A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09
English drama
INGENIOSO.
_Durum telum necessitas_. Good faith, they do, as I do--exchange words
for money. I have some traffic this day with Danter[61] about a little
book which I have made; the name of it is, A Catalogue of Cambridge
Cuckolds. But this Belvidere, this methodical ass, hath made me almost
forget my time; I'll now to Paul's Churchyard; meet me an hour hence at
the sign of the Pegasus in Cheapside, and I'll moist thy temples with a
cup of claret, as hard as the world goes.
[_Exit_ JUDICIO.
ACTUS I., SCAENA 3.
_Enter_ DANTER _the Printer_.
INGENIOSO.
Danter, thou art deceived, wit is dearer than thou takest it to be: I
tell thee, this libel of Cambridge has much fat and pepper in the nose;
it will sell sheerly underhand, when all these books of exhortations and
catechisms lie moulding on thy shopboard.
DANTER.
It's true: but, good faith, Master Ingenioso, I lost by your last book;
and, you know, there is many a one that pays me largely for the printing
of their inventions: but, for all this, you shall have forty shillings
and an odd bottle of wine.
INGENIOSO.
Forty shillings! a fit reward for one of your rheumatic poets, that
beslavers all the paper he comes by, and furnishes all the chandlers
with waste-papers to wrap candles in; but as for me, I'll be paid dear
even for the dregs of my wit: little knows the world what belongs to the
keeping of a good wit in waters, diets, drinks, tobacco, &c. It is a
dainty and a costly creature; and therefore I must be paid sweetly.
Furnish me with money, that I may put myself in a new suit of clothes,
and I'll suit thy shop with a new suit of terms. It's the gallantest
child my invention was ever delivered of: the title is, A Chronicle of
Cambridge Cuckolds. Here a man may see what day of the month such a
man's commons were enclosed, and when thrown open; and when any entailed
some odd crowns upon the heirs of their bodies unlawfully begotten.
Speak quickly: else I am gone.
DANTER.
O, this will sell gallantly; I'll have it, whatsoever it cost: will you
walk on, Master Ingenioso? We'll sit over a cup of wine, and agree on it.
INGENIOSO.
A cup of wine is as good a constable as can be to take up the quarrel
betwixt us.
[_Exeunt_.
ACTUS I., SCAENA 4.
PHILOMUSUS _in a physician's habit_: STUDIOSO,
_that is_, JAQUES _man, and_ PATIENT.
PHILOMUSUS.
Tit, tit, tit, non point;[62] non debet fieri phlebotomia in coitu Lunae.
Here is a recipe.
PATIENT.
A recipe?
PHILOMUSUS.
Nos Galliâ non curamus quantitatem syllabarum: let me hear how many
stools you do make. Adieu, monsieur: adieu, good monsieur.--What,
Jaques, il n'y a personne apres ici?
STUDIOSO.
Non.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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