A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Ix Part 9

MRS MA. Alas! poor fool, the pedant's mad for love!

Thinks me more mad that I would marry him.

He's come to watch me with a rusty bill, To keep my friends away by force of arms: I will not see him, but stand still aside, And here observe him what he means to do. [_Retires_.

AMIN. _O utinam_, that he that loves her best, Durst offer but to touch her in this place!

_Per Jovem et Junonem! hoc_ Shall pash his c.o.xcomb such a knock, As that his soul his course shall take To Limbo and Avernus' lake.

In vain I watch in this dark hole; Would any living durst my manhood try, And offer to come up the stairs this way!

MRS MA. O, We should see you make a goodly fray. [_Aside_.]

AMIN. The wench I here watch with my bill, _Amo, amas, amavi_ still.

_Qui audet_--let him come that dare!

Death, h.e.l.l, and limbo be his share!

_Enter_ BRABO _with his sword in his hand_.

BRA. Where's Mistress Mary? never a post here, A bar of iron, 'gainst which to try my sword?

Now, by my beard, a dainty piece of steel.

AMIN. O Jove, what a qualm is this I feel!

BRA. Come hither, Mall, is none here but we two?

When didst thou see the starveling schoolmaster?

That rat, that shrimp, that spindle-shank, That wren, that sheep-biter, that lean chitty-face, That famine, that lean envy, that all-bones, That bare anatomy, that Jack-a-Lent, That ghost, that shadow, that moon in the wane?

AMIN. I wail in woe, I plunge in pain.[15] [_Aside_.]

BRA. When next I find him here, I'll hang him up, Like a dried sausage, in the chimney's top: That stock-fish, that poor John, that gut of men!

AMIN. O, that I were at home again! [_Aside_.]

BRA. When he comes next, turn him into the streets.

Now, come, let's dance the shaking of the sheets.

[_Exeunt_ MISTRESS MARY _and_ BRABO.

AMIN. _Qui, quae, quod_!

Hence, boist'rous bill! come, gentle rod!

Had not grimalkin stamp'd and star'd, Aminadab had little car'd; Or if, instead of this brown bill, I had kept my Mistress Virga still, And he upon another's back, His points untruss'd, his breeches slack; My countenance he should not dash, For I am expert in the lash.

But my sweet la.s.s my love doth fly, Which shall make me by poison die.

_Per fidem_, I will rid my life Either by poison, sword, or knife.

[_Exit_.

ACT III., SCENE I.

_A Room in Young Arthur's House_.

_Enter_ MISTRESS ARTHUR _and_ PIPKIN.

MRS ART. Sirrah! when saw you your master?

PIP. Faith, mistress, when I last look'd upon him.

MRS ART. And when was that?

PIP. When I beheld him.

MRS ART. And when was that?

PIP. Marry, when he was in my sight, and that was yesterday; since when I saw not my master, nor looked on my master, nor beheld my master, nor had any sight of my master.

MRS ART. Was he not at my father-in-law's?

PIP. Yes, marry, was he.

MRS ART. Didst thou not entreat him to come home?

PIP. How should I, mistress? he came not there to-day.

MRS ART. Didst thou not say he was there?

PIP. True, mistress, he was there? but I did not tell ye when; he hath been there divers times, but not of late.

MRS ART. About your business! here I'll sit and wait His coming home, though it be ne'er so late.

Now once again go look him at the 'Change, Or at the church with Sir Aminadab.

'Tis told me they use often conference; When that is done, get you to school again.

PIP. I had rather play the truant at home, than go seek my master at school: let me see, what age am I? some four and twenty, and how have I profited? I was five years learning to crish cross[16] from great A, and five years longer coming to F; there I stuck some three years, before I could come to Q; and so, in process of time, I came to e per se e, and com per se, and t.i.ttle; then I got to a, e, i, o, u; after, to Our Father; and, in the sixteenth year of my age, and the fifteenth of my going to school, I am in good time gotten to a noun, By the same token there my hose went down; Then I got to a verb, There I began first to have a beard; Then I came to _iste, ista, istud_, There my master whipped me till he fetched the blood, And so forth: so that now I am become the greatest scholar in the school, for I am bigger than two or three of them. But I am gone; farewell, mistress!

[_Exit_.

SCENE II.

_The Street_.

_Enter_ ANSELM _and_ FULLER.

FUL. Love none at all! They will forswear themselves, And when you urge them with it, their replies Are, that Jove laughs at lovers' perjuries.

ANS. You told me of a jest concerning that; I prythee, let me hear it.