousin?

STEP. I protest, as I am a gentleman, but no soldier indeed.

PROS. No, Signior, as I remember, you served on a great horse,
last general muster.

STEP. Ay, sir, that's true, cousin, may I swear as I am a
soldier, by that?

LOR. JU. Oh yes, that you may.

STEP. Then as I am a gentleman, and a soldier, it is divine
tobacco.

PROS. But soft, where's Signior Matheo? gone?

MUS. No, sir, they went in here.

PROS. Oh, let's follow them: Signior Matheo is gone to
salute his mistress, sirrah, now thou shalt hear some of
his verses, for he never comes hither without some shreds
of poetry: Come, Signior Stephano. Musco.

STEP. Musco? where? Is this Musco?

LOR. JU. Ay; but peace, cousin, no words of it at any hand.

STEP. Not I, by this fair heaven, as I have a soul to be
saved, by Phoebus.

PROS. Oh rare! your cousin's discourse is simply suited,
all in oaths.

LOR. JU. Ay, he lacks nothing but a little light stuff,
to draw them out withal, and he were rarely fitted to the
time.

[EXEUNT.]