Enter TRUEWIT with a post-horn, and a halter in his hand. True. By your leave, sir;-I am a stranger here :-Is your name master Morose? is your name master Morose? Fishes! Pythagoreans all! This is strange. What say you, sir nothing! Has Harpocrates been here with his club, among you? Well, sir, I will believe you to be the man at this time: I will venture upon you, sir. Your friends at court commend them to you, sir Mor. O men! O manners! was there ever such an impudence? True. And are extremely solicitous for you, sir. True. Mine own knave, and your compeer, sir. True. You shall taste the one half of my dagger, if you do, groom; and you the other, if you stir, sir: Be patient, I charge you, in the king's name, and hear me without insurrection. They say, you are to marry; to marry; do you mark, sir? Mor. How then, rude companion! True. Marry, your friends do wonder, sir, the Thames being so near, wherein you may drown, so handsomely; or London Bridge, at a low fall, with a fine leap, to hurry you down the stream; or, such a delicate steeple in the town, as Bow, to vault from; or, a braver height, as Paul's: Or, if you affected to do it nearer home, and a shorter way, an excellent garret-window into the street; or, a beam in the said garret, with this halter [shows him the halter]-which they have sent, and desire that you would sooner commit your grave head to this knot, than to the wedlock noose; or, take a little sublimate, and go out of the world like a rat; or a fly, as one said, with a straw in your arse: any way, rather than follow this goblin Matrimony. Alas, sir, do you ever think to find a chaste wife in these times ? now, when there are so many masques, plays, Puritan preachings, mad folks, and other strange sights to be seen daily, private and public If you had lived in king Etheldred's time, sir, or Edward the Confessor, you might, perhaps, have found one in some cold country hamlet, then, a dull frosty wench, would have been contented with one man: now, they will as soon be pleased with one leg, or one eye. I'll tell you, sir, the monstrous hazards you shall run with a wife. Mor. Good sir, have I ever cozen'd any friends of yours of their land bought their possessions? taken forfeit of their mortgage begg'd a reversion from them? bastarded their issue? What have I done, that may deserve this! True. Nothing, sir, that I know, but your itch of marriage. Mor. Why, if I had made an assassinate upon your father, vitiated your mother, ravished your sisters True. I would kill you, sir, I would kill you, if you had. Mor. Why, you do more in this, sir: it were a vengeance centuple, for all facinorous acts that could be named, to do that you do. True. Alas, sir, I am but a messenger: I but tell you, what you must hear. It seems your friends are careful after your soul's health, sir, and would have you know the danger: (but you may do your pleasure for all them, I persuade not, sir). If, after you are married, your wife do run away with a vaulter, or the Frenchman that walks upon ropes, or him that dances the jig, or a fencer for his skill at his weapon; why it is not their fault, they have discharged their consciences; when you know what may happen. Nay, suffer valiantly, sir, for I must tell you all the perils that you are obnoxious to. If she be fair, young and vegetous, no sweetmeats ever drew more flies; all the yellow doublets and great roses in the town will be there. If foul and crooked, she'll be with them, and buy those doublets and roses, sir. If rich, and that you marry her dowry, not her, she'll reign in your house as imperious as a widow. If noble, all her kindred will be your tyrants. If fruitful, as proud as May, and humorous as April; she must have her doctors, her midwives, her nurses, her longings every hour; though it be for the dearest morsel of man. If learned, there was never such a parrot; all your patrimony will be too little for the guests that must be invited to hear her speak Latin and Greek; and you must lie with her in those languages too, if you will please her. If precise, you must feast all the silenced brethen, once in three days; salute the sisters; entertain the whole family, or wood of them; and hear longwinded exercises, singings and catechisings, which you are not given to, and yet must give for; to please the zealous matron your wife, who for the holy cause, will cozen you over and above. You begin to sweat, sir! but this is not half, i'faith: you may do your pleasure, notwithstanding, as I said before: I come not to persuade you. [MUTE is stealiny away. Upon my faith, master serving-man, if you do stir, I will beat you. Mor. O, what is my sin! what is my sin! True. Then, if you love your wife, or rather dote on her, sir; O, how she'll torture you, and take pleasure in your torments! you shall lie with her but when she lists; she will not hurt her beauty, her complexion; or it must be for that jewel, or that pearl, when she does: every half hour's pleasure must be bought anew, and with the same pain and charge you woo'd her at first. Then you must keep what servants she please; what company she will; that friend must not visit you without her license; and him she loves most, she will seem to hate eagerliest, to decline your jealousy; or, feign to be jealous of you first; and for that cause go live with her she-friend, or cousin at the college, that can instruct her in all the mysteries of writing letters, corrupting servants, taming spies; where she must have that rich gown for such a great day; a new one for the next; a richer for the third; be served in silver; have the chamber fill'd with a succession of grooms, footmen, ushers, and other messengers; besides embroiderers, jewellers, tire-women, sempsters, feathermen, perfumers; whilst she feels not how the land drops away, nor the acres melt; nor foresees the change, when the mercer has your woods for her velvets; never weighs what her pride costs, sir; so she may kiss a page, or a smooth chin, that has the despair of a beard: be a stateswoman, know all the news, what was done at Salisbury, what at the Bath, what at court, what in progress; or, so she may censure poets, and authors, and styles, and compare them; Daniel with Spenser, Jonson with the t'other youth, and so forth: or be thought cunning in controversies, or the very knots of divinity: and have often in her mouth the state of the question; and then skip to the mathematics, and demonstration; and answer in religion to one, in state to another, in bawdry to a third. Mor. O, O! True. All this is very true, sir. And then her going in disguise to that conjurer, and this cunning woman: where the first question is, how soon you shall die? next, if her present servant love her next, if she shall have a new servant? and how many which of her family would make the best bawd, male or female? what precedence she shall have by her next match and sets down the answers, and believes them above the scriptures. Nay, perhaps she'll study the art. Mor. Gentle sir, have you done? have you had your pleasure of me? I'll think of these things. True. Yes, sir: and then comes reeking home of vapour and sweat, with going a foot, and lies in a month of a new face, all oil and birdlime; and rises in asses' milk, and is cleansed with a new fucus; God be wi' you, sir. One thing more, which I had almost forgot. This too, with whom you are to marry, may have made a conveyance of her virginity afore hand, as your wise widows do of their states, before they marry, in trust to some friend, sir: Who can tell! Or if she have not done it yet, she may do, upon the wedding-day, or the night before, and antedate you cuckold. The like has been heard of in nature. "Tis no devised, impossible thing, sir. God be wi' you: I'll be bold to leave this rope with you, sir, for a remembrance.-Farewell, Mute ! [Exit. Mor. Come, have me to my chamber: but first shut the door. [TRUEWIT winds the horn without.] O, shut the door, shut the door! is he come again? Enter CUTBEARD. Out. 'Tis I, sir, your barber. Mor. O, Cutbeard, Cutbeard, Cutbeard here has been a cut-throat with me: help me in to my bed, and give me physic with thy counsel. [Exeunt. SCENE II.-A Room in SIR JOHN DAW's House. Enter DAW, CLERIMONT, DAUPHINE, and EPICENE. Daw. Nay, an she will, let her refuse at her own charges; 'tis nothing to me, gentlemen: but she will not be invited to the like feasts or guests every day. Cler. O, by no means, she may not refuse -to stay at home, if you love your reputation: 'Slight, your are invited thither o' purpose to be seen, and laughed at by |