DICCON. To-morrow, Hodge, if we chance to meet, shall see what I will say. THE SECOND ACT. THE FOURTH SCENE. DICCON, GAMMER. DICCON. Now this gear must forward go, for here my Gammer cometh: Be still a while, and say nothing, make here a little romth.[233] GAMMER. Good lord! shall never be my luck my nee'le again to spy? Alas the while, 'tis past my help; where 'tis, still it must lie. DICCON. Now, Jesus, Gammer Gurton, what driveth you to this sadness? I fear me, by my conscience, you will sure fall to madness. GAMMER. Who is that? what, Diccon? cham lost, man: fie, fie. DICCON. Marry, fie on them that be worthy; but what should be your trouble? GAMMER. Alas, the more ich think on it, my sorrow it waxeth double. My goodly tossing[234] Spurrier's nee'le[235] chave lost, ich wot not where. DICCON. Your nee'le! when? GAMMER. My nee'le: alas! ich might full ill it spare, As God himself he knoweth, ne'er one beside chave. DICCON. If this be all, good Gammer, I warrant you all is safe. GAMMER. Why, know you any tidings which way my nee'le is gone? DICCON. Yea, that I do, doubtless, as ye shall hear anon, 'A see a thing this matter toucheth within these twenty hours, Even at this gate before my face, by a neighbour of yours; She stooped me down, and up she took up a needle or a pin, I durst be sworn it was even yours, by all my mother's kin. GAMMER. It was my nee'le, Diccon, ich wot; for here even by this post Ich sat, what time as ich up start, and so my nee'le ich lost: Who was it, leve son?[236] speak, ich pray thee, and quickly tell me that. DICCON. A subtle quean as any in this town, your neighbour here, dame Chat. GAMMER. Dame Chat! Diccon, let me be gone: chill thither in post haste. DICCON. Take my counsel yet, ere ye go, for fear ye walk in waste, It is a murrain crafty drab, and froward to be pleased, And ye take not the better way, your[237] needle yet ye lose: For when she took it up, even here before your doors: What, soft, dame Chat (quoth I), that same is none of yours. Avaunt (quoth she), sir knave, what pratest thou of that I find? I would thou hadst kiss'd me I wot where: (she meant I know behind) And home she went as brag as it had been a body-louse,[238] And I after her, as bold as it had been the goodman of the house: But there, and ye had heard her, how she began to scold, The tongue it went on patins, by him that Judas sold! Each other word I was a knave, and you a whore of whores, Because I spake in your behalf, and said the nee'le was yours. GAMMER. Gog's bread! and thinks the callet[239] thus to keep my nee'le me fro? DICCON. Let her alone, and she minds none other, but even to dress you so.