A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 12Dodsley, Robert
General
A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 12
Dodsley, Robert
English drama
LAMB. He calls you tooth-drawer by way of experience.[84]
SPEED. In loving your face, I love all the rest of your body,
as you shall find by experience.
JANE. Well, sir, you love me, then?
SPEED. Let your experience make a trial.
JANE. No, sir, I'll believe you rather, and I thank you for't.
LAMB. I love you too, fair maid, double and treble, if it
please you.
JANE. I thank you too, sir; I am so much beholding to you both,
I am afraid I shall never requite it.
SPEED. Requite _one_, sweet chastity, and let it be Sir
Godfrey, with the correspondency of your love to him. I will
maintain you like a lady; and it is brave, as I know by
experience.
LAMB. I will maintain you like a gentlewoman: and that may
be better maintenance than a lady's, as I have found by
observation.
SPEED. How dare you maintain that, sir?
LAMB. I dare maintain it with my purse, sir.
SPEED. I dare cross it with my sword, sir.
[_Lays his hand on his sword._
LAMB. If you dare cross my purse with your sword, sir, I'll lay
an action of suspicion of felony to you; that's flat, sir.
JANE. Nay, pray you, gentlemen, do not quarrel till you know
for what.
BREW. O, no quarrelling, I beseech you, gentlemen! the
reputation of my house is soiled if any uncivil noise arise
in't.
LAMB. Let him but shake his blade at me, and I'll throw down my
purse and cry a rape; I scorn to kill him, but I'll hang his
knighthood, I warrant him, if he offer assault and battery on
my purse.
BREW. Nay, good sir, put up your sword.
SPEED. You have confined him prisoner for ever: I hope your
experience sees he's a harmless thing.
_Enter_ GEORGE.
GEORGE. Sir, here's young Master Foster requests to speak with
you.
BREW. Does he? Prythee, request him [in]. Gentlemen, please you
taste the sweetness of my garden awhile, and let my daughter
bear you company.
SPEED. Where she is leader, there will be followers.
JANE. [_Aside to her father._] You send me to the galleys, sir;
pray you, redeem me as soon as you can: these are pretty things
for mirth, but not for serious uses.
BREW. Prythee, be merry with them then awhile, if but for
courtesy; thou hast wit enough: but take heed they quarrel not.
JANE. Nay, I dare take in hand to part 'em without any danger;
but I beseech you, let me not be too long a prisoner. Will you
walk, gentlemen.
LAMB. If it please you to place one of us for your conduct,
otherwise this old coxcomb and I shall quarrel.
JANE. Sir Godfrey, you are the eldest; pray, lead the way.
SPEED. With all my heart, sweet virgin. [_Aside._] Ah! ah! this
place promises well in the eyes of experience. Master Innocent,
come you behind.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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