Act 5 — ACT V. SCENE I.
Reading edition
A Street.
Enter Jack Dapper, Moll, Sir Beauteous Ganymede, and Sir Thomas Long.
J. Dap. But, prithee, master captain Jack, be plain and perspicuous with me; was it your Meg of Westminster’s courage[1134] that rescued me from the Poultry puttocks[1135] indeed?
Moll. The valour of my wit, I ensure you, sir, fetched you off bravely, when you were i’ the forlorn hope among those desperates. Sir Beauteous Ganymede here, and sir Thomas Long, heard that cuckoo, my man Trapdoor, sing the note of your ransom from captivity.
S. Beau. Uds so, Moll, where’s that Trapdoor?
Moll. Hanged, I think, by this time: a justice 531in this town, that speaks nothing but make a mittimus, away with him to Newgate, used that rogue like a firework,[1136] to run upon a line betwixt him and me.
All. How, how?
Moll. Marry, to lay trains of villany to blow up my life: I smelt the powder, spied what linstock[1137] gave fire to shoot against the poor captain of the galley-foist,[1138] and away slid I my man like a shovel-board shilling.[1139] He strouts[1140] up and down the suburbs, I think, and eats up whores, feeds upon a bawd’s garbage.
S. Tho. Sirrah, Jack Dapper——
J. Dap. What sayst, Tom Long?
S. Tho. Thou hadst a sweet-faced boy, hail-fellow with thee, to your little Gull: how is he spent?
J. Dap. Troth, I whistled the poor little buzzard off a’ my fist, because, when he waited upon me at the ordinaries, the gallants hit me i’ the teeth still, and said I looked like a painted alderman’s tomb, and the boy at my elbow like a death’s head.—Sirrah Jack, Moll——
Moll. What says my little Dapper?
S. Beau. Come, come; walk and talk, walk and talk.
532J. Dap. Moll and I’ll be i’ the midst.
Moll. These knights shall have squires’ places belike then: well, Dapper, what say you?
J. Dap. Sirrah captain, mad Mary, the gull my own father, Dapper Sir Davy, laid these London boot-halers,[1141] the catchpolls, in ambush to set upon me.
All. Your father? away, Jack!
J. Dap. By the tassels of this handkercher, ’tis true: and what was his warlike stratagem, think you? he thought, because a wicker cage tames a nightingale, a lousy prison could make an ass of me.
All. A nasty plot!
J. Dap. Ay, as though a Counter, which is a park in which all the wild beasts of the city run head by head, could tame me!
Moll. Yonder comes my lord Noland.
Enter Lord Noland.
All. Save you, my lord.
L. Nol. Well met, gentlemen all.—Good sir Beauteous Ganymede, sir Thomas Long,—and how does master Dapper?
J. Dap. Thanks, my lord.
Moll. No tobacco, my lord?
L. Nol. No, faith, Jack.
J. Dap. My lord Noland, will you go to Pimlico with us? we are making a boon voyage to that nappy land of spice-cakes.
L. Nol. Here’s such a merry ging,[1142] I could find 533in my heart to sail to the world’s end with such company: come, gentlemen, let’s on.
J. Dap. Here’s most amorous weather, my lord.
All. Amorous weather! [They walk.
J. Dap. Is not amorous a good word?
Enter Trapdoor disguised as a poor soldier with a patch over one eye, and Tearcat all in tatters.
Trap. Shall we set upon the infantry, these troops of foot? Zounds, yonder comes Moll, my whorish master and mistress! would I had her kidneys between my teeth!
Tear. I had rather have a cow-heel.
Trap. Zounds, I am so patched up, she cannot discover me: we’ll on.
Tear. Alla corago[1143] then!
Trap. Good your honours and worships, enlarge the ears of commiseration, and let the sound of a hoarse military organ-pipe penetrate your pitiful bowels, to extract out of them so many small drops of silver as may give a hard straw-bed lodging to a couple of maimed soldiers.
J. Dap. Where are you maimed?
Tear. In both our nether limbs.
Moll. Come, come, Dapper, let’s give ’em something: ’las, poor men! what money have you? by my troth, I love a soldier with my soul.
S. Beau. Stay, stay; where have you served?
S. Tho. In any part of the Low Countries?
Trap. Not in the Low Countries, if it please your manhood, but in Hungary against the Turk at the siege of Belgrade.
534L. Nol. Who served there with you, sirrah?
Trap. Many Hungarians, Moldavians, Vallachians, and Transylvanians, with some Sclavonians; and retiring home, sir, the Venetian galleys took us prisoners, yet freed us, and suffered us to beg up and down the country.
J. Dap. You have ambled all over Italy, then?
Trap. O sir, from Venice to Roma, Vecchia, Bononia,[1144] Romagna, Bologna, Modena, Piacenza, and Tuscana, with all her cities, as Pistoia, Volterra,[1145] Montepulciano, Arezzo; with the Siennois, and divers others.
Moll. Mere rogues! put spurs to ’em once more.
J. Dap. Thou lookest like a strange creature, a fat butter-box, yet speakest English: what art thou?
Tear. Ich, mine here? ich bin den ruffling Tearcat, den brave soldado; ich bin dorich all Dutchlant gereisen; der schellum das meer ine beasa ine woert gaeb, ich slaag um stroakes on tom cop; dastich den hundred touzun divel halle, frollich, mine here.
S. Beau. Here, here; let’s be rid of their jobbering.[1146]
[About to give money.
Moll. Not a cross,[1147] sir Beauteous.—You base rogues, I have taken measure of you better than a tailor can; and I’ll fit you, as you, monster with one eye, have fitted me.
Trap. Your worship will not abuse a soldier?
Moll. Soldier? thou deservest to be hanged up by that tongue which dishonours so noble a profession: 535soldier? you skeldering[1148] varlet! hold, stand; there should be a trapdoor here abouts.
[Pulls off his patch.
Trap. The balls of these glasiers[1149] of mine, mine eyes, shall be shot up and down in any hot piece of service for my invincible mistress.
J. Dap. I did not think there had been such knavery in black patches[1150] as now I see.
Moll. O sir, he hath been brought up in the Isle of Dogs,[1151] and can both fawn like a spaniel, and bite like a mastiff, as he finds occasion.
L. Nol. What are you, sirrah? a bird of this feather too?
Tear. A man beaten from the wars, sir.
S. Tho. I think so, for you never stood to fight.
J. Dap. What’s thy name, fellow soldier?
Tear. I am called by those that have seen my valour, Tearcat.
All. Tearcat?
Moll. A mere whip-jack,[1152] and that is, in the 536commonwealth of rogues, a slave that can talk of sea-fight, name all your chief pirates, discover more countries to you than either the Dutch, Spanish, French, or English ever found out; yet indeed all his service is by land, and that is to rob a fair, or some such venturous exploit. Tearcat? ’foot, sirrah, I have your name, now I remember me, in my book of horners; horns for the thumb,[1153] you know how.
Tear. No indeed, captain Moll, for I know you by sight, I am no such nipping Christian,[1154] but a maunderer upon the pad,[1155] I confess; and meeting with honest Trapdoor here, whom you had cashiered from bearing arms, out at elbows, under your colours, I instructed him in the rudiments of roguery, and by my map made him sail over any country you can name, so that now he can maunder better than myself.
J. Dap. So, then, Trapdoor, thou art turned soldier now?
Trap. Alas, sir, now there’s no wars, ’tis the safest course of life I could take!
Moll. I hope, then, you can cant, for by your cudgels, you, sirrah, are an upright man.[1156]
537Trap. As any walks the highway, I assure you.
Tear. Brother to this upright man, flesh and blood; ruffling Tearcat is my name, and a ruffler is my style, my title, my profession.
Moll. Sirrah, where’s your doxy? halt not with me.
All. Doxy, Moll? what’s that?
538Moll. His wench.
Trap. My doxy? I have, by the salomon,[1160] a doxy that carries a kinchin mort in her slate[1161] at her back, besides my dell and my dainty wild dell,[1162] with all whom I’ll tumble this next darkmans in the strommel,[1163] and drink ben baufe, and eat a fat gruntling cheat, a cackling cheat, and a quacking cheat.
J. Dap. Here’s old[1164] cheating!
Trap. My doxy stays for me in a bousing ken,[1165] brave captain.
Moll. He says his wench stays for him in an ale-house.—You are no pure rogues![1166]
Tear. Pure rogues? no, we scorn to be pure 539rogues; but if you come to our lib ken or our stalling ken,[1167] you shall find neither him nor me a queer cuffin.[1168]
Moll. So, sir, no churl of you.
Tear. No, but a ben cove, a brave cove, a gentry cuffin.
L. Nol. Call you this canting?
J. Dap. Zounds, I’ll give a school-master half-a-crown a-week, and teach me this pedlar’s French.[1169]
Trap. Do but stroll, sir, half a harvest with us, sir, and you shall gabble your bellyful.
Moll. Come, you rogue, cant with me.
S. Tho. Well said, Moll.—Cant with her, sirrah, and you shall have money, else not a penny.
Trap. I’ll have a bout, if she please.
Moll. Come on, sirrah!
Trap. Ben mort,[1170] shall you and I heave a bough, mill a ken, or nip a bung, and then we’ll couch a hogshead under the ruffmans, and there you shall wap with me, and I’ll niggle with you.
Moll. Out, you damned impudent rascal!
540Trap. Cut benar[1171] whids, and hold your fambles and your stamps.
L. Nol. Nay, nay, Moll, why art thou angry? what was his gibberish?
Moll. Marry, this, my lord, says he: Ben mort, good wench, shall you and I heave a bough,[1172] mill a ken, or nip a bung? shall you and I rob a house, or cut a purse?
All. Very good.
Moll. And then we’ll couch a hogshead under the ruffmans; and then we’ll lie under a hedge.
Trap. That was my desire, captain, as ’tis fit a soldier should lie.
Moll. And there you shall wap with me, and I’ll niggle with you,—and that’s all.
S. Beau. Nay, nay, Moll, what’s that wap?
J. Dap. Nay, teach me what niggling is; I’d fain be niggling.
Moll. Wapping and niggling is all one, the rogue my man can tell you.
Trap. ’Tis fadoodling, if it please you.
S. Beau. This is excellent! One fit more, good Moll.
Moll. Come, you rogue, sing with me.
Song by Moll and Tearcat.[1173]
A gage[1174] of ben rom-bouse
In a bousing ken of Rom-vile,
Is benar than a caster,
541Peck, pennam, lay, or popler,
Which we mill in deuse a vile.
O I wud lib all the lightmans,
O I wud lib all the darkmans,
By the salomon, under the ruffmans,
By the salomon, in the hartmans,
And scour the queer cramp ring,
And couch till a palliard dock’d my dell,
So my bousy nab might skew rom-bouse well.
Avast to the pad, let us bing;
Avast to the pad, let us bing.
All. Fine knaves, i’faith!
J. Dap. The grating of ten new cart-wheels, and the gruntling of five hundred hogs coming from Rumford market, cannot make a worse noise than this canting language does in my ears. Pray, my lord Noland, let’s give these soldiers their pay.
S. Beau. Agreed, and let them march.
L. Nol. Here, Moll. [Gives money.
Moll. Now I see that you are stalled to the rogue,[1175] and are not ashamed of your professions: 542look you, my lord Noland here and these gentlemen bestow[1176] upon you two two boards[1177] and a half, that’s two shillings sixpence.
Trap. Thanks to your lordship.
Tear. Thanks, heroical captain.
Moll. Away!
Trap. We shall cut ben whids[1178] of your masters and mistress-ship wheresoever we come.
Moll. You’ll maintain, sirrah, the old justice’s plot to his face?
Trap. Else trine me on the cheats,[1179]—hang me.
Moll. Be sure you meet me there.
Trap. Without any more maundering,[1180] I’ll do’t.—Follow, brave Tearcat.
Tear. I præ, sequor; let us go, mouse.[1181]
[Exeunt Trapdoor and Tearcat.
L. Nol. Moll, what was in that canting song?
Moll. Troth, my lord, only a praise of good drink, the only milk which these wild beasts love to suck, and thus it was:
A rich cup of wine,
O it is juice divine!
More wholesome for the head
Than meat, drink, or bread:
543To fill my drunken pate
With that, I’d sit up late;
By the heels would I lie,
Under a lowsy hedge die,
Let a slave have a pull
At my whore, so I be full
Of that precious liquor:
and a parcel of such stuff, my lord, not worth the opening.
Enter a Cutpurse very gallant,[1182] with four or five others, one having a wand.
L. Nol. What gallant comes yonder?
S. Tho. Mass, I think I know him; ’tis one of Cumberland.
First Cut. Shall we venture to shuffle in amongst yon heap of gallants, and strike?[1183]
Sec. Cut. ’Tis a question whether there be any silver shells[1184] amongst them, for all their satin outsides.
The Rest. Let’s try.
Moll. Pox on him, a gallant? Shadow me, I know him; ’tis one that cumbers the land indeed: if he swim near to the shore of any of your pockets, look to your purses.
L. Nol. S. Beau., &c.[1185] } Is’t possible?
Moll. This brave[1182] fellow is no better than a foist.
L. Nol. S. Beau., &c. } Foist! what’s that?
Moll. A diver with two fingers, a pick-pocket; 544all his train study the figging-law,[1186] that’s to say, cutting of purses and foisting. One of them is a nip; I took him once i’ the two-penny gallery[1187] at the Fortune: then there’s a cloyer, or snap, that dogs any new brother in that trade, and snaps will have half in any booty. He with the wand is both a stale, whose office is to face a man i’ the streets, whilst shells are drawn by another, and then with his black conjuring rod in his hand, he, by the nimbleness of his eye and juggling stick, will, in cheaping a piece of plate at a goldsmith’s stall, make four or five rings mount from the top of his caduceus, and, as if it were at leap-frog, they skip into his hand presently.
Sec. Cut. Zounds, we are smoked!
The Rest.[1188] Ha!
Sec. Cut. We are boiled,[1189] pox on her! see, Moll, the roaring drab!
First Cut. All the diseases of sixteen hospitals boil her!—Away!
Moll. Bless you, sir.
545First Cut. And you, good sir.
Moll. Dost not ken me, man?
First Cut. No, trust me, sir.
Moll. Heart, there’s a knight, to whom I’m bound for many favours, lost his purse at the last new play i’ the Swan,[1190] seven angels[1191] in’t: make it good, you’re best; do you see? no more.
First Cut. A synagogue[1192] shall be called, mistress Mary; disgrace me not; pacus palabros,[1193] I will conjure for you: farewell. Exit with his companions.
Moll. Did not I tell you, my lord?
L. Nol. I wonder how thou camest to the knowledge of these nasty villains.
S. Tho. And why do the foul mouths of the world call thee Moll Cutpurse? a name, methinks, damned and odious.
Moll. Dare any step forth to my face and say,
I’ve ta’en thee doing so, Moll? I must confess,
In younger days, when I was apt to stray,
I’ve sat amongst such adders; seen their stings,
As any here might, and in full play-houses
Watch’d their quick-diving hands, to bring to shame
Such rogues, and in that stream met an ill name.
When next, my lord, you spy any one of those,
546So he be in his art a scholar, question him;
Tempt him with gold to open the large book
Of his close villanies; and you yourself shall cant
Better than poor Moll can, and know more laws
Of cheators, lifters, nips, foists, puggards, curbers,[1194]
With all the devil’s black-guard,[1195] than it’s fit
Should be discover’d to a noble wit.
I know they have their orders, offices,
Circuits, and circles, unto which they’re bound
To raise their own damnation in.
J. Dap. How dost thou know it?
Moll. As you do; I shew’t you, they to me shew it.
Suppose, my lord, you were in Venice——
L. Nol. Well.
Moll. If some Italian pander there would tell
All the close tricks of courtesans, would not you
Hearken to such a fellow?
L. Nol. Yes.
547Moll. And here,
Being come from Venice, to a friend most dear
That were to travel thither, you’d proclaim
Your knowledge in those villanies, to save
Your friend from their quick danger: must you have
A black ill name, because ill things you know?
Good troth, my lord, I’m made Moll Cutpurse so.
How many are whores in small ruffs and still looks!
How many chaste whose names fill Slander’s books!
Were all men cuckolds whom gallants in their scorns
Call so, we should not walk for goring horns.
Perhaps for my mad going some reprove me;
I please myself, and care not else who love[1196] me.
L. Nol. S. Beau., &c. } A brave mind, Moll, i’faith!
S. Tho. Come, my lord, shall’s to the ordinary?
L. Nol. Ay, ’tis noon sure.
Moll. Good my lord, let not my name condemn me to you, or to the world: a fencer I hope may be called a coward; is he so for that? If all that have ill names in London were to be whipt, and to pay but twelve-pence a-piece to the beadle, I would rather have his office than a constable’s.
J. Dap. So would I, captain Moll: ’twere a sweet tickling office, i’faith. [Exeunt.