A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 11
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 11
English drama
W. RASH. Well said, logic: sister, I pray, lay hold of him; for the man,
I see, is able to give the watch an answer if they should come upon him
with interrogatories.
_Enter_ SPENDALL, WIDOW, _and_ PHILLIS.
Zounds, we are discovered! boy, come up close, and use the property of
your lanthorn. What dumb show should this be?
GERA. They take their way directly, [and] intend nothing against us.
STAINES. Can you not discern who they are?
JOYCE. One is Spendall.
GERT. The other is the widow, as I take it.
STAINES. 'Tis true, and that's her maid before her.
W. RASH. What a night of conspiracy is here! more villany? there's
another goodly mutton going: my father is fleeced of all; grief will
give him a box, i' faith--but 'tis no great matter; I shall inherit the
sooner. Nay, soft, sir; you shall not pass so current with the matter,
I'll shake you a little. Who goes there?
SPEND. Out with the candle [_Aside._]: who's that asks the question?
W. RASH. One that has some reason for't.
SPEND. It should be, by the voice, young Rash. Why, we are honest folks.
W. RASH. Pray, where do you dwell? Not in town, I hope?
SPEND. Why, we dwell--zounds! where do we dwell? I know not where.
W. RASH. And you'll be married, you know not when--zounds, it were a
Christian deed to stop thee in thy journey: hast thou no more spirit in
thee, but to let thy tongue betray thee? Suppose I had been a constable,
you had been in a fine taking, had you not?
SPEND. But, my still worthy friend,
Is there no worse face of ill bent towards me
Than that thou merrily putt'st on?
W. RASH. Yes, here's four or five faces more, but ne'er an ill one,
though never an excellent good one. Boy, up with your lanthorn of light,
and show him his associates, all running away with the flesh, as thou
art. Go, yoke together, you may be oxen one day, and draw altogether in
a plough; go, march together, the parson stays for you; pay him royally.
Come, give me the lanthorns, for you have light sufficient, for night
has put off his black cap, and salutes the morn. Now farewell, my little
children of Cupid, that walk by two and two, as if you went a-feasting:
let me hear no more words, but be gone.
SPEND. _and_ STAINES. Farewell.
GERT. _and_ JOYCE. Farewell, brother.
[_Exeunt. Manet_ WILL RASH.
W. RASH. Ay, you may cry farewell; but if my father should know of my
villany, how should I fare then? But all's one, I ha' done my sisters
good, my friends good, and myself good; and a general good is always to
be respected before a particular. There's eightscore pounds a year saved
by the conveyance of this widow. I hear footsteps: now, darkness, take
me into thy arms, and deliver me from discovery. [_Exit._
_Enter_ SIR LIONEL.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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