A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 09
English drama
WILL CRICKET.
This good fellow, quotha? I scorn that base, broking, brabbling,
brawling, bastardly, bottle-nosed, beetle-browed, bean-bellied name.
Why, Robin Goodfellow is this same cogging, pettifogging, crackropes,
calf-skin companion. Put me and my father over to him? Old Silver-top,
and you had not put me before my father, I would ha'--
PLOD-ALL.
What wouldst ha' done?
WILL CRICKET.
I would have had a snatch at you, that I would.
CHURMS.
What, art a dog?
WILL CRICKET.
No; if I had been a dog, I would ha' snapped off your nose ere this, and
so I should have cosened the devil of a maribone.
GRIPE.
Come, come: let me end this controversy. Prythee, go thy ways in, and
bid the boy bring in a cup of sack here for my friends.
WILL CRICKET.
Would you have a sack, sir?
GRIPE.
Away, fool: a cup of sack to drink.
WILL CRICKET.
O, I had thought you would have had a sack to have put this law-cracking
cogfoist in, instead of a pair of stocks.
GRIPE.
Away, fool; get thee in, I say.
WILL CRICKET.
Into the buttery, you mean?
GRIPE.
I prythee, do.
WILL CRICKET.
I'll make your hogshead of sack rue that word. [_Aside. Exit_.]
GRIPE.
Neighbour Plod-all, I sent a letter to you by Master Churms; how like
you of the motion?
PLOD-ALL.
Marry, I like well of the motion. My son, I tell you, is e'en all the
stay I have, and all my care is to have him take one that hath
something, for, as the world goes now, if they have nothing, they may
beg. But I doubt he's too simple for your daughter; for I have brought
him up hardly, with brown bread, fat bacon, puddings, and souse; and,
by'r Lady, we think it good fare too.
GRIPE.
Tush, man! I care not for that. You ha' no more children; you'll make
him your heir, and give him your lands, will you not?
PLOD-ALL.
Yes; he's e'en all I have; I have nobody else to bestow it upon.
GRIPE.
You say well.
_Enter_ WILL CRICKET _and a boy, with wine and a napkin_.
WILL CRICKET.
Nay, hear you; drink, afore you bargain.
GRIPE.
Mass, and 'tis a good motion. Boy, fill some wine, [_He fills them wine,
and gives them the napkin_.] Here, neighbour and Master Churms, I drink
to you.
BOTH.
We thank you, sir.
WILL CRICKET.
Lawyer, wipe clean. Do you remember?
CHURMS.
Remember? why?
WILL CRICKET.
Why, since you know when.
CHURMS.
Since when?
WILL CRICKET.
Why, since you were bumbasted, that your lubberly legs would not carry
your lobcock body; when you made an infusion of your stinking excrements
in your stalking implements. O, you were plaguy frayed, and foully
rayed--
GRIPE.
Prythee, peace, Will! Neighbour Plod-all, what say you to this match?
shall it go forward?
PLOD-ALL.
Sir, that must be as our children like. For my son, I think I can rule
him; marry, I doubt your daughter will hardly like of him; for, God wot,
he's very simple.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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