Act 3 — SCENE II.
Reading edition
A Room in Creon’s House.
Enter Eugenia at one door, Simonides and Courtiers at the other.
Eug. Gentlemen courtiers.
First Court. All your vow’d servants,[177] lady.
Eug. O, I shall kill myself with infinite laughter!
Will nobody take my part?
Sim. An’t be a laughing business,
Put it to me, I’m one of the best in Europe;
My father died last too, I have the most cause.
Eug. You ha’ pick’d out such a time, sweet gentlemen,
To make your spleen a banquet.
Sim. O the jest!
Lady, I have a jaw stands ready for’t,
I’ll gape half way, and meet it.
60Eug. My old husband,
That cannot say his prayers out for jealousy,
And madness at your coming first to woo me——
Sim. Well said.
First Court. Go on.
Second Court. On, on.
Eug. Takes counsel with
The secrets of all art, to make himself
Youthful again.
Sim. How? youthful! ha, ha, ha!
Eug. A man of forty-five he would fain seem to be,
Or scarce so much, if he might have his will, indeed.
Sim. Ay, but his white hairs, they’ll betray his hoariness.
Eug. Why, there you are wide: he’s not the man you take him for,
Nor[178] will you know him when you see him again;
There will be five to one laid upon that.
First Court. How!
Eug. Nay, you did well to laugh faintly there;
I promise you, I think he’ll outlive me now,
And deceive law and all.
Sim. Marry, gout forbid!
Eug. You little think he was at fencing-school
At four a’clock this morning.
Sim. How, at fencing-school!
Eug. Else give no trust to woman.
Sim. By this light,
I do not like him, then; he’s like to live
Longer than I, for he may kill me first, now.
Eug. His dancer now came in as I met you.
First Court. His dancer, too!
61Eug. They observe turns and hours with him;
The great French rider will be here at ten,
With his curvetting horse.
Second Court. These notwithstanding,
His hair and wrinkles will betray his age.
Eug. I’m sure his head and beard, as he has order’d it,
Look not past fifty now: he’ll bring’t to forty
Within these four days, for nine times an hour[179]
He takes a black-lead comb, and kembs it over:
Three quarters of his beard is under fifty;
There’s but a little tuft of fourscore left,
All of one side, which will be black by Monday.
Enter Lysander.
And, to approve my truth, see where he comes!
Laugh softly, gentlemen, and look upon him.
[They go aside.
Sim. Now, by this hand, he’s almost black i’the mouth, indeed.
First Court. He should die shortly, then.
Sim. Marry, methinks he dies too fast already,
For he was all white but a week ago.
First Court. O, this same coney-white takes an excellent black,
Too soon, a mischief on’t!
Second Court. He will beguile[180]
Us all, if that little tuft northward turn black too.
Eug. Nay, sir, I wonder ’tis so long a turning.
Sim. May be some fairy’s child, held forth at midnight,
Has piss’d upon that side.
First Court. Is this the beard?
62Lys. Ah, sirrah? my young boys, I shall be for you:
This little mangy tuft takes up more time
Than all the beard beside. Come you a wooing,
And I alive and lusty? you shall find
An alteration, jack-boys; I have a spirit yet,
And can do offices of youth yet lightly;
At least, I will do, though it pain me a little.
Shall not a man, for a little foolish age,
Enjoy his wife to himself? must young court tits
Play tomboys’ tricks with her, and he live? ha!
I have blood that will not bear’t; yet, I confess,
I should be at my prayers—but where’s the dancer, there!
Enter Dancing-Master.
Mast. Here, sir.
Lys. Come, come, come, one trick a day,
And I shall soon recover all again.
Sim. And I have a scurvy grinning[185] laugh a’ mine own,
Will spoil all, I am afraid.
Eug. Marry, take heed, sir.
Pup!—there ’tis. [Bursts into a laugh.
63Eug. Peace! O, peace!
Lys. Come, I am ready, sir.
I hear the church-book’s lost where I was born too,
And that shall set me back one[188] twenty years;
There is no little comfort left in that:
And—[then] my three court-codlings, that look parboil’d,
As if they came from Cupid’s scalding-house——
Sim. He means me specially, I hold my life.
Mast. What trick will your old worship learn this morning, sir?
Lys. Marry, a trick, if thou couldst teach a man,
To keep his wife to himself; I’d fain learn that.
Mast. That’s a hard trick, for an old man specially;
The horse-trick comes the nearest.
Lys. Thou sayst true, i’faith,
They must be hors’d indeed, else there’s no keeping on ’em,
And horse-play at fourscore is not so ready.
Mast. Look you, here’s your worship’s horse-trick,[189] sir. [Gives a spring.
Lys. Nay, say not so,
’Tis none of mine; I fall down horse and man,
If I but offer at it.
Mast. My life for yours, sir.
Lys. Sayst thou me so? [Springs aloft.
Mast. Well offer’d, by my viol, sir.
64Lys. A pox of this horse-trick! ’t has play’d the jade with me,
And given me a wrench i’the back.
Mast. Now here’s your inturn, and your trick above ground.
Lys. Prithee, no more, unless thou hast a mind
To lay me under ground; one of these tricks
Is enough in a morning.
Mast. For your galliard, sir,
You are complete enough, ay, and may challenge
The proudest coxcomb of ’em all, I’ll stand to’t.
Lys. Faith, and I’ve other weapons for the rest too:
I have prepar’d for ’em, if e’er I take
My Gregories here again.
Sim. O, I shall burst,
I can hold out no longer.
Eug. He spoils all. [They come forward.
Lys. The devil and his grinners! are you come?
Bring forth the weapons, we shall find you play;
All feats of youth too, jack-boys, feats of youth,
And these the weapons, drinking, fencing, dancing:
Your own road-ways, you glyster-pipes! I’m old, you say;
Yes, parlous old, kids, and[190] you mark me well!
This beard cannot get children, you lank suck-eggs,
Unless such weasels come from court to help us.
We will get our own brats, you lecherous dog-bolts!
65Enter a Servant with foils and glasses.
Well said, down with ’em; now we shall see your spirits.
What! dwindle you already?
Second Court. I have no quality.
Sim. Nor I, unless drinking may be reckon’d for one.
First Court. Why, Sim, it shall.
Lys. Come, dare you choose your weapon now?
First Court. I? dancing, sir, and[191] you will be so hasty.
Lys. We’re for you, sir.sir.
Second Court. Fencing, I.
Lys. We’ll answer you too.
Sim. I am for drinking; your wet weapon there.
Lys. That wet one has cost many a princox life;
And I will send it through you with a powder!
Sim. Let [it] come, with a pox! I care not, so’t be drink.
I hope my guts will hold, and that’s e’en all
A gentleman can look for of such trillibubs.[192]
Lys. Play the first weapon; come, strike, strike, I say.
Yes, yes, you shall be first; I’ll observe court rules:
Always the worst goes foremost, so ’twill prove, I hope.
[First Courtier dances a galliard.[193]
So, sir! you’ve spit your poison; now come I.
66Now, forty years go[194] backward and assist me,
Fall from me half my age, but for three minutes,
That I may feel no crick! I will put fair for’t,
Although I hazard twenty sciaticas. [Dances.
So, I have hit you.
First Court. You’ve done well, i’faith, sir.
Lys. If you confess it well, ’tis excellent,
And I have hit you soundly; I am warm now:
The second weapon instantly.
Second Court. What, so quick, sir?
Will you not allow yourself a breathing-time?
Lys. I’ve breath enough at all times, Lucifer’s musk-cod,
To give your perfum’d worship three vennies:[195]
A sound old man puts his thrust better home
Than a spic’d young man: there I. [They fence.
Second Court. Then have at you, fourscore.
Lys. You lie, twenty, I hope, and you shall find it.
Sim. I’m glad I miss’d this weapon, I[’d] had an eye
Popt out ere this time, or my two butter-teeth
Thrust down my throat instead of a flap-dragon.[196]
67Lys. There’s two, pentweezle. [Hits him.
Mast. Excellently touch’d, sir.
Second Court. Had ever man such luck! speak your opinion, gentlemen.
Sim. Methinks, your luck’s good, that your eyes are in still;
Mine would have dropt out, like a pig’s half-roasted.
Lys. There wants a third—and there it is[197] again!
[Hits him again.'
Second Court. The devil has steel’d him.
Eug. What a strong fiend is jealousy!
Lys. You’re despatch’d, bear-whelp.
Sim. Now comes my weapon in.
Lys. Here, toadstool, here.
Sim. Vennies in Venice glasses! let ’em come,
They’ll bruise no flesh, I’m sure, nor break no bones.
Second Court. Yet you may drink your eyes out, sir.
Sim. Ay, but that’s nothing;
Then they go voluntarily: I do not
Love to have ’em thrust out, whether they will or no.
Lys. Here’s your first weapon, duck’s-meat.
Sim. How! a Dutch what-you-call-’em,
Stead of a German faulchion! a shrewd weapon,
And, of all things, hard to be taken down:
Yet down it must, I have a nose goes into’t;
I shall drink double, I think.
First Court. The sooner off, Sim.
68Lys. I’ll pay you speedily, —— with a trick[200]
I learnt once amongst drunkards; here’s [a] half-pike.
[Drinks.
Sim. Half-pike comes well after Dutch what-you-call-’em,
They’d never be asunder by their good will.[201]
First Court. Well pull’d of an old fellow!
Lys. O, but your fellows
Pull better at a rope.
First Court. There’s a hair, Sim,
In that glass.
Sim. An’t be as long as a halter, down it goes;
No hair shall cross me. [Drinks.
Lys. I[’ll] make you stink worse than your pole-cats do:
Here’s long-sword, your last weapon.
[Offers him the glass.
Sim. No more weapons.
First Court. Why, how now, Sim? bear up, thou sham’st us all, else.
Sim. [’S]light, I shall shame you worse, and[202] I stay longer.
I ha’ got the scotomy[203] in my head already,
The whimsey: you all turn round—do not you dance, gallants?
69Second Court. Pish! what’s all this? why, Sim, look, the last venny.[204]
Sim. No more vennies go[205] down here, for these two
Are coming up again.
Second Court. Out! the disgrace of drinkers!
Sim. Yes, ’twill out;
Do you smell nothing yet?
First Court. Smell!
Sim. Farewell quickly, then;
You[206] will do, if I stay. [Exit.
First Court. A foil go with thee!
Lys. What, shall we put down youth at her own virtues?
Beat folly in her own ground? wondrous much!
Why may not we be held as full sufficient
To love our own wives then, get our own children,
And live in free peace till we be dissolv’d,
For such spring butterflies that are gaudy-wing’d,
But no more substance than those shamble-flies
Which butchers’ boys snap between sleep and waking?
Come but to crush you once, you are[207] but maggots,
For all your beamy outsides!
Enter Cleanthes.
Eug. Here’s Cleanthes;
He comes to chide;—let him alone a little,
Our cause will be reveng’d; look, look, his face
Is set for stormy weather; do but mark
How the clouds gather in ’t, ’twill pour down straight.
70Clean. Methinks, I partly know you, that’s my grief.
Could you not all be lost? that had been handsome;
But to be known at all, ’tis more than shameful.
Why, was not your name wont to be Lysander?
Lys. ’Tis so still, coz.
Clean. Judgment, defer thy coming! else this man’s miserable.
Eug. I told you there would be a shower anon.
Second Court. We’ll in, and hide our noddles.
[Exeunt Eugenia and Courtiers.
Clean. What devil brought this colour to your mind,
Which, since your childhood, I ne’er saw you wear?
[Sure] you were ever of an innocent gloss
Since I was ripe for knowledge, and would you lose it,
And change the livery of saints and angels
For this mixt monstrousness; to force a ground
That has been so long hallow’d like a temple,
To bring forth fruits of earth now; and turn back[208]
To the wild cries of lust, and the complexion
Of sin in act, lost and long since repented!
Would you begin a work ne’er yet attempted,
To pull time backward?
See what your wife will do! are your wits perfect?
Lys. My wits!
Clean. I like it ten times worse; for’t had been safer
Now to be mad,[209] and more excusable:
I hear you dance again, and do strange follies.
71Lys. I must confess I have been put to some, coz.
Clean. And yet you are not mad! pray, say not so;
Give me that comfort of you, that you are mad,
That I may think you are at worst; for if
You are not mad, I then must guess you have
The first of some disease was never heard of,
Which may be worse than madness, and more fearful:
You’d weep to see yourself else, and your care
To pray would quickly turn you white again.
I had a father, had he liv’d his month out,
But to ha’ seen this most prodigious folly,
There needed not the law to have him cut off;
The sight of this had prov’d his executioner,
And broke his heart: he would have held it equal
Done to a sanctuary,—for what is age
But the holy place of life, chapel of ease
For all men’s wearied miseries? and to rob
That of her ornament, it is accurst
As from a priest to steal a holy vestment,
Ay, and convert it to a sinful covering.
[Exit Lysander.
I see’t has done him good; blessing go with it,
Such as may make him pure again.
Re-enter Eugenia.
Eug. ’Twas bravely touch’d, i’faith, sir.
Clean. O, you’re welcome.
Eug. Exceedingly well handled.
Clean. ’Tis to you I come; he fell but i’ my way.
Eug. You mark’d his beard, cousin?
Clean. Mark me.
72Eug. Did you ever see a hair so changed?
Clean. I must be forc’d to wake her loudly too,
The devil has rock’d her so fast asleep.—Strumpet!
Eug. Do you call, sir?
Clean. Whore!
Eug. How do you, sir?
Clean. Be I ne’er so well,
I must be sick of thee; thou’rt a disease
That stick’st to th’ heart,—as all such women are.
Eug. What ails our kindred?
Clean. Bless me, she sleeps still!
What a dead modesty is i’ this woman,
Will never blush again! Look on thy work
But with a Christian eye, ’twould turn thy heart
Into a shower of blood, to be the cause
Of that old man’s destruction; think upon’t,
Ruin eternally; for, through thy loose follies,
Heaven has found him a faint servant lately:
His goodness has gone backward, and engender’d
With his old sins again; has[210] lost his prayers,
And all the tears that were companions with ’em:
And like a blindfold man, (giddy and blinded,)
Thinking he goes right on still, swerves but one foot,
And turns to the same place where he set out;
So he, that took his farewell of the world,
And cast the joys behind him, out of sight,
Summ’d up his hours, made even with time and men,
Is now in heart arriv’d at youth again,
All by thy wildness: thy too hasty lust
Has driven him to this strong apostacy.
Immodesty like thine was never equall’d:
I’ve heard of women, (shall I call ’em so?)
73Have welcom’d suitors ere the corpse were cold;
But thou, thy husband living:—thou’rt[211] too bold.
Eug. Well, have you done now, sir?
Clean. Look, look! she smiles yet.
Eug. All this is nothing to a mind resolv’d;
Ask any woman that, she’ll tell you so much:
You have only shewn a pretty saucy wit,
Which I shall not forget, nor to requite it.
You shall hear from me shortly.
Clean. Shameless woman!
I take my counsel from thee, ’tis too honest,
And leave thee wholly to thy stronger master:
Bless the sex of thee from thee! that’s my prayer.
Were all like thee, so impudently common,
No man would [e’er] be found to wed a woman. [Exit.
Eug. I’ll fit you gloriously.
He that attempts to take away my pleasure,
I’ll take away his joy; and I can sure.
His conceal’d father pays for’t: I’ll e’en tell
Him that I mean to make my husband next,
And he shall tell the duke—mass, here he comes.
Re-enter Simonides.
Sim. Has[212] had a bout with me too.
Eug. What! no? since, sir?
Sim. A flirt, a little flirt; he call’d me strange names,
But I ne’er minded him.
Eug. You shall quit him, sir,
When he as little minds you.
Sim. I like that well.
74I love to be reveng’d when no one thinks of me;
There’s little danger that way.
Eug. This is it then;
He you shall strike, your stroke shall be profound,
And yet your foe not guess who gave the wound.
Sim. A’ my troth, I love to give such wounds.
[Exeunt.