A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) - Various
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SUM. A broken staff, a lame right hand I had,
If thou wert all the stay that held me up,
_Nihil violentum perpetuum_.
No violence that liveth to old age.
Ill-govern'd star, that never bod'st good luck,
I banish thee a twelvemonth and a day
Forth of my presence; come not in my sight,
Nor show thy head so much as in the night.
ORION. I am content: though hunting be not out,
We will go hunt in hell for better hap.
One parting blow, my hearts, unto our friends,
To bid the fields and huntsmen all farewell.
Toss up your bugle-horns unto the stars:
Toil findeth ease, peace follows after wars.
[_Exit_.
[_Here they go out, blowing their horns, and
hallooing as they came in_.
WILL SUM. Faith, this scene of Orion is right _prandium caninum_, a
dog's dinner which, as it is without wine, so here's a coil about dogs
without wit. If I had thought the ship of fools[66] would have stay'd to
take in fresh water at the Isle of Dogs, I would have furnish'd it with
a whole kennel of collections to the purpose. I have had a dog myself,
that would dream and talk in his sleep, turn round like Ned fool, and
sleep all night in a porridge-pot. Mark but the skirmish between
Sixpence and the fox, and it is miraculous how they overcome one another
in honourable courtesy. The fox, though he wears a chain, runs as though
he were free; mocking us (as it is a crafty beast), because we, having a
lord and master to attend on, run about at our pleasures, like
masterless men. Young Sixpence, the best page his master hath, plays a
little, and retires. I warrant he will not be far out of the way when
his master goes to dinner. Learn of him, you diminutive urchins, how to
behave yourselves in your vocation: take not up your standings in a
nut-tree, when you should be waiting on my lord's trencher. Shoot but a
bit at butts; play but a span at points. Whatever you do, _memento
mori_--remember to rise betimes in the morning.
SUM. Vertumnus, call Harvest.
VER. Harvest, by west and by north, by south and by east,
Show thyself like a beast.
Goodman Harvest, yeoman, come in and say what you can. Boom for the
scythe and the sickle there.
_Enter_ HARVEST, _with a scythe on his neck, and all
his reapers with sickles, and a great black bowl with
a posset in it, borne before him; they come in singing.
The Song.
Merry, merry, merry: cheery, cheery, cheery,
Trowl the blade bowl[67] to me;
Hey derry, derry, with a poup and a lerry,
I'll trowl it again to thee:
Hooky, hooky, we have shorn,
And we have bound,
And we have brought Harvest
Home to town_.
SUM. Harvest, the bailiff of my husbandry,
What plenty hast thou heap'd into our barns?
I hope thou hast sped well, thou art so blithe.
HAR. Sped well or ill, sir, I drink to you on the same.
Is your throat clear to help us sing, _Hooky, hooky?
[Here they all sing after him.
Hooky, hooky, we have shorn,
And we have bound;
And we have brought Harvest
Home to town_.
AUT. Thou Corydon, why answer'st not direct?
HAR. Answer? why, friend, I am no tapster, to say, Anon, anon, sir:[68]
but leave you to molest me, goodman tawny-leaves, for fear (as the
proverb says, leave is light) so I mow off all your leaves with my
scythe.
WIN. Mock not and mow[69] not too long; you were best not,[70]
For fear we whet your scythe upon your pate.
SUM. Since thou art so perverse in answering,
Harvest, hear what complaints are brought to me.
Thou art accused by the public voice
For an engrosser of the common store;
A carl that hast no conscience nor remorse,
But dost impoverish the fruitful earth,
To make thy garners rise up to the heavens.
To whom giv'st thou? who feedeth at thy board?
No alms, but [an] unreasonable gain
Digests what thy huge iron teeth devour:
Small beer, coarse bread, the hind's and beggar's cry,
Whilst thou withholdest both the malt and flour,
And giv'st us bran and water (fit for dogs).
HAR. Hooky, hooky! if you were not my lord, I would say you lie. First
and foremost, you say I am a grocer. A grocer is a citizen: I am no
citizen, therefore no grocer. A hoarder up of grain: that's false; for
not so much for my elbows eat wheat every time I lean upon them.[71] A
carl: that is as much as to say, a coneycatcher of good fellowship. For
that one word you shall pledge me a carouse: eat a spoonful of the curd
to allay your choler. My mates and fellows, sing no more _Merry, merry_,
but weep out a lamentable _Hooky, hooky_, and let your sickles cry--
_Sick, sick, and very sick,
And side, and for the time;
For Harvest your master is
Abusd without reason or rhyme_.
I have no conscience, I? I'll come nearer to you, and yet I am no scab,
nor no louse. Can you make proof wherever I sold away my conscience, or
pawned it? Do you know who would buy it, or lend any money upon it? I
think I have given you the pose. Blow your nose, Master Constable. But
to say that I impoverish the earth, that I rob the man in the moon, that
I take a purse on the top of St Paul's steeple; by this straw and thread,
I swear you are no gentleman, no proper man, no honest man, to make me
sing, _O man in desperation_.[72]
SUM. I must give credit unto what I hear!
For other than I hear detract[73] I nought.
HAR. Ay, ay; nought seek, nought have: An ill-husband is the first step
to a knave. You object, I feed none at my board: I am sure, if you were
a hog, you would never say so: for, sir reverence of their worships,
they feed at my stable-table every day. I keep good hospitality for hens
and geese: gleaners are oppressed with heavy burthens of my bounty:
They take me and eat me to the very bones,
Till there be nothing left but gravel and stones;
And yet I give no alms, but devour all! They say, what a man cannot hear
well, you hear with your harvest-ears; but if you heard with your
harvest-ears, that is, with the ears of corn which my alms-cart scatters,
they would tell you that I am the very poor man's box of pity; that there
are more holes of liberality open in Harvest's heart than in a sieve or
a dust-box. Suppose you were a craftsman or an artificer, and should come
to buy corn of me, you should have bushels of me; not like the baker's
loaf, that should weigh but six ounces, but usury for your money,
thousands for one. What would you have more? Eat me out of my apparel,[74]
if you will, if you suspect me for a miser.
SUM. I credit thee, and think thou wert belied.
But tell me, hast thou a good crop this year?
HAR. Hay, good[75] plenty, which was so sweet
and so good, that when I jerted my whip, and said
to my horses but _hay_, they would go as they were
mad.
SUM. But _hay_ alone thou sayst not, but _hay-ree_[76].
HAR. I sing hay-ree, that is, hay and rye; meaning that they shall have
hay and rye, their bellyfuls, if they will draw hard. So we say, _Wa
hay_, when they go out of the way; meaning that they shall want hay if
they will not do as they should do.
SUM. How thrive thy oats, thy barley, and thy wheat?
HAR. My oats grow like a cup of beer that makes the brewer rich; my rye
like a cavalier, that wears a huge feather in his cap, but hath no
courage in his heart; hath[77] a long stalk, a goodly husk, but nothing
so great a kernel as it was wont. My barley, even as many a novice, is
cross-bitten,[78] as soon as ever he peeps out of the shell, so was it
frost-bitten in the blad, yet pick'd up his crumbs again afterward, and
bad "Fill pot, hostess," in spite of a dear year. As for my peas and my
vetches, they are famous, and not to be spoken of.
AUT. Ay, ay, such country-button'd caps as you
Do want no fetches[79] to undo great towns.
HAR. Will you make good your words that we want no fetches?
WIN. Ay, that he shall.
HAR. Then fetch us a cloak-bag, to carry away yourself in.
SUM. Plough-swains are blunt, and will taunt bitterly.
Harvest, when all is done, thou art the man:
Thou dost me the best service of them all.
Rest from thy labours, till the year renews,
And let the husbandmen [all] sing thy praise.
HAR. Rest from my labours, and let the husbandmen sing my praise? Nay,
we do not mean to rest so: by your leave, we'll have a largess amongst
you, ere we part.
ALL. A largess, a largess, a largess!
WILL SUM. Is there no man will give them a hiss for a largess?
HAR. No, that there is not, goodman Lungis.[80] I see charity waxeth
cold, and I think this house be her habitation, for it is not very hot:
we were as good even put up our pipes and sing _Merry, merry_, for we
shall get no money.
[_Here they all go out singing.
Merry, merry, merry: cheery, cheery, cheery!
Trowl the black bowl to me.
Hey derry, derry, with a poup and a lerry;
I'll trowl it again to thee.
Hooky, hooky, we have shorn
And we have bound,
And we have brought Harvest
Home to town_.
WILL SUM. Well, go thy ways, thou bundle of straw: I'll give thee this
gift; thou shalt be a clown while thou liv'st. As lusty as they are,
they run on the score with George's wife for their posset; and God knows
who shall pay goodman Yeoman for his wheat sheaf. They may sing well
enough--
_"Trowl the black bowl to me,
Trowl the black bowl to me_;"
for a hundred to one but they will all be drunk, ere they go to bed. Yet
of a slavering fool, that hath no conceit in anything but in carrying a
wand in his hand with commendation, when he runneth by the highway-side,
this stripling Harvest hath done reasonable well. O, that somebody had
the sense to set his thatched suit on fire, and so lighted him out: if I
had but a jet[81] ring on my finger, I might have done with him what I
list. I had spoiled him, had I[82] took his apparel prisoner; for, it
being made of straw, and the nature of jet to draw straw unto it, I
would have nailed him to the pommel of my chair, till the play were
done, and then have carried him to my chamber-door, and laid him at the
threshold, as a wisp or a piece of mat, to wipe my shoes on every time I
come up dirty.
SUM. Vertumnus, call Bacchus.
VER. Bacchus, Baccha, Bacchum: God Bacchus, God fat-back,
Baron of double beer and bottle ale,
Come in and show thy nose that is nothing pale:
Back, back, that[83] God barrel-belly may enter.
_Enter_ BACCHUS _riding upon an ass trapped in ivy, himself
dressed in vine leaves, and a garland of grapes on his head;
his companions having all jacks in their hands, and ivy
garlands on their heads; they come singing.
The Song.
Monsieur Mingo for quaffing doth surpass,
In cup, in corn or glass.
God Bacchus, do me right,
And dub me knight
Domingo_.[84]
BAC. Wherefore didst thou call me, Vertumnus? hast any drink to give me?
One of you hold my ass, while I light: walk him up and down the hall,
till I talk a word or two.
SUM. What, Bacchus; still _animus in patina_:[85] no mind but on the pot?
BAC. Why, Summer, Summer, how wouldst do but for rain? What's a fair
house without water coming to it! Let me see how a smith can work, if he
have not his trough standing by him. What sets an edge on a knife? the
grindstone alone? No, the moist element poured upon it, which grinds out
all gaps, sets a point upon it, and scours it as bright as the
firmament. So I tell thee, give a soldier wine before he goes to battle;
it grinds out all gaps, it makes him forget all scars and wounds, and
fight in the thickest of his enemies, as though he were but at foils
among his fellows. Give a scholar wine going to his book, or being about
to invent; it sets a new point on his wit, it glazeth it, it scours it,
it gives him _acumen_. Plato saith, _Vinum esse fomitem quendam, et
incitabilem ingenii virtutisque_. Aristotle saith, _Nulla est magna
scientia absque mixtura dementia_! There is no excellent knowledge
without mixture of madness, and what makes a man more mad in the head
than wine? _Qui bene vult [Greek: Pioein] debet ante [Greek: pinein]_:
He that will do well must drink well. _Prome, prome, potum prome_! Ho,
butler, a fresh pot! _Nunc est libendum, nunc pede libero terra
pulsanda_:[86] a pox on him that leaves his drink behind him.
_Rendezvous_!
SUM. It is wine's custom to be full of words. I pray thee, Bacchus, give
us _vicissitudinem loquendi_.
BAC. A fiddlestick! ne'er tell me I am full of words. _Faecundi calices,
quem non fecere disertum; aut bibe[87] aut abi_; either take your
drink, or you are an infidel.
SUM. I would about thy vintage question thee. How thrive thy vines?
hadst thou good store of grapes?
BAC. _Vinum quasi venenum_; Wine is poison to a sick body. A sick body
is no sound body; _ergo_, wine is a pure thing, and is poison to all
corruption. Try-lill! the hunters whoop to you. I'll stand to it:
Alexander was a brave man, and yet an arrant drunkard.
WIN. Fie, drunken sot! forgett'st thou where thou art?
My lord asks thee what vintage thou hast made?
BAC. Our vintage was a vintage, for it did not work upon the advantage:
it came in the vauntguard of Summer.
And winds and storms met it by the way,
And made it cry, alas, and well-a-day!
SUM. That was not well; but all miscarried not?
BAC. Faith, shall I tell no lie? Because you are my countryman, and so
forth; and a good fellow is a good fellow, though he have never a penny
in his purse.[88] We had but even pot-luck--little to moisten our lips
and no more. That same Sol is a pagan and a proselyte: he shined so
bright all summer, that he burnt more grapes than his beams were worth,
were every beam as big as a weaver's beam. _A fabis abstinendum_; faith,
he should have abstained, for what is flesh and blood without his liquor?
AUT. Thou want'st no liquor, nor no flesh and blood.
I pray thee, may I ask without offence,
How many tuns of wine hast in thy paunch?
Methinks that [that is] built like a round church,
Should yet have some of Julius Caesar's wine:
I warrant 'twas not broached this hundred year.
BAC. Hear'st thou, dough-belly! because thou talk'st and talk'st, and
dar'st not drink to me a black jack, wilt thou give me leave to broach
this little kilderkin of my corpse against thy back? I know thou art but
a micher,[89] and dar'st not stand me. _A vous, Monsieur Winter_, a
frolic up-se-frieze:[90] cross, ho.' _super naculum_.[91]
[_Knocks the jack upon his thumb_.
WIN. Gramercy, Bacchus, as much as though I did. For this time thou must
pardon me perforce.
BAC. What, give me the disgrace? go to, I say, I am no Pope to pardon
any man. Ran, ran, tara: cold beer makes good blood. St George for
England![92] Somewhat is better than nothing. Let me see, hast thou done
me justice? why so: thou art a king, though there were no more kings in
the cards but the knave. Summer, wilt thou have a demi-culverin, that
shall cry _Husty-tusty_, and make thy cup fly fine meal in the element?
SUM. No, keep thy drink, I pray thee, to thyself.
BAC. This Pupilonian in the fool's coat shall have a cast of martins and
a whiff. To the health of Captain Rinocerotry! Look to it; let him have
weight and measure.
WILL SUM. What an ass is this! I cannot drink so much, though I should
burst.
BAC. Fool, do not refuse your moist sustenance: come, come, dog's head
in the pot; do what you are born to.
WILL SUM. If you will needs make me a drunkard against my will, so it
is; I'll try what burden my belly is of.
BAC. Crouch, crouch on your knees, fool, when you pledge God Bacchus.
[_Here_ WILL SUMMER _drinks, and they sing
about him_, BACCHUS _begins_.
All. _Monsieur Mingo for quaffing did surpass
In cup, in can, or glass_.
BAC. Ho, well shot, a toucher, a toucher!
_For quaffing Toy doth pass,
In cup, in can, or glass_.[93]
All. _God Bacchus, do him right,
And dub him knight_.
BAC. Rise up, Sir Robert Toss-pot.
[_Here he dubs_ WILL SUMMER _with the black jack_.
SUM. No more of this, I hate it to the death.
No such deformer of the soul and sense,
As is this swinish damn'd horn drunkenness.
Bacchus, for thou abusest so earth's fruits,
Imprison'd live in cellars and in vaults.
Let none commit their counsels unto thee;
Thy wrath be fatal to thy dearest friends;
Unarmed run upon thy foemen's swords;
Never fear any plague, before it fall:
Dropsies and watery tympanies haunt thee;
Thy lungs with surfeiting be putrified,
To cause thee have an odious stinking breath;
Slaver and drivel like a child at mouth;
Be poor and beggarly in thy old age;
Let thine own kinsmen laugh when thou complain'st,
And many tears gain nothing but blind scoffs.
This is the guerdon due to drunkenness:
Shame, sickness, misery follow excess.
BAC. Now on my honour, Sim Summer, thou art a bad member, a dunce, a
mongrel, to discredit so worshipful an art after this order. Thou hast
cursed me, and I will bless thee. Never cap of Nipitaty[94] in London
come near thy niggardly habitation! I beseech the gods of good
fellowship thou may'st fall into a consumption with drinking small beer!
Every day may'st thou eat fish, and let it stick in the midst of thy
maw, for want of a cup of wine to swim away in. Venison be _venenum_ to
thee: and may that vintner have the plague in his house that sells a
drop of claret to kill the poison of it! As many wounds may'st thou have
as Caesar had in the senate-house, and get no white wine to wash them
with; and to conclude, pine away in melancholy and sorrow, before thou
hast the fourth part of a dram of my juice to cheer up thy spirits.
SUM. Hale him away, he barketh like a wolf:
It is his drink, not he, that rails on us.
BAC. Nay soft, brother Summer, back with that fool. Here is a snuff in
the bottom of the jack, enough[95] to light a man to bed withal: we'll
leave no flocks behind us, whatsoever we do.
SUM. Go drag him hence, I say, when I command.
BAC. Since we must needs go, let's go merrily. Farewell, Sir Robert
Toss-pot: sing amain _Monsieur Mingo_, whilst I mount up my ass.
[_Here they go out, singing, "Monsieur Mingo," as they came in_.
WILL SUM. Of all the gods, this Bacchus is the ill-favoured'st
mis-shapen god that ever I saw. A pox on him! he hath christened me with
a new nickname of Sir Robert Toss-pot that will not part from me this
twelvemonth. Ned fool's clothes are so perfumed with the beer he poured
on me, that there shall not be a Dutchman within twenty miles, but he'll
smell out and claim kindred of him. What a beastly thing it is to bottle
up all in a man's belly, when a man must set his guts on a gallon-pot
last, only to purchase the alehouse title of _boon companion_. "Carouse;
pledge me, and you dare! 'Swounds, I'll drink with thee for all that
ever thou art worth!" It is even as two men should strive who should run
farthest into the sea for a wager. Methinks these are good household
terms, "Will it please you to be here, sir? I commend me to you! Shall I
be so bold as trouble you? Saving your tale, I drink to you." And if
these were put in practice but a year or two in taverns, wine would soon
fall from six-and-twenty pound a tun, and be beggar's money--a penny a
quart, and take up his inn with waste beer in the alms-tub. I am a
sinner as others: I must not say much of this argument. Every one, when
he is whole, can give advice to them that are sick. My masters, you that
be good fellows, get you into corners, and sup off your provender
closely:[96] report hath a blister on her tongue! open taverns are
tell-tales. _Non peccat quicunque potest peccasse negare_.
SUM. I'll call my servants to account, said I?
A bad account; worse servants no man hath.
_Quos credis fidos effuge, tutis eris_:
The proverb I have prov'd to be too true,
_Totidem domi hostes habemus quot servos_.
And that wise caution of Democritus,
_Servus necessaria possessio, non autem dulcis_:
Nowhere fidelity and labour dwells.
How[97] young heads count to build on had I wist.
Conscience but few respect, all hunt for gain:
Except the camel have his provender
Hung at his mouth, he will not travel on.
Tyresias to Narcissus promised
Much prosperous hap and many golden days,
If of his beauty he no knowledge took.
Knowledge breeds pride, pride breedeth discontent:
Black discontent, thou urgest to revenge:
Revenge opes not her ears to poor men's prayers.
That dolt destruction is she without doubt,
That hales her forth and feedeth her with nought.
Simplicity and plainness, you I love!
Hence, double diligence, thou mean'st deceit:
Those that now serpent-like creep on the ground,
And seem to eat the dust, they crouch so low--
If they be disappointed of their prey,
Most traitorously will trace their nails and sting.
Yea, such as, like[98] the lapwing, build their nests
In a man's dung, come up by drudgery,
Will be the first that, like that foolish bird,
Will follow him with yelling and false cries.
Well[99] sung a shepherd, that now sleeps in skies,[100]
"Dumb swans do love, and not vain chattering pies."
In mountains, poets say, Echo is hid,
For her deformity and monstrous shape:
Those mountains are the houses of great lords,
Where Stentor, with his hundred voices, sounds
A hundred trumps at once with rumour fill'd.
A woman they imagine her to be,
Because that sex keep nothing close they hear;
And that's the reason magic writers frame[101]
There are more witches women, than of men;
For women generally, for the most part,
Of secrets more desirous are than men[102],
Which having got, they have no power to hold.
In these times had Echo's first fathers liv'd,
No woman, but a man, she had been feign'd
(Though women yet will want no news to prate);
For men (mean men), the scum and dross of all,
Will talk and babble of they know not what,
Upbraid, deprave, and taunt they care not whom.
Surmises pass for sound approved truths;
Familiarity and conference,
That were the sinews of societies,
Are now for underminings only us'd;
And novel wits, that love none but themselves,
Think wisdom's height as falsehood slyly couch'd,
Seeking each other to o'erthrow his mate.
O friendship! thy old temple is defac'd:
Embracing envy,[103] guileful courtesy,
Hath overgrown fraud-wanting honesty.
Examples live but in the idle schools:
Sinon bears all the sway in princes' courts.
Sickness, be thou my soul's physician;
Bring the apothecary Death with thee.
In earth is hell, hell true[104] felicity,
Compared with this world, the den of wolves!
AUT. My lord, you are too passionate without cause.
WIN. Grieve not for that which cannot be recall'd.
Is it your servant's carelessness you 'plain?
Tully by one of his own slaves was slain.
The husbandman close in his bosom nurs'd
A subtle snake, that after wrought his bane.
AUT. _Servos fideles liberalitas facit_;
Where on the contrary, _servitutem_--
Those that attend upon illiberal lords,
Whose covetise yields nought else but fair looks,
Even of those fair looks make their gainful use.
For, as in Ireland and in Denmark both,
Witches for gold will sell a man a wind[105]
Which, in the corner of a napkin wrapp'd,
Shall blow him safe unto what coast he will;
So make ill-servants sale of their lord's wind
Which, wrapp'd up in a piece of parchment,
Blows many a knave forth danger of the law.
SUM. Enough of this: let me go make my will.
Ah! it is made, although I hold my peace:
These two will share betwixt them what I have.
The surest way to get my will perform'd
Is to make my executor my heir;
And he, if all be given him, and none else,
Unfallibly will see it well-perform'd.
Lions will feed though none bid them go to.
Ill-grows the tree affordeth ne'er a graft:
Had I some issue to sit on my throne,
My grief would die, death should not hear me groan;
But when, perforce, these must enjoy my wealth,
Which thank me not, but enter't as a prey,
Bequeath'd it is not, but clean cast away.
Autumn, be thou successor to my seat:
Hold, take my crown:--look, how he grasps for it!
Thou shalt not have it yet--but hold it, too;
Why should I keep what needs I must forego?
WIN. Then, duty laid aside, you do me wrong.
I am more worthy of it far than he:
He hath no skill nor courage for to rule.
A weatherbeaten, bankrupt ass it is
That scatters and consumeth all he hath:
Each one do pluck from him without control.
He is not hot nor cold; a silly soul,
That fain would please each part[106], if so he might.
He and the Spring are scholars' favourites:
What scholars are, what thriftless kind of men,
Yourself be judge; and judge of him by them.
When Cerberus was headlong drawn from hell,
He voided a black poison from his mouth,
Call'd _Aconitum_, whereof ink was made:
That ink, with reeds first laid on dried barks,
Serv'd me awhile to make rude works withal,
Till Hermes, secretary to the gods,
Or Hermes Trismegistus, as some will,
Weary with graving in blind characters
And figures of familiar beasts and plants,
Invented letters to write lies withal.
In them he penn'd the fables of the gods,
The giants' war, and thousand tales besides.
After each nation got these toys in use[107]
There grew up certain drunken parasites,
Term'd poets, which, for a meal's meat or two.
Would promise monarchs immortality.
They vomited in verse all that they knew;
Feign'd causes and beginnings of the world;
Fetch'd pedigrees of mountains and of floods
From men and women whom the gods transform'd.
If any town or city they pass'd by
Had in compassion (thinking them madmen)
Forborne to whip them, or imprison them,
That city was not built by human hands;
'Twas rais'd by music, like Megara walls:
Apollo, poets' patron, founded it,
Because they found one fitting favour there.
Musaeus, Linus, Homer, Orpheus,
Were of this trade, and thereby won their fame.