TRASH. Yes, good man, angry-man, you shall find he has qualities if
you cheapen him.
WASPE. Od's so, you have the selling of him! What are they, will they
be bought for love or money?
TRASH. No indeed, sir.
WASPE. For what then, victuals?
TRASH. He scorns victuals, sir; he has bread and butter at home,
thanks be to God! and yet he will do more for a good meal, if the toy
take him in the belly; marry then they must not set him at lower ends,
if they do, he'll go away, though he fast; but put him a-top o' the
table, where his place is, and he'll do you forty fine things. He has
not been sent for, and sought out for nothing, at your great
city-suppers, to put down Coriat and Cokely, and been laughed at for
his labour; he'll play you all the puppets in the town over, and the
players, every company, and his own company too; he spares nobody.
COKES. I'faith?
TRASH. He was the first, sir, that ever baited the fellow in the
bear's skin, an't like your worship: no dog ever came near him since.
And for fine motions!
COKES. Is he good at those too? can he set out a masque, trow?
TRASH. O lord, master! sought to far and near for his inventions; and
he engrosses all, he makes all the puppets in the Fair.
COKES. Dost thou, in troth, old velvet jerkin? give me thy hand.
TRASH. Nay, sir, you shall see him in his velvet jerkin, and a scarf
too at night, when you hear him interpret master Littlewit's motion.
COKES. Speak no more, but shut up shop presently, friend, I'll buy
both it and thee too, to carry down with me; and her hamper beside.
Thy shop shall furnish out the masque, and her's the banquet: I cannot
go less, to set out any thing with credit. What's the price, at a
word, of thy whole shop, case and all as it stands?
LEATH. Sir, it stands me in six and twenty shillings seven-pence
halfpenny, besides three shillings for my ground.
COKES. Well, thirty shillings will do all, then! and what comes yours
to?
TRASH. Four shillings and eleven-pence, sir, ground and all, an't like
your worship.
COKES. Yes, it does like my worship very well, poor woman; that's five
shillings more: what a masque shall I furnish out, for forty
shillings, twenty pound Scotch, and a banquet of gingerbread! there's
a stately thing! Numps? sister?--and my wedding gloves too! that I
never thought on afore! All my wedding gloves gingerbread? O me! what
a device will there be, to make 'em eat their fingers' ends! and
delicate brooches for the bridemen and all! and then I'll have this
poesie put to them, _For the best grace_, meaning mistress Grace, my
wedding poesie.
GRACE. I am beholden to you, sir, and to your Bartholomew wit.
WASPE. You do not mean this, do you? Is this your first purchase?
COKES. Yes, faith: and I do not think, Numps, but thou'lt say, it was
the wisest act that ever I did in my wardship.
WASPE. Like enough! I shall say any thing, I!
_Enter EDGWORTH, NIGHTINGALE and People, followed, at a distance, by
OVERDO._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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