A Select Collection of Old English Plays Part 114

CAPT. Go, get you in, then, and let your husband dip the rosemary.[271]

JOLLY. Is all ready?

CAPT. All, all; some of the company are below already. I have so blown it about, one porter is gone to the Exchange to invite Master Wild's merchant to his wedding, and, by the way, to bid two or three fruiterers to send in fruit for such a wedding; another in my lady's name to Sall's for sweetmeats. I swore at Bradborn in his shop myself, that I wondered he would disappoint Master Wild for his points, and having so long warning: he protested 'twas not his fault, but they were ready, and he would send John with them presently. One of the watermen is gone to the Melon garden; the other to Cook's, at the Bear, for some bottles of his best wine; and thence to Gracious Street to the poulterer's, and all with directions to send in provisions for Master Wild's wedding. And who should I meet at the door but apric.o.c.k Tom and Mary, waiting to speak with her young master?

They came to beg that they might serve the feast. I promised them they should, if they would cry it up and down the town, to bring company, for Master Wild was resolved to keep open house.

JOLLY. Why, then, here will be witnesses enough.

CAPT. But who should I meet at the corner of the Piazza, but Joseph Taylor:[272] he tells me there's a new play at the Friars to-day, and I have bespoke a box for Master Wild and his bride.

JOLLY. And did not he wonder to hear he was married?

CAPT. Yes; but I told him 'twas a match his aunt made for him when he was abroad.

JOLLY. And I have spread it sufficiently at court, by sending to borrow plate for such a wedding.

_Enter a_ SERVANT.

SER. There's half a dozen coachfuls of company lighted: they call for the bridelaces and points.

CAPT. Let the fiddlers play, then, and bid G.o.d give them joy by the name of my Lady Careless and Mistress Wild.

FID. Where shall we play, sir?

JOLLY. Come with us, we'll show you the window.

SCENE II.

[_The_ FIDDLERS _play in the tiring-room; and the stage curtains are drawn, and discover a chamber, as it were, with two beds, and the ladies asleep in them_, MASTER WILD _being at_ MISTRESS PLEASANT'S _bedside, and_ MASTER CARELESS _at the_ WIDOW'S. _The music awakes the_ WIDOW.

WID. Niece, niece, niece Pleasant.

[_She opens the curtain and calls her: she is under a canopy_.

PLEA. Ha! I hear you, I hear you; what would you have?

WID. Do you not hear the fiddlers?

PLEA. Yes, yes; but you have waked me from the finest dream----

WID. A dream! what was't, some knavery!

PLEA. Why, I know not, but 'twas merry; e'en as pleasing as some sins. Well, I'll lie no more in a man's bed, for fear I lose more than I get.

WID. Hark! that's a new tune.

PLEA. Yes, and they play it well. This is your janty nephew: I would he had less of the father in him, I'd venture to dream out my dream with him. O' my conscience, he's worth a dozen of my dull servant; that's such a troublesome visitant, without any kind of conveniency.

WID. Ay, ay, so are all of that kind; give me your subject-lover; those you call servants are but troubles, I confess.

PLEA. What is the difference, pray, betwixt a subject and a servant lover?

WID. Why, one I have absolute power over, the other's at large: your servant-lovers are those who take mistresses upon trial, and scarce give them a quarter's warning before they are gone.

PLEA. Why, what do you subject-lovers do?--I am so sleepy.

WID. Do! all things for nothing: then they are the diligentest and the humblest things a woman can employ: nay, I ha' seen of them tame, and run loose about a house. I had one once, by this light, he would fetch and carry, go back, seek out; he would do anything: I think some falconer bred him.

PLEA. By my troth, I am of your mind.

WID. He would come over for all my friends; but it was the dogged'st thing to my enemies; he would sit upon's tail before them, and frown like John-a-Napes when the Pope is named. He heard me once praise my little spaniel b.i.t.c.h s.m.u.t for waiting, and hang me if I stirred for seven years after, but I found him lying at my door.

PLEA. And what became of him?

WID. Faith, when I married, he forsook me. I was advised since, that if I would ha' spit in's mouth sometimes, he would have stayed.

PLEA. That was cheap, but 'tis no certain way; for 'tis a general opinion that marriage is one of the certain'st cures for love that one can apply to a man that is sick of the sighings; yet if you were to live about this town still, such a fool would do you a world of service. I'm sure Secret will miss him, he would always take such a care of her, h' has saved her a hundred walks for hoods and masks.

WID. Yes, and I was certain of the earliest fruits and flowers that the spring afforded.

PLEA. By my troth, 'twas foolishly done to part with him; a few crumbs of your affections would have satisfied him, poor thing!

WID. Thou art in the right. In this town there's no living without 'em; they do more service in a house for nothing than a pair of those what-d'ye-call-'ems, those he-waiting-women beasts, that custom imposes upon ladies.

PLEA. Is there none of them to be had now, think you? I'd fain get a tame one to carry down into the country.

WID. Faith, I know but one breed of them about the town that's right, and that's at the court; the lady that has them brings 'em up all by hand: she breeds some of them from very puppies.

There's another wit too in the town that has of them; but hers will not do so many tricks; good, sullen, diligent waiters those are which she breeds, but not half so serviceable.

PLEA. How does she do it? is there not a trick in't?

WID. Only patience; but she has a heavy hand with 'em (they say) at first, and many of them miscarry; she governs them with signs, and by the eye, as Banks breeds his horse.[273] There are some, too, that arrive at writing, and those are the right breed, for they commonly betake themselves to poetry: and if you could light on one of them, 'twere worth your money; for 'tis but using of him ill, and praising his verses sometimes, and you are sure of him for ever.

PLEA. But do they never grow surly, aunt?

WID. Not if you keep them from raw flesh; for they are a kind of lion-lovers, and if they once taste the sweet of it, they'll turn to their kind.

PLEA. Lord, aunt, there will be no going without one this summer into the country: pray, let's inquire for one, either a he-one to entertain us, or a she-one to tell us the story of her love; 'tis excellent to bedward, and makes one as drowsy as prayers.

WID. Faith, niece, this parliament has so destroyed 'em, and the Platonic humour, that 'tis uncertain whether we shall get one or no. Your leading members in the lower house have so cowed the ladies, that they have no leisure to breed any of late: their whole endeavours are spent now in feasting, and winning close committee men, a rugged kind of sullen fellows with implacable stomachs and hard hearts, that make the gay things court and observe them, as much as the foolish lovers use to do. Yet I think I know one she-lover; but she is smitten in years o' th'

wrong side of forty. I am certain she is poor, too, and in this lean age for courtiers she perhaps would be glad to run this summer in our park.

PLEA. Dear aunt, let us have her. Has she been famous? has she good tales, think you, of knights, such as have been false or true to love, no matter which?

WID. She cannot want cause to curse the s.e.x: handsome, witty, well-born, and poor in court, cannot want the experience how false young men can be: her beauty has had the highest fame; and those eyes, that weep now unpitied, have had their envy and a dazzling power.

PLEA. And that tongue, I warrant you, which now grows hoa.r.s.e with flattering the great law-breakers, once gave law to princes: was it not so, aunt? Lord, shall I die without begetting one story?