A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 02
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 02
English drama
TEDIOUSNESS.
First I must quite this brain of thine, if I can reach it.
[_Fight, strike at Will_.
WIT.
Well shifted, Will; now have at thee, sir knave.
TEDIOUSNESS.
These friscols shall not serve your turn for all your vaunts so brave;
Ho, ho! did I not tell thee thou cam'st to thy pain!
DILIGENCE.
Help, help, help, our master is slain.
WILL.
Help, help, help, &c.
TEDIOUSNESS.
Where are these lusty bloods, that make their match with me?
Here lies a pattern for them all, to look at and to see.
To teach them to conspire against my force and might;
To promise, for their woman's love, to vanquish me in fight:
Now let them go and crake, how wisely they have sped,
Such is the end of those, that seek this curious dame to wed.
[_Exit_ TED.
ACT IV., SCAENA 3.
WILL, RECREATION, WIT.
WILL.
Rub and chafe him:
For God's love, haste; see, lo, where he doth lie.
RECREATION.
He is not cold, I warrant him, I.
SING.
_Give a leg, give an arm; arise, arise.
Hold up[411] thy head, lift us thy eyes,
1 A leg to stand upright:
2 An arm to fight amain,
1 The head to hold thy brains in plight,
2 The eyes to look again.
Awake, ye drowned powers.
Ye sprites, for-dull with toil:
Resign to me this care of yours,
And from dead sleep recoil.
Think not upon your loathsome luck,
But arise, and dance with us a-pluck.
[Both sing, Give a leg, as is before.
2 What, though thou hast not hit
The top of thy desire,
Time is not so far spent as yet
To cause thee to retire.
Arise, and ease thyself of pain,
And make thee strong to fight again_.
SING BOTH.
_Let not thy foes rejoice;
Let not thy friends lament;
Let not thy lady's rueful voice
In sobs and sighs be spent;
Thy faith is plight, forget it not,
Twixt her and thee to knit the knot_.
SING.
_Give a leg, &c.
This is no deadly wound:
It may be cured well.
See here what physic we have found
Thy sorrows to expel.
[Wit lifting himself up, sitting on the ground.
The way is plain, the mark is fair,
Lodge not thyself in deep despair_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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