A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Viii Part 5

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 l.u.s.ty as they are, they run on the score with George's wife for their posset; and G.o.d 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: G.o.d Bacchus, G.o.d fat-back, Baron of double beer and bottle ale, Come in and show thy nose that is nothing pale: Back, back, that[83] G.o.d barrel-belly may enter.

_Enter_ BACCHUS _riding upon an a.s.s 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 surpa.s.s, In cup, in corn or gla.s.s.

G.o.d 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 a.s.s, 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 _ac.u.men_. 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 s.h.i.+ned 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 a.s.s 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 G.o.d Bacchus.

[_Here_ WILL SUMMER _drinks, and they sing about him_, BACCHUS _begins_.

All. _Monsieur Mingo for quaffing did surpa.s.s In cup, in can, or gla.s.s_.

BAC. Ho, well shot, a toucher, a toucher!

_For quaffing Toy doth pa.s.s, In cup, in can, or gla.s.s_.[93]

All. _G.o.d Bacchus, do him right, And dub him knight_.

BAC. Rise up, Sir Robert Toss-pot.

[_Here he dubs_ WILL SUMMER _with the black jack_.