DICCON. Yes, marry, sir, if ye will do by mine advice and counsel: If mother Chat see all us here, she ['ll] know how the matter goes, Therefore I reed you three go hence, and within keep close; And I will into dame Chat's house, and so the matter use, That ere ye could go twice to church, I warrant you hear news. She shall look well about her, but I durst lay a pledge, Ye shall of gammer's nee'le have shortly better knowledge. GAMMER. Now, gentle Diccon, do so; and, good sir, let us trudge. DOCTOR RAT. By the mass, I may not tarry so long to be your judge. DICCON. 'Tis but a little while, man: what, take so much pain; If I hear no news of it, I will come soon here[280] again. HODGE. Tarry so much, good Master Doctor, of your gentleness. DOCTOR RAT. Then let us hie inward, and, Diccon, speed thy business. DICCON. Now, sirs, do you no more, but keep my counsel just, And Doctor Rat shall thus catch some good, I trust; But mother Chat, my gossip, talk first withal I must, For she must be chief captain to lay the Rat in the dust. [_Aside._ _Exit._ Good even,[281] dame Chat, in faith, and well-met in this place. CHAT. Good even, my friend Diccon, whither walk ye this pace? DICCON. By my truth, even to you, to learn how the world goeth. Heard ye no more of the other matter, say me now, by your troth? CHAT. O yes, Diccon: hear the old whore and Hodge that great knave. But, in faith, I would thou hadst seen: O Lord, I drest them brave. She bare me two or three souses behind in the nape of the neck, Till I made her old weasand to answer again keck. And Hodge, that dirty bastard, that at her elbow stands, If one pair of legs had not been worth two pair of hands, He had had his beard shaven, if my nails would have served, And not without a cause, for the knave it well deserved. DICCON. By the mass, I can[282] thee thank, wench, thou didst so well acquit thee. CHAT. And th' adst seen him, Diccon, it would have made thee beshit thee For laughter: the whoreson dolt at last caught up a club, As though he would have slain the master-devil, Belsabub; But I set him soon inward. DICCON. O Lord! there is the thing, That Hodge is so offended, that makes him start and fling. CHAT. Why, makes the knave any noiling,[283] as ye have seen or heard? DICCON. Even now I saw him last, like a mad man he far'd, And sware by heaven and hell, he would a-wreak his sorrow, And leave you never a hen alive by eight of the clock to-morrow: Therefore mark what I say, and my words see that ye trust, Your hens be as good as dead, if ye leave them on the roost. CHAT. The knave dare as well go hang himself, as go upon my ground.