English drama -- Early modern and Elizabethan, 1500-1600
_Sarlab_. Curse thy selfe.
The trusty bark, ore laden with thy sinnes,
Baudryes, grosse lyes, thy theft and perjuryes
Beesydes the burdene of thy ill gott gooddes,
Not able to indure so greate a weight
Was forct to sinke beneathe them.[96]
_Mild_. Out, dogge!
_Sarl_. Out, devill!
_Mild_. By thee I am made nothinge. Oh my giurles
You sweete and never faylinge marchandyse,
Comodityes in all coasts, worthy coyne,
Christiane or heathen! by whom in distresses
I coold have raysed a fortune! more undoone
That I should loose you thus!
_Sarl_. I knowe hee had rather
See halfe a hundred of them burnt[97] a land
Then one destroyde by water. But, oh _Neptune_,
I feare I have supt so much of thy salt brothe
Twill bringe mee to a feavour.
_Mild_. Oh my _Palestra_
And fayre _Scribonia_, weare but you too safe,
Yet som hope weare reserved me.
_Sarl_. I praye, _Mildewe_,
When you so early to the bottom dyv'd,
For whom weare you a fishinge?
_Mild_. Marry, for maydens;
Woold I knewe howe to catch them. But my gutts,
Howe they are sweld with sea brine!
_Sarl_. Tis good phisick
To cure thee of the mangy.
_Mild_. Wretched man!
That have no more left of a magazine
Then these wett cloathes upon mee, nay the woorst
Of all I had and purposely put on
Only to lyv a shipp-board.
_Sarl_. Once to-day
Thou wert in wealthe above mee, nowe the seas have
Left us an equall portion.
_Mild_. In all the wourld
I vowe I am not woorthe a lighted faggott
Or a poore pan of charcoale.
_Sarl_. Justly punisht
Thou that hast all thy lyfe tyme dealt in fyre-woorks,
Stoves and hott bathes to sweet in, nowe to have
Thy teethe to falter in thy head for could
Nimbler then virginall Jacks.[98]
_Mild_. Th'art a sweete guest.
_Sarl_. Too good for such an host, better to have bin
Lodgd in som spittle; or, if possible,
To bee imprisoned in som surgeon's box
That smells of salves and plasters.
_Mild_. Nowe what sharke
Or wyde-mouth'd whale shall swallowe upp my budgett,
May it at th'instant choake him!
_Sarl_. Cursedly twas got,
And nowe thy curse goes with it.
_Mild_. But those giurles!
Nought so much greives mee as to part with them
Before they lost theire maiden-headds. Had they lyvd
Till I had seen them women, and oth' trade,
My tast and care bestowed to bringe them upp
I should have thought well spent, which nowe with them
Is meerely cast away.
_Enter Godfrey_.
_Sarlab_. Peace now your pratinge and heare another spirit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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