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• THE OLD LAW.
• THE MAYOR OF QUEENBOROUGH.
• BLURT, MASTER-CONSTABLE.
• THE PHŒNIX.
• MICHAELMAS TERM.

Vera Effigies
Tho. Midletoni Gent.

All the surviving works of Middleton are comprehended in the present volumes; and though, perhaps, to a certain class of readers, a selection from his writings might have been more acceptable, I am confident that the entire series is requisite to satisfy the lovers of our early literature.

So rare are some of the pieces now reprinted, that they were not to be obtained without considerable difficulty. The original quartos of The Triumphs of Integrity, and The Triumphs of Honour and Industry, are nowhere to be found but in the dramatic library of the Duke of Devonshire; and I beg leave respectfully to express my sense of his Grace’s liberality and kindness, in granting me permission to transcribe them.

An obligation, for which I am truly grateful, has been conferred upon me by the Rev. Joseph Hunter, whose intimate acquaintance with the viiigenealogical collections of the British Museum enabled him to point out to me a most important document, which had escaped my notice—the pedigree of Middleton in one of the Harleian MSS.

To Charles George Young, Esq., York Herald, who readily assisted my researches at the College of Arms; and to Henry Woodthorpe, Esq., town-clerk of London, who with equal good will rendered me the same services at Guildhall, I have to return my sincere thanks.

To Sir Harris Nicolas, John Payne Collier, Esq., the Rev. John Mitford, and the Rev. Stephen Reay, sub-librarian of the Bodleian Library, I have to acknowledge myself indebted for a variety of useful communications.

Thomas Middleton^[1] is seldom mentioned by his contemporaries; and to the scanty materials for his biography already collected by the curiosity of antiquarian writers, the facts which I have been enabled to add, though important, are unfortunately few.

His father was William Middleton; concerning whom I have found no earlier notice than is contained in the following document, which affords unquestionable evidence that he was a gentleman by birth:

“To all and singuler as well Noblez and gentlemen as others to whome these presentz shall coome I Sir Gilberte Dethicke knyghte alias Garter principall kinge of armes sende greatinge in owre Lord god euerlasting, Forasmuche as anncientlye from the begynninge the valiant and vertius actes of wourthie parsons haue ben commended to the world and xposteretie with sondrie monumentz and remembrances of there good desearttes Emongst the which the chefiste and most vsuall hath ben the bearinge of signes and tokens in shildes called Armes which are euident demonstracions of prowez and valoure diuerslie distributed according to the qualities and wourthines of the parsons demereting the same which order as it was prudentlie devised in the beginnynge to stirre and kindle the harttes of men to the ymytacion of vertue and noblenes Euen so hathe the same ben and yet is contynnuallie obseruid to the [end] that suche as haue don commendable seruice to their prince or contrey eyther in warre or peace may bothe receiue due honor in their liues and also leaue the same successiuelie vnto there posteritie after them And wheras therfore William Midleton of        in the Countie of        ^[2] xigentleman hathe ben of longe time one of the bearrers of these Armes That is to say Argent on a Saulteir engrailed sablez a Castle of the firste And for asmuch as I finde no Creaste therevnto belonging or appertayninge hath requested me the sayd Garter to assigne vnto his coot armoure such creaste or Cognissance as he may lawfullie vse and beare In consideracion wherof and for a further declaration of the wourthines of the sayd William I the sayd Garter kinge of Armes haue assigned vnto him this creast or cognissance folowinge That is to say on his Torce argent and sables a Ape passant with a coller about his necke and chaine golde mantelled argent double gules as more playnlie appeareth depicted in this margent Which Armes and Creast I the sayd Garter principall Kinge of Armes haue ratefied confermed assigned and allowed and by these presentes do ratefye confirme assigne and allow vnto the sayd William Mydleton and to his posteritie for ever and he and they to haue hould and enioy the same and therin to be revested att his and there libertie and pleasure without the lett ympediment or interruption of any other parson or parsons whatsoeuer In wittnes whereof I the sayd Garter haue signed these presentes with my hand and sett therevnto the seall of myne office and armes Dated the xxiiiᵗʰ of Aprill in the xᵗʰ yeare of the xiiRaigne of our moste gracius soueraigne Ladie Elizabeth by the grace of godd of England France and Ireland Quene Defender of the fayth &c Anno 1560 [1568].”^[3]

William Middleton appears to have settled in the metropolis.^[4] He married^[5] Anne, daughter of William Snow, of London; and by her had two children,—Thomas, the subject of the present memoir; and Avicia,^[6] who first became the wife of John Empson, of London, and afterwards of Alan Waterer, of the same city.

xiiiThe date of the poet’s birth, which is matter of conjecture,^[7] I am inclined to fix not earlier than 1570.

It was probably about 1603 that he married Maria,^[8] daughter of Edward Morbeck,^[9] of London, one of the Six Clerks of Chancery, by Barbara, daughter of William Palmer, of Warwickshire. A son, named Edward, the only issue of this marriage, was alive in 1623, aged nineteen. If there be no error in the MS. from which the above information has been derived, and if the entry among the City Records, which is cited in another part of this memoir, be also correct, Middleton must have married a second time, either during 1623 or subsequently to that year, for, according to the latter authority, the name of his widow was Magdalen.

A “Tho. Middleton” was admitted member of Gray’s Inn in 1593, a second in 1596, and a third in 1606.^[10] Of these individuals, the first is more likely than either of the others to have been the dramatist.

xivThe Wisdom of Solomon Paraphrased, Written by Thomas Middleton, 1597, has generally been assigned to our author; and since no other poet of the same name is known to have existed in those days,^[11] I have thought myself obliged, notwithstanding its length and tediousness, to reprint it entire. Micro-cynicon, Six Snarling Satires, 1599, has also been attributed to him, because the prefatory verses are subscribed “T. M. Gent.;” and as it possesses at least the doubtful merit of shortness, I have not rejected it from the present collection.^[12]

xvBut of whatever kind were his earliest (and perhaps unsuccessful) efforts to attract the notice of the public, it is evident that Middleton devoted the maturity of his powers almost exclusively to dramatic composition, though the period at which he commenced a writer for the stage cannot be determined. There are grounds for believing that The xviOld Law was first produced in 1599.^[13] Of that play, a portion only is by him—a portion is by William Rowley; and subsequently it received improvements from the pen of Massinger, who when it was originally acted had not completed his fifteenth year. The reader ought to remember, that dramas which bear on their title-pages the names of more than one author were not necessarily written by those authors in conjunction: that popular playwrights were often employed to alter and to add to pieces which had ceased to be attractive, is a fact sufficiently established by the valuable memoranda of Henslowe. We are not, however, to conclude that the other dramas of which Middleton was only in part the xviiauthor were wrought into their present form by such a process.

It is unnecessary to enumerate all the various pieces with which, during a long series of years, he continued to enrich the stage; nor would it be possible to ascertain the exact order in which they were produced. Henslowe’s papers supply the following notices of two which perhaps were never printed, and are no longer extant:

“May 1602. Two Harpies, by Dekker, Drayton, Middleton, Webster, and Mundy.”^[14]

“Oct. 1602. Randall, earl of Chester, by T. Middleton.”^[15]

And among the MS. plays which belonged to Warburton the Somerset Herald, and which, according to his own cool statement, “were unluckely burnd or put under Pye-bottoms,” there was one entitled xviii“The Puritan Maid, the Modest Wife, and the Wanton Widow, by Tho. Middleton.”^[16]

Two tracts, which issued separately from the press in 1604, The Black Book, and Father Hubburd’s Tales, or The Ant and the Nightingale, I assign, with little hesitation, to Middleton: in both the Epistle to the Reader is subscribed “T. M.,” and in both are found expressions which remind us strongly of his dramatic dialogue. They are coarse but humorous attacks on the vices and follies of the time; and are peculiarly interesting on account of the passages which relate to Thomas Nash,^[17] of xixwhose admirable prose-satires they may be considered as no unhappy imitations. The verses interwoven with Father Hubburd’s Tales are occasionally very graceful.

The Inner Temple Masque, written, I apprehend, in 1618, and The World tost at Tennis, first produced as a royal entertainment, and afterwards brought out with alterations, probably in 1620, are the only pieces of the kind which we possess from our author’s pen; but it appears, by an entry in the City Records, that he had been called on at an earlier date to compose a masque, of which the title alone remains:

The “solempnities” in question had been occasioned by the recent nuptials of that infamous pair the Earl and Countess of Somerset, and are thus described by Howes: “Vpon Tewsday the 4. of January [1613-14], the Bride and Bridegroome, being accompanied with the duke of Lenox, the Lord priuie Seale, the lord Chamberlayne, the earles of Worcester, Pembroke, Mountgomery, and others, and with many honorable Barons, knights, and gentlemen of qualitie, came to marchant-taylers hall, where the Lord Maior and Aldermenne of London, in their Scarlet robes, entertayned them with hearty welcome, and feasted them with all magnificence: at their first entrance into the hall, they were receiued with ingenious speeches and pleasant melody: at this princely feast all the meate was serued to the Table by choyse cittizens of comeliest personage, in their gownes of rich Foynes, selected out of the 12. honorable companies: after supper, and being risen from the Table, these noble guests were entertayned with a Wassaile, 2. seuerall pleasant maskes, and a play, and with other pleasant dances, all which being ended, then the Bride and Bridegroome with all the xxirest were inuited to a princely banquet, and about 3. a clock in the morning they returned to Whitehall.”^[18]

Middleton’s earliest^[19] pageant was produced in 1613; and his ingenuity was again taxed to devise fantastic shows for the amusement of the populace in 1616, 1617, and 1619.

Among the expenses of the pageant for 1617, The Triumphs of Honour and Industry,^[20] which have been printed from the accounts of the Wardens of the Grocers’ Company, are the following entries:

Partly, perhaps, in consequence of the satisfaction afforded by these and other performances, he was appointed, in 1620, Chronologer to the City of xxiiiLondon, and Inventor of its “honourable entertainments.” Such, at least, is the date of his election according to the authority cited below^[22] by Oldys; and in the extracts from the City Records with which I have been furnished, I find no mention of his having held the office anterior to that year:

xxviiiWith the representation of A Game at Chess in 1624 is connected the most memorable incident of our poet’s history. In this singular drama he ventured to bring upon the stage both the English and the Spanish court; much of the satire being levelled at Gondomar, who is unmercifully held up to ridicule not only for his political intrigues, but even for his bodily infirmities. “Prince Charles,” says Mr. Collier, “returned from Spain, after the breaking off the match with the Infanta, late in the autumn of 1623; and to take advantage of the popular feeling upon this question, Middleton’s play was probably written in the succeeding spring, and certainly acted at the Globe in the summer.”^[23] A Game at Chess could hardly fail to prove attractive; and it had already been performed (as the 4tos state) “for nine days together,” when the exhibition was suddenly prohibited by a royal mandate, and both the author and the actors were cited before the Privy Council. A detail of the proceedings in this curious affair is supplied by the following letters.

Mr. Secretary Conway to the Privy Council:

“May it please your Lordships,—His Majesty hath received information from the Spanish Ambassador xxixof a very scandalous comedy acted publickly by the King’s players, wherein they take the boldness and presumption, in a rude and dishonourable fashion, to represent on the stage the persons of his Majesty, the King of Spain, the Conde de Gondomar, the Bishop of Spalato, &c. His Majesty remembers well there was a commandment and restraint given against the representing of any modern Christian kings in those stage-plays; and wonders much both at the boldness now taken by that company, and also that it hath been permitted to be so acted, and that the first notice thereof should be brought to him by a foreign ambassador, while so many ministers of his own are thereabouts, and cannot but have heard of it. His Majesty’s pleasure is, that your Lordships presently call before you as well the poet that made the comedy as the comedians that acted it: And upon examination of them to commit them, or such of them as you shall find most faulty, unto prison, if you find cause, or otherwise take security for their forthcoming; and then certify his Majesty what you find that comedy to be, in what points it is most offensive, by whom it was made, by whom licensed, and what course you think fittest to be held for the examplary and severe punishment of the present offenders, and to restrain such insolent and licentious presumption for the future. This is xxxthe charge I have received from his Majesty, and with it I make bold to offer to your Lordships the humble service of, &c. From Rufford, August 12^th, 1624.”

The Privy Council to Mr. Secretary Conway:

“After our hearty commendations, &c.—According to his Majesty’s pleasure signified to this board by your letter of the 12^th August, touching the suppressing of a scandalous comedy acted by the King’s players, we have called before us some of the principal actors and demanded of them by what license and authority they have presumed to act the same; in answer whereto they produced a book being an original and perfect copy thereof (as they affirmed) seen and allowed by Sir Henry Herbert Knᵗ, Master of the Revels, under his own hand, and subscribed in the last page of the said book: We demanding further, whether there were not other parts or passages represented on the stage than those expressly contained in the book, they confidently protested, they added or varied from the same nothing at all. The poet, they tell us, is one Middleton, who shifting out of the way, and not attending the board with the rest, as was expected, we have given warrant to a messenger for the apprehending of him. To those that were before us we gave a sound and sharp reproof, making them xxxisensible of his Majesty’s high displeasure herein, giving them straight charge and commands that they presumed not to act the said comedy any more, nor that they suffered any play or interlude whatsoever to be acted by them or any of their company until his Majesty’s pleasure be further known. We have caused them likewise to enter into bond for their attendance upon the board whensoever they shall be called. As for our certifying to his Majesty (as was intimated by your letter) what passages in the said comedy we should find to be offensive and scandalous; We have thought it our duties for his Majesty’s clearer information to send herewithal the book itself subscribed as aforesaid by the Master of the Revels, that so either yourself or some other whom his Majesty shall appoint to peruse the same, may see the passages themselves out of the original, and call Sir Henry Herbert before you to know a reason of his licensing thereof, who (as we are given to understand) is now attending at court; So having done as much as we conceived agreeable with our duties in conformity to his Majesty’s royal commandments, and that which we hope shall give him full satisfaction, we shall continue our humble prayers to Almighty God for his health and safety; and bid you very heartily farewell. [Dated the 21st of August, 1624.]”

xxxiiMr. Secretary Conway to the Privy Council:

“Right Honourable,—His Majesty having received satisfaction in your Lordships’ endeavours, and in the signification thereof to him by yours of the 21st of this present, hath commanded me to signify the same to you. And to add further, that his pleasure is, that your Lordships examine by whose direction and application the personating of Gondomar and others was done; and that being found out, the party or parties to be severely punished, his Majesty being unwilling for one’s sake and only fault to punish the innocent or utterly to ruin the company. The discovery on what party his Majesty’s justice is properly and duly to fall, and your execution of it and the account to be returned thereof, his Majesty leaves to your Lordships’ wisdoms and care. And this being that I have in charge, continuing the humble offer of my service and duty to the attendance of your commandments, &c. From Woodstock, the 27th August, 1624.”

The preceding correspondence was originally printed by the late George Chalmers:^[24] the following “Letter to the Lords of the Counsell from my Lord Chamberlain about the Players,” indorsed xxxiii“27 August 1624,” is now for the first time published.^[25]

“To the right honᵇˡᵉ my very good Lord, the Lord Viscount Maundeville, Lord President of his Majesty’s most honᵇˡᵉ Privy Counsell, theis.

My very good Lord

Complaynt being made unto his Majesty against the Company of his Comedians, for acting publiquely a Play knowne by the name of a Game at Chesse, contayning some passages in it reflecting in matter of scorne and ignominy upon the King of Spaine, some of his Ministers and others of good note and quality, his Majesty out of the tender regard hee had of that King’s honor and those of his Ministers who were conceived to bee wounded thereby, caused his letters to bee addressed to my Lords and the rest of his most honᵇˡᵉ Privy Council, thereby requiring them to convent those his Comedians before them, and to take such course with them for this offence as might give best satisfaction to the Spanish Ambassador and to their owne Honnors. After examination that honᵇˡᵉ Board thought fitt not onely to interdict them playing of that play, but of any other also, untill his Majesty should give way unto them. And for their obedience hereunto xxxivthey weare bound in 300^li bondes. Which punishment when they had suffered (as his Majesty conceives) a competent tyme, upon their petition delivered heere unto him, it pleased his Majesty to comaund mee to lett your Lordship understand (which I pray your Lordship to impart to the rest of that honᵇˡᵉ Board) that his Majesty now conceives the punishment, if not satisfactory for that their insolency, yet such as since it stopps the current of their poore livelyhood and mainteanance, without much prejudice they cannot longer undergoe. In consideration therefore of those his poore servants, his Majesty would have their Lordships connive at any common play lycensed by authority, that they shall act as before. As for this of the Game at Chesse, that it bee not onely antiquated and sylenced, but the Players bound as formerly they weare, and in that point onely never to act it agayne. Yet nothwithstanding that my Lords proceed in their disquisition to fynd out the originall roote of this offence, whether it sprang from the Poet, Players, or both, and to certefy his Majesty accordingly. And so desireing your Lordship to take this into your consideration, and them into your care, I rest

xxxvAn entry in the Council-register of the 30th August, 1624, declares: “This day Edward [Thomas] Middleton of London, gent. being formerly sent for by warrant from this board, tendred his appearance, wherefor his indemnitie is here entered into the register of counceil causes: nevertheless he is enjoyned to attend the board till he be discharged by order of their Lordships.”^[26]

A copy of A Game at Chess, which formerly belonged to Major Pearson, contains, in an old hand, the following memorandum:^[27]

“After nyne dayse wherein I have heard some of the acters say they tooke fiveteene hundred Pounde the Spanish faction being prevalent gott it supprest the chiefe actors and the Poett Mr. Thomas Middleton that writt it committed to prisson where hee lay some Tyme and at last gott oute upon this petition presented to King James

The writer is doubtless mistaken as to the amount xxxviof money received at the doors of the theatre.^[28] What he states concerning the imprisonment of Middleton, &c. seems to be disproved by the authentic documents already given; and Mr. Collier (who has not noticed the latter part of the memorandum) xxxviiremarks, that “the reason why no punishment [except the interdiction from acting] was inflicted, either upon the players or poet, was perhaps that they had acted the piece under the authority of the Master of the Revels.”^[29]

In a letter by Howel from Madrid, addressed to Sir John North, there is an evident allusion to Middleton’s notorious drama: “I am sorry to hear how other Nations do much tax the English of their Incivility to public Ministers of State; and what Ballads and Pasquils and Fopperies and Plays were made against Gondamar for doing his Masters business.”^[30] And in The Staple of News, by Ben Jonson, acted 1625, may be found a humorous but rather gross passage about Gondomar and “the poor English play was writ of him.”^[31]

xxxviiiThe Triumphs of Health and Prosperity, 1626, was the last piece composed by Middleton for the entertainment of the city; and it was also, perhaps, the last effort of his pen.

That in 1623 he resided at Newington Butts,^[32] has been already shewn; and that there he died, is proved by an entry which I now cite from the Register of the parish-church;

The following lines have been frequently adduced as a testimony that our author was far advanced in years at the time of his decease; but I have little doubt that they are the invention of Chetwood, who on other occasions is known to have been a most expert and impudent forger:

Middleton appears to have left no will; nor is it likely that he had any property to bequeath, since, xxxixsome months after his death, a petition for pecuniary assistance was addressed by his widow to the City:

xlThe Register above cited contains an entry which in all probability refers to her:

Concerning the poet’s son Edward, who, as we xlihave seen^[36] was aged nineteen in 1623, I have not succeeded in obtaining any further particulars.

xliiThe portrait of Middleton (without the engraver’s name) prefixed to Two New Playes, 1657, and copied for the present work, is the only one xliiiextant; but whether it conveys a true idea of his personal appearance, cannot be determined.

Malone informs us, that “Drayton has commended Middleton;”^[37] and though I have searched xlivin vain for the eulogy to which he alludes, it may nevertheless exist. I shall here throw together the xlvfew notices of our author by his contemporaries which I have been able to collect.

In Howes’s Continuation of Stow’s Annales, 1615, he is included in a list of the Elizabethan poets, which, because I do not remember to have seen it formerly quoted, I subjoin entire:

“Our moderne and present excellent Poets which xlviworthely florish in their owne workes, and all of them in my owne knowledge liued togeather in this Queenes raigne, according to their priorities as neere as I could, I haue orderly set downe (viz.) George Gascoigne Esquire, Thomas Church-yard Esquire, sir Edward Dyer knight, Edmond Spencer Esquire, sir Philip Sidney knight, Sir John Harrington knight, Sir Thomas Challoner knight, Sir Frauncis Bacon knight, and Sir John Dauie[s] knight, Master John Lillie gentleman, Maister George Chapman gentleman, M. W. Warner gentleman, M. Willi. Shakespeare gentleman, Samuell Daniell Esquire, Michaell Draiton Esquire, of the bath, M. Christopher Marlo gen. M. Beniamine Johnson gentleman, John Marston Esquier, M. Abraham Frauncis [Fraunce] gen. master Frauncis Meers gentle. master Josua Siluester gentle. master Thomas Deckers gentleman, M. John Flecher gentle. M. John Webster gentleman, M. Thomas Heywood gentleman, M. Thomas Middelton gentleman, M. George Withers. These following were Latine Poets. Master Gaulter Hadon gentleman, Master Nicholas Carr gentleman, M. Christopher Ocland gentle. Mathew Gwynn doctor of Phisicke, Thomas Lodge doctor of phisike, M. Tho. Watson gentle. Thomas Campion doctor of Phisicke, Richard Lateware doctor of diuinitie, M. Brunswerd xlviigentleman, Master doctor Haruie, and master Willey gentleman.”^[38]

In the record of Jonson’s “Conversations at Hawthornden in 1619,” our poet is thus contemptuously mentioned: “That Markam (who added his English Arcadia) was not of the number of the Faithfull, i. e. Poets, and but a base fellow. That such were Day and Middleton.”^[39] There can be no doubt that Ben was strongly possessed by the humour of disparaging, xlviiiwhen he chose to couple Middleton with writers so inferior.

In The Praise of Hempseed, 1620, by Taylor the water-poet, these lines occur:

In The Hierarchie of the blessed Angels, 1635, by Heywood, there is a curious passage concerning the disrespectful curtailment of the baptismal names of modern poets, which will probably be new to many readers:

I may add, that in a work of later date, Wit’s Recreations, is the following “epigram:”^[42]

lThree of our author’s pieces are recorded to have been performed after the Restoration, A Trick to catch the Old One, The Widow, and The Changeling; but at the commencement of the eighteenth century his writings may be considered as forgotten.

The publication of Dodsley’s Old Plays^[43] in 1744 had some effect in reviving the faded reputation of Middleton; and in 1778 his name was made still more familiar to the literary world, when copies of The Witch, printed from a MS. in the possession of Major Pearson,^[44] were circulated by Isaac Reed. Besides the less important discovery that D’Avenant had availed himself of this drama in his alteration liof Macbeth,^[45] it was evident that the resemblance between the scenes of enchantment in The Witch, liiand those in Shakespeare’s tragedy as originally written, must have been more than accidental. Steevens maintained that Shakespeare was the imitator. Malone at first coincided in that opinion; but receding from it at a later period of life, he endeavoured to establish by a lengthy dissertation that the performance of Macbeth (which he fixes in 1606^[46]), was anterior to that of The Witch; and though his reasoning appears to me very far from convincing, I am by no means disposed to assert that the conclusion at which he has so laboriously arrived is not the right one.^[47] Gifford, indeed, has unhesitatingly pronounced that Shakespeare was the copyist;^[48] but, notwithstanding the respect which I liiientertain for that critic, his incidental remarks on the present question have little weight with me: he has assigned no grounds for his decision; he had not, I apprehend, considered the subject with much attention; and on two occasions at least, he appears to have alluded to it chiefly for the sake of giving additional force to the blows which he happened to be aiming at the luckless “commentators.” As Shakespeare undoubtedly possessed the creative power in its utmost perfection, and as no satisfactory evidence has been adduced to shew that The livWitch was acted at an earlier period than Macbeth, he must not be hastily accused of imitation. Yet since he is known to have frequently remodelled the works of other writers, it may be urged, that when he had to introduce witches into his tragedy, he would hardly scruple to borrow from our author’s play^[49] as much as suited his immediate purpose. But, after all, there is an essential difference^[50] between the hags of Shakespeare and of Middleton; and whichever of the two may have been the copyist, he owes so little to his brother-poet, that the debt will not materially affect his claim to originality. Concerning the tragi-comedy The Witch, I have only to add, that its merit consists entirely in the highly imaginative pictures of the preternatural agents, in their incantations, and their moonlight revelry: the rest of it rises little above mediocrity.

In the estimation of an anonymous critic, Women beware Women is “Middleton’s finest play,”^[51] and perhaps he has judged rightly. It is indeed remarkable for the masterly conception and delineation of the chief characters, and for the life and reality lvinfused into many of the scenes; though the dramatis personæ are almost all repulsive from their extreme depravity, and the catastrophe is rather forced and unnatural. In this tragedy, says Hazlitt, there is “a rich marrowy vein of internal sentiment, with fine occasional insight into human nature, and cool cutting irony of expression.”^[52] To his subsequent observation, that “the interest decreases, instead of increasing, as we read on,” I by no means assent.

The Changeling affords another specimen of Middleton’s tragic powers. If on the whole inferior to the piece last mentioned, it displays, I think, in several places, a depth of passion unequalled throughout the present volumes. According to the title-page, William Rowley, who was frequently his literary associate, had a share in the composition; but I feel convinced that the terribly impressive passages of this tragedy, as well as those serious portions of A Fair Quarrel which Lamb has deservedly praised, and the pleasing characters of Clara and Constanza in The Spanish Gipsy, are beyond the ability of Rowley.

Among our author’s works there are few more original and ingenious than A Game at Chess. By lvitouches of sweet fancy, by quaint humour, and by poignant satire, he redeems the startling absurdities in which the plan of the drama had necessarily involved him.

Middleton’s “principal efforts,” says an accomplished writer, “were in comedy, where he deals profusely in grossness and buffoonery. The cheats and debaucheries of the town are his favourite sources of comic intrigue.”^[53] A Mad World, my Masters, and A Trick to catch the Old One, are the most perfect of the numerous comedies which Mr. Campbell has dismissed with so slight and unfavourable a notice; and next to them may be ranked The Roaring Girl,^[54] A Chaste Maid in Cheapside, Michaelmas Term, and No Wit, no Help like a Woman’s. The dialogue of these pieces is generally spirited; the characters, though their peculiarities may be sometimes exaggerated, are drawn with breadth and discrimination; and the crowded incidents afford so much amusement, that the reader is willing to overlook the occasional violation of probability. As they faithfully lviireflect the manners and customs of the age, even the worst of Middleton’s comedies^[55] are not without their value.

A critic, whom I have already quoted, after observing that “it is difficult to assign Middleton any precise station among the remarkable men who were his contemporaries,”^[56] proceeds to compare him with Webster and Ford, who were assuredly poets of a higher order. The dramatists with whom, in my opinion, Middleton ought properly to be classed—though superior to him in some respects and inferior in others—are Dekker, Heywood, Marston, and Chapman: nor perhaps does William Rowley fall so much below them that he should be excluded from the list.

In the first volume, and in the greater part of the second volume, I marked the deviations from the old editions with a minuteness which I afterwards saw to be unnecessary; and throughout the remainder of the work I accordingly abandoned that system of annotation.

THE OLD LAW.

“Not fainting,”

Read

“Nor fainting.”

pan’d hose] Are, I believe, more correctly described by Gifford as “breeches composed of small squares or pannels.” Note on Massinger’s Works, vol. ii. p. 485, ed. 1813. “A kind of trunk breeches, formed of stripes of various-coloured cloth, occasionally intermixed with slips of silk or velvet, stitched together.” Introd. to Ford’s Works, p. clxxvii.

Scirophorion ... Hecatombaion] When I reprinted Gifford’s note on these words, which he calls “a miserable ostentation lxiiof Greek literature,” I forgot to observe, that the “Grecian Moneths” were formerly not unfamiliar to the vulgar; see, for instance, the last page of Pond’s Almanack, 1610.

BLURT, MASTER-CONSTABLE.

kerry merry buff] So Nash, “Yea, without kerry merry buffe be it spoken,” &c. Haue with you to Saffron-walden, 1596, sig. F 4; and Kempe, “One hath written Kemps farewell to the tune of Kery, mery, Buffe.” Dedication of the Nine daies Wonder, 1600.

Cornelius’ dry-fats] Compare Taylor, the water-poet: “She [the bawd] will harbour no ventred commodity in her warehouse, and if the Informer or Constable doe light vpon one of her conceal’d dryfats, Punchions, fardels,” &c. A Bawd, p. 103—Workes, 1630.

“Enter Doyt and Dandyprat.”

Read

“Re-enter Doyt,” &c.

“I’ll keep time just to a minute, I.”

Read, for the metre,

“I will keep,” &c.

lantern and candle-light] “Was anciently accounted one lxiiiof the cries of London, being the usual words of the bellman:” see Nares’s Gloss. in v.

“marry, Blurt master-constable.”

Read

“marry, Blurt, master constable!”

a proverbial expression: see p. 225 of the same vol.

“Enter Blurt and all his Watch.”

Read

“Re-enter Blurt,” &c.

For “his” of old ed. the sense requires that we should read “this,”—an alteration which I intended, but by some oversight neglected, to make in the text. As to my note, “lie] i. e. lay—for the sake of the rhyme”—the word, I believe, is rightly explained; but I find that Brathwait has used “lies” for “lays,” even in the middle of a line:

steaks] That this is the right reading, appears from a passage in Your Five Gallants: see vol. ii. p. 287.

Without thee] I was wrong in supposing that the earlier part of the line had dropt out: see notes on imperfect couplets, vol. i. p. 424, vol. ii. pp. 7, 307, &c.

MICHAELMAS TERM.

scurvy murrey kersey] So in The Two Merry Milke-Maids, 1620; “foolish, scuruy, course-kersie, durty-tayl’d, dangling dug-cow.” Sig. C. 3.

i’ th’ wold of Kent] I ought not to have altered “wild” into “wold:” compare The Marriage-Broaker by M. W.; “Ride to my Farm i’ th’ wild,” p. 27—Gratiæ Theatrales, 1662.

a warning-piece] The text is quite right: so Dekker, “Ther’s a warning peece. Away.” Whore of Babylon, 1607, sig. C. iv.; and S. Rowley,

the row] Perhaps I ought to have printed “row” with a lxvcapital letter,—i. e. Goldsmiths’-Row in Cheapside: see Stow’s Survey, b. iii. p. 198, ed. 1720; and Gifford’s note on B. Jonson’s Works, vol. v. p. 93.

A TRICK TO CATCH THE OLD ONE.

We learn from Downes’s Roscius Anglicanus that this play was one of the early dramas revived between 1662 and 1665, p. 36, ed. Waldron.

Longacre] The editor of 1816 is mistaken: this word was used for an estate in general; compare Lady Alimony, 1659, “It will run like Quicksilver over all their Husbands Demains: and in very short time make a quick dispatch of all his Long acre.” Sig. B 3.

A passage of Gammer Gurton’s Needle, which stands thus in the various editions of Dodsley’s Old Plays,

has drawn forth the following extraordinary note from Steevens: “I believe we should read halse anchor, or anker, as it was anciently spelt; a naval phrase. The halse or halser was a particular kind of cable,” &c., vol. ii. p. 11, last ed.—If Steevens, or the other editors, had only taken the trouble to look at the 4to of 1575, they would have found the true reading—“halfe aker,” i. e. small bit of ground.

Weber remarks, &c.] The mistake of Weber may be traced to Langbaine, who says, “This Play is mentioned by Sir Thomas Bornwel in The Lady of Pleasure, Act 1. Sc. 1.” Acc. of English Dram. Poets, p. 372.

“a corruption of will.”

Read

“a corruption of wilt.”

We saw Samson bear the town-gates on his neck from the lower to the upper stage, with that life and admirable accord, that it shall never be equalled, unless the whole new livery of porters set [to] their shoulders] Middleton seems to have had in his recollection a passage of Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost: “Sampson, master: he was a man of good carriage, great carriage; for he carried the town-gates on his back, like a porter.” Act i. sc. 2.

Europa’s sea-form] Probably “sea-form” is used in the sense of sea-seat,—the bull on which she sat.

play Ambidexter] I was wrong, I believe, in saying that this expression has an allusion to Preston’s Cambises: it is by no means uncommon.

“Hist! a supply.”

Read, with old ed.,

“Pist! a supply.”

See notes, vol. ii. pp. 460, 468.

After this line insert “Exit;” and in the note, for “and thrown a scarf over his face (see what follows), the audience,” &c., read “and having made his exit at one door, had re-entered at the other with a scarf thrown over his face, the audience,” &c.

“Master, hist, master!”

Read, with old ed.,

“Master, pist, master!”

See notes, vol. ii. pp. 460, 468.

The boy means that she made his father a cuckold: compare Dekker’s Owles Almanacke, 1618; “Men whose wiues haue light heeles, are called Ramme-headed Cuckolds,” p. 10.

the glory of his complement] I doubt if Steevens’s explanation lxviiiof this passage be the right one, or if complement mean here any thing more than courtly address.

Steevens’s remark, cited here by Reed, that a horse was sometimes denominated a footcloth, is certainly wrong. “Sir Bounteous,” observes Nares (Gloss. in v.), “is said to [be] alight[ed] from his footcloth, as one might say, alighted from his saddle.”

THE ROARING GIRL.

the high German’s size] This person is probably alluded to in the following passage of Dekker’s Newes from Hell, &c. 1606: “As for Rapier and dagger, the Germane may be his journeyman.” Sig. B. See also Beaumont and Fletcher’s Knight of the Burning Pestle—Works, vol. i. p. 215, ed. Weber; and Shirley’s Opportunity—Works, vol. iii. p. 407, where Gifford observes, that “he seems to have been ‘a master of fence,’ or common challenger.”

Since writing the note on this passage, I have met with the following lines in The Travailes of the Three English Brothers, &c. (by Day, W. Rowley, and Wilkins), 1607;

I am told that a gentleman in London possesses an edition of the Life of Long Meg of Westminster, printed in 1582.

I ought to have substituted “lap” for “lay,” as Reed (see note) suggests.

THE HONEST WHORE.

Curs’d be that day for ever, &c.] In a note on Shakespeare’s King John, act iii. sc. 1, Henderson has pointed out the resemblance between this speech of Hippolito and that of Constance which begins,

“Cas. Please you be here, my lord?    [Offers tobacco.”

This appears to have been the customary expression on such an occasion: in Wine, Beere, Ale, and Tobacco, Contending for Superiority, a Dialogue, we read,

Tobaco. Be your leaue gentlemen—wilt please you be here, sir?”

ningle] I have observed, in my note, that all the eds. except that of 1605 have “mingle.” Nares (who had not seen that rare edition), citing this passage, gives Mingle in his Gloss. as lxxa legitimate word; but I do not recollect to have met with such a form.

turn Turk] “Was,” says Gifford, “a figurative expression for a change of condition, or opinion.” Note on Massinger’s Works, vol. ii. p. 222, ed. 1813.

orangado] Should be “oringado” or “eringado:” oringo was an old form of eringo.

“A sister’s thread, i’faith, had been enough.”

In Ford’s Lady’s Trial is the same expression:

“A flake, no bigger than a sister’s thread,”

which Gifford too hastily altered to “a spider’s thread,” Works, vol. ii. p. 306.—That “sister’s” is not a misprint, there can be no doubt: it seems to be a form of sewster’s.

B. Jonson’s Sad Shepherd—Works, vol. vi. p. 282, ed. Giff.

We see you, old man, for all you dance in a net] An allusion to the proverbial saying, “You dance in a net, and think nobody sees you.” Ray’s Proverbs, p. 5, ed. 1768.

Bow a little] i. e. bend your hand a little: so in The Spanish Gipsy, Alvarez, while telling the fortune of Louis, says to him, “Bend your hand thus:” see vol. iv. p. 149.

I’ll fly high, wench, hang toss!] In this passage, says Gifford, “toss is used in a way that would induce one to think it meant low play, or a hazard of petty sums.” Note on Massinger’s Works, vol. iii. p. 160, ed. 1813.

a cob] “A [silver] Cob of Ireland, or a Peece of Eight, is worth four shilling eight pence. It is a Spanish Coin, not round but cornered, or nuke shotten, and passith according to its weight for more or less.” R. Holme’s Ac. of Armory, b. iii. c. ii. p. 30.

Must I be fed with chippings? you’re best get a clapdish, and say you’re proctor to some spittle-house] “It was once,” says Gifford, “the practice for beadles and other inferior parish officers, to go from door to door with a clap-dish, soliciting charity for those unhappy sufferers, who are now better relieved by voluntary subscriptions.” Note on B. Jonson’s Works, vol. i. p. 44.

old Cole] Is the name of the sculler in the puppet-show of Hero and Leander, introduced into B. Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair, act v. sc. 3: see Works, vol. iv. p. 509 (note), and p. 520, ed. Gifford.

improv’d] Is right; meaning, as it frequently does, proved.

And they’re both well provided for, they’re i’ th’ hospital] “Hospital” ought to have been printed with a capital letter: for though the scene of the play is laid in Italy, yet the allusion (as Gifford observes, note on B. Jonson’s Works, vol. i. p 41), is to Christ’s Hospital, whither, when it was first established, the foundlings taken up in the city were sent for maintenance and education.

Come, my dainty doxies?] I neglected to notice that this song is found entire in our author’s More Dissemblers besides Women: see p. 606 of the same volume.

A FAIR QUARREL.

from the six windmills to Islington] “The third great Field from Moorgate, next to the six Windmills.” Stow’s Survey, b. iii. p. 70, ed. 1720.

a quadrangular plumation] Compare Vigon’s Workes of Chirurgerie, &c., 1571, where, treating of “tentes, lyntes, and bolsters” for wounds, he tells us that “some [bolsters] bene quadrate;” and a little after, “some moreouer vse bolsters made of fethers,” fol. cxiii.

board] The spelling of the old ed. is right—“bord,” i. e. size. So in Beaumont and Fletcher’s Knight of the Burning Pestle;

where, says M. Mason, “bord means rim or circumference.”

corps] So the word is used as a plural in Epigrams and Satyres, by Richard Middleton, 1608;

“11 Rider’s Dictionary] A Dict. Engl. and Lat. and Lat. and Engl., by John Rider, first printed at Oxford, 1589, was a work once in great repute.”

THE SPANISH GIPSY.

“this she, trow;”

Read

“this she, trow?”

A GAME AT CHESS.

Roch, Main, and Petronill, itch and ague curers] Compare Taylor the water-poet: “he must be content with his office, lxxivas ... Saint Roch with scabbes and scurfes ... Saint Petronella the Ague or any Feuer.” A Bawd, p. 93—Workes, 1630.

Epistle to Nicholas the first, &c.] Since writing the note on these words, I have found in the Κειμηλια Literaria of Colomesius what he calls a confirmation of the absurd story of the six thousand infants’ heads. “Simile quid narratur a Joscelino, in Episcoporum Cantuariensium Vitis, p. 210. editionis Hanovianæ. Anno 1309, inquit, Radulphus Bourn Augustinensis Ecclesiæ Abbas electus, cum ad Papam Avinioni agentem confirmandus accessisset, reversus domum, testatur se vidisse in itinere piscinam in quadam Monialium Abbatia, quæ Provines dicebatur; in qua, cum educta aqua luto purgaretur, multa parvulorum ossa, ipsaque corpora adhuc integra reperiebantur. Unde ad criminalia judicia subeunda viginti septem Moniales Parisios ductæ et carceribus mancipatæ fuerunt, de quibus quid actum fuerit, nescivit.” Col. Opera, p. 301, ed. Fabr.

ANY THING FOR A QUIET LIFE.

the new prophet, the astrological tailor] Perhaps Ball, who is thus mentioned by Osborn: “And, if common Fame did not outstrip Truth, King James was by Fear led into this extreme; finding his Son Henry not only averse to any Popish Match, but saluted by the Puritans as one prefigured in the Apocalyps for Rome’s destruction. And to parallel this, one Ball, a Taylor, was inspired with a like Lunacy, tho’ something more chargeable; for not only he, but Ramsay his Majesty’s Watch-maker, put out Money and Clocks, to be paid (but with small Advantage, considering the Improbability) when King James should be crowned in the Pope’s chair.” Trad. Memor. on the Reign of K. James—Works, vol. ii. p. 153, ed. 1722; see also B. Jonson’s Works by Gifford, vol. v. p. 242.

To take out] i. e. to copy—a not uncommon expression in our old writers.

NO WIT, NO HELP LIKE A WOMAN’S.

the widow’s notch shall lie open to you] This passage is, I think, explained by the following line in our author’s Triumphs of Truth;

I did quite right in substituting “slander” for “slave.” These words were frequently confounded by the old printers.

I from the baker’s ditch] So in Brome’s Sparagus Garden, 1640, “Sheart, Coulter, we be vallen into the Bakers ditch.” Sig. K 3. The ancient way of punishing bakers, who did not give full weight, was by the cucking-stool (see Grey’s note on Hudibras, P. iii. C. iii. v. 609); qy. is that punishment alluded to in the above passages?

Ill May-Day] i. e. Evil May-day—so called from the rising of the London apprentices against the foreigners, on the first of May, 1517: see The Story of Ill May-Day, &c., and the editor’s illustrations, in Evans’s Old Ballads, vol. iii. p. 76, ed. 1810.

Midsummer-Eve, that watches warmest] Perhaps this is an allusion to the setting out of the Midsummer watch: see Herbert’s Hist. of the Twelve Great Livery Companies of London, vol. i. p. 196, sqq.

“i. e. wife.”

Read

“i. e. city-wife.”

THE TRIUMPHS OF INTEGRITY.

“pegmes.”

Read

“pegms.”

THE BLACK BOOK.

ketlers] This word occurs in Kemp’s Nine daies wonder, 1600; “Those that haue shewne themselues honest men, I wil set before them this Caracter, H. for honesty; before the other Bench-whistlers shal stand K. for ketlers and keistrels, that wil driue a good companion without need in them to contend for his owne.”

3The Excellent Comedy, called The Old Law, or A new way to please you.

By {Phil. Massinger.
Tho. Middleton.
William Rowley.

Acted before the King and Queene at Salisbury House, and at severall other places, with great Applause. Together with an exact and perfect Catalogue of all the Playes, with the Authors Names, and what are Comedies, Tragedies, Histories, Pastoralls, Masks, Interludes, more exactly Printed then ever before. London, Printed for Edward Archer, at the signe of the Adam and Eve, in Little Britaine. 1656. 4to.

Steevens (Malone’s Shakespeare, by Boswell, ii. 425.) remarks, that this drama was acted in 1599, founding the statement most probably on a passage in Act iii. Sc. 1., where the Clerk having read from the church-book, “Agatha, the daughter of Pollux—born in an. 1540,” adds, “and now ’tis 99.” From similar notices in several other old dramas, the periods at which they were first produced have been clearly ascertained; and Gifford (Introd. to Massinger, p. lv. 2d ed.) inclines to believe that The Old Law was really first acted in 1599, and that Massinger (who was then only in the fifteenth year of his age) was employed, at a subsequent period, to alter or to add a few scenes to the play. What portion of it was written by Middleton cannot be determined.

The 4to. abounds in the grossest typographical errors. I have followed, except in some trifling particulars, the text of Gifford, who published The Old Law in the ivth vol. of his Massinger.

“There is an exquisiteness of moral sensibility, making one to gush out tears of delight, and a poetical strangeness in all the improbable circumstances of this wild play, which are unlike any thing in the dramas which Massinger wrote alone. The pathos is of a subtler edge. Middleton and Rowley, who assisted in this play, had both of them finer geniuses than their associate.”—Lamb, Spec. of Engl. Dram. Poets, p. 453.

• Evander, duke of Epire.
• Cratilus, the executioner.
• Creon, father to Simonides.
• Simonides,
  Cleanthes, young courtiers.
• Lysander, husband to Eugenia, and uncle to Cleanthes.
• Leonides, father to Cleanthes.
• Gnotho, the clown.
• Lawyers.
• Courtiers.
• Dancing-master.
• Butler,
  Bailiff,
  Tailor,
  Coachman,
  Footman,
  Cook, Servants to Creon.
• Clerk.
• Drawer.

• Antigona, wife to Creon.
• Hippolita, wife to Cleanthes.
• Eugenia, wife to Lysander, and mother to Parthenia.
• Parthenia.
• Agatha, wife to Gnotho.
• Old women, wives to Creon’s servants.
• Courtezan.

ACT I. SCENE I.

It is—Secundum statutum principis, confirmatum cum voce senatus,^[57] et voce reipublicæ; nay, consummatum et exemplificatum.

First Law. Why, sir, the very letter and the sense both do^[71] overthrow you in this statute, which^[72] speaks, that every man living to fourscore years, and women to threescore, shall then be cut off, as fruitless to the republic, and law shall finish what nature linger’d at.

Anno primo Evandri, Be it for the care and good of 11the commonwealth, (for divers necessary reasons that we shall urge,) thus peremptorily enacted,—

Second Law. That all men living in our dominions of Epire, in their decayed nature, to the age of fourscore, or women to the age of threescore, shall on the same day be instantly put to death, by those means and instruments that a former proclamation, had to this purpose, through our said territories dispersed.

Clean. There was no woman in this senate, certain.

First Law. That these men, being past their bearing arms to aid and defend their country; past their manhood and likelihood^[76] to propagate any further issue to their posterity; and as well past their councils (whose^[77] overgrown gravity is now run into dotage) to assist their country; to whom, in common reason, nothing should be so wearisome as their own lives, as they may be supposed tedious^[78] to their successive heirs, whose times are spent in the good of their country, yet wanting the means to maintain it; and are like to grow old before their inheritance (born to them) come to their necessary use, [be condemned to die]: for the women,^[79] for that they never were defence to their country; never by counsel admitted to the assist[ance] of [the] government of their country; only necessary to the propagation of posterity, and now, at the age of threescore, past^[80] that good, and all their goodness: it 12is thought fit, then, (a quarter abated from the more worthy member) they^[81] be put to death, as is before recited: provided that, for the just and impartial execution of this our statute, the example shall first begin in and about our court, which ourself will see carefully performed; and not, for a full month^[82] following, extend any further into our dominions. Dated the sixth of the second month, at our Palace Royal in Epire.^[83]

That man at the age of fourscore, and woman^[85] at threescore, shall the same day be put to death.

ACT II. SCENE I.

Evan. Executioner!

Crat. My lord.

Evan. How did old Diocles take his death?

Crat. As weeping brides receive their joys at night;^[117] With trembling, yet with patience.

Evan. Why, ’twas well.

Sim. There’s least need of thee, fellow; I shall ne’er drink at home, I shall be so drunk abroad.

But. But a cup of small beer will do well next morning, sir.

Sim. I grant you; but what need I keep so big a knave for a cup of small beer?

Cook. Butler, you have your answer. Marry, sir, a cook I know your mastership cannot be without.

Sim. The more ass art thou to think so; for what should I do with a mountebank, no drink in my house?—the banishing the butler might have been a warning for thee, unless thou meanest to choke me.

Sim. I prithee, hold thy tongue, fellow; I shall take a course to spend ’em faster than thou canst reckon ’em; ’tis not the rents must serve my turn, unless I mean to be laughed at; if a man should be seen out of slash-me, let him ne’er look to be a right gallant. But, sirrah, with whom is your business?

Coach. Your good mastership.

But. Come, will you be ruled by a butler’s advice once? for we must make up our fortunes somewhere now, as the case stands: let’s e’en, therefore, go seek out widows of nine and fifty, and^[144] we can, that’s within a year of their deaths, and so we shall be sure to be quickly rid of ’em; for a year’s enough of conscience to be troubled with a wife, for any man living.

Cook. Oracle butler! oracle butler! he puts down all the doctors a’ the name.^[145] [Exeunt.

But thou art but a dead man, therefore what should a man do talking with thee? Come, widow, stand to your tackling.

Gnoth. You have searched o’er the parish-chronicle, sir?

Clerk. Yes, sir; I have found out the true age and date of the party you wot on.

Gnoth. Pray you, be covered, sir.

Clerk. When you have shewed me the way, sir.

Gnoth. O sir, remember yourself, you are a clerk.

Clerk. A small clerk, sir.

Gnoth. Likely to be the wiser man, sir; for your greatest clerks are not always so, as ’tis reported.

Clerk. You are a great man in the parish, sir.

Gnoth. I understand myself so much the better, sir; for all the best in the parish pay duties to the clerk, and I would owe you none, sir.

Clerk. Since you’ll have it so, I’ll be the first to hide my head.

Gnoth. Mine is a capcase: now to our business in^[164] hand. Good luck, I hope; I long to be resolved.

Gnoth. Pray you, let’s hear what it speaks.

48Clerk. Mark, sir.—Agatha, the daughter of Pollux, (this is your wife’s name, and the name of her father,) born——

Gnoth. Whose daughter, say you?

Clerk. The daughter of Pollux.

Gnoth. I take it his name was Bollux.

Clerk. Pollux the orthography I assure you, sir; the word is corrupted else.

Gnoth. Well, on, sir,—of Pollux; now come on, Castor.

Clerk. Born in an. 1540, and now ’tis 99. By this infallible record, sir, (let me see,) she is now just fifty-nine, and wants but one.

Gnoth. I am sorry she wants so much.

Clerk. Why, sir? alas, ’tis nothing; ’tis but so many months, so many weeks, so many——

Gnoth. Do not deduct it to days,^[166] ’twill be the more tedious; and to measure it by hourglasses were intolerable.

Clerk. Do not think on it, sir; half the time goes away in sleep, ’tis half the year in nights.

Gnoth. O, you mistake me, neighbour, I am loath to leave the good old woman; if she were gone now it would not grieve me; for what is a year, alas, but a lingering torment? and were it not better she were out of her pain? ’T must needs be a grief to us both.

Clerk. I would I knew how to ease you, neighbour!

Gnoth. You speak kindly, truly, and if you say 49but Amen to it, (which is a word that I know you are perfect in,) it might be done. Clerks are the most indifferent honest men,—for to the marriage of your enemy, or the burial of your friend, the curses or the blessings to you are all one; you say Amen to all.

Clerk. With a better will to the one than the other, neighbour: but I shall be glad to say Amen to any thing might do you a pleasure.

Gnoth. There is, first, something above your duty: [Gives him money] now I would have you set forward the clock a little, to help the old woman out of her pain.

Clerk. I will speak to the sexton;^[167] but the day will go ne’er the faster for that.

Gnoth. O, neighbour, you do not conceit me; not the jack of the clock-house; the hand of the dial, I mean.—Come, I know you, being a great clerk, cannot choose but have the art to cast a figure.

Clerk. Never, indeed, neighbour; I never had the judgment to cast a figure.

Gnoth. I’ll shew you on the back side of your book, look you,—what figure’s this?

Clerk. Four with a cipher, that’s forty.

Gnoth. So! forty; what’s this now?

Clerk. The cipher is turned into 9 by adding the tail, which makes forty-nine.

Gnoth. Very well understood; what is’t now?

Clerk. The 4 is turned into 3; ’tis now thirty-nine.

Gnoth. Very well understood; and can you do this again?

Clerk. O, easily, sir.

50Gnoth. A wager of that! let me see the place of my wife’s age again.

Clerk. Look you, sir, ’tis here, 1540.

Gnoth. Forty drachmas, you do not turn that forty into thirty-nine.

Clerk. A match with you.

Gnoth. Done! and you shall keep stakes yourself: there they are.

Clerk. A firm match—but stay, sir, now I consider it, I shall add a year to your wife’s age; let me see—Scirophorion the 17,—and now ’tis Hecatombaion the 11.^[168] If I alter this, your wife will have but a month to live by the law.

Gnoth. That’s all one, sir; either do it, or pay me my wager.

Clerk. Will you lose your wife before you lose your wager?

Gnoth. A man may get two wives before half so much money by ’em; will you do’t?

Clerk. I hope you will conceal me, for ’tis flat corruption.

Gnoth. Nay, sir, I would have you keep counsel; for I lose my money by’t, and should be laughed at for my labour, if it should be known.

Clerk. Well, sir, there!—’tis done; as perfect [a] 39 as can be found in black and white: but mum, sir,—there’s danger in this figure-casting.

Gnoth. Ay, sir, I know that: better men than you have been thrown over the bar for as little; the best is, you can be but thrown out of the belfry.

Clerk. Lock close, here comes company; asses have ears as well as pitchers.

Cook. O Gnotho,^[169] how is’t? here’s a trick^[170] of discarded cards of us! we were ranked with coats, as long as our old master lived.

Gnoth. And is this then the end of serving-men?

Cook. Yes, ’faith, this is the end of serving-men:serving-men: a wise man were better serve one God than all the men in the world.

Gnoth. ’Twas well spoke^[171] of a cook. And are all fallen into fasting-days and Ember-weeks, that cooks are out of use?

Tail. And all tailors will be cut into lists and shreds; if this world hold, we shall grow both out of request.

But. And why not butlers as well as tailors? if they can go naked, let ’em neither eat nor drink.

Clerk. That’s strange, methinks, a lord should turn away his tailor, of all men:—and how dost thou, tailor?

Tail. I do so, so; but, indeed, all our wants are long of this publican, my lord’s bailiff; for had he been rent-gatherer still, our places had held together still, that are now seam-rent, nay cracked in the whole piece.

Bail. Sir, if my lord had not sold his lands that 52claim his rents, I should still have been the rent-gatherer.

Cook. The truth is, except the coachman and the footman, all serving-men are out of request.

Gnoth. Nay, say not so, for you were never in more request than now, for requesting is but a kind of a begging; for when you say, I beseech your worship’s charity, ’tis all one [as] if you say, I request it; and in that kind of requesting, I am sure serving-men were never in more request.

Cook. Troth, he says true: well, let that pass, we are upon a better adventure. I see, Gnotho,^[172] you have been before us; we came to deal with this merchant for some commodities.

Clerk. With me, sir? any thing that I can.

But. Nay, we have looked out our wives already: marry, to you we come to know the prices, that is, to know their ages; for so much reverence we bear to age, that the more aged, they shall be the more dear to us.

Tail. The truth is, every man has laid by his widow; so they be lame enough, blind enough, and old [enough], ’tis good enough.

Clerk. I keep the town-stock; if you can but name ’em, I can tell their ages to [a] day.

All. We can tell their fortunes to an hour, then.

Clerk. Only you must pay for turning of the leaves.

Cook. O, bountifully.—Come, mine first.

But. The butler before the cook, while you live; there’s few that eat before they drink in a morning.

Tail. Nay, then the tailor puts in his needle of 53priority, for men do clothe themselves before they either drink or eat.

Bail. I will strive for no place; the longer ere I marry my wife, the older she will be, and nearer her end and my ends.

Clerk. I will serve you all, gentlemen, if you will have patience.

Gnoth. I commend your modesty, sir; you are a bailiff, whose place is to come behind other men, as it were in the bum of all the rest.

Bail. So, sir! and you were about this business too, seeking out for a widow?

Gnoth. Alack! no, sir; I am a married man, and have those cares upon me that you would fain run into.

Bail. What, an old rich wife! any man in this age desires such a care.

Gnoth. ’Troth, sir, I’ll put a venture with you, if you will; I have a lusty old quean to my wife, sound of wind and limb, yet I’ll give out to take three for one at the marriage of my second wife.

Bail. Ay, sir, but how near is she to the law?

Gnoth. Take that at hazard, sir; there must be time, you know, to get a new. Unsight, unseen, I take three to one.

Bail. Two to one I’ll give, if she have but two teeth in her head.

Gnoth. A match; there’s five drachmas for ten at my next wife.

Bail. A match.

Cook. I shall be fitted bravely; fifty-eight, and upwards; ’tis but a year and a half, and I may chance make friends, and beg a year of the duke.

But. Hey, boys! I am made sir butler; my wife that shall be wants but two months of her time; it shall be one ere I marry her, and then the next will be a honeymoon.

54Tail. I outstrip you all; I shall have but six weeks of Lent, if I get my widow, and then comes eating-tide, plump and gorgeous.

Gnoth. This tailor will be a man, if ever there were any.

Bail. Now comes my turn, I hope, goodman Finis, you that are still at the end of all, with a so be it. Well now, sirs? do you venture there as I have done; and I’ll venture here after you. Good luck, I beseech thee!

Clerk. Amen, sir.

Bail. That deserves a fee already—there ’tis; please me, and have a better.

Clerk. Amen, sir.

Cook. How, two for one at your next wife! is the old one living?

Gnoth. You have a fair match, I offer you no foul one; if death make not haste to call her, she’ll make none to go to him.

But. I know her, she’s a lusty woman; I’ll take the venture.

Gnoth. There’s five drachmas for ten at my next wife.

But. A bargain.

Cook. Nay, then we’ll be all merchants: give me.

Tail. And me.

But. What has the bailiff sped?

Bail. I am content; but none of you shall know my happiness.

Clerk. As well as any of you all, believe it, sir.

Bail. O, clerk, you are to speak last always.

Clerk. I’ll remember’t hereafter, sir. You have done with me, gentlemen?

All. For this time, honest register.

Clerk. Fare you well then; if you do,^[173] I’ll cry Amen to’t. [Exit.

Cook. Look you, sir, is not this your wife?

Gnoth. My first wife, sir.

But. Nay, then we have made a good match on’t; if she have no froward disease, the woman may live this dozen years by her age.

Tail. I’m afraid she’s broken-winded, she holds silence so long.

Cook. We’ll now leave our venture to the event; I must a wooing.

But. I’ll but buy me a new dagger, and overtake you.

Bail. So we must all; for he that goes a wooing to a widow without a weapon, will never get her.

Gnoth. O wife, wife!

Aga. What ail you, man, you speak so passionately?^[174]

Gnoth. ’Tis for thy sake, sweet wife: who would think so lusty an old woman, with reasonable good teeth, and her tongue in as perfect use as ever it was, should be so near her time?—but the Fates will have it so.

Aga. What’s the matter, man? you do amaze me.

Gnoth. Thou art not sick neither, I warrant thee.

Aga. Not that I know of, sure.

56Gnoth. What pity ’tis a woman should be so near her end, and yet not sick!

Gnoth. Ay, alas! I see thou hast been repairing time as well as thou couldst; the old wrinkles are well filled up, but the vermilion is seen too thick, too thick—and I read what’s written in thy forehead; it agrees with the church-book.

Aga. Have you sought my age, man? and, I prithee, how is it?

Gnoth. I shall but discomfort thee.

Aga. Not at all, man; when there’s no remedy, I will go, though unwillingly.

Gnoth. 1539. Just; it agrees with the book: you have about a year to prepare yourself.

Aga. Out, alas! I hope there’s more than so. But do you not think a reprieve might be gotten for half a score—and^[175] ’twere but five year[s], I would not care? an able woman, methinks, were to be pitied.

Gnoth. Ay, to be pitied, but not helped; no hope of that: for, indeed, women have so blemished their own reputations now-a-days, that it is thought the law will meet them at fifty very shortly.

Aga. Marry, the heavens forbid!

Gnoth. There’s so many of you, that, when you 57are old, become witches; some profess physic, and kill good subjects faster than a burning fever; and then school-mistresses of the sweet sin, which commonly we call bawds, innumerable of that sort: for these and such causes ’tis thought they shall not live above fifty.

Aga. Ay, man, but this hurts not the good old women.

Gnoth. I’faith, you are so like one another, that a man cannot distinguish ’em: now, were I an old woman, I would desire to go before my time, and offer myself willingly, two or three years before. O, those are brave women, and worthy to be commended of all men in the world, that, when their husbands die, they run to be burnt to death with ’em: there’s honour and credit! give me half a dozen such wives.

Aga. Ay, if her husband were dead before, ’twere a reasonable request; if you were dead, I could be content to be so.

Gnoth. Fie! that’s not likely, for thou hadst two husbands before me.

Aga. Thou wouldst not have me die, wouldst thou, husband?

Gnoth. No, I do not speak to that purpose; but I say what credit it were for me and thee, if thou wouldst; then thou shouldst never be suspected for a witch, a physician, a bawd, or any of those things: and then how daintily should I mourn for thee, how bravely should I see thee buried! when, alas, if he goes before, it cannot choose but be a great grief to him to think he has not seen his wife well buried. There be such virtuous women in the world, but too few, too few, who desire to die seven years before their time, with all their hearts.

58Aga. I have not the heart to be of that mind; but, indeed, husband, I think you would have me gone.

Gnoth. No, alas! I speak but for your good and your credit; for when a woman may die quickly, why should she go to law for her death? Alack, I need not wish thee gone, for thou hast but a short time to stay with me: you do not know how near ’tis,—it must out; you have but a month to live by the law.

Aga. Out, alas!

Gnoth. Nay, scarce so much.

Aga. O, O, O, my heart! [Swoons.

Gnoth. Ay, so! if thou wouldst go away quietly, ’twere sweetly done, and like a kind wife; lie but a little longer, and the bell shall toll for thee.

Aga. O my heart, but a month to live!

Gnoth. Alas, why wouldst thou come back again for a month?—I’ll throw her down again—O, woman, ’tis not three weeks; I think a fortnight is the most.

Aga. Nay, then I am gone already. [Swoons.

Gnoth. I would make haste to the sexton now, but I’m afraid the tolling of the bell will wake her again. If she be so wise as to go now—she stirs again; there’s two lives of the nine gone.

Aga. O, wouldst thou not help to recover me, husband?

Gnoth. Alas, I could not find in my heart to hold thee by thy nose, or box thy cheeks; it goes against my conscience.

Gnoth. What a spite’s this, that a man cannot 59persuade his wife to die in any time with her good will! I have another bespoke already; though a piece of old beef will serve to breakfast, yet a man would be glad of a chicken to supper. The clerk, I hope, understands no Hebrew, and cannot write backward what he hath writ forward already, and then I am well enough.

’Tis use enough a’ conscience for a broker^[176]—if he had a conscience. [Exit.

SCENE II.

ACT IV. SCENE I.

Draw. By and by:—here, gentlemen, here’s the quintessence of Greece; the sages never drunk better grape.

Cook. Sir, the mad Greeks of this age can taste their Palermo as well as the sage Greeks did before ’em.—Fill, lick-spiggot.

Draw. Ad imum, sir.

Gnoth. My friends, I must doubly invite you all, the fifth of the next month, to the funeral of my first wife, and to the marriage of my second, my two to one; this is she.

Cook. I hope some of us will be ready for the funeral of our wives by that time, to go with thee: but shall they be both of a day?

Gnoth. O, best of all, sir; where sorrow and joy meet together, one will help away with another the better. Besides, there will be charges saved too; the same rosemary that serves for the funeral will serve for the wedding.

But. How long do you make account to be a widower, sir?

Gnoth. Some half an hour; long enough a’ conscience. Come, come, let’s have some agility; is there no music in the house?

Draw. Yes, sir, here are sweet wire-drawers in the house.

Cook. O, that makes them and you seldom part; you are wine-drawers, and they wire-drawers.

Tail. And both govern by the pegs too.

Gnoth. And you have pipes in your consort^[213] too.

Draw. And sackbuts too, sir.

76But. But the heads of your instruments differ; yours are hogs-heads, their[s] cittern and gittern-heads.

Bail. All wooden heads; there they meet again.

Cook. Bid ’em strike up, we’ll have a dance, Gnotho;^[214] come, thou shalt foot^[215] it too. [Exit Drawer.

Gnoth. No dancing with me, we have Siren here.

Cook. Siren! ’twas Hiren, the fair Greek,^[216] man.

Gnoth. Five drachmas of that. I say Siren, the fair Greek, and so are all fair Greeks.

Cook. A match; five drachmas her name was Hiren.

Gnoth. Siren’s name was Siren, for five drachmas.

Cook. ’Tis done.

Tail. Take heed what you do, Gnotho.^[217]

Gnoth. Do not I know our own countrywomen, Siren and Nell of Greece, two of the fairest Greeks that ever were?

Cook. That Nell was Helen of Greece too.

Gnoth. As long as she tarried with her husband, she was Ellen; but after she came to Troy, she was Nell of Troy, or Bonny Nell, whether you will or no.

Tail. Why, did she grow shor[t]er when she came to Troy?

77Gnoth. She grew longer,^[218] if you mark the story. When she grew to be an ell, she was deeper than any yard of Troy could reach by a quarter; there was Cressid was Troy weight, and Nell was avoirdupois;^[219] she held more, by four ounces, than Cressida.

Bail. They say she caused many wounds to be given in Troy.

Gnoth. True, she was wounded there herself, and cured again by plaster of Paris; and ever since that has been used to stop holes with.

Draw. Gentlemen, if you be disposed to be merry, the music is ready to strike up; and here’s a consort^[220] of mad Greeks, I know not whether they be men or women, or between both; they have, what-you-call-’em, wizards^[221] on their faces.

Cook. Vizards, good man lick-spiggot.

But. If they be wise women, they may be wizards too.

Draw. They desire to enter amongst any merry company of gentlemen good-fellows, for a strain or two.

Cook. We’ll strain ourselves with ’em, say; let ’em come, Gnotho;^[222] now for the honour of Epire!

78Gnoth. No^[223] dancing with me, we have Siren here.

[A dance by the old Women and Agatha; they offer to take the men, all agree except Gnotho, who sits with the Courtezan.^[224]

Cook. Ay! so kind! then every one his wench to his several room; Gnotho,^[225] we are all provided now, as you are.

Gnoth. I shall have two, it seems: away! I have Siren here already.

Aga. What, a mermaid?^[226] [Takes off her mask.

Gnoth. No, but a maid, horse-face: O old woman! is it you?

Aga. Yes, ’tis I; all the rest have gulled themselves, and taken their own wives, and shall know that they have done more than they can well answer; but I pray you, husband, what are you doing?

Gnoth. Faith, thus should I do, if thou wert dead, old Ag; and thou hast not long to live, I’m sure: we have Siren here.

Aga. Art thou so shameless, whilst I am living, to keep one under my nose?

Gnoth. No, Ag, I do prize her far above thy nose; if thou wouldst lay me both thine eyes in my hand to boot, I’ll not leave her: art not ashamed 79to be seen in a tavern, and hast scarce a fortnight to live? O old woman, what art thou? must thou find no time to think of thy end?

Aga. O unkind villain!

Gnoth. And then, sweetheart, thou shalt have two new gowns; and the best of this old^[227] woman’s shall make thee raiments for the working days.

Aga. O rascal! dost thou quarter my clothes already too?

Gnoth. Her ruffs will serve thee for nothing but to wash dishes; for thou shalt have thine^[228] of the new fashion.

Aga. Impudent villain! shameless harlot!

Gnoth. You may hear, she never wore any but rails all her lifetime.

Aga. Let me come, I’ll tear the strumpet from him.

Gnoth. Darest thou call my wife strumpet, thou preterpluperfect tense of a woman! I’ll make thee do penance in the sheet thou shalt be buried in; abuse my choice, my two to one!

Court. Cud so, Gnotho,^[229] I’ll not tarry so long; five years! I may bury two husbands by that time.

Gnoth. Alas! give the poor woman leave to talk: she with child! ay, with a puppy: as long as I have thee by me, she shall not be with child, I warrant thee.

Aga. The law, and thou, and all, shall find I am with child.

80Gnoth. I’ll take my corporal oath I begat it not, and then thou diest for adultery.

Aga. No matter, that will ask some time in the proof.

Gnoth. O, you’d be stoned to death, would you? all old women would die a’ that fashion with all their hearts; but the law shall overthrow you the tother way, first.

Court. Indeed, if it be so, I will not linger so long, Gnotho.^[230]

Gnoth. Away, away! some botcher has got it; ’tis but a cushion, I warrant thee: the old woman is loath to depart^[231]; she never sung other tune in her life.

Court. We will not have our noses bored with a cushion, if it be so.

Gnoth. Go, go thy ways, thou old almanac at the twenty-eighth day of December, e’en almost out of date! Down on thy knees, and make thee ready; sell some of thy clothes to buy thee a death’s head, and put upon thy middle finger: your least-considering bawd does^[232] so much; be not thou worse, though thou art an old woman, as she is: I am cloyed with old stock-fish; here’s a young perch is sweeter meat by half: prithee, die before thy day, if thou canst, that thou mayst not be counted a witch.

Aga. No, thou art a witch, and I’ll prove it: I 81said I was with child, thou knewest no other but by sorcery: thou saidst it was a cushion, and so it is; thou art a witch for’t, I’ll be sworn to’t.

Gnoth. Ha, ha, ha! I told thee ’twas a cushion. Go, get thy sheet ready; we’ll see thee buried as we go to church to be married.

Aga. Nay, I’ll follow thee, and shew myself a wife. I’ll plague thee as long as I live with thee; and I’ll bury some money before I die,^[233] that my ghost may haunt thee afterward. [Exit.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt Evander, Courtiers, Simonides; and Cratilus with Leonides.

Sim. I would you’d seized upon him a minute sooner; ’t had saved me a cut finger: I wonder how I came by’t, for I never put my hand forth, I’m sure; I think my own sword did cut it, if truth were known; may be the wire in the handle: I have lived these five and twenty years, and never knew what colour my blood was before. I never durst eat oysters, nor cut peck-loaves.

Court. You’ll prove a bawdy bachelor, Sim, to have a cut upon your finger before you are married.

Sim. I’ll never draw sword again, to have such a jest put upon me. [Exeunt.

ACT V. SCENE I.

Clean. [reads.] It is decreed by the grave and learned council of Epire, that no son and heir shall be held capable of his inheritance at the age of one and twenty, unless he be at that time as mature^[322] in obedience, manners, and goodness.

Sim. Sure I shall never be at full age, then, 108though I live to an hundred years; and that’s nearer by twenty than the last statute allowed.

First Court. A terrible act!

Clean.^[323] Moreover, [it] is enacted that all sons aforesaid, whom either this law, or their own grace, shall^[324] reduce into the true method of duty, virtue, and affection, [shall appear before us]^[325] and relate their trial and approbation from Cleanthes, the son of Leonides—from me, my lord!

Evan. From none but you, as fullest. Proceed, sir.

Clean. Whom, for his manifest virtues, we make such judge and censor of youth, and the absolute reference of life and manners.

Sim. This is a brave world! when a man should be selling land, he must be learning manners. Is’t not, my masters?

Evan. Read the law over to her, ’twill awake her: ’Tis on deserves small pity.

Clean. Lastly, it is ordained, that all such wives now whatsoever, that shall design the[ir] husbands’ 109death, to be soon rid of them, and entertain suitors in their husbands’ lifetime—

Sim. You had best read that a little louder; for, if any thing, that will bring her to herself again, and find her tongue.

Clean. Shall not presume, on the penalty of our heavy displeasure, to marry within ten years after.

Eug. That law’s too long by nine years and a half, I’ll take my death upon’t, so shall most women.

Clean. And those incontinent women so offending, to be judge[d] and censured by Hippolita, wife to Cleanthes.

Eug. Of all the rest, I’ll not be judg[’d] by her.

110Enter Fiddlers, Gnotho, Courtezan, Cook, Butler, &c. with the old Women, Agatha, and one bearing a bridecake for the wedding.

Gnoth. Fiddlers, crowd on, crowd on;^[328] let no man lay a block in your way.—Crowd on, I say.

Evan. Stay the crowd awhile; let’s know the reason of this jollity.

Clean. Sirrah, do you know where you are?

Gnoth. Yes, sir; I am here, now here, and now here again, sir.

Lys. Your hat^[329] is too high crown’d, the duke in presence.

Gnoth. The duke! as he is my sovereign, I do give him two crowns for it,^[330] and that’s equal change all the world over: as I am lord of the day (being my marriage-day the second) I do advance [my] bonnet. Crowd on afore.

Gnoth. I think so, my lord, and good reason too; shall not I stay, when your grace says I shall? 111I were unworthy to be a bridegroom in any part of your highness’s dominions, then: will it please you to taste of the wedlock-courtesy?

Gnoth. If your grace please to be cakated, say so.

Evan. And which might be your fair bride, sir?

Gnoth. This is my two for one that must be, [the] uxor uxoris, the remedy doloris, and the very syceum amoris.

Evan. And hast thou any else?

Gnoth. I have an older, my lord, for other uses.

Gnoth. As the destiny of the day falls out, my lord, one goes^[332] to wedding, another goes to hanging; and your grace, in the due consideration, shall find ’em much alike; the one hath the ring upon her finger, the other the^[333] halter about her neck. I take thee, Beatrice, says the bridegroom; I take thee, Agatha, says the hangman; and both say together, to have and to hold, till death do part us.

Evan. This is not yet plain enough to my understanding.

Gnoth. If further your grace examine it, you shall find I shew myself a dutiful subject, and obedient to the law, myself, with these my good friends, and your good subjects, our old wives, whose days 112are ripe, and their lives forfeit to the law: only myself, more forward than the rest, am already provided of my second choice.

Gnoth. I have taken leave of the old, my lord. I have nothing to say to her; she’s going to sea, your grace knows whither, better than I do: she has a strong wind with her, it stands full in her poop; when you please, let her disembogue.

Cook. And the rest of her neighbours with her, whom we present to the satisfaction of your highness’ law.

Gnoth. And so we take our leaves, and leave them to your highness.—Crowd on.^[334]

Gnoth. Alas! she’ll be dead before we can get to church. If your grace would set her in the way, I would despatch her: I have a venture on’t, which would return me, if your highness would make a little more haste, two for one.

Cook. Now they shall be despatch’d out of the way.

Gnoth. I would they were gone once; the time goes away.

Evan. Which is the wife unto the forward bridegroom?

113Aga. I am, and^[335] it please your grace.

Gnoth. O, she paints, my lord; she was a chambermaid once, and learnt it of her lady.

Evan. Sure I think she cannot be so old.

Aga. Truly I think so too, and please your grace.

Gnoth. Two to one with your grace of that! she’s threescore by the book.

Leon. Peace, sirrah, you’re too loud.

Cook. Take heed, Gnotho;^[336] if you move the duke’s patience, ’tis an edge-tool; but a word and a blow; he cuts off your head.

Gnoth. Cut off my head! away, ignorant! he knows it cost more in the hair; he does not use to cut off many such heads as mine: I will talk to him too; if he cut off my head, I’ll give him my ears. I say my wife is at full age for the law; the clerk shall take his oath, and the church-book shall be sworn too.

Gnoth. A mess of wise old men!

Lys. Sirrah, what can you answer to all these?

Gnoth. Ye are good old men, and talk as age will give you leave. I would speak with the youthful duke himself; he and I may speak of things that shall be thirty or forty years after you are dead and rotten. Alas! you are here to-day, and gone to sea to-morrow.

Gnoth. I see your grace is disposed to be pleasant.

Gnoth. I’ll talk further with your grace when I come back from church; in the mean time, you know what to do with the old women.

Aga. O gracious prince!

Cook. Your venture is not like to come in today, Gnotho.^[338]

Gnoth. Give me the principal back.

Cook. Nay, by my troth we’ll venture still—and I’m sure we have as ill a venture of it as you; for we have taken old wives of purpose, that^[339] we had thought to have put away at this market, and now we cannot utter a pennyworth.

Evan. Well, sirrah, you were best to discharge your new charge, and take your old one to you.

Cook. What for the bridecake, Gnotho?^[342]

Lys. This passion^[343] has given some satisfaction yet. My lord, I think you’ll pardon him now, with all the rest, so they live honestly with the wives they have.

Evan. O, most freely; free pardon to all.

Cook. Ay, we have deserved our pardons, if we can live honestly with such reverend wives, that have no motion in ’em but their tongues.

Aga. Heaven bless your grace! you’re a just prince.

117I will weep two salt [ones out] of my^[345] nose, besides these two fountains of fresh water. Your grace had been more kind to your young subjects—heaven bless and mend your laws, that they do not gull your poor countrymen: but^[346] I am not the first, by forty, that has been undone by the law. ’Tis but a folly to stand upon terms; I take my leave of your grace, as well as mine eyes will give me leave: I would they had been asleep in their beds when they opened ’em to see this day! Come, Ag; come, Ag.

Creon. Were not you all my servants?

Cook. During your life, as we thought, sir; but our young master turned us away.

Creon. How headlong, villain, wert thou in thy ruin!

Sim. I followed the fashion, sir, as other young men did. If you were^[347] as we thought you had been, we should ne’er have come for this, I warrant you. We did not feed, after the old fashion, on beef and mutton, and such like.

Creon. Well, what damage or charge you have run yourselves into by marriage, I cannot help, nor deliver you from your wives; them you must keep; yourselves shall again return^[348] to me.

All. We thank your lordship for your love, and must thank ourselves for our bad bargains. [Exeunt.

Sim. I had ne’er thought to have been brought so low as my knees again; but since there’s no remedy, fathers, reverend fathers, as you ever hope to have good sons and heirs, a handful of pity! we confess we have deserved more than we are willing to receive at your hands, though sons can never deserve too much of their fathers, as shall appear afterwards.

Sim. Alas! sir, you see a good pattern for that, now we have laid by our high and lusty meats, and are down to our marrow-bones already.

Sim. If these be weeds, I’m afraid I shall wear none so good again as long as my father lives.

122The Mayor of Quinborough: A Comedy. As it hath been often Acted with much Applause at Black-Fryars, By His Majesties Servants. Written by Tho. Middleton. London, Printed for Henry Herringman, and are to be sold at his Shop at the Sign of the Blew-Anchor in the Lower-Walk of the New-Exchange. 1661. 4to.

From the introduction of an individual as a chorus, and of dumb shows (such as we find in Pericles, and other dramas of an early date), we may gather that this piece was among the author’s first attempts at dramatic composition. Nor does the mention made in it of a play called the Wild-Goose Chase, even supposing that Fletcher’s comedy be meant, overthrow such a conclusion. The passage where that mention occurs (Act v. Sc. i.) might have been inserted when the Mayor of Queenborough was revived, at a period long after its first appearance on the stage: (every reader of our old dramas is aware that play-wrights were often employed to make “additions” to the works of their predecessors): it might, indeed, have been written by Middleton himself, after the appearance of Fletcher’s play, which was produced about 1621.

When Henslowe in his diary notices “Oct. 1602. Randall, Earl of Chester, by T. Middleton,” Malone thinks (why, I know not,) that the Mayor of Queenborough is meant.

This drama has been reprinted in the different editions of Dodsley’s Coll. of Old Plays, vol. xi.

“The author,” says Langbaine, “has chiefly followed Rainulph’s Polychronicon: see besides Stowe, Speed, Du Chesne, &c. in the reign of Vortiger.”—Account of Dram. Poets, p. 372.

123Gentlemen,^[353]

You have the first flight of him, I assure you. This Mayor of Queenborough, whom you have all heard of, and some of you beheld upon the stage, now begins to walk abroad in print: he has been known sufficiently by the reputation of his wit, which is enough, by the way, to distinguish him from ordinary mayors; but wit, you know, has skulked in corners for many years past,^[354] and he was thought to have most of it that could best hide himself. Now whether this magistrate feared the decimating times, or kept up the state of other mayors, that are bound not to go out of their liberties during the time of their mayoralty, I know not: ’tis enough for me to put him into your hands, under the title of an honest man, which will appear plainly to you, because you shall find him all along to have a great pique to the rebel Oliver. I am told his drollery yields to none the English drama did ever produce; and though I would not put his modesty to the blush, by speaking too much in his commendation, yet I know you will agree with me, upon your better acquaintance with him, that there is some difference in point of wit betwixt the Mayor of Queenborough and the Mayor of Huntingdon.^[355]

• Constantius,
  Aurelius Ambrosius,
  Uther Pendragon, sons of Constantine.
• Vortiger.
• Vortimer, his son.
• Devonshire,
  Stafford, British lords.
• Germanus,
  Lupus, monks.
• Hengist.
• Horsus.
• Simon, a tanner, Mayor of Queenborough.
• Aminadab, his clerk.
• Oliver, a fustian-weaver.
• Glover.
• Barber.
• Tailor.
• Felt-monger.
• Button-maker.
• Graziers.
• Players.
• Gentlemen.
• Murderers.
• Soldiers, Footmen, &c.

• Castiza, daughter to Devonshire.
• Roxena, daughter to Hengist.
• Ladies.

• Raynulph Higden, Monk of Chester, as Chorus.

ACT I.

Enter Constantius in the habit of a monk, attended by Germanus and Lupus: as they are going into the monastery, Vortiger stays them.

[Exeunt Constantius, Devonshire, and Stafford; while Lupus and Germanus enter the monastery.

Fortune discovered, in her hand a round ball full of lots; then enter^[378] Hengist and Horsus, 133with others: they draw lots, and having opened them, all depart save Hengist and Horsus, who kneel and embrace: then enter Roxena, seeming to take leave of Hengist in great passion,^[379] but more especially and warily of Horsus, her lover: she departs one way, Hengist and Horsus another.

SCENE II.

Butt. I have such a treacherous heart of my own, ’twill throb at the very fall of a farthingale.

Graz. Not if it fall on the rushes.^[381]

Butt. Yes, truly; if there be no light in the room, I shall throb presently. The first time it took me, my wife was in the company: I remember the room 135was not half so light as this; but I’ll be sworn I was a whole hour in finding her.

Graz. Byrlady,^[382] y’had a long time of throbbing of it then.

Butt. Still I felt men, but I could feel no women; I thought they had been all sunk. I have made a vow for’t, I’ll never have meeting, while I live, by candle-light again.

Graz. Yes, sir, in lanterns.

Butt. Yes, sir, in lanterns; but I’ll never trust candle naked again.

Graz. Hark, hark! stand close: it opens now indeed!

Butt. O majesty, what art thou! I’d give any man half my suit to deliver my petition: it is in the behalf of button-makers, and so it seems by my flesh.^[383]

Graz. Graziers and braziers some, and this a felt-maker.

Butt. Here’s his petition and mine, if it like^[387] your grace. [Giving petitions.

Graz. Look upon mine, I am the longest suitor; I was undone seven years ago.

Const. Make your requests to heaven, not to me.

Butt. ’Las! mine’s a supplication for brass buttons, sir.

Felt. There’s a great enormity in wool; I beseech your grace consider it.

Graz. Pastures rise two-pence an acre; what will this world come to!

Butt. I do beseech your grace——

Graz. Good your grace——